I’M ALIVE, I SWEAR

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

Okay, I lied, I’m a zombie.  Sorry.  Had appointment at six thirty am that ran MUCH MUCH later than it should and am home only briefly before running out again.

It looks like I won’t be doing much on the blog today, so, carry on!

204 thoughts on “I’M ALIVE, I SWEAR”

            1. Well, I was kinda distracted by pins and needles attack from not having moved my legs since I sit with them crossed in my chair, for about an hour and a half.

              I actually have the save button macro-ed to one of the shortcut buttons on the Cintiq. It gets a looooot of use.

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              1. I don’t art worth a damn, but I have serious tech drool for the Cintiq. I want one so badly, even if only so I can stroke it while crooning, “My precious… my precious…” :)

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                1. I wouldn’t have one if it wasn’t for my hubby. He secretly ordered it while he was deployed to Afghanistan… but the bonus DVDs and the artist’s glove arrived first. I thought that was the surprise and thanked him for it when he called up, and luckily he realized I wasn’t talking about the BIG surprise… which arrived the next day. My yells of delight were louder only when Rhys came back home (surprising me when he did, too! “Hey, love, could you check the front door for me? I just got a notification a package arrived…” Me on phone: “Okay, sorry, was just doing siege in Lineage 2… I didn’t hear the postman though…” *open door, see husband standing there, grinning, cellphone to ear*)

                  I adore that wonderful, wonderful man!

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                  1. y’all know there are perfectly servicable Cintiq clones now, bot less than half the price, right?

                    Only reason I am buying a Cintiq is i am getting the Companion 2 so i have both the Cintiq and the mobile tablet.

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                    1. Got any you’re willing to name so I can look them up/research, please? I’d read that the Surface Pro was an alright alternative but … =/ really when it came down to it, I’d be paying about as much for the higher end / capacity models.

                      Also, how many of the alternatives are willing to play nice with non Windows/Mac computers? Pressure sensitivity? etc. I was reading some of the reviews on the Huion tablet screens in Imagine FX, but it seems that you really get what you pay for – the better ones are more expensive and the cheaper models aren’t that great.

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                    3. We were discussing it some time back as a potential tool for Rhys to play with Zbrush. Hell, I’d love to play with Zbrush myself, but Rhys says for now he’s playing enough with the program he is using. He’s admittedly curious about how I’d play with Zbrush.

                      Oh, and Aff tells me that Krita is able to use Photoshop plugins and such natively now.

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    1. Same as we always do…”How much trouble can we get into without getting caught?” Extra points for combustion, originality, and style :-D

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      2. Something like this? Enlighten me, I’m just a poor beginner here… (apart from one nearly burned down the forest next to our house experiment with how to make a fire when I was about six years old. Mother caught me in time, and was not amused. I had a deprived childhood.)

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        1. Okay, I have nearly burned down two saunas too, one as a teen and one in early 20’s. When the pitch starts to drip from the walls (new buildings, newish wood) it’s too hot, even for Finns.

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          1. I’ve been building up quite a pile of wood particles*, ranging from shavings the size of toasted coconut, down to salt-grain size…

            I have a new toy, a lathe.

            Oh! With new toy, I was making a couple of bowls from some logs we just cut from a dead tree. Well, when you are using “fresh” (it’s not as green as a live tree, but it’s got more moisture than properly dried lumber), you need to dry it somewhat. Most guys throw the work into a box full of shavings, and let it sit for 6-12 months, but you can take a shortcut using a microwave. Well, I didn’t realize how quickly it would dry out, and looked up when I smelled something, and saw the microwave full of smoke. I charred places in the bottom of both bowls and ruined them. I have a cool new pair of candlesticks that I made from another branch, though.

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            2. I have new toy, too: a 48″ metal bending brake. It took me a week of evenings to create it from steel angle, hinges, screws, bolts, and wood, but it is doing wonders. I’ve bent all sorts of aluminum pieces for my Airstream rebuild, including the pieces I needed to fabricate new wheel wells. It’s amazing what you can learn how to do these days with a bit of Googling and a trip to a hardware store (and an online order of aluminum).

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                1. It’s primitive, but it (mostly) works. It uses bolts and/or C-clamps to secure the work piece, so it can take some time to secure/release each piece. If bending 48″ long 2024-T3 at .032″ thickness, it is a little balky, but 30″ long 3003 at .040″ and 24″ long 2024-T3 at .050″ were no problem at all.

