Yubsie's Yammerings

Ryan's birthday was yesterday. Jello couldn't figure out why I kept disappearing to the kitchen with "brb, gotta make a cake" "brb, gotta make fish" "brb, gotta frost a cake".

I made red velvet cake with yummy white frosting. It turned out really well. And red velvet cake is so cool. 'Cause Red is Best!

He really liked his present (Monty Python's Meaning of Life and Mel Brooks's History of the WOrld Part 1)

Tonight I have to proctor an intro chem midterm. Don't wanna, it's boring as hell. :p We've been promised coffee and homemade cookies, but that doesn't make up for the long doing nothing hours. :p

I'm also not feeling the greatest today. I wonder if I look ready to keel over, Felix will send me home. :p

We made it to Vicki's! Eventually. :p

The following things suck:

1. Mapquest
2. Not checking that both pages of directions printed
3. Construction
4. Pouring rain
5. Lack of street signs in Toronto

So yeah, between leaving late, stopping for supper and all the above, we got here like two hours after my original estimate. :p But we're here!

Also, I got my employee email today, so I can finally do my WHMIS and my chemistry can stop being illicit. :p

Well, we made it to Edmundston eventually. Despite all sorts of construction and being stalked by a transport truck. And having grabbed directions to the wrong hotel. :p LUckily we were able to spot a sign by the highway to get to the right place. Now we just have to actually make it to the wedding tomorrow. And to the reception, which involves hopping over the border. :p We'll manage something though!

I'm hungry right now, but I don't have any food on hand. Alas. :p

So, you are all SPAMMERS. I'm at skip=300 and I'm only to THURSDAY. And this is on the filter with most of the spammy communities removed!

I eventually wound up borrowing someone's cellphone to call neekabe, but we did eventually succeed in making plans. So I was supposed to meet her at the Chapters by MicMac Mall at one. I managed the first bus fine, it was the transfer that got to me. I discovered that in Halifax, it's not enough to know the NUMBER of the bus you're looking for, you have to know the name for the relevant direction. I wound up at Dalhousie University. :p I did eventually make it to the mall though, and all was well. :p

The bookstore was, all things considered, a really dangerous meeting place for us. I wound up buying the Serenity novelization, even though there SO wasn't room for it in my luggage. I'm not sure how exactly I'm going to manage to read The Bad Thing though, considering I usually whimper through that entire scene. :p

After we'd spent enough time around that temptation, we took the bus over to downtown Halifax to find more temptations. :p Starting with "Are you in the mood for massive amounts of sugar? Candy store!" :p We also went to HMV, where I convinced her to buy Firefly, and now she's all addicty and stuff. :p (Serves her right. She persuaded me to buy Sandman!) We stopped into Strange Adventure and I managed to NOT BUY ANYTHING! We ogled the GORGEOUS Dream statue (gorgeous, but $40 :p), and Absolute Sandman volume one (Which is physically gorgeous, and the interior colouring has all been redone and looks MUCH better, but I can't justify $100 for a fancier edition of something I already own)

We wandered down to the waterfront, and I picked up a pair of earrings because they were pretty. I'm justifying it with "Umm... I need earrings to wear to Bill and Lindsay's wedding?" Plus, they weren't too expensive and it's been a while since I bought new earrings.

We had sushi for supper, which was an awesome change from "those two places across from the hotel". :p And of course, there was much of that talky thing that people do when they're around each other.

Yesterday was absolutely BRUTAL. There were about 90 people scheduled, but less than 50 actually showed up. So we started at 7 AM and didn't finish until 11:30 PM. I was sick to DEATH of hearing about the Zellers in house pharmacy, not to mention losing my ability to count. (As in, my machine showed 51 items and my manual count showed 60... it turned out that I had counted "48, 49, 50, 60" :p) Just to make matters worse, once we finished we had to drive for a little over an hour to get to Bridgewater, where we were supposed to count today. So I got to bed a bit after 1 AM and had to wake up at 5:15 AM.

