Cat Nicknames Level Up

When I got my cat, I called her many things.  Sometimes I even called her by her actual name, but mostly not.

I’ve decided to document this interesting, and ongoing, change in nicknames for my cat.  This will possibly lower your opinion of my intelligence.  Well, to this, as with many situations in life, there is an XKCD.

XKCD on Cat Proximity.

I also should mention my attitude towards names.

In lore, names are an extremely powerful thing.  Lots of magic has to do with knowing the True Name of someone, or some thing.  The Name of the Wind, Rumpelstiltskin, The Hobbit, The Dresden Files; the list goes on and on.  I employed this interesting trope in my second novel, Trook Hunters, and was excited at the results it yielded.

More on True Names on Wikipedia here.

So, over the years, I’ve practiced up on learning the True Names of things.  Seems silly, but I have an astonishing rate of being able to call the neighbourhood cats to me.  It’s very rare that cats are actually named their true name, but I’ve found at least one case of this being true.  With all the others, I pick a name and try it out, and keep on trying until I say one the cat likes.  Silly, I know, but hey, it works.

The cats in my neighbourhood are named: Brickhouse, Shy One, Handsome (RIP), Tiramisu (Aaron named that one), Grey Cat (not actually his true name, I’m still trying to find that one- Grey Cat is the one he responds to most- he’s still pretty ferral), Houdini (actual name), Sofie (that’s her actual name; I can’t figure out her True Name though, she responds to anything, is super affectionate), and Nice Cat.  I’m still trying to broach several strays near my new apartment; the man downstairs feeds them, but they are feral and scared, and hard to observe.

I like naming things.  When writing, I spend an inordinate amount of time on names.

So, with all that in mind, I give you the evolution of cat nicknames for my cat.

Cat: Echo

Nicknames, in the order in which they were coined and used:

Roo

Brew

Brew Bean

Big Roo

Big Strange Roo

Roo Bean

Smittens

Cat Butt

Big Cat Butt

Cute Boot

Muffin

Muffin Bean

Muffin Butt

Fluffin

Fluffin Butt

…And this week, I levelled up: a four syllable cat nickname.

Dunder Mufflin.

(I’ve been getting into “The Office”.)

So, that’s it so far.  We’ve had her for one year.

No doubt there will be more.
Bonus pic.

Thanks for reading.

Heidi out.

I Guess Coffee isn’t the *Worst* Vice…

I’ve had a streak of unproductive, uninspired, generally depressing weeks. My writing is in a slump. Putting words down is like a slog through quicksand.

And then I made myself a bunch of coffee… I was drinking decaf for health reasons. …And I had no idea how much I really relied on coffee to get my but in gear and WRITE.

I suppose it’s not the worse vice to rely on for that elusive inspiration. My stupid Prechordial Catch Syndrome will likely make me have to ration my new method of kick-it-into-gear, but hey, now when I want a nice cup of delicious coffee, I’ve got to earn it by writing.

So cram it, heart, we’ve got work to do.

The Exciting World of Home-Brewing!

Aaron and I and his co-worker Chris have been brewing!  Chris makes various neato beers, and Aaron and I are jumping on the opportunity to have someone help us along as we get into a new and exciting hobby.  A tasty, tasty hobby.

Our first batch of Pear Mead came out rather well!

We have bottles on reserve to be opened in 1, 2, 3, 5, and 10 years.

And we’ve got a couple of smaller experiments happening; a root beer, and a test for a larger Apple Cizer.  Both are bubbling away nicely.

Today I go get a large primary fermenter bucket for large projects.

And perhaps also today, I want to start a test for a pumpkin wine.

In other news, I’ve been emailing the various productions that are starting filming in the next few weeks around Vancouver.

I got my Traffic Control Person certification, and I hear PAs with a flagger’s ticket are pretty useful.

In still other news, I was on the front page of Reddit last week for my Minecraft project, a Hardcore Superflat world.

Thread (with link to album) here.

Anyway, that’s all for now.

Thanks for reading.

Heidi out.

Back into Submissions / Minecraft Pics

I’m sending out another wave of subs, and it feels great!  I found some anthologies that several of my short stories really fit.

In other news, iTunes has proved a fine way to get the latest episodes of The Walking Dead.

In still other news, my Minecraft world (Hardcore on a superflat world) has come along nicely.  Pictures below!

I had fun with it.

Oh, and I’m over the flu now.  …That’s enough Minecraft for now, eh?

Imgur album here

SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY

Lately I’ve been grappling with how I get my watchable entertainment.

All the video rental stores near me have closed.

HMV downtown, where I used to buy my DVDs and BluRays, has closed.

iTunes is frustrating sometimes- there’s content I want on it, but it might not be on the Canadian store.

I have a Netflix account, but the content is pretty limited (it’s great for when you feel like watching something non-specific, but as soon as I start naming movies I’d like to watch, I’m disappointed every time).

I will now attempt an experiment.

I want to keep watching The Walking Dead.  I don’t have AMC or cable of any kind.  My criteria:  I want to watch this show that they make, and I want to give them money to do so.  I want to watch it within a day of it airing on TV.

