Have Faith in Your Government

Even the Treasury, it seems, is not without a sense of humor. Included with my refund check (WOOHOO!) was an informational flier with the title "Don't Be a Victim of Predatory Lending or Other Bad Deals," which at first glance seemed like a thoughtful thing for the Treasury Department to include in this Era Of Madoff. Further inspection, however, revealed this delight in small print at the bottom:

For more free information, the U.S. Department of Treasury invites you to: visit www.mymoney.gov or text* "smart" to 22122 on your mobile phone.
* Standard message rates apply. Other charges may apply.

Now, if you're like me, and you stay up way past your bed time watching television programs that you could probably live without, you're well familiar with what "other charges may apply" tends to mean. For the uninitiated, it means that the recipient of your text will not only sell your phone number, they will also automatically sign you up for their own dodgy subscription service at an outlandish monthly rate. It seems like kind of a bad deal to me that the Treasury Department has been reduced to such practices to pay off the bailouts, but I guess everyone's just trying to get by as best they can these days.

Jerks.
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April madness

Why???

Script Frenzy: 100 pages of screenplay in the 30 days of April. Or, in Eliza's case, a 50,000-word novel in the 30 days of April. That's 3.3 pages of screenplay or 1,667 words of novel per day. It can be done, people. It has been done and it shall be done, and it is a fantastically productive way to pass time, but MAN is it tough!

For my part, I'm attempting to write 100 pages worth of comedy sketches. Or sketches, anyway. I'm on track page-wise, but I refuse to vouch for the quality of the product. That's not what it's about, after all. Screenplays can be punched up later, real jokes can be added, endings can be re-written - the important thing is to push through this month and experience the creative breakthroughs that inevitably happen if you just keep writing.

If for some reason this sounds like fun to you, it's not too late to start! This is my third Script Frenzy, and I've done the National Novel Writing Month a couple of times, too, and each time I've hit the goal without writing every single day. Sure, it makes a few other days just a tiny bit more difficult, but it all evened out in the end.

Regardless, if we seem a bit quieter than usual this month, Script Frenzy/NaNoWriMo might be the reason.
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March Madness

It's a well-known fact in certain circles that of all the major professional sports currently available in the USofA, basketball is by far my least favorite. After all, golf at least puts me immediately to sleep - a wonderful gift for an insomniac. As such, all of this hoopla (if you will) about March Madness is a bit like tinnitus, only more far-reaching. What's a girl to do?

The Name of the Year Tournament, that's what.

All year long, the fearless NOTY Committee collects hilarious and downright astounding names of real people from all seven corners of the globe, narrowing them down in early March to a bracket of 64 tip-top contenders. From there, they let the public decide through voting on the blog. 64 become 32, 32 become 16, and so on and so forth until a winner is crowned. Last year's victor was the always-delightful Spaceman Africa, despite some controversy over whether legally-changed names such as his were acceptable or if they should not contend next to natural-born wonders like Destiny Frankenstein. Rules is rules, though, and Spaceman Africa has enjoyed his year in the sun. Who will be this year's winner? Dr. Shasta Kielbasa? Velvet Milkman? Iona Knipl? Only time (and the votes of the masses) will tell.

Voting has already begun in the first-round matchups, so get in there and let your voice be heard! Vote early and vote often (once per day until each round of voting closes).

You're welcome, interweb.
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Nature Week, part 3

Part 3 of Nature Week brought me to a different section of the massive, massive Topanga State Park. I parked at the head of the Santa Ynez/Waterfall trail, at the edge of a very paranoid-looking gated community, under the watchful eye of the gate guard. Seriously. When they say they want to keep out all the hippie hikers, they mean it. The path brought me along a creek, and for about ten minutes I wondered if this was the only waterfall I would see (photo is actual size). Lest we forget, this is Los Angeles, where even 5'2" guys can be called Action Movie Heroes.
Read on...

In the meantime, though, the path was just lovely. Unlike the trail I'd followed up to Eagle Rock, this one was smaller and only moderately groomed, and wended its way through shady glens instead of sun-beaten ridges. Also? Poison oak everywhere. Everywhere. But with a little extra attention to footing, and regardless of whether or not I ever found the waterfall here in the middle of a gigantic drought, it was a positively lovely walk.

After only a couple of minutes (and far less time than it should have taken me to give up on the existence of a waterfall), I found a signpost pointing to the trail branch headed for the waterfall! It went past some truly prehistoric-looking foliage that didn't show up well in photos at all, and after another few minutes I finally hit the fall:

That's right, it's just a bunch of big rocks. I could hear water trickling somewhere, but nothing like whitewater or real falls. Ah well. Maybe if it ever rains here, it'll be completely awesome. Meantime, it was just nice.

The even-narrower path I'd taken to get to the falls seemed to continue on, so I scrambled up the side of the canyon following it, up into the sunlight and back into the desert. To be honest, I'm a little disappointed at myself for forgetting, while in the canyon forest, that I was still in the middle of a much, much larger desert. Luckily this lizard reminded me (actual size: approx. Godzilla).