We got to the store, and were all dreading how long we were going to be here before the three hour drive home. (There was talk of mutiny if we didn't make it out by eight) Well, we made it out by eight. Eight in the MORNING, that is. I had just punched in and scanned my first item when we were informed to shut down, because we didn't have enough people to do the store and would have to reschedule. Which is probably a good thing, because the people we did have? ZOMBIES at this point.

So we made it back to Moncton safely. I must say, I should go away more often, because I get all SORTS of interesting mail. :P There was the invitation for Bill and Lindsay's wedding (which is beautiful, Lindsay :D) Though there was the fun realization that the reception being in Maine might mean passport, I need to check the rules for driving across the border. If so, I sure hope I can get a passport in time. :p

Of course, the MOST exciting arrival while I was gone had to be my wedding dress. I tried it on, and I LOVE it. It fits, which is wonderful, and it's BEAUTIFUL, unlike all the scary things that I'd been seeing around. The fabric is in really good condition, which is amazing considering it was my grandmother's dress as well as my mother's. We have to find a good dry cleaner to get it pressed. We're thinking of asking the alteration shop that I'm going to rent my hoops at for recommendations. (It's a great shop, they did the alterations on my prom dress for me :p)

So yeah, I'm not going to go into further detail about the dress because Ryan reads this thing. I may make a "not Ryan" filter to post a picture later, but he's sitting right next to me at the moment. :p

QotD: "Today we have a celebration full of blessings. We're blessing everything that isn't nailed down! We're blessing these children, we're blessing their parents, we're blessing their godparents, we're blessing Jeff, we're blessing mothers because it's Mother's Day, we're blesssing... toothless lumberjacks from Albert County!"- Father Phil

So yeah, church was crazy today, between Father Jeff's (technically not his title anymore, but it's just WEIRD to try to call him just Jeff :p) sendoff and two baptisms. :p My sister was joking that it's a good thing the fire marshal only checks up on us at Christmas and Easter, because the place was PACKED.

The reception for Jeff was great. Especially since I got to see all sorts of people I hadn't seen in ages. Including my neighbour, who has apparently become an opera major and just had her first performance. She also does vocals for the high schools, which amuses us both IMMENSELY, since it means she now does vocal warmups for a living. When we were in Fiddler on the Roof, she would do the vocal warmups. It was amusing, because all the guys in the cast were intimidated by this 5'0" grade nine student. :p

I also got to joke with Jeff about how this means I don't get to threaten to spoil the ending of the last Harry Potter book. And even if I could, he couldn't threaten to excommunicate me anymore! :p I also got to talk to Father Phil about such exciting things as the fact that there is more paperwork tied to marriage than all the other sacraments put together. :p

Vicki and I actually successfully visited Kate yesterday! (Ryan came with us too, but he hasn't been trying to arrange a visit with Kate for two years to no avail :p) We weren't sure for a while, because the directions to the new house were shakey, but several cellphone calls later and a visit to a gas station, we made it!

We introduced Kate to Firefly, which was a BLAST. She's incredibly taken with the series. Not that I'm surprised. She was kinda sold on it from "It's so shiny! And they actually call things shiny!" :p She's currently torn between Simon and Kaylee for favorite character, though she's having the same problem I did when it comes to picking a favourite character. Well, without the desperate attempts to NOT love the eventual winner. More the "Everyone is just SO FREAKING LOVABLE" problem. :p

She's also distraught by the warning "Tess ships Zoe/Wash" :p It was really exciting to watch the series on a tv bright enough to actually SEE what's going on in the first scene of the pilot. :p We got to "Safe" before realizing it was getting late and we had to head back.

