*sniffle*

Watched Romeo + Juliet again, the lovely Baz Luhrmann version. That man has my utmost respect. He makes beautiful, unique films. Also, if I could pick any famous person to look like, it would be Claire Danes. She is beautiful but in a very normal-person-looking way. She is even beautiful when she's crying her eyes out.

Kim is over. She fell asleep before the movie even ended, despite the gunshot at the end which makes me jump EVERY time even though I know it's coming. *sigh* I'm seriously considering just going to bed - turning everything off, giving her a blanket, and going to bed. I have to be at work at 10.

In other news, I'm halfway through the Bonnie & Clyde book, which is very good. I also made two things out of the origami book (I found my lovely origami paper, yaaaay!). It's been a wonderful day off.

As you wish.

Which Princess Bride Character are You?
this quiz was made by mysti

Here comes the sun (do do doo doo)

Wheeeee, today is great. It is beautiful, sunny, and just about 80 degrees outside. I'd forgotten what real "summer" weather felt like. Furthermore, I didn't have to work, so I could really get out and enjoy it. Of course, first I enjoyed it by sleeping in. :) I got up a couple of times to see if Bryon was online, but then I went back to bed... ended up sleeping til about 10:30 overall. Then I got up, made the rounds of the blogs, email, and IM... wrote to Bryon... then finally I showered/dressed and went to the library to pick up Stitch 'n Bitch, which I had on hold. Of course, I can't leave a library with just ONE book... don't let's be silly. I found the following:

- Dealing With Dragons & Searching For Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede. These are the first two of the Enchanted Forest Chronicles. I used to get these out EVERY summer to read... and I just had a craving to read them again. They're really amusing despite been teen-level, and the covers were done by my favorite illustrator, Trina Schart Hyman.

- Sorcery and Cecilia, also by Patricia C. Wrede. A new book by this author!?? Need I say more?

- Girl in a Cage, by Jane Yolen and Robert J. Harris. It was on the same shelf, with a cover (and picture on the spine) by Trina Schart Hyman. Again, need I say more?

- A book on origami for beginners. I have some *lovely* origami paper, if I can find it. Heh.

- Bonnie and Clyde: A Love Story, by Bill Brooks. Fictional, but sounded intriguing.

- Various knitting books: Reader's Digest Knitting Handbook, Classy Knitting: A Guide to Creative Sweatering for Beginners ("sweatering" - heh), The Weekend Crafter: Knitting, The Knitting Goddess: Finding the Heart and Soul of Knitting Through Instruction, Projects and Stories, oh... and um, Stitch 'n Bitch, the book I went in there for. :D

Tonight, Kim is coming over and we're going to have a Sunny Weather Girlfest. We're having hot dogs, baked beans, potato salad and pasta salad for dinner, then we're going to go for a walk, then we'll watch Romeo + Juliet (the Leonardo DiCaprio/Claire Danes one) and try to make origami stuff. I am very excited. I haven't enjoyed a day off like this in a long time - I think it's because, to truly appreciate it, it really has to be a day off from something stressful.

Mom is at a conference this weekend. :( It would have been fun to hang out with her today, but... I will get my chance. I work tomorrow, 10-7:30, but I miraculously have Sunday and Monday off. Hopefully one of those days, we will go to the new Japanese restaurant that's close to here.

I'm so glad I went to the library. I'd lost my motivation for reading until today. In celebration, I'm updating the book blog.

Blah.

This wasn't the best day. Had a rough time at work, didn't hear from Bryon at all, and worst of all I found out I have to work tomorrow. I don't have a day off until Friday. Ugh.

I am very sore, and very tired. I want to knit a little before I go to bed, but I don't know if I'll have the energy.

Zzzzzzzz.

Wingardium leviosa

Dad and I helped Mom come up with a quiz on Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix for her reading program at school. It was huge fun. We also watched Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, something I've wanted to see ever since we watched a little snippet of it in one of my history classes. It was funny at times, but more often disturbing. It also had moments where you just wanted it to end NOW before things got any worse. It's a very good social commentary movie - sure doesn't give you hope for the human race though.

I also realized one scene in the silly Communist episode of SeaLab came directly out of that movie.

