Warhead On Legs

( Deutsch )

Drowning. In. Paperwork. Thankfully this isn't so much a matter of drowning in stuff to do as clearing out paperwork related to completed things or obsolete or irrelevant things and stacking up all the paperwork I have to do something about. Which is a surprisingly little stack. ... And there is now a small pile of plastic bags on my desk. Why is there a small pile of plastic bags on my desk?

Weird.

Note to self: if there is breathing room at the end of the day, which it's finally looking as though there might be that doesn't involve me being exhausted, try to finish cleaning off/out the desk. I've already evicted the now-well-dead birthday flowers from weeks ago, and a bunch of stacks of papers, and my standing clipboard is back to where it should be with all my paperwork on it. Now I just have to clean out the rest of this garbage and probably get rid of some paperwork that can be shredded and/or burned. Not sure where I'm going to do that. Maybe send it home with the Lurking Bandit and have him burn it in the stove.

Oogh. Oh! Apparently, living organisms really can live on caffeine. They're bacteria though, so don't get your hopes up. I had something else I meant to say but now I've completely forgotten it. Instead, you get Rachel Maddow's highlighter. Hee.

Um. Um um. Busy work morning, but hopefully easing up now that I've had some lunch and gone through my freaking desk, so there's that. Two Big Bangs to work on, and a novel to edit, and that's more than enough to keep me busy if I run out of paperwork to sort through. Ooh, plus a fanfic short to write that I had an idea for the other day. Which means it's probably time to get my ass moving and open those docs so they're there.

I have a new fucking desktop.

The facts were these: Several (six? eight? more?) weeks ago my screen started to flicker and eventually to go out. Two weeks after that, I noticed that my screen was unusually hot. Several days after that the screen extinguishing increased, and I began to notice a black spot creeping up from my start menu. A week or so after that I gave it up for a bad job entirely and went to using Guerrero (my netbook) exclusively, until I made a plan to finance and purchase a desktop.

Cut to today. I went to Best Buy, I found a sales associate who, I might add, was awesome. He listened to what I needed, evaluated my choices, wasn't too pushy, was conversational and friendly, offered honest feedback on the products, advised me on brands I hadn't used or heard much about before, and was generally a pleasure to work with. I got a Best Buy credit card pretty much solely for the 18 months no interest plan, so I could pay for the computer over time and not worry too too much about financing it immediately. I got a desktop with a hefty chunk of space (1 TB), an extra bay for another HD (maybe another TB, or maybe I'm just drunk on storage space), and an extra bay into which will go a Blu-Ray player because I'm getting sick of all the good stuff coming out on Blu-Ray and not DVD. Bastards.

I also got a headset for the Dragon and that reminds me that I should install that, too. Tomorrow. And a 1TB USB portable HD for the backing up of things, and since I was putting a ridiculous amount of money on a credit card anyway. I want another. And another. Mostly to put all the TV ever on, never mind that I don't even watch it that much.

So, yeah. I have a new computer. I have named it Simon, after a character from Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Inheritor and if anyone but me has read and remembers that book, they will know (probably) why I named it that. Also because I expect to demand copious things of Simon that will have him going "This must be what going mad feels like."

And now, for my own record-keeping:
* AVG in 60 days, along with:
-- Spybot
-- AdAware
* WinRar
* UltraEdit, license and install file are on the pocket ninja.
* GIMP
* Campaign Cartographer and sub programs. CD/DVDs are on the DVD shelf.
* MS Office Suite, if it is available for download so that I can use my current software license key for it. If it is not and I actually have to purchase the CD, since the thing came with my laptop and/or pocket ninja, I will be pissed. And then I will probably have to hunt down the install CDs, which may or may not work with this computer, and if they do not I will be more pissed. But, that's all assuming it's not available for download, which it might be.
* VLC
* Dragon NaturallySpeaking. Somewhere around here I have that damn disk and its key.

I also need to double check and make sure all the files I might need are on my backup drive, which is on my desk now and hooked up to Simon. Otherwise I will need to turn on Soren and send my file of licenses and keys and things to myself, not to mention tax things. And as soon as it arrives I will have a skull 4-port USB hub. And it will be awesome.

If there are any other new computer businesses that anyone thinks I should be doing, please let me know? It's been a little while.

I will now do the cabbage patch of victory.

German and a more substantive post will go here in a minute but right now I really, really had to share with the world: LEDs, sheep, dogs, and Welsh sheepherders making their own fun. Oh my god that was hilarious.

( Русский язык )

OI that was an infodump. AUGH. At least it's stuff that, while it won't always be so terribly prominent, will definitely come up. Especially in reading.

