telesilla @ 11:14pm: My part of the conversation...
... will be held primarily on DW.

Every post after this one will direct comments back to DW. Anon commenting will be enabled as long as no one abuses it and, as always on DW, you can comment using OpenID.

telesilla @ 9:12pm: You know, I suspect this won't matter...
God, I am SO tired of watching LJ do STUPID STUPID stuff and having people in fandom just shrug and go on with business as usual because, as someone recently said: "LJ's where the conversation is."

Right now a bunch of us are pretty pissed off that LJ's gone from three gender options (female, male and unspecified) to two. And if you guessed that those two are "female" and "male" give yourself a pat on the back. You know why they're doing it, don't you? So they can do a better job targeting ads.

Read all of Syne's post, too. You can't just get out of this by choosing one option or the other--specifying one of two genders will be mandatory on account creation.

And if you don't get that this is offensive, then really, I've got nothing to say to you. Fortunately, both rm in a post here and thingswithwings in a post here do have things to say.

I'm sure this will mean a few more people come over to DW or even IJ, but for the most part, fandom won't care. I'd love to be wrong, but each time LJ does something stupid, fandom's just shrugged and kept the conversation where it is. I don't know what it is and God I wish I did so I could figure out what to say to get people to realize that things like this hurt people.

We could host the conversation here on DW, if, you know, fandom gave a damn.

telesilla @ 7:11pm: Is there some kind of game?
Some of the guys either next door or across the courtyard are yelling excitedly every once in a while. Based on the timing, it sorta sounds more like a football thing than a basketball thing.

In other news, I have a headache and I hate hate hate social anxiety. The amount of time I had to spend talking myself into making a simple phone call is ridiculous and absurd. On the good side, I made it and have an appointment with an optometrist on Saturday, the day before we leave.

kyuuketsukirui @ 2:30pm: In shock
We got some very sad news today. One of Carla's best friends died last night after being tased by a cop.

I have always been appalled at how quick cops are to use a taser when it should be a last resort. It's not as deadly as a gun, maybe, but this is not the first time someone has died from a taser, yet cops continue to use them as if it were nothing.

kyuuketsukirui @ 4:21am: Daily Happiness
1. Going to breakfast with my mom in a few hours. We're going to IHOP so I can get some more of those delicious, delicious gingerbread pancakes. om nom nom!

2. Carla made this really yummy Moroccan chicken & lentils thing in the crockpot Saturday. Not only was it delicious, but it used a bag of lentils that had been sitting in the cupboard for ages, plus I'm always happy to get use out of the crockpot, which spends way too much time in the cupboard.

3. I have been reading Mizusawa Megumi manga the past couple days. She's one of my favorite authors and I just don't understand how someone so prolific and famous in Japan has not ever been published in the US. But anyway, that sort of sweet shoujo always makes me happy.

kyuuketsukirui @ 6:05am: Daily Happiness
1. I got the house all cleaned up and took photos of the living room, bedroom, and computer room. Now that Photoshop is working again, I think I'll probably post them tomorrow.

2. Last night I slept with the new flannel comforter and omg, it's so comfy and warm! Carla had all the blankets when she went to sleep, and usually I just take some off the top for myself when I go to bed, but last night they were all tangled up, so I couldn't get any free except the comforter, so I thought, well, I'll just see how this is on its own and it was actually enough! I wouldn't say no to more blankets, because I love the weight of a bunch of heavy blankets on top of me, but I didn't feel at all cold with just the comforter.

3. Thanks to a suggestion from busaikko, I managed to find a Q&A about a laptop not recognising its CD drive, and it seemed like a similar problem to mine, so I followed the instructions there and it turned out the CD driver had just spontaneously become corrupted. I was able to download a "fix it" program from Microsoft that seems to have restored the driver, and now it sees the drive again!

So I don't have to reinstall the system, yay! Though I think when I go to bed, I will set it to defragment the hard drive. Maybe that will help with some of the general issues I've been having.

4. I started my Yuletide fic! Okay, I've only got a couple lines written, but it's a start!

5. I really loved this Maru video. It's my new favorite.

kyuuketsukirui @ 9:11pm: Computer woes
So around the beginning of the month, I went to burn a CD and found that my computer no longer recognises its CD drive. It couldn't see it when I tried to burn a CD, nor could it see it when I inserted an audio CD. I have no idea how long this has been a problem since I really don't use the drive very often. But now that I know about it, it's bugging me.

