Archives: July 2002
Tuesday, July 30, 2002
So I drove out to the Palisades Center yesterday to pick up some lace and a hot glue gun, to get started on the hairpiece. About 5 minutes into the project I could have screamed due to the hair just tangling and being annoying, but, eventually I got the hang of it. The hardest part is blending colours (which was the main screamworthy part), as I decided to mix the burgundy and red together rather than have them as seperate accent colours. The red always seems slightly too orange tinted on it's own.
It's a hair piece with loose hair, and I'm discovering very quickly why the dreaded hairpieces are now so massively popular... no tangling, mess or fuss whatsoever. Considering I have so much hair left over, I'm going to be trying my hand at one of those tonight/tomorrow.
Now my main issue is the fact that having waist length thick hair makes it a pain in the butt to do a ponytail on top of my head, and conceal my own hair. I need to conceal it as it sticks out like a sore thumb peeking out from the fall hair. I'll probably end up hacking off a few inches again due to weight, like late last year.
Anyway, issues for another time... sleep now.
@ 08:01 AM EST
Sunday, July 28, 2002
You know you've walked too much when you wake up 3 hours after going to bed and need painkillers to fall asleep again because your legs hurt so much that you can't sleep. No joke.
*Owee*
I slept about 10-11 hours too, so I was well and truly knackered I can tell you. At least I wasn't as sore when I woke up which was good.
Saturday was a 'do nothing' day, recovery from Friday. Hopefully when I wake up later today (Sunday) I'll have time to drive up to the Joann's and pick up some black lace and a hot glue gun to get started on the hairpieces. As it turns out I probably have enough hair to make 2 hairpieces, and possibly even more, which will be interesting.
@ 06:11 AM EST
Saturday, July 27, 2002
My legs feel like they're going to fall off at the hips. Kit and I walked *way* too much today. From Port Authority (38th Street/8th Ave.) all the way down to St Marks Place (near 8th Street and 3rd Ave.) and back again... not counting to-ing and fro-ing between avenues down streets to check out shops.
I did manage to pick up some fake hair so I can try my hand at a hairpiece... black, bright red and burgundy. An interesting project no doubt... now I need a piece of lace and possibly a hot glue gun to get things underway.
At St. Marks Comics I picked up 2 issues of Gloomcookie and the first issue of Nightmares and Fairytales which is the new Serena Valentino (Gloomcookie writer) project. They didn't have anymore Gloomcookie back issues, so I'll be getting them online... which also means that the prices aren't hiked up by about $0.30 per issue for being a back issue. I also need to get my hands on the 4 part series by Ted Naifeh (original Gloomcookie artist) Courtney Crumrin and the Nightthings which is looking delightfully spooky.
Spotted some nice boots at Trash and Vaudeville and Religious Sex (both stocked them), so I'll have to check out some online prices to see how competitive they are... the afore mentioned stores have a way of marking up certain items quite substantially.
The only thing I didn't succeed with was chair upholstery fabric. The kind we'd gotten several months before was out, and they weren't getting any more, so we'll have to choose another pattern which is a bit of a pain in the butt. At least they have other similar patterns in the same colour which is good.
Kit also supplied me with Thursday's copy of the NY Sun's article about the Gothic trend in catwalk fashion for which PreZ and I had been interviewed per email recently. The section about the Gothic fashion looked good, so I'm happy with that, even though I'd never use the word "chi-chi" to describe something (though it wasn't attributed to me it was used around stuff I had said). I might type it up sometime.
Now I must lay my weary body down to rest *ache*.
@ 01:10 AM EST
Friday, July 26, 2002
A quiet few days... nothing eventful really. I got some reading done, including reading Neil Gaiman's Sandman: The Dream Hunters, Caitlín R. Kiernan's In The Garden of Poisonous Flowers and a few stories from 2 anthologies (The Sandman: Book of Dreams and Darkside: Horror for the Next Millennium.
And we've watched a number of the dvd's that we ordered, the second order of which arrived earlier this week, so I watched Gladiator, Shrek, Galaxy Quest and Chicken Run. Mmm fun.
