|now candy|

Ah. PMS can be beautiful. It empowers one to say, without hesitation, to a person: "This assignment you gave us is crap. How so? The questions are vague, the notation is inconsistent, the examples are hard to follow, and the notes are sketchy at best. We are supposed to know what's going on by Wednesday but this assignment wastes our time. Oh, and thanks for all your help."

For Thursday Night:
"Snow... freezing rain and sleet... changing to rain late. Ice accumulations of a quarter inch possible. Little or no snow accumulation. Evening lows near 30...then temperatures slowly rising into the mid 30s. Southeast winds 10 to 20 mph. Chance of precipitation near 100 percent. "

But the best part is the one-word forecast for Thursday, right under the little rain cloud and the high/low temperature: Ice Pellets.

Ah, yes. When someone asks me what winter is like in Pittsburgh, I will reply: Ice Pellets.

Hurray! Home early!!!

Fortune cookie from tonight's Chinese take-out:

Keep your feet on the ground even though friends flatter you.

"NPR Online Position, Job #WEB417-120 - Senior Web Designer, Online"

NPR is looking for one person with the following qualities:

- Art director, design, director, director of user experience, or senior designer

- At least 5 years experience

- BA or MA in design, architecture, human factors engineering or a related field

- Strong creative ability and perspective

- Good working knowledge of HTML

- Command of digital design technologies (Photoshop, Illustrator, Visio, etc.)

- Strong organizational skills and ability to work under tight deadlines

- Must have ability to work both independently and as part of a team

- Excellent written and oral communication skills

- Prefer equal ability and facility within Mac & Windows environments

- Writing and proofreading skills

- Familiarity with JavaScript and CSS and experience with public broadcasting or radio generally

- Experience with public broadcasting is a plus

Well, there you go. Might as well add "Applicants to turn water cooler into wine fountain to ensure we are not wasting our time."

Hurray!!!

JB out in NJ is almost ready for the MFA Thesis Exhibition. Go here to see two of her works in the show, she's the first listed.

For those of you closer New Jersey than I am, get out there and see the Exhibition. I can't talk for the other artists, but JB's stuff will move you. She has complete thoughts with her art, yet nothing is exactly spelled out. It's just there, and you feel it. It's personal.

Congratulations, JB.

Adam Felber has a blog.

UUrrrggh!

I know better.

I know better than to look NPR/PRI hosts up online in order to see what they look like. Sometimes it's better just not to know.

I'm sitting here, home early since I decided to go in early instead, and Echoes is on the radio.

I used to hate Echoes, wrote it off as just a bunch of ambient crap that stoned people listen to. Well, it's still ambient and I still think of stoned people when I listen, but it's grown on me. Plus, it follows the Music from India show on WDUQ with Harish Saluja and Dr. Vijay Bahl. I first heard the show during the fall fund drive, and vowed to catch as many Music from India shows as I could.

During this particular show there was a home Steelers game. In case you aren't familiar, during NPR fund drives, individual shows try to get as many people to call in as possible because (a) it means money for the station and (b) it's an indication of how many people listen to that show. These two guys knew they were fucked, no one in PGH was going to be home listening to Indian music on NPR during the Steelers game. The Harish and Vijay took it in stride:

Harish: "Oh, my. This is dismal. We've had two callers in the past 45 minutes."

Vijay: "Yeah, these home games are tough. Last year we were lucky, no Sunday game, they played Monday night instead. Much better. Say, what was that you wanted to play last week and I wouldn't let you? We might as well throw that on, I don't think anyone is listening."

H: "What? That's insulting, people will love that song. Just wait, we'll get a call in from it. I have it right here."

V: "Yeah, people will call in wondering why we've gone mad and are playing that thing. You might as well introduce it, I don't remember how you find it. Or why."

And etc. Their banter was like they've been friends since college, easy and friendly. The few shows I've caught since then have been only one host, but still great. The best is that these two hosts are complete music dorks. And it comes out wether there is one or both of them on the air. They are professional middle-aged men who are complete music dorks. Indian music dorks.

Yeah, so Music from India was over and here comes Echoes. I'm listening, at the computer, and the host John Diliberto mentions the Echoes website. I'm thinking "I wonder what the website looks like for the hippie-stoner-space-ambiance-music looks like. Eh, pretty normal. John Diliberto is still taking. His voice is deep, smooth, methodic, and like thick soft flannel. To me he is a trim-haired thirty-something because, well, that's apparently what I envision the host of the hippie-stoner-space-ambiance music program being. I hear a guy who is tall, medium complexion, prominent nose, soft eyes, and clean shaven. Doesn't own a suit.

Wrong. So wrong. I hate this. It's a clinical denial of mismatch between the radio host in your head and the actual radio host's picture you are looking at. About the only NPR people who, to me, look anything like themselves are Carl Kasell and Cokie Roberts. I'm not sure I can really count Cokie Roberts, I think she used to guest on the McNeal-Leher (spelling) News Hour, so I'm tainted by seeing her on TV.

It's like this: listen to a person on the radio for months or years, have a fully functioning picture of them in your head, you envision them on assignment or in the studio, you think you would recognize them in the grocery store but realize this is absurd since you've never seen them, bet you could recognize them if they spoke to the cashier at least, get the great idea to look them up in NPR's big list of people, undergo shock that they look nothing like what you had envisioned, you quickly double check you are looking at the correct bio, yes, close browser window quickly before you actually have a chance to remember what they look like, go back to your previous notion of what they look like.

However, I'm so intrigued with how John Diliberto looks vs. sounds, that I've kept the page open while I write this. Image is burned into my head. Echoes will never be the same.

