It's not a cry you can hear at night, it's not somebody who's seen the light...

I just cleaned...so much. It turns out my vampire fang box fell off my bookshelf and I probably vaccumed up one of the fangs. Darnit. But you know...they were expensive things but not entirely practical. So I will live.

Now I am so tired and zoning out to As It Fades by VNV Nation which is like what floating through the Aurora Borealis must sound like.

( Have some photos of today, including my awesome room and Leah's creepy costume )

It seems the worst of the snowpocalypse might be over, which is good. I don't know when things will open again, but it will be nice not to feel stuck at home. Not that I go anywhere these days, but I like it to be an option. It does mean Alison will fly away from us tomorrow, waahhhh. Let's not focus on that, or the fact that a virus deleted the essay I had mostly finished so I had to write 2,100 words for it last night. I kicked it's arse though. Thanks to my own personal cheerleader. His name is Simon!

So here is a pictorial account of the last few days. It is awesome and features mostly cats, my bathrobe, Jen in an awesome costume, a lot of me (some upsidedown) and a photo that looks like I am choking Ariadne. I was not.

( Listen close to everybody's heart )

Laura came over and made me fajitas. OMG. So.Good.

It's that time again. Cat pictures time.

( Why do the Vikings in How to Train Your Dragon all have Scottish accents? )

Bought a cat tree house (the tunnels are not that big at all and I don't think Ariadne could even remotely fit in them but the rest is awesome) and they love it! Well the kittens were immediately convinced. They climbed up there before I was even done building it. I had to place Ariadne in one of the little cat hammocks and manually curl her up and then hold her there while I pet her for several minutes before she calmed down, but she hasn't moved since and she looks quite happy with her new sitting place. She's going to sleep in fact. See, baby? Sometimes when I bother you, I actually have your best interest at heart instead of just wanted to kiss your wee face because it is so cuteomg.

Also, check out the spam email I got (this is a print screen I took. It's safe to click!) It makes me laugh quite hard. I don't live in the US, guys. I didn't file a tax return. And much better on disguising your address there and even including a header, but still not falling for it. You sort of uhm...used some wrong words there. But you are getting craftier. Bravo.

The last few nights have been rough. I can't sleep again. Increased adrenaline makes for increased anxiety which makes for me staying up until 6 am and sleeping badly when I finally do fall asleep. I have a little dry mouth again and that's annoying. Huurrr. The social anxiety is still okay, I think! And I have finally gotten my head back into writing, YAY! Thank goodness for that. I missed it while it was gone!

Also thank goodness for our new cheese toastie machine. I will never eat anything else. And all the tea. I drink it. All.

I've been sleeping better, and when I woke up with a funny feeling throat thanks to the cold I am developing, I didn't panic. Which is awesomely amazing. First time.

Yesterday I had class which went really well, except that I was 40 minutes late. Why? I walked to the vet to get a flea treatment for the new kitten, Echo. But when I had printed out my assignment, I had taken my wallet out of my bag to get my student ID to write it on the cover sheet. I did this at home, so at least I didn't leave my wallet somewhere public, but it wasn't in my bag at the vet's. :|. I had been planning on taking the bus from there to uni to turn in my medical withdrawal form and turn in my assignment with plenty of time to get to class. Except then I had to walk home. And then the bus was late. And then it stopped to let about 500 kids on, which is fine as that is what a bus is for, but they were stupid kids and took forever to wrestle before boarding the bus and then struggling to find their own wallets. And then the student services office had moved. And then I got lost trying to find it. And then I had to cross campus to turn in my assignment. And then the bus to the Dovedale campus took forever too. So yes. Late. But I didn't panic then either. Hurrah.

Today I have a meeting with Anxiety Support Canterbury. I am going to discuss counselling and group with work them. And I am not anxious about the meeting at all. I can't even describe how that feels.

So instead I am about to post 25 photos of kittens. Yesterday the sun was streaming in and since my flash is as bright as a thousand suns and washes everything out, I decided to take photos of the cats with natural light so people could see what they really looked like. And then the photos looked amazing. So I took like...150. Shut up, these are freaking gorgeous. The cats and the pictures ;)

( You should be glad there are only 25... )

That little kitten bastard just clawed me under my toenail. And I would yell at him but oh goddddd he is so cute!

( LOOK, KITTIES )

MMmm Scream 3 and tacos! I woke up early this morning to take Woot to the airport and so apparently this afternoon I decided I needed a four hour nap. I didn't even mean to fall asleep! Darnit!

Ariadne never goes after your food. It was so nice having a kitten who didn't crawl into your lap when you were eating. Helios is a different story, the little scrapper... But he's too cute to mind.

( See?! )

Yesterday?

( This happened )

Today?

( This happened )

A view of Christchurch from the hills the minute after the quake. I was in the middle of this and so were so many others.

That dust cloud is from collapsing buildings and it is just...so- Indescribable.

On the side of lovely things though, I called my workmates from ACU in Melbourne because they left panicked messages on my Facebook yesterday. It was so nice to talk to them. They put me on speaker phone and they all yelled "HI WE LOVE YOU HOW ARE YOU WE MISS YOU" and various word-clouds of loveliness. Then Lisa spoke to me for a good half an hour before they all got back on to say goodbye. They are so lovely, and I miss them!

Tonight I made a sort of spaghetti sauce out of tinned tomatoes and herbs and spices. It was a little weird, but good! And we ate more of Alison's Amanda-food. And we got water from a tattooed man at a primary school. But he wasn't creepy, he was lovely!

EDIT: A post on Leah's journal of our own photos here In the photo of our rainwater collection, my kitty is staring out the window at Alison taking the photo. She is ADORABLE. /biased.