[

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chipper

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Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (film version) = fan-fricking tastic!!

Twas quite beautifully filmed and the kiddos actually got a chance to act rather than react.
It's the best in the film series thus far (and this is coming from one who quite enjoyed the first two films!)
Points were made rather more subtly (and well) than the Columbus school of thwacking over the head with them and even the score was understated and more interesting than the previous films!

Yay for yorkdigger coming out to see it with me!

I'd be quite happy to go and see said film again with any who want to go see it.


Boo to Pasta Luna over in the west end for crappy service (partly due to inexperienced waiter, though) and for NOT having the best Italian food in Richmond. The food was ok, but it was not anything special. The pesto for the bread, on the other hand, was lurvely.

Oh, and enthusiastic thumbs up for Starsky & Hutch which I finally got around to seeing at the Byrd on Thurs. It was very funny and rather delightfully cheesy and fluffy (which a movie such as this really ought to be if it possibly can!).

June 19th is looking like a go as regards housewarming festivities ... them as said they could go on my previous entry are of course, most welcome!

[	Current Mood	|	hopeful	]
[	Current Music	|	Maroon5 - "Sunday Morning"	]

It's been a while hasn't it?

Much has happened and I've not a lot of time to explain it in ... so it'll have to be bullet points.

* Oldest brother Mike visited from Florida at the beginning of May - hadn't seen him in a couple years so it was great to catch up!

* A visit from UncleNoah and the lovely Mrs. Effingway also took place - they're as nice in person as they are online. My only regret is that we did not have enough time to do a whole lot - but I did subject them to a brief tour of the Fan.

* Saw the lovely Miss Ellen at the Greydog station in Richmond at stupid o'clock in the morning - whilst her bus was laid over. We were both bleary, but we had good conversation and Krispy Kremes - another visit that was alas, a bit short - but twas DEFINITELY better than nowt.

* Little green honda complete with "special" antenna was acquired from yorkdigger on the 19th. Was parking ticketed on the 20th (D'OH!!) Acquired a rented off-street parking space of its very own on the 25th and was attacked by some moron in the Joe's parking lot on about the same day - the bumper now bears a battle scar (they just drove off without leaving a note or anything). Guess it could've been worse though ... I'm just happy to be somewhat independently mobile and am fighting the urge to bitch about the rising cost of petrol.

* Went to NC over Memorial Day weekend to go to a 90th birthday party for my great-uncle Russell. Haven't seen a lot of that side of the family in AGES, so it was good - although I assiduously kept my mouth shut on the subjects of politics and religion in the interests of harmony. Uncle Russell was looking good - everyone should be in that good shape if they are lucky enough to meet their 90th year.

* On the way back from NC, we swung by Nags Head and I got to play on the beach and a little bit in the ocean. It's the first time I've been in an ocean that wasn't the North Sea/North Atlantic in quite a while and the water was AWESOME. I'm s'posed to be going back down there in July with Alan as he's rented a beach house and I am cheeky.

* Flat is shaping nicely - there are even pictures and things on the walls and I now have Roman shades (rather than bedsheets) over my double doors. Many happy evenings have been spent out on that porch - i had a bit of a hangover from the session last night involving beer and whiskey. Housewarming party details are forthcoming ... how does the 19th of June strike people?

* Sorta kinda had a date to the Poe Museum with Mr. Ben upon whom I have been crushing since March. It was nice ... he did come by for drinks later in the evening (c.f. hangover above). Not sure how things are going to go there ... but he HAS broken up with the psycho hose beast which is great any way you look at it. Only time will tell - but I'm feeling all fluttery which hasn't happened in a while ...

* I am now the proud owner of a mobile phone - contact details will be posted in a "friends only" entry for all and sundry who might be interested.

