bedofbones' Friends

2:05PM

WINTER IS UPON US.

Not that you'd know it here in Chicago, where it's sunny and cool out and has snowed ONCE and it's DECEMBER.

*shakes fist at the sky*

But I can pretend, after all. viggosterri and pinkfinity both sent me a lovely snowflake via LJ (thank you! It's like a flurry!), and I've been curled up pretending it's snowing and watching videos.

bluejeans07 linked me to DOCTOR CLAUS:



Less Christmassy, but no less hilarious, is cluegirl's accusation that I am secretly one of these gentlemen, professing my love of typeface. I WISH.



And finally -- this was one of my favourite films as a child, around the holidays. Most of the actual cartoons in it are old or clipped from barely-relevant films, but I loved the little intervals with the dancing toys and the incredibly stupid lyrics. This is just part one; you can find the rest on youtube pretty easily.

12:43PM - Mom can't eat wheat. Here's a flour-less choc cake.

Choooooocolate.

Completely wheat-free.



Flourless Chocolate Cake
(Recipe source The Gourmet Cookbook)

Ingredients:

8 ounces good quality bittersweet (not semi-sweet) chocolate, roughly chopped
2 sticks unsalted butter, cut into pieces
1 1/2 cups sugar
6 eggs
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Generously grease a 9 or 10 inch springform pan and line the bottom with wax or parchment paper (cut into a circle to fit bottom of pan). Make sure to grease the liner as well.

In a double broiler or in a large bowl over a pan of simmering water, add chocolate and butter. Stir constantly until melted. Remove bowl from heat and whisk in sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Last, sift cocoa powder into mixture and whisk until just combined.

Pour batter into prepared springform pan and bake for 35-40 minutes. A toothpick inserted in the center should come out with moist crumbs and top should have a thin crust. Cool cake in pan on a rack for 10 minutes and then remove sides of pan. Invert cake on a plate and then back onto the rack to fully cool before serving.

Yield: 10-12 servings

11:11AM

WELL.

The beans and the beer bread came out well -- for the many who've asked, the beer bread is a quickbread, a mix from Trader Joe's, $2 and well worth it because it is DELICIOUS.

Meanwhile this morning, the yoghurt is yogging and will be for the next ten to fourteen hours; the pumpkin bread is baking, the rice is soaking, and the curry for the rice is defrosting. I am going to have some EPIC LUNCHES this week, between the curry and the beans and the chowder. And the fried stuffing, oooh.

As long as I'm taking a break from cooking, I may as well post Chapter Nine of Valet of Anize; Chapter Ten might...take a while.

I used to write faster than this, you know, but I also used to have a job that wasn't nine-to-five and I don't think I wrote as well. I'm trying to embrace the genre-adventure-story thing and not struggle with imbuing too much meaning in this; it's never going to be the same kind of story as Nameless was. It's still my problem child, but I'm finding moments of pure beauty in it, so. I do what I can.

10:43AM - Transcripts arrived.

Ah. My transcripts finally arrived from Seattle Central.

I've dug my SAT scores out of the boxes.

I have the transcripts from UW.

Time to wave it all in front of the state of Maryland Dept of Education to see what I need next to teach.

Listening to the soundtrack from Out Of Bounds.

And snow has frosted all the trees. I think this is going to be a snowy Christmas.

7:49PM

Hokay, I have taken out the trash and gone to the store and done Wii workout for the evening. I've done it enough now that all the exercises are in order on my "favourites" menu -- six yoga positions, boxing, penguin-feeding, and then the "sit very still" game as a closer. Though one of the yoga poses is out of order because omg it feels so good to feel my whole spine pop when I do it. :D

Tomorrow is the DAY OF COOKING. I'm going to make baked beans (with turkey, naturally), beer bread, pumpkin bread, Hellish Gluten-Free Fruit Bread, yoghurt, rice for the turkey curry, and ground beef. And then do a lot of dishes. A LOT OF DISHES.

On the plus side: I will have food for, you know, EVER.

3:15PM

AND THEN I SLEPT FOREVER.

Okay, till 10, which is still late for me. Since then I have essentially goofed off. I did try to get the student loan application finished, but they need my Borrower PIN, which I left at work in my Giant Spreadsheet Of (Oh Shit Nobody Better Steal This Or They'll Have All My) Passwords.

