web-goddess

Author: Kris

  • Meme Time

    My Mom sent me this silly little e-mail survey, so I’m just going to post my answers here. I’m not going to bother “tagging” anybody else to do it; you can have a go if you’re bored. 🙂

    1. What time is it? 3:14pm
    2. What’s your full name? Kristine Michelle Howard
    3. What are you most afraid of? In, like, a phobia sense? Probably animals. (Tiny ones like mice are the WORST.) In a keeps-me-awake-at-night sense? Money stuff.
    4. What is the most recent movie that you have seen in a theater? The Illusionist
    5. Place of birth Hicksville, Ohio, USA
    6. Favorite food Bread. Fresh bread. *sob*
    7. What’s your natural hair color? Light brown/blondish. (“Dishwater blonde” is the Hoosier term.) Increasingly grey on top.
    8. Ever been to Alaska? Nope.
    9. Ever been toilet paper rolling? Meaning teepeeing? Yep. On one memorable occasion, Eileen, Erin Fair, and I teepeed Jon Ford’s dorm room during Freshman Orientation.
    10. Love someone so much it made you cry? Awww, sure. I’m a girl. Duh!
    11. Been in a car accident? Yes. I rear-ended a Corvette in Michigan. That SUCKED.
    12. Croutons or bacon bits? Bacon bits. We’re back on the low-carb.
    13. Favorite day of the week Definitely Friday.
    14. Favorite restaurant I wouldn’t say I have a favorite at the moment. I’m a bit burnt out on all my usual favorite places.
    15. Favorite Flower Gerberas!
    16. Favorite sport to watch Live: baseball or cricket. On TV: none!
    17. Favorite drink Diet Coke, by far. If you’re talkin’ drink, then I’d say red wine.
    18. Favorite ice cream In my life? Gelato by the seaside in Sorrento, Italy. From the supermarket? Any and all. (Again, the low-carb thing.)
    19. Disney or Warner Brothers? Disney!
    20. Ever been on a ship? Like, a real big ship? Nope. I’ve been on a big ferry before. I took the bus from London to Dublin once, and it just drives on to a real big boat.
    21. What color is your bedroom carpet? Unfortunately, the answer to that question is hidden beneath layers of cat hair and laundry. I seem to remember it being beige though.
    22. How many times did you fail your driver’s test? ZERO! Of course, back then in Indiana you didn’t even have to take a proper driving test if you passed Driver’s Ed. I just took the paper version.
    23. Before this one, from whom did you get your last e-mail? The Snook. He was telling me he’s got a work dinner tonight, so I’ll have to forage for my own supper.
    24. What do you do when you are bored? Read the Internet. Knit. Watch TV.
    25. Bedtime? Ideal: 10:30pm. In reality: closer to midnight.
    26. Favorite TV show? At the moment: Heroes, The Biggest Loser, and The Amazing Race.
    27. Last person you went to dinner with? That would be Amy. We went to Redoak last week before The Sound of Music.
    28. What are your hobbies? Knitting, reading, TV, running, Internet stuff…
    29. What are your favorite colors? Red, hot pink.
    30. How many tattoos do you have? Just the one.
    31. How many pets do you have? Again, just the one.
    32. Which came first, the chicken or the egg? What a silly question. The concept of the “egg” developed long before there were chickens.
    33. What do you want to do before you die? Have my own talk show. (I really can’t think of anything else.)
    34. Have you ever been to Hawaii? Nope.
    35. Have you been to countries outside the U.S.? Yep. I’ve been living outside the US for over seven years now. I’ve been to four of the continents.

  • Where are the bees?

    What’s happening to the bees? That’s really weird. It reminds me of something a Bond villain would do, destroy the world’s bees to threaten the food supply. (Unless, of course, we pay him ONE MEEEELLION DOLLARS!) But seriously, that sucks about the bees.

  • Taxi?

    How to Look Like a Jerk-Ass American in a Foreign Country:

    • Pay for a $13 cross stitch chart with a hundred dollar bill. Sigh dramatically as the assistant tries to scrape together $87 in change for you.
    • Never say please or thank you for anything.
    • Demand that the shop assistant ring you a taxi. When she explains that THIS ISN’T A HOTEL, insist that she’s being difficult and she really does know the phone number.

