Just got back from a week in Minnesota. Having Zeke (my netbook) really helped, in that I didn't have to spend hours trying to catch up on things online once I got home, but the connection up there was sllllloooooowwwww and it got frustrating to even do webmail. I was worried it was the computer itself, but when I got back here to my hispeed connection it worked much better, so my mind is set at ease for the SCBWI conference.

In other news, yesterday in the car, among other things, I finally got around to reading The True Meaning of Smekday, by Adam Rex. OMG I LOVE THIS BOOK.

I want to go back and read it again before I return it to the library, then buy a copy to read to my niecephews. I LOVE this book, love Gratuity and J-Lo, love the humor and the sly and not-so-sly parallels to Really Big Themes, love the illustrations and graphic novel bits (and I am not generally good at reading graphic novel stuff).

Did I mention I love Gratuity? 'Cause I really, really do. She's an awesome heroine...and I want to go on and on, but I don't want to spoil it.

Annnnnddd I just realized I have a stack of books here waiting for me to update my GoodReads account, which I haven't done in months. I can't remember if I've mentioned it before, but I do have an account there under my so-called-real-life name. Friend me if you're there! And if you don't know mscrl name, send me an LJ message and we'll work it out.

Tags: books

So, a few months ago? Maybe more like last fall. My niece E., who's 11 now (her baby brother turned SIX today OMG) was over and looking for something to watch. And I showed her an episode of Early Edition, since S1 was recently out on DVD and it seemed like the kind of show we could watch together--not all the episodes, yet, but I figured she'd like the premise. And Cat.

Now every time I go over to watch them, she calls to remind me to bring my DVDs. She's seen a bunch of S1 & S2, and has favorite episodes...like "Faith", "Hot Time in the Old Town", "Halloween", and especially, especially "The Choice". She loves "The Choice" like I can't even believe. I think it might have something to do with her own time in the hospital last year.

Last weekend I told her I'd figured out a way to watch some of the episodes on my iPod. Today she knew I was coming over so she called and asked if we could put some episodes on *her* little Nano, and when I left this evening she was curled up on the couch and saying, "Oh, Mary, I forgot how sad some parts of 'The Choice' can be!" and then a few minutes later laughing at Chuck.

Tonight I'd also brought over some episodes she hadn't seen to watch together, and she chose "Romancing the Throne". I hadn't watched that one in years, and had forgotten how much I like it. E. liked it to, but--and if I didn't already love that kid to pieces before we shared any fannish glee, this would have sealed the deal--when it was done she turned to me and said, "This episode is good, but it could have been great."

"What would have made it great?" I asked.

"Well, DUH! It needed Marissa! Where is the love for Marissa?"

One of us, people. ONE OF US.

Tags: early edition
Feeling a Wee Bit: giggly

I have a netbook!

(I am not currently posting from the netbook, because I need to get antivirus software loaded onto it, but that will happen today, I hope.)

It's a 10" Asus Eee; I played with a couple models at the Big Electronics Store, and decided I needed the 10" keyboard to do anything comfortably (still won't be writing whole novels on it, but it'll work for travel and notetaking and internetz stuffs). I looked at several different brands, went home to think--and discovered Target had the Asus on sale for $100 off. It was A Sign! *g*. For $250, this thing seems to be able to do everything I need a mobile computer to do, and it's truly mobile--can fit into my purse in a pinch, and isn't nearly as heavy as my writing laptop, so I'll be able to hike to the library with it in tow.

So, yay, netbook! I bought this Gelaskin to go on it (and a different one for my iPod, because I've been looking at these things forever), and I have named it Zeke II, after my laptop that was stolen (*sniff*), because "Zeke is a good name for a boy or a girl", and it has that "Eeeee" sound in it, especially when I say, "Zeeeeeeeeke!". Also, because it's supposed to be one tough cookie.*

In other news, the house is nearly clean and the yard is nearly under control. It'll be a July Miracle if it all gets done, but I need some order right now. A really really lot. And I only got enough cherries off my BIL's tree to either make something now, or freeze them to make something in the dead of winter (ie, my birthday). Decisions...

So, howzur Monday?

(*Why don't I have a Crumb icon? I ask you!)

Okay, so. Netbooks. Teeeeeeny tiny computing machines. (well, not as teeny as an iPhone or blackberry, but I don't want to deal with phones/aps/etc.) I'm considering one for some traveling I'm doing (for example, I can't see myself at SCBWI in LA for a week without a computer, but I don't know if I want to take my full sized laptop for various reasons).

Anybody have experience with these? Best brands, things to look for, etc.? I'm really looking for something *cheap*, but I don't want a piece of junk either.

Oh, Merlin...the show whose motto just might be, "Why yes, we truly DID just go there."

I just have a couple semi-spoilery thoughts.

( O HAI So-not-English Castle and Arthur's Matrix Coat! )

Today is full of numbers:

4
9:00
7 (Happy Birthday, K!)
77.9%
3.16
5
4 again (Happy Anniversary, A&B!)
~6
2.5

(and phone #s, which I won't post here)

*tilts head, looks at numbers sideways*
No, that really doesn't make them line up either. Hmm.

The good: It is summer, we've had lots of rain, the garden, what little I have in it this year, is going nuts.

The bad: Right now, 7:15 AM, it's 82 degrees, 95% humidity, and no wind. The grass needs mowing. And my allergies are going nuts.

It's only June. I should not have to worry about heatstroke in June!

The cracktastic: I have watched the first two episodes of Merlin and am *highly* amused. I can't tell if it's in ways the creators intended, but I get the feeling they wouldn't much care either way, because they are clearly having fun with it.

The hard-to-admit: I am behind in everything productive, especially writing. I can't seem to get my bearings in the current chapter of revisions. And my schedule's a mess, as it tends to be in the summer, so there's no one time I can set aside for writing every day. 's frustrating.

