I took advantage of the rain on Friday, I wiped down my car. I used a shamwow that I bought during the State Fair. I may have ruined it, as it's now quite black. We'll see how it comes out of the washer. On the bright side, my car looks much better. It's no longer black & I got all the leaves off of it. That did not last of course, it's right under a Bradford pear, but it did make a difference.

I got 9 hours of sleep Friday night. Guess I was tired, huh? Then I took a 3-hour nap Saturday afternoon. Needless to say, not much cleaning. Managed to at least get the kitchen to where we can cook again. We've been on the go so much, the house is just plain cluttered.

Gaming: Sunday, since one of the player's bailed on Rosemary's game, I ran Nature's Wrath, a Living Forgotten Realms game. Only one of the player's had ever played it. Since there were only 4 players, two who had planned to come got sick, the fights went quickly. They had no healing so the fights got quite challenging. At some point, all four characters got bloodied (1/2 hit points). Rosemary won't be running her home game again until January. It's just too difficult to arrange a time around the holidays.

Last night was Chris's game. We didn't have a fight; our characters delivered the magic artifact to the elf queen, got the treaty from and got the chance to do some research done in her library (working on a dangling plot line). Then the characters managed to sneak back through enemy lines to their own side.

After our characters had two weeks leave, and got paid for rescuing the Baron's children, they got their new assignment. They get to go sabotage the enemy supply depot and supply line. That's what happens when your characters are 12th & 13th level scouts; not the character class, the branch of the Imperial army. If we don't play again after Thanksgiving, then this will be the last game of the year.

Tatting: it's past time to start tatting snowflakes and stars for Christmas. I've pulled out my Oh My Stars book and the Sunderman snowflake book.

I spotted a redtail hawk on my walk to the bus stop this morning. How cool is that?

Gaming: We did not reach the elf city Monday night. Instead, we ran into the previous diplomatic group. Sort of. Two were undead & the other four were somehow broken, via magic, etc. Since they had very similar abilities; a warmage, a cleric, etc plus a bard, it was not easy. We did try to capture one but that was a failure. They were too far gone. At least we know what happened to them, although unless we find some clues we won't know who did it.

This weekend is Mace. I'll be playing the last Living Greyhawk, with my bard Nadia; some Living Forgotten Realms & some Witch Hunter again (finally). I have to be packed tonight because I'll be leaving from work tomorrow.

Politics: The election is OVER! Finally, the campaign ads will be gone. You have no idea how happy that makes me. It got to the point where I had the urge to do laundry twice a day, just from the splash caused by all the mudslinging. Blyech.

I voted in October, but on Monday, November 3rd I saw an ad that made me almost made me wish that I could vote again. I saw an ad for a Judge on the appeals court that only talked about her qualifications & what she wants to do. It said absolutely nothing about her opponent. I am so glad that I had already voted for Linda Stephens. Unless she changes, I will vote for her again.

I wrote letters to my Mom's sisters on Tuesday. Since they are all at Aunt Shirley's, I just put them in one envelope & sent them together. Hopefully, they have them by now.

I was so tired yesterday that I laid down for a nap before Chris got home. He woke me at 9:30 and an hour later he woke me up enough to eat supper. We ordered Domino's and half an hour later, I went back to bed. I got about 10 hours of sleep and was still sleepy this afternoon. I have no explanation. The weather is sunny & gorgeous. I had two cups of tea.

Tatting: Saturday was the Heritage Day at Oak View Historic Park. The Triangle Tatters got together & had an exhibition table. About six of us came, tatted, chatted, demonstrated and displayed. The weather was nigh onto perfect, although I could have done with fewer bugs. I did not get much done, except for learning that I have my necklace entered in the wrong category. To still have a good entry, I'd need a new creation, one that fits the category that I entered. Poor Tara about freaked out. Today is the first day that entries can be taken to be submitted. I have until Monday. My bookmark is about 3/4 done so I'm not very worried. And I wasn't worried on Saturday.


Gaming: Sunday's game got cancelled. One of the players got sick and Chris had a flat tire. If we had tried to go, after that, we would have been at least an hour late. It was one thing after another. The special piece that lets you loosen the theft-prevention lugnut was missing so Chris and Joe couldn't change the tire to put the spare onto the car. So we called AAA and had it towed. The tire place we took it to didn't have a universal so they couldn't get it either. Chris ended up taking it into the dealer on Monday, before work.