Plus then in the couple weeks since, more things have started getting wonky. A few days ago I noticed that Photoshop wasn't working properly anymore. I could use it, but just barely. Then today I was using iTunes and it was acting wonky, too.

I really didn't want to have to do a full system restore, because that's a pain in the ass. So first I decided to try reverting to an earlier point. Tonight I reverted to the earlier point available, which was only December 12th...after I noticed the problems with the drive. I tried anyway, and if nothing else, it seems to have fixed Photoshop.

It did, however, cause Firefox to stop working. I couldn't get it to open at all! So I uninstalled it (which thankfully did work) and downloaded and reinstalled a new version. Thankfully it kept my bookmarks and extensions and even the open tabs, because I couldn't find where that data is stored on Vista (doesn't seem to be the same place as XP).

Anyway, I guess I will try a restore tomorrow or Monday. I have almost everything backed up, just need to back up the documents I've used since I did the major backup a few days ago, and go through my programs folder and back those up as well. Thankfully we have an external drive I can use, since I can't restore from a CD drive that the computer doesn't recognise as being there.

I would do it tonight, but I actually have stuff I need to do, so I don't want to spend the whole night on that. (Dunno how long the actual reinstall will take, but after that I have to completely reconfigure my system again since the original settings will be restored. Ugh.)

If that still doesn't fix the drive, well...it's not like I use it that often, so I guess I'll just have to live with it. I hate the idea of having a broken drive on a computer that's barely over a year old, though, so I hope this will fix it!

kyuuketsukirui @ 7:04pm: Musics
Here's some album downloads for you. Unfortunately a lot of them are stuff I ended up not liking, so it's not really recs, per se... XD But maybe there's something you want anyway! (And there are some recs in there, too!)

Enrique Iglesias - Enrique Iglesias, Enrique Iglesias: 95/08 Exitos
I wasn't that thrilled with either of these and ditched them both except for one song from each album. IIRC they were both Spanish-language albums.

Favorites: Experiencia Religiosa, Dimelo

Mika - The Boy Who Knew Too Much
At first I wasn't sure I liked this as much as his first album, but it soon grew on me, especially Blame It on the Girls, which is now my favorite song by him, period.

Favorites: We Are Golden, Blame It on the Girls, Rain, Good Girl Gone, One Foot Boy

Serpenteens - The Superhuman Monstershow, Dead Men Walking
I grabbed these ages ago when I was interested in more horror punk after falling in love with The Spookshow, but these guys were nowhere as good. I didn't keep anything off either album.

Whitesnake - The Definitive Collection
I've always liked Here I Go Again, so I thought maybe I'd like more by them? But as it turned out, no, I don't. In the end, Here I Go Again was all I kept. XD

My Little Lover - Identity
I think I just need to give up on these guys. I loved their early albums, but I haven't really liked anything of theirs in years. This was no different. It was okay, and pleasant to listen to, but nothing jumped out at me, so I just deleted it without keeping anything.

Unicorn - Hige to Boin, Unicorn Golden Half Special
I always think I should like Unicorn more because the few songs I do like by them I really, really love. But I listened to both of these and really didn't find anything new to like besides the songs I already had favorited.

Favorites: Maybe Blue, Daimeiwaku, Subarashii Hibi

Weezer - Weezer Red, Raditude
Raditude is AWESOME. So after listening to it a bunch of times, I decided to give Red another few listens to see if I liked it any more this time as I'd been really disappointed when it first came out and nothing on it was anywhere near as good as Pork and Beans. But no, I still am really not a fan, though I did manage to find one more song off it to favorite.

Favorites: Pork and Beans, Troublemaker, Heart Songs, King, (If You're Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To, Can't Stop Partying, Put Me Back Together, Tripping Down the Freeway, Love Is the Answer, Let It All Hang Out, I Don't Want To Let You Go, The Prettiest Girl In The Whole Wide World

La Roux - La Roux
These guys are really good. davidap turned me on to them and I was totally hooked.

Favorites: Bulletproof, In for the Kill, Tigerlily, Quicksand

Lady Gaga - The Fame: Monster
I didn't love this as much as I thought I would. It was good and I liked all the songs on it a lot, but for the most part they just didn't really stand out from each other, and nothing comes close to Bad Romance on the awesome scale.

Favorites: Bad Romance, Alejandro

Adam Lambert - Take One, For Your Entertainment
Take One was boring. I deleted everything. Apparently it's an unofficial release of some of his old pre-AI stuff. For Your Entertainment, though, is pure awesome. Very, very catchy.

