Red-Handed Jill

and pilfer his weasely

Happy Winter Solstice everyone!!!

Someone at work discovered this - we've been giggling for two days. Here's mine: http://www.elfyourself.com/?userid=d7933c5...1f5395G06122014

^ I like the early fall. Around these parts, it means warm, clear weather and good sailing! < Spending Christmas Eve drinking exotic rum drinks at Trader Vic's V What are your New Year's plans?

I don't promote it, really. It's mostly a place for me to direct folks who want to know when we'll be playing or who are thinking about hiring us.

eye on the horizon

It went quicker than eight seconds for me - more like three or four. No matter; I know that I'm not stoopid.

Yeah, it did go pretty quickly. I suspect I missed a couple of questions when I got distracted by a co-worker.

The rapper and Japanese car trivia was outside of my knowledge, but I scored a 26.

tender

One of my local pirate buddies came up with these: Sung to the tune of “Jingle Bells” Yo Ho Ho Yo Ho Ho And a bottle of rum We are thievin’ pirates We’re scallywags and scum. (repeat) Sailin’ o’er the sea Stealin’ lots o’ swag People try to flee When they see our flag. But we board ‘em quick Like wind afore the gales Then we kills ‘em neat and slick Dead men tell no tales. Oh… (chorus) We will steal it all If it ain’t nailed down. From a cannon ball To a lady’s evening gown. Then we load our haul Safely aboard our ship When we hear the navy’s call We fast give them the slip. Oh… (chorus) Twelve Days of (Pirate!) Christmas – By Tortuga Kate On the First Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Second Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me TWO SCURVY DOGS, AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Third Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Fourth Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Fifth Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Sixth Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me SIX SHIPS A SAILING FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Seventh Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me SEVEN CANNONS BLASTING SIX SHIPS A SAILING FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Eighth Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me EIGHT WENCHES WOOING SEVEN CANNONS BLASTING SIX SHIPS A SAILING FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Ninth Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me NINE PISTOLS FLAMING EIGHT WENCHES WOOING SEVEN CANNONS BLASTING SIX SHIPS A SAILING FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Tenth Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me TEN CAPTAINS CURSING NINE PISTOLS FLAMING EIGHT WENCHES WOOING SEVEN CANNONS BLASTING SIX SHIPS A SAILING FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Eleventh Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me ELEVEN SKULL AND CROSSBONES TEN CAPTAINS CURSING NINE PISTOLS FLAMING EIGHT WENCHES WOOING SEVEN CANNONS BLASTING SIX SHIPS A SAILING FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY! On the Twelveth Day of Christmas, me true love stole fer me TWELVE CHESTS OF TREASURE! ELEVEN SKULL AND CROSSBONES TEN CAPTAINS CURSING NINE PISTOLS FLAMING EIGHT WENCHES WOOING SEVEN CANNONS BLASTING SIX SHIPS A SAILING FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS! FOUR CABIN BOYS! THREE FRENCH SWORDS, TWO SCURVY DOGS AND A BARREL O’ RUM FROM THE BRITISH NAVY!

