My husband cohosts a podcast dedicated to old school macintosh computers. He's the sidekick. :) They just celebrated their 3rd year of podcasting! Normally it's just an audio podcast, with Monkeys at our house and James at his place using Skype to communicate, but on special occasions like this they meet up in person and record video. This clip is the third bit of the episode, I'm posting that one because at the end of it Monkeys does a cute little bit pretending to show up at James's house in a robe. You can watch the entire show if you like via the links on the side of the clip.

Click me! Click me!
( Monkeys is adorable )

Monkeys calls me every morning. It’s kind of our daily checkin/how you doin/no how you doin/I love you minute.

This morning it took a wrong turn.
If you can get passed all the mush at the beginning, it made me giggle quite a bit.


MLR: I bragged about you on FB and LJ today. I said you hung the moon and stars.
Monkeys: Awwww, I love you soooo much.
MLR: Undeservedly much.
Monkeys: You are right; I don’t deserve you.
MLR: *taken aback because he turned my statement around so quickly* You are smooth!!
Monkeys: As smooth as your lips.
MLR: *pause to process* Okay, now you are just corny. Funny how you can go from smooth to corny so quickly.
Monkeys: *in a vaguely Isaac Hays voice* Corny as Iowa, baby.
MLR: *fit of giggles*
Monkeys: And on that note, I’m going…

Our bedroom is a celestial theme. We just moved the piano and instruments from the Alice room to our bedroom, so we had to rearrange the various stars, moons, and suns that were hanging on our wall. On Wednesday I helped with the pictures and wall decorations, but last night Monkeys was in the bedroom alone working. I thought he was cleaning out his dresser. When I went to bed last night I discovered Orion and the milky way above our bed. Moreover, he’d bought a mini-solar system for me, and he hung the planets around our ceiling fan sun in the positions they held on December 2, 1970 – the date of my birth.


On a less romantic note, he also hung the cool flying saucer/shooting star Christmas lights I bought for our Halloween Invasion party. They are behind our bed with his robot collection and look awesome.

For several years now we have had problems with our front yard by the porch - between evil popcorn trees and wild growing things, it never looked nice for long. After several years we chopped down the popcorn trees, but the stumps didn't want to leave. We tried various tricks for stump killing, but the trees kept coming back. Plus, while I like *looking* at nature, I'm not great at yard upkeep. So in addition to stupid baby popcorn trees we would get overgrown weeds over and over. I still had dreams of a flower garden or salsa garden, but after several years of it not happening, I gave up. So we salted the earth and covered it with flagstone. Tada!

Our plan became flagstones with river rock and container garden. Woot! We are partway done. We got the mesh stuff down to stop weeds from sprouting up. I also really did salt the earth. I thought it would be better for the environment than manmade weedkiller. We put down flagstone - but will probably still be rearranging for tighter fit over the course of the next few weeks to make sure we are happy before we finish out the project. :)

	Parents with Trucks are AWESOME My parents are so awesome! Not only did they let us borrow their truck, they drove the flagstone up and helped us unload it.
	Look At Them Working - I'm Taking Pictures Mom and Monkeys working on placing rocks.
	Working on filling in between the pots It was like putting together a jigsaw puzzle with no instructions and no guarantee you had the right pieces.
	Mom Working She swears she was not wearing this tshirt as protest or irony.
	Smile for the Union Newsletter! Poor thing was squinting more than smiling, but it's a good picture nonetheless. Plus, you can see my shadow in it, so I'm in there with her!
	Working Hard! Someone should organize these workers!
	1/3rd Done? Well, rock laying. We still have to add the gravely bits and plant the plants and fix up the water feature.
	Monkeys WATERING the water feature. Although it looks like something else...
	Close-up on the rocks Monkeys is filling the water feature (which turned out to be a bit of a let-down).
	Starburst! This was supposed to be a water feature, but it didn't really do much. But the starburst pattern is pretty!

He brought me half of a small peanut butter crunch blizzard from DQ.

