finally

I've been meaning to blog about this since I got back from L.A.

IKEA is coming to Stoughton, MA!

Back in 1998, I wrote IKEA a letter asking them to please open a store somewhere closer to me since the closest was New Jersey and I was from the West Coast and missed them. They politely wrote back to me (including a catalog, of course) that they were pursuing opening a store sometime in the next "2-3 years" in Somerville. I waited. Patiently. Kept hearing rumors over the years. Nothing.

Then, during the IKEA pilgrimage in L.A., Cate asked one of the employees about stores opening in MA. All he could tell us was "Stoughton" and "Somerville". I didn't believe. But then non-blogging husband surfed the web that evening and found me the information. Fall of 2005. Yes, Soon. Stoughton. Soon. I had no idea where Stoughton was. I do now.

I have signed up to receive e-mails and want to go opening day or sometime during opening week. Yeah.

Posted by jennj at 09:21 PM | Comments (7)

relaxing a little

* Rebecca sent me this link: Cats in Sinks! Cats make me happy. We only have cats in bowls...

* I would hope that if I were interviewed by Fox "News" I would respond like this guy did. Suh-weet.

* And finally, conversation at bday cake gathering this afternoon:

co-worker1: "Why would anyone think that the Astrodome or the Superdome is a great place to temporarily shelter people?"

co-worker2: "Especially with all the problems with the Superdome."

co-worker1: "I mean, how will all these people survive being in a stadium for days or weeks?"

me: "Depends on where your seats are, doesn't it?"

Posted by jennj at 07:41 PM | Comments (12)

ozone layer has stopped shrinking

"These early signs indicate one of the strongest success stories of international cooperation in the face of an environmental threat," said NOAA administrator Conrad Lautenbacher.

Posted by jennj at 02:38 PM | Comments (0)

thank goodness

Last week I was told I was going to San Antonio tomorrow. Today, it was cancelled. Whew. Especially after we just found an error (serious) in a system that is supposed to go live on Friday morning. And if I'd had to go to San Antonio, with this system error, things would have been bad. Bad. Bad. Bad. Doomed. Doomed. Doomed. But I have to work late. Yeesh.

Survey results so far:
You should stick to the registry: 3
Buy whatever I think they want: 3
I give money: 0
Other: 2
- Either or. Depends on the giver and the giftee. See the long clue-ment I posted. DMP
- Stick to the registry in most cases. Ignore if you really know they person and have a good idea

Posted by jennj at 04:26 PM | Comments (0)

bridal and baby registries

After some discussion this last weekend at Donna's bachelorette party, I thought I'd poll you all to see what you think. Should you stick to the registry (except for things like money, down payments on houses, that kind of thing of course) or go off on your own and get the bride/groom/parents-to-be whatever you feel like getting them? Me? Stick to the registry. You don't know what thought processes went into their selections and is it really your job to second guess?

p.s. this online survey tool has no link to the results unless you have my userid and password. So, i'll update within this post the results as we go along.

Posted by jennj at 12:54 PM | Comments (12)

newsgroup reader for mac?

Anybody know of a good newsgroup reader for the Mac? Heck, is there already one in Tiger? Is there one that hooks into Apple e-mail client? Should I be looking at something that can be used in Firefox (right now I get an error message when trying to access newsgroups through Firefox)??

Merci.

Posted by jennj at 06:37 PM | Comments (10)

three laws

Saw this on akirlu's journal and just had to do it.

Posted by jennj at 01:56 PM | Comments (4)

busy

Sucked into Harry Potter. Can't blog. Reading.

Crappy day at work, tho...why do I let a certain project piss me off so much? It's the one, truly, black hole in my job and every time I tell myself to just not let it get to me, there I go, letting it get to me. I am better than I was a year ago. But, still. Tomorrow will be a new day.

Posted by jennj at 08:32 PM | Comments (0)

fringe benefits

I was looking at my work calendar to see what is up for tomorrow, and apparently I have a three-way scheduled to start at 3p.m. Meeting request subject line: "3-way with xxx..." Hehe.

And a link seen on betnoir's site:
firefly serenity lego ship
suh-weet.