Bryon returned to the online world today!!! :) He's been off on a special mission. I was thrilled to see that he is ok. I keep trying to call his house to tell them that, but the phone will ring once, then stop ringing, and if I hang up and call back, I get a busy signal. I'm going to try again after I post this.

The long-promised sweater pictures.

I know I said I'd post pics of the sweater, say... two weeks ago, but... this way it was much more exciting. Yeah, that's my excuse. See, now I can show you the FINISHED back panel.



Optimus Prime happened to drop by just as I pulled out the camera... He's very photogenic, don't you think?



Anyway, I also finished the Thick & Quick Knit Purse for Kim, but I don't have a picture yet. I rushed around after work today, found a dragonfly button for it at JoAnn's, and sewed it on at Sara's so she could take it with her to Kim's party. I think it turned out nicely, even better than the project photo. Hopefully I'll get a picture of it eventually. It really was very fast and simple - I would recommend it for anyone as a first knitting project.

What else, what else... no word from Bryon in about... 4 days now. :( I'm working my last weekend at the museum. Usually Saturday is our better day, but we did almost NO business today; no admission, and very little in the gift shop. My mom was sooooooper nice to me and brought me lunch from McDonald's! She even stayed to eat with me, which was the highlight of my day. Nothing seemed to work, computer-wise, so I feel like I got very little accomplished. I couldn't upload or send email because it kept giving me errors. Something's up with the server... I hope it's better tomorrow.

Off to start the front of the sweater. :D

Just a quick post before I run off to get ready for work. Things are going really well. I've had some rough moments, but mostly it relates to who I'm training with at the time. And most of the time I'm training with the "good people." I've worked one day at the mall kiosk now, and I work there today and tomorrow. Wheee.

I'm almost done with another knitting project. And ... *ahem*... it's not the baby sweater. I made Kim a purse for her birthday (which was yesterday). I've got the body done, I just have to do the strap and sew it all together. I used Lion Brand Thick & Quick, and really huge needles (size 15). I love working with this stuff. It's very therapeutic, if you're having troubles with another project. :) The Lion Brand acrylic needles are fantastic, too. And such pretty colors!

Bryon's doing ok, he got "borrowed" for a while, but not very far from where he normally is, which is good. I haven't heard from him yesterday or today, so I'm wondering if they're moving back to their normal base. Or, the computers could be down again... where they are, there are only 4 computers, and only one of those can do email.

More later - gotta run.

A day offff *angels singing*

Yay, a day off so I can chat with my love and not have to rush off to work. :D

And I have French toast. Today is goooood.

Last night I worked at the kiosk, which was really pretty weird. I almost cried... the guy training me was going through things soooo fast when he did them, that I could barely keep up with what was going on. And it made me look like a complete idiot in front of customers. Not only that, but he'd give me stuff and expect me to know what to do with it. For example, we were activating a prepay account, and he just handed me the phone and had me program it, which I did, but then he's like, "dial any number." I figured he just meant for a test call, which is what we do on other phones. When I did that, it kept saying "press 1 for English, 2 para espanol." I'm like.. um... I was wondering if I did something wrong when I programmed it, but it said programming was successful. As it turns out, I was just supposed to dial any number so it would prompt me to put in the minutes card (being that there was no money on the account yet). Like I'm supposed to know that! Auuuugh. Stuff like that happened all day. Plus it's like a rat maze in there... the comps are all in the middle of the kiosk, so there's just a 2-foot path around them and we're constantly in each other's way. There were 4 of us in there at the peak time... and that's without Rochelle (the girl I normally train with) who had called in! *sigh* I'm working at the store again tomorrow, then the kiosk Thursday and Friday. I hope it goes better next time.

Finished my book, too. Soon I'll be posting my review in the other blog.

The good and the bad. We'll leave the ugly for another time.

The good: the job is going well. I've worked 30 hours in three days, and I am wiped out, but I'm learning a lot and I'm enjoying it. I so want a new phone.... an Audiovox 8900 to be exact. Two-year plan, with insurance (definitely - I've heard way too many horror stories to make that mistake), the PIX and TXT promotion (80 pix and 500 txt for 7.99), and probably roadside assistance. Hmm, 55.00 a month right now... I wonder how much it would be with an employee discount? I have no idea how much the discount is, or when I will stop being a temp and become an actual Verizon employee. Huh.

