I'm spending this weekend at mom & dad's new house. Yesterday after work, I loaded up stuff for supper & clothes for the weekend and headed to the parental units' new house. Before I could make their supper, however, we had to do a short trip to Kroger for some vegetable oil. We decided to try walking to the grocery. And it's a nice walk, too.

On our way back, mom and I popped into Papa John's (which is in the same shopping complex as Kroger) and bought two garlic butter packs (for the bread sticks I was going to bake). And when we returned, I mixed up the ingredients for Ghirardelli's Caramel Turtle Brownie Mix and got that baking (the first thing to be baked in the oven - yay!) I also baked bread sticks and cooked the shrimp & broccoli alfredo on butterfly pasta (both MarketDay purchases). Before I'd left for the house, I'd made up a salad as well.

So we had supper at the dining room table (which is half covered in sort-of-unpacked glassware, but there was room for 3 of us). The alfredo stuff was tasty. And I'm glad we got the garlic butter sauce - that just set off the bread sticks nicely. We then settled down to watch Star Trek (the 2009 movie). It was a great choice to show off mom's new plasma screen TV. We had brownies about halfway through. Tasty tasty!

We got up early today and headed to Ikea in time for their free coffee time. We all got the regular breakfast and also split an order of sausage gravy on biscuits. Then we did our mega-shopping extravaganza.

Dad's main priority was getting the bookshelves for his den. Mom's main priority was getting her tables for her bonus room. And I had a goal too - the Ektorp sofa bed and a matching chair. We all successfully found our goals and a few other things to boot. We filled the car and also each had stuff scheduled for delivery. (It's $89 to get stuff up to 500lb delivered to our addresses.) The folks' bookshelves and table parts will arrive Monday and I scheduled my sofa and chair (I got the Ektorp recliner) to come Wednesday, since we've got that day off.

Tonight we'll go to the bookstore in Troy since they're having their annual holiday sale, and then head to O'Brian's since Rick Fannin is performing there again tonight. Tomorrow - who knows? I hope to get a walk in to Boston Stoker (local coffeehouse chain) tomorrow. Still haven't been in their new store in Troy.

Current Mood: happy
Current Music: Top Gear on the telly

My thesis proposal was approved by my advisor and he only had a few corrections for me to make. Woohoo!

My sister arrived today!

My folks are moving this Saturday to their new house (hence Amy arriving today).

I'm taking tomorrow afternoon and all day Friday off to help with the move.

I'm working on a Soooper Seeekrit Project for mom & dad in honor of their move (though I'm a bit behind). I'll describe it more later (after I've given it to 'em - mom reads this journal, you know...)

We had supper at Indian's Pizza (the local pizza joint which is owned by my coworker) with mom's brothers & their spouses and my cousin Patty. Fun night out for all!

Should be a fun (albeit busy) weekend!

Tags: amy, dad, family, mom
Current Mood: excited

Hope everyone had a Happy Halloween today!

Wound up being a productive day for me. I just sent the following to the Masters Thesis forum for our Science and the Public Program at uni:

They don't call me Trina "A Day Late and a Dollar" Short for nothing. Let it be known that the proposal, she is-a-written. I've sent it to my father (a retired physical science teacher) for constructive criticism and should be able to mail it to Dr. Liu tomorrow (Sunday, the day after my self-determined deadline).

:-) I then wished them all luck on their own goals. I'm liking the feeling of accomplishment, which may diminish a bit after dad gives me his commentary (and later Dr. Liu gives me his), but for now, it's a nice feeling. I think I might be able to do this thing after all.

Tags: college
Current Mood: accomplished
Current Music: Leftfield / Melt

Today we could dress for Halloween. I decided on my costume a few weeks ago, and as with many of my previous costumes, it was rather inexpensive. Only purchase was a red with white polka-dot cloth. Mom was a great help - she suggested where to find the cloth (Jo Ann Fabrics), loaned & applied lipstick, and tied my head scarf on. Thanks mom!

BTW, the sheer number of people who asked if I was dressed as Aunt Jemimah... I know I've got the cheeks for it, but seriously....

Tags: halloween
Current Mood: artistic

Been ages since I last posted, so I figured I'd better pop a quick note in to say that all is well, I'm just a bit busy.

I'm working on my thesis proposal with a goal to have it done by Halloween - of this year. That would be, like, this Saturday. Ahem. So here I am, writing my literature review (or rather, taking a break from writing my literature review to give Lucy scritchies, comment on Twitter, and type this up).

Got my costume planned for Friday (dress up day at work) and should have photos this weekend. Tomorrow's Beggar's Night in our county, so I'll be interested to see how many kids I get. I might wind up working on my proposal while I wait for the kiddies to pop by. The parental units are at their first party at their soon-to-be community tomorrow night, so no Beggar's Night for them.

Last weekend was a Buy Music Weekend for me (and I partially blame gregmce for it) which I hope to write about soonish. I expanded my MP3 collection with the new purchases as well as with some older DW audios (the missing eps) finally ripped into my collection. And updated playlists. Etc.

