Creation in the Cauldron

Studied three contracts chapters, and now to a job interview!

I can do this. I can, I really can.

On another note, I was front row to this event, told twice.

Step One

-- Make a post (public, friendslocked, filtered...whatever you're comfortable with) to your LJ. The post should contain your list of 10 holiday wishes. The wishes can be anything at all, from simple and fandom-related ("I'd love a Snape/Hermione icon that's just for me") to medium ("I wish for _____ on DVD") to really big ("All I want for Christmas is a new car/computer/house/TV.") The important thing is, make sure these wishes are things you really, truly want.

-- If you wish for real life things (not fics or icons), make sure you include some sort of contact info in your post, whether it's your address or just your email address where Santa (or one of his elves) could get in touch with you.

-- Also, make sure you post some version of these guidelines in your LJ so that the holiday joy will spread.


Step Two

-- Surf around your friendslist (or friends' friends, or just random journals) to see who has posted their list. And now here's the important part:

-- If you see a wish you can grant, and it's in your heart to do so, make someone's wish come true. Sometimes someone's trash is another's treasure, and if you have a leather jacket you don't want or a gift certificate you won't use--or even know where you could get someone's dream purebred Basset Hound for free--do it.

You needn't spend money on these wishes unless you want to. The point isn't to put people out, it's to provide everyone a chance to be someone else's holiday elf--to spread the joy. Gifts can be made anonymously or not--it's your call.

There are no rules with this project, no guarantees, and no strings attached. Just... wish, and it might come true. Give, and you might receive. And you'll have the joy of knowing you made someone's holiday special.

My Wishlist

1. Reviews for my stories on ff.net, or here. Any feedback on my writing makes me so happy
2. Networking chances with people in the fields I'm interested in, literature, politics and law. Any kind of chances to meet with someone via email, phone or real life and learn about my fields would make me so happy, and perhaps some direction on internships? If you know of internships or mentors or publishing opps, please try and hook me up.
3. Books. Books. You can see my list of books I had planned to read, but I'm a big Peter David, David Eddings, Terry Pratchett, Jim Butcher, Victoria Thompson and any historical fiction in Europe or Asia or the Middle East, I'm a big fan of those areas currently.
4. Old law books (especially E and Es) are especially adored.
5. Fanfic and fanart of my favorite characters, especially if Jewish themes can be employed. A list of my favorites can be provided in another post.
6. Music. I love poppy and dance type music and sending me some always makes me happy.
7. A nice comment or email or letter. Seriously, just a nice message to make my day is often enough.
8. For those I know in real life, (or could), make a date to see me. You don't have to spend money on me, just say hi and we'll talk and catch up. I'm free for four weeks and would love to see you all.
9. Introduce me to a nice guy. I am looking to get married and if you know of a single Jewish guy between the ages of 23-27, who is kind, intelligent and ambitious, think of how much blessings you get for making a match!
10. Vegetarian or dairy cookies (no lard or meat related products) please!

Riordan Talks Up Clues in Bologna :

Bestselling author Rick Riordan was brought to Bologna by Scholastic to introduce The 39 Clues series, a multi-platform middle-grade adventure series, which launches this September. Hyperion also announced a million-copy print run for the fourth Percy Jackson book, The Battle of the Labyrinth, as well as two new series from the author.

I'm so excited, I'm a major Riordan fan.

And the characters of the next series have Jewish names. Cheli will be so happy, she loves seeing characters like her in books. Even if they aren't "Jewish", she'll pretend they are, and that will make her happy.

Love the names. Carter (yeah, every Egyptian story needs one) and Sadie Kane.

So...at least some good news.

Did three chapters of civ pro, pleased with myself. Now to finish some torts work and then relax.

My facebook friend request:

My neighbor's crazy ex wife who broke his heart.

Hey Elle!

What's up? I hope you're doing well! I wanted to see if you wanted to write anything for this next issue. I love your contributions and it would be great if you wrote for this issue as well. Did you like any of the ideas below? What ideas of your own do you have?

Hope to hear from you soon!



I love having my work sought out.

