twinkelbelpeach

I meant to mention in my previous 221B con post the most excellent mixed drink that my good friend mydogwatson invented at the con last year. It is composed of raspberry Chambord, vodka, and heavy cream. Shaken over ice and topped with a cherry. She named it The Elephant in The Room. It is most delicious and we verified that fact frequently. Highly recommended for those who like a little nip now and then.

Got home yesterday from a wonderful weekend in Atlanta for 221b Con. Saw old friends and made a few new. Romance must have been in the air for we not only
had the Cro-babies (world traveling Sherlock and John crocheted dolls) wedding reception Saturday night (yes, there were drinks and party favors) but there was a real live wedding proposal at one of the panels (yes, she said yes). Speaking of panels I truly enjoyed the ones I went to. From the seriousness of a diagnostic clinician who determined that Sherlock does meet the current criteria to be diagnosed an addict, to the sublime comedy of Arthur 'continuity' Doyle where it was pointed out that the dates used by Sir Arthur would have given Watson six wives, the panels were a highlight of my con.

The con did get off to a bit of a rocky start because of all the problems with Delta and their massive f**k-up with flights. Many con attendees and a few guests did not get in until late Friday and some still arriving on Saturday afternoon. One of the guest authors was unable to get there at all and he was VERY unhappy about it, letting the world know through social media. Can't blame him at all. Good news though for those of us who came by car from a southern direction, the con will be moving next year to a hotel near the Atlanta airport.
That saves a good 30 minutes of driving in heavy traffic, so yea!

Well. I see I set this up five years ago and then did nothing with it. I have not done anything on LJ worth transferring over either, mainly just a yearly list of books I have read. But I did still log on and read things occasionally
so I was shocked when I went there last night and saw their new 'Policy'. Oh hell no! So time for a final goodbye to LJ, time to try and break my addiction to twitter, and time to start saying things occasionally that take more than 140 characters. So hello Dreamwidth. Hopefully this time I'll take time to make your acquaintance.

OMG, my heater has come on. We might be going to have a winter this year in Georgia. I can dig out the sweater I bought on sale last January and possibly WEAR it. What a concept.

Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/49686.html

I can't believe it's been three months since I've posted anything; I truly do suck as a journalist. But I'm just not an initiator. Everything I do is in response to other people and I am a terrific responder. I have plenty of opinions and don't mind expressing them, but for some reason I always leave it to the other person to initiate the dialogue. There must be some way to kickstart myself. Right now I just sit and stare at the blank page, giving it an evil suspicious eye like it's going to bite me. And maybe it should. Because then I'd have something to respond to!

Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/49659.html

We had to have our 12 year old lab mix, Bella, put down this morning.
Her problems came on so suddenly that I feel like I've been gutted.

Current Mood: crushed
Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/49144.html

In the past three weeks I have been on seven airplanes from two different airlines. KLM from Atlanta to Barcelona to Amsterdam and back to Atlanta. Then on United from Atlanta to Chicago to Lansing and back to Chicago and back to Atlanta. May I say that KLM was wonderful. The flight attendants were numerous, efficient, and very polite. I have never been offered so much food by any airline. On one nine hour flight I had four meals. Not to mention the drinks and snacks that came down the aisle, I kid you not, about every 30 minutes. And people, the booze was free. Even the cognac. I would not hesitate to recommend KLM to anyone.

United is another story. The two flight attendants for some reason had the giggles, making the safety lecture a bit of a farce. They gave me a glass of water and offered to sell me a snack. Uh... no thanks.

It seems like every time I like an airline, it's based in Europe. Why is this? Why can't the American airlines seem to get their act together?

Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/48881.html

I won't be on the internets much at all for the rest of the month, but I do look forward to seeing some of you at MediaWest over Memorial Day weekend. I know I hardly ever say anything on my own journal, but I do tend to blither quite a bit in response to other people. Didn't want anyone thinking I'd fallen in a hole or something. Just going to be travelling for a bit and quite excited about it.

