So here we are, finishing up the third week of NaNoWriMo, and I'm only about 11,000 words out. Not the best prognosis here, but it's not exactly like I didn't expect to be about 30,000 words behind by now. I'm still sitting down with my pen to write whenever I get the chance, and that's an accomplishment in and of itself. I suppose NaNoWriMo is more about fostering your creative habit than actually pushing out 50,000 words in one month. Once you've done your first 1,666 word evening, I don't know anyone who thinks, "Well, that was easy! I can totally see myself doing that every single day without any interruptions from my job/family/real life for the next 29 days! Piece o' cake!"

While we're on the topic of real life, Mike and I are house hunting. This has been the most time consuming thing I've ever been a part of, and I'm only happy I don't have to do it alone. Mike has his system down to an art - we basically sift through the listings our realtor sends us and narrow the list down to houses we really want to see, at which point Mike turns into a veritable county sherrif and weeds out which houses are in high crime versus low crime areas by going through district crime records through the month of August and noting where there is a high concentration of burglaries, rapes, assualts and (*shudders*) murders. We had a couple of instances where I saw something I liked and Mike came back with, "Well, there were fifteen burglaries down the block within the last three months. Now we know why it's so affordable."

There was this one house we were sort of in love with. We almost put an offer down on it until we discovered someone had beat us to it. Talk about sour grapes; there had ne'er been such sinful, covetous thoughts in my head until that moment. Apparently that sort of thing happens a lot, so I'm chalking it up to experience, and we're just gonna have to be a little bit more efficient at our decision making process from now on. (It was probably a crappy flipped house anyway.)

Lastly, it is a crappy, humid day here in DC. My hair has expanded significantly as a result of this, and considering I'm in for a long work day that will end at roughly 9PM tonight, there is little hope of taming it at any point with some concoction of mousse, gel, or flat iron. I tried putting a clip in it to flatten it out, but there is a resulting balloon animal effect that I don't quite appreciate - like the clip is cutting off the circulation to my enormous fluff.

So. What's up with you guys/gals?

Of late, I have come to discover the following formula:

new job + wedding planning + moving out of apartment = no time, no money, no brain cells left to accomplish much of anything

So many people left wonderful congratulatory replies on my engagement post, that it's my hope to reply to everyone this week. I only wish I could have gotten my act together sooner, but given how many life changes have happened in a very short span of time, I'm glad I got on here at all! (All I need now is a kid and a dog, and I'll have hit just about every single momentous change I can possibly hit at 28 years of age.)

There's lots to say, and I'm going to try to be better. I miss you guys, and anyway, this is the perfect place to document the wedding planning process, which is already riddled with lots of crafty, artsy stuff since I've been suffering from the biggest creative drought since high school. (I've even forced my fiance to pose for me so I can prevent myself from losing the ability to draw altogether.)

That said, a preliminary thank you is due. I'll be back on here with open posts again soon once I've gotten to comments. In the meantime, hope you're all having a great summer!

Just dropping a note to say a long-overdue hello now that I've got a day to regroup after a work trip to Colorado. :) I know I've been completely MIA, but (as usual) it's not my fault!

With a new administration (YAYOBAMA!!), work has had me under the gun more than usual. Since December, all of us in every corner of the Dept. of Defense have been putting in a heap of overtime trying to account for and justify our programs; it's the easiest way for new folks in charge to get read in on what happened before they showed up. Actually, it's kind of neat to be working for the fed in Washington, DC during a time when so much change is happening. Some interesting tidbits that show that Obama's administration is already at work to revamp the way the U.S. Government does business:

- We've all been given direct orders to conserve energy by turning our computers/monitors off every day
- Unless it's a briefing for one of the bureaucratic bigwigs, all printing must be double-sided to conserve paper
- Documentation explaining and justifying our programs must include return on investment and "Way Ahead" (ie. the next steps that will improve our results)

More work is on the horizon, no doubt. It's only been a little under 2 months since Obama's been in office, and while we've sort of had to derail for a bit, I'm certain it'll all be for the best. If anything, someone's going to look at all the paperwork I've been producing for our department and realize that the Army Guard has all our money. ;)

And then, In the midst of all of this stuff, something totally unexpected happened: I fell in love.

