So good!

Joss Whedon is totally my master now.

Celeb sighting!

I don't write fancy Gawker blurbs, but I did just come back from lunch, and saw Shia LaBeouf! Which makes a nice change from the usual folks I see in the neighborhood around my office -- like Ed Koch and Larry King.
Anyway, a mom had stopped him and was telling him how much her daughters liked him -- I guess from the Nickelodeon show he was on? -- but I kept thinking of him in "Constantine."

Anyway, that's my celeb sighting.

Which was totally trumped when my coworker came back from her lunch at fancy Balthazar where she sat next to, and had a conversation with, Kate Bosworth.

Shoes, so I love it!!

I suspect today's going to be just as busy as yesterday was, but I just learned how to connect to the office from home, so at least I don't have to think about coming into work this weekend to get stuff done. Thank God and the Powers That Be.

Anyway, though I'm over-the-moon excited about seeing Serenity tonight, last night I saw "In Her Shoes," which was really adorable. I mean, yes, it's a chick flick, but I love those. And I love shoes, so this was pretty much a given. (Even though my feet are momentarily pissed at me, and sport various band-aids for various blisters because of various shoes.) Cameron Diaz plays yet another blonde babe, but there's actual depth to her character, and Toni Collette is absolutely winning as her big sister Rose. And Shirley MacLaine, as their grandmother, is wonderfully natural. Really natural. Like, lines on her face, liver-spotted hands natural.

And the shoes! Oh. Just so pretty. Rose has a line, almost directly from the book though I can't find my copy to quote directly, which is pretty much exactly how I feel about shoe-shopping. Bascially, she says she buys them when she's feeling down, and wants to feel better. "Because clothes look horrible on me, food just makes me fatter, but shoes... shoes always fit."

Which I can empathize with. So, in honor... today's shoes.

Just a filler

It's a little crazy here at work today. My boss is working out of our London office for the next few weeks, and one of my other colleagues went to Virginia for a writers conference, so the two of us that are left in our department are handling all the meetings and such ourselves, plus trying to get our notes together for the big book fair (I leave in two weeks!) and put together a rights list.

Busy, busy, busy.

And I have to finish my NF proposal for my writers group, and figure out exactly when I'm going with friends to see Serenity tomorrow, and see if I can find SOMEONE to come with me to a free movie screening I have tonight. You wouldn't think it'd be hard to do that, but there you go.

So, um... more later.

Got an Idea!

Ok, so I don't know exactly how this might work, but I was thinking about Nanowrimo, and how I haven't managed to finish editing my LAST Nanowrimo novel, and then I was thinking how much I love some of my new internet buddies' writing, and I thought... collaborative story, anyone?

I'm totally just throwing out ideas here, and the reason I'm not posting this on the Alliance boards is because I don't see us having to be constrained by the characters we play in CoH. This would allow us to be as creative as we want. Basically, someone starts it, writes about 2000 words, or thereabouts (I'm thinking of the daily recommendation to finish a 50,000 word novel in 30 days, but we could do less), and the next day, someone else adds onto it, picking up the story where it was dropped. We'd have to play by improv rules, to some degree -- you'd have to use the basic principle of "Yes And" to not negate anything that went before, but let each piece (perhaps written in a different character's voice, perhaps not) add something to the one before it.

I just know there's some really great writers out there, and as much fun as it is to riff on the OneWord each day... what would it be like to go beyond that?

Someone with more technical expertise than I might need to figure out a way of posting it, like on a shared blog or something, but them's just details.

Thoughts?

I need a good name

Got some really good work done last night on my non-fiction proposal, the previously discussed "How to Date a Superhero." Hopefully that will be in good enough shape to share with my writers' group on Monday, give myself a few days to make any suggested changes or revisions, and get it back to the agent with whom I've spoke about it. The more I work on it, the more excited I am about it. There's a special sort of challenge in non-fiction -- without that comforting buffer of a "plot" between the writer and a reader, all you have is, well, you.

And so I've been debating pseudonyms. I mean, I want people to know I've written it (and this is, of course, looking way ahead to a big, delicious book deal, and promotional goodies that will put my name on everyone's lips!) but I do think I might have to consider my "career." You know, that thing that I do that pays the bills? I have some concern that some of what I write might be... well, risque, and not the first thing that I want to spring to people's minds when I'm talking to them in my alternate professional capacity.

