"You ever been stung by a dead bee?"

Souvenir

Back from Del Rio.

I typed infallibly, what could this mean?

I am notorious for typos and then , on top of that, I am a horrid speller. Everything I type must go through a spellcheck. This blog is riddled with typos, sure you have noticed, D.
This evening I typed an email to a friend of mine and sent it off. OOPS! UGH! forgot to spellcheck. Just out of curiosity I hit back and spellchecked. Not a single misspelled word, not one. I re-read it twice for grammar and it looked good. Wowsers! what could this mean? I have never had a clean email. Was there dogma in that email? In any case, make wishes everyone, today is obviously special, you have until 12am CST. YES! It is that rare and special. EEKS! I'll erase this post when I am looking for a job. Now I will spellcheck then get back to my OTM work.

Sidenote- I heard this story today: "Can you spare any change you fucking bastard". Now, this person has issues but is lacking in the simple social skills needed to survive in today's society. I mean, you'd think a pan handler, an Austin occupation if there ever was one, would know better? Success is in the phrasing, the delivery, the quirkiness of the signs etc....To fail as a pan handler must be hard. Funny, when I heard this I instantly pictured Failure Face Charlie Brown as a pan handler.

Lists

In
Tokyo Flash watches (neat looking but pricey)
Vintage Scarab Bracelets
Toast-The innest thing in the world is to have your vintage toaster on your table so you can have toast anytime with real butter,honey,yummy homemade jellies and jams or just yummy jellies and jams
Fresh peaches from the farm-or so the sign says-sold by people in my hood
Yard work and planting flowers
Painting and being artsy with wood
Cake-with or without frosting
Sidewalks
Casseroles to match the cupcakes
Hazel-The TV Show, I know, but whatever , it's like comfort food and I gotta be me

New Tapioca Recipes-C. from Nebraska, that was uber delicioso!
Here it is printed with his permission:

1/3 c. lg. size pearl tapioca (not instant)
2 1/4 c. milk
1/4 tsp. salt
2 eggs
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 tsp. vanilla
Soak tapioca in water for 4 to 12 hours. Add milk and salt. Heat and stir until boiling. Simmer at low heat, uncovered, for 50 minutes, stirring frequently. Add sugar gradually. Beat eggs. Mix with some of hot tapioca. Return slowly to rest of mixture. Bring to boil, stirring constantly for 3 minutes to achieve pudding consistency. Cook 15 minutes. Add vanilla.

Mexican Food: From my new cookbook
Full moon dining outdoors
Olives
The Paramount: I totally dig it this year!
St Benedict

Out
The 200,000 sqft WalMart-Heard Northcross will house the smallest Wal-Mart in Central TX? Sort of Yay !
Staying in and letting the yard get ugly
Chocolate-just haven't been in the mood, it's been weeks, crazy, huh
Amtrak-UGH! why do they depart in the wee hours every time?!
Soy-It's so, uber,ugly, bad for you!!!!!!
Flipping houses: It's tres unethical and indecent in my opinion. I watched episodes of that cable show and what I saw was sad. What I have seen firsthand in the hood is sad, some spakle, pressed wood, caulking and paint and for that you are paying what?! Just so Flipper can buy a new set of tires for his Hummer? Besides, the market is cooling, even in Austin (re-sell fell in March and with subprimers, who we all know were helping to fuel the rush and pump the numbers, falling into foreclosure nationwide....I don't know, I'd buckle down and invest my money somewheres else if I were you muchomoneybucks Austinite)
Republicans and their stinkin war

Wanted:
Working 16mm Projector
More days off so I can work on projects
More Tapioca Recipes
Impatiens in the backyard
Yoga class
The Champions on DVD-UGH! Cannot get this show anywhere right now

Found:
Cool vintage scarab bracelet
**NEW** Julie Christie Film-Thanks, Paul!

What a Luxurious War we are fighting and not stopping

Hitler and Bush-no self doubt, what a lousy trait to have, it is indecent and in human. It is the sign of a megalomaniac.

What a luxurious war, while people are dying in combat, on the home front no one does without. WWII lasted six years and there was rationing. The US sends thank you notes to the troops but actions speak louder than words. Surely a rationing of gas and oil early on could have helped the war in some way and keep the government from having to cut Medicaid and Medicare. Our grandparents who already fought wars and sacrificed and rationed should not be given a hard time in their later years.

World War II conquered the Depression, re industrialized the country and built the middle class. But that was special. The U.S. fought WWII with full mobilization, super-high taxes, super-low interest rates, big deficits, price controls and rationing. It was over in six year and the 1950's boom happened. This war has no end in sight and when it's over, we won't be booming. It is being fought on credit dontcha know.....

