zomg!!! Did I really do this!!! Wow! :)

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Cross-posted from my Blogger account.

Ack!!! I am so so far behind! I have to post all my music lists, in addition to the potterplace Saturday Truth or Dare summary posts, which I'll do later on tonight, I hope.

But first... I want to get this rant out of the way.

( Ranting and raving ... )

I'll be working the Fair again next week. Naturally, when I virtually visited my lovely friends in the TPP Chatroom last night, they all asked what lovely fair food I enjoyed. My answer: my favourite term, thanks to my friend Sherrye: UFO's, or Unidentified Fried Objects.

And yes, Cindy, I will have a few fried pickles for you next Saturday when I work the Fair for the entire day.

:)

Cross-posted from my Blogger account.

Well, what an interesting evening I ended up having.

After work, I met my friend, DP, and we had dinner at one of the Chinese buffet places. He was working on a story that I looked over and proofread. Afterward, we were going off on our separate ways; he was going to a concert at UNC, and I was going to conduct my choir rehearsal.

I got into my car, the lights flashed on briefly, and then... nothing. Car battery was dead. Luckily, D. hadn't left yet, so I asked him to drive me to choir practice. He was worried, wondering how I'd manage, but I said I had an idea what to do and not to worry about me. And besides, my apartment was just on the other side of Duke's East Campus, so I wasn't worried about getting home.

So I conducted my choir practice, and only had one chorister turn up. So we had good one-on-one time, working through the anthems I'd programmed for the next three weeks, as well as the service music we'll be doing for Advent.

After choir practice, my friend DD turned up. I was actually going to ring him up to ask him if he could take me home. Luckily, I remembered that the Honda dealership's service department closed at 11:00 pm, so I rang them up and described to them what happened. They said the battery's gone dead (it was probably due for a change anyway as I don't remember the last time it had been changed). They suggested I jump-start it and get it over to the dealership ASAP.

So I told D we probably should pop over to Wal-Mart and buy some jumper cables. So we made the Wal-Mart run, bought jumper cables, flashlights, and batteries, then we made our way back to the Chinese restaurant where I'd left the car.

I had bought a fancy unit that said it was capable of jump-starting a compact- to mid-sized vehicle. Thought it wouldn't be a bad idea. So I was reading the instruction manual on how to run it (really, I was wondering if it had come fully charged) on the way to the restaurant.

We got there, and I noticed that I'd parked the car very close to some hedges. I tried to move the car back, but I couldn't get it out of park, so I said never mind, I'll work with it. Whilst opening the hood of the car, I managed to cut my foot against some broken glass shards. I didn't think much of it, but D. was freaking out when he saw how much blood flowed out. So to assuage his fears and prevent him from freaking out more than he was already, I told him to get my first-aid kit from my car, and I cleaned and dressed the cut. Which was all it was: a cut, and there was no glass embedded in the foot.

Once all that hullabaloo was done, I connected the unit to the battery and asked D. to start the car. Nothing happened. The lights inside the car came on, but there wasn't enough energy to start the car.

So I had D. open the hood of his car. Unfortunately, his battery was too far away to be able to use his newly-bought jumper cables. So I went into the restaurant and asked the people if the car parked next to me could move.

Well, the driver did more than just move his car. He had parked it backside in, so he moved his car and parked it forward, got out his jumper cables, opened his hood, connected the cables, and started his car. This enabled me to start my car, and D. and I were profusely thanking this man.

So off we went to the Honda dealership. They were expecting me, and I told them I'd intended to bring it in for service and get the safety inspection sticker updated next week anyway, so I might as well have them work on all that in addition.

So now I'm home... the car will be ready by 7:00 am tomorrow morning. The foot is fine. The car will be fine. No worries. Seriously.

Wishing a very happy birthday to closetravenclaw! I hope you enjoy the day! :)

My trusty clock tells me that it's already 7 October in NZ, and so...


glitter-graphics.com

I hope you enjoy the day! :)

Just want to wish a very happy Belated Birthday to kyriaofdelphi! I hope you had enjoyed the day. :)

*skids in*

Just wanted to wish a very Happy Birthday to one of my favourite AR fans, monicarnsg! I hope you enjoyed the day!

Here's a picture for you, from Lucky Chance, ca. 1984. Enjoy! :)

This time, it comes from luvsev. She wrote me a very sweet story with the following prompt: SS/HG, ocean sunsets, pineapples.

Here is what flowed out of her pen: At Sunset

Thanks so much, luvsev! *glomps/squishes*

Cross-posted from my Blogger account.

After a lovely Choral Evensong I attended at the Duke University Chapel, I took the bus back to St. Joseph's to conduct the first choir rehearsal of the Fall Semester.

So I was in the middle of my rehearsal when the Vicar entered the church and said she needed to see me. So I apologised to my choristers and followed her out the church. We went towards the Parish Hall. I had no idea what she needed me for, but I continued to follow her.

We went into the Parish Hall, and much to my surprise, my friends, both from St. Joseph's and non-St. Joseph's friends, were sitting around a table laden with cookies and a huge cake with a heap of candles on it! There was also a bouquet of sunflowers on the table. I was very very surprised! My friend, Maria D., was the organiser of this entire thing, and she had told the choir what she'd intended to do. There was a huge card that apparently people were signing after the service last Sunday that was presented to me. I had no idea they had planned all this!

