It Started with a Journal

Happy day-before-U.S.-T-Day!

I am so tired. Up late last night and then had to wake up early, bleh. And why was I up late? Playing WoW. That's right, I've gone back to the dark side. S. is constantly raiding and they were looking for a healer and I still have friends in the guild, so why not? I'm just going to take it far less seriously this time and also accept no positions of responsibility. That's really what ruined it for me last time. Another thing that's kind of fun is that I'm a disc priest now. :D I've never healed with a full disc spec, usually I went holy or holy/disc. It's taking some getting used to, but I actually like it. It's not THAT different from holy, though disc is less useful as a direct raid healer (it's more of a damage mitigator). Very good single target healer though (so good for MT, though possibly not as good as a holy pally, damn their plate-wearing hides). The biggest thing I'll have to get used to is that meters mean exactly squat for me now. So much of my usefulness comes in the form of, as I said, mitigation, so until meters start counting absorption rates I'll always be lowest on the healing meters. I'm fine w/ that as long as the guild realizes that, but it seems unlikely. People are and always will be obsessed with meters. Still, I'm having to think about my gear very differently than I did before. I used to stack spirit like crazy and now I wouldn't spit on it if it were on fire.

When my mom was here visiting she mentioned that she thought my hair was too dry. I was like, really? I mean, it's not brittle or anything, but it certainly isn't all satiny and silky like those models in shampoo commercials. She was like, yes, sometimes what I'll do is put olive oil in my hair, leave it on for 15-20 minutes, then shampoo and rinse like normal. So last night I tried it, thinking my hair was going to be awesome. It wasn't. It was the opposite of awesome. It was greasy and disgusting, even after shampooing. I knew there was something wrong when I was blow drying it and it still looked wet even way after it would normally have been dry... and that's because it WAS dry, it was just greasy! Ugh. Luckily after washing it again this morning my hair's back to normal. Though that could be because I made sure to use Big (by Lush), which is really good about removing oily deposits. I should probably use that less than I do because using it constantly is probably very harsh on my hair, which is probably what made my mom make the remark about my hair being dry in the first place.

My car's still in the shop. With the Thanksgiving break coming up it's probably not going to be done until mid to late next week. Sigh. I really, really miss my car. It's even less now that I miss the luxuries as it is that I miss something that's MINE, that has all my little knick knack stuff in it, that I don't have to think of as temporary, etc. One good piece of news (though, only relatively -- it's not as good as, say, not having been rear ended in the first place)... early on, I insisted that I wanted brand-new OEM parts (as in, genuine Lexus parts. They hit a car that had that, and were not going to get away with replacing with generic parts). Everything was agreed to except the bumper, in which they wanted to use a reconditioned part (but which was a Lexus part) rather than a new one. After the whole nightmare with the rental (oh yeah, I need to share the letter I wrote), I really didn't want to have to fight with Farmers about the stupid bumper, and yet I felt aggrieved. I mean, the accident was their fault, the difference between a new bumper and the reconditioned one was $150, and on a $6,000+ repair you want to quibble about $150?! Screw you. The auto body shop (which has been great) said that what they could do was to order the reconditioned part, try to find something wrong with it, and then say that they couldn't use it because of XYZ reason. Since I was/am sick of dealing with all this crap I said that was fine, because a bumper is a bumper, not an engine. Anyway, apparently the reconditioned part came and there *was* something wrong with it, like the tabs didn't fit my car or something, so the auto body shop ordered a brand-new OEM one for me like I had originally wanted. So HA, stupid insurance company.

I finally had my blood tested again, and while my cholesterol wasn't good, it wasn't as bad as I was expecting, either. Yay for that. I can't remember the specific numbers for each thing, but basically my LDL was a bit elevated, but my HDL was OK so that helped a bit. What's not so good is that apparently my thyroid was up again. This happened last year and when I got retested it was back down to normal... now it's up and I'm going to be tested again in 3 months and if it's still up my doctor's going to refer me to an endocrinologist. :/ Why is my body doing this to me, why. But speaking of my doctor, apparently she was selected by Seattle magazine as one of the 2009 doctors of the year! Coolness. Now I have to give a shout out to romanticalgirl for referring me to her. :D

I've been playing Professor Layton and the Curious Village on my DS. I loves me some puzzles! Some of them drive me inSANE though.

Going to have a very quiet Thanksgiving (as I do every year ... I hate flying so I can't imagine flying home for the holiday when I'm going to be going again in December). It's just going to be me, my cousin, and her 6-month-old baby. She didn't want to travel with him, so her husband/daughters are going to his family gathering w/o them. We're ordering one of those prepared meals from Whole Foods, which was (imho) hideously expensive, but neither of us could face the thought of cooking a big Tday meal just for the two of us.

