Mirawyn's World

Lessons Learned in India

2011-11-16T17:02:00.000-05:00

I returned yesterday from a trip to India. It was an eye-opener, to say the least! I learned several…interesting…lessons.

The lines on the road are part of a pavement beautification project and should be ignored.
Water buffalo do not care how large your vehicle is, or how loud.
If you're from America, you probably know Obama.
Motorized vehicles have been modified so that they only operate if the horn is used every three minutes.
Motorcycles and bicycles can carry four or five people.
Toilet paper can be crisp.
Ten passengers in a rickshaw is perfectly reasonable.
"No problem" can mean anything from "That's the best idea I've ever heard!" to "If we do that, the universe will implode."

I also learned that the people of India are some of the most gracious and hospitable anywhere. We could learn a lot from them.

A Passion for Parasols

2011-06-09T14:39:00.000-05:00

When I was a kid, my grandma gave me the coolest little parasol. It was green, and it doubled as an umbrella. She bought it from this wonderful lady in Dahlonega, Georgia, who would paint your name and fanciful little designs on your parasol. (As of two years ago, she was still doing them at Gold Rush Days.)

Years later, my class made a field trip to something called the "China Exhibit" at the High Museum of Art, and I bought myself a beautiful waterproofed paper parasol (green again, as it happens), and I toted that thing around until it eventually disappeared.

Well, I'm fair-skinned and burn easily. Make that really, really fair-skinned, and really, really prone to sunburn. Despite having a decided goth streak, I love the sun, and I love to be outside in it. (I've relegated my inner goth to a part of my soul that mainly gets to play with my wardrobe and Halloween.) For years I've relied on hats and sunscreen, but I hate sunscreen. I hate putting it on, and I don't trust most sunscreen after doing a bit of research.

Last year, I remembered my beloved parasols from my childhood. Why wasn't I using a parasol anymore? I've always loved how they look, and I see them all the time around where I work, carried by the Hispanic and Asian women who walk everywhere. And hey, it's certainly an environmentally friendly approach to sun protection!

So began my hunt for the perfect parasol. My first acquisition, after much research, came from Luna Bazaar, who have the most amazing assortment of paper parasols! (Their main clients are brides and event planners, so they have a rainbow of colors. There are even a few nylon parasols, and they've announced that they'll be adding lace parasols.) I settled on the henna design painted paper umbrella, one of only two waterproof parasols. It stands up to rain quite well, though I wouldn't use it in high winds. (That's only because I'm protective of it, not because I've had a single problem with it.)

As a result of my parasol hunt, I found several examples of belly dance routines with parasols. Since I have a bit of an addiction to props in belly dance, that's just up my alley! I also saw one example of a paper parasol breaking during a routine, so I knew I needed a regular parasol for dance.

I found it this year at the Georgia Renaissance Festival. It's a beautiful red lace parasol, with a sturdy black wood handle and metal ribs. (I found an identical one on sale online.) I had seen several black ones at various conventions, marketed to the steampunk set (yay steampunk!), but this was the first red one! I love that it's so unusual. I hope to have a dance solo worked up in time for my troupe's December show.

Now I'm buying a couple more paper parasols. I'm feeling the lure of the unusually shaped ones, so I've looked at the grass green scalloped parasol and the powder blue star parasol, both from Luna Bazaar. Then again, the gilded blue parasol is gorgeous... (That's also from Luna Bazaar. Have I mentioned how much I love them? And that most of their parasols use sustainably grown wood for the handles and finials?) Eventually I'm going to get the butterflies and flowers parasol or maiden oiled paper parasol, both very Asian designs from Asian Ideas. They also have a lovely square parasol, which is certainly distinctive.

Apparently the recent appreciation for multicultural designs has been having its effect. I've found some other sources, too.

Oiled paper parasols from Japanese Style
Very elegant fabric pagoda parasol-umbrellas from Bella Umbrella
Paper parasols from Asian Import Store
A wide range of distincive parasols from Pamela's Parasols
Asian-style parasols and umbrellas from Oriental Decor
Silk, nylon, lace, paper, and oiled paper parasols from Asian Ideas

Photo by Michael Connell on Flickr

2011 100+ Book Challenge

2011-02-23T13:32:00.014-05:00

For the third year, I'm joining the 100+ book challenge over at Home Girl's Book Blog. Last year I did a worse job of tracking it, but I definitely went way past 100; my total from 2009 was probably a bit over one hundred and thirty books.
I've already been tracking my reading this year, starting January 1. So here's where I am…

*Denotes an audiobook

January 2011 (12 books)

Neuromancer (The Sprawl #1) by William Gibson
Mona Lisa Overdrive (The Sprawl #3) by William Gibson
The Constant Princess (Tudor series) by Philippa Gregory
First Test (Protector of the Small #1) by Tamora Pierce
Monsters, Gods and Heroes: Approaching the Epic in Literature (Modern Scholar series) by Timothy B. Shutt
Mike McGrath's Book of Compost by Mike McGrath
Page (Protector of the Small #2) by Tamora Pierce
Domes of Fire (The Tamuli #1) by David Eddings
A Handbook of Edible Flowers: Their Cultivation and Use by Florence G. Dale and Charles J. Ziga
The Shining Ones (The Tamuli #2) by David Eddings
The Hidden City (The Tamuli #3) by David Eddings
Storm Front (The Dresden Files #1) by Jim Butcher

February 2011

The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey
Fool Moon (The Dresden Files #2) by Jim Butcher
Grave Peril (The Dresden Files #3) by Jim Butche
Gooney Bird Greeene by Lois Lowry
Summer Knight (The Dresden Files #4) by Jim Butcher
The Boy Who Dared by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
Financial Peace Revisited by Dave Ramsey
Death Masks (The Dresden Files #5) by Jim Butcher
Blood Rites (The Dresden Files #6) by Jim Butcher
Dead Beat (The Dresden Files #7) by Jim Butcher
Proven Guilty (The Dresden Files #8) by Jim Butcher
Growing Tasty Tropical Plants - In Any Home, Anywhere by Laurelynn G. Martin and Byron E. Martin
White Night (The Dresden Files #9) by Jim Butcher
Reaper* by Rachel Vincent
The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

March 2011

Small-Plot, High-Yield Gardening by Sal Gilbertie and Larry Sheehan
The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy
Murder at Avadon Hill* by P.G. Holyfield

April 2011

Financial Peace University Handbook by Dave Ramsey
The Final Empire (Mistborn #1) by Brandon Sanderson
Billibub Baddings and the Case of the Singing Sword by Tee Morris
The Prince of Hazel and Oak (Shadowmagic #2) by John Lenahan*
Changeless (Parasol Protectorate #2) by Gail Carriger
Blameless (Parasol Protectorate #3) by Gail Carriger
Some Girls: My Life in a Harem by Jillian Lauren

May 2011

Another Fine Myth (MYTH #1) by Robert Asprin
Myth Conceptions (MYTH #2) by Robert Asprin
Myth Directions (MYTH #3) by Robert Asprin
Dead Until Dark (Southern Vampire #1) by Charlene Harris
Living Dead in Dallas (Southern Vampire #2) by Charlene Harris
Club Dead (Southern Vampire #3) by Charlene Harris
Dead to the World (Southern Vampire #4) by Charlene Harris
Warrior Heir (Heir Trilogy #1) by Cinda Williams Chima
Dead as a Doornail (Southern Vampire #5) by Charlene Harris
Guards! Guards! (Discworld #8) by Terry Pratchett
Green Like God by Jonathan Merritt

June 2011

Feed by M.T. Anderson
Men at Arms (Discworld #15) by Terry Pratchett
Feet of Clay (Discworld #19) by Terry Pratchett
Jingo (Discworld #21) by Terry Pratchett
The Fifth Elephant (Discworld #24) by Terry Pratchett
Night Watch (Discworld #29) by Terry Pratchett
Thud! (Discworld #34) by Terry Pratchett
Going Postal (Discworld #33) by Terry Pratchett
The Well of Ascension (Mistborn #2) by Brandon Sanderson
Making Money (Discworld #36) by Terry Pratchett
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter #1) by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Harry Potter #2) by J. K. Rowling

July 2011

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Harry Potter #3) by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter #4) by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Harry Potter #5) by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (Harry Potter #6) by J. K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Harry Potter #7) by J. K. Rowling
Bloody Jack (Bloody Jack #1)
The Curse of the Blue Tattoo (Bloody Jack #2)
The Hunger Games (Hunger Games #1)
Catching Fire (Hunger Games #2)
Definitely Dead (Southern Vampire Mysteries #6) by Charlene Harris
Mockingjay (Hunger Games #3)

August 2011

All Together Dead (Southern Vampire Mysteries) by Charlene Harris
Dead Reckoning (southern Vampire Mysteries) by Charlene Harris

Reading

Equal Rites (Discworld) by Terry Pratchett
Tahn: A Novel by L. A. Kelly
The Way of Kings (Stormlight Archive #1) by Brandon Sanderson
Only the Good Spy Young (Gallagher Girls #4) by Ally Carter
Leviathan (Leviathan #1) by Scott Westerfeld
The Divine Comedy by Dante Alligheri
Behold the Mighty Dinosaur (Modern Scholar series) by John Kricher
The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
Flatland: A Romance in Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook by Paizo Publishing
Watership Down by Richard Adams
Dixie Divas by Virginia Brown
Crunchy Cons: The New Conservative Counterculture by Rod Dreher
A Game of Thrones (A Song of Fire and Ice #1) by George Martin
Robert Browning: Selected Poems by Robert Browning
The Sari Shop Widow
Heartless (Parasol Protectorate #4) by Gail Carriger
Alton Brown's Gear for Your Kitchen by Alton Brown

In the Queue

The Alloy of Law (Mistborn #4) by Brandon Sanderson (Due out November 2011)
The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare
Behemoth (Leviathan trilogy) by Scott Westerfeld
Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Caroll
Immortal Poems of the English Language by Oscar Williams
Macbeth by William Shakespeare
Hamlet by William Shakespeare
The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum
The Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
The Legacy (aka A Town Like Alice) by Nevil Shute
On the Beach by Nevil Shute
Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler
Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
The Secret History by Donna Tartt
The Secret Adversary by Agatha Christie
Whistlin' Dixie in a Nor'easter by Lisa Patton
Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Little House on the Prarie by Laura Ingalls Wilder
From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg
Cybele's Secret by Juliet Marillier
Keeping Corner by Kashmira Sheth
Elephant Run by Roland Smith
What the World Eats by Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio
Un Lun Dun by China Melville

What are you reading?

2010-10-11T12:26:00.005-05:00

Okay, so my resolve to post more about my reading didn't last very long. I'll blame it on Monday, since that IS the night my gaming group gathers, and there's usually at least one person who stays late. (You know who you are.)

Okay, so it's actually my own fault.

Anyway, I've been reading bunches and bunches of books. Physical books, ebooks (thanks to my iPad), audiobooks, podcast novels…I love books. If I went back over everything I've read since the last time I posted, we would run into a few problems.

You would run away before I made it a quarter of the way through my list.
You would decide I was even more insane that you thought.
I can't remember EVERYTHING I've read.

So, recently finished books it is.

Lamplighter (Monster Blood Tattoo #2) by D.M. Cornish
I love these books. The setting is intriguing and original–a bit steampunk, a bit medieval, with a good dose of oddball semi-organic primitive technology. Plus, the characters are well developed with distinctive personalities. My husband's only complaint is that the hero, Rossamund Bookchild, doesn't seem like a fifteen-year-old boy. I'm okay with it, because at his age in this setting, young people are out working as soldiers, risking their lives fighting bogles (deadly monsters). I think that would sort of skip over much of what we associate with the teen years. I can't wait to read book three, which comes out this month in Australia and New Zealand, and next month in the US, UK, and Canada. (I'm not going to give the title, because the title of each book is Rossamund's profession during that book. It would be a bit of a spoiler.

Catching Fire (The Hunger Games #2) by Suzanne Collins
Mockingjay (The Hunger Games #3) by Suzanne Collins
Like The Hunger Games, Catching Fire and Mockingjay are emotionally harsh. I'm not kidding; lots of characters you come to adore will suffer in grueling, cruel ways, physically and mentally. Some will die.

Strike that; many of them will die. In fact, the games are supposed to end with only one person out of twenty-four still alive. They entire idea is to kill lots of people in a highly entertaining fashion. The entire point of the books is to fight against it.

Despite the gruesome premise, the books are all wonderful. The struggle to overcome a great, pervasive evil is riveting, as is Katniss, the heroine. I find the battle to win over the hearts of the people, inspiring them to join in fighting the corrupt, evil government at least as interesting as the physical battle. (I waited to read Catching Fire until Mockingjay was released because I couldn't stand to wait between them!)

If you can take it emotionally, I highly recommend the series.

New Spring (Wheel of Time prequel) by Robert Jordan
I reread New Spring late last month, as part of the run-up to the release of Towers of Midnight (Wheel of Time #13) on November 2. I finished all the other books, but wanted more WoT, and realized that I had only read New Spring once!

As a result, I think I gleaned more from it than any of the other re-reads. The first time through was when it was first released, so a lot has happened in the series since them. Insights into the characters of Morraine, Lan, Elaida, and Siuan (even glimpses of Liandrin) have been illuminating. Certain events that start in The Gathering Storm involving Lan make the bits of Malkieri custom, from a time closer to the fall of Malkier, especially enlightening.

I highly recommend it for all fans of the Wheel of Time; it still shocks me that some haven't read it! And of course, I recommend that all fans of epic fantasy give the Wheel of Time a shot. Not that I'm biased…

Distinctions: The Prologue to Towers of Midnight (Wheel of Time #13) by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
I heard one section of the Prologue to ToM at Dragon*Con, read by Brandon, and couldn't resist buying this on my iPad, through the Kindle app. I loved it. It has made me even more excited about the release of Towers of Midnight in just over three weeks! Of course, now chapter one is posted for free on Tor.com. I will say this: it's excellent!

Nim's Island
This is a "middle readers" book. That means about fifth through seventh or eighth grades. I enjoyed it, and finished it quickly. The setting is interesting, and all the characters, human and (non-speaking) animal, are fun. Totally clean and age-appropriate. It could almost convince me that living almost alone on a tiny, remote island would be fun!

Current Reads
Greywalker
The Way of Kings* (Stormlight Archive #1) by Brandon Sanderson
The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
The Outsider by Ann H. Gabhart (Kindle app)
Flatland: A Romance in Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott
Homespun Bride by Jillian Hart
The Herbal Body Book: A Natural Approach to Healthier Skin, Nails, and Hair by Stephanie L. Toules

*I've been reading The Way of Kings since I got home from Dragon*Con. I am absolutely forcing myself to prolong it. I have definitely enjoyed it, but it helps that it's a huge book, and I'm afraid of damaging it. So I only let myself read it at home.

Loving the Fall!

2010-10-02T10:18:00.000-05:00

For most of my life, summer was my favorite time of year! As a kid, it was easy: summers meant no school, which translated to lots of fun time with my mom, siblings, and (until I was twelve or so) my cousin. Lots of time at the pool, and constant trips to the library for more books. Add in Girl Scout day camp and occasional summer camp, and it's a clear choice. Plus, I have a summer birthday. :D

Even when summer meant more time at my part-time job, I was still a die-hard fan of summer. Even summer classes during my very extended college years didn't change that.

But over the last few years, I've come to really love the fall. There are awesome fall festivals everywhere, and the weather is so wonderful: still warm, but breezy and not nearly as humid. The North Georgia mountains are so beautiful, too, come fall, with all the leaves changing. (I'm also a big fan of Halloween, as well as all the winter squashes like sweet dumpling squash.)

Of course, it helps that I am absolutely addicted to hats of all sorts and interesting socks. Summer is so very hot in Georgia that I don't wear socks unless I am hiking, and only straw hats or cotton canvas bucket hats are bearable.

This year, I've already been to the Atlanta Arts Festival (where I browsed but didn't buy) and the Duluth Fall Festival, which is small but one of my favorites! It rained on us, but we still had a blast. I bought my usual supply of handmade soaps from Thistle Ridge Soap out of Walhala, South Carolina and my favorite huckleberry honey from Allen White of Dalton, Georgia. I also bought my first Christmas gift of the year, for my mom.

Tonight I'm headed to the Atlanta Greek Festival, for souvlaki, pastries (yum), music, and street dancing, my favorite part! (I hope I remember the dances; I usually forget half of it!) Next weekend we head to Andy's Trout Farm in Clayton, Georgia with my husband's family, including three of my four nephews. I think we are planning a side trip to Helen for Oktoberfest (which is actually over in Germany!), but I'm not sure.

Hope you're enjoying your fall as much as I am!

Another Book Challenge: Support Your Local Library 2010

2010-04-27T20:47:00.001-05:00

So you might have noticed that I like reading challenge. It's because I love books, and it's fun to find new ways to stretch my horizons.

My latest challenge is again from J. Kaye's book blog: the 2010 Support Your Local Library Reading Challenge.

Here's the challenge in a nutshell: read twenty-five books checked out from your local library. That's it! I've already read six or so, but I kept forgetting to actually enroll in the challenge.

So now it's done. Stay tuned as I update my list.

It's Tuesday; what are you reading - 03.16.2010

2010-03-16T22:03:00.001-05:00

Yes, I know I'm a day late with this.

So I think I need to change the direction of my reading. A summary of my last week and a half of reading:

Unwind by Neal Shusterman
A story set in the future United States, where all life is protected from conception to age thirteen. From the age of thirteen to eighteen, parents or guardians may choose to "unwind" a life, where the body is dismantled and at least 99.44% of it is reused. This way, the unwanted individual is never ended but is instead divided.

Wonderful characters, intriguing plot, emotionally wrenching. Tragic yet with a note of hope.

The Giver by Lois Lowry
This story is set in the future, an advanced enough future that they are able to institute sameness. Everything is flat; there is no color, and emotion is very, very dulled, except for a few, isolated individuals. Sameness is enforced–terminally if necessary.

Great plot, well-developed characters, emotionally wrenching with a very sad, tragic ending.

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
Again in the future United States. The country fell apart in the past, dividing into thirteen districts and ruled from the Capitol. Over seventy years earlier, the poor districts rebelled against the Capitol. They were utterly defeated, and District Thirteen was totally wiped out.

To remind the districts of how much they're under the control of the Capitol, they instituted the Hunger Games. Once each year, the Capitol has a massive "festival" nationwide, with a mass gathering mandatory in each district. At the festival, the names of each child age twelve through eighteen are placed in two glass balls (one for boys, one for girls). One boy and one girl are chosen in each district, and those two "tributes" are whisked away to the Capitol. They are given the "honor" of participating in the Hunger Games, where only one can survive. It's proceeded by a week of testing and interviews, which is televised to the nation. (Again, mandatory viewing.) If the tributes impress the audience, sponsors can pay to drop a gift to that kid–tools, food, medicine, clothes, weapons. So the kids must each put on a good show, or else they'll die fast.

The main characters, Katniss and Peeta, are from District Twelve (Appalachia), one of the poorest districts. The Capitol, by contrast, is rich and frivolous, and very technologically advanced, which highlights the cruelty of their rule.

A full cast of well-developed characters. Brutal plot. Redemption. Emotionally wrenching from beginning to end.

Incantation by Alice Hoffman
My husband bought me this audiobook for Christmas. It is set in Spain, at the beginning of the Spanish Inquisition. Sixteen-year-old Estrella deMadrigal lives in a pleasant, peaceful village that's experiencing the first rumblings of serious persecution against Jews, especially "hidden Jews". Some families had pretended to convert to Catholicism generations earlier, after authorities had taken their children, to ensure their return. My husband and I have just reached the point where the executions (murders, really) are beginning.

