ZOMG, Slaanesh loves me, seriously. You guys will not believe this...

A couple of years ago, I got a custom scent made for me by S'Amuser perfumers in Cambridge. It was basically perfect on me, the only scent ever to be so - all vanilla and amber and molten gold, and I adored it. Unfortunately, being all-natural, it eventually died on me... and S'Amuser closed down a while back. I thought I'd never have it again.

I managed to find their email address, back in June, and sent them an email. The email bounced, or seemed to. I figured they'd gone out of business and that was going to be the end of it. Much quiet mourning ensued.

Only tonight I just got an email from someone at the company, apologising for her mailbox having mislaid some of her mail! And she has all the supplies! And she's willing to make me up a custom batch just because I was dedicated enough to chase them down! I can have my perfume again!

You all have no idea how happy this makes me. ^_^

Laters,
The Navigator

This could've been a post about how miserable I was. But y'know what? Bad day, I defy you. Six things that are making me happy today!

1) Bon Jovi, because Iron Maiden may be my all-time favourite band, but Bon Jovi were my first favourite band and they still make me smile when not much else can. I am going to be unashamedly sappy and make you all listen to Thank You For Loving Me. And also It's My Life, which is very appropriate to my current mood. ^_^

2) Being into the Good Bit of my 2009 WWE calendar, ie the last five months which consists almost entirely of my favourite Superstars. This month, I have Edge smirking from my bedroom wall. There are so many worse ways to wake up than this. ^_^

3) Equilibrium, who are brilliant. I'm particularly in love with Ruf in der Wind, which is the wildest dancing song I've heard in forever. Seriously, if I put this on and shut my eyes I can feel the whole sky spin above me - it's amazing. ♥ (For the German speakers on my friendslist, here are the lyrics - and if anyone has time to poke them, I'd love to know roughly what they mean! ^_^)

4) Text from Mum, to say that the tiny stray black kitten who was outside their house at the weekend has been reunited with his owners! ^_^ I'm so relieved. Tiny kitten was very tiny, should not have been out on his own!

5) My headcast. No special reason today, I just love all of them very much and they make my life a better place by leaning over my shoulder and poking me. ♥

6) And finally, as if to justify my decision not to whinge, I got a phone call right after I started this post to ask if I wanted to come and view more houses! ^_^ Why yes, I do. Excellent!

Laters,
Rath

Just for the record, I am so in love right now with Bai Bang's cover of the Sweet's X-Ray Specs that I may actually explode from joy. Man, the Swedish glam scene is awesome. Here, have a random pic of their bass player, to demonstrate just why the idea of this band being able to see through people's clothes can't be all bad... ^_^

Meanwhile, anyone who reads here but not LJ should probably refer to this post for important State of the Rath information. Also, I've been to Wacken if that sort of thing is of any interest - full review later!

Sorry if I missed anything while I was gone - if you need me to see anything, please let me know! Hope everyone is okay. Now, since it's four in the morning, I crash. Night guys!

Laters,
Rath

So, as those of you who read (lj)faithinfire will already know, yesterday I was formally diagnosed with depression. This is a good thing, arguably, as it gives me some framework for handling the overwhelming sense of "oh shit, universe falling to pieces" that I've been suffering for the last few weeks and assuming was somehow entirely my own fault.

So while I was at home feeling sorry for myself and very small indeed, koilungfish went out and came home with lookingforsigns, and they brought me presents! ♥♥♥ There were cookies! And Seiber bought me pizza! And... and, and, and...

There were also a whole five booster packs from the Pirates CSG that Seiber and me have been fangirling over lately! Including one from the "Fire & Steel" expansion that has the gorgeous Switchblade and Scorpion miniatures, which have tiny moving parts! Blades that turn on miniature plastic cogs! Now, Seiber had been lucky enough to get a Switchblade ship, HMS Salient, in our very first packs of boosters and I'd been profoundly jealous. But...

As I tore open the Fire & Steel pack, I saw the glint of silver. My eyes widened. Silver-stamped cards! Black super-rare corner tags! All of them! And...

