Bandolero by Day

UNHOLY COW! I GOT TO SEE SHARON NEEDLES PERFORM AT THE STONEWALL HERE IN BETHLEHEM! I went with mindsplinters and Jeni. We arrived a little early, had some drinks. Jeni and I danced so badly that we actually ruined Angie's ability to dance, but I still think our robot moves were the coolest. I'd never been to the Stonewall before, and it wasn't anything special but the other patrons I chatted with were nice I guess. I tried to have a Conversation with Cute Girl Near Bathroom, but then I had to, you know, use the bathroom, and when I came out she was gone! And when I found her again she was dancing with friends and I just stood very far away and spied and said DERP DERP DERP. I AM SO BAD AT THIS.

( Cut for possible TMI about Z's personal life. )

Anyway, that was me fretting. Back to Sharon Needles. THIS IS HOW SHE MADE HER ENTRANCE. I threw up the horns. I was also wearing a light-up skull Halloween necklace in her honor (which I already owned, because LIGHT-UP SKULLS YOU GUYS). She performed to Marylin Manson and the Rocky Horror Picture Show. She spat. She sang. She viciously tore up a bible and threw the pages into the crowd AND I CAUGHT THREE PAGES and I gave one to Angie and one to Pixie and mine I shall have framed or something. My favorite part may have actually been when she was talking sincerely about how hard it was to tour and be away from her boyfriend, and the respect and wonderful things she had to say about Chad Michaels. And especially when she said she forgave Phi Phi O'Hara, because Phi Phi acted from a place of anger, and how can you blame LGBT people for being angry? Class act. I was really happy I got to see her. And thanks to Angie for getting these pictures.



WOR_xK

Still working five days a week, yessss. It is so good. Corporate has changed they day we get our weekly inventory of drugs (aka truck) from Tuesday at 3 am to Thursday at ???, so truck is officially my job because trying to get it processed and stocked at whenthefuckever'o'clock in a busy pharmacy is not easy and I am officially BEST AT TRUCK. Not the most stunning achievement, but it's always good when the boss can say "we depend on this employee for [insert job here]".

Still studying for tech certification. It's slow going because the history of drug regulation and new drug development is kind of interesting and I keep stopping to read supplemental materials.

Walking with Hobbits

Since my last mileage update nearly six months ago I've only walked an additional 42.8 miles for a total of 314.4 miles. :/ I stopped walking regularly when I was sick and didn't get back into the habit when I was feeling better, in part due to a million consecutive heat waves. But anyway, it puts me on day 32, which puts me between the Weather Hills and the Trollshaws STILL.

Also, in this special edition of EXERCISING WITH HOBBITS, I've added crunches to my exercise routine. Previously I was just doing stretches, because yay stretching, and push-ups to keep my ribs semi-mobile (since the costochondritis causes the cartilage around them to become very stiff), but then one day I noticed that HOLY SHIT! MY ARMS HAVE SWEET MUSCLES NOW! I mean, for the past couple of years I've only been able to do like 10 half push-ups at a time, but I guess I just reeeeally had to work my way up from the bottom. And this encouraging development has inspired me to sloooowly start expanding my exercise routine, such as it is.

As an adorable red-haired British woman once said, "Someone call a vet because THESE PYTHONS ARE SICK!" (and here I would flex my biceps for you)

Gastronomic Goodness

I realized that these past couple of weeks I've been really overdoing it with the junk food. My main problem is that I'm not motivated to sit down and eat lunch or dinner (unless Angie feeds me ♥ ) and wind up grazing on shitty food throughout the day, so I figured instead of trying to force myself to sit down and eat a decent meal, I'd take baby steps and start snacking on better food: fruits, veggies, yogurt, cheese, HUMMUS, non-processed stuff in general. So far so good, because it's all stuff I like to eat anyway; I just need to make sure to keep the good stuff on hand and keep from bringing home Cheetos and fast food and such. Basically it boils down to "Z! PAY ATTENTION!"

So to help me pay closer attention and get me excited about food again I've resolved to try a new kind of fruit every time I go to the store. This time it was pepino dulce. I just scooped out the seeds and ate it raw, and it really does taste like a cross between cucumber and honeydew. It was very mild, and pouring lime juice on it heightened the flavor, but it doesn't really hold my interest. I'd eat it again, but I can't see going out of the way to acquire some unless I wanted to make an interesting salad.

I'm also on the lookout for some kabocha squash, because as soon as it hits the stores I want to try an intriguing soup recipe from the cookbook kol sent me.

Make Words Do

All my recent writing has been in the form of tags (I'm just feeling very tag-focused lately!) so, um, here are those tags I'm working on!

Science Fiction/Daemon Creatures (Kingdom)
The Case of the Missing Leaf (Perfect World - Tetsuya)
A Few Bricks Short of a Wall (Perfect World - Binshou)
Age-Appropriate Attractions (Perfect World - Tetsuya)
I Love the Nightlife...? (Perfect World - Binshou)
Welcome to the Jungle! (Perfect World - Tetsuya)
Elysia: Explorers of Darkness! (Silvermoon)
Burning Water (Kingdom)
That's No Moon... (Silvermoon)
Boot Camp, Part Deux (Kingdom)

Second Best Thing on the Internet

That would be a Pez uzi.

