Okay, this might be sorta redundant to post *here*, but...

Announcing: the Vixy & Tony Mailing List. :)

This came about partly because I've actually had a *lot* of people email me over the last couple years asking me to please *please* PLEASE let them know when "Mal's Song" was being recorded on a CD. (Seriously, I saved 'em all in their own folder. There were a lot.) I thought maybe one big bcc mass-mailing wasn't necessarily the way to do that. This also came about partly because I keep forgetting to tell people about our upcoming gigs, in the various different ways by which I tell things to various different peoples.

Hence, thanks to the magic of the internets and kendaer, a Vixy & Tony mailing list! The news will be mostly be notification of upcoming gigs. Also news on any recording projects (probably including stuff we do backup on for other people, when that stuff becomes available for purchase). Also news on my artwork on Etsy (though these will be less frequent; I'm not going to send mail every time I upload a new piece.)

To subscribe, send an email to announce-request@lists.vixyandtony.com with the single word "subscribe" (no quotation marks) in the subject line.

(If you subscribe and change your mind, do the same, but with "unsubscribe".)

Have you seen this book?


Don't you wanna be a pirate? Yarr!

I forgot to crow about my new shiny thing! :)

I read the illustrators community, and not too long ago came across a post advertising Razorberries' awesome Etsy store.

What caught my eye, of course, was this shiny little mirror.

Was that not just made for me? :) :) :) (Okay, strictly speaking you can make out *more* than thirteen corvids on there. But still!)

Naturally I ordered it. Not only did it show up really quickly and safely intact, it also came with its own li'l velvet pouch and a little free button too. :)

Shiny things!


Vixy & Tony's Schedule

Vixy & Tony's Thirteen is officially available on CD Baby!

*happydance*

It's also coming to a filk dealer near you!

I... can't think what else to say. :D

Oh, I know what else to say. Heh. Tony remarked that they seemed perplexed that we had sent them a box of 100 CDs. Why didn't we just send 5 to start with, as their site recommends? Um, because you'd be out in like five minutes, people. :D

Vixy & Tony's Schedule

I think it's time for a bookpost! It's actually been a little over two months. Oops.

( What I've read since Valentine's Day: )

Vixy & Tony's schedule

A bunch of only marginally related things:

( Gig! )

( Walking! )

( Makeup! (That's not as exciting.) )

( Weather! )

Vixy & Tony's Schedule

Also, I've realized that I really really REALLY want to get myself a working camera of my very own. This "poking Tony to take a picture or lend me his" thing isn't cutting it for me. Also, the "get Fishy's old camera after he got a new one" plan has failed, as Fishy's old camera is definitely on its last legs.

Aside: what does one *do* with an effectively unusable digital camera? I feel really weird just putting a major piece of technology in the trash. But I also don't really feel comfortable putting an ad on Craigslist or even Freecycle that says "Digital Camera. Battery will only hold a charge of about 1 hour. Puffs of smoke occasionally rise from camera when taking a flash photo."

Anyway, I've realized recently that my tendency to think of big-ticket purchases like this as something I can't afford is more a habit than anything else, because I'll ofte put about the same amount of money on my credit card for books or clothes or a ticket to a filk con. I'm not sure at what point in my personal timeline I started automatically filing technology as "cannot afford", or for that matter deciding what I can & can't afford by category rather than price. But anyway, I've just recently realized I was unconsciously doing that, and that it's rather silly, and that I could probably make my next big purchase a camera rather than another batch of Threadless t-shirts.

I'm not really ready to shop just yet (and I'll be poking about Debbie's archives from her recent camera-shopping adventure, too), but if you've found a model of digital camera you've been happy with (bearing in mind I'm talking "take along to cons and parties and also maybe shoot random neato things that I see when I'm out walking, like Brooke does"), feel free to recommend your favorite here. :)

...now I gotta go rehearse. See some of y'all tonight!

As so often happens, I haven't finished my FKO report, and now we're two weeks out! If I don't do this now I never will, so...

( As much as I can remember... )

IT IS SNOWING WTF. Not just like, mushy and melting. It's been snowing HUGE, fat fluffy flakes for an hour now, and it's STICKING. STOPPIT STOPPIT STOPPIT THIS INSTANT.

