I told myself like a million times that the next entry was GOING to be the ink entry. I SAID.

But you know what? Fuck it. I want to talk about this first. XD

( Vacation. Return Trip. Current Jazz. )

So Ian is all moved in, now, which means that... we sort of unofficially have pets, even though we're not allowed to. O.o Two tubby-wubby black and white cats, Mel and Roo. Mel seems to taken a liking to me. Roo is indifferent. Strictly indoor cats. The landlady NEVER comes to see us, so we're hoping that this will be okay until Ian's roomie moves down here and he moves out to be with him. I'm going to try to just enjoy the animal company. It's been too long since I've had pets.

I wanted to know what the Hell this Anaface.com place was about.



Geometry is totally not on my side. 5.56 out of 10? OUCH. XD

Just proof that I'm not a pretty as people have claimed that I am... Geometrically speaking, anyway. XD

Anyway, I haven't posted in a while and soon I probably won't be posting for another couple of weeks. There's a suprise to be had, you see.

And between getting ready for the suprise, and tackling an illness, I haven't really had much time to post.

ALSO ALSO ALSO, I keep thinking about what I'm going to do for the Ink Post. Whether or not I actually want to TRY making visual representations of what I want. ~Snort~ I'm still kind of on the fence about it, and have KIND of not been posting as a result, because I wanted to make the next post the Ink Post. But now it's not going to be, because of this right here. XD

Another note - Ian is in the process of moving into the house until springish. As of today he's brought in a crapton of boxes. For at least that amount of time, everything that was mine and out in that empty space will now be in my bedroom, with the exception of my sewing machine... Currently the poor thing is sitting on the kitchen counter, but whenever the men move the square table (The Worktable) back into the little breakfast nook part of the kitchen, I will be putting it back on there. The INJUSTICE of such a situation - a sewing machine next to the STOVE! DISGUSTING. ToT

Anyway, I'll post again in a couple of weeks. Unless I find that I have the time to actually get on DadComp during that time... but I'm kind of doubting that. XD

You're not gonna get it. XD

I spend a decent amount of time each week out and about the city/cities. I always bring my journal. More than once it has served me well for recording anything at all for "Forever."

... And I do mean anything. I've got everything from free writing to timelines to stats to quotes.

I daydream about my work almost constantly, so I have a weird habit of mentally, um, acquiring weird scenes and quotes that don't seem important or vital in any way. At least not at the time.

Here's a couple I found just now:

D: It's abnormally delicious; that's what I love about it most. Literally sweet. You're like my walking tub of cake frosting.

G: Well then I sure feel sorry for you! Too much sugar makes you sick! It's disgusting!

I don't even know what this was supposed to FOR, other that it's involving "Forever" characters. XD I can guesstimate the only POSSIBLE time these things could POSSIBLY be said. Something so random and quirky and lighthearted. There's pretty much only one window where something like this could occur. But I don't even know if I'd ever really USE this quote for ANYTHING.

It IS randomly amusing, though. XD I'll sure say that...

I don't like it when my Dad says that he'll call and he doesn't. I know I should know better, but it always freaks me out. Like maybe he hasn't been able to call me because he's been too wrapped up in complications at the hospital. When Mama had the stroke he didn't tell anyone until a couple days after, partially because he was too distraught, and partially because he knew that one or both Aunties would fly up along with me, and that we wouldn't have seen Crooked Smile Mama. We would have seen Completely Unresponsive Mama. Something he directly told me that he did not want me or anyone else to see.

So yeah. I get really paranoid and shit. So when Dad didn't call at all last night, I was like, worried. Not too terribly worried, because I'm going out of my way to calm my ass down (or try to), but still worried.

Well TODAY, he called me to apologize for not calling me last night. XD He needs to understand that I stay up until at least midnight on most nights. And if it's anything regarding our family, he can damn well call me at 3 AM. I will NOT care. He and my family will ALWAYS be more important than sleep.

Now, on to the update on Mama:

There still aren't any test results regarding her disappearing blood, but they DO know what particular lung infection/virus she has: pneumocystis, and no, I don't know what that IS, but I know that it's being treated with septra (spelling?) for the next 21 days. As of the moment, she's still got the breathing tube and the feeding tube... and had her arms strapped to the bed in ICU for a while because she kept trying to, um, pull the tubes out. O.o

And by NO means am I saying that it would be easy to DEAL with tubes shoved into your fucking face. For fuck's sake, no. I would be fucking paranoid as shit. But still. That stuff is there for a reason, Mama. Pulling it out is just going to hurt you more.

