Today, Saan has been playing the hero in training by looking things up. Like nature-loving moth repellants. Like 5 Latin verbs for her cousin who had completely forgotten she had a dictionary of her own. Like French stuff for her grammar book (though that's still under construction). Like chocolate (which she didn't eat). Like new slippers (which will have to be returned because they're damaged). Like what genus a vendiagram had in Dutch. Like when she's stopped her pill and should start another (Tuesday night). Like OHSHC episodes. Now seems like a good time to look up her bed. See y'all tomorrow.
Saan's feeling sad because the cell-phone-shop-man couldn't fix her cell phone (which wouldn't make any kind of noise any more. No ringtones, no IM tune, no mp3 player, no FM radio, not even game sounds) at all. And then took out the SIM card and the headphones and gave those back with a piece of paper. When you know the phone cost considerably more than a sheet of green paper and all Saan's contacts she forgot to make a backup of, it seems like a rather unfair trade. She should have her cell phone (which isn't leaving the country) back around the time her New Zealand package arrives. So no music on her walk home on Thursdays and field trips for the next week, no completely irrelevant instant messages at the most ungodly hours and the need to recollect all her contacts. And no shiny orange bits and pieces. And an empty pink sock. (Lucky she made a backup of most of her pictures on it, though) ... Saan misses the jukebox-you-can-phone-with.
Saan has reached the current top of the homework mountain. And now has to clean up her stuff, because it's cleaning day tomorrow. So no post today. There will be blankies, paper, paper, byros, school-stuff, cell phones, bookmarks and loads of other stuff Saan can't remember using, but that somehow got out of place.
...On Yon Small Ink Stainh On Yon Mhap Somewone Had Jokingly Nhamedeth 'Belgium', Just To Seeheth What'd Happeneth, Yon Spoiled Bratte of Yon Sixteen Year Oldeth Experiencedeth-- Okay, so Saan's stopping that particular line of thought before she hurts herself.
Reason for the excessive cap use is that she finally ('After One Hundredth Of Yeers', like. Okay, really stopping that, now.) got the password to the paypal account to pay for her order on Home of Poi and it should be on its way by tomorrow. Also, she's got a five percent discount, on top of the LED poi she'd been drooling over losing about five euros of their original price. Meaning she's got twelve euros and some change left of her Saint Nicholas budget. So she'll probably find a post packet with barbie-pink fluffy poi and her blue LED poi for Saint Nicholas. The day after, there's... exams.
Luckily, she's got 6 hours of time for Latin this year, lifting some of the pressure you get when you prepare for a four-hour exam. Apart from Maths and Latin being placed in rather closed together, her exam schedule could've looked a lot worse. Now she only needs to get started in her book for French and perhaps start reviewing the 'short' (16 pages) review of Latin Poetry, mainly in the Golden Century. And then there's... Virgil with descriptions of landscapes even he admits are meant to fall asleep over and Tedious-Puppy-Dude-Who-Can't-Get-Over-Himself-Or-His-Girlfriend. But it could have been worse. Saan should probably have that printed on a T-shirt. No one's telling her they'll fail half the class just yet. No one's scrambling to see enough stuff to make it to the exam yet. So it's probably going to be alright.
Edit (8 minutes later): Saan's order has been shipped and should arrive within 7-9 working days. Gotta love time differences over spaces of 20.000 km.
What's this? Saan posting her daily message before she actually should have been asleep? The reason: Saan's still typing out her report on the practical chemistry lesson.
She's nearly finished with her first list of petpets. Naalala's the last victim. She's also the most expensive puppy in the box. Her next list's full of petpets which should cost about 5000 NP. Because they're easier to resell. And get the NP.
Her chart for physics turned out great. She stared at it for a full five minutes after it was finished and saved. Oh, and she's already finished her translation assignment for Friday.
To come back on yesterday's subject: Saan's now missing a pretty big chunk of toenail. And her toe hurts. It's wrapped in band aids. And it still hurts.
And, because she's still got her French stuff to repeat later, this post's short.
Saan did some auto-surgery on her toenail today (read: she cut away some dead skin and started bleeding) and is now limping on the left side. But at least it's stopped being yellow. And it doesn't sting quite as bad anymore than when she dabbed some 70% alcohol disinfectant on it. She did find out that disinfectant not only dissolves glue, but also does some serious damage to biro-written/drawn stuff (Uhm... Yif? Part of your doodle was contaminated. Accident! It wasn't much, and the most important bit's still untouched). It also took all the color off of the half-faded Windows emblem on her pc. Maybe it's time for Linux, or perhaps Ubuntu.
