DC Radical Faerie Beltane was a wonderful occasion this year. Our maypole was a motley assortment of all kinds of amazing colors and though it turned out a little kaplowy on top, the center part all the way down to the end wove up perfectly. It's a crazy beautiful thing.

And of course I'm like a shade away from sunstroke...

Cursed day star...

Anyways, the weekend was lovely. The bonfire was fun, even if the wood was smouldering on the fire. The maypole dance was excellent. And the little cluster of people going out for kabobs afterward was great.

Saturday night after the bonfire I went home and watched a ton of anime on adult swim. Hooray for an all anime saturday night again! It was glorious, and I even watched InuYasha twice! Sunday I bought a ton of anime at Best Buy with a tiny portion of my tax refund. I got the complete set of Noein, vol. 4 of Haruhi Suzumiya, and the movie Paprika.

So, tonight, I'm going to chill at home with my boyfriend, and a couple other folks and watch some Noein.

I've been in New York since Thursday night. I've got a TON of notes about all kinds of awesomely cool comic, manga and anime news. But I'm going to be saving those for later. I'm just going to share some quick anecdotes about the weekend.

The Chinatown Bus: This is the most efficient and fast paced ride that I've ever taken. It was great, fast, cheap and dropped me off in a prime location. So, I'll definitely be down with going that route again.

The Hotel: The hotel I stayed at was basically a tenement house that was converted into two buildings of hotel rooms. Good, cheap, upper west-side location, just a block or two down from the 1,2,3 subway stop at 96th. Though the "cable" is like a few channels and then a bunch of public access. Completely worth it, and a great neighborhood.

Europan Bakery: this was an AMAZING bakery near the hotel. We had breakfast there two mornings and dinner one night. It was that good.

The Con: I spent most of my time in panels, listening to tons of news and one recurring annoying guy trying to break into the comics industry always asking every publisher if they'll take his book during the Q&A session.

The Ramones: On Saturday night we didn't have anything to do and we were thinking about getting cheap food. So we went down to 2nd Avenue and went to an indian place. We spent about $30.00 together, and as I'm sitting there eating my chicken vindaloo it hit me:

Hanging out on second avenue
eating chicken vindaloo
I just want to be with you
I just want to have something to do
Tonight, tonight, tonight.

The spirit of Joey Ramone guided us to our destiny that night. And we had curry and something to do.

Books: I got a bag full of books. Mostly I got four books by Koji Suzuki for $30.00 at the Vertical Publishing booth at the con. Ring, Spiral, Loop and Birthday. And yes, it's that "Ring." The first three pages are pretty terrifying. I can't wait to read the rest. As for comics, I got a bunch of sneak preview titles, but not much beyond that. I was kinda broke the most of the weekend. I've wanted to get the Suzuki books for a while and 4 books for $30 was an offer I couldn't refuse.

Shops: I went to Kinokuniya in bryant park. It was nice, but I think I like the Seattle store better. It's just laid out a little better. We were going to go to Mood and the Strand, but time just seemed to get the better of us.

Bryant Park: Saw Bryant Park. It's not terribly big either. I would have expected it to be something much much larger, given its prominence in the fashion industry.

People: Met up with dmlaenker, bobo_dreams, and Tracy who I work with at the library. I saw Jackson Publick, Doc Hammer, James Urbaniak and another guy from the Venture Bros (which was THE BEST panel at Comic Con ever). Saw Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz of the X-Files, and Ralph Bakshi (on separate panels). UPDATE I totally forgot I saw Jim Butcher and got him to sign book one of Codex Alera.

Shows: Got to see Doctor Who and Battlestar Galactica on a giant theater projection screen with about 600 people. It was AWESOME! Got to see the preview for the X-Files movie, and preview for the new season of Venture Bros.

And the battery is getting low on the laptop. Gotta run.

Later Folks!

Tuesday through Sunday I'll be in Minneapolis. I'll be there for the Public Library Association Conference and also visiting with oftheeast. It portends to be a fabulous week. Though I'm totally stressing about the hotel, because I have to wait til tomorrow morning to book the one I want with the rate that I need... The perils of playing your cash flow close to your vest.