Tomorrow I'm meeting up with Kit to do some (window) shopping. He needs to run some errands in the Fashion district and we might check out a store with some fake hair and later on head on down to St. Marks place... I need to go to the comics store and it's always good to browse for boots and goffy accessories.
@ 01:33 AM EST
Wednesday, July 24, 2002
Because PreZ officially ends his working career at his current employer at the end of the month, we of course went looking at the possibility of maintaining our current healthplan. After receiving a letter stating the cost, it is no longer a surprise to me why so many Americans do not have any health insurance.
To continue our current coverage, which includes a $500 per person per year co-pay it would cost us $700. At first I assumed that this was a yearly fee, which would have put it around what it cost me back in Holland for private health insurance (private, not state funded!). But no. MONTHLY! Now please someone tell me who the fuck would pay $700/month for health insurance... and still have a $1000 co-pay for 2 people?? It's one of the most insane things I've ever had the misfortune to read/hear.
So our nifty plan is to not get sick after the end of the month. Until such time as a new job with medical coverage rolls around.
@ 12:13 AM EST
Monday, July 22, 2002
In a fit of energy I reshuffled the GOTH.NET forums. They've been growing and evolving over the last few months, and now was a good time to see which sections could be merged, which could go... that kind of thing. It should make things a little clearer too.
Oh, and on an unrelated topic, I got my social security card on Saturday.
@ 03:24 AM EST
Well, apparantly my parents are now on speaking terms even. And my dad sent my mother 29 yellow roses for their 29th anniversary on Friday, which apparantly threw my mother for a loop. Now this actual speaking thing has to commence.
I'm hoping they get some professional counselling, because they have so much shit from the last few years that needs working out. If they don't get it sorted out it will be like sitting on some time bomb and they'll always have these niggling doubts in the back of their minds.
We'll see I guess.
Batcave last night was fun, even though VNV Nation was GROSSLY overplayed... close to 10 times in 2 of the 3 rooms in the space of 3-4 hours. I'm sorry, but there are many good bands out there, and enough within the ebm genre that you can get away with playing VNV once or twice per evening... but going on 10 times? Slight overkill if you ask me *sarcasm*. I also found a 3 song cd by Carfax Abbey laying about which I appropriated, something new to listen to.
Breakfast/über late dinner at Yaffa's afterwards, yummy!
@ 02:01 AM EST
Saturday, July 20, 2002
Nothing really eventful the last few days.
A trip to the doctor with PreZ on thursday to have a cyst removed from the back of his neck. A 10 minute procedure with local anaesthetic. I just had to be there in case he felt kind of ill afterwards and I needed to drive him home, but in the end it wasn't necessary.
Friday afternoon was the company picnic. PreZ was still invited, along with other people that got axed along with him, because it was kind of celebratory for the recent product release they'd done. It was good, even though the weather was pretty damn hot and sticky. PreZ also got a few tips and pointers on people to contact in the quest to find a job. Networking, ahh... Hopefully some things will start surfacing sometime soon.
I finished Neil Gaiman's American Gods the other day, a wonderful book. I highly recommend it to everyone. Weaving a contemporary story with ancient myths from various cultures, it's very inventive and keeps you intruiged towards the end.
I was very happy to find Caitlín R. Kiernan's In The Garden of Poisonous Flowers on the doorstep yesterday. Illustrated by Dame Darcy it's a really gorgeous little book. A prequel to her novel Threshold, a story involving Dancy Flammarion. Should be good.
We're going out clubbing tonight, for the first time in many weeks. We've been doing various things most weekends, but we've just not been out clubbing since Rasputina was playing at Batcave. Unfortunately it was very overcrowded that night and we didn't see much of Rasputina, mainly as the chairs they were sitting on on the stage didn't really put them into view as they were lower than the crowd. Musically they sounded great, from what we heard. We'll be heading back to Batcave tonight, there's not much else of interest on tonight other than Batcave.
@ 06:26 PM EST
Wednesday, July 17, 2002
So one of the more odd things I've heard this week is that my parents might actually not be on the road to divorce.
Those of you who know me know most of the story, and if you don't you can ask.
