And a couple things I forgot:

1) Saturday night we (Alex, George, Arthur, me) were bored and we couldn't get to the theater before Tropic Thunder started, so instead we watched Kung Fu Panda in IMAX. George was the only one who hadn't seen it already, but the rest of us agreed that IMAX made it even prettier and more awesome.

2) I bought a membership to Capclave because I am missing the hell out of cons and this one is not only in-town but highly non-scary. I don't even need to know what the panels are going to be, because just going and hanging out will be enough to approximate my money's worth.

3) The Dumb has become a two-day extravaganza, but now I'm just chalking it up to "getting back into the swing of things" after vacation.

4) Twitter is fun:

'Carded a doctor co-pay recently b/c I was out of cash. It shows up in my statement as PURCHASE INFECTIOUS DISEASE and I'm all DO NOT WANT D:'

'Overheard@Work: Coworker #1: "One hand doesn't know what the other's doing." Coworker #2: "I think that's because one hand is paralyzed."'

I woke up half an hour early this morning because that dripping noise did not sound like it was coming from the bathroom or outside; my window was leaking prodigiously. I put a towel on the carpet, but the water was kind of streaming down the outside wall of the building and spreading over the blinds and dripping all over the air conditioner, so I hope maintenance can figure out how to seal it up before it causes any damage.

Oh! Alex and George came over to help me install my headboard last night, and we went to see Get Smart at the giant swanky theater down the road. I have no idea if it was true to the original series, but I loved the crap out of it. (OMG the nerdy tech guys were so cute! Also I want their job!) The whole thing held together pretty well, though I didn't understand a couple of the transitions, and it was actually laugh-a-minute funny. Your mileage may vary, but this movie hit my sweet spot so hard I might get it on DVD.

( Work )

Saturday was a very, very slow adoption fair. Almost no apps on anyone, though Zippy got some interest for being a freakin' beautiful cat. Still need to pimp him at work. Lack of working printer complicates this only slightly.

Sunday I slept until almost noon but woke somewhat revitalized. The first thing I discovered while watering my plants was ( OMGWTF HUNDREDS OF BABY SPIDERS AAAAGH )

Cue massive apartment-cleaning! I moved some furniture around, took 99% of everything out of boxes and put it away, and carried my month-old stack of newspapers down to recycling. Where I found a beautiful ginormous dresser with a big "FREE" sign taped to it.

I probably looked like one of those cartoon characters trying to move something obviously too heavy for her, but eventually I inched it into the freight elevator, then inched it into my apartment, then inched it into the spot where the old beat-up dresser lived until now. I'll hang onto the old one until Saturday so it has all weekend to be snatched up.

Then, though my feet were pow'rful sore, Alex came and picked me up so we could go sneak Chipotle-to-go into Kung Fu Panda and make room for imminent George by moving some of my leftover crap out of the spare room. George gets a free Uncomfortable!Futon (TM) and Spinny!Chair (TM) because, well, because nobody wants to move them. Watched some Season3 Venture Brothers (the deconstruction, it will brainfuck you) and then schlepped some bookstacks and a pickanick basket (Hey, Booboo!) back to my place. Place is mildly cluttered until books go on shelf and old!dresser goes away.

Kung Fu Panda was awesome, by the way. Jack Black is still one of my many heroes. It made me miss martial arts so strongly that I looked up Kenpo dojos in my area. If I spell it "Kempo" instead (transliteration from the Japanese can sometimes be an inexact process) I get a hit right in Alexandria, which would be fantastic...I have to get back in some semblance of shape before I try anything, though, and I'm not looking forward to fighting my pain response every step of the way.

Ah, Bubba Ho-Tep. Such a weird little B-movie. Elvis and a black JFK battle a mummy in South Texas, and somehow it goes from utterly bizarre to touching to incredibly poignant. I cried the first time I saw it. You guys should be sad that you missed it on the big screen tonight.

( Doodle #6: Doodle of Incredible Speed. Yeah, so it's D&D-related. Wanna make somethin' of it? )

[[5/5/09 - I'm starting to think I'm going to look back on this as my artistic peak.]]

Holy crap! I finally get every single one of arctangent's stupid brilliant inside jokes!