More good: My brother got a job this week as well!! :D He's working at Champion, which is actually someplace he WANTS to work, yay for him. He starts next Tuesday. I know he'll do a great job, plus they gave him clothes to wear as his "uniform," and it's all sporty stuff, which he loves anyway. :) And it pays $6.75/hr, which is really decent considering minimum wage is what, $5.15 still?

The bad: I got an email from Bryon (ok, that's good) but I keep missing him online. He's getting on at like... 2:45 am, and 6:45 am... and signing off once he sees I'm not on. Not sure why he expects that I would be at that time, but he takes the opportunity to try whenever he can. He said, however, that he's "not in the same place he was" and the online situation is different. :( I do not like this at all. At least before I knew where he probably was, and now I'm completely clueless again. -_- This Iraq thing is killing me...

I'm working at the museum this weekend, quite possibly for the last time. (Woo!) I'll still be doing their website, but the gift shop days shall be over, I do believe. Wow, I'm tired. Soo... time for bed.

Worrrk.

Job = good.
Job = busy.
Julie = tiiiiiiiired.
More later.

My last day of freedom

Starting tomorrow, I'm working every day of the week for a while. I made myself a list of things I wanted to get done today, but... none of them are done yet. I suppose that's how I am celebrating my freedom - complete and total laziness.

We are eating dinner (yes, my plate is sitting in my lap as I type this), and afterwards I must go to Walmart and buy a windshield wiper; go to the Gridleys' house to pick up some stuff; and bake cookies which will go in Bryon's birthday package. In the meantime I'm trying to finish Hart's Hope, because I'm hoping to accomplish at least ONE thing today.

Unfortunately, I don't feel that good. It's like my gut is rebelling against something, but I don't know what, and I wish it would stop. Hopefully a good night's sleep will cure it all.

The big piece of good news for today is, I talked to Bryon online!!! I'd completely given up for the day and was just sitting here looking up computer stuff, when bam, he signed on. I was so shocked that I thought it might be his dad having signed on accidentally from their house. Happily, I was wrong. He's doing okay and apparently the guys who were injured (1 dead, 6 injured, two of whom are already back on duty) were not any of the guys I know. Not that it makes it any better. Heh, now he's got to catch up on all the emails I sent him this week, one of which was practically a book. :)

So, goodbye freedom... and goodbye, poverty; I hope I really enjoy this job and do well at it. If not, well, I will remember that on my last day of freedom, I heard from my boyfriend and had yummy whipped-cream and cherry waffles for dinner.

I'm hired!! :D

Take that, Donald Trump. :D So yeah, I got the job. I start on Wednesday. Lonnnng hours - 9-7:30 on Wednesday, 11-8:30 on Thursday so far. Apparently there's a lot of overtime involved with this job - but it pays time and a half, which would be 15 dollars an hour. Woo.

Had to go to the hospital for a drug screening this afternoon, then to Adecco for some more paperwork. I knew if a job came through it would be from Adecco. They were so much more professional than the other places.

I added a comment feature to both blogs - it's from Haloscan, and it's a free service. Nice.

Oh... my goodness.

33.333333333333336% of me is a huge nerd! How about you?

This is the BEST. TEST. EVERRRRR. I'm only ashamed I couldn't answer more.

Happy Easter (ok so technically it's post-Easter, but whatever)

So yeah. Happy Easter. Had to work, had only one family through, in addition my family came to visit me and bring me lunch before they headed to the Buffet for dinner with the relatives. I really missed seeing everyone, and I also missed the Buffet despite my family bringing me banana bread and an Easter basket with Josh Groban's new CD, candy and Easter Peeps in it. (Yeahh!!) Conclusion: Working on Easter SUUUUUUUUCKS.

