The lyf so short

Vor ein paar Wochen hab ich ja mal diesen gut gemachten, zuverlässigen und ausdauernden Webcomic namens Stand Still, Stay Silent verlinkt. Wie es sich begibt, gibt es den ersten Band gerade mal wieder zu kaufen... aber leider sitzt der Versand (anders als die Autorin :() in Texas, und die Versandkosten sind mit $28,50 ein wenig abschreckend (das Buch selbst kostet $39,-).
Wie in solchen Fällen üblich würde es also Sinn machen, wenn sich mehrere Leute zusammentun und die Versandkosten unter sich aufteilen. Gibt's da Interessenten auf meiner Flist?

Da die Bücher immer ziemlich schnell ausverkauft sind, werde ich nur bis Montag Rückmeldungen sammeln. Danach geht's los... oder halt nicht. :)

Wie schaut's?

Never mind, ich hab's mal durchgespielt, da die Versandkosten mit jeder Ausgabe unproportional ansteigen, würde sich das erst ab 7 Leuten aufwärts lohnen - sonst kommt der Einzelversand trotz allem billiger (zumal bei mehreren Ausgaben sicher auch Zoll hinzukommt). Ich glaube, so viele Landsleute lesen hier gar nicht mehr aktiv mit, aber ihr könnt mich natürlich gern überraschen ;)
Ansonsten lasse ich das hier einfach mal zur Info stehen: Momentan gibt's SSSS Band 1 zu kaufen. Sicher nicht für lange...

Schockierend, schockierend: Ich werde erstmals NICHT am Prämierentag den neuen Harry Potter sehen *schluchz*. Dafür würde ich gern nach der Prüfung am Samstag oder am Sonntag reingehen, um wenigstens kurzfristig auf andere Gedanken zu kommen und mich ein bissel zu belohnen (ob ich das dann verdient haben werde, ist eine andere Frage, aber ich will jedenfalls! Püh!).
Wie sieht es also aus bei den Kölnern - hat noch irgendwer am Wochenende Lust, (ggf. nochmal) ins Kino zu gehen? Würde vielleicht gar jemand anders die Organisation übernehmen? :D

Sprache ist mir beim Erstkontakt sogar einigermaßen egal (also... ob Englisch oder Deutsch. Suaheli muss es nun grad nicht sein ;)), da richte ich mich nach dem, was angeboten wird und was meine potentiellen Mitläufer bevorzugen. Also: gibt es Mitläufer?

... kann man Pistazien in der Mandelmühle mahlen, oder sind sie dafür zu weich/ fetthaltig/ sonstwas?

*teuflische Pralinenpläne*

1. Ancient Chinese star-map. ♥♥♥

2. So the tit finally learned that Yes, twigs with plant lice on them are a great way of feeding oneself. I had found plant lice while gathering redcurrants and left them lying for the tit, and it actually took them and picked the lice off. FINALLY. Now we can try to release it to the relative wilderness!

3. I am attending this "Anthropology in Practice" seminar which is not, as you might think, about How To Do Fieldwork or the like but rather about What You Can Do With Your Weird Degree When You're Done Studying. It's technically aimed at the sweet little bachelors who are supposed to be shoveled from school through university to a job in three quick years, but I figured that as even I, a dinosaur from the time of Magister degrees, am now nearing my finals, it wouldn't hurt to get some options pointed out.
For the most part this has been interesting, entertaining and even encouraging. For me. For the poor bachelors it must have been kind of frustrating, because they're all advised to take more time studying (which they aren't really supposed to do - take time, that is; they are of course supposed to study), go abroad, do internships of at least three months (which they can't because of the way their curriculum is scheduled). Oh, and actually they should be doing a Master's anyway. Worse: In the humanities, most good jobs call for a Ph.D.. So basically they're being told that "Actually the way your curriculum is structured is unrealistic crap" (which they know already) "and when you're done, even though you have a degree, you will be paid very ill even for a humanist" (who will be ill-paid anyway) "because under the old system it wouldn't even be a degree. And most research jobs" (which is a good place for Anthropologists to go) "will demand a Master's at the very least, and very likely a Ph.D., so actually your degree isn't worth much".
But this is not supposed to be bitching about the German study system.
Today we had a very sweet young woman (and her baby for whom she didn't find a babysitter) from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, a prestigious society that basically hands out money to researchers if they think their research projects are worth it. And she told us about her job, and how she got it. And in the end one of the sweet young bachelors asked her whether she might be indiscrete and let us know how much she earns, roughly. And she replied that we could basically google it anyway so she saw no reason why not, and told us.

