Burgandy Skies

Today is... New Year's Day!

2007-01-01T11:54:00.000-08:00

I don't know if all is quiet, but here's wishing everyone a great start to the New Year!

Appropriately we started it by staying up late at Cheesecake Factory, getting up late and having to ask for a late checkout from our hotel. ;)

Today is... New Year's Eve!

2006-12-31T23:59:00.000-08:00

Taking a page from the White Queen's playbook (having watched a trippy version of Alice in Wonderland involving Kate Beckinsale last night) I'm living backwards. ;)

Q & A with Burgandy

2006-12-29T15:26:00.000-08:00

How much would LYT Charge for a glass of "Pellicano-on-Tap" Beer?
MarioGeorgeNitrini111

Given how hard it is to tap Pellicano, probably at least $29.95. But it would include a free LYT-shirt.

Is it weird that the last two nights in a row, my dreams have involved Mario G. Nitrini? Seriously, they have. What's the significance of this?
LYT

That you need to start serving “Pellicano-on-Tap” Beer.

Do you think the City of "DAVID" was God's "FIRST!" choice?
harryoriginalgangstamartini181

Indubitably.

Can you solve the JONBENET RAMSEY case???
harryoriginalgangstamartini181

Only if it involves Geometry or chemistry. I flunked out of Algebra.

And if you do, do you think "I" will try to take all the "CREDIT"?
harryoriginalgangstamartini181

No, but you might take the cash.

It's Friday and you haven't posted the answers yet. Is it too late to ask a question?
Justin

It is now. ;)

I'm Back!!!!!!!!!!!

2006-04-01T00:20:00.000-08:00

Ok, I know it's going to be a bit hard for you guys, and it'll be hard for me, too. But I'm sure we'll all adjust eventually. I mean...it couldn't go on forever.

25K hits...I think maybe it was just time to, y'know, move on...or something.
Anyway, we'll deal. You'll see.

Fixed!

2005-10-05T13:36:00.000-07:00

Ok, here is better linkage to that photo. Didn't realize Yahoo Groups was so pissy. Sheesh.

Last Post

2005-07-13T14:03:00.000-07:00

Ok...due to the overwhelming lack of interest in this blog and the stress of trying to webmaster for both this site and Pererro (and to keep our marriage from becoming a giant who's the worse chunker contest) -- I will be moving permenantly over to Pererro.

Please update your links accordingly.

Then go over to Pererro!

Duh!

2005-07-10T00:32:00.000-07:00

Oh yeah and before I forget:

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY SWEETHEART!!!

That is all. Return to your normal lives citizens...

The Balancing Baby

2005-07-10T00:28:00.000-07:00

And while I'm at it, here's a pic of this guy we were watching while waiting for the Boo and my mom-in-law to get off of Jungle Cruise. He was actually balancing his little one on one hand the whole time we were waiting. It was really wierd and kind of cool all at once.

The Boo

2005-07-10T00:19:00.000-07:00

So...I finally got my pictures developed from our trip to D-land in May. So here's an obglitory cute picture of the Boo in her Minnie Mouse finest.

"Cor, Cor, I almost flew to Ethiopia. Second Class, o'course. Know what I mean?"

2005-07-08T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you do know what I mean, good show to you.

The attack on Britan was rather distressing, it'll be interesting to see how thier reaction compares to ours. I don't know if I agree with the Derb that they'll "pull a Spain", I'd like to think Blair is a much cooler leader than that, but I've been ignoring politics (even world politics) like the plague since the election, so I'm probably not qualified to say.

Anyway, Raging Waters was fun. They added a few rides since the last time I was there, most of which were significantly more exciting than those they replaced. There is a four person raft tube that was particularly stomach churning, since nearly the whole ride is pitch black and a neat version of the new bowl style slides that involves a two-person innertube that was fun. The lines are still atrocious, though. On the upside, the Boo was finally tall enough to go on one "big-kid" ride - Thunder Rapids, which involves a seven-person raft, so we spent a good amount of time on that one.

David got stung by a bee, which seems to be having some delayed effects, but you can read about that over on his site.

Sitting on hold with the IRS, which continues to be the most boring work activity ever, but not much else to say right now.

No really, it isn't scary...

2005-07-06T21:27:00.000-07:00

War of the Worlds that is. Dave keeps trying to convince me it was. I dunno. I wasn't scared, I thought the movie was really lame and I don't know what the fuss is about.

In other news, Dave's cousin is hanging out over here for a couple of days and there is a trip to Raging Waters in the works, but don't know if I'm going yet (the file that will not close continues to have complications).

Anyways, ignoring all this, I'm looking forward to Comic-Con next week. Hopefully we will be able to track down C-Jo and LYT while we're there and have some fun to boot.

The summer of the Geek

2005-07-06T00:58:00.000-07:00

It was not enough to have a really cool Batman Begins. Oh, no.

Fantastic Four now looms on the horizon, so once again I must carve out some cinema time (and I still haven't seen Mr & Mrs. Smith!). If it is even half as cool as Batman Begins I will be happy. I just hope all the funny Johnny Storm jokes aren't all in the trailer.

Oh, and Comic-Con is less than two weeks away! The Boo insists we should all cosplay it. We'll see. If nothing else I will be sporting a pink wig on at least one day of the con. Been pondering a Black Canary outfit, but I don't know if I have time/funds to pull it together.

Anyways - Off to bed. Laterz all.

Ladybug, Ladybug, fly away home...

2005-07-03T22:15:00.000-07:00

Well, the week went by quickly enough didn't it?