A few minutes up the trail, it got a lot smaller, and I started to doubt the wisdom of following the Waterfall trail past the actual waterfall. This is a huge park, after all, and the bigger trail had turned away from the Santa Ynez trail up on the ridge and away from my current location. It was a beautiful afternoon, though, and I was in a pro-exploration mood, so I continued along, across the exposed sandstone and past the stinging yucca. I have to say, even though the path was getting fainter and my doubts were growing, the view was great.

Of course, all good things must come to an end, and most of my adventures seem to eventually stumble across a Really Bad Idea. The path I'd been following dead-ended at a crevice in a rock face, and at first glance I thought I might be able to climb it. After all, I've done my fair share of climbing, and it looked like there were a bunch of good footholds.

I wasn't wrong. I was, however, mistaken about how accessible those footholds were, especially with the holly plant growing right at the starting point. It was going to be a long way back down, though, and I really didn't want to back-track if I had the option to explore new terrain, so despite knowing full well that it was a Really Bad Idea, I went for it. I pushed the holly to one side as best I could and started bouldering, and for a moment I really thought I might make it.

Then I realized that my next foothold was either in the holly plant, or at waist-level on the rock. Then I started to think about exactly how long it had been since I had seen anyone else out hiking. Then I started wondering if I'd be able to call 911 if things went horribly, horribly, gorily wrong.

The climb down was a lot easier than I expected, and in no time at all I was back on the canyon floor and more than a little thankful to be there, even with all the poison oak.

Of course, I was quickly faced with a new decision: head back to the car and take advantage of the customer bathroom at the coffee shop a mile down the road, or hike up to the main trail and the shockingly clean bathroom just over the top of the ridge. The smart choice would have been choice A, so obviously I went for choice B. After all, despite the rock climbing, I hadn't had all that much of a workout, and the sun wasn't that close to setting...

Onward!

Now, I want you to know that I have not photoshopped that picture. It is as it was. A half-mile up the trail I found myself it what looked like a cypress forest. Magical.

Remember how I said I got scared by frogs? Well this is when it happened. I didn't get scared by the giant lizard, I didn't get (too) scared when I was up on that rock face, but I did get scared by a bunch of frogs that I didn't even see. Yes, OK, maybe I'm a complete wimp, but if you were there you would have been a little freaked out, too.

See, I was walking along, minding my own business and enjoying all the trees, when I started to hear frogs croaking to each other along the creek. Delightful! Any time I got close to one, it would stop croaking, as frogs tend to do, and it became kind of a game, trying to see how close I could get before it saw me. They were only in a small section of creek, though, and I was soon past them. Only a few seconds later, though, they all stopped, all at exactly the same time. Now, I'm not a frog expert, but in my experience, frogs don't do that unless they have a really good reason for it. Mentally reviewing the wildlife and warnings about wildlife from earlier this week, I immediately concluded it was a Western Lion Wolf, and hustled on up the trail.

As the trail climbed and climbed and I tried as hard as I could to keep up, I started to notice that the sun was getting a little close to the top of the next ridge. There was plenty of time to get to the top, but then I'd have to walk back down again and go through that canyon to get to my car, and it wouldn't be getting any lighter any time soon. I seemed to be pretty close to the top, though, so no problem.

Wait, no, rounded a bend in the path, not at the top. Definitely around the next one. Orrrrr the next one. I was starting to annoy myself, so I made an executive decision: 10 more minutes, and then turn back. Those 10 minutes took a shockingly long time (still going up steeply enough to necessitate the occasional set of stairs in the trail), and when the moment of truth came, I still wasn't quite at the top. Always a woman of my word, I refused to turn back, and only a couple of minutes later, my obstinance was rewarded.

Do those shadows look a little long to you? They looked long to me. After the shortest possible stay at the trail hub, I high-tailed it downward, pausing only to take a picture of what I assume to be the Pygmie Western Jackalope.

When I reached the canyon floor again, I was pleased to discover that it wasn't nearly as dark as I had thought it would be, and the frogs were even behaving themselves. The only trouble I had with wildlife was the shrieking of an irate squirrel. I swear I didn't start that fight!

In the end, everything worked out just fine, although after almost 8 miles of hiking and climbing, I'll fully admit my feet were a little sore. I leave you now with the soothing sounds of a babbling creek and babbling frogs. Enjoy!



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Nature Week, part 2

The second nature excursion of the Pacific Bureau of the UGC was to Topanga State Park, also known as 11,000 acres of awesomeness within the city limits of Los Angeles (crazy, right?). It was sort of an accidental excursion, but hey, that still counts.

I found some random parking and set off down the trail, and within minutes I had my first wildlife encounter. Thankfully, it was far more docile than the initial encounter in Part 1, but it was still exciting. I even flagged down a passing hiker to point it out to him, but he was totally unimpressed. Regardless, here's what I saw:


There were six of them, these mule deer, and appropriately enough, they were sleeker and better-groomed than the mule deer I saw in Colorado. In fact, I could have sworn they were even a little bit more tan. This is SoCal, after all!


