Happy Canada Day to all my Canadian friends! And to all fans of Canada. :)

I made some more icons. I wanted one for our 4th of July. I'm so indecisive.





I also made a bunch of icecream icons, but haven't uploaded them yet because I'm still too busy drooling.

Also - how great was So You Think You Can Dance tonight? I love that show, I love the judges, I love the host, I love the performers, and I love the fact it inspires me to dance. Not just to want to dance, but to actually dance.

When I was a little girl one of my favorite Atari 2600 games was Adventure. However, the "dragons" terrified me, and whenever they appeared on the screen I would scream. My mother had to take over the game for me and escape their clutches. I think once I even cried from fear. Later, in my teens I loved Nintendo's Super Mario Brothers - except for the mushroom jumping. TERRIFIED. If I fell off a 'shroom I would scream. I scream a lot. You can ask my friends. Anyway, the point is that I get waaaaaaaay to attached to characters in games. I cannot seem to separate myself from the avatar. So if Mario fell to his death, I thought *I* was falling to my death. If my little cube was being chased by a dragon, I felt like *I* was being chased by a dragon.

Now I've over on Facebook playing an incredibly stupid Vampire game and a Pirate game. I am trying to save up blood to buy some vampire trait so that I can advance to the next stage but people keep fighting me and stealing my blood. Likewise, over on Pirates people keep stealing my treasure which is stopping me from building my tariff station. I'm not as upset about the Pirates thing, because I make a lot of treasure, but that blood is difficult to come by. Plus, it kind of sucks losing over and over. It's seriously hurting my feelings! I really need to stop playing these games for my own sanity. Then again, I am hoping playing will break me of these attachment issues. It really is a miserable personality flaw.

I am a TERRIBLE pirate, by the way. I never attack anyone. I did at first, but when I did I would attack once, and if I won I would pick a different target. So seeing that the same person has attacked me five times in a row strikes me as awful and enrages me. You don't kick someone when they are down!! Except, I suppose if you are a pirate or a vampire you do. (Again I reiterate, me = really bad pirate. *grin*) Now I have completely given up on attacking. I just click the plunder button to build up treasure so I can buy islands and build tree houses. :)





Adventure icons works in process. I want to make a moving one that says "going on an adventure" or something, but I'm too tired. Also, today I'm vaguely depressed.

I'm having trouble picking which one I like best.





Also, my husband looks a lot like Cardinal Fang. Plus, he has fangs. I swear. So I wanted an icon to use for him.

where can i get sharper images to work with?!?!!

Today was a great day! Spent the day with my parents. Mom and I went shopping (Morning Ms. Gorilla! Been shopping? No! I been shopping!) then we met up with dad and watched another Midsommer Mystery.

Home again in time to grab dinner before the gang showed up to watch the funny on YouTube and also a Peter Davidson episode of Doctor Who (Black Orchid). Then, I could finally reveal the new pinball machine Monkeys found on eBay for a ridiculously low price. DOCTOR WHO. Remember the pictures from way long ago our last trip to Wisconsin? (http://madladyred.livejournal.com/114497.html) We now have that machine, too! I will have to take pictures of *our* game, but for now that's a link to what ours looks like. I still suck. Apparently the game is really loud, because several people commented on hearing it from outside when they were walking to our house. Ha! It blares the theme song and there's also a Dalek on top that yells at you as you play.

Oh, and my programming teacher emailed me back answering my question regarding solving some whacked out logic question. Basically I was asking her to look at one of my solutions to make sure I was doing this right because I was trying to figure it out from the book without having seen anything like this before. I was very relieved when she confirmed my answer, because there were twenty or so questions in that vein. I solved 19 of them before thinking - maybe I should ask her about these?

Tomorrow will be a busy day as well. We're having brunch with James from the podcast. Monkeys and I baked a brownie for the Machintosh's 25th birthday, so I'm going to bring James and his wife half the brownie. I'm not being nice, I just don't want the calories. I really want the brownie to myself.

