Continuing our year of New Years, we give you the Feast of the Annunciation, March 25: the day that began the year in England, Wales, Ireland, and the British colonies until 1752. The image is an annunciation scene painted in the Netherlands around 1425 by Robert Campin and an assistant.
Happy you-know-what, everybody!
(Users’ Manual: Obey The Rules. Consult The Guide. Have fun!
Why are the lower left and upper right corners of the picture missing?
This painting is part of a triptych painted on three wooden panels. I imagine the missing corners are where they fit together or where the hinges went. Lady B. may know more about this piece.
I found one of my “old” journals today. Old as in “pre-MB”. As I’m reading it, I’m pretty amazed by how much of a different person I was back then. I was lonely, because I had just moved and switched to homeschooling. I didn’t even know that different kinds of sexuality existed, although that might have been due to my lack of interest in that area. I had a tendency to be biased, illogical, and judgmental. If I hadn’t found MB, I might have continued to be like that. I could have easily been one of the girls in my dance class who don’t know what “legit” actually means.
..well, maybe not that extreme. I knew what legit meant when I was in second grade. But basically I might have been the stereotypical Southern teenager. Aside from a penchant for disliking watching television and preferring to read books instead.
That’s a scary thought.
What I’m trying to say here, basically, is thank you guys for making me who I am and helping me be a better person. I don’t want to know what my life would have been without all of you. <3
I totally agree. I think I was way different before October 17, 2009.
Wow. Has it really been that long?!?!
I shudder to think how middle school would have been if I had not gotten on the awesometrain in fifth grade. *MB love-fest*
I just finished a GREAT book. Among Others by Jo Walton. It’s sort of low/urban fantasy, but not really (rural fantasy?), with fairies and magic and stuff. But it’s also a boarding school story. And a book about books, and Science Fiction in particular, and life. yeah. it’s REALLY good.
Also, spring Break start on Friday. So I’e been reading a lot more then I was before. Now on Little Fuzzy by H. Beam Piper.
Kindle is awesome.
You’ve read Among Others? Awesome! Jo Walton is an awesome author as well as a really cool person. More people should read her stuff and more people should read more of her stuff. I’d recommend Lifelode especially, if you liked Among Others.
She writes good poems too.
Oh, and if you liked Among Others, you might also like Tam Lin by Pamela Dean. It is about college and nerdy people who go to college. (Also the queen of faeries and such but it is mostly about college.) And yes, I’d say Among Others is rural fantasy. Rural fantasy not of the vampire and werewolf and such sort but of the strange things shifted just off of everyday rural life.
Also, also you might like Juniper, Gentian, and Rosemary, also by Pamela Dean which is about middle school nerds. (it, too, has fantasy things in it too.)
Portable Childhoods is a collection of short stories by Ellen Klages that is along similar veins and is also really good.
Did women really wear dresses that long? It seems a little unwieldy.
Admittedly I’m no expert on it, but probably nobles and rich people did, yeah. Where were they going to go anyhow that didn’t have servants to carry the train or palanquins or stuff like that?
I don’t think peasants (aka most people in medieval Europe) would have, though. For starters, they probably couldn’t afford all the cloth. And second, yeah, it is unwieldy and would get in the way of physical labor. Similar pictures from the time period depicting peasant women depict shorter skirts at least.
Correct my history if I got anything wrong.
Spiffy new picture!
The weather has been so nice lately. It’s just nice to walk around the yard and clean up, with chickens following me, of course. They’re actually getting pretty annoying. I was standing still for a moment, moved, and accidentally flung one of them off my foot. Why would she sit on my foot…?
I planted garlic in the fall, and it actually came up! Can’t wait to dig it up in the summer.
Tri-M is tomorrow! Squee!
/scattered post
So, New Year All Year, I guess.
Hallo all!
There are not many things I will confess to liking about Singapore, but free internet in the airport is one. Off to Borneo.
SFTDP: I forgot to add, happy Saint Patrick’s Day. A pinchey squid to all of you who aren’t wearing green (that includes me, I guess).
AT&T. Grargh.
10 – Agreed. I have AT&T as well, but there’s really no hope of switching because my whole family is on it and has a shared plan, etc.
Also, I only realized now that I was challenged to a Harry Potter Trivia Off! I’m sorry for not seeing that sooner, guys. :/ I’m going to be honest, I’m not very good at Harry Potter trivia, but the fact that I just re-read 1, 6, and 7 might have helped a bit. Either way, apologies for being invisible during that whole thingamagig.
This should probably go on Books and Reading, but *lazy* so does anybody have any good book suggestions? I’ve never actually read Eragon, nor do I know anything about it besides the fact that it’s about a dragon…? Yeah. Somehow when everybody else was reading Eragon at school I was probably buried in Harry Potter or something so I missed the mini phase and I haven’t heard people talking about it in ages. Regardless, would you recommend it? I haven’t been reading much out of school lately, so I really just want to bury in with a nice little fantasy or something.
Don’t read Eragon. Read LOTR if you haven’t already. Or read it again. Read some Le Guin. I also strongly recommend Among Others . Terry Pratchett always good if you want something somewhat funny.
If your interested in some science fiction, The Android’s Dream by John Scalzi is good. Or any of his other books. Cory Doctorow’s also good, if a little heavy handed at times.
Little Fuzzy by H. Beam Piper is somewhat good, and in the public domain, so if you have an ereader you can get if for free from project Gutenberg.
Branching out even further, The Areas of My Expertise and More Information Than You Require by John Hodgman are also good.
Hmm, interesting. Thanks for the suggestions, embarrassingly I haven’t read LOTR even though I own it (Which makes it even worse, really. It’s not like the books haven’t been accessible.) Should I start with The Hobbit?
Yes, you should.
I would.
Dracula by Stoker was very good, if you like a sort of old, creepy vibe. The language was easy enough, and the style is beautiful.
That’s interesting. Many of my friends have read it and considered it almost as bad as twilight plot wise.
I agree with TMFA. Don’t read Eragon. Read something by Diana Wynne Jones. Cart and Cwidder perhaps.
Though I’ve been too swamped with school to work much on my fantasy world I mentioned a few weeks ago, I have begun to develop an alphabet for some eventual languages. It uses a base 12 numbering system, which I know will please some of you.
How would numbers be involved in an alphabet?
Well, I need symbols to represent numbers. Punctuation’s important too.
Progress: I’ve completed it and made a custom keyboard layout for it. It’s basically a one-to-one correspondence with the Latin alphabet, though I dropped C and Z and added glyphs for th, sh, and ch. Punctuation is a period, a comma, an exclamation mark, and a question mark. Now, to practice writing with it.
Fun fact: this alphabet was based on how I sloppily connect a lowercase t to a lowercase e.
♥
Yay! Someone else who feels C is unnecessary!
Would you like it to go extinkt?
I recently invented an alphabet called Fuplah Ra. I dropped C and Q and added some new letters including th, sh, and ch. There were some more new letters as well; I forget what they all are. There are also separate symbols for long and short vowels.
Oh, I think I might’ve removed X as well, although I can’t be sure because I’ve misplaced the key. Again. I probably should make a digital version once I relocate it. “Fuplah Ra” is pronounced “Fooplah Ray,” by the way. It means “Rosebud Two.”
I made an alphabet my freshman year! It was extremely phonetic and had different symbols for different vowel sounds. I should see if I can find that sheet…
Despite to popular belief, I never invented an alphabet. My calligraphy is just …interesting. But functional. I mean, who needs to tell the difference between v, u, r, m, n, u, and i ?
My ‘v’s look like ‘r’s and vice-versas. So I can tell the difference, but others are like “rery” or “ved.” So yeah.
I don’t do it on purpose, it just started with french verbs that ended with z or s in the vous-form and I could remember which, so I implemented a creative solution.
That sounds like one of my sister’s friends. She could never remember which accents were acute and which were grave, so she wrote them all straight up and down: accents verticaux. She’s now a physics professor.
Strangely enough, in spite of my otherwise pervasive left-right/directional confusions, I didn’t have any particular difficulty with knowing whether an accent was grave ou aigu. Maybe because accents were coded in several dimensions — sound, spelling, meaning, &c — rather than presenting a simple binary choice. To me the accented letters are as distinct from each other as, say “f” from “w.” (Guess this should be on a thread of “things I never thought about until today.”)
Having bad handwriting is a blessing in some ways – there was more than one English timed writing where I couldn’t remember how to spell the author’s name or something embarrassing like that, so I’d do “The author of _Brave New World_, A. Hscribble” and the teacher never noticed.
I remembered acute versus grave because acute appears in Spanish and grave doesn’t and I’d learned Spanish first.
lol, my boyfriend’s got the same problem….His ‘v’s and ‘r’s are indistinguishable….Which causes difficulties when I’m quizzing him from his handwritten flashcards for things like human anatomy and animal phys when half the stuff on the cards are unfamiliar words, so I dont’ know if a given ‘v’ is really an ‘r’. It makes things interesting, lol.
I’ve never made an alphabet, but I’ve outlined one in my head.
K goes away. C replaces K, and looses the s sound. Milc, cat, nise.
Replace x with c/s — ec/sit.
ph, v, are all f. fone, fery.
thorn (Þ) is brought back to replace th. Þe
Every single sound a vowel can make get’s it’s own letter
Every single sound gets a letter, and only one letter.
Order is based on the way the mouth says the sound, not some random order.
You’re going to have a ridiculous number of vowels.
Also, “it’s”? For shame, TMFA. For shame.
Yay! ♥ Dozenal ftw~
I’m just going to pop in.
I’ve been very busy. I’m in a play these next two weekends (rehearsal for that and another=time consuming), and everything is all very fast and rushed and tiring.
But to slow down, I’d like to tell that I’m off to the New York History Day contest! I got second place yet again at regionals, and so I’m off to compete with older people…. The most interesting part of the story is the topic I chose to study. Is anyone familiar with homosexuality’s status on the list of mental disorders? Well, that’s what we focused on, and I recommend googling it. It’s quite the story, what with interrupted meetings, violent threats, costumes, protests, scientific studies, and overall, a very interesting debate over what it means to be gay.
Yay! Good luck, Fishy!
Nym, unfortunately, will not be going to Nationals.
THE PROJECTOR WORKS! *dances for about half an hour* (For the story, see the Rants & Plaints thread.)
Les Mis is now one of my favorite musicals I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen it through four times in rehearsals. I am madly in love with Enjolras and Little Cosette is so sweet she makes my teeth hurt and I’m convinced Javert has a huge crush on Jean Valjean and “One More Day” has been stuck in my head for five days straight and the Epilogue makes me lay my head down on my projecting table and sob every single time. I’m doing a run up to the local snack store and getting a bunch of candy and sodas for my fellow techies. I’m so, so glad that I get to be a part of it.
There are some days when all you want to do is go to a cafe and drink wine and wear sashes and plan the glorious revolution of the people. I’ve been having one of those days for the past two years and I haven’t realized it until now.
In other theater-related news, we’re doing Our Town in Acting next year! It’s looking like I’ll be cut from the advanced class, but I’m still really glad they’ll do the play! We did some cold reads in class today and some of the people playing George and Emily were so adorable. Maybe I can get a job working lights and sound or stage managing, even if I’m not in the class proper…
I would say “I need a life outside the theater”, but then I realize I don’t.
S-so tiredddd… *been computer-coloring since 8PM*
Two of my shirts have disappeared. A black short-sleeve and a brown long-sleeve t-shirt. I don’t understand where they could have gone, and I liked those shirts.
I guess I’ll go through everything in the dresser?
Got an email from supervisor at Jtown, I can be of use there this weekend. Which means that I don’t have to miss Military Through the Ages! Whee! Now I’m in the process of trying to bum floorspace off of a friend who’s camping out for the event…it worked last year, hopefully she won’t be too put out by latelate notice and all. I feel so weird asking people to do things for me, even when it’s like “hey can I sleep on the floor of your tent and possibly ride down with you? I’ll bring my own food and/or contributions to the camp’s food and if I ride with you I’ll chip in for gas and I can help drive and I’ll help set up and tear down camp too.” Meh.
Anyway, no response (as I just sent that a few moments ago), but HOPEFULLY I’ll have somewhere to stay other than like, sleeping in my car. Because my car is not comfortable to sleep in.
All that said, this is kind of how I want my life to be, just doing cool stuff because it’s cool.
Except without looming academic requirements and no money and stuff. That I could do without.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day, everybloggy! My science teacher threw a potato at me when I left school. Well, it’s one way of celebrating, I suppose…
I CAN SEE THE GROUND! Oh my sweet ground, how I have missed thee… And look! The sun! I’m not a frozen zombie! *squids* I’M ALIIIIIVE…
Happy St. Patrick’s Day! We had a day off from school, on account of it’s being the anniversary of the Battle of Dorchester Heights.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day. I’m wearing a shirt with the Scottish flag on it.
Why are you trying to annoy Irish people?
I’m not. When I got dressed this morning I was too tired to remember it was St. Patrick’s Day. It wasn’t until I arrived at school that I realized the irony.
Guys, I made an absolutely terrifying calculation regarding Doctor Who.
Assuming- 24 frames per second (probably more, but I’m guessing and hoping low). 1 hour episodes (I know it’s a bit less, thankfully.)
Okay, so, combined, Time Of Angels and Flesh And Stone have 86,400 frames. If we guess an average of 5 angels per frame (might be less, but there are enough scenes with thousands of angels to even it out) we have 432,000 possible angels.
And that’s only per episode. That’s not counting the different times they’ve been broadcast. Or the times people have recorded it. Or the DVDs people have bought (I have it on my iPod.
). Or the illegal uploads and downloads. Or any of those having to do with Blink. Or the freeze frames and pictures (which have their own life on every screen and are saved in some database.)
People, we could be talking about easily millions, possibly BILLIONS of angels.
*hides in a corner*
Just watching, waiting for the moment to attack. All at once, probably.
DON’T BLINK.
(Luckily, the frames are only shown one at a time, so most of the images don’t appear for very long. That makes it very unlikely that we’ll have to deal with ALL the potential angels at the same time. But you did forget things like images in books, action figures, sketches by fans…)
Sorry for the double post, but –
Oh no.
Fans’ memories
We need The Sentry to come and take care of them all.
(The Sentry is a character from Marvel comics who was introduced as being a superpowerful hero who had existed since the beginning of the company and used his powers to make everyone- even the readers- forget he ever existed. Yeah, it was meta and weird.)
How many angels can dance on the head of a videotape?
Too many?
Uh Oh…
And they spread, too, every time somebody catches a glimpse of a weeping angel, and then they go home and show more and more people pictures, and…and…and…TERROR
Also, I saw an angel on a cereal box. *shivers*
Happy Saint Patricks’s Day!
It’s really interesting to go back and look at you’re handwriting to see how it has evolved over the years. Mine has gotten marginally neater and shrunken quite a bit.
I’ve never had good handwriting but at the same time, have never felt any great need to improve it, because at least this way, people sitting next to me have trouble copying my notes (Which happens a lot, to my dismay).
Mine has hardly changed at all, except that it was very curly in 2nd grade..
Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
I had a pretty good day today. I bought a shirt made from Ugandan cotton to help benefit war orphans and got to spend lunch talking with my Science Research teacher about EPCOT.
Also, tomorrow is Friday!
I’m currently in the process of a complete mental and psychotic breakdown
Don’t leave us, agrrrfishi.
You can do it…
Hugs.
More hugs and a mountain of dark choklit.
We love you still, anyway and always ♥
It sucks now, but it’ll pass eventually and things will get better *hugs*
*hugs**gives pie*
Aw, I hate it when that happens. Much sympathy. Try eating cereal, that seems to help. *psychotic squid*
Sooo… I feel like a normal teen almost. Today after school my friends and I went to the park. One of them has a paranoid mom, and even though she is almost 18 she isn’t allowed to do much. We are still in shock that she is now allowed to ride in cars with other teens. So we left the school, and our friend’s mom had told her not to eat because she wouldn’t be hungry for dinner. We decided that we are rebels and bought a bunch of fries at McDonalds even though we normally don’t like to eat their food.
We walked around the park for a while and planned how the sheltered friend and two of our other friends are going to get an apartment together in a couple years. It was really fun.
I feel like according to movies and tv this is supposed to be what my entire high school life is like, but it just started this year and it’s almost too late. I feel like we are the nerds in a high school story who are really cool and have fun doing stuff that normal kids think is lame.
Also, I have decided that I might be really cool and dreadlock my hair. When the German exchange students came in November, one of the girls had dreads and it looked awesome. She almost convinced me to do it and she even offered to help me start my dreads when I come to Germany. She said it is a lot of work for the first few months, but it’s worth it. Also, it is a myth that people with dreads don’t wash their hair.
The section leader of the saxophones is always twisting his dreadlocks.
I know someone who likes to chew on his. It’s very disconcerting.
24 (Agrrrfisihi)~ *hugs* We’re here for you if you need.
25 (UP)~ Heh, normal teenagerhood. I remember the first night that I had that feeling, hanging out with some of my Wisconsin friends and going to Denny’s. Terrible food and I only knew the two sisters I went with, but it was fun. Normal is a very strange feeling.
Also, DREADLOCKS! Yes! I’ve been thinking and talking about dreads since this summer/fall, and I’m actually growing my hair out so I can do it if I don’t chicken out. You have to have at least 3 inches, my hair is about 5 or 6 inches by now, but with the hair shrinking up I want to have some to spare so I don’t end up with some kind of dreadfro effect. I’m pretty sure I want to do it though. We should squeal obsessively together.
(In case you haven’t already found it, google dreadheadhq, they have a lot of information about making and maintaining dreads as well as more products for them than you probably ever imagined existed or will ever need.)
I just got back from dinner! Some friends and I organized a sort of flashmob (we didn’t really start in different parts of the room, though) where we sang “Belle of Belfast/Tell Me Ma” and polkaed to it in the middle of the cafeteria. It was really fun!
