True Love is Special

Reason #227 that DS loves me but shouldn't: 


Walking home from the climbing gym in 45 mph gusts I exclaimed "This wind BLOWS!" without meaning to pun. Then busted out laughing for the next block at my unintended brilliance.


In other news, I have spaghetti noodle arms from climbing today.  Perhaps I was not fully recovered from those 5.8's and 5.9's I was struggling up on Wednesday.  I tried to take it easy and stick to 5.6's today, with a 5.7 thrown in for a high point, and yet I still think my arms will be useless tomorrow.


The husband is going to Boston tomorrow.  This is a short trip, after which we have a couple days at home and then we're off to Salt Lake City to visit not one, but two distinct groups of friends from different parts of the US who just happen to be converging there at the same time.  Some of these people we haven't seen in a year or more.  It's going to be excellent even if I still suck at snowboarding.

The Verge of Something

I finished reading The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson today.  I found the ending to be abrupt, and that made all the side store lines feel inconsequential.  Which is too bad, because had they gone somewhere, they would have probably been considered awesome.  As I was entering this read into Goodreads, I saw that I'm already 4 books behind for reading goal this year.  This is not a good sign...  It also has me thinking about my other goals for the year that I posted.

In my head, I was doing really terrible at all my goals.  But as I look back over them, I'm not doing too awful really.  I haven't been working on learning to code at all, but I've been making excellent progress on the cross stitch and Star Trek.  DS and I have been climbing twice a week, which is one more day of exercise than I wanted already.  I can already tell that soon I'll be doing other exercises specifically to make my climbing better, so that the exercise thing is in the bag.  I'm not blogging as much as I might want, but I am technically blogging more.  And while it hasn't really felt like I've been playing my instruments like I intended, in truth I just haven't been playing the mandolin/violin/hammered dulcimer, which need the most work.  I've been playing the crap out of my piano, and even finished writing that song I was working on.  As for board games, we had people over last night for that reason, and while we did not play one of our newer ones, we did play a rather fun game of Clue.

So things that still need work: the clothing pattern, coding, weaving, my website, and Etsy.  Also, at some point I threw learning sign language into the mix.

Last band practice was pretty awesome.  We finally found our new trumpet player, and he's a pretty cool guy.  So we're going to start looking for shows to go again, which will be fun.

I have this strange feeling that all aspects of life in general are on the verge of something great.  I've felt like this before, and even if it doesn't go anywhere, I really like being caught up in this feeling of profoundness.  But I'm holding onto this thing's coat tails and letting it pull me where it needs to go.  Bring it, greatness.

Working on a Transition

The band has been hard at work on our second album.  We write songs two different ways as far as I can tell.  The first is that someone starts noodling while we're all together, and we all join in and just jam until we find the sweet spot.  The second is a little more structured, though not much.  Someone usually works out a part for their instrument and then brings it to practice when they're happy with it.  Then we all join in and jam until we find the sweet spot.  I have a hard time writing on my flute, which is what I usually play in the band, and tend to make my writing contributions via the piano.  Typically, these have been simpler chord progressions, so our pianist still has a lot of writing to do to flesh it out.  However, this one I've got on the burner is turning into a full fledged piano piece.

I've got a lot of solid ground work laid for it, but I'm having trouble with one of the transitions.  There's a place with the key signature modulates, and I thought I had something worked out, but DS doesn't like it. With just the two of us, I can't be sure if it's just personal taste, or if my near tone deafness is making my life hard again.  We have practice on Thursday (I hope), so perhaps I can get it close enough to finished that we can open it up to the rest of the band by then.  It's always interesting to hear how different your melody becomes once five other people write parts on top of it.

Tribbles and other thoughts

DS has made it home from CA.  As usual with prolonged trips, he was more than ready to be back.  Winston has demanded fetch sessions about 10 times today.  We are all happy he's back.