With my crappy undergraduate student job (at which I am currently being underpaid, not because I do so much but because I do the work of a secretary, who is paid waaaay better than a student) at half-time, I earn only a little less than half of what she gets. If I work full time in the semester holidays, I earn almost the same as she does.
And she - working with a prestigious research society, with a Master's degree and a Ph.D. to her name - cheerfully tells us that she is being paid well for a humanist.

I'm not in it for the money, but DAMN, that's bleak. I mean, what kind of incentive for finishing my studies is that? If I don't finish them, I know I have my crappy undergraduate job. If I finish them, I'll likely spend a few years doing internships and being unemployed earning next to nothing, and even if I manage to get a job, I'll at best get about as much as I do now. That's kind of not motivating.

At least it gives me a very original answer if, in some far-off job interview, some staff manager asks me why the hell it took me 15 semesters to finish my studies. "Want an honest answer? Financial safety."
>_>

Before it's so late that none of you have a chance to give me a holler, or at any rate so late I can't write down your addresses...
Anyone want a postcard?

I'm leaving on Friday (yes, that's Friday the 13th, and no, I am obviously not superstitious), so if your hands-up comes later than, say, Thursday afternoon, I can't promise anything.
If you specifically want a card from either place (choice of Namibia or South Africa), lemme know; if you mostly care about the stamp let me know as well, because I might well end up buying the cards in NAM but sending them from RSA otherwise. Or somesuch.

With only three months to go until Rohan LARP IV, I figured I should start preparing. Three months in advance may be a bit early, but if I wait until there's only two weeks left, I'll doubtlessly be bogged down by term papers and building (March is a cruel month), I may as well start now and be less stressed and perhaps then I can relax in the usually stressful last two weeks, or do other things. (Procrastinating procrastination is an interesting policy.)

(I can't wait to LARP right now. I should have gone to Nögge after all, no matter the cost. >_>)

Anyway.
Stuff I ought to do:

Garb stuff: Theoretically my old garb should do, but an aditional shift would be good. And I should pimp my hood and cloak. They're both obviously Leonardo Carbone (a company who makes relatively affordable pseudo-medieval clothing), and while the quality is good, they're, well, obviously bought off the shelf. I'd like to trim and embroider the hems.
If I find the time, making new boots would be good; the old ones always have been a kind of make-shift solution, and after eight years one should be able to go beyond that. It's not that hard, and def. cheaper than buying.
Considering the weather we had last time, pattens might also be a good idea. (Incidentally, I was the only one in the Medieval Literature seminar who knew what pattens are. All I need to know for life I learned from geekdom, seriously.)

Char stuff: I already have collected and dried various herbs throughout the summer, so I have a good collection now. I do, however, have to memorise a lot of stuff about herbs, especially the healing variant, as my character can't read or write (although the Gondorian rangers tried to convince her that reading and writing is totally awesome and necessary, and perhaps in time they'll manage to teach her, but until then...) So I'll have to read up on wild herbs, and try to keep part of it in mind.

Spare time stuff: Actually I could do part of the embroidering at the LARP itself; handcrafts are a good IC occupation for moments when there's no plot, or when you need rest but want to be present, after all. But we'll also need to make wreaths and such in our "spare time" - the King is getting married, after all - and with cooking and dishwashing and awesome GMs, it's not all that likely that I'll have much time for embroidery.
But coming up with ideas for symbolic wreaths (somehow we have to make them suitable for a union between Rohan and Harad (this is the Fourth Age; we have overcome past hostilities)), and collecting appropriate plantstuff, goes on the list.