It wasn't entirely serendipitous. I was sickened by memories of last year's New Years Eve debacle, so my sister encouraged me to get on eHarmony. Being an eternal skeptic when it comes to internet dating, I had little faith in the success of an online dating service in which I had to detail all of my "Must Haves" and "Can't Stands" and answer questions like "What's your idea of a perfect date?". And to be fair, it wasn't exactly easy to navigate the sea of people that turned up on my list of matches. A good many were evidently the awkward type, which, being the sort to dread a conversation in which I do all the talking, provoked my closet social anxiety - I even had one date in which the guy told me upon my arrival at the coffee shop that he had not given me his real name, but rather the alias he uses to protect his identity in foreign countries where he would bail out international criminals.

Yep. My finger hovered over the "Delete profile" button. My sister told me I hadn't given it a fair shot. I told her she had not been single for longer than a day in her adult life and therefore didn't have the authority to prevent me from giving up the hunt altogether.

But just before New Years' I got pinged by Mike. His eHarmony profile indicated he was an English teacher, and in a series of rapid-fire exchanges, he and I decided to meet by the end of the week. Our first date consisted of early dinner at his brother's restaurant on M Street in Georgetown and a trip to the movies to watch "Slumdog Millionaire", which had us both misty at the end. Then, not wanting the evening to end yet, we decided to go to Karaoke together. The man has a singing voice that belongs on Broadway. Kid you not.

Our first date lasted 8 hours. He walked me back to my apartment, and not exactly knowing how these first date things are supposed to end when things are evidently going well, I thanked him for a wonderful time, lingered for a split second, then inched away towards my front door. What did I know? Thankfully, he had the wherewithal to close the three foot gap between us and kiss me. :) We've been virtually inseparable ever since. I adore him.

It's the short version of what's been going on in my life lately to keep me off of LiveJournal, and while it doesn't look like I'm going to get too many breaks in the immediate future, I can say for now that I'm thinking of you guys and hoping you're all doing okay. This weekend, I'm going to do what I should've done a while ago and clean out my Yahoo email account, so if you've written me there and I haven't responded, please accept my apologies for not writing back immediately and hang in there! (When you're getting 100+ emails a day for work, it doesn't leave too much time to check my fandom account, if you know what I mean. However, I resolve to be better.)

All that said, happy winter to all! In the words of John and Hank Green: don't forget to be awesome.

September continues to shock and astound me.

I'm in Nashville working the last piece of the Air Guard video shoot. In the last two weeks, I've been made a studio manager which has added a bit of pressure and a lot of e-mail traffic to my work inbox, but essentially, this is a cool thing since it brings me closer into the fold of our in-house production studio and advertising agency. Both branches are quite cool and I greatly enjoy my involvement with them, so it's all gravy, ya know?

Of course, it's greatly hindered my ability to answer LJ comments, and considering how grateful I am that anyone still pokes around this dusty old thing anymore, it bothers me that I can't get on here to tell you how much your feedback brightens my day. Moreover, it sucks that I can't keep up with your lives.

So, in the event anyone's wondering what the heck has got me so busy, here's the synopsis of what I had mistakenly thought was going to be a low-key September:

9/8-9/11: Nashville, TN to film last piece of Air Guard music video
9/12-9/17: San Antonio, TX to catch up with good friends and AFRISS folks at Randolph AFB (pending certain hurricanes don't screw it up)
9/19: Andrews AFB, MD to do the Nat'l Anthem at promotion ceremony
9/19-9/21: Raleigh, NC to throw my sister her baby shower
9/25-9/30: New York, NY to meet up with more good friends for Equus and drop in on family

And somewhere in there, I have to coordinate a trip to Burlington, VT. Don't know when on earth that's gonna happen.

In any case, just so no one thinks I'm being lazy or thinks I'm not the sort of person to reply to comments, please know that I SO would if I could only stay home long enough! *thud*

I hope you guys are awesome (and srsly, you already are), and I hope to catch up with you guys soon!

