I Don't Want To Be Perfect Any More

Okay, Katie has beaten me about the head until I made another post. The writing exercises have evolved into me just writing every day, and the more I do it the easier it gets and the more I tend to write. Before I know it I might actually have a whole book, if only I could write in a linear fashion. What this also means is that my reality disconnect is getting worse and worse, so I have to be prodded to do things like this that are actually some form of contact with the outside world aside from AIM and my weekly excursion to Flying Saucer.

School is...school. I am essentially sleeping through two of my classes and getting an A because I learned nearly all the subject matter via actually working in a library. It might also have something to do with the fact that my final project for one of them is an 8-12 page literature review... that we're doing in three person groups. Ah, well, it leaves me more time to build my digital library for my digital libraries class, which is actually teaching me a great deal and making me work besides.

I finished reading Tigana a while back, and I have to say it was very enjoyable. The reviews on Amazon are all 'oh my god the characters are so amazing I've never read anything like this,' and to some extent there is a grain of truth there. The characters are very well done, with very personal motivations for what they're doing. It's not 'let's save the world because it's the right thing to do,' it's 'let's take this king out because he screwed over our country, even though doing so is going to get a lot of other people killed in the crossfire,' which is a refreshing change. I also read the newest (I think) book in Naomi Novik's Temeraire series, which was enjoyable per usual and a good quick read that was a much-needed break for my brain. I've just started Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson (who happens to be the man finishing the Wheel of Time books) and I am certainly intrigued by it, though I haven't gone much further in than 30 pages at this point.

Katie knocked me off the Lady GaGa train with this amazing mashup, which I had on for a few days almost continuously while writing horrible things, and then I knocked myself off that by acquiring pretty much all of BT's music and I've been tripping on that ever since (These Hopeful Machines is a great album).

Also, Ben bought me Settlers 7, which is waaaaaay more fun than it has a right to be, and one day I will play through FFXIII.

We May Be Some Kind Of Crazy

I have to say, getting a tattoo wasn't really what I expected - though I'm not sure what exactly I did expect. I got raised eyebrows from both artists I talked to at the shop when I told them I wanted to get my feet tattooed (and have since gotten varying degrees of incredulity from nearly everyone I've told since), but they basically said 'well, that's going to hurt' and left it at that. And it did hurt, I suppose - more like stung. I spent the majority of the time chatting with Teri, who was doing the inking, and drinking grape Crush except for when she got out towards my big toe, at which point I put the bottle down and opened my mouth to say 'that hurts the worst of everything you've done' and then she moved to my arch and that was...breathtaking. I did manage to hold completely still for the whole thing except for involuntary twitches of my calf when she hit particularly sensitive spots. I'm still sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop, though, since the tattoos never bled and have yet to scab over, itch, or peel (though I did hit my right foot against the bedpost on Saturday and I think I literally made the D: face because it felt like sandpaper on a sunburn). My only real complaint is that this has made my favorite sitting position (legs tucked under) completely impossible for the time being.

In other news, Jeb graced us with her presence on Saturday and Sunday, during which time she and Ben did their level best to make me spontaneously combust, thus ending my torment and hopefully taking both of them out in the process. We took her to Flying Saucer, which she enjoyed up until she ate so much she KO'd herself, and made her watch Zombieland once D&D was over. She and Ben also spent a fair amount of time laughing at how excruciatingly painful I find listening to one of my professors lecture is - I had to sit through two lectures this weekend because I had an assignment due and some of the information could only be found in the goddamn lectures. I really just want this woman to learn the meaning of brevity, because you seriously do not need ten or fifteen minutes to explain a concept that could be covered in three concise sentences.

I have been playing FFXIII so much that I haven't even really thought much about writing, which has actually been a nice break since I am seldom not thinking about writing in some way. Once I got into the swing of the battle system I found that I actually really like it, even though it's very different from the norm and takes a bit of getting used to. Lightning is amazingly socially maladjusted - so far the only main character she hasn't punched is Hope, but that's because he's like twelve and broken and I'm waiting for that shoe to drop too. There's a lot of kinda shady stuff going on that has me waiting for everything to go straight to hell in the blink of an eye, and the characters are all different enough that you spend quite a while watching them interact and slowly realize that they can, in fact, work together and function as a group, which seems kind of novel. Normally if main characters don't get along they're still willing to stay in your party, but these guys tend to just walk the fuck away, leaving you with two mini-parties as everybody gets over themselves. The leveling system is also very interesting and I must admit I rather like it - kind of the bastard child of the class system from Tactics and a much-improved sphere grid from FFX.

And speaking of brevity, I believe it's time I shut up and went to lunch.

I Want Your Love And I Want Your Revenge

Time to try this in a different format. I think I have too many bad associations with LJ (not to mention its interface is obnoxious) to really use mine well, so I'm going to make an attempt over here. My day-to-day activities are not incredibly epic as a rule, so expect a lot of discussion about grad school (and why this semester is obnoxious), video games, music, and writing, which eats up the bulk of my brainpower.

Ben has been in some kind of fanboy fugue state for the past few days thanks to FFXIII, which is ridiculously pretty and fun and full of really dysfunctional and increasingly traumatized (poor Hope) characters. I haven't played it much because I keep finding things I need to do (like be a housewife, apparently, and write) instead of playing it, but one day soon here I'm going to haul on that bitch. The battle system is quite engaging and the character development is FFX-inspired but a bit more well put together from the brief time I've spent with it.

My job at the med library is actually not at the med library - I'm working for a small special collection of disability-related resources within it. Family members and professionals from around the country can go through our catalog online, then email or call us and we will send them any books they request as well as articles or general information. Family members get free postage, professionals pay return. So work for me is talking to patrons, taking requests, checking in any books that have been sent back, packing up books to mail them, managing patrons in our catalog software, and keeping the library blog updated. At some point I'll also be updating the HTML in the webpages, but until then I usually finish these tasks within two hours and hang out (and occasionally do schoolwork).

In other news, my Zune died an early death while Ben and I were in Georgia this weekend, well within warranty. So Microsoft magicked me up a shipping label and I sent it back to its God for repair work on its doomed, clicking hard drive. Hopefully they won't try to tell me I abused it; it spent its lifespan in a pretty heavy duty case and was definitely rather sheltered. Also hopefully they will fix it, since they no longer make Zunes with hard drives that large.

Currently reading Tigana by Guy Gavriel Kay, which is quite excellent if you're into political intrigue-based fantasy centered on a kind of personal vendetta as opposed to EPIC WAR TO SAVE THE WORLD ZOMFG. Music lately has been all over the map: currently listening to Hans Zimmer soundtracks, but there's been a lot of Lady GaGa and 90's alt rock lately as well.

Over and out, for now. Jeb sent me a writing meme I might do for epic TL;DR.