Oh, and here's Midna, noticing Igor. Igor is being nonchalant, but don't be fooled, he's paying attention.

Notice that all the carpets have been taken up. Life is currently... easier that way.

Yeah, I take awful pictures. Well, until I get a better one, here's a shot of the doggage. She's very calm, we had a bunch of friends over last night, and she was happy, and completely unfazed by all the noise. Whew!

Phew. I still haven't got a picture of the puppy, because I've been running around trying to teach her how to behave and keep her happy. Also, I'm a total sleep-deprived basket case, and keep forgetting to bring the camera down from the studio. What else is new? We've named the puppy Midna, after the Twilight Princess of the eponymous Zelda game.  She's turning out to be very sweet, and remarkably calm--our biggest problem is that when she's feeling playful, she wants to chew on people's feet and hemlines. She thought cupcake_goth's skirt and lovely boots were delicious. No actual harm was done, but I can't be having with that. I like having guests. Training must happen.

Somebody said something like: "That was a fast decision!" but it wasn't, really. We've been working up to getting a dog for a long time. I just didn't post about it until we had done our research and were about to get the actual dog. I actually started reading up on them years ago, when I was tempted by a lovely puppy in a nearby store. Instead of buying the dog, I bought a book about taking care of dogs. I read the book, and decided that it wasn't yet time to get a dog. Now we have kids, and a larger house, and a fenced yard, and things are different. It's working out just fine, except that I'm tired. And I smell like dog. I'm starting to not mind smelling like dog. Oh, dear.

Someone else asked why I've been occasionally posting a little early over at (girlgeniuscomic . The answer is: I used to have someone who posted it for me, right around nine. Now, I'm stuck doing it. The problem is, around nine is when I'm often still getting the kids to bed or dealing with some household thing. Also, sometimes my internet connection decides not to work well late at night. So if I'm tired, which I often am, I will post the LJ around the same time that I post the main site page. That lets me turn off the computer and go do something else without having to remember to go back online around nine and post on LJ, and possibly have to wrestle with my system to make it talk to the internet. If there's a way to schedule LiveJournal entries to go live at a certain time, I don't know it, so you're doomed to often get the page early or late. I figured nobody would mind a couple of hours early, but late makes people sad. That's all.

Tonight we packed the kids in the car without telling them where we were going... and took them to see Walking with Dinosaurs. It was lovely, they were monumentally impressed, and all had a fantastic time. Seattle Opera needs a few of those things. It'd be great. Valkyries on T-Rexes. Teh awesome.

My Mom stayed at our house to babysit the new dog, who is indeed a baby and needs to go out every three-to-four hours. Ugh. More about her later. Also pictures later. I am so exhausted that I haven't yet had a chance to take any photos. She's fuzzy and black with a white blaze on her chest. She's very calm, but a little shy, I think she misses her litter mates. She has decided that I am in charge, so she lies under my chair and watches everyone else, venturing out to make friends and going back under when she feels nervous. She's already learning to come when I call, and doing all right with "sit." She's a rescue dog, so we're not exactly sure what all went into the recipe, but the people I got her from thought she was a lab/golden mix. We think she's got some kind of sheep dog in there, too, but that's just another guess. Our vet thought so, too, so maybe it's not a bad guess. There's actually a DNA test they can do to find out more, but they'll do that in a few months when she gets fixed. No point in drawing blood just for frivolities. (Although there are apparently some drug reactions certain breeds can have, so knowing the mix might have some advantage medically.)

The cats are surprising me. They're a little annoyed, but not extremely. They can't leave the puppy alone. They keep peeking at her from around corners, then running off, then cautiously coming back for more. When she was sleepy, Igor (the young gentleman cat) was wandering up and sniffing her nose-to-nose, then backing away cautiously. (She really does look like the dog version of Igor. Perhaps this confuses him.) Zeuxippe (the old lady cat) has batted the dog in the nose twice that I've seen, but only when she was in a place where she couldn't back away easiy, and, oddly, never with claws. The puppy backed away gently both times, still wagging her tail, but staying out of Zeu's way. It's bizarre. They're all so polite.

