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august 2002

aug 31 -- drove up to van nuys for an RC Helicopter fun-fly thing. I watched some of the stunt-flying, but mostly sat in the shade, finished reading "persuasion" and played an entire game of kingdom :) very pleasant! traffic was AWFUL on the way home. we just finished watching The Graduate. great movie. i thought i spotted a VERY young richard dreyfuss -- looked him up on IMDB and i was right! he's the guy in the boarding house who wants to call the cops. i was trying to watch Cabaret (another one for when henry's not home) but liza minelli is just too annoying and i can't stand her anymore so i'm going to bed! taking henry camping on the mountain tomorrow :)

aug 30 -- i was working on my aldon's crossing module yesterday and was totally perplexed by the fact that my actors were only giving half the experience points that they should be... i stewed over it and posted to the forum and fretted... and finally tony pointed out the fact that when you have a pet, he takes half the experience too... D'OH! boy did i feel foolish! bought push-pins recently and hung henry's posters up, finally. he nees a little bookshelf and a little dresser for his clothes, but that will have to wait for another month until i have money again :)

aug 27 -- happy birthday to me! i'm having a lovely day. henry gave me a big set of colored pens, and dan gave me two wonderful coloring books, dr. strangelove on dvd, and a james hogan paperback (the Giants trilogy).

aug 26 -- whoops missed some days there. sorry! we had a great weekend! Henry's gymnastics recital was on saturday, so that was fun and exciting. he had a wonderful time. let's see what else happened... i worked on my aldon's crossing module quite a bit. it's slow though... i need to think of some more quests! oh and last night dan and i watched some of "the great escape" which i told the TiVo to record for me. we'll probably finish it tonight. good movie! today we met nicolas and alina at mission bay park and we all had such a good time! henry and nicolas get along great together, and alina and i get along great together too :) it was lovely -- we were there for hours!

aug 23 -- josh just url'd me freeciv for palmos. oh my god. it looks amazing! i hope they complete it someday -- i just emailed and volunteerd to beta test :) look at the screenshots!

aug 22 -- woke up at 6:45am for some reason. argh. yesterday i was cleaning henry's room, and dealing with this horrible old vacuum that we got for free, and something inside me just SNAPPED and i decided to go spend some of my savings on a brand new vacuum. so i ran down to the Denault's True Value Hardware Store and bought a nice little hoover upright.(mine was on sale for $79) a nice grandmotherly sales lady let me try it out and everything, and told me all about the Denault family -- how the first store was started in 1950 or something, and the grown up sons manage the stores and the grandkids work in the office, etc. brought my nice new vacuum home and it works wonderfully. yay! ...later that same day... well since i was up so early i decided to use the quiet morning to find/install/test/use a new aim client. i use gaim, which is an aim client for linux. well, lately gaim has been exhibiting some undesirable behaviour (e.g. showing me chinese, nothing, or large bars of blue instead of whatever text people are trying to send me). I tried ntaim (non-graphical) but it leaves a LOT to be desired. so today i tried everybuddy and kopete, both of which i have heard good things about. well, everybuddy segfaults whenever i run it. i even got the latest version from their website, compiled it (which took forever because i had to track down a bunch of extra libs and stuff)... and boom, it segfaults every time. ok so i thought i'd try kopete... well, kopete depends on a bunch of kde stuff that apt never heard of (i don't use kde, but i do use konqueror so i thought maybe kopete would work too... no such luck.) so at this point, 14 hours later (well i didn't spend the entire day on this project but it kind of feels as if i did) i'm back to semi-good old gaim.

aug 21 -- mom and dad gave my birthday present early, since mom will be out of town on my actual birthday. they gave me a beautiful pair of zeeta shoes! i love them.

aug 20 -- last night i slept well, and went all night without coughing. yay :) i have found two new GOOD palm games: Kingdom and Timebomb. see my palm stuff page for details.