She also heard that, although her down-filled fluo monstrosity of a winter coat isn't ruined beyond belief, she's getting a new, preferably black coat. One that can be washed without giving her mom a nervous breakdown. Saan's demands: a cap and comfort.
Jittering some with colors and batteries and extra's, Saan managed to find a way in which she can get two pair of poi for Saint Nicholas. Fluffies and LED sock poi. And hopefully some chocolate. White chocolate. Lots of it.
She finished her Anita Blake book (and is already jumping for more) and finished 'The Truth' from Terry Pratchett's Discworld series. She got started in 'Men At Arms' and wants to look up the recipe in 'Nanny Ogg's Cookbook' for Strawberry Wobbler. Provided she can find some straight champagne flutes. And gelatine. And strawberries. Maybe she can use deep-frozen raspberries instead. Oh, and she'll need an aerosol can of whipped cream. She's regretting she didn't have enough money for the 3 parts of Discworld Science and the Discworld Day Planner 2007 when she visited the Boekenbeurs. Then again, she knows where the stand's shop is: STERLING BOOKS!!!! God forbid Saan ever gets a credit card and figures out how to take the tram without feeling like she missed her stop three stops before getting on. She'd camp there. Go on, Google it, find the address, visit, buy some doggy-loving refrigerator poetry and Disworld-y goodness. Or, if you prefer, the Dalai Lama's book and The Da Vinci Code in English.
She tried to come up with a better cover for her school diary. So far the frontal theme is 'Devil's Panties'. Not satanic porn, the webcomic. Downside: It's... Wow, nearly 5 years of daily comics. Upside: there's teletubbies scaring away the Jehova witnesses and pirate-fishing and Jesus having friendly chats with Satan and Legolas in a hall closet. http://devilspanties.keenspot.com Love it.
She did do homework. Honest. After she gave Yif her scarf (for which Yif still needs to pay her back, before Saan gets lynched by her mom). And played some on Neopets. And rebooted the pc. Before she went to the restaurant. Really.
She made a list of things she did wrong and needs someone else to fix. She made holes in her brand new gloves and doesn't know how to fix it. Her mom does. She removed the stickers off her paperbacks with her nails. Two are scratched up enough to make her regret it. So, she needs about... 10 books covered in self-adhesive plastic. Her mom's great at it. And she needs her toe made better, which her dad can help her with. The table-wrestling in Excel or Word will get solved with some help from her big brother, who's feeling a bit under the weather, but went out drinking anyway.
Today, Saan: -Developed an interesting ache in her neck. And back. -Managed to make a single mum with five kids work (up 'till now) on the Sims 2. -Didn't forget not to leave her shoes lying around in her bedroom -Wanted to practise her poi some, but it was dark by the time she finished dinner -Messed around some with her Saint Nicholas budget. So far, it works. Now, to convince her mother. -Didn't do any homework -Got a French-speaking pen pal -Is going to sleep -Should send a message to a classmate before midnight.
Saan's still suffering from post-free-week-jetlag and just wants to go to sleep. Her current plan is to go to sleep as soon as possible. To make sure you guys don't suffer too much from her state of half-consciousness, there are... ...The game Maths Nightmare ...The webcomic Count Your Sheep ...Dannygirl's Delicious Knockout Sleep-Aid ...The Fuzzy Dice to fall asleep on (or the 100-sided die to count the numbers of until you fall asleep) from AdvancingHordes ...Some fuzzy sickness to sleep off. ...A bit of fun and games, to burn off that last bit of energy of the day. ...Some X-tra soft and Fluffy Poi, for those die-hard spinners so far gone they need something to twirl day and night...without risking murder of any bedmates. ...And , perhaps, someday, her brother's website, if he finds a new server. The previous link was www.slapie.tk. Now, however, it's dead. It was tons of fun while it lasted, and might return. Especially when his classmates start asking about the study-aid Rubes dumped on it (site crashed due to excessive use during most exams), together with humorous pictures of sleep and things you do not remember after waking up from a night of drunken fun. Because sleeping sucks when there's a party to go to.
See TheSeals, the Lupe of the Official Irreality For Dummies Neopets Account Irreality4Dummies, is sick. He's got bubbles. Saan's insanely ( <-) mad quest for tons and tons of petpets (current petpet count: 37) while she tries to get the Pack Rat avatar (301/1000 items, petpets included) has been put on hold until she's got enough money she isn't spending on stupid stuff that keeps popping up to afford the medicine. So now Saan's playing her less favorite games until she has all the cash she needs. The picture was shamelessly stolen from the Neopets site and so does not belong to Saan.
