In retrospect, perhaps boxing up all of my toy making supplies was a stupid idea. Granted, they're in labeled boxes, and I think I even might know where those boxes are. But that where would be behind other boxes. Boxes not currently at the head of the unpacking list.

But I am so desperate to make more toys. And to paint too, and while I have a lot of my painting supplies out, a lot of them aren't, including the canvases. Plus I need a drop cloth to protect the carpeting.

So I am thinking that I will stop by Michaels this afternoon. I'm not usually inclined to by art supplies from them, but for the toy making stuff it will probably be fine. Plus, it's only a few blocks from my house! Not to mention that I haven't ever been to this particular Michaels. For all I know, it may be great.

And it's on the way home (sort of) from the hair salon. That's right. After years of cutting my own hair, I've decided to let a professional have a go at it. I don't know that it's something I'm going to make a habit of, but my hair is at an awkward growing out point that could use some help. Also it's cheap.

Enough Already.

Alright, seriously, this is getting ridiculous. So, earlier this week there was the people gunned down, one dead, in front of our old apartment. Then tonight we were going to the grand opening of the Panorama. Except we never got out of the car, because on the same block as the Panorama, at the other end, was a dead body. Covered by a white sheet. Surrounded by police. So we turned around and went back to Pasadena.

There better not be more dead bodies tomorrow. I've really had my fill, thank you.

Dodged Bullet

We went back to the old house last night to get some stuff, and discovered that a 14 year old had been shot in front of our old house Wednesday night. Apparently he fired into a crowd of people in some gang related thing, hitting two people. When the police responded, he turned the gun on them and they shot him.

Needless to say, Charlie and I are both freaked out, Charlie to the point where he vomited in his sleep from nerves last night. We just moved out on Saturday. We had originally been planning to look for a place that started August 1, but some lucky bit of instinct and intuition told us we need to get the hell out of there, as soon as we could.

And obviously, we're fine. Shaken, but unharmed. But this wasn't a surprise. It was a long time coming, and up until this incident the police more or less ignored the constant cries for help from the community.

Our front neighbor is terrified, and is trying to get out of her lease. She has six and a half months left, and the landlords aren't sympathetic to her justifiable fear. I've told her to get a lawyer, and that if necessary we will help her find one. Because we may have had our issues with her, but no one should have to live with that, and as a young single woman she's especially vulnerable.

We'll still have to go back, to get the rest of our stuff and to clean up at least a bit. We're going in the mornings only, and bringing friends. And for today I'm making Charlie stay home from work, and we're going to spend time together. I feel so, so lucky.

Oh Internets, I Missed You So!

And I'm back. Nothing deeply exciting here, at least nothing that would be deeply exciting to other people. I'm totally in love with how I can walk my dog with out feeling uncomfortable or endangered. My new place is even bigger than I first thought, now that there's furniture in it for scale. Um, Trader Joe's has started selling dried mangosteen, and that's pretty awesome. That's something that would be exciting to other people. Attention people who are not me! Trader Joe's has dried mangosteen. Go get some. You'll probably like it!

Not much art stuff getting done the past few days, what with the moving. A little sketching. And I have plans to make little diorama type sets to photograph the dolls I make in. That should be fun.

Oh, and we have a Wii now, so I will now have to allocate time to that. It's a great big wonderful time suck. Even just sitting around making miis is deeply amusing.

The Moving is Rotting My Brain.

Tomorrow is the big moving day! Hooray! I am so ready to be done with this. It's been 24/7 work for about two weeks, and a lot of work for the two weeks before that, and I am absolutely spent. I was starting to hyperventilate this afternoon when the woman from the moving company called to tell me they had to change the time frame for the pick-up from the 11am-2pm she told me earlier to 7am-9am. Which is bullshit really. Yesterday she tried to get me to change the day from Saturday to Monday. It's too late to do anything now, but needless to say, I am not hiring these people again.

There was also a panic earlier today when I realized my credit card was over the limit, and how did it get over the limit? I mainly just buy groceries, and for two people. A bit of thought and some conversations with Charlie (but not looking at my transactions online, because Capital One was being a butt today), and we realized that I had booked two plane tickets, a hotel, and a rental car. And those are all expensive. Mystery solved, although I am still waiting for the payment I made on my card to clear.

Now I am kind of half packing, half chilling. My brain is mostly shut down. And in about four hours I'm heading out to see a puppet show and eat Indian food. Which I thought was going to be what I did yesterday afternoon, until I realized that the fact that every email and invitation to the puppet show said July 13, and Friday, and that those were good signs that showing up on Thursday, July 12 was going to get me a lot of staring at nothing. Because I'm a genius like that.

The stuff dreams are made of.

I had a dream last night that I was waiting to buy a bus pass. Really. I am so boring.

I am at the worst bit of packing right now. The time when all of the easy to pack, easy to catagorize things are done, (books) and we are left with the difficult (cast iron pans) and the odd (knick-knacks). Plus I've entirely run out of patience for this, not to mention energy. I hate moving. Hate hate hate. Before I came to LA, I lived in the same place for six years. And I hate packing most of all. It ties in to my other big hatred, putting things away. If you want laundry washed, dried, and folded I'm your woman. If you want that laundry to live in drawers instead (neatly folded) in the laundry basket, that would be a job for someone else. Left to my own devices, I keep my home clean in the sense that it's sanatary, but it's always cluttered. So the fact that I hate packing should not be surprising.

That said, it's worth it. I hate our old neighborhood. I don't feel safe here. It keeps getting worse, and the police have only recently gotten interested, and then only barely.

Hey! I am not dead, nor have I given up on blogging. I'm just super busy, with the trying to move very quickly (I hate our old neighborhood. I hate it. I'm so tired of firecrackers all the time, and graffiti, and kids breaking in to houses, and constant, constant noise), and also the working with Pete on some stop-motion stuff. (Speaking of Pete and stop-motion, check out this spot he did on his own a week or so ago. It's awesome.)

Also, it's hot. Actually, that's the main hang up against real content today. I've been working on moving stuff at home, packing boxes and calling utilities. But honestly, the packing and dealing with utilities is not holding me back. I could find time. But I can not deal with heat. I just can't. I am not a hot weather person. I'm more of a brisk to cold weather person. (I know. I moved to Southern California. I'm a genius.) Fortunately, the new apartment has central air, but until then, expect me to be a little less comprehensible than usual.

Ah well. Back the box mines for me!