Masterfully told. Perfectly captures the feeling of the age. Sad, sad, sad.

Give me comedy! I can't take another book like this! Maybe I can find a Robert Aspirin MYTH novel I haven't read yet…because I've read all the Discworld novels in the past five months.

I'm also reading Elantris, by Brandon Sanderson. Not nearly the emotional toll of the other three, but still not light and cheery. (It's excellent; I can't wait to find out what happens to Elantris and the main characters. Like any good book, I also don't want it to end.)

Current non-fiction reads:
The Organic Garden: Green and Easy by Allan Shepherd
1 Dough, 100 Cookies by Linda Doeser
Gardening with Native Plants of the South by Sally Wasowski

Defining Drian, or How to Figure Out Your Character's Identity

2010-02-28T00:34:00.005-05:00

I've been playing D&D (that's Dungeons and Dragons, for those of you not into the gaming thing), off and on for, well, years. Right now I'm in an intermittent, extended campaign with a couple of our closest friends. My character is Drian, a second level half-elven cleric. (That's a healer.)

Tonight our party found itself disagreeing over our course of action. As a player, I had certain ideas about the wise thing to do. But I'm not Drian; I'm me. Drian doesn't know what I know about her world.

To figure out her stance on the issue, I had to figure out who she was. That's pretty incredible, because I usually have a full back story and a personality worked out before the first session. Somehow, that didn't happen this time.

Defining a character can be a bit intimidating to a new player. I spent literally weeks agonizing over Xandria the elven cleric-sorceress, my first character. So I thought it might help some new gamer out there if I worked through my process on the web. Here we go.…

Drian is a cleric.
Perhaps nothing else defines Drian so much as her chosen vocation, a cleric. As a cleric, she cares for her party, healing them when they need it, and calling on her god to bless and protect them in difficult situations. As such, she feels very responsible for them. Very, very responsible. In fact, the mental, physical, and spiritual welfare of her allies is second only to her duty to her god, Pelor.

Drian serves Pelor.
Pelor is the god of the sun, and by extension the god of summer, agriculture, and time. His clerics are sworn to uphold the cause of good, and to battle the undead. Such beings are anathema to him, having left behind the natural order of things. They are called to help the helpless wherever they can, and stand vigiliant against evil. Did I mention really, really hates undead?

Drian is good.
Okay, I lied before; this is Drian's most defining characteristic. Everything else plays out around it. Above all else, Drian wants to do what's right; it's why she's a cleric, instead of a merchant or an artisan. It's why she's an adventurer, heading out into every kind of dangerous and unpredictable situation when she could settle down in a nice, safe village or city to serve in Pelor's temple.

Drian is a cultural half-elf.
As a half-elf, Drian has been reconciling two different natures all her life. Half-elves are not elves, and they are not humans, yet they are both. Many half-elves are conflicted, torn between the two societies yet never fully accepted by either. However, Drian was raised in a half-elf community, with a distinctive racial identity. Being raised among people who were comfortable with both races, in a society where each half-elf is encouraged to integrate the aspects of humanity and of elvenkind that best fit them, she's confident and adaptable. She's also more able to relate to someone with a different point of view, making her a natural diplomat and quite insightful. Oh, did I mention that most half-elves dabble in other professions? Well, Drian spent enough time with the warlock down the street to pick up a thing or two.

That's only one part of the picture, though. Drian is also defined by her ability scores and skills. They define her strengths and weaknesses, as well as her areas of interest.

Strength: 14
With a strength of 14, Drian's not the greatest fighter. However, she's not especially weak, so she's not helpless; her mace shows enough wear to make that clear. But fighting's definitely not her strongest suit…

Constitution: 12
Drian's constitution is about average for an adventurer, which is just slightly above average for a regular person. It means she has more than enough endurance to carry a good set of gear (including bearing up under the added weight of a fair amount of armor), and she's not especially fragile. Combine that with strength, and she can stand to put herself in harm's way if necessary to get into position to help a wounded ally or innocent. She'll do it, too, if they need her.

Dexterity: 11
Good thing Drian never wanted to be an archer, because she's not especially dexterous. In fact, she's a bit less so that the typical adventurer. Fortunately, her party members aren't counting on her to pick off distant targets, even if she does carry a crossbow; the party's fighter is much better at that. But she has to hope she doesn't get into a situation where fancy footwork is called for, because she's not cut out for dodging attacks or balancing on a precarious ledge! (She would also make a terrible sneak thief, by the way, if she were the type.)

Intelligence: 12
Drian's book smarts are a bit above the average person's, but dead average for an adventurer. She's certainly not dumb, but she doesn't have an extensive education or a head for obscure facts. The only areas where she shines are the arcane, history and religion, and that's only because of her religious training. But where did she learn to speak and read giant, of all things?

Wisdom: 16
Ah yes, now we're getting to areas where Drian shines! She may not be the most intelligent, but she's got more than her fair share of street smarts. She's also quite empathetic (that's useful in healer), and very self-disciplined. If someone in her party is going to pick up on the subtle clues that indicate danger in the making or get a read on the stranger they encounter on the road, chances are it will be her.

Charisma: 15
And with a high charisma, she'll probably do well getting that stranger to trust her. She's persuasive, with a strong personality and innate leadership abilities. Combine that with her diplomacy skills, and she's a good choice to represent the party, if the party leader isn't available. In a pinch, she may even be able to intimidate those standing in their way; they're less likely to see through her bluffs.

Week 2: It's Monday; what are you reading?

2010-01-11T20:24:00.000-05:00

Well, week two for me of participating in J. Kaye's It's Monday; what are you reading?

It's been a busy, Pratchett-filled week! I finished Jingo, which was fun. I have also finished The Last Continent, The Fifth Elephant, Carpe Jugulum, and The Truth. I've started Thief of Time, but I'm nearly a quarter of the way into it and it's just not interesting me. (Blasphemy, I know!)

I'm also reading Mrs. Sharp's Traditions: Reviving Victorian Family Celebrations of Comfort & Joy. I've been reading it a chapter or so at a time, and I like what she says about a home being a refuge, a source of comfort and calm. Though I do really well in the cooking and craft areas, and fairly well in the fiber arts area, and I'm great at figuring out how to use space, I'm terrible at keeping up with it. I'm using this to try and stay motivated.

My husband and I finished our audiobook (Inkheart, by Cornelia Funke), and started a new one: Tiger by Jeff Stone. It's the first book in the Five Ancestors series.

I enjoyed Inkheart. After reading it last year, it was interesting to hear it as an audiobook! I keep forgetting that it's actually a translation from German…if only the translations of the classics from Ancient Greek were so well done!

Tiger I'm not so sure about. The synopsis on the case seems like it should be interesting, but in some ways it comes off as a caricature of Asian literature. It's jsut a little too stereotypical, if you know what I mean.

Oh, I'm also reading Singer's Crown. Very good book. :)

Week 1: It's Monday; what are you reading?

2010-01-04T17:37:00.003-05:00

I'm a fan of J. Kaye's Book Blog. She does several reading challenges each year; last March she started a weekly event called "It's Monday; what are you reading?"

Sounds like fun; wish I had found it before!

I've been on a Discworld kick; in the last month and a half, I've read about a dozen of them. (Gotta love Terry Pratchett!)

My husband and I are listening to the audiobook of Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. I read it last year, but my husband the media specialist happened across it at the public library. We're about three-quarters done, and I'm really enjoying the reading.

Today I finished Hogfather, which is hilarious. It's the Discworld take on Santa Claus. But of course, since we're talking Discworld, it's pretty odd. Especially when Death and Death of Rats get involved, dragging Death's adopted granddaughter into things. (I really wanted to get to this one before Christmas, but c'est la vie. At least it's still technically the Christmas season, since Epiphany/Twelfth Night isn't until tomorrow.)

Then I started the next book, Jingo, at lunch. This one is a reread for me. In true Discworld fashion, it takes all those legends of lost or sunken continents, throws in some mindless nationalism, and brings it through insanity and out the other side. It also gives Leonard of Quirm, the Ankh Morpork version of Leonardo da Vinci, a prominent role. (I love his names for stuff…like the "Going Under the Water Machine", for a submarine!)

I'm also reading The Bread Machine Cookbook. Tonight I'm going to take on Honey Whole Wheat Bread for the second time.

Also, I've decided to give up on the One Year Bible thing, since it never works for me. Instead, I'm going to try to read The Old Testament this year, and the New Testament next year. (I was inspired by our Minister of Administration, who is doing a two year plan for the Bible.) I'm in Genesis, which I always find fascinating.

That's really it for right now.

Signed up for the 2010 100+ Book Challenge

2010-01-04T15:28:00.054-05:00

For the second year, I'm signing up for J. Kaye's 2010 Book Challenge! Last year I exceeded my goal: I counted one hundred twenty-three books in 2009. And I missed some books, during the madness that was buying a house (July) and my usual November madness, so I know I read at least one hundred twenty-five; probably more. Thinking about it, it had to be more, because I certainly read more than four books in November!

I loved doing this; I always read tons of books, but I never really remember when I read what. This took care of that problem! (Well, for the most part…)

I had a bunch of books I never finished reading this year. So I'm going to set those aside, to either add to the abandoned list or start over with later. Well, I finished up the last chapter of Feet of Clay at 2 am on New Year's Day, so that will count for last year. :)

If you want to join me, sign up at J. Kaye's blog!

By the way, books marked with an asterisk are audiobooks.

January 2010 (11 books)

Hogfather (Discworld #20) by Terry Pratchett
Jingo (Discworld #21) by Terry Pratchett
The Last Continent (Discworld #22) by Terry Pratchett
Carpe Jugulum (Discworld #23) by Terry Pratchett
The Fifth Elephant (Discworld #24) by Terry Pratchett
The Truth (Discworld #25) by Terry Pratchett
The Last Hero* (Discworld #27) by Terry Pratchett
Inkheart* by Cornelia Funke
The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents (Discworld #28) by Terry Pratchett
Night Watch (Discworld #29) by Terry Pratchett
The Singer's Crown by Elaine Isaak

February 2010 (13 books)

Star Wars: Soldier for the Empire
Star Wars: Rebel Agent
Star Wars: Jedi Knight
Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
Star Wars: The Courtship of Princess Leia
Star Wars: Rebel Mission to Ord Mantell
Wondrous Strange by Lesley Livingston
War of the Worlds Audio Drama
Star Wars: The Courtship of Princess Leia
Star Wars: Soldier for the Empire
Star Wars: Rebel Agent* (Checked out fr library; horrible full cast recording, with cheesy sound effects–especially the moaning voices on the planet–and overdone evilness from the Dark Jedi)
Northhanger Abbey
Star Wars: Jedi Knight

March 2010 (6 books; several missing)

Heist Society by Ally Carter
Elantris by Brandon Sanderson
Mistborn: The Final Empire (Mistborn #1) by Brandon Sanderson
Well of Ascension (Mistborn #2) by Brandon Sanderson
Hero of Ages (Mistborn #3) by Brandon Sanderson
The Warrior's Apprentice (Vorkosigan Saga) by Lois McMaster Bujold

April 2010 (3 books; many missing)

The Gathering Storm (The Wheel of Time #12) by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have To Kill You (Gallagher Girls #1) by Ally Carter
A Way with Words II: Approaches to Literature by Michael D. C. Drout

May 2010 (10 books)

The Season
Distant Waves: a Novel of the Titanic by Suzanne Weyn
Thirteenth Child by Patricia C. Wrede
Lord of Chaos (Wheel of Time #6) by Robert Jordan
Unwind by Neal Shusterman
The Hunger Games (Hunger Games #1) by Suzanne Collins
Mike McGrath's Book of Compost by Mike McGrath
The Roar by Emma Clayton
The Giver by Lois Lowry
Victoriana Player's Handbook

June 2010 (7 books; several missing)

The Vor Game (Vorkosigan Saga) by Lois McMaster Bujold
Mountains of Mist (Vorkosigan Saga) by Lois McMaster Bujold
You Can't Judge a Girl By Her Cover (Gallagher Girls #3) by Ally Carter
Cross My Heart and Hope to Spy (Gallagher Girls #4) by Ally Carter
The Path of Daggers (Wheel of Time #7) by Robert Jordan
Dracula* by Bram Stoker
Preserving Summer's Bounty: A Quick and Easy Guide to Freezing, Canning, Preserving, and Drying What You Grow by Susan McClure

July 2010 (8 books; a few missing)

Ringworld by Larry Niven
The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner (Twilight novella) by Stephenie Meyer
Water for Elephants* by Sara Gruen
There's a Monster at the End of This Book
Dead Until Dark (Southern Vamp Mysteries #1) by Charlaine Harris
Living Dead in Dallas (Southern Vamp Mysteries #2) by Charlaine Harris
Club Dead (Southern Vamp Mysteries #3) by Charlaine Harris
Dead to the World (Southern Vamp Mysteries #4) by Charlaine Harris

August 2010 (12 books)

Dead as a Doornail (Southern Vamp Mysteries #5) by Charlaine Harris
Definitely Dead (Southern Vamp Mysteries #6) by Charlaine Harris
All Together Dead (Southern Vamp Mysteries #7) by Charlaine Harris
From Dead to Worse (Southern Vamp Mysteries #8) by Charlaine Harris
Dead and Gone (Southern Vamp Mysteries #9) by Charlaine Harris
Dead in the Family (Southern Vamp Mysteries #10) by Charlaine Harris
Time Travelers Never Die* by Jack McDevitt
Rendevous with Rama by Arthur C. Clarke
Barefoot in the Park
The Passage* by Justin Cronin
Slightly Shady by Amanda Quick
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (HP #5) by J.K. Rowling

September 2010 (14 books)

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (HP #6) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Deadly Hallows (HP #7) by J.K. Rowling
Gift of the Magi by O. Henry
Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone (HP #1) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (HP #2) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (HP #3) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (HP #4) by J.K. Rowling
Catching Fire (Hunger Games #2) by Suzanne Collins
Mockingjay* (Hunger Games #3) by Suzanne Collins
A Study in Emerald by Neil Gaiman
Princess Academy* by Shannon Hale
You See but You Do Not Observe
Catch a Rising Star by Tracey Bateman
The Blue Girl by Charles de Lint

October 2010 (8 books)

New Spring (Wheel of Time prequel) by Robert Jordan
Nim's Island by Wendy Orr
Lamplighter (Monster Blood Tattoo #2) by D. M. Cornish
Greywalker (Greywalker #1) by Kat Richardson
The Herbal Body Book: A Natural Approach to Healthier Skin, Nails, and Hair by Stephanie L. Toules
Belgarath the Sorceror (Belgariad series) by David and Leigh Eddings
Pawn of Prophecy (Belgariad #1) by David Eddings
Queen of Sorcery (Belgariad #2) by David Eddings

November 2010 (9 books; a few missing)

Magician's Gambit (Belgariad #3) by David Eddings
Castle of Wizardry (Belgariad #4) by David Eddings
Enchanter's Endgame (Belgariad #5) by David Eddings
The Wisewoman by Philippa Gregory
Take a Thief (Valdemar series) by Mercedes Lackey
Exile's Honor (Valdemar series) by Mercedes Lackey
Arrows of the Queen (Valdemar series) by Mercedes Lackey
Arrow's Flight (Valdemar series) by Mercedes Lackey
The Ghost of Crutchfield Hall by Mary Downey Hahn
Arrow's Fall (Valdemar series) by Mercedes Lackey

December 2010

The Outsider by Ann H. Gabhart (Kindle app)
Winds of Fate (Valdemar series) by Mercedes Lackey
Dune (Dune #1) by Frank Herbert
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo* (Millennium #1) by Stieg Larson
The Boleyn Inheritance (Tudor series) by Philippa Gregory
Fire (Graceling #2) by Kristin Cashore

Currently Reading

The Way of Kings (Stormlight Archive #1) by Brandon Sanderson
The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
Flatland: A Romance in Many Dimensions by Edwin Abbott
Homespun Bride by Jillian Hart
Mrs. Sharp's Tradtions: Reviving Victorian Family Celebrations Of Comfort & Joy by Sarah Ban Breathnach
The Warrior's Heir (Heir Trilogy #1) by Cinda Williams Chima

Abandoned

Thief of Time* (Discworld, Book 26) by Terry Pratchett
Tiger* (The Five Ancestors, Book 1) by Jeff Stone
The Gearhart*

In the Queue

Confessions by Saint Augustine
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

The Elusive Charm of Mason Jars

2009-11-06T18:16:00.002-05:00

Mason Jars
Originally uploaded by Patrick Q

As a child of the South, I have a soft spot for mason jars. I grew up surrounded by them, since the ladies on my father's side of the family did a fair amount of canning. (After all, his family did come from the country: Seminole County, in the Southwest corner of Georgia.)

And yes, people really do drink out of mason jars here. In fact, Folks restaurant chain used to serve drinks in them. Of course, it's less common than it used to be, but it can be very handy if you want to be able to seal it up. (Think of it as the environmentally-responsible late nineteenth and early twentieth-century version of the to-go cup and tupperware…) I recently bought a bunch of them for canning.

To me, Mason jars are wonderful to look at. Today's jars look just like those from my childhood, except that the lids and bands are now platinum colored. In our living room, we have a half-gallon Mason jar sitting on a shelf, filled with glass florist marbles. It looks very cool, but in our case they aren't simply decorative: we're gamers, so my husband and I actually use those marbles for D&D and for card or board games.

Mason jars are just so handy! I remember my grandfather keeping miscellaneous fasteners in those jars in his workshop; in the utility room off the garage, my grandmother had a couple of shelves of them, which she would send us to fetch to store leftover soup, or perhaps some sweet tea to send with a guest.

Perhaps it seems old-fashioned to you, but it's not like I'm old. Sure, we have dedicated drink bottles now, and all sorts of plastic storage containers. It's not like we didn't have those when I was a kid, though the variety was certainly smaller.

But think about it: after you finish your 32 ounce cup of Coke from McDonald's, what do you do with the cup? Trash it. What would you do with a Mason jar? Wash it out and reuse it. The only plastic is in the lining of the lid used for sealing; even those lids can be reused for non-food storage. The bands and jars can be reused until the jars chip or the bands begin to rust.

That's part of the appeal of a Mason jar: they remind us of a time when resources weren't taken for granted…and neither were people.

A Life Less Dramatic

2009-10-18T12:09:00.002-05:00

I want a life less dramatic. Until recently, I would listen to tales of drama from friends and co-workers and think, "I'm so glad my life is relatively drama free."

God decided my friends and co-workers had suffered enough and I needed to take on some of the excess.

A month ago today, my husband and I were driving home from a trip to Ikea (yay Ikea!) where we picked up a few small items we had been avoiding buying. Turns out it was a good thing that it was small items, because our car came to a total stop on the expressway. Blessedly, it was actually at the exit to his parent's house, and his dad is quite mechanically adept. So we called him, and he set out at 10 at night to come rescue us. And right after that, the mechanic who works two businesses down from my office happens by, and stops to see if we need help. (He didn't recognize us in the dark; he just stops to help people stuck at the side of the road.) He figured out what we needed to be able to coast to the in-law's house, so we put him on the phone with my father-in-law. He headed on, and by 11:30 we made it my in-laws house. They loaned us his dad's truck, and we headed home, getting back past midnight.

The next day, his mom's car breaks down at the side of the road. His dad has to go rescue her, and the car juggling gets complicated.

Fast forward to Monday. Did you hear about the Atlanta floods? Well, guess where my raincoat was? Yep, in our car. I finally made it to work, over an hour late instead of fifteen minutes early as I would have under normal conditions. Getting home was fun, too…I just love public transportation when I don't have a rain jacket and it's, well, raining.

The next weekend we have to switch vehicles with my in-laws, which wasn't a problem since we weren't going far and my father-in-law actually drove out here to make the switch.

