As you can see, I’ve been trying to change the templates for this blog so make it a dynamic size rather than fixed width. it’s not behaving itself though. You can’t preview the changes you make, so you have to wait 15 minutes for it to rebuild all the files and so I’m leaving it as it is for a bit… The latest bell/whistle I’ve added is the current weather for Santa Cruz under the moon phases thing…

Had a fine time yesterday, we almost finished cleaning up 629. Just the oven and the bathroom left to do. On the way home we stopped at “Ye Olde Watering Hole”, our nearest bar. It’s alright, touch screen quiz machines, pinball, pool table all present and correct. Too much American Football on the tellies though and the only beer on tap is Budweiser. Anyroad, had a swift bottle of Sierra Nevada with sita, then we got supplies in for the night including Funyuns- America’s anwer to twiglets. Then Tanya & Scott came round and we dined, drank and played scrabble and trivial pursuit. I also learnt that Graham is pronounced Gram in US english. I already knew, but shall repeat here, that Craig is pronounced Kreg and Atticus is Addicus. Like, enough already. WTF DUDE. LOL. ROFL. That’s a link to a 12-year-old AOLer translator… enjoy.

Plans for today include dog walking and scarf shopping… and i’d quite like to see The Indredibles. See yas

Click on the pic of Atticus for a few pix from this morning which serve as illustrations to the goings on round Santa Cruz way. Massachusetts residents, take note of the lack of snow…
So I rang me Mum this morning and she sounds a lot better and feels it too. She’s still too housebound for her liking but the end is in sight. See picture “Sita on the phone with mum” for a visual aid. Dad finishes school next wed so at least there’ll be some company for mum and dad can forget about malfunctioning computer networks for a few weeks.

I went to the garage to get petrol and oil for “El Poderoso”, our ‘vintage’ lawn mower. I can’t remember if I mentioned buying this one, but basically the moral of the tale is never buy garden equipment in pitch black darkness, cash-in-hand on an as-is basis. It took a good half hour of fuel-spilling, cord-pulling and poking-bits-with-knives, but I was quite chuffed to get it working. Your average electric toothbrush has more power and I found myself having to slowly lower it onto daisies to keep the motor running. Still it’s done but I think we’re still in the market for a newer model.

Atticus barked for something like the third time as when i came back in the house i had petrol and oil smells all over me. So maybe he’ll be a good guard dog? As long as the burglar doesn’t carry any cats with him/her, cos he’s more than a little scared of them.

Lulu escaped from the bunny cage and was moseying around the garage when I went in to get the mower… he looked very sheepish but i managed to corner him and get him back in his deluxe accomodation. Blimey… well that’s life on the farm so far today, it’s not even 12 yet. we’re off to 629 Koshland to do some more cleaning up and to read the latest issue of Das Loopline- UCSC Family Student Housing’s monthly missive consisting of pictures to colour in, details of events like “Kiddy Song”, disaster drill articles and new commandments for living there. I’m expecting them to issue a curfew some time soon and maybe some new directives on naming your children.

Miserable weather here in SC, rain, wind, it’s just like Taunton… anyroad, at least I wasn’t getting neutered today which is more than I can say for the latest arrival to Bellevue St.. Sita was going to pick Atticus up from the shelter, but she had an exam to envigilate/proctor so I went meself. Atticus was carried out to me, cos he was still sleepy from his op, and handed over with all his medical records and suchlike. We had a painless journey to the house. I walked him round the garden for 20 mins or so, as per my instructions, in the dark. I then let him into the kitchen, let go of his lead and he darted off into the living room to crap slap bang in the middle of the carpet. I told him my feelings on this, said I was dissappointed rather than angry… I wasn’t sure whether to get dog shit clearing up equipment or my digital camera… I plumped for the former and we went on a 30 min walk round the block. We encountered 1 cat on the way which reared up and Atticus tried to hide, then I called round Tanya’s who provided me with vittals and good cheer and is coming round later to make veggie lasagna. Atticus is in the kitchen now. I am in me office. I’m about to download an mp3 of Talking Heads “Once in a lifetime”.

