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Today was the official publication day for the latest Wild Cards book, SUICIDE KINGS.

Run, don't walk, to your favorite bookstore and getcha copy now. And hell, while you're there, get copies for all your friends as well. All you Xmas shopping in one swell foop.

Current Mood: chipper

Played a 6-epidemic game of Pandemic with Medic, Operations Expert (the new one), Researcher, Scientist. We won without much alarm, even though we had all six epidemics come out.

This makes four victories at six epidemics in a row. (Two with four players, two with three.) We're starting to feel delusions of competence. I fully expect to be humbled horribly soon.

bcbonifeeeds

13:34 will be pulling double-music-duty this Xmas Eve, cantoring at 5pm and choir extravaganzaing for the 11pm, will be a very musical holiday! #

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This does about sum it up

see more dog and puppy pictures

Current Mood: Getting better

Giants Crush
Well, that was fun. If only every game was like this...

(Maybe it is, if you're a Colts fan).

These were the Giants I remember. The swarming aggressive D, the sacks, the knockdowns, the hurries, the interceptions, runners tackled at the line of scrimmage. And on offense, long time-consuming drives ending in touchdowns. Eli looked terrific, spreading the ball around. Nicks, Smith, Manningham, and Boss all had big catches, and even Derek Hagan scored a touchdown. The running game was back, especially when Ahmad Bradshaw had the ball. The O line opened gaping holes, and the D line was so relentless that our wafer-thin secondary was never threatened.

Yeah, these were the real G-Men.

I have no idea who those clowns in the Redskins uniforms were.

That fake field goal the Skins tried at the end of the first half had to be one of the most bizarre plays I've ever seen. Watching Steve Young talk about it in the postgame was hilarious.

I do feel sorry for Jim Zorn, whose postgame press conference was... well, obviously, no one ever taught the guy Coachspeak. Poor guy is not long for D.C.

But it was a great win.

Now we need two more like it, coupled with a Cowboys loss.

(Or a Packers loss, maybe... but while I know the G-Men have the tiebreaker over Dallas, no one has ever mentioned who wins a tie between New York and Green Bay).

Next week, the Panthers. Who beat the Vikings yesterday. Let's hope the real G-Men show up.

Current Mood: happy

So some company sent a nice shipment of hentai tshirts to the Goodwill, which promptly put them out on display. I apologize to all those who wanted one; they've been removed. I suggested to the manager that, "There's a woman and an octopus and ... something's not quite right." Just don't want the Goodwill getting closed down in a shitstorm this close to Xmas.

Every Celiac's Nightmare
Every Celiac's Nightmare...

===This just came to my attention, and passing it on...anyone heard anything about this?

For those of a mycophile sort...
amatoxin antidote?

===Follows from the finding that Milk Thistle extracts are good for mushroom poisonings....

Immanion Press/Megalithica Books would like to announce its two newest nonfiction releases! We now have both of these books in stock here at the Green Wolf, so here's the official announcement.

Women's Voices in Magic edited by Brandy Williams is a phenomenal collection of essays from female occultists and magicians. People often think of female magical practitioners as mainly witches and neopagans, and the areas of ceremonial and chaos magic as more male-dominated. The essayists in this collection would like to disagree, some politely, some not! We discuss everything from our historical predecessors to the effects pregnancy has on magic, dealing with discrimination by other occultists for our sex, and how we work to change the assumptions that are made about us. Click here for more details, including a list of essays, and ordering info!

As for our other release--chaos magic has been around for a few decades now, and some would argue that it's long since gone stale, assimilated into a more mainstream, image-oriented form of occultism. Liber 767 vel Boeingus by Josef Karika takes chaos magic back to its exploratory, experimental, and lovingly irreverent roots. Based on the author's fifteen years of practical experience, and written with a good dose of humor, this text includes a wide variety of ideas for magical practice, from new takes on sigils and servitors and technological magic, to innovative ways to work with memories and dopplegangers. Here's where you can find more info, and place your order!

