Brown Bulletin June July 2013

Editor: Keladria Tulin

Happy Birthday to: Rijomu Sedai and Kairina

Belated list of the newest Brown aspirants

Aryela (Mar)

Cealestis (Mar)

Elia (July)

Welcome home

and....

Congrats to the newest Brown Sedai, Mirandha!

Which of these fantasy author's worlds would you most like to live in?

Robert Jordan (WoT) - 17.39%

J.R.R. Tolkien (Middle-earth) - 34.78%

Brandon Sanderson (any) - 17.39%

Lewis Carroll (Wonderland/other) - 4.35%

C.S. Lewis (Narnia/other) - 8.70%

G.R.R. Martin (Westeros) - 0%

Neil Gaiman (any) - 0%

Robin Hobb (Elderlings Realm/other) - 0%

Cornelia Funke (Inkworld- because bookception would occur *) - 4.35%

Other (Harry Potter, Star Wars, Tortall - Tamora Pierce) - 13.04%

No-Bake 'ems (Chocolate Peanut Butter Oat Cookies)

Ingredients

-2 cups sugar

-1 stick butter

-3 Tbsp cocoa powder

-1/2 cup milk (almond milk works great too)

-1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter

-1 1/2 tsp vanilla

-3 cups oatmeal

Directions

Mix sugar, butter, cocoa, and milk in medium saucepan.

Boil for one minute, stir continuously.

Reduce heat and stir in the peanut butter and vanilla.

Mix quickly until peanut butter melts.

Add the oatmeal and mix until all ingredients are well blended.

Stir for a couple more minutes on low heat to slightly cook oats.

Drop spoonfuls onto wax paper/parchment paper/tin foil and allow to set before nomming.

Enjoy!

Hawaiian Lemonade

What you Need

¾ cup frozen lemonade

¾ cup water

30 ml Vodka

30 ml white Rum

1½ cups apricot nectar

1½ cups fresh pineapple juice

1 tablespoon ginger ale

Lemon slices to garnish

How to Make

Take a bowl and mix all the ingredients well until evenly mixed together.

Add some ice cubes and serve chilled.

I just totally brown'ed out about leaving my office to go home... mostly because I was distracted by the boards... but really, who the heck is sitting in their (academic) office at 6:20 on a Friday for fun

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When I got to the grocery store all kinds of other things pop into my mind "oh, I'll need to buy stuff for my lunch salad. And vinegar is almost used up, I need that too, and ..." So when I got home I realized I had forgotten half the things I needed for the baking. [for the daughter's day care group's fundraiser bazaar thingy]

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Yesterday I was halfway to Llys y Dail when I realized I'd forgotten my lunch bag at work. I was too far to turn around.

Today I was in my driveway when I realized I'd forgotten my lunch at the museum. Luckily, the museum is only five minutes from home.

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Yesterday at work we were planting for the ice cream parlour (called the Refectory) on the resort grounds. I grabbed the flat of flowers (mini bell petunias, bacopa, wave petunias, and loads of begonias) that had been parceled out for the Refectory.....and proceeded to try to arrange them in the golf course hanging baskets instead of the giant wicker planters the other three were working on right beside the golf course baskets.

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At work we keep a bottle of salt on top of the fridge. Today I used it, but when I tried to put it back on top of the fridge I realized I had my glass of iced tea in my hand instead. Drinking salt would have been pretty awkward

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

I filled the dishwasher up a couple days back. I have a system where I change out a magnet to indicate whether the dishes are clean or dirty. Green magnet means clean, red magnet means dirty. I'm sure you can see where this is going. I apparently didn't change the magnet OR start the dishwasher. Because I am a lazy mofo I've just been taking dishes out of the dishwasher the past two days thinking they were clean. I just realized today that they are all dirty.

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I turned on the wrong burner. How, I don't know, because only the front two work decently, and the back two don't work at all......I'd turned on one of the back burners, and not even the burner that the tea kettle used to sit on.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

It was night, so the hallway at home was dark. I had to get something from my bedroom. I didn't bother switching on the lights, since I know the layout of my house, and so just jogged to my bedroom in the dark. And jogged, nose-first, right into its closed door.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

I was just trying to watch a youtube video, but I didn't get any sound. I was almost at the point where I started shouting "f*** you, computer", when I realized I had my headphones still plugged in... But obviously not on my head.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

So today, I go to the property mgr's office to sign the lease for the house I'm going to rent for the next two years. This is a huge deal and I'm all zomg excited, right? Last week, as soon as I knew I was approved for the place, I called the utility companies, got all the basic stuff set up, got my renters insurance, good to go, right? so, we start in on the process, and the property mgr asks, "you've got the money orders ready, right?"

