I'm razzled AND dazzled!

Ah, South Beach, you beautiful lying bitch--

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 12:53:33 GMT

Unemployment, mood-eating, and a run of home-made desserts has left me with a waistline of a slowly increasing nature. So, back on South Beach, which is a nice, heart-friendly diet anyway.

I'd ooched my way up to 191, which is higher than I'd ever gotten. The first week on the south beach (and most low-carb diets, pretty steady loss of about a pound a day. It's not "real," but it's still nice.

...

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 21:19:40 GMT

The spam's title was, "ATTENTION: WINNER."
Right away, I knew it wasn't for me.

Spam for the day:

Sun, 05 Jul 2009 04:12:20 GMT

"Enjoy the delicious taste of having a monster in your pants."
/me nods.

Really, if it weren't for all the ups and downs, how would we know what level was?

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 21:52:23 GMT

Jobstuff--excellent opportunity at University of Texas. We'll see what happens there. I think I may have a professor in the department willing to recommend me, unless I totally misunderstand the position.

Formatted my cover letter in some bizaare way, text without linebreaks (paragraph yes, linebreaks no). Go me :( That's the way UTexas USED to take letters, but now it seems they've got a better way of doing things, which I learned after I submitted. At least it's spelled okay.

Life is too crowded to be social :( I hate that. Every evening is stuffed with something or another, too back-to-back to allow the flexibility of catching a movie with some friends. Maybe it's just this week. With two ongoing serious commitments and one light commitment during the week, and weekends being as crowded as they tend to be, that doesn't leave a lot of playroom.

Money situation a wee bit grim. Unemployment should kick in at the second half of the month, that's good, but in the meantime, watch my bank account slooowly empty itself :( Ach. If this is the month I land a job, no problem, I've wiped my savings out but haven't gone into hock yet.

*snickers* Going through the photos in my Flikr archive that people have favorited. Someone favorited my picture loosely titled "Spotty demonstrates how not to sit in a kilt." Their archive is naught but boys in bikini briefs, or less. So I guess that's a compliment :)

Heat killing my desert plants. Worrisome.

Fuxed up a huge batch of iced tea, somehow. Oh, yeah, I let it boil. I cleaned out ALL my mint and most of my verbena, lemon balm, and stevia. Ended up with a pot of brown water with the taste of diluted burned sugar. Not pleasant. Sickly-sweet, musty flavor.

Making two of Whines' mom's rhubarb pies for a potluck :) Hope THOSE turn out well, I only rarely screw up pie.

Hmm.

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 14:53:28 GMT

"The theme of player's handbook 3 is character options."

So...this will almost certainly include the hybrid class concept. Okay, I can handle that...

Job interview results--

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 22:56:19 GMT

Brief and noncommital. I think it went well, if an interview in 15 minutes is "well," but we were both quick and chirpy and didn't have much to say or ask each other.

I really don't think I'm in line for this job, tho. It's for a retail management position, and I've only ever made it to assistant manager, and that was an oddball sort of thing. Technically there's nothing in the land of retail management I haven't done, but not all at once, and with this job market, a $10 position is going to bring in doctorates, so, it seems unlikely.

We'll see, but don't nobody sprain their fingers crossing them. Save that for the gay rights job I app'd for.

Trying to remember a song parody--other Jackson parodies

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 14:53:28 GMT

I think it might hve been a parody of "Billie Jean is not my lover"--someone was riffing on Michael wandering around on a color-changing floor. I remember the main character going down the sidewalk touching things and watching them light up, and then lighting up a mailbox. Anyone remember that one?

Can anyone think of any other required Jackson-based humor? Besides Weird Al, of course, that's a given.

This Friday--MJ lovefest--

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 04:52:09 GMT

The Wiz, Moonwalker, videos, parodies, The Jackson 5ive, hopefully Captain Eo :) Our place, 7:00, bring munchies...

Job interview Monday--

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 17:20:43 GMT

At a large educational supply store :) Fun, fun...employee discount on all kinds of fun plastic stuff :) I need to take a safari down there Saturday to check the stuff out!

Thanks, Dev :)

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:17:52 GMT

Dev got tickets for me and Whines to see Mama Mia! :) Which was a treat. I'd seen it before, but it's such a great pick-me-up :) I think the gay character changes a lot between the play and the movie, but I'll have to see the movie again to be sure. Oh, horror.

Every time I see a musical with dance numbers, I'm struck by a strong urge to lose weight. So...I'm going to try to get to 165 by late October for the renaissance festival, so I can be all trim for all the leather I want to wear...we'll see, but I think it's doable.