Remember the problems with his mom's car? While we were getting set up for D&D, my husband ran out to pick up pizza. Half an hour later he wasn't back, and he calls. BECAUSE THE CAR KEPT BREAKING DOWN! So his dad is driving back out to pick him up, but he needs someone to come get the pizza from him before it's stone cold. HIs dad comes out, he gets it running, we switch vehicles, and my husband follows his dad back to their house, and then comes back to our house. Meanwhile my friends take me home.

Later that week, we find out the car is kaputt. (The guy couldn't get to it for a few days, because the road going to his lot was flooded.) The engine is shot, which is especially disappointing since we had it rebuilt about a year and a half ago. So now we're car-hunting, only two months after having to buy a house. Oh joy.

During this time we receive some disturbing health news, which I don't want to go into here. Just accept that it's more stress we don't need.

Since then we've had lots of drama with car shopping; a trip my husband and his dad took to Birmingham on their day off, only to find out it was seriously misrepresented in the ad and their phone conversation, getting lost trying to find sellers, cars that sell just as we're about to leave to go see them, and more.

While we're out of town for a conference, his mom's computer also goes kaputt (that's German, by the way). Fortunately, it can be repaired, but we spent a lot of time on our trip trying to provide tech support by phone, with no good results. We have to come back a little earlier than planned to try and fix it, but we're thankful we had a vehicle to even make the trip!

Also during this time my best friends' little girl was diagnosed with swine flu, and one of my nephews (the eight month old) had to go to the emergency room twice. The second time was yesterday…

Which we found out while waiting for a wrecker to come and get us after a guy in a Mustang ran a stop sign, resulting in my husband hitting him. Blessedly, my love was able to slam on the brakes and swerve, so he was going a bit slower and didn't hit the driver's side straight on. Everyone was fine, which is what counts, and amazingly enough there was an ambulance just driving down the road, so they were only four cars away when it happened.

Did I mention we were all the way in Ellijay, leaving the Georgia Apple Festival, two hours from home? And that we were in my father-in-law's truck, which had been the spare vehicle? We ended up on the side of the road for an hour, then the (very nice) police officer drove us to the towing company's lot. There we had arrange for someone who could tow us to Atlanta, which entailed lots of conversations by phone with my father-in-law. We finally found a local who could, and the officer drove us to the local shopping center (Starbucks, IHOP, and Wal-Mart) to wait for the towing guy to finish up what he was doing and pick up the truck. Finally, after 9:30, we make it back to my father-in-law's house, where we pay the driver (a very nice guy, a churchgoing family man) and get the car unloaded. Another of our nephews was there, so he had stayed up WAY past his bedtime to see us and the big wrecker truck. (He loved it, and we were thrilled to see him.)

By the time we got home, my back was killing me. It was already sore, but after an hour standing at the side of the road, and another hour alternately sitting in the back seat of a police car and standing around, then a ride in the cab of a wrecker? Not good. Not to mention the stress that left my back all knotted up.

So, spare car gone, and we're going to look at another one today; not how we planned to spend my love's birthday! I so pray this works out, because the last thing I need is another week or two of drama. And we didn't even get to stop and buy our apples…

Dark Gardening

2009-07-30T12:54:00.003-05:00

I love plants, and I really adore flowers. I'm even blessed enough to live in an area where you can have flowers all winter long! (Yes, really, you Northerners. I've seen pansies peek up through our infrequent snows, and just keep on going.)

But all the pastels! They make me twitch after awhile–especially the overload of pink. I want a garden that's unique, a garden that doesn't look like every other garden in the city. A garden that doesn't feel frilly.

Like one with this little beauty.

Isn't that awesome? It's a bat plant, or Tacca integrifolia. I couldn't actually grow it in my garden, but that's beside the point. I want plants with character! And preferably, plants with some darkness.

I don't even remember how I found it, but I stumbled across the black pansy yesterday. A bit of searching uncovered the Black Moon, Black Prince and Clearly Crystals Black varieties, all available from Hirt's Gardens. They also carry Bowles Black violas. (Violas, of course, are from the same genus as pansies.)

What's wonderful about these is that I can have them blooming at Halloween! Is there anything more appropriate? (Well, okay, black roses, but this is close enough…)

Hirt's also carries seeds for a few other gorgeous black flowers, including the black iris, King of the Blacks carnations, black bachelor button, and black hollyhocks. (Don't miss the selections of black vegetables, including tomatoes and corn! Hirt's also has seeds for both the black and white bat plants.)

But I hit the real motherlode when a link from a livejournal community led me to Chocolate Flower Farm! Are they not totally incredible?

I can't wait to place an order for the spring. I want to use lots of native or naturalized plants in my regular garden, but I think a few carefully chosen selections of "black" or "chocolate" plants would be a wonderful addition!

College Board's 101 Great Books

2009-07-28T21:17:00.006-05:00

There's a so-called BBC list making the rounds on Facebook, which is kind of interesting. Except no one can find where the BBC ever published it.

Pfff. Details.

Actually, I did find a list from College Board that looks sufficiently challenging:

101 Great Books
Recommended for College Bound Readers

Bold entries are books I have read.

Beowulf (author unknown)
Things Fall Apart (Chinua Achebe)
A Death in the Family (James Agee)
Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
Go Tell It on the Mountain (James Baldwin)
Waiting for Godot (Samuel Beckett)
The Adventures of Augie March (Saul Bellow)
Jane Eyre (Charlotte Brontë)
Wuthering Heights (Emily Brontë)
The Stranger (Albert Camus)
Death Comes for the Archbishop (Willa Cather)
The Canterbury Tales (Geoffrey Chaucer)
The Cherry Orchard (Anton Chekhov)
The Awakening (Kate Chopin)
Heart of Darkness (Joseph Conrad)
The Last of the Mohicans (James Fenimore Cooper)
The Red Badge of Courage (Stephen Crane)
Inferno (Dante)
Don Quixote (Miguel de Cervantes)
Robinson Crusoe (Daniel Defoe)
A Tale of Two Cities (Charles Dickens)
Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (Frederick Douglass)
An American Tragedy (Theodore Dreiser)
The Three Musketeers (Alexandre Dumas)
The Mill on the Floss (George Eliot)
Invisible Man (Ralph Ellison)
Selected Essays (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
As I Lay Dying (William Faulkner)
The Sound and the Fury (William Faulkner)
Tom Jones (Henry Fielding)
The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald)
Madame Bovary (Gustave Flaubert)
The Good Soldier (Ford Madox Ford)
Faust (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)
Lord of the Flies (William Golding)
Tess of the d'Urbervilles (Thomas Hardy)
The Scarlet Letter (Nathaniel Hawthorne)
Catch 22 (Joseph Heller)
A Farewell to Arms (Ernest Hemingway)
The Iliad (Homer)
The Odyssey (Homer)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Victor Hugo)
Their Eyes were Watching God (Zora Neale Hurston)
Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
A Doll's House (Henrik Ibsen)
The Portrait of a Lady (Henry James)
The Turn of the Screw (Henry James)
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (James Joyce)
The Metamorphosis (Franz Kafka)
The Woman Warrior (Maxine Hong Kingston)
To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
Babbitt (Sinclair Lewis)
The Call of the Wild (Jack London)
The Magic Mountain (Thomas Mann)
One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel García Marquez)
Bartleby the Scrivener (Herman Melville)
Moby Dick (Herman Melville)
The Crucible (Arthur Miller)
Beloved (Toni Morrison)
A Good Man is Hard to Find (Flannery O'Connor)
Long Day's Journey into Night (Eugene O'Neill)
Animal Farm (George Orwell)
Doctor Zhivago (Boris Pasternak)
The Bell Jar (Sylvia Platt)
Selected Tales (Edgar Allen Poe) *
Swann's Way (Marcel Proust)
The Crying of Lot 49 (Thomas Pynchon)
All Quiet on the Western Front (Erich Maria Remarque)
Cyrano de Bergerac (Edmond Rostand)
Call It Sleep (Henry Roth)
The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
Hamlet (William Shakespeare)
Macbeth (William Shakespeare)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (William Shakespeare)
Romeo and Juliet (William Shakespeare)
Pygmalion (George Bernard Shaw)
Frankenstein (Mary Shelley)
Ceremony (Leslie Marmon Silko)
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (Alexander Solzhenitsyn)
Antigone (Sophocles)
Oedipus Rex (Sophocles)
The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
Treasure Island (Robert Louis Stevenson)
Uncle Tom's Cabin (Harriet Beecher Stowe)
Gulliver's Travels (Jonathan Swift)
Vanity Fair (William Thackeray)
Walden (Henry David Thoreau)
War and Peace (Leo Tolstoy)
Fathers and Sons (Ivan Turgenev)
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Mark Twain)
Candide (Voltaire)
Slaughterhouse-Five (Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.)
The Color Purple (Alice Walker)
The House of Mirth (Edith Wharton)+
Collected Stories (Eudora Welty)
Leaves of Grass (Walt Whitman)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (Oscar Wilde)
The Glass Menagerie (Tennessee Williams)
To the Lighthouse (Virginia Woolf)
Native Son (Richard Wright)

So, even though I've made no special effort to read these particular books, I've read forty-one. I have also read other novels by the authors on the list, so I suppose I'm entitled to call myself "well read".

* I've read all but three of the short stories in the specified Edgar Allan Poe collection, and a lot of his other work, so I'm counting that one.

+ I haven't read The House of Mirth. However, I slogged my way through Edith Wharton's novel Ethan Frome, which is one of the worst "classic" works I've ever read. I definitely deserve credit for that.

Almost have a house!

2009-07-22T21:16:00.001-05:00

Well, hopefully tomorrow! We’ve been through so many hoops at this point–I feel like a trained monkey…

If everything goes right, we’ll still be moving on Saturday!

We planned to buy a house this summer over a year ago. Really, with the tax credits and all, we couldn’t have done better if we had time-traveled to the future to check it out.

See more progress on: Buy a House

Getting All Domestic

2009-06-18T17:44:00.001-05:00

I love cooking. In particular, I love baking, casseroles, and desserts. I go through spurts where I do a lot of cooking; last night, I decided to make not one but two desserts.

The first thing I made was coconut cookie bars, out of 1001 Cookie Recipes. (I love that book! My copy was a gift from a former manager, who somehow ended up with two. He had baked rugelach from it, and since I loved it he gave me the spare.)

I enjoy the cookie bars, but I think they're a bit too yeasty. Next time, I think I'm going to use half shortening, half butter, instead of all shortening, but my husband loves them. Maybe I'll fix it the same way and eat it with a glass of milk; I liked it that way.

The rice pudding was adapted from In a Persian Kitchen by Maideh Mazda. It's my favorite Middle Eastern cookbook. I increased the sugar very slightly (by about half a tablespoon) and put three whole cardamom pods into the milk during the first fifteen minutes of cooking. I think I should have removed the cardamom earlier and increased the rose water, but it was still tasty. It's also very healthy for a dessert. Nice bonus.

Anyway, I hope to keep trying new recipes so we aren't so tempted to eat away from the home!

Customizing Clothing and Killing Sims

2009-06-11T23:11:00.002-05:00

So I've been playing The Sims 3 for about a week now, and I love the customization features; it's almost like Second Life in that respect (except that you can't re-edit them constantly).

That you can't edit their basic physical attributes (their face, anyway) after creation does make sense. In-universe, you are one person per sim; each persona is a separate sim. In Second Life, your one avatar is many different personas, depending on your mood or the sim you're visiting. So the fixed facial features makes sense for The Sims.

Speaking of customization, I love the hair coloring! If you choose the advanced editing, you can edit hair color in four different areas: base, roots, highlights, and tips! So both natural and decidedly unnatural hair colors are easy to create on the fly! And you can assign different hairstyles for different categories. It's great that I don't have to change hairstyles manually every time my sim changes into her swimsuit (and back). Really, who wears the same hairstyle to swim and to go to the theater?

Okay, what woman?

I also love the editing features for clothes and objects. All the patterns divided into categories, and every single color editable through swatches, hex or RGB code, or a color picker? It's brilliant! And I can use any pattern for any item, regardless of what the original creators [i]thought[/i] it should be used for! But I wish they had made more styles; there really aren't that many available. (What is it, four or five beds?) It looks like they put all their effort into patterns. I'm really glad there are so many patterns; don't get me wrong. But I'd feel better if I didn't suspect part of it was so you'd buy items through the Sims store…

I also like "Lifetime Wishes" much better than the old "Wants and Fears". Being able to choose and save the four you want to promise–and still work on the ones in the current queue, at least until they disappear–is great!

When it comes to controlling a sim, I love the new moodlets! Everything that happens to affect your sim's mood results in a "moodlet". These little icons reflect how your sim is feeling. If somthing good happens (you fulfill a wish), it's positive (Fulfilled), and gives a buff to your mood; if it's bad (a dirty room), it's negative and you suffer a penalty. Each has a duration and a value. The better the event, the higher the mood boost and the longer it lasts. The same goes for bad stuff: if it's just a bit bad, it's a small penalty with a short duration. But if you don't eat, it's a -40 to your mood!

Speaking of being hungry… There are also neutral moodlets, like "Hungry", which clue you in that your sim will need something soon. (Very handy, if you ask me, since that means you If you give your sim what it needs before the time on the moodlet expires, you're fine. But if you don't, the resulting moodlet is usually pretty bad! Fortunately, the lead time is pretty long! Sims seem to eat and use the bathroom way less than in the previous games.

But killing sims seems harder. I think I'm going to have to talk to an undesirable townie, lure him or her to my home in Mosquito Cove, and wall them in. After a few days, that should do it. I'll just ignore that corner of my property until whoever it is dies. Maybe then I can start a little private graveyard!

A Return to PvP

2009-06-10T17:30:00.000-05:00

So last night I did PvP with my Guild Wars guild for the first time in months.

We chose alliance battles because it's easier to put together four person groups, and AB is way more rewarding than Team Arenas or Random Arenas. (Plus, I hate them.) They're also much more newbie-friendly, and we're trying to recruit some new blood from our alliance.

Another bonus? Kurzick and Luxon faction are actually worth something! When you redeem it, it counts towards your Alliegance Rank title track (Kurzick or Luxon, depending upon your allegiance). You can cash it in for valuable crafting materials (amber chunks for Kurzick and jadeite shards for Luxon). If you're title-crazy, you can donate it to your guild and get double credit towards your title! Plus, it can be used to get PvE skills, which also counts double.

I had so much fun! Why have I been away? I love my guildees!

Environmental Stewardship

2009-04-22T16:25:00.002-05:00

Environmental Stewardship

I tried desperately to avoid making this post on Earth Day. It seemed too cliché. But though I've been working on this post for over a month, I simply haven't had a chance to finish it.

I wasn't raised in a Christian household. My sister, brother, and I went to church on Sundays until we moved away from my grandparents and the drive was too much for my grandfather to make every Sunday morning. However, I was taught to respect the Earth. (If I littered, even today, my mom would probably kill me!) We fed the birds, the fish, and stray wildlife. We did not waste food, period. Wherever we went, we usually picked up trash inconsiderate jerks had left behind. We recycled cans (free money for us kids-yay!) and newspapers, and later milk jugs and plastic bags. We reused anything worth reusing (we were fairly poor, so that was pretty much necessary) and had to think carefully about where we put our money.

This was pretty much just how my mom is. It's not like she sat down and thought, "I must be environmentally responsible. Therefore, I must do this and this and this." She likes the outdoors, and she doesn't think it should be junked up. She's also a softie when it comes to animals, so she did what she could to look out for them. We were kinda poor, and she grew up really poor, so she avoided waste. And her Girl Scout troop? It was pretty much funded by our family. My mom never wanted to ask for much in dues, so she scrimped and saved to pay for as much of it as she could. That meant we figured out how to do as much as we could with reused or donated stuff. And recycling just made sense. (Not that my mom was a perfect environmentalist, of course. We had our share of cheap plastic doodads, for one thing. But she was remarkably sound for her day.)

I've stepped up my efforts on behalf of the environment for a specific reason: I don't think we're doing such a good job taking care of God's creation. Really, this place is His, and I can't help but think that He's not so happy with the way we're taking care of our room. People are more important than the environment, but come on! It doesn't have to be an either-or. There are a lot of little things that we can do that make a difference.

If you want a better-written viewpoint on Christians and the environment, check out the Southern Baptist Declaration on the Environment and Climate Change. It's written by Jonathan Merritt, and is quite rational. (Ishy pointed me to it; Jonathan is her singles pastor.) Even if you aren't a Baptist, I think you'll find it interesting.

Epic Fail
Before I share my eco-friendly habits, I figure I'll get my confessions out of the way. First, I have way too much plastic junk. And I do mean junk; it's not even worthwhile stuff. I also have an art and craft supply stash that verges on embarassing. And we don't recycle at home, though I hope to change that now that the local recycling center is open. We also leave our electronics plugged in all the time (which means they always draw some power), though I'm going to buy a separate surge protector for the things that don't have to be on all the time. (I refuse to unplug things like the VCR when they're not in use, because I am NOT reprogramming them every day!) One of the worst things, in my opinion, is the food we waste. (I'm working on that one.) We also buy too much pre-packaged food, and we eat out too much. (I need to cook more…)

That was painful. Now on to the good part: the positive choices I've made.

Public transportation
I take public transportation every day of the work week, usually both to and from work. It's actually pretty pleasant, except for the part where I have to wake up before six a.m.!

Skipping plastic bags whenever possible
I try to always carry a reusable tote with me. I use them everywhere, even at places like Macy's, TJ Maxx, or Big Lots. (Makes me wish I still had the wonderful cotton string bag I bought in 1993 or so. I gave up using it because the only place that didn't give me a hard time about it was the natural foods store.) Sometimes I skip bags, like last week when the waitress at the Mexican restaurant offered me one for my leftovers. I can carry a box just fine, especially since I live around the corner! (I don't think she's ever had anyone refuse a bag; she was really confused…)

Reusing plastic bags
Sometimes we're caught without our bags, or with too few. In that case, we use as few as possible and reuse them. We use them in our small wastebaskets in the two bathrooms, and Paul uses them when he takes lunch or other stuff to work. I'm hoping to get to the point where supply drops to equal demand, with only a few bags in reserve!

Cutting back on disposable dishes
At work, I keep dishes in a desk drawer: eating utensils, a paring knife, a bowl, a small snack-size bowl and plate, a teacup, a lidded ceramic mug, and a stirrer. Also, I try to always have my reusable insulated cup with me. Not only does it keep my drinks warmer, but it's way easier to handle when I'm taking the bus. Some coffee shops even give you the option of using a ceramic mug and plate if you're eating in. Yay for less waste!

Homemade cleaning products
My experiments here have been mixed. The homemade laundry detergent seems fine (and is cheap!), and my Windex replacement is a winner. Borax or baking soda as a scrub works wonderfully. I'm still working on my dishwasher detergent recipe, since the first one I tried left a white residue on the dishes. I'm hoping to find a good mold and mildew killer that works, and a good oven cleaner recipe. (The commercial stuff is pretty nasty and rather expensive…)

Minimal packaging
I like stuff with very little packaging. This is one reason I like bulk, as well as stuff from indie artists and places like Lush. When it will work, I reuse packaging to hold stuff around the house or at work.

Environmentally sound cosmetics
I've been making my own facial scrub since, what, forever? For other stuff, I've been slowly switching to more earth-friendly products. Sadly, I've had to hide from Bath and Body Works, but my addiction to Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab has helped. Their scents are so wonderful that it makes everything else seem sub-par. For skincare, I've been haunting Whole Foods. For makeup, I've switched to Alima Pure, which has been great for my skin. My lipstick is Aveda, which has a partially refillable case (those have always seemed wasteful) and is wonderful!