I accomplished more than I would have thought while he was gone.  I'm making a lot of progress on this cross stitch pattern I've been sewing.  I woke up Friday with an idea in my head for new jewelry options and then made a whole bunch of them.  The first one was given to my friend Sarah, who came over that day, and she was super excited about it.  So even though she later broke while nervously fiddling with it, I feel like I'm on a good path with this idea, and that I can work through the kinks.

I got bored with the living room layout and decided to completely rearrange.  Well, as completely as we can considering the tv is immobile.  We're getting used to it, but so far I think it's a nice change.  I also started teaching myself sign language from a website I found.  It's something I've always wanted to do, and could possibly come in handy one day.  Especially if we ever have kids, since comprehension and motor skills come earlier to children than speech.

I'm reading The Diamond Age, and while I'm not very far along, I can say A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer is something I would have absolutely adored in my youth.  Alas, I learned to read from regular books...

I've finished the first two seasons of the original Star Trek series in my quest to watch them all in order.  DS even watched an episode with me today and laughed at all the appropriate parts.  Perhaps there is hope for him yet.  Here are some thoughts so far:

• I knew going into this that gold uniforms of command in the original series were actually chartreuse, but that the lights on the stage made them appear gold on film.  So I find that I really enjoy it when Kirk wears his couple other shirt designs.  They seem to be made out of a different fabric, and actually show up green.  It's really lovely.  Related: sometimes you can see the hidden zipper on the left shoulder, and even when the shirts look gold, that zipper looks green.
• Most of the stereotypes you've probably heard about the show don't seem very apparent until the second season.  And considering the first season was a whopping 30 episodes, that's a lot of show to get through before you start seeing them.  I kept a special lookout for the ill fates of "redshirts" and "Dammit Jim, I'm a doctor!" jokes, but I don't think I saw the first redshirt die until close to halfway through season 1.  That being said, they certainly ran with it once it got started.
• I really enjoy the banter between McCoy and Spock.  Also, I love it when Kirk compliments Spock's humanity, and Spock is subsequently offended.
• I was happy to see the cast solidify a bit more in season 2, meaning more of Scotty, Zulu, and the arrival of Chekov, who I was not aware wasn't in season 1.
• Also, what the heck is up with Chekov's hair in his first few episodes????  Did something made a nest in there??
• While The Trouble with Tribbles is a pretty famous episode, it had been a long time since I'd seen it.  Watching Shatner trying not to laugh as he's buried in tribbles and someone is obviously pelting him in the head with more while he talks is super hilarious.

I just noticed today that Deep Space 9 finally made it to streaming, so now it looks like I won't have any trouble getting through all the series, including the animated one.  Though all but the newest movie will have to come in disc form.  I can handle that.

DS called me a geek today, like it was a bad thing.  Though I give him credit for smiling when I said "OF COURSE!"

Like a Glove

DS left for his conference today.  I figured while I was out with the car, I might as well go shopping.  Less so I can spend money, and more so I can just look at things.  Sometimes it's nice to do that.  I picked up a couple of things for the cats, found no shoes I liked, and got groceries.

Then I did one of the best parallel parking jobs of my life.  Behold!

Less than foot of space on either side.  And on our actual street!

The mice we normally get for Winston are a specific kind.  We've found, to our monetary sadness, that he is very particular.  We had been getting the Hartz ones that come in super bright colors and have real rabbit fur.  He went nuts for them, and would play fetch multiple times a day.  He was overly particular to the blues ones.  However, they've recently make them NOT rabbit fur, and he has no interest whatsoever in toys that are made out of anything else.  We know.  We've tried.  (Please note that despite the image their site and Amazon shows for the product, they no longer really look like that.  The reviews, and my own trips to the grocery to get them, attest to this.)

Anyway, I found a different brand at PetSmart today that used real fur.  I wasn't sure how he'd feel about them, since the crazy dye was missing and they're a bit lighter in weight (he prefers a certain weightiness, which helps them fly better when thrown, and they make a nice thunk when they hit which he seems to like for fetch purposes).  However, after giving him one and leaving the rest on the table, I later found him claiming them.  So... let's hope this is a success!

