So far I am disappointed in this tropical storm everyone's been talking about. All it's done is made it HOT all over again when the weather was just getting nice! Boo. D:

This week is going to be totally crazy; the buses aren't running tomorrow for the holiday so I think I'm going to try to work from home. But I also got in late today (stupid pest control - or, well, stupid me, I really need to learn to not go back to bed even if I still have 20 minutes before I need to get up) so I'm going to stay late tonight to catch up, since I don't have to run. I had this weird dream this morning though, which I can only partly remember, but I think it involved Jake from Hannah Montana. Like, we'd accidentally body-swapped or something, and we kept trying to get back to our own bodies but nothing we tried worked. XD; That's pretty fail, brain.

Friday and Saturday is STARS (including a scavenger hunt and ahaha, I don't know my way around campus! ::diiies::), and Sunday is Disney. I'm actually really just looking forward to going to Epcot, plunking myself down in one of the countries, and sitting for a nice long while with a coffee or something. Since I'll likely either be by myself (or hopefully with violet_lane), I can take it easy and just enjoy the atmosphere, which I really want to do. :D Especially since I get in for free! And then hopefully I will get home in time for Venture Bros. XD

Also, to all you NaNo people posting snippets, I keep meaning to read everything you've posted up so far and I haven't gotten to do it yet! But I will! It probably doesn't help that all my spare time is spent plugging away at my own crazy epic PJO fic or reading 501st, which I am about halfway through and really don't want to put down. I'm going to be so sad when it's done (but at this point I am still hopeful that there will still be more to come!). Also, it really makes me want to write a clone fic. You know. In all my spare time. >>; (But seriously. I <3 Niner. Niner needs more love. Lots more. <3)

Okay, off to enjoy a few more minutes of "lunch break" before getting back to work. I want to have some final-ish tables by tonight, I can do it!

Welcome to day 3 of November and the end of DST! I just love watching the clock go from 1:59 to 1:00 over again. There's something very... master of space and time-y about it, maybe. :D;It does, however, severely limit my afternoon sunlight, which is distressing since it means I have to rush home earlier than 5 if I want to run four and a half miles before darkness descends. At least the weather finally seemed to figure out it was FALL, PEOPLE, and it's a lovely 71 or so outside right now. Oh man, I'm so excited. I really hope it doesn't get hot again. ._.;

So! Good luck to all those doing NaNo; I would be with you if I wasn't suddenly trying to finish up a PhD this year (because between writing and astronomy? We all know which I'd rather spend my time doing XD;). Although I'm beginning to think that despite the fact that I'm not doing NaNo, I may end up writing just as much this month. XD; I finally figured out how to do this interim scene in my PJO fic (ahaha, completely differently than it was originally supposed to go, and of course I figured this out as I was almost done with it so now I have to go back and rewrite it all). And as soon as the middle stuff is done, we get to the GOOD STUFF. >D I'm really curious to see what readers will think. There are at least a few people who leave consistent reviews over at fanfiction.net and I really look forward to seeing their reactions. But hopefully by GOOD STUFF I mean that I know mostly what's going to happen already, and I'm really looking forward to writing it. I mean, a big long scene between Percy and Hades? Total win~ Plus, Percy is turning out to have a lot more thoughts on things than I originally thought, and I really like that. Things I hadn't even thought of end up tying together ever-so-nicely, it's really pretty awesome. (Seriously, if I put this much energy into The Dead Prince it'd be a whole series of published novels by now. ::fail:: I really need to get working on that.)

At least I've also got a number of contests lined up for this month, and I want to get working on some original stuff for those as well. One of them even involves Greek mythology! And another I can totally garner inspiration from Firefly. That's not cheating, right? It's just inspiration!

As for the weekend, I spent my Halloween watching way too much HGTV and now I want to redecorate my entire apartment. ::dies:: Actually, the worst part is I may be actually thinking about it, albeit more along the lines of moving out some of the anime stuff and putting up some of the nicer stuff that's been sitting in my closet for years. I fear I may be ::gasp!:: acquiring a somewhat more grown-up sense of taste. I don't know what to say. XD But never fear, even if I were to undertake such a task, the number of Ryomas in my living room would likely only go down slightly. I mean, come on. Some of them would need to stay! It's really too bad I probably won't be here long enough to bother painting; my mom's been trying to get me to paint the place for years, but with the actual real possibility that I may be leaving within a year, it's likely not worth it. Still, now I'm inspired to paint my future place! Though the inspiration may not last until I next move... XD;

Then Sunday was Star Wars in Concert with Nathan and Scott, and that was really pretty awesome. That screen was HUGE! Plus, during intermission this woman came around and offered all of us pretty awesome seats on the first level not far from the stage, since that section hadn't sold out. Who were we to say no? The concert was really enjoyable and there were all these little kids and the exhibit was pretty awesome too. Then we had dinner at Outback and after we got home Nathan ended up stopping by around midnight for Venture Bros, which was a very... special episode. XD; Man, it's so weird to watch just one new one a week when I blew through the first three seasons like crazy!

