Blog Changes

So after nearly seven years, the blog is getting a facelift! By Monday or so there will be a new platform, new look, new better pictures, tabs for my portfolio, and more stuff I haven't even figured out yet. It should even look better on a mobile device (now that I have one of those, I care about these things).

The move should go well because I'm not doing it (these pros are) but just in case this page doesn't cahnge for a week, you can check my Twitter stream for any updates (and follow the saga of the broken French press while you're there).

I Wish I Had His Energy

Of course, I wish Play-Doh (being swung in that bucket) got me that excited, too. More darling pictures at my brother's blog.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Christmas Joy And Christmas $!%*#

First the joy: Last week's kitty blanket tying party will make a lot of kitties warmer and happier this year.

And for the "oh shit" moment of the week: I'm making a rice wrap for my friend (but using buckwheat hulls as a filing instead, since rice can smell a little rice-y and he's sensitive to smells)...

...and I was opening up the buttonholes in the cover and sliced right through one. $%&! Good thing pillow coverss are easy to re-do.

IPHONE

This is what going from a first generation flip phone to an iPhone was like this weekend:

Dawning realization of the power I hold in my hand? Yes! Richard Strauss? Yes! If you need me I can be reached on my monolith. I mean smartphone. 

Friday Unrelated Information

1. The Discovery Channel has announced that they've captured footage of "a live giant squid in its natural habitat". We have to wait to tune in January 27th to see any shots, though.

2. In other science-y news, it's the birthday of of Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe.

3. And in decidedly non-science-y news, shamans have this to say about the new moon yesterday:

As the Moon increases from New to Full Moon, and as the days lengthen and bring more light at Solstice, we have the power of increase at our fingertips. Use it; ride the wave; harness it. On so many levels, we are being offered the portals, tools, and opportunities to tune in to unprecedented spiritual evolution.”

Space!

I love anything from the Hubble Telescope, but this is pretty amazing: A new an hours-long infrared exposure at a section of the  Hubble Ultra Deep Field image has shown us perhaps the most distant galaxies we've ever seen. One of the group of seven is 13.3 billion light years away--meaning that these galaxies were around before Earth even existed. 

I mean....holy shit. Way to be mind-bogglingly vast and ancient, Universe. Way to be clever hairless ape and figure this out, humans.
More information and better pictures are right here at Bad Astronomy.

12.12.12

Happy birthday to my sister-in-law Altair today! She's a gardener, a reader, a runner, a breadwinner, a hard worker, and a great mama to Skyler.

Her namesake!

Tuesday Project Roundup: Kitty Blankets

I spent my hiking time this past weekend getting ready for the Third Annual Kitty Blanket Tying Party at my house this Thursday (here's the first one in 2010). I ended up with seven fleece blankets ready to tie:

Seven isn't that many, but fortunately my mom has been cutting and fringing for a month so there will be blankets for all the kitties.

What I Have Today

I can tell you that it's Emily Dickinson's birthday today and that I did not go for a hike over the weekend, due to shopping and projects and snowing. I said this: 

And Emily said this: 

There's a certain Slant of light

There's a certain Slant of light,
Winter Afternoons—
That oppresses, like the Heft
Of Cathedral Tunes—

Heavenly Hurt, it gives us—
We can find no scar,
But internal difference,
Where the Meanings, are—

None may teach it—Any—
'Tis the Seal Despair—
An imperial affliction
Sent us of the Air—

When it comes, the Landscape listens—
Shadows—hold their breath—
When it goes, 'tis like the Distance
On the look of Death—

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I wanted to announce that I'd finally gotten a smartphone by posting from it (technology!) next week, but yesterday it was left on the porch when it shouldn't have been and now it's missing. I'll get a replacement next week, but I felt like Sad Christmas Grumpy Cat for a while: 

2. Of course, then I see the Atlantic's "Year in Photos 2012" and realize how much of the world had so many more problems than a missing package this year. 

3. And it's Pearl Harbor Day. Also a source of perspective.

"Falling Leaves and Early Snow"

Here's the second half of a Kenneth Rexroth poem I've been saving for a while. It sounds almost Japanese to me, and what he's talking about could be a Japanese painting. Or, you know, today's weather. 