And while I was standing there, staring at them and making them alittle bit uncomfortable, a little lizard showed up on the fence in front of me, begging for attention. I took a picture, then politely dismissed him. He probably thought I was a Somebody. Joke's on you, bucko!


This park is full of the coolest trees. Saying that just made me feel like a complete nerd. It's true, though! And different terrains had different kinds. This one was in a wide valley, and it looked like it belonged in the middle of a savanna. It also looked like it would be a lot of fun to climb.

I made my way over to the main trail system, and started up the ridge toward Eagle Rock. The sign said it was a two mile hike, so I figured it would be a nice, pleasant stroll - nothing too intense. Even from partway up the first rise, the view of the valley below was just lovely, and the whole scene was incredibly peaceful.

And looking south, I could see the Palisades, and the Pacific beyond it.

Ok, so it was a little hazy, but it was still pretty nice.

After a while, though, I started to wonder if I'd missed the Eagle Rock. Sure, I know that walking is a lot slower on uphill gravel paths than on the flat sidewalks I'm used to, but still. Come on now. And since it was early afternoon, it was also starting to get hot. I started thinking that around each bend in the path, or just over each rise, I'd see the damn rock and get to go home, but no. More path.

There were a few flowers, and I did see two flocks of some sort of pheasant-related bird take off (way too quickly for me to get a photo), but no eagles, and no Eagle Rock. Just when I'd made up my mind to turn back, I walked another five minutes and finally, blissfully, saw this sign:

The sign failed to mention in that little arrow that it was ten very steep minutes in front of me, but I do appreciate its conciseness. And during that steep jaunt, I did stop once or twice to stare at the ground, not in defeat, but because of a proliferation of these:

They were like a cross between crop circles and finger prints, only more unusual because they were in the bare rock of the path, and only in one particular stretch of the trail. If I ever have a patio, I'd love to have these things carved all over the place.

In any case, at long, long last, I turned a corner and caught a glimpse of the infamous Eagle Rock.


Exciting, I know. But when I finally made my way up to the top of the rock, I felt like I could see the whole state of California.
Whilst up there, I also took the opportunity to look back at the trail I'd taken to get up there, and got this shot:

Since it really was such a lovely day, I spent a few minutes at the summit just soaking it all in, then headed back down. On the way, I saw a really lovely grove of trees that would be perfect for a picnic, a terrifying gigantic beetle, and two more deer, but Blogger seems to think I've hit my limit for number of photos per post. Jerks.

In any case, tune in tomorrow for the next installment of Nature Week, in which I attempt a Very Bad Idea, and get frightened by frogs.


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Actors not to hate

It's very hard to like anyone involved in the Twilight franchise. None of it is the actors' fault, obviously, and I doubt they're fully aware of the hacked shitstorm headed their way in the next few scripts, but it's still very hard to see tiny girls squeeing over suicidal heroines who want to marry young and -- well, you'll have to wait for the rest to be horribly revealed. But then I read this in an interview with GQ:

Twilight got mixed reviews but opened huge anyway, pulling down $70 million in three days. By then the screaming had started. Girls who’d been in love with Edward on the page suddenly had a real-live human to focus their passion on. The cast’s public appearances occasioned Hard Day’s Night hysteria. In London, Pattinson’s friends watched in horror as the crowd swallowed him. At a mall in San Francisco, Pattinson was supposed to sign autographs for about 500 fans at a Hot Topic store; a few thousand showed up. Pattinson claims not to remember the chaos that resulted, although he says it in a shaky voice, like someone claiming not to remember shit that went down in Nam.

That is hilarious. So, along with Tina Fey musing as to whether or not he's Satan and him responding with a crush, Robert Pattinson has neutralised at least a bit of the Twilight nasty.
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Nature Week, part 1

It's Nature Week here in the Pacific Bureau of the UGC, and you know what that means: boring photos from an experience that only one person could ever find interesting! Woooo!

Our first installment is from Griffith Park, the 4,210-acre park right smack in the middle of Los Angeles. How could this possibly qualify? Read on...



Coyote. That's how. It was just meant to be a workout excursion, but as I was pulling into the parking lot I saw this:
Ok, so maybe it's just a dog. A dog with really big coyote ears. A dog with really big coyote ears and a coyote face. Sure! Why not? After all, it was hanging out in a dog park area, and people in this city do tend to own all manner of crazy designer breeds. Maybe it...

AAAAAAAAAAUGH! WOLF!! Do you see that tail?! What the hell is that thing?? Do we have wolverines here? WTF! Definitely a coyote. Crazytalk.

Ok, so with my car parked a safe 10,000 miles away from the carnivorous wildlife, I headed up a nicely-groomed trail and encountered this warning sign:

Oh great! Two more lethal types of wild animal to worry about! I thought I was going on a hike, but maybe now I'll just run for my life. That sounds like a good cardio workout.

