Took the kids to yoga; built my wife's bicycle (should have done that ages ago); cut down the big bike boxes so the kids can make a playhouse; now thinking of going to Westonbirt and 'The National Arboretum'.

I'm off for a week (Autumn break) and we need to get a plan together. I've got gigs and dates in the studio so we can't stray far.

Sounds like the perfect Friday night to me, taz.

mrs chewie & I shuffled off to the pub for an early anniversary dinner (it's monday and we needed beer immediately).

Today it's sift through accumulated mail from the week, de-hair the pooches, peeking at college football games while doing the usual domestics and the Indians/Boston game tonight. I love October!

It's still 80 fucking degrees during the day here, but we did get some rain finally over the past two days.

Saturday afternoon, here, actually, chewie. Happy anniversary! Happy beer! Happy October! I hope it cools down for you. It has here - one reason I'm so happy.

I have been up since two a.m., for no good reason, doing nothing in particular. Soon I will drive The Boyfriend to the train station, then go to the bank, then to Costco (ick!) and then I don't know. I might have to go into the city for this game thing, but I think I'll start to fail by then. GAH.

Wheeeeee, yeaaa for taz. Don't know how Jameson tastes, but I'm sure it must go down nicely with the storm outside.:)

Just celebrated my sister's nineteenth birthday here, and it was nice. Have a long awaited off tomorrow (Sunday!), so plan on doing nothing much except lazing around the house.

I might post something to Mefi after god knows how long; the work's really been piling up on me.

How's by me?

Well, I went to my first-ever swing dance up north in Portland last night. I'm hooked now - we did the Shim-Shim and some other basic steps, then danced around to swing music for hours.

This is not as easy as it appears when 90 percent of those on the floor are seasoned vets, and you're feeling cocky because you can keep time to a backstep-rockstep-rockstep motion. (Swing dancing is only really fun when you can turn your partner and do impressive whatevers along with your basic moves).

It's a step up from square or contra dancing. Plus, people actually have rhythm!

It's no fun when you're contra dancing and someone next to you can't follow simple moves like "take three steps to your left and come back."

HCIYH? was uninspiring... maybe because it came on 15 minutes early (wacky Greek programming) and I missed the shock-y intro when they show the dirty house and make make scary stabby psycho sound effects. By the time I started watching, it was ucky, but, meh. Mostly it was just that they had dogs sleeping on top of everything, so tons of dog hair and lots of mess and boxes piled up everywhere. Almost spic and span compared to some of the episodes.

Meanwhile, when I went upstairs to feed my neighbor's cat, I noticed that the little top skylight thingy was open on my husband's little shop/workroom (we call it "the laborrrrratorrrrry"), and though he's been meaning to fix it, it can only be closed from on top of its roof (the room is attached to our place at one wall, but completely separate otherwise). So I went in there and moved a bunch of stuff out of the way and put a huge bucket under the skylight (it's really more like a grill in the ceiling, but whatever). There was sort of a minimum of leak at that point, so I think everything's probably okay - and now it's raining really, really hard. So I'm a hero.

I'm spending my Saturday pulling a 12-to-15 hour day at work. BLEAH.

I'd rather be sipping Jameson with taz.

aaaaw! Me, too! You here with me and Jameson, and rain and lentil soup.

The boyfriend took Friday off work, so we sat around and played Warcraft for most of the day. Level 30 is tantalizingly close.

Today we're probably going to the Centennial Celebration for Orange Grove Monthly Meeting out in Pasadena. Yay!

And I *think* on Sunday I'm going to San Diego with my friend who just got back from Vietnam. Her little sister is at UCSD and we're going to hang out. Double yay! (I should make chocolate chip cookies to bring with. Every freshman needs chocolate chip cookies.)

Every freshman, and lots of internet friends living in faraway places. *bats eyelashes*

I'm debating on going to a reptile swap or going to a last-minute baby shower. I hate decisions. Maybe I won't do either and just burn a Richard Cheese CD.

Just got up. Wife is in the shower. It is rainy and gloomy and I am going to make some breakfast burritos and then just hang reading the paper, and hopefully we'll convince Daughter to go to an afternoon movie with us.

The Decemberists last night on ACL was sort of disappointing, from the standpoint of they did not show songs that we love, and 30 min was too short but we have tix to see them in Portland later this fall.

Wife and I have a consensus that some good sex should happen this weekend, so now we need to set aside a time. . .we both tend to crash late at night so that complicates it . ..

It's fall but a lot of leaves are still green out there. . .

I just got up too! At 12.15. Haven't had a huge sleep like that (10 hours) for months. About to head to the gym, then do various household tidying things. Tonight we are going to carve pumpkins at my friends' place.

