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bluelovesorangeI'm flying to Seattle this evening, and will be there until Saturday. It's
coming at a perfect time, because
my multi-tasking skills are getting stretched to the limit. I know I've
whined about being tired before in this LJ, but I seriously think there is
something wrong with me (and not just according to the list of
things I've drawn up, optimistically titled, "Things I can Improve (Before I
go Mental)"
Vitamins, not enough sleep, crappy diet, the super sedentary workstyle of a
desk monkey - it's all taking a toll and I'm kind of appalled at how quickly
I've deteriorated in some areas. And I don't always say I'm feeling bad when
I am, which I know is a bad habit because I'm only adding to my own stress.
Then again, I've always been the case of the devil you know - I
know when I'm being hateful, unreasonable and bitchy, but amid the
dark cloud miasma of my own suckitude, I'm always trying to find a bright
side. I wonder if it's because I was brought up to not complain (well, about
family matters.) or the societal tyranny of being a nice girl, or just
because I'm more of a thinker than a doer. I live too much in my head,
sometimes. And I'm always vaguely disappointed when people can't actually
read my mind and know that actually I'm not okay without me having to
telegraph it via emo semaphore.
Bitter navel-gazing - oh LJ, what have I been reduced to?
But I did have a really lovely Saturday - I finally got a chance to hang
with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lilorphanannie after, I don't know - has it been a year? I
feel like it's been a year or longer. And she is what I want to be when I
grow up - maybe I was easily impressed by the company car, but it had GPS!
And an Ipod dock, and a FREEZER inside the dock compartment. We walked
around old town Pasadena and we discovered a huge Famima!, and so I had to
buy their speciality dessert - a Whole Lotta Banana (a pancake wrapped
around a chocolate enrobed banana, with some light cream, and then chocolate
curls as decorative garnish. It looks like a big fluffy cannolli.) and the
Strawberry Roll cake, which is basically the same thing, only with
strawberries.
And there was an abortive attempt at finding Mediterrannean food, but
apparently some restaurants actually have the nerve to be closed on
weekends, because their owners have actual lives. We also briefly popped
into Vromans - the utter complete quietness of the store actually
unnerved me. This isn't Borders or even Barnes and Noble quiet, this was
akin to going into the far stacks of oh, say the British Library. I was
impressed. And again, unnerved. A bookstore that's actually quiet? With
respectful patrons and big stacks of Penguin classics in front?
I've been damaged by the entire retail chain trade.
Then we wandered out into the more mainstream part of the Pasadena
promenade, and I picked up a few things at Lush, and Annie and I went inside
to the Apple store. I was just curious - aside from DJ milky, I've stayed
clear from the Apple as LIFEstyle branding, and the store kind of reinforced
my belief (prejudice? Yeah. That too.) about Apple People.
The Mac Air is interesting looking, but the flatness of the keyboard was an
issue with me, along with the relative sparseness of usb hubs - and really,
their machines are mostly a visual delight, but they're so damn expensive.
One of the Mac pros was almost a thousand dollars more than my new laptop
but it had less features.
And I'm a shallow creature, but if I'm going to shill out money for a pretty
paperweight --- well, anyway.
Oh yes. My new laptop.
I'll take pictures and such of her when I get back (Marvin is still around,
but he's emergency back up.) from Seattle. She is so quiet and speedy, and
the color of gunmetal - really sleek with some interesting decorative
touches (also a Special Edition) and she has the same brand of speakers that
Apple is hawking with their machines, built in.
And oh, she's a Toshiba.
I KNOW. I know, Marvin is a Toshiba too and I was so very very bitter about
various failings - and I was originally going to buy an ACER, but then Best
Buy was having a sale and I was just browsing online, in the spirit of
non-committalness, but then I saw the price tag and the specs were just what
I was looking for: 4 gb memory, intel duo core processor, a fair hd space,
though I now have two portable harddrives that total 500 gb together, so
it's not that much of an issue, a nonglare bright screen...and there's all
these other little bells and whistles.
Moneypenny - yes, I named the laptop Moneypenny, has a built in webcam, blue
tooth capability, a radio tuner, and is running Vista, which I was expecting
to be the equivalent of a flaming bag of poo on my doorstep - and while
there's been some hiccups in learning where things are, it's not that awful.
