the second video is more like what they really do in real-life performances. I've seen them a few times in real life, and I have to say that they're always fun and entertaining... and smoke-free because of their drummer daughter. they get slides from estate sales and make up songs about them, and not all of them are on such heavy topics (although I have to say that even the heavy ones have a little bit of funny in them, i mean the auction voice?? come on, that's funny!).




in other news, I went to see Andrew Bird play at the plaza theatre last weekend. it was fun and I got a few good pictures that I will post sometime. I went with my high school friend Craig, and really, it's strange still having a lot in common with someone you knew when you were 14. from the show I concluded that Andrew Bird is a fabulous whistler, singer, and violinist. however, his lyrics could really use some work. I think maybe he's just such a master at those other three things, that content just got put on the back-burner. this is my favorite Andrew Bird song:



and this is what it looks like in person:



what else, what else... OH! I'm getting a moped on sunday! it looks like this: to be named...

plenty more things I could say, but I'm tired, have an assignment to finish, and I have to wake up at 8 with elliott... only to be at dechoes by 10.

okay, so this semester has been crazy. C R A Z Y. so crazy in fact that i am considering taking one, or maybe two classes, IF ANY, next semester. what i need to do is get my business all in order, and what i need to do is salvage some of my sanity, and some of the friend i used to be. i have been meaning to do so many things, but then these other million things creep in and i don't get to do the things i had been meaning to. and then i try to get some sanity back, but by the time i'm stationary long enough to feel somewhat level-headed again, i get sleepy or just pass out. so then i still don't get to actualize my intentions. sarah, this sorry is for you.
also, this semester i got the first F in the history of my life, you know as a final grade. I did receive this F by choice, as if that makes it better. it was past the withdrawal deadline and i thought that by putting that class on the backburner, since it was the easiest, i would be able to stay afloat in my other classes.
school is usually not hard for me! but between having elliott, photography, dechoes, napasorn, and helping friends out with projects, etc. things just got a little tricky. not having spanish for 7 years didn't help, and then i jumped into a high level course, which was not smart. i took that final today, and i'm pretty sure it's possible that i bombed it. for UCF you have to have 3 language credits, but apparently if i pass this class, the requirement is met. that's how hard it is!!

however, in my linguistics class and my literary theory class, i think i did just fine.

i'm so tired, that now it's time for me to hibernate. i'm so relieved that school is out for the semester.

oh diary, sometimes lately it takes me a few extra seconds to get a joke, and i hope that doesn't mean a part of me is trying to go to sleep forever.

dear sarah,

this is the video i said i would post for all of your help with the IPA chart. my voice sounds a little snobby in the video, but hopefully you know i don't sound like that usually. sorry it's late, but i hope you like it.

your friend,
delila

i want to marry all of my close friends, and live in a big house together by an angry sea.

right now i am watching the adams family alone, and i think i will make this a holiday tradition for elliott. claudia left today for brazil, and she will be gone for a month. i miss her already.

i am filling out my absentee ballot, and each candidate that i'm unfamiliar with i look them up online. so here i am bubbling away when i come across don s. mitchell....

http://www.electdonmitchell.com/about.html

i wasn't so sure how i felt about lydia gardner. you know, even though i'm independent, honestly i'm a tougher critic when it comes to republicans. but did you see don mitchell's picture? it looks like he has a black eye.

starting tomorrow, we have a new roommate! his name is roger, he's in a few pictures at flickr.com/delilasmalley. our budget should be thanking us very soon. now we have a futon bunkbed and we share a room with elliott.

my new battery charger for the sd1000 should be arriving any day, and i will post the videos i have been storing soon!

also.. i am going to paint a 4'x5' picture, any ideas? i am also going to paint a 2'x4' painting. the big one is on canvas and the other is on wood. i have yet to strike gold in my idea dig.

okay, sorry for the dramatics livejournal.. but i am coated in hw, i tell you. the reason for this post, i am ashamed to admit, is that i am having such trouble with my linguistics course. it's all online, and it's an advanced class that my advisor waved my prerequisites for... except i think maybe i needed those prerequisites because i am sinking i think.

