gryffindorseeker's imagination journal.

It's been a while, eh? I admit I've been a terrible blogger and an even worse updater of fanfiction, but real life has been terribly busy (and for once, productive) so I've been doing my best to participate in the House Cup in the forums and occasionally do a bit of writing. Speaking of segues¹, I've begun a new (but often delayed) story about 17-year-old Albus Dumbledore and his friendship with Gellert Grindelwald. I'm very excited about it because it's quite a dramatic departure from the slapstick humor of We Gryffies and it's been in the works for years now. You can check it out here (M) if you like, and while there is a Contains Slash warning, it will be such a minor part of later chapters that I doubt it will make even the most slash-averse readers uncomfortable. The warning is mostly precautionary.

I haven't updated We Gryffies in a while and honestly, the next chapter won't be completed anytime soon, and because I feel wretched for the lack of Gryffietastic content out there, I thought I'd (feebly) try to rectify the situation. I've often been asked if there will be a sequel to the story², and while the answer is no, I do have two titles for the hypothetical trilogy that this saga should never become. Below are the titles and premises to the imaginary sequel and threequel, and I think you'll see why these stories should never be written:

You Gryffies: Narrated by Dawlish the ex-Auror, this sequel would chronicle his divorce proceedings and battle with alcohol dependency, and only mention the Gryffies once or twice, while Dawlish is damning them all to hades for their juvenile shenanigans in his classroom.

Dem Gryffiez: This threequel would center around the life of Lewd Wig, from his upper middle class beginnings to his ascendency to hip-hop superstardom. If 8 Mile had been produced by Walt Disney, you'd have Lewd Wig's biopic³. (The Gryffies would not be mentioned once, making the title irrelevant.)

So there you go. Hopefully that made you chuckle, and if not, at least I'm protecting the world from these terrible ideas by not writing them. Right?


¹Not the Segway brand of motorized scooters, mind you, but the art of subtle transition-making in discourse.
²Why anyone would want one, I haven't the foggiest.
³Or autobiography, as it were.

a famous person once said that you should celebrate new challenges. if this is true, i'm going to party like it's 1999, because Life has dealt me some pretty challenging cards as of late!

challenge #1: my beautiful, 2-year-old MacBook has finally kicked the bucket. due to a lack of expendable funds, i do not foresee a time when i will have a functional computer again. (or at least one with a working hard drive.) this is one (major) reason why fanfic updates have taken so long and i've been so m.i.a. (not the singer, but congrats to her on her baby!) around the forums. i must say, thank goodness for friends' computers and public libraries!

challenge #1a: not having a computer has also complicated the responding to reviews process. i've fallen quite behind, admittedly, and i can't promise that i'll catch up soon. i'm prioritizing the next chapter of We Gryffies, which i hope everyone understands, but i will respond to every review eventually. it goes without saying that i love getting feedback on my writing, and i really appreciate everyone who takes the time to leave a review. i've always seen responding to reviews as a gesture of gratitude to you kind folks, and that gratitude is coming, albeit later than is ideal.

challenge #2: i'm a college student (or "university" student, to those of you in Britain or Commonwealth countries) so i find myself very busy with schoolwork and social engagements. i still work on We Gryffies whenever i can, but i sort of have to prioritize studying and such. i still think about the gryffies, like, all the time, and oddly enough almost always when i'm in the shower. (not in a weird way. the scent of shampoo just inspires me, okay?) so i have almost all the remaining chapters plotted out in my head, and the challenge is finding the time to write everything down.

challenge #3: i'm working on an original novel! well, i'm sort of co-writing it with my brother (he had the initial idea for the story) but i've taken over the bulk of the writing of the narrative. "but what about your fanfiction?" i hear you ask. well, it's really my priority when it comes to unscholarly writing, but whenever i have writer's block for We Gryffies i turn to my original work, and that sort of helps. if you care, it's a historical/political thriller set in an alternate universe where there's a successful communist revolution in the United States during the Great Depression. it's sort of like Brave New World meets A Clockwork Orange meets Star Wars, except with communism. don't worry, it will never be published because it's kind of horrible, but it's the very first time i've let my friends and my brother read any of my fiction, so that's kind of a big deal.

so these are the challenges i will celebrate! hmm, what else is new with me? i jumped up and down when Slumdog Millionaire won all those Oscars, i'm listening to "You're the Best Around" from The Karate Kid, and i'm reading James Joyce's Ulysses. so i'm pretentious, but not too bad, because my vice is obviously 80's music.

