Shelby's Life and Whatnot

Is there anything you don't know

because it's obnoxious hearing about everything you DO know. That is all

And lest you think I'm talking about you, I'm not. I'm talking about a woman in our stained glass class.

Stained Glass

So the window is DONE! Yeah, I know, pictures are coming. We had our critique on Friday and I was SO nervous. It didn't help that Kevin's looked picture-perfect while mine...had some issues. Anyway, once people started putting their windows up for critique I began to feel better about mine. There's a girl who insists on sitting at our table even though there is clearly only room for 4 at each table and there are other places available at other tables. We call her Goth Girl because, well, she is. She's got "666" tattooed on her ear, has several piercings, and generally looks different just like everyone else. Whatever.

Anyway, her window was particularly appalling, I thought. None of her lines met up and her craftsmanship was really poor. She's spent about 2 hours in class over the last 6 meetings or so, but she seems to be excused about that. It was baffling, people were comparing her window to Tim Burton-type themes. I thought it was just plain awful. Oh, and the best part was that SHE hated it too! We were supposed to say what we liked about the window and what we didn't, and she kept repeating that she hated everything about it and didn't like a single thing. I honestly wonder what grade she's going to get.

Then there was the girl who pretty much got ripped apart by our teacher. Our teacher started the discussion by saying "I pretty much cut all of these pieces" and chastised the girl for not following directions--the directions being straight lines with minimal curves where the girl used all curves and not a single straight line. Why? "Because I don't like straight lines." Um, okay.

Anyway, so mine went well. I was expecting a bunch of negative comments but her primary negative remark was that she hoped I took more risks in my next project. Unlike the girl above, my window was ALL straight lines, and I like lines just fine.

Exhausted

I'm back and unfortunately am exhausted both physically and emotionally. Friday through Sunday I went to a writer's retreat in Oregon that was absolutely awesome. Tuesday-Thursday, as you may recall, I had planned a trip to Chicago to see my uncle who was quite ill. Unfortunately, on my way back home from Oregon on Sunday I learned that Uncle Ted had passed away. Monday was a rather crazy day of organizing, washing clothes, trying to get stuff in order in able to hop back on a plane. Tuesday was a challenge as well. I arrived at Midway Airport in Chicago and drove 1 hour and 45 minutes to Woodstock, IL where the wake was taking place. I squeezed in at 7:15 (only minutes after my brother, who flew into O'Hare) and was there for the eulogies. Tuesday night I stayed with my Aunt Sue and Uncle Rick and Aunt Sue and I stayed up late into the night having a heart to heart. Wednesday morning was the visitation and the funeral mass. Following that we went to the Polish Legion of American Veterans' hall (Uncle Ted had been an active member) and had a big party in Uncle Ted's memory. I know it seems strange to go from a funeral to singing karaoke, but it was exactly what Uncle Ted would have wanted. The next day I headed back out, a 4.5 hour plane right back on Southwest (no stops, thank god), arriving exhausted last night.

Today we went to stained glass and had our critiques--mine went well. I'll write more on that later. For now I'm taking another nap and attempting to recover from a pretty crappy week.

A Blogging Absence

I will be gone tomorrow (Friday) through Sunday, home on Monday, then gone from Tuesday-Thursday, then at stained glass class Friday. So I won't be blogging until next week at the earliest. Have a good week everyone!

Doo Doo Doo

Lots has been going on lately. We spent the weekend at the Santa Barbara County Vinter's Association's Harvest Festival (say THAT three times fast!). We met up with my cousins Geoff and Tracy and had an absolute BLAST! The Harvest Festival is a large wine and food event. Booths are set up everywhere and wineries pour their wine while restaurants and catering companies give out samples of food. For some reason, we didn't think there would be as much food as there was, so we loaded up at IHOP before. Mistake. We porked out like it was the apocalypse once we were there.

In fact, a highlight of the trip was the famous "Pasta booth." They had this rigatoni pasta in a cheesy sauce--it was to die for. Geoff and Tracy first went and got some, plus two extra bowls for their "friends" (us). It was so good Geoff went back, and the woman said, "Oh, do you want an extra bowl for your 'friend'?" Too bad Geoff was wearing a distinctive plaid shirt and was easily spotted. We sent Kevin for thirds.

We tasted tons of wine but really took it easy and enjoyed the afternoon. The weather was beautiful and we were very comfy in jeans and t-shirts. Before and after the festival Geoff, Tracy, and the two of us played games in their room. Okay, that sounded a little dirty. I mean BOARD GAMES people! We forgot our favorite game, Apples to Apples, but we played a bunch of other standbys.

I've got some busy days ahead of me. Friday I head to Oregon for a writer's retreat over the weekend. I come back Sunday, and then Tuesday I'm heading for Chicago (more on that in a second) and return Thursday. Friday is the critique of our stained glass windows--yikes! Then Monday the 24th I'm going to Disneyland with some girlfriends, which should be a blast (of course, it's the happiest place on earth!).

On a more somber note, my Uncle Ted, my mom's brother, is back in the hospital. He has lung cancer and has been having a rough time of it lately. I'm flying out to Chicago Tuesday-Thursday to visit and say hi to the rest of the family. Any prayers you could send would be welcome.