Diana and Kevin had invited me to the Disney Halloween Party that night too, but with the ending time of the concert and the time it would take me to get to Orlando, it really wasn't quite worth it since I wouldn't be able to make the whole event. I would have really liked to go, but I think maybe it was better that I didn't spend the whole concert freaking out about when it was going to end and how I was going to zoom out of there and still be late, because that would've probably lowered my enjoyment of the whole thing. Next year, guys! Because clearly I have to go to the Halloween Party for the rest of my life~ <3 I may even try out the Christmas Party this year!

Speaking of Disney, I should check and see if the Food & Wine Festival is still going on; I think I'll go to Epcot for my birthday regardless, but that would certainly be an added bonus! And also totally randomly, Tyler and Valerie have decided we're going to Canada in May, so this should be exciting. At least it means I'll get to see pergamond! :D (I could probably fit my PS2 in my baaaag~)

And finally, because this entry is getting absurdly long, I don't know what I did but I must have slept really, really wrong because my neck is killing me today. All I want to do is go home and steal Sashi's heating pad. :x Ouch.

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EDIT: Who did not tell me that the Imperial Commando book is already out? D: I believe a trip to Borders tonight is required.

So... this shall be a rambly entry on probably nothing useful whatsoever. XD; It has been a fairly busy week, what with my dad visiting over last weekend (which bled into Monday, which also included 7.5 miles of running, Heroes, and The Dark Knight) and pergamond and me trying to date random tennis players by asking them questions in a language that we do not understand. XD (Yesterday we made it all the way to the festival, and we totally got Ryoma to ask for our phone number! That was fabulous~ And then we started again at Rikkai, and Niou made us clean out the storeroom and we fainted - GO US - and it was hilarious because Niou came back and was all, "OMG I TOTALLY FORGOT ABOUT YOU OOPS". But at least it got us points with him. ;D) Today is a short run (3.5 miles) and an attempt to eat dinner with very little food in my house, and then early tomorrow morning (like, nine ;_;) I have to leave to get Frank from the airport in Orlando. Then it's a weekend of Disney, woo!

So don't get me wrong, I've had a fabulous week and am really looking forward to this weekend. But I am definitely also looking forward to next week when I should have a few days to sit around and do nothing but write in the evenings. XD The Ties That Bind is a bit behind, but I should have the next chapter out early next week. I had to sit down and think about this one scene I was writing, because at first I realized it showed nothing new (and was not required) but then got this inspiration to make it actually useful, which is good, but now I've got to figure out just how I want to do it. And after I've managed to pass enough time in-story, we get to the good stuff. >D I'm really looking forward to that. I also really need to write my Halloween entry for the fic battle, which I haven't really touched since Sunday when I was jotting stuff down in between downs. XD I'm still not sure whether there is actual conflict in the story, but we'll see. Maybe it can be just a meandering piece or something... Must think on that!

Aaaand I think that might be it for now. Gonna get some work done in the hopes that I really can graduate next year. We're going to assess where I am in December and make a more final decision, but as for now I'm going to work like I can graduate next summer. Plus, we just actually got some GTC data! Here's hoping it actually helps. XD

BUT FIRST. WHAT is up with the episode synopsis for Alien Force tonight? Dear God. XD We already did this on Venture Bros, people. ::dies::

Went to a rather interesting talk today on the nature and possible manifestations of dark matter, which was pretty awesome~ Cosmology is fantastic, and I think I will always love it. :D (Especially when you get to go to talks featuring WIMPs, MACHOs, and the all-new WIMPZILLAs!) I have also achieved IRAC color-color diagrams of my galaxy clusters, which made me feel rather accomplished. Alas, I have to wait 'till next week to get ACIS-Extract and its associated programs installed, but that gives me a chance to ignore X-rays for yet another few days~

This evening I set to work getting Penny ready for this weekend, which I am happy to say only took about an hour to an hour and a half total. I love easy costumes! (Granted, I had the black shirt already, and I bought the pink shirt and black shorts from Goodwill. All I had to do was make the pink shirt smaller and cannibalize two pairs of leggings into one pair of stripey ones. Dude, I measured those stripes and made them proportional! Cosplay math FTW.)



( Two more here! )

I don't think I'm going to wear anything horribly costume-y for the race, mostly because I don't have anything. (I could always run in Videl, but that's so obscure it's not worth it. XD) Maybe I'll come up with something I already have before Saturday. In the meantime, I just have to make sure I remember to bring Bolt this weekend, along with a lightsaber for Frank. And I need to tape Venture Bros!

So! I would say welcome to a real update, but I don't know that anything I'm going to update about is actually useful to anyone. XD; But here it is, nonetheless.

