Polar bears and sled dogs hanging out from spnknffork, Bringer of Cute from all across the tubes to my friends page. It's just over two minutes of deadly cute. The last three seconds or so contain a touch of "WTF, am I seeing what I think I'm seeing?"

I had a heck of a time sleeping last night. My next door neighbor had friends over, and they sat in their back yard until about 2am, laughing, drinking and talking. I don't begrudge them that. They should have friends over more often. The only thing is, their party kept setting off the neighbor's dog on the other side, which, in turn, set off Rory, who sleeps with us. Rory knows our neighbor's voice, so he doesn't bark at him, but he can't stand the neighbor's dog. So, we kept getting woke up. After the friends left, the folks across the street continued their stoop party, and, I think because the neighbor's dog was already worked up about the party next door, he was hyper-sensitive. So he kept barking.

Because I couldn't sleep, I started thinking about a story. I am going to take a little time today to write, since I am too tired to really do much else. I might post it, I haven't decided yet. I might be fun for some of you to see some of my fiction writing. We'll see.

One of my coworkers who pledged for this event asks Kaden "If you could become normal again, would you?"

The answer changes, depending on the phase of her life you ask her. Some of you have read about her first encounter with the fae which occurred when she was around 8 or 9 years old and the impact on her life changes many times. Here's her answer at age 19, roughly the same time as the piece of story I've been working with today:

I would only choose to become fully human again if I would, as part of it, forget my experiences with my fae kin. Even then, its a maybe. But if I would remember, absolutely not. Would you choose to see the world in black and white after knowing for years that there were other colors? That's what it would be like. You have no idea what I see and how much more brilliant it is than my memories of what I saw as a kid. "they" say that children see the word most brilliantly with the most awe filled eyes but they are wrong. We do and it grows as we grow older. Our vision becomes deeper, richer.

Plus I can talk to faeries. Not that I don't love talking to humans as well because I am still, at my core, a human, but the fae are so different and they help me nurture parts of myself that most humans don't know they have.

If I knew I would forget... I suppose life would be easier if I were only a human. Its a lot to hide, that I'm seeing things others don't see. I've learned to because hospitals, not so much fun. Neither are anti-psychotics for people who don't need them. I was lucky my mother knew the truth and took me off those meds. That was when I was 12 and we had a LONG talk about what I should and shouldn't say at school anymore.

But.. No. I wouldn't go back. This is me now. I want to be me.

*****

We've still got more Venturities to go! figmentj is blogging for Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children and she has a lot to say about why in her blog.

Bears are fuzzy http://www.vitalground.org

Because I can respond to an email of hers with

"BirnirnirnirNIRnir nir nir nir"
"BirnirnirnirNIRnir nir nir nir"

And she will understand exactly what I mean without batting an eyelash.

Sometimes I need a reminder that I have a place in the world. (FYI: going to see live music at the New Castle Farmer's Market* is not that place.)






*Farmer's Market around here=flea market/House of Stolen Goods/obscure and tasty Amish food everywhere else. Boy was I disappointed the first time I went looking for rhubarb and found stripper boots, nunchucks and Sega games without boxes.

slipjig suggests for my music thingy that I introduce you to Mr. Richard Thompson. Richard Thompson is responsible for writing the saddest song every in the history of people. More notable than the sadness though is the amazing guitar playing. People have tried to play this song and died. Well, not really but I don't know anyone who can do it thus my theory that he must have some extra fingers.
(making connections between posts, my character Rini can play it quite well. You might hear about that later.)

Here's video so you can not only hear the song but watch his hands. If you can figure out how he does it, tell Slipjig because he's confused.



Entertainment of a different sort is available in jennifer's journal where she is blogging 24 hours worth of fan fiction for St Judes Research Hospital. Pay her a visit!

Http://www.vitalground.org. ROOOOOAR GROWL!!!

Ongoing summaries of the Gygaxian Grinder can be found as we write them at http://sites.google.com/site/gygaxiangrinder/show/episodes

I'm trying to save every half-hour or so, while they are on 'commercial breaks' or something similar.

There will be more fae fiction later but for now, a little bit about what's going on here with Team Venture.

There are 10 of us who I have been pimping and will continue to pimp. We have a team mascot, Frank the rubber chicken. Our fearless leader has declared that our theme song is Baby Got Back. I lodged a protest but am being ignored. We have only one male blogger on the team though there is another guy here acting as pit crew. Half the team is gathered around the House Gojirawitz dining room table with an array of laptops. The rest of us are sitting on couches and beanbags or cushions in the living room.

