September 2007 – akaemi.com
 

Month: September 2007

what not to wear

| Leave a comment

Lately, I’ve been toying with the idea of saving up to get my very own ‘what not to wear’ style consultation. The consultation itself, while not cheap, is reasonably priced. The part where serious savings come into play is in the buying-a-new-wardrobe part. There’s a reason Stacy and Clinton hand over a $5,000 Visa card to people they take under their wing; a new wardrobe doesn’t come cheap.

I don’t think I dress horribly, but I think I could do much better. At the moment, I fall into a strange fashion void, of being a professional in my twenties who doesn’t want to dress like a bimbo, but also doesn’t want to dress like my mom. (No offense, mom …) Not only that, but my size seems to fall more in line with the ‘juniors department’ than the actual ‘grown up ladies department.’ And, well, ‘juniors’ these days apparently don’t care to fully clothe themselves. And ‘juniors’ couldn’t care less about sensible things like ‘wrinkle-free.’

I also have a penchant for comfortable shoes. The exception to that rule is my 5’9″ collection. This collection includes 3 pairs of shoes that enable me to be 5’9″. (For the truly curious, the math on that works out to be 3-inch heels.) It works out well to have some 5’9″ shoes; when I get tired of wearing pants that are a teensy bit too short, I buy myself some ‘tall’ pants. And, well, tall pants require something a little higher than my skechers in order to not get ragged from dragging on the ground.

The real solution to my pants problem is a tailor. I’m of average height. Actually, I think the most perfectly averagest of heights. At 5’6″, I am neither tall nor short. Ladies 5’3″ and under are adorably short. Ladies 5’9″ and over are elegantly tall. So, one would think that ‘average’ length pants would be perfect. In fact, they are generally one inch shorter than I prefer. But ‘tall’ pants are anywhere from 2 to 4 inches too long (depending on that particular manufacturer’s version of ‘tall’). And so, I wear my pants too short or too long.

And then there’s my hair and makeup … I’ve never been one to spend, well, any time on makeup, and if it takes longer than 5 minutes, I’m not doing it to my hair. That used to include blow drying my hair, because I was blessed with a LOT of really thick hair that holds a LOT of water. I managed to find an 1875-watt monster that gets my hair dry enough in a few minutes. It also makes the lights in the house flicker, but, you know, that’s the price of beauty.

I know that “beauty is only skin-deep,” and that “it’s what’s inside that counts,” but there is something about feeling good about the way you look that just makes you feel better about yourself. Like when I go to the salon for a pedicure, I wear my adorable spa outfit. It’s not necessary, but it sure does make the experience all the more enjoyable. And on the rare occasion that I make it to the gym, I make sure to wear a you-wish-you-had-this-body exercise ensemble. It’s not that I want everyone to stare; but I sure do stay in the gym longer when I’m not self-conscious about the way I look.

So, for those of you who know me irl, if you happen to notice me wearing pants that fit and un-wrinkled shirts, then you’ll know I finally took the plunge.

my cross-indexed brain

| 1 Comment

My brain is a big fan of cross indexing, but it only seems to do it as the mood suits it. I have yet to be able to master control of the skill, and instead am often struck by memories that I am reminded of when I see or hear the right trigger.

One of the triggers is cars. Yes, that’s right, cars. Which happen to be a reference to people. When I see a Ford Aerostar, I think of my mom. When I see a Prius, I think of my college BFF, and occasionally the wife of an old work colleague. When I see a Ford Probe, I think of a guy I went on one date with even though he still lived with his parents. (He bought me a sandwich, and, over lunch, he said: “I enjoy working with kids.” For real? If you think I can’t see right through where you think that one is gonna get ya, you got another think coming. It was the fulfillment of a third-grade crush, what can I say …)

When I see a Toyota Matrix, I wonder if Michelle ever bought one. And when I see a Mazda RX8, I wonder the same thing about Kevin. Ditto for the FJ Cruiser and John.