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful Wife
And you may ask yourself-well…how did I get here?
And you may ask yourself, what’s that scratching sound on the kitchen door?

Sita seems happy. He’s a very dark dog, might have to wait for daylight for decent pix.

If I’m understanding everything right, today we pick up Sita’s dog from the pound. He was called Sputnik by the staff there, was briefly renamed Huasco last night, and today is probably Atticus (of To Kill a Mockingbird Fame). Anyroad, just wanted to blog that this is the last dog-less day I’m going to have for next 13 years or whatever they live to be. On the plus side, at least we went from rabbits to a dog without acquiring a cat along the way, on the negative side, AAAARRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH how did this happen? Post from now on may acquire the title “Confessions of a reluctant dog owner”… photos soon, natch.

Here’s just one of the three 4′ tall ice sculptures:
{{popup ganesh.jpg ganesh 500×667}}Lord Ganesh
I took bloody tons of photos, but because I didn’t have a tripod, they’re all blurred to buggery due to atmospheric indoor lighting and shaky hands. I should’ve learnt by now. At Joop & Laura’s get together t’other night he showed me his new SLR digital camera. It was a sight to behold and to wield. I’m experiencing yet another bout of camera-envy… Anyone want to buy my Fuji Finepix S5000? One careful owner? 250 of your earth dollars… or 6 pounds, probably given the exchange rate these days.
Have you ever been to www.last.fm ? It rocks- enter 3 of your favourite artists, choose someone with a playlist that looks to your taste, then listen to streaming radio from that person’s favourites list. You rate the tracks as you go and teach it what you like and it should start showering you with nothing but tunes you like. It’s, like, a radio TIVO. And it’s free apparently. It might start weaning me off NPR and BBC Radio 4…

Just received these lovely pix of Bethan and Ali’s new puppy, Jed
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{{popup jedthedog3.jpg jedthedog3 900×600}}jedthedog3
In other news, hot tubs rock…
am feeling a little cloudy today, monica surprised us with a visit this morning and went for breakfast downtown, and we’re off to a Hindu wedding with horses and everything this afternoon…

I was planning to do some kind of E-advent calendar- I only just realised it’s december, that means there’s already 2 chocolates waiting to be devoured- anyroad, it may still happen. In the meantime, I never got round to posting any Mexico photos from last year. I had planned to write a novel of some sort, but instead I took about a thousand photos and learnt how to use photoshop. I was a bit too enamoured with the photo border plug-ins, but have a look at a sample of pix from the trip here

I got another “Was this helpful vote?” for one of my reviews and it bumped me up to 69 + votes for 13 reviews… My day is made.

It’s been right nippy round santa cruz way. We had to take the bunnies in from the garage as I haven’t yet installed the hypocaust system which will keep their little paws all toasty.

Been muy busy the last few days catching up on emails, phone calls, interoffice mail. Fascinating stuff so I won’t bore you here. Am glad to have lots to do though, can’t help thinking of me mum being stuck at home and feeling poorly so I’m not complaining. Mixed news on the health front, there. Some things improving, some things not going so well and some pretty obtrusive tests in the near future. bless. She does a grand job of sounding perky on the phone, mind, but she’s obviously not having the best of times. bless.

eeh well, my day is ending. things are either taken care of, or can’t be taken care of and it’s time to go. Cheers fer now- and don’t be afraid to use the guest map thing… i know for a fact that the last 100 page views were from:
Santa Cruz California United States United States
Amherst Massachusetts United States United States
San Francisco California United States United States
Great Barrington Massachusetts United States United States
Copenhagen Kobenhavn Denmark Denmark
Boston Massachusetts United States United States
Springfield Massachusetts United States United States
Hopkinton Massachusetts United States United States
Camberley England United Kingdom United Kingdom
Ashburn Virginia United States United States
Chappaqua New York United States United States
Limerick Limerick Ireland Ireland
Edinburgh Scotland United Kingdom United Kingdom

still no sign of the swedes…

Have a click on the above button thing to show ‘the world’ where you are.

