neon epiphany

GNE.flickr.com? I’ve never wanted any April fool’s joke to be real* more than this one. Is it 2003 again? It was eerie and wonderful to wander the old roads, crossing through firefields and city squares. Absinthe is still there, though it seems much more like a luxury in an economic downturn that has seemingly extended to my in-game pocketbook  as well. And old faces (many with new names), sounding much as if they’d dropped in directly from then. I don’t want it to end, but I’m afraid to get too attached, should they break my heart again … but will they? Oh, they make tantalizing noises: “we’ll have to fix that,” dangling the possibility of a future. Is there a place for a little freeform gaming in the new new economy? I fear not, but I’ll enjoy this carriage until the moment it becomes a pumpkin again.

In other (more mundane) news, “Still Alive” is possibly the only song in Rock Band where singing in a manner true to the original actually coincides with maximum scoring potential. Which should help the efforts of the Aperture Science Self Esteem Fund for Girls. It’s true!

As quickly as it came, it went; Good-bye, GNE, sleep well, and Thank You for the best April 1 on record. Sniff.

Took out Alan Moore’s Promethea: Book 1 from the library, even before I’d read a single page of Preacher. I feel like I’m getting a bit ahead of myself, but it only seemed appropriate after a night spent dreaming I was a super-powered reincarnation of Cleopatra, fighting terrorists with the ability to see actions as words on a printed page and affect their fates through copyeditor’s marks. Seriously. And! You should have seen it, loves — my costume was amazing, a thing of bronze and silk and leather, full of reptilian ferocity. The Editrix, I think, as a name. Don’t you?

That’s right, I even get to cosplay in my sleep. If that’s not a superpower, I don’t know what is.

“The sky broke like an egg into full sunset and the water caught fire.” — Pamela Hansford Johnson
Show us a self-taken picture of the sunset.
Submitted by Connie.

Our last KitKat report was almost two years ago & the flavors underwhelming, so it’s high time for another, and have I got some lovely new boxes to show off. I heart Japanese candy packaging — not exactly zen, but definitely elegant!*

First off, matcha choco is yet another green tea flavored variety, although in contrast to our previous friends, green tea and green tea with azuki bean, these aren’t coated in nummy tea-infused white chocolate. Instead, we get familiar standard milk chocolate coating with green tea filling between wafer & shell. Normally, I adore all matcha-based desserts, but I think chocolate overwhelms here ~ v. sad. Couldn’t taste green beyond a vague sense of “creamier-ness” — much, much prefer its white choco-based cousins.

Ringo choco, clearly from the same “release,” comes in an identical form factor: two solo-wrapped, chubby bars inside a tall, thin box. These are wearing the same milk chocolate cocktail dress, but sport apple-flavored intimates this time. The apple? Totally fake & supercharged with sweetness but in a classic, candy way, and as such can’t be overpowered by the cocoa, which makes it automatically more successful than the matcha. Was reminded of Miranda’s bizarre choco / apple gummy panda cookie, and these are similarly simultaneously appealing & disturbing. My reshuffled pantheon of fruit-flavored KitKats is now ranked thusly: Wine (yes, please!), Strawberry, Ringo choco, Orange, Banana (yuck!).

Finally, chestnut brings us back to lovely white chocolate-based goodness. Again, we’re bordering on too sweet, but there’s a pleasant nutty, woody, almost smoky flavor present that recalls, if not specifically roast chestnuts, something in their general neighborhood. The flavor’s definitely the most complex of the three, and bears further “study.” However! Am feeling guilty now after three KitKat bars, so… will have to wait a bit on that.

*it remains impossible to reconcile this elegance with Japanese candy commericals. w. t. f.

**though I do like this one — I mean, Ayumi Hamasaki!

More KitKats

I got the table of contents page! (shush, please don’t tell me if that’s a bad thing!)

