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Below are the most recent 13 friends' journal entries.
| Monday, December 21st, 2009 |
cyan_blue
|
7:51a |
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) enegim shared this bit of adorableness... I don't know the original source, but it's such a gem! By the account: this vacationing couple set the auto-timer, walked back, and sat down for their portrait...and had an unexpected visitor intervene: ----------------- Incidentally, hi from somewhere above Utah... brian1789, patgreene, the boys and I are headed to Atlanta to spend the holiday with Jay's parents, siblings and nieces. I love free on-board wifi... |
| Sunday, December 20th, 2009 |
missjanette
|
5:31p |
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| Friday, December 18th, 2009 |
cyan_blue
|
6:38p |
Awwwwww :) patgreene drove all the way to Casa de Fruta to get me some chocolate apricots and cherries for my 8th-day-of-Hanukkah present! Thank you so much, Pat! |
| Thursday, December 17th, 2009 |
cyan_blue
|
7:01p |
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| Wednesday, December 16th, 2009 |
missjanette
|
12:32a |
holiday wishes
as seen in a buncha places, the holiday wish meme Step One Make a post (public, friendslocked, filtered...whatever you're comfortable with) to your LJ. The post should contain your list of 10 holiday wishes. The wishes can be anything at all, from simple and fun ("I'd love a Snape/Hermione icon that's just for me") to medium ("I wish for _____ on DVD") to really big ("All I want for Christmas is a new car/computer/house/TV.") The important thing is, make sure these wishes are things you really, truly want. If you wish for real possible things, make sure you include some sort of contact info in your post, whether it's your address or just your email address where Santa (or one of his elves) could get in touch with you. Also, make sure you post some version of these guidelines in your LJ, or link to this post so that the holiday joy will spread. Step Two Surf around your friendslist (or friendsfriends, or just random journals) to see who has posted their list. And now here's the important part: If you see a wish you can grant, and it's in your heart to do so, make someone's wish come true. Sometimes someone's trash is another's treasure, and if you have a leather jacket you don't want or a gift certificate you won't use--or even know where you could get someone's dream purebred Basset Hound for free--do it. Once a wish has been granted, it will be crossed off my list. You needn't spend money on these wishes unless you want to. The point isn't to put people out, it's to provide everyone a chance to be someone else's holiday elf--to spread the joy. Gifts can be made anonymously or not--it's your call. There are no rules with this project, no guarantees, and no strings attached. Just...wish, and it might come true. Give, and you might receive. And you'll have the joy of knowing you made someone's holiday special. ( here's my wishlist ) |
| Tuesday, December 15th, 2009 |
cyan_blue
|
1:00a |
One, Two, Many, Lots... a meme!
* Leave me a comment saying "One, two, many, lots." * I'll respond by asking you five-ish questions so I can satisfy my curiosity. * Update your journal with the answers to the questions. * Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions. * OR leave me more questions - this can go both ways. Questions thoughtfully provided by vvvexation: 1. What's one place where you'd like to hide a geocache, but don't think it would be physically possible for you to do so?Atop one of the high craggy peaks of the North Farallon Islands, ~25-30 miles off the coast of SF. 2. Name three things you like about your house.(a) The people and cats who live in it. (b) That we appreciate each others' contributions to it, and don't get caught up in arguments about how best to do something (c) The tangerine tree out back, and the glorious mimosa out front! 3. If you could introduce one person you've never met to one of your hobbies, which person and which hobby would it be?Geocaching would be the likeliest, in all of its quirkiness. As to a person I've never met before... hmm! I suppose perhaps an LJ friend I hadn't yet met, like slipjig and rafaela, or theferrett and zoethe... 4. What do you think you'd be doing for a living right now if you hadn't pursued your current career?I would love to have been a National Geographic wildlife photographer, or a writer of books about secret gems of travel places. Practically speaking, I'd likely have done web design work. 5. How are you celebrating Hanukkah this year?By lighting my grandmother's old bakelite menorah, which is glowing next to brian1789's and patgreene's Xmas tree. Jay picked up some chocolate gelt in case we get around to spinning the ornate ceramic dreidl. |
