My fic journal can be found if you follow this link. Fic

Miles Biked Monday: 40
Miles Biked Thursday: 25
Total: 291

:Squints at mile total. Shakes head: 

Two weeks to rack up 200 more miles. I'm not that worried.

I'm shit at getting to bed at a decent hour. If I go to bed at midnight I can easily pull seven hours of sleep, but that never happens. I go back to my book or my music or the internet and suddenly it's 1:30 in the a.m. and work is looming large. 
 
I haven't written a poem in almost three years, and today I finally shook off whatever metal block I'd had shoved in that area of my brain and got a first draft of something I actually like. 

Miles Biked Last Week: 83
Miles Biked Today: 35
Total: 226

 I could have kissed the women who did my physical therapy evaluation. Answers. So many beautiful answers. And they gave me a routine of exercises to follow! I love that! I need that! If something is wrong or things go bat-shit crazy I need to be physically doing something. There's a reason my mom taught me how to needle point in kindergarten. She saw what kind of personality was wandering around the house and figured she better give me something to work all that nervous energy into. 

So, yes. Stretches to do, leg exercises and 'hey don't do that for six to eight weeks' rules. Finally! The one down side is that  I just earned my blue belt, but I have to drop karate for a while. It doesn't bother me as much as it should because if I listen to these women I've been told they can get me running again. I'd wear funny hats to work everyday if they told me it would get me running again. 

I think I had a dream about Torchwood last night...but I can't remember what it was about except that Iano and Jack were both there. 

Oh Captian Jack. The Doctor and Rose are incredibly cool, but you and the coffee boy own my heart.

Miles Biked Monday & Tuesday: 39

Total: 108

  sam_can_do_it: Did you ever think that Dean Winchester is Eric Kripke's Mary Sue?
silverkit: I would have said Sam, because he's geekier, but now that I think about it, you're right. Dean makes a lot more sense.

<i>Miles Biked: 28
Which brings total to: 69</i>

I spent my weekend in Chicago searching through the massive bookfair that took over Printer's Row. I love that part of Chicago. Not just because of the books, but because of the buildings and the architecture and all of it!

One of my favorite stands at the fair had wooden printing blocks from printing presses for sale, but it was a bit too much for my slim budget to buy enough letters to spell out my name or anything like that. 

I really only went to see all the smaller presses that had their books on display. Borders had a stand, but I avoided it because I can always get to a Borders if need be. Being able to peruse a small chain that focuses on radical poetry, or women's writing or vegitarian cooking (no seriously. A whole stand with books on vegitarian cooking! Love it!)  is much rarer and as available as the Internet has made a lot of things, I still prefer to hold things in my hand and look them over before I buy.  

I almost bought Li Young-Lee's newest book of poetry, but figured I could find him again if  needed to and the hardcover wasn't something I could really afford. I also debated over an autographed copy of  Lisa Sees' Snow Flower and the Secret Fan (of which three women randomly told me was fabulous while I internally debated), because I adored her other novel Peony in Love. I decided against it in the end because half the fun of having autographed copies of books is going to meet authors and hearing them read their work aloud. 

What I did end up getting is a few prints that I fell in absolute love with! This isn't the exact copy of what I have, but it's the same blue moon silk stocking woman that appears on the one I purchased.

Fortunately, we made it back to my friend's apartment before the crazy tornado warnings, but we still had to skip around the city under umbrellas to pick up our dinners and snag a movie.

Spaghetti, tiramisu, and a bottle of wine was a great way to end a day!

Just in case you needed something to make you bash your head against a wall I give you the story of one man's journey to donate LGBT themed young adult novels to a middle school!

The fun is this way!


The only up side to this is the cash of young adult queer themed novels I now have to go find. Because those are always cool.

Bike Shop Sales Boy: Now the cool thing about the model I'm showing you now is that the over all geometry of the bike allows for a more comfortable ride. The flat handel bars and the lower seat make it more of a road bike, perfect for the kind of ride your planning on, but you could also change out the tire model it comes with for a thicker rubber for more of a trail ride rather than a road ride.

silverkit: Oh my god! It's decorated with silver butterflies!

Bike Shop Sales Boy: Yeah, that too.

Biked Today: 26 miles
Brings Total To: 51 miles

I need to go between 500 and 600 miles before the bike ride. 600 is the recommended distance, but they've upped it since last year, and I only did the 500 in 2007and was just fine. 

After Ellen's list of the Top 100 Sexiest Women and After Elton's list of the Top 100 Sexiest Men are both up! I love these so much more than People Magazine or Maxium's lists. 

Tina Fey secured the top spot on AfterEllen's list which is perfect considering that A)She's hot. B.) She's smart. and C) Willow Roseburg from Buffy has snuggly fantasies about her and Willow knows all. 

