I made the cake and my mom loved it. It was quite delicious. Pecans in the meringue... mmm.

Used a whole 20 ounce can for the filling instead of 8 ounces of canned pineapple.

Today has been pretty good, I guess.

After the long silence from Tennessee, I have news to report. Starting January 15, I will be in a new job. (Yay, me!) I have not really been looking for anything; this one came about as a result of me having an application in the state system for over 2 years. Decided to interview kind of on a whim and was offered the job. I will be an Information Resource Support Specialist 2 for the Dept. of Human Services (or whatever they call themselves).

Basically, that's a fancy name for a desktop PC support dude. (High 5, Mil!) It pays almost twice what I am getting now, and the schedule is more regular- I will actually have my Saturdays back! The teaching will have to go away... and I will miss the folks at my current (soon to be former) job. But...all my state benefits carry over (retirement, 401k, leave, etc.). So, no more working six days a week.

And what does this mean for all the fine Chorrol folk, you may ask. Christmas presents, perhaps? Eh, not so much... but I will be able to get back to writing and move Athlain out of limbo. And then maybe I can also catch up on some of the other writing that has been going on here....

May my good fortune touch everyone here is some way, not just now, but through-out the year.

MM, your post sounds tantalizingly exciting .. hope all continues well. You are a charming self of a person, so I don't see why not.

Mil, I envy you the beauty of the snow but not the cold and definitely not the digging out of the vehicles from under said snow.

Treydoggie, that is marvelous great news! And Danny, what a cool guitfiddle .. teehee. Ummm, our roaming correspondent Minque sounds ever restless and willing to got job/will travel. Zarr so glad that your mom loved the cake. Pineapple merangue? I will needs to look into that myself - it does sound delicious.

To ALL Chorrol citizens ... have a Happy Happy Christmas shopping season!!

High five, Trey! Enjoy those lazy saturday mornings snoozing...

Well, I got done with two out of six semester tests. The AP English one I had to take early, but I thought it was way easy.

Tomorrow I have AP Calculus and AP Chemistry. Good thing it's AP Chemistry that I'll have to take in the morning.

This week has sucked, no way around it. It started out alright, three and a half days of school before break right? But, lo and behold, I pick up a virus on Monday! For the first time all sememester, too. I've been running fevers and being reasonably normal under medication for the last two days.

Not only have I missed two days of school, but the TEK check tests scheduled for today!!!!! At least I'll be able to go to school tomorrow....... I can't believe I'm saying this, but it sucks that tomorrow is a half-day. Oh, well, can't change the past, might as well deal with it.

Tomorrow I'm taking my A+ tests. Woohoo!

I made myself some dinner. Man am I stuffed. Blargh.

Oh, the AP Calculus test yesterday killed me. Yep.

The Zombocalypse has begun with Zarr!!! FLEE IF YOU VALUE YOUR LIVES! (and fleshy parts)

Imminent doom aside, life has been rather dull for me of late, what with being on my christmas break from university with nothing to do XD

Ahhh I thought I did my last day before Christmas holiday today...but nope, I´ll have to visit my sweet NPP tomorrow as well, see if I can keep it to merely clean up my desk and wish my nice colleagues Merry X-mas. Did my hair today...hehe great color if I may say so...

YAY Treydog! a job with just 5 days a week! Now isn´t that nice...and a sweet increase in salary, that´s not bad at all! Congrats my old friend!

Tonight then...well my washing-machine is working as usual, I´m sort of planning to prepre my big ham by putting it in water overnight...because tomorrow night will be my "cooking-ham-whilst-everybody-else-sleep" That´s so nice..to have that time for myself! And as a special treat...I will be the first one to taste the ham! YAY


Now Ibis, Mil, Zarr, Wolfie, Revie, Mallie and all the rest of you..

Have a nice "preparing-for-christmas-evening"

Thanks Minque! I still have two days of work to go through before I get my x-mas break. I hope that I don't have to close tomorrow and that would make everything that much better. We shall see I suppose...

Like I said before, I'll be in Arizona for X-Mas (parents ) still, I am glad that Christmas Break has begun. And thanks Minque, hope you all enjoy your holdiays, it only happens once a year! Remember that, or ELSE!!!!!

Thanks Minkey dear, but I don't celebrate Christmas remember?

Anyhow, it's beginning to be really freezing here. Thank god it's not windy, that would be too damn much.

For New Year's... ah, I hope I'll get enough cloudy days and LOTS of sleep.

Ehhh yeah....hmm I do remember now..but anyway....you could prepare for something else then

It´s a bit cold here too..but no snow and no christmas spirit yet....

Thank you Minque. Tomorrow we will be buying our Christmas turkey. And carrying it and all the fixings home in backpacks on our new bicycles. Hehehe .. makes shopping fun.