Saw two movies on Thursday (Batman Begins and Sharkboy & Lavagirl, both of which I highly recommend) and took Boo to the Zoo, all of which was good times. Don't remember Friday that well, but I think there was loan business stuff involved (been in Post-Closing hell for the last week - never ever expect the IRS to do anything for you in less than a week, just a tip from me). Saturday was cool because my parents are finally back from their 3 week trip to Maui and we saw them for a bit yesterday, while the Boo spent most of the day there (which made her very happy and gave us some time to work in some much needed hang out time with Joe and Mark - a professor friend of ours who only shows up during Summer and Winter breaks).

Which leaves today, which was fun, though we missed church due to the aforementioned hang out time and our own inability to get up before 10:30 this morning. As to the above tagline - David took the Boo to the local OSH and picked up a carton of ladybugs for the garden and we had a big ladybug release at dusk. It was fun watching 1,500 ladybugs crawling around the backyard and the Boo had a blast following them all around and watching them crawl on her fingers. If your kids love bugs, I highly recommend this for cheap summer giggles.

Also, finally tried the mysterious drive-thru Italian place down the street, Fazolli's. We got the family sized spaghetti with breadsticks and the lasana, both of which were very good for being delivered through a drive-thru window, about equivalent to getting Sabarro's. Not to mention surprisingly cheap at about 5 bucks a person. So if you're anywhere near 17th and the 55 frwy in OC, and feel like quick Italian food, check it out.

Anyways, that's all for me for right now.

Random

2005-06-29T00:34:00.000-07:00

Been too busy to post between my Philosophy final paper, assisting David with getting his new Transhuman blog up and running, and various work related crisises.

So, here's a random cute site from my Favorites list to amuse you.

Crickets

2005-06-27T08:32:00.000-07:00

No comments, my hitcounter is pathetic (although it is set up only to grab unique hits, so I probably need to fix it), where is everyone? Do I just do this blog to amuse myself and David? Perhaps.

Anyways, if anyone is reading out there - prepared and served food at the soup kitchen this Saturday. It appears to be down to us and the guy from church that started this project Eric. Luckily Joe decided to tag along so it was the four of us making burgers and hot dogs and feeding the hungry. Which is still fun because we get hang out time with those guys and get to help out people who really need it. But it is still kind of sad in its own way that out of the hundred people or so who attend the church we used to call our home church the only people who show up on a regular basis to do the only outreach the church does (at least so far as I'm aware) are the guy who started it (Eric) and the couple that hasn't really attended the church since they moved across the county (us).

Meanwhile, the stated reason why not even the pastor showed up this week? Because all the other married couples (ourselves and Eric & his wife not included obviously) were out on a retreat in Palm Springs. Cute, real cute. Not that I have anything wrong with retreats or anything, but, uh, couldn't we schedule them on a different week than the church outreach that we only do once a month, on the same weekend every month? I know fellowship is important and all, and so is a good marriage, but I think caring for the poor should probably rank just a little higher on the church's priority list.

Anyways, just soapboxing as I sit on hold with the IRS and try to get back into "write my Philosophy final paper on my worldview" mode.

Tagged Again!

2005-06-25T01:39:00.000-07:00

1. What were three of the stupidest things you have done in your life?

Eating whatever I wanted when I could get away with it. The eating habits of my teenage years stuck with me, but my very high metabolism got a case of mono.

Choosing my skanky drug dealing boyfriend that needed me over the cute stable good 'ole southern boy that wanted me. Double stupidity for giving him the "Let's just be friends" speech the morning after and being a complete bitch about the whole thing to convince my very jealous boyfriend that it was a one-night fling.

Taking up drinking and drugs when I knew my dad had alcohol "issues".

2. At the current moment, who has the most influence in your life?

Considering we spend pretty much 24 hours a day, 7 days a week together, I think David wins that contest hands down. Nonetheless, the Boo, my philosophy professor, my mum-in-law, and Luke Ford are all close runners up at the moment. (Luke mostly because he has a surprising amount of influence on David, and it spills over to my side of the office on occasion, such as this whole crazy blogging thing.)

3. If you were given a time machine that functioned, and you were allowed to only pick up to five people to dine with, who would you pick?

Ok, pondered this far too much and came up with the following - Benjamin Franklin because he was sbrilliantrillant and funny. Lucius Cornellius Sulla just to find out how many of those crazy stories in First Man in Rome might be true. King David to get a better idea of what a mortal man after God's own heart is really like. Jesus Christ, for obvious reasons, and so I'll feel safer being the only woman at lunch with Ben Franklin, King David, and Lucius Cornellius Sulla. And, last, Plato, just to see intellectualtellitual discourse with all these great minds, and to see him have a philosophical discussion with Jesus. I think that would be cool.

4. If you had three wishes that were not supernatural, what would they be? To see David's book series be successful on a "Star Wars", "Lord of the Rings" kind of scale.

To have more Starwood points/Frequent Flyer Miles than I would ever know what to do with.

Free college tuition for life.

5. Someone is visiting your hometown/place where you live at the moment. Name two things you regret your city not having, and two things people should avoid.

I regret OC not having a decent goth/industrial club scene, at least not that I've been able to locate.

I also regret the lack of any kind of decent public transportation system.

People should avoid the freeways because the traffic is unpredictable and trying to drive through the Crush is a wonderful way to suddenly find yourself half-way to San Diego if you don't know where you are going.

You should also avoid any hotel that says it is "near Disneyland", since from what I've been able to tell that can be translated as being located anywhere from next to Seaworld to being in West Hollywood, both of which would probably be in completely different states on the East Coast.

