In Defense of Girls' Night

Girls' Night, Ladies' Night... whatever you want call it, Girls' Night is a fun concept that my adorable husband just cannot grasp. I have plans tonight to go to a Girls' Night with my former co-workers and earlier, on the phone with Luke, he referred to it as Girrrls' Night (with a long "rrrr" sound and in the same tone you'd mention toenail fungus). His exact phrase was "since it's Girrrls' Night, I can't stop in. Huh?" No honey, cause you're not a girl.

I held a girl's night for the same crowd at my house a few months back and we had to turn it into a girls' and guys' night because he was so saddened that no guys would be coming over to keep him company. It was still a lot of fun but somehow I think the night would have been different of the guys stayed home. For instance, I'm sure I wouldn't have been walking back to the house with Megan and Angie at two in the morning in my socks, and we wouldn't have been covered up to our knees in mud. Long story involving a Jeep. And testosterone.

Don't get me wrong, I love hanging out with the guys, but there's just some overeating and complaining that can't be accomplished when the men are present. I need the girls' nights to remind me that I am a girl. I spend so much time with men that I need this time set aside to eat junk and talk about whatever comes to mind and hang out in a room where everyone has showered recently and no one farts and the only time boobs are mentioned it's when we're complaining about our bras.

My family started the tradition, several years ago, of a Girls' Night Out every year on the day after Christmas. It eventually turned into Girls' Morning In and now it's even harder to keep my persistent guy out of the group. He can't understand why he can't hang out when he knows and likes most of the people in the group, too. One year he even got the flu just so he could stay home and not go away when the girls arrived. (The nerve!)

I think I might know the reason for this Girls' Night aversion. The two of us have been together for 14 years now and we've sort of become one person. We do everything together, good and bad. Going somewhere without Luke is like going without my arm. My sometimes irritating, often grumpy arm. He's so used to being with me all the time that Girls' Night seems like a personal attack on him. I'm so used to having him with me that I get to feeling antsy after being without him for too long. I guess that's sweet... or maybe co-dependant, I'm not sure which.

So honey, I love you, but I need my girl time. I'm going to Girls' Night!

More Places To Buy My Stuff (cause I know that's what you all want)

Da-da da-d-da-daaaa! An exciting post announcing the opening of my new Etsy store located here: http://lgaumond.etsy.com Woo-hoo! What's that you say? A what store? Let me explain...

Etsy is a place to sell handcrafts of all sorts where a person like me can have a little store and sell things to nice people like you without having to program a shopping cart and update my webpage constantly. Yes, it's all about me. So go, shop, enjoy like crazy! Check back often, I think I might try to sell all sorts of fun stuff on there if it goes well. I might even have a few tie-dyed onesies left in the closet that I could throw on there.

I was signing up for my Etsy store and one of the questions it asks is how did you find out about Etsy? How DID I find it? Well, I'm not entirely sure.

You know how you can be riding in the car with a friend and you're talking about, I don't know, something that happened at work maybe, and then you stop talking and look out the window and see a street light on with moths flying around it, which makes you think of summer, which reminds you that you wanted to buy some sunless tanner, which makes you think of going to CVS, and that CVS is right next to a sushi place and then you remember that guy you were listening to on the radio who talked about mercury poisoning from sushi, an then you wonder if tuna has a lot of mercury, too and tuna makes you think of Chicken of the Sea, which of course makes you think of Jessica Simpson... then your friend asks you, (since it's been all of 10 seconds now since you stopped talking), what are you thinking about and you have to say "Jessica Simpson".

Yeah. That's how my net surfing goes. I go from one site to another following links and recommended sites and links in blogs until I'm absolutely lost and can't remember how I got to where I am. So thank you, whoever it was who had an Etsy store that I followed a link to in order to find out about Etsy. Ths announcement wouldn't be possible without you whoever you are.

So browse Etsy, there are some great shops on there, and be sure to stop by my shop every now and then!

Floored

My husband and I bought our house about two and a half years ago from a woman who was a professional chain-smoker, who had lived with her now deceased, also chain-smoking husband and their blind, elderly, incontinent Yorkie who peed on every 90 degree corner in the house, and also in the center of the floor, and on the walls. Anywhere he felt the urge, he peed.