                  It’s based upon the plans at http://www.ch601.org/tools/bendbrake/brakeplans.pdf

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      3. Maybe someone can explain to Sib why I’m not really corrupting Red 2.1 by getting her the “Backyard Ballistics for Toddlers” picture book. I keep explaining that she’ll be properly supervised by Dad Red and I, and Sib has a large backyard, so there shouldn’t be any problems with making a snowball cannon.

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          1. Definite possibility. As long as we keep Red 2.1 out of the launching sling. *has vision of toddler in bright red snowsuit doing cannonball into neighbor’s snow-covered compost heap*

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            1. Speaking of aiming high (and the real possibility of terminating the flight in a compost heap).

              I need to thank Sarah for her short story cheat sheet over on MGC. It has inspired me to take a shot at a short that I had just a two sentence idea scribbled down for – and trying for a slot in There Will Be War.

              With luck, I’ll at least get the flames beaten out before I hit…

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    3. I just swapped Orvan Taurus (don’t worry, he’ll come back; he always does) to some itinerant peddler for these magic beans! Anybody want to plant them and see what comes of it?

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            1. Remember, the price of repairs comes out of your hoard, not mine. [Very Big Dragon Grin]

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                1. Well, Dragons have hoards filled with precious items but we have hordes of dangerous minions to assist in defending our hoards. [Evil Dragon Grin]

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                  1. yeah, that’s why I hired a short hairy fellow who claims he can burgle a few things here and there.
                    I’M not going to try
                    can’t prove a thing
                    I wasn’t here
                    I didn’t do it
                    check’s in the mail

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                    1. That little guy? Oh, he paid us a visit but fell in love with one of the cooks so he stayed.

                      Especially since the wages include plenty of good food and the best pipe-weed around.

                      He may not be that great of fighter compared to some here, but he’s very helpful in other ways. [Smile]

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                    3. Better check your library especially those precious special editions. As I said, he’s very helpful in other ways. [Very Very Big Dragon Grin]

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                    4. well, many of my specials were sold for food before he showed up, and the others are still there with the understanding if they get moved, the mover will be a permanent fixture of the scenery with no one the wiser (~_^)
                      Best thing is, it leaves no mess.

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                1. Considering 1 thru 4 are pretty much all open sided at this point (and topless), you might want to firm them up a skosh.

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          2. Yeah, well, if someone hadn’t gotten the clever idea of using real rockets and bombs during the finalie of the national anthem …

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            1. Well, someone forgot to pack the multicolored 30mm tracers for the Warthog, so we had to make do with what we had.

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                    1. I was advised that the false half was true and the true half was false, while the other half was neither true nor false but unverifiable. Was that true?

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      1. The sun gets up earlier in equatorial regions this time of year, to take advantage of the longer days there. Farther North it sleeps in, in part because the nights are so cold.

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    3. Around here right now the official rise time is shortly before that. I have been managing to be out for my doctor advised walk by then. This summer it has been too hot and the dew points to high to risk starting the walk much later than sun rise. With the passage of the second cold front, they are predicting that this changes, tomorrow’s low temperature is supposed to be some 20 degrees cooler – yeah!

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    4. This time of year, The Daystar is still up by then here in Arizona, since we don’t mess with Father Time. We constantly remain on Mountain Standard Time.

      As sure as I know anything, I know this. They’ll continue to do this again. Maybe on another continent, certainly on this windswept continent. Every year, this year, ten years from now, most of North America twice a year swings back to the belief that they can make Time… better. We in Arizona do not hold to that. So no more running from clock to clock. We aim to misbehave.

      ;-)

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      1. As a farmer, I’d prefer we just keep the same time year round. The critters wake and sleep with the sunrise and sunset anyway.
        And at this point, we have pretty much given up watching regular TV, nothing much is worth wasting that time.

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    5. You’re burnin’ daylight by 6:30. I hate the fact that so many places don’t open until the middle of the day*, nothing like wasting a day for an half hour appointment.

      *Says the guy who grocery shops at Winco because not only are they the best prices, but they are a 24 hour store, so I can grocery shop at 3 or 4 AM when there aren’t a bunch of idiots in the store.

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          1. Well, to be honest, they have nothing on the “WalMart at 2am” folks.
            I too used to do a lot of my shopping at the really late/very very early hours.
            02:30 does not mean you have no annoying children to deal with when at WalMart.
            I used to use a 24hr HEB, but they built a new building and changed to their normal corporate hours of closing at 1am.
            Hmm. I wonder if there is a 23hr store where my job is moving too?
            I think Marinette has a WalMart, but I don’t know if it has groceries.
            I went and looked and Squirrel!, but yes, the WalMart there is a 24hr Super Center.

