Life Update

Since it's been a little while since I have posted I thought I'd do a quick update on how things have been going. 

First off, J found a job!  YAY!!  Not only did he find a job, but it's a great one.  Good paying and great benefits.  He's just finished his 3rd week on the job and seems to be settling into it now.  He was very nervous and frustrated at first because he had a lot to learn in a very short amount of time but I had faith that he would figure it out and he has.  It's nice to see him settling in and getting some confidence back.  It has been a long 6 months for the both of us.  When he came into my work to tell me he got the job I gave him and big hug and congratulated him.  What I really wanted to do was break down and cry.  I had been trying for so very long to hold it together for both of us and it was like a huge weight had been lifted off me and all these emotions I had been holding in for so long wanted to come rushing out.  His new job may mean some big changes in our life, but I am looking forward to that.  He is working out in Taber and has to commute to work and back each day.  We have discussed the option of moving out to Taber.  This is something we have talked about before.  To be closer to the farm and be able to help out a little easier.  I am all for moving, but with the caviet that we get a new and more reliable car so I can commute back to the city and keep my job.  I love my job and am not ready to find something different.  The commute for me would be a little easier as my job starts a little later in the day than his.  We are thinking that January would be a good time to move. That way he is good and settled in his job and we have time to save up a little money beforehand.  I am really looking forward to this as I find myself growing more and more sick of the city.  I tried to sit on my deck and read the other day and I found myself getting very frustrated with how noisy it was outside!  Construction, cars, sirens, people yelling etc.  And I really miss having a yard.  I think we have outgrown our little apartment and I look forward to something new.

I am offically the stage manager for LMT's production of Hairspray this year as well as my duties as Vice President.  I was very excited that the director wanted me involved in the audition process.  I really enjoy working with this new director so far and I am hopeful for an amazing show.  I really enjoyed watching everyone audition and seeing such an amazing group of truly talented people!  I am glad that the final decision wasn't mine.  I did get the opportunity to call and offer parts to the members of the cast who made it into the ensemble.  That was an interesting experience.  I was expecting people to be a little more excited I suppose.  I was shocked by the number of people who auditioned, said they would accept a role in the ensemble and then turned it down when offered.  Two of the people who turned it down later reconsidered and were allowed back in and two more ended up declining after initially accepting the role.  But all in all, we have a great group of people and some amazing new talent to work with.  I will also be training a new assistant stage manager this year as one of my usual ones has been promoted to production manager.  I'm excited to work with her though and I know she will be an asset to me. So, as has become a bit of a tradition with my, my fall will be exceptionally busy.

Work has been going well, if not a little slowly.  This is our first summer since I've worked there that we don't have an alterations department in the store so we are finding ourselves a little bored at times.  But all in all, it's good.

Some sad news to report.  The little colt who was attacked by the coyote is now an orphan.  Her mother had a heart attack on father's day.  J and I arrived at the farm and were in the house for no more than 5 minutes when we went out to help his mom light the BBQ and found her dead.  We're not sure what happened but we think the stress of the attack took it's toll on her and she had a heart attack.  B said she had slowly been going downhill since the attack.  It was so sad.  I have been on the farm when a horse has died before but this was way harder to watch.  The little filly tried to wake her up and kept pawing at her mom.  I was heartbroken.  I just hope that she makes it.  She has fought an uphill battle since she was first introduced into the world.

On a happy note, I'm going to be an Aunt again!  Ms A and Ms E are going to be big sisters and I'm very happy for my brother and sis-in-law.

Anyway, there's the update.  I'm going to try to to get back to writing a little more regularly on this blog, and maybe my other one too until the fall hits and life goes crazy again.

Being a Farm Girl

So the last two weeks have been crazy and we've put a lot of mile on our little car.  Usually we go to the farm every May long weekend to brand cattle but this year things went a little differently.  Friday (the week before the long weekend) I get a text from J while I was at work that we needed to head out to the farm asap as things had gone bad at the farm.  We rushed out after I got off work and found that things were a bit of a mess.  The cattle where breaking down fences and a new baby colt had been attacked by a coyote. By the time we got there, J's dad had gotten the cattle into the big corral and the colt and it's mom into a stall in the barn.

We got straight to work.  Me, J, B and my nephew T2 went to work sorting the cattle into 3 groups.  One to stay in the field at the farm, one to go to the community pasture, and one to go to the west pasture.  It was going well until I realized that the list I was working off wasn't divided correctly and we had too many cattle in one pen.  It was getting really dark by this point so it was hard to see the tags in the cattle's ears.  We had to give up for the night, but at least we got them settled.  J and T2 did have to do a little hunting to find one mama that had gotten separated from her calf so they didn't break a fence in the night trying to find each other but they managed to do it.  The next day I had to go back to town to go to work.

