Whewww.

Weekend was good, despite some rain. We went to Cape May, and got to watch God bring his A-game and put up lightning alongside the fireworks, which was cool. Everyone managed to pack into the Jaffinarium without too much difficulty, and we ate delishus fishus, and clean up wasn't too bad. All in all, a success.

Today...today started with my accidentally tripping some poor lady in the PATH station this morning, her wiping out on the platform, and my guilty ass sticking around for the cops to get my information. They told me I could go, so I went to work and promptly had a panic attack about getting sued. I swear, on a visceral level, fear of getting sued is the new fear of getting eaten by wolves. After being repeatedly told that barring a high level of craziness on the woman's part, there was no point in suing me, I calmed down. I will say, no, I will beg you all, DO NOT WEAR EFFING FLIPFLOPS WHILE COMMUTING ON PUBLIC TRANSPORT! A more dangerous shoe-like thing for walking quickly around a lot of other people I can't imagine. (I stepped on the back of her flipflop.)

But, on the good side, HR has decided that I am not, in fact, a communist, so I have the official offer! Next step, going in for scads of paperwork filling out, and telling Carelli I'm leaving. Bleah. Awesome job, yay! Leaving really pretty good job, boo.

reports to come. Azeroth, take me away!

The loves, I feel them. It's been so long since I took a step like this, 5 years to be exact, and I've needed the support to move on, and y'all were there in one way or another.

I'll be off to Cape May this weekend, to savor fishes seasoned with VICTORY!
Hope everyone's weekend is awesome, Happy Explody Times!

I got the job! Now I can tell you all about it! I just didn't want to jinx it.

So yeah, a little over a month ago, a friend of mine from grad school told me that there was a first hand position opening up at her old shop; the graduate costume shop at NYU. I checked it out on her recommendation, and applied. Today, they called to let me know they want me, and barring HR finding out I'm a communist, I start work there mid August.

It pays more, has better benefits, I have more freedom of ability (draping? sure! millinery? why not!), I believe I get a class discount, and I HAVE PAID VACATION. I can finally take a vacation without counting every hour not spent at work.

I'm pretty goddamn psyched. Thank you all for the good wishes, candles lit, etc.

Woo!

Um...anyone know a good accordion teacher?

See, in a fit of whimsy, I told my father in law that if he ever found an accordion at a garage sale, I would learn how to play it.

So, yeah, uh, accordion teacher?

I had an awesome night last night. Met up with piratedan and serendipitygrey, and we went to go see WALL-E.

See this movie.

I mean, generally, Pixar can do no wrong in my eyes. But this one goes above and beyond. It is wonderfully sweet, utterly romantic, has an awesome message, and the credits (the _credits_!) should be sat through on their own artistic merits. Yeah, it was good.
Then we went swimming in piratedan's parents wonderful outdoor pool, and it was warm, and there were stars, and fireflies, and the occasional meteor, and we stayed up way late, and when we got back to JC, there was parking right by our place. An excellent night.

So, to some of you I've spoken of this, to the others....
I need candles lit, fingers crossed, etc, for June 30th. By the 4ht of July weekend, I should know about what I'm hoping for. I'd say more, but I'm dreadfully superstitious about jinxing things. I promise I'll tell y'all what its about either way afterwards.

In the meantime, whoo, it's the weekend!

Dads: I know a bunch of really wonderful ones. Here's to you!

My Dad: The most wonderful of all. I don't tell him enough. He's been on my mind frequently lately; in a friend's asking me what my favorite poem is, in discussing songs sung to me when I was a child, in polishing brass with club soda, a trick I learned by accident with him.
I'll call him soon, and maybe this time the cel phone will be kind to his hearing. As long as I can get across how I love him, it doesn't matter.

I leave you with a song.

Oh Mr. Moon, Moon, bright and shiny moon
Won't you please shine down on, shed your lovin' light on,
Please shine down on me

Wehlp, the past couple of months have been, oh, a mite up and down. Currently, other than revstomp's foot acting up, we seem to have reached a median, which honestly feels almost a little better than the up. At least, after the down it does.
Anyway, stuff happened. Some highlights: poguer came out to scenic NJ to work, and we kidnapped him for movie, Warcraft, and sushi. He now has been to the famous Tomo's, a Jaffe tradition for days of yore. It was awesome to have him come visit, it gratifies my lazy ass to have family come out to NJ to play. :) Sadly, isabeaus_mom couldn't make it, but I should be seeing her in Seattle later.
With our stimulus package, we bought drums for revstomp! 10 years out of practice, but he can still tear up "Hooked on a Feeling." He's adorable.

