My glasses do offer UV protection! Today was a really bad day to forget that there is a miracle known as sunscreen and then go wandering to Jasper and then go grocery shopping.

This is going to hurt very shortly.

Well that went well. I saw WALL-E. It was painfully cute and also had a well spoken moral. As boy!Corey said, it's not even something you can see someday happening to Earth. No, it's something you can see happening right now.

It was also fascinating from an artistic standpoint. It was just like in V for Vendetta, where I was impressed by V's character since all of his acting had to be through body gesture and voice work what with having no real face. This one impressed me with the range of expression that the main characters could manage with such limited body movements and a very simple vocabulary. They could only really say their names and the words "plant" and "directive" and they still were not only easy to connect with, but they had very distinct personalities. It's not always what you say. It's how you say it. Gives me ideas for my book in some ways, since a lot of that revolves around a language barrier.

Also... Eve's character. She's a pod with a round head and arms that don't even have joints. There is so little movement capable there and yet she was extremely expressive. That was cool.

Plus, she reminds me of Brittany in tiny robot form. Win.

I giggled and sniffled a lot. Good fun movie.

Finally, I have my sexy shiny after all. My brand new iPod Touch is charging on my dresser and looking very sleek. I'll still use my old iPod Mini until it really dies, but mainly as a backup or something to lend to people (provided that they can tolerate my tunes). And yes, I'm naming it Zaphikel, for it likes to be touched.

Now to go back to waiting for Corey to get home. >>

Someone needs to kick my ass and get me to finish something, art-wise. I have the following:

( A List and Some Pieces of Artwork In Progress )

Its been the same problem all year. I have the skill, but my motivation is just shot. The result is this. I keep starting one hundred million drawings, getting partway through each one, and then getting bored and starting another. The next thing you know I'm up to my eyeballs and I can't dig myself out.

Everyone tell me that they specifically want to see one of those finished. Then I'll feel like I owe people or something and I'll get it done. Or something. Somethingsomething.

In other news, my birthday was good. Thanks flaming bunches to everyone who popped up and wished me a good one. I actually don't think I've ever had so many people remember. You're all sweethearts. <3 I'd report on my swag (because who doesn't love a bragging session?) but it's... actually not all here yet. I have at least three people who swear they have something for me, but they haven't forked it over yet. Squee! Nothing better than dragged out surprises. =D

Tomorrow we're theoretically going to see the new Batman movie... but possibly not. The boys are grumbling at me that they don't want to get up in the morning at all and see it before/at noon, and I have to be home around five. Poor Corey's flight back from Italy was delayed like crazy and she was stuck spending the night in Toronto. Come hell or high water or badgers in tutus, I'm going to be home so she can have someone to vent at/collapse in front of and babble gibberish at. So I might not be going.

I'm not sure I relish the idea of a full theatre and a gigantic line-up, of course. I don't care how awesome a movie is, I'm not sure its worth me hyperventilating. I'm not too choked up about the idea of staying home.

Besides, I'm getting a sexy shiny tomorrow if I'm home. >> Otherwise I'll have to wait for next weekend. It will be the second piece of technology I have that demands to be poked and prodded before it will give to me what I want. I may name it Zaph. That's all I shall say for now.

WHOO! ONLY TWO AND A HALF WEEKS UNTIL I'M IN TEXAS. DANCE WITH ME.

Update! Never mind. We're going to WALL-E here at the City Centre theatres instead. Much closer, much shorter, much easier to get in to. I'll be back in plenty of time to catch Corey-bug. Also means no shiny for me, probably, but I can survive another week without it.

Today was the first time in a long long time that I just sat down and allowed myself to play for a bit. I needed that. I could feel my stress levels dwindling and fading until they were gone, and I made some stuff to show off and provoke giggles with, too.

See, there's a game that's produced a lot of hype over the last while: Spore. It's basically guiding a creature through the stages of evolution, adding bits here and tweaking limbs there until you get a unique critter. Very cool. I'm not so much interested in the game aspect, of course. This is me. My attention span for games is limited. Besides that, Spore itself isn't out yet. A tiny mini-program is, however, and in my opinion it's the best bits of Spore in a compact and very cheap package (Only $10? Why not?). That would be the Creature Creator. It's a little program that gives you a blob with a spine and a hundred or so eyes, ears, feet, hands, heads, and fancy bits. Stretch it, squish it, stick pieces on and test drive your new beastie. Fun and cool.

I'm basically going to wind up using this to create a mini-library of my head critters and favorite aliens, plus for coming up with a few more just out of the blue. I love designing critters. This rocks.