In the afternoon thin blades of cloud

Move over the mountains;

The storm clouds follow them;

Fine rain falls without wind.

The forest is filled with wet resonant silence.

When the rain pauses the clouds

Cling to the cliffs and the waterfalls.

In the evening the wind changes;

Snow falls in the sunset.

We stand in the snowy twilight

And watch the moon rise in a breach of cloud.

Between the black pines lie narrow bands of moonlight,

Glimmering with floating snow.

An owl cries in the sifting darkness.

The moon has a sheen like a glacier.

I Probably Should Re-name The Blog

How about "Better Living Through Hippie Readings"? Because I'm sharing another one. (There may be one every day, if that's what it takes to  make it to the solstice.) 

Anyway, as part of the 3+2 Goals to "be happier [in my work, but really just in general]" and "be more compassionate," I bought The Book of Awakening, a year of readings and meditation prompts. This was today's: 

[Try to] honor each obstacle as something flowing in its own right in the Universal stream, to see ourselves and the obstacle as two limbs of the same tree drifting in the same river, bumping into each other, and even blocking on another for a moment...we must focus on our relationship to the stream and not to the things being carried alongside us.

Tuesday Project Roundup: SQUEEE!

Look at who's modeling his really really oversized sweater!!

 In new project news, I'm going to say that putting up the Christmas tree counts. 

(I'm having a fuse issue with the bottom third of the tree--I replace them but they short out again. That's not very Christmas-y of you, tree.)

December

If it's December, it's time for my favorite part of it: The Hubble Space Telescope Advent Calendar.

Today's image: Part of the Carina Nebula

It's also time to keep something in mind that my yoga teacher shared on Saturday: "The theme for December is forgiveness." That's taken from this page, and the metaphor of "moving houses" really touched me, as did this:

This is the task this month: To forgive and let go. To release the unproductive partnerships and bad investments and stupid mistakes and all the guilt and shame around the ways that we were naïve or impulsive or addicted or ignorant.

...and as you release and let go and forgive, look at what may be coming to you that is new, innovative and exciting. Take a chance on something that feels right and inspires you. Now is the time to have the courage to make the changes you know are right.

And there you go. Space and hippies, brought together for your Monday morning. 

Friday Unrelated Information

It's been a tricky week, as I'm sure you've been able to tell from the shortness of the posts, but here are some things that made me happy online:  

1. GRUMPY CAT. Guys, I'm losing my edge--I didn't even know this was a meme!

2. An elephant helping a man play some ragtime on the piano:


3. And this gif from the last season of Mad Men. Someday I will re-create it.

Writerly Birthdays

Today is the birthday of both Madeleine L'Engle (A Wrinkle In Time), Louisa May Alcott (Little Women), and my buddy Clive, aka C.S. Lewis (Narnia!).

Making Me Happy

It's not a hippie quote today. It's not a space picture (although there is a penumbral lunar eclipse happening). Instead, it's cat-bounce.com! Just go and make those kitties bounce. You won't be sorry. Meow! 

Tuesday Project Roundup: Starting, Finishing, In Progress

Over the long weekend I made a valiant effort to finish (or at least start) a few projects in the queue, in between eating pie for breakfast.

Another pair of boot toppers for a friend are DONE:

 The rayon dress has sleeves and half a collar (but is still looking a little Laura Ingalls Wilder; I'm not sure about this one):

And 4 out of 8 kitty blankets are cut out (but not fringed). Maybe my helper needs to be a little more helpful:

Again

Another weekend, another hike in Millcreek, another chance to smirk at nature.

Look at that air! People, you need to stop idling your cars.

Gratitude

 

“Finding our attitude of gratitude may be a difficult task, but the more we learn to return thanks, the more space we make for new unexpected blessings to appear in our lives. There is no substitute for finally acknowledging the blessings that we have taken for granted. In this process we rediscover the magic and wonder of the most simple gifts. Do we have to suffer from emphysema before we can have gratitude for the precious breath of life? Do we have to lose our homes before we can return thanks for having shelter? If we have taken for granted all our blessings of health or a loving family, will we need to be reminded to be grateful through near tragedy or actual loss?”