But there were no mountain lions or rattlesnakes on the main trail, so my pulse stayed disappointingly low and I started to get bored of the nicely-groomed and rather flat path. As I rounded a corner, though, I saw a promising side trail that only looked like a Fairly Bad Idea.


Sure, it looks a little tough, what with the lack of switchbacks and all, but I do love scrambling up a hill, and this one might be just the antidote I needed on this otherwise-boring walk. Who knows, maybe there will even be something with fangs up there, but at like a safe distance so it's roller-coaster scary, not mugger scary. That would be awesome! Sign me up.

Of course, then I went a little farther along the path and the Fairly Bad Idea started looking a bit more like a garden variety Bad Idea.

Delightful.

See, when it comes to this sort of thing, I'll almost always go for a Fairly Bad Idea, but I'm only about 50% with regular Bad Ideas. Sure, I have health insurance now, but I wasn't getting good cell phone reception up there in the hills and there really weren't very many other hikers out and about at that hour in the middle of the week. And then I got even closer, and the Bad Idea turned out to be a Really Bad Idea.


And while there's still a half a chance I'll go for a Bad Idea, I will not go for a Really Bad Idea, unless for some reason I have a choice between a Really Bad Idea and, say, a mountain lion that's threatening me with a rattlesnake while a coyote waits to tag in to the fight. Not cool, guys, not cool. That path looks an awful lot like it actually just goes straight up the side of the hill, and when I finally got to the bottom of that death path, it was confirmed.

The so-called path looked more like an erosion problem that happened to have a few footprints in it, and while I might have been able to scramble up it (if chased by three unruly carnivores), getting back down again would have been a whole other problem. And you know what I have to say to that? Something unprintable, that's what.

So instead, I turned around and headed over to a different part of the park, and did some Fairly Bad Idea climbing to get up to the highest point in the park, Mt. Hollywood (elev. 1625 feet). Now THAT will get the blood moving! It wasn't exactly a clear day in Los Angeles, but I still got a pleasant view of the Griffith Observatory and downtown.


That's it for today, folks. Tune in tomorrow for more wilderness adventures and close encounters with (far less scary) wildlife!
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Geekout Tuesday

I just spent about three hours in the basement of my building doing laundry, and something about the total lack of natural light and smell of not-yet-washed clothing sent my browser round to the nerdier realms of the interwebs.

In this corner, something I missed on SNL (because tragically, who remembers to watch SNL anymore?):



Cracked has an intellectual analysis of sci fi/fantasy novel covers.

This one's less nerdy, more scary talented:



But he does also sing a lovely little bit of a VERY nerdy song, "Mario Kart Love Song". Awww.

And for all your geek needs and fixations, may I recommend io9? Because when you just can't take politicos talking about your hideous unemployment spiral anymore, it's time to check out of this universe entirely.
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I finally broke down.

Kids, I've been out of work since November 1st. For anyone counting, that's just over four full months. I'm literally bouncing off walls at this point (from boredom, and from the extra energy I've gotten from my recent return to the world of exercise). Sure, I'm doing my volunteer work and I'm going to auditions and I'm seeking out reasonably-priced entertainment, but it's just not cutting it. Much as the thought of cubicles and taupe gives me hives, I really, truly, desperately need to get back into the world of the working. I want to be a taxpayer. I'm even getting all nostalgic for mandatory Sensitivity Training sessions.

So I did it. Yesterday I went to a temp agency and got all signed up again (disappointingly, no typing test!), and this morning at 8am I dutifully called in available. Sure, I have an audition this afternoon, but I figured (accurately) that it wouldn't end up being an issue, and besides, I wanted to make a nice impression on my first day on their temp list. Also, at 8am, I wasn't thinking clearly enough to say anything beyond "available." And then I went back to sleep. Looks like someone's got a case of the Mondays...
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And then, things got worse

"Do a little food blogging", I thought. "It'll be fun".

Fie.

It turns out, I am cursed. Not only have a team of irritating mice laid siege to my kitchen, but now I cannot use the oven. Well, I could try, but if I did I would get blown up.

I know this because my lovely neighbour banged on my door, in a panic that I was dead in here, because she'd been able to smell gas fumes all the way down the stairwell and traced it to my place. I'd been using a bleach cleaner for a few hours, and so didn't really have a sense of smell, but once she led me down the hall and back -- whew. Very evident. I am immensely happy I did not turn on any of the stovetop burners in that time, and promptly threw open all the windows to let the gas out (and snow in, unfortunately. Bad timing).

So my new project is now trying to get the range replaced (pictured is same model, but not actual stove). The unit is so old that the manufacturer cannot identify it, and it is so weirdly configured that a contractor sent in by my landlord to okay a replacement just stood there and gaped in awe.

"I never seen anything like this," he murmured, running his hand along the pitted chrome.

"I think it's older than I am," I supplied.

He stepped back, gave the entire kitchen a once-over, and then proclaimed "I dunno. You probably have to redo the whole kitchen to fit something new in here."