Besides, I do still want to write fiction, and I want to use my own name for those books (4 in progress, and counting). From a "branding" perspective, it's not entirely a bad idea to use a slightly altered name for my non-fiction. At some point in the far distant future, after the awards and the accolades, and the best seller lists, I can come clean to my adoring public.

While still keeping my blog a big, dark, dirty secret.

So... any suggestions for pen names?

Publishing blogs to read

Just posting this here real quick because I want to remember to go back sometime and read over these blogs from publishing industry insiders: Miss Snark and Agent 007.

In other news, I would really love a whole day that I could come into the office, sit here at my computer, and write. But that's so not going to happen. And I need to get something written, since I'm up next Monday in our writers' group, and I have nothing yet to submit.

Feed me!

Ok, so I think I managed to do the little feed thing through Atom and Feedburner, but I haven't really been able to tell if it works. At least, not through yahoo. Can someone give that a looksee and let me know if it's all copacetic?

Crazy Dog Lady thinks I'm sexy

Had another little lie-in this morning, showered, ate some breakfast, and watched "Hitch" on DVD. When the roomie and I went out for some food for lunch, a short time ago, the woman who lives upstairs from us with her pooch (whom we lovingly call "Crazy Dog Lady") said I looked very sexy. Which isn't something I'm all that used to hearing when I'm dressed in comfy sweats, and haven't bothered to brush my hair. I suppose it's the disheveled look. Still, nice to hear, though it may just be further evidence that Crazy Dog Lady is the same upstairs neighbor we call "Tipsy the Wonder-Drunk." I live in a very colorful apartment building.

Otherwise, I'm looking forward to another relaxing day at home. I've been exchanging emails with a friend on and off all weekend, about various plans she had, but there's something lovely and peaceful about not having to go anywhere. It's not just about not going out to Brooklyn, where she is, so much as not going anywhere. I've got a few more manuscripts to read for work, but then I'm hoping to get into CoH later today. Maybe watch another movie.

Actually, speaking of CoH, I had an interesting RP conversation with another hero yesterday, going back to a storyline which is now several months old. Not to give too much away, but it seems as if everytime my little Noelle gets her love life in some sort of order, something comes along to screw it up. In this case, it's not something entirely new so much as a new perspective on an older situation. I'm looking forward to playing with it further.

What else? Oh, I was thinking of posting a excerpt from an older journal, to give my life a little perspective, but - in a rather sad commentary on my life, I guess - I'm not sure my old journals would be of interest to anyone else. I'm not even sure they're of that much interest to me. Well, I'll let you decide. This was me, then.

10 years ago today
I was living in London, working at a theatre in the general manager's office. Still my diary sounded rather tame.

Well, I arrived home from Paris fine last night, although the flight was delayed an hour leaving Charles de Gaulle. No other problems and I was able to come back to the flat, throw my bag on the floor, and relax with a cup of tea and the telly before bed.
Work was hectic today - An indication, I'm afraid, of what the weeks with Riverdance will be like. Oh well, only 1 more month anyway.
Theatresports class tonight - a small group only, but we did some really good work on emotions. I got to play angry, comforting, lustful, amazed, sorrowful, melancholic, and schitzophrenic. This week I definately have to get to the Actors Centre on Wednesday to see the team in action. I was also happy to hear that there is a New York Theatresports group, which I plan on contacting when I go home. This is just too much fun to give up easily!

5 years ago, not exactly today, but close
I think I was drunk.

Have you ever come across all the wisdom of the world in the walk home from a pub? All gone with the coming of sobriety, but in the moonlight, in the pale shadow of streetlamps and headlights, it all falls into order - a part of the tapestry. I'm under the spell of the moonsickness even now, with feelings gone in matters of hours, but at this moment, tonight, I've discovered one of the loneliest feelings in the night - to be by oneself amidst a group of people celebrating, enjoying themselves. This has been my weekend. Alone, mostly, and mostly lonely! Not the same thing, but two sides of a coin, or a double-edged sword. And there, too, is sadness. I'm alone because some of my friends are at the faire, and I'm alone because I chose not to be with them. This will all be meaningless in the daylight, save for the feelings of want, of belonging. Where exactly do I fit in? Not sitting on a barstool by myself while others are happy around me, not sitting on a beach chair by myself while others dance, and not, I lay odds on the future, in seeing what could have been this summer at the faire. But this is tonight, and with the rise of the sun, and the lessening of my headache, I hope to have a different view. But not tonight.

