I think poor Olive has finally had enough of Freddy, because she made a break for it this morning. Like, for real. Normally her escape attempts are limited to the front steps. But this time she bolted down the block. When I gave chase I managed to rip my damned jeans. In the crotch. The little man was laughing his head off throughout the spectacular spectacle. Thankfully I wrangled the cat back into the house and the kid to the school bus on time. But then…

• On my drive to work I encountered two middle-aged bicyclists with death wishes. First one decided the other wasn’t going fast enough and attempted to pass him - right in front of my car! I had to slam on the brakes. Their erratic biking continued for blocks. At each stoplight one would try to outpace the other. It was ridiculous. Especially now that the shoulder is diminished, what with the giant snowbanks and all. Geesh.
• I currently have a flickr parse error on my front page, and I am not alone.
• I picked up a pair of 4g tapered ubolts, but have been too wussy to stretch my ear lobes myself (currently wearing 6g spirals).
• We have to haul ass out to Savage, MN on Saturday morning for a birthday party. The things I do for the little man.
• I’m all about percussion, but only just found out about the Hit It! festival at the Southern Theater. Doh.
• Yesterday I experienced the spectator paradox, firsthand, when our Pizza Luce food order arrived at the office but no one told me. Everyone assumed someone else would let me know. 20 minutes later I stumbled upon the order and ate my cold vegan cheese toast. Alone.
• Juno is screening at the Walker tomorrow night, complete with a Q&A session with Diablo Cody. I have no tickets.
• My dear Andrew Bird is performing at The Guthrie Friday and Saturday nights but I have no tickets.

But it’s not all bad.

• That flickr parse error has been corrected already, all lickety-split like.
• Ericka pointed out what is now my new favorite etsy store - yes, I still have the cephalopod love.
• Looking forward to watching the just-released Battlestar Galactica movie Razor. It’s got more Ensign Ro in it!
• How to hack LEDs into Lego minifigures for Halloween makes me happy.
• Pomegranates. Period.
• Gillian Anderson is taking over Masterpiece Theater. Now that’s what I call revamping!
• I’ve been having way too much fun with Google Street View.
• I’m shooting photos of Sheela (creator of Cupcake Saturday) in her very own post punk kitchen on Friday.
• We’re having friends over for Festivus on Sunday.

Gosh I had a lot to say. Thankfully they weren’t all grievances. But none qualified as Feats of Strength. Maybe I’ll come up with one of those for tomorrow.

It was an unexpectedly awesome weekend but today (Monday) I was totally beat. Low on energy though I am, sleep is eluding me. Yay. But Saturday saw cupcakes, sledding at Como, and lounging on the new furniture. All with fab friends. Sunday brought an unanticipated break, when the little man’s grandma called out of the blue. She hadn’t seen the lad since September and asked if she could have him for the day. Why certainly! This allowed me to enjoy a leisurely brunch at Seward. After which I hit up The Handmaidens Craftmas Spectacular with my pal Ericka. Then I went on to check out The Golden Compass film adaptation with J (it made us both want to revisit the books more than anything). And lastly to do some solo grocery shopping at the co-op. Sure, it was all go-go-go but it was utter bliss.

Today we were back to the usual slog, starting out with a 45 minute haul to the school bus stop (it’s usually half that or less). Thankfully we’d left early and the school bus was late. After work we met up with Zophia for the first time in ages, at Muddy Paws. I was so spacey I neglected to photograph her or the vegan cheesecake we consumed. Doh. We popped by J’s afterwards for dinner (his ingredients, my culinary talents) before heading home. Where I’d intended to cross a few items off the To Do list but have instead spaced out, dozed and otherwise squandered my time.

Hoping a return to my workout schedule at the YWCA - in combination with cutting back on the caffeine - will help set me right and boost my productivity again.

Bonus: For some reason Santacon has never struck in Minneapolis. I feel this should be remedied next year. Who’s in? I’ll be a sexy Santa. Or maybe just a really really short one.
Plus: Our Mustachio event may be over, but I’ve only just discovered Whiskerino, via the flickr blog. What grabbed me more than anything? That man’s jumping photos. Fantastic captures.
And: “Mysterious mammal caught on film.” Mammal? I think the Jerboa looks way more rodent-like. Or like a Pokemon character.