i CANNOT understand this...

http://www.pmpkn.net/4660/ipachart.pdf

it's making me feel like i felt when i took statistics... it seemed so practical, i thought it would just click. but instead, i was left alienated... like, they were speaking tongues at me.

in hopes that you will help, i promise to post this "worth it" video when my camera battery is not dead. i tried to upload it now, but the battery died.

oh diary, remember when i thought it was a good idea to be a full-time student, stay-at-home mother, and have three jobs? present day me would like to time travel and reason with past me.

job 1 = dechoes on sunday, and selling stuff for kerri on ebay.
job 2 = server at napasorn thai restaurant.
job 3 = the most important to me, photographer and digital editing extraordinaire.

my latest task for job 3 has been... i don't even have the words. i shot a wedding for this couple, mailed out their pictures, and received a call from the bride complaining that she looked fat in her pictures... but that it was somehow MY fault.... it's a long boring story, but let me just tell you that this lady is terrible. terrible. from the day of her wedding, to the climax of terrible she put me through today, this lady has been trouble and stress for me. we ended up arranging a deal where i would edit however many photos she wanted, she just had to let me know which images so i could quote her a price. she ended up just picking one, but she wanted a lot of work done to it. for the quoted price i agreed that i would make her prints for her, five 13x19 prints, and four 8x10's, and i would also put the before and after picture on cd for her. my quote was $250, which we both decided was fair. so today i met with her, exchanged goods for a check, and i went on my merry way so happy to finally be rid of this lady. 15 minutes later i receive a call saying that she needed to return the pictures because her husband was furious that she spent that much for the job. i told her that even if she were to return the pictures, she can't return the time i spent working on them, and therefore i didn't really think what she was trying to do was fair to me. about 2 minutes after hanging up with her i decide to go to bank of america and just try to cash the check. she had already put a stop payment on it!! she calls me again saying she will pay me $75 for everything (which i have about $50 invested into this for expenses already), and i tell her that's unfair. we had already discussed the price before i ever did the work, you know? it's not like i just threw this figure at her at the last minute. so i talked to my grandfather about this, he owns a successful accounting business, and he tells me that she's just committed civil fraud and that i can sue for triple damages! he told me it's happened to him six times, and that he's won all six cases. somebody's getting some comeuppances...





on top of that? i rushed to finish the job for her during the week of finals. i can't wait until this week is over.

some good news? all of my places of employment are family owned and less than 5 minutes away. i've been riding my bike. two of my friends, austin and josh, moved away... which is not good news, but the good news is that austin gave me his owl collection, and josh sold me his macbook. mama has the cs3 series and i'm so excited about it!! he also left all of his music on here, and gave me some books too. um, what else... elliott is 9 months old today. he has an appointment with his new pediatrician on monday who will not kick me out of the practice for refusing to immunize. i think i'm going to have a's in all three of my classes.

i am oh so very sleepy, night.

i decided i would make a post briefly highlighting a few things that have been going on that i haven't mentioned. there's a lot that i haven't mentioned due to the quantity of posts/quality of posts i make, but i thought i'd just mention a few of them.

for the past couple of months i've been making sushi again! ben and i made these on saturday.






last month i took pictures for the love to hate fashion show, and here are a couple of my favorite shots:
( cut )

tomorrow i have a portrait session scheduled, and i get paid! this saturday i have a wedding scheduled, and i'm so excited to have almost enough pictures for my website.

sunday we went to the dali museum in st. pete.



it looks like i'm clawing elliott, but i was really tickling him so he'd smile. that's why he's kinda giving you the crazy eye/tongue.

about half-way through the violin joins in, just in case you don't like the song and want to skip ahead.