Sunday was made of football (woo!) and Venture Bros (double woo!). Although I must say, the Bears totally self-destructed and it was horribly embarrassing, alas. I mean, they kept false-starting and it was just ridiculous. Sigh. Then it was time for the season 4 premiere of VB, which did not disappoint. It was crazy! ("Oh holy crap, you're Nazis!" XDD) I think Dad was somewhat confused, seeing as I'd only shown him two episodes from season 1 and the last two of season 3, and then the premiere wasn't exactly told in chronological order and the only thing we had to go off of was Hank's hair, which is fine when you need to tell short from long, but then there were varying degrees of long and yeah. XD; But this season is certainly looking epic. Or something. Yeah. XD

Monday after dropping my dad off at the airport I came back and did my longest run yet: 7.5 miles. It took me about an hour twenty, which averages to 10.6 minutes per mile. The 13k is only 0.6 miles longer than what I ran, so I can totally do this. :D My legs are a little tired but not too bad, and I took today off. I think maybe tomorrow I'll do 4.5, and then 3.5 either Thursday (probably) or Friday, and then Saturday night's the race! (Hm... perhaps this means I need to remember to go to bed at a reasonable hour on Friday.) Also, I need to finish my costume (tomorrow) for the Halloween Party. And speaking of Halloween, the short little thing I was writing for pjo_fic_battle is going to be longer than I thought. And may only be peripherally connected to Halloween, but I'm trying. At least it should prove to be interesting... I just hope I have time to finish more than one prompt. XD And I also need to work on The Ties That Bind; I'm a little stuck as to what I want to put next, since I need to pass some time in-story, but I'll figure out something. The next time I have a chance to sit down and write... uh. Maybe Thursday? Not tonight, that's for sure.

pergamond is back in town for the week; this afternoon we broke out Gakuensai no Oujisama and had ourselves some fun. XD It's so much more entertaining to make the story up as you go, which is pretty much what we have to do, given our horribly incomplete understanding of the Japanese language. We first attempted to join Hyoutei, but after being totally snubbed by Shishido for Ohtori (well, no surprise there...) we restarted at Seigaku, which seemed to go much better. Momo totally loved us, and it took a while to win Ryoma over but we were totally getting there! It was also our mission to annoy Tezuka as much as possible. I am happy to report we were totally succeeding. XD Also, Fuji tried to feed us jalepeno sandwiches. Thankfully I think we ran away with Ryoma. (I'm not sure, but at least we survived, either way?)

Also, at work today I totally got IDL to do fancy things with errors and chi-squared and I think I may actually have gotten something approaching reasonable results for my IR power-law galaxies. ::squee:: I mean, I've got some overlap with optical variables and X-ray point sources - that totally means I'm doing it right, right? XD; Hopefully tomorrow I can finish that up and then I can get ACIS-Extract up and running and get those darn X-ray fluxes so I can move on with my life, eesh. And speaking of moving on, I finally got the paperwork signed on my Rio reimbursement. Here's hoping it goes through quickly. I could really used the nearly $2k they owe me! Because Delia's has the cutest star t-shirt and some kickass hoodies.

And finally. I went to Wal-Mart this evening and procured myself a copy of Revenge of the Fallen, because I had a gift card for almost exactly the right amount (I love how movies are only $20 the day they come out, even the fancy 2-disc special edition I snagged). ( Cue Transformers babble below. )

valeriebean, I know I owe you a phone call. I was out 'till late yesterday (I made the mistake of reiterating that I hadn't seen The Dark Knight after Heroes and so it was immediately and impulsively watched) and I should head to bed within the hour, but I should have time tomorrow since there is no NGN! Also, I don't know if you'll even see this, but link621, I've been thinking of you all day. <3

So~ Uh. Another normal Sunday; woke up naturally at 2:15, seriously, body. You do not need this much sleep. No, really. D:

Anyway, I decided to get my butt in gear and ran 4.5 miles today in about an hour, which averages to ~13 minutes per mile or so. That's fine, since that's over halfway where I need to be in a month and apparently you need to be faster than 18 minutes per mile for the 13k, so I am not worried. (My legs might be sore tomorrow, though? XD;) I think I'm going to keep up the 4.5 mile circuit if I have the time to do it this week, and get it up to 5 or 6 in a weekend or two. We'll see how that goes. Frank's already at 7, but he doesn't count. XD

Also, apparently? You can run the race in costume if you want. Ahahaha, I'm SO DOING THAT. I was thinking maybe something Kim Possible-inspired, like green shorts and a black top? And then I can bring Rufus in a pouch or something? Hm. Any other ideas for Disney-related running costumes? Or I could just get a second Camp Half-Blood shirt and run as a random camper. XD I think Stacie might be coming down to watch us too, which would be awesome~ Then we could go to the Halloween Party! I need to pick a date for that asap. OCTOBER IS HERE BY THE END OF THIS WEEK, GUYS. WHEN DID THAT HAPPEN. o.o But! Tons of premiers coming up~ I wonder if there's any news on that next season of The Secret Saturdays. Hm. I should finish season 2. >>;

Totally randomly, I decided to revise my journal/Gmail/desktop a bit, since it was time for a change (or something). So I have a new layout, a new default icon (not this one, alas XD), a new desktop for Freedom (Ben 10 vs. zombies FTW~), and I tried out a new Gmail theme and we'll see if I can live without getting fed up with it. XD;

Aaand that's really it. I am going to try to get to bed by 2. I really hope it happens. Guess I'll have to finish my PJO fic battle thing tomorrow.

