For Starters...

This is going to be a week of starters for me. At least...that's my goal.

Pictured above is a somewhat spread out stack of 5"x5" squares of fabric. It doesn't look like a lot, but pictured there is well over 100 squares! Making a quilt? No. Just a skirt, with nine tiers of different colors. I'm hoping to get it finished within the next couple of weeks, I'll try to keep you posted on that. I'm actually rather excited that I've gotten this far with my progress! What remains to be done with the inevitable extras is soon to come after this project is finished.

Next on the agenda: moving preparations. So far the goal is still October 1st. And this weekend I will be picking up a couple of plastic totes to pack away all the winter clothes that I have decided to keep. Along with a few desktop items and things I know I can truly cope without for the next few months are going to start finding themselves packed away.

During this whole process, I will be working on lessening the clutter that I have help onto for so many years. Pathetic, I know, but there comes a time where its okay for me to get rid of some of those notes from high school, and maybe start putting those pictures into an album.

Along with all of that! I have been browsing ideas on what/how I would like to decorate my upcoming apartment.

Colors have been chosen for each room, and I think I'm ready to start purchasing small things here and there to start furnishing. I mention small, because I do not want to go overboard and have to store some of my stuff away because I will not have the room for it.

Mostly it has been a matter of looking for ways to create space for my cluttered areas, i.e. the craft/sewing area and kitchen. Not saying that my kitchen will be mega cluttered, but I do want to start recycling, and I do not want that to start overflowing everywhere at random times when certain wastes are in heavier use than normal.

So! I'm open to ideas if you all have had the experience of living in small quarters and had to come up with clever ways to use your space wisely. I'm on a shoe-string budget for real, so any tips and tricks of the trade are welcome!

Thoughts and Questions!

Alright, this is spurred by the previous post, along with a few other factors: The World After Humans, and Fall Out 3 (in specific).

Alright, I was watching the show The World After Humans (TWAH) with FDR last night, and something occurred to me as they hit the "200 years after humans" point. It was fairly fascinating. Vegetation everywhere, animals doing the natural order of things, etc. Now this may not be very question spurring to most of you out there, but it was to me.

I got to run "co-pilot" (which means I got to read the strategy guide out loud at crucial points) to FDR while he spent hours playing Fall Out 3. Now! A short background of the game: 200 years after nuclear fallout in the DC area. Humans have survived in underground vaults. (aka GINORMOUS bunkers.)

That's the part that matters to this blog at any rate. 200 years after a fallout? Aaaand...for those of you that have played the game, you will notice that there is quite a bit of land that lacks
vegetation, aside from Eden. Now you are probably sitting there, saying to yourself, "But Toast...it was a nuclear fallout!"

Good point, and I'll admit that. FDR pointed out, "There are still humans left." True again!

But the flaws I see in both points were actually covered in TWAH. First, we shall observe a few photos of Chernobyl twenty years after the accident at their nuclear power plant happened:

Now, there are vague similarities between the above picture of a Fallout 3 screenshot, and the pictures of Chernobyl...vague.

Really this post is just a mild complaint about how unbelievable Fallout 3 appeared to me last night after watching TWAH. Because if Chernobyl already has that much recovery over twenty years? Then how can you explain the landscape of DC after 200 in the game?

A wooden house still stands in that screenshot. Wooden. Where the show clearly pointed out that wooden structures would be gone by then. Why only vegetation in Eden? The water is still irradiated there, so what is the difference between there and the rest of DC?

Now to bring up the point of FDR's: "But there are still humans." Yes there are, but again, I will reference TWAH when they mentioned that without the constant maintenance that the world puts into keeping the structures up to snuff, they would crumble and decay, returning to the basic elements they were before man. (yay run-on sentence!)

That being the case, I will concede that there were a few settlements that were maintained...but they still looked like crap. Practically all vegetation throughout the game was dead. Rocky, deserted...wastes. Sounds fun, hm?

Alright, that's my beef with the world moving on, but not doing so in the game. Now...here is my other issue with the game's storyline.

Vaults. 200 years in a vault? You are seriously telling me that a large group of people can live within a vault for 200 years, and not be inbred? Not be insane, for that matter? What about food? Clothing? Shoes? Where did they get the material to keep making the things that they needed? Who made the goods? Where was it made? Where did all their waste for 200 years go?! How about the leather for those Tunnel Snakes jackets? And if you are so safe from the outside, then how do your GIANT rad-roaches get in?!

Electricity was another thing that was pointed out in TWAH. Almost all of the world would lose electric power within thirty-six hours of humans being wiped from the planet. Guess who still had electricity after 200 years? That's right...most everyone. Radios still worked, lights, computers. (Granted, everything was really old, but still.) They said on the show that the Hoover Dam would most likely be the one power plant that would be able to keep running without humans, due to the near limitless supply of "fuel" (i.e. water) that was behind it. The only thing that would put a hold on it in a few years, would be this certain species of mussel that would eventually clog the cooling pipes, causing the turbines to overheat, and the automatic control system would shut them down. Thus, no more electricity for that area.

