Dwarf Planet in Purple

1. I'm writing this post on Nick's new laptop, which is now mine, of course. I wonder if I'll ever feel as if it's completely "mine." His name pops up when I go to sign in, and I enter his password (thank goodness he used the one from his previous computer, because I didn't have time to ask him about All The Things before he died). I wonder if I should try out his LOTR Online game....

2. I really should pay DW a bit of money so that I can have some new icons.

3. I want some of those icons to reflect the current political situation, but I will not use the face of a certain dictator whom I hate. I don't want to see his face on DW.

4. It's the middle of May. I should really dig out the rest of my spring clothes (and start sorting out Nick's). However, I am also really far behind on the baronial newsletter.

5. I also have about a month to figure out whether I can go to Pennsic. More about that in another post.

The Dreamwidth people had some sort of "code push" over the weekend, so I thought I'd check to make sure everything still works around here. Apparently it does.

Anyhow. Yesterday I was thinking, "Hm, there was one Pennsic when I didn't bring my tent, but I can't remember why." So I went through my DW entries with "pennsic" tags. Turns out that was in 2017 and the only way I could register was as someone's "ghost," so I ended up in a borrowed mundane tent with a slightly smaller footprint than my own. Obviously the experience did not kill me. In fact, I had a blast, because that was the year that Wyn and Yaakov were elevated to Laurel.

Looking up past Pennsics and remembering the issues I had with the 1993 Honda Accord also reminded me that I'm glad I didn't have that vehicle for an extended period of time.

The packing is getting ramped up. So many things got put into different locations during the move. I just extracted a bunch of mundane necklaces and other doodads I don't want to bring to Pennsic from my "treasure box," a wooden box with a hinged mirror folded into the lid. I bought it years ago at a Pennsic shop called Tancred's Tangled Woods. I'm pretty sure the shop owner passed away before the next Pennsic took place, sadly.

And speaking of death, a friend whom I never met in person, but knew through LJ at first and later through Facebook, passed away a few days ago due to complications from heart surgery last month. He was at https://davidkevin.livejournal.com/ but hadn't updated that blog since the 50th anniversary of Star Trek's premiere in 2016, and I don't think he ever joined DW. His beloved wife Nila died of cancer several years ago, and one of his two grown sons kept everyone up to date on his condition via FB. Ad astra, David.

EDITED TO ADD: Tributes to David here (item #9 in the July 27 entry) and here.

Stupid LJ, effectively owned by the Russian government, has decided for whatever reason to ban crossposting from DW. Not DW's fault, apparently. I'm sure you can read about it elsewhere on DW.

I've made my Jan. 25 entry public and I will write a separate entry over at LJ so that friends there can catch up on what I've been posting. Guess I'll be doing a lot more cutting and pasting in the future. *sigh*

In other news, I had a quiet weekend at home, between an online "visioning" session at church and lots of online classes from the University of Atlantia. The visioning session is part of the congregation's effort to set some new goals and put ourselves on a more sustainable trajectory for the future. I'll write more about that some other evening.

Some days are more productive than others. Yesterday I made progress on my next feature article, watched a session of the Toastmasters International virtual convention (the one that was supposed to be in Paris), and attended my friend's Zoom-based Zumba class (yay for exercise in a pandemic). Today I went to the store to pick up a few things, but then I learned that an SCA acquaintance on the West Coast had passed away from cancer. We weren't close, but still, it's sad. I ended up taking a nap.

Tomorrow I hope to be more productive. I am scheduled to interview a scientist for my feature article, so I had better be more productive.

I temporarily forgot my new LJ password, but I think I remembered it now. If you missed the last couple of entries that didn't get crossposted, hop on over to http://luscious-purple.dreamwidth.org.

Also, I dug out an oldie-but-goodie LJ icon to bring over to this site. So many of my old LJ icons (inactive, so invisible to anyone but me) are even more outdated than my DW icons. But I found one that still applies.

Over and out.

I think I've finally (or LJ has finally) fixed the crossposting thing. The tag line on the LJ post isn't formatted as nicely as it used to be; it just runs into my last paragraph of text. Maybe I just need to add a few line breaks at the end of each entry.

Anyhow, if you are reading this on LJ and want to see what I've been up to the last few months, please check things out at https://luscious-purple.dreamwidth.org/. Most of my Dreamwidth entries are public, except for one that revealed how old I am.

Of course, if you are reading this on DW, then ... no worries.

Jeez, I should visit here a little more often....

For a couple of months, the boy toy and I had been discussing the possibility of going on a little "weekend adventure" around the time of his birthday (June 25). Last year we spent one night in a mom-and-pop motel he found on Travelocity/Expedia/something like that. This time around, I noticed that there would be an SCA event (University of Atlantia) in Lynchburg, a region of Virginia that's part of the Barony of Black Diamond. Never mind that my friends who are Baron and Baroness of Black Diamond would be away at the Known World Dance and Music Symposium in Texas. I figured that we could drive down to Lynchburg on Friday, the boy toy could toodle around Lynchburg on Saturday during my event, and then we could take a leisurely sightseeing drive back to Maryland on Sunday. So that's just what we did.

The boy toy suggested joining Airbnb because his parents have had some good experiences with it. They like having access to a kitchen so that they don't have to eat in restaurants all the time. So I signed up and found a cute little finished basement and kitchenette on a cul-de-sac right in Lynchburg. Two nights, even with the cleaning and administrative fees, came to less than $120.

I should probably write up the details for my Lady Patricia of Trakai blog, but I just wanted to say that at one time between the early-afternoon classes, I was heading to the bathroom when I passed by a woman in a purple dress. She looked familiar ... and it took me a few steps to realize that I had just passed zhelana, who of course lives in a different SCA kingdom from me, so we've never met in person before. I could have met her! But by the time I made my recognition and turned around, she and I were separated by the crowd in the hallway. I looked for her afterward, but I didn't find her, so I missed my one big chance. Darn....

In other SCA news, tonight I bit the bullet and pre-registered for Pennsic (today's the last day for doing so). I still don't know whether I can actually go because of impending freelance work, but I want to preserve my options.

I *finally* accepted the evil new LJ TOS today. Just because I wanted to check in on those friends who (a) haven't left LJ and (b) friends-lock their posts. (If you look at LJ in a browser in which you are not logged in to LJ, you can see the public friends' posts on your feed.)

Still haven't figured out whether I will delete the LJ or just stop posting there eventually. We shall see. In the meantime, if you're reading this on LJ and want to see the two most recent things I wrote, go here and here.

Somebody wrote this celebration of LiveJournal that sums up a lot of my feelings about LJ and DW. I don't mind FB, but sometimes there are just things that need to be said without being attached to a legal name that can be Googled by prospective employers.

I've been meaning to write a long post about relationships (the romantic or not-so-romantic kind) on LJ/DW, but I need to make some headway on my writing-for-pay first.

Who knows, maybe I can get a post in every day this month? Or at least this week?

My skin seems to be less itchy today. Thank goodness.

It still is REALLY quiet in LJ/DW land. Where did everybody go? Well, at least pearl posted some links for safekeeping! Thanks!

Now, back to work...

... because the last one didn't.