Yeah. Doing better. Spent almost the entirety of Monday (apart from part of the morning and a few minutes in the afternoon telling various friends I was sick and making the blog post) and a good part of Tuesday splatted in bed, sleeping the high fever off and drinking LOTS of water. Didn't throw up or anything, luckily, except for one time Monday morning (I was worried... my aunt, cousin and brother, who got the same thing, spent nights and days throwing up), but still I didn't get anything to eat until this evening (ahh, blessed pasta).
I was lucky, overall. Just had to spend time splatted in bed with a fever, as opposed to having a fever and throwing up every hour like the rest of my relatives... meep. I did miss class today though, which makes me grumpy, and I had stuff I'd planned on doing these past three days (namely, working on my dissertation and pulling together a CV for a work opportunity this summer which I'm keeping quiet about until it's finalised). Ah well. Such is life.

This is just to say - since this is the quickest way to reach almost all of my friends - that I'm not going to be online for a day or two, at the very least, cause I caught a bad bug (I knew visiting relatives was a bad idea :P I got it from them...), and I currently have a temperature of 38.8 °C.
So yeah. Going to curl up in bed until this goes away (I so wish I had my computer in my bedroom, near my bed, but noooo...), and I'll see you all in a couple of days, hopefully.

...the Silmarillion in 1000 words.

SAURON: Bwa ha ha!
LAST ALLIANCE OF ELVES AND MEN: Push off.
SAURON: Make me.
ISILDUR: Whack.
SAURON: Ow.

Lesson learned: if piano music suddenly starts sounding like somebody is raping the melody line with a pitchfork, check if the bass boost option on the CD player accidentally got activated.
What the hell is that option for, anyway? Unless you're listening to the ear-killing soul-destroying monstrosity some people call "music" music that's little more than noise, having just a loud bass line, I can see no reason to use the bass boost option. It completely kills any melody line the piece of music might have had.

Yes. New layout. It was worth it to spend days CSSing the previous layout of this weblog, this time the layout change took me five minutes only of CSS and color tweaking (I'm not counting image-editing work, as that is something I enjoy doing). Opinions please :)

Seems I've changed my modus scribendi... I used to have a lot of short posts, mostly with random links, while now I post long posts and only when I have something to say. I dunno which is better, but I think the few long posts strategy agrees better with my current doing-too-many-things-at-once daily life.

So, what's new in my life, let's see... I've actually been studying more, even though I have no exams close by. Yeah, yeah, out of character, I know... but I need to study and work on my dissertation if I want to graduate, and I do want to graduate, so I have no choice :P I just found out I have an extra week of holiday with no classes (I thought I had to go back to university tomorrow, it's next week instead), though, so I have more free time to relax and think about stuff that isn't studying. Yay! (I'll still be doing university work, don't get me wrong, but if I don't have classes I can time it so I can do it at my best.)

So there's a good chance I'll be changing the layout of wingedspirit.net and of my photolog soon (about time!). Which also means I'll be posting a LOT of new photo entries to my photolog (and backdating them, of course, to reflect the date I really took them at), as soon as the layout change is done. Which means I'll then be able to post photos as I take them again, rather than delaying the posting.

What else... got addicted to Pretty Guardian Sailormoon. Yeah, yeah, shush. It's cheesy but it's utterly cute. And Sailormoon was what got me into anime to begin with, so I just had to try and watch the live action version. (You can get it via Bittorrent, the .torrent files for the subbed version are on this page if you're interested.) Kinda wish Bittorrent would download faster, but ah well. Such is filesharing. :)

No staff shall oper up or be in help channels while under the influence, whether it be alcohol, extreme emotion, illness, or drugs. There's enough mind altering going on without expediting the process...

Hi! I'm sailoreagle, and I'm one of your friendly neighborhood IRCops. I am one of several people who volunteer their time and/or money to keep the network running smoothly, so you can have a more enjoyable chatting experience. No, that doesn't make me your slave or mean you can demand that I do everything you want.

No, my whois doesn't change if you do it twice. It does, however, generate a notice that is tolerable once or twice, but gets fairly annoying if I get it five times in ten seconds. Quit that.

