The Cantina Staring Back At You From The Abyss

CobraMisfit said:

Happy Thanksgiving Eve to the US folks.

Man, I love this holiday. It's my absolute favorite.



Morning, gang.

Whut up?

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I keep forgetting that for you guys it's now. Us Canucks had it last month. Still even if we get no turkey, we still get some sales to blow money on, though I don't think we have the same stampedes with people getting trampled as you guys do. It's generally a bit more low key.

I made my first beaded star last weekend. It was cute, I enjoyed it. Then I started a MONSTER beaded star. It may just be big enough to be a tree topper. I'll post photos when I'm done.

My beta reader almost cried over a part of my story and she has a rule about not crying over books. *feels accomplished as a writer*

E.F.B. said:

My beta reader almost cried over a part of my story and she has a rule about not crying over books. *feels accomplished as a writer*

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I've had this happen and have always felt a little guilty about it. Like, it's a bit of a rush and a nice boost to the ego to think that you made someone else feel *that* strongly through just words alone. Then on the other hand, I realize, "I'm punching my first in the air in triumph 'cause I just made someone cry. Maybe that's not so cool..."

All of the above! Fantastic feeling with a bit of gleeful guilt

I think I have a working title for my Iceland book.

"Past storm and fire"

I like the double meaning of past = time slip, as well as conquering over nature... twice... Is it too pedestrian? Bleh? Yay?

Freeeeeeeeeedddddoooooooommmmmmmmm!

Take that, accounting system!

*runs off cackling about getting a haircut*

Shoeless said:

I've had this happen and have always felt a little guilty about it. Like, it's a bit of a rush and a nice boost to the ego to think that you made someone else feel *that* strongly through just words alone. Then on the other hand, I realize, "I'm punching my first in the air in triumph 'cause I just made someone cry. Maybe that's not so cool..."

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Well, in this case she was crying because she found it touching, not because it was sad or anything like that, so I don't feel too guilty.

greendragon said:

All of the above! Fantastic feeling with a bit of gleeful guilt

I think I have a working title for my Iceland book.

"Past storm and fire"

I like the double meaning of past = time slip, as well as conquering over nature... twice... Is it too pedestrian? Bleh? Yay?

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I like it.

I love it, Greendragon! Of course, I adore double-meaning titles.

Basking vicariously in Aggy's news, and feeling cautiously hopeful myself. Some maybe-good news on horizon. Maybe.

My Intuos4 mouse (#2 of its line) is self-destructing, and now the right-click is permanently disabled. A new one is on its way, but ugh. Try writing or doing digital art without a right-click button on your digitizer pad. (Digging out old cable mouse tonight.)

Got a story idea for an anthology that might not make its Kickstarter and public call, but it will be a good story. In my larger world, and marketable to a couple other places.

Still fighting with insurance, yay, but making some headway.

Bwahahhaaaha! I just figured out how to do what I was certain should be easy, but which had never managed to do before. That is, automation within my audio editing software. Automation being, like, adjusting the volume or panning of a particular piece of audio in a smooth, controllable way. I just managed to get a piece of sound to go from left to right and back again, while also adjusting the volume - all smoothly, no fuss. Hooray!

Seriously, I was sure there was a way of doing this, but I'd never figured it out before. But now I know, and soon the world shall be mine, precioussssss!

Aha! Just figured out how to automate pitch, too. For those moments where you just need something to shoot up in frequency all of a sudden, and don't want to manually add in dozens of tiny notes, each slightly higher than the previous. Success!

Yay for figuring out things!

I also finally figured out something that had baffled me for a while. I managed to get my 'books written' with links in the footer of my website, rather than just at the bottom of each of 20 pages. That means I only have to change it ONCE when a new one comes out, which is much easier. Of course, it insists on putting it in a narrow column, and I've not yet figured out how to expand it... anyone know how>? www.greendragonartist.com if you want to see what I mean. I have my newsletter signups and current books all at the bottom, but it's all compressed in a narrow column. Ugly.

The only thing I find wrong with the title is the difficulty in actually saying out lout 'Past Storm and Fire" because the two 'ST' sounds next to each other. I could switch it to "Past Fire and Storm", which flows more easily, but then the two disasters are out of sequence with the story... oh, but wait, technically, even if the MC experiences the storm first, the fire is in the 12th century, so that really is first... hmmm...

Never mind. I just looked again and figured it out in two minutes. Duh.

*releases turkeys all over the Cantina*



*is drawn away by the warbling of a turkey siren*

Morning, Cantina. Happy Thanksgiving! *is stampeded by turkeys*

I thought I was going to have to go out today, but my dad just changed his mind. I feel like some form of writing related things need to happen today, but will probably wait until after the Macy's parade because I like watching that undistracted. Hungry. Need breakfast. And tea.

ETA: Re the Macy's parade and the Broadway showcase they always have at the beginning... There is now a Spongebob Squarepants show on Broadway where Spongebob has to save Bikinibottom from an underwater volcano. This is complete with people who look vaguely reminiscent of the characters who are dressed in their outfits. I...just...whut.

Shoeless said:

We really need to come up with a better term for those things. Maybe when they produce results faster we can just switch over to Replicators, a la Star Trek. 3D Printer just sounds so... clunky.

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or we can go in the other direction and give them a really silly name. I'm thinking 'Easy Make Oven'

Shoeless said:

I keep forgetting that for you guys it's now. Us Canucks had it last month. Still even if we get no turkey, we still get some sales to blow money on, though I don't think we have the same stampedes with people getting trampled as you guys do. It's generally a bit more low key.

