Thursday, March 25, 2010

Wonderful Williamsburg for the Weekend

So after that awfully alliterative title, perhaps I should finally tell you about my trip to Williamsburg this past weekend. On Thursday night, Jeff and I trekked over to his parents' house and ate some yummy home-cooked chicken and slept. In the morning I got up to get my truck inspected. I took it to this GM dealer (after all it's a GMC), except it wasn't a GM dealer anymore - it was a Hyundai dealer. Luckily they were still an inspection station so I still got it done there. Had to replace the wiper blades, so they now have the Hyundai symbol on them which amuses me for some reason. After that we headed down to Richmond to Thai Diner Too to have lunch with Jeff's friend Savannah. However, on the way, we discovered that Savannah had to stay home with her sick kid so we went to Thai Diner Too by ourselves. It was good! Then we went to Savannah's house in Church Hill which is a nice neighborhood. She has a really sweet pit bull named Will, and she lives with Thomas and his son Silas who is an adorable toddler and he was a bit sick. But I made silly faces at him and he liked us. Savannah is also pregnant with twins, and studying to become an art teacher. Pretty cool.

After that we drove on to Williamsburg, and went to dinner at Sal's with my grandmother. It was good as always. From there we drove to campus, then rounded up the troops to spend a Green Leafe gift certificate. Megan, JG, Trevor, and Will ended up coming. We ate cheese fries, had some beers, watched some basketball, and generally had a good time. After that we ran into Ashley and Margaret who were going to the drag ball, so Jeff and I decided to go too. It was great - Will Martin picked me up and carried me almost all the way into the room, and everybody rushed up to us when we got there and gave us a gigantic hug. The Lambda people are so awesome. Also Rachel A, Erica, Pablo, and Alex Y were there. After drag ball ended only an hour later (sadly) Jeff and I went to Rachel A's room with a group and hung out for a while, then went back to bed.

On Saturday we were supposed to meet Suz in CW but she didn't make it. Instead we met Zach and Trevor in CW and had a Cheese Shop picnic on the Palace Green. It was lovely. After that Jeff and I went to Jamestown Beach because the weather was so nice and read in the sun. Then we went to Zach and Trevor's room to watch with them and Mel the adult musical comedy version of Alice in Wonderland and eat pizza. Next we drove to the Huttons' house off campus for the yearly Classics banquet, which just happened to be occurring (fortuitous!). It was cool to see classics club people and my profs. Also Sam Angley made an awesome Pantheon cake and an awesomer penis-shaped cake (which was also delicious!). After that Jeff and I met up with Minda, then went to the UC which is now the SC to grab Kat, and Mel was there too. We talked for a while then went to Wawa where I sadly did not get mac n cheese because I was too full. Or a milkshake even! Wawa run fail. Oh well. Then we sat on the Sunken Gardens until it was too chilly, and after that we went to Landrum and met up with Suzy as well as visiting Katy, who rooms with Catherine Cole who also happened to be there! We hung out for a while in the basement then left for sleeps.

Sunday we headed to Newport News to meet Suz and my mom for lunch. Managed to catch Suz this time, but my mom couldn't make it because of traffic - ugh. It was pretty unfortunate. We went to a Mexican place in City Center called Salsa's which was decent and quite cheap. Then we walked around for a while and then headed out to try to make it to a dinner party in DC with Jeff's APCO friends (at Karly's house), which we did make, though we were late. It was yummy and then we walked to Eastern Market to return some library items. Basically, a jam-packed fun weekend!

Since then:

Monday - there was THUNDER! For I think the first time since I've lived here.
Tuesday - trivia! Carla came with Mary and Rob. We did terribly; the picture round was female tennis players, and basically just blonde Russian ones. It got better from there though, just not better enough. Before trivia I went to MLK library and read, which was a good way not to go home.
Wednesday - work was great because I got to hang out with my supervisor while he did database stuff then he took me to get a burrito at CalTort! Also it was nice out so we ate at the Sculpture Garden by the now-closed ice rink which, I found out, is actually in a giant fountain! Cool. Then after work and stopping by home I met Jeff at Mt Vernon Square, and we went to the DCist Exposed Photo Exhibit's last day at Longview Gallery. There were some cool pictures and all for sale for a mere $100 or more. Way out of my price range. Then we walked towards home and found ourselves in Logan Circle, at which point we realized we were close to the Whole Foods. We followed the trail of people with Whole Foods bags to the store and decided to grab salads at the salad bar for dinner - and they were awesome. So many toppings... mmm... On the way back some guy outside of a personal trainer place asked us if we worked out but didn't try to sell us anything and then some nice middle-aged ladies laughed with us about it.
Today - nothing special.

As for the future:
Tomorrow - dinner at the Melting Pot! Karaoke!
Saturday - kite festival! possibly Good Stuff Eatery!
also... how long can we manage not to go to the grocery store? It'll have been two weeks since we went tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Monday, March 15, 2010

DIY: Air Mattress Pump*

*all genius belongs to Jeff.

