Thanks, Seska, but I feel better.

I'm finally coming to terms that there's absolutely nothing I can do about it that won't make the situation worse. So I really shouldn't take it so hard.

Have I mentioned how much I adore Shir?

::despite the staring at Delurking, now snuggles Zenkitty::

And thank you for the answer! I was sure it's one word, for some reason.

JZ, feel better~ma.

I think it's a universal truism that we adore Shir. Just because of her complete fabulousness.

I'm sorry, smonster.

Cutiehead baby + turtles = win!

So I started running yesterday, for the first time in a year. It went about as well as I expected (walk, run, walk, run, walk walk, run, walk walk walk, run . . . ). This morning I'm all stiff and a bit sore, also as I expected. But expectations and feeling it are two different things. I have a dim memory of running becoming enjoyable after a while. It's been over a year since I ran regularly, though, so dim = 1 LED bulb in the back of a storage closet that I never visit. It does get fun again, right? Right?

No, that's why you had kids, JZ. fancy dress=costumes/masquerade, right? because when I came across it as a kid I just pictured really dressed-up folk till Hyacinth Bucket. And I still have "Sixty Minute Man" as an earworm. Could be worse, but it's Keith Olbermann's fault.

I still have "Sixty Minute Man" as an earworm.

I unreservedly ADORE that song. Billy Ward and the Dominoes.

Yeah, I can live with Bitches tellin' me they love me.

And just wait until you'll see me in person, 'babies.

::Snuggles the entire thread, declaring this HAS to be good day at Bitches::

fancy dress=costumes/masquerade, right? because when I came across it as a kid I just pictured really dressed-up folk till Hyacinth Bucket.

Me, too. As do, apparently, just about all USians. I spent my junior year of college at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, and the first social event I went to was a fancy dress party for...I can't even remember what group (knowing me, it was either a literature geeks party or something churchy). All the visiting students from the US came all gussied up in our dressiest dresses or nattiest sportjackets and ties, and stood around utterly baffled at being surrounded by kangaroos and aliens and Ladies of the Lake. None of the USians until that very instant had had any inkling that "fancy" meant "fanciful" and not "swank."

It was a very mutually amused and baffled and WTFy party, but still kinda fun; still, I didn't go to any fancy dress parties after that one.

I would, once I knew and figured out "What are you supposed to be?" wasn't some existential thing. Yeah, Tep, much better than commercial jingles, but SMM has even more staying power than he knew, apparently. I'm cool with it though.

None of the USians until that very instant had had any inkling that "fancy" meant "fanciful" and not "swank."

This is why everyone should adopt my philosophy of reading many mysteries set in a country before you go there.

I want to see the wolves in the walls costume. Badly.

I'm wondering whether there's anyone who has kept track of when the Christmas decorations have gone on sale each year. I think the first week in October is the earliest I've seen them. The stores are all Halloween decorations next to Christmas decorations, making me consider a Nightmare Before Christmas approach to outdoor decorating. I was rather taken with the animated lighted vulture at Michael's. I think arranging bits of one of the plastic human skeletons around it would be a nice touch. For Christmas, I could stick a Santa hat in its mouth.

Yes, fancy dress = costumes. Heh. Oh, English, English, why are you so variable?

I haven't the heart to retype my whole gigantic post, so key points:

• I'm basing the Year 8 & 9 curriculum around this. Should be fun.

• This week, my class were basing their literacy activities around

• Meanwhile, this kid is not in my class, thank God. He's in my friend's class, two doors down from mine. His father is an Elvis Impersonator. Evidently he's planning to follow in his father's footsteps. Only with Michael Jackson. Um. Yeah. Not sure if this is quite as horrifyingly funny if you don't actually see the kid on a daily basis, but, dear heaven, this amused the crap out of me. (Although, props to him, he's put A LOT of effort into this. And there are stacks of other ones he's done. And he has costumes and everything. And he's choreographed the crap out of it all. But, but, but...it's uncanny how like Michael Jackson he isn't. Um. Also, the camera appears to be operated by a small child, or possibly the family dog. And has a disquieting tendency to drift right, to what I presume is his father's torso. And I presume that the anonymous and rather disquieting sliver of flesh jutting out in an unfortunate location is his father's thumb. But...yes. Quite unfortunate.)