illogicalvulcan:  How did an @ wind up in my logs?
me:  it hatched from three brackets and a tilde.
illogicalvulcan:  whoa! kinky
me:  this is why typography is so popular
illogicalvulcan:  wow...vermilionsun never said
illogicalvulcan: top
illogicalvulcan: that was not for you
me:: :D I thought we were back to kinky typography
illogicalvulcan: no, now we're back to me sending you unix commands
me:: hee
illogicalvulcan: would you like to tell me your most resource intensive processes?
me:: paying my cable bill.
illogicalvulcan: I just LOLed

Friday night the parental units and I descended upon one of Houston's dens of indie rock, Fitzgerald's, to see the debut of Peter's new band, CommieHilfiger. Yes, it's satire. They were hilarious and loud and awesome. And they did a synchronized dance number. Win!

I think the Blog Every Day in April brigade probably had something more pithy in mind for entries, but I've got every day so far covered, I may as well go for the gold. Right? Here, have a funny family story.

So down by the grocery store my parents shop at is this gigantic cross looming over the freeway interchange.  Seriously, a gigantic cross. It lights up at night.  It is obnoxious.
And apparently it and some other megachurches and various schools do get some graffiti every so often. Apparently somebody spray-painted a Star of David on one of the big crosses as an act of protest.  I'm not sure what they were protesting, or what they wanted to accomplish, but nevertheless...
So as we were driving by the other day on our various errands, Mom wonders about the sort of graffiti an atheist might put on a big giant obnoxious light-up cross that suddenly sprouted across the freeway from the grocery store.
Naturally, I proposed that an atheist would post an equation.
That got us started on what sort of equation it should be.  Mom wanted to put a²+b²=c² but I objected that it didn't actually mean anything without an explanation of a, b, and c, so then we had a conversation about defined variables and constants and E=mc². And then Dad wanted something more interesting than E=mc² so I said, "Hey, I have a song with an equation in it!" and played Jonathan Coulton's Mandelbrot Set. Except they didn't realize that the equation was in the lyrics, so it was an exercise in hilarity. And that equation does have a heckuva lot of explanatory text.  Hard to spray-paint, you know, which was the (theoretical) point of the exercise. 
I think actually mom's idea would work perfectly well if she accompanied it with a labeled drawing of a triangle. 

(Disclaimer: This post not actually meant to encourage or condone graffiti on religious or other buildings. Can't we all just get along, and paint murals or something?)

Title: The Shabazz Family on Vacation
Artist: zephre
Rating: G
Fandom: Dragonsfire MOO
Characters: Rose, Agnes, Tibbins, Ramon, and Lila
Summary: Keet and I used to play some wonderful characters on our Dragonriders of Pern RPG, two Harper Masters and their various in-laws, out-laws and offspring. The nickname for this particular branch is "The Family Shabazz".  I asked Keet where they should go on vacation, and she said, "GRACELAND!"  Yes, if you look closely, Tibbins is wearing a t-shirt with Elvis in the style of Fairey's iconic Obama "HOPE" poster. It probably says "VIVA" or maybe "KING" at the bottom.  ;) If that t-shirt doesn't already exist, it should.



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OMG, libba_bray posted about this and I WANT ONE!

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

The awesomeness knows no bounds - especially note the info about the illustrations. w00t!

Here are the caveats:
I don't tend to watch TV, so I have seen neither the show nor any clips.
The web site video doesn't work if you're logging in outside the UK, so all I had to go on were the character descriptions and stills. 

Transcript of chat below:
( a plenitude of snark and a lack of saxony goodness, or evilness as the case may be )

The school where I work had its 40th Anniversary gala tonight at Houston's most exclusive country club.
They had an open bar, so naturally I took advantage. At one point, I set my glass down on a table near several co-workers.

Co-worker: zephre, are you drinking apple juice?
zephre: No, it's single-malt scotch.
(laughter)
zephre: Glenlivet, I believe.
Other co-worker: You are the weirdest person I know.

ETA: I think the weirdness stemmed from either a) knowing enough to want single-malt and avoid Jack Daniels, plus reading the name on the bottle, or b) taking advantage of the open bar. Or it might have had to do with the discussions about Unicorns for Obama... To be honest I can't remember the entire context of this exchange- it was in the middle of a different conversation. ;)

I'm sure everyone I know will be terribly amused to know that I have signed up for a holiday fan art exchange which has only one non-negotiable content rule: No Harry Potter.

Dozens of students milling around a crowded gym full of tables.
Every so often a cluster would move past our table.
Then a lone student would step forward, her parents (they were almost always young women) hovering behind her.
We'd smile, and ask, "So have you heard of Vassar?"
And the student shrugs a little, points at her parents, and replies, "No, but they have."

Do you need a "Zombies for Obama" campaign button? How about Unicorns for Obama? Mullets for Obama? Guitar Collectors for Obama? Large Hadron Collider for Obama? Caber Tossers for Obama?
Personally, I like "Ice Cream. You Scream. We all scream for Obama."

So I'm officiating a wedding on Saturday and have this great green and brown ensemble to wear. I just needed shoes - here I am, tons of brown clothes and no brown shoes. Egads.
So Mom and I braved the sales and lo, if we didn't find the perfect pair of wedding shoes.

( the perfect shoes )
What do you think, Lisa?

Uploaded by zephrene on 26 Aug 08, 12.09PM CDT.

The Wrong Flier

Ok, I know I am just a sick person but this flier made me laugh out loud as I walked to lunch in the student center today.

ROFL.