(quote and image via Mystic Mamma)

 This weekend is for focusing on my blessings, and finally pruning the lavender, and Tofurkey. I'll be back Monday.

No Projects To Round Up

I haven't tackled the pile of Christmas projects from October (except for the chutney--everybody's getting chutney this year!) nor have I put the sleeves in that rayon dress, nor have I started on a quilt for a friend. I also don't think I ever mentioned that Skyler's sweater turned out plenty big, so I don't have a picture of him wearing that (since wearing it won't be possible for a few months). 

Instead, I give you a picture of Skyler hiding in an end table, lifted from my brother's blog. Because sometimes you just have to hide in an end table. I feel the same way lately, kiddo.

Weekend Hiking, Winter Edition

It's winter in Millcreek Canyon and I'm about to get really familiar with all the trails below the upper gate, which is now closed. I think I can deal with that, though.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I don't want to make Carl Sagan sad, but I really think I can get behind the latest hippie astrology advice for the new moon:

We need to sleep as much as possible during our cycle of transformation. We process the most karmic residue, readjust and realign into higher vibration when we are sleeping.

 I could definitely sleep more. I'm not staying up too late; I have a lot of karmic residue to process!

2. Check out 100,000 Stars, a web app (those are covered in my friend's book!) that plots our nearest 100,000 stars in interactive 3D.  The "play" button on the upper left gives you a nice tour and sense of scale. (This was built for Chrome, but it worked fine for me in Firefox. No guarantees for Internet Explorer, though.)

Idiom

Here's a Polish saying I found on Pinterest that is an awesome way of saying, "Not my problem": 

This

Realizing it's only Wednesday:

Tuesday Project Roundup: Test

I had an idea and some fabric I didn't care about and Joann stores had Simplicity patterns at $1. So I tried making one of those "waterfall cardigans" with an idea to wear it to yoga.* 

Of course,  then I realized that having a lot of moving fabric around your waist is probably not the best thing for yoga, so I experimented with tying it: 

I'm not sure. It's a test, after all, so I don't have to feel bad if I don't wear it too much. I used Simplicity 1945 and some random burnout tie-dye knit I'd ordered online a couple years ago, somehow not realizing it was either burnout or tie-dye.

*Assuming I ever get back to a real class, that is. Anybody have a favorite Anusara teacher who has a class people working normal hours can get to?

Holiday

Yesterday was Veterans Day and the end of three days of snow. I heard this song on KRCL as I was driving home Sunday and it was a really good pick (thanks, Linda on Sunday Sage). The Veterans Day part doesn't start until about 4:10 but all of the song is brilliant ("the kids are strapped down like a half laod of pipe" in the back of the car). I wouldn't expect less from my almost-boyfriend James McMurtry.

Happy Birthday, Carl Sagan

Today is the birthday of my science boyfriend Carl Sagan. It's hard to narrow down what I want to say about him, or pick a favorite quote, because how can you say that this:

There was a time when the stars seemed an impenetrable mystery, but today we have begun to understand them. In our personal lives, also, we journey from ignorance to knowledge. Our individual growth reflects the advancement of the species. The exploration of the cosmos is a voyage of self-discovery.

is more inspiring than this?

Even The Writer's Almanac gave him a mention today:

Because he had done extensive research on nearby planets, NASA hired him as an advisor for a mission to send remote-controlled spacecrafts to Venus..In preparation for the mission, Sagan was shocked to learn that there would be no cameras on the robotic spacecrafts, called Mariner I and Mariner II. The other scientists thought cameras would be a waste of valuable space and equipment...Sagan couldn't believe they would give up the chance to see an alien planet up close[...]

Sagan lost the argument that time, but he won over NASA eventually. The Mariners were the last exploratory spacecraft ever launched by NASA without cameras. He contributed to the Viking, Voyager, and Galileo planetary exploration missions, and his insistence on the use of cameras helped us get the first close-up photographs of the outer planets and their moons.

I think that this latest image from Curiosity--on THE SURFACE OF MARS, fer crissake--reflects his legacy.  

