A little bit of this, a little bit of that

Kitchen
I got the call yesterday from the tile place. My order is in.
I may try to get by there this morning before work, but it is in totally the opposite direction of where I need to go.
If I don't make it today, tomorrow or Monday will have to do.
I guess this means I cannot put off painting the kitchen any longer. That will happen Monday for sure.
Then the following weekend I hope to get the tile up behind the stove, sink and in the area under the glass cabinets.

Work
We got the information about our new workflow yesterday. It will not change my hours substantially. Which is great. And it won't change my days off. Of course, had it changed them to Friday and Saturday or Saturday and Sunday, I would have been fine with that.
But as long as I get to keep my Sunday and Monday, I can deal with it.
And it won't change my work too much. There were the usual skeptics, but I think it will be fine once we all settle into it.
Other than that, work is work.

Life
I've got a couple things in the works for Sunday with friends. My monthly card group is going to skip our normal get together and head out to the stamp convention in Carson. I haven't been to one of these things, but i have a feeling I should leave my credit cards at home and only bring what I can afford to spend in cash.

I made a card for the swap, but forgot my camera at work last night, so a photo will have to wait.

Then Sunday night, the manfriend and I will be having dinner with some friends at this place.

I have never been there, but I am already checking out the online menu trying to figure out what I want to eat. Wait, I want to eat ALL of it. It sounds great. And my friend tells me they make a killer martini.

It is in Stanton. Which is some vague place in O.C. But that is what Google Maps is for.

Well, I must be off now if I have a prayer of getting from Torrance to the tile place in Hermosa Beach and then to work before noon.

Yeah, I know. Noon. I sound like a slacker. It's just my crazy hours.

Sure, it's a nice rut, but...

The visit to the Pine Wind Garden in Torrance made me realize that I need to get out of my rut.

I tend to do the same routine: work, home, work, store, home, work, food, cleaners, home, work, home... you get the idea.

I gave up my ceramics class at the Palos Verdes Art Center this past session because I wanted to deal with the kitchen and various other things and that three hours on Monday just seemed to tear right into valuable time.

But really, I don't have much to show for it.

OK, one of those Mondays I did grout the kitchen and one of them I was sick as a dog.

But overall, I didn't get as much done as I should have.

So the other night I went from room to room in the house making a list of all the projects and chores I want to tackle.

It soon became a long list. The next step will be to type it up and prioritize it.

Much like chores around the house, I think I need to make a list of the things I can be doing outside the house and get to at least one of those places a month.

Sure, I have been to the various farmers markets. I have been to the beach and driven around the Peninsula. But there are plenty more I haven't. And there are plenty that I saw once years ago and haven't seen again.

So I think it's time to make a list of all the unique local attractions I have yet to seen or want to experience again.

These can be parks, standing local events, galleries, museums... heck, just about anything.

But what is the best way to start?

Maybe I should start in my own city, Torrance, and radiate out from there.

Of course, the best place to start will be each city's Web site.

But I also want input from people who have been there, where ever there is.

Come on, get me out of my rut.

A gem in Torrance

I am a bit ashamed to say that it was not until my uncle and his bride decided to get married that I learned there is a Japanese garden in Torrance.

I have lived in the South Bay for 18-plus years and never knew this.

I really need to get out more. Especially to see all the things in my own back yard.

Anyway...

The wedding was Saturday at the Pine Wind Garden at the Torrance Civic Center. I took a few pictures before the wedding started.

This is by no means the biggest or most elaborate of the Japanese gardens in the L.A. area.

The garden at the Huntington in San Marino is far larger, with a tea house and the red lacquer bridge.

In La Canada-Flintridge, the Descanso Gardens offering has a tea house where you can actually get tea service.

But the small garden here in Torrance was a beautiful place for a small wedding.

The garden is manicured, yet with a natural, rambling feel in its small space.

A series of steps leads down to a small areas in front of a rock waterfall. There are tiered benches around that and space for more chairs. This is where the arbor was set up for the ceremony.

To the side of that area, a stone path winds its way around the small garden passing a fountain on its way to a koi pond.

Even though there were classes, a martial arts event and an arts event taking place in the surrounding rooms and auditoriums, the garden was still a peaceful place.

