So you know I have a miniature habit. It's a pewter monkey that get's heavier with every new release by every company that looks cool. Every once in a while, when its claws dig in a little deep, I give it a small sacrifice to ease it up a bit. The most recent sacrifice was the new Chaos Codex for Warhammer 40K. Mind you, when I say "new" what I really mean is it came out 8 months ago, and I was both annoyed at the reported changes, and gearing up to buy a house plus taking classes so kinda busy.

I'm still not thrilled with the changes. My very characterful (though often not that successful) army is going to need some tweaking to make playable again. Some of these tweaks will require converting some figures, which is kind of ok, as I wanted to make some changes anyway, and some will just require refiguring how my guys are organized within the army.

Of course this is all rather theoretical, as all of the painting and converting I'm doing right now is on the house. I'm hoping that by the time I finish my summer class (July 10) that all the painting in the house will be done, and that I can do some gaming stuff over the following 7 weeks before I start my fall classes. Is it doable? Maybe. We'll see.

Now I'm off to go take a final.

Well, I blew it. I said I wouldn't, and I held out for a while, but the siren's call just took me in.

Saturday night I painted a miniature, and worked on another. I know I said I wouldn't, and I hadn't really planned on it, but when silentrequiem arranged a craft and movie night… what was I to do? I don't have any pictures to show you, but I painted Khamul the Easterling (a ring-wraith), and the base colors on Suladan the Serpent Lord. Pictures forthcoming.

Mostly we watched The Simpsons, and I played some Lego Star Wars on Elspeth's Wii with Jay.

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Today Lucy did really well at both her dog school classes. Go monster!

First post of the New Year! Kind of exciting really, for as I've said before, there's going to be a lot happening. I don't know how it'll impact my level of posting, or even if it will at all. I tend to post 2-3 times a week, and they are rarely posts of particular depth or insight. This may be because I don't spend a whole lot of time thinking about things of great depth or insight. I'd work on that, but I think I'm gonna be a bit busy this year. Maybe for '09 that can be my resolution? Either way, we'll see what happens here. I'll do my best to keep you all informed of the major goings on.

I started my econ course Wednesday night. I bought the book, signed up for the web site, and then worked through about 2 hours worth of online tutorials. Not exactly fun. Plus the school library closes at 7:30, so I spent the second hour out in the hall using one of the public computers. Not the most conducive working environment.

When I got home Wednesday night I pulled out a vegetable soup mix that has been in the cabinet for a while. It's mostly beans, but I also tossed in some rice. Truth be told, it's kinda bland, but I can deal, and I made enough that it kept me warm at lunch for the rest of the week. This weekend I'll probably make a chili for next week, something with a little more kick in it. I'll need to pick up some things for it though. Actually I think I'll need to pick up most of the things for it.

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In a shocking turn of events I will be packing away all of my miniatures.

All of them!

And I expect that they will remain packed away until we move. I don't foresee enough time over the next 5 months to spend any of it painting or modeling. I'll keep a case of minis handy in case I can get a game or 3 in with my cousins, but aside from that… I'm taking a break from the hobby until summer. *Deep breath* It's kind of a scary thought actually, especially as I still have tons of thoughts and ideas about things I want to build and a ton of unpainted minis that I want to paint.

In further depressing news, I got a call from corporate HR telling me that my (future) accounting certificate isn't enough to qualify me for a staff accountant position. I know how stupid this all is considering that once I have my CPA no one will really care that much what degree I have. Unfortunately to take the CPA I have to have accounting experience. I may end up looking outside the corporate system I'm in to find a new accounting job. I'd hate to do it, for a number of reasons, but if I need to in order to advance in the direction I'm going, then I wont hesitate.

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I just finished the first online graded quiz. Now only if I knew how to check the grade...

Peace, Love, & Hope!

Tuesday night was rough. Lucy was very much not in the mood to listen to me, and was very much in the mood to herd me. At home this isn’t such a big deal. Out on a hike, likewise, not a big deal. During agility class, as we are running side by side, and she decides to leap up and grab at my shorts and I’m in significant danger of falling on her or stepping on her, then it becomes a bigger deal. On top of the danger to her, there is also the embarrassment of having your dog not listen to you. At all. In front of the entire class. The worst part of the embarrassment is that I feel like I should know how to correct it, and I don’t. So I get frustrated, and when I get frustrated I also tend to get mad. I don’t like getting that way, because while the emotions are mine, I take it out on Lucy, and on Tigs. I get snippy, and short, and I hate it when I take it out on them.

Aside from that it’s been a decent week. I’ve gotten my grades back on all the assignments and tests for both classes, and so far I’m getting an A in both. I’m not entirely thrilled with the A in accounting though, because it’s a curved A. I’m going to have to work harder between now and the next test (2-3 weeks). I really wish that school ran on 7 week quarters, rather then the 15 week semesters. I felt so much more motivated during the summer sessions to get stuff done because I only had so much time to do it in. With 15 weeks, it feels like forever. That’s plenty of time to get everything done! Until you realize that it’s 3 weeks till the end of the term, and you now have that time to do 12 weeks worth of back homework. Personally I don’t want to spend December freaked out about school. I’d like to be comfortable with my grades and my work by that point.

I started painting up another warlock. I decided on an orange robe, something a little different, and also in the theme of the month. At first I was unsure about the color choice, but I kept at it, and wanted to see if I could make it work. At this point the robe needs maybe one more highlight, just on the very edges, and then on to the his face and hands. I really like the figure too, as there are a lot of neat little details like the frog on his shoulder, and the claw coming out of his backpack. Pictures eventually. I’d say soon, but really I can’t promise that.