The weekend, as always, was fun. Jen and Devo were great hosts and it was a lovely party. Elke is the hostest with the mostest(tm) and made us muffins Saturday morning. I don't feel bad that Iwan was the brunt of the two most memorable quotes from the party and that I was responsible for one of them. I think I've convinced Deb and Elke to watch Firefly. My work is done for now.

Posted by jennj at 06:20 PM | Comments (4)

thoughts

It's really hard when you realize that someone you've known for ages isn't what you thought they were and is actually not a very nice person anymore. That if you met them for the first time at a party, today, you would not spend much time talking with them at said party and definitely would not pursue a friendship.

Were they always like this and I didn't see it? Did events over the course of the last time I saw them effect them that I couldn't tell when talking to them on the phone or email that they had changed for the worse because of said events?

Hmmm. I don't like these feelings and thoughts. But I've learned over the years to trust my gut, and my gut is telling me this is true. Bleah. Going home is always an interesting thing and you never know what's going to happen.

Posted by jennj at 12:30 PM | Comments (14)

setting expectations

For all four of you (hmm...maybe five?) that read this, I'm setting expectations for the next couple of days or so (through the weekend).

My friend daniel and his gfriend are in town on a trip across/around the country before they leave to go to Thailand to live on little money and just enjoy not working and living life to the fullest. They arrived tonight and I'm not sure how long they'll be here.

We will be leaving Friday evening to head down to New Jersey to stay with our bud, Elke, and attend Devo and Jen's houseswarming on Saturday night in their swanky, new Manhatten abode. Then to see the Rude Pundit at the NYC fringe festival Sunday afternoon. Returning late Sunday evening.

Cheers.

Posted by jennj at 09:52 PM | Comments (1)

touching lives

Conversation with friend in L.A.

cate: jenn, i have to tell you about how you’ve affected my life and my friends.

me: what did i do now?

cate: see, you got me hooked on firefly.

me: and how did this affect anyone’s life?

cate: it did. i loved it so much i was telling my friend joe about it and kept talking to him about it. all the time. so he finally said, okay, lemme see it. he got hooked. he got so hooked he went to one of those joss whedon firefly watching party thingies and he ended up meeting his fiancé there. so there you go.

me: awesome.

Posted by jennj at 03:04 PM | Comments (1)

mom's blog

Mom has got a blog. Show her some support please. I'm still fiddling around with layout, etc.

But she's posting something right now....

Mom's blog.

This is what geeks do when they visit their geeky family. We'll be back in Boston tomorrow evening...too short of a visit...*sigh*

Posted by jennj at 05:03 PM | Comments (13)

back in bowl! back in bowl!

Meep.

Posted by jennj at 07:02 PM | Comments (2)

temptation

They opened a mini-Toscanini's ice cream "stand" 100 feet from my office building. Bastards.

Posted by jennj at 06:32 PM | Comments (2)

gimme! gimme!

I want one of these for christmas (clicking on picture takes you to the site):

Posted by jennj at 08:09 PM | Comments (2)

invasion of the idiot dog brain

Sometimes a road trip needs a blender or coffee maker in the car with you. I can't tell you how many times I've been inconvienced because I don't have a frying pan in my car. Seriously, I love baking a pizza as I drive and talk on my cell phone at 80 mph. And with a margarita to wash it down.

Just click on the link. It cracks me up. Work safe. The ionizer actually is kind of a cool idea.....

Posted by jennj at 07:50 PM | Comments (4)

the end is nigh

Oh fer crying out loud. This is like one of the stupidest news stories on the planet. Boohoo, I might have to _manually_ set my VCR for daylight saving time. Boohoo, the cell companies may give me a free hour of cell phone coverage. For god's sake, people, it's just going to be a minor inconvienance twice a year - and even then, it'll only be for those technology devices you have that will not have a software/firmware update to account for it.

Posted by jennj at 02:01 PM | Comments (7)

home stretch

Research paper turned in and most homework done for the semester. Final exam (macro) and one more test in my other class and I'm home free. Which means I can _finally_ read Harry Potter. I've been holding off cause I know that once I get my teeth into a good book, I will deprive myself of sleep in order to finish it.

I'm taking the fall semester off. Too much stress right now.