Cebu is going to ask me if I want to go to the gym. The answer is no, I don't particularly *want* to, but I may anyway!

I'm at 190 now, so that's 25 pounds to lose, and hopefully keep off.

Meh.

Mon, 22 Jun 2009 22:01:48 GMT

I know I've made this exact post before, but I need to whine a little bit, so I'm going to make it again.

The jobsearch thing keeps underlining that I spent six years doing an entry-level job v-e-r-y well. I made it branch into new directions, created/facilitated some excellent sales opportunities, got a lot of respect, and did a really bang-up job at it, but still, the basic job title was an entry-level position, and I never really picked up a new title. Add to that that I really only focused on data juggling...and never learned SQL, though it was something I was starting to do.

The only thing I've got enough experience at to move myself out of "entry level" is MS Excel, *maybe* marketing copywriting, but that's kind of a stretch, since I've only got about a year of professional experience at it--maybe a month of paid experience.

The state's requiring me to play on their search engine, but it just sends me very basic admin assists, because it's impossible to sell yourself as a generalist, no matter how good a generalist you are :(

Whine, whine. Okay, I'm finished.

This and that--

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 21:27:46 GMT

Enjoying the first day off in a long time! "Off" is a vague term, as I'm not "on" in any paid sense of the word, but it's nice to be able to catch up on the jobs I've been putting on the backburner after what seems like an endless stream of church events.

Looking forward to cooking tonight :) Cran, Chance, and self went shopping a few days ago to a marvellous tea shop in SE Austin. The owner does a lot of blog marketing, so I don't want to mention the place here, but I do talk about it in my food blog. Good stuff--I bought the ingredients for Chai Tea Chicken, two cannisters of coconut chai tea and a fruity rubois blend, and a sample of a coconut assam...I lurve assam tea, and I'm very sad that I've run out of the coconut assam :( It became several servings of iced tea.

Submitted my first job application in a while--I just haven't bothered over the last month or so, but I confess, as much as I want mom's business to succeed, I'm having a gut-level bad feeling about it, and need to get a back-up plan in order. I've got one low-grade lead, we'll see what happens...but if anyone wants a gently used hyena as a co-worker, keep me in mind :)

Looking forward to the weekend. I've got one unpleasantness ahead--a six-hour church meeting--but I'm not going to do church on Sunday, just relax, give my father his birthday presents, and have a nice relaxing day before the committees and nonprofits and other time-wasting-but-rewarding groups start nipping at my heels again.

...

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 02:24:07 GMT

Kochenhundertangst: The fear that one is almost certainly going to have to cook for one hundred people. :(

Gaming over the weekend--

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 14:07:31 GMT

Ran another installment of my about-monthly D&D game. New monster in the MM2 that's very neat for gnoll fans, the witherling--a sort of demon-tainted undead created by Yeenoghu worshippers, a fast-moving (speed 8) bastard that gets Shift 2 and double-attacks when bloodied, a poison claw with Slow (save ends), and a scary jump thing--very 28 days later, really, but the thing looks like an old corpse with gazelle-horn claws and a hyena skull grafted to it. Serenghetti Horror :) Four of these was a pretty nasty challenge for the party (there was also a few hyenas and a gnoll armed with a poison longbow, but the witherlings really were the core disaster.

The party mission for the game was "retrieve some treasures from the boss's house and escape." I blew an hour last month making a map that covered my gamer's table, lots of sheets of paper--fun to have a large chunk of world to work around, and it led to some interesting moments that I hadn't expected. That, and the party decided to draw off a lot of the gnolls with some distractions, leaving the "it'd be better if the party just ran away" encounter a little more approachable. It was a pretty near fight, I had three out of five members down at one point, and had to throw in an NPC cleric to stabalize people (the PC priest didn't make it to the game)...but GM fiat was pretty minimal, one heal, two stabalize dying with Heal skill.)

Hoping we can wrap up the current plot, which has gone on for I think five games now, and doesn't have NEARLY enough undead for my taste. I've been enjoying the gnoll content, since the plot is built around "City under Seige by Gnoll Army," but I'm pretty sure the next plot is going to be dungeon/pirate city, unless someone surprises me.

Recurring problem in life...

Tue, 09 Jun 2009 14:30:33 GMT

I feel older and crotchettyer each year. Like every year is a spade of dirt in a hole marked "negativity", and I'm standing in it whilest digging it. This really needs to change, somehow, but I can't figure out how. I've got less patience and a sharper tongue than I ever have before. Some of that is situational depression and stress, but some of it is just a rut I've given myself permission to fall into. Must work on this, "unpleasant" is never an adjective I'd want used against me.

thump

Tue, 09 Jun 2009 14:27:09 GMT

Oi, whadda weekend. Long, but rewarding.

