beard5

Hello hello! I've posted my past couple of apartments here - which i shared with roommates - but my husband and i recently moved into our own little place in somerville, ma. I've been working on it for about 6 months and, though it certainly isn't "finished", i think it's ready for it's saucydwellings debut.

this post will focus on the bedroom, studio and living room - the kitchen and bathroom still need a LOT of work.

( lotsa pictures )

I want these to succeed. DIY Adjustable Glasses.

Rick Springfield starkers doing interesting things with two other people from Californication

Jeez. Jesse's Girl was losing out!

Etsy: Your place to buy & sell all things handmade NeliaTenlion.etsy.com

I walked into my local gaming store last week, and there sitting on the shelf was the shiny, new 6th edition of the Hero Rules System. One of my gaming buddies who knew I played a lot of Champions pointed it out and asked if I thought I'd buy it. So I went over and took a look at it, and then told him, no, I didn't think I'd be buying it.

This wasn't a simple decision. I was introduced to Champions back in the mid 1980s, when it was in its third edition - 3 paperbacks, which sold for 9.99 each. the first one was the basic rules set, and the other two were expansion and additions. We had a lot of fun with those rules. They included some sample characters, and there were supplements. One of the guys I played with even contributed to a couple of the supplements. But we never felt we had to buy them, and mostly we didn't. We wrote our own.

Then the 4th edition came along. That was a good update, for the most part. It was handy to have all the rules from the 3 books in one volume, and the price was pretty comparable to what we'd been paying for the 3 books together. I never had much use for the sourcebook or the campaign book sections, but I can see their value for novice players. I never bought a version with the software included, so all I can say about that is that I was glad they offered versions without it, so I wasn't buying something I didn't want and wouldn't use.

I was less enthusiastic about the 5th edition. We were perfectly happy with the way things went in 4th edition. I finally broke down and bought it when I joined a game where the GM wanted to use it. It was still only a little more expensive than the original set ($39.95). It looks like a bigger book but I just did a page count, and it's actually shorter than the 4th edition set (371 pp vs. 384 pp). I guess the additional 1/4 that makes it look like a bigger book must be thicker paper. It doesn't have a ton of rules changes, but enough that I felt I needed to have it if I was going to play in a game that used it.

Now I'm looking at the 6th edition. It's suddenly grown to something on the order of 800 pp., in two hardcover volumes. With glossy paper and color illustrations. And if I buy it, it's going to set me back a minimum of $70 if I buy them as a package from the publisher, $80 if I buy it at my local gaming store, which I'd generally like to support so it stays around.

But I'm looking at this new edition, and asking myself why I should spend that kind of money on something which replaces a product I'm already happy with. I'm just not seeing a benefit to it any more. A quick skim through the books doesn't suggest that they've made drastic changes. To be sure, there are changes - a character statistic has been dropped, there are a few new powers, some old powers are gone, and so forth. But are those benefits really worth investing $70-$80 in?

It seems to me that most of the changes are in production values, which aren't really important to me, and just enough mechanics changes to force me to buy it if I want to play in a game using it, because the old rules details won't be close enough to get by. This is starting to feel to me like some gaming publishers (not just Hero) are taking a page from the textbook publishing industry, and creating a new edition ever other year or so, whether there are really changes which call for it, just to keep people buying new books.

Personally, at this point, the one thing I'd like to be able to buy is the 4th edition in PDF format. But that won't happen because they want to sell the new, 6th edition.

Fabric for Sale

Etsy: Your place to buy & sell all things handmade GirlisPoison.etsy.com

With Thanksgiving less than two weeks away you're probably wondering what you're going to make for dessert.  This recipe is sure to please everyone and is super easy to make!  Just read the reviews, they won't steer you wrong.  If those aren't enough to convince you, maybe this review sent to me via convo, should.  oh. my. goodness. These are SO good. Dare I say orgasmic?

This recipe is also vegan friendly, one of my customers graciously made some vegan subs and provided me with her notes.  All that information is contained in the recipe.

For $2.99 you get 6 pages of easy to follow step-by-step instructions along with clear step-by-step pictures to help you along the way.  In addition, I am always available to help out via email or convo if you have any questions.   So what are you waiting for?  Pick up your newest dessert hit, you won't regret it!