Today I went with the theme of my novel's universe and made a happy tekk and a really really dorky looking Tarsin tikedi (it had to be a Tarsin; the only "hair" I could find was spiky not-very-hairlike stuff; I do wish there was more of that, especially since tekk technically have a mane or a crest of hair instead of a lizard frill, but that's really my only complaint about the whole thing). The tekk's my fave, hands down.

( Beasties are this way! Prepare to giggle, for they are dorktastic. )

So ta da! Spore Creature Creator. It's fun. iSquee.

Now I need to drink something or I'm going to die of dehydration.

Well, days have been better lately. Lots better. Everything in between my panicky posts is generally a day I don't say anything because it's a fine and all right day.

I guess there are a few things I forgot to update on, for those that were actually wondering. Scotty-fish did recover from his case of pop-eye. A week or so in the hospital tank with treatments of Maracyn and Maracyn 2 did the trick. The sad news is that when all the puffedness went away, I got a good look at the side of his head and it was indeed an injury that caused the popeye in the first place. He's missing either part or all of his left eye. Hard to tell with him. My guess is that it still works a bit because he seems able to see what's going on behind him on his left side, but he's otherwise blind there. It makes feeding him interesting. I have to tap the water so he feels the vibration and turns, otherwise he misses the pellets entirely until he sees them with his right eye.

Poor fish. Now he's just like me. He seems perfectly okay with it, though. He puffs at people who walk by his tank and happily builds bubble nests all over the place, so I'm not worried. He just looks a little bit funny now.

I'm looking more into giving Tyler, the plecostamos, a better environment now. I asked mom if she had any little ceramic flower pots or something like that so I could give Tyler a house to hide in and she's going to look. Considering how much he's always trying to bury himself in the plants or lurk in the shadow of the filter or the rock, I think he'd like that. Besides, it worked for Cleaner, our fifteen-or-so year old clown loach at home. He loves his pot. You almost never see him.

I've also finally gotten back into writing. It was a really pleasant surprise for me to discover that after two weeks of putting off the novel, I haven't lost my knack. In fact, spending the in between time on reading (I'm on my third book for the month; jeez) has actually seemed to improve things. I wrote chapter ten on Friday and chapter eleven is almost finished now. Probably wouldn't take me more than an hour to polish it off.

I may not reach my goal, but I'll get a whole lot done by then anyway.

Finally, my injuries. Well, the knee is better. It popped and started hurting again a day or two ago, but was fine within a few hours and hasn't hurt me since. Whatever was going on there is all right now.

The ankle's a different story. That was a really bad sprain. I'm still limping, but the swelling's gone down to almost nothing. Now the whole thing's just a rainbow of putrid purples and blues and yellows from my heel, over my ankle, and across part of the top of my foot. Lovely, huh? It looks like I have a polluted rain cloud tattoo.

This week I work three eight hour days of being constantly on my feet and I unfortunately could use the money, so this is going to be an adventure. I'll just have to suck it up and deal with it. Can do. It's not excruciating like it was a couple of days ago, after all. Just sore.

You know what? I'm going to explain my day. If only because it's astounding me to great degrees. This Wednesday was just terrible.

I had a hard time waking up first. That should have been my first sign of doom. Why? I was depressed. Very vaguely, but depressed. I always sleep a lot when depressed. So it was already impressionable towards negative thoughts.

Then comes thing two. Corey told me she wasn't going to be online on Thursday, but she said nothing about missing Wednesday, and yet she wasn't there. That immediately worried me, if only because I'm a hair-trigger worrier. Can't help it. Before work I tried calling her cell, since that's almost always on and easy to get through to her on, but it was acting weird. At first it was a constant busy signal and I thought she might be on the phone with her parents or something. Then, right before I went to work, it actually started properly ringing, but it would ring and ring and ring and ring and no answer. Then it would jump back to the busy signal.

Cue worrying increase number one. I don't like surprises like that.

Off to work. Work was boring. Work was impossibly boring and it dragged on forever. We had barely any customers and next to nothing to do in the meanwhile. A few odd jobs here and there. I was still worrying about Corey, too, so that didn't help. At lunch I went home, thinking I'd give her a call and see if I could catch her. It would only be about nine or ten in the evening by then. I figured she'd be up.

Again, a constant busy signal. Had she left her cell phone off the hook or something? Can you do that with a cell phone? Or maybe the network had crashed? Either way it was frustrating me because she'd missed our MSN chat time with no reason given and now I definitely couldn't get through to her on her phone, either. I had no idea what was going on and I really hate feeling blind like that.

