Seed beads are the debil

…but I’ve got bunches of them, so I might as well *do* something with them.

An overlong three-strand necklace with hemalike, coral and clear seeds:

Detail:

And matching earrings.

Cleanin’ house

Stranger’s mad at me.

OK, maybe not mad. Maybe just disappointed. It’s that time of year again. I’m *cue scary music* CLEANING THE KITCHEN FLOOR. Which is where the food is traditionally kept. Which is now in the closet. Because the floor is wet. And because I’m weird, and after spending all that energy on cleaning the floor, I don’t find it particularly cute to have little paw prints decorating it.

This is, of course, not acceptable logic. (I have yet to find logic that Stranger finds acceptable.) So she’s spent the last half-hour yelling at me from various spots in the bedroom (where we’re all trapped). I’ve tried telling her I’m going to trade her in for a hamster. She scorned this threat. Then I told her I might be able to get as many as two hamsters. She, cleverly, pointed out that nobody was dumb enough to take her in exchange for anything as smart as two hamsters. I got out the squirt bottle. She ran around the bedroom three times, and then climbed up next to me for cuddles.

They’d have to be really *cute* hamsters.

Fixing the fix out of it

I dealt with this woman today…

…Only he was a forty year-old man.

He tells me there’s a problem with his bill. I apologise, and tell him I’ll fix it. In the process of fixing it, I have to tell him three times that, yes, sir I did hear the part where you said it was a problem and yes, sir, I am currently attempting to correctly fix the problem and yes, sir, I do want to verify which credit card you want to use to pay for the porno movies you don’t want your boss to know you watched, because the entire problem that we’re having here is that I have a list of stuff we want you to pay for and I have in front of me two choices of payment, one which says MC and four numbers and the other that says AX and four numbers and since we got it wrong the first time I want to make sure I’m getting it right this time, and YES, sir I know we made a mistake, and I appreciate you letting us know about the problem, but, hey, look, it’s all fixed!

I’m lucky, though… my guy walked away happy as a clam. Go figure.

I mean, I get the whole perception that mistakes should never happen, I really do. But they do happen. But if it takes longer for you to complain about the problem than it takes for the problem to be fixed, maybe you shouldn’t be allowed to travel all by yourself?

Passing it along

Interesting post from Tor.com’s blog, written by Kathryn Cramer (writer, critic, and anthologist presently co-editing the Year’s Best Fantasy and Year’s Best SF series with her husband David G. Hartwell.)

OK, so it basically boils down to “we’re seeing a lot of dark fiction because we’ve been in the middle of a frikken war for half a decade now,” but it’s still interesting reading.

Tidbits from the night:

Absolute best conversation this week:

Guest: Excuse me, do you have a Time Machine?
Me: *blink* *blinkblink*
Me: I’m sorry sir?
Guest: Do you have a Time Machine?
Me: I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean, sir.
Guest: You know, a Time Machine? So I can get some money?
Me: I’m sorry, I really have no idea what you’re talking about, sir.
Guest: You know, like an automated teller?
Me: Oh! An ATM! Yes, right around the corner!

Now, I know I read too much science fiction, but having a guy walk up to the desk and ask me to direct him to a time machine so he could get some money just amused me. A lot.

Also…

Please, if you call me for directions, PLEASE stop driving your car. Please. Seriously. You call me on the phone, ask me to help you because you’re lost and don’t know which way to go and then you tell me YOU’RE STILL DRIVING. See, now, when you do this, it sets up a cognitive dissonance feedback loop that makes my head go all tingly. Seriously, if you are lost, figure out where you are, stop your car, and THEN call me for directions. And please write down the directions I give you. It would also be nice if you follow them. It makes that whole “getting to the hotel” process a lot simpler. And please, by all that’s holy, please do not say things to me like “Oh, well it’s so dark out, it makes it hard for me to see.” I really do not need to spend the time between talking to you and your actual arrival wondering if you’re going to end up driving directly into my lobby because “it’s so dark out!” at night.

More testing

OK, this is a nonsense post as I’m simply testing the excerpt feature to see what happens with it, since I’m not really smart enough to figure out exactly what they’re talking about in the faq. But I’ve always been more of a hands-on learner, so this really doesn’t bother me much. I’ve never been quite convinced that faq aren’t written by computer programmers to make the rest of us feel inadequate. Can’t trust those programmers. They’re all trouble. Unless they work for Google. I find it funny that I distrust both Microsoft (because they’re in it for the money) and all the Linex, Unix, Mozella freaks (because they’re in it for the LOVE), but Google doesn’t bother me.

Anyway, this post is probably long enough to test the feature. If you’ve read all this way I’m sorry my stream of consciousness post wasn’t more fun. Please see the previous post about having a migraine.

Let’s see what happens.

Thank you, Excedrin(TM)

Question for today, why have I started getting migraines since I quit smoking? Seriously. It’s not like smoking doesn’t cause headaches, because it does. It also makes existing headaches much, much worse.

But it seems like since I quit smoking I’ve gone from having migraines once every two years to having them once every two weeks. Which is insane.

I mean, I’m used to getting headaches. I get them all the time. It’s one of the reasons I never bothered to learn to drive. It’s one of the reasons I can be such a cranky bitch. But those are just tension headaches. Usually treatable by application of ibuprofen and caffeine. And I’ve been in enough doctors’ offices for them to know that I just don’t get migraines all that often.

Until now. Light sensitivity, nausea, the whole thing. Bleagh.

Well, fortunately, I handed in the insurance paperwork two days ago, so in two months I’ll actually be able to go to a doctor’s office and hopefully figure this out.

The fiction section

Read this post for a full explanation of the fiction section

Testing… Now say “Ah.”

Just a note to the EAers, I’m going on hiatus for a couple months. Amy’s been nice enough to set up this feed, though. So, I probably won’t catch any comments made in EA about posts on my blog. You all are welcome to come here and post.

I’m not leaving because of anybody there. I’m just taking a break because I’ve been a moody bitch and I don’t like carrying on cranky on someone else’s playground. I’d rather carry on cranky on my own territory. (Leave to me to quit smoking in the middle of a campaign year.)

Experimenting…

And today we try loading pictures. I’m scared. I’ve gone over to the html tag here. And there’s buttons. Oh, dear.

Anyway, for those I’ve been out of touch with for ages, I’ve lately taken up making jewelry as a hobby. And I say it as “making jewelry,” because in speaking, when I tell people I’m into beading, it often leads to blank, horrified stares.

Anyway, one of my latest pieces, made with hematite, “silver” washers, and some really pretty stones that had some long name I don’t remember:

And the matching earrings…

And I hope you’ll all take a minute to appreciate the fact that, in taking these pictures, Pixie-cat had to GET UP off the couch, and go sit on her carrier. I didn’t actually make her get on the carrier. I think it was some sort of statement, maybe her way of saying that if she’s going to be treated like that, she might as well go to the vet’s. Or something. So, thank her for her sacrifice.

Thank you, Pixie-cat. And remember, if you eat me in my sleep, the boyfriend probably won’t feed you.

~edit:

Well, that didn’t work. Little red boxes. We’re gonna try again. According to the FAQ, the secret is to NOT use the little buttons! How clever!

~edit:

Yay! I’ve posted pictures! I RULE the web! OK, I’m lying. Pixie-cat rules the web. Just look at that steely gaze.