So as you can imagine, the carpet was a little, well... nasty. We had it shampooed and we did our best, but it was still ugly, stained, and tan and on hot, humid days you could still come into the house and smell cigarette smoke. We were dying to tear up the carpets but we were waiting for the money to do it. Well, this year, the IRS was nice enough to direct deposit our floor money and we went out and bought ourselves 1,100 square feet of laminate flooring.

We picked up our new floor on Friday night and were so excited that we tore out the carpet the next morning. We worked round the clock, despite the cold I have and the raging fever and the aches and pains and the blood Luke shed in the process, we were determined. Two days down, we now have a beautiful new living room floor, the hallway is almost done, and the other rooms aren't far behind. Here are some lovely before and after shots. Notice the miserable Molly who thought we were moving and couldn't understand why the couch was no longer in the sunshine where she liked it.

It's a little dark, but this is the living room before:

And here it is after: (Feel free to Ooooh! and Aaaahh!)

And here's the dining room before:

And here's part of it after (we haven't gotten to the new floor yet, but the absence of nasty carpet still makes a difference):

Notice the sad, far-off look from the dramaic pup. She's happy now that the couch is back where she likes it, but this morning she insisted in laying on the dusty, nasty dining room floor.

Next weekend, my pup. We'll have the dining room floor done next weekend, if it kills us.

A big thank you to Amy at DIY Flooring for actually making it fun and not scary to buy a whole crapload of laminate flooring off the Internet from a company all the way across the country.

All These Books and Nothing to Read

I've been poking around online looking for a book to read and nothing looks that interesting to me. It could be the cold I'm fighting off or it could be that I just don't know what the heck I want to read next. Picking a new book is a big commitment. First there's the $14 it costs to buy one, then there's the couple of weeks I'll be spending with it, then there's all the doubt about the choice I made. It's hard!

I used to work at Borders where it was much easier to be daring and try out books - they were free after all. On lunch breaks, I could just take any book off the shelves and give it a try. I did this every day and read a store full of books without ever having to pay for a single one. Sweet.

This led to my favorite game of "What's Your Favorite Book?"

I asked the retired French teacher who stocked the Literature section (84 Charing Cross Road), the video game and comic book freak who stocked the Sci-Fi section (anything by Tim Robbins), the awkward Music Clerk (The Perks of Being a Wallflower) the dramatic Cafe Barista (Danielle Steel), everyone got asked.

They would tell me a book and I'd read it. No matter how freaky. Or boring. I figured it was reading after all, so even if it was Danielle Steel, there were worse things I could be doing with my brain cells.

This was the best thing in the world, I'm telling you.

Free books and I never had to choose for myself. This of course led to a frightening variety of tastes in books and led to other games like "Whatever Books Are Left On The Floor" where I'd read whatever someone hadn't thought to reshelve at the end of the day. That game was riskier and led to such delightfully bizarre books as Tex and Molly in the Afterlife.

I eventually left Borders and had to start choosing my own books. Which is so hard. I've resorted to choosing books based on their covers. I have to say it's worked out well for me. Being an illustrator who aspires to have her own artwork on the cover of a zillion books all over the world, I can appreciate a beautiful cover illustration and it makes me want to touch the book, to find out more. The covers are what interested me in these three awesome books by Garth Nix: Sabriel, Liriael and Abhorsen. (I think it was Leo and Diane Dillon who illustrated those covers - I love the Dillons' work. ) So I figure, if a publishing house thinks enough of a book to hire a good illustrator (or in the case of Mr. Nix's books - two phenomenal illustrators) then the book has got to be worth reading.

When there aren't any inspriing book covers to peak my interest, I often pick through my mom's enormous collection of books for something good. My mom works full time and goes to school and somehow manages to read three books at a time and, like a dozen a month. I don't get it. But anyhow, my mom likes to read books about serial killers and crazy people. She's interested in the psychology of it all, which I get, but when my mom tells me that she loves Augusten Burroughs and I should read Running with Scissors... Well, if any of you have read Running with Scissors, think about YOUR MOM telling you she loved it. It's like when my grandmother recommends a book with a big, nasty love scene in it. As I'm reading it, I'm thinking, "Grandma read this (eeew!) and now she knows that I'm reading it!" It's just a little disturbing, that's all.

