Continuing my trend of removing optional body parts this year, I had my tonsils taken out yesterday morning. I was much too groggy to say anything after getting home, but I'm doing okay now, except for the parts about being completely mute and unable to eat anything except thinned out ice cream, ice water, and apple juice.

I've tried for years to convince basically every doctor I ever saw to get them removed. No one would even give me a referral. Finally, now that I have health insurance that doesn't require referrals (not that I had it at all for a long time), I made myself an appointment directly with an otolaryngologist. He too seemed iffy at first, but basically said I knew better than anyone else how much they were affecting me.

Now that they're out, even though my throat and tongue are still all swollen from the procedure, I can breathe better than I've been able to for... I don't know, 15 years? I didn't realize until now how much I was constantly feeling like I was just a bit strangling, since by being constantly swollen, they blocked off about half my throat. While I was recovering from the anesthesia, the doctor told my boyfriend that once my tonsils were out, he could see how scarred they were from what must have been dozens of infections, and that taking them out was absolutely the right and necessary thing to do.

So, that's a brief update on my life. Merry Christmas, everyone!

Normally I don't advertise sales in places other than my website, but BlueLinePro.com is having a straight 20% off your order sale. In their words:

BLACK FRIDAY!
Use the following code(BLACK1109) in the online store at [link] and receive an additional 20% discount on your purchase.
Code is good thru December 1, 2009

I've used them for years for actual blue line pro comic art boards, but they also have delicious copics - and you never see those on sale. Just thought some people would like to know. ^^

Several months ago, when managing to snag Microcenter's $40 Windows 7 upgrade, I didn't stop to think that some of my peripherals were so antiquated as to be rendered useless. So... goodbye, CanoScan N67OU - you never even had Vista x64 drivers. Right now, if I wanted to scan anything, I'd have to hook up a clunky, but only somewhat old, multifunction machine with limited scanning capabilities.

Most of my art is 11x14 or 11x17, which means I've been scanning and piecing for over 10 years, and it's never gotten less annoying. As much as I'd like a larger format scanner, they all seem to start in the $1500 range. The one I'd been planning to get - the very popular $150 Mustek one on Amazon - doesn't seem to have support for Vista x64 or Windows 7.

Does anyone have any recommendations? Know of a lower-priced, 11x17ish scanner? Or, failing that, have a recommendation for a high-quality letter-sized one?

For the next three days, use the coupon code "spookyscary" (and yes, I have been watching too much 30 Rock) at The Ghostfire Marketplace and receive 20% off all orders $15 and over!

Some of the newest and most popular:

P.N.Caster - Airship Provisioner
Crabby
Sweet Lolita and Hurty Kitty
550XP
Bunneh

I haven't been hanging around there much lately - too depressing. Back in June, someone hacked my account and stole almost everything of worth from me, including all my gold, my tokens, my tickets, and my Summoning Tome and Kiki Kitty Plush! It was a very rude thing to come back to, having happened during Anime Mid-Atlantic, but I filed a report within a week of the incident, and haven't heard back yet. Is two months normal for a mod report response? I have the reference number, but it doesn't seem like there's any way to track the report with it.