Your Birthday Predicts You're Influential

Ever since you were born, people have found themselves drawn to you. You have a superstar personality. You are charming and fascinating. You believe in hard work and persistence. You know how to make your big dreams a reality. You are demanding, but your standards are reasonable. And you demand the most from yourself.

Notes augmented

We've enhanced and de-bugged Notes. If you haven't tried it yet, now's the time! You can create a private note when you ban multiple users. You can also delete multiple notes at once. Lastly, paid users have the option to add a note (visible only to you) whenever you add or remove a friend (guaranteed to avoid embarrassing social mishaps). If you don't currently have a paid account, you can upgrade now! It only takes a few minutes and costs less than a bad shopping mall haircut (plus, it's way more fashionable)!

Product tweaks and bug kill

1. In another effort to zap spam, comments containing links from domains LiveJournal deems untrustworthy are now automatically screened
2. If you sign up to get notifications of the Writer's Block question of the day, you'll now see the daily question in the email notification, so you'll have a little extra time to ponder before you post. You can subscribe to Writers Block notifications here
3. The issue causing random comments to vanish has been fixed!
4. If you visit a LiveJournal page and get prompted to log in, you'll be returned to the same page after you sign in (Thanks, Dreamwidth)!
5. If you don't edit the timestamp for an entry at all, the entry timestamp will indicate the time the entry was posted instead of the time the Update Journal page was loaded
6. Comments with paddings/backgrounds render correctly within the comment box (and will no longer wrap outside the box and break frames/margins)

New FCK fixes rich text editor!

1. We've updated our RTE (Rich Text Editor) to FCKeditor version 2.6.5
2. When switching from the RTE to HTML editor, links for syndicated feeds are no longer broken
3. RTE now functions properly in Safari 4.0
4. An extra line/space will not be auto-inserted whenever you switch from RTE to HTML editor
5. The insert image link now works correctly in all browsers

LiveJournal Cares

We’re pleased to introduce you to lj_cares, a new LiveJournal community dedicated to raising awareness and funds for U.S. charitable organizations that improve the health and well-being of people around the world. Each month, we’ll spotlight a nonprofit that is making a significant global impact through medical research, public outreach, and/or humanitarian social programs. Charities will be selected in accordance with the U.S. calendar of national health observances based on a high rating (of over 60%) on Charity Navigator and global scope of impact.

In this, our inaugural month of November, we will celebrate national adoption month by offering a charitable virtual gift (priced at $2.99) to support Love Without Boundaries, an organization that saves the lives of orphans with life-threatening diseases and places them in loving homes around the world. LiveJournal will donate 100% of the proceeds from the sale of charitable vgifts (we'll cover the cost of credit card transaction fees). To learn more about Love Without Boundaries, please visit lj_cares and read about how they helped save Baby Kang and the Rainbow Twins from fatal illnesses, who are now thriving in nurturing families. You can purchase your Love Without Boundaries gifts in the Virtual Gift shop.

Papered in postcards

A couple of weeks ago, we asked you to send in postcards to surround us with LiveJournal community. Thanks for coming through! We've received postcards all the way from Germany, Finland, and Canada and from all over the US, including Texas, Florida, Alaska, Montana, Wyoming, Indiana, Hawaii, and Oklahoma just to name just a handful. We're thrilled with our improved decor.

Please keep the love coming for one more week by writing to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be drawing the names of ten random contributors next Thursday to win paid account credits!

Photos of the week

We have more dazzling images posted by talented LiveJournal photographers from around the world. We're hoping to span the entire globe, so please continue posting and tagging. Of course, you can also sit back and enjoy the view at lj_photophile.

You can see a sample of this week's gorgeous photos and check out spotlight communities and awesome user content after the jump!

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Curtains

We thank you, once again, for joining us. See you next week!

Did the Idan Raichel concert today, which rocked. Got to watch him practice and he winked at me. It was amazing to see him play, he is truly gifted, his music is so addictive. I also got to see with India Ari, which rocked. Sigh, my life is hard and annoying at times, but it's never boring.

For those who don't know, this is Idan Raichel.




So, a quick interview from dragonbat2006

1. Which Broadway showtune best describes you, right now?



Feeling a bit overwhelmed in law school.