A girl at school today was wearing a shirt that said “Kiss me: I’m Swedish”.
Is anybody watching the NCAA basketball tournaments? I made the best bracket ever for the men’s tournament with my foolproof methodology that consisted of flipping a quarter. Too bad my champion, Louisville, is already out.
Okay, I unfortunately have no idea if this is true or not, but I am told of two people who came in wearing a pair of shirts, one of which read: “Kiss Me, I’m Irish.” The other said “Kick Him, I’m British.”
The little jock inside of me is watching the NCAA tournament.
Two big upsets in the first round, what is this? Luckily I didn’t hace Louisville going too far…
A girl at my school wore a shirt that said “Kiss me, I’m Pregnant.”
Yeah…I love Kentucky
Two things I miss (correlated):
1. Pre-Calculus-level-math classes.
2. Sleep.
Oh, sleep. I remember sleep vaguely as something very nice and soothing where all you’re troubles and life went away for about 6 hours in a trance. I think it’s a myth though, kind of like unicorns.
I must be the only person left on MuseBlog who freaks out if she doesn’t have eight hours of sleep.
No, you’re not.
You’re not. Though I don’t usually get 8 hours. I try for 8, I usually get 6 or 7.
If I get much less than eight hours of sleep I feel terrible. I wish it weren’t so. Because if I didn’t need to sleep so much, I’d have much more time to to do fun things, foment revolution and keep the world safe from HPBs.
Curses! Drat! ETC!!!
On the bright side, while you’re sleeping your brain is very busy preparing itself to handle all those fun things, so you can do them better and enjoy them more.
I wish I could afford to do that :/ I average around 6.5 on your average school night.
That’s about right for me. This past couple weeks I’ve gotten much less than that, though.
My goal this school year has been to get to sleep before 11 every night. I’ve been modestly successful, but I still feel exhausted a lot of mornings because I wake up at 6, and that’s only 7 hours.
Have you guys ever heard of “free time”? Apparently, some people have hours and hours on end when they don’t have anything to do. Imagine that! It must be just another urban legend. *glares at unwritten Biology essays*
What is this sleep of which you speak?
Look up Historyteachers on youtube. There are all sorts of excellent things such as the French revolution to “Bad Romance” and Canterbury Tales to “California Dreamin'”
And, while you’re at it, look up a complete history of the soviet union told through the eyes of a humble worker to the tune of tetris. It is made by someone else but it is excellent too.
Did they do a parody of “Apologize” about the American Revolution?
I’ve seen that one, by the way. Still has nothing on the JSC version “Apollo Guys”, though.
That is so incredible. I know now how I want to study for the AP Euro test.
Ooh, I forgot to mention: tomorrow (i.e., the 18th) is the last day of Tabesca, and the Spring Festival is right after that!
Friday! No PSSAs! But on the downside, we have a whole 45 minutes to listen to some guy read “The Giver” painfully slowly. I finished it in the first 2 days, so even more torture. Ugh.
I HATED that when I was in elementary school.
I sound like such a high schooler. LBK, you’re in eighth grade, right?
They gave you The Giver as a reading assignment in elementary school?
No…I mean having to listen to some guy on an audiotape read a book painfully slowly when I’d finished it in the first two days.
The only book that has ever worked with that was “Night” (that one about the Holocaust). We’re reading it in school. Oh, the depressingness.
4am here, considering staying awake for another 17-18 hours just to break the cycle *sigh*
That has never worked for me.
yeah i was even thinking that as i typed it…*headdesk*
But O! the number of times I’ve tried.
I guess it’s that time of the year again- the air is warm, the pollen is flowing, and I kept waking up in the middle of the night because my nose was stuffy and I couldn’t breathe.
Spring allergies are annoying, but things could be worse. At least you’re not proposing marriage to every other MBer in sight.
True.
KAI, WILL YOU MARRY ME?
What he emoted.
Okay, so I’m happy today because…
– It’s Friday.
– I don’t have any Math homework this weekend. I have other homework, but at least it’s not Math.
– MESSENGER is orbiting Mercury!
– Erin was able to go to an event at AMNH while MESSENGER was going into orbit and we texted each other, because she couldn’t call.
– And I made a joke involving PETA and a failed Coca-Cola product from eight years before I was born. And Erin got it.
– We got to watch The West Wing in AP Gov class!
– My grade won March Madness, and the team I was in won the Quiz Bowl event!
What was the joke?
Okay, so, Ingrid Newkirk is the president of PETA, who has said and done several things that Erin disapproves of and hence is on Erin’s “hit list”. New Coke was a variation on the traditional Coca-Cola recipe that was introduced in 1985 but turned out to be widely unpopular and was a huge embarrassment for the company.
So… Ingrid New Coke.
I just had the seriously depressing thought that the first movie I ever saw with Alan (long before we were dating, and back before we’d really even moved on from being lab partners to being friends) was the second twilight movie. *barf* It so was not worth the $1 spent on the ticket….
On a less depressing note, I do still have the origami whale that he made me from my ticket. It’s sitting on my desk back home….
I still can’t believe I actually sat through that movie.
My old boyfriend made me an origami heart. I still have it and would really like to know how to make one.
Aw, that’s so romantic.
Just kidding, that was one of the most boring movies I’ve seen.
You know someone’s cool when he wears bright blue sneakers with red laces, is in the band, is in the school production of Beauty and the Beast, uses a scale from “paper plates to purple rainbows”, and says that Daniel Radcliffe is playing him in the movie of his life.
Sounds like a fun guy.
I have an intense desire to meet this person.
By the way, Emma Watson would be playing me in the movie of my life…
Today I ran into like a thousand people I didn’t want to run into and we had to pretend to talk civilly and try and ignore the awkwardness that erupted out of the fact that we both hate each other and know it. Superfun!
On the other hand, SCSBOA festival and we got a superior!
Holy opening night, Batman! *collapses of exhaustion*
We were awesome. The band pulled off “Master of the House”, which they haven’t done once in rehearsal, and half the prostitutes’ hats fell off and the Innkeeper was the most hammy, scenery-chewing clown I’ve ever seen, and even though I’d only gone through the projection slides once in rehearsal (stupid broken projector) they worked just fine, and during “I Dreamed a Dream” I think I saw a few people crying, and everything was fantastic.
Les Miserables is life. The rest is just details.
So I keep really wanting to get out the house and do something, but I’m too sick (I don’t know what it is), and so I’m stuck at home with my kindle and my programming books and the computer. And it’s getting boring. I’m rereading Little Brother by Cory Doctorow right now. as in i’m holding the kindle with one hand and typing with the other. So, yeah. I wish I could get 52 on this thing. or maybe so manga. Just something different from the novels I’ve been reading.
I’m going to program for a while, I think, once I hit 60% for LB.
Fitting with the spirit of the Spring Festival, I bought chive, mint, and radish seeds this morning. We bought some rosemary a couple weeks ago, and we’re planning on planting basil, parsley, and green peppers as well. Maybe some tomatoes, too. I’d like to plant snap peas, but we don’t have anywhere to put them.
So remember when I was complaining about losing my shirts? I just emptied out my dresser and had a look. Stuck behind one of the drawers was five shirts, four of them mine, and two socks and a pair of underwear that I’d never seen before.
That’s vaguely sinister.
It seems some of the things I can’t explain to my parents I also can’t explain to my brother.
I was sitting at the computer drawing yesterday, and he came up and told me he wanted to use it. I said no, because I was drawing. He says, “You can draw off the computer.” I tell him I’m working on something specific, go away. He then says, “Just copy it on paper.” Because of course I’m able to completely redo something I’ve been working on for 2+ hours (not all at once) just so he can go on Facebook. That’s not how it works, buddy. He should be happy I don’t have a tablet or I’d do it more often.
Does anyone have tips on how to use acrylic paints?
*frustration*
Trojan Tiger, what particular problem are you having?
Oh, yes, they are difficult. It’s generally easiest if you use only a small amount of paint and on a small brush. And put it on lightly. You might want to do a pencil-outline first.
Hello everyone.
Just popping in to say that I received an acceptance letter from University of Puget Sound, along with an estimated $45,817 in financial aid and scholarships.
Per year.
By the way.
Congratulations, Alice!
Congratulations!
Was it your first choice?
It’s not my first choice. It’s my third. But it’s still incredibly exciting, and an awesome school, and the school that I expected to get the LEAST amount of money from. So…I’m pretty happy right now.
Congrats! That is a wonderful feeling!
*confetti pies*
That is really awesome. Congratulations!
If you go there you’ll be in my (general) area
Congratulations!
Grats! that’s pretty good aid money.
Pretty good? That’s really good!
Congratulations!
Congratulations!
How are you doing, ML? Haven’t seen you in a while.
And yes! Congratulations, Alice! That’s absolutely amazing. Good for you!
That’s fantastic that you’re getting such a specific amount in scholarship!
Congrats! *celebratory squid*
Yes! I finished the fan-fic I’ve been writing for about a year! Now I just have to check for any errors, put the finishing touches on my reader-interaction Questions of the Week, and post it on (the site where I’ll post it).
And in the process, I figured out how to combine elements of 40-year-old comics with real-world lunar geology- the Lifestone/Moonstone was found in Shorty Crater!
(And if you get that, I’m very impressed that you know both Avengers and Apollo 17.)
I’ve been wondering for a while… in French txtspk, do people write JTM?
Today I saw Tangled with two of my friends. It was pretty cute. :]
What would JTM stand for?
Je t’aime, which means I love you.
I just looked it up, and I think they do.
Aw.
I was thinking about it because when AIM was the big whoop my friends and I all signed off saying ILY (I love you), and JTM makes even more sense than ILY because it kind of sounds like the actual sentence.
Is anyone going to be in Chiangmai in the next few days or so?
If so, are you going to eat there?
If so, are you going to go to a restaurant that happens to have a wooden railing broken and in a pond?
That was me.
What happened?
My sisters and I were feeding the fish there. I actually noticed a few minutes earlier that the railing was rather unstable, and warned my sisters not to lean on it. I happened to lean on it, and the entire thing fell down. My sisters were okay, but I fell down into the not-exactly-clean water and scared all the fish :D. We thought they would get mad that I broke it, but instead the manager was mortified and
offeredgave us a free meal. He even personally dressed my extremely mild injuries. I love Thailand.BACK FROM SHANGHAI! What. A. Trip.
Except now that I’m back it’s 10 o’clock on a Sunday night and I have all my homework I need to catch up on, especially in the subject with the least understanding teacher. >.<
School, I don't like you.
I have just watched Willow Smith’s 21st Century Girl – the music video, that is – and have decided it’s totally age-inappropriate. She sounds like Kesha. I wonder who’s in charge of her musical career.
I spent most of yesterday racing a sailboat.
It was mostly fun, although the wind was way too strong for our experience level, and we capsized into rediculously cold water once, and we came in dead last. Probably because we didn’t really care and everybody else was at least mildly competitive.
Actually, a good fraction of the racers didn’t finish at all. All and all, I’m glad I did it.
Even if I’m red as a lobster now, because we decided to wait until we were out on the water to put on sunscreen, and then we never had time.
Incidentally, black tea applied to sunburns works wonders.
Errata! Chess!:
Sorry.
I spent today and yesterday not-writing my political speech. But I got my math homework done and scanned it in so that it can be copied- otherwise we’ll get stuck doing the same chapter again again.
I bought a TARDIS shirt! Yes! I have found the one website where I will buy my shirts now! (Except it is $20 for one shirt) Now I have no money….
What was the thread on which there was a long conversation about supporting fictional characters for president? I said something I liked on that thread and now I can’t find it again.
There’s one every election year, so I’m not sure which one you mean. I looked through many of them, and this one seems the most likely one for you to be talking about (because you posted something more significant likely for someone to want to reread there than on the others that I looked at), so is this it? https://musefanpage.com/blog/?p=882
No, it was a thread unrelated to Koko for President. There were people talking about Harold Saxon for president and a number of other characters I can’t quite recall. I think people were also complaining about how Twilight ruined “time of day” titles for all other books. Or something.
Was it https://musefanpage.com/blog/?p=836#comment-399631 ?
It was indeed. How do you retain so much?
GAPA powers. And being Robert.
That must be truly awesome.
I’m sure you’re all aware of this, but…there is a Pie Town, New Mexico.
There’s also a Truth or Consequences- I think they’ve got a lot of great town names.
There’s a town, right before you cross into Canada somewhere, that’s called Mexico. So there’s a sign that say “Welcome To Mexico”.
A quick search of Google Maps turned up towns called Mexico in Maine, New York, Missouri, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, South Carolina, and Maryland. There may be others that I didn’t see. The ones in Maine and New York are indeed close to the Canadian border.
htt p://cache.virtualtourist.c om/3590629-Travel_Picture-Mexico.jp g
Also, the one nugget of trivia I know related to this is that there’s a town called ‘6’ somewhere. The numeral, not even spelled out… Or so I’ve been told.
-A
Ur. I think my dad just gave me a makeover. I look like an actual teenage girl now. o.o
On the other hand, I now have aviator sunglasses! <3
Why did he do that?
Because, and I quote, he “didn’t want me to walk around looking like a boy.” xD
Me: I look like a teenage girl. o.o
Dad: Well, that’s better than teenage boy!
Me: Says who?
Dad: …
Cool about the sunglasses!
I have been watching Katekyo Hitman Reborn instead of working on my homework. Has anyone else here watched the series, and if so, when does it stop being a comedy? I have a rather short attention span for that type of thing.
On the subject of avoiding homework–I appear to have developed a reputation for being very studious. I don’t really feel this is at all close to the reality, given how many nights I stay up without even touching my homework. I don’t know how to deal with my rep now. It seems somehow dishonest to put myself on a pedestal above everyone else, or to let others put myself on a pedestal when I know that the pedestal has been eaten by termites and repaired by scotch tape.
At the same time, I know I’m not exactly unidustrious. I mean, I try to at least pay attention in class, and I tend to remind everyone about their homework, though that’s to remind me as much them. I don’t know. Teh situation’s weird.
You could tell people you’re not very studious. They may not believe you, though. I was in the same situation in public school. I always pay attention in class and do homework on time, but I never study at all, so I don’t think the reputation was accurate. They believed me when I told them so, luckily, but I didn’t get to tell everyone, so I still quasi-had the reputation. I didn’t really care much, but it was a little bit annoying.
If they don’t believe you, maybe you could look for the root of the trouble and eradicate it? Mine was that I generally got good grades, especially in English, so I couldn’t do anything about the problem, as the only ways for that would be to stop getting good grades or brag often about never having to study, neither of which I wanted to do. If they don’t believe you and you don’t want to fix the root of the problem… I’m not sure what you should do, really. Sorry.
answer: NEVER. well actually the daily life arc ends eventually and the art gets better in the manga, and it does get more action-y, but the utter ridiculous nature of it is never really gone.
having that reputation doesn’t seem like an entirely bad thing. probably the easy fix would be to stop talking about homework (i.e. reminding people)
Heh, I’m reading Reborn as I type this. I’m told the funny goes away in the manga around chapter 60, but I don’t know about the anime as I haven’t watched very much of it.
As for the unwanted studious reputation, I would recommend studying more if you can, but tell people that your reputation is inaccurate. Although it’s not necessarily a bad thing to be perceived as studious. Unless your classmates are nasty about it, as mine periodically are(I’m, really not that superb a student. I mean, I get the work done and pay attention in class, but there are other people much more deserving of that label than me). Sorry if that wasn’t particularly helpful. I do manga better than I do advice, alas.
Thanks all for the advice–and Reborn tips. I read on TVTropes that the series grows the beard eventually, but it didn’t say when.
Lizzie–Looking at it objectively, I can see how reminding people about hw would be annoying. It’s just that the girl who’s the main source of this is so unenthusiastic I sometimes wonder why she’s at college at all. I will take your advice though.
Yesterday I was hanging out with my friends. One of them told me that when she was younger she would get magic Valentine’s Day presents like the presents from the Easter Bunny or Santa. Magic Valentine presents apparently come from the Valentine Heart, which is a giant disembodied bleeding heart that breaks into people’s homes and leaves many red gifts.
Apparently my friend’s mom used to put ketchup on the porch and door handles to make the Valentine Heart more realistic. She would always get red stuffed animals and red candy.
O.o I think that is creepy now, but when I was little I probably would have thought a giant heart was cooler than a bunny.
I am about to explode.
I am performing at Macaw Hall with the rest of my cast. Somehow the chose the song in which I am a soloist to perform. I belt to a high F. Oh my.
There’s a place called Macaw hall? Cool! What is it?
According to the Seattle Opera, it’s one of the greatest performance spaces in the world. It’s a highly acclaimed theatre (not theatre company, just theatre) that many different groups of various pursuits have performed in. It’s a pretty big honor to get to perform there.
Oh. Well, congratulations, then!
That would be McCaw Hall, then? I know where that is. (Macaw Hall would be awesome though)
Oh… So there isn’t a Macaw Hall, then? Well, that’s too bad. I suppose I could start calling my house’s front hallway that now, though, since the name isn’t already taken…
Sorry – I probably should have refrained from calling it Macaw Hall because that’s my pet name for it. I know the name but it’s kind of instinctive right now.
It is sad that I read that as “McCall Hall”. Sad, sad, sad. I like his artwork, but…
Congratulations, that’s amazing!
I’m reading some of my posts from two years ago.
I apologize for having subjected you to my immaturity. Especially Piggy. Sorry, Piggy.
When have you subjected me to immaturity? You’ve been one of the least immature people of your age that I’ve ever talked with.
Yeah, you’re a lot more mature than I was at that time. I think I should make the same apology. Especially you, Piggy.
Why is everyone apologizing to me?!
BECAUSE YOU ARE AWESOME
Sorry, Piggy.
-A
We’ll stop. I promise. Sorry.
-A
We just like to bug you. I’m sorry, Piggy, I’m so sorry.
