Pay no attention to the cat behind the curtain

This is one of Cher's new fun games. It combines her fascination with the bathroom, in general, and the fun of surprise attacks. She will "hide" behind the curtain and attack passers-by. Or if there's no one to jump out on, she also enjoys toilet-gazing through the curtain. Crazy cat.

Requirements: 3-7 years proven Superhero experience

The other day I found a job listing that seemed pretty good. I showed it to Marty and he agreed that I should apply. I noticed that on the company website there was a "Tips for your application" link. I checked it out, and it went on and on about the cover letter. So I put extra care into my cover letter, and as recommended, I scanned my transcripts into a pdf to send as well.

Last night I was ready to apply. I was a little surprised after all that about cover letters, that a cover letter wasn't part of the online system. So I looked back at the application tips, and it looked like those directions were specific to UK and European postings.

Oh well, on with the application. I submitted my resume, I answered the questions they asked, but there was one required field that stumped me. "Descriptive phrase" with this note "This will be prominently displayed before everything else when recruiters searching for candidates find your resume." In 35 characters or less.

I asked Marty. He thought about it a minute then said, "Hmm. I don't know. Can't help you with that one." And then he fell asleep. It was too late to start calling people for opinions, so I just went with the first thing that came to mind that was less than 35 characters--a nickname my friend Crazy Horse Lady gave me.

Descriptive phrase: aka "Tiny Dynamo Super Chick"

And I clicked submit. A few seconds later I got confirmation that my application was successfully sent.

Sweet Like Maraschino Cherries

Tonight when I got home I smelled something. At first I thought Marty was baking something for me. But when I asked what he'd made, his only answer was "lasagna" (don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about the lasagna, but that was not what I was smelling).

I left home and came back, still the same smell. Like maraschino cherries or almond extract. Kind of yummy, but also strong and pungent.

I called a bunch of people, and no one seemed to have any idea about this odor that was strongest around my furnace and hot water heater closet. A few minutes ago I spoke with the on call maintenance man, and once I described what it smelled like he said, "Oh. Today we fumigated the apartment beneath you and it had a really strong cherry scented deodorizer. That's probaby what you're smelling."

So that's it. They bombed the place downstairs. In case you were wondering.

Why I *NEEDED* that big, heavy desk...

A number of weeks ago, as I was working on reclaiming our second bedroom, I found a crochet hook at the bottom of a box. Now, until that day the extent of my crocheting experiences was limited to finger-crocheting a belt or something in girl scouts. But there it was, in my apartment, a perfectly good crochet hook. Thank you, internet, for the pattern and instructions, including diagrams. Here's what I made:
I suppose my cell phone didn't really need a cute little cozy, but it seemed like an easy enough thing to start with. And actually, even though I had picture instructions, I still needed to call Mom and say, "OK, I'm trying to crochet, and I don't understand the instructions. They say 'Blah, blah, blah' but how does that work?"

And Mom said, "Well, you 'blah, blah, blah'." Somehow all it took was Mom quoting the instructions back to me for me to get it. She's just that good.

Shortly after my cell phone was snug as a bug, I moved on to another activity. I used leftover fabric from my shower curtain to make a little something to hang on the opposite wall of my bathroom.

Once I was finished with that, I decided to actually read the quilting book I found in Mom's library and she said I could have. And after reading it I decided to do more than just one block. Marty picked out the pattern from the book, and when I asked him how big I should make it, he suggested I make it as big as the book suggested ("crib size") and kindly reminded me that it was my first real pieced quilt. So now the quilt top is done, and I'm ready to put the layers together. Of course this quilt will have yarns, but I'm also considering doing some quilt stitching around the boats. We'll see. (As you can see, this is a project that Razor and Cher have really wanted to help out with too.)