Peanut Butter Crunch is my FAVORITE Blizzard flavor, but they don't make it in Atlanta, so I didn't get one at Dragoncon. :(

Now that we are home, I'm back on my healthy lifestyle choice (see, I didn't say diet). Today when he was coming home from work and passing by the DQ he stopped and bought a small Blizzard for me. Best of all, he ate half of it instead of getting one of his favorite flavors for himself so that I could have a blizzard w/o totally trashing my points for the day. :)

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Should I feel guilty that I have baked a cake or a brownie for like a million friends, family members, and coworkers, but I'm not doing anything for my husband this year? Monkeys and I talked about it, and with Dragoncon next week we have too much trip prep to worry about a party. We don't even have time to clean the house - there are clothes and suitcases and everything all over the diningroom table. I'm not sure what he's done in there, actually.

Oh, well. I threw a huge, awesome party for him last year. :)

And I'm going to get him a brownie and some coffee at BAM on Saturday.
And I'm going to see a movie I probably would not otherwise see but for his birthday.
So I don't suck totally.



Supernatural tonight is my favorite Misha episode. It is the one where I realized what an amazing actor he is.

It's kind of like 1000 Monkeys with typewriters, except it's monkeys with hammers.

Monkeys built us a headboard! I loved our old headboard, but it had some flaws, so Monkeys designed a new one for us that also serves as a shelf and holds our alarm clocks. Woot! It's not completely done yet, but the majority of the work is done. We need to buy some more paint. Also, the next part of the plan is to get new curtains for the window AND matching curtains for the hallway leading to the bathroom to give a symmetrical effect. Well, when the curtains are pulled anyway. We are also going to hang some shelves up above the bed to hold his robot collection currently living in some crazy cubby in the bedroom. Said cubby will become a terrarium for his turtle Shelby. Not sure how long all that will take... I'm hoping we will actually go curtain shopping next weekend. That seems like it should be pretty easy to do since it won't involve cutting boards, upholstery (he covered panels with fabric for the visible part of the headboard), construction, etc. Anyway - here's what my construction monkey created:

Close Up of the Headboard You can see the texture of the fabric. Monkeys made a series of five panels he affixed to some kind of scaffolding wooden thing he designed and build. He also made a top fabric covered panel. The rest of the shelf is a triangle of wood that we are going to paint the same golden color as the dresser he modified. These pillows, by the way, were made by Reddheaded. :)

Wider Shot of the Headboard Okay, we still need to touch up the wall a bit, so don't look at that. This is more to show the little cubbies he built to hold our alarm clocks and books or what not. We are also going to buy little LED lights to put in there so we have reading light. I painted the cubbies blue to match the walls. What you can't tell from these pictures is that Monkeys also raised the bed off the ground by an additional two inches so that we could better arrange the storage bins under our bed.

Oh, and since furniture has been moved around the room, I also want to take everything off the walls, touch up all the paint, and rehang stuff in more appropriate arrangements based on current furniture locations. So much to do!

I'm having trouble picking which one I like best.





Also, my husband looks a lot like Cardinal Fang. Plus, he has fangs. I swear. So I wanted an icon to use for him.

I loved the Infocom Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy game. I actually prefer the text-based adventures to most of today's computer games. Anyway, I was goofing around LJ and found this link on someone's page (forgot to write down who's journal to give credit for providing the link...). It's an article from Wired magazine showing WoW if it had been a text based adventure. I've never played WoW, but this was funny...

http://www.wired.com/gaming/virtualworlds/commentary/alttext/2006/03/70348


Meanwhile, Monkey's podcast got mentioned on Wired magazine's Cult of Mac site (again!)
http://cultofmac.com/25-years-of-mac-engineer-steve-capps-talks/11189


And we are home safe from Tallahassee. Loved visiting; wish we could stay longer. My godson graduated high school on Friday, so we went over for the ceremony. It was one of those weekends were we were nonstop - getting things ready for the ceremony, getting things ready for the after party, getting things ready for their week vacation, etc. We made a vow that one weekend we're just going over to do *nothing* but hang out.

We also saw Night at the Museum II when we got back - loved it! Even with my back out from the bad seating at the Tally civic center and sleeping on the floor, I still enjoyed the movie - so props to the movie as it was hard to get my mind to break away from the real world of owieouch yet somehow it succeeded.

I'm tired.

