rucksackjack will be flying in the week of Unique LA, which we will attend together so I can be held back from wanting to buy everything. On Dec 3rd, we'll scare ourselves with a mob of Disney Princesses at a limited release showing of The Princess and the Frog. Apparently, we'll be given Mardi Gras beads!

I have been poking the internets in search of a local store that carries copies of Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet. According to their stores-that-carry-us map, the closest place would be in San Francisco. Boo to that! I didn't want to believe it, and thought perhaps I'd luck out and discover that the map's out of date, but I guess the West Coast is not nearly as awesome as I thought. I could order issues online, but I wanted to flip through a couple to see whether any stories catch my eye. The thought of missing out on a gem kills me.

Organizing my links is about as daunting and frustrating as gathering and separating seeds hidden haystack for a grumpy ogress. Only I don't have little animal friends who owe me a favor to help me conquer this task.

Came across my link for Mix my Granola. Mixing your own cereal, ice cream, granola - is there anything the internet can't do for you?

Hello Kitty Exhibition

Should I go? I'm leaning towards "yes, you may as well go see the madness in person," but then I think, "Well, I might be BLINDED afterwards." Besides, I don't know anybody who'd wanna go with me to see Hello Kitty (Hell), and I am not very good at socializing if I'm alone.

Am pondering attending SCAD.

Sister: "What's that green thing you always eat?"
Me: "Uh... broccoli?"
Sister: "That's what broccoli looks like? Wait, then what's celery?"
Me: "..."

Remember when I cried a little about having big feet that would probably not fit Fluevogs?

Irregular Choice is making me feel the same way. They do sometimes make pretty men's shoes, which gets my hopes up that there will be something wearable in the future. For $200+, of course.

Woman 1: "Aren't sodas full of carbs?"
Woman 2: "Yeah, full of CARBONATION!"
[They laugh hysterically at this oh-so funny joke.]
Woman 1: "No, really. Is that what carbs stands for, you think? Carbonation?"

Plant Names I've Come Across In the Pursuit of "Research" (Today):

Lavaglut Rose, which is apparently German for "lava glow," and not at all related to "lava glutton," which is ruined the magic for me (can't get enough of that lava, mmm!) but it's still an evocative name. (LAVAGLUT would be an excellent name for a lipstick, come to think of it.)

Kiss-me-over-the-garden-gate, the longest common plant name I've come across yet. Can you imagine a garden of love-lies-bleeding, love-in-the-mist and kiss-me-over-the-garden-gate? Or... Snow-on-the-mountain, blue-of-the-heavens, love-in-the-mist, kiss-me-over-the-garden-gate, touch-me-not, blood-on-the-snow, and farewell-to-spring? (There's a story in there somewhere.)

Broomrape

Some time ago, I asked my father for some strawberries.
He came home with lots of strawberry yogurt.

"It's the same thing, right?"
No... No, it is not.

This time, when he left to go grocery shopping, I reminded him that we need more salt.
He came home with more strawberries than I can imagine eating in a whole year. One whole shelf in the fridge of strawberries.

When I asked him where he'd put the salt (we were sorting through bags), he said:

"Why do you need salt for strawberries?!"

Sigh.

If magazines and movies (and a lot of porn) are the source materials of your ideal life, expect to be disappointed that nothing ever ends so neatly and relieved that there are no synchronized dance numbers set to ABBA tunes.

When I'm sick, I will watch anything on TV. This being Valentine's Weekend, "anything" has included cheesy, terrible romantic comedies such as Must Love Dogs, Cinderella Story and Failure to Launch. Thankfully, I washed these movies out of my brain by watching both Addams Family movies, and I feel a little better now. But I can judge how sick I feel by my willingness to watch these things without becoming bored and changing the channel.

Sniffly, hoarse from a sore throat, achy. Even with the heater on and wrapped in a big, fluffy down-feather blanket, I feel cold, yet I know that I'm warm because my skin feels hot. It's been a fun weekend, let me tell you.

This being the Year of the Ox, I'm hoping that 09 will bring me more unicorns and fewer split-ends.

I spend way too much time browsing interior design blogs and clicking around COLOURlover. Sooner or later I'm going to end up stealing paint chips just so I can play with palettes when I'm offline.

There is an amazing amount of color-it-yourself wallpaper and Tetris-blocked bookcases in the world. Which is weird to me, sort of, because you'd think that these things have a smallish customer base. And yet one of those Tetris bookcases costs thousands of dollars. I can just barely tolerate the idea of furniture that costs over a thousand, but multiple-thousand dollar furniture blows my mind.

Dry-Erase and black board paints for a table or wall would force me to (attempt to) draw Paleolithic-esque unicorns and other monsters on it.

*

ANYWAY, thank you all for the merry b-day wishes. :) Y'all came outta the woodwork just to comment on how I'm not old! How sweet.

Am now 24. My mother told me I'm old.

Last night, in a dream: Zulu remixed with Mortal Kombat. Instead of hordes of tribesmen descending upon an army hospital defended by soldiers, it dealt with groups of assorted over-the-top fighters. We were outnumbered and doomed. But I didn't mind so much when Anthony Hopkins showed up to lead the Welsh men. "Sub-Zero doesn't stand a chance against you, sir," I told him respectfully.