Welcome to Monday! (Or something. D:)

( My busy but awesomely fun weekend~ )

I headed out around maybe two or three on Sunday, and called a bunch of people on the way home (except valeriebean, I still owe you a call sometime this week because I haven't talked to you in forever!) and then spent the rest of the evening doing nothing very constructive, which included watching some Secret Saturdays, reading Star Wars fanfic, and generally trying to catch up on LJ and stuff. I'm still a bit behind in RP, but I'm really hoping to get back on the ball by mid-week with that. Thankfully I will actually be around until August, which then involves AFO, the Demi Lovato concert (yay, I'm going!), Brazil, and then the Jonas Brothers concert. (Speaking of, I totally had another Jonas Brothers dream last night. THEY ARE STALKING ME. D: Or maybe I'm stalking them. I'm not sure.)

I also need to catch up on writing, because I need to get another PJO chapter out (ahaha, I still need to read the last book!), I know I still owe those drabbles to people from the meme I put up what feels like a million years ago, and I've also actually started my dark!Ahsoka fic (well, all of a page or two of it). The problem with Star Wars fic is that I feel like I want to get all the details right, which means I either have to rewatch or Wikipedia a bunch of stuff, including Revenge of the Sith. (I think a rewatching might be in order for that, but maybe I can just Wiki it first to get myself going.) In any case, I think I have the beginnings of a plot, so that's all I can ever ask for! Now to just figure out the murky parts of it...

Okay, off to read the paper I'm presenting on Wednesday and maybe even get some work done on identifying galaxies with redshifts. Redshifts, yay! (Gee, I wish I had my own...) Tonight is more NextGen and Wednesday is Star Trek movies! (And I still need to see UP before I completely forget it's out.)

I am back! :D

Okay, well, kind of back. XD Due to my deciding to make a costume for Star Wars Weekends (and leaving for said event on Friday to hang out with noctaval and her awesome friends!), as well as various other things requiring massive amounts of catching up, I haven't really gotten a chance to go over my flist (and honestly, I think reading three weeks' of missed entries may kill me so I think I might just not D:).

Sooo I'm back-ish~ Or something. XD (And here to wish a somewhat belated birthday to ink_blots_101! <33) In any case, around once more. I think. XD A million pictures and summaries of my trip to follow. Someday. :D;

I also think I may have to go to bed soon, actually. :O And I even slept in today until 1:30! It was glorious (minus the fact that I didn't get home until probably about 2:30 last night XD).

It feels like days since I dropped my grandmother off at the airport, but that was only this morning. I got back here around 12:30, ate lunch, and headed in to work for a bit; I actually got stuff done, which is exciting! Distances down for at least a couple of the clusters! And then I got completely soaked on the way home from work in a freak thunderstorm. XD It was so weird - I mean, the sun was shining and it was pouring at the same time. At least it stopped raining soon after so I could go running! But my clothes are still water-laden and hanging in the bathroom. I can't wear my green sneakers tomorrow, I'll bet.

Anyway, I got out running and made it back in time to watch Suite Life on Deck and The Secret Saturdays (even though I missed last week's episode, but I taped it) and Phineas and Ferb~ Then I decided I should maybe try to tackle my friends list, and at least read over most of it if not actually get to comment on things. asjfaf I think I had to skip 400 or something. DD: Apologies for the few comments over the past week's entries, but I just couldn't read it all. I think I'm kind of caught up, at least? o.o; (I still have to go back through a couple of people's journals and some comms, though.) And at least I'll be around, online-speaking, until Wednesday. Though I really have to get a giant list of things to do for my trip and then get them done. I've got part of a list, but I imagine it's not nearly complete. I'm going to try and run most of my errands in the morning tomorrow, though, before we head off to St. Augustine in the afternoon.

So while perusing my flist, I learned that it appears that Rick Riordan might be doing a new series, based on Egyptian mythology this time? Hello, Percy Jackson meets Stargate. How could that possibly be bad? (XD Jeeeen. Why do people always listen to us when we plot things? THEY ARE SO LISTENING TO US. D:) Anyway, speaking of the first, The Last Olympian is sitting on the coffee table and it is taunting me. I have no time to read it. I should finish The Demigod Files first, anyway. Ahhhh. ;_; And the worst part is, it's hardcover so I shouldn't even bring it on my trip. (I'm actually thinking of bringing Magic's Pawn or something, to read if I get bored but at least it's small and light. ::fail::) Ah well, at least I'm inspired again for my fanfic, and I think the next chapter is almost done! Except Kronos is getting really freaking long-winded. Then again, it takes a lot of words to convince people to be evil, I guess. XD (Or just a... what was it called, the Turn Everything Evil-inator. Right. That would make it much easier. ;D) And speaking of the second, I totally watched all of season 1 of SG-1 with my grandmother (at her suggestion!) in four days. XD WOO. Except it ended on a horrible cliffhanger and now I have no more and she promised to mail me more, but not 'till I get back. Ahhhh~ At least she left me the season 1 DVDs so I can watch the bonus features and possibly make screencaps for icons.