Then there's the best-ever book club in the world, the BBCS, (I could tell you what is stands for, but then I'd have to kill you), which was started with four of my former co-workers. We have very few rules in the BBCS, (and actually reading the chosen book is not one of them), we're more interested in eating than reading, but having a common book to talk about for a few minutes just gives us a good excuse to meet for lunch more often.

The only rules a loyal BBCS member must follow are these: the chosen book must never be sad; never have anyone in it who dies, (unless it's an anonymous character in a murder-mystery book whose death, although unfortunate, is necessary for the storyline - it's the long, painful, harrowing deaths-by-cancer that we're not interested in reading); never have any dying pets, (that's a new one I added after a conversation about this evil book); and never ever ever are any books written by Alice Hoffman allowed in. We read one Alice Hoffman book early on in the organization of the BBCS and we all developed serious allergies to Ms. Hoffman's writing on account of the thick, heavily descriptive, overly abundant flora in her books. We now have an aversion to all apples, apple trees, flowering trees in general, and anyone named Jorie or Collie.

Other than the Hoffman mishap of '05, the BBCS has been a great resource for different types of books that I'd never choose on my own. I've read two murder mysteries, a collection of short stories, a book about a blogger, and my last selection, A Long Way Down, which I really enjoyed, and which added some fun new British curse words to my vocabulary, but which the rest of the BBCS wasn't to keen on. I told them to bugger off. I liked it and that's all that mattered! Our current book is Without You: A Memior of Love, Loss, and the Musical Rent, which I haven't read yet because we developed a policy on hardcover books where if you don't feel like investing in the book, you can wait to borrow it from the person in the BBCS who chose it in the first place. So here I am waiting, and now I need a book to read.

I just finished reading The Secret Life of Bees which I read in three days and which I loved very much, but what do I read now? There was a little teaser in the back of The Secret Life of Bees about The Mermaid Chair which sounds fantastic but I just can't bring myself to read two books by the same author back to back. It just seems like a cop out. If I wanted to read the same author over and over, I could just read Danielle Steel for the rest of my life. I need to separate authors by at least a few books. So now what?

I got the idea in my head that I should take stock of what I've read recently. Maybe that would help me decide on what to read next. So here goes, in no certain order, just as I remember them, the books I've read in the past year. (This is March '05 to March '06 - not books I've read since January - I'm not that good.)

The Secret Life of Bees
The Dog Walker
A Long Way Down
Why Girls Are Weird
Good In Bed
I'm Not the New Me
Everybody Into the Pool
Dancing Naked at the Edge of Dawn
Dress Your Family in Courdoroy and Denim
Killer Summer
Sammy's Hill
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

And now I'm sad. Is that ALL I've read? In a year? Well, I have been busy. And I do read a lot of blogs, so that has to count for something.

All right, now I'm depressed at my illiteracy and I still don't know what I want to read next. Anybody got any suggestions?

The New Christy Line of Jewelry

Exciting news! I have a new jewelry offreing that I think you'll love - the two-strand necklace (AKA "The Christy").

My friend Christy is getting married this June and asked me to make her wedding party some personalized necklaces but she asked if I would make them two-stranded instead of three. Well, I made them, and by golly, I love them!

Just as much casual fun as the three-strand, but a bit more delicate and $10 cheaper! What more could a girl ask for. I don't have a large quantity of them at the moment, and there still aren't jewelry pictures on the website (I know - let's all make a collective "tsk" sound) but feel free to email me with your special orders anytime.

The new Christy is $20 and the earrings are still $10. I even made one for myself and I'm wearing it now as I type.

Sorry for the funky pictures - I took them on the lovely beige counter top in my kitchen.

And thanks Chrsity for the inspiration!

Before and After

Wow, it's been 8 weeks already!

Here's the before and after of Miss Puppy's most recent haircut. It's kinda hard to see in the pictures, but she was sporting a seroius case of rockstar hair on her head before. Now she's sleek and smooth and she knows she looks good.

Scruffy before...
Sleek and slightly aloof after...

This One's All For Flannery

Here are some of the fonts I liked for your postcard. I put them on both the hand-painted version and the Photoshopped version becasue (although it kills me to say it and I can hear my paintbrushes gasping as type this) I think I like the Photoshopped one better. You tell me what you think.