Watched "Forbidden Planet" with miraling, nautiluspq and deathbysnusnu for class credit, since the screenplay is based on "The Tempest." The Prospero equivalent was a philologist, and he could kill people with his Id. The plot and special effects were actually damn good for a fifties crapfest. One of my more amusing homework assignments, if poorly-timed, since now I have to stay up all night to write this lab report. Optical tweezers would be fun in any other context, but somehow the act of slowly performing an experiment one afternoon per week and then trying to write about it on top of my normal courseload sucks all the life out of the experience. Oh, well. I had to get the movie out of the way.

This weekend was fun, although I of course spent too much time relaxing and not enough working. I regret nothing, as I really needed the break. Now I'll have another stressful and sleep-deprived week and repeat the experience, except that next week is Thanksgiving. Hooray for national holidays! Hooray for assloads of homework to do on the airplane!

But I digress. For tomorrow: Lab report due in six hours, Electrodynamics homework and presentation due in ten. Go, Speed Slacker, go!

EDIT 5:15 AM: Complication #1 - my data is still in the lab, on the hard drive of the crappy old Mac used to run the experiment. Guess I'm going to campus early tomorrow... (Lab report due in four and a half hours. May not make the deadline, but I just sent an email to Peter explaining this, so I think I have until maybe noon as a grace period.)

EDIT #2, 8:45 AM: So Peter emailed me at 6 AM to say that he was stuck in the airport in Denver, so he doesn't mind if I turn it in this afternoon. All-nighter wasted? I think not. I totally have 80% of a lab report - all I have to do is go to campus, get the data, and stitch it in. This won't be my best lab report, or my longest, but they never are, are they? My one consolation is that I'm officially halfway through the year-long Advanced Lab "course", meaning that I only have to write two more of these, and not until next semester.

Good lord is that a great movie. Even better the second time around, and now it has a score and finished CG and everything. I can't really understand why they aren't raking it in with this thing, but perhaps, as one of the geeky converted masses, I'm simply too close to the material.

Yyyyep. Still haven't done any homework. I figure I'll do the physics reading tonight, then post the short story discussion questions, work on the physics homework, and study for the other physics exam in the next couple of days, which has me reading Beowulf on the plane and finishing the other Beowulf-related material back at Swat. I'm finding it hard to get into the "groove" with writing and comicking on Will's computer, but perhaps I'll be able to churn out a couple of comics and tidy up some mostly-finished work before I get back. I fear the return to Swarthmore - a week is not enough to recover!

In the midst of all this, I am going to take Alex to meet Bob, the guy who perhaps more than anyone else shaped my high-school years and made me who I am today. ( On Bob. )

I'll show Alex around the museum, the hall of dinosaurs, the real Balto, hero dog (stuffed and mounted after his death - the ignominy!), the moon rock. Although some familiar faces have moved on, Bob probably has enough clout to get me invited down to the animal room, where I volunteered beginning at the age of thirteen. We may see a show in the new planetarium, attached to the forties-era building like a modern-art zit. The inside, though, the inside, oh! Stars, stars, infinity.

Well, today was sort of a bust. Nobody showed up until lunch, and then I realized that we ran out of nitrogen for the laser overnight, so we couldn't even perform mindless realignments all afternoon like I was planning.

Richard: Well, you know what we have to do now.
Me: ???
Richard: Watch Die Hard.

So we did. I'd never seen it. It wasn't, you know, the greatest movie ever, but gratuitous violence is a wonderful thing when you're thinking about taking a wrench to the damn optics. Alan Rickman, you are a great man. Bruce Willis, ditto.

It's been about two months since I sent off the story, and I hadn't heard anything, so I emailed Brian Aldiss to say hi. (Damn, my inner eleven-year-old is doing cartwheels at that sentence.) He wrote back right away, but didn't have much to add, other than lamenting the fact that everything is done by committee these days. Apparently there are some folks in New York somewhere who do not have a great opinion of his editorial picks for this book. I'm pretty sure "Friends in Need" is helping influence that opinion, but what can I say? I wrote the sucker in high school, of course it isn't as polished as everyone would like. I know we're not supposed to "write for" editors, but I was at least partially re-editing for Brian, and definitely not a committee.

