Nadolig llawen a blwyddyn newydd dda.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all.
It's time for me to put 'Fairytale of New York' on infinate repeat, and spend the day with family.
I hope you all have a lovely day, even if you're pagan like me and just in it for the liquor and food. ;)

It's really sad, but I'm using PBS to fill in the gaps in my history education.
There's a lot of stuff that we just didn't cover in school.

Being in Rhode Island, there was a heavy concentration on the colonization of the US, the Constitutional Congress, and the Revolutionary War. Then, we lightly touched on the war of 1812, and slammed into the Civil War. You would do a week or two on that, then speed forward, touch on the assassination of Arch-Duke Frances Ferdinand, skip over WWI, and spend the rest of the year doing WWII.
After that, NADA.
Nothing about Korea or Vietnam, or even the aftermath of WWII.

So, as to not be completly ignorant, I've been soaking up as many documentaries as I can.
It's also giving me an excuse to sit around and do nothing as I knit.

I'm not going anywhere today, except maybe to pick up my car. It's only 18, and it's just bitterly windy out there. I think I'm much better to stay inside with my kitties and my knitting and my history.

- The car is dead. I will not go so far to say that it has ceased to exist, but it is no longer in a state where I can drive it.

- Said car decided to conk out on me on the drive home from work on Tuesday. Leaving me stuck on the highway until the tow truck driver could come and find me.

- Said tow truck driver could not find me for an hour, even though I was stuck between two very recognizable landmarks. If you tell anyone in Rhode Island that you're in the breakdown lane between the 'big blue bug' and the 'HJY' building, they'll know exactly what you mean.

- Rhode Island is kinda weird for having a landmark that is a big blue bug. They light it up at the holidays with a Rudolph nose and antlers.

- The extra kitty food and kitty litter that I buy is usually kept in the trunk of my car, just to save space in my apartment (and lend extra weight to the car in the snow). So, I have no car to go and get more kitty food/litter, and must wait for the car to be repaired. The kitty committee is not pleased with this development.

- This week has just been rotten, horrible, awful and absolutely no-good. I'm very happy that it's over, and I can start this mess again on Sunday.

- Wait, it will start all over again on Sunday, because I have no money to buy things I need to get, like brother's birthday presents. Gah. I fail at being a sister.

- I just want this year to be over. Maybe things will start to turn around in 2010.

x-posted to note_to_cat

To my dear Moose,
I know that you think that you're the only kitty that matters. And, I know that you feel it's your duty to soak up every bit of lap space, and to keep me well groomed.
The lap space I don't mind so much, but after about five minutes, the grooming starts to hurt.
Please stop being all offended when I take my hands away.
I promise you, mommy doesn't taste that good.

PS. Peabody doesn't seem to care for the grooming, either. Though, she needs it more than I do.

To Squirrel,
I know that you are a cat with very little brain, and this lack of a brain has endeared you to me.
Kicking your poop out of the litterbox, or pooping outside of the litterbox (when I just went and bought you your own box, so that you don't have to share) kind of makes you not so endearing.
Laying in the window and talking to the birdies - good. Flinging poo - bad.

And, at some point, we're going to have to address your obsession with me petting you with my feet. That's just weird.

To Peabody,

Aside from your meow sounding like a puppy dog barking, we're pretty cool. Keep on using the back of my knees as a pillow, when I'm lying down to read. It's kind of relaxing.
Though, you really could learn to get along with Moose and Squirrel. We're kind of a package deal.

♥
The pink thing that feeds you

I had some fat girl guilt today, feeling the need to explain to the cashier that I wasn't buying the four tubs of fluff, two packages of butter, and two bags of sugar to eat on my own, I was making gifts with it. CYN FAIL.
It is a pretty awesome fudge recipe, and is pretty easy. It's close to the recipe at on the back of the fluff jar, but this one has a higher boiled sugar to fluff ratio, giving you a better texture.
( Nana's Fudge )
Now, I've found that you can use this recipe with just about any kind of chips, and any kind of add-ins.
The batch I just made used white chocolate chips, and I stirred in crushed oreos.
Tomorrow, I'm tackling a batch with the reese's peanut butter chips, and will be stirring in more chocolate. Yay chocolate.

It was very oddly warm today. 65° in December is just WRONG for Rhode Island. I was running errands with my sunroof down, blasting holiday music.
This does not fit in with my world view. I would like my cold weather back. Thank you.

In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I'm one again sharing my Thanksgiving tradition with all of you.

Alice's Restaurant, in all of it's 20 minute glory.
It's what I listen to while beating my bird into submission to go into the roaster.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Stolen from the_impassive & heartflood

( Urban Dictionary, you say the nicest things! )

Okay, holiday card time again.
I couldn't find any of my Edward Gorey cards this year, but I promise to find something suitably ghoulish.

So, who wants a card? As always, the poll is locked so I'm the only one who can see the results.

Poll #1487065 Holidays 2009
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None, participants: 9

Of course I want a card! Here's my address!

I've been pulling far too much overtime at work. It leaves me feeling too hateful at the end of the night to want to do anything but shower and climb into bed.
I'm hoping after the holidays I'll have some time to do some doll photography. I've got an idea in mind for a puki vs gundam photo shoot.

