Hey, if you have asked me about helping out, I have a definite Thing that needs helping with.  It's on Saturday night, preparing for the Haiku Earring Party.  I am trying to make sure I get dinner, by the simple expedient of accepting a dinner invitation I have been offered, but I also confess that setting up for the Haiku Earring Party is the time I am most prone to melancholy missing of Mike. I keep looking over to the little kitchen space and expecting to see him there slicing cheese and broccoli and stuff, and making his Fordean observations. So it occurred to me that I could, you know, ask if my various helpy friends who have been asking what's needed might want to help out with this particular task. (A bunch of you have done it before, and are wonderful and experienced; it's not as much prep as some parties, as our decor is mostly Earrings On A Table and some Food On A Different Table, plus a Table At Which To Write Haiku.) 

Not sure yet on the timing of dinner and all, but as I find out, I'll let you know.  Probably I'd set up the team with a diagram, and then join you as soon as I have et.

Let me know if you might want to lend a hand.  Thank you a lot. A lot a lot a lot.


(There's a little other prep on Saturday morning, going with me to the Farmer's Market, maybe. But Saturday night is the big thing.  Set-up of the table is no longer a mad scramble, now that I have Katie along with me. In fact, she mostly chases me away once I get to the fidget stage, so she can set up in peace. Hee!

Bits of Tid
Just a few odds and ends to report to you, gang, so I'll just get right to it and see if I can restrain myself from extraneous banter. Hey, did I just hear you scoff? Oh well, maybe you're right, but I can at least try.

First tidbit: The winners of the Support Apex contest have been announced over at Shocklines. To take a quick cyber-hike over to see if you're one of the lucky ones: Click Here.

Two free subscriptions to Apex, 4 issues of Dark Discoveries and a copy of Jennifer Pelland's, Unwelcome Bodies were all up for grabs and donated by Apex fans to help remind folks to subscribe to Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest. The publisher needed a little help getting the word out that new subscribers were needed to keep their fantastic magazine afloat. If you'd like to add your support and receive one of the best mags in the business, stop on over to Apex and nab yourself a subscription for the very reasonable price of just $20 for four issues. Buying subscriptions keep magazines in business, which in turn gives writers a place to sell their stories so you have something wonderful to read!

Second Tidbit: After a whole long year of messing around, I'm FINALLY going to publish my newsletter. Thanks to everyone who subscribed WAY back when I launched the website. If you haven't signed up and you'd like to, Click Here.

Obviously from my newsletter publishing track record, you're assured I won't be spamming your email account with trivial ha-ha, BUT I can guarantee we'll have some newsletter-only promotions worth signing up for.

The inaugural issue will include a random drawing from all subscribers signed-up by the launch date, May 25th. The Prize: A signed/inscribed softcover copy of Mama's Boy and Other Dark Tales. Only catch, you have to actually read the newsletter to see if your name was drawn. Not too tough, right? Subscribe Here!

Third Tidbit: I saw something over at David Niall Wilson's Macabre Ink that I wanted to be sure to share with you. When we shell out bucks to the small press often the limited editions we received are made by hand, which is the case with the books from Insidious Publications. They were the original publishers of my novella Mama's Boy, and since then they've been busy with several other titles. David interviews Chris Hedges in a fascinating photo essay on the making of a hand made book. Makes you really appreciate those little literary jewels even more. Click Here to have a look at "The Anatomy of a Book."

Tidbit Four: As you may have noticed, I'm easily entertained especially by strange things. One recent find for my personal amusement was The Alien Insult Generator. It's a random word generator but dedicated to, well...alien insults. If you stop by, you'll be treated such nuggets of nasty goodness such as, "Three eyed son of a radiation damaged toilet eating droid!" Or who could resist the "Dribbling son of a space sick nose worm." Oh yes, as I said, easily entertained. Click Here for more...I bet you get hooked too, you Bord sniffing son of a deranged space weevil! *giggles* Thank you John at Hollis.co.uk! Click Here and begin your dissent into alien insult hell!