...three entire cards that went to make up a great, pale, hideous monster of a ship. Grey and black and dust white, the pallid shade of old skin and the rotten muted red of dead, stripped meat. And dazzling, silver, twin scythelike blades...

A super-rare, Cursed-fleet Switchblade. Oh. My. GODS.

Her name is Skin Flayer and she is gorgeous. I cannot believe that a random booster pack my friends grabbed for me as a "please cheer up!" present could manage to be the single most coveted set in the whole expansion - witness the bit of paper that fell out after the Skin Flayer (not to mention the Silver Coffin, the Soul Mark treasure card, and Tabitha McWarren, the Cursed pirate girl who joined the crews of the damned when she threw herself from a clifftop for the sake of a dead pirate lover): a note that read "Congratulations! You just dug up the most sought-after treasure chest in the Pirates of the Cursed Seas Fire and Steel pocketmodel game! It contains every super-rare game piece in the set!"

I mean, how extraordinary is that, in those particular circumstances? I think something out there loves me at least as much as my friends do. ♥♥♥

Laters,
Rath

"Universe," said I, waving a hand from the depths of a half-proofread treatise on analytical theory, "everything sucks. I'm feeling bitter and resentful and nothing looks fun. Cheer me up!"

"No problem," replied the universe, riffling through its box of LPs (which, as we all know, is of infinite dimensions and contains every song ever written in all possible realities). "Here, you might try this."

"^_^!"

"Also, for the record, Gödel's incompleteness theorems are exactly the kind of kneecap-shot theoretical result you love. Go look it up."

"^____^!!!"

"You're welcome. ^_^"

There we go, all better now. Who says there's no benevolent Providence? ^_^

Laters,
Rath

*IS TEN THOUSAND TIMES DED*

Oh my... I cannot articulate how much I love this, mostly because I am laughing too hard. But seriously, this has just given me an entire year's worth of joy in the space of five minutes.

Okay, everyone knows The Wind Beneath My Wings, right? Here's Michael Ball's version, which I happen to like, for reference (excuse the Xena, but this was the only version of it I could find on Youtube). Classic, slow, sentimental, much loved song you can play at weddings, funerals and your Dad's sixtieth birthday bash. You know the one.

Now, here are my beloved, beloved boys Sonata Arctica (YES, the Finnish metal band, for those of you sitting at the back) doing their version of this pop classic. I... am INCOHERENT, seriously. Oh, my BOYS. This is simultaneously utterly and soaringly gorgeous and the funniest thing I have heard ALL DECADE. ~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~♥~

Dear power metal scene, and Sonata Arctica in particular, I love you very, very much. Please do not ever, ever change, and in particular please do not ever develop ANY sense of how you look to people whose senses of the ridiculous have developed beyond the embryonic. Please keep doing wonderful, ludicrous, utterly unselfconscious things like this for ever and ever, because the world could more easily spare a million scoffers than it could spare one band THIS AWESOME. ^_^

...I would totally dance to this if it ever got played in a club. And if they play it live next time I see them, I bet I cry. ^_^

Laters,
Rath

A propos de rien, except that sternenstaub mentioned the Eurovision, I've just found the bestest photo of Lordi that I've seen in ages. Castle + monsters = win. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

WUS last night was completely off the sanity chart, since we got a prog set and a weird covers set right after each other. Word to the wise: don't cover Megadeth. You do not sound like Dave Mustaine, and consequently absolutely nothing you can do to the vocals will do anything but detract from the awesome. On the good side, I did get to headbang myself into rapturous oblivion to the Children of Bodom cover of Alice Cooper's Bed of Nails, which is one of the most brilliant things ever. There's this one moment in the chorus where the lead guitar line collides absolutely amazingly with the note Alexi's singing and it makes the back of my neck tingle every time. Eeeeeeeeee. *shivers*

There were also two (that I picked up) weird Manowar covers in there and now I have a terrible urge to listen to Manowar a lot. Okay, I don't think that's so terrible, but I bet everyone else does.

Meanwhile, I am so dead of tired right now. Luckily I am off work this afternoon. Downtime plz...

Laters,
Rath

Bon Jovi, Heartbreak Eyes.

