What else has been going on, you may ask? Well, we attended a concert:

Our chums Paul and Storm came to town. Wonderful guys, both. I don’t know what it is about internet celebrity people of Roughly Our Age, but so far every one of them I’ve met has been lovely.

I re-strung my best and my cheapest ukuleles. The best got a new set of Aquilas, including the low-G string. The cheapest got fishing line. For realsies. As an experiment, I strung it with pieces of 25-pound, 40-pound, 50-pound, and 60-pound test. Being me, I got the cheapest fishing line I could find: $2.50 for each spool. It doesn’t sound too awful!

It’s my understanding that some of the really good quality strings are, actually, high-quality fishing line. But we’re talking fishing line that’s $20 per package. I’d have to re-string really frequently to make it cost-effective over the $10 I spend on a pack of high-quality strings.

And when changing, it was totally obvious that I needed to swap out these strings. These are both low-G metal-wound strings. The bottom is the old one, the top is the shiny new one.

Unfortunately, now I have to deal with stretching out the new strings. Which means re-tuning over and over and over. Right now, they don’t even stay in tune through an entire song. But they’ll stretch and settle in soon enough.

I put a new battery in my electronic tuner, since I’ll be using it a lot. Did you know that IKEA now carries size 2032 batteries? Those flat round ones, about the size of a quarter, that seem to be in EVERY little gadget? $1.99 for an eight-pack, which was the highlight find of my most recent IKEA trip.

I don’t know if the Swedish yellow pea would have been a highlight. Just the name gave us the giggles.

I also transplanted my two little lemon trees into bigger pots. They’re both flowering like crazy right now, and the Meyer lemon is still working on a few fruit that it started back in the fall. They stopped growing for a month or so, during the colder times, but they’re totally getting bigger again. Hopefully the Eureka will also bear fruit, now that it’s in its first flowering.

The cats remain grand, as usual. They’re both on my desk right now as I type, trying to duke it out for the coveted spot in front of the keyboard. Which means I may soon have to wrangle my arms up over the top of one of them to type. They’ve been very civil to each other today, including a cheek-to-cheek nap.

To close, things are good. Especially my job, in which things like this happen:

You can see the general leaflessness of the Eureka lemon, but a couple of weeks ago I noticed that it was starting to bud like crazy. And those buds are now getting ginormous. Within the next week or so, that sucker will be flowering.

The lemons that were growing on the Meyer lemon tree stopped getting any larger for a while, but they seem to be on the grow again. The Meyer is also budding up, but not as violently as the Eureka. It still has probably a dozen lemons in the works, with the largest ones about the size of a small lime. We’ll see if they continue their journey now that they’ve had a little winter nap.

The other night we attended an awesome concert — They Might Be Giants, with Jonathan Coulton as the opening act. Coulton played the electric guitar (as opposed to the acoustic performance two years ago [and I'm amazed that it's been two years since JoCo visited]), and he was accompanied by a bass player and drummer. A small band, but a band nonetheless. His performance was awesome, as always, and he played many a good song, but it was too darned short.

We hadn’t seen TMBG for years; certainly not since we moved to Florida. They gave a great show, and did some fascinating bits with knit puppets. And we got to see what was probably one of the last public performances of “Marty Beller Mask” ever.

Paul and Storm are also visiting our town this coming Friday. I may have to venture downtown to see them.

I changed the strings on my second-best ukulele, and it sounds much brighter. I think I’ve had this thing for three or four years now, so it was about time for a string change. I’ve special ordered strings for my first-best uke, so I can get the low-g string instead of the high-g. Those should come in later this week. Then I’ll put the used first-best strings on my third-best, littlest uke. Yes, I have three ukuleles. And like cats, I’d have more if I was allowed.

Finally, in the category of tasty things, I made some roasted garbanzo beans (or chickpeas, if you prefer to call them that). I started with the Alton Brown base, then fiddled with the recipe. I ended up soaking the dry beans for at least 16 hours (overnight), then roasting at 375° for about 45 minutes (stirring them around every 15). Instead of his oil-vinegar-spice mix, I just used coconut oil and salt.

