I turn 27 today, the 27th. Supposedly that’s the ‘royal’ birthday, or magic birthday, or whatever you like to call it. Pretty cool, regardless. Happy birthday to me. *cheers* I’ll have dinner with family tonight, and I spent the past weekend in Chicago with friends, so it’s been a very nice yearly ritual. And there’s a full moon tonight, whoo.
To my two cousins who share my birthday: enjoy it! Let’s have a good day.
Daemon
StandardWhat do you think? (x-posted at LJ, because that’s what I had open first…) You’ve got 12 days to decide if this is me (that gives you to the 26th, btw). Click and see it change, I guess.
One of these days I’ve got to read the books. Annoyingly enough, neither of the libraries in town have the series in one volume. Since I’ve already got a backlog of library books to read, I’ll have to wait and request each separately.
I know something you don’t know
Standard(doo da, doo da)
…but I can’t tell you or Carol Berg will kill me, haha. This weekend at Archon I had the privilege of hearing some of the beginning of Carol’s next book, Breath and Bone at a private reading. According to her, I’m one of about 7 people who know. Sweet! The book comes out in January, and I’m even more keen to read it now than I was after the end of the first book in the Lighthouse Duet, Flesh and Spirit when it came out in May. Excuse me while I squee.
Archon (the St. Louis sci-fi/fantasy/comics/pop-culture convention that’s really in Collinsville IL) was very good. I debated about going for quite a while, because it was so expensive this year. Archon 31 was also NASFiC, since Worldcon was awarded to a non-North American site (Yokohama, Japan). It was, therefore, a national con and not a regional one, and theoretically worth more, I guess. I have very limited con experience, so I can’t tell you if it really was bigger than normal (though some of my new con friends say it wasn’t). I knew Carol Berg would be there, and I really wanted to see what she had to say. I took at look at the programming and decided that it would be worth it to pay that much, and indeed, it was. Thank goodness I have a car that could make the forty-mile round trip now.
There were quite a few writing panels, and I’ve got many notes which are going to live in my manuscript folder. It was pretty cool to interact with authors and agents, some of whom I’ve only encountered on blogs. And it’s doubly cool to actually talk with the authors, most of whom are really nice and surprisingly approachable, especially for a shy girl like me (unless I’m talking about myself, sigh. then I seem to run on forever). It was wonderful to actually have a discussion with one of my favorite authors about writing (Carol sat down with me for an entire hour) and get some great advice. I was really intending to sit down this evening and write some on my novel, but the computer thwarted me with its one-two punch of slowness and browser-crashing in the middle of my entry, sigh.
18
StandardDaniel Radcliffe turns 18 today. Yahoo. How would you like to be the richest kid in England? And know how the character you originated is going to die/live? Sort of surreal, if you ask me.
And I only post this because the post I made three years ago about him turning 15 broke my site for a little bit, because I was silly when I started out here…
It was fun talking about HP when I got to work this morning. Nice to know I’m not alone in my like of the boy wizard.
aaaand…I’m done.
Standard12:32 am to 6:18 am. I watched the sun come up as I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
Well, damn, JK. You did a good job. The ending was pretty exciting. Satisfying, even.
Gonna put this next behind the cut just in case people don’t want to know, but it’s not all that spoilery, especially if you already read the Washington Post review, like I did.
Shush, I’m reading
StandardI’ll let you know when I’m done.
Ready for Death(ly Hallows)
StandardJust finished the 6th Harry Potter book (to the accompaniment of the 5th movie soundtrack, natch), and so am ready for the midnight release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows this weekend. I’m totally dressing up. It will be fun. And perhaps good that I didn’t manage to finish my Gryffindor scarf, as it will be in the mid- or upper-90s Friday, and unlikely to cool off much before midnight…
Found a bookmark in my copy that mentioned HBP’s release date, and found it sort of scary that I started rereading the book for only the second time almost exactly two years to the day I read it on release day. Weird. Was rather more warm to it this time, what with taking two days to read it rather than only eight hours…I’ve got some thoughts, and I’m remembering how much I miss or hate certain characters. JK Rowling still has some odd ideas about teen romance (or perhaps I just had an abnormal experience in high school) but she’s not *quite* as bad as George Lucas.
It will be interesting to see that one made into a movie.
Did a lot of web design over the weekend and today. October is going to be a good month. And I’m seriously (Siriusly) thinking of going to Archon, since I’d have HP friends going…gotta decide soon. Deadline is Friday.
