arya_riddle

I honestly don't know what the hell I am doing... Blogging sounds so much fun, and I have such a lot to write crap about, but. I just don't GET IT.

Well.. anyway. CHRISTMAS! I. am. so. freaking. excited! *squee*

and I cant finish one fo these posts within two hours. It is ACTUALLY impossible for m to do!

I just burnt my hand really badly on the kettle and it FREAKING hurts. Typing makes it worse, so I'll just post this crappy post now.

Rush xxxxx

So today is exactly one week to Christmas, and there is still the hope that someone out there might get something right about the holiday, so a rather Merry Nice Report this week.

My DH actually asked for a list more than 2 days before Christmas! YEAH!

I already have a present for my mother.

And my father

I got a really sweet wonderful Christmas card from a friend in which she said very nice things, and it really cheered me up on a bad day.

We went to a wonderful nursery for Braveheart's Christmas visit to Santa this year, and had a marvelous time even though I spilled coffee all over the floor and so forth.  (I really did also spill coffee all over the floor.)  Santa was a very nice man with a real beard and real white hair, and the little storybook area with the moving elves was set up very nicely.  They've come up far in the world since the last time we went at Christmas.  They also have a little cafe now.  We got two ornaments and some mistletoe, too.  A nice time altogether, and BH wants to take his little brother tomorrow, which I think is very sweet.

DH has been making noises about actually getting me the sewing machine I want for Christmas.  When I tried some out last week I got him a card, but really, for the one I really want he needs a little luck.

There was a nice little party at the House Elf's school in his classroom today, to which I brought 2 dozen cupcakes, 23 of which came home with me, as there was way more than enough food, and I was the one who ate the other one.  And a few more.  They are going to have to go into the freezer.

My mom made me some nice cards from something she had painted so I at least have cards to send to one segment of my card-receiving public. 

I tried voice posting, and by the third one I was doing all right.  Not brilliant, and I think I gave Mrs. Figg sentences in which by the time I am done reading she's had three or four DIFFERENT British accents, but then, I am not an actress and I've never had any accent coaching.  My basic narrative voice does not entirely reveal my roots, at any rate.  I think only two people have listened to it at all, that or everyone thought it was horrid and was afraid to leave a message, but I am satisfied with the improvement between post one and post three.

I cleaned out half a cabinet to put magazines in. 

I got to Spinning on Wednesday night like I rarely get to do, and there were people there who wanted to sit with me, as well as very good food. I ate way, way too many peanut butter and chocolate thingies for a woman on WW, let's just say that.  There was also someone there getting rid of yarn from her family - she had had several sales of various kinds and was showing what was left...which was the entire front of the stage.  I had five dollars so  I got what I think is enough of some peach colored stuff for a tank top for two dollars, and three balls of Berrocco Sensu-Wool for three dollars.  It has a texture very different from most hand knitting wool and I am not quite sure what I am going to do with it, but it was my color!  I also spun some.

I also got to knitting on Monday night - so, actually two nights this week when I got to talk to real, live people who are not paid to be there.  (Most of my conversation is with Braveheart's service providers.)

I had the GREAT BAG TRIUMPH I reported earlier.

I found a nice gift for the nurse, who is leaving tonight until March or so...

I have a new nurse coming in Monday.  So if she's any good, that will mean unbroken service.  I am holding out some hope that she will, indeed, be some  good.

I finally bought the Severus Socks pattern.

We got one air-conditioner out of the window.

Today I took the boys to the craft store and among other things we got nice silk flowers to use on the tree.  We saw this at the fancy nursery, and we can do similar for a fraction of the price. 

The week had its challenges, but I made it through.

Your niceness below, please.

VoicePost 692K 3:28

(no transcription available)

Thanks, everyone. Yesterday's muddled part 2 was not supposed to post, but it did, so a special thank you to all who suffered through that one. I think this one is the most clearly audible so far. I do know at least one person has been listening, and I thank everyone else who has as well.

MNFF Supports the YouTube Project For Awesome

Once a year in the week before Christmas, fans of the American author John Green and his brother Hank (known as the VlogBrothers on YouTube) get together to take over youtube for a day.

This day is known as the “Project 4 Awesome” and youtubers are invited to make a short video advertising a worthy cause.

The exciting news is that MNFF is currently planning its own charity project which we will be announcing in the new year! The charity we would like to support is called Room to Read. What Room to Read does is build libraries and give books to countries with poor access to education. They work with local communities, translating literature into native languages, building schools and generally providing education to as many children as they can.

They currently work in Nepal, Vietnam, Cambodia, India, Sri Lanka, Laos, South Africa, Zambia and Bangladesh, with plans to move further into Asia, Africa and South America in the new year.

Here at MNFF we believe in the power of literature and the right to an education for every child. We hope you agree with this sentiment and will look forward to our exciting project in 2010!