After working, I headed back out to the farm and found the J, B, T2 and one of our other nephews W just finishing up with the cattle.  The got them all sorted and the cattle for the west pasture hauled away.  Everything was ready to go to brand the next day.  We headed back to the other farm to check on the colt. It was the first time I had seen her and it broke my heart.  The coyote had really done a number on her.  It attacked her rear end and had ripped her up very badly.  Her right hipbone was visible through the wound but she's a fighter.  She was up and walking around and eating well.  And she's gorgeous!  Thankfully she has a really gentle mama so we get easily get into the stall and clean and doctor her when needed.  I love the name B picked for her too.  Because the horses are purebred, their names often have a  bit of their parents name in it as well making it easy to follow the line back. (ie Silver and Gold to Silver Warrior to Warrior Princess)  The colt's mom is names Penny so B named her Penny Many Wounds.  I took some pictures of her about 18 hours after the attack.  Warning, the images are graphic.  The black/dark blue inside the wounds is bactine for pain and to prevent infection.  Just remember, she is doing very well.

Left leg after coyote attack.  

Right leg after coyote attack

Mama and Baby 

Sunday, we decided to brand.  It was a week earlier than we had planned but the cattle were getting restless and hay was starting to run low.  Better to get it done early and move them to the pasture with loads of fresh grass.  The only bad part with this was that the rest of the family had not planned on being out there until next weekend.  They all managed to rearrange their schedules to make it out and by the time they got there we were ready to go.  One of the great parts of my nephews getting older (and bigger!  Holy have they grown) is that they are more than capable of jumping in to help us now. J and B got se up on the calf table while T2 and I made a plan to push the calves.  Usually J and I do this job but it's time for T2 to learn the ropes.  I loaded the calves in the chute and moved them forward and then T2 would take them one at a time and load them into the calf table to be branded/vaccinated etc.  W learned how to vaccinate this year and did a great job.  T2 was so awesome with the calves, who were exceptionally big this year.  He took a good kick in the chest at one point but kept on going with a smile on his face.  We got done in record time this year.  The best part for me was watching one of the dogs work.  Kobe is a two-year-old Border Collie.  She was bred to work animals, but she has had no training with them yet.  The most she has been taught is sit, come and where she is able to wander on the farm and where is off limits (such as the road).  I was to busy working to grab my phone and film her working but it was amazing to see.  No one told her what to do.  She sat in the alley and watched us for the first few calves and then suddenly it was like everything clicked for her.  She would lie in the alley with one eye one the calves in the pen that were finished one one eye on the calf in the table.  When the calf in the table was finished, she would jump up and lead it into the pen with the other animals.  She kept a watchful eye on them and got it in her head that they all needed to stay together in the far corner of the pen.  If one began to wander away from the rest, she would jump and and herd it back with the others.  She never barked once or nipped at any of the calves.  It was amazing to watch really.  Pure instinct.  She's going to be one heck of a cattle dog.

After 3 long days of working with the cattle and the horses J and I were exhausted so we headed back to town.  That night we got the call that a second colt had been attacked.  Thank goodness this one wasn't as bad.  It has a fighter for a mama and she beat them off before they could do too much damage.

Since I already had the long weekend off, we decided to go back out to the farm for the long weekend anyway and do some fix up jobs that had been neglected over time.  Everyone came out with their trailers and tents and we had a very productive weekend.  Me, J and the kids rebuilt a couple of the corrals and cleaned up a bunch of wood that was lying around.  It was so great to get down and dirty and work hard, eat amazing food and sit by the campfire and visit each night.

J and the boys hard at work on the corral

Finished corral

Sunday we decided we had had enough of building fences so we decided to move the horses from the lake up to the other pasture out west.  That involved moving them across the road from the lake, behind the house and into the round pen where we could load them up into the trailer to move.  In the past this hasn't been the most difficult challenge, but with the attacks this year those mares where high strung and skittish.  We made a plan of how to do things and went into action.  

A few of the herd at the lake before we moved them

We dropped of J's sister and one of the boys down the road a little ways to keep them from turning and J's mom and I took our post a little further up the road.  W haltered Penny and brought her out to the gate by the lake to lead the herd across.  That kid was amazing.  Here he was holding this incredibly strong animal who wanted nothing more than to get back to her baby and he kept her under control and kept his cool.  After a few tries we finally got the herd to follow W and Penny and that kid just took off running to show them where to go.  Thank goodness we got them across the road safely as some cars just didn't pay attention to what was going on.  One we got them in the pasture behind the house, things fell apart.  One of the mares was being very uncooperative and kept breaking away and causing the herd to scatter.  Poor W was working so hard to keep Penny under control and she just kept spinning around him and nipping at him constantly.  One of the colts took a hard tumble when the herd turned but she got up and kept on running.  I watched the poor little one who had been attacked take a hard step into a badger hole and open up it's scab pretty good.  As frustrating as it was, it was a thing of beauty to watch.  There's something about a herd of horses running that is just beautiful.  I wish I could have stopped to take a picture.  One of the coolest things I saw was my one nephew outrun a horse.  One of the mares cut from the herd and ran towards him full tilt.  He waved his arms to try to get her to turn but she wasn't stopping.  I thought for sure she would get past him and we'd have to start over but he turned and took off running, got ahead of her and managed to turn her back to the herd and the right direction.  After a while, we finally got them moved and into the round pen where they could settle for a bit and have a rest before we loaded them to move.  Those poor babies were so tired!  They just laid out where ever there was some grass and took a nap.  I took the time to play with Jack a bit and pet T's horse Appy.  

