The origins of Sirius Black, revealed at last

No, not that Sirius Black. Sirius the Eyelashdoodle. Remember him?



If you'll recall, Sirius belongs to my friend Julie. Julie claims that he is a Goldendoodle. I used to call him an Eyelashdoodle because he has the most freakishly long eyelashes I've ever seen in my life.

That is...until I went to the San Diego Safari Park.

There, I discovered Sirius's true nature. He is a Cape Buffalodoodle. Allow me to prove it to you.

Here are Sirius's freakishly long eyelashes:



I drew that blue box around them to help you see them since, even though the suckers are two inches long, they are a little hard to distinguish with the whole black-on-black look he's sporting.

Now here is a Cape buffalo I met at the San Diego Safari Park:



CHECK OUT THEIR EYELASHES:



I mean, come on people. That's two different Cape buffalo, both with Sirius's freaktastic eyelashes. Indisputable.

This raises some serious (see what I did there?) questions. Where did Sirius come from? How did his poodle-parent get access to Cape buffalo in the first place? What was the courtship process like? Were they discriminated against for being an inter-species couple? The implications are mind boggling.

Juls, I hope for your sake that Sirius doesn't start sporting a pair of fantastically curved horns to go along with his buffalo lashes. That could get a bit unwieldy. In the meantime, I expect you to start owning up to his heritage. For the love of rhinos, it's 2011. Designer dogs are all the rage now. ;P

Really?

Anyone have a copy or two of Lynne Truss's EATS, SHOOTS & LEAVES they can spare for the journalism world? These two headlines were taken from today's news:

Police: 14-Year-Old Hospitalized, Struck By Car (The Hartford Courant)
Don't worry--as it turns out, he was struck by the car before he was hospitalized, not after. Because being struck by a car in the hospital would be awkward and disturbing.


photo credit: SOAPnet (from a General Hospital episode, apparently...who knew?)


First a spat, then boy, 3, goes missing (CNN)
Again, rest assured. Only the three-year-old went missing (after a fight with his mom), not the boy and a spat. Phew! For a second there, I thought we had some sort of bizarre serial kidnapper on our hands!





Now it's really the word order and choice, not the punctuation, that's screwing up those headlines. But still. Lynne Truss's clever book would probably be of some kind of assistance...

Things I am madly in love with today

A list, in no particular order:

1. Scrivener v.2.0.2
2. Gerard Butler and the exorbitant amount of man-titty in the movie 300
3. Fight scenes
4. Fire
5. Tea
6. Blankets
7. Puppies
8. Hard-working husbands
9. Lena Headey
10. The luxury of nothing on the agenda but writing

She-Ra!

Just two quick things tonight.

First, this from Dictionary.com:

Word of the Day for Saturday, January 29, 2011

cacoethes \kak-oh-EE-theez\, noun:

An irresistible urge; mania.

Cacoethes stems from the Greek kakoethes, a combination of the roots kakos, "bad," and ethes, "character." The word occurs famously in Juvenal's Latin phrase insanabile scribendi cacoethes, "incurable passion for writing."

I *love* that the famous usage is for an "incurable passion for writing!" Now if only it was easier to say... (and spell)

Second, this hilarious (and pathetic and true) comic from Dueling Analogs (via my husband Ben).

Friday Five: Obsession Edition

I present to you the five stages of TV show love, Renee-style:

Stage One: Interest
Huh. That looks neat. Let's watch an episode.

Stage Two: Infatuation
OMG! I love this show! The characters are so interesting!!

Stage Three: Addiction
Just one more episode, honey. Pleeeeease?

Stage Four: Obsession
Do I WANT to watch it tonight? Is that a trick question? DO YOU NOT REALIZE THAT THE PROMISE OF WATCHING THESE EPISODES IS ALL THAT GETS ME THROUGH THE DAY???

Stage Five: Integration
OMG, I totally just made a Torres expression. Did you see it? I just did that thing she does. Also, you know that voice you hear in your head? Like your internal narration voice? Yeah. Mine's Tim Roth now. All the time. Spot-on accent, too. I'm kind of impressed with myself.

Words, oh how I love thee

I subscribe to Dictionary.com's Word of the Day emails. They're free and I'd like to think they're helping to expand my vocabulary. But even if that's not true, they're still informative and, often, damned entertaining.

