Look at my sexy facial hair, oh man hot damn it's everywhere! Wednesday, August 6, 2008

First of all, I would like to make the observation that many others have: John McCain is dumb. Did you really think you could get away with using Paris Hilton's face in your commercial (insinuating that Obama is a celebrity the likes of Britney Spears and the aforementioned Hilton) without getting some flack? Like... perhaps from her parents? Who donated money to your campaign? (insert golf claps here). Luckily, Paris Hilton is a clever lady and responded with an ad of her own.

McCain's ad:

Hilton's response (hope you don't mind the new image for the White House)

See more Paris Hilton videos at Funny or Die



I have been a little camera shy lately. That is, I've been a little shy about using my camera. Not sure why, just haven't been taking many pictures. But Sunday after Farmer's Market I really had to bring it out to document my gratitude for the summer bounty of Pacific Northwest farms.

I spent 15 minutes at Farmer's Market (due to arriving at 2:45 and the market closing at 3:00). I came with a $20 bill in my pocket. I left with change in my pocket and all the above in my bag. That's 3 zucchinis, 1 red bell pepper, 2 heads of broccoli, 1 yellow squash, 2 carrots, 1 cucumber, 1 head of lettuce, 4 heirloom tomatoes, 3 ears of corn, a bunch of basil, and a container of marionberries. Wow. I love the world.

That would cost upwards of $40 at Whole Foods, and half of it would be organic, but imported from New Zealand. And honestly, what's the point of farming organic if you're going to transport it half way around the world? Seriously. Babysteps, people, that's my philosophy. Start by eating local, and do what you can from there. I use the lovely Elona's rule of trying to eat food from no further than 1 state away. It's working pretty well, but I'm not giving up coffee any time soon, and there's some packaged food we're still getting, too. But really, we eat so little packaged food compared to the amount of fresh we eat that I feel ok for now about it.

The new hippie-rific goal is to try not to eat food that has corn in it that obviously shouldn't. What is corn doing in my soda? Or my ice cream? Gross, people. I feel like it shouldn't have corn in it unless it's corn flavored. And I really don't want corn soda. But if you do, I won't judge you, I promise.


I haven't really been listening to music lately, since I listen to NPR basically solidly from 8 to 5. My iPod sits for days at a time, battery dead, music tired and listened to too many times. Sometimes I turn on the radio to another station (but only if there's a repeat broadcast on NPR), but basically it's just news. This trend is partially because listening to constantly changing and updating news all day is way more interesting than music most of the time, and also because I'm bored of my music. So I got more! Rob and I went to Everyday Music last week and together got 4 CDs. New music of mine:
  • Old 97's Blame It On Gravity (Choice track: No Baby I) (Thank you, Terri Gross, for introducing me to the lead singer, Rhett Miller, on Fresh Air)
  • The Long Winters Putting the Days to Bed (Choice track: Pushover)
  • The Builders and the Butchers (Choice track: Black Dresses)
  • Natalie Portman's Shaved Head (Choice track: Me + Yr Daughter)


And now for your moment of zen:

(courtesy of Rob, who left that picture on my camera)

Bonus moment of zen: Rob also just pointed out that Obama went to school from 1975 to 1979. Try to imagine our hopeful future president with an afro, bellbottoms, doing the hustle. DO IT.

She claims she was the inspiration for the song, 'My Sharona'. Monday, July 28, 2008

I sat down with something to say and now can't remember what it was. That seems to be happening a lot lately.

So instead I will say this:

  • The Old 97's make me quite happy.

  • We move in just under a month.

  • I left for Budapest almost a year ago (August 15th will mark that anniversary).

  • My hair is responding well to my hippydome and I can now go 3-4 days without washing my hair.

  • Uncon was lovely

  • I am very unsuccessfully trying to find some sort of cart or storage system for my arts and crafts supplies that is clean and uncluttered. No one seems to have what I want for a reasonable price.

  • The Mountain Goats are coming back to Portland in October! October 21st, to be exact.
I need to be better about keeping this updated. I've been a little technophobic as of late.