Eh, screw this. There was a time when I really did pin all my hopes and dreams on pushing that story through to publication, but if the Dell Award did anything at all, it showed me that there are people out there who are actually willing to read what I write, and that's infinitely more precious than whatever I might conceivably make from this deal. I am beginning to realize that this probably will not be my first published story, but I don't want to do too much in the way of re-re-editing until I get the actual rejection letter/email/brick through my window. On to other projects! I've decided to draw most or all of next semester's comics before school starts to prevent catastrophic sanity failure. There are several stories I should finish. Also, there's an animation program I've been itching to try. I'd love to make another movie...

Where the crap did all the time go?

[[4/17/09 - Oh man, Rick was such a bad influence. I'm glad he was around to temper all my neurotic bitching about how nothing ever seemed to work right, though. I wonder where he is now. I hope he still has his potato gun.]]

( Thursday through Sunday: A rundown of how my weekend vanished... )

Monday: Awoke around 7 AM to the sound of hammering in the wall directly behind my head. Went to work in the pouring rain. Was rather useless all day, as we still couldn't find the signal. However, Carl had a pre-frosh visiting, and after chatting for a bit I discovered that she used to take Kenpo. Yays! I pitched a number of clubs to her, but she was fairly withdrawn today so I don't know whether she'll actually consider or ignore my advice. Came home, watched some Full Metal Alchemist, did D&D stuff with Alex to make up for what I missed Friday. A good day. I feel refreshed after my weekend away, although I think at least half of that comes from simply observing and being in contact with so many animals. It would be nice to get an actual good night's sleep sometime, though.

I shall make another attempt forthwith.

[[4/17/09 - I'm still embarrassed about that video. It was the first time I'd tried to record anything of great length (all the scenes in the Tribute music video are less than 15 seconds long) and it swoops around a lot while not spending enough time focused on the couple of the hour. I got a few good moments that I remember but the rest of it's awful. They should have hired a professional.]]

( not spoilers, merely general comments about the Movie of Awesome )

Gotta go finish packing for my wild family reunion weekend and get to work, but more later if I think of anything else to say.

[[4/17/09 - ...watch me soar. *sniff*]]

Dear Mr. Lucas:

LEARN TO WRITE A GODDAMNED LOVE SCENE. Or get someone to do it for you. There are ways to make even Hayden Christensen not sound like a robot.

General Grievous intrigues me. I must watch the Clone Wars cartoons to learn more about him.

Not a spoiler, since it's in the trailers: Yoda vs. Palpatine + Anakin vs. Obi-wan = AWESOME.

...( Spoiler...ish. )

In spite of my beefs - thank you, Mr. Lucas, for creating a popular mythology which will last for decades, if not centuries. I feel privileged to be a part of the fandom, and to stand witness as the inverted cycle of your legendary saga comes to a close.

Sincerely, Your Fan,
Eliza

( Linkdump for the interested )

Although I'm gaining ground in the rest department, I'm not sleeping as much as I would like. There are too many crazy things to do before I go back to Swat and become mired in the everyday routine of the forty-hour workweek. At least I'm on the sleep schedule which suits me - get up at 11:00, go to bed at 2:30; that has to count for something. And, indeed, the dark circles under my eyes are slowly vanishing.

I allowed myself two days of complete slacking - farting around on the internet, unpacking, cataloging my book collection, partially "dejunking" my room in preparation for a hypothetical move, reading most of the first volume of Catfantastic (trashy fantasy represent, yo!), learning how to use my dad's old castoff PDA now that the office has him using a Blackberry. Good things:

( Gaming nostalgia, old friends, new purchases, and Star Wars geekdom )

Working on the story. I've cut maybe a page, out of the two-to-three mandated. Jesus, this is hard. Some of my favorite little bits, the clever puns and language tricks, have turned out to be the parts which are least important to the story. Out the window with you, then! I console myself by saying that when I'm rich and famous, I'll print the "updated" version with all my favorite lines reinserted. Maybe I'll print a collection with all of the "Friends" stories at once. Of course, that means I have to write them first. XP Anyway, it has to be one of life's supreme pleasures to plunge into a story, with nowhere to be and nothing to do, and just play around for hours on end.

gimme three steps, mister, gimme three steps toward the door

[[10/11/08 - I never did look her up. I didn't want to seem too stalkerish, and the poor woman was completely senile. I at least have my memories of her, even if the reverse is probably no longer true.]]