At this point, I don't remember friday at all :( I'm not sure what happened. There was some great gaming in there, A's campaign is going in some odd and unexpected directions, but PLANAR TRAVEL is in the near future, I think! Yay! I've NEVER EVER gotten to be in a campaign that's jumped to an alternate plane, and it's one of my favorite aspects of D&D. Woohoo.

Oh, now I remember Friday. I was busy all day. Had it in my head that I was going to make korma, but kept getting pulled aside to do other things, work with mom, that sort of thing. Then gaming happened somewhere in there. But korma didn't. Oh, well. Sometime this week, it's been like three weeks since I've cooked anything of value.

Saturday, Pridefest day. Some long conversation with Whines, then food, then grabbing Chance and travelling Prideward. Three hours too early. So we puttered around in the heat and walked for what felt like three miles altogether. Not a huge distance, but not one that I'm currently "trained" for...and it was hot!

Pridefest and the pride parade were both a little bit of a letdown--the GLBT group has (wisely?) decided to hold the festival for only a few hours in the late afternoon, rather than baking their volunteer staff in the hot, hot sun all day. Probably cheaper and easier to run. The parade...weird, a lot of local businesses (like realtors and banks and stuff), rather fewer purely gay groups. Or at least they didn't bother identifying who they were. And one UU church, yay, go uus!

Sunday...church biz in the morning, lunch, light shopping, more long conversations with Whines, then taking the dogs to the park. Which was a lot of fun :) I was all set to have a nice relaxing dinner, when my family called to tell me that I had to leave RIGHT THAT MINUTE to go to grandma's funeral (which, to be fair, I was expecting to drive to the next morning at like 4:30...I'd much rather leave at 4:30 than spend the night at a hotel, I think I get more rest that way.)

Monday, funeral. Graveside, which was a new experience (I suspect one that I'll have more of as time marches inexorably forward). The family stuck a pair of well-worn dancing shoes and a bottle of tequila in the coffin...since Grandma was buried with quakers, she had to have SOMETHING to tide her over...

Mom got unusually drunk and silly. Sister got unusually (or usually) judgemental of mom. Not a good dynamic, considering the circumstances. Apparently extended family knows I'm gay now, as the single biggest gossip in the family finally made the connection with that guy I'm always hanging out with. That simplifies things.

Made it home 7:30 or so, ran north for dinner with friends and *other* family. Chicken, TV, bed, in that order.

Aaaaand, thrifthorror made the Livejournal spotlight...without my intervention this time. Whines pointed this out to me when I was in Houston, so I grabbed mom's laptop and switched the community's status immediately to "mod approves posts." It's for the best, after last time. Nice to be a part of such a prospering thing :)

Betrayal!

Wed, 03 Jun 2009 23:11:55 GMT

The new Monster Manual has an extremely hawt gnoll in it. I cribbed a copy of the illustration from Wizards...when the illo is double-sized, it becomes obvious that the gnoll has cleavage :( It's a lady gnoll. Which is actually interesting in itself.

Fur...unforgettable fur...

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 20:35:18 GMT

Fur, I am covered with fur.../I'm a furry fella...Fur! When you stroke it I purr...It's maroon and yella...

Two three, double dip!

Long Day Party?

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 14:15:39 GMT

Anyone not solsticing on the solstice (June 21)? My nonprofit is putting on an eventlet at The Long House, a very nice edifice near the base of SoCo and Barton Springs (?). Live music, food. Kids welcome, probably some sort of speaker/reading/conversation cafe', we're still schmoozing a bit these days, but it should be a good event beyond that!

Hear me stutter, in podcast!

Wed, 27 May 2009 21:24:26 GMT

http://equalmeasurepodcast.com/archives/137

Thoink produces a mostly regular gay/lesbian issues podcast, and in the wake of the Prop 8 judicial decision, he threw together a Distinguished Panel of Experts (read: interested friends who he could reach in six hours notice) to stop film and discuss. I'm a member of this Distinguished Panel.

(Note: The views I express do not necessarily reflect my views, since I *do* play devil's advocate to move the conversation from time to time).

Opinion:

Wed, 27 May 2009 20:40:11 GMT

"Randy Ho" is an unfortunate name.

paging through quotes...