Oops Thursday, July 17, 2008

Somewhere in the last week or two I grew up. I got a job. I'm pretty sure my official title is Temp, but I'm cataloging files in a warehouse. The work is pretty mindless now that I've gotten the hang of it, and they don't mind what we where or if I listen to NPR on my phone headset ALL DAMN DAY (8-5). I think Rob is probably getting sick of all of my conversations starting with either, "Ok so at work..." and, "There was this thing on NPR..." Whatever. I have a grown up job. And I'm getting paid more than I was last week, which was $0.

I've also progressively been becoming more and more of a hippie. First it was hangdrying clothes... then saving and reusing plastic bags... then trying to get my body off shampoo? I mean, you know how you get addicted to chapstick? You put it on and it relieves you until it wears off, and your "...lips hurt real bad" (N. Dynamite). And you need chapstick again. So hair has that same cyclic relationship with shampoo. So I'm trying to break the cycle by first switching to natural shampoo, then switching to baking soda and vinegar. It's still washing my hair, but it's without all the chemicals and hopefully my hair will be healthier thanks to it.

This weekend is the second annual uncon, which I'm very excited about, but don't have time to explain, since it's 7:24 and I need to leave for work.

We're gonna sail through the night sky like a pair of bottle rockets! Wednesday, July 9, 2008

So maybe we had another big old weekend love-in at our apartment for 4th of July. Whatever, these things happen.

This 4th was my first experience with home projectile fireworks. They're pretty cool, turns out. I didn't really understand what all the fuss was about when Rob was buying a small fortune's worth. Now I do. They're big and shiny and go BOOM. That's a good enough reason. On top of home projectile fireworks, we also live in the town that hosts the biggest 4th of July fireworks display west of the Mississippi, and that's pretty cool, too.

Me, Anny and Kate on the bus to the fireworks.

Bored, waiting for the fireworks to start, Anny and Kate decided to play airplane.

WE MADE THAT HAPPEN. ZOMG.

Sweet people Saturday morning.

I did a few haircuts on Saturday. This is Rob's (with a Lizzy).

Zoe's pink Mohawk I made.

Stephen is actually Harry Potter. No joke.

Pretty sparkly things.

Tonight we're going to see Hapa at the zoo, tomorrow we're going down to Corvallis, and then up to Seattle on Saturday to see Eddie Izzard!

Friends Saturday, June 28, 2008

The last several weeks I have been spending an inordinate amount of time with con friends, etc. And it's only going to continue throughout the rest of July, and I'm sure the rest of the summer. I choose to illustrate this through photojournalism!

First of all, Laura graducated on June 13th - Yaaay Laura!

Saturday morning after Laura's graduation we drove up to Seattle to play in Dev's ballpit, picking up Steve and Zoe in Portland. Most people had been there Friday night, so by the time we got there Saturday afternoon, everyone had left to do their own thing. Things picked up pretty quickly, though.

Hee hee. Poopa.

Kate and Dev, proud ballbit owners.

Okay so maybe we sorted the balls.


Miriam and James

Nooooo!
Lazy Sunday.

The next weekend we drove up to Port Townsend to hang out at Rob's parents' house. Kate and Dev and PJ decided to join, just because Port Townsend is that special.

Family portrait?

Kate was seriously ready for breakfast.

Swinging!

Silly, sweet happy people rolling down the hill at the park

Kate found a friend on the beach.

Spider Monkey?


Rob and Kate at the Fort (we were there for a benefit for The Boiler Room, a volunteer led coffee shop in PT that does something amazing for the youth and young adult community - gives them a space to hang out, make art and get work experience. I wish Corvallis had something like that!)

On our way back to Vancouver we stopped on the reservation to pick up fireworks.

Eat your heart out, Oregon! These bitches aren't illegal in Washington!

On Wednesday night of this last week, Rob and I and Steve and Zoe went to McMennamin's for dinner, and then Oaks Park, a crappy amusement park in Portland with about 15 rides (but fairly cheap ride bracelets and no lines on a Wednesday night... so who's complaining?)

On the Scrambler

Suuuper creepy

The slide I refused to go down, because I didn't want to recreate the alpine slide incident... Notice Zoe's posture, and the name of the slide itself. "Big Pink - the ham flavored gum that pinkens your teeth while you chew!" - Futurama.

Zoe and Steve on the tiny train


And now it's the weekend and almost July! And Summer's finally starting! And I got my bike fixed up yesterday! I put road tires on my mountain bike, which was way less of a hassle than selling my mountain bike and buying a used road bike. For serious.