2. Your autobiography would be titled __________?

Showering in the Dark. It's where I got my best ideas, spent my hardest times and plays a big and weird role in my life.

3. If you could go back in time and visit any one celebrity before they became famous, what scandal/headache/heartache would you warn them to avoid?

Heath Ledger, to get help and not take the drugs. Sniffle.


4. Favorite comfort food?

blueberry pie.

5. What "cute" thing did you do before age 5 that you wish your family would forget about?

I used to scratch on the fridge a lot, when I was hungry. Not funny to me, but the family finds it hilarious.

EDIT@08:16 UTC/GMT. Wow. That was ugly. I expected it to go for 30 minutes and have maybe 1 minute of broken connectivity. Instead it lasted over 4 hours and we had 10 minutes of downtime directly related to the load balancer upgrades and then another 5-10 minutes of downtime when our primary Pingback database server crashed and the secondary couldn't take over; which could have been indirectly caused by the network upgrade missing a self-VIP.

Anyways, we're up, we're working, the load balancers are barely breaking a sweat right now and I need some food and a shot of whiskey. I don't even *like* whiskey!!

Thanks mhwest and dnewhall for helping out!

---

On Saturday the 14th at 4AM UTC/GMT we will be upgrading the operating system of our network load balancers to a newer version, one that will allow us to use both CPUs! Nifty, because multiprocessing is nice.

Since we have 2 load balancers, the plan is to upgrade 1 at a time, and there really should be very little impact to our website. Hopefully you won't notice a thing and I'll get to go back to the hotel and watch some wonderful late night infomercials.

We've got a lot of exciting projects coming up for 2010 and we're hoping that we'll be able to deliver them all to you, that you will find it useful/cool/lovely and then you will use the site even more. Behind-the-scenes work like this will give us the capacity to handle the anticipated traffic, so expect a few more maintenance windows especially in the beginning of next year as we've got some neat ideas to improve performance around here! We had the recent 30-45 minute outage yesterday due to one of our logging databases filling up disk space -- not so great design coupled with my human error in handling the initial problem -- and it looks like we're going to finally have some resources to eliminate stuff like that. I can't wait!

As usual, I will be updating status.livejournal.org before and after, just in case you are not able to reach our main website during the work.

Got to meet a lot of celebrities on my last and final day.

Rahm Emanuel spoke beautifully, even if at times, his applause was less than full. He did get amazing applause when he talked about how much Israel meant to him personally and to the president and how they were committed to an "unbreakable" and "sacred" alliance with Israel and he would be personally spending his vacation there, with Ari and his nephew Noah, to show his commitment.

An incredible and beautiful ceremony was held, where a new Torah was created for the troops, a portable one. I bought a letter (one can finance the Torah by buying a letter) and was quite moved by the honor guard ceremony where nine Jewish soldiers marched in, carrying flags and the Torah to the sound of God Bless America. We all stood reverently, as they marched in, proud and tall. They named the Jewish brothers and sisters who perished in the war and then kissed the Torah scroll reverently. I may have been sobbing.

Then we got to meet Joe Klein and James Kerchick and watched them duke out like a bunch of children. We got to hear them curse each other out and insult each other and it really got horrible at times, but it was amazingly interesting and very incredibly informative. Both gave me their cards and wished me the best.

Then I got to meet Galia Albin, who adored me (yay translating) and asked me to contact her, she could use some writers for her work and would like me to keep in contact. "I'll take care of you" says she after hugging me.

Of course, I must return to law school now, but I had the time of my life.

Missed you all.

So, another glorious day in the life of yours truly.

I awoke to breakfast with Israel ’s Foreign Service Ido Aharoni with  the other members of the scholarship. We also meet a Soviet oil baron who is interested in start up companies in Israel.

Then I went to listen to this speech.

I got to hear Sharansky speak and then hear Netanyahu, two of my personal heroes. It was an incredible moment to see 3000 people rise to greet the Prime Minister. He speaks so incredible, Bibi. I mean, he speaks a perfect English and he can just turn a phrase so incredibly.

One arse tried to protest but was booed out, and we even stole their protest sign. It was sorta hilarious, a guy in pink drag being chased by Secret Service.

