So, a couple weeks ago, while I was at the mall with
( Read more... )

Recall, if you will, that last week I mentioned that my brother and I made a visit to Yosemite, the occasion for which was my mother desiring to attend a ten-day meditation retreat at the Seriously-Scary-and-Possibly-Cult-Like Meditation Center somewhere in the Sierra Nevada. B and I being dutiful children, we cheerfully deposited her there last ( Read more... )

I have finally, belatedly gotten around to seeing Quantum of Solace.  I understand that the general consensus is that it is not as good as Casino Royale, but for my part, I am of the opinion that this second chapter offers more fun.

With that said, I shall now proceed to complain about it.

About a third of the way into the movie, there is a scene ( Read more... )

Some time ago, my mother, for some unfathomable reason, decided that she would like to go to a 10-day Buddhist meditation retreat somewhere in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada.  Now, you might be wondering: what, precisely, is so daunting about a 10-day meditation retreat?  Is it not a rather fashionable sort of activity these days?  Wandering ( Read more... )

So, remember how, a while back, I posted that I was contemplating buying a new computer?  And then I was asking whether it was worth it to pay an extra $450 for, essentially, a 15-inch screen rather than a 13-inch screen?  And then I never said anything more about it because I am just the sort of person who leaves all her LJ friends hanging instead ( Read more... )

Before I left on Tuesday, I did neglect to mention that I was going to be in New York for the next two weeks or so.  However, john_j_enright did helpfully (and poetically) inform a full half of my friendslist of my departure a few days ago.

Anyway, I made a perhaps-misguided decision to take the train, as it was only very slightly more expensive than the plane ( Read more... )

So California is on fire, and I think we're downwind of it, because for the past few days the scent of burning pine has been in the air.  When I went outside this morning there was a great cloud of smoke drifting across a bright blue sky, and the sun was filtered through it, lighting everything with a diffuse orange slightly otherworldly glow, and ( Read more... )

I had to run out into the hall because after a quick look around my room once the shaking started I realized that there was nothing in my room to hide under to prevent chunks of ceiling falling on me.  Those school earthquake drills are so unsuited to the real world, where often rooms lack a convenient earthquake shield (i.e. desk) for each person ( Read more... )

So I think I owe several of you some sort of correspondence and other things, but that hasn't happened, because I spent the whole weekend at a Buddhist meditation retreat out in the middle of the desert.  I went with my mother, because she has lately expressed some interest in Buddhism, and this has manifested in a desire to attend Buddhist-themed ( Read more... )

When you see someone whom some real estate company has hired to be a human signpost, waving about and twirling a large, arrow shaped sign directing passers-by to an open house, except he is feebly swaying back and forth, angling the sign at the ground so no one can read it, and you suddenly realize that a pole would actually do a more competent job