Simple Jack and a baby bunny

I love it at the farm.  I would be happy to stay there all the time!  It's so peaceful out there and I love the hard work.  Here's a few more pics from the weekend.

Our home away from home

The kids decided to make Smores by wrapping the whole thing in tinfoil...

The result of the Smore attempt...

J was playing fetch with the dogs and got the toy stuck on the power line.  B got the tractor to help him get it down. Please don't attempt this yourself.  They are trained "professionals"

The dogs after a long game of fetch...all tuckered out

The view over the lake every night.  This is why I love being a farm girl.

Project Lulu Update

I thought I'd do a quick post updating my progress on my cosplay for this years Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo.  I decided to go with Lulu from Final Fantasy X this year as she is a character I love and I thought it would be a great challenge.  I am making this costume mostly from scratch and have been working on it bit by bit since about December.  It's taken quite some time to do the planning stages as well as collecting all the materials I need, particularly the massive amount of belts needed.  I have also managed to get almost everything I need locally, which is awesome because I love supporting local businesses.  The only things I have had to get online are my wig and contacts (currently on order).  Here's the progress with just 36 days to go!

Materials I used to construct the purple necklace.  I couldn't find the proper disk beads so I made them from Apoxy dots (for scrapbooking) glued together and then painted with a metallic pearl craft paint.

Completed Necklaces.  The pearls are restrung from a necklace bought at a Thrift Store and each necklace has a magnetic clasp to keep them all properly aligned with each other and prevent twisting and spinning on the body.

To save time and major headaches I purchase a corset that I could convert to work for the costume.  You wouldn't believe how difficult it was to find one!  I wanted one with a shorter body so I wouldn't be uncomfortable as I was last year when sitting in panels.  I finally found one and even though it's not perfect, I kind of like the grey pinstripe in it.  I like how it ties in with the grey of the dress.  I added the grey trim with a hand stitch.

Finished corset and fur wrap.  I reclaimed the fur from the lining of a vest purchased at a Thrift Store.

Rough Draping...just so I could see where this is all heading.

Constructing the "lace" trim.  I debated on how to tackle the edging on the dress for quite some time.  Real lace didn't give the look of the picture I'm working off of as it is uniform and generally not the right colors I need.  I decided to make my own using a stencil to paint the desired effect on a white muslin and them outline it for more detail.

Finished sleeves and partially finished overskirt.  I just have the lace trim for the train left on this piece and then to tackle the belt skirt.  Good news is I still have enough fabric left from the skirt to use as a base for the belts so I shouldn't have any other major purchases in order to complete this one!

What's left on the to do list?

• paint and attach lace trim to train
• cut out belt skirt base and attach belts with glue and zip ties for added strength
• add 2 tiers of boning to the belt skirt for added stability, ease of movement and weight distribution
• add velcro to edges of overskirt to attach to belt skirt
• add belts to sleeves
• construct the 4 hairsticks and add to the wig (once it arrives)
• find some purple lipstick

Wish me luck!

Christmas Baking

Today was our annual Christmas bake day with my family.  Every year my mom, sister and sister-in-law and I get together and do our best to make our friends and families a little fatter each year.  Today we got together and made gingerbread men, sweet n salty (a yummy cereal and nut mix covered in a syrup), cherry and lemon pound cakes, lemon shortbread cookies and oreo truffles.  This year went super smoothly and we got all this baking done in just a few hours.

It was the first year we made these Oreo truffles and let me tell you, they are amazing!  They are super easy to make too.  Well, after you figure our how to dip chocolates that is.  My mom and I started on them before everyone else arrived and after two terrible rounds of attempting to melt the chocolate and ruining some perfectly amazing Bernard Callebaut chocolate we finally got our technique down.  My sister showed up in time to help me start dipping the truffles and they turned out pretty great for our first attempt.  Plus they are super yummy!

Once the truffles were done D, JH and Miss A moved on the the gingerbread while my mom worked on various other goodies.  I rolled out the dough while D and JH cut out the cookies and Miss A did the decorating and sugar sprinkling.  She did a great job and helped through almost all the cookies which is pretty impressive for a 2 year old.  Some of her decorating made us all giggle.  Particularly the "fig leaf" gingerbread men and generous sprinkling of sugar.

Some of the fig leaf gingerbread men came out a little...inappropriate.  This lead to a lot more giggling and merriment.

All in all it was a fun day, even if my tummy is a little mad at me for having too many sweets.  Here's the fruits of our labors for the day.  Hopefully everyone enjoys them as much as we enjoyed making them!