*Doctor Who-related twitches*
Oh, sorry. Should I have let you apologise first? Sorry, Choklit Orange. Sorry, everyone. Sorry, Piggy.
-A
That word…WILL YOU STOP SAYING IT?!
Sorry for yelling. Sorry. Can we at least get some synonyms in here? Like regret, or apologize, or even ‘sorry’ in different languages if English gets too repetitive. I hear Japanese has at least two different ways to apologize depending on the situation. Possibly more.
Wait a second… Is it just me, or did you first apologize for immaturity? And now we’re immaturely apologizing?
*notices irony*
Sorry about that, Piggy
I AM SO SORRY. I’M SORRY, FANTASYFAN. I PROMISE I WON’T DO IT AGAIN. SORRY.
-A
I’M SO SORRY FOR STARTING ALL THIS, I NEVER SHOULD HAVE COMMENTED.
I’M SORRY, EVERYONE. THE FAULT IS ENTIRELY MINE, I ALONE AM TO BLAME. SORRY!
In the words of Captain Planet: I’M SORRY EVERYONE! WHY COULDN’T YOU JUST HAVE STAYED AWAY?! GRAAAAAAAA!!!
I’m sorry we made you apologize, Piggy.
Apologies accepted. Go on now, thees words free you. There’s no need to stay here any longer digging yourself into a pit.
I’m sorry you had to say sorry because we said sorry after SBF said sorry. Sorry Piggy.
((And is the fact that there is no reply button on Giminator-FFs comments because we broke the nesting limit? If so, sorry))
No, it means we’ve reached the nesting limit. Only GAPAs can actually break the limit, and then their comments appear at the bottom of the page without a number, and stay below all the other comments, even if there are more recent ones. If someone replies to one of these numberless comments, theirs also becomes numberless at the bottom.
Sorry, Koko’s Apprentice. I should have explained that earlier.
-A
How on earth have so many people liked the Captain Planet post… do people actually understand the reference?
I didn’t, actually, but it was funny anyway
This was such a great way of wasting five minutes.
I’m sorry we wasted your five minutes, Zinc…
-A
Because we love you.
/Mickey Mouse voice/
A whole lot!
/Mickey Mouse voice/
(Cookies to anyone MB-age who gets that.)
I feel I should apologize to everyone on the blog for 2007-era shadowfire.
I can pie some of my own posts again.
MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Why does this give me such a sense of ultimate power?
The Internal Revenue Service had better keep a sharp eye on you once you start paying taxes.
Paying taxes to oneself is pretty dangerous, yes. (?)
-A
GUYS. LOOK UP “(Subbed) Nuclear Boy” ON YOUTUBE. NOW. FIND IT. IT IS AMAZING.
I really love Japan.
I too love Japan. Which is why I scolded myself into starting to teach myself Japanese again a couple days ago. Because what I really need right now is more work to do.
♥ WOW
School starts again tomorrow. Which means less time to read and program and write. Sigh.
At least I’m the only ten grader with an open.
You’re only a sophomore? *blinks*
This comes up every time I mention my grade on here.
I know.
OH LIFE. Computer broke again last Tuesday Aja no Jade for a while. Again. Sigh. Midterm tomorrow, need to study more. Might post actual life update later if I have time x_x we shall see.
AAAH LIBYA OHMYGOD AAAH!
Four days without internet.
Four days without my violin.
In other news- I’m back from Borneo! ‘Twas warm. We saw a crocodile.
Welcome back, Choklit Orange! I only just got back yesterday myself.
Ooh! How was Shanghai?
My brain asplode. I don’t know where to start. Maybe I’ll tell you later; too tired to think coherently right now.
We’re starting Lord Of The Flies in English.
I described it as “Plane crashes into island. Political allegory ensues.”
Pretty much.
Summary of Lord of the Flies by my [hyper… but pretty much always like this] friends at a band party last year. (Transcript of recording on my cell phone)
SPOILER LORD OF THE FLIES SPOILER SPOILER LORD OF THE FLIES SPOILER SPOILER LORD OF THE FLIES SPOILER (kind of)
N: We’re on an island! Let’s take our clothes off! We can stand valiantly in the breeze and look in the water and swim in it, naked. We need a meeting! We need to meet! Oh my god, we need other people here!
Z: [says something]
N: Shut up, you don’t have the conch.
Z: I actually do have the conch.
N: No, you don’t have the conch. We need a fire, on the mountain.
Z: You guys broke my glasses!
N: I have the conch, stop freaking talking.
D: Let’s go kill some pigs!
N: No! We have to build a fire!
D: We have to kill some pigs!
N: We have to build a fire!
D: We want meat!
N: We need a fire on the mountain so we can get rescued or we’ll die!
[Yelling]
N: Oh my god, you let the fire go out!
D: But we killed a pig!
N: You let the fire go out! You let the fire go out!
[More yelling]
N: You don’t even have the freaking conch! You let the fire go out!
D: OH MY GOD WE KILLED A PIG!
N: Oh my god, we’re going to die, you let the fire go out. Where’s that little kid with the purple mark on his face?
[More yelling]
N: There’s a ghost! Oh my god!
Z: No there isn’t.
N: But you don’t have the conch!
D: I do believe in ghosts, I do believe in ghosts, I do, I do, I do, I do believe in ghosts! THE END.
I’m ba-ack!
My time travelling weekend was AWESOME, as always.
I stood on pretty boats and told people about the 17th century and Jamestown, then I wandered around through all the other time periods, then I went to the 19th century to hang out with my Civil War navy buddies to sing and tell stories and talk and sing and talk and sing and tell more stories and sing some more. While there a German sailor, a Viking and a few others wandered in and sang/talked/told stories with us, then we made a blanket tepee and huddled around the lantern to stay warm, then around 3am I went to sleep in 18th century Scotland. Rinse and repeat the next day, only without getting to sing with the silly war sailors, which is sad.
I’m back in the 21st century now, after waking up horrifically late (about 1 in the afternoon…I haven’t done that in ages). My internal clock is all whacked now, it’s almost four and it feels like noon. Eesh.
ANYWAY.
I’m back.
My weekend was awesome.
Now I need to work.
Cool! Sounds great!
Fiddler, how did you start working at Jamestown?
That sounds fun!
Woo! Listening to “Countdown” by Rush!
I have a feeling there are puns that could be made with certain songs by Europe.
Also, high five for listening to Rush. =high fives=
-A
It’s good music, what can I say?
I think it’s pretty cool that I post two hours in the past.
-A
That reminds me: we forgot to set the blog to daylight time. *attempts to do so*
What’s the future like? Are there any more disasters we should be on the lookout for?
Or am I misinterpreting, and I’m actually two hours ahead of you? In which case: get ready to be nice to the robot overlords.
did you say overlords
you mean protectors
I feel prouder of the New World Order when I call them overlords. We have given all of our power to them because of their eternal magnificence. I would proudly give my life to honor them, and I expect nothing in return for my lifetime of service. The protection they have granted to us is a gift we will never be able to repay.
If you’ll excuse me, I have some dissidents to crush in order to help preserve the wellbeing of the Order.
It was a song reference– Chiron Beta Prime, Johnathan Coulton.
Heh. I post three hours in the future. Pacific time FTW!
Piggy… Is the man in your icon named Samuel? Or is his last name Jackson?
I feel like I should really know who he is…
67-Midnight Fiddler- That is so cool! I wish I could do that! :]
I got voted “teacher’s pet” in the school yearbook. So… people actually know who I am? I guess that’s cool because that must mean people think I’m good at school and like me enough to vote for me. I’m pretty sure this means I’ve accomplished my social goals for high school! (only partly sarcastic)
Lalalalala it’s time to waste time on MB yahhh!
I think he said it was John C. Calhoun, vice president and then senator from South Carolina during the Jackson administration.
*collapses* Busy day today. An hour and a half of choir practice + what was supposed to be an hour and a half of opera practice but ended up being more like an hour because everything’s coming along nicely = one very tired (but happy) Koppar.
Oh, and in between practices, Mom and I stopped at a local organic foods store for a second dinner (I’m like a hobbit! =P) and guess who was also there–Lady Bunniful! So that was cool. =D Very cool.
…I think I’m gonna go to bed before my coherency decreases more. ‘Night, you guys.
Good to “see” you, Koppar. You ran into Rebecca? Just like that? Wow! I usually have to reserve her months in advance. I’m glad to hear that your life is so busy and so musical.
Lately I have to make an appointment to meet up with myself.
So… Why is the H&H also known as Piggy’s Happy Bottom Riding Club?
I was here when the H&H started, but I missed the whole part where Piggy became the whatever-he-is. Why is Piggy always there? Was Piggy here before I left under a different name?
What happened to Red-Tailed-HAWK? Is he Piggy? Piggy kind of reminds me of HAWK, but older.
1. I have no idea where that name came from. This Yuri’s Night party is the first time I’ve seen it.
2. In the months before the 2008 presidential election, it was somehow decided that the H&H should have a barkeep. I can’t exactly remember how everything went down, but eventually myself and Gwendolyn of the Eastern Seas were chosen as co-barkeeps. Then she left–I don’t know where or why. I haven’t seen her since.
3. Piggy has always been my name.
4. RtH isn’t me, as far as I know.
It’s a reference to the movie The Right Stuff- the bar where the test pilots hung out was called Pancho’s Happy Bottom Riding Club.
70- No and no. His first name is John and his last name is Calhoun. Middle initial: C.
So I’m getting a car this Saturday, apparently. My cousin’s old one–a rusty-ish ’92 Camry, I think. It’s free, which is good, and fender benders won’t matter. “A good car to learn on”, I’m told.
Les Mis is over, and all the seniors are leaving, and my older brother just turned 18 and soon he’ll never live with me again, and I only have two more years before I have to leave home forever.
The summers die, one by one.
How soon they fly, on and on.
There’s got to be some word in German that describes how this feels.
I don’t know, but the Germans have named a condition that causes bad jokes “witzelsucht.” I love Germany.
Zunkunftsangst? I’m not sure if that really covers it.
SFTDP:
Maybe Vergänglichkeitsgefühl, but that has a sort of morbid aftertaste (at least for me).
I must leave Asia with at least one piece of Doraemon merchandise. I MUST.
Are those the little blue guys? Wait, is Doraemon part of Pokemon? *senses she may be sparking outrage*
Yes. You are. At least in me.
Nuclear Boy was featured on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me this weekend. ♥
Well. My science teacher may have just won the biscuit (I love making up new expressions) for stupid assignments. Here follows my unit-end project outline:
This is the summative assessment for our unit on geology. Pick one major organ system and advertise it in a poster. Relate this to geology.
What the cake?!
What does that have to do with geology? Are you sure the handout wasn’t misprinted?
I like it. It’s kooky and creative, totally over the top and off the wall. Over the wall! Clearly there’s no way to get a wrong answer. I’m amazed that your teacher dared to do it. Somebody like Lady Bunniful or Nancy Kangas would have loads of fun with an assignment like this.
Yeah, except she was being serious. As in, one-third-of-your-grade-rests-on-your-ability-to-link-the-digestive-system-to-volcanoes. We suspect she’s been replaced by a pod alien incubating inside her body.
That was probably a bad example. For me, at least, it conjured up some fairly unpleasant images. But my personal assignment is to link the respiratory system to shifting tectonic plates… any ideas?
Oh, you don’t get to choose your topic? Still, that’s not a bad one, and all the other kids are in the same boat.
So, what do we know about tectonic plates? There are two kinds, continental ones and oceanic ones. Continental ones are made of relatively lightweight rock (coincidentally light in color, too) and ride high; oceanic ones are made of darker, denser rock and ride low.
Both kinds ride on top of the mantle. The mantle gets heated by Earth’s core, rises, and flows sideways, moving the plates on top of it. Then the mantle cools off and sinks again. That up-and-down or inward-and-outward flowing is a bit like breathing, I suppose (though it also somewhat resembles blood circulation, with the core functioning as Earth’s “heart”).
Let’s see, what else? Mantle heat under an oceanic plate boundary gives you seafloor spreading. When an oceanic plate hits a continental plate, it dives underneath it and re-melts. That could be compared to inhalation, I guess (though it seems more like digestion to me). Anyway, between the mantle cycles and the cyclic movement of crustal rock, you shouldn’t have too much trouble finding a breathing analogy somewhere.
(There’s nothing wrong with pod aliens, by the way. They can be very entertaining, except the pink ones.)
I was going to suggest something similar, but school ensued, and anyway Mr. Coontz’s explanation is more complete and coherent than mine.
Wow, you’re good.
(I’ve feared pod aliens since I sneaked into the living room when I was supposed to be asleep- at the age of seven- and saw my parents watching Alien)
“MuseBlog: Salvaging Hopeless Homework Assignments Since 2005.”
More like “Robert: Salvaging Hopeless Homework Assignments Since 2005.”
Without MuseBlog, I wouldn’t even know about all those beleaguered assignments and assignees.
Won the biscuit ♥
I just read that is “What the biscuit?”.
Why would you read that way? I mean, what the biscuit, Bibliophile? Really?
Wait a minute…organ system? Isn’t that more related to biology, or perhaps music?
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRGH NO, NO, NO. *headbang* Snoooooow. *shakes fist at sky*
IT WAS SPRING…
And we have school off today. THIS IS RIDICULOUS. RIDICULOUS I SAY
Want to trade weather? It’s 80 degrees here. That’s not hot or anything, but we don’t generally get snow (we had none this winter).
*showers with snow and takes summer weather* Ehhh, I’m just annoyed because I thought spring had come…*glares at sky*
Pffff, 80 is hot. 80 is very hot.
Okay, maybe.
Yay!
For Maine, maybe. Not in Texas, or at least my part. Here it’s just normal early spring weather.
Also, when I press preview and try to pie my comments to see what happens, it makes an error, which I suppose is good, but it says the error is ‘fatal.’ I’m not really sure what to make of that…
Well, you’re still here, so it clearly isn’t fatal to you.
How do you know it works immediately?
WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!
(Eventually.)
***HERE IS A SMALL FACT***
You are going to die.
I am in all truthfulness trying to be cheerful about this whole topic, though most people find themselves hindered in believing me, no matter my protestations. Please, trust me. I most definitely can be cheerful. I can be amiable. Agreeable. Affable. And that’s only the As. Just don’t ask me to be nice. Nice has nothing to do with me.
***REACTION TO THE***
AFOREMENTIONED FACT
Does this worry you? Do not be afraid. I’m nothing if not fair.
Besides, to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure.
You’re in Texas too? Cool!
Yes, I am. I’m in the general vicinity of the Houston area. We can have a Kokon sometime if you want and are allowed to, as long as we’re not too far apart. Didn’t you say at one point that you were in central Texas? I go there fairly often, so it wouldn’t be difficult.
Yeah, I’m in central Texas. I don’t go out towards Huston that much, but I can pretty much get to anywhere in this part of the state fairly easily.
And a Kokon would be fantastic. If I can get my parents to agree. (I think they’d be okay with it, once I explained enough of the system to convince them I’m not an idiot with no concept of internet safety, but I can’t figure out how to ask without starting with something along the lines of ‘So, Mom, can I meet this person from the internet?’)
You could start by saying how much you love MuseBlog, and then sometime in the next day or so mention how awesome everyone was and how you wished you knew someone like that in real life, and then later, “You know what I was saying earlier about MuseBlog? Well, it turns out they have this great, really safe system…” but end with, “It’s not as if there are many people living that close to me, anyway; I just wish they did,” and that way you could see what she thinks about it and whether she’s fine with it, so then when I’m about to come to central Texas (My grandmother lives there, and I often visit her, and my mom visits her even more often; I think there’s a chance we’re going in April, actually, though it’s not certain.), you can tell her, and then bring up a Kokon possibility. Or something like that. Anyway, I’m sure it’s possible. I know my parents won’t mind, because I’ve done it before with someone from ChatterBox, and she turned out to be a real person rather than a stalker.
Yeah, I’ve mentioned things like that before. I think the best way to do this is to just wait till one of them’s in a fairly good mood and just ask. I’ve tried the subtle hinting before finally getting around to asking approach, but I never got past the subtle hinting.
Anyway, I’ll ask them about it, and post something on the Kokon thread when I get an answer either way.
I’ll try to ask before the end of March.
72 (UP)~ RtH is alive and busy, as far as I know. I haven’t been in touch with him for ages, but last time we talked he was keeping busy with homeschooling and college (dratted genius, doing HS and college at the same time….) as well as managing his town’s birdhouses and their occupants, volunteering with the Audubon society and learning to play guitar.
I am in a quandary. I managed to reason out how I’d be able to do 17th and 18th century girl clothes with dreadlocks. After all, I wear a cap with plenty of space for hair, and it would probably even keep them on better. All good, right?
But….if I want to do 1812….I’d like to do a sailor’s impression, which would entail boy clothes. I’m all over that, but….hair. Now, if I just grew out my hair and tied it in a ponytail, that would work perfectly fine. If I kept it short like I’ve had it the past few years, that would work perfectly fine. But dreadlocks? Not so much. Not only would it look kind of funky overall, but wearing a hat would be difficult, as I’d have to have a HUGE one to fit over my hair.
Merble.
I’m also thinking about that uniform Allen said was in the slop chest that would fit me. He would like me to join their Civil War naval unit, and I’d absolutely adore doing events with them, but, they’re 5 hours away.
Mrumph.
If anyone can think of ways I could swing it, let me know.
Oh man Civil War Naval unit sounds awesome. I still really want to know how you got into this type of work. I think it’d be a really neat thing to do and I want to know how to start. Can I apply for jobs at local places?
76.2.1.1- Yes pod aliens are great! You should be friends with all of them. Unrelated, but what time do you go to bed? :3
I go to bed early and wake up whenever my cats decide it’s time to play. That can result in odd hours.