6. Name one event that has changed your life.

This would have to be the first time I agreed to marry David, which was about a month after we started going out (though to be fair we had been friends for a couple years). The silly side of me says this is because it was the only way I could get David to give it up before Marriage, the serious side of me says that in some way we could not explain we both knew this was it for both of us. I don't know how serious we were at the time, but it's been almost eight years and we're still together. In the meantime, I've sobered up, become a Christian, a wife, and a mom, as well as many other changes that I don't really have time to get into right now.

7. Tag 5 people.

Well, crap. Once again everyone I would tag is tagged.

So, uh, whoever wants to tag themselves, have at it and drop me an email about it or something.

The Cool Looking Chili's Waitress

2005-06-21T22:15:00.000-07:00

Ok, having been ousted by the David, I thought I'd least post some thoughts here.

In case you don't want to read the whole thing the main issue was that we went to Chili's to eat dinner before meeting up with a client for a document signing. Our waitress was just so exotically good looking I could not take my eyes off her. She had this shiny long black hair that was just curly enough to be sexy, and these amazing green eyes that just glowed. She was kinda skinny, but in a still feminine way and was one of the nicest people I've ever only known for a half hour.
As I told David later, "If I wasn't married, I'd totally ask her out."

So, what does that mean? Well, fact of the matter is that I have some Bi tendencies, but have never and (now that I'm married) never will indulge them beyond the realm of fantasy. But it's fun to have crushes on people, and I've always thought looking (guy or girl) is fine, as long as one doesn't go further than that. The Bi thing is especially complex because I don't really like women in a personal sense; I have no real female friends and generally think of myself as one of the guys. Which, as David has pointed out, may be exactly the problem. He thinks I'm just a femdom waiting to happen. Which, given my B&D tastes may not be that far off. Which is fine, because David doesn't mind indulging me in the slightest and thinks my weird little girl crushes are cute.

So there you go. My secret to marriage - indulge each other sexually as much as your morality will let you and try to be as honest as you can without hurting the other persons feelings or making things weird. Anyways, just my two cents.

Blogging Offline

2005-06-21T22:13:00.000-07:00

(Written at Chili's in between sneaking peeks at the cool looking waitress)

So, things I learned this weekend. Why I still don’t like LA. It just feels….closed. I felt trapped all weekend. The hotel was tiny, the room was tiny and there was nowhere to really escape to because we were right by downtown, so it was nothing but tenements and office buildings for miles. No place to park that doesn’t cost you 6 bucks or more. And after only two days in LA I think I’m starting to realize why you see more people from LA talk about class division than in O.C. In LA the class differences are almost oppressively obvious. There are almost no signs of middle-class civilization like you see in OC, i.e. a proliferation of fast food restaurants, places like Chili’s or Denny’s that pretend to be restaurants but are very little above sit-down fast food, Kmart, Target, etc.

It’s all either way lower class liquor stores or way upper class Morton’s. It’s just weird.

The Music Version

2005-06-14T23:40:00.000-07:00

Ok, I will!

1. The total number of CDs/Songs I own: Somewhere over 2 gigs of individual songs, probably about 200 CDs, give or take.

2. The last CD/Song I bought: The Requiem for a Dream soundtrack. Awesome classical meets dance club soundtrack. Great for doing homework to.

3. The last concert I saw: Bond, at the House of Blues in Anaheim. It was, hands down, the best concert I’ve ever been to, as well as the best concert venue. Classical music always sounds better live, even remixed classical music, and the Bond girls were only a few feet away, very different from the statium style concerts I’ve gotten used to.

Last song I listened to:
“Satisfaction” by the Rolling Stones, mainly because David was playing some horrible Steel Wheels single and I needed to remind myself why I like the Stones, if only in small doses.

4. Five Songs or Albums that mean a lot to me, in no particular order:

1. Mr. Brownstone, by Guns N’ Roses – This was the first band I was ever obsessed with and hearing old Guns N’ Roses songs still takes me back to the more fun parts of High School. This song, in particular, I cannot listen to without singing along, and the lyrics remind me, at the same time, of some of my worse experiences from High School. Go fig.

2. Dragostea Din Tei, by O-zone – AKA the “Numa Numa” song. I love this song, it’s my new favorite. Amazingly catchy, it makes me smile whenever I hear it. ‘Nuff said.

3. Orion, by Metallica – The best Metallica song ever. This instrumental is amazing and I was really, really sad it wasn’t on the S&M album. It belongs in the classical section. It’s that good.

4. The Nutcracker Suite, by Tchkovski – Yes, it reminds me of Christmas, but it was also my first exposure to classical music and is still my favorite, especially the Arabian dance, which I think is the sexiest piece of music ever written.

5. Alive, by Pearl Jam – This song was my life perserver the day after I was raped. I must of listened to it about 20 times that day and I think it was one of the few things that kept me grounded.

Honorable Mentions: Cornflake Girl (Tori Amos), Pretty Hate Machine (Nine Inch Nails), These Thousand Hills (Third Day), He Reigns (Newsboys), Use Your Illusion I&II (Guns N’ Roses), Hard Days Night (The Beatles), Sweet Lulluby (Deep Forest)

Woo Hoo! Now I can actually tag people because no one has done this one yet (I hope):

David Scott, LYT, Christian Johnson, Luke Ford, Cathy Seipp, you are all tagged. So there.

I've been Tagged!

2005-06-14T23:29:00.000-07:00

Ok, I'm offically answering the tag:

1. The total number of books and movies I own:

Movies I own: Somewhere around 50, not counting those I left at my parents house when I left home.

Books I own: In the neighborhood of 400, though that fluctuates on a monthly basis.

2. The last movie I bought: Well, the last movie *I* bought was Napoleon Dynamite, for David’s birthday. We buy most of our movies on EBAY, and David is the EBAY expert in our house. The last movie we bought together was Embrace of the Vampire, because it looks like one of those movies that will either be a fun B-movie or horrible, but I love vampire flicks, so hopefully it will be the former.