Today's word is moue (a pouting grimace). I've seen this word many times in books but never had the occasion to say it out loud. In fact, I'd argue that it's the kind of word one never actually does say out loud. I think there are some words that are used almost exclusively in print--some that shouldn't be used at all anymore, perhaps, because they're outdated, and then some that are just used in print because they're a little too formal or precise or whatever for everyday speech. But they still have a place in writing because we're often looking for that level of precision (or formality or whatever) when we write.

But I digress. Moue.

When I've seen this word, I've always pronounced it in my mind's voice as "mew." Today, I learned that it is actually pronounced "moo." Which is, of course, completely absurd.

I'm not saying Dictionary.com is wrong. That's crazytalk. I love that site. It's just that "moo" is what a cow says. It's not an actual people word. And it's certainly not the sound of something as pretentious as the word "moue."

Another often hilarious thing about the Word of the Day? The examples Dictionary.com gives to illustrate the word's meanings. For example:

Word of the Day for Saturday, November 6, 2010
nacreous \NEY-kree-uhs\, adjective:
Resembling nacre (mother-of-pearl); lustrous; pearly.

Nacreous pearl light swam faintly about the hem of the lilac darkness; the edges of light and darkness were stitched upon the hills.
-- Thomas Wolfe, Look Homeward, Angel

Um, soooo... Pearly pearl light swam faintly about the hem of the lilac darkness? Because I'm pretty sure my critique partners would have been all OVER my ass if I wrote that. But apparently not so! Apparently that gets you into Dictionary.com! As an example of correct word usage! Awe. Some. ;P

So anyway, get thee over to Dictionary.com and sign up for their free word of the day emails. Well worth it for the entertainment value alone (if you're a word geek like me) and, hey. You might just learn something. :) (Like the fact that "demotic" has nothing to do with demons but actually means "of or pertaining to the common people or everyday language" and whoa isn't THAT and interesting contrast... )

This is me, not-writing

I can tell I needed a break because it's been a whole week since I've written and I've not even freaked out once. ;) I started to miss it a little over the weekend, but that even faded a little as my focus turned to preparing for the trip to Japan. Normally I get kind of spazzy if I go more than a day without writing. Today some revision ideas tried to creep in, but they weren't anything I hadn't thought about before, so I shut them out. I desperately need this break from the manuscript so I can come back to it with fresh eyes.

In the meantime, I've loved having so much reading time! In case you missed it over the weekend, I posted an early review of Marjorie Liu's next Dirk & Steele novel, IN THE DARK OF DREAMS. It was excellent, and a wonderful reward for finishing my draft. (See, Kaz? I held out!) In the next couple of days I'll have to decide which books to load onto my nook for the Japan trip. I am so excited about this. I can bring as many as I want! I don't need to worry about suitcase space! I can bring 100 if I want! Wooooo!!!! Of course, I have to buy them still... I've got an arc of Jackie Morse Kessler's HUNGER, which I've been dying to read and will be reviewing, and also a copy of THE ROAD by Cormac McCarthy already loaded on there. I don't think I'm going to read THE ROAD while on vacation, though. Too depressing. That can wait until I get back.

Have you seen the movie Kick-Ass? Hit Girl is my new hero. If I hadn't already bought my Halloween costume, I would have TOTALLY been her. She's this incredibly foul-mouthed, ass-kicking, horribly violent 11 year old superhero girl. I love her so much. :D I tried to find a clip on YouTube to post here but a lot of them are stupid and/or don't really capture her character. Just rent the movie. It's fun.

Ben Gems

During dinner tonight:

Ben: *dramatically straightening his back* My posture has been terrible lately.
Me: O.o
Ben: What? It has.
Me: Don't crane your neck out. *imitates* You look like an ostrich.
Ben: I am an ostrich! My neck is fucked up! I have scoliosis!
Me: *snorts, goes back to eating*
Ben: *pauses* I'm also knock-kneed.
Me: *chokes on potato*
Ben: What? I am. It makes it harder to run.
Me: *drops fork*
Ben: I don't know why you're laughing.
Me: *abandons all pretense of getting laughter under control*
Ben: I can't believe you haven't noticed. We've been married for almost eleven years.
Me: *crying with laughter* You are not knock-kneed.
Ben: *leaps out of chair* See?! *stabs finger at knee cap* That's what knock-kneed is! When the knee cap turns in to the center! Look! *bends leg at knee* They angle out to the side. I AM KNOCK-KNEED.
Me: *pulls up Wikipedia entry for knock-kneed*
Ben: ... Oh. Well I guess not, like, officially...