PEZ UZI!!!



So obviously I started reading Problem Sleuth recently. And finished reading it. It was fairly adorable!

to see me shot down in Eastern Pennsylvania?

This week can best be summed up by the promise I made to myself about halfway through it: I will not ingest Xanax and alcohol in the same 24 hour period.

We've lost one employee so far at work (to grad school, so good for her!) and are set to lose two more, so I'm finally working five days a week. This is awesome. Less awesome is the two no-show techs this week on top of increased customer volume with decreased employee coverage, capping the week off with a new pharmacist who's only been with the company a month, so it's like this



except with prescriptions. The combo of stress and the physical demands of the job and the skipped lunches have made my everything hurt. But I guess overdoing it with the push-ups didn't help. I CAN'T HELP IT, MY GUNS YEARN FOR EXERCISE.

Plus my car's battery died (Letitia Nyota Delenn Bogovinina'na III, noooooo!). I've been attempting to prepare for this eventuality after finding out that my car's battery is a special snowflake that costs $180 to replace, but so far have only managed to save... $4. At least more work hours will help with this.

I've been keeping myself sane with episodes of The Twilight Zone, and Scrubs, and Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain. And sleep. And the aforementioned booze and Xanax (but on alternating days).

This weekend I'm hoping to order a new battery and to clear out all this creative constipation I feel. And I get to see Brave with mindsplinters and tatterpixie since it's finally showing at the cheap theater!

First off: this past week sucked. OH MAN it sucked. Tuesday morning my mother woke me up with a pretty disturbing phone call, and the family drama that followed just toppled the precarious Jenga tower that is my life.

This week I will be occupying myself with making appointments with 1) a doctor, 2) a counselor (the brain kind), and 3) a counselor (the credit kind).

It did get to the point where I was finally able to cry, which I'm actually counting as a good thing. I used to cry at the drop of a hat, but the past several years I've just dried up somehow. Add to that the fact that I've got my anger issues under control a few years back and you get a Z who doesn't have tears OR property destruction as a stress outlet! Buuuuut, I do... push-ups? Well, and I cried this week. And I really do think that was a good thing.

So in light of all this I'm just skipping directly to the second best thing on the internet: George Takei, celebrating the fundraising success of his groundbreaking Broadway project with a happy dance.

WARNING: he winks at the camera, so brace yourself or it may stun you.

ALL HAIL alificent ON THIS, HER NATAL DAY! The only person I know with a birth date suckier than my own!

As per her request, this post shall be a Pirates of Penzance extravaganza!

Disclaimer: I've never seen the movie, nor the play. I had to look it up, and my first reaction was "OH IT'S BY THOSE H.M.S. PINAFORE GUYS". It was my intent to watch it with mindsplinters, who had also never seen it, but I waited until the last minute because I thought for some reason that it was streaming on Netflix. SPOILER: it's not. Nor is it on Hulu, or YouTube. In desperation I even looked on the Pirate Bay (LOLS), but there were not enough seeders for a timely download.

So instead I just pillaged the internet, and here is my booty...

Here is the Pirate King sequence from the Opera Australia production, which the internet tells me is very good. (The Pirate King DOES look like Jack Sparrow here! Or is it the other way around?)

Here is a picture of a production by The Hypocrites in Chicago, which looks charming as hell!

Here is one more such picture! (BANJO!)



Here is a very well-drawn animation of the Major General song that will cloud your mind and haunt your nightmares.

Here are one and two cute posts from a "musical character confessions" blog.

Here is a poster for one of about ten thousand concurrent school productions of the play that I particularly like. The sketchy quality of the drawing just works for pirate dude there, I feel.



^ Here is one and another and a third and a fourth hipster graphic from a tumblr aptly titled "hipster theater pictures". I like them; they're simple and pretty. GOOD JOB, HIPSTERS.

Here is an amusing animated gif (yes of course we are, Kevin Kline).

Here is another.



Here is an old movie that looks interesting, and which I fully intend to download sometime.

Here is a picture of Linda Ronstadt and Rex Smith from a goddamn issue of goddamn Teen Beat. What the hell was wrong with you, the 80s? Or right, as the case may be.

And finally, here is my favorite Pirates reference from anything, anytime, anywhere. ♥



I very rarely get to say this, but there is a very amusing comment on the YouTube page for the video. KITTY TREAD.

I actually found a lot more cool stuff, but maybe I'll save that for when I actually see the movie!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ALI! I love your face.

Merry Z's State Tax Refund Hits Her Account Day! This is the very first year I haven't gotten anything in from the state of Arizona. Bit of a milestone.

It got me thinking about the odd fact that I always knew I'd move away from Arizona eventually, that it was as inevitable as the passage of years, and yet never actually thought that I would move away from Arizona.

It took a few moments for me to realize that this thinking is a remnant of growing up in a violent and chaotic household. Specifically, as a child I always knew that I would grow older, might even grow old, but never really entertained any thoughts about living to adulthood.

But I just got my PA state tax refund, and I'm pushing thirty, and every fine line and trace of future wrinkles on my face is like a victory lap.

So a very merry today to you and you and you!