and since i probably won't blog within the next 12 days, happy st. patrick's day! oh, and my half birthday is in 2 days, and in my imaginary canon, James II's birthday is in 10 days. i love the month of march.

hi guys! i'm so sorry that i've been m.i.a. for so long - i've been so mad crazy busy that i haven't been able to update, which sucks. unfortunately, we gryffies ch. 24 is only about 30% done, which is not news you want to hear, but i swear i'm doing the best i can with the tornado of crazy that is my life right now. you've all been so patient and i thank you for that, and i think you'll find the final product to your liking. it will also be an extremely long chapter.

i suck for not updating, duh, but i've been slaving away on this screenplay for school and i kinda like it. i mean, i want to finish it and submit it to some hollywood studio that will immediately reject it, but hearing their criticism (a.k.a. "coverage") would be cool. it is tentatively titled "pygmalion: a documentary" and at least the kids in my class like it. here's a snippet of act one:

SALADIN: Yeah, 'cause the defenders won't know what hit 'em when they realize that Jack's a girl!

The guys begin laughing uproariously, except for Rob and, of course, Jack. Jack appears mildly perturbed while Rob is irritated by their insurrection.

HAT-TRICK PATRICK (to Saladin): Salad, who the hell has ever mistaken Jack for a girl? Come on!

L'IL TIMMY: Yeah, she's man-er than the rest of you jerkfaces!

HAT-TRICK PATRICK (to L'il Timmy): SILENCE FROSH! L'il Timmy, you look like a Keebler elf preparing for his bar mitzvah.

ROB: On that note, I declare practice to be officially over. Get a good night's rest on Sunday and I'd rather you didn't but if you must, cocaine. Uppers, not downers.

it's about a girl named jack (after famous cellist jacqueline du pré), her henry higgins-esque friend rob (after cold warrior robert mcnamara), and their comrades with funny names.

so i failed NaNoWriMo, but i did end up with a 40,000 word piece of mediocrity masquerading as a novella. it was a good experience and i learned many valuable lessons, at any rate.

[edit: i posted a lengthy tidbit from the upcoming wg chapter on my hpff forums blog. it's here, or if the link doesn't work, it's entitled Hello Blogosphere. and it's in the general list thing.]

fuck it, i know i just blogged a few days ago, but this warrants its own post.

'Arrested Development' film gets closer, says The Hollywood Reporter.


squee!!

The "Arrested Development" feature has moved closer to reality, with Mitch Hurwitz and Ron Howard reportedly closing deals for the long-gestating project from Imagine and Fox Searchlight.

reportedly closing deals?? and mitch hurwitz is going to write the screenplay and maybe direct with help from ron howard???

oh happy day!! finally, FINALLY, the arrested development movie is moving from myth to reality! if (when?) this unquestionably prolific film hits theaters, i am going to scream and squeal and giggle like a twilight fangirl every time jason bateman comes onscreen and when george-michael and maeby inevitably kiss and when tobias pulls his analrapist stocking over his head! (note: that's anahlrapist, a contraction of analyst/therapist)

considering that they've already had charlize theron, ben stiller, liza minelli, carl weathers, henry winkler, et al., i wonder what famous hollywood stars they'll get to co-star in the movie!

let's play "guess what movie roger ebert is reviewing!"

Should a woman fall in love with a man because he desires her so much? Men seem to think so. It's not about the woman, it's about the man's desire. [...] [At its core, this movie is] about two good-looking kids who want each other so much because they want each other so much. Sometimes that's all it's about, isn't it? They're in love with being in love.

while you mull it over, watch this video of suburban youths hurling compliments at pedestrians:



that was dickishly charming. okay, ready to hear the title of the mystery movie?

twilight. but roger does concede that the movie is "lush and beautiful" and well-cast, and that robert pattinson "is not unaware of how handsome he is."

it's official: everyone has jumped on the "r.pattz is smexy" bandwagon except me.

i know i rag on twilight a lot and i genuinely don't want to offend anyone, what with its small and generally dispassionate fan base,* but this franchise is EVERYWHERE and it's driving me CRAZY. maybe i love to hate twilight as much as bella & edward love to love each other, but roger's first quote sums up what i don't like about the story. that and its racist portrayl of native americans. (to be fair, twilight does better than pocahontas. have i ranted about how disney brainwashes kids with its racist and misogynistic agendas, in addition to taking all of the cool violence out the films based on fairy tales and all of the fact out of those based upon history?)

in other news, we gryffies will probably be pushed further back because i won't even be able to begin writing it until mid to late december. i know i suck and that this post is just full of happy thoughts, but i presume you'd all prefer honesty to false promises. also, i'm having a rare "i hate the world" sort of day. later, biznitches.