In other news, yes, the deadline for Digging up the Ostrich's Head, the animal sacrifice anthology, blew by a few days ago. I'm still way behind on, well, everything, with holidays in full swing, so if there are still outstanding essays, feel free to let me know--I'll still accept them. I don't have the time right this moment to do a full round of editing, but I am going to try to go through and cull anything that absolutely won't fit, and let folks know whether they have an initial yea or nay.

Bleah. Been feeling low-energy the past few days, going to take it easy now.

Nice Guy 101: Attention to Details
( Read more... )
~facepalm~

So absorbed in being nice to all these other people, I had spent the entire conversation talking about myself, and then ignored her while making my calls. *sigh* So much to learn, so many habits left to break.....

not sure who this will reach
but go and see Avatar.

I have a few problems with this movie. One is the black and white portrayal of the military. The other is Dance with Wolves story line. But there are some subtle and not so subtle messages in the movie that are important for people to hear. Who knows if this will bring about any change, but any effort at awakening our awareness is worth our support. And if you get bored the visuals will be there to entertain you. It is a movie that has to be seen in a theatre. I would suggest trying to find an Imax Theatre to see it in. I kept looking for the CGI in the movie, but couldn't find it.

Holiday Party, Dec-19-2009
Our holiday party was very quiet this year. A combination of scheduling conflicts and snow troubles brought us down to only fifteen people at the party. I had hoped for many more people to celebrate Lori's birthday with us--particularly since we had a beautiful cake:

I'm really glad that Lori liked her birthday cake:

I'm glad we kept the party tradition alive. I hope that the St. Patrick's Day party will be bigger and better.

Happy Yule
Hope you all had good celebrations over the evening/night/morning. I had a wonderful time last night and was glad to see those who came out to celebrate with us.

I've been asked several times why I celebrate Yule with all the other "Pagans" since I'm Kemetic and follow a different calender and set of traditions. While it is not called Yule there is actually a Egyptian festival that coincides with Yule. (Egypt is in the Northern Hemisphere too :) ) The festival called Hb-nxt (The victory festival) or Hb-stH (The festival of Set) or msw.t-ra (Which translates to something close to the Festival of the New Year of the sun) This is a festival of Set and Ra both.

The mythology behind this festival is that every evening the sun (Ra as Atum) passes into the underworld. The Duat/Tuat (Underworld) is filled with beasts and demons that try to devour, kill or otherwise hamper the rebirth of the sun. On Yule/Solstice the sun spends the longest time in the land of the dead and Ra is at his weakest point throughout the year. Also those things of "evil" (Actually chaos when you translate texts) are stronger on this night than any other. Set (Seth/Sekhet/Sutekh if you prefer) always accompanies Mehen (the solar snake god) on the Solar barque every evening through the underworld. In this mythology Set is the protector of the sun and not really associated with the deceit and betrayal he has when associated with the Osiris mythology. On the longest night of the year, as the myth goes, only Set and Mehen have the strength to drive off Apep (the evil, chaotic serpent that seeks to kill the sun). Set as the god of darkness, violence, storms, the sky and strife is the only one able to stand up to the onslaught of beings encountered this night. For most of Egypt's history and particularly in Lower Egypt and the delta area, Set was seen as a heroic god who while evil, chaotic and destructive was also a great and noble warrior.

Historically, Set is believed to be demonized through two events.. one in the unification of Egypt where Upper Egypt was mostly Osiris based and Lower more Set based leading to religious conflict and later during the foreign invasions of Hyksos, Persians, Greeks and Romans. This later demonization was related to Set being the god of Foreigners who were now the oppressor, invader and ruler.

The imagery of Set from this myth is shown in several aspects related to this myth. He can be shown as a snake headed god on the front of the solar barque (which is actually a combination of Set and Mehen). He can be shown as Set in his usual form or, in later art, as the dual Horus-Set god where he and Horus have been melded into one two headed god in the representations. Set as the defender of the sun is most often depicted in the garb of a foot soldier with a spear either held at his side or raised as if poised to spear an adversary.