The last book I bought was Chaucer: His Life, His Works, His World, which seemed like an interesting biography, but I got completely distracted by a gift copy of Requiem for a Dream and haven’t had a chance to really read it yet.

3. The last movie I saw:
In the theater: Revenge of the Sith, twice. It’s awesome, in a Star Wars way.
On Video: Big Fish, which was also awesome, in a Tim Burton way.

Hey, both movies starred Ewan McGregor! Coincidence? I think not. That’s the key to the movies, folks. If you want me to go see a movie, stick Ewan McGregor in it.

Last book I read:Much like David, I am in the middle of several books, mostly for Philosophy class, though as mentioned above I have a Chaucer Biography I need to get back to and I have the ever present editing project for David’s books going on. The last book I finished was Requiem for a Dream, which was better than the movie (no surprise, the only book I ever read that was worse than the movie was the Neverending Story, but that’s a whole other post). It’s a tough read, but very rewarding and thought provoking, so I highly recommend it. I also think it should probably be required reading for High School students, but again, that is another subject entirely.

4. Five movies/DVDs that mean a lot to me, in no particular order:

1. Requiem for a Dream: The look, the emotion, the directing, the acting, it was just mesmerizing. I think it is now my favorite movie ever. Very few movies make me cry. This one made my soul ache. Powerful stuff.

2. Sleeping Beauty: My favorite Disney movie ever, also my favorite animated film in general. The art of this movie is really well done, and unlike the latest Disney flicks it actually kept the Tchokovski ballet score. It also helps that David sang “Once upon a Dream” for me while we were dating and it is now my daughter’s favorite Disney movie.

3. Napoleon Dynamite: I cannot watch more than two minutes of this movie and not sit down and watch the whole thing. It’s addictive, it reminds me way too much of my own childhood, and it’s funny without being gross. It’s also amazingly quoteable. Gosh!

4. Natural Born Killers: To be fair, I’ve never actually seen this movie all the way through, and I may never do so. But in terms of emotional impact, I have to say that this is the only movie I’m scared to watch, not because of the movie itself, but because of the circumstances I first watched it under. Note to sociopathic incest-minded estranged (Thank Goodness!) older brother: This is not a date movie and even if it was, your 16-year-old sister does not count as a date. End of lesson.

5. The Rocky Horror Picture Show: I really wrestled with putting this movie on this list, but to be honest I don’t think any other single film has had more impact on my life. How many movies spawn whole subcultures? Sure you have Star Wars and Star Trek, but it’s just not the same thing, because, well, the movies are actually good, whereas with Rocky the subculture is the draw. Anyways, I’ve never quite managed to get away from my Rocky roots; my sis-in-law was ever in a rivival of the stage play two summers back. When David and I started dating he had been playing “the man with no neck” at the Redondo Beach Rocky and I had done a very brief stint as a tranny there, mainly because most of my friends were also on cast. Anyways, for better or worse, the movie and the subculture it spawned are forever attached to my life, and I can’t say that about many other movies.

Honorable Mentions: Resevoir Dogs, The Princess Bride, Rocky, Army of Darkness, Monty Python & The Holy Grail, Trainspotting, Mallrats, Dark City, The Graduate, The Bells of St. Mary’s…and far too many others. I love movies.

Five Books...

1. The Bible – Actually the weird thing about the Bible has been that I never really read it until a few months after I became a Christian. So, I can’t say the Bible led to be becoming a Christian, but it’s certainly (for obvious reasons) been important to my walk as a Christian. Not to mention the Bible is really, really interesting when you approach it fresh, because there are so many things there you never hear about in most churches and so much not there than many chuches pretend there is.

2. The First Man in Rome – I actually started reading this because David was reading it as research for his book series and I couldn’t put it down. The book is just fascinating and a good history lesson to boot, without putting you to sleep. We both read this book so much that it literally split in half and is currently bound in duct tape, because for some reason we’re too cheap to buy a new copy…I mean, for sentimental reasons.

3. Hamlet – Okay, I know it’s a play. But Shakespeare is so…good. The way he plays with language is well worth the time it takes to decipher what the characters are actually saying. We read a version for a literature class that had the most awesome translation notes and I was amazed to realize that for all its tragedy how funny the play actually is, in a witty sort of way.

4. The Four Loves – This is currently my favorite C.S. Lewis book because it tackles a subject I don’t think enough of us think about, particularly Christians – What do we really mean when we say “Love”? It also illustrates how completely inadequate the english language is when it comes to concepts like Love. I, mean, the Greeks apparently had at least five words for Love, all of which are far more precise in meaning and would probably help people avoid that wierdness of saying things like “I love her, but I don’t love love her.”

5. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a genius. Sherlock Holmes was a genius, but then you realize that someone had to come with all the cool stuff he said and did and then you realize, no, the author is the genius. Anyways, this book started my love affair with British Lit and it has not stopped since, ergo, the biography of Chaucer sitting on my bookshelf.

Honorable Mentions: The Canterbury Tales, The Jungle Books, Black Beauty, The Princess Bride, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, LOTR, Requiem for a Dream, Alice in Wonderland, The Dark Tower trilogy, The Eye of the Dragon, and far too many others to list right now.

Now I have to tag five people and I’m not even sure five people (and the only 3 I am sure of have already been tagged), ok, here goes nothing:

Joseph Riesen (I’ll post your answers if you’ll email them to me), Robin Nair (who probably doesn’t read this, but I’ll email him), uhhhhhhhhh…huh.
Ewan McGregor (yeah, right. I wish he read my blog)
Donna B. (She’ll say she doesn’t read this blog, but I bet she does, just to think up new insults to throw at me on CW.)
Pastor Mark Roberts (I don’t know if he reads this or not, but I go to his church sometimes and his blog is cool.)