* Have applied for a job at the VA Credit Union as their starting salary for tellers is $4000 more than what I make at Franklin Federal. If I manage to get a job there, I might even be able to bargain that salary up and quit Joes and afford internet access of mine own! (Today's entry brought to you by Dad and the VA Dept. of Labor & Industry.) Again, we shall just have to see what shakes out - even though I feel kinda guilty about ditching Franklin Federal so soon - making a better living is more important at this time though. This working two jobs thing is killing me!


So much is going on and much continues to go on. Updates as and when I can ... I miss you all!

Well, I have an apartment of my very own.
It's in the Fan near VCU.

I move in on Saturday.

I may also have a car courtesy of yorkdigger.

Trouble is, I won't have money for internet access from home what with all the other bills I gotta pay n'stuff.

But I'll try to stop by the library when I can.


Life is ... exhausting at present.

Must dash or else I'll be late for work at Joe's.

That is all.

[	Current Mood	|	calm	]
[	Current Music	|	Gene Krupa - "Sing Sing Sing" (stuck in head head head)	]

It was a slow day at work. (Being back as a teller is a lot like riding a bike - once you've learned, it apparently sticks with you.)

A thin yellow coating of pollen dusts everything in the immediate vicinity.

I was staring out the window looking at the hideous office park in which my job resides, when I saw a mama duck and 16 ducklings waddling across our parking lot Make Way for Ducklings style. They got to the curb and one by one jumped up to proceed to the manmade lake aways off. Except for one iccle duckie who couldn't make the jump. He tried and tried but just wasn't getting it. I was fearful that he would fall down the storm drain.

After about 5 minutes of watching him attempt, I couldn't stand it and decided to go try to help.

The duckling was crying (well, cheeping) piteously and his mom and siblings moved away from me down the hill. First I tried to herd him down to where the curb was lower, but he was having none of that. Finally, the duckie realised he needed me and actually came towards me and let me scoop him up and put him in the grass. Then he booked down the hill towards his mum.

I hope the people scent on him didn't get him on the outs with his family and that he's ok. We small creatures must stick together.

My soft spot for ducks strikes again!

In other news, birthday festivities were low-key, but generally nice. Got to meet erechtheus and boringgirl in person for the first time! Wine and cheese were enjoyed courtesy of the lovely yorkdigger (who also went to brunch at the Strawberry Street Cafe with me on Sunday - after an amusing but unfortunate incident involving my hairdryer and the breaker switch in the basement of Alan's building.) Weird drinks with names like "mind eraser" and "surfer on acid" were also imbibed on thursday night - and an odd sense of disconnectedness featured heavily in my existence at Joe's the next day on both Friday and Sunday *rueful grin*) I racked up on the dvds this time aroud (Mallrats, Lost in Translation, the first season of Angel, Keeping Up Appearances etc.) and got other goodies as well! (And cake!) Once again I am awed by the generosity of my friends and family and rather sheepish about my estimation of deserving it.

I even got an email from the Spineless Weasel wishing me a happy birthday (as well as informing me that his friend that moved to Chelts now is living in the building right across the street from my old flat.) *sigh* He wrote on the 15th. I have yet to reply. I don't know that I will.

Alan's going to be able to pick up my stuff in Norfolk tomorrow - the shipping people have at long last gotten their act together. Huzzah.

I am so desperate for my own place to live, I'm even considering sharing a 2 bedroom apartment (provided I can find someone I could stand to room with ...)

Will try to write more soon - but as am in the midst of a 55 hour work week, it may be a while.

[	Current Mood	|	silly	]
[	Current Music	|	Queen - "Another One Bites The Dust"	]

"I want everyone who reads this to ask me 3 questions, no more no less.

Ask me anything (yes.. ANYTHING) you want.

Then I want you to go to your journal, copy and paste this allowing your friends (including myself) to ask you anything."

[	Current Mood	|	ditzy	]
[	Current Music	|	The Beatles - "Birthday"	]

So this is what being 28 feels like.

A hangover.