WHAT THE FUCK WHAT THE FUCK IT IS *APRIL* AUUUUGHHHHHHHHHHH

I love snow. I do. I love it in winter, where it BELONGS.

We have a coffeehouse gig tomorrow! I hope this doesn't cause people to stay away. Um, if you come anyway, at least it's always warm there, and there will be plenty of hot drinks!

And I have to drive my mother home to TACOMA on Sunday in this crap. Assuming my sister actually manages to get her *here* from Tacoma tonight.

SWEET SMOKING JESUS, man. Who do I complain to?

Whuf.

Edit: Plus massive amounts of rolling thunder.

*sigh* It's incredibly beautiful. I can't stop being lured into watching it and looking at it and STOP THAT GODDAMMIT I'M TRYING TO BE GRUMPY.

Edit Edit: This is really messing with my sense of time, though. I mean, lying on the couch gazing out at a snowy snowscape with thickly falling snow... it's beautiful, and if I just glance up, just for a second I'm lulled into enjoying it and just accepting it as normal... and then part of my brain gets this *JOLT* and thinks for a split second that I've dreamed the last few months and they never really happened and oh GOD I've got to live through winter again. Like when you dream that you missed an important test, or that you're back in high school, or something? It's like that.

Yeah. This is really fucking with me.

I keep forgetting to post about this. Tony already has, but just in case you don't read him:

We're playing at Wayward Coffeehouse this Saturday! That's April 19, 8pm - 10pm as usual. Broenwynn's been advertising the heck out of this one, guys, so you wanna get there early to get a good seat; I suspect the place is gonna be pretty packed. :)

We'll have LOTS of our new CD with us, and since CD Baby is still being inexplicably slow making our CD available, this will pretty much be the first chance the Westcoasters have had to get it if you weren't either at FilkONtario or actually on the CD.

If you can't make it, you can still hear six tracks on our MySpace page. (Sorry, that's the most MySpace would let us do!) And a lot of interesting extra info will be up in the "Behind the Music" section of our website, just as soon as I get my ass in gear and, y'know, write it down.

See you at Wayward, I hope!

vixyish: Y'know, I heard...
tfabris: Yeah?
vixyish: I heard there was a sacred chord.
tfabris: ...wait. Is it sacred, or secret?
vixyish: Sacred.
tfabris: 'Cause what I have here is "secret", but maybe that's a Mondegreen.
vixyish: Well, that's what I heard.
tfabris: Y'know what, with the tradition of changing the lyrics of this song? I'm gonna say sacred. And really that makes more sense.
vixyish: I dunno. I don't really care for music, anyway.
tfabris: Well it's not all that complicated. It's really pretty simple.
vixyish: Yeah?
tfabris: Yeah, it goes like this: the fourth, the fifth...
vixyish: Uh huh.
tfabris: The minor fall, and the major lift.
vixyish: I see.
tfabris: I'm a little baffled, though.
vixyish: Well, what do you call it? This thing you're composing, I mean?
tfabris: "Lick My Love Pump."

I had no less than THREE compliments on my Tiffany dragonfly umbrella today. Well, I choose to assume that the guy who said "that is a FAR OUT umbrella!" meant it as a compliment. The other two were obviously so.

I love umbrellas. I often use them even when it's not really raining all that hard. There's something about them that makes me feel like I am inside my own little portable room, and the rain is the walls. So I have more umbrellas than I need, and more on my wish list. I rotate them sometimes. Here in my office is the Tiffany dragonfly one and my Caillebotte "Rainy Day in Paris" one, and my Jack Vettriano "Singing Butler" one at home, and my UCSB one in my car. (The Tiffany one was in the car, but I was afraid of it getting faded in the back window.)

I'm fussy. I don't like the mini-ones. I like the full-size long ones with hook handles. Even better if they're wooden. And not just any pretty thing. They have to have a certain something. I'm not so much for gambolling kittens. (I only have the USCB one as a memento from my undergrad.)

