Category Archives: doing it wrong

Pendleton Roundup 1925 by Frederic Allen Williams

Hey, did you know about the New York Public Library Digital Gallery? It’s amazing. I looked at the pictures of Indians first, but there is tons of other stuff.

NYPL Digital Gallery provides access to over 480,000 images digitized from primary sources and printed rarities in the collections of The New York Public Library, including illuminated manuscripts, historical maps, vintage posters, rare prints and photographs, illustrated books, printed ephemera, and more.

This is the kind of stuff that makes the Internet good.

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Plogic At Its Finest

Several weeks ago I constructed a primo Target list. I compiled from other lists. I cross-checked with my to-do list so that I could grab items for various projects, gift giving and domestic tranquility needs.

It was a beautiful list and I had it in my hands when I got in the car to go to the store. When I arrived at the store it was gone.

I looked in my purse. I looked in my bag in the trunk. I took every single thing out of my purse. I took every single thing out of my bag in the trunk.

Yes, I was frustrated because I couldn’t find my list but it wasn’t the end of the world. I was more aggravated because how could that even be possible that a list can disappear like that?

I looked in the ashtray and took everything out of the glove compartment. I looked in the cracks in the seats. I looked under the seats, in the backseat and in the little pockets in the door. I could not find that list.

I repeated all the above steps several times just because I knew with 100% certainty that I’d had the list in the car. There was no way the list could have vanished.

At last, I gave up and developed a weak theory that it had blown out the window. It had been open at one point. I was probably so absorbed in driving/climate control/music selection that I didn’t notice my beautiful list, flying into the wind.

I bet you know where this story is going. Earlier in the week I saw some scrap paper back behind the passenger seat and last night I picked it up and set it on the front dash so I could put in recycling. When I finally turned it over on my way into the house I saw that: IT WAS MY LIST.

My beautiful list, sitting there mocking me right to my face. How is this even possible that you can tear your car apart looking for a list that isn’t there and then it appears?

The only explanation: time travel.

Yesterday Bob and I went to see the new Woody Allen movie Scoop. It’s hilarious. If you hate Woody, this probably won’t change your mind. But if you’re ambivalent or like some of his movies, I think you’ll find this entertaining. It stars Woody, Scarlett Johansson and Hugh Jackman. Scarlett plays this nerdball aspiring journalist and Woody plays a goofy magician named: Splendini. They are hilarious together.

The theater was about 90% full which was amazing. Usually when we see a Woody Allen movie it’s just us and a couple of angry looking foreign ladies. It was fun to see it in a big crowd with everybody laughing. Plus Woody’s demographic is people our age or older so everyone was well behaved except the lady next to me was unable to go the full 96 minutes without eating something from her bag which was wrapped in crinkly paper which she unselfconsciously took her time peeling off. Also, I hate the sound of other people chewing so it was extra distressing for me but luckily she ate pretty fast.

There were two trailers for movies that looked good, another surprise as normally during the trailers I’m looking at Bob and going, “That’s a movie?” I even did that yesterday with some stupid looking poker movie which, based on the trailer, I think is about a charming young woman played by Drew Barrymore who falls for a dreamy guy (the guy from the Hulk) except instead of having a job, he plays in poker tournaments and has Daddy issues and in the suspenseful climax, plays in the World Championship Poker Match and the last two players are he and his dad who is OF COURSE played by Robert Duvall. Please.

The movies that look good are The Science of Sleep directed by Michel Gondry who directed Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and which stars Gael Garcia Bernal who was in the The Motorcycle Diaries. During the trailer I leaned over to Bob and said, “I love it already.” (And by the way, congratulations IMBD for adding those hideous animated mortgage ads to your site. They look like shit, bravo.)

The other movie is called Trust the Man and stars Dave Duchovny, Julianne Moore, Billy Crudup and Maggie Gyllenhaal and is about friends and relationships looks funny and good.

After movie time we went to the park where the Hawaiian festival was going on and were hoping to score some killer dinner even though I really wanted to eat leftovers at home because the refrigerator is too full. Sadly (or gladly) the food vendors had been cranking out the food all day and all that was left were two pitiful looking banana lumpia, some panini and some yakisoba. Not sure how panini fits in with the Hawaiian theme. I’m guessing someone coughed up a bunch of money for a panini machine and needs to pay it off. I was not about to stand in line for yakisoba so we had leftovers served in taco shells at home. It was awesome.

Last week I saw this exciting news online:

Empire Pictures has signed a deal with Transcience Corp. to develop an animated film and possible franchise from the infamous children's toy line "The Amazing Live Sea-Monkeys," reports Variety. Under the deal, Empire acquired entertainment rights to the line, which has been on the market for 45 years and sold in more than 50 countries.

Full item here

Someone commented: Oh great, a movie about brine shrimp.

I read a lot of comics books as a kid and let me tell you, I wanted those sea-monkeys. Remember those ads with the sea-monkey family and their happy faces? I really thought that’s what you were getting. They still advertise like that. How many kids are crushed when their sea-monkey’s hatch and they’re just brine shrimp, well “amazing new hybrids [that] live longer than any “natural” variety of brine shrimp.”? Notice how few photos of actual sea-monkeys are on the website. Other troubling news: on the trouble-shooting page it says if you’re having trouble seeing them, look more closely “Sea-Monkeys are as tiny as a pinpoint sized “dot” of white.” Having fun yet kids? Be sure to click on the video. Love that groovin soundtrack.