This past weekend I also installed Winders 7 proper on my PC. Go me! Got it for the $30 college price. Yay for Masters program! (One of these days before my graduation I intend to get Adobe Web Premier for a reduced rate thanks to my scholarly ways. Heh.) Oh, and also related to college, I have registered for what I hope will be the final credit hour in my program. Yay!

OK, that's enough procrastinating. I should get back to writing my literature review. (As I told the folks in Twitter, I'm not even done with my thesis proposal yet and I've already got 30 citations.)

Tags: college, halloween
Current Mood: busy

Ages ago, I think mentioned that we're having a new school built. It's been fun watching the progress of the building. Our superintendent tries to hold tours for the staff and neighbors about every 2 weeks. Here are some photos from two tours exactly a month apart. Neat to see the progress. For more photos (not by me, but by the Super) visit our school website and check out the New Building Updates pages.

Tags: photos, school
Current Mood: cheerful
Current Music: Mark Ayres/Requiem

When I found out about Microsoft offering Winders 7 for $29.99 to college students (thanks to Twitter) I immediately pre-ordered it, then passed the news along to my Twitter followers. And promptly forgot to mention it to LJers on my list. Whoops - sorry about the oversight!

So anyhoo, if you're interested and you've got a valid .edu e-mail address (and preferably proof that you're taking at least .5 semester hours in case they ask), you can pre-order Winders 7 for $29.99 from http://www.win741.com/. Click on the box that says "Buy." You can get Premium or Professional, 32 or 64-bit. (I went 64-bit, Pro.)

UK college students, you, too, can be infected, er can buy Winders 7 for a low price as well. http://www.microsoft.com/uk/education/studentoffer/

My main OS will still be Ubuntu (and I'll probably upgrade to 9.10 when it comes out later this month), but for gaming and a few other Winders-only programs (MediaMonkey specifically), I'll have my Winder 7 partition.

(Of course, I'm writing this current post on my laptop which has Winders XP on it. Heh.)

Tags: computer
Current Mood: geeky

On Saturday, I spent a day at Boonshoft Museum of Discovery attending a number of workshops designed by Boonshoft, the Dayton Regional STEM center, and others. The workshops were fun and informative. The lunch was free and tasty (catered by University of Dayton). And I got to do experiments. A great day, in other words. I tell of the day in photos and video.

( Read more... )

In other news, it looks like autumn has finally agreed to join us. Yay!

Tags: science
Current Mood: bouncy

I probably wouldn't have found out about the Taste of Troy if not for my cousin. Last weekend at the Lowry reunion, she came along, but her little sister didn't. When asked where the little one was, her response was that they (her sis, mom, mom's sis, etc) were planning for the Taste of Troy. Having attended Taste of Chicago for a number of years, I immediately understood the gist of the concept, which my cousin confirmed. Basically, you buy tickets, wander the downtown area (which is closed off to traffic) and get samples from local restaurants.

I, of course, talked the parental units into going. After all, Troy will soon by their home town. (They recently were part of a huge group of folks taking part in a TV advertisement who claimed that Troy is "where I live!" Alas, I've not gotten to see the ad. Neither has mom, though dad did.) Upon the advice of my ticket taker (not my cousin's mom, though I soon saw her & her sister) I bought 10 tickets (for this taste, each ticket was $1).

( Details about Taste of Troy )

I pottered about in the house for awhile, but then when it got closer to 7:30, I headed off to O'Brian's pub to hang out with my coworkers and listen to Rick Fannin perform again. I ordered the fish & chips, which I'd gotten the last time I was there. Very nice fish & chips (though the chips are potato "coins" that are fried, rather than fry-shaped things). I started with an amaretto sour, too, but finished with water. During Rick's first break, I ordered the Bailey's Irish Cream cheesecake. The pub's cook bakes them herself and I got to tell her just how yummy it was. Rick finished a bit before midnight, so it was after midnight that I returned home.

( Photo of Rick at O'Brian's )

Today was a semi-productive day. Finished my laundry, got some needed supplies from Kroger and Meijer, had lunch at Tokyo Peking. Tomorrow, back to work! :-)

Current Mood: cheerful

Without intending to, I apparently got onto a Fairy Tale kick. Early today I finished watching all of the Faerie Tale Theatre stories, ending on "The Dancing Princesses," one of the many stories I'd not seen the original time around. But more than that, I just finished reading Fitcher's Brides by Gregory Frost. "The tale of Bluebeard, re-envisioned as a dark fable of faith and truth," as the cover says.

It was when I'd reached disc 3 of the 4 disc set that I was looking for a new book to read and remembered Fitcher's Brides. I'd bought the book knowing little about it except that it was used, only $2 (or maybe free with a coupon), and looked unread. It had looked interesting enough at the Bookery Fantasy (which is where I'd seen it) that I got it. Years ago I'd read a book of reimagined fairy tales called Red as Blood by Tanith Lee, which I had liked well enough. So I thought I'd probably enjoy this novel.