Well that's is for the bits of tid. I hope you found something of interest. I hope to see you at the newsletter next Sunday!

Wickedly Yours,
Fran Friel

I had a good weekend. Thanks, world.

The new tv is being hooked up/tuned in, so while I can't work, I'll do this instead.

Smart Bitches, Trashy Books is a great website.

Go read this new entry ... sexual customs of native Americans. And then laugh yourself sick.

http://www.smartbitchestrashybooks.com/

oh yeah... this is so ghetto...
with the Control Box 95% complete, and the cabling 80% complete, the next phase of the project is about to begin in earnest. So, today... I Got Wood.

Just how much wood can a valis fit in a Honda Del Sol?
Turns out quite a bit, if you dont mind looking like an idiot while driving down the road. thankfully i am far beyond caring about the stares of onlookers. They just jealous cause they aint got no GAME.





now i wonder what the hell i'm going to do with all that...

Valis
the suspense is killing me... i hope it'll last...
rubberella sure has been going through the vodka pretty quickly recently...

I had an interesting game design question.

Is earned advancement really needed?

Whats to say we have to have experience points in a game?

I was wondering if would hurt a system is if all the character advancement was based on how long the characters played or age. It seems to me that concept of an earned advancement through points is not inherently even. And if you are doing it in such a manner to keep everyone even then there is not point in having an earned point advancement.

Just a thought. I would be interested to see what other people thought.

After a fitful night, Sasha took a turn for the worse and had to be put down this morning. He is buried under a tree in our new backyard, under a large boulder.

Spent the rest of the day repairing plumbing, moving things between houses, and mostly driving. Going to shower and try to sleep now.

We're back from a fun-filled weekend at jadziadaxwb's house.

Details to come when I am less tired. *falls into bed*

• 22:48 @zappos_alfred Quick, Robin! To the bat metal detector! #
• 11:47 Lunch and "Prince Caspian" and spring cleaning this afternoon. #

Follow at http://twitter.com/mhaithaca
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Today I had friends over for a girls day/brunch/tea party. We had a lot of fun, listening to a mix-mash of French & Portuguese music, chatted, ate, and drank exotic tea's. Thank you marcassa, Michell, onehotbeeyatch, sunflower_andi, and vampymissk. It was a blast and I hope we'll continue the tea time tradition.


Menu:
Green Chile Corn Chowder
Spinach & Feta Cheese Quiche
Sausage, Onion, Chive & Cheese Stuffed Mushroom Caps

Fresh Fruit: strawberries, cantaloupe, seedless green grapes
Caramel Apple Coffee Cake w/whipped cream
Chocolate Cake

Cucumber Ice Water
Asti Spumante Champagne

Assorted Tea: Twining Earl Grey, Ladygrey, English Breakfast, Irish Breakfast, Indian Spiced Chai, lj user="onehotbeeyatch">'s homemade blend of Lavender & Chamomile and Oolong tea, Jasmine tea, In Pursuit of Tea Green Tea Anemone Rosette, and vampymissk & marcasssa brought a delicious variety of tea's from Stash Earl White, Double Bergamot Earl Gray, and Harney & Son's. (Ladies, please share the Harney & Son's flavors in the comments section because they were INCREDIBLE.)

http://www.youarenotrudy.com

Nick Curtis (Necro's design guy) is playing around, having fun. I love it. I'm told more stuff will be on the site as the days progress.

There's this, a wee video, as well:

The Harlequin & the Train

Wednesday, fairyhead and I are flying to Montreal to visit friends for a stretched weekend. As of yesterday, reports were that it was sunny, 70s during the day, 60s at night. Today, I checked the weather, and it's expected to be cloudy or rainy all week, 50s/40s until Sunday, when we leave.

Oh, well. I trust the cool hair and cute accents will have to make up for it. I sincerely hope Denys Arcand and Atom Egoyan weren't lying to me all these years.

