Movie and Media Madness...

1. Ice Age 2: The Meltdown is entertaining, but not as focused as the original. The theatre was surprisingly packed.

2. Sharon Stone really annoys me. The Smoking Gun has published her "Perks" list for filming the undoubted crap that is Basic Instinct 2.

3. If you think Iran is being fairly represented in the Western media, check out this thread, "The True Iran and its People" on Iran Defense.

4. The Faculty is a better film than you'd expect. Solid script, great cast, great direction. Entertaining time after time.

5. I'm about to watch Mr Blandings Builds his Dreamhouse for around the 5th time... I really ought to buy it.



tags: movies, media

Things I learned this week.

1. Jell-O™ can go mouldy in the fridge. It just takes 4 or 5 weeks.

2. A handy tip for easier cleaning of clumping litter from litterboxes: spray the box with Pam™ Non-Stick Spray before putting in the litter.

3. I can follow through on the things on my to-do list that keep getting pushed to the bottom of the list. I now have an appointment to take the van in for repair tomorrow, and the CuppaJoe Cozies are now available for sale at Solstice Cafe in Victoria. Yay!

4. Apparently I have either hidden or purged most of my craft books. Luckily the web is full of inspiration: on Flickr, at DickBlick and of course in Google Images (oh, and btw, how cute is this Cup of Yarn kit??).



tags: useless knowledge, tips, inspiration, ideas, crafts, crafting.

Upcoming project...

I've been pondering how to make one of these. Now I know: Super Simple Light Tent



tags: photography, diy

Total Eclipse Photos

Nifty. There was a total solar eclipse yesterday. We couldn't see it here, but many Flickr users did: Flickr: Photos tagged with eclipse

Tags: science, astronomy, eclipse, Flickr

Gathering no more dust...

... well, not as a kit in the drawer. Now the actual creations can start gathering dust:

The kit was purchased in November 2004 (yep. really. the receipt was stuffed in the box). I paid a whole 29 cents at Sally Ann -- it was one of those "bargains" I couldn't pass up. I am trying to work through my stash over the next month or so... and this kit was on the top of my "craft overflow" drawer. The kit was complete except for the instructions, so I just tried to recreate what was on the cover.

Now I am off to create something more interesting.



tags: usewhatyouhave, usewhatyouhaveapril, crafts, craft kit, wirecraft.

More "books as art"

Jim Roseneau has a wicked sense of humour that clearly translates into his sculptures. Check them out at: This Into That - Gallery.

Some of my favourites are: Larkitechture, Pandemonium, and this amazing bookcase made from two sets of encyclopedias.



TAGS: Books, book art, sculpture

Apathy kills.

LOCAL APATHY KILLS SF CONVENTION (Jedi Council Forums)

Oh, boooo f**ing hooo. RimCon was cancelled due to "lack of interest" -- yes! Lack of interest in the one husband-wife pairing of authors who had signed on! I've watched others try and find out what exactly was on the books and how they could help promote the event only to be ignored. How is that apathy?

What I love the most about this whiny post is that the organizers of a "literary SF con" approached the "the largest SCA club" who were, understandably, not interested. Um, yes, there might be people with shared inerests between the SCA and the SF con, but did the organizers also check with local gamers? book clubs? bloggers? Anyone??

I think perhaps the whiner got it wrong -- the only apathy I've seen is on the part of the organizers.



tags: victoria, fandom, sfcon, idiots, whiners.

Home Day and Stock Photos

The last hours of my vacation are winding down after a quiet day at home... did laundry, got the Cozies all ready for roll-out and packed up the next order to go out, read to and cuddled kiddo. I also uploaded the first batch of photos I'm submitting to BigStockPhoto.com:

I uploaded 7 -- in a variety of subjects since I'm still not completely sure if my photos meet all their standards. I don't know how long it will be before any of the photos are approved, but hopefully at least some of them will be. If I am successful, I definitely need to do some photos with people in and I will need to have model releases signed. Anyone interested? I'd like to do a series of "conversations" -- laughing over coffee; arguing; playing; and so on.



Tags: stock photos, photography

CuppaJoe Update

1. The new domain name is active! www.cuppajoecozy.ca
2. The first batch of consignment Cozies are ready to go.
3. On a whim, I designed a new series of Cozies tonight: "Elements" -- tri-colour Cozies in the themes of earth, air, fire and water.