Thing is, as I was reading the introduction to the story, I realized I'd never actually read or heard the tale of Bluebeard. And while I was reading the intro, I remembered "Hey, I have a book of Grimm's Grimmest fairy tales. I should read that too!" So while Fitcher's Brides was my bedroom book, I read Grimm's Grimmest in the library. (Only took 3 days for it - it's a pretty short book.) It had a version of Bluebeard in it - "Fowler's Fowl" - which, along with the introduction, pretty much educated me in the general Bluebeard lore.

Despite knowing what basically would happen by the end of the story, I found Fitcher's Brides a good read. Indeed, I think I liked the book even more because I knew, generally, what would happen later. For one thing, it made the grimmer bits a bit less grim. :-)

As for the remainder of Faerie Tale Theatre - the latter half was a bit easier to swallow than the earlier stuff I'd talked about before. Perhaps because I was less familiar with the stories (I'd seen very few of the third and fourth disc stories), but also because the stories weren't quite as misogynistic as the earlier ones. (More Andersen, fewer medieval tales.) There were still a few surprises. I guess I had never known the original ending to "The Little Mermaid" before - I found myself teared up at the end of it. (And then read about Hans Christian Andersen's even more religious version after watching the story.)

I found "Rip Van Winkle" (as directed by Francis Ford Coppola) to be far too stylized for my liking. Actually, it looked too much like a pantomime than anything. (I wonder if it was the inspiration for Duvall's other children's series, Tall Tales and Legends. I never cared much for that series - not like Faerie Tale Theatre. Probably because of the lack of Eric Idle and/or Jean Stapleton.) Oh, and in other director coups, they had Tim Burton directing "Aladdin." (That one wins simply for having Leonard Nimoy as an evil magician and James Earl Jones as the Genie of the Ring and the Genie of the Lamp. Heh.)

Although I'd not seen "The Dancing Princesses" as done by Shelly Duvall & co, I knew the story from another telling of it. I liked how they tackled it and I think it could go up there with Eric Idle's "Pied Piper" and Jean Stapleton's "Cinderella" (she was the fairy godmother, if you're curious) as favorite Faerie Tale Theatre stories (despite Peter Weller's stupid mustache).

I could probably continue my fairy tale trend - I've got an eBook of Hans Christian Andersen's stories which I might read. I don't think it has "The Little Mermaid," however. (It wasn't in the table of contents, but then again, neither was the first story in the book. Just what one needs - an eBook that's been coded incorrectly.)

Anyhoo, Lucy's sleeping on the chair arm beside me. Linus is who knows where (probably in the living room chair). I'm still fighting my cold. (Hey, when I get a cold, I know how to hang on to it!) And tomorrow's a family reunion. Good times, good times. :-)

Tags: books, dvds
Current Mood: contemplative
Current Music: Rite of Spring / Fantasia

My timing couldn't be more perfect - I have a nice 3 day weekend ahead of me and... I think I'm coming down with a cold.

Still, I've done what I can thus far to knock it out. I have had Mrs. Grass' Noodle Soup and a fizzy pop (Jones cream soda, if you want to know) for supper. I watched "The Pied Piper" on DVD (it was the next episode cued up - I swear!) I have just taken a Nyquil (well, a clone thereof). And I'm gonna lay down for a bit and nap (AKA, sleep). I gotta be well by Sunday cuz I'm going with the parental units to the Heritage Festival. Or to Ikea. Whatever the current plan is. (Then we go the other place on Monday.)

So, cold, go away. I don't want you this weekend.

Current Mood: sick

Of late, I've been watching all of the Faerie Tale Theatre stories (thanks to the complete DVD set). Many of these I'd not seen since I was a pre-teen/early teen. And a few I'd never managed to catch in the first place.

This was probably my favorite Showtime series. (I also liked Q.E.D. but I remember so very little about it now. And I don't recall if that was a Showtime exclusive or not.) I was jealous of Shelly Duvall for having the perfect job - play around and recreate my favorite fairy stories from my childhood. I'm only about halfway through the DVD collection (so I haven't gotten to my favorite one - The Pied Piper) and it's been rather, um, illuminating.

So like, in Rumpelstiltskin, a woman's father lies to the king about her, the king threatens to kill her if she doesn't spin straw into gold, she successfully does it (thanks to a not-terribly altruistic fellow) three nights running, so the king makes her his wife... Greedy much? Nasty much? Then, thanks to a promise made under duress, the woman has to give her child up to the not-terribly altruistic fellow (who already took her locket and ring). So we get our happy ending with a woman living with a man who threatened to kill her unless she made him rich... And I liked this story growing up?

Rapunzel... Oh my. Hubby steals radishes for preggers wife, witch demands unborn child as payment. Child is raised in seclusion in a tower. Finally meets a guy and gets knocked up, so he's blinded and she's banished to the desert. Obviously sex is bad, m'kay? But it's all happy in the end when they all meet up in the desert.