| Sunday, December 13th, 2009 |
arrus
|
1:42p |
...that was messed up
I had a really disturbing dream last night, I want to get some of it out to excise it from me as well as to help my memory retention. I was on the train, coming back from Christmas holiday with my family. There was a sense though that something was wrong. And then this great, booming voice sounded out, something about having found the city wanting, and these wierd tendrils from this suddenly angry red cloud, not unlike a hand or lasers, started to demolish the city. The train tracks were going up behind us (as in my dream rather than a proper bridge, it was just a small lift of some tracks over the water). It was like one of those disaster movies I never see. We were freaking out...and finally the train overturned on land, and I was in a diner (in Connecticut, right across the water). I was only there briefly though. The Army corp of engineers had already built a temporary bridge, and for some reason I was on the next train away from the mound of slag that had been New York City (well, Manhattan. Outer boroughs seemed fine and I remember thinking 'yay Brooklyn!'). There was a pretty girl, Polynesian I think, and I just knew she had been in some joking performance or game about being a sacrifice for the ocean god....Then this booming voice from the ocean demanded her. We were all terrified, and this huge hand was trying to reach into the train (which was a subway car, not a proper amtrak), and we actually forced the door open. I'm not sure whether we threw her out or she was grabbed out, but there was screaming and I felt really bad. Then there was something like a tidal wave, and I don't recall much of what happened next. I knew some time had passed, and I woke up in a car being driven by Jeff and Brian. We were just pulling in somewhere, I was in the back seat, and for some reason I knew that we had decided to get to a Con that was going on somewhere not destructed. I thought it was the East Central one, but they said "nope, we're in Austin." Or...no, I was in a cab, and I met Jeff and Brian there. I freaked out and Brian Hannah lent me some cash for cab fare, and we got my bags out of the car. I saw some people I incorrectly recognized as British Cammies (I think they're actually French-Canadian, they were at NERE), and then I saw Jilly. There were hugs, and I think it was about then I broke down a bit crying over the truama of seeing my home city destroyed by vast, unknown forces. Then I woke up. That was messed up, no two ways about it. Current Mood:  distressed |
| Saturday, December 12th, 2009 |
missjanette
|
7:57p |
freewillastrology says:Cancer Horoscope for week of December 10, 2009 So how are you doing with your year-long resurrection project, Cancerian? Have you been taking care of the finishing touches these past few weeks? If not, do so soon. It's high time for you to officially and definitively rise from the dead. Your wandering in the underworld is at an end. Your mourning for broken dreams should be complete. In January, the age of exploration will begin; make sure your reborn spunk is ready for action by then. Rob is better than a Magic 8 Ball. So let's talk about "being okay." A lot of ppl look okay and say they're okay when they're really not. Sometimes it's bc they're trying to convince themselves. It's a good idea to try to keep that in mind. Related: I've gotten a number of invitations for social activity and fun and I haven't been able to commit to any of them bc I'm in the process of getting okay. I don't want to say yes & then back out. I realise that when someone is a no-show or a flake you stop asking, but please know that I do appreciate it and do continue to ask if you are moved to do so. I'm working on it. |
cyan_blue
|
4:48p |
Potato pancake making step 1
...figuring out where the assorted household members hid the assorted parts to the 3 different food processors that we own. Finally found enough parts to make a full set. Yes, I know, our grandparents used to have to grate the potatoes by hand. Both ways uphill in the snow, etc. |
cyan_blue
|
10:55a |
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cyan_blue
|
10:51a |
Overheard...
Cat: Meow! 15yo: What? Cat: Meow! 15yo: What? Cat: Meow! 15yo: What? You need to be more specific! |
cyan_blue
|
10:36a |
Did Flickr just get proprietary on our photos?
