What I did this year to decrease worldsuck:

( January )

( February )

( March )

( April )

( May )

( June )

Fiona had a fabulous time at Convergence. She came back with a bunch of purchases from the dealer's room: a spiffy dagger which would not be scorned by Buffy herself, a chain mail purse (a chain mail purse! It's AWESOME!), and sundry posters, buttons, and T-shirts. She hung out talking Buffy and Firefly and Serenity, and she played Reavers (Mafia) and she did the Doctor Horrible Sing Along, and she was only one of five people who knew all the words to "All We Want to Do is Eat Your Brains."

Yes. My daughter is a proud nerd.

Well, not entirely. "And about five different guys hit on me," she reported.

No surprise. "How did you handle it?" I asked cautiously.

"It's not like I was tempted or anything," she said, wrinkling her nose. "They did it right in front of my friend, and they'd had too much to drink. It all seemed pretty stupid."

No need to worry, obviously. She's got good taste, a good head on her shoulders...and a black belt.

Melissa Anelli of Pottercast interviewed several of the cast and crew of the group that put on HP: The Musical here.

They are also on Twitter now: as StarKidPotter.

but Palin's resignation is BIZARRE! Have you read her resignation statement? Mario Piperni [balloon_juice] points to Paul Begala’s biting take on Palin’s resignation.

Sarah Palin makes Mark Foley, the congressman who sent filthy emails to pages look almost normal. She makes David Vitter, the senator who was hanging out with hookers, look almost boring. She makes Larry Craig, caught hitting on a cop in a men’s room, look almost stable. She makes John Ensign, the senator who was having an affair with a staffer, look almost humdrum (and compared to the rest of the GOP whack-jobs, he is). And she makes Mark Sanford, the governor with the Latin lover, look positively predictable.

It gets better…

Her statement was incoherent, bizarre and juvenile. The text, as posted on Gov. Palin’s official website (here), uses 2,549 words and 18 exclamation points. Lincoln freed the slaves with 719 words and nary an exclamation; Mr. Jefferson declared our independence in 1,322 words and, again, no exclamation points. Nixon resigned the presidency in 1,796 words — still no exclamation points. Gov. Palin capitalized words at random - whole words, like “TO,” “HELP,” and “AND,” and the first letter of “Troops.”

And the knockdown…

I’m no latter-day Strunk & White, just a guy who was struck by Palin’s spectacularly rambling and infantile prose. It bespeaks a rambling and infantile mind. But perhaps not. Perhaps this is all a ruse. Perhaps Gov. Palin wants us to believe she’s an intellectual featherweight who is slightly shallower than an actor on High School Musical. Maybe she’s trying to throw us off the trail.

Naah. A lot of people thought that about George W. Bush. He couldn’t be so block-headed, they said. He couldn’t be as childish and churlish as he came off. Oh yes he could. And so, too, might Ms. Palin be as vapid and puerile as her inane statement suggests.

.

The Bulwer-Lytton winners for 2009 have been announced. Here's this year's grand prize winner:

"Folks say that if you listen real close at the height of the full moon, when the wind is blowin' off Nantucket Sound from the nor' east and the dogs are howlin' for no earthly reason, you can hear the awful screams of the crew of the "Ellie May," a sturdy whaler Captained by John McTavish; for it was on just such a night when the rum was flowin' and, Davey Jones be damned, big John brought his men on deck for the first of several screaming contests."

David McKenzie
Federal Way, WA

The Winner for Fantasy fiction is:

Fantasy Fiction
A quest is not to be undertaken lightly--or at all!--pondered Hlothgar, Thrag of the Western Boglands, son of Glothar, nephew of Garthol, known far and wide as Skull Dunker, as he wielded his chesty stallion Hralgoth through the ever-darkening Thlargwood, beyond which, if he survived its horrors and if Hroglath the royal spittle reader spoke true, his destiny awaited--all this though his years numbered but fourteen.

Stuart Greenman
Seattle, WA

although I will admit I'm very fond of the runner up as well:

Towards the dragon's lair the fellowship marched -- a noble human prince, a fair elf, a surly dwarf, and a disheveled copyright attorney who was frantically trying to find a way to differentiate this story from "Lord of the Rings."

Andrew Manoske
Foster City, CA

See the rest of the winners and enjoy the awfulness here.

What if Buffy Summers met Edward Cullen instead of Bella Swann?

This is useful: KnowEm checks the availability of your brand name, user name or vanity URL on 120 popular Social Media websites.

Unfortunately, it doesn't (yet) include Dreamwidth.

Fiona will probably be helping staff the Dreamhaven booth, so stop by to say hello, and let her know you read her mum's LJ.

I won't be there (too broke) but Fiona's been saving up for it and looking forward to it all year.

Remember this entry? I'm sorta back there again. Except more so.

I've written and erased an entry here about three times. Been tinkering with it all day and getting more and more frustrated. I want to be able to talk freely here, I want to be able to say what I need to say. But I can't, and it's really, really frustrating me.

Part of the problem is obvious, and can certainly be said aloud. I can't do karate, which is driving me absolutely crazy, and my husband has been out of work for a fricking year. A bad combination for a woman with a predisposition for depression.

Part of it has to do with someone else's medical issues. Which, as Aslan says, isn't my story to tell.

Part of it has to do with the private stuff between a husband and a wife. Which, you know, should remain private.

Part of it has to do with the stuff Elinor Dashwood's been processing the past couple of months. I keep thinking I've dealt with it, put it away, and it keeps stealing back. And the situation isn't resolved yet, so silence seems to me to be the only ethical policy.

Silence isn't natural to me, really. I like to talk, it's natural for me to reach out to others, especially when I'm hurting. And I'm hurting an awful lot right now. But I'm protecting other people by being silent. That's an ethical choice I feel I have to make.

Just now, it's so very hard. Which is why this journal has been quiet lately. I'm doing my best to maneuver around the ice bergs in the water, and keep my ship from sinking, and it keeps me from spending much time adding to the captain's log, so to speak.

Edited to add: There are people I'm talking with about this stuff, I hasten to add. I'm not cut off from being able to speak about these things I'm struggling with entirely. There are people who care about me who are helping me address each one of these issues.

I'm just saying that I can't talk about it here in this journal, which I'm finding immensely frustrating, because my journal has been a reflection of my true self, and now, necessarily, I'm leaving out what I'm thinking about the most.