Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday Laura, I hope you have a great birthday. I missed seeing you over Labor Day, but hopefully I'll see you in May!

Crochet Wars

I have not heard from the crochet Nazi, so I am assuming she realized she was wrong and an ass to boot. However, I have heard from another one of the crochet Nazi's commarades. Another totally random person sent me an email about using one of her patterns in a dress I made. "Really people do you have nothing better to do than harrass me about items I have for sale that I will probably never sell." People fucking suck! (I'm only being so vulgar because I've had a few glasses of wine and it's coming really easy). So I get this email; at least it's a little more sugar coated. This person just wanted me to mention that the dress was her design. She wasn't asking me to remove it. The funny thing is; that same person sent me another email that said: "Never mind, aparently the crochet magazine that I sold the pattern to now owns it, so you have no obligation to me." No shit Sherlock! Get over yourself you crochet idiots. Your patterns aren't complicated. You're not the Vera Wang of the crochet world. I ended up putting a disclaimer on my Etsy site so maybe people will leave me alone.

I put the two items in question at the top of my page as "features". It is definitely an in your face, kiss my ass kind of statement. It makes me feel better.

Technology

It's about 1:30am. I should be in bed, but I'm trying to wind down after setting up my new DVR. I should have let it go till tomorrow, but at around 10:30 I thought I would just set it up real quick and go to bed. I should have known better. I upgraded our Dish to HD with a DVR. It was great for about 24 hours and the DVR died. Not fixable, so Dish sent me another DVR to replace it. I got it all hooked up and went through all of the steps to get it up and running, then I had to call to have it activated. About 2 hours later I was finally done. I did however have a nice chat with Raymond from India. My satellite got activated from India, where according to Raymond it has been raining for the last 3 days straight. I also learned that he works the graveyard shift 1am - 10am. I was his last call of the day and then he was going home to bed. He's never seen snow before either, except in pictures. He complimented my voice. He told me I had the voice of a 20 year old. What a charmer. We had a lot of time for discussion while we waited for everything to download. Technology is so obscenely crazy good and so incredibly frustrating at the same time. After talking with my new friend Raymond for awhile, he transferred me to another department because I had some other bull shit to take care of. After I had explained what I needed from them and was put on hold for 5 minutes, they promptly disconnected me. Great! That's just great! I guess I'll call back again tomorrow after I've had a few hours sleep.

I have more crochet war information to share, but it will have to wait till tomorrow too.

ZUMBA

Zumba is a Latin inspired aerobic exercise style. It's been around for a long time. I actually have a VHS tape from back in the day. It's just recently becoming hot here in the Hoosier state. We always get the "in" things about 5 years later than most areas of the country. A new dance studio opened up on my side of town that offers classes. A few of my friends and Amanda have taken the class and said it is a lot of fun. I figured what the hell. I've done it before so I thought I knew what to expect. This was like no other Zumba class I have ever taken. It was a little Latin, a little Belly Dancing, and Hip Hop all rolled into one.

The instructor had more energy than a hip hop rabbit on crack. The music was loud and fast. Everyone was shoulder to shoulder. 40+ people in a 30' x 20' area. The room was hot and humid. She started quick and before I knew it bodies and bootys were shaking all over the place. I was next to Queen Latifah. She sauntered in a little late, ran into Amanda and then positioned herself at my side. Perfect! I was keeping up pretty well but I had to take a break about half way through. It was either step out for a moment or hurl and pass out in front of everyone. There was probably a 20 degree temperature difference between that room and the lobby. I took a few deep breaths of fresh air and headed back in. At least Queen L kept my spot open. I really wouldn't have wanted to tangle with her. She was a little bossy too. At one point both Amanda and I were going the wrong way and she yells; "left, right, left, right." WHATEVER! As if we were making her look bad. Her pants up her ass crack were already doing that. The class was an hour long. It felt like a week. I couldn't even keep track of the time because at one point the instructor's energetic dancing knocked the clock right off of the wall. I kept looking at it lying there on the floor. It seemed like time stood still. Wait....it did. The battery had fallen out of the clock. Phew! I thought I was in a time warp or something.

Standing next to Queen L and attempting these hip hop moves, I never felt so white. But I showed her. When it came time for the cool down and the stretching, my yoga experience payed off. I was a stellar stretcher! IN YUR FACE HIP HOP QUEEN!

The studio is having a special right now. If you pay for one month, you get one month free. Before class Amanda and I talked about doing that. After class Amanda asked if I was ready to sign up. I told her I'd have to get back to her on that.

Crochet Wars

The battlefield has been silent for a few days. I'm ahead at this point because I got corroboration from the Editor of the crochet magazine. Little Miss Crochet Nazi doesn't have a hook to stand on. Still waiting to hear from Etsy. Maybe she gave up and didn't report me after all. Maybe she was bluffing. To be continued.......

Love Letters

Time for another love letter. This is the actual letter. It's lyrics from a song from 1941 by Ella Fitzgerald. How romantic!
Listen to the song.....
Ella Fitzgerald

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday Robbie and Shane! Hey Robbie, you're older than me! Just thought I'd remind you. I hope you both have a wonderful Birthday. If you have cheesecake, please send me a piece. Love you guys!

Technology Is Great.....When It Works

Now I remember why I go to great lengths to resist new technology. When it breaks it really pisses me off. Mostly because I know it's something that I can't fix myself which requires talking to service people. I don't like dealing with service people especially when I get the impression that I know more about the problem than they do. I read the manual and sometimes it's pretty obvious that they didn't. That's why when I do run across someone that actually knows the product and what they are talking about, I get all gidy and I want to kiss them. I refrain from the kissing but I make sure I tell them how much I appreciate their knowledge.

Which brings me to my current problem. I have my beautiful new flat screen TV and I upgraded to a DVR receiver. The receiver was installed yesterday. Worked great, except Joe hogged the TV all day. He was watching football, but I really didn't mind because the picture was so awesome I just liked looking at it. So I get up this morning and the DVR is making a humming noise (no it didn't hum anything I recognized). It wouldn't turn on either. That's just great! Less than 24 hours and it's not working. I do all the normal troubleshooting things....still doesn't work. I break down and call Dish Network. The guy was pretty pleasant. I almost believed him when he told me that he was sorry I was having problems. Long story short, the receiver is toast. A lemon. After he had me go through the steps that I already did, he determined that the receiver would need replaced. Unbelievable! He starts processing my order for a new receiver and begins to tell me of the $14.95 return charge and some other charge. Just as I was about to throw an F bomb in his face, he says "I will waive those charges since this is a brand new receiver." Yes, yes you will.

Tuesday Best Buy is coming to install all the other components, which I am not sure I can even test out since there is no antenna connection. I probably won't get the new receiver until Thursday. Ahhhhhhhhh! I know it's not the end of the world and I am thankful that I am even in a position that I can have these things. It's just soooooo frustrating. I feel intimidated in my own house by my electronic equipment.

I was reading an article in a magazine (HD Living) which apparently I now receive. It was actually an article about a guy who recently moved from California to Ft. Wayne and wanted to upgrade his current home theater system. He enlisted the services of Audio Visual Lifestyles and $90,000.00 later he had his upgrade. $90,000.00 for a HOME TV! I guess if you can spend $90,000.00 for TV equipment you can probably afford to hire a repair tech for 24/7 service. Hell, you could probably hire someone to work the remote.

I need to relax a little, maybe I'll go do some yoga. I just hope my DVD player works.