Beowabbit

On Friday, plumtreeblossom, cathijosephine, and I went to see Eddie Izzard’s Force Majeur show, which was wonderfully hilarious. Can’t possibly do it justice. (And wow, the Wang Theatre is a stunning and stunningly restored venue!)

Beforehand, plumtreeblossom and I had had dinner nearby at Empire Garden, which was the site of our first date almost eight years ago, and I had a scorpion bowl for the first time.

On Saturday, we went to Johnny D’s for brunch with vanguardcdk for a late celebration of his birthday, and then headed to the Quincy house. I was exhausted — I’d been a bit underslept all week, and I had had to sleep without my CPAP machine the previous night because some bits were being cleaned — so I had a nice long nap, which is almost unheard of for me. Then I was thoroughly refreshed, and we did a bunch of yardwork (planting and watering our cosmos, and finally managing to take soil samples — previous efforts had been stymied by the weather). We finished just in time to enjoy a brief but torrential downpour from the dry comfort of the porch, had a yummy spaghetti and meatballs dinner, and then watched Ken Burns’ documentary The Shakers, from which we both learned an awful lot.

On Sunday we did a bunch more puttering around indoors and out (I was alternately working on house stuff and PMRP website stuff). I had a nice phone call with my mother silverlibre (and left voicemail for my sister). Then around 2pm when we started to feel a little eleven-o’clockish, plumtreeblossom had a culinary inspiration and made me a grilled-cheese sandwich for lunch with Cheddar, blue cheese, cream cheese, minced garlic, and roast beef. It was spectacular! And she doesn’t even like blue cheese herself. Now it’s her turn to take a nap, and she’s dozing in her room (which has become our nap room) while I catch up with the world.

How’s your weekend been?

Just wanted to let you all know I’m still here. :-)

plumtreeblossom and I have a busy and fun weekend ahead of us, starting with Pride and Prejudice again tonight and including dinner with vanguardcdk, his parents, and cathijosephine on Sunday.

And wow, typing this on a touchscreen is a tedious process!

Last night plumtreeblossom and I had a lovely dinner and drinks with cathijosephine and vanguardcdk at Five Horses, a new upscalish restaurant in Davis Square that pheromone and Dreaming had introduced us to. It was Yum! Mee! And the company was excellent. Was great to get some catching up — I hadn’t seen cathijosephine in a couple weeks, and while I see vanguardcdk on a fairly regular basis, it’s nice to get to sit and have a relaxed chat.

The food was, well, “spectacular” would only be a very slight overstatement. I think “superb” is the right adjective. I love that place. It’s yuppified comfort food. They have bread and butter on their menu — bread and butter — and yes, it’s definitely worth the $4 or so, at least if you like the flavour of goat milk. My Kentucky-fried Cornish game hen (with jalapeño mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese flavoured with pork belly) was as yummy as it was last time, and we all had lots of appetizers to share. And the Old Fashioned I had was very good, very mellow.

And when we got back to plumtreeblossom’s place (also vanguardcdk’s place) she and I put some fruit to drying overnight in her food dryer, so we each have snacks for work today.

Anyway, there’s this morning’s effort at approximating a post a day for a while. :-)

Between catching up from travel and a big busy work schedule, I’ve been behind, so sorry for posting these late.

Happy belated birthday to the fabulous, lovely, and delightful xmelancholia! You are awesome, and I can’t wait to see you again.

And happy belated birthday to cathijosephine. I can’t say enough good things about you. I love you, and I hope the next year of your life is full of joy.

Happy belated birthday to xmelancholia and cathijosephine! So sorry my work situation didn’t allow me to celebrate your birthdays with you, but I sure hope to see you both soon. (And cathijosephine, I am so glad to have you back on this coast!)

And a happy early birthday to nex0s, since judging by recent events I may not get a chance to wish her happy birthday on the actual day.

