Random blargh with drawing

I've frittered away much of the day so far trying to find a decent drawing program for my computer. So far, everything is a fail for what I want a computer program to do. I want to make perfect/nearly perfect nine-pointed stars in many variations. You know, like sunbursts, flowers, long points, and short points. I also want something for creating designs for cross-stitch, needlepoint, and filet crochet. Not all on the same program, mind you. One for the drawing and one for the graphing.

For now, I'll stick with paper to make my stars and charts. ;) I've already charted a small teapot and a 33 square wide 9-point star. The star turned out better than I hoped. If I can add a fairy or dragon to it, I'll have the perfect symbol to combine my Faith with my love of fantasy. Back to the drawing pad, I guess. At least I'm not feeling so blargh anymore. :D

10th Kingdom/Mamma Mia crossover

I was going to attempt a blog hop today, but the one I was watching for hasn't posted the topic yet. So, since I still want to offer something for today, here's something I ran across this evening: clips from 10th Kingdom set to Mamma Mia. I'd been trying to find one of those fan vids, but pretty much everything I'd seen gives away too much of the ending. This one didn't; it's just fun. The song is performed by the A *Teens.



If you haven't seen the 10th Kingdom, you should. The story is fantabulous. It's well worth the 417 minutes to sit through the whole mini series. And watching it on DVD will spare you the agony I had when it came out and being forced to wait a week between each segment. Here is the trailer:



The show more than lived up to the promise. If you need more of a teaser, here is one of my favorite songs from it. It's gorgeous and acted as one of the strongest hooks to pull me in at the beginning.

Three great YA fantasies

A couple weeks ago I picked up some crafting books and three YA fantasies. Last week, I made it to the novels. Wonderful. All three of them rang with their own harmonies.

First was Dragon Sword and Wind Child by Noriko Ogiwara. I admit I picked this one because it said dragon. But I really enjoyed how the author used the mythology and setting of ancient Japan to create her world. Saya is thrust into the conflict between Light and Dark and comes to realize that it is not a matter of good versus evil like she'd been taught. She must accept her birthright and figure out the meaning behind an ancient legend regarding the Wind Sword in order to save her world.

For a retelling of a Grimm's fairy tale, Shannon Hale does a great rendition of The Goose Girl. Princess Ani starts off timid, but it's hard to learn confidence or social graces with such a dynamic mother. Nothing is ever good enough. After the king's death, her mother declares her to not be fit as Crown Princess and sends her to their neighboring kingdom as bribe, err, bride to prevent the larger country from carrying out possible plans to invade. But on the journey, Ani's maid stages a coup and usurps Ani's place and her name, sending Ani fleeing for her life. The former princess must learn to both survive and find her strengths in order to save her old home, her new home, the people who've accepted her, and the man she loves. When you wants a cozy fairy tale but with more scope than the typical one, this is a fun read.

Toads and Diamonds by Heather Tomlinson is another fairy tale rendition. This one has the feel of India, something that intrigued me because of my friend Jai. Out of the three, this book was probably my favorite. It has a gorgeous cover: lovely sari fabric and golden bangles above hands decorated with henna tattoos and a large pink blossom cupped between them. In the original tale, one sister is sweetness and light but bossed around and made to do drudge work. One day at a well, she is kind to an old woman who turns out to be magical who grants her the gifts of jewels and flowers dropping from her lips when she speaks. The other sister, in jealousy, goes to the well herself but is haughty to the old woman. As punishment, the magic woman makes toads and snakes to fall from her mouth. The kind sister gets to marry a prince, while the mean sister is driven into the wilderness.

This version is wildly different in how the story happens, beginning with the characters. The sisters love each other, though they each have their unique talents. Diribani isn't used to working so hard, but she tries her best in order to provide for her stepmother and stepsister after her father's death. While fetching water at the well, she is kind to a goddess disguised as an old woman. She is granted the first gift. Tana, her sister, feels unworthy next to Diribani's goodness, so when she meets the goddess herself, she feels she deserves the unpleasant gift. Diribani is taken up by a prince and Tana is forced to leave her home. However, blessings and curses are not always what you expect. A gift may be both. Wisdom, good fortune, or death. Which fate will each girl find?

I recommend all three books, but if you can only find time for one, get your hands on Toads and Diamonds. *mutters* Now to go find Tomlinson's other books.