*tee hee, that's meiosis!†
†and that's sarcasm!‡
‡which is original!§
§now i'm just being obnoxious.‖
‖shame on you if you didn't catch the dr. horrible reference.

dear log,

it is Day 11 of National Novel Writing Month (i.e. NaNoWriMo) and much to everyone's surprise, i have not quit yet. this is my first attempt EVER at an original piece of fiction and it's going almost well. in fact, the thing i like the least about my novel is its title (The Wicked Witch of West Hollywood) which i am thinking of replacing with something like Seurat's Monkey (which makes sense if you read the narrative, i promise). my NaNo page is here, if you want to friend me or laugh at my pitiful word count.

i am so sorry that i am so behind with answering reviews, i really am. please don't be offended if it takes me several weeks to respond to your review(s), but NaNo + school are both absolutely killing me right now. i think i have a decent track record of responding to reviews overall, so please bear with me during this masochistic month of november.

hmm, i don't have any fun stories to share, since NaNo sort of dominates your life by necessity. everyone seemed to like the story about my english teacher from a few posts ago, so i'll make a list of the many life lessons he has taught us. (we haven't learned as much about literature, sadly - he spent the first HOUR of yesterday's class on various tangents. they were entertaining, but the class is only an HOUR AND TWENTY MINUTES long.)

13 life lessons i've learned in english class this semester:

1. your life is meaningless. there is no higher power, there is no afterlife, and karl marx was right when he said that "religion is the opium of the masses." (this went over REALLY well considering that 95% of my class is RELIGIOUS.)
2. all white people should feel guilty for the genocide of native americans and the rape of their culture. (this also went over well considering that 100% of my class is WHITE, including our TEACHER.)
3. never follow the directions for daily contact lenses - don't throw them out and wear them until they start to hurt or get sucked behind your eyeball. (you'll save a fortune!)
4. watch out for your australian buddy from graduate school - he is probably secretly dating your little sister and will probably marry her one day. (this was actually a cute story.)
5. suburbia is just an outlet for men to prove their masculinity, by having the greenest, most well-maintained lawn in the neighborhood. men are always trying to prove their masculinity.
   
6. a subaru outback wagon is not effeminate. not compared to a minivan.
7. bono and aragorn are the two ideals all men should aspire to.
8. you can never read ernest j. gaines's "a lesson before dying" too many times or feel too guilty for racism/segregation/slavery, if you are a white person.
9. if you want to make a woman fall in love with you, leave shakespearean sonnets in her mailbox. if this doesn't work, she is obviously a robot. (only 10% of our class is male, but i suppose that statistically, some of the girls are gay.)
10. if you want to make a woman think you're perverted, leave a copy of john donne's "the flea" in her mailbox. (personally, i prefer donne to shakespeare, but maybe i'm a perverted robot.)
11. there are three different kinds of moles, and all are bad.
12. don't buy your children toys. they will pick a stick they found in the woods over a store-bought toy every time.
13. the most effective way to kill the animal variety of mole is not by poison or guillotine, but by beating it with a stick.

and this guy isn't even the weirdest teacher i've ever had - far from it. see why i always write weird characters? either i'm surrounded by weird people, or just notice the weirdness more than other people do...

hi guys!! i have not been blogging much...i actually started a blog at the hpff forums, but i sort of like this one better...it's colorful and stuff...

i figured i'd let you all know that i hope to post we gryffies ch. 22 by halloween...it's half done at this point, but i'm participating in nanowrimo which means that if i don't give up on writing a 50,000 word novel in 30 days, i won't be able to update wg until december. and that's no good, hence my manic panic to finish ch. 22 by the end of october.

since i have no shame in pimping tv shows that i love, i think i'll do that now. i have recently discovered It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Skins, which are both AWESOME.

