Hey sorry!! Sorry for the impromptu hiatus – I’ve been so busy working on Weregeek: Book 2 that I had to let Moosehead Stew drop for few days. But the book’s off to the printer, and we’re back up and running now!!

Oh, road trips… I’ve often joked that to anyone from the prairies, the thought of a 6 hour car journey isn’t at all daunting, since you’ve got to drive that long just to get ANYWHERE in Saskatchwan!! I’ve done the 5 hour drive from Edmonton to Saskatoon in a weekend so often that I know the night-shift workers at my favorite bathroom stop in Lloydminster* by name.

Winter road trips can be a little more daunting, since prairie roads are notoriously pot-holed and bumpy at the best of times, and in the winter that patch of black on the road could be either dry road or glare ice. But that never really stops anyone… (Or, well, sometimes stops people**, but not by choice…)

Anyway. If you’re ever through the prairies, there’s one last thing to note: There’s no “Last chance to get gas” signs, but if you’re driving at night, there probably should be. All those little towns along the way that make great refilling spots during the day close at night, and nothing sucks worse than getting stuck in Bladworth*** with an empty tank!!

* A note: The bathroom in Lloyd that says it’s the “Cleanest Bathroom in Lloyd!” isn’t lying. They even have fresh flowers in there sometimes. And hand lotion.
** Taken this past November, just outside Airdrie, Alberta
*** Say it with me. “Blaaaaaaaad-wuuuuuuurth.” Sorry. Funniest town name, can’t resist making fun of it every time I drive past.

Superman has his kryptonite. I have cats.

Actually, I DON’T have cats, because I would die. But just about everyone I know does, and therein lies the problem. See, when I’m not around cats, I don’t really have asthma. I can run, dance, jump, and do all those other lung-irritating things just fine when there’s no felines around. But as soon as there’s an ounce of cat-dander in the air, I stop being able to breathe.

Ok, ok. It’s not that bad… If I’ve taken some allergy medicine, and if the house is clean, I can stay in a cat-infested area for a day or two with few ill-effects. Shorthairs are also way easier on me than long hairs. Siamese cats are the worst – I can spend a few minutes around them, and then it’s “rush Alina to the hospital happy fun time”.

Which isn’t to say I don’t love cats. I do. They’re lovely animals, and while I am through-and-through a dog person, I do appreciate that they’re wonderful companions, especially if you’re working from home. There’s nothing quite like a purring cat to soothe frayed nerves or curl up in a comfy chair with on a rainy day.

Hedgehogs, for the record, don’t purr, and will probably pee on you if you try to curl up with them in a chair for too long. But they’re still cute.

Ok, guys. This is seriously exciting.

I love birds. And I love dinosaurs. And the more we find out about how many birdlike traits dinosaurs had, the more I love both of them even more. Seriously – floofy dinosaurs. Or the thought that those things eating out of my trashbin and uttering their bloodcurdling cries of ‘CAW CAW!!” at 6 in the morning are actually highly-evolved black-feathered raptors. How is that not awesome??

HERE is the article in question. Bits of it have been re-posted elsewhere, but as is the case with many newspapers, they’ve taken out the interesting science bits. (Like the most important part – how they arrived at their data, and the mention that they’re still searching to see if dinosaurs feathers possibly had iridescence, which would imply that they also had rich color vision!!!) But this is the most complete version I’ve found, and is definitely worth a read. The fact that melanosomes survived being fossilized is just mind-boggling…

But, anyway. I’ll let the rest of you get back to speculating over what features the iPad will have (wings? anti-leak cores? the mind boggles at that name choice… But I digress.). I’ll be over there, geeking out over THIS news and doodling little red-tailed raptors.

Shopping for jeans wouldn’t be such a chore if there were more styles of jeans available. But no. There is only what is ‘trendy’ right now, and usually, whatever’s trendy now looks good on .00025% of the population, and terrible on everyone else. The low-rise trend was that way – it made scrawny girl’s hips jut out like knife blades, and everyone else’s bunch up in a ‘oh-so-flattering’ muffin top.

The skinny leg thing that seems to be trendy right now is just as bad – either you have no butt, and it makes you look even more like you have no butt, or you do, and it makes it look giant in comparison to your teeny, skinny-jeaned ankles. (And don’t get me started on what it looks like if you’ve already got a butt that’d make Sir Mixalot stand up and salute. “Contrast” is putting it too kindly.)

Oh, I know, I know. I got no right to complain – I’m small enough that I can shop at most chain stores. (And by shop, I mean “try on 30+ pairs of jeans, hoping to find one that’s not too objectionable, and if the stars are aligned and the perfect combination of leg-length, waist-to-butt ratio, and lack-of-rhinestones happens to appear, you have the privilege of shelling out $100+ for something that’ll wear out in the knees in 6 months (or god forbid, is already ‘distressed’ – but that’s another rant for another time.) anyway, starting the whole process again. But I digress.) But it seems that EVERY woman I talk to – from teeny size 0′s all the way to the rockin’ plus size ladies – can’t find a pair of pants that fits.

So really. Who are these pants made for again? Seriously, people. Don’t make pants for 0.00025% of the population. That’s just silly.

My love of stinky fish started in early childhood. Every New Year, my grandma would open a can of smoked oysters and put them out beside the fancy cheeses and wide variety of crackers, and you’d pick them up with toothpicks and eat them on a cracker. How on earth she ever got a six year-old to try eating something that looked like some sort of slimy alien organ, I’ll never know, but for whatever reason, I loved them. Couldn’t get enough of them. Ate whole cans by myself, even.

And so now, every time I walk past the canned fish isle, I’m tempted to buy a nice smoked kipper or sardines in brine or even pickled herring. But I always save the canned oysters for New Years…

But good luck getting Layne to give me a New Year’s kiss after I’ve polished off the can.

What is this, Penny Arcade? When did I start doing video game reviews all of a sudden?

Honestly, though. All of the ‘squee’ I’ve been holding back while playing Dragon Age didn’t have an outlet because I couldn’t decide which of the many, many jokes to make. (Trust me, though – a Dragon Age strip IS coming.) But, with Assassin’s Creed, I finally got one easy, straightforward joke.

Assassin’s Creed II is a pretty, pretty game, if not for those who are easily given to vertigo. (Actually, if you’re given to vertigo at all – stay far, far away from this game… I’ve got a pretty good stomach for heights, but watching Ezio climb some of those towers makes me feel a little queasy.) I’m not very far into the plot yet, because – yes, you guessed it – I went around and climbed all the viewpoints and collected all the feathers first, just so I could see all the architectural details. Mmm, architectural details…

If I ever actually go to Italy, someone will have to put a harness on me like they do with kindergarten kids so that I don’t get lost simply staring up at the buildings for hours on end. So. Pretty.