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Art, Books, and Cats

admin — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 04:34:18 +0000

I sold the piece I entered up in Baltimore, this piece to be precise. I won’t be sure of how much I get for it until I get the check (it was an art auction), but it’s at least 50 bucks (I started at $100, and the gallery keeps 50%). Entirely too little, based on the amount of work that went into it, but at the same time, it’s a piece that I don’t like as much as others, and is thus not very likely to be in my wall anytime soon. And thus, $50 in my pocket sure beats a painting sitting and collecting dust in the closet. Better for me to have one less thing to keep track of, better for the painting to have someone that appreciates it more then I do. I’ve got scans as well, so I can continue my magical fantasy of selling prints of all of this stuff to eager buyers.

I finally got around to reading The Tipping Point, which gave me mild Freakonomics flashbacks and makes me want to go prowl around the social sciences section of Ye Local Library. Also need to get ahold of the two pre-Miles Bujold books at some point. Read her fantasy book “Curse of Chalion”, it was OK but fantasy just doesn’t seem to be my cup of tea, methinks. Either that, or I’m reading the wrong kind of fantasy.

The cats were getting all yowley last night and staring at me with googoo eyes, as it was dinner time. So I got out my camera and decided to mess with them. They’re so used to eating out of the bowl, I wondered what would happen if I just laid the bag of food down in front of them. Took them awhile, sniffing around and staring at me and such, but eventually they figured out what was going on. Kinda.

They each managed to nibble a little bit, then wandered off, apparently bored with the exercise, deciding that waiting for dinner wasn’t worth dealing with this weird bag that also extruded food. I want to put little saddles on them and get gerbils in cowboy hats to ride on them.

Miles, Mucous, and Mewling

admin — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 05:38:30 +0000

The flow of items from my sinuses out the exit holes has begun to slow. This pleases me. So, in theory, at some point the evacuation will be complete, and I can get back to life as scheduled. My toilet paper rolls have been very stoic through all of this. I, uh, don’t buy tissues. I figure that anything that’s good enough for my butt is good enough for my nose. The thing is, there’s multiple types of ‘disposable soft papery absorbent material’, the notable ones being toilet paper, tissues, napkins, and paper towels. I find that I can easily combine the first two into one and have no problems. I know of various folks who combine the latter two, using paper towels for napkin-related purposes. While I have done this on occasion, I must confess to being a veritable napkin fiend, and have a definite preference for them for all of my mouth-dabbing needs.

Drew and I have been making great use of the Henrico Public Library system as we crush through the Miles books at lightning speed. I just killed off ‘A Civil Campaign today’, and it was delightful. I will be sad when I run out of Miles books, as I want be a mercenary and go to fancy Vor parties and hang out with hermaphrodites at the Orb. I suppose that is the problem with books that are good to escape into. Also, I find that this is the good part of reading certain other sorts of books, such as pretty much anything by Jane Austen. I read them and think they are exciting while reading them, but am otherwise perfectly glad to not be living in 19th Century England as a young lady whose sole purpose in life is to find a good husband.

On a related note to the first part of the preceding paragraph, I can’t believe that vorkosigan.com is actually available. I’d get it if I could figure out a decent use for it. I love to make a good website and all, but I’d need content first, and the only think I can think of is a resource website, of which there are already a few. Mind you, they look like they haven’t been updated in about 10 years, designwise, but the content seems more or less updated. Anyhow, I’m gonna randomly brainstorm for content and see if I can think of anything creative or interesting, as I could use another site for my portfolio.

My latest hobby, at random, is cat tents. I will come across a cat that has decided to take a nap on a chair or couch. I will then pile the areas around that cat up will pillows, and then drape a blanket over the area to create a tent/cave. It is very cute and sometimes the cat will leave and then come back. Works for both cats as well. You wanna know something crazy? There are some people that prefer kittens to cats. I feel that this is crazy talk. The kitten is the pesky little thing you put up with until it finally blossoms into a lazy huggable cat.

Oh yeah, and I finally figured out (more or less) how to make a passable pad thai! Yay!

Williamsburg, Lights, Cats, etc

admin — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 05:12:45 +0000

We went to Williamsburg for the grand illumination. It was rather exciting, I’ve never seen a fireworks show that was so well choreographed. It’s like they got Gandalf all involved, quite fancy!

In other news, this weekend has been exhausting. This is because so much stuff has gotten unpacked that’s needed to get unpacked. And then I put up a teeny tree and added lights, it’s quite festive. And then I made magical apple chocolate muffins, which were quite delicious. And then we got a new bag of cat treats, which was much less indestructible then the last bag of cat treats. The last bag’s been in full view of the cats for quite awhile, they never messed with it. With the new bag, I left it on the kitchen counter, and later find it sprawled in the middle of the kitchen floor, gnawed into with pieces spilling out. Quite strange! Perhaps they are tastier then the last treats. So I put it in a ziplock bag. Sure enough, the next day they drug it out and the plastic bag had a few teeth marks in it (though no tears). Really weird, they don’t even do this with their food or anything. Kinda makes me want to taste it, to see if these treats are really super delicious and I’m missing out on something.

Speaking of which, don’t believe for a second that salmon cat treats are more then just a dribble of salmon. The second ingredient is chicken on this pack! The salmon is more like item seven! Madness. Kinda like that time I got pina colada juice. Turns out the main ingredient was apple. And after reading that and taking another swig, it totally did taste like apple! Lies, all lies! Speaking of which, I wonder if spiced rum would work in pina coladas. For I have spiced rum, I have pina colada mix, and I even have a can of pineapple for bonus nutrients. Hmm, this must be experimented with!