Been sacrificing sleep for the love of Scrabulous and/or for insomnia’s sake. I am one groggy girl.

So…yesterday morning I had some new furniture delivered. Real furniture. No more crappy futon couches or hand-me-downs for me. I hit up the Room and Board Outlet. Yeah, I felt a bit conspicuous-consumer, all surrounded by yuppies, but I got some excellent deals on really well made stuff. I sat on every couch in the place before I found the pair that will transform my living room into a room I actually want to live in. The Tulane and the Lenox are now in my house. Teevee party tonight, all right! After the roller derby, of course. And before that, cupcake Saturday and sledding. Oh how I adore weekends.

But I love work too. Because it’s Clockwork. The other night we had our holiday rumpus/first annual Mustachio party. I love my people.

Bonus: Bauhaus is allegedly releasing one last album before calling it quits. “We were getting along really well, but there was an incident that occurred,” drummer Kevin Haskins tells Billboard.com, declining to elaborate further. “Some of us just felt that we didn’t want to carry on as a working unit.” Hmmm, curious what this incident was.
Plus: Missed a slew of shows last night, but I did get out to dinner with J, to celebrate his 14th vegan anniversary.
And: Today is International Human Rights Day.

Whenever it snows I am thorough in the shoveling of my front steps and sidewalks, but always run out of steam by the time I get to the driveway. My half-assed job of clearing the driveway invariably leads to the car getting stuck when backing out or trying to get back in or both. And it’s only worsened by the damned snowplows leaving behind a barrier of compacted snow. Ah, the joys of homeownership in the upper midwest.

How about five better things?

• finds! secrets! arm-wrestling! music, magic & mayhem! Too bad that the Found vs. Postsecret tour isn’t coming to our town. It would’ve been magical.
• Totally disturbing yet oddly compelling, kitty wigs!
• Who is The Superest? Begin at the beginning.
• There are a couple of art openings of note this weekend. “Hello lovers of posters! Come on through to First Amendment Arts this Friday night for the grand opening of I Wanna Roll You, celebrating 5 long years of screenprinted posters from local artist Amy Jo Hendrickson. After you’ve enjoyed and purchased some prints, rockers The Blind Shake will blow your dome off!” Saturday night New Land opens at Rosalux Gallery with work by Scott Wenner and David Malcolm Scott.
• Didn’t realize it before, but the city of St. Paul maintains a list of choice sledding hills. Nice!

I’ve shacked up with menfolk for over ten years of my adult life, but for the last year I’ve been sleeping alone. In a ginormous queen-sized bed. I could totally sprawl, spread-eagle, across the middle of it. Or sleep diagonally. Or heck, I’m so short I could just about stretch out horizontally. But no, every night I still confine myself to the right hand side of the bed. Recently I moved my night stand over to the left, in an effort to force myself into the middle area. It didn’t work. And now I have to get up - or roll over a few times - to turn off the damned alarm clock in the morning. Ensuring that I literally wake up on the wrong side of the bed. I think I’ll be moving the night stand back to its original spot.

Bonus: More writers strike blowback. Ah, David Cross in a cat suit. What’s not to love?
Plus: Voting is now open for Mustachio 2007.
And: The Golden Compass opens this weekend. Debating, for entirely selfish reasons, whether or not to take the little man to see it. It’d be far more relaxing to go without him. He sometimes has a hard time sitting still at the movies, and will occasionally, arbitrarily, announce that he’s bored and wants to leave (even when it’s a movie he wanted to see). Then there are the times when he shouts out spoilers. At least he wouldn’t be able to do that with The Golden Compass. He hasn’t read the books yet.

Ahhh, a brand new month brought us a better day. The boy seems to be recuperating. Proof? He had way too much fun running around the house with the walkie talkies shouting Wassup. Even so, I was hesitant to let him play outside. But wound up caving, as it was the first real snow of the season. We tried out the new sleds in the backyard for just a little while. And Cupcake Saturday came to us, courtesy of a kickass friend. It was good to see an outsider. There’s been too much of just the two of us.

While Adam was visiting, he clued me in to the existence of a Turkish ripoff of Star Wars. Highlights include entire scenes stolen from the original, incongruous Indiana Jones music, and fight sequences with Chinese throwing stars the size of hub caps. Amazing stuff! I know what we’re watching at my next teevee party.