I did see the Easter Bunny today. On the way out the front door for work, I heard some rustling in the bushes, and the Easter Bunny shot out of them across my driveway. :D

No word from Bryon. Kim came over before heading back to Binghamton, but I sort of unintentionally ditched the girls. I meant to call back after we moved furniture, but... I was wiped out and distracted by 2348223482 things and it just didn't happen. So, I'm sorry for that. :( I hope everyone had a fun Easter.

Scooooore!

Well, step one went very well. Before I'd even gotten home (it takes 40 minutes to get home from Ithaca), Adecco called to say Verizon wants to schedule a peer interview for tomorrow evening - that's step 2. :D

Before leaving Ithaca, I stopped by this cute place called Pie Girl and got a small-size "Nutty Monkey" pie - chocolate with a layer of bananas, with a graham cracker crust and walnuts on top. Yum! We had a lot to celebrate today - Dad's uh... screening went perfectly fine, he has a clean bill of health. :)

Plus, the sweater is back on track. I'd made a silly mistake which was throwing me off, but I fixed it pretty easily and made a couple inches' worth of progress. :)

Sometimes, just when you think life is only handing you lemons, it hands you a glass of freshly squeezed lemonade. :)

AHHHHH!!!!

I HAVE AN INTERVIEWWWW!!!!

:D :D :D

Adecco called back and said that Verizon already "bid" on my resume, whatever that means. They are opening up interviews this afternoon at 1 pm, and I am going to be the first one. :) I don't know if that's good or bad, really, but I want to get it over with and find out one way or another as soon as possible.

So, wish me luck! XD XD XD XD

More fun with spam...

Got an email yesterday from "Anselm Streptococci." Hee hee.

Adecco called this morning! They are sending in my resume for a job in Ithaca (eek), at Verizon (double eek). It pays well and I would get benefits through Adecco, which is nice. Apparently it's a job that frequently needs overtime, but again, they pay the overtime well so people tend to stick with it anyway. It is a sales/customer service position, and they are looking for bubbly, friendly people. Joanne (at Adecco) seems to think I'm a prime candidate. :) While it would be a complete pain the butt to drive to Ithaca every morning.... I have to give it a try. I could move to Ithaca if I had to. :p The good thing is, they have two slots open. And I would get to put my new work clothes to good use. :)

Nothing from Bryon yet.

And don't forget... to keep... looking... UP!

I know I'm not the only one who was forced to watch Star Hustler for astronomy class.

Today was a bit better. Still no word from Bryon, but I did go shopping with my Mom. We didn't buy much; started off at the Bargain Hut, which wasn't as big a bargain as it used to be. Then we went to Barnes and Noble (Fruits Basket vol. 2 is out!) and the mall. We did find a couple of birthday presents for Bryon, which I won't describe here; he should be really proud - my mother ventured into Hot Topic AND Spencer's for him! :D

No progress yet on the sweater. I think I'm going to bite the bullet and take the last few rows out. *sigh*

I can't believe how often I'm posting in here. When Bryon's around, I don't even think about it, and I spend MUCH less time on the computer. Maybe it would be different if we were married and actually living in the same house; as is, we just want to spend every second together doing the same thing because we know we're on the clock, so to speak. Oh well. We'll see what happens when he comes back. But in the meantime, I'm enjoying the blog. :D

*sigh*

This night has been very rough for me. It's, well, the time of the month for me to be extra crabby and extra emotional - both of which I am - but on top of that, there's all this stuff about "fierce fighting" in Iraq and I haven't heard from my boyfriend in 4 days. I know he will contact me as soon as he can - it's not in his hands. But it's still hard to sit here and wait, trying not to imagine what he might be doing right now, or getting a really awful phone call. His mother scared the bejeezus out of me tonight, calling at almost 10 pm just to see if I'd heard from him. I keep saying I will call her as soon as I get anything.

I'm now going to pretend the start of this entry didn't happen, and talk about fluffy things, like knitting and movies. My sweater is going ok. The stockinette part of the back panel is done and looks great; the problem is, I keep ending up one stitch off in the mock cable pattern so it looks all screwed up. I don't know how I do it. It's not like the pattern is that complicated. I really messed up somewhere in the last two rows, and I think I have to rip them out, but it's SUCH a pain to get it back on the needles.