This is a partial list, but I think it's quiet long already, so I'll stop.

I Joined the 2009 100+ Book Challenge

2009-03-03T22:41:00.049-05:00

I posted in January that I had joined that I had joined J. Kaye's audiobook challenge. I mentioned that I had also joined other challenges, but I forgot to actually create posts for them.

This will be for the 100+ Book Challenge. I'm already well on my way, but I am way behind on my reviews. Rather than fill my blog here with book reviews, I plan to post those on my LiveJournal, which had a whopping total of um, one entry until now.

Oh, wait, I'm actually up to three entries on Livejournal. Woohoo.

On to my books...

January 2009 (8 books)

A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'engle
A Wind in the Door by Madeleine L'engle
A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine L'engle
Sorcery and Cecelia by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer
I'd Tell You I Love You, But Then I'd Have to Kill You by Ally Carter
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
The Subtle Knife by Phillip Pullman
The Amber Spyglass by Phillip Pullman

February 2009 (7 books; Running Total: 15)

Inkheart by Cornelia Funke
Inkspell by Cornelia Funke
The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke
Star Wars New Jedi Order: Onslaught (Dark Tide #1) by Michael A. Stackpole
Star Wars New Jedi Order: Ruin (Dark Tide #2) by Michael A. Stackpole
The Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allen Poe
Thud! (Discworld) by Terry Pratchett

March 2009 (16 books; Running Total: 31)

As You Like It by William Shakespeare
Star Wars: Hero's Trial (Agents of Chaos #1) by James Luceno
Star Wars: Jedi Eclipse (Agents of Chaos #2) by James Luceno
Belgarath the Sorceror by David and Leigh Eddings
Polgara the Sorceress by David and Leigh Eddings
Maire: The Fires of Glenmaera by Linda Windsor
King Henry IV, Part 1 by William Shakespeare
A Scanner Darkly by Phillip K. Dick
Stellaluna by Jannell Cannon
The Diamond Throne (The Elenium, Book 1) by David Eddings
The Ruby Knight (The Elenium, Book 2) by David Eddings
The Sapphire Rose (The Elenium, Book 3) by David Eddings
Star Wars: Balance Point by Kathy Tyers
Star Wars: Vector Prime by R.A. Salvatore
Star Wars: Conquest by Greg Keyes
Star Wars: Rebirth by Greg Keyes

April 2009 (13 books; Running Total: 44)

Domes of Fire (The Tamuli, Book 1) by David Eddings
Crafternoon: A Guide to Getting Artsy and Crafty with Your Friends All Year Long by Maura Madden
The Case of the Toxic Spell Dump by Harry Turtledove
The Shining Ones (The Tamuli, Book 2) by David Eddings
Star Wars: Star by Star by Troy Denning
Star Wars: Dark Journey by Elaine Cunningham
Star Wars: Rebel Dream by Aaron Allston
The Hidden City (The Tamuli, Book 3) by David Eddings
Star Wars: Traitor by Matthew Stover
Playing for Keeps by Mur Lafferty
The Final Empire (Mistborn, Book 1) by Brandon Sanderson
Star Wars: Destiny's Way by Walter Jon Williams
The Well of Ascension (Mistborn, Book 2) by Brandon Sanderson

May 2009 (12 books; Running total: 56)

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
The Hero of Ages (Mistborn, Book 3) by Brandon Sanderson
Fairest by Gail Carson Levine
Arena by Karen Hancock
The Path of Daggers (The Wheel of Time, Book 8) by Robert Jordan
The Three Golden Keys by Peter Sis
Winter's Heart (The Wheel of Time, Book 9) by Robert Jordan
Mixed Signals by Liz Curtis Higgs
Amulet: The Stonekeeper by Kazu Kibuishi
Grand Tour by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer
The Blue Girl by Charles de Lint
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving

June 2009 (10 books; Running total: 66)

Crossroads of Twilight (The Wheel of Time, Book 10) by Robert Jordan
Murder at Avedon Hill by P.G. Holyfield
The Mislaid Magician by Patricia C. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer
Knife of Dreams (The Wheel of Time, Book 11) by Robert Jordan
The Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway
The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time, Book 2) by Robert Jordan
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Harry Potter, Book 1) by J.K. Rowling
Pyramids (Discworld, Book 7) by Terry Pratchett
Foundling (Monster Blood Tattoo, Book 1) by D. M. Cornish
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Harry Potter, Book 2) by J.K. Rowling

July 2009 (5 books, with a few missing; Running total: 71)

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Harry Potter, Book 3) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Harry Potter, Book 4) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Harrry Potter, Book 5) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (Harry Potter, Book 6) by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Harry Potter, Book 7) by J.K. Rowling

August 2009 (9 books; Running total: 80)

Arrows of the Queen (The Heralds of Valdemar, Book 1) by Mercedes Lackey
Take a Thief: A Novel of Valdemar by Mercedes Lackey
Arrow's Flight (The Heralds of Valdemar, Book 2) by Mercedes Lackey
Arrow's Fall (The Heralds of Valdemar, Book 3) by Mercedes Lackey
Resistance (Star Trek: The Next Generation) by J.M. Dillard
The Black Gryphon (Mage Wars, Book 1) by Mercedes Lackey and Larry Dixon
The White Gryphon (Mage Wars, Book 2) by Mercedes Lackey and Larry Dixon
The Silver Gryphon (Mage Wars, Book 3) by Mercedes Lackey and Larry Dixon
Brightly Burning by Mercedes Lackey
Exile's Honor by Mercedes Lackey

September 2009 (15 books; Running total: 95)

Winds of Fate (Mage Winds, Book 1) by Mercedes Lackey
Winds of Change (Mage Winds, Book 2) by Mercedes Lackey
Star Wars: Remnant (The New Jedi Order, Book 15) by Shane Dix and Sean Williams
Star Wars: Refugee (The New Jedi Order, Book 16) by Shane Dix and Sean Williams
Star Wars: Reunion (The New Jedi Order, Book 17) by Shane Dix and Sean Williams
Star Wars: The Final Prophecy (The New Jedi Order, Book 18) by Greg Keyes
Star Wars: The Unifying Force (The New Jedi Order, Book 19) by James Luceno
Star Wars: The Paradise Snare (Han Solo Trilogy, Book 1) by A. C. Crispin
Star Wars: The Hutt Gambit (Han Solo Trilogy, Book 2) by A. C. Crispin
Star Wars: Rebel Dawn (Han Solo Trilogy, Book 3) by A. C. Crispin
Star Wars: The Truce at Bakura by Kathy Tyers
Star Wars: The Way of the Apprentice (Jedi Quest, Book 1) by Jude Watson
Star Wars: The Trial of the Jedi (Jedi Quest, Book 2) by Jude Watson
Star Wars: The Dangerous Games (Jedi Quest, Book 3) by Jude Watson
Star Wars: The Master of Disguise (Jedi Quest, Book 4) by Jude Watson

October 2009 (8 books, several missing; Running total: 103)

Winds of Fury (Mage Winds, Book 3) by Mercedes Lackey
Storm Warning (Mage Storms, Book 1) by Mercedes Lackey
Rules by Cynthia Lord
Myth-taken Identity by Robert Asprin and Jody Lynn Nye
Class Dis-Mythed by Robert Asprin and Jody Lynn Nye
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
Preserving Summer's Bounty: A Quick and Easy Guide to Freezing, Canning, Preserving, and Drying What You Grow by Rodale Food Center and Susan McClure
Making Money (Discworld, Book 36) by Terry Pratchett

November 2009 (4 books; Running total: 107)

The Gathering Storm (The Wheel of Time, Book 12) by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
Lamplighter (Monster Blood Tattoo, Book 2) by D.M. Cornish
Chivalry by Neil Gaiman
The Reptile Room (A Series of Unfortunate Events, Book 2) by Lemony Snicket

December 2009 (16 books; Running total: 123)

Storm Rising (Mage Storms, Book 2) by Mercedes Lackey
Storm Breaking (Mage Storms, Book 3) by Mercedes Lackey
Sanctuary (Dragonlance: Elven Exiles, Book 1) by Paul B. Thompson & Tonya C. Cook
Foundations (The Collegium Chronicles, Book 1) by Mercedes Lackey
Guards! Guards! (Discworld, Book 8) by Terry Pratchett
Eric (Discworld, Book 9) by Terry Pratchett
Moving Pictures (Discworld, Book 10) by Terry Pratchett
Reaper Man (Discworld, Book 11) by Terry Pratchett
Witches Abroad (Discworld, Book 12) by Terry Pratchett
Small Gods (Discworld, Book 13) by Terry Pratchett
Lords and Ladies (Discworld, Book 14) by Terry Pratchett
Men at Arms (Discworld, Book 15) by Terry Pratchett
Soul Music (Discworld, Book 16) by Terry Pratchett
Interesting Times (Discworld, Book 17) by Terry Pratchett
Maskerade (Discworld, Book 18) by Terry Pratchett
Feet of Clay (Discworld, Book 19) by Terry Pratchett

Abandoned

Hart's Blood by Orson Scott Card
Magic's Pawn (The Last Herald-Mage, Book 1) by Mercedes Lackey
Star Trek: The Last Roundup by Christie Golden and David Kaye
Sacrifice (Star Wars: Legacy of the Force)

Currently Reading*

Spirit Gate (Crossroads, Book 1) by Kate Elliott
The Ragamuffin Gospel
Tathea by Anne Perry
On Basilisk Station (Honor Harrington, Book 1) by David Weber
The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt
Visual Chronicles: The No-Fear Guide to Creating Art Journals, Creative Manifestos and Altered Books by Linda Woods and Karen Dinino
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
The Holy Bible
The Dragon Reborn (The Wheel of Time, Book 3) by Robert Jordan
Hunters of Dune by Kevin J. Anderson and Brian Herbert
Watership Down by Richard Adams
Elantris by Brandon Sanderson
Hogfather (Discworld, Book 20) by Terry Pratchett

In the Queue

Young Miles (Vorkosigan Saga) by Lois McMaster Bujold
Confessions by Saint Augustine
Snow Crash by Neal Stephenson
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

*Yes, I really am reading that many books at once. No, I am not insane.

You're a geek girl if...

2009-02-18T13:41:00.002-05:00

This is sort of an informal list I've been keeping for a few years. A few months back, I posted it on Technochicks, and got a few more good ones. The events of Valentine's Day prompted me to post it on my blog. :)

You're a geek girl if...

You own more computer media than makeup (and carry more of it with you, too).

When you wear makeup, your friends ask you "What's the special occasion?"

You can keep track of chargers for your iPod, DS, PDA, GPS unit, digital camera, and laptop, but you've lost your lipstick. Again.

You've been hit on by a Jedi, a Klingon, a pirate, and an elf, and it's not even lunchtime yet.

After the last entry, you added "Jedi" and "Klingon" to your spell check, and then threw in a dozen other words for good measure.

You miss Surge, because it was a great stand-in for Bouncy Bubble Beverage during gaming sessions.

You've had to replace elf ears or horns because they're worn out.

Your costume wardrobe is bigger than your real life one.

Packing for a vacation requires an extra bag for your laptop and all your travel chargers.

You barely read the local paper, but you know about strange events all around the world.

Your sweetie has bought you things with power cords for Valentine's Day, and you were ecstatic. (Who needs onyx jewelry when you can have an onyx DS Lite?

You don't know the names of your neighbors, but you know the handles and real life names of dozens of people around the world...

And their blogs, websites, and social networking IDs.

You go through your day looking for things to blog.

Google is your best friend.

Your favorite number is pi.

In your mind hottest = smartest (Courtesy of Anathema)

You're in the hospital and a guy comes in to replace the monitor, and the nurses get upset it will bother you, but all you want to know is the resolution on it. (This really happened with Ishy; she's a bigger geek than I am!)

And now for true confession time:

You're a geek girl if your husband gives you diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, amethysts, and topazes for Valentine's Day...in Diablo II...

...And you're terribly excited about it, and spend an hour selling off stuff to make room for them in your inventory.

Yes, it's really true. And my favorite number really is pi.

2009 Audiobook Challenge

2009-01-30T17:29:00.006-05:00

J. Kaye is doing an audiobook challenge over at J. Kaye's Book Blog. As it happens, I love audiobooks almost as much as I love regular books. It's just so much easier to listen to audio while I knit, crochet, spin, or journal, you know? (Though I can knit or crochet while I read, if it's a nice, thick hardcover that will stay open on its own...)

The goal is twelve audiobooks; I'll probably do a few more, but that's where I'll start. I'll blog a review for each of them, and post it here.

My definite listens:
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine l'Engle
A Wind in the Door by Madeleine l'Engle
A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine l'Engle
A Scanner Darkly by Phillip K. Dick
Begun with my husband 01.27.2009

Completed to Date
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine l'Engle (01/09)
A Wind in the Door by Madeleine l'Engle (01/09)
A Swiftly Tilting Planet by Madeleine l'Engle (01/09)
A Scanner Darkly by Phillip K. Dick (03/09)
Playing for Keeps by Mur Lafferty (04/09)
Winter's Heart (The Wheel of Time, Book 9) by Robert Jordan (05/09)
Crossroads of Twilight (The Wheel of Time, Book 10) by Robert Jordan

Abandoned as Horrible
Hart's Blood by Orson Scott Card

In Progress
The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time, Book 2) by Robert Jordan
Knife of Dreams (The Wheel of Time, Book 11) by Robert Jordan

Save Handmade! Amend the CPSIA!

2009-01-29T17:45:00.002-05:00

Cross-posted from my craft blog, because it's just that important.

Have you heard about the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, or CPSIA for short? No? Well, our government has really done it this time!

The CPSIA is a new requirement for all items intended for babies and children. Its aim is good: keep kids safe from lead. But it's insane! Under its provisions, handmade items, especially one-of-a-kind handmade toys and clothes, are no longer feasible to make and sell.

In a nutshell, it requires that every single item intended for children and babies be tested for lead and the like, and have a tag permanently affixed to it. That may sound reasonable, right?

Think about it. If your neighbor is a seamstress who makes custom christening gowns for babies, she now has to make TWO IDENTICAL DRESSES and send one off to be tested (which destroys it). The remaining dress must have a permanent tag affixed to it, stating that it is safe.

If a handmade item is sold in a store, the store must display a certificate for that item, and for every other children's item! How does that work?

It's insane! For more information, see Craftzine's excellent post on the topic.

Sixteen Things About Me

2009-01-07T17:08:00.002-05:00

I've been tagged repeatedly on Facebook, so here we go.

1. I'm a native Atlantan, married to a native Atlantan. Though I'm the first in either of my parent's families born in Atlanta, my family has been in Georgia for several generations...at least five, I think.

2. Though most of you know me as an artistic person, I didn't even think I could draw until I took Two Dimensional Design and Drawing I in 2000 or so. I had been doing crafts since, well, forever, but I was convinced my mom and siblings had all the artistic ability in the family. It took me years–literally–to be able to call myself an artist!

3. For almost all of my life, I thought I would be a scientist. I started college as a physics major and math minor. I've taken math through Calculus IV, and lots of physics (including two semesters of quantum mechanics). Not very useful as a graphic designer; take my word for it!

4. I can listen to a podcast and read a book while knitting or crocheting, if I have the right place to sit...and I retain the information. It only works with hardcovers, and it works best with big, thick books like the Wheel of Time novels: they stay open on their own quite well.

5. I adore baking, though I don't do it nearly as often as I should. As for cooking, I prefer yummy, nourishing stuff like casseroles. My husband is the one who loves cooking ethnic foods (except for Persian rice); I usually just eat it.

6. Counting from when we began dating, my husband and I have been together for almost half our lives! We started dating a month before he turned eighteen, and we're both thirty-five now. We dated for almost three years, were engaged for two years minus one week, and have been married for over twelve and a half years.

7. Total strangers have been known to comment on how dedicated my husband and I are to each other. Inevitably they ask how long we've been married, and are surprised to find out it's over a decade!

8. I really adore goats. No, I don't know why, but I really want pygmy goats. Note the use of a plural, which scares my husband.

9. I have never broken a bone. Likewise, I have never had surgery. If I were superstitious, I would be afraid to put that in writing. However, I don't expect God to jinx me just because I said it. :)

10. When I was a kid, my sister and I used to fight over my brother. We would have long, involved arguments where we used kid logic to try and convince each other that we had the most "right" to him. Fortunately, we eventually stopped viewing him as a possession, but we're still a very close family.

Okay, it's getting hard to think of stuff; bear with me.

11. I collect...well, things. Lots of different things. Fortunately, my husband loves me anyway. :)

12. I adore costumes of all sorts. Give me an occasion where I can wear a costume, and I'm happy. I can keep myself occupied quite nicely planning and plotting for different occasions.

Woohoo! I'm getting a second wind on this stuff, I think...

13. I never read only one book at a time. I'm always setting one down, or leaving it at work or home. In fact, I can't even remember the last time I read only one book. Maybe elementary school?

14. I have a very interesting approach to exercise. I detest participating in organized sports, probably due to my poor depth perception and the number of times I got hit in the face with a ball as a kid. However, I will happily troop around in the woods, climb things, or bike, as long as I have freedom to stop and explore when I want. And swimming? My husband has the hardest time getting me back out of the pool, unless I'm absolutely freezing.

15. Though I've been a Middle Eastern dancer for over fourteen years, I was never a dancer before then. My parents simply couldn't afford lessons for me or my sis. I didn't even do drill team; I did Flag Corps instead.

16. Speaking of Flag Corps...I was in Flag Corps for three years, my sophomore, junior, and senior years of high school. I now twirl brooms, sticks, and anything of the right shape, usually without thinking about it.

If I tag you on Facebook, it's probably because you tagged me. :)

Lacking Motivation

2009-01-06T23:29:00.003-05:00

I feel so worn out. I suppose I should be knitting or working on ATCs or journaling or something, but I'm just too tired.

Maybe I'm just feeling a bit down because it's Twelfth Night. That means I had to take my tree down, and all the lights.

I miss my pretty Christmas tree. Sob.

And so does Bibo.

A Year of Change

2009-01-02T14:05:00.001-05:00

I think it's funny that this month's NaBloPoMo theme is change, because 2008 was a year of change for me.

Some of the change was great: my beloved husband finally finished all his schooling, allowing him to get a position as a school media specialist. This meant we got a new apartment (big yay!), moving to Gwinnett County from DeKalb. Nice apartment with a high balcony, which means the kitties can go outside. Of course, moving and a new job for my husband meant big changes to our schedules: I wake up between 5:20 and 5:45 every morning. Not so hot for a dedicated night owl, believe me. But so worth it.

Because of the new apartment, we've been able to host a few overnight guests: a Guild Wars friend and his wife and family in July, and some other Guild Wars friends for Dragon*Con. I have loved the freedom to invite people over whenever we want!

There was even bigger good news for my family: my sister got married and is pregnant. He will the first baby on my side of the family. I take great pride in having bought him his first stuffed animal (a frog from Ikea), only three days after I found out she was pregnant and before most people even knew!

I've done some cool stuff artistically this year, too. In February, I took an art journal class, Love This Journal, with Jessica Wesolek. I loved it, and I've almost filled my first Moleskine. I also got a spinning wheel, which I adore. (Note that I don't claim to spin with any degree of skill...)

At church, we called a new music minister, just in time for our Christmas program. Exciting for sure; we've needed him! Still, I'm glad we didn't jump into a decision.

Not all the change was good though: my life was really shaken up in October, when my mom was diagnosed with lymphoma. Her prognosis is excellent (as I've posted before), but it shaken up everything. (Even more so for my brother and uncle.) But it has definitely reminded me of how much I love all my family. The blessing in all of this is that once my mom is cancer free, she should be in better health than when she started! Turns out the cancer was behind some health problems she had been having...and they discovered her gallstones before they caused her any problems. Since they are taking out her gallbladder once chemo is over, she'll never have any problems with them!