So Mom and I went for the super crack this morning - a trip to The Painted Pony in La Porte. I asked Mom if she wanted to come with me to the fabric store and she was kind of indifferent to the usual places, then I said, "Or I might trek out to La Porte," and she changed her mind. The rooms full of quilter's cottons call to us, my precious calls.
Mom claims that I bought half the store, but really I only got a few yards of some really amazing, bright prints. Including one that may become the back of the Snape Quilt. There were such amazing and wonderful designs there, and I am *loving* the retro splashy flower prints so much.  Wild. Unfortunately, there were no prints that really truly screamed "potions" or "chemistry", but what I got I think is pretty evocative anyhow. If you squint, you can see magic/science in them. And they work so amazingly well together. Squee!

The Snape quilt (which is a small wall hanging, actually) is going to be so awesome, although I may have to do the Snape center piece several times. Mom and I discussed different techniques for getting him onto the fabric and "painted", so if I have lots of leftover attempts maybe I'll make little pillows or something.
You know what I didn't buy? Thread. Oops. I am so going to need more black for this.

Also found a fun pirate print, and it's an unwritten rule in this househould that if you find a cool pirate print, you buy enough for the family stash.

On the drive home, Mom and I discussed ethics, philosophy, and religion, or lack thereof. I think that having these important conversations with an atheist offers me some very good perspective, as a person and as a minister.
On the topic of irreverence, check this out: God: A Career Retrospective.

At this evening's political fundraiser (for a local judge we've known since I was a wee thing who is campaigning for a district bench) Mom wrote out her name tag to say, "Hello, my name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father, prepare to die."

<3

We're spending the Fourth quoting movies and singing musicals (badly) on the patio.  Peter is grilling up steak, shrimp, kabobs, brats, and veggies. We're all playing Chicken Feet (a vicious, vicious game! hee.) with a round of Cranium in the future.
I finished the muslin of my cloak and will be fabric shopping tomorrow.
I hear rumors of sparklers for the back yard, as well.
There was Babylon 5 earlier, and there will be more later. Plus a marathon of The Twilight Zone, and some channel is supposed to play 1776.
Yay for holiday weekends.

Hee hee hee. For illogicalvulcan especially:

Demon Muppet of Sesame Street by *HedgehogBeeblebrox on deviantART

You are in a mall when the zombies attack. You have:
1. one weapon
2. one song blasting on the speakers
3. one famous person to fight alongside you (real or fictional)
[Random editorial moment - if you choose a real person who is deceased (like, say, Alexander the Great), does that defeat the purpose of the meme?  hahahahahah. I kill me. Ahem.]

Weapon can be real or fictional, and you can assume endless ammo if applicable. [Where's the fun in that?]

Right at the moment I'm going with:

1. a katana (did you know that a good katana blade will cut right through bone? Yeah, I thought you might.) [man, I would need stronger arms, though. do I get an upgrade on my Strength roll?]
2. Dies Irae (Sequence No 1)  from Mozart's Requiem
3. Ambassador G'kar (Babylon 5)

I thought about a flamethrower, but let's be real. When fighting with the Narn, you would need a bladed weapon. Not to mention that I'm not sure a flamethrower would stop a zombie, just make him a bit crispy.

Or, When Language Goes Slightly Awry:

Dad: O Interfaith Minister, how many in a minyan?

Me: Uh. Minion is singular.

I've taken these before, but this one is going around again.  And it's not multiple-choice.  #1 and #20 are especially telling for regional origin, not to mention directly related. I'm always really curious with these things because for most of them I have no idea what the alternative answer could be!

1. A body of water, smaller than a river, contained within relatively narrow banks: Bayou  ;)

2. What the thing you push around the grocery store is called: cart, shopping or grocery

3. A metal container to carry a meal in: lunch box

4. The thing that you cook bacon and eggs in: skillet

5. The piece of furniture that seats three people: couch or sofa

6. The device on the outside of the house that carries rain off the roof: gutter

7. The covered area outside a house where people sit in the evening: porch, except on some houses it's a veranda because it wraps around.

8. Carbonated, sweetened, non-alcoholic beverages: cokes, except for Dr Pepper, which is Dr Pepper (accept no substitutes!)

9. A flat, round breakfast food served with syrup: pancake

10. A long sandwich designed to be a whole meal in itself: sub

11. The piece of clothing worn by men at the beach: swimming suit or trunks

12. Shoes worn for sports: tennis shoes or sneakers

13. Putting a room in order: having never really done this, I cannot say.  ;)  Cleaning up or arranging, depending on whether there's furniture being moved.

14. A flying insect that glows in the dark: fireflies, I guess, except that I don't remember actually seeing these until I went north.

15. The little insect that curls up into a ball: doodle bug

16. The children's playground equipment where one kid sits on one side and goes up while the other sits on the other side and goes down: see-saw

17. How do you eat your pizza?: sideways, so I get some crust with every bite.

18. What's it called when private citizens put up signs and sell their used stuff?: garage sale

19. What's the evening meal?: dinner or supper rather interchangeably

20. The thing under a house where the furnace and perhaps a rec room are?:  the what?
(seriously, we have neither basements nor cellars here unless you are a business who can afford the construction/pumping costs. I had never seen a finished basement in a house until I went to college, nor had I ever seen a split-level house.)

21. What do you call the thing that you can get water out of to drink in public places?: water fountain.

Title: Percy Weasley, King of Magepunk
Artist: zephre
Rating: PG
Characters: Tonks/Ginny, Luna/Percy, various OCs
Summary: Waiting in the queue for the club, Percy decides that maybe Luna's idea isn't so entirely daft after all...
Warnings: none
Medium: Photoshop
Notes: If I didn't think my viewers and I would go blind, I'd try to make some of the clothes change color through animation. But I'm just not that ambitious. Notes on Magepunk subcultures (I included at least one of each!) are in my fandom journal. Fic to follow.




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