so, a couple of years ago when i was in alaska i decided that i wanted to learn to play an instrument. i wanted to learn something new. the choice was between violin and banjo, and since they rented violins i chose to play that. while there i played all the time by myself, and a few times in front of my sister - i knew she wouldn't make fun of my beginner skills. well, when i came back to orlando i went to a local music store and got another violin. it's a rent-to-own violin, and i bet it's almost paid off.
coming to the beach i decided to bring it with me and maybe try to pick up learning it again. since ben and i have been together i've probably only touched it two or three times in two years, so, i'm not only rusty.. i'm a rusty learner.
over the weekend i decided to try to play for elliott. ben plays guitar for him all the time and even if he's cranky and tired, he'll just kinda stare in amazement. so i got my violin out, i tightened up my bow, rosined it a bit, and began to warm up. elliott started kinda whining and making a pout face... and he continued until i stopped playing. i wasn't even screeching i tell ya! today the same thing! except i kept playing thinking he would warm-up to it. he did a little i guess, but he definitely doesn't like it.
not all of us can be born with a silver spoon in our mouth, and a violin in our hands michael rabin!


i still have my tapes on so i know where to press. maybe i will take lessons again, but the next teacher better not call it a fiddle or i'm walking out. the last lady who called it a fiddle left off the air conditioner and brought her giant dog to lessons!

thanks to lisa, elliott and i will be practicing this tomorrow! i'm not a professional, but i did teach my sister to swim. when she was 3 she could do backflips off of the side of the pool and everything.

this weekend elliott got to go swimming for the first time at my grandparent's joint barbque birthday party. he didn't make a peep when he first got in and then he was kicking and splashing and loving the pool in less than five minutes. he didn't want to get out for a long time.

tomorrow both of us are going to stay at my grandparent's beach condo until next wednesday and we are going to have some more swimming fun! heellloo summer.

dear journal friends, i have a request that i don't think you will receive very often in your life... i have been trying to think of a new last name for both elliott and i, and i have yet to think of a very good one. the thing is, right now we have different last names and i want them to be the same. i don't want to give him smalley, because it kinda sucks as a last name, and also i don't want to pass the family name on. i don't want any other of my family names either. i need something that sounds good with both:

elliott pax
and
delila cathleen

i was thinking himmel which means sky in german, kinda like, metaphorically broadening his horizons by not giving him a family name?... and also risley.. which i don't know the meaning of, but like the sound of.

what do you guys think?

oh diary, i was gonna post some tmi last night, except i could only think of things like how i am having surgery again on monday, and how this time they are cutting my breast open and leaving it open. things like, ben and i are broken up and we're just roommates... and all i would hear in my head was wah wah, nobody likes debbie downer! i couldn't really think of anything else, except for this:

when i put elliott to sleep at about 8:30, he sleeps until about 1:30ish, so i usually just stay up until he wakes up and i feed him. then i'll usually go to sleep and put him in bed with me. when he wakes up again around 5, i just feed him laying on my side, but i don't stay awake the entire time. i'll start feeding him, and then i usually pass out, and he passes out immediately once he's full so it's okay. but the funny thing is i wake up at about 7:30 because he starts to feed again due to the fact that i'm hanging out. classy club! that's all i got.

please don't cancel your subscription to my friendship!

( cut.. no pun intended )

by the way, sarah/lisa... i have been on antibiotics for a month and a half, and i had to use monistat once. so apparently i didn't get the memo on how terrible it is for you. :( i know antibiotics kill all the bacteria and can weaken your immune system... but i did buy a $20 probiotic to counter the goodbacteriakilling. anything else?

this short film full of me sounding like butthead from beavis and butthead, and elliott full of giggles has been a great accomplishment for me this month. okay, first let me say that i'm no fool. BUUUT i created my youtube account on march 12th, and today is the 25th, and i have been trying since my day of creation to bring my account to life for sarah and i had been unsuccessful up until today. the problem was the type of file my video was saved as apparently.. an AVI file rather than mpg4.

during my attempts i even went to starbucks with ben's laptop, after driving around to get elliott to fall asleep, only to find out that to be one of those kids, YOU HAVE TO PAY $10 A DAY. ridiculous! so it wasn't uploaded that day.

then i drove over to lake eola and parallel parked to try to steal better internet, because i thought the problem was that we share internet with our neighbors... well, truthfully it's more that we steal theirs. but no luck, no better reception with the wifi there. then i went to the library and parked outside to steal their internet, except that didn't work either.

finally i got it! see sarah i didn't forget about you!