Well, that's all rather depressing. I got better, I'll have you know. And I don't miss working at the Ren Faire. I mean, I'm still alone, but rarely lonely. Just... sometimes.

Computer question

I'm taking a brief break from the day's craziness to toss out a request for advice. See, I have this grand idea that I'll buy a new laptop with my year-end bonus in December, and yes, I know it's only September, but I'm a "plan-ahead" kind of gal. Ideally, I want something light, and fast, and not extragavantly priced, that I can play CoH on as easily as I can write the Great American Novel. I want to have a nice, long-lasting battery life, or at least the ability to extend it. And wireless internet (or is that a given nowadays?). Oh, and I use a PC.

So... what should I start looking at?

So soon, you break my heart?

Fell in love with my new digital cable box last night, as I set it up to tape the entire series of Lost, The O.C., Gilmore Girls, Arrested Development, Kitchen Confidential, and whatever else came into my head as I played with it. Even recorded The Daily Show, and started watching it on a few-minute delay so we were able to skip some of the commercials. Good stuff. Really good stuff.

And then -- tragedy struck our burgeoning love. The roomie and I had to play with the connections to the tv and vcr and such, so we could watch the shows I'd taped on Tuesday. At some point after we'd done that, though I don't know if there's any correlation, the cable box started trying to reboot itself, and went kerplooie. Oh, Time Warner Cable, you minx. You tease. You lure me in with beautiful picture quality, and claim to release me from the bonds of programming, only to fail me.

I spent the time I should have used getting ready for work this morning on the phone with a service rep, who tried to talk me through fixing it, to no avail. She offered a service call -- at some point today. Unfortunately, not being independantly wealthy and able to laze about the house all day on a Thursday, I couldn't take it. So, the roomie having JUST picked the box up yesterday, today at lunch I have to go back down to the Time Warner offices and either try to get a new box, or see if they can fix what's wrong with this one. Sigh. I'm just glad I chose to watch Lost already. And how about that for a mind-blower?

This, that, and, yes, the other thing

So, every year my brother arranges a golf tournament in memory of my dad. He's been doing it for -- let's see -- 18 years? That can't be right... Anyway, my job has always been to help with the all-important beer cart driving. This year, because I'll be out of the office for the week before the tournament in Germany, and have been rather strenuously encouraged to be right back to work on the following Monday (the date of the tournament), I'm going to have to miss it. Which is a shame, and I'm annoyed, but since there's nothing really I can do about it, what's the use in complaining?

So, I won't be able to take place in this big family thing we do every year, but my brother's got me handling webmistress duties instead. Yup. We've gone high-tech, and got ourselves a blog. And the whole point of this post here was going to be a triffling little "argh!" that I got called THREE times by various family members to make spelling corrections on the post. Which, ok, yes, I fully intended to fix them immediately after I got the first call, but the internet was haunted and wouldn't let me, and by the time I had a chance to do so this morning, I already got the next call, and the third shortly thereafter to change something back. Just... sigh. But thanks to my friend who talked me through the template changes on my site, I was able to easily make changes on the family site. So, wahhoo! And thanks.

So if that was the "this", what's the "that?" Hmmmm... Oh! I'm going even MORE high tech at home. The roomie and I have upgraded to digital cable and digital video recorder, so those mean programmers who schedule Lost at the same time as Veronica Mars won't be able to keep me from going on on Wednesday nights. Now, I can record two things at the same time! Isn't technology grand? Thanks to Matt and Alisha for the final nudge that brought us into the brave new world of the 21st century. (Also, they're funny people. Go read their stuff. Go! Now! I'll still be here when you get back.)

You back? Ok, so on to "The Other Thing." Something happened recently to an internet friend that made me think about our online society. It's not a happy thought, but if something happened to me, god or the PTB forbid, would my email correspondents and blog readers ever know? I want to leave something -- like a note with my will, if I had one, or some kind of final instructions -- that if I died, or were otherwise unable to type again, or even just was cut off from all internet access for a period of time, that someone would blog about it for me, and let people I know know. Because the fact is, while some of the people I email with and talk about and who comment here are "real life" friends, the others that aren't are still folks I consider friends. It's a Blade Runner kind of futuristic mindset that hopes that someone, if the worst would happen, would think to email everyone in my address book, so that no one is left in the dark.

