Worst. Nanowrimo. Ever.

This year's Nanowrimo has been a disaster from start to finish. I couldn't think of anything to write til day one- too much school work- no time to plan events- the story I picked up ended halfway through. I started another story as soon as the first finished but by god there's only so many weekly papers and final papers and Livy a person can cope with before defeat happens.

Besides the not winning part- which I've done before, just not in years- the worst part is feeling like I can't write anymore. Nothing is as good as it used to be, I don't think of the story unless I'm sitting at the computer (no time to think up conversations while I'm at work or driving, apparently), everything just feels blah. I looked at last year's Nano which was a romance novel and I swear to god it's brilliant in comparison to anything I wrote recently but it's no For the Glory of Rome.

Sometimes I'm scared I cranked out my Penultimate Life's Work.

I hate feeling like this.

In other, happier, news:

I've talked to my sister about five or six times on the phone. She's really nice. She has two kids. She wants me to visit.

My seamonkeys are doing great.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson is even more awesome than the movie. I cannot put it down. Even though I know what's happening.

In comparison Michael Crichton's Pirate Latitudes is no Jurassic Park. I think he must have still been working on it when he died, like it's draft 1.5 or something. It's just not as long as usual.

My friend Lisa has a bunny that she let me petsit. I've never really seen a bunny up close besides in pet stores. They're not very friendly but they are soft. I guess you just hold it?

A 26 year wait, over.

A lot of you probably know I'm adopted. Since I was twenty I've been looking for my biological family- with no luck. I made a lot of phone calls and sent a few letters but it all amounted to was disconnected numbers. Thursday afternoon I tried googling again, trying some new numbers. The first one went to a disconnected line, the next rang and rang and then someone answered.

I asked for my biological mother and the she said she'd go look for her out in the yard. About two minutes later she was on the line.

It's still blowing my mind. I looked for them for six years and it was just as easy as calling the right number at the right time. I talked to my biological mother for an hour that day and a few hours later my sister called- I have a sister and three brothers- she lives in Hawaii and is in the Navy, two of the brothers live here, and another is in the Army. One of my brothers who lives here has called me a few times. I'm supposed to go down to see them soonish...

Right now it's so much. Every time the phone rings I jump up to grab it- who's calling now? Who's texting? Is it one of them?

Late

I used to know this guy named Andy Zebrowitz. He was one of those people that looked like trouble, but he was always a good friend to me. Not in the overly friendly, I'd do anything for you way, but in a quiet way where he'd do it anyway, while acting gruff. The best way I can describe it is like Dr. House. He was smart and cool and I didn't have a crush on him, just sort of hero worship. He was that guy that you knew that was so cool you'd tell people you knew him. That kind of thing.

He used to fix my computer for me sometimes, when I couldn't figure it out myself. And I used to bring him cookies and pizza (when I worked at a pizza place) and Thanksgiving Dinner leftovers... I never heard one way or the other if he had Thanksgiving plans but he never turned down the food and always gave the Tupperware back clean. One time I randomly asked him if he'd like to go to the Renaissance Festival and when I went to pick him up in the morning he'd gotten a new computer the night before and stayed up all night playing with it. I think he'd gone to bed about half an hour before I showed up and when he answered the door it was clear he'd forgotten about the whole thing. I felt like this goofy kid- like I was bothering him- but he just said he needed a shower and a cup of coffee and we could go.

Before I went to Italy I asked him if he wanted anything from over there. I don't think he ever got back to me, and I didn't pick anything up for him. I remember a winter or two ago I said I'd knit him some gloves and he sortof said what kind he'd like- fingerless, black, long cuffs- but I never did get around to making them. We didn't talk all that much.

And then before I knew it it was this summer and I was going to head to London and it struck me if I hadn't gotten him anything from Italy I could get him something from London and we could hang out at least once more. Something like that. And at the time I was thinking it I also thought it had been a while since I'd seen him online. And he's one of those people, like me, always on.

I checked IM and he wasn't on. I just sort of thought he might have shut it off or was doing something to his computer but when I checked his blog I saw his obituary. I thought it was a joke for about fifteen minutes- I had to do some googling to see what was going on- we mostly knew each other online and didn't have any mutual friends. He'd died a few days before my birthday, about five months earlier. It was like a gut punch. I know, sort of a bit much of a reaction to an internet friend dying who I hadn't seen in years- but- Andy was one of those people... Who make a difference for you even though they don't do much of anything. He was a decent guy when I didn't seem to know any of that variety.

Books, books, books.

