Entries tagged with home improvement

Current Mood: sick

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kind of a long ketchup

Ugh... I think I'm getting sick. :( The only silver lining to this is that I'm going to get to go first in Pandemic.

What a bummer. For once, I managed to avoid getting sick the entire time I was in LA (which had the most amazing weather when I was there... mostly in the 70s, and one day it even got up to 81), I got my flu shot before I left... and now this. Ugh.

Also, I came back to crap that I have to deal with. :(

1) Before I left, my washing machine broke. It was set to a medium load but the sensor stopped working or whatever and it FLOODED my finished basement. So I had to deal with that before I left (drying the whole place out). The carpet needs to be replaced, so I have to do that, then I have to get a new washer (and probably dryer while I'm at it, and also a new water heater, which has been on the blink for months). Meanwhile, all the crap that was in the basement is now scattered throughout the rest of the house/garage, so it's a giant mess.

2) My PC, which was custom built by my brother years ago, has been acting wonky for awhile. But it had awesome specs at the time it was made, so it's still a really good machine (the graphics card is still way better than any typical graphics card in a regular pre-built machine made today), and despite its issues would never completely die, so I just kept using it. Well, after I came back from LA, it seems to have finally kicked it at last, so that needs to be replaced as well. I've been vacillating between these two options -- if you know computers, feel free to give me your input on whether you'd pick one over another! ( A tale of two PCs. )

While on vacation I saw American Hustle (which I did not like at ALL, though it had everything going for it, including a bunch of actors that I love) and The Wolf of Wall Street, which was spectacular. It barely felt 3 hours long, and it was so unexpectedly funny!!! Kudos, Leo and Martin, kudos.

Blahhhhhhhhh. Cheer me up! Watch Arrow and tell me how much you love it. Or at least check out my post about how much I love it and tell me you'll give it a shot. Here are some incentives!

I love when Felicity gets glammed up.

But I also love when she's in her normal ponytail and glasses. <3

More secret elevator missions plz.

IT girl turned first-aid specialist. :D

Perfect OTP is perfect.

Why are non-canon pairings always so much more interesting than canon pairings? :/

Current Mood: pleased

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You come at the king, you best not miss.

I FIXED MY WATER HEATER! Yay. I found the breaker panel (it was in the garage) and it wasn't super well labeled so it took me two attempts, but I found the right ones for the water heater. The switch wasn't actually in the "off" position, so I was a little afraid that that wasn't the answer, but as soon as I flipped it back and forth, I saw the little light on the heater's control panel go on. There was a small moment of panic when, checking it again after 15 minutes to make sure it was still on, it was instead giving one blink, meaning that there was a start-up failure. So I flipped the breaker back and forth again but had to run off to dinner with

slitherhither so couldn't wait around to see if it had really taken the second time. When I got home, it was blinking. I finally had to pull out the owner's manual and figure out that I actually needed to reset it (consisting of changing from one mode to another). And after that it was all good! I woke this morning and was able to take a hot shower, yay!

So dinner last night was at Lark and had a blast with B. Good convo, good food, it's nice to be an adult. I'd been to Lark once before and it was good, but last night was better than my first experience. ( What we ate. )

Lunatix Loop, the Matt Leacock game I bought from that guy in the UK, arrived the other day. Yay! Sadly I didn't do a lot of research on it beforehand, and it turns out that it's a 4-player game. >< BUT the cool thing is that our little group will have one more player come June... because that is when

jade_okelani is visiting! Eeeeeeee! She's purchased her tickets and everything. I'm trying to plan out our itinerary -- because I'm like that -- and there's just NOT ENOUGH TIME to do everything. She's only going to be here 7 days, and there are a number of things we've planned that are immovable (such as seeing American Idiot, which is going to be here during that time! Actually that helped us narrow the dates), and so very many things we'd like to do. So that's exciting.