Monday's game: we managed to leave the Giant's castle, without fighting the entire population. We did score, inadvertently, a diplomatic coup. We set off the traps on the magic artifact, so the queen for whom we were retrieving it, won't. Which is good, because she'd auto (story-line) fail all the saves and die. Poor Gaius, Joe's character, failed one of them and was in very bad shape.

On the bad side, I apparently bought my tennis shoes, on sale, when I weighed a couple pounds less. When I was driving to meet Anitra on Saturday they about cut off the circulation in my left foot. I am not exaggerating. Ouch. Luckily, I had another pair of shoes with me. Otherwise, Saturday would have been quite unpleasant.

I was interviewed on Monday for a friend's ethnology class. It was interesting trying to explain gaming to someone with little to no common experience. For one analogy, I suddenly stopped, she had no clue what I meant when I compared Superman to oh..Booster Gold, or Blue Beetle. Literally, I had to explain the dice involved, the character sheets, the existence of rulebooks, touch on the history of gaming, all that. She barely knew enough to know what questions to ask. Heck, if I'd been a jungle tribeswoman, she'd have had a better idea what to ask.

The walking group was still small on Tuesday. We walked a 3rd route and boy howdy, this one was hill-acious. It took me half the afternoon, and a smoothie, to cool off.

Online Weirdness: I am on a couple social networks and I always include in my profile that I am in a relationship. So why do guys keep sending me messages about 'how pretty' I am and wanting to get to know me? One, while I don't scare small children, I'm no beauty queen either. Two, you only know what I've posted. For all they know I'm a guy who's using some woman's picture & is spoofing being female.

FYI, according to the "quiz" below, I jumped on a football player because I'm a Ninja.
Pick the month you were born:

January-------I kicked
February------I loved
March--------I karate chopped
April----------I licked
May----------I jumped on
June----------I smelled
July-----------I did the Macarena With
August--------I had lunch with
September----I danced with
October-------I sang to
November-----I yelled at
December-----I ran over

Pick the day (number) you were born on:

1-------a birdbath
2-------a monster
3-------a phone
4- ------a fork
5-------a snowman
6-------a gangster
7-------my mobile phone
8-------my dog
9-------my best friends ' boyf riend
10-------my neighbor
11-------my science teacher
12-------a banana
13-------a fireman
14-------a stuffed animal
15-------a goat
16-------a pickle
17-------your mom
18-------a spoon
19------ - a surf
20-------a baseball bat
21-------a ninja
22-------Chuck Norris
23-------a noodle
24-------a squirrel
25-------a football player
26-------my sister
27-------my brother
28-------an iPod
29-------a surfer
30-------a llama
31-------A homeless guy

Pick the color of shirt you are wearing:

White---------because I'm cool like that
Black---------because that's how I roll.
Pink---- -------because I'm crazy.
Red-----------because the voices told me to.
Blue-----------because I'm sexy and I do what I want
Gr e en---------because I think I need some serious help.
Purple---------because I'm AWESOME!
Gray----------because Big Bird said to and he's my leader.
Yellow ------ --because someone offered me 1,000,000 dollars
Orange --------because my family thinks I'm stupid anyway.
Brown---------because I can..
Other----------because I'm a Ninja!
None----------because I can't control myself!

tatting: I started an easy heart this morning & messed it up. Instead, I made a butterfly and gave it to the guy sitting next to me, since he asked me what I was doing and even asked questions about it.

health? I don't know if I'm coming down with a cold, the office is just too air conditioned or if I'm suffering from hypochondria. I feel lousy but that could be lack of sleep, coupled with hormones. Maybe.

Music: I'm listening to 80's tunes on Pandora. My assistant reminded me of it. I'd heard of it months ago but never followed up. It's pretty cool, but it doesn't seem to have any filk.

Gaming: We survived the fight in the feast hall. When we ended the game, there were two or three giants left, my druid had fallen twice (thank goodness for Delay Death), the dwarf monk called it a 'good fight,' and the cleric and my character were pursuing fleeing drow.

TV: I'm catching up on Primeval. There was a neat twist in the episode that I saw last night. Can't wait to see what they do with it. There's an American version of Life on Mars coming out. It should be interesting to see what they do with it.

Picture of a picnic area at a rest stop in Oklahoma. Yes, that's me on the left.