I picked up Anne Macaffrey's Crystal Singer last week at Book Exchange. Normally I give books the 50 page test that I learned from Charles- the first fifty pages were just kind of... Sleepy isn't the right word, but I wasn't excited about anything Killashandra was up to either. But I couldn't stop reading it either. I think I'm about 3/4 the way through it and I don't want to read it anymore, but I do. I guess Killashandra isn't very interesting, but Anne's writing is very good.

Then I picked up Dracula, My Love by Syrie James which is a retelling of Dracula from Mina's POV. I'm only about a hundred pages in, but it's a good read. Not YOU HAVE TO READ THIS yet, but it's amusing.

And last night I noticed that Clive Barker's Absolute Midnight which is the third book in the Abarat series was supposed to be out last month. I think it was also supposed to be out last month last year. Come on Clive, put the book out- there's not even any fanfic I know of to bridge the gaps.

Why I Don't Like Apple

Ok, I have some good news about the whole iPod Touch thing. After about forty minutes on the phone with tech support- who I do have a warranty with, despite what the website says- and much troubleshooting and reinstalling we both admitted the iPod was probably bricked. Then Felix, the tech support guy, made me an appointment at the Lenox Apple Store so I could get it looked at, just in case.

I drove down to Lenox today and went to the jampacked Apple Store. Forty-five minutes after my appointment time I finally was called up to the bar to have my iPod looked at. The man at the counter implied it was my Windows computer that was the problem twice before he'd actually plug in my iPod and see how bricked it was. After about three minutes of it plugged into his MacBook he finally did a restore on it- thankfully it restored and now my laptop is updating it.

The part that got me was after he'd restored it he told me two more times that the iPod might not work with my computer, then asked if it was a laptop so maybe if it didn't work I could bring it up. I told him, yes, it was, and then he sneered.

"Well, I can't say I'll be happy to see your computer in my store, but, I think I can try to troubleshoot it."

I just stared at him.

I have worked in retail for about ten years now, and I hate going to people's managers and making a scene. I have had costumers I've done nothing to do it in hopes of free food or gift cards or whatever. I didn't go to his manager, I didn't even say anything to him, which I'm sort of regretting.

Yeah, you know what, I have a Windows Computer. And it works really, really well. I love it. And you know what, if you have an Apple and you feel the exact same way? Good for you! I'm not going to try and change your mind and talk to you like I'm a Superior Human Being.

Mike, at the Lenox Apple Store, you're not better than me, you're just rude.

Not that anyone probably cares

But I think the last update of iTunes bricked my iPod Touch.

I'm torn between misery and a sort of righteous fury- I've only had it nine freaking months. My iPod I had before lasted something like four years. Maybe it's just some kind of thing that Apple is going to shortly patch and it'll go back to working, but if not... Nine months. Come on, Apple.

iTunes had a new software update for my iPod so I installed it. Ever since then the iPod has either been on the "please connect to itunes" screen or off. If I turn it on it'll show the logo then go to the connect screen. Nothing else. It doesn't show in my computer, and it doesn't show in iTunes. But the computer sort of sees it because it keeps telling me it could connect to the iPod if only I could find a driver that worked. The computer

Three days later I'm still in search of a driver.

I've reinstalled iTunes 10 twice, went back to 9, found out 10 did something to the library so 9 can't use it, went back to 10, trolled the Apple Forums, googled, and tried to update iTunes 10 countless times in hopes of a patch of some sort. Nothing.

Contrary to the "it's just the driver" thing is that the iPod itself isn't making any noises inside. Which is what my old iPod did when it died.

$300 for nine months of iPod is pretty sad.

Dear Customers #1

Please do not ask me for things when you're on your cell phone. It goes like this:

Customer: Yes, Cindy I did ask her to bring the pie, no the other pie- Excuse me miss! No, the other pie, obviously.

Me: Yes? Can I help you?

Customer: Look, I'm looking for- No, Cindy, you're bringing the green beans- Can you find me a blue shirt? No, no, not for the picnic, for that other party Cindy.

Me: What kind of blue shirt?

Customer: A blue shirt. Look, Cindy, you know how I feel about that guy, do not bring him to the party.

Best. Story. Ever.

Ceroc

I was at a BBQ last weekend in Surbiton and after it got dark suddenly people started dancing in the kitchen. Really good dancing- like on Dancing with the Stars! I asked what they were doing and it's called Ceroc. It's a huge craze over here in Europe. If I check the main Ceroc site here there's about five different places I can go most nights of the week to take lessons and dance after. And they're all different places.