Several minutes later, What A Fool Believes by The Doobie Brothers comes up in my playlist*, which I have blasting in the kitchen.
Me: *cranks up the volume, boogies down*
Ben: Is this Al Green?







*I know, a rare non-Breaking Benjamin, non-Last Samurai score moment. Don't worry though, a BB song came on right after The Doobie Brothers. ;)

The writing retreat

First, don't forget to check out my early review of Marjorie M. Liu's A WILD LIGHT and enter to win a copy here!

So! Yes! I went on this mysterious "writing retreat" last week and left all of you with nothing but pictures of shoreline sunsets and adorable yellow labs to remember me by. So sad. But I am back now!

The truth is, I went on my (mostly) annual pilgrimage to Canada (or, Canadia, as I affectionately call it) to visit my family. More specifically, Bouctouche, New Brunswick. I wasn't lying about the whole writing retreat thing--I devote a large portion of the vacation to writing and, in fact, busted out 10K on TLOS while I was there (w00t!). But I was also there to get back in touch with my Canadian roots.

Here are a few highlights:

I purchased this AWESOME chair + awning, which enabled me to work on my laptop outside in the sun!! (Note: Working not pictured below. This photographic masterpiece is entitled 'Drinking of Canadian beer after meeting daily word count goal'.)



Another wondrous fact about Bouctouche: You can purchase six pound tubs of margarine in the regular grocery store. I didn't capture the true scale in this picture, but they were approximately the size of my freaking torso. These people do NOT mess around with their butter products.



Also available? Pregnancy tests at the dollar store. They did cost a whopping $1.25, however. Perhaps a marketing ploy to boost your confidence in the results?


This magical delicacy:


This is a poutine rape (prounounced poo-tin rah-pay). It's a regional thing specific to New Brunswick, as far as I know. Basically, you take some salt pork and surround it with potato and then boil the whole thing until it becomes a gelatinous brownish and/or grayish mass, as pictured above. Mmm-mmm. Tasty!! Actually, I used to love them when I still ate meat, back in the day.

Despite my snarky pictures, New Brunswick is freaking gorgeous. In Bouctouche, there is a huge Eco Center (excuse me, Centre) with a really long boardwalk along the dunes. It's beautiful and educational, as well as helping to preserve that portion of the coastline. It's also my favorite place to walk at sunset. It's quiet and peaceful, and the shoreline is dotted with herons looking for their evening meal.



Oh, Canadia. I shall miss you in the coming years.

On Phones, Technological Advancement of

I might have made my daily word count goal by now, if the woman sitting behind me on the bus hadn't been SHOUTING! INTO! HER! PHONE! LIKE! IT! WAS! HALF! OF! A! PAIR! OF! TIN! CANS! CONNECTED! BY! STRING!

But, yanno, she was, so I didn't. Therefore, I can't be here. Buh-bye.

Forgot!

I forgot to link to this superhilarious post by on plotting (sort of), via Marjorie Liu.

And, since I'm posting for the second time today, I might as well add this:

38751 / 70000 words. 55% done!

I met and another friend at a coffee shop to write on Saturday. He asked what everyone was working on that day. My response? "The fucking middle of my book." He and my other friend just nodded in sympathetic understanding. Book honeymoon = over. *sigh* But good work is still being done. It's just good hard work now. ;)

Weekend roundup: the numbers

Glasses of wine consumed: 3 (see how I start with the important things?)
Pages of ON WRITING read: 5
Mothers taken out to dinner: 1
Mothers phoned: 2
Number of times nephew balanced a coaster on his head: dozens (impressive for a just-over-one year old, no?)
Hours between eating asparagus and having the asparagus pee: 2
Hotels and hotel-like-places booked in Japan: 4
Tripadvisor.com reviews read: 3 gorgonzillion (+/- 1 gorgonzillion... I may have lost count towards the end)
Potential fraud alerts received from credit card: 2 (no, darlings, that was 31,500 YEN not dollars but thanks so much for checking)
Contortionists watched: 1 (no, ppl, this was not at home thankyouverymuch)
Boxes of seltzer thrown from the shopping cart when husband wheeled around a corner at the grocery store: 1

Number of words written: 0 *crai*

Worthy of a semicolon

So, I'm writing this asshat of a character, right? This real jerk who's trying to screw my main character out of some money (for all intents and purposes). And I write this line of dialogue that requires a semicolon. My first thought? "Pffft. This asshole doesn't even deserve a semicolon in his lines."