Gaming: Tough fight last night in Chris's game. The giants were pretty stock, a couple hill giants and a trio of frost giants. But they were supported by a couple Drow arcane casters. Kelis went negative (-6 hit points) but autostabilized. Then the scout and the warmage poured enough healing potions down her throat to get her to positive. By that time, the giants were dead and our group was hunting the two casters who were under the effects of a greater invisibility spell. Our cleric was sick so my druid and potions or wands was all the healing that we had. Since our cleric was gone last session, Kelis had some healing spells prep'ed. Good thing, too. She used at least one & maybe two of them, plus a mass lesser vigor. No one else went to negative hit points, but at least two others were in single digits.

Next time, we continue our search for the missing Elf relic and kill more evil giants.

Weather: it was pleasantly cool this morning. How refreshing.

TV: I found the remote last night, so we're going to put off buying a new tv, at least for a couple months. We taped the Olympic equestrian events last nigh; and I'm going to check the online schedule to record some other things, too.

site of the day: Angry Chicken, eco/hippy/treehugger but practical

Chris's game tonight. So we have to move the old tv, it's still in the middle of the living room floor. The TV died the second Wednesday that I was out of town. It was death by fire (there were flames involved).

TV: We went TV shopping this weekend. We're looking at 30" to 42" and no larger. That's the biggest that will fit the space that we have. We know what we're looking for, just shopping around for price.

Movies: Went to see Dark Knight & the 3rd Mummy movie yesterday. Dark Knight is a very good movie. It's going to be interesting to see what they do for the next one. It's going to be hard to top. They set a very high bar. Mummy was about what I expected. It's not quite as good as the first but it was a good movie.

Greyhawk Ruins: We did another two adventures on Saturday. They went pretty fast. Part of that was that we got lucky. A couple of well-placed spells really shut down the opposition.

My sunburn has finally stopped peeling. Yay?

Tatting: I worked a little more on the Checkerboard doily, from Tatters Treasure Chest. I don't think that I really like it though, pity that. I really want to work on AnneB's dragon. I just need to finish at least one project.

Doily that I gave Louise:


I've almost caught up at work. Now I'm starting the actual, current work. Again, yay?

One picture from Vacation (one of the few that looks good enough to share)

Urban Legend: Have you ever heard the story of the lost server? The story goes that an institution had a contract to replace their servers on a rotating schedule. The company notified them that it was time to replace Server, let's call it X. Institution's IT department checks their maintenance logs & can't find a server X on it. They double check with the company, who confirms that yes they have a Server X. IT people ping the server & to their surprise they get a response. So the server does exist, but where?

They do a quick check and can't find it. In resignation, they form teams to start tagging and tracing cables, to find the server (good things those thing aren't wireless, huh). These cables sometimes go through walls and so on, too, increasing job fun. One team, in a recently renovated building, traces a cable going into a wall but can't find where it exits. As a last resort, they cut open the dry wall to see where the cable went.

There, behind the drywall, still in the plastic, protective dropcloth, is the missing server. It had been placed temporarily between to wall studs and then the workers had just drywalled over it. In all the time since the renovation, it had done its work, without requiring service, covered by a dropcloth.

Here's the kicker. I know the building where they found the server. One of my friends was on a search team, although not the one that found it. This is not an urban legend. It really happened.

Bus: I was (I counted) 36 steps from the bench at the bus stop when the bus drove by. It must have been a new driver because although the sidewalk is not right next to the road there, experienced drivers look to see if anyone is close to the stop. I know because I've had them stop for me. I got to work a little late as a result. The sad thing is, if I had walked back home and driven to a park & ride to get to work; I would have gotten to work at the same time as I did waiting for the next bus.

Gaming: Chris's game was last night. We're sticking with D&D 3.5 because switching to 4.0 would be like changing game systems entirely. One player is at the beach & another one had car problems but we continued the adventure anyway. We descended into the underground river to sneak into the giants' keep.

It was all navigating natural hazards and one character's lack of engineering knowledge. Our scout almost drowned but the one who almost drowned her, rescued her. We used an immovable rod to belay the rope to lower folks down the waterfall. Which is great, but the monk deactivated the rod early and let all the rope descend on the scout swimming downstream. She managed to cut the magic rope, making is disappear, before she drowned. The monk had consumed a fly potion so he was able fly over and grab her to finish the rescue.

