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What?  No Zerg?

The Moth is a live storytelling series. Sometimes the stories are true, and sometimes they are factual. Always they are interesting.

Here’s a sample.

The Moth will be in Pittsburgh in August, and I’m so looking forward to it.
American Shorts @WYEP presents The Moth in Pittsburgh

Nerves of Steel: Stories of Moxie and Might

Hosted by

Jessi Klein

Featuring stories by
George Dawes Green (founder of The Moth)
among others

Stories begin at 7pm
at New Hazlett Theater
Allegheny Square E.
Pittsburgh, PA

Tickets: $20, $25, reserved seating

http://www.pittsburghlectures.org/interior.php?pageID=238

If you can’t attend the event, they also have a podcast.

It’s the little things that let you know when you found your soulmate…

Dave of Cyanide & Happiness would like to come to the good old USA to work on animations, but is having issues getting a visa.? It seems that they don’t think him to be famous enough of an artist to be able to get the visa.? To prove them wrong, you can go here to [...]

The Virginity Hit looks like a shaky cam version of The 40 Year Old Virgin, but with a younger cast.  It’s got Will Ferrel’s name on it, so it’s bound to have a laugh or two in it, but I don’t know that the rest of the movie will be good.

I was rather excited when I got in on the limited edition DVD release of Tales of an Ancient Empire, that changed when I received an email today. Thank you for your recent order of the Tales of an Ancient Empire – Special Limited Edition DVD. Your credit card has NOT been charged but we [...]

Recently, my niece Rachel found this white ceramic cat at my parents’ house. She carried it downstairs by herself.

The cat had been a Christmas gift for me years ago and was a prized possession. This was during a period when I was nicknamed “Pussycat Doggie Girl,” thanks to my habit of crawling around houses on hands and knees, either mewing or barking depending on whether I felt more like a cat or dog at the time.

I think that’s my father’s handwriting. He’d also have been more likely to include the date.

Sometime to shake things up I would be a horse instead, but somehow “Horsey Girl” didn’t stick as a nickname.

Thirty-some years later, my niece has taken up this animal-impersonation habit, completely on her own and much to the amusement of everyone. Here she is, a momma cat carrying her kitten.

She’s also been playing with the ceramic cat. She’ll put it and her stuffed kitty in a laundry basket and then crawl in with them, three cats in a nest together.

As adorable as that sounds, my parents decided I should take the ceramic cat to my own home — one tiny step toward clearing out clutter from their place. For now it’s in my living room. My live cats have taken little notice of it, until tonight when I took these photos to share on the blog.

I always thought of the ceramic cat as larger than life-size. It’s only now, seeing my real housecats next to it, that I see it’s been just about life-size all along.

Meow.

Hot girls, big guns, swords, dragons, and a giant samurai with a minigun

Here’s how I knew I need to go on a clothing diet: Yesterday I read about Six Items or Less in the New York Times, and, while I felt inspired by the people who restricted their wardrobes to a bare minimum of items for a month, I felt more inspired to buy more clothes.

Specifically, I felt that I needed a pair of jeggings — an item of clothing I’d never heard of before, denim-ish leggings. Clearly the perfect thing to straddle the line between casual and hip. I also thought I would do well to get some more black tank tops, and a versatile black dress that could be accessorized to be dressy or day-to-day. I started searching online for an ideal pair of jeggings, ignoring the nagging thought that my closet is crammed to full to fit even a tiny pair of jeggings or leggings or even flip-flops; my two bureaus are overflowing with clothes; and I have yet more dresses and coats and stuff in the basement and garage.

Eventually I convinced myself that I would rather attempt a six item clothing diet with only clothes I already own. I consider this bit of shopping self-control a major win already.

The idea of a clothing diet is this: Choose 6 items of clothing and wear them, and only them, for a month. Underwear, socks, and pajamas don’t count; I’m also not counting workout gear, nor clothes for yardwork (still have a half a yard full of forsythia and regrown weeds to battle in the next few weeks). If you have several duplicate items, like white t-shirts or black tank tops, you can count that as a single item since it really just reduces your laundry efforts. Accessorize in any way you please.

I’d previously thought of trying something like The Uniform Project, in which a woman wore the same dress (actually multiple copies of a dress) every day for a year. But the focus there was on creativity, whereas I’m more interested in simplicity and focus.

