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phoenixsinger's LiveJournal:
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| Wednesday, July 9th, 2008 | | 7:36 pm |
 more cat pictures "I like your meerkats," I said. Yes, Mom, I remember. | | Monday, June 9th, 2008 | | 9:27 pm |
| | Sunday, June 8th, 2008 | | 12:01 am |
Wishes from an aunt/fairy godmother Happy birthday to one Margaret Rose Gallagher. She is now six years old, a very important and special age. Six-year-olds can still see magic in the world. And Maggie, my dear, you bring magic and joy everywhere you go. You are intelligent. You're spunky. You're a bundle of fun. Never stop being you. You rock! I want you to have a magical,beautiful year filled with love,curiosity,a feeling of security. I want you to have a year full of the courage and self-confidence to go out and explore, discover your world. Most of all, Maggie, I want you to know how much Aunt Robyn is very, very proud of you. Aunt Robyn misses you very much. I see things that make me think of you all the time. And I love you with all my heart. Happy birthday, dear little Princess Maggie. Current Mood:  touched | | Monday, June 2nd, 2008 | | 3:29 pm |
Nanowrimo Hi everyone. I have just signed up for Nanowrimo. (Yes, I know I discovered it in 2007 and planned to do it then, but let's just say life got in the way in a major sense and I probably would have chickened out anyways. Never mind that. This year I am REALLY gonna do it.) The trouble is that I had a loose plot in mind in 2007 and that it has really solidified in the intervening year. In fact, the moment I signed up for Nano online and my characters realized that I seriously intended to tell their story, they all started clamoring in my head at once. They won't bloody shut up now. They are all talking over each other to try to make their individual selves heard over everyone else. It's like a party line from Hell. Well, I can't take this until November without writing it down. I simply can't. I am thinking of doing about a month of planning and starting the actual writing in July. I'll stick to the month/50k formula just for a beginner's framework. But--- ---the trouble is, that leaves me with no plot for Nano. Not so much as a genre. I don't know what to do about this. The mercenary, practical side of my mind says, "Write a romance novel. If you can manage to do what Paul Sheldon did in Stephen King's Misery , you'll be set for life. A character people are obsessed with to that degree will pay a lot of medical bills. Who cares if you're taken seriously? What you want is book signings and seeing your name in print. That'll fit the bill." Then a more sentimental side of me says, "But you hate romance novels. You think most of them are crap. You would never be caught in public reading one, even if it was only a stranger who saw you. The only romance novels you'll read are Georgette Heyer's, and you can't write like that. The stuff that sells is the Harlequins, and you wouldn't write like that; you couldn't look yourself in the mirror if you did, even if it sold." Hence my problem. Can anyone recommend a romance author other than Heyer that doesn't write pure smut/sounds like he or she has had better than an 8th grade education in English? If I could read some good examples, I think I might be able to pull this off. However, I have no intention of writing a bodice-ripper. Current Mood:  creative | | Thursday, May 29th, 2008 | | 1:44 pm |
 more cat pictures And here's my other cat, Skipper, doing DH's job. :) Seriously, Pat earned a major Daddy merit badge last night. Paul apparently managed to stick a peanut from a bag of trail mix up his nose, and Pat got it out without the benefit of either a nose bulb or an ER, thank goodness. | | Tuesday, May 27th, 2008 | | 3:37 pm |
 more cat pictures Oh my gosh someone has kidnapped my cat, Merlin!! OK, that isn't my kitchen (I wish) and said cat is safe at home. But boy is he a dead ringer for the one in the picture. I think I've even seen him leap that high. | | Monday, March 31st, 2008 | | 9:03 pm |
| | 5:38 pm |
 see more crazy cat picsToo cute to pass up, and reminded me of Mom. Yup, I am now addicted to lolcats. Thanks everyone. I am addicted to the degree that I am considering how to make my own. Current Mood: amused | | Sunday, March 30th, 2008 | | 8:59 pm |