My druid Kelis, 12th level now by the way, used her 2nd wild shape of the day and took the trip as a polar bear. I need to check how long she's been changed, I think she's limited to her level in hours.

Tatting: I finished the 4th round! Yeah! Only took 12-13 yards, too. I thought that it was going to be 16-19 yards. I started the 5th round but put it on hiatus while I work on the eTatters March monthly challenge. So far I've tatted 2 3-leaf clovers, since yesterday. It's Rozella Linden's Celtic knot shamrocks and works up really quickly. It's all chains.

gaming: Rosemary's game went well. We've hit another plot point so we're making progress. We had to call the combat because we were running short on time. We'll pick it up next session.

Tonight is Chris's game and they'll be taking up duties at Flagstaff. Good news, our characters are not being court martialed, for being AWOL. Okay, they didn't come back after leave but they did send messages about what was going on & they did get back in time to report.

Tomorrow I'll be zero rounding some LG. It's gonna be APL 6 so I'll be playing my sorceress probably.

The day flew by at work today. I had the monthly reports to finish & then a billing spreadsheet enter. Plus emails & phone calls about HR stuff.

books: Um, I read something. Dark Melody....and I don't remember what else. I'm still reading the ShadowRun book. I picked up my manga & started reading that. But I haven't finished anything.

clothes: suede shoes, black jeans, black belt with silver buckle, white waffle polo, purple sweater (my office was cold today, I never took it off), feather earrings & quartz point pendant, fem power ring, class ring, hematite band & braided hair.

Chris's game: Last night the fight with the Salt Baron continued. One of Kelis's last actions was to cast sleet storm, which blocked the merchant from targeting our PCs with spells (sleet storm does not do damage, it blocks normal sight and makes it hard to walk). Joe's cleric, Gaius, hit the area with a dispel magic a few rounds (& some healing) later. That revealed the merchant & his closest salt golem, which was half-destroyed. Turns out, when Chris wrote up the salt golem he included a specific weakness: vulnerability to 'create water' & 'sleet storm'. That was also true for the salt merchant's salt staff. It was half-gone, too. That had the unintended side effect that the next time he used it, it blew up. One more destroyed golem later & the fight was over.

We spent the rest of the session dealing with our PCs correct orders (make a 6-week trip in 3-weeks, since they weren't where they were when the orders were cut). Also, the undead knight sent a little 'gift,' 6 black heavy warhorses with matching tack. The dwarf developed a distaste/hatred/antipathy towards riding so he certainly wasn't going to take one. None of the other PC's except for the fey-ish warmage & my half-elf druid took one. They are very nice warhorses. My cavalry characters would be drooling (so to speak).

tatting: I finished the red butterfly that I started, from the Palmetto Guild's book of butterflies, while trying to donate blood. Now I've started another snood, red this time.

dream: I was working at Piece Goods and Louise was the manager. There were just 3 of us working and it was almost closing time. We could see snow falling outside in the lights of the parking lot so we were trying to hurry. 3, or 4, people came in through the back door (storage room) and were stacking up fabric from the remnant tables, mostly camo and heavy fabrics. The handwritten sign on a nearby table said $4/yard. I just knew that they were going to claim that sale price for the fabrics that they were buying. At least they weren't too horrible about it, just irritated.

We finally got everyone out the door & started cleaning up. Someone had left a box of kittens as well and I was trying to put water out for them when this lady barges into the store (oops, forgot to lock the door). We tried to tell her that we were closed, 'but I need this for my job. I won't be long.' Finally we showed her that the register was empty and closed, we couldn't sell her anything. She finally left.

In the meantime, 2 others came into the store but they helped us clean up when they saw that we were closed. We locked the door but accepted their help because we really needed to be out of there before the snow made it too dangerous to drive. First lady came back, pounding on the door, demanding to know why the other 2 customers could buy stuff but she couldn't. We had to explain to her that they weren't shopping, they were helping us straighten & pick stuff up.

Was that an anxiety dream or have I been reading the Customers Suck forum too much?

clothes: black half-boots, black jeans, black belt with Celtic knots, silver belt buckle with Celtic knotwork, hematite band, onyx band, emerald pendant & earrings, dark green Ocean City MD polo, & braided hair.

I ran into not one but two nice people today. That just perked up my morning.

One was the woman who called out, letting me that someone was trying to get my attention. Of course, the person trying to get my attention is the guy who works where I usually pick up my breakfast (I'm toting my breakfast this week). We made faces at each other through the window.