Second night in Arizona, I just watched Sweeney Todd, starring Johnny Depp. I'd give it a 4.3 out of 5. It definitely isn't for people who can't stand anything but a happy ending.

I won't be back with my own comp until the day after
X-mas. This means no italics, no bold, and no updates to Uprising until I get back.

Anyway, everyone have a happy holiday!

If that doesn't shout "Holiday spirit" into people's ears I don't know what does


It's a lazy, hazy, very cold [-7C outside] and partially trippy morning here in the Mediterraneans. Listening to Massive Attack, relaxing muscles and trying to get more coffee is the plan for today. I'm also anxious to find out how Zarr did on her A+ exam.

Wooo! 666th post on this thread! I feel so evil! \m/

Anyways, I still got an annoying stomach virus where food seems to be going through me a little too quickly for my liking. Feeling like this during the holiday season is not fun.

I really hope I get over this thing really quickly, I want my week off from work to be awesome! Not hampered by illness

For the last I've been with my ex/bff at his dorm all the way at the main campus of OSU (Stillwater). I had a good time. Unfortunately the money I saved up for getting him Christmas stuff ended up going into food and gas, but since he's getting money from his mother not all is lost. Probably the best part was playing Guitar Hero games twelve hours straight. We ended up playing GHII until around 4 in the morning. Yesterday (the day we played GH) I learned HDTVs and GH games really don't mix. It's almost impossible to play well on them. Even calibration doesn't solve the horrible lag on it. Yeah, we played on the HDTV out in the lounge room of his dorm floor for maybe two or three hours. Coupled with my wireless controller, it was a large portion of fail. Finally, we took it into his dorm and I proved to him I can actually play GH games. It was awesome. As soon as my time is up on this computer, I'm going to sleep. Even 7 hours of sleep... yeah, I won't be staying up that late for awhile. Well, at least until the day after Christmas.

Anyways, Thursday I breezed through the A+ Essentials exam and the A+ 220-602 (IT Technician) exam. I passed both, and shall be recieving my certificate in the mail a month to a month and a half from now.

I'm so glad to hear you nailed both exams, Zarr. Get mucho rest, you deserve it.


Work was so & so today, not too stressful. Cold though, since our heating isn't all that... people who owned the building before us never payed their heating bills to the city, which is why we use electric and gas space-heaters. Helps a bit.

Listening to remixes of NIN's "Year Zero" album. They seem funkier than the original thing.


Correction: those remixes are WAY funkier than the original thing. Think "Dirtchamber sessions: Volume One" on steroids and Red Bull.

Congratulations on the A+ Zarr. Maybe in 6 months or so, I can join the ranks of the certified. (As opposed to certifiable.) I am on the 4th day of my time off, and have done very little. Well, some shopping (Christmas and foodstuffs for same); a little writing; some football watching.

Be good to yourselves and have a fine Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

I did nothing today!

Thanks for the congrats Mil and treydog. My instructor wants me to try to get my Network+ before the school year is over. I'll try to do that. If not, I'll just buy the book and take the test over the summer.

Piece of cake. Mmm, cake....

We're having ham tomorrow. I hate most pig products (bacon is sorta okay though), but I'll still eat it.

Thinking of making Christmas cake tomorrow.

Ahhh congrats Zarr! Waaaay to go! Hope you´ll have a great Christmas!

I add my congratulations to Zarr and to Milanius too for having the job that you like. They sound like your kind of people there. Too bad that it is cold. We use space heaters in Florida and I know that they don't really heat things up that well, not the way central heating does.



I'm glad to hear that everyone had a nice Christmas. I can't wait to see what kind of gilfs I'm going to get two days after Christmas. I've been looking at some shell rings since my sister sent me a beautiful Pacific coast shell necklace. And I am considering sending for a deviantart tee-shirt.

'Sup y'all?

Been playing Mass Effect. Haven't even touched the Orange Box.

Haven't heard from my ex, hope he's okay and all.

Currently listening to Aenima (the album, not the song song) by Tool.

Hehe, I've been playing Mass Effect a LOT as well. Such an awesome game.
How's everyone else?

Mass Effect is awesome! My cousin's going to come tonight, hopefully he'll enjoy it as much as I do. He's the only one in the family who plays videogames at all, he even introduced me to RPGs in the first place (KOTOR, ironically).

It's really great to be home again, the hotel was pretty nice, but the dang cold was a damper on the experience...... *shrug* Next time I'll remind my parents not to go on vacation for Christmas Break. It was warmer here at home than in Ariz!

School is going to be crappy when we go back....... At least I applied for the school spelling bee, it's a first time that I've decided to do it. Not only that it's the last time in this school seeing as I'll be off to highschool next year.