And on that thrilling, upbeat note... I'm going to lunch.

Triathlon Recap

The moon was still up, shining brightly on the waters of the bay as we drove to Sandy Hook yesterday morning around 5am. I haven't seen that side of the clock since... well, since last year's triathlon. I sat in the backseat of Yi Shun and Jim's car, arm around their happy little hound, listening to my iPod as I struggled to wake up. As Rufus Wainwright's Hallelujah played in my ears, our caravan of cars joined others on the road to the race site, other bleary-eyed racers with their bikes in racks on top of their cars merging with the line of traffic like some silent, choreographed ballet, conducted by race volunteers waving lit batons, pointing us towards parking.

In the pre-dawn light, a noisy generator doing its best to illuminate the parking lot, we unloaded the cars, pumped our tires, and gathered our packs. Coast Guard officials checked our names off as we entered the main staging and transition area, which was on a Coast Guard base. As the sky brightened, I laid out my towel and gear next to my bike in our "Divas in the Dirt" rack, making sure I had everything ready to go. We took turns marking each other with our numbers, which had to be not only pinned to our shirts for the run, but stuck on our bikes and helmets, and visible on our arms and legs for the swim portion. Before I knew it, the announcer was calling the elite athletes and survivors to the start, and after handing my camera off to Jim, Yi Shun and I found spots on the bleachers near the start to watch our friend Jodi go off in the first group. After a stirring rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner," the countdown began, and Jodi was off like a shot to all our cheers. Yi Shun and I were in wave 7, but it wasn't long before we took our place with the other red-capped swimmers and inched into the water of the bay for one final inspirational speech. Suddenly, they were counting down to our start, and... go!

There's nothing quite like the surging into the water in a mass of bodies, all kicking and flailing to find the rhythm of their training runs. It's not like swimming in a pool, the lanes clearly marked and a wall at each end to push off from. There are bodies all around you, everyone trying to make room for their arms to stroke, their legs to kick, to move themselves forward. The extra-salty water gave us extra buoyancy, but the waves that came at us from the side made every stroke harder. I panicked, a little, and kept to breaststroke as much as possible for the first half of the swim, using freestyle to get me around the buoys at the halfway mark, and staring up at the now-blue sky as I backstroked for much of the drive back to shore. Swam into one or two little jellyfish, which was an adventure in not freaking out in open water, and swallowed a little of the bay, but I didn't have to fall back onto an Angel's noodle for a rest, or take a break on a lifeguard's surfboard. Though some of them were cute, and I was tempted...

Made it out of the water near the end of the competitors in my wave, and was passed by some in the wave following me, but I didn't care. I made it out, and walked/jogged to my bike in the transition area. Sat on my towel to rinse off my feet and pull my socks and shoes on, grabbed some Gatorade (a sort of unofficial sponsor of our Reluctant Divas team) and water, put on my helmet and shades, and lifted my bike off the rack to walk out to the bike start. On my way out, I passed Jodi, already done with the swim AND the bike, and on her way out for the run. I saddled up, biked the first few yards with Jodi beside me, and headed off for the 11-mile bike with the wind at my back.

The first half of the ride was a breeze. I had my gear-switching under control, though I'd say 14 of the gears on my 21-gear bike usually go unnoticed. Keeping the front wheel in the middle gear, I ranged up and down in the back, from 1 to 7, depending on the grade on the road, which was mostly flat -- and scenically beautiful. I wished for a helmet-mounted camera so I could take a few shots, though once we reached the turnabout at the middle of the out-and-back course, I was too busy pushing against the wind in my face to think about photography. Instead, with Cake's The Distance running through my head on repeat, I pushed on, and made it back to the transition area past cheering spectators, and saw Sally Edwards accompanying the Final Finisher as she set out on the bike ride.

Had some more to drink in the transition area as I put my bike back on the rack next to Yi Shun's (who I'd waved to on the bike course), and threw on my baseball cap as I walked on unsteady legs to the start of the run course. And actually, walked most of the "run" as well, my shins and calves complaining most of the way. Saw Yi again on her way to the finish line as I headed out, and waved to another member of Team Reluctant Divas as I pushed through the first two miles at a walk, turning to a combo jog/walk for the final mile. I took the last few hundred yards at a beautiful pace, one I wished I could have had for the whole run, and saw a whole wonderful, lovely Divas cheering squad as I crossed the line and got my finisher medal. Final time: 2 hours, 8 minutes, 34 seconds. Overall, I finished 835th out of 929. Nowhere near the front, but not at the very back, either. Hooray!