Finally, I snagged a plane ticket for my December vacation for like, the best price ever. Seriously the best price I've ever paid to travel to SoCal -- $59/one way for a nonstop flight on Alaska. Usually it's more than double that. Of course, I'll have Talis with me so that's not all I'll have to pay. His flight in the cargo hold costs $100/one way, which is seriously highway robbery since it's not like he gets any special treatment and is basically treated like a piece of luggage. Grrrr airlines. Still, it's cheaper than boarding him or shipping him off separately.

Oh -- because I said I'd post this. The letter I wrote to Enterprise/the story of how they wronged me. It's really super long though, so if you're not interested in reading a bunch of ranting/complaining, do not click. ( Bad, Enterprise! Bad! )

How you know when you need to lose weight: Your gardener, who sees you seldom enough that any changes in your physical appearance garners attention, says that you look like you've gained weight. >< He was quick to be all, "You look prettier with meat on your bones!" But I know the truth. OK. Losing weight was one of my new year's resolutions, which I promptly did nothing about. But when you've gained so much weight that it spurs spontaneous comments, it's time to face reality, and the scale, once more. I don't want to waste food so I'll finish what I have in the fridge, but I am going to be super careful about buying or making anything else. I'm also going to have to turn on my treadmill again. Assuming the lack of use in the last 6 months hasn't caused it to stop working entirely. I may also have to quit Daring Bakers, because having to make a whole big dessert every month is not going to help matters.

SIGH. Going on a diet when you haven't been on one in a long while is hard, because it's like a whole lifestyle change. You also have to start shrinking your stomach, which is the hardest part in the first phase, so that eating less still fills you. But in those early stages your stomach SO isn't filled, and those hunger pangs can be overwhelming!

I was playing WoW last night, and usually I ignore the Trade channel. But this really annoyed me. ( I know. I shouldn't read Trade. )

Not much update on the housing front. My dad is starting to drive me crazy again with his pedantic, overly thorough, analytical/critical assessments. In his mind, you can't do enough research. You have to do as much research as possible, and then when you've exhausted your avenues, you find new avenues to research some more. It makes me INSANE. I'm not against caution, but I am against caution to the point of paralyzation. In my view this is an opportunity, and with his tortoise-like ways it may just pass me by. Anyway, his latest thing is that he thinks a casita should be a top-level requirement. A casita is a separate detached room that is inaccessible from the main house that has its own bathroom and therefore can function as a living space on its own. He's looking at all the different building areas that he remembers having a casita option back in the day. We have seen ONE house so far that's had a casita. And now it's a requirement?! *pulls hair*

Going to Crush with corianderstem tonight. Yay! I forgot my camera. Boo.

Edit: Dollhouse's 6th ep is this Friday. This is supposedly when Joss wrested control back. Here's an interview he did regarding the episode and the show in general.

WoW news:

I opened up my cracked egg last night and guess what was inside? That's right, [Reins of the Green Proto-Drake]! Woot. It took me ... I think 6 eggs to get. Which isn't that many, really. Now I just need the proto-drake pet and then I can switch to the Frenzyheart. If I don't get it after a couple more eggs, I may just buy it for 500g or whatever and switch anyway.

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I am thrilled to report that I have found a great sushi place in Lynnwood. It was quite brave of me to try a new restaurant after the last disastrous attempt (Nara Japanese Restaurant in Redmond -- NEVER GO THERE), but I didn't want that experience to forever keep me from trying new places. I wanted something close to home, and this place had gotten decent reviews on Yelp. So I decided to give it a go.

( Details! )

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Update on jade_okelani and Mal: I spoke with her last night, and she was, indeed, exhausted from taking care of Mal and worrying about him. His seizures haven't stopped, and it seems that it's harder and harder for him to recover from them. Her family was frantically trying to call around to various vets/hospitals to see if the seizures can be treated in any way -- because except for them, he's fine. (I know, that sounds odd, but -- it's true.) Looks like she may have finally found a place that's willing to treat the seizures as seizures, rather than just as byproduct of his heart condition that they can't do anything about. When he was going through this in December, it took about this amount of time to get back to a point when he stopped having them, so hopefully even if the new place can't do anything for him, it'll follow the same course as before and will simply stop after this on its own, at least for awhile. Send your good thoughts her way and keep your fingers crossed!

