Mmm, it is a lovely 54 degrees outside today, yess~ (Well, the computer claims 54. My thermometer claimed 59, but either way, it was less than sixty when I left this morning.) I hope this continues! Pleeeease~ (Of course, it's supposed to be back in the 70s/80s by the weekend... I hope the forecast lies. D:)

I totally feel like it's Monday all over again. o.o; Probably because yesterday was the weekend I'm not going to get this weekend. XD; I totally meant to get up and do stuff, but alas, I got up just before Diana called at 3pm. (For the record, my dream appeared to include both Chad Dylan Cooper - WTF XD - and Ny Vollen. And Hannah Montana. Clearly I need help.) I did get some laundry done, though? And I went running! Buuut that's really about it for productive things yesterday; I don't know where it all went. D: I did go to bed before 2, as well, and I even managed to get up at 9 this morning! (Well, 9:10, but that's close enough!) Sashi actually seemed miffed and wanted me to stay in bed and stop getting up to turn off the alarm. XD;

Anyway... I should get back to finishing my cluster stuff so I can make sure I have enough labs printed and email people about getting stands for the lab on Saturday. I should also go take a tour of campus later to make sure I know where we're going for this scavenger hunt. XD;; Also, must talk to Vicki this afternoon - I found a postdoc that I might actually be good at, but the application is due in... nine days! Eep. o.o (Also must remember to register for AAS and get plane tickets to D.C.! And get a hotel at Disney. AND FIND A CATSITTER OMG. D:)

EDIT: Also! JAYNE HATS FOR TURKEYS! You know you want one!

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!

Oh man, I have so many wavelengths to work on I don't know where to start this morning. I may have to come in this weekend, this week has been so unproductive (again, not for lack of trying!). I never feel like I have anything reasonable to show for myself at weekly meetings. :x I did start IR photometry (just playing around with some parameters in PHOT and re-making some mosaics at different pixel scales) and I am going to play with X-ray stuff probably today, and I need to get those photometric redshift estimates moving. Eek. ;_; Somebody stop the world, I think I want to get off for a while and be a writer.

... Actually, I think I may have dreamed about work. I think I might have been working on IR stuff. Except I was in Japan. Percy was possibly running around. (Damn, why can't I remember? If Percy Jackson is running around my dreams, I want to remember it!) I place any blame for the non work-related parts of that dream squarely on the shoulders of antistar_e, whose totally freaking awesome Percy/Nico fic I finished reading last night and now I am depressed I have no more to read. D: (Also, you have no idea how much better it makes me feel that I'm not the only person to have written over 60,000 words of Percy/Nico in one story. XD And by the way, pergamond, the instant you finish the last Percy Jackson book, provided you like them, I am sending you to read this fic. It made me miss Japan!)

Right. Okay, back to work. In the disgusting weather, because it is disgusting and only 78 degrees outside but I think the humidity is possibly a google percent. Yes, that's possible here in Florida. I wish it weren't.

Also, my power went out today three times in as many minutes. D: Talk about weird.

Right. Work!

You know, when I was little I always wanted my mom to tell me bedtime stories. Except whenever she'd start, I'd always tell her, "I want it to be about this person and make sure you include a waterfall, and I want them to go here and do this and these things," and she'd always tell me, exasperatedly, to just make the thing up myself if I knew exactly what I wanted to happen.

I notice that still happens to me, sometimes - particularly when there's something like the new PJO fic battle up and there are all these awesome prompts and I can totally tell you what I want to happen in at least six of them. Which invariably means I'm probably going to end up writing six of them, except I want them to be done instead of having to do the work myself. Ahaha, I'm pretty hopeless, aren't I? XD I really should also pick new characters to write about, or at least different situations. There is actually a Percy/Nico/Annabeth prompt up that I'm going to give a go... The problem is, I can see Percy and Annabeth, and I can see Percy and Nico. I have no freaking clue what would get Nico and Annabeth together, short of their mutual love for Percy, which... is where the thing I'm writing is headed, but I'm not sure that's where I want it to go. Hrm. :x

Actually, I spent a lot of the day writing; I got a whole BeVin fic out for the current challenge at ben10_x_kevin11 and I worked on hashing out two chapters ahead of where I am in "The Ties That Bind" because I want to show, not tell, but if I do that then it will be a bajillion million chapters long and sometimes you really just have to condense a few days of story!time into a few paragraphs and I just need to figure out the best way to do that. XD Also, I came up with this great reason that explains something important as I was falling asleep last night, and of course now I can't remember it. Fail~