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                1. Between the propane buffer and the ear protection, you don’t have to listen, just watch, so I’d think it’s nearly all the entertainment without the hassle.

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      2. I used to have access to a Wally World near a military base with a 0530 shift change. By 0500 they had half a dozen live clerks, everything was restocked, but the hordes had not arrived yet. About as good as it got, except for the having to part with money bit.

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        1. Had the last really decent fight of my life in a Los Angeles Super Market at about 4 A..M. Bunch of A-holes tried do a smash and dash in the liquor aisle and when the stock crew got stuck in I just had to do my bit. Rolling around on the floor with one of them in a choke hold when his amigo starts beating me about the head and shoulders with one of those three-liter plastic vodka bottles, which splits and soaks me in cheap hooch. So I roll over and lunge from my knees and get his baggy ass pants by the waistband. Told the cops it was a DNA sample for them later.

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      3. The only 24 hour store near us is Walmart – and believe me, the people who shop there in the wee hours of the morning are kind of sort of idiots. Drunk and stoned idiots.

        I rarely go there unless it is the wee hours of the morning, so….

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    1. God bless you Dorothy, but the best bit is “Faqir, off!”

      The closest I could get is:

      Makes me proud to be British, it does. (wipes tear from eye)

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    1. I think it’s still Witch’s Daughter right now. I’m fairly certain I haven’t slept through the release announcement, so that’s got to be the still-current project.

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  7. It is always good to know that Sarah is alive! I’m sure that her storytelling might take a different turn when she’s writing as an undead.

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          1. I never really saw the charm of tentacle hentai — but if our esteemed hostess were to write some I guess that it would be worth giving it another try.

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      2. Damn. This crowd is more my kind of people than I thunk. *tries to think up a way to direct them to a story featuring superheroines, government agencies, tentacle perverts, Willis O’Brien, Benny Hill, the Marx Brothers, Thomas Edison, and Carrie A. Nation — that someone told him about. Can’t.*

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  8. When the cat’s away— seriously I go zombie-like after a doctor’s appointment… and I have a lot of them. There must be something in the medical air–

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    1. Been mostly zombified for days now since minor-ish oral surgery. They never mentioned I’d be completely useless for at least 36 hours afterward. Well, that and I lost the scrip for the pain meds and couldn’t be bothered to find it. I mean, it’s just a little pain… why yes, that *is* a dunce cap on my head. Fancy that. Still, I’ve managed two project management meetings, edits on three business process maps, five loads of laundry folded, and none of the minions have starved or been eaten by goblins. Not great for three days, but I’ll take the victories I can get.

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      1. “… none of the minions have starved or been eaten by goblins.”

        Congratulations. Have you checked for changelings?

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        1. Yeah, a few hundred mg of vitamin I seems to be sufficient if I’m careful (e.g. don’t let the Littlest Minion headbutt me in the jaw). Speaking of which, I should go take more now. And sleep eventually.

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      4. My dad had his wisdom teeth out before work one day; and refused pain meds because he was going to be operating heavy equipment.

        Yeah, he only made it a couple of hours, before giving up and going home, and I’m pretty sure he would have been safer operating the equipment on pain meds.

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              1. You know what happens when the Alaskan Scottish Club and the Finnish fishermen go drinking at the same bar?

                No, I’m not going to tell you. I’m going to let you imagine it.

                One hint: as the police say, “Alcohol may have been a factor.”

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    1. Plot bunny, free to a good home: zombie apocalypse, only it’s the original zombies from folklore. They aren’t dangerous. They just rise out of graves and morgues and get to work on whatever plan the sorcerer is up to.

      Nefarious plan, though. We are, after all, talking about a sorcerer who traps the dead and enslaves them.

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      1. As I recall, in the GURPS: Technomancer setting, reanimating the dead is part of the justice system in Louisiana. Some felons are sentenced to serve “life at hard labor, plus 10 years.” After they die in prison, they’re reanimated for 10 more years of hard labor. Once they finish that, the magic is reversed, and the bodies are finally laid to rest. One would hope that they are laid to rest in such a way as to prevent them being reanimated again by some rogue technomage; I don’t recall whether this was specified. An argument in favor of such a policy would be that the criminal had truly paid his debt to society, and therefore should be allowed a final rest.

        That’s not even truly nefarious (though it is truly disturbing). It just showed the Louisiana penal system in that setting as something in which you don’t want to find yourself enmeshed.

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        1. IIRC Salt does the trick in making sure a zombie permanently returns to his grave. (At least in the Haiti zombies.)