aug 18 -- yesterday i felt ok in the morning but crummy again by nighttime. went out to the flying field with dan to watch him fly his RC heli and started reading "Persuasion" again (the penguin classics edition he gave me for christmas). after flying, we picked up Sal and went to see My Big Fat Greek Wedding which was absolutely wonderful. (that review gets a couple of details wrong, but you'll get the idea) go see it go see it go see it. by the time we got home i felt awful so i lay on the couch and watched Nick at Night (a couple of annoying Lucy episodes and a couple of pleasant, early, Leave it to Beaver episodes). I feel a bit better again this morning -- i'll try not to over-do it again today. have you ever been to villainsupply.com?

aug 16 -- finally started feeling better yesterday. i still have a bit of a dry cough, but my appetite is back and i feel human again! yay for good health! i just discovered that kayray.org is listed in the "recommended" catagory nycteris.net -- the lovely site belonging to my dear nephew's g/f. i feel honored :) hope to meet you someday, kc!

aug 15 -- henry invented a wonderful game today. i sent him off to wash his hands, and after a while i realized there was singing coming from the bathroom. he was in there a long long time and then he came out and said he'd invented a game, ao i went with him to see. the game is called "Boiling Lake". you fill up the sink to the very brim with hot water, and you sing the Boiling Lake song ("the boiling lake will make you go insane, everyone wants to see that groovy thing" to the tune of "Spiraling Shape" by TMBG) and then you dunk toys in it... apparently it is extremely fun! yay henry :)

aug 14 -- sick. but taught my wednesday students anyway -- there were only two today. henry is home! yay!!! he had a busy day -- first a grappling seminar at the dojo, and then he went to an indoor rockclimbing place with his friends, and then he played with them, and then they dropped him off at sally's when i was done teaching and then i took him to gymnastics. and then we lay on the couch and watched two mr. rogers episodes (how people make balloons!) and it was lovely and relaxing.

aug 13 -- sick. lay on the couch all day, napped, listened to bach. dan took good care of me.

aug 12 -- woke up feeling bad... i can feel a sore throat starting and i feel generally crummy. blah. lay around most of the day, and then dan drove me around to do errands and stuff.

aug 11 -- my birthday wishlist is up! i did a little shopping for henry's birthday today. i bought him a couple of cd-roms at costco -- the I Spy Treasure Hunt (he liked the I Spy Schoolhouse game a lot) and a three-pack of Spy Fox games, which I hear are good, and they are made by the same company that makes pajama sam, freddi the fish, and other favorites.

aug 10 -- yesterday i worked on my little mod all day (when i had time) and late at night my modmaker crashed and i lost everything i'd done all day (which wasn't much -- i've been fighting with an actor script). grrrr, learn to save more often, kara :) i made my fabulous casserole for dinner again -- here's the basic recipe: make a big pot of polenta (2 c. polenta, 6 c. water, some salt) when it's done, stir in a lot of grated parmesan, romano, or asiago cheese. meanwhile, saute some onion, garlic, diced peeled eggplant, carrots, red/green peppers, and zuchini in a big pot in olive oil, or whatever is handy. when the vegetables are nice and tender, add a big can of diced tomatoes and some basil and oregano, and salt and pepper, cook it down a little, and stir in a lot or grated cheese, again. pour the polenta into a LARGE casserole, and then pour the vegetable mixture in on top, gently. sprinkle a lot of grated mozzarella on to, and bake at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes, or until the cheese gets bubbly. let it rest a while, and then devour it. yummmm! today has been lovely so for. got up pretty early, and henry and i played on our computers next to each other until it was time to take him to gymnastics. read my book while he bounced around. then we came home, and i read him three more chapters of swiss family robinson, and then we watched "splash", and then took him swimming so he could be a merman. and then read to him some more and then matthew came to pick him up. and now dan and i are sitting together -- he is working on his helicopter, and i am going to tinker with my mod!