It's true that 2008 had some very serious, scary problems, but life is always like tht. Regardless, it was a promising year for us.

Sock Dream Addict

2008-11-21T13:33:00.003-05:00

I know a lot of women have lifelong love affairs with shoes; I've never been one of them. (Though my sister definitely is!)

Except that now I am addicted to legwear. See, until two or three years ago I practically lived in jeans. After working for years in print shops where I did a lot of customer service and had to dress up some (hose, even!), I got a job where I could wear jeans. This coincided nicely with my messier art classes, by the way, which further encouraged the wearing of jeans. (Have you tried throwing pots in a skirt? Or welding? Or building large sculptures? Besides the inconvenience, you'll ruin a lot of pretty clothes!)

After I graduated, though, I really got sick of always wearing jeans and wanted something that felt more feminine. Enter an article on Boundless webzine pointing out that skirts are an easy way to feel feminine.

Thus began my skirt-wearing kick. I now own only one pair of decent jeans (the rest are ratty, worn, and possibly paint-stainted). Most of the time, I wear skirts. And that began my interest in interesting legwear. It was about that time that I found Sock Dreams, this incredible online store that sells the most unbelievable socks, tights, leggings, and leg warmers.

True confession time...
I own a fair number of Sock Dreams socks. I have a pair of Super Stripes (red and black), two pairs of Super Ms, three pairs of Inklined Knee Highs (two of which are discontinued colors), Diamond Rib Knee Highs in Bordeaux (a dark red), M Squared Knee Highs in Dark Red, and a couple of others I can't remember. I also have a pair of Simone's Black Sleeves, which have been a lifesaver in this insane cold snap Atlanta's having.

And today I ordered a pair of the Super-Long Ribbed Leg Warmers (charcoal, of course). Because waiting for a bus in twenty-four degree weather (wind chill in the teens) while wearing a skirt? Oh yeah. I need thigh-high leg warmers.

So consider this revenge on every woman who has enabled me into new addictions...like BPAL and Malabrigo.

Another Mom Update

2008-11-05T14:13:00.001-05:00

So...my mom started chemo unexpectedly yesterday. She thought she was going in for a consultation; instead, they sent my uncle to get some food for her, so she could eat before it started.

It is in her bone marrow, which make her cancer Stage IV. They gave her only two of the drugs they will be giving her, since they're waiting for some test results. Fortunately, she didn't have any serious reactions. Her only reaction was a bit odd: it made her very hot. Apparently, chemo gives everyone else on the Prime Material Plane serious chills. That's my mom for you!

My brother is trying to help her, work, and keep up an A average in school. Oh, and take care of my grandmother, who lives with them. That in itself is a big job, because she won't do anything for herself if she can help it...even though she has better mobility than my mom does healthy!

My uncle is shouldering the rest of the burden for my grandmother and mom. It's such a blessing that he is retired and lives only a few minutes from my mom! But he's the type who loves peace and solitude, which he does not get at my mom's. My mom's chatty even under normal conditions, but the medication is making her ramble (and not always coherently, either). We measure my uncle's day by how many miles he has to walk for his sanity. Friday was six; Saturday required nine.

Oops.

I hate to admit it, but I think the stress is making me a little bit cranky and restless. I feel so bad about that, because I have an absolutely wonderful husband. I thought I was doing great and was stress free, until I developed a cold sore a few days ago. Apparently my body knows me better than I know myself; I only get those when I'm stressed.

Oops again.

On the good side, this might fix several problems my mom has had over the past couple of months, at least once all the chemo and stuff is over. So yay!

Halloween Aftermath

2008-11-01T13:30:00.002-05:00

This year was my first opportunity to decorate for Halloween to my heart's content...and in my own style! I really had fun, though a couple of planned projects never happened.

For most of my shopping, I headed to Jo-Ann's and hit the autumn and Halloween decorations. Most of them were at least 60% off; I was late decorating because of my mom's illness. The hall table featured a clearance-table skull candle (which looked like it cost a lot more), a cheap black plastic tray that will be re-purposed later, and a pretty goblet-type candle holder. (I tinted the water with food coloring and floated candles in it.) The feathers came from the autumn clearance section.

Add a wild-looking twig wreath, a basic evergreen wreath, and a can of spray paint. The result was two fun yet spooky wreaths. (See the black bird? That was a Christmas dove, painted black with India ink. 40% off from the new Christmas decorations.) Sadly, the flash reveals all the green underlayer of the wreath on my door. In person, it just looks black.

But the coolest part was in the craft room. I hung one of my black veils from the ceiling and suspended a ghost in front of my window (white gauze and styrofoam balls). It really looked awesome from the street, even if it's rather distant.

Okay, okay. The shrunken heads were pretty cool, too. AND when I told my husband what I was making, it left him speechless for the first time ever.

Edited to add: When I went to post my blog today, I realized I never hit "Publish Post." So here it is, a few days late.

Mom Update

2008-10-29T06:33:00.002-05:00

I have so many online friends and family that I gave in and decided to do a full update on my blog instead of rewriting it several places.

For those of you who don't know, my mom was diagnosed with Stage III non-Hodgkins lymphoma on Friday, which is cancer of the lymph nodes. She has one cluster around the bile duct, which was choking the flow of bile from the gallbladder. There is a second cluster near her lungs, which is not causing any major problems right now. (Except that, well, it's cancer…) Her prognosis is good.

She is a cashier at a Publix grocery store near her home. Last Monday, she went to work with a slightly sallow complexion and came home very yellow. My brother took her to the doctor, and they scheduled her to come back for additional tests on Wednesday.

By Wednesday, she was golden yellow, almost orange. She was tested, then sent to two other doctors for tests. The third doctor wanted to send her straight to the emergency room, but she had driven herself. She talked the doctor into letting her go home, take care of my ninety-two-year-old grandmother, and have my brother drive her to the hospital as soon as he got home.

At the hospital, the barrage of tests began. The extreme jaundice was a pretty good clue that something was wrong with the gallbladder. They stuck her so many times that by Saturday the inside of her left elbow was purple and sunken, and they were no longer able to take blood from either elbow and were moving on to sticking smaller vessels. Did I mention my mom has a major fear of needles?)

At first they thought she had hepatitis, but that turned out to be a false positive. Since my grandmother is so old and my sister is pregnant, we're especially thankful that was not the case. My mom would have been so depressed if she couldn't be around her daughter while she was pregnant with my mom's first grandchild! (My sis is having a boy.)

Friday they diagnosed the cancer: twelve lymph nodes in two places, I believe. They did surgery to put a stent in to allow the gall bladder to drain. I think this was the worst part of it for my mom: she was awake for the procedure, which took over three hours instead of the usual forty-five minutes. And despite what the doctors said during the procedure, she remembers all of it. (Which is ironic, considering that the overload of bilirubin in her body and the medications are temporarily interfering with her short-term memory and ability to concentrate.) They also did a biopsy of a lymph node under her right arm, but that was fine. They thought they may have to do a lung biopsy, but the CAT scan made that unnecessary.

By Saturday, she was much less yellow, though that is relative. She was still very jaundiced, but she had dropped from twenty-two times the norm to nine. Still lots of medication-induced fogginess, though. Nothing changed Sunday, except that she continued to improve.

On Monday, they put a port in her collarbone and did a bone marrow biopsy a couple of hours later. They also did an echocardiogram, which came back fine. We won't have the results of the bone marrow biopsy, though, for a few more days.

And yesterday she went home. Infection control is a big issue with her stent, so my uncle and brother cleaned and disinfected the entire house. She'll be starting chemo soon; she also has gallstones, but they're going to wait a couple of months on her surgery.

So right now, we're praying for good results on her bone marrow biopsy and making sure she takes it easy. As long as her bone marrow is cancer-free, her prognosis is very good!

Don't Touch That!

2008-10-14T22:07:00.002-05:00

I just loves it when Windows tells me, "This folder contains files that keep your system working properly. You should not modify its contents." You have to actually click on the link saying, "Show the contents of this folder" to be able to even view the contents.

And it's my hard drive. C:/. Sigh.

And of course it does the same thing when I go to "Program Files." Heaven forbid if I actually want to, oh, RUN AN APPLICATION. Hello!

Why do we keep giving MS so much of our money, when they treat us like imbeciles? Okay, I can understand protecting your Windows folder. But your HARD DRIVE and the Program Files? That's just idiotic.

I think it's Microsoft's way of denying all responsibility for anything that goes wrong. "Hey, we TOLD you not to modify your hard drive! Now look what you did! No cookie for you." Or, if you're using Internet Explorer, "thousands of cookies for you."

The Dangers of Paranoia

2008-10-13T14:04:00.003-05:00

Over the weekend, my husband Dorkelf and I got together with some friends (and friends of friends) at Galactic Quest in Lawrenceville to play some Shadowrun. It was lots of fun, even though my character hasn't really done anything useful yet. (She's a dwarf, and a radical eco shaman. I don't think most dwarves would like her, since they're very pro-technology.)

Dorkelf and I were talking about the campaign, and he said it was "almost as dangerous as Paranoia." I disagree; not a single member of our party died during the first session. That should never be the case in Paranoia!

Other things that won't be likely to happen in our Shadowrun campaign:

Being killed by the food dispenser before you leave for your mission briefing

An exploding medkit wiping out the entire Troubleshooter party

Your electric toothbrush going haywire and drilling through your head

R&D experimenting with the food vats and killing an entire sector

I really miss playing Paranoia!

Taking Things for Granted

2008-10-08T13:47:00.002-05:00

I've changed vitamins, and these new ones have to be taken with a meal. Since I eat breakfast at my desk before work, I have to take them to work. So when I grabbed the vitamins, I headed over a couple of aisles to pick up a pill case…and found myself facing an astounding array of gadgets and organizers. All I could do was stare. Some of the cases were huge things, probably 8" by 10", and had four compartments for each day. Four per day.

It made me so grateful! Yes, I have a few health issues: I have scoliosis, rosacea, and keratosis pilaris. I also have sensitive skin. But you know what? I'm healthy. Yes, my vision is so bad that I live in a world of very fuzzy blobs without my contacts.

But I'm healthy.

I do not have an army of medicine bottles populating my bathroom; my days are not regulated by medications. I do not have to plan my life around doctors' appointments.

I'm healthy. And I'm thankful.

Phantasma Relay for Life

2008-10-01T13:26:00.003-05:00

This is a repost from my Relay for Life page. I was surprised how hard it was to write it. Anyway, I've joined the Phantasma team for the Gwinnett County, Georgia Relay for Life, a fund raiser for the American Cancer Society. Phastasma is being captained by Ishy, and is being coordinated by TechnoChicks.

Here's why I'm doing Relay for Life. I'm not begging for money here; this is only intended to get people thinking.

Why Relay for Life?

Days before my wedding in 1996, my grandmother's younger sister was diagnosed with breast cancer. Neither she nor my Aunt Odette could be there when I was married. Aunt Dot was a widow: she lost my Uncle Joe to lung cancer a few years earlier. Her cancer did finally go into remission, but returned with a vengeance. We thought she had beaten it, but this time her brain, liver, and breasts were all affected, and she died soon after her initial collapse. I still remember the shock when my sister and brother told me; I was numb for days.

Then, just a few years ago, my grandmother came to visit us for Christmas. The day after Christmas, she said the words you never want to hear: "I have cancer." Grandma Lucy was a strong woman who was healthy her whole life, a woman who went on a mission trip to Romania working with orphans and a pilgrimage to the Holy Land after my grandfather died. How could such a woman have cancer?

She did, though: breast cancer, just like her sister. I thank God that my aunt, uncle, and cousins were able to move her to Pennsylvania and care for her until her death, surrounding her with the love of family and giving my cousins the chance to know her as I did.

I've known so many people who have struggled with cancer; too many of them have lost their fight. As a teenager, I watched my neighbor Betty die of lung cancer. Just a year ago this month, my friend Lisa had breast cancer surgery. Lisa's doing great, but while she was fighting breast cancer, her mom lost her own battle with breast cancer.

And if not for the grace of God and the miracles of medical science, I would never have met Michelle, a wonderful woman and one of my closest friends, a thyroid cancer survivor.

I want to see an end to cancer during my lifetime; I don't want the threat of cancer looming over the next generation. By participating in Relay for Life, I have an opportunity to celebrate the lives of those who have battled cancer, remember loved ones lost, and support the American Cancer Society’s lifesaving mission.

No Gas for You!

2008-09-29T22:01:00.003-05:00

You may have heard about the gas shortage in the Southeast following Hurricane Ike. What you may not realize is just how ridiculous it has gotten here in Atlanta. In my part of town, at least, more than ninety percent of the stations I pass are out of gas. You heard me right: nine out of every ten stations simply don't have any gasoline. None. And mid grade or premium gas? Well, if you find stations that have it, it's pure luck.

Dorkelf and I were supposed to go camping at Amicolola Falls over the weekend, with a visit to Dahlonega (site of the first major U.S. gold rush and a beautiful town). Um, that would require enough gas to get us there and back, and half a tank won't do it.

My husband had passed an open station on his way to pick me up, so we headed over there. We wait in a fairly short line (that means there were only five cars in line waiting for each pump) and pull up. No gas. Seriously: while we watch, an employee walks over and removes the prices from the sign. As we learned over the past week, that's the universal symbol for "no gas left." The person before us had gotten the last of the gas!

So we drove around and around, unable to find another station with gas. The only one we found was a QuikTrip up the street from our apartment, and the line was so long that we wouldn't be able to go camping if we waited. It was already 6:45; wait an hour for gas, and it would be 7:45 or 8:00 when we finished. That would put us arriving at the campground at 10:00. Our tent is very easy to set up, but at 10 pm, in the dark, trying not to disturb everyone else? Not my idea of fun. (As we found out the next day, it's just as well we didn't wait. They ran out of gas shortly thereafter; there was also a scenic fistfight in the parking lot…not the usual sort of thing for our neighborhood!)

Friday night we drove the five miles to a very pleasant shopping center and spent my husband's Barnes and Noble gift card on Heroes season Two. To our way of thinking, if our plans were going to be spoiled, we were at least going to have some fun! Saturday, we drove all the way to IHOP, four miles from the house, which allowed us to do our grocery and pet shopping all in the same shopping center.

Sunday we splurged. After church, we drove a few minutes down the road to the Duluth Fall Festival. We met my sister (driving on a nearly empty tank of gas) and had a great lunch. Then I hung around and did birthday and anniversary shopping while Dorkelf ran back to the church for his student's recital.

After he picked me up, I told him about an open gas station a woman from church said had gas that morning. It was only a couple of blocks out of the way, so we took a chance and drove over. Yay gas! We were in line for forty minutes, which isn't bad considering that the line you see in the photo was one of three lines just like it going into the one station. But we got ten gallons of gas, and QuikTrip was only charging $3.89, the lowest I've seen in Northeast Atlanta! Plus, the employees were doing a great job directing traffic. (QuikTrip has handled this better than any other company I've seen.)

Of course, many inconsiderate people are only making it worse. Ridership on public transportation was up last week (according to drivers; I know my bus was more crowded!), but this morning the bus was nearly empty. Many other people aren't cutting back on their driving, especially in upper middle class and upper class areas. People all over the city are topping up the tank every time they pass an open station, instead of waiting until they get to a quarter tank or so. That means the gas runs out faster, and our supply is already low in the wake of Gustav and Ike.

I feel like my husband and I are already acting responsibly on this front. We live fairly close to my husband's job now, so his commute is short, even with a short detour to take me to the bus center. I take public transportation to work every day, and home every day except Wednesday and Thursday. (Wednesday, public transportation would make me late to church; Thursday, I take it to dance class, but get out of class too late for the bus.) On those days, he picks me up.

Anyway, next time you pass two gas stations in a row with gas and no waiting, think about all of us in Atlanta and be thankful!

Kitty Cats and Sea Otters

2008-08-29T13:40:00.002-05:00

The cats...the otters...is there a connection?

Actually, it looks like there is. I've had kitties all my life, literally: my mom's cat had her kittens under my crib the day after I was born. When I was growing up, we had as many as thirty at a time.

But I fell in love with river otters the first time I saw them at the Tennessee Aquarium, and then with sea otters. It's so sad that sea otter populations have seriously decreased along the California coast. It's even sadder that it appears they're dying because of a disease they've caught from cats: Toxoplasma gondii. I'll give you the short, short version.

Otters are dying of Toxoplasma gondii, or "toxo" for short. Many animals can get toxo, but only cats shed the "eggs," in their feces. Somehow, toxo is getting from cat feces to the otters. The leading theory is that flushed litter and wastes is surviving the sewage treatment plants, then ending up in the ocean. Either the otters are picking it up directly, or it's contaminating something else then infecting them, such as shellfish.

So, to protect ocean wildlife, especially otters, we have to keep toxo out of the ocean. To do that, we have to keep it out of the groundwater, sewers, and streams.

Don't flush used cat litter; any toxo in the feces, even in trace amounts, may survive the sewage treatment facilities.

Don't wash used litter or cat feces into storm drains. Often, this water goes into streams and rivers, then to the ocean.

Dispose of cat feces by bagging in plastic and placing in the trash (if laws allow) or burying it at least six inches deep where it can't contaminate the ground water. Cat litter should not be used in a home compost heap: it's very unlikely it will get hot enough to kill the toxo.

References
Facts about Toxo and Cat Poop from the Sea Otter Alliance
Wikipedia article on Toxoplasma
Parasite in Cats Killing Sea Otters from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Dragon*Con is tomorrow!

2008-08-28T14:50:00.001-05:00

Okay, I always get excited about Dragon*Con, but this year my excitement level is off the charts! I can't wait; I get to go for the whole weekend, AND stay at the con! Very cool.

Even better, I have three friends from the Christian Gamers Alliance who came from OUT OF TOWN to attend Dragon*Con! Isn't that beyond awesome? I think so; one is a young friend who I had never met in person.

Going down tonight to register. Who, me? Counting the hours?

Edited to add: Photo from the con pre-reg! Cool Dalek, huh? Most stuff that elaborate doesn't show up until later.

Plurking Away

2008-06-24T17:24:00.002-05:00

So yesterday I was listening to the Lime n Violet podcast. One interesting thing popped up: Plurk. What's Plurk? It's an addiction!

Okay, actually it's a very fun social site. You make friends, and post little tidbits during the day. Friends and "Fans" (people who don't add you as a friend but still want to follow your plurks) can reply, and you can reply back, creating a sort of meandering mini-conversation.

Your page is a timeline, which shows your plurks as little sentences scattered along, with numbers after them indicating the number of replies. You can look at only your plurks, only a certain person's plurks, only new plurks, whatever.

I'm sadly addictive. But it's amazing how many knitters are on there: MissViolet of LimenViolet, of course, and WendyKnits (of WendyKnits), Quietish (Rosemary) of CraftBorg, and a couple of dozen ravelers and lots of others.

Love my reusable bags!

2008-05-05T22:48:00.001-05:00

Back at Christmas, I bought a really pretty reusable bag at Barnes and Noble. I love it, and I tote it with me a lot, and my Trader Joe’s red-and-pink Hawaiian print bag.

But it’s so frustrating! At least once a week I forgot to take a bag with me, and have to use disposable bags. I had a clerk tell me the other day, “Well, just throw it away when you get home,” when they didn’t put my stuff in my bag, even though I told them I didn’t want any plastic bags!

People just don’t get it. What, does she think it just disappears? It has to go to a landfill or be recycled; neither is good for the environment. Even if I reuse it as a trash bag (which is preferable to going out and buying trash bags when I have grocery bags already), it ends up in a landfill sooner or later.