This war should be stopped, end it, or at the very least institute the draft and rationing and then see who wants it to continue.

BEN STEIN: Here's how it goes: The nightly news grimly reports that the terrorists in Iraq or Afghanistan have detonated a bomb that has killed seven American soldiers. A few seconds later, the announcer says that the Dow closed at yet another record high, and we see men and women cheering at the rostrum of the New York Stock Exchange. This combination of stories tells us exactly what's wrong here in the U.S. of A. The nation is not fighting the war on terrorism. The nation is partying hearty and living it up — at least the high end of the nation, money wise. The word "sacrifice" never even comes up. The grunts and jarhead Marines who don't get a hot meal for days on end, and who sleep in their vehicles, and never get a night without being mortared or sniped at — they're fighting the war. The women whose husbands come home in a box (or not at all), the kids who will never see mom or dad again, the parents who invested a lifetime in bringing up their kids right — they're fighting the war. Our enemy is united against us. If we keep acting as if we can win this war just by sending over the other guy's son or daughter, while we pay attention to our tax cuts and the stock market, we're on a long, disastrous downhill slide. Instead of all of that cheering on Wall Street for the already rich getting richer, let's see some solidarity with the guys whose blood and lives defend our economic interests around the world, safeguard the oil supply, maintain Pax Americana... to at least some extent. The military builds the wall Wall Street and the whole economy play games behind. Let's start thinking about a draft where the children of the investment bankers might even have to go fight. This might concentrate our thinking about the war considerably and might make us a bit more cautious next time. Right now, the frantic making of money here at home while the other guy's kid gets his head blown off in Ramadi is not a pretty picture, or a winning picture.

BEN STEIN: For the rich in this country, things have never been better. There are over 500 billionaires. There is a long waiting list for Bentleys and high end yachts. Wall Street powers routinely make $50 million a year and more. They have birthday parties with statues gushing champagne. But we live in a small bubble of freedom and prosperity on this mad, dangerous earth, and it's protected by the men and women of the military and their families. They live on a pittance. While the rich get in line for Ferraris and $10 million co-ops, the men and women who save our lives get paid in a year what Wall Streeters make in a minute. I know these military families. They put their lives and their families' future on the line for us every day. But somehow, at least partly because of lowered federal revenue because of tax cuts for the very rich, the military cannot get adequate pay, adequate training, adequate equipment when they go off to fight for us. This is just an outrage, to have such opulence at home while the people who defend us in our bubble live in such dire straits. Here's one thing we know for sure: The people who give their blood and their lives for us need more money, and there are more than enough rich in this country, and they've got more than enough money to pay a bit more tax. That's partly economics and partly just basic decency.

We are definitely heading for a depression, does no one see this? When it hits,no one is going to be ready. Not many in this country know how to live within their means.

Yay! It's something

Though this isn't enough for my neighbors and though I still wish they wouldn't put in a Wal Mart I was pretty happy to read the following:

By Sarah Coppola
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Saturday, May 12, 2007

Wal-Mart will reduce the size of a store that is planned for North Austin, but not enough to satisfy a neighborhood group that opposes the project.
Lincoln Property Co. plans to redevelop Northcross Mall into a Wal-Mart Supercenter and other stores. Wal-Mart said Friday that it will build a 186,500-square-foot store, instead of a 219,000-square-foot one. It will also build a separate 5,500-square-foot garden center.

By reducing the size, Wal-Mart avoids a threshold that would have required it to use higher estimates to predict traffic created by the store. The more traffic the store creates, the more road improvements the developer would be required to pay for.

Recent traffic counts at other Central Texas Wal-Marts showed that those stores draw as many as 28,277 cars a day — almost three times the amount Lincoln has predicted for Northcross. Also, a 2006 journal article from the Institute of Transportation Engineers said that discount stores bigger than 200,000 square feet generate more traffic than previously thought.
Lincoln needs to submita new traffic analysis by mid-June before the city can approve Lincoln's site plan and the Wal-Mart can be built.

City leaders recently told Wal-Mart that if the store remained bigger than 200,000 square feet, Lincoln would have to use the recent traffic counts and higher estimates from the journal article as a guide, Council Member Brewster McCracken said.

Richard Suttle, a lawyer representing Wal-Mart, said the change would make the Northcross Wal-Mart the smallest in Central Texas.

During the protest there were 3000 people and not everyone came in a car. When it was over there was a traffic jam and it was a Saturday, 11ish. It's all just common sense:

The mall was built in 1975.
Estimates of the population in Austin while the mall was at it's prime
1970- 251,808
1980- 345,496

Today we have over 656,562 (this was the population count in 2000)

So when that mall was at max capacity and cars moving in and out of the area did it create congestion? I am sure it did for THOSE times. The area did not extend much further past Anderson Lane.

