Der Feuervogel aufersteht.

When's the last time I wrote about what I've been doing, other than writing? Uh, can't recall. April 10, maybe?

Let's see. Sunday the 11th I went to the park to practice San Shou with my tai chi school, then went to UNC for the anime club's spring picnic/ohanami. That was fun, aside from there being no fucking parking on campus diediedie.

I did the usual weekday stuff during the week, then Friday I went to Charlotte to stay closer to where I was going for a writers conference. The conference itself was OK; it was only $20 so even if the session I went to in the morning was billed as a workshop but was more of a lecture on what to do than how to do and there were so goddamn many Christian-interest writers there, it wasn't a huge waste.

The afternoon session I went to was David Drake talking about how he writes - his process, that sort of thing - and taking questions. It was interesting, and he's really intense. He told me I shouldn't read Hammer's Slammers, because it would disturb me (eh?) because he wrote them after he got back from Vietnam and they were a form of therapy. Now, I like a good, realistic, gritty war story, so I'll see how that goes. I might have time to start reading again soon.

Saturday evening, since I was in the process of flipping out about that volcano in Iceland, after I got home, I texted my ex-coworker and we went out to the bar in Hillsborough. (There's just the one, actually.) Then I tipsy-posted when I got home.

Sunday I went to a Turkish festival out at the fairgrounds. It was OK; there was Turkish coffee, and for an extra $5 I could get it in a Kütahya porcelain cup to take home. I bought some more helva, and Ben got some chocolate-creme-filled cookies that were pretty damn tasty. There were demonstrations of ebru (video) and folk dances (these guys were pretty amazing).

Monday I went out to Greensboro to meet xjenavivex and J, to talk about starting a regional genre writers group, for things like networking, promotion, support, etc. The coffee machine at the Borders was broken, wtf. It was fun, and we're going to work on how to make it bigger & better. And maybe if we get enough interest, we can do a writers retreat out at the Outer Banks in like January when it's cheap(ish).

Coming up: Saturday I'm going to a conference/CME event on pain, addiction, and the law (from 7:30 am to 5 pm...but I'll get close to 8 hours of CE credit for it.) Sunday we have to run another blood glucose curve on Isis, so I'll be home all day. Then next week, I'll be running around and getting my shit together for Germany (clothes, toiletries, hair cut) and trying to see people before I go. L's having her birthday party Friday the 30th, and I may or may not go. I probably won't decide until Friday, actually. My plane leaves at 12 something (I forget if it's noon or like 12:45), so I'll have to be at the airport at like 10:30. We'll see.

Also, thanks to av3rnus I have a lot more German industrial & techno. I need to find time to sit down and make note of which bands I liked enough to want more of, now that I've listened to all 3 CDs like 2 or 3 times each. (The only band whose song I skipped was Einstürzende Neubauten. Sometimes music hits certain frequencies or rhythms or something that makes me either cringe or become anxious. I can't reliably describe what exactly it is, either. EN tripped that button, each time I listened to it. Thankfully, I know how to use the 'next track' button.)

Right, then. Time to get the last few scenes on this novel draft edited/written. I only have 4 left. Which means I'll need a few hours tomorrow to finish it, because I'm good for about 3 scenes a day, if they need extensive reworking, and these, uh, do.

Helped Sarah move. In the process, I smashed my finger between a box and the corner of a filing cabinet. It's swollen and tender, but I iced it for a while (at A's place, during another friend's birthday party) and it's a little better now.

That's pretty much been my day so far. Need to finish this book I'm reading. I only have 110 or so pages left, I think. It's very challenging: it challenges a lot of assumptions I have. One in particular is librul guilt over colonialism. The author says it's condescending and arrogant for people (Americans, mainly, are his target) to assume that everything fucked up in the "Third World" [sic] countries is our fault and we should flagellate ourselves over it.

That deserves its own post, with the relevant passage quoted. But right now, my finger hurts, so I'm going to stop typing.

I had a successful party! Food was eaten, beer was drunk (and all the sweet tea I made; it's quite popular. I make simple syrup for sweetener, but when the sugar is all dissolved, I put a few sprigs of rosemary in then take it off the heat. Once it's cool, remove the rosemary. Also makes a nice soda when mixed 1:4 or 1:5 with seltzer.)

There's leftover beer, unsurprisingly, and about a dozen inch-square blondies, 2 slices of the buttermilk spice cake (OMG, I'm making that again, it was easy and delicious), and about 1/4 of the linzertorte (also delicious, but piping the dough was such a pain in the ass I may never attempt it again.)

I think everybody had fun, even my HS friend K who didn't know anyone and doesn't watch Japanese cartoons or play video games. Now, if we could have turned the conversation toward ST:TNG...

About halfway through, though, my throat started hurting. I don't know if it's because of all the dust I kicked up in the cleaning process or if I'm getting sick. Obviously, I'd prefer the former. I feel somewhat better this morning, after a nice hot shower. I feel like I could use some sudafed, but fucked if I want to put my name in some PATRIOT Act database bullshit. *shakes fist*

And thanks to the time change, it's 11:00 already, and I haven't done much. Stupid time change. Though the towels are in the wash and we have a fasting blood sugar on Isis. We got a new meter, an AccuChek Aviva, whose strips use far less blood than the Comfort Curve. This should make Isis-poking much easier, since we can skip the "hold hot washcloth to ear until it's warm so blood flows better" step.

OK, time to change computers and work on the novel.

