I stalled a little bit on chapter eleven, but I did manage to get chapter 10 finished yesterday (in 34 degree heat, no less!) Hopefully today I can crack the 30k and be on my way towards finishing!

I am flying along here *grins* And while I doubt I'll be able to do my 50 in 8 days feat I did in '06, I am well on the way to pulling this off without a hitch :D

And yes, I know, I said I wouldn't be changing my layout again so soon, but this one is so pretty! I will definitely be sticking with this one for a while :D

Now we're getting somewhere *grins* And yes, I changed the layout again in only a matter of a week or so ^_^; I swear I'll stick with this one for a bit longer!

Eh, hit a slight snag as to how to introduce the next part of the plot, but at least I'm chugging along nicely! Let's hope tomorrow's a better day ^_^;;

Not a bad effort for stalling somewhat over the last two days. But I should pick up tomorrow as I slowly start moving into the main meat of the plot *grins* It's going to be a fun one!




And now bed!

Since the Zouktoku word meter isn't working any more, I'm using this handy little progress meter, which I think is going to be a handy little guide. Not bad for someone who started writing at, like, half past 3 in the afternoon! XD


And here be my dragons as well ^_~

***

Can I pull off the same feat I pulled off in '06? *glances at the meter* I'll get back to you on that after day 3 or so XD; Don't want to count my chickens too early!

Edit: Forgot the "img src" tag @_@ It should be showing up now, right?

http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/user/537831

I've gone and done it ^_^; My username's Pikapi Pikachu on the site. Feel free to add!

Yes, you may deem me a nut now XD;;;;

*throws dragons to stop you all throwing rotten tomatoes at me*


****

The sequel to Broken Boundaries has been officially named, and the outline is now written out and ready for me to get started. So say hello to Shattered Crystal, the sequel to BB, which, as the name implies, will be set in Crystal Tokyo. It's going to be another Yuugiou x Sailor Moon crossover, of course, but I think the senshi will have more of a role, while the Yuugiou cast take more of a backseat. But there is going to be a duel, so that should be fun (and I might need to call on you to help me out for that one, mattbcl!)

Now, to decide if I'm going to make this my NaNo '09 attempt. I have an outline, and I have the drive back, so should I sign up for it? I'm tempted to, believe me!

****

And have some dragons too ♥

As of a few moments ago, Broken Boundaries was wrapped up, at the grand total of 42 chapters *grins* Now I have to plot out the sequel, and decide if I'm going to try NaNoWriMo this year!

*does a happy dance*

Oh yeah, and I finally have to start posting this, don't I? Well, I don't want to overwhelm you guys, so I'll post one chapter (or maybe even two, I'll let you guys decide) a day :D

And have some dragons to celebrate~

****

Broken Boundaries has now passed the 40 chapter mark *grins* I started chapter 41 tonight ♥

Check out this email I just got from the myki people:

myki application status
...
Wed, 14 October, 2009 2:43:45 PM
From:
"mykijobs@skilled.com.au" <mykijobs@skilled.com.au>
...
Add to Contacts
To: kathtara@yahoo.com.au
Dear Katherine ,

Thank you for your application for the position of Customer Service- myki mates. The response to our recruitment programme was outstanding in both the number and calibre of applications.

After careful consideration of the claims of all candidates, I regret to advise that your application for the position has been unsuccessful.





SKILLED Group has a large client base to whom we provide qualified and competent supplementary staff. Although in this instance you have been unsuccessful, we would like to keep your application on file for 3 months. Should another suitable vacancy arise that matches your experiences and skills we will contact you and discuss your application further.



Many thanks for your interest in applying and we wish you every success in the future.

Yours sincerely,





SKILLED Group


You SCUM! *throws something and curses up a storm*

I am pissed OFF!

Broken Boundaries will definitely hit 40 chapters *grins* I finished chapter 37 last night, so I'll see how many chapters I get done today!

