twoapennything

Honestly, was there ever any doubt?

"As adults we make assumptions about what works for children," said Penny Curtis, a senior lecturer in research at the university."We found that clowns are universally disliked by children. Some found them quite frightening and unknowable."

I'll take a tub of eels, thanks. No clowns.

Now that President Bush has declared martial law, it will be illegal to own precious metals after the first of the year. Here's a sneak peek at the new money from BlimpTV.net:

Gakked from boingboing_net: Rankin, photographer and founder of Dazed and Confused magazine, created an incredible photographic series of more than a dozen decontextualized irises. Scrolling horizontally back and forth across these images is quite trance-inducing. The project is called Eyescapes. LINK

I think this decontextualized iris most closely resembles my eye color, as my shade of blue is very dark.



What about you? Which decontextualized iris most closely resembles your eye color? Leave a comment with your decontextualized iris! (I uploaded the image to Scrapbook, fwiw)

In other news, a conversation:

twoapennything: Haha, my kids are riding circles around me on their Razor scooters :)) *makes Indian noise*
longtimegone: :)):)):)) That's hilarious!
twoapennything: Yay for snow in Denver! Kids must exercise in the house. Should I make them wear helmets? ;)

It is cold here tonight. Currently is it 4 degrees Fahrenheit (-16 Celcius). *BRR*

Busy weekend, this one. I spent most of the day cooking and doing food prep. Tomorrow, I'm having my mom and step-dad for dinner. We always do our gift exchange on either Christmas Eve or thereabouts, so the kids can have time to appreciate their gifts from Grandma and Grandpa before the deluge that is Christmas morning. That said, to be fair to myself, I don't provide a deluge of gifts for my kids -- they have five presents each, plus stocking stuffers. I hit the dollar store -- you know, the dollar store has some interesting stuff if you're willing to sort through the bins. Anyhow, tomorrow night's menu consists of: Beef Bourguinon, fresh carrots prepared in butter and baked new potatoes with Parisien herbs. For dessert I'm just serving chocolate-covered bing cherries from Harry & David. The beef is marinading right now.

( || RECIPE : BEEF BOURGUINON || EPICURIOUS.COM || )

I am also brining a turkey, which I will roast tomorrow. I usually buy a turkey at Christmas time, as they're cheap. I freeze the meat for casseroles and soups. I cooked the gizzards for a gravy base and fed the liver and heart to the dogs (after whirling it in the food processor)

I have two items to purchase tomorrow: more Christmas cards and a foursome of M*A*C eyeshadows for my niece. After that, I'm done with my shopping. Hmm, I'm almost tempted to go tonight and just get it over with. *ponders* I mean, it's going to suck either way . . . hmm. I mailed out 20 cards on Tuesday, but ran out of cards! This gave me time to complete a 2007 holiday letter. I haven't done a holiday letter in like five years, but I've always enjoyed it traditionally. It's good to get back into the swing of things.

Also, I'm three months out from my surgery, so I suppose more "AFTER" pictures will soon by forthcoming.

I've decided to do the Year in Review meme, but I'll make that a separate post.

Today my job required me to carry a half-drunk bottle of SKOL vodka through the lobby of my building, while wearing full body armor.

I'm just sayin'.

( || SPEAKING OF HIGH FASHION . . . PROJECT RUNWAY & JANICE DICKINSON'S MODELING AGENCY || )

And my TV evening wouldn't have been complete without Gordon Ramsey vomiting loudly and with much gusto.

Gakked from piperki:

Seen on the internets...a meme for people over 18! Dang!

The "Grown Up" Survey
(Meant to be completed by those out of high school)

Tired of all of those surveys made up by high school kids?
'Have you ever kissed someone?'
'Missed someone?'
'Told someone you loved them?'
'Drank alcohol?'

Here are 50 questions for the people who are a little more "mature"...( || MEME || UNDER THE CUT || )

Today I gave away every goddamned diet book I had. I've been collecting diet books for . . . hmm . . . fifteen years? Sommat like that anyway. But, my God, how freeing it was to get rid of the books . . . Thin For Life, Eat More, Weigh Less, The Paleo Diet, Dr. Atkins Diet Revolution, You: On a Diet, Protein Power, five books on candida-free eating, a cholesterol cookbook, a metric buttload of Weight Watchers materials and many, many more. I have to admit, as I did so, I got teary-eyed. It's just that I've been living with obesity for so long - sometimes it seems like a dream, that I'm actually losing weight. I'm not sure how far down I am by now, but at last count I had lost 43 pounds -- that was about three weeks ago? I will see my doctor next week for my vitamin B12 shot, so I'll see if I can sneak back to the scale. I do not have a scale in my house right now and, you know, that's actually okay, as I'm an obsessive scale watcher in general. For the first time on Monday, I had a client ask, "Geez, have you lost weight?" It was the first time someone asked me if I'd lost weight, who didn't know I've had the bypass.

We're gathering tomorrow for the family dinner at my sister's ex-husband's home in Henderson, which is a first. Our family specializes in amicable divorces. Anyhow, I'm quite proud of myself because I actually was uber prepared for Thanksgiving this year. I baked 10 pounds of Yukon Gold potatoes on Sunday -- today, I peeled and cut them up (so much easier than peeling raw and then boiling) and made some kick-ass mashy tay-tays. Recipe: 10 pounds Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and cooked; 1 stick butter, melted; 1 pint heavy whipping cream; 2-3 cups chicken broth; salt to taste. Combine and mash ingredients; reheat prior to serving and garnish with chopped chives or parsley, or herbs of choice (I'm using a light sprinkle of Penzey's Bonne Herbs (Parisien). Tomorrow I'll bake the rolls right before we leave for Doug's. The gravy -- classic brown -- is prepared and ready to reheat. I may even whip up some cranberry relish using a recipe I heard on NPR this morning, if I feel arsed to. We'll see!