Excellent. My kitchen is about 1/4th of all my apartment's square footage, and the idea of unloading all the cabinets and having to store everything in closets and flee the building for the entire thing to be knocked out... Well. I am not filled with glee.

Hence the grinding-to-a-halt-ness of the cooking. The job market continues to be just as awesome as the nightly news tells you, and efforts to stave off spending by staying indoors are starting to do my head in. Also, my parents are coming to visit this weekend. Hope they like toast.
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What I Learned Today

If you're at an audition, and you've been waiting in line for an hour and a half, and if you've psyched yourself up so much by the time you go in that you have MASSIVE ENERGY, and if the director then asks you if you're always crazy, and if he still gives you a second shot at doing a scene, you might want to consider toning it down a little for the second time around. Might. Just a thought.
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Dispatches from La-La-Land

I do apologize for my absence. It seems that in trying to keep busy, I've somehow managed to keep too busy, which is truly an odd phenomenon for someone in a position such as mine. And what on earth have I been up to? What could possibly be sapping so much of my day that I have found it difficult to scrape together a few minutes to write a blog post?

Several things. First, volunteering. Now, this hasn't been taking up vast swaths of time, but it has been rewarding in its own way. At first it seemed odd that whilst looking for someone to pay me to work, I should work for free, but now it seems odd that the notion ever seemed odd. After all, these organizations need people with spare time to help them out, and I have spare time and want something useful to do, so why on earth not go for it? I'll admit that it was suggested to me several times before I took action, and that it was an Obama commercial that finally got me off the couch and over to the computer, but all's well that ends well. If you're interested, I've found VolunteerMatch to be extremely helpful. So far I've gone on a bird count with the Audubon Society and started a community outreach research project for the National MS Society. More to come...

Second, and more selfish and time-consuming (but marginally more lucrative): auditioning. I'd say acting, but I really have been focusing more on the audition part of the equation. I used to be a working actor (with a day job), and I did go to drama school, but since moving to LA I've done nothing of the sort. Now that I have all this time during the day, though, I figured I might as well see what's out there for me in this field. It fits nicely into my "no stone unturned" approach to job-searching, and in addition to being an enormous source of entertainment for me, it has already yielded a couple of paying gigs! Nothing that'll pay the rent, but it'll keep me online for a month or two.

Looking through audition listings, I've noticed a few things. First, people are seriously creepy. Seriously. Creepy. I stay well away from those auditions. Second, there is no shortage of demand for "hot," "sensual," or "sexy" women for whom there will be "nudity and sexuality required" in audition listings, but I have my doubts as to whether there are actual, funded projects behind many of them. Third, if you have a truly bizarre talent, someone out there will put you on TV or in a movie, but probably only once, so don't count on it being your meal ticket forever. (This also includes unique physical traits - I just saw a listing that had as a postscript "Weird hair is helpful.") And finally, there are a disturbingly-large number of audition listings that specifically mention "must be good at facial expressions." That's verbatim. Now, I know that Botox is beyond popular here, but has it actually managed to annihilate all expression from 99% of actors' faces? Or do these casting directors know that 99% of "actors" here have no idea what they're doing and can't even pull faces? Or is that line just The Mark Of The Amateur? I do not yet know the answer to this question, because most listings that have that caveat also have multiple spelling errors, and I refuse to even make contact with people who can't be bothered to run a quick spell-check.

Despite all of this, I am persisting, and I am learning from each audition and each gig (thusfar I have been paid to be an audience member, an extra in a commercial, and a hair model for one of those books you see at the salon), and most importantly, it's still really amusing for me. When I get jaded I'll stop, but for now, it's all good.
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Fluffernutter

I'm hedging a bit here; I had a total urge to make my own marshmallows, but we're coming to the end of the winter and they look like they might require more counterspace than I've got, so I was putting it off. All it took was making bread yesterday to realise what the solution could be: one mouthful of peanut-butter on homemade bread, and I knew all that was missing was FLUFF.

Don't get me wrong; I never, ever got to have fluff as a child. For good reason, now I know what goes in it: it must be a dentist's worst nightmare. But I had bread, and I had peanut butter, and... Mmmm. Actually, I can't relate this without a fluffernutter sandwich. I'll be right back.



Mmmmmm. See, this is another reason to make fluff seldom and sparingly. Because this happens -- it's delicious, and you want to eat it. If I had kids, I'd probably make this once a year, maybe in February during school vacation -- you know, something to tide them over in those cruel candyless months between Christmas and Easter. I'd also make them help make it, because DAMN, the amount of sugar in this will establish for them exactly why this is a once-a-year treat.

Okay! Now that the health warning's out of the way, here we go.

I used Eileen Talanian's "Marshmallows" book, which looks like it belongs on Amy Sedaris'scoffee table. To start with, I made the base syrup: 1 cup of water, just over two and a half cups of sugar, a teaspoon of cream of tartar, and a dash of salt. Stir this until nicely mixed, then boil in a heavy pan. When it's boiling, cover the pan for 2 minutes (to wash sugar crystals from the sides of the pan via the steam). Uncover, stick a candy thermometer in -- but NO STIRRING! That'll form crystals again, and when the syrup cools the crystals will go through everything. Bad. Wait for the thermometer to go to 240, then kill the heat. Cool for 15 minutes before putting in jars...

