Tonight was a lovely Halloween. We stayed in and drank wine with friends and gave candy to little kids and made them all tell us what their costumes were. Yes, we're those people. And tiny kids dressed as superheroes and fairy princesses ruled the neighborhood. The leftovers will be abandoned at work tomorrow for other people (Whoppers and Almond Joy, we are keeping the leftover Twix and Heath bars).
And I have clearly been listening to the radio too much while driving around for work. Because right now I am irritated at the pop music industry and their need for maudlin love songs (ahem, paging miss Adele?) There are more things to sing about than luuuurve. Which is why I have to post this new Florence and the Machine video. She is one of the only things I am hearing on the radio right now that I am excited about at a Neko Case level. As in, I think she is as talented and as weird and I am excited that she is on the radio as much as she is. And this new video is awesome.
Also, pretty!
The other favorites of mine that I can't believe are getting as much radio play as they are are The Black Keys. If you're going to sing about love, this is the way to do it.
They have such a good, gritty sound and that drummer makes me want to dance! What are you listening to right now that you are excited about?
The other thing I am loving right now is a blues musician named Rory Gallagher. Sometimes Matt will say, "oh, you should listen to this, you'll like this" and be completely correct and it will be somebody I never would have known about otherwise. So this is the song on repeat on my iPod this week:
Monday, October 31, 2011
Monday, October 24, 2011
God I Am Terrible At Titles
Had a nice weekend with my dad, my mom is in Utah visiting her granddaughters and Matt is in Reno checking on the house. We hung my mailbox (finally!) and got plants for both our yards. And then last night my neighbors were throwing away camellia bushes because they were mislabeled white/full sun when they were really pink and didn't care for sun at all. Which sounds like most of my yard. So those are going in back hopefully after work today.
Also, I have a job interview today! Cross your fingers for me, it's a soils job similar to one I had in Reno for FOUR YEARS so I am optimistic. Based on info from a friend that works there it would mean some annoying office politics but it would be work that I am good at, plus a salary, benefits and a 10 MINUTE COMMUTE.
WANT.
And since I miss Matt:
I love Peter Gabriel. Also my husband.
Also, I have a job interview today! Cross your fingers for me, it's a soils job similar to one I had in Reno for FOUR YEARS so I am optimistic. Based on info from a friend that works there it would mean some annoying office politics but it would be work that I am good at, plus a salary, benefits and a 10 MINUTE COMMUTE.
WANT.
And since I miss Matt:
I love Peter Gabriel. Also my husband.
Thursday, October 20, 2011
Hi Again
So it seems like this is a once-a-week blog lately. That's about how exciting my life is right now. If one of these other jobs pans out and I suddenly get a normal sleep schedule and a normal commute I could see going back to three or four posts a week but I am just not doing projects like I have been in the past.
I come home, do some laundry, clean up the kitchen and take a shower. Then I have dinner and fall asleep, usually to reruns of The Big Bang Theory. My garden projects are in limbo until we decide what to do. And the house is getting painted, one bit at a time, but it is all neutral colors or colors that don't show up on my camera (mad photography skills here).
I hope to get some projects taken care of this weekend and have some pictures to show for it. I just pulled my squash plants out and about half of my tomatoes as it has gotten wet so they are just sad and sloppy now. So once I finish cleaning up out there I want to redo the foundation plantings around where the veggies will go again in spring. Roses, lavender, gaura and loropetalum are the current front-runners as this is only a moderately sunny area and I want to keep the back comparatively more traditional. I have fantasies of dogwoods and rhododendrons for the full shade...
The front, I have other ideas for. We are waiting for a permit to take out the street tree and once that is out we are taking out the sad fruitless mulberry too. And the lawn. It is going to be a big project. And a decent amount of it hinges on what I can get the landlord to fund. There is a nonprofit that will replace the street tree but I want to replace the mulberry with a (very fruiting) navel orange, with a Western Redbud on the side. Currently it is 90% lawn with a couple of small beds up against the house that I have mostly filled with succulents. I want to do a nice mix of low-water stuff like ceanothus and more lavender with succulents. I have some volunteer agaves in pots that will be going in, and the "fence" between our yard and the neighbors is made of yuccas and I want to break that up a little bit and clump them around other places in the yard so they don't look completely random over there (ha).
And I just wanted to share a cute new blog I found, The Color Issue, it is full of fun inspiration (just what I need right now as the holidays loom).
Pictures soon, I promise!
I come home, do some laundry, clean up the kitchen and take a shower. Then I have dinner and fall asleep, usually to reruns of The Big Bang Theory. My garden projects are in limbo until we decide what to do. And the house is getting painted, one bit at a time, but it is all neutral colors or colors that don't show up on my camera (mad photography skills here).
