Sleepless in Scotland

This is likely to be the last entry posted directly into LJ. Not leaving LJ, mind you, but I'll be posting from WordPress from tomorrow on, because that lets me crosspost nicely across LJ/JF/GJ/IJ from any computer, which is nice. Plus, once I get everything loaded into my on-site blog, I'll have a good backup of my LJ, which is always a good thing.

I am, however, going to be doing some cutting in my friendslist. Nothing personal aainst anyone, but I've had less and less time to properly read my friendslist in the last ... mor than a year, and haven't managed to venture outside of my smallish default view for at least a year, and yeah. Cutting it is, then. :/

Also, if anyone has journals at either JF/GJ/IJ/whatever and wants me to friend them there, let me know. :)

Quick heads-up: I'm off to Dublin tomorrow until Sunday evening, and I need to pack and clean toonight, so I'll likely not really be on from when I leave work until Monday morning. Nobody panic if I disappear, in other words. :p

Still not planning on moving, btw, but knowing that there is a way to move my lj, all six and a half years of it, including (threaded) comments, to a wordpress blog, has me intrigued. There may be a bunch of crossposting in my future.From LJ to wordpress rather than vice versa, I suspect, because: icons! Oooh, unless they have a plugin for that too? *googles* They do! :D

Looks like the kerfuffle ought to be winding down soon, hopefully. I know people are still gonna be pissed at LJ/6A for a while at least, but it looks like I won't have to leave LJ to keep up with fandom, which, thank god. I have my entire adult life documented in this journal, folks, not to mention my permanent account, and I dun like changes. I tried leaving LJ for nine months, once, and I'm not doing that again. Although anatsuno brought up a good point about the centralisation, and I'm going to be thinking about decentralising a bit, probably. Whatever that'll mean for me, of course. And that's the most substantial thing I'm going to say about the situation, because other people are better at that sort of thing, and I tend to hide from kerfuffles a lot, especially when stressed. *goes back into cave to go draw cave art pr0n*

In completely unrelated news: food post! And speaking of food, best bento ever, holy crap!

Also, I need some help with Outlook Express. (Don't look at me like that, they make us use it at work, boo.) I have several shared mailboxes I need to keep an eye on. Unfortunately, the automatic send/receive thing keeps hanging on the shared boxes, and then not telling me about it, so I have to keep remembering to go cancel it and check manually, which means I often don't get e-mails to my own inbox until an hour after they were sent. Is there any way to disable automatic send/receive for the shared boxes?

I've been talking to Anna about how I feel like I should make a damned effort to make this LJ about a little more than random work angst, squee, and porn, because dammit, I used to talk about personal stuff and "deep" fandom thoughts at least, and I just don't do that anymore, in part because I do most of my LJing and stuff frmo work, and I can barely manage to finish a thought that's actually work-related these days, let alone anything else, without getting interrupted or otherwise distracted, and when I'm home I usually don't remember what I wanted to write, and get distracted just from wandering around my flat, and it's partially because most of the personal stuff I talk to Anna or Sarah or Mags about, but still, I'm going to make a concious effort to write something of some substance at least once a week, and to make entry-ing part of my routine.

Speaking about my routine, ( cut to spare your friendslist )

And speaking of more personal things, I'm thinking of giving up not going to church for Lent. We'll see how this goes. I'm kinda terrified, which is fairly ridiculous as the church (or "church", depending on your definition of church) I'd be going to is a Quaker Meeting, and if there's a less threatening church-type organisation out there in the Christian spectrum, I've yet to find it. But still.

Somewhat related to this, I recently had cause to inform my dad that he was not allowed to leave an inheritance. Not that I think my brothers and I would turn into the sort of people I keep reading about on EtiquetteHell, with the rental vans to empty the house an hour after someone dies and shit like that, but since the death of my grandfather a few years ago, my dad and his siblings have inherited what I almost hope is one of the most complicated cases of inheritance crap ever. Not that involves a lot, mind you, just a house (which has now, just to add further complications, been bought by the governement beause they're building something there -- I'm sure there's a proper English word for this, but even the Dutch term escapes me), but the whole case now involves 50-odd people, spans five generations (including mine, although on the other side of the family), and two notaries (original one retired, left the case to his son-in-law, who is now desperately trying to get the case done with and closed because he's retiring), and I swear to god, if my dad dies before this thing is settled and leaves my brothers and I to deal with this, I will have his corpse enbalmed and refuse to bury him until it's settled. Remember folks: if you love your kids, spend your monney before you die!

And finally: ( Daily Magnetic Prose )

I feel like I need to note that this is just the result of me grabbing both "fight" and "drama" at random, not any reflection of my life at the moment. :D

For the purpose of trying out my new flickr account, have some random pictures of my desk at work!