I am holding my very own DVD copy of the Protein Synthesis video. It is t3h camp. There should be a showing, either in two weeks when I come back and/or the beginning of next semester. Also obtained a copy of Wizard of Speed and Time, which I must show to my little brother, because he loves this sort of thing.

Home. Exhausted. Just emailed off last assignment of the semester. Want to unpack, but barely have energy to type. Have already lost ability to write complete sentences. Sleep now, massive unpacking madness tomorrow. Am currently surrounded by cats and very happy.

( Worldview Quiz )

[[10/11/08 - My little brother actually hated the movie; I have no idea why it didn't connect with him, since he was really into stop-motion.]]

Wizard of Speed & Time = BEST MOVIE OF TEH UNIVARSE. The...the everything...was mind-blowing. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING I've ever tried to do with film, it was there, and it was a hundred times better than anything I could ever make. But all I can do is try.

So if I don't have some sort of stop-motion film by the end of the summer, please kill me with an axe.

This is what I missed all semester. The work and the sleep loss and the constant pounding of the thundercloud fist of academia made me forget what it's like. But I'm sitting here and I'm barely touching the chair and the ideas are fountaining from my brain and flying around the room and I'm already waking up from a long semester of slumber and pretty soon I'll remember how to catch them and this is the best, the most wonderful feeling in the entire world.

[[10/11/08 - I'm glad nobody took me up on my request.]]

nautiluspq: I wonder if there's a psychic phone sex hotline?
deathbysnusnu: I know what you're wearing...the cards tell me!

So I got another comment on my livejournal post about the hilarious Berkeley Protein Synthesis video, which was most recently shown in February 2004. You have to see this thing to believe it. I'm not even going to try to explain. Anyway, the comment was once again a college student who nearly pissed themselves laughing and really wanted a copy. I have scoured the intarweb high and low and have been unable to find one, so I got in touch with the Bio professor who owns the VHS tape. She let me borrow it to make some DVD copies, on the condition that she gets one. I just want it in a format which doesn't decay as quickly as VHS does - and, coincidentally, can be ripped to my hard drive and possibly posted on the web. ;D

Last exam tomorrow. Six hours, but taken in the comfort of a fluffy chair in the physics common room, with open notes/textbook/everything, and Doc just around the corner to answer questions. I love this guy...if there's anything that can help me overcome severe math anxiety, it's probably this.

[[10/11/08 - I got the DVD and everything, but I procrastinated so long in uploading it that someone else on the internet beat me to the punch. Oh well.]]

Darth Vader has a lot to say to his whiny, no-good son.

So I started writing the D&D entry a couple days ago, but I was so caught up in the studying and death that I didn't have time to finish it until today.

Exam Week: 2 down, 1 to go. The Econ one went fine, and I have high hopes for a mildly good grade in spite of the fact that I came out of that class hating the very foundations of Economics. The Quantum Mechanics...eh. Could have been better, could have been worse. Probably didn't fail. I hope. I've lost all sense of proportion on these things.

OOH! THING! Remember the fan letter I sent to Mr. Budrys a while back? His wife sent me a note back that she was going to print it out and take it to him, and then I didn't hear anything for a while. I figured he got lots of fanmail every day and didn't, you know, have the time or the strength to answer all of it. However, yesterday I got a mysterious package from one "A.J. Budrys"....!!! An autographed proof copy of the latest edition of Writing to the Point by Algis Budrys! Kick ass. I've heard mixed reviews from people who know things about writing, so I'm not going to take his word as gospel, but I am certainly going to read it with an open mind. I still have to send them a thank-you email. Or a card or something. Man, SF people are without a doubt the nicest bunch of folks around. Although I sort of wonder how they got my address...through Michael, I guess. I'll ask him.

Attended the premiere of appending_doom's SWIL documentary last night...it was t3h awesome. My main cameo (although he tells me there were others) was when sinsofthedove mentioned reading science fiction and it cut to a mug shot of me flipping open The Family Trade, of all things. I'm sorry, Mr. Stross, but that book reads as if you spent two whole weeks of your life on it. I love the bit where you can't decide whether the character's name is "Helge" or "Helga". Please shoot your copy editor. ANYway, I then proceeded to give the audience my "I'm KISS, look at my tongue" face. Mildly embarrassing, but funny as hell, in my opinion. The rest of the audience seemed to enjoy the documentary as a whole, and I look forward to seeing it again if appending_doom ever manages to get it into a portable/watchable format.