( Stolen from silentrequiem )

( Friday Five! )

Damn. I was going to make pumpkin bread tonight, but the pumpkin went bad. *sigh*

Current (realistic) hobby project list (listed in priority order by category):

To Paint:
Imperial Battleship – In progress
Ork capital ships - Primed
Planetary defense stations - Primed

To Model:
Removable bases for various ships – supplies needed!
Chaos planetary defenses – Need plasticard
Chaos Battleship – Need plasticard
Starfort – Need plasticard
Magnetize weapon slots on Imperial Battleship – I think I have everything I need for this

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I’m going to a preliminary “Meet and Greet” style interview tomorrow after work up in White Marsh. I don’t yet qualify for any of the positions I’m interested in, but I will in May. The most awesome thing would be for them to say “That’s ok, keep going to school, we’ll hire you anyway!” I’m not sure how realistic that is, but really, how fantastic would that be? My resume is all updated, and I can't wait 'til tomorrow!!

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Also, Lucy was v. embarrassing tonight in class. Sigh.

( Doing things with the help of a monster! )

Things I should be doing right now:
Sleeping

Man I feel like crap right now. Sunday night my nose started running. Monday my throat got sore. By Monday night I was feeling downright awful, but I made it through class. After I got back from class I took some NyQuil and tried to watch the pilot of Heroes. I think I remained conscious through the whole episode. Of course I some funky dreams when I did go to bed.

Tuesday morning, I wasn’t really feeling any better. I took some Sudafed and headed off to work. Managed to make it through the day, but tigergladys ran Lucy in agility class. I was sure I’d end up falling, cracking my head on something and bleeding on the floor mats. Then I’d get yelled at for staining the floor.

Wednesday was still crappy. My boss actually just told me to go home around 1, so I did. Took sort of a nap, relaxed, read some and had some soup. Tigs has been wanting mozzarella sticks for a while now, so when she got home we went down to the TT diner and she got her sticks and I got some more soup. Then I went to class.

Now it’s Thursday. Still feeling crappy. I wish I was sicker. As it is I just feel sick enough to feel sick, and not sick enough to stay on the couch and watch movies and drink tea. At least I don’t have anything I need to do tonight.

Tomorrow night Tigs goes to visit her sister for the weekend. So it’ll just be me and Lucy. We’ve got big plans too! I have to go to school first thing Saturday morning to take a test that I’m going to miss on Monday due to picking Tigs up from the airport and taking Lucy to her Rally class (not in that order though). Then I’ll be taking Lucy up to Oregon Ridge park for a dog charity event. When that’s over we’ll head home, and I’m going to study for the upcoming accounting test. Sunday will be more studying and some hiking with the Lucymonster. Not sure where we’ll go yet.

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In other news, my X-Box power cord has decided that it doesn’t want to play anymore. For those who don’t know there is a built in fuse on the plug. Well, mine has apparently burned itself out. It was kind of a bummer as I wanted to shoot some stuff in Halo. Anyway, I called the X-Box help desk, and talked to a nice lady in India , or maybe Pakistan , and spent a little bit of time going over the problem. They are sending me a replacement cord…. FREE! It turns out that all cords made before some point in 2003 are defective and can cause fires! Awesome! Now I just have to wait for it to arrive...

I have also painted up a number of BFG ships. I hope to have Tigs take some decent pictures of them tonight. If we succeed in getting decent pics, then you should see them this weekend. Aside from that I don’t have anything I really want to do except relax and try to feel better.

Also, an icon I've been meaning to upload for a while.

So as I mentioned before I got some painting time in recently. First up is the Culexus Assassin.

( Psychic Killer! )

Next up is the Eversor Assassin. This guy is a melee monster. Totally pumped up with combat drugs, he will literally explode when he gets killed.

( Watch the blade! )

Lastly we have the Mordheim Warlock/Necromancer. He's a characterful little fellow, but probably not one you'd want to invite over for dinner.


And in case his magic fails, he can still shoot you. I'm really pleased with this guys face. And I think the dirt on his clothing came out well too.

( Dark magics below! )

The last week has been fun, computer-wise. On Tuesday (8/21), while I was home studying, the printer died. I spent an hour trying to get it up and running again with nothing to show for it. So when Tigs got home we checked the net for what was on the market, and then hit the stores. We ended up with a very cool wireless photo-printer, with crazy cheap ink. Of course that was another $200 I didn’t expect to be spending this weekend. Anyway, we brought it home, and after a couple of hours and a whole lot of cursing later we managed to get it talking to our router, but failed to secure the wireless network. But it all worked.

Wednesday I registered and paid for the fall semester classes ($600), bought the books for them ($300), and then went on to take the accounting final. I must have done pretty well on it, as I got an A in the class. As soon as it was posted I sent in my reimbursement form. The 4 months of the fall semester, plus the month to wait for the check are going to be less then fun with that, plus the tires, plus the printer all sitting on my credit card. Ug. And then I’ll be taking 2 more in the spring. But by mid-summer I should be making enough to make up for it!

Wednesday night the internet decided it didn’t want to play with us anymore, and it’s been like that since.

Thursday night we called Comcast at around 8, after futzing with the internet and trying to make it work for a few more hours. Shockingly we actually got hold of a real live person, and after he did what was necessary to prove that we aren’t ID10T users he scheduled a tech to come and check things out.

On Tuesday. *sigh* Between 6 & 8, or so they say.

So it was a weekend without the internet. I know for some of you this would be easily as horrifying as a zombie horde coming over the next hill, or learning that Fox is yet again canceling an awesome show that barely got off the ground. In reality it wasn’t all that bad. Besides, it was a busy weekend, so we wouldn’t have spent a whole lot of time online anyway.

On Saturday we started the day by checking out the AKC Obedience trial at the dog club, and hung out there for a while. Then around 11 we headed home, packed up some stuff, and headed out to an all corgi picnic. In spite of the high humidity and very sunny sky it was a lot of fun, and it turns out that a number of ODTC members are also members of the corgi club. (Although none of them were there.) The picnic was in honor of rescue corgis, but it was open to all. Lucy had a somewhat stressful time, but overall enjoyed herself. Plus, there were puppies! (Lucy loves puppies.) The picnic wrapped up around 4, and we went home, all of us feeling tired and worn out by the heat.

Pictures will be posted soon!

