Crafty Halloween!

About a month ago I deactivated my facebook, hence the “increased” activity here at raeannisrude.com.

Because my obsession with facebook was so time consuming I’ve had a lot of time for other activities like cooking, pinterest, multi-media projects, and crafts. Today I made spirit jugs:

The pinterest item that inspired me linked me to a blog that linked to a tutorial on eighteen25.blogspot.com.

Pointers for the project:

1. Read the instructions first.
   They are located here at eighteen25.com.
   I didn’t, but now that I have it occurs to me that sharpies are a better long term bet than construction paper and that a hole in the back of the jug would be more serviceable than a hole in the bottom.
2. How to remove labels from milk jugs.
   Fill the jug with hot water. As hot as it comes out of the tap is fine.
   Wait 10 minutes or more if you can stand it.
   Try to peel the label, if it does not come easily. Wait longer!
3. Remove the date stamp with nail polish remover.
4. I had to spray paint the caps because we only drink vitamin D milk ‘roun here and that cap is red.

Big thanks to all my milk jug contributors!

Two more photographs because my iPhone is rad and has a bunch of settings:

 

A Slide Family Story

I am currently in the process of creating a video project of my grandparents narrating our family slides, 1961 – 1973. I guess in 1973 the slide camera broke and they switched to photographs?

Below is the first four steps of the process, and a sampling of the slides.

1. Scan the slides. Discover the scanner I bought is a piece of sh*t that arbitrarily chooses which images to import to iPhoto. Hack directly into the file structure each time I scan a slide magazine. Pack the scanner back up for return. I’d have kept it if it worked.
2. Create photo albums (not smart albums) in iPhoto and review the slides for quality and chronology. I’m not a photoshop wiz, or an iPhoto wiz for that matter, so I just pressed the enhance button and if I thought it looked better I kept it.
3. Test software and hardware for expected functionality.
1. Confirm: iPhoto albums import to iMovie in their intended chronology
2. Figure out how easy it will be to change “clip time” for each image depending on how long my grandparents’ commentary is for each image. Result: relax, I own a Mac.
3. Explore iPhone’s stopwatch functionality. Each time my grandparents use the apple remote to advance the slideshow I track the action as a lap, so I can easily match up audio with video later. Stopwatch does not export the lap data at all, so I download the AnyCourse app, which allows me to export the data to PDF.
4. Figure out how to use my camcorder. Download home movies I shot in May 2010. Cringe at that thought of reviewing them because I hate home movies.
5. Purchase cord to hook the computer up to the TV.
6. Ask what happened to magazine 7, since I have magazines 1-6 and 8-10. No one knows.
4. Introductory meeting with my grandparents
1. Review the slides that were loose in the box and place them approximately in the correct magazines.
2. Plug my ears and say “stop talking stop talking save it for the video” each time my grandparents launch into a story.

More to come after Monday’s meeting.

My second cousin once removed and my great aunt visiting my grandparents in Hawaii — we can see that my love for yellow shoes runs deep.

My grandmother and great grandmother at an air show in the mid 60s.

My mother sliding down the driveway face first on her skateboard. This did not end well. Literally, she scraped her face on the concrete 3 seconds later.

My grandmother at the Great Buddha of Kamakura.

crabbilyeverafter.com Teaser

The Victorian Novel Joke

I’ve adamantly made this point in many conversations to much laughter and agreement.

Nothing is better than a victorian novel. No? 800 pages of boring? Bullshit. 720 pages of ankle showing and 80 pages of shit hitting the fan. Allow me to demonstrate:

*victorian novel spoiler alert*

Jayne Eyre: Jayne’s an orphan. She is an unhappy and bewildered governess to a snot-nosed child. +720 pages and BAM! we find out about Rochester’s secret attic-dwelling syphilis-crazed wife. She burns down the mansion just before she jumps to her death and Rochester loses his eyesight and hand trying to save her.

That’s not boring, that’s masterful setup.

Raeann is an editor.

