I feel bad and beautiful

And the drama just keeps rolling in. Perhaps a week when I'm having some depression issues of my own wasn't the best time in the world to get involved in some rather emotional RP threads... yet I did anyway. And yes, I cried. Hormones are ebil things.

Let's start with ( Afterglow )

Then there's ( Lightning )

Seriously, I ate one of those jumbo Fudge Round things around ten pm last night and was on a sugar fueled rush until well after seven am.

I did a lot last night. Most of it was technical behind the scenes stuff getting ready for __lightning__ to launch on Monday, so I won't bore you with the details. I was running three characters in four different threads, working on backdated history posts for Daphne's past on Lightning (still so far behind there), made eleven Katie Bell icons for perkygothess, wrote the summary for quibbling, and put the Quibbler on-line.

And then - sometime between four and six am - I did these. I'll put them behind a cut cause I'm nice that way.

( Photoshop Experiment #27 - Lightning Strikes )

They're meant to work as Pimp banners for Lightning, but when one is very tired the animated one becomes hypnotic. Seriously.

Heard my husband's voice for the first time since June. It was only three minutes, but it was nice to hear him. Of course, he woke me out of my drop-dead-in-exhaustion moment so I wasn't very much with the coherent and there seemed to be a large angry duck on the phone line squawking every few seconds, but it was still nice.

Firstly - revena made me the kick arse icon I'm using at the moment. I adoressess it, yes, my precious.

( Miah complains about her sleep schedule for two paragraphs. She rambles. You can skip down. Really. )

And finally, because we are always looking for new players, I feel obligated to post the fugly banner I made for Afterglow.

bw_afterglow - A Post-Hogwarts Soap Opera

Am in KS. Was a very long drive and I listened to the audio book of Philosopher's Stone most of the way North.

Staying with Alex since Tuesday. Spent most of the week working on AG stuff and burning CDs (52 of them on Wednesday *headdesk*).

( Brief Afterglow update )

Saw Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I loved it. And the Willy Wonka Song is stuck in my head. I wasn't going to buy the soundtrack because I really didn't need to spend $20 on brain cell killing songs sung by Danny Elfman as the Oompa Lumpas... but now I want it. I almost think I neeeeddd it.

"Everything here is eatable. I'm eatable, but that, my children, is called cannibalism and it is frowned upon in most societies."

Went to the midnight book party to pick up my copy(copies) of HBP. Yes, I dressed up. Hush. Yes I was one of only a handful of adults in costume (J and rewil being the other two. And J was working. But that's okay. I had my picture taken and you know how I'm such an attention whore (that's sarcasm, I know it doesn't translate well in the written word). beeform and sigma7 were there as our pet Muggles.

Since we were in line with the books for nearly an hour waiting to be allowed to purchase them, rewil decided to start at the back of the book and point out things of interest. So, having only ready the first chapter myself, I already know who died, who did it, who the HBP is, have confirmed several spoilers and threatened to beat at least two people about the head with the heavy book.

I've already posted a disclaimer on Afterglow's info page reminding readers that we are based on canon through book 5.

DH called this morning (his evening) to say he was at his new FOB and that he was alright.

And that he loved me.

He remembered.

Had no plans with friends and family for the day. I hate being stuck down in this pit. I was going to drive up to KS for the holiday but with everything that happened last week it just didn't seem like a good idea. And everyone in KS had family to spend the day with.

Instead I stayed home, which was good because a neighbor came by to let me know he reported my fence to the city. The one that has been down since before I moved in. Since he seemed so very, very interested in my yard I asked if he knew anyone who could mow my lawn. He's going to ask his grandson.

Since I was home and had no plans at all, I spent the day doing maintenance things on-line. Added all the past issues of the Quibbler to quibbling's memories, with labels to let us know at a glance who/what has been summarized and who has been interviewed for each issue. That way I won't have to go back through the archives to figure out who to harass politely ask if they'd like to be bothered by Rita Skeeter. Fixed some random HTML tag issues too.

I'd forgotten how funny those past issues were.

Was inspired to work on a large and probably incredibly complicated Photoshop Elements project. I sort of know what I want to do, I just don't know how to do it or even if I do get it done where I would put it. rillathegrape gave me a link to an icon tutorial that has some cool ideas. I maybe able to do something with those. Most of my PSE projects are of the 100x100 pixel less than 40k variety and this new thing... I can see it turning out huge if I'm not careful and heck if I have a clue how large the file will end up.

Also it will take mad PSE skillz that I'm fairly positive I don't currently have.