My informal mascot for the day is my teddy bear Roosevelt, a plush grizzly who carries a plush stick, thus the name (a teddy who walks softly and carries a big stick)

I'm going to eat some lunch now but we'll return to more substantive posts and pimping later.

My laptop gets a lot of use and it is started to show signs of the beating that it must take if it is going its life with me. My mouse touchpad literally has the paint worn off of it, and the clickers are worn almost completely out. I am going to have to get an external mouse soon, but I am hoping that it waits until I get a job.

At any rate, sometime when I try to click my mouse, nothing happens. Other times, it clicks itself. That happened yesterday while I was working on my post. My clicker clicked and my posting posted itself before I was done with it.

So, I immediately hit the "Edit" button and changed its security to "Just Me" until I could finish it. When I was done, I reposted it.

The only thing is, I know that some of you are now using Yahoo! Alerts to keep track of your friends posts as I do. I know that when I post, the Alert gets sent immediately. If I then change the security, as I did, when you try to view my post, you get a very jarring FORBIDDEN notice. The first few times this happened to me, I took it very personally. I don't anymore, but I do sometimes get very curious (and, in some cases, even a little concerned) over what it is that is FORBIDDEN to me.

So, just to let you know, that original FORBIDDEN post was really just the same Public post that I put up later on. No worries.

I couldn't let this sit for long so here's part 2. there will be one or two more later.

Date: March 25th, 1999, several hours after the funeral of Padraig Shea Sr, Kaden's grandfather
Location: Kaden's family home in West Ireland

As she shrieked up toward the sky the faint glimmer around Kaden's body grew more pronounced and her companion backed away to huddle against a large tree. A harsh wind came through the trees but Kaden did not seem to feel it. Rini looked on in horror as Kaden appeared to begin speaking angrily into thin air: "YOU should have been at my grandfather's funeral! I needed you and that bastard Fiachra."
then silence
Then Kaden's small frame thrust against another tree and her arms wrapping around, what?
"I know, I know I shouldn't call him that. I'm sorry. I'm so lost!" and she began to sob.
then silence
"There's someone you both need to meet. Someone who needs to understand what's been done to me."
more silence
"Rini come here."
"Kaden I don't get it. Who are you talking to, have you lost your mind? Maybe we should go inside and you could lie down." In Rini's eyes, Kaden saw a familiar look, half pity half fear, just like the teachers and nurses when she was younger. It made no sense. She KNEW Rini could see the change in her face, the flickers around her body, and yet she still persisted in believing that Kaden was having some kind of grief induced hallucination.
"You think I'm crazy!" Turning back to the empty space "You'll have to push harder. She still can't see you"

Suddenly what appeared to be a rip in the air appeared in front of Rini.
"wha..."
It took a moment for her to realize that it was the tip of a golden wing like a giant butterfly. Next, an arm with that same blue shimmer that now surrounded Kaden. A torso cloaked in red silk and a head with curled light brown hair that went down the the waist, another arm, another wing. For the first time, Rini was face to face with... what?

The small figure chuckled and turned to Kaden "oh thank god, she's seeing me proper now. I couldn't keep that up for long" Visibly relaxing she turned back to the stunned woman on the other side and reached out a small glowing hand. "Hi, I'm Orlaithe, Kaden tells you human folk shake hands."
***

More later but the BIG SECRET is out. Whew. So there are many more members of team venture blogging today. One of them is rafaela who is blogging for Planned Parenthood Mohawk Hudson (her home region's PP clincis). She is being mysterious about the theme of her posts so you'll just have to go read them.

Fairies like bears so if you are enjoying the story I'm currently writing, you should check out http://www.vitalground.com.

Heh. I have found my first error in Apostol's Calculus. (Okay, I'm 98% sure - going to look over everything one more time tomorrow, but Maxima agrees with me, and alternate methods of solving the silly thing get my solution and not his.) It's just an inversion - 2 instead of 1/2, but still. (Okay, it's kind of my second, but the other one didn't really make sense as a problem unless you changed it slightly, and then the answer was fine.)

Better, it is one that K did not find. (Hey, sometimes it's a little depressing that he's about a year ahead of of me on this having started a bunch earlier. I kind of aspire to catch up, but that will involve being healthy and not swamped fairly consistently.)

Yeah, you'll get part two of that scene later but its really intense for me and I can't do it all at once. This is one of those posts that has very little in the way of a point.

Things I need in order to do blogathon

1) Stuffed bear
2) My purple and black striped Jolly Roger Socks
3) My black glittery keds that I got in London
(those are all COMPLETELY NECESSARY I SWEAR)
4) Coffee
5) tea
6) our pit crew
7) my entertaining friends from Team Venture
8) House Gojirawitz's cats
9) a momentary lapse of reason
10) YOUR PLEDGES!