Me dad drew this lovely goat in the moon… and I had to include it. Gracias, papá 🙂

Tanya passed on this poem to me, as requested, bless her. I’ve had quite a few worse things round my way of late, but it tends to be nearer 4 a.m…

Things

There are worse things than having behaved foolishly in public.
There are worse things than these miniature betrayals
committed or endured or suspected; there are worse things
than not being able to sleep for thinking about them.
It is 5 a.m. All the worse things come stalking in
and stand icily around the bed looking worse and worse and worse.

Fleur Adcock

And here’s a photo of Sita, her sister and her Dad from the Downey photo collection, click for bigger version.

Made record time coming back from LA, we left at 6:20am to beat the traffic and it all went according to plan. Going down there took 9 hours though. Anyroad, had a lovely time again. Can’t be doing with writing much now so here are some photos instead. There’s our house, chateau lapin, local sunsets, dolphins, oil fields and a moon. Enjoy 🙂

Only $20 a month to rent a fiddle- it turns out. I took one of me guitars to the shop today to be repaired and on a whim rented a violin. My guitar skills are OK, quantity of songs, rather than quality as I’ve said before. However, my violin playing is execrable. I thought it’d be fun to post a song now to look back on in a month’s time to see if I’ve improved… So with me on guitar and me on “fiddle”, in glorious stereo, here’s a painful rendition of Dirty Old Town, by the Pogues. Maybe i’ll improve in 30 days time…

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Sita almost collected on my life insurance today, I was lifting a washing machine down some stairs with the “help” of some septaugenarian who was more concerned about his cacti than my imminent demise. On the plus side, the washer only cost 20 bucks and he gave us 5 persimmons. Which will probably be used ornamentally for a few days then chucked. Just a tumble drier to aquire and we’re ready to set up our antique laundromat service…
The bunnies are getting used to their new palace in the garage. Pictures soon…

I can’t believe how good the house looks after less than a week. We’ve got cable plumbed in, the phone should be connected any minute now, and I’m expecting a package from SBC Global filled with DSL goodies to get back on the interweb… Still to do this weekend: Build the bunny-containment-facility in the garage, hang up me clothes, decorate my little corner of the office, investigate 5.1 surround sound possibilities for the living room, fix the truck’s indicator light, clean/sterilise 629 Koshland way and move the plants, mow the lawn, plant some “erbs”, reestablish contact with family and friends… I’ll be busy alright. The joyous news is that next week I’m on holiday and will relish the chance to relax and get things done at a slower pace. I’m planning on sorting out my electric guitars and amp and introducing the neighbours and anyone else within earshot to solo renditions of Levellers songs. Should even fit in a trip to Downey to feast on turkey, ham, pecan pie and mashed preta (which is Irish for spuds, though the spelling may be off a tad…) . Sita, meanwhile, has 800 pages of papers to mark (grade in American) from the Hip Hop Culture (nothing to do with rabbits) class she TAs for. Eeh well, more “news” soon once the information superhighway gets funnelled into the house.

I’ll have to put me computer back together again though… and my desk, and Sita’s, and… you get the idea. While you’re waiting, try this test. You say which logos you recognise and it diagnoses your myriad disorders. It rightly worked out I was from the UK and had a BBC Micro obsession. And that I had gothic tendencies?… see how it works for you 🙂

I wasn’t expecting to be moving house today, but we’re about half way there. I took a few poor quality photos of the garden, living room, kitchen and garage. Once we’re moved in i’ll try and do it better justice. Really is a nice house you know…

And I managed to install Mandrakelinux too… not too shabby for a saturday.