Time for bed.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
StandardWhew! Another fandom midnight movie premiere. Saw HP and the OotP last night (with friends! finally!) and enjoyed it. The Post-Dispatch reviewer gave it a B+, and that’s probably what I’d give it too…there was an awful lot missing (when you have to distill 820 pages into a 2:18 movie, of course there will be) but I think they did a good job at editing.
Daniel Radcliffe is still too cute for his age. His acting is better in this film than the others, though he was pretty good in Goblet of Fire. However, his acting is almost all we get to see. The other characters have been pretty much cut to secondary roles. Usually the most is made of any role, however small.
There are some tough scenes in the movie (as they were in the book, and if you haven’t read it, I won’t spoil you) but they’re done well. One of my friends remarked that this one was the first she’d seen where she’d read the book first, and it is a little odd to see it, knowing what happens. I think this one did a good job at keeping the suspense up even if you knew how it would end. Of course, I don’t think I’ve read OotP since the last book came out, so it’s been a while, and things had sort of faded into the fogginess of my mind.
I liked the ending (in the sense that it was well done, not the it’s-a-happy-ending way), though I wish it could have explored the book storyline a little more. There were some slow parts, and I wonder that they chose not to expand on the conclusion. People would watch it no matter how long it was. It’s the shortest movie of the five that are made, yet the longest book. It could be longer.
The music wasn’t wonderful. Nicholas Hooper composed it, and while there were a few times of hearing Hedwig’s theme reworked, most of it was new. It was very unobtrusive except when there were establishing shots, which I’ve never understood. Yes, let’s have sweeping orchestrals while showing you castle turrets. I’ll probably buy it anyway. I miss John William’s score, though.
This one won’t make me rush out and see it again immediately, unlike Pirates 3, but I’ll be happy to go with my parents or other friends.
I always did like Matrices
StandardOMG I BOUGHT A CAR.
Well, almost. Financing still has to be worked out. But for all purposes I have a used Toyota Matrix. It’s bright red. LIKE WHOA.
I always have to pause when I refer to multiple Matrix cars. I know, since I went through the lovely engineering math classes at WU that the plural of matrix is matrices but I don’t know how many other people do, and I feel silly saying “Matrixes,” but that’s how most folks would pluralize it…I can’t figure out which one to say. And I suppose it’s silly, since I’ve only bought one…you get the picture. Regardless, matrices were something I actually understood in Engineering Maths…course, show me one now and I don’t think I could do much of anything with it. But at least I have a cool car.
Dunno, do I look like a red Matrix girl? No? Too bad. That’s what I’ve got 😉
‘Twill be expensive. Looks like no more Borders runs for Jen…but I’m writing my own, right? Oh Lord please let this be the right decision!
car repair
StandardLast month I took my car in for an oil change and to have the mechanic look into why the car was shimmying and seizing when accelerating uphill. It needed new spark plugs and a transmission flush. Not cheap, but if it gets me through another summer, it would be worth it.
Bah. In the last two weeks the car has started to rattle loudly when idling and squeaking when the wheels turn. So back to the shop it went, but of course it wasn’t due to shoddy work on the previous trip (which I didn’t think it would, because Butch at Fred’s Auto Body is a nice guy). No, it’s a possible timing chain issue…’possible’ because to make sure, they’d have to pull the engine or whatnot (I’m not a mechanic, I don’t know the anatomy of a car) and that’s $150 right there. Of course, paying that much to see what’s wrong and then not fixing it is silly, so I would have had to pay a lot to fix it, which I elected not to. I think it’s to the point where I can’t put any more money into that car and feel good about it, because I’m reasonably sure I’ve put more into the car that it’s worth in the four years I’ve been driving it.
The teal Saturn is 14 years old, so I guess it deserves a break. But I’m dreading buying a new car. My dad really wants me to get a new one, so I can get deals or whatever. We stopped by a Toyota dealership last night for a look at what’s out there. There was a green ’03 Prius hybrid (Green! Hybrid!) that I theoretically could afford, but it has pretty high mileage. No luck there. I don’t have a lot of cash, and no more time this week to go looking, and I’ll be busy this weekend so it will be next week before I can spend more money. Guess that’s a good thing. I don’t get paid until Friday 😉
Wish me luck on the car issue. I don’t like being without one, but thank God I live near the Metrolink and can take the train to work.