I spent the afternoon delivering magazines. Now my feet hurt. :p

So yeah, Convocation tomorrow. :p

So, kinda sick of saying "Hi, I saw out front that you're hiring?" :p I went to the mall and applied at a bunch of stores. Including a kids' clothes store, which led to a lot of jokes about "Ooh, and you can wear the clothes!" from my family. Loving family I have. :p

This was AFTER the madness that is Free Comic Book Day. Or as I like to call it "Evil sale day" :p I was MOSTLY good! I bought the first volume of the FMA manga, volume two of Books of Magic and volume four of Lucifer. None for full price? Yeah, I need a job. :p

I also ran into seryan, which is always exciting and random. :p

This evening we went to see The Choir of Misfits, an amusing musical put on by a new community theatre group. I got to gawk at all the shiny things they've done to the high school theatre since I left. :p

I've decided that McDonald's is like dwarf bread. There's always going back to McDonald's! Just like there's ALWAYS the dwarf bread. :p

Been a busy couple days. Yesterday I went to Moncton with Ryan and his roommates. I'd debated not going, but it wound up being really fun, so I'm glad I went. I only bought one book at Chapters, that's a wonderful bit of self control, right? It's a fun looking anthology.

I spent a bit of time in Chapters talking to the bookshelves. Looking at the Pratchett and declaring "Ha! HA! You can't get any more of my money right now! HA!" (This would be much more triumphant if the reason wasn't that I already had all thirty plus books :p) Glaring at Melanie Rawn's books because "You're never going to write book three of that trilogy, are you?" (I read books one and two in middle school :p) And a very melodramatic "I WISH I COULD QUIT YOU!" to the Star Wars EU. :p

We had lunch at a Thai place, with a very cool waitress. I had yummy fried rice with shrimp and lobster meat. Mmmm...

After that, we headed down to Gamezilla. I was good and resisted Lucifer! AND the Order of the Stick collection they had! I did by The Dead Boy Detectives, but I had been trying to find that for AGES! It's SO cute! :D

Then we had sushi and went back to Sackville. Where I stayed up until 3:30 AM finishing my computational paper. :p "Fun" times that. :p

Today, Vicki finally gave me and Sam our Christmas presents. They're teddy bears with "uchi" written on them in hiragana, which is the Japanese word for "house". She has one of her own too, and the three together are "house house house!" one of our running jokes. :p SHe also gave me a birthday present, this ADORABLE elephant hat. I was totally wearing it around inside all day. :p

My mother came up to help me get a start on moving out. SHe took back three boxes of books and one of fabric. And that's not all the books I have here. Ooh boy, packing will be an adventure this week. :p

Other than that, today was a SIMS D*MMIT day. :p Highlights: Jayne's alien son Sue is now a teenager and madly in love with Delirium. DEATH desperately wants to get engaged to Death. Death is too busy being a sorority girl and a popularity sim to actually roll romantic wants. Dream inherited a lousy party when he moved into a random off campus house at the university.

I'll probably do a massive picture post of doom in the near future. :p

It's been a pretty fun weekend. Friday was a "SIMS D*MMIT" day, which I greatly enjoyed. Simon, amusingly, has been playing piano at his son's house for three solid days. I'm starting to wonder if he's just planning to sit there until Amos and Helen GRADUATE. :p I played Luke's house a bit, he's boring right now, he just skills and goes to work as a Jedi. :p (I don't think I mentioned it, but Han and Leia wound up having a shotgun wedding because they refused to roll a marriage want. And then I cheated so they would have twins. :p) And then I played Daniel and Susan's house. Zoe and Wash now have their first grandchild, Derrial Washburne.

I had to get up early on Saturday because the Honours students were getting together to practice our presentations. Only the Toads and Metalheads showed up, which was somewhat upsetting, since we'd wanted to see what sort of questions people from other areas of chemistry would ask. Still, it was good to get that practice in for next week.

We took a break in the middle to all go down to the Farmer's Market. In four years, I'd never actually gone. I picked up some earrings because it's been ages since I last bought earrings. I also tried a rice dish.

