This time of year, I don't have much time to spend on DU.

I retired at the end of September - I'm reviewing three books for a friend - not exactly hard work

There's a huge giveaway of opening night free tickets for people starting accounts over a certain amount of money. Star Trek is one hell of a global geekfest.

Icky! Yucky! Poopyheads!

I admit it, I'm a political junkie, so I went over there because I was going through withdrawal symptoms. I just lurked a bit, hung out mostly in the "Fun" section, but was surprised to see quite a few Bernie supporters over there.

and cleaned house.

Watched the first half of the Panthers game. Watched Homeland and The Affair.
Took the dog for several walks.

I'm thinking the dog took you for several walks

and took some NyQuil, which caused me to sleep until 11:00 this morning, by which time DU was back. So I didn't miss it much.

Giggle

Wanted to post that

It was fascinating, and eerily familiar.

Took the bus to downtown Seattle, went to a movie, went to an Indian Buffet restaurant for lunch, took the bus to Queen Anne and went to another move, took the bus back home.

Sunday, however, was different. I clicked on DU a couple of times, out of habit, I guess. Nothing there. So I had to make due with reading Rawstory, Talking Points Memo, TalkLeft, and then, with nothing left, I read articles on Wikipedia. I also checked one of my favorite time wasters, www.ExecutedToday.com. Yup, it's just what it sounds like, articles about people who have been executed throughout history.

Otherwise, I just futzed around the house.

I was sure glad to see DU back on again! THANKS!!!!!!

Wouldn't dream of that other place DI - yes I'm happy we're back up

gifts - banana bread, carrot bread, cinnamon rolls, along with buying brick of cheese and summer sausage. I do this for the 7 families and my PCA.

I still have most of it left to bake.

Yummy - I'm baking on Friday.

something they really can use. Working parents do not have a lot of time to do this for themselves.

One of my sisters baked Christmas cake and sends to everyone. She bakes the best cake with mom's recipe. I just bake my cinamon - walnut/raisin cup cakes.

Holidays is the food.

for the big feast

Glad we are back up!

I clicked last night before I went to bed, clicked this morning and then late this afternoon.
I simply accepted that yesterday was no go.

Quite a challenge as the sky was only clear off and on.

My old 35mm could have done a cool shot by locking the shutter open for an extended period, but the off and on light pollution from nearby lights would have screwed that shot up as well.

So, all I have is the memories. There were some really good ones with long tails. Tonight is shaping up to be even better than last night (already spotted 15) but I have an early morning and can't stay out watching it like last night.

I had the shower on my calendar, but the Seattle winter weather did not cooperate, as one might expect.

Made pot au feu for last night's dinner.

and destroying old papers since end of September - all the clutter is gone. We repainted and had the floor stripped. I'm lovin' it. Putting up new drapes next week - we call this the last major redo in our lifetimes

on a lot of things I can do to my mushroom hunting golf cart.

actually

went over there and nosed around a bit but didn't bother to register or participate in any way, other than laugh my ass off, or cower in fear depending on the subject.

I live from one mushroom season to the other.

Congrats backscatter712

.....sealed the new countertop.

I am not as avid a poster as probably you are, so when I checked in at DI, it was to learn a little. Nothing wrong with that. Actually, there were some good ole DU people under different names.

But, mostly, I centered a Saturday around talking to folks in yet another part of Pittsburgh about Bernie Sanders.

It's all good, malaise!

I am delighted with my handiwork - the holiday wreath is gorgeous and the place smells sooooooooooooo good

Had an excellent night out for a friend's birthday at a nice restaurant. Then we decided to wriggle over to a local gay bar for a post-meal birthday drink. The bar next door was having some kind of furre convention. I had to walk through a dense fuzz concentration on the sidewalk between car and destination. There was pawing. Oh god, there was pawing.

But the drink was good and the company were excellent. Worth the mascot molestation.

I do that a lot many days. Now that I have one of those "jazzy" phones I can check DU even on a Samaritan mission! Instead, I watched crap on YouTube!

