(dc) sleep

no internet yet at my loft. this week is the week to catch up on sleep. 9pm (or earlier) bedtime is my goal. i'll start my life next week.

(dc) home

i spent today making home. i mopped the floor with a no-kidding mop after sweeping it systematically. i handwashed in the bathtub and put up the ikea blinds-slash-curtains that a previous owner had installed. i scrubbed clean a bunch of sundry items that a girl from craig's list gave me when i went over to buy her tv ($40). i bought some lovely furniture from my nice neighbors downstairs at goodwood, who gave me a splendid 1950s black vinyl and chrome reclining barber's chair. from a man who calls himself "the flagman" i bought an 8'x 10' piece of carpet ($10), some LL Bean boots ($5), and a 1930s era record player ($10). (aside: the flagman drives around DC in his pickup collecting stuff from homes and businesses that he then resells to flea markets. he says he's been doing this for 30 years. i'll try to take a picture of him next weekend.) from another girl on craig's list i bought an ikea bench (gray), and from my friends jessy and robbie i borrowed an aerobed and a pillowcase. things are shaping up so that i can almost live normally. i love my neighborhood.

still missing: a shower curtain, all my studio gear, my cat, and internet service. if i can find some rabbit ears for my tv, i might even be able to get fox.

(dc) meet jessy

isn't she beautiful?

(dc) homesick

i took my laptop to my loft tonight to explore wireless possibilities. i picked up no fewer than four connections. things called linksys, community, and some cryptic ones. one of them connected with almost full bars, but gave me no internet access. bummer. i called my neighbors to see if i could mooch until i get service.

robbie and i stood and contemplated the building of the sleeping loft. we carefully weighed the pros and cons. the con, "it would break up the room and make it feel smaller," seems to outweigh everything else. so, i'm changing tomorrow's plan to: buy an ikea sofabedlüfdirk and just go with that for now.

in the meantime, nasa jsc is once again refusing to ship my stuff, 3000lbs of which is sitting in their facility. even if i were to prioritize 1000lbs, they still will not ship anything that isn't clothes, toiletries, and personal papers. who has a thousand pounds of those things? according to the rules, i am not allowed another trip home for 2 more weeks (i get to go home every 3 weeks). i can fly down there and drive back as long as the total cost of the trip doesn't exceed the cost of flying the whole way. this rules out the Uhaul, but i may be able to drive my own car towing a trailer. shut up, justin, my car would totally make it. or...a more ideal solution would be to get a penske truck (much cheaper than uhaul, by the way), tow my car, and pay whatever overage that the truck costs. this is my new tack in the everchanging winds of nasa. i miss my studio. and my cat. and the warm weather. i even miss friendswood. sigh.

this week was challenging. i'm glad it's over.

(dc) sigh

my hair froze walking across the street to work this morning.

(nyc) aliens on broadway

we were on broadway last night followed by a night on the town.


limo ceiling

there are good stories (like when the limo driver took us to the abc building instead of the nbc building for dinner at the rainbow room , which disney had arranged for dijanna and guests:
us: "um ...hi... we're here for the rainbow room"
abc security guard: "one moment"
us: "are we at the right place?"
security guard: "let me call"
several minutes of waiting
woman coming down escalator: "are you here with ....who are you here with?"
us: "um, we're here with disney for reservations at the rainbow room"
(oops. jon stewart would say, "awwwwwwk-ward"),

but i'm ill equipped to do the stories justice. i'm trying to talk justin into writing them for me. he complains that he doesn't have enough details, having not been there. i say he just needs to kick into reporter mode and get the details from me. justin's the talented storyteller. i tried to take pictures, but most places and things were dark and my cellphone camera wasn't up to the task. i'll post pictures when my friends send me theirs. it might be time for a flikr account.

(capitol hill) fortune

found on floor near hotel elevator this morning: ONE (1) fortune cookie fortune.

