Eldrad must live

Okay, so I haven't posted since break started. As you may have noticed, I'm still in KC, later than I thought I'd be. But my time in Kansas City has been pretty fun, and the holidays have been relatively stress-free and low on the annoyance level, which is nice. I extended my stay a few days to get together with folks who weren't available earlier (most notably rathershady, with whom I will be having lunch tomorrow), but I've booked my bus ticket home for Tuesday evening (so I should be back in the IC around 2 a.m. Wednesday morning).

The most notable thing I can say about my stay so far, however, is that my Doctor Who mania has turned rather into an obsession. It has spread from the new series to the classic series; this is nice, in a "usually when I get into something I finish everything that's out straightaway and have to wait for new stuff, but I've got 30 years' worth of episodes I haven't seen yet, woohoo!" way. However, it also means that this series has seized on my mind in a way that very few things have recently, even series I've been really into like Veronica Mars and Heroes; the last thing I was this enthusiastic about was Buffy, back when I first discovered it.

Of course, as I do with all of my enthusiasms, I've dragged my parents kicking and screaming into at least the periphery of it; after having shown them several eps from seasons 1 and 2 of New Who and an ep or two from Classic Who, my mom admits it's pretty good, if not necessarily her thing, and my stepdad, despite not being a big sci-fi person, at least liked the cat-nuns in New Earth (he has this thing about nuns). I'm sure they're waiting with bated breath for me to get tired of it; I'm starting even to annoy myself with my babbling about Doctor Who. All too many conversations in our house recently have gone something like this:

Mom: So what do you want to do for supper?
Me: Did you know that Diana Gabaldon based her character Jamie Fraser in the Outlander series on the Second Doctor's companion Jamie McCrimmon?

...TRUFAX, you know.

Anyway, between giftcards and then buying stuff on my own when I've seen it at the numerous local quality video retail establishments (I went wild at Hastings yesterday), I now have not only the second season of New Who (the only one I was missing) but also a crapload of Classic Who DVDs: Pyramids of Mars, The Talons of Weng-Chiang, The Hand of Fear, The Sontaran Experiment, The Invasion, and Genesis of the Daleks. LET THE WHO-FEST COMMENCE. I also have a few more earmarked to buy on Overstock the second I have the funds. MOAR FOUR AND SARAH JANE OR LEELA, GOSHDARNIT. Also, I kind of want to see Five and his companions now, after watching Time Crash and the latest Christmas special on YouTube this evening. Also, in related news, Kylie was surprisingly good in said Christmas special.

...But back to the swag! I also got some other sweet stuff as presents and with my giftcards, including I, Claudius on DVD and Assassin's Creed. Seriously, I am going to go back loaded with so much loot that I may need to pack an extra checked bag on my bus ride just to get all my presents back up to Iowa with me. Oh well, can't really complain. XD

Anyway, it's way past my bedtime (damn RTD and Kylie, making me stay up for their damned Christmas special), so I'll sign off...I imagine the next time I post I'll be back in the IC. Talk to y'all later!

Went down to my second Christmas at my aunt Becky's on Sunday. It was nice, and I got a lot of swag:

- the new Harry Potter book, a soapmaking book and supplies, a book of Jane Austen's letters, and a foldable shopping cart from my parents, as well as a CD of local indie bands (which I think is the first "wtf?" item I've ever gotten from them, they normally have a pretty good idea of what I like);
- Finding Neverland on DVD from my brother;
- a gorgeous quilt, a watercolor picture of Christchurch College in Oxford, and a Barnes and Noble giftcard from my aunt Becky;
- and a Borders giftcard from my cousin Andrew.

