Celticangel.org

(with apologies to Lee Hays and Pete Seeger, here is what got stuck in my head this morning…)

If I had a Blog…

If I had a blog,
I’d blog in the morning
I’d blog in the evening,
All over this land

I’d blog about danger,
I’d blog out a warning,
I’d blog about love between my brothers and my sisters,
All over this land.

All over this land.

(Oh, someone stop me before I filk again…)

My new hard drive arrived!

Hello folks. I know that things have been a wee bit quiet over here of late. Sorry about that. To make up for it, here is a whopping great post about things that I’ve been up to.

Let’s see now…well, two weeks ago I had a week of vacation. I had planned to go to L.A. and attend the Gallifrey One Doctor Who Convention with Koskvader, My Evil Twin, and My Evil Twin’s Dad. Before that was to have been the Great Ceremonial Returning of my Mother-in-Law to her home (after being stuck at my place for two months due to weird schedules and inclement weather. Poor woman.) What actually happened was:

Monday, 11 February – I worked. I even managed to get two weeks worth of schedules done, as I am currently the desk scheduler. Go me. I didn’t quite tidy up my desk as much as I would have liked, but there you are.

Tuesday, 12 February – As near as I can recollect I worked on my blogs on this day, and packed my things. It was decided that Koshvader would be taking his Mum home, while I would be driving down to L.A. on my own. Oh! And I took my Car in to be serviced. Gaia needed an oil change and a new belt.

Wednesday, 13 February – Realizing that Koshvader would have to drive his Boat up the mountain, as my lovely all wheel drive Subaru was going to L.A. with me, we took Dark Star to get some work done as well. On the way back to our place, I stopped at Border’s to get a book on CD to listen to on the way. I ended up with the Arkangel Shakespeare’s As You Like It. (No David Tennant in this one. He is in Romeo and Juliet, by the way.) I sort of wanted Much Ado, but there were only two titles to choose from, and that wasn’t one of them. Of course, I also bought the Doctor Who Magazine, but that’s what I generally get there. Somewhere along the way it was decided that I should just go ahead and leave that day, while Koshvader was actually reachable by phone. This made too much sense. When I got over that, I left. Along the way…in the traffic, I received a call from my sweet husband informing me that there seemed to be an oil leak in my parking spot. So, once I was done eating at Pea Soup Andersen’s a while later, I moved my car and checked my parking spot. Yep. Oil, but not too much. I made it to L.A. with no further misadventures, but I’d really like to avoid driving all that way in the future. By the time I arrived it was well dark. I spent a wee bit of time with my Evil Twin (who I shall hereafter refer to as Steed, as he loves The Avengers as much as I do) then I went to bed. I was staying at his place, you see.

Thursday, 14 February – We had this day free, so Steed and I went over to Santa Monica after he, I and his Dad had brunch at a decent Chinese buffet. Our first stop in Santa Monica was at the Harry Potter store – Whimsic Alley. I’ve bought stuff from them in the past through their internet shop, but going there was a lot more fun. They have all kinds of things there. I only managed to restrain myself by thinking about the shopping possibilities at the Con. I bought myself a Ravenclaw bumpersticker, a Ravenclaw Prefect badge, and some Blood Pops for my Husband. Steed and I then wended our way over to Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash. Yes, there is one that is not in Red Bank, NJ. It was fun, tucked away as it was in the back of a DVD shop, but I managed not to buy anything. Taking a look at the time as we left the shop, we realized that we would be better off eating in Santa Monica than trying to make our way back through all of the traffic. So…we went to Hooters. Yes, you read that right. I’d heard that they had great wings. That turned out to be an understatement. Their Garlic Wings were a religious experience. Our waitress, Rain, was a big sweetie. (Well, small sweetie, but you get the idea.) All of the food was good, and so was my beer. I had such a good time that I bought some pyjamas with cute owls on them. They have merchandise, you know. We packed up our leftovers to bring back to Dad and headed out. And then…we stopped at a light. On my right was my Mother’s High School. Of course I had to ring her up to tell her this. (My Father-in-law also graduated from Santa Monica High, we discovered a few years back.) My Mum seemed to quite enjoy the fact that I was near her Alma Mater. Well, as it was V-Day, and a Thursday, the traffic was horrendous. I managed to see quite a lot of cool shops as we worked our way homeward through the back streets. Upon our arrival, Dad agreed with us about the food. Even reheated leftovers were good.

Friday, 15 February – We started out the day by taking Dad to the Doctor’s office. I am very glad that I brought my knitting. That took quite a while. Then we stopped at Denny’s for lunch and on to the Con. If you want an in depth discussion of my first day at the Con, I recommend that you go here, as I’ve already written it up.

Saturday, 16 February – Surprise! I’ve already written this day up, too. You can find it here. I did get to spend the day with an acquaintance who works at JPL and then have dinner over at their place. It was really nice to see them again, and let me just tell you that they have a gorgeous library in their house, with a ladder on a rail and everything. Also, we had fabulous Chicken and Dumplings. Meeting their son was really cool, as he was celebrating his 5th birthday that night. (Also, he’s brilliant.)

And I’m going to leave it here for now, as It’s late and I’m off to bed. Just so y’all know, my new hard drive is on its way. Hopefully I’ll be able to post a picture of my new PJs when it arrives. Night!