I lost most of my time on the run, but am pretty happy with my swim and bike splits, which I did in 23 and 45 minutes, respectively. And though I didn't love my new tri shorts, for the most part all my gear stood up well to the demands I put on it, though I have few ideas for alterations for next time.

Yes, next time. I'll do this again. Though maybe I'll train for it next time. Who's with me?

Finished!

Excuse me if I can't walk for the next few days.

Not just blathering again

Trying to get a few more things done before taking off for the weekend. The pile of manuscripts on my desk, which seemed so bearable earlier this week, has grown exponentially. I don't have to read ALL of them, and some of them I can take my time about, but still... several hundreds of pages to get through. *Sigh*

I don't want to use this just as a checklist of things I need to do before I head down to the train and the Jersey Shore later tonight. That's not interesting. I will tell you I'm bring down the latest version of my "How to Date a Superhero" draft proposal, and will hopefully get a little work done on that. I'm still very excited about it. There's an article in last week's Entertainment Weekly about girl gamers, but the idea I have for my book will be about so much more than that.

So, with nothing else interesting to say (sorry), I'll just throw up a little link to a reading I'm going to on Monday, provided I survive the weekend. Maybe I'll see you there!

Looooong lunch

This has been a sort of weird work day. I had to get up by myself today -- which, ok, so you're all like "What? Big deal!" -- but I usually can trust my roomie to knock on my door as he goes into the shower, and it's that knock, more so than the alarm clock which I snooze every nine minutes, which gets me up and going. But he (the roomie, not the alarm clock, which is sexless) was working from home today, or as I like to refer to it: "working" from home, so he slept in.

So, anyway, I get my little self up, grab the subway to work, have a little breakfast, and then have a 10am staff meeting, which takes about an hour. I don't mind that at all -- it's great to actually sit down with my colleagues, and half the time it's the first chance I get to hear about some of the issues they're dealing with, good and bad. So, staff meeting, then when I get back to my desk I have a message from my lunch date's assistant, suggesting a time (12:30) and a restaurant (way down in Tribeca). I agree, of course, for I'm nothing if not agreeable, and then I had less than an hour to get an entire morning's worth of work done. Ran out of the office at noon, hit an ATM, and took a $13 cab ride down to the office of the editor I was meeting (who has an AMAZING view of the Hudson, by the way. Stunning!), and enjoyed a nice, leisurely lunch. My cab ride BACK to the office took For-EVER though, and when the meter hit $16.50 and I still was several blocks away, I told him I'd walk the rest of the way. Which I did, and saw two very cool, New York-y sights.

1)A full brass band being conducted in concert on the sidewalk in front of a Greek restaurant less than a block from Carnegie Hall, and

2)Someone smoking outside the service entrance to Trump Tower, wearing a "You're Fired!" baseball cap. I wonder if she HAD to wear it, or if it was some sort of meta statement.

Anyway, so I'm back to work now for a few more hours before I run home to do laundry, go to my CoH character's impromtu "Welcome Back!" party, and see about rolling up a villain or two. Yay!

Four days

So... it's really happening. Yup. I'm really doing it again. The only difference is, this time? I am so not prepared. Not. As in, not in the least.

If you don't hear from me after, say, Friday, it's probably because I dropped dead somewhere along the race course. I mean, I'm hoping I make it through the swim. Drowning is such an ugly way to go, and it would seem too ironic to have spent so much of the past summer down at the Jersey Shore without incident, only to drown when it matters. And, well, if I can depend on my swell little bike, freshly decorated with Lance Armstrong and "Whores on the Hill" stickers, then the bike part should be fine - as long as it's as flat as the race description says it is. And being New Jersey... yeah, I can believe that. As for the run - well, I guess I can walk that, if I have to, except for my no-doubt stirring finish.

So... maybe I'll be ok. I hope so.

I just heard from Yi Shun that our Team Reluctant Divas t-shirts are in, so that's cool, and one less thing I have to think about wearing/bringing. Still need to get a new pair of bike/running shorts, I think. Sounds like a fun errand for lunchtime, since my appointment got cancelled. And otherwise... well, I guess I'm just about as ready as I'll ever be.

