Thursday, February 15, 2007
Well, that's reassuring!
It is always good to hear, when calling one's cable modem service, that the tech on the other end of the line would not recommend the service he is supporting because it doesn't work very well, especially in our area. Sigh. The next house we move to (Yes! We are moving again!) will either have Amnet or we will get Acelera through the ICE. Double sigh.
Monday, February 12, 2007
Help me name this quilt!
At long last, here is the first pic of the quilt top that I've been working on for a year (or so), and that I hope to enter in the Costa Rica quilt show in May:
As you can see, this is only the quilt top, and still needs to be backed and quilted and bound, plus the embellishments (like whiskers) will go on at the very end. It looks a little wonky because it's just pinned to a curtain, but it really is pretty straight on the edges! (The border is wonky, but it's supposed to be that way -- it's called a crazy border and is made similar to the way a crazy quilt is put together, using leftover pieces of material from the quilt itself.) The quilt is based on a poster by Laurel Burch for the ASPCA for "Adopt-a-Shelter-Cat Month" back in 2005:
I got the poster after the cat shelter where my mom used to volunteer was done with it, and I immediately liked the art and thought what a great quilt it would make. I love the graphic style of Laurel Burch's artwork, which lends itself really nicely to quilting. I had originally intended to donate it to the shelter to hang on the reception room wall when the quilt show was over, but now that my mom no longer works there after a falling out with some of the leadership, I'm reconsidering. Then I thought that I'd give the quilt to my mom (who has 27 cats) after the quilt show, but since she will probably not make the quilt show (my first ever), and hasn't always been there for some of the more important events in my life (e.g., graduating from two colleges), with the exception of my wedding and the birth of my son, I'm reconsidering that also. Maybe I'll just keep it for my son. What do you think?
At any rate, before I can quilt it, I need to make a label, which includes the title of the quilt. I was thinking of something along the lines of "Laurel's Feline Friends" or "Laurel's Rainbow Cats for Colin" (he told me the border looks like a "wainbow"), but I can't decide. I would like the title to pay homage to the original artist, while capturing the essence of the quilt. HELP! I'm not so good at titling things.
What do you think of my interpretation of the art? Will it fly for the quilt show? Comments are MUCH appreciated!
Speaking of quilts, you may remember my fiasco of a quilt block that I donated to the Quilt Pink project. Well, the quilts are finally finished, and here is the finished quilt. I also donated a couple of blocks to this quilt; can you guess which ones they are?
As you can see, this is only the quilt top, and still needs to be backed and quilted and bound, plus the embellishments (like whiskers) will go on at the very end. It looks a little wonky because it's just pinned to a curtain, but it really is pretty straight on the edges! (The border is wonky, but it's supposed to be that way -- it's called a crazy border and is made similar to the way a crazy quilt is put together, using leftover pieces of material from the quilt itself.) The quilt is based on a poster by Laurel Burch for the ASPCA for "Adopt-a-Shelter-Cat Month" back in 2005:
I got the poster after the cat shelter where my mom used to volunteer was done with it, and I immediately liked the art and thought what a great quilt it would make. I love the graphic style of Laurel Burch's artwork, which lends itself really nicely to quilting. I had originally intended to donate it to the shelter to hang on the reception room wall when the quilt show was over, but now that my mom no longer works there after a falling out with some of the leadership, I'm reconsidering. Then I thought that I'd give the quilt to my mom (who has 27 cats) after the quilt show, but since she will probably not make the quilt show (my first ever), and hasn't always been there for some of the more important events in my life (e.g., graduating from two colleges), with the exception of my wedding and the birth of my son, I'm reconsidering that also. Maybe I'll just keep it for my son. What do you think?
At any rate, before I can quilt it, I need to make a label, which includes the title of the quilt. I was thinking of something along the lines of "Laurel's Feline Friends" or "Laurel's Rainbow Cats for Colin" (he told me the border looks like a "wainbow"), but I can't decide. I would like the title to pay homage to the original artist, while capturing the essence of the quilt. HELP! I'm not so good at titling things.
What do you think of my interpretation of the art? Will it fly for the quilt show? Comments are MUCH appreciated!
Speaking of quilts, you may remember my fiasco of a quilt block that I donated to the Quilt Pink project. Well, the quilts are finally finished, and here is the finished quilt. I also donated a couple of blocks to this quilt; can you guess which ones they are?
