Panic on the Streets of LJ...

Somehow, it took me two hours to back up my journal using http://www.livejournal.com/export.bml

I think that's because I kept reading the old entries and getting nostalgic. I think that's the point of LJ, or at least a point.

I don't know what I'd do if they shut this site down... would I start a blog elsewhere? Write in a paper journal? Have more time for preparing to take over a GURPS game? D'oh!

Okay, I guess I can do all the preparation tomorrow night... yeah, that'll work. Curse you, time!

At least I have stats for Lazar's enemy. I made it as cheesy as I could manage, given the extremely tight point budget. It has a 26 in Sunbolt, so it can toss off 3d-3 impaling lasers with no casting time and zero fatigue... that makes it almost as effective as an ordinary gun!

Icy Doom

Sometimes I hate winter. Sometimes I hate it so much that I can't remember why I ever liked it.

After getting up, taking a shower, and paying some bills (my power bill arrived nine days before it was due, so I had to pay it right away), I headed out to take my morning walk. I was planning to walk the 'hard' route, which goes up and down hills, but as I stepped out the door I almost slipped off my feet on the slick damp ice coating the sidewalk, and decided that maybe walking up and down hills was not such a good idea.

So I did the 'easy' route instead. It was still pretty tiring -- walking on ice is like walking on sand; you lose a little energy with every step as your feet slip out from under you. But it's worse, because you have to take smaller steps to avoid falling on your butt (or, if you're unlucky, on your elbow, breaking it). If you fall in sand it's no big deal.

So I spent forty five minutes waddling like a pengiun, then got in my car to drive to work, dodging the idiot patrol, which was out in force. There were people who wanted to die (that is, they had their headlights off despite the gloom and rain), there were people who wanted to test the coefficient of friction (let's turn right on red, forcing that car barreling down the icy hill to slam on his brakes!), and there were people who wanted to test my patience (oh, was that light green? Sorry I made you all wait through another three-minute cycle, I'll just bolt through the yellow here).

But at least when I got to work all my overnight builds and quick tests seem to have worked, so I can check in. I wasn't expecting that.

The Saga of the Frozen Turkey

For Christmas, my surviving grandparent bought me a frozen turkey. My sister got one too. They were mailed to us, packing in styrofoam and dry ice, with a notation saying 'perishable!' I didn't see the notation because I picked mine up in the morning a few days after getting the note about it, just before a loooong day with the family...

But it was still cold, if no longer frozen, so I stuck it in the freezer and forgot about it. Well, mostly. A couple times I thought about eating it, but couldn't think of a reasonable way to accomplish that -- it was pre-cooked (smoked!) but frozen solid

Until tonight. Tonight, I craved the turkey. So after taking it out of the freezer and attacking it uselessly with a knife for a few minutes, I shoved it in the microwave set to defrost for 10 minutes.

Then another 10 minutes.

Then another 10 minutes. The turkey finally started to get the slightest bit soft on the side that was held towards the emitter (it was too big to turn; it was almost too big to fit in the damn microwave), so I attacked it with tooth and claw, and managed to gobble down a few hunks of lukewarm flesh. This only sparked my appetite.

So back into the microwave it went, on HIGH this time, for another 10 minutes...

To make a short story not-quite-as-long, I managed to devour a good portion of the thing, but the rest was still frozen, and besides, I was getting a little sick of smoked turkey. So it's in the fridge now. I'll either eat the rest Saturday, or throw it out.

If the slight sick-to-my-stomach feeling I've got is because of food poisoning, the choice will be easy. x.x

Right now, I'd better get that windex and scrub down the surfaces the turkey juice leaked all over... I mean, it was precooked and all, but ewww.