TAGS: cuppajoecozy, knitting, sales

Conflict of Interest.

Barbara Bush Gift Earmarked for Son's Firm [TalkRadio 570 KLIF]

HOUSTON (AP) -- Former first lady Barbara Bush gave relief money to a hurricane relief fund on the condition that it be spent to buy educational software from her son Neil's company.

OK, so it is at all possible for George Sr. and Barbara to do anything other than provide endless financial support to promote their children at any cost? Jeeeeeeeeez.



tags: US politics, conflict of interest, Bush family.

Kid-Free day (and night)

Ahh. At about 9:30 this morning, my mother picked up kiddo for a day of fun and adventure, followed by a much-anticipated "sleepover at Granny's." About 30 minutes later, hubby and I were out the door and on our way up-Island.

It was sooooooo nice and quiet. Well, not all quiet; we did crank the tunes. I was able to knit four CuppaJoe Cozies (two on the way up, two on the way back). We stopped in some favourite places, some new, and some we haven't visited before. It was nice.

We hit a bunch of thrift stores -- in one I found a great vintage Burberry men's overcoat. It isn't the most flattering of coats, but it is sooooo comfortable and it was only $9.99. I also got two long-sleeved t-shirts for 99 cents each. In another we found the ugliest speakers I have ever seen:

We did not buy them.

We visited Fascinating Rhythm in Downtown Nanaimo (bought a CD and a DVD) and we popped into Jysk to get one more wood crate for the kitchen. We had lunch at Blue Ginger, an Asian restaurant in Nanaimo which serves a variety of Cantonese (Dim Sum), Japanese and Thai cuisine. Verrry yummmy. Finally, we wandered Woodgrove Centre where we broke our boycott of an Evil Retailer because I found four cheeeeep DVDs ($6.88 each) that I decided I wanted, despite their being sold at said Evil Retailer.

Since being home it's been a quiet evening watching Firefly, computing, and considering crafting.

Monday is back to the grind... and it'll be a while 'til my next day off. My next lengthly vacation (10 days) is around my birthday at the end of June.



Tags: Nanaimo, Duncan, roadtrip, shopping.

Crafty Month Ahead?

The thrifter, the crafter and the hoarder in me all love this idea. The original idea was found at Simple Sparrow, via Thriftcraft. There's even a Flickr Group where crafters can share their projects: Use what you have.

This may coincide nicely with my signing on to Etsy.com.... or it may put me over the edge. Time will tell. :)


Tonight, I whipped up this little carrot... kiddo will probably get this one, but version 2.0 should make it to the sales floor:

tags: crafting, crafts, frugal, etsy.

Paint by BRAAAAAAIIINNNS!

ZOMBIE COLORING BOOK, monster horror art zine

This is nifty. I am convinced that Philadelphia is the Zombie capital of the planet, as the creator of this zine, Marc A. Damicis a.k.a. "pickledpunk" hails from that region as do at least one or two of my zombie-friendly readers...

And if zombies aren't your thing, he also offers Cthulu or garden variety Monster colouring books.


(Pssst! While you're snooping around Etsy.com, check out hubby's new store....)


tags: zombies, crafts, zines, etsy

Was that a new rock?

CBC British Columbia - Premier to meet with rescued ferry passengers

OK. So all 101 crew and passengers were saved from the sinking ferry. This is one of the big BC Ferries -- it runs along the Inside Passage which is a fairly rough route, but the reason given right now for the sinking is that the ferry hit a rock. My guess is that wasn't a brand new rock. So what happened?

The whole fleet is aging, and not in a good way. Most of our ferries were built circa 1970 and have gone through several refits. That said, this is the first time a BC Ferry has sunk, which is pretty good for all the years they've been in service.



TAGS: BC Ferries, shipwreck

Nearly complete....

Kiddo's room:

- wallpaper border remnants sanded off (check)
- new wallpaper border adhered (all but one small piece)
- storage unit in place and anchored to the wall (check)
- tv wall bracket in place (check) -- unfortunately, this meant getting a new tv, as her existing one was too big, but she is really happy with the new tv!
- DVD and video storage in place and "stocked" (check)
- IKEA Smila star lamp installed (check)

to finish -- hang canopy, hang new curtains, hang bulletin board and white board, put on new bedding, adhere last piece of border, rearrange remaining toys into new locations.