At home I decided to treat myself to some painting time. I looked through some of the stuff cluttering the top of my painting table, and picked out the two assassins that were sitting there. The standard GW paint scheme is really boring: black body suits and some details picked out in primary colors. I wanted something a little more interesting to paint, though I did keep the skull masks bone looking. I opted for a dark green body suit with some fairly intense highlights. It’s not perfect, but the effect is close to what I was going for.

Again, pictures will be posted soon!

Sunday morning we went to the farmers market and picked up this week's veggies. When we came home I worked on the minis some more. As it is I still have about an hours worth of work before they’re done. Then they’ll be listed on e-bay. Why will I be selling them? Mostly because I’m not really impressed by the sculpts, they don’t fit into my army, and I don’t have anywhere to keep them.

Around noon we headed back over to the club to watch some more obedience. The main thing we wanted to see was the basic rally. (Since the Monster is signed up for a class in September.) Now, most of the time events are run from basic to open to advanced. Of course, this time it was reversed, so we didn’t get out of there till around 8. A long time, especially since I hadn’t eaten lunch. However it was cool to watch all the different dogs run through the course. Tigs was really good at picking out which of them had the top scores. Then we went home, made dinner, and watched some Reno 911.

Monday night I had my first management class. It’s MGT 105 – Principles of Management. It’s going to be a ridiculously relatively easy course, with about 500 pages of reading over 15 weeks, and some written (easy) assignments. The book though… oh god it is BAD. In the first 10-15 pages there were 3 MAJOR grammatical errors. Major enough that the editor should be shot for incompetence! Seriously they were bad enough that I noticed them! Either way, it’ll be a relatively easy “A.”

Management isn’t anything I need for the accounting certificate, but when I want to take the CPA exam I’ll need to have about 30 credits in accounting courses, and another 30 in related subjects. I already have a significant chunk of that done (more than half), so it’s mostly just filler, since I couldn’t fit another accounting course in with the intermediate accounting and dog agility. With luck they won’t stick all the accounting classes on Tuesday night again in the spring. (Again, dog agility.)

I’ve also managed to squeeze in some Galactic Civilizations time. The first couple of games I played back when I first got it ended quite badly for me. This time I played at the easiest level (rather then normal) and on the next to smallest map. I’m actually doing well in it now, but honestly at this level that’s not all that hard. At this point in the game I’ve hit the middle part where no one is powerful enough to take on anyone else directly, so everyone is trying to build themselves up as quickly and as powerfully as possible. There have been a few little skirmishes, and I’ve lost some ships, but nothing too bad. I also have a couple of battleships currently being built. Once those launch things should move quickly. Plus my culture is dominating most of the map. I’m going to see if I can use it to “encourage” some stars to defect to my Federation.

Tuesday night the cabledude was due to come and fix our line. The window we were given was from 6-8pm. So around 6/6:15 Tigs took Lucy to the park, and I waited.

And waited.

And waited some more.

Finally at about 7:50 the Comcast truck pulled into the parking spot in front of the house. The tech grabbed her stuff, came in, and checked the line. The cord was a little lose, but it had a strong signal once she tightened it up. Then we checked the connection, and it worked. She stayed maybe 10 minutes. Where the connection doesn’t work is through the router, either wireless or through an ethernet cable. So last night Tigs ordered a Buffalo router, which should be arriving on Friday. It’ll be nice to have internet on my computer again. And then I’ll be able to upload this massive post, rather then keeping it on a word document.
Or just post it from the laptop, with a 50 ft ethernet cable plugged directly into the modem.

We visited a new park this weekend, Oregon Ridge State Park . I’m not entirely clear on how we missed this one in the book, considering how often we’ve referenced it, but it is a beautiful hike. At a little over 4 miles, mostly in shade, and of moderate difficulty (aka not really flat, but the inclines aren’t too bad) it was a good workout. Plus at the end is a beach! Now the neat thing about that is the beach has an entry fee, but if you hike your way into the park along the trails, you can get to the it without having to go through the gate. Maybe they figure that if you are willing to hike a couple of miles you deserve to swim free? The only downside to the beach is that they don’t allow puppy swimming.

After our hike we headed over to Gaer's for the Craft and Movie Night. None of us were in the mood for anything too angsty, so we watched I.Q., 9 to 5, and a couple of episodes of Dougie Howser MD. Tigs and I sewed up some dog toys that Lucy had unstuffed to various degrees. Tigs also worked on her latest cross stitch project. Gaer knitted, and changed outfits a couple of times, and I painted the elementals. Pictures to be taken tonight (maybe). Commentary on them when I post the pictures.

Sunday we headed out to Ikea for breakfast, and to look for a new TV stand. The one we bought last year just isn’t holding up to the weight of our hefty TV. It was (we discovered after we bought it) designed for a flat panel TV, rather then our big ol’ CRT, and now it is bowing. Plus the open bottom allowed the Monster to chew on the AV cords and a controller for the N64. We were successful both in obtaining breakfast and the TV stand.

While we were in White Marsh we also decided to swing across the street and hit Games Workshop. I wanted to take a look at the new terrain pieces they’ve come up with. The one I was most interested in was a new forest piece, but I was disappointed by. In person I felt it looked too plastic, and that it was something I could do myself to far better effect.

Next we popped over to AC Moors and I got some new t-shirts for work. I love it when they go on sale. Plain colored t-shirts for $2 each! Can’t beat that. Then we went home, and I got to work on my take home test for accounting.

The test itself wasn’t that bad. It had only 25 multiple choice questions, so it went quickly. There was only one problem that gave me any real pause. it was written in such a way that it required you to make a whole bunch of assumptions in order to be able to solve it. After getting it wrong, then thinking that there wasn’t a right answer, then getting an idea of how to solve it, I finally figured out the correct answer, and the correct way to solve for it. Once I finished with the test I moved onto the homework, and did about 3 hours more work.

Monday was work, then class. After the class had been dismissed, I stayed after to talk with the professor both about the test and about the homework. It seems in spite of the stress I’ve been feeling that I’m actually getting this. It’s always nice to have someone tell you that you are on the right track!