My Vacation

Today is the last day of my summer vacation, and it's been great.  J and I didn't have any major plans but we had a wonderful time anyway.  Last Sunday we spent the day out at my mom's place visiting with the family and spending some time with my Aunt that was up visiting from Arizona.  It was a great time and some great food.  J still had to work Monday so I went in for a couple of hours to get caught up on some stuff and then went and did some shopping.

Tuesday was our anniversary - see last post for details on our day.

On Wednesday J got a call that he had a coaches meeting that night for the football team he's helping with this fall so we headed out to the farm for the rest of the week.  The first few days were pretty uneventful just hanging out at the farm with a few of my nephews.  My oldest nephew and I did sit outside and watch a pretty amazing thunderstorm on Wednesday night which was followed by a biblical down pouring of rain that only lasted 5 minutes but made me wish we had an ark during that 5 minutes.  On Friday, J's sisters both decided to pull their trailers out and we could all camp together.  It was so nice to camp out with everyone and not have any major chores that needed to be done.  On Saturday it was hot out.  One of those sweltering heats that makes you now want to do anything.  My youngest nephew was bored so we turned on the sprinklers for the kids to run through.  None of the other kids wanted to play with him so I decided to jump in even if I didn't bring a bathing suit with me.  I got really tired of the other kids being lazy and just hanging out in their great-grandma's house watching tv and playing video games so I decided it was time to do something about it.  J's dad went in the house and yelled that it was time for them all to come outside and play and as they grumbled their way out the door I got them with a bucket of water and an hour long water fight ensued.  It was so much fun!  After the water fight died down we decided to take the kids swimming in the canal.  The water was clear and moving quite fast and was surprisingly warm.  Despite dousing myself in sunscreen I still walked out with a super bad sunburn.  We headed back to camp and relaxed around the fire while my brother-in-law cooked burgers over an open fire.  They were fantastic!  We stayed up late around the fire visiting and watching J and the kids play a late night game of "war" running around the fields shooting each other and having a grand time.

Sunday we were supposed to leave in the afternoon to pick up a friend at the airport but I decided to stay while J went back to town so I could go horseback riding with my sister's in law.  Things were going well at first.  I caught Jack with no problems and got him haltered and in the round pen with no resistance.  He was acting a little funny once I put his bit in but calmed down after I walked him around for a bit.  I decided to get on him in the round pen and ride a bit in there before we went into the field just to make sure everything was ok and that's when things went wrong.  I got on him and it was ok for a minute and then all hell broke loose.  He just started bucking like mad which he has never done before.  I tried to get him back under control but I soon realized it was a losing battle.  I managed to hang on until he turned away from the fence and then I bailed.  I hit the ground hard landing on my right foot and left knee  I scrambled to climb the fence quick as he was still bucking and had just reached to top when one of the kids and one of my sister in law's rand around from the other side of the barn.  My ankle was hurting pretty bad but I walked around a bit and C and I got Jack calmed and started checking his tack to see if we had done something wrong to make him buck.  C got on the phone and called my father in law to come down and help.  When B got there he checked things over and thought things were ok so I got back on with B holding a lunge line just in case.  Things went good for a couple of minutes and then he started again.  I lost my balance and my inner thigh's slammed into the pommel of the saddle hard and down I went.  B got him calmed and lunged him for a bit and then back on I went.  He seemed much better at this point so B gave me the reins and we went to riding.  I screwed up a bit and scared him and he jumped in response which threw me off balance again and scared him even more and he started bucking again.  In my head I knew what to do, but in that moment my body didn't respond and he managed to throw me high in the air and I cam down flat on my butt and my wrist.  That really hurt and I wasn't able to get back on at that point.  My nephew got on him for a bit and I went back to the campsite.  I found out later that my nephew got bucked off as well but thankfully he's ok.  I, on the other hand, am not.  My ankle is bruised and swollen.  Both of my thighs are jet black with some of the worst bruising I have ever seen.  And I have very limited use of my right arm.  I have injured my ulnar nerve which is really making life difficult since I'm right-handed.  Work tomorrow is going to suck!

Right leg 3 days after.

Left leg 3 days post "rodeo" I love how you can still see the seam line of my jeans in the bruise.

Calgary Comic Expo 2011

I'm home.  What a fantastic weekend we had!  The con was amazing.  I thought I'd share the weekend with you so you could come along for the ride.

Things started out bad.  We got the news Thursday the George A. Romero was forced to cancel his appearance due to injury.  You see he broke his arm and would be unable to sign any autographs so he decided to cancel.  While I understand the reasons I was a little choked that we had spent money on tickets to the private screening and now we weren't sure what was going to happen.  There was some quick work done on the organizers part and they brought in Linda Blair at short notice and billed a double feature of The Exorcist and Night of the Living Dead.  They also gave you the option of getting a full refund.  We decided to wait and decide with D and R on the way there to see if they wanted to go or get a refund.  We spent the evening Thursday getting our bags packed and triple checking that we didn't forget anything.

