To Stretch Or Not To Stretch

Really trying to keep the ears at 8mm in case I go back to the wonderful world of server-groove, but it's hard when I make big plugs that I really, really want.

See, these nebula plugs look better in big sizes, but I don't want big, flapping granny-ears when I'm old. What do I do?

Master Chief Loves More Nail Varnish

He loves Hello Kitty as well :3

Better Late Than Never

Got my 150K ages ago but forgot about it and have just found the picture on me phone.

That isn't a Portal gun, that's my e-penis.

Look! Look At This Thing!

Something With Easy Hair

Mr Luton got a big one of these for having a spontaneous protest and a little spot of unexpected civil disobedience. Nice work Mr Luton, have some Sid Vicious \m/

Can't Draw Hair

One of the things that I didn't do during my spectacular career in IT is draw things -- I've not bothered in about 15 years, in fact, I'd pretty much forgotten how to draw. My Nan reminded the other day that when I was young I used to draw pictures for her and me grandad, normally of dead film and rock stars. I had completely forgotten this and, as I've got teh ills, bored beyond belief and twitchy fingered, I had a go at Jim Morrison.

Haha, yeah, I'm well out of practice.

Devaluing The Master Chief

Really, really, really, really, really want a fag but have chosen to colour in the Master Chief with some nail polish then make a pointless post about it instead.

I want this one, pls <3

WTF Desmond?

Desmond is lazy.

Despite becoming skilled and fit simply by lying on his lazy back on a futuristic memory bed, he is perfectly capable of climbing up the insides of mysterious warehouses, and (by means of ancestoral memory) scaling ancient lighthouses, basilica, fortresses and all kinds rickety old structures that he really shouldn't be climbing. He does this all with the greatest of grace and ease.

Yet he can't be arsed to clamber over this little wall in the Sanctuary and it is really annoying me, so much that I'm wasting a post about it.

Just noticed that he's got quite a flat bottom as well.

A Nice Bowl of Face Stab

LoveFilm sent Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood this morning, which is great. I've been waiting to play that since November, and if there was ever a cure for my loss of gaming mojo, this would be it.

I've so far left Rome, carried some flowers for a woman wearing a very unflattering frock, recovered a horse for an old man who can't handle the horses no more, and fired a cannon. Naturally, this is just the build-up to the wandering around beautiful Renaissance Italy (with the exception of that marshy place), leaping about on rooftops and stabbing guards in the face, but I can't be arsed with it.

Actually quite worried as I had the choice of playing Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood or cleaning the kitchen. I paused the game and cleaned the kitchen and now I'm cooking beef in Newky Brown in a slow cooker. Then I'm doing a suet crust and we are having a pie.

WTF is happening to me? Have I become possessed by the rabid spirit of some 50s housewife? Really don't like this shit, need to get back to work, and soon :(

Welcome To My Gnome

Someone asked me the other day about the collection of garden gnomes that I amassed in 169 hours of playing Fallout 3.

I have a group of damaged garden gnomes queuing up outside my Megaton Loveshack; there are 16 of the little buggers waiting there. I gave them a football to keep them occupied but they're not interested, they just stand there, like they think I run some sort of Fight Club or something. They ain't coming in though, they're far too tatty. This is a respectable establishment -- no damaged garden gnomes, no trainers, got it?

I let all 19 of the intact garden gnomes in because they don't look like they'll start any trouble. They don't get a football, they've got shelter, books, a jukebox and Wadsworth, the robot butler.

I did arrange the gnomes neatly on the stairs (which took bloody ages and ages and ages) but Wadsworth kept knocking them over, despite me telling him to keep the fuck off the stairs. Useless robotic butler, he is always knocking things over but never bothers to pick them up. WTF is that all about? Really, what does he do apart from occasionally provide some clean water and a nice cut and blow-dry? I've actually followed him around the house and he does absolutely fuck all. Useless. It's a good job he's unpaid otherwise he'd be sold for scrap.

BTW, this Fallout 3 blog is rather groovy.

Lost Me Mojo

Something isn't right. I'm still standing next to a dead hippo in Chapter Three of Army of Two: 40th Day, less than 2K away from 150,000 points, Bioshock 2 has just been sitting here for ages and I can't be fucking bothered with any of it; I'd rather write this bollocks TBH. I've definitely lost my gaming mojo, shit what now? Is it time to post pictures of ridiculous hats?

Yes, yes it is,

Posh Polish Plugs

Was a bit bored so coloured in some colourfront glass plugs wot I had.

The plugs started life as these very boring blue colorfronts. They weren't as blue IRL, more of a nice pastelly baby blue, which just ain't my thang, dawg. I put some Orly Lunar Eclipse nail polish on the back of them to darken the blue and to get some nice purple duochrome going, then I chucked a couple of coats of Nfu.Oh 52 nail varnish on the fronts for some blue and green flakie goodness. Lashings of top coat went on top and they were left to dry for a few days.

