Summary of the holiday / photos / various & sundry when I'm caught up with stuff.

It's good to be home.

Back in a week. Will prolly bring back home lots of photographs, and a couple blog entries saying how bored I was. ;)

See you all next Saturday.

And so I do, apparently, according to the Gender Genie. Hrmph.

Fuck off, Microsoft. Security reasons my ass. I don't trust anybody who multi-spammed my inbox with notices, whether it's because of a snafu in the email system like the article said or because they felt like it. And I sure as hell am not going to stop using Trillian. If MSN stops working on Trillian, I'll stop using MSN, most likely. *grumble*

Fuck off, Microsoft. I'm not going to use your proprietary client for the MSN Messenger. I've got every intention of using Trillian forever and ever. Especially if you think it's a good idea to spam my inbox by sending me something like 10 announcements reading "OMG YOU NEED TO UPGRADE" rather than just one. >:| Fuck off.

Time to plug NationStates again (I mentioned it back in December 2002, when I first discovered it). You can create your own country and have fun messing with it. I have two countries... the first one is Alathia, which was first founded on the 23rd of December 2002, then died (inactivity, I got bored with the game for a bit), and recently got resurrected; the second one is Elvians, founded on the 18th of July 2003, when I re-found interest in the game (thanks to some friends still talking about it, and the game finally getting some new issues for nations to decide on).
It's a fun game. Of course, right now I can't log in and play because they're apparently having database issues... ¬¬

Dragon Court. Oddly addictive for being a simple little game. And damnit, I used up my last turn helping an unicorn, now I've gotta sleep in the forest again, my equipment will be rusted by tomorrow... *grumble*
(Link from here.)

If I say, in response to a question concerning my state of well-being, "I'm fine", without elaborating on it further, it can either mean that I'm really fine, or that I'm not fine but I don't want to talk about it. Either way, if after that you keep asking, or say things like, "are you sure?", the following "yes, I'm fine" should be read as a "yes, back off already". In fact, I might start saying that bluntly. Because that's what it means. Back off, already. Give me some breathing space. I might not want to talk about things, even if I'm upset, has that ever crossed your mind? I might want to just curl up and cry and deal with my hurt on my own. I might be trying to forget about it. What do you know? You don't know me that well. If I want to talk, I'll talk. If I need to talk, I'll seek you out. (Or I'll seek other friends out, in which case don't you dare have a fit of jealousy. I'm not your property, I talk with who I want. I can have a billion different reasons to talk with somebody different than you, such as life experiences, knowledge of something in particular I need to know about, and so on.) If I don't want to talk, it means I don't want to talk. It's not some elaborate plot to elicit pity or understanding out of you. There's nothing behind it. I don't want to talk about it. Back the hell off.

And the complaint / comment / "but why" I'm fully expecting you to say in response to this post? Swallow it up. I don't want to hear it. Back off, you're not giving me room to breathe, and I get defensive and lash out in that sort of condition.

(Note: this is directed to one single person in particular. Said person is not going to be named, but he knows who he is. If you have to ask yourself, "is this me?" then no, it's probably not you.)

I couldn't write. Not about myself, not about funny or interesting links, not even a single story about a fantasy world to lose myself for a bit. It's not easy when all of yourself is focused inwards, trying to sort out the big tangle of feelings. Writing about it helps; but in a way, that's very difficult, trying to find the balance between private and public, wanting to tell somebody about what you're going through but not wanting to tell somebody in particular, nor wanting to say too much.

I've been tidying my room these past few days, moving boxes and piles of stuff from under the old bookshelves and evicting dustbunnies, tossing out what needs to go and making space for new things.

Been trying to do that in my feelings too, straightening out the knotted up mess, evicting the dustbunnies... not choking up and crying anymore when I encounter something to be put aside. Making space for new things. I need to wake up, and remember, and realize that what I thought existed wasn't really there. All I have is memories, and those are behind me. I will remember, but I will not let it block my path.

And I'm fine. I'll be fine.

It appears that Google now works as a calculator, which is very cool. It can even do unit conversions.
And since I can search right from my browser's address bar, this means I can do calculations and unit conversions from there, too.
I love Google.
(Via Metafilter.)

I wish.

What happens when you are hurting so badly you just want to forget?