This apparently is a lost demo from the first Bon Jovi album. The user who posted it has a ton of similar outtakes, demos and so on (man, gonna be here all night!), but Bon Jovi has a particular place in my heart, so this is something a little special for me.

Cos... one of the fucked up things, for me, about the invention of sound and video capture technology is that even while it gives us chance to have the past at our fingertips, it really rams home the fact that you can't have it all, ever. There's more material already on record than any one person could ever sift for everything they wanted to hear, and much of it locked in vaults or forgotten in attics where you couldn't get to it anyway; and that's before you start asking for the stuff that wasn't caught on the magic reels, the one-nights-only that nobody taped, the old episodes that the BBC threw out. The rehearsals where someone achieved that one perfect riff while the deck wasn't running.

And even what we do capture and get to general release, is never the same as being there. This is why I love eighties hair metal videos and watch them with tears in my eyes; they're like tiny perfect splinters, sent shattering to the winds when the nineties put a sledgehammer through my sonic birthright and sent the pieces flying through time on the precarious wings of VH1 Classic and fans' old tape collections. And somehow, miraculously, they survived until now, twenty years later, they can embed themselves under my skin and dump their small cargos of preserved light and sound and beauty into my veins. I'm staring through a Youtube-sized, pixellated window into an age that doesn't exist any more and probably never did outside the daydreams of a pack of fluffy-haired adolescents in tight trousers, and it hurts so much to know that it was broken before I ever got there - but I can never stop hunting for more pieces.

...maybe some part of me still does believe that one day I'll find them all and be able to put it back together. *soft smile*

Rath

I was originally here to stuff a post on the religion filter which would basically have just been me rambling about stuff for my own enjoyment, but seriously, nobody needs to listen to any more of me being an irritating little ball of obsessiveness so I've locked that one down. Instead, here is something beautiful:

Lord of Nightmares, by Dianae on Devart.

Seriously, this is breathtaking. Go look. And even better, the development of the picture is all here on her forum thread so you can see all the layers of work underneath the final version. (Also, the final version on page eight of that thread is a bigger and better version than the devart one.) How awesome, seriously?

Laters,
Rath

Okay! Prompted by rumblings from tribe sternenstaub's general direction, here is a list of Thirteen Films Rath Loves And Will Show At The Slightest Provocation (there are more, but I thought I'd limit myself a little...)

Trick or Treat (being the definition of what one certain strand of the eighties was ALL about, yes. Featuring Sammi Curr, the greatest fictional rock god of all time.)
Streets of Fire (rock opera. Only not. Only gritty and badass and snarky and slashy and amazing. This film makes me want to explode for joy. With added Jim Steinman songs! And Willem Dafoe in black vinyl!)
John Carpenter's Vampires (is sleazy and rough-edged and politically incorrect, violent and sexy and has an old priest, a young priest, a fantastic vampire, and James Woods being utterly brilliant)
Ghosts of Mars (because I want to see it again dammit and nobody ever wants to watch it with me. Primarily a visual-spectacle flick, recommended for anyone who likes glossy-edged, darkish, vaguely incomprehensible SF and anyone with a kink for sharp objects/piercings/body mods/black leather/pain.)
Last Action Hero (anyone who loves the way stories and worlds fit together should see this film. As should anyone who likes their villains intelligent, well dressed and dangerous. Warning: contains Arnold Schwarznegger sending himself up, which is dangerous levels of adorable.)
The Ninth Gate (I normally don't do the Johnny Depp thing, but when he's playing a complete bastard of a book dealer who's chasing down a book co-written by the Devil? Hell yes. Also, Frank Langella does his Bad Guy routine in this to wonderful effect. WIN.)
Batman Forever (because it's so slick and nineties and glossy and ridiculous and eye-candy, and I cannot get enough, ever, of this version of Two-Face and the Riddler - seriously, seeing is believing.)
David Cronenberg's Crash (I love this film and it's a lot more than just the shocker it was made out to be on its release, but just about everyone who has ever reviewed it has managed to make me go "What, no, YOU HAVE NO CLUE" so I always like rewatching it. But it's one that not many people I know have the stomach for, sadly. :/ )
Dracula (the 1979 version, for my money the finest portrayal of the Count ever, courtesy of Frank Langella. Beautifully sensual, ambiguous, subtle, and gorgeously shot, this is a lost classic of the highest order.)
Mortal Kombat (I will not try to be coherent about this film, never going to happen, seriously. Characters/design/fight cinematography/music/EVERYTHING++++++)
Ghost Rider (...obviously.)
Sin City (makes me cry and ache and cheer and gasp out loud every time. Best comic-noir movie ever made except, just possibly, Watchmen.)
The Shadow (most gorgeous America-that-never-was in the universe, Mongol warlords, and Alec Baldwin hamming it up. I love this film not so much for what it straightforwardly is, as for everything I can see just off the edges of the frame.)