Monday night I went to the O2 center which is like a mall, I think, and I took my first lesson. I wish we had this over in America!

This isn't exactly the same dance I learned Monday, but it's pretty close. They had in a few arm things I don't know how to do yet.



You get a really good workout doing it, too. And you meet a lot of people- When I went to my second lesson/dance on Wednesday night there were about four people I recognized from Monday and I'm terrible with faces...

I really, really wish we had this, but I know why we don't.

Wow. Ok. Sorry.

I didn't realize I'd gotten so far behind on blogging until Mom mentioned it.

I spent a day in Oxford last weekend- no really outstanding pictures from that but it was really something seeing the city and walking around it. We payed extra to see Christ Church College- part of that was used for Harry Potter- and it was really beautiful. I can't really picture people going to school there, but then again I didn't see any classrooms either.

The day after that was when it got really awesome...



We took the train out to Salisbury, then from there went on the Stonehenge tour. Imagine a somewhat curvy country road, riding in a doubledecker bus at alarming speeds. Yeah, scared me too. And then we're driving through a big open area of fields and the driver says, Look Forward, and there it is. And then we actually get there and get out of the bus and walk under the road and onto a little sidewalk and right up to the stones. I couldn't have been more that 20 or 30 feet from the stones at one point. THAT CLOSE. All that was keeping me from them was this little, tiny, chain on some posts about a foot high and not a guard in sight. If we weren't all thinking the same thing I'll be surprised but no one jumped the fence. I think I took about a hundred pictures right there.

It was an audio tour too, which was interesting. It needed better writing but it was about an hour long and really informative. Except for the part that said "...and then the stones were levered up ramps of dirt and lowered into holes in the ground, upright, like teeth into the gums of the earth.". You could see the moment where everyone got to that part of the audio track. The looks of horror.

After that we went to Avebury which is... A big hill. A gigantic hill with trenches and such. And while we were climbing it we took a wrong turn and walked about 3/4 the way around the hill instead of straight to the top like everyone else. Let's put it this way, I explained two years of Days of Our Lives plot lines while we walked, that's how big the hill is. Finally we found a way up and played with some whippets on top of the hill (Fergus and Alfie) and watched one of them climb a ten foot stone wall like a spider or a goat.

From there back to Salisbury and the market (where we bought freshly made donuts and dried apples) then to the Cathedral which has the most incredible baptismal font in it. It sort of doubles as a reflecting pool and gets a large portion of the stained glass in it. I took a picture but it was pretty dark in the cathedral. It's not worth posting on here.

This is Brighton, where I went on Tuesday night.



It is the dodgy capitol of the world. (Dodgy = Skeezy). If you have seen The Lost Boys and/or a pier by a beach with amusement park rides on it, you have seen Brighton. We hopped the train after our field trips were done and an hour later we were at the seaside. Which is another reason to love the train system here. An hour that I spent eating a sandwich and writing in my journal, then knitting a glove, and there is the freaking ocean! I think we spent two or three hours in the town, laying on the beach, throwing rocks in the ocean, riding a carousel, walking on the pier, then eating the best Chinese food I have ever had in my life. And then we came home.

Oh, and I threw seaweed at Sarah and she screamed.

Tonight we went to see WarHorse which probably the biggest play in all of London. It's about this boy named Albert who has a horse named Joey who gets conscripted into WW1 and then Albert joins the war even though he's 16 to go track down his beloved horse. All of the horses are done with these incredible wicker frame puppets. There is no moment you do not believe you are seeing real horses.



Tomorrow I leave for Cardiff!

Lost in Translation

For future reference "Quiet Hours 10PM to 8AM" actually means LETS SLAM THE DOORS AS HARD AS WE POSSIBLY CAN EVERY FIVE SECONDS UNTIL SOMEONE ACTUALLY COMES OUT IN THE HALL AND STABS US IN THE EYE.

Very English

So. Before I get to all the "what have I been doing" stuff I have to tell you what happened this afternoon. I go to school in two buildings- the dorms I live in and one I have to walk about four blocks to that looks like it's Hogwart's In London Campus. Really it's just the UCL Cruciform building, but it's pretty badass looking. To get to my class I have to walk down a hallway which makes a sort of left hand curve around a stairwell. But you can see into the stairwell from the curve because there's windows- open arch style. When you get around the curve you make an extreme right hand turn to get on the stairs.



As I'm walking to class I see someone coming up the stairs and I think I've got to be careful coming around the corner because I might collide with the person and knock them down the stairs. So I sort of pause a second coming around the corner so they have time- only no one comes up. I peer around the corner and there's no one on the stairs. Or in the hallway.