Yif made a digitally colored version (okay, so a better digitally colored version) of the Halloween chibi, based on the one Do colored with pencils and I ruined in PSP8. ... Saan's feeling awfully jealous right now (and so should you; Yif's better than you at this, so there). On the other hand, she didn't have to come up with a topic for today's post! Thanks, Yif!
And Saan came home today and fell alsleep for an hour and half. Then she had dinner. Then she squealed all over the chihuahua on TV. It's nine and she still has to correct her Maths test and memorise some religious...thingies. And she wants to read some Anita Blake tonight.
Today's Tidbits of Info You Really Must (Not) Know: (Saan is not responsible for anything written below that you try out. Anything you wish to try, you research. Saan's just reporting tidbits of it. Try to restrain yourself from using the knowledge you may gain from this post for evil, such as animal abuse.) -The shortest possible healing period for getting something pierced is two weeks. The body parts that heal the quickest: lower lip and the clitoris. Wikipedia informed Saan of this when she tried to figure out why her sis' ears got infected around the piercing in her ears. Saan suspects her sister's just allergic to one of the compounds of most earrings. -Salpetre mixed with methylated spirits make for purple, very hot flames. Because Saan likes chemistry. -A hyena is more mongoose than it is dog. -Most cereal is not fit to be your faily breakfast, as it contains too much sugar. -Hiei and Kurama are both mountains in Japan. They are also both characters in the anime and manga Yu Yu Hakusho. -Most teenagers suffer from about two hours of something similar to jetlag during their puberty. -One haiku consists of three verses, in the syllable scheme of 5-7-5. Grammar is unimportant in this kind of poem. -The Voluspo is similar to the ancient Roman Song of the Sybil. It was prophecied by a wisewoman, written down and goes about the future. -There are parts of the Bible that condemn the eating of both pork and chicken. Slavery and the use of hard-drugs (if these are purely biological) however, is, according to the same book, a-okay. Most law books do not agree. -While New Rock is a Spanish brand (which makes real pretty boots) and has more shops in Europe, the online stores have more merchandise for the Americans than for any other part of the world. However, a quick trip to their stores (online or real life) will prove that they stock shoes in larger-than-usual-sizes also, giving the big-foots among men something else to wear apart from sport shoes. -The high heel was originally meant for mean, and if not for some six-toed (French?) man, men would not be wearing such comfortable shoes today. -Mondonation.com takes charity quite seriously: you cannot purchase either a pillow case or a T-shirt from their website without donating part of your money to some kind of charity. All their products are personalised, and proclaims a belief. -The High Priestess in a tarot deck can also be referred to as a female version of a pope. Three guesses why this one got changed, boys and girls. -You can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but it's not recommended to pick your friend's nose. -The King Charles Spaniel got bred through interbreeding the original version of the Cavalier King Charles spaniel with the pug. -Short noses in dogs often lead to breathing problems, short dogs, bred to achieve miniaturizing or altering a breed, can sometimes be unable to bring their puppies into the world without a c-section. -The rejected subject of this particular post was 'St. Hubertus'. -Saan has nearly finished her Anita Blake book and is planning on ordering the new Merry Gentry book for under the Christmas tree. -Saan's e-mail buddy in California wonders why she's rarely online when he is. The fact that there's an eight hour difference inbetween doesn't seem to cross the guy's mind.
Wikipedia is a mind-boggling thing. For example, today Saan started by looking for Mt. Hiei, located in Japan, near Kyoto. After a while, she came over the Japanese mountain monsters, the Tengu, who are said to live in Mt. Kurama and Mt. Takao. Then, following the link 'yokai' she came across the nine-tailed kitsune and, before she knew it, she was staring at near-terminal cases of ingrown toenails. Just as she finished finding the actual nail in an especially pus-filled specimen, she got asked what she would like for dinner. Needless to say, her appetite was far lost. Going back to the topic of 'Nail (anatomy)', she read that the illusion of hair and nails growing after death is called 'Desiccation'. Dessication brought Saan to sodium hydroxide, which brought her to a process she'd discovered over the summer, called 'saponification' (Sodim hydroxide, or lye gets used to make soap. Going frop NaOH and fat to soap is this particular chemical wonder. The process can also take place in corpses, but Saan, having decided this particular digital journey would be fun for her blog, had a better idea than researching that particular branch of biochemistry).