If anything on that list sounds like something you want to see/resee/geek about, please leave a comment below and I will see what I can do! :)

Love,
Rath

...and I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of Man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels.

The above from the immortal William Wordsworth, but delivered into my field of awareness by being on the back of a Relentless can (yes, I do drink energy drinks at twelve o'clock at night, you think I got this way naturally?) Thus inspired in more ways than one, I seem to have gone off collecting pretty things - so here, I share!

( Slaanesh-themed art links. )

(If you're commenting on this btw, please be invited to add art links of things that you love (any subject at all) - I want there to be as many beautiful things in this post as will possibly fit. ^_^)

Laters,
Rath

EDIT: I have just discovered the source of the Wordsworth quote above, namely "Tintern Abbey".

Which OF COURSE would also be the one with the line about: Knowing that Nature never did betray / the heart that loved her, wouldn't it. Of course it would. ♥

Lupie? Saw these and thought of you! (All SFW, the worst thing here is a lot of bare male torsos. *g*)

Servant of Tzeentch. Apparently one fairly high in his lord's favour, as well, to look at him. I absolutely love this.

Someone's version of the King in Yellow, whoa. I have no idea if this actually looks like him or not, btw, but that face(s) gives me the shivers. O_O

WOLF!

Necromancer type thing.

One in scarlet and one in white, which are so gorgeous I couldn't pick my favourite, and demonstrate exactly what you can do with a simple recolour. ♥

Meanwhile, as a matter of completely unrelated public record, I am currently listening to Hammerfall's Riders on the Storm and trying very hard to stay sitting down because it is a bloody awesome song. "Riders on the storm - one with the wind, defenders of creation-!"

Laters,
Rath

And, 'nother meme! This one from zeldenthuis. You comment, I give you a letter. You post five songs that start with that letter, ideally with some kind of upload or link!

Apparently, annoyingly few songs I love start with an R. >.> Still, I can cheat if I have to, because the word "Rock" does indeed start with an R...

( Onward! )

Actually, there are more I could've included, but I'll be good and stop. Anyone want a letter?

Laters,
The Navigator

Six things that have made me happy in the last few days!

1) Realising, albeit rather painfully, that I Have A Problem(TM) regarding my distressing lack of ability to tell people "no", "fuck off", or "I don't like this situation" - and also realising that I can fix this problem and will not automatically get killed and dumped in a field next to the A14 just because I happen to cross someone else's whims. I mean, really, Aleister Crowley would be ashamed of me. But I honestly think I've figured out how to stand up for myself a bit more now, so that makes me very very happy indeed.

2) The fact that we have a new President of the USA and I actually managed to watch him take the oath of office on the BBC live feed, even though I was in work at the time. The headlines this morning are full of honest-to-gods good news for the first time in who knows how long: Guantanamo, the Middle East peace process, and a whole sheaf of suspiciously fairytale-esque Inauguration Ball photos. Congratulations Mr President and GOOD LUCK! ^_^

3) Connected to (2) above, eating vast quantities of celebratory donuts on Tuesday. They were really good donuts, and everything. Also, relatedly, having finally had enough spare cash to put in an order for some Stuff from americansweets.co.uk. Real cream soda! 3 Musketeers bars! Hell yeah. ^_^

