Miscellany of a Cheshire Cat

I’m a bit of a weather tracking nerd, I’ll admit it. In my Mac’s dashboard, I tend to track places I work with people, places I’d like to go and places I’ve been. That’s Portland, MAINE in the upper left at 100 degrees. Concord, NH. Glen Mills, PA. Toronto, Ontario. Eau Claire, WI. Key West is certainly looking appealing and Vancouver, my beloved Vancouver, BC? 63 degrees. How civilized. Now that it’s after 11 p.m., the temperatures here are down in the low 90s.

Pennsic prep is necessarily abbreviated this year. Laundry is on-going but I think most of the Pennsic stuff is clean at this point. The humidity may be at 65-75% but it’s hot enough that stuff is still drying quickly in the sun out on the back porch. I have achieved footwear that is more supportive than my usual little medieval shoes and shouldn’t kill me in the heat. I wouldn’t call these shoes subtle or say they’ll blend in all that well, but they’re not sneakers. I’ll be taking sneakers too. Must keep feet happy.

I’ve got a vague plan for food but nothing involved. I have a bunch of eggs to use up so there will likely be cookies. (OH NO!) And Pennsic is always better with Chex mix (at least it means I get my salt).

So, yes, crazy week at work. Pushing probably a little too hard to get stuff done and yet it doesn’t feel like hard enough… Worried about vacation coverage so I’m already planning on checking email lots. Stressing about stupid stuff. Getting interrupted by other stuff. Not being able to prioritize due to conflicts. I’m ready to shut up and reboot my job. Even if I check my email 3 times a day at Pennsic, I will enjoy the time off immensely. I need it.

heat, packing, pennsic, weather

It’s so warm this lily may burst into flame! We still have less than ideal AC to the bedroom, but the house is otherwise cool, thankfully. I would still prefer to have some cooler days though… I’d rather have windows open than be running the AC. The house feels so comfy with the windows wide open.

My morning has already had a crisis… the k-cup machine didn’t want to work. I have coffee now, thankfully, but it was touch and go for a little over an hour. Every once in a while the water system fails to produce water. Usually turning it off and turning it back on has worked, but this time it wanted a rest before it decided it was ok to actually function.

As a result of this trauma, I’m now on my second cup of coffee. With whole milk. Yum. I’m so decadent.

In completely random science news, it’s been a year on Neptune since Neptune was discovered as a planet. Neptune was discovered in 1846.

coffee, heat, neptune, random, summer, weather

Happy birthday to the Mini-cats! There is tuna in your immediate future. The ladies are 2 years old and have been filling in quite a bit the last few months. They’re still “mini”, but it’s hard not to be with Monster Cat around.

For another year I resisted buying legal but crazy fireworks from the grocery store or fly-by-night fireworks stand. I got a taste of the Wilmington fireworks display last night which was, remarkably, just enough to make me content.

The weekend has been excellent and relaxing if insufficiently productive due to heat and insufficient air conditioning. There’s been lots of pool time and hanging out. We have proof, once again, that if you add a couple glow sticks to a group of vaguely responsible adults they are all likely to act like kids for hours. (Glow sticks float!)

I’m starting to think seriously about getting things ready for Pennsic. I’m hoping not to sew much, but we’ll see. Thinking, however, does not count as doing and hope is not a plan. I have a new comfy-garish chair for War though… it’s bright yellow-green with orange arms and has a terribly non-period print on it… but it’s the right level of comfortable and will be fine if I throw something over it to hide it a little.

4th of july, cats, fireworks, mini-cats, pennsic, weekend

The seedlings and some bean seeds are in the raised beds in the 90 degree heat. Once again, I think the plants are too crowded, but every other time I’ve thought that they’ve been fine. New this year: sweet peppers, beans and jalapenos. Basil and 2 types of cayenne are back again this year.

To get enough space I had to pull some of the mint that had taken over one of the beds. Despite the heat, my brain said, “Hey, there must be something I can do with a knee-high pile of mint.” Since I was already Too Hot, I decided to make some mint sugar syrups on the stove. One experimental mint syrup and one experimental ginger-mint syrup are cooling on the counter right now. I hope they’re relatively tasty. And while my brain was on sugar syrup, I started browsing my liquors book and notes. I might have to do some spiced liquor experiments soon too.

I need to do something about the other bits of garden around the yard… I broke a trowel trying to dig a spot to transplant some of the mint. More topsoil. More hot, dirty work. Maybe it’ll cool off… but I’m not holding my breath because this is already the second month with multiple 90+ degree days this year.

Still on the list today: 1) Go through the fabric closet. 2) Grocery shopping.
Given it’s a holiday, I think the latter won’t be happening until tomorrow.

gardening, heat, mint, random, syrups, weather

Technically, today was cooler than the past few days. Technically. I’m not actually sure I believe it, but maybe it’s the heat catching up with me. I am more than ready to be on vacation. Seriously. I have dealt with double my quota of stupid people today. Stupid people and heat make me cranky all by themselves… together, monster-cranky.

So here is a pretty flower from my garden. It makes me less cranky. Sleep, sleep will be nice for reducing the cranky too I think. I love sleep. Yay sleep. Good night!

flowers, heat, photographs, photography, roses, stupid people, weather

Hot days like these call for polar bears.

I borrowed slyppi‘s shopping karma today, sort of in exchange for some zen I loaned her earlier in the week. I had extraordinary good luck at Kohl’s and Fashion Bug. I ended up with a dress for the wedding next Saturday without too much trauma! I also found 2 fabulous tops for work, 2 casual tops and 2 piratey tops (one is even pink to help me embrace my “pirate chickness” – I even have a flag). Finally, I snagged an awesome dress – black lace over red slinkyness. It wasn’t an awesome dress when I tried it on a few months ago and it was $70. But, at $14 this dress qualifies for awesome status.