Right. Money. First months rent and security deposit. Kind of crucial.... Not like I'm renting the place for free....... le sigh.

Fortunately, she's letting me move in anyway, I'm just bringing the money orders to her first thing tomorrow.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

I had a Brown Out on Tuesday. I was super excited to get to work and put in some good thesis time. My goal was to be at the library at 10. Super cheerful, I left the house at 9:45. Then, I got an email. "we're still on for 10, right?"

I totally forgot - I had an appointment with a fellow student to arrange some stuff for our conference organization!

Glad he sent that email

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

Oh I Browned Out about my physical therapy appointment. Thought it was Monday, turns out it was Tuesday. BUT MY CALENDAR SAID MONDAY. I blame the calendar.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

I just now poured myself some kombucha. It might be a good thing if I had the glass turned the right side up.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

Last night I dreamed about forgetting where I'd parked my car and I was walking around in my old hometown trying to find it. In the dream I actually thought that this was the silliest brown-out I'd had in ages.

Continuing on from the last article (only five more books/series to be read), now it's time to choose only books that you have never read before.

Ten books is the limit and while anthologies and such count, series do not (although you can choose to give an unfinished series some of your spaces).

Which ten new/unread books would you choose if those were the absolute last books you would ever read

This turned out to be quite difficult for most to even narrow things down enough to be able to post anything

Some of the responses include:

• I don't think I can do this.
• I have a list of books that I'm waiting for, next books in a series with a (supposedly) definite publishing date. I runs from now to March 2014 and only has one book from each series, so that even if I know series X has three more books coming, I'm only listing the next one. And if the book doesn't have a date yet, it's not listed, which means that some of my favourite authors are not listed. The list has 15 titles currently and I haven't updates it in a while.
• No way in h*ll am I able to give you a list of ten books. My head hurts from just the idea.
• I have to think about it. But definitely the unpublished Stormlight Archives. I'll get back to you.
• This is too hard. If someone tried to tell me I could only read 10 more books, I would blindly grab as many as possible and risk being burned at the stake. Anyone stupid enough to try and keep me away from new books could suck my big fat imaginary peener.
• On the other hand, if I knew I was going to die and only had enough time left to read 10 books, I think I would forego reading in lieu of writing down all the stories I have floating around in my head. *shrug*
• I guess this question is just impossible for me to answer.
• ^This.
• I haven't decided if I'm going to choose yet.
• Uh-oh... It's such a long time since I last "played" this. I'll have to think a bit (this too).

There were two who managed the task set forth and brought us these two lists

(Nary)

1. Complete works of Plato

2. Complete works of Cicero

3. Complete works of Ovid

4. Complete works of Ellery Queen

5. The Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin

6. Complete works of Aristotle

7. The Works of Henry David Thoreau

8. Complete works of Hesiod

9. Complete works of H.G. Wells

10. Complete works of Edgar Rice Burroughs

(Cea)

1. Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson

2. The Kingkiller Chronicle by Patrick Rothfuss

3. The Origin of Species - Darwin

4. Complete works of Michel Foucault

5. Complete works of Haruki Murakami

6. (Finish reading) The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil by Philip Zimbardo

7. Visions of Social Control: Crime, Punishment and Classification by Stanley Cohen

8. Complete works of Philip K. Dick

9. Complete works of Neil Gaiman

10. Complete works of Hunter S. Thompson

In the end, I've decided that telling a book lover they can only read so many more new books causes trauma

An American ad company is filming an ad for Verizon in our street all this weekend. So if you look carefully in future Verizon ads, you might be able to see my house!

Turns out it's not the first ad shoot they've done in my street: I think the shot in this ad of the kids looking out the window at the street could just about be from my living room. It's certainly from one of the living rooms in the small apartment building I live in

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

If it is "Save a horse, ride a cowboy" or "Save a courser, ride a knight" would it then be "Save a sheep, ride a Scott"?

Or a Kiwi. Aves keeps talking about sheep f***ing and the like, so yeah.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

"I found an interesting thing in the series I'm reading. The author mentioned a Baynard Castle, in London, England near St. Paul's Cathedral. This author is particularly fact-conscious, so I quickly did a research session.