I'm so very tired right now! Not as tired maybe as V, but I am looking forward to bed. Inspired by this, some icons. Not great, but I'm tired.

I'm hungry. I am not a sexy shoeless god of war. I'm a hungry clueless goddess of grilled cheese.

Mostly bases.


EDIT - I am now full of popcorn. I mean *really* full of popcorn. I'm not sure that it's healthy to eat that much popcorn at once, actually. I believe the intention was such that people are supposed to share the bag of microwave popcorn. I did not.

Just cuz I loved this picture. Poor kitty. The close up is easier to see. I know it's hard to see the full picture; I only did the full shots because it's such an adorable picture that I didn't have the heart to crop it. The others are bases to do with as you will should you feel the urge.



EDIT - more icons.

I'm breaking this up into two bits. This is just a quick review of the lecture portion of class last night. We also watched another amazing and thought provoking video by Father Hines, which I will post about maybe tomorrow.

I had heard of Advent, but honestly had no clue what it was about, so as we are now in the Season of Advent I'm glad that was this week's topic. She said that over the years Advent has had different perspectives. (She made a point to use “perspectives” and not “meanings” with the idea that the meaning of the season has not changed, just the way we understand that meaning.) In the past, Advent was a time of penitence similar to Lent, but over time it changed more to a time of joyful waiting. Still, you are supposed to be reflective and use this period as a time to get right with God before his birth so that you’ll be in a better place for receiving him when he comes. (That’s why Purple, the color for penance, is still the color of Advent.) During Advent we present day await the second coming of Christ and, even though it happened in the past, we retroactively await the birth of Christ. So we kind of exist outside of time. I find this concept fascinating and just plain cool.

Other than that, she didn’t say much! Most of the class was the video. I did have a clicky-click moment when she was trying to explain “penance” to a young man in the class. She said it was kind of like getting and staying right with God and suddenly my mind flashed to Weight Watchers. It’s been a struggle for me to get and stay right with healthy nutrition. I have made sacrifices and I have backslid. Also, it’s a commitment I have made for life (I hope! It’s a daily struggle…) and I made that commitment in order to have a longer and better life. It struck me that this whole WW gig is just a physical representation of the spiritual idea of penance. If I can do WW for my physical body, then I can do this for my soul.

( Anyway, on a waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more selfish note... )

Okay, that's it for now. It's raining. I love the sound of raindrops! I need a rain icon.

OH and I made some nativity icons. They aren't great, but they aren't terrible.

Just messing around. I'm trying to make a tap dance icon to use.






Seriously, I really need to do some laundry. I have dishes to take out of the dishwasher and more dishes to put in the dishwasher. Stuff to get ready for work tomorrow. I need to practice for class. Hmmmmm.
Also, bedroom = total wreck.

Yeah, I was productive. *sigh*






I had meant to bake something for catechism tomorrow night. Didn't do that either.

Cool article about Steampunk I saw on both the Abney Park journal and Voltaire's myspace page.

At least I got the laundry done and most of the living room cleaned up. I also cooked dinner for me and an hour later cooked dinner for Monkeys and talked to a friend I hadn't seen for waaay to long.

Hey - For those of you who have seen the new Batman movie ( I have a question )

Anyway, for the last few weeks I've seen a bunch of these types of icons. When Raven made one, too, I decided to jump on the bandwagon. Wheeee!



EDIT - BTW, Alan Cumming hosts Mystery! now :) :) :) Yippie!

Our power was out for about four or five hours today. Thankfully it was coolish outside because of the overcast skies or the flooding (it went back and forth between the two) and the wind blowing helped to keep the temperature down, as well, so even though we had no A/C it never got hot in the house. At one point the wind was so wild that I got really afraid and stood in the hall for a little bit. My husband, of course, went outside to watch the trees. After being assured it wasn't a tornado I gave up and went outside, too. It was really pretty.