*****

Broken Boundaries as of a couple of nights ago, officially surpassed High School Love (my first published fanfic) as the longest fic I've written to date. BB now stands at 36 chapters, and I'm about to start writing the 37th chapter probably tonight, if not definitely tomorrow :D I can definitely see it getting out to at least 40 chapters, if not more.

Methinks I should start posting it on here, am I right? ♥

Have a relatively new batch of dragons to celebrate :D


*****

Btw, you know how you use the handy little "a href" code to change intelligible links into something more readable? How do you do that for LJ names? 'Cause I've seen it used on the flist a few times, and I have to admit, I am curious!

Edit: Sorry, I don't think I quite framed my question right. What I meant to ask was, say I wanted to put someone's real name in place of their LJ name, and still have it link to their journal, how do I go about doing that?

I usually just grab a seat wherever looks good, unless pre-arranged seats have been allocated. Although when I was in high school, I did have a favourite teacher back in Year 7 and 8, so whenever I was in a class of his, I'd always make sure I had a seat up the front *grins sheepishly*

As for focusing, well, I try to concentrate, even when the subject matter isn't particularly interesting. 'Cause you never know when it might come in handy.

So I caved and decided to buy the laptop, figuring that I might as well get in before prices went up. And boy, did my impulse pay off! Not only did I get that sweet bundle I mentioned last time, but the Office 2007 software ended up being on special, owing to it being the weekend. So I ended up paying only $1158 (well, $1162 after purchasing a pack of M&Ms to help breast cancer research) instead of the original $1250, which leaves me in a much better financial position. I did have a teeny bit of a snag when starting it up for the first time, but thanks to some over the phone advice, I got through that, and was able to complete the rest of the set up without any problems ^_^. And let me tell you know, transferring stuff is a pain, especially when you have two different types of files one after the freaking other to deal with @_@ But I got all the important files I needed over here, and the best part is, documents created in Word 2003 open just fine in Word 2007, thanks to a handy dandy little feature called Compatibility mode. So I am very happy indeed. And with a whopping free space of ... *checks it* 255GB off a 320GB harddrive (well, I have 284 to play with in total, which is still something), I'm not going to be running out of room in a hurry! My total files only came to 1.80GB, plus all the other programs I've had to put back on here from the old machine, not to mention other sundry odds and sods here and there which came with the new laptop. So really, I've only used 29GB so far, and no way in hell could I have gotten away with that on the old laptop! It'd be crawling slower than a snail on a slowboat to China in no time!

So, in short, I am very happy :D I just have to get used to using a laptop keyboard again, but that won't take me too long to adjust. The only reason I had to use a USB keyboard with the old machine is because one of the arrow keys failed on the laptop keyboard, thanks to some annoying software I'd installed previously. I've since removed that little bugbear, but the arrow key still refused to work, so the old machine is going to be heading in for a service one of these days. But despite all the quirks, my old Toshiba served me really well. Sure, it started to slow down as it got older, but in reality, there was still a bit of grunt in it. And now I have a machine with phenomenally more grunt than I'd even dared hope for. I had been willing to settle for an older model, but after looking at what this baby has, and seeing how well she performs, it's just as well I got a Ferrari of the laptop world, instead of settling for, say, a Volkswagen (I've got a funny story to tell about a customer I had at AAMI one time with a 1970 Volkswagon Superbug. Must share it one of these days!).

And have I named her yet? Yes I have. So say hello to Usagi the latptop *grins* Yeah, I'm a nut. But I'll bet I'm not the first person on the flist to name various pieces of technology, and I daresay I won't be the last *grins*

Oh, and have my eggies and hatchies up for viewing as well. I ended up with a third female geode, so I'm hoping that the geode egg I have currently will turn out to be male. Hey, at the very least, he'll have a nice harem to get him going when I can get a geode of the male persuasion!

Edit: And it would help if I actually posted the damn codes!

