Today was an Every Which Way sort. I had a fairly good day overall, but there were some odd contrasting moments. For example: we had a group pizza lunch thing and the pizza was good, from somewhere I'd never had pizza before, and clearly won't again as I had a strong allergic reaction to it. Yes, I am allergic to cheese, but I know how much I can manage and a couple slices is way under that limit. In the past few years, I've also developed reactions to certain types of dough, and that pizzeria's appears to be one of them. *eyeroll*

Received some critical paperwork much earlier than I'd anticipated, which is awesome, but I hadn't quite psyched myself up to receive it yet so while excited, this also was a little nerve-wracking.

Then, it snowed. All day long. By the time I left work at 9 p.m., the parking lot didn't seem to have been *touched* and while the roads had been ploughed... sometime or other... they were still very snow-caked and slippery. The person behind me on the short strip of road leading from the parking lot to the traffic lights to the main street missed the light because they did an inadvertent 360° - in a van. I drive a little hatchback. So, yeah, I went extremely slow all the way home because guess what? When it's snowing still, has been for hours, and the road conditions absolutely suck? THAT'S WHAT YOU DO. And you DON'T TAILGATE goddammit. Between the continual tailgating, the fact that I was already on edge emotionally, and the general uneasiness I now have driving in these conditions, I was not exactly a happy camper. Actually between the utterly tense grip on the steering wheel and the crying all the way home, fuck me gently, I gave myself quite the headache. :-/ And then, because the streets had been ploughed so shittily, I went the way I normally go into my subdivision in bad weather to discover that no, I wasn't getting any more than fifty feet up that hill. Had to back out onto the main road again and take the next possibility (there are only four roads that will get you from a main road to my street, all of which have steep hills), which I did make with a lot of coaxing and gear-shifting - in an automatic! - and just, give'er. Fuck. Anyone who's driven in snow and ice conditions in a city that doesn't know the meaning of 'flat' knows that to get up a hill, you need to take a good, fast run at it and just push. Poor little car. I did make it, though, obviously. It certainly reminded me of why people tell me that I drive like I should have a stick shift, lol. If anyone actually *has* one and wants to teach me how, I'm all ears/hands. I never learned because no one I knew growing up had a manual transmission car.

A nice thing to come home to was one of the mother's baking experiments: chocolate Brie tarts with hazelnut/graham cracker crust. She's been on a baking kick lately and I'm not sure if it's just because she keeps watching cooking shows and is incapable of differentiating between "want to do sometime" and "do now," or if she's stressed about something and doesn't want to talk about it, because baking = mother therapy. Probably a bit of both. In the meantime, all I can say about today's experiment is *droooooool*. :D

Oh and lastly, I'm feeling slightly overwhelmed fannishly speaking. There's been such an avalanche of photos and vids and everything the last few days and I haven't even managed to look at a lot of it for doing other stuff. There's also a niggling annoyance, not directed at anyone, that everything I keep seeing/hearing is All About Billie. Because there are three other talented men in that band and it is *theirs* as much if not more so than it is his. I've hardly even heard anything about Jason and he at least is usually part of the GD coterie of musicians so it's not like no one knows him. I can't even explain really, it just rubs me the wrong way a bit. I guess the thing is, I am absofuckinglutely thrilled that friends of mine got to go to one or more shows and have such a fantastic time. But I'm not jealous, because I'm not so much into Pinhead Gunpowder. I like them okay and I listen to them occasionally, but they're hardly one of my favourite bands and were I not enamoured of one of the band members from somewhere else, I doubt I'd go out of my way to see a gig. Which I think is the part that bothers me, that it was about Green Day for a lot of the audience and not about PHGP, which I think it should have been. And maybe that's silly but that's the way I feel and so this inundation of new media is not full of unmitigated squee for me like it is for most. Though I have to say, I *am* digging the shaggy blond. Hee.

ETA: Forgot - here lieth a batch of icons entitled books and cleverness that features women and books. Somehow I had a feeling that that would appeal to the majority of my flist!

No, not the well-known novel. I can't think of anyone on my flist who wouldn't find this hilarious: Bad Sex Award 2007 shortlisted passages. Dude. I don't even have words. *sporfle*

I'm participating in Wine Tuesday and that's going to make me pass out very soon, after a 6 a.m. or so start to my day, ow. The shitty part about having to go downtown in early morning is that you run into traffic, and remember that Haligonians don't have a fucking CLUE how to drive in traffic. Which is not helped by the fact that the city just isn't *built* for it. Like the Armdale Rotary - which I think is still called the Rotary though it's a full-fledged roundabout now; yes, they brought in a British engineer and everything. *facepalm* Anyway, it was designed to handle about 5000 cars and about ten times that go through it daily. Despite listening to various horror stories, both here and about roundabouts in England, I actually have never had a problem navigating it. Apparently the "go round in circles seeking an exit point" strategy meshes well with my thought processes. :P

ETA: Ack, forgot: metlab pointed me at this oh so awesome piece of fabulousness, aka the new White Stripes video for Conquest. Just watch it, no matter whether you like their music or not. The video itself RULES.