Feeling unreasonably giddy at the idea of being published in a real, live, you-pay-for-this magazine*. Even if the other envelope never arrives, I think my euphoria should last for awhile yet. To tell the truth, I was offered some decent money a couple years back for several shots by the Washington State Tourism Board, but at the time fear of having my real name out there (and, after all, they have to cut a check to somebody) convinced me not to. ~ so glad I got over it, because it’s really quite enjoyable!

On the other hand, hate, hate, hate, hate doing taxes. Seething hate. How do I get myself into this situation every year?

*This is the May 2008 issue of Popular Photography & Imaging.

Did I mention how much I hate taxes? Finally, thrillingly, done, but at a cost — apparently the window of time spent doing them coincided exactly with a window of unseasonably beautiful weather. This is the usual story of my life.

Had a brief conversation with a friendly barista at Aberdeen Centre’s Starbucks, where the following vital information was gleaned:

1. Mango tea frappuccino will never arrive because apparently it already did, and  due to an abject failure in north American test markets was a no-go. Test markets which went unnamed for their own safety, because they are so finished once I uncover their taste-defective identities.
2. Tangerine and pomegranate have been off the menu some time, leaving only the heavy stuff, but you can still get a strawberry-lemon tea frappuccino if you ask nicely. A touch over-sweet, but it’ll work in a pinch.
3. Iced green tea with a couple squeezes of melon syrup: maybe the best idea of all.

Believe me, as a non-coffee-drinker who spends a lot of time with addicts, this is all going to save my life someday.

Hit my deadline & have been laying v. low the past few days, a happy feeling indeed! Sweeney Todd is sitting  next to the television, waiting to be watched. Finally saw Juno. Persepolis was just so good, must see movie version stat — if I can find it. Elsewhere on the to-consume list: Top 10 #1, Absolute Sandman #1, Heart Station, Lost Odyssey. Plan to try to fit as much as possible, plus relax, the next five weeks, inasmuch as one can do that whilst preparing to move.

I’m not certain if I’ve ever really been prepared to learn that my father wasn’t immortal. I have never met anyone who was as self-assured as he is — and remember watching, wide-eyed, as he, badly burnt in a yard project gone horribly wrong, proceeded to cut dead meat off his leg with a pair of kitchen shears. Was it meant to be sick or reassuring when he pushed his finger into exposed flesh to show me what “edema” was? To my forever-afraid, little girl eyes, this was on a different plane: real Zeus-versus-the-Titans stuff.

On Friday, I got a call from my baby sister, who told me that he was in hospital, with a likely stroke — he’d been feeling numbness in his right side while packing for a trip, and after making his self-diagnosis (of course) had gone with my mother. I talked to him that afternoon, and he was in good spirits, talking clearly, and apparently moving around well and often (they couldn’t keep him his room). But there was some question about his blood pressure, and his blood sugar, and…

Odds & ends, because it’s all I feel up to:

Could tell that Elizabeth: The Golden Age wasn’t exactly to a level with its predecessor, but it was too easy to lose myself in its costuming and set design. Those dresses! (swoon) … sadly, all Clive Owen’s subplots were dead weight, I felt, and I’m pained in saying so as I love Clive Owen dearly.

Alan Moore love fest continues: Top 10 #1 was great, eagerly awaiting book 2; League of Extraordinary Gentlemen #1 a fun read though more of a simple diversion.

<3 Heart Station, as expected.

Officially filled up on $4 gas last week, but too shellshocked to come to terms with it ‘til now.

Didn’t warm to Helena Bonham Carter as Mrs. Lovett until her final, heartbreaking duet with Toby. Anthony and Johanna? Ugh. Johnny Depp, unsurprisingly, mrowr.

Am not feeling like jumping on GTA IV’s bandwagon with the rest of humanity. Truly, when would I play?

These little guys were hanging out with their mother just outside my building’s rear entrance (am not sure why, but immediately the cover of Beatles For Sale came to mind). They hadn’t been there long, at least not in this state — you could still see eggshells on the ground. Was immediately flush with newfound sense of renewal, and v. timely so… and oh, but they look cosy, don’t they?

Just looking at them made me feel warm, too, and loved.

Thanks for the well-wishes, all. Really, and truly, mean it…