My other conclusion is, I think I want to try straight needles. I've sort of wanted to anyway, just for comparison purposes, but... having to convince the loops to go over the bump between plastic loop and bamboo needle is driving me CRAZY. I might buy a pair of bamboo or acrylic straights (if I can find acrylic...) but I wouldn't get metal at this point - the stitches slide too easily on metal. I will post a picture of my progress soon, probably tomorrow. I just can't face messing with the camera at this point.

I wiped myself out crying earlier. My parents were watching the end of Taken, which by itself made me cry a lot, but add the Bryon thing on top of it and I wasn't doing too well. My right nostril completely stopped functioning there for a few minutes. :/ I did rent Wasabi for the second time, which I very much enjoyed watching. I love it when they speak Japanese and I can actually pick up some of it. :D After much convincing, my brother watched it with me but, 1) he fell asleep, 2) a friend of his called and he referred to the movie as "stupid" during the phone conversations, and 3) he LEFT to RENT ANOTHER MOVIE with his friend. How insulting. I understand this movie isn't everyone's cup of tea, but he could have just... kept his mouth shut. My mom said she would watch it with me tomorrow; I will see if I can convince her to watch it subtitled. I want to hear the French. Especially the weirdness of the Japanese girl speaking French. :) The subtitles and dub script are VERY different though. To the point where he will say "blah blah happened seven years ago," and the subtitles will say five. Silly.

Ok, I'm off to try and work on this $%@* sweater pattern... maybe I should take something for this headache first.

Deep political thoughts.

belldandy K13: we need to start our own political movement, the Everyone Get Along Because Stine and Julie Say So movement
ChicoryBloom: YAY!
ChicoryBloom: I'll make the fliers and coffee
ChicoryBloom: you start the web site
belldandy K13: rofl :D
ChicoryBloom: hey, we could get on the ballot
ChicoryBloom: down there next to the communist party that tries every 4 years...
belldandy K13: lol
belldandy K13: either that, or let's vote kermit the frog into office
belldandy K13: i always liked kermit
belldandy K13: always seemed like such a down-to-earth, sensible sort of frog
ChicoryBloom: YEAH!
ChicoryBloom: even better
belldandy K13: lol
belldandy K13: then we wouldn't have to hold office, we could just be advisors
belldandy K13: and could pursue highly successful careers in the arts
ChicoryBloom: rock out
ChicoryBloom: and we'd institute positive change, like manditory pajama day on Tuesdays
belldandy K13: lol
belldandy K13: wow, you already have the lingo down, "institute positive change..."
ChicoryBloom: and free sandwiches for all

Of sweaters and snow, and boyfriends.

I would like to point out that "snow" is a four-letter word.
~ My friend Kim's away message

At least it's nice and sunny today, if not warm, so it's melting the snow off the ground.

Last night I went to Sara's and we watched Dangerous Liaisons. It was much better than I thought it would be. I'd seen both of the other versions of this movie: Valmont, set in the same time period (18th century) but with Colin Firth and Annette Bening instead of John Malkovich and Glenn Close; and Cruel Intentions, the more recent teen-movie remake. It shames me to say that I actually kind of liked Cruel Intentions. *cringe* Anyway, I think John Malkovich is really scary, but he actually managed to make me feel kind of sorry for him by the end. Now that's some good acting.

After the movie we just sat around watching the History Channel program on Noah's Ark and a few other random things, while I worked on my sweater (finally) and Sara read a magazine. It was really fun.



So yes, I've actually begun my baby sweater. I did the ribbing and am working my way up the back. Soooo exciting to actually be making progress instead of knitting yet another swatch.

In other news... there's been a lot of nastiness going on in Iraq the past week. It's so disheartening. He hasn't been online yesterday or today either. At least he explained to me that they aren't allowed online for a while if there's certain kinds of stuff going on, so I'm not sitting here *worrying* that much, but it would be nice to get that confirmation that he's ok, you know?

Soooooooo dead. Damn you, Daylight Savings Time.

Reading blog is up.

It's called "Readbooks." Like, "red" books. Get it? No one else seems to, except my dad who made it up. Ah well.