I will document my results here, starting with last nights episode.

Attempt number one: go directly to the source.  AMC’s website for The Walking Dead.  (http://www.amctv.com/shows/the-walking-dead)  Result: “shop” seemed like my best bet, as none of the menues seemed to have season three episodes.  The “shop” is for apparel, DVDs of past seasons, and other things I’m not looking for.  *sigh*

So it’s not available from them, from their own website.

Attempt number 2: Shaw, who plays this show apparently.  (http://vod.shaw.ca/details/109972/The_Walking_Dead/#)  Result: the episode I want appears to be free; attempted to access it, got put through some loops to register, but halted when it became apparent I had to be a Shaw cable subscriber.  *sigh*

So it’s not available on their distributer’s website.

Attempt number 3: iTunes.  Found it!  Purchased it for $3.49.  Success!  Cool beans.  I was tempted to get a seasons pass; I’ll do the math later.  Good job iTunes.

I’ll keep updates on other shows or movies as I try my best to get people to SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY.

Update: seriously iTunes?

Your competition is THIS fast:

*sigh*

And that’s downloading the torrent while iTunes is downloading too; usually torrenting is much faster.  :/

(I deleted the torrent after I took that screen shot- I just wanted to get the comparison.  Still have 6 minutes to wait on iTunes.)

Flu Symptoms May Include Creepy Minecraft Roleplaying.

Gosh, I’ve been sick for almost all of January.  Not stellar.  Aaron’s been home all week too.

‘Tis a plague house, be gone, be gone!

To distract myself, I’ve been playing Minecraft again.  New worldtype: super flat.  It’s bedrock, 3 layers of dirt, and nothing else.  Oh, except for the pre constructed villages scattered about.  Most are about half a days run (a Minecraft day) from each other.

So I made a survival world to roleplay as a farmer (normal world type, not superflat).  He wakes up- in a snowy wasteland- with no knowledge of how he got there.  There are no other people to be seen.  Some pigs and cows are scattered about the sparse tundra.  He makes a crude shelter and rakes precious seeds from the frosty grass with his bare hands.

After a few terrifying nights spent in his snow shelter, he decides to set off to find a warmer place, where he could grow crops, and try and make a farm, like he had in the before-time.

He takes the meager possessions he’s accumulated and sets off north.  On the frozen beach, he makes a boat and sails, and sails, and sails for what feels like forever.  At last he makes shore on a sandy beech.  There is green grass, and a lush forrest.  He makes shelter in the woods and once again survives a few frightening nights.  The creatures that come for him in the dark fade to nothingness as he falls asleep…

At last he sets off and finds a nice, flat plains area to start his farm.

It was a struggle, but he wound up with a log house, a huge irrigated field of wheat, a pen each of sheep, cows, chickens, and pigs.

When he was content, he explored nearby areas.

There were strange people in a village nearby.  They wondered around seemingly aimlessly, giving him no notice.  The creatures that would attack him in the night disregarded these strange village people.  He explored their village and found books, which he borrowed, leaving them food and some metal in return.

He spent days pouring over the books.

He learned of a strange ‘nether’ place, where strange creatures lived, and glowing stone hung over endless pools of deadly boiling lava.

He learned of strange magics practiced using enchanting rituals and bizarre ingredients.

He even read of strange islands in his own world that were covered in a strange fungus and had giant mushrooms growing on them.  His heart sped up when he read of the ‘mooshrooms’ that roamed them in vast herds.

He prepared for a long journey, taking many tools, supplies, and food.

Once more he set off by boat, skirting continent after continent in search of the mushroom land.

When he found it he stayed the night and was delighted that there were none of the monsters he was now so used to.  Only the mooshrooms seemed to be able to live on the strange fungus land.

He got out his wheat and tempted a whole herd of the animals to follow him.

He swam, leading them back towards his farm.

He set out 9; by the time he ushered them into the pen he’d prepared for them, but 3 were left.

He bred them and made a nice herd of mooshrooms for his very own.

Several days of contentment followed.  But the farmers thoughts turned dark one night, durring a thunder storm.

He dug out a basement for himself and crafted a magical enchantment table.  He began tinkering with the arcane arts.

The farmer would emerge at night, roaming the desert to the west in search of the night monsters.  He slayed them all mercilessly, gathering power to use in his arcane experiments.

He journeyed to the nether and fought even greater foes.  The frustrations of being on fire almost drove him back to the safety of his farm, but he continued on, exploring a strange constructed fortress full of fiery creatures.

With new ingredients, he dared new, powerful potions.

With the eyes of one of the night monsters and the strange substance from one of the fire creatures, he crafted a curious device: when thrown, it hovered up in the air, flying away from him to the south-west.  He followed it, picking it up where it landed.  It took him to the ocean, and he again took to the sea and followed the strange eye-construct.

