So it would seem that I now have more relatives now than I originally thought. Such an explosive bunch you could say.

http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/ee04/

Lol.

Thank you everyone who expressed their concerns and gave their wishes, and it looks like everything is going to be okay. I'm still going to be in some pain for the next few days, but I've been cleared to leave the hospital. They aren't sure what caused the pain, but they found some issues with my digestive track that could have gone badly for my had I not come in. But thank you again, you guys are the best.

Long weekend, and now I'm laying in a hospital bed. Yesterday around Noon I had a sharp pain shoot through the left side of my gut and I've been in a manageable level of pain and discomfort since. Now I'm waiting for my test results and we'll see how I'm doing. Very glad that I have some really fantastic friends that have been looking out for my well being.

Okay...so this was just brought up to me and I really think that we need to do something with this.



So yeah...

And here's the pony version...

So the room I was supposed to be staying in got cancelled, and the backup room also fell through. Anyone know of anyone with crash space? I don't need a bed, I have my own cot. Please let me know if anyone has a good lead. Thanks guys.

~The peep

EDIT:

I've been saved! Thanks again to the folks who got in touch with me to help me out, it really means a lot to me.

http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2948514/

Passing along the info for a friend. Might as well check it out.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! *hugs all around*

So MFF this year was interesting. Remind me not to do 2 shows in 1 weekend like that again. It was good seeing some of my friends and fellow bronies this past weekend, but I only got to see a fraction of those I hold dear, and for way too short a time.

---

So here's a new one for you. Went by my storage unit with a friend on our way to Ohio and asked the fine folks up front if they knew of a place nearby where I could get my oil changed and tires rotated(both overdue) and was referred to a new shop down the street(half a block away). Simple, convenient, and after tax my oil change came out to $19 even. I asked about the tire rotation and was quoted only $15 so I'm pretty happy right now.

Here's where things went wrong.

So we spun around and went into the bay where they had the lift so they could rotate the tires and said it was alright for us to stay in the car. I was an idiot for not thinking twice about this but I digress. So we're up on the lift, just waiting as they do their job, and then we're at an angle. Its an interesting sensation when you're in a vehicle and said vehicle falls forward off a lift. That's right, it fell off the lift.

Now I've only heard about stuff like this happen online on hear 8th party horror stories like this, but holy crap. Please note that we're both fine, we were just shaken up as usually only people who fall over cliffs or bridges ever really experience. So from here what does the owner and employees do? They get a jack, ratchet my car back onto the lift(more or less), using the jack not just to push my frame back into shape, but also to keep my car stable on the lift, with both of us still in the car.

They finish the tires and then act like nothing happened and try to get me to leave the shop. Now I wasn't going to leave without a written statement because I have no idea what sort of damage that my car may have sustained, but the owner wasn't being cooperative to say the least and tried to use the existing damage to my bumper to say that everything was fine and nothing happened at all.

At this point I had to call the police. To say the least, the owner was furious, but he still admit that my car fell off the lift, and with both of us in it. I let the police know in advance about the prior damage to my bumper(darn you Ohio!!!), and told the officers about said prior damage when they arrived. They took the report, I contacted the insurance company, and to say the least, they were surprised as well as they had never heard of this ever happening before either.

As the owner and employees were more than pissed at us(you know, because we didn't roll over and let them get away with it), I gave them the Oil Change place's information and they're gathering their insurance information incase there really is damage to my vehicle beyond the bumper. Luckily the gas station down the road gave me some rope(thank goodness for being a regular) and with that and a little duct tape, its not flapping around for the moment.

---

Again, happy thanksgiving everyone.

Well I have to say that AC this year was not the stress reliever that I was in need of. Much thanks for those who were looking out for me and dealing with my emo-ness of the past year, I do appreciate it.

So due to circumstances beyond my control, I didn't arrive in Pittsburgh until Saturday morning, and then had to leave as soon as we could load out. For about as long as I can remember, I've always arrived Thursday night, and had a blast throughout the weekend, and then take off being completely de-stressed on Monday. Well life didn't see to it happening like this for me this time around.