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia is the funniest show on television today, i am convinced. it also might be the most "offensive," but i don't necessarily agree with that. it simply tackles topics that other shows are afraid to. (for example, the first two episodes are titled "the gang gets racist" and "charlie wants an abortion.") it has also been hailed as "Seinfeld on crack," which i think is also misleading: Always Sunny attains a level of sophisticated humor that Seinfeld never even attempted. (and i like Seinfeld!) Always Sunny is about a group of misanthropes who run an irish bar in south philly (i suppose i'll watch any show that takes place in an irish bar...The Black Donnellys, anyone?) and get into the craziest shenanigans you ever did see. while it isn't exactly a groundbreaking show, the acting and writing are excellent. note: it's on FX so they do swear, and this show isn't for everyone. if you're easily offended (personally, it takes a LOT to offend me), then you might not like Always Sunny, and i would feel really bad for recommending it. but if you're bored and in the mood for giggles, it's on hulu. (also: it's rated MA so children probably shouldn't watch it...)

also, charlie kelly is the greatest character on television today. (the passionate passionate night man!)

all you brits out there are probably like, "wow, you must've been living under a rock if you haven't heard of Skins" and to that i reply, "no one in america has even heard of Skins!!" except now i have and am catching up on all the episodes. like how i will watch any show that takes place in an irish bar, i am also inclined to watch shows with lots of swearing. (and on Skins they drop the f-bomb, which they can't on Always Sunny!) simply put, Skins is a teen dramedy that makes the kids on The O.C. look like saints. (e.g. they drink and do drugs and other bad things.) but, unlike absolute crap such as 90210, Skins is well-written and makes you actually care about the characters. (however, i might just think it's clever because the kids talk with english accents.) anyway, it's smart and compelling and almost provides an accurate portrayal of teenage life. (not that i was as cool or badass as these kids when i was in high school, but i KNEW people who were this bad.) again, this show probably isn't for everyone (if you're disgusted by Gossip Girl, Skins is possibly more nefarious), but if you like indulgent television then you might enjoy Skins.

also, i'm still catching up on all the episodes, but sid is the most adorable bespectacled character ever.

i'm such a tv dork, but that's okay. hopefully we gryffies will be done soon, and in the interim check out Always Sunny and Skins. (or not...particularly if you consider Two and a Half Men to be cutting edge programming.)

neil patrick harris + some other guy, singing les misérables:



i heart nph. i was obsessed with watching doogie howser reruns when i was five, i love harold & kumar, and i LOVE dr. horrible. when faced with adversity, i say to myself, "what would nph do?"

it's almost 4 am so i find this reeeally entertaining. oh, and wg is updated.

this is potentially worse than her inability to name a single newspaper.

2:02 mark:

Katie Couric: Why, in your view, is Roe v. Wade a bad decision?

Gov. Palin: I think it should be a states issue, not a federal government-mandated [pause] mandating yes or no on such an important issue. Uh, in that sense I’m a federalist, where I believe that states should have more say in the laws of their lands and individual areas.

who remembers the federalist papers from high school history class? the ones written by "publius" (a.k.a. james madison, alexander hamilton, and sometimes thomas jefferson) advocating a strong central government, where states have less say in the laws of their lands and individual areas?

d'you think she meant "new federalist," which means the exact opposite of federalist? you see, this complete 180 in the definition of the word is a fairly recent development, spurred almost exclusively by the prominence of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, an association of libertarian lawyers counting among its members the appointees john ashcroft, michael chertoff, and justices scalia, roberts, and thomas.

maybe sarah palin is trying to keep us on our toes. maybe she does read every newspaper in the world every day and knows that there's a secret new definition of "federalist" that is the opposite of the definition that we learn in school!

maybe not. she can't even name one supreme court case other than roe v. wade. and that doesn't count, because roe v. wade was part of the prompt.

joe biden, i could kiss you!

since hpff is down, i said to myself, "kelly, why don't you write a blog post?"