Really? No Way!

You Should Get a PhD in Liberal Arts (like political science, literature, or philosophy)

You're a great thinker and a true philosopher. You'd make a talented professor or writer.

Dr. Phil One More Time

I went to see Dr. Phil being taped again this morning. No, I'm not turning into a Dr. Philaholic, they called me! My interest in Dr. Phil is purely academic--research for my novel. And boy, did I glean a bunch of information.

Three things were markedly different between this show and the last one I went to.

1) I was inside, not outside
2) It was positively freezing, not boiling hot
3) I got no free gifts, unlike the haul from last time

Yes, that's right. No autographed copy of the book. I didn't even get a lousy coffee mug. They did give these things away to seemingly random people, but only about 10-12 of them, and I was not one of the lucky winners. Not that I wanted his book anyway, but it's the principle of the matter. Is it so wrong to want free stuff?

This time I got to see how the Dr. Phil show really works. I had a great seat, in the 4th row up from the stage, 2 rows above the guests on the show. I could see Dr. Phil's makeup. And that of his wife Robin, whom I am convinced is an animatronic cyborg. Just kidding. Sort of.

They raced through a number of guests on this show--far more than usual I believe. The theme was "Ask Dr. Phil and Robin." People had sent in questions and were brought on the show for Dr. Phil to address. One memorable one in particular was this man who felt that his daughter was a child prodigy on the piano and was the next Mozart. The mother of the child felt that the father was making the child (whose name was Nila, just like my Aunt!) practice too hard. Oh, and the child was SEVEN MONTHS OLD. No, that wasn't a typo. Seven MONTHS old. Ummmmmm, okay. Nila played a little Beethoven for us at the end. Just kidding. She was basically just pounding on the keyboard with her palms as 7 month olds are want to do. She was very cute though.

No word on when the show will air. I'll have to keep you posted on that, if I remember. I was nodding and shaking my head enthusiastically so maybe I'll actually make it on TV!

The Taggart House

We got the historic survey of our house and it's wonderful! Our house was built in 1922 (not 1906 as we had thought) for J. Paul Taggart, and was thus named the Taggart House. It was built as a rental property and Mr. Taggart never actually lived there himself. Its original location was on the other side of the train tracks, not far from where it is now. I'm sure Kevin will write a more comprehensive blog entry about our house. I'm very excited because I've always wanted a house that had an original name, and now we do!

Look, I've been busy!

Hello my faithful readers. This has been a busy weekend for me. Friday was stained glass, as usual. Remember that piece in the middle of my window that I broke? So I brought the replacement piece of glass to class (why I didn't cut it at home, I don't know). And then guess what? Broke that piece while cutting. Absolutely wonderful. So I had to drive home (a whopping 3 miles) and find more of that glass and cut it a third time. Success! After several tries I finally wedged it into my window and managed to finish soldering and "beading" the window on one side. I'm going to have to get some work done at home because I'm a bit behind--not as behind as some in my class, but I work slowly (I'm paranoid of a repeat of the broken piece). Kevin already has his "lead came"--the frame of the window--applied on two sides so he's way ahead of me. And another girl in the class actually patinaed her window and is done. So I feel the pressure. More below.

Saturday morning I headed to Arcadia (in LA) to go wedding dress shopping with my friend Dorothy. Her wedding, not mine. She tried on some real cute dresses and I think she may have found The One. It looked fantastic on her and was very slimming (although this girl hardly needed slimming).

Following the shopping I headed down to Orange to turn in my final donations for my CHOC Walk. Thanks to many generous people, I reached a total of $505.00! THANK YOU to everyone who donated! Following that, we headed out to Torrance for a wine tasting party at my parent's. That was a very nice party. My dad had a fantastic vertical of Lytton Springs Zinfandel (before it became Ridge Lytton Springs--and if that makes no sense to you, carry on). A vertical is a collection of the same wine from the same winery and vineyard over a period of time. Dad's vertical this time was from 1976 to sometime in the late 90's. It was over 25 years and was really fun to try the wine from year to year. Lest you think this is some kind of hoity-toity adventure, many of the early bottled had price tags reading "$5.99" and such. Kevin and I have started a vertical or two and in 20 years you're all invited to a kick-ass party at our house.

This morning, Sunday, was the actual CHOC walk. I had a blast! I walked with my friend Amy, her friend Sally, and Amy's 5 year old, Kylie. I got up at 6am which wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. The walk started officially at 7:30 and it took us about 2.5 hours to make the whole route, which went through Disneyland and across the way, all the way through Disney's California Adventure. It was crowded (something like 10,000 people) so we walked at a leisurely pace, which was good because the route was 4 miles total. As we walked through the parks, there were characters in costume all along the route cheering us on. Kylie particularly liked Alice in Wonderland who knelt down to her level and held on quite the conversation--much more in depth than you'd get during a regular visit to the park. It was very cute. The walk was a lot of fun, and thanks again to all of my contributors.

I sacked out and took a nap upon arrival back home, then we headed to Kevin's grandparent's (they live about 10 minutes from us) and met his parents there. It was fun to hang out, and Cindy is hemming some slacks for me for an event yet to be named here on the blog. We then hit IN-N-OUT and Trader Joe's and are back safe and sound!