It's a terrible thing to watch someone age and decline. More terrible still to watch their well-hidden dark side come out because they've lost control. And terrible beyond words to consider the possibility that my Granny will "have a fall" and die when the bruises on her shoulders will tell us that she didn't fucking fall.

just keep pushing me
see how long it takes until
I am lost to you

In the words of our eloquent Governor Perry, as I watched Mr. Bush take off in that helicopter to leave D.C., I had to say:

Adios, Mofo.

I've been sucked into Plurk and Twitter and Facebook and the WoW expansion. HALP.

But here is a terribly amusing video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dz2szNKnsXo

Mind you, I have four cats. This quiz was taken with my (secret) favourite cat in mind, the tuxedoed tomcat Zephyr. Gods forbid I took it from the point of view of the bitchy calico.

This article is both thought-provoking and sadmaking.

I am laughing so hard at this article, I can't help but post it here:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/worklife/11/10/cb.seven.signs.work.spouse/index.html

A good friend and I often joke about our "work boyfriends". I had no idea that this idea was widespread.

( (posting text of article for posterity) )

Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

I'm a little bewildered at just how much the WoW bosses were nerfed in patch 3.0.2. We rolled through Black Temple tonight like it was Stratholme. Akama, Gorefiend, and Bloodboil all down on the first try...and the last two with no deaths? Please. It is definitely more fun mowing this stuff down than wiping on it forever. But it's pretty much trivial content for competent raiders now.

(Dear WoW Gods, can please get it together to murder Archimonde? Love, Celi.)

Want:

HP Vivienne Tam Edition laptop

Also, a smattering of the vast array of photos collected thus far has been posted on ye Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=64378&l=b972b&id=677463267

Tadaa.

This trip sure has been a schlep. We're finally in Munich for...lets see, there we are, 5 nights, which feels like a lifetime. I've schnitzeled and spätzeled and strudeled and am well ahead of the national average of consuming a pint of beer every 32 hours. Suffice it to say that an extensive fitness program will commence upon my return.

We didn't have any internet access until yesterday, on our second day in Salzburg. It was interesting being unplugged for that long.

We've been incredibly lucky with the weather. Just a few days before we were going to leave Austin, the forecast for Innsbruck was snow. It's been very cool in the evenings, but with highs in the 60s every day--and it's only rained the first day we got here, when we were driving from Frankfurt to Rothenburg. Wahoo.

The German speaking is going pretty well. Husband knew quite a lot of it at one point, and is remembering well. The quietly amusing part to me is that I generally make myself better understood. I think this is partially because I tend towards very simple sentences, but also because I learned German from speakers from the south, and he learned from ones from the north. It's very different sounding--northern German has rolled r's and hard consonants. Southern German is softer-sounding and takes place mostly around one's uvula. We've been in Bavaria and Austria, so the northern German sometimes gets some double-takes.

Driving on the Autobahn is everything as advertised. Austria was less fun--130 km/h speed limit and late worries about a toll sticker we didn't know we had to buy. Germany, though...ah, to be driving my own car. Our Opel (!) wagon can move, I'll give it that. I had a brief stint at 195 km/h, but that was a little fast for me for long stretches. I settled on a comfortable 180 km/h for a good 20-minute stretch after Rothenburg. The miles just fly by, especially since they're fake miles.

I've been blogging analog-style, in a little blank book where I can blather on and paste in ephemera such as attraction tickets, hotel business cards, brochure cutouts, and other hokey stuff. I'll go ahead and write up those visceral accounts and post them here by each day.

Der "newbie" Unterricht(en?) auf GermanPod101.com bist leicht. Das ist gut, aber ich brauche mehr Worten. Ich verstehen viel mehr deutsch als japanisch. Ich bin immer schüchtern, deutsches zu sprechen. Diese podcasten sind viel Spaß und gut. Die Reise Spaß ist. Jawohl!

Tschüss!

(Ja, mein deutsch ist immer schlecht...)

