Good morning BabyBear!
Mid-afternoon storytime!
Dinner at The Twisted Fork (before she lost her focus, got whiny and stressed me out!)
I say dinner.. I mean mostly dessert. ;)
Saturday, July 30, 2011
Foto Friday
...on Saturday morning (no one ever said I was prompt.)
Dinner at The Twisted Fork (before she lost her focus, got whiny and stressed me out!)
I say dinner.. I mean mostly dessert. ;)
Dinner at The Twisted Fork (before she lost her focus, got whiny and stressed me out!)
I say dinner.. I mean mostly dessert. ;)
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Tech fun.
Technology is rebelling and my brain is melting. (Yes I'm aware that my brain melts on an alarmingly frequent basis.) Our shiny black viao hit it's one year birthday and promptly went kaput on the same day. (Well almost. We placed the order on the 26 of July 2010 but it wasn't actually shipped until late August so I'm pretty sure we're still covered by the warranty.)
Tuesday night I pulled out the power cord to move the computer and *poof* instansta off. When we finally got it back on there were all kinds of crazy warnings popping up including helpful comments such as, "may not be an official sony battery" Way to disown your offspring when the going gets rough Sony! Thankfully, they've sent us a prepaid box to mail our laptop back in. (Free shipping is a big deal for me. If a product is defective and the company tries to make me pay to send it back, I will consider staging a boycott! [I'm looking at you VTech!] Of course I'm pretty lazy though, so I mostly just think about staging a boycott and whine a bit.
The box arrived today so Mark and I have been taking it in turns to backup our data and remove anything we don't feel like sharing with a lab full of tech guys. It's not the least stressful evening activity ever. I think the only reason we're not in a tailspin of panic is because we've learned our lesson in years past. We have not one but two different TerraDrives, one of which we try to backup to regularly. Most importantly though, Mark has a loan of a MacBook Pro from his office, which means we still have portable internet on something larger than a smartphone but smaller than a 47 inch (not so portable) tv.
The MacBook though... that's entire different kettle of fish. We aren't getting along so well, for now we're agreeing to disagree and there's been no physical violence, but I can't say it hasn't come close. (argh!! stop zooming when I move my fingers!)
Tuesday night I pulled out the power cord to move the computer and *poof* instansta off. When we finally got it back on there were all kinds of crazy warnings popping up including helpful comments such as, "may not be an official sony battery" Way to disown your offspring when the going gets rough Sony! Thankfully, they've sent us a prepaid box to mail our laptop back in. (Free shipping is a big deal for me. If a product is defective and the company tries to make me pay to send it back, I will consider staging a boycott! [I'm looking at you VTech!] Of course I'm pretty lazy though, so I mostly just think about staging a boycott and whine a bit.
The box arrived today so Mark and I have been taking it in turns to backup our data and remove anything we don't feel like sharing with a lab full of tech guys. It's not the least stressful evening activity ever. I think the only reason we're not in a tailspin of panic is because we've learned our lesson in years past. We have not one but two different TerraDrives, one of which we try to backup to regularly. Most importantly though, Mark has a loan of a MacBook Pro from his office, which means we still have portable internet on something larger than a smartphone but smaller than a 47 inch (not so portable) tv.
The MacBook though... that's entire different kettle of fish. We aren't getting along so well, for now we're agreeing to disagree and there's been no physical violence, but I can't say it hasn't come close. (argh!! stop zooming when I move my fingers!)
The Twilight Post.
There's still time to close the page and walk away...
Generally speaking, I'm an anti-bandwagon kind of person. Unless I accidentally wind up on the bandwagon without knowing it's a bandwagon (eg. Star Wars) I tend to steer clear. I'm not really sure why, but the more people who like something, the more likely I am to ignore it completely. I've never read Harry Potter, I've never seen Forest Gump and up until this month I'd never read Twilight.
I'm hesitant to do this, but it's fresh in my mind and if I'm not careful I'm going to open my mouth and start gabbing Twilight with the wrong person, bore them to tears and be forever ostracized. Plus I want it out of my head. Perhaps what I'm really in need of is a book group. I love discussing a book... in crazy detail, but I'm pretty sure my husband will disown me if I try to recruit him as my Twilight sounding board.