NO ONE.

I even turned around to look behind me. I'm the only person in the hall at this point. And I kept looking around for a second before I was like ....was that a ghost?

On the way out of the building my friend Sarah made me ask the desk people if the building is haunted and they looked very grave and said ...did you see something? And I told them in the stairwell, and they started to tell me about people they see in the classrooms after everything is locked up at night, or noises. The building is over 300 years old. Of course it's haunted.

Saturday we did go to Camden Lock and it was just as punk rock and awesome as it was last time I was there. And everyone here in London has colors in their hair so I decided to get some too. And some stockings, since that's also the thing. After the Market I came back to the dorm and got in touch with my friend Steve who lives here and we planned a pubcrawl. That was a blast! And Steve is hilarious and the night went on just long enough to be really really fantastic and still let me get up early Sunday for...

The Battle of Hastings! Which was hot, and miserable, and sunny. But the abbey was beautiful and something right out of Highlander (which I've been rewatching) and the countryside makes you want to lay down on the grass and take up painting. Or fishing. After, I had this enormous Full English Breakfast at the restaurant we went to called... A Taste of Battle. da da ching!



Then we headed home on a rather mysterious train. See, we went to the train station at the right time for our train but there was no train there. And we waited and found out the next train we could take was in an hour. Then the digital signs at the station change and say the next train coming down the line (not the one we're waiting an hour for) is not for civilian use. About all of us ran out onto the platform to see if it was nuclear weapons or cattle or what, but the train stopped and looked normal enough. There were people on it so we all ran around like crazy people getting our bags and jumping on the train. And inside the train the intercom was like NOT FOR CIVILIAN USE and we were like "oh no do we get off what's happening" and the train conductor yelled at me to get back on when I hopped off. And then the train started up again and we were all asking each other what was going on.

I pointed out if the train was MI-5 only they were probably going to come down to our carriage and shoot us. And we all nervously laughed.

No one shot us. Thankfully. And then nothing happened last night- I thought about doing more mudlarking but decided not to go when I realized I'd have to go alone. Then class today, and then a ghost.



DOVER BTW

Lazy Day

The last few days have been really busy. I haven't even uploaded the pictures from them to the computer, but when I do- probably tonight- I'll make another big post full of pics.

Thursday we went to the Globe for a tour of the museum and it was sort of at lowtide so before the tour (we got there early and then the museum opened half an hour late) I went mudlarking. It's basically when you go on the shores of the Thames and look for stuff. Coins, spoons, pottery- anything that might have been dropped into the river since people first showed up in the area can be found on shore.

Thursday night we went back to the Globe for a performance of MacBeth which was super gory and had this sort of canopy thing coming out from the stage with holes in it. If you wanted to stand with your head in one of the holes you were one of the severed heads in hell. Guess where I stood? You also had a higher risk of being bled on or terrorized by the weird sisters.

Friday a group of us went out to a place called Folkstone which I guess is the boonies. I think it's about an hour away by train and it's within seeing distance of the White Cliffs of Dover, if you don't mind hiking all the way down the rocky shore we were on, then climbing onto an abandoned wharf/lighthouse base/nuclear instalment. The view was incredible.

Today it looks like Sarah and I are going up to the Camden Lock markets. I think she's looking for a dress and I want boots. Who knows what we'll really find.

Anyway, update later.

d'awwwww

More London

This is a cute video. This one is more OMG.

Ok, back to London news. I'm still really tired, but it's not jetlag or anything. I'm pretty well adjusted to the time here and when to go to sleep. It's that all this weekend we've been walking. Friday we had a tour of the part of town we live in so we can find the grocer's and the tube stop and school. Saturday we had a photo scavenger hunt all across London. We rode the Tube a lot, but there was so much walking. Today, Sunday, we went to Hampton Court and walked up and down it.





(btw that's a foot and a half step up into the train. gap indeed.)

I feel like I've mastered the tube system though I've only rode a train once so far (up to Hampton Court) and I still don't really understand the buses yet. Apparently it's a matter of understanding the layout of the city, then finding a bus going mostly the way you want to go, then hopping off when you get close. I'll have to use it Tuesday night though, because...

I have a ticket to go see Scissor Sisters!

And apparently I can't just take the tube there, I need to use the buses too. Very exciting.