Just hang in there. We've been through how much already? This is nothing.

The doctors theorize that it was probably one of the blood transfusions that caused this infection, as an extra nugget of information.

And the neurologist wants to do a spinal tap on her, but I don't know when. The weird breif fevers and shit that she had can be neurological symptoms, apparently. He just wants to make sure that there isn't some bacterial goings on in the spinal fluid. It doesn't sound as if they're REALLY concerned, especially because her last fever broke when they put her on the septra. But better safe than sorry.

That said, her chemo session won't be for a couple weeks at LEAST, then. Ugh, whatever. As long as it gets DONE, for crying out loud. This is what happens when I get hyped up for the end and then a roadblock appears. I get all impatient. I need to remember to be happy that this has gone by so fast. And it has gone by fast. We are lucky. We went through SHIT, fucking SHIT. But we are lucky.

It was nice to hear Dad be hopeful and confident within that hope. Since the second time I went up there this summer, he has been making an effort to be more positive. He slips a lot. After a lifetime of doubt, yeah. Being positive is hard. But he's trying now and that's all that matters, to me. That he tries while he's still alive. It's never too late to make a conscious effort toward change. Ever.

So this author reviewed several chapters of Impy and started exchanging friendly PMs with me, so when she mentioned posting a fanfic on Raziel, I thought I'd read it and review. Give back what I received. XD

Posted A/N prior to the story:

Author Note: First off I do not own Angel Sanctuary or any of the main characters. I do own my own characters of creation, Nevena and Blyth. Now I request that you all do go easy on me. This is my second AS fic. I did as much research as I could to figure out stations, peoples, ideas, terms and anything else. However, I did add my own creativity to the story line. I ask that reviews be polite and creative. I REQUEST no reviews containing criticism or complaints. If you do not have anything nice to say please, “Stint thy Clap!” In the words of Chaucer but meaning to us…keep your mouth’s shut. Though if you do notice that I may have messed up a term or such…please let me know as politely as possible through a private message. WARNING: this story will contain graphic details, adult situations and mature language. Please make sure to have your I.D. at the door and do enjoy!

As far as I could tell she hadn't messed up any "term or such," and I like to believe that all of my reviews are very polite - unless I'm reviewing Jaw Quay's work, in which case I'm basically a total idiot but it's okay. I'm assuming she gets that. XD

My Review:

Overall I rather like the story thus far; I'm a big fan of battles. I do think that there is something that I think you could improve on as you progress with this story, though. You have a lot of run-on sentences and that be sometimes be difficult to read. I suggest throwing in some puncutation and cutting the sentences up a little bit, to make them easier to understand. It couldn't hurt to play with other descriptive words, as you reuse a few, sometimes within the same sentence. For example, 'coil' and 'uncoil.' I really do think that you have the potential to make this a great story! But if you work on these things it will be even better.

Is that rude? XD

Apparently she thought it was.

( Here's the PM I got in response. )

I wanted to reply back to explain that by all intents and purposes, I was very polite and that I'm sorry that I have apparently offended her. Also, that I wouldn't review her work again if that was truly what she wanted. But she has apparently already blocked me.

"DO NOT contact me again or I will block you from my work."

Er, I hadn't even gotten around to contacting her again and she already blocked me. XD SO, on the off chance that she finds my LiveJournal, I'm going to say a couple of things here. Just because. XD

"You know...I really don't like people jumping on me like that. I didn't jump on your for all the mistakes I found in your story and the things I did not like about yours out of respect to you."

I didn't consider my review an attack, so I'm sorry that you did. Personally, I rather wish that you had reviewed me to point out what mistakes you might have found in my work. I'm already aware that there are several spelling errors, some punctuation errors, and a few grammatical errors, to boot. People think I'm strange for this, but I'd rather take an honest and critical review than a sugarcoated one. That's the only way I'm going to improve as a writer.

"As an honor student in English classes both lit and writing at my college...not once has my grammtical skills been questioned. Apparently you cannot pay attention as I indicated in the Author Note not to critique or criticize my writing but for some reason you felt you just had to do it. "

I hope that you're not implying that I don't have that kind of experience under my belt. I have one year of honors English and 2 years of AP English from highschool to my credit, and have taken up to English 201, Speech Writing 101, Journalism 101 (with every article I've written published in the college newpaper - two of them landing in the shiny color spread), and Creative Writing 112 and 113... IF you're really implying that I am not on par with you. XD (But in all honesty, I don't believe that anyone's highschool and college transcripts are a good basis for judging the quality of someone's writing. A person can go through college without any criticism and still have average writing, whereas a homeschooled poet can make the kind of language that would make you weep for all its beauty. Transcripts don't hold much weight with me, but if you list yours, I'll list mine.)