As part of the Project for Awesome, we have created this video to raise awareness of ourselves and the charity. Thank you to Molly, OliveOil_Med, for being so wonderful and putting it together for us. All we ask right now is that you watch the video, rate it using the stars in the bottom left corner, maybe send it to a few friends or leave a comment for other people to read. If you want to, you can go to the Room to Read website and donate to the cause right away. If you don't have the money to donate, sit tight! You'll like what we've got planned! This project is designed to spread the word about charities that deserve the recognition. We believe Room to Read does. Please watch our video now.
Thank you for your time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKpFLmcQByk

Please watch and rate. Leaving a comment would be great, too. Thanks

So why is it that everytime DH asks me to make a Gift list, I end up crying? And it is not good crying, either. And that is just making the list.

Spindlewand must admit to liking bags.

By Bags, we do not mean expensive designer handbags, which, quite frankly, spindlewand thinks are ridiculous. Said wand is not defined by the pile of leather/pleather/stuffthatoughttobeholdingupasink that passes for a fashionable object.

I am, however, (because I can only talk like the Queen for so long) absolutely addicted to bags as things-in-which-other-things-can-be-put.

I come by this totally honestly. My father is exactly the same.

There could be a lot of reasons for this, starting with the amount of stuff I seem to take any time I leave my local cruising area. My mother is certain my great-grandmother emigrated with less junk than I routinely brought back to college from Thanksgiving break, for example, and I have never argued with her. I'm fairly certain she's correct. However, at this point I rarely leave my local cruising radius. Once a year I got to my brother's house for the holiday (we were not invited this year and I will not lower myself to discuss this omission, *sniff*) and sometimes, but by no means every year, and certainly not twice in one year, we go on a family vacation by car for which, in all honesty, we are prone to pack in the big blue bags you get for under a dollar at Ikea. (The glamour just never ends around here.)I do not work outside the home. I do not go anywhere that requires a knitting project larger than a sock, and I can fit a sock in my handbag. In short, I have a need for, let us be generous, one or two knitting bags, and perhaps one in which I can throw my netbook when I am not throwing it in my purse, where it fits quite well.

I love bags, however. I will not, at this point, go into the reasons why, but I love bags. Sacks, totes, suitcases, rolling totes, I adore them all. I want them all. I thrift, and when I see nice ones, I buy them all. At one or two dollars each, who can really blame me?

And every time I bring one home, Mr. Wand makes fun of me.

Mr. Wand is not enamored of my thrift shopping. Mr. Wand would prefer I purchase everything new. Mr. Wand has clearly never added up the potential cost of "everything," but my father, in an extremely uncharacteristic moment of taking-my-side-in-front-of-my-husband (As in, we have been married 20 years, and I do not recall a previous occasion) has recently told him that I save him a great amount of money by buying my clothing that way which said Mr. Wand does not, according to Father Wand, realize because he has no experience with woman who can spend hundreds of dollars on a blouse, (or some similar example. And Father Wand must know this from his years in the wilderness, because Mother Wand is exceedingly frugal and has never, even when she worked in industry and was billed to big businesses as a computer consultant at 300 dollars an hour spent that much on a blouse.)

Mr. Wand is, indeed, unappreciative of both my thrifting, and my propensity to not exactly hoard, but let us say, prepare against eventualities. Some day, for example, I may actually get to leave the house. (Two winters ago I went about 6 days without leaving the house, quite literally, as in "did not put foot to ground on front or back landings.) And that would require a bag of some kind. And so I have some.

And when I see another one for 2 dollars, I buy it. Then I bring it home, and then Mr. Wand makes fun of me. But today, today I had my just revenge....

Mr. Wand called out from the top of the stairs "_____________, do you have a bag?"

And I called back "As in the bags you make fun of me for buying?"

And he called back, "Yes"

To which I replied "Of course! You know that last one you made fun of me for? You can take that one!"

He came downstairs with his stuff in this bag, which was entirely new when purchased for two dollars at the thrift. It has two compartments, so his cd's can be apart from his paperwork. It has regular handles which unclip and then clip back together to be a shoulder strap. It has a zipper to make one part of the bag either thicker or thinner.
"This is a great bag!" said he.

Revenge is very, very sweet.

Doing a friends cut. Don't take it personally if you're removed - I'm just getting rid of people I don't really talk to much anymore/people who don't post, in an attempt to keep my flist smaller. :)

Also, why is the LJ home page so ... squishy? O.o

I thought I'd better make a regular post to explain what I'm doing with that voice posting. I'm reading a Christmas story I wrote aloud. It's about Mrs. Fig's Christmas during the Half Blood Prince. The first one is a bit difficult to understand, but I 'm moving on to the next part and I will try to speak more slowly. (I thought I was speaking VERY slowly - that is what happens when you come from Brooklyn, I suppose...)