"FORTUNE COOKIE SAY:
DON'T LOOK BACK,
ALWAYS LOOK AHEAD
04 08 12 15 25 27"

(dc) god bless america

this is the mall at crystal city. i was filled with an inexplicable patriotic inspiration while shopping tonight to prepare for tomorrow's premier in NYC. here's a rundown:

makeup: 60 scratch
coat: 110 scratch
scarf: 13 scratch
train ticket: 140 scratch
hotel: 50 scratch

that's a lot of scratch for this shindig. hope it's fun. it would have been a lot worse if my boss hadn't loaned me a great black dress, shoes, and jewelry. she's fabulous. we had our first group meeting today (on my first day at my new job), and all 5 of us were women(!): two engineers, two scientists, and an administrative assistant. apparently, there are a couple guys in our group, but they are out of town. in addition to normal NASA business, the meeting turned naturally at times to things like childrearing and shopping. it was excellent and refreshing. i think i'm going to like working with women. we discovered that we all wear the same size shoe and i had plenty of help figuring out how to outfit myself for tomorrow's red carpet.

(dc) brr

most of weekend we tried to stay indoors.
today, however, we bundled up and ventured out to the international spy museum. we couldn't let justin go back to houston without a little spy action. then we had a quaint mexican meal at rosa mexicano that put us back $49.68. i ordered no entree. just an appetizer: $7 mini-quesadillas.


there was $12 guacamole (made fresh tableside), and $17 chicken enchiladas for justin.


that's just wrong. of course, justin and i don't drink, so that's food only. the decor was indeed stunning...but, but, but...$50? sigh. i miss texas already.

(dc) new home

well...after 24 solid hours of packing (and not finishing), we arrived into DCA last night, just in time for a lovely little dinner party


and the first "real snowstorm" in the northeast. we opted for the cab to my new place saturday morning. it was so snowy and cold, we couldn't really enjoy my new neighborhood (as seen here from love cafe)


i got my new keys. turns out i have an unusally big door. loretta, will, and james came over to inspect. loretta had a grand vision for a sleeping loft over the bathroom door that left me truly inspired.

(friendswood) going, going....gone

sigh. night and day spent frantically packing. justin took the day off work (without pay) to help. sheesh, i have a lot of cables. in a toally inadequate attempt at repaying him, i gave him my first class upgrade on the flight to dc.

(nasa) blank stare

justin, your blog is EMPTY. it's empty, dude. get with the program. if you don't start posting stuff, i will have to start posting news about you, because, let's face it, everyone who reads my blog only does so to find out what's going on with you. let this serve as a warning. *shakes fist*

(nasa) bonus

turns out nasa will pay for 1000lbs of my stuff to be shipped from here to DC. this means i don't have to drive. it will also mean i won't have a car in dc, but that's fine with me. best of all, it means i have two extra days to pack and finish stuff i have been trying to finish for months. today's the day.

another bonus - ed marsh, the creative producer of aliens of the deep, was able to use some of the voiceover justin and i worked on to replace some pretty silly things i said in their rough cut of the extended DVD. in particular, i used to say (after a (very rough) discussion of panspermia), "we might all be martians...we might all be...you know...from another solar system entirely!" i asked ed to take out the bit about another solar system, because i'm not sure i buy that theory yet. i think he wasn't happy to have to take it out. perhaps it made good TV. he left the martian bit. hello, martians. i'm just glad he could use any of what we did. this was my fourth attempt at recording voiceover. the third attempt was rejected on the grounds that it sounded "too sex-kittenish." actually, fiona thought it was sex kitten. ed said i just sounded dog tired. obviously, it was the latter. i had pulled an all-nighter to do it. i'll just be happy when this is all over.

the premier is tonight at universal studios in hollywood (same place we went to the screening with jj and marisol). i might have gone tonight, too, except that i only received the invitation from Disney yesterday. there's apparently going to be another premier (what do you call a second premier? isn't that no longer a premier?) in new york in a week or so. perhaps i'll try to get invited to that.

(friendswood) fear is the new black

according to jon stewart, fear is the new black. i think he's right.

(friendswood) limpet

lim·pet    ( P )  Pronunciation Key  (limp' it)
n.

1. Any of numerous marine gastropod mollusks, as of the families Acmaeidae and Patellidae, characteristically having a conical shell and adhering to rocks of tidal areas.
2. One that clings persistently.
3. A type of explosive designed to cling to the hull of a ship and detonate on contact or signal.

