Category Archives: Play

The weekend, in pictures.

May 18, 2009PhotographyMush

In which I do some stuff… but don’t really get much accomplished!

Saturday I lounged around, made soup, then in the afternoon went to get film developed and have my nails done. Because I’m white trash like dat.

The developer at Rite-aid was broken and my nail shop was closed for the weekend, so I ended up getting the film developed at Albertsons and having cocktails at The Blue while I waited.

From the 1941 Argus C3 came these nice shots:

I think I’d had the Argus’ telephoto lens installed off true by one tooth (the C3 is a rangefinder, not an SLR) and so nearly the entire roll was slightly out of focus. Sadly I’d already removed the lens by the time I got the film developed, so I couldn’t check to see how it really wants to be installed.

The Yashica Electro 35 GSN took great pictures, as always:

Saturday evening after the guys got of work, there was an impromptu BBQ on my brother’s patio:

Becca brought her kid, and Lannie dropped by too. We had a lot of fun. I at this amazingly delicious ‘burger’:

Sunday, SUMMER ARRIVED! It was hot! Teh BF and I ran errands all morning, stopping at about five places – I bought groceries at Andy’s Market and film at Walmart – and even shopping for luggage. Then we had tacos:

After which I napped all afternoon at his place.

I went home at seven, and accomplished nothing of note after that.

Today I got up, bathed, and walked to work. It’s very, very slow – just like it was last week, and the week before that. My hours have been cut from 40 to 38. My brother’s hours have been cut from 40 to 18.

Suddenly I’m worried about my lack of savings, and I fear that my trip to Dallas next month may be my last travel excursion for quite awhile.

What are you reading?

May 6, 2009ReadingMush

In which I’m in a slump and need your input.

As y’all know, I read voraciously. So much so that I’ve already read most of it. All the Asimov. All the Bear. All the Robin Hobb. All the Vonnegut, all the Eric Flint, the Egan, the Guy Gavriel Kay. And all of a bunch of other shit, too.

In the last year I’ve discovered Jay Lake and some new Naomi Novik, but mostly I’ve just been re-reading sci-fi ebooks I bought years ago because I don’t know what to look for and apparently I’m too lazy to go surf around and see what’s hot.

I need to learn about new authors in sci-fi and in GOOD fantasy – clever, interesting worlds, not “magic” for its own sake – and modern fiction and engaging science and, what the hell, good erotica too.

Tell me what you’re reading, my babies! Please!

This is why I'm fat.

May 4, 2009Admissions, PhotographyMush

In which Teh BF and I have been together for a whole entire year already. And it’s a good thing, too, because I’m entirely too pudgy to be on the market.

Saturday morning I did laundry and rearranged my bedroom in such a way that I can now watch movies while lying in my bed.

Saturday afternoon I ate a delicious burrito, and then I went and got my nails done. They look like this:

From the Laotian guy who did my nails came a nugget of wisdom just way too awesome not to share. The exchange went like this:

Him: When you get your nails done last? Long time?
Me: Oh, it’s been a few years. Maybe five.
Him: I can tell you got nails done before.
Me: Yeah.
Him: Many times before. Long time.
Me: Yes. The first time I got my nails done, they were still doing them round-tipped instead of square!
Him: No! You not that old!
Me: But now they’re always square.
Him: Yes. Square much stronger. One time, I do nails for a lady, she said she want round. I say, No! Not strong! Lady say, It not look natural, square not look natural. I say, You can look natural in the cemetary!
Me: In the cemetary? …Oh, you mean, when you’re dead?
Him: Yes! You can look natural when you’re dead!

And then we giggled companionably together for the next three minutes while he sanded my new acrylic French nails.

Meanwhile, I was having three rolls of 35mm film developed. Here’s a shot from the Yashica Electro 35 GSN:

And a shot from The Brick, aka the Argus C3:

Saturday night I had Singapore noodles at the P’n’E. I didn’t take a picture of them at the time because what kind of asshole takes pictures of every goddamned thing she eats? (Don’t answer that!) But this morning the leftovers looked like this:

Sunday I had an veggie omelet containing nearly an entire day’s calories for brunch:

Sunday happened to by my one year anniversary with Teh BF! He brought me coffee and flowers in bed that morning.