Okay, so almost at the exact moment when I wrote that I was going to spend August at home in Arlington, my job decided it was critical for me to provide some acting/creative direction in Tucson, Arizona for all of next week, followed by another week in Burlington, Vermont for an Air Guard Intelligence Commercial we're filming.

Pros:
- We get to play with Predator Reconnaissance Aircraft.
- This shoot will reunite the production team from the Nashville shoot, who are a lively, awesome bunch of creative folks, and I adore them.
- I've never been to Arizona, let alone Tucson, so it'll be fun to cross another state off my list.
- There will be lots of pretty horses. And stunt men. (Can't say more than that as I'm not allowed to spill the concept for the commercial.)

Cons:
- Predators sound like lawnmowers. This is a decidedly uncool sound, so there'll have to be some extra production dollars dedicated to replacing that sound with the roar of an F-16 engine... because that's sexier.
- I will be away from home for another 2 weeks, and considering the difficulty I have sleeping in places that are not my own bed, this could be problematic.
- We're filming 50 miles outside of Tucson. In the desert. I've been told to prepare myself for "extreme weather conditions". I am somewhat fearful of dying in the desert from heat exhaustion/sun stroke/dehydration/all of the above. (This one counts for multiple "cons".)

But, whaddayagonnado? Stretching myself thin has become one of my marketable skills, it seems, but a little Yoga in the mornings should keep me fairly, er, pliant. Hell, I'll be the last one to complain about going to neat places and doing cool stuff with cameras and multi-million dollar aircraft.

Anyhoo, I'll definitely take pictures - I've been told Tucson is beautiful, despite the heat. In the meantime, I wish you all a wonderful couple of weeks!

ETA: I am so jealous of you guys who are in Chicago right now. Say hi to John and Hank Green for me, will you? *weeps*

Okay, so I don't actually know why annoying crap has a way of occurring simultaneously.

Since the thing that happened at work was published on the Washington Post, I feel better about saying what happened. Basically, the federal government didn't pay any of its contractors due to a glitch in a new system they're using... so all of our paychecks bounced (except mine - I didn't actually get a paycheck while all this was going on). For a while, we all thought our contracting companies went defunct and that we were all going to have to find new jobs. It was stressful = understatement of the year. But it's all been worked out, the gov't got it's stuff together, so it's okay. I'm okay.

And then, just when that problem irons itself out, my laptop panel screen gets stuck. I bring it to the Geek Squad at Best Buy, who tell me they need to send it away for parts and that I'm not going to get it back for a MONTH OR LONGER.

Did I mention I'm doing NaNoWriMo? And that I'm now going to handwrite the rest of the 50,000-word manuscript?

*sigh*

So now, I've got a window of maybe an hour or two every day between workstuff in which to answer e-mails and whatnot, and that's it. It makes me feel a little better to think that this is a sign from God. Venessa, get off the net. Get reaquainted with how life was without a computer. Enjoy the quiet. Suffer my wrath...

Anyway, suffice it to say that I'm counting myself as offline until my beloved laptop is repaired. I'll try my best to keep up with everything, but obviously it'll be hard to keep up with everything, everything. In the meantime, I figure it'll give me extra down time to finish up artstuffs.

What a triumphant return that will be when all I have to show for my time offline is a drawing of a Volleyball named "Wilson".

Ever get that feeling like you just missed getting struck by lightening? I'm kinda in that place right now. Basically, almost immediately after my trip to Annapolis, I got the sort of phone call from a co-worker that no one wants to get, and let it suffice to say that we had to get our hands dirty with the Virginia Department of Labor and I was threatening legal action by Monday morning. This doesn't seem to me to be the right place to discuss what happened, but let it suffice to say that the drama is almost over and things are, at the moment, okay. My psychological state is another story, of course, and I'm sorry if I missed your e-mails, text messages, or phone calls, because you can bet I wasn't fit to talk to many people.