I do have a few links to share -- one, tripping_doozer asked me to signal boost a campaign to Bring Anya Home, a letter-writing project to help unite two sisters separated when one of them was adopted to the United States.

Two, ljgeoff is having an End Of Time party on January 2nd in Chicago. Locals should go check out the preliminary post and drop an email if you're interested.

In other news...this is tough to say without sounding like an asshole, or like I'm angry (which I'm not) but let me try:

At this time of the year there are many charitable appeals, and nearly half of all charitable giving occurs around the holidays. I want to remind everyone that while I like to publicise good causes when I can, the primary function of this journal is still a journal, an account of my life and the events therein.

I feel bad turning people down for help in publicising or signal-boosting, and I will often post for friends who ask, but I can't always say yes, especially depending on how relevant or local the cause is to the readership I have here. If I did post everything I was asked to post, copperbadge would basically be a messageboard for other peoples' causes and concerns, and the whole point of my ability to reach a wide readership would become moot. (As an example, six people asked me to publicise events or causes for them yesterday.)

I appreciate your understanding. :) It's not easy for me to say no, but sometimes I have to.

2:36PM

Apparently I have acquired a dimple.

I never used to have one, but one of the admins today said to me "Your dimples are so cute!" and I thought, uh, what dimples?

It turns out I have one. There's a crease that develops in the skin -- one of our resident medical staff will know what this is called -- from the edge of the nostril to the edge of the mouth, and it only starts showing up in your twenties. When I smile, that crease creates a little dimple on the left side of my face.

I spent about fifteen minutes making faces in a mirror, studying it. I'm not sure I approve.

*pokes own face, experimentally*

10:24AM

WOW is technology not on my side this morning.

I got in to work and the elevators in my "bank" are broken -- as with most buildings downtown, there are multiple sets of elevators that only go to specific floors, like one for floors 1-15 and one for floors 16-30, et cetera. I managed to get a ride to the right floor from the wrong bank, only to arrive and find that my computer wouldn't log into the network. When I finally did get it to log in by the expedient of "retrying and going for a cup of tea while it started up", it wouldn't let me use Outlook to log into my email. Tech support are perplexed by me.

THEN I tried to make a maintenance report to the building and found that the building's email system is completely down.

Possibly I'm cursed? Possibly it's the SNOW ON THE GROUND OUTSIDE, HOORAY or possibly it's a hint to work on other projects this morning.

I did finally get to call my loan consolidation people about getting on the IBR plan, but the IBR plan is not actually the same as the plan I need to be on, which is the PSLF (Public Service Loan Forgiveness) plan. Which requires that I reconsolidate into a Direct loan held by the federal government. Fortunately, I consolidated at a good time and my interest rate will only go up by .2%.

It does mean I have to go find my Adjusted Gross Income from last year's tax return, though.

I'm sure they do this on purpose to prevent the undedicated from applying, but they sure don't make this bullshit easy.

5:50PM - Naruto Bleach-style!

This is bloody awesome! Naruto, Bleach-style from Naruto 10th Anniversary Special Fanbook 2 (Via lyssaphra and Bleach newsletter).

And this clearly shows why I love Bleach better than Naruto (although I like Naruto too): among other things, it's simply a question of art style preferences. If Naruto were drawn this way, I'd fall head over heels for it despite its first 20 volumes :D

=====

8:31PM

sky_was_green clued me in to, and asked if I'd publicise, a poll going on over at pubhistwho, which is eventually going to count as 30% of someone's final grade. It's suffering a bit from lack of participation, and various bets have been made the upshot of which is that we'd like to get 50 more responses before the poll closes on Saturday.

It's a poll specific to the Who fandom but it's very anecdotally aimed -- all the questions are open-ended and it looks like it may garner some very interesting results. Anonymous participation is welcomed. Go ye and check it out!

Also:

( So there's this whole big thing where Seeley is a stupid name. )

3:32PM - Power outage

The candle made shadows like lace on the wall. The low, omnipresent buzz of electricity was gone.

The kitties cuddled close in confusion. Just because they can see in the dark doesn't mean they like to.

The laundry silenced halfway through its cycle.

The baking had to stay in the fridge.

Eastwick was on ... somewhere else.

The streetlights vanished.

Then the whole world restarted again.

3:17PM

GUESS WHAT ARRIVED IN CHICAGO THIS AFTERNOON?