And finally, in awesome news, they extended Star Wars weekends! I CAN GO! :D (Of course, I think I'll just have to re-wear Padme, as I don't have time to make anything new, but I'm kind of tempted to throw together a Jedi-ish outfit if I'm alive after my trip...) noctaval, I can't convince you to drive up for it, could I? :D; I can only go to the last weekend, June 12-14 or something, so I've got to pick a day in there, probably actually over the weekend since I should, you know, start being an astronomer again at some point.

What I wouldn't give to be NOT BUSY for a while. D: Seriously.

dsjfafgnakla. It's been a busy week. XD Or... well, busy few days, anyway. Friday I picked up my grandmother in Orlando and we spent the weekend at DisneyWorld! :D (Hey, I swear it was her idea!) We got back Sunday evening and yesterday (ack, is it only Tuesday? Well, Wednesday now...) was made of attempting to see the shuttle launch from Gainesville (too cloudy, boo), pricing new microwaves, and Stargate. Lots and lots of Stargate. See, since everyone on Earth (well, okay, a large percentage of my friends) seems to like Stargate, and it is quite honestly the reason my grandmother bought a DVD player (so she could own it all on DVD, I kid you not), I figured I'd ask her to bring some of season 1 of SG-1 and I'd give it a try. I'd only ever caught episodes here and there before and it was really hard to figure out what was going on or why I should care about any of these people. So yesterday we watched... I don't know, something like the pilot and eight episodes. XD And then today we watched a whole bunch more.

( So, Stargate stuff. )

Anyway, I haven't checked my flist since Friday morning and I probably won't really be able to catch up until this Friday. But I'll try then! So if you've actually noticed and felt like I was ignoring you, I wasn't! I've just been either running all over the place or losing brainmatter to that other shiny metal box that isn't the computer screen. :D;

Oh, man. Not that I haven't enjoyed the trip down from Chicago or the visit from my grandmother and not that I'm not looking forward to this three-week trip I have coming up in something like a week (OMG), but... I will be really, really happy to get home in June and just SIT AT HOME for a while. With my cat. <3

A couple of quick notes before I run, though! Thank you to rkold for the postcard, and an early Happy Birthday to wearingskirts! (I have all your books for you! We should try and trade back sometime soon!) And I haven't forgotten about the drabble or icon memes, I just haven't had time to do them yet. I will, I swear! And valeriebean, sorry I missed your call earlier. I'll try to call back over the weekend? :D;

And now it's time for bed, if I'm going to get up at (ugh) 8:30.

asjdoafdja I just put my registration in the mailbox. I am officially running the 2010 Walt Disney World Half Marathon, because I just paid the $120 registration fee to do it. XD I may die. I'm hoping not. I have a year to train!

Okay, back to your regularly scheduled lives. I have more progress pix to post, but I need to get some other stuff done first so that will be later or tomorrow~

So~ Today was actually rather successful. Since the buses weren't running and there were no classes I decided I shouldn't have to go to work (eheh) and I kidnapped Diana and we went to Lakeland to go to Hancock Fabrics to look for Star Wars fabric! And $70 later, I have almost everything I need for Padme and Ahsoka. (Alas, no snakeskin/crocodile print for Jennie's Aayla, but I'm going to look around online, and I have 'till D*C to make that anyway.)

Also, I won the auction for my Gwen jacket! I am so excited~ Now if I can win the one for the shirt that ends in a day or two, and OMG I really hope I win this damb auction for the blaster I need for Padme. OF COURSE they'd stop making the Battle Droid Blasters, right? Ugh, I swear they're the only blasters they don't make for Star Wars anymore. Geez. XD; This is reminding me of my quest to find a phase pistol. I have lost far too many auctions at the last second for this thing.

(Valerie, I think I missed a call from you? D: I've been on the phone nearly since I got home. ._.; I'll try to call you back in the next day or so! I'm all talked-out tonight.)

Anyway. I started watching The Invisible Man; it's so nostalgic~ And fantastically nineties. XD In a good way, though. And Darien is still quite good-looking~ I hope they don't just stop with the first season - I mean, I don't actually remember, but if it says "Complete First Season" on the box and not "Complete Series" then that probably means there was more than one season, right? XD; Memory fail! The episodes all kind of blend together after so long. I don't even remember what year it was on, anymore. Probably around the same time The Sentinel was, though.