I am so excited about our upcoming New York trip!! I want to start packing now but that’s just stupid as we aren’t leaving until June 19th. Monkeys is coming this year; it’s the second time in the nine years we’ve been married, so I’m extra excited because I keep thinking about getting to show him houses and yards and plants and rocks. He’s probably not all that excited, because I’m sure nothing has changed dramatically since the other time he came with us. But two of my cousins got new homes with *amazing* yards, so I think Monkeys will enjoy tromping around their woods and streams, at least.

I’m not really much of a nature girl. I don’t spend a lot of time outside. But I think that’s because there isn’t much shade around here and I don’t handle sunshine well (instant explosion) and because all we have around here are sand spurs, beaches, and straggly pines and water oaks. Our beaches are gorgeous, truly. The Gulf is stunning; the water is often the most incredible shades of blue and green. (Often – “frequently”, not “one who has no children”…) When I was dating Ken of the Sailboat I was outside every weekend on the boat enjoying the coastline. But from shore, it’s not as fun for me. I love mountains and woods and streams. I love Florida more, so I imagine I will never permanently get my forest home, which I suppose makes the NY trips even more special.

I adore everything about the flora and fauna up there. I love visiting the plants as much as I love visiting the people, which seems a little wrong. But they have ferns and flowers and bushes that we just can’t grow down here. It’s insanely green and lush. Honestly, I could just lay out a sleeping bag in any of my aunts’ or uncles’ back yards and sit in the grass the entire week. Well, except for the bugs. I hate the bugs. They don’t get as many of them either because of the cold winters which would probably freeze me back to Florida, but they do have loads of mosquitoes. Then again, at least that part feels like home. :)

I should have probably mentioned this early, but Monkeys made it safely home tonight around 6:30 - despite the stormy weather, thank goodness. :)

And just in case I don't have time to get online tomorrow -
Happy Birthday jcw_da_dmg!!!

As promised, pictures of the shelves my husband built. He repositioned the aliens in the gumball machine so that they are looking down! How cute is he?!?!?

For quite some time now I have been whinging about lack of shelf space. (I would never complain about too many books...) The other Saturday I was walking to the bathroom and looking up when an idea hit me - maybe we could line the hallway with shelves. It would be above everyone's heads, we're not really using the space except for a candle holder and framed art.

I talked it over with Monkeys, and he actually liked the idea. A tape measure, a trip to Lowe's, 20 feet of six inch pine, some cool iron worked brackets, some white paint, and WOOT! Monkeys did an outstanding job with the shelves, and I intend to take pictures, but the paint is still dripping. I did the painting, which explains all the dripping. Tomorrow we start uploading books! Yay!!

Anyone want a candle holder?

I just finished making a Mii of my mother and my father! Monkeys helped because he is rather artistic. Monkeys is going TDY in a few weeks for a week in Tucson, and my parents are going to come up and hang out with me while he's gone. We already have several activities planned (some art projects, some house projects, some British television shows to watch), but I also want to show them the Wii Fit and see them try a few of the balance exercises or yoga poses. Mom and I did yoga every night together the last time Monkeys went TDY, and she is interested in learning more about yoga.

Monkey's trip is part of the reason I have this new laptop. (I could have lived with the dead battery and treated it like a desktop system; I could have lived with the lack of cd drive though it would have sucked.) He wanted to be able to video chat while he was gone, and my old system could never have supported that. :)

Okay, so I posted before about how my husband was in a bumper on Adult Swim because at Dragoncon the creatures of the Venture Brothers so loved his Jonas Venture Jr. costume they asked Monkeys to pose for pictures with *them* instead of Monkeys asking them to pose with them. They even used their own cameras.

Well, last night we were watching the shows with commentary AND THEY MENTIONED HIM IN THE COMMENTARY! Not by name, of course. But they said something like "the most amazing Jonas Venture Junior costume" as they were naming the costumes that impressed them at the con. :) :) :)

My husband so rocks!

(Also, Doc Hammer and Jackson Publick so rock. They are the sweetest guys; I love listening to their commentary because they really like their fans and appreciate what the fans do. And they are quite humble, too. They talked about Dragoncon a lot in the commentary. Now I'm all pumped up and ready for September!!)