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          1. Salt (an electrolyte) is only effective against zombies if you also provide a slight electric shock, such as from a 9v battery.

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  13. Has anyone checked out the new samovar on the sideboard yet? I don’t recall it being delivered and I usually notice that kind of thing …

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        1. I can’t believe you had poor enough taste to choose a guy who doesn’t drink coffee. Of course, that means he never takes the last cup in the pot, either.

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        2. One woman I used to work with mentioned I was always in a bad mood until I had my morning coffee. I explained I wasn’t in a bad mood, I just couldn’t form syllables.

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    4. The Russian tea to go with it is in the cabinet beside the sideboard, bottom two shelves. Yes, the stuff with French and Cyrillic labels. Because it was less expensive that way. Yes, use the color chart on top of the second shelf, it has the English names. That’s not my department, but I am pretty certain that using mesquite chips for fuel would not end well. Those are for the meat smokers out back.

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        1. I’ve heard of people smoking beverages or syrups; I suppose it could be done with tea. Or cold smoke the tea itself before brewing. Hmm… *adds notes to giant idea list*

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          1. some of the teas used in Russian Black tea is roasted in bamboo over a fire so it gets smoked when that happens. hmm, we need to get Louis Mueller to but some tea in the smokers …

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          2. Lapsang Souchong is a smoked black tea, one of the oldest, if not the oldest, of the black teas. (I believe that it is pine smoked.) Daddy, who was the one who introduced me to it, likes it very lightly steeped. I am more inclined to make it far too strong for most others.

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        2. Well. Mom Red likes piñon flavored coffee, and Russian Caravan has a smokey taste to it . . . Although, IMHO, pecan and apple wood should be reserved for BBQ. (There is one, and only one, benefit to an ice storm. Lots of new woods, for free, to try in the smoker.)

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            1. Ah, Russian teas. May be smokey. May taste more strongly of roses than tea. May have bits of flower petal in large proportion to amount of tea leaves. May be flavoured with cardamom. May be dark black and bitter, and strong enough to grab you by the roots of your soul and drag you into full wakefulness despite being 6-1/2 months into a long winter, and not having seen the sun in weeks.

              Good stuff. (Except the rose petal tea; that’s hard for me to drink. My brain is all “No drinking perfume! Bad idea!”)

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              2. “Except the rose petal tea; that’s hard for me to drink. My brain is all “No drinking perfume! Bad idea!”)”

                Rose petal tea is right up there with lavender wine and cilantro; any perfume flavored food or drink gets on my “I’d rather gargle 90W” list.

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                1. Having finally gotten back (Why did I wake up, dazed, in a labyrinth, anyway? No idea how I got there.) I can say that some things work and some do not. I have no issue with (or against) chamomile tea, but when someone decided that a ‘drop in’ bowl cleanser smelling of chamomile was a good idea… I found it a very bad one. A (less un)pleasant smelling toilet, fine. One that smells like something I sometimes drink? Bad idea.

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                1. I’ve been working my way through a sampler of rooibos and other herbals from Dryad Tea and loving it. I fell in love with a couple, but had a few that smelled amazing and tasted bland; I’m pretty sure I did something wrong. I’m still a novice at proper tea preparation.

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              4. I take it you’ve no taste for those little Indian dough balls soaked in rose syrup, then? The Oyster Wife and I loved them, but I keep forgetting to harvest petals from our roses to make my own.

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                1. What you are speaking of is Gulab Jamun, kind of an Indian equivalent to Baba au Rhum, without the alcohol.

                  There are may recipes available online.

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              5. “Perfume” smelling tea probably wouldn’t bother me. However, a few years ago, we had a custom of several of us going to lunch once a month, ostensibly to celebrate the birthdays of everyone born in that month, and the birth month people would get to choose where we went. One month, we went to a Chinese place (I think), and someone ordered CORN tea. Apparently, it is made by putting corn kernels in water and boiling it until the kernels pop open. But it SMELLS like burnt popcorn. Ugh.

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    5. “Has anyone checked out the new samovar on the sideboard yet? I don’t recall it being delivered and I usually notice that kind of thing …”

      Oh, that was built out of the skulls of the last batch of SJW trolls to wander b… oh, wait, you said samovar? Nevermind.

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  14. Did you know the Bible its own self sayith that only men should make coffee? It’s in the Old Testament book of HeBrews.

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    1. Do you know the verse? My Sunday school class would appreciate that very much: 6-12 grades (yes, we’re crazy). Then we’d have an excuse to always make the other teacher make the coffee–he does it best.

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