I was attempting to send someone a couple of photos from my flickr account today. I went to right-click on the photos, to copy them to my hard disk so as to put them in an email attachment... and there wasn't a save-to-disk option. I could have sworn this was possible in the past. I sent the person the links to the pages, but at some point I'll want to actually retrieve a photo from my online storage on flickr, so as to edit and print the photo, or save it on a new computer's drive, or whatnot. Is there a workaround that anyone knows, or do I need to start hunting for a new place to store my pics? |
robardin
|
11:43a |
I Renewed For Mets Season's Tickets in 2010
It's nuts, right? The team sucked hard last year, in especial contrast to That Other Team In Town, the tickets can be pretty damn expensive in face value, yet were dirt cheap on StubHub by August. So... Why? Well first of all, I'm getting much cheaper tickets, and with a view that I know I will like ( Section 518, Row 2 in the middle of the row, so there's no issue with those annoying Plexiglass stairwells). They're cheap enough (to me) that I'm perfectly fine with going to 25-30 games like I did last year, getting my money back for another 25-30 of them (especially since I typically sell the tickets to the Yankees series for profit), and giving away the remaining tickets to friends, family or charity. But more fundamentally, why even bother being a Mets fan? Despite having a high payroll and playing in the biggest market in the country (where even a minority share to the Yankees is very significant), the franchise has seen only a few magic seasons compared to 40+ years of mostly misery. And even more ironically, despite growing up up Flushing I only started following the team AFTER the 1980s. Beginning with a team labeled "the worst team money could buy" in 1991, the team has seen SIX seasons out of 19 with 90+ losses, less than half (nine) end with winning records (counting an 83-79 season among the "successes"), and FOUR seasons ending with a dramatic collapse in the final fifteen games. 1998: 88-74, 18 Games Behind first place in the NL East, 1 GB for a Wild Card tie. The Mets lost all last 6 games of the season to miss forcing a 3-way tie for the Wild Card. 2001: 82-80, 6 GB first place, 11 GB for the WC. Pulling to within 3-1/2 games of first place with 19 games left (on 9/23/2001), the Mets then went 9-10 to end the season. This disappointing finish included going 2-4 in their last six games, all played at home, against the two teams with the worst records in the NL that year (the 62-win Pirates and the 68-win Expos), getting shut out (scoring ZERO runs) in 3 of those losses, and just ONE run in the other one. It also came after going 1-3 after that date against the first-place Braves, with two of those losses coming on dramatic blown saves on 2-out 9th inning home runs given up by A. Benitez and John Franco. (All they had to do was hold those two MULTI-RUN 9th inning leads, then go a relatively modest 4-2 (win both series) at home against the two last-place teams, and they'd have tied for first place.) 2007: 88-74, 1 GB first place, 2 GB for the WC. They went an astonishing 1-5 against the last-place Nationals in the last 2 weeks, and featured unspeakably horrendous starting and relief pitching down the stretch, all while the Phillies suddenly just kept winning and winning. (That Phillies team got swept 0-3 in the first round of the playoffs though, by the equally hot Rockies, who made it to the World Series.) 2008: 89-73, 3 GB first, 1 GB for WC. They again led the NL East with one week left to play, but lost 9 of their last 15 games, with their "closer" losing the lead (and the game) twice on 9th inning home runs, and middle relievers like Scott losing leads in the 8th inning another two or times in that stretch. The bullpen sucked after the closer Billy Wagner went down in August, and it being after the trading deadline the best the GM could do was to pick up a castoff closer from the last place Nationals in Luis Ayala. Even Wikipedia notes: "if all games played by the [2008] Mets ended after the 8th inning, they'd have won the NL East by 12 games". Then came last year, the 2009 season: a sad final record of 70-92, finding themselves more than 10 games behind by the end of July, getting decimated by freak season-ending injuries... All while That Team Across Town won #27. The rich got richer, and the fools looked, well, more foolish. That's not even counting the ignominious way their only three post-season appearances in the past 20 years ended: giving up a game ending walk with the bases loaded in 1999, having their home field about 35% full of celebrating fans of the opposing team in the World Series, and with Carlos Beltran taking a called strike three with the bases loaded in 2006. (Which in retrospect, given the wickedness of the curveball, is really the least offensive of the three.) It's enough to make me want to vomit. Or drink. Or drink until I vomit. And yet, there is hope. Look at that sentence again about the 2008 team: with an anywhere close to decent closer (which K-Rod is), the team should have won the NL East running away, and that 2008 Phillies team they lost to by 2 games ended up winning the World Series. The 2009 Mets team on paper was meant to be just that -- the 2008 team's lineup, but with a much improved bullpen -- but freak injuries tore the team apart. It could be that I'll be looking back on this dark time in August laughing with fellow fans like my Yankee-fan friends did this past September, saying, "remember anguishing about being 0-8 against the Red Sox?" Yet more speechifying on the theme of shoulda, woulda, coulda, right? Maybe, even probably. The Phillies got better in 2009 with Cliff Lee, and the AL sure hasn't gotten any easier to beat. The Braves made a series of excellent moves going into 2008, contended into the last two weeks of the season, and have made a couple of nice moves so far this year as well. Without significant bounce-back performances from oh, at least 4 out of 6 players with exceptionally disappointing years last year, not to mention a good pickup or two via free agency or trade, the Mets will most likely end up a close third in the NL East (those Marlins always seem to overperform to expectations every year). But, as the character Andy Dufresne wrote in The Shawshank Redemption, one of my favorite movies of all time: "Hope is a good thing, maybe the best of things, and no good thing ever dies." And if Yankees fans are defined by Expectation, are Mets fans not defined by Hope? "I find I'm so excited, I can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. I think it's the excitement only a free man can feel, a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain. I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend, and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope."
Current Mood:  hopeful |
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