I hope to get some projects taken care of this weekend and have some pictures to show for it. I just pulled my squash plants out and about half of my tomatoes as it has gotten wet so they are just sad and sloppy now. So once I finish cleaning up out there I want to redo the foundation plantings around where the veggies will go again in spring. Roses, lavender, gaura and loropetalum are the current front-runners as this is only a moderately sunny area and I want to keep the back comparatively more traditional. I have fantasies of dogwoods and rhododendrons for the full shade...
The front, I have other ideas for. We are waiting for a permit to take out the street tree and once that is out we are taking out the sad fruitless mulberry too. And the lawn. It is going to be a big project. And a decent amount of it hinges on what I can get the landlord to fund. There is a nonprofit that will replace the street tree but I want to replace the mulberry with a (very fruiting) navel orange, with a Western Redbud on the side. Currently it is 90% lawn with a couple of small beds up against the house that I have mostly filled with succulents. I want to do a nice mix of low-water stuff like ceanothus and more lavender with succulents. I have some volunteer agaves in pots that will be going in, and the "fence" between our yard and the neighbors is made of yuccas and I want to break that up a little bit and clump them around other places in the yard so they don't look completely random over there (ha).
And I just wanted to share a cute new blog I found, The Color Issue, it is full of fun inspiration (just what I need right now as the holidays loom).
Pictures soon, I promise!
Thursday, October 13, 2011
I Was Over It, But Now I'm REALLY Over It
Years ago I saw the Keep Calm poster somewhere and ordered one from Barter Books. I actually took it down because I got so sick of it, and stopped reading a snotty decor blog after she started printing her own and selling them with no effort to give Barter Books any kind of credit. Somebody in the UK has also started doing this, but they have also attempted to sue Barter Books to stop 'em from selling the posters. Crazy? Yes. But there has also been a decent writeup of the whole story, here. And I have decided that I really like The Hairpin. I think it was what xojane.com was kind of going for, but it doesn't piss me off. And my new favorite decor blog is here. Any new favorites, ladies?
I am trying to pay off some stuff so I am between projects and not doing much exciting stuff right now but I am sure reading a lot! Gotta love the library! And whoever got me hooked on Ngaio Marsh, thanks again! By rights, my house should probably be cleaner, based on what I am reading about everyone else doing ;) Maybe this weekend...
I am trying to pay off some stuff so I am between projects and not doing much exciting stuff right now but I am sure reading a lot! Gotta love the library! And whoever got me hooked on Ngaio Marsh, thanks again! By rights, my house should probably be cleaner, based on what I am reading about everyone else doing ;) Maybe this weekend...
Monday, September 26, 2011
Moving Slowly
These 6-2:30 hours are not working well for me. I came home today and took a two hour nap. I need to get applying to jobs instead of watching The Big Bang Theory in reruns.
But I will say, I went to an amazing concert Saturday night. CAKE has an email list and if you are on it and were in the Bay Area you got access to tickets to what basically amounted to a private show on the San Francisco Belle on a cruise around the bay. And for the same price they are playing next month at the Fox theater with two other bands. Who I don't care about. So this was the show for me!
It was an interesting show - they played a lot of their new album and very few of their biggest hits. And the crowd knew all the words to every song! And it was some good people-watching, one of the first shows I have been to since moving back to the Bay Area and a very stereotypical SF-looking crowd (as opposed to the last show I saw, which was Prince).
Also I came home with a limited-edition letterpress poster from the show! Now I just have to figure out where it can go in my house...
And in garden news (someday there will be pictures) I think my tomatoes are going to be a failure. Too much water. They are finally ripening now and the ones that got hit by the lawn sprinklers are weirdly squishy while not being ripe enough to pull off of the vines yet. My expectations are not high. The one tiny bush that didn't get hit by the sprinklers at all is half their size and is successfully producing awesome tomatoes, interestingly enough.
Musical interlude (not CAKE):
But I will say, I went to an amazing concert Saturday night. CAKE has an email list and if you are on it and were in the Bay Area you got access to tickets to what basically amounted to a private show on the San Francisco Belle on a cruise around the bay. And for the same price they are playing next month at the Fox theater with two other bands. Who I don't care about. So this was the show for me!
It was an interesting show - they played a lot of their new album and very few of their biggest hits. And the crowd knew all the words to every song! And it was some good people-watching, one of the first shows I have been to since moving back to the Bay Area and a very stereotypical SF-looking crowd (as opposed to the last show I saw, which was Prince).
Also I came home with a limited-edition letterpress poster from the show! Now I just have to figure out where it can go in my house...
And in garden news (someday there will be pictures) I think my tomatoes are going to be a failure. Too much water. They are finally ripening now and the ones that got hit by the lawn sprinklers are weirdly squishy while not being ripe enough to pull off of the vines yet. My expectations are not high. The one tiny bush that didn't get hit by the sprinklers at all is half their size and is successfully producing awesome tomatoes, interestingly enough.
