Chateau Karamakov

I promise there will be cast iron update soon.

I can't stop watching Dance Academy. It's this Australian show that's basically Center Stage, except... a tv show, and Australian? and Better. capital B Better.

I had my sacral/pelvic/lumbar/thoracic dysfunction fixed -- the osteopath got the right side of my pelvis to drop down 3/4" back to level, which untucked my sacrum from where it was pinching my sciatic nerve, and he said he was very impressed with the amount of work it took to get my pelvis screwed up like that -- and my range of motion on my left side is suddenly nearly equal to that of my right side. There's clearly more work to be done; I have to relearn my alignment all over again, and all the muscles in my back are trying to figure out how to be in the proper place, which can be painful. I obviously don't want to overdo it and put myself back into sacral misery, especially since I have no idea how I got there in the first place. But, it's refreshing to know that I'm not just incapable of doing anything to the left in ballet.

Edited to add a kitten picture:

NYM 938L

We're watching Top Gear and I don't understand half the jokes, because they're all in British.

H is for Helping

Today I watched a solid 25 minutes of Sesame Street while icing my sciatic nerve on the couch. At home. No children present.

I need no defense but if I did, it would be that Grover 2.0 is hilarious.

I Am A Protein, All Living Organisms Need Me To Function

A new thing I learned the other day! Apparently when you get a gmail address, you own all the permutations involving periods, so when you own firstlast@gmail.com you also own first.last@gmail.com and also f.irst.l.ast@gmail.com and f.i.r.s.t.l.a.s.t@gmail.com blah blah etc.

I think it is time for a general update about the kidlets.

Baby Biebzbear is almost 14 months. Walking, running, finally eating food that isn't just baby food, finally. He is quite literally inhaling bread, he makes this scary choking noise because he eats it too fast. I stand there and stare at him while he eats his bread and his goldfish. He is transitioning to one nap, finally. He is generally less of a jerk, finally, but now it is too cold to go outside so we have 16 hours a week together in one tiny apartment, which is driving me nuts. He is pretty cute though.

Stellina LOVES school. She makes lots of art and then when I come over she goes "I MADE THIS I MADE THIS" and she is so proud. She got her first haircut recently, and it is super cute. She is the best.

The Three Horsechildren of the Apocalypse are as skinny and as apocalyptic as ever. Zannah, Prince Philip, and Captain Bananio, are all totally crazy insane. Though Zannah is becoming gradually more rational, Captain Bananio is losing all sense of sanity at a rate so exponential that it totally cancels out Zannah's eight year old maturity. Prince Philip is turning into the sweetheart I always knew he was, but he acts it more consistently now that he is in school. He doesn't remember how much he loved dressing up in Zannah's princess dresses, which makes me sad. He does know how to work Instant Netflix on the Wii. I do not know how to do this. I have to have a five year old help me with the technology.

Dave Jr. is getting over a cold, and I am crashing into a cold, so I did not see him this week. He turns two on Christmas Day. He loves Elmo. He loves watching Elmo on YouTube. It's pretty cute, actually. He's talking more and more and somehow not really making any more sense.

So, I've gotten to the point with my various kids that I think I can really see the benefit of sign language. When I first started with Stellina, she was 14 months, which is Biebzbear's age now. Dave Jr. is six months younger than Stellina, Captain Bananio is the exact same age, and Bee is a few months older. There are lots of factors at play, obviously, but when looking at communication, it's pretty clear that Stellina has always been at least one step ahead of all my other kids. It's unbelievable how far ahead of Captain Bananio she is, and when she was 14 months she was lightyears ahead of where Biebzbear is now. Even compared to Bee, who is older, Stellina is much easier to understand (perhaps because there is always a pacifier in Bee's mouth).

Anyway, I could write a lot about that. It's not just because I love Stellina the best. ...but I do.

New Things November-ish: Saturday the 34th of November

Some awesome New Things today! I went to IHOP.

AND IT WAS AWESOME.

LET ME TELL YOU.

It was extreem awesome. But there was a 45 minute wait, so first we had bloody marys and that was even more awesome!

(I have been to IHOP before, just not the brand new one in DC, so ... this is kind of a New Thing.)

