Alyson Hannigan is super-adorable as she talks about her home birth experience. Alexis Denisof is also adorable (but lets her do most of the talking).

You know, whenever I hear stories about giving birth, it sounds an awful lot like being on drugs with bonus massive pain.

Saw The Damned United today. It wasn't something that was high on my list, because I've never had an interest in soccer, but it was a free showing for members of our local NPR station. Boy, am I glad I went!

The Damned United is FANTASTIC. By turns it will have you laughing, biting your nails and agonizing over the hero's tragic flaw. Michael Sheen is outrageously good as Brian Clough; there's this way he has of smiling that feels like a warning before a gigantic, catastrophic storm. I will now have to see every film he's ever made, which tragically includes the Twilight movie and all the Underworld films. (But hey, I've also decided I need to see everything Ryan Reynolds has been in, which includes When Friendship Kills, Blade Trinity and Wolverine, so.) Colm Meany is awesomely Colm Meany, and it's amazing to see the performances he and Sheen bring out in each other when they share the screen. Timothy Spall is one of those "oh, THAT guy!" actors, and he's just great in this, playing the yang to Sheen's yin.

The Damned United reminded me of why small, independent films exist. It's the best film I've seen in months, and I walked out of the theater in a GREAT mood. I'm really glad I saw it, and I plan to pay to see it again. You should see it too.

In other news:

We have a new couch! Unlike our old couch, which was - as legions of our friends and M. pointed out - apparently only comfortable for me, this is a couch the whole family can enjoy. It is pretty and well-made and should last us for at least ten years. (For the price we paid, it had better!) So if you had visited us and were Living in Fear of our old couch, fear not! It's gone! We are considering holding a couchwarming party.

Hosted the lovely lifecollage for the Internet Librarian conference. It was really great to see her, and I'm hoping she comes back again next year. Also had remyheart as a surprise house guest the weekend before the conference, which included a trip to Big Sur.

Have been busy today hammering out an outline for a novel-length piece I'm writing. I've already written over 25,000 words of this thing (yes, before outlining, yes, I'm Doing It Wrong) which means I can't really use it for NaNoWriMo. I would really rather use November to work on this project than start something new for NaNo. I am involved in a round-robin NaNo project with six other writers, though, which should be fun.

M. is starring in Mame as Patrick. (Older Patrick in the second act, who is 19. Yes, M is dyeing his hair. Since everyone already assumes he's 15 years younger than he actually is, once he dyes his hair the entire world will think I'm a cougar.) The play starts this coming Friday, November 6 and runs through the weekend before Thanksgiving. If you're in the Bay Area and looking for an excuse to come to Monterey, this is a good one! M. says the cast is great, and the play, if you've never seen it, is extremely funny.

In not-entirely-unrelated news, my mom and uncle are coming to town starting on Friday, November 6. Among other things, we're going to the Star Trek exhibit in San Jose. M. and I went to it when it was in Long Beach, but I understand this is a reduced version of that exhibit. Has anyone been, and do you have any comments on this version?

So, I don't do this often, but I know there are lots of chefs and knife fans on my flist, so.

I'm on a members-only website called Rue La La, where they have 48-hour deep discount boutique sales. Usually the boutiques are high-end designer clothing boutiques, which does me no good whatsoever. But occasionally, their boutiques are housewares (they did Cuisinart last week, and some dish company), or something else I can use. Every time, I've dug, and their discounts are way beyond what you can get elsewhere.

Today, one of their boutiques is Henckels, the awesome knife people. And the discounts are pretty substantial. If you're looking to stock up, it could be worthwhile. Here's your invite link. (They also have Keen shoes, Canyon Ranch spa, and Locman watches today. Does anyone wear watches anymore?)

We now return you to your regularly scheduled LJ.

I know some of the people I'm connected with here must also be on Goodreads. Are you? You can friend me here. My reading list isn't very intellectual, but I do endeavor to be engaging!