In more scholarly news I have done all of the work due for the first week of classes, which starts tomorrow. And despite the pub food I'm still eating healthy. Tesco has cheap apples and carrots. On the way to Hampton Court I ate an entire box of grapes. And they do have macaroni and cheese over here- only it would be better to label it "macaroni in nutmeg cream sauce". Yuck. Glad I brought four boxes of it from Kroger at home.

SHIELD COINS COLLECTED: 5/7



Also London has a vampire problem. (besides all the twilight posters everywhere). Really I think it's a PSA for car accidents but...

Really really tired

This sums up everything I have ever learned about living with other people.

Yawn. Fighting jet lag by staying awake as long as possible is soul crushing. I woke up on the plane this morning at... 9AM brit time or something and ate this delicious cinnamon cake they gave me in my breakfast box. And I have been awake ever since and it is... 9PM brit time now and I feel like it's the longest day there has ever been. Midnight sun, six month days, kind of long.

The dorms we're in are nice. From the outside they look like brutalist architecture but it's more soviet looking than that. I'll take a pic tomorrow when it's not so drizzly outside. On the inside the dorms are yellow. And the windows open. Window. And I have a sink.

Earlier we went to a pub to see the england/algeria (?) match. There's nothing like standing in a mad crush of people who are all shouting at each other about work today then howling like werewolves when the ball gets close to the goal and realizing you have no idea how football/soccer is played.

Ok. Super tired. Bed now.

TOMORROW: SCAVENGER HUNT

SHIELD COIN COLLECTION: 1/7

Oh, I also forgot to mention the 50p of custard I bought at Tesco's. It was more custard than a Ben and Jerry's carton could hold. For 50p. So good.

A Hell of a Life

You know a person had a rollicking good time being alive when their obituary containes the following:


His personal humour often whirled into the surreal, as his fellow journalist Peter Tory learned to his cost. One night, in a Blackpool restaurant during a Conservative party conference, Waterhouse inveigled Tory into a bet which resulted in Tory losing his trousers. Waterhouse made off into the night with the item of clothing and Tory had to borrow a pair of the chef's pants.

Back at the bar of the Imperial hotel, he made himself busy introducing Tory's trousers to various Conservative party grandees, insisting they shake a proffered leg by way of greeting. In later weeks, Tory would receive sinister, late-night calls, claiming to be from his trousers, relating, in a falsetto, northern accent, the various risque adventures he was enjoying with his new master.


Copied from here. Found it while doing a paper for theater class.

This Just In From The Newsroom-

I am somewhere in the AJC. No, really. It's a one week long contractor job typing up address on raffle tickets, but it's still a newspaper building.

I went on a tour the first day I was here and got to see the big presses, vats of ink the size of showers, rolls of paper half the size of my car... There's actually this miniture train type thing built into the floor to drive the reams of paper around and load them into the presses. And the coffee machines they have here...

The one down in the bullpen area is the most amazing. It autobrews three 12-cup pots at a time, with warming plates and everything. When you go down there to use it all the journalists make growly faces and sort of lunge towards you, like maybe you were sent there to break the machine.

It's adorable.

Unfortunatly unlike on TV the journalists do not appear to be friendly. None of them have spoken so far besides glaring to communicate when you go near the coffee machine.

In other news, it is sixteen days til London.

All the books in the world.... except one

Scan of some comic.

Found this randomly, it's really great.

meh

Wow. I was sort of expecting about fifty flames over that last post.

Sorry I haven't written much lately. Spring semester was a nightmare and there's been some personal stuff going on. Nothing worth writing about though.

Right now it's seventeen days to London. Still have a lot to do before I can roll out. Like pack.

I finally saw Iron Man 2 today. Despite all the "it's not Iron Man 1" hype I thought it was pretty good. I feel a little gypped that Iron Man and Warmachine didn't fistbump in costume- but that was pretty much my biggest complaint. The movie didn't suck and for a sequel that a miracle, right? Tony did his big self-destruct thing which was fun to watch on the big screen. No matter how much they told me the Russian guy was a physicist I couldn't believe it- silver nail polish, dyed streaks in his hair, the prison tattoos. All I could think was "world's smartest hooker". He did have a good villain laugh, though.

On another note I saw Prince of Persia. (Spoilers) I don't even know what to say about it. Lots of parkour stuff and sharp objects and a princess. Mostly I think I feel cheated for the Prince guy since he lived through the whole movie and then went back to five minutes in.

Back to Iron Man- Jarvis could have talked 5000x more in the movie and it would have been awesome. Likewise that Jason Hammer dude could have stopped talking three hours before the movie started and I'd have been happy.

