Experimenting with movies 2009

Here's a little diary post which I whipped together mostly thinking about the pecha-kucha ideas.

Warning: It's a two minute diary not a one minute diary as titled, oops, and the audio came out a trifle louder than I expected thanks to a better microphone than I'm used to.

My process was to record the slideshow in Keynote, then export to Quicktime, then upload that to Vimeo. Ideas on improved approaches are appreciated in the comments; I decided to go for "imperfect and up today" rather than making it a big project that might get bogged down.

Banking Caveat 2007

Lest you think there is any such thing as a reliable float anymore, I wish to report that the check which I presented at the counter at 5:55pm yesterday at Bank of America cleared my account at Wells Fargo yesterday and that news plus the scan of the check appeared in my online access late in the evening.

Stunning.

Smuggery in the birthday season 2007

It's truly gratifying to be carded - in New Orleans no less - when you're got double the necessary years to go into a place.

(My jealous friends remarked "Well, you noticed that lady did have very thick glasses", but I found the security person quite perceptive).

Lovely weekend! 2006

What a gorgeous day it is outside. I'll be heading out into it soon, but I just woke up half an hour ago. It's been an intense week for my brain at work - good but busy - and I guess I needed the dreamtime; I slept for over 10 hours.

Not much news to report. Life is good, I've been relaxing in the evenings, having fun tramping about town with my sweetie, trying new restaurants & bars, seeing the occasional concert, watching Top Chef, cooking and trying to make myself pack a lunch more often, being depressed by the news, trading CDs with lala.com, playing computer games (Geneforge lately), writing Discardian, and making slow progress on my home to-do list.

Hope things are good with you!

Generally Good 2006

Hello, yes, I'm around, just not very posty.

Everything is pretty much fine. Weather variable. Health took a hit through the whole middle of the week with a beastly cold, but I'm on the mend now thanks to the care of The Lovely Man Who Feeds Me Soup And Reads To Me.

Work as usual has the potential to be highly stressful, but I'm managing pretty well under the load. (Thank you David Allen and Merlin Mann for the boost to my productivity and time management skills over the last year).

Didn't get to go to SXSW this year  :(  but that's because I spent all my money on my fabulous trip last year and this tasty maxed-out Powerbook :) so it all balances out.

Yes, yes, I will start getting some of the Tanzania pictures up soon - Kenya's all there at least - and I'll add in the travelogue in the blog one of these days. (I do wish the TypePad gang would get around to improving that post date selection tool so it was easier to select a day months or even years in the past. It really is the fly in my blogging ointment. *sigh* I've tried suggestions, whining, reminders, cupcakes, pointing to the good way to do it (thank you, Flickr!) and am beginning to wonder what it will take to get that feature. I wonder if they'll do contractual development? Only problem is they make more money than I do, I suspect. Poop. I hate waiting.)

You begin to see why I haven't been posting lately. So boring! Good lord. Go watch The IT Crowd or something. At least things catch on fire in that.

Laggy 2005

I woke up at 5something this morning - which I guess is reasonable since I went to sleep about 10pm - and didn't go back to sleep after.

I've frittered away the hours since just reading stuff online. Just reading journals and stuff.

I should clean up my stuff from my trip, deal with bills & receipts, prepare for the workweek ahead, but no, I'm just laying in bed being a slug and listening to a random assortment of music.

Slug Sunday. :)

Mood: a little bit stir crazy 2005

Now that my foot is healed enough to start being able to leave the house and walk to nearby places I'm having a harder time just staying in. I overdid it a bit today though and should put it up, give it some ice and elevate it.

But I want to go sip cocktails with my witty friends and flirt with cute boys.

I want new and odd music and clever interior decor and talented bartenders and at least one outrageous fashion mistake to wander by our part of the bar.

Since the witty friends and cute boys aren't currently beating down my door trying to coax me out, I guess I'll go get the ice pack.

Sunny Saturday 2005

Lovely light today. I slept in and then woke, unfortunately, from a dream about work (I could do without this sort of overtime or at least without the knowledge that my subconscious is grinding away all night). Mercifully, instead of dim grey gloomy light the house is bright and inviting and sunshine scrubs away tension.