4) Getting to steal Mikki for a day so that we could rehearse and then audition with Fire & Forget (the audition itself was very good fun though I have no idea if we got the gig!) I miss him a lot and it was really lovely to see him and sit watching Mortal Kombat: Conquest and generally goof off. ♥

5) This morning, on the way to work, finding and following a mysterious trail of... WWE trading cards! Seriously, someone had scattered a good twenty or more of them along the verge on Ditton Lane, so I followed the trail and picked them all up. They're a bit mangled from having been out in the rain (but salvageable), and none of them are what I'd consider A-grade trophies, but there are a couple of definite B-pluses in there (Stone Cold Steve Austin, yay!) and hey, so what? It's still FREE WWE TRADING CARDS, wtf. (I think Slaanesh has a hole in his pocket. The number of times I find random pretty things that are perfectly me, simply lying in the street, is truly uncanny. ^_^)

6) The world in general, just by being fucking beautiful. The wind in my hair, the rain skittering on the window. The blackwork delicacy of bare trees against the glory of the sky, early on a clear morning when everything is just starting to spin up and come alive for the day. Cold winter sky, and the stars - I mean, gods dammit, all I did was open the back door to put something in the recycling the other night, and I looked up to find myself standing under a sky so spectacular that kings and emperors couldn't afford something half as glorious. And it was just there, for free, and all I had to do to have it was tip my head back as I dropped the dustbin lid.

How is this not awesome? I mean, really? ^______^

Laters,
Rath

For special entertainment of my darling (lj)yvesilena and also because I think it was doing me good. Since I've missed a couple of weeks these aren't all from today, but here are six things that have made me happy today or at least recently:

1) W40K! I've been reading a bunch of Black Library stuff and found a couple of fantastic Chaos stories; it's soooo nice to see various members of the Traitor Legions being written as real characters rather than just one-dimensional bad guys. The bloodshed, the camaraderie, the exhilaration, the altered but definitely still real codes of honour and brotherhood - and, yes, the pain of being caught between worlds and between oaths for all time, and having to handle it by any means that lets you (figuratively) sleep at night. This is the stuff I want to read, and wish people had started writing a lot earlier. Not just a bunch of grinning arseholes with axes any more - these are Chaos Champions. *nods* ♥

2) Discovering just now that actor/wrestler Kevin Nash, of whom I'm something of a fan, is apparently going to be let out of hospital tomorrow and should basically be okay! Given that two days ago the reports were that he might have anything up to MRSA (*shudders*), I am SO relieved to hear this. Fingers crossed that nothing else goes wrong for him! *sends fanhugs*

3) Getting the next session done on my epic Ghost Rider tattoo! For the record, it looks amazing. And my brain is apparently permanently rewired, at this point, to accept a certain type of "pain" as being An Okay Thing, because I no longer seem to feel any animal urge to pull away from the needle at all. Also, the afterburn (for those who aren't inked, it feels kinda like a graze or a bad sunburn) seems to now register as an actively pleasurable sensation, which is fantastic because it means that the outer curve of my left arm, from shoulder to elbow, is now one solid wall of ohhellyeah whenever it gets knocked or I stretch too far. Niiiiice. ^_^

4) I have my ticket for Lordi in February! Nuff said. ^____^

5) Finding a very, very cool photo of one of my favourite wrestlers showing off his car. Behold, Edge in a black '69 Camaro! (Man, if I hadn't fancied him already... *g*)

6) Getting my "we sent you money" slip from GW, meaning that I can afford to live and fight another day AND go to see my mum and dad next weekend! This gives me much joy as I do miss them, and home, really a lot.

So yeah. Not everything is perfect at the moment, but I'd rather post about the stuff that is than the stuff that isn't. I know which I'd rather read back over six months from now, anyway. ^_^

How is everyone else?