I finished Number: the language of science ... , and while I did enjoy it, it certainly got a bit above me mathematically. Still, I quite liked most of it. My favorite parts were the idea of number sense, Gematria, and the many controversies and arguments as mathematics grew and defined itself. If only I knew how to do superscripts; I would love to share my favorite section from the book. I'm going to try... There is a formula: e/\i*pi + 1 = 0 that has actual mathematical use but was loved metaphysically because it can be called the mystic union "in which arithmetic was represented by 0 and 1, algebra by the symbol i, geometry by pi, and analysis by the transcendental e." All that math and I liked the crazy mystic symbology. Oh, also loved that in the "further reading" section the authors recommended Simon Singh. :)

**EDIT:** Down in the commentszarathud posted the equation with superscript as it is supposed to look. Yay! **end EDIT**

The other day I made a bunch of St Michael the Archangel icons. I want to make a nice cross and a nice nativity scene, too. ( the actual artwork were so beautiful )
But I wanted to try anyway.

And my reunion was pretty cool. I didn't see the people I most wanted to see; with the exception of two people, my best friends from high school didn't attended. But I did see three people I really enjoyed in classes even if we didn't hang out outside of school. I was really excited to see them. I also saw a couple I didn't know well in school but were friends with someone I dated in college, so I got to catch up with them. I got to see someone I was in college classes, and we swapped email addresses so I'm hoping to keep in touch with her. Best of all, I got to get better acquainted with someone I knew but was more friends with my friends than with me. I wish I had known him better in high school; he was really cool. He married someone who graduated two years before me so there was lots of catching up. He and Monkeys hit it off, I think, which was really nice. Anyway, the gatherings were nice but way too noisy, I was still too shy to converse with people, and I wish I had been braver and able to talk to the slightly familiar faces. Still, I'm glad we went. I'm even more glad that eight of us cut out early and went to Basken Robbins for ice cream and easier conversation!

I made a new icon.

Over on my child_of_orion journal I have some space icons and one of them is of the shuttle. So I posted this over there. Then I decided to improve my shuttle icon and liked it so much I wanted it over here on MLR so that I could use it more often.

( post from child_of_orion )

In more cheerful news, I also made a bunch of Kids in the Hall icons yesterday that I haven't decided if they are good enough to share or not.

Also, in more spacey news didja see they are doing another HD documentary with the help of Ron Howard about the moon?!? Yay! Not that I have HD. But still, it's lovely.

EDIT:
High Flight
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air....
Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark nor even eagle flew—
And, while with silent lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
--Gillespie Magee

I'm supposed to be cleaning the house...



EDIT: added a few more...







I named my lobster Dexter. I'm very proud of this.

Which one of these affen would you schlag?

Do you watch Dexter??? Because they just did a scene where he and another cop were examining blood spatter on the wall at a murder scene AND discussing what they saw in the images. Dexter pointed out a lobster and his coworker asked what was with him always seeing crustaceans.

Oh, and that lobster - IT WAS THERE. You could totally see the claws.


( Sorry about my sudden disappearance last night )

AND I made some BNL icons the other day - saw a picture of Ed looking in a mirror and it made me feel all Jabberwockalicious...

That's all I wanted to say. Watching a PBS documentary on her right now. I am not a history buff, though many of my friends are, so I'm a little ashamed to say other than an appearance in the movie Annie, many brilliant quotes I've read on a few web pages/magnets/mugs, and a very rudimentary knowledge of American History from 10th grade (they were cousins, she was outspoken, she was not traditionally attractive) I didn't know very much about her.

They've covered their early years & Roosevelt's affair then her ascension into politics and efforts to help with poverty and racism. Apparently in her younger days she was very insecure. They also discussed her energy and how it could have been partly induced by battling depression. Now they are talking about her huge FBI file! Over 3000 pages. And Hoover hated her. Ah, now onto her travels visiting soldiers and I'm starting to tear up so I guess I'll shove off. I am amazed by people who rise up and do beautiful things on a national or global scale when I barely manage to make a difference in my neighborhood.