I am giggly, despite the fact I spent nearly 11 hours at work. It wasn't as busy and nerv-straining at all times, in fact we unwinded a bit while we waited for our truck with supplies [bad weather, icy roads, long story], so we overused certain substances my co-workers can be bastards at times, but they can also be great guys. Depends on how swamped with paperwork we are.

Right now, it's Manu Chao time, at least 1 more hour.

Oh my god I am in LOVE with a new girl at work

It's such crap when you're very much attracted to someone and they're not even half as attracted to you....

Good way to end my day.

May I make a humble request to admins? I need a [censored] hug smilie. Cause, you know, when people who I care for feel like [censored], much of it rubs on me too.

Our pleasure;


~ Alexander

...
Today's work report:
Been a hellish day. Worked from 9AM to 6PM, constant running, chasing components, big & small. My knuckles hurt when I type and I believe I have some sort of flu, again. You wouldn't believe the ammount of hardware we shipped out today. Whatever. It all happens because people are idiots and they remember to buy presents [i.e. a computer] 2-3 days before New Year's eve. I [censored] hate people.

God only knows how will it be tomorrow. I just hope this madness tones down in the 2nd half of January. Every single muscle is aching. Throat is sore.

I have about three more days of simple enjoyment before I have to go back to Toronto and start working once again. Tonight, I go to my friend's concert gig at a bar (so that means drinking!). Tomorrow, is the big fight night, plus some guitar hero 3 beforehand plus I'm meeting a friend I haven't seen in years. Sunday, I think I'm going to a hockey game and then going home. And another positive thing is that it appears that my stomach issues are all but totally gone. Hopefully it doesn't rear it's ugly head for a long time.

Overall, it should be an enjoyable 3 days left of holidays for me. The only unfortunate thing is that I'm probably going to be working on New Year's Eve. Bah!

Do tell, Doomed One. You sound quite smitten. What is she like?



Perhaps yuo are having to work so overly hard due to it being the Christmas season, Milanius. Hopefully things will slow down a bit as the year progresses.

You're right on the money, Ibis. Damn the holidays!

10 hours. 2 shipments. ~120 tower cases, ~70 TFT dislpays, 100+ printers and god only knows how much of the other stuff [hdd's, mobos, the works]. Colleagues and me managed to take down a portion of it and register it into our storage [monitors, graphic cards] but cases are still waiting for Monday. Eeeeuch...

In Good News guess something totally unbelievably amazing that has happened to me.

That new hot girl at work. Yeah... she's single, and I'mma teach her how to snowboard. It's dope.

Doomed, this is probably unnecessary, but I'll say it anyway. Take things slow; good luck all the same. Hope this works out for you and this girl.

Well, Amazon totally pooched my Christmas gifts- one went to Massilon, Ohio and the other to Pittsburgh. So we went to the book/game store and I picked up Shivering Isles and The Orange Box.

It has been a wonderful week of time off- will be over too soon- but that just means I appreciate it more. Most of the food is finally gone- adding inches to my doggie waist....

Spent the day trying to calibrate monitor and printer for Mrs. Treydog so she can begin to produce consistent fine art prints.

UFC 79 was a pretty sweet night of fights I do have to say. Hung out with a few of my friends I haven't seen in awile and most of the matchups were entertaining. The big highlight fight, Chuck Liddell vs Wanderlei Silva, definitely lived up to the hype and I'm more than ecstatic that Canadian Georges St.Pierre manhandled his opponent Matt Hughes. The guy is a beast when his head in straight!

Now I'm back in my home base back in Toronto. Now I'm stuck living on my own again (damn!) . I also found out that I'm working 5 days this week at my "part-time" job. Looks like the new guy they hired quit all ready, though I think it was because of his parents not liking him staying up so late. That sucks because I usually need help on Fridays.

Hey y'all. Not much going on at my corner of ze world.

The only thing "going on" is that I finished Half-life 2 Episode One and started on Episode Two today.

I'm also waiting for my father to finish washing the dishes so I can make dinner. I'm going to make stuffed manicotti.

My day was alright I guess. Could've been better, of course.

Well in my corner of the world (and it is a corner too) I have the day off so I've slept in and thats about it. Yesterday and work I found a cool little beetle sitting on my shirt so I put it on the table, and then it flew about 15cm up into the air and landed on the same spot. It then did it again and I had worked out that it was trying to flip itself over from its back and had succeeded the second time. I turned it over and it did it again. Very interesting way of turning over, it would be like me jumping the height of a skyscraper to stand back up after I had tripped.

Leave it to the ol' exboyfriend to say intelligent, nice things like "everytime I see you, you get fatter and uglier."