But it's all right, because there were some silver linings, many of them way overdue to be shared with you guys. :)

First off, SpellCast Season Two just got off the ground - in AAC format! It's fun - it actually sounds like we're recording from the Three Broomsticks, and while you're listening, you can see a little picture of our hangout (drawn by me). Check out our shownotes:

( Welcome to the Cast, Benn. )

In other news, my story, Mum, Dad, It's Me... Harry, won the runner-up Mugglenet Fanfiction Quick Silver Quill for Best General Story! (*is utterly astonished*) More exciting is that I get to share this excitement with belladonna_tb who won the runner-up for Best Romance for her beautiful story, Wednesday Dates. I'm so honored to be among such truly wonderful writers.

And speaking of truly wonderful writers, lunalovepotter has written another masterpiece based on this picture. It's called "The Promise", and you can read it here: http://fics-by-llp.livejournal.com/36140.html#cutid1. Bring your tissues!

Also, if you're looking for hella awesome icons, look no further than ahewlett's LJ. She did a fantastic icon post featuring my artwork and that of some of my absolute favorite fandom artists, so pop on over and see it at http://ahewlett.livejournal.com/38320.html#cutid1.

While I'm on a roll, I adore hippie_girl8 for drawing me the following ridiculously steamy Ron/Hermione pivture. Talk about your pick-me-ups! She's hosting it at DevArt, and I'm not sure what you need to do in order to view it, but I think if you've got an account and you specify that you meet their requirements to view restricted material, you can see it here: http://hippie-girl.deviantart.com/art/Moonlight-61446636.

Lastly, I am grateful to hp5freak for all the ways she kept me away from the ledge this weekend. Amber, you warm my heart... and my head! The skull cap you crocheted fits perfectly and it's helping me get through the November chill!

And that's all she wrote. I hope everyone here is well, and I'm gonna take some time today and scroll through the flist in an attempt to catch up. Cheers everyone! :)

-V-

So I'm departing tonight for Virginia Beach for the Rock 'n' Roll Half-Marathon. Just finished packing. Should be an interesting weekend since I haven't trained further than 6 miles. (Thank you for your advice, profvector, I think the 5K was a good idea!)

I'm bringing my laptop, but it's possible I won't have any internet access at the hotel. I owe e-mails and comments and goodness knows how much else. Therefore, I promise to get back on the ball after the race (especially since I'll be crippled). Some things that will be up here when I get back:

1) Ginormous Pimp Post
2) SpellCast Censorship Roundtable (editing's done!)
3) Birthday/other artses
4) End of Summer Picspam (hopefully including a pic of me as I stumble over cross the finish line)

In the meantime, please read this:

http://fics-by-llp.livejournal.com/28419.html

It's about all the pimping I can do at the moment seeing as I'm running around like a chicken with my head cut off, but apart from the fact that lunalovepotter wrote it for me and it made me weepy, I think it's an exceptional story from Lily Potter's perspective, and as many people should read it as possible. I'm just saying. Drop by fics_by_llp and let her know how wonderfully talented she is. :)

And with that, I'm off to go get my butt kicked and will be on hiatus. Wish me luck. Or at least, pray that I have easy access to to something a little more palatable than Gatorade during the race.

(PS: myrafur, I'm calling you tonight!)

I'm about to become sparser than usual on LJ, which, considering how sparse I already am, greatly frustrates me. Right now, I'm typing with my left hand only, because my right wrist has been really hurting - I've got it on ice right now.

I hope this is not a sign of future problems. I don't think I ever quite realized how valuable my right hand is to me until it hurt to use a mouse.

Anyway, I'm going to slow down a bit and see if it helps. I'm really sorry for comments left unanswered and missing out on commenting on your LJs. I'm just a bit scared. Everything I am is expressed by my right hand...

Clearly, it's a good day for Harry Potter fans.

At FedEx today:

COUNTER LADY: How many photo mailers?
ME: Three. (Looks down at the photo mailer in my hands from reallycorking) Oh, this one was mailed to me.
COUNTER LADY: I figured as much. There's drawing on it.
ME: (nervous laugh) Yeah.
COUNTER LADY: What is that, a Howler?
ME:...
COUNTER LADY: *laughs*
ME: Um. No, just Owl Post.


