Happy Birthday Mark!

The Big 3-0!

Those Silly Interwebs

So Mark passed me this link for an opinion article back in 1995 in Newsweek, "HYPE ALERT: WHY CYBERSPACE ISN'T, AND WILL NEVER BE, NIRVANA," by Clifford Stoll. Stoll was so sure that the internet would never amount to anything (sounds like somebody's parents I know!), and who would ever buy anything off the internet, etc. Oh Stoll...I hope you look back at old articles and smile!

And Now from the Brain of Mark...

So, in Mark's spare time, he has begun to draw his own comic. As usual for this blog, you'll see them accidentally, flukily, fortuitously, impromptuly, improvisionally, impulsively, incidentally, infrequently, irregularly, occasionally, oddly, offhandedly, randomly, serendipitously, spontaneously, unexpectedly, unplanned, unpremeditated, or, in other words, erratically.

Mark said I should entitle the comic, so I’ve come up with the working title of The Quirky Dreamers (yes, I’m stealing the title from Naruto).

This is Where the Magic Happens

This is my little computer nook, which is also our media center (printers, scanners, etc., galore). From here, I am posting to our blog to give you a little tour of our new home.

In the living room...

Mark multi-tasks (the tv's on in the background), while Neko looks on from one of the cats' favorite perches. Sometimes all three cats sit on top of the sofa, and it's so cute you just want to scream.

Downstairs...

Down in the basement we have lots of storage, a laundry area, and a walkway into the backyard. We've also set up our theater room, which, again, is a bit messy as we try to finish sorting/organizing everything.

On the Main Floor

Here's Niles on one of his many beds that we have for him around the house. Notice the bell, which some little trickster put on his collar to annoy both Niles and me and Mark.

Our Big Backyard

If you glance out the kitchen windows, you get a view of our huge backyard, which to me seems to go back very far. Niles loves to run/frolick back there, and I am really looking forward to summer and having some great barbeque parties!

On the Main Floor

Around the corner is our Ikea-fied and red-ified kitchen. I love our kitchen. We have so much space in the kitchen, as well as a pantry. In addition, we've put some appliances that we don't use often in the basement.

On the Main Floor

Here's the living room. We're trying to make it homey, with minimal furniture. Unfortunately, in this picture it is a bit untidy because we're still sorting and organizing. I have managed to get some photos out, but Neko likes to get on top of the cube-thingey piece of furniture and knock everything over. Another piece to note is in the center of the cube-thingey piece of furniture is a quilted pillow my Nana made for me for our wedding.

On the Main Floor

Between the guest bedroom and formal dining room is a closet where we keep our coats, etc., as well as this nifty laundry shoot! Unfortunately, everything is dropped off in the middle of the basement floor (where our bike exercise machine currently is), but at least it beats walking downstairs everytime you have dirty clothes!

On the Main Floor

Also in that area is the formal dining room, which we have purposely placed in a room with a door so we can keep the cats away from the breakables, and also because we have some friends who've done this and we liked the idea.

On the Main Floor

If you go towards the bathroom and turn right, you'd go to our guest bedroom (almost finished).

Hello, and Welcome to Our Home

So, when you enter from the front door, you come into our living room, facing the bathroom (where Ceilidh was just grooming herself).

Our Little Nook in the Master Suite

There is this great hallway/nook area next to our bedroom, up on the second floor. I like it because it is away from the main living area, so if people are over, I can get away by coming upstairs. I've been setting up my scrapbooking stuff up here, as well as all of our books in these great built-in shelves (there are a lot of these in the basement as well!). Here's Octavius looking on disapprovingly at Mark's collection of computer books.

The Walk-in Closet

So, here is our large walk-in closet, up on the second floor. Right now we are still trying to put clothes away (and also, hopefully, sort out some items to give away), hence the two large piles of clothes. It is so nice, though, to have all this room for our clothes, and it doesn't end up making a mess in our bedroom!

Missing My Blog

So, I've been really wanting to blog lately, but I was going to blog about our new home that we've moved into, but as we still have some stuff boxed up, I haven't been able to unpack our digital camera to take pictures. (This is probably for the best, because the house is looking a lot cleaner, neater, and lived in now then when we first moved in). So, I've posted a few photos for you to take a gander at in the meanwhile.

Remember 1999?

Here I am in some wilderness area in Scotland. I love this picture because the tree is just so cool and enormous, and I had gotten pretty good at setting up my camera and using the timer to get pictures of myself while in Scotland (in case I was by myself, as in this instance). ...And yes, I am wearing a do-rag.

Three Peas in a Pod

Here's a photo of Neko, Octavius and Ceilidh last fall at our apartment. They are clearly enjoying having the blinds open and watching the wildlife. I simply called their names to get their attention so I could take the picture. :)

Halp!

The old head-in-the-shoe bit. Octavius is so loving and playful, that we can even stick shoes on his head, and he thinks we're playing with him (which we are, but not all cats would think that).