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Feb

Time marches on in February

By rei 1 Comment

Categories: my cats, school and weather

The blizzardy winter weather has finally broken, and temperatures have been hovering at least a little above freezing during the daylight hours, leaving squelchy mud in the place of slippery packed ice, only to crust and harden once the sun drops below the tree line. The piles of winter snow have diminished to a few inches — our driveway remains impassable, but only just.

By the time we arrived home last night, a day of rain and melting had resulted in a soft, dense fog. While ascending the still necessary trail to our front door, I had reason to pause in amazement at the gentle luminescent glow that captured every spare bit of light in the area and reflected and refracted the illumination thousands of times over through the air and across our snowy yard. The ethereal blue-white radiance contrasted starkly against the unbroken black of the marshy path, and behind our house, winter bare trees reached spectrally through the incandescence…a fantastic sight, in the purest sense of the word.

In this enduringly grey and sodden month, life remains much unchanged. School carries on at a pace at once alarmingly quick and frustratingly ponderous, classes seeming merely dull placeholders at one time and desperately vital at another.

Robin, at long last, had his most important operation–a fact that seems to have effected his spirits and exuberance not in the least, much to our bemusement. (We have determined that the fault is likely mine, for naming him as I did.) This past night, he was found perched precariously atop our bedroom door, seemingly perplexed as to how he had arrived in such a place and, finding himself in the situation, just what to do about it. The only change seems to be in Mercury’s attitude, as she has become less tolerant of his presence than she had been prior to his brief time away.

Not much else of interest has come to pass — certainly nothing approaching the magnitude of our deeply exciting and incapacitating snow storm. The days become longer, the world turns towards spring, and the days of each of us, in turn, become ever so slightly shorter.

Feb

storm of the…um…decade.

By rei 3 Comments

Categories: art, movies and tv, my cats, rants, school and weather

Of course, seeing as we are still only in the second month of the first year of said decade, there is still plenty of time for this particular little blizzard to be outdone. Regardless, it is somewhat inconvenient.

I am speaking, of course, of the rather excessive snowfall that has brought most of the Pittsburgh area (and other effected places around this part of the country) pretty much to a standstill.

My school has been closed all week. When I attended orientation before beginning classes a couple years back, one new student asked about weather-related school closures, and was informed that the Art Institute of Pittsburgh had bowed to the elements only once…maybe twice…for maybe a day at a time. Well, that record is officially shattered, as all classes have been canceled since the first storm hit on Friday night. I find this all rather frustrating, as I not only have classes to attend, but also have scholarship paperwork I am attempting to compile , and really need to be at school to take care of certain aspects…specifically imperative since everything is due this coming Monday.

Of course, I complain about the personal irritations the snow is causing, like missed classes and the path I had to dig (and today, re-dig) to the bottom of the driveway…and then have to remind myself that I am not one of the people who won’t even have power restored to their homes until the end of the week. I have food and heat and electricity and internet. I have tv to watch and books to read, and today I even have a boyfriend to hang out with, as he got a snow day too.

So, since I can’t really complain, I suppose I should talk about something other than the snow.

I have already mentioned my upcoming scholarship submissions, more than once. Well, now I am up against the deadline and trying to write an essay that stays below 500 words. The only way I have been able to say what I want to with few enough words and any measure of success has been by choosing poetry over standard essay format. So we’ll see how that goes.

Robin G., now fully recovered, has resumed his status as resident holy terror. He delights in wrecking havoc at truly obnoxious hours of the morning. As long as the snow doesn’t prevent us doing so, we plan to get him neutered this week. It will not be too soon.

After watching Army of Ghosts, Doomsday and The Runaway Bride, my Doctor Who obsession, always bubbling just beneath the surface, has returned in force. Though, I know what’s coming next:

And you ask, will I ever give Martha a break? Of course I won’t. I love to hate her. Though I must admit that there are definitely a few season 3 episodes that are more than decent. Blink is brilliant, and the The Family of Blood is pretty great…and of course, The Sound of Drums and Last of the Timelords are a bit on the epic side. Still…that is one companion whom with I will never see eye to eye. Sorry, Martha lovers.

