As the dining hall food did not quite suit my tastes for the occasion, I tried out a nearby pub for dinner. Pierogies and curry, not bad. After that, I finally stopped in at the candy store that replaced the bookstore, and was pleasantly surprised to find that they have an ongoing promotion with late-night discounts. Now I've some fudge and candy corn to try when I'm not so stuffed. And I talked to my parents in advance and I should have a sewing machine waiting when I get home for Thanksgiving.

Now I had better buckle down to all these papers before I let myself get back to playing "poke the Silver Fang from multiple angles" and never actually finish anything either recreational or academic.

(Seriously, they're so especially values-dissonant with all their Divine Right and such that I can't resist imagining i.e. the cub of impeccable Fang lineage who is genteelly poor and falls for his Bone Gnawer neighbor, or falls for a vampire, or runs off with changelings, or is a hapless WWII-era Red Army soldier, or is an avowed commie. Not to forget the Malkavian Kinfolk)

(Also, because I am perverse, the occasional tone I get from the sourcebooks of "NO NO YOU'RE DOING IT WRONG," or in the case of the Malkavian and Fianna books "SHUT UP ABOUT THE DAMN FAIRIES ALREADY," especially tempts me to do it wrong)

Those inexplicable shopping cart additions turned out to be one of my sisters shopping for her Halloween costume. Apparently I forgot to sign out of the home computer.

Found some inexplicable pairs of fifty-dollar boots in my Amazon shopping cart, supposedly put in there yesterday. Took them out and changed the password posthaste. According to the order history there doesn't seem to have been any shopping sprees in my absence, but that leaves me wondering what it was all about if not your run-of-the-mill account hijack.

Title: A Romantic History
Fandom: Old World of Darkness (Vampire: the Masquerade)
Genre: Angst/Horror
Rating: R
Word Count: ~6,600
Summary: A Toreador storyteller who’s not as understanding as he thinks meets a Nosferatu Cleopatra who’s not as over things as he thinks. Sparks fly and set things on fire.
Author’s Notes and Warnings: This fic is going up in two posts. Further notes on sources and the like at the bottom of this post. Thanks to those who helped out with that.

Contains language, allusions to violence, torture, nonconsensual sexual contact, dark themes. Please note that the views of these characters certainly don’t always match my own.

( Vampire Stockholm Syndrome or whatever the hell )

( Further notes )

Title: A Romantic History
Fandom: Old World of Darkness (Vampire: the Masquerade)
Genre: Angst/Horror
Rating: R
Word Count: ~7,300
Summary: A Toreador storyteller who’s not as understanding as he thinks meets a Nosferatu Cleopatra who’s not as over things as he thinks. Sparks fly and set things on fire.
Author’s Notes and Warnings: I've been dithering over this piece for a while and am finally biting the bullet. This is going up in two posts. Further notes on sources and the like at the bottom of the second post. Thanks to those who helped out with that.

Contains language, allusions to violence, torture, nonconsensual sexual contact, dark themes. Please note that the views of these characters certainly don’t always match my own.

( Aren’t you accustomed to being loved? )

... include that when, on the occasion that the creative writing prof asks for the definitive vampire novel, I think Anne Rice before I think Bram Stoker.

Also when, in a hurry to cancel out my last dumbass answer in the same hour, I actually say it.

Slinking back under my rock now.

(I wonder if it's karmic comeuppance for filing the serial numbers off my Werewolf: The Apocalypse fanfic those times, or for recasting a couple of vampires as a bickering couple on the verge of divorce)

I am spending far too much time and having far too much fun sketching out a liberally crossovered cast of thousands which I have to doubt I'll ever use a tenth of, ranging from the roaming band of vampire Kinfolk who thus far have managed to avoid evisceration to the hapless changelings caught up in a werewolf-vampire territory struggle.

ETA: Inexplicable embedding now deleted.

... some win that would be. Congratulate me, will you?

I suppose then would be a good time to set up my own charity, with lots of overhead. Or, slightly less questionably, give it to my parents and persuade them to raise my allowance.

The PDF site where I've been getting my fix is having a major sale* so I've stocked up on further reading material (it would've been nice to know there was going to be one before I got the sect books, but no use crying over spilt). Among other things I scooped up the core books for aforementioned old-school Werewolf and Changeling - because you see, an even bigger time sink is just what I need.

( With regard to what I've read so far )

*The site in question, as a hopeful compromise between plugging and playing coy.

... I really want to justify the cost of a sewing machine. When I'm not working on dolls and the like, foot after foot of running stitch gets a bit tiresome (to say nothing of when I'll have to go back and finish the seams and whatnot). But I have to ask myself if spending so much for a hobby I take up so sporadically is really worth it. So far the answer's been no.