White Accords pull double duty with two old work colleagues, as do black Accords. The new-style Honda CRV reminds me of a neighbor, as does the old-style CRV. Additionally, the old-style CRV reminds me of a past life, the first brand new car I ever bought. The old, old-style CRV brings up memories of yet another old work colleague.

Whenever I see an Xterra, I wonder how Angie and her twins are doing – even though I’m pretty sure she traded that car in years ago.

Mazda Tributes, Infiniti FXs, and the sporty little Infinitis all pull up hits for people I used to work with. Honda Odysseys are soon to be tied with Accords, with one neighbor, one past boss, and one past coworker all coming to mind.

This is only the surface of my linkages of people and cars. I have to say, it does make my commute a little more interesting, as the thoughts of everyone I ever knew go flitting across my mind, jumbled in with trying to make my mental shopping list (that NEVER works, I always forget something), contemplating the Heroes story lines, and trying not to rear-end the guy that just cut in front of me. Maybe someday I’ll hone my skill, but for now, I’ll just enjoy the ride.

woohoo!

| 5 Comments

I just put the very last car payment in the mail. It’s a liberating feeling, to own my car free and clear, while it still has some years left in it. The odometer has yet to hit 40K. She’s still in good shape, except for a dent courtesy of a drunk Diamond Rio fan, and a horribly crumpled front license plate, courtesy of a minor fender bender. Both are things that can be easily fixed, I just don’t know a good body shop.

Unfortunately, having the car paid off doesn’t free up any cash, due to the fact that I am a money nazi. And I’ve got another car payment and two student loans to worry about. Not to mention my ill-timed mortgage. My ill-timed interest only mortgage. My ill-timed, interest only, 100% financed mortgage. My ill-timed, interest only, 100% financed ARM mortgage that resets in another 3 years. I know, I know, what was I thinking? All I can say is, at the time, I didn’t foresee my house suddenly losing 15% of its value. And, well, I didn’t think I’d be in the house for longer than 5 years. Which, I likely will be, seeing as I’m not exactly gaining any equity …

So now comes the hard part – do I put all that extra money to the littlest loans to get them out of the way? Or toward the monster mortgage? Or do I attack the loan with the highest interest rate? Or do I just leave all the loans the way they are, making the required payments, and invest my money elsewhere, assuming I can get a return that’s larger than my highest interest rate? Also assuming that I can keep my grubby hands off that money long enough for it to grow into something besides ‘a fabulous trip to Italy!’

Before I decide what comes next, though, I think I’ll take my car for its first fully-owned spin around town.

ding!

After two years, and over 16 days of solid play, I finally made it to level 70. By all accounts and purposes, that is a shamefully long time to level a World of Warcraft character to maximum levelage, but, you know, I have way more hobbies than the average wow-er.

So now, at level 70, I finally have my flying mount. Which means I can fly over mountains, instead of running around them. Or land right in the middle of a field of baddies, without having to fight my way through. Or just fly somewhere, in a straight line, instead of running along a meandering road.

In most games, once you hit the top, that’s the end. You put your name in the hall of fame, and you start again, or you move on to a new game. But that’s not how wow works.

If I save up 5000 gold, I can buy a super-fast flying mount. Which means I can fly even faster! Unfortunately, that flying mount is really ugly – which will provide motivation for me to do the quests that will let me buy other super-fast flying mounts that don’t look like flying lions covered in spiky, neon armor. (Seriously, nobody can ride one of those and feel good about themselves …)

I still have 25 more levels in my leather-working to go. In order to get higher, I have to find the right vendors who sell higher-level patterns, and then I have to gather the mats to make the stuff. And then I’ll be able to sell that stuff on the auction house, to move toward my 5000-gold goal!