Back to work. Was really starting to feel moody by that point. About three o'clock I started to notice that my leg was really hurting. Left knee. It would be fine at some angles but not at others. I figure I must have twisted it, but I don't know when or how. Either way, I limped home.

The evening sucked. I was anxious and worried and I was in pain. I fell asleep repeatedly just because I was feeling so down and needed to escape consciousness and worrying. I hate my brain. Even when I tell it to chill, deep down it's constantly panicking. I woke up. I wasted time until 10 o'clock, which would be morning for Corey, and then I tried to call again.

Still a busy signal.

About then I just broke down and cried. I tried again, got the same result, and then just snapped and called her home in Texas. I figured if anything had happened, they'd know.

Corey's little sister Lori answered and sort of calmed me down. She said that Corey hadn't called home that morning either, which gave me absolutely no answers, but she said she thought Corey was probably fine. We talked a bit and it distracted me for a while. At the end she told me she'd let Corey know that I had called and was worried the next time they heard from her and that I should relax. I felt better by the end of the conversation. Then, when I hung up, it all kind of hit me again - that I'd been stressed all day and I hurt and I still didn't know anything - and I started crying again. Just a great big release of everything. I realized being home alone was probably not a good idea with the state I was in because I'd just work myself right back to the beginning of the cycle and so I called my brother. He was across the street at boy!Corey and Rose's place, and asked if I could come visit, just so I'd have people with me, because I was still really scared. They said okay. I headed over.

I was distracted by Invader Zim and their cat, Kissy, and eventually started to feel better. Laughed a bit, smiled a bit, got hugs. Then Liam suggested we go to the Husky station and he'd buy me chips. I said okay and we set out. I vented some more and he was rather receptive, we got our chips and then we headed back.

Then on the way, I hopped a curb to try to avoid putting pressure on my twisted knee. Lo and behold, the gods still hate me because I landed on my ankle. There was a loud snap and suddenly I was on the ground in blinding pain. Not broken, but really really badly twisted. So now I had no good legs. Hooray. Universe, I love you, too.

I eventually got up again and Liam helped me back to Corey and Rose's place. We hung out for a while longer, I got a big hug from Corey, which I needed, and then we headed home. I called my Corey again, just for kicks, and it's still a busy signal. At least I'm just sighing at it now instead of wanting to bash the phone into a wall.

Oh yeah. Did I mention the PMS plaguing me right now? TMI, possibly, but it's a factor. I'm naturally twitchy to begin with, but that just makes it a million times worse.

So here I am. I can feel my right ankle swelling as we speak and I'm freezing an ice pack for it but won't be able to do much with that until morning. My left knee is fine until I move, and then it makes me cringe, and I still have no idea what happened to Corey today or why I can't get through to her. I just really badly want to hear from her and know what's going on and then I think it'll all be somehow worth it. That's all. Just one thing to let me know that she's fine and this little communications breakdown was nothing but me overreacting. I like overreacting. I fear the day when I'm right on the money about things like this.

In the meanwhile, I'm just glad I have people who are understanding and supportive. I'm thankful for that. Immensely.

Figures. Right when I want to write in the morning, my betta goes and spontaneously develops the beginnings of pop-eye. He's in his hospital tank again (last time was a rather nasty fin injury) with clean water and treatment, so hopefully that fixes it and it's not a sign of something worse. Poor Scotty. Last night he was fine, and then I woke up this morning and one of his eyes was filming over and looking gross.

He was easy to catch this time. The first time I put him in his hospital tank I had to chase him with a glass and the fish net for an hour before I could get him out of his big home tank. This time I just tapped the side of the aquarium to get his attention and as soon as he wasn't looking I came up behind him and sucked him into a glass then dumped him into his hospital tank. No stress, no mess. He didn't even seem to realize he'd been moved.

I wish I wasn't as attached to the little guy as I am. I know he's going to croak eventually just because betta lifespans are short, and I keep preparing myself for it.

I've been busy lately. I've gotten more hours at work to contend with (For the next week I only have two days off: Friday and Sunday. The next break won't be until next Friday. Nice for monies.) and my writing muse has been extremely demanding. Yesterday I sat down to fiddle with my book at nine in the morning and by the time I realized I was getting hungry it was six in the evening. Whew! I just want to finish a few things between now and Sunday. Little deadlines. I'm aiming to have everything figured out up to chapter ten. My big deadline is still to have the book written beginning to end before I leave for Texas in August and to be prepared to hand it out for others to critique by September. It'll be nice to get to book two.