Yeah. I kid you not. That actually just happened.

So we have the title of Book Seven. Without giving it away for those who would not like to be spoiled (as I was this morning by at least 5 bazillion people on the flist *hmph*) I'll just say that I personally think we're going to be seeing a lot more of the Inferi in this one. In which case, IF I'm right, my Year Seven fic is spot on. ;)

And that's all I'll say about it. It's growing on me. ;)

PS: Forgive me, I'm uber behind on birthday wishes. To everyone who has celebrated a birthday this December so far, Happy Birthday! *hugs*

First of all, tremendous thanks to all who commented to the last sketch post. I'm really so happy that you liked them! I'm heading out of town for a day, but when I get back, I plan to go hog-wild replying to them. :)

In any case, I'm dropping one last post before getting on a train to... um, somewhere... where I'm hoping for something miraculous to happen.

I'm not allowed to say what that something is, but I definitely need some good vibes because if what I hope will happen happens, it will be to the benefit of a lot of people. I'm so sorry I can't be less cryptic....

Because I definitely need some good thoughts. Like... REALLY GOOD THOUGHTS. Something to the effect of "Dear Big Man Upstairs... Venessa needs your help. Make sure she doesn't chicken out tonight and while you're at it, make sure she doesn't pass out if what she hopes will happen... happens."

*crosses fingers, eyes, and toes*

(Also, if you haven't friended faspellcast, you may want to because there's some awesome stuff coming up on SpellCast that you won't want to miss! Tremendous thanks to madeof_stars who made our beautiful layout!)

I'm slowly coming back to the real world, although I'm still out of sorts something fierce. Every so often I'll be 100% certain that I'm fine, but then someone will ask about what happened or I'll get another comment from one of my family members on the August 27th post and I'll lose my cool.

So what else is there to do but find ways of cheering myself up?



I only realized how metaphorical this little animation was after I drew it. Like... just gimme a pencil and I'll draw myself happy. lol Anyway, thanks for the idea goes to cambryn. This was good times :)

Here are some other things I found on the way back to sanity. I hope they add a little laughter/happiness to your day. :)
( These quadruplets give the Weasley Twins a run for their money. )

( The absolute coolest car commercial on the face of the earth. )

Okay. I'm back.

A million thanks and hugs to old friends and new for being my support during such a nightmarish time.

This is it. One more day to work on this confounded thesis. After that I can make my LJ return and reply to everyone's comments (ETA: and scour the flist for everything I've missed). Thank you guys for being so supportive (in all aspects of my life). It's been a crazy couple of weeks.

And speaking of crazy, I think thesis writing is bad for your brain. Check out this little exchange that happened on the rooftop garden of jaredmorrison's apartment building after I stopped working for the night. (Backstory: No one else had been bitten by mosquitoes, but I somehow managed to get bitten four times because apparently I taste like chocolate.)

mudblood428: (angrily) It's like they can't get enough of me.
kirleyfries: Seriously, that's crazy. They won't leave you alone.
mudblood428: That's because they know that sucking my blood means they're getting 100% of their daily allowance of AWESOME.
(Insert raucous laughter)
jaredmorrison: You're such a tool!

Yes. Excess thesis writing = brain turns to stoopid.

Wish me luck!

The reason why I've been MIA: I'm in New York! Why? Because it's Mother's Day and I've got three people up here who need special Mom's Day lovin'; namely, my mom, grandmother, and "adopted" grandmother, Jean. I simply couldn't stay away. To all you mom's out there in the ether and on my flist, I hope you all had a wonderful Mother's Day!

So remember that uber-gigantic post about Easter festivities at my apartment? Well, the proof's in the pudding. Or the turkey, as it were. I've got a mess of pictures from the holiday, so if you're curious as to how the Gluten-Free, Egg-Free, Sugar-Free, Low-Salt, High-Fiber menu came out, or you just want to gush over shots of my nephew, click below. :D

( As CRACKED as an Easter Egg! )

Fun times had by all. :) Happy Mother's Day again, and bear with me as I catch up on my f-list!

And now for the real-life post o' randomness. First things first:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY peachespig! You rock!