...unless you're making fluff, in which case measure out 1.25 cups of the syrup and put into a saucepan with half a cup of water and another 1.5 cups of granulated sugar. Same as with the syrup, mix the ingredients, bring to a boil, cover and sweat the saucepan for 2 minutes, and then chuck in the candy thermometer.

Separate four eggs, putting the whites in your trusty Kitchenaid and saving the yolks for some future attempt at eggs benedict. Add 1/8 tsp salt to the egg whites, but don't start the mixer yet.

At the 220 mark, start the egg whites in the Kitchenaid and whisk on medium until it's thick and fluffy. Has the boiling sugar stuff reached 240? Good! Remove from heat, remove candy thermometer, and be VERY CAREFUL. The base is all gooey and sticky and also 240 degrees hot, so obviously this is a bad time to have it come in contact with your skin. Tip the base into the mixer while the whisk's going, but don't pour it onto the whisk, pour it along the side of the bowl -- aim for a point above the top level of the egg whites.

Once everything's in, crank the mixer up to high for 7 minutes -- this is also the time to add 2 teaspoons of pure vanilla extract, just as the mixer's kicking into high gear. At the end of the 7 minutes, act fast to get everything into plastic containers and into the fridge, it lasts for 2 weeks.

I did that with most of the fluff, saving aside a little to put on my fresh bread with peanut butter, and also holding aside about 2 cups at the end when I dashed a tiny bit of mint extract into the mixer and made minty fluff for topping my cocoa. Mmmmm. Looks delicious there, and is delicious now.

The original Marshmallow Syrup recipe is actually double what I've posted above, but considering I just made an actual quart of fluff off of halving it, I think that most people wouldn't need the full dose of Syrup. And of course, I'd be remiss not to point out that this batch of fluff has no oil or anything naughty like that, but certainly DOES have almost FOUR CUPS OF SUGAR. Yikes.

So, what I've learned about fluff: Like most things that are bad for me, I love it. My mother was right not to give it to me in elementary school, though if I'd seen how much sugar went into it I might've been more reasonable about that rule. I would make this very seasonally, as in "for February school vacation" or "for a sundae-making event". And I'd make my consumer watch, so they know exactly what they're getting into.

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OBEY

What happens when you take a Futurama reference, run it through Shepard Fairey's Obey Giant design, and then shoot it out the Obama poster? This:


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Alors, bread!

Simple, eh? I've made bread before, years ago, but that was before I got a Kitchenaid. Then, I needed a lot of kneading space and time and while the bread was good, it wasn't fall-in-love good. And the kitchen ended up coated in flour.

This time round, things were different.

I'm using Alton Brown's Basic Bread recipe. You really do need a scale for this recipe, but as you'll note, I winged it with conversion of bread flour into cups. (In future, I won't do this.) All of the Good Eats eps are available on YouTube, and I'd suggest watching the ep while making the bread because he explains the science of what he's doing. Such as "why mix together a yeast slurry the night before?"

So, into a suitable container: first portion flour, honey, first portion rapid yeast, and bottled/filtered water. Whisk quickly, then leave in the fridge overnight.

Wake up the next morning, put rest of flour, rest of yeast, and salt into the Almighty Kitchenaid! Attach piratey bread hook, arrr. Tip the yeast slurry into the mixer, and turn the gears onto "2". Why 2? Because Kitchenaid really can't handle anything faster while kneading bread, but no one tells you that until your machine starts making funny noises. And if you've measured the flour incorrectly, your dough's going to be REALLY thick and bad, bad things might happen.

Once the dough's picked up all the flour in the bowl and blended in well, tip up the mixer's head and leave the dough at the bottom of the bowl to rest for 20 minutes, covering the bowl with a teatowel. It'll be a little puffier, at which point lower the hook, bwa ha ha! Knead mercilessly for 5-10 minutes.

Lightly grease a container and chuck the doughball in; put this in your oven with a roasting pan full of boiling water. Don't turn the oven on or anything, this is just to keep the steam in an enclosed place with the rising dough. Leave it alone for 2 hours.

I'll update with kneading photos sometime, maybe. It's probably better to leave it to the Good Eats episode. Besides, the really weird and important part was the slurry. (That, and not breaking your mixer.)

But here is the result! It's Franken bread! I didn't shape the loaf as well as I might have, so there's a weird little bulge going on at the bottom of the bread, but that didn't affect the flavour. Which was delicious!

All together, good project. Long project, and passively time-consuming -- you don't really need to do much more work than about 30 minutes, but you need to be present. But this is a pretty good thing to do on a Saturday morning, and you'll have fresh (unpreserved, so short shelflife) bread for the weekend. And when you add up all the ingredients, it's cheaper than buying nice bread from a local bakery. So really, it's all about working the time into your schedule.