So imagine max capacity of the mall today as a Wal Mart-keep in mind the amount of cars and people that site will have will increase from the 1975 Northcross Mall model because parking garages and square footage are planned to increase. Burnet and Anderson Lane will remain the same, as will Northcross drive. Big mess.

UHGRRRRRRR!

So the software has been installed but we are not off and running. Far from it. It has been a constant start stop frustruation (frustrating situation), a dozen an hour. Things freeze up and by the time I log in again with my 20 something alpha numeric password generated by a machine (what a quaint word nowdays) we are down again. (Checked for tapioca pudding recipes and we got two overnight! Thanks C. from Nebraska and P.L. from California, will test this weekend.) How far ahead I'd be by now if we stayed the constant and true course. It worked, why did we change, oh yeah progress, progress it's what all the other libraries were doing, improvement, improvement, it's bettertrustusjustbetterfasterimprovedprogressivestateoftheartcremeofthecropkingofthehilltopoftheheap.
Luddite I said, then referred to my personal bastardized definition of it but Henry set it straight: those that destroyed textile machines. Ironic. One thing I love and was just thinking of how much I loved it this morning was mechanics. I am by no means a technophobe anyway read this while I prepare to get back on when they say go. Wish me luck.

Tapioca Sidewalk Art

YES! We are getting sidewalks up and down the street,plus, a paved driveway. Right now the place is a huge mess and we have a mound of dirt and asphalt on our lawn. Looks like that mess is staying awhile but whatever, eventually, I hope, it will go away.

Can't wait to etch our names in the cement. Actually, I am uber excited about this, really can't wait for that!!! Once all this is out of the way we can start talking landscaping, like take down the scarybighuge dead tree and add three cute trees to the front yard. Make that retro driveway etc...

My friend Ollie and I can't seem to shake this lil obsession with tapioca pudding. We have both tried it several different ways. I did Coconut,Almond and Mexican Vanilla (bad, unappetizing color but tasted great) flavors, used evaporated milk, skim milk and let it boil anywhere from a few seconds to 10 minutes. Each time a different tapioca. So far the best was almond, skim milk and let it boil for only seconds. It took longer to set but was light and fluffy. Ollie was a chef and has been to culinary school and still finds tapioca a small challenge.

Want us to try your uncomplicated tapioca pudding recipe? Send us an email! If we love it we'll send you tchokes!

OOOOOOH some Robert Franks and Stieglitz's will be in town??? I checked it out and AMOA states: Key moments in that history are represented, such as Alfred Stieglitz’s The Steerage, 1907, selections from Robert Frank’s The Americans, 1955-56.... starting 5/19 I am there!

Gifties!

Wm gave me the Barry William's Presents: 70s Music Explosion CD set!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh yeeeeeeeeeeeeeah, SWEET! 70's am radio flashbacks like: Indian Reservation playing as I am being driven to kindergarten, looking at comics at the Piggly Wiggly with December 1963 playing, sitting in a car wash with my grandparents listening to Bad, Bad Leroy Brown, one of my first 45s, the Bay City Rollers in my dance class......
The set comes in a cute 45 record case.

Don't know how much listening to this had to do with me dreaming that William Demarest was my boss and something about a project that would bring Solid Gold back. I was still working in a library, so weird. My cubicle mate was Elinore Donahue and I was excited about having lunch with her and trying to not to ask her about everything from FKB to Get A Life then being embarassed that I brought a PB&J in an orange and yellow plastic lunch box with missing thermos. Totally random shhhhhhiiistuff.

Weekend

Man! It's May and that means students return to their homes and the streets are a bit thinned out in the mornings and Paramount movie time begins and there is parking at work as late as 7:30am!!!!!!!

1. Yay! Got the LP copy of the infamous Velvet Underground acetate! Cute, has a green banana. SOOOOOOOOO loving it! Can never, ever tire of the VU
2. Went to the Violet Crown Festival but they had no funnel cake and that is what I wanted to try. Yeah, I have never had funnel cake.
3. Had Lima beans for the first time in a long ass time. They were really very yummy and I have Lima bean fever now.
4. Need Jute! Realized that I am out.
5. What A Way to Go-one of my favorite films ever! Got to show it to some friends who have never seen it and now they love it too! Actually want to see again. I can get the fever for a movie and just watch and watch over and over. I did this with Rosemary's Baby, Casino,Goodfella's, Bonnie and Clyde, (wait, before you notice a pattern) Breakfast at Tiffany's, Darling, Funny Face, The Apt, Corrina, Corina even......
6.Hmmmm I have an aptitude for constant repetition though I have never felt like I am in a rut. Just lucky I guess, teehee
7. The last thing I thought of before I fell asleep on Sunday was Ken Nordine and how I had not thought of him in awhile. In a Ken Nordinemood, jonzing for Ken Nordine. I was after the LPs for awhile, yeah right! But I'm ready for them on cd now. I really love Colors and Wink.
8. Thought of these "things"
9. Very Hopeful