SNOW, YOU BEAUTIFUL MOFOS.

11:01AM

Yesterday I finished my Christmas shopping. (Actually I need to buy one more thing, for BossBoss, but I can't do that till a few days before Christmas so that it stays fresh.)

As ursula_bear reminded me, last year in the Cafe we made Christmas Decorations out of words. She was in search of the PDF of the Christmas Decorations, which I appear to have lost, so I thought I'd make another one and reupload it.

You can find the PDF of all the Word Christmas Ornaments here:
Sendspace | Sendspace Mirror
Megaupload | Megaupload Mirror

Or you can find individual full-size high-res images at my gallery here.

There are nine pages of individual and grouped-word ornaments, some on various themes; two pages of single-letters that you can string together as garlands, and three "crown" tree-toppers. Reposting my Crafty Tips from last year:

For all pages, I'd recommend either printing them on card stock or gluing regular printouts to card stock (if you want the ornaments to hang around -- HA, see what I did there? -- for a while, I would use acid-free spray adhesive) before cutting them out. When I make paper ornaments I often glue the backs to construction paper, which adds some colour. Little kids think this is MAGIC. How is the paper two colours at once?

For the garlands, you can punch holes in each letter and tie them together with string, but that gets time-consuming. Easier is to glue the letters along a strip of ribbon or onto the links of a paper chain.

For the tree-toppers, I'd recommend gluing a bit of wire between the topper and its backing, then twisting the wire into a coil that you can settle over the top of the tree. Or, only glue the very edges of the topper and backing together, like a seam, leaving the bottom open. Then fit the pocket that creates over the tree. With the Doctor Who topper in particular you could probably also make the bottom word into a circle, glue it together, and settle it on the tree.

But, you know. It's your art! Go to town, do what you want, have fun.

8:13PM

CHOWDER SUCCESS.

Why do I never remember how long it takes me to chop stuff up?

Anyway I made chowder, and I'm almost out of turkey, for grate yayes. Tomorrow I'm going to watch Wheel with R and eat shit-tons of turkey chowder and fried stuffing. OH YES.

51stcenturyfox found this recipe for me, because I was moaning about the one I had that I didn't want to use because it had tomatoes in it.

( TURKEY CHOWDAH )

4:15PM

I was going to spend the last few hours of today sitting down and writing an LJ post -- okay, well, maybe not hours, but you know how it is -- when BossBoss called me. He comes back in to work tomorrow, and he had a project he wanted to give me to work on while he was gone. In other words, two weeks ago, he forgot to give me a project he thought would take, oh, about two weeks.

Can I get it done by the time he's settled in tomorrow morning? NO PROBLEM, BOSS.

The nice thing about working this job is that people have no clue how long it takes me to do things. A two-week Space Allocation survey would probably actually take an unprepared person, oh, maybe a day. I'm eternally prepared, so it took me forty minutes to do half of it, during which Coworker Fail swore left right and sideways about having to print the documents for me to use. So I just used the digital copies, and now Coworker Fail is swearing about having to do his half of it. Which I would happily do, now that it's down to a SYSTEM!, except that he insists on doing it himself.

ANYWAY. I HAVE RECCS FOR YOU. And now I get to share them, while he whines.

First, kath_ballantyne and non_sequential have opened tw_canvas, a place to post fanart and other artsy things that are Torchwood- and Doctor Who-related. It looks great!

Second, velvet_mace posted a really fantastic analysis of why "bad" fanfic can be popular and gratifying. It is one of the most awesome graphs I've ever seen. She posted it in May and I'm just now finding out about it, so maybe everyone's already seen it or something, but it's definitely deserving of a look if you haven't. There's some cool meta in comments, too.

As always, if you visit these places, play nicely; I'm responsible for you and you have the Cafe's reputation to uphold. :D

1:52PM - Dating article

An interesting article about dating.

My favorite points --

Values vs Interests: Having the same values as your partner is truly a must. Its the glue that keeps you bonding, growing together and connected. Interests are different. For example if you VALUE a family, a belief in a higher being or power, or a fit and health conscious lifestyle your partner should equally believe these are significant in his/her own life. Interests like playing soccer, dance, rock climbing, fishing, fashion or shall I say YOGA, don’t determine compatibility. You don’t have to share every single interest with your partner to make it work.

So true. I've been noticing on online dating sites that people go on and on about interests.