Kitchen:

- side shelves installed (check)
- new garbage/recycling "station" in place (check)

to finish -- install new kitchen faucet.


Other:
- call from reporter about interview (check)
- panic that house needs to be clean (check)
- cute picture of my cat (check)

Tags: renos, cat, kitchen, bedroom.

Out in the Garden...

Kiddo thinks it's time to get digging in the garden... I didn't have the energy today, but I did go check things out. The bok choy bolted, the flowers are coming up randomly, the lettuce died as seedlings.... so there's lots of work to do. Luckily there are plenty of weekends in which to tackle things.

TAGS: garden, gardening, garden.

hAppY sPriNG!

As promised, Hubby balanced an egg at the equinox (about 10:25 a.m. local time). Here's proof! It took him a few minutes to get it balanced, and I was low on batteries... so you only get to see it from the point at which it is balanced.


Tags: equinox, egg balancing, fun with science, video.

Mind the wet paint....

Well this round of the kitchen facelift is almost done: we still need another cabinet or some shelving (we will be going to ReStore tomorrow...) so we can merge in the rest of our food and I need to install the new faucet.

Upstairs, we painted the accent wall and the trim (yay!), put kiddo's bed and side table in their new places, and hung her stuffed toy holder (IKEA Fångst). The colour is quite lovely on the wall...

Still to come, new lighting, new curtains and bedding. On the other wall, we will put up the wallpaper border, mount the tv wall bracket, and put in her storage unit.

TAGS: reno, makeover, kitchen, kiddo, IKEA

Watch your step....

... we are renovating again. Hubby painted the back wall of the kitchen yesterday (same orange colour as our accent wall in the living room) and he hung a new corner cupboard which we found at ReStore. It almost matches our existing cupboards (the dimensions are identical but the door has an added detail/frame which I'm hoping can be pried off). Here's a view of the new back wall of the kitchen through the passthrough from the living room:

Meanwhile, upstairs, I tried to take off kiddo's old wallpaper border. One wall came off completely clean... the others are giving me much grief. Naturally, the new border is much narrower or I'd just say to hell with it and cover over the stuck-on shards that remain. I tried scraping them off, I tried soaking them off and now I'm down to sanding. Worst case, I go buy a gallon of flat white paint and cover over the mess after I've sanded down to the drywall. Heh.

Today, hubby will likely finish off the kitchen and we may try to paint kiddo's accent wall, but we do have to sneak in a birthday party to which kiddo has been invited in the middle of the day. Of course, it doesn't do much for our schedule that we slept in until 9:30!!

I will post more photos when we are closer to complete....

Days Go By

Hmm. Well, while on vacation, I missed pi day; let the Ides of March slip under the radar, and forgot to wear green on St. Patrick's Day for... possibly the first time ever. Although, maybe the year kiddo was born and she was 5 days old, I might have forgotten then too. I don't remember.

It's not a bad thing, really.




TAGS: celebrations, vacation, passage of time.

Vancouver: Day 3

a.k.a. Beat the Clock.

OK. So... we set ourselves a "late checkout" of 2:00.... but we didn't leave the Coquitlam IKEA until 1:23.... so we were late... and beat... and by the time we stuffed everything else on top of the IKEA booty (of which there was MUCH -- four pieces of furniture, plastic bins, and 3 or 4 bags of other goodies), we were also very fully loaded. In fact later while waiting at the ferry terminal, I remarked that another van had less crap than we did in their trunk. From the back seat, kiddo piped up, "Yay! We win the crap game!" So true, kiddo.

We chose to take the Horseshoe Bay - Nanaimo ferry back. We waited at the ferry terminal for almost two hours... for the record, that is too long for me and for kiddo (we were both complaining) and long enough for hubby to consider exit strategies (because we were both complaining). Sailings were behind because of this incident:

Driver runs amok with his truck at ferry terminal
Mar, 17 2006 - 2:20 AM

WEST VANCOUVER/CKNW(AM980) - BC Ferries is reviewing its security procedures after yesterday's incident at the Horseshoe Bay Terminal in which a distraught man drove a five-ton truck at high speed through the vehicle waiting area narrowly missing several people before crashing it through a gate and into a loading ramp.

Weird.

We got home about 11:30 last night, got kiddo into bed, then made a half dozen trips back and forth to the van to unload. Today we installed some of the new stuff in the kitchen; part one of the makeover should be complete after this weekend.