Laters,
Rath

PS, Oh, and one more cool thing that didn't fit in the list: Scan from somewhere in Marvel Secret Invasion. There's having God on your side... and then there's being the Avengers. *loves this page*

I didn't post this when I got in last night in the end because it was late and I was exhausted. So Friday's six, first:

1. Finishing work for the holidays! This is very important, obviously.
2. Getting a pack of the bracelet-type glowsticks on our table at the Downing Christmas dinner! And being very amused that all my colleagues were too, ah, mainstream to know what they were and how to make them work. *g* I stole two green ones in honour of DX, and a pink and a blue one just for the hell of it.
3. The fact that the puddings at said Christmas dinner CAME UP THROUGH THE FLOOR. Murray Edwards College (aka New Hall), where we were eating, has a servery area that can be raised through the middle of the dining hall floor, and they used this to bring up the dessert plates! Dimmed lights, sparkthrowers on the corners of the counters, and the James Bond theme as an accompaniment (O_O) - it was a fantastic piece of spectacle. Whoever came up with that one deserves a bonus.
4. Managing, early in the evening, to hit the DJ with one of those long balloons that you blow up and let go of and they go flying across the room. SCORE! (I wasn't even aiming for him, but don't tell anyone.)
5. Playing air guitar to Status Quo in front of all my colleagues. Admittedly that was the only thing they played at the disco that called for air guitar at all, but still. And the video was up on the screens (Rockin' All Over The World, for the record) and my gods, the Quo boys were adorable when they were young. ^_^
6. Stopping off on the way home to lie on the grass out on the fens, just basking in the knowledge that I was free for the next two weeks. I love the night, and the sky, and being alone just sometimes.

Admittedly (lj)naranek stood me up for said dinner, but you can't have everything. *pokes and grins*

And today, ie Saturday:

1. Being on holiday, which is still making me happy!
2. The epic success that was the Triad early-Christmas-dinner. I made a full roast dinner with all the trimmings and ate until I can currently barely move. No fewer than FOUR kinds of pudding were involved. I rock.
3. Getting awesome Christmas presents from my friends, the absolute pinnacle of which has to be the pageful of chibis that deepbluesquee drew for me. There are no words for how thrilled I am with this.
4. Decorating the Christmas tree(s) and getting tinsel all over everything and everywhere, including on my own head (where it still is).
5. Spending the evening belting out Twisted Sister, Lordi, Zodiac Mindwarp, Blue Oyster Cult and Whitesnake. I fucking love proper hard rock. I love feeling my heart lift and my feet tap and not being able to do a damn thing to stop it. And I love how easy it is to do anything from cooking to dishes to cleaning when I've got something to sing along with, too. Best of the night had to be Whitesnake's Saints and Sinners, which was one of the first rock albums I ever owned (taped for me by my cousin when I was only about fourteen) and I always love to hear again. I'm such a sucker for good memories. ^_^
6. The simple delight of hanging out with people I love... and who can reduce me to laughing until I think I'm going to turn inside out. Never underestimate the joys of daft, perverted, and completely deranged friends.

So yeah. Good day. Gooooooood day. *contented sigh* How are you guys?

Hail Slaanesh and happy Christmas,
The Navigator

[This is Thursday's post that I didn't make because the internet crashed. Friday's later on!]

More than half way! Though to be honest I don't know that I'm going to want to stop this after eight days... it's good for my mood as it makes me take a mental note of everything good that happens over the day. ^_^ So today:

1. lookingforsigns bought me a gorgeous opalite stone! Opalite is magic - in low light it's the blue-green white of winter ice, but any light shining through it comes out on the other side a deep, glowing red-orange colour. Like fire at the heart of winter... so beautiful I feel like I should have gone blind just staring into it. Thank you, sis. *s*
2. Looking at the moldavite pendants in Nomads, at sternenstaub's suggestion. I know exactly which one I want - it's a piece of rough moldavite held by silver wire, with a pink cabochon-cut stone above it. I held it in my hands for a few moments and my palms tingled for the next five minutes. Unfortunately it costs *whisper* a hundred and twenty pounds, so I will almost certainly never have it... but it made me happy to look at and touch it for a bit anyway. (Moldavite is earth that was thrown up by a meteorite impact and fell back fused into olive-green glassy stone, by the bye - it's weird and wonderful in the highest degree!)
3. Indigo's smoked-salmon-and-cream-cheese bagels - awesome comfort food - and their caramel slices, which today were absolutely fantastic. Basic-style good food is one of life's most underrated luxuries.
4. Koi doing an impression of a set of bagpipes attacking somebody. This is a noise I don't think I can physically describe, but I laughed until it hurt. Koi is great at sound effects. ^_^
5. Various mental images involving attractive men, whips, and black leather. Why my brain is generating this sort of thing today I do not know but I am not about to complain.
6. Music! Within Temptation's The Silent Force is a gorgeous, gorgeous album. *sighs happily*

