Author: Heather Meadows

Our move-in date for the new apartment is March 24. I am really excited.

So many people have been generous to us. Furniture-wise, we will start out with a couch, a chair, a china cabinet, and a desk (thanks to a man at Cheryl’s work); a bed (thanks to Will and Sarah); and a TV (thanks to Robert and Julia).

My mom gave me her other wicker basket to use as a hamper–she started out with two, and I had one of them in the apartment. That will lend a sense of normalcy and familiarity to the new place, although I did unfortunately break one of the handles.

We’ve also already got dishes, including a set from someone at Sean’s work, a set from Aunt Carol, and some nice Japanese pieces I picked up at various Asian grocery stores. And Cheryl gave us some lovely silverware for Christmas. I’ll have to buy some glasses when I do the shopping for other necessities. I’d also like to buy two coffee cups for hot cocoa, a treat Sean and I indulge in on cool evenings.

We have some bedding, from Aunt Carol and Aunt Irene, some beautiful towels from Uncle Tom, and two towels I bought at Wal-Mart, but I will need to buy pillows and a few extra towels.

Aunt Carol gave me a Magic Bullet, which I am very excited about–I can’t wait to try out some recipes with it. With that, I shouldn’t need a blender or food processor, but eventually I would like to replace my Kitchenaid mixer. (Mom says I should have a Bosch mixer/processor. They are industrial-strength, strong enough to grind grain. They are very expensive…I’m not sure I would use it enough to justify it. But you never know.)

I will need to get a new can opener and toaster.

Mom and Dad gave me a wonderful set of pots and pans for Christmas, so I shouldn’t need anything in that department except a wok. I already have a rice cooker, given to me by my mother’s cousin. With the pot and pan set came some cooking utensils, but I still need wooden spoons and plastic and metal spatulas. I also need to buy a set of glass bakeware.

As I mentioned, we’re getting a desk for the office, which Cheryl says she thinks is an L-shaped desk. David gave me a nice CRT monitor which I plan to make liberal use of; at first I’m just going to use it as a second screen for my laptop, but eventually I’d like to have a desktop again. It will be so nice to have a CRT and be able to see colors and details properly. I’m used to LCDs now, but they still don’t feel as “real” as CRTs.

We got a printer free when we bought our laptops, so we’re covered there too.

We will eventually need chairs for the office. I want to get Aeron chairs again, of course, but we might not do that right away. We’ll see. Herman Miller has also come out with a different chair, the Celle, which costs less and is available in burgundy and pink. I definitely want to check those out.

As far as dining room furniture, all we have so far is the china cabinet. However, Sean has agreed that we should get a kotatsu. For those of you who don’t know, a kotatsu is a low table–essentially coffee-table height–with a heater built under it. The top of the table comes off so you can put a blanket (futon) beneath it, and you sit at the table with your legs under the blanket on cold days.

A kotatsu is a decent-size table, and I think we will probably just use it to eat on at first (or maybe permanently). For that, I’ll want to invest in some zabuton pillows for sitting on. (For now I’ll probably get some cheap Wal-Mart cushions.)

When we’re not using the kotatsu, it will serve as a coffee table. I’m kind of imagining Sean spending most of his time there, maybe leaning back against the couch, legs tucked under the warmth of the blanket and heater.

As you can see from the floorplan (we’ll be in an apartment like the one on the left), the living room and dining room are one big long open area. I’m not sure yet how I’m going to arrange the furniture. I will need something to put the TV on, but that’s not a high priority right now. I’d like to take my time and find nice furniture pieces that will go with my style.

I do want to buy a shelf to keep books and DVDs on. My collection is rebuilding, slowly but surely.

I’m going to have to live in the apartment for awhile before I decide on a noren, but I really do think I will want one–or something–for the doorway to the kitchen right off the front door.

For the bedroom, we have a walk-in closet, so we might not need to get a dresser/chest of drawers. If we do, though, we can certainly buy one. Other than that, we’ll need bedside tables, and then we’ll be pretty much covered.

A large expense will be the washer and dryer set, but thanks to the generosity of Mom, Dad, and Hai, we will save a lot of money when we buy them at Sears.

