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Eye-Gougin' Nadine Smythe
• Sunday, October 30, 2005 • 10:37 PM
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Tomorrow is Halloween! All the pumpkins from the patch will be made into jack-o-lanterns. I also hoping that all of the candy filling our house will be all given away to trick or treaters. I love Halloween, though I'm especially excited this year. Everyone at work has really been getting into Halloween. The entire office is decorated and tomorrow will be like a big party. There is going to be lots of food and even costumes. The costume theme is pirates. Everyone is going to be dressed as a pirate tomorrow! On Friday, one of my co-workers said "The next time you see me, I'll have a mustache!". This is a female co-worker by the way.
I have been working on a fantastic pirate costume. I'm so excited. I have to say though, that my mom really made it fantastic. She made an unbelievably cool pirate shirt for me, complete with sinister black lace. Man, that lace is truly sinister. She is an expert at sewing. I'm lucky to have her help; I'm pretty bad at sewing. My dad loaned me a reproduction dress sword. It looks very pirate-esque. I contributed the boots, pants, and most of the accessories. I did a costume test run this weekend and oh man, this costume is going to be sooo much fun. I had the bf take some pictures tonight, but I will have to post them tomorrow.
I'm bringing a bunch of stuff to work tomorrow. I volunteered to bring paper plates, cups, etc. I also agreed to bring ice cream and soda for floats. I was hoping to get out the ice cream maker, but ended up not having enough time. I copped out and bought some french vanilla. I also decided that everyone needs a jolly roger flag. So, I got felt and cut out enough skull and cross bones for everyone to have their own miniature pirate flags. And as if that wasn't overdoing it, I made a pirate lingo printout with pirate vocabulary to aid in our pirate impersonations. I discovered some interesting pirate websites in the process. I found a pirate translator as well as a pirate name generator. The pirate translator is mildly amusing. My randomly generated pirate name is Eye-Gougin' Nadine Smythe. Or, Dread Pirate Rackham if you go by this mini-quiz name generator.
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Pumpkins!
• 10:15 PM
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Yay for pumpkins and yay for pumpkin patches! Last weekend, we drove out into the country to visit a pumpkin patch. A large beige storage barn marked the farm. When we pulled up, a man greeted us and gave us a metal garden cart. It was a beautiful place. The patch was in the middle of an apple orchard. We walked through rows of twiggy apple trees, their branches twisting up towards the sky. The were tiny birds congregating on the branches. Just when we were beginning to wonder just exactly where the pumpkins were, we saw orange dotting the slope. There were lots of tangled vines and pumpkins of all shapes and sizes. We had to twist and rip them off of the vine. We got as many as we could pull! After pulling the cart uphill back to the barn, we found that the barn was full of bins of apples. We ended up buying a big bag full of apples. It's a week later, and I still haven't used them all up. I think apple turnovers are in order. They are very pretty though; they are filling up containers with are scattered all over the kitchen. We also bought a jar of apple butter, which is not lasting. There is only about 1/3 of it left. It was a very satisfying day. My boyfriend even told me that he was glad that I had made him go :) We had a lot of fun together.
 
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Finally, Here's a Post
• Sunday, October 23, 2005 • 7:23 PM
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No, I did not abandon my blog. I feel lame for not having kept up. The lack of posts this past week did not mean that nothing was happening though; in fact, it was quite the opposite! I'll start all the way back with last weekend:
I went to two parties and made two cakes. The first party was Alex's existential birthday party. Alex's re-do cake turned out even better than the original. Maybe I'll just claim that it was a test cake... yeah.... So anyway, an awesome time was had by all. I hadn't met most of the other people at the party before, but everyone was good company. I really enjoyed talking to everyone. Alex had put up posters all over his walls with existential quotes on them. There was a reading of one of Alex's recent plays (he writes plays) as well as reading of existential quotes. We also entertained ourselves with food (Alex made some awesome dip), wine, and a couple of partygoers made a "modern art piece" with Alex's refrigerator magnets. There were a lot of interesting intrepretations of the "installation". The party went on until about 1:30 when Alex kicked us out. And not to brag, but my cake was a big hit. Someone told me that they thought it had come from an expensive bakery. HA! We also used a whole package of birthday candles on it. It was glorious.
 
