Nov. 7th, 2009


[info]gwionfawyr

[info]gwionfawyr

*rubbing hands together*


[info]gwionfawyr
I'm feeling energized, if still coughing a mile a minute. I've gotten over 1800 words typed since I woke up this morning. I'm thinking of taking a break to work on a Of Dragons and Men/Duke of Cambridgeshire short. I know I've been a flake, but I started school and did renovations on the house.

So, by tonight, I'll have the ficlet written, but then I've gotta catch up with my NaNo numbers.

Jenn

[info]vakkotaur

[info]vakkotaur

"The End of..." and time marches on.


[info]vakkotaur


When the Berlin fell (was torn down!) and the USSR tossed itself onto the ash heap of history, Francis Fukuyama suggested that it might be "the end of history."

After the 2002 elections when the Republicans gained seats in the House and Senate while there are was a Republican President, some suggested that it might be the end of the Democrat Party.

Now, with a Democrat in the White House and Democrats in majority in the House and Senate, some are saying that it's surely the end of the Republican Party.

History is on-going. The Democrats managed not to collapse into nothingness after 2002. Why should 2008 or even 2009 be any different for Republicans or conservatives? It's all rather silly. The form may (and rightly should) change. But "the end" it is not. I'm not about to predict an automatic Republican resurgence in 2010. It's quite possible for them to screw up - just take a look at how well they did with NY-23 where they swerved so far off course that when a third candidate started gaining, the supposed Republican dropped out of the race and endorsed the Democrat. Unless that third party candidate was "caught in bed with a live boy or a dead girl" that is a Career Limiting Move. If they repeat that performance, they will likely get the same result.

It's just that I've been seeing many posts or comments about the end of one party that seem silly to me. I've seen the exact same thing from the other side not that long ago. And I remember. It's not the end. It's just different for a while is all. The population that got tired of Republicans can, and will, eventually get tired of Democrats and almost certainly for about the exact same reasons. The details will change, but the cause-effect relationship will be pretty stable. And time marches on.


[info]countrymouse

[info]countrymouse

From Twitter 11-06-2009


[info]countrymouse

  • 17:33:36: Got replacement Kala Kiwi uke--not the same. :-( Sending it back for refund. Might be getting a reduced-priced concert Fluke! #fb
  • 17:39:46: @webcruzr21 Thank you very much. :-)
  • 18:03:46: Way behind on reading tweets--don't know when I'll get time to catch up. Doing dishes in a minute, busy this eve.
  • 18:05:41: Might be getting a digital video camera tonight on sale (thanks @deach !)--if so, Cat'r & I might make a video. We'll see. :-)
  • 19:20:40: @thisnthat I'm going to use the money towards a Fluke, I think. I might be getting one built from a "factory-second" top, so 20% off!
  • 19:21:25: @thisnthat Mainland some time in the future. Flukes and fleas withstand low humidity better--gets DRY in here in winter!
  • 19:44:51: @webcruzr21 Me too. Oh well.
  • 22:35:26: Well, that was a total bust: sound quality on $100 Insignia dv camcorder was worse than on my Canon PowerShot. :-/ 15% restocking fee.
  • 22:36:45: @thisnthat How does the relative humidity stay in your house? For ukes it should be around 40-50%, IIRC.

Tweets copied by twittinesis.com


[info]xie_xie_xie

[info]xie_xie_xie

MEME!!!


[info]xie_xie_xie
I just got home from a family birthday celebration... this is late for me, LOL!

SO I'M GOING TO MEME NOW!

Tags:

[info]keleos

[info]keleos

[No Subject]


[info]keleos
Bleh. Sick. And I can't seem to concentrate well. I had plans to do WC replies and a new post today, but it just didn't happen. I barely got DDC replies done. I'll try again tomorrow, but no promises. I feel like snot.

[info]greenwitch

[info]greenwitch

Pumpkin Soup!


[info]greenwitch

Not sure when this turned into a food blog, but that seems to be what I’m working on lately. And since the fabulous Juliana is requesting pumpkin recipes (and since I didn’t get around to making my chili today after all), that’s what you’ll get…

A friend passed this along to me a few years ago, so I’m not sure of the source. I also tend not to measure much, and I can say that the only time I’ve ever screwed this one up is when I added too much pumpkin and didn’t balance it out with extra spices. So really, everything is approximate and spice to taste. Also, I’m writing this from memory so forgive the lack of exact step-by-step directions.