Getting walnut shells to crack into two nice, usable halves. I have these stupid craft things I want to make with my kids, and the stupid walnuts... argh... gar... well. The Google is merely giving me more ideas about what to use them for, but isn't terribly helpful for actual advice on splitting the things.

Anybody have better luck with this than I do?

Edit: Yay! Suggestions! These walnuts are indeed fairly fresh. I'm going to try drying them out in the oven. I'll let you know how it works!

Hey, after not having anything to say for a while, I've got something new.

We're getting a dog. We have kids, as you know, and about six months ago, Phil got tired and started answering every "Can we get a dog?" with: "Yes."  This shut them up for a while, but now the question has become: "When?"

We fended this one off for a while with: "Eventually."

Recently, Phil came home with an evaluation sheet from the doctor that included: "Get a dog to walk NOW." With underlines. Okay. Fine. We've now got a prescription for a dog. From an actual doctor.

So we've been talking ourselves into it for ages. We're very much cat people, but I grew up with dogs, and there have been a few that I've met over the years that I've completely fallen in love with. Still, it was never the right time to have a dog. Until now. Now our kids are old enough, and we're going to be home a lot, and we've got a prescription and all that... so it's time.

Actually, I've known this was coming for a while. So I've done a lot of reading up on care and training and such. We're all set. Now, I've filled out applications at a couple of rescue operations in the area. I've been using Petfinder.com, which seemed a good start.

Our cats are going to hate it, but the house is large, so they'll be able to get away when they want to. We'll do our best to help them adjust. Poor dears. At least it isn't another CAT. A cat can follow another cat anywhere.

When Phil started telling the kids they could have a dog, I laid down these conditions:

--I get to choose the dog. It's going to make my house smell funny, so I'm going to make sure it's one I adore.
--I get to name the dog. I'm not putting up with some of the stupid stuff my kids would no doubt come up with. I'll think up my own stupid dog name, thanks.
--It must be a dark-colored dog, so that the inevitable blanket of dog hair will somewhat match the furniture.
--It must be a somewhat fluffy dog, because I like fuzzy dogs.
--It must be good with children, for obvious reasons.
--Everyone has to read up on how to take care of it, but children will not be expected to shoulder the responsibility of training and care. I will train the dog. There are classes and stuff. It's important. If I want people to continue to visit my house, then a polite dog is necessary.

Okay, I am taking the rest of the family's ideas into consideration, but I am Mom, Destroyer of All Fun, and my word is the final word. My daughter wants: "A black boy dog named Spike." Ooookay. Where that came from, I don't know. Before that, she wanted a dog exactly like Bolt. I don't know what changed... "Spike?" I personally think that, whatever else it contains, any dog name should end in: "...the Destroyer."

I would prefer a biggish, floppy, family-type dog. I'm currently looking at some lovely Golden Retriever/Black Lab mix puppies. I haven't heard back yet, so I'm in that limbo where I get to sit and wonder if I'll be deemed "worthy." I'll keep you posted. I'll put up pictures when we've got one.

Aaaaah! What am I doing? It's like having another child! Gah!

I got to see Swan Lake! It was gorgeous! And next year, they're doing Coppelia. I'm going to have to go see it--how can I resist a ballet about a mechanical girl? I have always wanted to see Swan Lake live, but I've been so buried in my studio that I didn't even realize that PNB was doing it until I got to go take the backstage tour with a friend last week. Then, on Sunday night, another friend called and asked if I wanted to go along and use a spare ticket he had. Well... yes, I would, thanks! I have awesome friends. The production was amazing. Lovely dancing, fantastic costumes, and I have always loved the music... I was in heaven.