Anyway, I should get going. I have to find my socks.

Hello! I'm back. I'm alive. Air Canada sucks giant mooseballs. They broke my pretty pretty Ezra-and-Elian decorated suitcase and it was sad. Fixable maybe if we can find a giant plastic plate to replace the giant plastic plate that shattered when they like.. ran over my bag. Maybe with the plane. I don't know. How do you break that? It was hella crazy durable. I know it was. The impact or whatever also exploded my new expensive loose tea of awesome but we saved the vast majority of it. I just have to get the dregs out of my carpet now. I hate vacuuming. I just did the vacuuming.

HateHateHateHateHate.

But I'm home. I'm alive. The important stuff survived with me and all is good. My vacation was wonderful and makes me want to move to the coast very very badly.

Gluh. Tired. Bed now. Many comments and emails to respond to tomorrow.

I have a hat. It's pinstriped. I love it. It makes me want Converse shoes and a TARDIS.

Whew. I hate packing. I always end up sitting there with a pile of things in front of me and thinking "Too much? Too little? Do I really need this for only four days?" and by the end of it I'm slightly neurotic.

In other news, the Big Finish Doctor Who audios are as cheesy as the show itself but I'm finding that the more I listen to them, the more that I really love them. I've been going through the Eighth Doctor's run and giggling the whole way.

It's probably the only series of audios that I'm going to give a listen to because there's a whole lot of even these, and my attention span's not that good. Really, the only reason I picked them up in the first place is because I have a rather silly crush on Paul McGann. He's got a great voice whether he's being his quiet thinky self or on the total other side of the spectrum and just bellowing. The man can't yell, he just bellows. Honestly. It's impressive. Best examples of it were in my parents' Horatio Hornblower videos. Wow.

...

Damn it, I'm babbling. Enough. Done here.

I posted a couple of sketches in my DeviantArt. I'm worried about how long they're going to stay as sketches, though, since I'm having a really tough time finishing things, even if I'm perfectly happy with how the preliminaries come out. It's like I've totally lost my sense of color. Maybe it's just that I've lost touch with my ability to toy with markers and pencil crayons, though. They're so bright just by nature and even if bright's what I'm going for, I don't really like it much. Not by the time I'm done. I really do like things grayed out and muddied a bit.

I need to go back to watercolors and ink washes and Photoshop. Just to get my feet back. Something like that.

Anyway. I've also got a lot on my mind in regards to others. People I'm worried about and it's bugging me because of my past failings in similar situations. Trying to keep it bundled up and manageable. I want to have fun in Vancouver.

And now that I'm a bit more recovered from All Things and feeling like I'm back on my feet, I have some gloating.

You see this? I'm totally going to be there this summer. With Corey. We have awesome seats.

Muahahahahahahaha!

I win.

Because various peoples were bugging me for a birthday wish list and this is the easiest way to hand it out.

( Here it be. )

Every once in a while my faith in humanity is restored. Whoever was delivering mail this morning misread the address on one of my packages (a birthday present for Corey, although it's not much of a surprise for her). It ended up at an apartment one block over. The woman who lives there actually went to the trouble of tracking down my phone number, telling me about the mishap, and giving me directions so I could come get them from her. How sweet! How kind! I just ran over there to get them and sure enough, yup. That was my stuff.

Now if only it hadn't been the first two volumes of the Trinity Blood novels, in all of their spiky, gothy, vampiric, black leather and chains glory. *facepalms* That poor poor woman. She looked so confused.

It never rains. It always pours. Why does everyone need me at once?

Here. I hopped on the artist bandwagon and got myself a Tegaki E journal thing. It causes my hand to turn into a claw if I draw anything too complex, like that first piece there. Pressure sensitivity! Someone design this thing to recognize pressure sensitivity! For the love of my fingers!

Now, I am quitting for today. I'm not done what I have to do, but the stress is eating me. So for today, I quit. Where's my book? I need to read.

Look! I made a tiny handful of icons and I actually like them! You can see the Ezra one as my new default icon since he always feels like a worthy representative for me and my brain.

( The rest be hiding behind here. )

More later. The rest need to be drawn before they can be iconified.

I have a bit of free time tonight, so I figured I'd throw a post up here just to prove that I'm still in some form of existence. Unfortunately, I don't have a heck of a lot to report, as has been the case all year.