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EDIT: Aw, man - from what I've been able to dig up, it looks like Star Wars Weekends are supposed to be May 22 - June 14 this year? That seems really short. D: And also pretty much the only time during the summer that I can't go. Boo. D:

SO. This weekend was pretty much awesome, with about two hours of panic in the middle. XD

( A Disneyful weekend FTW! )

Anyway, it was an awesome weekend - I don't get to see Frank really often (usually just at Stacie's Christmas party, which he wasn't able to make this year) and it was really great to see him and hang out~ Diana and I had a wonderful time at tea and everything, and mad props to her for hanging out with me while I got my car fixed. <3

I really think I might do the Half Marathon next year - we were talking about it and I could start training as late as October. It's only 13 miles! I could do that! Slowly, but I could do that. XD; I think you just have to be able to do 16-minute miles or something, which I could totally do. I hope. :D;; Plus there's that Tower of Terror 13k that I might be getting roped into this year as well.

And then today it's been overcast and cold (50s) in Gainesville - what's up with that? D: At least I get to wear a scarf! And I got some hot tea a little while ago, which was nice~ Those London Fog Tazo Tea Lattes at Starbucks are amazing~ I highly recommend them!

OH and I finished True Colors on... Friday, I think! I'm still reading "Odds" but I brought Order 66 with me today to read at the gym~ I think there will definitely be a Fi plushie somewhere in my future. XD I <3 you, Fi~

Okay, gotta finish running WAVDETECT before 4:30 or so~ I hope this time I've broken the evt2 file up properly - I don't know why it's been giving me so much grief. I'm sure there's a way to automate this, but then I would have to learn it, and that might be harder than what I'm doing now. XD;

So apparently yesterday Tyler slept through an earthquake and I was paying too much attention to True Colors to realize that UF won the championship. XD

Next up, ( icon meme! )

Clone Wars was very entertaining tonight. XD No, seriously - you watch half an hour of Obi-Wan and Anakin joined at the waist and tell me it's not funny. XDD Next week looks good - and is that possibly Aayla I spotted in the preview~? :D Now, if only The Secret Saturdays would decide to start showing new episodes again...

Other than that, not much really going on; I have to make sure to print out the marathon stuff and pack for the weekend. I think I'm going to try to be the most brightly-colored spectator there, so Frank can find me. XDD (Well, that and I have all this nifty new stuff to wear!) I need to transfer my stuff to a smaller bag, though - I don't need my nice new (but large) Jedi bag to cart around Disneyworld.

... Why do I even have this song? XD;;

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EDIT: ... Well holy crap. I just found $100 in my small bag when I went to clean it out to bring to Disney. IT'S LIKE CHRISTMAS! :DDD

So at 11:05pm Diana called me, and said, "Hey, there's this website and if you write an essay on why the inauguration is important to you, you can win tickets to the event! Except it's due at midnight!"

And thus followed about tweny minutes of the most politically-minded writing I have ever done. XD; I figured what the heck, right? We'll see if anything comes of it~

Of course, now I might be written out for the evening. The Winter 2009 Gwen Battle started today over at thefuturequeen; I have two fanfic prompts that I'm excited about, but I don't know that I feel like working on them tonight. I might even have a totally unrelated Morgana fic starting somewhere in the back of my mind. And I also have that scifi flashfic contest that I want to enter before the 15th. I don't want to forget that! And there's a poetry contest due the same day; I think I could bang out a poem for that maybe, even if my poetry does suck. At least there's a photo to go off of, and no entry fee. So I won't feel bad even if my poem does suck. XD

In work news, I think I might have realized today why I'm at least having one of the problems I've been having with MS0451 - I downloaded the shorter of the two datasets available. Ahahaha, DUMB. XD; So tomorrow I will try to see if I can't get the 45ks data to tell me what I want, instead of the 13ks data. That might have something to do with the lack of sources I'm finding in the cluster center. Gah. Sometimes I don't know why anyone ever gave me a degree in anything. I think I deserve a PhD in FAILness. XD

And now I'm that kind of headachey that I get when I'm tired, but I don't really want to go to bed yet. Of course, I don't really want to do anything else, either. But I should probably map out the marathon route for this weekend - my friend Frank is running the Disney Marathon and I'm going to go watch him! But we need to figure out which mile marker I'm going to stand by, so he can look for me in my bright yellow Wall-E shirt and the new purple-and-pink hat Valerie gave me for Christmas~ I figure that's probably a surefire way to spot me, right? Who else is going to dress that colorfully? XD

Guh. You know, I think I might actually excel at something like flash fiction. I'm pretty good at writing 1000-word stories, when I think about it. Or, at least, 1000-word scenes, which is a good start?

It's really too bad, the contest I wanted to enter has a 2500 word limit, but the story I wanted to use is over 5000 and there is no way I can get it down to half that. XD Fail~ So I guess I won't be entering that, unless Johnny on the Subway is decent short enough. Gee, I hope they don't want anything, uh. Optimistic. XD; Aww, damn, gonna have to cut 500 words out of that one. Well. That can probably be done. Hacking ahoy!

