Morning.

Wearing white, for once -- speech today. The guys were babbling about Star Wars for nearly an hour. I got dizzy and had to sit down.

*sigh*

Today was one of the rough mornings. I don't know what it is, whether it's me doing the internal barrage of images and sensations, or some external source, but I almost failed my Willpower check to keep hands mostly off, and did fail my Willpower check to keep hands all the way off.

Hope evealone shows up today. He was invisible yesterday, which worries me, as he had to get offline suddenly the night before.

Quiet. I'm hacking at my speech.

It's about that time of year when Halloween merchandise begins to appear in the stores. One of the classic Halloween costumes is the witch, with pointy hat, pointy nose, and broomstick.

Real-life witches use a variety of tools, though not always the stereotypical objects that are included in Halloween costumes. There are many varieties of witchcraft, just as there are many subdivisions in other religions. The four main tools of the witch, based on traditions that date back to the medieval alchemists and perhaps further, are representative of the four classical elements: air, fire, water, and earth.
( ... )

Speech

Got an A-. Teacher didn't hear me use the watchword, I guess.

Had much fun otherwise. Nervous as hell. Evidently I only appeared so at first; the teacher said that all three speeches today were excellent.

As I had giggled to Neighbor earlier, the evaluator's comment on my ethos was that I am, in fact, a witch. The teacher only commented that I seemed to know what I was talking about.

Unfortunately, I didn't make my logos clear enough. It's elementary that one arranges the things in order of elemental correspondance to the directions, and then proceeds from the correct starting direction in the correct circle direction, right? Evidently not to the rest of the class, who weren't witches, at least for the most part. Ooops.

Pet Peeves (from notecard)

Books that don't resolve themselves, especially books that are really plugs for a computer game
Words being used incorrectly, especially in a professional setting -- publications or teachers
The Same Damn Noise/phrase/song over and over and over
Opinion being presented as fact
Preppies
Flagrant disrespect for good teachers
Bad grammar and bad spelling -- Tommy escapes because he tries to improve so damn hard!
Bigots. Racists. Snobs.
Getting interrupted.

The concrete + head incident:

Back in my days back at UAF, I used to hang with a guy named Asa. He looked just like Darkside, only with longer, redder, frizzier hair, and a little bit older. Otherwise, very similar, both in personality, the fact that he was a Practitioner, the liking of anime, and the whole virgin-thing. I had the hugest crush on him.

I was hanging with Asa back home while he was LARPing, and I was watching... I was sitting on the floor checking out his ass, and someone walked through my line of vision. "Hey, you're spoiling the view!" I said, then realized I'd said it aloud. I cringed and ducked, smacking my head into the concrete wall behind me. Embarassment.

Neighbor may or may not have been there for this. He had, evidently, heard about it.

Fwd: The perils of writing sex scenes

[Attributions lost to cyberspace]

Jim pauses in his latest endeavor and frowns. After a moments contemplation, he saves his work and firmly closes his new fantasy G4 titanium PowerBook. After a meditative sip of his drink, he addresses those around him. "There are some literary subjects that have become total cliche and attempting to describe an erect penis is one.

( Not for immature eyes )

Sailor Jim stares into the fire for a moment, then opens his PowerBook once more. "Screw it ... or, rather, let's not. I'll simply segue from her starting to slip out of her clothes to the morning after. Y'know, the standard story cop-out. Thanks for letting me talk this one through."

Little perceptions, one by one.

( Darkside ramble: you know who you are who this cut is for. You're welcome. )

PTA, PTO, blow it out your... eh?

Votania and I are Grown-Ups. Amusing, that I'm a Grown-Up, and I don't put Darkside (or, even, ralmathon) into that same category. Why?

Votania and I are, respectively, the mother and the Designated Alternate of a little dude, whereas Darkside's still living with his mom and dad, and still therefore "a kid". Neighbor's an adult, but not really a Grown-Up.

Evidently, the local PTA is not the PTA anymore, but the PTO: Parent-Teacher Organization. For all that I'm a Correct Terminology junkie, that just seems silly to me.

Nephew is going to associate black leather trenchcoats, spikes, black nailpolish and lipstick, and your assorted gothic and classic rock with maternal influences rather than with your rebellion-type things. That's what mommies wear, right? Mommies wear black leather and black nail polish...

Votania and I are going to the Open House tonight at Nephew's school. We're going to be active in school government.

Attack of the Killer Goth Moms?

To construct:

Memecatcher. I see dangling Barbie heads and random bits of AYB, as well as other fads. Hula hoop, of course. With lots of pony beads and the random WWJD? and gods know what-all.

School

Tactical Assault --- oh, sorry, I meant "Curriculum Night" at Little Fay's school went well. I had brought paper and pencils, so Nephew and his friend from school drew during the boring parts. As is perfectly understandable, Votania and I did not heart-to-heart bond with Nephew's best friend's parents. Mom^friend looked almost... preppy.

There are birdies at the school! And beasties! The lead rooster tripped over his wing to his girlfriend, and then tried to help her make baby chicks. Several times. Now all we need are the bees. I gave Votania a few pointers in the matters of chicken body language.

After the introductory portions of the assembly, the little ones were shuffled off to the inschool daycare center, so we grownups could have grownup time with the teachers. Nephew's teacher is nice, and she's pretty too. She says that grown-ups may call her by her first name, but children must address her properly.

In addition to everything else, I'm going to teach Nephew "cat arithmetic" (base eleven with the extra number being "cat" thus: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, cat, 10, 11, ...., 19, cat-teen, 20, ... 98, 99, ninety-cat, catty, catty-one, catty-two, catty-three, catty-four, catty-five, catty-six, catty-seven, catty-eight, catty-nine, catty-cat, 100!) just as my father taught me. This will make the concept of binary, and other alternate number bases so much more easy.

We had fun, wandering around and being all parental. Votania is anyway, but I'm getting to be so, more now. Raising a kid is a big responsibility, and I have the feeling it's going to be for longer-term now than we might have thought a few months ago, at least until ( other stuff happens [rant] )

. In short, Votania and I are together until we're both out of college, and I'm delighted to be able to be there for Nephew as he's growing up. (Votania and I did the tag-team salad battle today, backing each other up.)

I must ask my blonder half more about Boy Scouts tomorrow, as Nephew will probably be headed in when he hits first grade. Good gods. The Goth den mothers? Some Boy Scout troops can get, I've heard, verrry Christian, in the "let us brainwash the little children" way, rather than the kindness and compassion way.

Walking home at night in Phoenix with Nephew is interesting. Votania watched out for us, and scared off someone following us with her vigilance.

More boundaries

Darkside and I worked on that, this morning. We got into what looked like it could have been one of our typical sparring matches, and then he, mindful of my careful appearance for my speech this morning, decided that it was a bad idea, and told me to sit down. No, not "told". Ordered.

I am a submissive, when in the right frame of mind, but you order me about as much as you order Darkside to do something: that is, not at all, and never without permission.

So I sat down -- in Darkside's chair.

Silly Lunatic. Darkside went around behind, lifted the chair up, and deposited me squarely upon the floor, much to my surprise. I am not a small woman, and while he is strong, there's only so much of him in that skinny little body.

After getting up and brushing myself off, I told Darkside with much certainty that he had permission to order me to sleep, but nothing else. This time, he asked me to sit down, and so I did.

Darkside is noticing what I wear. Today I wore a white tank top rather than my usual black.