I lazed about for an hour checking email, looking at things on the Web, chatting on phone and IM with friends, before getting up and getting going on small tasks around the house.

My foot is healing. It'll be two weeks ago tomorrow and the bruising and swelling of those two toes has gone down. It's sore if it gets touched, so life continues in "cautious hobbling" mode. I figure another week and I may be able to upgrade to "being very careful and walking slow", but it might take another two.

Fortunately, there's plenty of things I can do without having to walk a block. Little bits of housework, balancing my checkbook, preparing for my trip to London & Africa, more futzing about with iMovie.

When it's time to put my foot up, there's a good game of Pharoah (with the Cleopatra expansion so pyramid building isn't such a pain in the ass), a movie from Netflix (Kinsey) or loaned by friends (Horatio Hornblower), or any of the score of books I'm reading.

Today I'm enjoying my unflooded house in my neighborhood without the sound of gunshots and the clean, drinkable water that comes out of my tap and the electricity powering the music on my new Mac. Count your blessings.

Good evening... 2005

Suiting myself on Saturday night.

Target audience, people, target audience 2005

In my subway station, Castro Street, there are now many ads for a popular mouthwash's new pocket breath freshener strips. The ad pictures a pretty woman in a white summer dress peeking coyly to the side at the handsome man standing beside her (in an elevator, I think). He is looking up abstractedly into the middle distance with a slightly suppressed smile.

The ad text says
"When there's only an instant to make a first impression..."
(or words to that effect)

Now I live in the Castro, one of the neighborhoods of the world most densely populated by homosexual men. There are a lot of good looking men here. A whole lot. (And that's rather pleasant, I find).

But I know where I live and the odds that implies, so when I saw the ad for the first time, my brain finished the sentence it opens:

"...minty fresh breath won't help you much if he's thinking about cock."

Thoughts on a Wednesday Night 2005

Working late is for chumps.
I am apparently a chump.
But, I am a chump who will be a good deal more ready for her big meeting on Friday.

I should not write the rent check in the morning before work because apparently I can't write out big numbers in text properly before 9am.

Thanks to a visit from the landlady (for a replacement check), I have clean dishes. (She's not THAT nice, though she is nice; I did them, like we all do so much of our cleaning, out of Guest Fear).

I really should finish one of these 15 books I'm reading.

This weekend is gonna be great. Even if I don't do anything at all, the combination of not-being-at-work and not-being-sick is so exhilarating!

One nice thing about cold San Francisco summers is that you still get to make winter favorites like roast vegetables.

Mmm, parsnips.

Thoughts from a summer festival 2005

Gosh, it's a lot hotter in the south bay than in San Francisco.

Outdoor movies are a wonderfully silly, happy thing.

Not all band managers are dorks, but the one's who are, hoo baby, welcome to pricktown.

Some of the best hugs I got this weekend (from these folks I see once a year) were from uniformed San Jose police officers. Shame they have to wear those dang lumpy vests under their uniforms, but these guys overcome that handicap with great skill.

There are few things nicer than a Filco festival on the Fourth of July. No significant incidents, good food, mellow crowd, great crew and fantastic fireworks. Really one of the prettiest shows we've had.

It is LOVELY to be home to quiet and my own bed and the rest of the day to recover before a short work week at my real job.

Still alive. 2005

Yes, yes, I've been really quiet, but things are fine. I'm just spending long intense days on the computer at work and not been inclined to pick it up again at home. It'll be better in a week after I get through all my big presentations.

How are you? What's going on in your world? Or, if you want a less far-reaching question, what's the last delicious thing you ate?

My answers:
Excellent.
Happiness and busy-ness.
Kickass wonderful hamachi at Osaka Sushi on Castro Street near 18th.

Week continues to be excellent. 2005

I'm back in San Francisco after the conference.

Having a wonderful time!

Winding down a busy week 2005

Lots going on this week at work - product beta test in full swing plus managing some contractual development, plus supervising projects being done by our interns this semester - but going well, so it's a good kind of tired.