In the evening, he took me out on a nice dinner date for which he’d made reservations and to which he even wore a proper shirt! I put on proper shoes and had T. Mac’s veggie lasagna (along with an amazing English pea bruchetta appetizer and a couple of lemon drop martinis) for dinner:

In return for the coffee, flowers, and lovely dinner, I bought brunch, wore mascara, and tried not to be a bitch for the whole entire day.

A weekend spent away

April 20, 2009Photography, TravelMush

In which I get the hell outta town!

I didn’t take a pre-spring vacation like I did last year, so I’ve been in the office without a pause since Vegas last September. (As soon as Amma’s tour schedule comes out I’ll be trying to book Chicago, and I’m also hoping to get to New York in late autumn.) Sometimes you just can’t have a good attitude if you haven’t gotten out of town lately.

I really, really, really needed to get out of town. I was sleeping too much, feeling irritated with my customers, and in general needing a little break in the old routine. I mean, when your mantra turns into “Fuck! Fuck! Fuckity fuck!” when you’re on the phone at work? You need a break.

Luckily, Teh BF’s birthday was Saturday! I gave him this:

Which is a sweet set of sushi knives with chopsticks in a groovy case, and in return he took me to Idaho with him:

Coeur d’Alane, Idaho! Where there’s a lake! And some leftover Rocky Mountains! And really good cosmopolitans!

We stayed in a resort hotel, ate an amazing meal, spent about an hour in the casino, and then slept in our room’s gigantic bed. In the morning we had the hotel’s VERY EXPENSIVE brunch buffet (apparently a buffet with chocolate fountain, ice sculpture, omelet and crepe bar = $30 a head) and then checked out.

I am the type of person who goes to a sporty resort and does nothing sporty at all. We barely even walked around; there was certainly no boating or fishing or water skiing or hiking or golfing or swimming. But the eating and drinking was stellar!

We took a detour through Medical Lake on the way home ’cause Teh BF was incarcerated there 23 years ago and wanted to have a look at it. He completely spazzed out and told me all kinds of crazy jail stories, like the one about breaking into the commissary and stealing cartons of cigarettes. Yes, when you’re in jail for stealing, you probably should not ought to be doing B&Es! Heh. My baby was a really ~~stupid~~ silly boy.

I took a lot of pictures – I brought three film cameras along for an overnight trip ’cause I’m a dork like that – but none of that is developed yet, of course. You can see the rest of my cell phone pics for now, though; they’re here. (Go look at them and come back. I’ll wait!)

When we got back to town Sunday afternoon, we went straight to KJ’s and passed out for three hours. (Most likely, those three hours were the most gorgeous three hours of 2009, but I needed the nap more than I needed fresh breeze and sunshine.)

When we got up, we ate at the new taco joint in town (it was AMAZING!) and then he took me home. I think I went to bed at ten, and slept until my alarm went off at nine this morning.

~+~+~
This morning I got up and packed my bento for the day:

That’s rajma masala. I made it myself.

Then Bindu and I walked to work. It was gorgeous and warm and I wished for a short-sleeved shirt.

~+~+~
When I got to work, the Yashica had arrived:

Can’t wait to get a battery and a roll of film into it!

Good News

April 16, 2009TravelMush

In which I share a few nice things with y’all.

1. I have paid off my 2007 surgery completely and in full.

2. I got laid last night. Yum.

3. I received a new classic camera today. It’s another Argus C3 and it’s in fantastic condition:

4. This weekend is Teh BF’s birthday! This is excellent for two reasons. The first is that I will finally get to give him his present, which I’ve had for weeks and which is burning a hole in my brain because I want to give it to him NOW and he won’t let me. The second is that he’s taking me to Coeur d’Alane for the weekend! We’ll be staying at this chichi hotel and playing at this nifty casino.

5. The weather is nice!

Actually, no, I wasn't talking.