Check it out if you're so inclined; anything bought on B&N.com by clicking through one of the book links on my page makes me a miniscule amount of money. :)

As you wish...

Wahhh. My brother and I are, for the 78948924th time, watching I Love the 80s Strikes Back. It's I love 1988... they did a nice long segment on The Princess Bride. We have decided, however, that they need to just give Donal Logue and Hal Sparks their own show. I get really sick of listening to Michael Ian Black be that sarcastic. And it's hard listening to so many people try to be funny, when only a few of them are succeeding at it.

I'm working on a new project - a reading blog. I used to have a page on my domain of book reviews, but it was SUCH a pain to update it and upload it... so I'm way, way behind. I think I'll do better with it in blog form. The layout isn't finished yet; it's just a Blogger template right now. But I have high hopes for it. :)

I am on a campaign to improve my Japanese-speaking ability. I took it for 3 semesters in college, and I did learn a lot, but of course I've forgotten some of it. The annoying thing is how you infrequently the "semi-formal" grammar I learned gets used. Watching Sailor Moon raw, I was so disappointed to realize how little I could really understand. Well, ok, some of it was just vocabulary. Right now, I'm going through the Japanese lessons on Japanese-Online. They're quite helpful; they certainly jump right into things, and by Lesson 6 all the example conversations are in hiragana. I've already learned a lot from it. Ganbarimasu!

[Pssst... hey Lin. Question for you. In the subtitles of the Sailor Moon opening, there's that line about "Gan! Gan! Kechirashite kou..." (it comes on when they show Sailor Jupiter) and the subtitles like to translate it as "Ding! Dong" like it's the sound of a bell... at least that's what their notes said when I looked up the lyrics. I really don't buy that. Isn't "gan! gan!" just short for "ganbatte" or "ganbare" or "ganbarimasu..." I think there's a lot of variations, but I swear Naru said it ("Gan! Gan!") to Usagi-chan when she found out Usagi liked a guy, to tell her to go for it. I really don't believe the translation of the lyrics anyway. All the English parts were subtitled in a way that made sense in the first episode, then all the other eps they changed the subtitles to total crap. "Bodii ni matou lamé and charm..." (on my body I wear a lamé and charm???) "Sailor senshi wa Moonlight Real Girl?" What the heck... It made more sense as "bodii ni matou lovely charm" and "sailor senshi wa moonlight miracle." Am I wrong? Is it officially written somewhere that those are NOT the lyrics?]

Omoshiroi desu ne...

Okay, I'm amused. The word for "knitting/knitted goods" in Japanese (as a noun) is "amimono" according to my dictionary, and "teami" according to Jim Breen's WWWJDIC and my kanji dictionary. Why am I amused?

ami + mono = compile/knit + thing
te + ami = hand + compile/knit
Ami = Sailor Mercury :D

As I've said before... easily amused.

Still awake, just barely.

I finally got my phone call!! :D At about 4:45, Bryon called. He had no clue what time it was over here, thought it was 4 in the afternoon apparently. :) Not that I care - I'll take a phone call from him absolutely any time at all! We talked for about 20 minutes, I think. I learned that he now gets two hot meals a day instead of one (the remainder are always MREs), but also learned that a "hot meal" just means the same food came in quantity and you get it heated up for you instead of having to do it yourself. What else... he's very open to whatever snack food anyone wants to send. There are so many things they can't get there, he can't narrow it down to a Top Five that he misses the most. He has, apparently acquired three cases of Pepsi. :) After we got off the phone we switched to IM and talked for a little over half an hour. The line that made me happiest in the whole conversation was "I think that after this my commitment to healing the world is pretty much fulfilled." Damn straight.

Today I tried to get some things done, and was semi-successful. I visited the LYS again, hoping for some guidance on the sweater project (and hoping against hope that I wouldn't be told to make another frigging swatch, as I've done FOUR already). Unfortunately, the LYS owner's only regular time to not be in the store was the exact time I showed up. Another woman tried her best to help me out; she said I should be ok with the size 6 needles since my gauge is only off by about half a stitch per inch. She said, too, that if it's really off at the end, I can fix it when I do the blocking. I really hope this is right; I am fighting the urge to call up the store again tomorrow and speak to the owner, just to be sure.