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Dee has horrible taste in music
If you don't want to spend a ton of money buying brand-new things when moving to Costa Rica, do what I (and many other expats) do: check the classifieds for used stuff for sale. I recently bought a beautiful couch (ok, only partially bought it because my ex-maid stole $100 of the $200 I was going to pay for it with) from a friend, who'd bought it from someone else. It's from Altea Design, like new, and that store's stuff is ridiculously overpriced. But for $250, ain't a bad deal at all.
Lots of people come, buy stuff, then decide to go not long after and sell their crap when they leave. Such was the case with Dee, who was selling her iPod. I wanted to get one for esposo, because, as a chef, he can really get "in the zone" when working, especially to music. Hers was only a tad more than the ones you can get in the U.S., and it came with "lots of music from the itunes store." Now, I didn't figure that being much of a selling point for me, because I have odd, er, eclectic tastes when it comes to music. I like punk rock, ska, swing, some "rock en espanol," bossanova, and a lot of music from the Middle East (especially anything in Arabic; I just love listening to the language even though I only understand one word: "habibi"), Asia, and Africa, and I do adore the cheese factor of anything Bollywood. I can't abide most country, "soft rock," dance music, or hip hop (though I do like a few hip-hop bands, Black Eyed Peas being one of them). I really didn't figure Dee would have much to offer on the iPod in the way of music.
When I got it home, I downloaded all of the music to my computer, added it to iTunes, and discovered that I had to "deauthorize" my computer to even listen to at least 60-70% of it. So all of those went right in the trash can. Of the remaining, I think I kept some disco from the 70s, a couple of 80s tunes, and some John Denver songs (why is it that "Country Roads" always makes me cry?). Dee had a lot of what I will call "high energy dance music" (think the crap you listen to while doing aerobics) that I just could not abide, so those all went. I think I ended up with 20 songs total. Oh well, one could always just download whatever one wants illegally using LimeWire or some other such p2p software. No great loss, believe me!
Come to think of it, though, I bet Dee would think my taste in music is just as crappy as I think hers is. Or perhaps not. I used to have a radio show on KAZU in Monterey, California that at least a few people listened to, and in fact of which I was quite proud...damn, I sure do miss those days sometimes!
Anyway, I made a CD of Dee's leftover music ("In Memoriam: Dee," I call it) that I could, in fact, stomach, and have threatened to make esposo listen to it in the car. He, in retaliation, has threatened divorce.
Lots of people come, buy stuff, then decide to go not long after and sell their crap when they leave. Such was the case with Dee, who was selling her iPod. I wanted to get one for esposo, because, as a chef, he can really get "in the zone" when working, especially to music. Hers was only a tad more than the ones you can get in the U.S., and it came with "lots of music from the itunes store." Now, I didn't figure that being much of a selling point for me, because I have odd, er, eclectic tastes when it comes to music. I like punk rock, ska, swing, some "rock en espanol," bossanova, and a lot of music from the Middle East (especially anything in Arabic; I just love listening to the language even though I only understand one word: "habibi"), Asia, and Africa, and I do adore the cheese factor of anything Bollywood. I can't abide most country, "soft rock," dance music, or hip hop (though I do like a few hip-hop bands, Black Eyed Peas being one of them). I really didn't figure Dee would have much to offer on the iPod in the way of music.
When I got it home, I downloaded all of the music to my computer, added it to iTunes, and discovered that I had to "deauthorize" my computer to even listen to at least 60-70% of it. So all of those went right in the trash can. Of the remaining, I think I kept some disco from the 70s, a couple of 80s tunes, and some John Denver songs (why is it that "Country Roads" always makes me cry?). Dee had a lot of what I will call "high energy dance music" (think the crap you listen to while doing aerobics) that I just could not abide, so those all went. I think I ended up with 20 songs total. Oh well, one could always just download whatever one wants illegally using LimeWire or some other such p2p software. No great loss, believe me!
Come to think of it, though, I bet Dee would think my taste in music is just as crappy as I think hers is. Or perhaps not. I used to have a radio show on KAZU in Monterey, California that at least a few people listened to, and in fact of which I was quite proud...damn, I sure do miss those days sometimes!
Anyway, I made a CD of Dee's leftover music ("In Memoriam: Dee," I call it) that I could, in fact, stomach, and have threatened to make esposo listen to it in the car. He, in retaliation, has threatened divorce.
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