TAGS: vacation, renovations

Vancouver: Day 2

a.k.a. Too Many Children or The High Price of Parking

Poorly thought out, I think, to go to both the Aquarium (parking $6 -- because I parked in the wrong lot the first time) and Science World (parking $4; plus a ticket because they are MORONS -- we will fight it) in the middle of spring break, when half of the children in the province were crammed into one or the other. The Aquarium was crazy... but that was nothing compared to the zoo of monsters inside Science World -- including one group whose leader thought it was an incredibly bright idea to line everyone up along the ramp that leads upstairs -- which meant that what could just barely allow two strollers to pass now became an instant traffic jam. And good luck to those in wheelchairs.

Also, I stupidly didn't eat at the Aquarium (because I wasn't hungry) -- two hours of science-based mayhem later, I was starving. Also, getting kiddo out of there even after two hours was near impossible. She was literally hitting and kicking us. I promised her that next time we are in Vancouver, we will not be visiting Science World.

Anyway... after all that we headed into town, paid waaaay too much to park (OMG, just a retarded amount, I am not even going to type it) because, I directed us into the first parkade that seemed close to the Art Gallery, then we ate (at Subway) and went to the Gallery... which was very cool. I wanted to go to see the Brian Jungen show, which was in fact the highlight of the gallery visit:

From here, we headed for Kitsilano (parking $1), spent over $30 at the Candy Aisle, and oggled but didn't buy anything at the Comic Store. We then moved the van up a few blocks to Capers (parking $1) where we bought some supplements that I stupidly forgot to pack and raided their incredible deli for dinner fixings. We discovered there was a Book Warehouse up the block (added another $0.50 to parking) and all got some cheeeep books.

Then came time to navigate back to the hotel. All fine and good until we got to the off-ramp, which we almost missed because I SUCK at navigating. After that... well, did I mention I SUCK at navigating? When faced with right or left at one critical intersection, I chose the wrong way... so instead of being about 2 minutes to our hotel, it took closer to 15 by the time hubby turned around.... sigh.


TAGS: vacation, Vancouver BC, Brian Jungen

Vancouver : Day 1

a.k.a. Consumer Frenzy Part 1.
Took later ferry than expected (don't ask; if you do, I won't answer).

Arrived in Richmond around 11 a.m., headed directly for Aberdeen Centre, home of Daiso!!
Approximately 40 $2 items later (and some of them are doOOooozies) we left with two giant bags of stuff and headed for the food court. Mmmmm. I had a collection of yummy fried things: gyoza, chicken karaage, and veggie tempura. Hubby ate a healthy plate full of sashimi, and kiddo piled in the carbs with some shanghai noodles.

From here, we crossed the street to Yaohan centre where we whipped around the aisles of the Osaka Market like pros -- except they no longer seem to carry my favourite emergency lunch: eMMe instant rice!! AAAGH!!
We lingered a bit at the Hong Kong Movies VCD kiosk...hmm $20 for 6 vcds including tax... I may go back.

Still having an hour before check-in, we decided to investigate the XSCargo outlet next door... which ended in hubby getting a nifty little gadget... of which I am a wee bit jealous.
From there it was off to the hotel to check in. We got a Kids' Suite which means there's a half wall around a bunk bed; a second TV and a "game system" --- a Nintendo N64, oooooOOooh.

At least there is free net access.

Tomorrow will be "Tourist Day"... wish us luck!

tags: Vancouver, retail

Preparing Exodus....

Today has been spent rearranging audio files (stuffing interesting new and old music and interviews on to my mp3 player), doing laundry, tidying, and otherwise preparing to leave for Vancouver for a few days.

Our "we should do x" list keeps growing so that we now have a definite list and an if-we-have-time list. Definite: Vancouver Aquarium, IKEA, Daiso, Yaohan Centre (and the Osaka Market), Vancouver Art Gallery, Science World (maybe only kiddo and hubby -- that place is expensive!). If-we-have-time: Book Warehouse, Half Price Computer Books, The Comic Shop and nearby Candy Aisle, Park Royal Shopping Centre .... and the list goes on.

I will update as I can (the hotel has internet access) but in case I don't... I'll be back in touch Friday or Saturday.

Quote unquote.