Yesterday was a long day. After work we had puppy classes. That’s right, plural. It was the last night of our agility class, and then immediately after it was the first class of her advanced basic obedience class. For those of you not keeping track at home, that’s 2 and a half hours of class, for a 1 year old puppy. We decided to split the duties:I would handle her for the agility class, and Tigs would take her for obedience.

In agility we started off by reviewing all the basic skills we learned in the first couple of weeks, and then moved on to a new skill, teaching her to go out ahead of us. Lucy did pretty well at that, though when I yelled at her (as we were running) to “GO!!” she did look back at me questioning what it was I was saying. We did that a couple of times, which Lucy absolutely loved. After that we set up a course of 8 obstacles (tire, A frame, jump, tunnel, 3 more jumps, and shoot) and we were timed and scored while going through. I admit the addition of the time certainly made it a little more exciting, but mostly I just wanted to make sure would Lucy actually run the course and not just run around like a crazy puppy. So before we ran I made sure to put her target at the base of the A frame (to make sure she paused at the bottom of it) and adjusted the tire height down to her jump level. Then we ran. It was a great run, in spite of her knocking a bar off the first jump. She hit the target perfectly, listened to my commands, and was fast!! This is the first time we’ve ever done that many obstacles in a row! At the end, because of the placement of the 3 jumps and the shoot, and her running ahead I wasn’t at the end of the shoot to catch her, and being all excited as she was I could see the “WHATS NEXT?!?!” look in her eye. Knowing that if I didn’t give her something to do THAT INSTANT she would probably take off, I told her to run with me to go get the target back at the base of the A frame. We got there at the same time, I praised her, caught her, and gave her treats.

After that we headed next door to where the obedience class was going to be held. The teacher for obedience is the same one we had for the puppy obedience class we took, and Lucy absolutely LOVES her! There was some serious full body wiggling going on. I think that Lucy will really enjoy working obedience again. As much as she has fun doing agility, she seems to like obedience a little bit more. Probably because she gets to be more active, as she doesn’t have to wait for the other dogs to use the equipment.

Once class was finished we headed home, and made ourselves dinner. Lucy was really tired and got very annoyed with us for switching rooms. We kept going back and forth from the living room to the kitchen, and she would always come with us.

Today I actually don’t have class. The professor has an event tonight that she has to go to, and she didn’t think she’d be back in time for class. So I’ll take an hour or two tonight to do some more work on my project and do some more reading. We’ll probably also head to one of the pet stores, as it’s time for another water test for the fish tank. This week we lost Oscar the algae eater, 1 of only 2 fish that we’ve actually named. The neons are more of a hive group then individuals, and I’ve been thinking of the guppies as a matched pair, kind of like the Bynars. We think he may have been trying to clean the intake of the filter and gotten stuck, but we’re not sure. On top of that I also changed some of the water in the tank, so it’s time to test again. The snail we got (labeled “mysterious black snail”) is a whole lot of fun to watch. In addition to hitting Petco we’ll probably also hit the Target that’s in the same plaza, as there are a number of little things we need from there.

Lastly, tigergladys made me this icon a while back, and I wanted to share it with you!

As I mentioned last week, I’ve been sorting through the boxes of minis that I brought back from Kim’s, and before I even got it all sorted, I’ve got someone who wanted to trade some bits! Some old 5th edition fantasy figures (mine) for some Lord of the Rings minis. We’re still working out the final details at this point, but either way, I’m getting rid of something that I’m not going to us for something that I will use! We’re ironing out the details and the stuff should be in the mail by Saturday!

I’ve been e-mailing back and forth with my cousin Cory about our next Lord of the Rings game. I’ve been looking at the big mumak and wanting to actually use it in a game. It’s been 2 years since I painted it, so it’s about time it saw the table!! So the next time I go up, the mumak is going to do it’s best to stomp all over his minis. On a related topic there is a mini conversion that I want to try out, taking a regular haradrim warrior and turning him into a mounted version with only a little cutting and some green stuff. Now, this is a good alternative to the $10 or $12 version that GW sells. In fact for the $30 I could make 6 of my own, and have an additional 6 to match them on foot! I’m not going to spend the money to do it, I’m just going to use the stuff I currently have to try it out. Eventually. You know, when I’m not crazy with life/work/puppy/school/etc. So… maybe sometime in January when schools out for the month? If I’m lucky… But it’s a neat idea!!!

Either way though, my work day is over. Heading home in a couple of minutes to get changed and get some food before heading off to class. Tonight is our first take home test. Aside from Craft & Movie night on Saturday, we don't have any other plans. Can you guess what I'll be doing? Seeing as it's a take home test I have no reason not to get an A on it. I have access to the books, access to the internet, and nothing to keep me from acing this test!

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Happy Birthday hughcasey

What’s a favorite shortcut of yours? I don't know that I have one...

What’s something you insist on doing the long way? Just about anything crafty. I just seem to have this compulsion to do it the hard way. Even if it isn’t a model I particularly care for. I get a little OCD about it.

What does your favorite pair of shorts look like? My favorite pair of shorts is a linen pair, off white in color.

Excluding classical music, what’s the longest song in your iTunes? While I don’t have it on ITunes, “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” by Iron Butterly is probably the longest at about 17 minutes.

What’s the title of a short story you really like? Masque of the Red Death by Edgar Allen Poe.

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Written Friday

In a highly hopeful move, last night I spray primed 6 minis: the elementals and the mounted and on-foot version of Khamul the Easterling. I’m going to bring them with me to the Craft & Movie night at Gaers. I want to try speed painting the elementals, and getting all 4 of them done that night. I have no idea how that’ll go, especially as each one is completely different from the others. My goal for the fire elemental is to get this effect. The water and the earth elementals are going to be the easiest. Air? I don’t know. I want to avoid blue. I’m thinking maybe tans & browns, like a tornado? We’ll see how that goes.