At least I have fewer absurd worries about gruesome needle accidents. And more to spend to indulge my hankering for Old World of Darkness PDFs. If boning up on Vampire for eventual Bloodlines fic isn't enough, I'm tempted to diversify into Werewolf and Changeling.

... so, time flies on summer break.

Now please excuse me while I am shocked and horrified by this revelation all over again.

( Cut for spoilers )

Barring that, I finished the game this evening, with the Anarch ending. Of course I haven't got much in the way of bragging rights, but I still hope that all the headcanon I've built up can amount to something worthwhile ficwise. At least a character sketch or two.

I've spent a good chunk of the last week playing Bloodlines, with the same probably going for the coming week, and ( rambly and spoilerish )

I'm really tempted to do some fic, though I'd like to hold off until I finish the game and probably do some more reading about the 'verse as a whole.

The new computer's arrived, I've got my stuff set up from backups, and Bloodlines is finally bought, installed, and running fine thus far. Am currently trying to get the hang of the controls.

1) My grades for spring semester came in and they're As across the board.

2) After some wrangling over video cards, I have a new gaming laptop ordered. It should arrive by early June, and then no more jostling for timeslots on the older computers around the house. *knock wood*

3) I have realized that a bright side to the protracted delay is that my advance Grand Plans for VtM: Bloodlines have had time to simmer down to a reasonable level.

Posting this from a campus computer. Starting with a couple of not-waking-up-from-sleep issues, my own computer seems to be in full-out implosion. Hoping against hope that at least Safe Mode will stay safe. From my Googling, the video card driver may be responsible.

There could be a worse time, I guess, but this is bad enough.

Dear Amazon.com,

Must you inconvenience my semi-conscientious and cheapskate lifestyle through your homophobic shenanigans? Please come to your senses, and soon.

No, self, you do not, in fact, need Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines. You don't even really want it. The amount of dying a player who's actually good at that kind of game does would leave you in tears. This is what the Let's Play is for (or at least part of what it's for in this case): all the pretty (for a given value of pretty) with none of the stress or, for that matter, the expense.

And when do you think you're going to have time to play it, huh? Look at what you're already juggling. Also, take a good long look at Baldur's Gate and Planescape: Torment and Neverwinter Nights, moldering away to this day.

And think of all the bugs!

Stick to Sims, when you have time. Give those Sims names like Heather and Alistair if you must (doesn't Camarilla sound like a nice and froofy name for a girl?), turn those Sims into Simly vampires if you must, but step away from the Steam website (and what if it asplodes at some point after you plunk down those twenty bucks, huh? Where'll you be then?).

At least give it a month, self. Then we'll see if we can discuss things in civilized fashion.

Memo to self: Diversify my "cheery" icons.

Anyhow, the cause of the cheer: passed my test for CPR certification this morning. Now I'm crossing my fingers for the literature test tomorrow.

I got a set of emails from the Dramatic Writing professor today. Apparently I ranked first in the class (earned a solid A, which he's sparing with), and he's actually impressed. Hell yeah! Hope I can keep it up next semester - I've got him again for Dramatic Writing II.

... when I suddenly notice stains on my clothes and cannot for the life of me figure out where they came from. I hope it's not mold.

Right now I'm kind of out of the habit of cooking, and I don't mind at all letting other people do it for me. This afternoon was a family cooperative effort, so - compromise, I suppose.

So, just barely yesterday (ETA: By the time I finished this post, anyhow), I picked up a package full of candy etc. mailed from home, saw a nice chunk of extra $ (also from home) in the process of being transferred to my bank account, finally ordered myself the newest Death Note DVD, went out for lunch, and saw the V for Vendetta movie courtesy of the college libertarians.

One major down note, namely the passage of Proposition 8 (and its siblings in other states). At least the margin's closer this time than it was with the last one, though close-minded me has a hard time imagining how much of an argument one could reasonably have over this issue. As long as I can remember, I've taken the right to rights as a given. It's disconcerting being reminded how many people disagree.

Once the time zones aligned right today, I called another number I found on the county voting website. After a while on hold (but thank goodness no more forwards to voicemail) I explained the situation to a human being, who asked for my name, checked my address, and told me he'd make a note of the resealed envelope so it won't be taken for a sign of tampering when my absentee ballot comes in over there. That's a lot more than I expected. I think I can relax a bit now. *knocks wood*

I most likely have screwed up my ballot on my first presidential election. More details of this colossal act of idiocy once the ramifications are confirmed and I actually speak to a human on the hotline. I suspect the only reason I haven't found precise confirmation yet is because people are expected to kind of pick up on this kind of thing on their own if they're bright enough to vote.