This morning we did a crepe walk. We walked downtown to have breakfast crepes at Mon Ami, a new place that opened about a month ago.

During the walk we stopped at a big garage sale which is going to benefit something with animals. They had all kinds of donations they were trying to organize.

I’m not a big garage sale person because I see it as more junk you’re bringing it into the house but when I saw these cookie cutters, I had to have them.

These are the cookie cutters we used when we were kids. Mom or Erin probably still has them. There was a scary moment when I thought I might have them but the box is behind a bunch of stuff and I don’t want to look right now.

I picked through the whole box for all the familiar ones. I thought I might even make sugar cookies for the writers tomorrow except I’m not sure I’m up for the effort right now. I already had planned to pick up another half flat of blueberries and throw together a quick crisp. I already know it’s yummy and whatever’s leftover won’t go to waste.

When I put on my shorts this morning I found a dollar in my pocket. Perfect for my purchase. We needed two more cookie cutters to make it a dollar. And I found two we didn’t have.

A witch. How cool is that? Also note I realize these photos are crap. I have a lot to learn.

Here’s another shot of the Frank Gehry building in Cleveland. If I was a bit more energetic I could Photoshop that lamppost out of there. Running late, decided to keep it real.

We finally had a cool night last night and were able to open the windows up again. I don’t like to sleep with the air conditioner on if I don’t have to. Bob grilled some portabello mushrooms, green pepper and onion for dinner. He’s got the routine down now, they were awesome. We had some rice and cleared out a dab of leftover bean salad and green beans. I had a lime popsicle while I watched my Battlestar Galactica DVD.

When I watered the yard, I found two tomatoes that are yellow-y orange. Getting closer. Also a couple of cucumbers. I remember planting tons of cucumber seeds but looks like I only have two vines. That’ll be enough.

I found this in the restaurant guide of one of the visitor magazines in Cleveland.

Today I spent a better part of the afternoon trying to wrangle my digital photos. Since Frodo’s color went wonky I got lazy and haven’t named or organized photos in at least a dozen downloads. They’re still haphazard but at least in folders with general dates and I deleted dozens of blurry crap shots that I don’t need to save.

I also played with iMovie. I made a little movie of my pumpkins (what else?) with my camera. I figured 40 seconds or so would be perfect to start out. It’s a somewhat intuitive program. I managed to tack on a fade in and fade out and put it to some music but I would have liked to understand how the program works.

I tried the help window which very helpfully told me I could make a movie and do tricky stuff like fade in and fade out and add music. It didn’t tell me out to do it so I would say that’s not help that’s marketing. Bob says he has a book but I bet it’s about 400 pages long and starts with instructions like: plug your computer into the wall and hit the on switch.

Who decided that computer books have to be giant tomes? What if you could tell someone everything she needed to know in 30 pages?

This evening I made a blueberry brown betty which was fantastic. I would have eaten a trough-full but I was full from dinner. Brown betty is the way to go. I think this fall I will develop the pumpkin brown betty. At last, I realize my life purpose.

Something I forgot to mention yesterday when I was talking about last week’s food section was this recent fixation with chutney. It seems like everywhere I turn I see a chutney recipe, which my research tells me “is a term for a variety of sweet and spicy condiments.” I’m so not interested in making chutney or having it served to me. It’s a 4 year old’s mentality because I don’t think I’ve eaten much chutney and I don’t know where the resistance comes from but enough with the chutney already.

A recipe that thrilled me appeared in today’s Foodday which featured a huge article about cheese and had a tidbit about the woman who won the Tillamook Macaroni and Cheese Bake-Off with a recipe called Crab and Macaroni Bake. It doesn’t sound good for the middle of summer but when the first cool days are here, I can’t wait to try it.

I forgot to mention that on the way to Tacoma the train showed Swiss Family Robinson. Yes, the Disney movie that came out in 1960. I thought that was odd, too. I’ve never seen the movie or read the book and everything I know about the story comes from an attraction at Disneyland that I played on as a kid. According to this website (which includes some wonderful photos) the attraction is no longer at the California Disneyland where it was transformed into some sort of Tarzan thing, but it still exists in Florida.

The original book Swiss Family Robinson was written in 1812 (!) and you can read it for free at Project Gutenberg.

The movie is completely loopy. Especially if you’re not really watching it because you want to read your book but you can’t help but look up at the screen because of all the crazy stuff going on. There was a shipwreck and an island and the Swiss family managed to adapt to the new situation pretty quickly. In Lost everyone wandered around in a daze picking through refuse and arguing about a rescue fire. In SFR they were all running around in clean clothes teasing elephants and riding ostriches right after they slapped up their tree house. What sort of magical wonderland was this because in addition to elephants and ostriches, I saw giant snakes, tigers and a zebra. And these goofy pirates of possible Asian origin. And the pirates were looting a different ship with Euro-type occupants including the Captain’s boy who was really a girl (his daughter or granddaughter?) who hooked up with the Swiss Family. (Probably a more amazing plot twist in 1960). It seems like the island wasn’t all that deserted. I guess I’ll have to netflix it and watch it because I’m intrigued now.