The other was the woman who let me know that I was missing my hair elastic. Not that she was to know that I had removed it because it clashed with my outfit today. So I thanked her and let her know that I had removed it and thanked her again for letting me know, 'cause if it had slipped off that would have been well, not a lifesaver, but something to tend.

Chris's game: We finally had the showdown with the Salt Baron (expletives inserted by our PCs who are really pissed at him). He had at least 3 salt golems and all his spells are salt-themed, like he got elemental substitution: salt. We had finished off his 2 guards and were working on the golems when 10 pm hit. Kelis, my druid, slowed down that spell-slinging idiot by casting sleet storm on his half of the room. At the same time, Gaius's (Joe's cleric) spiritual weapon is whacking on him. His 3rd salt golem is defending him but so far not 100%.

I spent most of Saturday getting the table & environs cleared for last night's game. It's a shame, I had wanted to go to What the Hell Con. Oh well.

Sunday, I took more books to the Used Book Store & bought more. But I also found V'day presents for Chris. I bought him season 1 & 2 of Veronica Mars. That was half my book bill right there. My Witch Hunter book still has not arrived. *wah*

I still need to get a birthday present for Rosemary. Chris sent me her list so I have some things to find. Joe seemed to like his Christmas present last night. I went ahead & gave the 50 comic book villains book to David. He really liked it. Joe gave me season 2 DVD of Ranma 1/2 & he utterly thrilled Rosemary by giving her the Isis tv show on DVD. He got a good D&D book for Chris & the latest Shadowrun book. Diana got the next book in a series that he'd recommended to her. I don't remember what or if Joe & David got anything from him.

Sunday, was Rosemary's game. Richard brought presents, too. He gave coffee to Chris, a couple candles to me, a Munchkin game to Joe & I can't remember what he gave Rosemary.

Those stupid undead cursed & gaunts came back to attack our characters in Rosemary's game. She had designed that encounter thinking that we'd have a 9th level cleric with us. We don't because Diana had to pull out of the game due to her irregular schedule. But Richard managed to turn the mounts (cursed, I think) & that got rid of half of the combatants. When we killed all the riders (gaunts, I think, I'm no longer certain which is which), the remaining mounts fled. They're smarter than the riders and both are nasty, icky, undead things. Midnight & Aidon only stayed alive thanks to plot immunity. Otherwise they were both just soooo dead.

The wind was intense Sunday evening. I was quite glad not to be driving.

tatting: I finally got past adding both new threads on my bookmark. I did that yesterday & last night. Then I forgot to bring it work with me today.

books: Read vol 1 of Magical JxR, Reluctant Rogue, vol 2 of Pantheon High, White Lies, & Larceny and Old Lace.

clothes: black or blue jeans, t-shirts over the weekend, polo shirt yesterday & turtleneck today.

It has gotten cold today. It's been colder but with this wind it feels much colder. I wore my ear protection & a scarf today (the recycled silk one).

Gaming: Chris's game is starting to come together last night. We got a clue about the source of some of our problems. Turns out we have (accidentally) undermined the Salt Baron. He used to provide the army with salt from his mines but we provided the army with 2 giants who grind salt out of a magic wheel. So the army canceled the contract. He blames us. *sigh* We still have problems with the blood cabbage and the Executioner. We've started asking, 'what do we have to do to get sent to the front, anyway?'

books: I've read part of the 3rd Sisters Grimm book & I've started Thraxas.

tatting: I made some progress on the silver & white snowflake. It's a pain because I'm working with a shuttle & ball, but reversed. The chain thread is on a shuttle & the ring thread is on a small ball. Hey, it's working. Slowly, but it's working.

clothes: black suede shoes, black jeans, same belt, ring & watch, green turtleneck, striped embroidered black, burgundy & cream vest (that's really too small, I should get rid of it), black stone ring, flower band, quartz & moonstone pendants necklace, silver hoops earrings & braided hair.

Sorry for the lack of post yesterday, I was still tired & I had a lot of work to catch up.

Gaming: Chris's game Monday night. We found the cabbage thieves. And judging by their reaction to our inquiries: they've already used it to poison their weapons. It's a bar brawl, with dire wolves (okay, singular dire wolf; that would be my Druid, Kelis).

