Dungeon Majesty was AWESOME!

I was all set to post the next bit about the engine swap, but I really gotta yack about last night. Oh my goodness, I had such a fantastic time at the premier of Dungeon Majesty episodes 4, 5, and 6. I was in episode 5, along with the other half of Ashleigh Raine. Mystika and Devastina interviewed us while we were at the Romantic Times Booklover Convention 2005 and I had no idea what the finished product would look like.

I was wearing that bizarre swirl dress during the interview and horridly nervous, but I have to say, I didn’t appear to be as frazzled as I actualy was. I think some of that might be great editing and some might be luck plus a little bit of acting skill on my part.

Anyhow, the event was held at the Vine Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard, just west of Vine.

Jen couldn’t make the drive (it’s quite a ways) and Jason was more interested in finishing his novel, so I took my next best best friend, Eddie. In fact, he was the Best Man at Jason and my wedding–which was held literally around the corner on the same block as the Vine Theatre.

I also took a funny picture of him–which he prefers–but that one turned out super-blurry. I don’t know what the deal is with my camera…

Anyhow, Mystika was in the ticket booth and she introduced me to Riley–their Dungeon Master.

As you can see in the background of all these pictures, these people are definitely my crowd. I’m not a hardcore fan, but I have the heart of one. See, if I truly embraced my fan-ness, I’d have no time to write!

Eons ago, when Jen and I first tried Dungeons & Dragons, we were probably about thirteen years old. During that very same time period, we were living in Northern California and for a few days, visiting Southern California. During our foray into Hollywood, she and I really, really, really, really, really, really had to pee and began going into every doorway, looking for a restroom. Obviously, the tatoo parlors wanted nothing to do with a couple of thirteen year olds. The first X-rated theatre also told us to go away. But the second theatre… Why, the nice guy behind the counter took pity on us and let us use the bathroom.

I hadn’t realized that this theatre was that theatre until I walked through the door, to the right and then saw the stairs. Talk about a silly, random, unrelated to Dungeon Majesty, blast from the past that I’d’ve kicked myself if I hadn’t gotten a picture of.

Okay, now, onto the show… I hope it gets posted to the Dungeon Majesty website soon. I can’t wait to see it again.

The first episode was a sort of live action version of part of their D&D adventure.

The next episode was shot entirely at the RT Convention and they manage to really capture the essence of the experience–all the costumes, the romance, the cover models, the great vibe to be had by all. That was awesome. Jen and I were interviewed and spliced in with authors such as Angela Knight, Morgan Hawke and Sherilyn Kenyon. WaHooooo! And as I said earlier, aside from the silly dress, I didn’t come off as too much of an idiot.

During intermission, they raffled off a bunch of books and stuff–including Ashleigh Raine’s <a href=”http://ashleighraine.com/books/loverstalisman”>LOVER’S TALISMAN</a>. Way cool.

The last episode was comprised of fun featurettes by each of the characters. I loved every inch of that!

And then I finally got to have my picture taken with Mystika and Devastina. …And that’s where I came off like an idiot! When my eyes were closed, they were looking at the camera. When my eyes were opened, they were looking away. Oh well. I tried.

I’ll continue with the engine swap stuff shortly. I just really enjoy sharing this stuff!

Engine Swap, part 1

ot that I’m new to the whole engine swapping experience, but this was the first time I’ve ever taken pictures during the process.

So, without further ado, here’s the “Before” shot of the engine compartment of my 1968 Mustang (which I’ve had for about 13 years and plan to keep forever–maybe even be buried in it!)…

There’s not much to say about it other than when I’m done, it’ll look almost the same–only much faster!!!!

Remember, my car is not a show car. She’s a plain Jane daily driver and therefore, I need not wear a lab coat and sterlize everything. Hell, I can accidentally scratch paint, leave wires out of looms and use bolts that don’t match if I want to.

Of special hinky driver note, yes, there’s a rag plugging one of the holes in the firewall on the right hand side. It’d be plugging both holes, but it has fallen. No, this is not stock and yes I prefer the rag…otherwise, I’d have to get off my lazy ass, measure the holes and hunt down grommets–waaaaay too much work for a driver! I’ll bet there are several car enthusiasts fuming right now. Sorry guys, I’m just a dumb girl. I dunno anything about cars.