Favorites: For Your Entertainment, Aftermath, Pick U Up, Whataya Want From Me, Music Again

Amuro Namie - Past<Future
This took me a bunch of listens before I really got into it, but once I did, I loved it. (Though I don't think it's her best thing ever.)

Favorites: First Timer, Copy That, Love Game, Steal My Night, Shut Up, Wild, Defend Love


Also on request, I uploaded everything Digimon from Adventure and 02. That's like a zillion albums and singles, so if you like Digimon, have at it.

Similarly on request, I uploaded Spitz's complete album discography plus whatever other random B-sides I had. Again, that's a ton of stuff, so if you like Spitz, go wild! If you don't know Spitz, um...I'd suggest trying their Fake Fur or Indigo Chiheisen albums. I think those are my favorites. Good stuff! (But I love pretty much everything of theirs, so.)

kyuuketsukirui @ 3:27am: Daily Happiness
1. It's been raining again, and when it hasn't been raining, it's been overcast and grey. :D

2. Had a delicious lamb shawarma for lunch from this little place down the street called Hungry Pocket. It's right next to the check cashing place with the Western Union, so we often get lunch there when someone pays me by Western Union (like today).

3. We went to Bed, Bath, and Beyond and looked at blankets. They didn't have any that I really liked (I don't understand why it seems like blankets are only made out of this one material in recent years and it's a material I really don't like the feel of; why does no one make just regular blankets anymore?) and the prices were pretty high, so I skipped that for the time being, but I did get a flannel comforter, which I think will be just as good, if not better (it seems like it will be nice and warm).

kyuuketsukirui @ 2:23am: Decluttering: box o' stuff
Well, maybe there will be a few small declutterings before the end of the year after all. :p

Before my mom came to pick up the stuff for charity the other day, I went through the stuff that was in one of my old ebay boxes and decided that since it's never sold, it's time to just get rid of it all.

Throw away
GLAY poster
Star Wars poster
Star Trek magazine
Star Trek movie pamphlet thing

Give away
A Sailor Moon coloring book
An incomplete set of Michael Whelan trading cards
A tiny stuffed Agumon
A Totoro puzzle postcard
A bunch of trading card sheets
2 karaoke CDs
An iPod case
A pocket knife
A pair of opera glasses
A pair of clip-on earrings

Photos are here and here.

So now we have a big empty rubbermaid container just sitting against the wall here. It makes a nice little table, but I'd rather have something nicer than an empty plastic box. XD Not sure what to do with it at the moment, either.

darkrose @ 1:09am: Love and Light
Happy First Night of Hanukkah to everyone celebrating! May the love and light last the whole year.

kyuuketsukirui @ 1:05am: Drabbles
I feel like writing drabbles. Yes, I know my Yuletide fic is due in a little over a week and I've yet to start, but I'm thinking these drabbles would be like, from now til the end of the year, so no rush.

If you've known me for any length of time, you'll know I don't always have good followthrough on these sorts of things, so if you'd be really bummed that I never got around to your request, best not to make one, but if you don't mind knowing that I might not actually write some of these, please leave me prompts!

Tell me a fandom/pairing/character, plus a word or phrase or song lyrics and/or just a general idea of what you'd like.

There's a list of all the fandoms I've written in the sidebar on my website, but I'm always looking to branch out, so long as it's something I know (and if you're not sure I can write the fandom you have in mind, just ask).

Directing comments to Dreamwidth on this one, so as to keep all the requests in one place.

This entry was originally posted at http://kanata.dreamwidth.org/141540.html. Please comment there using OpenID.

telesilla @ 7:14pm: To those who celebrate...
Happy Chanukah!!

mirabile_dictu @ 6:39pm: Seriously self-indulgent post about bread
xposted to IJ and LJ

I love bread. I have always loved bread. Bread for breakfast, for dinner, for dessert, any and all kinds of bread. For several years, we went without because Webster had been diagnosed as having celiac's disease. Celiac's is "a digestive disease that damages the small intestine and interferes with absorption of nutrients from food. People who have celiac disease cannot tolerate gluten, a protein in wheat, rye, and barley. Gluten is found mainly in foods but may also be found in everyday products such as medicines, vitamins, and lip balms" (from here).

