catching up

Hey, many congrats to Cory Doctorow (Amanda's partner), who won a Hugo this past weekend in Chicago!!! He won the 2000 John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. See Cory's website for details.

Hope you're all having a great long weekend!

I've moved my Blatherings over to a new server, but am leaving the Blatherchat script on the old one until I can figure out how to convert it. If you notice any problems, please let me know, thanks.

I've been spending most of it cleaning up the apartment, stocking up on groceries, catching up on my finances, preparing for the workshops I'm giving in Surrey next month, and Inkspot stuff. I also stocked up on videos: End of Days, Stigmata, Backbeat, and Bridges Over Madison County. End of Days was so-so (it would have been better if they had chosen someone other than Arnie as the hero), Stigmata was ok (the presence of Gabriel Byrne in both of these religious/apocalyptic movies was interesting and somewhat confusing for me), Backbeat was very good (thanks to Allison for the recommendation!).

Signed up for a massage at my gym. Administered by the tender/cruel hands of Regina, the massage was the most painful and at the same time relaxing I've ever had. Felt like screaming as she worked on particularly stubborn knots in my shoulders. Fell asleep twice in spite of the pain, so something must have worked. :)

Munched on chocolate from Scott and Amanda (thanks!), who sent a package of goodies lately (more details in future Blatherings). Practiced my harp lots. I'm starting regular lessons from Kimberly Rowe (editor of The Harp Column) next week. I had a sort of trial lesson a couple weeks ago, and was paranoid that I had developed all kinds of bad habits since I moved here (other buying more ABBA albums). Turns out that I'm not hopeless after all, but I have definitely been plucking at the strings too wimpily. After playing "properly" for an hour, however, my fingers were in agony! Augh!!! I am in desperate need of harper calluses; if anyone has any to spare, please send some!

Let myself play The Sims last night. I've started a new character, Karyn Kaiser. She's doing okay, just barely over the poverty level. She keeps complaining that I'm not letting her have any fun, so I upgraded her tiny television to a bigger one, and also put in a comfy couch. I'm trying to encourage a romance between her and Gomer Glotz, a neighbour. Gomer was a character I created a couple weeks ago but then got bored of. He seems to manage all right without me, though, and comes over to visit Karyn on a regular basis. He seems much happier than Karyn, in fact, which makes me wonder if my interference makes my Sims' lives more miserable! Ah, the complexities of being a world-builder...

Annie just called to say she got new purple pants for school.

Today's Blatherphoto: Scott M. carrying my husband. I think they make a cute couple, personally.