And I know Gaer sent out the e-mail, and is hosting, but CRAFT NIGHT ON THE 16TH!!!

Today is going to be hot! It’s already hot actually, but it’s going to get hotter. This morning we set up 2 fans for Lucy, and I froze her 2 water bowls last night. When I get home this afternoon I’m going to see how hot it is, and if the A/C needs to be turned on. We’re hesitant to do that, as BGE just raised Maryland ’s energy rates by 50% last week, and they just raised them significantly last year. But if it’s too hot, we’ll have to. It’s cruel not to. Besides, I’d be miserable too, and I get whiney when I get too hot. No one wants that!! :-)

Tomorrow Tigs has to work. A crappy mandatory sort of thing, but the overtime will be nice. My plan is to take the puppy out for an early hike, maybe to Soldiers Delight, and then to come home and work on homework. I’ve got 3 chapters worth of exercises to do, and at least 2 chapters to read and outline (should probably do 3) for Monday.

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tigergladys has left for work, I've got some coffee, and am now going to run the vacuum quickly before Lucy and I head out. When I got home yesterday the house was thankfully cool. I think the 2 fans and blocking all the light from coming in helped a lot.

Sounds like it should be the title of a D&D adventure, but instead it’s something less fun.

Tonight I start class. Or at least I’m supposed to. You see, on Friday CCBC audited their enrolment and decided that the class I had signed up for didn’t have enough students in it, so they cancelled it, and sent me a letter, which I received Saturday. The registrar’s office is of course closed on Saturday. All weekend I’ve had to spend my time wondering who I’m going to have to deal with in order to rectify the situation. Today I called the registrars office from work and found out there is another session being held at pretty much the same time also in Catonsville , and it has 6 spots left open in it. Of course I can’t switch it online, or over the phone because all of those options are closed due to the fact that today is the first day of summer session 1. What this means is that I’m going to go from work directly to CCBC, deal with whatever paperwork I need to at the registrars office, pickup the book for the class in the book store, and then go to class… until 10pm tonight. Good thing I packed an extra large lunch!

I must admit I’m a little nervous about going back to school. Maybe not for the usual reasons, but for the fact that I’ve got a whole lot of other things going on in my life, and I want to avoid disrupting them too much. For instance I have class Monday and Wednesday nights, and puppy class on Tuesday night. What are the chances that I’m going to have stuff assigned to me on Monday, due on Wednesday? Also I’m going to completely miss out on family time those nights… for the rest of the summer! And in the Fall? At least the classes are only 1 night a week then, but does that mean I should take 2? They aren’t offering anything I can take during the winter-term. I’m just going to have to see how this first summer session goes.

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Saturday we drove over to Frederick to visit the Monocacy Battlefield National Park and do a short ½ mile loop of a hike, complete with a swim for Lucy. It was too hot (as early as it was) to do one of the longer hikes. Plus we knew we’d be walking around Frederick enough to make up for it. We were headed to Frederick to pick up some more dog food and to hit the comic store to pick up our box. Shortly after leaving the house we were driving by the Jo-Ann Fabrics and we noticed that they were closing. I pulled over and Tigs went in to investigate. 20 minutes later she came out with a small bag! As you can imagine, it was rather busy inside. After we got back from Frederick we dropped a very tired Lucy at home and headed back to Jo-Ann’s to pick up some fabric for living room pillows.

Sunday we headed up to Lancaster to watch Cory and Alex play at a street fair in the city. All morning both of them kept praying for rain, and around the time we were heading into downtown Lancaster they got their wish. The heavens opened and rain fell. So we drove back to the house and unloaded the van. We still got to listen to them play, but in the basement, rather then in the street. And as always happens there was a ton of food! I always feel like I need to fast for a day or two after visiting their house.

One of the other things we did while we were up in Lancaster was to go through some of the boxes we had stored up there when we moved. While we still don't have room for any of the toys (good lord there are a lot of toys) I did snag a few more boxes of gaming stuff to sort through and organize. Very little of it (as you can imagine) got organized before we moved. So I have that to look forward to doing. I'm gonna need some more baggies though... Yay dollar stores!

I got the car back on Saturday, and it only cost me $20 for my free oil change. But now I have a new oil plug. Isn’t that great? In other car news gas has topped $3/gallon. As an environmentalist I would like to see $5/gallon gas. As a consumer it hurts.

I finished painting two more of the Last Chancers this weekend, and am so close to finishing the last one. I also spent a fair amount of time cleaning up minis. Mostly this means getting rid of mold lines. The next group of minis I want to paint are some D&D Elementals. They were part of the mini set that was released just before the short lived Chainmail game that preceded the pre-painted plastic minis. I figure that I’ll be able to test out some different techniques. I have an elemental for each of the 4 basic elements (earth, air, fire, water). I’m not sure what color to paint the air elemental. It’s a whirlwind, so it probably has a lot of dust and dirt in it… so maybe like a tornado? The water elemental is going to need some greenstuff to smooth out a fairly significant miscast. It looks like the mold didn’t line up during casting, so there is a 1mm shift in the middle of the wave. It’ll be easy to fix though.

( Elementals! )

The one that I’m not really sure about is the earth elemental. I mean, how do you paint something to look like rock and dirt and make it look interesting? I was thinking about maybe putting gems or crystals in it, or maybe having grass growing on it. Any ideas? The fire elemental is going to be fun though! Lots of reds oranges and yellows!

Balticon starts in 4 days and still no schedule. No list of guests. Nothing. *Sigh* Can you say frustrating? I wonder if there will be a panel about solar energy from space. You know, like this!

The fish are doing well. We’ve been holding at 6 neon tetras and a small algae eater named Waldo. He’s the only one with a name, and he got it because every time we look at the tank we do a fish count and end up spending a lot of time finding him. The tetras are all doing well, but the algae eater is getting FAT! We’ve been thinking about getting a second one, because it’s fairly obvious that this one has too much to eat!

