Joelle said before her coffee on April 18, 2008
Ladies and gentleman, after reviewing your incredible suggestions, observing my fish and going with my gut feeling, I bring you…
Neil Patrick Harris and Hashbrown
“Huh?” you might say. “I thought you wanted two-some names!” I did and still do kind of, but here’s the thing: I couldn’t shake NPH. I had to name my fish Neil Patrick Harris. I just did. And Kathy and I have this whole “Hashbrown Friday” thing and it just struck me funny to have a fish named Hashbrown. It suits him.
Which brings me to another reason for no two-some names: Hashbrown is looking… well, sickly. He won’t eat and he just lays on the bottom of the bowl all full of ennui. Occasionally he’ll swim slowly to the top and then just let himself slowly drift to the bottom. He’s not nesting (blowing little bubbles along the top), he’s not swimming, he’s not eating. He just lays there, quietly hating me like a teenage son. I switched him to a different shaped bowl last night (same as Neil Patrick Harris’, who seems quite happy), hoping that would help. I even put a plant in there so he had something to look at/hide in, but this morning, I found him lying languidly under the plant, writing on his blog about how I ruined his life. Typical.
So you can see why I didn’t name them Hall & Oates, which was high on my short list. What do I do if Oates bites it? I can’t just have Hall! Poor Daryl. If they were both happy swimming, nesting and eating, I’d have done it, but I can’t risk breaking up the set in the event of a water burial (*flush*). Plus, I can’t fit a tiny mustache on him.
Here’s hoping Hashbrown starts acclimating and eating. Live, Hashbrown, LIVE! There’s a whole world out there! Or… well, not for him, but one lap around the bowl and he won’t remember anyway.
Joelle said at some point on April 16, 2008 while listening to Feist - The Water
I hit up Petco and bought some fish this weekend. Bettas, specifically. When I lived in Dallas, I had several bettas over the years… up to three at once, I think. I really like how tropical they look and low maintenance they are.
As you may know, bettas are Siamese fighting fish, so you can only have one in the container at a time or they’ll tear it up. You can have a male/female combo, but only under certain circumstances. They pretty much tear it up, too. The males are the most commonly owned and the most “fancy”.
So, it became a tradition to name my pretty, fabulous, colorful, fancy male fish names that suit such fierceness: Nelly, Mary, Nancy, Mark, Rick and Steve. I stopped short of giving them track lighting. (And if you laugh at that, you are so my people. Come over and we’ll have ‘armadilla cake’.)
Anyway, I’ve got them on opposite sides of the living room. One is your standard betta. He’s primarily turquoise and pink with some red bits and speckly white bits. It really depends from which direction you’re viewing and if he’s stumbled into some dramatic backlighting.
The other is a delta-tail betta which have shorter, rounded-but-fluffier, guppy-like tails. Like a ruffly fan. They don’t seem to be as bold in color… at least from the selection I saw, but they’re beautiful nonetheless. This one is kind of a gray-blue color. Saturated, but not bright if that makes sense. His colors are more subtle, changing to a deep midnight blue, almost charcoal color. He’s not as swimmy as the other guy, but I think it may be because I don’t have much in his bowl yet, just some glass stones in the bottom. Usually, they like a simple plant or something for interest so they can hide in it or around it. Otherwise, they just swim or lie on the smooth stones on the bottom. Not very exciting… at least the first guy has an Easter Island dude to keep him company.
I keep calling them the first guy and the second guy because I don’t have names for them yet. I’m kind of at a loss. What am I left with? Patsy and Edina? Captain and Tennille? Gilbert and Sullivan? Martini and Rossi?
Got any ideas for two-some names? Help a girl out. My fish need names! 
Joelle said in the early morning on April 15, 2008
Last night, I heard the local news guy say, “When you think of popsicles, you probably don’t think of this flavor! A favorite condiment becomes a frozen treat when we return.”
So… mayosicles? ketchupops? salsa sorbet? (Salsa is the #1 condiment in the country, did you know that? Southwest represent!). But lo, it’s the PickleSickle™.
I love pickles, especially those really garlic-y dill ones and those little wee gherkins, but seriously… seriously. PickleSickles? It really doesn’t surprise me that it’s from Texas — home of the “Deep Fried Anything You Can Fit in a Fat Vat”. Though, fried pickles are deeeeeeeeeeeeeelicious in small doses. Cajun restaurants often have them if you’re wondering where one might procure such a thing.
Anyway… pickles. Since when is a pickle a condiment? And if so, then what constitutes a condiment? Is it just something you put on something else to enhance it? If so, then my Sexy Motherpucker lip gloss from Soap & Glory is a condiment, no? (Lip gloss, how I love thee… you taste like chocolate cupcakes.) And what about a burger? I’ve understood meat, cheese and bun to be default components of the cheeseburger with mayo, ketchup, mustard and things of that ilk to be condiments. Lettuce is lettuce. Tomatoes are tomatoes. Pickles are… not condiments.
Now, relish… I’ll have to concede. It’s a condiment. Not a very good one, I might add, but a condiment nonetheless. My pickle relish acceptance extends only to tuna fish and the occasional Hebrew National from Costco.
But it’s not called a RelishSickle, is it? Hm.
Speaking of pickles… who decided the gold standard for pregnancy cravings is “pickles and ice cream”? In the clip of this PickleSickle mania on the news, they showed a woman emptying her pickle pop into a banana split and eating it with her daughter, laughing and looking excited.
Do any pregnant women want pickles and ice cream? Have they ever? I realize that pregnancy cravings are strange. Kathy would have cut someone for pad thai (wasn’t it Thai? I can’t remember now...) and another friend of mine ate her 5’1” weight in bean burritos.
But who one day said, “Pickles and ice cream are the common denominator between all pregnant women to the point that it shall now be the default assumption of what a pregnancy craving should be.”? What if someone’s into sardines and Cool Whip? That’s pretty bizarre, too, but you don’t hear any cute cliches about that, do you? Baby carrots and pudding? Oysters and Nutella? Balut n’ baklava? Hell no. Why pickles and ice cream?
Joelle said at some point on April 14, 2008
I finally found the perfect piece of art for my living room. This snazzy piece is a limited edition serigraph by our favorite artist, Derek Yaniger. Derek is the talent behind our Moxie Girls characters for us. We really dig him and I thought that it was high time I had a piece of his art for my home.
This is one of his newer pieces, but I’m so tempted to order more. I’m so proud to have #3 of 100! I suspect he’s going to be even more popular than he is already… like, big-time famous, though, I’m biased. He’s got a book of his art coming out soon, too. Yay!
The framing was an ordeal because I had such a huge wall space and an irregular-sized frame (thank you, IKEA), so I had to have it professionally matted. But it was really worth it. I think suits the space and me perfectly. 
Joelle said around mid-afternoon on April 10, 2008
Moxie Design Studios™