oh one more MY MOTHER IN LAW PAINTED ME A PICTURE OF MY CATS THIS IS THE BEST CHRISTMAS PRESENT EVER!

1. I gave myself a spongebath and washed my hair in the sink and gave myself a shave, so for the first time in a week or so, I look and smell presentable. My beard is getting nice and bushy. With the time off, I'm considering letting the chin part grow out all viking style.

2. Last night on p2p, I found a guy who had the motherlode of obscure 60's music, I managed to DL about half of what i wanted overnight. I hope he shows up again soon.

3. Yesterday, It was actually warm enough to hang out on the porch, so I sat out there reading and listening to tunes and airguitaring to "Can't Get Enough" and watching people walk down the sidewalk.

Back in the nineties, I briefly worked at a newsstand in New Haven and there was used bookstore down the block. One girl who worked there had about 30 facial piercings who'd come in to buy cigarettes. Later, when I was working at a chain bookstore, I read a tiny blurb in Publishers Weekly that she'd been fired for having too many piercings and was suing. How it worked out I don't know. This was in the mid-1990's when it was more shocking than today. Down at the famous Used Bookstore, roughly 75% of the staff is pierced/tattooed/complexly bearded or otherwise unconventional looking. Times change.

1. I have never been so glad to be at work in my life. This Christmas was insane.

2. I'm now the proud owner of an awesome Betsy Johnson coat! love love love!

3. I've gained a really awesome sister-in-law! Pie-sis is awesome and full of win. :D

1. My 5-year-old nephew and sister are visiting. Nephew could light up a city with the amount of energy he has. Somewhere there was a study about who had more energy, Olympic athletes or toddlers, and the toddlers won. Wish I could find it.

1a. His new thing is reading the logos on the fronts of cars and announcing them. "That's a Ford!" "That's a Honda!" Something that never, ever occurred to my sister and I growing up (the nature argument wins here).

2. Amazon.com claimed that they shipped 99% of their Christmas orders on time. Mine was not in that 99%.

3. When I read old books or watch old movies I feel jealous at how much life was simpler in those days, but then I realize that it probably wasn't all that simple, it was just watered down for these books and movies. (Just reread "The Celluloid Closet" and how difficult it was for gay people in the early part of the last century). I wonder if people had piercings in the 1920s, during the flapper era.

1. My boss has told me that I can take my holiday prep time tomorrow so that means I can get on the road to go spend the rest of the week with my homie a lot earlier. Yay for not having to drive at night! Yay for probably not falling asleep at the bar this time!

2. I am still all sketchy and worried about my job and the economy and all that, but a great majority of all that stuff is completely out of my hands and therefore, I wash my brain of it. It's not something I can influence or control or anything, so it's not something I should waste my time worrying about.

3. I have this sinking feeling that things are going to go batshit in the next few months, but I have no definitive proof of anything. Just a sinking feeling. Argh. I must drink to purge it out this weekend.

1. My dad and stepmom went to mexico for christmas, so I haven't sent their presents yet. In fact, I don't have their presents yet. Any ideas? Dad just lost a ton of weight (>150 lbs, I think) through gastric bypass and is cold all the time. He wears a size L sweater, but I can't find him anything I like. My stepmother is about the most easily-pleased person I know, but that's also made me freeze up on what to get her.

2. A patient in our waiting room has a very small boy with her who is screeching uncontrollably. I'm glad my office is across the hall. However, they left and are now outside my window two stories down. He's still screaming. Yikes.

3. I got new binoculars! Bought at a local store rather than online, so I paid more than I'd strictly have had to. Best service I've had at a store ever, I'll tell ya. I told the owner my price limit, and she picked out three pairs that were in my range. Didn't tell me how much they cost, and let me decide on a pair based on a number of exercises she put me through. IOW, she let the binoculars sell themselves, and was very very very mindful of letting me decide based on the performance.

And then she threw in a lens-cleaning pen, as well as a harness I'd been planning to buy anyway. For free. Love that store.