It's my sad news to report that the Waldenbooks in the Oakdale Mall (Binghamton NY) is on the list of stores to be closed at the beginning of the new year. This is sad in more than one way--everyone hates to see a bookstore close--because this particular bookstore manager, April, has treated me and my fellow authors with both respect and fan-glee. She has supported us by making certain that our books are on the shelf at the store AND, perhaps more importantly, talking the books up to her customers and making certain that they are in the hands of potential readers out there. I honestly can't believe the bookstore is closing.

However, before the news of the closing hit the airwaves, we'd arranged for a holiday signing at the store. It's now become a "last hurrah!" signing, and we're hoping to make it a huge send-off not only for April but for all of the employees at the store who've helped push our books in the past. So if you're in the Binghamton area--or even within a reasonable driving distance--come by on December 5th from Noon-4pm and help us let April and the other employees know how much we appreciate all of their efforts over the years. We'd like this signing to be a huge success! In addition to having our books there to sign for either you OR as gifts for all of your friends, we'll be wrapping the books you intend to use as gifts as well. FREE GIFT WRAPPING!! By authors who may (or may not) know anything about gift wrapping!! That, in and of itself, will be a blast. *grin* I'm sure we'll also have some candy and other freebies to give away.

We realize that not everyone is within even an unreasonable driving distance of Binghamton, NY. If you can't make it for whatever reason, you can still help us celebrate and thank April and the other bookstore employees by buying the books through the store and having them shipped to you (or someone else). April has graciously agreed to handle ordered copies in two different ways: you can either have the signed books shipped to a local Waldenbooks in your area so you can pick them up there, or April can ship them directly to you. For the second option, there will be no shipping cost (for shipments in the US), April will simply charge you for the books. For either of these options, send an email to fireun3@gmail.com with either the name of the town or city where the local Waldenbooks is located OR with where you'd like the books shipped. You should include what books you'd like by what author, how you want them signed, and (if they're shipping directly to you) if you want them wrapped.

Here are the details of the signing if you think you can make it. Keep in mind that the various holidays are inching ever closer. Ask yourself who on your gift list might enjoy some great fantasy novels! Signed even!



And if you aren't certain what books are up for grabs, here's a list of all of our books in print and available through the store:

Patricia Bray: The Sword of Change series: Devlin's Luck, Devlin's Honor, Devlin's Justice; The Chronicles of Josan series: The First Betrayal, The Sea Change, The Final Sacrifice

S.C. Butler: The Stoneways Trilogy: Reiffen's Choice, Queen Ferris, The Magicians' Daughter

Barbara Campbell: The Trickster's Game series: Heartwood, Bloodstone, Foxfire

Laura Anne Gilman: The Retrievers series: Staying Dead, Curse the Dark, Bring It On, Burning Bridges, Free Fall, Blood From Stone; The Vineart War series: Flesh and Fire

Jackie Kessler: Hell on Earth series: Hell's Belles, The Road to Hell, Hotter Than Hell; Black and White (with Caitlin Kittredge)

Joshua Palmatier: The Throne of Amenkor Trilogy: The Skewed Throne, The Cracked Throne, The Vacant Throne

Anton Strout: The Simon Canderous series: Dead To Me, Deader Still

And there you go! A long list of great books to browse from. I hope to see you at the signing, but if you can't make it, definitely send April a message with what books you'd be interested in. Help support good booksellers! Us authors can't survive without them!


(portions of the text were lifted from jpsorrow's LJ and amended to reflect my holiday preferences)

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/11/16/birth.registration.plan/index.html

pretty cool. ( how long before the crazy western nutter conspiracy theorists latch on as this as a step to one world gov? ah, crazy people. crushing the hopes of humanity daily.)

sorry. Still damn cool that they're doing this. No idea it needed doing, but wow.

.

Ugh. I don't care to do this, because I love Sir Ian McKellen. I do. He won me forever in the title role in Richard III, which every Shakespeare fan, and especially NON-Shakespeare fans, should see.

But I am also a Patrick McGoohan fan, long before Sir Ian's talent surfaced on my event horizon.

So I will get this out of the way by stating the AMC version of The Prisoner SUCKS DIRT.

There IS an awful lot of it in the story, after all. They did location shooting in the desert and by gawd, they're gonna get their money's worth by seeing to it every foot of it winds up on screen. Pretty, but boring.

I will NOT ignore the idiocy of the characters who repeatedly trot into the desert surrounding "The Village" do so minus a single bottle of water and wear no head protection. No wonder they're bat-shit insane. I've no sympathy for them.