******

Yeah, I know I should be updating more often, but there's been a bit going on of late. But now that I've got some space, I can finally catch you guys up on what's been happening lately ^_^

For starters, Centerlink have, as I said in my last entry, come to the party, and I'm getting regular payments again. I have to send back a Rent Certificate so they'll continue to pay me Rent Assistance on top of my normal payments, but that's just a matter of going to the agent early next week and getting them to verify what I've filled out. Just so long as it's done before the 28th of this month, it should be sweet.

Remember that myki job I applied for a few weeks ago? Well, someone from Mosaic Recruitment, the guys who are in charge of it all, called me last Friday, and we had a phone interview (it was a little bit hard in places, owing to the fact that I was at a noisy station, and the volume for some reason wasn't that crash hot on their end!). But I did pretty well with the phone interview, and was invited to attend an assessment session on Wednesday. The first half was pretty straightforward; they explained what our roles would be, and how myki was going to work. The second half; eh, put it this way, I could've done better. They conducted a series of role plays to see how we'd do in the actual role, and yeah, personally, I think I could've done better with them. Oh, there were two that I did okay on, but the other two ... yeah. Oh well. I find out either today, or the start of next week, so fingers crossed!

The shifts themselves are between 6am and 11am, their reasoning being that it's peak hour between those times, so there's going to be a high volume of people passing through the system, hence plenty of opportunities for us to interact with the public and tell them about myki. We're not going to be actually riding on public transport, but we are going to be based at stations, bus termini, and tram stops. I was wondering how they'd check to see we clocked on and off at the right times, but we were told to "scan on" at the start of our shift (scanning on and off being how the back office would calculate a person's travel, the exact fare to charge them, etc) and then "scan off" at the end of our shift.

And the best part? We're working in pairs, we can choose our own shifts to work, when we select those shifts they're ours to work, and we get a free, unlimited myki card to use when we're off the clock, the onus being we don't give them to anyone else (not that I would, but hey, free myki!). Oh, and we get our own uniform shirts and jackets, but we have to give them back when our contract is up (boo!). We do get to keep the water bottles, though XD.

So yeah, fingers crossed I get this! It's not much in the way of a job, I guess, but it's a start, and the three hour shifts give us flexibility to do other things for the rest of the time. And I can look for another part time job to help boost the money I'd be bringing in also. At the very least, it keeps Centerlink more or less off my back, 'cause it shows them that I'm working. And who knows, it may lead to something more permanent! (And it's in the public transport field, which is an area I've always desired to work in too <3).

On the writing front, Broken Boundaries is coming along very nicely ^_^ I've completed 32 chapters of it so far, and it doesn't look like it's going to end any time soon! I see it getting to at least 35 chapters, if not more. And I even have a sequel in the works. Maybe even a threequel if I get that far *grins* I'm going to start posting it here in the next few days :D And if anyone wants to avoid my fanfiction posting spree, lemme know, and I can filter you out of it. (I may even join Fanfic.net and post it up there as well. Whaddya think?).

And next week, I may, just may, be getting a new laptop! I stopped in at Harvey Norman (or Hardly Normal as Laurence likes to call them!), and discovered that I could save a decent amount of money if I bundled a few things together, combining the new laptop with Office 2007 Student and Teacher addition, Trend Micro Internet Security (the package actually comes with Norton AntiVirus, but the gentleman I dealt with said he could easily swap it out for Trend), a laptop bag, and extended warranty, all for $1250. I'm very tempted, even though I am on benefits now, so my money won't last forever ^_^; I'll talk it over again with Laurence tonight when he calls and see what he thinks. He already seems to think it's a good deal, but I did calculate what it'd leave me with for two weeks, and it's looking a bit shaky. But we'll see. I can survive, just so long as I'm careful, but I'll see what he says first. Loki seems to think I should go ahead with it, but I'm going to just double check, and then decide. It may be that I'll end up waiting until I'm working again before I upgrade my laptop, or it may be that I just might go for it. We'll see!

