I keep meaning to write small catch-you-up posts... and then forgetting or getting distracted, and now I'm not even sure what I wanted to write about anymore...


I have a new layout! Let me know if you're having problems with the header... as of right now the FTP is up and active, and I can see everything properly, but I've been told that the header wasn't displaying and I don't know what will need poking at if it's not working across the board.

HOWEVER, major props and thanks to koryou, who helped me take two themes snagged from milou_veronica blend together perfectly. Thank you~~ ♥


David's finally got his license back! There were problems, way back when things were at their absolute shittiest, and he's had an ID for this whole time. He'd thought he was going to need to re-test... but he got a notification in the mail saying it was time to "renew his license". We made this face o.O and he went in to straighten things out.

Turns out the DMV isn't always a gate to hell. He had a very good person manning the desk, and they went with what the system said. David filled out the right paperwork, paid the usual fee for renewal, and has a shiny, proper license! Well, ok, he's got a temporary one at the moment, but he'll have the real one soon. :D


Work on the novel has been crawling. I keep writing, but my word counts are kind of crappy, so it's inching... And yet, when I looked at my overall word count I'm over 20,000 words now. At just previous to what's probably half way. Dude. Dude. I originally plotted this out as a novella... and god only knows what length it'll be after editing. But... it really is aiming at novel length. Sweet. :D

Coming along but just as slow is stuff-that-I'm-not-writing. Which may or may not require me to watch Avengers movies. :coughs:

Of course, I've had no inspiration whatsoever for what to submit to the Austin Chronicle's annual contest. I need to dig up the story I wrote years ago that a friend of mine dubbed "casually nihilistic". Maybe with a little (or, uh, a lot) of cleaning up it'd be worthy? :shrugs: Better than nothing, unless inspiration bites me hard in the ass.


Hm. I guess that's it for now. I need to edit. And write. ... Um, and eat.

I'm not looking forward to walking later. It's cold, and I haven't got cold weather athletic anything for going running in. Meh.

Two things...


ONE: I have an interview on Friday! For a job! It's the first in a long time, and I'm kind of freaking out. And by kind of, I mean a lot. It's not my favorite of the applications I'd turned in to the university, but it IS permanent part time (50% FTE) paying monthly about what my parents have been helping me with. This would be really, really good. (Even if it does kind of amount to scooping ice cream. I don't really particularly care, because dude - JOB. And I'd have plenty of time to continue editing/writing.)


TWO: The print version of Southwest Soul is becoming available! If you are interested, please contact me. For my friends, what we'll do is David will order copies, sign them (maybe get a message), and you will pay us $10 for the book plus pay for shipping of your choice. This is especially good for those of you interested in a print version internationally, because I'm not sure it will be available through the online store as a physical book that way. Leave a comment here if you're interested, and we'll hash out the details.

The Nook and iBook versions are in the process of being available. Hopefully those will be up soon!

So in an effort to start spinning up mojo for his cookbook release sometime in September, David's set up a new website.


Please check out Bakerstreet Culinary! He'll be updating with pictures of food, a recipe of the week, and various blog posts covering all sorts of things like the benefits of cast iron and how to pick out chilies. Traffic is good...pimping out his site and the book to others is great too. :D

I also won't hide the fact that he's got ads on there, and clicking through them (even if you don't care about them much?) earns him a little money. We've got important plans we're saving for, and clicking through doesn't take much. /shameless begging

He's also got a funny new twitter (@BkrStCulinary) to tweet food thoughts, be amusing, and put out the word when he's posted something new on the site. :)


You know you want to!

♥ ♥ ♥

Woops, I missed a day. Sorry about that...

Day 02 – Your first love

My first love? I could be obtuse about this, first love of what and all that, there's a lot of happy things I could babble about. But there's two ways to look at this really.

There's the first love that I knew was love, the love that broke my heart and broke me, and taught me how to put everything back together again, taught me there were things worth fighting and crying for. I'm not sure there's a whole lot of people that follow me now that will remember then... but. Anyway. David, hands down, forever and always. We met on the steps of my dorm in the fall of my freshman year at college, during a discussion about X-men of all things. We went out the next day to wander around the mall and stop at a comic book and gaming shop. I think (I think because things like this were never important to us, just like we don't have a proper anniversary) our first date was to see The Others, that Nicole Kidman ghost movie that came out that year. Or maybe that wasn't the first date, maybe that was later. But I remember it, anyway. And the rest, as they say, is history...

Then there's the first love I didn't know was love. I was too young, and would never have thought about things like loving a girl. That Wasn't Done, of course, but it wasn't something that would have occurred to me really either. It broke my heart and made me angry, it genuinely hurt me, the way things went, the way she treated me. Unfortunately I don't particularly feel like rehashing the story, but for those of you who were around when she decided to try and make amends, I'm talking about Summer.

I'll go back to thinking about David now, thanks.

It's funny, cos I met him when I was still a good girl. I went to church every sunday, taught sunday school, never drank or smoked, barely cussed... That was 9 years ago. Life hasn't been a picnic, not by a long shot. But I don't think I'd trade having him in my life for anything.

... Is this the part where I get all sappy and mention that I'd follow him to the gates of hell*? Anyone? Bueller?

*It's worth pointing out that given our personalities, it'd probably be his personal gate to hell, and I'd be laughing maniacally all the way down. I'm just sayin'.

So David finally heard back from the dean. And this is the most fucked up situation ever.