Also, I had this really involved dream last night where I was supposed to be at Dragon*Con with a bunch of people (I think meandering and noctaval were supposed to be staying in my room), except the Jonas Brothers lived across the street and I sure did hang out a lot with Kevin. I do not recall minding in the least~ <3

Anyway, I actually should probably get to bed, since I'm driving down to St. Pete tomorrow to hang out with adamatari before I pretend I'm not too old to fangirl over Mitchel Musso in concert~

Huh. This is really interesting - self-publishing hooking up with Barnes & Noble? I've always kind of envisioned myself going down the traditional path to publishing, but maybe it's time to reconsider that assessment. (Of course, I'd have to actually finish something decently long and original, first. XD; That's what NaNo is for, right?)

Also, I had this dream last night that I was going to visit link621 in Japan... which doesn't quite make sense. XD; I think I also visited februaryfour in said dream, which makes a good deal more sense. There was also something about astronomy and crew in there. Wow - two things that should never be mixed. One brand of crazy is enough!

I think that's about it for now; back to working on my talk, which I have to give tomorrow. D: (Well, it's mostly done really, I just want to make sure it flows and that there aren't too many words, which tends to happen and then I read slides and that's just no good.) I would complain about having to be on campus by 9am, but... yeah. I think I have no grounds. ^^;

Woo, no A/C at work today. D: Or, well, 1/3 A/C, apparently. Oops. I guess it's better than freezing to death in the middle of September. (Oh, man, is it really the middle of September? WHERE IS MY LIFE GOING?)

Also, Sashi made me late for work today. She was so cute I couldn't get up. Also, I might have been having a dream about Transformers. This would not be surprising, though. XD; I definitely had one the other day.

... Right. Working now. Go MOPEX, go! In the meantime, I shall work on my talk. Ahhhhhh.

So! it has been a long, slightly-eventful week, whereby "slighty-eventful" I really mean "work-filled". I have a rough draft of my poster that I'm working on (which I am sure I will eventually be sending to valeriebean so she can tell me it sucks and has too many words, because where would I be without her to tell me that? XD <3) I've also discovered that two epochs is really crappy for figuring out variability (well, we knew this) and that I have no clue how to get X-ray luminosity from X-ray flux, provided I can even figure out the right task in CIAO to give me the proper X-ray flux. Buh. I know it involves a power-law... seriously, people. Why is there no online tutorial? (Well, probably because that would be ridiculous, but still...)

... Hm. And maybe I'm not as smart as I thought I was. Every time I open a new terminal, it tells me I have an undefined variable in my IDL_PATH. Oops. :x

[/astrobabble]

On the upside, I found fabric for my Star Trek uniform! I hit up the Jo-Anns that I don't usually go to yesterday, and there, right as I walked in the door, was the best fabric I've found so far so I decided to go for it. Plus it's their crazy coupon week so I had a billion coupons I could use. XD Anyway, that excited me greatly, as I was sure I'd never find anything even remotely close. It's not perfect, but it does have a slightly-raised diamond pattern on it that I think will work from far away. And now I shall proceed to share pictures for no good reason:

With a flash, so you can see the texture.

Without, so you can see the color.

In other news (as though it were actually important or something XD), I randomly go nominated for a number of Gen categories in excalibur_award, which is really kind of exciting! (Well, to me, anyway. :D;) Especially when one considers it's for a short little fic about Gwen and Arthur in episode 13. Eee, I feel all fuzzy. :D (Not warm, though. It's too cold in here for that. Thankfully I have a hoodie.)

I also finished From the Earth to the Moon last night, which as a whole was absolutely fabulous and everyone should watch it. And then Deke Slayton showed up in my dream, gee, I wonder why. XD Except I think my brain thought he had diabetes instead of a heart murmur, because in my dream some doctor was testing his blood and apparently had been every day and that was the reason he couldn't go into space? XD Who knows. At least Joe Jonas didn't show up. Although, Joe Jonas in a snoopy cap...