The cake was yellow cake with chocolate icing (again). Oh yes, I took the "test-cake" to work; they enjoyed it, so it didn't go to waste as I had feared it would.
The second party was for Anthony and Mike, who have very close birthdays. We met at T.K. Brothers, a restaurant and game place. It was so good to see everybody. I haven't seen that group much since Anna and Anthony moved away. Almost everyone was there; there were about 18 of us there. We took up two long tables. The place mostly had meaty stuff, but I did eat some very delicious squash soup. It was awesome. The portions were huge by the way. I also played an incredibly long game of darts. I don't think that I had ever played darts before. We ended up walking to the dart board and stabbing it with darts just so the game would end. Oh, and I missed my target while I was standing less than a foot from the board. Haha. I'm spectacular. There was a scary, scary soccer theme pinball game. There was also a large Fast and the Furious linked racing game. Mark was winning a lot. Then, he turned and asked if his gas pedal should move; it was broken and thus constantly floored! After games, a few of us left to go to a bar, but it was packed (homecoming weekend for Mizzou). So, we went to a second bar. Though, the boyfriend and I had to wait a few minutes for someone else to come out so that we could get in. When closing time came, my boyfriend decided that he was tired and went home. About five of us went to Sanchez's house to hang out. Sanchez was showing us his golf swing, but ended up shattering a full length mirror propped up in his living room. Glass went everywhere. His swing is awesome, apparently. ;) After golf, it was on to drunken fooseball. I won, because I was the only one playing that had not been drinking. Anna and Anthony gave me a ride home, at about three. It was a great time. And it might all happen again; there might be a big trip to Las Vegas in the works. I've never been there; ironically, I don't drink or gamble, but with these guys, I'm sure I'd have fun. Plus, there have to be lots of pinball games there, right?
 
Here's the cake I made for Mike and Anthony. It was chocolate with fluffy white icing. It slid a little in the car.
I was soooo tired after last weekend. Even so, I kept staying up until two or three a.m. almost all week. I had lots of stuff to work on, including finishing up the maps for my new "graphic artist" job. I found out that my official job title is "Graphic Articst II. That makes me sound way more important/cool than I actually am. This week was the deadline for my first project. It came out pretty good. I was pleased, and I think that my boss was, too. It was a relief to get it done. As soon as I got that done, on Wednesday, we decided to have "happy hour" Thursday. A group of our Anthro friends get together on most Thursdays at Neil and Eliana's house or a restaurant. This time, everyone came over to our house for homemade pizza. I made the dough in my bread maker (whole wheat dough, yum) and our friends contributed to the toppings. Nicole also brought some really good frozen cream puffs. Oh man, she left the rest of the box with us. I think that was a dangerous idea. The pizza turned out really good, though the first one stuck to my pizza stone. Neil was our hero and managed to cut it off without damaging it. Thanks Neil! Tom had to leave to go to choir before the pizza was done, so we begged him to come back afterwards to pick up a slice. I felt very sorry for him, and was very relived when he did in fact come back. He got three slices to take home.
Yesterday, I drove to Kansas City to help my mom with her garage sale. We ended up getting rained out, but it was still fun. I went through my old trunk of costume/dress up clothes that I played with when I was a kid. Some of those things are really cool; I'm not above borrowing from the costume trunk. Of course, now, the clothes actually fit me. There were some great vintage things in there. There were also some horrible leotard/sequin numbers in there. Oh man, those went into Goodwill pile. I'm so grateful that there are no pictures of me as a kid playing in those. After the sale got totally washed out, we decided to get some hot food. We also ended up going to the $1 store. Haha, they had some really strange things. Including and Lord of the Sun brand sword that looked suspiciously like Frodo's sword, Sting, in the Lord of the Rings movie. But, I did buy some really cool giant stickers. I have big plans for my giant stickers. Whooooo!
So while I've been busy, I have been having fun. Lots of fun. I even had fun today, but this post is so huge that I'm going to write another one.
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Sucessful Rescue
• Monday, October 10, 2005 • 12:44 AM
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Last weekend I was able to rescue my camera phone pictures. Stupidly, I can't send pictures when I'm in Columbia. I can send pictures when I'm in Kansas City, though. So, I sent them to my email account. Now you can see my gloriously blurry Wilco shots:
 
As you can see, we started out quite far from the stage, but gradually worked our way up until we were pretty close.
I also rescued this picture of Mr. Mister. He was sooo sleepy.
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Foibles, etc.
• Saturday, October 08, 2005 • 10:19 PM
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I finished putting everything away on my new shelves today. I really like how it turned out. It looks really nice, I'm glad that I bought them. My studio/crafty room was kind of torn up after the flood, but finally things are all neat again. I even felt like working down there today after I was finished putting everything away. I finished a micro-project that I had been meaning to do for awhile now. My great grandma moved into a nursing home this summer, so all of her belongings have to have her name on them. I gave her some really soft fuzzy pink socks (she likes very "girly" things) last Christmas that I think she really liked. When she moved, they couldn't write her name on them because they were so fuzzy. She was worried that they would get lost in the wash. So, I bought her two new pairs of fuzzy socks, plus two regular pairs that I thought she would like. I wrote her name on ribbon with fabric paint and sewed the ribbons onto the socks. So, now she won't have to worry about them getting lost. Yay!
 