Continuing on the vein of BBC shows, a boy in my literature class recommended ‘Being Human’ to me…a BBC production about a vampire, a werewolf and ghost who end up flatmates. I have only seen the (loosely connected) pilot and the first episode so far, but as of yet, the premise is being handled with the honesty, elegance and cleverness that I am recognizing more and more as the hallmark of the BBC–much the same way that ‘Skins’ was a teen drama that actually could have been about real teenagers, ‘Being Human’ is a supernatural drama that chooses substance over flash, and deals with the more logical difficulties the characters might have moving through the world, rather than focusing on sex, overdone costumes and fancy martial arts moves.

So…yes. This is indeed another one of those posts that mostly concerns what I am watching on tv. But seriously, it’s too wet to go out, too cold to play ball…so I sit in the house…and watch tv. Oh, also, I straightened my hair last night. It was very pretty. Then I shoveled snow this morning and all the snow and ice that froze into my hair and then melted when I returned inside kind of undid all my hard work. See? I do stuff!

As Briggs got a snow day as well, we were planning on trying to run some errands, but halfway through removing the snow from his car, while contemplating the fact that half the stores we were planning to visit very well might be as closed as everything else in the city, I decided that staying at home might be the wiser (at least easier) choice. However, this does mean that I haven’t left the house since Sunday evening, except to go on walks with Anna. I may axe murder the whole neighborhood.

I WILL write in a rambling and unfocused fashion. Deal with it.

Other than watching tv, I have poked at homework, slogged through scholarship stuff, and made pasta sauce…talked on the phone to my mom and goofed off on the internet. Drank tea and coffee and read fanfics and drank more coffee. Thought seriously about working on art projects that have been waiting for me, but ended up procrastinating. Found a couple of new Doctor Who fanvids that I enjoyed quite a bit (hey, I told you the obsession had resurfaced) and will share with you here, momentarily. Other than that, I really don’t have much else to say today. Still alive. If I succumb to cannibalism, I’ll blog about it.

First, a little love for the Master and his lady:

And next, a happy Who vid — not that I don’t love the angst-filled laments of love and loss, but it’s not all gloom and doom on board the TARDIS. (hey, there’s even a little Martha tucked away in this one!):

Jan

defeats and triumphs

By rei 5 Comments

Categories: Books, movies and tv, my cats, random links, rants and weather

Yesterday brought the latest installment in the quest to move the title of our car into my name. Yesterday was intended to bring the quest to its glorious conclusion…but the fates continued to bar my way, their foul breath filling my senses as they laughed in my face.

After previous experiences, I had finally acquired my PA license, Briggs had gotten paid so we could afford the transfer fee, and we headed to the AAA so that we could finally make the bank happy by putting the title of our perky blue Subaru in my name.

We stood in line for half an hour, finally had our number called and excitedly approached the desk only to have the clerk coldly inform us that — contrary to what we had been lead to understand…contrary to the information given to me when I called the AAA to find out what documentation and information we would need for the process and I was told I just needed a PA license or ID and the title — the car ALSO needs to be both registered AND insured in my name. Oh, sure, we could have switched the title over, but if we did that we were required by law to immediately remove the plates from the car and park it until the afore mentioned actions had been taken.

As Briggs is the only one who actually ever drives the car (I think I have driven it…I don’t know…twice?), we would, of course, also have to continue an insurance policy in his name. Not only that, but when a vehicle is registered, it has to pass inspection. The car just got its annual inspection about two months ago, and a switch in registration would mean we would have to pay the rather hefty inspection fee all over again, along with the registration fee, the cost of insurance and the cost of the actual title change.

I don’t know if this has ever come up, but we are pretty darn poor at this particular moment — we certainly can’t afford all those expenses this week. Meanwhile, the bank gets more irritated at each delay.

…but it isn’t all bad. The moon is very close to the earth right now, and last night when we came up the driveway, it was just rising over the hill behind our house. The heavenly body glowing through the winter bare trees led us to momentarily believe that we had left the house with all the lights on inside, until we realized that the glow was too immense for that. Then there was a brief flash of fear that the house was burning with that eerie golden glow before we realized that the source of the illumination did not came not from our dwelling, our yard, or even our home planet, but from the giant moon cresting a gentle rise.