It led him deep into the earth, to a frightening underground lair.  There he found dungeons and chests and new strange bug monsters…  and the makings of a strange portal.  He’d read that he’d need many of the night-eye devices to activate it.  The books at back at home told of people going into these portals and never coming out…

He went home, still debating what to do about the ‘end’ portal.  He lives on his farm, tending his crops and animals, and taking shelter in his house at night, where the books that tell of the strange places sit on his shelf, staring down at him, tempting him to go back to that underground portal and finish it.

Heh, anyway, that’s the first of my Minecraft sick worlds.

…And then I got food poisoning.  Nothing like Minecraft to take my mind off of stuff like that.

My curent one is a flatland, where I ran from village to village until I had enough material to make an enchanting table.  I vowed that the village that gave me the final diamonds I needed would be transformed into a paradise in the flatland.

So far it has lots of light, is surrounded by trees, has a grassland plains, and a few mountains.  I’m working on a stone (stone!) hall, and have just sectioned off an area free from slimes and lit it well enough so monsters won’t spawn there.  Got a lot of crops growing, and have pens of chickens, cows, sheep, and pigs.  Things are going well.

I like my flatworld.  It’s on hardcore mode though, so if I die, it all goes away.  I’m holding out pretty well so far.  Pics will happen if I don’t die.  🙂

What I Did on Blackout Day: A Pocket Full of Links

I’m sure Reddit will be inundated with posts about the blackout.

F7U12 will be full of blackout related comics.

Pics will be full of blanket forts and other things made out of boredom to fill the gap that is usually so well filled by Reddit.

(And Amy: I wrote this before you told the world that you made a blanket fort during the blackout- how awesome is that?)

This isn’t necessarily a bad thing; it just means that, for some people, the one day blackout is actually more like a two day blackout (one actual blackout day, then one day of blackout posts).

This post is not about what I did on blackout day.

Well ok, it’s actually exactly that.

But hey, want to see what I did on blackout day?  Because I was sick and it was still a good day.  This post is full of delicious links to videos, pictures, and various other media.  It’s a journey.  If you want something to do, check out all this cool stuff.

I woke up sick.  It was snowing.  My man went to work.  I bundled up in many layers and planted myself in front of my laptop at my kitchen table.  Ugh, sick.  Cancelled plans to go see a movie I’ve been looking forward to.

Relatedly, I’ve been trying to coin a term to describe having a crush on someone without knowing what they look like.  But not a lusty crush.  Well ok, lusty, but not lusting after their bodies- like, like lusting after their delicious, sexy brains. Cronenberg (see above).  Fincher. Cuarón. I have crushes on a ton of brilliant people, but it’s like a brain-crush, where I love their brain and how it works and everything they make.

Brain-crush?  Hmm, needs more work.  Maybe when I’m not sick it will come to me.

What better way to feel better than to let the pleasing antics of Simon and Lewis lull me into satisfying state of amusement?  Their Minecraft golf episode did the trick while I made coffee in my new Aeropress.

Then, I decided to do my part and learn more about SOPA/PIPA.

I made a FB post about it to try and get others to learn more too: “Stop SOPA/PIPA! I hope the Blackout today will get people to call and write their congresspeople to prevent this terrible, terrible bill from going forward. Would you like to know more? http://vimeo.com/31100268

Then I was amused at myself for my Starship Troopers reference and decided to see what came up on YouTube when I searched for “Would you like to know more?”

Consequently, I learned more about Belgium.)  Amusing.

Then I put on slippers.  My apartment is cold.  Went and found my cat (see previous picture) actually no, see THIS) picture.  Echo tells the best jokes.

I decided that it was actually a good idea to make something to eat.  Something warm and mushy and tasty.  Steel cut oats.)

My mother in law phoned and offered to bring over her plug in heater.  I readily agreed.

I tried to find a gif of this hilarious dancing Russian, and was instead amused at Google’s ‘did you mean’ racism…

But it led me to this), which is just about the most awesome thing I could have found.

My oats were finally ready, and they were delicious.  Extra butter.  Cream, vanilla, cinnamon, brown sugar.  Yes.  Yes, good.  I ate them while looking at gifs.

From there things were just starting to get silly.

So I opened my new Minecraft world (“Flatopia”) and proceeded to try and make a safe area to grow crops in.  Damn slimes.  SLIMES EVERYWHERE.

Aaaan, that’s it!  Once I got into Minecraft the day was Minecraft from here to eternity.

Anyway, hope you enjoyed the links.  It was fun making this.

Thanks for reading.

Heidi out.

The Gym

It’s been a month of going to the gym, nearly everyday.  And heck, I feel great.

I just wanted to share.

Oh, and my brain has clicked into novel writing mode.  The first one took a year.  The second one took four months.  Let’s see what happens with this one.  I’m excited to begin.  It’s still in the planning stages- gotta iron out some characters and basic plot before I begin.

I’ll keep you posted.

Also, I’m addicted to Dr. Who (which has led to an addiction to David Tennant in general).  And I’ve been playing Skyrim since it came out- what a marvelous game.  Really, it is a tremendous, beautiful, stunning game.  I really enjoy it.

In the mean time, getting fit!  I have made a lazy comic to share.  🙂

Cheers guys.

 

Thanks for reading.

Heidi out.