( Fishes! )

I can’t name it exactly, but I really enjoy having the fish tank in the living room. It’s definitely added something to the room. Rather like in The Sims actually…

Today after work I’m going to the post office. Due to the agility trial we volunteered at on Saturday I didn’t get to mail off our most recent paperbackswap requests or the lamp I sold on e-bay. Actually the guy who won the lamp (even before he bid) has been a bit of an ass hole about the whole transaction. His communications have been very terse and demanding. Spiteful even. He started with:

Quick question what is the basis for charging $30 to ship something that will not even cost $10 with the insurance included. I'm debating not bidding because of your insane price for shipping.

Tigs handled that one by pointing out the fact that the USPS had just increased all their rates, and that it was a large and heavy package. When he won (damn it), and sent payment he included a note that said

I will provide appropriate feedback after receiving [sic] the item to verify condition and shipping cost.

Then on Sunday he e-mailed me again. Now I had said in the listing that I would mail the item on the Saturday following the receipt of the payment. This is what he sent

Since payment was sent 1 minute after the auction ended on FRIDAY can I assume that you mailed this on Saturday as stated in the description? If so were [sic] is the tracking information that was promised also in your description?

I wanted to reply with “Life got in the way, other things are more important to me then you, it’ll be mailed on Monday. PS Bite me.” I actually sent him something far nicer. I have the feeling that at best he is going to give me neutral feedback. We'll see.

Edited to add
Box mailed. I look forward to seeing what feedback he gives.

It was a full weekend once again. Saturday we took Lucy up to visit her doctor in Frederick . We discussed her change in bathroom habits, and they managed to collect a urine sample. It was kind of fun to watch the tech follow Lucy as she walked around the side of the vet's office with a cat food bowl, which she deftly slid under Lucy just as she squatted. They probably called today with the test results from that, but seeing as I left the cell phone at home this morning, I’ll have to wait a bit to find out. While at the vet's, Lucy also got a booster on one of her vaccines.

When we left the vet's office we went back down to downtown Frederick to hit the usual places and walk around a bunch. Frederick does this thing on the first Saturday of every month, a themed event. This Saturday was a celebration of May/Spring and so all the retailers downtown were giving away flowers. You could get a flower in every shop, and if you hit all the shops you would end the day with a huge bouquet. We didn't hit every store, and some seemed to be out, but we still have a vase full of flowers in the living room because of it! Around the 4th time going around downtown Lucy started to show signs of the vaccine hitting her; she slowed down and was walking as if slightly dizzy. So we bundled her back into the car, and drove up the road to Brainstorm Comics.

You might not have known it, but Saturday was the annual Free Comic Book Day. This has always been a pretty big day for me, ever since they started doing it about 5 years ago. Disappointingly FCBD at Brainstorm was only slightly better than Lancaster Comic Shop's showing 2 years ago. It’s especially disappointing considering the events that That’s Entertainment and Sarge’s put on. But we got our books, headed home, and Lucy crashed for the rest of the night! (One of the free comics featured a corgi artist - Christian Slade.)

Sunday felt a bit more like Monday then it usually does - we got up early, put Lucy in the kitchen, and headed to an AKC Agility Trial down in Millersville, to volunteer for the ODTC again. This time was a little different as Kim, Cory, and Alex (aunt, cousin, cousin) came down from PA to see it with us. I felt a little bad about having to work at the event while they were watching, but they all seemed to really enjoy it. Kim was thrilled at all the poodles that were running, and Tigs says she wants a puppy, as Lucy is now old. For the record, Lucy isn’t even a year old at this point. (There were some very cute puppies though. One was named after the tonksmonster.) The boys are going to be pushing to get a dog more often now I think.

When we got home Sunday evening Lucy was thrilled to see us, and all the toys we brought home for her. (Each part of the event you work you get a coupon good for a toy, or $2 off food at the event, or $2 off the cost to register to run a dog at an event during 2007. We aren't going to be running a dog in 2007 and we brought our own food. Between the 2 of us we collected a total of 18 coupons, and brought home 16 toys, with two left over as proof that we were there.) However, Lucy was still worn out from the vaccine, and so we all relaxed on the couch and watched Voyager.

Next weekend is just as booked. Saturday, I’ll be going to a Hirst Arts party up near Harrisburg PA with some people I met on the INTERNET, while Tigs and Lucy will be going back to Frederick to go to the opening day of a new dog park. Sunday we are planning on tackling the BWI trail. Over 12 miles long! It’s the longest we’ve attempted yet! We’re hoping to be up to doing the Maryland portion of the Appalachian Trail this fall (40+ miles).

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White Dwarf is Games Workshop’s monthly publication that is about half advertisement and half content. Of the half of the magazine that contains useful content for GW's various games, only half of it (a quarter of the original) is generally interesting to me, and most of it is more entertaining then useful. However, several years worth of issues were taking up space on one of the bookshelves and in the closet. It’s amazing how it grows to fill all that space… Anyway, I decided that to make my life a little easier I would cut up my magazines, taking out the articles that interested me, and the pictures that inspired me. Last night I finished putting all the ones I wanted to keep into page holders that fit in a 3-ring binder. It’s nice being able to flip open an binder and see all the articles that have interested me since I’ve started this, and none of the fluff. Now the only thing I need to worry about is what to do with the gutted White Dwarf issues. I gave a small stack to my cousins this weekend, and they may want the rest. Otherwise they’ll either end up in the dumpster or I may give them to the pediatric ward.

Books 13-15

Only Forward
By Michael Marshall Smith

Sometime in the future, when people live in self divided neighborhoods based on their lifestyles a man named Stark must track down a missing person. The tale makes it's way through various neighborhoods, tells you of the past, and brings you to Jeamland, a repository of dream and memory, and spits you out in the last few pages to a shocking end. I was very surprised by this novel and hated that I was only reading it during my lunch break!

Drowned Hopes
By Donald E Westlake

This is the first Dortmunder novel I've read, though it's the 7th in the series. The writing is a little slow, but witty, the story funny, and the characters are just a whole lot of fun to laugh at. I mean how hard it is to retrieve a casket with $700,000 from an abandoned town? So what if the town was flooded as part of a new reservoir?

