Ice cream is done and yum, but I might add some peach slices to it, the peach in it now is all puree and I think I want more.

So time to get the coffee on. I am ignoring mac's room and instead got a craigslist listing up and will email pictures of some furniture I selling to the vintage store I bought it from, fingers crossed they will want it back even with the wear.

I had a really great view of the fireworks last night from my friend's place, but the cloud cover meant that all of the smoke just hung around, so there were times we could only see like 1.5 of the 3 sets of fireworks that should have been visible. And I continue to be unimpressed by most of her roommates and friends, so eh. But still! Fireworks!

I stayed at her place, so this morning we had diner breakfast, then I went to Trader Joe's and now I am home. Odds I do anything before Damn Yankees tonight? Slim to none.

Also, I like to look at Pioneer Woman recipes and dream of having a lifestyle where I could use multiple sticks of butter in every meal and have it be OK. Then I make popcorn.

NYCistas up for cheesed out musicfest - turn on PLJ, they are doing some countdown thing. So far I have heard Journey, Paula Abdul, Def Lepard - currently Jack & Diane.

Ya'll I am totally getting treated. This "1 hour at the park" thing is totally more like over 2 hours.

OK- I fail at wrapping gifts. In the past hour I have a) realized I had no wrapping paper, b) ironed some tissue paper with the iron, c) ruined my iron because I did not realize there was glitter on the tissue, d) tried to spray paint a paper bag , e) almost asphyxiated myself, f) cried g) realized I have only one chjoice of outfit to wear that does not need to be iron h) cannot find my gold scarf that I usually wear with it and i) no been ready when someone was ready to pick me up. I am also hungry and hangry.

Sophia, will they have wine at the party?

Seriously, Jesse. I usually chicken out of making her recipes for that very reason. But damn, do they look good.

(Who was that woman who was the runner up on Food Network Star last year? Pioneer Woman is totally who she dreams of being. Um, with a tv show.)

I was just thinking athat I wished there was wine! But it is at my friend's house whose husband is a recovering alcoholic of 1 month, so, um, no. I am now having a peanut butter sandwich and am feeling a bit better. I really don't think a 6 year old will care about my wrapping ability and neither will my friends. Missing the transfer downtown really put me behind (1 hour) the time I thought I had

Aw, Sophia. It'll be OK.

(Who was that woman who was the runner up on Food Network Star last year? Pioneer Woman is totally who she dreams of being. Um, with a tv show.)

The toothy blonde? Yeah.

brenda, I am making her cake here: [link]

Both Steph and Jesse have linked to her before.

I love the Pioneer Woman! She revamped her site in the past few months, so that instead of being a straight blog with entries by date, it's in sections now, so if you just want to read the cooking stuff, you can, or her photography stuff, etc. (I love her photography stuff, and I've learned a lot from it.)

Also, I like to look at Pioneer Woman recipes and dream of having a lifestyle where I could use multiple sticks of butter in every meal and have it be OK. Then I make popcorn.

I just want her kitchen. God, the island in the middle? That much counter space? I swoon. (Although in my house, it's just that much more space for pet hair to stick.)

The first paragraph that Kat quoted ("The account of perception that’s starting to emerge is what we might call the “brain’s best guess” theory of perception....") has been my view for a while now. It could explain all sorts of things, like, say, some UFO sightings, where what the brain "sees" is the result of it trying to make sense of some very unusual stimuli. Or if you draw a "3 dimensional" box on a two-dimensional surface, it'll look sorta' 3-D, no matter how hard you try to see it as just some lines on a flat surface.

On our drive back from vacation, we went to the Mystery Hole in West Virginia. (We really only went so that I could get a t-shirt. Come on -- Mystery HOLE!!!) Anyway, it claims to be a place where gravity doesn't work the way it does normally.

Basically, the tour guide leads you in down some dark-ish stairs, through a dark hallway with black light and fluorescent paintings, etc., which throws off your perception. And then the main attraction is a room where everything seems to be at an angle, water flows "uphill," etc. (That link is just for the picture, but the text is hysterical because it's so earnest.)

And of course all it is, is that the room was built on an angle, but all the furniture *seems* to be set normally, so your brain is trying to make it all seem normal, so everything seems skewed. (Again, that link is for the picture, but the text is so damned funny.)

And stuff like that, IMO, totally falls into the "brain's best guess" category. The brain *wants* everything to be at a normal angle, on flat ground, so it seems like you're standing at a slant.

(Plus, the tourist trap-y-ness and outright chicanery doesn't hurt, either.)

(And yet? Worth every penny of my 6 bucks. The tour guide was a total showman and really got into explaining all the "gravitational anomalies." Hell, I've paid 10 bucks for movies that SUCKED. The Mystery Hole was WAY better than the new Indiana Jones movie.)