OK, who else caught the premiere of Dollhouse? If you missed it, it's currently on Hulu (I don't know how long it's going to be up). ( My thoughts. )

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Strange or not?

I have a coworker who I'm friendly with. (Grammar nazis -- is "who" or "whom" correct in that sentence? I've gone over and over it in my head to the point where now it's meaningless, and I'm second guessing myself re: the object and subject, etc. etc.) She's Asian, was born in Singapore, lived in Korea for a bit, but lived for many years in New Zealand and moved here from there. She misses Asian food, so we try to have lunch once a week and I take her to the best Asian places I know (which aren't many). This includes Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. We've also talked about cooking, and last time we had lunch she was like, "Oh, I'll have to invite you over for a meal sometime! I can experiment on you." And I said sincerely that I would enjoy that -- because I love home cooking, and finding good recipes, and stuff like that.

So the other day, she pings me at work and says that she made some mint pea and ham soup, and wanted me to try it. So I gamely went over, and she was microwaving some obviously frozen soup, and from the discussion we had about it, I found out that this was soup she had made not recently, but had frozen to eat at a later time. Which is fine for stuff you make yourself or for your family, but to offer someone else that food? I thought it was a little bizarre, but I ate some of the soup anyway, which was fine (even though I'm not a big fan of mint in savory dishes).

THEN, yesterday, she pings me again and says, "I have some food for you." I thought perhaps she had made something and wanted me to try it. So I went over to her office, and she had brought me leftovers from a Korean dish she'd had the night before when she went out with her husband. It was a huge dish (I've been there and had it before) so she couldn't finish, and she said that she ordered it in mind to "share" it with me. I'm sure that the food itself is fine, that she didn't eat off of it (as in, she spooned from the dish onto her own plate), but STILL. Is it just me or is that totally weird? Why would you bring someone your leftovers?? And expect that they'd want it?? Because I'm sure it's fine and because she's my "friend," I don't want to make a big deal of turning it down, and I'll probably eat it ... but seriously. Am I being too sensitive and I'm the weird one?? I just feel like some weird social breach has been made somehow, even though there's nothing technically wrong.

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Buffy S4 has sold. I thought it would be the one to sell last, because who cares about Riley? In sell order so far: 2, 6, 7, 4. I can't believe no one wants the Faith arc, or what I think is possibly my favorite season (5). I'm going to guess that S1 will sell last, if at all, because it is the worst season of the lot (imho).

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So a couple of days ago, my cousin asked if I could be ready to do the dinner this weekend because next weekend was the 40th birthday of a good friend of hers. What could I say but yes? ( Recipe revisit + rambling. )

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akscully shared a link to the most awesome WoW machinima video ever. It's here. It's a lot more meaningful if you know something about WoW lore (I'd be happy to share if anyone wants to know), but even if you don't, you can appreciate the technical awesomeness. It really makes me want to write fanfic about it.

( Embedding it here so I can come back and watch it over and over within the comfort of my own LJ. )

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After reading about so much good food, and finishing Garlic and Sapphires, I felt inspired to be more ambitious about trying new restaurants. That's what led me to Nara Japanese Restaurant in Redmond. BIG MISTAKE. The worst money I have ever spent -- and that is saying something. The food was mediocre, the portions were tiny, it was run by non-Japanese Asian people (which should have made me run out the door immediately), and there was practically no one there for dinner. With tax and tip it ended up costing $24, and I got sick the next morning. Seriously, I would take that entire night back if I could.

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Getting my hair cut at 3pm today. How I hope it won't be a big waste of money like that dinner.

Sometimes, it's good that I'm forced to socialize. After a long, hard day yesterday, the higher ups at work decided to treat a few of us to dinner. ( Talk of food, wine, and dessert. )

When I got home I was ever so slightly inebriated, which probably meant that I shouldn't have signed into WoW. A friend of mine was asking my advice about a gal that he's interested in, which he's been doing for a few days now. Initially I was very encouraging ... but after hearing more and more, I finally got fed up with it last night and the alcohol loosened my tongue (and fingers). I might have said things like, "If she knows how you feel and is still behaving like this, then either a) she returns your feelings, or b) she's leading you on, which makes her a bitch" and "If she has a reputation for leading guys on and you still like her, then I have zero respect for that. Don't talk to me about it anymore, because I have no desire to waste my time analyzing the motives of some cocktease." I thought there were going to be negative repercussions to voicing these extremely unflattering opinions about the object of his affections, but he was actually fine with it. Wow, apparently I can do and say anything, now. Then my head continued to hurt and I went to bed.