In totally not-writing-related news, Jenjen was here all week~ :D Which was much fun - we went to Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party and the Epcot Food & Wine Festival and Animal Kingdom and Downtown disney on Thurs-Sat. Then we went to see High School Musical 3 and Heroes on Monday, watched some Merlin and Life on Mars with Diana on Tuesday, and Star Trek with Scott, Tiff, and Nathan yesterday. Then we went back to Downtown Disney this morning to eat at the newly-opened T-Rex Cafe (pretty awesome, and yummy food!) and wandered a bit before I had to take Jen to the airport. I got home a few hours ago and ate dinner and kind of vegged and then cleaned and talked to my mom. ^^; Woo, I am going to do NOTHING tomorrow. Well, except for exercise. I need to exercise tomorrow. :D; BUT. I had a lot of fun~ (Yay! ;D) I made her watch Clone Wars and Enchanted as well. :D

AND they came and replaced my front door. :D Now I feel safer - I swear, I could've broken down my old front door. >>; This one is all aluminum-y and actually fits in the doorframe and woo~ Though they still have to come and grout up the hole they left between my tile and the doorframe. But if they don't do that soon I'll go poke them.

That's... really it. :D; Or at least all I can think of, my brain is kind of fried.

Okay, I know I should be in bed but I figured I would sleep better tomorrow night knowing my costume was actually done, and I'd rather be tired tomorrow than Thursday. SO!

( It's done! )

Tomorrow is going to be... long. I have a GAO meeting at 12:30, extragalactic-ph at 1:30, and I'm skipping colloquium so I can make it to the UAS meeting on time to give my talk at 5ish. Thankfully I got another mask in today, and if I can find the time I can get one more done before Thursday, but if I don't it'll still get in before the end-of-the-month deadline.

We finished Gundam SEED tonight, which was very yay~ I still think it's a good ending, even if it was actually worse watching it the second time around, knowing what was coming? ^^; Merlin continues to entertain, Life On Mars is still made of EPIC AND WIN, and G00 is gearing up and I like this season, even with their weird thing that I will not talk about so as not to spoil people that haven't seen it yet~

Okay. BED. No Han Solo Trilogy for me tonight.

NTS: Snogs tag tomorrow! I'm so behind. D:

Somebody else needs to read these books. ;_; I really want to fangirl and I have no one to fangirl with! I can't believe there is only ONE Percy Jackson community on Livejournal. :x And that their rules pretty much say I can't post my fic there. I feel kind of like I'm going to explode. Which I suppose isn't good. XD;; Maaaaaan. It's just as bad as it is with the Valdemar books. aduiaiufdha I need to stop liking things that no one else does.

Um. This weekend was good~ :D Can't Stop the Serenity was quite enjoyable. And there were fortune cookies. With awesome Firefly fortunes. XD I want those year-round! And then Valerie and I drove to Orlando and hung out at the Polynesian and the Grand Floridian to watch the fireworks before going back to All Star Music and actually getting a decent night's sleep! And then on Sunday we proceeded to make the best use of our Park Hoppers evar~ We went to Animal Kingdom in the morning - it took us three tries to get soaked on the Kali River Rapids, but finally we did. XD Then we went on the Safari and the dinosaur rides. Yeah, that thing is so not any less scary the second time around. ::dies:: Valerie even offered to sit on the outside and I was like, "No, I think this side is the one that's okay." And it wasn't. The dinosaur tried to eat me again. ;_;

Then we went to MGM for Star Wars Weekend, where we saw people in fun costumes and got our pictures taken and transferred to a promo shot for Attack of the Clones and we went on the new Toy Story ride, which was totally awesome~ It's too bad the Prince Caspian exhibit wasn't open yet. You could get your picture taken with Prince Caspian, though~ (Well, not the real one, but you know what I mean.) I didn't, but you can bet if it had been a photo op with Peter I so would've done it. ;D And then I think we just kind of wandered around - we had milkshakes and fries at the Sci-Fi Dine In, which was yummy~ And then we headed to Magic Kingdom and spent the rest of the day there, until 2am. XD Extra Magic Hours FTW, really. We even got to see Spectromagic and the fireworks~ AND then we drove home and I think I got back at 4:30am. XD Whee~ I think I need a "I go to Disneyworld way too often" tag.

Anyway, I have a couple of pictures, but I haven't uploaded them yet. I'll try to do that soon. And get to that ABC meme, because I meant to do that today and it just didn't happen. And I am probably going to go back to my fic, because I've kind of decided to change it a little bit from what I'd had going, because that didn't make as much sense. I feel so dumb. I mean, I've been mapping little towns in Texas (did you know there's a town called Rising Star? Isn't that cool? XD) and calculating approximately how long it would take a pegasus to fly from New York to Texas and gah. I'm such a dork. At least I think I have a title! Edith Hamilton for the win, seriously~ (And you know, the more I re-read bits of Battle of the Labyrinth, the more the Percy/Nico hits me over the head. Wow. He sure does worry about Nico a lot. <3)

Oh, but Tyler told me about this really cool contest thing they're having in the UK - something about writing a story on a postcard and sending it in, and they'll publish some of them along with postcard-sized sories by famous authors (J.K. Rowling being among them). I need to check this out - if you don't need to live in the UK then I am so entering!

