because I cannot be bothered to make separate posts
1. Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab announced in their Dragon Moon update that they would add, among others, a scent created after the Jersey Devil. Is it going to smell like oil and petrochemical refineries?

2. Are you attending Lumos?

Do you want to get creative?

FictionAlley and HPANA are sponsoring a Creativity Booth - it's a chance for you to showcase your talents and skills for your fellow
fans - sign up to spend an hour at the booth, drabbling, drawing, debating or filking.

Drabblers: Attendees may visit the booth and request that the writer on staff write a short piece — approximately 100 words — to their specifications. The only submission requirement is that you provide us with links to 3-5 short (under 10,00 words each) samples of your writing.

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Artists: Attendees may visit the booth and request that the artist on staff draw a small sketch to their specifications. The only submission requirement is that you provide us with either a link to your online gallery or links to 5-7 samples of your art.

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Filkers: Attendees may visit the booth and request that the filker on staff write a filk — based on a particular song, theme or other specifications. The only submission requirement is that you provide us with links to 3-5 samples of your filking.


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Debaters and Meta: Attendees may visit the booth and request that the writer on staff write an essay or argument — approximately 100 words — on the topic or theme of the attendee's choice. The only submission requirement is that you provide us with links to 3-5 essays or other arguments that you've written.

Just go to http://www.fictionalley.org/lumos_creativity/ and fill out the form.

At the very least, stop by the booth and say hi to me. And bring me chocolate *bats eyelashes*.

2a. If you're the fannish sort, feel free to vote for "Iscariot" and "Sweet" here. Warning: Contains (small) NSFW art.

3. I have no idea what to get Mr. Cedar for our wedding anniversary. He just got me the best present ever and now I have no idea how to keep up. He does not need a PDA, an iPod, or a cell phone. Maybe a new watch is in order.

4. Thanks to those on Team Cedar, my kinda_lush fic may very well be ready to go by the end of next week. *tosses confetti* I'm very excited. This fic is something new and kinda different from what I've done in the past.

5. Recent reading (might contain spoilers, depending on what you consider a spoiler, but neither of these books have been published yet so if you don't want to know anything, skip to the next section):

More Confessions of a Hollywood Starlet by Lola Douglas, sequel to True Confessions of a Hollywood Starlet. My love for the first novel is well known throughout the internet. I thought it was a fun read and very well structured, with complex characters and realistic conflicts. The sequel does not disappoint. Morgan Carter, no-longer-undercover starlet, is trying to maintain as normal a life as she can lead in Fort Wayne, Indiana, complete with mean girls, loyal friends, and an insecure (kinda) boyfriend. Only now that everyone knows who she is, she's followed by tabloids and celebrity journalists, who are making her life insane. In the midst of the insanity, she has to get through her classes, deal with her superficial mother, support her friends, and try to figure out what the hell is going on with Eli. (He's a teenage boy. 'Nuff said.) This book has a lot more serious content than the first, but it's by no means gloom and doom. There's lots of girly brand-dropping, Hollywood gossipy angst, and romance. Verdict: Style and substance.

Bleed by Laurie Faria Stolarz. This book has the most beautiful cover I've ever seen, done in black and white curlicues and what looks like Park Avenue font (but probably isn't, and my guess is that at least two of you will know what it actually is) with a small heart design that looks like bloody fingerprints. Seriously gorgeous and if I were the type to write a book I would want the name of this book designer immediately. Also, the description on the back of the book sounds kind of interesting. It's not quite Rashoman, but it's a day in the life of (ten?) teens whose lives are interconnected even though they don't all know each other. Each character gets his or her own short story. The problem is that the adage of not judging a book by its cover is way true. I did not like this book. It reminded me of The Torn Skirt, where I was totally convinced that the author woke up one morning and said, "I'm going to write a teen angst novel today and put in all the teen "problem novel" issues in the world in 250 pages." It was page after page of blood and angst and eating disorders and sex and dysfunctional families and by the end of the book I needed a Xanax. This book had a lot of potential. While I liked the interconnected-short-story format, the heavy language (as in lots of odd descriptors and too many adjectives, not as in they-say-fuck-all-the-time) was hard to get past. Verdict: Great ideas, decent cast of characters, not enough cohesion or reasons for this reader to care about the people in the book.

Next on the reading list: The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl by Barry Lyga

6. I watched the Project Runway season 2 marathon yesterday and even though I liked Santino's final collection the best, it was right for Chloe to win. I think I may start a campaign to get my mom to try out for the show. For those that haven't known me since high school, I will tell you that my mom can sew ANYTHING. She made my senior prom dress (and my junior prom dress, and my sophomore Homecoming dress, and the junior and senior prom dresses for both of my sisters, and a matching vest for my sister's prom date, and all the jewelry and my headpiece for my wedding...you get the picture) FROM SCRATCH. She made the patterns and everything. And let me tell you, I am not easy to fit. My sisters and I are all between 5'1" and 5'4" and we have big boobs and the hips of people who are 5'9" and 5'10". Ma Cedar could have kicked Santino's butt. Must get together with Allyn and Michele and start pestering Mom.

7. I saw Superman and didn't much care for it. (Notice that there are no cut tags? That's because there are no spoilers here.) What I would like to say, though, is this:

HOW MUCH BLOODY EFFORT DOES IT TAKE TO NOT TALK IN A MOVIE THEATER? Honestly, all the rude people in New Jersey were in my show with their loud children who they did not teach to behave. It's not so much the little (like, 4 or 5 years old) kids being at an 11 p.m. movie that bothered me, because I am nocturnal and stayed up on weekends until 3 am from the time I was in first grade and some people are just born that way, but it was that they were clearly tired and whiny and their parents didn't do anything about their incessant babbling. So I paid $9.50 to hear the morons behind me saying, "Shhh!" to their four-year-old for TWO AND A HALF HOURS. My usual strategy is to go to the latest show possible, but clearly that is not working.

And don't even get me started on the guy across the theater who thought it was appropriate to shout where he saw fit. I hate people so much.


8. The Phoenix Rises looks like four days of unadulterated wonderfulness, and New Orleans is such an amazing place, and I am so sad that it is at a really bad time of the year for me (spring workshops at work, two weeks before Book Expo, which is three weeks before ALA, which is four weeks before Prophecy, which I probably won't attend anyway, woe!) and I am going to go sniffle now because unless work pays for it, there's no way I could go.

8a. Probably no Prophecy because Mr. Cedar and I really want to buy a house next July.