With the coconut oil, they smell like movie theater popcorn while they’re cooking. When they’re done, they have the texture of corn nuts, but a flavor similar to roasted pumpkin seeds. Me likey!

We went out to Epcot on Wednesday night with some friends; it’s always nice to hit the theme parks in December to see the decorations, and we hadn’t seen the seasonal add-on fireworks at the end of the Illuminations: Reflections of Earth show.

First, I played around with some new camera apps for my phone. This is from the HDR app, and the water of the fountain came out creepy cool. You can see Scott peeking in on the side. I like this HDR app, and may actually upgrade to the paid version eventually. It’s “HDR Camera” in the Android Market.

We got a nice lagoon-side spot to watch the fireworks, although from over in France where we were, there was an island blocking the big globe. That’s OK, I’m not a fan of the globe parts anyway.

The extra fireworks on the end were so over-the-top, I giggled like an idiot all through them. Also, you can see a lot of ducks over in our corner of the lagoon, hanging out as far away from the fireworks as they can. Over on my Flickr, you can see I have a history when it comes to fireworks and ducks.

It was a gorgeous night, and there was a HUGE half-moon hanging low over the Mexico pavilion as we left. I know it doesn’t look all that huge in this picture, but isn’t that how it always is? Also, I love that we have flowers blooming in December here in Florida.

Onward! I went to Old Navy to consider their sweaters again. Once again I tried on some of the ladies’ sweaters, and once again I ended up buying a boys’ XL instead. They’re just so much softer! I don’t get why ladies’ sweaters have to be so coarse and stiff.

I sure am glad I carried my stuff to the fitting room in a neat stack. The girl took everything from me and piled it elegantly in the corner.

I also looked at sweaters at the Target. In the adult section, as well as in girls’ and boys’.

I think they forgot to include something on this particular label. Or perhaps they couldn’t think up any actual features of this tee.

I also found something delicious at the Target.

Don’t knock the chicken granules until you try the chicken granules! I took this jar full of delicious to work, where it’s nice to have a hot cup of broth in a freezing-cold office. It tastes just like the broth that I used to get out of a machine at the high school where my mom worked, back in the ’80s. The cups had poker hands on them. Ah, memories.

Yes, that’s an electric stapler. This office is classy.

I’m going to miss this job when it’s over. There are only three weeks left of my temporary assignment. Although there’s always a chance my temp spot will be extended, I haven’t heard anything to that extent yet.

So here’s to you, cube 226A! My festive lights, fez lamp, various other crap and I will savor you for the next fortnight and a half.

It actually wasn’t that bad. I parked around the backside, where I usually go, and got a spot that wasn’t exactly rock-star-parking, but it was certainly bar-band-with-a-following parking. In the central rotunda, I saw this:

You can see Santa down there, in the middle of what looks to be a baffling and overstimulating maze. Good luck, kids.

I browsed a few stores, but the lines were massive. And they didn’t have anything I wanted. Is it just me, or is it hard to find sweaters that aren’t coarse and stiff this season? Either that, or they have a massive cowl neck and short sleeves. The short-sleeved sweaters are everywhere.

Although I’m a fan of a good droopy cowl neck. Still, the short sleeves need to go. It’s not that cold out here in Florida, but the office I’m working in is usually freezing. Guess I’ll keep looking. Either that, or I’ll whip up something long-sleeved and fleecy on the ol’ sewing machine.

The malls are also boasting a look we refer to as “Vulcan air hostess” this season:

We borrowed “Vulcan air hostess” from Stacy London on an episode of What Not to Wear. Amazing how the look has stayed around. And speaking of WNtW, the new season starts up again this week. Can’t wait, love the show, though after watching it for 20 seasons or however long it’s been on, you’d think I’d dress less like a schlub.

Costco has a ton of gifts, a surprising number of which are Hello Kitty. There’s a Hello Kitty projection alarm clock. A Hello Kitty sewing machine. A Hello Kitty microwave oven. A Hello Kitty mini-fridge, just big enough to hold a 6-pack of pop cans. And the weird yet wonderful Hello Kitty water dispenser.