Here's Tangerine:

And Blackjack/London:

And finally, I thought I'd throw in a fancy font, but I only added it to the Photoshopped one. This is Freebooter:

So what are your thoughts? We never talked fonts, but since you're cute and funky and laid-back, I figured that your font should be, too. Cute and fun, not stuffy and fancy. Let me know what you think and if there are any fonts you had in mind.

6 months and three days...

Pretty Things

I'm too sleepy to write today so I'll leave you with some pretty pictures I've taken recently.

Like this one:
The old red barn at my friends Dave and Sharon's place.

And this one:
The side of our little wood bin near the house which looks like an outhouse when you look at it from the other side.

And this one:
Which I took last night when Molly and I went out for an after-work walk down to the river. The sky was such an amazing shade of blue - this shot just doesn't do it justice.

OK, time for a nap - enjoy your day!

How Do I Ever Get Out of the House

When I get this look every time I put my coat on.

It's says "I know, you're leaving without me, right? How could you? You're leaving me here ALL ALONE? No, the cat doesn't count, she won't play with me and she's too small to snuggle with. Can't I go with you? You know, you might as well just beat me if you're just going to abandon me like this. How could you?"

She's perfected it. Does she practice in the mirror when we're at work.

Here it is again:

This is the look I got this morning. She knows how to break my heart, that little booger. And this morning when I was so cold and tired and wanted nothing more than to climb back into bed and blow off work, she had to give me the puppy eyes while snuggled into the fleece blanket.

She's probably going through the trash at this very moment to get back at me...

New Job Update: Thrilled, Art-Drunk, Tired, Happy

I was looking back at some of my old posts and read Sad. Scared. Excited. Happy. and got that same sad feeling of loss and lonliness again so I thought I should post a follow-up .

I'm happy.

At my old job, I used to handle checks. Today I handled art. Real art. Amazing art. I held it, I looked at it, I moved it, I rolled in it (no, not really, but I was so excited and art-drunk at one point, I might have).

Sure, I sit behind a desk for most of the day, but a short walk from my desk is a collection of fantastic art. A few more steps down the hall is the gallery. And I have the keys!

I like to go in there before the gallery opens to the public when the lights aren't on but the sunlight is indirecly lighting the space. It's so quiet and private. I can look at everything and be alone with it and not feel self-conscious about looking at one piece for a really long time. It's the best.

So I might still feel a little lost and confused, I might be exhausted at the end of the day from trying to remember everything, I might not feel as comfortable as I was a my other job yet, but I'm getting there. It's good. I'm happy.

Slacker

I know, I know. You think I'm slacking. That I'm not doing anything but laying around and eating Cheetos and that's the reason I haven't posted in forever. Well you're wrong! I've been busy. And I haven't even had Cheetos since I left my old job with the vending machine in the basement. I haven't seen much of my couch either - so there!

Want proof? How about this...



I finished painting Flannery and Nate and I do think they look adorable. Now I have to find some time to sit at my computer at home and set the test in to let everyone know that "Nate and Flann are getting married!"

I've also been thinking a lot... Communication Arts magazine has an illustration contest every year and the deadline is coming up in two weeks. I really want to enter something this year; I want to enter something EVERY year but I never think I have anything good enough. I'm sort of stuck in that place again this year, but I'm determined to get over it.

I have a painting that I started a while back for a postcard mailer that I like, but I'm afraid that it's too cutesy for CA. I have a couple of completed jobs from this year that I think came out really well, (here and here), but I don't know if they're up to CA standards. I've also got a sketch that I've been playing with for a painting based on a poem that Garrison Keillor read on the Writer's Almanac on NPR that I think would make a fun and lively painting - but it's only a sketch. And the deadline is March 13. I think I might go back to that sketch and play with it. See if we can come to an agreement and see if it can become a painting in a very short period of time. We'll see. And I'll be sure to let you know.

Thanks for checking on me. More to come - stay tuned!

New Job = No Time to Blog

I'm so sorry, I feel like I've neglected you. I hate going onto someone's blog and seeing that it hasn't been updated in, like, six months. Now I've become that person. That's not what blogs are for. They're all about updating regularly. And I haven't been regular. So sorry.

