Adventures of an Urban Jungleboy

It being September, that means that not only did I have my monthly measurements with my personal trainer Josh, but it was time for the regular cholesterol check with my doctor.

The news was good.
( boring/bragging details under the cut )
So, such good news on the health front coming into my 49th birthday is a pretty good gift. I just have to keep up the eating/exercise regimen.

Today I took on that most dreaded of tasks, cleaning up the Augean Stables sewing room part of our studio.

Much sorting, tossing, setting aside for auction, putting things away in the proper bins in the garage, and hauling of stuff to the storage locker ensued. The result: Floor!

The other half (the computer desk) remains to be tackled, but much of the tech bits need to be triaged by bovil.

( photos of the carnage behind the cut )

11 years ago tonight, I met my beloved bovil.

In the Hostility Hospitality Suite the night before Costume-Con 16 started.

The rest is history.*

Happy Anniversary₁, my love!



*Constitutionally inconvenient history, since we were legally wed June 23, 2008. That would be Anniversary₃. Anniversary₂ is May 25, 2005, when we married each other in the midst of our friends and family on Natural Bridges State Beach in Santa Cruz, California. :-)

This weekend I set out to repair a leaky irrigation valve in the back yard. I expected a muddy day.

( Home-repair neepery behind the cut -- how I fixed the leak )

I'll pressure test it in the morning, but everything looks good so far.

Best of all -- no mud.

Color me pleased.

Andy did his best to get a good photo of some of the lights on the house...

( Photo behind the cut )

For the first time since I bought the townhouse, I put up lights.

It helped that

• Orchard had blue and white "twin-cicle" lights that don't look like all my neigbors


• Orchard also had a quick-and-easy Light Tacker staple gun, so I could get them all up in about 45 minutes


• We've only got about 35 feet of visible eaves on the front of the place

Unfortunately, 2 strings only cover about 3/4 of the front of the house (and don't wrap around the corner at all). I'll have to go add a third string tomorrow!

(pix later!)

Happy Holidays

Yesterday and today, I just kept slogging away at the remainder of the disaster that used to be our office/studio.

Today I made it all the way down to carpet.

That's all the way... as in pull out the vacuum and vacuum all the carpets.
(For those of you who've seen the studio, that included moving all the art and rolled fabric from behind the door and vacuuming there).

I chucked piles of useless paper, sorted convention, Court and Leather memorabilia into boxes (with lots of help from bovil today, who found the other 3 bins of memorabilia and resorted into better order) and organized lots and lots of clutter.

It's not perfect (the desk still has lots of miscellaneous paper on it), but it definitely qualifies as clean, and it's certainly ready to use.

Future Fashion show (and Conzilla, and ACLC contest, and LA Con IV) here I come!

I just got a call from my friend Jeff, owner of Sacred Places Garden Design, who has been re-doing the backyard at our townhouse.

It's done.

We won't be able to run around on the lawn for several weeks while it roots properly, but.

It is done! We have a yard! with irrigation and lighting and everything!

I can hardly wait to get home and see it...

I spent about 7 hours today (Sunday) trying to reclaim the studio, and have made significant progress.

Among other things, the folding cutting table, which was folded out halfway and covered in junk, with an equally large collection underneath it is now cleared off and folded up against the wall.

3 loads have gone out into the recycle bin, and there's a big enough bag of trash that I'm going to have to get an "extra garbage sticker" for Friday's pickup.

Among other long-put-off tasks, the boxes of old HOA documents (no longer relevant) and magazines have been chucked into recycling.

I figure another day's work and I'll have a usable studio again, so I can get to work on my Future Fashion show piece.