I think that pretty much covers what we’ll need for our new place.

It is, of course, due to the generosity of Aunt Bev and Uncle Josh, Aunt Irene, Grandma, Uncle Steve, Hai, JP at Japundit, Matt, and so many others that we are able to replace so many things, move into a new apartment, and still have money left over to invest in our future. And then there are those dear souls who bought us treasured things from the Things We Lost in the Fire list! I’m continually amazed that we are doing so well, given that we had no renter’s insurance and did not receive any assistance from the Red Cross. Our well-being is completely due to the kindness of our friends and family, and for that we are grateful beyond words.

Here’s my schedule for the next two weeks:

• March 13 onward: accumulate smaller needed items
• March 16: try on bridesmaid dresses for Brooke and David’s wedding
• March 17: order kotatsu (delivery estimate is 5-9 business days via FedEx)
• March 18/19: head to Washington, Georgia with Brooke to check out a possible wedding site
• Week of March 20: shop for and decide on washer and dryer
• March 24, 25, 26: move into new apartment–gather up donated goods from across Augusta (neighbor’s house, a storage facility, friends’ houses); pick up washer and dryer
• Thereafter: organize, arrange, and buy any additional needed items

And there you have it.

I went to the Bee’s Knees yesterday for lunch, to celebrate my first paycheck and my first two weeks of work. (Which reminds me, I forgot to turn in my timesheet yesterday…blah.)

This time I had the Spicy Crab sandwich, which was quite delicious.

It is really nice to be working so close to downtown, with quick access to my favorite restaurants, and in North Augusta, close to my favorite parks and trails. My plan is to join the Riverview Park Activities Center so that I can go there before or after work to work out.

I also want to buy a car that is big enough for my bike to fit inside–Mari is able to fit her bike inside her PT Cruiser, so that’s what I’m leaning towards right now. With that, I can bring my bike with me for a morning ride and then not feel paranoid that something will happen to it while I’m at work and it’s sitting outside.

Tokyo’s City Hall is gorgeous, a striking design that photographers love. You can see it in the opening credits of Hikaru no Go…but if you don’t have access to that glorious anime (and why not?!), you can see it here.

Nice, eh?

Unfortunately, that cool design comes with a price, as government officials are discovering.

Only 15 years after it was built to great fanfare for its novel design, this soaring Tokyo landmark is plagued with rain leaks, faulty lighting and other aging problems.

Rainwater seeps through cracks, staining the walls and ceilings. City officials are clearly embarrassed.

But repairing the structure–even simply cleaning the outer walls–is hampered by the unusual geometric patterns of its modernist design.

“This is a result of the metropolitan government giving priority to design, without considering the operating costs,” said a Tokyo official in charge of maintenance.

Full-scale repairs would cost about 100 billion yen, according to one estimate. That is almost two-thirds of the 157 billion yen it cost to build the structure in the first place.

Oops.

Lexington Herald-Leader: Student brings mercury to school; cleanup required

Ten students touched the liquid mercury, Young wrote in her letter. “When you touch it, it beads up and runs away from you, and they were touching it to see what it would do,” Young said in an interview.
Those students were required to wash thoroughly, and their parents were called to bring changes of clothes to school, she said.

The boy brought the mercury to school on a bus. Young said that bus will not be used until it has been cleared by state officials.

The school will be closed this weekend as a private contractor removes any traces of mercury from a hallway in the upstairs seventh-grade wing, Young said. A Nicholasville contractor will do the cleanup work, but a cost estimate wasn’t available today.

The student who brought the mercury, his family and home will be scanned for the chemical, according to Young.

Scary!

In other from-home news, I saw Dunbar High School cheerleaders on national news today.

Pics from today’s lunch are up. I went to the little trail stretching between Buena Vista and the golf course end of the Greeneway. I’m not sure if that’s technically part of the Greeneway or not. Either way, it’s pretty there.

Tomorrow I get my first paycheck. In celebration, I’ll be taking myself out to lunch, so I probably won’t take any pictures.

I’m thinking of starting a separate photoblog (I already have a name for it) in which I feature a single photo every day. I’d process the photo and make it all purty and stuff. I’m thinking that maybe that would gain more attention than spewing a whole bunch of mediocre photos all at once. Quality over quantity, plus a guaranteed photo every day.