If I get a volunteer to beta/BritPick it'll go up on MNFF too, and then you'll be able to read it... Which will probably help a lot with the parts that might have been difficult to hear...

My accent will probably send all you who know what Brits actually sound like from long experience rolling on the floor with laughter, but I have a really good reason for wanting my stuff audible. Audible is the only way Braveheart gets to "read" anything. I've read books aloud to him, but I wonder if having it coming out of the computer or CD player won't make it seem more like a "real" story to him. Anyway...

VoicePost 1049K 5:08

(no transcription available)

I'm afraid my British accents aren't quite as bad when I am just fooling around as they are when I'm reading, but the MerMuggles are very busy and I thought you'd like this. Part one of three, I think. Let me know how you like the story and the reading... I can probably take it...

I want to voice post.

I went and made a voice post thingie with my email and my password.

When I try to make a voice post, it tells me it is an invalid login.

WTF?

Does anyone see what I am doing wrong?

Niceness!

There is a wonderful new Thrift Store where National Wholesale
Liquidators used to be.

I got an Ott Light from Joann fabric so you can now almost see in the living room.

I was able to get leather needles to fix the 100 dollar bag I bought for a dollar at the little church thrift because it's handles were wrecked. (The rest of it is fine. And it happens to be a bag I've been eyeing in Staples. For like 2 years now.)

When I go to the counter in Joann Fabric and the girl rang up my order at the end of what was probably a really long day, she was very nice even when I realized I left my money and credit card at home and she'd have to void the whole thing.


I managed to turn two of my friends to the dark side - mwahaha - both got vintage sewing machines at my urging, both on Tuesday.

On Friday, with the liberal help of You Tube videos and her own native intelligence, I was able to be of some help as one of them pretty much fixed the one she got. (It still does one wonky thing, but it's a wonky thing it couldn't even do yesterday morning! To me, that's success!)

I got my own good sewing machine cleaned out and oiled during the same process ("On mine it works this way. OOOH - TWO drive belts! Well, as long as I'm in here anyway...").

I got a new cell phone. It just happens to be Gryffindor color. I will admit to having picked it because it was the cheapest they had. (Maybe I mentioned this last week...)

The man I told I would pick up the sewing machine from last weekend was very nice when I told him on Monday that there was no way I could get out there. (Montauk, yes. Midtown, no.)

I figured out something I can get for Braveheart's teacher.

I also figured out something for House Elf's bus driver.

When Braveheart fell asleep and was not hooked up to his monitor and DH then fell asleep with his foot underneath him, and the nurse rang the doorbell and DH got up but his foot was asleep and he tripped and hit his face on the wooden arm of the Morris chair, he did not black out, he will still need makeup to play Frankenstein, and the nice Doctor who sewed him up at the ER at 2 am said that he didn't have a concussion. And Bravheart was ok.

When I dragged the House Elf to the doctor because two people from school were hocking me about the pain he was reportedly having in his leg, he would not really stop moving, climbing and getting himself into odd positions long enough for the doctor to formally range him without a good deal of entreaty. Between that and the ranging itself, it was clear to the doctor that there does not seem to be anything terribly wrong at this time. And she certainly didn't think he needed the xray the two people at school thought he needed. Win for mom.

Braveheart has agreed to try wearing glove with fingers.

MIL wants to get Braveheart something special for Christmas

My parents got their flu shot.

History Channel had some great stuff about the Black Death and castles and other things of interest to me on yesterday.

I am readng my first Neil Gaiman book and having fun.

Your niceness below, please!

So.

I logged in to LJ today, and I found out from reading nina_myers24 's LJ that there's a remake of Death At A Funeral coming out next year. This is unacceptable. Death at a Funeral is hands down one of FUNNIEST and most hilarious movies I've ever had the pleasure of seeing. It's definitely one of my top five favorites all around. It's just British comedy at its best, I feel. And after seeing this "remake" which is really the same movie [including plot, lines, and in one case, actor] but with American actors, I feel....disgusted with Hollywood.

Last year they remade the awesome [REC] [a Spanish zombie movie] which was quite honestly one of the best zombie movies I've ever seen. And then not even a year later it was remade into this crap called Quarantine. WTF Hollywood?! Are you that money hungry? Let someone else share the fame and glory.

I'm so sick and tired of Hollywood insulting my intelligence. If I want to see foreign films and get a kick out of them, I don't need you remaking them for me - the original is always good enough. I dare say, that if Hot Fuzz gets a remake someone is going to get their head "blown up."

-______-

Do yourself a favor, f-list. See the original movie [click here for the Apple Trailer]. It'll totally be worth your time. Trust me.



As for me, I'm boycotting the "remake" 'cause WTF?!