The most obvious option would be just forgetting, or ignoring the memories. Tying up everything in a bundle, the good and the bad, all my ties to you, and just burning it. And forgetting. And then maybe, the hurt would stop...

But I don't want to forget. I just want to open my hands and let the hurt go, but still treasure the memories... it was good, while it lasted, even if now I'm looking back and seeing all sorts of things I'd missed and I really should've seen, and those hurt, too.

It's been a little less than three years since I first met you. I don't know why, out of all the people on IRC that evening, I decided to talk to you... and I don't know why, the following three years, I was so convinced you were my friend. You listened to me cry, and that was enough for me. You were there. So I ignored all the little warning signs... the way you would ask me to do something for you and sit and ignore all my other attempts at conversation until I did what you wanted me to, the way you always had an excuse to not do anything for me, how you always had to go or you were suddenly busy when I was the most upset... how you treated your girlfriend when you dumped her, the same thing you are now doing to me... and everything my other friends told me about you. I would defend you, and say you were not really like they said; they didn't know you.

Turns out I didn't know you, either... and that you didn't know me, or didn't want to. It seems that nothing I said, and nothing I did, nothing of the three years we spent being friends was enough to make you know me, and trust me, and really consider me a friend.

You called me your best friend. You said you'd always be there for me. You said you cared. How much of that was a lie? How much of that was just convenient to say, so I'd keep doing things for you?

And did you really expect that, after months of you ignoring and avoiding me completely, I would greet you with a smile? Did you really expect none of the hurt you've deliberately let me take up the burden of would spill out? Did you think you could come back, and use me again? Did you think I had not, finally, seen through you?

What you were, or what I thought you were, is the past.

What I am, and what I can be, is my future. Without you.

You can say all you want about me. I can be, in your eyes, mean, a crybaby, rude, an idiot, a little girl who doesn't know how to behave. You can say that. It doesn't make it true, and it says nothing about me, and more about you than you will ever know.

I am here for myself. So are many others. You aren't... and while I regret that, and wish things had been different, it's time to let go.

I hope the people in your future are smarter than I was. I hope it doesn't take them as long as it took me to see through you.

Maybe, someday, we will meet again. In the meantime, I can only close my eyes. And remember.

And let it go.

According to the "Which Fantasy/SciFi Character Are You?" test, I'm Aragorn. Dunno if I agree with this one, though... heh.

I think I seriously need to add categories to this blog.

Anyway, have fun with Space Dudes. To quote from the webpage, because I'm not awake enough to come up with a creative description: "Space Dudes is a classic arcade-style shooter. Play through 50 levels of manic shoot-em-up action and destroy everything in sight!"
That's pretty much it. Fairly brainless, but fun.

- Tolkien books are remarkably sneaky. If you check all your existing book shelves and stacks, looking for all Tolkien books so you can put them all together on the new shelves, you'll miss some, and forget they ever existed. You will eventually find them two hours later, prompting an "awww, fuck, I missed a Tolkien, now how do I squeeze it in?" outburst.
- If you're balancing precariously on a stepladder, with a small stack of books in your hands, said stack of books won't crumble and fall until you've almost pushed it onto the shelf.
- Any stack of books will fall in such a way that it'll knock over a couple other stacks in the process, and force you to spend the following five minutes picking up books from every corner of the room and rearranging the stacks.
- Italian publishing houses are quite clueless in terms of book cover design. They're quite capable, for instance, of making the covers of the first two books in a series a nice dark blue, then making the cover of the third and last one orange, so it looks like utter shit when the series is grouped together on a shelf.

It's been what, four days? and my connection is still having fits. Oh, it works, sort of, it just believes it doesn't. When I try to connect to anywhere (IRC, websites, pinging a host, whatever) I get unable to resolve server / could not locate remote server / unknown host errors (depending on what I'm trying to do). Sounds like DNS issues, right? Well, I try a couple more times, and suddenly that particular host is recognized. It makes it enough of a pain in the ass to browse the internet (ever tried getting a website or bit of information for somebody you're helping in a hurry, when you've got to try three times just for the website to load?) that I'm thinking of going to tidy my room instead. ¬¬
The internet seems to be unable to come up with anything interesting, too. Maybe I'm just not looking in the right places, I dunno, but I can't find anything interesting enough to keep my attention for more than a few minutes.
Bleh. Maybe I should really just go tidy my room...