Somebody should do a music version of this.

Blogging from the LA Convention Center!

2005-06-11T13:26:00.000-07:00

Hello all. So here I am, waiting for David to finish his real estate exam over at the LA Convention Center. I have escaped to the South Hall because the food court in the West Hall sucks. Not that the food is much better over here, but there is a real Starbucks kiosk and for some reason there is both a Home Improvement Expo and an Erotica Expo going on at the same time, so it makes for good people watching. The hall just erupted in random clapping for some guy. Anyways, found the erotica-la show interesting, but it's $30 to get in, so no satisfaction of curiosity for me. Oh yeah, and there's also some Tony Robbins thing going on.

Meanwhile, the Philosophy class continues to be entertaining and challenging. It's got me thinking about looking at how I became a Christian from the viewpoint of what I see as "real", and that's had my wheels turning. I had a wierd upbringing. No personal exposure to a church or other house of worship until I was 20, didn't really even look at a Bible unti after I became a Christian. After this class, it starting me thinking about why the heck I became a Christian, since most Christian's idea of God is apparently based in what the Bible says or what they learned in Church. I realized it has a lot to do with the reality of God from my own perspective. In a nutshell, God wasn't "really real" to me for many years. Then the Enemy (Lucifer, Old Scratch, etc) became real to me, because he intervened in my life in such a dramatic way, and then as side effect of that, God became real to me, but in a messed up, negative kind of way. Then various "supernatural" stuff because real to me, because of various interventions in my life and neo-paganism became very real for me, but probably in a very different way than most people would think (it's a long story, if you're curious, email me). Anyways, then I had a better concept of God, but thought of Him as a very distant and cold being, because out of all this craziness in my life, He had never intervened. But then, He did, and rocked my world, and became real to me. And then I became a Christian, because God was real to me, had shown me examples of His inceptions, His love, that He wasn't just an absentee parent, and I became a Christian, without any real idea of what I was signing on for. It's been a fun journey, though.

Postmodernism and the Church...

2005-06-08T00:14:00.000-07:00

I predict troubled waters ahead for the Crystal Cathedral, but only time will tell. Just got back from preview night for "Creation" and it was...uh...Interesting. The first half, I must say, was quite the visual spectacle and could only be described as Cirque de Soleil presents Creation! Or maybe Creation! The latest Disney musical. But, I digress. The first half was a fun visual treat, my little one was captivated, the second half needed a serious overall and my little one was traumatized. Do not go for the theology. Please, don't go for the theology. But go for the fun of it. I think as an evangelical tool it failed miserably, though I wouldn't really expect anything that refers to God as "the presence" and presents Him as a completely distant creator with not even an echo of the personal, loving, relationship oriented God I could have sworn the Bible teaches about, to be evangelical at all. But anyways, Schuller said he wanted a show anyone could go to and like and that's exactly what he got - secular mediocracy, with some good showmanship. Welcome to the Postmodern Church folks!

Where oh where is my Diet Sunkist?

2005-06-06T22:54:00.000-07:00

So...still no sign of the elusive Diet Sunkist. Not that I've been looking all that hard, but one SavOn, one Albertsons, two 7-11s and a Blockbuster have yielded no results. This reminds me of when Vanilla Coke came out and David and I went on a hunt through O.C. to find one, until we finally tracked down a random AM/PM in Santa Ana that had them.

Meanwhile, a quick update, since I only post once in a blue moon. Ran Old School West End Games Star Wars 2nd edition this weekend. Our college professor buddy who only emerges during winter break and after spring finals played a Jawa Jedi. As I posted over on Cinerati, anyone who can think of an actual rules reason this should not be is free to let me know, but it was fun in its own goofy way, so I suppose I don't mind too much.

The lunch with old high school friend didn't happen, but I continue on with my mad return to the "1200" diet, nonetheless, since it's summer, and the 10 year H.S. reunion is less than a year a way. I have no idea why I care, but I do, so there. It's a reason, and as long as my fridge doesn't start growling at me, I figure I'm cool.

Ok, so off to watch "Big Fish", which somehow just never showed up on my cinematic radar last year, despite the fact that it's a Tim Burton flick. So, good night, or good morning, or whatever the heck time of day it is where ever you are!

Brilliant!!

2005-06-02T01:25:00.000-07:00

Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy!

A DIET, ORANGE, soda with CAFFINE!!

I haven't been so excited about a soda since they came out with Mountain Dew Live Wire. Orange soda is vastly underappreciated. It's my favorite flavor, in case you couldn't tell, but most orange sodas are vastly lacking in the caffine department, which is one of the only addictive substances I've allowed to stay in my system. And I have never, ever been able to find a diet one, so this is awesome. All the orangy goodness, but none of the calories. Which is good given my impending lunch meet-up.

Anyways, if you also crave orange soda with caffine coolness, but zero calories go get some and tell me if it tastes like crap, because I only saw it advertised in a magazine and haven't gotten my hands on one yet, so maybe I will be horribly disappointed by the reality of it all (but I hope not).

Anyways, this whole post makes it obvious I need sleep and have spent far too much time on my philosophy paper.

But you'll never take my freedom!

2005-05-31T23:28:00.000-07:00

Ah! Finally mentally free of horrible, horrible ethics class. Perhaps I can finally think of something to post about. Hopefully my bitter class survey will not have terrible reprecussions, but the professor was just offensive and I felt I had to speak up. Especially when someone says normal people don't go to therapy - sheesh! Not that I really consider myself normal, but what the heck is normal anyways? At least it puts me in a good mindframe for the Philosophy class we're in now.

