Month: July 2007 Page 1 of 2
You can find the most interesting things using StumbleUpon. Today, I found this lovely, funny country music video, which is apparently set to a song by singer/comedian Rodney Carrington, about the beauty, splendor, and yes the healing power of the bosom.
I will warn you that this video is not remotely safe for work. But gosh, it’s fun.
Should this video, er, inspire you, feel free to drop me an e-mail at autographedcat@gmail.com. *wink* *grin*
Some people have complained about some of the unresolved questions in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Fortunately, davehogg fills in the blanks for us. (Warning — spoilers may occur.)
Lo, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of Livejournal
I shall fear no spoilers; for thou art finished;
Thy series and thy ending, they satisfy me.
Which is to say….stayed up Way Too Late™ last night finishing Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Thoughts later.
I like to have music on while I work, though I’m often only listening to it with half an ear. At work, I take advantage of Pandora Radio to offer up a stream of music that is likely to be pleasing to me, while still exposing me to interesting new things that I might not otherwise hear amid all the stuff i do know.
So I’m sitting here working on a project, and my brain starts to register the music that’s playing.
“Hrm. This is a good song.”
…
“It sounds vaguely familiar.”
—
“Familiar, but it’s not right. It must be some weird cover of a song I like.”
…
Finally, this thought gets hold of enough of my consciousness that I flip my browser up to see what I’m listening to.
Turns out it’s not a weird cover at all. It’s the original recording of “Three Fine Daughters of Farmer Brown” by Eddie from Ohio. I’ve just gotten so used to the Lady Mondegreen cover that I register this recording as odd. 🙂
Despite being a bit loopy from painkillers due to my recent fall, I managed to have a pretty fun weekend.
Saturday morning, kitanzi went out to do the weekly grocery shopping, and brought home a copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. This was pretty much how I picked up my copy of Half Blood Prince, too: avoid the midnight madness and grab a copy in passing at a non-book store. Unfortunately, I didn’t get as much reading on it as I’d have liked, because the first time I tried to sit down with it I was having trouble concentrating. I’m currently about a third of the way through it, and actively avoiding spoiler discussions until I finish, hopefully tonight or tomorrow.
Early Saturday morning, our new washing machine and dryer arrived! I have to give major props to Best Buy, who made the entire transaction, from purchase to delivery to installation, about as painless as one could want. The new machine sure extremely spiffy, and have lots of features and functions that we’re not yet exactly sure what they’re really for, but I’m sure we’ll have fun figuring them out. The first test for the washer was the pair of jeans that I got muddied up when I fell down the hill. They came out as good as new. We’re officially impressed.
Saturday night, we went to joyeuse13 and abovenyquist‘s housefilk near Brookhaven. We hadn’t seen them in far too long, so it was doubly nice that it was at their house. We also had some special guests from far away, with janeg and shaddyr both visiting from various parts of Canada, and our own bedlamhouse making a rare local appearance before shaking the Georgia clay from his boots en route to the Midwest. And of course, many of the usual suspects were there, including sffilk, filkferengi, mrpsyclops and his daughter, J., and spambrian. I was limited by not having my filkbooks with me (they’re in a box somewhere), and I’m afraid I wasn’t in very good form, but I did have a good time. I remember playing Richard Shindell’s “The Next Best Western” and, during a run of Canadian folk/filk, Sam Baardman’s “Down To The River”, which I at least had memorized and thus didn’t need to fumble for words to play. Oh, and I did my own “Sauron” during a small run of Tolkien filk, which was fun. We ended up leaving slightly early, around 11pm, because kitanzi was driving and wanted to get home before she was too tired to drive safely.
Sunday, we went over to the old apartment to get most of the last odds and ends out of the place. kitanzi packed stuff in the car while I set about the place with a can of Spackle, patching the holes in the drywall from where we’d mounted shelves. We’ll be going back over this afternoon after work so I can sand them down, and we can haul the last of the trash down to the tip. The house cleaners will come in on Wednesday to give it the last polish, and then we’ll turn the keys in and that will close the book on my time at The Wellington.
We spent most of the rest of the weekend at home. Watched the last of the season 3 Doctor Who Confidentials, chatted to folks on the Internet, and I played a fair amount of World of Warcraft, which was about as much attention span as I had for any one task, anyway. I just hit level 58 with my hunter, and made me first proper trip into the Outlands.
How was your weekend?
I ended up taking the day off yesterday and today, and called yesterday to get an appointment with the doctor just to make sure I didn’t cause myself any more serious damage than my wounded dignity. They didn’t have an appointments available yesterday, but I was able to get one for 9:30am this morning. I spent most of yesterday wandering from the computer to bed to the couch, because being in any one place for very long (or indeed, in any one position) was rather painful, and what painkillers I had on hand just weren’t cutting it. I did have some leftover diclofenac sodium left over from my back problems last summer, so I was taking those along with Tylenol for pain as often as allowed.