I sent the notes from the Witch Hunter game, that she ran, to Paige. She replied that they were pretty funny. I tried to write them more from Solange-Marie's point of view, rather than just generic notes.

tatting: I screwed up that snowflake. Luckily it was only the last point, really. I had to cut it off & start again. End result: a less than attractive snowflake, in my opinion anyway. I'll know more once I finish it.

Other crafts: I used that metal frame from Harrisville to make a couple potholders. I bought the frame & starting loops from Spin Blessing. They were great. They shipped quickly & without any problems. I think that I'll give them to my neighbors, along with my mini-calzone recipe.

Once again, I have a little bit of a headache by the end of the day. I think I've been staring at the computer screen too long again. Or it could be because of the cold front moving into the area.

gaming: We spent part of last night's game trying to track down William Talbot, the city hangman (part-time employee). He's taken care of all 30 of the town's executions, over the past 750 years. Last session we found his death record, about 380 years previous. Last night, we looked around his house & yes, there are signs that he's there, as undead, probably a ghost. Too bad when we went back after dark we found signs that someone had raided his garden. That's bad enough, but the cabbage that they stole was a toxic variety (Chris made it up). We spent the rest of the night talking (telling David R) about our Legend of the 5 Rings game. It was fun.

I finished the first story of my Tradewinds 2 game. It's a computer game & sort of fun. Not 'I can't wait to do that again', more like 'hey, I enjoyed that, I think I'll play it some more'.

tatting: My necklace is almost finished. I need to do the findings and the pendant. So I started another bookmark for Nordic Needles. I'm using one of Kersti's patterns, flora size 50 in multi red, white & blue.

books: I'm re-reading I'm the Vampire That's Why. I really needed something happy to read this morning. I have some credit at the local bookstore & I picked up The Way To Glory by Drake.

clothes: same shoes, watch, hematite ring & belt. Otherwise, black slacks, Celtic knot earrings, ring & triangle/Triskele pendant, hash mark ring, new burgundy Jamestown 400th polo shirt, & hair in a ponytail/bun held by new hair clip.

Chris's game: It was kind of quiet, no combat. Instead, we went over what we'd learned with the dwarf commander and he told us the origin of the wheel of cities. He also got Deriot (Diana's character) very, very drunk. He offered the entire group this unusual...wine. Even immunity to poison only helped, did not avert the effects. Chris had everybody do all three saves, reflex (Deriot auto-failed and sprayed most of her drink), will & fort. Deriot ended up singing bawdy songs in funny languages, until she passed out.

Our characters also reported for their new duty. Their orders got mixed & they ended up in the port town, as constables. As in fact, the entire force of constables. Pity the poor confused constables being given scout duty, somewhere on the front lines.

Morning commute soundtrack: Hazy Shade of Winter (Bangles version), Eddie, Bat Out of Hell, Gone to California, Now You See It (Now You Don't), Let's Dance, 3 Small Words & Khavi: Marching Orders.

books: I bought & read Making Money last night, before & after gaming. The bookstore had it on sale, and signed. I only went in to buy a Divine candy bar, but alas, I succumbed to the lure of the latest Terry Pratchett book. And stayed up until midnight to finish it.

writing: I talked to John a little bit after the game & I thought of what to do next with my story. I'm working on the prologue. I don't want to go into too much detail.

tatting: I started the necklace (black thread & black/copper beads) and was only halfway through the first ring & realized that I had 48 of the beads on the ball thread & 1 on the shuttle. Oops. So I retro-tatted and moved the stray bead to join the other 48.

I've decided to do a simple 3 ds (3 p separated by 3 ds) 3 ds ring with 4 bead 4 chain edging for the necklace. I'll add a flower, or maybe a bead & flower at the center when I'm done. I got the idea from the the gold necklace in Lyn Morton's book. If I get really ambitious, I'll join a strip of split chain to it (based on Lyn Morton's choker from the same book).

clothes: black ~slippers, black jeans, dusty rose wrap blouse over grey floral tank (which I was little doubtful about because it's very snug & women of my figure should be very careful about snug, but one of my coworkers said that it's very slimming), silver harp pendant on silver chain, triskele earrings, Celtic knot ring, hematite band, silver band w/ silver ~cord impressed in it,