I drew the following comic for school today, featuring the villains from most of the books we’re read so far in English class this year. (If you don’t want spoilers for Beowulf, Medea, The Tempest, Jane Eyre, A Doll’s House, or The Great Gatsby, don’t read any further)
The title is “I’m Eviler Than You”…
Medea (Medea): “*I* killed my own children, my husband’s new wife, and her dad with magic.”
Antonio (The Tempest) “Oh yeah? Well, *I* overthrew my brother, took his dukedom, and put him and his baby daughter out to sea in a raft with no food.”
Mrs. Reed (Jane Eyre): “*I* let my kids mistreat my niece, locked her in a haunted room, sent her to a sucky school and never told her she had nicer relatives.”
Nils Krogstad (A Doll’s House) “*Puh-leese*. I found out a woman had borrowed money illegally to save her husband when he was seriously ill, so I blackmailed her so I could take his job. (And she got so worked up about it she left him.)”
Tom Buchanan (The Great Gatsby): “Me? I was a jerk to my wife, beat up my mistress for saying her name, and sold my wife’s ex-boyfriend and one true love out to a crazy guy with a shotgun who killed him. Also, I read racist books for fun.”
Grendel (Beowulf): “AMATEURS.”
ARGH!
Today I discovered Googlewhacking, and am trying it for the first time right now. And I got a result of 2 HITS for “cimicine carbuncles!” SO CLOSE!!!
And again with “intergenerational zugzwang’s!”
‘Arctisconia’ is a very good word for Googlewhacking. Don’t put it with a really rare word, though, or you won’t have any results at all. Choose one that’s about as common as ‘bizarre–‘ which, incidentally, does make it a Googlewhack.
Also, don’t forget about the HP trivia competition.
I haven’t forgotten about it. I posted yesterday, and you haven’t responded.
Anyway, I got 2 Googlewhacks out of “arctisconia!!!” Thanks! They were “long arctisconia” and “unctuous arctisconia.” What does it mean, anyway? I also got another ‘whack- “epicritical schadenfreude.”
Oops. Sorry. I didn’t notice. I should have checked.
Arctisconia is an archaic word for tardigrade. It comes from the Greek word arctos, which means bear, and possibly also onia, which means… to last a long time or something like that.
Coincidentally, the one search result for “unctuous artisconia” is on the Chatterbox forum at Cricket’s website, on a thread discussing Googlewhacks.
Actually, it isn’t a coincidence. I was the one who brought up ‘arctisconia’ on that thread a few months ago, because I wondered if I could find a Googlewhack with it. I did. Thus, ‘bizarre arctisconia.’ I was just searching again to see if I could find anymore, and I did. ‘Pig arctisconia’ has the same one result.
Yeah, I kinda wondered if it was you that mentioned it, although I didn’t read the whole thread, since apparently only 9 people in the world know about the word “arctisconia” (That’s how many hits it gets by itself).
Well, there are more people now that I’ve mentioned it here! I think I mentioned it at one point on another ChatterBox thread as well, but for some reason it doesn’t come up on the list of results. I wonder whether it would if you searched ‘cricket arctisconia.’ If not, that would be another Googlewhack! *tries* Never mind, it just shows both pages of the Googlewhack thread.
Anyway, I know this is on the wrong thread, but you know you’re addicted to tardigrade research when you’ve been to every single one of the results for ‘arctisconia’ except the 2 in German, and you have been to the English version of one of those 2, though that probably doesn’t count as it’s another of the 9 results.
Bad arctisconia is also a googlewhack.
As is ‘over arctisconia.’
Pretty much anything arctisconia is a googlewhack. Including ‘anything arctisconia.’
Woot!! After a bunch of experimenting, I have done it with:
TETRAÂMETHYLÂDIAMINOÂBENZHYDRYLÂPHOSPHINOUS OOGLIFICATION
Yes!
Me too!!! I got it with ‘liquescent eudyptula’.
I learned along the way that crepuscular means “of, pertaining to, or resembling twilight; dim; indistinct.” (Okay, it is also is used as a term to refer to animals that come out in the twilight.)
Now whenever anyone makes a reference to Twilight I’ll be like, “That is so crepuscular” and they will have absolutely no idea what I am talking about.
See. *ahem* That was very educational. I also learned that little blue penguins live in Australia. That was a constructive use of time! Ha!
CREPUSCULAR CONTORTION
THAT IS ALL
-A
That sounds familiar. Why does that sound familiar???
Tridecalogism.
-A
78.1 (Oxlin)~ Civil War naval unit is indeed awesome…they’re just so far away. And wrong era, but I could get into it pretty easily I think.
As far as getting into living history, just look around. Historical sites just about always need people and they LOVE volunteers. If google maps doesn’t lie you’re about an hour from Old World Wisconsin, which is a fantastic outdoor museum. They have houses and farmsteads from various times and immigrant cultures, a town, craftsmen, great events, I could go on and on about them. I’m sure you could get involved there, I don’t know about a paying job, because as far as I know they’re broke, the way most independent museums are, but it’d be a great local place to get involved.
As far as getting involved with it yourself, I’d choose a time period you’re interested in (one at a time is probably wise at first, though may reenactors have multiple time periods), do research, get yourself the gear and go to whatever events you can find. If there’s a group that looks promising that’s doing the same kind of thing you’re interested in, join it. I have no idea what the midwest living history scene is like, but it’s got to exist somehow.
Interesting! Maybe I can have a summer job at Plimoth Plantation or Sturbridge Village.
SPOILER TAGS AND STUFF, DO NOT CLICK, OR YOU WILL REGRET IT
Anyways, I just lost the game.
Heh. Fail. Shows up anyway.
Also, I lost too.
-A
Arg… eternal loss of the recreation-that-must-not-be-named.
Argh!
I just lost the game.
Story of walking my dog: Dog excites puppy, puppy pulls on leash, puppy pulls leash from owners hands, dog rolls puppy over (for the first time ever, he is never aggressive), owner gets puppy’s leash, pulls puppy away, I pull dog away, puppy pulls elderly owner over, owner falls, I pull dog away, owner says he’s fine, I have to leave before my dog makes things worse… *sigh*
Also, Why did my brother have to get an electric guitar? And play it in the family room where everyone is? And not get lessons?And only know less than half of one song?
/end rant/ (This should be in the Rants and Plaints Thread, but I already typed it here….)
It was around 80 degrees in NC today. Thursday, I pack up and go tour colleges in the30-to-40-degree Northeast. Not sure how I feel about this (besides terrified at the thought of college).
Badminton, how I’ve missed thee. Unfortunately, all of the girls that i don’t like joined the team. I’m praying for them to drop out. It doesn’t matter if they stay though, my friends and i have a year more of experience than them, so we can kick their popular butts.
Tess- Bahahaha, it’s snowing here tomorrow. Four inches. Enjoy the lovely north!
My life is getting increasingly more crazed. This morning I went to get a drink of water, slipped, skinned my knee, discovered a gecko in the band-aids, tripped over a snail, finished Hamlet, and broke a metal bowl… before my alarm went off.
Also, I was paying no attention to anything during Humanities, and realized at the end of class that I had drawn a map of Middle Earth on my notes page, with little hobbits denoting the trail to Mordor.
Is the snail alright?
Yes, and now my neighbor is keeping it as a pet. It seems quite content.
Pinkage.
Singapore snails must be more robust than the ones around here.
Oh, good!
How large was this thing, exactly? o.O I’ve never seen a snail big enough to trip over, much less big enough to trip over and not render incontent.
Today, March 23rd, I finally received my February issue of Muse, my first in a while. I don’t recall it taking this long a few years ago when I used to get it, but oh well – I have it now!
This past Sunday was my 5 year blogiversary.
And I missed it, as per usual.
I have decided (read: FINALLY convinced my mom to let me) that I’m going to start learning how to play the cornet. I’ve even completely overworked my practice ethic to convince my mom that I CAN do this. And I’m probably going to end up buying myself the right kind of mouthpiece using the money I saved up to buy tickets for the anime convention, but THIS IS MORE IMPORTANT GAIZ now all my otaku friends are gonna kill me o_o FIRST LESSON THIS FRIDAY YEAH :D.
My dad played the cornet when he was in school.
Band Geek Rule #371881: Strive to learn to play as many instruments as possible.
*may or may not have purchased a French horn book so she can teach herself some basics this summer*
I probably need to learn another instrument- the violin and cello are all very well, but carrying a cello about poses something of a problem.
solution:
– cosplay popular character (hetalia and vocaloid are popular…*shudder*)
– bring “broke cosplayer, will cornet 4 $$ :'(” sign
– ????
– profit
Cute shirt ideas:
“Innocent Bystander Person”
“My Fancy Villain Costume is Being Drycleaned”
“[Axa’s idea]”
“Don’t Mind Me, I’m Here for the Merch/Slash/Awesome”
“Here I Look Abnormal”
I went running yesterday (I try to run every other day) and my leg’s kind of been throbbing hurting every time I sit down, in the thigh where it hits the chair and in the shin. What should I do about this?
See a doctor?
When I did Track and Field my coach said running on cement (like roads) can mess up your joints.
Be sure to stretch your quads and tendons and basically your legs (and body). Also, make sure your shoes have proper support. I know what you’re talking about and it’ll go away in a few days unless it’s serious.
Kai is right- and don’t stretch it if it hurts.
Today in social studies, my social studies teacher had us all write out the names of the 5 presidents that preceded Obama on scraps of paper and put them into a large jar. Then, he pulled out scraps and the first person whose scrap was drawn that had the right answer on it was awarded a sucker- one of those flammy ones that are flat on top and taste like Smarties. It was me.
Social Studies Teacher: *reads scrap* Reagan….Kennedy… nope!
Kid: But I thought Kennedy was the president when I was born!
SST: He was assassinated in 1963, so probably not…
Ouch. I was reading in Newsweek that people don’t know much American history, but…
A few years ago, someone in my history class didn’t know who the first president was…
How old were you?
Seventh grade, maybe sixth grade…
What a fail. Obama, GWB, Clinton, GB, Carter, Regan. (Wow, is that right? It feels right. I would be ashamed if it were wrong.)
Almost!
Reagan comes before Carter. Also you missed Nixon. Am I right? Confession: I always used to get Reagan and Nixon mixed up. I thought that it was Reagan who did Watergate. Now I’ve got them straight, but I doubt I could recite every president in chronological order. And I thought I was good at history. But there’s more to the subject than just rote memorization of dates and names, right? And that other stuff is more interesting…
Nixon was earlier.
Do you learn them in reverse order, or do you just recite them that way? Either way, I’d say the past 50 years’ worth of Presidents is something every American should know. (Of course, I was there. But it does seem to me that if you knew the most important parts of the history, they wouldn’t just be names and dates to memorize; they’d be part of patterns.)
I think that part of the problem is that most history classes run out of time before they can cover anything much past Vietnam – I know mine did – plus there’s debate on how to cover events still in living memory. I would guess I know more about the American Revolution or the second half of the 19th century than I do about the ’80s.
Same here. Tons of stuff about the Revolution, skip forward fourscore and seven years to the Civil War, Maybe do a little bit about Manifest Destiny and Westward expansion, and then it’s on to WWII…Most of history class seems to bounce from war to war, come to think o fit.
It’s like that at our school, too.
What was actually really funny is, our teacher last year had us read the chapters on the 80s for homework since we didn’t have time to do them, and he gave us (I think) two days to do it.
I read them all on the first day, so on the second day, I had free time after I did my homework and I watched a DVD I’d gotten from the library about the space shuttle, and there was one really great excerpt from a speech Reagan gave after one of the first landings, so I actually took the time to rewind and pause the DVD multiple times until I’d copied it down somewhere.
So the next day, he gave us the final exam from another year to do in class for practice and one question was something like “Which phrase best describes Ronald Reagan’s economic policies”. That was the only question I wasn’t sure about, so I went to the teacher to ask about the wording of some of the choices.
He said “You’re having trouble with that one? What were you doing last night?”
“Watching Ronald Reagan.”
Wow. It’s *snowing* here. I had my sleeves rolled up and the window open on Saturday and now it’s snowing.
When the snow I got from Mika melts (Unless it has already?), I’ll be more than happy to take yours if you like. (Of course, if you want your snow, feel free to keep it).
Nope. Still going strong.
That’s good to know. Of course, I could have just looked out my window, but I didn’t feel like it. Do you have some sort of special connection to it because it used to be in your area, like with Harry and Voldemort?
Well, it appears to be snowing, not down, but in the general direction of Texas.
I’m okay with it, it’s pretty and the ground’s too warm for it to stick, so I don’t have to worry about it causing any problems.
But thanks for the offer.
Don’t worry, there’s plenty more outside now. I think it’s mostly hail at this point, though. Doesn’t matter, really. All white, cold stuff is the same to me at the end of March.
saw the new jane eyre adaptation today, i liked it a lot! i am going to try to order the poster because it is glorious and well designed.
my desk is covered in timelines and pictures of things for a story i have been trying to write for two years! thus i am wallowing in my bed with my laptop. hmm….
also it is raining and i approve of that
It is sunny here. I strongly disapprove. Dance class was like being slowly baked, urgh…
It’s hailing and thundering outside, and there’s already a lot of hail on the ground, so I left bowls out to make a hail slushie.
Yes.
For the past three days, I have been totally out of it. Physically present, but my mind a million miles away. I wonder if I’m coming down with something, I feel so thick and fuzzy.
My life is so routine. Even things that I would find exciting seem dulled right now. …I feel stupider, too. I’m missing out on obvious things. And it takes me forever to understand questions.
What I need is a break. And also some emotional/mental peace.
I’ve been out of it lately too. Sort of the way I am immediately before and during a thunderstorm, but there’s only been one storm recently, and it was pretty uneventful.
Get more sleep!
If it helps, I’m always out of it. I just can’t kick my brain into gear. My suggestions:
-chocolate (that’s my suggestion for everything
-go swimming
-cook something long and complicated but delicious
-watch Star Trek (also my suggestion for everything)
*neurosquid*
Roasted broccoli is so good. Roasted broccoli with seasoned rice. Mmmm.
For those unfortunate souls who’ve not yet had roasted broccoli, this is how you do it: cut up broccoli into munchable bits, peel the stalks and cut them into munchable strips, toss them in a bowl with some olive oil and salt, then pop them into the oven at 425 degrees (F) and wait until they’ve got little brown bits at the edges but are still green overall, then messily devour them.
SO GOOD.
I think I’ve added another thing to the List of Foods Fern Will Most Likely Live On Once Out of the House.
Right there with kale in any way shape or form, baked beans, baked beans with mushrooms, potatoes in any way shape or form, squash and lasagne.
Omnomnomnomnom.
DISLIKE BROCCOLI. I just don’t really think fractals should be edible. Stop it, maths. You’re delightful, but when you pull broccoli and calculus on me, you’re really just asking for it.
However, I am with you very wholeheartedly on the last three.
(Did you mean lasagne with an e?)
Mmm… Food. Anyone ever heard of slash had orange-carrot juice, by the way? Sounds disgusting, smells weird, but then you sip it… Oh, gods. Oh, mighty juicy gods.
(GODBERRY: KING OF THE JUICES anyway back to whatever it was I was doing)
… Oh yeah, going to bed.
-A
I have a question that I am going to ask at the risk of being considered inconceivably stupid…
How does one go about becoming scientifically literate?
I know the obvious answer is “READ, you dummy!” But everything always seems to go over my head, even in intro classes in high school, I had zero retention of facts…
I’m asking because I do have a real interest, and I am trying to understand things, but it just seems like there is so much and I feel that I am of Very Small Brain. Also after talking to my mom and then looking up some courses, Geology looks like a really interesting field to me…Volcanology as a class?! Neotectonics? That’s so amazingly…AMAZING. So I don’t know if the aversion to science is learned (well probably) or what…i actually really resent that people are either supposed to be scientific or literary, I do not think that’s true at ALL, but that’s another long discussion and I have been posting all over the place.
Also I feel this way because I saw Neil deGrasse Tyson on the Bill Maher show a little while ago, and he talked about the importance and necessity of a scientifically literate citizenry and that really affected me…GAHHH
I was seriously considering transferring but now i see that the consortium my home college is in has a REALLY COOL geology program, and I am le conflicted.
SOMETIMES IT IS HARD BEING INTERESTED IN EVERYTHING! *dies*
Watch Nova programs and the like.
Bill Bryson’s “Short History of Nearly Everything” is a painless way to learn a lot. Larry Gonick’s Cartoon Guides might help, too.
“Short History of Nearly Everything” is FANTASTIC. To date, it’s the only scientific thing I’ve ever read that was comprehensible to me, interested me and made me want to learn more.
That book is sitting on my shelf right now. *sends it through the computer screen to Axa*
Neil deGrasse Tyson is one of my favorite people ever.
I love Bill Bryson. I must read that.
The part that really fascinated me was the bit about Yellowstone park. It could blow at any moment, apparently.
98 (Axa)~ Not a stupid question at all. I feel very much the same way, especially with math, but with other scientific fields as well.
I don’t know how to overcome the zero fact retention bit, if you ever find out, will you let me know? I am certain that you’ll be able to do anything you choose, and I’m equally certain that you’re not of Very Small Brain. Quite the contrary, you’ve shown yourself to be a very creative and intelligent individual who connects data from all parts of life and actively observes and participates in the world.
I don’t know exactly what kind of problems you’ve been having at your college, but if it’s really that miserable of a place for you, you shouldn’t feel the need to stay. If, however, you feel that your misery is caused by being in the wrong department or pursuing the wrong interests, then switching your major or area of study may be a good way of handling this. If that wouldn’t be enough to solve your college woes, keep in mind that other schools may have equally fantastic geology programs and be a better fit overall.
Also consider whether the program you want to be involved in is worth putting up with the problems you have with the school. You may be able to excel at a somewhat less awesome geology program where you’ll be in a comfortable environment than to go to a fantastic geology program at a place where you’re unhappy and end up performing below your abilities due to external stresses.
(Keep in mind that this is all from someone who’s not in college yet, so take it as you will.)