I've ordered the latest Georgia Nicholson novel. I wonder if there's any end in sight for these books? As much as I love Georgia and her escapades, I don't want to be strung along indefinitely, especially since there isn't much meat per novel anyway. :/

Saw MI3 last night. Fun action flick, though my favorite of the MI movies is definitely the first. I think it's the most polished, in terms of plot at least, and I've seen it half a dozen times at least. Plus, even though Tom Cruise is off his rocker, it doesn't at all bother me to watch him in movies. Maybe because I never got all, "Oooh Tom CRUISE!" I never expected much from him beyond his movies. :D In fact, I flat-out adore some of them ... Top Gun, A Few Good Men, and that guilty pleasure of guilty pleasures, Cocktail. And then I don't like certain of his other movies, that other people seem to really enjoy, like Jerry Maguire. /shrug

But first we had dinner at the Cheesecake Factory. I get full just remembering it. :/ The best part was Craig's Crazy Carrotcake Cheesecake, which Danielle and I both ordered. It's the best one!

The regular TV season is drawing to a close, which means that my TV season is about to begin! :)) Can't wait for these to come out on DVD: VM S2, Lost S2, Alias S5, House S2 ... and to pick up some new ones, like Grey's Anatomy, and possibly Prison Break or Bones.

Also, I know Aunt Flo is due for a visit, because I've been eating a lot of chocolate, drinking a lot of water, feeling generally bitchy, and wanting very, very much to sleep all the time. She only visits 12 times a year, but it feels like so much more. :/

I'm bored, so here are some WoW pics.

What my main toon currently looks like. I <3 my staff.

How AWESOME does the "Faith" set look?? I am bitter that humans are so pretty. ><

My sleepiness does not bode well for our Gehennas-Rags run tonight. Loooooong freaking night, and this is the first time we've tried doing 8 bosses on this end of things, rather than Luci-Golemagg. Can we do Rags at the end of such a long night? I guess we'll see.

A few of you have reminded me that it's been a really long time since I made a post to LJ. And now that I see the date, and the date of my last (non-WoW) post, I can see that you were right. It's been over a month. I just got out of the groove of posting, and now there's too much and too little to say at the same time.

The most important thing that's happened since my last entry -- and the reason I just haven't been up to updating my journal although it needs to be mentioned -- is that my grandmother passed away. Some of you knew that she was sick. She appeared to be getting better for a time, but, well, she was 90 years old and is now at peace. She was my last living grandparent, and while in later years our communication grew limited, she will be missed.

( Other updates: )

And just because it's fun, I'm turning this into a game. Two things I said in the "other updates" list above are NOT true. Can you guess which they are??? (jade_okelani and akscully are not allowed to play ... they know too many of my dirty secrets.)

Happy birthday to my cousin, who is officially an adult today! Dude, I'm so old. I still remember when I used to change his stinky diapers. O.o

Another day, another online game to suck at. Do any of you play Sudoku? Or at least know what it is? I first heard about it from kstanley when she whipped out a puzzle and showed it to me and Jade when we were in New York. I remembered it the other day when I was bored, and found this place, which provides thousands of free puzzles for you to try and work out. Let me just repeat: I suck at it. My fastest time on the Easy level is almost 14 minutes. It's all, "91% of people were faster than you." *facepalm* But that's okay, I keep playing, and I'm improving. :P Edit: 8 min, 14 sec. Woohoo! Only 65% of people are faster than me! 7 min, 16 sec.; 55% still faster than me. :(

I have been extremely unimpressed with the people at work lately. I seriously wonder sometimes if some people should just never interact with other people. Let's see, what's happened:

1) During a weekly team meeting (general assembly of about 35 people), our GM started to do his goodbye appreciation to a member of our team who's leaving. He's been here for 7.5 years. Anecdotes were told, praise was heaped, etc. In the middle of it, someone else pipes up, "Oh, I just want to say--" And we all expected him to share something about our colleague who was leaving. Instead, he goes on and on about some work-related thing, brushing off the goodbye as if it were done with. I think the general consensus of the room was, WTF is wrong with you? At the end of his spiel, our GM was like, "So ANYWAY, back to our regularly scheduled program..." and went back to the goodbye stuff. The interrupter isn't a bad guy at all, but dude, learn some social skills.

2) One of our freelancers turned in a story late, because his son had been in a skiing accident and he'd been with him at the hospital for the surgery. He explained this when turning in the story. Business owner's response? "Thanks, I'll look at this and get back to you with any edits." NOTHING about writer's son. OMG take some sensitivity training. Luckily my editor jumped in and said some kind/appropriate words, but it was kinda too late to make up for Dunderhead #1.