Thumbelina always keeps meeting men who want to marry her without her consent. (Then, in this version - I haven't looked at the original texts yet since I've only watched it tonight - she winds up marrying a guy she barely knows.) Sounds like poor Peri in Doctor Who.

Most of the Faerie Tale Theatre productions are fun, colorful, and chock-full of actors to watch out for. However, Mick Jagger as the Emperor of China... Not terribly PC. (Indeed, there were only two or three Asians in the production - Mako being the main one. I thought we were starting to get enlightened in the 80s.)

Some of the actual stories I like better than others for their portrayal of women. They did a great job with the Princess and the Pea. Liza Minelli's Princess is quite the independent woman. It even had a believable love story in there. (Unlike the "love at first sight" Rapunzel & Sleeping Beauty.) Thumbelina, OTOH, winds up having to clean up or serve all the men she meets.

So it's been fun watching these as an adult with certain sensibilities. OTT Italian accents in Pinocchio? Check. Slanted eyes for Caucasian actors in The Nightingale? Check. Crappy portrayal of women in far too many of these stories? Check.

And it's been fun actor watching. Vitto Scotti as a fruit seller? Check. Jean Stapleton as an ugly ogre? Check. Burgess Meredith as a mole? Check. Princess Leia and the Greatest American Hero as a couple? Check.

I hope I have as much fun with the rest of the series. (I most likely will. Plus it'll be good to see the story that had me fall in love with Eric Idle back when I was a youngin'. Oh, and that helped me memorize over 100 lines of Browning's poem. Heh.)

Tags: dvds
Current Mood: thoughtful

Today marks the birthday of the Internet Friend I've had for the longest time, Miss elsaf! Hope you have a lovely day today!

Current Mood: excited

Since I've become a Linux user, I've become more appreciative of software and hardware that "just works." And I really appreciate companies that realize there are more OSes than Winders or MacOS. So here's a big cheer for Brother for being one of those companies.

When my mom got her Winders Vista laptop, dad gave me their Minolta QMS 1250W since it didn't work with Vista. (Oddly enough, the "W" stands for Winders.) When I upgraded from XP to Ubuntu 9.04, I was pleased to note that the Minolta worked just fine with Linux. Hilarious that a machine with a "W" for Winders couldn't work with Winders Vista but could work with Linux.

However, when I was printing something off about a month ago, I had forgotten that there was a little plastic package of stand-offs sitting on my printer. And sure enough, the plastic package was pulled into my printer. I managed to get 3 of the 4 stand-offs out of it, and most of the (now melted) plastic bag. But it was still sticking during print. When ol' Doc Short took a look at it (he fixed more of those suckers than a Minolta repair man, I'm sure) he declared it dead. (Well, the drum was dead, but the cost to replace it was more than a typical laser printer.)

It was nice while it lasted, but now I needed a new printer. So a couple nights ago, I scouted out the ideal replacement. First and foremost, it had to be networkable. With my laptops oot & aboot, an IP addy on this sucker would be ideal. The Brother HL-2170W (with the "W" meaning Wireless this time, I believe) seemed to fit the bill. But would it work with Linux? Linux users said "yes!"

It arrived, to my great surprise, today. Hell, I feel like I ordered the sucker last night, but it must have been a few nights ago. I imagine the high yield toner cartridge, which I ordered the same night, will arrive Monday.

Although the CD didn't have the Linux drivers, they were easy enough to find on Brother's website. And though the directions for install eventually went cryptic, I found that when I added the printer via Ubuntu's Printers program, it showed up on the network and installed like a dream. Sweet! Plus I can navigate to its IP address and see all kinds of fun stuff about the printer.

So now I've got a laser printer again. Now if I just had something I needed to print... (Oh, and an extra bonus? The paper tray is concealed, so I probably won't be pulling plastic bags o' shit through it like with the Minolta.)

Current Mood: accomplished

Today was the first day of school for kids. (We teachers were back to work last Wednesday). We're going in early this year in order to finish up early so we can be out of the building in time for them to tear it down.

It was a good day, albeit hot. I wasn't at all surprised to see our cool summer turn back to normal as soon as the kids started back. I also wasn't surprised that the air conditioner in my room died. But thanks to our wonderful maintenance guy, it's working again and hopefully can get us through August (and part of September). Next year, new building and air conditioning for all. Yay!

Should be a fun year. While I'll be teaching, I'll also be working on my Master's Thesis. I've sent an updated idea off to my advisor and here's hoping I'm on the right track now. If so, my goal is to have the proposal done before October and a goodly portion of the thesis itself done by the new year. Then I can spend the first couple of months of 2010 cleaning it up and getting ready to finish. Here's hoping!

Looks like it's gonna be a good year. Let's hear it for school - yay! :-)

Current Mood: optimistic

We had another lovely day today. We didn't stay up quite as late last night, so I got up a bit earlier today. After I'd had breakfast and was sitting reading stuff online, judiang came in fully dressed and said, to my great surprise, "I need you to take me to the store." (Now to fully appreciate this, the only "store" I'd be taking her to is Wagner's grocery. If you know Judi's phobia of groceries as elsaf and I do, you'll understand my surprise.) Turns out her ear wax was working overtime and we needed a solution (pun intended). That matter solved, we could continue our morning veg.