Thursday morning we did an extra check of inventory (and yet I still managed to forget my jacket) and hit the road at 11 a.m.  We got everything loaded in the car I asked D and R if they had their tickets.  Good thing I said something because they had forgotten them!  We made a quick detour back to their house and got on the road.  We made Calgary in good time and stopped off at the mall so I could buy some new eyelashes for my costume because I lost the ones I had.  I bought them months ago and put them someplace safe which of course I couldn't remember later.  I found some amazing ones and then we walked the mall for a little bit before going to our hotel to check in.  The hotel was quite nice and very close to the Con.  We probably could have walked there except that we were downtown and I wasn't comfortable with walking through some of the sketchy areas to get there.  We checked in and dropped our bags and headed off to day 1 of the Expo.  I was very pleased with the changes they had made this year.  The layout was better, the lineups for the panels had virtually disappeared because the venues was much larger.  The more popular panels were held in the Corral which can seat around 6000 so no one was turned away.  Once we got in the door we made a bolt for Artists Alley to find Linsner and Cary Nord.  And they weren't there...  We found their tables, but not them.  So we decided to do a little shopping and walk the floor.  While we were shopping an announcement came on that if you had tickets for the Romero screening you could exchange them for tickets to the Masquerade Ball instead.  I was pissed!  We would have done that in a heart beat if we had known before hand but we didn't bring outfits that would have worked for the Ball with us and we were 3 hours from home.  So now it's no Romero, no Linsner and no Masquerade.  This was not shaping up to be a good weekend.  We decided to do all our shopping on Friday because it was much quieter in the hall and the booths were fully stocked.  We came across and awesome t-shirt booth and I got a shirt that says "I'm with flanking bonus" and J got one that says "If you can read this, you just provoked and attack of opportunity".  D got a "Neville would have done it in four books"  I went to the autograph area and collected 2 more Cylons.  Kate Vernon (Ellen Tigh) was very sweet.  Micheal Hogan (The XO Saul Tigh) was fraking halarious!  J did some more shopping and we check for Linsner, Nord and Jeph Jacques one more time before we decided to leave.  We were all hungry so we decided to find a place to eat.  We decided to go to this little pub across the street from J's favorite gaming store in Calgary (The Sentry Box).  We shopped a bit there and then had a fantastic meal on the patio of the pub.  This was the point when I realized I had no jacket.  It got a bit chilly but I survived.  Then it was back to the hotel to try to get some rest before the biggest day of the con.

I was like a kid waiting for Christmas morning that night.  I was so tired but I couldn't sleep!  I knew I had to get up extra early to get in costume because there was only one bathroom and 4 of us that needed it.  I got up around 6 and decided to do down to the lobby at 6:30 to get a coffee from Starbucks.  I went back up to started getting ready and J, D and R went down for coffee about half hour after I did.  They come back up and tell me that they were in line behind Micheal Hogan!  Frak!  I can't believe I missed that!  So we all finished getting ready, took a couple of quick pictures and then headed out for the Con.  I was so nervous leaving the hotel because my costume was a bit revealing and people in the lobby where staring at me like crazy.  I almost lost me nerve and went back up to the room to change, but I decided that I would be ok once I got there and was around other geeks who would stare in a good way. I thought maybe a few people here and there would "get" my costume but I was overwhelmed with the response!

The finished product!

We arrived around 9 a.m. (advanced tickets holders got in at 9:30) and the line was huge!  It was much better organized than last year and it moved very quickly once the door opened.  In less than a minute walking through the doors people were already asking if they could take my picture.  I was shocked!  I couldn't believe how many Repo! fans there were.  Not only did people get what I was, they loved it!  This was the first person to ask to take a pic of me.  He was a real sweetie!

Photo Op while waiting in line with the cutest Ash ever.

Once we got inside we decided to walk the floor and check out other people's costumes.  We found out quickly that if you stopped walking or even slowed down for a moment you would get mobbed for pictures. We did each manage to find someone else there who was wearing the same costume as us and get a pic.  One of the convention organizers even ran up to me and awarded me a costume prize.

Found another Blind Mag!

Tron!  Let the games begin.

Galactica Crew

J's doppleganger was so excited to meet him.  Ah, the hero of Canton.

