and are generally v. happy with the site. They weren’t keen on the dark colours though, which is a pain. I was quite chuffed with the autumnal shades, still there’s no accounting for taste. First draft of what it might look like in minty fresh sky-ee colours, here. I’m not going to do the whole site until they get their whims straight though…
And that’s the picture of the tequila, miniatures, book and I forgot to mention the agave honey…
It’s been a busy week for me and Drsita, though I think S worked harder than I did. She’s had her usual lectures, meetings, office hours & job applications going on and also yesterday gave a 45 minute presentation on tequila and gender involving various Lucha Reyes clips.
And we’re glad it’s the weekend…
So last Friday I had an interview for a job as a UK English localisation tester and that came through. On Monday I was testing a training program about EU Competition laws and Thursday and Friday I was recording all instances of organization (rather than organisation) and suchlike in a proprietary course management system. A lot like Moodle but infinitely more expensive. There’ll be more on Monday then it may well dry up for a bit.
I’ve been making DVDs for Drs. Sudarat & Sita. Working on theming a Volusion e-commerce site (I’ll post the link when I finish) and a 12′ banner for a friend selling camping gear for festivals. Putting together the first non-WordPress site I’ve done in years (link soon “Marketing Gestalt”…) Updating nourishingnutrition.com , lorrainepursell.com , comfortmattressfurniture.com . Finalising pink-caterpillar.com. And all the while clicking over to the LA Times site (which appears to be down today) to see how Atticus is faring in the popularity contest. He needed 3 votes to overtake the picture of the dead horse last time I checked…and watching my adsense pennies pile up.
Here’s my logo for the camping thing…
Cusifer’s in the dog house after his behaviour over the last couple of days. First off, on Wednesday we barbecued some veggies and while I was sorting them out inside, he made off with two thirds of my baked potato with cheese that was sitting on our garden table. And was very reticent to give it back. I wrested it off him and he sulked for the best part of 3 hours. As punishment, rather than his usual treats I gave him slices of said potato for the next 48 hours (If my baked potato is all that you want, baked potato is all you shall have…) Which may well have been the trigger for finding he’d been unable to contain his bowels on Friday night and gave me a fine way to start Friday.
Changing the subject… I finally finished watching The Wire Season 4. I think it’s been noted before, but it’s the best damn drama available on the planet. I can’t stop thinking about Bubs. Bless him. After season 5 it’s going to be hard going back to normal telly. I’ve found there are presently 4 reasons to subscribe to basic cable. And 2 (possibly 3) of them are freely and legally available online. The Daily Show, Colbert Report, The Soup and America’s Funniest Videos. The first two package US news in a palatable form. The Soup reminds me why there’s no point in watching anything but the aforementioned 4 programmes. And America’s Funniest Videos is perfect for watching while eating. Zero plot, zero thought, and 100% people falling over/hurting themselves. The cream of a country of 300 million all with easy access to a camcorder.
Here’s a picture of the sculpture by the PGE stadium next to where I’m working…
I’ll try not to let a week go past again before the next post… Here endeth the stream of consciousness.
DrSita
My Nanny (Welsh for Granny) lived down the road from us from most of my life. She was 63 years old when I was born, and had had quite a life that I heard about through her many anecdotes and stories. When I was little she still lived on her own in Swansea, then moved down to my parents’ village in Somerset when I was 7 or 8. I have great memories of going to stay with her in Wales when I was little, going to the Gower and Mumbles, cooking all manner of treats, travelling on the top floor of double decker buses up front, pumping the pesticide spray in her garden while she aimed the nozzle at the aphids on her fruit trees, and visiting her good friends and neighbours.
Some of my favourites stories she’d tell were the ones about sending rapidly decomposing laverbread to London in the post, the day she was teaching in a Swansea school classroom and a monkey came in through the window and chased the kids and her travels with my ‘Auntie’ Myf. She also had vivid stories about The Blitz in Swansea when she had to look after the boys and girls in the bomb shelters during the sustained air raids. Despite Nanny’s fair share of hardship she was always stoical and ready with a smile and a conspiritorial wink.
For me, Nanny seemed at her happiest when people were doing odd jobs for her and she could be there looking over your shoulder checking your work and offering Welsh cakes and cups of tea. Nanny taught me how to prune her roses right back so they’d grow with increased vigour the next year “Let your worst enemies cut your roses” she’d tell me and would single out weeds to take out with her walking stick because they grew “like the Dduw”. I also learnt my DIY skills painting and decorating her house probably more times than it needed but it was a good excuse to spend time together and, fair play, she always paid me a very good hourly wage. After working we’d sit down with tea and a well-supplied biscuit tin and natter away or watch Countdown or Eastenders together. Occasionally we’d play Scrabble too. Playing Scrabble with Nanny was enjoyable not just for her impressive recall of the official WI list of two letter words, but also because of her stock phrases such as “Just opening up the board” as she’d place some high scoring word right where you were going to go. Bless. She started my whole obsession with Scrabble thanks to playing Junior Scrabble with us when we were little.