When lunch time arrived, I started up a fire and we burned some hot dogs. (Judi's burned so much it fell in with the coals. I think I found the right thing cuz she says it didn't taste woody at all.) Chex mix (homemade, of course) and baked beans complemented our burned eats.

We went for a little walk around this end of the Lake and Judi took a few photos. (She twitpic'd one, for those of you who follow her on Twitter - a nice shot of the channel near us.) But when we arrived back at the cottage, it was time to head to Piqua. We had some movie-watching to do.

Judi was somehow under the misapprehension that Elsa and I were saving up watching Harry Potter 6 until we reconvened later in the summer. I recall no such agreement and had seen the movie the day it came out. (Which I tweeted about and, I think, mentioned in LJ.) Elsa, of course, couldn't join us and had seen it with her bro & s-i-l. But I was quite happy to go see it again. My folks hadn't seen it yet either, so I invited them along. We met them at the theater and I bought us tickets. (Decided to treat everyone to "dinner and a movie" - the folks in thanks for letting us use the Lake, and Judi to congratulate her for her promotion at work.)

I really enjoyed the movie the first time around, and equally enjoyed it the second time. Since seeing it last, I'd reread books 6 and 7, so that was handy to have going in my mind. My mom's only been following the series via the movies, so she was surprised by the SPOILER at the end. Both she and dad really liked it as well. Judi can speak for herself in her own LJ.

For dinner, I wanted to treat them all to Sakai, the local Japanese hibachi place. As with our time with Amy & Rachel in tow, we had Daniel san as our chef. He was excellent as always. Mom had scallops, dad had chicken, I had chicken & scallops, and Judi had steak & scallops. It was quite tasty. And very filling. We parted company with the parentals and headed back north. Now we're vegging and geeking. (I had a bit of coconut ice cream awhile ago - just as good the second day!)

Tomorrow, alas, Judi heads back home. But it looks like we'll have another fine morning to spend here at the Lake. Apart from a little rain last night (which happened while we were inside playing cards), the weather's been perfect. Gonna be chilly tonight. (I like chilly nights!)

Current Mood: content

After staying up late last night, judiang and I slept in today. I woke up in a nest of inflatable bed, but wasn't touching ground yet, so that was good. (It has a very slow leak. Thankfully slow enough to last me through to pee time.)

Since we'd gotten up so late and I had forgotten to buy cereal when I was at the grocery yesterday, I suggested we go to Haus der Eleganz, a little preppy coffee shop in Minster. We did and then asked for the breakfast menu (despite it being noon). We both ordered omlettes - mine was feta, spinach, and bacon. There was also toast and fruit (most of the fruit being various melons, but Judi let me have all of her non-melon fruit, so I had that instead). (I'd also ordered a vanilla Italian cream soda, but that was when we were looking at the lunch menu. I was finished with it by the time the food arrived.)

I popped across the street to the grocery to pick up cereal (Haus isn't open on Sundays or Mondays) and ice. Oh, and rum. Judi stayed in the car (don't worry, I opened the windows a crack).

Back at the cottage I did as much prep as I could for supper. Tossed the salad (spring mix, romaine, feta & Gorgonzola, Roma tomatoes, slivered almonds and craisins, blueberry pomegranate dressing). Made the pineapple topping for the coconut ice cream. Toasted some sliced almonds. Then sat and worked on my mini for a bit before reading and eventually napping. Judi was napping the entire time. :-)

Mom and dad arrived around 4pm with the corn on the cob. So then I put the ears to soak in water for at least an hour before grilling. Aunt Becky arrived next, followed by Uncle Dean later. With everyone here, I started the fire (with issues, but we managed it).

The corn was grilled first since it takes the longest. I had them on rotation and got all but 4 ears (of the 16 mom brought) grilled. Then I put the t-bones on. They were HUGE and could only get 4 on the grill at a time. But I got 'em done and they were cooked just right, apparently. Folks were already eating the salad and then the corn by the time I had the steaks in. They said they liked it all. I really liked my stuff too. (The corn was perfectly sweet and still firm - Fulton's corn at its peak. No butter or salt needed!

Becky had brought some fruit and cake along, so we had that as well. Very nice selection of fruit and she made an orange/lemon sauce to pour on top. Yummy. I had a piece of the blueberry snack cake that she'd made. A successful experiment, IMO.

We were all stuffed to the gills, so Dean headed back home and we ladies started a game of pinochle. After a test round to make sure we remembered the rules, we played in earnest. With just a couple rounds to go (with Judi and me in the lead) we paused for ice cream and pound cake.

The coconut ice cream was very soft and in the freezer here at the lake, became even softer. But with a scoop or two on pound cake and then the topping of your choice (pineapple, chocolate fudge, and/or toasted almonds), it was quite tasty. I opted for chocolate and almond slices. Yum! I think I'll experiment some on that coconut ice cream recipe, but it was an excellent first attempt.