(By the way, the best newscaster is Nora Raum. Every time she says "I'm Nora Raum" with her one and a half syllable Raum, I think "That woman knows." Her top (and bottom) of the hour reports ease up to the front of what you are thinking. You're listening to her despite you just breaking another glass in the sink before the morning tea is ready. She's just clipping along, smoothly picking up after any bad edits, reading with purpose, you're listening along, and then it's "And I'm Nora Raum" and you are almost sad the top of the hour newscast isn't longer. Nora Raum: newscaster, woman, undercover super-hero.)

Nine things that would be nice if they happened on their own:

1. Tax returns

2. Laundry

3. Cleaning the bathroom

4. Car washing

5. Picking up the house

6. Writing rent checks

7. Cleaning the disgusting gunk off the pair of boots I wore to the club on New Year's Eve

8. Change of address with all the companies/organizations/businesses whose mail you actually want/need to receive

9. Getting the house ready for the movers

I wish I had my camera tonight. There are ten foot icicles hanging off my apartment building tonight. Really.

It was sunny today. Sun combined with a high of 15 degrees and the week's worth of snow makes for spectacular icicles. The building is three stories. They start from the roof (obviously) and extend down to the second story. Huge.

I drove through quite a few residential roads today (because that what Pittsburgh calls "belt" routes) and saw a handful of very flamboyant icicles extending themselves down from roofs of nice houses in nice neighborhoods. I was happy tonight to see that icicles are not snobs, they'll put on a show for the shabby apartment complex with all the zeal and flash they give the nice neighborhoods. And them some.

Today I drove around, running errands. Among other things, I was going to a cat store (like a pet store, but run for and by crazy cat ladies), and I was very much looking forward to going to this cat store. I found it online last night, the two fat and spoiled cats I keep company with need new things to sit on, sleep on, and claw on. Their cat perch is pretty much done and apparently the only other thing they do while I'm out of the house, besides eating and sleeping, is sharpen their claws.

The scratching posts are easy to replace, the usual Petco sisal ones are just fine. However, I can't stand their cat trees/perches. They're all cheap carpet and flimsy and, apparently, are made for anorexic cats. My two fat tubbies will not even begin to fit on the tiny little platforms.

I'd make my own, but living in an apartment building with no power tools to my name (much less a place to use them) is a little prohibitive. Maybe when I get back to DC I'll see who's up for a day of DIY cat perch building and I'll build the most awesome cat perch ever. And for $20.00 instead of the $100 charged for the dainty useless carpeted pieces of crap at Petco.

Yeah, so back to today. After purchasing a very awesome and very compact paper shredder, I headed off towards the delightful cat-lady-cat-store that awaited me in Mount Lebanon. Only, it's no longer open. At least not as a store you can walk into. The helpful lady in the coffee store said indeed the one there closed down and she sent me down to Dumont (pronounced "Doormont") to another cat store.

Of course, the Dumont store was a lost cause, just a bunch of knickknacks with cats on them. No cat perches. This place is clearly a money-laundering front– there is no way in hell it makes enough money to stay in business. Hmmm. On to Southside.

The Southside pet store, which I'd noticed a few times over there, was a waste. I'm sure they have some stuff in there that other people want, but almost nothing for cats. On to other errands.

I came home perchless. The cats did get a pair of collars out of it, though. I figure they should have some identification on them. Since cat's don't wear pants that they can put little ID cards into the pockets of, collars will have to do. Mine have been collarless since about the second month I had them, they outgrew their first collars and I never like the ones I find when I think to look for collars. I want breakaway leather collars. I'd have better luck finding this in a sex shop than a pet store, but I keep hoping I'll find them. I don't like the way the nylon ones snag, but apparently I'm the only person on the planet with a dislike towards nylon cat collars. I found two I liked this evening, though.

The cats, however, would rather not have them. Thankless spoiled brats. They are getting along OK with them, if you count that every time Newton gets up she takes off running through the house, trying to get away from the thing on her neck, as OK. And, yes, it's not too tight. She's just a needy cat. Tonight she thinks she needs drama. Got it.

Enough rambling. Time for bed. By the way, the cat store I was looking for is My Three Cats & Co.

Also, the reason I even started talking about today's errands is this: there is so much of Pittsburgh I haven't seen. And it makes me sad. It makes me sad to think that I've been here for six months and have only seen a small bit of a very great city. This is one of the few remaining cities that hasn't completely sold itself over to the corporate box stores. I purposefully took roads today that I had not taken before so that I could see more of the city. It makes me sad that I just spent six months of my life in a very small building. Working. Working until late at night. I don't wish it upon anyone.

It is quite amazing how sudden the daily stuff can just take over, even more so that it was before. We've only got thirteen days before we (those of us here with work) will be leaving Pittsburgh. Days remaining. Hours, almost.

My days of late aren't particularly stressful, but they are consuming. I've been staying later and starting earlier, which seems absurd given the hours I was already putting in, but it just doesn't really matter. It doesn't matter because we are almost through. We seem to have the hope that if we can just finish up the everlasting project, just pound it out and wrap it up, then we'll have a few days of relative freedom before we leave here. Of course, once we leave here our days will open up immensely, but there is just something tantalizing about having a few days of almost-free evenings before we leave.

Of course, I can only really speak for myself. But there is definitely a feeling of cresting, of daylight, of countdown among us. We just have to go through a few more hurdles. Only a few more hash marks on our calendars.

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[Music I must get, soon: Hank Williams and Johnny Cash.]

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Alright. So the trash dumpster outside has been overflowing for days days. That still doesn't explain why a garbage truck is out there now, at 1:22 am on a Sunday, emptying it.

Yes. It is banging around out there at 1:24 in the morning. Those poor guys driving the thing: it's 2 degrees outside right now.