I have also achieved a great deal of pleating in the past 36 hours. Stupid Fop pants. They still need buttonholes, but the cuffs and waists are pleated into their appropriate sizes. I hope. Can I mention one more time that I hate pleats? Yes? Good. I hate pleats. A lot. They tweak the little OCD chick in the back of my head and I end up using a zillion pins when I probably shouldn’t have to. There’s probably a better, easier and faster way. In fact, I expect an e-mail from my mother in the morning telling me there is indeed a better, easier and faster way to put in pleats and that I’m a silly goose for not realizing sooner.

I also finally got around to doing a mock-up of a Viking apron dress. I’ll be having Gertrude help me tomorrow with cutting the hem right. Then I’ll rip it apart and cut one or two out of real fabric. The apron dress does not involve any pleats. I’m excited by this. I’d rather do dags than pleats. The apron dress doesn’t involve dags either, it’s okay. I have a ridiculous list of things I’d like to get sewn for Pennsic. I think if I get a quarter of it done, I’ll be doing well.

This weekend has been stupidly hot. I hope all the folks at EKWC are drinking their water. Well, at this hour they’re probably drinking something else, but I hope they drank their water all day! I have been chugging ice water today. I was reminded earlier why I don’t usually drink ice water – I drank 2 big glasses very quickly. Ugh. Oops. I’m glad I could spend the day being productive in air conditioning. I am a wimp when it comes to heat. I skipped war camp this weekend in the interest of not starting Pennsic already cranky about heat. I’d be fine with a cold Pennsic this year – days in the mid-70s, nights in the low 60s or 50s… Yeah, that would be lovely.

Right, now it’s time to go to bed, but not to sleep… I haven’t finished Jhegaala yet.

clothing, garb, heat, pennsic, sales, sca, sewing, shopping, weather

We had some fun thunder and lightning earlier and the heat has finally broken a bit. It’s down to 75° F out there right now. If it weren’t nearly midnight I might be more excited by the low temps.

I ordered from Threadless again. I blame my dear friend and coworker Andy who mentioned them casually the other day. I popped over to learn that my favorite t-shirt now comes in their super-soft custom brand and it was all down hill from there. I even got The Fop a shirt, because I’m just that kind of darling girl. And the package you see pictured here with Mr. Paw? That’s from Threadless. There’s nothing like being awesome.

Work is being its usual adventure. I got bogged down with spreadsheets that I’m pretty sure I still don’t fully understand as well as miscellaneous other “do this now please – it’s urgent” items. Always fun even if these things derail my usual plans.

I already feel like summer is flying by and it’s only June 10th – in many ways, summer has barely begun! I really need to readjust my mindset to Pennsic being the middle of summer instead of the end of summer.

And that’s all the news that’s fit to print tonight!

heat, t-shirts, threadless, weather, work

For those keeping score at home, this is the 75th episode of Monster Cat!

It was a terribly hot weekend. Saturday the cats were left alone to be lumps around the house. They were very glad to see us when we got home. Since their food dishes weren’t empty, I have to assume their happiness was due to the fact that our thumbs would soon turn some AC. They did look a little wilted in their little fur coats. Sunday we did very little. I organized some sewing stuff and poked around at bits of my desk. I’m achieving greater organization but slowly. Tennyson spent the day finding the best angle on the Vornado fan. I am happy to report that it circulates air very well, even with a large, gray cat in the way!

More comics at: The Chronicles of Monster Cat

cats, comics, heat, monster cat, organization, silly, tennyson, weaterh, weekend

We’re looking at having a very hot weekend here. Monster Cat is not excited by this. Neither am I.

More comics at: The Chronicles of Monster Cat

cats, comics, monster cat, silly, tennyson, hot, air conditioning, boxes, weather

That’s right. It’s March. It’s practically Spring, especially if you ask my thermometer. *grumble* I hate missing a really good Winter.

Monster Cat has been terribly cute lately. I’ve been in Meeting Hell [tm] lately and he’s taken to climbing into my lap when I push back to listen to the conference call. Cute and warm, both of which are good. Except that it got really warm in my office again today. Handily he’s easily displaced if I open a window. Because he can SMELL things through the screen and that’s very exciting to what kitty brain he has.

It rained on the paper recycling. I’m sure the guys who do the pick ups hate that. A lot. I wish the town let us recycle more curb-side. I don’t mind separating nor do I mind the fact that we sometimes go a full month without a recycling day due to holidays and elections. I do mind that we don’t do plastic recycling at all and glass recycling involves running down to the school to dump stuff. So what goes out? Metal and paper. And paper needs to be self-contained in paper or cardboard which isn’t usually a problem as long as we aren’t getting too much junk mail. They won’t dump from blue bins. Please, Upper Darby, just make this easier for everyone. Oh and it will help me save the planet even more! Yes, at least we have curb-side recycling. It is awesome. But I want more!

And that’s all for now. I will post this in the morning. (Yes, I try to get Monster Cat posts prepped the night before so I can just click “Publish” in the morning. I’m not nearly creative enough to build Monster Cat in the morning. Nor am I coordinated enough to do all the right exports and uploads. Trust me, it’s best for everyone. I usually give myself at least half an hour between getting up and playing with fire to make coffee… comics are much more dangerous than my stove and should not be toyed with in an under-caffeinated state! Or in an over-tired state, which I am quickly achieving here. I guess I should close these parentheses and toddle off.)

More comics at: The Chronicles of Monster Cat

, cats, comics, meetings, monster cat, recycling, silly, tennyson, weather, work