I'm actually writing this on my lunch break, just to squeeze a post in. But don't worry, LisaGaumond.com isn't going into hiding. I've got plenty of stuff churning around in my head. There are a few new painting ideas pounding on the inside of my skull, I have to finish Flannery and Nate's save the date card, I have TWO commissions to make jewelry for wedding parties, oh and that sleep thing. I'll have to fit that in sometime, too.

Have you noticed that it's February? Yeah, me neither. February in Connecticut should be cold and bitter but it's been mild and wonderful. We actually went out for a motorcycle ride on Saturday and it was AWESOME! Every week or so, I have a dream about riding my motorcycle, or Luke's motorcycle, or a giant yellow motorcycle, or any type of two-wheeled fun machine, and the feeling of being back riding so amazing. This winter I've really missed old Bessie and her rattles and her get-up-and-go. But on Saturday, I got to hop on her and go for my first ever February ride. We bundled up and took off cautiously since we live down a lo-o-ong dirt driveway and just getting to the street is usually the most dangerous part of any ride. We rode for about an hour until the wind picked up and I lost feeling in my hands. It was so worth it.

This ride was not only inspired by the beautiful weather, but also the morning AND afternoon spent in the motorcycle shop in Saturday where Luke bought a new toy. Thanks to the patient guys at Gengras and hello to Ed, our awesome salesguy. Now when do I get my new bike?

Hang in there, there's plenty more news and pictures and updating to come. Thanks for visiting.

Nate and Flannery - Blue and Yellow

It's really not flattering of me just how much joy I take in looking at this drawing. I should have maybe just a bit of modesty but it's just so cute! So how do you like it? Colors good?

Sad. Scared. Excited. Happy.

This week I'm leaving one job and starting another. I’m leaving a job that I’ve been at for four and a half years. A job where, although I’m not the happiest, I’m comfortable. I know what to expect. I know at least ten different ways to get from my office to the vending machines. I know where the office supplies are and where the coffee and the plastic forks are, and I know where my friends are when I need them. And I’m leaving that behind. And I’m scared.

I’m going to go to a new place where I can learn new things and thrive and be something great. I can feel accomplishment and self-fulfillment like I haven’t felt in a long time. But I can also feel lost and loneliness and doubt.

I know that this change is an amazing thing for me. It will allow me to be so much more than I am now. I will be among artists and creative folks and in my element. I’m so happy and I feel honored that I was given the opportunity to start fresh and show this new group of people that they won’t be sorry for choosing me. I am so excited. But every now and then I just want to cry.

Walking down the hall to the restroom or to the fax machine, I think - this is my last Monday here. I will never be here as an employee on a Monday ever again. And I feel a little panic. What have I done? And then I mentally slap myself and try to get over it.

The problem is that it feels like I just broke up with the fifty people I work with. I feel like I’ve disappointed them all and that breaks my heart. I don’t want to disappoint anyone, but I really don’t want to disappoint myself. I need to do this. I want to do this. It’s a wonderful, wonderful thing.

Now that I’ve given my notice, everyone is so much more open and honest. There is dialogue where there was only frustrated silence. Opinions have been shared, frustrations addressed, honesty is everywhere. Why did it take my quitting to make it this way? We should have been this way all of the time. It’s like when your hair looks great the day you’re going to get it cut. It makes you wonder if you’re doing the right thing.

But I am doing the right thing. I’m so happy and I’m so excited. I’m off to be awesome and I can’t wait. I’m going to miss you all and I’m going to cry, but I’m so happy. Really.

Show and Tell

Here's a collection of random things that I wanted to show you.

First off, here's another sketch for Flannery and Nate's wedding save-the-date postcard. Adorable, huh? If F & N like it, I'll make it final and put paint to paper. If not, I'll start on a new sketch. Either way, I'll show you when I'm finished.

Next, here's something new I've been playing with. Aren't these cute? Cherry earrings. Maybe it's just me, but I thought these were great. I wore them to my sister's and was just waiting for her to compliment me on them. I nearly burst from the waiting and finally I said "did you see my earrings??" She said "oh yeah. Cherries right?" Hmm. Not the reaction I had hoped for. What do you think? I love them.