My Friend Wrote A Book (And I Edited It)!

My oldest friend, career and boyfriend adviser, portfolio builder, and fellow viewer of the Birdemic live event has written a book! In her non-Birdemic watching time she's a super-savvy business owner, and the book reflects what she's learned as her company builds mobile apps. 

It's not at all technical, don't worry; it just gives you what you need to know before you get involved in an app project. My friend is a really entertaining writer and I found the info very useful as a background for my own field--and for the modern world in general. 

Check out the book's site here: www.buildingamobileapp.com. There is a launch party for it tomorrow night at another friend's new rare book gallery downtown. Bring your Kindle/device with a Kindle app and you can get a free edition of the e-book!

Whew

It's over. And I'm trying not to have too much schadenfreude about Romney backers threatening to move to Canada or Mexico, because that was the liberal reaction to Bush's 2004 re-election, too.

I'm thrilled about more than just the president: Voters in Maine and Maryland approved a measure to make same-sex marriage legal in those states, the first time the issue was at the ballot and not in the legislature. And voters in Minnesota voted down a proposed amendment to make gay marriage illegal. Well done, people of M-states.

Plus, Todd "Legitimate Rape Doens't Get You Pregnant" Akin and Richard "Rape Pregnancies Are A Gift From God!" Mourdock have not won re-election. Well done, every thinking human who realized what utter bullshit these two were spouting. 

 So yeah, I feel good. I feel that hate didn't carry the day like I was afraid it would. And I feel really happy I don't have to stockpile birth control between now and January. We may have a long way to go, but I'm proud of America right now.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Tiny Tolkein

Skyler's sweater is finally done! It came out somewhere between "Hobbit child" and "Oxford scholar who writes about hobbits." I can't wait to see it on him. 

I don't know if I have that many knitters reading along, but here are some knitterly details: 

• Pattern: Duck Soup, in the 2-3 year old size
• Yarn: Berroco Vintage Chunky, really nice for a wool/acrylic blend (I wanted it to be machine washable)
• Toggles: from M&J Trimming in NYC, sewn on with a leather needle in my trusty sewing machine

Get Ready To Vote

I let early voting pass my by but I'll be out tomorrow morning to participate. And I'll keep this in mind, from The New Yorker's endorsement of Obama (all emphasis mine):

Romney, despite his pose of chiselled equanimity, has pledged to ravage the safety net, oppose progress on marriage equality, ignore all warnings of ecological disaster, dismantle health-care reform, and appoint right-wing judges to the courts. Four of the nine Supreme Court Justices are in their seventies; a Romney Administration may well have a chance to replace two of the more liberal incumbents...The rightward drift of a court led by Justices Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito—a drift marked by appalling decisions like Citizens United—would only intensify during a Romney Presidency. The consolidation of a hard-right majority would be a mortal threat to the ability of women to make their own decisions about contraception and pregnancy, the ability of institutions to alleviate the baneful legacies of past oppression and present prejudice, and the ability of American democracy to insulate itself from the corrupt domination of unlimited, anonymous money. Romney has pronounced himself “severely conservative.” There is every reason to believe him.

And I'm also going to have this ready to read Tuesday if I need it.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. This video of ladybugs taking off is like a Mary Oliver poem. And also very soothing. 



2. Enjoy a big list of all the "uh oh!" moments from infomercials as animated gifs. My favorite is below: 

Truth

Eeeeeeeeeeek!

It's Halloween, and if you're a Celt it's Samhain tomorrow, and that means it's just six weeks until the winter solstice, and if you're me you may begin a prolonged and escalating freakout as you contemplate 2013, so what do you? 

You pet your cat, you see your nephew tonight in his costume, and you look at this picture from your brother's blog yesterday.

You may also listen to this.

Tuesday Project Roundup: Wrapping Up Little Things

I've been meaning to finish that rayon dress for the last two weekends but fall yard cleanups have pushed it back, so it's still sleeveless. But I did get some little things done (literally, tee hee): 

Tiny 4 ounce jars of green tomato chutney: 

And Skyler's sweater, which is just waiting on toggle closures to arrive on the Wells Fargo wagon today.