Hey, cool. In checking my referral links, I found out that an earlier post I wrote about 30Boxes has been quoted on their "user raves" page.

I am still using it, and I really like how useful it is.

Tags: review, quoted, 30boxes

Somebody is turning 5 today....

Kiddo rolled out of bed at a respectable hour of 8:45 this morning... after she got dressed she came downstairs and saw all the decorations and pile of gifts awaiting her (the manic 5 photo was taken last night):

Happy Birthday, Kiddo!

tags: family, kiddo.

Mother Nature is Pissed.

What did we do? Two days of icy snowfall (most of which melted) and then this evening a big round of thunder and lightning followed by HAIL. Seriously ugly big hail -- there was about half an inch accumulation in less than 15 minutes. Crazy.





TAGS: weather

Oooh, Two Idiots with a Microphone!

It's not perfect -- not even close -- but ThoseDewolfes: Weasels is up and out there. We decided to post it under Creative Commons on Ourmedia.org so if you really want to, you can listen online once it loads. Whee!




Tags: podcast, thosedewolfes, creative commons, ourmedia

"The Question" - Rebuttal of sorts

Lawrence Hill thinks that, "Canadians have a favourite pastime, and they don’t even realize it. They like to ask—they absolutely have to ask—where you are from if you don’t look convincingly white."

Maybe, but, he also asks,"Do you suppose that—15,330 times in thirty-four years—strangers will ask an indisputably white Canadian with a traditional Anglo-Canadian accent where he is from, where he was born, or where his parents were born?"

This sticks in my throat. As an "an indisputably white Canadian with a traditional Anglo-Canadian accent" I get asked this fairly often. To be fair, I usually interpret the question as being in regards to "where in Canada" (it sometimes seems few residents of Victoria were actually born here) but every few years, the question is raised on the Census and I always want to declare my heritage as "Canadian" because I was born here, as was my Father, as was my maternal Grandmother. Unfortunately our multiculturally-obsessed federal government wants to crow about the blend of cultures, and so demands that I actually declare my ancestry as non-Canadian:

QUESTION 17 – Ethnic origin (from the 2001 Census guide - pdf)
This question refers to the ethnic or cultural origins of a person’s ancestors.An ancestor is someone from whom a person is descended and is usually more distant than a grandparent. Other than Aboriginal persons, most people can trace their origins to their ancestors who first came to this continent.

and here's why:

Question 17 provides information about the ethnic and cultural diversity of
Canada’s population. This information is used to administer the Canadian Multiculturalism Act. It is also used extensively by ethnic and cultural associations, as well as by agencies and researchers, for activities such as health promotion, communications and marketing.

Oh, fantastic! I have to make up or amalgamate my ancestry to help the government with their marketing! And, I see that they are hiring for the 2006 Census -- and Question 17 still exists (though I no longer have to amalgamate, and I could potentially say "Rigel 7" or perhaps "Ferengi" because the format is unstructured):

The census has collected information on the ancestral origins of the population for over 100 years to capture the composition of Canada's diverse population.

17. What were the ethnic or cultural origins of this person's ancestors?

An ancestor is usually more distant than a grandparent.

For example, Canadian, English, French, Chinese, Italian, German, Scottish, East Indian, Irish, Cree, Mi'kmaq (Micmac), Métis, Inuit (Eskimo), Ukrainian, Dutch, Filipino, Polish, Portuguese, Jewish, Greek, Jamaican, Vietnamese, Lebanese, Chilean, Salvadorean, Somali, etc.

Specify as many origins as applicable using capital letters.

At any rate, I have a few months to think about a heritage. Rest assured it will be a creative one.

In the meantime, I have this to say to Mr. Hill: Yes, "Where are you from?" is a patently stupid question and, unless you have a personal friendship with the person you are asking, it's akin to asking "Are you gay?" or even asking a woman you don't know, "When is the baby due?" -- because they might just be overweight. Most often though, if you are friends, you don't have to ask, these things come out in conversation.

I can't pretend that I don't ask these and other questions in my head -- I do! And I am curious sometimes. I also think some people are just plain stupid and/or rude. My 5 year old has started to point out obvious physical features (like "That lady is bald!" or "He has girl hair!") so we have been working on "manners." Apparently, many parents don't take the time for such instruction.



TAGS: rant, heritage, ancestry, race, rudeness.

Podcast done. Sort of.