So Al-Jazeera interviewed me and asked me what my opinion on what can be done to have Israel withdraw from settlements. "Free Gilad Shalit and you'll have the social capital to do do anything" was my response which was not what I should have said, but I was sorta in a daze from having a camera shoved in my face. Apparently, I was a major hit, even if they couldn't use me. I have the pictures though.

Then we met with the Israeli counsel and discussed job opps for me.

Then i networked like a madwoman and have so many many many presses that are interested in me freelancing and one asked about interviewing to podcast. I am a law student who should buckle down, but next semester, I will balance out a bit. One lady really seemed wonderful in helping and she has a women's magazine who needs me.

Then we had dinner with Natan Sharansky and that rocked.  The man is a hero and I was so honored to hear him.

Then we saw Capital Steps and had an Elliot Yamin concert, where i was front row. The guy has the pipes of an angel. They got these giant balloons

Tomorrow is Rahm Emmanuel and then some more networking to make my journalistic career, and my long ride home to NYC.

I have met so many incredible, amazing, career building people.

And then on Wednesday Idan Raichel concert.

And then my special breakfast next month.

And writing up all these articles and writing to contacts and thanking them.

And finals.

And job interviews.

Life is insane....but good. Kinehore

Just...wow.

Here in DC with all the fancy Jewish leaders, Eric Cantor, Rahm(bo) Emmanual and so many others. The hotel is freaking huge, it's a bit bigger than Central Park and I got an adorable room. I'm a journalist paid to stay in the Marriot and meet heroes? Can my life get any better? I mean, think about it? I got stalked by some nutcase over my Zionism and now it's paying me to be here.

Networking like mad, I have at least four new newspapers who are interested in having me, including one that's the largest Jewish periodical in the country, hint hint. A few big Jewish newspaper gurus here, all willing to mentor me.  

Internet access severely limited so don't expect swift responses.

Met Natan Sharansky. Shook his hand. Sat front row in a press conference with him. Had everyone compliment my question, including him. Got pictures.

Got to see alonglongtime  who I still love (my brother, hehe) and cherish. We done good, kiddo. We done really really good in the last decade.

Not sure how my day could get better.

Miss you all like crazy.

Some crazy times here.

Wake up and breakfast

• Finish Memo
• pack for Washington (find USB cable)

Lunch

• Do three pages of torts
• Clean apartment

Dinner

• Email Rich Gold
• Revise memo
• Study Civ Pro
• if Andi gets it back to me, revise one more time

So, Elle is going to Washington to network like crazy and has two long three hour trips and she'd love some fresh music. So, anything you send me would be much appreciated, since I left my CD collection at home and can't burn new things.

I like fast Japanese pop, dance beats, anything that one can groove to. I also like ballads, medieval style songs and I'm open to new stuff.

Anyone want to make my day?

Summarize 10 of your fandoms in one sentence, then see who on your friends list can guess each fandom.

 

1.       All you need to save the world is four friends and a talking cat-Sailor Moon

2.       Historical accuracy be damned, the slash dragon has spoken-Merlin

3.       Too much time and daddy issues make for a strange hero-Batman

4.       A hero with multiple tattoes, and a villian with magic hair  -Avatar the Last Airbender

5.       He only acts whipped, he’s really a reluctant sociopath-Dexter

6.       A lot of walking for a piece of jewelry-Lord of the Rings

7.       He only acts effeminite, he’s actually badass-Ruorani Kenshin

8.       Things get sticky for him, and not by choice-Spiderman

9.       Kick ass space monks-Star Wars

10.    The greatest superpower is coming back from the dead, repeatedly

I have a few free minutes before a meeting and I decided to cautiously allow myself the time to type up a rant. One of the worst things I find in many stories, especially fanfiction and television is the cheesy moment of Kodak. Life is not a bunch of perfect Kodak moments and showing the harsher side is often what makes it interesting. One of the biggest problems in fanfic is the bonding stories, where a fanfic character, aged has a child and gazes over lovingly, often to a sentimental sugary ballad about love. Or a child is desperately ill and the parents bond over the kid, as the kid angelically clings to life. Here, fanfic diverges, usually the kid lives while in tv, the kid usually dies.

