I is for...

I is for Intolerable Cruelty! Well, it was going to be for Interweave Knits, the only knitting magazine that consistently has enough good patterns for me to subscribe to it... but then I was rethinking the letter, and re-stumbled across knitty.com's Intolerable Cruelty pattern and it was love (re-love? love at second sight?).


Well, if you have met me a time or two, you know that I absolutely LOVE pencil skirts... so what could be better than knitting your own? (and do you see how fabulous her bum looks in it!?)

Reality has always set in though, and told me that it would not keep as well as I think it would, what with that whole "knitted garments stretch and move" thing. So I sigh and look at it... then go buy another pencil skirt from the store to make myself (and my bum!) feel better.

:)

SEGWAY!

Okay, so we're not as crazy as "We got a Segway" sounds.... but we're pretty close! John's parents are big motor coach people and spend a lot of time now that they are "semi" retired on vacation trips. And in one RV magazine, they found an ad from Segway that says you can have a Segway for free so long as you drive it around the campsites you visit and advertise for them. Well, they thought it was a) a joke or b) too good to be true, but filled out the little form anyway... And then one day a box showed up on our front door! We can only assume (in the little time we have had to think while we are breaking numerous safety rules) that we'll get it for a certain time period, then Segway will call us up and ask for it back; and in that case, knowing the addiction it brings, we can guess that most people will want to buy their Segway so that they can keep it.

Now, PLEASE don't look at us in these pictures and think we are models of Segway responsibility. I cannot repeat enough that we broke like 17 safety rules in the first day. Maybe it is "new toy" syndrom, but we were eager to hurt ourselves. So first, the rulebook says to charge it for like 12 hours... Broken. The guys had it zipping around the warehouse as soon as they put it together. Then, Rule #2 is helmets.... definitely broken. We ARE trying to get John's dad to wear his Iron Man helmet while riding the Segway... and then maybe we'll get another one and have Segway jousting! Rule #3 is no uneven surfaces.... broken on the gravel driveway and the steep loading dock at work. Rule #4 is keep it in "turtle mode" and don't test the upper limit... DEFINITELY broken as we had races to see who could get the top speed (I won!)... Do I need to go on?

Again, kiddies, don't try this at home! Be good Segway owners!

First, a primer on how to ride the Segway, shot and narrated by yours truly. Then a demo of John setting off.

The hardest part, I think, is getting on the dern thing! Finding your balance should not be so hard!


Once you are stable, however, you are free to take off! The handles turn you and merely leaning forwards and back controls your speed.


John getting it out and showing off his balancing skills. (Rule #12 broken: always hold on to the handle bars!)


You'd think it wouldn't go as fast as it does, but see John's hair blowing in the breeze? We clocked it at over 12 mph!

And we did finally give John's dad a turn on HIS toy :)

HALFWAY!

Half-way done with the special April promotion for an extra $10,000 to breast cancer research... but we are not keeping up!! We're only at 45% of the goal! :0 Please take a few seconds every day to click and help out to save the ta-tas!

www.thebreastcancersite.com

H is for...

H is for HARVEY PANTS! Gotta love more pictures of the kitties! John and I are currently in debates over whether Harvey will come to our new house with us, or be kicked outside to join the other kitties at his parents' house. I say 1) Harvey is coming, and 2) if he doesn't come with us, then I will make a quick stop at the SPCA one day after work and get another kitty. John is sometimes accepting defeat, but at other times is quite adamant about leaving the cats here.

Now, you may ask yourself who names animals "people names," but I've never had a cat that doesn't have a people name (Thomas Jefferson (TJ), Frank, and now Harvey). And they all are perfectly justified, too. When Harvey was an outside cat, he was usually referred to as "fluffy kitty" or "gutter" (there was an unfortunate incident with getting stuck in a gutter) because he was too shy to show us his personality. Then, he got all torn up in the facial area... about the time "The Dark Knight" came out in theaters last summer... so John started calling him "Harvey Two-Face" since he looked SO bad. :( Once he healed, it has been shortened to just "Harvey." (Sometimes, John calls him "Harvey Jones, Jr" but he can't explain why the "Jones" or who was the HJ, Sr.) My cutesy name for him is "Harvey Pants" on account of his freakishly fluffy behind. Observe:

I laugh every time he runs down the stairs in front of me. The pants are so funny!


He's so fluffy! He's the only cat I know that LIKES to be brushed, and will roll all around to make sure you get everywhere.


I will never again buy this stupid cat a toy because it's a waste of money! He is perfectly content with my yarn, or the electrical cords, or paper, or a coat hanger... Weird cat. This is him snoozing with his new best friend.