Since it is November, I think I was lucky to see a lone lily blooming on the pond.

Now that I know it is there, I want to go back in spring to see what flowers might bloom there.

And I really do need to get out of my little rut and get to more of the places the South Bay has to offer.

Dressing for a soiree

My uncle's wedding is Saturday and I decided to order a skirt called the "Soiree Skirt" from J.Jill to wear. But I couldn't decide on the color based just on the catalog or Web site.

I'm the kind of girl who wants options.

So I ordered both colors.

The dark grayish-brown is called "shale" and the other burgundyish one is called "chambord."

My dilemma now that see them in real life is that I like them both.

The shale is totally a me color. I do favor neutrals and that is just a nice happy medium between gray and brown.

But the chambord seems a bit more festive. And it's by no means a bright color. It's just not a color I normally choose. But it is a good color for my fair skin and brown hair.

But I can't really justify keeping both. I mean, I just don't go to that many parties where such a skirt is appropriate.

I plan to wear the skirt with a fitted black sweater and black strappy sandals.

So, any one have an opinion on the color choice of the skirt?

I'm open to suggestions.

Do the first seven words of this sentence send you into a frenzy?

I saw this in a business story yesterday:

NEW YORK (AP) — With Christmas only about eight weeks away, shoppers are feeling more forlorn about the economy than they have since hurricanes Katrina and Rita battered the Gulf Coast two years ago.

I know some people who have been preparing and shopping for months. I know some people who will wait until the last week to even begin thinking about Christmas.

Of course, since it is Halloween and the candy displays and jack o' lanterns will be replaced with wreaths and twinkle lights before the last little goblin is tucked in for the night... well, it's hard to not think about Christmas. Or, to be more PC, the winter, gift-giving holidays.

It became a lot easier for me a few years ago when mom, sis and I decided that we would not give each other gifts. Instead we would take the money we would have spent buying each other another sweater or purse or gift certificates for the movies and instead do something charitable.

My choice has always been an adopt-a-family program sponsored by the Volunteer Center of the South Bay in Torrance.

I call them up and tell them I want to sponsor a family and they ask me how many people. One year it was a single father of two little boys. Another year it was a single mother with a boy and a girl.

Then they send me a wish list and I get to go shopping. And let me tell you, that is a great shopping trip. It is so much fun to ponder a gift for a child you will never know. Really.

It makes you realize that giving can be so much better than any gift you can receive.

The first couple years, when I was married, we went all out on these kids we sponsored. There were bikes and helmets for each kid, plus gift certificates of $100 each for Old Navy. Hey, say what you will, for a kid Old Navy has great clothes at decent prices. We also sent along a $100 gift certificate for a local grocery chain.

Last year I decided to see if my whole family wanted to get in on the action with me. Since I was single, spending $400-$500 was a bit excessive.

So I got my my, sister and aunt in on it. Then an uncle threw in some money for the cause and my manfriend ponied up, too to buy rechargeable batteries and chargers.

Since there were so many of us involved, we decided to do two families. Each was a single mother. One had a teenage daughter and one had a baby girl.

My mom, sis, aunt and I did all the shopping.

And even without the amount of money I was able to spend when I was with the ex-husband, we still managed to buy toys and pajamas and books for the kids. We bought a CD player for the teenager. There were new clothes for the moms and the requested bibles and rosaries.

Then we all got together with our tape and paper and scissors and had a wrapping party. By the time it was over there was a giant pile for each kid and a pretty good pile for each mom.

I delivered the stuff to the group home where these families were staying.

I never met them, but I walked out of there with a huge smile on my face.

And on Christmas Day, as I watched my younger cousins tear open gifts from under the Christmas tree, I knew that on the other side of town there were a couple moer kids laughing and smiling as wrapping paper flew around them.

George is linked!

Yep. Someone linked to George off his YouTube video

FatCatBlog picked him up.

Sweet. The big fatty also has 373 views so far.

Just something to think about

You can either hold yourself up to the

unrealistic standards of others, or ignore them

and concentrate on being happy

with yourself as you are.

J. Jacques

Questionable Content web comic

Who knew a Web comic could be so insightful?