In other news, Fishy sent me this today. I found it REALLY interesting! I'm including his moomail to me, because he put it better than I could:

I think you'll really like this. It's an ASL translation of a Marilyn Manson song. Well done, at least in
terms of production values and high level thematic content. It's really interesting from a translation
level, and the disclaimer at the beginning is also neat cause it makes you realize how hard pop culture and
music would be to understand if you can't hear any of it:

(Do pay attention to the disclaimer, so's you can click 'pause' if you have to. Short version: it's got curse words in.)

( And now we see if I can make embedding work: )

I'd never actually heard ANY of Marilyn Manson's music before, I don't think. But it *is* interesting to ponder the idea that there are probably those who think only the good and nice and safe stuff should be interpreted. I like what he has to say about having the whole culture accessible to the whole population, mostly because I'd never given thought to that (more specifically, to how that probably fails to happen) before. And it's interesting to see something pop-culture-y interpreted that's going as much for the inherent style as for the words. We filkers have all seen judifilksign capture the inherent style of our music quite expertly. I'd never given thought to how that would play out in other styles.

And, it's side-line amusing to me that there were a couple lyrics in there that I could not for the life of me understand by *listening*, but figured out because of the signs. :)

Edit: Interpretation in general also fascinates me. I know very few signs, but I did notice, for example, that where the lyric says "Do we get it?" "No!" "Do we want it?" "Yes!" As far as I can tell, what he's actually signing, at least the first time, is "Understand the music?" "No!" "Want the music?" "Yes!" It illustrates how sometimes the interpreter must have to make a judgment call on what the singer meant. You could mean several things by "Do we get it?" He's probably right, by the context, but I mean... oh never mind me, I'm just language-geeking over here. :)

Edit edit: I should add, I find this issue fascinating for all languages. I understand French, some Spanish, and a bit of Russian, and I geek out utterly whenever I watch anything with those languages in. (I was interpreting Call of Duty 4 for Tony last night, until it made me too motion sick to be in the same room anymore.)

It fascinates me to watch things with subtitles, and see if I understand, and what the difference is. Once in a while the choice of subtitles makes NO SENSE to me, but mostly it's just interesting to see the interpretation. Because it's very, very often that a strictly literal translation would not be meaningful or useful, and then you have to apply your own judgment based on context.

So I've decided to join hsifyppah in her walk to all the filk cons. It seems like a good idea, and I often don't exercise much without some sort of motivation. (Most exercise bores me. Even DDR has kinda lost its appeal, mostly for the amount of hassle it requires, and for the fact that I don't like most of the songs on the versions beyond Extreme 2. If this doesn't work I should probably get a treadmill with some kind of rail or table that lets me read while I walk.)

Anyway, despite my suggestion to Brooke that she should do the filk cons chronologically from now, for which she looked at me like I was insane (what? Just because it'll take DECADES to get to the first one?), I am just going to use the map she's already set up geographically (to which she let me add vixy start- and end-points), because I am a lazy lazy creature. It was enough trouble converting her handy spreadsheet from metric.

Shiny awesome Brooke gave me a spare pedometer at FKO (did you know that pharmacists get swag? I didn't!), helped me figure out how to use it, and even helped me measure my stride. (As it happens, we discovered through experimentation that we have about the same stride length, so then all I had to do was another one of those fun conversions from metric again.) This happened just before the Interfilk auction, which meant I was able to determine that I walked the equivalent of about a mile. That's right, I WENCHED A MILE FOR INTERFILK. :D Amusingly I walked somewhat more than a mile in the airport after the con. It's also pretty interesting to see how many steps I take while tidying the house or running around my office.

I have a bit of a headstart on Brooke since I live closer to Conflikt; I'm just under halfway there already! But then I think she gets the jump on me on the way home. :)

Filkers!

First of all, The Pegasus Awards Brainstorming Poll is up and extended through April 20. This is not the official nomination; this is "put down anything you think is a good idea, so that everyone can see what everyone else's ideas are." It's to get you thinking. You don't have to be attending OVFF to brainstorm (nor to nominate, nor to vote) and you don't have to have attended a filk con. There's no "have to" except that you consider yourself someone who likes filk music.

