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☆ Today was much better than yesterday.

☆ Took the dog out for a walk after supper. Good times.

☆ Mum's new computer arrived, which means she no longer needs to borrow the one that I usually use for writing. (Which is good, as I don't really trust her with it, pfff.)

☆ Nice and unexpected comments on my stories. <3 Yay!

☆ DELICIOUS MANGOES.

☆ Upcoming SSSS & aRTD fic exchange, silentnightex. Fic or art, 500 word minimum, lots of matching options (including original characters and worldbuilding stuff). I'm really excited.

☆ The latest Kittens Game update has some VERY interesting possibilities. So far, assigning Engineers to tasks gives a way to small-scale automate some production in a way that I haven't had luck with fine-tuning in the Kittens Scientists autoclicker.

☆ My fragrance order arrived. *_* Hooray!

☆ This evening was nice. Not too cold. My brother went on a hunting trip and took the German Shorthair Pointer, so we're looking after his Cavalier spaniel while he's away. I took the dog out tonight, and it was just... nice. I don't go out on evening walks much these days, but I probably should, even though it's been getting a little dark around seven. Everyone's got their Halloween decorations out; there's this one house that has like, an eight-foot-tall inflatable grim reaper in front of it, and I don't know whether it's creepy or tacky. A bit of both, really.

☆ I'm coming down with a cold. I was sitting on the bus on the way home, and then suddenly it whacked me upside the head, like a brick. Ugh. Lovely. This is pretty bad, because I can't afford to take time off work - not because of money, but because I'm so busy, even losing one day puts me in a jam. Damn it. Hopefully this will sort itself out over the weekend. I wasn't planning to spend both days in bed, but I very well might... I have all of my sick days left, I haven't used any yet, so it isn't a problem, but I really, really don't want to call in on Monday.

☆ Had been thinking about going to see Crimson Peak on Saturday, but in light of the above, I might need to put it off until next weekend. I've heard people saying mixed things about it - though I haven't been watching too closely because I generally prefer not to be spoiled for horror movies - but eh, even if it's not-so-great, going to the movies is always fun. Well, hopefully next week....

☆ So how about that Kittens Game update, eh? Details are here; remember to backup your save file before you update. I'm really interested in that new storage option; I think it will solve my unobtanium limit problems (for the most part I've been grinding harbours slooowly until I can build more moon bases, which is just - ugh). Also very interested in what effects Kerosene will have. It seems like in a future update, 40k achievement will be the result of accumulated years, rather than years in a single run. And you know what? That might be what finally persuades me to do a reset. Up until now, I haven't really had a desire to, but - I'm still on my first run, and there are some late-game features that I will just never get to if I don't reset (Necrocorns, Leviathans, etc). So, maybe. Also: Autokittens has an update for Kerosene; I had to do some fiddling before I figured out how to add it, since someone dumped it on pastebin without explanation... but here's the code to get it to work, just dump the whole line into a bookmark like usual:
javascript:(function(){document.body.appendChild(document.createElement('script')).src='http://pastebin.com/raw.php?i=AipEa8yD';})();

☆ Yuletide letter is done and up. Still feel like I'm jumping the gun, but it's one less thing that I have to think about now. I'll probably keep tweaking it, but it's there. Now I can spend my writing time working on other things! Which is great because I still have that aRTD fic that I wanted to finish this month and -- yeahhh it's starting to look like I won't finish it this month. Disappointing. But I'll keep trying. It's not like it's for an exchange, at least, so I don't need to worry too much.

☆ Go look at this gorgeous Lalli fanart by Cerberyusu. Look aaaat iiiiiit, isn't it pretty? (... I hope they have plans to do a similar one of Emil.) (One-track mind, I have it.)

☆ I finished my Kittens Game fanfic. (Here). Well, that was fun! I don't think I'll write anything else like that for a while, but it was nice to just slap down words without worrying too much about it. Surprising how it developed a plot along the way... That isn't what I originally expected, but then I had fun working out why the Zebras hate you.