Speaking of cash flow, my business taxes are done, but my personal taxes have yet to be completed. Gotta get on that right quick.

Not much else. Busy doing stuff.

Oh, had wonderful food all weekend! JD and I cooked up a storm. We had about a gallon of Paella on Saturday night and a big fat skillet of Mabo Dofu Sunday night. It was good times.

OH, yeah. Here's the Big Boy pic. :)

JD and I are in Bethel now. We played Yahtzee til 2:00 a.m. last night with my mom. Today we all slept in. I got up first and finished reading my book club book "Flight" by Sherman Alexie. After mom and JD got up, JD and I went to Frisch's Big Boy. We both had big boys. It was lovely. I've got a pic to share of the Big Boy, but the library software has blocked my Verizon pics account. :(

Another time.

We'll be in Bethel tonight, and then tomorrow we head out to the city. It's going to be a whirlwind tour, but a good one.

Steak Hoagies for dinner! WOO!

Last night I tried to make a recipe from the NHK show Your Japanese Kitchen. It was the Mabo Dofu recipe, and it was very successful! Everyone liked it very much. It's basically a very spicy beef and tofu recipe with leeks. :) Yum.

I promised to post the recipe here, so it's linked above. There are dozens of other wonderful and interesting recipes on the site. You should peruse the archives at length if you're even remotely interested in asian cooking. It's a goldmine of home cooking wonderfulness.

Last night dmlaenker, potpourrifae and I cooked up a storm! Through our combined efforts we succeeded in making the Chicken Tikka potpie of my dreams. The crust was just right, there was a lot more sauce, it wasn't as sweet or dry as the previous one... It was phenomenal. I nearly had seconds, but again it was amazingly filling.

This weekend I worked a lot. Yup. My job requires me to work every other weekend, so it's pretty common that I'll pull both a saturday and a sunday. Though now that we have a sunday librarian I'm putting my sundays aside for a while. I just really need to relax a little more on my off days.

I've got some comic and book reviews coming. I'll probably post them later today.

I have worked the last 14 days in a row.

Today I had off and I did not a goddamn thing.

I made breakfast burritos, oatmeal and tea.

I watched Astroboy, The Simpsons Movie and The Notorious Bettie Page.

My hair is a mess, I'm in my jammies. It's a wonderful thing.

I have needed this time, and I'm glad I had it.

Today I had the misfortune to have lunch in Chinatown. Normally this is kind of a highlight for me because I get to go to the Chipotle and have an enormous burrito and a giant coke with 5 limes in it.

However, today the streets of our fair city were mobbed with people, mostly catholic school kids and their parents and priests, from other cities. All of them carrying protest signs saying that they were pro-life. Many of them were not even old enough to vote, but they had an opinion, and their opinionated swarm was all up in Chipotle around the corner. It would have taken me an hour just to go through the line. So I went to Blimpie hoping that they wouldn't know it existed as it was down a non-major street and not very visible. But alas, they were in there too. However, there was not an enormous line, so I braved it and ate lunch with the protesting children.

I put in my headphones, closed my eyes and ate my sandwich, pretending they didn't exist. As each song ended their cacophony reminded me they were there.

After my emotionally draining lunch I went to meetings and then took the metro down to Southeast and had more meetings and then headed back.

Only to be caught in the swarm again. This time it was after five, all the Senate and House offices had closed and they were being herded out to the Capitol South station. Thankfully I ran into a friend and we talked about coat hangers, Paganism and gay sex. It helped to alleviate the tension of having to look at sidewalk trash bins filled with anti-abortion banners and placards.

This is the one major downside to living in DC. All that freedom of speech comes knocking down your door and dragging you out into the street.

You can not have an abortion all you want.
I just want a burrito.

Yesterday I was out sick from work, and I slept most of the day. Unfortunately this resulted in me not getting to sleep until about 4:00 a.m. this morning. I was rolling and rolling and tossing and turning and my brain would not stop thinking

about getting married.

See, I was watching Ace of Cakes the other day and I knew that we had to order a cake from them for our wedding. Cause basically they can make anything and we are going to be having a highly unorthodox wedding anyhow.

Then I started thinking about where to have it. And people. And potties. And costumes. And Rings. And who would do the service. And food. And honeymoon. And money.