*clears throat* 'Kay, so now that that's done, onto randomosities. :)

I. ( The most abnormal baby pictures you've ever seen. )

II. ( Cherry Blossoms, Arts&Crafts, and Bald!Natalie Portman! )

III. ( Fake Cut to happy Harry/Ginny Art )

Anyhoo, that's all she wrote. Thanks to you guys who have been commenting on the picture - I'm thrilled that y'all like it. And as a parting gift, here is another installment of "Where in the World is Pinsheng Ken Hu?" ("Knife Ken" is in Sweden at the moment. Click here if you need to be brought up to speed.) This is from his birthday entry:

"It was sure not a drunk and partying night, with kissing and dancing as what I had done in the past, rather a night of peace and reflection on the past 25 years of my life… I had became more humble, receptive, open-minded, considerate, did a lot more self-criticizing than point fingers. My life had became more than just exciting, almost to a point of content as if it couldn’t get any better. Yet every and each day, I wake up to a better morning." - Knife Ken

*tips her hat* Peace out.

I have to start things off by saying 'thank you' to everyone who commented on my last art entry. I've never gotten that kind of response before to any picture I've drawn, and I'm completely overwhelmed at the comments I received. Thanks also goes to Jezzleffezzle for giving me juicy stuff to work with. You LJ peeps are amazing.

So onto randomosities.

( The Jorb. )

( The Art Stuffs )

In other news, Chapter Three of After the Die is Cast was posted to hp_cafe today. I hope you'll pop in and check it out seeing as stuff's heating up a bit. As always, anyone who wants to skip the slow wind-up can go straight to Potter on Paper and read all the chapters I've written to date (10). Comments make me happy, so do leave one over at hp_cafe if you liked it :).

And lastly:

( Organizational Wonderland!! )

Well, that's all for today's randomosities. Peace to you all and always remember:

"When a man tells you that he got rich through hard work, ask him: 'Whose? - Don Marquis (1878-1937)

PS: It took me four hours to finish this post. We MUST get a temp!

Blimey. That went fast. After seven days, I've got about 30 pages total, un-edited. Not too shabby. Tonight, I think I'll reward myself and relax. For anyone who's interested in what I've been busting my ass over, click on the cut below.

( A snippet from the Thesis )

Other news. Potter on Paper got a mad update today including the Harry/Ron picture and a humongous download page I'd been waiting to post, featuring the amazing manips and color-jobs of velvethope (ie: sunlitdays). Really, it was a selfish endeavor. All I need to do is click on that page and I'm instantly cheered. :D She rocks my world.

Anyway, please go over and have a look at her masterful work. (Thank you again, C, for letting me put them up!)

Also, huge thanks to everyone who sent their well-wishes on my last post. It's been rough times these days, but your comments really did help. Part of what sucks about this whole thesis writing experience is how isolating it can be. LJ friends like yourselves make things significantly less lonely. :)

A final randomosity, courtesy of my Starbucks cup:

"The irony of commitment is that it's deeply liberating - in work, in play, in love. The act frees you from the tyranny of your internal critic, from the fear that likes to dress itself up and parade around as rational hesitation. To commit is to remove your head as the barrier to your life." -Anne Morriss

Words to drink Skim Chai Lattes to.

Yes! Make way for randomosities! And a big honkin' photodump.

First things first - some lovely friends over at Fiction Alley Park have made a special thread for Alyson, aka redmonster, as she will be departing from the Harry Potter fandom to join the Peace Corps in Albania. I have provided the threadart (below) for this massive Harry/Ginny ship thread extravaganza :). Do stop in at the Orange Crush Thread if you can and send some well wishes her way, even if you don't ship Harry/Ginny. We're all going to miss her terribly. *pokes icon*

( Click for Threadart )

In other news, many thanks to everyone who enjoyed yesterday's Harry/Ron Picture. To my utmost surprise, reallycorking liked it so much, she colored it! (asdfjkl!) Check out her color-job here. [/Happy Dance]

Moving on, my nephew is a superhero. No, really. Don't believe me? Well check this out:

( Kneel Before Zod! )

Yep, that's my little nephew down there in the corner in his Halloween outfit. I about damn near peed my pants when I saw this. Of course, my ulterior motives include the hope that this picture will circulate rapidly around the internet and eventually wind up on VH1's Best Week Ever, thereby making my little Michael the most famous 17 month-old kid in America. But we'll see. :D

Finally, as promised, I've added Chapter Two of After the Die is Cast to hp_cafe. Click the fake cut below to get there. (And do remember - it's unbeta-ed and lookin' for love, so comments are welcome. Just leave 'em over at the hp_cafe post.)