I'm supposed to be finishing up the lettering for tonight's page. Yeah, right. Actually, I'm completely hopped up on some kind of caffiene-sugar thing, and swilling down a thermos of my favorite tea. A trip to Uwajimaya this morning replenished my supply of roasted green tea. Mmmm. Phil has fallen asleep, because he hasn't been getting to bed early enough lately. He's been drawing tons of sketches for our pre-order offer. It's pretty nifty, watching him draw like a fiend. Hee. Between the tea and the caffiene and the weird silence in the studio  brought about by lack-of-Phil, I am having trouble getting any decent scripting done. Bzzzzzzzzzzz.

Cheyenne finally finished coloring all of my new LJ icons, so I need to put them all together so I can actually USE them. He's been so busy being fabulous this year... which is a very good thing, actually.

Last night we were up late celebrating Jeff Vogel's birthday over at Spiderweb Software... this involved lots of Rock Band, then Barbeque from our beloved Gabriel's Fire and the best cake in the Universe(TM). Then we had a screening of The Breakfast Club, during which we all laughed at the '80's for being hilarious, and ourselves for being, ya know, old. The best part was that Phil, being extra double secret old, was seeing it for the first time. Surrounded by a bunch of people who actually were teenagers when the damn thing came out. It was, I'm told, an experience. He also drew a lot of sketches while the rest of us sat around laughing at thousand-year-old photos of all the same people, all taken in the same room we were still in, but with a whole lot less furniture and way more plastic dropcloths and Jack-o-lanterns. Actually the photos were only about ten years old, but it was still pretty weird. "Wait, where were all the kids when we took these pictures? Were they downstairs? The house looks so clean... Oh, right."

On Thursday, one of my super-hero friends had tickets to go on a backstage tour of Pacific Northwest Ballet's production of Swan Lake. She took me along, (lucky me!) and we got to see the costumes and sets and backstage areas, and sit in the orchestra pit. (Whee! Check me out! I'm in the orchestra!) It was fun, even though I was foolishly breaking in a pair of granny boots that probably should have waited. Ouch. Listening to the conductor talk was the highlight of the trip, I could have listened to him talk about his career all night, and not just because I was sitting down at the time.

Okay, steam blown off. Now I have to get back to work!

Soooo... Sakura-Con! Yay! I went on Saturday and Sunday, and had a fantastic time. I even managed to resist the urge to spend ALL the money we made. Here are some of the booths I enjoyed:

I got a pair of steeplejacks from LAST. They're wonderfully comfortable, beautifully detailed bloomer-type pants that can tuck into boots. And they have lots of lovely brass snaps. I'm going to have to work on what to wear with them (aside from boots) because they really call for something special--just a floppy T-shirt won't work.

Catalyst Studios was there-- and they had trilobite refrigerator magnets. I bought two. I really like their work.

The masks and various wonderful things at the Tormented Artifacts booth were great--there was a fantastic book there that I can't find an example of online, er, but it was worth seeing. And I got to!

And there was another amazing  book at the Steam Society booth--that one had a decoder inside--made of clockwork! I waaaanted it! Heh. That booth also had tons of accessories and gothy-steamy-loli type wonders, and I kept getting pulled back there by the mystical magnetic forces of shiny awesomeness.

I also bought some bugs in acrylic, but I didn't get a card at that booth. Oops. But I do love beetles.

We were right next to the Innocente Seraphim booth, they had ball-jointed dolls and tea. They were actually there promoting their event, which is being held in Bellevue WA on August 8-9. They were adorable and very nice. I am still looking for a pair of socks like the ones one of them was wearing: they had a pattern that looked like corset-lacing and lace up the outer edge. Very pretty.

I spent most of the time in a rosy-pink anime-induced fog of happiness. Also, I was brought cake and shrinky-dink dingbot earrings. Hee! Cake! Dingbots!  And a CD that I still have to listen to. (I'll get to it!) And there was a great Agatha cosplayer, with a little sleepy-eyed dingbot. And lots of beautiful people in pretty outfits who said very nice things to us and fed us Pocky. I'll admit that toward the end of the day on Sunday, I was losing my voice and generally getting pretty wiped out, but it was worth it.

