Awesome.

I just got to edit copy written by a non-native speaker. Wow.

The best part? The restaurant review that talked about foie gras, caviar and happy pills.

Edit: Okay, I got to see it again, so I'm reproducing the whole thing here for your ...enjoyment?

"Taste of Discovery Station and happy pills, caviar and foie gras, terrace barbeque, pink therapeutic cocktail lounge and international DJ... Sunday brunch in pink themed new perspective awaits your discovery."

Or, as I thought of it at the time, "Copy edit this, bitch."

Under the wire

Just noticed that I have not posted once in June, despite it being a perfectly lovely month in which many good things happened.

Kicked it off with a visit to Temp in her new digs. She took us to the licorice store, an awesome street market, the Nebraska store with its incredible selection of Nebraska wine (don't laugh), several nifty beer joints, and The World's Most Homoerotic State Capitol. There was also a little gardening in what locals seem to consider soil but I know as modeling clay.

Hit the lake for the first time this year for a rainy weekend with the folks. It dried out long enough for us to go on a few good walks and for my dad and I to fail to catch any fish. We did, however, have a splendid bird-watching excursion from the boat, so let's just pretend that was the point.

Last weekend was the Minnesota wine tour! Yay! A bunch of us squished into J & TSB's minivan (thanks again for driving, J!) and drove around the southeastern part of the state drinking wine. Beautiful vineyards and sparkly shirts abounded. Couldn't have been nicer, even down to the dramatic thunderstorms on the return trip.

The garden is going well. I built a raised bed for the tomatoes this year and filled it with mostly compost, so I have huge, beefy, mutant plants. Whee! Since Ken retired this year, he's growing his own. It feels very strange to only have five tomato plants instead of my usual 15 or so. The snap peas have been weird this year. The plants only got about a foot high. They still gave me peas, but on these tiny, spindly little vines. For the first year since I put them in, I'm getting a bountiful blueberry harvest. Oh, so tasty. Now I'm wobbling again on whether to move them. They just finally started producing well, so it seems a shame to dig them up! Accidentally bought bush beans instead of pole (oh seductive purple, why could I not read the packaging beyond your allure?). The poor zone 5 peach tree is still with me, but the center keeps dying off every year, so it's weird and sprawly and completely lopsided. I'm sure I could fix some of that with pruning, if only I had a clue how to do it properly and what to take out (though there's really no pruning that can balance out an empty center). But it did bloom this year, which was pretty damn cool.

Also, bought a reel mower. I should really do a product review of that soon -- it's nifty, but does have some issues.

Faster, Day, faster!

Not a lot to do at work to day, and wow am I impatient for the weekend! Heading out this evening for the long drive to Lincoln to visit Temp and check out her new digs. (Poor Puck is going to have quite the drive, since I haven't managed to stay awake much past 9:30 yet this week....)

Is it time to go yet? How 'bout now?

...

...

Now?

No fair doing this while I'm on cold medication

Seriously, L.A. Times, you had me wondering whether I had (a) fallen asleep or (b) started hallucinating with this one.

I mean, Kevin Costner May Hold Key to Oil Spill Cleanup? Really? And it all started with Waterworld?

WTF?

I think I need to go back to bed.

Pusher's Guide to Weight Loss

C'mere. Let me cough on you.

In the week and a half that I've been sick, I've dropped eight pounds. Of course, I'll be gaining it all back as soon as I start staying awake long enough to eat supper....

In which we are raided by the police

Update: For those of you who expressed curiosity: A very nice young police officer just stopped by to apologize and explain. They had the wrong address. He gave more details than that, but that's someone else's life and I'm not comfortable telling more. I almost preferred not knowing. Then I could pretend it was just a dumb prank.

Let me set the stage: It's 3:30 a.m., and I am sleeping the sleep of the grossly ill before being jolted awake by a tremendous noise and what seems to be the house shaking. Briefly wonder what could have fallen with that much force, then bedroom window is pierced by intensely bright sweep of light, and the tremendous noise is repeated, proving to be emphatic knocking, accompanied by someone shouting "POLICE!"

I wonder if the neighborhood is being evacuated. Ah, the stupidity of a clean conscience!

Then I hear voices in the back discussing an "unsecured entry" -- we never lock the back door when we're home -- and I realize they're coming in. My main priority at this point is getting into my robe before they get into my bedroom, because I am *not* dealing with the police naked. The robe is, of course, mulishly uncooperative, but I manage to find the arm holes eventually and shuffle out, meeting several of Our City's Finest in the kitchen. The one in the lead is wearing a bright yellow vest over body armor, and is carrying a a very disorienting flashlight and maybe a gun.

Anyway, they are tense, I am tired and confused. I wonder why they're there, they establish the address, say there was a call, ask some questions about who else is in the house and whether there's a basement apartment, blah blah blah all-a-mistake-cakes. They clear out with an awful lot of noise, light, and radio chatter, and I wander back toward bed. Am met in the hallway by Puck.

Puck: "Were the police just in our house?"
Me: "Yeah."
Puck: "Weird."

Hee.


Anyway, no big deal, just a surreal sort of interruption. I really hope it was just a prank or something equally stupid, and that there wasn't a real emergency at, say, our address on a different block.

May in March, March in May, wth is going on around here?

Actually, I have really appreciated the long, cool spring. But it's mid-May now. Time to start warming up a little so I can put my tomatoes in the ground.

Those would be the tomatoes I bought at plant sale, which was as fun as ever, even though it was really chilly and I did (accidentally) try to ditch No-Nick on the way there. I behaved myself quite well this year. I didn't even buy the contorted-needle pine that I fell madly in love with at first sight. (I briefly considered selling my house and moving somewhere that I'd have room for it. It was that awesome.) What is it with me and plants that look diseased? Veggie was equally strong in the willpower department, and we both managed to escape within budget, or near enough as makes no difference.

This was the second weekend in a row at the Arboretum for me, as Puck and I went down with my folks to be blown away by the crabapples in full bloom (pretty impressive tulips in the annual garden too). Also getting some work done in the yard, though, as always, the more I get done the more I see that needs doing. Which reminds me, must take the annual picture of Mixologist's bleeding heart!