Why yes, I'm an IRCop. How perceptive of you! No, I'm not here to shout at you, I'm not here to close your channel, I'm not here to eat you and your descendants raw and whole for lunch, I'm just here to chat. Now can you PLEASE quit whoising me and let me chat? Thank you!

No, I'm not an IRC cop. IRCOP. Short for "IRC operator". Kinda like a channel operator, only network-wide. You don't call chanops "chan cops", do you?

Yes, I have the IRC equivalent of a a big gun, and yes, I can /kill users off the network if I want to. Most of the time that big gun is kept holstered, though, and no, I will not /kill somebody just because you dislike them. No, not even if you beg.

No, sorry, I can't help you figure out how to set up your client to make a noise every time somebody joins your newly registered channel, it's outside my duties and I'm quite busy right now. Yes, of course I can try and help you figure out how to set up your client to make a noise every time somebody joins your newly registered channel, give me a moment. :) It depends on attitude, you see. Basic help you'll always get from me, but I'm only willing to go out of my way to be helpful to you if you're nice to me and respect me.

Yes, I have a shiny IRCop badge. No, I will not give you a shiny IRCop badge. No, I don't care how good you are, you will not get a shiny IRCop badge without going through the procedure everybody goes through. No, all begging will do is land you in the NWIH stack.

Why, how nice of you to inform me that, since we elected to not take the opportunity to have your clearly amazing self as an IRCop, our network will not last! I hope you have a fun chatting experience on whatever network you will go and beg for an IRCop position next.

No, "I will not give you a shiny IRCop badge" does not mean "please feel free to try to open an alternate network help channel centred on your amazing self". Don't pretend to be surprised when the channel is closed on you, you knew this would happen.

Yes, of course, I do agree that it's incredibly sad that you got banned from your favorite channel. Such a pity! No, I'm afraid not, I can't force the ops of that channel to unban you. Why, thank you for informing me that my refusal to get you unbanned from that channel means that our network endorses child pornography. That's amazing. I didn't know that! By all means, feel free to use that argument with that channel's ops to try and get unbanned, because you're still getting no help from me. Have a nice day!

Oh dear, you got banned from the network? Yes, I agree, it's so sad and unfair that we're keeping you from chatting with your friends on this privately-owned network after you so innocently went around the network gathering material for the new "Getting banned from any sane IRC network in five easy steps" book you're planning to write. You're suing us for that? That's so nice of you. I'm sure whichever lawyer you attempt to contact will enjoy the laughs.

Thank you for your kind offer to help us test the stability of our servers and connections using your floodbots. It's amazing how swift akills are, isn't it?

I'm so sorry to hear it was your brother/sister/uncle/roommate/fifth cousin twice removed/monster in the wardrobe/pet iguana who got you banned from the network. I wish you luck in dealing with the person responsible.

Hi, welcome to the h--

Hiwelcometothehelpchan--

*mutter* *scribble scribble* alias F3 { msg $chan Hi, welcome to the help channel... }

Hi, welcome to the help channel for this network! Did you know you can get right to your channel without passing through here? Oh, you didn't know, that's ok... no, don't worry, now that you know how to go there directly you will no longer have to pass through here. You're welcome!

No, I can't help you with that. No, it's outside my powers to help you with that. No, I really can't help you with that. No, really, I have no power to help you with that. No. No. No. What part of "no" is so difficult to comprehend?

This would be easier if you told your friend to come here instead, you know. There's no need for you to act as a go-between and report the wrong commands five times. We don't bite. Really.

Shush for a bit, I'm trying to help your friend, here. Finding the help conversation among all the chatter isn't easy.

If you stopped complaining that the command doesn't work, and instead typed the command exactly like I showed it to you, I can assure you it would work. Try it if you don't believe me!

I'm sorry, I don't accept private messages from users while helping. If you have a question, please ask in the main channel :) Hmm, that makes me a "rude whore"? Interesting. Do stop throwing abuse at me though, something bad may happen.

Hmm, I wonder why the flow of swearwords from you just suddenly stopped after my status window went "ding!"...

108/transsexual recovering from a sexchange operation gone horribly, horribly wrong/right behind you. Now may I help you with anything? :)

04/06/2003 - 04/06/2004, one year of insanity. It's always a full moon in help channels.