It Started with a Journal

There's a Woot off going on right now, and I've purchased stainless steel water bottles and a vacuum sealer (and missed out on 2 other things that sold out too quickly). WHY are there so many irresistible ways to spend money?! Anyway, I've been wanting a vacuum sealer for awhile. It seems like such a handy item to have. Especially for someone like me, who tends to buy a lot of stuff that I freeze for later use, then totally forget about it. >.>

I'm reading this book called Peony in Love by Lisa See. I actually started it back in December while at Jade's, and recently picked it up again. See wrote Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, which I loved and can't recommend enough. I don't feel the same way about this book, but I keep reading it because it's beautifully written and I love the cultural stuff. But the protagonist is so stupid and annoying.

I've been watching Carnivale. It took me awhile to get into it, and I still am not at the point of reccing it, but it's caught my interest enough to keep going, at least. It was canceled after two seasons and each season only has 12 episodes, so it's not a huge commitment.

Have I ever mentioned that you guys needs to watch Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles? It's so, so good. Unfortunately it was too expensive to produce so they canceled it after two seasons (I'm sensing a theme...), and it ended in a place where you're dying to know what happens next, but for all that, still worth it. One of the few friends I knew exclusively from WoW that I keep in touch with started it at my recommendation, and he loved it. It's for girls and guys alike!

Music wise, I have a few recs for y'all. Lately I've been wanting to listen to nothing but dance pop, something lacking in substance and has a constant, catchy beat. <g> I've had to turn to K-pop to find the best of what I'm looking for. :D

- Abracadabra by Brown Eyed Girls is seriously BADASS. If you're in a place where you can play some music, click on that link and crank it up loud. It doesn't matter that half of it is spoken in a language I can't understand, because with dance music the beat's what's important, it's not like any of it's conveying anything of significance anyway, lol.

- Can't Nobody by 2NE1 is also quite awesome.

I also read a positive review of Britney Spears's latest album Femme Fatale on Slate, so it made me want to check it out.

- Hold It Against Me is the first single from the album, and I like it OK, but it's not my favorite

- Inside Out is probably the one I dig most

- Though Till the World Ends is also pretty awesome

- (Drop Dead) Beautiful has that dance beat I've been enamored of

- I also like Criminal, which is about as ballady as this album gets

I've been bad about keeping up with my AeroGarden progress on LJ.

( Week 3 )

( Week 4 )

Day by day it doesn't seem like much growth happens, but when you look at the pics it's amazing, the difference.

( Brief thoughts on Fringe, through the first seven-ish eps. )

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Dinner with J. Friday night was lovely. We never seem to run out of things to talk about, and at the end it's like, argh, I had 5 other things to tell her! Pair was cute, but the food left something to be desired. The gougeres were terrible and the mussels were way overcooked. They have nothing on The Stone House.

The dinner party last night was really fun. I generally like every member of my team on a personal level; it's just that our work styles sometimes clash.

My attempt at appetizers didn't quite go the way I wanted. ( My woe and other party details. )

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I've just put in a big Amazon order for the Buffy S8 and Angel S6 volumes that I haven't been keeping up with. I'll need to reread everything from the beginning because I suspect it's not going to make any sense if I don't! One thing I regret from Comic Con is that one of the Buffy artists was there signing comics and I didn't even think about bringing mine. D'oh!

I've been rereading the Hot Gimmick manga, and I'm kind of blown away by how adult themed it is. It was the very first manga I ever read, so I just kind of figured they were all like that.

Next on the manga front I'm going to be reading Skip Beat!, which I may or may not actually get into. Apparently it was going to be made into a TW serial called "Extravagant Challenge" starring Ariel Lin, but for some reason it got shelved. I have all 22 volumes except for 2-4 from the library.

It is so ridiculous that you can't put holds on holds. What that means is that you often get things out of order, depending on when your turn comes up, or else you have to keep a separate list of what you want, rather than being able to conveniently use the library system to keep track of it. Which even then might be doable, except if you want things that are high in demand, because then it behooves you to get on the waiting list asap. If you did it one at a time, it could be months in between! I suspect this also delays people getting books, because as there's no late charges, people probably just keep the later books until they get the earlier ones, then read all at once. The good news is that I wrote to Sno-Isle about it, and the response was that they are going to institute the feature I want in the April timeframe. Yay!

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I saw this on rainpuddle13's LJ and had to share because it is so creepy and COOL! Zombie ants! For real! The fungus that kills the ants takes control of their tiny ant brains and guides them to the ideal location for the fungus's growth. Seriously awesome. I mean, human zombie stories are all so lame and pointless -- all they do is kill with no real purpose.

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I've had the AeroGarden for 1 week now, and 5/7 herbs have sprouted. It's even possible the other two herbs have sprouted as well, but they're in the back, the light's in the way, and I can't really tell. The thyme is ahead of schedule; I could see little sprouts at 4 days and it was supposed to take a minimum of 7 days. I think I'm going to try and take pictures every week to keep a visual record of the growth!

( First 2 pictures! )