So, last weekend was chock full of awesomeness. Sunday, we went to Colonial Williamsburg, and I even have pictures, but I’m not posting them right now. All that walking was pretty brutal – it would seem that I’ve got shin splints. It’s pretty painful, and so I get to stay off my feet/legs as much as possible and ice them and shit. I’m really looking forward to the new round of bellydance class that starts up this coming Sunday, so I want these shits gone by then. In the meantime, elevation, icing, ibuprofen, and Traumeel. Pobre mio. Oy.
This would appear to be my 1300th post. Hee.
Anyway, we went to a baby shower for Kimmie and Jeremy last weekend, and baby-in-waiting Zoe. It was tons of fun, and now I can reveal some of the secret crafting I’ve been doing, since they were presents for Kimmie: a pair of dzonba (Himalayan slippers) and a Starling Handbag.
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Also, on a recent trip to Target, I picked up a pair of Nick and Nora fleece footie jimjams. Holy crap, do I love footie pajamas. These have feet that look like sock monkeys. Adorable. And very snuggly.
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A while ago, Greg and I went to the surplus store to get some bookcases for the house, and I picked up a SWEET mailsorter that has been turned on its side to become a yarnsorter. It is AWESOME! Here it is, empty:
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And Greg very sweetly bought me a candlesnuffer and some candlesticks from Azure Green, and they are beautiful! And then I got some chime candles to fit into them, and now I feel all old-timey and stuff. I just need a nightstocking and a long flannel nightgown and I’m set! (And some red longjohns with the buttflap for Greg.) No outhouse, though, that’s too much.
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Jesus christ, Librivox, what the fuck is up? I thought we had standards? Apparently not so much. I’ve listened to two and a half books this week, and they’ve all been RIDDLED with problems. What. The. Fuck. Even experienced readers are pulling shit like fucking up a sentence and then just starting the sentence right over without editing out the fuck-up. And really, that’s the least of the problems I’ve heard. (I even bothered to check the texts to make sure they were fuck-ups, and, yeah, they were.)
What is going on? Why did I spend so many, many, MANY grueling hours reading and re-reading and re-reading ad nauseam, and then spend so many, many, MANY grueling hours (and my husband, too) editing shit in and out to produce something listenable, when apparently none of that mattered? (If you actually pull up what I’ve read, it’s not much. Because even that little amount of finished product, is a shit ton of work. Well, I guess it’s not if you’re just not editing out your blips and shit.) I’m not nitpicking about people’s accents, or reading styles, or not bothering to look up how a word or placename they’re unfamiliar with is *actually* pronounced. Here’s an example of what I’m talking about. The line to be read is, “No objections, gentlemen? Then carry on.” What was read and recorded and allowed to stand as-is: “No, um, objections?….Gentlemen? Then carry mom…I mean, carry ON.”
Sweet fucking jesus. I know it’s all volunteer-run, but goddamn. The last thing I tried to listen to? I couldn’t even keep track of the plot because of all the mistakes, and I finally just gave up. And these are recently finished projects, according to the threads. I certainly won’t be listening to any more Librivox recordings, I won’t be volunteering any more (because I can’t bring myself to post something so riddled with problems, but why put in so much effort when it seems that no one else cares?), and I won’t be recommending Librivox to anyone anymore. This is fucking sad. It’s a great concept, and the earlier projects are totally fucking rad. I don’t know what’s happened, I don’t see any posts that are like, “Alright, y’all, we’ve decided half-assed is good enough. Go to it!” But I’d get more listening enjoyment – AND be able to understand more since there wouldn’t be all these stops and restarts – if I just took the text from Project Gutenberg and ran it through some TTS.
Made a necklace tonight:
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The round beads are really pretty, and have kind of orange-looking streaks on them.
Quick update before Crotch Rocket practice (with our new keyboard player, excitement! and nervous tummy).
Friday, I got to see Zardoz’s first performance. It was FUCKING AWESOME!!! I was keeping an eye on the video camera, though, so I don’t have any pictures (because I didn’t want the flash to fuck up the video). Hog opened, and they were awesome, too. (But they didn’t have a breakdancing frontman. On a slightly side note, Crotch Rocket is all the same peeps from Zardoz except for their singer, Cody. I am singing for Crotch Rocket. And will not be playing keyboards. So I feel more pressure to be an entertaining frontlady. And after seeing Cody tear it up Friday night, man…I just don’t know. I really just don’t know. I am going to be boring as fuck compared to Cody. However, since Crotch Rocket and Zardoz are the same musicians, minus the singers, I think it’s unlikely we’ll play together, since that would be extremely tiring for Greg, Rick, Jeremy, and Stephen. Which is great for me, because it means no one will ever see me perform onstage before/after Cody, and therefore the likelihood of a comparison and the inevitable paling of me beside him is pretty low.)
I got to make up time at work over the weekend. It was actually pretty quiet and extremely productive, even if it kinda negated the weekend-feel of the weekend. Oh well.
And then I got to call 911 Saturday AND Sunday. Woo woo! They must think I’m nuts. But Saturday, to sum up, a pack of four feral dogs tromped through our yard and bushes, after riling up fenced-in neighborhood dogs and much growling and snarling. So I wanted to call Animal Control, but couldn’t find their number, so just called 911 to ask for it. Turns out Animal Control has been trying to catch these four dogs for about 3 years. Awesome. They’re not skinny by any means, so they’re alright, just extremely dirty and feral and homeless. On the downside, one of the dogs attacked some woman’s cat. On the upside, our cats are indoor-only, and there haven’t been any repeat sightings reported, so hopefully I will not see them again. That would be cool with me.
Last night, Greg and I are watching It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and I realize I’ve been hearing an alarm go off for a while. I ask Greg if he hears it (he does), and we go outside to see what it is. I’m thinking it’s one of our car alarms. Nope – it’s the house alarm of our next door neighbor. Who, as far as we know, is a little old lady. The porch light is on, there’s no car in the driveway, but that’s about all we can see because there are trees and bushes between us and her house. Greg started to go towards her house to “see if anyone was home,” but I convinced him that was a bad idea. (I mean, even if someone else did live with her, we wouldn’t know them by sight. And we don’t know for a fact that she lives alone. So we’d have no way of knowing, if someone was home, whether they actually belonged there or not. Plus, if it was a break-in, someone might have a weapon.) So, I called 911 and let them sort it out.
Greg was very sweet and got me some old-fashioned candle holders and a snuffer. They arrived Saturday, and I love them. Now I just need to sew up an old-timey flannel nightgown for myself, some red flannel pjs for Greg with the trapdoor-butt, and some nightcaps, and we can creep around the house with our candle holders and pretend we’re from the past. Or something. I love those candle holders, they are adorable. And the snuffer is decorated with jewels (probably glass, but still cool-looking). Pics to come. For now, I have a picture for you of my swank new Breakfast at Tiffany’s style earplugs. (I think that, as reproductions go, they’re not exact, but they’re close enough for me.) Now I can sleep in real style. Or something.
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