(just kidding - the hangover is due to a fella from Joe's buying me something called a "mind eraser" as a birthday drink last night - i think the fact that I'd had nowt to eat all day and had an amaretto sour right before that might have contributed somewhat ...)

Trying to go to Norfolk to FINALLY pick up stuff shipped from England, not sure if it will go as planned, but at least we're making the attempt.

Anyone wanting to come to belated birthday festivities on Saturday needs to give me a call and/or drop me an email.

[	Current Mood	|	calm	]
[	Current Music	|	NPR	]

I will likely be going back to work as a teller at Franklin Federal soon.

Starting off as hourly and moving into a salaried position (with benefits).

And I'll continue to work at Joe's in the evenings.

It's not really what I want to be doing, but it's money and keeping me from staying home and sleeping all the time. Moreover, the people at both places are nice - and they seem to think I am extra good at these jobs for some reason.

It could be worse.
It could be better.

But hopefully soon I can get an apartment of mine own.
That can't be a bad thing, right?


In other news, re. the 9/11 commission excitement today, does anyone else think that Condoleeza Rice did a lot of talking around various questions rather than actually answering them? Then again, I guess all politicians do that.
While it is true that the government likely could not have predicted the specific horror that occurred on that day, they knew SOMETHING big was likely, so this "no silver bullet" arguement rings a bit false to me. It would seem to me that New York and Washington would be OBVIOUS places to step up security if they knew that a threat was possible.

[	Current Mood	|	aggravated	]
[	Current Music	|	1776 - "Sit Down John"	]

Ok, the movie 1776 (one of my favorite films!) is being BANNED from being shown in Fairfax schools!

Here's the article about it if you're interested: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11721-2004Mar20.html

Stupid, weasly, puritanical suburban nightmare idiots - excellent descriptor of those who would ban such material.
Fuckmuppets also strikes me as being appropriate somehow.


Further reasons why I refuse to live in NoVA.


In other news, Williamsburg fell thru on me due to silly boys deciding they'd rather play golf. Rescheduling is being contemplated.

Work this morning was just doing catering deliveries. Got a free lunch and about $25 gross for 2 hours of actual "work". I feel like I'm getting away with something here ...

I'm scheduled to cater again tomorrow morning and to work the takeaway window tomorrow, wed, sat and sunday night. It could be worse I guess. It's nice to have some form of income any road.

[	Current Mood	|	geeky	]
[	Current Music	|	New Pornographers - "Mass Romantic"	]

So, last night my parents came round to meet Alan's new girlfriend (her name's Honey and she is indeed quite sweet!) - as an adjunct they cooked us dinner. We watched Chicago as it was on. Baby pictures of Alan were brought round for perusal (as a result of his somewhat sardonic request).

I fell asleep early and had bad dreams involving Spineless Weasel and a 28 Days Later-esque scenario. *shudder*

Tonight I am hopefully going to Williamsburg to get wasted playing the Buffy drinking game with Heather, Derek and company.

Still have not plucked up the courage to ask Alan's friend for his friend's phone number. *sigh*

First day on the job at Joe's will be tomorrow, I'm trying to be excited at the prospect of $9/hr, I really am. *sigh*

Anyway, that's what's going on (or not) at the present time.
I seem to be in a literary slump of late and for this I apologise.

[	Current Mood	|	contemplative	]
[	Current Music	|	Maroon 5 - "This Love" (again!!)	]

I ought to be being productive.

For some reason I am not.


Instead I am futzing online (in limited library time).

And wondering where the HELL my deposit refund re. my flat in Cheltenham is. I needs it so I can get my stuff out of hock from customs. *sigh*

And am mildly crushing on a friend of a friend of my brother's who is FIVE YEARS YOUNGER than I. Eep. I am debating about calling the friend and asking for his friends phone number, but I am kinda leery of being perceived as "odd"(er than usual).

That Maroon 5 song is STILL stuck in my head. Impressive.