Then I watched the most of a football game that I have ever watched! I watched a whole three quarters, before I had to leave for working times. It was great fun, except for the leaving. ALSO THE DUCKS WON... AGAIN. Woooo

Lastly, I let Stellina stay up WAY past her bedtime and watch an entire Sesame Street with me, because I was lonely, and I love her. We ate Honey Nut Cheerios together. We discussed her new big girl bed, which she is getting tomorrow, so that her old crib can be used for New Baby Space Monkey when he comes in March. We discussed her artwork on her brand new easel that she got for Hannukah, and we discussed how they learned about yelling in school yesterday (?!?!?), and we discussed how she had chicken for dinner, and we discussed how her haircut looks really fantastic. I've never been the cool babysitter and let kids stay up past bedtime, mostly because there is no point in letting kids under 2 stay up late, it only causes destruction and badness. Hopefully she will sleep late in the morning and give her mom and dad a break. Shhh.

Sunday is the last day of this past week, which I have lived through somehow. I don't know what happens tomorrow. Monday I have Baby Biebz from 9 to 5 and then the three horsechildren of the apocalypse (Zannah, Prince Philip, and Captain Bananio) from 6 until late???, and then the same thing again on Tuesday. So yes, I'll make bank between those two days. but I do not plan on being happy about it.

New Things November: Sunday the 28th

I took a new bicycle route to work today! I usually go south on either 8th or 11th, but today I went on 9th! It was very nice. I might do that again.

Also I had some New Kids today, one time kids. I had Bee, who has not yet made an appearance on the blog until now because even though I've been watching her since the beginning of the summer, she is not super regular, and she is more stress than sweet, so there aren't many cute stories to tell. But, today, I had her and the kids of her parents' friends, so that all the parents could go to dinner together. Bee is two and a half, and the boys are 4 and 6, so it was ... kind of stressful? The surround sound on the DVD player wasn't working, so when the characters on Finding Nemo were on the sides of the screen we could hear them just fine, but when they were in the center of the screen, their little aquatic mouths were moving and no sound was produced. None of the little ones seemed to care, but now I want to watch it again, so I can get all the funny parts that I missed.

Bee was mostly cuddly on the couch with me, which was super adorable, while the boys threw around a yoga ball and mostly ignored me when I yelled at them, until I took away the yoga ball and the 4 year old had a minor breakdown. My bike was only knocked over twice, so I consider the evening a complete success.

After we had found Nemo, we switched to The Wizard of Oz on one of the movie channels, and the sound was fine! Weird.

New-ish Things November: Friday the 26th

Today I did nothing new. I was in bed all day and I watched the new episodes of The Walking Dead, Modern Family, and Glee, in that order. Watching new episodes doesn't count, a whole new TV show might count but not new episodes. I took two showers, also not a new thing.

But this is my 200th blog post, which is a milestone, which is kind of like a new thing. In celebration I made this video which is very cute.




I am not sure what will be the new thing for tomorrow. It is my half birthday on Saturday the 27th, so maybe I will try a new bar, or maybe just a new drink at my regular bar, while wearing a pretty dress. We will see. Maybe not a dress, because it gets cold at night. Is it winter now??

New Things November: Wednesday the 17th

Today's new thing is Super Tasty New Thing. Somehow I have made it 22 years without eating banh mi sammich. NO LONGER! Super delicious. Also I got to have pho which made me into a superhero. Everyone should go eat one or twelve right now.

Also I got to drive a new way on Rock Creek Park today that I had never been. It was dark, so I didn't see anything to tell you.

Dave Jr. and I had some cute times today. After dinner we took a bunch of pictures with PhotoBooth, which was fun, and then we YouTubed Elmo videos. We watched Elmo Has Four Ducks, and 12 Ladybugs, and C is for Cookie, and I Love Trash, and then Elmo and India.Arie singing the ABCs. Somewhere in the middle of the ABCs, maybe somewhere around LMNOP, Dave Jr.'s eyes slammed shut and his head fell back on me, so we quickly said "adios" to the dogs and traipsed upstairs to brush teefs and wash face as best as possible. No bath tonight! Lucky bug.

New Things November: Saturday the 13th

Today I have a New Babby! Not for regulars but for tonight, anyway. She is amazingly adorable. She is the babby of some people with names. Names that you can Google and find things about. Babby is tiny and bubbly and has see-through eyelashes and loads of curly red hair, and is friends with Stellina! And anyone who is friends with Stellina is friends with me.

The Best Years of Our Lives is on TCM right now, which is exciting. Some people might know that it is one of my favorite movies! I wrote a couple of papers about it in sophomore year, but I haven't seen it since then. Myrna Loy is gorgeous.

OH, double new things for today! I found a store that sells ONLY CHEESE, and also I guess it sells other things that go well with cheese, so bread and olives and wine and stuff. I was only there for a few minutes but now I would like to back, because they sell ALL THE CHEESES.