I would like the Scottish Falsetto Sock Puppet Theater to please Get Out of My Subconscious. Seriously. This time they’re doing A Christmas Carol…and they’re even messing with one of my favorite songs. Yes, these are definitely Silly Socks.

Part One:

Part Two: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5W-feHDbH9U

My laptop died. *sob*

I just gave in and added “music” to the categories for this blog. I’m not sure why I haven’t done this previously, as music is sort of central to my life.

Anyway, this video is for my Father, now that he has DSL. (Finally!) It’s my favorite plainsong (though not my favorite version) paired with some beautiful images. This is just to remind you all that nearly everything is on YouTube…including Gregorian Chant.

So, there’s this band called Rhapsody of Fire. They did an album that was narrated by Christopher Lee, and he ended up singing a duet on that album.

The brain ouching part is that I like this song.

It’s me. Get it?

Thursday 13 #12
I was surfing around Youtube the other day and it occurred to me that they might have some of the intros to the shows that I loved in my childhood. And by childhood I mean before I turned 18. I started searching and wow! They had all sorts of things. That’s about the point that it occurred to me that this would make a great [tag]Thursday Thirteen[/tag]. So, without further ado, here is my list, complete with links to the YouTube videos of the intros. Do you remember any of these? What were your favorite shows? (Oh, and I apologize for the short informational bits this week. My tendinitis is really acting up.)

13 TV Show Intros (for shows I loved) From My Childhood

1. Benji, Zax, and The Alien Prince – Has anyone else ever heard of this show? Generally I get blank looks when I talk about this Saturday morning treasure from when I was ten. Except from my sister, that is. And yes, that Benji. It was a show about an alien prince hiding out on Earth. I adored it.

2. The Tomorrow People (old) – I also loved the new Tomorrow People, but I came on when I was in college. I remember watching this on my Uncle’s TV when we were staying at his house. He had cable, you see. I still occasionally hum the music to myself. The show was about kids discovering that they were the next stage of human evolution. They got cool powers and lost the ability to kill. I still want a Jaunting Belt.

3. The Big Blue Marble – My memories of this show are vague, but I remember loving it back in the 70s. It was a very progressive understand-each-other kind of show. I love the opening theme.

4. Chocky – Another show that I saw on Nickelodeon, though I think we had cable by then. It was based on a book by John Wyndham (which I managed to hunt down eventually.) I distinctly remember the alien calling a car “silly.”

5. Kidd Video – A show that combined animation and music videos. This Saturday morning treat was about a Band that was turned into a bunch of cartoons. Each week they had adventures and tried to find their way home. At the end of each show they had music videos that had quite catchy tunes.

6. Doctor Who (4th Doctor version) – Do I really need to explain this one? I mean, I write for Watching Doctor Who. I get paid to write about my favorite show ever. Talk about a childhood dream come true. The Fourth Doctor was my first Doctor, so I shose his intro to highlight here.

7. Misfits of Science – Goodnight Bunny. Yet another cool show that my family loved…that was canceled. I loved this group of high powered misfits. It even included Courtney Cox as a teenager.

8. You Can’t Do That On Television – Another Nickelodeon show. I loved the slime and the skits and…okay…the whole show. This was the origin of the whole slime thing on Nickelodeon. A Canadian show that contained a variety of child actors…including Alanis Morrisette.

9. The Mysterious Cities of Gold – A cartoon that I think originated in France. I saw it on Nickelodeon (no surprise there.) I taped the theme by holding my tape recorder up to the speaker. Unfortunately, the tape was faulty and the song speeds up faster and faster as you listen. To this day I still expect the song to do that, even when it’s a perfectly good MP3 copy. The show was about those Mysterious Cities of gold, and the hunt to find them.

10. Mork and Mindy – I saw every episode multiple times. I loved all of the actors. Nanoo nanoo!

11. The Powers of Matthew Star – Oh look! It’s a show about an alien prince hiding out on Earth. This show was really good…for about the first half of season one. Then the show changed in a really weird way. I only acknowledge the episodes before the change.

12. Starman – I am still pissed off about this show being canceled. Seriously. I also know that I am not alone. What was the network thinking?!?!?! Nice use of the Stranger Comes to Town idea.

13. Robin of Sherwood – I used to watch this on Showtime at my Nana’s house. I own the soundtrack. Michale Praed was so dreamy. *swoon*

Today I came home from work slightly before 10pm, discovered that we needed cat food, and then…my blood sugar suddenly dropped through the floor.

Like: Boom! No blood sugar! Instant Grizzly.

It was not comfortable. At all. I hate the shaking and inability to concentrate. And worse yet? The mood swing and the lack of quick consumables in the fridge. Well, ones that I could comprehend anyway.

Did you know that I had no pickles? Pickle relish, yes. Branston Pickle, yes. Pickles, no. This fact was very important to me for some reason as I stood staring into the fridge. How was I supposed to eat I toasted cheese sandwich with no sweet pickles? That’s just barbaric!

Well…I did. And then I went to the grocery store with my Mother-in-law. Bless the woman for a saint. The eating didn’t quite fix everything (weirdly enough) but I was human enough to get stuff at the store. Once we returned home, I had a sweet pickle. Oh, and a bit of chocolate. And then? Things looked a lot better.

Sometimes I wonder about my body.