You know who else needs your pledges? nevacaruso! She's blogging for Amnesty International.

blah blah blah http://www.vitalground.org blah blah donate blah.

Poll #1229985 How Long Did You Last?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All

How long before you started laughing? If you didn't laugh at all, please use 0:00 and go sit in the corner, you old curmudgeon!

An Archaeology of Images
by Miranda J. Aldhouse-Green

The subtitle, Iconology and Cosmology in Iron Age and Roman Europe, promises a little more than this book delivers. Cosmology is very rarely touched upon and I was a little bit disappointed. Nonetheless, it made for interesting reading and I particularly enjoyed the chapter on survival of iconography in the Roman period.

As far as Miranda [Aldhouse-]Green books go, it is a very purely archaeological book, which I see as a big improvement. It is, in my eyes, a much tougher read than her other works, however, because here she has a tendency to talk at length about vaguely related distant anthropology and modern literature.


Revelations

This companion to the Vampire Bible gave some interesting insights into that work. I would have liked to strip it of 90% of the story-telling, for it is full of some very strangely interpreted anthropology, archaeology and history, with gross generalisations (it is true in this culture, ergo it is true for the world), and even some stange biology (e.g. "The lion does not need to demonstate what he is. The hunt occupies only a small portion of his daily life." I'd say; male lions don't hunt unless they're expelled from their pride and not strong enough to form their own, and even then they often simply scavange). It is something, of course, to overlook for it serves a purpose here, but it's occasionally a real eyesore.

Date: March 25th, 1999, several hours after the funeral of Padraig Shea Sr, Kaden's grandfather
Location: Kaden's family home in West Ireland

It wasn't unusual for Kaden to wear black but normally it would involve fishnets and leather, not the somber suit and stockings. Rini had attired herself similarly and held Kaden's hand as Padriag's casket was lowered into the ground. As the first bit of dirt flew into the hole she could feel Kaden pulling and had to literally restrain her from flinging herself on top. Now that the funeral was over Kaden had regained a bit of composure and the two friends wandered through Padriag's house to the backyard where she had spent much of her childhood.

They crossed from the rocky section of the yard into the cluster of trees heading toward the river and Rini noticed a frozen quality come over her companions face as she came to a complete stop?

"Kaden what is it, what's wrong?"
"Just a lot of memories back here."
"Tell me about it."
"I can't. Some things cannot be spoken."

Rini's shoulders dropped in exasperation. Once again her friend, her best friend, was hiding something. Her next words flew out drenched in anger and frustration.

"Look, I get you have secrets. We all have secrets. I get its hard to talk about some things. Most of the time I just tolerate it. The vague comments, the stops and starts in conversation. But this time I have fucking flown over 3000 miles because YOU asked me to because YOU did not want to be alone at your grandfather's funeral and now you pull this shit again? What I've done for you I have a RIGHT to know? What is so big so important so scary bad evil that you CAN'T TELL ME???"

"You don't know what you're asking...." Kaden grumbled in a sinister tone, looking down at the ground.
"I don't CARE what I'm asking. I'm tired of this! I do everything for you and you can't even be honest with me. What the hell kind of a friend are you?"

As her dark haired companion lifted her head, Rini saw a sparkling blue haze come across her eyes. It was as if she had never seen this woman before.

"Fine. Your choice. I am not responsible for this." Kaden squared her shoulders and with a voice that didn't even sound human anymore belted out a word Rini had never heard.

"ORLAITHE!!!!! COME TO US!!!"

*****

Yeah I know, its a cliffhanger and I'm a big meanie. I'm okay with that.

As long as you're here you should take a look at what ewinbee is doing. She's writing fiction bits from prompts for the American Heart Association.

And as always, I would love it if you would pay a visit to http://www.vitalground.org and make a donation. Don't forget to notify me!

I dreamt that my ex came into the store. I was at the end of an aisle and noticed him out of the corner of my eye. For a moment we played the game that past aquaintences sometimes do- a mutual agreement not to make eye contact, each giving the other a way out. But the store was busy, and I was the nearest employee to him. I asked him if he needed him help.

He said was looking for a supplement to stabilize fevers. I assumed it was for his girlfriend (who last I heard had suffered an aneurysm. this was three years ago and I have no idea if she lived. I haven't seen him since.)

In the dream he volunteered nothing. He did not ask about my child (I was pregnant when we last met). I could see from the look in his eyes that he was as conscious of our mutual history as I am. I could also see that the awareness made him anxious and so, in a VERY uncharacteristic fashion, I handed him off to an employee from the supplement department without acknowledging our connection. With a smile.

