joy and shadows

Busy weekend. We started it off with another grill-fest, when Steve's car buddy and his girlfriend and their dog Bandit came over for dinner. We really do need to get some patio furniture, because it's not a cookout unless you can eat outdoors. In any case, there was way too much steak, and Bandit was the happiest dog in NJ with a big plate of scraps.

I was up at 6:45 on Saturday because F1 qualifying was on, meaning that husband was up and rattling around like a pea in a coffee can even though qualy wasn't on until 8 AM. I hate getting up early on the weekends; it feels like such a cheat. Once qualifying was over, we went to Rutgers for Ag Field Day/the NJ Folk Festival, which we hadn't gone to in years. I was hoping to get some interesting flowers, but they seemed to have all the usual stuff for this time of year, and it wasn't worth carrying back to the car.

We had a great conundrum over whether to eat at the fair or whether to go to College Ave. to hit the grease trucks for lunch. (As an aside, I can not believe that the grease trucks have their own Wiki entry. This is truly wonderful.) Husband had a severe jones for a Fat Cat, which is two cheeseburgers, French fries, lettuce, tomato and onions on a sub roll (hey buddy, you want fat cat?) I had a gyro, because they really do make the best gyros in NJ. It was delicious, even though they left off my hot sauce. :P

Saturday night, there was a bachelorette party in NYC for a friend who is getting married over Memorial Day weekend. We went to a tourist-trap restaurant off Times Square and then a tourist-trap comedy club for a dueling pianos show. The piano show got started almost an hour late, and it left me in the position of getting home by myself from an unfamiliar train station because I wanted to take the 12:24 train home and no one else did. At any rate, I found my way home eventually, and then we were up again early for the F1 race on Sunday.

After the race, husband thought we ought to go see a movie, so we went to see "Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay." It made me realize that the reason I liked the first movie was because it was set in NJ - the sequel was very raunchy, and the gratuitous amounts of frontal poontang were really not what I'd signed up for. We went out for sushi afterwards, and I tried a roll with raw fish in it for the first time. Not bad, but I'm not sure I'd make a habit out of it.

All in all, lots to do, and next weekend is going to be just as much fun. :)

Such a lovely weekend. I'm so happy now that spring is here. We have three gorgeous cherry trees in the back yard, and there's something very Japanese about viewing the moon and the cherries at the same time. XD Sadly, the cherry trees in the back are starting to drop their petals in a snowfall every time the wind blows, but the cherry tree out front only just started to bloom. My daffodils came up (mostly) and are looking very cheerful. The package was supposed to contain many varieties, but out of twenty, three didn't bloom and only one is different from the standard yellow kind. That's OK; they are pretty all the same.

It was past time to do something about the state of our yard, so we put out a general call for help this weekend, and husband's parents answered the plea. I don't think I'd be exaggerating too much to call Mom Q a master gardener, so it was great to have her around to tell me what kinds of plants would work well in our back yard and which ones the deer wouldn't immediately destroy. (We have a LOT of deer in our area.)

We took down one tree and several shrubs, and we planted two Leyland cedars, a Japanese holly, and a kind of spirea. The back definitely looks a lot nicer now that the scruffy dying spruce is gone. Mom Q and I looked in vain for a butterfly bush that wasn't white, but it seems that most of the nurseries don't have them in just yet. We'll see what we find at Cook College next weekend when we go to Ag Field Day. Husband was worried that if we planted butterfly bushes too close to the road, the butterflies might get hit by cars, but I reassured him that we'd plant them closer to the house.

Last Friday, husband surprised me with a brand-new Jenn-Air grill, and we christened it on Saturday night with some excellent steaks (yay Costco!) His aunt and uncle came over for the cookout, which was great because we'd been meaning to ask them over for a while. They had helped us paint, and they hadn't seen the house again since we moved in permanently.

Husband left yesterday for South Carolina until Wednesday, so I get to play Single Girl until he returns. Mostly this means having Cocoa Krispies in the morning because he's not there to sniff at my love of kid cereals. He'll be away quite a bit this summer, which isn't very fun. Oh well, more internets time for me at home.

OH HAY GUYS, I HAVE A FUN GAME FOR YOU B/C WORK IS BORING

Today I want your help in assembling: Internets 101

We have all seen Flash/Youtube/whatever videos that spread like fungus through the Internet. Post here with a link to such videos as you think are essential for a n00b to see.

(nothing disgusting, please.)

Here are some I think are essential:

The End of the World (did we ever get some mileage out of this, girls?)

Takes for the L33t

Shoes by Kelly

Bananaphone

Badger Badger Badger

The Llama Song

Weebl and Bob - Pie

Strong Bad email - Techno

Strong Bad email - Dragon (with Trogdor the Burninator)

The Bauman Emails - a Dramatic Reading

LOL Internet

OK, your turn!

In case any of you wanted to get into my lab today, the keycards lock the doors, rather than unlocking them.

(yes, they are b0rked.)

For the past week, I have been in Six Sigma/Green Belt training, which is a problem-solving/quality assurance type thing that is often used at large corporations. Training is something akin to hitting yourself in the head with a brick repeatedly.

In any case, a lot of the principles were imported from Japan. So, I am finding that the phenomenon of fangirl Japanese is rampant: we go to genba to find our muda, and have hansei at the end of our Kaizen event (all this is pronounced wrong, of course; Kaizen comes out "Kaizaaan," and hansei comes out "hansaaaaiiii".) There is also something called poka-yoke (let me show you it?) which I can not believe is a word in any language.

I keep wanting to ask our teacher Jill if Jill-chan is feeling very genki today, and would she then reply "Nani?"

Just shoot me and get this over with.

VERIZON

FUCKING I HATE YOU

IF THERE WERE ANY OTHER OPTION THAN DEALING WITH YOU FOR INTERNETS, I WOULD TAKE IT, BUT WE HAVE SATELLITE

PS - SHOVE YOUR NETWORK TOO

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LOSING A SHINY PIDGEY.

Should be followed by

GIANTS WIN THE SUPER BOWL, EAT YOUR HEART OUT PATRIOTS!

My mom and I cheered so fiercely that I can't talk. Amazing game, and IMHO the best team won.

It was a great party, even if jaina got decorated twice with the evening's dinner. ;) Oh well, that's what the washing machine is for. (We all got just a little bit excited. These things happen.)

Now what are we going to do with enough leftovers to feed a small army?