They show he registered, they show he never ever attended class, they show he accepted aid online (not in the actual finaid office - this would have been one click?), they show he never came in to release the aid (he had to come in to sign a form for it to be released because of previous money owed). Because there was pending financial aid, he was never dropped from class (apparently he would have had to go to the Registrar in person... but was never notified of such). Because he was registered and "accepted" aid (despite the fact that he wouldn't have accepted aid on a semester he wasn't attending) they get to charge him. Because they get to charge him, they also get to assign all Fs.

I don't understand. It isn't right, it isn't fair, but that's the school policy.

Because that's the school policy, the dean, no matter how sympathetic, can't do anything. This same sympathetic dean said that unfortunately, because the school has the records they do (whether they make sense or not) David also has no further recourse... except to pay the $5.5k owed (that is previous debt plus the non-attended semester).

This would have been his last semester before graduating.

Because of the downward spiral before the breakdown, and because of this semester especially his GPA is shot. Which makes it difficult for him to pay this bill and try applying to a different university. If he paid the bill and stayed at UNT, he could do grade replacements.

:sighs: IDK. I guess we'll just have to figure something out.

David's hit the point of calm that comes from finally having an answer. Not the one he wanted, perhaps, but now he can move on to trying to figure out what to do. What makes the whole shebang better for me, personally, is that I started my period today, and my hormones are haywire. I'm going to go cry in the corner now ok?

And not just because this sucks donkey balls. I also have really awesome friends. :smishes y'all up tightly: I don't even know where I'd be without you guys!

PS: Yeah, don't expect blow by blows from White Collar tonight. I'm not even sure I'm going to attempt watching Leverage today.

David and I were watching Castle tonight (which, btw, AWESOME), and an ad came on for Windows. It was one of their new "Windows 7 is my idea" ads, some of which are funny, and some are just annoying.

David promptly comes up with this. (Directly quoted from him, all grammar and spelling are his in the casual context of IM.)

I'm Elliot Spencer and one day i had an idea (cut to scene of elliot hitting someone on the head with a laptop) what if my computer had backup protection that would protect my computer in the event of a sudden impact (cut to elliot standing over someone beating them with a computer) then came windows 7 with the shock absorb technology. so even if my laptop takes a hit, my e-mail and files will be safe. I'm elliot spencer and windows 7 was my idea (someone is sneaking up behind elliot and he spins around and hits them with his laptop)

Followed a little while later by the idea that Hardison should do something similar, but when he says the line about it being "my idea", he says "No, seriously. It was my idea. You hear me Gates? I'm comin' for you!" And then does the watching you hand signs.

He cracks me up, he really does...

We're watching Flashpoint right now, and there's characters that my brain keeps trying to relate to Sam'n'Dean.

So then this:

Me: So... much... Sam'n'Dean... ::tries to watch the show without doing that::
David: ... ... ... When does Supernatural come back again?
Me: September 18
David: God, we better put some DVDs in soon or you'll explode in a puff of fandom!

Oh, that was a nice laugh...

Yeah, I'm still alive. At the moment at least. I'm pretty sure. ::pokes self in arm:: I feel real enough at least. ::shrugs::

Currently attempting Ubuntu Linux, but due to networking difficulties I will probably be switching back to windows in the near future. It is rather shiny, though. Its just a matter of learning everything.

Life, other than this. has been like going on the Superman rollarcoaster with shaky straps upside-down in constistant spirals... My roommate for a while has been David. I have not been dating David, and there is nothing going on. We're neighbors and best friends and we each pay the rent. The shitstorm started with this: He had a nervous breakdown due to some things going on with his parents, and stress from school, and I'm not going into this because its his business. I will say that the higher management of Drug Emporium (namely the store manager) is equivalent to ass hats because after having told them that my roommate could quite possibly have a tumor (because the way he was acting was so unusual) or be going completely insane, I then spent the next day without my phone following him around ensuring that when he decided to wander the city of Denton without so much as a bottle of water he didn't accidently get himself killed or arrested. Regrettably, I was unable to call out. They fired me. This is a relief and a source of stress.

Or it has been. I'll probably be hired by Tuesday Morning. Probably.

Oh, then there was David's father calling me a "snake in the grass" because when I came back from an errand I found David all but sobbing and I tried calling his mom to figure out if there was a way to help and/or interpret what happened to help David straighten things out. I overstepped my bounds, maybe, in their stick-up-the-ass point of view. And not the week or two before he was saying he'd always liked me. Fucker. But I digress.

(On a side note, David does not have a brain tumor, and is all but back to normal. He will be seeing someone to find out what happened etc and so forth...)

I've also figured out how to bloody graduate. Its called a Sociology degree. Since it drops off 40-something credits of non-university core, it drops me to a minimum of 56 credits to graduate, putting me at a graduation date of Dec 2007 if I take 15 credits per semester including summer. Plus, if I can take a good number of classes under a certain wonderful prof named Williamsen (whose class I failed, because he got sick and had to pass the class off and I stopped going... oops) I'll learn lots about culture and religion and how to research it properly. He makes the writing wheels turn inside my head. And he's a good story teller too...

But yeah. I'm broke. Literally. Phone is currently turned off. Barely had enough to pay enough on my cable bill to keep the internet running. And my parents have been dropping money on me on an almost weekly basis for me to get by, so I can't just go to them... again. ::sighs::

Life is going to be interesting. In that proverbial way...