So I had plans to stay in GA after SF this year and visit family, specifically my 92 year old Grandma. Now when I was out in October I discovered that my Grandma had boxes and boxes of photos in her closet, most of which never made it into photo albums.
Since I love pictures, I decided to take on the daunting (and possibly insane) project of scanning all of her photos onto the laptop. What I didn't realize, was that the textured mat photo paper catches the light of the scanner in strange ways... which creates strange white dots in the photo.

So the lesson for today... when you have pictur

Got this one in an email from a friend.

CAPRICORN - The Go-Getter (Dec 22 - Jan 19) Patient and wise. Practical and rigid. Ambitious. Tends to be Good-looking. Humorous and funny. Can be a bit shy and reserved. Often pessimistic. Capricorns tend to act before they think and can be Unfriendly at times. Hold grudges. Like competition. Get what they Want.

AQUARIUS - The Sweetheart (Jan 20 - Feb 18) Optimistic and honest. Sweet personality. Very independent.
Inventive and intelligent. Friendly and loyal. Can seem unemotional.
Can be a bit rebellious. Very stubborn, but original and unique.

So I finally figured out how to work the program I have that creates astrological charts. Once I figured out the crazy menus, the worst part was having to dig out my birth certificate to enter the time and place I was born. But once that was done it was really easy... and suprisingly enough pretty right on when it came to describing my personality.
So now I've done mine.. and Storm's... and I need new victims! LoL
If anyone wants a copy of their astrological chart just PM me the following:
Date of Birth (including year )
Time of Birth
City of Birth

And I don't charge 3.95 a minute!

Just wanted to share a few pictures of a mosaic I completed for the holidays.. I actually have a more detailed step by step pictures on my myspace:

http://blog.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=blog.view&friendID=34881957&blogID=350639097

This ended up being a lot of work but was really happy with how it came out When you opened the box it would start playing Silent Night.

And omg I passed! Which is seriously amazing since I had to go to the dentist on Friday and am still recovering from that fun experiance.

Just one more rank and I can finally get out of my ugly white gi!

*starts counting down to her next rank*

I posted some of this on the forums, but they are such cool gift ideas I'm posting the full details here *laughs*

My number 1 pick for cool gift for Christmas 2007:
Give a gift that will help protect the future of nature by making a Donation gift to Adopt an animal species through World Wildlife Fund.
Priced from $25.00 to $250.00
worldwildlife.org/gifts

[color=blue] For A $25.00 donation you get:
A Species Spotlight card full of fascinating information about the animal
A handsome 5"x7" adoption certificate, suitable for framing
A beautiful 5"x7" full-color photo of their adoption animal

Ok so I'm totally blaming Geril for getting me addicted to the silly Gaia Online site. I've alreadt spent a few too many hours already shopping for clothes for my avatar.

The sad thing about it, is I remember when Gaia first launched their avatar builder... when it was still free and you didn't have to try and collect gold or buy "money" to make your avatars. Heck I still have copies of some of the avatars I created messing around with it when it was free.

The moral of the story is stay away from adictive websites!

http://www.gaiaonline.com/

Nothing like a friend who will dress up in costume with you and pose for goofy photos at the office.

Happy Halloween!

(Does anyone know why my Blog posts don't show up on the main page anymore?)

Anyway, here are a couple that I figured you wouldn't mind seeing here...

It's time for the "Tiassa random blog entry of the month!" This time, it's photos of Eclipse, another LARP but one set in the Sci-fi genre. (Yes, we're in a dance club). There was a "pit fight," complete with techno fight-music and somebody who'd yell "FIGHT!" before every match.

Be warned, there are A LOT of photos. A bit more than a hundred, if you must know. But just in case you're not completely bored at work, here's one of the best:

Clearly, the Imperium is going to conquer the galaxy if for no other reason than the shaggin' outfits.

So Gabs and I sneak out this morning for 9 holes. Her mom was able to watch the kiddies.

Now, something you should know about Gabs...she learned how to play golf a few months before our wedding. She knew I liked to play and she was afraid she'd never see me during the honeymoon other than the 30-50 seconds of...well, you know. And since we went to Hawaii, golf was not optional, it was required.

