StallNine: Spirit of the blog

Orange!

Last you saw my office at home, the walls looked like this (click to enlarge and really appreciate the wallpaper -- and, no that's not my computer game on the screen, it's Spencer's.):

The walls, now:

   

After the  initial shock of having ipod orange walls wore off, I grew to love my new walls. Only one more wallpapered room to go!

65 degrees and balmy

I can't remember the last time I left the house only to turn around to put my jacket back in the house. Even in the Fall I'm often found wearing a winter jacket. But not today. It's January. I live in the Northeast. And I wasn't even cold running errands jacketless. Man, when I go to LA next week, I'm not even going to notice a climate change. Scary. When the hell will the Bush administration realize that Global Warming is REAL?! One more reason Al Gore should run in 08!

The war on Christmas continues.

I'm not even going to read the rest of the article, the headline and first sentence told me all I needed to know:

Stolen, Away From A Manger

December 9, 2006
By ANN MARIE SOMMA, Courant Staff Writer

It's not Christmas until baby Jesus starts disappearing from outdoor Nativity scenes.

Okay, I caved and read the rest of the article. It doesn't disappoint. Apparently baby Jesuses disappear all over the place. Just last year Naugatuk's $650 baby Jesus was stolen and has not been seen since. I can't figure out if $650 is a ridiculously high price (yes, the town pays, that means you, taxpayers) or a ridiculously low price (he is the savior, after all).

Assabassador?

I received an email from a friend announcing that John Bolton quit and maybe I should apply to be the next UN Assabassador. I think it was a typo. There are only three "a"s in Assbassador.

Another underoos post, but not really

Because these are not underoos:

They are a Wonder Woman Cami & Panty Set. I'm pretty sure the main difference is that adults don't wear underoos. Anyway, I found these this extra super awesome underoos cami and panty set when checking out this just as extra super awesome Ladies Sewing Circle and Terrorist Society T-shirt:

Either would make excellent holiday presents, I think.

Thanks to Lauren in the Pandagon comments for the Ladies t-shirt link! And, check out Joe Scarborough's idiocy as detailed by Amanda at Pandagon. Bottom line: Scarborough thinks women watching daytime tv shouldn't expose their delicate minds to politics. Nice.

Bush as substitute teacher

This commentary by Aaron Freeman made me smile on my drive home. I think my favorite part was when Hugo Chavez (the student) called Bush (the substitute teacher), "el diablo". Or at least that was the part where I laughed out loud the loudest. But I don't think Dr. Codswallop will enjoy the part about France taking over for a while so we can throw spit balls...

The things you don't learn when you're afraid of horses

There is a whole sport that I never knew existed until yesterday. And no, I'm not talking about curling, everyone knows about curling. I spent much of my childhood doing gymnastics so I have always associated vaulting with running down a runway, hitting a board, and doing a bunch of flips over a horse, landing on a mat, preferably on my feet. And the horse of which I speak looks a little something like this:

Okay, I'm old school. The young'ns think a horse looks like this:

Apparently, there are a bunch (10? maybe 20?) of people who think vaulting involves real, live, horse animals! Thanks to YouTube, you can see that I'm not making this up. (The first two minutes are dull but then it gets good -- and if you don't have hi-speed, think of a cross between dance, gymnastics, and horseback riding. I can't believe I'm not making this up.) Enough description, take it away F.A.M.E:

Update: Click here for more videos!

Quote of the day

From my objective friend (after I thanked him for letting me vent):

Hey, if we don't support each other then we're fucked.

Indeed.

Tofurkey love

I got an email thanking me for playing in the ultimate tourney the other day. It was signed "Turkey love, [name]". I think I'm going to start signing all my emails "Tofurkey love". Speaking of which, I bought a tofurkey this year. I got one in LA a few years back but never ate it. This one is sitting in my freezer still. I have no idea why it needs to cook for three hours when tofu is the consistency of pudding and since there is no meat involved there is no need to be extra sure to kill potential bacteria. Seeing as the odds of my cooking anything are inversely related to the amount of time it takes to prepare and/or cook, I'm not all that confident I'll eat tofurkey #2...

Kitchen misadventures

98% fat free clam chowder tastes nothing like real clam chowder. I have no idea what possessed me to buy the (mostly) fake stuff, I haven't gone the low-fat/fat-free route in ages. And I won't be making that mistake again for a long time. And speaking of kitchen mistakes...I figured  out why my pumpkin pies were lacking in flavor (and why at the same time, I had an extra cup of pie filling after filling my pies). It turns out 12 ounces does not equal 3/4 of a cup. Though, it does equal 3/4 of a pound. So my calculation was correct except for the type of measurement part. Moral of the story: 12 ounces of evaporated milk, for example, is equivalent to 1 3/4 cups of evaporated milk. Fine, that's not really the moral. I suppose the moral is to measure ingredients, especially when you have no idea what you're doing in the kitchen. You'll be happy to know I figured this out all on my own by my third pie!