I woke up before we won the day. So sad.

My phone keeps suggesting "mime" instead of mine/mind/nine. In fact, if I didn't know better, it seems rather offended that I don't use mime more often. If anybody gets a random text about Mimi the Mime, you now know why.

Anyway, I really came here to say: My birthday is coming up, and I'm feeling low and blah (as I always do in the winter, it seems there is no escaping it), and if I could give you all little tins of scented putty I WOULD, but this little YouTube video actually brightened my mood enough to feel better.



Also, one more call for anybody who wants a valentine.

eCreamery

Would you like to mix your habanero-flavored ice cream with dill weed and wasabi peanuts?

If I had money to burn, I would combine ube and coconut ice cream and mix it with vanilla chips. Then add whatever fruit from the market. (Hello, eCreamery: where is mango flavor? You're breakin' my heart.)

D claims he'd create habanero and peanut butter ice cream. I am keeping my desserts away from him, and also keeping away from his desserts. Ick.

Merry thezmas! <3

Do you want a valentine? (In late January to early Febuary.)

I guess "valentine" might be a little inaccurate. I want to write you a little feel-good letter on kickass cards. Do you want one? Surely you want something cute in the mail that's handwritten and not a ransom note or spam.

If so, either comment or email (balloonhat@gmail) with an address. If you're worried about bear clowns hunting you down, then rest assured that comments are screened.

My computer is still sickly (old & blind!), and even if it wasn't I'm sure all the addresses I had on it are outdated. If you posted an address to your LJ, I may have missed it. (In fact, assume I missed it. I've been watching, but this laptop really hates me and I do not like to use it much.) The only addresses I definitely have are squirrels_oh_no and loki_sataere.

I know we're still dodging flying Holiday Cards, but frankly I hate holiday cards because I never see anything particularly cute. I miss giving little ur awesome cards, so I'm going with that. Even if you're a complete stranger, I want you to know that you knock my socks off with awesomeness.

So I went to Unique Los Angeles today, hoping to find goods that weren't ridiculously over-priced. I'm all for supporting local artists and buying from cute boutiques, but I must protest some of the price tags I saw there. And I know that some of those prices were lowered (thank you for the thought!) just for the event, because of all the booth signs telling me that such-and-such is usually $170 but is being offered to us at a mere $48. I think my brain recoils whenever I see products that cost more than $60 or so.

Thank god for the free chilled Izze cans everywhere. Free Izze redeems any event, in my opinion. I also have a Bossa Nova bottle - mangosteen flavor. I don't know what Bossa Nova drinks taste like, but I still have it (right after I got one I saw the chilled Izzes and put the mangosteen bottle in my bag so I could drink an Izze instead).

I did spend $40 (plus $5 entry plus $6 parking) - half on me, half on rucksackjack. Actually, according to price tags I should have spent $50 today, but both times the booth person reduced the total by $5 simply because... I don't know, they didn't want give change, I guess. For myself I bought a sugar bath scrub (yuzu), lotion (satsuma glow) and soap (I forget, but judging by the smell I'm pretty sure it's grapefruit). [As they were bagging my purchases, one of them said, "Wow! You sure like citrus, don't you! Very gender-neutral of you." Oranges don't like filling in the bubbles that indicate whether or not they are male or female.] I can't say what I bought for D, but the booth drew me in because I noticed a lucha libre artbook. As soon as I touched the cover, some guy popped out from behind a curtain to shake my hand, telling me that he was the artist and I should feel free to touch the book and "have my way with it." Imagining other people licking the book, hugging the book, making out with the book, I set the artbook back down.

I was looking for stationary while I was there, except the concept of X sheets of paper and X matching envelopes seems to have escaped the brains of all the letterpress folk there. There was one booth that had very cute designs (simple, artsy animals), but it was mostly cards (plain or holiday) and I honestly can't bring myself to spend $20 for 6 small cards and 6 envelopes. I described to the booth person what I was looking for ("Like, paper with elephants and giraffes on the top or bottom? Regular-sized sheets? Wow, I've never thought of that before. Hmm."), but she suggested: 1) buy multiple sets so I could have enough cards for my letter, 2) attach a longer piece of paper to the card, 3) buy lots of single cards and staple them together like a book. I did think Suggestion 2 was an idea worth thinking more about later, but her cards were tiny and just $2+ too pricey. Too bad. I really loved the way the animals were drawn.

I did like the venue. It was on the top floor (13th) of some building, so you can see a lot of LA from every window.

I think I'll send valentines this year (well, technically next year). I'm pretty sure I wouldn't actually send them out in Feb, though. Probably in January?

I'm trying not to wonder if anybody would want such a thing, because it'd break my heart if people didn't want me to scribble a personal "you're awesome! really!" note. Lately I have been obsessed with sending snail mail, and I'm remembering my past complaints about the lack of Just Because You're As Cool As A Turtle cards.

I think every address I have is outdated or lost.

It upsets me that there's no such thing as lucha libre gift wrap. Somebody can wrap gifts with bacon, but I can't wrap anything with masked Mexican wrestlers? Life sucks.