I know you’ll be a wonderful addition to any program you choose. ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
What is a “syllogism”?
According to dictionary dot com,
“1. Logic–an argument the conclusion of which is supported by two premises, of which one (major premise) contains the term (major term) that is the predicate of the conclusion, and the other (minor premise) contains the term (minor term) that is the subject of the conclusion; common to both premises is a term (middle term) that is excluded from the conclusion. A typical form is “All A is C; all B is A; therefore all B is C.â€
2. deductive reasoning.
3. an extremely subtle, sophisticated, or deceptive argument.”
What I see: ht tp:/ /grab.b y/9FWM
-A
100 (Zinc)~
“syllogism |ˈsiləˌjizÉ™m|
noun
an instance of a form of reasoning in which a conclusion is drawn (whether validly or not) from two given or assumed propositions (premises), each of which shares a term with the conclusion, and shares a common or middle term not present in the conclusion (e.g., all dogs are animals; all animals have four legs; therefore all dogs have four legs).
• deductive reasoning as distinct from induction : logic is rules or syllogism”
Logic is interesting. I should get back into it. Just like I should try to learn Latin in my free time.
Oops. Fiddler’s comment wasn’t up when I started mine.
Ahhhhh. Swear and Shake, one of my favorite bands is playing at a bar in Brooklyn Friday night. I want to go so. Freaking. Badly.
You sound like you can’t. If so, why?
My mom won’t let me, I won’t even bother asking because:
A) It’s in Brooklyn.
B) It’s in a bar.
C) It’s in Brooklyn. At night.
D) It’s in Brooklyn.
E) It’s in Brooklyn.
Now, Brooklyn isn’t that far, but my mom won’t even go to the botanical garden there because she thinks she’s going to get mugged.
STORY OF MY LIFE
Zinc! Didn’t know you were still here. Heh, didn’t know I was still here until today. We have a comment rating system now? Cool.
Agrrfishi – I recommend Eragon as well as Maximum Ride, Uglies, and The Hunger Games.
Welcome back.
Don’t you dare recommend Eragon.
Oh, and hi.
I thought Eragon was a fun read, if somewhat lacking in originality. I don’t know if I would recommend it, but I certainly wouldn’t discourage somebody from reading it.
People, Eragon was not that bad. A story does not have to be original to be good, as long as there are other redeeming qualities. Paolini’s magic system was well thought out, his characters were developed, and the plotline diverted to its own original thing very soon. (Heck, I met the author and got Eragon and Brisingr signed)
I disagree. The prose was purple, Eragon bordered on Gary Stu, the rest of the cast were stock characters, and Paolini didn’t put any new twists on the old tropes he used.
I do agree that a book does not have to be original to be good. For example, The Name of the Wind is about a young, ridiculously talented man whose parents are murdered by an evil force against whom he swears revenge. He attends a school of magic and learns secret arts of combat from an irascible and cryptic mentor. Cliché storm, right? But the author adds his own creative spin to the old ideas — the story is being narrated by the protagonist at the end of his heroic career, an old, broken man in the midst of a world that’s burning up because of the mistakes he made, and the man who’s writing the story down is reluctantly conspiring with the protagonist’s student to pull him out of his downward spiral. (There was more, but then I realized this post was turning into a rave review for The Name of the Wind, which has nothing to do with my point. I LOVE THAT BOOK)
Anyway. I agree that originality is not the sole point on which a story’s quality rests, but Eragon and the Inheritance Cycle were bad in other ways as well.
The main problem that I had with Eragon was that the writing just wasn’t good. The descriptions were clunky and the dialogue was stilted and cliched. He had good ideas, but, in my opinion, lacked the technical finesse to execute them.
(also, someone on here, I think Pan, did a very convincing comparison of passages from Eragon with passages from David Edding’s Belgariad. It didn’t look that promising for Paolini’s creativity or originality, to say the least.)
HI! Yes, I am, but sporadically. Better than before!
And we do.
MY MIND JUST EXPLODED
Umm… Why?
And is that a good or bad thing?
I have discovered that almonds can catch fire and provide a steady source of light for up to three minutes.
Please don’t ask me why I was lighting almonds on fire.
Why were you lighting almonds on fire?
*searches for almonds*
Too bad, I only have airplane peanuts. Let’s see if there’s enough oil in them to get similar results.
I’d do that if I wasn’t afraid of fire.
*Ahem* A half burnt almond works well as a charcoal drawing utensil, turning from black to a nice brownish color.
DID YOU KNOW OREOS ARE VEGAN?
…They’re still bad for you, but they’re vegan.
Really? All of them? I thought it was just some. Yay!
YES!
I suppose once you reach a certain state of unnaturalness, you no longer have to worry about animal products.
Wikipedia says that British-made Oreos contain whey powder.
Meh. Lifestressstresslife.
I just realized that I’d be a lot happier about the latin test tomorrow if I didn’t feel like I’ll freak if I get anything less than 59,5/60, even though I liked Ovid better than Vergil. So I’m trying to relax a little. The Siebente is meant to be the hardest and I can’t be perfect at everything. Trying to relax and take it easy.
I’m just a little worked up/depressed because my Spanish test scores was somewhere in the lower average, while another girl had full points and I have to face the fact that I inexplicably suck at Spanish even though I’m the best in Latin and English and the best non-nativespeaker in French (though I’ve been getting worse and worse at it). I can pull up my german grade, but after my vendetta with the geography *expletive* the best thing I’m getting is a B+, which means that yet again I don’t get a 4.0 like a wanted to, though I’m going to try for a 3.8. And I have a lot of homework, and for some reason I’m on MB again…
Anyway, there is some good: we have a political speech in german, and if I can actually write it my rhetoric is rather good, as long as I don’t go overboard (by Austrian standards- they don’t really do the whole emotional thing so much).
WOW you have to learn too many languages. I think it’s perfectly natural to panic about these things- take deep breaths and consider that scoring less than perfect on a Latin test probably will not impact your future too badly. *anxious squid*
thank you for the suggestions and advice, everyone! fiddler i love you! ;A;
I checked out A Short History of Nearly Everything and the preface was EXACTLY everything I had been thinking (I don’t know about the oceans! WHY DON’T I KNOW ABOUT THE OCEANS!?) so I am very excited to read more!
Also I just made a really good strawberry smoothie and it is my favorite weather outside (cloudy and promising to storm but not yet overcast)
EXCLAMATION MARK!!! so far today is good
A Short History of Nearly Everything was excellent. So excellent, in fact, that Muse used an excerpt from it for an entire article in the January 2008 Muse. Go Bill Bryson!
Woah, and now the snow has melted almost completely and my window is open again.
You guys.
We’re playing “Friday” in band.
Yesssssssssssss
Band is so good. It’s the one thing I miss about my old school.
I’ll bet you’re all saying, “We so excited!”
Actually, my geometry teacher included that phrase in his lesson.
Why.
All right. I’ve made the decision to not read any fanfiction or go on TVtropes for the next two weeks. I have midterms coming up, I need to study, my life is backed up with old assignments…I’m not totally cutting myself off from the Internet, or even all time-wasting websites—just those two because they are the worst–and my favorites. It’s not even that long…but I want you guys to witness this for me so that every time my will is tested I’ll have people who know what I’m doing and will be disappointed if I fail. (I came up with this idea at four in the morning last night, contemplating my terrible sleeping habits after staying up reading–what else?–fanfiction. This is an attempt to fix that too.)
So. No fanfiction or tropes for two weeks. It doesn’t seem all that long when I write it out like that but it’s the first time I’ve ever attempted to put limiters on myself and I know I go crazy even going one week without Internet and I’m not prepared to cut it out of my life entirely.
Third day of eating vegetarianally! Woooo!
Good for you. A vegetal diet can be pretty healthy… I’ll never give up meat, though; I just can’t.
-A
Happy Birthday to Harry Houdini, turning 137 today!
I may be late, but I’ll second the notion before any more time ESCAPES…
I’m afraid HH did escape us this year (his birthday is March 24), but I’ll add him to the calendar for next year.
My campus has been infected (er, that is, we’re playing Humans Vs. Zombies now.)
So has mine. I hate this time of year – it makes me feel so paranoid to have people walking around with giant nerf guns, jumping out at people, etc.
Tomorrow I get my hand stuck to my face for five minutes. Then I stop. Guess what I’m doing?
Um… living statuary?
Getting an eye exam?
…Playing with glue?
Correct! Sort of.
extended facepalm?
Testing an experimental super-strong but very temporary superglue?
You stop what?
-A
School pictures?
Reenacting Home Alone?
Alternatively, is this some variant of sticking your tongue to a frozen flagpole?
Making a cast for a thematic sculpture of ‘frustration’?
Doing a monologue about getting my hand glued to my face!
Grump. I hate my classmates. If I had a clam for every time they’ve insulted me or hit me, I would be swimming in vongole sauce.
Wooo no sleep!
I’m at school.
Wednesday was our DC trip.
Last night I had work and tons of homework.
This weekend is a taekwondo tournament.
I’m going to sleep so much on Sunday.
:]
My regional spelling bee is tomorrow! It’s on local television, and whoever wins goes to Nationals! I can’t believe it’s so soon; I’m really, really excited! *goes back to studying*
Good luck, Bibliophile! May the Muses be with you, and may all your pies be bullseyes!
Good luck! Knock ’em dead!
Good luck, Bibli! You’re going to do great!
I got out in the third round on parallax. I misheard the word, but I would have gotten it wrong, anyway, so it doesn’t matter. It’s really too bad, but at least I got there in the first place. Anyway, there’s next year.
Screnzy: Who’s doing it?
As everyone knows, because I repeat myself every time NaNo comes up, I’ve sworn off those write-lots-and-lots-in-a-short-period-of-time things. However, with Doctor Who Series 6 rapidly approaching, and my recent discovery of Slings and Arrows and re-discovery of Red Dwarf (it is correct to italicize TV show titles?), I have, naturally, been yearning to write something involving Shakespeare, adventures, and time and space travel. Like…the plot of a Shakespeare play, say Twelfth Night, only…on a spaceship. Or two. Yes.
That said, I can feel myself tiring of the idea already. So I guess I’ll just go back to my motley. -sigh-
Maybe it would be better if I put in wandering space minstrels?
I’d read that. And I like the idea of wandering space minstrels!
I’m not sure. I wasn’t going to, because I’ve never had much luck with it, but then I remembered that I’d been wanting to do something with superheroes, and since superheroes tend to rely on visuals, I might end up doing it anyway.
I also need to go finish my NaNo. After I figure out how to deal with the formatting issues I’m haveng…
OMG, I knew I forgot something-
I forgot Earth Hour was tomorrow night.
I might actually be at an astronomical observatory at the time, though, so I guess it’s nothing to worry about. I suppose it’d be okay to turn on my lightmeter to study light pollution.
Choklit Orange- Thanks
It’s over now, making me feel much better. The translation part itself was easier than I expected, but the questions were much tougher because it wasn’t one of the parts I’d figured would actually come. Surprise! Never mind. Positive thoughts.
Bibliophile- May you annihilate your apian nemeses!
I wanted to pie you and accidentally typed 
the first time around- watch out!
Alice- Wandering space ministrels= epic. I’m doing Screnzy, sort of. Actually, I rebelled during NaNo and tried to write two novels. After -0.3 GPA points, burnout(s) and social crashing and burning, I quit at 66,680 words and two half novels later. I don’t have much time this april, even with the easter vacation, so what I want to do is to finish the novels. It’s just 33,320 words, only a little over 1,110 words per day and I’ve got the easter vacation. I need closure, if possible without messing up another NaNo and I never got the hang of scriptwriting.
It’s getting freakishly warm here and I love it! No more thick winter coats, here comes spring. Long overdue.
What else is new? Today in music class, my teacher’s cell phone rang in class. He picked up as usual- we were singing, and we ended up serenading whoever was calling (on porpoise*).
Ack, my sister is annoying me again. She wants the computer to go on facebook. I’m going to do my homework after this and don’t see why I should put it off just so that she won’t have to use her I-pod touch to see if someone commented on her photos. And she just declared she hates MB because I spend so much (of her) computer time on it. Calm. Chill, Margaret. It was one of my new years’ resolutions resolutions to be more calm, serene, composed and friendly. Fine, I’ll be calm- after I go and –, no, you’ve invested so many years in beating the crap out of people who looked at her funny, don’t waste that even if she’s grown up to be like this. How can younger siblings be so bloody antagonizing?
*I’m not sure why, but writing porpoise is so much fun than purpose. The word is just so much nicer.
It seems the stationary pie was eaten by a wung- oh dear.
Wungs will be wungs.
Wungs will be wungs.
It’s been one day, and my resolution to stay away from tvtropes and fanfiction is already being tested.
Also, I don’t know if you’ve been paying attention to the news, but one protester has been killed in Jordan and many more injured. Protests have been going on during Fridays for a while now but this is the biggest thing that’s happened so far. Just figured I’d mention it.
I am now looking up information on proxy servers in case anything happens to the Internet, because many of the protests have been organized on Facebook. I think it’s a sensible precaution to take. So is avoiding the area where the protests are.
Wow…this post took a turn for the depressing pretty quickly.
Aaah! Please don’t do anything dangerous. Please?
Definitely not planning on it. I’ve already gotten warnings from my parents, too. I plan on avoiding the Interior Circle and/or downtown for as long as need be.
It turns out my aunt knows the mother of a Museblogger! 0.o
14 year old male twins who live in New York (not the city).
I don’t really recall anybody of that description, perhaps they’re lurkers?
Or maybe former posters, I suppose. I don’t think I can remember anyone matching that description either.
How did that come up in conversation?
Almost, Robert.
*talking about various things about their children*
Though some of the information I have might be a bit off… my mom said my aunt said that the person was called “Bibliophile” which we do have… but as far as I can tell from looking at this page, en’s from Texas, and not likely to live in New York with a twin.
I wonder if one of them is Thanks For All The Fish 42, or Kokos Apprentice. They’re boys, and I think they live in New York. Beetles might be there, too. Or Vendaval? That could sound like “Bibliophile” to the uninitiated.
Most of our other New Yorkers are girls: Beedle the Bard, Dodecahedron, KaiYves, You Are Never Safe Without A Towel, RoseQuartz… I’m sure there must be others further back.
All things considered, I’m betting she heard “Vendaval.”
Everyone, I have a confession to make…
…It’s me.
Not Beetles, he lives near me.
Wait a second here. I am 99.9% sure that is me, seeing as my mother told me about her coworker’s nephew that goes on MuseBlog. I was going to post about it sooner or later… Wow, this is… Wow. My mother thought my screenname was Bibliophile because that’s my name on another site, but yeah, its definitely me (us).
Wait, who’s your twin? Is en on the blog?
Koko’s Apprentice is really two people posting under the same name. When we first joined the blog, we decided we would try it out together, and we just never switched.
They both post under the name Koko’s Apprentice.
SFTDP I forgot to mention that we were hiding the fact that we were twins because when we originally came to the MB, we tried it out on a single username, and then never changed it. So, yes, we are 14 year old male twins from NY.
Ahhh that’s so cool! What a small world.
*starts singing uncontrollably* Enc, if you ever come to visit your aunt, we should have a small Kokon.
Hmm… Well, next year I’ll definitely be coming up to visit my aunt’s family (to see my cousin in a musical).
So one of you is Koko and the other is the Apprentice?
Do you both play chess?
Um… yes.
Is that against the rules? We are both of like the exact same skill level, and when we play the games usually go on for more than an hour with very few advancements in the game.
SFTDP I apologize for the terrible grammar in that last post. If its possible we can each play one of the chess games we have going on right now.
I’d say it’s up to your opponents. But it would be fun to get a KA-vs.-KA game going.
We could do that. Do you want one of us to make another account for the chess game?
Only one of you did the HP trivia competition, though, right? It seems like it wouldn’t really be fair if you did it as a team; if one of you didn’t know the answer, the other one might, and no-one else had that advantage…
Oh, and SFTDP, but are you fraternal or identical? You look the same in my mind, so it would be strange to learn that you look different…
Well… The doctor said at birth that we were fraternal, but we look ridiculously alike, according to a lot of people. And our sister refuses to believe that we’re fraternal.
Oh SFTDP, didn’t see above question. Yes, it was only me that did the HP trivia thing (The older twin by 18 minutes, if your curious), although my brother did watch the thing progress.
Koko’s Apprentice(s):
We should have a way of telling how many of you have posted. Like
Koko’s Apprentice 1 and Koko’s Apprentice A.
*brain implosion*
My brain just exploded.
Mine too.
How did I miss knowing this?…Never mind.
Our writing styles are very similar, but with practice one might be able to tell the difference.
Well, if you’re not former posters, please say so now. Even if you’re lurkers, please, don’t be shy, just reply (rhyme unintended) saying so.
Woo! Got to walk part of the way home from school and the weather was very nice.
It’s Friday
Friday
Gotta get down on Friday
Anyway, I get to sleep late tomorrow. Yay!
FUN FUN FUN
TILL HER DADDY TAKES THE T-BIRD AWAY
Alice~ That story. Yes. You should write it.
FantastyFan~ I don’t follow the news as well as I should, but my thoughts are with you. Stay safe!
I realize that the only reason I can zip through the beginning of algebra 2 (which I’m just starting, yes, I’m insanely behind in math, I know) is because at this point it’s all disgustingly simple review of the things that I agonized over for two years trying to learn in algebra 1, but it’s still very nice to at least get the illusion that I’m good at math and that I might not die.
That’s all, really.
I continue to be entirely uninspired and unprepared for the paper I should have written months ago, as well as how I’m going to work out this whole summer job thing. It doesn’t help that my potential employer is TERRIBLE at returning emails or calls. So am I, and the compounded effect is rather bad.
Sailing is out though, which is sad but I’m surprisingly okay with it. Next summer when I know what my time limits are and what I need to have done I can figure out a boat job. I’ll survive a summer without a tall ship. Somehow.