That's all for now, I think <3

New default icon = win :D I requested it over at rainbowgraphics, cause they were having a free-for-all icon request thingy, and I gots me a kitty icon with my name on it :D I'm going to be doing a bit of icon overhauling later on today too. I might even go the whole hog, say "screw it" and get me a permanent account once they go on sale again. But we'll see :)

And speaking of money, Centerlink have finally come to the party, and I should be getting payments as early as next week. The gentleman who called me yesterday said I'd be notified by mail in the next few days, so I'm watching the mailbox like a hawk. At worst, he suggested I call tomorrow just to check on the status of things, as they'll now be able to tell me when I should be getting my first payment. Plus I'll be getting the singles' rate (yay!) which is a bit more than the couples' rate. PLUS I think I have me some lovely backpay owing as well. That should give my bank account another nice cushion for a little while *beams*

But on a more serious note, I'm going to start seriously looking for work, now that my payments are assured. Not sure of the exact field I'll be going back into, but I may look for a reception/administration type job, with a bit of phone work thrown in. Hey, I handled crabby customers at AAMI for nine months, so I think a reception type job shouldn't be too hard on the old nerves. Or I can go completely left field and look at apprenticeships. I was thinking about them yesterday, actually. But I'll avoid retail jobs like the plague. There's just too much stress involved in such a fast-paced environment like retail. Unless I'm in the back. Then I can handle it. Kinda. Ugh.

On the writing front, I'm getting along at a much better clip, and I have two GWTW (*ignores the inevitable fart jokes*) fics up and going (though they are based more in the Scarlett universe. I've also started a one shot GWTW fic (though it could get to be more than a one shot, knowing me!), which I think will turn out quite nicely. AND I have a Sailor Moon/Yuugiou crossover called Broken Boundaries, which I started for NaNo a couple of years ago. It's at 28 chapters, and I reviewed it last weekend. I might get back into finishing that one of these days. Not sure if I'll attempt to finish it as part of the NaNo attempt this year (will I be attempting NaNo at all? I may. We'll see :D I just have to settle on a suitable idea, and go with it), but it's got to be finished one way or the other!

As for writing, I'm going to go with the decision I made in a post prior to this one, and put my fanfics in along with my regular journal entries. Now, if you'd rather just see my regular entries, I can create a filter for you, and therefore, my fics won't be visible. If, on the other hand, you want to see my latest creative attempts, then I'll be more than happy to show them off :) I'll start posting in the next week or so, so keep your eyes peeled!

And to round this much more upbeat post, have some dragons! I managed to score two geode eggs, plus one of the new eggies, so I'm very happy! Now if I can just get a gold, I'll be dancing indeed!

******

Yes, after an age and a half, I has dragons again! (I'm also going to clean out my scroll a little and neaten it up somewhat ^_^;)

Here they be!

***

Edit: Got a sunrise/sunset (I can't tell!) dragon egg :D *does happy dance* Now I have to calm down till they grow up ^_^;

So I took the final forms needed for my claim back to Centerlink, and now I'm sitting on my heels, waiting for them to approve the claim and decide whether I'll get the singles or couples rate. But at least it's done now, after all the faffing around and running around and general dumbfuckery (but that's always the norm when dealing with Centerlink @_@).

Now to work on some ideas my plot bunnies bit me on the ankles with! The fandom? (you're going to laugh) Gone with the Wind and its sequel, Scarlett. I might do a cynthia_harrell and post my fictions here when I've gotten the first few chapters written up ^_^. As for my evil_pgmistress writing journal, I'll use it for something eventually ^_^; It might become a home for any original stories (and I have plenty!) I end up writing. I've got one in the works which I want to finish, and maybe publish online. But evil_pgmistress will get its day in the sun, one way or another! :D

Well, I figured it's time you guys found out what's been happening for the last three or so weeks.