I’m going to buy the Eden Mini Maxi Shopper by Rosenthal. It will clip on my knitting tote, so I never forget it! And it’s cute…

See more progress on: Use fewer plastic bags

Responsible shopping in Virginia Highlands

2008-04-09T23:44:00.001-05:00

If you like the handmade, Ten Thousand Villages is the place to go in Virginia Highland. I love this little shop: it’s full of wonderful treasures from across the globe, all handmade by people who care. The best part? It’s fair trade, and many of the “employees” are actually volunteers.

I love finding a place like this in a neighborhood like Virginia Highland. It’s a beautiful district, but so many of the shops carry the formulaic staples of every artsy-urban area. But not Ten Thousand Villages. Get great, distinctive items for yourself or a loved one, things you won’t see in every shop. And help struggling artisans with limited options for employment make a fair living.

See more progress on: Ten Thousand Villages Atlanta

The Fabulous O'Brien Horsehead Nebula

2008-02-21T10:45:00.002-05:00

This may sound strange, but Orion is my favorite constellation. I know a lot of people love it, but my reasons are odd...it was the first constellation my baby brother (who is now twenty-seven...) learned to identify.

See, my little sister and I were Girl Scouts, and we sold cookies every winter. Once we sold them, we had to go back and deliver them all. When you consider that I usually sold over three hundred boxes by myself, that's a lot of time spent in a car.

Since cookies were always sold in January or February and delivered in February or March, Orion was always up. And my little brother, who has always had an excellent memory and was very smart, learned to recognize it pretty fast. He would lean out the car window and yell, "Look Mommy, it's O'Brien! Look! Look!" If a four year old can recognize Orion's Belt, anyone can learn.

All that to explain why I love everything about Orion. But in the past few years, my husband I have been going to the Fernbank Observatory for public viewing nights. Since then, we've seen some really great views of the Orion Nebula and other bits of Orion through the thirty-six inch scope.

But this is really spectacular. See the bright star on the left? That's part of the Belt. I wish I could see it with my little telescope!

read more | digg story

Total Lunar Eclipse!

2008-02-20T13:59:00.003-05:00

I'm really, really looking forward to the total eclipse tonight. I'm hoping the skies are nice and clear, though the forecast has me a bit worried. Ah well...

If it's been a while since you've studied astronomy, here's a primer. The moon doesn't actually shine; it reflects sunlight. Sometimes, the Earth will pass between the full moon and the sun. With the Earth between them, the sunlight is blocked; the moon is in the Earth's shadow. As the shadow moves over the moon, it takes a bite out. Once the moon is fully inside the Earth's shadow, the whole moon becomes visible again and the color changes. (That's all because of our atmosphere, by the way.) In the prettiest eclipses, the moon will turn a gorgeous blood red. As the moon moves out of the shadow, the whole process reverses. You can get more in-depth info at Mr. Eclipse, the NASA site for tonight's eclipse that I linked to above, or do a search on "Lunar Eclipse."

If you've never seen it, make plans right now to see at least part of tonight's eclipse! NASA has a Javascript app that will give you all the info you need.

And speaking of the eclipse, did you know that our moon and the Earth are in a perfect relationship, both in size and in relative positions, to have lunar eclipses as well as total solar eclipses? It's true. God's cool like that.

Love that Chimera!

2008-01-18T13:38:00.000-05:00

I have noticed a bit of a trend. On FaceBook, there's an application called "BPAL of the Day" that lets you post which Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab fragrance you're wearing that day. It lists it on your profile, along with the scent description if there's one on the Black Phoenix site still; you can even link it to your review at BPAL.org.

Anyway, I was looking over my mini-feed and decided to review my perfume choices.

Imagine my surprise! I have twenty-two entries since December 18, when I added the app. (I usually only enter a fragrance on weekdays, and rarely update on the weekend.) And seven of them are for Chimera, from the Bewitching Brews line.

SEVEN. That's one third. And the cool thing? I don't even own a bottle; I only have a 1 mL imp's ear that came as a freebie (or "frimp", for "free imp") from a decant circle. Even better? I'm still not out of the perfume. Factor in the number of times I've worn it before I installed the application and the times I've worn it on the weekends, and I've gotten at least a dozen days of Chimera out of that one imp! Consider that I usually apply morning and afternoon, and that's twenty-four applications. Not bad at all!

In case you're interested, here's the scent description from the Lab's website: "The fiery, volatile scent of cinnamon, thickened by myrrh, honeysuckle, and copal."

I would describe it as a warm, rich fragrance with a subdued sweetness. I think the richness is the resins (myrhh and copal) mingling with the cinnamon, and the honeysuckle I think adds that touch of sweetness. It's divine. I've ordered another imp, since I can't justify buying a bottle right now: I just bought a bottle of The Fruit of Paradise, a limited edition Yule scent.

I hope my order gets here before I run out!

BPAL Longings

2008-01-16T22:30:00.000-05:00

Parsifal: my first BPAL fragrance

2007-12-17T11:20:00.001-05:00

I had looked at Black Phoenix Alchemy Labs before. I love the wonderful descriptions and art for the fragrances…but I wasn’t sure if I would like it!

But BPAL.org has such great reviews (though you have to register to see them) that I quickly found a couple of limited edition Yule scents I just had to get. Plus, I was able to pick a set of six Mad Tea Party (Alice in Wonderland) fragrances to buy as 1 mL samples for my sister. (She has a Wonderland addiction…)

But then I discovered there was a retail outlet in Atlanta for BPAL! (Amazing: there are only four, total!) I went right over to the Whole Foods in Roswell, and now I’m the proud owner of a 5 mL bottle of Parsifal, a retail-only exclusive fragrance! Yay.

See more progress on: promote Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab.

More Guild Wars Goodness!

2007-12-12T17:45:00.000-05:00

Okay, if you aren't a gamer like me, you've probably read my raves about Guild Wars and thought, "Guild what?"

Guild Wars is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game, or MMORPG. "Massively multiplayer" means that lots and lots and LOTS of people are all playing it together. "Online" is pretty straightforward: it's played, well, online. And you probably know what a role-playing game is; think "Dungeons and Dragons," the most famous role-playing game around. (And no, D&D is not Satanic. And no, it does NOT drive people to suicide.)

Guild Wars is a fantasy RPG; it's not set in our normal world. Instead, it's set in a world where magic is real and a human can get in a fight with a huge troll and win. (Hey, it's a game, remember?) You fight on the side of good, campaigning against evil. This usually involves killing lots of bad things and traveling lots of places.

So, let's say you have a mission to clear out all the bad guys from an area. You have two professions; your professions determine what type of stuff you do. If you're a warrior, you run up to the bad guys, choose someone to attack, and start whacking it with your sword or axe or hammer, until one of you is dead. If you're a ranger, you may turn it into a pincushion with your bow or send your pet in to fight it.

Elementalists have lots of fun: throwing fireballs, hurling ice shards, shooting lightning, or knocking down enemies with hurricane-force winds. In general, you make them miserable through the wonderful world of the elements.

Perhaps you play a necromancer; then you would curse them to steal their strength. And if you are a necro, you can make nifty little minions out of their corpses, which you can use to fight the other bad guys! Isn't that nice?

Of course there are healers: monks, in this case. But monks can also smite. I guess Balth doesn't much like the enemies...

But if you're me, you're probably playing a mesmer. I love mesmers! They have highly trained minds, and use them to do most of the work. They may hex their enemies and give them migraines, so they can't cast spells or even move very fast. A mesmer may follow that up by interrupting their actions, stealing their health or energy, or turning them into pacifists. It's fun, but it's also one of the hardest choices.

Anyway, those are the core professions. The other campaigns add other professions, but those six make up the bulk of every party. Try it sometime; just don't start as a mesmer like I did...

So sick of being sick

2007-12-05T11:40:00.000-05:00

Every year, I catch a cold and end up with a cough that lasts for months. Literally: I caught a cold about a week after Dragon*Con, and my cough has never gone away. That was early September!

Last week I had a cold, and it lasted a couple of days. But last Wednesday night I lost my voice, and my cough started getting really bad. And that was after the worst of my cold was gone!

At the time, what I really wanted was to get my voice back by tonight. Our church Christmas concert, A Midnight Clear, is Sunday. Tonight is our tech rehearsal; tomorrow is our dress. I really, really wanted to sing.

Now I just want my cough to go away. Forget singing; my cough was so bad yesterday I was sitting on the floor, doubled over. I was coughing too hard to actually do anything.

I can't wait for this medicine to work. At least if I can't sing in the concert I won't have to wear my hideous choir outfit, more commonly known as the "total sparkly mistake."

Step One: Post More...Step Three: Profit!

2007-12-03T08:28:00.000-05:00

Did you know last month was National Blog Post Month, or NaBloPoMo? Me neither. I knew about NaNoWriMo, but NaBloPoMo?

Anyway, I missed it. And just when I was thinking I should post more! But no matter. It's always the right time to be loquacious, right?

I actually have two other blogs, so I'm going to go back and forth between them. Let's see how well I can communicate this month. :) I'm talkative enough in real life; this should be a cinch!

What's your fandom?

2007-11-15T08:10:00.001-05:00

"Fandom" seems to be the big buzzword right now. Everywhere I turn I see it on a shirt or a sig or a blog… It's so ubiquitous that it ubiquitousness was the topic of a Dork Tower comic; you can even buy Igor's "My Fandom is Random" shirt!

So I got to thinking: what's my fandom? I could cheat and say "scifi and fantasy", but isn't that rather vague? But if I list them all, that would be pretty long. I need a top five list (because top ten would make it too easy).

So without further ado, here's my Fandom Top Five! It's unranked, because ranking it would be like choosing a favorite child. And that's just wrong!

The Lord of the Rings
How could I not love it? It was awesome as a book (and Tolkien saw it as one book, not three). Add in Peter Jackson's movie, and its awesomeness is beyond measure. Wonderful story, incredible visuals, utterly fascinating characters.

Star Wars
I fell in love with it as a child and still find it just as captivating. I had the Underoos and shirts, and I was convinced I made a perfect Princess Leia. Nothing could capture the imagination like it; it revolutionized science fiction and fantasy.

Star Trek
Ah, the other side of my childhood addiction! I wasn't as much of an instant addict, but my interest in it keeps growing. (But let's pretend Enterprise and Movie Five never happened, okay?)

The Wheel of Time
I love, love, love to read, and Robert Jordan's masterful epic has everything I could want: a sweeping scope, intricate plot, well-developed characters that can hold your interest, and lots of hidden clues to the later stories! Woohoo!

Role-Playing Games
Now, I don't love every role-playing game, but I adore several. Dungeons and Dragons tops the list: Third Edition finally made RPGs approachable for me. But I adore Paranoia, too; it's so off the wall and insane! How could you not love a game where your character comes in a six pack? And Guild Wars is my drug of choice: a wonderful, incredibly well done multi-player online RPG. I met a bunch of wonderful new people through my guild! I loved LARPing, too, but there's not a good group here. Maybe at Dragon*Con…

By the way, my Google search just turned up 6,660,000 results. 666…should I worry? Ah, never mind. But tell me, what's your fandom?

Happy Halloween!

2007-10-31T13:07:00.000-05:00

Well, I hope everyone is making the most of National "Yay! I get to wear a costume!" Day...

Can you tell I really enjoy costumes? Have fun, stay safe, and watch out for trick-or-treating kiddies!

Am I too old for that gadget?

2007-10-15T16:54:00.000-05:00

So, today I was at Popgadget, and found a link to "Are You Too Old For That Gadget?", an article at Laptop Mag. It amazes me that someone would seriously write this thing...never mind the list of gadgets they object to!

From the intro:
"Just because it's shiny, costs a lot, and your grandmother can't use it, doesn't mean you should...there's a chance it was built for someone much younger."

Okay, why do I care who some ad agency thought should use it? If it works for me, it works. Period. I'm more concerned by the idiotic fashion designers, who are designing clothes for anorexic models or strippers, or for middle-aged women with no fashion sense. But I digress...let's look at their list of prohibited gadgets.

Here's the funny thing...they seem to like the Flip Video Ultra. They mention its ease of use and low price, as well as its portability. But you shouldn't buy it...because the bright colors "look like they should belong to a ten-year-old." And the quality? Well, it's only VGA, and it only holds sixty minutes. (But I'll bet thats about right for the price point...) So "don't expect to create any epic masterpieces." Well shoot. There go my plans to become a famous film maker, armed only with my Flip Video Ultra and my creative genius. Seriously, if you're considering buying this and you're this stuffy, the ten-year-old probably has a better chance at that masterpiece. At least they can use the video editing software.

Don't think regular cameras get a pass! If you buy the Fujifilm Z10fd, you should be totally mortified for using "a camera designed for Generation Z!" Never mind the host of features, including facial recognition, a bevy of modes, wireless sharing, and more. You can't have it...because the website's photos "all feature fresh-faced 15-year-olds."

What about smartphones? Those are sophisticated, right? Not if it's the T-Mobile Sidekick 3! Sure, it's "high-end enough to entertain 'tweens and adults alike," and it has "a feature package that includes full Web browsing, three messenger clients, an MP3 player, and a 1.3-megapixel camera." Still, its marketing rules it out, too; according to them, its owners are all ninth graders. Get a Blackberry, they declare. Then you'll look cooler in the airports; otherwise, you'll have to use it discreetly, so no one sees what you're using.

Next up on the taboo list is a truly drool-worthy laptop: the VooDoo Envy H201 Gaming Notebook. According to them, if you're old enough to have kids, you have no business taking your gaming seriously! If you do game, you must use laptops with screens 17" or smaller, and make sure the case is drab. Otherwise, company might see your boldly-colored, stylish laptop! ("Company" is coming? Who says that? No one I know with a journal-keeping little sister and a gadget-phobic grandmother, that's for sure! They can't seem to make up their mind about their target audience!)

On a side note, using "if you're old enough to have kids" as a standard seems pretty foolish. I mean really! I've know fourteen-year-olds with kids; many twenty-somethings have them, too. Does that mean you stop gaming as soon as someone your age you know has a baby?

And their last target is a pretty popular gadget: the PlayStation Portable, or PSP. Don't use this one on the subway, because you may "get a few bemused stares." I think young people are going to become surly, because you're using "their" gadget. The older people? Well, they may think it's an old Sega Game Gear, circa 1991! Horror of horrors! According to Laptop Mag, "If you can remember this toy, which was ubiquitous back in 1991, your days of public gaming should be over."

Over? I don't think so. I own a beautiful onyx Nintendo DS Lite, and I feel no qualms about pulling it out while waiting for a table or on public transportation. I graduated high school in 1991*, so I am certainly old enough to remember the Game Gear. What does that make me? Something bad, I'm sure. I think I'm supposed to hang my head in mortification right about now...especially since there's less chance my peers will mistake it for a "more adult" media player.

If I were the author, I wouldn't worry about my gadget choices making me look like an idiot; I would worry that my obsessive concern about what the "in crowd" might think would make me look like an insecure fourteen-year-old trying to fit in with the cool kids.

Meanwhile, I'm going to keep choosing my gadgets based on what I like and what works for me, rather than what random strangers on MARTA think of them.

I performed a dance solo!

2007-09-24T19:27:00.000-05:00

I actually did it…

It was for a benefit, for a good friend with breast cancer. I nearly hyperventilated beforehand, and I almost hyperventilated again afterwards.

I’m glad I did it. Everyone said, “Now it will be easy next time.” Um, no. Maybe in another thirteen years I’ll do another solo. But I think Nyssa understood that I did it for her. :) And she’s the one who mattered.

See more progress on: Perform a Middle Eastern dance solo

The loss of two legends

2007-09-19T14:13:00.000-05:00

If you haven't heard, Robert Jordan, author of the best-selling fantasy series The Wheel of Time, died Sunday afternoon. This comes on the heels of Madeleine l'Engle's death on September 6, just ten days earlier.

For me, this is a sad, sad thing. The Wheel of Time is one of the best fiction series I've ever read, and currently my favorite. I started reading it about the time The Lord of Chaos was out, around 1995. I remember how quickly I read them all...and how quickly I re-read them. That's no small thing, considering that each book-and there are eleven in the main series-is at least seven hundred pages, and two are over a thousand! I've since read every book at least two times; some I've read as many as five times.

Madeleine l'Engle, however, goes back much further. I'm thirty-four; when I was a kid there wasn't exactly a wealth of science fiction and fantasy literature for us. Basically, it was Madeleine l'Engle or C.S. Lewis's Narnia books. And like many sci fi and fantasy geeks "of a certain age," A Wrinkle in Time was my introduction to the genres. I say "genres" because it blends the two, using science to explain its fantasy elements.

Even today, I love her work. Of course, I can read through them just a bit faster now... But my husband has never read them; can you believe it? He went to school to get a library degree, and he's getting a teaching certificate so he can work in a school library media center...and he's never read A Wrinkle in Time. Simply amazing.

But Robert Jordan and Madeleine l'Engle had something else in common: both were openly observant Christians. Jordan was a "High Church" Episcopalian (his words); coincidentally, l'Engle appears to have been an Episcopalian, too. So while the lose for science fiction and fantasy fans is great, it's even greater for us Christians among them.

It's comforting to know that, regardless of the suffering they experienced at the end of their lives, both are free of pain and sorrow right now, and living a life of joy in heaven. So I grieve for myself and for this world, and most of all for the families they left behind.

60% Nerdy?

2007-09-11T16:45:00.000-05:00

Wait, that's a lot, isn't it?

You Are 60% Nerdy

You may be a bit surprised with this score, but your more of a closet nerd than an actual nerd.
Stop denying your inner nerd! You're truly dorkier than you think.

How Nerdy Are You?

How many times must I say it? I'm a geek, not a nerd!

Back from Dragon*Con!

2007-09-04T18:46:00.000-05:00

It was great! It was wonderful! It was totally exhausting...

What did I do? Well, I talked about geeky stuff with my geeky friends, played geeky (perhaps even nerdy) board games, did some roleplaying with Blackmoor, and blew up an entire sector.

Oh wait, that last one was Mir-O-Wyn... She also ate computer chips and plotted the overthrow of Alpha Sector, but that's standard behavior for a Matter Eater in Purge.

I ate Suno and things which I can't pronounce or even read the labels of. (But my friends assured me it was, indeed, food...) Yeah, that was a field trip to Suno and Super H Mart.

Costumes were fun, too. I modified Thunder Paladin, (excuse me, the Shade of Trokair), giving him a +1/+1. (I was a +1/+1 counter on Sunday. Comfy costume...)

I loved Dragon*Con. When can I go again?

Dragon*Con time! Yay!

2007-08-31T00:46:00.000-05:00

I am so incredibly excited about Dragon*Con this year! Last year, I was just getting to know people who were there. But this year...this year I have very good friends who are there.

And we're going goth on Saturday. I made a bat shawl for my costume, too, which I adore. And, because my plain old light brown hair is too boring, I decided to dye my hair burgundy.

At least, that was the plan. The color on the box looked burgundy-ish, on hair about my color, too. But the result is considerably brighter! Fortunately, it shouldn't last too long. I used Color Pulse by L'oreal, and it supposedly washes out in eight to twelve shampoos. And I dyed it tonight, which meant bright red hair for work! Hey, my boss said yesterday that it was okay! :)

Should be fun, though, for a few days. It's still way more normal than a lot of what I'll see there!

Edited to add a photo

I took this photo at work, at my desk. See? Bright!

Team Soe's team has won a battle in the Hall of Heroes!

2007-08-18T01:12:00.001-05:00

Yes! Tonight we won in the Hall of Heroes! It has taken a long time (I’ve been playing for two years, and I’m rank 3.) But it was worth it.