I haven't been feeling particularly motivated towards being creative lately. When I do draw I tend to try to make it worth it, but the instances of me picking up a pencil have been few and far between. I just don't feel like it. I almost never do lately. I know that when I do start drawing I enjoy it immensely, but starting is the hard part. Writing hasn't been much better. In that case I can start, but it feels like the words just aren't flowing as well as they should and after a few paragraphs of drivel I tend to give up.

So basically I'm going to work, coming back, reading or gaming or, more likely, catching up on the endless housework/paperwork/job hunting crap that demands my attention, and trying to figure out what is wrong with me and my muse.

And somehow, not being creative leads me to not having a lot to say to anyone. If you thought I was quiet before, then you'd be astounded to find that I'm worse now. That's the main part of why I haven't been making much of a stir on the internet. I just don't know what to say to my corner of the world. Hi? I'm still here. That's about it.

I should just kick myself to start. Writing or drawing or even sculpture. Doesn't matter. Just start. If I was actually doing something, even if it's utter crap, I'd probably feel better.

That may be all I have to do.

If I can talk myself into doing it.

There's a flu going around.

WARNING: Do not catch it!

Augh it hurts. ;_; And on my long weekend too.

If you need to laugh, I couldn't stop while playing with this thing:

Japanese flash game involving throwing furniture at an old woman's house with a trebuchet.

Mental Note: Always check the bus schedules before attempting to catch the Greyhound.

Guess where I'm not going this weekend.

Jennifer tagged me and hey, its been a while since I did a meme. It's about books! That's enough to sway me into showing some interest.

1. Name one book that changed your life.
Call it odd, but I'd actually have to say it's my current read. It's not a single book, but it is a single story. Stephen King's Dark Tower series has been a big inspiration to me as a writer, and it's also had some little effects on how I view a lot of things in real life, particularly a few relationships of mine. Those books are going to be favorites for years to come, I'm sure.

2. Name one book you have read more than once.
Again, it's not a single book but a series. I recently re-read the Rod Allbright Alien Adventures books by Bruce Coville, since I used to fangirl those like crazy when I was in the single digit years. They were actually still very good reads. What was really fascinating was exactly how much I missed the first time around, especially in regards to the nature of some of the character relationships.

3. Name one book you would take on a desert island.
China Mieville's Perdido Street Station, although that's awfully unfair to assume that I could only carry one book. I chose it because it's one of my favorite weird books and because I secretly believe that my character in the RP that Corey and I do has stashed that one away in her little pink bag somewhere. She's kind of sort of stuck on a desert island herself, although it's more like a desert alternate universe.

4. Name two books that made you laugh.
Anything by Terry Pratchett thus far, but specifically The Wee Free Men. If you haven't read it, then do so. I've never torn through a book faster and it had me giggling out loud the whole way through.

Also Harry Harrison's Bill the Galactic Hero. That's another book that I wish I could re-read but might never get to. Alas.

5. Name one book that made you cry.
I... don't think I ever have actually cried over a book. I've raged to the heavens when a truly awesome character has been slain and I've been awed into stunned silence by a really good tale a time or two, but nothing has really brought me to actual tears. Well. That is unless you count some of Corey's stories, of course, but that's mostly because I'm just so incredibly invested in her characters. Then it's like losing good friends.

WAIT! I just remembered one! Bruce Coville's Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher had me just bawling when I was little. I remember Liam re-reading it a year or two ago and mentioning that it still chokes him up. It was the book that hooked me into all of his other books back when I was in elementary and junior high. I still need to write to him again.

6. Name one book you wish you had written.
I can't say there is one. First, it feels awfully weird to ever presume that I could or would be able to write a story the way the actual author did, and second, if I wrote a book that someone else was meant to write, that would just be fundamentally wrong to me. My stories chose me for a reason and their stories chose them for a reason.

7. Name one book you wish has never been written.
The vast majority of the new Dune novels by Herbert's son and that Kevin J. Anderson person-thing that calls itself an author. Talk about beating a dead horse. They were (are? I rather hope not, but I haven't been keeping track) beating a dead horse with a sledgehammer while blindfolded. Augh. Kill it with fire.

8. Two books I am currently reading.
Just one right now, unfortunately. Like I mentioned before, I'm still working on the Dark Tower series. I'm about halfway through the sixth book, Song of Susannah, right now. I was reading two at once before that: Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla and The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman.

9. Name five people that you tag.
Do it if you will or don't. I'm just curious to see what you'd put down: zoe_sama, wshex, cherry_faery, meestahmahrv, and Nishiko via Deadjournal.