Pumpkin Soup

4+ cups broth
1 cup chopped celery
1 cup chopped onion
1 15oz can pumpkin
1 tsp sage
1 tsp thyme
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 chopped cooked potato (optional, to thicken)

Directions

1. Saute onion and celery for about 5 minutes in a bit of olive oil.
2. Add half the broth and spices (and potato, if you want). Simmer for 10 minutes.
3. Take off heat and puree in blender or food processor.
4. Return to heat, add the rest of the broth and stir in pumpkin.
5. Simmer for another 10-15 minutes.

I usually end up adding extra vegetables and with about 6 cups of broth by the end. It’s pretty hard to screw this one up, as long as you don’t burn the onions.

Mirrored from December Project. Comments are preferred there.

[info]apod
[info]apod

Ring Nebula Deep Field

[info]apod

A familiar sight to sky enthusiasts with even a small telescope, A familiar sight to sky enthusiasts with even a small telescope,



[info]lore

[info]lore

BloMo6: Friday night is Wonky TV night!....


[info]lore

It's like...if you stay home on a Friday night, you must have eclectic tastes. Right? It's certainly not Loser TV for Losers, nooooo. ~_^

(I am kidding, really!)

Ghost Whisperer
I didn't watch the early seasons of this show, trying to tell myself I wasn't interested, but I have a hard time resisting supernatural anything. I mean, I watched Charmed for a few seasons, for gawd's sake! Plus, I have to admit, Jennifer Love-Hewitt is awfully...Lush. It's actually not a bad little show. Usually, the ghost is put to rest at the end of the episode, and any mytharc the series flirts with fits into the regular episode. Ok, the husband's not bad either.

Ugly Betty
Bright, colourful, wacky, fun! I'm a little sad that more people don't watch Ugly Betty. I love the entire cast; I can't think of one character I don't adore. *clings to it*

Medium
This show is smart, the family and characters are real, and NBC is staffed by fools. The End.

Monk
The first half of this last season, the show was cruising hard. The cases were almost nonexistent, and the "bits" were tired. But now that we're into the second half, it's like a light went on and the people involved realised that they only have a few episodes left to say goodbye to one of TV's most original characters. If you watch The Mentalist or Numbers, you have Mr. Monk to thank.

Psych
Oh. How. I. Love. This. Show. Shawn and Gus are a great team, and I love the premise, of a man so observant that people wouldn't listen to him until he began doing his psychic schtick. It's funny, it's fun, it's smart. I actually like Corbin Bersen for once. If you have no idea what Psych is about, then ask me more, because this is a show you should be watching.

White Collar
Jury's still out on this one. The SO likes it, but I have a hard time cheering for criminals.

Sanctuary & Stargate BSGUniverse
Um, we have bazillion episodes sitting on the TiVO. Does not bode well. The first episode of Stargate Universe was a huge downer, and people keep telling us it finds sub-levels from there.

So, who's home with me? ^_^

love, lore

[info]mugetsu
[info]asylum_promo

[info]mugetsu
[info]asylum_promo

Batman, The Joker, Vagrant Story, The Pirates of Dark Water fandom asylums


[info]mugetsu
[info]asylum_promo
[info]octopon - Pirates of DarkWater fandom asylum. Completed!

[info]gotham_gazetteCompleted!</i>

[info]vagrant_story - Vagrant Story fandom asylum. WIP; will be deleted unless more interest is shown.

And,

Please feel free to join [info]commedia; a personal project of mine, aiming to review and analyze comics (and other selected media) that feature DC Comics' The Joker.

It is currently a WIP because I am still going through my 500+ hardcopy!issues collection. I do not download torrents/scans.

I'd like to point out that currently I have two polls up for debate, as can be seen here explaining two routes the asylum's project can take. IE: spoiler free reviews, spoilerific reviews, and whatnot. =) Otherwise, the FAQ and The Rules are already up. The tags/memory post is still a WIP.

I am also open to affiliating with other comic book and/or Batman related asylums, except for RPGs.