This? This is awesome. It also prompted me to look up just how many countries have a Sesame Street. Apparently? Way more of them than I would have thought! I vaguely remember there being something about broadcasting programs that had some kind of content Sesame Street usually has in the Arabic world, but I suppose that's been solved now. Really, the overall format is kind of awesome. The fact that it's gone all over the world just makes it more awesome. And now I get to go looking for Sesame Street in Russian, because it would so totally help the whole learning the language thing.

Restful weekend. Hopefully I shook the last of the ick and the bleh. And now, to take on the week, full steam ahead and damn the torpedoes and all. We can start by paying off my credit card (again) and ordering Tron Legacy. Ahem.

( Deutsch )

... Does anyone remember the coordinating conjunction acronym FANBOYS? For-and-nor-but-or-yet-so? Or is it just me? I remember thinking of that in the context of boys with fans, maybe like the titular Persian boy from the Mary Renault novel. Now, of course, it's a whole other image.

This post today is brought to you by BOOTS. BECAUSE I HAVE THEM. And they are tiny (which is good because my feet are tiny), and they are biker, and they are AWESOME. They are, for those of you who care about such things, Steve Madden London boots. I have no idea what that means but they are tiny and fit and look cool and I will wear the fuck out of them. With longer socks, because they're obviously made to go over skinny jeans. Even at my best, I would look silly in skinny jeans. So I will put long socks under the boots and wear them with boot cut jeans. Or skirts. Skirts with knee socks. I will be the first ever biker-goth-sailor senshi EVER. Or maybe not the first but still I will mash all my random wardrobe shit together and it will be awesome.

And possibly run around in biker boots, long bright socks (oooh, for my birthday I should go to sock dreams), skirt of some kind or maybe a skirt that flaps over with the pocket in front, blouse, and a whistle. And my skull do-rag. And wander around Asheville because I will look like a freak but it doesn't matter because I live in fucking Asheville and it's almost required that you look like a freak at least once while you live here. Just once. Even if it's by whapping a stranger in the face with a pillow.

Right. I should actually, um. Do work. Someone remind me in a month and a half when I'm wondering what the hell I want for my birthday, I want:

1 Hiya Hiya set, probably the smaller one
long bright socks from sock dreams for wearing with skirts
These earrings, assuming they're still there, if not, something else wacky.
A strawberry scent from BPAL (why do I not have this already?)

And those are the things not covered by Amazon wish lists and things. Because I will forget and then I will go "shit. I have birthday monies. What the hell did I want."

You know. I was so excited by the fact that I had staff, and so was Anna, and so were some of our staff and our partner in activism, that we went and made a comm about it. Wires and Lights is, apart from being so-named because I have an unhealthy love for that speech, your source for all union-and-politics related news. Potentially also to be your source for budget-related shenanigans and other ways the middle class is being screwed, if we get the staff.

See the top level mod post for details.

Because now I am about to go pass out.

( Русский язык )

Argh. That was more frustrating than I wanted it to be. Also, why is it snowing. Ugh. Can't it wait to snow till the weekend when I don't have to go in to work? Pout. Sulk. Or at least can't it wait till I actually went to bed early.

Signal boosting! Off my flist, personal parts redacted: The Tuesday Toolmen are retired volunteers (early 50s - late 70s) who perform free repairs and modifications to low income senior citizens' homes and people with disabilities in Michigan. Their efforts keep the elderly from losing their homes. They've donated more than 4,000 hours of volunteer service (recognized by a Presidental Service Award) and their efforts have been very successful in helping the community. The Tuesday Toolmen are trying to receive a grant through the Pepsi Refresh project in order to help expand their organization into other cities. Pepsi is distributing the money based essentially on popular vote - if you build an account, you can vote for 10 organizations every day. (And if you're OK with signing in via Facebook, you don't even have to build an account!)

The Pepsi Refresh page: http://www.refresheverything.com/tuesdaytoolmen
The Tuesday Toolmen website: http://www.tuesdaytoolmen.com/

Please consider taking the time to set 30 seconds aside and vote. The Tuesday Toolmen will be eligible until December 31.

I went to TSO. It was fucking awesome. We were up in the third row, along the end, close enough that I could have reached out and touched the bassist as he ran past at the end segment when they're coming back from the platform. There was a lot of up close views of the band, which was kind of awesome, since I've seen the light show many times but now I'm up to the point where I may or may not have small crushes on half the band. Ahem. No I want not trying to make eye contact with Chris Caffrey why do you ask. The bassist totally did remember us, though. The really cute bassist. Aw. The only bad thing was that Jay Pierce didn't do either of his songs that I remember, I think there were only two, apparently because he was sick that day. Which left weird gaps in the program where they hastily segued through his parts. Ah well. It's TSO. They'd have to work pretty hard to do a bad show.

NASA made new life, and not in the usual way. The possibilities for that both in science fiction and in science research and development are staggering. It's really kind of awesome.