Not sure why the top one has gone wrinkly, think it's a smudge or something but I had such a bastard of a time getting a half-decent photo of these that I've left it.

Still Need Saucepans And A Gravy Boat

Mr Luton and I got married in Fable 3 because we couldn't be bothered to pay out £120 for the Registry Office, or invite anyone.

This is not a good way to acquire presents so we'll probably end up doing it properly. Hopefully, my husband won't impregnate me before copping off with the nanny IN FRONT OF ME, followed by fucking off back to his own world, like he did in Fable 3. Then I won't have to set fire to him.

How Many Boots Can A Stompy Boot Boot Whilst Stomping?

Whilst having a bit of a clear-out for an upcoming ebay sellfeste, I needed to get some perspective on the stupid amount of pairs of black boots that I currently own. I rummaged through cupboards, under the bed and in dark corners to bring my collection together on the stairs, like some sort of leathery PVC party. Then I took a really awful picture of them for some sort of willy-waving thing, yeah, it was a dull night.

I currently have 21 pairs of black boots, ranging from flat buckle boots that came from Carnaby Street in 1986 to festival wellies that act as a groovy festival rain prevention device, and some nice stompy New Rocks that I wore for work with a nice Karen Millen suit. Fuck yeah. I'm not sure why I have four pairs of cowboy boots as they all look exactly the same, except for some minor variations on the heel. I could have got some RAM with that money, FFS.

TBH, I don't know where half of them even came from. I've probably not even worn some of them and should considering flogging a few pairs but I can't and I don't know why.

There's also a bit of a gap in the collection; I've not got any really tall boots and my Doc Martens have completely vanished. I know one pair disintergrated, I used to wear them when I was a poor student and they were falling apart so I had to take it into the 3D room and glue gun them together every morning :(

One pair starting falling apart as I put them away, leaving horrible, sooty deposits on the cream carpet (cheap, old man-made suede things) so now I only have 20 pairs of black boots. It's progress, sort of.

*Why, yes, I am a bit bored, how can you tell?

zao plugs

Watched Die Another Day (again, ITV were showing Bond films every five minutes) recently and thought that it would be a good idea to make some Zao plugs. If you're not a James Bond fan, Zao would be one of the film's villianous-looking villians, with lots of diamonds embedded in his face and it all looks rather damn cool. However, I didn't want diamonds in my face, I wanted diamonds embedded in my ears. I didn't have any briefcases filled with diamonds so had to go the simulated gemstone route.

I got some superglue and some cheap and cheerful stainless steel 8mm and 4mm tunnels, measured the flare on them (10mm and 5mm in this case) and got some gemstones of the same size from Fleabay. The total cost for each tunnel and gemstone averaged out at about £2.00 including delivery, which was nice, as I was being a right cheap-arse.

After getting the materials it was a seemingly simple matter of gluing the gemstone into the tunnel. This was quite a fiddly job, and was especially hard when I inadvertently glued my fingers to the tunnel and the gemstone adhered itself to my kneecap then fell to the floor, picking up dust, fluff and mysterious hair. Setting the gem in its final position right was also a right pain as the gluey gemstone preferred to stick to fingers rather that the tunnel. Patience, steady fingers and a good cup of tea were key here but sadly, I only had the good cup of tea and that went cold.

Once the gemstone was correctly installed it was left to set for about 24 hours, then the excess superglue was easily removed with some nail polish remover and a cotton bud. At last, they were to bung in me ears so I decided to bling my thing. In Sainsburys. Hell yeah!

Last Of The Nail Stuff

Still off the fags (apart from one or two minor incidents), however, I appear to be getting a bit obssessed by my nails. It's been eating into my gaming time as well, as I've only completed the first two chapters of Army of Two 40th Day, and that was last week. My completion ratio is suffering greately, so, before I go back to admiring Salem's arse, I shall quickly pimp my Konad Abuse Blog -- a blog of Konad abusing and nail bling.

Qui Gon Would Approve

As I am now utterly determined to give up tobacco and smoking in general, I used last week's would-be fag money to get a Vapir 02 Mini vaporiser from Paradox as it's pretty portable and suitable for puffing on molasses as well as medicinal purposes if your into that sort of thing. Came with a free grinder as well, which was nice :)

It works OK too, warms up quickly, doesn't stink that place out, has a handy digital temperature gauge and is just really convenient. It has a couple of optional extras as well, like a battery pack and car adapter which is handy should you ever be stuck in a field in the middle of nowhere.

My personal favourite thing about the O2 is that it has a little belt hook on it so you can hang it off your robes and pretend it's a light saber. I like to think that Qui Gon Jinn would approve of a light saber that dispensed vaporised goodies, he looks that type.