I speak as a Texan used to dealing with heat. Our summers are freaking HOT, but not quite as bad as one finds in a REAL desert where they filmed. Even so, you learn to stay hydrated and put on a gimme hat or you get heat stroke. Duh.

None of the characters did that, which puts them squarely in my "Too Stupid To Live" file. I am not blaming the actors stuck with the crap material they had to translate. I know who to blame: bad writer, bad director, bad-bad-bad, NO cookie!

I better state that it was this movie that was my reward for being a good little writer and getting some words out of my Muse last night.

My Muse is not amused with me. Not one little bit. She feels betrayed. She worked so hard and her payment was two hours of boredom. Thankfully the sewing machine was back on the work table so the time wasn't a total waste.

All I can say is that the previews made it look freakin' AWESOME.

Only it wasn't. It was anti-awesome.

I was prepared to see and accept major differences between this 21st century take on the concept and Patrick McGoohan's brilliant theater of the absurd work of art.

I was not prepared for the dismal level to which concept had been taken.

Instead of a dark satirical allegory of conformity vs. freedom with a single freedom fighter driven by anger and outrage to resist to his last breath--

--we got a 9/10ths brainwashed whiner who ends the episode in tears, whispering something about not giving in, when it is clear that he has already been broken and is on his way to a lengthy bout of chemical therapy.

I am not harshing on the actors, they could only do the best they could with the crap material they were given.

The original--in every sense it was indeed original--made you ask questions. The action/adventure format managed to do that with amazing scripting and energetic direction, all hurtling forward at breakneck speed. You HAD to pay attention or you would miss something. There was a solid internal LOGIC to the strangeness. In the end you may not have understood things, but it made you think and question.

The only question this bland, lead-footed decaff version posed for me was, "Why the hell did they bother?"

When I should have been going OH WOW and cursing the length of the commercial breaks, I broke away repeatedly to check my e-mail, hoping for distraction until someone got around to a real plot point. When I wasn't doing that or sewing, I played Freecell.

The only good I can see in this production is that it gave some actors work, but the material was not worthy of their talent.

There IS an excellent example of a concept that's been successfully updated for a new generation: Doctor Who.

Why couldn't this production company have done something like THAT?

Sir Ian, I love you. In this show you proved that you CAN read the script equivalent of a phone book and be riveting, but I'm going to watch something else with you in it.

There. 1100 words today, which works out to six pages because of judicious chapter breaks. Which means I am on page 90, and eyeing a quarter of a book*.

I have successfully written at least a thousand words on this project every day for nine days. That feels really good. My current plan is to get to page 100 and give myself a day or two off. Tomorrow, though, I have a dentist's appointment which is at 10 am and then a climbing date at 5, and since the farm stand I want to hit up for pie apples is between the two, and the dentist is a third of the way to the climbing gym, I think I might just spend the day working in a coffee shop.

I have the coffee shop all picked out, too.

Wednesday or Thursday, whichever winds up being that Day Off, I will be putting the garden to bed. And possibly acquiring some straw bales, because batwrangler has convinced me to try straw bale gardening next year in some wasted space bseide the shed, and supposedly they work better if they have had six months or so to season.

(Where by "convinced" I mean she mentioned the possibility to me and I went "What? Huh? Ooo!)

There will of course also be a day or two off next week, because, well, major holiday and cooking extravaganza.

Meanwhile, the dog thinks there should be an apartment-sized chicken baked for lunch every day.

And now I have to go to the bank and go climb.

17300 / 100000 words. 17% done!*

*Inconsistency in %done from nearly-25% to a mere 17% is due to methods of calculation. Microsoft word counts, more or less, a word as a word. Manuscript word count generally runs about 15% higher, because it counts a single manuscript-formatted page as 250 words, no matter whether that page starts halfway down or is all dialogue or what have you. This is because that page that's all dialogue, which may have only 170 "real" words on it, still takes up the same amount of space in a finished book as a densely-written page.

Magic!

We may be evicted and our gas and electricity are about to be disconnected because the house ran us into the ground and the one thing that was going to help isn't going to happen.

And I know the temptation right now: to offer us reassurances that it will all work out for the best, that God knows what He's doing, so on and so forth.

I don't need that. I don't WANT that. I'm not in a place to hear it.

What I need is HELP. We have looked into every option we could think of and nothing. And I know no one can help, so, no, not asking.