Laters,
Rath

Tuesday's post. Today started out with a certain degree of fail, but has improved along the way. So:

1. As I was walking to work, passing a guy who was just starting his car. As he turned the key, the stereo came on along with the engine, sending a huge deep thumping blast of bass and guitars echoing into the hitherto silent street. It was just... exhilarating. Thanks, unknown guy!
2. Crossing Parker's Piece after dark, and seeing the ice rink had purple light-pollution glare above it instead of the eerie orange that I'm more used to. The big bright blue-white lights that illumine the rink must have been scattering really brightly off the ice to make that effect happen and it was gorgeous. The entire world needs to switch to blue-violet streetlighting now please!
3. The German Market, again on Parker's Piece. It's a whole lot of little faux-log-cabin things strung with lights, selling wooden toys and reindeer hides (which are all stroky and soft!) and strange candy and honey and who knows what else. Absolutely magic, especially after dark when the lights make it look like fairyland or something.
4. Getting #2 of Ghost Rider: Danny Ketch. Which was apparently written by someone who was aiming to make me, personally, fall over and die. That perfectly matched to one of my emotional hot buttons. Hell yeah!
5. On my way home, seeing A Car. I don't know what it was, though my brain is saying Dodge or Mustang (I am not as hot on IDing muscle cars as I should be, and it was dark) but anyway. Big, matt-black with no badging or decals of any kind, those beautiful hard brutal lines that you just don't get since they invented wind-tunnel design, jacked up painfully high at the back end. Massive bulge in the hood for the air intakes (this is the car equivalent of a roll of socks down the front of a pair of very tight pants), old silver-and-black license plates (which I adore) and an engine that sounded even at near-idle like something monstrous snarling for blood. Guh. I'm fairly sure the driver saw me drooling and I honestly don't mind if he did. Best part? Really heavy traffic on Newmarket Road so I got a good long stare at it instead of just a quick one-eighty and a "whoa!" as is so often the case with cars like that. Yay!
6. Getting chatted to at the Calling by someone I actually really quite liked. He was a nice guy, older than me AND still has long hair which is an automatic several point bonus, and danced to almost all the same stuff as me. Cool! ^_^

Oh, and a bonus 6a for Oliver's Calling set which was awesome and included Harsh Generation, Raising Cain, All Along the Crooked Way...

Right, sleep. NOW. Goodnight everyone!

Laters,
Rath

PS Bonus #6b, also, for the WWE After The Bell video of Matt and Jeff from Armageddon (warning - spoilers, obviously). Triple H hugging Jeff! And Edge doing the ZOMG-wide-eyes face over the announce table! (Yes, I admit it, I love the fights but I'm a total sucker for the fluff. *g*)

Dingo, House Without A Name - I would never have heard of this song if Lordi hadn't done very evil things to it. Thank you Lordi, as ever!

Domination Black, The House of 1000 Eyes - someone, somewhere, will love this song as much as I do. Right?

Also, I have succumbed to temptation and now own a DX belt buckle, as an early Christmas present to myself. Ah, DX shinies - the ultimate mixed message. "Yes! I'm a rebel - and I have twenty bucks worth of corporate merchandising right here to prove it!" ~~God knows god knows I love this perfect world...~~ ^_^

Rath

I can't, cos I'm in CB2s, but never mind, because I always knew the Eagles were cooler than people gave them credit for. This song is just... yes. Exactly like this, dammit!

And a tribute to the power of the OTP that is Google/Youtube, too! All I had of this song was the chorus refrain and a memory of how the guitars sounded, and from that, I found it in less than fifteen minutes. How cool is that?

Laters,
Rath