And finally: link621, I just got an email telling me to adopt kittens from the Humane Society of Boulder. (This actually isn't a new occurrence... long story, it's all your fault. <3) But then I started clicking and I think you should adopt him. LOOK HOW CUTE HE IS. :O You could name him... I don't know. Sanada or something. :D;

So~ Clearly HBP was good, and going to the midnight showing was fun. :D There were actually quite a few people dressed up (I just had on my Gryffindor shirt and my Goblet of Fire hoodie, since I was going with three other guys and none of them were doing anything) and they had eight theaters showing it. XD Alas, that meant I couldn't find Diana, and I guess we ended up being in different theaters anyway. But regardless, it was pretty epic and very enjoyable with everyone in the theater laughing and gasping and whathaveyou all at the same time~ My only complaint is I did not get my PJO trailer. DDDD: But Tyler did in Baltimore! So totally not fair. (Well, it's not like I haven't watched the thing on my computer a couple of times by now anyway, though. XD PERCY IS SO CUTE. I am already satisfied. :D;) And then I had this wacky dream with Ron and Harry and Hermione in it last night; gee, I wonder where that came from. XD

Anyway, since I really didn't have time to do much yesterday, I kind of spent this evening just puttering around (uh, I'm not sure how that's any better); I made a few new icons (case in point XD) and... well, okay, that's mostly all I've gotten done, but still. >>; Nick at Nite has started showing Malcolm in the Middle at 8, which is when I've started eating dinner (this is what happens when I don't leave work 'till 6:15 and then I go running), so I've been enjoying that~ And I know I need to write this next chapter of my PJO fic, because it's all in my head and half down in Word, but I just don't feel like doing it. ::fail:: I'm going to try to get it out before the weekend, though. That'd be nice. I also want to get some original stuff done, because I am feeling poor and contest winnings (should I be lucky enough to get them) would not be unappreciated right now.

Yeah, I'm sorry, this is actually a pretty boring post. D: Except I keep feeling like it's Thursday and tomorrow will be Friday. I'm going to be so disappointed in the morning. But I suppose it's actually a good thing to have more time this week than less. I seriously do not know where July went. Last time I checked, it was June. Seriously. What happened?

Firstly, a very happy birthday to lavenderlilly! :D

I kept having dreams about astronauts last night. XD All I can really remember every time I woke up was all the radio chitchat and guys wearing spacesuits on the moon and I think this is entirely due to a certain HBO miniseries that I'm over halfway through with by now. (Aw, but last night was Apollo 11 and 12! All I could think was, "Man, Apollo 12 was a party! Al Bean is adorable!") Eesh, I remember learning all this stuff from books in junior high, but this is so much better than books. Sometimes I think I must be living my life backwards, fangirling astronauts in junior high and the Jonas Brothers in grad school...

Costume-wise, Gwen is almost done! Hoping to finish her tonight so I can start working on Ahsoka in earnest (Wonderflex ordered, $50 later...), and I still need to find fabric for the Trek!Reboot uniform. Plus I need to see if I really will be able to convince people to do Venture Bros cosplay or if this will just be a bust, because I can't walk around by myself as Dean Venture. That will not work. XD (Maybe I could be Triana? With a Dean plushie? XD) And someone needs to tell me that making Penny for AFO is probably a bad idea... even though I think I might do it. >>; NTS: take a look at her stuff tonight to see if this is even possible.

Okay, back to alternately watching MOPEX chug along and trying to get these flux maps made. Cutting the images down to just the area viewed by the ACS makes it much faster!

Okay, for serious, brain. I am not still in high school. And I definitely don't (nor did I ever) go to school with the Jonas Brothers. And yet you keep making me dream about this. It makes me feel kind of weird every time. XD In fact, it's almost weird to watch Jonas now because I have had so many dreams involving the Jonas Brothers that I feel like I actually know them when this is not at all the case. I fear I may have a problem. D: (Even weirder: in the dream, Nick burned all of TOS for me, and was totally nerding about Star Trek with me. XD Trippy. At least I appear to have moved from dream!dating Joe to dream!dating Kevin, which I consider an improvement.)

Anyway. Yesterday Scott, Nathan, and I went down to the Tampa Pitcher Show for dinner and Transformers 2, which was... well, maybe not great, but at the very least it was vaguely entertaining and spawned many interesting conversations in the car on the way back, some of which I probably should never ever repeat. XD (This seems to happen a lot, I've noticed. ::dies::) Today we met for a few episodes of TNG and then went to Sticky Fingers in Jacksonville for dinner (barbecue, yum!) before driving down to the riverfront and hiking over to plop into some lawn chairs for the fireworks. We did something right, because they shot them off right in front of us and it was a really nice show~ Then we drove home and had more interesting conversations involving South Park and why astronomers are crazy, which is a practically inexhaustible subject, let me tell you.