Most of these things also came in Julius, who’s also cute. But I’d totally go Hello Kitty. I already have the Hello Kitty humidifier by my bedside. The water dispenser is pretty small — I think it only holds 8 glasses of water. And it has encouragement to “drink 8 glasses” printed on the side of the bottle.

We ventured out to a Barnes & Noble bookstore for the first time in ages this past week, to see our friends Jen & John do a signing for their most recent Cake Wrecks book, Wreck the Halls. They had a good turnout:

And they gave a very entertaining show. I can see that it would be tough to build a “reading” around a book that’s mostly pictures, and they did a great job building a presentation that works.

At every stop on their book tour, a local baker made them a cake. The Orlando cake had a great rendition of the book cover, as well as a “carrot jockey”:

Scott said the cake was very good. I believe it was piña colada flavored, possibly also with raspberry.

They also had a guest book, signed by people from all of the stops on their book tour. It was cool to see all the lovely things written by all the lovely people throughout the US and Canada. My favorite, though, was an entry from a kid:

“Love cake I”. Says it all. Makes me think of the original Star Trek, and “NO KILL I”.

Which is appropriate, because Jen & John are geeks.

On the way home from the signing, which took place in a part of Orlando we rarely visit, we saw Beefy King.

If they’d been open, I might have tried them. Sadly, I guess Beefy King calls it a night pretty early in the evening.

In health and cat news, my finger is healing up great, it’s all scabby now. The antibiotics are doing their thing, and I’m infection-free. The cats appear to be killing off fleas very well, and both seem happier and less twitchy-scratchy. Although Commie has scabs on his back, he’s a lot less tender to the touch. I’m giving them daily comb-outs to get rid of the last of the flea dirt and eggs.

We’ve also salted the carpets, and are waiting a week to vacuum it back up. I have no idea how well it’s working on drying out and/or eviscerating the fleas with its razor-sharp crystals, but at least I don’t have to worry about having poison on my floors. At any rate, we’re seeing far fewer fleas, and those that I’m finding are usually dead or very sluggish.

Commie is, in fact, more affectionate than usual. I’m sure we’re just anthropomorphising, but we feel like they know we’ve helped them banish the itchies and they’re thankful for it. He’s also become a huge fan of our desktops. Although usually, he’ll lay on my hand or stand up in front of the screen, blocking any kind of work.

My next task for the long weekend is to put up decorations. I just did the lights out on the deck; next will be the tree with its silver piggybank topper.

Instead of our tree, though, I’ll leave you with this decorative item from the local outlet mall.

WHAT?!

Scott’s mom and younger brother came to town for a few days, so we showed them a good time. That good time included visiting Disney parks:

I took this with a HDR camera app for my phone. The results aren’t as good as real HDR work, but it still comes out pretty cool. The colors seem more vivid, and everything is super-sharp.

I was also able to take the four of us on a surprise voyage — a fireworks-watching cruise out on the lake in front of the Magic Kingdom. I, a person who never wins anything, won it! It’s part of the “magic backstage” program, which provides nice little thank-yous for cast members. We set sail from the Contemporary Resort.

The weather was a bit drizzly, and there were a lot of pesky bugs down at the Contemporary marina, so the pool wasn’t being used by any people. Good thing, because a dozen or so ducks made it their home base.

We headed out on the water, and we were given drinks and snacks.

Neither Scott nor his Mickey-shaped “crispy cereal bar” are actually that creepy.

The fireworks show wasn’t the usual Wishes, but a special Halloween presentation. Awesome as always.

Our little boat had the soundtrack piped in. It was a load of fun!

At one point in our Disney-goings, we went to a cast-specific store. It used to be just merchandise, but now they have a section where you can shop from a limited selection of groceries. The prices were great! I just don’t need a restaurant-sized can of marinara sauce. But I did get some produce, because the Granny Smiths looked excellent.

And indeed they were. Fresh and tart, as opposed to a lot of the cold-storage stuff the groceries have at this time of year.

You know what else is delicious?