That said, I would like to say that I did read the author note, but that I had assumed you only meant to turn away flames. I didn't consider my review to be a flame, so there you have it. Sorry that you took it as such.

"I could suggest a lot to you but I won't do so considering you wrote your story the way you write." "Each writer has their own way of doing things."

I agree, actually. I was merely explaining that in my opinion, I found your sentences too long to understand right away. That's my personal opinion and those are my personal suggestions. I never said that you HAVE to do it that way. Because "each writer has their own way of doing things." For example, you claim that my writing "often became dull and bland in many aspects." "Your story was not descriptive enough." I don't exactly agree with that, but you are definitely allowed to have your opinion. It's too bad that you never mentioned this in all those reviews for Impy. I would have liked to know your 100% opinion, instead of only part of it.

"Now...I ask that you DO NOT review this story again. As I do not take kindly to people who think they should rip apart another's story because they have some superiority complex."

I don't see myself as above you. I see you as a peer. A fellow writer. So I'm not exactly sure where the superiority complex really comes into play. Is it because I thought I should offer some advice? That was intended to be a friendly, kind gesture. Once again, I'm sorry it offended you.

"So again...do not review my story again. And next time you review a story think before you just decide to destroy a writer's pride over their own creation. DO NOT contact me again or I will block you from my work."

I truly hope that I haven't stripped you of your pride in your work. I told you that I loved the story as a whole. What's not to love about a battle? You should be proud of your creation, always. But that doesn't mean that our creations are exempt from improvement. Nothing we create is ever completely perfect. I'll readily admit that.

But I'll honor your request to not review your story again. Seeing as you've blocked me from PMing you, I'm not sure if I even really have a choice in the matter, anyway.

... Yup! Just attempted to see if I could open up a review box on your other work, and I can't. I've been thoroughly blocked. AW, SARAHBETH. CAN'T YOU GIVE A GIRL A CHANCE TO DEFEND HERSELF, FIRST? XD

It didn't have to be this way. We could have agreed to disagree, forgive and forget. Now you've changed the locks to the house and dumped all my clothes in the yard. WON'TCHA HEAR A SISTA OUT? XD

Sorry for hurting your feelings, love~! XD

The second one in one day?

Well yesterday I posted 3 in one day. Because I am insane.

Just an update on Mama. She was moved into the ICU for a lung infection. She's breathing via tube. They're running tests on her to diagnose the infection. Should know more tomorrow, just like we're always supposed to know more tomorrow.

This should take at least a few days.

Chemo on the 4th, my ass. ~Sigh~

Brought on by yesterday's post on what I want to do with my hair, I've decided to post two more entries of a similar vein, this time regarding something a little more "alternative" than haircuts.

Piercings~!

( Here be really WEIRD looking edits I made; bear with me. )

So between my hair post and THIS post, I'm not sure if the ink post is gonna be able to top these two. As far as tattoos are concerned I have plenty of ideas, but they're all within my head, and very specific. These aren't exactly things that I could find via Google, and even if I did, I REALLY don't know if I'd want to spend the time learning how to Photoshop the image onto my body, though I know it can be done. It WOULD be a good learning experience, I guess...

Basically what I'm trying to say is that the ink entry, whenever I post that, will probably NOT be image intensive. I COULD, in theory, try my hand at drawing out my ideas and scanning them. In which case, in ANOTHER theory, I could attempt to Photoshop them onto images of myself. IF I have images of myself that would be easy to edit all the tatts onto.

I have no idea. We'll see.

Okay, spent an hour on the phone wiff Dad, and here's the stuff:

Mama can't get chemo until she gets this fluid in her lungs taken care of. They've given her a vial of medicine and so far the medicine seems to be working marvelously. They've given her 3 of the 4 units of blood and apparently, that's good enough?

But there's no chemo until the fluid is gone. Tentatively that should be tomorrow. It BETTER be tomorrow, just because the sooner we get this over with, the better, I say. But Dad IS right, and if she has to stay in longer, then she'll stay.

AND I'll get the number to her hospital room. Her roomie neighbors are apparently pretty chill, but hospitals ARE still pretty damn boring, and Dad and Ken both have work. I'm quite cool with helping her pass the time. XD

BUUUUT ideally it shouldn't come to that.