An actual email I replied to and sent to hr@macys.com and marketing@macys.com It can’t hurt.

Dear Macy’s,

Please hire me to edit your web content. I had NO IDEA what message this email was trying to convey the first time I read it. I can help! Please see my revision below.

Best,
Raeann

Original email:

My revisions:
(I did not control for design or formatting. Just content. It was difficult using gmail and only one tiny laptop monitor.)

Raeann Is Not Rude at Work

Yesterday approximately 25 of my coworkers and I gathered for a staff meeting. The team-building exercise after the meeting was nothing short of experiencing my own personal hell.

And not because I hate team building exercises, I am very good at Two Truths and a Lie.

I hate chewing gum.  Just thinking about it makes me want to vomit and sends shivers of revulsion up my spine simultaneously. I don’t allow it in my house, and even go as far as to prohibit my husband from chewing it. My brother-in-law will be moving in with us soon, and despite my best efforts I will undoubtedly end up asking him to keep gum out of my house and his mouth as well.

Yesterday’s team building exercise was Who Can Blow the Biggest Bubble?

FML.

Please Remove the Fashion at the California State Fair Photo Gallery

To Whom It May Concern at fox40 News:

Your decision to feature the Fashion at the California State Fair
photo gallery at
http://www.fox40.com/news/photo_gallery/ktxl-fairpics,0,5573110.photogallery
is appalling.

Admittedly, I’m not surprised, your parent company isn’t exactly a
bastion of integrity. I wonder what you’re trying to accomplish by
featuring photos of overweight, poorly dressed people with thinly
veiled descriptions in the captions. To alienate your viewership,
perhaps? Roseville might be the one of the thinnest cities in the
country, but the rest of the greater Sacramento is much in line with
America: populated with overweight people who have feelings and brains
and can recognize when they’re the butt of a mean joke.

Additionally, it’s shoddy journalism. You don’t identify your subjects
with photo captions. Perhaps you’re concerned the individuals in the
photos would object to being featured in such a piece? And you don’t
identify the journalist either. A fashionista? Doubtful. Ignorant,
classist and privileged? I’d bet the farm on it.

I sincerely hope you decide to remove the gallery and exercise better
judgment when considering future content.

Sincerely,
Raeann
Orangevale, CA

Speaking in English

This afternoon I read an article on feministing calling out the official Twitter account of AP Style, @apstylebook, for using the term illegal immigrant. Usually it bothers me that the feminist community advocates for every disenfranchised group around, but this time I’ll give it a pass because Miriam makes a great point: “People are not illegal, actions are.”

Fresh off that indignation, I began to browse facebook and then failed to say nothing at all when I didn’t have anything polite to say:

What is the matter with me?

Thematically Relevant Literature Quote

Becka over at failuresofapuppyraiser.com recommended I read Expecting Adam. Well, she didn’t reccomend it so much as she didn’t give me the option to decline and plunked the novel into the trunk of my car.

I like her style.

I started reading this afternoon I am about 25 percent through it. I think that Becka knew I would be interested in the book because I am passionately interested in the politics of pregnancy, and perhaps she’s observed my voyeuristic interest in her work with severely developmentally challenged children.

I’m not sure she observed how hilariously callous the book’s author is:

“As I watched the television special, I kept imaging what the woman’s fiancé must have thought as he plummeted past his beloved, perhaps even seeing, as he went by, the angels who were gently transporting her to solid ground. I know what I would have thought. I would have thought, “So, what am I, bat guano?” It would have been the last thing to go through my head, if you don’t count the rocks at the bottom of the cliff.”  (emphasis mine)

This could just be a mistakenly literal interpretation on my part, but I don’t think the fiancé was thinking about the rocks.

-Raeann Is Rude

People Should Not Give Me Beer

Me: “You only say that because of your own insecurities.”

-silence from the group-

Me: “Go ahead and pretend like I didn’t just say that. But I meant it.”

My Husband: “Don’t hold back now, Rae.”