W00t I took my car in today for the annual safety inspection and I didn't even have to get a light bulb changed or nuthin'! Much less expensive than I was anticipating. Not that that ended up meaning anything by day's end as I indulged in a bit of retail therapy. Which ended up being all make-up as the CD I'd decided to get, nobody had! Yeesh. And since I'd made up my mind on that one, I totally blanked on what else I'd been looking to get at some point, and ended up at M.A.C. instead lol.

I fell in love with this limited edition mineralized eyeshadow duo in Mi'Lady - yeah, the purple and red one. *glee* They're beautiful. The purple is almost holographic, with so many tints to it, and the red *is* bright but not the same kind of red as a lip product, though it's brighter than the one that I got at Sephora in Boston last May, Urban Decay's Heat, which is kind of a terra cotta/brick red (I also got UD's Shag then, which is a coppery beige. Heat and Shag look awesome together and make me giggle besides. Because I am twelve.) At M.A.C. I got a sample of the gold fluidline liner too, though my other indulgence today was Lise Watier's 'Precious' dual-ended liquid liner, one in black and one in almost the same shade of gold. Mmm lovely and that purchase also netted me some samples (some odd ones, like the men's cologne-infused deodorant; wtf am I gonna do with that?!), plus I had to get a bunch of other stuff at Shopper's - that's why I'd gone in there in the first place - so I now have a $10 gift cert to use towards anything in the store until the end of November, ergo the liner was more justifiable. ;-)

But, really, I've just had the shittiest week in years and I did work some overtime that showed up on this pay, so I feel entitled to some splurging even if it wasn't necessarily the best thing for my wallet. And I love the black-and-gold scheme, actually; have for ages, since the first time someone put it on me when I was around 16. It's definitely a look that works well for me so it's nice to play with it again. And it was nice to do something for myself, even if it is on the shallow side. :P

Two AHHH!RAAAAGE songs for ya: Aftermath by Battery (lyrics), and Fuck You by Archive (lyrics). The first is more scream-along-with-me bitterness; the second is more...insidious, I think might be the word. :D

I continued to have a largely unproductive weekend, but that's okay. I gotta go to bed shortly because I'm on the day shift tomorrow, and I have to take my car in before that, so I'll be up uber early. I need to wait about another half an hour for my hair to completely dry, though, unless I want some seriously severe bedhead in the morning. *grins*

Ran across this site today, which is pretty much everything you could ever have wanted to know about Gallifrey for the Whovians. There is a frightening amount of stuff there. Yet another way in which the Who fandom reminds me of Roswell's. Hee.

Can't recall what else I was going to say. I am actually tired; haven't been sleeping well the last few days. Keep waking up and then not being able to get back to sleep for ages. I hate that.

Well, having used the Mood Theme Editor (which requires you to paste in the URL for every damned mood individually), I am essentially back at square one: some show up, some don't. I have not a clue what else I can do with it. The installation instructions I have are beautifully clear, but were also originally posted 2 years ago by someone I don't know so it's not like I can expect help there. It's even more frustrating after going through all these one by one and remembering just how lovely they are.

It's another gross day - humid, rainy and daaark. Actually, the rain only started in the early afternoon...five minutes before I left the house (for reals). The extra sucky part about that is that there's a problem with the fan in my car - it's only working on high, and the air-conditioning isn't working at all, so it doesn't defrost very well unless it's on hot. :-/ This is not particularly comfortable, obviously; it's what I was *going* to get fixed before there was the brake problem, and had put off for a bit because it's not a safety thing, just annoying as fuck plus I mostly drive with the windows down in the summer anyway so it's not been turned on much at all unless it's absolutely pouring rain. However, since having said brake problem fixed, the acceleration has been hugely whiny and it doesn't feel stable; also feels like it's going to stall out when I slow to a stop; so back in it goes because clearly that is NOT safe. Fuck. I just do not have the money for this shit. I can borrow it, and that's not really a problem except for, y'know, in my head where I'm supremely pissed off (again) because I shouldn't *need* to borrow; I should be making enough money to be able to have contingency funds for shit like this. And there's the deep cynicism that the extended warranty coverage ended last summer, so of course this is all happening now. Especially with 'now' being just a few months before I want to SELL the fucker.