Yet. (crosses fingers)
And she was about three hundred dollars cheaper than when I bought Marvin
3-4 years ago and totally PWNS his specs. And you know, names are important.
Naming my laptop after a possibly suicidal android was probably not the best
idea because - really.
So Moneypenny. So sleek. So efficient. So very over-protected. I uninstalled
the majority of the microsoft crap that gets bundled, and installed Open
Office, AVG free, and I'm waiting for my order from Gelaskins to arrive so I
can add further outside protection, and then I'm getting a case for her (and
yes, I realize that I anthromorphize to the ridiculous) and anyway, I'm very
pleased with my shiny new toy.
And as for my 13 year old girl - so, amid all the crappiness of the Other in
my life (work, my mom has to get gall bladder surgery) and the genuine
pleasures (hanging out with friends, Moneypenny), there has been the utter
glee at picking apart the truly terrible.
I am of course, talking about Twilight.
And the best part of this is that I haven't even read the books in
actuality, but read the wiki summaries/heard the howl of WTF that did scythe
through the innernet fandom, and oh, how I laughed. Twilight is
Hotel Schadenfreude plus lifetime movies plus every anonymous Harlequin
novel you swore you never read.
It's not the kind of bad that it is so bad that it sort of masquerades as a
kind of greatness (see: cult 80 movies, the initial reaction to One Tree
Hill, etc, etc.) but just actually AWFUL, with I suppose, flashes of
potentiality that are crushed underneath the heavy anvil of All Encompassing
Suck.
And that is why I have to admit I enjoy it (or more precisely, mocking it)
because it is just so dreadful, that suck by osmosis is about as far as I'm
going to go in pursuing any kind of 'relationship' with the series, because
I fear if I actually read the books, other, less amusing emotions will
surface and then no one's having any fun.
Namely, me.
Stephanie Meyers isn't the next great anything. She's just a very
lucky woman that got her fanfic published and embraced so passionately, and
as I admitted tomonimala a while ago, I can truthfully say that
yeah, I'm jealous. Or maybe appalled. Because it's not like Twilight is the
worst book I've (n)ever read. There have been worse books. And there will be
more in the future. As long as Laurell K. can hold a pen.....
It's almost an inspirational rallying cry, isn't it?
coming at a perfect time, because
my multi-tasking skills are getting stretched to the limit. I know I've
whined about being tired before in this LJ, but I seriously think there is
something wrong with me (and not just according to the list of
things I've drawn up, optimistically titled, "Things I can Improve (Before I
go Mental)"
Vitamins, not enough sleep, crappy diet, the super sedentary workstyle of a
desk monkey - it's all taking a toll and I'm kind of appalled at how quickly
I've deteriorated in some areas. And I don't always say I'm feeling bad when
I am, which I know is a bad habit because I'm only adding to my own stress.
Then again, I've always been the case of the devil you know - I
know when I'm being hateful, unreasonable and bitchy, but amid the
dark cloud miasma of my own suckitude, I'm always trying to find a bright
side. I wonder if it's because I was brought up to not complain (well, about
family matters.) or the societal tyranny of being a nice girl, or just
because I'm more of a thinker than a doer. I live too much in my head,
sometimes. And I'm always vaguely disappointed when people can't actually
read my mind and know that actually I'm not okay without me having to
telegraph it via emo semaphore.
Bitter navel-gazing - oh LJ, what have I been reduced to?
But I did have a really lovely Saturday - I finally got a chance to hang
with
lilorphanannie after, I don't know - has it been a year? Ifeel like it's been a year or longer. And she is what I want to be when I
grow up - maybe I was easily impressed by the company car, but it had GPS!
And an Ipod dock, and a FREEZER inside the dock compartment. We walked
around old town Pasadena and we discovered a huge Famima!, and so I had to
buy their speciality dessert - a Whole Lotta Banana (a pancake wrapped
around a chocolate enrobed banana, with some light cream, and then chocolate
curls as decorative garnish. It looks like a big fluffy cannolli.) and the
Strawberry Roll cake, which is basically the same thing, only with
strawberries.
And there was an abortive attempt at finding Mediterrannean food, but
apparently some restaurants actually have the nerve to be closed on
weekends, because their owners have actual lives. We also briefly popped
into Vromans - the utter complete quietness of the store actually
unnerved me. This isn't Borders or even Barnes and Noble quiet, this was
akin to going into the far stacks of oh, say the British Library. I was
impressed. And again, unnerved. A bookstore that's actually quiet? With
respectful patrons and big stacks of Penguin classics in front?
