Defriending Amnesty and RL Catch Up.

[paraka]

So, I'm not actually dead, I just haven't been online very much. I keep meaning to make posts, but then I think I should get caught up on my flist first, and wow, that's just going to take forever. It seems like whenever I finally get caught up on my flist I'm only able to stay caught up for a day or so then I get behind again. I hate to say this, but I might have to do a flist cut :( So, before I do that, I want to declare today defriending amnesty day on paraka's journal. If you feel we've drifted apart, or you're kind of busy too, or if we just never clicked, feel free to defriend me today, and no hard feelings.

In other RL news...
-OMG work has been insane. I hate tenders, and I keep getting really big ones. I'm hoping things will settle down now that we're hitting March 31st Year End, but I have a sneaking suspicion that April will be just as bad, since everyone will now have new budgets to play with.
-I've actually been having a social life late. It's still a fandom social life, but I think that just makes it 10X better than a normal social life. diurnal_lee has introduced me to the wonderful idea of write-ins (well, we've kind of changed the name to play dates since I'm not actually a writer). Where we get together in a group and work on fandom stuff. If we continue on this trend, I may actually have a vid done in the next few months. As well as a podfic. We've also been getting together, along with some of the other ottawa_slashers just to hang out. kronos999 had me watching Twin Peaks yesterday afternoon.
-God, last week, kronos999 talked me into going to see the midnight showing of Watchmen, even though I worked the next day. And because I live out in the country, I don't actually like going home if I know I'm going to have to go back into the city that night, so I ended up just killing time between work and meeting up with her for a late dinner and then the movie. While killing time, I decided to pick up a birthday present for a friend and managed to walk out of Best Buy with $200 worth of DVDs. *headdesk* I'm able to justify splurges like that when I'm buying from Amazon or something, then it's all in the name of shipping costs, but there's really no excuse when it's a store. Still. I got, S1 and 2 of Dexter, Terminator the Sarah Connor Chronicles S1, Passchendaele, and S2 of Heroes.
-Speaking of Heroes, I finally started watching it. I spent many a sleepless night watching S1. S2 hasn't been as gripping, but I'm still really loving it. Such a slashy show. I'm pretty sure future!Hiro practically declared his undying love for Ando in S1. So cute! And the Petrelli Brothers? Something more is *so* going on there.
-Speaking of Passchendaele, I know there are a lot of Due South lovers on my flist (even though the love seems to be skewed more towards CKR than Paul Gross), would anyone like me to upload it for them?
-Whee! Only 11 days until I leave for Europe! Psst. scatterheart are you still interested in meeting up at some point while I'm there? Because I would totally love to meet you :D
-I'm going to be there for 10 days, because I have no concept, how much money do people think I should bring with me? I'm going to have my credit cards with me, but I should have cash too. I'm just not sure what to expect.
-Oh, and once I get back from Europe, I'm going to be getting a mortgage broker and real estate agent, and start really looking for a house! So exciting!!!

Comments

[madeira.livejournal.com]

I call dibs on one of the rooms!

:P

[paraka]

One of them is totally yours, I'm banking on that now ;)

[anoel.livejournal.com]

That sounds like a cool concept (write-ins)! And good to know it's getting vid results. At least the DVDs you got are awesome though ;) And yeah, Heroes is reeeeally slashy on all fronts and that only increases especially in this latest season.

Yay house!

[paraka]

Yeah it is kind of neat, and as a vidder/podfic'er it's a bit easier to stay focused since I have earphones on :P

Also, just hanging out with vidders really helps get the vid bunnies flowing. kronos999 and I have two co-vidding projects planned, one which is a SGA/SPN Xover vid, and one which is just pure crack, but shall be awesome when it is done :P

And yeah, Heroes is super slashy. It was so cute how Mohinder and Matt were practically married in the beginning of S2. And how Nathan and Peter are each other's world, and Hiro going all bad ass because he lost Ando. Although, I will aslo add, what with everyone being connected in *some* way, it also comes off as the most incestious show I've ever watched.

[kaaatie.livejournal.com]

I'd love to hear what you think of Passchendaele. It's pretty high on my list of things to watch. (I do talk about CKR a lot more, but Paul is love too!)