So we sat, talked, ate cake and cookies, drank sparkling apple and grape juice, and then they took me out to one of my favourite Chinese restaurants in the area, China Palace.

Luckily, the anthem I chose for Sunday is one we've done before, and is simple enough: A Prayer of St. Richard of Chichester by L.J. White.

So thanks to Maria as well as to my friends who were present. It was, indeed, a lovely surprise. :)

Happy Birthday and best wishes to stefdarlin! May you have many, many more to come!

*glomps/squishes you*

After an adventurous day (which I'll describe in a post when I'm more awake), I discovered this beautiful banner waiting for me in my mbox:




It goes with my ficlet, A Walk on the Beach, which I had written during one of the Saturday Night Truth or Dare nights.

If I did this right, you should be able to click on the banner, and it will bring you to the story.

Thanks again, southernwitch69!

*glomps/squishes you*

I'm still not all that faithful about keeping this up, but FWIW, here is my contribution to Ravenclaw House.

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Cross-posted from my Blogger account.

H/T to my friend, Chris T.

Now that I have an iPod, I can actually answer this meme!

Once you've been tagged...

1. Turn on your iPod / mp3 player
2. Go to SHUFFLE songs mode
3. Write down the first 15 songs that come up -- title and artist. NO editing or cheating, please.
4. Share either your favorite line from the song, or a memory it brings to you, or a random observeration
5. Choose 20 (or so) people to be tagged. Don't forget to circle back and tag the person who tagged you.

Here are my fifteen. I don't like tagging people, so if you've read this meme, consider yourself tagged.

1. Buxtehude: Præludium in F Major (BuxWV 157)—David Durkop, organ
2. Beethoven: An die ferne Geliebte (Op. 98:III)—Mattias Görne, baritone; Alfred Brendel, piano
3. Sibelius: Finlandia (Op. 26)—Wiener Philharmoniker
4. Sibelius: The Tryst (Op. 37, No. 5)—Siv Wennburg, soprano; Geoffrey Parsons, piano
5. Schubert: Schwanengesang: Am Meer—Görne/Brendel
6. Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique for orchestra, Third Movement: Scène aux champs (H.48; Op. 14)—Philadelphia Orchestra
7. If I Didn't Care—The Ink Spots
8. Schubert: Schwanengesang: In der Ferne—Görne/Brendel
9. We'll Meet Again—Ink Spots
10. I'm Beginning to See the Light—Ella Fitzgerald with the Ink Spots
11. Rachmaninov: Piano Concerto No. 3 in d minor: I: Allegro ma non tanto (Op. 30)—Vladimir Ashkenazy
12. Schubert: Schwanengesang: Die Stadt—Görne/Brendel
13. Slap That Bass—The Ink Spots
14. Sibelius: Black Roses (Op. 36, No. 1)—Siv Wennburg, soprano; Geoffrey Parsons, piano
15. Always—The Ink Spots

Cross-posted from my Blogger account.

Episode #40 of The Secrets of Harry Potter is up and available. You may listen to it here or subscribe via iTunes.

We discussed fear and greed, love and self-sacrifice, slavery and freedom in Chapter 23 of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

If you want to interact with the host and his cohorts, feel free to pop over to SQPNConnect, and the Secrets of Harry Potter page.

Enjoy! And please let me know what you think of it. :)

*skids in*

Just popping in to wish debjunk a very Happy Birthday! I hope you enjoyed the day! :)

Yesterday was a nice day spent with friends.

After having been sufficiently fed and watered, lady_karelia and I went off in search of groceries and the like. We had grand plans of cheesemaking, and I was looking forward to it.

Whilst we were gone, sunnythirty3 and Little Sunny33 popped over after having driven by Graceland. So we sat around, enjoyed some very delicious cheese, Little Sunny33 drew me a few pictures, sunnythirty3 was updating her LJ (and you can read that particular post here), I was knitting a scarf, lady_karelia took a few pictures and posted them here...

We continued our merry-making as dinner was prepared. lady_karelia made some very nice beef curry and some wonderful green chilli pakoras. I contributed grapes and cherries. Mr. sunnythirty3 contributed strawberries and cream.

In the meantime, lady_karelia, sunnythirty3, and I engaged in a bit of round-robin writing. You can say we got "Peafowled". Have a look at the fruit of our labour here.

I'll be travelling back towards Durham today. This time, I will break my trip into two, stopping short of the TN/NC state line, spending the night at a motel before continuing over the mountains and back toward central NC.

To lady_karelia and her family: thank you so much for your generous hospitality. I really enjoyed myself! My welcome mat will always be out for you.

<3, organic_chemist

Cross-posted from my Blogger account.

Episode #39 of The Secrets of Harry Potter is up and available. You may subscribe via iTunes.

This is part three of a three-part series reviewing Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

If you want to interact with the host and his cohorts, feel free to pop over to SQPNConnect, and the Secrets of Harry Potter page.

Enjoy! And please let me know what you think of it. :)

Hahahaha! Now, this is funny.

On Twitter, I follow Warwick Davis, who plays Professor Flitwick in the Harry Potter films. He said he saw Alan Rickman wear an iPod and wondered what songs would Professor Snape have on his iPod playlist.

He queried his Twitter followers and came up with a list. He says the next time he sees Alan, he'll ask him what songs he listens to, and he will post that list on his blog.

Click here to read the list.