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dragonlady7no heat today at work. v. cold. have violent eczema inside elbows and backs of knees. i blame cold plus dry.
work was dumb as usual. I made twice as much in tips, however, because of one fellow who spent $10 and left a $10 tip, and another who spent $10 and left a $5 tip. And then bussed his own table. Dude, I could've kissed them both: Humans are sometimes good. *bowled over* Other than that, I wrote, but it was fanfiction. And it wasn't even juicy or gooey fanfiction. It was just the setup for Eomer and Lothiriel to meet. And you know, nobody cares. But me? I am a dork. And my brain is too fried for anything else. And I have non-lj people who have volunteered to read The Finished Novel and I just haven't been able to look at it one more time to send it to them. Yeesh. So, in the meantime, no porn.
Dave and I decided, after my freaking-out fit after coming home from Local Bar (I keep having dreams about bartending, btw., and they are all about me screwing something up), that we had better just drive to Melrose. So we left buffalo at about 6:30 and we were in Melrose before midnight.
We baked cookies and went shopping in Cambridge and drove around and looked at the pretty countryside. I removed my camera from its case once, but then I put it back in. I didn't take a single photograph.
Ann came home the next day, and she and I made cutouts and frosted them with help from Dad and Dave. Dad and Dave were both... different in their cookie-frosting aesthetic. Dad made a lot of blue dinosaurs (yes, I brought my cookie cutters so the xmas cookies would be dinosaurs and fruit, as per Dave's & my tradition), and Dave specialized in the ultra-thin frosting veneer.
We also went Local!Shopping, which is mom's new specialty. Not only did we go to the indoor, all-winter Troy Farmer's Market and buy organic local produce (i am inordinately fond of hormone-free organic goat cheese and don't know why), but then we went to Elissa Halloran's store on Lark St. and bought artsy jewelry. Elissa Halloran, by the way, makes absolutely stunning jewelry, and does it for a living. Incredible. Her biggest boost so far has been that the NBC news personality Soledad O'Brian bought a bunch of her jewelry and wears it on the air. Very cool. I coveted everything in the store. But I only bought one thing, a pair of fish-skeleton earrings for Dave's sister because I had nothing else for her.
Now I am kicking myself for not having bought five or six of Eve Halloran's (the jewelry-maker's mother) beautiful painted picture frames to give to everyone I know-- except for the fact that I am, once again, amazingly, totally broke. I have such a talent for it. At least half of this went for gas.
Driving back today, we left just before 6 am. The drive sucked from one perspective, but was sort of cool I suppose-- around Utica (map of NY state for outsiders who think I'm speaking Greek; I live near the dot that says "buffalo" and my folks live nearish to the dot that says "albany"-- oh neat, Google found me one of the Thruway!) (Uh, this map doesn't have Utica, unless you click in the more detailed view. OK, rephrase: between Albany and Syracuse) it started snowing, and it snowed in various intensities for the rest of the 200ish miles of the trip. Around Rochester, this was unsurprisingly shitty; crap is always falling from the sky in Rochester and in this case the snowplows hadn't been by. But we maintained speeds of 55+mph, which means we got to Buffalo in time for me to brush my hair and go to work.
And that means there's snow on the ground here, and while the Buffalo snow removal isn't necessarily prompt, the other drivers don't make a fuss and drive like assholes, so it's really no big deal, and even kind of fun at times. Except that Dave's windshield is about to crack in half and the wipers are no good either, so it's kind of... well... driving by *feel*. Ugh.
So, I am tired, but refreshed, because I was somewhere other than here for a while, doing something other than either work or stress out about it. So I feel a bit better. At least I don't want to cry all the time.
And I mailed off the gift for Katy.
And oh, Mom's getting Scout for the next year. So the empty photo holders I enclosed at the back of the binder: a good idea, instead of just stupid. Yay!
Not so good for Mom, who didn't really want a Springer Spaniel puppy for a year, but it makes me happy because I wasn't going to go visit my brother-in-law's brother in Georgia just to pet the cutest puppy in the world (who is my dog-niece).
ok, I was going to say more but I'm going on toward Hour 18 of consciousness, which doesn't sound like much but is plenty for me, in my current disorganized state. So I'm going to just post this and think, ok, maybe next time I'll post something readable, poignant, pithy, succinct, or in some way worthwhile. We live in hope to see that day.
work was dumb as usual. I made twice as much in tips, however, because of one fellow who spent $10 and left a $10 tip, and another who spent $10 and left a $5 tip. And then bussed his own table. Dude, I could've kissed them both: Humans are sometimes good. *bowled over* Other than that, I wrote, but it was fanfiction. And it wasn't even juicy or gooey fanfiction. It was just the setup for Eomer and Lothiriel to meet. And you know, nobody cares. But me? I am a dork. And my brain is too fried for anything else. And I have non-lj people who have volunteered to read The Finished Novel and I just haven't been able to look at it one more time to send it to them. Yeesh. So, in the meantime, no porn.
Dave and I decided, after my freaking-out fit after coming home from Local Bar (I keep having dreams about bartending, btw., and they are all about me screwing something up), that we had better just drive to Melrose. So we left buffalo at about 6:30 and we were in Melrose before midnight.