I am so seriously trying to convince them they want to do Venture Bros cosplay for Dragon*Con. I don't care if I don't have time. Nathan could be Brock and Scott could be Rusty and we'd build him a H.E.L.P.eR. and connect them at the kidneys. XD It would be fabulous, I tell you. Fabulous. And I'd so be Dean! It could happen, I tell you! It could! (Of course, Ahsoka will not happen unless I start sewing, so I swear I am going to cut out fabric and sew it together tomorow. I AM. D:)

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.)

Okay, brain. Seriously. ( Stop having dreams about Joe Jonas. )

And then Maintenance knocked on my door and it was 8:40 in the morning and I was tired. D: Somehow my dumb Jonas Brothers dreams always get interrupted. Coincidence? Perhaps not. XD I think I may need a Jonas Brothers icon. HELP. Well, have a Stargate one instead.

At least after the maintenance guys took a look at my re-plastered bathroom ceiling (it sprung a leak while I was gone, thanks upstairs neighbors) they said they'd come back in an hour (gee, thanks). It's probably a good thing I was so groggy, or I might've said something about how when the guy came in yesterday to re-plaster it he left plaster and gross wet ceiling pieces all over my bathroom and now I have to replace my toothbrush and wash the heck out of my towels and vacuum every horizontal surface and then some. And possibly sand down my shower curtain bar because there's plaster caked on it and I can't actually pull the shower curtain across. Boo. It's probably too much to hope that the guy painting it today might actually clean up after himself, too. Ugh, if he gets paint on things I really will talk to someone. Plaster I can vacuum up. Paint, not so much. Which is why I hung my towels in the bedroom. (And, funnily enough, Sashi was apparently not ready to get up today because even after I got out of bed she stayed there and went back to sleep instead of following me around like normal. XD Cute~)

... Yeah, that's really it for now. Been working on my Jedi costume (it will get done, bootcovers and all!) and went to NGN last night as well, which was fabulous and involved the most wrong jokes about Riker yet. I don't think I can even repeat them. XD I did miss about eight episodes while I was gone, but I'll just steal those on Monday after we finish out season 6 before marathoning the TNG movies Wednesday before Tiffany leaves. D: (I am going to miss her!)

And now that I have wasted all of the extra time that I had for getting in so early this morning writing an entry, I shall endeavour to get to work and finish reading this paper that I've been reading for... a couple weeks, now. XD

Whew, so! Busy weekend~ (Well, except for the part where I accidentally slept through my alarm today until 1pm. I swear I barely remember it going off. D: I had this weird dream I that was hanging out with the Pevensies and trying to rescue random animals...) But! I finished Bad Girl for reals~ (And the Lara top, not that it took long. :D) Pictures here! (Because I am too lazy to cut them or something.) I managed to find some window lining stuff at Lowe's yesterday that works well for the skirt... now to figure out how to mail it to Jennie. XD Need to get that out within a day or two~

I also finished the sleeves on Drew. (Yeah, it looks awful on the hanger. XD) But then I realized I need more black for the boots, so it's off to JoAnn's tomorrow, I guess? I went to Center Stage today to look for a sword, but even though their website (and their door!) said they were open, they were not. D: Maybe they're not open Sundays during the non-Halloween season? That's weird, though. I guess I could try that again tomorrow, too, if I can get there before 7.

Finished my flashfic for the Merlin comm (and found out that I really like writing Merlin and Lancelot, which is kind of scary and may mean I might have to do it again in the future XD). I really should be working on that contest entry fic, but while I have most of the thing planned out and I know what's going to happen and I'm interested in the story and all, I don't really want to write it. >>; We'll see if it actually gets done in time. Even if it doesn't, I can always finish it later and enter it somewhere else, I guess?

( And! I went to go see Dragonball Evolution with Scott, Tiffany, Diana, and Kevin yesterday. )

Maaaaan, where'd all my GT music go? D: This song has been stuck in my head all day; I love Yamcha, but still. XD (And it keeps coming on my Winamp, WTF? XD) I need to re-download Dan Dan Kokoro Hikareteku.