My brain would not shut off. Not at all. I felt like I was going crazy with details and we haven't even picked a date yet.

I chalk it up to fever and good ideas.

Incidentally I'm slightly feeling better today, still ill, but coping mightily, and no fever dreams of wedding days. Though I'm thinking I need to start a list soon of all the things we need and the costs associated and starting a general fund for the wedding... Why I've put this off til now is beyond me.

The cake alone is going to cost a fortune.

Last night after work, and I worked late last night, JD and I went out to have a late dinner at this fantastic little bistro on U Street called "U-Topia".

Absolutely wonderful.

I had a glass of tempranillo and a small plate of pasta and hot sausage. JD had the pepper soup (which was awesome) and the scallop fettucine in a white wine and butter sauce. It was absolutely wonderful.

There was a nice little jazz band playing and it was absolutely divine. We were both blissing out. I can't tell you how nice it was to just chill like that. It was some well needed relaxation.

I would recommend this restaurant to anyone. It's seriously fantastic.

Last week when I went to Richmond we went to the Nile Cafe. It's a FANTASTIC Ethiopian restaurant, with wonderful food. While trying to decide what Wat we were going to have the conversation kind of went like this.

1: I'd like to have the Doro Wat.
2: Yeah, but the Yesiba Wat sounds good.
3: Personally I've always liked the Angkor Wat myself.

I believe it was Greg who said it, but I can neither confirm nor deny.

The last of the guests just left my house from the Faerie ThanksGaia dinner and Margaret Cho marathon. It was a LONG day.

Dinner consisted of:

turkey Breast
tofurkey
chicken tenders
veggie gravy
cranberry sauce
cranberry and blueberry dressing
beer marinated brussel sprouts
green beans
collard greens
mashed potatoes
macaroni and cheese
squash
corn
cornbread dressing
rolls
banana bread
banana pudding
cookies
chocolate pie
pumpkin pie
key lime pie
apple cider
coffee
tea

And yes, I do have leftovers, but not that much.

The funniest thing we talked about, at least in my mind, was that the turkey breast was bio-turkey and that the tofurkey was trans-turkey (tofu-to-turkey).

So today we took the bus out to the REI mothership and walked down to the Kapow! coffee. We saw all the Ride the SLUT shirts and got some really great stuff for some folks. We also went to Home Deli and got some fantastic gyoza for like $4.00. And also we got a chance to see the SLUT in action as it went slinking down the street. It was a really cute and crazy vibrant trolley.

While at Kapow we met up with techiecub and wound up spending the rest of the day together. It was really amazing, because we'd been talking together on BearCiti, and though he lives in upstate New York and we live in DC we just all happened to be in Seattle at the exact same place at the exact same time.

From the Kapow we walked down to the Seattle Center and went to the Science Fiction Museum and the Experience Music Project. Which was all pretty fantastic. We had a lot of fun, and got some shirts and stuff. From there we took the monorail back over to the Westlake Center and got coffee at Tully's, and from there we went up to Broadway. We had sandwiches at Dilettante Chocolates and drinks at Julia's.

It was amazingly nice.

So, I made it.



Here's how:

Filling:

Rice: 1 cup Basmati Rice / 2 cups water (cook on medium 15 minutes, let sit)
2 8oz jars curry sauce
1 cup water
1.5 lbs boneless skinless chicken breast cubed
1 8oz can peas
1 8oz can chickpeas

1 3qt baking pan
2 frozen pie crusts thawed to room temperature

In a 3qt saucepot cook the chicken. Drain excess grease. Pour in curry sauce and water peas and chickpeas. Simmer on medium for about 25 minutes. Add additional spice to taste. Preheat oven to 450 F. deg. Line baking tray with first pie crust. Add thin layer of rice to bottom crust. Scoop out solid ingredients from curry sauce and fill pie. Add remaining rice to liquid sauce and stir. Scoop in rice/sauce mixture into pie crust. Cover with second pie crust, crimp and vent. Bake on 450 for about 15 minutes until golden brown. Let cool 15 minutes and serve.

Serves: 6-8 easily. VERY FILLING!

Thank Scary-Go-Round for this inspiration.