New Things November: Thursday the 11th

Today the new things is some movies, I am in the middle of Elizabeth, which is pretty ok, and also I am watching Henry Poole is Here. It is interesting, I guess. I have never seen these movies! Luke Wilson is very Luke Wilson-esque. Both movies are really heavy on the religion! So there you go.

Some other things, as well. We have no heat, still. Tomorrow the guy comes to look at it to see if we need a new furnace, and then after that we will get a new furnace, because I will tell you that we need a new furnace.

I realized why my bartender looks so familiar, he looks just like Geoffrey Rush, but not the Geoffrey Rush in that picture, more like the Geoffrey Rush in Elizabeth.

I'm not sure how I feel about today.

Dear Selle Italia

I finally sucked it up and bought my new saddle for my bike, which I didn't want to do because it's pink and while I like pink, I wish it wasn't so gendered. Then I had a short but good conversation with one of the guys at the shop, who gets a ton of crap from people because his bike has lots of pink bits, pink grips and wheels and chain and straps and stuff. I wanted to have more conversation about it but I didn't get to. It is silly, the association of the color pink with the ladyfolk. If I want to have the color pink, I should be able to have it, but so should the guy at the bike shop who wants his bike to be pink. If I don't want to have pink, I should not have to have it.

That said, my new seat is pretty great. (and look! those people are selling it at cost!)

The end.


Tomorrow I get to watch the new episode of the zombie show. Or maybe Tuesday morning we will watch it before work, so that I don't have to sleep after it. I have already been having weird dreams lately.

My cat is trying to hack into my bag of Costco mangoes that Stellina's mama bought for me! He is a jerk.

Cold house is cold.

Today is Thursday

and I am cold.

I understand it is the case that I have not blogged in a long time. It is now October. It gets cold at night and often during the day it is not all that warm.

One of our biggest squashes is moldy?? Not rotting, moldy on the surface. I discovered this with no time to deal with it today, so I will deal with it tomorrow.

I have been listening to wayyyy too much pop music, but I did get to see the New Pornographers again on Sunday!

I was pretty disappointed by 30 Rock's live show last week, but I found the west coast show much more entertaining. Kelsey Grammer is guest on tonight's show!

I have almost finished my November budget! My finances are in pretty decent order, as it turns out.

For how short my attention span is, I can't stand flipping channels.

I keep having dreams that I wake up and my hair is long again.

Now that it is cold, Rhett is cranky again, and Zoe is cuddly except she keeps trying to escape.

Nine days until the Rally to Restore Sanity!

These are things that I know.

Maximum Strength Cortizone and I are like *this*

Things I did not accomplish this weekend:
1. Cleaning my room
2. Laundry
3. Purchasing eggs at farmers market, they were out before 9:20am! Boooo

Things I did accomplish this weekend:
1. Showered Captain Bananio with kisses this afternoon when I ran into him and his daddy at the store
2. Harvested squash blossoms
3. Singlehandedly provided enough blood to increase the world's mosquito population threefold
4. Started watching Doctor Who!
5. Started a project
6. Cooked and consumed stuffed fried squash blossoms oh hey oh hey oh HEY.

It is Zannah's 8th birthday!!! She is sooooo big

This was my Friday:

This is my cat sleeping at night:

And this was my dinner this evening!:
and theennnn we sopped up all the extra browned butter with bread that was fresh from the oven. This house was a good choice.

I am the biggest dork ever

I'm still a little bit weepy over THIS.

Happiness: November 18

THING EIGHTEEN: Laughing. Ok, that's cliche. but it's more specific than that!

My enjoyment of laughter causes me to appreciate other things! Things such as:

• Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me! I know my momma says it's bad for me, but I like to listen to the podcast of Wait Wait before I go to sleep at night. She says it will give me weird dreams, but it doesn't seem to. I just really love laughing as I fall asleep. Nothing during the day can bother me, and stuff can't hang over my head, because I'm laughing at something Paula Poundstone said to Tom Brokaw. I like that. The side effect of this, of course, is that I repeat episodes because there is only one a week, and I have to fall asleep 7 days in every week. I think I am probably their most avid listener. I listen nearly every single day!
  

• 30 Rock Yay for Netflix! I have the 3rd disc of Season 1 right now. and I'm being surprisingly good about not watching it all at once!

• Tina Fey, in general

• funny things that my kittens do, such as beg me for piggyback rides, and knock things over and then look at me like "You can't do anything to me, because (a) you love me and (b) I'm really cute!" This is the kind of situation in which I look sternly at kitten on top of bookshelf, with glass on carpet (unbroken, thankfully) and 50 bottlecaps all over everywhere, and then I turn around and giggle, so he can't see me.
  

• RUBY JUNE!!!!!!!