April 13, 2009PhotographyMush

In which there are some events of the not-so-stunningly-fantastic sort. It’s not that interesting. You may talk among yourselves.

Saturday I had the first roll of film shot through The Brick developed. Several of them turned out really well, particularly considering that the rangefinder window is filthy and I can’t see through it, and that I totally guess on aperture and exposure times. (The roll is here if you wanna take a look at what a 1962 Argus C3 shoots like.)

I had my hair colored Saturday afternoon. No more roots! (I also had my eyebrows waxed. Best use of seven dollars EVER.)

Saturday night Teh BF and I went to bed – and to sleep – at 8:30. It’s a totally rockstar lifestyle, I’m telling you.

Sunday we went to brunch at The Oasis with family: G’ma, my brother, my aunt and uncle, two of their friends, my aunt’s mom, and KJ’s mom. The food sucked – the Caesar salad was fishy, the eggs were green, and the hash browns were those awful frozen fried potatoes with green and red peppers, and the rest of the buffet was FODA¹ so naturally I couldn’t eat it – but the company was congenial.

Sunday afternoon we spent at my place; KJ watched golf with G’ma while I installed the giant hand-me-down flat monitor he gave me and watched a couple of episodes of Firefly and Torchwood on it upstairs. For dinner, I made black bean soup. He took off around seven; I did laundry and watched Mystic River and went to bed early.

I’m not sure if it’s blogging or aging, but though the agency of one or both I’ve finally relaxed enough to be utterly vacuous. I no longer worry about coming off as deep and self-reflective; I post utterly vapid shit with no greater meaning whatsoever and feel pretty good about it. I talk about getting my eyebrows waxed, for chrissakes. Is this what they mean by ‘mellowing with age’?

—
¹ Flesh of Dead Animal.

Today is Only Tuesday. (Only. Jesus. Feels like it should be Thursday.)

March 31, 2009Photography, Weather, WorkMush

In which it totally feels like hump day, but it isn’t.

Weather in the Walla Walla Valley

First there was sun.

Then there was wind. Then there was hail.

Then the power went out. Management decided to send everyone (but me) home, and they all left and had had just enough time to get into their cars… and the power came back on. So they all had to come back.

I didn’t have to help clear the queue, though, because it was my lunch break.

Vintage Photography

I’ve been playing with The Bricks every day because they’re just so cool looking. Finally got the Tele-Sandmar on Brick The Younger today:

Still need to clean and adjust the rangefinder before I can actually shoot anything with it. I ordered cheap film from Adorama and it won’t be here for a few days anyway; hopefully the camera will be ready by then. Last night I learned how to remove (very easy) and replace (total pain in the ass) the exposure counter. This means I’m one step closer to taking the top panel off of the camera so I can clean and adjust the rangefinder!

I don’t think I know anyone with a scanner. I realize it seems weird to take film images simply to put them into electronic format, but I’ll tell you what: all the pictures in my Flickr account? are still there. All the photos and photo albums I once had? are gone. No idea where they are. Maybe I have some in boxes, but I think most of them were rotten and not worth saving from the farm. So I’ll have to pay extra when getting my film developed to have them all scanned.

I wonder how many rolls of film it will take me to really grok this:

Even though you focus your camera lens on a certain distance, the picture will be sharp in front of and behind the point focused on. This “range of sharpness” (depth of field) depends on the lens opening used and the lens focusing distance.

The smaller the lens opening, and the greater the focusing distance, the greater is the the lens’ range of sharpness. The range of sharpness will be least when the lens is used at its largest opening and shortest focusing distance.

Working at an ISP

In other, wholly unrelated news, we had a six-state DSL outage that lasted about two hours. An hour into it, all the rest of the staff’s shifts ended and I ended up in here alone. My brother gave me the saddest little “Sorry to leave you with all this, but my day’s done” shrug on his way out the door. I have about 40 calls to complete.

In other words, I am alone and TOTALLY FUCKING SLAMMED AT WORK TONIGHT.

And now, to close, a little about this bullshit worm scare story in the news:

A pox upon CBS and CNN and every other news agency that picked up this stupid Confiker/Downadup worm story! You are making my job stupider!