Harvey reveling in his "indoor cat" status when it snowed really badly last month.

Harvey also makes the funniest noises! Squeaks and trills and whimpers and all kinds of things I've never heard a cat make! It's so funny! Just wait until he is napping, and then touch him, and you will be rewarded with an indignant, "prrrt?!" Funny every time.

More Cuteness!

For another viewing, the Legendary Hamster on a Piano with his popcorn...MAN! Does he love his popcorn or what?

He also experiences difficulties with doors sometimes...

Hamster on a Piano also gives us great wisdom to live by:

Rule of Cuteness #1: Make it smaller and it is cuter.
Rule #1B: Small bodies and big feet are naturally cute.
Rule #1C: Eating is cute.

Howard the Rabbit tearing the heck out of the yard!
(Little pushy digger paws are cute too!)

TV Earworm...

Has anyone else seen this commercial? They've got several versions out now, but this one song keeps getting stuck in my head. (Doesn't help that it's cute hamsters rocking out to the beat!)

How is this not the best thing ever? I mean, if your childhood memories have to be ruined, at least make it funny!

(thanks to Lar and Sohmer at leasticoulddo.com!)

G is for...

G is for Grey Momma, Alpha Kitty of the House and Woods! Now for those of you who are new, Grey Momma is the oldest of the cats at the house and was the friendliest until I kidnapped and domesticated Harvey. Though she has mostly always been an outside cat, Grey is taking advantage of my kitty-loving nature and running inside whenever she can; her bones are getting a little up there in years, after all. Grey is the mother (if not grandmother) of the other cats, and frequently beats up on the boys when she is not happy. (For poor Harvey, that's every time he wants to play with her.)

So, because the only other "G" option I had was more gloves (which was my "G" for last year, as well as a fairly recent, extensive post), I chose to post more pictures of the kitties. Deal with it! I have already accepted I will be a crazy cat lady by the age of thirty. :D

This picture is a set-up for the video clip: Grey was helping us out looking through the MLS reports as we house-shopped, but grew angry when we shooed her off her new seat.


How she and Harvey deal with me knitting (knitting = no laps for kitties, how sad) : they get as close to me as possible without technically being in my lap.


Kitty says, "You shall neither read nor watch TV until you have satisfied the kitty!"


More additions to the "weird things kitties sit upon" category.

REVIEW: Murder by Death

Plot a la Netflix:

Millionaire Lionel Twain (Truman Capote) invites the five most brilliant private eyes to a dinner that turns into a murder investigation with a million-dollar prize going to the one who solves the case. The all-star cast (working with an Oscar-nominated script by Neil Simon) includes Peter Falk, James Coco, Elsa Lanchester, David Niven, Peter Sellers, Maggie Smith and Eileen Brennan, all playing characters based on famous literary detectives.

...and by "based on famous literary detectives" they really mean obviously ripped-off spoofs! It is so funny if you are familiar with a few detectives enough to get the jokes. The detectives are James Coco as Milo Perrier (Agatha Christy's Hercule Poirot), Peter Falk as Sam Diamond (Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade), Else Lanchester as Jessica Marbles (Agatha Christy's Miss Marple), David Niven and Maggie Smith as Dick and Dora Charleston (Nick and Nora from The Thin Man), and Peter Sellers as Sidney Wang (Inspector Charlie Chan, complete with #3 son!). All the stereotype jokes are there, all the accents and caricatures and plot devices. It was super funny.

Overall, it is like the Clue movie, the same wit and face-paced dialogue. I can't say much more about the movie because the jokes aren't really funny when read because you miss delivery and accents. Nevertheless, I highly recommend this to anyone who has a passing knowledge of the detectives to be able to understand the inside jokes.

My Rating: 5 of 5! Highly enjoyable.

Do a Good Deed

I know I've mentioned it before, and I've even passed a chain letter on to friends, and I've got the link a the bottom of my blog here, but I need to mention it again, I feel. In short:

SAVE THE TA-TAS!

There. The Breast Cancer Site is a "charity click" page where you click on the little button daily and the advertisers on the site pay to give mammograms to underprivileged women who would not otherwise afford to get checked. Let me repeat that again: YOU CLICK. THEY PAY. There are several charities (animals, rainforest, literacy, health care, hunger) linked together if you follow the links, all of which are FREE TO YOU.

I mention this again now because The Breast Cancer Site is having a special find-raiser for April. They will donate $10,000 to cancer research if total clicks reach enough for 200 mammograms during the month. As you can see above, they are 4% of the way to 200 with about 4% of the month done. A good start, but please help out!

So let's all chip in, spend at most 30 seconds each day, and try to change the world. As a chesty girl myself, I thank you on behalf of all ta-tas.