So, I was reading Scary go round like I do, and the story line is all about the Great Tackleford Fair. In the opening scene of today's strip there's a little meat pie booth behind the characters. One of the flavors is Chicken Tikka.

OMG!

I would LOVE to have a Chicken Tikka Pot Pie!

I think I know what I'm going to be doing when I get home...

On Thursday night, rather than going straight home we went out to Bailey's Crossroads and went to Trader Joe's.

We went to the store for hotdogs and wine.

I'm not kidding.

I couldn't stop laughing when I realized what we were doing, and that we weren't doing it for an intentionally ironic B-52's reference, but because that's ACTUALLY why we went to the store.

ASTRO-PROJECTOR!

I've worked in the cage all week. My feet are tired. My legs are tired. My shoulders are sore. I slammed my finger under a box...

I'm glad we've finished the Adult Non-Fiction for my branch.

I'm glad it's Friday.

I'm glad I have a functioning shower.

I'm sad that there's no Slush Puppy machines around here. Cause I could sure go for that.

A great, big, purple Slush Puppy.

And a giant dinner.

And now, I go to lay on the couch and veg before I contemplate a real dinner.

Yesterday was youth pride. Yesterday evening we put the new ribbons on the maypole and watched the movie "Claire" starring Sister Missionary Position Delight. Both things were awesome.

Today we danced in Dupont Circle. There were 30 people on the pole, and it wove up beautifully. We've even got pictures, but I'll have to post them later.

Tonight sqrlcub took me, Kurt and JD out to the Melting Pot for a birthday dinner. It was excellent as always.

And now I've caught up with email and comics. I've not even looked at my friends page yet so if there's something I'm missing out on I'll just have to find out another time.

Tomorrow I go back to working at Tenley. And I have to say, that I'm thrilled that I won't be in the cage.

I also got some fantastic artwork and a new tee shirt and some excellent shoes. Not in that order. Urban Outfitters is good for something.

Watched the episode "Evolution of the Daleks" yesterday. It wasn't as holy fucking fuck as the first episode, but it was pretty hellacious. I can't wait to see next week's episode. It looks like a creature straight out of The Great and Secret Show, and that makes me all giddy.

I had a lovely time down at Rosengård, Peggy Lee's Fig Farm at St. Faeries this weekend. I always feel like I learn something while down there, and I always feel like we accomplish so much. We arrived around lunchtime on Saturday, we went shopping and bought knicknacks and food, we ate lunch, tilled the garden, hauled 6 wheelbarrows full of mulch to the garden, took a nap, tilled the garden again, planted a bunch of seeds (radishes and spinach), cooked a huge dinner (so huge we didn't even get to finish it all), went to bed, got up, polished the copper hood on the fireplace, cooked breakfast, sowed another 3 rows in the garden (fava beans), did some yardwork, rearranged the woodpile, got water from the neighbor, hung up some beautifying elements (welcome sign and a pig skull, yeah, mixed message), and cleaned up the house and got rid of a lot of excess wax.

So, yeah, we did a lot.

I learned how to polish copper using vinegar and salt and a rag. The chemical solvent "Brasso" did nothing for the copper fireplace hood, but the old fashioned method did just the trick. However, my hands, specifically my fingernails are that green patina color. I'm sure it'll come out in time, but for now I'm Patina Turner.

Oh, and I drank nearly an entire bottle of white wine by myself. It was the Chapel Cellars something or other, a local St. Mary's winery. Sweet, but not overly sweet, good with dinner (roasted chicken thighs with onions, carrots, garlic, lima beans, corn and diced tomatoes and fire coal baked potatoes!). Amazingly I did not have a hangover either. How bout that!

Peggy and I talked a lot this weekend. About living in Seattle, and where exactly we both lived while there, his dramatic exit from Seattle, the clubs we both went to (both very different), our families, folk music (scandinavian vs. appalachian), the old ways of doing things, his plans for the property, the fig trees, the local wildlife, and on and on... It was a wonderful little trip. I hope I'll be able to get out there more often. We were talking about putting together a faerie farm work weekend out there and having a fence making bonanza with a raised bed raising. I'm sure that can happen, we just gotta put the word out and make a date for it.

Now to spend next weekend whipping my own backyard into shape!