I had a bit of time to kill after that, so I tried to work on my computational assignment. The computers were being ridiculously laggy in the Cragg, so I tried going over to the Avard Dixon computer lab, but it didn't help. I ran into someone from my Japanese class, so we had an awkward conversation in Japanese. (Mostly about coffee and plans for the night :p) Awkward, but still fun.

I gave up on productivity and headed over to the grocery store to pick up some bread. Never made it to the grocery store though, because I wound up hanging out on a roof with Maria, Lily and McGeek. :p

After that, I went to sing karaoke with the con staff, which was an absolute silly blast. Then it was the club meeting, with crazy anime purchase voting. We watched Nurse Witch Komugi (?), which was... strange. The incredible Gatchaman parody made it totally worth it. After that, we watched Castle in the Sky, because you really can't go wrong with a Miyazaki film. :p Even if we did have a field day with the thing about "With our primitive technology, we don't even know what this is made of, metal or ceramics." :p

After the meeting, I found a Firefly/Fiddler on the Roof crossover fic. This led to me wondering who looks at Fiddler on the Roof and decided "you know, that really needs to be crossed over with that space western...".

And then I decided I wanted to make Fiddler on the Roof sims. :p Poor Tevye's brain will so BREAK though. :p

Today was just karate and trying to work on this infernal computational assignment. Oh, and Japanese homework. We decided Wessa did that part, because my kanji look like a six year old wrote them. :p

So the grad banquet was actually quite fun. We had a blast talking to the random person we met in the line to get in. :p

Lindsay, Bill won the Computer Science award. Yay Bill!

The Alma Mater Song has these INCREDIBLY cheesy lyrics set to lovely music. Lovely for a FUNERAL, that is. The music sounds for all the world like "Behold, Behold the Wood of the Cross"... which we sing on GOOD FRIDAY. :p

There was a collective stifled laugh at the line "on every field, her teams victorious". We just couldn't keep a straight face through THAT! Mount A. Right. :p

Other than that, I sent my thesis to Steve but the odds are very much against him being able to look at it, so I'll be sending it to my second reader soon. Tomorrow I'm ordering my transcripts and talking to Glen about a rec letter. I need one from Steve too, but I really don't want to ask him when he's this badly off.

I also totally forgot my mechanistic paper for Organic was supposed to be due this week. Hopefully Dr. Grant will let that slide if I bring up the thesis thing. He's already proven just how cool he is today. He realized that we all have a lot of work to do, so he made this really intense assignment GO AWAY. :D

Now if only the calculations for my Computational project would WORK. They keep failing after eleven hours, giving me a collection of disconnected atoms. I need to talk to Khash about it.

On the plus side, my mom's stopping by for a bit tomorrow afternoon. ANd we're celebrating Vicki's birthday tomorrow because I didn't have time to make her a cake on Tuesday. Tomorrow is also Urinetown, which should be a fantastic show considering who's involved. :D

I also started playing Kingdom Hearts today, which was SO fun and actually RELAXING!

Oh, and I finally managed to get decent ring pictures. Small sparkly objects are hard to photograph. :p

( SParkly! )

Today started out pretty fun with crazy pinata making day. (The pinata smashing is always a highly popular event at the convention) So messy! So inner child!

After that, I went to the Chinese food place with Ryan and a couple of his roommates and we jabbered about silly things like fanfiction.

Then we headed back for the staff meeting and assorted flailing. Because the convention is thirteen days away.

This was followed by SCARY. Lindsay and Bill each thought the other was bringing the anime today, so all we had were some movies that Patricia brought in. The first was Death Trance that had some cool fight scenes and not much plot. We followed it with the most frightening thing I have ever seen. This thing competed with the STAR WARS HOLIDAY SPECIAL. It had, uh, manga and cosplay and rocks and lots of sex. Which was intercut with frightening rock smashing and ink dipping as a metaphor. SO SCARY! MAKES NO SENSE! DO NOT WANT!

Patricia is now banned from bringing things in. :p

Oh, and for those of you who were wondering...

Star Wars the Musical. :p