Tradition!

My family has several traditions. Oh, not the family I grew up with - those traditions were few and far between. No, my new little family, consisting of Will and myself. We're making traditions as we go. Some of them come from my family or (more likely) his, but many are just ours.

Every year on September 30th we begin reading Roger Zelazny's A Night in the Lonesome October. Each chapter is one day in the month of October, with a prologue to be read tonight. Will always reads to me. He does the voices.

Any day now we will have another holiday, on account of getting married. I imagine that one will be pretty much the same as the anniversary we've celebrated for nearly seven years now (February 13th for those keeping score), in that we may or may not exchange gifts, and will almost certainly have something nice for supper.

Halloween is a favorite around here. I think I am going to dress as a ninja this year. Maybe we will have our first horror board game party at the end of October as well. We've been planning this party for a while, in the abstract. We have the Buffy game, a lame-ass game called Vampire Hunter (or something), the official Dracula game, and (best for last) Zombies!!! The guest list is tough because we don't want too many people but ALL of our friends would be fun to have at such a party. We may have to do more than one.

We haven't got a Thanksgiving tradition yet. Wait, that isn't true. Every year at dinner we go around the table and say what we're thankful for. Melanie started that one. It can be awkward but is really what the holiday is about for both of us. Well, and the food.

Christmas is my favorite holiday. Don't tell anyone, but I like it even better than my birthday. We don't visit our parents. In fact, we don't leave the house. Christmas Eve we have a meal (pizza last year and that's likely to carry over because if I may say so, my homemade pizza is divine), open one present each (my family), and listen to Orson Welles and the Mercury Theater's production of A Christmas Carol. Every year I fall asleep before the Ghost of Christmas Presents (hee) shows up. Christmas morning we wake up, usually early because we are great giant children, make coffee, open pressies, giggle a lot, and listen to a lot of holiday music (something we usually start doing no later than December 1st). Then we start cooking. It's a Mexican feast, and any and all of our "orphaned" friends are welcome to stop by and be fed.

Then there's New Year's Eve. For years the tradition was Will and Shelby, staying in with bad movies. We still stay in, and often watch bad movies, and Shelby even joins us sometimes, but I think we need to work on this one a bit more. Following New Year's Day, we have a wait, broken up only by Will's birthday (he doesn't like a fuss), to Valentine's Day, which we've always celebrated in conjunction with our anniversary.

After that is Tax Day, when the tradition is general floundering about and praying for money back. I know, I'm reaching.

We haven't got an Easter tradition at all. I feel like that should be remedied. Or, you know, a tradition ought to be resurrected. Oh, I slay me.

Are there any other holidays? I mean, Christian or Traditional holidays? My family used to celebrate St. Nicholas Day, December 6th, with shoes put out at night for gifts. It was usually cookies and sweets, so maybe I'll make that (or the 5th) a baking day. We also "celebrated" Channukah, by which I mean we lit the Manorah, in deference to my step-father's lapsed Judaism, but that's as culturally diverse as we got, and Will was actually Christian. Oh, we also celebrated Saint Lucia's Day once or twice (December 13th), but that is a day when the children serve their parents breakfast, and so will have to wait a few years. (By the way, I apologize for any spelling errors in this paragraph particularly - my spellchecker is gentile.)

I love traditions. They make me feel safe and happy. I particularly love carving out our own traditions. (Which reminds me, must buy pumpkins this year.)

What are yours? (If you are feeling as verbose as I was, I urge you to make your own post and comment here with a link.)

I don't do these "meme" things.

But...I really like this one.

Think of 3 pictures you�d like to see from me. Leave whatever you�d like to see in the comments; things around the house, whatever, stuff that's easily photographed. Once I have enough requests, I�ll start posting them. If I can�t feasibly take a photograph of what you'd like to see (or am hideously offended by the request), I'll let you know and you'll be welcome to give me another option or to tell me to piss off.

Stolen from Maison Pants.

I forgot to remember to blog you.

Who am I and what am I doing with this computer?