It was a pain, especially living here in the Wine Country where our artisan breads are known and loved. Within three miles of where I live is a world-renown bakery, and fewer than thirty miles away are a number of others equally well known. For my birthday, we go to a restaurant in San Francisco with its own bakery that puts the most delicious bread imaginable on the table, with fresh local olive oil.

We had to give all that up for years. I know that others suffer much more, and that we are lucky. And we were luckier than we knew because eventually Webster got a new gastroenterologist who ran the tests and discovered that, whatever is wrong with him, celiac's isn't it. We could eat bread again.

Almost at the same time, I discovered the New York Times's recipe for no-knead bread. When I was a kid I'd made bread a lot; I loved the kneading, and watching the dough rise, and oh, the flavor. But when I grew up I somehow lost the knack. The bread wouldn't rise. The crust was too hard. The bread lacked flavor. I decided that the yeast no longer loved me, and gave it up.

But now, armed with the NYT recipe and medical permission to eat gluten again, I tried my hand. We loved the results. Unlike me, Webster hadn't grown up in a house with fresh bread, so this was new to him. At first, he would eat about half a loaf at one sitting! Oops. Not good for his tummy, even if he could eat gluten. But it was soooo good.

Not long ago, I started hearing about another no-knead recipe, Artisan Bread, one that lets you make one big batch of dough and then bake whenever you want (recipe here). I think MRKinch mentioned it? Whoever did, I bless her. Now we have fresh bread literally every day, and if Webster wants something dessert-ish and quick, I turn some of the dough into little cinnamon buns or plain rolls that he slathers in strawberry jam.

I'm so enthusiastic about my breadmaking that I've documented it! So if you dare, here is ME making BREAD!

( Seriously, links to BIG pictures of me making bread )

telesilla @ 12:01pm: Dear Anon
You didn't give me your name, but I want you to know that the note you wrote meant a lot to me and made me tear up just a little. Thank you!

And yay cast iron frying pan! Corn bread! Pan Seared Rib Eyes!!

Thank you again.

♥

kyuuketsukirui @ 12:43am: Daily Happiness
1. My mom came over this morning to get the rest of her Christmas stuff that's stored in our garage and took the pile of stuff for charity while she was at it. We also moved the chair that was in the living room into the garage (it was most recently in the hallway, since the new loveseat is in the living room), so now there is actually room to walk through our hallway without moving stuff around depending on which direction you want to go.

2. Finally got the tree decorated! Now I just need to tidy up a few things and I can take pics of the new and improved house. (I'm really, really pleased with how things look right now.)

3. I got an early Christmas present today! Three little boxes of Morning Glory Confections brittle from telesilla and darkrose. The flavors are Indian Curry Pistachio (which I tried and is really good), New Mexico Chili Pumpkin Seed, and Fleur de Sel & Peanut. I will have a proper review when I try them all, but omg, definitely good stuff.

sorchar @ 10:45pm: Today's Twittiness

• 23:14 @oshunanat Well, it's not like the information is top secret. I know it, and I'm not even a cook! #

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telesilla @ 10:28pm: Review: BPAL's Sol Invictus
Just one tonight:

From the 2009 Yule LE Line:

Sol Invictus -- "A radiant blend of solar oils: golden amber, saffron, heliotrope, hibiscus, citron, frangipani, frankincense, tangerine, mock orange, and orange blossom."

It's a somewhat heavy floral with just a touch of ambery spice under it. Mostly what I'm getting is the frangipani and the orange blossom grounded by the amber. I'd say this is an almost tropical floral for people who don't like florals. In other words, me. :)

telesilla @ 9:54pm: If you ever get the brilliant idea to...
...replace the milk the cheese sauce for baked macaroni and cheese with mostly heavy cream (I thinned it with a little milk)?

Don't.

God, I think I'm gonna die.

Thing is, other than that the fact that it was insanely rich, it was incredibly good. Half sharp cheddar, a quarter jack and a quarter blue cheese made for a nice mix of cheesy taste and melty goodness.

Oh also? It had bacon in it.

Die, I tell you. I'm gonna die.

astolat @ 10:40pm: Idol RPF: Drive-By Devotion (Adam/Tommy)

http://astolat.livejournal.com/215342.html

haha, okay, so here is the full version of the ludicrous porn story I started on aianonlovefest the other day. I had it finished a bit earlier today but merryish said it was too much porn for noon, but good for 2am, and I had to agree, so I waited a bit to post. :>

Seriously, this is even more x-rated and also even more COMPLETE CRACK than before, you are warned.