But let me tell you: this fresh bread with honey, or jam, or nutella or peanut butter? Seriously satisfying.

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Friday the 13th

What a horror this day has been so far!

A bit of a preface - in my ever-expanding search for employment, I have started looking at casting notices and trying to get auditions. After all, now's as good a time as any for that sort of thing! Earlier this week I received two emails from a particular theater company here in LA, inviting me to two separate auditions: one for a certain play, and one to become a general member of their company. Sweet!

Except that I didn't read them very carefully, and completely missed the audition for the play. Now, this wasn't as tragic as it could have been, since they said in the email that if I was unable to make the audition I could simply attend the call-backs on Saturday, but still. That's just bad business on my part.

So I started preparation for my general audition, which entailed learning a contemporary monologue. For someone like me who's more accustomed to learning Shakespeare, it didn't seem like it should be much of a problem. I flipped through a book of monologues, picked one that seemed funny and could show off my comedy chops, and got started trying to learn it and make a few acting choices.

And then I read the email again. After several hours of learning this comedy monologue, I realized that the monologue was supposed to be 2 minutes or less, and this one was closer to 4. Back to the drawing board!

I selected a different monologue, one that seemed dangerously familiar, and got to work on it. I say "dangerously familiar" because I had learned (and subsequently forgotten) it several years ago, but I was vaguely familiar enough with it that I didn't have the sense of urgency with regards to learning it - surely that level of comfort means I know it, right?

Wrong, but whatever. After some half-assed attempts, I actually did more or less know the thing, and thought I could make a good impression with it for my audition today.

Which brings us to Friday the 13th.

I woke up early this morning, figuring I should probably take a little extra time to get my head screwed on straight, get my voice all warmed up, and maybe run the monologue a few times before heading off to the 11:00 audition. I did all of the above the best that I could, and my head felt totally calm, although my stomach begged to differ. Either way, 10:30 rolled around and I headed out, determined to give it my best shot. I found the theater (which, much to my surprise, was located in a strip mall), parked, re-parked when I realized I was in the wrong part of the garage, and headed upstairs, taking deep breaths as I went. There were a few people milling about outside the theater, and two in the lobby, so I pulled the door open and bravely went inside.

"Can I help you?" one of them said, which was, coincidentally, a line right out of my monologue. And, just like the character in the monologue, I froze. Something in the way she said it meant I had absolutely no business there.

"Audition?" I managed to croak out.

The woman looked at me funny. "Here?" she asked?

I looked at the sign. Yes, this was the right place. "Yep. At least, I think so."

She called to someone inside. "Do you know anything about an audition?"

The other woman came out to the lobby. "For...?"

"Uh, the company?" I said, really hoping I would spontaneously combust.

"Oh," the woman said, finally clear, "that's at 12:45!"

I was mortified. "Oh! Oh, um, sorry! Guess I'll -" and I practically ran out the door. When I got home, still mortified, and checked the email for the third time, I realized that the woman was absolutely correct, and that I'd mixed up the time for the Saturday call-back with today's audition. And did I regroup, get myself together, and go back? No, I did not. I thought about it, I considered it long and hard, and at one point I thought I absolutely would, but in the end I realized that if I'm having this many issues with getting the simplest thing right today, I probably shouldn't go and try to make a good first (give or take) impression on this company. It can only end in tears.
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Unappealing Tasks

Okay, so. In addition to the general cost-cutting (have I mentioned I'm about to start making my own bread?), I've been looking at proactive ways to stay OUT of the credit/debt/whatever trap before I fall in.

For instance: I thought I paid a doctor's bill about a million years ago. Apparently I didn't; I got another notice (the "pay this before we collect on you, starting with your kneecaps!" type), discovered I had no record of paying it, and so got on the phone. It was a genuine mistake, the hospital sent me around five different bills for a single visit... Ech, anyhow, watch out for that. And lo and behold, as I'm talking to the guy and say "I lost my job a month ago..." he suddenly says "Well, for people in your situation, we do have permission from this vendor to give a discount, if you can pay that discounted rate in full."

Oh, realllly?

Yes really! And it turns out it was a 50% discount! Outrageous! So I saved a fair amount of money, which was delightful, and immediately decided to deploy this in every possible place I can.

It doesn't work that way often, obviously. But simply by getting on the darn phone and making a few calls, I was able to knock $5 off my monthly Verizon plan -- the rep took a look at my average phone usage, found a minute plan that's closer to my actual usage, and voila. On top of that, she reminded me that I've got an app on there that's costing me $10/month. And when I was first learning my way around New York, that was a fair expense, but now? Cut cut cut. So that's $15 off my phone bill.

Next up, heating and gas. (I'd actually sat on my gas bill for a little while, so this was three months' worth of cost.) After a 20-minute wait after a bunch of other panicking masses, I got a lovely woman and explained to her that I'm unemployed, that I'm ineligible for unemployment benefits (thanks, contractor-happy corporations!), and that I'd like to sort out a payment plan. Within a matter of minutes and a 45 cent charge to do a cheque-over-the-phone initial payment, a $400 bill transformed into a monthly $125 payment schedule. Shazzam.