Nearly forgot. I wanted to share my favorite buttermilk biscuits recipe with you guys. I know, I know, everyone has their own favorite recipe for buttermilk biscuits, but I swear this is the best! ( Mile-high biscuits. )

And finally -- Game of Thrones renewed for season 3! Not that there was really any doubt. As expected they're going to split ASoS into two seasons.

grrm has already said which episode he's going to write in S3. And he still thinks he can finish the book series before the the TV show catches up with the current published text? HA. The producers also confirm that, as I theorized, they're planning to deal with AFFC and ADWD as "one" text, since they deal with parallel events.

Current Mood: busy

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I'm like Tinkerbell... I need applause to LIVE!

This weekend I Gleeked out and rewatched the first 13 episodes, plus the newest 6 that I hadn't seen. It's like the best show ever. ( Spoilers. )

So I saw Robin Hood. I can't in good conscience recommend it. It was just too all over the place and nonsensical. Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves is still all the Robin Hood I need, though if I could I would totally switch the actors playing Robin and Marian. Morgan Freeman and Alan Rickman made PoT great.

For K.'s birthday dinner D. made linguine with clams. It was so good and so easy I made it again, with a few tweaks. Posted about it on my food blog.

I'm halfway through Black Powder War and started Jinx by Meg Cabot. It's one of the 527901354102 books she's written in the last few years that I haven't yet read. She's too prolific; I can't keep up with her. She writes as many books as I read. It's kind of ridiculous.

The handyman came on Saturday and fixed the toilet and two tubs, installed a peep hole (though unfortunately he went a bit higher than we agreed and it's a bit too high for me), and sprinkled moss killer over the roof. He got everything done in under 2 hours. I'm pretty pleased. That was really a $45 well spent (plus $15 for materials) -- not only did I get all that stuff I've been wanting fixed, fixed, but now I know a decent go-to handyman!

It's gotten so cold here that it's almost like we've been in fall and now it's approaching winter. People on

gardening are showing pictures of their first tomato HARVESTS and here in the Pacific NW most people don't even have their tomato plants in the ground yet. It's pathetic.

Current Mood: chipper

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Stuff again

So I've been reading about foot binding, and it sounds HORRIFIC. I'm reading Lisa See's Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, and the protagonist goes through the process as a little girl. I'd always been under the misguided thought that all it really involved was binding the feet really tightly to stop growth or something. What it entails seriously sounds like something you might wish on your worst enemy, or if you wanted to torture someone into submission. AND PEOPLE DID THIS TO LITTLE GIRLS. *Parents* did it to their children. For fashion. Or status. Or whatever. Omfg. They CRIPPLED people. They deliberately took beautiful, natural things and made them deformed. WTF was wrong in their heads that anyone would ever consider it AESTHETICALLY PLEASING? I've never been a big fan of feet, but I have newfound appreciation of mine. Ever since reading about foot binding and seeing pictures of women whose feet had been bound (you know, if they didn't die from infection), I'm admiring what a beautiful thing the natural foot is, with its pretty arch and 5 perfect toes. Thank GOD I wasn't born during the 2,000 years that foot binding was practiced in China, because I might very well have had to endure it!! OMG.

My mom is leaving today. :( We decided to take it easy on her last day and went to a Japanese place for lunch and for an early dinner we're going to have some braised oxtail and leftovers. I don't think I mentioned that I made my mom short ribs in red wine sauce the other night and the whole process took 7 hours. O.o Maybe 2 1/2 hours of active cooking time and 5 hours of oven braising. It was delicious, but so much work for so little (6 little ribs). I'm probably never going to make it again ... but it did make me appreciate the food at nice restaurants like Tavolata (whose short rib dish I was trying to emulate).

I have hired a new gardener, and I'm pretty happy about it. I did end up going with my neighbor's gardener, who was willing to come just once a month (usually they want to come more often or it's not worth it) -- probably since they're right next door doing the other house anyway -- and are charging $40. That's half the price I was paying before, and at the frequency I wanted in the first place! So yeah, very glad about that.