Also, in non-DBZ-related news, I SEEM TO HAVE GROWN A RYOGA WTF. XD A Ryoga who wants to date Gakuto, to boot. I think Ryoma may try to throw himself off a building if this goes much farther. ::dies::

djadifpupiffdafafprs Supernatural Season 1 finale o.o ( WUT )

I had this really weird dream involving the Jonas Brothers last night. XD Not that this happens often, it would only be the second ever, but it was kind of in a similar-ish vein as the first. Which makes me think that my subconscious must sure have a thing for Joe Jonas. My conscious mind just doesn't know it yet. XD (And then my neighbor's phone went off or something at 5 in the morning and woke me up and I was sad. D:)

Also, I finally found an article (mostly for personal reference) that tells me what is going to comprise this awesome BEN 10 WEEK thing next week. Re-showing of Race Against Time with nifty info, two hours of reruns a day, plus two new episodes AND a one-hour season finale? MADE OF WIN. Smoothie-drinking, metal-absorbing, mana-shooting WIN. In a green Camaro~ ;D (Actually, that's a lot of episodes for season 2. Not that I am complaining. Now if only someone could assure me there will be a season 3. But I think it's pretty popular? IT BETTER BE. It can't eat my life and then go away. I will not allow it.)

And then I got AF!Kevin in the mail today~ He is as short as baby!Kevin, which kind of makes me laugh. XD I think he can join the bookshelf battle, though - he's got a laser lance thing that should come in handy...

And I want to write more but I have to go to beeeeed. Ugh stupid presentation in the morning. I don't want to do it. D: But at least I get to have pictures of Homer Simpson in my powerpoint. I mean, I can't give a talk with "doughnuts" in the title and not have at least one picture of Homer Simpson. XD Hopefully my re-rendering of the used-to-death AGN diagram will at least amuse people~

The end!

Darths & Droids today was hilarious. XD I love this comic~

This weekend has been full of weird dreams. D: I mean, Friday night I dreamed that I murdered a whole bunch of people with a kitchen knife because someone was controlling them and making them try to kill me, and then yesterday I dreamed that I was dating Sylar and I was totally okay with killing people for him but then I eventually left him for Troy Bolton and wanted him to sing music from Spectacular! and I HAVE NO IDEA. D: (Although, now that I think about it, I could probably attribute all of these things to Let the Right One In, if I tried really hard? I mean, the thing with the kitchen knife and the killing people for people, but still. I don't like dreams where I kill people. ;_;)

So I actually got up this morning at a reasonable hour so I could drop Scott off to pick up his rental car, since he leaves uber-early tomorrow morning. Then I came back and watched Ben 10 (Kevin showed up! Oh, tiny!Kevin, you are so cute and such a jerk at the same time. I suppose... nothing changes. XD Well, except that when you grow up you are thankfully no longer inclined to kill trainloads full of people for cash.)

Then I went to look for fabric for Drew (apparently that's how it's spelled, who knew?) because I realized stretchy orange fabric was going to be really hard to find so if I had to order it I should do so sooner rather than later. I scoured the store with no luck, but then on a whim decided to take a second pass at the discount/red tag/upholstry fabrics, and lo! I totally found exactly what I needed! Orange lycra stretch fabric, $4.00 a yard! There was a little less than two yards left on the bolt, so I just got it all because I realized I'm going to have to make my own gloves and I want some extra in case I mess that up. I was thinking PVC for the boots and shoulder pieces, but then I found some really thin matte black vinyl that might work better, since PVC (if I recall correctly?) is pretty flimsy and I've got to make big bootcovers out of it. So I got a yard of the vinyl (for 40% off, it's coupon week!) and I'll give that a try, and if I end up thinking PVC will work better I should still have enough time to order that. I mean, it looks like the black on her bodysuit is shiny, but if it doesn't hold the shape it's supposed to then it really won't do me any good. I also thought about getting PVC just for the shoulders, but then the black won't match and I want it to match. I'm so picky. D:

Anyway, I'm gonna finish Bad Girl first, since there really isn't too much left on that. I'm going to try to put the skirt together (finally!) today~


... And now I'm hungry. D: But I just ate! Well... okay, I ate three hours ago. Maybe I should get a snack. XD I came home and accidentally read for an hour and a half without meaning to. THIS BOOK IS EATING MY LIFE. XD Must fill void left by Republic Commandos...

