I took Thursday and Friday of last week off and created for myself a four day weekend. That was fun. I got some organizing projects done around the house, and played around a bit with a photography project. The end result of the photography project wasn’t great – but I know what I need to do to fix it, so I just need to reshoot, and I had a lot of fun playing with it, so I’m happy about what I learned.
The household organizing – I’m pretty happy about that too. It was mainly little stuff, but stuff that makes a difference. We had seven or eight redundant flower vases that we purged, keeping our favorites. I rearranged appliances in the kitchen, and threw out some liquor that has been hanging around my kitchen since I was a renter and not a home owner – one bottle that I know a friend brought to a party I threw in February of 1999. (Yikes!) Not big drinkers we. You can look into the site https://certifiedfixed.com/service-areas/sarasota-appliance-repair-fl/ – if you are looking for quality and affordable appliances repair services.
I bought some better storage containers for winter apparel and cleaned out the dining room closet so we can get at our winter stuff more easily. The cats are now fascinated by the free space in the closet. They keep wandering in there to see I’m not sure what. Maybe they’re just astonished that we have a space in the house that’s actually organized. I know I am.
I also wrangled Drusilla and Huckleberry to the vet on separate days for long overdue checkups and shots. Everyone is apparently healthy, if a bit grumpy about the wrangling process.
For a friend’s birthday, we went to see Julie & Julia, which I loved. Don’t go to that movie hungry – you’ll be ravenous when you leave the theater. And possibly a bit in love with Julia Child, or at least Meryl Streep. I particularly enjoyed the segments about blogger Julie Powell, the parts of the movie that were critically panned by apparently everyone. But then, I’ve been blogging since the 90s, so I thought her story was hilarious, where others thought she was self-involved.
The eye candy of mid-century modern furniture in both Julia and Julie’s abodes is worth going, and I’m strongly considering wearing my strand of faux pearls from now on. At least I’ll know by people’s reactions who actually still reads my blog.
What a fun video. Now I want to watch the movie and learn the dance.
Wow. I have a million images in my head. I’m struck by how much it looks like the book – the colors, especially, are exactly like the color palettes in the book, and the hand drawn font evokes the like quality of the book, too. Interesting.
Why do I ask? No reason, really. Ahem.
I’m really looking forward to Coraline hitting theaters!
(My weird obsession with buttons started when I was a little kid. The pillowcases my grandmother made had tiny button closures, and I would play when them while falling asleep. It’s a comfort thing.)
Oprah interviewing Kate Winslet after her two golden globe wins for Revolutionary Road and The Reader. In this clip, Oprah is talking about scenes from The Reader.
Note – in searching for links for this clip, I couldn’t find news sites that DIDN’T make double entendres with their “Winslet’s Golden Globes!” headlines. Golden indeed. Dorothy Snarker provides lots of pictures of Kate and her assets.
Courtesy “O Brother Where Art Thou“:
Reform? I’ll reform you, you soft-headed sonofabitch! How we gonna run reform when we’re the damn incumbent!
Y’ignorant slope-shouldered sack a guts! Why we’d look like a buncha satchel-ass Johnnie-Come-Latelies braggin’ on our own midget! Don’t matter how stumpy! And that’s the goddamn problem right there – people think this Stokes got fresh ideas, he’s oh coorant and we the past.
Discovered in the comments of yesterday’s Shakespeare’s Sister’s Question of the Day, (What actor makes you refuse to see a film?) this video of Sean Connery defending hitting his wife:
Wow. Epic fucking FAIL. Never seeing a Sean Connery movie again.
I woke up this morning with much improvement in my vision. It’s still not 20/20, but I can read text at a distance, and such. I’m back at work – one thing I’ve noticed is that I still can’t see facial expressions at a distance, so I can’t tell what my co-workers are doing/expressing when they’re walking down the hallway toward me. But that will clear up soon, I’m sure.
While I was home puttering around, I was okay to watch movies and such. So I saw a few things that I could add to my movies list.
As someone at work put it. I’m getting laser surgery (specifically PKR) done on my eyes tomorrow by Dr. Waltz of TLC of Indianapolis. I’m doing my traditional “Stress relief by just not thinking about it” form of denial, so I don’t freak out. It couldn’t possibly be worse than the surgeries I’ve already had. Anyways, I’m taking several days off work – tomorrow, Tuesday and Wednesday (with bonus MLK day on Monday) to hang out around the house. My eyesight is pretty darned bad, and in the last few years my allergies have made contacts a pain to wear on an all-day basis. I’m completely looking forward to not being near-sighted; to be able to see while swimming, shave my legs in the shower without guesswork, and see the alarm clock better in the morning.
On Monday, I went out with some friends and saw National Treasure: Book of Secrets, starring Nick Cage, with his toupee in a prominent but uncredited role. There’s a fellow that’s had some surgery – and not in a good way. You can tell he’s going for the “Indiana Jones/Harrison Ford rakish grin” in some scenes, but it ends up looking a bit like he has gas.
And I just finished up The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn Iggulden and Hal Iggulden, finally. That took me awhile, mainly because I just wasn’t into it after I got part way through. I gotta say, I did completely pooh-pooh the people who were dissing it as a sexist tome, but after reading it, I see what they were on about. There were several sections that really should have been written a bit less – I dunno, anti-feminine? It’s great to be all “rah rah” masculinity, but not at the expense of “rah rah femininity.” The sections on Famous Battles was great for getting me to fall asleep – if I’d been sitting in a class on it, I’d be at the back intoning “boooooooooorrrrrrrrrring!” under my breath.