Current Mood: happy
Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/48583.html

I am so happy to be home again. For the past eight days I have been living in a hospital room while my dear daughter is recuperating from her diverticulitis surgery. All went well and she is home now, hopefully on the way to a full recovery and being able to eat like a normal person again. The one thing we both had to laugh at though was how dependent we were on all our electronics. God forbid we should be conscious and not in contact with the outside world. So there were two chargers plugged in at all times with either iPads, iPods, iTouches or iPhones attached. I-I-I-I-I, when did this become normal life?

Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/48306.html

How the **&?@! did it get to be March already?
I seem to have lost most of January and February since I fell into the giant pool of Sherlock fandom. I totally blame my friend T (you know who you are) for showing me second season in one three day gulp. It was our annual fanish gathering on a mountaintop in Alabama, when she inquired innocently "Anyone want to watch the new season of Sherlock?" Okay. We watched episode #1 and episode #2. The final episode was due to air on our last night. Naturally their was no wi-fi on top of the mountain. So off we went to the giant city of Ft. Payne, looking for a restaurant with wi-fi. 'Ruby Tuesday' to the rescue. The connection was bad, but it was there, and T started downloading. We all whipped out our electronics and proceeded to order much food. The startled waitress said she had never seen so many people at one table with so much... stuff. We smiled and ordered more food, hoping that our download would finish before the restaurant closed. It was close, but we had the whole ep at two minutes till closing time. There was much rejoicing. We went back up the mountain to our little chalet. We had champagne. We had key lime pie. We watched 'Reichenbach'. I whimpered and tried not to sob. I had more champagne. It was such a wonderful weekend.

I've spent the time since swimming through the aforementioned pool of fanfic, fan art, fanmix music and songvids. I'm loving every bit of it of course, but deargawd, I have to come up and breathe the real-life air sometimes. So this is just me popping in to wave hello to anyone who cares. Maybe I should just wade around in the shallow end of the pool for awhile, before diving into the deep end again. On the other hand... nah.

Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/48099.html

I love Christmas shopping online, I really do, but deargawd you do have to keep a constant watch on it. First came the CD of pictures I ordered from a professional photographer. Only $65, so much cheaper than individual prints. Except two days later when I checked my charge card balance, he had charged me $650! After I revived from my (almost) dead faint, I contacted him and listened to his tale of woe about how he was posting charges late at night and so on and so on. The only part I cared about was "I'll rectify this right away." Which he did. So on then to dealing with a big company which shouldn't make these kind of errors, right? Cyber Monday and I'm ordering from my beloved Coldwater Creek. 40% off and free shipping!! So says the big blue banner at the top of their page. Except when I get to the end and hit purchase, guess what doesn't happen? Yep. So here I am sputtering indignantly on the phone again. "Hmmm, no," says the guy on the other end of the line, "It didn't take that 40% off, did it? Let me rectify that right now." Okay fine, you do that. 'Rectify right now' has become my favorite phrase this holiday season.

So check your bills closely boys and girls. Don't let the retail grinch steal your Christmas.

Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/47354.html

You've always got to have a Plan B my mama said. Since I haven't been able to get on Live Journal for more than ten minutes in the last four days, I decided to take her wise advice. Hello Dreamwidth.

Crossposts: http://twinkelbelpeach.livejournal.com/46625.html

I'm home from Southern Media Con in Tampa/St. Pete and I'm hot, tired, and five pounds fatter (thanks Starbucks, for being right there in the hotel.) But I had a wonderful time! Thanks Deb, and all the Stonehill gang for putting on a great little con once again. And after Perry read that Transformers story at Vogon Prose, I will never again be able to walk into a "portrait gallery" with a straight face.
You guys always have some of the best panels too, so I hope you can keep The Best Little Con in Florida going for many years to come.

My daughter brought her new puppy Bentley over to meet the Moose.
I don't think either one of them was quite sure what the other one was. At least the 75 lb Bella didn't try to eat the 4 lb Bentley, so we were all happy.

Current Mood: pleased

Originally posted by

kythryne at internet powers, activate!

Okay, people. I need you to take this viral, and fast.