I'm going to visit my family in L.A. this weekend for five days and it's been over a year since I've seen them. Too freakin' long. Nbh will not be able to come as we made the reservation when we thought someone would have to stick around and take care of pepper. With flights at $500 a pop now, forgetaboutit. But we're holding hope that maybe there will be a last minute deal we can snarf up. I don't want to travel without him, as I just did that to EU, but I want to see my family soooo badly.

Pepper's death is hitting me hard. It's just bumming me out. Bleah.

Posted by jennj at 01:30 PM | Comments (2)

meme, meme, eggs and meme

Daniel posted a meme. Part of the deal is if he answered, I have to post the answer on my blog. So, here ya go. I'm amused by the "Tigger and unsinkable molly brown" portion.

1. I'll respond with something random about you. You are a geek.

2. I'll tell you what song/movie/book/fictional character reminds me of
you. Somewhere between Tigger and The Unsinkable Molly Brown.

3. I'll pick a flavor of pudding or soft cheese to wrestle with you in.
Anything... anytime.

4. I'll say something that only makes sense to you and me. Or at least
me. John (Below) Parr.

5. I'll tell you my favorite memory of you. Nope... not telling. Not
here, anyways.

6. I'll tell you what animal or plant you remind me of. Date palm.

7. I'll ask you something that I've always wondered about you. See
#5...

8. If I do this for you, you must post this on your journal. You MUST. It is written.

Response to 7: Narrowboats.

Posted by jennj at 10:07 AM | Comments (0)

pepper, r.i.p.

We put Pepper to sleep this afternoon. It was disturbing to see how fast her health deteriorated in the past 72 hours. One minute she's doing as best as she can with some walking problems (hissing and clawing at the new cats to make sure they understood she's the matriarch) and then stopped eating, drinking and listless, etc. We got 30 extra days with her because of the Prednisone we put her on. It was worth it.

Pepper photo album.

I loved you Pepper.

Posted by jennj at 04:31 PM | Comments (8)

ipod babies

This amuses me. ipod your baby. If only one could setup a playlist of happy gurggling on a loop and no crying soundtrack....

Posted by jennj at 11:59 AM | Comments (1)

trip report

Update: There are pics of me eating raw herring on the extended entry. hehe.

No Versailles love. I'm very, very disappointed. But what's a girl to do?

I did end up volunteering to give up my seat on the earlier flight for a 300 Euro (approx. $425!!) flight coupon. Which is good on Air France or KLM. This will help with the New Zealand trip. Or another trip. Not sure yet.

More trip report...

So, click on the pictures below and you'll see commentary with photos about my trip.

It was mostly work stuff that I did. However, there are pictures of me trying raw herring for the first time....

photos.

Who's on First moment:
me: "Uh, restaurant bon. Uh, 25 rue de la pompe?"
taxi driver: "bon?"
me: "Oui. Bon."
td: "bon?"
me: "Oui. 25 rue de la pompe?"
td: "pompe?"
me: "Oui. restaurant bon."
td: "bon?"
me: "Oui. restaurant bon."
td: "Non."
me: "pardon. uh, one minute."

We think that he thought he meant we were asking him for a good restaurant, bon meaning good in French. We asked the doorman to help us out and were finally on our way....with much laughter on all sides.

Posted by jennj at 10:20 AM | Comments (5)

your kung fu is better than mine

Raj and Otto do "wire fu" moves. Seriously. Nbh saw it and then I witnessed it. They run at each other and then leap with paws moving through the air and then connect. One of the few times I wish we had a video camera.

Posted by jennj at 10:18 AM | Comments (0)

kcab

Yeah, I'm back. I can completely and utterly say that I'm back.

Number of password resets by help desk this morning before finally fixing my problem which didn't involve a password reset but removing me from the domain and adding me back: 9
Time passage: 2.5 hours

Today is the first day of the new network password security hoopla, and of course, my machine decides that it won't recognize my password anymore.

My favorite part with the stupid help desk was: "We've given you a temporary password. Please wait five minutes and then reboot before trying it."

me: "Dude, reboot is sooo fifteen years ago."
hd: "What?"
me: "You know, when all else fails, reboot. Never mind. I'll try the reboot but it's unnecessary."

Didn't work. Duh.

Not a great way to start the day.....

Posted by jennj at 11:55 AM | Comments (1)