Musical interlude (not CAKE):
Wednesday, September 14, 2011
Breaking The Blog Silence (Ooh That Sounds So Serious)
So the truth is, my job is less than "all that". It is a good starter job, but overall, there are a lot of things I don't love. The hours right now are making me an antisocial non-blogging lame-o, but hopefully those will change in a couple of weeks. And I am trying to decide if the job is making me feel racist, or if the people I am seeing are really just the racists. I work with plants. It is a maintenance job. Thus, the three people that have trained me so far have all been Hispanic. Very nice and good at their jobs too. Now we work with plants, so people come and ask us plant questions (somebody asked me a cleaning question my first week but he was a total douche so I just said "I'm not a cleaning lady, I just do plants"). Whenever somebody white or Asian has a plant question, they ask me. I think it's fairly clear that I'm the trainee, but maybe not. Whenever we are dealing with demanding little ladies who want their plants Just So, they tell me. However, whenever some other maintenance person in the area or secretary we have a question for happens to be Hispanic, it's like I don't exist because I can't talk to them in Spanish. Is this weird? Or do I just need to be practical and learn some Spanish?
In the "good stuff going on", Matt is meeting people and being social. He has been a shut-in ever since the accident except for when Reno friends visit, so this is really exciting. He is starting to really enjoy his job and is staying late tonight for a blues jam (because all the guys there are into blues jams, apparently). Tomorrow night he is off to the city to see a show with a buddy. I had to get on his schedule for date night Friday night! No idea what we will do, but it will be together, and sans guitars.
And I am getting lots of food for my plant obsession! Today I brought home some leftovers that can't be reused, three bromeliads and three phalaenopsis orchids that are still mostly blooming. They sell "color bowls" and the color has to be kept up-to-date and while with the bigger foliage plants they can often be reused, the color really can't be. So free purple orchids for me! It is still to be seen what will survive in this house... my current orchids have been blooming for a month and a half now and my grandmother used to keep her cymbidium orchids outdoors so I am tempted to try doing the same with these fellas when they are not in bloom.
AND I am fantasizing about what to do with these paychecks I am going to be getting! Note the key word, fantasizing. Apparently fall means neutrals and navy for my imaginary living room.
In the "good stuff going on", Matt is meeting people and being social. He has been a shut-in ever since the accident except for when Reno friends visit, so this is really exciting. He is starting to really enjoy his job and is staying late tonight for a blues jam (because all the guys there are into blues jams, apparently). Tomorrow night he is off to the city to see a show with a buddy. I had to get on his schedule for date night Friday night! No idea what we will do, but it will be together, and sans guitars.
And I am getting lots of food for my plant obsession! Today I brought home some leftovers that can't be reused, three bromeliads and three phalaenopsis orchids that are still mostly blooming. They sell "color bowls" and the color has to be kept up-to-date and while with the bigger foliage plants they can often be reused, the color really can't be. So free purple orchids for me! It is still to be seen what will survive in this house... my current orchids have been blooming for a month and a half now and my grandmother used to keep her cymbidium orchids outdoors so I am tempted to try doing the same with these fellas when they are not in bloom.
AND I am fantasizing about what to do with these paychecks I am going to be getting! Note the key word, fantasizing. Apparently fall means neutrals and navy for my imaginary living room.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Work It!
So today I got my first paycheck since October. It was a relief. The job is not my favorite, I am epically overqualified but until I find something that uses all my skills it is sure better than nothing. I get to go to malls and offices and model homes and all different places like that and take care of the plants. We bring new orchids when the old ones are done blooming and make sure everything is pretty and healthy and shiny. So I get to drive to all different places and meet new people every day and be active and busy and walking around a lot. And now I don't have to apply to the cheesy $10/hour Part Time Administrative Assistant jobs just so I can feel like I am making an effort. I am making an effort, so I can just apply to cool lab jobs and eventually I will find the right one.
But I don't love getting up at 6:15 every morning when Matt gets to sleep in. Waah. He also may have talked himself into a job at a super fancy boutique local guitar shop. I don't know how he does it, he just has a knack. I need to get him to work some of his mojo on my lab cover letters.
Also, here are some pretty pictures from my last Friday at Filoli with my mom before I rejoined the working world. It was apparently my day for peachy flowers. Isn't that last zinnia amazing with the color gradient? I couldn't do justice to most of the dahlias and roses but I am sure getting tempted to plant some! I am mostly all low-water and pro-natives but they sure are purty. Such inner turmoil!
But I don't love getting up at 6:15 every morning when Matt gets to sleep in. Waah. He also may have talked himself into a job at a super fancy boutique local guitar shop. I don't know how he does it, he just has a knack. I need to get him to work some of his mojo on my lab cover letters.
Also, here are some pretty pictures from my last Friday at Filoli with my mom before I rejoined the working world. It was apparently my day for peachy flowers. Isn't that last zinnia amazing with the color gradient? I couldn't do justice to most of the dahlias and roses but I am sure getting tempted to plant some! I am mostly all low-water and pro-natives but they sure are purty. Such inner turmoil!
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