And here, long overdue, is the final shot of the chickadee painting I created for this year's Christmas thank-you cards. I completely forgot to post a picture when I finished it. So here it is. I really like the way it came out, despite the not-perfect wavy lines in the background, I really do like it. Maybe I'm becoming less of a perfectionist in my old age.

So there you are, I hope you liked them. Have a good weekend!

My iPod Needs Meds.

Under the heading of the gadgets I love most, the top spot would have to belong to my new iPod. We’ve only known each other for a little over a month now, but I’m in love. My wonderful husband finally succumbed to my constant whining and not-so-subtle hints that I wanted an iPod, and surprised me with one for Christmas. I say “surprised” because I thought he’d been tuning me out this whole time. Turns out he really listens!

I wanted an iPod because I absolutely must be listening to music at all times. I must. If I could have a chip implanted in my head that would play music constantly, I would be a happy girl. It drives me crazy to be anywhere that is entirely quiet. When visiting people, I’m not too shy to say, hey, let’s listen to some music. It’s like air. And gum. I need music all the time.

I also have an embarrassingly W-I-D-E taste in music which makes having an iPod a good thing. Now I can keep the weird stuff to myself. I can listen to French reggae or SKA or rap or classical guitar or 80’s power ballads and no one knows what’s coming out of those earbuds. Unfortunately, I think this variety has confused my iPod. Putting it on shuffle is like unleashing an attack of manic depression.

This morning, driving in to work, it went from Jack Johnson to Jimmy Buffett to Rage Against the Machine to Josh Groban (remember, I said EMBARASSINGLY wide…) to Ra to Teitur to G. Love to John Mayer to Faster Pussycat. Yikes!

Some days I think it reads my mind.

One day, driving in to work and feeling melancholy, all it played were sad, slow songs. Another day I was really pissed off as I was leaving in my car and it played a block of Disturbed and Rage Against the Machine. Some days it has a crush on Jack Johnson and plays nothing but his songs, but really, who can blame it.

So, yes, I’m in love. This iPod is awesome. I resisted getting one for so long because I hate to follow trends, but heck, if the trends are all this good, sign me up for the next one. Unless it’s legwarmers. In that case, never mind.

So Board.

I know, I know. I'm even making myself gag at these corny titles but I don't see an end to them in sight. Sorry.

So in addition to drawing, painting, making jewelry and loving the gadgets, I can also write with chalk. Amazing, huh? This is one big gi-normous chalk board that I've had the pleasure of maintaining for the past couple of years. It's at a very fine restaurant in Hartford called Max Downtown. Every so often, once or twice a year, the nice folks at Max's call me up and tell me that there's some changes that need to be made and I head out to Hartford in the early morning to update.

You really have to see it in person to appreciate the hugeness of this thing. When they called me the very first time to do the board, I had only been doing small boards, like 2ft by 1ft boards. The kind you can take off the wall and sit on the floor to write on. When I asked if the board could come off the wall, the nice man from Max's burst out laughing and nearly fell over as he told me that it was about ten feet long. And about four feet high. And about seven feet up in the air. Oh boy.

I've got it down to a science now and I was able to get in there, move the tables and booths, haul in the enormous 12ft ladder, remove five items, add four, change one, move the tables and booths back, and put the ladder back in the storage area without breaking a single fancy, expensive lighting fixture, all in just over an hour. Not too shabby.

There's a Polish cleaning woman there named Sophie who I see everytime I go in to do the board and I love her. She doesn't entirely speak English but she understands what you say and she says back words that, when you throw them up in the air, shake them around and rearrange them a bit, will make an intelligible sentence. It's like talking to Yoda.

Here's an example. I was supposed to go there yesterday to do the board but the crappy, slushy weather and the insane traffic made me so late that I didn't have time before the restaurant opened so I made arrangements to come today. When I walked in this morning I saw Sophie and said "Good morning!" She said "G'morning. Ah, you today. People you yesterday looking." After a second's pause to rearrange, I knew that meant that not everyone got the message that I had rescheduled and they were expecting me yesterday.

I once heard her yelling at a Spanish-speaking cleaning lady in her Yoda-English. It cracked me up. I wonder if the woman understood. The important words stand out and allow you to get the gist of what's being said. And that's all that really matters.

So from Sophie and me to you, my good readers, and especially to you, Paula - "Morning you good. Day too."