I also got Bryon's equipment in the mail from Blackhawk.com. It was in this massive box, which made me think I'd have to send it in multiple (smaller) boxes; but once you took everything out of the packaging, it fit in about 1/3 of the original box. :p Sooo... I made cookies again (Chewy Brownie Cookies and Peanut Butter Oatmeal Treats, both quite good) and will send the package out tomorrow. I'm also going to send some to Bryon's friend Mike, who is also in Iraq. Mike is a friend from Bryon's active Army days, and we hadn't heard a peep from him in about 2 1/2 years, until, miraculously, Bryon actually crossed paths with him in Iraq! I wonder what else I should send him?

I was proud of myself today - I wore the very short plaid skirt I bought at the second-hand store. Usually I buy these things and then never have the guts to wear them, and they sit in my closet. Note the white stockings sticking out of the tops of the boots... my lovely Sailor Moon is influencing my wardrobe (they wear boots with tall socks/leggings all the time, and it looks adorable). I wonder what I'll end up convincing myself to wear tomo--I mean today?

Ok ok, time for bed. At 6:27 am. This is very pathetic. I just wanted to get all this down before I forgot.

Hmm.

The College Board's 101 greatest works of literature - ones I have read are in bold.

-- Beowulf
Achebe, Chinua - Things Fall Apart
Agee, James - A Death in the Family
Austen, Jane - Pride and Prejudice
Baldwin, James - Go Tell It on the Mountain
Beckett, Samuel - Waiting for Godot
Bellow, Saul - The Adventures of Augie March
Bronte, Charlotte - Jane Eyre
Bronte, Emily - Wuthering Heights
Camus, Albert - The Stranger
Cather, Willa - Death Comes for the Archbishop
Chaucer, Geoffrey - The Canterbury Tales
Chekhov, Anton - The Cherry Orchard
Chopin, Kate - The Awakening
Conrad, Joseph - Heart of Darkness
Cooper, James Fenimore - The Last of the Mohicans
Crane, Stephen - The Red Badge of Courage
Dante - Inferno
de Cervantes, Miguel - Don Quixote
Defoe, Daniel - Robinson Crusoe
Dickens, Charles - A Tale of Two Cities
Dostoyevsky, Fyodor - Crime and Punishment
Douglass, Frederick - Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Dreiser, Theodore - An American Tragedy
Dumas, Alexandre - The Three Musketeers
Eliot, George - The Mill on the Floss
Ellison, Ralph - Invisible Man
Emerson, Ralph Waldo - Selected Essays
Faulkner, William - As I Lay Dying
Faulkner, William - The Sound and the Fury
Fielding, Henry - Tom Jones
Fitzgerald, F. Scott - The Great Gatsby
Flaubert, Gustave - Madame Bovary
Ford, Ford Madox - The Good Soldier
Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von - Faust
Golding, William - Lord of the Flies
Hardy, Thomas - Tess of the d'Urbervilles
Hawthorne, Nathaniel - The Scarlet Letter
Heller, Joseph - Catch 22
Hemingway, Ernest - A Farewell to Arms
Homer - The Iliad
Homer - The Odyssey
Hugo, Victor - The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Hurston, Zora Neale - Their Eyes Were Watching God
Huxley, Aldous - Brave New World
Ibsen, Henrik - A Doll's House
James, Henry - The Portrait of a Lady
James, Henry - The Turn of the Screw
Joyce, James - A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Kafka, Franz - The Metamorphosis
Kingston, Maxine Hong - The Woman Warrior
Lee, Harper - To Kill a Mockingbird
Lewis, Sinclair - Babbitt
London, Jack - The Call of the Wild
Mann, Thomas - The Magic Mountain
Marquez, Gabriel Garcia - One Hundred Years of Solitude
Melville, Herman - Bartleby the Scrivener
Melville, Herman - Moby Dick
Miller, Arthur - The Crucible
Morrison, Toni - Beloved
O'Connor, Flannery - A Good Man is Hard to Find
O'Neill, Eugene - Long Day's Journey into Night
Orwell, George - Animal Farm
Pasternak, Boris - Doctor Zhivago
Plath, Sylvia - The Bell Jar
Poe, Edgar Allan - Selected Tales
Proust, Marcel - Swann's Way
Pynchon, Thomas - The Crying of Lot 49
Remarque, Erich Maria - All Quiet on the Western Front
Rostand, Edmond - Cyrano de Bergerac
Roth, Henry - Call It Sleep
Salinger, J.D. - The Catcher in the Rye
Shakespeare, William - Hamlet
Shakespeare, William - Macbeth
Shakespeare, William - A Midsummer Night's Dream
Shakespeare, William - Romeo and Juliet
Shaw, George Bernard - Pygmalion
Shelley, Mary - Frankenstein
Silko, Leslie Marmon - Ceremony
Solzhenitsyn, Alexander - One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
Sophocles - Antigone
Sophocles - Oedipus Rex
Steinbeck, John - The Grapes of Wrath
Stevenson, Robert Louis - Treasure Island
Stowe, Harriet Beecher - Uncle Tom's Cabin
Swift, Jonathan - Gulliver's Travels
Thackeray, William - Vanity Fair
Thoreau, Henry David - Walden
Tolstoy, Leo - War and Peace
Turgenev, Ivan - Fathers and Sons
Twain, Mark - The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Voltaire - Candide
Vonnegut, Kurt Jr. - Slaughterhouse-Five
Walker, Alice - The Color Purple
Wharton, Edith - The House of Mirth
Welty, Eudora - Collected Stories
Whitman, Walt - Leaves of Grass
Wilde, Oscar - The Picture of Dorian Gray
Williams, Tennessee - The Glass Menagerie
Woolf, Virginia - To the Lighthouse
Wright, Richard - Native Son