And it was an alliance group, not a guild group, which was kinda cool. We had members of SoE (Spirit of Elijah), SOE (Spirit of Elisha), JCHC, FSCF (Four Star Christian Force) and HOLY (Holy Angels).

To make it even better, we won a FLAWLESS victory against GANK and CCCP, two of the best guilds in the Hall, 22 to 3 to 2!

See more progress on: win a battle in the Hall of Heroes in Guild Wars

Now, part of the reason we won is that GANK and CCCP, as two of the highest ranked teams, fight each other often, so there's lots of rivalry there. The battle started with each team quickly scoring one run. But then GANK and CCCP turned on each other and fought bitterly, until we had seventeen relics scored. Then they finally came after us...but we did very well. None of us died (flawless, remember?), and we scored five more runs. They only managed three more runs combined.

Not bad, huh?

A performer? ME?

2007-08-07T17:10:00.000-05:00

Apparently, I'm a performer. Yes, I dance. Yes, I'm in the choir. But not that type; this type...

My score on The LONG Scientific Personality Test:

ESFP - The Performer
(You scored 81% I to E, 52% N to S, 28% F to T, and 52% J to P!)

Your type is called the performer, and you very much feel "all the world's a stage". Your type is part of a larger category called experiencers or artisans. You are playful and fun-loving, and wish to help all those around you lighten up. You radiate warmth and optimism. Your motto is "eat, drink, and be merry". You share your type with over 10% of the population. You don't like to be alone - ever, if possible. You are always up on what is new and hot.
As a romantic partner, you are fun and affectionate, leading an active life full of friends. You are naturally happy-go-lucky and supportive of your partner. You dislike confrontation, and will avoid conflict discussion at all costs. You tend to let things go, hoping they go away on their own. You feel most appreciated when your partner is affectionate and acknowledges the good deeds you do, but doesn't make a particularly big deal out of them.

Your group summary: Experiencers (sp)
Your Type Summary: ESFP

The LONG Scientific Personality Test

It's based on the Keirsey Bates MBTI personality test.

So I looked at this, and I thought, "Huh? Are they NUTS? I'm not a performer! I get stage fright! I don't like being in the spotlight, most of the time."

But then I read a little further. I am rather playful, and quite cheerful. I think I'm warm and optimistic, sure. I'm not the "eat, drink, and be merry" type, exactly. I believe in the value of an optimistic outlook, grounded in realism, and taking advantage of opportunities. But the whole "eat, drink, and be merry" thing usually carries a connotation of hedonism, and that is so not me. (Though I do love food...)

I love being around people, too, or at least talking to them. (TeamSpeak, anyone?) But new and hot? Not interested, really.

Fun and affectionate, active, avoid conflict...that's me. And "not a big deal?" Oh yeah, all me.

Weird how something can sound like one thing, but mean something totally different!

I want Six Flags!

2007-07-20T16:27:00.001-05:00

2006-10-07 Six Flags 19.JPG
Originally uploaded by Maid Mirawyn

Last year, we went to Six Flags for my husband's company picnic thing. It was so fun, but it was a bit crowded...and it was in October, which meant Fright Fest was going on.

But there were roller coasters we didn't get to ride at all. How sad! And the lines were so long for Goliath that we skipped it totally; it was the new coaster for the year.

And just to tempt me: Six Flags sent a load of buy one, get one coupons to our office just this week! If my husband doesn't get a school library job this year, we are so going!

Woohoo! Bonus tourism!

2007-07-08T21:03:00.001-05:00

Well, five minutes away from St. Louis, I realized that meant the Gateway Arch! Well, of course we had to stop...especially since we had never been to Missouri or Illinois.

We only had about half an hour in the city, but it was fun. Parking was a bit tricky, but I'm glad we did it. The arch is so cool! It's big, and it's pretty. Really, really big.

It's practically impossible to get a good, complete photo of it, but I still took several interesting photos. Then I bought a postcard, so I would have a "perfect" photo for the scrapbook. But in some ways, I like my photos better! For instance, I took one that makes it look like the symbol for Starfleet. Perfect geek shot. :)

But then we had to get back on the road. Illinois, then Kentucky, then Tennessee, then HOME.

Did I mention we arranged everything so we can have dinner in Chattanooga, at Luipi's Pizza? (It's only one of the best pizza places ever!) It will be our shortest visit in Chattanooga in history!

Totally in love with the Denver Public Library!

2007-07-08T19:15:00.000-05:00

I was so surprised by the Denver Public Library, right in the middle of the downtown area. It's incredibly unique...but that's what you would expect, since it was designed by Michael Graves. We saw the outside (and took tons of photos) on Friday night, but we didn't get to go inside. Yesterday morning, though, we took the speed tour before leaving Denver. It was great! It's so large that they have a self-guided tour map available at the front desk. Not only is it absolutely filled with books, but the art collection is astounding! There's art on every floor, and the about half of the top floor is a gallery. The main gallery space overlooks the city, facing the park; there's a deck that is opened for the special events, too.

The fifth floor historical room is breathtaking. I'll upload a photo later, but the center is dominated by the timbers that form the central space. AND along one side are table areas that overlook the museum. The coolest part? It's like a big desk and a window seat all in one; the table is that deep. I would have loved to have climbed up and sat in the window, but I doubt they would have been too happy about that...

We proposed a "bring Colorado here" lever so we could visit the library frequently, but I think they have a backlog.

Tattered Cover Book Store, Denver

2007-07-06T23:42:00.000-05:00

We visited Tattered Cover's downtown location after finishing up downtown. If you know us, you know we had no choice. It is a bookstore, after all. It is also practically an institution in Denver; I had read about it long before, so it was on the must-visit list. Plus it had a coffee shop and was open late...

The selection is great, and the atmosphere is wonderful! There's antique furniture everywhere (but the friendly type of antique, not the "don't touch me" type). The sections are logically arranged, and the magazine assortment is wonderful! The art in the store is unique: portraits of every writer or illustrator who has visited the store, taken when they visited. I didn't have time to look at every single one--there were way too many--but I was happy to see Madeline l'Engle. Yay.

Anyway, if you visit Denver, you must visit Tattered Cover. Next time we hope to visit the Lower Downtown ("LoDo") location, too.

A little more of Denver

2007-07-06T21:06:00.000-05:00

Dredd is totally nuts. Denver really is a nice little city. There's a lot of interesting buildings downtown, including an unbelievably beautiful library, the really weird (yet appealing) Denver Art Museum, the Byers-Evans House (where the people were very, very nice), and all the great government buildings.

And of course, there's the Capitol building, with its official "One Mile Above Sea Level" marker. Um, make that markers: the one mile mark was officially changed in 2003, presumably as a result of more accurate measurements.

Parking can be very difficult, but after 6 pm and on Sundays and holidays you don't have to pay the meters...which is a big help.

All in all, it's very compact, so getting from one place to the other is easy!

Next up: Denver

2007-07-06T16:40:00.000-05:00

Ugh. The traffic is way worse than Atlanta's: nearly forty minutes to go twenty miles. But so far I love the scenery. To the west, beautiful snow-covered mountains, as far as the eye can see. They just keep getting bigger!

We want to go downtown and do the touristy walking-around thing, but traffic is scaring us. So our plan right now is to head to Boulder, for Shuttles, Spindles, and Skeins. (Because I obviously I haven't bought enough yarn. Right...) I'm probably going to buy (a drop spindle and some roving) stuff to spin my own yarn for dyeing.

Anyway, I think I'll like Denver. Too bad we have so little time here.

Colorado Springs

2007-07-05T23:44:00.000-05:00

Well, Dredd and the Brothers of Dredd are on their way back home now. We had a great time today: Garden of the Gods is breathtaking! All six of us went, and it immediately turned into another chance to climb big rocks. I, of course, am always in favor of that, and kept up quite nicely, even though I was wearing a long denim skirt and sandals. Go me. :)

One of the really fascinating things about Garden of the Gods is the rock formations themselves: they look like sculptures! I would swear I saw a head, a troll's face, a puppy, and at least two fish. Weird, huh? But totally beautiful. I took tons of photos, and Corin took quite a few with my camera, too. He has a good eye, by the way.

After Garden of the Gods, we went to see Transformers, at the Tinseltown USA theater in the Springs. Nice theater, good screen, great movie. The movie really lived up to the hype (in my opinion), but there was a bit of gratuitous sexual-themed dialogue in a couple of places at the beginning. Other than that, I have no reservations. You do see individual humans die a couple of times, but it isn't graphic or bloody. Mainly, you see bad things happen, which presumably kill people. (Like explosions which rip through an area, but you never see the people caught in the explosion.)

Saying goodbye to our friends was sad, but we had a great couple of days with them. And to think, it's all thanks to the internet!

Small town fireworks...

2007-07-05T11:22:00.000-05:00

Last night we went to Crossroads Church's annual Fourth of July cookout. (That's the church Dredd's family attends.) Everyone was so nice, and apparently they had heard about our pending visit.

The food, of course, was wonderful. We got to meet so many people we had heard about from the guys...including the infamous Justin. He's really a nice guy!

The fireworks were a lot of fun, and the rodeo grounds weren't crowded at all. One great bonus to the small fireworks: we were very close to the launch site, so we were able to see some really great stuff!

Then everyone went back to the house, and we set off lots of bottle rockets and other stuff. After that, we all played Munchkin, until I got too tired. (Yes, I was actually the first person to go to sleep!) Prince Cor won the game, but Corin (the youngest) played really well. Poor Caspian, though: his brothers ganged up on him, so he never really got beyond level three or four.

Anyway, tons of fun. Off to the Springs today, for Transformers and general fun. I'm going to hate to say goodbye to everyone.

Vogel Canyon adventures

2007-07-04T14:15:00.000-05:00

This morning we all headed to Vogel Canyon for some hiking and a picnic. There were nine of us,total: the two of us, Dredd and his three brothers, and Sherman, his twenty-one-year-old sister, and his seven-year-old brother.

It was so much fun! I wouldn't have believed I could do that type of rock climbing, but Dredd and Sherman really knew what they were doing, and were always willing to help anyone who needed it. Sherman also played pack mule and lugged in two gallon jugs of water. Believe me, we drank every bit of it!

The scenery was incredible! The plateaus are absolutely gorgeous, with the exposed strata of rock creating bands of color, contrasting with the green plants everywhere. They tell us we picked a great year to visit; no one remembers the last time it was so green in July!

Dredd and Sherman had their cameras along, too, so I'm going to try to convince them to upload their pics to flickr, too.

Edited on 07/12/2007 to add: Flickr set is here. It's still a work in progress.

We made it to Colorado!

2007-07-04T08:48:00.000-05:00

Yep, we made it to La Junta, safe and sound. Sadly, I had to call for further directions just two hundred feet from our destination; it seems Dredd lives on a trick street...

Anyway, the Riveras have been so very, very nice. The guys are all exactly like I expected, and their mom is very sweet. It's not everyone who would invite total strangers from the other side of the country to come stay with them for a couple of days!

Last night we played with the Wii. First the Brothers of Dredd (Cor, Caspian, and Corin) played a weird Mario game and then something called "Rayman: Ravin Rabbids". Mainly, you torture psycho bunnies. Then we all took turns playing Wii Bowling. Apparently I'm better at Wii Bowling than real bowling...but just barely.

Today we're hiking to Vogel Canyon, which should be fun. So Sherman and his siblings just showed up, and it's still unknown whether we'll be meeting Hobbs later today. Yay for Spirit of Elijah!

Leaving Santa Fe

2007-07-03T11:15:00.000-05:00

Santa Fe is beautiful! The art district is wonderful, and seems like it will never end. There are sculptures everywhere, along with paintings and murals. It's great!

BUT I miss Southern hospitality. The people here are curt and so many of them rarely smile. They are pushy, too.

But I've met a few really nice people here: a couple from Ireland who are traveling old Route 66 and the owner of Oodles Bead and Yarn Gallery and a male friend of hers who was at the store knitting. The women at Marigold Arts, too, were as friendly, welcoming, and hospitable as anywhere in the South.

All in all, this trip has been incredible already.

Everything's bigger in Texas!

2007-07-01T18:02:00.000-05:00

Including the crosses! Groom, Texas, about half an hour east of Amarillo, is home to "The Largest Cross in the Western Hemisphere." And boy is it big! The land is so flat that you can see it from miles and miles around. I mean it is huge.

We never intended to stop, but when we saw how big it really was, we decided we had to go see it. Originally it was for laughs, but once we reached it we were quite surprised! It's not just a big, huge cross; it's in the center of a plaza, with the bronze statues for the Stations of the Cross circling it. A path at one side leads straight to a tableau of Jesus, John, and Peter at a table, with Jesus breaking the bread for the Last Supper. Behind it, wide steps lead up to three bronze crosses, depicting Jesus and the thieves. At the base of the stairs, a path leads around to a replica of the Empty Tomb; the angel atop it is visible from the crosses.

I'm not Catholic, so the Stations of the Cross weren't something I'm used to, but it was still beautiful. The sculptor was obviously talented, so the faces are expressive. And across from the parking area is the Pilgrim Center, with a gift shop (we didn't shop). Visible from the parking lot is a beautiful fountain with waterfalls, the Fountain of Mercy. At the center stands another statue of Jesus. Yes, it's a bit cheesy, but it's really quite beautiful, and I thought, "I wish Grandma Lucy could have seen this." She would have loved it.

Wide open spaces

2007-07-01T17:08:00.000-05:00

I can't believe how open and flat both Oklahoma and Texas have been! It's amazing enough that you can see practically forever; but the houses! They're so few and far between. There are cows everywhere, or else cultivated fields. I'm more accustomed to the fields of Rural Georgia or Lower Alabama; maybe there are fields this large down there, but they're never that open! There are always gentle hills, so you never see the whole field. But not here.

In some ways, it could be boring. But it's so different from the landscape I'm used to that it's actually interesting.

Get your kicks...

2007-07-01T16:45:00.000-05:00

Yep, Route 66! We stopped in Shamrock, Texas to grab a milkshake at McDonald's. As we were exiting the expressway, I noticed a sign for "Historic Route 66." Well, we had to stop. So we headed down the road, and--sure enough--there was Route 66!

We chose the right spot, too. On the corner was a wonderful restored gas station, complete with restored gas pumps! It's now the Shamrock Chamber of Commerce and a gift shop(which we didn't go in). There were also a couple of old "Route 66" motels, which I'm sure have been there since its heyday. I'm really happy with my photos.

And if my mom is reading this: yes, I got you a rock.

Where can you find buffaloes? Only in Oklahoma!

2007-07-01T15:44:00.000-05:00

We stopped at the Cherokee Trading Post, somewhere along US 40 in Oklahoma. For the most part it was the typical tourist goods (made in India, usually). But there was also an art gallery, which had some stuff that actually was made by Native Americans, some Cherokee and some Navaho.

My beloved husband knows how I love Raku pottery, so he bought me a little "Dream Box" (or something like that). The theory is that you put your dream in it. I'm thinking it will be perfect for a couple of pairs of earrings. :) It's really well done, and the glaze went almost pure copper on the body of the box, leaving it as beautiful and shiny as a new penny.

AND they had a couple of buffaloes, which I went and tracked down. I couldn't get any good photos, but I did get to see both of them. I love buffaloes! They're almost as cool as the yaks in Yak's Bend. ;)

Almost there!

2007-07-01T03:47:00.000-05:00

Well, it's been an eventful day! Our morning started with breakfast at the Waysider Restaurant in Tuscaloosa, courtesy of my husband's instructor, Professor Bullock. She was so nice: she invited me to join the class for breakfast! A true Southern lady...

Then on to Serendipity Needleworks, just a few blocks from the university. What a wonderful store! Shelf after shelf of beautiful yarns, arranged by color! And the owner was so nice! So were the customers, for that matter. I spent an hour and a half there. Lots of fun..

Then we hit the road. Alabama to Mississippi to Tennessee; in Memphis, we stopped for dinner. It was barbeque ribs, of course, on Beale Street: Blues City Cafe. A few photos of Beale Street, then back on the road.

Arkansas, then Oklahoma. We stopped in Seminole for coffee from the Starbucks; again, really nice people! And 3 am Eastern, we made it to the hotel, the Travelodge. Maybe not the best choice: it shares a parking lot with a nightclub, and it was pretty noisy for a while. But it finally quieted down, so I'll be going to sleep as soon as I post this. Tomorrow, we enter Texas and then...NEW MEXICO!

I have escaped!

2007-06-29T23:28:00.000-05:00

Yes, I actually escaped my office, with both my boss and the other designer threatening to chain me to my desk... But I made it out!

We're in Tuscaloosa right now, for my husband's very last class for his library degree. As soon as he is finished tomorrow, we head for Santa Fe. We'll stop somewhere when he's too tired to keep going, so we should be in Santa Fe Sunday evening.

But to while away my time tomorrow morning, I will be going to Serendipity Needleworks. Ah, the sacrifices I make for my husband... Actually, I tried to visit it last time I was in Tuscaloosa, but I missed by minutes: I got there five minutes after closing! But what I saw in the window was at least a little drool worthy!

Weather Shock!

2007-06-19T15:31:00.000-05:00

I just looked at the National Weather Service report for Santa Fe.

Seven. Percent. Humidity.

Yes, seven percent. SEVEN! That's right, seven! I didn't know humidity could drop into the single digits! Denver's is high, because they're expecting rain...it's twenty-one percent.

Our humidity? Sixty-five percent. It's low this year; Georgia is suffering "extreme drought" conditions throughout much of the state.

Can I survive seven percent humidity? I'm not entirely certain.

0.000002% of iPods sold!

2007-06-18T16:17:00.000-05:00

How did I miss it? The iPod passed the 100 million mark back in April! Woot!

As the proud owner of two iPods, I can claim responsibility for 0.000002% of the total iPods sold! Isn't that great?

Okay, maybe that's not exactly a significant contribution. And I know some people will use the latest milestone as another reason to turn up their noses at iPods: "They're too trendy."

But you know what? I don't care. I didn't pick the iPod because it was trendy or cool or whatever. I'm a fan of the iPod because it's a truly wonderful piece of electronics. It's easy to use, it's beautiful, and it's fun to use. Simply put, Apple created a great product and marketed it wisely...and so people buy it.

My first iPod was purchased for me by my husband the day they released the third gen iPod, though my thirty-first birthday was still a month away. My second iPod (an iPod Photo) I bought right after they released the "iPod with Color Display," because the price of the iPod Photo dropped...even though it was the same thing, but with a bigger, 30 gig hard drive. (Gotta love the masses!)

And I bet I'll upgrade to a video model eventually. But I think I'll wait for the sixth gen. :)

Can't wait for vacation!

2007-06-12T12:10:00.000-05:00

I'm really getting excited about our upcoming vacation! My husband and I are headed to Colorado and New Mexico the minute he finishes his last class for his master's degree.

I mean that literally...we're leaving on Friday afternoon for Tuscaloosa, for the last session of his last class at the University of Alabama. As soon as he gets out of class Saturday afternoon, we're heading to Santa Fe. We should get there Sunday night,stopping at a random place along the way.

I've planned this trip to death, it seems like, with visitor's guides from all the cities and endless time spent on Google. Not to mention all the time spent on IM with one of the friends we're visiting in Colorado, and a billion lists made and discarded.

I really need a real vacation. We haven't taken more than a long weekend since going to Fort Walton Beach four or five years ago. I think we're definitely overdue!

Did I mention neither of us have been past New Orleans? We're going to see thirteen states (besides Georgia, of course), and eight of them will be new to me! But I have my husband beat: nine will be new to him! Hah!

Edited to add: I almost forgot. Photo is of Garden of the Gods, by lars hammer. Creative Commons non-commercial, attribution, share and share alike.

I miss geocaching!