Home Again I'm home from the hospital now, much earlier than expected. I got lucky in that someone needed an emergency pheresis treatment in the ICU; while the nurses were there, they decided to treat me, too. I had the further good fortune of the fact that the surgeons who were authorized to take my vascular catheter out were in on a weekend giving someone an emergency chest tube. They, too, came up to my room to take the catheter out as long as they were in the hospital anyway. I managed to convince Dr Morris to let me go home this morning, taking chemo in his office rather than in the hospital, provided that I agreed to stay Saturday night for observation. No problem! And my nurse was on top of things; she had my discharge papers ready by 8 am, thank you. I really feel bad for the people who were so sick that the staff I needed had to come out on a weekend. But I am so glad--I'll get to go to part of OES Grand Chapter after all! I don't get to sing, but I do get to see the events that were most important to me firsthand. As for what we discovered during the hospital stay: there was some swelling in my brain (nothing new) and in my spinal cord (which was a new development). Both were treated with heavy doses of Solumedrol (steroids) and the pheresis. Everything else came up normal except for a CT scan of my lungs--apparently there's some new damage there, although Dr Morris did not propose any new treatment for that. I underwent some lung function tests, and my scores there were fine; it's structural damage we're looking at. Morris says he's hitting me with the biggest guns he has in terms of meds. Oh well. But there's further good news: I'm knitting! Albeit on a circular loom, not real needles, but I'm knitting! As soon as I figure out what this tube is going to be :) I'll post a picture of the finished product. Current Mood: cheerful | | Sunday, March 23rd, 2008 | | 8:32 pm |
| | Friday, March 14th, 2008 | | 2:33 pm |
Books I've read in 2008 (starting from roughly 1-15) I don't know exactly why I'm keeping track of this. Just call me ambitious, I guess. Abarat by Clive Barker The Widow of the South by Robert Hicks The Clan of the Cave Bear , The Valley of Horses , The Mammoth Hunters , The Plains of Passage , and The Shelters of Stone by Jean Auel Passionate Marriage by Dr. David Schnarch Variable Star by Robert Heinlein and Spider Robinson Protector by Larry Niven A Wizard of Earthsea , The Tombs of Atuan , and The Farthest Shore by Ursula Le Guin Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury Scream-Free Parenting by Hal Edward Runkel, LMFT Vanity and Vexation: A Novel of Pride and Prejuidice by Kate Fenton Little Heathens: Hard Times and High Spirits on an Iowa Farm During the Great Depression by Mildred Armstrong Kalish The Cymry Ring by Michael Allen Dymmoch Pay it Forward by Catherine Ryan Hyde Friedman's Fables by Edwin H Friedman Alton Brown's Gear for Your Kitchen by Alton Brown Sarum: The Novel of Englnad by Edward Rutherford Sandra Lee Semi-Homemade Cooking Made Light by Sandra Lee Food Network Kitchens Making it Easy ed. by Jennifer Dorland Darling Better Homes and Gardens Test Kitchen Favorites The History of Sexuality: An Introduction, Volume One by Michel Foucault, translated from the French by Robert Hurley The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins Kids Draw Anime by Christopher Hart Lady Chatterly's Lover by D.H. Lawrence Misery by Stephen King 'Salem's Lot by Stephen King The Stephen King Companion ed. by George Beahm Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain Murder Two: The Second Casebook of Forensic Detection by Colin Evans Dolores Claiborne by Stephen King Danse Macabre by Stephen King I should point out that these are not listed in the exact order in which I read them, and that both A Wizard of Earthsea and The Tombs of Atuan are rereads for me; I just never finished the trilogy before now. Of course I will read many more books this year, and keep adding to this posted list as I do so. Current Mood:  contemplative | | Monday, August 27th, 2007 | | 2:55 pm |
Hang on to your braiiins.... This clip should be filed under the category of "such a train wreck, I had to share it." Another appropriate tag might be, "why phoenixsinger has the sudden urge to dye her hair ANY color other than blond." In which Miss Teen South Carolina answers a question....sort of http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj3iNxZ8Dww | | Thursday, August 23rd, 2007 | | 7:56 am |
I've already posted the results of this test to Selenite's journal, but I thought they were so neat that they deserved a place in my own. Your Score: Volva-Priestess You scored 40% nobility, 56% magic, 23% slavery, and 51% practicality!
As a volva, or seeress, you can see into the future, and are useful to many powerful people. You could have been born anywhere, to anyone. Your powers are arcane and you know all of the seeing songs. You are probably the youngest of nine sisters and dedicated to Freyja.
| | 7:48 am |
Wow, time flies. My husband and I have been discussing how to redecorate Paul's room, once he gets his toddler bed for Christmas. (My father-in-law volunteered several months ago to provide the bed.)
I think Pat and I have come up with an idea we can both live with: an outer space/astronomy theme. Pat loves astronomy, would probably be tempted to major in it if he ever went back to school-impractical as it is.
So little Paul will probably end up having star and moon stickies on his walls, just as his father did when we were dating. :) I'm thinking of getting a Cabbage Patch boy at a thrift store and a CP astronaut outfit on Ebay. I'd love to make a mobile with some of the planets, or perhaps a couple of planets and a rocket. No idea what sort of sheets, comforter, etc we should do, but I imagine there are people on my flist who could suggest things.