And Ellen Page too! Yay Ellen Page!

Jensen Ackles made the top ten on After Elton, and Jared's on there too (Hells yeah!)  I love that John Barrowman made it, though to be honest I don't really find him hot so much as I find him adorable. I look at him and think "must bake cookies for you" not "must get your shirt off."

"I’m thrilled with the results. Who wouldn’t want to come in behind Jake Gyllenhaal?" — John Barrowman, Torchwood 

See adorable!

Then again Gareth David-Lloyd, when not playing Ianto (because Ianto belongs to Jack), sooo hot.

"I understand I'm underneath John Barrowman, which seems to happen quite a lot. Maybe, next year, Ianto can be on top." —Gareth David-Lloyd, Torchwood

 

Mom: You know when I was a kid we didn't have a dish washer. We had to wash all our dishes by hand.

silverkit: Did you have to walk up hill, down hill and through the snow to get to the sink?

Dad: Snow! Ha! We would have been grateful for snow. We had fire!


My knees looks to be healing nicely, and not to jink it, but everything might be coming up Milhouse. 

I took the bike out yesterday and went five miles. It went well enough, and so I went with my dad today for fifteen. There's not a lot of time until the RAGBRI to train, but I'm not out of shape. It's more that there are parts of my body that I need to toughen up. (a.k.a. my ass. No seriously, you've got to train your butt to be able to sit for that long and not kill for the rest of the night. Lance Armstrong eat your heart out). I think I should be fine come July, but the route this year is going to be tough. Last year they broke it up very nicely with 25 miles there and 50 miles here and oh look here's a 70 mile day, but this year looks to be longer routes with hills. Lots of hills. 

I have to start looking for iPod speakers that I can attach to my bike. I won't be tagging along with the people dragging boom boxes behind them this year! No no! This year the people of Iowa will be forced to listen to any play list I desire! 

Torchwood has completely stolen my heart. It's a fun, dark, sexy show, and there are also a lot of parallels that I think you can make with the Angel (except that Gunn and Westley never listened when I yelled "Now make out!" and Jack and Ianto have so Torchwood wins).
 

Iron Man I humbly welcome you to this spot on the shelf of awesome comic book movies. There is never any middle ground with these types of films is there? They're either amazing or shit. 

I loved Pepper's freckles, and her hair! Cube job has given me a lot of compassion for assistants, and every time Pepper was trying to hunt down Tony for a signature or trying to get his schedule to run correctly all I could think was "I feel you sister!" I need an icon of Pepper with all those freckles, and I don't like Gwyneth Paltrow so that's an interesting urge for me.

ladybiue correct in saying that no one tops Robery Downey Jr. at playing a charismatic asshole. By the end of the movie I'd started to wonder if Tony was specially ordering his shirts so that all of them came with a hole in the chest. 

A group of us got Indian food before hitting the theater. Sweet rice and nan are so addicting!  Our poor waitress burned her hand before she brought us our order, and as we were listening to the yelling going in the kitchen in what I'm going to assume was Hindi (don't quote me I didn't fact check) sam_can_do_it said, "Well, I bet all of that translates to 'next time don't try to carry so many hot things at once!'"

I have officially finished watching both seasons of Torchwood. For some reason the entire cast reminds me of a huge black panther (Jack) being followed around by a cluster of of very determined kittens (everyone else).

I definitely saw a great deal of my personality reflected back at me via Tosh (which at several moments was a rather depressing realization), Owen grew on me, Jack is hard not to like, as is John, Gwen is....interesting and a bit all over the board, but Ianto is my hands down favorite. 

Why won't you download faster season two of Torchwood?! Why!

I saw the most wonderful thing on my way home from work yesterday. 

I was stopped at a red light right where the highway ramp connects to the road I take home, and I saw a mama duck (a hen, right? Female ducks are called hens?) followed by two little goslings who of course think it's a good idea to cross the road in front of five or six cars that can't see them during rush hour.  

I'm a few cars back, and I'm sure that this is it. That light will turn green in two seconds, and they'll be toast, but then a man in a suite got out of his car. The guy started waving his arms, and yelling and kept all the other cars in place until the ducks crossed. 

And just like that my faith in humanity was restored.

(And that need for someone to write fic where Ianto saves a bunch of ducks on his way to work was born)

On the outskirts of every agony sits some observant fellow who points.
Virginia Woolf 

Unfortunately for me, that observent fellow lives inside my head.

I took a tumble off my bike today. Hit a wet patch in the road, went down hard, and landed...on both of my knees.

silverkit : 4281hfeowpry!!!^&****$$$
Snarky Inner Monologue: Wow, all 145 pounds of you just landed on your knee caps! Right on the bones! Isn't this ironic? 
silverkit: Ow!
Snarky Inner Monologue: Let's be all stolid and steady about it. It's not that much blood. Stand up and walk it off. You'll be just like John Wayne.
silverkit: :SOB:
Snarky Inner Monologue: Or...you can do that crying thing. That works too. 