I Heart Technology.

Not long ago, when I graduated from college, I didn't own a computer. I had never USED a computer. I didn't have a cell phone, I actually had a paper calendar in my purse where I wrote down things with an actual pen on real paper, and I didn't even own a Walkman. There were computers in my high school, and even at my university, but this was the early 90's and they were no big deal. In school, I had computer lab where we learned to program the computers so they would make little pictures with numbers and letters. It was cute, but I thought - what's the fuss? I don't get it. Who needs a computer? HA!

Flash forward about fifteen years. This morning as I got ready to leave for work, I unplugged my cell phone from the charger, grabbed my PDA off its charger, stuck my iPod in my pocket and stepped out the door with my digital camera to take a picture of all the snow coming down so I could email it to my friend in Florida to remind him why he moved out of Connecticut. I got in my car and plugged my iPod into the FM modulator, ready for a long, sloppy, snowy commute filled with loud music, and I headed off to work where I checked my email and read a few blogs. This is insane.

Some days when I think back to my pre-computer days, I just can't believe how I got anything done. How did I learn about everything? Where did I find my recipes? How would I have found neoprene dog boots, size x-small, for Molly without Google? How did I fill my free time? I feel like I must have grown up in the 70's and then shot directly into the 21st century after graduation. I went from indifference to total, flat-out, can't live without it obsession. I love gadgets. I love technology. I can't imagine a world without it.

Mostly, I love technology because it allows me to further my anti-social habits without looking too strange. I can walk to work, iPod blaring in my ears, and not have to talk to anyone. I don't even have to make eye contact. Tra-la-la, can't talk now, Jack Johnson's singing to me, what? sorry, can't hear you, tra-la-la. Blissful unfriendliness. And I'm not alone! It's accepted behavior now. My cell phone allows me to talk to people without ever having to see them in person. My computer lets me email friends and keep in touch without having to make time to go see them. The Internet, my favorite place of all, is filled with blogs that let me feel like I have cool friends everywhere even though they have no idea who I am or that I even exist. I can go shopping without ever having to deal with a rude cashier. I can comparison shop for my new scanner without trying to ignore the useless teenage salespeople circling around me. I can diagnose medical conditions without going to the doctor. I can check the weather without actually looking out the window! It's fantastic!

Technology has made my life so much more fun and I am incredibly thankful for it. So today, on this snowy Monday morning, I'd like to thank Bill Gates and Steve Jobs for the personal computer. Thank you Larry Page and Sergey Brin for Google. Thank you Gateway for making computer-buying so easy that even my parents weren't afraid to buy one. Thank you Steve Case and AOL for dumbing down the Internet and making it so darn easy to get online (back in '98 before six-trillion people were online, slowing down AOL and making it nothing but pop-ups and spam). Thank you DSL for getting me online in the blink of an eye since waiting for dial-up makes me want to rip my hair out. Thank you Palm for allowing me to not have to remember anything and to have everything at my fingertips. Thank you John Warnock and Charles Greschke for Adobe. So many wonderful people to thank...

Most of all, I'd like to thank you, my readers (or reader - hi Mom!). Yes, I am a nerd and now you have proof.

Flannery and Nate, Lisa-style.

A friend of mine, Flannery, (who also has a very funny and smart blog of her own here) asked me to draw her and her husband-to-be, Nate for a save-the-date card for their wedding this September. Here's what I think they look like:

And here's what they really look like: Flannery and Nate. Am I close?

I'm sorry, I really need to get a new scanner. It's a real drag having to tote everything into work to scan (which I'll have to do tomorrow since, as you can see, I need to enlarge the size of Flannery and redraw her - she looks like a Hobbit next to Nate) and this photo-of-a-drawing thing sucks, too. The angle is all weird and, well, I just really miss having a scanner around.

Stay tuned for more progress on the save-the-date drawing...

Well here she is.

What do you think? It's more painterly than I usually work and there's more lifelike detail than I usually use, but it was a good exercise. Sometimes it's good to stretch your brain and work on something unfamiliar. I think I might even try painting portraits of my awesome nephews, (Cameron and Alex), just for fun.

Well, say bu-bye to Leta. She's off to be packaged up and sent off to Dooce. I hope she's not horrified that I painted her daughter.