Okay, I had this really weird dream I wanted to jot down before I start going over this paper I have to present today.

( In which Riley is a Trekkie? )

Is it really Wednesday already? Wow. (And actually, I just typed Monday. Major fail. XD)

EDIT: Also, apparently Dan moved to a desk next door? So we're down to two people in this front office, which is kind of nice; not sure that'll last, though, considering how space is at a premium.

Okay, SO. Uh... trying to go in order here, though all I really remember about Friday was that I spent the entirety of Clone wars thinking that Senator Chuchi was gorgeous and wondering if I could cosplay her and have anyone know who I was. XD;;; Hey, at least Star Wars has plenty of short girls for me to cosplay! :D;;; Saturday was the Hoggetowne medieval faire with Tiffany, Scott, Nathan, and Elizabeth~ It was quite fun - not quite as big as the one in Bristol, I don't think, but pretty much the same idea. It was actually a bit chilly, which was nice for walking around; we got food and shopped a bit and watched a bunch of knights beat the crap out of each other on GIANT horses. All in all, quite good fun! ;D

The only downside was, we had to park two or three miles away and take bus in, but the buses took FOREVER when we were just trying to get there in the first place (as in, it took us an hour to get on the bus to get to the faire, because they only had three) and so when we left, we all decided to be SMRT and walk back to our cars. XDDD We weren't the only people, but man, that was a hike! On the plus side, I got plenty of exercise and it took us about an hour still, which was how long it would've taken us to even get on a bus, most likely, so we felt justified. But it was quite hilarious because by the time we got to the parking lot (which was really just a big field in the middle of nowhere; we had to walk around the Gainesville Airport just to get there) it was completely dark and there was this fog setting in and I swear, it looked like we were hiking through a zombie movie. Especially the part where Scott goes, "Hey, I think this path through the pitch black woods is a shortcut, let's take it!" XDDD We spent most of the second half of the walk discussing how we were going to beat any (hopefully slow) zombies we might encounter in the woods. And before that there was this little girl in a wagon who, very intentionally, made the "loser" sign at Elizabeth. XD There was much amusement concerning that as well~ But in the end we couldn't blame her, because she was at least getting a ride in a wagon and we were, admittedly, the losers who were walking.

And then today was spent sleeping, for the most part - I mean seriously, I went to bed around 12:30 last night and I tried (really tried!) to get up at 10 today, but I just couldn't wake up and so I didn't get up until about 1pm. I kept having these really weird dreams, one of which involved the Weasley twins (<3) and me wearing Aurora's pink dress for no reason I can really fathom... Aside from the sleeping, I ran some errands and worked on Padme - and for the record, can I just say I hate those seams under her arms? I did them three times, and the third time is as good as it's going to get, though I had to seam rip the corners and I'm just going to do that bit by hand. I'm not entirely 100% happy with the way the shirt is going to look, but I think that's more of a result of the type of fabric I got than anything, and I'm just going to go with it for now. It'll be just fine, for all intents and purposes, but I am not ignoring the fact that I may want to remake it at some point in the future. We'll see how Megacon goes. I also think that the armbands will help quite a bit, so I need to look into getting some material for those soon. I probably should've gone to Home Depot when I was in the area, but I wasn't thinking about it at the time.

That's really about it. Darien keeps getting awesomer and awesomer, but that's just the way these things go, I guess. XD I am going to be really, really sad by the end of the week, probably. I'd watch season 2 on Hulu, but I'd rather watch it on DVD WHEN it comes out because it had BETTER. I have to say, though, I was really impressed by 'Beholder' - usually shows (or actors, whichever) totally botch how to portray someone who's blind, but I-Man did a really, really good job. Mad props to whoever played that girl, and to Vincent Ventresca. Daaamn, he was good at being blind.

And Disney Channel has been playing Phineas and Ferb all day and now I have Love Händel stuck in my head. XD

I found someone's recording of The Little Mermaid musical when it was doing previews in Denver - it was really pretty good, and they were all wearing Heelys! XD Ahaha, that was fantastic~ And Flounder was the cutest thing evar. No, seriously. XD Adorable.