As I mentioned in the last post, Zach and Trevor came by and stayed over not this past weekend but the weekend before. Jeff and I had thoughtfully bought an air mattress, so when added to our Love Sac that equaled two makeshift beds. We were looking in Target and the cheapest one didn't come with a pump. I voiced mild concern that it would be annoying to blow it up by our own lung power but Jeff was certain it wouldn't be too much of a problem. So it came time to set the thing up and there was a problem, only not one we had expected. The little air hole thingy that you usually use to blow things up with was clearly designed with only letting air out in mind. You literally couldn't get air in it - we thought maybe it came with the hole not opened but that wasn't the case, it was just somehow designed to go only one way. I was ready to give up and go buy an air pump. However, Jeff had an idea. He asked for two items:

+

It worked really well, actually, as a makeshift pump! Now, if you're going to do this at home, you need a hair dryer that has a 'cool' setting. I wouldn't try it with the hot air unless you want to risk that fragrant smell of melting plastic (and you don't, plus busting the air mattress is no good either). You can use any old cardboard tube, and I'm betting you have one around somewhere. Open up the place where the pump hose goes, put the cardboard tube over it, then hold the hair dryer against the tube, blowing in cool air, and there you go - a relatively decently inflated air mattress! I'm happy that my boyfriend is so creative!

Sunday, March 14, 2010

Let's face it... I'm a slacker

Yes, I'm going to admit it right now. There's something in me that's patently lazy. Maybe it's just the weather - after all, I have done a lot during all the nice days we've had, at least. Maybe it's the still-early-darkening of the days. Maybe, for this week in particular, it's the fact that I've been sort of sick. But anyway, there are a lot of things I haven't been doing. One of them is writing in this blog. I hope to change that. I get distracted every time I'm online, especially by my RSS feed which has the effect of 'oooh, shiny...'. Also, playing Robot Unicorn Attack hasn't helped (I see you clicking that link. Go ahead... it's fun). And I just decided to really start up my Flixter account, to feed that need to put star ratings on everything I do ever - so that covers movies now as well as books and food/businesses/museums not to mention the site I use to simply catalog everything I watch or read. So I'm a little addicted to social media sites, including Facebook and Tumblr too, which sadly has made me neglect my blogging.

I also haven't been exercising like I should. Yes, last weekend I walked from my house to U Street to Dupont Circle then from Metro Center to the Washington Monument to the Capital building to Union Station then from Woodley Park to Adams Morgan to home again... but then I woke up the next morning to find that my knee hurt. So I need to be doing stretches and purposeful knee exercises. And going out dancing whenever I'm feeling better from this mystery illness.

Another thing I haven't been doing is applying for jobs. My AI internship is coming to a close at the end of April, and I'd really like to have something part-time lined up by then. I am also going to apply to this sweet Sierra Club internship, but that is basically a shot in the dark. But if I got it - oh man, two months in SF plus hiking and rafting and traveling? AND a whole bunch of free North Face gear? Awesome. Basically I gotta get on the making-another-video thing. I just don't want to give up. Of course, it's also come to my attention that I should probably be thinking about the future. The Sierra Club internship wouldn't really help there, unless I really go for my dreams and try to make some sort of career out of travel or the great outdoors in one way or another (kayak instructor? horse trek leader? ropes course facilitator? travel writer? suggestions?). Maybe I could be the next Randy Drake, who knows.

Here are what I have in mind for possibilities of what I might do in the future: library or archival work, museum stuff, teaching of some sort, or maybe something with computers, maybe even specifically social media. It's still pretty broad and each thing is even too general. But at least for most of that stuff I am on the right track - the Smithsonian internship is really broad, enough to cover most of that stuff. I need to do some informational interviews with some CFCH employees to see what they really do and if I might like it. I want to work in a library, I really do, to see if that's the kind of thing I might like. And of course there's the hope that Jeff and I will be teaching in South Korea next year which would cover the teaching possibility, and allow me to see if I like it.

Here's a quick overview of what I have been doing:

-Obsessively watching the entire three seasons of Veronica Mars (oh wait, there is where all my time has gone recently!) But I'm done now. Kind of sad.
-Languishing on my computer.
-Reading the Mistborn series by Brandon Sanderson (partway through book 2 of 3 now).
-Feb. 27 - my parents came to visit. Ate lunch at Capitol Brewing Co., walked around the mall, went to the National Botanic Gardens, played some Phase 10 at home, ate dinner at Ray's Hell Burger.
-Feb. 28 - parents still here, and my grandparents came in along with Uncle Jamie and Aunt Kathy and we went to brunch at Jaleo which was absolutely amazing and decadent. Then my parents and Jeff and I went to the Newseum. I returned the next day since the admission gets you in two days in a row. It was great.
-March 6 - went into AI really early to help Keri with a meeting. Then went over to Old Town Alexandria and watched a St. Patrick's Day parade, met up with StephGreg and Suz and Nate and had some lunch and some cupcake. There were shriner cars and storm troopers in the parade!
-March 7 - Zach and Trevor came to visit and we did the aforementioned walking around, going to Ben's Chili Bowl for lunch, Firehook for a cookie, and Bukom, a West African place in Adams Morgan, for dinner.
-March 8 - I went to Pollo Campero by the metro for lunch with Zach and Trevor then finally finished Veronica Mars, leaving me time for a life.
-This Wednesday started getting dizzy spells so I didn't go into work Thursday, and went in but left early Friday, and didn't go to the rally yesterday. I'm feeling better now and we're supposed to visit Williamsburg this weekend, so I hope I really am better.

Sorry this post was so long, but I had a lot of catching up to do.

Jeff GIF

Just testing out some online GIF animators. Hopefully this works!

gif maker


And this might just be a little better:
gif maker

(made them at Picasion)