Had a great day yesterday. Helped Kristin with her move - driving the truck & helping organize the load - which went nice and fast. Kristin knows how to treat her helpers right and her new apartment looks beautiful - full of character and good light. Afterwards there was a shower (all praise the glory of indoor plumbing and a good hot water supply) and a nap before a sublime dinner of sushi at Shi Mo with an attractive man.

I finally got to bed at a reasonable hour and slept in a lot, but just shy of too much. The light is beautiful here this morning, birds are singing and the sky is blue. I had the last of my friend Vicky's lemon marmalade on some toaster waffles, a glass of OJ and a mug of faux coffee and now I feel quite content.

It's so wonderful to have all this sunshine pouring in the windows. I think that, though it'd be a good walking day, I'll just stick around home and recover from all the lifting yesterday. I don't feel bad, just aware that I've been doing things. Shannon arrives tomorrow, so I'm feeling an incentive to clean up a bit. Not that she's afraid of the occasional dust rhino, but I figure I can use any vague guilty sensation which motivates me to get housework done.

Enjoy your day! Put on some music you like and do what feels right.

Elsewhere 2005

No posts from Dinah all week? What's going on?

Well, reading a book (The Eyre Affair, which Kristin recommended), watching the extended versions of The Two Towers and Return of the King with some bunny, playing Kingdom of Loathing (now level 13, go me!), getting ready for my new part-time roomie Shannon to arrive, and working on Bloggers Without Borders (mostly fixing small typos and pestering Jonas with suggestions and questions).

Cold 2004

The weather is cold here in San Francisco. I've been really enjoying cooking things in the oven. I'm thinking I might move my bed into the kitchen where it's cozier. Unfortunately, my bed seems to be larger than my kitchen.

Do you think that cold weather causes simple declarative sentences?

A real weekend 2004

After conferences, Fray Day, and being sick, I am so happy to have a weekend with no obligations. Yes, a friend has a literary event at his house tonight. Yes, another friend is having a house-warming tomorrow. But I don't have to go. I can bow out if I really want to.

Now that I've
- stayed up as late as I felt like playing games (Kingdom of Loathing) and watching movies (two episodes of Upstairs, Downstairs)
- slept in as late as my body decided to let me
- worked on a home project bringing up my old stereos from the basement so that I can start weeding through old records and cassettes to do a bit more Discardia
- cooked a new recipe (Chopped Eggplant with Cocoa Nibs from Alice Medrich's Bitter Sweet cookbook (disappointing: mostly the right ingredients, but not put together the best way, and even the amount of oil & salt I cut from her recipe wouldn't save it)
- studied more math (part of my ongoing project to beef up my math and science knowledge)
- had a nice chat with my friend Corey
- played a bit more Kingdom of Loathing
and am about to take a nice shower, I'm more ready to consider going out and being social. I did say consider, mind.

Budgetary Changes 2004

I am now officially living la vida grad student, except that I'm not a grad student and and I have a stunning apartment. That's right. Chris found a place and I'm keeping this one. He'll be making a move over a while, but soon I'll have a guest room and double the rent.

If I am suddenly more reluctant to meet you to do anything that costs money, now you know why. On the bright side, you're probably be trading The Dinah Who Dines Out for The Dinah Who Cooks Yummy Dinners For Friends.

Only one problem: the dining table & chairs move out with Chris. (Mum, remember that holiday present of helping me out with plants for the balcony? I think I may need something a little more woody...)

The end of a short weekend 2004

I could definitely do with one more day to be home from my trip, but tomorrow it's back to work. It'll be a busy week, I know. I was out of the office the last 6 work days between taking a day to relax before the busy-ness, getting sick, and the trip to Cleveland.

The flight back was fine. We had a good tailwind so arrived 20 minutes early or so. I stopped at Ti Couz on the way home and had an excellent crepe (carmelized onions, tomatoes and sausage) and some tea. Napped for an hour or two and then did epic laundry (four loads!) and grocery shopping. Stayed up late chatting & writing email & stuff which was fun.