Scapegoat

I'm not really into politics. In the sense I have no idea what is going on most days or what things mean. Some guy was on the tv the other night howling about the oil spill in the gulf and the anchor covering it was like "this DEMOCRAT says this about the oil spill.... even a DEMOCRAT feels this way..." and I had to ask why they were stressing the word 'democrat' like maybe they hate the environment or can't see oil or something.

Basically I don't get it.

Anyway. Not that I know anything about politics but I have noticed one thing that I don't really get. I know a lot of people don't like Obama because they think he's not an American or he's secretly Muslim or something- but there's moments where they're talking about the economy on tv and they get really angry he hasn't made more jobs yet.

Like he's the Cadbury Bunny and he lays jobs instead of Creme Eggs.

I don't know. Maybe presidents have powers like that, but I have no idea. I don't think they do.

What brought this to mind was the oil spill press conference thing this afternoon. It seems like everyone is like "you, president guy, why did you let the oil spill happen? how could you do this to us?!". Even when he was saying that we've never had an oil spill accident on this level and that people weren't prepared for it because we didn't know a spill could be this bad- people seemed to be blaming him for not being psychic. Or people are wanting to know why he hasn't stopped this yet, or hasn't cleaned up the gulf yet- and it's BP's fault and problem as far as I understand.

Don't know. Like I said, I don't get politics.

In other news, is anyone else completely freaking out about the Bones season finale? CAN'T. WAIT. FOR. FALL.

Sigh

I miss Torchwood.

I have no idea what the point of COE was besides ruining the show. Yeah, sure, it was pretty, and dramatic, and whatever- but seriously, admit it, it pretty much canceled the show. And I really, really wish I could understand the logic behind that. It was making tons of money, I loved it, I know a bunch of people who loved it; wtf.

And since COE I haven't wanted to watch the show, or read the books, or pick up the magazine. When I saw John Barrowman on Desperate Housewives it felt like a punch to the gut.

Sherlock Holmes Defends London from Dinosaurs!

Ok, Sarah and I watched the Sherlock Holmes movie last night and... It was pretty good actually. I mean, seriously dinosaurs! And a kracken! And power suits! It was sort of horrible and awesome at the same time, in a low budget way, thought the CG bits were more charming than in Clash of the Titans. (I mean the cityscape specifically- Every time I saw the temple on the hill all I could think was video game graphics while Parliament looked pretty in the fog and nighttime lights). I did think Gareth David-Lloyd was pretty good as Watson- sort of bumbling and determined. And that guy who played Sherlock was alternately awesome and hilarious- startlingly effete, though. And I got the distinct feeling that it was much less plot coupon-y than the Robert Downy Jr. version.

And now we are watching Nicole Kidman in The Invasion which is setting off every horrible hypochondriac feeling in my body. Space plague spores. *shudder*

Sherlock Holmes versus T-Rex versus Kracken!!!

When you're this guy...



And you're fighting this guy...



And this guy...




You might need this guy...



Nope. Not kidding.



Oh right. I forgot Rodan is in it too. I'm pretty sure this movie is going to be awesome.

The point of watching Bones summed up in eight lines

(only the vaguest of spoilers for the last episode)

bentochan: woah woah what the
bentochan: brennan is in her jimjams
bentochan: and booth just showed up in the middle of the night
bentochan: and now they're drinking scotch or something
bentochan: OMG AND THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT SOUL MATES
bentochan: and now they are referencing hedwig and the angry inch
bentochan: OMG THEY ARE GAZING AT EACH OTHER
bentochan: IN THE EYES

Books, Books, Books

Sat down and read all of the recently released Lord Sunday in one sitting. Last book in the series and it manages to put a new spin on what's been happening in the previous six books to the point I think I have to reread them. The Keys to the Kingdom series is pretty young adult and the books are pretty thin- it's one of those series I'd love to see rewritten as doorstops for a more adult audience.

And before that I read The Steel Remains which was on a blog post about all of the remake movies they're doing this year and next and what they could be making from books instead. Apparently there is going to be a new Highlander movie and that's my childhood so when the blogger said "make steel remains instead" I had to see what was so special about the book that it beats out my beloved Highlander. And as much as I love Highlander I'd rather see Ringil hacking things up on screen right now.

The Cobb County Library Book Sale yielded up an almost complete set of hardcover Vampire Chronicles (only need two more) and I've been rereading Interview with the Vampire. It's the book that besides the Narnia books owned my childhood. And its funny- there's moments I remember almost word for word in it, then there's parts I can never recall- like Babette. I always forget who she is. Louis is still very emo. I wish Vampire Lestat had been one of the other hardcovers I'd picked up- I'm almost done with Interview already and ready for Lestat to start behaving badly.