Filk Friday: filk from Parnell Hall

The next time I go to the library, I really need to remember to look for Parnell Hall's books. Authors who can write filk get a step up in my reading list, and the Puzzle Lady mysteries have sounded neat. Here I have two filk songs that he did: Signing in the Waldenbooks and Kill 'Em.

Signing in the Waldenbooks is about the woes of trying to get noticed once you get published, a humorous lament. The part where he's seated next to Mary Higgens Clark at a con is one of the best parts. Kill 'Em is a guide for writing murder mysteries. He has some great chains of rhyming.

To err is human...

...To really foul things up requires a computer.

I thought I was going to be all big-girl and all and transfer my files over all by myself. I'm not too shabby at working a computer. I know what things are, and I use my regular programs just fine. I shouldn't need my hubby to do this for me.

Ha. Haha. Funny me. I knew just enough to get myself messed up.

The salesman at the Apple store told us about Migration Assistant. It can move my programs over for me. Bad idea. Because I knew less than I thought I knew, I tried it instead of doing the safe and slow way by copy/paste from old to new over the home network. I know how to do that, but I thought I was going to be clever and use the speedy way. Speed is not good when you don't know exactly what you are doing or what to expect when it happens. Speed just makes bad things happen faster.

MA doesn't copy then paste, so that you can go back if you mess up. It cuts and pastes. If you delete anything to try again because it didn't do what you expected, too bad for you. You now have no copies of those files.

So, bye bye iTunes library. I have a bunch of empty folders. Even though iTunes has no obligation to restore my purchases--it's in the terms and conditions--I still wrote them to explain what happened and beg them to do so anyway. Even if I can't get everything back, getting a significant portion of it will go a long way to helping me out. The free podcasts are easy enough to redownload, but even with taking out the songs I loaded via CD, I had a lot of music on there, not to mention the couple movies and several show episodes I'd purchased via iTunes. That's a lot of money. I'm hoping whoever reads my plea will take pity on me. My most recent purchase was just a few days ago, too. Pout.

In using MA to transfer my music over, I also let it move my documents and photos over. They suffered the same fate. However, those aren't completely gone since I did copy ALL of those onto my flashdrive. I am quivering at how close I came to destroying a few years of work, not to mention lots of cute pictures that may not be on any other device. Scary! Since I avoided that fate, I am merely sniping at myself for idiocy rather than being in a severe depressive fugue right now.

Backup, backup, backup. You've heard it before. It's no joke. I don't backup as often as I should, but I am so grateful I did yesterday.

But other than proving how fast a computer can help a human wipe out tons of data, I do love my new one. I just finished loaded my documents via my flashdrive, so I will try to do a little work this afternoon before my son gets home. It'll be easier to write now that my battery lasts more than a couple minutes and my power cord isn't half broken. (I can sit where and how I want again.) My screen image isn't affected by the angle of the screen to my eyes. And the MagSafe cord connection is so cool.

New computer! (and blog thoughts)

Squiggly happy dance! I am on my way to go buy a new laptop at the Apple store in Buffalo. My iBook G4 is finally wearing out, but it has survived long enough that I can get files transferred over. I made backups of my documents, photos, and bookmarks (almost as important as the documents). Even though I could get a PC laptop for considerably cheaper, Macs just appeal to me more. The MagSafe power cord connection is just one significant selling point of the MacBook Pro. No yanking the laptop off its perch again because my feet snag the cord when I'm getting up. *sheepish look* The MagSafe ones just pop off. (Not that I plan to do that again, but I'll feel better anyway.)

New computer. Squeee!

For other news, I am shifting my posting schedule. Mondays just have not been working well, since they have turned into errand and activity days (my hubby's day off) and I don't get much chance to write stuff up on the weekend. But Wednesday/Friday feels like a lopsided week, so I will give Tuesday/Friday a try. I'm also considering some of those blog hop events. Meeting people is fun, and most of the hops seem to be on Fridays. Since I don't want to stop my regular feature or double up, I'll just alternate weeks. Please tell me if you have any favorite blog hops.

Filk Friday: A Wizard's Staff Has a Knob on the End

This is supposed to be a filk for Terry Pratchett's Discworld. The words don't begin until a minute into the music. But it is catchy. A Wizard's Staff Has a Knob on the End starts off sounding like early Final Fantasy music, and when the words begin, it picks up a sort of Clancy Brothers feel. One of the top comments is, "Seen on a chalkboard in Hogwarts: "I will not teach first-years to sing 'A Wizard's Staff Has a Knob on the End'."



And as a bonus: here is Death's Job Interview from a production of Terry Pratchett's "Mort."