Hallucinations? For some unknown reason, I woke up & thought I saw light outside my window. I checked my clock, thinking that I had somehow slept through the alarm & was thus running late. Very late. I was more than a bit surprised when I saw that it read something after 4 am. I check the window again, it was dark. So I mentally shrugged, rolled over & went back to sleep. Then when my alarm clock radio did wake me up, I swear it sounded like the weather forecast was for a high of 58F. Since yesterday's high hit about 94F, that seemed unlikely. So I stumbled down to see the tv & check the weather news. The real high was supposed to be near 90F (actually it only hit mid-80's). Odd, huh?

books: I finished Fortune's Stroke. Now I need to find the next book. I read the prologue to Scion: Demigod.

tatting: I loaded the black/brass color Czech faceted beads onto the black size 12 perle. Now I need to decide what pattern to use. I only have 49 beads, I lost one.

writing: I've now written cards to both of my father's sisters. That just leaves 7 more to write.

Chris's game is tonight. I need to clear off the table first. It has the most recent mail and Chris's cds (he's looking for one that's gone missing) all over it.

clothes: black ~slippers (I saw a student wearing an identical pair at lunch), black jeans, lilac polo, almost matching animalrescue site silicon bracelet, fem/dancer ring, flower band, mostly hidden flower fairy pendant, hematite band, butterfly earrings & plaited hair.

I'm feeling better - of course I slept most of yesterday, whether due to illness or the medicine I don't know.

sight of the day: a very bad accident involving 2 cars & a transit bus. At least one car's airbag deployed & in the second car I saw a passenger supporting the driver's neck. I sincerely pray that it's only a precaution that she is not that badly hurt. My prayers to them and all those involved.

I sort of read yesterday, they were re-reads that didn't take much attention. I did not try to tat, I didn't trust my concentration. Cold medicine makes me so foggy. I watched tv when I wasn't napping.

Gaming: Chris's game was last night. We finally rescued the dwarf commander, getting through one more fight while exiting the city. In the first fight, in the tunnels, the trolls transformed back to duergar when they died. This time, the trolls remained trolls but the dead duergar transformed to dark elves. We grabbed their corpses and ran. Maybe we'll get some information; if not at least we'll get loot.

Tat Days extra: I took the extra Workbaskets from Leigh, and gave them away at Tat Days. We ended up putting them out on Saturday & everyone loved them. The Palmetto Tatting Guild filled some blank spaces in their library & a woman who had lost the issue with the Barbie wedding gown to flood damage replaced it.

tatting: I worked on Jane's fantasy flower this morning on the way into work; it's from one of the classes this weekend. But I screwed up a ring again. I'll have to take it out & try again.

clothes: yesterday I wore sleepshirt & robe most of the day. Then I pulled on a t-shirt & leggings for the game. Today it's black jeans (despite the 97F heat), thin cotton blouse (texture check), Celtic knot ring, triskele earrings, knot pendant, ~rope band, braid, hematite band & black ~slippers.

Gaming: Chris's game last night. We found the commander, with a few diversions. We fought duergar and only one got away. He's outlined in faerie fire so he may not escape entirely. Xiana (Rosemary's character that I have yet to get the name right) proved herself boom-y when she killed 2 of them with arc of lightning followed by ring of blades (which doesn't care if they're invisible - just that they're only 5' away) and then the other 2 guards & 2 trolls finished off with suddenly empowered fiery burst. Boom! I took some damage and wounded a couple guards. That's pretty much it.

book: I bought & read Legacy, book 2 of The Sharing Knife yesterday. I got it for half-price between my discount & the frequent reader card. You know Bujold, she reads fast. I also finally finished the Game Master Emulator. I think I'm going to try using it for a solo adventure tonight.

tatting: I gave up trying to get that knot out. I managed to make a ring anyway, by getting that knot in one of the double stitch/knots. It looks a little lumpy but it's not egregiously noticeable. I have now started the bottom leg of the cross.

Weather: Thunderstorms last yesterday. I managed to get home just as one was starting. I need to check to see where we are on the rain gauge. We may be only 3" behind now. I can't find that information but the lakes vary from 2" to 26" below full.

clothes: black ~slippers, jeans & belt, Vorkosigan black/brown polo, silver clip watch, flower band ring, hematite ring, Celtic Knot ring, triangle triskele pendant, knotwork earrings, & ponytail bun held with black hairstick with brown bead.

Chris's Game: We finished off the other two trolls (duergar) and the last three kobolds. Our poor dwarf monk, Vertum, was so upset when he woke up (From being -55 hp with a delay death spell), that he hadn't killed a troll. He was happy that he'd killed duergar though.