I got my first box of organic fruit and veg yesterday, and I'm thrilled with it. Wee apples! Interesting new stuff! there are edible flowers in there, people! And something I'm fairly sure is fresh spinach, and also long black and green beans, which if anyone could tell me (from the picture I just linked, which admittedly is rather bad quality) what those are so I can google some recipes, I would be very grateful.

(Also, is there a way to blog more than one picture at a time? And/or blog pictures including the notes?)

Oh and I'll be posting this to my knitting journal as well, but I thought you all might enjoy what I made for padredon as well: Snake on a Cane! (troubleinchina, if you (or padredon) can send me a decent quality pic of it, I'll make you that icon!)

Also, hi! I'm back! And not catching up on the LJ I missed this past week, so let me know what I missed if it's important, or even if it's not.

[ETA] Okay, this (gacked from sonatine is disturbing. (Worksafe, not so much sanity-safe.) [/ETA]

So the other day, I was watching TV, minding my own business, and suddenly, in one commercial block, there's not only the Snakes on a Plane trailer, but also a new commercial for Pipex broadband with ... David Hasselhoff, King of the Internet. No, really. Go watch it, it's brilliant. :D

I just went on a commenting spree, and I think I got everything, though I skimmed a lot, especially from more than a day ago. If I missed something you think I should see, let me know.

Happy birthday to ktnb!

I'm feeling a bit weird today, will probably be spending tonight napping and/or cleanin or ... something. Or maybe I'll just go on a reading binge; I suddenly found myself wanting to re-read old Metallica slash this morning, and metslash is blocked from here, so the craving has only grown. (And yes, this is an invitation for random recs. :D All fandoms welcome, pretty much, though I'm not known for my love of anime, so.)

Speaking of Metallica slash^*, go read and contribute to the stories of Crazy People In Fandom!

^* Watch my entire friendslist except a handful of people go "Huh?" at that segue, ahahaha!

Also, ( that comment meme. )

Dear weather: Yesterday, when I had nothing productive to do, you were overcast and kinda bleh, but today, on a freakin' match day, you suddenly get your sunshine on? Damn youuuuuuu! Sulkingly yours, Melle.

So, yeah. Kickoff for the England game at 14:00 BST, I'll be seting up a chatroom on AIM around 13:30, so drop a comment here with your screenname and I'll invite you. Unless people do prefer IRC?

[ETA] Chatroom created. Someone come join me before I have to start blithering to myself. [/ETA]

Is anyone else getting old comment e-mails? Like, from a month ago? o_O

So near my work, there's a bunch of used car dealerships, and at one of them, this car is currently prominently displayed, and um. ikindamaybewantit. I have no idea how the fuck that happened, I mean, I don't like cars, I'm a motorcycle girl at heart, and the only cars I've ever even vaguely considered getting if I had the money for it were a VW Beetle, or a Deux Cheveaux, or a Mini, and even that was more idle consideration than actually coveting, and also, I don't even have a driver's license, so WTF self?

(To further my shame, it's an SUV as well. Gah!)

Aaaand a hearty "Fuck you!" is in order, I believe?

Scene From The Break Room:

Assorted People: *stand around in line for coffee machine*
Candy Vending Machine: *jingle*
Melle: ... Did that machine just randomly drop money?
Co-Worker: *checks change tray, holds up 10p coin* Yep.
Melle: O...kay, then. o_O

[ETA] It just did it again! :D Only 5p this time but hey, money's money. [/ETA]

And then I had a call from a bloke who was looking for a summer job ... for his kids. The hell? Unanimous reaction from self and co-workers: "Why are his kids not looking for jobs their own damn selves?" I mean, seriously.

I nipped into the new second hand shop down the street after work yesterday to see if maybe they had a pair of jeans that fit me, because having only one pair of decent-ish jeans is starting to annoy me. Didn't find a single pair of normal, non-low-slung jeans that fit me, but I did find a lovely pair of work trousers--blue shimmery velvet, perfect fit, and best of all, they have pockets, and only cost £3.50! \o/ Also, a cheapy pair of shorts for work in case it turns out to be a hot summer. I'm not to happy with those because they're knee-length and have this weird split thing at the end of the legs, but they were only £1.50 and they'll do in a pinch if it's a choice between these and overheating.

Overheard At Work:

One: What're you doing with your money?
Two: I ... I ate it?

I just ... don't want to know, do I?

I have a post brewing about blood ties versus chosen family and stuff, but that might take a while. LIke, a couple of days, probably. In the meantime, though, it's brought on another question , and therefore an excuse for a ( poll. )

(Sorry for the deleted entry/repost, folks, I'd forgotten to add the second question.)

In other news, I just went to the loo, and the stall smelled of cotton candy. o_O I am officially afraid of my co-workers.