Grey, muggy days have always accompanied such news in the Spring (view entry:26.3.07 )

My friend, who I love so much, received news today that she is very ill. I've had a few friends have health issues recently. She knew she was ill but only to the extent of surgery and a long recovery. Instead the news today was more serious than we could of imagined and left us all stunned. We thought all that would be discussed was her surgery date. I want so much for her to come out of this, it will be complicated but it's completely possible per her doctor. That is what I want, for her to be completely well.

I wish I could fix people the way I can fix a turntable or other things I have fixed. I really am very good at that, things, just things. I am truly lousy with the sciences though so out went any possibility of becoming a doctor or a nurse (considered that once). I got the white elephant of the fix-it talents. Feels powerless to have a desire to heal and cure especially people you love. The desire to make people and animals well has always been there, it's one of those things I think everyone desires and would love to do but few have that ability.

When things like this happen my thoughts always jump back to happier times far, far from any thoughts of illness. It also makes me think of some saints like St Benedict who just retreated to a cave in Monte Cassino for three years, became a hermit to escape from reality because at the time reality was just too much for him. Later he emerged did good deeds, founded a monastery and became a saint.
Side note:
Hundreds of years later my Grandfather was severely wounded and left for dead near that monastery in Monte Cassino. It was a miracle that he survived after being left for three days on the side of a mountain with three wounds to the abdomen. Double miracle that he was able to walk (one bullet just a hair away from destroying his spine) and is still alive today. I digress, but that's good.

Finally the software has been installed at work and tomorrow should be a regular working day. I so need that right now. No time to look things up, no time to dwell on scarier scenarios than what we already know, just work, work, work,work.......
I want everyone to take care of themselves, health is wealth, it's all you really need, everything else fades and runs together when it comes down to it.

Still no work at work!

Yep, we still have no software installed and so, we can't do our work. I have to remember that the ideas I may get during this time are best left ignored. BUT! maybe Ebay will have a bubble machine I could buy. I thought, why not a bubble machine? Would be neat in the backyard. Though, it could scare away Sal Mineo, my skittish, adopted stray and I wouldn't want to do that.

Looking up "vintage coin operated" on Ebay, some interesting gadgets. Actually, just "coin operated" (adding vintage is redundant). Just type in "ugly vintage" or "ugly heavy" and you also get ineteresting things. How bored am I?

Bored! I can't think of a worse way to spend 8 hours. Darn, I should have saved 120 hours of vacation, I could be doing something really productive right now had I held on to 120 hours of vacation. That's a year, btw.

Remembering (after trying to forget) Chelsea Creekside Apartments

I used to live at these apartments and what a hell hole. One evening I had guests come over for the first time. It began to rain as they entered , as soon as they sat down the entire living room had to be moved into the kitchen. Water had begun to seep into the room at a rapid pace threatening my flokati, the entire living room and the soiree. All my towels had to be brought out to keep the water from damaging my furniture. The party continued but the ambiance sucked.

The laundry room was a place I never used or entered. One morning I passed it by and saw the table broken on the floor, the windows had been broken and glass and blood were everywhere. UGH! It was a crime scene with blood on the ceiling, broken windows, dents in the machines and holes in the walls where you could tell heads and fists went through and drops of blood down the sidewalk leading to the victim or the culprit. UGH!
To make it worse, nothing was ever cleaned up, fixed or replaced and remained this way until I left in 2005.

I came home one day to find the living room ceiling on my floor (not on the flokati). A pile of sheet rock and ceiling and a broken piece of furniture(nothing of value). It was at this point that my blood boiled and I exploded all over the staff. With this I moved out. The place was left as spotless as could be but they had "lost" my deposit. Still, I was more than happy to sign off and move into my own house.

I highly suggest you don't even contemplate living at Chelsea Creekside. Yes, it amazingly still stands, by a hair no doubt. It's a lousy and somewhat dangerous place. Loads of cops were at the building at least 4 times a month. The pool was declared a bio hazard at one point and management treats you like a deadbeat even when you have paid your rent in full months in advance. It was the roughest year I ever spent in an apartment in all my years in Austin. Last due paid before I became a homeowner.