We went to the Battlestar Galactica panel at 11 with Kate Vernon and Micheal Hogan.  It was good but not as entertaining as last years panel.  I found it very hard to sit so I didn't want to do to many panels and there was a very annoying family in front of us that just let the squeaky shoed child run around the whole time.  People, they provided a daycare for this very reason!  After the panel we tried one more to to find Linsner only to find out his sign had been taken down and someone else took over his booth.  J did managed to find Cary Nord and get his Conan autographed and we finally tracked down Jeph Jacques and bought 2 copies of his book.  So many people were complimenting my costume J, D and R decided that they were going to register me for the costume contest.  I protested but they insisted.  We went to the booth but they told us they were full up on registration.  Shucks!  I guess I won't have to go onstage in front of several thousand people.  At 3:00 we went to the William Shatner panel.  Unfortunately it didn't get started until 3:30 or so due to the back up at Photo Ops.  He was funny as predicted and even managed to turn the stupid questions people asked into something else.  He did come across as a little arrogant at times, particularly when he basically dissed the InnerSpace boys who were moderating asking them what they were doing there.  His panel ran a little overtime which was good since he did start late, but he was a little put out when they said he had 10 more minutes.  After the panel we walked the floor some more, took more pics with people and chilled a bit before going back to watch the costume contest.  I must say, most of the entries in the contest where amazing! Some of the stand outs for me where Iron Man, Spawn, Master Chief, and Kneesocks.  There were so many amazing costumes there!  The major downside to the Costume contest was the sheer amount of Batman villains (I felt bad for them because the crowd got really tired of another Batman entry)and the fact that we were subject to almost 45 minutes of terrible improv while the judges deliberated.  I had heard that the improv troop The 404's were really good, but I (and the rest of the crowd) was less than impressed.  The costume contest ended after the expo was closed for the night so we headed back to the hotel to change and have a quick bite to eat before heading out to the private screening of The Exorcist.

The movie was screened in this really neat old theatre that used to be a garage but was converted to a movie theatre in the 1930's. They even served popcorn with real butter!  And for a reasonable price too.  Before Linda Blair came in they staff requested that all cell phones and video camera's be turned off or else she wouldn't come.  This may sound strange, but she explained her reason for this.  She felt that we had paid for a private show and therefore she wanted it to just be between her and those of us that paid and not show up on youtube for the world to see.  She shared some pretty interesting things with us that she doesn't often speak about in the more public venues.  The most interesting thing she shared was the story of how she was injured on the set of the film.  I will respect her wishes and keep most of her stories to myself but I did want to share this with you because it changed the way I viewed the film

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThO60o6w7Tc

This scene contains a revolutionary camera shot which lead the way for steady cams as well as has the actual footage in which her back was broken.  There was a malfunction with the apparatus and the result was very real screams to "make it stop"  I choose to just link to the video instead of having it on here because I know a lot of people find this film very disturbing.  I did like that fact that Linda Blair made it clear that this is not a horror film, it's a theological thriller.  I was very glad to have had the chance to watch it with fresh eyes and to see the rare 35mm writer's cut of the film.  Unfortunately due to the late start of the film and the extended cut it was after midnight before they were even getting ready to load the second film so we decided to call it a night.

J and I decided to wear our costumes one more time since they were so popular.  D opted out since her costume didn't survive the day very well and it was extremely hot.  R decided not to because one of the joints in his elbow had frayed and he spent most of Saturday getting electrocuted whenever he moved his left arm.  D decided to bring her camera and follow me around taking pictures of people taking pictures of us.  We were curious how many times we got stopped for pics in a day so we took pictures every time someone else did.  She even got pictures of people who thought they were being sneaky and taking them from afar.  By the time the day was over she had taken over 200 shots.  It was much slower on Sunday so we figure there must be at least 500 out there from the day before.  We watched the zombies vs super heroes roller derby for a bit (cool) and then went to see the Pinky and the Brian vs the Animaniacs panel.  This was one of the highlights from the weekend.  I loved that they started out by reading a scene from The Princess Bride in some of their most popular voices.

This is the panel.  I know it's long but it's totally worth it.  We then went to the Jonathan Frakes panel.  He was very good and I enjoyed listening to it but it became clear that we were about conventioned out.  We did one last walk of the floor before changing out of costume, doing some last quick shopping and then hitting the road for home.  It was an amazing weekend and I can't wait until next year to do it again.  Now to come up with a costume to top this one....

Here's a few of my favorite shots from the weekend:

A fantastic weekend

I had an incredibly relaxing and fun weekend.  We went out to the farm for Mother's Day and it was a blast.  We got there on Saturday night (a little later than expected, but I had to see the new episode of Doctor Who before we left) and I gave my nephew T the present I got for him.  The look on his face was totally worth it!  I got him an autographed picture of Lady GaGa.  Now T is obsessed with GaGa so I knew he'd love it, but I didn't realize how timely my gift would be.  When we arrived he was watching the GaGa live from Madison Square Garden special.  I now officially hold the titles of "Auntie of the Year" and "Awesomest Aunt Ever".  This did also mean that I had to watch the Lady GaGa special 3 times in a row with him that night but it was worth it.

The next day we got up after a bit of a sleep in and had a great breakfast and just lounged for a bit.  I ejoyed a couple of hour of reading and then we headed out to see the new corrals for the horses.  It is so nice to spend time out in the field with the horses.  Time and stress just seem to evaporate and you just live in the moment.  I played with the new colts for a while and then Jack came in from the field.