Bumbershoot Thursday, June 26, 2008

Holy crapola, Francesca Lia Block (favorite author in high school) AND Sherman Alexie (favorite author introduced to me in college) are speaking at Bumbershoot. Now I'm basically required to go.

Also summer classes are ending tomorrow and I dyed my hair normal-ish. Maybe now I'll start getting call-backs after interviews. Sigh.

Adventures of the Pedo-grill Friday, June 13, 2008

A few weeks ago our sketchy next door neighbors moved out in a big hurry. Two days later the sheriff's department came by in the morning and asked if we knew the whereabouts of the sketchy husband. Turns out he was wanted in the state of Oregon for his penchant for 12-14 year old girls. Gross. We'd all been friendly with them. The husband fixed Rob's speakers, and we gave him and his wife a table we didn't want. We always said hi when we ran into them. Now it turns out they're seriously sketchy.

In their haste to move out, they left a small shelf beside their door that they'd kept an ashtray on. On one of the lower shelves was a small (maybe 1.5' by 1.5') cheap propane grill. I decided that because of the emotional distress they'd placed on us, I was going to take the grill for myself. Whatever, they were long gone to Colorado by that point.

The grill was nasty. Like, used once a week for a couple years and never cleaned nasty. Used to cook lots of fatty meat nasty. I stuck it on our back porch and promised I'd clean it soon, and once I did we'd have grilled asparagus. But then it sat back there for a couple weeks. Last Sunday I decided it was finally time to clean it. It took me over 2 hours, 2 Scotchbrite pads, and about 8-10 paper towels. I had the sick feeling while I was cleaning it that maybe after all this disgusting travail, it wasn't even going to work.

We'd been planning on having salad and spaghetti for dinner, but after all that we were going to use the goddamn grill. After a quick trip to Freddie's for hot dogs, buns and propane, we were ready.

And oh happy day, the grill worked!

The fruits of my labor:




This weekend it's off to Seattle to play in Dev's ballpit and hang out with UUs... hooray! <3

Brought to you by Morning Edition Wednesday, June 4, 2008

I was truly inspired by the story of Amber Alibhai on Morning Edition today. Check her out, she's doing some pretty amazing things.

Life is good. We're going to the Rose Festival this weekend! And to Corvallis/Seattle the weekend after that! And Port Townsend the weekend after that! And it's worth mentioning that I only have 3 and a half weeks of class left. I'm a little sad, since I'm really loving my classes, but with a gallon of gas at $4.059 in the cheapest gas station in Hazel Dell (along with your standard environmentalist wish to drive less), I'm going to be really pleased to not be commuting a total of almost 38 miles daily.

Good News! (Election Coverage, etc) Tuesday, June 3, 2008

  • Dick Cheney is really dumb
  • Goats on a TriMet!
  • McCain's speech in Kenner, Louisiana (currently being viewed) is a whole lot of negative, anti-Obama, 'vote for me, I'm not Bush' bs and it makes me sad.
  • We're having potatoes, chicken and asparagus for dinner.
  • Obama made the democratic nomination!

Life is pretty exciting, huh?

Confessions of a futon-revolutionist. Saturday, May 31, 2008

...somewhere love and justice shine.
Cynicism falls asleep.
Tyranny talks to itself.
Sappy slogans all come true.
We forget to feed our fear.
--The Weakerthans


There is a new link on the left, titled "I make stuff". Go there. It is a gallery that will be routinely updated with stuff I make. Hair timeline has also been updated to show new color.


There was a really amazing storm prequel last Sunday night and I took bajillions of pictures. These two are the best, I think. The second one looks tiny, but really you should click on it. That's my apartment complex, as viewed from our balcony. I put the pictures all together in Canon PhotoStitch


I was sick last weekend (still am, actually) so instead of doing anything cool for the holiday weekend, we stayed home, watched movies, made jell-o, played cards and got bored. It was fun.

Devon is moving back to San Fransisco so we had our very last Sushi Takahashi date for the time being. I will miss you, schmev.

Tonight we're having a grad party for me and Rachelle. I also have to write a 4 to 6 page paper about Citizen Kane, and do some Abstract Algebra. All before Tuesday. Oh, I can totally do that.