Tomorrow my husband goes to a job fair for culinary students at his school, but even if he gets hired, it's not going to save us.

So, yea, we're in trouble. The priority is to keep a roof over our heads, obviously, and I'm going to write to the landlords and send in the letter with our next (so not enough) payment, but I'm not holding my breath.

Anyway, not sure if I'll be around much until this is salvaged. I'm an emotional wreck and don't have anything much to offer right now. I'd like to work on my novel, but it almost seems pointless right now (what? losing your housing and you're writing?), so, yea, quite obviously not in a place to much good to anyone right now.


~~~

most recent

whysper screwed :: journeys Not As Busy, Still Going :: booklog Heat Wave

I now have a framed picture of James Hong and Suzee Pai on my wall at work.
It is autographed and says "Thorson, Theres a little Lo Pan inside all of us. -James Hong"

Thats right. I have a little evil Chinese god in me. I will nurture it, and let it grow.
Then I will find a girl, a girl with green eyes. Then I will go and rule the world from beyond the grave!!

If you don't know who these people are, they are actors in the movie "Big Trouble in Little China".
If you have not seen this movie, you are missing out on the best cinematic creation man kind has ever made.

We need to liberate some of the size 7 Black Women's Steampunk Casual Boots from our warehouse. They are taking up three shelves currently and we'd like to even it up abit.

As a note, I wear a 6 1/2 - 7 depending on style normally, I needed a solid 7 in these. I feel they run 1/4 - 1/2 size small so beware, there are no returns or exchanges on size for these sold through ebay.




Feel free to read what customer's say about these on our Store's Product Page.

We have them on a Buy It Now on ebay for only $29.99. They are normally $42.95 on our site. The first 10 customers who buy them get them at that price, no more. Black Only.

And one more thing, we added a new corset to our store. This is exclusive to us, hand made by a local corsettiere and designed by me.


That's it, I'm tired from a weekend full of Yo Gabba Gabba, John Cleese and Dr. Sketchy's. Probably (I hope) my last sane weekend before Holiday sales render us without stock or sense.

-Donna, Captain
www.clockworkcouture.com

There's a local tempest in a teapot, so I went to read the local newspaper article about it, and the comments by readers.

At least 75% of the posts were mostly enraged yelling at the 'other' political party, with no content and barely a nod to the actual topic of the article. About 10% were ad hominem attacks on the officials or committees involved... with no actual content or proof of the hinted misdeeds. There was actually some discussion in the remaining 15% but as it was free of name calling, nobody responded to the ideas therein.

Much heat but no light.

Short dental appt tomorrow ( half an hour) to do some cleaning on the busted tooth to see if it's salvagable or not.

Today: knit, dutch, clean the house, try to review some chem.

Need to zip downtown and get some dress pants, possibly, and maybe some tops, and socks. A week at my oma's will cost next to nothing, and a week in vancouver won't be so bad this time because I'll be right downtown, and I don't need to shop/hoard stuff to take back to Hellifax. I expect to do some spending, but not crazylike.

( 3 More )

I once more point people at my environmentalism temper tantrum, mostly because it’s faster than typing it all out again. Triggered this time by

- the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas failing to have the balls to do what needs doing, ie, a total ban on tuna fishing for years to come. Yes, I get the impact of that on ordinary fishermen, I am from a fishing community myself, and frankly it’s not Joe Bob with his single boat that’s the problem, it’s huge conglomeration fleets and giant ships sponsored by corporations, but none of that matters, because the goddamned end result is the same. Furthermore, I recognize that a significant part of the problem is also a lack of ability/desire/follow-through on policing the fisheries to ensure the sanctioned catch isn’t being disregarded, but none of that diminishes the fact that that the ICCAT lacks the balls to do its job

- Sean goddamned Parnell, the new governor of Alaska, vowing to get polar bears removed from the endangered species poster child list because he can’t let a few dumb animals stand in the way of the state’s prosperity

- the unshocking news that gosh, there’s almost certainly not going to be anything binding coming out of the upcoming climate change summit–because hey, why not lower expectations plenty early, especially when countries are already being handed concessions on the topic while on a national scale in the US, Republicans just flat out walked out of a climate bill discussion because THAT’S HOW WILLING THEY ARE TO FIX THE PROBLEM.