Ok, off to work. Enjoy your morsel of news!

Seriously. I won't enumerate all of the awful crap that happened this week, but there was enough of it that at one point, I called my family to make sure they were still ok. I hope everyone here hasn't had anything terrible happen to them this week, and it's mostly been in the NY/NJ area.

12:12 Monday morning. Here's hoping for a better one.

But I was too busy enjoying my anniversary to post this.

I'm gonna love you
Like nobody's loved you
Come rain or come shine,

Happy together
unhappy together
and wouldn't it be fine?

Days may be cloudy or sunny,
We're in or we're out of the money,
But I'm gonna love you
Come rain or come shine!


And I mean it, darlin. Happy 2 years with you!

And there will be an enormous post soon to come, with all of the over the top things that have been happening, but right now, it's my birthday, and I am preparing to om nom nom a punkin muffin.
Woo!

That would be me and my husband this weekend. Originally, we were going to go down to Philly and hang with the inestimable volkmeter, but then we caught this cold. So then, we were going to stay at home and get all manner of things done that need doing around the apartment, but the cold got worse. So all we've done with this weekend is lie abed and recover. Well, and I got to lvl 57 with my rogue. On the one hand, boo not getting things done. On the other hand, I do feel much better, revstomp seems to be better too, and at least we didn't spend a lot on this weekend.
My favorite cold fighter this winter- The Cara cara orange. I don't know if it's a hybrid, but it's a kind of navel orange that's a lovely pink! on the inside, and has a flavor that's somehow less insipid than your standard navel. Also, is cheap by the pound.
Valentine's day was nice. We stayed home, ordered in sushi, revstompy got me an insanely cool lego house, and we had a nice relaxing time. Well, mostly relaxing. :D
Oh! Almost forgot. We went to a show for yshua's new band, The Smash-Up, whom I believe you can find on Itunes with their original line up. There's a new singer and yshua on bass now, and it's an improvement, but the band was pretty good to start with. Try and find their cover of Pressure by Billy Joel if you can, it's a hoot. So yeah, I really like this band. They seem much more approachable than chiba-ken, and have a lot more energy on stage. Also, the show was a label showcase for a bunch of medium sized labels, and The Smash-Up totally stole the show, and the band leader was making the schmoozing rolls with a plus 4, so they seems to be better poised to go places. Check 'em out!

The past week and a half has been a lot of bouncing around and business. For one thing, work has finally picked up again, so I've been collecting the sweet, sweet overtime that we've needed for a while. Still a tad tenuous, but hopefully the next couple of paychecks will smooth that over (btw, thanks mom!).
Last weekend and this one have not really helped money matters, but dang I've had a lot of fun! We went to Disney World to visit equusregia and rhrackman and the chilluns; and also to hang out with our friends b4rk0de and roze, who were there for a wedding. Some of the usual issues of cat-herding disparate groups of people, and wee people for that matter, were in evidence; but too much fun aside, we had an awesome time. Rhrackman is the best person to see disney with, with roze a close second. All kinds of neato background information on the rides, and the park design, and the various details of disney. You can't buy gum on disney property; who wants to have to clean it all off? There's only cardboard straws at Animal Kingdom, so the bird population won't choke on them.
My favorite things at disney: Soarin' (I <3 patrick wharburton), the ginger ice cream at the china pavilion, the Dino Dig, Dole whip, the beds at Saratoga Springs, Bongos, the Coke from Israel and Mozambique at Ice Station Cool, the tabi sock selection at the japan pavilion, the dancing skeletons at mexico, and having ibis hanging out 3 feet from me.
This weekend, we had a tournament for lordxur's birthday (I was the runner up, and I got Pez), and then we went to Kaiju Big Battel! I haven't been to Kaiju in years, and it was more rad than I remembered. For those not in the know, Kaiju Big Battel is a bunch of people dressing up in Godzilla-style monster costumes, and doing WWF style wrestling. Pure awesome. Then we just managed to make the show of 4Radio, which is Mark holcomb/MC Ink rapping, and that was really good, rev met some old friends he hadn't seen in awhile, and then we retreated to jersey for diner.
Now, I'm going to go continue the virtuous path I started this week, and work on cleaning out the basement.
In a bit. /wink

I made mention of the game we're working on in my last post. It's kind of hushhushy, so please don't say much other than amongst yourselves. This is probably unecessary, but just in case.