IKEA chocolate. I’ve never been much of a dark chocolate person (really, the bulk of my experience has been the miniature Hershey’s Special Dark bars that come in the Xmas assortment), but I’ve heard that it’s good for you, so I tried out IKEA’s Choklad Mörk. And it’s surprisingly tasty!

Also apparently delicious: grass.

I planted a little patch of grass for the cats to enjoy, since their main outdoorsy time is on our 2nd floor deck. So far Commie is still scared to come out on the deck, but shy Trouble loves it. And she loves to eat her greens. It’s surprising how fast this Bermuda grass grows.

My lemon trees are doing well as well. The Eureka still hasn’t bloomed, but the Meyer went through a lovely bloom (and those flowers smelled fantastic). I’ve been warned to not expect lemons right off the bat, but it sure looks like I have almost a dozen little guys growing. They’re tiny so far, but making nice progress.

They’re just adorable!

Now that I’ve sidetracked like crazy, back to the visiting Meyers. We also went to Sea World! It was my first time, but everyone else had already been a couple of years ago. Still, we three young’uns got to ride Manta for the first time together.

I really loved that coaster. You kind of dangle downward on your belly, so there’s none of that bashing and smashing of my head like I get from a lot of looping coasters. Compared to Manta, the old Kraken coaster was painful and kind of boring.

Had a surprisingly good gluten-free meal (roasted chicken) there, and I was also impressed at the upkeep of the park. Everything was neatly maintained, freshly painted, and very clean. I went in with Unversal-level expectations, so Sea World kind of blew me away.

Except the penguin exhibit was kind of eerie. They just stood around in groups, staring at each other. (This is another picture from the HDR app.)

All in all, it’s been a great fun month!

I’ll leave you with this warning sign that appeared one day at a busy intersection in our neigborhood. Simple, but a message that motorcyclists would love more drivers to keep in mind.

Trouble the cat accompanied me out onto the balcony, as always. She loves it out there, even though she’s the one who’s afraid of most people. On the flip side, Commie the social butterfly is terrified of the deck. He’ll stick his head out the door and sniff the great outdoors, but he won’t come out.

Anyhoo, the Meyer lemon looks great here. And hark, what’s that?!

One of my little buds has gone full blossom! And it smells fantastic. It would appear that not all flowers become fruits; in fact, relatively few do. But a girl can always hope.

Meanwhile, the Eureka lemon tree looks lovely, but not a bud so far. It would appear that Eureka is the lemon most commonly sold in grocery stores, while Meyer has a thinner skin and is slightly sweeter (possibly a cross between a lemon and an orange).

On a competely different topic, we partook of Taco Tuesday at the new Tijuana Flats nearby. As opposed to the one we used to live near, I really liked the mural painted on the wall.

Zombies and pirates and skeletons. It was fairly awesome.

And the tacos were great, too.

We saw the Cowboy Woody doll in a couple of places. But next to Jessie, it made a packaging peculiarity even more perplexing: why does Jessie get to wear her hat, while Woody has to straddle his? Awkward.

I was first drawn to this Tinkerbell because of her oddly stiff and large dress. Then I fell in love with her thousand-yard stare. I knew Tink was a little cray-cray in the head, but don’t let this one near a knife.

I think this Disney hotel is taking the penny-smashing machine trend a little too far. It’s like a mini-Vegas, but the only thing you win is a smooshed coin. Though to be fair, half of these machines were quarter-smashers. Which seems like a waste of a good quarter, if you ask me.

In other central Florida news, were you aware that we don’t do emissions testing on our vehicles?

That’s right — your vehicle can spit out as much stink and smoke as it likes; we won’t make you fix it. After all, the winds blow everything out to either the ocean or the gulf so fast, we don’t have to worry about pollution!

Yeah, it kind of disturbs me, too.

But the wildlife flourishes nevertheless. Remember the ducks from a while back? They’re getting bigger! And it turns out we have at least TWO families of ducks here at our apartments.

These were part of a crew of about a dozen. I think there were two mother ducks in the group (I believe the farthest-right duck in this picture is a mom) and ten or so slightly-smaller ones. And if you make the right kissy-sounds, they come waddling right up to you. Then they see that you’re not offering any food, and they stalk away in a huff.