For now, we're just dreaming. We're too pressed financially to do anything about it, and it's early anyway. But boy, dreaming is fun. | | Monday, August 6th, 2007 | | 9:10 am |
Whee. I called my library to place an order through Interlibrary Loan, and discovered that I didn't have to go through all that rigmarole at all. The main library in my city actually has a copy of The Coumadin Cookbook . (On the shelf, gasp.) Now all I have to do is wait for that book to make its way to the branch much closer to me. I never thought I would be so excited about the prospect of cooking. I hate cooking. However, this is cool. Current Mood: pleased | | Wednesday, July 18th, 2007 | | 11:26 pm |
Your Score: 10", Willow, Veela You scored 42 wisdom, 38 bravery, 31 emotional, and 0 martyrdom!
A willow wand signifies that you care deeply about emotions, art, and intuition, and that you have a particular knack for charms. The veela hair as a wand core means that you are slightly unpredictable but very powerful.
| | 8:39 am |
Sure, you deserve one. You helped popularized lolcats from a running gag to an online sensation. Now mainstream media writes asinine columns on this 'phenomenon', students write theses on the topic, programming languages adopt the grammar, and losers write tests about them on dating sites. Now take your cheezburger and never touch the internets again. </p> </div> Kitty looks like my Russian Blue, Merlin! I am enchanted. I proudly wears title Cheezeburger Cat. | | Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 | | 8:53 am |
Just a quick post to say I had a lovely, lovely weekend indeed with celticdragonfly, selenite, and the family. Almost every instant was filled with pleasant things. There was adventure, good company, and good food. There were great games to play. There was great musical fun. There were new friends. There was even a slight question on my part: would I be happier in a Lutheran church, where there would be more music? (And where the people would apparently be friendlier than those in the Episcopal church, if my home church is any valid comparison model for celticdragonfly's.)
It is disconcerting that I find myself in a church with people who are more reserved than Lutherans......
Something is simply not right here. I don't know whether I have a denominational problem here or not, but something is Not As It Should Be At All to make me happy.
I glance over my post and find myself thinking, "Are you kidding? Fencing, fighting, torture, revenge, giants, monsters, chases, escapes, true love, miracles..."
"Doesn't sound too bad. I'll try to stay awake."
(Drat the blasted lupus!)
I sang for my enchanting new niece Alanna's baptism. It was a joy and an honor to give her such a gift. From a purely musical standpoint, I would have liked to have been able to give myself higher marks for technical merit, but I will allow myself to be satisfied with what I got: which was respectable marks for technical merit and outstanding marks for interpretation. (This was the musical equivalent of an OWL. I knew I was giving Alanna something meant to last, and I had better do it right. I think I succeeded in giving her something worth the test of time. I hope so. I hope she will enjoy it very much later.)
More mental cues: "We could have been killed---or worse, expelled!"
"She needs to sort out her priorities."
I had a ball reconnecting, not only with Karl and Laura, but also with Maggie and Jamie. (Jamie has made marvelous progress in communication since I last visited. :) )Maggie and I had many hugs and kisses shared, and many engaging conversations.
I wish I had been in possession of a Time Turner, as fordprfct will attest. The time could not possibly go slowly enough to suit me. We will visit again sometime soon, I know. I do not know whether or not I will be able to save up enough money to get a plane ticket (and thus, an extra visit) in my current quest to sell my extra stuff on Ebay, but it is certainly one of the things I want to do. | | Wednesday, July 11th, 2007 | | 8:23 am |
Your spirit animal is the otter. Playful, curious and fun animals, they are truly the start of what can be considered a noble creature. Otters are good at figuring things out, and make great friends. You are lucky to have one as a spirit animal. Otters are fairly rare as spirit animals.
***Wondering how this animal was chosen for you? These questions were carefully thought out to see how important you hold certain virtues such as: humanism, self-knowledge, rationalism, the love of freedom and other somewhat Hellenic ideals. Some of the questions were very subtle. Your score was then matched with an animal of corresponding nobility. However, you shouldn't think this was a right/wrong sort of test, but more of an idealistic values test. It's ok to not hold these values, you'll just get an animal spirit of lower stature if you do!***
</div> | | Tuesday, July 3rd, 2007 | | 8:32 pm |
Patrick is lying on the couch, clad only in his shorts. Paul is lying on Pat's chest, clad only in his diaper, at least three-quarters asleep, thumb in mouth. Pat is awake, and has his arms around the boy. Adorable. Kodak. Moment. Could entitle me to stock in Kodak. I wish I knew how to use the camcorder my father-in-law gave us at Christmas. Life is good, and I am a very rich, fortunate woman. Current Mood: grateful |
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