☆ Speaking of Kittens Game, my kittens are almost ready to invent biology. Yay! ... I'm still trying to figure out the optimum way to juggle resources/tools in order to produce titanium and coal, but errr, I'll figure that out soon. I think I'm going to need more kittens; I've been keeping my numbers low but after a while, it gets hard to do anything without more cats.

☆ It's been super cold the last couple of days. Damn it, it's April; I shouldn't have to put up with -11C and such. I've packed my winter clothes away for good. ... Except for my earmuffs. I will, apparently, be needing to keep my earmuffs out for a while longer.

☆ Watched Sinister (2012) last night with the Horror Group. This is a film that started off strong, but started to unravel toward the end. I'll put my thoughts behind the cut so as not to spoil anything.

( So, about Sinister )

Today is one of those days where I look at my to-do list and go "nope".

To be fair, none of it is stuff that can't wait until tomorrow. But most of it involves replying to people - roleplay tags I need to send, a reply email to my Norwegian studying partner, etc - and I feel bad leaving it go for a while.

... But not badly enough to get to it right away. It can wait.

I'm at a point in the Kittens Civ Game where I can't get anywhere without titanium and science upgrades. So, right now I'm just poking around and maximizing resources and optimizing trade and things. I can't decide what I want to do next. You need Chemistry in order to get the calciner upgrade to produce your own titanium rather than trading for it, but you can't get Chemistry until you discover Physics. And I'm not quite there yet.

... Ah, well. Might as well create more buildings in the meantime. And save up for trade ships. (Fucking trade ships, man. I am constantly building scaffolds. WHY DO THEY REQUIRE SO MANY SCAFFOLDS sob)

I had a more intelligent entry planned, but I've forgotten what it was going to be.

☆ Signups for nordipalooza are open! ... Well, I opened them last night, a few hours early. I figured that I might as well do it now, rather than fiddle with it in the morning. This is the fourth year that I'm running this fest, and I'm excited.

☆ Prompts for historyfest are closed now. I think I'm going to try to fill one of my own prompts, but I also want to fill someone else's. Haven't found one that I can do yet, but I'm not finished poking through everything. Something might turn up. I really hope that there will be a lot of responses to the prompts here, because practically everything sounds good to me, and I want to read all of it. :D

☆ I've become completely addicted to this Kitten Civilization Game. Fortunately, I've reached a place where my resources are pretty balanced and I can leave it alone without needing to check it obsessively. My kittens have now invented philosophy. ;p I guess I should warn, though, that this game is a major time waster. It's delightful, but - might as well be up front about it.

☆ I've finished reading Good Omens! There was a lot more going on in it than I remembered. I barely remembered most of the stuff near the end, except for the part with the flaming Bentley, so it was a bit of a surprise. Like reading it for the first time. Good stuff. Not sure if I ship Aziraphale/Crowley the way that I did the first time I read it... mostly what I want now is just for them to be together, doing their thing. Just like in the book. (And yeah, I want to read fic. Maybe when I'm feeling not-lazy, I'll look.) Next... I don't know. I dug out The Colour of Magic and tried to read it, but found myself getting misty-eyed, so - I might need to find something else. Or read a non-Pratchett novel first. But I'll give it another try, first.

☆ Though, since I'm thinking about the subject, if anybody has a favourite Good Omens fic that they'd like to rec, that would be cool. I'm mainly interested in reading about Aziraphale & Crowley, The Horsemen (especially War and Death), Anathema, and Agnes Nutter. And also Pepper, or stuff about Them in general where Pepper plays a large part in it.

☆ The Weather Network informs me that we're sitting at -16C due to windchill. I am annoyed. Equinox was yesterday. It's supposed to be spring, and I want to wear my warm-weather clothes. What we're having right now is just... Winter with less snow and more ice. That's all this is. But, I'll still go out and head down to the cafe to read, because if I don't then I won't get any writing done, and that would be terrible.

☆ I have three packages in the mail on their way to me, and none of them are close to arriving yet, and it's driving me nuts. ALAS.