I'm baaaaa-aaaaaack!

Tearing up the ugly, threadbare carpet in the dining room to reveal the nice ceramic tile underneath.

Realizing that the nice ceramic tile has ugly carpet glue on it.

Removing said carpet glue with a heat gun, a paint scraper and some spray Murphy's Oil Soap left on for 20-30 minutes to take care of the final residue. (PLEASE NOTE: Do the heat gun bit first, THEN the Murphy's Oil Soap bit, or fire may ensue! NOT THAT I'D KNOW FROM EXPERIENCE.)

M. taking a hammer and chisel to the plaster ramps some previous owner misguidedly built in under the carpet.

Occasional discussions on what we'd do to this place if we owned it. (We rent. The landlady was 100% in favor of us pulling up the carpet so long as she didn't have to pay someone to do it. We plan to stay here for a while, so this investment of elbow grease was worth our time.)

More heat gun, more scraping, more Murphy's oil soap today. I don't think I'm going to finish the job before the weekend is out, so that will probably be my evenings for the next several days.

We did get in a nice brunch with some of my former fellow Mahooligans who were in town for a wedding, and we got all caught up on Psych. And we took a lovely bath. And ate strawberries. So that was kinda nice.

In other news, since I became a vegetarian I have become much more positively inclined toward spicy food. This weekend I put three fresh hot red peppers (serrano and red jalapeno) in our stir fry. THREE! And after tasting the end product, I wished I'd put in more!

I knew I should have hid under the covers when I had that nightmare of Mike dying of a heart attack.

Had a nightmare that Mike had died suddenly of a heart attack.

Woke up to find that I'd failed to turn the alarm on last night.

Went to the kitchen to discover that, although I'd set up the coffee maker and timer last night, I failed to hit the button that tells it "go forth and make coffee at the time I have set!" And thus it was still waiting patiently for me to tell it to make coffee.

This is not my morning.

Brigitte Magazine, Germany's answer to Glamour, will only use "real women" in its fashion shoots from now on.

For years we've had to use Photoshop to fatten the girls up," he [the editor in chief] said. "Especially their thighs, and decolletage. But this is disturbing and perverse and what has it got to do with our real reader?"

I think maybe it gets me *right there* a little more, being so far away from home.

This isn't a scientific study, but it's a really charming story. Mom and kids get hooked on cooking shows like Iron Chef. Kids get interested in unusual vegetables and start insisting on doing their own Iron Chef event a couple of nights per week. It's really worth reading; she writes well.

When I was their age, my mom wouldn't let me IN the kitchen when the stove was going. I think it's awesome that these kids are learning to cook so young.

Burgler updates his Facebook status during a burglary, using his victim's computer. And forgets to log out.

AWESOME.

Me: "You're not an international arms dealer, are you?"
Mycranium: "No. If I were, we'd have a new couch by now."

Today I went on what turned out to be the Bataan Death March, searching for canning supplies.

Many of the resources I've read say, "You must add citric acid to your tomato sauce prior to canning, OR DEATH WILL ENSUE!!!! Citric acid is easily available at all drug stores."

In fact, citric acid is entirely unavailable at drugstores, at least here. I went to four drugstores, if you count the one inside Safeway, and asked at every one. The drugstore workers either looked apologetic, or looked at me like I was nuts.

This largely made me want to throw myself off a bridge. (I think if I were a more self-actualized person, it would make me want to throw the drugstores off a bridge.)

Here's hoping that ReaLemon lemon juice (which has a carefully monitored level of acidity) will up the acid level in our tomato sauce enough that we don't DIE A HORRIBLE TOMATO-INDUCED DEATH!!!

So, we have this event called the Monterey Jazz Festival. Perhaps you've heard of it.

I posted a lot about it on our official blog this weekend. If you are interested in that sort of thing, please do take a look.

I have no idea how I found this; it just appeared spontaneously in my iTunes. Did one of you recommend it to me? It seems like something spike would like.