krisalis

A tag from al

7 things that scare me: 1. Severely enclosed spaces, especially ones that are dark. Hello, claustrophobia! 2. Huge crowds of people all around me. Probably related to the previous point. 3. Knee injuries. 4. Big ships in the ocean. Specifically, imagining myself being very close to one. 5. Horror movies. 6. Things that go bump in the night. 7. The Superman ride at Six Flags in Dallas.

7 things that I like most: 1. Eating 2. Sleeping (esp. napping) 3. Going on holiday 4. Riding my bike 5. Watching tv from the comfort of the sofa, snuggled under a duvet 6. Puppies, especially labradors 7. Taking a long hot shower or bath after working out

7 important things in my room: 1. the bed 2. the duvet 3. the pillows 4. the curtains 5. my wardrobe, containing all my clothes and shoes! 6. my hairdryer 7. an alarm clock

7 random facts about me: 1. I wear my watch on my right wrist. 2. I mix up my left from my right. I have to look at my hands and check which thumb and first finger make an “L” to be sure.
3. I make excellent banana bread with chocolate chips and walnuts 4. I sleep on my tummy, with my arms tucked in by my side 5. I can cartwheel 6. I don’t function well if I’m really hungry. Did I say I don’t function well? Sorry, I meant I don’t function at all. 7. I used to be scared of swimming in the sea because I thought the fish might eat me. Now I eat them. Ha!

7 things I plan to do before I die: 1. Complete a half iron man 2. Run a marathon. One day…. 3. Own a house 4. Knit something other than a scarf 5. Live in Australia 6. Learn how to make stuff – furniture, clothes – I’m not really sure exactly what…but, y’know….stuff in general. 7. Grow old with Mark

7 things I can do: 1. Type pretty fast, without looking at the keys 2. Block out external noises, including entire conversations, whilst watching TV. This is a self-defense technique learned from growing up with 3 noisy sisters. 3. Count to 10 in English, French, Spanish, Italian and Mandarin. 4. Run 10k 5. Touch my nose with my tongue 6. Install WordPress! 7. Sing all the words to Don McClean’s ‘American Pie‘. Useful, huh.

7 things I can’t do: 1. Talk without using my hands. 2. Leg raises. My abs just don’t work that way. 3. Get MoveableType 3.2 to work 4. Remember passwords to all the stuff I have access to on the ‘puter – frequent flyer programs, banking information, weblog applications… 5. Sight read music 6. Lie convincincly 7. Stand the cold

7 things I say the most: 1. “Hello, this is Kristen” 2. “YES. I have fed the dog.” 3. “I’ll check and get back to you” 4. “What do you want for lunch/dinner?” 5. “So, what’s the plan?” 6. “tall Americano with steamed soy please” 7. “Rosie, SIT!”

1. Celebrity Crushes: Pah don’t feel like doing this part. I can’t remember which celebrities I like. It changes all the time, and it has more to do with the roles they play in movies/on tv than the actual actor/person themselves.
2. 2.
3. 4.
4. 6.
7.

7 people who could do this: I know this is really really long, but if you’re free/seeking a time-wasting activity… ) It’s taken me a few chunks of time here and there to get through the whole thing, but every now and then I need a brain break, and this has been a welcome foreground distraction while my processors are working on more complex issues in the background. 1. Andrea 2. Tricia 3. Jeff 4. Kris 5. j-a 6. Rob 7. Troy

Ps Yeah, so I’m back to WordPress….

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Recently finished reading: The Paradox Of Choice by Barry Schwartz It’s got me thinking. I think I’m being too much of a maximizer in the house-hunting. Time to assess what it would take to satisfice…

Now reading: The Rescue by Nicholas Sparks I think one of our Houston evacuees left this behind. I picked up this book last night before bed and read a couple of chapters. And a couple more. And then a couple more. Not something I think I would normally have chosen to read, but the story has totally drawn me in.

Listening to: Coldplay I’ve pretty much been obsessively listening to Coldplay ever since the concert on Sunday. ‘Fix You’ from X&Y is my new favourite. The lyrics remind me of how Mark treats me when I’ve had a rough day – when I’m so darn tired but I just can’t sleep, when the tears come streaming down my face, when I lose something I can’t replace, Mark knows how to fix me.

Future listening: The Decemberists The CDs are in the mail! Wheee! ACL has a lot to answer for…

Wanting : this t-shirt I know I’m (theoretically) heading into autumn, not spring, but the green leaf print is so pretty.

Currently cooking: Dinner Mince meat with onions in gravy, mashed potatoes, steamed carrots and cabbage. Old school Grandma cooking – simple and tasty.

Which reminds me…I should go make sure dinner isn’t burning….

Well, we finally got around to seeing some live music in Austin. It only took us 18 months of living here.

Mark, myself and about a hundred thousand of our closest friends decended upon Zilker Park en masse for Austin City Limits Festival.

We had tickets to the 3rd day (Sunday), which was blisteringly hot, with temperatures above 108F. After enduring 2 days of intensive human traffic and hot hot sun, Zilker Park had transformed into a dust bowl, throwing up great clouds of sand and grit into the air as people traipsed from stage to stage.

We slapped on plenty of sunscreen, took plenty of water, wore hats and sunglasses and dressed in preparation for meltdown temperatures. We took along a blanket to sit on, which was nice early on in the day, but completely useless for the big name acts later in the evening.