I'm pretty sure that makes me insane, right? Like, when you start assigning character value on a scale of semicolons and ellipses, that's a clear sign you've gone off the deep end, right?

My Karaoke Story

A very amusing thing happened when Ben and I went out with some friends for karaoke last weekend, so I thought I'd share. The story really starts long before last weekend though...

Okay. So. Last year, the night before I left for RT, we went out for karaoke for my friend Donna's birthday. It was Ben's and my first time going to karaoke and we were super nervous. So, we decided to see what it was all about before we signed up for our songs.

One of the first people to sing was this dude who sang the song Levon by Elton John. Ho. Lee. Shit. That dude could SING. He never looked at the monitors that had the lyrics, and he was freaking *rocking* out. He was walking around the bar, working the room, getting all into it. And he sounded just like Elton. It was a great performance. I pretty much just wanted to listen to him sing Levon over and over all night.

In any case, Ben and I were like, forget it. There's no way we can do *that*. But then other, regular, people got up and we realized that the Levon guy was not "normal" karaoke. So, we got up and sang and it was fun. Later on, another dude got up who sounded JUST LIKE Meatloaf if you closed your eyes. It was uncanny.

So, skip ahead to a year later (last weekend). We're back at the same karaoke bar for Donna's birthday again. This year, we all meet for dinner at the adjoining restaurant ahead of time. In the intervening year, I've talked about the Levon guy several times, probably anytime karaoke has been mentioned. There are a bunch of people with us this year who weren't there last time, so I tell the Levon story again. We head in and start the karaoke portion of the evening. Good times.

Late in the night, who walks in? Levon Guy. I FREAK OUT. I'm shrieking to all my friends, "ZOMG! It's the Levon guy! OMG! OMG! I want to go ask him to sing Levon! OMG! But that's so creepy and stalkeresque! OMG!" We're all hysterical. Me, primarily because his performance has grown to rock-god levels in my mind over the past year; my girlfriends, primarily because they are in various stages of silly drunkenness and because I'm shrieking.

In the meantime, Levon Guy is making his way through the bar. He is clearly a regular and has many middle-aged female groupies. They all fluff their hair before he comes over, and touch him when they talk to him, and watch him after he walks away.They are all dressed up.

Ben, being the outrageously fun Ben that he is, loses patience with all of our girly shrieking and goes up and talks to Levon Guy. Girly shrieking reaches epic levels. Levon Guy walks towards us. He's older, maybe late 40's, wearing a suit jacket and a button down shirt, and bathed in cologne. He has big hair. It's utterly fantastic.

Levon Guy: So I understand you want me to sing for you.
Me: (omg!) Yeah, we were here a year ago and heard you sing Levon. It left quite an impression on me--
Levon Guy: In a good way, I hope. *winning smile*
Me: (omg!) Yeah, in a good way. Tee hee hee! So, I was hoping you would sing it again tonight.
Levon Guy: Well, I was going to sing Journey...
Me: *desperately plays trump card* It's my friend's birthday! *points to Donna*
Donna: *waves and bats eyelashes*
Levon Guy: ...but I guess I could sing Levon. *even bigger winning smile*

Time passes. Increasingly drunk people give increasingly worse performances. Levon Guy checks on us once, to make sure we're still there to witness his Levon Awesomeness.

The DJ calls Levon Guy (whose name is apparently "Jonathan") to the front of the bar. OMG! Middle-aged groupies assemble. Levon Guy knows where it's at, though. He starts the song in the usual way, playing to the whole crowd. But then? Then he comes and sits at my table. He sings it to me, in my jeans and sweatshirt. Middle-aged groupies are not amused. I grin like fucking Elton John himself is sitting across from me. I am pelted on all sides by dagger looks from the middle-aged groupies. They are repelled by the light that is Levon Guy's rock aura.