Watched The Social Network at the library tonight…I thought it was good, but it’s going to be interesting with Mom. She’s already started talking about how displeased she was about the depictions of partying at college and how “all of the women” were portrayed as “ditzes who did nothing but bedflop.”
When I pointed out that most of the women were supporting characters and not really fully developed and could, and probably did, have interesting lives and make meaningful contributions to the world her response was “what, when they weren’t drunk or sleeping around?”
Yes mom. Just because someone parties doesn’t mean they cant still be perfectly fine people. It’s true, they can often be rather shallow, but they’re not subhuman just because they’re on birth control.
*sigh*
I’m beginning to think I’ll never understand her.
Also that probably should have been on the rants thread. My apologies for inappropriate comment-placeage or snippable content.
Opposition group: We’d like your permission to protest your tight rein on free speech and expression.
Singapore government: I’m sorry, we can’t allow that.
I’m currently doing a college tour circuit around the Northeast. Today was Brown (I am no longer in Providence so it’s okay if I say that, right?). I liked it a lot, which I’m pleased about–I’d been worrying that I was going to feel pretty neutral about most places. Unfortunately it’d be a place that I have almost no change at getting into that I decide I like… oh well, seven schools left to visit! Plus the ones I’ve already seen (Hopkins, Bryn Mawr, Haverford, Princeton, Swarthmore), of which I’ve only especially liked the last. Brown had an atmosphere and attitude that I really liked. I wrote down some of my impressions, so hopefully that’ll help me retain some of it!
So, a couple of weeks ago, I applied to a local arts school, and we were supposed to hear from them this week about whether or not I was considered for audition. Well, we found that out on Tuesday, so by the time today rolled around, I was almost completely certain that I was out of the running. I knew they had an acceptance rate of less than 50%, but still. Rejection hurts. =( Cue depression/feeling of inadequacy/randomly crying/eventually coming to terms with rejection. Then I had opera practice from 6:45-10:00-ish, and that was fun, so I was in a much better mood by the time I got home. And guess what?!?!
MOM GOT AN EMAIL FROM THEM AND I’VE GOT AN AUDITION NEXT WEEK!!!!!! =D =D
I’m really happy. Even if I don’t get in in the end, I’ve still made it this far. =D
Great news, Koppar! Good luck with the audition!
MIDTERMS= DONE.
FINALLY
I had all the work all the time this past week. /All the studying.
AND NOW IT IS OVER AND TOMORROW I LEAVE FOR THE FAR-OFF AND MYSTERIOUS (THOUGH NOT FOR LONG) LAND OF COSTA RICA
Volcano and Monteverde Could Forest and the coast and more rainforest and I am going to take ALL THE PICTURES
and I am not even bothered by the long flight time because now that tests are over I can finally PLAY POKEMON WHITE HELLS YEAH
/excitement
Bon voyage, Jadestone! Or “buen viaje.”
Or Pura Vida.
Buen viaje, Jadestone!
I got into Whitman!
I haven’t got my Official Letter yet, just an email, so I don’t know how much money I have. But I’m EXCITED! The mail will take extra long tomorrow.
We have finally decided to make it known… there are two of us. Two Choklit Oranges. We’ve been in the closet for so long, and we’re tired of keeping it a secret. Now that we’re out, we just want to be treated like everyone else.
Okay, okay, we just want an excuse to refer to ourselves in the plural.
Next up… GOLLUM! GOLLUM!
Really? Cool.
Koppar~ Congratulations, that’s awesome!
Alice~ More congratulations, that’s also awesome!
Jade~ Congratulations on tests, have a safe and fun trip!
Re: Twins in NY:
I know Beatlesrockr was a twin, but she was a girl I don’t know where she lived, so I don’t know.
A name similar to Bibliophile would be biblioRose, if anyone remembers her, but again, female and unknown location, not to mention not a twin.
Vendy does apparently have a brother (I did some stalking on *coughothersitescough*), but not a twin, as far as I can tell. Hmm.
In creeping through the twins thread from a few years back, it turns out Kai has younger brothers who are twins. The question is whether they ever posted on MB or not.
That’s the only promising information I got there.
OH HAI NEVER MIND.
Koko’s Apprentice is two people?
So…do you post together, or do you just post your own things under the same name? *confusion*
Why hide twinness? I mean, even if you wanted to post under one name. *shrug*
We didn’t really hide it, it just never really came up that much. Sometimes we posted the same thing twice when we didn’t realize the other one had posted like Posts 152.1.1 and 152.1.2 on this thread here.
If we are both there, we post together, but otherwise we mostly just use the same username to post, just because we didn’t feel like changing it after our ‘phyte days.
WHOA BRAIN EXPLOSION
It’s a little weird to find out that someone whom you thought was one person is actually two people.
You are the third person whose brain has exploded, imploded, or were otherwise destroyed…
Apparently we have that affect on people.
Yes, my younger brothers are twins, but they’ve never posted on MB. They think it’s dumb.
*shock* *horror* People who actually think MB is dumb exist?!
I’m pretty sure my sister does.
A lot of people think a lot of things are dumb.
My brother does.
They think it *must* be dumb if *I’m* doing it.
I’d say that says a lot about them and nothing at all about you. But perhaps there’s hope for them.
I ab a bid sduffy. Also, talkig lige this id idteresting.
-A
My friend is on her way to being a published manga artist. This, I would say, is a Pretty Cool Thing.
Indeed. She texted me last night and I could tell she was manic even though I couldn’t see or hear her. It added to my “best last-night-of-being-14 possible” (most of the rest is on the R&R thread, in case anyone’s curious.)
Yep, same here. I think she deserves to be manic.
Ooh, awesome!
I just finished a HUGE IMPORTANT math project!
And earlier, I did some really good fencing!
And now I’m totally rocking out over John Williams!
And I had a red pepper and brie omlette for lunch!
And I’m about to go to Brass Quartet!
It’s a good day.
That does indeed sound like a good day.
I, meanwhile, have nearly nothing to do today. This is also good.
And I just bought the Series 5 soundtrack.
Oh, and the BBC has released a preview of the first episode!
“There are no monsters in the oval office.”
alternate at forensics national qualifies.
ALTERNATE.
after five straight weeks of placing third or second EVERY week, in the MOST IMPORTANT week, we have a huge freaking upset and I’m not going to nationals, i’m not going to DC, I’m going to have an awful time sitting at home alone curled up in a ball while everyone else has fun and I DESERVED THAT MEDAL.
Those idiots, don’t they realize what they’re missing?! Your team stands little chance without you.
I got accepted to Boston University!
*Happy dance*
Congratulations! *joins in happy dance*
I’ve seen a lot of getting-into-college-related posts lately. I’m glad they’ve started realizing the awesomeness of MBers.
Awesome! Congratulations, KaiYves!
Congratulations, Kai!!
CHEERS!
Yay! Massachusetts Kokons hopefully ahead!
Kai- Congratulations!
I was quite sad, because many of my friends had received acceptance emails from Lewis and Clark, my second college choice, and I had not.
But then this morning I found it in my spam filter! Yay!
Congratulations! *makes note to always check spam filter*
I need to get a real camera.
Like, a good camera, not just a point-and-shoot.
A REAL camera.
I should get on that.
I would beg my parents for one, but I don’t like asking for things. Also mom just got me a pair of Birkenstocks, so I really don’t want to beg.
She also is mad at me as regards to cameras because the family camera that was mine because I knew how to use it vanished at the end of the summer. It was in the breakroom and then it wasn’t and I didn’t have time or resources to look for it because I was working every day all day and not living in that area and anyone who might be able to help me find it was also working and everything was crazy. Not to mention the other crews that had taken residence in the building
So I got told that if I want to have a camera I need to buy it “because [I] lost the last one because it was too easy come, easy go.”
Anyway. I’m lusting after Jade and Kiki’s camera.
But that camera costs money. And I have money, but I don’t really, because I have a car and I go places, and gas costs money.
ADULTHOOD WHY ARE YOU CREEPING TOWARDS ME LIKE THIS?
Adulthood does have its advantages, although it’s also true that not all adults avail themselves of such.
It does?
Just participated in Earth Hour with my brothers. Great bonding time, sitting in the dark, just a few candles, singing “The Campfire Song Song” from SpongeBob, stargazing, making each other laugh… just really great brother-sister bonding.
So I’m editing my novel and I have to get it done by april first (or…doom) and it’s driving me crazy. I joined a club when I was doing NaNoWriMo and we’re going to publish all the books we wrote through Createspace, have a book signing, et cetera. I wasn’t going to edit/publish mine due to a fear of people reading my mind through my writing ( And also because my writing is ABSOLUTE CRAP no matter what anyone says.) but I finally succumbed to PEER PRESSURE (The good kind, I am told.) and decided to (Okay, it’s really an awesome group of people and I don’t feel like I’m a part of the club if I’m not concentrating on editing and revisions; I don’t want to disappoint them, either.). We’re all trying to get our manuscripts edited by april first so that we can have the book signing by the end of June.
I can’t seem to concentrate and just write; I have to rewrite several scenes and I’m struggling with them.
…So I was wondering if anyone had any tips on editing and revising tips? Augh, please. I am slightly desperate. Okay, really, really.
The vocabulary that you use helps sets the mood of the piece. Certain words can distract you from what is actually happening, so try to streamline your writing. If it feels like prose, you might want to take it back a step. Read through the novel and make sure that every scene has a function, obvious or subtle.
I want to finish my novel during April in lieu of Screnzy, and maybe get around to editing it. I have no thoughts about publishing it in the state that it is in. Your’s is going to look bad to your mind no matter what, because you remember it pre-editing and those images are retained I suppose. Just try to get one person give it an honest review, maybe give it to them without telling them you wrote it, and get them to tell you exactly what they think needs work.
There is always something that can be rewritten, the choice is whether it should be.
Avoid repetition–if the hero is hot, OK we get it, you don’t need to remind us a hundred times. ((Coughtwilightmortalinstrumentscough))
Using good vocabulary can help you sound mature and interest the audience, but if you start writing things like, “I had been vacillating between blah blah blah and blah blah blah,” people will laugh at you. Don’t try and make your writing dramatic and elegant, because it may come off as forced.
That’s all I can think of now; I hope it helps.
Ask yourself which parts have a purpose and which parts are just fluff.
This is more a general writing thing and not all that useful to your purpose, but: read a lot. Read everything you can find. Well-written, badly-written, fiction, nonfiction, everything. Think about what works and what doesn’t, and why.
(this is also how to get a good score on the SAT reading / writing portions)
Thank you! That helped quite a bit. *grateful squidles*
Actually, I’m pretty much done with editing now; at least, I can’t go any further until I write more. Siiigh.
(Trust me, my novel is baad, though… argh.)
We’re still plural! Yay us!
Life is good in plural.
So, we have not much to say, except that we are reading Jodi Picoult’s Sing You Home and it is good. We didn’t like My Sister’s Keeper because we thought it was melodramatic and kind of badly written, but this is good.
Oh, and also, we are attempting to knit a toy llama, and it is not going well.
This is where panic sets in. My Euro teacher, instead of just giving us a curve on the test that everyone, decided to have us write why each correct choice was correct and why each incorrect choice was incorrect. Remember what I said, most people failed, and I got a 66, so that’s a lot of questions as it is. But it gets better. I lost or left my scantron in school, so I don’t know which questions I got wrong and which I got right, so I’m just doing the whole test. All forty five questions. And I have to write an essay. I tried to get it done earlier, but I was busy all weekend. *headdesk*
My friend just sent me the correct answers. Goodbye, until probably six o’ clock tonight.
Just kidding, it’ll be more like twelve a.m.Hello MuseBlog and All Who Inhabit It!
I am (temporarily) back!
A few updates on my life:
We scored 3s in band festival. Everyone we talked to said we should have gotten one-one minus, but according to the judges
90 is too many people to have in a band
The pianissimo wasn’t soft enough (with 20 clarinets you can only go so soft)
Our fortissimo was too loud (see above, also they were sitting too close to the stage)
“That’s not the way I would have interpreted the song” (Did anyone ask you? It’s not your band)
The bari sax was too loud (this coming from a judge who sat 10 feet away from said baritone saxophone)
The trumpets were too loud (this coming from a judge ten feet away from the trumpet section)
Only the 45-piece bands got ones. Our band director’s friend’s band only scored superior because at the last minute he cut half the parts.
And of course I mean this in all due respect to the judges. It’s not their fault they’re picky and stingy.
Then in a fit of random madness I switched to trombone. Wish me luck learning bass clef!
Kai- Congratulations! I’m so happy for you!
We are playing “Take Five” in jazz band. I will fight to the death for that solo.
Editing and Revising Tips: Try to see the book from the point of view that you were wandering around the library and picked up the book from the shelf, and began reading it to see what it was about. This is what I do when I write/edit/revise. I hope this helps!
Random Philosophy: Hollister. If the models wear know shirts, do I even want to know what the acctual merchandise looks like?
Off to update my RPG’s!
Oh, gods, how I hate bass clef. They keep trying to impose it on my parts; my precious euphonium parts.
-A
I love Take Five! We played it in orchestra three years ago and it was awesome.
I have had that exact thought regarding Hollister ads before. They’re supposed to be advertising clothes, right?
Trombone is the best! Good luck learning bass clef.
Thanks! Actually, it’s not so bad if you played an Eb instrument on treble clef before.
I was reading a comic (Sunday comics! Yay!) and in one of them, there was, a HPB! There was a stick of dynamite behind it…
What comic?
Bizarro, right?
Yes…
One of my bean plants grew a flower! It’s purple!!
Also, I knitted four inches of something! Slowly, I am becoming cool.
Congratulations! Right now I have knitted about 5 1/2 inches of a hat; it’s my first time trying to make one. What are you knitting, or is it just a something? It’s fine if you are; somethings are quite useful.
YAY another knitter! We’re thrilled! How wide is it? You can make almost anything into a scarf…
Yes, it’s a scarf. It is lavender and turquoise.
Since the NationStates thread is closed:
So our region’s been invaded and the new admin is banning people right and left. Do we try to elect a new delegate? Do we dump it and start a new region?
Let’s try to take it back. We have help, we can try to elect a new delegate and I don’t think we should let a few *inappropriate vocabulary* …people walk all over us. The new admin was only banning the people trying to help us and doesn’t have enough influence to ban any of us yet, all well as one cavalry nation trying to help us out. Maybe we can’t win this. Maybe we’re just too few. But I know that I’m going to keep trying to take our region back until we are outnumbered 100:1. I have to fold at everything else: this is one thing I’d like to fight for.
Okay: so, unless Raynpho appears, it looks like I’m going to be the one who everyone will try to endorse for delegate, since–excepting Raypho–I have the most regional influence. If you have a country in the region already, please endorse me. If you don’t, you could try making one and joining us, but you’ll most likely just get kicked out by the invaders.
I can try, but what is the password?
Nevermind I’ll telegram one of you. Not that I’ll be able to do much.
Okay. Raynpho has appeared. Everyone, please: make a nation on NationStates and join the region “Land of the Muse”. Send a telegram to one of us for the password. I think Raynpho will now be the one to be sure to endorse? She has more regional influence than I do.
And from this point forward please keep NationStates administrative discussion on NationStates.
Yes, ma’am. *bows apologetically*
My dad says when I make it, I can live like Thoreau if I want.
Heck yes.
Half-Price Books is now using HPB as an abbreviation for itself.
What are we going to do?! I loved that place, and now it’s been infiltrated!
O,o
My neighbor’s front door is now occupied by a glowing beacon of death.
Apparently, a light-up HPB is now acceptable easter decoration.
If anyone wants a picture, I’ll get one. It’s a perfect HPB that glows the perfect color.
I think it’s made of that tube Christmas lighting, formed into the shape of a rabbit.
Please do send pictures.
I’m a Ravenclaw, I like to read books! When I cast spells, they’re off the fricking hook~!
My personal accomplishments for the day: I FINISHED THE HAT. I have my very own hand-knit hat and I’m totally going to wear it tomorrow even if it’s warm out. Or at least carry it around. iA. I also finished about 9 episodes of Reborn while working on it. Also, I have made it to 60 on Who’s Posted How Much list. Number 42, here I come!
So all in all it was a very productive day.
…what’s that you said about homework?
I slept for 14 hours last night wooo!
I feel so much better now. I was half dead all week.
Now I have to do all of my homework. Blahh. So I might end up negating all the sleep I just caught up on.
Wednesday I took a school trip to DC, and Friday and yesterday I was at a taekwondo tournament. I worked every day I was home. :]
Today all I had was a flying lesson, and now I’m cooking and I’m going to do homework. (maybe?)
I was mistaken: it’s a ’92 Honda Accord, not a Toyota Camry. Apparently its former name was “Trusty Rusty”. The second word is definitely true, and I hope the first one is as well. But I’m trying to think of a new name for it. I was thinking “Jules”?
Jules could work. To me, the car looks like a Steve, or maybe Fiyero.
I want it to be ironic, I think. After driving it for the first time, I happened to glance at my Kindle, and the screensaver was a picture of Jules Verne. It just clicked for me. But I’m still rather uncertain, and it’s not technically my car yet.
Oh, we (my family) have an ’89 Accord at home (California)! My parents say they will let me learn to drive in it because it is no longer possible to insure…
Went to the fort today and ate chocolate cream that a friend was making. I say chocolate cream, but a more fitting name would probably be death in a bowl. It was chocolate, cream, egg yolks and sugar. That’s it. So terribly anti-vegan, so terribly good, so terribly put-me-off-chocolate-in-the-best-way-possible….
Also got to talk to potential boss who I’ve known since forever about a summer job. Looks like the time should work, and we discussed clothes (I have my own, but I’ll probably end up wearing the fort’s because they don’t let people take in their own stuff so as to ensure accuracy and not wear out people’s individual things). Meh, but whatever. As long as I’m allowed to wear my own stays and shoes (the most important and hardest to fit parts) I don’t really care.
