This Path

Haggis the Fearsome: Yulebuck lineage

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:53:02 GMT

x-posted from lineage_project

Dragcave Forum Topic Is Here

Now that I finally have the internet again, and with Christmas right around the corner, I thought it would be a good time to open my Haggis the Fearsome lineage up to the public. Haggis the Fearsome is my Yulebuck, and one of my very first eggs (I started DC on Christmas day last year).

I already have a request for a Yulebuck breeding from Haggis on Christmas, so I cannot promise any Yulebuck eggs. I'll be happy to breed him after Christmas if anyone wants an egg from him specifically.

A bit about Haggis (taken from his description):

All Christmas dragons embody the Spirit of Christmas, but there's something slightly off about Haggis. He embodies the Spirit of SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder). Haggis has a chip on his shoulder because he was born with bright red stripes, and all of the other dragons used to laugh and call him names. He constantly got into fights as a hatchling and quickly gained the moniker "Haggis the Fearsome" after defeating the scroll hotshot, Han Sum, in three consecutive schoolyard battles.

Haggis usually smells of strong eggnog, and he loudly bemoans his holly-leaf wings whenever he's drunk. He rails against commercialism and will completely trash any yard he finds decorated with neon reindeer.

Haggis the Fearsome and all of his progeny, including ALL generations, have “So-and-So the Such-and-Such” names. I also cross lineages and am happy to breed with any lineage I have, so long as you keep all lineage names. Several people to whom I have given eggs agreed to breed for folks once upon a time, but you'll have to check with them directly if you want one of their eggs.

Here are the Haggis dragons. Most of mine have descriptions. I have NOT checked them all for inbreeding, so if that's an issue for you, let me know and I'll run them through the inbred check before breeding. Feel free to request a specific dragon/pairing/breed/lineage:

Haggis the Fearsome CB Yulebuck male; lineage patriarch

Curse the Sudden but Inevitable Female skywing; also part of Firefly lineage
*Unnamed Male pebble. I'm particularly proud of his even/double-rare lineage. If you have it, please let me know! Firefly lineage
*River-the-Confused-Assassin Female grey; Firefly lineage; owned by Ahkalia
*Unnamed Female grey; Firefly, Ridiculous, and it looks like possibly Dungeons & Dragons lineages. Owned by Malandar
*Two by Two the Hands of Blue Male grey; Firefly; owned by MrsPlinks

Inara the Ambassador Purple female; Firefly; Buddhist lineage

Haggis the Timid of Crystalmoor Female white stripe; owned by Sscott3825
*Princess Nenya Haggis Misnamed but still counts; unsure of owner. Since she and her children don't carry the lineage name, I won't list them all, but if you have any from this line, feel free to reinstate the naming.

Haggis the Dorkface Black alt male; Dorkface

Rabasa the Demon Child Female white stripe; Demon Child's lineage
*Angel the Demonic Female white; Demon Child's'; Angel lineage
*Hermeth the Peaceful(and unnamed children). Female white. Owner is unlisted, but I have zir in my records.

Hanbi the Dorkface Male vine; Dorkface

Haggis the Ridiculous Male almost-pb daydream; Ridiculous lineage
*Aesir the Ridiculous Daydream Female daydream; Ridiculous

Haggis the Magi Male magi

Haggis the Magnificent Male water
*Haggis the Lost Sailor Male water; Grateful Dead-themed, although it's not necessarily a lineage you have to keep.

Black egg Will be named upon gendering; Grateful Dead-themed.

If you want a Haggis dragon, you MUST keep the naming theme. I really prefer that following generations keep it as well. I was very disappointed to see that the theme was lost along the way, as I went nearly a year keeping it whole! I do understand that these things happen, especially if extras bounce to the AP. I always try to find specific catchers who will keep the theme if I get multi-clutches. If you find that you had one and didn't know, feel free to add yours here and I'll update the list.

WOOT yeah!

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 05:43:14 GMT

Hello!

I'm posting to you from my very own house and my very own internet connection! I've caught up on emails and hope to catch up on the rest of LJ/FB/twitter/etc. sometime in the very near future.

For everyone who has asked and wondered about our new coordinates, thank you so much! I have an 'Emergency Contact' post that is permanently linked in the top of my journal, and my personal information is linked from there. If I know you in real life, or know you for a good while online and you've requested it, then you should be on my 'Emergency Contact' filter and have full access to my address, phone, etc. If you can't see that link and would like to, please let me know.

I have pictures of our new house linked up on a facebook album. I'm not sure if you have to have a fb to access it, but there's the link. Let me know if you can't see it and want to, and I'll either upload some to flickr or just make a proper picture post.

Slowly but surely, we're coming together.

Also, if you'd like to have some posts or phone calls from us, feel free to leave your own personal info in this screened post that is permanently linked in my sidebar.

I miss you.

Missouri Move

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 02:31:55 GMT

Today is December 3. Since I don't have internet and haven't yet found a local hotspot, I'm not sure when exactly I'll be posting this. Before I get into our move, I'd like to just say that I got 39090 on NaNoWriMo by Nov. 30th's midnight. I didn't stop there, since I was in a groove. I wrote until one and got 40 thousand something. I really think I would have won if we hadn't been so incredibly busy with this move and the surprises that came with it. I'm really proud. I beat my NaNo best by three thousand, and I've never actually written 40k on anything ever. I got further plot-wise with my WonderSaga than I did in 36k last year, and I'm still working on it! Yay.

I really thought I'd win though.

At any rate, moving has also been slower than expected. Everything takes way more time and money than we'd anticipated! I've moved a lot in my life, probably more than the normal person. I reckon I've moved at least twenty times in as many years, maybe more. These last eight years in Leicester have been the longest I've ever spent in any one place. I've moved states, but usually I was only in charge of my room. The only time I ever moved states on my own was from Tennessee to North Carolina, and at least then, I was moving in with Josh and his then-girlfriend in an established home.

Being a real-life homeowner is different.

Time and money is the hardest. Josh is the fastest worker you're ever likely to meet, not counting those on coke or speed, and yet we are still puttering along way slower than expected. If not for the bit of money we got from mom, I now know for a fact that it would have been another good ten or twenty years before we ever escaped our little valley in NC. I expected stuff like inspections, home warranties, turning lights on, etc., and that was budgeted into our home buying budget. To an extent, I expected the other expenses, but not on this scale and they were definitely not budgeted. We've probably spent a good ten thousand above and beyond what we thought “buying a house” would cost, though a big chunk of that is moving truck rental and gas back and forth.

The electricity co-op humped us, since the last few months that the other people were here, their power bill jumped from about $80 to over $200. The co-op had to charge twice their monthly bill for our deposit, so that's almost $500 right there, and I'm still paying electricity, cable/internet, mortgage, & lot rent on the other trailer. Whee there, right? (Those should be canceled by the end of the month, if we get back to finish cleaning in time.) In addition to extra cleaning supplies, things to fix leaky sinks & showers, change of doorknobs for every door, etc., we've also had to invest in homeownery-type tools. We bought two chainsaws so we can work on clearing our land together. There's quite a bit to clear out. We bought a pressure washer, which we'll definitely need for cleaning out those old buildings. Josh got a drill, air compressor and nail gun, and various other tools that I'm not quite sure what they're for but Josh swears they've already come in handy.