I was leaving a friend's house one morning after Jessica had played hard and after I'd lamented that I didn't have any books in the car and hoped that she didn't fall asleep before we got home, K went and brought me some books. (God bless friends who love to read!) One of these books was Twilight. I kinda looked sideways at it but went with it. After all, I was kind of curious. I'd seen the first movie and thought it was dire. There had to be something amazing in the book for so many people to put up with such a rotten movie.
Twilight - Not too bad. Definitely better than the movie. Still didn't like Bella very much, but I was beginning to be able to see the appeal.
Cue trip to the library to collect the rest of the series.
New Moon - hmm still good, still don't like Bella. I decided that maybe it was because I was picturing Kristen Stewart and her sour puss in the role, so I spent the rest of the book trying to force a different character image into my head. Have you ever tried changing the look of a character after reading an entire book? It's hard in a strange way. The way writing with your left hand if you're right-handed is hard. Your brain feels like it's physically rebelling at the idea.
Eclipse - okay I can see how it developed a following. I need the final book, but the local library didn't have a copy. (Yes, I'm ashamed to admit it but as one of my friends so eloquently said, "It's got crack in the pages." You don't know WHY you can't put it down, but you just can't. ) Thankfully, this wise friend had a copy of Breaking Dawn that she loaned me.
Breaking Dawn - When I started this book I was warned that I'd hit a point and go "Argh!" so I spent every page in a stress bubble wondering who was going to die and why. Turns out the warning applied to something much smaller in scale and everything was nicely tied up into a happy ending. Actually, the most tied up and satisfying ending I've read in a long time. I wasn't expecting that.
Midnight Sun - An unfinished manuscript by Meyer, retelling the first novel via Edward's perspective. Perhaps my favourite of all the books. I finally like Bella - it's amazing how much more likable she is from Edward's point of view.
The Movies.....
Most of the actors appear to be comical spoofs of the characters in the book.
(remember these are my own opinions you are under no obligation to agree with them, you don't even have to like them.)
Bella - I don't even know where to start. Honestly. There are so many things wrong here that I don't even know where to start. So I won't. I don't approve of the casting choice. I also don't approve of bad wigs such as her wig in Eclipse. I hate it when actresses have to wear tacky wigs - think Hayden Panettiere in Heroes, I can't focus on anything else.
Rosalie - She was supposed to be gorgeous, not, well not whatever it was that she was.
I really won't say anything else about the movies I'm just going to treat them as the comedy/farce/spoofs that they obviously are and move on. :)
and now that I've gotten that off my chest I can stop bothering friends and family with my inane ramblings about Edward, Bella and Jacob.
Generally speaking, I'm an anti-bandwagon kind of person. Unless I accidentally wind up on the bandwagon without knowing it's a bandwagon (eg. Star Wars) I tend to steer clear. I'm not really sure why, but the more people who like something, the more likely I am to ignore it completely. I've never read Harry Potter, I've never seen Forest Gump and up until this month I'd never read Twilight.
I'm hesitant to do this, but it's fresh in my mind and if I'm not careful I'm going to open my mouth and start gabbing Twilight with the wrong person, bore them to tears and be forever ostracized. Plus I want it out of my head. Perhaps what I'm really in need of is a book group. I love discussing a book... in crazy detail, but I'm pretty sure my husband will disown me if I try to recruit him as my Twilight sounding board.
I was leaving a friend's house one morning after Jessica had played hard and after I'd lamented that I didn't have any books in the car and hoped that she didn't fall asleep before we got home, K went and brought me some books. (God bless friends who love to read!) One of these books was Twilight. I kinda looked sideways at it but went with it. After all, I was kind of curious. I'd seen the first movie and thought it was dire. There had to be something amazing in the book for so many people to put up with such a rotten movie.
Twilight - Not too bad. Definitely better than the movie. Still didn't like Bella very much, but I was beginning to be able to see the appeal.
Cue trip to the library to collect the rest of the series.
New Moon - hmm still good, still don't like Bella. I decided that maybe it was because I was picturing Kristen Stewart and her sour puss in the role, so I spent the rest of the book trying to force a different character image into my head. Have you ever tried changing the look of a character after reading an entire book? It's hard in a strange way. The way writing with your left hand if you're right-handed is hard. Your brain feels like it's physically rebelling at the idea.