Do what you feel in your heart to be right - for you'll be criticized anyway. You'll be damned if you do, and damned if you don't.

I'm going to have to pick up a biography on her I guess.

Sarah & Kwix are here!!!!!






EDIT - if anyone happens to want one of these as a .psd to write on them or whatnot I can provide. I love the poppy one.

Yoinked from nqn (haha, I, too, have loads of icons! Sorry!!).

1.Reply to this post, and I will pick three of your icons.
2. Make a post (including the meme info) and talk about the icons I chose.
3. Other people can then comment to you and make their own posts.
4. This will create a never-ending cycle of icon squee. Whoo!






In Charge of the Monkey. . A few years ago I had a dream about reddheaded and disbandedtoastr. In my dream Redd’s husband had searched the state over for the perfect barn for their dream wedding and he was showing it to her, Toaster, and me so we could see it. We were discussing wedding setup, running through the rehearsal, decorating etc. and Redd turned to me and said something like “Are you okay about not being one of the bridesmaids” and I cheerily replied “that’s okay! You put me in charge of the monkey!” Then I picked up the reigns of one of the horses, helped the monkey to get on its back, and started putting the monkey through his paces for riding circles inside the barn during that part of the ceremony. So ever since that dream there’s been a running joke between the three of us that I’m in charge of the monkeys and I get cool monkey-themed presents every Christmas.


Banana Jr is Oliver Wendell Holmes’s computer from Bloom County. I’ve loved Bloom County since the 80’s. I married a Mac fundamentalist and since learned the Banana Jr was a play on Apple Computers so I made that icon to do posts about my husband, his podcast, and computer stuff in general. I’m really proud of that one because it was the first time I used the lasso tool and cut around things and moved the position of images to actually manipulate a photo instead of just crop it.


Soot Sprites Spirited Away is my favorite Hayao Miyazaki movie (though everything I’ve seen by him I have loved). In addition to being a great story it is visually beautiful; I would have a million icons from that movie if I could. But my favorite part of the movie was the soot sprites that carried the coal into the furnace for the spider guy so that he could heat the bath water. They are so cute I wish I could have a house full of them!! That image is when he was throwing what looked like candy sprinkles down to them on their lunch break. That’s the second version of that particular icon; I redid it to make the candy look brighter using some color alteration tool in Photoshop. We have a lot of parties and gatherings at our house so I wanted a “party” icon. I have a non-text version of it, too, and also one that says “Sprites” on my other account plus I have a Soot Sprites icon of them throwing coal into the fire for rough days at work.

More Big Bang Theory bases of various clarities blah blah blah I'm bored.










My alarm clock is broken. I was almost late for work today. And I was still the 4th person in the building! LOL! I'm actually starting to do my new job now - which is really exciting even though no one has a clue as to what I should be doing. The college is starting up two bachelor's programs, neither of which are fully operational or even fully conceived at this point though they are both starting up in August! Whoot! But I am the admissions and records person for the three programs (business, nursing & education) so I'm just making up stuff for now - like admisisons letters and filing systems and excel spreadsheets for tracking students based on my guessing what should be tracked. It's interesting. And everything I've submitted has gotten approved and even some praise so I'm very happy. Plus, I got a really nice thank you email from a student today regarding my help with admissions. And I get to order supplies. I love office supplies. Still, I'm applying for a new position at work. I had been waiting and waiting for this one to come out - advisor for the new bachelors in education!!! - but the position that was released today is dramatically different from the one I was expecting. Apparently they had to add a bunch of extra stuff to it because (if I'm understanding the rumur mill correctly) when the State came back with their approval they included more reports and requirements and strings than anyone realized when they dreamed up the program. Alas! I'm going to try for it anyway. So wish me luck! I love school :)

Oh, and pottery is going really well, too!! Yay! I'm going to raku some pots next Tuesday. Tomorrow I'm buying some shredded glass to melt in some designs. So yay!