Uh... I also watched Sleeping Beauty today, while I sewed together plushie bodies. (And I realized that geez, the fairies didn't really give Phillip the chance to be all that badass, they seemed to be intent to do all the work for him!) Anyway, it seemed to fit, given that I apparently couldn't be bothered to drag myself out of bed before 1pm today. >>; Uh, fail. But I was having this really weird dream, and Claire and Peter and Hiro were all in it, although I feel like I was doing a lot of cheerleading. As in, they were hurt or something but trying to defend the world against aliens and I was pretty much just, "Uh, go guys! You can do it!" Or, uh. Something. XD;

Anyway, as a result of all the Disney-ness I've had either Once Upon a Dream or Part of Your World stuck in my head all day, except now it somehow seems to have turned into Reflection. I don't know how that one happened. XD; The world may never know~

Okay, time for dinner now. :D; Yes, I know it's almost tomorrow.

First off! I am back in Florida, yay! It was quite an adventure, involving delays and trying to load an entire plane in ten minutes to beat the cold front moving in and having to gate check one of my carryons, but thankfully all went well and I arrived in Orlando last night this morning around 12:40am. I think I left the airport around 1:40am, so I got home almost at 4am to a whole lot of mail! XD Which was very exciting, actually; I was still awake enough (thanks to the Diet Coke I had on the way back) to open all my mail~ So THANK YOU to EVERYONE who sent me Christmas cards - I got them all in one go and they were utterly fantastic. <3 I also got to open Valerie's present, and I now have another awesome hat to add to my growing collection! (Thank you~ <3 It matches the scarf I got for Christmas perfectly!) And I still have one more package apparently waiting in the apartment office, so I will get that tomorrow when I hand in my rent and stuffs. And Scott gave me the Heroes calendar - I have the perfect place to put it, too! :D (Actually, Sylar was in my dream last night. It was weird. And a little scary.)

Anyway; I think I got about six hours of sleep. XD It was hard to fall asleep because I was tired but caffeinated and Sashi was very "OHMYGODYOU'REHOME!" and kept waking me up. XD But it's okay. <3 I got up around noon and had lunch (ahaha, that turkey sandwich I made from the Christmas leftovers before I left Illinois came in handy!) and went to Borders and the grocery store. I have to say, I am really loving the 75 and sunny down here right now. While I was in IL, it went from -8 to 60 with fog and thundstorms to 20 and there was freezing rain and ickiness and now I think I remember why I decided to move to Florida.

BUT. Um, I am abysmally behind on my flist. I think I've managed to skim back through most of it, but I didn't have the energy to comment, so. It seems everyone is doing pretty well, though. I hope everyone had a good Christmas!

Now I have to burn all the Christmas music off my computer and take down all the decorations; I feel silly having them up for too long after the holiday. And I really have to get to work on that celebration fic, because I only have a few days to write it. I think it's going to be short though, anyway. And I should make sure I don't have any contests coming up, and my horridly long Merlin fic is still needing to be finished. But all I want to do is read about clone commandos. XD I got about 100 pages into True Colors on the plane and then I bought Order 66 today because I had a $5 off coupon; damn, $27 list price? Ouch - Karen Traviss, I hope you appreciate this. XD I really should not go back to the bookstore for about two months, though. I have a whole stack of new books to read now! Including a book on how to make Wookiee Cookies. Because my sister is made of win. :D

Oh, and as a final note. LJ has been awful about my userpics lately. If you find that I'm replying to you with a really off-the-wall or weird userpic, chances are it might not even be mine. :x I've sent in a report, hopefully someday soon they'll fix this altogether. It's getting annoying.

They are, as I type, cutting apart my mother's counters. XD Good fun~ She's been getting the entire house redone (eek, it needed it >>) and the new marble countertops are coming in today, so they have to get rid of the old ones first. Very exciting. ;D

Let's see... so ( the past couple of days in summary. )

And then, this morning, I had the weirdest dream. My dreams usually don't make a lot of sense, or aren't very continuous, but this one kind of was. ( But it was cool! )

Also, for the record, the Armadillo is NOT the only animal to suffer from leprosy. You know, just in case you were wondering.

And that is all for now, I think. :D Not that I expect anyone to read this mammoth entry anyway; it's mostly for posterity. Also, I haven't been around much to answer a lot of email or comment or anything, and I might be kind of scarce until I get back to Florida. But I'll try to keep up!