"capital idea!" i replied.

so here we are. i am currently in the midst of some relationship drama (or getting-that-jackass-to-commit drama), but otherwise i had a pretty good day.

thursday is my "omfg overloaded with classes" day, but i like all my thursday classes so it isn't too bad. i had an art history quiz so i woke up early to study (8 am...yeah, i know, it's not early for the real world), and i came to the conclusion that i'm crap at art history. i mean, no one's really crap at art history, and i'll probably end up with a B on the quiz, but i suspect that i'm better at regular history. which is nuts, because art history is what all the football players take to make girls think they're sensitive and emotionally vulnerable. art history is supposed to be the easy kind of history, but i'm so bad at drawing/painting/coloring inside the lines that it has rubbed off on my aptitude at studying other people's art. but i am one of the two most vocal people in the class (it's a celtic art history class and i studied medieval ireland for like a month in one of my classes last year, and there's been a lot of overlap), so hopefully that will help my overall grade.

after art history, i ran across campus to my screenwriting class. this is the most phenomenal class ever. right now we're studying the one-hour teleplay and writing spec scripts (which are episodes of existing shows screenwriters write to show execs their writing skillz) and me and my partner are writing a script for Lost. he is possibly more obsessed than i am, so it's really fun. so act 1 was due today and we had a workshop for the groups that are doing House and The Office (every group can't go every week, natch). so we did table readings and everyone was either less than enthused or passive or something, so i got to read for house and dwight (i was also the only one in the class remotely familiar with these shows), and i was also really engaged critiquing/complimenting their scripts. (i chugged a cup of coffee while running from art history to screenwriting, as has become my routine.) i wasn't mean, and i know that screenwriting is a very different medium than prose, but honestly, most of the writers on hpff could do a better job than some of my classmates. i don't mean "most of my favorite authors," i mean "most of the authors." i've become very spoiled because I'm so used to such a high caliber of writing.

then i had english class, which was fun regardless of that-jackass-who-won't-commit, who i think is pissed off because i get check pluses on the homework when he usually gets checks. anyway, we read some play called "fences" by august wilson, which james earl jones was in way back when and he won a tony award. i was still on a coffee high and had some very insightful contributions, if i may say so myself. my teacher is hilarious because he always spends at least half the class telling personal anecdotes, which is great because i hate discussing books in english class. today we somehow got on the tangent of my parents being concerned that i won't be employable as an english major (which greatly distressed my english professor) and then my teacher started a class discussion on whether from a psychological standpoint, this might explain why i excused the main character in "fences" for discouraging his son from following his dream of playing college football, because we all turn into our parents whether or not we mean to, which i think is valid. my professor also swears a lot but has started cutting back so he won't get in trouble with the chair of the department, and he accidentally said that i should tell my parents that "it's bullshit that english majors aren't employable," so then he started freaking out that i'd say B.S. to my parents and he'd get in trouble (honestly, i'm not five years old), so then he made me pinky swear that i would keep it D.L., but he didn't really know what a pinky swear is so the class spent like ten minutes explaining it, so then i pinky swore to my english professor that i would explain to my parents that i can be an english major but i wouldn't nark him out for saying bullshit. which in itself is bullshit, because i miss when he would drop the f bomb during class. (i love swearing, but someone apparently complained about our professor's language.)

so, this is a long and random entry, but there's a snapshot of my life without getting into my personal life. i hope hpff comes back on tonight because there's a grey's anatomy premiere party tonight, and i fucking hate grey's anatomy. (excuse my language!)

item #1: listen to jeff buckley, the single greatest musician from the '90s, and maybe a couple other decades too. i've been working on my "defining moments" piece (pinky swear!) and listening to jeff buckley has really helped me get in the right state of mind. (i'm doing dumbledore, btdubs.)

this is going to sound like a bad oscars speech, but THANK YOU to everybody who voted for wg at the dobbys!! i'm over the moon about losing best humor to a fountain pen because duh, settling the score is incroyable and it's flattering just to have the opportunity to lose to afp. the notion of wg winning best next gen hasn't really sunk in yet...i mean, i think it's a piece of crap compared to vog and delicate but i'm also wearing my humility socks today. (not really...it's sooo hot outside.) so thank you all from the bottom of my heart, it hasn't been the easiest year (what with the deaths in my family and the bullshit my brother's had to deal with that i'm not going to specify cos it's his business, not mine) but the dobby really does make me feel better. but because i'm wearing my humility socks (erm, let's call them humility bermuda shorts) i feel weird calling it "my" dobby cos it isn't, it belongs to the readers who put up with james's eccentricities (as well as my own) for as long as you have.