OK, focusing solely on the "Whoo hoos!" of the day it breaks down like this:

-Gay Marrage Ban Struck Down In California!  It's a start!

-I do not need surgery on my knee! Nothing is torn, but there is some inflimation under the knee cap. I start going to physical therapy (as soon as I sign up that is), and this will hopefully solve the problem. It's too late to sign up for the Chicago Marathon :kicks rock dejectedly:, but I've still got the RAGBRAI. The marathon will be there next year. 

-Supernatural Season Finale: YAY! SOB! JOY! WHOO! YAY! again followed quickly by SON OF A BITCH!

-Finished Peony In Love by Lisa See which was full of women's writing, and discussion of women's writing, and ancient China, ghosts and love and....yeah ok the page or so of descriptive foot binding made me want to throw up and then punch random walls, but the book as a whole is awesome-cakes!

-Kahlua cake. Kahlua cake people!
 

Mom: You know honey, we'd really love it if you moved your bed out of your closet.
Brother:  I like my bed in the closet.
Me: Well, you've got to be careful. You don't want to roll over and fall ass first into Narnia. 
Mom: .....
Brother:....
Dad:......
Me: Whoops! Sorry, wrong crowd.


I've really started to enjoy listening to books on CD while driving to work. What's funny is that I first started doing this when I was temping at the place where I now have my cube job. To pass the time they would allow me to bring my headphones in and I listened to a wide variety of books. It's just like being in sixth grade and getting story time all over again. 

Hello, Doctor Silbermann. How's the knee? 

Sarah Connor
Terminator 2

The MRI I had yesterday was open, and due to the location of the irritation my knee went in first, but it still isn't a procedure I'd like to repeat anytime soon. The better part of my chest was under a large disk, and the claustrophobia, while not horrible, was still present.

I just kept picturing the desert, the Grand Canyon, all the fields and areas I saw years ago on a trip to Arizona. It helped until the last photo when the image started slipping. Photos take about five minutes each, and that was about when I started conjugating all the Spanish verbs I could remember, and listing all the different words for members of ones family in Chinese. 

It's very calming. 

I was down in my old stomping grounds for the day watching my brother graduate. (I'm so proud!)

It gave me the chance to visit my favorite used book store. It was really cool that the owner remembered me from two years ago, and their new location is amazing! I love being able to sift through the piles on the floor (because 'alphabetical order' is really more of a suggestion than a rule in places like this), and I found Magic Steps another Tamara Pierce novel in hardcover to add to my growing collection as well as a illustrated version of Sense and Sensibility, Don Quixote, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, The Other Boleyn Girl...there are a few others, but I'm too tired to type them all. 

Tried my best to find a copy of Les Miserables but no dice. Couldn't shake a foot without poking a copy of A Farewell to Arms in the ass, but no Les Miserables.

What we have here is the top 106 books most often marked as "unread" by LibraryThing’s users. As in, they sit on the shelf to make you look smart or well-rounded. Bold the ones you've read, italicize the ones you read for school, underline the ones you started but didn't finish (or are on the shelf waiting for a free week). 


You're trying to tell me that there are people who buy Neil Gaiman books and don't try to read them on the car ride home?

What's funny is that yesterday I was thinking about how I never finished Les Misérables, and want to give it another go. 

Just as soon as I read the one million and eight other books on the list. 

Yoinked from thirdsouthobbi

Reply to this blog with your name.

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2. I'll tell you what song/movie reminds me of you.
3. I'll pick a flavor of jello to wrestle you in.
4. I'll say something that only makes sense to you and me. (if possible!)
5. I'll tell you my first memory of you.
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7. I'll ask you something I've always wondered about you.
8. If you do this you MUST post this on yours. You MUST

An animated movie with Neil Patrick Harris as the voice of the Flash, David Boreanaz voicing Hal Jordan, and Lucy Lawless as Wonder Woman. Oh, you better believe I'm going to rent that baby.

I have to go pop my Torchwood cherry now.

Bottoms (or whatever you prefer) up.

The comic Runaways is so addicting. And the best part is that it's far enough along that I'm able to pop back the graphic novels like they're mini Milkeyways.

Written by Brian K. Vaughan and later picked up by Joss Whedon, strong females, characters of color, kick ass humor, a lesbian, a cubby chick who is not only smart as hell but getting some, guest appearances by A/B and C string superheroes from the Marvelverse. Good lord what's not to like?

....Karolina comes back eventually, right?

Seriously, Karolina in Runaways, ( Read more... )
If I walk into a comic store and shout "Where are all my queer ladies at?!" we'll all know what's to blame.