So here's a post that I wanted to make before the holiday season got too far behind us.
As anyone who has been in a grocery store, convenience store, or any other place wherein they purvey comestibles knows, food manufacturers have gotten into the practice of releasing "limited time" holiday flavors. I have had the opportunity to sample a number of these products this season, and here, for your edification, are my ratings.

Wish I had tried- Cranberry Cinnamon Bread by Pepperidge Farms. Ok, I never got to try it, but what could be wrong with that?
Very good- Stash Christmas tea set. Got this as a Xmas present from Yshua. 5 types of tea; English Breakfast, Chai Masala, Green Mint, White with ginger and mint, and a Christmassy herbal. It you like tea, it is ftw.
Very good- Honey Maid Gingerbread Flavor Graham Crackers. Now, I have an almost unnatural love of ginger, so I tried these with high hopes. On my first try I was rather disappointed, but I must have just had numb taste buds or something, because the second time around I really got the palpable ginger kick I was looking for. Excellent for making ghetto gingerbread houses. I wish I had bought more.
Best- Hands down, the Starbucks Dark Chocolate Peppermint Frappucino (the kind in the little glass bottle). I stocked up on extra of this one. To any of you who were lucky enough to know what a Frango(tm) mint was, it tastes exactly like one. Which, to me, means like it tastes like a Christmas morning in childhood. Not too sweet, with a perfect mint aroma and flavor.

Notably awful- Jones soda Co. has developed a reputation for making odd flavors of soda. A few years ago, they took this to a Dr. Badplan extreme by releasing the Holiday pack. The Holiday pack contains flavors like Turkey with gravy, Brussel Sprouts, Stuffing, and Pepto Bismol, depending on what year you went insane and bought one. About 2 or 3 years ago, my dearest love bought not one, but two Holiday packs. A tasting ensued, and while I was smart enough to refrain, the expressions were priceless. Apparently, not only were the expected flavors awful, but Jones had the effronetry to make them diet! Eeeuww.
Cut to this Xmas season. My friend Pirate Dan has a visit from Dr Badplan, and concieves of the Double Turkey; Wild Turkey whiskey with Turkey soda. We still have a (2 or 3 years old) Holiday pack. Our friend Foley is coming to town. The stars aligned, and a Bad Plan was brought to fruition. For the record, the Double Turkey tastes like a cut rate bourbon that someone spit in. The alcohol cuts most of the awful, but it's still kind of salty, with a haunting presence of the soda.
Somewhere, there is video of this.

And there you have it. Gratuitous holiday flavor, at your service.

Been a while, but the new year's been a but of a stunner. Lessee...news.
- Due to my shop manager's poor planning, I got shafted for work over the holidays. Time off, yay, 7.21$ paycheck for a week, boo. Things are picking up, and we'll likely be slammed soon, but things are stretched just a haaaaair tight right now.
- The truck is dead. It started making bad muffler noises. We take it to mechanic, who says it's the engine. Yeeek. Fortunately, we hadn't managed to get rid of Yshua's old car, so we still have wheels, but it's going from a 2002 ford explorer to a 1992 ford tempo. Wish the lil white car luck...
- I broke Rev's ipod. Go me. So he has mine now.
- Due to the advent of Rock Band, which is a game I can really get behind (I am craptacular at the guitar, but singing I can do.), Rev is jonesing ever more for a drum set. Also, he's had an invite from a friends band who's drummer is apparently insane. Anyone got a set of drums they aren't using?
-Lots of travel plans for future. First we go down to Fla, to see rhrackman and equusregia. (thanks mom!) Then in April we're planning on going to GAMA (gaming trade show convention) to debut and hopefully talk someone into buying/investing in the game that Rev, Yshua, lordxur, myself, and a few others have been working on. Well, and to be in Vegas, let's be honest. Late in August, we're to go out to Seattle way to have a family reunion. Then, Xmas in Chicago. (For those of you in MA, this is why I never make it out anymore. We have a pull out couch though...)
- Draping classes. As I'm feeling waaay out of practice, I've been thinking about taking a refresher class, or three. So let's hope that Carelli gets a whole lotta work, or that I can convince FIT that I live in NY. (it's a state uni, who knew? but in-state classes are 3hundred something, out of state are a grand. yikes.)
- Saw Cloverfield. I found it awesome, I think it should be seen.