Levon Guy can stay seated no longer. He is too into the song. He jumps up and roves around the room, back into his stage persona. Middle-aged groupies are appeased. The song ends. Levon Guy and I thank each other from across the room. I'd envisioned a hug or something that would incite the middle-aged groupies into a riot, but I convince myself that Levon Guy is worried for my safety. My night is complete. :)

Damn you, sluts.

Could all you promiscuous women please, for the love of rhinos, stop causing earthquakes already? (Don't. Even. Get me. Started. Grrr.)

Grrr.

Apparently today I am a bitter, hateful person. And, really, what better to do when one is a bitter, hateful person than dole out fashion advice? Let us begin.

1. Girls. For the love of Manolo Blahnik, don't buy the shoes if you can't walk in them. I understand that heels the height of skyscrapers are "fashionable" right now but for fuck's sake, listen to me: I don't care how curvaceously fantastic they make your calves look. I don't care how delightfully petite they make your ankles look. If you think everyone is looking at you because you're the sexiest thang in the hallway, you're sadly mistaken. Even children will stare at a fully grown, physically fit human who is shuffling for no other apparent reason than the ridiculous things she's strapped to her feet. You're just making a goddamn spectacle of yourself and knocking the rest of your gender down a few rungs on the ladder of equality. My advice? Save them for the bedroom, where you don't have to walk more than a few paces at a time.

2. Let's discuss pony tails, shall we? Boys, if you have a pony tail please ask yourselves the following questions: Is there more than a centimeter's worth of hair gathered in the tail? Are there more than "a few" fly away strands that routinely pull free of the tail? Does the hair that is gathered into the tail have to circumnavigate a medium- to large-sized bald spot prior to reaching its destination? Because if the answer to any of these questions is yes, you need to cut that shit off. It's time to face facts that the pony tail is a hair style that is in your past. The good news is, you don't have much to mourn because it doesn't look good on you anyway. Find a decent barber or hair dresser (Supercuts DOES. NOT. COUNT.) and allow them to help you find a haircut that will flatter you. Really. You'll be happier and so will we.

3. While we're on the subject of boys, let me say this: Do not fool yourselves into thinking you're getting away with anything when you try to adjust yourselves with the leg shake. Women are not idiots. We are intimately familiar with the male anatomy and it's basic needs. We can use the power of our minds to deduce what is happening when you suddenly shake your legs and hips like you're doing a tribal dance in the middle of a fucking mundane conversation. It is not subtle. It is not--in my opinion--more appropriate than just discreetly adjusting yourself with your hand (over the pants, just to be clear), which would surely get the job done quicker and more accurately, no? Thus preventing the rebound leg shakes that seem to happen so often, in quick succession to the first leg shake? Really, people. We've got to get over all this bodily embarrassment crap. Also, may I suggest boxer briefs? Still sexy and with added support.

4. Girls, I couldn't let the boys leave us outnumbered. Not when I'm All About the gender equality. A word to the wise: See this shirt?

See the horizontal seam in the upper portion of it? Yeah, that's intended to go under your boobs. Under, girls--not over, not on top of, not straight across. Fucking. Under. It is meant to accentuate your breasts, to make them look perky! and young! and desirable! Know what happens when you wear a shirt like that and the seam goes across your boobs? You look like you have The Sag. And The Sag, my friends, is neither perky, young, nor desirable. To anyone. So you, like the dudes of the shittyass pony tails, must accept that your breasts are either too saggy or too large for this style of shirt and LEAVE IT AT THE STORE. Just like the dudes, you're not mourning much because it doesn't look good on you anyway.

Incidentally, I have just witnessed someone vomiting on the side of the road. Surely this is a sign that I should stop spewing my venom upon the interwebs. I'm going to go find some alcohol and bathe in it. Have a pleasant evening.

Do Not Pass Go

Today is the last day to comment on the Carrie Jones interview for a chance to win Captivate!

My agenda for this evening: make dinner, slice and dice WIP to holy hell, paint nails with OPI's Absolutely Alice nail polish (pictured below) in preparation for seeing Alice in Wonderland Friday night. I'm a bit preoccupied with the middle one, so I'm afraid I don't have much more to offer in the way of a smart and/or witty post. Tomorrow I'll have a winner, though! 