I did my yearly pumpkin carving marathon. Only took me about two and a half hours to carve all of these. AND - I have yummy pumpkin seeds.
I'm already plotting my carving designs for next year.

( This year's batch: Edward Scissorhands, Skull with a bow & the Headless Horseman )

Some of the kids were talking about the house, and the pumpkins I carved last year as they walked by. Good to know I can still warp young minds.

My sister just reminded me that it was seven years today that Dad passed away.
Mom and I spent the day at a museum, that she and Dad had visited on their honeymoon.

I wasn't sad. Heck, unless I was reminded, I wouldn't have remembered that today was the day. I'm horrible with dates.

It's just really hard to believe that it's been this long since he's been gone.

I wonder what he would think of us now. I know he would be proud of my brother, but I'm pretty sure I still would have been a dissapointment.

And, I'm not too sure how I feel about that.

I'm getting ready to leave on a mini-vacation to the Cape, and I feel like ass warmed over. Can't shake this cough. I see a trip to the doctors in my future once I get back home/scrape together money.

Peanut Butter pie was a huge hit. Will have to remember to make it for brother-dear's birthday.

And yeah. That's about it. I've been knitting, and hacking up a lung. At least, I don't have to deal with work for a week.

Spent all day yesterday volunteering at an event to raise money for a family that I'm friendly with.
I knew there was going to be a raffle, so I brought $20 to buy tickets with.

I was swamped with kids coming up to get their faces painted, so I gave my money to one of the other volunteers with instructions to buy me raffle tickets.

I ended up walking out of there with two wine baskets. Eight bottles of wine.
This will keep me in alcoholic bliss for a good long while.

And...we were raising money for a good cause.

Yesterday, life was good.

I'm too tired for coherency, so here's another trip into bulleted points theater.

• I have no sympathy for the woman who called in to get her overdraft fees refunded, because her only source of income was her child support, after she told me she went to the ATM to pull out money to get a carton of cigarettes.
  I don't care if people smoke, hell, I've got a pack in my freezer for nights when I hate everything, but child support isn't to buy you cigarettes, it's to buy food and clothing for your child. FAIL



• As of yesterday, I've applied for 12 different positions at the bank, only to be shot down for them all.



• This is a very good book month. I had a new book by Lackey, a new Lisa Kleypas book, and there is a J.R. Ward book due out at the beginning of October.



• Oh, PBS, why do you suck me in to your documentaries? My comfy chair is singing a siren song of knitting and loosing myself in history for a few hours.



• I might go on a photo jaunt on Saturday to a church in Fall River. Supposedly there's a wax figure in one of the crypts that's really interesting. I've got to say that Catholics have the best churches, at least when it comes to neat stuff to photograph.



• Backing away from using anything with ammonia in it to dye my hair. Trying a new demi-permanent mix. Hopefully this will give me my red, and not compromise my length. I WILL be able to sit on my hair, at some point.



• I have massive dollie want, and no money to do anything about it.



• I am a rotten child for stealing my mothers new rice-cooker cookbook. I'll give it back as soon as I've procured my own copy.

I ended up doing pretty well when it came to the wedding I was photographing last week.
I got permission from the bride to add some of the pictures to my portfolio. I'm hoping that this will lead to more jobs in the future. I've already got a nibble from one girl who's getting married this spring, and is thinking about hiring me.
I'm keeping my fingers crossed!

( And then, there was a wedding )

I'm really happy with them, the bride is really happy with them, and my boss, who is an amazing photographer, gave me some complements that are still making my head spin.

Photographing the wedding was a lot more fun than I had thought it was going to be. I'm not sure how much fun it would be, though, if I couldn't make snarky remarks to the bride, and then drink heavily with her afterwords. XD

The wigs have shipped, and are on their way to me. Thanks Leeke ever so much for sending an e-mail to let me know they shipped. *fume*
The tracking # is EM939080959KR

I'm going to photograph my first wedding today, and I'm very nervous.
I just know I'm going to screw it up, somehow.
I've been having arguments with myself, in my head, all morning.

DEFEANING VOICE OF DOOM: You Are Going To Fail!
Small, glimmerings voice of reason: Well, maybe not.
DEFEANING VOICE: YOU SUCK. You've Had No Training, And Your Equipment Is Crap!
Reason: But I do have an art degree, and my camera...
DEFEANING VOICE: YOU SUCK! YOUR DEGREE IS USELESS! GIVE UP NOW!
Reason: She's not expecting perfection...
DEFEANING VOICE: YOU SUCK!

And so on, and so forth.
I just pray I don't fall on my ass and make a fool of myself today. That's all I ask.

The wake was rough. I didn't think there was going to be an open casket. I was holding it all together until I got up to the casket and saw that they had tucked a little Optimus Prime figure in there with him.
He was the son of one of the girls I'm friendly with at work.
This shouldn't have hit me so hard, but it did.

Shit. I think it's about time to call it a day. I'm going to be cooking all weekend, first for mom's birthday dinner, then to make food for my friend and her family.

Happy birthday to thewaywardrose, who is not only far to awesome for words, but is also one of the most tallented women I've ever had the pleasure of meeting.

Just watch out for the huge frickin' guy. ;)