crocodile? He decided caution

Yes - one of my heroes; father of the twentieth century and inventor of much more than the Tesla Coil. You are Nicola Tesla, inventor of the Tesla Coil! A minister's son from Simljan in Austria-Hungary, you were precocious from an early age. At three you could multiply three-digit numbers in your head and calculate how many seconds visitors to your home had lived. In awe of your older brother Dane, you shot a pea-shooter at his horse, causing it to throw him and inflict injuries from which he later died. This tragedy haunted you ever after. You frequently suffered bouts of illness with hallucinations throughout your life. During one affliction of cholera, you encountered the writing of Mark Twain, with whom you were later to be close friends. Later, another, this time mystery, illness inexplicably heightened your senses to a painful extent, only relenting when you hit upon the idea of the alternating current motor. You developed an aversion to human contact, particularly involving hair, and a fear of pearls; when one would-be lover kissed you, you ran away in agony. Later, you insisted that any repeated actions in your day-to-day life had to be divisible by three, or, better yet, twenty-seven. You would, for example, continue walking until you had executed the required number of footsteps. You refused to eat anything until you had calculated its exact volume. Saltine crackers were a favourite for their uniformity in this respect. In the midst of important work, you forgot trivial details such as eating, sleeping or, on one memorable occasion, who you were. Your inventions, always eccentric, began on a suitably bizarre note. The first was a frog-catching device that was so successful, and hence so emulated by your fellow children, that local frogs were almost eradicated. You also created a turbine powered by gluing sixteen May bugs to a tiny windmill. The insects panicked and flapped their wings furiously, powering the contraption for hours on end. This worked admirably until a small child came along and ate all the creatures alive, after which you never again touched another insect. Prompted by dreams of attaining the then-ridiculed goal of achieving an alternating-current motor, you went to America in the hope of teaming up with Thomas Edison. Edison snubbed you, but promised fifty thousand dollars if you could improve his own direct-current motor by 20% efficiency. You succeeded. Edison did not pay up. It was not long until you created an AC motor by yourself. Now successful, you set up a small laboratory, with a few assistants and almost no written records whatsoever. Despite it being destroyed by fire, you invented the Tesla Coil, impressing even the least astute observer with man-made lightning and lights lit seemingly by magic. Moving to Colorado Springs, you created a machine capable of sending ten million volts into the Earth's surface, which even while being started up caused lightning to shoot from fire hydrants and sparks to singe feet through shoes all over the town. When calibrated to be in tune with the planet's resonance, it created what is still the largest man-made electrical surge ever, an arc over 130 feet long. Unfortunately, it set the local power plant aflame. You returned to New York, incidentally toying with the nascent idea of something eerily like today's internet. Although the wealthiest man in America withdrew funding for a larger, more powerful resonator in short order, it did not stop you announcing the ability to split the world in two. You grew ever more diverse in your inventions: remote-controlled boats and submarines, bladeless turbines, and, finally, a death ray. While whether the ray ever existed is still doubtful, it is said that you notified the Peary polar expedition to report anything strange in the tundra, and turned on the ray. First, nothing happened; then it disintegrated an owl; finally, reports reached you of the mysterious Tunguska explosion, upon which news you dismantled the apparatus immediately. An offer during WWII to recreate it was, thankfully, never acted upon by then-President Wilson. Turning to other matters, you investigated the forerunner of radar, to widespread derision. Your inventions grew stranger. One oscillator caused earthquakes in Manhattan. You adapted this for medical purposes, claiming various health benefits for your devices. You found they let you work for days without sleep; Mark Twain enjoyed the experience until the sudden onset of diarrhoea. You claimed to receive signals in quasi-Morse Code from Mars, explored the initial stages of quantum physics; proposed a "wall of light", using carefully-calibrated electromagnetic radiation, that would allegedly enable teleportation, anti-gravity airships and time travel; and proposed a basic design for a machine for photographing thoughts. You died aged 87 in New York, sharing an apartment with the flock of pigeons who were by then your only friends. Ridiculed throughout your life (Superman fought the evil Dr. Tesla in 1940s comics), you were posthumously declared the father of the fluorescent bulb, the vacuum tube amplifier and the X-ray machine, and the Supreme Court named you as the legal inventor of the radio in place of Marconi. Wardenclyffe, the tower once housing your death ray, was dynamited several times to stop it falling into the hands of spies. It was strangely hard to topple, and even then could not be broken up.

Clear as can be, but frost on the ground. When I was in Chicago last week, it was during a spate of spring weather. Lots of snow on the ground, but it was raining and in the upper 40's to mid-50's. It was warmer there than at home! Of course, I had to fashion a pile of skulls out of a snowdrift...

A lot of folks get very enthusiastic and post like crazy, only to disappear. Life gets in the way, perhaps or they get just as enthusiastic about something else and lose interest?...

You have an evil grandmother too? Mine is in a home, so old that she's pretty much out of her mind and draining the life from the other inhabitants to extend her own unnatural life. If your grandmother gives you or your sister grief, just think - karma's a bitch. In terms of the guyfriend, what about giving him an experience rather than something tangible? As in take him somewhere where he hasn't been or introduce him to a restaurant that you like but he hasn't tried or treat him to a minor bit of pampering that he doesn't usually get (such as a guy manicure and hand massage.)

Hmmm... another Vixen.

Yep! Douse it in rum and liqueur and then light it on fire.

Oooh - I LOVE Bananas Foster! That reminds me - I haven't made it lately. If you haven't tried it, you sure have something to look forward to!

that stood there, taunting

^ Going to do a pirate invasion at a casino with Tales of the Seven Seas. < Starting on my flying harpy costume for WonderCon (none of that fluffy, slightly tattered angel wing crap - these are going to be eight-feet-long, articulated black harpy wings.) V Do you have a killer egg nog recipe?

Iron Jack and I accompany Skip and his band every once in awhile at Speisekammer and it is a heck of a lot of fun. He is a treasure trove of chantey songs from all over the world. During the Tall Ship Festival in San Francisco, he and I were touring the Pallada, a Russian vessel when, as soon as he could find a place to sit down, he unpacked his melodica and started playing Russian chanteys and folk songs for the sailors on the ship. If you don't have Billy Bones and Other Ditties - GET IT NOW. He's working on another CD, but I don't know when that one will be done.

and generally making a

^ Saffron Indian Bistro < I think I'll make french onion soup for dinner. V Beer or rum?

I've always been a fan of Bob Newhart - "driving instructor" still cracks me up. And I'm a big fan of Rita Rudner.