Time is the other big one. Well, we live a good hour from any sort of Lowe's/Home Depot/Walmart, so when we realize we need something, it's like a half day excursion between shopping time and driving at least two hours to get there and back. Josh's jeep has only plastic in the back windshield, and I think it actually started snowing last night. Very cold business. We have not accomplished anything that we thought would be finished by now.

We tried to get back Saturday (Nov. 28). We made it here more around 1 pm (Central time, not Eastern) Sunday, and that was after driving through the whole night. Unloading the jeep took a chunk of time, and we fed Bo, our new dog that we inherited with the house. He wasn't starving, I'm pleased to say, even though we were held up about 48 more hours than we expected. Then we totally crashed at about six pm.

Instead of getting the house into perfect order, as I thought we'd come in doing, we had to make the long drive into Fredericktown Monday. I had insisted on the sellers putting down a thousand dollar deposit, since we had to wait 30 days for possession after we had bought the house, and we're unfamiliar with such things in NC. We were just too far away to feel completely comfortable handing over all of our money and just waiting. I'm glad we did it, but we had to drive to the realtor's office to sign off so they could get their money back, and then we had to hit Lowes and Walmart while we were in town. I needed a new mop and broom, because we hadn't had room to bring ours. We left it in NC for our next big cleaning trip. I had to buy more dishrags, since mine were all old and gross and used as cleaning rags in the old house. Etc., etc. Got home real late, after buying a pizza since all our kitchen stuff was still packed.

Tuesday and Wednesday, the first days of December, were a lot more productive with cleaning and setting up the house, but it takes so damned long! I worked half a day and only got the top cupboards above the sink clean. Oh my God, for a house that looks so much better than ours, it is SO grungy! I at least shine my sink before I do dishes, and clean my tub before we bathe. How can you clean yourself and your dishes in disgusting tubs? Do they even get clean that way? Flybabies might understand. This sink has never been shined, and I scrubbed the hell out of it. It's as shiny as I can get it, but there's still streaks of something stained down the sides. I don't even think they'd ever wiped the outside of the cupboards, especially around the handles, or the whole disgusting cupboard over the stove. Light switches or outlets, either. I've used innumerable scotchbrite scrubbies and nearly a whole bottle of Greased Lightning just trying to clean the dust and dried gunk off of the cupboards. Thank God that Josh is handling the bathrooms (I love my husband).

Speaking of bathrooms, we had leaks in both, so we knew that Josh would have to come in and fix the showers before any of us could bathe. He's finally got the gunk cleaned from our shower and garden tub, which he swears was grosser than the kitchen gunk, though I'm almost skeptical, that's how bad the kitchen was. I think some things might just be permanently stained, and we'll have to try to replace them if we ever start making money. At any rate, he swears that they're as clean as humanly possible, and he's got the leak fixed but now has to put on a new shower head because we didn't notice how gross the old one was. So not using that. We're all going to get to bathe again today, and even the kids are super-excited about that. They can't wait to try out the garden tub.

When we saw the trash pile they had out back (which they did remove, huzzah) and the half-assed way the additions had been done, we kind of knew that we'd be putting in some work. That's okay. Josh likes fixing things up, but it sucks when they just let a leak go that Josh was able to fix in two and a half hours, including caulk-drying time, or putting in a door so crappily that the insulation needs to be cut out from around it in order to open it. They didn't bother moving their many coat racks when they painted, so when Josh moved the one in Eden's room down so she could reach it, it had the old wallpaper beneath it. That's so lazy it's funny. We look forward to painting it our own way anyway, so that's not so bad. But after they moved, there were suddenly dead ladybugs everywhere, where the windows aren't flush in the rec room - which also isn't insulated very well if at all. Its very cold back there. Josh is going to fill in and weather strip everything that he can, and I've been reading about energy conservation and passive solar heating, so we're using this opportunity to try to make our little home as healthy and efficient as possible.

I think – and I'm not sure, because I can't look it up again to verify everything exactly – but I think the only real requirement for homeschooling in Missouri is to keep a journal/record of what you're doing. I've started that, and I'm also doing a little sketch in the corner of how the sun moves throughout the day. I have the shoddiest memory anyway (which I'm working on), so part of this is to help with all this solar energy through the season stuff I've been reading about, and part is being mindful of what lahermite was telling me when I first started gardening. She was much more aware of the natural order of things than I was, and she showed me a lot about setting up her home and garden, and I saw how she paid super close attention that first year.

The girls are really enjoying being farmgirls more than they'd expected. Ivy was particularly upset by the move, and Eden has always maintained that she was excited but it was still scary. From the first day, she's enjoyed running around outside with a passel of animals trailing after her. She's already bought hunting magazines and is super eager to go hunting in our forest. I told her that we have to learn how to do it legally, and we'll probably have to wait until after the house gets set up, so we might miss this season. Explaining the regulations and trying to learn about them together is a good family & unschooling experience, but she's very unhappy about that. It's nice to see her so eager/

We're still all sleeping on mattresses on the floor (need to find a place to rent a carpet shampooer), so she and sissy have been sleeping side by side in Eden's room. Ivy's still a bit nervous about having their own rooms, but I think she'll do well. That's the only thing she's still not sure about. She wants to stay with sissy, but Eden's old enough to want her own private place, and we have plenty of room for it. Ivy had one accident the night we got here wet the bed, which she'd started doing again before we left NC and we'd a big talk about. She hasn't had any more trouble and is happy staying in her own bed all night while it's next to Eden. I'm hoping she'll be comfortable enough once we get the beds set up. Ivy's going to keep the bunkbeds in her room, and Eden will pick out a new bed. I'm going to let Ivy get a new dresser so she can have something new and pretty to spruce up her room. We're going to paint them eventually and let the girls do them however they want. Eden wants hers pink, and she's already picked out a princess rug she wants, but Ivy's hesitant to do her room. I'm trying to ease her into the excitement of it, but we're not rushing it.

Achaiah, my oldest baby, is indeed meant for the outdoors. When she was a pup, I kept her outside except at night. When we moved to our trailer in Leicester, we weren't allowed to keep animals outside unless we were with them. I'd take her out quite a bit, and when I was in a particularly motivated stretch, we would go for daily walks down our road. I'm as glad to see her frolicking on a bunch of land as I am for the girls. She did well on all three of her rides she joined us on between NC and MO, and she is an exceptionally smart dog. We have a very special bond that I don't think any other relationship has matched. It's hard to explain in words, but I guess most everyone has had an otherworldly bond with a pet at some point. If you haven't, keep adopting and loving and it's bound to happen. Achaiah is happy to run around and roll in the dirt. She's taken very well to Bo. He was waiting for us here, and she jumped out of the truck and raised her hackles, and I just said “No” and petted Bo. That was it, he's part of the pack. She doesn't go near the road, and she stays right with us whenever we take a walk or go exploring.

Bo must not have been around girl dogs, because he's literally been up her ass the whole first few days, and he just doesn't know what to do with himself. We set the animals up with their bowls under one of the awnings on our outbuilding, and we had to give Bo his own big bowl, since he doesn't seem to know how to share. Either that or we did leave him with too little food for too long. He's about twice as big as Achaiah and eats way more than I'd expected. The only fight so far has been about food. He broke Achaiah's automatic feeder bowl and she's pissed at him. He may be twice her size, but she's the big dog in town.