There isn't an array, either 2D or multidimensional, that has enough memory locations to hold the amount of love I have for you.

EDIT: Adding pictures to show exactly how awesome my husband is...




Ever since we saw that Denny's Nanerpss commercial I've been singing this song and talking about pancakes. So for the past two weekends my husband made me a Nanerpus (woot!). Last week Toaster and I had to go to the Cathedral for the Rite of Election (part of my joining the Catholic Church) and he made Nanerpus for both of us. Ignore my hair in that photo. (Yes, that's some of Redd's jewelry I'm wearing.) Toaster's Nannerpuss appears to be casting a glance askance...

If you haven't seen the commercial, here's a link so that you can truly appreciate my husband's masterpiece.

I could watch this over and over again.

By the way Denny's... All I wanted after your commercial was to go to IHOP and get a giant stack of pancakes with Giggledrops while singing about Nanerpusses. I can't understand anyone else *not* having the same reaction. I question your advertising skills. Guess what? I love Nannerpuss.

Saturday was our 9 year legal wedding anniversary, but as we had friends coming to town for the weekend we "celebrated" on Friday night.

When I got home he had the table set with candles and my favorite dishes along with leftover sparkling cider from New Years (*grin*) in wine glasses.

Monkeys faked two of our favorite entrees (Seafood Natua and Chicken & Banana salad) from a local restaurant called French Quarter Grill. They make an amazing crawfish bisque which they use as a part of another dish called Seafood Natua, they pour the bisque on a bed of rice with seafood/fish. It's decadent and amazing. The salad is a bed of spinach with mandarin oranges, grilled chicken, toasted pecans (??), and grilled bananas, with a fabulous citrus sesame salad dressing. Weeks ago Monkeys figured out how to make the salad dressing and has been refining it.

We are not allowed decadent. We are on diets. He made a super yummy corn bisque (modifying their crawfish bisque to make it a bit more WW friendly and vegetarian). For a Christmas stocking stuffer I had given him some odd rice from Fresh Market - some "forbidden black Chinese rice" and a crazy blend of wild rices. He used that instead of white rice to up the healthy factor. He also made a bunch of broccoli using a similar method as we use for the cumin/chili powder green beans. We did the salad without grilled chicken and nuts, but otherwise he nailed it. Woot.

That was our fancy dinner. After that we had to work on cleaning the house for company the next day. :)

Oh - and he gave me the Riddick trilogy and I gave him some stuffed valentine robots because technically the Doctor Who pinball machine was our anniversary gift, so we weren't allowed to buy anything for real.

(LOL - okay technically Sylar is a serial killer. Should I be afraid that he and I were momentarily in sync...)

I had been wanting to see Done the Impossible: The Fans' Tale of Firefly & Serenity for quite some time now. I almost bought it on several occasions. Well, one of the people who helped make the documentary is apparently a listener of Monkey's podcast. He met up with James (the Carson of the podcast to which Monkey's plays McMahon) when James was at MacWorld expo this past January and gave James a copy of the DVD to give to Monkeys. Monkeys has mentioned Dragoncon and such sf/f geekiness in addition to the Apple obsession stuffs, so he thought Monkeys would like it. Isn't that amazingly nice and cool? Unfortunately, James couldn't remember the name of said guy, so I don't know who exactly to thank for this gift. Regardless, I'M SO EXCITED! I've heard a lot about the documentary - it's fan-made (and FF fans are quite amazing in-and-of-themselves), but hosted by Adam Baldwin and has interviews with Joss and most of the cast plus all sorts of extras. Woot! It's time to put on the cunning hat S₂K sent me and watch me some Space Western!

Monkeys is going to track down who our benefactor is so he can ask about meeting up next Dragoncon. I want to say thanks in person and to get an autograph.

What's really funny/cute, James doesn't really watch Firefly, so he had no idea what he was bringing back to us.

Monkeys found the chords for JoCo's song Just as Long, so for the past fifteen or twenty minutes we've been messing around with it. It's been fun! I haven't had my mandolin out for maybe a year, so my fingers are tingling right now. We also dug out some of my Celtic sheet music and practiced a song called Salmon Tails Up the River (something like that), and he picked it up pretty quickly, so go him! I really need to practice more.