[info]alisanne

[info]alisanne

Drabble: Full Moon


[info]alisanne
Title: Full Moon
Author: [info]alisanne
Rating: PG
Pairing: Severus Snape/Harry Potter
Summary: Severus is never shy to give his opinion, and neither is Harry.
Word Count: 100
Genre: Humor
Warnings: Er, humor. *g*
A/N: Written for [info]veridian_dair, who yet again managed to successfully guess which fic was mine in the [info]snarry_ldws week 7 competition. Also, please to be excusing the lame title.
Beta: [info]sevfan
Disclaimer: The characters contained herein are not mine. No money is being made from this fiction, which is presented for entertainment purposes only.

Full Moon )

[info]kaellite

[info]kaellite

Addicted to Glee and puppies..


[info]kaellite

I gave in and we are getting the beagle puppy, from the animal shelter puppy wash.  This will raise our household count to me, Teh Rock, cousin, his SO, 3 dogs, a cat and 2 turtles.

This is the last animal, I swear.

I am also addicted to "Glee", so much so that I now have the soundtrack.   What does it say about me that I have never really cared much for Diana Ross (even in her younger days she looked like a female impersonator IMO) but I LOVE the Glee casts version of "You Keep Me Hanging On."

And I have listened to "Somebody to Love" 5 times thus far in the last hour.

Need Glee icon

[info]shinywhimsy

[info]shinywhimsy

*breathes in then sloooooooooooowly out*


[info]shinywhimsy
Wow, OK, hi. This week can go screw itself over on a pointy stick. Like, really. Wow. I've been back from the beach since Sunday morning and have done nothing but work since Tuesday. And that's because I had a holiday on Monday or else it'd have been non-stop work since Monday. And I literally mean non-stop, because I was even working in my sleep. What little sleep I managed to get anyway.

Anyway, Sunday I took to catch up on all the TV I missed over the week and then Monday I started on my skip-300 flisting spree and managed to get it down to skip=75. Then, I basically... wasn't online pretty much all this week because of all the overtime and all the bringing work home with me and the stormy weather and the power going out and, oh lookit, my flist is back up to skip=200 *flails*

Speaking of TV, on the way back home (after another hour of overtime at work, oh joy) I watched this week's SYTYCD which my sister downloaded for me because she's a sweetheart when she wants to be and she felt sorry for me heh Spoilers for SYTYCD 12 here )

Still haven't watched this week's SPN or Vamp Diaries. There was no new Glee this week and I don't think White Collar has even aired yet? If it has, the download isn't available yet anyway. Speaking of White Collar, let's talk about it up to last week, yeah? Cut for White Collar spoilers )

Tomorrow I get my hair cut YAY! Not that I'll do any drastic changes to it or anything but it's gotten to the point where it just won't behave *sighs*

It's the weekend, peoplez! \o/\o/\o/

Nov. 6th, 2009


[info]kyrielle

[info]kyrielle

What on earth, LJ?


[info]kyrielle
[info - livejournal.com] news has become a random splat of happenings on the site and sponsor ad placements, in addition to minimal site news, instead of focussing on site news.

Enh.

But the latest one? Seriously, what were you thinking, LJ? Titling the bit about your war on spambots as "The empire strikes back"...uh, you do realize which side was supposed to be the good guys there, right?

And blocking 30,000 accounts in a single day for being spam bots doesn't give me warm fuzzies. It tells me that you're frantically smacking things down, too fast for me to know whether I trust that you're identifying only spam bots, and if you are identifying only spam bots then boy have you got a problem of epic proportions. Which, no, the fact that you knocked them back out doesn't make me happy they got in, nor impressed.

But really. The empire strikes back?

[info]yohjideranged

[info]yohjideranged

Moral of the story: Don't Lie


[info]yohjideranged
So,  for a while, my grandmother (who is in her mid-80s) has been in and out of the hospital. It started when she fell in her kitchen and scrapped herself up pretty good. Since then she has claimed to have fallen in her apartment several times - each time ending up in the hospital.

It turns out that this was a lie. She had not fallen and she was just using the hospital to get attention from her family.

Okay, a little background. My grandmother has always been a little bit, no, scratch that...a lot manipulative. She has always been the first person to lay a guilt trip on somebody. It wouldn't matter how many times you visited with her or went over to see her, it would never be enough. And while you were visiting, you would be treated to all the gossip about everyone else - even people you didn't know. This talking behind other's back has cost her a friend that she had had for 25 years, but that is another story.

