200 Things to Do Before You Post
So, there’s this list of 200 things you’re supposed to go through and bold what you’ve done. Some of them are very specific: I’d like to see Siouxsie and the Banshees in concert, for example, but it’s unlikely I will ever have the opportunity; I imagine that “fallen in love at an ancient Mayan burial ground” is pretty rare, too. A few of them conflict a bit; “Visited all 50 states” and “Visited more foreign countries than U.S. states” can both be accomplished, but at a real cost in time and money.
In the final tally, if I counted right, I managed 84 out of 200. I’m pleased with that result.
EDIT: Rain reminded me of one I missed. 85 🙂
Never deal with a Dreadlord
Just watched Unlimited Escapism, Vol. 0, by “Baron Soosdon”. 14 minutes of wild visuals and trance music… nicely soothing on a Woden’s Day evening.
This image of Petite Nikita, however, made me want to run a Shadowrun (2nd ed.) game set in a highly-technological future of Azeroth…
I doubt that anyone would be thrilled to find that their back-alley street doc was an undead Forsaken 🙂
Good News and Bad News
Yesterday was a real roller-coaster ride.
I was slammed with tickets at work yesterday, and fell behind despite my best efforts. I’m catching up a little bit today, but what a mess. There is never a lack of things for me to do here, let me tell you!
So, back in April, the driver’s door switch in the Hyundai broke. The car believed that the door was constantly ajar, meaning I couldn’t keep the power locks locked while the car was in motion (BAD), the dome light wanted to stay on all the time (turned it off), and the open-door dinger would chime erratically (psychosis-inducing).
While I still have to take the car by the dealership for several reasons, it finally occurred to me that with three pennies and a bit of duct tape, I could restore proper function to the switch. Now the locks work right, I’ve got my dome light back, and the dinger is no longer suggesting that I go on a three-state murder spree.
Then we headed over to ptownhiker‘s superhero game; and, less than a block away from the venue, someone’s cat darted in front of the car. It was over before I registered the blurred shadow. We pulled over immediately, and found the owners, but it was far too late. The owners thanked us for having the decency to stop and find them… thank goodness I was heading straight to a big gathering of friends, because that was a hell of a downer.
The WWII superhero game, on the other hand, may have been the best session we’ve had in the campaign. All the heroes pulled together as a team and contributed something vital to the rescue of a torpedoed troopship in the North Atlantic, and the evening was full of crazy plans and laughter. One of the heroes has what is basically the Portal super power, and we come up with a new way to abuse it almost every session 🙂
And this morning I found where I’d accidentally hidden my iPod from myself. So, an eventful day-and-a-half.
EDIT: Here’s a Flash version of the Portal game. I wish I hadn’t found this at work 🙂 http://portal.wecreatestuff.com/
Resting Place
Since the issue has come up, this is what I’m currently thinking of for the fateful day:
I recently heard the story of a person whose passing wish was to have her ashes scattered at midnight on a local golf course.
Problem was, no one in the family had access to the golf course. So the family and friends had to sneak in, in the middle of the night, in their funeral garb; scatter the ashes, and get the heck out, riding adrenaline highs and laughing nervously the whole time.
When I heard that story, I thought that was awesome.
Area 51 is probably a bit much to ask of you folks, but I’m sure I can come up a suitably interesting place before it’s time.
I dressed funny today. Like that’s new.
Happy Halloween / Samhain to everyone!
I wore my Enterprise jumpsuit for candy distirbution tonight. Nobody recognized it. Given that people even mis-recognized it at a DragonCon where Connor Trinneer was guesting, I have to wonder if it should be packed away and only brought out for hardcore fannish events.
On the other hand, I got involved in a very cool audio production of a part of the Headless Horseman legend. You totally need to check out the journal entry I’ve linked to, and listen to the file.
Here, have a holiday-themed WoW screenshot.