This was first brought to my attention earlier this week by someone who is a friend of my mother and is someone who's been somewhat of a confidant to me over the years when I couldn't turn to my parents. It was extremely odd hearing that my mother was interested in a reconciliation with my dad as she's been so adamant as to not want that over the past year/several months. When faced with the oppertunity of meeting up with him in June when he was in Europe to visit my brothers (he currently lives in South Africa) she was adamant about not wanting to see him. So hearing this was a surprise indeed.
This morning it was actually confirmed by email by my mother. It's just odd because she's been so anti towards him over the past 2 years or so as many of the problems have dragged on and out. Some of them his, and others hers and many of them theirs. But apparantly they're going to be talking.
I guess I'll see what the outcome is of that. I've kept away from most of the stuff between them, and have tried to avoid debates with my mother when she embarked upon the variations on the "he's a/an [insert expletive]". As a child of both I retain loyalties to both, and I'm not about to be maneuvered inbetween them. They're adults and they can sort it out.
I have to say that I'm incredibly glad that all of this shit hit the fan at a time that I'm in my early 20s and not before now. Being the age I am I'm in a position to avoid getting dragged into it or put in the middle as often happens with younger children. And I'm at an age where I understand it. This isn't to say that I like it, but at least I have the life experience to make sense of it, rather than be so young and not understand why or how.
Even so, I've fought my battles over this to keep myself and my brothers out of the fray. While my mother at times would say that what she was doing was her own business, for a long time it failed to register with her that her actions impacted on the 3 kids that resided in the house with her. Just because your decisions are your own does not mean the consequences are not felt by others around you.
Anyway, I guess I'll see what eventuates. I'm not even that particular about the outcome, that's theirs to decide. The child in me would be particular towards the 'get/stay together' outcome, but I'm also a realist and know that some things just have a limited lifespan and need to end.
Now playing: Amélie Soundtrack
Currently reading: Neil Gaiman American Gods
@ 06:01 PM EST
So one of our dvd orders arrived today (Tuesday), including Amélie. Sooner than I expected as Tuesday was the actual release date of that dvd, so I'd expected it to arrive later in the week. Kudos to Amazon.com.
Also among the order was the collected box set of Black Adder, mainly for PreZ and he spent the evening watching the first series... interspersed with Amélie as I booted him off my computer after the fourth episode to watch that ;)
Amélie is just such an incredible movie, extremely endearing and adorable. I blame Cherie for my love of it, as it was she who insisted we must see it and dragged us to see it.
If you've not seen this yet, you really must because it's such a lovely movie.
@ 01:47 AM EST
Monday, July 15, 2002
We had a fairly quiet weekend. Saturday we brought back the boots (*sigh*) and we bought a VCR. Now I can enlist friends to tape Farscape for me so I can watch the new episodes, as the upstairs people's cable selection doesn't include Sci-Fi Channel.
Saturday evening we ended up watching Farscape and some standup comedy on tv over at Kit and Cherie's place, slept over and then spent Sunday crawling around some old military bunkers near the beach and also spent some time on the beach along with Erin, and then dinner later.
I borrowed a cd with pictures from the Projekt picnic that Kit made when we went a few weeks ago, and I may put some of them up later.
Oh, and today someone online told me that I look like a Spice Girl. This was meant as a compliment (from a non-Goth) and in regards to the picture of me on my site. Very odd.
@ 10:38 PM EST
Saturday, July 13, 2002
Today (well, yesterday) was a quiet day... actually slept for most of it and finally started to catch up on all the hours missed over the past week or two which was good. Even after sleeping a substantial amount I still actually went and had a nap like 5 hours later. I'm thinking the vitamin tablets with the iron are in order again ;)
This morning PreZ had a recruiter call for which he now has an appointment on monday morning. His details had been passed on by his now ex-colleague Arkady which I thought was a nice thing to do. So we'll see where that leads, and also what else happens on monday.
For the upcoming weekend we have more beach adventures planned... we'll be heading down to NJ again and staying with Kit and Cherie at Kit's mother's place, who will be out of town. I'm not sure what exactly the plan is, but I'm sure we'll have fun either way. Also an opportunity to exchange the boots I bought last week that don't fit as well as I'd originally thought.