Can I just say... Tess of the d'Urbervilles is one of the most disturbing and depressing books I've ever read.

Hours and hours later...

Good grief, it's 3:43 am. It's taken me FOREVER to get this layout tweaked til it works right. And even then, it works right for ME, but may not look the same for anyone else. The content and menu divs should be translucent in IE and Mozilla, but probably not in any other browser, and I'm not even sure about Mozilla (Lin?).

Ahhh. I really, really like it though. :D

A very good quote.

"Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless."
- Mother Teresa

This is so true. I found this out first-hand. When I was a senior in high school, I took a Shakespeare class. There was a girl who sat behind me - a nice girl, very quiet. We got talking and found we had some common interests... then, as often happens, I graduated and we just lost touch. Years later, a friend of mine happened to find her through Livejournal and we talked a bit. As it turns out, she hadn't really had a lot of friends in high school, and had a rough time of it... and she said I was the only person who'd been nice to her! It amazed me that she had held onto that memory for so long, and made me so glad that I'd made the effort to talk to someone new. You just never know how your actions are going to affect others, or what they will mean to that person. So be kind! You won't regret it.

Yarn as a substitute for crack.

Urusai Otaku: Julie hasn't done drugs has she?
belldandy K13: nope. [Ed. note: I've *never* done drugs.]
Urusai Otaku: I didn't think so
Urusai Otaku: Julie has her yarn
Urusai Otaku: her own
belldandy K13: rofl :D
Urusai Otaku: her prrreciossssss

Attack of the Giant Mutant Jellybean...

Just had to share.



Also, this is the fabric I bought in Ithaca:


...and this is what I've made out of it so far:


It's been a fun night. :D This bag is a bit fancier, with nicer straps and a pocket on the inside. I'm making sewing progress!! :)

I also watched Episode 25 of Sailor Moon... raw. Didn't realize it would be raw... but I really enjoyed watching it that way. I did pick up some stuff - you'd think I'd pick up more after taking Japanese for 3 semesters - but hey, it's been what, 3 years since then? It's so nice to be able to concentrate on the whole screen though, instead of trying to read the subtitles. Makes me want to go watch Ranma without subtitles for practice. :) I am LOVING the Dark Mercury thing... she is almost more entertaining this way. And yay, this was such a great episode! I wish I knew more of what Hina-chan and Mamoru were saying to each other though. :p Ahh... all in good time.

Still working on the layout thing... having a difficult time settling on a theme. :(