I bought a camera. Specifically, a Canon 40D with a 17-85mm lens. It is the bee's knees. Seriously. Just fooling about tonight, chasing the cats around, I took the best pictures I've ever taken. Finally, I can make the picture come out like what I see in my head. Thank you David for the photography wisdom about apertures imparted thus far. ^_^


(LOOK MA I HAVE DEPTH OF FIELD!!!)





The Husband took this picture of Zephyr. I like it because it has kind of a vintage photo studio feel with the pose and the lighting.


Now we continue to get it all straight so we can take awesome pictures in Germany next week!

One of the reasons why I sometimes buy things I shouldn't, summed up so well on an episode of This American Life:

In Wal-Mart, there's no tragic past or scary future. She's just a customer in the unburdened present.

Lhe Loud Party Neighbours finally got yelled at tonight, after years of angering us with their loud parties. It was the 30-odd people shouting tuneless karaoke to the Gilligan's Island theme that did it. I hauled over there and told whatever poor bitch that answered the door that they "should at least take the fucking karaoke inside". Wouldntyaknow, they did? Of course, I'm still all furious, but at least I will sleep without earplugs.

-------------------------------------

In other news--best quote from tonight's SportsCenter, during coverage of Purdue vs. Central Michigan:

"Uh, there is a support device on the field: Would someone please return to claim it?"

Well, I had a 50/50 chance, but lost--Husband was pretty irritated about my cunning plan for getting the situation we wanted for the Lich King release. *shrug* He would have been unhappy if we hadn't been able to play, too. Whatever. I never can win.

I've been trying for what is apprarently the Holy Grail of WoWness: Wrath of the Lich King Collector's Edition available for in-store pickup. I waited this out for a couple days because the regular edition took a day or so for the online places to offer it for pickup. We want this because, of course, we don't want to wait two days to receive the game so we can start playing it. Well, I waited too long and had a devil of a time trying to get a CE at all today. Nobody's doing preorders, and most places I would know to look are now sold out completely. So here's what I did, hoping it will work out in our favour:

1. Preordered 2 copies of the regular edition for in-store pickup at GameStop the night of release.
2. Preordered 2 copies of the CE for later shipping from Fry's.

Yes, I am a desperate fool. We missed the CE for Burning Crusade, and I recently bought Husband one as an anniversary present. We were able to upgrade his account with no trouble. I'm really, really hoping that they don't take away that option for WotLK, because I just bet a shitton of cash that they won't. Husband is either going to be amused and think it was the right thing to do, or be really pissed. I think he'd be pissed if we couldn't get a CE or if we couldn't play immediately, though, so it seems like a good gamble.

In other news: I didn't make my high school reunion a couple nights ago. At the time I was supposed to be in the car driving up, I was sitting in an urgent care facility finding out that I have some sort of intestinal bacterial infection--EEEWW--and generally being in a lot of pain and miserable. So. Guess I'm glad I went ahead and put in vacation for yesterday, because I spent it on the couch being sick from the antibiotics. Goddammit. At least today I'm not too sick to knit and there's football on.

This is such a great idea! Wasteful, unnecessary packaging is one of my huge annoyances. If I were in the market for a laptop, this one thing would push me over to buying an HP.

Yesterday, I wrangled my tomato plants and replaced the toilet seat in our master bath. I also cleaned the garage a bit and did another task for a friend that I have been unnecessarily putting off. AND I watched my Netflix movie that I've had for two months (Ocean's Eleven). Oh yeah. Good day there.

What a great morning. It's a little gloomy, having rained maybe early this morning with more chances later in the day. I came in to ZERO actionable emails in my box. I have a list of tasks that are tackleable and I'm motivated to work on. I'm cautiously optimistic that it's going to be a good day.

First Thing of Sharing:

Pic I snapped of an awesome storm we had a few weeks ago.



~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Thing of Sharing, Parte the Seconde:

Pic of an awesome Cube Prank at work.



That's someone's desk, completely buried in styrofoam peanuts. Pro.