Music stuff: Our bard already warned us that she'd prefer if she didn't have to make all the dancing music all by her onesies so I've already begun practicing some historic dances on the recorder. So far I can play (In alphabetical order, with LARP-compatible names where extant):

-Allemande ("Rohanesque")
-Belle qui tiens ma vie
-Black Almaine
-Chapelloise
-Gallopede
-Gathering Peascods
-Hole in the Wall ("Calacirya")
-Indian Queen ("Sindarin Queen")
-Jamaico
-New new nothing
-Parson's Farewell
-Sellenger's Round
-Siebensprung
-Siege of St Malo
-Tourdion
-Traubentritt
-Upon a Summer's Day

If at all possible, I want to be able to play those fairly hitch-free, and with perhaps a few variations, and repeated often enough for a proper dance. Also I'd like to additionally get the hang of:

-All together, one after another
-Emperor of the Moon
-Pavane La Bataille
-Queen's Jig
-Siege of Limerick

(If anyone happens to have, by some weird coincidene, sheet notes of these, I'd be grateful if you could share them! Will make icons, art or even drabbles for notes. I can always use the scans of the original Playford ones if I must (except for the Bataille, obviously), but something more readable with, like, consistent tone length and variations and such would be awesome.
And I should be able to explain all those dances, too, because it's not certain whether Bella comes along or not and anyway it's always good when more than one person knows how it's done...

Our bard definitely knows how to play

-Bransle des Chevaux
-Bransle des Rats
-Chapelloise
-Folia
-Maître de la Maison
-Tourdion

and she likely used the time since then to learn further dances, too, so that gives us a varied repertoire (and probably waaay more than we can teach people to dance anyway).
Now we just need a harpist or someone who can play the lute and we can start making our own medieval historic dancing team.

- - -
And more is unrealistic anyway, so I'll leave it at that.
Unless I think of something vitally important, of course.

[/geek]

With only about a month to go until Christmas, I suppose it's high time I started collecting addresses.

Sooo: If you'd like a Christmas/Yule/Kwanzaa/Hannukah/Festivus/Emperor's birthday/whatever card, this is the post where you shout "here".

If I sent you a card before, I should have your address unless it changed. If I never sent you anything, I'll likely not have your address, so it'd be helpful if you either gave it in a comment (they're screened) or, if you don't trust that, sent it per e-mail (lyraforeniel at hotmail dot com).

As I live in a dominantly Christian country*, I am kind of sending Christmas cards by default, so if you don't celebrate Christmas and would like to get a card for whatever holiday it is you go in for, please specify.

If you'd rather want a normal card instead of some fugly self-painted card with random calligraphy, green knights, time-travelling Elves or other horrors from the Lyrabrain, please say so as well. I promise I won't take offense; I understand perfectly well if not everyone wants the weirdness!

So... have at it!

*Although given my procrastination skills the cards will more likely than not be sent from a dominantly Buddhist/Shintoist country, but still.

We now have a community for the celebrations. Please join if you're interested - joining is modded, but anyone who doesn't look like a spambot will be permitted to get in, really. I'm just a wee bit paranoid.

30yearssilm

Come! Participate! Have fun! Please? :)

Soo my calendar tells me that the Silmarillion was first published on September 15th, 1977.

Now if you check your calendars (even if they don't provide you with such wonderfully random information as mine does), you will likely find that it is a) September and b) 2007.

Now of course, this being Tolkien fandom, the 33rd would be more of a milestone than the 30th. Then again there aren't all that many Hobbits in the Silmarillion, so we can ignore them really. (But of course we can totally have a party in 2010 as well.)

What I am trying to say is: We should totally do something to celebrate the anniversary, shouldn't we?

The question would be, just what do we do? Mad drabbling sessions? Artspam? Lenghty entries on just why we love a lengthy, nebulous monster of a chronicle in which pretty much everyone dies? Quote-slams? Any ideas? Everyone who comes up with an idea just shares it somewhere, and whoever wants to can play along, and in the end we'll have a delightful chaos consisting of everything fandom is about*?

:D

- - -
* everything fandom is about except for wank and/or drama, I should say

So, es sieht jetzt also sooo aus: Ich hab hier zwei Karten für Neil Gaiman morgen abend, aber mein Freund kriegt da jetzt doch keine Vertretung und kann also nicht mitkommen.
Da ich die Karte natürlich ungern einfach verfallen lassen würde, hier also die Frage an die Flist...
irgendwer interessiert, spontan mitzukommen?

und nimielle und lexygranger, wollen wir uns irgendwo vorher treffen und gemeinsam hingehen, oder hoffen wir, dass wir uns schon vor Ort sehen? ;)