Last weekend I put up our Christmas tree. Our tradition is to decorate the tree either on Thanksgiving evening or over the weekend following. We have a nine foot, skinny tree, and I use a lot of lights and am super anal about their placement. I wanted the tree to be ready for the ornaments, so I spent a few days on the tree, making sure the branches were properly fluffed and arranged, and then I put on the lights using red minis and gold/glitter bubble lights. Gryffindor colors, heh! It looks really pretty, especially as we have yellow and red paint on the walls.

Otherwise, I've been gorging myself sick on cover songs over at audiography, which is totally a 100% black OR white thing. Either I like the cover, or I completely do not. A lot of the songs are misses for me, but I've also found some terrific gems.

Denver Public Schools Closing 8 Schools: DENVER – Monday, Superintendent Michael Bennet of the Denver Public School District unveiled his list of eight schools the district plans to close.

-Remington Elementary School, 4735 Pecos St., Denver
-Smedley Elementary School, 4250 Shoshone St., Denver
-Del Pueblo Elementary School, 750 Galapago St., Denver
-Whitman Elementary School, 451 Newport St., Denver
-Fallis Elementary School, 6700 E Virginia Ave., Denver
-Mitchell Elementary School, 1350 E 33rd Ave., Denver
-Wyman Elementary School, 1690 Williams St., Denver
-Hallett Elementary School, 2950 Jasmine St., Denver

Bennet also listed five schools that will be reformed under his plan:

-Horace Mann Middle School, 4130 Navajo St., Denver
-Place Middle School, 7125 Cherry Creek North Dr., Denver
-Gilpin K-8, 2949 California St., Denver
-Kunsmiller Middle School, 2250 S. Quitman Way, Denver
-Cole Middle School, 3240 Humboldt St., Denver

Now, Mitchell Elementary is our home school, although we choiced in to Bromwell Elementary and were lucky enough to get the children slots. Seriously, that was a crapshoot -- it's one of the top performing schools. Interestingly, the academic requirements are not as rigorous as the charter school in Jefferson County where Ariel and Hunter transferred from. Anyhow, the neighborhood we live in here in Denver is eclectic, culturally rich, mostly Latino and has a high immigrant population. It's unfortunate that Mitchell will not be available to serve our neighborhood children anymore -- every morning as I drive to work, I see a lot of families walking together to drop their children off at Mitchell. There is a lot of poverty in our neighborhood; conversely, it's become a "trendy" neighborhood, as people are priced out of neighborhoods like Washington Park, Cherry Creek and Congress Park. I.E. it's gentrifying.

I used to have a very caveat emptor attitude about gentrification and felt it was progressive and positive to see neighborhood revitalization. Of course revitalization can be a positive thing, but when it disparately displaces the working class, and families and individuals of color, then, yeah, I have a problem with that. For the first time in the history of our city council district a caucasian won the seat for District 8 Denver City Council. It has always traditionally been seen as an African-American seat and, indeed, the run-off election between Carla Madison (winner) and Sharon Bailey was very close.

I think the closing of all the schools listed above will negatively impact Latinos in particular (judging from demographics). This is such a hard situation -- I am not the one who will be affected negatively by gentrification. I am part of gentrification, even though my motive wasn't particularly malicious: I just wanted an old Victorian house. This neighborhood is where I could afford to buy one. I wish there was a clear path of inclusion in this situation, so that those constrained by poverty and historical white entitlement wouldn't be so negatively impacted.

I do like to shop, as you all probably know by now. Yesterday the children and I went to the crack house Target to buy materials for Ariel's project on mythology. Then, we went to Borders and found this great book on Mythology for only $19.99

Okay, I ordered shoes from Zappos. Why? Why do I continue to do this? Perhaps it's the hope that someday -- SOMEDAY! -- I will find a pair of shoes that do not flay my feet open when I wear them, that aren't Crocs. I'm sure weight loss will help. But, anyway, I purchased these ballerina flats:



I have the perfect skirt that has both colors featured in the shoe in the fabric, and I anticipate wearing the skirt with opaque tights and some kind of wrap-around shirt. God help me, but the shoes come in red, too. (I did not order the red ones, although I was tempted!)

I also decided to try getting my groceries by home delivery, which I haven't done since 1999. Previously, the cost of delivery was 10% of the total bill, which could easily be like $25.00. I thought that was excessive, so I just stopped using the service. However, it's become popular, so now the cost of delivery is a $9.95 flat fee. I'm totally down with that. So, my groceries will be delivered tomorrow evening. Another advantage, I've found, is that when you order online, you are faced with the reality of how much stuff you are purchasing. I re-did my shopping list three times before submitting it, and doing so really gave me pause to consider what I truly needed, as opposed to things I was purchasing because they were on sale, thus "a good deal." My bill went down from $460 to $290 -- that's a huge difference. And I realized that I had shopped online in the same way I shop when hungry/tired/in a rush in the actual store itself. Many times I've purchased groceries that ended up going to waste just because something looked, or was, a good deal. It's not a good deal when you end up throwing it away. $290 is still a lot to spend on groceries and sundries (although we're a family of four), but we've run out of, like, everything -- I had to stock up.

DD = Dear Daughter
ME = Me
DH = Hubby

DD: *calls from the front door excitedly* MOM! THERE'S A CAR DRIVING BY OUTSIDE WITH GLOWING BLUE WHEELS!
ME: Classy.
DH: Classy.