Mark and I saw The Decemberists, Franz Ferdinand and Coldplay.

The Decemberists were awesome. Several people had told me they were good, but I had no idea how much I was going to enjoy their music. They reminded me a little bit of The Whitlams, and a little bit of Beautiful South (but in a good way). Initially, we were seated towards the back of the crowd, happy to sit on the ground and head-bob away to the music from the comfort of our blanket, but as the set went on, the music gradually crept into my soul and I had to stand up and clap and dance about like a loon. It was great. I think my favourite songs were ‘This Sporting Life’, ‘Both Go Down Together’ and ‘Chimbly Sweep’. Am I allowed 3 favourites?

Franz Ferdinand were….OK….I mean, they were good and all, but I just didn’t enjoy their set as much as The Decemberists. It was mega hot by this time, and we were really far back from the stage. The crowd around us didn’t seem into the music, and they seemed overheated and tired. I think a lot of them were saving spaces and passing time before Coldplay. ‘Take Me Out’ was the only tune that got the crowd going at all. My favourite from their set was ‘Darts Of Pleasure’ – something about hearing ‘ich heisse super fantastique’ really loud with lots of guitar and drums out in the open air made me want to jump about.

Coldplay. I have to say I was cautiously optimistic about seeing Coldplay live. Before the concert, I had said that I would be happy if they at least played ‘The Scientist’. Well, they played it, and they played it well, and I was ridiculously thrilled. Chris Martin was funny and personable and got the crowd going. The drummer was amazing. The Johnny Cash tributes were fun and well received by the crowd. ‘Speed of Sound’ was ace. ‘Clocks’ was ace. Coldplay were ace.

All in all, given the extreme heat, dust and my general discomfort in huge crowds, ACL and the concert experience treated me very well. I’m already looking forward to next year!

More photos of our ACL day are over here on Flickr.

I’ve been out in California all this week while Texas has been going through the mill with evacuations and gas shortages and panic buying of bottled water and other goodies.

My sister’s university in Houston cancelled classes and she evacuated to Austin with some of her friends. My parents have 10 people staying with them, and it sounds like all our neighbours have out of town guests too. The combination of people fleeing the hurricane and flocking to Austin City Limits means Austin is at maximum capacity, bursting at the seams from all the extra people.

I’m headed back to Austin today to join the fray.

Our Houston evacuees have all gone home. I miss them. Having everyone here was actually pretty fun. Not that I’d wish another evacuation on them, or another hurricane on the poor battered southern coast. But the overall full-house living experience was like Thanksgiving or Christmas, without any of the pressures or expectations.

I think I may be being punished for finding some sort of enjoyment in the hurricane experience….

• The MT 3.2 upgrade broke my ability to post camera phone pictures via Flickr. Not impressed. It may really be WordPress time. No, really this time. Maybe.

• My car got a flat tire this morning. Ran over a nail.

• My air conditioning is broken. Being in Texas in September where temperatures are still soaring above 100F (that’s somewhere above 35C, otherwise known as bloody hot) with no air-conditioning is no fun.

Moveable Type is back up and running.

I’m all upgraded to version 3.2.

I still may switch over to WordPress, but for now, at least this is working again, and I can transition at my own pace.

Lessons learned: - Just because upgrading has always been easy in the past doesn’t mean it will always be easy. I got slack about reading all the instructions and checking on all the required modules etc. It would have served me well to check out the support forums before proceeding with the upgrade. Forewarned is forearmed etc etc

• It’s better to be patient and than to rush on in. My webhost was able to install the updated software needed, but by the time they did that (today), I had already tried out a zillion other fixes of varying levels of idiocy. I made a lot of this mess myself.

• Moveable Type may be complicated, but I pretty much know how to navigate it. WordPress was incredibly easy to install and get up and running, but it’s still a foreign interface, and that makes it less appealing to me. Familiar is good.

Moveable Type is back up and running.

I’m all upgraded to version 3.2.

I still may switch over to WordPress, but for now, at least this is working again, and I can transition at my own pace.

Lessons learned: - Just because upgrading has always been easy in the past doesn’t mean it will always be easy. I got slack about reading all the instructions and checking on all the required modules etc. It would have served me well to check out the support forums before proceeding with the upgrade. Forewarned is forearmed etc etc

• It’s better to be patient and than to rush on in. My webhost was able to install the updated software needed, but by the time they did that (today), I had already tried out a zillion other fixes of varying levels of idiocy. I made a lot of this mess myself.

• Moveable Type may be complicated, but I pretty much know how to navigate it. WordPress was incredibly easy to install and get up and running, but it’s still a foreign interface, and that makes it less appealing to me. Familiar is good.

I broke Movable Type. I tried upgrading to v3.2, but turns out my server doesn’t have all the necessary widgets to make that work, and when I tried to downgrade back to a previous version, everything went squinky….

So after several hours of fiddling and not being able to fix MT, I tried out WordPress. They are totally not kidding about being able to install WP in 5 mins! I was SO impressed! And the ease of importing! Amazing! I made more progress in 15 minutes with WordPress than I ever thought was possible.

Fortunately, I had exported all my MT entries before attempting the upgrade, and uploading that info to WordPress was super simple. Of course, I still need to figure out how to navigate WP….and I’m using WP templates at the moment until I can get that figured out…so come on over here, ’cause that’s where the actions probably going to be for the next little while…

Trying out WordPress!