Drive-By Devotion (6,970 words)
Adam/Tommy, so very very adult & explicit

It seemed like a good idea after five martinis in the Wynn high-rollers bar.

(Read the story!)

You can also read this entry on Dreamwidth ( comments)

telesilla @ 3:38pm: *dies dies dies*

zillah975 @ 9:33am: Pictures to words
This is an interesting idea... Pictures2Words, a new big bang where the artists sign up to create art and the writers sign up to write stories based on the art. They're limiting it to Supernatural, Leverage, and RPS of those shows (and crossovers among those three categories), but anyway, it really makes me wish I were one of those writers who could always manage to write. The ones who do writing roundups every month of like twenty fics they've posted and are still all "woe, such writers block omg! I've hardly written ANYthing!" But I can't sign up, I know I wouldn't finish (or probably), but still! What a cool idea.

Mirrored from this post at Dreamwidth, which currently has comments.

Read comments | Reply

kyuuketsukirui @ 1:24am: Manga: Kindaichi & Ai no Shintairiku
Title: Kindaichi Shounen no Jikenbo: Kenmochi Keibu no Satsujin
Author: Satou Fumiya & Amagi Seimaru
My Rating: 5/5

Three years after the torture, rape, and murder of a high school girl, her attackers are free. But now someone is killing them and Inspector Kenmochi is the prime suspect.. As the evidence mounts against him, will Kindaichi and Akechi be able to clear his name in time? (Answer: Yes. Duh.)

Well, I haven't met a Kindaichi case I didn't at least like if not love, so unsurprisingly, I really liked this one. Even though I guessed the real murderer before Kindaichi did for once (though I was still surprised by his motive and the obligatory sob story (Kindaichi murders are always tragic revenge stories and no matter how brutal the murders, no one is really a coldhearted killer (except perhaps the people who got killed))).

Title: Ai no Shintairiku
Author: Yamada Nari
My Rating: 4.5/5

When Nikotama Souhei transfers to a new school, it's the perfect opportunity to start living as Sara, the girl she's always known she was. Although the school allows her to wear a girls' uniform, she's still down as Souhei on their records, so she's outed the moment she introduces herself to her new class as Sara. Though she faces harrassment from classmates and opposition from her parents and teachers, she soldiers on, determined to be herself, and eventually she makes friends and even gets the guy.

The events are very typical school shoujo. There's a Mean Girl who bullies Sara, and a timid girl who becomes Sara's first friend. There's a wacky teacher and a day at the beach and love at first sight (with a boy on the train who of course turns out to be in her class). It's actually really pretty generic other than the fact that the heroine is trans.

But...I still love it. Because the heroine is trans. It's not unproblematic (I could have lived without the joke of Sara's last name, which sounds like "two balls", or the ugly, jealous feminists who protest a swimsuit contest as being sexist), but I liked Sara a lot. It's no Hourou Musuko, but I love that it exists.

Scanlations are available and the translation is not too bad, but the translator made the horrible decision to have Sara and another girl refer to themselves in third person. This sounds totally natural in Japanese. It's cutesy and childish/girlish, but not uncommon. In English it just sounds bizarre, especially since English uses subjects way more often than Japanese does, and when forced to add the subject in English when it wasn't there in Japanese, the translator just used regular first-person pronouns, so it sounds like sometimes Sara is speaking of herself as a separate person. Just doesn't work at all.

Also warning: DO NOT READ COMMENTS ON THAT SITE. There's one topic all about how much the manga sucks and how it's stupid for having a boy dressed as a girl (three pages of people agreeing with this). Then there's more topics about how this story is actually yaoi, and people saying they liked the part where Sara was a boy best and wished it had stayed that way (especially disgusting considering how blatantly unhappy she was then and she was only dressing as boy to try and please her mom). And then there's the people who use quotes when calling Sara by female pronouns (is that better than the many other commenters who just used male pronouns?). Ugh.

sorchar @ 10:45pm: Today's Twittiness

• 21:35 Western Culinary Inst. being sued by grads who are pissed off that they still have to start as line cooks out in the real world. Douchebags. #
• 21:57 @mamadeb1963 yes! You have to do it to learn. #

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mirabile_dictu @ 7:18pm: A bad decade
xposted to IJ and LJ

Why am I not getting my IJ and LJ notices? Do both services have it out for me? Dang. Still not going to DW, though. There has to be a third way.

Casa McShep is open! Yay!

( Some big photos back here )