This leads to now, with her being in the hospital. While in the hospital she starts not only playing up the "can't walk" thing (yet refuses a wheelchair) but also starts telling falsehoods of neglect to the nursing staff. This leads to the staff calling in a caseworker from the state. She lied and said that her family never checks on her or visits her.

Grandma is assigned the caseworker and the woman calls all grandma's children (one being my mother). She tells my mother, my aunt and my uncle that grandma needs round the clock care and that they have 24 hours to figure out what to do with her.

Well, my aunt lives in a cramped trailer over 2 hours away, my mother is nursing a broken knee and is in the process of moving and my uncle - well, he has frickin' power of attorney over grandma, which is why he checks on her damn near ever day. But Grandma lied about people visiting her, so therefore the state thinks that the family is neglecting an old woman. This despite the fact that my uncle and my cousin, D, check on her on a daily basis and my other cousin, W, drives her around.

So, due to all her lies, she no longer can go back to her apartment. The apartment where she had a lot of freedom to do what she wanted to do and all the independence to do it.  Now, the state is going to send her right from the hospital to a nursing home. One in which she has to be signed in and signed out and they dictate the schedule.

Well, I hope that she is satisfied with what her lying has given her in the end. I am quite sure that it was not her expected outcome. I can just shake my head at the situation. She didn't want to go to a home when the family asked her before, and now, she will probably end up in the same one where she committed her own mother. Irony, this has it.

So, the moral of the story is: don't lie. See, people will find out and it will come back to bite you (even if it takes a while).  I wish I had sympathy for her, but knowing what a liar she is...it may seem awful of me, but I just don't.

I am sure the family can fight the state on the case of neglect to get her back into her apartment, but you know, she has so many of us burned out and just burned now, that I don't know how many of us give a damn. Hell, maybe in the nursing home she will have whatever she wants now - people who she can talk trash to about other people and the opportunity to bitch to us how she is being treated.  I hate to say it, but I don't recognize this woman any longer and I really don't like who she has become.

[info]lonely_hunter

[info]lonely_hunter

[No Subject]


[info]lonely_hunter
I updated the firmware and didn't brick the PSP! Yay!

[info]dragovianknight

[info]dragovianknight

Crying is not productive


[info]dragovianknight
Particularly when there is quite literally nothing to cry about.

[info]ladyofshadow

[info]ladyofshadow

Librarian Job...GOOOOOO!!!!


[info]ladyofshadow
On Saturday I start at the downtown library as an official Librarian. It's a second position, so I'm still at the suburban library of West Seneca as a Library Associate. I'm at both places part-time.

I'll be at the Humanities & Social Sciences reference desk (which has been combined with Business, Science, & Technology...so basically all of nonfiction). As far as I know, there's some sort of training checklist/program I have to go through. I heard from my boss today (she took me out to lunch ^^!) that it can be intense because you have to utilize the approved sources. Being that I'm familiar with the library databases, things should go well. Also, it's pretty much going to be strict reference (as compared to smaller branches where you do a bit of everything).

However, I'm a mix of nervous and excited. This is my foot in the door. I make a good impression here and I have the opportunity for more hours, a position with benefits, and security during an unstable budget period. I must do well, I will do well.

I can't wait to hear patron questions!! I learn so much from them!! The urban environment should be interesting as well. There's free parking in downtown Buffalo on weekends, which is a plus for my first day. Though, it will suck when I have to pay for parking on the weekdays, but I'll make back the money.

Cross your fingers for me everyone!! ^___^
Tags:

[info]xie_xie_xie

[info]xie_xie_xie

Around the world with Brian and Justin again


[info]xie_xie_xie
Wow, I haven't done this in ages!

For anyone who is new, let me explain what this is. I have a website called BrianJustinLove.com, and this is a little chart showing where in the world the most recent site visitors came from. Is your country there?
 

[info]xie_xie_xie

[info]xie_xie_xie

Holiday fic master list


[info]xie_xie_xie
I noticed that I had quite a lot of QAF fic related to the holiday season, which I'm defining as Halloween through New Year's Day. I decided to create a master list to link to from my fic index page. Nothing new here. :)

Tags:

[info]seanlily

[info]seanlily

Not Car-Less!


[info]seanlily
 I have an awesome mechanic who called me a little while ago to tell me I can pick up my car tomorrow!
He got the window in this morning and then fixed my car.
So  yay! not car-less for the weekend.
Tags: