On the mend

Feverish ass

Feeling much better, but still running enough of a low-grade temperature that my butt was too much of a temptation for Gemma to resist. Photo credit to M. Panique.

Prévisible

Now I'm sick.

And I mean, really sick.

At least I know the worst will be over in 18 hours.

Best. stamp. ever.

Designed by Carl T. Herrman, Carlsbad, California. I got to use these working on a massive mailing at the work/study gig. The gold signature is shiny, and dear Edgar looks dashingly melancholy.

M. Panique is doing better, but came home mid-afternoon today to get some much-needed rest.

A little something

On the bright side, I worked on little embroidery today. I know you've heard this before from me, but I'm not sure where this is going. If it gets worked into another project, it will be big news and will definitely be updated here.

On the dim side, M. Panique was sick sick sick today, though he stuck it out at work most of the day. Don't know how he does it. We're turning in early tonight.

Inauguration Shuffle

This is the route Big Kitty and I walked last Tuesday in DC. I love walkjogrun.net.

In situ

Thanks to the persistence of Big Kitty, I came back from DC with a commemorative Metro farecard, and it will live on my refrigerator forever.

Conspiracy

M. Panique and a buddy prepare to wow the crowd at the karaoke birthday party of one of our friends. They turned "Never Gonna Give You Up" into a frightening duet, but they made a better showing earlier in the evening with "Live Forever".

Battlesnore...

Could they just find a place to live already? The first two of the Final Episodes have been okay, but I worry that they'll end up cramming all the action into the last few hours, à la Season 4.0.

America runs on...

We passed this absurdity yesterday morning on the New Jersey Turnpike.

After

After the inauguration, when the crowds were heading home or swarming toward Pennsylvania Avenue for the parade, no one was interested in two young women exploring the Capitol grounds.

Moving

Inauguration Eve

We spent the day at the Holocaust Museum, then set out across the Mall to scout out the set-up for tomorrow. The whole area was humming with activity, and buzzing with the generators of all the media trucks.



We found much-needed sustenance at Red Velvet, and actually got there in time for the eponymous pastry, which usually sells out in the early evening.



Back at the home of our hard-working hosts (they were overseeing all kinds of inaugural ball logistics during our stay) I got to know this silly, snoring kitty.

Road trip!

I'm setting off with Big Kitty to enjoy the inauguration festivities in DC. I've got many layers of long underwear, warm boots, and a new LeSportac cross-body bag. Wish us luck!

Before and afterglow

Kirsten Hassenfeld at Smack Mellon.

Dinner at Superfine.

Culinary FAIL

Ugh. Sometimes a recipe is not what you expect, but rarely does three days of prep yield stinking gray piles of inedible chewy crap. I will let you guess what I was trying to make.

Notre ami mystérieux

I know there is a simple physical principle that explains why this circle of condensation appears periodically during the winter months, but I prefer to think of it as our mysterious friend.

Does Jeremy Sisto look mad at me?

Law and Order shoots in our neighborhood frequently, but this is the first time I've actually seen actors I recognized, and since I had my camera, and they were sitting there like fish in an aquarium... Well, at least Anthony Anderson looks relatively amused.

Battlestar Galactica(t)

Orange on Orange

I got to the work/study gig today, and as I stowed my purse under the front desk I noticed a crumpled, empty bag of mutant Fritos in the trash.

I was sent out again shortly thereafter to run some errands, and guess what was sitting on the subway seat next to me?

Wishful Thinking

I'm afraid when these little ones get to Central Park, a block and a half away, they will be sorely disappointed. It is cold as all get-out, but there's only a dusting on the ground.

Isn't she lovely? 2008 edition

Not as fragrant as last year's tree, but this faux beauty can stay in the corner of the living room until we tire of its majesty. I'm not sure we'll use it every year, but I'm happy to have an option to just leave it up if we skip out of town on Christmas day like we did this year.

Ragged beauty

I'm pretty sure there's no such thing as flesh-eating tulips.



But if there were, they'd look like this.

Disappearing husband

Où est mon mari à trois dans le matin?

Il est au bureau.

Merde.

Back out

As in, I threw my.

Overzealous yoga

plus

awkward painting assignment at work/study gig

equals

I bet I'll be laid out on the sofa for two days.

How to spend $100 before 10 AM

We have a gimpy cat, but our super vet says nothing's broken. Now Fat Molly has to eat the dreadful-looking restricted diet kibble. Poor kitty. Poor expensive kitty.

Still ill

That's misleading, as I have almost shaken my cold-type sickness.

"Still Ill" is the Smith's song that is the source of the quote on the coolest necklace ever, sent to me by The Marchviolet.



The feeling of this necklace, with its ball chain and lozenge charms, reminds me intensely of a St. Christopher medal I appropriated from my high school sweetheart. Through some miracle of self-restraint, I didn't throw it in his face after he broke up with me on Valentine's Day my freshman year of college, but I don't wear it anymore because I'm married to a different guy now and I don't wear jewelry from guys I had a thing with way back when. Duh.

Milk

So, at the end of the movie, there was someone crying in the theater and it wasn't me. I had to offer a tissue to the man sitting next to me, and I was happy to do it. He said, "That was my life up there."

I would like to fervently wish that it would not have to be anyone else's life again ever.

There is a lot not to cry about, though, and of the many tales Milk tells, perhaps the story of a late bloomer touched me the deepest. At least, it's what I came away with most strongly. Harvey Milk was 43 with no prior political experience when he started campaigning, and within five years he had been elected to city-wide office.

This gives me a tremendous amount of hope, which was Harvey's wish, for everyone, all along.

Bloody holidays

Early last evening, I dropped off my six enormous pomegranates and scurried to the local library to pick up a book I requested back in September. On the way, I finally got a chance to photograph the local butcher's, with its red tinsel garland looking for all the world to me like shiny innards, strewn and draped around the shop.

Chinatown doll

I was feeling better enough (grammar police?) this afternoon to go down to Chinatown in search of pomegranates and char siu bao. I took this video on Grand Street so that I could confirm later that I wasn't hallucinating. You see it too, right?

Old Bones

I am, as we say Chez Panique, feeling poorly. It might just be from yakking with Mrs. Boot out in the cold for the past two days, but I think it's a little more than that. Lucky me, there's a Bones marathon on TNT today.