 

Be realistic. If the kid has cancer, show the kid throwing up, show him become angry at the world, have the mother feel the pinch of being stretched too far, let her find the financial drain hard.

 

If it’s a new mother, have her be sleep deprived and lactating and sore and tired.

 

Please, stop with the rose-ification of life. Real life is most beautiful at its nitty gritty.  

And for the love of God, no more songfics (or maudlin ballads on tv) We're not imbeciles, we don't have to have it handed to us.

The empire strikes back

In recent weeks, we've taken huge steps towards blocking spam accounts on LiveJournal. In fact, we've suspended as many as 30,000 accounts in a single day! We've implemented several pre-emptive measures to prevent the creation of spam accounts, and we've honed our detection of suspicious content. Spam bots are a crafty lot, so we'll continue to refine our tactics and keep up the good fight to keep you safe from spam attacks on LiveJournal.

RSS feeds again

If you're addicted to xkcd_rss, icanhaschzbrgr, or other syndicated feeds, we're pleased to report that we've resolved the update error that was mucking up your RSS feeds. While content was being pulled correctly, it wasn't being posted to the feeds themselves. Late last week, we finally nailed down what we hope was the root problem, so content should post properly. We thank you for your patience.

Wii have killer CSI Deadly Intent contests!

c_s_i

If you're a gamer who loves CSI, have Wii got news for you! c_s_i is sponsoring killer contests. Simply post a question to a member of the CSI crew. The winner will get a free copy of CSI: Deadly Intent for Nintendo Wii (with a retail value of $39.99) and get their question answered by a member of the CSI writing team! There's also a fantastic monthly contest. To enter, join c_s_i, play the online version of CSI: Deadly Intent, and respond to a two-part query for a chance to win a Wii! Entries will be judged on composition and originality. Sorry, but you must be a U.S. resident and over 18 years old to participate. Check out the rules here.

Enveloped in postcards

Last week, we asked you to send in postcards to help us decorate our drab concrete walls. Here's a photo of the results so far! Thank you so much and please keep them coming! You can mail them to Frank the Goat, Esq., c/o LiveJournal, Inc., 539 Bryant Street, Suite 210, San Francisco, CA 94107. Be sure to include your username, since we'll be giving ten random users paid account credits.

Photos of the week

If you haven't visited our new LiveJournal photo community, you're in for an amazing visual trip. LiveJournal users from around the world will take you on a scenic journey to everywhere. Post your own pictures or kick back and enjoy at lj_photophile. You can view some of this week's awesome photos after the jump. Please start tagging with geographic location, since we'd like to track all the places around the world represented in this community. Keep on commenting too!
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I'd like to be in Harvard Law School, so I wouldn't be stressed all the time. I'm serious, law school eats away at my sanity. I'm doing decently, but I just have a never ending to do list and LJ is my only outlet from the stress. I am lucky to have you guys. Legal writing is kicking my butt and torts and contracts is killing me too. ( my day )

So now I just need to prep my resume, study some more and pray I survive the next five weeks. I'm hoping to interview for a judicial clerkship and just network, do decently in my class and move on to more fun stuff.

Pick a paragraph (or any passage less than 500 words) from any fanfic I've written, and comment to this post with that selection. I will then give you a DVD commentary on that snippet: what I was thinking when I wrote it, why I wrote it in the first place, what's going on in the character's heads, why I chose certain words, what this moment means in the context of the rest of the fic, lots of awful puns, and anything else that you'd expect to find on a DVD commentary track.

Here we will create the top 50 greatest cartoons. I listed my 25 top choices and I'm hoping you will add to and/or disagree with my choices so I can have something fun to think about as I read boring material.

So, any thoughts on my choices? I can't rank them, because it's like ranking meals, they are too hard to compare. I will seperate them into catagories though in the next entry.

• Best Female Character
• Best Male character
  
• Best Opening
  
• Best overall story
  
• Best voice work
• Best action
• Best artwork
• Best DC
• Best Marvel
• Best villain
  
  

But let's get the contenders first.
So tell me where things should go. And we'll also do the overall voice acting one tomorrow. ( my choices )