This was day one and my hands were still clean:

I dunno why I put the bandana over my hair. It seemed like a good idea at the time even though I had yet to be in a position to need my hair covered. Whatever. I was working on my car, for goodness sake, not going to a gala.

It was my job to get everything off of the engine so that it’d be ready to pull over the weekend. I started easy: Disconnect the battery, the ignition, pull the alternator and set it aside, empty the radiator, pull the heater hoses, pull the radiator hoses…and most importantly, try not to make too much of a mess because I was going to end up crawling around under the car at some point and there are few things worse than automotive fluids to get in your hair…thus perhaps why I put the bandana on my head prematurely.

My new motor

It’s looking like I might have the necessary spare time to get my new engine into my old Mustang…

Ain’t it purrrty?! And the real beauty of it is that the car it’s going into doesn’t have power steering or power brakes, the fuel pump is electric and therefore doesn’t bolt to the motor and the fan is electric thereby keeping further drag from the motor…and making for lots less work when swapping! Yay!

I won’t even have to swap carburetors. I did, however, get new headers which’ll go in when the engine does–this’ll be the first time I’ve put headers in with a motor. Last time, the engine was already in and me and a buddy had to muscle the darn things in and around…good golly that sucked, but I gained noticeable horsepower by going from stock manifolds directly to full length headers.

This is gonna be tons of fun…

And my convertible Mustang will get the hand-me-down so that it’ll no longer get smoked by 6-cylinder TransAms from the mid-80s. Granted, the convertible is all about cruising, but come on, right now that poor car can’t even break its peg-leg loose when I stomp on the gas…unless I’m in a puddle. Sad. Really sad.

Here’s me and my two ‘Stangs…

Funny, how just a few posts down, I was talking about sewing and now I’m talking about cars. Makes me think I should round out by mentioning antique doll restoration just so I can have all of my hobbies covered!

Duh…

I did have something newsworthy to report and I have no idea how I neglected it!

Okay, other than that I hadn’t been sure which day Jason had a book signing with Tim Powers until the day was upon us…which had made it very difficult to mark my calendar and mention it here ahead of time. And with the constant flow of life’s activities lately there hasn’t been much time to dwell on events past.

Over the weekend, Jason Stoddard got to share a signing table with Tim Powers. And good golly, I had a wonderful time with Tim and his wife, Serena. They’re a hoot!

I’m still kicking myself for bringing my camera, but forgetting to snap pics. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duh. Duuuuuuuuuh.

Next time, of course.

The store, Bookman in Orange, CA, was phenomenal! I scored some Jude Devereaux titles I’d been needing to replace since a rather unfortunate spring cleaning accident a few years ago in which a bag of ‘keepers’ got tossed because it was next to a bag of ‘giveaways’. In most cases, I even managed to match the old covers, too.

See, it’s Jude Devereux’s fault for hooking me on romance. I was in either 8th or 9th grade–perhaps the summer between the two–when my best friend (the other half of Ashleigh Raine) loaned me KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR–which actually belonged to one of her friends and she was worried she’d get in trouble for loaning it to me without asking first. Well, I got it on a weekend and gave it back the following weekend. From then on, I was hooked. Time travel. Romance. I was soooooooooooooooo into that!

A few years later, I discovered Virginia Henley–who at RT 2005 judged my costume as one of the winners! Needless to say, I was in absolute awe.

Oops! I digressed… Sorry, I got a little excited. Books take a person to more places than just the fictional worlds therein.

Anyhow, the signing was fantastic–got to meet a lot of people and then talk amongst ourselves over pizza afterward. That was tons of fun.

…And I’ve already learned a thing or two from the big fat sewing book from 1972 that Jason sprung for. I swear times have changed so much that I get more use out of old sewing books than new ones!

Derailed!

And I’d thought the shirt patterns were tops of my list for when I got my sewing room shovelled out. Ha! Instead, I …uh… ‘merged’ a shirt and dress from the late 60s/early 70s and created a coat. Perfect for spring!

I really wish I had more to report. Life’s gotten busy, but mundane and boring. By the end of this month, I’m sure I’ll be wishing for mundania, but in the mean time, I hope all is well with everyone!