I had some fun at FWA earlier this year, and I was expecting this to be a blast, but I'm still feeling blah at best. I had a few things go right over the weekend, but I still have to figure out a few of the details and see how I can improve on the things that went wrong. My crew for my table did a pretty darned good job, and I hope that they had a good time there, despite my antics and random moments of randomness.

In short: I need a vacation...

Well my life sucks pretty hard right now, with a lot of people expressing to me just how much I suck, exactly how I suck, and telling me that I should just throw in the towel, I really need to get away from everything right now.

Oh yeah, I just tried that, and it only made things worse. Now I'm finally home, exhausted because I had to do at least 80% of the driving on my own, then I immediately have to mow the lawn. All this after losing a whole week to an event that wasn't worth my time or effort, only to come out more broke and frustrated as hell.

Now all I want to do is sit back and relax to a movie. Oh, what's this? Go figure, my DVD player just took a dump and somehow ate my video and won't release it.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!

So thanks to my recent awareness of my gluten allergy, I've made a lot of radical changes to my diet. Now along with just eating healthier(almost 0 fast food these days), I've been exploring new avenues in which to explore when it comes to what I can consume, and not all of them have ended well.

Now one of my passions has been middle eastern and Mediterranean food, but with not being able to eat pita anymore(or wraps in general), its made things that much more difficult. Since gluten-free bread sucks on so many levels that its not funny, so I'm now stuck with relying on rice cakes from Quaker.

There have been quite a few setbacks when I didn't pay enough attention to what what I eat, like when I was stupid and didn't realize that I can't eat gravy or holandaise sauce. Now while its not on that same route, but it looks like my body reacts poorly with a mixture of beets and ginger. Like, very poorly.

Perhaps I can interest you in our rapture plans. This was brought up a few days ago by friends of mine in Detroit. This is entirely for shock value, and seeing reactions from "True Believers".

Step 1, get some old shoes(salvation army for the win). Step 2, dry ice. Step 3, public place.

You get the idea. Its pretty funny all things considered, and a video camera makes everything better. For the most part, this is very out of character for me, but with all those people that honestly believe that the Rapture is coming(and have been cramming it down my throat), and for those that believe that its happening today, I think this is justified.

And today I'm 31...

More of a musical update. It would seem that Renard is still around and producing music, so as I was looking around just a bit ago, it would seem that a new album was released...today. This has the track that I was looking for alright, as its what introduced me to his music. So yeah, enjoy.

http://lapfox.bandcamp.com/

So I still have yet to see the series, even though a really good friend of mine worked on it, but I finally saw footage of the show for the first time at a friend's b-day party this past Saturday night. I may have to watch this now.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsCHIKTRYRk

Also, this was hysterical. We've all heard this before, but it works so well like this.

---

Side note, I'll be at FWA this weekend. Also ducking out to watch roller derby.

---

Edit: wow, 2,400 page views. How did that happen?

Down in Atlanta right now for a convention. Thought it would be nice to get away from the cold for a bit...guess I was wrong.

http://www.furaffinity.net/view/5320102/

So as some on you know, like many people, I do a lot of business with PayPal. Well I'm looking for options because PayPal just screwed me out of over $600($1200 if you look at the merch I'm out of as well) because they thought it looked suspicious that several transactions were all done by Credit Card so they immediately reversed all of those transactions and told me that it was "to protect me" and refused to give me back the money for merchandise that was already in the hands of the purchasers.

DAMNIT!!!

Well, the costuming is moving along and the bulk of the materials arrive tomorrow, so yay for progress. At the moment though I am looking for anyone interested in a large scale commission as I've finally come across something truly amazing that I think will drastically improve my life. I'm not usually one for most material objects, but this is one of those things that will really help me feel serene and complete.

http://www.tronbymonster.com/products/lightdisc/

So yes, I am more than open for commissions right now, please help me to make this become a reality.