After almost 9 months of service, I got schunked by AAMI on the 4th of this month. Their reasoning? I'd taken a ton of time off due to sicknesses of one sort or another, and since that proved to them that I was "unable to cope" with the "demands of being in a call center", they had no choice but to schunk me.

I'll be honest, I did see it coming, and I do take the blame. I should've tried to manage my health a lot better (even though in the case of my infected wisdom tooth, which had to come out as it was causing me no end of pain, I couldn't do much about it. Same about my fillings, which left me with a face that looked as if I'd gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson). But to schunk me for that reason alone; I'm left going "Bwuh?" If I'd honestly done something wrong, like be rude to customers, or put in false leads, or something like that, well, I'd understand it. But to schunk me on that sort of excuse? But again, I admit I could've done better. I guess they were just itching to cut some people loose for no reason other than they were lower on the totem pole when it came to future sales promotions, and guess who was one of those cut loose?

So I've had to go back to Centrelink to get my payments re-established, but because I had to tell them about my divorce (which, as you know, is now finalised), both Loki and I had to fill out forms detailing the exact nature of our relationship (though I had to fill Loki's out for him, with him being blind and all @_@). I have to take those forms back to Centrelink tomorrow, and then a decision will be made as to whether I'll be paid the couples' or singles' rate for Newstart Allowance. The good news is that I'll be getting a payment either way (and a decent back pay as well!) Let's just hope I'm not on the merry go round for too long!

And to get the ball rolling for new work, I've applied for a job as a 'myki mate' (for non-Melbournians, myki is a smartcard ticketing system which, in time, will eliminate the need for paper tickets altogether). They want 600 people for this, and there's hints it could become full time. So here's hoping that I'll be one of those lucky 600, even though they don't start training till November. I'm going to have to look around and see if I can't score something in the meantime, 'cause if 3 months go past without me finding something, I get to have my "hand held" again by my Job Network (or whatever they're calling themselves now, I forget!) provider. I've gone with Job Prospects this time, which is in the exact same address as Interact, with at least one familiar face I could've done without! That's right, my old case manager Michelle is there (even though I'm being seen by someone else at the present time). Ugh. As soon as I saw the address, I should've gone back to Centrelink and asked to go to another provider @_@ Oh well. If I can get a job somewhere soon, I won't have to worry about being entered into another stupid activity agreement @_@ Anyone (in the Melbourne area, I should say) who can offer me a job somewhere? Or tell me of a prospect for a job somewhere? I'll do anything to get some ready cash!

Speaking of, I've signed up for this "Your Journal, Your Money" thing. I've also converted some of my most recent photos on DeviantArt to try and earn a bit of extra cash for myself on the side. My tax came in, with a nice tidy check of over $1700, but that's not going to last me forever! I won't ask anyone to buy the prints I'm going to be adding to my dA gallery, but every little bit helps, and I've got something to keep me going till I can get a job and earn some decent money again!

So that's the rundown @_@ Sorry it's taken me this long to sit down and put a proper entry together, but I've been that bumrushed, running around from place to place. Maybe I can begin updating with semi-regularity now that things are on the way to slowly being sorted out. Ugh. Life sucks sometimes.

Oh, and here are some of my recent submissions. Our beloved furballs are providing some nice camera fodder, and they make lovely models ♥ At least not when they move suddenly, and make the picture come out all blurred!


Ra the sun god III by *yugisgirl on deviantART


Nefret the queen III by *yugisgirl on deviantART


Onyx the panther III by *yugisgirl on deviantART

Sorry for that last one looking a little grainy ^_^;

Expect more pic!spam from me in future, simply 'cause our cats are too lovely not to share! And I'll make sure to keep you guys posted about my ongoing woes with Centrelink as well @_@ And sundry other occurrences as well. Ugh. I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Life. Sucks.