Then, I imagined the moon swooping down and biting a chunk out of the earth.

I went outside later and the moon had risen further in the sky and no longer seemed quite so immense…but it shone with such intense silvery brightness that I almost could not gaze upon it with unshielded eyes. I later turned off all the lights in the house and marveled at the inky shadows the illumination cast on the white snow in our yard.

Another mark in the ‘pros’ column — I repaired our kitten. (No, not fixed…not yet. Soon.) On Monday, Robin G was very obviously ill…he kept vomiting, with nothing left in his stomach to eject, was lethargic and obviously miserable. With no other options at the time, I made sure he got fluids and nutrients via syringe, and by Tuesday night he seemed back to his regular trouble-making self, as he walked around on the headboard of the bed and meowed at me to wake up and entertain him over and over again. (He almost died right there, despite his recovery.) After three days of apparently perfect health, yesterday he got sick again. He had no energy and no appetite, was lethargic and throwing up…I figured he must be getting into something he shouldn’t. I gave him broth every couple hours, checked on him concernedly, then finally went to bed and crossed my fingers for a recovery like he had experienced previously.

A short while later, I heard him hacking something up, yet again. With a heavy heart, I went into the living room to check on him and clean up whatever there was to clean up. And as I bent down to do so, I noticed that he was attempting to dislodge something dangling out of his mouth. I quickly caught it an pulled it — all two or so feet of it — out of his throat. It was a piece of plastic ribbon, like those used to wrap presents. My eternal troublemaker had found a piece of ribbon and decided that ingestion was a fitting death for his shiny victim. Then, of course, it got caught in his stomach and started causing him problems. Almost as soon as I removed it, he started feeling better and perking up. By the time I fell fully asleep, he was energetic enough to come wake me up. Repeatedly.

But it’s not all evil moons and cat vomit around here — oh no! I made tuna melts for dinner last night, and they were delicious and a perfect comfort food after a stressful day. I followed them with the comfort food of desserts — home-made chocolate chip cookies. Which means I also got to have breakfast cookies today!

We watched the finale of Dollhouse on last night, and, though perhaps not the BEST finale ever (something about the format of that show made it a little hard to get really emotionally invested, I think. Still a great show. Just weird.) but still pretty darn sweet.

On the topic of finales, we did a back-to-back Doctor Who night with Anna and Aaron this week, because we were at the end of season two and it just didn’t seem right to break up ‘Army of Ghosts’ and ‘Doomsday’. In accordance with my master plan, Anna cried. Quite right too.

Other portions of my fictional life are less satisfying at the moment, however. After finishing Robin Hobb’s ‘Liveship Traders’ trilogy, which became increasingly difficult to put down as I approached the conclusion, I decided that, as Briggs and I have been watching Legend of the Seeker for a while now, I should read the series it’s based on — ‘The Sword of Truth’ by Terry Goodkind.

…I do apologize if anyone out there sincerely loves T.G.’s writing…but I don’t know when I last read such utter, awful crap. Just…crap. I’m barely halfway through and harbor no excitement at the thought of continuing. I will, because I can’t not finish a book, but I will get no enjoyment from it. The characters spend half the book hugging — hugging each other, random kindly strangers, magical chipmunks…any time one of them starts to get angry at another, they immediately change their mind after thinking about what their dear, dear friend must have gone through keeping the secret from them/choosing to do the right thing…the male protagonist stops his female companion (who he is deeply enamored of) in the middle of sexing him up, because he can’t be with her unless she can be fully honest about her past…the writing is dreadful, the characters are unconvincing, and at least one NPC is an almost direct rip-off or Tolkien’s creature, Gollum.

I’m also currently watching through the show ‘Bones’. So far it is mostly diverting and entertaining, though there have been one or two deeply annoying points when the writers bent science to suit the plot, and many of the secondary characters are much more interesting than the two leads. David Boreanaz’s ex-Army Ranger character perhaps a bit more gung-ho and slightly less brooding than the one he played on Angel and Buffy, but otherwise largely indistinguishable.

The weather right now is bloody cold and very clear…lip balm is hardly noticed by my chapping.

Tonight I plan to do my taxes.

Jan

so far so good

By rei 6 Comments

Categories: Books, art, movies and tv, random links, school and weather

In keeping with my promise to try to update more regularly, here I am, updating.