Babyface has done well. She's the stray who adopted us. I was worried about her, after she'd fallen asleep in Josh's jeep without him knowing and woke up as they drove into the lights at the main road. She freaked and jumped out the back, and he realized it was Babyface and tried to find her. She was lost for about five days and came back just in time for our move. We got her a carrier, and she seems happy enough in Missouri, glad to be with us. We let her in once to see the house, and she sniffed at all our things and was happy to go back outside.

Cinder doesn't like it. She's been an inside cat her whole life, who'd been happy enough to escape outside through a whole in one window and go fight Babyface. Now that she's supposed to be outside, she really wants back in. She's too used to being Josh's lap warmer who gets petted all evening long. She's not happy to be outside, and I think it's actually colder here. But it makes her, Babyface, and Sable all get along better now that they all huddle in a warmth pile with Achaiah on the porch at night. Cinder was so funny when we finally let her in to check out the house yesterday morning. She sniffed everywhere with this crazy look and her tail straight up. She seemed satisfied to go back outside once she realized all our stuff was here, and the kids had their beds set up and were playing happily.

Sable, Babyface's kitty that we kept from her litter, is as unhappy as Cinder. At three months, she is apparently also spoiled as a house pet. As I was typing this up, she somehow found a hole and crawled in through our heating vents. Josh had to take it apart to get her out. Good thing we got the nail gun last night, because she broke it a little. I guess that's my fault for letting her come in to warm up this morning, after it got a bit frosty last night. Bo apparently likes to chase her up trees though, and then Josh has to rescue her. They're starting to get along better, but Sable would really much rather stay inside. I'm not letting them, though. I'm too allergic for that, and I want this house to stay nice.

Josh smiles a lot, and he called our home beautiful even as we scrubbed nasty. That's good to see. He can't wait to finish setting everything up so we can start focusing on the land. Me too.

Josh & Cherry

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 21:32:15 GMT

Josh was on his way home, on my bike, and some asshole came flying down the road in his lane. Josh had to take the bike off the road or be run over, and he hit a bank and ended up taking her down in the middle of the road. In the middle of two curves at the crossroads of Gorman Bridge & Old Leicester Hwy, on freshly paved roads. He thinks one or both of his big toes might be broken, and Cherry's windshield is busted (I did need a new one anyway), but he thinks she's otherwise okay. He got her up again just as more cars started coming. The other guy didn't stop.

11 Things

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 18:35:28 GMT

To celebrate 11/11, and also to procrastinate on NaNoWriMo, I have decided to share some more random things about me and my family.

1. I couldn't care less when the clock hits 11:11. No wishes for me; I'll take the stars!

2. Stars and space stuff stays on my desktop, screensaver, & slideshow when I'm working on the WonderSaga. (So that's like two continuous years now. It's grown on me considerably.)

3. I really want to take an astronomy class. And a guitar class.

4. I keep my taskbar at the top of my screen.

5. I've lived in several states, but we've stayed in North Carolina since I was seven. Moving to Missouri is going to be crazy exciting and scary. I'm not even entirely sure how to do it, and we still don't know what's going to happen with our trailer here. That's often our MO (har har), so I'm just hoping it falls into place the right way. Of course, last time we were this unprepared was our wedding, and most of you saw how that went.

6. Josh is super excited about becoming a farmer. I really hope we can swing self-sufficiency, because I'd hate to see him have to fight for jobs in the middle of nowhere, MO. I think he'd make a great farmer though. I'm really glad I ended up with a man who shares my crazy dream.

7. Eden is excited too, but Ivy is very nervous and scared about moving. She's really grown up a lot this past year, and I'm glad she can share her feelings so clearly nowadays. I'm trying to help her through it, as I did this a lot growing up. I understand. I think they're most upset about leaving lahermite and her kids. I am too.

8. Supposedly, we'll be getting a new dog with our new house. It's a white shepherd (the owner said German Shepherd. I'm not sure, but then I've never seen a white one either). Its name is Jasper. That's the name of Josh's old dog, from Achaiah's litter, who was poisoned a few years back. At the time, we thought it was parvo, but then several dogs in mom's neighborhood had been poisoned, and we'd stayed with her at the time.

9. I've been feeling my mom a lot lately. I don't know if it's because of Grandma's passing, or the thinness of the veil around Halloween. I didn't do a real ceremony, but I opened up myself for a journey as I laid in bed on Halloween. I got to visit mom. It seems like she's been staying around a bit more since then.

10. Last night, my NaNo wordcount was 18776. I'm doing better this year than I have any of the others. This is my third attempt at the WonderSaga, though the first one was half-hearted, and I'd actually done about 2,000 words on an unrelated story the year before that. I guess that would have been 05, and I'd just learned about NaNo in October. Last year, I went all month long for the first time, even though I didn't hit 50k. I think I might actually win this year, if I stay on track.

11. I think the reason I'm not on track right now is because I slept in, and now I'm not dressed to the shoes. I'm still trying to be a decent flybaby (it's my only hope for moving and doing NaNo at the same time). Now that Josh isn't working, he's actually giving silent prods when I forget, by getting his shoes on and making the bed. He encourages me to work on NaNo as long as I want, but we get into a good routine together. I love him! Things are going to work out fine. Time to get my shoes on and help make it happen.

On Your Mark, Get Set, NaNo!

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 18:32:53 GMT

I'm off to a good start! Day 1's word quota is 1667, and I'm already at 2221. Not as far as I wanted to be, but I'm on a pretty good roll. I hope to knock out as much as possible today, with a personal goal of hitting 5,000.

I'm going to share an excerpt! I'm making it public since some non-livejournal friends would like to read it. Livejournal buddies, please let me know if you want on my NaNo filter, because the rest of it will likely remain locked, if I post any more.

Remember, NaNo is about quantity and not quality. You are forewarned.

Tabby King gripped her seat as the shuttle began its descent to Akupara. Looking into space made her gut drop, but she leaned forward as much as she could to see around her husband. They approached the generation ship for landing, and somehow it seemed to her that they were coming in upside down. She gasped and closed her eyes, reoriented, and tried to look again.

The ship itself was a giant torus that circled around a central hub to provide artificial gravity in the torus' living quarters. To Tabby, it looked like a giant metal bicycle wheel spinning slowly in space. It looked huge even from afar, although she knew that as a ship meant to leave the solar system, it was much smaller than the original Lagrange Colony. She almost wished she'd been able to see that first wonder of New Earth, but it's not like they were the usual space tourists. To be honest, Tabby had never truly believed that their family would be chosen for the Akupara project. Her husband was a carpenter – a good carpenter, but in no way affiliated with ISACC. None of them had even been to space before.

ISACC, the International Space And Colonization Coalition, had opened up the generation ship project to a limited number of laborers, tourists, dignitaries, and refugees after their initial crew had been filled. Noah had always yearned to see the space habitats, where Earth was being reborn in her true glory. Tabby had hoped his dream would be realized, but the application process was so stringent that she felt they were really only going through the motions. They were beyond lucky to have been chosen. Now the King family found themselves seated on a space shuttle with people like former Senator Andrew Lange and Princess Jacqueline March, King James' granddaughter. That was just as surreal as flying through space.