Here's my new shelves. I like the orange. I also cleaned out my fish thank, sitting on the top shelf. I'm going to get a betta for it tomorrow. Also, Sock Monkey is posing here. He washed up nicely. His ears are just as floppy as ever.
And now for a less satisfactory story: Last night I came home from work and made a birthday cake for my friend, Alex. He decided to have a birthday party, and I was excited about going. So, I made the cake to his specifications (yellow cake with chocolate frosting). It turned out to be cute, yay! I used eggs from our hens. It made the cake a very pretty yellow. I piped icing around the edge of the cake and sprinkled the top with non-pareils. It was going so well, and I was even on time! For once! I found a box and used towels to stabilize the cake. I even seat-belted the cake into the car seat. When I got there, I noticed everything looked pretty dark. So, I got paranoid. And apparently with good reason. As it turns out, the party is NEXT WEEK!!!! Why am I such a doofus? Anyway, Alex had told me that today is his birthday awhile ago, and my wonderful brain assumed that the party would therefore be this week. Anyway, now I have a very nice cake in my fridge. I'm not sure what to do with it, so if you want some, let me know, hehe. We can have an unbirthday party.
 
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Update: I am not a fax
• Thursday, October 06, 2005 • 12:37 PM
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The mysterious beeping caller stopped. Finally. I guess it decided I'm not a fax machine after all.
______________________________________________
Ironically, I learned to use the fax machine today at work. Though my fax didn't go through. I hope someone else doesn't have three messages on their answering machine consisting solely of beeps now.
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BEEP ... BEEP
• 12:10 PM
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I've been busy this week painting and putting together some wooden shelves for my studio/crafy room. I painted them "pumpkin" orange. I like them a lot, they seem sturdy, though they don't stand up quite straight. I'm organizing all of my design books, sewing books, origami books, magazines, etc. on them. Mao definitely approves of the new digs.
I also got hired for a side project, doing diagrams and such for an Anthropologist. She needs them for her research papers. So, at the moment, I'm busy altering maps.
I've been coming home on my lunch breaks and letting the chickens out in the yard to play. They always seem glad to see me. They've been laying incredible amounts of eggs, two and three eggs each day. We can't keep up with them, we have a perpetual dozen eggs in the fridge.
Oh man, some place that registers as "HLTH HUMAN SVCS" on the caller id is calling me literally every 4 minutes. When I answer, I just hear a repetitive beeping sound. I stayed on the line once, just to see what happens. Eventually it just hangs up. Undiscouraged, it just called back. Weird. And annoying. Whatever it is, I hope it gives up soon. There are three messages on our answering machine consisting of beeps.
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Ye Olde Blog Update
• Monday, October 03, 2005 • 6:04 PM
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This weekend I drove to Kansas City to visit my parents and go to the Renaissance Festival. Yay! It was fun. There were a lot of terrible skits, belly dancers, and tights. Lots of tights.
I saw quite a few people I recognized. The "king" is my parents' neighbor and my dad's best friend. My dad made his crown. We got to see him marching around with all sorts of crazy costumed people following him. But the king was not the only neighbor of ours there. I saw the Maupin family from around the corner there, too, all together in costume. One of the daughters, a childhood friend, married one of my high school friends, Jon. He was there, too. He just got back from Iraq; I was really glad to see him. They had great costumes. I especially liked Sheryl's hat.
From left to right: Jon, Jesse, and Sheryl. Bill (Sheryl's husband) was also there, but thought he wasn't "dressed up" enough to be in the picture. Silly Bill.
We had a lot of fun. There were a lot of interesting booths, though my favorite has always been one called Wolf in Sheep's Clothing. They sell woven things, knitted things, yarn, and wool. The weaving has actually not been part of the shop for the last two years. Unfortunately, I found out that they lady who does the weaving got MS. She is shop partners with the knitting lady, who's husband rode in a 100 mile bicycle ride for MS, which I thought was very sweet. Anyway, most of the yarn is hand spun on a spinning wheel and the clothing is knitted by hand. I was oogling over the yarn. My mom bought some wool; she has a spinning wheel and is learning to spin wool. She also bought be a green knitted poncho. I know, a knitted poncho sounds kinda dorky, but it's cool, really.
 
I love all of the colors together. Most of these are also hand dyed.
Going along with the wool theme, they had quite an array of fuzzy things at the petting zoo. Sheep, goats, ducks, a pig (maybe a pig isn't so fuzzy?). My favorite was the llama.
There was a kid that was even more excited about the llama than I was. You can see him waving at the llama, off of the edge of the photo.
There were a lot of strange sights at the Ren Fest. The strangest by far though (and this is saying a lot) was a booth, well, an elaborate tent actually, stocked with something called Chameleon clothing. One garment of clothing had so many zippers, velcro apitures, and who knows what that it could be worn as a whole chart of hilarious running shorts, dresses, pants, and capes. It also turned into a sleeping bag. It was ingenious in a way, but not so much that it wasn't a little freakish. I felt like I was trapped in some sort of hippie infomercial. And to top it all off, the woman working the tent (which probably turns into a hammock or canoe) was wearing one currently in pant form. She excitedly announced, "My pants turn into a dress. Wanna see?" I should have said yes.
Of course, we couldn't just go straight to the Ren Fair, no, we stopped at the thrift store on the way. Hehe. I got a sock monkey! With strange floppy dog-like ears. He's strangely likable. Since he looks like some sort of strange monkey-dog creature, I started calling him M-Dogg. But he's not a very good rapper (too soft), so I guess I'll have to think of something else. He's in the washing machine now, swishing around. His ears are probably flopping around in there.
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