Turns out, Baynard Castle is connected to my father's family. Apparently we're direct descendants of the family who gave the castle its name."

"I hope I see you in the background staggering about with some books on obscure law and a glass of wine."

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

"I think I tried baking a book and serving it as cake with tea, in my dream last night."

"Mmm, that sounds good... if it was a cake shaped like a book that is. I don't actually want to snack on a book. I'll take the tea though."

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

"I've been calling everyone in voice chat hos lately. Mostly the guys."

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

"I love this curse word conversation."

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

I had a seriously weird dream last night. I was with a volunteer medical unit in South America and we were trying to get through a very territorial group of natives that were blocking the road (I was cowering with the supplies in the back of one of the trucks). Year: Circa 1920s-ish--I was wearing what we were calling dungarees. I hate dreams where I get shot in them.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

Off to the mechanic, the cake shop, and the liquor store. Whee!

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

In other news: The potted kitty is cruising for trouble this week. Sunday night she kept me up until 3 am because she wanted snuggles (I have to leave for work at 5:30 am, for perspective). Just now she stole a magnet off the refrigerator!

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

Isn't the point to make you uncomfortable, then examine why?

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So I went on a impulsive trip to Austin to visit my friend, and I've ended up staying three weeks. I thought I would stay one week. Which is why I didn't bother doing laundry before I left and instead just grabbed the last 5 pairs of clean underwear from my dresser. Of course those 5 are the most annoying uncomfortable pairs (hence why they were the only pairs left clean) and OMG I'M GOING CRAZY. Three weeks of uncomfortable undies riding up my ass. When I get home I am throwing these away and buying 5 new pairs of comfortable underwear so I never do this to myself again.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

My dad has cooked up a convoluted ass plan that involves picking up and dropping off multiple people in various worldwide cities, because of the Civil War, and other reasons.

I feel like I'm in an episode of Doctor Who or something.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

“I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.” ― Jerome K. Jerome

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

Today at work someone asked us what time it was.

When that happens in the right circumstance (such as this), I just point at the nearest public clock. Which happened to be on all four sides of the bell tower we were right by. She didn't even have to crane her neck to see the clock. ~ . ~ * ~ . ~

I had so much caffeine today. Black iced coffees. Wtfuuuuuuuu was I thinking?! Awake foreverrrrr.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

How Brown am I that I got all excited when I realized Im close to the university i already decided is the one id like to start attending as soon as possible, and stopped at the first place i could get wifi and a beverage and a break from exploring new worlds and new civilizations, bravely going where no Austin has gone before? wow runon. Not editing. Yall still love me despite ipad typing, right? i miss my computer.

~ . ~ * ~ . ~ And I've finally discovered gifs.

They add a whole new level to life. I know I'm extremely late to the party. I don't care xD

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The puppy has spent the last ten minutes blowing bubbles in the pond my mum put in our sunroom

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Now that I have the rant off my chest, tell me if it sounds insulting. I'm considering posting it somewhere more public and would like to be warned before sticking my foot up to my tonsils.

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I can hear it pouring rain on the roof of the building. I see we have a flash flood warning for the whole metrowest area for the next 3 hours. The forecast for today and tonight is an 80% chance of rain and thunderstorms.

Weather.com's hourly forecast summary says I can expect dry conditions for the next 6 hours.

Apparently it's raining right now, but for the hours of 3pm through 7pm there's a 0% chance of rain in the area. A new system will move in around 8pm and dump more on us.

This is a case of the computer algorithm being technically correct and yet completely unhelpful.

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I discovered that I can get on the boars at work....

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

"*shines her new title*"

"You're shining something? Why bother? It'll get dusty here in no time anyway."

"I'll keep it pinned to my chest. That stays clean. And visible."

~ . ~ * ~ . ~

Perrin managed to discover that the door from the sun room to the "almost deck" walkway thingy outside the master bedroom doesn't always latch. He managed to push it open and then lock himself out on the deck type thingy. Fortunately, we were in the bedroom handing the new curtains I bought so he wasn't outside for long. Poor thing was completely freaked out.

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My eyeliner looked so good today. Too bad it was wasted on only a trip to Best Buy

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Last week we had to ban a woman from the library for taking pictures of other patrons. She refused to leave the week before that when the fire alarm was going off and she's argued with the Library Director. She claims we are all part of a plot with Child Protective Services to spy on her...

We're also accused of listening in on phone calls by another guy who refuses to put his phone number in his library record

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Can one plan an impulsive holiday?

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