Sometimes, a girl needs a break from things she has to do and takes it by doing something she wants to do, which uses exactly the same skill sets as the things she’s taking a break from. For instance, I’ve been doing a lot of book binding and work with marbled papers for the show Prisoner of the Crown.

As noted elsewhere, I have a weakness for paper and it wasn’t really possible for me to handle all of these papers without coveting. Especially since I had them scanned and was printing them onto giant sticker sheets for work anyway.

Giant sticker sheets… hm. And I’ve just gotten this new $10 folding keyboard.

So, while I was waiting for something else to dry, I made this.

From the outside it doesn’t look that much different from a makeup case or small book. In fact, I thought about putting lettering on it, but decided I liked the cleanness of the lines.

Well, that and everything on this moves as it opens.

The keys are a slightly modified version of the Kowal Portable keyboard. I used a different paper for the interior. I thought about doing brass cogs instead, but decided that I liked the idea of playing with book motifs instead, so went with a contrasting endpaper. I may swap this endpaper out though for something more interesting. At the moment the infrared wand is painted bronze, though I might change it to a red gloss, like a silk ribbon bookmark. Alas, there’s not enough space for another layer of thickness in here, so it can’t be actual silk. That’s also why the space bar is not wood. I cut the pieces but even paper thin wood was too thick for this to handle.

Because the keyboard has much snugger margins for fit the whole thing is done with laser printed regular sticker paper (instead of the schtickers I used on the Kowal Portable) and coated with ModgePodge. Yep. This is a decoupage keyboard. It’s a little stiff, opening it, but I think that’ll loosen up.

And this is what people sitting across from me will see. I wonder how long it will take before I feel compelled to bronze my Palm Pilot?

Comments? -- Link

Just by way of an FYI, for those of you following the Megan Meier case, Lori Drew, the conscienceless bitch who drove a teenage girl to suicide by harassing her online, could be in deep shit.

I first wrote about this back in November, so you can find relevant details about the case there.

Now, she's being charged in California, of all places. Weird, considering this all happened in Missouri. Anyway, she could be looking at 20 years in federal prison. Which, on deeper thought, sounds about right.

Not really looking to debate whether or not she should be punished*, or whether the law should be stretched to cover people being obnoxious on the internet**, just making sure everyone hears about this. And anyone pulling the "But suicide is a choice!" line is going to get banned; also FYI.

* She should, and it's long past time.

** Oh, please. This is "bullying" like stalking is "bothering." Way beyond the pale.

The post about Netflix RSS feeds was designed to come up with a variety of useful data for this:

FeedFlix is a clever new service that takes the readily available information Netflix provides in personalized RSS feeds (your feeds will appear if you’re logged into your Netflix account) and displays that info in more digestible format.

http://www.gizmolovers.com/2008/05/18/share-your-netflix-stats-with-feedflix/

Thanks to everyone for their help!

Yes, you're a lovely idea. I can imagine writing you THIS VERY MINUTE. You're sleek and sexy and would capture the heart of the nation. Uh-huh. At least a Pulitzer, and probably a Nobel as well. Yes, I'm sure you're much more fun to write than the novel I'm currently writing.

The problem, you see, is that you're a shiny thing. Silver, sleek, and undeniably sexy with your fishnet stockings, swooped tailfins, and candy apple lipstick. You're beautiful, and one day I might spend some time with you, but right now I've got this other gal. Really we just started out together. We're past the honeymoon stage, and she's been kind of a drag the last few weeks, honestly, but I want to see this out.

I've had a problem with commitment in the past, you see. I'm inconstant. After that honeymoon time, I split and run. Maybe I'll stick it out 10,000 words more, but never all the way to the end. Yeah, I know you're just aching to give me fame, money, and literary immortality, but see, I've got to finish a novel. Once I've got this one under control--buffed, fluffed, and ready to go out into the world--I'll think about it.

Right now, you're going into a Word file with a do-not-open-until in the filename. If you're still hot and throbbing when I've taken care of my current project, maybe I'll, you know, take you home and see what makes your motor run. Until then--sayonara, sweetheart.