Rules: there aren't any. You can suggest your own songs, you can suggest others' songs, you can suggest songs that have or have not been recorded, printed, performed in concerts, whatever. There are rules about what's eligible for nomination, when that time comes, but if you are not sure, go ahead and put it in the brainstorming poll. The Pegasus committee will make sure that no song or person who is ineligible will actually get nominated (I *think* they weed them off the brainstorming poll results, actually) so you don't have to worry that you'll inadvertently cause some problem. When in doubt, I say err on the side of suggesting.

So please, filkers, go add your thoughts to the poll. They will get compiled into a big list of SUGGESTIONS for people to consider when nominating. (Note that I said SUGGESTIONS. You're not limited to this list when nominating; it's just in case you want to look at what other people think, or be reminded of songs and people you maybe hadn't thought of, or get a bit of a jog when your mind suddenly goes blank when faced with that nominating ballot later in the year.)

Secondly, I want to repost something that peteralway posted in his journal, because I agree wholeheartedly. The following is an unpaid, unsolicited advertisement. :)

But I do want to talk up one suggestion I made for best performer just a little. You see, there is one filker who I think is worthy of serious consideration for a best performer Pegasus. She's given exactly one filk concert, at a smaller, non-filk convention. She doesn't often take a turn in filk circles. So you might not think of her immediately when thinking Pegasus. But I've seen her on stage and joining in with songs in circle as often as anyone, and invariably adds something to every performance. For the five years I've been attending filk conventions, I see more and more filkers asking her to join them with her fiddle. And when she joins a performance spontaneously, she invariably turns ordinary performances into magical moments. And while I often wish she'd play more, it's also true that she never jumps in when her contribution wouldn't improve the music--knowing when to refrain is a valuable talent that makes her contributions all the more precious. I've finally learned to prod her into taking a turn in circle--she graciously assents to requests, and I have never regretted asking her for a tune. I'm one of the lucky ones who has been joined by her fiddle on many occasions, and it is always a joy from my perspective and from that of the listeners. She's enhanced the performances of big-name filkers like Wild Mercy, Seanan McGuire, Urban Tapestry, Tom Smith, Lady Mondegreen, and many others. When you think of who deserves a Pegasus for best performer, don't just ask "who gave a kick-ass concert?" but also ask "whose kick-ass performances have added the most to my filk experiences, both in concerts and in circle?" If you have had one of your performances transformed by "Amy McFiddler" or have heard her magic in action as a guest in a concert, don't forget Amy McNally when the nomination poll comes up.

( The lyrics to my version of 'Re: Vos Cerveaux' (with patter!) )

( What I said to the crowd while Tony tuned his guitar )

Mission accomplished. :)

Before I continue, I wanted to note that The Most Adorable Plush Moose Ever has now been named Maurice Miller McMoosington.

So let's see... when I left off, it was Friday night, and we were wrapping up the CD release party.

( Oops, I forgot the cut tag. )

Okay, I'll never do this if I don't do it soon. I've still got a lot to get done at work here, but for now, here is as much as I wrote in the airport and on the plane before my battery died. :) With the help of a schedule I'd made for myself beforehand in wordpad, I got as far as the CD release party on Friday night...

--------

So... I've been remiss in writing con reports for the last five or so cons that I've been to. Stuff just... happens. I wish I had the brain to go back and complete them all, but for now I have just enough brain to try and break the trend by starting THIS one. :)

So... ( take me home to FilkONtario! )

I'm in jammies, stretched out on the couch, eating Chinese food and watching Top Gear. Oops, and I need to reset my laptop's time zone.

More later!

So, for those of you who were not in the hotel lobby with us this afternoon: we were running late.

It's pretty much my fault, for taking longer than I planned to get up, longer than I planned to eat, and much, much longer than I planned to pack. Tired vixy is sloooowwwwww.

It's only slightly the hotel's fault for saying "the shuttle will be here in five minutes" and then proceeding to take twenty or thirty to get there. But mostly it's mine.

So at 1:15, as I stood there jittering with worry over our 2:15 flight but not being coherent enough to do anything about it, Jane Garthson took us in hand, lit a fire under the hotel staff, and got us the hell out of there (with the help of David, who grabbed my suitcase and dragged it out the door so that I was bound to follow it going HEY THAT'S MY SUITCASE. Our friends, they are clever.)

