Jack of All Trades, Master of... Well, Whatever...

I've never been one to focus, undivided, on one task. I'm always coming up with some new thing I want to try. That's why stores like Joann's, Home Depot, heck, even Target are so hard on me. I walk in and all the little project neurons in my brain start firing up until I leave with smoke coming out of my ears and bags full of random items none of which are the actual item I came in for in the first place. I know the people who run the stores are all too familiar with my kind. I suppose there's a bunch of government funded researchers somewhere tranquilizing aimless shoppers coming out of Michael's to tag them for further consumer monitoring. We must do what we can to lift this recession, you know.

Well, here are a few of my latest little endeavors:

I was able to sneak in a day of raspberry picking. I froze a ton of them, but also made a batch of freezer jam. Can't wait to put a little of this in my fro-yo!

Of course I'm still working on the garden. I've got some fun little peppers coming in and some great tomatoes! Lately as I've been eating the garden-fresh tomatoes I've been wondering what those red things I've been buying at the store all year are. They look the same, but the taste doesn't even compare!

David and I finished our 50 Mile Challenge last month! Yay us! We finished it on the fourth mile of the 8K we did together. Now we are preparing a fun chart for our next challenge.

Melissa gave me her old sewing machine a couple months ago, so that's really getting the wheels turning on some projects. Dad gave me a bookshelf that I've been wanting to spruce up, so I decided to see what I could do with some paint and material. I love color, but I think I got a little too pastel on this one. I like the material and the paint, but together they look like they belong in a nursery. I'm still pondering this project... I've also been experimenting with my dining room wall. I added some vinyl words and want to surround them with pictures, but haven't gotten everything in frames yet.

Oh, that's just a sampling. I also have other projects scattered about my home and my life. We'll see what turns out and what doesn't! Now, if you'll excuse me, the last time I came back from Michael's I blacked out and when I came to I had this big, plastic bracelet on. I'm gonna go see if I can get that thing off...

*D*

"What's On Ur Playlist" Circa 1989

Today the Walkman turned 30 years old. Kids these days take for granted that if it wasn't for this cutting edge technology they could still be carrying "ghetto blasters" around on their shoulders.

Since Melissa wrote her "What's On Ur Playlist" post a little while ago I (Deanna) thought it might be fun to peek into her playlist from the past. (Well "our playlist" since I was four years younger and dependent on my junior high sister to lead me into the ways of pop culture.)

The last time I was at our parents' house, Dad was handing me things he'd found here and there that he figured must be ours. I opened up a shoebox and their was our playlist.

There were some infamous tapes in there that could possibly go down in pop history.

It is easy to see that when Melissa wrote about her eclectic taste, that's something that hasn't changed much.

Lucky for us we had the grandfather of the modern day playlist available: the mixed tape. Special note that one of those mixed tapes is "Dirty Dancing". We listened to that so much I could probably still sing along with every word... even the latin songs.

Like I said, I pretty much depended on my older sister to share her music, but after awhile I started developing my own tastes. Oh, I liked these ones.

I'm pretty sure the first tape I ever bought was The Beach Boys' "Kokomo" (go ahead, you know you wanna sing it... Aruba, Jamaica, Ooooh I wanna take ya...), but here were a couple of staples in my music library a little later on.

Wow, I listened to my IPod while writing most of this post. Things do change, don't they? But I don't care what kids today say, we and our cassette tapes were hip.

Life Disconnected

Wow, I (Deanna) haven't been my usual bloggy self lately. Why you ask? Ah, the answer is simple, I've been disconnected. My internet has been down for a couple of weeks and thanks to wonderful aparmtent life, the many channels I must go through sometimes slow down, get blocked or have their car break down so they have to take the bus to get to the building they manage, but don't actually live in. I've been able to sneak in access here and there, but the truth is, I pay my bills, shop, talk, apply for jobs and a billion other things through my computer so I'm feeling a bit unsettled. Do you even realize how long it's been since I've been able to play a decent game of Chicktionary?! Besides, what if I have to email something very important to somebody very important? Luckily, I do have a few minutes to send bits of intellectual stimulation to the people in my life. How else would I alert my fine readers about this breaking (and actually true) news?

Pedestrians ran in every direction and a woman and her dogs jumped into a lake as a 77-year-old motorist led officers on a wild, yet slow, ride through the hub of Port Orange near City Hall.

If that little snippet doesn't make you want to read the full article, how about:

At one point, a policeman ran alongside her car and was able to open the door and grab Hollifield's left arm. But that only strengthened her resolve. She put the car in reverse, revved the engine and rammed into the officer's squad car before roaring off, police said.

As you can see, it is paramount that I get this internet issue fixed immediately.

If You're Gonna Dream, Dream Big...

When I was "knee high to a grasshopper" (that's what my mom would always say), people would ask me what I wanted to do when I grew up. My first serious aspiration was to be a major league baseball player and an archaeologist in the off-season. For those of you readers who don't know, this plan never came to fruition. The next serious consideration was to be a speech pathologist and audiologist. I'm not exactly sure why this popped into my little third grade brain, but then again, I always have been drawn to the art of conversation (i.e. I talk a lot). As I was bathed in hormones throughout my jr high and high school years my ambitions were usurped by friends, boys and acne. However, a distant part of my brain was calling to me to make it big on Broadway. Again, for those of you who don't know, I have not become a speech pathologist, audiologist or a star on Broadway... but I still have acne. My university years were filled with decisions and I followed my loquacious giftings (loquacious giftings in this case meaning I still talked a lot). However, there is always a crazily perfect dream hanging out and having fun in the back of my head. I wanted to share my current resident. Folks, may I present The Greenhouse.

Imagine, it's a cold winter day and it has snowed... let's just say... 19 inches in 24 hours. Wouldn't you just love to cuddle up with some coffee or maybe fly away to somewhere tropical? Can't decide? Come on over! I would have a giant tropical greenhouse looking something like this:
Birds would be flying around in areas behind some netting (so your latte doesn't get any extra "cream"). You can grab your friends and a latte, sit by the waterfall and listen to the birds.

Oh, and the temperature wouldn't be the only thing that's warm. The baristas would be warm and friendly and able to chat anytime because it would be overstaffed. They would make some great coffee (fair trade, non genetically altered of course!). Sometimes they will sing a silly song for you or remember your daughter's birthday, but they will always do there best to make you smile. If you're a regular you will probably have your picture somewhere around the cafe area in a frame. It's always important to have family photos you know. We would send used coffee home with our very welcomed composters. We also might stick a flower behind your ear as you walk out the door so you can go add a little color to the world.

Deanna