I’ve thought often of adopting a uniform, like Steve Jobs and his black turtleneck/blue jeans, or like habits worn by the nuns at my grade school. How lovely it would be to not fuss each day about what to wear, I’d think. Over time I have in some ways simplified my wardrobe, color coordinating it so that it’s easy to mix and match. Even so, it still takes time and mental effort each day to choose an outfit. And I’ve hesitated from making a commitment and really sticking with a uniform of my own.

No more. Starting today I’m wearing these items for a month:

Long black skirt
Light-weight khaki pants
Brown knit capris
White t-shirt
Black tank top
Crinkle-dyed embellished top

The big decision was whether to include a jacket, for client meetings. In the heat of this summer I haven’t worn a jacket in weeks, so including one would feel like a waste of an item for this project. And over the next few weeks I don’t anticipate many meetings with new clients — we’re mid-project on several jobs. If a meeting does come up I may be able to squeak by with the embellished top and skirt, or black tank and a scarf.

One of the interesting points that the Six Items of Less participants made was how few people even noticed that they were wearing the same clothes over and over. In part this may show how clever folks are at accessorizing, but I think it’s also true that people on the whole don’t notice what others wear. Will anyone notice that I’m wearing the same clothes every day? I’ll let you know.

Want to join me on the diet? We can be our own support group, ready with a calming word when the compulsion to buy just this one awesome pair of pants feels too much to bear. We can do it!

Some of the vampires/monsters/whatever, kinda reminds me of the lickers from the Resident Evil movies.  Starring Paul Bettany as a priest who leaves the church to go after a band of vampires who kidnapped his niece.  You may thing that going from the Archangel Michael to being a renegade priest somewhat of a demotion, but [...]

No corsets, no hat pins, no crying.

Here is the trailer for the Syfy (I still feel ridiculous typing that) original movie about a werewolf fighting Felicia Day, Red.

This movie is going to be so ridiculously awesome.  The trailer looks like you took a bunch of Mexicans, and threw them in a blender with boobs and knives, then hit the highest setting.

Someone needs to translate this, tell me how it works, then find out where to buy one. View the high res version here

There is just something about a gorgeous woman with a 12 gauge.  This image is brought to you, if you can’t tell by the watermark, by the Brigade.

Because you just simply cannot get enough of girls with high powered rifles.

A quick video containing a few interesting facts about pornography on the internet.  Also a hot chick getting undressed.

DJ Anorexia and Bob Vengeance embark on an incredible journey to kill Ronan Harris and Trent Reznor in an attempt to save the industrial music scene. Part 1 joins our heroes as they prove their worth to fellow industrial music fans. The frightening thing, I seriously don’t know if this is a joke, or an [...]

Warm lentil and lamb’s-quarter salad with feta, originally uploaded by cynthiacloskey.

Last week in the CSA share that my mom and I split, we had the option to try two kinds of wild greens: purslane and lamb’s quarters. We took a bag of each, and Mom kept the purslane to try while I took the lamb’s quarters.

Lamb’s quarters (that link includes lots of photos) are a relative of spinach. They tasted a little like spinach to me, but also like wild leaves, although not unpleasantly so. The leaves themselves are smallish — at least mine were — and a bit more tedious than spinach to pick off the stems and wash.

Mixed with warm lentils and red wine vinaigrette, topped with feta, the lamb’s quarters were delicious. Here’s the recipe, provided by the Northwest PA Growers’ Co-op and attributed to “Facts on Edible Wild Greens in Maine,” Mahmoud El-Begearmi, Extension specialist, nutrition and food safety, University of Maine Cooperative Extension; Bulletin #4060.

Warm Lentil and Lamb’s-Quarters Salad With Feta Cheese

4 cups water
1-1/4 cups dried lentils
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon dried whole oregano
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 small clove garlic, minced
3/4 cup (3 ounces) crumbled feta cheese
3 cups lamb’s-quarters, well washed

Combine 4 cups water and lentils in a saucepan. Bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat to low, and cook 30 minutes or until tender. Drain and set aside.

Combine 2 tablespoons water, olive oil, vinegar, oregano, salt, pepper and garlic in medium bowl. Stir well. Add lentils, cheese and lamb’s-quarters; toss well. Serve warm or at room temperature. Makes four 1-cup servings.

For this, I used a French feta cheese, Valbreso Feta, and I need for you to know that it is the most exquisite feta cheese I’ve ever tasted. Salty and just barely tart, and somehow also wonderfully sweet, like the goats had eaten only cherries their whole lives.

Another awesome song and animation by Cyriak.