I have been having the weirdest craving for coffee recently so I picked some up today. We do have coffee in the house - the mother drinks it - but I'm fussy and I don't like hers. *laughs* So when I reaaaaaaally want it, I splurge on some good stuff. (Relatively speaking, anyway; 1/2 lb. of ground coffee @ Sbx is not *too* outrageous esp. when it's maybe a bi-annual purchase.) I made the mistake of choosing to wander around Chapters for a few minutes instead of going immediately back out into the rain, hence the acquisition of two bargain books as well: Expletive Deleted: A good look at bad language by Ruth Wajnryb, and Letter Perfect: The A-to-Z history of our alphabet by David Sacks, both of which are exactly what they appear to be. :D Notwithstanding the part where I'm not supposed to be buying any more books at all, but they were $4 each and sometimes, the inner geek needs feeding. Said purchases were also before I finally decided that yes, the car really really does need to be looked at by a professional. Not that my little extravagance would have helped much there, anyway, it just feels a mite hypocritical to be whining about money and then talking about spending it in the next breath. ;-)

Though the only expensive thing I bought today was halogen light bulbs for my living room. I have twin fixtures that hold three 50w floods each. One bulb's been out for ages and I never bothered replacing it as it was the one directed at the far end of the room from where I normally am (thereby not missing it much). Another went right before Jeff visited, and then night before last, two more blew when I turned the light on, leaving me with one bulb in each fixture. Well, yeesh, it was frigging dark in here! Fortunately they don't need to be replaced often. Now that I can see in this room again, I can get some stuff done. Assuming I find any motivation, that is. I kind of feel like just curling up with a book and telling the world to fuck off right now.

janajoh, you were partly right - it did have to do with brake fluid. *laughs* The rear wheel cylinder, aka the bit which delivers said fluid to the rear brakes, broke. Which was not, thankfully, insanely expensive to replace. Actually, that repair was slightly less than the non-critical-but-needs-to-be-done one that I was planning to get done now anyway, so while I still have that non-critical repair to do later, I'm not currently out any more money than I'd expected to be. Yay. (Not that it was *cheap* exactly, but I'd already budgeted for it, so...)

Sooooo nice to have my own car back. Though I do like borrowing my mom's in the wintertime as hers has heated seats. :D

Today was, in a word, crap. I was going to say that I can't necessarily point at any one reason why, but there IS one I can name: there's something very wrong with my car. Specifically, with the brakes, or possibly just the pedal and some other weirdness. I kind of hope it *is* the brakes because they should still be under warranty; I only replaced the fucking things last fall. Anyway, I'll be taking it in on Wednesday morning and driving like it's the middle of a raging blizzard in the meantime. :-/ (Note: I am still stopping, so nobody freak out. I just have to stomp on the pedal to get it to engage. Which I can do no problem, it's just so not right that I should have to.)

As for why Wednesday, well, the mother leaves tomorrow morning to spend the next week and a bit in Newfoundland with her mom and sisters, so once she's gone, I can use her car freely - but she kinda needs to get to the airport first. I was originally asked if I wanted to go on this female bonding trip and I think my first answer was a facial expression that is better suited to a teenage girl, heh. Followed by a slightly more polite, "No way but thanks for asking." Dude. I love these women but spending ten days living with ALL OF THEM AT THE SAME TIME??? Hell no!

There was more, but I'm cranky. And liable to remain cranky for a long while if these repairs end up costing me a fortune. *grumps*

I came home all rant-y today: somebody else fucked up at work and it took me a while to clean it up, consequently affecting my own work - and it was something that they should have known how to do properly for quite some time now, so that pissed me off even more, because it should not have been necessary at all.

However, I happened to have been struggling with a rather intense scene which is now done, along with other bits of this fic, to the tune of 2000+ words added. Woo! I also realised by working on this particular scene that the beginning of the fic is actually way later than I'd been thinking of. That's happening more and more lately, I've noticed. I think that "the first chapter is really just practice" thing is finally kicking into full awareness, lol. Anyway, I'm right pleased with all that.

I'd kind of like to keep working on it tonight, but I really need to go to bed soon. Gotta pick up my car in the morning. I had my mom's today, which is always weird. And vaguely annoying because her stereo is better than mine. :P But, I had a lovely Bon Jovi moment. Hee. The radio station she listens to plays 60s-80s music, and I'll Be There for You was on when I got into the car. Ah, nostalgia. Nice bookend to the fact that they released a new album today, too.

That's all I got, folks. I skimmed a lot today so didn't comment much and may have missed stuff. ♥ to y'all, anyway. :-)

ETA: Forgot - this is a gorgeous pic of a hummingbird drinking from a flower in Codroy Valley, Newfoundland. The photographer is Marg Gale. (Yeah, yeah, shamelessly hotlinked, I know. :P)

Daughter of ETA: The 'mood' and 'music' tags are right beside each other for this one. I rather like that. :D

(^ from The Waitress ~ Tori Amos. Wonderfully fucked up song.)

I take back the ranting at the universe. When they hoisted my car this morning to do the tires, the front passenger side spring just fell out, rusted through. You know, that kinda holds that part of the car together?? It was apparently faulty and I was supposed to have gotten a parts recall letter from Ford, but had not received such. And had it fallen out while I was on the highway, it could have caused a fatal accident. o.O

Having to pay for new tires is not looking so bad anymore!!!

I forget what else I wanted to say now. Being confronted with mortality has a tendency to erase thought. lol