Dog Eat Dog: A Very Human Book About Dogs and Dog Shows
By Jane Stern & Michael Stern

This slightly more serious look at dog shows (as compared to say Best in Show) follows Mimi Einstein, owner of the Allstar Kennel in upstate New York, a bullmastiff breeder over a year as she wins and loses in the show ring. Side stories about such topics as the specialized art of dog grooming, and rare breeds are interspersed with funny touching looks at Mimi's love of her dogs, and the world they inhabit.

I'm almost done with another book, but I wanted to get this posted so I could put the books back on the shelf. A bit of a slow month, but still doing well toward my goal. Not sure if April will pick up the pace much, as it looks like it's going to be a busy month.

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Friday night was interesting. I got off of work early and went out to the Howard county fair grounds to volunteer at an obedience rally event. Tigs was already there by the time I arrived. The event started a little bit after 4, and we were there for at least 4 hours, at the end of which they fed us!

Saturday we all went to Susquehanna State Park for a hike. Unfortunately the directions weren't the best and we went down the wrong trail for about a mile. The trail we had planned on was supposed to be moderate to easy, and the one we were on was moderate to extreme! 45 degree climbs and all. Checking the book we realized the error, and figured out that we had entered the park from the wrong spot. So we hiked back to the car, and headed around to the trail we had originally planned on. That was a much flatter hike, and more populated too. At the far end of the spur was a dam, and some strategically placed porta-potties. After a few minutes watching the water pour out we headed back. Total we did about 2 miles on the difficult trail, and another 6 on the easy one.

Sunday I got in some painting time, and I am almost done with the Last Chancers. Finally!! They need a little bit of basing done, and then clear coated, and then BAM! They're done! Then I'm going to finish off the Necron Lord, and then' who knows? I'm sure I'll come up with something. In other game related news I got 2 free cases to hold minis in. That's right!! 2!! For free!! I just need to cut the foam for them to actually hold minis, rather then the medical scope that came in them.

Tonight I'll be filling out the final tax forms, and getting them into the mail tomorrow. I can't tell you how cool it is to be to be getting a nice rebate! Of course most of it is going to the credit cards. And speaking of credit cards I applied for a Discover card that came with an introductory 0% interest rate (for 12 months) and transferred the bulk of my high interest debt over to it. Now I can concentrate on paying it off, rather then paying the interest.

I’ve been thinking about heroes lately, primarily in terms of role playing games. Most of the time they are publicized as getting the chance to save the princess, stop the Big Bad Evil, etc. Yet the reality is most of the games I’ve seen and been involved in have rarely dealt with heroes, and mostly had the players taking the role of mercenaries. Yes they do extraordinary things, but they do them for the tangible rewards: land, gold, magic items, etc.

So what is a hero? There are tons of definitions. Everything from the soldier in Iraq, to the fire-fighter, to the revolutionary, to the old lady who doesn’t give up her bus seat. But what about the single mother who works two jobs to provide for her kids, or the social worker who struggles to help those who can’t help themselves? What about the person who overcomes addiction or the teacher that motivated you when no one else could? Where is the line drawn between being a good or even extraordinary person, and being a hero?

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I’ve begun putzing with a new small project. I was digging through my bits box the other day when I came upon the old Necron Lord miniature. This guy was just hanging out, and had been since… well since I got him in a boxed set way back around… 2002? It’s not a bad miniature, but with a little bit of work it could actually look kinda cool. So I pulled out my knife, file, and clippers and went to work. I have to repair a broken staff, and sculpt some stuff, and I’m adjusting both of it’s arms a bit. The one with the staff is being repositioned, and the other one is being swivelled. At this point I’m just about ready to break out the green stuff, and start gluing.

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I just sent in my application to the accounting program at CCBC. Shockingly the application didn’t require an essay. I was actually a little bummed out about that, as I had started writing it in my head. So, I’m gonna write it now!

Why I want to go back to school
In 2003 I graduated from the University of Connecticut with my bachelors in arts with a history and political science double major. I knew I wanted to continue my education, but I also knew I couldn’t afford to do it right away. After 5 years of college, and 12 years of schooling before that I was quite ready to leave academia and see what “the real world” was like. It turns out that a bachelors degree isn’t particularly useful, and a liberal arts bachelors degree is even less useful. It turns out the real world is demanding, and furthering my education has become less something I want to do, and turned into something I need to do.

Thus I approached the dilemma of where to go and what to do. In the years between graduation and now I have not suddenly come into a small fortune which will allow me to pursue (directly) a higher level degree. A company that values the education of those in their employ has however employed me. As such I have access to a yearly fund which I can use to take classes. Still the question remains what to study? This is really an economic decision, as whatever I pick will greatly affect my personal economy. I need specific training that will give me a defined trade. I was originally thinking law when I got out of UConn, but the expense both in time and cash is just too great to afford. Business is a very vague idea, and too nebulous to provide me the trade I’m looking for. Seeing how this decision really is about money, and my natural aptitude with numbers, accounting really is an obvious choice, and had I been thinking ahead I’d have realized it when I went to get my BA.

CCBC’s accounting program has a lot going for it, from my perspective. Over the next year I can take enough classes to become an accountant, and a couple of years after that I’ll have completed the coursework to qualify for the CPA exam. One year’s worth of classes would increase my earning potential around 25%. The math is simple, and undeniable, I can’t afford not to go back to school, and put in the best effort I possibly can. This is especially true as it'll all be reimbursed up to $3,000 a year. That even includes books! So with my application submitted, my transcripts on the way, and the advice of my mother to study whatever I wanted as long as I had a trade to fall back on, I'm ready to go back to school.

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Does taking the responsibility for making my life better make me a hero? I don't think so. Getting it done? Maybe. Either way, I do know that it's the right thing to do, at the right time, for all the right reasons, and knowing that is enough.