Ah, an excellent segue into the topic of food:

We visited our beloved Texas de Brazil last night, because we finally got our anniversary 2-for-1 coupon. (The anniversary itself is Wednesday the 17th, by the way. 15 years. Unbelievable!) The food was fantastic as always. This was just the trip to the salad bar — fried cheese, bacon, salami, shrimp, salmon, artichoke, and some potatoes. And a bowl of the lobster bisque, which may be my favorite soup in the world. Don’t worry, I also wolfed down some sausage, filet mignon, flank steak, and parmesan pork loin.

Although I have to admit, the bacon on the salad bar was a little too … even.

Ah, that sounds better.

Last but not least, and completely unrelated to anything, I found this in the Target “1 Spot” section.

Pardon me while I turn my rant on. THAT’S NOT A MACE! THAT’S A FLAIL! ARRRGGHHHH!

Ah, better. They also had giant axes, also made of this fake Nerf stuff. Part of the “baby’s first LARP” line or something, I guess.

Workwise, I’ve just finished a week of training for my actual job. If you’ll recall, I’ve been doing some basic greeting and luggage-hefting until they had a classroom session available. I only had to wait a month and a half to start my actual training, which is apparently fairly fast. The five days of training consisted of one day of learning the two software programs, then four days of doing the job while under supervision. I’m sure I’ll still have lots of little questions here and there, but I have the gist down. I start doing the actual job tonight, although I don’t get to do the classroom learning until tomorrow, so I may only have half of the software I need available tonight. We’ll see. Three people do the job at the same time, so at least I’m not being thrown in all alone.

Since I have no seniority, it looks like I’ll be mostly working nights. I don’t mind it so much, except that Scott works mornings. We get to re-bid for schedules every 6 months, and I just missed the bids when I started, so hopefully in 4 months or so we’ll be able to figure out a way to see more of each other and maybe share a day off.

Medically, I’ve been down with a cough and some stuffiness. I’m also going next week to a brand-new gastroenterologist, hopefully one who actually listens to me and doesn’t treat me like an idiot. With any luck, he’ll agree to let me stop the double-dose of immunosuppresants, and go down to one for maintenance. Also with luck, he won’t make me wait two hours to be seen or make me cry or tell his staff what a pain in the ass I am when I’m standing right around the corner, like the old guy.

Scott’s getting ready for some medical whatnot of his own, although I don’t know for sure if he’s said anything to the general public yet. I’ll just say that he’s going to have a procedure done soon that I had done when I was five, and after he has it done, he’ll be able to eat all the ice cream and popsicles he wants.

Commie’s eye is doing great. A little weepy now and then, but for the most part back to normal. Here he is on top of the safety and side-effects sheet for Cimzia, one of the medications I take for Crohn’s. Mind you, it’s also printed on the back side. In fairly small type. This stuff packs some serious yuck.

In the world of little animals, we’re seeing a ton of baby frogs lately. When a friend was over visiting, she just had to pick one up. You can see how totally tiny they are.

Believe it or not, this was one of the larger tiny frogs. Later that week I saw some that were less than half this guy’s size. I’m making sure to step gently when I see them.

Here’s a question for you Oregonians and Portlanders. I saw this car in our apartment complex lot, and while I understand the two Oregon-related stickers, I don’t quite get how the “TURD” sticker fits in.

Perhaps it’s just another of this Portland-loving person’s fixations. Portland and poop, two great tastes that taste great together.

Lastly, we met up with some friends for dinner and mini-golf last week. First we went to Putting Edge, which is an indoor glow-in-the-dark place located at Festival Bay. For those of you who don’t know, Festival Bay is a relatively new-ish but spookily deserted mall. Over half of the stores are vacant, and the occupied spots are filled with weird stores like Black Market Minerals or the several memorabilia stores. When your mall’s biggest stores are Bass Pro Shop and Shepler’s Western Wear, you know you’re in trouble.

We peeked in at Putting Edge and decided that it looked cheap and cruddy, like a traveling carnival’s spooky dark ride. Everything looked like badly-painted plywood. Their price was the same as all of the other area mini-golf joints, so we just toodled over to the nearest Congo River Golf location. Same price, but far less creepy.

