Cuteness overload

They call her Amélie Jr.

Once upon a time... from Capucha on Vimeo.

It's cute because she's French, and it's cute because she's a fucking genius. I can't wait until she starts putting together elaborate, personal, and heartbreakingly delightful pranks on the citizens of Paris! ~Videogum

She even has almost the same toys as Amélie.

And has already earned a marriage proposal.

Going under the drill

I am feeling muddled about this morning's "follow up" dentist visit.

There has been something curious going on with two of my teeth - nothing too painful - but it appears that two of my teeth were too tall and so I have in fact been chipping bits of them off along the gumline over the past 15 years or so because the "neck" of the tooth is apparently the most flexible.

So, I had them paint a little something on the chipped bits, which they insist on calling a "filling," and they did some occlusal something or other to make my teeth all more or less the same height, which should prevent me chipping them off more.

And that's good, right? Only I liked not having "fillings" in my teeth. I liked having my real teeth, which I still have, except now they feel different. Well, two of them do. I can feel the resin paint, and I miss feeling my shiny smooth teeth. Sigh.

They do look normal though, and my bite does feel more even. So, I suppose if this keeps things from getting worse later, it is a net positive. I just don't like the idea of them sanding off my perfectly good tooth parts to make the resin paint stick, and I want my one tooth to feel less like a brick on the outside - which is partially my fault because I didn't notice it felt like a brick while I was still there.

Anyway, trying to have happy thoughts.

Plan B

What if I started applying for the Peace Corps now? Would that be a bad idea?

Pro's
- I could start doing "interesting" stuff sooner.
- I would potentially have another job lined up for late next year/early 2010.

Con's
- PC is having trouble getting funding :(
- I'm not qualified for farming/plant stuff yet.
- I can't speak Spanish yet (and therefore would be ineligible for Latin America, which means chances are I'd get sent to Africa, but is that a bad thing? I could get sent there anyway...).
- Band stuff is not happening in PC countries.

So I guess now isn't the best time. But then when is a good time for doing something scary like quitting your job to move to a developing country when we'll be in a world-wide recession for the foreseeable future?

I would love to just sit down with some accommodating and objective but neutral person to really puzzle this out. Where do you find these people? My parents are out since they will always oppose quitting one's job to do something not fully fleshed out during a recession, but there should be some reasonable person. Or does that really and truly sum things up?

I almost want to drive to Virginia to ask Barbara Kingsolver what to do. I want to pull everyone I know aside and interview them individually, but I honestly wonder if things wouldn't make more sense once I was growing rhubarb in Iceland.

More babies

So, major highlight of my week: I got to play with Hajera's nephew Zaid for a few hours last night. I helped him wipe the ricotta off his lasagne noodles, flew him around the dining room, slid him across the hardwood floors, got him to sit quietly on my lap when he was running around and screaming with this noise-making toy, played trains, tickled him senseless, you know, fun stuff. The girls were also impressed with my nonchallant diaper changing skills. I've still got it.

Is it uncool for someone my age to admit that they adore little kids? I think the rule is that you're not supposed to mention it until like the third year of marriage. Which, unfortunately for me, appears to be a long way off.

The Death and Life of Great American Cities

Reading that piece by Jane Jacobs. I heard her on the radio a while back and she seemed like an all around cool lady, so I instructed my mom to collect this book from the Strand when she was in NY last winter. Finally getting around to it now.

And it's interesting when you read one of those earth shattering, paradigm shifting books written a couple decades ago, you're pretty much sure that the world must have ended at some point between publication and now - only you're still around to read the book. Cadillac Desert was like that. How can there still be water coming out of the faucets?? How are we still alive? Only now the questions are more like - how is it that Mosswood Park isn't an abandoned den of sin? Are we still building Garden Cities? Is there not a way for city people to meet each other that also includes trees?

I heart that the shuttle gets me reading in the mornings, but I still wonder if there's not some middle ground between impoverished unemployment and a 45 mile commute. How does one go about translating that wonder into an alternative source of income?

hitting the books

Have you noticed that everyone is doing their fashion shoots in Iceland now?

I really do want to learn up Icelandic good and proper as best as you can with no other human instructing you, but I have some tapes and a book and I just discovered that the University of Iceland offers two free online courses (!) bless them.

I even put a reminder on my calendar to work on my language skills every Saturday morning for two-ish hours and Wednesday on the way in to work.

I will get there, I will.

baby quilt - check

So this is the reason I have been getting rusty on the banjo and taking a long time to return emails:


From the back:



And here's the man himself:


After a November of renting vids from Reel and hunkering down in my few hours at home, it is finally done! I have now outed myself as a "quilter" to my extended family as I worked on it between dinner and dessert on Thanksgiving. It's hard to tell whether people are being polite or whether they actually might want one of these things. If there's actually a demand for them, I might even be able to use a machine to make them.

Usually by the time I'm about half way through, I think of how I could do it better next time, or I think about how I'm making it simpler than I'd originally planned, so it's nice to have somewhere for these things to go since I already have a bunch on my bed and in the closet.

Now I'm in that lull that comes after the completion of some big project, fantasizing about other big blanket-shaped projects I could start, but I want to try to work on this banjo thing. And learning Icelandic. And clearing my apt of anything I don't like enough to keep in storage when I make it to Iceland.

You're no fun anymore

I have developed the bad habit of regularly checking the Google stock price. And even when I peek occasionally at my Vanguard 401k and whatever else it is I have in there, all I see is red, red, red. It wouldn't be so bad if I was at least breaking even, but no.

Boo, you're no fun anymore, stocks. You are making people tell me I should keep my job.

But I want to grow vegetables and play banjo and sew things. I want to compost and bake and meet people.

Were you aware of it? vol. 12: The Mayor of Rabbit Hash, KY

Rabbit Hash, KY (pop. 40) is a small community in Boone County. In 1998 and again in 2004, Junior the Dog was elected mayor, in an unofficial election. The 2004 mayor died earlier this year, and the town brought the vote for a new mayor online. For a $1 donation to the Rabbit Hash Historical Society, you too could have voted.

Here are a few words, from mayoral candidate, Travis the Cat:

Travis chose Rabbit Hash and you should choose this cat to be the new Mayor of Rabbit Hash. He is the ONLY candidate that actually resides in Rabbit Hash. This gives Travis an advantage because he sees the needs of the town and is always there to greet and meet the needs of the people. He is a hard working cat and he is non-discriminating, but most important he is not intimidated by the other candidates. He is not afraid to stand alone or to be the Top Cat in the Top Hat Vote now, vote often, vote for change, vote Travis!!

Lucy Lou the dog pulled ahead in the polls on election day, though, and now serves as mayor.

Visit the official Rabbit Hash website.

The beginning of the bluegrass band

So these home schooled 18 year old boys are really good. And they are adorable.

Tim (the banjo/mandolin teacher/band coordinator) told me and Anna (his gf/our guitar player) to be nice to them because they're shy. Aww how cute is that?? They are absolute sweethearts.

I really need to practice though. These kids learned in about 15 minutes the song I still can't play right even though I've been trying it for months. And they can play it faster and with out messing up as much - granted they've been playing their instruments for way longer. I'm just pleased to be playing bluegrass with other people, esp. people who are better than me.

I also need to learn how to play with a capo since all the fiddle versions of these songs are written in A instead of G, so I get lost when I have to make that giant leap in the B part of Salt Creek. And I need to practice chords and try to relearn some more interesting way of vamping behind other people's solos.

I did nail Cripple Creek, though, thankfully, since it's probably the easiest song I know.

Now that this quilt/monster is done and given away (more on that later), I'll have plenty of time to practice.