If I say I'm doing this again next year, someone remind me to train for it, ok? Thanks!

Tuesday ramblings

She stares at the blank space on her computer screen, willing the words to come. Surely, she thinks, if I just wait long enough, inspiration will strike. The minutes tick by... tick... tick... tick... marked by the tiny digital clock in the corner of her screen, always a few minutes off from the clock on her telephone, which is off from the one on her wrist. Where do all those little minutes go? Between "I have plenty of time" and "Oh no, I'm late"?

She stares at the pile of papers on her desk, not getting any smaller in just the looking at them. She needs to actually read them, to decide how she feels about someone else's writing. Instead, though, she wants to think about her own.

Tick... tick... tick...

She feels that tug of inspiration, drawing her to write, to create. Is it worthy? Will they like it?

Does it matter?


Yeah, sometimes I do just babble on, don't I?

Remembering

There are some things that are hard for me to write about, to talk about. My dad's death when I was a teenager, the recent devastation of New Orleans, and 9/11 are pretty much on the top of that list right now. Needless to say, 9/11 is a topic of much conversation right now here in New York, and I'm sure a lot of people -- good people, strong people -- are writing about it and sharing their experiences. I'm not sure I'm there yet.

What I can do is share this. Personal recollections from one of my favorite bloggers and favorite authors, Meg Cabot.

Happier thoughts soon.

At the Guinness Oyster Fest

Feeling a little guilty

Ok, so I'm sitting here, still in my pajamas (because it's Saturday, and I can do that), paying someone to clean my apartment while I browse the 'net. Actually, this is better than before, when she was cleaning my bedroom while I sat in the living room watching tv. And not just any tv, but TLC's "Clean Sweep." There's just levels and levels of irony or something there.

Anyway, I have to call the girls and get things organized for later. We're going to the Guinness Oyster Fest up in Riverside Park to enjoy some sun, booze, and Irish music. Later, there'll be more music indoors. And I think a crafts festival. All I'm saying is, it'll be a busy, fun-filled day.

Oh!! And because this never happens, I have to brag that I won not one, but TWO games of Catan last night. Two! (Oh, and that's a link to the online version, though we play the old fashion board game, albeit one with all the expansion packs: Seafarers and Cities & Knights, as well.) Go me!

Happy updates

When my little blog existed on Diaryland, I found that it felt like more than enough to update it every week or so, every couple of days at the most. Here though, where I know (or think I know) that there's a whole wonderful group of folks reading and commenting, and (if they're anything like me with other people's blogs) checking it regularly, I want to update more frequently. So, yes, some of what I throw up here may be useless crap, but some, I hope, may spark some fun "conversations." Or whatever we call the chain comment-leaving that we do.

I finished a first draft of the non-fiction proposal I'd been working on for the last week, and gave it to a few people for comments. I'm nervous, certainly, but I think there's a real great idea in it, and I would love -- for oh-so-many reasons -- to make it work. The main criticism I've received so far was a vague unease with the amount of "me" in it, but I think that's part of my plan. (Not the unease, the me-ness.) Or I want it to be, to judge by some of the other books I'm using as examples. Does that make any sense?

No, of course not, because you have no idea WHAT I'm talking about. Sorry. Ignore me. Go about your business.

World Outside My Window

I went to bed early last night, victim of one of those annoying headaches that comes after a cocktail or two, not enough to actually get buzzed, just enough to throw your whole evening out of whack. I'd wanted to get a lot more work done on this great idea I had for a non-fiction book proposal, but aside from fixing a few typos I'd found in what I'd already written, I didn't get much done. So, to bed.

Now, I love my little NYC apartment, but it has a few quirks. No window screens, crazy small closets in each bedroom but nothing that would pass as a coat or linen closet, kitchen cabinets that try to knock out tall folks who walk in, a bathroom door that opens out into the narrow entrance hallway, etc. etc. But one of my favorite quirks, really, is the piano bar directly downstairs from us. In the summer, I barely hear anything from it, with the noise from our air conditioner or a fan drowning out the music. And in the deepest winter, the tunes are muffled by the floor. But it's those beautiful balmy fall and spring nights, when I sleep with my window wide open to catch a breeze, that I get to hear not only constant refrains by Billy Joel or Elton John, Broadway tunes belted out, or the once-a-night jingle for the bar itself, but exciting conversations from bar patrons who take their cigarettes (and their arguments) outside.