This is Simple Jack.  I fell in love with him the moment I first saw him.  As you can see in the picture, he has a lip deformity that causes his lower lip to hang open all the time.  I thought it gave him personality.  As sad as this is, most ranchers never would have invested the time and money into raising a horse like Jack.  In most cases he would have probably ended up at the slaughterhouse.  He would have been deemed "unsellable" and not worth keeping.  But my father-in-law is a great man with a heart as big as anything.  He saw me go out to the field time after time to visit Jack.  One day we were sitting out on the patio enjoying the sun after a long day of farm work and he turned to me and said "If you pay to break that horse, he's yours".  Just as simple as that.  I was elated!  My very own horse.  I've had a lot of experiences with horses in my life as my own grandparents used to have a few and I used to ride them daily, but this is the first time I've had one to call my very own.  Last year I sent him off for training for a few months, but due to unforseen circumstances I never got the chance to ride him.  Yesterday when he came in from the field, My father-in-law B handed me a halter and I caught him and brought him into the round pen to work with him.  I took him for a walk and brushed out the remaining winter hair and just hung out with him for a while.  Then B went into the tack room and grabbed a saddle and I finally got to ride him.  It was a pretty awesome feeling and I rode for about 4 hours before I was ready to get off.  I have to say I am paying for that today though.  My legs and backside are so sore it hurts to sit.  But it was worth every minute.  Especially when B and I sat down after I was done, had a drink and he said he wanted to go for a long ride with me next time I'm down.  That's a statement not to be taken lightly and it makes me feel pretty great.

I was sad to come home as I usually am when we leave the farm.  One day I hope we never have to leave and it will become home.

10 things that made me smile this week

I have decided to try to do this once a week and since my weeks begin on Tuesday at work, I figured Mondays would be a good day to do this so here are 10 things that made me smile this past week

1.  The look on my niece's face when she ran up to give me a hug after not seeing me for a couple weeks.  Little miss A, you are the sweetest thing in the world.

2.  Monday lunch dates with J.  J works on Mondays but we have a standing lunch date every week and it always brightens my day.

3. Uncensored bridesmaids.  I worked with an awesome group of bridesmaids who totally understood that their role was to support the bride but that didn't stop them from being wild and crazy and a little foul-mouthed.  Totally made my day.

4. Unexpected visits.  My Grandpa showed up at my work on Friday just to give me a hug and tell me he loved me.

5. Double date night with my sister and her hubby.  Had a great time visiting and laughing and eating Chinese buffet followed by a movie date to see Black Swan.

6. Warmer weather.  Finally spring is starting to make an appearance.  I even went out without my winter coat yesterday.

7.  Cranberry Goat Cheese.  Sometimes it's the little things.

8.  Fancy Hats.  I came across a sweet purple sunhat (for free I might add) the other day and I can't wait for an excuse to wear it.

9.  Being told that I'm very intelligent by a co-worker.  Always nice to hear.

10.  Playing fetch with the seeing eye dog that lives in my building.  I love that dog, he's so good at his job and I love the way he turns back into a puppy when he's not working and just loves to play.

Superbowl Party 2011

Every year J and I through a huge Superbowl bash.  Over the last few years it has really taken on a life of it's own and grown exponentially.  The first year it was just us and 3 or 4 close friends.  This year we are expecting around 30 people.  People talk about it all year and the closer it gets, the more we hear about it.  "What food are you going to serve this year?" "How many kinds of beer will there be?"  We put alot of work into this party and it seems to pay off in spades.  I love playing the hostess.  I'll give you a little preview of what will be going on Superbowl Sunday.

Kick off may be at 4:30, but things get started early here with a ton of food prep.  As one of my guests put it, it's best not to eat for a week before coming just so you have enough room for all the food.  Guests will start arriving about 2 and the fight for seating begins.  We don't have a huge place, but everyone makes room for each other.  Beer roulette has become a staple game at the party and everyone loves it.  We fill 2 large tubs with about 30 varieties of beer and cover the tubs.  You reach in and grab a random beer and the rule is you must drink it completely before pulling another.  The variety of beers included range from popular brands to foreign weirdness and plain old crap.  Everyone seems to stop what they're doing whenever anyone pulls a new beer to see what they might get.  We divide all the flavors evenly between the tubs and at half time the tubs switch side of the room to shake things up again.  But the big thing for me is the food.  I love putting it all together and try to mix things up and serve different dishes every year to keep things fresh.