Winston claims the extra mice.  Also, a woven paper ring toy I thought Felix would enjoy batting around.

 We also haven't had a real cat bed for ages, because Winston had a tendency to use them as a litterbox.  I got tired of washing them and throwing away money, so I stopped getting them.  It's been a couple of years though, and Felix really loves them.  So when I found one on clearance today, I thought I'd give it a shot.  I'm testing it on the couch first, since I'm hoping that will impress upon Winston that it is not a toilet.  Felix took to it almost immediately.

"I don't even care if the tag's still attached."

 Despite missing DS already, I'd say today was a success.

Day of Fun

DS is leaving me in the morning for California.  He has a week long conference, and I wasn't able to tag along this time.  Which is really too bad, because it would have been lovely to spend a week with my SB folks.

We decided to make the most of our Saturday together.  For us, this meant we spent the day doing the following:

• Playing video games (Skyrim for me, Dark Souls and Soul Caliber V for DS)
• Rock climbing
• Playing Dominion, of which I lost, both times (freaking SEA HAG!  ugh!)
• Catching up on House
• Eating yummy homemade foods (pizza for me, wings for DS)

Tomato, green olive, and turkey sausage pizza.  Also, Dominion.

Now that DS is sleeping, I'm watching Star Trek and working on a cross stitch project.  I just saw the episode Space Seed, which originally aired Feb 16, 1967.  Apparently in the Star Trek universe, I lived through the last world war for our planet, also known as the Eugenics Wars of the 1990's.  It seems we were creating super humans, and this is where Khan was created.  He led a group of the super humans that, I'm guessing, stole a star ship.  But star flight before 2018 was so slow that everyone on board had to be put to sleep until they arrived at their destination.  And so, due to problems of some kind, the Enterprise came upon this ship 200 years later (so no later than 2200, since the ship left in the 1990's), revived the crew, and met Khan.  I thought he looked familiar, and found out it was for good reason.  He also plays Khan in the second Star Trek movie from 1982, The Wrath of Khan.  Since I recognize this dude, I suspect this was one that got played around my house at some point as a child.

So there you go.  I'm sure that was exciting for you.  A history lesson!

The Brooklyn Bridge is Secure

 Every once in a while, we like to take the bus up to Brooklyn to stay with our friends Matt and Sam for the weekend.  The guest room in their "cloud mansion" has two walls that are all glass.  This photo is a panoramic around the angle as the sun was setting.

This one is out their living room, and that's Manhattan in the background.  The roof of the building at the bottom of the photo is Macy's.  You can easily see their roof decks from the living room, and according to Matt, their catalog photo shoots are often done out there.

Friday night we hung out with their friends, went out for Thai, and then back "home" to the pool room for beers and a few games.  Just fyi, it's easy to convince a group of people that you're excellent at pool if you're one of the only people not wasted.

Saturday we took a rare trip to Manhattan to see some sights.  Normally when we're visiting, we spend the entire weekend hanging out, but it seemed weird to never do any of the New York things I've wanted to do.  So I got to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge for the first time, and at one of the towers, discovered these locks:

Every one of the metal rings sticking out of the tower, of which there were many, was completely covered in locks.  They were mostly normal locks like you'd get in the hardware store today, but some of them were really cool.  Really old things with fancy designs and giant keyholes.  We had no idea why they were there.  A quick search just showed that they were probably some love thing, but for some reason that is not as cool of a reason as I was hoping it would be.

Once in Manhattan, we saw what we could of the inside of the Woolworth Building, and checked out the construction site of the World Trade Center.  By this time we were tired and ready to play games and drink coffee, so we caught the subway back home.  We played a lot of Dominion, and learned how to play Killer Bunnies, which was hilarious.

It never feels like we have enough time there, but the nice thing is that they're close.  I can't wait to go back.