My first week back to school is over and so far, my classes don’t seem as though they will be quite as unpleasant as I had steeled myself for them to be. On Mondays I start with Packaging Graphics, which is instructed by a teacher I have had before and liked fairly well. We have two projects over the course of the quarter and both seem rather diverting. My Monday evening consists of the dreaded Art History class, and it is likely to be at least nearly as abhorrent as I expected, but I have already conversed with the teacher regarding one issue, and he seemed willing to accommodate my needs. We shall see how the matter progresses.

On Wednesday, my afternoon was spent in ‘Design Team Production’ — a class that I was predisposed to disdain, due to the dreaded ‘T’ word. It was not, however, nearly as bad as I had feared. We will be working on a quarter-long project with students from the Photography major, and though the work could go smoothly or less so, depending on who I am paired with, the undertaking seems an interesting one. On odd weeks, we are to do in-class assignments in two-person teams, but at least two of my classmates are good students that I have had former interactions with, so even that aspect of the class is not quite as loathsome as it could otherwise be.

My final class of the week, on Wednesday night, is World Literature. I began this class with trepidation, as it is a subject that could truly go either way, depending upon the instructor. The first session, at least, gave me great hope. The professor is weird and funny and dorky in the way of the best literature teachers, passionate about knowledge and much more interested in what we take away from the class than how many books we get through in the 11 weeks allotted. The assigned readings are Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, Achebe’s Things Fall Apart, and Gordimer’s July People.

Along with my formal studies, I am making a concerted effort this quarter to find time for my personal work as well, even if that time is only in snippets and wedges between larger projects. I am sincerely tired of the feeling of my skills rusting and stagnating, and the fears that I am backsliding in my abilities that visit me each quarter, and of the inevitable fevered rush to work on as many personal projects as possible during my breaks. Especially as I have no drawing courses this term, I feel that working to improve my skills in my own time if particularly important. I am perfectly aware of the fact that my lack of time for extracurricular projects is due in large part to my bad time management skills, and endeavor to achieve better habits this quarter.

Outside of the academic world, my life marches on at the same exciting pace that draws readers back to my blog time and time again. I finally received my birth certificate, and Briggs and I plan to wake at an inhuman hour on Wednesday, in order to finally acquire my Pennsylvania license. Or so we hope.

Today, while picking up the first assigned novel for my World Lit class, I stumbled upon a bargain compilation of the work of Scottish-Italian artist, Jack Vettriano. Though not greatly admired in the fine arts community, I am entranced by his work. His work is in many ways reminiscent the voyeuristic style of Edward Hopper, but containing an aura of passion, glamor and noir grittiness that I adore. His use of color is at the same time limited and decadent, and his technique almost impressionistic in broad strokes and simplification of detail, which enriches rather than depletes.

So anyway, despite my limited means at this point the $8 seemed a justified expense. And now I have a little book full of gorgeous paintings.

Due to a certain amount of peer pressure, the show that is currently serving as a background distraction is the geek-turned-spy saga, “Chuck”. I admit that so far, I am enjoying it. I have also been enjoying the series “Flash Forward”, and just last night watched the first episode of “V”.

I continue to experiment, however slowly, with my new crock pot and have made some truly delicious food. Slow-cooked meat is a truly glorious thing…even tough chunks of stew-beef come out of the pot full of flavor, moist and juicy, and so tender that a they can nearly be cut with a sharp glance. (And I would like to thank Crissi, aka Wine County Mom, for her direction to the Year of Slow Cooking blog. If you have crock pot and are looking for recipes, YoSC is a gold mine.)

The frigid cold has departed these last few days, melting snow into slippery slush as temperatures hover in the 30’s and 40’s. Yesterday felt almost tropical, with temperatures approaching 50 degrees. (Stop laughing, Californians.)

I have begun, and am enjoying, the Liveship Traders fantasy series, but have learned that author Robin Hobb never seems satisfied to let her characters have their happy ending — circumstances have a great tendency to intervene, just when characters stand on the brink of romantic fulfillment. It’s a real dick move, IMHO.

And upon that elegant note, I have nothing else of the slightest interest to impart. The saga continues anon.