We know someone in upstate New York who needs a good custody lawyer ASAP. I'm not at liberty to go into details publicly, but this woman is very afraid that her abusive boyfriend is going to get sole custody of her young child. She's presently being represented by a public defender [edit: I may have the terminology wrong here, my understanding is that her lawyer was assigned to her rather than being someone she chose] who doesn't seem to care about the case, and she has very few resources left at this point. Her next hearing is on Thursday.

If you know a good lawyer in New York State who might be willing to take this case for a low fee or pro bono, or at least offer her advice or support, please let me know. If you don't know anyone, please repost this far and wide. As a mother and an abuse survivor, it makes me absolutely sick to my stomach to contemplate a child being left in the hands of an abuser.

I can be reached at kythryne@gmail.com if you have any leads or want to help.

The internet can work miracles. Let's go.

What American accent do you have?
Created by Xavier on Memegen.net

Southern. Love it or hate it, your accent says you're probably from somewhere south of the Ohio River.

If you're not from the South, you probably were overanalyzing the questions. Take the quiz again but don't think so hard next time.

Take this quiz now - it's easy!

I'm really mad at General Mills. I stopped by Walmart this morning to pick up a few things including cereal. The hubby loves Cheerios so I picked up a box, but then noticed the store brand sitting right beneath it was 40 cents cheaper. I picked it up to compare ingredients and immediately noticed how much heavier it felt. Now these two boxes are within millimeters of being the same size. So now I look to see how much cereal each box contains. The box of General Mills Cheerios contains 12.25 oz. The box of Walmart True Value Honey Nut Spins contains 17 oz. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out this is nearly one third more cereal in the box that costs 40 cents less.
In a box that is the same size. Okay, I know this goes on all the time, but somehow this was so blatant! I hate it when a giant company like General Mills implies through their packaging that they think I am stupid. I'm going to be watching this stuff a lot closer in the future. And not that I think it will do any good, but I'm going to send a copy of this message to General Mills too. "Hey, Giant Company! I saw what you did!"

Current Mood: irate

I flew back to Atlanta yesterday after spending the weekend in Houston, TX at my first ever Revelcon (where a good time was had by all. Thanks much, ladies). Not only was the con lots of fun, but so was the local shopping, and the restaurants were great. Turned out the hotel restaurant was being remodeled, so that meant lots of eating out. Canyon Cafe, Maggiano's, Sweetgrass; all were good and Canyon Cafe was so good we went twice. I've got to say though, that the Houston drivers were all, as my friend Connie pronounced them "Batshit Crazy!" Not only do they all fly (what speed limit?), but they do it right on your bumper and then lay on the horn if you don't jump out the very split second the light changes. I saw more near wrecks this weekend than I've seen in the past six months. Never thought I would say this, but they made the drivers in Atlanta seem sedate. I don't think I will ever complain about Atlanta drivers again. I do give Connie props though; she whipped out what she called her "Chicago driving talents" and got us everywhere we wanted to go. She even backed down a super-rude yuppie in a big ol' SUV and claimed us a parking space. He might have been waving his hands around and yelling, but we had the '5-women-in-a-car glare.' We won.

I hate living in Georgia during the summer when it's so miserably hot, but this time of year I wouldn't want to trade it for anything. Yesterday I rode down to a place called Massee Lane Gardens with my friend Linda. Unlike me, she has a green thumb and can actually grow things, and she wanted to pick up a certain type of camellia. (Are flowers supposed to be capitalized? Not sure). Anyway, there was a camellia show going on and the individual blossoms on display were so gorgeous.

We looked at a bit of the show and then went for a walk around the gardens.

Everything was so beautiful and peaceful. No sounds but the occasional faint hummings of the bees. When I think of all the photos my friends have uploaded recently of their battles and woes with snow, I realize how much I take for granted. So when I start whining and moaning again around mid-July, somebody please remind me of this.

Current Mood: refreshed

Your Travel Type is Cultural

Your perfect trip is enriching, nourishing, and taste expanding.

You're looking to take in the best of what a region has to offer. You especially love the arts and history.

Of course, no vacation would be complete without some amazing shopping and dining.

And to top off the full experience, you'd love to stay in a historic or five star hotel!

What's Your Travel Type?

Blogthings: If Quizzes Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Will Take Quizzes