On other notes - hubby talked me into/tricked me into finally having lunch with an old friend of mine from high school. I've been avoiding her for years because of the horribly rivalry in high school (she was the Betty to my Veronica, and, yes, I will at least admit I was the Veronica here) and the mere thought of meeting up with her is already causing the old competitive animal to start crawling around in my sub-concious and I find myself worrying about such stupid things as what will I wear, how bad are my roots, can I possibly lose 20 lbs before the lunch, and other such nonsense.

Anways, as the Perrero readers know, hubby has been waiting for an hour for me to go to freakin bed already. So off to dreamland and horrible nightmares of high school....er...I mean sweet dreams...I hope...

Stewing...

2005-05-27T23:35:00.000-07:00

Ok, so really I should be getting to bed because we're supposed to wake up early tomorrow and finish making beef stew for the homeless shelter we volunteering at once a month, doing the cooking for the Saturday dinner. But instead, I'm messing around with my blog. I finally figured out how to get some pictures posted on here, as you can see over on the right there. As it so happens Anime Burgandy was designed and drawn by Omi of Counter Culture to be a banner ad, so it works well here, I think.

If you care, it's actually a cute story how I wound up with it. Read on if you're feeling mushy.

David didn't have a whole lot to spend on my anniversary present last year but wanted to get me something really special. So he sent a bunch of pictures of me over to Omi because he reads her comic and thinks she's a good artist and knows I like anime. He then commissioned her artistic abilities to make this very cute banner and ran it on her site as an ad that said "Happy Anniversary" on it. So, the when I went to read Counter Culture a couple of days before our anniversary, there it was. I thought it was really, really sweet, and probably the most creative present I have ever gotten. He even paid to keep it up there through my birthday (though the message changed, of course) since it was the following month.

Anyways, it has ever since been the picture I use when asked to use an avatar or post a pic, so thought I would share.

Half-Empty Cans of Diet Coke

2005-05-24T14:13:00.000-07:00

Are littering my desk, acting as reminders of my inability to finish anything this week.

Avoiding doing homework. muddling through paying work, actually making fairly substantial progress on editing what should be the first book of David's epic series, and getting to read the installments of the sequel to said book.

I've been finding the editing process both rewarding and frustrating, since David is constantly striving to make the books internally consistant, which means maintaining a generally awareness of what's happening in all the books, all at once. (Thus avoiding "pulling a Lucas", as we've started to call internal inconsistancies.) Anyways, sometime far from now we'll see if we pulled it off or not.

Meanwhile, back to working and junk.

I am a slacker...

2005-05-20T23:45:00.000-07:00

or at least David makes me look like one.

Saw ROTS at midnight on Wed/Thurs. (However you want to count it). It was awesome. It was more a prequal to the original Star Wars and less a sequal to the last movie, if that makes any sense. The first half hour, especially, is a loads of fun. David did a much better review of it than I ever could, probably because he's seen it twice now (Lucky!). So go read his - we were generally in agreement on the deconstruction of the movie. Though the soundtrack didn't seem as good to me, but that may be because we were sitting all the way in the front because certain someone's insisted we not leave until 11pm to make a midnight showing. Anyways, going to see it again tomorrow so I can't complain too much.

Visited LYT today. It took forever to get out of the house. Mainly, I think, because I had no idea we were supposed to be leaving at noon and was busy running errands and doing work stuff instead of getting ready to leave. And having a slow moving altercation with the big yellow pole at the drive thru ATM. See David's blog for the whole story on our crazy day. I'm too tired to get into it. Anyways, LYT is a cool guy and his apartment made me feel bad for making David get rid of most of his action figure collection. Oh yeah, and he has an awesome movie poster collection, which made me miss my old poster covered walls. Ah, the price we pay to not pay rent, or for babysitting, or daycare, or to not have to work 9-5 jobs - Oh wait...I guess it's worth it. But still...as Napoleon would say - Lucky!

An Allowance?

2005-05-17T20:36:00.000-07:00

Just thought I would clarify. Yes, my three year old gets an allowance, but not in the give her money to put in the piggy bank kind of way. She gets a piece of the family budget for the week that she can then spend on "Boo things", i.e. lightsabers, Yoda stuffed toys, and the current champion - the Darth Vader mask. This actually has resulted in us spending less on her, since it gives both us and her a budget, and she has a remarkable grasp on the situation for a three year old. She has been pleasently content with waiting until her next "payday" to get something and has shown a good grasp of budgeting already, such as trading the overpriced large Darth Vader stuffed toy for three of the smaller Star Wars stuffed toys. It's been a good experience so far, I think.

Plus, whenever my mum-in-law complains about her increasing stock of "boys toys" we can at least honestly say "Boo bought them".

The Boo

2005-05-17T20:19:00.000-07:00

The Boo is aware of a disturbance in the Force. My daughter loves Star Wars...loves it. For the last month she has spent her allowance on nothing but Star Wars stuff (with the brief exception of our impromptu trip to Disneyland last week, wherein this obsession was switched to Buzz Lightyear toys). In fact, speaking of Disneyland, to illustrate my point, for quite a few days after a trip, if you asked her about Disneyland, the first thing she would tell you is that the man at the Star Wars ride said she was too little to ride it. So, she is getting more and more suspicious about the fact that even though she knows the new movie is coming out Wed. (How could she miss it?) she doesn't get to go first. (Actually, my hubbie is trying to negotiate a compromise wherein we will take her after we see it on Wed. at Midnight (Boo Freakin' Ya!), sometime this weekend, if she promises not to hold it against us if we go "ohh! Scary part!" and cover her eyes or something. )

Anyways, I have no idea why anyone would care about all that, but I'm putting off looking up Jack in the Box stuff for class, and realized I hadn't posted in awhile.

