MVA

I go to the MVA today, wait in line, and tell the lady at the info desk that I need to change the address on my license.
She asks in the standard unfriendly govt. worker voice:

"Do you want to wait in line for a very long time, or do you want to go through a process that takes about 5 minutes?"

I told her that obviously I would want the one that does not take as much time, but I don't know the difference between the 2 options.

"OK, then fill out this form" she says, hands me a number, and goes on to the next customer.

I guess it was the 5 minute line for me.
Until I got to that line, and learned that I actually need to be in the long line, since my license expired and I need a new one anyway.

We're all being trained to accept interactions like that.

Daisys

Aww, aren't they cute? It's a much less professional version of what I saw here.
That preceding link gives directions on how to do it.

We've been staying at my Mom's for a few days because we needed someone to watch Fil a few nights in a row. While here, I collected up toilet paper rolls, flattened them, and cut them into half-inch slices. That makes them the perfect shape for flower petals!

Then, I glued 5 of the slices each into a daisy, and glued each daisy to another daisy so it makes a cute door frame.
One could be very professional and spray paint the door frame, but you can't even tell it's cardboard with the lighting in my Mom's dining room.

Baby Names

My friend told me about a woman who named her daughter 'Ledasha', but it was not spelled with just letters. The proper spelling of it was 'Le-a'.

My sister and I were looking at the keyboard and envisioned a whole new source of baby names. It just takes a little familiarity with punctuation marks.

The name :dra is pronounced 'Co-LON-dra'

=la is pronounced 'E-QUELL-a'

Most of the names that we came up with using punctuation marks were female, but here's one that can be used for male or females.

The "&" (ampersand) literally means "and per se and". You can read about it on Wiki:
It's used in business firms to represent two or more names, in which one name is not more important than the other. So you can see, this is a great mark for boy and girl twins

&dra (girl)
&der (boy)

Here are a couple girl names:

[ella (Bracketella)

)(ia (Pa-REN-the-SIS-i-a)

%ress (Per-CEN-tress)

'la (A-POS-tro-FEE-la)

Or an alternate pronunciation of "-" could be used both ways

-ia (Hy-fee-nia)
-drick (Hy-fen-drick)

Some boy names:

#ter (HASH-ter)

@ley (AT-lee)

_der (Under-SCOR-der)

Here's one that 'adds up' to a great name: +ter (Pluster)

HA HA


Can you come up with any? Comment and tell me!

Ambigram

If you search 'Ambigram' you can find some very professional images of words that spell something upside-down as well.
I don't have a scanner, so I had to write my name as an Ambigram on paintbrush to share on this blog. It's much better on paper.
It took me all day experimenting to finally get something that someone can read.

The reason it's so difficult is because when I'm writing, I lose perspective of how readable it is. So I give my work to my sister to read.

She looks at it and says "So-jap-linp"
I say "No! It's my name, can't you see it?"
She tries again. "Um, I guess the 's' is 'j' so it's "Jo jiplin"
"okay" I say "Read it upside down"
She reads "Ninny-coos"

It takes about 50 of these attempts and subsequent conversations similar to the above for me to have the skill of writing something un-legible pretty quickly. That's when I give up for the day.
A few days later, I attempted again, and came up with the above.

I got inspired to try making this when I rented the Princess Bride. The new DVD cover has a really cool ambigram.
Check it out here:

http://boingboing.net/2009/01/11/princess-bride-dvd-a.html


UPDATE

Okay, after I made this post, I found an Ambigram Generator here:
http://www.ambigram.com/matic

I wish I saw this before! It's pretty basic, but it's a great tool to get good ideas about converting letters.

Fall Leaves

We had such beautiful leaves this fall, I thought I'd frame some.


I got the instructions from http://www.ehow.com/how_4509754_frame-fall-leaves.html

The fun part was collecting different colored leaves that were in good shape for my picture.

I got the frame for $5 at Goodwill. It was actually someone's old framed print of a moon photo of earth, accompanied by a write-out of the creation account in Genesis. I cut the photo out of the print, and hung it on its own for Fil to see. I like outer space pictures.

I bought Silica gel to dry out the leaves. It's about $15 for a large box of this sand-like substance, but you can use the same gel over and over for different projects.

After I was done, I kept finding beautiful leaves, and wanted to do something with them. I flattened them in a book for a day or so, when ever I found some, and that seems to be sufficient to dry them and keep their color.

Here's what I did with some left overs:

It just tied them onto some fine string and tied that to a stick I found in the yard. Now, I have 'falling' leaves in my kitchen.

Uses for Old CD's

Now that I quit Facebook, I've had so much more time to spend on other non-essential activities.
When we went to the library, I saw this book on things you can do with old CD's. They're pretty easy to cut with scissors. I liked the idea of cutting up the CD into small squares and gluing them to a flower pot to make a mosaic.

Here's the CD mosaic I made:




It took about 2 hours to cut up the bits and rubber cement them to my computer. It's a perfect project to do during a movie.

Check out these glasses:



They're rear-view sunglasses. I cut up bits of CD's and glued them at an angle to the inside of the glasses.



I got the idea from a catalog, and figured I could just make my own. Now I'm nauseous from looking out of the corner of my eye for 2 hours, trying to get the angle correct.

To make them, you have to have a mirror (back of the CD reflects well) angled away from your eye. I found the larger the angle, the better your field of vision is.
To keep the mirror at that angle as you glue it to the lens, you need to glue about 3 extra layers of CD bits to one side of your big reflective bit so it props up when you stick it on.
If you try, you'll figure it out.

Now I have spy-sunglasses. I think it's useful to have these when you have small children who tend to dawdle. My way of preventing Fil from dawdling is to continue walking and give the vibe that I expect him to follow me. The only problem with this method, is if I look back to check if he's coming, it breaks the illusion that I'm confident that he's following.
Now, my rear view sunglasses solve the problem.

Harvest Moon

The earth changed four times since the Harvest moon witnessed you
Your family changed, more knowledge this year and with that we grew
We still carry you around, each day mentioning your name
You ride along each adjustment, each change

But you stay quite the same.

The Harvest moon won't see you this time
Not even if the night is clear
And if it rains, you will not see that sign
Simply because you're not here

Some would say you exist in a labeled box on a shelf
Others, forever in our hearts
Those may be true, but memories store your self
Not my memory, or you'd be missing parts

In God's memory, each detail of what you are
Relieved of suffering and pain
The Harvest moon will one day rise again
And find you here, quite the same.

In Memory of Baby Silas