2007-06-06T13:46:00.000-05:00

I haven't geocached in months, and I've really missed it. See, the aftermarket charger for my Garmin iQue PDA broke off inside it, so I've had no GPS ability. But over the weekend my father-in-law fixed it for me. Yay!

So I've found several promising caches not too far from my home. Can't wait.

AND I found several candidates near the family friends we're visiting this summer. Yay again!

The show is done, so now for fun!

2007-06-05T13:18:00.000-05:00

Yesterday's show may be the best we've ever done! Seshambeh was the third number in act two, and boy did Sarah give us a tough spot: right after a nine-year-old girl! Who wants to follow an adorable little girl? You lose, right away!

Anyway, we appeared to have been a hit. The audience was very responsive, and there was actual cheering and applause, which is always encouraging. AND for the biggest surprise: I smiled. All the way through.

Seriously. I really did.

Ishy came, and I'm so glad she was there! AND she had a good time, I think. Of course, Nicola himself is a blast, so that helps. :)

My husband even made it in time to see part of our number, "Toul Omry." I have to say I enjoyed this show more than any other yet. I felt good about the routine and about my costume, hair, and makeup, which may be a first. Anyway, it was wonderful!

Now I have to start on my solo for Nyssa's benefit in September. I can't bail, since it's for her...

Choreography obviously isn't my thing

2007-04-30T20:34:00.000-05:00

I've been listening to Dargaard's Takhisis Dance over and over, and I'm still having problems. HOW AM I GOING TO CHOREOGRAPH THIS? I really need to get it finished by the end of next week, if I'm going to do this solo.

Can I do it? I really don't know.

The Violet Beauregard skirt

2007-04-23T17:28:00.000-05:00

YAY! I got in my yarn from elann.com! It's amazing, considering I only ordered it late Thursday night! They shipped it Friday, and it arrived here at work today! Sometimes you just have to love the US Postal Service.

Sadly, I left my copy of The Happy Hooker at my sister's so I STILL can't start on my Violet Beauregard skirt. Which is sad, because I so want to make it! I mean NOW! Right now! Where's my hook? I WANT MY SKIRT!

In the meantime, I think I'll go fondle my Sonata yarn. French blue, tapestry blue, and Alaskan blue. I love it...

Magic Yarn Ball, Anyone?

2007-04-19T17:54:00.000-05:00

I recently heard about magic yarn balls on one of the knitting podcasts, and I immediately thought, "I MUST DO IT!" I mentioned the idea to Jenlar and Ishy over at Craft Wonderland, and they agreed. So, it's official: we're going to do a swap. Our first, actually.

Okay, by now you may be wondering, "What IS a magic yarn ball?" A magic yarn ball is like a little treasure hunt meets knitting and crochet. Here's the idea...people sign up, just like for any other swap (duh!). You get your partner's name and stuff, just like any other swap. But this time, the goodie basket is IN THE YARN. Instead of making a little package, full of wonderful little things, you buy a skein, ball, or hank of yarn. Then, you start rolling it into a ball. As you go, you wind all the little treats up into the ball! You can hide everything, so it's all a surprise, or you can leave little bits peeking out to offer a taste of what's to come. Then you ship it off...with the label from the yarn, of course!

You've had your fun, but now it's your partner's turn! They receive this wonderful little ball of goodness, maybe tied with a ribbon or with things sticking out. (Why am I suddenly thinking of Katamari Damacy?) Now it's time to get to work: starting crocheting or knitting! As they work, more of the goodies are exposed. Common items are candy, ribbons, buttons, stitch markers, little things of lotion (wrapped securely!), and silk flowers. Handmade goodies are always appreciated, of course!

We haven't set a deadline yet, so if you want to join us, head on over to Craft Wonderland and let us know!

Some examples of magic yarn ball goodness...
Whip Up's cute kid's myb
Stitch Marker's chronicle of her magic yarn ball
Another myb blog entry, this one from The Heathen Housewife
An old magic yarn ball swap at Craftster
Tons of magic yarn ball pics from a flickr group

Happy Easter!

2007-04-07T23:30:00.000-05:00

May this day mean more to you than chocolate bunnies and colored eggs! Remember, it's the celebration of Jesus Christ's resurrection, and our promise of the resurrection to come. Happy Easter, everyone!

To Solo, or Not to Solo...

2007-04-06T19:39:00.000-05:00

I happened to catch just a few minutes of Dancing with the Stars earlier this week...just enough to see Heather Mills do a front walkover. Now, I haven't followed the show. In fact, I don't particularly like it, just as I don't like any of the other shows that are always picking a worst. And don't get me started on the suggestive choreography and skimpy costumes! (end rant)

However, I have watched a couple of the Heather Mills numbers...because that woman flat-out blows my mind. I didn't know who she was before this, but I'm so impressed by her spirit. She has a prosthetic leg, and she's doing Dancing with the Stars! Can you believe it? THAT is guts!

And now the dilemma. I've been considering a solo for dance for probably six months now. I have considered doing one in June, but I'm hesitant. I found a song I like, Takhisis Dance, and a style: double veil. So when I saw Heather Mills dance, I told myself, "If Heather Mills can do a front walkover with a prosthetic leg, I can do a solo!"

Except I can't choreograph. At all. I tried, and my mind goes blank after "Enter wrapped in veils." Yeah. The song is almost four minutes long! I can't just SPIN for four minutes! And I'm already fighting my choreography for the Seshambeh number...

What do I do?

Postscript: Please excuse my limited editing and any errors that surface. And the lack of links. I seemed to have misplaced my handwarmers. Well, I can find one. Just one. Even though they come in a pair. So I'm typing wearing my satin over-the-elbow Rogue gloves. It's not as easy to do as one might think.

Come knit a dragon with me!

2007-03-30T21:37:00.000-05:00

Over at Craft Wonderland, we're doing a dragon stole knit-along. Actually, it's a knit- or crochet-along; Ishy is finishing up a crocheted dragon.

It's inspired by the Vegan Fox on Knitty. I would say "based on," but it seems we all left the pattern after about row three...Anyway, it's an awesome pattern, and we're having a blast.

For the record, mine is now 23.5" long. I'm using TCL Amore in black (yes, it's cheap, I know, but it did what I wanted!) and Patons Brilliant in Black Dazzle. I'm using size 8 bamboo needles.

So if you knit or crochet, even if you're a total beginner, come play!

Confessions of a Guild Wars addict!

2007-03-29T17:00:00.000-05:00

Wow. Can't believe I've never talked about Guild Wars. I mean, I'm an addict. Really.

I've been playing Guild Wars since less than two months after its release on April 28, 2005. For the first seven months, my husband and I played on our own or with a small group of RL friends. Then, in January 2006, I found Christian Gamers Alliance, which has a very active GW chapter! Woohoo! We joined and found out that GW is even more fun with an active guild...cause my husband talked me into liking PvP!

Okay, "talked into" is a bit of a stretch. What really happened is that he told me, "Here, they need a mesmer. Do what Fiona Dredd tells you." He then logged me in to TeamSpeak and left me there!

After I got over the shock, I started having fun. Sure, I had NO IDEA what I was doing, but it was still fun. And now we do PvP every Tuesday and Friday night. (Oh yeah, Friday night playing a video game. I really am a geek.) In fact, I'm now rank 3 (/rank)...and I only earned about twenty or thirty of that rank during double fame. GO SoE!

Oh yeah, "SoE" would be "Spirit of Elijah," my guild. Well, technically I'm in two guilds; my husband and I have two accounts, and we each have characters on each account. One account is in each guild. So to be exact, I'm an officer in both SoE AND SOE...Spirit of Elisha, that is. Twice the fun! Except that we're actually one guild. (Yeah, it confuses us, too.)

And now my social life depends heavily on TeamSpeak, alliance chat, guild chat, and team chat. Is that good or bad?

What can you do with an Altoids tin?

2007-03-21T12:58:00.000-05:00

Over at Craft Wonderland, I started a new thread on creative uses for mint tins.

I'm currently using some to hold D&D dice, a barebones first aid kit, Splenda, a basic bike travel kit, and some other stuff.

The internet gives many more creative uses, including an Altoids tin wallet or a thumb piano. If you like gadgets,you can go high tech! Try a mp3 player, flash drive, mouse, or a battery pack for an external hard drive that runs on four AA batteries! You can even go retro and make a Morse code oscillator. (Not practical, but it sure is geeky!)

Here's one I may try: an iPod charger. There are multiple versions; one uses only one 9V battery, while more sophisticated versions use combinations of batteries.

What can YOU think of? Why don't you come add it to the list?

Craft Wonderland for Christian Crafters!

2007-02-14T01:31:00.000-05:00

Well, my friend Ishy of TechnoChicks has started up another new forum: Craft Wonderland! So far, I've racked up thirty-eight posts in four days, and we aren't even "really" up and running. But feel free to come join; we DO have stuff going on.

Since it's a "Craft Wonderland," the theme is Alice in Wonderland. And in case you were wondering, yes, we ARE all mad. In fact, Ishy is the Mad Hatter; I'm the Queen of Hearts. OFF with your head!

Okay, all better. :)

On a serious note, we have some great features. The most interesting one to me is our Member Showcase, which is just that: a subforum where every member can create a thread to showcase all their creative stuff, whether it's digital art or photos of your work; you can also include writing, whether it's creative writing or short essays.

Speaking of creative writing, Ishy is working on the Creative Writing forum. Should be fun; Ishy is a very creative person, and quite a good writer. I'm working with the Art and Digital Art section, as well as Papercrafts (which is currently part of the Other Handicrafts section. Ishy and I are both working with the Knitting and Crochet section, too.

Know what we have that other craft forums don't? Faith Talk and Prayer Requests. That's right: Craft Wonderland is a Christian-oriented craft site. You don't have to be a Christian to join, but you do have to respect our faith. So, we'll be keeping it clean. Yay!

For the low price of nothing, all this can be yours. So come join us!

Belliveau Shores-Gulf Cove Hat!

2007-01-31T21:13:00.000-05:00

I finished crocheting my first hat from a pattern (about a week and a half ago)! Yay me! And not only that: I customized the pattern!

I love hats, and cloches are one of my favorite styles! So when I saw THIS pattern, I couldn't wait to try it! I really couldn't justify going out and buying more yarn, though, and I had three skeins of Paton's Classic Wool in black...which, conveniently, makes up about three-quarters of my wardrobe.

Okay, so I have some really great (if basic) yarn that I bought on sale...except that it's thinner than the Lamb's Pride Bulky for which the Belliveau Cove pattern was written, and thicker than the Lily Sugar and Creme called for in the Gulf Shores hat. But I really can't go buy more yarn. So, I forged ahead and customized the pattern.

Like I said, I used Patons Classic Wool. That yarn calls for a size 7 hook, but I only have a G and an H, and none of the stores carry a 7. So I used a G. I added an extra round of double crochet stitches after round six; I increased it by one stitch every six, for a total of eighty-four stitches going into the shell stitch portion. If I were to do it again, I would make my increase round single crochet or half double, and add an extra round of shell stitches before the shaping the bell (round thirteen in the pattern). But I had already frogged several rounds to go back and add the extra round on the crown, and I was not about to crochet the same section a third time! Instead I added a single crochet edging, which helped lengthen it just a bit.

All in all, though, I'm very happy with my new black hat. :) And just in time for the really cold weather (by Atlanta standards) from the last week. Now I'm making an amigurumi "Fat Kitty" from Crochet Me. :) Light blue with embroidered eyes, since it's for a baby boy!

Behind the veils...

2007-01-19T12:36:00.000-05:00

I think the average person would be so surprised if they were a fly on the wall at a dance rehearsal! Every single woman in my dance company has been dancing for years; Ghala and I have been dancing for over a decade, with the same troupe! But you wouldn't have known it if you had seen us practicing last night.

We're working on double veil right now, and boy is it a challenge! And it's not just any double veil combinations; I would swear Saroya has searched for the most mind-bogglingly complicated moves in existence! We snagged the veils on our jewelry and hip wraps, tangled them around our arms and legs, caught them on our skirts, and generally became ensnared. One set of evil veils were dubbed "the veils that ate Atlanta." Not our most shining moment.

On the bright side, I did come up with a way to gracefully transition the veil out of a front butterfly wrap through a spin. So it wasn't a total loss.

Moral of the story: Next time you see a dancer performing, give her some credit. That stuff is hard work and takes months of practice!

Star Wars: Geek Vindication

2007-01-01T12:37:00.000-05:00

Star Wars in the Rose Parade! Who would have imagined it?

But it's true. For the thirtieth anniversary of Star Wars, George Lucas and company planned the Star Wars Spectacular as part of the Rose Parade. It started with plans to honor the 501st Legion, a very dedicated fan group comprised mainly of Stormtroopers. From there, George Lucas chose the Gramling Tiger Band (Grambling State University) to participate...in Imperial uniform, with the dancers and flag corps in Twilek costumes. Then they asked for floats...so Lucas commissioned two floats, one of the Forest Planet of Endor and one of the Garden Planet of Naboo. Then George Lucas was chosen on Grand Marshall.

But know what's funniest? My mother-in-law has always treated us as if we were strange for liking scifi and fantasy. (So being addicted to football is okay, but enjoying the rather-intellectual fields of scifi and fantasy isn't? I don't get it.) But for one day, it's cool? I don't get it. But this is proof that geeks are finally, finally, coming into their own!

This photo and the links are from bonniegrrl's photo sets on Flickr...

Acoustical Liberation...

2006-12-23T13:32:00.000-05:00

Ever heard of LibriVox? It's sort of Project Gutenburg for audiobooks. The selection is still small, but it's varied. It includes Charles Dickens, the Grimm Brothers, Descartes, James Joyce, Shakespeare, and Joel Chandler Harris.

It's always a surprise. I've listened to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and some of the Grimm's Fairy Tales; the readers are all volunteers, and can change with each chapter. Some works are "solo recordings," and short works such as the individual fairy tale are recorded by one person. Though it can sometimes be a bit disconcerting to have the voice change with each chapter, all the readers I've heard have been good. (Surprisingly, the changing voices work for Alice...)

got suno?

2006-12-06T17:08:00.000-05:00

If you don't live in Atlanta or Korea, my condolences. No Suno for you! And life without Suno just isn't complete!

What's Suno, you ask? Well, they call it "shaved ice cream," but I think it's more like sweetened vanilla snow, topped with all sorts of wonderful stuff. Apparently it's a new twist on "Pappinsu," which is quite popular in Korea.

So far, I've had Ko Ko Koffee, with coffee syrup, coffee jellies, and "puddings," and Puddin' Pudding, with chocolate syrup and puddings. The puddings are incredible: tiny little flans, really. I'm not really sure what the PINK puddings are, but they are delicious, too. Ko Ko Koffee is my favorite.

So if you are in Atlanta, check out Suno. It's in front of Super H Mart on Pleasant Hill Road, in Duluth. And if you're of the female persuasion, stop by on a Wednesday night: 20% off for ladies!

One show down, one to go...

2006-12-05T18:15:00.000-05:00

Well, our first show was last night. Not too bad, really. We laughed, we cried, we danced with Nicola and random strangers.

I was serious about the crying, by the way. The tribute to Caroline went great, I think. It's the only time I have EVER danced without smiling and not gotten reprimanded. But it wasn't too serious, sappy, or sad, either, and Saroya and Sarah scheduled one of the beginner students with a really upbeat, light-hearted number right after us.

I really do a much better job dancing with props. We did fans, and it was so much less nerve-wracking than it would have been. Fans, swords, candles, tambourines, baskets, canes, veils...I love them all! Except zills. Zills are evil incarnate.

By the way, did you know you can practice double fan to White and Nerdy? Now you know...

I can't believe I'm doing this...

2006-10-23T21:58:00.000-05:00

Well, my dance troop, Seshambeh Dance Company in Atlanta, is part of a twice-yearly show at Nicola's Restaurant in the Emory area. This year, we're doing a tribute to my friend Caroline Moulder as our group number. Did I mention we are each doing a very short solo as part of it?

Yeah, you heard me right. A...solo...ME. Sure, it's really, really short, but for me, it's still a miracle. Oh, and I left out the part where we do TWO shows this year! So I guess you know where I'll be December 4 and December 11. And in the MIDDLE of those is the church's Christmas show.

And it's too late to back out now! I have the tickets to sell and everything. And the group choreography is already broken into solo sections, so no backing out of that, either. Did I mention the part where I said I MIGHT do a solo—a REAL solo—in June? Yeah, I've done it now. But one performance at a time...

Knitting made easy

2006-09-15T00:21:00.000-05:00

Really, really easy. My mother-in-law and I joined a knitting prayer group at my church. To get into it, I picked up a knitting loom, recommended by my friend Jenlar. It's called the Knifty Knitter, and it's so easy I can't believe it! Do you know what you do? You wrap the yarn around pegs. Then you use a pick to pull the bottom loops over the top loops. Then you wrap more yarn, and repeat.

Still not convinced? Well, get this! I started out on Sunday making a child's hat. I finished it Monday. On Tuesday, I started a lacy-looking scarf for someone who I can't name. I finished it tonight...all six feet of it! I have to add the fringe; that is IT!

I took photos, but it's late, so I'll have to add them later.

In Memory of Caroline Moulder

2006-09-05T21:44:00.000-05:00

This is the saddest post I have ever made. It's been over a month, but I still don't know if I can get through this without crying, so bear with me.

On July 26, 2006, in Afghanistan, a very sweet, beautiful young woman named Caroline lost her life in a helicopter accident. She was traveling with her mother Darlene and her sister Bryn to visit her dad, a civilian contractor working on base in Afghanistan.

Caroline was a wonderful person and a true joy to know. She was always kind and always exhuberant. She and her mother and sister were active members of their church in Midtown Atlanta. Caroline had just graduated from Grady High School and would have started at the University of Georgia last month.

My fondest, clearest memories are of her and her best friend Kate joking around in class. Whenever we were working on a particularly difficult combination or routine, we could always count on them to remain upbeat. Together, they were a blast. The loss of Caroline makes me treasure Kate all the more.

Please pray for Kate and for Caroline's family, especially her dad. Perhaps it seems strange to ask that now, five weeks later, but I think now is when they need that prayer most. All around them life has returned to normal and settled into a new routine. But for those closest to them, the pain and emptiness left by the loss of the Moulder women won't disappear so soon.

Caroline, I can't wait to see you again. You know I'll look you up when I get to heaven.

Andy Goldsworthy, Nature, and Time

2006-08-19T13:17:00.000-05:00

About three years ago, when I was finishing up my art degree, I took a sculpture class with Kyle Dillehay (who is definitely a very cool professor). He introduced our class to the work of Andy Goldsworthy, a truly intriguing artist.

Goldsworthy's work doesn't follow the usual course of things. He works with found natural materials, creating ephemeral works which are nevertheless breathtaking. They can be as small as a single stone, covered with petals, or a massive cairn constructed of stone. Some last only minutes; others withstand years of exposure to the elements.

I'm not entirely sure why his work so appeals to me. I love being outside, so I'm sure that's part of it. I just love God's creation; it reminds me of just how awesome He is, how far beyond us, and how blessed I am that He loves me. For me, the creative use of God's creation is truly inspiring, in a way nothing else can ever be.

The simplicity of the design is also appealing. Many of his pieces employ very basic techniques, such as stringing together leaves, sculpting sand, or stacking stones. It makes the work seem so approachable, inspiring an "I can do that!" response. I'm inspired to go outside and play, just to see what I can come up with.

But despite the simple forms, Andy Goldsworthy is a true master of design. "Simple" can mean many things; simplicity of form is not the same as "easy!" The example here uses only colored leaves, arranged in that most basic of forms, a circle. When there is so little to work with, real mastery of the principles of art is essential to create something so stunning.