And then there’s this thing called ‘raiding.’ I don’t think I’ll ever get into that – it sounds way too intense to me – but my husband has already started getting my rajali ready for raiding. Because, well, he wants to take rajali raiding. And that’s a-ok with me, because the reward for raiding is some seriously nice gear. And, well, all of rajali’s clothes are a horribly mis-matched hodgepodge of things I’ve picked up along the way. He only recently traded up his halter-top chestpiece (Seriously? A chestpiece for a boy character that looks like a halter top? That’s just degrading …) for one that actually looks like armor.

So, there’s plenty more for me still to do. In fact, some would say that the game has just begun.

linkin park live

| 2 Comments

So, awhile back I went to a Linkin Park concert – and while I was at the merchandise booth picking out a t-shirt, I noticed that they were selling a live download of that night’s show. It seemed like an intriguing idea – and being only a fraction of the cost of my (hugely overpriced) new t-shirt, I decided to try it out. I paid my $11, and got a URL, a code and a blank CD.

It took a week or two for the concert to show up online, so some of the excitement had worn off by that point. I downloaded the 21 tracks, and put them in my iTunes library. It took me a couple more days to sync it to my iPod, and then probably a few more days before I actually gave them a listen.

All I have to say is, it is AWESOME! I’ve never been a huge fan of live CDs, what with all the screaming and the talking – but since I was actually THERE, at the concert, and I remember when they dedicated a song to ‘the guy in the Meteora shirt’, and when they discussed how cool it was to get punched in the face, it’s actually pretty fun. I was in that screaming crowd! That’s me screaming at the end (and middle, and beginning) of the songs!

I’m glad I gave it a try, and I hope more concerts follow suit. 🙂 It was well worth my $11.

logitech remote5 years ago, as a single gal, my home entertainment system consisted of a tv, a digital cable box, and a dvd player. The cable guy was kind enough to program the cable remote to work the tv. And when I wanted to watch a movie, I had to break out the dvd remote. So I had 3 components and two remotes. And I knew how to work them. And life was simple.

Then I got married. Enter surround sound, directivo, an xbox and a game cube. And a universal remote. It was a mid-range universal remote, one that could “learn” from any remote, so you never had to worry that it wouldn’t have the right codes for your stuff. Unfortunately, it didn’t quite have all the right buttons for all of our devices, so my husband mapped a few buttons to things that weren’t labeled what they were.

One remote is easier than 4, and it’s certainly less to get lost in the couch. The remote worked fine, and for the most part, I remembered which buttons did what. I could go from watching tv, to watching a dvd, and back again. But if my husband left it set up for gaming, I couldn’t always remember which buttons to push to get the video and audio back to where I wanted. There was many a holler through the apartment when I needed to know which video input the directv was on, and which button to push again to change the audio. Even when I could remember which sequence of buttons to push, it was a fairly involved process that took 5 or 10 button-mashings. Certainly not beyond the ability of a capable adult, but remembering each sequence for the 4 different options (directv, dvd, xbox or gamecube) could be challenging, especially when I didn’t use all the options on a regular basis.

When we bought our house, I made a deal with my husband: If I got a house, he could get a fancy new tv. What with the nearly half-million dollar mortgage (welcome to 45 miles outside of dc …), it didn’t seem so crazy to spend a few thousand on a tv. I almost balked at the $250 logitech harmony remote – there are tvs that cost less than that! – but, again, what’s a couple hundred when you are signing papers for a couple hundred thousand? I didn’t get why this new universal remote was so much better than the universal remote we already had – that I had almost mastered – but he was so in love with it, I gave in. Plus, it was made by logitech, and, well, who doesn’t love logitech?

To program it, he had to hook it up to his computer, via usb cable. It took an hour or two, and needed a few quick tweaks over the next week or so. But once he was done – once it was finally ready – I understood what was so awesome about it. It became very clear to me that it was the best remote. EVER.