    And you wonder why some of us pretend to be Canadian…

  • Lesbian Koalas

    Lesbian koalas. Well, it is Mardi Gras…

  • The Great British Venn Diagram

    The Great British Venn Diagram. Surprisingly useful to us geographically-challenged Yanks. Plus I’ve just always liked Venn diagrams.

  • Oscar Night

    Oscar Night: Two upsets so far! That’s spread the field a fair bit…

    More than four hours later: Congratulations to Kent Bailey! Kent got an amazing 11 out of 12 correct, only missing the clean sweep on Best Foreign Film. (What an upset, huh?) He was also only one person off the Dead Person total, so any way you slice it, this was Kent’s year. Thanks to everybody else who played along (and who counted obits for me). See you next year!

  • Sal’s Visit

    I was rather quiet this past week, wasn’t I? As some of you have worked out, I was hosting my dear friend Sal Scherer and her boyfriend Tom from Chicago. They got in on Monday night, and on Tuesday I tramped them all over Sydney. It was perfect weather, and the fact that there was a big-ass boat in town added to the festive atmosphere. Sal and I even took a spin on the Harbour Jet Boat. (I’ll post a photo of that once Sal scans it.) Wednesday they hit the Aquarium and the Rocks. Thursday they left for New Zealand and I went to the Sound of Music thing. (Nun.) As you can see, it amounted to a pretty tiring week. I had four days in a row of getting less than six hours sleep… which put me in little mood for blogging. I’ve had a nice quiet weekend of napping and knitting though, so I’m back on track. A couple photos:

    Sal and the Opera House
    Me and the Queen Mary 2

     

  • Cabled Jacket of Doom – FINISHED

    Finished jacket

    It’s done. It’s really and truly done. After an aborted attempt at sewing in the zipper last weekend, I hit upon the idea of sewing down some ribbon along the inside of each front to hide the cut edges and provide a more stable foundation for the zipper. So I got four meters of ribbon from the shop (which turned out to be the perfect amount) and got to work. Unfortunately the Cursed Nature of this project meant that first I had to do things completely wrong. I sewed down one ribbon with the sewing machine (without pinning), then sewed down the other (after pinning). I’m sure some of you can see the problem already. I tried it on and groaned. The side I hadn’t pinned had stretched at least an inch or so in the process of sewing, so it was all ripply and crap-looking. Why the hell didn’t I think to measure and make sure the two pieces of ribbon were the same size? Because of the Curse, obviously. So I ripped out the ripply side and then wet it down for the night, hoping it would spring back into shape. (It did.) The next day I measured out the ribbon, pinned it down, and sewed it into place. It looked good! I then used the rest of the ribbon to face all the seams inside the garment: around the arms, the shoulders, and the hood/neck steeks. Lastly, I sewed in the goddamn zipper. It’s done! This sucker took me exactly SEVEN MONTHS to finish. I learned so much along the way! I learned how Debbie Bliss patterns can SUCK; I learned how photos that don’t show vital parts of the garment – like the collar – are a big ol’ WARNING SIGN; I learned that steeking saves you knitting time but doesn’t necessarily cut down on finishing. And you know what? After all that, the bastards will probably reject it for the Show. That’d be just my luck.

    Didn’t Snookums do a good job of taking Interweave-esque photos?

  • Speedcluster

    Speedcluster. It’s sorta like the card game Speed crossed with Solitaire crossed with Tetris. Or something. I’ve managed a high score of 122,150 so far. (Tip: It really helps to play with a real mouse as opposed to a track pad.) Basically, you move the cards from the bottom row onto the falling columns of cards by placing one number higher or lower. I think making a long chain gives you a bonus. I have no idea what the whole “pass” thing does. I wish they’d put the instructions in English!

  • Me and a Very Alive Hill

    moblogged image

    I’m at the Sing-a-long Sound of Music with just about every gay in Sydney. There are nuns, Nazis, girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes…

    The Next Morning: Oh, my aching head. Every time I closed my eyes all night, all I could hear was “DOE – A DEER – A FEMALE DEER!” Here’s some more information on the show for those that are interested, and Amy will no doubt have some pictures up on Flickr soon.