As I mentioned yesterday, we went to see tigers in Pittsboro. The Carolina Tiger Rescue (fka Carnivore Preservation Trust) had a bunch of tigers, but also a lot of ocelots and binturongs and caracals and another spotted cat I can't recall. They're mostly from people who thought it was a good idea to have wild animals as pets, then discovered, oshi, this 6-month-old tiger is bigger than me.

Seriously, folks, what the hell?

After that we went to S&T's Soda Shoppe, which has OK food, but it's mostly for the ambience: it's an old pharmacy/soda shoppe, and there's a bunch of old pharmacy stuff there (including a pharmacist's license from the original owner. The board of pharmacy still uses the same font/calligraphy.) The ice cream is pretty darn good, though.

I didn't want to stop hanging out with people (I don't get enough social time!), so we called Nolan, who called Mo, and we all went to Tyler's Taproom. They had dinner, and Ben & I had beers & chips. I tried a Duvel Green (verdict: nice, but not as good as regular Duvel) and a Kasteel Rouge (verdict: cherry juice flavored beer; I like cherry lambics better, but it's worth a try.)

Today we're doing another glucose curve on Isis, who still hates it very much thank you. It's not as bad as last week, so far.

A couple cons have come to my attention: MidSouthCon, just over the TN/MS border from Memphis, my birthday weekend, and RavenCon, in Richmond a month later. MSC is a bit further (and could involve flying, since I-40 is still closed in the mountains after a rockslide in ... October, was it?) and the hotel is pricier, but there's a writers' conference thing, which appeals. RavenCon is closer (Richmond is about 2.5 hours) and the hotel is cheaper, but it appeals to me less. Financial constraints mean that I shouldn't really do both, especially if I want to apply to VP this year (assuming I get in, which I certainly don't.)

On the VP tip, thanks to my recent employment, I haven't made progress on this damned novel worth a damn, which means I have less time to get my application packet together (8000 words, including synopsis, so 6000-ish words of story + synopsis; cover letter iirc) before I go to Germany for a month. If I can do it, I do it; if not, I'll count it a learning experience and get it together for next year. When my finances might look a little better to begin with, since I'm not spending a ton on German school tuition, food, and 2 weeks' vacation in Vienna & Budapest.

So, blah. Now to focus on this writing thing the rest of the day (in between laundry and cat-poking.)

Today I slept in a bit (though I laid in bed awake a while), then did the Saturday morning routine: Cup a Joe for coffee & breakfast, then grocery shopping. We skipped the farmers' market, because we didn't need anything, and, besides, the weather was nasty.

It's the type of day where you want to stay inside where it's warm and dry. It's been in the 40s and rainy all day. It's supposed to get into the 20s overnight. Brr!

I finished reading All the Shah's Men. I'll put a review and some thoughts on my blog later this week. I made a brief review on GoodReads already.

I wrote a couple reviews of books I finished earlier for my blog; they'll be autoposted at specified times.

Inspired by sabeth, I'm going through my hoard of BPAL and deciding what I want to get rid of. I'll possibly post here, then at the forum. Primarily looking to sell; I have more freaking perfume than I know what to do with. (You'll pry War from my cold, dead hands, though.)

Tomorrow, Mo & Nolan are coming over, and I'm making them Turkish coffee. One pot makes a demitasse cup for 3 people (approximately), so that should work out fine, since Ben can't have caffeine. I'll have to break out the antique cups I got from Etsy that I'm terrified to use (because they're 80 years old!), since I only have 2 cups from Ikea.

If you want to hear this year's Bad Sex in Fiction "winner" read out loud in silly voices, go here. NSFW, obviously. Possibly also not safe for your mental health. Or your sex life.

My friend K from high school just moved to Raleigh from Iowa, so I went to hang out with her. I'd invite her over, but she's allergic to cats, and even with Claritin, 5 cats is overwhelming.

So I found her place and we walked out to Glenwood Ave to get some lunch, then talked for a while about stuff. In general. Kinda like in high school, actually, except we're a lot older now.

When we walked back to her place, we walked past Escazú chocolates, which is a local (!) artisan chocolate shop owned by people of South American origin. Possibly Bolivian, but I'm not sure. I got a spicy chocolate ice cream pop, and my god, it was good.

I went back to Chapel Hill for COUP, and I was making fine time...until the traffic stopped. It took me 45 minutes to get about 5 miles. I'd called Ben to tell him I was stuck in traffic and get me some dinner, and he said he'd gone past an accident at Southpoint (276) when he was heading out. I wasn't even to the Durham Freeway yet (279), but knowing it had an end that wasn't really far away helped a lot. Even if my clutch foot got tired.

Good LORD there are a lot of new kids in COUP this year. William thinks it's because the kids who watched Pokemon on TV as kids are college freshmen now. *blinks* Good lord, I'm old. But it was adorably hilarious that one of the new kids asked if attendance at dinner was mandatory! Yes, we will make you join us for food! ... Yeah, no. We're a club made of college students and townies who (get this) watch cartoons for 3 hours once a week. We don't do anything mandatory, but we encourage people to come do social things, like eat food, see nerd movies at local cinemas, play (board & video) games at game night, and come to cons. What better way to make new nerd friends is there?

Speaking of cons, for reasons I am not at liberty to disclose, next year may be my last Animazement. (I already got my badge for 2010.) This would free my Memorial Day weekend to go to Wiscon. Or just stay home; who knows? I don't really *do* anything at the con, except this year I sat in Artists Alley for the better part of 3 days. Didn't sell much. (Though next year is the year of the rabbit, so I could make some adorable bunnies.)

OK, now to go wrangle some words.