I also need to really get on this Iliad thing. And gah. Why do I want to read Dante's Inferno again? >>; And I never did finish the rest of the Divine Comedy...

I am really tired today. I went to bed at 12:45 last night, and I swear I was out within fifteen minutes. And I still couldn't drag myself out of bed today before 10:15, ugh. ><; I'd been doing pretty well this week with wake-up times, but alas, not today. And I am so exhausted that I really just want to go home and take a nap right now. =_= Why am I so tired? It's really hard to concentrate on work when I want to go to sleep so badly. D:

So Valerie and Jesse and I met last night to map our route from Gainesville to LA. I get to book hotels in Dallas and Flagstaff, and I'm in charge of our trip to the Star Trek Experience in Vegas. Woo~ :D I'm thinking of staying in LA from July 31st until Aug. 6th or so, which is a reasonable number of days, since I'm putting in all that effort to drive there. XD; Hopefully Sashi won't hate me too much by the time I get back. :x

Okay. I just nabbed a Frappuccino from the fridge. Hopefully that will help matters.

I feel like I'm gearing up to write (a horribly-deviated-from-canon form of) the as-of-yet-unpublished fifth Percy Jackson book. ::dead:: I mean, in order for the story I want to tell to unfold, I kind of have to... actually incorporate Big Important Stuff. Like a real plot. Once I figure out what that is. Waugh, this was supposed to be a side project. Some stupid little three-page cute thing that has apparently earned me a death warrant among fans already anyway XD. WHY does it want to turn into a full-blown epic story? I have original stuff I should be writing! ::fail::

And in the meantime, Gemini is confusing the crap out of me. I really, really wish their webpages were more clear and concise. I mean, there is no lack of information there, but it's not really organized in a way that I can understand it. It just makes me feel stupid. I mean, just figuring out what boxes I need to fill in is hard enough, let alone what I should put in them! Gah. Talk about overwhelming. One step at a time~ Hopefully by the end of the day I can make a list of what observations I need. And go from there.

Okay, I think that's enough complaining for one entry. On the upside, Serenity and Disneyworld this weekend! There is much looking forward to that~ I love how we don't even really have to plan anything with Disney, it's just, "We'll go to this park... then maybe stop off at this park, and finish it out over here with the Extra Magic Hours." XD We've been there so many times it's just all fun and no planning, by now. What am I going to do when Valerie leaves me? ;_;

PhD Comics strikes again with its being so close to reality it's scary! Apparently one of our professors is currently unable to get back into the country due to putting off renewing his green card, among other things. XD We all had a very good laugh about that at lunch. (After we'd laughed over whatever that was supposed to be, that thing that Dave had defrosted and eaten for lunch. It looked rather scary. And somewhat congealed.)

Hotel for Disney World check! We're going again, on the 21st, after the Serenity screening (because hey, why not?) to use up our last day of park-hopping. XD Alas, the Prince Caspian exhibit at Hollywood Studios isn't open yet (boooo), but it will be a Star Wars Weekend and they just opened that new Toy Story ride so we might stop by anyway. Definite plans include hitting up the rapids ride at Animal Kingdom (with bathing suits!) and hanging out at Magic Kingdom until the wee hours of the morning. And possibly spending Saturday night riding the monorail and watching the fireworks from the Grand Floridian. Yay, Grand Floridian. XD

Also, it sounds like Valerie's really going to head off to CA. So end-of-July road trip, here I come! Now to figure out how many days I can afford to stay in LA...

And in the meantime I have been writing, yay~ I mean, not very much, mostly while Multidrizzling (heh), but writing nonetheless. Fleshing out scenes and stuffs~ I'm starting to come up with more names, at least, and I think I had names for the opposing countries at some point. Good thing I keep notes. XD

And hey, the Percy Jackson movie actually has a director and writers and a release date next year! Woo! I'm so going for my birthday, provided the movie doesn't get pushed back massively or anything. I haven't been able to find much on it, but something is better than nothing! The Battle of the Labyrinth is actually turning out to be quite good. These books remind me a lot of the Faerie Wars books, only for a younger audience (and, well, with Greek gods instead of Faeries and whatever XD). Sad, that I had to kick out my Percy icon for something else, whatever it was. ^^; Oddly enough, though, I wonder if even the last book cover will show us the kid's face. None of the covers do, which is weird - they always show him from the back or so very small that it doesn't matter. It's a bit weird, but at least the art is pretty.

And we made it to the third season of NextGen! YAY! NO MORE DR. PULASKI! And the uniforms have collars and no more zippers in the front and they really do look so much better~

Okay. I should get back to work. :D;