3/24/2009

Look!

I found this site on The Paris Apartment blog today: http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/colors.php

I downloaded this picture:

And got back the photoshop palette which includes colors called trout, dawn, eagle, scorpion, and brown derby.
Hours of fun!!! If only I could download the resulting swatches...

3/19/2009

Breaking the habit...

My relationship with AOL started after I graduated from college. I had a fabulous Macintosh courtesy of my mom, and a brand new modem courtesy of my sister, and a shiny AOL floppy disk free-for-nothing. We’re going back a few years here. Time passed and AOL grew to be perceived as part of the evil empire, but still, I’d had that email address since 1995 and didn’t see a huge need for change.

But after a while, I wanted to break away, be one of the cool kids with a cooler email address (or five - why does everyone have a million email addresses - me included - and how do I know which to use??). So, I formulated a plan. Wireless Philadelphia had a greater coverage area than previous and was cheap, so I signed up with them and at the same time got myself a universal forwarding address from Bryn Mawr. After I was sure it would work, AOL would be out. Good thing I waited.

After being very specific with Wireless Philly/Earthlink representatives on the phone that I lived in a first floor rear apartment with no natural light and no direct access to the outside world, and after being assured that my personal signal was very strong, when I got the equipment and set it up, no dice (This took 45 minutes on the phone and a huge amount of connecting and reconnecting the modem. My favorite set-up had me and the modem and the laptop outside in the courtyard. I still couldn’t get a signal and the person on the phone just brushed passed the idea that I wouldn’t be able to use the equipment outside in the rain, snow, cold.).

Speedy connection, or lack thereof aside, a couple of years ago, I got myself a gmail address, and learned how to use that system, which I still do and love. But the spectre of AOL still looms (including those friends and contacts who persist in using the AOL address for me, despite numerous reminders...). My work forwards all of our emails to a personal email account (because the email interface for work is horrific and only to be used as absolutely necessary, in my humble opinion). This is still the AOL address for me, as I don’t want the gmail account to be in any way connected with work. Nor do I want the forwarding address from Bryn Mawr (which forwards to gmail) to be it because I don’t even want to see those work emails in that inbox. But finally, a new solution is ahead.

A few months ago, I finally gave in and purchased a high(er) speed internet connection for home. With this came a bright, shiny new email address! This one can become the work forwarding address. And with this new connection at home, I no longer need the AOL software to act as my ISP. So the plan is that by the end of the month, be rid of AOL.

One of the lingering things about AOL that I used was my list of bookmarks that I've amassed these many years, including my list of blogs. I've saved that list so I can reconstruct it someplace else, but I knew I needed a plan for the blogs. And sure enough, google has one for me: Google Reader. (Yes, I know all of you knew about this already, and are savvy about RSS feeds, etc., but bear with me while I continue my crawl into the 21st century). Last week I put all of my sites with feeds into the Reader and so far, love using it. It's not cumbersome. It cuts down on the ads without minmizing content. And I'm logged in already any time I'm using gmail.

Go, technology! I'm getting there.

3/16/2009

Getting greener...

Spring is still not quite a week off, but it's so close, you can taste it. The snowdrops are up down the street, and all over people are saying that their bulbs are popping up. But I hadn't seen hide nor hair of mine, leading me to the conclusion that they must have been eaten by squirrels. But no! As I was walking to the train this morning, I noticed that their are several things popping up. Thus far, none look to be flowering, but you never know. I also noticed that not only is my potted lilac leafing out great guns, the one in the ground is showing signs of green! Yay!!!

Yesterday, Peter gave me some daffodils (which squirrels don't like, apparently) and daylillies. This evening I planted them in the back yard and noticed there that my azalea from Liz is still alive, and one of the roses that Susie gave me from Monticello made it through! I also noticed something else with a varigated leaf that looks vaguely hosta-like that I may have planted on purpose coming up near the back fence. I can't wait to see what it looks like in a few weeks.

I'm still not a gardener, but it was fun playing in the dirt today.

3/12/2009

What was she wearing??



Arthur Fergusson snapped this some time during the first half of this year's Boston Ball (I took the gloves off for the second half). It's a good view of the dress, the current length of the hair (just assume the vast amount of chemicals it took to get my hair to stay that way), and a smattering of the 78 rosettes that seemed to have survived their second washing...

Sure signs of Spring...

Yesterday, as I was walking into Merion Friends for longsword, I spied the first daffodill of Spring, early even for this area. I was so excited that I ran back for my cell phone to capture these images in the now-lighter early evening.



3/05/2009

While March is still in its lion phase, I need a bit of cheering. These three images help qite a bit.

There was a post on the ECD list today and a link to this image of one of Magda's Cake Creations. Yes, it's an edible page from John Playford's Dancing Master open to Gathering Peascods. We need one of these for the next demo team potluck.


I have a folder of electronic pictures called House Ideas. The most recent addition from Kim Vallee's blog is below. This image is the tenth example showing open kitchen shelves that I've saved. It's a sign. Yes, I fear grease and dirt and dust, but I am compelled. There will be open shelves in my kitchen. I feel a spring project coming on. Maybe one of these days I'll go crazy and paint the kitchen cabinets too.



This last is my favorite one, as featured on Oh Joy. Every crafty bone in my body now yearns for masking tape in all of these colors. I have no idea what I would do with them, but it doesn't matter. I want them all!


3/02/2009

Snow Day!

Whenever I have periods of free time at home, although I have a vast to-do list, it's amazing how some things always fall to the bottom of the list, like cleaning, taxes, sorting through the mounds of paper that have accumulated to decide what to shred and what to keep, etc. But on this snow day, not only have I managed to shovel, cactch up on dishes and actually relax over a pot of tea, I've also managed to make serious progress in my efforts to hang up pictures on the second floor.

In a previous post I mentioned the picture wall I was creating in my upstairs parlour. Today, the wall is complete, pending additions. Here's a chronicle of the progress:

Where it all started:



A few more added:



And more:



All along the way I was moving and tweaking. The beauty of working with frames all the same size is that as long as the image has the same orientation, it will always fit in the same space. Another thing I began doing was adding small images for filler to make sure that as few of the framed pieces were line up as possible. Here's the final result:



The pictures can't do it justice, so you'll just have to come over and see it yourself.

I hung some additional things in the parlour and below are a few shots of some of the things I hung in the bedroom:





I still have a pile of family pictures to hang. I have my eye on the hallway for those. And the craft room is still a blank slate, but it has more floor space than ever, and those grandiose plans I alluded to earlier.

Maybe I'd better hurry up and do my taxes to see what that refund will really be like...