Other than that we ordered a whole bunch of dvd's. With the impending release of Amélie on the 16th I wanted to order that, and we ended up buying a whole load more. We haven't actually bought any dvd's in over a year, so we were due for some splurging. Think of it as consolation for being made redundant. Or something.
I'm also kind of sad that I missed seeing Neil Gaiman sign and do a reading in NYC on Thursday, but then after having PreZ come home jobless and nobody wanting or being able to go with me, I kind of lost the will to. Maybe next time I guess.
And now I must sleep, for it is 7.27am and I'm in danger of getting back into the really crappy sleeping patterns once more, and with the added sleeping issues I have like the bouts of insomnia and restless sleep this is not something I need to foster.
@ 07:21 AM EST
Thursday, July 11, 2002
Just when you think things are going okay, life has this way of pulling the rug out from under you.
After an extremely tight year money-wise last year, we were finally starting to get ahead of the curve after moving into a new (bigger and cheaper) apartment back in February and then with a nice pending tax return on the horizon. Not ahead by all that much, but still ahead of the curve instead of running to keep up. And then the economic downturn kicks in and PreZ gets downsized.
It's kind of in keeping with many of the people we know from some IRC channels we frequent... several of them have lost jobs over the past months, all in various tech/programming positions.
At least I have a work authorisation now and a pending social security number so that I can chip in if his finding a new job takes longer than expected. Makes me feel a lot less helpless than I did early last year with the whole Toronto debacle when, after relocating from Australia to Canada, they figured out they didn't have the appropriate visas for PreZ to work there. This meant we had to travel into NY with llike a day's notice to stay with relatives of PreZ's and then he commenced with a new job hunt. At least staying with relatives meant you didn't have to worry about the mundane shite like rent and bills which continue on after your paycheck stops.
In keeping with today's theme of Happy Happy Joy Joy the neighbours decided to have their batch of workmen do some gardening with chainsaws, cutting down the huge trees that divide the backyards of this house and theirs. God forbid you build a patio and the sun won't shine on it *rolls eyes*. Of course this gardening started very early in the morning.
Oh, and my computer keeps locking up while playing Settlers 4, even though I have at least double the minimum requirements (200mmx, 64mb RAM), I have no idea how it would play on a comp that slow, probably not at all.
[/rant]
@ 06:26 PM EST
Wednesday, July 10, 2002
So today I had to trek into NYC to Federal Plaza to waste away several hours of my life waiting in various lines to pick up my work authorisation and social security cards. I can't complain really as it went a lot faster than I thought it would.
After depositing my appointment letter in some kind of in-tray they called my name, along with a bunch of others within maybe 15-20 minutes. While waiting in line I got asked by someone what time my appointment was for (noon), hers had been for 11am and she still hadn't been called. Another guy had been there since before 10.30am, somehow some people had fallen between the bureaucratic wheels somewhere. It's surprising to me that you can sit there for close to 2 hours and not wonder if something is wrong when your name never gets called out and the time of your appointment slips further and further past.
It took only moments to get my wad of documents, to fingerprint the form with my index finger and to go have a photo made for my EAD card. Then upstairs to the social security office and fill out more paperwork, wait to go to the counter where a bored looking employee enters all the data I filled out into the computer and then proceeds to shred the form I just filled in. I'm left wondering where the 'paperwork reduction act' comes in. Or maybe I should wonder at how much paper this used to take?
So in 2 weeks I should get my social security card in the mail. And I now have the authorisation to work for the next year. Kind of a scary prospect as I have absolutely no clue what I want to work as. I guess we'll see where things take me. Apparantly our insurance agent told PreZ that he knew a bunch of people that were in need of people for general office work, so I could probably get something set up soon. Kudos to our insurance agent who really has gone above and beyond the call of duty in many instances, there's not many of them that will send their secretary in their car so you can take your driving test in their car due to your own car not having had it's yearly inspection on time.