The purpose of the festival is to give offerings and strength to both Set and Ra. The festival is two fold. The time before the actual solstice evening is a gathering of force/energy, you might say, to aid Set and after the Solstice night it is a celebration of Ra being reborn after the trials of the night. I don't know much about other Yule traditions but from what I do understand the purpose in many of them seem to be the same as the Egyptian standard as far as the sun goes.

On a side note there are specific offerings to be used. For the night before it is meat, incense and oils to Set. Honey is the traditional for Ra because honey was known as sun tears from the way honey drips from the hive when the sun hits it.

Current Mood: drained
Current Music: "Bad Boy Boogie" - AC/DC

bcbonifeeeds

09:14 despite the blizzard, we had a really great crowd last night at the @RCCPGH Holiday Concert:) Thanks to all who came and good job everyone! #

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Blasphemous Night & some random hotness
Stolen from

gailmom, cuz they're awesome.

File this one under "Oh, right. I do like boys, too."

Jets Crash
Life is meaningless and full of pain.

I saw this one coming. Three missed field goals will always come back and bite you in the ass.

Great D, but Mark still has a lot of maturing to do.

With the Colts and the Bengals yet to come, I think we can kiss the playoffs goodbye.

And I'm not feeling good about the Giants game tomorrow either.

Current Mood: crushed

Best moments of the day
- Having someone to talk my problems out with, even if I couldn't touch him because he was diseased ;).
- Rubbing feet instead of snuggling, no chance of disease exchange with feet rubbing.
- Sleep, blissful, uninterrupted sleep.
- Waking to the sun streaming in the room and the chickens clucking in the yard.
- Successfully, in my tastebuds, making pho broth.
- Trips to the ethic markets when you're not in a rush.

pineapple upside-down muffins are the best thing ever... save for having absolutely no redeeming nutritional value they're the perfect food!

nicanthiel has just announced the release of a new book--Boar, Birch and Bog: Prayers to Nerthus, about one of the lesser-known Germanic deities. Click the link for more info!

snow... or not ...and muffins
so, just after midnight I was finally able to discern a thin dusting of white stuff on the tops of bushes and on some blades of grass... not entirely convinced this is even as much as the 1/4 inch of snow news people were trying to convince everyone that we had on the southside... but hey, it was something, right?

woke up this morning to find the world sunny, somewhat damp, and entirely without snow

guess I won't be making any snow muffins this morning... they require 1.5 cups of snow... no joke- from page 174 of "the 250 best muffin recipes" snow muffins:

ingredients:
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup lightly packed brown sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
3 tbsp margarine, melted
1 cup milk
1 & 1/2 cup snow
3/4 cup raisins or currants

Preheat oven to 375 F
12 cup muffin tin, greased

1. In a bowl combine flour,brown sugar, baking powder, & salt; mix well. Add margarine and milk; mixture will but lumpy. Quickly add snow and raisins; stir just until blended.

2. Spoon batter into prepared muffin tin, dividing evenly. Bake in preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until lightly browned.

"muffin stuff" addendum from book re: recipe- At first, when I was given this recipe, I thought it was an April fool's joke! Before making muffins collect fresh, loosely-packed snow.

...anyway, I'll be making pineapple upside down muffins today instead but I totally think that those of you with snow should try the snow muffins and let me know how it goes (or try some variant on it 'cause of course if I tried it margarine would be butter and raisins would be chocolate chips because I don't take instruction well and have certain standards... but y'know, that's still trying out the spirit of the recipe anyway, right)

Traveling
Despite the snow in VA, the flight is on time. Hopefully, I can make my wifi router work through my parents brick walls, & get online easily tonight. Once again I'm reminded of how much I loathe flying. Since not visiting my parent would cause me much grief, next year I'll see if I can get them to fly out & see us. If they stayed in a hotel, Becca, Alice, & I could have a far saner holiday.

bcbonifeeeds

13:09 RT @RCCPGH - Lovely snow for RCC Holiday Concert TONIGHT! 8pm Carnegie Music Hall in Oakland! Join us for an evening of holiday music! #
14:10 for tonight's concert if you don't already have a ticket you can still buy at the door. General seating so remember to arrive accordingly! #

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