The kids squealed excitedly as Akupara grew larger before them, and Eli's face was beaming so brightly that it helped calm her own fears down. As they neared the hub, they could see through the inner windows that formed the ceiling of the habitat. It was an awesome sight, looking down into a great forest bisected by a river. There were even little mountains that bloomed with bright tropical flowers. The window was tinted against the sunlight that reflected from Akupara's giant solar mirror, but she could still see the vibrancy in the life growing below. It looked nothing like any part of Earth she'd seen.

“Daddy, look!” Eli cried. Misty leaned back so her father could peer up out of the window.

Noah stared for several moments before leaning back in his seat with a grin and a great, contented sigh. “You can see the opposite side of the torus far above. It's...” He shook his head.

“Do I want to see?”

“No.” Noah grinned. “There's a giant lake up there. Might be the Salt Sea. It looks like it's just hanging there.” He squeezed her hand.

“It's pretty cool, mom,” Misty said.

“No thank you.” Tabby didn't try to look out of the window again after that.

“Ladies and gentleman, this is Captain Harrold. We are coming into Akupara. It's 8:13 am local time, and the start of what promises to be a bright and sunny day. May it also be the start of a bright and sunny future for you. We here at ISACC AIR thank you for flying with us, and we thank you for your service to humanity. May the Lord God bless and keep you.”

The landing went without incident. The pilot was smooth, and they didn't even feel a bump until the landing gear grabbed hold of the shuttle. The attendants unbuckled first and floated out, which was met with a round of happy applause. They reviewed the rules for disembarking and reminded everyone not to push off too hard when coming to the front. Tabby was glad they were near the back, so she could watch how to do it. They'd had simulations during training, but it didn't seem quite the same.

The first row unbuckled first, most disembarking in pairs. Up front was where the dignitaries sat. There was Princess Jacqueline – or Countess, or something – and another Lord of the British royal family. He was extended family of Jacqueline's, she knew, though she wasn't sure how. Senator Lange and his wife were seated next to a Mexican diplomat and his wife. The rest of passengers were auxiliary crew like she and Noah, or wealthy retirees who bought condos to retire among the stars. Misty and Eli were the only children on the shuttle. Crew had been brought to the ship in waves over the years, and Tabby knew there were some kids already living on board. A few would also be coming on the last shuttle, but that was for the tribal refugees, and they'd not had a chance to meet them yet. With only two hundred twenty three colonists, she wasn't sure how many were children. She hoped there were some boys Eli's age.

Disembarking took a bit longer than she expected. Each row took between ten and fifteen minutes, unstrapping both themselves and their carry-ons before floating to the front to exit up through the ceiling. Inevitably, someone would push off either too hard and go flying or too softly and not make it. It had almost been an hour when it was finally their turn. Tabby erred on the side of pushing off too softly, since there were other seats for her to push from up ahead. At thirteen, Misty made it up easily without help. Noah followed, helping five year old Eli.

One attendant took her bag and passed it up to the other attendant before doing the same thing with Tabby herself. Tabby floated up into the entry hub of Akupara. The other flight attendant waited, one foot hooked through floor railing that kept her in place. She pulled Tabby up and helped her find a wall railing to hold onto. “Thank you,” Tabby said with a wan grin as she took her bag. She pulled herself along the rail and out of the way of the door before looking around.

About two dozen people were already in the room. Most held on to railings, some clinging carefully like Tabby and others with a foot or leg cocked through a rail, like the attendant. A few intrepid souls pushed off the walls and spun through the air, while one grinning woman hung from another rail along the ceiling. Tabby felt a wave of relief when Noah and Eli reached her, and Noah kept Misty from joining the woman on the ceiling.

“Welcome aboard!” A woman in uniform floated up on her right, offering a hand to shake. Tabby recognized her as General Audrey Mills, the Captain of Akupara.

“Thank you, Captain,” Tabby said, then also shook the hand of the man who floated up behind her. She knew from pictures that this was the Captain's husband and Second-in-Command, Jackson Mills. They hadn't met any Akuparan officials before, but they'd learned about them all in orientation.

“It's good to have you guys aboard,” Captain Mills said, smiling at Eli as he solemnly shook her hand. “We'll do our best to have you settled in as quickly as possible.”

The captain's word was good. She gave a very brief welcome speech before escorting them out of the landing room. Like the flight attendants, Captain Mills reminded them how to safely exit the hub and move to the rotation corridor. They were in a small room that was only a tiny portion of the hub itself. As the stationary portion of the ship, the hub was huge and also housed areas for null-G research and recreation. A large hallway rotated around the hub, with eight elevator entries that led down into different sections of the torus. Since that portion was always rotating, there were special doors that opened up into it. It was a bit like an elevator. They pushed a button and waited for a green crossing light, which came on as the opening slots circled around. Long rectangular doors pulled back, and as many people as possible pushed through before the warning light came on, signaling that the slot was about to end. The slots were about a dozen meters long and spaced out every dozen meters. It took two slot passes for everyone to make it through.

“All right,” Captain Mills said once they were gathered in the rotation hall. “Please remember that children are not permitted in null gravity areas without a supervising adult. Anyone else is welcome to use the facilities at any time. We'll take you down to your respective sections and see you settled in. Your belongings have all been delivered to your homes or dorms. I know space lag can be a doozy, so we'll have the official launch party the day after tomorrow. Until then, if you're up to it, feel free to take the river tour or explore on your own.” She looked around the group and smiled. “Now, everyone stationed in NW-N or N-NE, follow me. Everyone in the southern sections will accompany Colonel Mills.”

There were about fifteen people, including the Kings, who followed the Captain to the northern sections. Tabby's family would start off living in the NW-N section, which was where the administration and main city were located. As a carpenter, Noah would eventually be allowed to build their own home. Until then, they would live in the dorms in Ellis City.

“It's easiest for all of us to go down in the North elevator,” Captain Mills explained. There were no actual directions in the torus, since it was just a giant hoop, except those created by the divisions of the elevators. The place where each elevator met the ground was designated as a directional node. Eight elevators subdivided the torus into according to the cardinal and intermediate directions, so the North elevator essentially marked Akupara's north pole.

They entered an enormous freight elevator, and Tabby was surprised to find herself staring at enormous red letters warning, “DOWN!” She found the nearest handrail and oriented herself so that her feet faced that direction. There was some shuffling and giggling before everyone was settled properly and the captain started the elevator. A print reader assured that children would not venture into this off-limits area.

It was a very long trip down, and everyone slowly began to bob a bit lower in the air. It was an odd feeling, the feeling of gravity slowly returning to one's body. Her feet were hovering about a foot and a half above the floor when Tabby's ears gave a mighty pop. A moment later, the elevator shaft opened up into clear plexiglass, allowing breathtaking views of the habitat below. The elevator connected at North Node Island, which sat within a fork of the great river. On one side, mountains rose on either side of the river, which forked again farther off in the distance. The mountains were full of thick, lush trees and topped with vibrant flora, looking like an exotic wilderness. Tabby took a deep breath and pushed off the wall, bobbing across for a view out the far window. On that side, she could see an orchard on one side of the river fork, and the bustling Ellis City below on the other.