OK, so podcast number two got treated to a ruthless editing so it is just a touch over one hour. Which also means it is 57 MB as an mp3.... so we are going to host it on archive.org... which meant that I couldn't post it this morning, before I left for work. Sigh.

Anyway, the "theme" of the podcast is "Weasels" and also weasely things like daylight savings. Speaking of which, the BC government wants your opinion (link to pdf news release) on the matter (until tomorrow, then they won't listen any more); email written responses directly to AGWEBFEEDBACK@gov.bc.ca.

In other news, there is snow falling outside. Snow! In Victoria! Stupid weather. Oh well.

Tags: podcast, thosedewolfes, archive.org, weasels, snow.

podcast logjam...

OK... so really, podcast number two is still long. I've been trying to trim, because nobody needs to listen to over an hour of "Those DeWolfes" in one sitting. So now I have to decide whether to keep trimming or whether to split it into two. I'm thinking "snip-snip."

In the meantime, I am daydreaming about our trip to Vancouver next week... we are hoping to visit the Aquarium, the Vancouver Art Gallery, Daiso, IKEA, and other fun things...

Liberal Leadership Kit.

OK... so since Mr. Martin fumbled and lost the country, no one in the Liberal Party has stepped forward to take the helm.

So on last night's episode of the Rick Mercer Report, he offered a leadership kit -- 15 minutes with the RMR writers and the use of their colour printer.

eBay.ca: The Rick Mercer Report Liberal Leadership Kit (item 6042164599 end time 14-Mar-06 19:17:43 EST)

Currently, bids are sitting at $16 million. Even Mercer thinks that those are likely not serious bids.

Even so, other people have climbed on the bandwagon to offer their own Liberal Leadership Kits (and similar items) on eBay.

Tee hee.


TAGS: Rick Mercer, RMR, Liberal Party, Canadian Politics, ebay weirdness.

Basic Book Repair.

How cool is this? It's a Book Repair Kit from TalasOnline.com. It comes with all the basic tools and supplies for properly binding, mending and preserving books.

Wanna learn more? We use Jane Greenfield's methods (for the most part) for in-house repair. Her books include: ABC of Bookbinding, Books, Their Care and Their Repair (1983, out of print) and Care of Fine Books.



Tags: book repair, books, preservation

T minus 3 days....

It is almost time for our two weeks of vacation.... though my brain is already in vacation mode. To confirm that, we went on a brief spree at Tillicum mall. In just over an hour we filled bags with...

Extra Value shopping: Safeway's Customer Appreciation Day -- to get 10x our base AirMiles. We spent $60. Rewards are 1 mile per $20; so that means we get 30 air miles!! Woo! [Though according to Airmiles.ca, the bonus miles "may take up to 120 days" to appear on my account. Goofs.]

Flyer shopping: sale goods from half the aisles at London Drugs including a litre of pure Maple Syrup for a friend's Canadian Citizenship party this coming weekend and food for kiddo while she is at her Nana's.

Crafty shopping: sadly, the Lewiscraft store at the mall is closing out; lucky for us that meant cheap sculpting clay for hubby's creations.

Frivolous purchase: [aside from two large coffee beverages and a Jones soda for kiddo] a very deeply discounted Law & Order photography book -- basically it looks like crime scene photos because it is full of photos from the sets of the show. Kinda creepy, even for me. However for $3.49 (original cover price was $45) it was a bargain I couldn't ignore.


Tags: shopping, bargains, discounts.

Watch This!

Knowledge Network: The Corporation

If you haven't already seen it (or even if you have), the Knowledge Network in BC is running the documentary in full, starting at 8:00 this evening. Well worth tuning in for.

Tags: television, documentary

MeeeeOW!

Oscar celebrity cattiness that goes above and beyond the call of duty.

Example A: [Go Fug Yourself] Oscar Fug Parties: Lindsay Lohan and Sharon Stone

Example B: [WWTDD] Oscar notes from all over

Beautiful.

Weapons Auction

Local auction house Lunds' next theme auction is "Fire Power" (tomorrow evening, March 7th). Included in the featured items is an antique walking stick gun (ooh, how Avengersesque), numerous swords and shotguns as well as militaria.

I'm afraid to go to a real auction, though. I've been to the Fringe auctions (to support the local Fringe Festival) and walked out of there $200 to $300 poorer. It's an odd form of euphoria... but one I don't particularly crave right now.

