I’ve been working on plans for a kitchen remodel sometime next year. I’ve read articles, I’ve drawn schematics. I pick my friends brains. Today I ran across this quote that sums up my goal:

I wanted it to fit the style of the house but include modern conveniences for a growing family.

From Country Living

I need an article on Built-In Kitchen Nooks for Dummies.

When Carol and Nicole told me the Nerdfighting Tour was coming to Gadsden, I knew I didn’t need to know exactly what the Nerdfighting Tour was to know I’d feel at home. As a card-carrying Nerd, I felt an obligation to attend. I am so glad I did.

I tried to discern what the Tour was about from the website, but it’s an entire community and the simple entry pages such as About and the FAQ weren’t working. So I showed up on Friday knowing only that one guy writes young adult novels and the other guy sings songs and that maybe they are brothers.

The songs were great, the reading was great and even though I know nothing about them, even the Q & A was good. Adding to all the awesomeness was sitting next to Cookie, who totally lost it when John said “Vampires in Suburbia or Wizard School.”

But the absolute best was Accio Deathly Hallows, a song Hank wrote three days before the book’s release. He made the crowd sing along if they knew the words and oh, they did. It’s rare for me, outside of church, to sit in a room full of people singing a song. Maybe that’s why I felt like it was a spiritual moment. This community of nerds has found one another online and traveled to meet in person. When he sang “I couldn’t care more about Harry Potter if Hogwarts was my Alma Mater,” you could feel that we all felt the same way.

And I smiled, and yes, this nerd is such a softie, because I teared up, too. They don’t know what it was like for us thirtysomething nerds, drifting through adolescene without the anchor of fellow geeks. Or how when you did find somebody who geeks out over the same things, it was monumental. (Jaimie and I forged our friendship over quoting lines from Monty Python.)

Here endeth the gushfest. Check out Hank’s song about Helen Hunt:

Helen Hunt, I’m Mad About You

If friends and love = $$$, then you two are like Gadsden’s own Lovey & Thurston Howell III, without the shipwreck-part.

For we are, in fact, awash in friends and love.

I went to check out Newseum today to see how other papers handled the big story. My favorite page one was that of the Santa Rosa Press Democrat (coincidentally, a sister paper).

I love that the photo is practically the whole cover, the election logo header, the head, the subhead, all of it.

Speaking of Obama and design, I mean, of course I think it’s genius that he has a signature font and his own cool campaign logo, but I am impressed by the cleverness he inspired in so many designers. My two, somewhat obscure favorites are the Voldemort Can’t Stop Barack motif from Harry and the Potters and this Mavis Beacon of Hope poster.

One final Obama-related artwork is this postcard from PostSecret, which is a fear I’m sure has been felt by his family. FA touched on it in his blog, too.

Kris and I had our first houseguest over the weekend. We were so stoked to have bought a house with a guest room, and we figured our first guest would be family or a friend crashing after a party. But then Debbie called from the church and asked if we could put Danny Daniels up when he came to town the first weekend in November.

For those of you who aren’t Vineyard folk, Danny Daniels is one of the original worship leaders of the Vineyard. You may not know it, but you’ve probably heard one of his songs before. Maybe an instrumental version while you peruse the offerings at Hobby Lobby. What I’m sayin’ is, the man is like a Pillar of the Vineyard church.

Kris and I kept thinking of hosting Danny Daniels “the first weekend in November” without connecting to the fact that this would coincide with our annual costume party on Halloween. I was already in costume when Danny arrived. Shortly thereafter, so were Kris and Ben, and suddenly the house was full of family and costumed friends.

Danny had some chili and retired to the guest room. I’m sure he’s used to all sorts of shenanigans when he’s on the road, but Kris and I so enjoy having people into our home and we want it to be a pleasurable experience. I felt bad that a loud party was going on; what if the man needed rest? But also, the partygoers were having a good time…

Liz and I were in the kitchen complaining about the itchiness of our wigs and I told her “and oh yeah, we’ve got Danny Daniels sequestered in the guest room.” She thought I was joking. “No, really,” I assured her. And about that time, the man himself emerged for another bowl of chili.

For the rest of the night, I asked Liz “hey, remember that time we had a Halloween party with Danny Daniels in the guest room?”

Our hospitality only got better the next morning when the power was out. But throughout the weekend, Danny was a wonderful guest. I do hope that if he comes to town again, he’ll consider the Catoe home open at his disposal.

This is the logo for the upcoming Milton 400 Pubcrawl. What’s that, you ask?

Join the Gadsden Public Library & Downtown Gadsden Incorporated as they celebrate Monster of Literature John Milton’s 400th Anniversary!

Read the 1664 classic out loud with your friends in three relaxing pub environments, listen to guest speaker Mr. David Murdock and collect all three Milton 400 Trading Cards.

The pub crawl is Wednesday, November 12.

(After the event, I will update with the Trading Cards.)

Well, no not really. But close, right?

Compare to the “even so” symbol in one of these album cover designs.

Jill Hamrick also has a tattoo based on it.

My grandmothers kept asking what our Halloween plans are, and though I kept telling them that we are having a costume party, they continued to ask. They were, in their own way, asking me to bring Ben by that night. There will so not be time for that, so I packed him into his costume and shuffled him over to both Mama Juanita and GJ on Saturday. The photos alone were worth the effort, but we amassed oodles of Grandparent Points.

I’m glad that I won’t be trick-or-treating this week, because, hello, cold front! And my dress is sleeveless.

Kris is still working on his costume. It’ll be very shiny.

What are you coming as? You’re coming, right?

The open-air market was indeed cool and it looked like there are different themes each week through December. Yesterday was Oktoberfest and so we heard live Polka music. You seethe with jealousy, yes?

Ever since Kris and I ate at Aretha Frankensteins on our last trip to the Chatty, we’ve been meaning to go back with friends in tow. The Jones were amenable to Aretha’s and the four of us stuffed ourselves on cornmeal pancakes and jalapeno hashbrowns.

High on coffee and getting out of Gadsden for a half day, we had silly conversations on the way home. This one was my favorite:

“Hey,” Jaimie says to Jimmy. “I’ve thought of a Biblical name if we have a son someday… Nicodemus!”

“I’ve always liked the name Nick,” Kris comments.

“You need a middle name from the Godfather,” I add.

“Nicodemus Corleone.”

“And in case you end up with twins,” I continue, “Let’s say a boy and a girl, you’re gonna need a nice name to go with Nicodemus.”

We begin brainstorming with literary and musical references. Now it is decided that if Jaimie ever has twins, she’ll be naming them Nicodemus Corleone and Narnia Garfunkel Jones.

Ben is on his fourth pair of Robeez footwear - size 16-20 months Tredz. GJ asked if there was anything she could buy him and I printed out the image of the size 20-24 month Tredz above. They stole my heart because they reminded me of Ben’s birth announcement.

I called her this morning to let her know the shoes arrived yesterday and that Ben was so taken with them, he slept with them last night.