Actually, I WILL be seeing stakebaitat Balticon... Hmmmm...  *wicked grin*

hughcasey's LJ stalker is stakebait!

stakebait is stalking you because they heard you are awesome in bed, and they want to find out. They are also stalking you in real life. Look out!

 
OK, I'm going to bed now.  Goodnight all!

I made an herbed, salt topped bread, and a cinnamon and vanilla sugared loaf, then decided to test out this herbed 24 coleslaw.

Nom. But now I smell like a pickle.

rubyquinn


my bad... busy but productive day -- missed your birthday, though. Many, many happy new years to come!!!

Just FYI....protein powder tastes like crap.

Many dogs are trained to find to find things, highly specialized to locate drugs, explosives, or missing skiers.

Maddie is no exception. But Maddie tracks down something else entirely: Graffiti.


This morning, she led me straight to the Walnut Park bandstand, where we found all sorts of scribbled ideograms.


Like this one: "Smoke till you die."

( Another discovery, and more, behind the cut... )

Y'know...
I can't replace my PDA with my "new every two" plan because Verizon will force me on a data package. Because all PDA's must surf the net at over $100/month, doncha know? And -- if they can find a replacement -- Verizon will charge me over $600 if I try to just outright replace my POS broken PDA phone ($200 if I just get a phone). Which POS PDA randomly reboots. Usually wiping all data and info except contact info numbers I've backed up to the chip. Usually the chip can restore those fine. Except...

Tonight it cold rebooted, and I tried to backup the contact info.
MY POS VERIZON PDA DELETED SEVERAL HUNDRED NAMES:
IT ATE EVERY NAME STARTING AFTER FRIGGIN' "C."
DIAF, Gorram Verizon, DIAF slowly and horribly.
(I should have backup numbers at work.)
(Whenever I get back to work.)
(I'm still convalescing.)
(I lost your new number, soulfulsinner.)

I've learned and pondered a great many things over this past week and then some. Like "Why didn't Laurie and I get a new grown-up sized bed and mattress and box spring years ago?" Our bed was a full and the mattress was twice as old as our marriage, but with the Economically Stimulating Money we were able to buy a new Queen with mattress and box spring, then a new full mattress and box spring to turn our old bed into one for a guest room.

(I would like to have pillaged more used bookstores with it, but responsibility and my aching back called.)

Oh yes, the new mattress is something like twelve times higher than the old one and fifty times as soft, give or take. And we had the good sense to get mattress covers, as the very first full day that we had our Lovely New Grown-Up Sized Bed, New Cat #2 (Wilder) peed on it. Wilder doesn't get to play in our room anymore.

"Daddy, that's a loooooooong way down for a little dog."

"Um, OK, I'll just get comfortable here then."

And there have been other matters, ranging from babies to 2300 degrees to hunting for a certain tree. Most thoughts are illustrated.

( The Other Matters )

Madness. This is madness.

I'm just going to have to suck it up and print it out to restructure.

ARGH!

Totally almost forgot that today's the 28th anniversary of St. Helens. I was on a class field trip to southern Oregon at the time -- stuck in the middle of high desert country -- and when we all heard the news we went into a minor panic, convinced we'd return to Portland and discover our parents' buried under ash, Pompey style.

Our class field trip same time the previous year? Spirit Lake.

Yeah, I've got fond memories of Harry Truman being a royal pain about us using the canoes, a year to the day before the volcano took him because he wouldn't get his cantankerous codger ass out of the red zone. Piece of work, that old fart was.

In other news:

If Dave wasn't working today and if I'd had the time, we would have been two tiny dots somewhere amongst the... WTF... SEVENTY FIVE THOUSAND???

WOW. Um. WOW.