a lot has happened since i last blogged to y'all. obama picked biden as his vp running mate, and i was okay with it. mccain picked palin as his vp running mate (i was disappointed to learn that it was not michael palin, the monty python guy), and i raised an eyebrow in suspicion. i feebly hoped that mccain would pick joe lieberman, the republican senator from connecticut (parading in an independent's clothing) whose '06 campaign i worked so hard to derail. now, what kind of bff is johnny being toward joe? besties don't turn their back on besties! plus, that selection would have caused me to shed tears of mirth and delight. i don't want to get into politics (it's too late, anyway), but as a former hillary supporter, i'm not going to vote for an anti-feminist, socially conservative, former beauty queen governor of alaska just because she has a UTERUS. that's NOT HOW I ROLL. frankly, it's insulting that mccain's people think that a broad who hates abortion and likes guns will remind me of HILLARY MOTHERFUCKING CLINTON and entice me away from barry o'bama. just because i disagree with most of o'bama's policy (i disagree with more of mccain's), i refuse to vote for an old dude just because his vp pick is a traitor to the women's rights movement and, i must reiterate, IS NOT MICHAEL PALIN.

...you've got to bash in minds!

ahoyhoy! I just wasted 30 seconds of my life reading the breaking dawn spoilers (no offense if you liked the book...but if you did, i hope you're on vicodin or something). let me make it clear that i am not bashing twilight. i just think that that insane lady who wrote the books is in a permanent state of arrested development and needs to see a psychologist.

here are we gryffies spoilers if you're curious. why keep secrets when you can ruin the suspence? (highlight to discover the truth!)

• james starts sniffing tea leaves and becomes a seer
  
• tegan realizes her folly and reunites with james
  
• they get married three days later, with hagrid officiating the civil ceremony
  
• tegan gets knocked up and names the baby farfignewton
  
• freddie is gay
  
• micah becomes a pimp
  
• j.d. discovers that he's sterile and kills himself
  
• albus and scorpius become marginally successful con men
  
• rosie drops out of school and becomes the dred pirate weasley
  
• james forsees that dobby longbottom will die, but is too late to save him
  
• tegan discovers that umbridge is her birth mother and fudge is her birth father
  
• james becomes a dancer in a chorus line
  
• farfignewton joins a motorcycle gang
  
• farfignewton falls in love with a malfoy

hi everyone! if anybody still remembers me, the next wg chapter should be fit to post in a day or two. my plan is to resolve the cliffhanger, take a wee break from writing to study for exams, and get my ehpf collab and challenge done by the end of august.

at the moment i am so sunburned it hurts to type, hence my dedication of this post to the magical, magnificent gel we call aloe vera. but once all the dead skin peels off i should be in top form to write!

hellooo people of the internet! i've been busy with school, which is good, and consuming a bit too much...er...firewhiskey...cough cough.

i'm working on my contribution to the elderly hp fans "defining moments" collab, and mine centers on dumbledore. the collab is on my favorites page if you want to check it out...momotwins' one-shot about percy is extremely fabulous. oh, and gryffies ch. 18 is up, if you haven't read it.

i'm up to date on answering reviews! this is nuts! and registration for pottersworld is this weekend if you want to join...frankly, i'm not all that addicted but it's a casual hobby, and my writing has improved. so don't be afraid of being addicted...if you want to try something new, give it a shot. =)

also, if you're extremely bored this summer, watch the mole. it's the only reality show that doesn't make me want to vomit. it's a really cool mind game, so check it out.

Shut up, I've got Doctor Who on the brain. xD I loves it.

Sooo, let's debrief, shall we? 7000 words in on WG Ch. 18 and I still have a ways to go. I know that long chapters suck for some of you and I'm sorry, but I really want to avoid cutting this chapter in two. There's no good place to split it, you know? And I'm in school and I've got a couple thousand words to go, so let's be patient, yeah? I promise that when it's completed, it will be the Most Significant Chapter To Date. So I want to make it as perfect as possible.

And it's the infamous Christmas chapter! And here's a sneak preview for you all:

‘What’re you lads doing so deep in Knockturn Alley, lads?’ asked Giraffe-Neck MacDougal, his voice so hoarse that I wanted to offer him a throat lozenge. Sadly, I did not have any on me.

J.D. pointed at me. ‘He told me we were going out for ice cream!’

‘It was a fairly transparent ruse!’ I shot back. ‘Who eats ice cream in December?’

‘Smart people, that’s who!’ said J.D. ‘It’s already cold, so it doesn’t melt!’

‘He’s right, you know,’ Giraffe-Neck MacDougal said to me. ‘It’s cheaper too. Ice cream in the summer is one sticky, expensive mess.’

edit: ch. 18 is tentatively titled "the phoenix and the turtle." i think i'll ultimately go with it...