We finished the game and Judi and I managed to maintain our lead. Thankfully Becky and mom didn't get any amazing double runs or anything to snatch victory away from us. :-) Becky then headed home, followed shortly by the parental units. Plans are made to meet them at the movie theater tomorrow to see Harry Potter 6.

So now we're just vegging on our laptops. Judi's roleplaying her dog Lance on IRC (he's quite the entertaining fellow), I'm writing all this. Maybe we'll get to bed at a reasonable hour tonight. *snerk*

Current Mood: full

Wow, been 20 days since I last posted. Course the main reason is cuz I've not been doing much of anything. But my summer vacation is almost up - teachers first day is Wednesday. Kids come the following Monday.

So to finish off my very short summer, judiang has flown in today and we'll be weekending here at mom & dad's cottage at the Lake. Alas, elsaf can't join us, so we're missing her. Still, we'll try to have fun without her. :-)

Since Judi had to fly into Columbus (cuz it's so much cheaper than flying into Dayton), I looked around online for a restaurant there to go for a late lunch. I found a pub called The Old Bag of Nails (the Bexley one), so we headed there for lunch. They've totally screwed up the roads around the airport, so my GPS got us a bit lost. Once I removed "major roads" from the settings, it got us there pretty easily.

I had intended to get the "all you can eat fish & chips" so I did. Judi ordered an appetizer of mussels and shrimp (I ate the five shrimp, she had the 4 million mussels - an exaggeration, but they do love giving you mussels) and the seafood platter (fish & chips along with battered shrimp & scallops). The food was very yummy. We then agreed to split the homemade bread pudding ala mode. The waitress brought out two servings of it and apologized for getting carried away when cutting up the freshly baked bread pudding. Sure enough, she only charged us for the one serving. It was also very yummy.

Although I had inputted the address for COSI (the Center of Science and Industry) into my GPS, Judi preferred instead to head on home. No problemo. Stuffed to the gills, we squeezed back into my car and I drove us home. When we got off the interstate, I took her around to mom & dad's new house & showed her around. She was quite impressed.

After a short stop in my house to pick up the groceries I bought this morning, we finally headed to the Lake. We've been here a few hours and have been vegging and catching up on our online lives. I even finished my first book for July. (Most of this year I've gotten at least 5 books read in a month - July has been an exception. Though I did reread HP6 & 7 just recently.)

Tomorrow, I'll be grilling t-bone steaks & corn on the cob for Judi, the parentals, Aunt Becky & Uncle Dean. I shall endeavor to channel Elsa's cooking mojo. :-)

Current Mood: relaxed
Current Music: The B-52s / Love Shack

In case you were curious, I got home from Chicago just fine. Flight & drive back both smooth & easy - the best way to travel. Since I've been home, I've been trying to milk the little remains of my summer as best as possible. (Short summer due to early school start - all new school building related. It will be our last school year in the 1922 building.)

Our school isn't the only new construction going up - mom & dad are having a house built in the next town over. It's been fun watching the progress of that. We've been taking lots of photos and videos of it. I missed 2 weeks of the construction since I was in Wooster & Chicago, but now I'm back in the flow of things.

We watched the trusses go up on Tuesday. They had the big crane out & were putting them in place and then nailing them proper. Quite fun. Yesterday they were putting tar paper on the sheathing. Mom and I watched it from the swimming pool. :-) (The "gated community" that they're moving into has a pool. And we were allowed to go swimming. Yay!)

Thanks to judiang (who is, I believe I said before, EVIL) I wound up buying a Wii and WiiFit for myself on Tuesday. It's been fun and I've started a regimen with it. After a couple of days up, I finally went down in weight today. We'll see if I can stick with it. Just bought two other titles for it today.

And unfortunately, before I bought the Wii, I reupped my World of Warcraft subscription, so I've been playing that a lot lately too. But it's been fun. Despite my playstyle (which is to focus on professions first, leveling second) I've gone from level 43 to 47 since I reupped. Heh.

Anyhoo, tomorrow I intend to get a handle on my house and maybe even get back to work on my Master's Thesis. And of course I have to rewatch all of the Harry Potter movies before Wednesday. (Watched the first flick today. Gee, they were all so small then!)

So anyway, happy gaming to all you gamers! And happy summer to the rest of y'all! (Or winter, as the case may be.)

Tags: home, wii, wow
Current Mood: happy

Alas, today was my last full day in Chicago. But judiang and I have been making the most of it. We started yesterday after our vegging/YouTubing time.

Judi needed a iPhone 3Gs case for her new iPhone since her case for version 1.0 interfered with the sensor. I said either BestBuy or the Apple Store would be the place to go and asked which she wanted. She decided on BestBuy. Bad idea... Remember, elsaf and her car are heading back to Michigan at this time.