So anyway, first time out this year, first hole is a par 5 and her first tee shot was something easily forgotten. So she re-teed and hit a nice drive in the middle of the fairway. 2nd shot was a solid 4-iron down the middle of the fairway. So she was set up for her third shot, about 100 yards from the green with an enormous bunker directly in front of the green...{note: her trajectory is usually more of a bump-n-run rather than a high-soft approach}... so I say, "just aim left of the bunker and then you can chip up on to the green." She was not pleased with that suggestion and proceeded to aim directly at the pin. Well, she hit what was, at the time, the most amazing shot of her life. Perfectly struck, perfectly high, perfectly soft shot landed over the bunker, short of the hole and rolled a fair amount towards the cup. 2 puts and she got her par. I was in awe.

Well! It seems that the baton has been passed to me. So says Hunden, who after writing a bit of his own story, told me it was now my turn to do the same. I love to write, so how could I possibly turn down the suggestion? However, my story turned out to be a good deal longer so I thought I would post it here in my blog. If you haven't had a chance I encourage you to read Hunden's story, as it is excellently written (please add more, kkthxdear). However, I also invite you to take a look at Nyalla's story as well, presented below:

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The weekend was pretty full with a friend's Housewarming/St. Patrick's Day bash, sewing, and a visit from Shieldhaven. No WoW to speak of at all, beyond a little quick sketching late yesterday. Not much, but I figure I'd post it since it's Scarab-related.

In an effort to actually FINISH some paintings, I figure I'd post progress reports in my various blogs. Kind of like those "support me as I get in shape" (which I need to do, actually) things; except for art. So, without further ado:

The Knight is one of the companion pieces to the Princess of Wands. Originally I wanted to do at least four of them-- the Knight of Swords, the Queen of Disks, the Prince of Cups, and the Princess of Wands. While I don't know if I can do all three of the remaining images this year (they take a while, since they're all watercolor on grounded paper) I want to finish the Knight.

Really more of a quick sketch-study. I'm currently on a Masterstudy kick... prepping for another major sketch. Most people recognize these very famous hands. Not Rodin's Hand of God or anything, but still famous. Though not as famous as her smile.

While gaming, I tend to sketch (I bet you're shocked).

Avarael Priestess of Pelor (Old-School Grayhawk)

Okay, so I've been asked by one or two people to post some of the easy gamer-friendly recipes I (and others) enjoy! I try to keep things simple for folks who aren't exactly graduates of the Betty Crocker School for the Gifted, and this one seems to be a favorite lately. It's a Taco Casserole and it can be pretty yummy.

What you need in your kitchen:
A large pan for sauteeing/simmering
Measuring cups/spoons
Knives
Cutting Board
A 2-inch deep casserole dish

Ingredients:
1 package ground chicken or turkey
1 packet taco seasoning (old el paso or mccormick are both good)

For the Guild History, as well as for general purpose Tiassa-randomness:

Thus far, here are a few of the screenshots I've collected-- some are in the process of becoming Art and possible sigs-- so if you want to be in on things (and appear in the History!) drop me a line!

My Hallow's Eve festivities were cut a bit short due to the fact that I had to attend a wedding, and sadly BSG attire wasn't appropriate (though I got major props for having my uniform out in the car). I work in a fairly relaxed office anyway, so yesterday wasn't all that different from the usual except some people were wearing obvious costumes (instead of garb or LARPwear or pyjamas or... whatever). During the day I wandered around in off-duty-wear, since it's comfortable.

Inked yesterday's sketch. Let me start by saying that Sharpie sucks as an inking tool, but sadly it was that and a Pilot G-2 pen, as it's all I can find around my office desk. If I have another huge printing run, I'll be able to get to coloring and tinting sometime this evening...

Well... because the host kept losing the connection (IP conflicts) and things were moving slowly (he had WAY too many programs open in his tray at once) things were.... difficult.

These are my notes.

As you can see, I don't think that we'll solve the transparency/flattening/vector/duotone issue any time soon between multiple platforms (Quark and Adobe). But I got down a few good ideas for a new project, which I'll post progress on, especially if we have more seminars.

If people send me screenshots, I will make a SCARAB one too.

Just because I'm a big 'ol geek, I redid the patches so that they're right.

The larger photo shows the majority of my team; here we are doing the "Right Stuff" walk before kicking some butt and taking some names.