We were denied preapproval for an auto loan. Mind you, this was not due to poor credit, but rather to the fact that we are considered new to the area. This doesn’t mean we’ll be denied a loan, just that we have to bring them 2 pay stubs and an offer from the dealership before they’ll give it to us. So onto plans B (other bank), C (online), & D (dealership).
Doing payroll (my main job function) gives me a fascinating view into peoples psychology. There are the people that wouldn’t really notice if you took $10 out of their paycheck every 2 weeks, and then there are the people who will quibble if the computer assigns them their lunch break at a time that they didn’t actually take it. Some people get very very anal about it. On one hand it’s frustrating because there is only so much I can modify within the computer, and on the other hand, I want someone who is completely anal about things to be the one taking care of me in a situation that requires me to be cut open.

Speaking of being cut open, last night I managed to slice into my thumb with an x-acto knife while I was finishing up sculpting a new head for an ogre from the old chainmail game. Somewhere along the line I managed to lose it’s head, and it’s been sitting, decapitated in my mini case for years. I decided to do something about it. Honestly, I’m kinda glad I lost the head, cause it was pretty ugly, not that what I sculpted is anywhere near attractive! I mean, it is an ogre! Actually I went more for troll, and in the end it came out looking more like a gorilla/Neanderthal. Well, I’ll let you decide what it looks like.





Poll #918213 What does this look like to you?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

What does this look like to you?

( I've also sculpted a hamster.  )

( And I converted this guy to hold a flamer. )

A big thank you to Tigs, without whom my posts would be a mess of miss-used grammar.

From Thursday:
Subtitle: I am a giant dork when it comes to food, and I will probably never be a food writer.

Last night I did a fair amount of cooking. I put a potato and bean soup in the crock pot in the morning, and when I got home I fried up some onions to toss into it. I chopped up the onion, and put it in the frying pan. Then I returned to the fridge and thought, “Well, I might as well toss in some garlic too!” and looking into the fridge I noticed some mushrooms from a little while back. “Those are going to go bad if I don’t use them up.” So I grabbed the mushrooms and the garlic, chopped them up and tossed them in the frying pan. Then I thought to myself “I can have the soup, but what will Tigs eat for dinner?” You see, Tigs doesn’t eat soup, potatoes, or beans (unless it’s in good chili) because they are gross. Also she had a terrible migraine. So I looked in the freezer (there was't much else in the fridge) and pulled out a bag of Quorn chicken bits. I nuked them to defrost them, and then tossed them in the frying pan as well, and put on a pot of rice. It ended up being a very yummy dinner. I thought a lot while making this, as you can tell. I ended up adding a couple of tomatoes to the soup, along with a seasoning packet that came with the beans, salt, pepper, and basil. After I finished my rice dish I then had a bowl of soup. It was good too! I ended up filling the 3 remaining Pyrex bowls with all that I made, and put the biggest one in the freezer. I still have some chili in the fridge too!

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From Today:

Saturday Tigs and I took the Toyota Camry in for its safety inspection so we can officially register it here in MD. Seeing as it had been inspected not all that long ago when it was registered in North Carolina, and was inspected again back in August, and had new tires put on it 2 months ago, we felt reasonably sure that it would pass or only have a small amount of work to be done. Nothing more then $500 or so. However, when we got the call saying that there were over $2,000 worth of repairs, we were to say the least, shocked. According to the place we took the car to the damage is as follows:

The outer CV boots are split with no grease ($710)
All 4 wheel bearings are loose and need to be replaced ($478)
All 4 struts are bottoming out and need to be replaced ($993)

Oh plus new wiper blades. *rolls eyes*

Mind you the car, being 17 years old, is worth maybe $900.

We were not yet panicking, as the car still seemed to be driving fine, so we picked up the car and went home. We have until the 16th of February before the temporary registration expires to make a decision. Unfortunately, just going without the car is at this point is not an option. While there is some public transportation in Baltimore none of it goes where we need to go. The route to Tigs’ workplace was discontinued in December. The route to mine would be somewhere around 4-5 hours round trip every day, and would be more expensive than gas. (Also, we just renewed the insurance to the tune of $1300 last week.)

So, what are we going to do? First, we’ve scheduled an appointment with the Toyota dealership to take a look at the car. Somehow I doubt that this level of damage occurred in the last couple of months. If there is that much damage, then we are looking at replacing the car, using this one as a trade in before the temporary registration runs out. The most likely replacement will be a used Camry, Civic, or Accord. (Tigs wants a Camry, you've got to admit that 17 years is pretty good advertising.) Right now we are researching online, and tonight we plan to visit a dealership. On Thursday when we deposit our paychecks we’ll be talking to the bank about financing through them.

If only we could hold out another month or two, financially it would be a lot better. We’d have a lot more cash available for a down payment.

The thing about it is we aren’t panicking. (Tigs is panicking.) There isn’t a need to, amazingly enough. (Because she has bad credit and no money and she has to be the one to get the loan.) We are finally at the cusp of being financially secure, and while this is a pain, it’s not going to break us. (Although we may not eat for several months.)

Comments in parenthesis were written by tigergladys.

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I sorted through more of the miniatures that I have all boxed up, and picked out which ones I actually want to do something with, and which ones I don’t. For instance, back when I was at Sarge’s, a company called Foundry wanted us to carry their stuff, so they sent us a box of some random minis. Vikings, witch doctors, chicks with guns, elves… random. Those can now be found on e-bay. On the other hand there were a couple of Mordheim minis that I’m looking forward to painting. At the moment there is a warlock that is high up there on my want-to-paint list. I’m going to hold off on painting anything I really want to keep, and see if I can clear through some of the massive backlog of minis I just want to paint and then sell.

Sometimes it’s nice to have all the variety I could want, but sometimes it’s just overwhelming. It is especially overwhelming when it is hard to fit in the closet.

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Sometimes Star Trek makes me sad. Other times... no, wait, still sad. What is it with these people?? Trek is supposed to be about a bright future for mankind. Yet they aren't giving me anything to be hopeful about now...

I'm gonna go practice the keyboard now.