He also wants to be careful and extra fair with interviews and such because, as I said, I’ve known him forever. He’s super careful about trying to make everything as fair as possible and to avoid letting people in just because they’ve already got their foot in the door. Anyway.
HOPEFULLY I’ll have a summer job this year.
Costa Rica! Volcano! Monkeys! Tapier! Leaf-cutter ants and more insects than you can count, including an irredescent blue butterfly! Bats! So many birds! Just had a delicious meal at tonight’s resort-cabin-place, And going to the Monteverde cloud forest tomorrow! I am excite.
Thanks for reporting in, Jadestone! I’m glad to hear that your adventure is going well.
Oooh, volcanoes? Do tell.
Is Muse Academy on Engey or Vioey?
You mean Viðey? (The third letter is an edh.)
Neither, I think, although it’s the same general sort of place. We call it Hyperborea. As far as I know, it hasn’t been extruded yet, at least in our timeline.
AAAH a bus painted pink with an advertisement for Singapore’s Health Promotion Board just trundled by our apartment….
We think we should be worried.
Oh dear.
155 (Piggy)~ Jules. Do it. What color is your car?
My Yugo was named Pepper, because it reminded me of a red bell pepper lying on its side–completely helpless and that odd orangey-red. ♥
I don’t really know what my car’s name is now. Other than just Car. Technically I think it’s Puck, because Puck’s other name is Robin Goodfellow, and my car is obnoxiously red, as I’ve mentioned before. My car’s theme song is “Car Song” by Woody Guthrie though, I do know that.
(It’s a ’92 VW Cabriolet)
It’s maroon, my least favorite car color (excepting unusual colors).
But maroon is a pretty color!
For wine, yes. For accent pillows, yes. For velvet curtains, yes. But for cars–especially older cars–no.
SFTDP
Oh, job application…previous jobs held, including volunteer activities. Well I can handle that, the only things I’ve done so far are volunteer.
So, Bring Niagara, various information…. “Number of hours worked per week” Hmm….get out the calculator…write out watch schedule…count hours of watch standing for a typical day…multiply by 7 (weekends off? HAHAHAHAHAHAHA oh, you’re serious? nvm)…70 hours. Hmm, but that’s under sail, which is a lighter schedule than in port…but each port is different…well, Chicago, that was the most intense…for a week with one day off would be 84 hours.
Hmm.
I wonder what a normal work week is?
9-5 Mon.-Fri. …40 hours.
WHAT?
40 MEASLY HOURS?
Whoa.
Real life perplexes me.
Actually no, wait…maintaining the Chicago tour schedule for a whole week with one day off would be 90 hours, what with an hour of prep and clean up before and after tours, dock watch and all that.
Gah, my political speech in is tomorrow and I’m very, very nervous. For one thing, the teacher is very strict. I’m pretty okay rhetorically but I didn’t write out the text after she lectured my unfortunate predecessors about speaking to the audience, not reading from the papers on your desk.
Besides, long sentences just confuse me. I just hope I can keep up the appropriate language register (I hate public speaking in german) with the few keywords I’ve written down and I hope she doesn’t find the research too patchy (I sort of had a crisis this weekend and didn’t have a chance to seriously prepare).
So anyway, wish me luck!
Best of luck!
*unoriginal comment yay*
Thanks anyway.
I failed, but I get to try again on Thursday.
Alright, that’s it, Google Chrome is reading my mind. There is no way in heck that “Lori Garver” is the normal first suggestion for “Lor”.
That’s the goal–to work better than you think should be possible. The suggestion it gives for me is “Lord of the Rings”.
It’s a tad creepy…
Mine too.
Yes, well, it isn’t perfect. Mine’s Loreal. I don’t even know what that is, but I have a vague idea that it has something to do with making you look better (or trying to), and if so, it isn’t something I’d be even a bit interested in.
It’s a company that makes shampoo and nail polish.
It isn’t even one of the suggestions when I type it into my Google sidebar. I’m not sure about Chrome, because I don’t use it.
Mine’s ‘Lord and Taylor’. I’d never even heard of it before.
It’s a department store in New York City.
And everywhere else too.
Everywhere else but here, then, I suppose.
I just signed an apartment lease.
Wifi in a resturaunt! Night hike in the cloud forest tonight, bridge walk/reptiles/hummingbird/butterfly garden tomorrow!
Wonderful!
Ooh! Take lots of pictures for us!
Oh oh oh oh oh! Ah! that’s so cool! Have fun!
Cool! Now *that’s* life.
Dear friends’ exes,
Can you please stop writing me on Facebook? Especially after I know that you had messy, nasty, break ups with my friends. Especially you, Troy’s ex.
Thank you.
Love,
Isabella
Piggy (155)- Steve Irwin.
Umm… I’m supposed to be doing homework… *awkward sideward glance*
I guess since I’m already here…
HOLY CAKE ONLY 9 WEEKS UNTIL I’M DONE WITH HIGH SCHOOL FOREVER! That doesn’t even make sense to my brain yet. I can’t imagine what I’ll be like without the people I’ve known my whole life. I can’t imagine what I’ll do without a taekwondo school. Well, I’ll probably just do homework and work all the time like I do now. It’ll just be school with different classes and new people and a job without martial arts.
HO. LY. CAKE.
You guys.
Diana Wynne Jones is dead.
Oh my god.
Oh my god, I can’t, I just can’t. I’m crying.
I heard about it a day ago. I think I may read Howl’s Moving Castle finally, at my friend’s insistence.
“Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.”
Aw.
Maybe we should each read one of her books in memory. Which do you recommend?
Which of her books has everyone read?
I’ve read Archer’s Goon, Cart and Cwidder, Castle in the Air, Charmed Life, Conrad’s Fate, The Crown of Dalemark, Dark Lord of Derkholm, Deep Secret, Dogsbody, Drowned Ammet, Fire and Hemlock, The Game, Hexwood, The Homeward Bounders, House of Many Ways, Howl’s Moving Castle, The Lives of Christopher CHant, The Magicians of Caprona, The Merlin Conspiracy, THe Pinhoe Egg, Power of Three, The Spellcoats, The Time of the Ghost, The Tough Guide to Fantasyland, Witch Week, Year of the Griffin
I’ve read:
Archer’s Goon, Aunt Maria, Cart and Cwidder, Castle in the Air,
Charmed Life, Conrad’s Fate, The Crown of Dalemark , Dark Lord of Derkholm , Drowned Ammet , Eight Days of Luke, Fire and Hemlock , The Game , House of Many Ways, Howl’s Moving Castle , The Lives of Christopher Chant, The Magicians of Caprona, The Merlin Conspiracy , The Pinhoe Egg, The Spellcoats , A Tale of Time City, The Tough Guide to Fantasyland, Witch Week , Year of the Griffin, Mixed Magics A Chrestomanci anthology, and Unexpected Magics. I also read whichever of her stories is in Firebirds.
169.4: 2 of her books will be published posthumously, but not those, unfortunately. 1 is for elementary schhol-aged people, and the other is essays and things.
WHAT?
Brian Jacques AND Diana Wynne Jones????
NOOOOO
There was going to be another HMC book, and more Chrestomanci, and a sequel to Year of The Griffin, and now none of them will ever exist….
ToT
I say we all read Fire and Hemlock to honor her.
I didn’t understand F&H when I first read it. I should try again.
It’s somewhat intertwined with the Ballad of Tam Lin. If you read F&H enough times it starts making sense, but it’s easier if you read it with the ballad in mind.
I’ve just created a thread in her honor.
WHATNOOOO
Would all of you MuseBlog denizens help me find a particular painting? We were shown it today at the museum during training to demonstrate a methodology, but we didn’t know the name and I really want to find it.
It appears fairly modern, maybe early 20th century. On the left, there’s a woman dressed nicely, as though she’s just come home from church or work. She’s very close to the wall and peering around the corner. In the middle, there’s what appears to be a young boy dressed in a suit. He also happens to be suspended several feet off the ground and is seemingly attached to the wall. On the right side, there’s an open door that looks into a bedroom, where two people are asleep.
I tried Googling “painting with levitating child” and other keywords similar to that, but those efforts were obviously unsuccessful. Any ideas?
Does the museum have a website? It may be listed there.
Any mention of levitating makes me think of Magritte, but more than likely it’s not one of his.
The painting isn’t actually at the museum. The woman who was training us had a digital image of it projected on a screen.
Discontinuing plurality charade; rules taking up valuable memory space.
Pyrotechnics continued: It turns out baking soda actually can burn.
Also, yay, I made up with my friend, resolving a great amount of chat-related strife between us.
I recently had a plurality crisis as well (see fashion thread). It can be very trying on the soul.
Listening to all of the original songs that made it to the top 10 in the space rock contest to choose a wake-up call on the last shuttle mission. They’re all really good, it’s going to be hard to pick one. I wish I had musical talent like that.
Ag.
Note to self: Do not get a migraine again, if at all possible.
You certainly take after your father.
Fortunately, I don’t get them very often. The last one I had was over the summer, and the first one was last year around this time.
And I managed not to throw up today.
You’re lucky. I’ve had them for as long as I can remember.
Ew. Migraines. I hate migraines SO MUCH.
So I guess we’re twins/half twins now? Because we share Piggy as a father, but I don’t know about my relationship with Bookgirl, and SBF is marrying both Piggy and I, and I’m also marrying Pseudonym…
This reminds me of my situation at school. One girl has managed to become the great great grandfather of their mother.
…
Anyway, I don’t think it’s possible to be half-twins with different mothers. It is possible to be half-siblings without being twins, though. If bookgirl is your mother, though, you certainly might be twins.
We were twins already, weren’t we? But yes, Piggy is our dad. I think Bookgirl is my adoptive mother and I’m not sure who our mom is. Or, alternatively, Bookgirl actually IS our mom.
It would make more sense to me for bookgirl_me to be your biological mother, and SBF to be your soon-to-be stepmother. Enc, I hope you’re alright with marrying your stepmother.
Hm.
*draws family tree*
That’s actually pretty straightforward. Let’s try it with bookgirl_me being the stepmother and
being the biological mother. How would you even denote that on a family tree?
The biological mother is a wung?
It only makes sense.
Did you really draw the family tree, or just in theory? I’m sorry, but I really can’t tell; I can be extremely literal-minded, so I’m often not sure whether people mean what they’re saying or not. If you did draw it, could you please send it in?
I did actually draw it. I’m not going to send it in because it’s quite simple to draw. There’s only six names to connect.
Lovely! Piggy, Enc – kisses.
The first paragraph made sense to me, the second one not really but never mind.
I’ve been telling myself that for years. Why don’t I ever listen to me?!
Aaaaand I’ll be gone til Monday! Going p to Sacramento for the bee, wish me luck!
Getting a bunch of Vocaloid music.
Vocaloid music is excellent.
Good luck!
Good luck!
SO MUCH ENERGY
ALMOST NINE HOURS OF SLEEP LAST NIGHT
I SHOULD DO THIS ALL THE TIME
-A
I can only imagine…
I corrected my teacher today, and he thanked me!
Him: “Geraldine Ferraro was the first woman to be on a presidential ticket.”
Me: “Don’t you mean, the first on a major-party ticket?”
Him: “That’s right, Kai, who was the first woman?”
Me: “Victoria Woodhull.”
Congratulations! I wish my own teachers were so appreciative.
They never appreciate my insight into the deep flaws in their curriculum. Or my insight into how “consternation” is spelled, for that matter.
Or my insight that “dimension” isn’t spelled with a t. Or that “tongue” is spelled that way. Or the difference between possessive its and contraction it’s.
When I was in public school, even when my teachers didn’t mind, my classmates did. I really don’t get it. If my English teacher doesn’t mind when I tell her that, “It’s alright, it’s okay, you’ll be working with us someday” isn’t punctuated correctly, why should they?
I’ve decided to keep a diary for myself. I like writing my thoughts down on paper. Why? Because paper is safe. Paper can’t stab you in the back. Paper can’t blackmail you. Paper can’t argue or yell or object.
All paper can do is sit there and listen, and care. Paper is a good friend.
(By the way, if you’re looking for something beautiful, listen to ‘In The Sun’
by Joseph Arthur. I plan to play it at my spring concert, but there are no piano tutorials, so I’m gonna learn it by ear. It’s a simply gorgeous song.)
Well, I was pulled over for the first time today.
Oh…well, I’m sorry. (I am not going to go into paroxysms over Piggy actually having something as banal as being pulled over happen to him. Or claim that it was clearly the fault of the police person. I know you are only human. Well, fairly certain anyways.)
It really wasn’t my fault, though, or the sheriff’s. While I was driving, the “Brake Lamp” light came on. Two minutes later, I pass a sheriff on the side of the road. As I cross the intersection, he pulls out, maneuvers behind me, and puts his lights on. I pull over, get license, registration, insurance out. He asks me if I know why he pulled me over. “Is it the brake light?” I respond. He informed me it was actually the headlight, contrary to what the car had claimed. He let me off with a warning and I drove to the auto parts place.
Camera and dreadlocks kit. My wallet is already cringing and I haven’t even ordered anything yet.
I want to do dreads. I’m pretty sure I want to do dreads. I’m starting to chicken out. Someone yell at me and set me straight. Or tell me that it’s a terrible idea and I should abandon it completely, whatever you think.
Merble.
I think dreads are a pretty awesome idea, provided you can keep them clean. Go ahead and do it.
Yes, cleanliness is key. I think you should do it.
It really depends. If you have the confidence to rock dreads, by all means do it.
I vote terrible idea.
Have you ever seen Fiddlefern (that’s your new nickname, MF) in person? You may think dreads are a terrible idea, but if she has the confidence and attitude to pull it off, she should go for it. We may be against it, but I believe Fiddlefern can do anything!
Aww, sbf you’re the sweetest! ♥
So, Fiddlefern, eh? Grant O. used to call me Fern Fiddler.
Now Piggy’s calling me MidFid.
Generally I just refer to myself as Fiddler.
UP (below this comment)~ You should totally do it too. We’ll be awesome together.
Midnight Fiddler- Do it!!! I’m wobbling about dreading my hair this summer. I really want to but I’m nervous. One of my German friends has them and she looks amazing. You should totally do itttt! I’ll let you know if I do. :]
My family keeps going to bed at like 8:30 or 9 I don’t know how to deal with this madness except by playing pokemon under the covers at night x_x
Otherwise, ALL THE ACTIVITIES WOO
So, uhh, update from Vermontlandiaplace; splitting headache. Which is weird, because I never get headaches. Pretty much ever.
I think it may be because I didn’t eat anything at all today before about 19:00… That’s when I got home and ate everything.
-A
Hey y’all! Typing this from my brand new iTouch I just got for by birthday today!
Overall it was a pretty good birthday….five minutes after I woke up Alan called and we talked for an hour and a half and then I talked to my sister for half an hour. Then I had to go by DMV and get a new license since I’m 21 now…..that wasn’t so flammy. I ended up standing in line for an entire hour waiting for my number to be called. Andthen the whole process of getting my née license took less than five minutes. *sigh*. I don’t get why DMV is alwYs so ridiculously busy. But whatever. And then I had to stand in line for half an hour at the post Office to mail a scholarship app. But then I went to dinner with the parents after opening my present. And then talked to alan again for a few minutes. So yeah. A pretty good birthday.
nd this thing is surprisingly easy to type on given that I don’t have a phone with text Nd thus haven’t had any sort of practice with typing on anything other than a regular keyboard.
Anyway it’s eleven…..probably should think about going to bed
Happy belated birthday! (how could I forget *headwall*)
Luna- Happy birthday! (requisite
)
I feel disillusioned. I opened a box of chocolates that was in the freezer to discover that my cousin had decided to freeze olive oil in it….
Cousins are like mosquitoes. There are a lot of them, and they fly around making a high-pitched buzzing noise.
Do you want to swap? Mine make those noises too, except it’s more like cellphoneomgliketotallylikecellphoneblackberry…
No, this is more like aaaahi’mcomingtogetyoulet’splaytagwaaahepunchedmemomeeeeeewaaaanowhe’spickinghisnosemakehimstopgetawayfrommeaaaaaahhestolemycookieyoualreadyhadtwothisoneisminemomeeemakehimstopWILL YOU PLEASE BE QUIET?!
That last bit would be me.
And the female ones have to drink animal blood so they have enough nutrients to lay eggs?
You three should be commended for having the funniest conversation on the thread.
GAPA please listen to this term. get ready……
THE UBER BANHAMMER!
banning wrongdoers in a flash of BANNING ENERGY.
… we don’t really do that here. We’re not very ban-y sort of people. You have to do something pretty huge to get banned on MB. I don’t know if it’s ever even happened before. The GAPAs are pretty great about warning us, making the rules clear, and being reasonable about everything they do. And besides, the rules are there for a really good reason: to keep a peaceful, safe, fun, polite, nice environment on the blog. Most everyone who doesn’t follow them either reforms and apologizes quickly or leaves the blog of their own free will.
I think Frigid Symphony got banned once, but only for a week.
With some exceptions. *coughAJARcough*
Actually, I don’t think he was on when I got on. All I’ve heard were stories.
I vaguely remember an AJAR, but I don’t remember any sort of fiasco that would have surrounded a banning.
He impersonated another MBer and put hidden obscenities into his posts.
Hm. I once pretended to be another MBer impersonating me… but that conversation got disturbingly meta after a while. Good times.
I once went into a chat with like five other MBers and pretended to be someone. It was glorious.‘
okay i didn’t actually chat as them i just logged in under their name. Whatever.
I don’t think he was ever banned, but he was generally annoying and thoughtless.
BANINATING THE VILLAG– oh, woops…
In their thatched-roof cottages?
==========
///
banning the hpbs
Ban them all you want.
What is the proper response to being forwarded a “send-this-to-8-friends-and-you’ll-magically-gain-money” chain e-mail by your mother?
After you delete it, I mean?
Uproarious laughter?
