Mr. Einstein

I realized today that I've never blogged about my step son. No, Matt didn't father an illegitimate child, but he did adopt a vicious/evil/awesome cat several years before we started dating.

Meet Mr. Einstein:

He's a little cutie, but don't let that picture fool you--he's sort of a bastard. After living for years with a bachelor and learning to fend for himself, Mr. Einstein developed a hard exterior towards the outside world.

Einstein, or "Little Buddy" as Matt likes to call him, liked to bite, scratch, and cause general mischief. Everyone who has met him has a favorite Mr. Einstein story. Once, he jumped into Matt's fridge and wouldn't get out. Matt kept reaching in to pick him up, and but Einstein kept fighting back, weilding his sharp claws. So Matt did what any parent would do. He left him in there to think about what he did. Before you call the ASPCA/Humane Society, remember that Einstein was only in the fridge for a day or two couple minutes before Matt let him out.

After college, Matt was deemed an unfit parent and Einstein was made a ward of the state. He went to live with Matt's parents, who decided to de-claw him in order to ensure their own survival. Matt's brother Russ has a scar near his eye from when Einstein decided to wake him up with a paw to the face.

Matt loves to tell the story of how he once ran out of cat litter and had to use oatmeal instead, but Einstein didn't care. "He liked being a bachelor," says Matt. This past summer Einstein proved he is not picky when it comes to doing his business. When Matt's sister Katie moved to New Jersey, she cleaned out her two cats' litter box and put it by the back door. Einstein needed to use the restroom, and went in the empty (and formerly clean) litter box.

Matt also claims that if Einstein bites you, you don't need medical attention because his saliva is the H1N1 vaccine, but that's neither here nor there. (He likes to make up his own Chuck Norris-esque jokes about Mr. Einstein.)

Perhaps the funniest thing about Mr. Einstein is the fact that he is a complete sociopath, but loves being around people. If you try to pet him, he will bite you. He will rub up against your leg and look into your eyes with a cute expression, but the second you reach down to pet him he will feast on your flesh. And if there is a room of people he is always in the room, unlike the other two cats who prefer to hide in the bedrooms.

If you don't pay attention to him, he will break things. The other day, Matt and I observed that every time we talk to his parents on the phone someone in the background says "Einstein, you little fucker," or "Damnit, Einstein!" or some variation of curse words + Einstein.

That is why we were so surprised when he did this during our last visit:

He sat on Matt's lap, and did not bite when Matt pet him. Is he finally coming around? Has he forgiven his father? Einstein, just remember: Matt didn't give you up; he gave you better.

Christmas Crafts

It is time for my holiday crafts to begin, or as Matt calls it, "Brianna's sweatshop." I know I should wait until school is over for the semester, but I can't help myself--I'm on a knitting frenzy.

I've already started the gift for my sister-in-law (hopefully she doesn't read this blog). I am making her a pair of convertable mittens. I have the glove part done on one, and need to add the mitten top. This is the first time I've actually used the recommended yarn in a pattern, and it's only because I bought it in a kit. Regardless, I like the colors and I hope SIL does too.
This is what mine looks like:

This is what it will hopefully look like when it's done (from the pattern's website):

I also want to make hats and mittens for the nieces. Here's a pic of Kirin wearing a hat I made Adi when she was a baby:

I saw this hat (below) at Baby Gap, and I think I'll try to replicate it for Kirin, but in different colors:

I also liked these items from Gymboree:

knit hat:

mittens:

knit jumper:

And this hat from Anthropologie:

And this Anthropologie headband:

Or, maybe I'll stop being lazy and come up with my own designs instead of copying stores' stuff.

100 Blogs of Solitude

I haven't blogged in a while, because this is the 100th post and I wanted it to be meaningful. After waiting nearly two weeks, I decided that I'd just blog about whatever I wanted instead of waiting for something amazing. I did, however, find this amazing photo:

From the accompanying article: "An iron-lunged pensioner has celebrated her 100th birthday by lighting up her 170,000th cigerette from a candle on her birthday cake."

In an unrelated note, I have a story to share.

The other day Matt and I needed some cash and stopped by an ATM. He accidentally pushed the button for "Spanish," and instead of admitting defeat and cancelling the transaction, we decided to attempt to translate it on our own. Mind you, our collective Spanish vocabulary probably amounts to about 100 words, 50 of which are numbers.

We entered the PIN, pushed the button for checking, told the machine we wanted a receipt, high-fived each other, and thought we were on our way to getting some cold, hard dinero...until the ATM asked a question about "sellos."

Sellos? What the hell are sellos? What other possible ATM questions could there be? Panicking, we canceled the transaction, and started over from the beginning, in Inglés. We went through the same series of questions, and found out that sellos means stamps. They really threw us curveball with that one.

Extreme Makeover Apartment Edition

Lately I've been really disenchanted with our apartment. While it is a decent size for a one bedroom apartment (734 square feet), we have a ton of shit and not very much storage. We still have stuff in boxes from when we moved in June, which is really pathetic. In order to mend this situation, we've made these goals:

1. Come up with a different arrangement for the furniture. This will probably entail moving some stuff into the bedroom, because right now our livingroom is very overcrowded.



2. Get rid of stuff. This includes the washer and dryer that have been sitting on our balcony. Any takers?



3. Come up with creative storage ideas. We've put the bed on risers so we can store stuff underneath it, but haven't yet purchased storage containers that can slide under the bed. I'm think that buying a flat screen TV would save tons of space, but Matt isn't convinced. :)



This is a picture of the model apartment in our complex (ours is the exact same layout):

While that looks nice, the model apartment doesn't have the following items that we have: 2 bookcases, TV with stand, desk with computer, loveseat.

I've been looking at Apartment Therapy all morning to get ideas, but I am not feeling inspired. Any suggestions?