In summary, it's been a dodgy start to my '08, but hopefully things will go uphill. *knocking on wood, wicker, head* At least I seem to have reached a temporary Zen level of "aahh, fuck it" ness. New York hasn't *actually* been eaten by a Great Old One, so I'm ok.

And now, cereal.

Tucked up snug in my bed, still full from dinner, sleepy and looking back over the christmas weekend.

My parents came out from chicago to visit me, and it's been wonderful. There is a bit of a challenge in adjusting to my father's physical limitations with the parkinson's, but he's still Dad, just on a slower rpm.
The first night we went to the opera with my folks, revstompy's dad, his girlfriend, and stomp and I. We got dinner at this crazy italian place beforehand, which included, and I'm not kidding, a dessert that came in 2 buckets. The chocolate mousse to share comes in 2 ice bucket sized buckets, one for mousse, one for whipped cream. OMG such awesome fatness, I can hardly speak.
Saturday my mom and I went to the greenmarket in union square, and got a bunch of shopping done at the holiday market there. I've been dying to take my mom to the greenmarket, and it was lovely to wander around with just her and peruse the deliciousness in a way that would likely have been maddening to anyone else. Stomp and my dad got breakfast, and then reinforced the notoriously rickety chairs in my father-in-law's house for company. Afterwards we fell over, and then saw Sweeney Todd. I loves that musical, I loves it good, and they did it very well, I think.
Sunday was more relaxing, Christmas Eve was mainly setting up for the dinner and pile o' swag. I haven't seen a christmas tree that packed in a long time, and with some real winners on the present end.
Stomp and I stayed at Maplewood, but for some reason decided to try and sleep on the couch rather than the downstairs bed. Ouch. So this morning was bagels instead of the original french toast idea. Then we acquired a Piratedan, which was nice. It's been a while since we had him around for the holidays. Then stocking presents, and then the rib roast. Oof.
So now back in JC, to give our lil dog her christmas gift of a new ball, and to kick back with some WoW. Tomorrow, the best sushi in New Jersey.

Thumbs up on Xmas this year!

I have a long string of media nerds that I've crushed on: Joel Hodgeson, Alton Brown, the Johns from TMBG, and now after seeing some old black and white footage, I have to add Tom Lehrer to the list....which it now occurs to me dovetails with my Noel Bennet from Heroes crush. Same glasses, similar smile...
Gonna go hug my nerd now.

Thought I should update, as my last post was kind of unrelievedly grumpy. Work has slowed down a bit, and while I will certainly miss the extra money from the overtime, this is the first time in...3 weeks? that I've had a Saturday off. Thoroughly enjoyable, I must say. Got the kitchen cleaned and rearranged in time for the now regularly scheduled (whoo new management at my apt building) exterminator to dome see about the mice, cleaned the bathroom, got the remnants of the halloween costume explosion out of the living room, finally assembled the new shelves so we have a big bookcase freed up, and can finally bring some more books from maplewood. Went to a sooper cheap music store, so I have some new music to add to our sadly overworked collection at work come Monday, and had a lovely date with my husband. Then today was tremedously lazy. I spent a lot of time on my new interwub addiction, Shelfari. I'd link it, but I'm just _that_ lazy today. But it's basically a place to put up books that you've read, and you can look at other people's "shelves". The reason I'm so addicted, is that instead of searching out the books that I've read, I look at other people's shelves and see what they have that I've read. Strangely but ceratinly compelling. Also catching up on xkcd, which I'm sure most of you know, but is an awesome webcomic.
A note about halloween: the new plan is, henceforth, (unless it falls on a weekend) to throw together a costume but not fret too much about it, head to union square, meet some friends for dinner, hang out in the park for a while, get some chocolate, and then head home. Simple, relatively easy to coordinate, not too expensive, and a minor amount of crowd surfing.

So hopefully things won't explode later this week, just as I've started to relax. There is still a lot that needs fixin', but it's really nice to at least have had a break. Perhaps when the car stalls out on 78 later this week, I can remember the cinnnamon butter on my french toast this morning.

The Honeycrisp apple. I do not jest, the fact that honeycrisps have been in season has, I think, done a lot to prevent me from bursting my bud of calm, and blossoming into hysteria. Very sweet, yet still slightly tart, extremely crisp (as the name would suggest) they are my favorite apple.

This moment of zen brought to you by the Honeycrisp apple.