moominmuppet

I already have several of these, actually -- the Fire Dragon is the one I was talking about in my other post

They've also got some cool fine art puzzles, as well as an assortment of other goodies. I also particularly like this puzzle, which looks like it would be fun to do.

For my reference, other puzzle sites I've found:
http://www.puzzlesusa.com
http://www.whitemountainpuzzles.com
http://www.americanpuzzles.com
http://www.bitsandpieces.com
http://www.galaxypuzzles.com
http://www.puzzlewarehouse.com (Eschers!)
http://www.jigsaw2order.com/
https://www.puzzlesandbeyond.com

Happy Birthday to marnanel, and Happy Belated Birthday to forestfire!

Life here is really quite quiet, except for work. Work continues to be almost non-stop and psychologically exhausting. I'm looking forward to my three afternoon/evening days coming up -- at least I'll get a breather on the evening shift. It's been snowing almost every day for the past week. Still pretty, still making me happy.

In other totally uninteresting news, I resorted my viewing filters so I'll miss fewer individuals' posts. My "hellishly busy" filter has gradually accumulated a lot of feeds and other interesting stuff, and I've just split all that off into a separate viewing filter (called "reading fodder"). I'm really only catching up on "reading fodder" on the days when I'm working an evening shift, but it means I'm more reliably keeping up with the people, which makes me happy. In general, I've been gradually wading through a lot of minor organizational stuff -- cleaning up email accounts, files, etc. Maybe it means I'm working my way toward attacking the apartment itself. Maybe.

My mood's been so-so. I think the long break from patient-instructing is starting to show; I'm sort of grateful for the extra time in my schedule, but I miss the intensity/interaction and the way it tends to improve my mood and make me feel like I'm doing something useful.

I'm still reading Powerful Medicines, which has gone from "I think I'll like this" to "anyone who ever gets prescriptions should read this" in my opinion. I'm very pleased with his even-handed and clear take on the issues around evaluating exactly what the title describes: Benefits, Risks, and Costs, with a clear look at what factors are influencing our remarkably ineffective and wrong-headed current approaches.

Check the reviews -- Whoops! Same problem with ours, so I had to send back the two disks we'd received so far, and it's back to waiting for them to release new, corrected, copies. Argh!

In the meantime, I've been watching An Evening with Kevin Smith 2: Evening Harder, and This Film Is Not Yet Rated, both of which I've been enjoying a great deal.

Also, for other Eddie Izzard fans out there:
FX has set March 12 as the premiere date for its new Eddie Izzard/Minnie Driver drama The Riches. The show will run at 10 p.m. with limited commercials through a sponsorship deal with The Weinstein Company/Dimension Films' upcoming movie Grindhouse. 13 episodes of The Riches will run Mondays at 10 p.m. through June 4.

Half-off on so many shows I want! Aaaah!. If this lasts 'til my next paycheck, I'm definitely going to squeeze the budget enough to pick up a few, at least. Right now my Amazon cart has the following (which will doubtlessly get pared down):
The Outer Limits: Sex and Science Fiction
Dead Like Me (both seasons)
Buffy, Seasons 3, 4, and 5, which would complete my set
The Lone Gunmen
and the one I'm most excited about:
Alien Nation: The Complete Series

Now if only they'd release Max Headroom on DVD already.

Trying to think of Games I'd particularly like to own:

I most definitely, really, really want to get myself an Icehouse/Treehouse set (In general, I'm in love with Looney Labs, and would happily collect all their games)
Ticket to Ride
Chez Geek
Othello (one of my all-time favorite games, but I only have an annoying little travel-board right now, and it's hard to flip the pieces.)
Checkers
Chinese Checkers
UNO
Trivial Pursuit
Scene It

By popular recommendation (or poking around online):
Apples to Apples
Taboo
Balderdash
Scattergories
Dirty Minds
Munchkin
Gene Pool
Cranium
Illuminati
Cosmic Encounter
Ingenious
Carcassonne

Have:
Mancala
Stratego
Can't Stop
Backgammon
Mastermind
Parcheesi
Yahtzee
Sorry
Battleship
Connect 4 (although Battleship and Connect 4 are both miniature travel size)
Chess
MindTrap
You Don't Know Jack
Peg Solitaire
And, of course, a few decks of cards

Guess whose parents passed on most of the family games to her?

Becca Has:
Pente which is fun and quick, and I enjoy a great deal.

I tend to get frustrated with word games more quickly than other types. I'll enjoy a few games of Scrabble or the like, but I hit burn-out point much faster. (Hmmm -- just realized that this doesn't apply to games in which word definitions matter -- I enjoy those. It's coming up with specific words for certain lengths divorced from meaning that fried my brain extra-fast)

I rarely get all that into war games like Risk. I think Settlers of Cataan is the closest I get, and although I enjoy it, it's not one I find myself randomly craving.

I particularly enjoy logic games, trivia games, abstract strategy games, and games that are quick and easy to pick up and play.

From the above list and notes, any suggestions for other games I should check out or be reminded of?

To be absolutely clear, this is a request for assistance brainstorming, not a request for presents.

Cleveland finally has a carshare program!

City Wheels Cleveland

Woot!!! I've been hoping for one of these for ages, and loudly envying cities that have them. Then I checked the qualifications page, and my heart sank... I haven't held a license for the past three years.

So I sent this off:

To: Info@CityWheelsCleveland.com
Subject: license requirement

I was very excited to see a carsharing group starting up in Cleveland; I've
been envying other cities for years! I've just been checking out the site,
and I see one major qualification problem I'm going to have -- since I've
been using RTA for several years, I don't have a valid driver's license, and

would be getting a new one if I sign up for this program. However, with the

three-year rule, that's a problem. Is there any flexibility in this
qualification, or are there plans for a policy change in the future?

--Sarah Young
Tremont, Cleveland, OH

And got this back:

Hello Sarah,

As long as you have three years' worth of a driving record at any time in
your history, you are eligible for CityWheels membership; it doesn't have to
be the past three years, per se.

We'd love to have you! Let me know by email or by phone if you have any
other questions; I'd be happy to talk with you more about the program. It
sounds like it would be perfect for you!

Looking forward to working with you,

Megan

Hoorah!!!!! It's not a solution to my commuting problem, but it does potentially solve our "trips to the pet store and grocery store" issues!

Eddie and Farscape and Xena, Oh, My!

Sometime later today I'm going to snitch some Bruce Campbell, Eddie Izzard, Angelina Jolie, Farscape, and Xena icons from there.

Posting for my own reference, and to share the joy.

So, I have a Canon Powershot A70 that I'm just starting to play around with. It currently only has the 16MB card that came standard, and I'm looking at getting an extra. Apparently, I need a "Type I CompactFlash Card". Can anyone with more experience tell me if this SimpleTech 1GB card is a decent investment, or suggest what else I should be looking for?

Henna kit for kids
(firinel, marnanel, forestfire -- I'm curious what you think of that in terms of potential for fun vs potential for mess and/or freaked out grandparents or teachers)

And various general henna kits -- If I get a henna kit for bec76 at some point, that means I can wheedle my way into henna decorations for me. I'm sneaky that way.