On the downside, the O2 looks like some form of butt-pluggy enema tool from outer space. It is a bit of a git to load, especially in the dark or if you have cack-hands, it feels very plasticy (though is apparently made of a nylon blend), and the power cord could do with being a bit longer but it is still nice to puff on whilst idly watching Jeremy Kyle at 2 o'clock in the morning.

Lets Put Nail Varnish In My Ears

Got my first lot of proper nicotine patches today (they don't go out of date until 2013), I'm on the Stage 1 ones and I'm craving harder then when I was wearing the Stage 2 patches. What's that all about? To distract myself from cravings and the stress of the 4th round of the FA Cup I tarted up some plugs with some posh nail polish. Well, poshish, it was 99p from Fleabay.

The plugs are 8mm double-flared clear acrylic, though I did have to sand the back flares down a bit as they were mahoosive. Once they were sanded to size, the rears were given three coats of Orly - Meet Me Under The Mistletoe then a top-coat of black to give the glitter a bit more oomph. The sanded-down bits were treated to a quick coat of clear nail polish to smoothen then up, as they tend to not go in otherwise.

Quite pleased with how they turned out, actually, and I'm not the biggest fan of the colour green (though I wouldn't say no to a pair of these galaxies in 0g). Going to try out some duochromes later this week, they'll hopefully look pretty badass.

Late edit: If you want to remove the polish use an acetone-free nail polish remover otherwise it will make your acrylic plugs go cloudy and :( Also, some polishes may discolour the acrylic, so you could be best off with some bog-standard glass plugs instead.

Chuckie Egg Was Great

I've been scanning and recolouring my grandad's old photos, and thought I would post his nerd rig shot from 1983 as it would have been his birthday today.

Konad Stamping, Not Gonad Stamping

Had a horrible, horrible craving for a cigarette today and was nicely distracted by the departure of Andy Coulson, and the arrival my Konad Kit from Blush Cosmetics. Hurray! And despite my hands shaking like my neighbour's wooden fence, I made some pretties instead of playing Sherlock Holmes vs Jack the Ripper.

I shakily applied a few coats MUA Shade 1 (nice deep blue with a blue shimmer, quite yummy and £1 a bottle), and prepared to stamp. I practised for a while on some paper with cheap and cheerful polish and got annoyed as I just couldn't get the hang of it. However, I found some helpful advice on Laquerized and Emerald Sparkle, and once I got the hang of stamping the paper, I went for the nails. By the time I'd done the light had mostly gone so the picture is a bit rubbish (which is quite good as it's hard to see where I've smudged it and cocked it all up. You can see where I haven't cleaned up, though).

My particular kit was £14.99 from Blush Cosmetics in the UK, and they sell a variety of different kits and plates and polishes. You can also find the kits and accessories on eBay and other online shops.

Haven't Failed Yet

Still off the ciggies. God, this is brilliant, I can spend my money on shit I don't need instead of spending my money on shit I'm addicted to.

Anyway, I've purchased nail stuff. Exciting, eh? I've bought my first ever top and base coat, and various cheap and cheerful colours from the MUA range at Superdrug as it only costs £1 a bottle. No expense spared here. Also got these shiny nail tattoos, cos I like skulls and they were a steal at £1.99.

These nail tattoos look really good on and they're pretty easy to use, just peel off, stick on in desired place, whack some top coat on top and Bob's yer uncle.

I'm wearing this skull over just one coat of the £1 MUA Shade 2 polish, it's rather good stuff. The eyes of the skull were filled with Eyeko's Vampira, a gorgeous black and red glittery polish. Unfortunately, my dodgy phone camera hasn't captured the red, glittery eyes and my hands look all wrinkly :(

Should probably stop spending on nail things and get myself a half-decent camera.

Not Quite Failure

Still off the fags. Sort of. I ran out of the strong nicotine patches so had to go onto the medium ones, which was, err, fun. Slightly more expensive as well, as I have purchased (and smoked) one whole packet of Benny Hedgehogs and have enjoyed one or ten prison rollies. It's not quite failure and not quite success, a kind of failcess, or something.

I'd easily give up tomorrow if it wasn't for posh, clueless Tories.

Anyway, one of the things that I've been doing to keep my hands occupied is doing my nails, because I like colouring things in, the smell of nail varnish, as well as dodgy finger bling. I appear to be going a bit girlie with my midlife crisis, dunno WTF is going on. I'll be going bonkers over eyeshadows next.

Boing Boing Boro Boro

Stevenage 3 - Newcastle - 1. Haha, we're shit but we've beaten you :)

Farewell Ciggies (Part 38)

Having yet another go at giving up the fags, so have replaced my Benny Hedgehogs with nicotene patches, and have dug out the old e-cig and copious amounts of zero-nicotene RY4.

I've only had two ciggies today (one upon waking, one after a row about my son's ongoing procrastination) so am doing quite well. Despite this, I am quite confident that I will fail and be back on the fags within three weeks.