Oh, right, I live here.

In shocking news, it turns out that I will be getting married in less than three weeks. I say shocking in part because I lost most of last week to illness (seriously, I can't remember any of it) and also partly because I keep forgetting he isn't my husband yet.

The caterer I fired called today to see if I got the invoice. Good grief. Oh, have I brought you all up to date on the catering situation? I doubt it, but am far too lazy to check. Anyway, my friend is back on, having gotten over her personal tragedy (what a horribly callous way for me to word that), and while we are still paying through the noise, now we are getting an absolute steal. And I guess I didn't really fire the movie theatre's guy, since he never sent me the right contract. But he got married, which I think is nice. Everybody get married! Unless you don't want to!

Spent most of yesterday scanning photographs of Will and me for a hideously egotistical slideshow during reception. We were very cute sprogs, but I feel sorry for our guests. I will try to find some nice Buster Keaton as a buffer. Actually, most of the time was spent downloading drivers for the scanner. Remarkably, we haven't got one at home and had to use the one at his office. Ahhh, well, we have one at home, in its box, because it is pre-USB and there is no way to plug it into my computer. Also, yesterday my NyQuil hangover convinced me that nothing smaller than 600 dpi would do. Ha. The files are so large that nine of them was too much for a CD-R. Also, I am lying, because Saturday night was the first time I went to sleep without aid (loving notwithstanding). So maybe it was withdrawal.

If none of this makes any sense, too bad.

The best part of yesterday was, er, acquiring the DVD of Freaks and Geeks, which I had never seen. We watched the first disc when we got home. I cried a lot, and laughed so hard that I may have dislodged a lung. Oh, but that might be the bronchitis or influenza or possibly walking pneumonia, whatever I've got now. Will was careless enough to trust me by leaving the DVDs here while he went to work today. I have watched all of the first disc extras including half of the commentaries. Keeping myself from putting in disc two is torture.

In other news, we've been working on our ceremony. Rewriting the standard Book of Common Prayer vows to avoid offending the bride. Which is funny when you consider that the first reading I chose is from the Bible. And even funnier because the man we asked to read it is Jewish, and it's NT. But he doesn't seem to mind. And I don't really care as long as we don't have any "God created marriage for men and women to have children" crap. So everybody wins, if by "everybody" I mean me. Let's just hope that our Christian minister approves of the changes. Since he used to do drugs with the groom, I don't think it will be a problem. (Note to my mother: by drugs, I of course mean alcohol.)

I am annoyed that the phrase Domestic Goddess is used so commonly these days. I was using it back when I was the only American I knew who'd ever heard of Nigella Lawson. Now I feel lame and in need of a new title. If only more people understood that nonpareil is not just a kind of movie theater candy.

If I keep using non-sequiturs, this post may start making sense. We can't have that.

Over and out.

In lieu of an update:

oslowe: From the heart of hell I stab at thee....

Bedhead

Not to be outdone by my sister's Hermione Hair, I took this photo this morning:



Click for full picture. Please note that Will looks fabulous. At 7:30 in the morning. Argh.

No one wants my money.

Weddings are, I presume, a multi-billion dollar industry. They must be, if the average wedding costs over $20 grand. And those crazy kids just keep on getting married!

So why doesn't anyone seem to want me to make payments for mine (in ONE MONTH)? The theatre owner does not seem to be in the office or returning calls, and my balance is due today. I would have mailed it if I'd known he would be missing. The caterer has not sent me the correct contract, so I cannot sign the contract and pay the obscene amount that constitutes only half of the total. No one is answering the phone at the court house to tell me whether the marriage license people take a lunch hour. The flower crooks have not contacted me for payment, leaving me to deduce all on my own that they might want it and call them myself. At least they answer their telephones.

I realize that out of the zillion dollars total taken in every year, my five grand or so is a paltry amount. But HONEST TO GOD! I do not have TIME for this. These people should be treating me like their CLIENT and kissing my fucking feet. (Eww, not literally.)