On a separate note, the holidays were fun, yet not overly eventful, especially since I spent the majority of it sick. My body has been slowly recovering from what I believe is more than one bug and I'm still sluggish, though I've been hard at work, trying to create a whole myriad of new products for our wonderful community. Keeping myself busy while my body fights me. Just wonderful

---

Sprite Badge commissions:
1. Zippiner - 2 badges
2. Open
3. Open
4. Open
5. Open

---

Custom Leather commissions:
1. Open
2. Open
3. Open
4. Open
5. Open

Okay, this is one of those films that pops out in a generation that really gets to you. Unbelievably powerful, and completely awe inspiring. As it is, I'm going to be doing a LOT of work in the immediate future along with Hollywood Blues to start working on Tron costumes, and to say the least, we'll be offering up costuming to the community. So if you have any ideas about "Tron-ing" up your fursuits, let us know, we are in business. Also, if you know of anyone interested, please pass the word along.

---

Sprite Badge commissions:
1. Zippiner - 2 badges
2.
3.
4.
5.

---

Custom Leather commissions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

Okay, so inspiration has hit me in a fairly odd way and I think that I will be offering custom physical sprite based badges in the immediate future. I tossed up the idea a while back about doing custom leather badges and lo-and-behold suddenly there were a bunch of others doing exactly that. So I'm moving onto a new area, and with any hope people might even like what I come up with.

I'm going to offer a handful of these at an introductory rate of $25-$30. Now these will be fairly large, but I'm willing to give this a shot, and for what I feel is a decent rate. Examples to come and will be listed here shortly.

Slots:
1. Zippiner - 2 badges
2.
3.
4.
5.

Aaaaaaaaand, I'm off to England for a week.

Pip pip cheerio and lots of fish 'n chips.

So its finally here. As of today I am now 3 decades old. Some of my friends have been texting me with "Renew" as the only thing they'll say, and I think it's hysterical. Points for those that get the reference. No I is olds.

Well, FCN was fairly fun for the time I was there. Missed just about ALL of Friday thanks to work and airport runs. Showed up on Saturday rocking the 1880s(hey, nobody specified, they only highly implied is all), and later got in my total (19)80's track suit and donned my Power Glove(still functional), and then eventually brought out my jumping stilts, and my gigantic Ninja Turtle(Leonardo) snuggee. For the Alley, with FCN's rules I'm totally a fish out of water if only because you can't have anything pre-made, and well, I usually do most of my work in advance(and my leatherworking can get quite loud at times), so all that I ended up doing there was constructing a prototype Maverick tactical holster. But enough of that.

It was who I got to hang out with that really made things really great this weekend. Major props to  Dearc and  VoodooWolf for being so totally awesome this weekend. Also to  Ifus and  EddyFDemocross and  Woods and  Aheria and so many more. Also getting to meet so many others like  Spix and  PoofyKnave and others. To  Twitch, sorry for totally not recognizing you out of suit. There are so many people I'd like to give a shout out to, but it was a really great weekend.

Still trucking through things. Back in Feb I took a trip out to Katsucon in Maryland/Virginia over Valentine's weekend. For the better part of things, let's just say that it wasn't the most productive weekend I've had. Lots of stuff that I just won't get into. Now onto the cool parts.

Over Saturday of the event I got a big hello from the ever-so-awesome  IndigoAngelCat who came out to hang out and help me with my booth. It was really cool on so many levels because for starters, we don't get to hang out nearly close to enough. Things went well during the day, and after the dealer's room closed we went out on the town.

First stop was to a classy restaurant called Ketchup. It was great to start out as we got our appetizer which was various flavored fries and at least half a dozen different flavors of ketchup. Because of the snow storm that had hit the East Coast just before the con, our first few attempts to order our food failed.