I do not hate the game, it just became apparent after the show, that it was now very unbelievable. Yes...I know it is a video game, and many are created to be unbelievable, to give you that escape from the real world, the norm, if you will. But...if you are going to go so far as to try and keep a real-life base-line to the game, shouldn't you consider the future possibilities of a situation before creating said situation?

Maybe I just do not understand nuclear fallout that well. I just figured, if Chernobyl could make it that far in twenty years? Why has there not been any progress in the Fallout 3 world in 200 years?


Alright, I'm off my soap box now, and my rant is done.



(Chernobyl after twenty years. None of those trees really existed before the accident. I would venture to guess at least 85-92% of them were not there, anyway. I just couldn't find a similar view from before the accident to prove my point.)

I am VICTORIOUS! (On very small fronts...)

No...seriously...? Fax machine: 7 Toast: 1....but that one is all that matters, and I totally outsmarted that stupid fax machine! It took that many tries to get it to stop pulling three sheets at a time...finally I had to stand there and hold the rest of the pack of paper and make sure only one went through each time. Sometimes, I hate technology.

Also an apology for my wonderful lapse in posting. Been a smidgen busy sewing and being mildly lazy. I'm guilty, and I seek your forgiveness!

Moving on! And speaking of hating technology Fr. Davis Redding (who will be referred to as FDR after this to save my mind from fear of misspelling...and because I confessed to being lazy earlier. So there.) and I had a discussion about survivalism...which eventually turned into a large dream of winning the lottery, building a home that would be sufficient without electricity etc., learning how to farm, take care of a small amount of livestock, and learning to live rustic. Oh, and a windmill snuck in there as well.

Now, to many, that may sound crazy. Or maybe to not so many, but I am not for certain. I'd have to see responses to really make a solid conclusion. At any rate, I found this prospect HIGHLY appealing. Do not get me wrong: I love my computer, phone, lights, etc. At the same time, though, I feel like life has truly lost something with the advancement of such technology. (Minus you know, things like medical and important stuff, I'm not completely off my rocker.)

I could clearly imagine this large area of land, growing vegetables, and fruit, taking care of goats. Being able to hunt in the woods nearby. Using the windmill to help with either grinding of grain or irrigation or...something. The windmill was my idea, I just haven't found its use yet.

If you seriously consider the possibility of something happening, to where the world would no longer be able to sustain electricity and those fine things that we have all come to know and love, how many of us would truly survive? Would evolution step in? Survival of the fittest? Is it so wrong as to be that slightly crazy person to sit and prepare for something of that sort? What's wrong with growing your own food and being a self contained living area?

Yes, FDR and I explored many of those possibilities in the discussion. stockpiling on fabric, ammunition, and machines that require use of your muscle and not the juice of electric current. Cooking by a wood-burning stove while making your recipes from scratch. (Which upon a little research last night, seems to be rather healthy and affordable.) I do not exactly have a romantic view of it all, that it would be all easy as pie, I know it would be hard as hell to adjust to something like that. To be frank, I still found the idea appealing. Writing in a journal? Making your own stuff???

I feel like after that conversation, that I was born in the wrong era! Love to hear your thoughts, audience!

If at first you do not succeed...

Just keep trying to do it.

This will be another attempt at keeping my blog up. But unlike last time, this time I equipped myself with a list. Something to blog -about- without just being random and deciding that one day I hated the world, and the next its all rainbows and sunshine, and putting it all in one post.

At any rate. I wanted to give a heads-up to my potential readers out there of what is to come in the future:

Sewing adventures: Things that I make, and possibly some tutorials. Also some in progress pictures to go with a few posts. I am going to be buckling down on my sewing, and I want to be able to share it with you all.

Random challenges: whether self-directed or if I feel ducky and can find a nifty prize to hand out, for my readers!

Some general things: they'll sneak in there from time to time.

Preparation for moving: and things that follow that. Big goal of October coming ahead, and I'll try to keep you all up to date with those fun things!

Thrifty things: I plan on doing more of this as my deadline approaches so that I don't spend an arm and a leg to get furniture and the like. D.I.Y. is not something I'm afraid of either. Plus thrifty things ties into sewing at times.

Music/Movies/Entertainment: we'll have the occasional review here and there and also updates on gaming that I may do. Not much television will be in this, seeing as I don't get behind a lot of it.

Writing: this may be the rarest topic you'll see, but it may be up there. So keep your eyes peeled, because I'll be looking for constructive criticism.

Religious experiences: No worries, I'm not about to bludgeon you to death with a bible or my views on things. Its just going to be something that I'll share when I feel the experience warrants sharing with my audience, who I know may not, if ever, share my views.

Harley: I do not have children, but I do have one damn adorable dog. So...I think you'll find those posts to be the most numerous/annoying, because I think she is part of the few things that make up my little corner of the universe. We'll see if I can't curb my enthusiasm a little, just for you lot though.

I feel I'm off to a good start with this so far, and I hope that I can keep it that way. I hope you all don't find my ramblings too boring!