Last night, I woke from a deep sleep at I-don't-know-what time, to hear some guy yell, "This place has LOST its charm!" He then proceeded, as far as I could surmise, to try to force his girlfriend to take his Amex card, yelling, "Take it! Take it! Take it!" At some point, one of his friends from inside the bar came out to try to calm him down, but just added to the noise, calling his name loudly even as the uncharmed fellow must have walked off.

As I laid there in bed, hearing the whole thing, slightly groggy from sleep, I felt like I could picture the whole thing, and was more than half tempted to just poke my head out my window and add my two cents, "Oh, just take it already and shut him up!" I never do though. Too much trouble to get out of bed. As the sounds drifted back to the usual noises of the street, cars and fire engines driving by, I fell back to sleep, disturbed once again by a garbage truck picking up trash at some point in the night/early morning, but otherwise, slept straight through to my alarm in the morning.

Just a bit of color from my New York life.

I should mention...

... that despite my earlier post I'm no longer doing the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer. Not because it's a bad charity (it isn't), or because I'm lazy (I'm not, usually), but because the organizers of the event require all participants to raise a minimum of $1,800 in order to participate. Which, after my earlier charitable efforts this year for the Revlon Run/Walk, and coupled with the Danskin Tri, is just way too much. So I'm putting a cap on my fundraising efforts for them now (they can keep my $55 registration fee), and will try to figure out a way to get those folks who already donated to have their money applied towards my friend Matt's efforts.

And I suddenly have another lovely free weekend to enjoy.

Blog issues and requests

Ok, so I've been futzing with the blog template here for the last few days, trying out Front Page, hoping to figure out what all the html codes mean and how they work, and I think I've finally gotten most of it to where I want it to be. Maybe. Though I'd be more than happy to play around with it some more, if I could find someone to talk me through it. I think that's the thing -- I can mess around with it for ages more, but without knowing what I'm doing, it's just me messing around. If anyone wants to volunteer to talk me through a few more changes -- I really want this page in shades of purple rather than blue, I think -- I'll be happy to take you up on it.

In other news, I've been having a lovely, relaxing weekend down at the shore house. The weather's been perfect, the waves have been great, and except for a few too many jellyfish in the water, it's been truly ideal. I got a couple of good books read: Uglies by Scott Westerfeld, and Valiant by Holly Black. Both very good. Uglies has a sequel, Pretties, which I'll have to see about getting a copy of, while Valiant takes place in the same world as Black's previous novel Tithe, which I loved.

In other news, thank god for internet connection, though my sitting here at the beach house writing has lead my sister to ask if I was "writing one of those embarrassing blogs that's going to come back and haunt [me] later?" Well, yes, please, if I'm lucky. So let's all be sure to write lovely, potential awkward things here, shall we? And I've been able to keep in touch with a couple of other folks via Messenger, which has been really helpful in coordinating a storyline on CoH (which I hope those of you who know it are finding interesting. And for those of you who don't, here).

What else? Oh! I finished moving all of my old posts here to Blogger, so the archives are all up! And I hope I've fixed any old links in them, but if anyone comes across one that I haven't please feel free to let me know. I'd addicted to checking on my comments, now that I have them. Now though, I should go run around outside playing with the little munchkins. Ciao!

Blog by phone again!

Late afternoon at the beach. I'm not sure it gets better than this.

Neato! I can blog from my phone. How cool is that?

Putting my feet up in my office.

Moving!

It's official! I just posted the following over on my diaryland site.

Exciting news, kiddies. I've decided I want to be able to get comments on my blog, and I just know you've been chomping at the bit to comment, and since I'm not prepared to pay for a Super-gold membership here at Diaryland, I'm moving the rantings and ravings of ktbuffy over to blogger.

It'll take me a little time, but I'm hoping to move all of my archives over there, so you won't miss a single delicious word I've ever written. Because I know you were anxious.

Anyway, I feel more grown-up and trendy directing people to my blog rather than my online diary here.

So come on by and drop me a line! Oh, and feel free to let me know if you know anything about html. I want to change the format a bit, and could use some help. Or a swanky program like Front Page.

So, soon the masses will descend on this little page, and the champagne will flow like water! Mwahahahaha!!!

Ahem.