When you pick up the remote, the lcd screen lights up, and you see the list of ‘Activities.’ The activities on my remote right now, for example, are ‘TiVo’, ‘DVD’, and ‘PS3.’ You push the button next to the activity you want, and the remote figures out what it needs to do in order to get you there. It knows what state the system was in last, and it sends all the right signals to all the right devices to get you to your final destination. It gets to the right video input, and to the right audio output. I push ‘TiVo’, and then I am at my tivo list, with my list of available shows. One button push. If I want to then watch a dvd, I press the ‘Activities’ button at the top of the remote to get my activity list back. And then I push the button next to the ‘DVD’ option. Two button pushes. And I’m ready to roll.

The other great thing the remote does, is it makes the rest of the remote buttons control the right things. When I am in tivo mode, the fast forward/rewind/pause/play buttons control the tivo. When I am in dvd mode, they control the dvd player.

(There are more advanced options available – using the lcd screen, for example, you can get to every single button on every single remote for every single device you have. I, for one, have never done it. I’ve never had a need to. But, the remote is capable of more than just the simple stuff I outlined above.)

This is the year 2007. We send rovers to mars. We do surgery using itty bitty cameras that are threaded though people’s bodies. We have cars that parallel park themselves! It is high time we had a revolution in remote control technology. This isn’t 1970 when a home entertainment system meant you had a television set – we are in an era where home entertainment systems are composed of multiple components, all intricately connected. It is a little silly to use 4 remotes just so you can sit down and watch the evening news. It’s even silly to have a clunky universal remote that makes you push 10 different buttons just to go from playing your PS3 to watching a DVD. In fact, It is downright ridiculous for someone with a high end system – a tv that cost over a thousand dollars, dvd player, sound system, etc. – to NOT have a logitech harmony remote. (Or one with similar capabilities.) I mean, honestly, if you spend $2000 on a tv and $200 on Monster cables, and then you skimp on the remote – that’s like wearing $2 old navy flip-flops with a designer gown. If you are going all out, then finish the package, and get the nice remote.

I love the logitech harmony remote. We started with the $250 logitech harmony 880, but just replaced it with the newly released $170 ($120 at Costco till October 31) 720. It is one remote. With one button to push to get you where you want to go. There is no more frustration. There is no yelling across the house. There is just me, enjoying my home entertainment system. I will never again live without such a remote. Trust me ladies, this remote will change your life. Logitech has several models in different price ranges (I actually prefer the cheaper 720 to the 880), so you do have a little flexibility as to how much you spend. (It looks like currently, Best Buy has models that range from $100 to $400.)

review: sweetwater tavern

| 6 Comments

meh.

I was excited to finally go to the restaurant that I’ve heard so many people rave about, but as I sat in my booth and read the menu, I knew I was in over my head. It became abundantly clear that Sweetwater Tavern is a fancy place.

I work for a company that loves to treat its employees to fancy fare. And most would consider that a nice perk, to be able to eat at Clyde’s, The Capital Grille, or Bob Kinkead’s Colvin Run Tavern on the company’s dime. But not me – I’m more than happy with a kid’s meal and some cheesecake from Chick-Fill-A.

I ordered the grilled salmon, and was surprised when the waiter asked how I wanted it cooked – the menu clearly stated that it was grilled. When he clarified that I could get it cooked to order like a steak – medium rare, medium, etc – I asked him what was best. I went out on a limb and ordered the medium he recommended, and made a mental note that at fancy places, you don’t have to have your fish thoroughly cooked.

When my food arrived, it was arranged on my plate in a rather odd manner. My mashed potatoes were dead center. My salmon was draped over the mound of potatoes. There were 3 sweet potato chips stuck into the left side of the potatoes, where they emerged from underneath the salmon filet. And the right side of my plate was covered in mustard sauce for the fish. It was very artistic and all, but food is … food. I want to be able to eat my potatoes without disturbing the fish. And without mustard sauce running all over everything. And without having to remove sweet potato chips.