I've been taking my cousin's cousin to wherever once a week - she'll be 94 in February and is as lucid as they come.

and trying like hell to stay in their homes. I'm wondering if that asshole Charlie Baker is going to dump the Senior Circuit Breaker tax credit like RMoney did one year. That put a lot of people in "cat food" territory for a bit.

Must talk to some friends about that over the holidays

sitting on the iPad which I hadn't gotten to yet.

Sigh.

I did think about them when I saw grovelbot - I loved the Valentine's day hearts back in the day

right up to current episode.

and a bit of housework.

I lead a boring life compared to most people, I think.

That is serious 'binging' sis

Hands down

Walls, ceilings, doors, curtains, windows, floors/carpets - every room in the house. Every knick-knack in the house got washed (that could be washed). I either polished or beeswaxed and buffed all the wood. I cleaned vents, filters, and assorted other fixtures.

Even got the garage.

I'm tired.

That's the norm around Christmas holidays here

Great work.

Thanks to Skinner, EarlG and Elad.

I also blame them for the body aches.

exercise

Hit a Christkindlmarkt, decanted some extracts, helped with a bit of holiday cookie making prep work, put together and shipped out a box of presents down to friends outside the pueblos. Read, watched a movie or two, loved the dogs. Got my first couple of seed catalogues of the season in the mail. Did some C coding and a few database design tweaks. Got a box of presents from Austria. Played a bit of LotRO.

"The Last King of Scotland", "Hellboy II", "Mr. and Mrs. Smith", and "Sunset Boulevard" - time VERY well spent.

I'm lining up some good ones for January.

lol - so when I get time, I overdose on movies. I deleted Watchmen halfway through, as I just wasn't getting the point, but other films, like "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore", are surprisingly engaging and funny and good. And then I also rent on demand titles (like K-Pax, a longtime favorite of mine).

I know lots of people on the board hate cable, but Verizon FiOS is so damn good at what they do.

I found a motel that takes dogs and we went on vacation. Joe was an ass and misbehaved and I was mortified. He managed to roll on his back and pee on his face in front of people on the beach.

What, you've never done that?

But he was sober at the time. I blame alcohol for my prior misbehavior.
We had a great time. Kinda bittersweet but I did it for him more than me, well maybe both of us. He's my late husbands dog and my husband always wanted to take him to the beach but always a million reasons why not to, so I took him and we thought about his dad and his much he would have enjoyed watching his old boy at the beach.

although I know you would have been there whether DU was up or down.

Congrats!

When I found out what was going on I went to sleep.

I had a lot of work to do outside this morning. By the time I got done the shutdown was over.

some TV. Nothing constructive.

and then wrote a few questions that were raised by them.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10027445499

but remember we aren't journalists.

those are the questions that were raised in my mind, but activists should be asking.

The crickets tells me that the activists part is mostly keyboard based.

to see a traveling show of Rodin's sculptures, and read a couple of mysteries.

But I'd be doing that stuff anyway, since I do my DUing just a bit in the mornings.

I met up with some former members of the Memento Mori group. This was a group of supporters and fans of the lead singer of Bucktick, Atsushi Sakurai. Atsu had been bullied off the sight by a number of trolls who either believed him to be fake, or was jealous of his world wide fame. Atsu only came to IMVU to meet his German girlfriend, Liz. Liz lives in Germany and Atsu in Japan, and
it was their only way they could be together without costing each a fortune in phone calls. They also used skype, but on IMVU they could virtually be together.



Here is our historic photo of AsahinaKimi with Atsushi Sakurai, of Bucktick and his girlfriend Liz on his shoulder. Bucktick, by the way is a major Rock band in Japan, and has been around for quite a long time. Their following is huge, and when they preform they need a major venue for all the concert goers.

Since I am now the owner of Ichiban Chatroom, I plan to have it as a sanctuary for all those fans to visit and talk about Bucktick and their music..while they can also enjoy the music from other Japanese rock bands featured in the room.