3) At the goodbye lunch for the colleague from #1, I ordered fire-seared tuna. It came with two steaks, and I could only finish one, plus a bit of the veggies and rice. The remainder was bundled up into a take-out container. I tossed it in the fridge at work. A few hours later, I was feeling peckish and figured I'd finish the rest of it. Hunted high and low. NO LEFTOVERS. OMG why would you eat someone else's leftovers??? Can you possibly be that hungry? What if I had a cold? Eww. Just EWW. Let's not even get into the total rudeness of taking something that's not yours. The only acceptable scenario here would be if someone mistakenly took my container (it was in a white clamshell box) thinking it was theirs (I saw a white styrofoam box that had chicken parmesan and pasta in it). Otherwise, I'm just like, "........"

I'm having tons of fun with the Valentine's Day stuff in WoW. How do you make those candy hearts? Someone gave me one, and I don't know how he did it.

Oh, I also meant to say that I finally got and finished the last of the Mediator series by Meg Cabot. I really think she's losing her touch. I loved the first five books, and the last one was ... blah. Blah in pretty much the same way Avalon High was blah. Maybe she should stop writing 50 books a year and concentrate on 10, so that they can actually be good. Also, I'm almost done with book 4 of the Cirque du Freak/Darren Shan series. I have a number of questions/comments, but those will have to wait. Work calls. :P

Re: the latest meme going around about 10 ways how you tell it's a fic by [insert author name here], I only have one for me.

1. It says "by Sarea Okelani" on it.

There. :D Now no one should have any trouble identifying my stories.

I've been thinking about my writing lately, and wondering why I haven't made any headway with any of the stories that I'm currently working on. It's slowly but surely dawned on me that my lack of creativity is due in large part to the fact that it's winter here, and it's been a really freaking cold one. I had never really noticed it before, but looking at my story list and their posting dates, the vast majority of stories were posted between March and October. Which got me to thinking about other ways in which I'm picky about writing, the act of writing, and how I need very specific things in order to get in the writing zone. I think most writers probably have requirements in that sense; whenever I talk to another writer I'm always fascinated by how different our processes are.

( These are the things I need in order to write. )

Am I weird for needing such a specific set of circumstances to be true in order to be creative? Or maybe this is all just a way to rationalize my recent writer's block. :-S

( Can't let an entry go by without talking about WoW. )

I saw the worst/best name for a driving school today. At first I couldn't believe it was a driving school -- but it was, proudly emblazoned on advertising all over the car. It was called SWERVE. Seriously, who thought that would be a good name for a driving school? Would you send your kids there? Gave me a good giggle anyway.

Finally took Talis to the vet yesterday, and he has been cleared for travel. Since we were there, I had the vet look at his left eye, which has a weird opaque mark on it. It looks like a small bubble in plastic wrap that hasn't been smoothed out. She used some sort of staining agent and then a blacklight, and was able to determine that it wasn't a cut (whew!). Apparently, Talis is SO MISTRUSTFUL that he literally sleeps with one eye open. Not fully open, just a slit -- which is why that mark is there in the middle of his eye. So he has a dehydrated eye (not unlike Charlotte's depressed vagina). I am now required to put this ointment on his eye -- yes, right on the eyeball! -- twice a day. You can imagine how popular I am with the canine contingent of my house these days.

The other thing I forgot to say about "Narnia" is that now I know, vaguely, what a WoW movie would look like. Strangely enough, I've never really thought about it before. But when I saw the Tauren it all became freakishly clear. If a WoW movie were to be made, Jennifer Garner so needs to be a NE rogue.

All right, so you all know by now that I am enamored of World of Warcraft, right? Well, I have a guest pass key if anyone is interested in trying it out. Unfortunately you'd have to find your own way of getting the game installed (I'm supposed to lend my 'guest' my CDs to install the game, but I am so not doing that for anyone whose house I couldn't drive to within 20 minutes so I can pound on their front door and obsessively demand the return of the CDs). HOWEVER, I also have rebate coupons from Blizzard to give to friends to make it so that the game only costs $19.99 (I paid $50 -- OH I'M BITTER). Everything expires the first of the year, so I probably should have been more diligent about pimping this stuff earlier, but oh well. Anyway, the guest pass key is YFNP8TRFC2F278NHPZJK8FC9JC -- good for a 10-day trial. I'm pretty sure it can be used multiple times.

Lastly, many happy birthday wishes to noelleleithe!