Right. Time to get ready to schlep out into the cold. And evict this purring kitten from my chest. Dammit. I don't wanna.

( Deutsch )

I need an icon of "I am INVINCIBLE." Preferably not of Boris Grishenko. Today I have slept in for an hour and a half, did exercise and Russian anyway, ate a healthy lunch, mailed out ALL THE THINGS the domestic signature things that needed mailing, did a whole fuckton of shipping backorders, re-labeled the yarn (stupid damn dyehouse) that had been mislabeled by the dye house and so was mislabeled by us until we realized that it was switched back to front. Fortunately we only had to re-label ONE box. Of 60+ cones of yarn. Oi. Cleaned up a mess of boxes, spun some yarn, came home, vacuumed the craft room, went walkies, came back, made dinner, put away the spices finally, and started tie-dyeing. Then German, and writing and editing. Holy fuck, I feel tired just writing that.

Tie-dyeing shirts has made me want to tie-dye everything, ever. I am so serious. I want to dye the world. I want to color it in various shades of blues and greens and pinks and purples and bright yellows and oh my god so much color was on these shirts you have no idea. People like me are the reason those instructions say "this amount of dye may dye between 4 and 15 shirts" because I will use ALL THE DYE on five shirts to make them a riot and explosion of color and then there will be none left for the other kids. It was awesome. I really want to have a tie-dye party now.

The good thing about this is, tomorrow I get to play with the dye some more, which is to say we're finally going to get around to dyeing my yarn. I have ... three or four skeins, although by the time I get my yarn off the drop spindle and off the bobbin it'll probably be more like six skeins. And unless something huge comes in I should actually have the time to get my hands wet and stained with different colors. I've come to the probably inevitable conclusion that I just fucking love color. This is possibly why I have a mini painting set of colors the size of a small suitcase. I should really, really get back to that. Maybe this weekend. I've put the sewing stuff away till January, and it promises to be a mild winter, which means I can prime and paint a lot. Yeah. I love color.

... Well, that sucked. No riding skirt for me, my buttonholer broke and I don't have time to figure out what's making it snag all the time. At least I have an emergency stash of garb, and that wasn't the costume I was really hoping for. I'll consider it a sacrifice to the Con gods that everything else goes well.

ANYway. Almost done! I think everyone who needs my cell number should have it by now, and if you don't, DM me for it. I'm mightybattlecat on Twitter.

(I totally stole a gold egg right off the cave. Holy shit.)

So, now I'm showering and helping load the car and then dropping off keys and going through garb and heading down. Thank god it's not that long a drive. The boy has this idea of hooking up the pocket ninja for music, which isn't a bad idea. I have an idea where Jim Butcher will be signing, and I should pick up something by his wife, and I have a list of people I'm getting autographs for: viridian, defy_n_gravity, kikibug13, lireavue. Did I promise anyone else an autograph whose autographer HASN'T punked out of D*C? Because I know that's already happened once. :( (And does that person wish a substitute autograph?) One last check to see if anyone else has punked out, but so far no one has. OH. MY UNICORN.

Which is too small to really autograph properly. Bollocks. Oh well, I'll get a print anyway. And it'll be kind of awesome.

Anyway. Okay. Showering, putting together a last minute sewing kit and aspirin kit, writing up my shopping list, and OUTTA HERE. TO DRAGON CON, YO.

It's going to be awesome.

( Deutsch )

( Bento, Day 1. Rang bell, cat fucked off... )

( Bento, Day 2. Rang bell, cat ate my food. )

I'm discovering the really awesome thing about bento is that I can eat my main meal and my fruit and my dessert, and feel full. I used to, when I brought leftovers in, eat a lot more than that, but now I can pretty much just eat that and even on a fucking insane day of work, I didn't snack. I didn't run to the candy basket. I didn't nick pieces of challah or find out what tasty cookie the Lurking Bandit brought in from home today. I just drank a litre and a half of water and kept going. And then I had merienda.

(Merienda, for those of you who don't remember or in case I didn't explain before, is a Spanish word roughly meaning afternoon snack. It's like the kind of snack you give kindergarteners. I don't think there actually is a specific equivalent word in English like breakfast, lunch, etc, unless you count tea, but that's what it is.)

I do need to start putting something in there for second breakfast, some sort of fruit or something. That's how I've been eating for a while, ideally five meals a day, cereal or toast or something small first thing in the morning, second breakfast I can carry around with me when I get to work while I see what's what. Lunch, merienda, and then the biggest (relatively speaking) meal of the day is dinner. It'd be awesome if I can do all three of the at-work meals in my bento, but we'll see!

Also, ( this is my chip-case. Because I AM FROM THE FUTURE )

Why yes. I am easily and cheaply amused. Why do you ask.