(AFTER THE DIE IS CAST: Chapter Two)

PS: I'm gonna see Billy Joel Tonight. YEEEAAAAAAHHHHHH!

So I'm back from NY and have plunged head-first into MARATHON THESIS WEEK! DUN DUN DUN! That's right, folks, my life is officially forfeit to the gods of thesis-writing from now until Easter, with this week being the 7 day-long kick-off festival! (You can tell I'm trying extra hard to infuse this task with positive imagery so I'm not so depressed over it.) To celebrate, I have done laundry, shopped at Harris Teeter, and helped my Mexican next-door neighbor with her camcorder. As to the latter, here's how that went down:

Neighbor: (rings doorbell) "Ah... Em... Can you...? I want to watch it... the home movie."
Me: "What?" (On the inside: "I thought I hid that blackmail video! Who leaked it??")
Neighbor: "Ah... Em... the home movie...?"

Finally, I tell her to tell me what she wants in Spanish (being half-Puerto Rican has its perks) and I procede to her apartment where I hook her Camcorder up to the TV so she can watch the video on the big screen and then teach her what to do so she can do it herself next time. She thanks me profusely in Spanish. I feel like I've made the world a better place. Productive AND altruistic, baby!

But yeah. I punched out 5 pages of thesis today and I'm not still not done for the night. Clearly I need to take my activities somewhere other than my dining room. Being in the comfort of my home is so not conducive to thesis productivity. But whatever. I've got my chocolate-induced glow to keep me going!

In other news: The New York trip!

My experience would be best expressed in a quote by the baddest of Strong Bads: "Holy Crap!" This is what my Dad built and put in my old room in NY (and forgive the wet hair - I'd just gotten out of the shower when this was taken):

( Holy Warner Brothers Collectibles, Batman! )

This was my birthday present. You're not mistaken. Those are all wands in there, many of which I'm sure you'll recognize. I took close-up shots of all the particularly ornate ones (Sirius Black's wand is out-of -control gorgeous). The one I'm holding is Hermione's. At some point I'll have to update with my uncensored reaction to all of this. For now, let me just say, "awslefk;lskdfjoewi."

Then, I met rhrsoulmates! What an incredibly funny, sweet, energetic, and beautiful person. As I told her on e-mail today, meeting her was like meeting family. I'm so grateful I could see her if only briefly. She's ridiculously nice (and sent me a wicked fun R/Hr music video today that made for a wonderful study break). Can't wait to see you in Vegas, Andrea!

And that's all we have for this installment as I really need to stop procrastinating. To the f-list: just bear with me til April! I promise I'll surface after Easter to comment on all of your fabulous posts!

( Real life getting in the way of my real life. Again. )

In other news, many, many thanks to everyone who enjoyed my last fanart installment and commented. It made me ridiculously happy. In fact, this picture was so well received, that I've decided to post the Chapters of After the Die is Cast on LiveJournal as well, for those who don't want to go through the song and dance of finding it on MNFF. At the moment, I'm thinking one chapter a week, so people can take their time reading, and they will all be posted to hp_cafe, a brilliant hp fic community. Find it here:

AFTER THE DIE IS CAST: Chapter One

ETA: Let it be known that this first chapter was my first foray into fiction, let alone fanfiction. If you find that it rushes and/or doesn't quite flow in spots, let it suffice to say that I know and am planning to rewrite the whole dang chapter when this whole school business blows over. Chapter 2 is significantly better in comparison, so please bear with me :).

Cheers :)