God, maybe you guys are right. Maybe I should write a book. Except I don’t know that I could sell it on proposal (Big Idea Environmental Fiction is not my gig) and I don’t think I could afford to write it on spec with my other contracted books.

*headdesk, anyway*

(x-posted from the essential kit)

If you get an e-mail with this header: "You are eligible to receive a tax refund"
Do not click on the attachment. You can report it by forwarding it to:
phishing@irs.gov

(I was suspicious of the IRS contacting me by e-mail, so I searched online to find out about scams. I was correct. The IRS does not contact people by email.)

Friday I'd been in touch with Elyssa & we were going to go to Xmortis. I'd bought a top hat right after Halloween and a wig & I'd put together this mad hatter-esque costume. 7pm rolled around and she & I were talking and neither of us could summon the energy for a long drive & dance-y night, so it morphed into dinner & drinks instead. While we were at Margarita's Joel showed up and grabbed dinner as well. I dodged being sung to, but Elyssa insisted on the waitress bringing me a sombrero. Now I am the proud owner of a hat I'll probably never wear again haha! We left Marg's to meet up with Sam and Jeremiah at McGarvey's, but by the time we'd got there Jer had juuuuust left. Somehow we ended up at the Black Brimmer. I've alway kind of had a beef with that place. When i first turned 21 I didn't want to hear cover bands, the bar was always filled with an older crowd, and the downstairs smelled like vomit... but I'm not 21 anymore, and I now like these cover bands, and they renovated the downstairs. The band was actually very good and played songs that made me jump around and order drinks, thus requiring red bull and water later. While I was waiting at the bar early in the night I noticed a bouncer come out of a side door... it was my friend Greg I haven't seen in like 3 years! We hugged and caught up a little and he told me my friends Lindsey & Leslie were on their way. Later in the night he found me to tell me they arrived. Joel left at about 12-ish because he was really tired, but me, Elyssa, Jon, Sam, Linds, and Leslie stayed and hung out. When the bar closed Greg told me we could stick around if we wanted, but everyone had already made their way outside so I didn't take him up on his offer. We did stand outside, though, for what felt like FOREVER (it was probably only a half hour) while I froze my butt off and sobered up. All in all, a totally fun unplanned night.

Saturday I had to run all over planet earth to get gifts for my parents for their birthdays. We were going to have a joint family birthday for the three of us on Sunday. My duty was to get the cake in Tewksbury, and wine in Sandown. So, we went south to Mass, then north to The Shire. Joel took me out to eat at the Fremont Pizzaria. I love that place. In the 10 years I've been going there they've never increased their prices, and the food is always fantastic. We headed home after for a nap to prepare for my birthday night. We went to Hurricane O'Reilly's, which I remembered being way less expensive. I feel bad! We got there before the $10 cover kicked in at least, despite the pouring rain. Oh, and thanks weather for holding out with the rain until my bday, you're awesome. *eye roll* Anywho, I had a blast at Hurricane's!! For some reason the majority of the pics are of me & Jon. I think I got my camera out when Sam's alarm went off at my birthday time (11:14pm) & I happened to be next to Jon or talking to him or dancing with him? Not sure, but it's pretty funny. I'll try to upload them to facebook tonight. Despite the nap earlier, two red bulls, and a water I started getting waaaaaaaaay sleepy at like 1am and had to leave. There was some confusion over where Sam and Lindsey were, and then when Lindsey made her way outside she or someone else said Sam was staying...? Which I guess was incorrect and we ended up abandoning the poor little feller! He had his own car, but still. I felt bad! I didn't know what was going on. I had a happy night overall, though. I love my friends!

Sunday we had to meet my family in Hampton for lunch/dinner. We got on the highway and my sister called to discuss details. Right as I answered I realized I'd forgotten the frickin' cake! We had to get off the highway, turn around, get the cake, get back on the highway.... argh!!! We were a half hour late, but got our food pretty quickly and still made it back to my sisters house to meet up with the rest of the family for 3:30. I was surprised how many people showed up... and the presents! It was like christmas! My Aunt Donna bought me every color lip gloss Mary Kay carries. So awesome. I guess from now on we'll probably be doing one big birthday because it seemed so much easier for everyone. There was soooo muuuuch caaaaake! Haha a bit of a miscommunication there... I bought a rum cake for my mom, my sister made a red velvet cake for people who don't like rum cake, my mom baked me carrot cake, I bought myself chocolate cake. Cake cake cake cake. There are left-overs. Want some???