She looked around in wonder until her feet were firmly on the elevator floor and the doors opened up into the second of humanity's New Earths. As she stepped out, she took a deep breath. The air didn't smell stagnant or recycled. It smelled like soil and flowers, with a musky undercurrent that spoke of sweat, dung, and life. Even though Earth's biospheres had finally started coming down twenty years earlier, Real Earth was nothing compared to this New Earth. It didn't smell like this. Somehow, ISACC had created an Eden that would allow both humans and animals to thrive. Tabby was not the only one who cried as she stepped out into her new life.

NaNoWriMo 2009

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 01:05:52 GMT

Three hundred years after a near-apocalyptic world war, the people of Earth have created space habitats in order to survive the death of the planet. In 2626, the world's first generation ship is completed. The WonderSaga follows the 223 people who leave our solar system for the very first time.

I believe this is my third go round on the WonderSaga. Last year I made about of 35,000 words, which I'm pretty sure is the most I've ever written on anything. Given what a hard year last year was, and since I wrote all through November, I consider 2008 my win for my goal of “completing National Novel Writing Month.” This year, my goal is to win National Novel Writing Month. Despite the fact that we're supposed to be moving to Missouri, I really think I can make 50,000 words by the end of the month. *knock on wood*

I think I know my characters pretty well (the main ones I worked on last year, anyway), and this time I actually have some broad plot lines worked out. I've been piddling around on backstories and bios for two years now, so I'm really excited about writing and not wandering this year.

My cursor on my new laptop seems to spontaneously jump into the middle of paragraphs I've already written, so that will add an extra little dollop of challenge.

I've updated my super awesome NaNo Space Soundtrack. I've gotten profiles for everyone, I think, who volunteered their names for characters in this post.

Is anyone else participating? Or if you'd like to follow along as a supporter, let me know and I'll add you to my NaNo filter. If you can see this post, you're already on my filter. (Feel free to also let me know if you want off.)

Thank You

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 14:56:09 GMT

Thank you all for all of your prayers and well-wishes.

My grandma's service was lovely. I hope to get some time to do a proper post. There's a lot to get out.

I miss her.

We packed up Tuesday to head home, and then we realized that our farm closing was this Friday. Today! So we headed to Missouri to be there in person. We even made it in time for Josh to be present for the inspection. Our most major issue is that we'll have to redo the septic. I can't seem to get away from the icky streams! We're still going to buy it...today at 4 pm central time. Woot.

I'm glad we're here in person, but I really wish it hadn't taken grandma's death to get my ass out here. :/

Well, just thought I'd keep you posted. Hopefully I'll see everyone again soon.

House Hunting Update

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 20:20:33 GMT

Well, looks like it's a no-go with our first choice. They weren't willing to pay the closing costs if we accepted their full offer, and we weren't willing to pay our full budget for a house where we'd still need to build outbuildings and an addition.

So, time to regroup and refocus. We have two second-choices, so now we have to decide which to offer on. I guess I need to call and make sure they're both still available. I do feel confident that we'll get a farm. If those fall through though, I'll just focus on finding a cheap lot for this trailer and getting that set up. The rest of my money can grow for a while, and maybe we'll be able to afford more on the next go round.

Either way, I still see this working for us. Thank you guys so much for all of your support!

Random Things

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 14:33:13 GMT

Here is a post that is not just about finances or house buying. I've been preoccupied lately, so I'm trying to stay connected.

* They say money doesn't buy happiness, but since we've gotten the money and started shopping for our dream-farm, I have to say that my depression is waning. I still get very sad and feel guilty about being excited. I'm also sad & feel guilty that I never got to go do the vision quest I was planning, and now suddenly it's fall here in the mountains. I'm going to start meditating again, and I think I'm going to make Josh take us up to Sam's Knob and let me have at least a full day walking around by myself before we leave.

* I've gotten the house mostly back in order from our trips, and I've been a good little Flybaby each day while Josh is as work. I'm culling through our things and we will soon (today?) be in the packing stage. I'm being optimistic and seeing the house thing go through.

* Amidst all this madness, I'm considering trying NaNoWriMo yet again. I've never hit 50,000, but I've always had fun and gotten a bit further in my WonderSaga. I would hopefully be in the throws of moving, but we'll see.

* It occurred to me that if my story were ever a movie, I'd want that guy who plays Sam Winchester to play my favorite character. Now I'm fangirling over my own character.

* I did an intro post in the NaNoWriMo community, and I wrote the sentence “I'm recovering from grief by making all of my dreams come true.” I think this is very apt, and it might become my new mantra.

* If this Missouri house thing doesn't work out, it will be time for me to register our homeschool here in NC. I've been holding off, hoping we'd move first. Eden is six and a half now, so if we don't move in the next month or two, I'll have to go through the red tape here.

* She just showed me her drawing notebook. She has lots of pictures of the family, including all the animals. She also has lots of pictures of me and Josh riding motorcycles. I thought that was awesome.

* I feel mom a lot lately. Nothing specific; I just feel her around. I'm glad for that.

New Filter

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:53:37 GMT

I just posted to my new finances filter. If you can't read that post and would like to be able to, please let me know.

Illinois/House Hunting Trip

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 03:06:51 GMT

This is the rundown. Pics will come later.

* Missouri is gorgeous. We definitely want to move there.

* The house we originally went to see was somewhat misrepresented. It looks like there's just way too much work needing to be done to make it worth the asking price, and the owner is apparently not as willing to negotiate as she said she was over the phone. We came away from that feeling very sad.

* We came back through and visited three more properties on the way home. One is seriously under consideration, although both the neighborhood and the entire town were awfully littered with trash. I mean debris piles abandoned everywhere and the woods appear to be a favorite trash can for pop bottles and old tires – and worse things at one of the homes. Josh would really like to live in the one nice house we found (10 acre, 3 bd, 2 ba permanent MH with additions), but I'm not sure I can get past the massive trashiness of the general area.

* We will probably be looking online for more Missouri properties and planning another (better prepared) trip out there for viewings.

* So looks like I'll have to up my housing budget if we want any kind of good home. That sucks, because I need money for other things like fixing our teeth and the trailer we do have.

* Grandma seemed much better after we arrived. As Josh put it, she got her rosiness back and a bounce in her step. He's agreed to let me look for a cheap fixer-upper in her area of IL, so I can have a place to go stay closer to her more often.

* She is getting much worse with her memory, which saddens me. Grandma was always so sharp. She still is, to an extent. I don't mind hearing the same stories several times in a row. She has awesome stories.

* Grandma finally admitted that she thinks she had a mild stroke while she was down here while mom died. She described what happened to her, and it broke my heart. I am praying that she recovers better. I'm really afraid of what happens if her memory worsens instead of improves.

* She can tell you anything that happened fifty years ago or more, though. Twice, she told us about some lady who pissed her off sixty-five years ago, and I finally understand where I got my temper from.

* I will never attempt another vacation with my sister. It was actually one of the worst vacations we've ever had, until she went bat-shit for no good reason and caught a plane home. Things immediately improved for us. That makes me sad. She didn't even show any gratitude for any of the stuff we went out of the way to do so she could come. She just bitched and was disrespectful to all of us the whole time. We probably won't be speaking for a while, to be honest.

