Sunday, October 31, 2004
 Happy Halloween!The party's finally over. Yes, that's me and the Snook as Miss Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy from Pride and Prejudice. We figured since we went with low-brow pop culture last year, we'd go high-brow and literary this year. It worked really, really well. The party was a smashing success (as I'm sure you noticed if you were watching CouchCam) and I've got lots of photos to upload in the morning. For now, I'm going to waddle my carb-sickened self to bed... Update: The pictures are now online! Saturday, October 30, 2004
Friday, October 29, 2004
It happened last night about 6:30, not long before we started to close up for the night. Becca and I'd been helping a customer down at the knitting counter for some time. Losh was also on the floor, along with about three customers. The first thing I remember is Losh rushing down to us and asking, "Did you let somebody back in the office?" No. "Somebody's back in the office." I looked up in time to see Albert dash through the door marked "STAFF ONLY." Losh was looking at me scared. I grabbed the phone off the counter. "Should I...?" In my panic, I forgot the Australian emergency number. All I could think was "911! No, that's not right, idiot!" A second later all thought left my head as we could clearly hear Albert fighting with the intruder in the hallway. I put the phone down. What should we do? Should we try to hold the door closed to he can't get out? What if he's got a weapon back there and we'd be trapping Albert back in with him? The matter was decided when the door flung open and a crazed skinny shirtless man flew out. I just had time to see his dirty blonde hair and notice that he was hitching up his pants oddly. My first incorrect (albeit funny) thought was that Albert had walked in on him having a wank back there. "Where's his shirt?" I gasped, wondering if I'd been so blind as to have not noticed a shirtless man enter the shop. "Albert ripped it off," Losh reported from the hallway. "What'd he get?" "A computer." We found out afterwards that Albert had entered the office, seen the guy, and asked him what he was doing. He said we'd let him in to wash his hands. Albert stepped back out into the shop to ask if it was true. When we denied it, he headed back in and asked the guy to return whatever was obviously stuffed into his pants. The guy rushed him. They grappled in our extremely cluttered hallway. Albert was twice the size of the guy but quickly realized it was better to let him go. The intruder was crazy and he was pulling things off the shelves, things like customers' irreplaceable tapestries. The stuff he stole was replaceable; they're not. So he let him go, but not before tearing off the guy's shirt. Everyone was fine. We called the cops. I was still shaking ten minutes later. How did I not notice him? Was it me that left the door unlocked? All my way home I entertained vigilante fantasies about noticing a shirtless man at my bus stop and kicking him in the balls so I could steal the computer back. I had dreams about it all night. The new shop's going to have security cameras. Thursday, October 28, 2004
Tuesday, October 26, 2004
Monday, October 25, 2004
Sunday, October 24, 2004
 The Greatest Care Package EVER.Friday was randomly super-duper busy at work and I was just having a complete crapper of an afternoon. All my customers were rude and stupid and irritating. I was hanging on to the last shred of patience when Losh walked by and announced that I had a package. "Another package for me?" It was, at long last, the mythical Little Debbie Care Package from my cousin Jenny. And just like that, my day turned around. Is this not the best box you've ever seen? Boston Creme Pies, Fudge Rounds, Star Crunch, Zebra Cakes, Oatmeal Creme Pies, Swiss Cake Rolls, and two boes of Nutty Bars (my favorite)! Not to mention Golden Grahams, Bisquik, and 500 tablets of ibuprofen. My co-workers couldn't decide what was more amazing: that I actually wanted this crap; that judging by the price stickers, the whole lot cost about $20; or that Jenny actually spent $70 to ship it airmail. All I can say is thank you. You probably saved more than one life that afternoon. And now I must go eat another Nutty Bar. (Don't bother asking me about the diet. It's officially shot.)
Saturday, October 23, 2004
Friday, October 22, 2004
Man, this iSight camera is so sweet. You can now choose between DeskCam and CouchCam over there on the right. (DeskCam's set to only update when it detects motion, so you'll probably be staring at the wall a lot.) And thus progresses my plan to build my own version of the Big Brother house... Thursday, October 21, 2004
 Boudicca II is finally here!I got the e-mail last night that she was finally being shipped but I didn't have a clue how long it would take. Then this afternoon Albert came by and said she'd arrived at the shop. I literally jumped up and down and squealed. Like a freak. In front of the customers. But I don't care. Now I'm just waiting for Snookums to get home so we can open the boxes together and marvel at Apple's sexy packaging. I guess I should clear off my desk, huh? I'll probably be listing some of my excess Apple junk on eBay after tonight. Anybody want a copy of iLife or OS X 10.3?