The cute: I wish I would have had a camera with me a few nights ago when I met my SIL and nephew for frozen yogurt and he managed to get the bright blue and yellow stuff he had everywhere--including in his very blonde hair. We wiped it out, but it looked like he'd dyed it with Koolaid. Though, if I did have my camera, I probably couldn't have taken a good shot--he wouldn't sit still long enough.

Is it just me, or did the not-at-all touted "series finale" of Cupid 2.0, which I just happened to stumble across last night, feature a plotline that mirrors one of the better episodes of its predecessor more closely than anything they'd done before?

Or maybe it's just that I remember that particular episode of the original better than any of the others.

Still no chemistry between the 2.0 leads, though. And very little personality of the sidekicks was ever allowed to creep in. What a waste of a great premise.

*waves*

Hi everyone. I was away from Thursday noon on, and just got home a couple hours ago. I've stopped advertising when I'm going to be away from home for the most part, even f'locked, because after the break-in last year I am quite frankly paranoid. But I had a really fun weekend--details may follow--and am already sinking under the knowledge of everything I have to do to make up for it in the coming days.

Also, I just finished Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth and am still shaking a bit, and then I get on FB and find my brother's taken a quiz that predicts he will TOTALLY survive the zombie apocalypse. So if it comes, I'm heading for his house, just FYI.

I know there are people in the world who operate without...any kind of organizational structure, and who expect others to change plans at their whim, or because they forgot other appointments at the time they just scheduled with you--for tomorrow, of course, because making plans a week or even a few days ahead of time "just isn't their style" (=would give you time to prepare for them, in which case you would have an advantage, because there's no way they are preparing, and they know this). I know there are people like this, and I know the rest of us have to work around them, and I know I'm just supposed to shut up and deal, because they've been reinforced for this behavior all their lives and there's no way they're going to change now.

I know this.

It doesn't mean I have to like it.

I also don't have to like the assumption that I'm sitting here at my computer ready to change *my* plans at the whim of such people, and of course I'm available 24/7 to play this damn game.

Brought to you by the fact that a meeting I didn't even know was going to *happen* twenty-four hours ago has now been changed, timewise and locationwise, TWICE.

Grrr.

Now Playing: "Life Without People" (ahaha, nice thought, History Channel!)

I did not plan to watch Glee, it just kind of happened.

It is the love child of a Christopher Guest movie and a Maureen Johnson YA novel, sprinkled liberally with glitter and awesome.

I just...did not expect to love a pilot this hard. Wow.

FOX had damn well better give this show a chance.

I forgot how much a morning spent making slime with kindergartners can wear me out, much as I like those kids. Every time, I have a renewed respect for the teachers who hang with those kids all day, standing bravely at the boundaries against which the kids are constantly, *constantly* pushing.

To come home from that on the first really hot afternoon of the year and set and enter copy edits? Is not the best combination. And I just realized I've had NO caffeine today. That might be why I'm drowsing at my desk here, huh?

Ten more pages of copy editing, then I get to write fresh curriculum. Um. Yay?

So, I think I posted about the current RA of the local SCBWI chapter asking me to take over for her. And one of--maybe the only immediate--perks of the thing is getting to go to the national conference (not for free, but at some reduced rates), and so when the brochure came for the LA conference today I opened it up and I actually did a happy dance right out in my driveway.

There are lots of really amazing authors and illustrators who will be there, along with equally fabulous but not as well known editors and agents. But what made me squee and do the happy dance was this:

KADIR NELSON.

Kadir Nelson is doing a workshop (two different times, I think) called "Words and Pictures: Pictures and Words".

I don't care that I'm not an illustrator, I don't care that I've never done a successful PB manuscript, I am SO GOING TO THAT THING RIGHT THERE.

A taco, a piece of chocolate, and three straight eps of S1 Life.

I'm zen-ish.

Where did all these ducks come from, and why are they hell-bent on pecking me to death?

*headdesk*

Just a thought:

The very FIRST time I go out to cut and trim the lawn this year? I shouldn't have to work around the fact that it will be in the upper 80s by mid-afternoon.

Dear Weather Gods,
I don't even get you. Really, I don't.
MK

I watched my sister's boys tonight (she took her daughter out birthday shopping), and we were walking home through the park as the sun set. A. & I were talking about his First Communion, coming up on Sunday. I was giving him advice every Catholic kid gets ("Make sure you have some spit in your mouth, or the host gets stuck up on the roof and you can't stick your finger in to get it out..."), and I mentioned that if the host *does* get stuck up there, the sip of wine can help.

"Well, we don't have wine on First Communion day," he told me. "And after that, I probably won't take the wine anyway. For health reasons."

Once I could actually breathe again, I asked him what the health reasons were, but he didn't really know. It just seemed like something he should do.

Then the younger one asked me, "What's ten and one and one?"

I took a second, trying to think like a five-year-old. "Do you mean, the numbers all in a row, or added together?"

"Added together."

"That's twelve."

"Okay," he said, "so if I give you twelve dollars, will you trade me back twelve dollars?"

"Um. Where did you get twelve dollars?"

He winked at me, which, given that he's five and doesn't really know how to wink, was funny enough in itself.

"I know a guy."

Should I be worried? ;)

Tags: niecephews

Being Erica is my favorite Canadian show since Slings and Arrows, even though they are really not alike at all, references to Stratford notwithstanding.

( Read more... )

Over the past day or so, LJ has stopped sending me notification of comments to my posts and replies to my comments on others' posts. I apologize if I've missed something important--I'll try to retrace my steps in a bit.

Is this happening to anyone else?

...and tell me there will be more.

( there's a word for that: spoilers )