Monday Poem

From today's Writer's Almanac, by Denise Levertov:

Bedtime 
We are a meadow where the bees hum,
mind and body are almost one

as the fire snaps in the stove
and our eyes close,

and mouth to mouth, the covers
pulled over our shoulders,

we drowse as horses drowse afield,
in accord; though the fall cold

surrounds our warm bed, and though
by day we are singular and often lonely.

Friday Unrelated Information

1. This is pretty much the best scathing restaurant review I've read, of Guy Fieri's new restaurant in Times Square, full of utterances like: 

Mr. Fieri not only serves truly horrible-tasting food, an awkward origami of clashing aleatory flavors, but he serves this punishing food emulsified with a bombastic recasting of deep-fried American myth.

 and

When they come, the fries are a sticky supernatural orange simulacrum of a former potato, fried to paralysis.

2. The Rifftrax live Birdemic screening didn't disappoint. I leave you with "slpnls":

Shock And Terror...And Awesome

I think if you've been reading for a while you know that I love Mystery Science Theater 3000. I saw the final seasons on TV in high school and then rediscovered it online, along with Rifftrax (a new venture with Mike and the voices of Servo and Crow riffing current movies as a voiceover track).

Well, the Rifftrax crew is riffing the 2010 "hit" Birdemic: Shock And Terror live and broadcast to theaters tonight, and I'm going. Check out the official trailer (yes, the official trailer) to see what I have in store for me, and then imagine the possibilites for riffing:



That's all for now, though. I gotta go, I hear a mountain lion! 

Let's Just Get This Over With

I have election fatigue. Here's an infographic from Google that sums the last debate, I think:

Beyond the "horses and bayonets" moment, though, there's only so much "I'm the opposite of the other guy and I'm right!" you can hear.

So go vote--especially if you're a woman, because you haven't had that right for even a century and you gotta cling to the rights you have in this election. (I'm just sayin'.)


Also, this: 

Tuesday Project Roundup: It's Not Too Soon

If you're a crafty type who's really slowed down lately, it's not too soon to be thinking about what you will make for The Holidays. 

Things will need to be made for neighbors and party hosts:

This will be green tomato chutney--if you haven't take out your garden yet, find the Joy of Cooking recipe and make some!

Things will need to be made for friends:

And things will need to be made for kitties: 

I might need to take a day off just to sew. 
  

It's Monday

Stand on it like it's a tree stump and you're a tiny mountain explorer on another weekend hike. (See more pics on my brother's blog!)

Friday Unrelated Information

1. I did my annual Halloween-ish viewing of the 1986 David Bowie movie Labyrinth this week--but now I have to go watch the Flight of the Conchords parody immediately after the movie ends ("Labyrinth-era David Bowie" starts at about 3:00 but it's all brilliant).

2. The Writer's Almanac posted something nice and hippie-ish today:

A Prayer Among Friends 
 by John Daniel 

Among other wonders of our lives, we are alive
with one another, we walk here
in the light of this unlikely world
that isn't ours for long.
May we spend generously
the time we are given.
May we enact our responsibilities
as thoroughly as we enjoy
our pleasures. May we see with clarity,
may we seek a vision
that serves all beings, may we honor
the mystery surpassing our sight,
and may we hold in our hands
the gift of good work
and bear it forth whole, as we
were borne forth by a power we praise
to this one Earth, this homeland of all we love.

Space News

Did you hear that astronomers at the European Southern Observatory have found a plant orbiting Alpha Centauri B, the closest star system to our own? 

It's not remotely Earth-like (small and really hot), but this is a really cool discovery because 1) we figured out it was there in a pretty sophisticated process after looking for a planet in the system for decades and not finding anything, and 2) as Phil Plait says in the same link above: 

This is Alpha Centauri! Famed and fabled in a thousand science fiction stories. It’s where the Robinson family was supposed to go in "Lost in Space". It’s where Zefram Cochrane lived in "Star Trek". It’s where the Fithp came from in Footfall...So I, and a lot of people like me, grew up hoping against hope we’d find a planet around one of these stars someday. And here we are.

And it's just a matter of time until we find planets that are actually Earth-like, I bet. Go humans!