The house I am renting is a MAC house. MAC is the Minneapolis Airport Commission and a while ago they were tasked to deal with airport noise in the city. It was determined that it would be cheaper to take every single house anywhere near the airport and soundproof them instead of diverting airplane traffic or building a new airport somewhere else, they were probably right. So I live in one of these soundproofed houses. The windows seal incredibly tight, the insulation is so good that the AC cools the place down in about 25 minutes. The best part, though, is that with the soundproofing, you can not hear ANYTHING from outside.
I would have slept through the whole storm last night if it wasn’t for Ghengis getting upset. He hates storms, even if they aren’t making noise (or maybe they are making noise he can hear that I can’t). It was disconcerting to see the flashing lightning outside but not hear anything but the faintest rumbling. The dog kept waking up so I had to take him out to pee. The dog HATES the storm but will not come in at 1:30 am or 4 am until he has determined things are safe even with thunder, lightning, and driving rain.
We were unscathed, the worst I can complain about is my neighbors giant tree puking fetal pine cones all over my car (I forgot the garage door opener in the house and had to park on the street again). My car looks like a bunch of maggots humped some puffed rice and layered their offspring onto my car in some sort of sacrificial offering. I hate that tree.
Power seems to be out intermittently around town. A lot of major intersections did not have traffic lights. MOST people know that in this situation you revert to 4-way stop sign mode in lieu of lights. MOST people do this, the occasional asswad thinks they should skirt the cars waiting their turn and then blaze across the intersection.
Who lives in a pineapple under the sea? That’s right, spongebob! Got the movie, will watch it many times.
My big post house sale splurge on myself….A Dyson vacuum! Do i know how to party? oh yeah, baby, i do. Now, before you say “Heather, you fool! How could you spend $500 on a vacuum?!” I’ll tell you I didn’t! I got it on eBay (thanks Alex for the tip) for a price so low that I could conceivably sell it again for a tidy profit. But I won’t. First off, this thing is like a motherfucking Transformer. If dirt was a band of Decepticons my vacuum would kick their asses! This thing (once you figure it out) is so damned easy to use! It has all the great features one would need in a vacuum cleaner, but also, that damned thing sucks…HARD. In a good way. I’m amazed at what’s coming out of my carpet. Eeeuuw, but in a good way. Also, the canister pops off and you hit a release button and everything just dumps into the trash. No bags, no filters, no clogging. The only thing to be careful of is accidentally dumping everything on the floor when you are still trying to figure out how everything works. Ah well, I just vacuumed it all up again. Is it wrong to get excited about a vacuum? Could be, but it feels so RIGHT.
You have to accept that if you are wearing a t-shirt with a t-rex, a giant squid, ,and a sperm whale battling it out for supremacy on the high seas you’re going to spend a lot of your day with people staring at your boobs (moreso than usual).
Suddenly, I’m addicted to NPR. What the hell. I couldn’t stand listening to it before. They always talked all slow (jesus, they talked a lot!) but now, suddenly, I’m listening all the time. They just sit there telling me things all day long. I know I know, NPR is nothing new, but here I am, coming into the game kinda late. Seriously, I just sit here listening to people telling me things. Interesting things. I got to listen to a blind, Dutch scientist telling me about the evolutionary model of bivalves and mollusks and then how that model applied to politics, I listen about using gumballs to fish for carp, I get insight into the news. Fascinating.
I’m using my new Hello Kitty lunch pack today! Hot and sour soup, cookies, carrot stick. YAY.
later…peeps

Night 4 of birthday celebrations. This was at April and Keith’s place with my mom and grandfather and David. I literally suffered a sugar crash and subsequent hangover from the very lovely and VERY sweet Princess Torte that was provided for this party. It was supposed to say “Happy Birthday, Pretty Pretty Princess” but ‘Princess’ wouldn’t fit.
The cake was Keith’s idea and based on that and the fucking fantastically delicious dinner I will give him permission to date my sister. He’s a smart man, that Keith, he knows the safest way to my sister’s heart is through my stomach.
Spongebob movie, dinosaur pancake molds, stuffed spongebob. Yay.
dang.
How do the birthday celebrations keep dragging on? I don’t know, but I am supposed to be treated to Cupcake for lunch today, but ecess sugar and excess work and a sick dog might push it to tomorrow.
Speaking of work, I’m off.

Man, when you start celebrating your birthday the friday before it actually happens you kind of get tired of celebrating your birthday.
You don’t get tired of free lunches, though! I get another one tomorrow. Some friends have informed me that I should go for some sort of hannukah version of my birthday because that way when their gifts arrive a week after the fact they won’t actually be late. This is the kind of logic that I appreciate!
I need to do laundry but there are issues! My dryer has a buzzer. A really really LOUD ANNOYING BUZZER. It goes off 3 or 4 times at the end of the cycle. I can’t throw laundry in to be done when I am not going to be there because this buzzer is so loud and long that it’s got to be irritating to my duplex buddy. So I have to stick around so i can run get the stuff out of the dryer after the first buzz. Also, I cannot just put laundry in before I go to bed. ALSO the washer and dryer are about half the size of my last set. Sigh. Still, though, it’s completely free to use, i don’t even pay for water.
Also, my house is a spider haven! My side of the duplex was vacaant for about 6 weeks before I moved in so the spiders had free reign. Their free reign combined with the wet weather has filled my house with spiders. So many spiders that David is tired of wresting them out the door and has started allowing me to kill them. I appreciate spiders and I appreciate their very important place in the food chain and in the ecosystem as a whole, but that food chain and ecosystem does not exist in my house, or, if it does, NOT in my line of sight. Period. Go serve your role in the food chain out of my site.
More birthday celebrations! HOORAY!
Later peeps!

Sadly, I couldn’t get a picture of everyone, but I’ll post more soon.
We’d had it all planned, bowling party at Stardust Lanes, bowling, beer, fried food and cake. What could be better? Saturday afternoon, as I lay on the couch painfully hungover after a night drinking and Denny’s (it’s not a birthDAY it’s a birthWEEK) I decide to call the bowling alley to reserve some lanes for the party as we were looking at 14 to 18 people. So, me, hungover, on the phone with the bowling alley listening to a message informing me that they are closed for renovations.
6 hours before the party I’m in panic mode (and hungover), what the hell!
The ever calm and helpful Jessi assures me everything will be okay! I make 8.5 billion calls to let everyone know that the party has moved to Nokomis Lanes. Phew.
I get some coffee in me and all is well.
Best. Party. Ever.
We bowled, we danced in the lanes, we ate cheese pizza, we celebrated every roll! I got a Hello Kitty lunch pack, a million dinosaurs, COOKIES, a surfing hippo clock, and LOTS of toys. Also, Levi watercolored the t-rex on the card for me, I’m going to frame it.
David made me a lovely carrot cake with pineapple glaze and crayons all over it!
We bowled until they turned off the lanes and then stood in the parking lot like a bunch of ruffians.
When we got home, David went out in the middle of the night to get Beebo the caterpillar some tasty new leaves. Beebo rewarded the attention by making his chrysalis during the night. Now I wait to see just what kind of butterfly or moth he will turn into.
Today was dinner and cake with my dad and Monday (my birthday proper) is dinner with april, keith, my mom and grandfather.
beebombom!