Vote Denver for BlogHer 09
If you do, you’ll make TW’s mom happy. We haven’t seen her in years … seriously. 🙁
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Queer
Queer is a book that’s on my From the Stacks Challenge list and I really wish I’d just left it on the stacks, unread.
I thought about putting it down, but I kept thinking it would get better or at least slightly less weird. Why I would have thought that, since I have read The Naked Lunch (which I liked) I dunno. But this is the kind of thing that usually prevents me from quitting a book, especially a short book.
Maybe I should have read Junky first? Oh well, too late now.
Weather in Illinois is weird
A little more than a year ago, I blogged about public service announcements and in that post I wondered whether towns and cities in the US actually used civil defense sirens. There are some good comments in that post and I heard from several people via email who weren’t sure if sirens were actually used anymore. Most people seemed to think announcements and alerts were given primarily on TV, radio and internet now because we are so plugged in.
Well, a couple of weeks ago, we were sitting here in the office and there was some weird noise outside. Neither of us really paid it any attention, we’re still getting used to the neighborhood noise and we’re in the flight path for O’Hare arrivals – so there’s a lot of noise. After a few minutes TW looked up and said “I wonder if that’ siren is a tornado alert” – she looked at the weather and sure enough… tornado warning.
Huh. Who knew?
Last night, after we had both logged off and were laying in bed with books, the siren went off again. TW said “I wonder if that means there’s a tornado watch or warning?” I grabbed the iPhone and looked at the weather report. Warning. Huh. What exactly does that mean?
TW attempted to explain tornado safety to me but I don’t really get it. I’m not at all interested in spending time in our basement and as I reminded TW our weather radio is in Florida, with Michelle, in case of hurricanes.
I kept surfing the weather report, watching for updates, and I had absolutely no idea if the tornado warning was really a warning for us. I mean I guess it was, since the siren was blaring for awhile, but it went off so shouldn’t that mean the warning was over? And then there’s the problem that I have absolutely no idea where we are in relation to any of the cities or areas listed in the tornado warning report. Where the heck is Schererville?
TW grabbed a Chicago travel guide off of the shelf to look up some of the cities listed. None of them were. Which means what? They aren’t worth visiting if you’re a tourist? Or they aren’t all that close to Chicago?
I tweeted that I didn’t understand tornado warnings or tornadoes and rocks in my dryer volunteered to explain it all to me. chilihead shared the fact that she’s lived in Oklahoma for 35 years and only taken cover three times. And when I told them both that I was just going to resign myself to die in a tornado, in bed, with a book, they both seemed to think that was an ok plan.
So, I think I’ll stick with that. But maybe spend a little time learning some Illinois geography so at least I’ll know if my time is coming – I want to be reading a really good book.
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My parents, they did it again
A long, long time ago I blogged about my parents and the weird cosmic tie they seem to have, even though they’ve been divorced for a lifetime. Since then, I haven’t had much more to report on the cosmic weirdness level. They have continued to call me almost always on the same day but otherwise, no new weirdness. Until today.
First, my mother sent me videos via email. I don’t believe she has ever sent me video before. In fact I am sure she hasn’t. Then, about an hour later, I walked out the mailbox and guess what was waiting… yep, video from my dad. He has also never sent me video, well wait. He did send me DVDs of old videos from my childhood but that’s different.
Weird. Very weird.
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Dueling Hybrids – a Side Note
Last week, TW and I went to Joy’s house so I could show her some stuff and so TW could mess up Jory’s childhood bedroom with spilled coffee from this awesome coffee pot.
After we’d worked for awhile, we took Joy out for lunch at Annie’s Pancake House. Joy hopped in the front seat, I turned on the car and she looked at the gas mileage I was getting and she was amazed to see I was getting 47 mpg.
She got her own Prius last year as a Christmas gift and she doesn’t get nearly as good gas mileage with hers. In fact, she seems to get considerably WORSE gas mileage and if mine was that low, I’d be at the dealer asking why.
Even our first tank of gas, when were driving 2 miles at a time, never quite getting up to 40mph or being able to stay at 40mph for very long in Gainesville we still got mid-30’s and higher. So why is Joy’s Prius not performing as well as mine and not even as well as my dad’s Honda hybrid?