Today I slept in (in my own nice bed with the clean sheets) and am definitely feeling much better. Still a little coughing, but doing pretty well. Min Jung and Jason got me out of the house and down to the Folsom Street Fair which was odd but fun until the crowd got far too thick and I began to get a little panicky. Icky sensation. Had to shuffle through the crowd for two blocks before I could get some breathing space and calm down. They definitely need to lay the booths out with better spacing. It was extremely unsafe when the crowds packed in. After escaping we walked back to Rainbow Grocery and then they came over to my place where I invented a new drink which we were going to call a Honey Crush, but Googling now I see the name is taken. Since it's based on a drink called the Bee's Knees, I guess it'll be the Cat's Pyjamas instead:

Cat's Pyjamas

2 ounces gin
1/2 ounce lime juice
1 barspoon honey
3 ounces Korean crushed apple juice

Shake with cracked ice;
strain into two chilled cocktail glasses.
Garnish with a lemon wheel.

Tart, sweet, sassy.

How to Clean: Procrastinator's Version 2004

Which is more fun: cleaning house or reading websites? How about cleaning house or reading a book? Cleaning house or taking a nap? Uh, yeah, basically most things are more fun than cleaning house, right.

So here's the thing: if you're a small-scale hedonist and are bad at making yourself buckle down and do chores, how can you force yourself to get on it? The answer is simple: fear.

Here's what you do:

1. Mid-afternoon on a Saturday invite twenty friends to stop by sometime between 4:30 and 11pm.
2. Go to the corner store & get ice & mixers for cocktails.
3. Clean house, but not too strenously to stop and be a gracious host. Periodically pause to wash your face, brush your hair and rest for a moment.
4a. Have a nice time with the friends who show up.
4b. (If no one shows) Have a nice cocktail in your clean house.

A is for Americano.

Away. Back Now. 2004

I was away for the weekend. Home now. Had a good time. Sorry about having to go to work tomorrow, but, truth be told, if I had another day off, I'd probably spend at least part of it doing a bit of work because I am enjoying it these days.

Slow Saturday Morning 2004

It is Saturday isn't it? I'm a little muddled after my busy couple weeks. Many great social events. Watched some movies (Rashomon, Sexy Beast). Had some nice time with friends. Got a little behind on housework, bills, responding to email, etc. Did some catching up (including working an extra 2.5 hours last night and getting a gratifyingly big chunk of email at work answered and bug calls opened), but the house still needs sweeping, laundry still needs doing and my checkbook still needs balancing. Ah well. Was filled with joy at my friend Jay winning the Movable Type plug-in contest. Was filled with smaller scale delight at getting to try Movable Type at work to manage my enhancement list. This morning I slept in until 9:30ish and that was so very nice. I've got a trip to a hot tub this afternoon (and a nice ride on the train) to look forward to this evening.

All is pretty darn good.

At the laundromat 2004

While waiting for my wash I picked up a 1982 issue of Architectural Digest which was lying about. My goal was amusement at the ads and then-fashionable decor - a sort of do-it-myself Interior Desecrators - and I found that, but I also found a nice little piece by Russell Lynes "The Satisfactions of an Imaginary Museum". Must remember to look for more of his writing.

I should have been in bed a couple hours ago 2004

I blame movies, comment spam and sheer bloody-mindedness for my late night. On the bright side, I cleared up the comment spam, reported the offenders to their registrars & hosts, listened to the commentary track of Fail Safe and chatted with boys. My housemate was extra cool and brought me a slice of pizza from Marcello's. Mmm. Every now and then my body just screams out for some pepperoni.

Now it's midnight and I don't want to go to bed now. I don't want to go to work tomorrow. I don't want to volunteer this weekend. I feel lazy and petulant and I just want to booze it up, sing along with weird bands and sleep until noon. Of course I will actually go to bed and put in a productive day at my job which I do actually like a lot and I will volunteer this weekend and have a great time and see old friends and probably get more work done while I hang out in the operations trailer between handing out radios and dealing with the crisis du jour.

It's funny. I am tired, but I've got that classic exhausted little kid who won't lie down thing going on.