Clive Barker's Abarat series was supposed to have the third book out last summer (also the original release date for Lord Sunday before it was moved back) but I'm beginning to suspect it's never going to come out.

And I picked up but did not start rereading the first book in the Bloody Jack series. I read the first five in three days when I checked them out of the library a few years ago- Jack is actually Jackie whose family dies of plague (i think?) and she joins the Royal Navy while passing for a boy, fights pirates, becomes a horseman, gets sent to a boarding/charm school for young ladies, joins a whaling ship, falls in love with another sailor, ect, ect. Crazy nautical awesomesauce.



Look at the second to last job title in the subtitle of the novel. I'm pretty sure when I read to book five I'd only gotten to the soldier/sailor part. Now she's a mermaid. Or she was book before this.

MERMAID.

And I thought the book where she's a horseman was going to be badass.

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT

Curse of the ADD knitter

Having seen Jean's post about knitting I feel the need to blog about it too.

I have come to realize over the last few weeks of knitting that I am hardcore ADD about it. I have at least ten projects going at the moment, and I sort of move between them depending on what I'm interested in working on at the moment. Give me something I'm inspired with and I'll work on it day and night and get it done in three days.

Give me something I am not so inspired with and it will sit in my knitting crate for a year.

And lately (much to Mom's horror) I have been frogging those uninspiring things. Frogging is where you pull the needles out of the project, then rewind all the yarn out of it, then do something else with the yarn. I used to be afraid of doing that because of all the hardwork I'd put in. Now I'm just like, urg, I can use that yarn on something else. Or I want the needles back.

Which is nice. It saves yarn. And Mom makes this face like :O only so much better. You can tell she wants to take whatever I'm frogging away from me.

Anyway, long story short, I have two shawls going at the moment, a pair of gloves in sock weight yarn (oh god all of those tiny little stitches), a pair of gloves with cables, at least two scarves... And I have a pair of gloves to finish for one of my WriMos.

And then today, knowing all of that, I found a pattern for fingerless gloves where you embroider words on the knuckles and it made me think of one of the sailors in Master and Commander who has "HOLD FAST" tattooed on his knuckles. I go to look at the yarn, see there's some I have in my stash already, but they're in some gloves from two years ago that I have never worn or finished. When I get home those things are getting frogged. Now if I only knew how to embroider so I can do little ships and Here There Be Monsters things all over the rest of the gloves...

I can't believe I am going to admit this but...

I watched Bachelor this season. You know, On the Wings of Love.

God, this is so embarrassing.

Anyway. It's reality tv which doesn't mean it's reality. Which some people can't seem to understand. It's all cut and pasted and high drama.

For instance there were several commercials this season with Tinley in them crying and telling Jake, the Bachelor, that she's pregnant. Only *gasp* she had previously told him that she hadn't had sex with anyone since her ex-husband some impossible-baby-making time in the past.

Only it was never in the show. Seriously, she's not pregnant.

Who knows what it was, originally, but once it's added to the commercials and everyone is all OMG about it it cranks up viewers which is all that reality tv wants.

Now, on to the Rozlyn scandal. *Heavy Sarcasm* on the "scandal" part.

Supposedly the contestant Rozlyn got into a relationship with one of the producers and she was thrown off the show for it. You know, since she's supposed to be there for Jake. Only, where's the pics? Where's the footage? Oh gosh, there isn't any. All there is are what the other contestants saw.

Granted, I don't know any of these people so I have no idea who's lying, but...

Women are catty. Especially when they're in a group together. And that's what you have in the Bachelor house. And worse they're competing for Jake and that's a pretty good reason to back stab one of their own.

Part of what bothers me about what the girls have to say is a lot of it's over the top. Apparently Rozlyn and the Producer were making out on some stairs. And then another girl says she was Rozlyn's roommate and one night Rozlyn never showed up to sleep. And another girl says that Rozlyn was crawling around in short shorts telling the girls that if they saw the Producer they should tell him to come up and "tuck her in".

If you're carrying on a clandestine relationship when you're supposed to be fighting for the attention of another guy wouldn't you be a little more... clandestine about it?

And seriously, crawling around in short shorts?

Anyway, apparently I'm being naive about this, and sure, I'm totally willing to say it's possible the whole thing is true. I'm just saying it's funny there's no facts, no proof. And that there's a seemingly endless supply of sites online refuting the whole story as made up by The Bachelor to get more drama and attention for the show.