Of course I would be dipping into the photos I already have up on smugmug, but I’d be making them better, you see.

I’ll have to think more about this, especially about how I want to actually do it. A lot of people use pixelpost, which is definitely an option, but there is something very comforting about having my photos stored on smugmug. Maybe I could do both somehow.

I’ve got the blinds and curtains open and the lights off in the bedroom so I can see across the street where, despite numerous warnings from weathermen and the fire marshal, some idiot is burning something.

He’s got the stuff in an oil can, but the fire keeps sparking and shooting out the top.

Today there was a fire in Aiken County that flared up out of nowhere to cover an acre in minutes. Officials say it could have been a cigarette or even someone’s car exhaust that started it, because conditions lately have been very fire-friendly: dry with hard gusts of wind. Needless to say, people have been told they should hold off burning until the weather conditions change.

I’m waiting for the fire in the oil can to jump out and spread to something else–the car in front of it, or maybe the house behind it. Then I’ll call 911 and hope I don’t lose all my possessions yet again.

Look, another reason to go back!

Not everybody in Savannah saw Safdie’s design as romantic, nor did they celebrate, when the Telfair Museum pitched his 64,000-square-foot annex to city leaders in 1999.

The Historic Review Board, guardians of the 2.5-mile National Historic Landmark District where Savannah was founded in 1733, saw the glass-and-stone structure as a jarring intrusion on the city’s Old South landscape.

This reminds me of Kyoto’s train station, and the controversy thereof. (Although now I think more people are annoyed by Kyoto Tower than they are by the beautiful Kyoto Station.)

I dropped my lens cap into the Savannah River today.

When I told Sean, he didn’t even blink. Without hesitation he responded, “That was coming.”

Isn’t he sweet?

I’d been working my way up the Riverwalk from St. Paul’s, taking pictures.

I stopped to get some shots of the river and that’s when my lens cap sprang out of my hand and fell into the water.

Unruffled (though I will admit to a curse word), I simply climbed down the rocks to the beach, took off my shoes and socks, waded into the river and snagged the floating bit of plastic.

Then I stayed and had lunch on the rocks while I waited for the lens cap and my feet to dry. I shared half my sandwich bread with the seagulls and little black ducks, and spent the remainder of my memory card snapping pictures of them as they converged on the crumbs.

Had lunch at Riverwalk today. Beautiful day out.

We’ll have more coverage on Heather Meadows Action News at 10.

Immediately after work yesterday I went to Brooke’s, stopping at Bi-Lo to grab a dinner of sushi (some sort of crab roll) and fruit. We sat around online for several hours; I read news and chatted with a few people (including Vertigo, who I haven’t seen in awhile, so that was nice), and Brooke occasionally sent me links to bridesmaid dresses. (We’re liking this one at the moment, but ultimately all the bridesmaids will help pick the final dress, on March 16. Brooke originally picked this one, but I don’t know if it would look good on me. I guess we’ll find out…)

At around 10 pm we got around to watching some Kyou Kara Maou. I watched Taizen Shuu episode 6 by myself, and then Brooke joined me for the regular series episodes 52-54. Cool standalone plot episode, silly standalone Gunter episode (ah, the Wild West exists in other dimensions!), and awesome beginning-of-the-end plot episode. As usual we ended on a cliffhanger :>

By the way, Brooke can now read this megapost, and the addendum.

In any event, the purpose of relating all that was to demonstrate that I had a long day yesterday. Last night as I fought to get to sleep I suddenly remembered that Uncle Lewis’ wallet with all his foreign money he’d picked up while he was in Europe during World War II was lost in the fire. I started to feel sick over it, because that was truly a treasure. Then I forced myself to think of other things.

And now I’m up early doing some contract work. Whee!

All the abortion news lately has got me thinking.

While I am opposed to abortion in general and absolutely believe that a baby that hasn’t been born should have the same rights as a baby who has, I am not completely blind to, or hardened towards, the point of view of mothers who don’t want to be mothers.