Way too damn hot. Can't breathe. Can't think. I wish I could just go fully nocturnal, the night hours are more livable... but then I would have to deal with sleeping during the hottest hours of the day. So uh... no. :P

I wish I had more effective ways of pulling up my hair than three hairbands and a braid wrapped into a knot. Waist-length hair is fun, but not in the summer when it's so damn hot. I'd chop it off if I didn't like it so much.

And yes, I haven't been posting much lately, have been suffering from the heat too much to do anything but be on IRC (talking with friends and helping out in #starchat) and wander around the internet looking for tips on cool stuff you can do with MT. Haven't even been doing the tidying of my room I really should do now that I have a new bookshelf (no more books stacked in double rows! w00t!), nor the bunch of other things I wanted to do (bookmark tidying for instance... lately I've been writing down URLs in a notepad rather than bookmarking them, because they're easier to find again that way ^^;).

Went shopping for groceries with mom again this morning... I hate shopping in the heat, it always leaves me exhausted afterwards. I did get some neat stuff though, a nice blue beach bag for when I go on holiday to the seaside and the DVD of "The Ring". And candy. :9
Also got some stuff a couple days ago, the previously mentioned bookshelf for my room, a new backpack (silver colored... I needed one, my old one was falling apart) and a new necklace (picked and bought the beads and the cording and made it myself).

I wonder how many double books I have in my room. I guess I'll find out when I tidy. At least a couple, that's for sure... maybe I'll free them via BookCrossing and hope they'll find somebody who'll love to read them, who knows.

Writing with Elvish fonts. Watch me spend all of tomorrow doing that, then actually attempting to learn to do Tengwar calligraphy, and then attempt again to learn Quenya... heh. Not that I'll ever get a working knowledge of Quenya, I'm too easily distracted... but meh.

How to install Windows XP in 5 hours or less. "30 days left for activation!" Click. Yes, I would like to activate Windows over an active internet connection, now that I have one. No, I would not like to register with Microsoft. Yes, I have read the privacy statement and agree to give up my computer, my civil rights, and my first-born child. I wasn?t using my civil rights anyway.

New Google operator: search by synonyms. You can for instance search for "Windows ~help" and you'll also get results containing "guide", "tutorial", and so on.

This RemovePings plugin for MT, to use in conjunction with the method of listing the last n songs played which I already mentioned, is great. Now I no longer have to delete all those pings by hand periodically, and curse myself for forgetting to do it long enough that I have to check seven hundred little checkboxes... I just rebuild a template, and the plugin does it all for me. Excellent. :)

Went and added a button linking to Use a better browser in the sidebar. Because hell, it's true. People should use a better browser. *hugs Opera*

And I need to make room in my sidebar somewhere, so I can join this fanlisting (and a couple other ones... namely the Akabane one). Right now there's nowhere to put a button / link to fanlistings... I could just make a "Fanlistings" section or put the links under "Miscellaneous", of course, but I dunno. We shall see.

I'm just testing the Zempt client here. It's quite interesting, and maybe I'll use this from now on when posting to my MT blog from home... if it works decently, that is... rather than opening a new browser tab in my already very crowded Opera. Hehe. We shall see...

[EDIT] Well, it works fine, after a bit of kicking it so it would take my preferences. There's also a Winamp plugin for it so you can click a button and have it insert the title of the song you're currently listening to in the post. And you can save posts and publish them later, so you can post without an internet connection...

...I think I'll load this on my laptop, so when I go on holiday I can type up daily updates on what I did and upload the lot of 'em when I get back. Aren't you happy? ;)

Result in extended entry. It's an image, what did you expect from a Quizilla quiz? :P (Though this one is actually clever. Heh.)

Disposable email addresses: jetable.org (all-purpose), spam.la (throwaway site registrations), SpamGourmet (all-purpose). I'll have to remember those sites next time I need to specify an email address for a website membership I know I won't need to recover...

This one is on crack. (Link from FB - no thanks to you for the mindfuck caused by this game ¬¬)

Spent pretty much the entire afternoon updating my photolog with the results of the 26 Things photographic scavenger hunt. Next time, I'll definitely not procrastinate until the day I have to submit my URL to upload all but 7 photos... x.x
You'll need to look at the category page for "26 things" if you want to see all the photos, the front page for the photolog only displays the last 7. (It wasn't designed for heavy-duty updating... :P)