Stew - MuddDude just lost a whole bunch of weight, and has the same problem with being cold all the time. I bought him a bunch of fuzzy house socks and he loves them - he wears them at night in the house and even under his normal socks if it's a particularly cold day. He has these ones from Dillards, but I'm sure every department store sells them.

(Yeah, I know it's lame to get/give socks for Christmas, but seriously these socks are ultra-warm).

muddgirl--awesome idea! Especially since dad got me socks, too. :-) Smartwool!

1) At the ballard farmer's market yesterday I got to watch my wife confuse both an Indian-American farmer and a deaf customer by translating a price into ASL.

2) The snow melted enough for me to uncover the vegetables under hoophouses. They are all flat. It's really sad.

3) We get to raise turkeys next year!

stet it sounds like you have a lot of the same interests as I do!

1) I finally have a little time off to "enjoy family." What this means is I need to get up from here and do some cleaning before my grandbun arrives tonight!

2) They aren't staying with us (the mother in law has more room than us) so the above is not as crucial. Which is good because my son is still here for a few days and I need to enjoy his visit too.

3) I have a headache. Note to self: ice cream for breakfast, even if that is the only time to make sure one gets a serving, is NOT a good idea before work, even if work is just a half day.

What is a hoophouse?

1. Going to have some juice.
2. Going to tackle scene 12.
3. Going to go with that for the moment.

1. I have a mustache in my hair.

2. I got fake fur to make seat cushion thingies out of but the hair falls off in clumps so I vacuumed the hell out of them. I think it's better now.

3. I ordered a quilting foot for my sewing machine and I'm stupid excited about it!

Stewriffic - I don't know if this is an option but as someone with low iron who is always freezing, I like vests a lot to wear inside. I usually wear a down one but some of the fleece look nice too. I like it because it genuinely keeps me warm without constricting my arms, so I can still do dishes, type, and generally live life.

1. Trying to recover from insane family at christmas. ;-;
2. Still in east Tennessee for another couple weeks.
3. Since I'm here for new years now, I'm seriously bummed. Trying to find something to do here that night is just depressing.

Cheers, Stewriffic. It's a good life. If you're anywhere in the pacific northwest, I might be offering you a free turkey if I find they're too loveable to eat.

typewriter, a hoophouse is a type of greenhouse/season extender made from PVC pipe and clear plastic sheeting set up over a row of plants. You bend a length of PVC pipe over the bed and then clip clear plastic tarps to it. Not pretty but, in a marginal climate, it'll do wonders for hot weather crops like tomatoes and peppers and, in a temperate climate, keep hardy crops going all winter long.

A hoophouse is a type of gardening structure, that allows for a longer growing season. Think greenhouse, but fabric/plastic, not glass.

I should take a picture of ours. It's collapsed from the snow (and because we dug out our plants before the snow and generally stopped caring about its success). Here it is before complete collapse.

1. I have just spent five glorious hours doing nothing. Sitting around in my pajamas, reading the internet, drinking tea, and eating leftover chili -- no having to get dressed and get in a car and chauffeur family around and eat enormous lunches and drive and drive and drive and try to find something to talk about and things to do that my father can physically manage but that won't bore me or my brother to tears. It's just me! And the internet! And the cat!

2. I should go shower so that I can get to my meeting this afternoon. But I don't really want to go, so I'm lacking motivation.

3. The complete lack of rain and clouds is making me giddy. Sun! Blue sky! Yay!

Ah, hoophouse. I got it now. Says the Canadian city girl. I don't how much you can extend the season up here! Then again, city girl. ;)

stet, i'm way down south in north carolina, so no turkeys for me yet. (And sad though it may be, I'd probably only want turkeys for the meat, so they'd better not be too lovable.

Mind you I have a friend whose turkeys (18-19 of them) were attacked by a large predator all in one night. Most died, but the one that didn't is now named Lucky, and no longer will there be meat turkeys on their farm. I'm scared I'll be a total sucker if I get poultry.