I've been damaged by the entire retail chain trade.
Then we wandered out into the more mainstream part of the Pasadena
promenade, and I picked up a few things at Lush, and Annie and I went inside
to the Apple store. I was just curious - aside from DJ milky, I've stayed
clear from the Apple as LIFEstyle branding, and the store kind of reinforced
my belief (prejudice? Yeah. That too.) about Apple People.
The Mac Air is interesting looking, but the flatness of the keyboard was an
issue with me, along with the relative sparseness of usb hubs - and really,
their machines are mostly a visual delight, but they're so damn expensive.
One of the Mac pros was almost a thousand dollars more than my new laptop
but it had less features.
And I'm a shallow creature, but if I'm going to shill out money for a pretty
paperweight --- well, anyway.
Oh yes. My new laptop.
I'll take pictures and such of her when I get back (Marvin is still around,
but he's emergency back up.) from Seattle. She is so quiet and speedy, and
the color of gunmetal - really sleek with some interesting decorative
touches (also a Special Edition) and she has the same brand of speakers that
Apple is hawking with their machines, built in.
And oh, she's a Toshiba.
I KNOW. I know, Marvin is a Toshiba too and I was so very very bitter about
various failings - and I was originally going to buy an ACER, but then Best
Buy was having a sale and I was just browsing online, in the spirit of
non-committalness, but then I saw the price tag and the specs were just what
I was looking for: 4 gb memory, intel duo core processor, a fair hd space,
though I now have two portable harddrives that total 500 gb together, so
it's not that much of an issue, a nonglare bright screen...and there's all
these other little bells and whistles.
Moneypenny - yes, I named the laptop Moneypenny, has a built in webcam, blue
tooth capability, a radio tuner, and is running Vista, which I was expecting
to be the equivalent of a flaming bag of poo on my doorstep - and while
there's been some hiccups in learning where things are, it's not that awful.
Yet. (crosses fingers)
And she was about three hundred dollars cheaper than when I bought Marvin
3-4 years ago and totally PWNS his specs. And you know, names are important.
Naming my laptop after a possibly suicidal android was probably not the best
idea because - really.
So Moneypenny. So sleek. So efficient. So very over-protected. I uninstalled
the majority of the microsoft crap that gets bundled, and installed Open
Office, AVG free, and I'm waiting for my order from Gelaskins to arrive so I
can add further outside protection, and then I'm getting a case for her (and
yes, I realize that I anthromorphize to the ridiculous) and anyway, I'm very
pleased with my shiny new toy.
And as for my 13 year old girl - so, amid all the crappiness of the Other in
my life (work, my mom has to get gall bladder surgery) and the genuine
pleasures (hanging out with friends, Moneypenny), there has been the utter
glee at picking apart the truly terrible.
I am of course, talking about Twilight.
And the best part of this is that I haven't even read the books in
actuality, but read the wiki summaries/heard the howl of WTF that did scythe
through the innernet fandom, and oh, how I laughed. Twilight is
Hotel Schadenfreude plus lifetime movies plus every anonymous Harlequin
novel you swore you never read.
It's not the kind of bad that it is so bad that it sort of masquerades as a
kind of greatness (see: cult 80 movies, the initial reaction to One Tree
Hill, etc, etc.) but just actually AWFUL, with I suppose, flashes of
potentiality that are crushed underneath the heavy anvil of All Encompassing
Suck.
And that is why I have to admit I enjoy it (or more precisely, mocking it)
because it is just so dreadful, that suck by osmosis is about as far as I'm
going to go in pursuing any kind of 'relationship' with the series, because
I fear if I actually read the books, other, less amusing emotions will
surface and then no one's having any fun.
Namely, me.
Stephanie Meyers isn't the next great anything. She's just a very
lucky woman that got her fanfic published and embraced so passionately, and
as I admitted to
monimala a while ago, I can truthfully say thatyeah, I'm jealous. Or maybe appalled. Because it's not like Twilight is the
worst book I've (n)ever read. There have been worse books. And there will be
more in the future. As long as Laurell K. can hold a pen.....
It's almost an inspirational rallying cry, isn't it?