Then there was a small comedy of errors getting IN the shuttle with a large family and Marilyn Miller, wherein they pulled up one shuttle, moved the other shuttle, moved the first shuttle again, moved the second shuttle to where the first one was, and failed repeatedly at communicating to us which one we were supposed to be getting in. Then I jittered at the shuttle driver, who to his credit did all he could to get us there. I tipped him well; he did his best, after all (and put up with an obnoxiously jittery passenger to boot).

So I just have to tell you all-- especially those that were in the lobby with us-- that with less than an hour to go, we RAN into the airport and RAN to a counter and were told to go to that other counter and RAN to that counter and apologized to the woman for being late but would we still make it for our flight to Calgary? And the nice lady at the counter went tappytappy and said she was sorry, but it looked like the gate agent was saying our flight was overbooked--

*gulp*

--and would we mind very much if we switched to a different flight. That is nonstop to Seattle instead of changing planes. And leaves in a few hours. And arrives in Seattle at 7-something pm.

*blink*

We were all OH HELL YES. Wait, can you get us seats together? You can? okay OH HELL YES.

The nice lady did all her tappytappyness, had us fill out the little customs form, walked us to customs (can't walk through the airport unescorted with tagged baggage, she said) and was generally INCREDIBLY nice and helpful and wonderful and we thanked her profusely.

So instead of frantically running through the airport, looking terrified and nervous in customs and security which is never good, and stressing that our luggage won't make a plane change, we had a leisurely stroll through the airport, through customs, through security, and on to our gate, which was very nearby, and are relaxing for the next couple of hours with sodas and internets.

Some of you may remember my having mentioned before that I'm unreasonably, bizarrely lucky? Like, Disney-princess lucky? Flowers-bloom-in-my-path-and-birds-sing-when-I-walk-by-and-parking-spaces-open-up-before-me lucky? Yeah... this is the kind of thing I'm talking about.

Thanks, Toronto! Thanks, YYZ! :D

(Con report to come...)

We're here after an uneventful (just the way I like 'em) redeye flight, checked into our room, showered, and rested. Well, Tony's still resting.

Customs barely batted an eyelash at us declaring 100 CDs. I'd been told when I called to ask about it that it was up to the customs agent's individual discretion whether or not to charge us sales tax on what we were bringing in; I suspect most customs agents are of a whatever-is-least-hassle-for-themselves-personally mentality. :)

Soon we shall find the members of Urban Tapestry as they drift in one at a time, and hopefully find some of the concom lurking about, and whomever else happens to be here. :)

CD release party is Friday night at 10:30pm in the con suite. (We brought some goodies!) Concert is Saturday at 3:15pm. Wish us luck! :D

Oh, PS-- 100 CDs have been sent to CD Baby. When I checked just now, it said they left Federal Way yesterday. So keep checking; I'm sure they'll let me know when they receive them but I'm going to keep checking the delivery confirmation just in case, and I'll post a link when I know. They just emailed me that they received them! They also said to please give them 5-10 days to get everything scanned, ripped, and up on the CD Baby website. Again, I'll post a link when there's a link to post. :)

Likewise keep checking vixyandtony.com; it's not up yet but it should be up some time this weekend.

Mwah!

From my IM window:

[09:15] tfabris: Um Vixy?
[09:16] vixyish: ?
[09:17] tfabris: I swear, the thing at the Diskfaktory web site.... I checked it this morning... and it was still "QC completed". Then I checked it a few minutes ago and it was "Shipped". So I'm certain it just changed from "QC completed" to "Shipped" only minutes ago.....
[09:17] vixyish: ...yeah?
[09:17] tfabris: There are 1000 discs sitting next to my cube.

IT'S HERE IT'S HERE IT'S HEEEEEEEERE IT'S HERE A DAY EARLY OMG.

We have a CD.

*stunned*

Dear Buffalo,

I think you must have left the gate open, and your weather got out. However, Seattle did not want it. Please come and pick up your snow. It will be here with your name on it. It does not go with our sunshine and flowers.

Not loving you anymore,

vixy