See? Much more civilized. The course was good, but it was mostly creative greens. I prefer a mini-golf course with stuff like windmills and buildings and other weirdness. I may be spoiled, since I grew up really close to a Putt-Putt that I loved.

It appears that Universal is building a pair of ’50s B-movie themed mini-golf courses, set to open in early 2012. Fingers crossed that they’re awesome, because the theme is right up my alley.

Horrible, right? Right.

Temperatures are around 90 degrees right now, with humidity to match. I’m working outside, but at least I’m working in the shade, so it’s tolerable. As for the job, it’s going well. I’ve learned that (a) I’m physically stronger than I thought, and (b) I’m much stronger now than I was a month ago. Not that I’m all muscley or anything, but 50-pound suitcases are way easier to lift.

I’ve had more than one manager thank me for doing a good job. Which seems to me the only way to do the job, but if you’ve ever worked anywhere, you know that there are those dead-weight people around. I’ve also had someone mention already that I should become a trainer. I’ll totally consider it in five months, because you have to have been in a position for six months before you can train it.

We’re also getting some kids from the college program starting up, and they all seem like nice guys. I wish I’d known about the college program when I was in college.

Onward to our visitor! Our friend Kermet was in town for a comedy gig, and we were able to meet up with him for an evening. Of course, we dragged him kicking and screaming out to the Magic Kingdom.

He took pictures to torture our Seattle friends. Then we ate some dinner and rode some rides. The new Haunted Mansion interactive queue is a lot of fun! And the new hitchhiking ghosts at the end are a nice update.

We fought our way through the pre-fireworks crowd and headed out via monorail after the sun went down, over to the Polynesian resort to get a Dole Whip. I actually had the pineapple/vanilla swirl, which was a great move. The vanilla cut down on the richness of the pineapple. We caught the ending of the Wishes fireworks show across the lake.

Then we strolled past the luau dinner show, where (according to Kermet) they played three great songs in a row. He’s Hawaiian, so I’ll totally take his word for it. He was also amazed and impressed at one of the hula numbers they included, which was all shirtless men. I can totally get behind this dinner show. Someday I’ll have to check it out.

He didn’t find the Polynesian resort as horrifying as we all thought he would, which was nice. I still don’t think he’ll stay there, though.

The main gift shop at the Poly (called “Bou-Tiki”, I believe) had this horrifying set of mannequins in the window:

The dad has wonky eyes, and the little girl is something out of a nightmare. But at least they’re stylishly dressed?

Anyhoo, we had a lovely time catching up with a great guy. He’s coming back out for another gig in a couple of weeks, so hopefully we can spend another evening taking him to another park.

It appears that some residents set fire to their deck.

This is actually a very impressive feat.

See, the deck planks are nice, solid 2x4s. And I watched these dozen-or-so firemen pry out planks and pass them over to the guy on the ladder, who passed them to some other guys who ran them over to the pond for a dunking. And most of those planks were burnt straight through. They looked like sharpened charcoal pencils.

There wasn’t much smoke at all. Just an occasional puff on the breeze.

Eventually, a couple of firefighters showed up on the 2nd floor balcony too. By then, I hopped in my car and took off on my errands. I guess they were checking to see if any embers made their way down and burned anything below.

I’ll make one guess as to what set this deck on fire: cigarettes. I had no idea when we moved to a building with balconies that everyone but us smoked. Some people even have elaborate smoking lounges set up on their balconies, with big squashy office chairs. Our neighbors both above and below are smokers, and sometimes we’ll find a butt that’s been dropped down to our deck. And in fact, looking across the pond a couple of hours after the big hullabaloo, there’s a guy standing up on the non-burnt part of the deck, having a smoke.

I love having the deck. It’s nice to sit out and enjoy the great outdoors, and our scaredy-cat Trouble will always come out and try to grab whatever sliver of sunlight she can.

But I’m making a concerted effort to not burn it down.

At least it gave everyone in the complex a little excitement on an otherwise boring Sunday.