Eventually we found something that worked as Indigo ordered chicken and I got a burger. We talked and talked and talked...and then we realized that it was taking forever for our food to come out. After finding out that from someone who wasn't our server that when they were bringing out our food, someone spilled wine all over it...and that out server was supposed to have told us but she never did.

Eventually the chicken came out(had a small piece, it was great). My burger took it's time. When it did come out, it had everything on it that I told them not to put on it(waitress took it down even) and I sent it back. It came back after some time and this time had the wrong cheese(cheddar instead of bleu). I wasn't too happy but at this point I was just going to roll with it...until I took a bite and it was charred all the way through. The manager was more than understanding and comped our meal. From here, things took a turn for the better.

---

After leaving Ketchup, we went down an odd set of stairs to one of the happiest places on Earth: Peeps & Company. This is the world's only dedicated Marshmallow Peep store. I could write a whole post about this place and I can't go on just how awesome it was. If Indigo hadn't brought me there, I don't think I ever would have found it. The entire place was one giant smile and there was much giggling and jumping around and hugging a $400+ plushy Peep.

Just so much happiness in this place that I can't describe. Now before this I didn't know that Mike & Ikes, as well as Hot Tamales are also produced by the same company. But yeah, the second I stepped in...well, I don't remember much past that point other than a pure wave of bliss. Ahhhhhh, to be one with my true spirit animal. Ehehehehehe.

Perhaps  IndigoAngelCat can elaborate more on this as I completely lost track of time and may have scared/scarred a few people including employees and other patrons. As I said, it all gets a bit fuzzy after that. Lots of colors, and strange visuals. I do seem to recall a wall that was nothing but dispensers for the dozen or so flavors of Mike & Ikes. Truly magical.

Afterward we went to Pot Belly for sandwiches and talked the night away until they closed for the evening. It was really cool, and I wish I had more time to have fun like I did this weekend. Thank you again ever so much Indigo.

Well, I'm finally back home. From where you would ask, well from where I left off with my previous journal, that would be MFF. So here's that quick update. MFF this year was indeed stranger than I had anticipated. To say the least, Duncan was more than right when he said that I was way too industrious to stay in the alley. 3 full tables and it still wasn't enough space for everything, not my a long shot. Here's where it gets better.

Just recently my buddy(let's just call him Mr. Irwin for the moment) and I did a bit of an overhaul when it came to what we produce merchandise wise. Well now we've more than doubled the amount that we make. That and I'm now working with produce even more...All that and cup of Joe as they say...well, at least that's what I think they say.

But I was definitely right when I said that the dynamic was different. I miss being in Artist Alley, it's totally not the same. Yes, there are some really awesome people in the Dealer's Den( IndigoAngelCat,  JenKiwi, and  Bar1Scorpio are proof of that), but I miss hanging out all day with my peeps(yeah, you see what I did right there). I was able to take several new people with me this year and none of them had been to a furry convention before, and they loved it.

Sales were decent, and I think it's phenomenal that MFF is moving to the Hyatt O'Hare. But now I'm in a conundrum. With all of the events that are happening that weekend, there's a huge chance that I won't be able to attend this year(first time ever). So yeah, sadness...

It's finally here. I have to say, that overall, no matter now bad or stressful a year can get, MFF is my end of the year con for a reason. It's a funny statement because year after year I attend and join in the artist alley, and every year I end up with significantly less than I arrive with.

This year is going to be rather odd for me to say the least. For once, I'm in the Dealer's Den, which is a first for me at a furry con. Now this changes things for me considerably on multiple points. For one, I can bring a significant amount of stuff with me and I don't have to lug it back and forth. Second, I'm going to be out of place seeing that I usually go to hang out with all of my friends, the majority of who are all in AA.

I've been referred to be in the DD because I've been told that I'm a bit too industrious of an artist to really stay in AA, which is funny because with the exception of this year's AC, I have NEVER actually made real money(and trust me, it was really a shocker).

But it's going to be great to come and hang out with everyone again, and in general, I'm looking for that next wave of badges. ^_^