I’ve never done this, but I think it would be hilarious to send it to the sender 8 times
“Mom, I forwarded that email you sent me to eight friends. Can I have ten bucks?”
If you’re getting those, your network of contacts is probably big enough for you to start a Nigerian email scam.
Rejected by Harvard and Stanford, but I don’t care, because BU was always my first choice. So now, everything’s settled and I’m definitely going there. Go Terriers!
YAYYYY
Boston rocks. I’ve been there.
Well, Howdy MB. Long time no talk to. Well, not really long, but somewhat long. Whether or not it’s necessary, here are some updates:
Education, as always continues- fierce battles between heavily conservative students and my very liberal history teacher are always fun. Religious education and psychology on my own time have also been quite informative. There’s just so much to learn, so little time.
The school had a musical of the wizard of Oz, in which I played the french horn(for the orchestra, of course). That’s done now, but it was certainly worth the amount of time it sucked out of my schedule.
Thinking about buying a pet lizard, when the time is right. It’s down to a battle between a Savannah monitor or a bearded dragon. I lean towards the monitor as an animal capable of affection, and that actually requires interaction, but they can grow to about 4 feet, and they need a BIG tank, so the issue is really only location, and what I do when I depart for the ever-nearing college experience.
Boy scouts as well, nears the final leap- eagle project makes me busy busy busy and stressed beyond belief.
Luckily, however, I’ve been getting more than my traditional meager amounts of sleep so I actually stay awake in class now and the remnants of depression are finally shedding.
Despite this, there was one specific incident, and have been some to follow that haven’t gone quite so well. To put it, in my mind, mildly, I’ve done, well, terrible things (I’ll spare MB any un-muserly details), and thanks to the breaking point of doing said things too much, it lead to a brief suicidal period and self-inflicted exile from communication with some close friends. Such a long period of feeling close to nothing just means that such an experience is an unwelcome explosion of emotion. Thankfully, though, I’m improving daily. Inexplicable shivering is almost totally gone, and I’m recovering. Things look up- but it’s impossible to ignore the fact that I pretty much view myself as a monster nowadays. So that’s that problem, but it’s getting better.
On top of that, my friend with PTSD had a massive, unexplained freakout today and refuses to talk, which she has only ever done when she’s particularly mad at me… I may be over-analyzing, but things just feel like they’re getting worse. I’m going to respect her wishes… but it’s painful to know someone you love and care about doesn’t want to see you.
And I’m shaving my head bald before I leave for Mexico with my church this spring break. It’s to eliminate the trouble of hair, but between you faceless musers and me, it’s an expression of penitence.
Well, that’s that. Sorry, it started on a high note and then sunk into what I’ve felt like for the past.. oh, few months. How are things going for you?
I’m glad to hear you’re holding up relatively well. If you want to talk more about the “terrible” things you’ve done (which I doubt are so horrid), the Student Lounge might offer you more privacy. Anyway, I hope you post here regularly. It’s good to hear from you. Question: what grade are you in again? I can’t recall. Good luck becoming an Eagle Scout. I’ve heard it’s a caketon of work. Don’t let it overwhelm you. I’m sorry to hear about your friend. Remember that it’s not that she doesn’t want to see you, but rather that the condition she’s struggling with doesn’t allow her to. Be there for her when she comes back.
Well, things are improving… and as to grades: Junior.
Friend: Things are looking up, I’m just worried the problem is too much for me to handle- I’ll need to start looking into outside help.
I FOUND A BOY SCOUT!! PEOPLE STILL DO BOY SCOUTS!
I’m really excited right now.
I recently met a boy scout troop leader.
189 (Gim)~ Good to see you again! I’m glad to hear that some things have been going well.
Re: Pet lizard: I know next to nothing about them, but timing and location are important, as you said. I don’t know what other colleges’ pet policies are, but I know that the school I’m leaning towards lets kids bring smallish pets in cages. One girl is bringing a bearded dragon this coming fall.
I’m sorry to hear about your struggles of late. Though I don’t know (or wish to know) what you’ve done, I’m sure you will be able to overcome any mistakes you’ve made and move forward. It sounds like you’re already doing this, and I’m glad. I hope that in time you’re able to forgive and completely love yourself.
I agree with Fiddler.
*hugs Gim*
I saw my new cousin today! She’s absolutely adorable and TINY.
It’s been a long time, beloved MuseBlog.
Life hasn’t been most amazing for the past two seasons, and it does not seem to be improving. And it’s horrible because I know that I am the one and only cause of pain to myself, because if I could just see myself the same way others see me, then I wouldn’t be hurting anymore. But it doesn’t work that way.
But hopefully everything will get better eventually, because I don’t want to keep hiding my feelings.
How are things going around here?
Is anyone on MuseBlog not depressed?
Me! I’ve just got anxiety issues.
Yep!
-A
*waves hands* Me! Me!
It’s sunny outside! And grass smells all grassy and green! And the sun is going down and have you ever noticed that the sky is always pretty if you look at it properly?
Grass feels so nice when you walk on it barefoot. Computers are warm when they’ve been on for a while, like a cat sleeping on your lap. I’m going to sleep tonight, and I’m going to dream, and my dreams are going to be crazy!
I own earrings! Earrings are awesome. So are hats, and I have a lot of those, too.
It’s spring!
I’m not. I’m actually the happiest that I’ve been in a long time.
I’m not depressed! I just now caught up on schoolwork, which is great because I’m sick, so it’s harder than normal to concentrate on schoolwork, so I was really behind! My mom’s so glad that she’s getting me a $60 book on tardigrades because she didn’t get me anything for winning the district spelling be last month! I saved an insect from drowning recently! I just took a quiz on tardigrades and got all the questions right!
Not anymore!
I’m not. Mildly insecure, with falling self-esteem, yes, but actually my life’s great.
*raises hand*
I’m currently a bit paranoid about people finding me annoying, but otherwise okay.
Just so you know, I don’t find you annoying.
Me either.
I’ll take that as you like that I’m not depressed, not that you like that I’m paranoid that people find me annoying.
I’m not. Life is good.
Actually, given the seemingly larger-than-usual proportion of depression, misery, and self-injury around here, I’ve asked myself that- maybe we’re just more likely to admit it to people we don’t normally see in person.
Or maybe smart people are more prone to depression, I don’t know.
We also tend to be a proportionally more reclusive bunch than found in Real Life. That was my guess, but it could be completely off-base.
It could also just be that those who are feeling down find that they have more to rant about than those who aren’t, so they post more, so it appears like MuseBlog has a lot of depressed people.
Not depressed at all!
I am… Eighteen.
Oh, gods, it’s terrifying.
-A
A while ago, in response to (I believe) one of Axa’s posts, the book A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson, was mentioned. Has anyone read one of Bryson’s other books, A Walk in the Woods? I’m reading it now. I want to walk the Appalachian Trail more than anything else in the world. I don’t know when, but sometime. I realize that it’s ridiculously difficult. But that’s what I want to do.
My dad has read In a Sunburned Country, Notes From a Small Island, and the one about Shakespeare. He frequently read passages aloud and I read chunks of each. They’re all hilarious, especially In a Sunburned Country.
I read it a few months back. It was very funny, and left me with some mixed feelings. I sort of want to go walk it, on the other hand it seems like an awful lot of work. So I’m not really sure.
I suppose if an opportunity comes my way, I won’t turn it down.
That’s on my to-read list, but I haven’t gotten to it yet. I’ve read I’m A Stranger Here Myself and the Australia one. My sister did a little piece of the trail at camp last summer and met all kinds of interesting people. It sounds like a great experience.
I walked half of the Appalachian trail three summers ago with my grandmother. It’s really beautiful.
How long did it take to hike a thousand miles?
194 (Grady)~ I’ve only got two more months of being 18, that’s terrifying too.
195 (Piggy)~ I haven’t read it, but my dad has.
When you hike the AT you need to stop by my house for a visit.
Hmm, hiking the whole thing. I don’t know that I’m into hiking enough to do it, but it could be really fun.
There’s so much I want to do. I want to go hiking and camping, sailing, exploring, road-tripping, settling down, music playing, community building, friend making and LIVING. I have no idea how I’ll manage it all, but hopefully I’ll at least be able to make a good attempt.
I am SO BAD at communication. Just when I had thought I was getting better with phones I had a “OH NOES IT’S GOING TO KILL ME” crisis. Okay, so it wasn’t that bad, but it was a “glarghjoifrjiofejndvjfdsujreeeeeeedsqw I’m so bad at calling people even though she was like ‘call me’ and ijerfsekjnfdijsnkwakdszjklnbfvcdsxaaaah SO SCARY.”
But it was okay. I remembered that a friend has dreadlocks and that it might be a good idea to be all “hey, is there anything I should ponder before doing this?”
So I wrote her a message and she was like “yeah, call me!” So I called and it was a bad time, so then I called later and we chatted for almost an hour about what we’ve been doing since the summer before last and dreadlocks and giggled awkwardly and whatever and it was fine because she’s cool and I really wish I knew her better. Anyway, she offered to send me her comb and soap bar and stuff that she doesn’t need anymore in May, because it’s at her house where she isn’t right now. That’s fine, because I was thinking to do this in the later spring anyway and free with a few months wait. I can handle that.
If you managed to get through all that, I heartily congratulate you. I know this is rambly and run-on-y and grammatically awful, sorry.
Hi!
Thank you, GAPAs, for acknowledging my 6,000th day!
I actually happened to check how many days old I was on Monday, and was amazed to find I was exactly 5,999 days old. I then promptly forgot about it yesterday, and remembered today.
Anyway, I’ve missed everybody! How’s life?
Hi! Great to hear from you. Things here are much the same only possibly more random than ever. How are you?
Hey! It’s been a while.
I suppose life is… life-ish. Lively? Welcome back
MidFid- For me, the hiking would only be part of it. It’s sorta like a pilgrimage, but without the holy locations and large groups of religious people? Just myself, the trail, and the millions of other hikers. It would also be a test of my motivation and determination, two things which have never been strong suits for me. I know I’d learn a lot, too, and it would be great conversation fodder for the rest of my life.
RtH- Good to see you again. You wouldn’t have to miss us if you visited more often.
197~ HAWK! *glomps* You’re back! I hope you’re going to stay this time, I’ve missed you.
Like Roseanne said, things continue on their merry way here. We’ve had a recent increase of returning oldbies, which is always pleasant. I don’t know if you’re aware of the paleophyte threads, but look into it. They’re slower and more in depth, much easier to keep up with.
My first opera performance was this morning! It was flammy.
One down, three to go…. =D
So this is how my life has been lately:
Me and Terpsichore: *long, long discussions about which of les Amis in Les Miserables are totally in love*
Me: *draws a fanart comic of said Amis in love*
Someone anonymous in my English class: *writing on the fanart comic* GAY.
Me and Terpsichore: …
Terpsichore: Well, no [cake], Sherlock.
Me: …Yeah.
I endeavor to always use “That’s gay” in situations where it actually is.
And then people are never sure how to respond, right?
I had the perfect day today. It involved a baguette swordfight. I have found new hope in humanity.
L’hayim!
I don’t understand…
l’chaim is a cheer from Fiddler on the Roof that probably means: To Life!
I had a lot of fun with that play
it’s a Yiddish? Hebrew? toast. chaim == life, l’chaim == to life. My brother’s middle name is Chaim – named after my great-grandfather Hymie.
Hebrew.
To Lazar Wolf!
To Tevye!
To Tzeitel, my daughter!
My Wife!
May your days be happy ones, not like our present ones
L’chaim, l’chaim, to life!
Er, why does the Coming Soon thing not include my birthday? Or does it now only include a few upcoming events and not all of them.
On the other hand, now it seems to include more recent upcoming events and not only scattered ones that reach June.
We update the list as a new month draws near.
Fiddler on the Roof ♥
Also, I have discovered that sour lemon candies act almost like antidepressants on me. Weird, isn’t it? Lemonade doesn’t have that effect, I guess it’s all the chemicals in the candy. I am torn between being overjoyed that something works and kind of scared of addiction to lemon candy.
In other news, I haven’t slept properly in a week because Singapore’s air force has moved their practice time to 11 PM and the jets make my windows rattle. They keep their navy in Australia, why can’t they keep the air force there too?
Our substitute Mandarin teacher today entertained us with stories of the time she got drunk at a bar. I have never known a Mandarin class to be quite so uproarious.
I love LemonHeads, but my taste buds are getting dull so they don’t taste as sour as they used to.
“Would you care for a lemon drop?”
“A what?”
“A lemon drop. They’re a kind of Muggle sweet I’m rather fond of.”
“No, thank you,” said Professor McGonagall coldly, as though she didn’t think this was the moment for lemon drops…
It’s a sherbet lemon, actually. At least, that makes more sense. Sherbet lemons are sticky. Lemon drops are not. Dumbledore’s lemon sweets were sticking to things. And then there’s the whole debacle about the password to his office. The American version is inconsistent! Whenever serbet lemons are replaced with lemon drops in the American version, something goes wrong. Therefore, I’m rather inclined to go with sherbet lemon theory, which is what JKR wrote originally anyway.
Not that it matters, of course, or kept me from pieing your post!
Lemon drops are sticky! Haven’t you ever had a bag of them in your pantry or your pocket for too long and then you take them out and they’re all stuck together into a giant lemon-flavored mess?
My version says lemon drops…
Ah, finally my german speech is made, my geography test is taken and I got over 100% on latin. Now I can concentrate on Math, Psychology, History and my version of Screnzy (and then on French and MUN). Life is definitely looking up.
SFTDP:
I just read an older post about t-shirts/nations. How about “Watch out, I’m Austrian”?
We are watching the 1994 Frankenstein in Brit Lit now. It’s pretty good, but it has some “overdoing it” parts.
How do I make a gravatar?
Google “gravatar”, click on the Gravatar website, and follow their instructions.
it is 86 degrees outside! I do not know how I feel about this.
Can anyone recommend some good German language films to me? Or films occurring principally in Germany?
I like Drei Haselnüsse für Aschenbrödel. It’s a sweet fairytale with beautiful scenery and some awesome costumes. Actually, its original language was Czech – the German is dubbed.
But my all-time favorite German language film is just a snippet of a longer film (one that I’ve never seen in its entirety.) It’s Peter Alexander’s performance of the song Komm und bedien dich. You can find it easily on YouTube. It is supreme 1960s silliness. Nutty dancing and the best clothes ever.
Someone created a nudibranch knitting pattern! It’s really too bad it’s already been sold.
*slaps forehead* why am I never cruising eBay with huge amounts of money to spend at the right time?
208 (Axa)~ You should put on skimpy summer clothes and run around outside for me, because it’s cold and damp (mostly damp) where I am.
You should watch the Threepenny Opera because it’s based on the Beggar’s Opera, which I am unhealthily obsessed with, as well being in German.
Why are you looking for German language films, though?
Nor’easter scheduled for tomorrow.
When, when will I be able to wear my nice warm-weather dresses to school?
I know…
The first flower just came up, too. Little crocus, prepare to be flattened.
Actually it is more like a bansword because of snipping obscene comments. if you want a visual of the banhammer or bansword, look up energy sword or gravity hammer. they are from halo. which is awesome because the makers of halo have an army of super flaming banhammer ninjas. that play the game and they will ban hackers. normally you are just sent out of the game with a text message on the screen, but in parodies of this it usually shows a flaming ninja with a hammer beating down the hackers with the uber banhammers. (the videos sometimes use bad language though)
“you have violated the terms of use by giving yourself self advantage. this will result in your being beat down by our uber (in a really deep menacing voice) BANHAMMERS.
I think we played the score from “Halo” at band camp once.
Started helping out with lights for another play yesterday. The thing I was not expecting to hear when I came in was, “I’m so glad your here! Now we have someone to stand on the stage while we test out the lights”
Apparently there was already someone there who knew about the light board so my job was to stand there and make sure the lights were set well enough so they could hit the top of my head
On an unrelated note, it is very interesting typing from this age old laptop becuase the text doesn’t load until after I’m finished typing, which means I’m typing blind.
Recently I have been feeling sad that so many threads quickly stop being posted on and vanish into the Woven Beyond, never to be seen again. So I came up with a game of sorts that could help remedy this.
1. Press the Random Button until you get an unlocked thread.
2. Make an interesting and relevant post on that thread.
I don’t know whether anyone will like this, or whether the artificial resuscitation of threads is a good idea at all. It was just a thought.
YESYESYES
Hi. I just did a HPB manicure on myself. So I now have a HPB on each finger. They’re sort of sloppy, but cool.
You what? Omigod they’re taking you over!
Now you can wave your hands menacingly at people and say, “They’re coming for you…”
Good news: I get to sleep in tomorrow.
Bad news: Because I’m going to the doctor for my yearly physical. I do not like sitting around in my underwear, and I *really* do not like peeing in a cup.
Rare good thing about Singapore: no doctor’s appointments unless you’re sick or need injections or something.
I busied myself drawing HPB’s in art today. The teacher mysteriously disappeared…
Well, I have a dilemma. Tomorrow, I was due to renew my novel, as it is Screnzy-time! On Tuesday, someone stole my notebook. The one that has all my novel notes and ideas in it. So right now I feel like I can’t start without somehow getting that back…
Worryingly, this is the second time I have lost something about my novel. Someone stole my flash drive with my novel (and school assignments) backed up on it in the winter; I’m getting annoyed and a bit paranoid. Would anyone try to copy/steal/manipulate my ideas?
As a side note, this is the first time in ages I’ve been here on my birthday.
And also, today’s my anniversary!
-A
“Happy anniversary of your mother giving birth to you…” -Stiggins, Neanderthal in the Thursday Next novels.
SPRING BREAK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
My plans mostly involve eating ice cream and staying up past midnight.
SFTDP.
Happy April Fool’s Day!
Today I was tripped, led up a flight of stairs to the roof, had a “kick me please” sign stuck to my shirt, and had my hair covered in blue paint.
It was a good day.