raloria

Yes, I'm still alive. Can't blame you for wondering, since I've been dead silent since the beginning of the year and here we are starting on April. Have I given up hope of posting on here weekly? Hell, no. I've realized I just need to get back into the habit.

For years logging into LJ was a daily occurrence. Now, I have to purposely remind myself that this place even exists. Sad, but I'm sure it's been the same for some of you. But the hope is to at least post once a week.

I just did a Friends cut, which I planned on doing nearly a year ago. Well, this time I decided not to just talk about it, but rip that band-aid right off! So it's done. I kept a lot of people that I probably should've cut, but we're friends elsewhere or nostalgia kept me from hitting that "unfriend" button.

In all I cut 16 Friends and there were 7 purged accounts I cut myself from. *sigh*

Mom & I have been watching several old TV series lately. We've recently completed: Gilmore Girls, WKRP In Cincinnati, and Are You Being Served? (which got old to me awfully fast and then the original cast got broke up - *sigh*).

Funny how they said FreeVee TV was going to disappear last year and yet it's still going. Was surprised to see Dharma & Greg playing on it the other day, but sadly it's only as a "live TV" option. Still, it was fun to watch some episodes again, especially since Pluto TV's app has been breaking up so much lately. Bleh. Plus they seem to be showing the same episodes over and over again.

I never bring up politics here, but...OMG Senator Cory Booker is a hero! I watched the last 3 hours of his record-breaking speech yesterday. Finally! A Democrat taking some action! I hope this spurs others on because we need some hope!

The SPNFamily fell into shock on Friday with the posting of this video on Social Media from Jensen, Jared, & Misha, saying that Season 15 will be the end of the line for SPN.



I've gone through a gamut of emotions, as I'm sure we all have. It's a huge loss. One we all knew would happen one day, but perhaps not quite this soon. It's kind of funny to say the word "soon" in relation to a show that will have a 15 year run. I got to thinking who I was when SPN began and you know what? I can't even remember. This show has forever changed who I am. So what will I be now with it gone? That has been one of the many thoughts going through my head since Friday afternoon.

I've lost sleep, I've shed a few tears, I've feared what this will mean for me and my various homes online, including this journal. But now at the end of this long weekend, I've reached a state of acceptance with it all. After all, we still have the last few episodes of this season and a full 20 episodes for Season 15. A whole year before we really have to say goodbye to the show.

It's a testament to how messed up I've been all weekend that it's taken me this many days to even be able to make a post about this. And I've seen so many of the rest of you make posts already and I haven't even been able to read them. I just couldn't. I promise to go back and read and leave comments, now that I'm more emotionally stable. Goodness knows we all need to support one another now more than ever.

Admittedly, hearing the announcement was similar to learning the world was ending. Our, SPN world, is ending, so I guess it makes sense. Here I thought, "Oh, I'll be prepared for this day." Nope. No way. Not even close! My world turned upside down.

Do I keep capping? Yes. I'll finally catch-up...hopefully!
What about my LJ? Like I'm going anywhere? I think you're all stuck with me.
But the filming locations will come to an end, too. What about those? Again, a chance to catch up at last!

I've asked myself so many questions this weekend. Some I have answers to and others I'm still searching for. But I still have a year to figure it all out. That's something I've had to keep reminding myself of. It's sometimes easy to forget with all the emotions rolling around in my brain.

So what does it all come down to?
SPN has had an incredible run. We are so lucky to have 15 years of this amazing show! I remember back in the early years when we wondered every summer if the show would be coming back. And then it became this invincible thing where the network president loved it and guaranteed it would go as long as the Boys wanted it to. And well, here we are. It says a lot that we learned from the guys themselves and based on what I've read, we learned of their decision right after they told the crew the news. If there was ever any doubt to how they feel about the fans, well, there it is. They broke the news to us themselves. It wasn't some Tweet from a news outlet. Jensen & Jared have said over & over that we're a family, so they had to share the news with all of us. No doubt this is equally a rough time for all of them. So many lives affected - that whole cast & crew. I'm sure it was a difficult decision to make. But I respect that the guys want to spend more time with their families. They spend 9 months out of the year making SPN. That's a lot of missed time with little kids who are growing up so fast. They deserve this break at long last.

The conventions will continue. Less of them, but they'll go on. The SPNFamily will definitely go on and our many creative works will continue to be made in the years to come. The Winchesters will never truly die. Not now, not ever. We will keep them alive. Fanfic will be written, fanart will be made.