 Lots going on over the last few weeks, and I’m so behind in reporting it that I’m just going to do bullet points, in something approaching reverse chronological order:

• My beloved honeywuzzle plumtreeblossom is cooking me eggs and ham and toast for breakfast.  Om nom nom!
• We saw Despicable Me last night and really enjoyed it.
• I feel like I’m hitting my groove at the new job, and feeling really good about it.
• Talked to bcat1 recently; she and the babies are doing really well.  They’ve started rolling over and are just starting the process of learning to crawl.  My mother silverlibre is going to visit in August, while papa spacechicken is visiting family in Canada.
• The festival went really really well! We sold out most of the nights, which is unusual.  (We usually sell out one or two.)  The cast party was lots of fun, but judging by the scandalous things I’ve been hearing, we may have left a bit too early.  As I posted earlier, I have photos from the show plumtreeblossom directed up, and hope to get photos of the rest of the shows up soon.
• Oh, speaking of photos, yesterday after going in to work for an upgrade I took a bunch of photos of the building I work in, also to be posted soon.  Practical it’s not, but it sure is pretty.
• I love living in Boston.  cathijosephine and I have been going to a series of free outdoor classical concerts.  Now that she’s done with the semester’s classes, plumtreeblossom can join us for some of them.
• I’m really enjoying the summer, with walks along the river and lots of good outdoor time.  plumtreeblossom and I are going to the beach next weekend.

I’ve got loads more to say, but that at least lets you all know that I’m still here and still having fun!

I’m almost too late wishing xmelancholia a happy birthday, but in my defense, I got to wish her one in person this morning.

And an slightly early happy birthday to cathijosephine!

Wow, the very end of December has the birthdays of some really awesome people in it.

Sorry for my extreme radio-silence lately. I’ve been mostly sort of keeping up with other people’s LiveJournal posts (albeit with more skimming than usual), but I haven’t had time or brainpower to post or do much commenting. Anyway, since I’m sure you all are wondering whether I’m still alive, here’s some of what I’ve been up to lately:

Home repairs: Just after cathijosephine moved out, the bath surround (the panels on the wall around the bathtub) fell off. Well, large bits of it did, anyway. It had never been all that convinced it wanted to be attached to the wall, and it gave up. I had been thinking for a very long time (since before I moved in, come to think of it) of pulling it off and repairing whatever damage it had been put up to cover, but had never gotten around to it, in part because it involves not being able to use the shower for extended periods of time due to wating for various bits to dry. Anyway, since I didn’t have a housemate for a bit (anybody want to move in? Quincy’s got lots of history and lots of yummy restaurants! Won’t be available for a bit yet, though.) I decided I’d go ahead and try that. As is the way with these things, it quickly became a much larger project than I expected it to. It was just three days ago (after starting the project about a month ago, although of course I’ve been working on it in spurts) that I finally had a day where I left the bathroom looking better than when I started.

This has all taken a lot longer because of not having a working car any more, so when I discover I don’t have the right tool or I didn’t get enough tile adhesive, I need to either carry stuff on the T (and on the walk home from the T) or rent a Zipcar. (I have to say, I’m really enjoying using Zipcar. But still, it means having to plan stuff in advance.)

Theater: As I did last year, I’m rehearsal-assisting for plumtreeblossom’s show in the summer one-act festival at Theatre@First. Unlike last year, I’m also going to be on the run crew, which I don’t think I’ve ever done. Means I can’t sit in the audience for the actual performances, but it means I get to be on stage, albeit with the lights dimmed. Also unlike last year, the show plumtreeblossom is directing is one she wrote herself! My darling is having her début as a playwright! I’ve read a bunch of short stories she got published before I met her and really enjoyed them, but this is the first substantial writing she’s done since I’ve known her, and I’m thrilled to see her getting back into it. It is a really funny show being put on by very talented actors and it’s going to be a blast! Many of the other one-acts are also really funny too, including the one being directed by surrealestate (who is directing for the first time, if I’m not misremembering). I am really really looking forward to this and you should all come see it.

plumtreeblossom: Things continue to be delightful in my relationship with plumtreeblossom! We have lots of wonderful dates and delightful times. Tomorrow we are going to see Up for the third time. :-) Her cat Rowley who had been frighteningly skinny for a while has been putting on weight, which is really encouraging. We’d already been mentally preparing to lose him. Not sure if the subcutaneous fluids the vet has her giving him are what made the difference or not, but he’s doing a lot better.

