Ree’s musings

The Chopping Block is finally back! YAY! It really is Christmas -- with a comic about a serial killer. If that doesn't sound interesting, stay away from this comic. If you like murderers and black humour, then baby, time to open your early Christmas present.

Most people who write will, sooner or later, come across something they wrote years ago that they blush to re-read. I think the few who don't are just a bit insane. Any skill regularly exercised should improve, so output from a much earlier stage should show less skill and ability. Whether or not the person blushes depends on whether they blush at the drop of a hat (right here) or grin to see how much better they are now.

Wow. Didn't mean to wax fancy on y'all. I was just sorting (I do a lot of sorting in winter, I notice, and I have an insane number of papers and files dated March 2004 -- I expect I was quite done with winter, though it wasn't done with me, and got to writing new things) -- where was I?

Oh yes. Sorting. For those of you who know that I'm talking about, I re-found "Elven King". For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about it, it was a story I started that involved a elven crown prince attempting to marry a human, and his family's reaction. And that's all you're getting!

Well. Okay. There was a scene. There was cream (some kind of sugar topping on their desserts). And innuendo (I swear, Ishtar, not a word and that goes double for you, Pasht). If it had been a romance novel it would have been the least erotic ever and very embarrassing to me besides. Nothing happens. Nothing. They whisper in each other's ears and get interrupted before so much as a shared soulful look.

Yet it still makes me blush.

Also I just had a vision of two roleplay characters, Pasht and Ishtar, somehow merged into the almighty sex fiend Pashtar, and that's just wrong. Throw ze Contessa in there and Oh my, that's just wrong wrong wrong wrong WRONG thank you. And no, I'm not explaining. Not until my face resumes its normal pallor. "Poinsettia", while seasonal, should not be a skin tone. Curse my face! At least I have good circulation....

I swear, I thought I wouldn't have a problem wearing three-inch heels around the house. I watched some TV. During a commercial break, I decided to grab a snack upstairs. The program came back before I got back to the TV, so I hurried down the stairs.

I cleaned the black scuff marks off the stairs and the rugburn has faded from my forearm, but my left foot has been reminding me ever since that I broke my fall with its arch. (Not like I landed on it -- I landed on my knees, rear on the floor between my feet -- but my left foot just likes to gripe.) I haven't been taking anything for the pain discomfort because if I'm misstepping and potentially making it worse, I want to know so I stop. It's manageable anyway.

No worries, folks; I'm fine. My mother thinks my foot's swollen and I may need a doctor, but she's a mom. I've had second-degree burn on my ankle and not needed a doctor.

However, tomorrow I am so wearing flats around the house, assuming I dare don footwear at all.

I almost didn't test for backward compatibility before I began using that layout (for a site, not this LJ). I'm so glad I did.

The cause of the overlap is a CSS float, by the way. They are tricky dangerous things that behave differently in IE than in modern browsers. I think I hate floats. Ick. There are far better ways to position and I'm beginning to get the hang of one or two.

(the following is an anonymous gift)

2 months of paid account time have been added to your LiveJournal account for user "msree".

*eyepop* But -- I -- they -- but -- uh....

I'm not used to receiving anonymous gifts, as you plainly see. Thank you, whoever you are. The comments are open and IP logging is off, should you wish to take a bow.

Hee. I have my userpics back and the advanced customisation center! Hurray!

All of the sudden my brain is spouting idiocy. "Forgo Fargo -- drop a billion in Vermillion!"

I don't know either. It's just *doing* it.

I have discovered the best rhyming phrase to date thanks to Scary Go Round, and that phrase is... no, you should see it in context. Sorta. There's not a whole lot of context there but it involves towels. Hee.

And that arc of comic would have been my break from moving furniture, but now I've gone and blogged so I should get back to hefting wood already.

...my brain just took that to a naughty place. Erin, get out of my brain. You'll get it all --

-- no, no I won't say that. Hee.

Brother is out of college for Yuletide. Last night was his first back in town, and already he's searched the computer for his porn stash and deleted the pictures he downloaded. Good idea, except for leaving the pics in the Recycle Bin right where everyone will notice them.

Heh. Guess what band I listen to when I debug. Go on, guess.

(Squirt says that band is awful and I have no taste in music. Given that his top five favorite songs include "Convoy" and Kenny Rogers, I'm not inclined to listen to the brat. *resists referencing the obvious song title*)

Sometimes I love December and sometimes I hate it. Today my brothers and I are invited (by proxy) to celebrate Christmas with my father and his wife; those who know me well can anticipate the swirl of emotions that rouses in me.

The computer is getting consistently worse, so I didn't get to wish everyone a pleasant Solstice in timely fashion. I really want to chuck the CPU at the wall. It would be impossibly rewarding, I just know it.

*gets crankier by the minute* I think I'm driving my mother crazy. Every time she talks to me all she gets to hear is "Holly and ivy are not either Christian symbols. They go back to pre-Christian pagan rituals, just like decorating evergreens with candles to symbolise continued fertility and light even in dark winter...." *cough* Can't be fun to listen to. I get in a bee in my bonnet and I go berserk. Memo to Ree: fix that already.

It's because of the dad thing. That I'm sniping and whinging, I mean -- as far as the "not either Christian" part goes, I do that at pretty much every major holiday. Come Easter, it's "what did you think eggs and bunnies had to do with Jesus? They're fertility symbols -- bunnies, helloooo! They sex it up!" You don't want to know much beyond that. Trust me when I say so.

And then there's not not-really--J-shaped candy cane.

I need to shut up now. I gotta find wrapping paper anyway.

Another December, another relative in the hospital. This year it's my dad's dad with pneumonia. When he gets out of the hospital they're putting him in a nursing home. The CAT scan results aren't back yet but they're saying it's Alzheimer's. I had no idea grandpa had degraded that badly -- he doesn't recognize his own daughter. He has no idea who my brother and I are.

I -- if you pray, please pray for my grandpa's wellbeing and my grandmother too. She's been trying so hard to take care of him, but the doctors won't let her anymore. If it's not too much trouble, pray for my aunts and uncles too. They're filtering in from all around to be there for their folks. My dad is taking it particularly hard, denying that anything is wrong with his father except the pneumonia. Daddy wants to believe that when the pneumonia clears up grandpa will be his old self again.

Poor Daddy. He got back from vacation and found his dad in the hospital.

I'll be okay. It obviously isn't a fun time, having your grandfather say he has no idea who those kids are, but I'm not carving my arms like a Christmas goose either and that's an improvement for me. I'll get through this with my family, I know that, but good God this isn't fun.

I'm also worried about people I knew from the old Vine who live in Singapore. I'd been irritable with the newscasts, wanting to know which countries got hit, and today I found a map. Singapore.

It's a merry fucking Christmas!