I'm not going to talk about all this show has given me right now: the inspiration, the friendships, the strength it's given me to keep going. For this isn't our goodbye. Not yet.
We can see the end of the tunnel, but there's still a few miles to go! Let's embrace these final 24 episodes and use this year to celebrate everything SPN is for each of us! ♥

John from 14x13 "Lebanon":
"All right. Near as I can tell, we have two choices.
We can think about what's coming.
Or we can be grateful for this time that we have together.
Now, me? I choose grateful.
So, to whatever brought us together, we owe you one. Amen."

I just made this animated gif because I need it in my life. ;)



I'll be making a formal posting of this gif (and in other sizes) next week. Stay tuned!

♦ Who knew you couldn't use Spotify in the Safari web browser??? WTH??? *fumes* I looked into why, but then my eyes glazed over because apparently there isn't any solution. Grrr! Well, that's annoying! Especially since I'm trying to use my Safari browser more now, because for some reason when I watch online videos too long in any other browser, my CPU heats up. WTH is with that??? *sigh*

♦ I uploaded the above animation to one of my old Photobucket accounts. Yes, still trying to decide what to do about them - which account to sign up for with payments again, now that they've got more reasonable plans. I wouldn't have even uploaded it to PB, but I can't get into my account at PhotoLand.io!!!! That's where I've been uploading and posting my gifs from. All of a sudden there's no way to sign in with Twitter, which is what I used. Gah!!!! I've contacted them about it, but who knows if I'll ever get a response. Well, speak of the devil....just got this email from them:

Hello,

We are having issues with the twitter API and are working on fixing it. Will update you once it's working again.

Thank you
Photoland Team

Well, I'll give them points for getting back to me so quickly. Sad that I can't get into my account there though. Serves me right for going the shortcut way into signing into a site. *sigh* So I guess I'll be using my PB accounts again for now...

Ok. Wow! The PhotoLand Support Team literally just got back to me, saying the problem is fixed. Sure enough, I was able to log in w/Twitter and upload the gifs. Yay! Very impressive support at PhotoLand!

♦ For my artsy & craftsy friends, I got quite the deal this past week at Hobby Lobby. A Marvy waterbrush marked down to $1.24, a set of Faber Castell 24 Watercolor Pencils marked down to $3.74 (from $14.99), and a set of 25 Stabilo colored pens marked down to $7.49 (from $29.99!). I've always been curious about the Stabilo pens because I've heard such good things about them (they are good!) but the price always turned me off. No more! These aren't the first great deals I've found at HL. A month or so ago I finally got a Gouache set of paints that was marked way down. I do love saving money on supplies!

♦ I found a great site for free book PDFs! Check out Ocean Of PDF! I've already got a few of them loaded on my phone for reading there. Such a great selection.

♦ Since SPN is finished for the summer, it's time to start in on updating the Locations List (LL) with Season 13 for spn_locations. Problem is...looking up addresses on Google Maps really eats up my internet data. *heavy sigh* I could really use some help from volunteers, but I've failed to use people in the past so I'm pretty sure it's a waste of time. People don't want to risk it. Of course, this time I KNOW what I would have volunteers help me with! :(

♦ Late add-in Edit!!!! OMG Does anyone else play Candy Crush on their phone??? I've been stuck on a level before, but nothing like with Level 149! OMG!!!! I CANNOT GET THROUGH IT!!!!! I've lost track of how many times I've played that level. And I've had tons of help from the game, but alas....still stuck. Gah!

Since when did Claire Novak become the most hated character on SPN?

( Behind a cut for spoilers about last night's episode... )

I went into Season 12 of SPN all ready to keep up with capping and get each episode's Highlight Caps posted on a weekly basis, along with the S12 Episode Title Caps.

Sadly, things haven't gone according to plan.
There's a reason for it all, of course, that is specific, but let's just say I've run into technical difficulties.

There's been problems due to my internet data running out last week and also with making the caps themselves.
To state it all briefly: I've fallen behind.

I only got the 12x01 caps posted, and the 12x02 ones are done, but...I'm thinking about re-doing them. >.<
I have a good reason...the original ones just aren't up to par IMO.
However, I just capped 12x03 and they look AMAZING! Had to work with some of my program settings, but I think I've finally got them all set.

So I just wanted to apologize for falling so far behind. Luckily, we're coming up on the winter break soon, and I'm hoping I can catch up then.

On a side note: Is it just me, or am I the only one capping Season 12??? Because last season I remember seeing posts of caps on a weekly basis from other people and so far this season? Nothing. Maybe I'm not following the right LJ comms? Anyone else seen any other Season 12 episode caps? Just curious.

