Stuff on My Mind

Hi all...

I've had a lot on my mind lately, so I've been a lazy Mithra. Here are some of the things that have been floating in my brain.

The Haiti quake on Tuesday the 12th. I'll be honest, I haven't spent a lot of my life thinking on Haiti even though I know it's a country in pretty dire straits. I remember some years back they were dealing with another disaster and I think some military coup. With the earthquake(s), the misery that was life in Haiti has been laid bare for the world to see. Of course, nearly 200,000 people have died and it's likely to get worse as the decay and starvation leads to more death.

Then, once in awhile, you get a miracle. Some 10-day survivors are being pulled from the rubble. I really hope there are more. But such inspiration will mean precious little to the woman who lost every member of her family in one stroke.

Tuesday:

Tonight at 9 was Shin's Holla run. It actually started pretty quickly, and the climb was cake. The fight against the Wreaker went pretty well - got it to 15% before we started having some trouble. We burned our animas a little quickly and the AoE sleep kept striking just as pots wore... I literally got stuck in the "item use" pose twice.

Wednesday:

I helped in Garlaige with a coffer hunt but I didn't take notes. I dunno if I took screenies either so I don't recall who was getting their AF gloves. Afterwards I asked the Bastokans if they could grab me arms from the Metalworks vendor since I couldn't with Windy in first. Nope, apparently the arms only come out if Bastok leads. And how often is that I wonder...

I know I spent an hour or so farming the arms for Warp II. I got one. Following that, there was an all-hands shell meeting and I went, checking Sandy's AH. Suuuure, plenty of cheap arms here, but not in Windy or Jeuno? /sigh The meet started later than the 11:15 time originally announced and I was sleepy. But I was interested in how it ran. This was also when I found out that Beni was booted from Rogues and four days after Autumn told me Archer had split off with some Rogues to reform GD. Hence Surg's meeting.

Deej was really upset at all that happened and I tried to help keep him calm during the meeting.

Thursday:

This was kind of a messed up day. I worked a full day, went home, hung out with Ape some, then took a nap. Then watched Private Practice and then headed to the dining room to log in for the server software install. Buuut. I lost my RSA key - it's the same thing as the Squenix security token. So I had to punt, calling in the server guy to meet me at work, at midnight. He was incredibly gracious about it.

We were there for about two and a half hours. He found some Krispy Kreme and I opened up some Coke Zeros. Blessedly, the install worked and I was able to finally close that rotting project.

Friday:

After work I met up with Ape to go to the PTA dinner, after driving through Mickey D's for the Clones. I wasn't expecting much at the dinner, but it wound up being very nice. The parents who hosted had a lovely home - very nice colors for the rooms we saw. The catered Italian was unreal. I haven't had bread that good since Venezia's. The conversation was good and lively.

From there, it was time for the comedy club with Sis and my parents. The opener was quite good and the headliner was top-shelf. There weren't too many minutes we weren't laughing.

Later, I think I tried to work on Warp 2 some more but Shantotto won't give me the quest.

Saturday:

My aunt Facebooked that she was really down. Xanax and alcohol down. She has MS and is in really bad shape. She's been on Zoloft for awhile now for her MS-related depression and may have missed some lately. She's the kind of person with friends everywhere and she used to take little trips all over to spend time with them. She can barely walk to the bathroom now. The Springfield Connection actually clued us in, as the rest of us, Sis included, were out at the Town Center.

From there was a brief stop at home, then on to my parents' for Dad's 62nd. We ate a veritable feast: Chicken Cordon Bleu, rice, corn, mac & cheese, yams, salad, pineapple cubes, hot dogs, desserts... And yes, I ate both corn and pineapple!

We then played a new game called Imaginif! It took a few turns to get the knack of it but then we had a blast. We followed that with Apples to Apples, for more riotous fun. We were there for like 5 hours...

Nice chat with Kep and Kaosu during another interminable party. As soon as I awoke in Vana'diel Medicinebox asked me to be his party's mage in the Citadel. When I got there I saw it was going to be a long night. WHM, SCH, DNC and BLU. While BLU and DNC are accomplished DDs and enfeeblers, I'm pretty sure setting up with basically two other mages is suboptimal. And it was. Kills took too long. We moved to Altepa where the Anticans made my life miserable. And kills still took too long.

Lost two people, one to overeager pulls ^^ And for 2.5 hours I got maybe 8k xp...

Sunday:

I got up and for some reason decided to trawl YouTube. I'm usually pretty with it, meme-wise. I remember Snakes on a Plane. I liked the movie and loved some of the 'shop work I saw. Somehow I missed "All Your Snakes Are Belong To Us". I practically wet myself laughing so hard. You'd think that the two prior days of levity would have worn me out but, no... From there I found a great "Know Your Memes" vid on the original AYB, and some nifty explanations of Speedcore.

One of these featured, among dozens of rapid-fire images and clips, a GIF-style shot of a cat-girl maid at a PC with a title like "Ha ha I'm on Internet". I Googled for it, hoping to find an image link to an original source.

Instead I found the blog of a woman in Canada who is dying from cancer. Her name is Elizabeth McClung and her blog's called "Screw Bronze". She's a big anime and manga fan and she blogs about the little things in life she can still enjoy between relapses and treatments. It's clear she and her partner are very close and both seem to be making ready as best they can. Elizabeth has a postcard project and apparently likes craft and food markets. Her passions come through and she makes no bones about the fact that she's not going gently into the night.

Given what's going on with G.S., B.C. and others, it's a lot of melancholy. I want to write this woman and give her a hug, Then I feel bad for not doing the same for B.C. I've known her for like 17 years now and they've been a little tumultuous. I need to put my feelings aside though. Healing is my job. I need to suck it up and get to work...

Spent about 3 hours doing two oil changes for Shiroma and Kuroma. Also did a little yard and garage work. I know know why ladies move their hands /just so/. Fingernails. Well, to clarify, when they have longish nails. Because if they didn't move them just so, the nails would constantly jam into things.

Then took BIL to Tijuana Flats to meet the whole crew for dinner. Later, watched The Hangover again with Ape, since our regular shows shows weren't on. That movie is still lol-worthy.

I have no idea what my friends think, but I want everyone to rest assured that I am a generally happy Mithra. I know all of us have been dealing with lots of stuff but don't worry about me. I have a pretty limitless listening ability and you all won't overwhelm me ^^

Silly fun things:

License plate seen on a smart car: "NANITE" Classic!
According to one particular web quiz, I am an Innocent Uke. But by the same site's personality profiles, I'd have to argue that I'm more of a Romantic Seme.
I love that Fireflies song :3 See? Happy!