Oh, shoot. I just realized that I didn't go back and buy the Mr. Resetti toy at that one booth. I was going to put him on top of the television. Oh, well. (Why yes,  I do play a bit of Animal Crossing.)

Oof. I am still very tired.

Phil is at Sakuracon. I am not, because I have things to take care of today. I will be there tomorrow, though, and Sunday as well if I'm lucky. I got to wander through the hall yesterday as everyone was setting up, it's going to be huge and noisy, as usual. Fortunately, it's also fun.

I wasn't able to make it to the Emerald City Comicon last weekend. I did get to hang out with Aaron and Cristi Williams--they couldn't escape, they were staying with us. We had a nice, if busy, weekend. Also, we got the back room cleaned out. Not bad.

Even though I wasn't at the con, a few people brought me presents. Eee! Except for one, I don't have addresses, so I will say it here: Thank you! I am always astonished at presents. I often come over all shy and freeze up and don't mention them here, and I'm sorry for that, because then people probably think I didn't like them. That's not true, I love them! I will try to be better about such things in the future. (Ha, I always say things like that.) But here's a start: to everyone who has sent me presents, I am very grateful. They make me so happy.

Erm, now I'm feeling all shy again...

Gah.

My old lady cat is sleeping in the bookcase near my desk... and snoring like a tiny foghorn. Hee!

I remember, lo these many years ago, getting dressed for my wedding. We had put my dreadful, ever-uncooperative hair up in rollers. I remember looking at it afterrobespierrette  helped me wrangle all those curlers out and wailing: "I look like Dixie Cousins!"

Now, back then, we'd only seen about two episodes of "Brisco County Jr." and that's all I ended up seeing. But I liked what I saw... so... tonight, I finally took steps to remedy my sad lack of education. I am happy to say that we're all enjoying the series tremendously. It's as entertaining as I remember. On the other hand, I have to admit that, even on my wedding day, I NEVER looked like Dixie Cousins. Damn. I should be so lucky in my next life. But probably not, unless I start being VERY GOOD RIGHT AWAY.

I'm glad I'm finally getting around to seeing the series. Thank you, Netflix.

Okay, I've been hiding long enough. I spent all of February sick... in one way or another. First, it was the hospital stuff, then everyone here got a really filthy stomach flu that wouldn't die. We're still feeling a bit wobbly from that, but we're making progress.

So all the things I wanted to get done... I didn't much.

Some of you noticed that we were getting a lot of 500 errors this last week. That finally came to a head last night, when the girlgenius.net site just stopped... working. Fortunately for us, the crew at 1&1 hosting is fantastic. As usual, they were easy to contact, and fixed the problem quickly. I love them. The problem wasn't even my fault. Astonishing. It was a bad hard drive on the server. It should be fine, now. I'm sorry for any inconvenience it may have caused!

I have added a new feature to the GG site, a news page! And, as you can see by reading the latest post, I have listed Volume Eight HC & SC for advance ordering, as well as the reprints of Volumes 4, 5 & 6. These will all be printed in the USA by our new printer, Courier, who does very nice work indeed. During the time that we are offering advance ordering on these volumes, we are also offering the option of ordering them along with a special bookplate. (The bookplate adds $10 to the price, but you don't have to order it if you don't want it, just choose the listings that don't include the bookplates.) The bookplates will have an original sketch by Phil, and you can request the character! (All the details are on the product information pages, so please read them carefully before ordering.)

I have also re-ordered the winged trilobite insignia pins, which we recently ran out of. I am also having more trilobite pins made, but those are going to be a little different. Instead of being flat stamped, we're going with a more 3D effect. Sort of like we did with the Jäger pins. I...hope they turn out well! We've had good luck with the company that's making them, so I'm sure they'll be lovely.