As he headed towards the registers, he did not look back. It seemed so odd to me, that a relationship between two people that was once based in love, however dysfunctional, could be reduced to a brief commercial exchange. It seemed so sad.

And yet... there it was.

I think the thing that surprised me most about the dream is that i didn't say anything.
For whose sake did I willingly shut my mouth and pretend? His? My husbands? Some greater good?
Or my own?

(because it is too early for opinionated rants, you get Justin Wallace.)

Description date: present day

What you will probably notice first is that he's taller than you, unless you're really tall in which case all bets are off. His hair is about 2 or 3 inches long, bleached, sometimes with bits of green blue and purple on the tips. Unless he just woke up it will be gelled till it sticks up in an array of Statue of Liberty like mini spikes all around his head. Depending on how diligent he is being about maintaining the bleach job, you might see the mousey brown roots, but he will never admit they are there. His eyes are deep deep brown and set far back into his face giving him the look of being off in deep thought but he's not. Justin is a social creature and if you are in the room, you are his focus. His skin is on the dark side, especially during the summer as he is one of the fortunate few "white guys" who don't burn to a crisp in the sun. His face is hard to describe except to say that, other than the eyes, the features are "mild." Nose is neither too pointy nor too round, face is neither too full or too gaunt. On a normal day, he'll be wearing a too big t shirt and jeans: "A guy needs to be comfortable!" Unless he's going to be on stage in which case its no shirt ("I can't drum with crap flapping around my arms!") black BDUs ("spare drum sticks fit in the pockets!) and a whole lot of black eyeliner ("NOT MY IDEA"). Like Kaden and the rest of his adopted family, he wears a small pewter fairy on a silver chain around his neck. It never comes off and IF he trusts you, you may get a hint or two as to its meaning. With a generally cheerful disposition and informal attitude, Justin is easily the most approachable of Kaden's friends. He has taken the change that came over him when he bonded himself to her in a stride, much as he does with all things in his life.

*****

Take a moment to check out milelaurel's journal where she will be talking about her current writing projects and a variety of other subjects. She is blogging for the Joslin Diabetes Center.

And when you're done there, hop on by http://www.vitalground.org. Don't forget to let me know if you're donating!

June 21, 1999, Somerville Massachusetts-

Something tickled at the corner of Kaden's awareness. For a moment she considered allowing herself to wake up and investigate but the soft texture of the pillow won out and she rolled over, draping her arm around her sleeping partner and drifting back to sleep. That lasted for a few moments...

"FIRST DAY OF SUMMER!!!! WOOHOOO!!!!!"

*WHOMP*

The something that had been tickling at a corner landed sprawled out on the futon, pieces of it stretching to poke both Kaden and Rini's bodies out of somnalescence. Kaden rubbed at her eyes and grumbled something unintelligible as she gazed on Jaime's satisfied face, blonde curls bouncing down his neck.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Rini growled as she slammed a pillow against Jaime's chest.
"I'm waking you up! It's the first day of summer! We're going to the cape! Beach time!"
"Wait, wha...?" At this point Kaden had gotten as far as being able to produce sound but her comprehension was sorely lacking. "Who is we, exactly?"
"Never mind who, exactly how are we doing this? For that matter, how did you get into the apartment?" Rini was less overtly hostile by this point but she would still need some convincing if she was to do anything other than lie in her bed for the next several hours.
"Justin's coming. he's got a car. He's already in the kitchen brewing the coffee."
"You've gotta be fucking kidding." At the thought of spending almost 2 hours crammed into Justin's tiny tercel hatchback, Kaden was becoming a little hostile herself!
"It's not so bad. Come on, you're gonna hang around here all day? No AC in the house, its gonna hit 90 by noon."
"We're not talking you out of this are we." It wasn't a question. Rini was up out of bed digging through Kaden's dresser "Where are the bathing suits?"
"I don't have any. I swim in gym shorts and a tank. We can go by your place on the way."
"Excellent, we'll leave in an hour!" and with that Jaime left the room, closing the door behind him.
"What the hell just happened?" Rini said to the back of the door.
"Don't ask me, he's your boyfriend."
***

I know, not terribly interesting or revealing but this scene came to me yesterday and I just thought it was so adorable.
If you're reading today, don't forget to check out slipjig's journal. He will be writing lists every half hour. Lists of what? You'll have to read to find out. He is blogging today for the American Cancer Society.

To sponsor me comment or e-mail me with your donation amount and then head to http://www.vitalground.org to donate.