Last Day 'o' Freedom

Minerva Networks made me a good offer ($10/hr above my usual rate) so I will start a short-term QA contract with them tomorrow morning. Pretty much doing the job I should have been doing with Microsoft.

So...

Have a lunch date with one of my Kasenna friends, and an appointment late afternoon to get my nails silk wrapped as the dermatologist suggested. Since it's the 25th, which is a month from my target date for moving, I will do some apartment hunting. I am hoping all I have to do is go back to my #1 choice and they will have a ground floor 2 BR available in the right time frame. But no problems if not, there are lots of places in my price range on CraigsList.

Next step is looking for a moving company which will handle the piano. The last two moves they lied.

This morning's culinary project was mashing the crispy fried onions and scrambled eggbeaters into the chopped liver. It tastes yummy. Yes, I licked the bowl. But the way chopped liver looks, it reminded me of this sick joke:

Child: "Mommy, mommy, may I lick the bowl?"

( Mommy: )

My Gateway recovery disc still has not shown up. Boo, hiss. Maybe tonight. Vista cooperated with me yesterday at Starbucks, so it has gone from crisis to annoyance. I will definitely not be moving to Vista until long after it is out and there are a full set of drivers. SP1, maybe.

Music Review - I'm Not Dead - Pink

Ever since Don't Let Me Get Me, the national anthem of self-depricators world wide, I have loved Pink's music. Iconoclast, party girl, Britney Spears look-unalike, inheritor of semi-porcine nose and figure, she shouts as much as she sings, but it sounds good on her choice of tunes.

One of the things I like most is these are not formula tunes - you can't tell what the song is going to be like until you listen all the way through. The intro may sound like a ballad, but by the time you're a minute in, it may have sprouted a heavy back beat or gone into narrative, or just gotten angry. Pink is a master of the throw-away line - it's not uncommon for the same chorus to have different chatter behind it. U + Ur Hand has some hillarous shout-outs - in some of the songs it's like the heckling at a bad stage play. Clever stuff.

It didn't take long to start loving this album. Let's go through the tracks:

1. Stupid Girls
Maybe if I act like that
Flippin' my blonde hair back
Push up my bra like that
I don't wanna be a Stupid Girl

A funny dig at the gold digger music video models & their clubbing counterparts. I think Pink's jealous, because she got the brains but not the body. If you can't join 'em, beat 'em.

2. Who Knew
Bittersweet torch song, tough and touching all at once.
If someone said three years from now
You'd be long gone
I'd stand up and punch them out


3. Long Way To Happy
Another tough torch song, a bit angrier this time, Pink may be in the next Olympics' torch toss. The words are torch song, but the sound is angry rock.

4. Nobody Knows
A sad ballad, Pink gets to sing all the way through this one, and that rough edge in her voice really sells it. Somtimes it's good not not have Sarah Brightman's vocal cords.

5. Dear Mr. President
This ought to be played every hour on Air America. Girl Next Door sings to The Furher.
Dear Mr. President
Come take a walk with me
Let's pretend we're just two people and
You're not better than me....

What do you feel when you see all the homeless in the street?
Who do you pray for at night before you go to sleep?

How do you sleep while the rest of us cry?
How do you dream when a mother has no chance to say goodbye?
How do you walk with your head held high?
Can you even look me in the eye and tell me why?

It's a quiet, very personal song, not the loud thing I would have expected from Pink.

6. I'm Not Dead
Just floating...
Another (you guessed it) torch song. This time it sounds like a mid-relationship we-almost-broke-up song.

7. 'Cuz I Can
Loud and raucous number which I am completely in love with. It's the ultikmate Po Girl Gets Rich song, and it needs to be played at full volume with God's Own Subwoofer. Those of you who know my taset in music will be saying "well, that's different!" and yeah, the words just cry out for LOUD. Heavy heavy bass that owns the track.
You talk real loud
But you ain't saying nothing cool
I can fit your whole house in my swimming pool
My life's a fantasy
That you're not smart enough to even dream

8. Leave Me Alone (I'm Lonely)
My favorite song on this CD. It's the B side of Don't Let Me Get Me, an album too late.
Go away
Give me a chance to miss you
Say goodbye
It'll make me want to kiss you

It's loud, fast-paced and may take three or four listens to catch all the words and nuances. And completely schizo.

9. U + Ur Hand
Three in a row. This is another loud, fast, insulting song, what every woman wishes she could say to that jerk trying to pick her up in  a bar.
Keep your dink and just give me the money
It's just you and your hand tonight...

I'm not here for your entertainment
You don't really wanna mess with me tonight

10. Runaway
Very sad, soft song which will make it big on the Disney Channel if they have the b alls to play it. Teenager sneaks out the window to run away from home, and doesn't think her parents will even notice.

11. The One That Got Away
Yet another torch song, this one is the ultimate groupie-in-lust song. It's done as a narrative, not sung.

12. I Got Money Now
Just what the title says. But this is a quiet song, the low-key version of 'Cuz I Can.

13. Conversations With My 13 Year Old Self
What the grown-up runaway would tell herself if she had the time machine. Very quiet, semi-narrative.

14. I Have Seen The Rain
Not listed in the TOC, and they tried to hide it by putting a lot of dead air after #13, but it has its own track number so some engineer blew it. This is a tune her father wrote about his Vietnam service, and they sing it in duet. Mediocre for its genre, but sweet to hear father-daughter singing dad's music.

---

Highly recommended. I'll be giving this CD as a gift to several of my non-rock-fan family and friends.Get them to play track 5 first...

Wrapped in Silk

Definitely the highlight of my day was having my fingernails silk wrapped. It took about 40 minutes at a nail care parlor I had passed by many times next to my favorite Pet Club.

I phoned at 10:30 asking for an 11:30 appointment, but they were booked till 3:30, which is when I went. The nail tech was a Vietnamese woman about my age, and she really knew what she was doing. It was fun to watch. It was also fun to be between two very pretty young blonde clients for most of that time.

( For those of you who want the hairy details )

I was out of there by 4:15. All this cost a grand total of $30, and I am to return in 2 weeks for a touch-up, for $20. I was expecting to pay maybe $45-50. The best news is from 3 feet away they look the same, very natural. But up close there are no surface ridges or splits to get caught on things, and the nails feel protected.

The other highlight of the day was lunch with She Who Must Not Be Named, who tells me the old place is falling apart. I got to introduce her to Shoreline Park and Lakeside Cafe, and show her where SF Bay was (she's new to this part of the geography).

Went to see the #1 choice apartment complex, they have nothing all next month. Foo. Visited one new place, they have two available but they are small and have 2 full bathrooms, which I don't want because it steals space. But it's a good location and very nice facilities, so it is down on my list. I have about 6 places to look at Saturday.

Tomorrow 9am pick up package at apartment office, then at 10 start new job in Santa Clara. See Gilligan's Island - The Musical.

Oy!

There is a lovely big photo of Mr. and Mrs. _oy_ dancing at the Browncoat Ball on page 18 of the current copy of SFSF and they published some photos I took at SiliCon. iamradar and laragoth and makellan are in there too. And others who may be lurking here but I either don't know their LJ handles, or am exhibiting symptoms of early onset seniorhood.