* On the plus side, my other sister had her offer on a house accepted during the week! She's waiting for the inspection to go through, and then she should be closing early next month. She'll be in Wilmington, but she's always wanted to live at the beach and so I'm happy for her. She's still not happy for me and Missouri, but oh well.

* Babyface, the new outside cat, had her kittens while we were gone. Josh will have to find them. We think they're up under the shed, which means that it'll need to be emptied out and somehow jacked up so he can get to them before they go feral. On the plus side, now that I have some cash, I'll be able to get Babyface fixed just as soon as allowed after having her litter.

* Bikers in Illinois do not wear helmets. It scares me to no end. I kept getting flashbacks of poor Momma's head. Even if I lived there, I would never travel seventy miles an hour with no helmet. I was seriously so scared the whole time, and they were everywhere.

* Some asshole at the knife store (Davis Specialties, I think) in Clinton, Iowa had the nerve to call me a bad mother – directed at Eden! They had each taken one of his lollipops and we were fixing to go eat lunch next door, so I told them they couldn't have a second. He gave one to Ivy behind my back, and I saw her opening one and took it away. She started crying, so I led her out the door, since that's what I do when my kids start pitching a fit in public. As I was heading out, I heard him say, “She's a bad momma, huh?” or something like that (might have been “isn't she?”) I yelled, “Excuse me?” and then hollered for Josh to get Eden, as I would have gone on a rampage and unplugged his oxygen tank and thrown it in his face. Josh didn't buy anything, and he'd been wanting to go back to that store since we found it two years ago.

* Lyz then started shit with me for actually getting upset about that, so then she and I got into a fight. A few days later, Josh convinced me to go back to that store and promised that he would defend my honor and give that guy a stern talking to. He ended up spending 45 minutes browsing and then telling dude on the way out that his wife was mad about what he'd said the other day (without even mentioning what that was, by the way). This caused an enormous fight between us. I still haven't forgiven him, and likely never will. This makes three or four times that someone has seriously insulted me and Josh never defends me.

* My kids, who had been having some behavioral problems in the weeks leading up to the trip, only got worse on the trip. They don't listen for shit anymore. Things did improve though once Lyz left and we didn't have her constant bitching and passive-aggressive whining egging them on. They're both still getting physically violent, though. Two nights in a row I grounded them and we didn't get to swim in the pool they made me shell out for.

* This means I don't want to take anymore family vacations for a very long time. So we'll have to find a babysitter for several days if Josh and I want to go look at more properties. It's hard concentrating on the houses when I'm having to corral the kids and keep them acting half-way decent.

* There were other issues that I may address in a friends-locked post. This was seriously not our best vacation ever, but Grandma asked me to hurry and I went straight there as soon as I could. I don't regret it. Visiting my family really helped recenter me and allowed me to regroup a little bit in ways that I haven't been able to since my mommy was here. I really need to be closer to them. Even when it's bad, being with them so helps my sanity. Grandma means the world to me, and my cousin Cole has been one of my best friends forever. My aunts and uncles are legion and the coolest.

Garden Adventures

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 18:56:04 GMT

x-posted

I joined the gardening community not too long ago, and it's been inspiring me to get back on track with my garden. I've been sharing our adventures with my facebook friends, but I thought I should share here on lj too.

Right now we live in Western North Carolina, in a mobile home that's on roughly a half acre lot. We're using the smaller side of our yard for our garden. I've tried and failed at gardening several times over the years, but I've really tried to buckle down this past year. We're currently in the process of trying to buy a home. Our dream has always been to have a self-sufficient farm, so it was really important to me that I harvest something besides way too many radishes (my only success until now). Our children are old enough that they've been a big help, both in the garden and in making sure I get out there regularly. I haven't been working this past year and we unschool, so we've had a lot of time to devote to it.

We started planting right at the end of March, and then the last snow hit on April 1. We covered the onion bed and the salad bed, but the salad bed didn't make it. It took me three more tries, with inside germination, before we finally got that salad bed to take. Our tomatoes and peppers are pretty late, but we've had plenty of lettuce. I also learned to stagger my lettuce planting from now on, because we're running out just as the cherry tomatoes started ripening.

The only really good picture from the snow.

I have a little kinship with turtles, so my husband is making this meditation seat for me out of leftover tiles. He'll eventually finish her up and add some water with the blue tile up in the corner.

Side view.

Josh built a bamboo fence for our rose garden. Those roses were the last gift from my mother, for our wedding in May of 2008.

This was our second year with a compost pile, and I think that really made a difference in our productivity.

This started as a place for the beans, but only the sunflowers really took. I also planted some strawberries somewhere in there, but I got busy and it got overgrown with weeds, and I'm not sure if they ever came up.

The sunflowers are in the back, and another flower I don't know in the flat there. My sister brought these for us.

The onion bed.

I've never even really liked onions, but my ultimate goal was to provide both salad and salsa makings.

A little garden lizard we had, but I think one of the neighborhood's stray cats ate him. We didn't have very good luck with critters this year.

Eden begged for a wheelbarrow, but she had to pull Ivy around for a week before we could use it for the garden.

In May, we had some pretty hard rains that mucked up the garden and killed my second or third attempt at the salad bed.

The herbs I planted didn't take, but we started germinating in the house while it stayed rainy.

The week of our anniversary, our marriage-roses were about to bloom.

The sunflowers were tall but overrun with weeds.

The 'salad bed'.

The onion bed was doing all right, though a few bulbs washed out.

We found volunteer mystery squashes that we assume came from the compost.

Garlic

A month after we began our reclamation process, I've got herb beds laid out.

And cilantro is growing. I'll need to stagger that better next year, too.

The rose/herb bed is almost laid out.

Josh had one tiny bean plant growing.

A cluster of lettuces. Me and the girls filled up some crystals with sunshine and reiki and set them out in the plots to encourage them to grow.

About to thin and transplant lettuces. The onion bed is on its way to becoming the squash bed.

Some more hard rains knocked around our onions, but we hilled them back up and threw some humus on them.

My three garlic plants did well. That middle one started wilting early, though.

My youngest, Ivy, after our humus adventure. She loves that stuff.

The girls measure our squash. We tried to train the big one out of the plot.

We weren't sure if it was acorn or pumpkin at this point. It was acorn.

I got overzealous and harvested that first garlic & a good sized onion for some salsa.

The lettuces and tomatoes finally took, though this wasn't until the end of June. We found some volunteer tomatoes in the compost pile and transplanted those over. They did much better in the sun.

First harvest! The onion is on the left, and the garlic's on the right.

Eden dug The Best Hole Ever. She was seriously proud of this hole.

My roses.

A friend gave me a recipe for stuffed squash blossoms. You use the male flowers, so we had a little lesson on telling males from females. This is a female.

Male flower. These are what we harvested.

Second harvest!

Ivy helped me transplant our mint.

The sunflowers started blooming.

The squash only kept getting bigger.

Darkening

Another visitor. Unfortunately, we apparently squished him and his buddies when we stood on the log to water the salad bed. We felt pretty bad once we found them.

More harvesting, and you see where the girls liked to balance...and the hole the frogs apparently lived in.

The very first of the salad harvest.

Josh, harvesting our biggest squash.

They will eat all this stuff up if they help pick it. (Dad too.) Hooray!

The lettuces finally started filling out.

Josh caged up the bigger tomatoes with extra bamboo.

Yummy.