My menu this year was a little hard to pin down because of the teams that made it in.  I usually try to find a theme food and do a cook off between the two cities involved. Last year I did a Indianapolis Hoosier Chili vs New Orleans Chili Con Carne and it was a hit.  Unfortunately Pittsburgh has a serious lack of good cook off style foods.  Did you know that the foods Pittsburgh is best known for are Heinz ketchup, Klondike bars and some strange sandwich with fries and coleslaw in the sandwich?  Not stuff that really lends itself to Superbowl foods so I decided to go a different route and we are doing sausage vs sausage.  Bratwurst for Green Bay and Kilbasa for Pittsburgh.  I am doing 20 of each served on s mini hotdog buns with a slice of pepper jack cheese on each and I am stacking them into the shape of a football stadium with a "field" in the center made of bean dip with sour cream lines on the field.  One half of the stadium will be the Brats and the other half the Kilbasa.  This will probably arrive at the beginning of the second quarter.  To start there is a cheese and cracker platter, potato skins with cheese and bacon, taquitos, bacon wrapped cocktail wieners baked in a vanilla burbon brown sugar and my nephew's famous cheese bung.  What is that you ask?  It's an amazing cheese dip baked in a sour dough loaf.  The sausage stadium will be accompanied with Heinz ketchup and a homemade hot mustard.  At half time I start cooking chicken wings usually about 15 different flavors and if I'm lucky, I'll see the last minute or so of the game.  It's fun though and I can't wait to do it again next year!

The Good, The Bad, and the WTF??

It has been an interesting week at work.  Although this time of year we are slower at work because people are more focused on Christmas shopping it is by no means uninteresting.  Here's a slice of the week I had.

The Good:  About a month ago I helped a grad girl find the perfect gown and all the trimmings to go with it.  She was so excited.  I found out last week that her home had recently burned down and she lost the dress and everything else to go with it.  Her mom called me this week and asked if we still had any of the stuff that she had purchased so she could replace it for her.  I did some rooting through our stock and found everything she had purchased except for the tiara.  When I told my boss about he situation she contacted the manufacturer and had the piece custom made for the girl and decided that we would replace the pieces for this lovely young girl for free.  I love working for a caring company.

The Bad:  A bride came in to shop for a gown with her terror of a child.  I love children, but this was no little boy.  I think he was a demon.  He ran all over the place, knocked over things, went into the private office area, stepped on gowns and even stole money out of our cash box.  And what did she do about all this....absolutely NOTHING!!  Please brides, we don't mind if you bring your children with you.  We even have a toy box for them.  But if you are raising a demon-child that you won't even try to control please come another day...when you have a sitter or someone with you to wrangle the monster.

The WTF??:  And lastly, I helped a walk-in customer and her fiance search for a gown.  Everything was going very smoothly and we were having alot of fun in the appointment until he asked me if he could speak to her alone.  This isn't an uncommon request, but it usually happens at the end of the appointment once the gown has been found and people want to discuss finances...but we were only 2 dresses into the start of the appointment.  They got into a very heated discussion and he ended up leaving the store.  I took her back to change out of the gown she had been in the whole time and she told me that she must have gotten a text message while we were in the dressing room and he checked it.  Turned out it was from he ex-boyfriend saying how he couldn't wait to see her again and blah blah blah...  Needless to say, she left without purchasing a dress...and I'm not too sure, but i think she left single as well.

Ahhh the drama of working in a Bridal store.  Keeps my life interesting at least.

The perfect gift

Christmas is coming and I have had a really hard time coming up with any ideas this year.  I just wasn't feeling inspired...until the last couple of days and know I feel like I'm on a roll.  The best part is, they are uber-geeky and super sweet gifts!

For my sister and brother-in-law:

Weekend passes to Calgary Comicon.  I am totally enjoying turning them into geeks.  last year we took them for one day and drug them into the Battlestar Gallactica forum and now...they have watched every episode and my sister even called me a little while ago and was so excited that "the Old Man" was on CSI:New York that she had to share...and then called again when "Starbuck" was on CSI.  I love turning her into a fangirl!  

For J:

The R2D2 Astromech Droid Robot.  When he saw this, he yelled in the store "Oh...my...god....R2 can bring me beer!!!"  Yes this amazing voice activated droid has a built in drink holder so he can bring you a nice cold beverage.  I can't wait to see his face on this one!  It's gonna be epic.

Ok so maybe I'm not really on a roll.....but I got 3 done so that's something.  Just 7 nephews, 3 neices, 3 brothers, 3 sister-in-laws, and the parents to go....geek inspiration don't fail me now!

Thanks for making my day!

This morning I was waiting at the bus stop to go to work and was thinking to myself..."Here we go again.  Another cold and snowy day means no customers at work and I still haven't started Christmas shopping and I have so much to to and..."  Round and round my brain went and I was beginning to think this was going to be a crappy day when a car drove by and stopped at the light right in front of the stop.  I was so caught up in my thoughts I didn't even notice at first until I heard his stereo start blaring.  At first I was annoyed and then I realized what song was playing.  He was blaring "Eye of the Tiger" so loud that even with his windows rolled up against the cold I could hear it clearly and suddenly my day got a little brighter.  I had a good day today.  My co-worker offered to help with my Christmas shopping by doing some running around for me when I can't.  I even did a good deed by finding a cell phone in a snow drift and managing to track down it's owner and return it.  He was very grateful.  And then I got an unexpected phone call from a friend I haven't seen in forever with a dinner invitation.  I think by making my attitude a little more positive first thing I was open to seeing things a little better today.  Thank you random guy in the red car blaring a kick ass tune at 9 in the morning.  You really did help make my day!