Eclipse - okay I can see how it developed a following. I need the final book, but the local library didn't have a copy. (Yes, I'm ashamed to admit it but as one of my friends so eloquently said, "It's got crack in the pages." You don't know WHY you can't put it down, but you just can't. ) Thankfully, this wise friend had a copy of Breaking Dawn that she loaned me.
Breaking Dawn - When I started this book I was warned that I'd hit a point and go "Argh!" so I spent every page in a stress bubble wondering who was going to die and why. Turns out the warning applied to something much smaller in scale and everything was nicely tied up into a happy ending. Actually, the most tied up and satisfying ending I've read in a long time. I wasn't expecting that.
Midnight Sun - An unfinished manuscript by Meyer, retelling the first novel via Edward's perspective. Perhaps my favourite of all the books. I finally like Bella - it's amazing how much more likable she is from Edward's point of view.
The Movies.....
Most of the actors appear to be comical spoofs of the characters in the book.
(remember these are my own opinions you are under no obligation to agree with them, you don't even have to like them.)
Bella - I don't even know where to start. Honestly. There are so many things wrong here that I don't even know where to start. So I won't. I don't approve of the casting choice. I also don't approve of bad wigs such as her wig in Eclipse. I hate it when actresses have to wear tacky wigs - think Hayden Panettiere in Heroes, I can't focus on anything else.
Rosalie - She was supposed to be gorgeous, not, well not whatever it was that she was.
Edward - They got the eyes right and I agree with his build in general and the hair, but ouch... it kind of looks like someone smashed his face with a frying pan..
Esme - I think I decided that she was blonde, so the brunette totally threw me for a loop.
Alice - one again, the fake hair bothered me. (I'm not positive if it was a wig, but I hope it was for the actress's sake, cause that's some bad hair.)
Emmett - pretty much what I thought, but it can't be hard to get the frat boy type rightCarlise - only real difference was that I was pronouncing it Car-leese and not Car-lyle
I really won't say anything else about the movies I'm just going to treat them as the comedy/farce/spoofs that they obviously are and move on. :)
and now that I've gotten that off my chest I can stop bothering friends and family with my inane ramblings about Edward, Bella and Jacob.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
House!
Hello. It's been a while hasn't it? More than a month to be less than exact. We've been busy. The whole trying to find a place to live thing really eats up all your free time. (sooo sick of hotpads.com and realtor.com)
However, I can now happily report that we have found a place we'd like to rent and the owners have graciously said yes despite our toddler and kitty baggage. You'd be surprised at how few quality (read: non-dump) detached houses for rent, that will take a cat, have any kind of yard, and are anywhere remotely in our price range are out there. The few that do exist get snapped up almost immediately. The final property we looked at had another set of applicants who'd turned in their paperwork the night before us. Thankfully our credit history was, according to the listing agent, significantly better. This and our 18 month lease offer put us "hands and feet" above them. (I'm sure he meant 'head and shoulders' but I think I may have to start using 'hands and feet' just to see if I can make it a thing!) Here's our new abode for the next 18 months.
However, I can now happily report that we have found a place we'd like to rent and the owners have graciously said yes despite our toddler and kitty baggage. You'd be surprised at how few quality (read: non-dump) detached houses for rent, that will take a cat, have any kind of yard, and are anywhere remotely in our price range are out there. The few that do exist get snapped up almost immediately. The final property we looked at had another set of applicants who'd turned in their paperwork the night before us. Thankfully our credit history was, according to the listing agent, significantly better. This and our 18 month lease offer put us "hands and feet" above them. (I'm sure he meant 'head and shoulders' but I think I may have to start using 'hands and feet' just to see if I can make it a thing!) Here's our new abode for the next 18 months.
Finally more than one bedroom! We can officially have visitors! Start planning your vacations now!
If you have any hot tips on the best place to buy a washer, dryer and new bedroom set, please let me know! (Notes of makes and models that won't eat my clothes or go kaput in the first year will also be happily accepted.) Also - if you want to do some heavy lifting on the weekend of August 20th, let me know. You will be compensated with food and beverage... I know how you Americans like your beer! ;)
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