Inquiring minds want to know. I’m tempted to take Joy’s Prius into the dealer and ask them to explain it to us.
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Starting the new “normal”
The little kids have finally arrived in Illinois. Finally. They arrived at our house yesterday afternoon and after showing their father and step-mother their new bedrooms, they dived into unpacking. OK I dived into unpacking and TW tried to dive into unpacking but we ran into some issues. The Prince was only interested in unpacking his TV and game cube. Once he got those unpacked he was too tired to unpack anything else.
Liz was very interested in unpacking but she was easily distracted when she discovered Michelle had allowed her American Girl doll to move to Illinois. From then on, Liz stood next to me with the Molly and ran commentary on whatever I unpacked. (Or Molly ran commentary on everything I unpacked.)
RJ showed no interest in unpacking. TW made the mistake of handing her the scooter and from then on, the child came in only to get some water and talk about whatever she’d been thinking while she scootered. She did head upstairs with me shortly before dinner to get her bed into place and she was interested in getting her bird lights hung up but we had some technical difficulties with that and got called down to dinner before we were successful.
They begged to watch Gilmore Girls, so after more technical problems related to TW having control of the remote control, we watched a few episodes. Liz has suggested we need to watch three a day to make up for the entire month of July. geez kid, I don’t think so.
It’s good to have them “home”. Really good but if you’re still reading, here’s where I tell you that it’s also really hard to have them here. It makes me miss the big kids even more than I already was.
The new normal isn’t going to include running into Chris in CVS or seeing him run into the LYS on Sunday just to say hello or having him stop by a couple of days before pay day to “borrow” some money or to have him drop off his laundry swearing that he’ll be back to move it to the dryer.
The new normal doesn’t include Michelle stomping around overhead, telling us all about what the dumb people at work did or the cool people at work did. It doesn’t include her talking endlessly about her wardrobe or her life plans or not talking endlessly about those things.
The new normal will be fine but right now, it’s not normal and I don’t love it.
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The Witch’s Dream
Do not ask my why I read The Witch’s Dream. I started it because I thought it was on my “From the Stacks Challenge” list. It was in the box clearly labeled “FtSC” but when I went to look at my FtSC post, it was not there. By then, I’d already added it to my books widgety thing and didn’t feel like taking it off. So, I read it.
And at first, I was really grouchy about reading it. Not only was it NOT on my challenge list, it was confusing as all hell in the beginning. TW kept saying “It’s good! You’ll like it!” (I don’t know why she insists on telling me whether something is good or bad, after that whole Kiterunner incident of 2004 I’m not really listening to her book feedback.)
I kept reading it and by the end of the first night, about 100 pages in, I was hooked. Interesting as all hell and I did actually start to like those witches, mediums, healers and whatnots.
A quick Michelle update
As I check to make sure her tuition is paid and everything is set for her to go back to classes, I thought some of you who are still lurking from the Storm School/Fast Times blog(s) might be interesting in an update. And of course, my mother is lurking (if her Kindle is letting her get here.)
I mentioned tuition, yes she did manage to get registered as a “real” college student and not a dual enrolled college student. It was touch and go for awhile but she made it. She didn’t manage to get the classes she wanted for this quarter, instead she got the classes she had planned to take next quarter.
* Human Sexuality
* Comparative Politics
* American National Govt
She’s had some rough moments, adjusting to living alone and I think she’s probably spent more time sleeping at other people’s houses or having them sleep at hers than she has actually living in her apartment “alone” with her cat. Michelle is an interesting person – she really likes people but she reaches the point where she really must get away and hide in some dark cave and regroup completely and nobody must ever bother her while she’s hiding in that dark cave. I guess that’s what she’s using her apartment for – that dark cave where she can go and regroup and just get away from all of the stupid people. 😉
Michelle is tired of her job, which is really nothing new since she quite a good long while ago and went back because they “needed her”.