aug 08 -- yesterday the LotR dvd arrived! henry and dan sat down to watch it together right away -- i had to go teach my little piano students. henry loved it! today i took henry to the 10am karate class, then we ate pastry at a little cafe, then we drove though horrid traffic to encinitas to meet a little homeschol boys playgroup at the beach! henry's dear friend nicolas was there, and some other nice fun guys. h rode his little kickboard in the waves, and then ran off with the boys and dug complicated canals and pits in the sand for a few hours. :) i hid from the sun under my hat, long sleeved shirt, long pants, and umbrella, and read "little lord fauntleroy". read the first couple of chapters to nicolas, too. he's a shy fellow, and was hanging around the grownups, for a while, just like i used to do. he's a very pleasant little fellow, and really enjoyed fauntleroy!

aug 06 -- just installed xmcd so i could play audio cds, and i've got the Italian Concerto in right now. ahhh, bach. started reading Swiss Family Robinson (unabridged, of course!) to henry last night, and he loved it and begged for more! read him four more chapters this morning. :) i've been waiting and waiting for him to be old enough to enjoy the Swiss Family with me. i got the troublesome script in my little AC mod working perfectly! now i feel inspired to start thinking of a story for REAL mod. i'm going to start VERY small, just to make something, so i don't get overly ambitious and end up with nothing. now i have to think of a story.... hmmm...

aug 04 -- on saturday henry and i watched "bicentennial man" which was surprisingly good. i wasn't expecting much, but it looked like something we might both enjoy... we liked it a lot! i don't remember the original Asimov story very clearly, but i don't *think* the movie altered it beyond recognition. this evening henry and i went to nighttime zoo! we entered the hula-hoop contest and did very well. henry lasted longer than i did! we also saw a tiny baby gorilla being carried by its mom, and we watched the orangutans for about half an hour. henry climbed on the gorilla statues, we looked at some beautful birds, and we saw the sea lion show. then we rode the sky buckets to the other side of the zoo, and then back again, and then we looked at some of the snakes, and then it was late so we came home. also henry had a churro and i had some coffee, and we shared. (henry is telling me what to write :) we had a great time!

aug 03 -- oh, strangelove (my desktop) is so nice now. i have 256mb of ram now and it seems lightning-fast! yesterday i played with racuum for hours and hours... i added a map to an existing mod, with spawning monsters, a signpost, and a little man who tells you something when you tap him. and everything worked! at night randy came into #aldonscrossing and he explained various scripts from AC to me for hours, and now i understand so much more than i did and i'm all eager to add stuff to my little mod. i'm going to just practice adding and changing things until i feel really comfortable, and then i'll try my hand at making an actual, playable mod! yay! the $5 clothing store is going out of business, and i stopped by there yesterday, sifted through the piles of super-tacky polyester, and came away with brown bike shorts, a little black skirt, a pair of olive-green linen drawstring pants, a little green stretchy top, and a long slim brown tencel skirt, for a TOTAL of $3.23 :) :) :) the linen pants are my new Favorite Pants -- wore them all day yesterday with my mustard-yellow plaid vintage camp shirt, and felt beautiful and comfortable.

aug 02 -- yay linux is all happy and nice on my desktop now! eventually, i'll put windows on the other partition... dan helped me SO MUCH last night. we tried to rescue stuff off my old hard drive but to no avail... but oh, well, there were not many irreplacable files, and it's my own fault for not backing stuff up. i do wish i had my john linnell/john flansburg wallpaper, though. i made it ages ago and it was a pain in the neck to get it just right. can't seem to find a copy on any other box. i'm reading "inherit the stars" by james p. hogan and it's so good! thank you rob for telling us about these books :) yesterday i made racuum work! racuum is an aldon's crossing modmaker for unix, and it took me a LONG time to compile it, because i didn't know what i was doing. but i finally managed, with only a little help (thanks worf :). if you want to compile it on a debian box, and you, too, don't know what you are doing, the packages you want are libgtk1.2-dev, autoconf, and automake :)

aug 01 -- nice and cloudy this morning! took henry to the 10am karate class (they got to do point sparring, which he loves, and the three little girls he likes so much were there too :), then drove him down to matthew's place. happy birthday matthew! on the way home i went to costco for 32x cd-rs for dan, and got one of their big 2.75 lb boxes of fabulous fresh blueberries. mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm :)

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2004

jan