We baked cookies and went shopping in Cambridge and drove around and looked at the pretty countryside. I removed my camera from its case once, but then I put it back in. I didn't take a single photograph.
Ann came home the next day, and she and I made cutouts and frosted them with help from Dad and Dave. Dad and Dave were both... different in their cookie-frosting aesthetic. Dad made a lot of blue dinosaurs (yes, I brought my cookie cutters so the xmas cookies would be dinosaurs and fruit, as per Dave's & my tradition), and Dave specialized in the ultra-thin frosting veneer.
We also went Local!Shopping, which is mom's new specialty. Not only did we go to the indoor, all-winter Troy Farmer's Market and buy organic local produce (i am inordinately fond of hormone-free organic goat cheese and don't know why), but then we went to Elissa Halloran's store on Lark St. and bought artsy jewelry. Elissa Halloran, by the way, makes absolutely stunning jewelry, and does it for a living. Incredible. Her biggest boost so far has been that the NBC news personality Soledad O'Brian bought a bunch of her jewelry and wears it on the air. Very cool. I coveted everything in the store. But I only bought one thing, a pair of fish-skeleton earrings for Dave's sister because I had nothing else for her.
Now I am kicking myself for not having bought five or six of Eve Halloran's (the jewelry-maker's mother) beautiful painted picture frames to give to everyone I know-- except for the fact that I am, once again, amazingly, totally broke. I have such a talent for it. At least half of this went for gas.
Driving back today, we left just before 6 am. The drive sucked from one perspective, but was sort of cool I suppose-- around Utica (map of NY state for outsiders who think I'm speaking Greek; I live near the dot that says "buffalo" and my folks live nearish to the dot that says "albany"-- oh neat, Google found me one of the Thruway!) (Uh, this map doesn't have Utica, unless you click in the more detailed view. OK, rephrase: between Albany and Syracuse) it started snowing, and it snowed in various intensities for the rest of the 200ish miles of the trip. Around Rochester, this was unsurprisingly shitty; crap is always falling from the sky in Rochester and in this case the snowplows hadn't been by. But we maintained speeds of 55+mph, which means we got to Buffalo in time for me to brush my hair and go to work.
And that means there's snow on the ground here, and while the Buffalo snow removal isn't necessarily prompt, the other drivers don't make a fuss and drive like assholes, so it's really no big deal, and even kind of fun at times. Except that Dave's windshield is about to crack in half and the wipers are no good either, so it's kind of... well... driving by *feel*. Ugh.
So, I am tired, but refreshed, because I was somewhere other than here for a while, doing something other than either work or stress out about it. So I feel a bit better. At least I don't want to cry all the time.
And I mailed off the gift for Katy.
And oh, Mom's getting Scout for the next year. So the empty photo holders I enclosed at the back of the binder: a good idea, instead of just stupid. Yay!
Not so good for Mom, who didn't really want a Springer Spaniel puppy for a year, but it makes me happy because I wasn't going to go visit my brother-in-law's brother in Georgia just to pet the cutest puppy in the world (who is my dog-niece).
ok, I was going to say more but I'm going on toward Hour 18 of consciousness, which doesn't sound like much but is plenty for me, in my current disorganized state. So I'm going to just post this and think, ok, maybe next time I'll post something readable, poignant, pithy, succinct, or in some way worthwhile. We live in hope to see that day.
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no subject
Date: 2004-12-20 03:24 am (UTC)I'm glad you got to visit even though Local Bar screwed you. I suspected you'd driven up here, but I was so busy with holiday stuff that I didn't get a chance to call. Sorry.
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Date: 2004-12-20 01:14 pm (UTC)So I'm not sure, but Katy just doesn't want to leave her darling baby dog with this other dog and these people who love the other dog more. Also, Mom treats Scout really well.
Scout is a very friendly and gregarious dog, and very trusting. I can see how Katy might think that her personality would be changed by spending a year as another, more favored dog's chew toy.
And Mom doesn't really mind. Also, Dad is the one who spends the most time with the dog and likes her the most, though he won't really put it that way because he's not a dog person.
See, this dog is the closest thing we have to a next Kelly generation, so she's the grand-dog and the dog-neice-- Katy can't have babies while she's shuttling around to Iraq and not being allowed to leave the Army. So... she's a spoiled dog.
Y'know, I was in Melrose for such a short time, I hardly even got to sleep. We did go to Albany, but it was with Mom, so it was one of those Terrifyingly Efficient Trips. We were in and then we were right out!
I do recommend you go over to Lark Street and visit Elissa Halloran's jewelry shop, if you have any Xmas shopping left to do-- she's in a basement under a hair salon, and there's a neon spiral in the window, and I can't remember what block it's on of Lark St. but I vaguely think it's east of Madison. (Or north-- I may have been turned around. We were on Madison and turned right.) I forgot you were in Albany.
no subject
Date: 2004-12-20 01:28 pm (UTC)--qwerty
no subject
Date: 2004-12-20 01:31 pm (UTC)Yeesh... there's a link to that page on her policy page, for heaven's sake!
no subject
Date: 2004-12-20 01:42 pm (UTC)Well, I'm beginning a correspondence with her sister, a much more wired, published author. Perhaps I'll bring it up to her, and ask who's doing the website, and give them a few tips. :)