Thank you, wendymr!

That was completely unexpected, and I laughed like a loon when I opened it! He even has a tiny little painted-on cat lapel pin... ahahaha!! I have resurrected my Blue!Six icon in honor of the occasion.

*points up*

And, as always, thank you for your ongoing and extremely generous support of Stacie.

Merry Christmas!

Higgs Boson walks into a church. The priest says, “We don’t allow Higgs Bosons in here.”

The Higgs Boson says, “But without me, how can you have mass?”

That is all.

... for I laughed like a loon at the bit with the remote key in CIN.

The meaty dialogue part was okay, too, I guess.

So far, so good with The Prisoner reboot; that's a tricky one to remake for 21st century audiences, and I think they've struck a pretty good balance between gritty realism and WTF!psychedelic-ness. (Yay Rover!)

In other news, the Tenth Doctor's cheese has slid right off his cracker. Finally. By going in with exceedingly low expectations, I found myself able to enjoy Waters of Mars to a fair degree... not least for Lindsay Duncan's stellar performance. And, while I'm about at capacity with Manic!Ten, Tennant certainly does "hanging onto sanity by a thread" very well.

After the episode, I was reminded of this amazingly prescient video by flummery, which I offer here for your enjoyment.


Scroll down to the second video!

... and I now have my Thirty Day Challenge website up and running.

This is where the "make $1 online without spending a penny" broke down a bit. I was wondering how they were going to get around domain registration/hosting, and the answer is, they said, well, you can get a free blog-style platform, but we *really, really* suggest that you get this cheap-o HostGator account instead, because we have not had good luck with people using the free platforms.

Since I already have a website, I know enough to know that the $19.96 I paid yesterday for a keyword-optimized domain name and unlimited hosting is quite reasonable, so this doesn't bother me unduly. In fact, I'm kicking myself for just having paid the outrageous, bloated annual bill for my *old* website last month. Maybe they'll pro-rate it if I leave now. Hmm.

Anyway... http://www.wheatintolerance.org is up and running, if somewhat sparse in content until I get some more copy written. I have just over three weeks to get it on the first page of Google for the search "wheat intolerance", a feat which 57% of Thirty Day Challenge participants manage to pull off with their websites, so I'm told.

A little side note about the economics of the internet. The domain name www.wheatintolerance.com is for sale for the low, low price of $1300. Www.wheatintolerance.net is available for a few hundred bucks. Www.wheatintolerance.org? Not taken until I snapped it up yesterday morning. What I don't get is, if you're going to try to extort get $1300 from someone for your web domain name, would it not make sense to spend $60 or so to buy up the .org, .biz, .tv, and .us versions as well (all of which were still available for wheatintolerance?

Obviously, I R missing something when it comes to the wonderful world of domain name squatting.

So, as the crisis with my current self-employed job (namely that it doesn't make me much money anymore) looms ever larger, I have taken action.

What action, you ask?

I have committed to the Thirty Day Challenge.

What is the Thirty Day Challenge, you ask?

The Thirty Day Challenge is to make $1 online in thirty days without spending a penny to do it (well... thirty-one days, actually. It's an inside joke).

So what, you ask? I sold a used CD on eBay last week and made $1 online, you say. Big Deal.

Well, okay. What the Thirty Day Challenge actually is, is a free online course which teaches the nuts and bolts of how search engine rankings work, how to do market research, how to market, how to find a profitable online niche, how to use affiliate programs, how to optimize a website... and so much other stuff that, as of day four, my head is spinning.

I wanted to wait until I could confirm that it does what it says on the tin (i.e., not a ripoff) before writing about it. It does, and it's not.

In fact, it's quite fascinating. And if anyone else is in the position I'm in, I'd highly recommend it from what I've seen so far. For those who aren't interested in joining in, wish me luck. I haven't done anything this mentally intense since I got my real estate license. It's good to know that there are apparently still a few brain cells knocking against each other up there. :-)

• Leave me a comment saying "Resistance is Futile."

• I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity

• Update your journal with the answers to the questions

• Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions (I'll also answer more, if asked)

From neadods:


1) Your favorite Big Finish author is...

Jonathan Blum (The Fearmonger). Please come back and write more Big Finish stuff, Jonathan! Bring Kate, too!

2) If you could review anything else in any genre, it would be...

Hmm... "genre" makes me think you're talking about fiction/nonfiction, in which case, I'd love to do science fiction movies. If I could review *anything*, I'd review horse products. Preferably expensive ones that I'd get to try for free. :-)

3) The best part about sustainable living is...

... driving past the CAFO (concentrated animal feeding operation, i.e., factory farm), or driving past the gas station, realizing that the liquid in those underground tanks is the root cause of widespread misery and tens of thousands of deaths worldwide, and knowing in your heart that-- today at least-- these terrible, evil things are not your fault.

4) The biggest challenge of sustainable living is...

... figuring out what to do when it seems like everything is going wrong... the cattle didn't get pregnant; the guy who planted the hay pasture couldn't be bothered to get it done until FRICKIN' JULY, so there's no hay this year and you hadn't budgeted to have to buy it elsewhere; there's been record rainfall and the barn just flooded... yeah.

5) (I really am asking everyone this) Which character from any other universe do you want to see show up in the Whoniverse?

Y'know, that's a surprisingly tough one, only because I just really have never given it any serious thought. Blake, Avon, & company, I guess... mainly because Blake's 7 and DW were sort of run by the same group of people back in the day, and seemed like they were operating in the same (or at least a similar) universe already. Not passionate about it, though-- I'm happy to keep my fandoms separate, for the most part.

Two years and one month after my pitch was accepted to write an audio script for Doctor Who Audio Dramas, I have just sent off the final episode to the editor-- one day before the October deadline.

Now, all that remains is to find out all the things that he thinks I did wrong, change them, and then

MY PART IS DONE! (Yay!)

Now, for the hard decision. Do I...

A) heave a sigh of relief at having one less giant project hanging over my head?

B) Immediately start writing the novel I have outlined? Or

C) Immediately start the movie script that I do NOT have outlined, but which has been floating around in my head for years, and was the reason I wanted to learn about script writing?

Probably, it's going to have to be A, at least until winter hits. Then, we'll see.

From dark_aegis...

( cut for memery )

With prize money and everything!

I got out of showing a while back in order to focus on my horsemanship (because it often feels as though the two-- horse shows and good horsemanship-- are mutually exclusive).

But this year, someone devised a competitive horse event that could have been invented specifically for me! No one cares if your saddle cost $4000; no one cares if you show up pulling a rusty stock trailer with a 20 year old truck. You are only judged on the quality of your relationship with your horse as you negotiate eight obstacles in eight minutes. So I took the bridle off and did it with nothing on the horse's head to guide him... and we won!

And, why, yes, I *am* spamming the entire internet with the video of our winning ride-- I'm so glad you asked! :-)

So here, O wise and mighty flist-- marvel at our winningness as we kick butt and take names! (Just don't pay attention to my appallingly bad posture... *ahem*.) My horsie is made of awesome, y/n?