Also, why doesn't ANYONE take credit cards? We're going to be stuck with something like 30% APR on all the cash advances we'll be forced to take in the next few weeks.

I'm going to cry. But not really, because I look pretty today.

UPDATE! I am feeling much better. I got in touch with the girl at the Silent Movie Theatre (who I have never worked with before but like a great deal now that I have) and she took my check, made sure the contract was all right, and told me what is going on with the caterer. Basically, he got married on Saturday and went on his honeymoon without bothering to mention it to clients. Now, I have absolutely no expectations of anyone dealing with clients while on honeymoon, but it's been two weeks since I asked him for the CORRECT contract and he never even sent me a note letting me know he'd be busy with his own wedding. So I am annoyed with him, but not quite as much, and the Silent Movie Theatre girl (whose name I am totally blanking on) is going to get in touch with him and make sure he calls me and takes care of things.

Also, we now have our marriage license, photo albums, and a guest book (if it's lame to use a sketch book from The Art Store [seriously, it's called The Art Store], tough cookies. I like it). And also some artist model 1:6 scale figures that I made Will buy because they looked super-neat.

Books of my childhood.

The wall between my computer desk and the porch is lined with bookshelves. And also piles and piles of paper that doesn't fit in the filing cabinet and books that don't fit on the shelves. The bookcase nearest the porch door has children's and young adult books on it. Whenever I go sit outside I grab one to read. Yesterday and today I read snippets of Harriet the Spy. I've probably read it a thousand times, all told, and it just keeps getting better. But I am still mad that Harriet never gets to finish playing Town.

I marry you, I marry you, I marry you.

Yesterday Will came home and told me that credit cards were invented so that I could have Thai food delivered for supper. Then he made me place the order because he wanted to hear me ask for "the whole chicken." Like he's never seen me chop one up - but nevermind. I love him.

Today I returned my library book. The fine was $1.60 - when I was a kid it was only ten cents a day. I borrowed a DVD of yoga for chronic back pain sufferers. I only get it for one week - do you suppose I ought to maybe start using it now? Yeah, I was afraid so.

"Hi, Rian? It's Annika. I can't come to poker night. No, everything's fine; I have to do yoga."

Oy vey, indeed.

Which reminds me, it is the New Year. I think Rosh Hashanah is the day that god created Adam and Eve. For whatever reason today is celebrated, I hope that it is lovely for those that celebrate. P.S. Am I allowed to say "oy vey" if I am not even remotely Jewish? I hope so.

30 days (tomorrow) 'til our wedding. I think I might throw up. But that might be the fault of the curry.

Oy vey.

At 4:00 this afternoon I realized that I'd eaten ice cream for breakfast and not had any lunch. I had some cereal after this realization, but I think that perhaps that was not sufficient either. I would like nothing more than to order in some Thai food for supper, but money is so tight that I can't justify it.

In other, semi-related news (related to money and food, anyway), I am getting the silent treatment from the second caterer, and the wedding is only a month out. Excuse me, I'll be over here with my head in the oven. Broiling it, since we have electric. I am FREAKING OUT because I still have not received the correct contract, so nothing is in writing. I hate everyone.

Also, my library book is almost a week overdue. I finished reading it three weeks ago. What is wrong with me?

Drastic change of subject.

Does anyone remember several years ago, in the heyday of the internet, a series of television commercials for a new site (I think search engine) whose servers were (the commercials claimed) the size of a warehouse? If you do, PLEASE TELL ME. I can't remember what site it was or whether it still exists.

Also, we have seen a lot of very good movies lately. Among others, Cronos, City of Lost Children, Ginger Snaps Back, Wisconsin Death Trip, Peter Pan and Sullivan's Travels. After each one, I was determined to write a quickie review, but obviously failed.

I also have several blog entries sitting in draft form on Blogger, waiting to be finished.

I wonder if I have any readers left at all.

Ack!

For the past several nights I have been hearing...things...in the walls.

Today the ceiling sprung a leak.

It is either wolves or the air conditioner.