( Yesterday, cont. )

Today we got up at a decent hour because we wanted to catch the first showing of Up at the 600 (AMC). So we had breakfast at the cafe across from her condoplex. I had mascarpone-filled French toast with blueberries and creme anglaise. Very yummy.

( Today cont. )

Tomorrow I fly home. I'm sad to be going, but am glad I get to see my kitties again!

( More pictures - glow sticks, Taste, Wii )

Tags: chicago, food, games, judi
Current Location: Chicago, IL
Current Mood: accomplished

Alas, elsaf is driving home as I type this. It was lovely seeing her again and I hope her drive back is smooth & uneventful.

After our fun time at Taste on Thursday, we spent most of the day relaxing. Toward supper time, Elsa cooked up Rogan Josh (a lamb curry) and Jasmine rice. Very yummy. Since we were nearly out of Bailey's ice cream, I went to the market in judiang's building and got us each a pint of something. We finally got Judi to watch The Princess Bride. I think she liked it, but she did miss several jokes cuz the sound set up wasn't quite right.

Friday was the day of the Grant Park Fireworks, so our focus of the day was making sure we'd be ready at 8pm to get to the penthouse to watch. I took a short walk in the morning to Dunkin Donuts to get us breakfast. I also walked with Judi to take the poochies for their morning walk. More relaxing, then lunch at a nearby diner/delicatessen Eleven City Diner. I had an open-faced Reuben and fries and cream soda. Very tasty.

Judi and I played pool in the afternoon. This time we were even on wins. She won solids/stripes and one of our 9-ball games. I won the other two 9-ball games. Alas, that's the only kind of pool I'll be enjoying this trip. Although the temperatures have been ideal, they haven't been swimming-pool comfortable.

On our way home from the diner earlier, we'd picked up fixings for grilling steaks and making more ice cream. So for supper, we had grilled rib eye, baked taters, and the rest of the pineapple from Tuesday night (when Elsa grilled us burgers w/ grilled pineapple & onions and mozzarella). Then at 5 till 8, we headed up to the penthouse.

The place wasn't at all crowded and we quickly found great seats on the balcony with a view to the Lake where the fireworks would be shot. Then we remembered the radio, so I went down to get it. Unfortunately, it didn't pick up the station like it did down in her condo. Bummer, no synchronized music for us! Still, the fireworks were brilliant.

hergrace called us back (we'd left a Happy Birthday greeting on her answering machine earlier in the day) and we all got to chat with her while watching the Boom Boom Boom. It was almost like having her there as well (though she couldn't see them). Glad you had a nice birthday, Steph!

This morning we got Elsa all packed up for her trip back. Then she drove us to Chinatown for Dim Sum at Three Happiness. Yummy as ever. We popped into Freida's bakery for some (more) sesame buns and then hugged Elsa before she headed off. Judi and I took the El back.

Now we're fiddling with YouTube and posting videos of fireworks. Behind the cut I have (I hope) the video that I just posted as well as a few photos. I'm impressed with what my phone can do!

( Fireworks photos & video )

Tags: chicago, elsa, food, judi, photos
Current Location: Chicago, IL
Current Mood: cheerful

Today we got to the Taste of Chicago! Yum! But before we did that, judiang and I went to her workplace in order for her to turn in cases she flexed on and pick up some new cases to flex. We got to the office block at quarter till 8am, so I wasn't let allowed in her offices. So I popped into the Starbucks in her building and had a caramel steamer and read a book on my mobile. It was kind of fun sitting and looking out at the city view. So of course I took a picture.

Starbucks View The view from Starbucks when I had a caramel steamer this morning.

She came down to get me once visitors were allowed in. I read some more and enjoyed looking out her window. (I also fixed a certificate which had fallen from her wall. Yes, I'm anal.) Her office is on the 9th floor and you can see over the El (elevated train). I, of course, took a photo.

De Trains! De Trains! View of the El from Judi's office at her workplace.

When Judi was done with her work, it was after 10am so we decided to walk to Taste of Chicago. elsaf e-mailed her requests, so once we'd grazed for a bit, we picked up her requests. Here are things that I tried:

• Potato Pancake w/ apple sauce from Manny's Cafeteria & Deli - alas, reheated rather than fresh.
  
• Irish Egg Roll from Abbey Pub - my favorite 2009 Taste item so far. Basically a Reuben in a filo dough that's been fried.
  
• Grilled Anjou Pear Salad from The Grill on the Alley - tasty, but a little too tart.
  
• Jambalaya from Blue Bayou - alas, they were already sold out of the Bananas Foster Bites.
  
• Potato Pierogi and Cheese Pierogi from Polka Sausage and Deli - very yummy and the cheese one was sweet rather than savory.
  
• Mustard-fried Catfish and Peach Cobbler - had a bite of these two items from Judi's purchases.
  
• Baklava from Costa's - wanted to end on a sweet note, so I did.

We started at 11am on the dot and were leaving the Taste at 12:05. :)

Tags: chicago, elsa, food, judi
Current Location: Chicago, IL
Current Mood: full

Wound up sending these photos from my phone via e-mail (a first for me). A little editing with GIMP and then time to post.