Waiting for a handy friend to call me back and see if I can get him to come into Asheville today or tomorrow to help me install a dog door - I'm going to go to the Habitat store, buy a door, cut a hole in it, hang carpet over that and hang the newly holey door in place of the regular door to the deck in lieu of buying a door AND a $80 dog door. And I need to clean the house but the library book sale is this weekend and it is beckoning. . . beckoning.

Also I need to pull all the camping stuff out, set up my tents, figure out which poles go to which tents and generally clean and organize them from the twin disasters of moving and impromptu teenage boy camping trips this summer so I can go camping in SC next weekend with a bunch of old college friends! Yay!!

Ooh, taz, maybe we should have a Mecha cookie exchange...like the card exchange at winter-holiday but everyone ships one other person a box of cookies...

Stayed out way too late with a date who turned out to be way too young (is there not even one single man over the age of 35 in the city of Chicago?). Also had Jameson's and cigarettes, though it was not as picturesque as a farawayland kitchen with a raging storm outside.

It's a beautiful day out, so I'm going to ride my bike.

Just got up, am doing my morning tea, cigarettes and MetaChat ritual. Then I'll head over the road for some kitty love, then up to my boss's place to help him set up his dial-up, which should be interesting. Hopefully finish this editing project this afternoon, too, 'cause it's taking too damned long. Not a bad day, but I'd rather be with taz & BP sipping Jameson's and salivating in anticipation of taz's lentil soup.

Early Saturday afternoon here. Spent all morning reading out in the back yard. It's been in the low 60s all morning with a beautiful clear blue sky. Starting to warm up, but for now, it's perfect.

oh, yeah. Party in the house!

Fuzz, I actually was looking for something to use as a cookie sheet today... for some reason I find that Greece, the country (or at least its two largest cities), does not offer cookie sheets for sale. At all. I'm eyeing an extra-big pita pan as a make-do. hmph.

Taz, if a pita pan is a big metal casserole, like a lasagne pan, try flipping it over and using the underside. I don't (yet) understand much about heat distribution, but I suspect the deep sides of the rightside-up dish would affect the spread and baking rates of cookie dough.

It seems odd not to have baking sheets at all --- what on earth do Greeks use for baking kourambiethes? Or are they an Americanized faux-Greek tradition?

Just got back from the farmers' market. It's a lovely fall day. Very sunny and breezy, so the golden leaves are raining down from the trees. There was a group of toddlers at the market jumping about in a huge pile of fallen leaves, throwing them at each other and laughing. It was a very sweet scene.

Now it's time to rake up my own leaves, compost them, and mow the yards. I may or may not rip out the tomatoes today. It's been too cool at night for them to set fruit, so I think it's probably time for them to go. Taking them out means room for other plants, but it also means killing my babies, and I have a hard time doing it.

And I believe now that I will be making lentil soup tonight, because I have almost everything it requires and it sounds damned good. I think I'd only have to buy a carrot. (Still waiting for the postman and my paycheck. Haven't gotten ANY mail at all in the past two days. Not even junk. I have bad mail karma, and $2.41 to my name.)

Jameson's sounds lovely. Maybe if that paycheck comes....

mudpuppie, I just learned a new trick: cut the plants down whole and hang them upside-down in a sunny window. Apparently the remaining fruit will continue to ripen. Someone else mentioned that his mum used to pull them up and put the roots in a bucket of sugar water for a couple of days first, to sweeten the remaining fruit.

Also, that paycheque still isn't there? *glares at US postal service*

mudpuppie, that is damned unfair. You deserve some whiskey.

The famous actor's house I looked at last year had a cracked skylight....the owners had taped on plastic sheeting.


I just called the hospital and received a recording saying they don't call back if results are normal...ooookaaayyyy. I made an appointment to see an internist on the 2nd, but I'm not sure if I want to make her my primary care doctor. Are the other NYC bunnies happy with theirs?

I let the phone ring 50 times at the extension I need at Home Depot and no one picked up.

Muddpuppie, I've had that happen too---the check I needed for the down payment for the condo was intercepted/put in the wrong mailbox; I had to cancel it and get a new one sent. Customer service wasn't prompt and the building owner was making noises about putting the place back on the market. Finally the replacement came...and THEN a few days later the concierge leeringly hands me an taped envelope with my name in ballpoint. Inside is the original check.

I'm going to Union square and the gym.

Good tip, elizard. I'll try that -- it'll make me feel better about uprooting the poor things. I need to have some sort of Saying Goodbye ceremony for the tomatoes. Maybe I'll sprinkle some Jameson's at their feet before ripping them from the ground. At least they'll go out happy.

And crush: I agree! ;-)