OK, so I've been bad about writing here... I have an excuse, several of them in fact.
First Summer Session class. It's highly condenced, trying to get a full semesgter into just 5 weeks is a bit of a trick. But mostly it's ungodly amounts of reading due each class period. For example, in these 5 weeks we are expected to read a whole text book and three other books on the side. Then we have to do the reading to write a research paper. It's a lot of work. It's been interesting though. So far I've read most of the text book and haven't been bored out of my mind. I've actually enjoyed Amazing Grace by Jonothan Kozol and Nickle and Dimed (On Not Getting By in America) by Barbara Ehrenreich. I'm still working on School Girls.
Then there is my jewery. I got a comission for a pocket watch, so I had to work on that some. Then tomorrow there is a visual arts thing going on at FUS. The organizer specifically asked me to bring some of my jewelry, especially a headdress. Well that just gave me an excuse to try the new spiderweb design I've been thinking of. It's almost done and looking really good. I just wish that I'd found a spider charm to go on it. Maybe by the time I take it to Convergence I will find something.
And then of course, we have Convergence coming up. I am scheduled for three panels and a reading (though I don't know when the reading is going to be just yet. I'm going to be reading my story "Vengence" so I've had to start practicing. This is my first public reading, but I'm trying not to think about that so that I won't get too nervous. I'm also going to try to get my jewelry in the art show, but the people at the art show have been less than forthcoming with responces to my questions about that.
So anyway, that's what I've been up to.
The other day, Sweetie wasn't feel too well, so it was up to me to make dinner. For myself I made cheese soup, but all Sweetie wanted was a peanut butter sandwich. So I pulled out the peanut butter jar and discovered it was almost empty. But with enough effort I was able to extract enough peanut butter to make one last sandwich.
Then cam the decision of what to do with the jar. It's just too useful to throw away, but there was still peanut butter in it. I could have filled it with water and let it soak for a couple of days then scrubbed it out, but that takes work. And then it hit me. The dog likes peanut butter.
I looked at the jar. Then at the dog. Then back at the jar. Then at the dog again who was now looking back at me with hope in his eyes. And I thought there's really not that much peanut butter in here and it will keep him occupied for a while. Then we can just run the jar through the dishwasher to sanitize it before relabeling it.
So with great fanfair (ok I said "sit... stay") I set the jar on the floor and walked away. At first Uno didn't know what to do. Did I really just leave the peanut butter jar on the floor where he could get it? Was he going to get in trouble for touching it? But it smells so peanut buttery. And finally he stuck out his toung and tasted it.
Two hours later I was sitting at the computer playing sims and I became aware of a strange noise. I turned around to find Uno, nose fully planted in the peanut butter jar, bumping into the bookcase. It seems his nose isn't quite long enough to reach all the way to the bottom of the jar. Besides, the jar had a nasty habbit of trying to get away. But he'd discovered the art of cornering the jar so that he could stick his toung out and almost reach the bottom.
Eventually he gave up on it that night and left the jar by the bookcase. The next morning however, I came downstairs to find the jar wedged under the first stair. Over the next couple of days, that jar would move when we weren't looking. And every time it moved, it had less peanut butter in it. It is currently sitting at the corner of the counch with just a tiny layer of peanut butter at the bottom.
I've always known that the cheepest toys are often the best (like all the boxes that they gifts come in at Christmas). And now I know that it holds true for dogs as well as kids.
So last night was our regularly scheduled mass halucination night. Our friends came over and we had dinner, discussed the goings on of our Sims and then deliberately left this world behind as we sank deep into Dungeons and Dragons (Sweetie-style).
Sweetie has an interesting style for those who aren't set on hack and slash. We have spent numerous sessions without needing to roll the dice more than about twice. You see, for this group, it's all about the characterization. And what a group of characters we've got. 3 brownies who are genetically induced to be obsessive compulsive about cleaning, a celestial who isn't so keen on the idea that he's expected to save the world, a Wildchild (elf/nyad hybrid) and an Aranian (shape-changing giant spider).
Last night's adventure was to find The Magus that my character's father had recomended as a good source for info (and maybe a magic item or 2) to help us get ready for the end battle with the evil god. Well we found him, that wasn't so hard - we have a magic item that will show us the direction to anything that we think of. Problems were getting past his guard vine and waking him up. We bribed out way past the vine by cleaning it's leaves and giving it a bit of healing. Then the brownies had to pass through a house that hadn't been cleaned in close to 3 months. They didn't make it, they cleaned. That slowed things down just a bit.
By the time we made it into the room where The Magus was sleeping, we had thuroghly justified cleaning everything to ourselves. So when he proved difficult to wake, we cleaned him too. Yup, that's right, we gave The Magus a sponge bath in our fantasy role playing game. He didn't wake up during the sponge bath. Finally we decided there was nothing more to do but poke him with our sleep antidote (all brownies dip their weapons in sleep, so in case of error we also carry the antidote). That woke him up.
Then the real fun began - trying to explain to this old guy why he should help us without giving away too much info about who and what we were (we're being tracked by the evil people already). So in the course of the following conversation we discovered that The Magus is actually a Silver Dragon. Not only that, but he was alive at the time of the last war for the world.
Then the real world intruded again and we discovered how tired we were. So we hit "pause" on the fantasy and agreed to do it again in a couple of weeks.
And people wonder why I'm so weird.
Yea for a long weekend! We spent most of it doing pretty much nothing (unless you count playing Sims as something). When we weren't doing nothing, we went down to Hidden Falls for a picnic.
We took the puppy and met up with some friends. Everybody brought their own grillables and we brought the grill (but forgot the charcoal which was remedied by a quick trip to the local grocery store). Uno ate enough to actually get full - he stopped begging.
After food we wandered up to see the fire rings and the falls. Unfortunately we gave a lot of people that wonderful idea and were followed up the hidden path by several families. So much for the solitude. All in all it was a lovely day. Not too warm, not too cold, just a few cotton ball clouds in the sky to trigger our imaginations.
When we got home, we resumed doing nothing.