Blue.

Ooh! Now this is awesome! My friend Blue Morris was published in 21st Century Burlesque magazine! And he quotes MY dumb ass, so this makes it even more exciting on a personal level. XD

Seriously though, this is a good article on gender in burlesque, written by a thoughtful man who isn't there to stroke his ego or play the nice-guy entitlement card. Go have a read.

I would rather read than eat.

Last night I taught an Intro to Candle Magic class at the Sacred Well. The weather was absolutely miserable, and the wind knocked out a lot of the power in Chilliwack, so the attendance was not as great as we were expecting based on the confirmation calls we'd received. However! The ladies who did attend were lovely, and easy to engage, and they all seemed satisfied with the information given.

A beginners course is challenging, in some ways, because you really have to break your practice down into steps and describe the hows and whys of what you're doing. You also have to bear in mind that not everyone has the same background as you do - if I'm sitting around drunk with the English Ginger (oh, those were the days) and I start quoting something or screeching about how I once read 'The Dark Crystal' was a Qabalastic film, he gets it. Do that to someone whose only exposure to the occult is a book on Wicca they bought eight years ago and you're going to come off like a douche.

(As an aside... the longest running occult joke Pete and I have now is simply, "I would fuck a prostitute!" Some day I'll explain it.)

Aaaaaaaaaanyway, while I was there, I bought candles (duh - I fucking love the Motor City Hoodoo ones) and some books. I finally got my copy of Protection & Reversal Magic by Jason Miller! This is one of those books I've read rave reviews for all over the magical blogosphere, and so I've been dying to pick it up. I'll let ya'll know how it is.

Goddammit.

I just spent the last few hours sewing fringe to this bra... and I think I hate it.

Grr.

"Did he call her teacakes? That is so fuckin HOT."

It's fucking freezing outside. So my aim today is to completely avoid leaving the house - I have tea, and a cake I made yesterday, and gin, so this seems possible.

I also have a list of things to do that all require staying indoors:

- Clean the kitchen.

- Clean the bathroom

- Put away laundry (Isn't this exciting?)

- Work on costume. So, I totally changed my number for January's taboo - I'm now doing Queen of Pain instead. This means half my costume is finished since it will stuff I already own, but I need to bling up a black bra. I'm planning on doing fringe - I went to Dressew the other day and picked that and some embellishments up. I also am considering hand sewing my pasties. My sister hand-sewed me one pair and they are my absolute favourites... but they did take forever, because frankly my nipples are large. So I bought a TON of black sequins.

I figure I'm behind on all my podcasts (New World Witchery, the Lucky Mojo call-in show, the Savage Lovecast, and of course Jay and Silent Bob Get Old and Smodcast) so I can just put some of those on and sew my little fingers off.

But first... tea. Delightful tea.

And what the hell, have an outfit post. Not from today, obvs: I'm staying in my pyjamas, bitches.

"Is that dogshit on my heel?"

Nails!

My nails don't grow long.

I used to work in a video store, and the constant opening and closing of DVD cases and pulling them out of the shelves destroyed my nailpolish. Before that I put my time in at Starfucks, and of course there you can't wear polish and your hands are often wet. My current career is easier on my hands, but alas, my nails still tend to tear at a certain length. This means I can't do a French manicure without making my hands look even stubbier than they are.

Enter... the half moon manicure.

WTF is that? It's this, bitch.

I prefer to just use one colour. I enjoy the classic look of it, even if an 'unusual' colour is used. (My nails were almost exclusively orange throughout October.)

Aaanyway. I saw on I'm pretty sure Pixiwoo a review of a matte topcoat. I think it was by Chanel, which was too pricey for my liking, but while in Sephora I saw that OPI made one as well. So I snagged it, and have applied it over OPI's 'Black Onyx.'

I looove it.

I've been wearing black polish since I was a teenager (back when the only black to be found was that really shitty watery crap that took like, six coats to become black) but it can get a bit dull feeling. This is a nice solution for me.

Booyah.

Rapeseed

I'm a big nerd for home decor. I like to blame this on the fact that I'm a Libra, and therefore my personal space needs to be welcoming and delightful, but whatever the reason, it means I spent too much time browsing websites like Apartment Therapy.

This morning I stumbling across The Evolution Store. They sell actual skulls and skeletons! Including raccoon penis bones! They also have a selection of really lovely botanical prints that I sort of absolutely adore, including one for 'rapeseed.' I had no idea 'rapeseed' was a plant. It sounds very sinister indeed.

Far, far too many of these items would not look out of place in my bedroom. And not in a super creepy way - my room is all woods and leather, glass and plants. A toad skeleton would not look weird on top of my bookshelf.

...there's a taxidermied piranha! Okay, that could match the Tiki theme in the living room! He could sit by the remote for the TV!

Mail!

Eeee! I just received my copy of American Shamans in the mail from Cory over at New World Witchery! And now I'm shamed because Cory has much, much nicer handwriting than I do.

I'd entered the audio spell contest and was one of the lucky draw winners. I'd like to shout out my thanks again, and also to tell anyone who reads this to go listen to the podcast. I'm a bit behind on it right now, but it is a solid program that never disappoints.

Secret Circle.... of life. Or something.

I don't have cable, so I watch all my television online. Recently, while enjoying the final episodes of Canada's Worst Driver, I saw repeated ads for a block of shows on MuchMusic (that's Canada's version of MTV) targeted at teenagers who no doubt enjoy Twilight and possibly the True Blood. The shows in question were The Vampire Diaries and The Secret Circle.

The vampires I had no interest in whatsoever - I don't even watch True Blood, despite considering ASkars my imaginary boyfriend. (Him and Jason Momoa. They could get all the things off of high shelves for me!) But the witch show? Ohhh, come on. It looked like just the sort of thing the sibling unit and I need to mock.

Aaaaaaaand it is. We watched the first episode tonight, and plan to watch the second before we podcast about it. The actors are not as awful as I was expecting, with the exception of the token Nancy character. Bitch, you cannot out-Fairuza Fairuza Balk, so don't even try. The evil guy we named the Whorelock, since he's the dude who played that asshole on Queer as Folk. The show is sort of like Practical Magic meets the Craft (duh) meets 90210 as near as I can figure it. It also made me feel old by having "sixteen years ago" seem ancient to the teens, when I'm sitting there going, "fuck you, I was a teenager sixteen years ago!" My shit-ass 'coven' never made a car explode though.


Next week at The Sacred Well I'll be teaching a candle magic class. Candle magic is one of those things I do so often, and have been doing for so goddamn long that actually sitting down to explain HOW is actually sort of hard. So that's my project for this week.

Well, that and working on this solo I pitched ages ago and have sort of been neglecting. The song I'm using is Save It, and I've honestly not worked on it at all because I've been busy either being an alternate for the Vegas submission (which we filmed the first part of today, go team!) or being deathly ill. I'm only just now finally just in the sniffles stage, ugh.

I really need to think of a good costume. I have a few ideas, but it will depend on what works best. I guess I'll see soon enough!