*replies a million years later*

[paraka]

So you haven't seen Passchendaele yet?
I thought it was a really interesting movie. Since it's a love story and half of it takes place in Calgary it's not as bloody as most war movies, but *god* the parts of war they did show...
I left the movie feeling really grateful for what I have and that it's been a long time since there's been a war on Canadian soil. The movie did an amazing job of showing the complete devastation of war. The last scene (or one of the last scenes) they pan out of the battle field and it totally broke my hear, because it's just this giant mud field covered in water-filled craters with a few scragles of dead trees.
Even the people scenes showed the devastation. Paul's character is back in Canada because he's suffering from PTSD (or shell shock as they called it then) so he's broken. The woman that he falls in love with has a drug addition. And the scenes in Calgary have a lot of the darker side of human nature showing through (othering, greed and pettiness and the willingness to watch someone die to fulfill those things).
It's definitely not a happy movie. But it's a powerful one. Even though it made me cry, I'd still recommend it.

Someone else asked me to upload it, so I think I'll try and do that this weekend if you'd like to grab it too.

[scatterheart.livejournal.com]

I've had this post open in a tab for days and kept forgetting to reply. FAIL.

Anyway, of course I'm still interested! :D I have to work during the day, obviously, but we could meet up in the evening.

As for how much money you'll need for ten days in Europe... it kind of depends? I guess in order to get around you'd need to plan around 10 Euro per day for public transport (at least in Berlin, I'm not sure about Munich and Copenhagen, but assume it would be about the same.) Then there's food - most restaurants will take credit cards, but fast food places and smaller supermarkets might not. I could tell you the average prices if you tell me some things you think you would want/need to get? If you plan on going out, admission to clubs is usually 5-7 Euro, and drinks in clubs and bars are somewhere around 1,50 - 2 Euro for a glass of water (slightly more for juices and soft drinks), 2,50-3 Euro for beer and slightly more for wine, and between 5 and 10 Euro for cocktails and longdrinks - that's all Berlin prices, though, it's definitely somewhat higher in Munich, and I don't know about Copenhagen. Coffee in coffe shops starts around 2,80 Euro. Touristy places like museums differ a lot - some are free, or free on certain days, but usually you'd pay somewhere between 5 and 10 Euro in entrance fees. They might take credit card, though, I'm not sure.

Personally, for a 10-day-trip where the basic getting-around (i.e. train tickets) and accomodation is already taken care of, I probably wouldn't take more than 200 Euros, 300 max, but it depends on how much you plan to eat out and the touristy things you want to do, and how much you plan to spend on souvenirs and the like.

[paraka]

I've had this post open in a tab for days and kept forgetting to reply. FAIL
Ha, I know I'm bad like that too.

Anyway, of course I'm still interested!
Yay! I'm arriving by train in Berlin on March 30th, and leaving April 2 (but I think those days will mostly be spent on the train).
I don't think we have concrete plans for what we're doing on which days, so whichever day would be best for you to meet up :)

I probably wouldn't take more than 200 Euros, 300 max, but it depends on how much you plan to eat out and the touristy things you want to do, and how much you plan to spend on souvenirs and the like.
I ended up getting 300 Euros (I figured it I get too much I can just exchange it back when I get home, I have some Yuen that I should probably change back too...). I have a question though, when I went to get the money exchanged today, they only had 100 and 10 bills. In Canada no one really uses bills higher than $20. In fact, most stores won't accept bills higher than $20. Are there any problems like that in Europe? Should I be worried about breaking the 100 that I got?

OMG, 5 more days! I'm so excited! *squee*

[scatterheart.livejournal.com]

I'm arriving by train in Berlin on March 30th, and leaving April 2
How about April 1, then? Mondays and Tuesdays are always stuffed with meetings at Lambda. We could meet up after I get off work and have a drink somewhere? Unless you need to get up very early on the 2nd, of course.

As for the 100 Euro bills, that shouldn't be a problem. Some small stores can't or won't take high bills, but in general 100 Euros are considered perfectly acceptable.

[paraka]

The 1st sounds fine. I don't think there'll be anything stopping me but I'll let you know if there is (I'll double check with the friend I'm going with when I meet up with her, because she's already over there). Where/when would you like to meet? (If you'd rather email me, my LJ email is the one I use).