Toy Soldiers (that aren't)

Toy Soldiers from Alta Media Productions on Vimeo.

The catch here is that those aren't miniatures, nor is that computer animation or the like - that's film shot of an actual parade lineup and such in Paris; just shot with angles, film speeds, and edited with other effects (the focus, I think?) that makes it look like stop motion animation of miniatures. (The overall scheme/system is called tilt/shift). Pretty spiffy, eh?

Really nifty site

Go browse for a bit at the CIA's World Factbook. It has a fair bit of interesting info; I spent a while just looking at information for France's possessions in North America (Clipperton Island, and Saint Pierre and Miquelon) as well as at Greenland's info. Nifty stuff. It'd be an excellent resource for a geography class.

Just a silly little thing

Last year sometime I lost track of a cassette that I just LOVED - it had Victorian carols on it (A Victorian Christmas, by Robin Petrie). I bought it back when I was in college, at a shop that had a lot of Victorian type decor and such for sale (it has since closed).

Today I found the album on Amazon. YAY! I hate the idea of buying it *again*, but at the same time, I'd buy it on CD this time, so it's not necessarily a bad thing. Plus, they have some used for sale. I may consider getting one of the used copies once we have a little extra available (they say they have some available from $1.51, so it'll depend on how many are available at what price and what condition).

Of course, they had a couple of recommendations. The music from the Middle Ages looks nifty. I'm somewhat amused to see that the used ones are available at twice the cost of new, heh.

Anyhow, it was just nice to see that I'll be able to replace the Victorian Christmas album - I was afraid it'd be one of those things that never made it to CD release and would be impossible to track down.

Seven Quick Takes Friday - IV

1. It's a bit after seven here. Calla is asleep, and has been for an hour and a half. Will she stay asleep all night? Will she wake and be up until midnight? Stay tuned and find out!

2. The boy is off with the hubby's folks on a car tour, and apparently, everything has finally *clicked* re. potty training - he's doing a FANTASTIC job there, and we'll be putting him in his Thomas underwear when he gets home. YAY!!! Now for Calla....

3. On Wednesday, I went to a meeting of room moms for the elementary school that Patrick attends. I found out I'm responsible for arranging 4 parties (Fall/harvest, Christmas, Valentine's Day, and End of the Year) of about 45 mins each - each with a snack, a game, and a craft - as well as sending out notice for Teacher Appreciation week (with suggestions for the kiddos on what to consider bringing, etc.). Hooboy. Wish me luck - at least I have a small class to supply; fewer than 10 kiddos. I do have to find out from their teacher what specific limitations the kiddos have, though, as it's the PPCD/special ed pre-K -- I don't want to go in with something prepared that half the kiddos wouldn't have the manual dexterity to do, for instance.

4. I think it's time to do *something* with the 10 or 12 single socks that have been unmatched for over a year. I just have that "As soon as I pitch them, I'll find the other" fear, so they're back in a small drawer. Heck, I don't even imagine that I'd ever wear some of them again if I DID find the match, they're so hopelessly out-of-date, LOL.

5. Less than one week until the official start of fall!! :) I had a caramel apple cider from Starbucks the other day, and have a box of gingerbread spice K-Cups for my Keurig. Bring on the season!

6. The hubby turns 35 this year (near the end of the month). I should do SOMETHING for his birthday (other than a card). Hmm....

7. I've found it amusing that I can load/install my old Windows 95 stuff on my Vista machine. The XP wouldn't load them; anything I really wanted (my Moraff CD-ROM games), I had to force by just copying the files over and hoping it would work (it did). It's been fun to drag out some of the older software and play it again - Dilbert, Monty Python, Connections (LOVE James Burke), etc. Yay for some backwards compatibility!

Mathematical Love

see more Funny Graphs

Only one minor little itsy-bitsy complaint - i is not a variable (the square root of negative 1). Maybe if they had used a capital I, but...that's way overthinking a cute little joke.

Biscotti experimentation

For the past several months, I've made biscotti for every church potluck. I'm expected to do it; there will be some very unhappy folks if I don't. ;) And I do like making them - they're fairly inexpensive, and I never have to wonder what I'm going to make THIS time.

I decided to play a bit with the flavors for tonight's singing & fellowship night. I typically make vanilla & cinnamon (itself a change I made from the Betty Crocker recipe that was for orange & almond using orange zest and finely chopped toasted almonds - I've actually never made that recipe, LOL - too much work!), but decided to try orange & cocoa (think those dark chocolate oranges out at Christmas time), orange & almond (using extracts for the flavors - remember that "too much work" above for the orange zest & toasted almonds), cinnamon & white chocolate (drizzled on afterward), and cocoa & cinnamon. The recipe in the cookbook makes two "loaves", so I doubled it (usually do anyhow!), and then made one "loaf" in each flavor.

The cinnamon & white chocolate was the big winner, with the others fairly equally sampled behind. Taking the leftovers to the study tomorrow night. Dunno that I'll stop making the cinnamon & vanilla - those are widely liked - and though everyone seemed to like the white chocolate ones, it adds a bit more cost to the recipe. Maybe for special occasions.

By the way, anyone know how much of a change needs to be done to a recipe before you can consider it "yours"? Not that I'm planning on starting up Cheryl's Biscotti Boutique or anything like that, but it's one of those "good to know" type of things, in case I were to submit the recipe for a fundraising cookbook or something like that.

Sonic and DonorsChoose.org

Those of you with Sonic in your area:

Through the month of September, Sonic is partnering with DonorsChoose.org in a promotion Sonic has called "Limeades for Learning" - it allows Sonic customers who purchase a drink (except Wacky Pack meal drinks and premium coffee-based drinks) to vote for the project they most want to see Sonic fund. Sonic will be donating over half a million dollars to the projects receiving the most votes.

SO! Is that car pickup line at school hot while you wait (cripe, ours is!)? Go get something to drink on your way there -- heck, remember, 2 to 4 pm is Sonic's happy hour, with slushes and soft drinks 1/2 price, so get an inexpensive way to cool off and do some good at the same time.

(And if you don't know about DonorsChoose.org, PLEASE go take a look! It's a great program, since every little bit literally helps - you may only be able to afford to give $5 toward a teacher's need, but your funds join with other donors' gifts to complete the project's funding - and you can see how much remains in the projects, so you can even look for a project that only has $10 left, for instance, and give to that project to complete the funding for it.)