It's almost embarrassing to tell you how many JibCon videos I downloaded overnight. Ate up some of my internet data, too. Ooops! :P

I just can't stay away from the videos of this con! There's something special about JibCon, even for those of us who've never been there in person. Maybe it's how relaxed the guests are, or the gift of having the boys there for 2 whole days instead of one like we get at Creation cons. Having double Jensen panels, and double Jared ones, plus each of them paired with Misha for a panel? Pure Gold!

Anyway, if you thought I was going to stop at the Jailbreak videos. No way!

I've been trying to find the best of the full panel videos, which isn't so easy a task. Plus, it seems the Saturday panels are very rare, but I did find a few. Some of the videos are good quality and offer nice, zoomed-in shots of the boys. I was thinking once I viewed all the contenders that I'd whittle it down to one video per panel. NO! I can't because they're taken from different angles. So I've decided a few will be done in B&W....just offer a different look.

Btw, the only panels I'm capping are the ones with Jensen & Jared...which still means quite a few over the course of 2 days. So you will get a little Misha in there, but no solo panels of him. Sorry. Gotta draw the line somewhere 'cause get this...

I've got 20 JibCon videos to cap. Hee!
Note that I've already capped 6 besides that which I'm prepping for posting.

Ah, free public Wi-Fi....how I love thee! *g*

I'm especially gonna need it over the next couple of weeks as I've been a bad girl and used more of my own internet data than I should have. *hangs head in shame* I'm down to only 8 GB! Eeep! Not good. So my time online is going to be extremely limited for the next week or so.

But! I have a plan! \0/
Luckily, I don't need to be online that long to do my daily posts....if I behave myself and use some self-control (youtube, stay away from me!). If I do more capping, fix the caps using software on the laptop instead of online...it should mean I can consolidate my online time much more effectively. *hopes*

Anyway, right now I'm going to try and catch up with more of my LJ replies. Prepare for your Inboxes to fill up! *g*

Have some random pretty from VanCon 2011...

Got caught up on a few shows.
Put my thoughts behind cuts in case of spoilers for anyone who hasn't watched them yet.

Chicago Fire:

Whoah! First that bombing episode(s) then this.

So happy for the Chief getting married. That was a sweet little ceremony with all of the firehouse there.

I miss Clarke, dammit. :(

But OMG that ending! All of 51 was in that building except the Chief! I knew something bad was going to happen and at first I thought the floors would collapse (hard to show that from the outside though). The explosion actually kinda surprised me. Who will survive? o.O

Castle:

Gah! We were cheated out of the fairytale wedding!!!!!!! I want my wedding, dammit! I love how most of the things that went wrong actually turned out better in the end: the venue change, Kate's dress.
There's no way Castle was in that car. Whoever was in that black vehicle grabbed him then crashed and burned the car. Question is, of course, who?

I keep wondering when she's gonna stop calling him Castle and switch to Rick or Richard instead. :P

Arrow:

They totally had me going with the "I love you" scene between Oliver and Felicity. OMG I thought...finally!
Then it turned out to be a trick to get Slade. Damn! It was ingenious though. Good on Felicity for coming up with the answer. I'm so glad she got to be the one to carry it out. Nobody would have suspected her.

Then we get the scene at the end on the beach...both saying they played their parts well. Yeah, but Felicity totally believed what Ollie said. It's been obvious since S1 that she's got a crush on him and this season it's been looking like he could feel the same way. I think maybe Ollie does, but he doesn't realize it yet.

Can you tell I totally ship these two? *g*

I need some Arrow icons. :P

aka My brain won't shut off when I need it to. :P

:: Got lots of new friends from that friending meme. *waves* So now I've got a question: Do you want an intro post from me? Seems like a lot of people are doing them. Yes? No? Maybe?

:: Got a fanfic stuck in my head that I'm tempted to type up and post. It's very short, but intense (I think). Fits right into Season 9, at least what we've seen so far. I'm not that much of a writer, but is anyone interested?

:: So sick of my LJ userpics I could scream. Seriously thinking of pulling a milly_gal (yes, you're a verb now LOL) and completely overhaul the lot of them. I mean, Milly's been making so many awesome icons. You should see the folder I've got of them on my laptop (over 300 strong). Plus, there's some of mine I'd still like to use. Of course there's always those few you simply can't NOT use. Decisions, decisions...

:: I need to get back to capping episodes. Life is so chaotic and exhausting though, it's tough to figure out how to work it into my non-existent schedule. I'm toying with the idea of asking you all which episode you want capped the most and doing them that way.