Probably wolves, though.

The maintenance guy is here. He is very cute and speaks minimal English.

This is a Penthouse Letter waiting to happen. Do they do horror?

(Cross-posted to Testing.)

I feel like I never update anymore.

Maybe because I never update anymore.

Too busy having nervous breakdowns. That is not fun.

And now it is the weekend and I don't intend to turn the computer on at all if I can help it. (The PS2 is another matter. Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven is in the cards.)

Argh.

Sunset.

The western skyline is golden, coloring the clouds a rich pink reaching all the way over the Hollywood Hills. To the east the clouds are purple. Overhead the sky is bright blue with puffs of pink and white.

I should go outside more.

John Kerry is stalking me.

He keeps sending me mail. OK, to be fair, the mailings probably come from his people. But if that's the case, can't they send this crap to my people? I received two - TWO - offers for credit cards with the Democratic Party logo on them. The credit card offers were the only mail I got from the Dems that wasn't asking for my money (just my interest, ha ha).

Today I got the kicker. The One. It is brilliant. I got a signed photo of Kerry and Edwards. Typed, it says, "Dear Annika, Thank you for helping us secure a Democratic presidential victory in November, and a better future for America. Most Sincerely," and then it is signed in (copied) blue ink.

It's nice that they can predict the future. Last time I checked, it wasn't November yet.

I suppose the whole thing is my fault. You vote democrat (traceably) just once and they think they've got you. Granted, I have never voted for any other party, but I'm registered undeclared. It's just that I requested the Democratic ballot in the primary in March.

I didn't vote for Kerry, though. Sucker. And yeah, I will be voting for him in November, but I'm not sending money and I'm not really sure what to do with this picture and I don't need any more debt so the credit card is right out and anyway I liked Howard Dean better. Up yours, Kerry.

[/grumpy]

Where for art thou, Blogger?

Or, more to the point: WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM?

I am getting very annoyed.

Communists for Kerry - 2004 Presidential Election USA

Communists for Kerry - 2004 Presidential Election USA

Oh. My. God. Fucking hilarious.

test

testtttt

Tonight we went to Southeast Asia.

That is, I expanded my cooking repertoire to include more Thai food.

Will has a favorite dish at the Thai restaurant near his office, a seafood soup. (I don't know if it has a traditional name - it is called Seafood Soup on the menu.) It's your basic Thai broth, which is usually a chicken stock base, with lemon grass, chiles, and seafood - shrimp, squid, scallops, and mussels. We keep a bag of Trader Joe's frozen seafood (shrimp, calamari, scallops) in our freezer. I always have at least one Thai chile paste and currently have three. I also have Thai fish sauce, dried lemon grass, and chicken bouillon cubes. So I put them all in a pan with some water and got soup. Well, okay. I put the lemon grass in a little cloth teabag first, made a paste of the other base ingredients (I chose a roasted red chile paste), heated it up, added water, added bag and seafood. Half an hour to delicious soup. I also made coconut rice, a personal favorite, and salad with a Thai lime-based dressing that Will found on the internet. The dressing needs a little work. I think the recipe was written for the American palate, and Will and I like our ethnic food ethnic.

My apologies to those of you that I promised a post about our weekend. Ain't gonna happen tonight.

Girls Only!

Would any of my female readers (probably those of you not from the WD, since this has made the rounds there) be interested in receiving a form letter for a Panty Exchange? The basic idea is that I send a letter to six of you detailing the exchange. At the bottom of the letter are two addresses, mine and the girl who sent the letter to me. You send her a pair of panties (new, tags on, any price), move my name to the #1 spot, and add yours, then send the new letter on to 6 of your girl friends. It's pretty inexpensive - six stamps plus one package (probably about $3) and you could get 36 (!) new pairs of panties. Please comment if interested. I am always the reason that fun chain stuff ends abruptly, and thought that just this once I'd make the effort.

Mmmmm

Dear Person Who Invented Cheese & Crackers,

I love you, I love you, I love you!

Love,
Annika