Today I'm going to go to Barnes and Noble and shop up a storm using my TWO B&N giftcards (since my stepbrother gave me one on Thursday). Ehehehehe. >D

Anyway, the rest of the day went pretty well too...had lots of food and pie, played my cousin's new game Shadows Over Camelot (a really cool cooperative board game) with my sister and cousins (for the record, I was the traitor and so won when we lost). The game was most notable, however, for the fact that my cousin Andrew actually used the word "pwned" (pronounced "poned") in normal conversation. XD

Later in the day we played a couple of games of The Perfect Ten (which my brother had gotten for Becky), but as far as trivia goes it was pretty woeful...both my family and my aunts and cousins were too smart for it to be TOO much of a challenge, and one game only went three rounds and the other only went two (for the record, it's supposed to take up to ten to win).

Monday and Tuesday were pretty peaceful, calm days - I surfed the Net some, read some HariPo, watched some Buffy, ate some leftovers, et cetera. It was nice to have some relaxation time. (I totally would have played some PS2, too, except that I left my power cord at home. ;_;)

Today is probably going to be devoted to two things: 1) spending my B&N giftcards, and 2) packing to go to CO. :D

( and a meme that turned out disturbingly accurate at times )

Let's Positive Linking!
- Accidental acetaminophen poisoning up. I'm not supposed to take acetominophen myself (it conflicts with one of my other medicationss, I think), so I should hopefully be able to avoid this. I'm not surprised this is happening, though, since I'm pretty up on my medical stuff and even I did not know that acetaminophen was used in Vicodin, Percoset, etc. (And my mom's taken both!) So I totally see how it could happen.
- Best Christmas commercial EVAR. (From angrybabble.)
- Harry Potter and the Hogwarts Dance Team. Warn those around you that paroxysms of laughter WILL inevitably follow watching this, and not to worry. (From jantalaimon.)
- A few days ago there was a story about a woman here in the metro area who swallowed (or attempted to swallow) a cellphone in order to end a conversation with her husband. Now it comes out that it may not have been voluntary. DUN DUN DUN!
- The NunBun has been stolen! (From eslington.)

Edit: Now it turns out that cellphone-swallowing lady was actually stalked and kidnapped by her ex, who then rammed it down her throat. Fucker, I hope somebody turns him in to the fuzz.

Hope y'all had a happy Thanksgiving, with lots of turkey (or tofurkey, if that's more your speed) and pie of some sort.

The bus ride down to KC was a little less traumatic than my last one (of course, I'm like 7 years older than I was then so that's probably not surprising). It did run long, though, so while I was supposed to get in at 11:15 I actually got in at 11:45, which made things kinda rough on my poor parents.

Being back at home feels kinda weird - I'm no longer used to it, so everything seems different and smaller and more cluttered and it all smells kinda like cat pee (the unfortunate result of having so many cats), but overall I'm still pretty happy to be home. On Sunday my parents took me to a lot of the places I'd been missing during my time in Iowa (finally, a store with a decent manga selection again!); I spent Monday and Tuesday with my mom, hanging out with rathershady and courters28 in the evenings, which was really nice (though Courtney, I think I picked up whatever you were sick with); Wednesday I went over to visit my stepmom and stepbrother and baby brother (I know I say this every time I see him, but Lance really is the cutest kid EVAR); yesterday my parents and I went down to Topeka for Thanksgiving with my aunt and cousins, which was fun (though slightly marred by the first signs of my illness); and today I'm full-blown sick, working on my Chaucer draft in a Sudafed PE-induced haze. But there's leftover French Silk pie, so it's all good.

However, since our car is having some coolant trouble, and it's been certified for in-city and even to Topeka but the mechanic couldn't guarantee no problems en route to Iowa and back, my stepdad's gonna drive me up in my truck. Which kinda sucks, because I think my mom would like to come back up to Iowa City, but she's probably not up to the drive anyway (she's just finished recovering from the nasty fall she took on her LAST visit to IC) and this means we can take up some bigger stuff, like bookcases and an endtable and boxes of books and clothes and stuff, which is DEFINITELY good.

Also, I'm looking at going to see Pride and Prejudice with the 'rents this evening, so hopefully impressions of that will follow soon.

Edit: Also, because it's now seasonally appropriate, have some horrific Grinch/Max pr0nfic courtesy of aff.net. Dr. Seuss was never so disturbing! :D