Michelle is heading to Charleston this weekend with her sister and “the boy” (who will be in Florida visiting friends) and is planning on seeing her father. Willingly. That’s a first, ok not a first, but a first in a long long while. She’ll fly back to Florida next week, probably to a very empty bank account… she will be able to pay her bills on the 15th, right? 😉
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The Flame Trees of Thikka
This is another book in my From the Stacks challenge and when TW saw me reading The Flame Trees of Thikka she said – “Didn’t you read that in middle school?” Err no. I cannot imagine such thing even being in my middle school library in Charleston, SC. It certainly wouldn’t have been on the required reading list for either middle or high school. So no. I hadn’t read it or anything else by Huxley. I should read more though. Old, dated, African non-fiction – awesome. Loved it.
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Exploring our Surroundings
Yesterday morning we headed out to visit a couple of Farmer’s Markets and a few thrift stores (hoping to solve some of our kitchen organizational problems on the cheap.)
First, the Northfield Farmer’s Market. It was considerably larger than the Glenview Farmer’s Market and we left with a mini loaf of marble bread and a mini loaf of zucchini bread, some mini plums and some tiny yellow tomatoes. We skipped the other veggies, thinking we’d get some at the next FM.
Next stop, the Northbrook Historical Society Shop – not really a thrift store, but a consignment shop. It was interesting, a tiny little room, but the women working there scared me. They were talking about their “house fires” like this is an everyday thing and no big deal. House fires? Scary! Are they that common that you can chat about losing everything without a blink of an eye?
Then we headed toward Skokie in search of the Skokie Farmer’s Market. Err we found it, or found where it was supposed to be but there were no farmers! I thought maybe this was just the parking area and the market was tucked away in a village park that can’t be seen from the street – so I drove around the block and came up empty. Drove through Skokie, peering down side streets looking for signs of farmers. Nothing. Weird. Turns out it’s on SUNDAY and not SATURDAY. duh. sheesh.
Since I was starving, I was also looking for some place to eat – found something interesting but couldn’t find parking so I kept driving down Oakton, hit a cross street that had no sign and took it to Dempster since our next stop would require hitting Dempster and looking for Crawford.
We drove and drove and drove with no sign of Crawford but that was OK because I knew there was food at Chicago and Dempster and sure enough, we got there – parked on the street and jumped into a bagel shop, Bagel Art. The Green Mt. Veggie Wrap was good, so was the coffee.
We got back in the car and continued down Dempster but at this point, I had pretty much decided we had missed Crawford. Sure enough, we landed on Lake Shore and turned around. TW opened the trust iPhone map and found Crawford – turns out that cross street with no name, the one I took off of Oakton was Crawford. Hah. Whatever.
We made our way through Skokie, back through Evanston and into Chicago and found Unique which really was the most unique thrift store EVER. I cannot describe this place – tons of clothes, all of which seemed in pretty darn good shape but organized oddly so sizes were impossible to find. No furniture that would solve our kitchen needs but I found a book that I thought was a sequel to a book RJ liked – turns out it was the sequel to Angus, Thongs, and Full-Frontal Snogging and I don’t think RJ read that. Oh well, we’ll enjoy it ourselves. (The young man who rang up my book looked at the very pretty pink and green hard cover and said “awe, cute!” and opened the first page to find “On the bright side, I’m now the girl friend of a sex God.” He closed it fast and looked shocked and I laughed so hard. He did not expect THAT in such a pretty little book, being bought by a middle-aged woman.)
From there, we headed back in the direction of Niles. Took a quick detour into a Tuesday Morning which was a lot more dumpy thrift store like than we’re used to in a Thursday Morning. And it smelled funny. Still no kitchen solutions, sheesh.
We found our way to the Wings shop in Niles and we could have bought any number of great things but none of them were things we absolutely NEEDED. I can, however, see us going back there again – and again. (I would also like a word with their webmaster. Those horizontal navs should not blink. It’s unnecessary and troubling. Stop that.)
Then, we stopped at the annual Glenview Art Festival where we were once again reminded that we are not in Florida (or anywhere in the south) any longer. There were no paintings of Miami or the Keys. No alligators. And the people were talking about how much BIGGER the festival was this year. umm bigger? Also, the people were… well that’s a post for another day when I tell you about regional differences. We bought nothing and were only tempted by metal lawn art sculptures. (These folks could also use some web design help. Are there no web designers in this area????)
So – we spent about five hours roaming the “neighborhood”. It was interesting and fun in a strange way. We’re definitely not in Florida anymore.
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