(friendswood) mea culpa

i have been negligent of the blog. you see, this is very typical. i can be good and disciplined with something until an entropic event of sufficient magnitude disrupts it, and then the discipline goes out the window. from the day i started the blog until the new year's retreat from civilization, i didn't miss a day. but once the streak is broken, it's hard to find that same spirit. i hereby summon discipline in the blog arena, because this is one of those periods of my life i know i'm going to want to remember later. it is also, not orthogonally, one of those times i'm going to have the hardest time remembering because it's overwhelming and chaotic.

we spent today preparing for and throwing a little open-house-type party for friends, work colleagues, and neighbors. most people stopped by mostly just to make an appearance and stayed for only a few minutes, but i appreciated it more than they probably think i did.

and some people stayed longer. claire and john paul jumped on and then adopted my trampoline. we dismantled it in 15 minutes and put it in claire's golf. we hope they can fit it in their backyard. they might have to adopt also their neighbor's back yard.

my house is now just about as tidy and orderly as it has ever gotten in the 8 months i've lived here, but it's the calm before the storm (or perhaps it's the eye). a tornado is about to hit tomorrow morning as i attempt to sort out what to take to DC and what to leave behind. the logistical problem is still out of reach for me, yet the morning will be here in a few short hours.

will it be the 17' uhaul truck towing my toyota? will it be just the toyota? will i bail on the whole idea of driving altogether and schedule a flight? who's writing this show?

i have to say, today was pretty idyllic. i was filled with nostalgia and all day caught myself pretending it was going to be like this for longer than just a few more hours. i'm going to miss a lot of things about this place and time and condition.

i leave you with a few photos from one of today's adventures called "cleaning the fridge." we started by simply trying to identify items. this was more or less successful, with several exceptions. we're not quite sure what this was,



but we think it was most likely a cucumber. then there was the realization that the thanksgiving leftovers were some of the newer items we were pulling out. the oldest identified item (unfortunately, cottage cheese) appeared to have predated my move to this house by a year and a half. it was unopened. how did it get there?



or maybe that means september 2, 2004? anyway, in the end, we removed mass equivalent to roughly 1/4 my body weight.



the great thing was that it was a fun day. given how much stress and irritation entertaining always brought out in my family growing up, i'm pleasantly surprised when preparing for a party is cheerful and enjoyable. thanks, j. you're the best.

(dc) thinking aloud

as i sit here in my (crazy posh) hotel room this morning, i'm beginning to formulate a possible new plan. originally i was going to pack up a suitcase or two this weekend in houston, fly back to DC monday night, and stay with my friend kat for a while until i could acquire some basics to move into my place. this would mean leaving my studio and everything else behind in houston, where it would just sit idle for weeks or months. upon further thought, since i've already got my own place all lined up here to live, work, and park, i think i should just get in there as soon as possible. according to yahoo maps, it takes 21 hours to drive from houston to dc. gulp. perhaps what i should do is take advantage of this monday's holiday, pack up my car with my studio basics and futon, and hit the road. yes, yes. that seems like a logical plan. i might even be able to rig up my old car-top-carrier and throw the big carpet that's currently in my garage up on top of the car. this should really help with gas mileage.

at least if i do this, i will be able to work on music in my own space right away here, which may well be the only thing to prevent me from darkness. i should be able to fit the control 24, one or two keyboards, a couple mics, a couple monitors, and the digi and midi interfaces. all the other instruments will have to wait, but this should be enough to tide me over. i'm starting to like this plan.

(dc) it's all sky

coming up out of the u st cordoza metro on the vermont side, all you see is sky. no buildings, no wires, nothing. it made me temporarily dizzy this evening as i ascended into the twilight.

(md) argh

nothing much to say today.

(DC) U st.

i went to visit my new studio location this evening after my meeting. it seemed great. things might just work out. i like U st.

still too much work to do - no time to write properly here.

more later. maybe this weekend?

(college park, MD) what i did on my winter vacation

it's likely to be some time before i get around to show and tell from the past couple weeks. if you want to look at photos from the annual new year adventures, the best place to go is to mark bentley's site - his pictures are jolly good. he is also going to put an archive of everyone else's photos up at some point. thanks, dr. bentley!

(college park, MD) back on

hi.

sad.

(ambelside, UK) low peak

we climbed to low peak today. this was enough to make us feel 100% wussy. high peak would likely have killed us. i'm sending this from the pub in town that has what appears to be the town's only dial-up internet connection.

the sheep here are spraypainted. photos will be forthcoming upon return to civilisation. with an s.

(ambelside) weather

not surprisingly, it is cold and rainy here. today we piled into cars and drove to grasmere for a walk but some of us wimped out and went to a bistro instead for a lovely broccoli and stinton soup.

we made a weak attempt at new year's resolutions. i decided mine was to be more generous with others. and also to get in shape (along with 80% of americans).