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Gnome on Broomstick Mirandala riding the “Magic Broom” available during the 2007 Hallow’s End celebration |
The Halloween workplace
Haven’t seen anyone dressed up for the holiday here at NASA. I guess it’s not too surprising, we are conducting serious business here frumph frumph frumph. But I have my bunny ears nearby in case of emergency.
The places I’ve worked have had varying policies about employee Halloween costumes. I think I wore a costume at B&D Comic Shop, but it was so long ago, I can’t clearly remember. The “Thrifty Nickel” encouraged dressing up, though many years, no one bothered but me; I usually wore a Starfleet uniform or my Jedi outfit. One of the last years I was there, one of our more conservative salespeople unaccountably chose “Tinkerbell” to make her sales calls in, which led to a panicky alteration of the costume when she discovered how much leg even the tame Disney version would show.
I can’t recall any costuming at Decipher, which was a bit of a surprise – you’d think a bunch of game geeks would garb up. My last Halloween at BCT was a smash, though. I dressed up in drag, and was convincing enough from behind that one of my bosses mistook me for another co-worker.
Anyone here dressing up for work?
Countless Screaming Argonauts
Thursday night, the Norva hosted They Might Be Giants for an evening. I’d wanted to go, but hadn’t gotten around to getting tickets and would probably have eventually blown it off; however, I got a phone call from Dwight offering me a spare ticket. I wasn’t going to turn down a free pass! We swung by on Tuesday and picked up a ticket for Starr, and looked forward to the evening.
When I arrived the night of the concert, I got a shiny green wristband to go with the “yes I’m over 21” wristbad. I learned that this band would get me upstairs into the VIP balcony seating, and VIP restrooms and bar/lounge. Swank! raininva and torn757 showed up for the concert, and I got to wave to them from the balcony before heading down to chat. (I said it a couple of times at the show, but I’ll repeat again that Rain’s really looking great. And I got to meet her boyfriend, which was cool.)
Starr finally got out of work, and arrived during the opening performance – a band from Ireland named Oppenheimer. She didn’t have a VIP pass, though! So I told her I’d stay downstairs and enjoy the show with her. The question turned out moot; Starr walked up to a bouncer, smiled sweetly, and made an impressive Fast Talk roll. Soon we were all upstairs for the rest of the evening.
The show itself was awesome. The band sounded incredible, and put on a goofy, geeky hilarious show. They played everything I’d hoped to hear, including “Mesopotamians”, “The Sun Is a Mass of Incandescent Gas”, “Particle Man”, and of course “Birdhouse” and “Istanbul”. (Did you know that one of the primary components of the Sun’s nuclear fusion is Advil?)
A bouncy, entertaining, endorphin-rush night. Hard to ask for better.
My packrat-fu is strong
Starr’s parents gave her a bare-bones used iPaq PocketPC to use at work – there are all sorts of electronic drug references and such for nurses. Luckily, I happened to have an iPaq stylus lying around. Luckily, I happened to have an iPaq power cable lying around.
I smiled at her, and said “To answer a question you asked several weeks ago: This is why I have all the boxes of old cables.” She laughed.
I’m still not on jdunson‘s level, though. I’m pretty sure he carries around the necessary cable to connect a SATA DVD-RW to an ENIAC.
Getting up before the sun is bad enough for me. Soon, I will be driving to work before sunup. I really hate that… but I shall live.
I did fix a space heater before attaining full consciousness this morning. Some doof left two loose washers in it that were getting caught in the internal fan; I found a hex driver that would loosen the grille enough for me to shake them out. Saving $40 before breakfast makes me feel good.
Wizardly Secrets
Speaking about her books at Carnegie Hall in New York, J.K. Rowling filled fan fiction writers everywhere with glee when she outed Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore.
Hapana.com and news.yahoo.com both report: Rowling said she “always thought Dumbledore was gay” and that he originally fell in love with the wizard Grindelwald.
Dumbledore’s orientation isn’t a factor in the plots of the books, so it doesn’t change much for me, though I’m pleased at the additional glimpse of his character. Anyone else have thoughts?