Since I'm so fat and ugly.

Wow, I forsee him marrying and having a stable relationship with his wife.

NOT.

I don't care if he's Adonis, a guy that is that much of an boatmaster when it comes to personality is plain cat-juggling ugly.

WHAT.
IIRC, 100+ pounds [~45kg] is very light load. I lift things heavier than that. If anything, you should get more meat on your bones and stop listening to anorexia fanboys.

But that's maybe just my perverse Serbian "plump is beautiful" hidden genetic heritage wearing its ugly head. No matter how much I run from it, it's still there, burried in a dark, secluded, chocolate creampie-eating corner.


...
2 days and the snow isn't slowing down. It's falling and falling and... well, you get the idea. I hope we get a 15-minute break so I could clean my car, since I work on 4th.

Today will be the first day back at work after my long rest. Gahh- have to reset the body-clock from my preferred mode of staying up 'til 2:00 am. Also, it's darned cold out- below 0 C (around 20 F).

Zarr, recall I once said a good boyfriend/girlfriend is one who makes you laugh- and who makes you feel good about yourself? I begin to see why your ex- is "ex-". You need a better class of ex-boyfriends. Although you share a history, it is not worth your time to put up with his crap. Way back when I was just a little doggie, I had broken up with my first fiance. I would find myself dwelling on the relationship. So what I did was, every time it happened, I would say,

"O.K., you have exactly 1 minute to think about What's-her-Name. But- you have to think about the reality, not the fantasy. What did you enjoy? The fighting? The immaturity? The cheating?"

And then I would actually time it with my watch. Remarkably therapeutic.

that is therapeutic. And do you have any pics of this Adonis himself, Zarr? Let's see his face, he that critcizes others. I've seen your pic and you are certainly far from ugly.

THAT IS WHAT I AM TRYING TO TELL PEOPLE FOR 2 YEARS NOW, ARGHH.


In other news, I think I'm close to finishing a new claymore. It's pretty much a basic thing, wanted to keep it simple; runes, however, that'll take up time and polygons. Ouch.

I'm starting to get that writing itch once again. I know I gotta finish something up first, but yea, just a head's up for all of you: The Metal Mallet is close to his writing return!

Coincidentally, MM, I'm starting to work around the writer's block with Revan. I'll alternate between it and Uprising.

I have pictures but they're not on a digital camera. I don't have a scanner, either.

I tried to remind him that I look past the fact he's acne infested. I know, I know, that's a horrible thing to say, but it's the truth. If I saw through his flaws (and he had several, not just physical but personalitywise), why can't he see through mine?

Sigh... I just don't understand people. You'd think guys who were acne infested wouldn't be shallow at all. Hah.

Perhaps it's the same as people who are insecure and then go and bully others. I think he might just be overcompensating for something he feels he doesn't have himself.

Really Zarr, it's easy for me to say, but don't worry about him and what he thinks, or says he's thinking. I'm sure someone will come along who will appreciate you for you

Well, the culinary disaster I call "desert" is done it's a little thing we call "bombs"; in essence, they're small balls made from grinded dry cookies, milk, margarine and few bananas [my own modification], which are then rolled in melted chocolate and then, coconut flour. Simple? Not exactly - while the recipe is foolproof, meaning even a novice can do it, it's also tedious and very much time-consuming.

Mom has won the bet, since the thing was taking me too long to make and I run out of coconut at the very end [we used grinded walnuts instead] that she had to come and help me finish up last batch of bombs. There are about 50 of them; the entire material costs total to ~3.5 euros. If they taste good though, it'll be worth it.


Zarrexaij, dear: This hostility from your ex might also be sour grapes. Like Alex said nicely, he might be compensating for something he sees in you and wishes he had it in himself with berating, which isn't helping either of you. Old proverb says nicely: "Clean your own yard first, then criticize your neighbor's yard".

It has been a good day. Mrs. Treydog's present arrived- a Casio LK-44 electronic keyboard. It has a "teaching function" that lights up the appropriate keys as you are learning a song. Should be lots of fun.

Creativity is an odd thing. Because of various RL issues, I have effectively had writer's block for 4 or 5 months. And then a seemingly minor question about my character arrived. Minque asked me for the names of my main character's sisters. I had actually not given them names- but now I had to. And in the two days that followed, I have written 6 pages of new material. Of course, that will probably become 3 or 4 pages in Word... but I don't mind. So maybe the lesson for today is this:

If you're stuck, ask questions. Ask different questions, questions that seem to have little to do with the problem at hand. Because when you have to answer those questions, you have to think about things in a new and different way. Thanks, Minque.

To MM and Lord R- I look forward to seeing your new material- I have followed your stories with great pleasure.