Drove down the doctor’s this morning, and was seen fairly promptly. I had an appointment with the same nurse practitioner that has been managing my blood pressure and blood sugar issues; I actually think of her more as my primary doctor than my actual PCP. (In fact, I have to call my insurance company to select a new PCP, as Dr. K. has left the practice. They told me this when I was checking in, and I realized that this really wasn’t a bother, since in the 7-8 years he’s been my PCP, I’ve only seen him about 5 times. But I digress…).
After getting the blood pressure and temperature readings out of the way, she prodded and poked and moved me about to see where the pain reactions where. Luckily, I don’t have the kind of radiating pain down my limbs that she was worried about. She wrote me out some prescriptions for pain medication, and sent me next door for X-rays. This was, oddly enough, the biggest bother, since taking them involved lying on my back and being rolled this way and that. I hadn’t had any pain meds this morning, so I was pretty sore and annoyed by the time they were done, but not so much at them (they were very personable and kept the amount of prodding to a minimum, and what prodding they did needed to be done). He told me that I’d find out about the results probably tomorrow.
I went by the pharmacy to fill my scrips, stopped by Moe’s for some lunch, then came home, took the pills and ate. I watched a little TV, but when I realized I was actually not listening to Matt Groening talk about….whatever he was talking about on the Daily Show episode I was watching, I took the cue from my body and went to bed. I slept until kitanzi came home and got me up for dinner. We watched the Dustin Hoffman episode of Inside the Actors Studio, which was amazing, and then I played a bit of WoW to pass time until I could take another dose of meds and go to bed. Which I am now going to do.
Thanks to everyone who commented on the previous post and offered their well wishes and support. It means a lot to me to know that you’re all out there paying attention and caring.
What the heck. I approve of this idea from cjdoyle:
Wow- what is it in the air lately? Post after filtered post about how everyone is feeling alone, disconnected, unwanted. It’s not like this is one or two people – it’s like a rash all over my friends list the past few days. Male, female, betwixt, undecided, unconcerned…it seems to be an equal opportunity Brain Weasel Invasion.
Clearly, something needs to be done.
I think we need to have a Brain Weasel Stomping Day.
The problem, as I’ve noted before, is “it’s easier to see the Weasels when they’re eating someone else’s brain.”
So.This is my call to my friends list, and to your friends list, and beyond. This Friday, make an effort to squish someone’s Brain Weasel.
Have a crush on someone? Post a flirty comment in their journal. Admire someone’s skills? Post a comment about it. Just think a person is nifty? This Friday is the time to tell them.
Doesn’t matter if the post you’re commenting to doesn’t have much to do with your comment. Just post those good thoughts. Trust me. People will appreciate it.
Do this for everyone – not just those you suspect are feeling down (After all, you might not be on their Brain Weasel filter). Take a few minutes and help launch people into the weekend with a smile.
And…who knows? Maybe sharing how others make you happy will make you a bit more cheerful in return.
It’s worth a try.
Spread it around.
One of the things I’d been greatly looking forward to with our new apartment was its close proximity to my office. It really is “around the corner”, and I thought I might take advantage of this one some nicer days and walk. Despite the fact that rain was called for today, I decided to chance it and stroll to work this morning, to get a sense of the timing.
Now, there’s two ways I can do this. I can stroll up the street to the light, and then down a short block, and then around the circle which leads to my office building. We’ll call this “the long way”. The other way, which looks so much more preferable on the map, is to cut through the back parking lot of the office building that is two buildings down from mine. This is the route I took this morning.
Right after coming out of our complex, there’s a path leading up a fairly steep embankment. I climbed up, and thought to myself that it really was just a bit too steep for comfort, even if there was an obvious path. But I made it up ok (about 15-17 feet from bottom to top, with a relatively severe incline), caught my breath, and then had a nice stroll across the parking lot to my building. Total time in transit, from my door to my office door: 11 minutes.
At lunchtime, I strolled over to the shopping centre next door and had lunch at Mellow Mushroom, a local pizza chain that I’ve always been fond of. While I was eating and reading the back half of this weeks Creative Loafing, the sky opened up. This wasn’t a shower, this was serious sheets of rain with gusting winds. But I had time, so I leisurely nibbled on my pizza and, having finished reading Creative Loafing, leafed through their far inferior competitor, the Sunday Paper. (The Sunday Paper is an alternative weekly newspaper if it were written by your dad.) The rain finally slaked off and I strolled back to work through the now-light shower, getting wet but not drenched. It was warm enough that this really wasn’t terribly unpleasant.
By the time it was time to go home, the rain was gone, so I merrily set off for home. As I got to the top of the embankment, I thought “this really is a bit steep. I’ll need to be careful.” Unfortunately, two steps later my foot slipped and, unable to recover, I landed hard on my tailbone and slid down to the bottom. I picked myself up and shook myself off, and limped home.
My jeans were a muddy mess, and my dignity suffered a near-fatal blow, saved only by the lack of anyone watching. I have a great deal of pain in my bottom and lower back, but I don’t think I did any serious damage to myself. If I’m still in great pain after 24-48 hours, I’ll go see a doctor. But I’m afraid that walking to work is going to either have to be the long way around, or I’m going to have to find a less steep pathway that parking lot, because I’m not going down that hill again.
Ow.