Superpowers

Quick reminder to check out the Carrie Jones interview! Last chance to enter the contest is 3/3...

My current WIP deals with superpowers of sorts, which has been both super fun and super challenging (see what I did there?). I've had a great time dreaming up all sorts of interesting-slash-bizarre-slash-awesome-slash-where-the-hell-did-you-come-up-with-that-renee powers for my characters to play with. The challenge has been to find just the right ones to fit my characters and the needs of the story...that haven't been used before. Not so easy to do with shows like Heroes and, of course, X-Men and other comic book characters.

Another thing I've found to be more difficult than it first seemed was coming up with not-so-useful superpowers. You know, like the ability to shoot glitter from your fingertips. That sort of thing. Everytime I sit down to brainstorm some of those (because I need both kinds in my story), my mind keeps giving up actual, cool, useful powers. Like time travel and control of fire and stuff.

To that end, I was combing the interwebs last night and I came across the blog Superuseless Superpowers. Ho. Ly. Cow. is some of that stuff funny. Obviously, I won't be using any of the powers they list since the ideas were theirs and not mine, but it did help to get my brain thinking along the right lines. And I laughed my ass off. The ShadowFlex power? Genius. Just sayin'.

Fashion Advice (or: The Horror That Was My Afternoon Coffee Break)

As I mentioned yesterday, I work in Corporate America. A very large office building of a very large company where people are, presumably, professionals. There is a dress code. Allegedly. Therefore, I should not have to be subjected to the horrors of nastyass mancleavage while innocently getting an afternoon coffee!!!!

This dude in the cafe this afternoon had his shirt unbuttoned to his freaking solar plexus. Not kidding. No t-shirt underneath. Now, some people can get away with that.

Robert Pattinson is one of those people. I don't find him especially attractive but...he's Robert Pattinson. Done.

Also? This guy:

My man Andy Gibbs was rocking that shirt back in the day when this photo was taken. We could all live without the package-master spandex pants, but the point here is the shirt.

David Beckham sporting the mancleavage? Two words: yum*.

This dude in the cafe? Not so much. His shirt was unbuttoned about as far down as Beckham's but spread about as wide as Andy Gibb's. But don't be fooled! There was no tanned, muscled, sexy-hairy or baby smooth chest on display. It was pasty white, sprinkled with a few curly hairs and seated atop a good headstart on a hideous, over-the-belt pot belly. And, may I remind you, this was AT THE OFFICE.

Oh, and there was a chain, natch.

*shudders*

Men: Do not do this! Keep your mancleavage to yourselves and your partners! And, for the love of rhinos, keep it out of the workplace!!!


*This is not a typo. Yum is actually two words when referring to David Beckham in any sense. Now quit proofreading me and pay attention to my fashion advice.

Blogfodder

It was really cruel of you not to tell me that today was Fill Renee's Morning with Idiots Day. I would've stayed in bed. Let me give you a little sample of my morning:

I decided to get a bagel at the cafeteria. Two women were barricading the toaster. Before I could figure out the best way to break through, a third woman breached their defenses and got her bagel in ahead of mine, then joined the barricade herself. I finally elbowed my way in and dropped my bagel into the toaster. Then the enemy women decided the toaster wasn’t toasting dark enough, so one of them cranked it up. Flames immediately erupted from my bagel. Not kidding. I said, “You just set my bagel on fire.” She said, “I don’t think so.” I looked again. Still on fire. I said, “I’m looking at the flames.” At that moment, the bagel tipped over the edge and slid down the chute, charred and smoking. We stared at it. She said, “Oh.”

Luckily, things got better as the day went on.

In case you haven't already seen it, I'd recommend checking out this (astonishingly long) article on James Patterson. It's a very enlightening look at one way to make it big in the publishing business. I especially enjoyed reading about Patterson's business approach to his career and his very different way of making the business work for him.

Last thing for tonight: Here's my latest song obsession. It's called "Same Mistake" by James Blunt, someone whom I normally can't stand (oddly enough). But I heard this song during the credits of the movie P.S. I Love You (love that movie) and instantly fell in love with it. It got me through the morning on repeat.