We backtracked them deep into the mountain. There, in the depths, we found another one of those cities. But it's apparently an earlier effort because it's not as well constructed and in worse shape.

Just as Deriot (Diana) & Vertum (David) were about to retreat from the city full of kobolds & duergar, they saw most of the kobolds being herded out of the city by duergar (dark dwarf) commanders. That's not enough to get even our characters to attack an entire city. But the sight of the Commander of the Imperial dwarf legions (ie our current CO) being dragged into the city in chains is. In two weeks, the next game session, we go try to rescue the commander, without a chance to rest up from our last fight. Kelis (my character) still has two wild shapes left and a number of spells: note - badger is really not the right shape to fight anything big. You just don't do enough damage (ooh, both claws & bite connected, raging, max damage, that'll be 10 points of damage).

Bus Pass: Still can't find it. Guess what I'll be doing at lunch.

book: finished the character creation section. Now on to the rules section of Scion: Hero.

New Comic: Chivalry & Knavery - the art is really simple but the story is entertaining; somewhat D&D centric.

clothes: black slacks, slippers, belt (silver tone belt), white polo, Celtic knot ring, stone ring, triskele earrings, triskele pendant (new), black glass bead bracelet, & plaited hair with white elastic at the bottom and brown/white/black glass bead elastic at the top.

Christmas in July Diana remembered, after a call from me, to bring the presents to gaming last night. She bought them on her trip to NYC, back in December/January. Chris & Rosemary got fabulous dragons (his is red with gold & silver horns & spikes while hers is green/white jade). John, Joe & David got good luck knot/charm things (Joe with 12 sides of jade discs lashed together, John with the Chinese Zodiac & I didn't really see David's). She gave me a chest of tea (6 varieties, 2 stacks of each, perhaps 6 bags per stack) and then an embroidered fan for my birthday (black embroidered with a peacock).

Gaming Chris's game was last night & we got a late start. So we began the fight with the kobold scouts, kobold sorcerers & the duergar disguised as trolls, but did not finish. We took care of the first wave and almost all of the kobolds of the second wave. There's one left and he's flanked. But everyone is concentrating on the other 2 troll/duergar (only 1 down so far & one's barely wounded & unseen since the 1st round after he showed up). David says that it's a fabulous fight (only the Delay Death is keeping his character Vertum from really dead at -55 hp). He usually says it's not a decent fight until Vertum loses half his hit points.

website of the day: Quilt of Belonging - each block represents a country or ethnic group

books: stayed up too late after gaming to finish The Silver Ghost. This morning I will start Shooting at Loons by Margaret Maron. It's another of the books that I picked up from the used bookstore.

new drink: tried the Monster M-80 monster energy this morning. It tastes loads better than Red Bull (but then what doesn't, other than pepto bismal). It's still not something that I would drink other than for the energy, though, and not just because it's 180 cal per can.

clothes: black slacks, ~slippers, belt with white textured plaid cotton shirt (3/4 length sleeves & band collar), fem ring, ~rope ring, hematite ring, chainmail earrings, art deco flower maiden plaque/pendant (on black cord), clip watch & hair up in ponytail/bun with brown wood hair comb with mother of pearl star.

Chris's game: This is the third night of the same fight. Two weeks ago we finished off the undead, just in time for the evangelist to convert my character & Diana's character (Diana is notorious for not being able to make Will saves - if the target number is 15 & her character has a +16 to the die roll, she will roll a 1; which is automatic failure). Last night we fought the evangelist, his general buddy & their 'justicar,' who was really a doppelganger monk. Luckily our boom (aka Rosemary's warmage) was back. To cover Rosemary's absence her character, who's a variety of fae, was a pile of leaves for the middle of the combat. That does mean that she skipped chancing being converted, too, which was a big help. It would have been very ugly if she had been converted as well.

My character did go negative but thanks, mostly, to the mass lesser vigor & the healthful rest spell, she recovered enough to contribute to the fight.

website: manga quiz

books: I read Case of the Roasted Onion. It's another mystery, an interesting one, too. Otherwise, I'm reading the mod that I'm running. Gotta be prepared. It's a round zero for ConCarolinas.

clothes: black loafers, socks, jeans & belt; brown/black polo w/ silver Vorkosigan, no jewelry (got moving late & had no time), & hair in a ponytail/bun with the same hairstick: black with a brownish bead.