Nanny was always very active and lived very independently right up to very recently. Her social calendar put mine to shame. Visitors would stream through her house and enjoy her hospitality and she, likewise, had many reasons to leave the house and take part in church events, Red Cross meetings, mystery trips, pub lunches… Nanny had an impressive knowledge of where you could get a decent pub lunch, cream tea or fish and chips all over the south west. “Craft Evening” was another perennial favourite where Nanny and several of her friends from the village would meet up weekly and knit clothes for charity. As Nanny’s rheumatism played up in later years her knitting became un-knitting where she’d take apart jumpers etc so others could use the wool. The craft was just a thinly veiled excuse to meet up and keep abreast of village gossip and display her baking prowess though I feel. Nanny was excellent at keeping in touch with people by phone and by post. Last year I even got an email from her. Yearly proof of how well she’d stay in touch with her friends from all over the world came every December when she’d send out the Xmas cards she’d bought in the sales the January previously and start to receive the 100+ cards from friends and family wishing her well. Hanging the cards from strings on the beams was getting to be an industrial operation. Then of course, afterwards, she’d check the senders against her list for next year in case there were any new friends, save the cards and stamps and donate them to Oxfam or somesuch charity.
Nanny had a stroke in March this year and following this, after a stay in hospital, went to Calway House a new nursing home in Taunton where she could get proper 24 hour care. She was comfortable, well attended by family, staff and friends, even dabbling in scrabble, apparently… I feel extremely glad that I was able to visit her over her last two weeks. I got to tell her about what I’d been up to, show her photos of life in Mexico and around and even take her to the Taunton Welsh Society’s Christmas Carol service. She still had her smiles, the occasional wink and offers of Maltesers for everyone. Last Monday we got a phonecall saying she was unresponsive and we rushed to the home to see Nanny having suffered another in a series of mini strokes. She was peaceful, breathing deeply with her eyes closed. Mum, Dad and I kept Nanny company and comfortable until suddenly she stopped breathing and quietly passed on.
That was last Monday. Today is her funeral. I’m sorry I can’t be there. I’m sure I missed a great celebration of her incredible, long life. A friend of hers, Chris Rusling was available to lead the service and I can’t think of anyone better suited to do it. I’m so glad I got to spend some more time with Nanny before she died. She was a truly special person in my life who will be acutely missed.
Last Summer we all rented a cottage in Llangynidir in the Brecon Beacons and had a week’s worth of adventures, picnics, walks and scrabble… Here are some of the photos.
Pictures of the Wedding Ceremony here…
and increasingly blurred pictures of the Reception here…
I just checked the Aztec Calendar and it’s only 12 days to Christmas. Leaving me a mere “13 days to perfect the Way of the Scavenger”. And I thought our astrology was cryptic…
Dad just sent me his xmas ecard. Our little village in the snow. Lovely. All 10.5 meg of it 
I’m still trying to think of what to photoshop this year. I’m going to put together a favourite picture from each month in 2005 slideshow soon too. Stay tuned.
And thank all kinds of Aztec deities for the Internet Movie DataBase. I was trying to work out where I’d seen Mr Tumnus from the Lion, the Witch etc. last night. He’s the car thief boyfriend bloke out of Shameless. Fine series that.
Friday Jose and me went round his pseudo-uncle’s office for his music sharing group thing. I brought a mix CD made with low qualityish MP3s which was frankly a bit embarassing to follow J.S.Bach’s organ music with, but hey ho. It’s impressive how listening to high quality organ music drags me back to Taunton School and the enforced chapel in the morning. And pretty far removed from Wellspring’s wurlitzer. Anyroad, made for a nice change and afterwards I watched Kill Bill 2 into the early hours. Yesterday I rambled into town snapping any cars that looked like where they were parked. And the occasional anatomically correct cow pinata. Grabbed some ‘new’ DVDs, Capote, Requiem for a Dream, American Visa and (just to get the bargain price of 4 for 100 pesos) The Wedding Crashers (I think Monica said it was a laugh…). Back to the house for a nap then Jose appeared and we went scouting for a location to do some more poetry/filming stuff. There’s a modern art museum I hadn’t even heard of in La Plaza del Arte, with lots of sculptures and suchlike outside which should be perfect. I used one of the pictures to update pinguino frog’s propaganda 10 page a bit. I don’t know if it works in Explorer though, as i mentioned earlier… afterwards, off to Jana and Victors for a meal that included such treats as mandarin, fennel and baby spinach leaves salad, couscous garlic and chicken. And brownies. House prices weren’t mentioned which is an excellent sign for any dinner party. Avian flu, requiem for a dream, scrabble and suduko kept us chatting mind.
Today lazy as you like. This site was down for some reason earlier. Hope that’s not a recurring thing. We’re off to Sarah’s for her birthday later. she’s cooking summink for us. Which should be grand. I’ve been listening to a few new podcasts of late. For webdesign, there’s this english nerd and his mate talking about design issues at boagworld.com that’s really informative, then NPR’s Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me is now available for download, rather than streaming which is tidy, and then there’s a fledgling podcast, Total Pod Catastrophe which is v. promising. I think I’ll shove one on now and do the dishes, before a starbucks coffee and off round young Sarah’s. Happy 28th, if you’re reading, Sarah 🙂 . Aquarius?…