Defining Oneself

2005-05-13T21:47:00.000-07:00

So I'll toss out a question instead. Been pondering the Stay-At-Home Mom label. I think of myself as a stay-at-home mom because I'm a mom and, well, I stay at home. But my husband has pointed out that this label is generally misleading because I am also the main Escrow Officer for his mom's mortgage brokerage and work 20 hours or so a week at that, as well as going to college full-time (in a Professional Studies program so it's only a once a week thing, but full-time nonetheless), and I also spend about 2-3 hours a day doing Author's Assistant work for my not-published-yet-but-working-on-it writer of a husband. And, I split the household stuff with my mother-in-law, who in turn watches the Boo when I have to do document signings or whatnot. So my question is...am I a Stay-At-Home Mom still? Is there a Work-from-Home Mom catergory yet?

I actually dislike labels, but they are a heck of alot easier than spending 10 minutes trying to explain my home/work situation every time someone asks (which happens frequently when you start a new college class every 5 weeks).

Discourse!

2005-05-13T21:44:00.000-07:00

Not a single non-hubby comment today. Even for all the trouble I caused today over on Cathy's blog. Not even to point out the irony of my cry for tolerance below and my (mildly) overboard rant against the feminist hordes over on Cathy's comments section. I guess I'll give up being controversial...for now...

Thank You Jonah Goldberg!

2005-05-13T10:11:00.000-07:00

For sticking up for us wacky Christians. Apparently Law & Order saw fit to take on the Scarey Christian Right...anyways, Jonah wrote a better article than I could, so go read it.

Two things about this article: to supplement what Jonah had to say, there actually is an example of someone coming to Christ and then feeling compelled to actually take responsibility for his actions - Chuck Colson (Funny enough I was just reading his story yesterday for an Ethics class). Not to mention there were rumors of that sort of thing happening after The Passion came out, but I'm too tired/lazy to look them up so you'll just have to Google them yourself.

Anyways, this just illustrated what I've come to love about being on the right side of the fence: I find that far more people are willing to actually be honestly tolerant of other people's faith. Catholic, Jew, Protestant, Atheist, Agnostic - you just don't see very much religious name calling. Which I think is cool. I think we could all set aside our defensiveness for a bit and have some honest discourse around here we'd all be much happier, if not better informed about the world at large.

And this goes for both sides of the fence - I have been snubbed by way back when pagan friends of mine for becoming a Christian, but I have also been chastised by Christian friends of mine for hanging out with a dominatrix (which I thought was especially annoying because she was a friend of mine's girlfriend). I mean, Jesus and then later Paul, went to the people where they were and they didn't beat them up for their ways, but tried to understand where they were coming from (Well, I guess Jesus already knew, but Paul didn't) and meet people where they were at. We need more of that.

Anyway, off my soapbox and back to work!

Talk amongst yourselves...

2005-05-12T23:57:00.000-07:00

Talking points that are rattling around in my head:

I have a new theory that despite what all the non-conformist movies of the last 3 decades have been trying to tell us - People like legalism. They like rules. They like people to just give them a nice little list of what they can and cannot do and to go on thier merry way. Witness the popularity of Mormonism, Catholicism, etc. vs., say, the Quakers. Even within the Protestant church you have denominations everywhere you turn and what is a denomination but a group that says we believe you have to believe/follow X doctrine to really be a Christian? Even in secular circles you have all these How-To books and self-help books giving 10 rules for doing such and such thing. People like things to be easy. Freespiritedness is not easy. It's complicated and messy. I don't think most people like complicated and messy.

Ah Ha! I'm being controversial! Not intentionally so, but this was just sticking in my head today.

Talking out of my bum...

2005-05-12T23:35:00.000-07:00

And no, I'm not British, but I am a terrible, terrible Anglophile...

Anyway, got back last night from our crazy three days at Disneyland. I love the makeover they gave the park for the 50th anniversery and highly recommend that anyone who hasn't been there in awhile give it another shot. The facelifts on the Indiana Jones ride and Splash Mountain were especially cool, but you'll find that pretty much every ride in the park seems to have been given a new lease on life and the new Buzz Lightyear ride is a hoot. I can't really tell you how Star Tours is though, because my husband and mother-in-law are bound and determined to sneak my three-year-old onto that ride (she's only two inches too short) and there is a general agreement that no one will go on until the Boo gets to ride.

Weekend Stuff

2005-05-09T09:52:00.000-07:00

Ok, I actually have stuff to post about, but we're getting ready to go to Dland for a couple of days while the construction guys put in new stairs, so not much time.

Finally saw "Bladerunner" for the first time and I was so confused. I mean, the main story seemed to make sense but it felt like something was missing, and there were all these long sequences where there was no dialouge and it make the whole movie seem really slow paced. Then I mentioned it to a friend of mine who asked if I watched the Director's Cut, which apparently does not have the nifty voiceover that explains what the crap is happening. So I have to rewatch it now. Anyways, it was visually interesting, but does not seemed to have aged well. Especially since a large amount of SciFi people seemed to totally miss the mark in the 80's. We are nowhere close to flying cars, but apparently no one saw the minaturization and internet revolution coming at all.