And remember to treat lye like sulfuric acid; don't add water, add the compound to water when mixing with water is neccesary.
On a sadder note: Saan just received word that her down-filled, fluorescent orange winter coat has probably been ruined in the wash and she'll probably have to go find a new one. Last year, that took a month and half.
Saan has got two minutes to say (Two minutes! Eek! Where has the day run off to?) she's spending her free Friday with a bag of Pickles potato chips behind the TV watching stand-up comedy. And sleeping late tomorrow.
The annual boekenbeurs is pretty much like giving birth, or it is if Saan can believe her mom. You want it, you do it, you suffer, you forget the bad, remember the good and do it again.
The bad: high temperatures underneath the spotlights they scatter above the stands, tons of books weighing you down to the point it's not pretty anymore, cues as far as the eye reaches, missed trains, trams, low temperatures outside, usually some rain, you lose (like Saan did today) a lot of money, some of it probably your own, (or at least, Saan has this problem) having to stand around and walk around practically al the time and getting a resulting, agonizing ache in your ankles for the rest of the day, if not the next and overpopulated public transportation.
The good: finding *the* book, spending time with your friends, jokes, finding other books that you were planning on getting anyway, but since you're there...
Today, Saan bought 7 books. 6 were meant for herself, but she kindly donated the canine encyclopedia from The Dog (c) to her (book-hating) little sister, who fell in love and is going to sleep with it tonight. Leaving Saan with four Discworld novels and 'It's Called A Breakup Because It's Broken', because it had a bright picture on the front. Many thanks to Sterling Books from Brussels for hiring a decent-sized stand. Saan spent more than one hundred euros on transportation, fast food and literature. She did keep her promises to her parents: no buying candy (muffin wasn't candy, it was dessert), no spending all your savings (that's why she left 10 euros at home to begin with) and no going crazy just because mom and dad weren't watching. The craziest Saan ever got at a similar happening was under her father's nose, if cheaper, but she ended up with eight (okay, so eight she can remember) books.
So now Saan's tired, feeling vaguely sick from too much grease in her food and too much extreme temperatures during the day and aching. Saan's friends had their books, Elly was downright delighted at the fact that Sterling sold translated-to-English manga she'd been dying to get, apparently, Saan's sister is looking at the pretty pictures in her new book and reading the few lines they put next to them (which is basically more than she's voluntarily done all year when it comes to reading), Saan's brother's back hurts, Saan's mom is a wee bit pissed that Saan brought home more than one book (And Saan did leave home the Discworld Science books, and the Discworld agenda, and '101 things you have to have done before you die' and all the versions of 'The Bunny Suicides' and 'Great Lies to Tell Small Kids' and the Casper and Hobbes comic books and the refrigerator poetry packs and the reading light, so she doesn't quite see the problem here), Saan's dad is glad the day is over and the four bags of potato chips have gone unharmed through another day.
And remember; he does not want you to call and you do not want to make that call. Goodnight.
Yestarday, Saan had her checkup with her overgrown dentist. No holes, but due to the glue keeping the retainer-wire to the back of her lower teeth, dirt had gotten stuck in them. So... now Saan has a new, bright pink toothbrush! Okay, so it's an interdental brush and it's as tiny as it gets, but it's cute. And it beats poking around with floss.
It's Halloween! Which means Saan woke up this morning, picked the first reasonably colored picture, messed around with it some in Paint Shop Pro (which didn't help) and came up with this! The Official Irreality For Dummies Halloween Chibi for 2006. An alien to keep the fribbin dude company!
Edit: Okay, so the site swallowed the alien. We try, try, try again.
This is the reason why Saan isn't making a decent post today. Four months of frustration due to on line bookstores, a year and half of waiting... But Saan has her book!
Also: the blog has hit its 1000th visitor! That's an average of 14 people a day. o.O;;; People keep reading this stuff, even if most of it's thoughtless banter.