I think now is the perfect time to go and crash for an hour or two, sleep has been restless the past week or so... the fact that the heat has kicked in again doesn't help though it doesn't seem to be the main thing that's keeping me from sleeping well.
@ 04:04 PM EST
Tuesday, July 9, 2002
PreZ complained that I didn't say much about Les Mis in my last entry :P
There's not all that much to say. It was a great show, even if we were seated in rear mezzanine ("nosebleed") seats. Ideally closer to the stage would have been nice so that you can see the actors better, but we got what we paid for.
I was most impressed with the girl who played Eponine, Diana Kaara I believe her name was. Her voice was definitely the best of the female cast in my opinion, very strong and clear and emotional. The only problem I had with one of the male singers was the boy who played Gavroche. He was just very hard to understand, he didn't enunciate very well and it sounded as though he had a rather thick accent too. You still got the gist of what he was saying, but it could have been better.
The sets were very impressive for the limited amount of space they had to work with. The costumes were very good too, of course those of the street people aren't much to look at ;) but the ballroom gowns at the wedding scene are lovely.
As I said, two thumbs up!
Sunday morning Devon left to embark on the 11 hour drive back to Michigan (*eep*) and later that afternoon we drove over to the Palisades Center in West Nyack. We picked up a bunch of stuff, some new things for the bathroom and kitchen and some storage items, a shredder and a fax. The latter shall make my mother very happy.
I also bought a pair of knee high boots, inside zipper and lace up front. Usually I have a bit of a problem with knee high boots as I have muscular calves, but these fit.
Alas, they'll have to go back again though. They were fine when trying them on at the store, but wearing them for 10 minutes at home I noticed they're just too tight across the top of my foot, maybe half an inch above my toes, which was causing the circulation in my toes to almost come to a grinding halt. So even though the sales clerk assured me that they're big for their size, I'm going to need a size up. Which might pose a problem as I know they didn't have a size up at that particular store. So either a refund, or try and get them to order them in, or start checking out other similar stores. *sigh* I never have all that much luck with boots and this is one of those occasions.
Other than that I'm being boring and have been playing Settlers IV which I picked up at the mall for $9.99. I'm a sucker for civilisation simulations.
@ 03:36 PM EST
Sunday, July 7, 2002
As luck would have it the neighbours continued work on what will eventually become a patio of sorts from what I've heard. I'm so fed up with the incessant noise in the morning that usually ends around the time that you're thoroughly awake and pissed off and unable to sleep further. The dog remains the thing that annoys me above all other things, and while I really do like animals, that dog is reason enough to be in favour of de-voxing dogs. Though I suppose it's more the owners not having trained the mutt properly.
This morning just before booking tickets for Les Misérables I decided to actually check the website and found out that online they were also offering the cheap tickets for the saturday evening performance. Considering all three of us hadn't slept enough the option of catching an extra 3-4 hours was a nice prospect and we booked tickets for the 8pm show. Rear mezzanine seats for Les Mis for $24, not bad. It pays to shop around for things like coupons and rush tickets, that's for sure.
The show was lovely and we had a great time. After we met up with Cherie and went and had a snack at a diner and left to go to our prospective homes.
This weekend has been such a blast. It would be nice to take credit for it all, but the input of Cherie and Kit was definitely one of the key points in making this a great trip for Devon.
Must sleep now for soon it will be morning, and that effing dog will start barking and the effing neighbours will start doing subtle gardening with backhoes and compressors again.
@ 02:42 AM EST
Saturday, July 6, 2002
The end of daffodil's second day here which was a real blast.
Yesterday (the 4th) involved us driving down to New Jersey to meet up with Kit and Cherie. First off we went and saw Men In Black 2 which was amusing. The first surpasses it by far, but it was still funny. Then we went back to their place to wait for the arrival of Erin and Arseni to complete the group that was to venture out for a candle light beach picnic. The beach picnic evolved into a late night semi-clad swimfest for everyone barring myself and Devon. She took digital proof instead, some of which will more than likely remain inside my picture folder and never make it online ;o)
Today we slept in until 2pm which wasn't really according to plan. It was about 4.30pm before we made it into the city after which we made our way to the Metropolitan Museum to see the Impressionist exhibit and the Egyptian temple and some of the other sections. We didn't really spend all that much time inside as we were waiting for Kit to arrive in the city to join us to go see the off-Broadway show "When Bush Comes To Shove" that Cherie is working on as the wardrobe supervisor. The show was like a musical revue of all kinds of political and news related current events, and it was absolutely hysterical. Many many thanks to Cherie for the complimentary tickets!