Anyways, I was disappointed to learn that my Dad (who usually has the same taste in movies I do) thought "Napoleon Dynamite" was "stupid". But apparently this is because he was the cocky jock guy when he was in high school and says he didn't get the nerds then, and he doesn't get them now. Which is funny to me because all three of his kids, myself included, are so geeky it's silly. Ah well. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that guy who was a drag racing surfer voted Most Likely to marry Miss America in high school doesn't get "Napoleon Dynamite", but still it made me a little sad to realize the social rift that lies between us. Anyways, he liked "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and continues to be a Star Trek fan, so there must be some geek in him somewhere. (Maybe he's just in denile.)

Ok, off to doc signings, Disneyland, LYTs, and other fun adventures.

Ok..One more thing...

2005-05-06T23:54:00.000-07:00

Actually I did see the funniest thing in the Westways that came today - That on the original Main Street, USA at Disneyland they had a store called "The Wizard of Bras", that sold "intimate apparel". (Does Lileks know about this?) The article says they had to close it down by 1956. Gee, really? Can't believe anyone complained about that one. Anyways, I thought it was funny, so thought I would share.

Boring Friday!

2005-05-06T23:38:00.000-07:00

So today was the Friday that didn't happen. No doc signing for me, no docs for that matter (people with a need for instant gradification and a steady income should never, never go into the real estate field). Anyways, the only things that got accomplished today were David putting in yet another palm tree for his mom and making it to Target before the pharmacy closed. Not exactly productive. Though the tropical plants continue to be an adventure in thier own way. The previous owners of our house apparently had no interest in thier plants, so our backyard has more clay than a kindergarden classroom, and is a pain the fanny to plant stuff in, especially large tropical plants. I must admit our pool is taking on a Jungle Cruise quality that is kind of cool though, and my mom-in-law has a veritible fruit and veggie garden going on in the sideyard, so I can't really complain. Anyways, at least I got to have Jamocha Almond Fudge ice cream (only one scoop) and Mountain Dew LiveWire in the same day! (Dieting has made me a strange, strange person...)

Off to bed. Maybe tomorrow will be more interesting.

Emperor's Club

2005-05-05T22:27:00.000-07:00

Okay, now that I've watched the movie I'll try to tackle Number One's question. Still not quite sure what was meant by "subtext"...but two subtle things that came through were the idea of parental influence vs. educational influence and (as my more well-read hubbie pointed out) classicism vs. materialism. I enjoyed the movie quite a bit and whole-heartedly agree that our current culture of the ends justifying the means has lost quite a bit of its classical foundation. Of course, David and I are in the middle of an elective Western Civ course that focuses on Greco-Roman influence, so I'm biased. As to the first Vs. I think that in many ways the movie showed that no matter how influencial a teacher may try to be, parental heritage has a way of winning out, for good or for bad. This movie touched me in a personal way, because it seems like Sedgwick Bell had an eriee similarity to pretty much every important male in my life, especially my brother (who I don't think ever learned the importance of character) and my husband (who, luckily, has, but most likely only because of the grace of God). And I found I related much to him as well, so there but for the grace of God go I (literally).

Anyways, the whole thing dovetailed nicely with much of the research David and I have been doing for his fiction series, which has consisted of very throughly studying the life and times of Julius Caesar. So we had a tremendous amount of fun trying to answer the test questions ourselves and I think I did fairly well, given my still limited knowledge. (Thank you Colleen McCullough for making studying Caeser fun! And thank you Hugh Hewitt for mentioning her books in "In, but Not Of"!)

Ok, I really, really need sleep, but felt a need to post since I actually had something of substance to say.

Passing Time...

2005-05-05T16:13:00.000-07:00

So, Boo is writing a story on the computer just like daddy. I think it's cute. It frightens one of our programmer friends that she knows how to work MS Word though. She says she's writing a story about horses, particularly the horse she met when we went to Northern Cali last year. I really want to go back there again. It's sooooooooo pretty up there. Especially Sonoma County. If you are going up there, they have the best ribs ever at the Sonoma Cheese Factory. I highly recommend it. They have awesome Chili Cheddar, too.

Ok, off to class soon.

Thursdays

2005-05-05T11:44:00.000-07:00

Ok...it's 11:45 and I don't have my homework done, no one called on the new ad, and David is doing some arcane stuff to his blog that is causing the sidebar to disappear...bleh.
Oh well, at least we are supposed to be watching "The Emperor's Club" in class tonight, so that should at least be entertaining. Kevin Kline has been hit or miss in my opinion, so no guaranteed good movie there, (and based on IMDB, it seems like a blatent ripoff of "Dead Poets Society", which I love), so we'll see. Maybe I'll do a review tomarrow or something. David says I've become the cinema snob queen since watching "Requiem for a Dream" though, so maybe I shouldn't...

Anyways, back to Thursday...

But Blonde...

2005-05-04T23:03:00.000-07:00

As of last week, the golden streaks have infected the rest of my head, so the pic isn't entirely accurate, but I like it and I have no recent photos...so...be happy!

Actually, having achieved my blonde ambition, I just might post a pic or two next week. If the digital camera is working...which is rare.

2005-05-04T22:53:00.000-07:00

Anime Me! As drawn by Omi of Counter Culture (http://counterculture.infinite-comics.com/)

Ha!

2005-05-04T22:13:00.000-07:00

Ok, I'm just not going to let my hubbie over at Pererro have all the fun. So here's my own blog. I am a much slower typer than David and, in theory, am supposed to be editing the first of his twenty book series right now, so my posts will be short but hopefully cool. (That probably sounds more impressive than it is, since I already edited one, which he then ripped into two books, one of which is the one I'm editing now, so really it's already half-edited, and now he's blogging instead of finishing the pre-writing for the next book, so I'm gonna show I can waste time, too!) Uh...I mean meaningfully engage my fellow geeks...I mean important people...in intelligent discourse...or something...