I was going to play those levels of Katamari Damacy that I missed when I accidentally beat it last week, but then I remembered that I still needed to write my grandfather a birthday card, and then I got distracted by an ongoing LJ comment-conversation between karentraviss and frostokovich. Damn you people for being so interesting and funny! My poor contributions are near the bottom. They REALLY make me want to try Clarion, though - maybe next year? It would require a large sum of money fountaining from my ass, and also make it very difficult to do any physics research that summer. Hmmm...maybe the summer after college, assuming I don't start grad school in fucking June? Bleh. I remember when I when it was all I could do to keep from getting phenomenally bored during the summer - where have those days gone? :P

Grocery Store Wars! (Star Wars + food = LOVE!!!!) The sheer density of produce puns alone fills me with joy. :)

doot doot DOOT doot doot doot doot...

Best movie evar.

Basically, KISS has super powers, including fire breath, teleportation, laser vision, and super strength, as well as all their "musical talent". This one guy growls a lot. They have to fight a crazy inventor guy who makes animatronics for an amusement park and kidnaps KISS and replaces them with android replicas. It's really weird, but somehow the whole thing hangs together just enough to be a hilarious B movie instead of a brain-melting torture device. Any boring bits were made entertaining with shadow puppets. Also, Ted's dad gave us ice cream and homemade chocolate chip cookies for no reason and we ordered pizza and soda. This has officially been the best evening ever.

Best offhand comment ever:
"Oh, androids will soon replace mankind in most menial jobs."

Tomorrow we will watch "Wizards of the Demon Blade", which I hope will live up to the high standards KISS has set. *coughNOTcoughHARDcough*

( Ultimate Star Wars Quiz )

Mr. Budrys's wife got back to me and said she would relay the fan letter. Joy! My only major adjustment to the world of science fiction writing is that I am, first and foremost, a fangirl. Gave a reading this evening with the rest of the Fiction Workshop crew - some of them made me laugh (in the good way), some of them made me want to gag. The usual. Mine would have been a lot better if I wasn't still sick as fuck.

idiot control now

Hitchhiker's Guide has been out in theaters for almost twelve hours and I haven't seen it yet. This must be rectified at the first opportunity. I refuse to read any reviews, and if you try to talk to me about it I will most likely put my fingers in my ears and sing. I don't care if it sucks - Hollywood's let me down enough times by now that my expectations are artificially low.

That said, who wants to go see it tomorrow? Anyone have a car?

Today I've felt better than I did all month. I think I actually forgot what "healthy" felt like. Always with the coughing and the choking and the shortness of breath...and it's over! Haha! I win! Suck that, nature!

Wow, I got almost no work done today, but it's alright because I am so totally pumped for the rest of the week. Basically, I got up, went to SWILMeeting, played D&D, and got my ass partially handed to me by a half-wolf, half-robot, due to an unfortunate series of natural ones at critical moments. I did, however, get brownie points for having a single charge of the "Hide from Animals" spell at the right moment, which allowed us to sneak up on the beast and surround it before it had any inkling of our presence. I felt so good on the way home that I participated heavily in an impromptu snowball fight and charged across the knee-deep snow of ML lawn in spite of inappropriate footwear. Hey, it's a start...now all I have to do is get back in shape before, oh, Monday, when I go back to Uechi Ryu and try to catch up on the whole "fitness" thing. Oh, is that going to be painful... 8D

This evening involved physics and some plans to do my Fiction Workshop assignment, but a spontaneous call for an MST3K movie showing dragged me downstairs to suffer/giggle my way through Pumaman yet another time. I think something may be wrong with the tape - it's acting a little wonky. This merely adds urgency to my plan to put all my VHS tapes on DVD before they entirely die. A project for Spring Break if I ever heard one....

I caught the end of Twelfth Night when I came down to start the movie, and all I can say is, why the hell was Gandhi coming on to the camera and dancing around? Everyone says it's a great movie, maybe I should actually watch it.

QotD:
"Thank you, O Pasta Necklace!" - Vidigno (sp?), Pumaman

Why hello, can I borrow a cup of BALD?

[[6/27/08 - Oh, how often my hopes for the new semester were dashed. But at least there was Pumaman.]]