1. I am feeling blue and have this gnawing, aching feeling that I have screwed up my life. Is this a midlife crisis? I don't know.

2. I am very antsy and bored and feel like I need to break out.

3. I am going to go for a run when my husband gets home from the bank. I've been up since 4:30 a.m., but feel like I can run for miles and miles.

1. Speaking of turkeys, I was driving home from the grocery store yesterday, turned down the street a couple blocks from my house, and saw this man in his yard staring up at the roof. There was a flock of about 20 turkeys up there. They looked pretty confused, like they weren't really sure how they ended up on this roof in the middle of town.

I pulled over to watch them, and then they flew into the yard across the street. It had a low fence -- about turkey height, actually -- and they couldn't figure out what to do about that. After a few minutes, one decided to fly over, so the rest followed.

They flew halfway down the block and landed in the middle of the street. A busy street, by the way. There apparently were some yummy tidbits in the middle of the street, so they stood there for a while, eating. Twenty turkeys. In the middle of the street. In the middle of town.

Totally made my day.

2. GF comes home tomorrow. On my way to pick her up tomorrow afternoon.

3. Actually had a really nice time at home with my folks. I've dreaded the trip the last few times, but enjoyed myself this time.

1. Am painting my kitchen several shades of yellow and orange. It is looking pretty scary but I'm having a frightening amount of fun.
1a. It occurs to me that the "Tuscan Gold" faux finish I'm achieving through lots of effort on the walls is the reason I paid such cheap rent in the 80s in Charleston: same old chipped old stained plaster look.

2. Off work for a whole week! What will I do when I finish the kitchen? Hopefully the supplies I ordered from Etsy for new projects - making drawer pulls, magnets and pendants, wahoo - will get here before I get terminally bored.

3. In a moment of foolishness, offered to host a party - another party, sheesh - on New Years Eve. Want to get out of this, want to get out of all NYE parties, want to stay home and bake bread in the worlds' yellowest kitchen. Can't figure out a way to tell friends this gently.

1. Sore from working. It's a good sore, and means I'm getting my muscle tone back, but it's still a sore sore. More sanding overhead today. Hope to get ceilings painted before stepmother returns tomorrow (goal downgraded from hoping to have job done...hahahahahahahahahahaha! I must've been mad to think that.) Out of Aleve, switching to Aspirin.

2. Met Dad's gf & her son last night over dinner. I really like them--both smart, funny, attractive people with a similar appreciation of the absurd. Plus, she's as obsessive as I am about the same grammatical errors, so we ranted for a bit while dad egged us on by making said errors and pretending he didn't know better.

3. Baby sister (okay, she's 28, but will always be my baby sister) did not have such a good time, and was stampy and sulky and a bit door-slammy, as she has been off & on all through xmas. I don't know what to do about this. I'd like to help, but we haven't had much of a chance to talk and when we do I seem to say all the wrong things. I understand that this is harder for her--it's her mother Dad left, not mine (and not for the gf. She came later.)--but at the same time am getting annoyed that she's making life unpleasant for both of us as a result, even though I can see she's (sometimes) trying not to and is (sometimes) just as frustrated by her own moodiness. *sigh* And it will all get more tense and awkward when her mum comes home tomorrow. Happy New Year!

3b. So glad I have work to distract me from all that, at least part of the time.

4. CBC Radio! Globe & Mail at the door in the morning! President's Choice foodstuffs! HP Sauce! Non-shouty politics! I missed you, Canada. (Not to impugn the fine people of Alabama or their state--there's much to recommend the place and much I miss--but I am definitely Canadian. Also, BOP kindly bookmarked the G&M for me when I got to B'ham, but there's nothing like a dead tree paper over your morning caffeinated beverage of choice.)

Want to get out of this, want to get out of all NYE parties, want to stay home and bake bread in the worlds' yellowest kitchen. Can't figure out a way to tell friends this gently.

One word, MGL: Norovirus.