I called the credit card company, only to have them bizarrely tell me that I couldn't get the rate they're offering to new sign-ons. So I went and found a new card, this time with shiny airline points included (and yes, I should've had an air points card all along, I know). On top of that, it's got the option of balance transfer and 6 months of 0% APR.

I do have a few friends who used this balance-transfer trick for years, shifting debt at set intervals to a shiny new 0% APR, but I can't decide whether that was a smart move or if it somehow dings your credit history. Then again, they were moving real mountains of debt, not the relatively small sums I charge up. Regardless, I intend to keep using the original card, just more sparingly -- I usually pay my credit bills ASAP, and the APR it jumps to later is comparable to my existing card, so all of this is good with me. And my existing balance is completely manageable; if I had a crazy amount of debt on plastic, I probably would've tried to talk them into forgiving some of it, but it just wasn't justifiable here.

I've also been signing up for discount store cards -- as in, the ones where you swipe/log it to get discounts and coupons. I never did before, because I am a taxonomist and therefore know exactly how marketers can use that collected information, but there is a time for noble posturing and a time for picking up loose change on the subway, and we are in the second of those times. And now all I've got left to do is get on the phone with the cable/phone/internets company and I think I'll have minimized my exposure as much as possible.

(Side note - do cut flowers ever turn into flower zombies?)

Only in horror films, and possibly New Zealand.



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Holy crap, a rainbow!

One of the best things about being unemployed is that when I stare out the window for hours at a time on a rainy day, no one yells at me for it. Also, rainbows!


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Flowers, Gifts, and Cheap Entertainment

Eliza, I'm so with you on the flowers.

The first reaction I had to unemployment (and really, even to impending unemployment) was to cut back on spending as much as possible. When you don't know when the next check will be coming in, it's kind of a smart move. I was reasonably thrifty while still employed, so the cutting back wasn't too much of a shock to the system, but I still miss the occasional new pair of shoes or new top. So what's a girl to do?

Reasonably-priced alternatives, that's what.

Flowers can be a fairly inexpensive way to brighten the apartment that you now spend a lot more time in (or almost all of your time, if, like me, you spend money every time you leave and thus try never to go outside). I have got to find a place that does roses for not a million dollars! Or maybe I'll get those potted daffodils that are in season right now. Somehow it seems more humane to have a flowering plant instead of cut flowers.

(Side note - do cut flowers ever turn into flower zombies?)

Another thing that helps keep the spirits high - or at least manageable - is the occasional treat, and I would definitely recommend toys or books. Yesterday an errand brought me to a toy store, and I decided to get something I've wanted for a month and a half: a Wall-E action figure. Sure, this little guy isn't as totally awesome as the removable-parts Wall-E that I got for my nephew, but as he perches on the counter above my computer and keeps an eye on things, he makes me smile!

Which brings me to the third part of the title - cheap entertainment. I have previously extolled the virtues of the $5 shows at the Upright Citizens Brigade, and having already been to one of this week and having plans to see another one before the weekend is up, I will definitely stand by my previous recommendation. This week I also caught a completely free stand-up comedy show at the House of Blues here in LA, and to cap it all off, I went (again, without having to pay) to see a taping of "The Late Late Show" over at the CBS lot. Now, if you're unemployed in or near New York, Los Angeles, or Chicago, you should see what you can do about availing yourself of the opportunity for free tickets. Many, many shows tape in each of those three cities, and they need warm bodies in the audience every day. Check the show's website for ticket info, and if that doesn't help, check the network's website. Barring that, I guess you can always hope for some luck on Craigslist! But definitely persist, because free entertainment is awesome.
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Coping Mechanism: Flowers!

I've stopped drinking any form of designer coffee entirely. (I used to work right above an Au Bon Pain, which means that this was a rather major behaviour change.) And once I got over the shakes, it's been quite nice just making do with tea at home. At the start of this experiment I started noting how many times I'd WANT a coffee and didn't get it, and having totalled all of that up? Man, I wasted a lot of money on coffee.

The wise thing to do here is to save all that money. But if you live like a total miser, you will eventually become evil and depressed, so I'm trying to counter that by scouting out things that cost about the same amount as a latte, but last for much, much longer. So Laurie, though I don't have a Trader Joe's locally, I'm totally on board this trend: flowers!

All of the bunches here are under $7 (though the tea roses are two separate bunches all stuffed into a trifle stand). Obviously, the only proper vase I have is the square one with the white tulips in -- did you know that you can put tulips in an oddly-shaped vase like that, and they'll pitch themselves up towards the light? Clever little buggers... Anyhow. Don't buy a vase unless you can find one cheap, just use whatever you've got in the kitchen (see: jug, trifle dish).

I can't tell you how much my mood's improved since buying these. Go buy flowers immediately! Or a plant! Or both!

Bar that, clean the house while jamming to the tragically danceable Bale Remix. I have no take on the source material, but man, the remix is catchy...
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