I was in the hospital for a few days, now they've patched me up and I'm back home. I had some kind of filthy (but unusual! Oooo!) infection that had been lurking for a while, only to suddenly break out and take me down hard. Really, really hard. I'm home now, and feeling a lot better, but I'm still tired. So forgive me if I'm not as sociable as I could be in the next few days. But rest assured that I am taking very good care of myself. I didn't go to the East Coast. I'm very sad about that, but there is no way I'm up for travel. It would hurt. So here I stay, minding the fort. Phil will be at both shows, serving the hive like a good drone. (Hee! Don't tell him I said that!) No, he'll be working hard on his end, too. So if you're at one of the shows, please stop and say: "Hi!"

Oh, and if you're wondering how Girl Genius gets finished and uploaded while I'm in the hospital? Let's hear it for laptops and free hospital wi-fi. Hooray! I really have to teach Phil how to letter, finish and upload pages. Anyhow, if that page with Othar blathering... or was it Klaus? It was Klaus. The one with "eviscerate." If that page seems wobbly, well, now you know why. I actually had the next one mostly done before I got sick, because it was an easier page to script. Yes, I sometimes skip the hard stuff so I can think about it more...this time, it bit me. I'm still not thrilled with that page, but it will do.

Cheyenne uploaded the Buck Godot pages for me. Because he is a Prince.

I'm going to bed, now!

Dan in Montreal sends us to Boing Boing, to enjoy "The Paleo Walkman of 1957!"

velkyn points out the Wikipedia entry for Jagertee. Mmmm.

rogue79 lets us know about a contest to design a steampunk Cylon.

Donal tells us: "Boing Boing's guest blogger is posting pictures from the Motorola Museum,
one of which caught my eye and made me think of you: The World's Most Convenient Portable 4-tube Superheterodyne! "

James C. sends along a link to a wonderful *non-fiction* children's book "Cromwell Dixon's Sky Cycle", featuring the true story of a 14-year old boy who invented a cross between a bicycle and an airship.

Thank you, everyone! These are great!

Whoa. Hey, look at this: at the New York Comicon, we'll be at booth 1809.

That's pretty impressive.

As for Katsucon, I went to the site to see what booth we'll be in, and, well...

It looks like we don't have one?

Uh oh.

Sooo... I've been feeling wretched, and that makes me reluctant to post. Really, who wants to listen to me grouse? Meh. I always feel rotten around January. I've been fighting it by drinking a lot of water, walking on my treadmill (while watching Earl and Fairy... a ridiculously girly anime), eating chocolate (so much for the treadmill), and reading more dopey shojo manga than I really should. Otomen is especially hilarious, which is good, because that's clearly the intent.

I did monkey around with my Facebook account this afternoon, long enough to stir up some posts, but not long enough to know what to do with them. Argh. I'll poke my nose back in there later, when I've got another minute. But I did get a bunch of "friending" taken care of.

I did get sick after that last post, so I've still got to get that PDF done... I need to stick some kind of disclaimer on it that tells people to give it to their friends, but not sell it, blah blah blah.

Ack. The computers. They are fighting us today. Oh, right... and I've put up a few more originals for auction on eBay.

I don't have my "I'm sick" icon yet, so you'll have to take my word for it. But whatever was making the kids sad earlier this week seems to have hit me as well. I'd be in bed right now, but Cheyenne's computer apparently spat out the latest page while he was working on it, so I'm still awaiting the colors. Feh.

In the meantime, I've been asked to post about the following: The deadline for the Jay Kennedy Scholarship is approaching (February 6.) This is a scholarship for college cartoonists. I've stuck more information under the cut:

( Scholarship Information! )

Even more information can be found here: http://cartoonistfoundation.org/

Oh, Cheyenne has just uploaded the page. Better go get that, then.

Y'know what? I'll finish that PDF tomorrow. I'm sleepy, and I have chocolate-covered cherries and some new manga waiting for me.
Instead, go look at this adorable shot of Helen and Dave's wedding. Please take special notice of the group in the back row on the right. Hee!

Then, go read the latest installment of Gothic Charm School. (Hooray!) You can even pre-order the book from Amazon! (Double Hooray!)