I’m not against educating people about Internet security, not at all. I am against hysterical reporting. I am against having customers freaking out on my phone and over LiveChat and through email for two days because some reporter learned about a particular kind of threat that’s been around since last autumn!

Here’s an email reply I sent to a customer:

>From : XXXX xxxxxx@bmi.net
> Phone : (xxx) xxx-xxxx
> O/S : Windows XP
> Comments : Do I need to worry about a virus tonight?

Hello,

Run Windows Update and make sure you have all available service packs and security patches installed in your operating system. Then force your anti-virus program to update as well. You should be fine.

The worm that made the news isn’t really news; it’s been out for quite awhile. The operating system hole it exploits was patched by Microsoft last year. The only people vulnerable to this worm are those using non-patched copies of Windows. I really have no idea why this thing even became ‘news.’

Have a great night!

Actually, the one good thing about all this is hearing people practically say “fuck” in German all day long and knowing they have no idea they’re doing it.

VD and Xmas! In the same weekend!

February 16, 2009EventsXmas VD family sushi videoMush

In which that’s Valentine’s Day, not ‘venereal disease.’ Sheesh!

Friday night, Teh BF and I went out for Mexican food and Becca dropped by and ate with us. Then we went to our separate homes to sleep; me because I had chores to do the next day, and him because he works on Saturdays.

Saturday, I cleaned the bathroom. My aunt & uncle arrived.

Saturday night, my BF took me out for sushi! It was really, really yummy.

Afterward, we crashed at his place but since we were both in Combat Sleeper mode it wasn’t the blissful night’s sleep we usually enjoy together. (He even bailed and slept on the couch for a few hours.) There was a lot of flailing and snoring and we both had bad dreams. Weird, huh?

Sunday, we went to my house where all the local relatives – two more aunt & uncle sets, plus some cousins – descended upon the house and we all had Christmas in February.

And pizza! And I got a killer fleece bathrobe!

I made this cheesy video for my mom, because she lives in Wyoming or something and rarely gets to attend family events, and my brother made this one. Yes, I have a big awesome noisy awesome family!

Sunday night, Teh BF and I went over to my (local) aunt & uncle’s house and had dinner and played pinochle. My uncle and I kicked their asses! And I got leftovers out of the deal, which I used for my lunch today:

Overall, it was a lovely weekend. I love it when my family gets together, even if they are loud and exhausting! Conclusion: Christmas in February = bathrobes and pasta.

It's Bento Nirvana Here, Folks

February 4, 2009BentÅbento, Japan, skamegu, swapMush

In which I am in total heaven because today I received THE BENTO BOMB!

This is what happened to me today (in pictures!):

I got a big giant huge massive collection of bento-junk goodness in the mail today!

Food! Bento accessories! And two new boxes!:

Now. How did this awesome explosion of straight-from-Japan bento lurve happen, you ask? Good question! I shall tell you!

Long story short:

I befriended someone on Flickr in one of the bento pools. She’s an ex-pat living in Japan, and as a NW girl she misses Tillamook cheese, among other things. So we arranged a swap!

I sent her a box of stuff (cheese, crackers, Neutrogena eye cream, flour tortillas, Mexican spices, stuff she can’t get easily over there) from my local grocery stores, and she sent me a box of stuff (the highly-anticipated BENTO EXPLOSION FROM HELL!!!) from her local stores. She put post-it notes on some of the items explaining what they were or giving useful translation details (like “not microwave safe” or “this is a giant Cheeto”). She also included a really cool tourist guide for Tokyo, and a lovely hand-written thank you note for the box I’d sent to her!

I’m so happy I could just pop!

I spent over forty dollars in shipping (cheese and tortillas are heavy!), BUT IT WAS SO. TOTALLY. WORTH IT.

Device Mania Week: Day 5

January 23, 2009GadgetsEee PC, RAMMush

In which I get a third package.

This morning I received my 2Gb RAM stick and used my trusty BMI pocket knife to install it into the Eee notebook.

Yay!

goblinbox.com

blogging for no apparent reason since 2001