Yeah, looking back... it's been awhile since I actually posted anything more than a few sentences.

I'm too tired to try to be coherent about everything so I'll just mention things as they occur to me. This could be a long post (or a really short one if that caffeine doesn't start kicking in).

But first, I want to send you SW fans on my flist over to iharthdarth if you haven't already found it. I haven't even seen the third movie and those little cartoons almost made me tinkle. I swear. I've seen icons of these things (hello, wendynat) and I covet.

My icon *points at iconage* was made by the very talented rillathegrape. She also made the Gildy/Millie one I stole totally took with permission and have credited. And the lovely AG color bars that are gracing my info page. *coughGregandCakeOTPcough*

Also - there will be an bw_afterglow summary coming soon. I haven't done dick with the AG summary in nearly a month (bad Miah, no biscuit) and it's going to take some time to get everything together. Sneak Preview - Snape is back, Myrtle is human, Gildy is fugly, Fleur is out of Hogwarts, Albus is in, Harry's in love, Hermione and Charlie are shagging like bunnies, Dudley Dursley showed up for a surprise visit, Paraboiled Moldy Voldy Anniversary, Theo and Lee, Roger and Ali, Greg and cake.

Always the Greg and cake.

I suddenly have a craving for frosting? Where was I?

So, yes, stuff. I haven't had a chance to mention ( what a great group of friends I have. )

This post is getting really long already so I'll save Midget's wedding and moving for tomorrow.

I just wanted to say thank you to all my friends, RL and those on-line and even the ones I only speak to in awkward games of LJ comment tag. I couldn't have made it through all that crap without you guys and I thank you all for that.

( Let's see what's happened this last week. )

For the second time, Myrtle stumbled across a wet and naked Gregory.

Gilderoy discovers Millicent's new mirror when he spends the weekend at her flat, and barely remembers to let her know he'll be leaving town for a few weeks.

True to her word, Fleur arranged for an escort to take make sure that Myrtle returned safely from her visit to Avalon.

---

I want to make special mention of a particular thread. It was an emotional one for me to write (yes, I'm a ginormous baby, deal with it) and it wouldn't have turned out nearly as wonderful without ellensmithee's Dung and andrian1's Delacour sisters, Fleur and Gabrielle. I especially want to thank andrian1 because all of the beautiful imagery and our use of the mythos of Avalon came from her.

Myrtle's visit to the isle of Avalon on her quest to become human again.

I have a plan. Which, I'm sure, will have to be modified several times before it comes to fruition. But the point is - I have a plan. And that makes me less cranky.

( The Plan )

This is the plan. Of course, as every gamer knows, the first step towards horrific failure is always to make a plan.

And since I haven't done it since the 16th of April (so it's going to be a long one) - Afterglow Highlights.

More specifically , the bits that pertain to my characters and the great things that really jumped out at me, and if I miss something... well, it's been a rough week and I've got pudding for a brain at the moment. Mmmm... chocolate pudding.
( Read more... )

As always, you can leave comments or questions for Rita Skeeter on each new edition of quibbling.

And if you're interested in what Severus Snape has been doing since he left Hogwarts, you can find read his personal journal at dark_occlumens.

The latest edition of the Quibbler is out on quibbling.

Check out the new Ask Rita Section.

And on a personal note, the Madam Puddifoot's ad was made by yours truly. My first non-icon Photoshop project. Very simplistic, but not a bad first effort.

First, the non-Afterglow thing. I have a mouse. Or, more specifically, I have at least one mouse. Which explains Roswell's sudden interest these last few weeks with the kitchen cabinets. Am I the only person who sees her cat scrabbling at the upper cabinet doors and just opens them up and lifts her into it? It's not like there is more than cup of soup in there and if she can catch the little bastards, more power to her.

And on to my bw_afterglow news. We have a Ron again and guess who plays our new wizrdchessmastr? Jane't. w00t! She officially joined today.

Because I promised rewil:

( More Afterglow Links )

My current campaign to have a happier life by simply ignoring everyone and thing that annoys me is now on day five. It's not working as well as I had hoped. I keep having to take breaks to be irritated about things like my missing internet order that was supposed to be here on the 8th, and then was supposed to be here on the 14th, and then will definitely be here on Monday. My Arse.

And finally... Since introducing my Afterglow pimping icon I have had some requests to make a couple for a few of the other Afterglow players. Which makes me giggle happily and then scamper off to make iconsess. So, any of the Ladies of Afterglow who are interested... I would be more than willing to hook you up with your very own personalized Afterglow pimpicon.