I suppose the atmosphere was … fancy … and the food was … fancy … and I suppose the food was even pretty good. But I was so out of my comfort zone, that I couldn’t wait to get out of there. (I took half my food home in a box, and had it for dinner – it was much better the second time around, in the comfort of my own dining room, after the microwave nuked that medium salmon to completely cooked.)

I have to say, though, the best food I’ve had recently is Kenny’s Barbecue. Never heard of it? That’s because Kenny is my father-in-law. Any time my husband’s family has a big get-together, Kenny barbecues up every kind of meat known to man. Chicken, brisket, pork loin, sausage in a variety of spiciness levels, you name it, he’s barbecuing it. And not only did I get to enjoy his barbecue, there’s always all the ‘fixins’ that come with it, prepared by the rest of my husband’s family: butter potatoes, rolls, black-eyed peas, bacon-wrapped asparagus, apple pie. Having grown up in the Pacific Northwest, Texan cuisine is something I missed out on – but I’m trying to make up for it on every trip to Texas.

All in all, I’m sure Sweetwater Tavern is a fine place. If you’re in to that kind of thing. As for me, I’ll take Kenny’s Barbecue any day of the week.

another round with the law

| 1 Comment

And I didn’t even cry this time. 🙂

I attended the HOA ARB meeting tonight, to discuss how one might go about building a Japanese rock garden that would meet with HOA guidelines, and was surprised to find that they all thought my garden was beautiful. One of the members, seeing me on the agenda, even came to my house to check it out, and was surprised to find a flowerbed filled with dirt.

The problem seemed to be, however, that they had turned down tons of other people for having rocks in landscaping. Because, really, what they want to have a rule on, is “no white trashiness.” Since that is not quantifiable, they instead made a rule of “no rocks in landscaping.”

They have allowed people to have “foundation” rocks, within the first 18 inches from the house. And they would like to see “more green” in my garden. I’ll certainly try with the “more green” part, but I was not blessed with a green thumb – nothing I plant will stay green for long …

So, I got some … tips … on adding more green, and making things more zenny, so I’ll make up another design, resubmit, and see where it goes from there.

I also told them I want to participate in the HOA. That should win me points, right? I actually really do want to join some HOA board, because someday, I want to work my way up to be in charge of sending out letters to “offenders.” Because the letter they sent me made me cry. (Now, I didn’t even cry at my own wedding. I wasn’t one of those teenage girls who ran to my room in tears all the time. So the fact that they brought me to tears is an impressive feat.) Nine times out of ten, the offender isn’t going out of their way to be offensive or neglectful. It’s just an oversight or a lack of knowledge about rules – so there’s no reason to get snippy and make people feel like criminals and not give them any options other than “comply in 10 days or you will be fined.”

So, if I’m on the board the next time my application comes around, I’ll be just one step closer to my own personal zen.

they do exist!

| Leave a comment

I’ve been telling people that I was taking today off to wait for the FIOS man. I had the brief thought that there was no reason my tech had to be male, but I brushed the thought aside, seeing as, well, I’ve never had a woman set up my cable, phone, directv, or internet service.

But it turns out, female FIOS techs do exist! She’s wiring up my house as I speak. She was a little wary of my two-cablecards-in-the-tivo setup, but I think I’ve talked her into giving it a try. And that wariness has nothing to do with her gender; my Comcast cable man had similar misgivings.

A lady tech ranks right up there with a female airline pilot, or a woman-owned car dealership. You know they must exist, but I’ve never been on a flight piloted by a woman, nor do I recall ever driving past a car dealership with a woman’s name plastered all over it. (To be fair, some car dealerships just have a last name, or they are named for some landmark, so who’s to know who actually owns the place if all you do is analyze the signage.)

So, heres to ladies who aren’t afraid to give “man-jobs” a try: you go, girls!

Edit: I just ordered a pizza and got a pizza girl! Girl power is strong today!

akaemi.com ©2024. All Rights Reserved.
Powered by WordPress. Theme by Phoenix Web Solutions