[	Current Mood	|	disappointed	]
[	Current Music	|	Maroon 5 - "This Love"	]

I hatehateHATE busting my backside doing stupid job applications without result.

I've just been rejected from yet another job - this one being an administrative assistant postion at VCU (they wanted management experience too!)

Looks like I'm going to be waiting tables at Joe's Inn (where my brother works in the kitchen).

*sigh*



On a random side note - I have had my "current music" song stuck in my head for the past 2 days. I wonder if the rest of the Maroon 5 album is any good?

Alan and I went to the river the other day - with me scrambling down banksides in old shoes of Alan's that were far too big for me to get to the spot he likes. Waded in above knee level to get to a rock not too far from shore and realized just how snowmelty effing cold the river still is at the moment despite the steadily rising temperatures. Still it was lovely to sit and enjoy the white noise of the river tumbling over rocks and observe some nutty Canada geese out on the prowl.

We cooked out on the fire escape on Thursday night. Yay slightly scorched burgers! Slightly scorched chicken is probably in the offing in the not too distant future. (Alan bought this little bitty grill that stands about 3 inches off the ground - inventive small space grilling!)

Yesterday was mostly spent going around various truck dealerships around Broad Street (and craning our necks to see if we could see the smoke from the big fire that happened near the Siegel Center)
Alan was wanting to buy a pickup truck.
Don't think he was expecting to do it right away, but he is now the owner of a new, white 2003 Mazda sport pickup! He is very proud that he didn't have to have anyone co-sign for him in order to get the financing. Bless him!

We celebrated by going to show it off to mom and dad :-)

and then went to see Jersey Girl which was quite different from previous Kevin Smith outings, but quite sweet and enjoyable to watch. It also gets musical kudos from me for featuring Sweeny Todd prominiently AND using the lalala bits from "Wandering" by Ben Folds TWICE. *grin* The characters were quite well-drawn and the dialogue (as per usual was great fun). The child playing Affleck's little girl was also quite a good actor, imho (i'm always impressed at non-obnoxious child actors!) It's something I'd be willing to see again in the theatre (incidentally insofar as friends in the area are concerned!) ;-)

Anyway, that's what's happened in the past couple days.

I'm thinking of seeing if I can get a job at Capital One seeing as all attempts to get a museum job (or even an effing TEMP job) in the area seem to be failing parlously. Must call Derek and enquire of him about that.
Must also see if I can convince Gina or Heather to come up today or tomorrow ...

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devious

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En route to the library, I always pass a store that sells "Religious Goods" - that's what the sign says out front and they seem to have lots of Catholic iconographic stuff therein (statues of the Virgin Mary, books about the Pope, etc.).

Each day, I have to really fight the urge to go in and ask them if they have any Hindu religious goods, or Wiccan or Jewish ...


their sign after all advertises them as purveyors of religious goods. It doesn't specify Christian. Could they be accused of false advertising?


I am SOOOO going to hell for thoughts like this.

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blank

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Hmmm ...

Had a lovely saturday hanging out with yorkdigger and Derek S.

Borrowed the first season of Angel on DVD - am enjoying it immensely and am in fact, almost done watching it. What has become of the actor who played Doyle, she wonders not really having time to IMDB him at present.

I am still unemployed.

I still need to figure out a way to get my own place and get out of my brother's hair.

But hey, it's spring ...

[	Current Mood	|	curious	]
[	Current Music	|	John Mayer - "No Such Thing"	]

Ok, so my birthday is coming up in less than a month now (April 15th)

I would like to have a party of some kind - I'm thinking along the lines of wine & cheese (and other nibbly goodness) and music and companionship. To occur at my brother's apartment (he says it's ok) on the 16th or 17th of April.

Trouble is, I have realised that most of my friends are no longer in the area - so the question is, who might be interested in attending such an event? Post a comment here and let me know (and if you're anonymous, SIGN!)
I thought it might be worthwhile to ask early and give people time to decide!