( Read more... )

Tags: chicago, elsa, judi, photos
Current Location: Chicago, IL
Current Mood: accomplished

Normally by now, we'd've been to Taste of Chicago by now, but the weather hasn't been all that amenable for it. Not a problem, there's lots of fun stuff to do in Chicago.

Monday we headed for the Bongo Room for breakfast. Alas, their tasty eggs Benedicts are for the weekend only, so I had to make due (heh heh) with French toast covered in blueberries & cream. Very very yummy. (Benedicts, what Benedicts?)

We were slow moving at the start of Monday, but eventually headed off to Target to get some essentials. Since judiang moved into this apartment in 2005, she's had her cable box & DVD player sitting on a cardboard box on an end table in the living room. I finally harassed her enough to get at least something different (poor Judi always having to suffer my harassment - dunno why she puts up with me!) We found a set of bookshelves which looked like they would work (at least until she finally finds the perfect piece for there). One thing the bookshelf does is gives her remote a better line of sight for turning the peripherals on.

Since the bookshelf took up so much room in elsaf's car, we returned to the apartment to dump off the Target purchases. Poor http://www.zolajonesdesigns.com/Judi was sat in the backseat nearly bent in two for the ride back. But once the car was emptied again, we returned to our route. Whole Foods was next followed by Jewel/Osco for the final purchases. We had lunch at Whole Foods (I had pizza) and grilled hot dogs for supper.

Tuesday was Visiting Jason Day. Jason Loper is the owner & bag-maker of Zola Jones Designs, a wonderful store on Montrose Ave. He graduated in my sister's class and is the closest thing I have to a little brother. When he came to Alumni this year (you know, I never did finish writing about that weekend...) I told him that I had to FINALLY visit his shop this time to Chicago. So Elsa drove us to Montrose and we walked the short (but noisy, thanks to all the street work) walk to Jason's store. We all found stuff at the shop to buy and then we went to Glenn's Diner (his recommendation) for lunch. The seafood bisque fettuccine (w/ shrimp & scallops) was very yummy.

On the way home, we popped into Michaels (a craft store) and Best Buy. Judi picked up a knitting starter kit at Michaels and Elsa has been teaching her to knit. (Sometimes with amusing results.) I bought some science toys at Michaels as well (mostly sodium polyacrylate-related items). Best Buy provided us with the wiring we needed to hook up external speakers to Judi's living room AV system. Too tired to attack the Taste for supper, we ordered Connie's Pizza instead. Mmmm, pineapple pizza!

We christened Judi's ice cream maker with Bailey's Irish Cream ice cream. But we needed to let it solidify more, so we went to the clubhouse to play pool. Well, Elsa knitted, Judi & I played. I taught Judi how to play 9-ball and she beat me 3 out of 4 times. The pool shark!

Today was cold and rainy, so we decided to make it Movie Day. But first, we had a leak to worry about. Judi's guest bathroom had a leak that we couldn't figure and it was getting worse. The building repairman arrived and determined it must be the toilet. So we left him to it while we headed off for some Cajun food & funny movie. Heaven on Seven was our lunch destination. I had shrimp po' boy and the etouffee of the day: chicken & crawdad. Tasty tasty. We watched The Hangover and were all entertained.

Now Elsa is knitting, Judi is cleaning the bathroom where the leak was, and I'm typing this. Doesn't look like supper will be the Taste, but it'll be wonderful cuz it's something Elsa's gonna grill for us. Yum!

Current Mood: satisfied

Well, back in my favorite Big City (well, favorite enough), Chicago. Flew from Columbus to Midway today and arrived in time for a late lunch with judiang. We originally headed for Howies, a hamburger joint near her place, but when we got there, the place was closed. A handwritten sign said that the owners had vacated the premises and wouldn't be reopening. I'm sure the story behind that is interesting, whatever it is. We headed across the street to Zapatista instead.

Since it was late for lunch, we decided to split a lunch. We got enchiladas suisa with chicken. It came with refried beans and rice. Tasty tasty. Judi had a virgin margarita that wound up being more foam than beverage. We headed for Judi's apartment to await elsaf's arrival. She was driving in from Michigan.

We watched several episodes of Gordon Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares on BBCA while I got online with her wireless network. Elsa arrived shortly before 6pm, which was within her predicted window. After she rested up a bit from the long drive, we walked to Ma & I, a Thai and sushi place a couple of blocks from Judi's place. I ordered pad thai with a starter of California roll. Yummy!

Across the street from Ma & I is an ice cream place, Marble Slab. So of course we had to go there for some ice cream. I had a waffle cone with Swiss chocolate ice cream and birthday cake batter ice cream. Very yummy.

Now we're vegging out in Judi's den. We watched the end of Aliens and will soon be watching the first two eps of Supersizers for this season (once Judi gets the DVD burned). Tomorrow should be a fun day - we may head to Taste of Chicago. More yummy food!

Current Mood: relaxed