Plus, do I have to already be a registered gun owner before I can buy a gun at auction? How does the gun registry work, anyway?


Tags: guns, weapons, militaria, auction.

Another day in paradise...

[Between this and the robin shots, you'd think I was becoming a birder! Not yet, but wait a couple of decades and ask me again...]

Lovely day: lazy start followed by some quick retail errands (new cheap sunglasses and a visit to ReStore where we found a corner cupboard for the kitchen) and then a walk along the Dallas Road waterfront and beach. Kiddo followed that with some time at the Cook Street/Beacon Hill playground. After that we tried to find somewhere for lunch... ended up at Willows Galley for greasy but goooood traditional fish and chips. This was after finding out that the former Marina Deli and Cafe is now the Marina Coffee Shop and is basically a Starbucks™ with soup. From there we grabbed some groceries and came home for a lovely barbequed pizza dinner with tomato salad and appetizers (thanks, Chef Hubby!).

Tommorrow we will be gathering the paint and supplies for kiddo's pending room makeover ("Just like Design on a Dime!" she says) -- it's going to be quite purple when we are done. We will also be visiting some friends before we settle in for a night of catty comments on red carpet fashions and questionable Academy decisions.

Spring is around the corner...

This fella was so busy singing I was able to get up close and personal and take a half dozen photos. My only regret was that maybe I should have used the flash for one or two shots, though the sillhouette effect isn't bad either.

(Also, pardon me for blowing out the frame on my blog, but I really wanted to show you a larger version; the mosaic was created with FlickrToys.)

TAGS: birding, spring, mosaic, FlickrToys

Degrees of Cute.

1. I'm not quite ready to jump on the CuteOverload bandwagon... but this picture of mother and child kitty-cats is awfully cute.

2. The campus is crawling with rabbits, and mostly I think they are vermin, but that doesn't stop me from continually photographing them in all their furry glory:

3. Kiddo can toggle between cute and dreadful in mere seconds. Truly, if we could harness this energy, I'm sure we could reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Perhaps this t-shirt is in store for her coming birthday.

4. Cute confession. Hubby and I often adopt a sickeningly sweet tone and say things like "I wubba oooo!" in an effort to make our 13 year old neice run screaming from the room.... but it always makes me smile. :)

Bad! Bad Disney!

Somehow, I missed the backlash on this if there was any last year (and there should have been) because the asshats at Disney, after acquiring the rights to distribute Hayao Miyazaki's films, decided to re-dub My Neighbour Totoro -- with Dakota "overexposed and poised for a rehab-required burnout" Fanning and her real-life younger sister Elle Fanning!! Ack.

Details are over at IMDB: Full Cast and Crew for Tonari no Totoro (1988)



TAGS: Disney, needless revision, movies, animation.

Another Language....

I have found that there is little application for Russian in my current workplace, but there is a genuine need for cataloguers who can read and understand Chinese.

To that end, I will be downloading podcasts from ChinesePod so that I can start learning Mandarin in little bite-size lessons! How cool is that? (I am however a bit concerned that there is a 7-day free trial... it is unclear whether the podcasts themselves will remain free with a basic subscription or just the transcripts.) More audio lessons are available at ZapChinese and as a general resource, Chinese Outpost looks well-organized!

There is the larger debate of Mandarin vs. Cantonese -- each is prominent in different areas of China and around the world, however, if I understand correctly, both use the same written language, so as long as I work toward the written language (which is what I would need for cataloguing) I should be OK. That said, if there are any native speakers of either language out there... I'd love your opinions. I'd be especially interested in which language would be more applicable in my region (Victoria/Vancouver/Seattle).


TAGS: language acquisition, Chinese, Mandarin, Cantonese, self-directed study.

Funny or just patheitc?

Stop! Lunch Thief! is a collection of tales about the dreaded office lunch theives. Who raised these people that they think they can just take other people's food?? I don't get it.

Tags: idiots, office humour

new media nook reviews

FYI: Hubby and I each added a new review to Medianook this week: I added Mirrormask; hubby, Eve and the Fire Horse.

I have set myself the goal of one review per week between now and the end of June... and I will likely bend the rules from time to time by doing two or three in one week and averaging it out... but ultimately the site needs more content! If you read Medianook and you notice that posts are not frequent, feel free to send me a reminder.