My least favorite of the four varieties we planted.

We bought the girls their very own cherry tomato plant, since none of their seeds took either. I promised Eden that she would finally love tomatoes if she'd just try one sun-warmed from the vine.

I also bought myself a few pepper plants, since I never had luck with those either.

Unfortunately, something started attacking my squashes.

We did get a cabinet full, and plenty to share with friends and family.

We had both bugs and mold. I had planted a yellow squash, too, but they hit during a very busy week and I didn't get to them in time. They were eaten up fast.

The cat that insisted she was ours. This is one of the neighborhood strays, and my girls finally named her Babyface and somehow we're apparently keeping her. Oh, and she's apparently pregnant. We'll be fixing that possibility again as soon as she has them.

The flowers that my sister gave me, which neither of us know what they are.

Everything got enormous. I pinched the lettuces to try to keep them longer, but I really didn't mess with the tomatoes.

This is the lettuce we got the most of.

Those spiky ones got up to my hip before bolting.

I like the redder leafed one best (top). I think they were some sort of buttercrunch, or at least the bottom one.

My bell peppers are late to the game, but trucking along.

Within a week or two of finding those bugs, the squashes were demolished. We picked some off by hand, but we had some other things going on and pretty much had to leave it.

I'm just glad my garlic is okay.

Ew! Pretty sure these are squash bugs, and we had some caterpillar problems, too.

We're looking forward to sunflower seeds.

Cilantro blooming.

Our mint is happy to be in the ground.

We have white as well as red roses. That bag in the back holds coffee grounds from Starbucks, which I get a good deal of since my sister works there. Josh also talked me into using a bit of Miracle Grow. I'm hoping that doesn't shoot down my organic philosophy.

A few of the onions. A lot of them stayed pretty small, thanks to those squashes. Next time I'll make an extra plot for volunteers. We did get a decent enough harvest for a family that is only venturing into onion-eating.

We had many nights of dinner that looked like this! I wish my carrots had taken, but it's not bad for our first successful try.

Yay, Erotica!

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 14:01:42 GMT

Tomorrow through Saturday, circletpress will be having an author chat with Elizabeth Schechter.

I have read Circlet Press and I have read Elizabeth Schechter. Good stuff! I can even happily claim to have written with her, and she is loads of fun. Check it out.

Go, ladysmith!

How Do You Manifest?

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 17:32:26 GMT

I would love to hear what your favorite manifestation technique is.

I'm a very visual person, so I like making vision boards & manifestation grids. Vision boards are basically like big collages of things that symbolize your goals. A manifestation grid is the same thing, with the addition of adding reiki symbols. You can draw symbols (CKR & DKM are the ones I usually use, though often I will throw in a HSZSN vertically and horizontally). This also prompts you to put added energy towards your goals every time you pass by or glance at it.

What do you do when you really want to see something come to fruition in your life?

It's Settled.

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 21:32:47 GMT

Our wrongful death case is officially settled.

Legally, I'm not allowed to speak about specifics. I will say it was less than we hoped, but that's part of the whole 'mediation' thing. We're all just glad it's finally over and done with.

Next week we go to speak to someone about structured annuities, which would give us money every year and help keep that money tax-free (as opposed to if we just took a lump some and invested it ourselves). Josh and I have some decisions to come to before then. Mainly, I think we want to move. Our neighborhood has been getting steadily worse since new landlords took over, so we need to get out. I need to get away from this place, because everywhere around Asheville is just too full of mom.

But we have time.

Thank you guys so, so much for all your prayers and support during all this.

♥

Rheims?

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 12:54:03 GMT

Has anyone here visited Rheims, or are you particularly versed in the area? I need to pick someone's brain (very lightly) for my story.

Thanks!

Isn't Floss Amazing?

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 15:29:48 GMT

I love my daughters. Eden and I just had the best conversation about floss.

"Mom! Mom! Look at this! There's a pulley inside here. You see? And you pull the floss, and then it has this thing over here, which is kinda like scissors but you don't have to snip. You just pull and...Snap! Presto! You have a piece of floss! Isn't it amazing? It's got simple machines inside."

"That really is amazing! I'm glad you like flossing so much."

"Yeah, cause a pulley is a simple machine. And look, you stick it in your teeth and wiggle it, and it's kinda like doing the wedgie dance in your teeth."

Bike Update

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 02:06:55 GMT

I've had my bike for two weeks now, and it is officially my ride. I'm fairly good on it at this point. Other bikers give me the neato biker wave. I'm a happy camper, but she still needs a name.

The Bike

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 17:49:42 GMT

The bike needs a name. I'm still a bit bumbly on her, so I don't feel we're really speaking to each other yet. Josh is threatening to name her out from under me. I'm improving though, so I think she'll have a name soon.

My learning-to-ride saga has been fun. I'll admit, I was quite scared. Everybody asked me, “Well, have you at least ridden a dirt bike or Josh's mini-bike or anything?” Nope. I never even got the hang of roller blades. Balance and me have never done well. I would have started learning on Josh's mini-chopper, but it's broken.

My bike is nice though. When I first sat on it to try everything out before we bought it, I was surprised at how light it is. It's a Honda Shadow just like Josh's, but Josh's is much heavier. We thought this was a pretty good bike for me to learn on. My feet sit flat on the ground when I'm on her, and she's all dented up so I don't have to be too afraid of learning on her (unlike Josh's mint-condition bike). I thought it was light, but boy, my upper body has been feeling the work-out of learning to hold her up and steer her!

The first day was, well, I sucked. By the time we got it home and got me out on it, it was already pretty late. I only had about half an hour or forty minutes to play around before it got dark. Josh taught me the basics, and I'm pretty sure he was surprised at just how basic my lessons needed to be. Josh had at least ridden one once and looked at magazines for years, so he knew pretty well much how they worked. He had to teach me how to turn it on, the brakes, I didn't even know motorcycles don't have reverse (which is why it's such a work out pushing that thing around). So yeah, my first day sucked hardcore, but at least Josh was nice and patient about it. Keia laughed a lot, but Josh said he didn't do much better the first time he road Josh's mini-bike, and he'd also ridden dirt bikes before.

So anyways, day one was a lot of start-stop, start-stop. I couldn't control how much gas I was giving her, so once I started going, I was going. Then I'd get scared and slam the hand brake, then I'd bow up like a dog taking one, then struggle to keep the bike up &/or not hitting anyone. Finally, we just kept it in neutral and Josh held on to the sissy bar like he had to do with Ivy on her bike, and I practiced trying to steer and keep her up as we went down the driveway. Then he'd walk me through turning her around, and I'd actually drive back up the driveway. I got okay controlling the gas if I was driving up our slight little incline, but since I couldn't really stop, I could not give her gas while going downhill. It wasn't bad for the first day though, even if I felt bad about Josh holding on to us. He didn't want me to crash first thing though, and I did eventually get better at steering.

The second day, we felt comfortable enough to practice on the long stretch of dirt road just below our house. I had to get better at stopping somehow, and I needed more room to work than our driveway gave. At first, I just practiced going slowly with my feet hanging down, so I could just stop with neutral & my feet. Eventually, I got comfortable enough controlling the throttle to be able to put my feet up. I even managed to stop on my own just before getting to the hilly part of the road. Then I put it in neutral so I could coast down the hill again, and that's when we went down. It had rained the night before and washed a little groove between some rocks on the dirt road (mountain dirt roads, for those not familiar with them, always wash out in even the slightest rain). I hit wet sandy dirt and lost control. I felt myself lose control and panicked, slamming the handbrake. I went down hard on my knee (on a rock), and the bike landed on me.