We also spoke a little of Uncle Pete. He can't move much and can't speak; has to be fed via tube. But he can open his eyes and he can acknowledge a person when spoken to. He's still HERE. Dad says that he'll most likely be moved into a rehabilitation center. He sent Auntie Alice an email, but she hasn't responded, yet. I told him not to worry about it. I mean, I wrote her a letter and she hasn't responded to that, though I know - via Mama - that she received it and loved it. Mama passed along her message to me, that she's sorry that she can't respond at the moment because she's preoccupied with Uncle Pete, and I totally understand that, you know? I asked Mama if I should continue to write her, anyway, and she said it would be a good idea. I figure maybe Dad can keep on emailing her as well, even if she doesn't respond? Just little signs that she does have support from us. In times like these that is definitely the most important thing. We'd know.

( Auntie? O.o )

AND OH MY GOD, THIS MAKES 3 ENTRIES IN THE SAME DAY. THAT'S RIDICULOUS, I KNOW.

I know that sounds PAINFULLY deep and philosophical.

Guess what?

... It's TOTALLY not. XD

( Getchyo herr did. )

Now for something that isn't hair-related - a Mama update.

Yesterday, Mama was scheduled for what was supposed to be her final chemotherapy session.

However, they discovered that her red blood cell level is far too low (I said red, not white - I KNOW that the white blood cell count practically disappears during chemo ~cough~Mr.You-Know-Who-You-Are~cough~).

Sooooo. Mama is camping out in the hospital for a couple of days to receive 4 units of blood, before she can get the final chemo sesh going. Thanks to this summer, everyone on the floor knows her. In the weirdest way it was kind of nice. Having all these nurses that don't even necessarily have to check on her come on in to chat when they can; ask if they can bring her ice cream or a popsicle - she loves the orange popsicles; you know you needed to know that. XD

I'm not necessarily WORRIED about how her blood seems to still be magically disappearing. Dr. Lund - the nice Pseudo-House? - was running some tests and the current theory is that the chemo is what's doing this to my already-anemic Mama. The results SHOULD be in today at some point, and Dad said he'd call me, so I'm just waiting on that call.

Ugh, let's just finish kicking this cancer in the ass and be DONE with it, already. I'm glad it's disappeared as quickly as it HAS. Make no mistake of that. I just don't like teetering on the edge like this is all.

FIRST OFF FIRST OFF FIRST OFF!!!

November 1st was my awesome lil bro's birthday. Dude, 20 now? That's just CREEPY as BEANS. He was supposed to stay round and baby faced. Of course, I was supposed to stay equally baby-faced and pigtailed. Well, I still wear pigtails on occasion and I'm still rather moon-faced... But then that means...

NO! I GOT IT! I HAVE BREASTS NOW! SMALL BREASTS, BUT IT'S A SIGN! A SIGN THAT I HAVE INDEED GROWN UP!!!

Also also also,

As can be noticed by the change of layout(s), possibly... I have uploaded Halloween pictures! I spent those couple of entries going off about needing white makeup and in the end, I didn't even use any. ~Sigh~ I bought Desitin, as it was suggested as a good alternative. I THINK, honestly, that the Desitin would have worked? But for some reason none of the other makeup would go on right. I can't quite explain it. The liquid eyeliner went on fine, but the red cream makeup - the little pot that I've used now and again? - has an even thicker density, and I couldn't seem to smooth it on without mucking up the white. I won't even talk about the eyeshadows. I suspect it was more of an application problem than a makeup ITSELF problem.

Between that and Adam commenting on how my face smelled like a baby's ass? XD I said, "fuck it," and recreated the look without the white base. It still looked FINE... not exactly my original intention, but FINE. Next year, if I do something requiring a white face as a base, I'm going to actually spend TIME with the cream to get a better feel for it. This year I cut it WAYYYY too close. Of course, arguably I would have had the time to test the cream if I hadn't seen one show, and then two more shows one right after the other during the two days before Halloween. But what can I say? Theater is expensive, so if there is a deal lurking somewhere, I'll take it. That and Pinky seemed to need the company.

Here are a few shots of the final look, though I will tell you right now that I'm lacking white false eyelashes that I'd purchased on a whim for the look. T.T Ten bucks says that if I hadn't been so frustrated with my makeup blunder, I would have remembered them. Oh well. I still HAVE them. I can wear them in the future.

CAMPHONE

~

DIGICAM

~ ~

FOR MORE PHOTOS, PLEASE VISIT MY DEVIANTART OR MY MYSPACE.

( And now for the final thing! )