Anyway, whatever. Reality tv. It's crazy stuff.

Part of the reason I wanted to spend half an hour blogging about it is something else, another article I read online. Don't Confuse Them With Facts. I was going to blog about how good that article was before all of this, but hey.

In completely separate news I couldn't find any Bay Rum at the store so I've decided to make my own. Should be ready in two weeks.

Blah

Sort of stuck in writer's block. Even for blogging.

School isn't going well. In one class I keep having to change seats because mine is constantly taken. I started in seat a, for instance, then someone took it so I moved to seat b, which was then taken, so I moved to seat c... This happens every class. For two months now.

In latin we're learning very differently from how my latin 1 professor taught us which is causing problems.

My art history professor can't get things right. He seriously told us the Roman Empire began in year 0.

I didn't say anything because I'm sure I'd say it wrong- but the next class he'd gotten the dates right, so I guess someone did.

I have hit this stupid diet and excersize plateau. Work more = nothing happens. It's frustrating on a level only writer's block can compare to.

Saw this. Was instantly eaten up with envy.

Hrm

Things I learned yesterday:

-Watched Legion and Book of Eli. Book of Eli is a better movie, but I liked it less than Legion.

-Apparently I can't tell Paul Bettany apart from Jude Law.

-I guessed the plot twist in Book of Eli the first time I saw an ad for it. And I was right.

-The last thing you want to do is get in a wing fight with an archangel. Wings count as bladed weapons AND armor.

-Something went terribly wrong with the Superbowl ads.

-An iPod battery can become so empty it won't charge. Because it's empty and the iPod wants to boot, but the battery is empty. Repeat x10,000.

-The new Clash of the Titans looks so good I would sell a kidney to go see it right now.

Still Ghostwriting for Shakespeare

I had this crazy dream this morning that a lost Shakespeare play had been found. It was called "To Wit" and was about... This young man who was getting married and took all of his friends out to his country estate for revelry before the wedding. They were going to hunt for a week, and drink, and boast about things, and then the bride would show up with her family and friends, and the play would end with a wedding. Only the friends of the bride were going to marry the friends of the groom, and the play was much funnier than it sounds.

Part of the reason it was a 'lost' play was that Shakespeare had written it in secret and had half the men played by women, and half the women played by men. Most of the boasting and jokes had to do with gender roles and sexism.

I remember in the first part, once they'd all just arrived at the country estate two of the men, Gracen and... this guy who's name I can't recall, they get drunk and start boasting about how they're both such good hunters they don't have to stalk their prey, they just hide so well it comes to them. And Kiera Knightly was playing Gracen and I think Karl Urban was playing the guy who's name I can't remember. And they wind up in the yard of the estate, pointing to trees and barrels saying they could hide behind them so well no one would ever find them. At one point Gracen is hiding behind a lone wagon wheel he's propped up in the middle of a field and it's after dusk and they're drunk and the other guy can't find him in the dark so he wins the boast off...

It was the most hilarious thing I had ever seen.

And then Nikki started crying and hopping up and down on the bed wanting breakfast and you have no idea how furious I am I did not get to see the rest of the play.

Cake in Wonderland

So I was watching the SyFy Alice miniseries the other week (it's actually pretty cute) and Hatter has this great line, where he's trying to make Alice feel better about liking a guy who's been kidnapped. He tells Alice that,

"Trust me - I, I know a thing or two about liking people. And in time, after much chocolate and cream cake, 'like' turns into 'what was his name again.'".

Oh, and this is Hatter.



I like the quote. But then I was like 'what's cream cake?'. Is it like Cream Soda? Just plain vanilla cake? Apparently, after trolling some recipe sites, it's cake sliced thin with a pudding/custard inside.

Can't be that hard to make, I figure, and pick up the ingredients. And it's not.

Not until you get to the slice the cake thin part. Thank god Amie was over. First you pop the cake out of the pan, then slice it in half with a huge bread knife, then lift the top off without breaking it, then put the bottom back in the pan, then add pudding, then put the top back on without breaking it.

In hindsight I think if you're trying to make it look pretty you should probably let the pudding set up then spread it on the bottom slice, and put the whole cake on a platter instead of back in the pan. But whatever.



Chocolate Fudge Cake Mix + Vanilla Pudding + Light Cream Cheese + Strawberries = So much better than it should be. I expected this to be good. I wasn't expecting it to be one of those things you have to sit down to eat. It's over the top good.

Definitely 'what was his name' good.