Wed, 27 May 2009 15:38:59 GMT

When grubbing for necessities man is still an animal. He becomes uniquely human when he reaches out for the superfluous and extravagant.
--Eric Hoffer

Don't ask the barber whether you need a haircut.
--Daniel Greenberg

Against stupidity the very gods fight in vain.
--Friedrich Von Schiller

If the gods do evil then they are not gods.
--Euripides

I have only a small flickering light to guide me in the darkness of a thick forest. Up comes a theologian and blows it out.
--Denis Diderot

Marke it welle, There are flowers, and there are weeds-But mostly weeds.
--Scott Orville Bergren

The meaning of life is that it stops.
--Franz Kafka

Night-blooming jessamine smells like treacle.

Wed, 27 May 2009 14:27:33 GMT

Recent additions to my increasingly complicated front yard...Maid of Orleans jasmine. *glees* It's not exactly what I wanted, exactly what I wanted is the persnickety Duke of Tuscany jasmine, which has flowers the size of 50 cent pieces that look like white roses and smell like a pokemon with a Jasmine Blast!! attack. Either one, though, is edible. The flowers are good for teas, jasmine syrup...and I found a recipe for jasmine pots de cream, which is pretty much food porn for an exotic herb/custard freak. I have to take a shower now.

At R (Wyte's wife)'s recommendation, went to a little herbalist shop nearby. It's really quite a piece of work! The shop, Garden of the Ancients, is near the corner of Yager and Parmer--maaaybe three miles from my house! It was more of a New Age herbalist than a nursery, though. I'm sure I'll come there again, but I don't work much with medicinal herbs. They had an excellent array of bulk spices though, with very good prices.

Happy gardener moment for the week--about four days ago, my Night-Blooming Jessamine started opening. At first the fragrance was weak, you had to be right next to it to catch it at all. Now, starting at about 9:00 at night, the entire front porch and court smells of flower. And the fragrance is just going to get stronger! It's a very sweet scent, I think it's like the smell of treacle dominating the scent of something like mountain laurel. I can't really compare the floral note in the smell to anything, because frankly, it's overwhelmed by the smell of syrup.

Hmm...I may regret my choices in life if it continues to grow and pour out that fragrance. It's pretty rich already! Some people love it, some people have torn it out of their yard because they don't like being abused by cheap perfume. Anyway...

A fine and private place--

Fri, 22 May 2009 18:23:04 GMT

The sexual violence website (against, not promoting) I'm working on is supposed to have an "in memory" page up--a memorial for people who have died, parts of the self that have died. This is the site that uses butterflies for a motif, right? Right. All these elements fit somehow.

Spent the morning with Chance puttering around the MLK and I35 cemetary. Big lot, filled with gravestones--a wooden one, outside, since 1876? Is that even possible? Maybe someone remakes it every 30 years or so? Some old favorites, like the uniquely Edward Gorey lot that I picnicked by in my goth years. A couple of gems this time through--

This strange supplication to the Eternal God Pichachu, for one. This one had one high creepy factor--after I'd taken about eight photos of it from different angles, Chance declares, "Oh, a dead dog." A very large dog was laying in the bushes, decomposing quietly. I hadn't noticed even though I was about three feet away, there was a nice breeze blowing in just the right direction. We moved on quickly after that.

A little later, I saw this lovely lady...who really must shave her pits more often...

I've titled her "M is for Moss" in my mind.

Anyway, as we were travelling back to the car, I noticed a flock of lovely black butterflies fluttering around the tombstones. Of course, butterflies being a leitmotif of the website I'm working on...and needing tombstones...well, perfect opportunity, but they were hyper and fast-moving and REFUSED to land on any tombstones at all! I chased them for a minute or two before giving up, muttering about missed photo opportunities.

Right at the time I said that, a flock of vultures flew overhead, drawn by the aforementioned dog's carcass. One of them settled on a tombstone. I stared at them, and said "now THAT'S photogenic." But I was driving off and had tossed my camera in the back. The one on the tombstone stretched his wings out to his full extent, just to say "oh yeah, Mr. Photographer, we know you want us."

I did have the luck to catch at least this much of a visitor, enough to remind me that we saw him--a pretty brown fox skulking behind some of the tombstones. It's not a great photo, but it'll be nice to have that image in my mind, at least.

Anyway, lovely morning!

I'm glad it's not JUST me...

Fri, 22 May 2009 05:28:44 GMT

the new Monster Manual II has a description of Flux Salads. Not Slaads. I'm glad that I'm not the only one making this mistake. Spellcheck is NOT a gamer's friend...