Wednesday, October 20, 2004
- Customers who just don't get it. "Is this yarn on sale?" "Yes, they're all on sale." "Well, is this one on sale?" "Yes, that one's on sale too. They're all on sale." "Even this one? This one right here's on sale?" Yes, that's what ALL means. It means F**KING EVERYTHING. Good grief. - Customers who have no friends. "Does this color look good on me?" "Yes, it looks fine." "Really? Where do you think I could wear it? Day or evening?" I am not a personal shopper. Find some friends or grow a spine. - Customers who can't do simple estimating math problems. "How much is this kit?" "Well, it's normally $53.20, so with the 30% discount you're going to save about fifteen bucks or so." "But can you tell me EXACTLY?" Why, are you going to pay in PENNIES or something? - Customers who think that they deserve special service. "This tapestry has a hole in it. Can I get a discount?" "It's already 50% off." "I mean an ADDITIONAL discount." "Ma'am, that's WHY it's 50% off." "But I'm in here all the time, and I spent a lot of money, and I know the owner's dad, and the last time I was here he gave me one for eighty dollars..." That's usually when I start gauging how fast I'd need to run to fatally impale myself on a tapestry stand.
- We finally got our television fixed, and it cost way less than we expected! Turns out that the explosion was just from the power supply, not the picture tube as we'd feared. - My computer is finally on its way! I can't wait to get it. - My laptop is fixed! Adrian at AppleCentre Broadway really came through for me. The monitor's been replaced and a new 40GB hard drive is installed. I can't believe I now have two computers! That's more than the Snook! - I found my Halloween costume! God bless The Costume Shop. (And God damn ABC Costumes, none of whose dresses would even go over my arms. As Snookums later consoled me: "That's because they were all made for drug-addled NIDA skanks.") Now I just have to figure out how to duct-tape my boobs up near my chin.
Apparently I am a hybrid of "Progressive Girl" and "Girl next Door". Actually that's pretty darn accurate.   You know, the detailed profiles of those "girls" are pretty darn accurate too. Maybe I should get the book for the Snook as a wedding gift! (Link courtesy of Brigita.) Tuesday, October 19, 2004
No, that's not a euphemism. Katherine visited the shop Monday and took a picture of the wool section, and lo and behold, there's one of the many, many signs I created! (Once it became known that I know my way around Illustrator, I got handed the task of designing all the sale signage.) That one is actually my favorite, because it just says: "Add to your stash. All knitting yarns 30% off." For some reason those short imperative sentences really crack me up. Monday, October 18, 2004
So I've had 48 hours to recuperate from my first Tapestry Craft sale experience... and I'm still a little wrecked. We ended up working til 3 a.m. Friday night setting things up, which meant I only had about three (crap) hours of sleep before heading back the next day. The old ladies were lined up six deep by the time the doors opened. It was a melee. It was a madhouse. It was like the footage they show on the news of women fighting each other at the annual Harrods sale. Surprisingly, I didn't touch a cash register until the very end of the day. I spent every other second helping people in the wool section. We'd been worried that people wouldn't buy much since it's the end of the knitting season, but instead folks were walking out with hundreds of dollars worth of stuff. By lunchtime I realized that I needed real food (as opposed to the Diet Coke and Krispy Kremes I'd been subsisting on for the past 24 hours) so I headed next door to a coffeeshop. I ran into Helen and her boyfriend Clinton on the way so they joined me. That was nice. Thirty short minutes later I was back into the fray. We didn't actually get the last customer out the door til nearly an hour after our official closing time. Even Albert the owner was amazed. (Apparently it was really weird to have a sale day that was full-on busy all day without any slow periods at all.) We ended up having our biggest sales total in shop history, which is pretty amazing. I just stood there dazed, looking at the knee-deep piles of wool on the floor and dreading the clean-up. Luckily everyone else was just as tired as me so we left it and went home. Since then I've pretty much been knitting, sleeping, and watching TV. Unfortunately, this is going to be the pattern for the next, oh, three weeks. Gahhhh...
Dammit! I just do not get the Australian voting public these days. First they vote to keep in John Howard and his army of crusty old curmudgeons, and now they've voted out the sexiest chrome-dome on television since the days of Jean-Luc Picard. I am speaking, of course, of tonight's Australian Idol elimination of Marty Worrall. My two SMS votes were all for nought, it seems. Now who the heck am I supposed to root for? Hayley's a robot, Chanel's a flake, Casey's uncommunicative, Courtney's an old man, and Anthony sets off my gaydar. I am most excessively put out. Okay, okay, so the final five aren't really that bad... but none of them will make half the pop idol that Marty would have.
Saturday, October 16, 2004
Friday, October 15, 2004
Thursday, October 14, 2004
Wednesday, October 13, 2004
Good grief. It's 37 degrees here today. That's 37 degrees Celsius, which to us uninformed Americans equals 98.6 degrees Fahrenheit. It's stinkin' hot. Spring stuck around for, like, three weeks before turning into summer. Tuesday, October 12, 2004
Actually that was just sarcastically dictated by the Snook himself. My iBook went off to the shop today for a monitor and hard drive replacement so I'm forced to share his Linux machine. Sheesh, between this and waiting for the telly to be repaired, it's like living in the Stone Age, you know? We've also just realized that we leave for our trip to the US in, oh, FIVE WEEKS, and there's craploads of stuff to do before we go. AND we're throwing a Halloween party in three weeks, AND we're having two sales and a relocation at work. So there may be some radio silence from my end for a few days... Sunday, October 10, 2004
 Real Embarrassing Photos: The Coolest 3-Year-Old in TownYou know what the coolest part of this photo is? It's not my sweet Wonder Woman Underoos. It's not my stylin' Powder Puff Big Wheel with the ribbon streamers. It's not my stick-straight bowl-cut bangs. It's not even my so-retro-it-hurts white knee socks. You know what it is? It's the approximately 53 yards of woolen lanyard plant holders hanging in the background. The 70's were a bad time for interior design, yo. Saturday, October 9, 2004
Update: We've got tickets! "Gold reserved" seating. Hopefully that doesn't suck. Friday, October 8, 2004
Thursday, October 7, 2004
 I decided to keep the invitation stylistically similar to last year's. Thanks to Matt for pointing me to the gallery of makeup kits. The e-mails are still going out so if you're in Sydney and you haven't gotten one, just hold tight. If you don't have one in a next few days - and you think you should - just drop me an e-mail.