Tomorrow we'll be attempting to go see Les Misérables at the 2pm matinee. A show that neither Devon or I have seen before, even though PreZ has seen it twice already. Kit will also be joining us for that. Should be a whole lot of fun.
@ 02:26 AM EST
Wednesday, July 3, 2002
A day of errands mainly, involving picking up stuff for the impending arrival of daffodil on Wednesday evening.
In the morning I really need to check out stuff to do and make some kind of preliminary plan about what to do for the days she's here. I'm kind of loathe to take her into NYC on the 4th of July as it'll probably be bloody murder in the city that day, though that might be a good time to go do some of the museum stuff, or the botanical gardens. I doubt the gardens will be completely overrun by people/tourists. Though I'll more than likely live to eat these words.
We're still deciding on whether to take her to see fireworks on the 4th or on the 5th where there's apparantly a display in Danbury CT on the 5th which some of PreZ's colleagues will be attending involving a kind of picnic gettogether beforehand. That might be entertaining. Will need to check that out.
The weather has turned back to crispy heat in the past few days again. I managed to gross out Dylan, the 5 y/o from upstairs, by saving a worm that was getting decidedly overheated on the lawn next to his paddling pool. It didn't help that I quickly dipped the worm in the water of his pool to cool it off a little before depositing the poor sod into the bushes in the shade. Trips into NYC will definitely be interesting in this heat.
Other than that a doctor's appointment this morning. Some standard check up stuff and new prescriptions.
@ 12:53 AM EST
Tuesday, July 2, 2002
This morning there was the lawnmower.
There truly is a conspiracy to keep me from sleeping, I swear. At least that wasn't too loud and I managed to sleep through it to an extent.
A quiet day interspersed with some crafty stuff as I finished spraypainting the dining table legs and assembled the table. They'll not survive another disassembling and reassembling, so the next time the legs come off the whole thing will be heading to the garbage. They do have a new lease of life with the paint. Now for sewing machine access so I can finish upholstering the chairs.
I noticed the other day that the current layouts for the 3 sections of the site are very RBG. I just had a period in which I needed vibrant colours. The layout for the journal is currently my favourite because of the searing red colour.
Sleep now, and a doctor's appointment in the morning. Yippee.
@ 02:26 AM EST
Monday, July 1, 2002
I'm not quite sure what our neighbours are doing next door in their yard, but Saturday morning it involved a backhoe, and Sunday morning other heavy machinery. Not exactly all that much fun at 9am when you went to sleep at 5am.
I like pets, I really do, but I want to choke their dog something fierce. It barks ALL THE TIME when there are people doing stuff outside, which means continually with all the yardwork that's going on over the weekends. The pitch of the barking is such that even earplugs couldn't drown it out much. Earplugs did drown out the machinery enough that I could go back go an uneasy sleep for a little while.
On a more positive/interesting note, we went to see MINORITY REPORT on Saturday. The latest Stephen Spielburg movie with Tom Cruise, based on a Philip K. Dick short story. A very very good sci-fi thriller that I enjoyed a lot. As an action movie it's fast paced, it poses a number of interesting questions in regards to the morality of such things as arresting individuals based on crimes they were going to commit but didn't and also about the use of people such as the "pre-cogs" solely for use as dehumanised tools of the justice system.
I always appreciate Spielburg's eye for detail, such as the moving picture newspapers and moving cereal box covers and the new glass (?) data machines that replace traditional media such as tv's and computers. The personalised spamming in stores and on the street was an interesting touch considering the current infestation of spam and advertising in the world around us, and all the information gathering that corporations do.
Well worth the box office fee, go see it.
@ 12:07 AM EST