We hadn't even been out there an hour before I laid her down. Only problem is, she'd been laid down several times before (all those dents that made it a good “learning bike” ), so the foot peg was a little loose already. Well it did some funky bending thing into my gears and stopped wanting to go into neutral. I was hobbling and hurt fairly decently – although going down was not near as bad as I thought it was going to be, at least not at that speed – but Josh wanted to take it into the shop to make sure it was okay. I wanted to keep going, but even he was having trouble with neutral, and he flat-out refused to let me back on it til we were sure it was safe. I'm not normally the type of lady who lets her husband make flat-out refusals on my own things, but I actually found it incredibly sweet.

So I followed him up to the closest bike shop, where we'd bought supplies but, so help me, I will never take it there for work again. It had only messed up with neutral once on the way up, but Josh still wanted to get it looked at. It was pretty busy, so they guy said we'd have to leave it. It was 24 hours before they even put it up on their rack and looked at it, and I had stopped by and called to tell them I'd pay whatever for overnight shipping on parts or whatever so I could get my bike back right away. I was so pissed when I called the next morning and they hadn't even looked at it yet. We went to go pick it back up, because I'm not putting up with that shit, and they'd looked at it and said there was really no problem. Whatever. The guy's a punk. We took it across town to MR Honda and bought some of those crash bar things, just in case, and the guy there looked at it and in like two minutes of wiggling told Josh that the connector pad thing was just rusty. He came home to put the crash bar thing on and just had to take a little sandpaper to the pad before he put it back together. Bike worked fine.

I had no idea how expensive bike stuff is, either. Ten dollars for oil? Two hundred for the piece of metal you put on just to dent up, instead of the bike? Ridiculous. I'm glad Josh already had me a helmet, and I was able to find boots on sale at K-mart for fifteen bucks instead of a hundred and fifty. It's insane!

Anyway, my pretty little bike is back and wasn't even really messed up to begin with. And I'm barely limping, so back to riding! After Josh got my ~~training wheels~~ crash bar situated, we went up to a wee little community center over the mountain from our house. It's one of those tiny things way out in the boonies where there are rarely cars and I've never seen a cop that far. This is my practice lot. I practiced first gear and stopping, and the dreaded turning. I say dreaded because leaning over on those things really scares me. Since it's a small lot, too, I don't have any room to get out of first even though I now want to, so doing slow turns was tricky. I mastered that shit last night, though! I am now ready to find a bigger parking lot and move up to shifting. Hopefully I can still do all right stopping when I'm moving much faster. We're going on recon today to find a suitably large and abandoned lot, so wish me luck on that for 4th of July Saturday. Ha! I may have to just wait until next week, since I was unable to make it to the DMV for my permit yesterday like I thought I would.

That's where it's at. I've gotten exponentially better each day, and I've really only spent an hour on it most the longest time. Pretty soon I'll be ready for riding the road! We're both looking forward to being able to ride together. It's been a dream of ours for years. It's going to be another year or so before we can afford sidecars, which are also way more expensive than I expected, but at least Josh and I will get some practice riding together before we attempt to take out the girls. They're anxious too, though. We can't wait! I'm so glad we're actually on our way to getting goals accomplished. It's a good thing right now.

Squee!

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 13:12:21 GMT

My facebook friends already know what I've been up to, so I thought I'd better share with all my friends. Guess what I did!

Mine is the red one. Josh's is the blue one in the back (her name is CC, and he got her last year). Both are Honda Shadows (mine's an 89, Josh's is a 94).

I don't know her name yet. And once I know what I'm doing, I'll actually post riding pics.

Josh & CC

Naamah's Kiss

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 21:43:16 GMT

I really enjoyed Naamah's Kiss. I especially liked seeing Moirin's childhood with her mother, and getting more insight into the Maghuin Dhonn.

I actually wish we'd gotten to see a little more, but what we saw was good. I thought the whole thing with Cillian was beautifully done. I could remember all that passion from my first love, only I respected Moirin more for her decision just before the cattle raid. I cried. I look forward to more Moirin books, and I hope she's not still reviled when she finally goes home.

As always, I loved getting more insight into D'Angeline culture – especially the priesthood. The bits she spent with her father were probably some of my very favorite passages. I know her time with Cillian's family helped her ease into the bustling City life a bit better, but I still thought she acclimated a bit easily. Getting purse snatched and hit by a carriage is pretty logical for a backwoods girl, so I guess I was just peeved when Raphael swooped in to “rescue” and debut her right away. I guess there was a lot of ground to cover though, so just a minor annoyance.

I really enjoyed the interesting triangle with Moirin, Raphael, & Jehanne. That was pretty delightful, and I'm glad I actually ended up liking Jehanne better. The summonings were interesting enough, and I did like how Moirin saw them all differently and got on better with them. I thought it was cool that demons were so taken with her courtesy while the others were trying to force their bidding. Attitude makes a difference!

I also really enjoyed Master Lo Feng and his energy work. As a Reiki Master, I was delighted to see energy work becoming a major plotline in the book. I've apped characters with the ability and am glad to see it officially cannon. I've done similar breathwork and energy exercises with my own Reiki Master. It tickled me, and yet again I have more respect for Carey's research and blending of reality with myth and fiction.

I don't do Traditional Reiki, but Medicine Reiki, which is more akin to the Maghuin Dhonn than to Ch'in or Buddhism. I have studied Buddhism, though, and I loved seeing how different paths were represented – and always, in her books, how it's stressed that each path is equal. Lo Feng was very similar to Master Piero in that respect. I don't know a whole lot about China and their history or myths, so I enjoyed the different flavor presented here.

The difference in Snow Tiger's possession and Lucius' was well-done, I thought. It could have been too much like Lucca and it wasn't, and I thought this instance was infinitely more beautiful. The dragon was awesome, in my opinion. I know some disagree, but I love when magic and wonder is highlighted more than the war or spying. (I also like that Moirin sucked at spying considerably more than Phedre did, even though she had actual magic to assist.) I also thought it was great that he became guardian of the snowdrops. I hope that ends up going somewhere in the next books.

I'm still on the fence about the Moirin/Bao thing. I'll hold out on making a decision just yet, but I really hope it's not too angsty or reminiscent of Phedre and Joscelin. She's done a good job of making both Imriel's books and Moirin's be very unique in their tone and stories. I guess I just get leery.

What did you think?

Ah ha ha ha!

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 20:49:45 GMT

I'm reading Naamah's Kiss! It's so far awesome.

I'm not very far in it yet, but they've just started talking about reiki! Energy healing from Ch'in!

I love when my squees overlap.

Plus, I really think JC has read and enjoyed the Earth's Children series, because I see a lot of subtle influence in many of her books.

Naamah's Kiss!

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 15:29:12 GMT

Just shipped to me!

SQUEE!

Very Asheville

ahavah_ehyeh@livejournal.com — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 06:32:29 GMT

This is too cool. It's on this week's postsecret.