Thanks to donations and help and mad skillz (and wiping out my elite flying mount fund, small as it was) I've gotten... mostly kinda pretty close to Kara-geared*. My only greens left are my offhand (since I just switched from staff to 1H sword and haven't caught up yet) and my pants (working on spellstrike set). So, starting next Friday, I may well be joining mr_rubix in what is largely viewed as Certain Death:

...PUGging Karazhan (KZ). Say a prayer for me, people. XD

* I am grinding to get both spellstrike patterns, which would nudge me a lot closer to the 100 spellhit/ 700 spell dmg that I am going for. But even at the moment, I'm still regularly hitting 450-550 DPS in endgame instances without usually pulling aggro, which I think is good enough to at least stick my toe in the Kara PUG pool. ;D

I saw Obama talk today. My adult experiences with past Presidents has made me so cynical that I don't want to like him. I'm pretty sure that I'll end up disappointed. Despite myself, it was exciting to see our future President.


And I've always wanted a picture of me with the president.


His talk was short and sweet, maybe because he's exhausted. He spoke well of Clinton and condemned the war. He said he'd push for education. Free college for people who will go do a year or two of civil service work post-graduation. Health care and housing for all. Ok. I'm sold. I like to think that kid is whispering something insightful and profound to his dad but I suspect he had to pee.

Notes from the doctor:

According to my insight provider, I have "the soul of a prophet"; apparently wishing I didn't is just part of the package. I'm pretty sure it's meant (semi-) metaphorical, but what the fuck do you do with something like that?

I'm also reminded that I can't control other people's reactions, only my own. But, no one seems to know how to advise me to take all the exclusionary, expulsive, marginalizing and socially violent reactions in stride, or to build up my own sense of self such that I can sustain it. I have a hard time not hearing that and thinking, "So, you're saying the problem is all in my head, and if I get that straight, all will be well?" I just don't know how to get from underpants to world domination, and nobody else seems to want to fill in step 2.

So the final episode of America's Next Top Model is over and they picked Whitney, which I am not unhappy about.

Out of the top four, her and Anya were the least offensive. I didn't like the personalities of either Dominique or Fatima because they were both so snooty, but in different ways. I would have been equally as happy if either of them won. It's always a crapshoot when you get down to the last two. Why they picked one girl over the other was always a mystery to me. I think the Cover Girl people may have some input in it. I've heard now that the only reason Whitney was chosen was because she was a larger model and the show wanted some extra publicity. To me, it's sad that people can't accept that Whitney may be a good model, that she can take pictures even though she's not a size two. I've watched the show from the beginning and there wasn't a point where they got rid of a girl and I didn't understand why. And maybe she can't take the modeling world by storm, but at least she'll show that larger girls can be beautiful too.

In other news concerning my life, I don't know if you guys remember way back in December I had problems with the vaccuum cleaner. It just wouldn't suck, and after a while, I realized that the brush head wasn't spinning, so I opened it up and took a look. The belt had been broken, so we bought a new belt, which also disintegrated into nothing. The doohicky was spinning, but the belt wasn't, so it just ate through the rubber. Well, people told us to put it on our registry, but we were like, we can't wait until September to vaccuum again. That would just be nuts. So we did some research and got a nice cheap vaccuum, except that it weighs 50 pounds. The upside of this is that I'll get a good workout vaccuuming.

And then, my laptop decided that it didn't want to live anymore either. At first, there was only one vertical line, which I can handle. Most of my programs run on a white background so I don't really notice it that much. Then a second one appeared, which was also fine. It was also a light color, so I didn't notice it much. But yesterday, there was a third line, at which point, I thought that it might bite the big one any day now. I've read that the lines will only get fatter and more numerous and it would only be a matter of time before it won't work altogether. The problem is that the laptop itself seems to work just fine. It's just the monitor. To replace it would be $400, which is ridiculous. I could buy an external for $250, but then where would I put the laptop? I basically need the screen open to start it and to get it out of hibernation. The alternative is to get a new desktop altogether, but I don't want to spend the money right now. I've got a wedding to pay for! So I'm going to put off this purchase as long as I can. I just know that a third thing will go terribly wrong and I'll have to spend another big bunch of money. Because horrible things always come in threes.

--