I can sit around all day and say that if a woman is raped, that doesn’t make it the baby’s fault, and the baby shouldn’t have to die because of it. And I do believe that. But that doesn’t negate the fact that the woman has been violated and may very well not want a reminder of that violation growing within her. She may want nothing to do with the baby whatsoever.

So I was thinking today, surely there is a solution to that sort of problem that doesn’t require the death of the baby. Would it be possible to “harvest” a child from an unwilling mother, and either grow it in a test tube or implant it in a surrogate? Is anyone doing research into this?

Today, my supervisor praised me for an email explanation I sent her of how part of our site works. She said it was the best explanation of the feature she’d seen.

Go me!

I am really enjoying the production meetings. It’s so fun to watch the producers throw out and discuss story ideas. I almost feel like I might have something to contribute someday, which would rule.

Today I ate my lunch while I worked, then drove around trying to find flowers to photograph on my actual break. I didn’t get anything particularly good, unfortunately. And there’s supposed to be a freeze tonight, so probably all the flowers will be gone tomorrow.

Oh well. They’ll come back, I suppose.

I totally fucked up last week at work. Let’s just say I was overzealous in cleaning house. Something very important was lost.

Fortunately, there were backups, from which I was able to restore everything today. My employers seem to be taking the position of “no harm, no foul”.

I felt like a moron for most of my workday, but by the end of everything I was cheerfully humming as I wrapped up the last few articles.

I am very lucky there were backups. I’m sure my mood wouldn’t have bounced back if there hadn’t been.

A lesson learned!

If, like me, you are amused by attempts to render languages in the character sets of other languages, you might like this article!

To help spell road signs in Roman characters, the government uses a handbook issued by an affiliate of the transport ministry, the Japan Contractors Association of Traffic Signs and Lane Markings.

The handbook goes with the Hepburn rules, James Hepburn’s widely used system for Japanese-Roman character transcription.

The Hepburn system eschews the use of macrons when indicating long vowels, like that tricky “o” in “Muroji.” And it advocates that place names be spelled phonetically; the handbook uses the example of “Kyoto.”

Based on the handbook, Masayuki Matsuhira, the temple’s financial officer, says it is clear that the name should be spelled “Muroji.”

Not everyone is on the same page.

Akihiko Yonekawa, a Japanese language professor at Baika Women’s University, says that “Muroji” is not a proper phonetic spelling, so if that is the goal it should be spelled “Murooji.” According to the direct transcription of kana characters, it would be “Murouji,” but that does not comply with Hepburn’s principles. The professor notes that prohibiting macrons made the whole process more difficult.

West Japan Railway Co. agrees. Forgoing the Hepburn system, the railway firm uses macrons for names with long vowel sounds, like Kyoto.

Macrons were used in romanization for decades after World War II, but in 1986 the transport ministry prohibited them.

“We don’t know the details as to the change,” says a transport ministry official.

“But we presume that Roman characters with macrons were not used for many of the road signs in the past, and those officials in charge of the changes might have thought it would be difficult for foreigners to understand the Roman alphabet with added macrons, since there are no macrons in English.”

The textbooks I first studied used Yonekawa’s method, but then almost immediately switched to using Japanese characters so it didn’t really matter. Knowing what I know now about Japanese, I prefer to transcribe the sounds as they are represented in Japanese (rather than how they are pronounced), because that helps me remember how to “spell” them. (Sometimes there actually is a double お; a system that uses two ‘o’s for every long /o/ sound does not reflect this.)

I decided to burn the candle at both ends this week and do a little web work for a couple of hours before work every morning. I may rethink this if today doesn’t go so well.

So far in my web design “career” I have managed to avoid learning much of anything about ASP. Here lately I’ve had to mess with it some, and I haven’t had a very good experience.

I don’t really understand how it works. I can look at the code and think I get it intellectually, but there are things going on that I am unaware of, meaning that when I go to edit, I end up breaking the page. It is really irritating.

In the case of the particular project I’m working on this morning, there must be some special settings on the server, because I can’t get the page to work on my own machine. That makes it a little hard to test, doesn’t it?

So now I’m paranoid that I’m going to completely destroy the page I’m working on. I guess I’ll spend this morning working through some ASP tutorials and studying the existing page code…