Work: Work is busy, but rewarding, and I feel like I’m accomplishing stuff (although projects in IT, as in homeownership, tend to take several times as long as you think they should).

cathijosephine: I’m delighted that I’m still seeing lots of cathijosephine despire her having moved out. We’ve been trying to have dinner together once a week (often with darxus and m_c_t if he’s in town, and sometimes with xmelancholia). Chickenfinger (her cat) has adapted really well to moving back to her condo; we were both worried she’d be upset about moving back to a much smaller space, but she had no trouble adjusting at all.

(Other than seeing a lot of plumtreeblossom and her housemate, cathijosephine and her partners, and the Firsties, I’m feeling a bit undersocialized and missing my friends. Have been popping my head in at some lovely parties though, at one of which I got to catch a glimpse of the delightful weegoddess during a visit this side of the pond.)

I feel like there’s been other important stuff over the past few weeks, but I’ve run out of brain so I’m going to stop for now.

Howdy! cathijosephine, who is currently living with me, is looking for somebody to rent her Quincy Center studio. Her Craigslist ad (with photos) is at http://boston.craigslist.org/gbs/abo/1058139649.html, and here’s the text, since it’s short:

$1000 Furnished Studio on Red Line Available Immediately (Quincy Center)
No Fees! Across the street from Quincy Center T Station. ~450 square feet, hardwood floors, 2 big walk-in closets, small dishwasher, full size loft bed and comfy pull-out couch. Heat and hot water included. Coin-op laundry in building. 2 blocks to supermarket and drugstore.
Short-term lease available for $1,100/month.

(I.e., it's $1,100/mo. if you want it month-to-month, or $1,000/mo. if you'll sign a longer lease so it comes back on the market at a convenient time.)

Quincy Center is pretty far out on the Red Line (25min riding time to Park St.), but I can’t emphasize enough how convenient this location is in Quincy; you’d be comfortable walking distance from a supermarket and a pharmacy, less than five minutes’ walk from the T station, and within ten minutes’ walk from lots of great restaurants and shops. And I find Quincy a fun and charming place to live.

EDIT: Bigger versions of the pictures in the Craigslist ad: Bathroom, main living area with couch and loft bed, very large closet, and kitchen.

On Friday I met plumtreeblossom after work (see her weekend write-up here) and we took the train to Quincy Center together. We had dinner at Outback Steakhouse. I don’t like their corporate politics, but I love their food and sometimes I just need a hunk of cow. As it turned out, I’m very glad we did, because I ordered an Australian beer I wasn’t familiar with — Cooper’s Brewery Sparkling Ale — and it was so good I ordered a second, and then went looking for it at the liquor store later in the week. (If you are wise enough to follow my example, be cautioned that it’s fermented in the bottle, so there’s some sediment in the bottom; you want to pour it into a glass.)

After a yummy dinner, we went to my house and watched Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical, which was very funny, and a little bit of the original 1930s exploitation/propaganda movie, which was a bonus on the DVD.

( Another few meals, another movie, some geekery, and some games with darxus and cathijosephine. )

At some point in the weekend, plumtreeblossom took a whole bunch of pictures of grim warrior beowabbit, including the one that I eventually munged into my new userpic, and I also took some pictures of her cats, who were sleeping together on her bed looking especially cute.

The one bad thing about the weekend is that towards the end of the workweek I’d been having little twinges in my hip, and they got considerably worse over the weekend. I’m going to need to drive to the T tomorrow (where parking is $7); there’s no way I can do the normally 15-minutes walk to the T station with the ice that’s on the sidewalks. I’m not sure if this is a return of my sciatica or if I did something to my hip slipping on the ice. But if a hurt hip is the price for all the joy and fun I had this weekend, it was worth it.