Wednesday, October 6, 2004
So, Amy and Rob are citizens of Australia now! Actually they're dual American-Australians, which is what I hope to be in about eighteen months. Their ceremony was held in Mosman and I went along to celebrate with them. They basically just had to pledge allegiance and then they got a certificate and a native plant. Pretty sweet! There was a sour edge to the evening for me, though, in the form of a famous visitor in the midst: Tony Abbott! (He's the Leader of the House and the Federal Minister for Health and Aging. He's also a raging conservative asshole.) Didn't he just get out of the hospital for kidney stones yesterday? And here he was, four days before a national election, spending the evening in front of a group of people who weren't even eligible to vote for him! His speech afterwards was polished but uninspiring, I have to say. (When he started talking about Australia's "freedom" I half-expected him to congratulate the new citizens on becoming part of the Coalition of the Willing.) You'll be proud to note that after a short internal battle, I managed to resist the urge to question him about the Pauline Hanson slush fund and kick him in the nuts. Man, I'll never have another chance like that again... And I just realized that I spelled his name wrong on the photo, but I don't really care. 
 Real Embarrassing Photos: The Man Who Stole Jimi Hendrix's HairI was going through some old pictures the other day when I came across this absolute gem. Yes, folks, that is the Snook. In college he had big hair, a dodgy goatee, and - what's more amazing to me - he actually wore blue jeans! Who is this person? It blows my mind. I'm putting this out there for anybody wondering if I know what I'm getting into with this whole marriage-thing. Oh yes, you betcher ass I do. I figure a guy who can laugh at his former self - and give permission for the world to laugh along with him - is a real keeper. Click here for some better views of the 'fro in all its glory. And yeah, I turned up some doozies of me. Stay tuned... [more...] Tuesday, October 5, 2004
It's been over ten years... but I've finally come to the clearing at the end of the path. I have finished Stephen King's The Dark Tower. In fact, I read over six hundred pages today; I couldn't put it down. You remember how I thought the sixth book kinda sucked? Well, this one didn't. It tied up loose ends and hurtled from action sequence to action sequence with a speed that left me shaking my head. ("Snookums, he spent all of that last book setting up cliffhangers that were resolved in the first forty pages!") When the ka-tet was finally broken about halfway through the book, I sobbed like a baby for half an hour. I'm still tearing up just thinking about it. ("F**king ka!") I found King's inclusion of himself as a character much less irritating this time around, mostly because he wasn't in it much. I liked finding out what happened to Randall Flag, Ted Brautigan, and Patrick Danville. And as for the ending, which probably pissed a lot of people off? I think what happens to Roland makes a weird sort of sense. It's not exactly satisfying but it's not the cop-out I feared. I'm left with hope. As for the rest of the ka-tet... I think that was a bit of a cop-out, but I'm still a sucker for a happy(-ish) ending. Man, I hope the Harry Potter series ends as well. Monday, October 4, 2004
So did I mention that the Snook and I both got new iPods on the weekend? Well, we did. We'd been thinking about getting new mobile phones for some time - since we both just have crappy pay-as-you-go Nokias - but we hadn't done anything about it yet because we're lazy. Then on Thursday the Snook discovered that Strathfield have a deal on where you buy a Sony Ericsson T610 and get a free 20GB iPod. Pretty sweet! We headed over Friday afternoon and spent hours waiting around while they transferred our numbers and upgraded our accounts. It was worth it though... I've even got a camera in my phone now! Oh yes, "moblogging" will be happening soon. This is, like, partial technological redemption for the whole TV-exploding debacle...
Sunday, October 3, 2004
Saturday, October 2, 2004
Later: Yowch. The site update has broken every single review link from the IMDb. Bad move, web developers.
So what did I do afterwards? I came home and flopped on the couch, hoping to clear off some TiVo and do some knitting. Two hours later, just as I'd started The Princess Diaries, the f**king television exploded. Yes, you read that right; our TV just exploded. So now there's no telly. This sucks. Friday, October 1, 2004
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archives
You can search through the archives by post keyword using the form on the left, or you can browse by month using the links at the bottom.
"Moblog" refers to posts and images posted directly from my mobile phone.
"PW Blog" refers to posts recovered from my very first weblog, which dealt with news related to my college dorm. |
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