Okay, so today Saan: -Was reminded that safety glasses are needed, but no fun when you can't see more than a foot and half far. The safety part gets canceled when you slide them over your glasses: your nose is only so long. -Learned that you do not shoot animals: you shoot targets -Made more than 13,000 neopoints and is still earning more -Colored chibi's until her fingers hurt and it still looks bad. Deadline's the day after tomorrow, eek! -Whined that she wanted the nice Dutch people from the bookstore to call. Which she does. (If the nice people of Gianotten Breda are reading this: call, god damnit!) -Went to see her family and sat in a car for an hour-long drive that usually takes up twenty minutes. -Discovered you do not need to have and/or play a guitar to have two plectrums lying around in your pencil case. -Tried out the new Milka milk-chocolate spread. It's too sweet, though perhaps on some baguette it might taste better. -Helped her sister discover the joy of pokémon ROMs and pc gameboy advanced simulators. -Asked Yif if she wanted to come to the annual Boekenbeurs (www.boekenbeurs.be) and Yif said yes. Saan'd really, really, really like to go on the day when they're open for twelve hours instead of eight, even if it's hot in there (tank tops can do wonders, and you'd only have to wait around outside with a 3°C temperature for fifteen minutes or so) and her financial situation would not benefit from it and she'd be busy reading until Christmas (but, hey, the new Merry Gentry book's coming out around that time!) -Discussed sports with Do (Okay, so it was more about the fact that they should do a sport and most sports are no fun at all. Saan needs to go find her sticks--poles and take a hike... somewhere in the near future. And try to perfect the alternate butterfly, which is starting to take shape.) -Had her banana eclair nicked while she wasn't looking -Showered -Discovered no chocolate mousse beats the one they have on Sunday mornings at butcher De Backer (and she didn't get her weekly cup. Boo, for the chemical taste of Delhaize) -Heard Mary (the cat) had been missing for three days and saw her turn up later. -Still needs to remind her brother he owes her six euros -Should probably have figured out where she lost her piggy bank. It still had some money in it. -Is feeling a bit under the weather. Like being car sick without being in a car. If she pukes later tonight, you'll hear about it -Set her watch from central European summer time to central European time (Yeah, she looked that up. She looks lots of stuff up. You learn stuff easier if you look it up yourself, instead of just ask others.) She woke up this fine Sunday morning at the ungodly hour of half past eight. -Apparently did more than she thought she did (or maybe she just kept on typing until it looked like a lot). -Filled in her blog -Heard the not-so-joyful stories of her own birth and her grandmothers death once more. Her birth, because Eve asked their mum, her grandma's death because Saan has to go to the graveyard on Thursday. -Looked up a few neopets game secrets and guides on www.pinkpt.com to actually get some serious winnings out of most of the games -Didn't get anything from the Snowager at three pm, local time. -Is going to stop typing and make some more np.
*Money grubbing, animal mistreating, good for nothing....* (OMG! Double Post!!!!)
The dog (and cat, and farm animal and random other pets) pound in Aarschot is getting sold. Or, at least, the grounds are. The pound rents them from a nice lady, and has done so for quite some time. Now, however, the same lady wishes to make them into several plots of building ground and sell them. Through the rental contract, the pound has preference should a sale occur. However, this all is happening in a space of mere months. No time for the Belgian government to come inbetween. The pound, which has missed financial support from the government not only for this year, but the next as well, totaling at the astronomical fee of fifty thousand euros, can't afford a high price, but the owner doesn't wish to see the employees of the pound or inform them of a price. They don't have time and probably not the money to look for a new piece of land and build a new pound for them to relocate on. They have no way to relocate the dozens of animals they lend shelter to. Their only hope is going to court, winning their case and getting the sale held off for two years. At the moment, they're holding a petition for everyone who wishes to support them. (Saan found most of this info in her Sunday morning newspaper and is still fuming about it. To get Yif's sympathy: they have almost as many cats as they have dogs) For more information, check their website at http://www.vvdb.be and leave your digital signature.
See TheSeals, the Lupe of the Official Irreality For Dummies 
<-) mad quest for tons and tons of petpets (current petpet count: 37) while she tries to get the Pack Rat avatar (301/1000 items, petpets included) has been put on hold until she's got enough money she isn't spending on stupid stuff that keeps popping up to afford the medicine. So now Saan's playing her less favorite games until she has all the cash she needs. The picture was shamelessly stolen from the Neopets site and so does not belong to Saan.
Yestarday, Saan had her checkup with her overgrown dentist. No holes, but due to the glue keeping the retainer-wire to the back of her lower teeth, dirt had gotten stuck in them. So... now Saan has a new, bright pink toothbrush! Okay, so it's an interdental brush and it's as tiny as it gets, but it's cute. And it beats poking around with floss.
It's Halloween! Which means Saan woke up this morning, picked the first reasonably colored picture, messed around with it some in Paint Shop Pro (which didn't help) and came up with this! The Official Irreality For Dummies Halloween Chibi for 2006. An alien to keep the fribbin dude company!