Individuality within a Couple: WHO ARE YOU? Do you know what you desire? What are your dreams? Being an individual is probably one of the more difficult things to hang on to within a relationship. We can get lost in another’s own view and dreams. Staying true to our own desires and dreams is equally important. It makes us happier because we are living our desires and growing from that place. You can’t grow living to please another or gaining approval from another. You are then living another person’s life, and that eventually manifests into resentment, hurt and pain.

I confess, I relied a lot on WG's advice when we were together. He had a knack for seeing straight to the heart of the matter (which holds true regardless of how he's treating me right now). It's fuzzy now how much of that meant he was steering the boat.

Please STOP HIDING who you are! Be yourself, completely. From date one present your authentic self. If you don’t usually wear make up or dress a certain way, then don’t do it for the first date. If you don’t like sports than say so and don’t pretend to be the “sports chick or jock”. If you absolutely dislike smoking than don’t pretend to be ok with that habit in another if you really aren’t. What you are is what you are. Being proud of that is really the first lesson to learn before even attempting to find a date. Pretending to be someone you are not, is not only difficult to maintain but a lie you have to live. How fun is that?

This is so tempting. I'm such a no-makeup, misplaced my comb a week ago kind of gal. But I'm thinking of trying out a different look, playing with a new hairstyle, wearing more makeup than I have been in school. But that's for me though, so I think it's not a pretense.

Funny. I've never dated. Guys have always found me.

10:18PM - [ART] WIP - Gundam Wing - Heero - Accidental Hipster

Two weeks left in the semester, going crazy.

Finished up the latest image for my regular illustration gig. I sketched to celebrate.

( Gundam Wing - Heero - Accidental Hipster )

7:51PM

I really hate the post office near my work. The people there are mean, and they don't respond well to my not-inconsiderable charm. :D

But then I came home and made a toasted turkey-and-stuffing sandwich with brie and fig jam, which was delicious, and went through my Student Loans Paperwork file. I think things are finally starting to slot into place. With any luck, I'll be able to competently fill out my IBR application and in the new year I'll be in the program. The cost of my loan payments will not go down at all on a month-to-month basis, but in ten years if I stay with my current job (or another job in the same company) the balance will be forgiven. So, fingers crossed.

I feel like such a grownup.

I am neglecting my creative projects a bit, but I've felt under the weather the past few days and given that I'm working on stuff I've been meaning to do for ages, I'm okay with that. I'd really like to have Valet of Anize done by the new year, though that's not looking especially likely. I'm working on a series of scenes now that I hope will grow me as a writer -- when I read The Three Musketeers for the first time, three years ago, I was awestruck by Milady's spiritual seduction of John Felton, and I'm writing in a similar vein now, so it's careful going.

Also I need to buy an onion. This shouldn't be as herculean a task as it is turning out!

3:56PM

To make an omelette, you gotta break a few legs.

I meant eggs! Eggs!

I got a lot of stuff done today but I also broke a lot of stuff (fortunately no limbs...yet). I managed to get my paperwork off to my healthcare provider so it doesn't try to steal $150 from me, but I broke my provider's website in the process. I brought candy for my candy dish, but I broke the scheduling program for our conference rooms. And I dropped a six-pack of Coke on the floor, though I didn't do anything directly to balance that out. Other than restocking the fridge, I suppose.

But! I did get myself set up with Google Adwords for Nameless. The ad is waiting on approval now, but I've done the math and if it earns me three sales a month it's paying for itself. If I can't even get three out of the thing, well, I've only lost eight bucks. I have to admit Google makes it pretty damn painless, even for a fumbling artist like me. I was expecting to spend much more time being much more confused.

Also, I dove back into the whole Income-Based student loan payments thing that the US has set up, and I did not cry, which given how similar it is to doing one's taxes is quite the feat, I think.

10:24AM - Why did I trust him?

Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'll find my dresses in one of the boxes, buried under some books.

I should never have listened to WG.

I was supposed to go to Seattle September 9th. I had the tickets and it was all set. We were going to go through all our things together and split them up. Take things to Goodwill. I was going to help him move. I was going to take him to his oral surgery appointment. I was going to put together furniture for him in his new apartment. I was going to spend some time with Monte kitty to say goodbye.

He called me and asked me not to come. He'd send me my things.

Why did I trust him?