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I bought nearly all of my xmas gifts already from the Amazon sale

E.F.B. said:

My beta reader almost cried over a part of my story and she has a rule about not crying over books. *feels accomplished as a writer*

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ooo that's awesome if your writing can make someone that emotional, you're doing something right

PS: I heard of the Spongebob musical. it actually has some surprising bands doing music for it: Panic at the Disco, Lady Antebellum, The Flaming Lips, They Might be Giants, Plain White Ts...

Happy Thanksgiving, Cantina!

*flails through a flock of turkeys* WHERE'D ALL THESE DEVIL BIRDS COME FROM?!

Damoclian said:

Quickfire, someone say something nice about this sad, tired, sore, sick, silly, ill bunny! D:

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Dammy, you're awesome. You might tell yourself otherwise, but you are. You get up every day and fight demons. Also, you have puppers who believe in you. They know you're awesomesauce.

I had Thanksgiving duck, cabbage with bacon schmaltz, and root veggies in honey ginger sauce. Delicious!

I finished my beaded star. It's almost as big as a pencil

Ooooooooh. Does that use wire or such to hold its shape?

Hugs to Dammy and all who need 'em.

Greendragon, that star is lovely.

The massive turkey has been cooked, nibbled, the rest taken apart and stored, and now the carcass is slow-cooking for stock.

I'm plotting out images and prose for an edition of five book sculptures, while watching Wes Craven's' Swamp Thing'. A fine evening.

Holy crap, GD, that thing is intricate and awesome! I'm not really a fan of beads in general, so trust me - if even I think it's awesome, it must be even more awesome than that.

And yes, yay for figuring things out. Automation would mean the difference between a bland song and something exciting. Or it could, anyway. Depends on the song, obviously. But automated pitch bending, volume changing, and speaker panning? These 3 tools can do amazing things, and I'm really glad to have figured them out at last.

In fact, I'm trying to convince myself to make some digital music today. I think I'd enjoy that, but my chronic indecision makes it hard to actually settle on an action and do it... Tell me your secrets, project-completion compulsionist! (That should totally be a real word, spellchecker.)

greendragon said:

I had Thanksgiving duck, cabbage with bacon schmaltz, and root veggies in honey ginger sauce. Delicious!

I finished my beaded star. It's almost as big as a pencil

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Ooooooooh purty!




Morning Cantina. I had a lovely Thanksgiving with family, much good food, Skype with my aunt, some relaxed editing, a little crochet, a little necklace making, and then PBS's Anne of Green Gables special which, despite some flaws, I like much better than Netflix's Anne with an E, which I still hate with the fury of 1,000 suns to finish the night off with just the right amount of happy. 'Twas great.

Today is moar editing, beta reading, and #ShamelessSelfPromotion I decided to have 20% off sale in my Etsy shop (lasts until Tuesday) because Black Friday and if feels like the thing to do this year. Now I'm going off to try to figure out how to set up the gift wrap option thingy.

Also my mom wants to go on and get the Christmas lights up outside. Since we got new steps built this year and they're longer than the last ones, we had to get more lighted garlands and they've been sitting in the living room in their boxes, taking up space. After all the work we put into painting and pretty-fying the new steps and the porch, I'm looking forward to seeing them all decorated and lit up.


ETA: Aaaaaand, mom's b-day cake has been ordered.

Rarely check-in here, but man I got a story.

So, Black Friday, for us retail folks you know what that means: torment. I work at a children's book store in West LA, and what I have learned the hard was is that it isn't always the bastion of progressivism it claims to be. So, I get this woman today who is all-around very difficult, but over the course of helping her she makes the point that it is very, very important the book she buy be 'anti-social justice'. I don't even know what that means! We try to be progressive and inclusive at my store, I'm probably the worst one in that regard. But anti-social justice!? So, a children's book about social injustice!? The encounter doesn't get better, and I have to end up eating crow when she gets mad at me for cutting her off when she was about to complain about a book with mixed-race children I showed her.

People say booksellers do it out of love, I do it because I dropped out of college and can't find anything better.

Hugs to all and hope you guys across the pond have a nice Thanksgiving. I missed your birthday, tiddly, hope you had a good one!

I'm really ready to have this meet-up with my college friends over with. I've been doing well enough with trying to not think about it so I can't stress about it. My continued Redwall-binging does bring me mental comfort but I have had to watch myself and not use 'nobeast' or 'footpaw' in normal conversation. A minor side-effect, I suppose. Even started cleaning and moving heavy furniture for two days which I wasn't looking forward to, but it did succeed in keeping my mind off other things. Well sort of, because two nights in a row I've been having dreams about my friends and school days which shows my unconcious is still all upset about it. Gah.

zanzjan said:

It's not easy to shut up the brainweasels, but best of luck to you. Working on trying to get out from under some lingering anger about a few things right now myself, and it's really hard.

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Brainweasels is such a good word for it.

Best of luck to you too.

greendragon said:

Boo Jade
I got some cool news. My co-worker from hell? I won't have to work directly with her next quarter! The task is being re-assigned to my co-worker (who I promised to support and help as much as he needs). Woohoo!!!

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Oh hey, good news!

And the place is 2.5 hours' drive from the Grand Canyon.

I've never been before. Now I will go and take all the photos!

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Even more good news!

*is slightly jealous*

Jade A said:

I just got certified to use 3D printers!

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For some reason I was expecting maniacal laughter after that statement and was already backing towards the door...

tiddlywinks said:

*runs off cackling about getting a haircut*

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Not with that scythe I hope!

Religion0 said:

*flails through a flock of turkeys* WHERE'D ALL THESE DEVIL BIRDS COME FROM?!

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Dinosaurs.

Run while you still can.

greendragon said:

I finished my beaded star. It's almost as big as a pencil

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Gorgeous!