Moreover, I shall be obnoxious and post links to my amazon.com wishlist and
amazon.co.uk wishlist in case people were feeling generous. (the .co.uk list has stuff I can't get in the US or specifically want UK versions of ... yes, I'm EVIL)

But the party is the important thing ... who's with me?

[

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contemplative

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Went to see Girl With The Pearl Earring last night.

It was, in a word, GORGEOUS!

Beautifully acted and beautifully filmed - each frame looked like a painting in and of itself.

It was not an "action" movie - more of a think piece with much intensity and sexual tension.

Well worth seeing.

I'm liking Scarlett Johanssen more and more the more I see of her!
And Colin Firth has once again demonstrated how good he is at smouldering. (Yum!)

This is definitely a film I think would be good for a second viewing. It's also one that is well worth seeing on the Big Screen.


I shall be reading the book upon which the film was based as soon as I've finished Lies & the Lying Liars Who Tell Them

In other news ...
I have an interview at an employment agency this afternoon, hence, I need to go buy pantyhose. So I am off for now ...

[

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curious

]

Attention Livejournal public -

Kevin Smith's new movie Jersey Girl is out on March 26th.
(It's not out in Blighty til June 25th!! One more reason to be happy about being over here again!)

Who wants to meet up in Richmond and go see it with me??

[	Current Mood	|	ditzy	]
[	Current Music	|	The Supernaturals - "Smile" (stuck in head)	]

Although I know that I have things to be happy about, depression seems to be my overriding state of being still. Need to get out from under the cloud.

Desperately.


And so follows a list of small happy things observed of late:

1) tiny leaf buds on trees hereabouts
2) anticipation of the not-too-distant lovely pale green of early spring creeping across the trees
3) this whole video on demand thing on Alan's cable system kicks all kinds of booty
4) knowing I have wonderful friends all over the US and UK
5) wandering around the area north of the boulevard and daydreaming about which apartment I'm going to rent there when I get a job
6) the back room at Bogarts
7) the thunderstorm we had the other night
8) maple and brown sugar pop tarts
9) Krispy Kreme donuts
10) the almost 6 hours of music downloaded onto my laptop
11) coming to the library and not having to wait for a computer
12) the possiblity of going to see Girl With the Pearl Earring at the Westhampton today or tomorrow
13) the meeting of Anthony Stewart Head and photographic evidence thereof (see Feb. 23rd entry) still makes me smile goofily

Hey, look at that, I came up with a baker's dozen good things!

Watched Alan's dvd of 28 Days Later the other night. I found it very good but profoundly disturbing in an "it could happen" sort of sense. (Not in terms of zombies mind you, but in terms of a biological weapon or pandemic killing lots of people). The empty streets of London and Manchester burning in the film were also quite disturbing and powerful images. The fact that I'm still thinking about it 2 days after the fact probably speaks volumes.

My date with match.com fella (called James) on Friday was ok. We met up at Maymont park (which he had never been to) and wandered around there. Then we went over to Carytown and he bought me lunch. He is a nice guy and did drive 98 miles from NoVA to meet me (flattering), but I'm not sure there's much in the way of "spark" (at least not on my part). I think this may wind up being a "just friends" sort of a thing if it continues ...
other match.com dates may be coming.
Something I don't get is why I seem to attract big beefy guys whose necks are as big as their heads (i.e., "jock" types). I've never found that in the least bit attractive ... superficial? probably, but I know what I like physically speaking and that's not it.

Went to a funeral for a relative that I did not know that well (a great-aunt) on Saturday. I always feel terribly awkward in such situations ... I never know what to say.

In other news, the job interview I thought I had has not worked out. Blah. I shall be calling employment agencies for the rest of today. Blah.

Alan and I stayed up really late last night talking and drinking whiskey & cokes. Feeling a bit funny this morning as a result. *rueful grin*