My mom and one of my sisters are terrible at gift-giving. My sister has given me a "makeup kit" for the last five or six years. This is a problem for me for two main reasons: 1) I rarely wear makeup, and 2) I was a cosmetic consultant for several months. I know how to wear makeup; I've even done makeup for bridal parties. I have my own set of quality makeup, so I don't really need a drugstore makeup kit with "sparkle eyeshadow" and lipgloss that has the constancy of sticky, hard wax.

My mom tries, but she tends to get me things that she thinks I'll like rather than things I've told her I might like. I have two sisters, and my mom gets us all the same presents even though we're at different life stages and very different people. I keep asking that she stop buying me this useless clutter (in kinder words, I promise) and give me gift cards to places like Dress Barn so that I can buy good clothes for work. No such luck.

I'm grateful that my family buys me anything, and I don't want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but I wish these "gifts" would be more relevant if they feel they have to give me anything.

Spice Girls make me feel 15 again, and by Merlin I would see them in a heartbeat if I had the chance. No regrets.

I'm confused about why you say that the Potterverse books "bear the ill judgment of 'Young Adult Fiction' among some people." YALSA, Young Adult Library Services through the ALA, defines young adult literature as those items recommended for ages 12 to 18 (although some argue that 14 to 21 might be better suited for YA lit), and the Potterverse suits that group. Just because adults enjoy it doesn't mean that it's not still YA lit. The Hunger Games is another great example of YA lit that became popular with adults.

I've been a football fan since I joined the marching band in seventh grade. I miss watching it in person, but I can't stand the idea of going to my college's stadium with over 70,000 people. The game was pretty good, and I watched until the end because it was pretty close for a while.

The commercials weren't particularly amusing this time, although I did like the Darth Vader kid commercial and the "Black Betty" VW beetle commercial. The Groupon commercials were in bad taste, but I appreciate what they're trying to do. I checked the website (http://savethemoney.groupon.com/) to learn more about it. The commercials didn't do the best job of getting the message across, but they did stir controversy and managed to get people thinking about the problems. These commercials will probably get more attention than the sad ASPCA and UNICEF ones. Most of us tune out the sad, serious commercials; these commercials, however unintentionally offensive, will get attention for the causes.

I had such an amazing time at Heroes Con and after! I know there's photographic evidence of my tipsy singing somewhere, but I'm a little afraid to see it in the broad light of day. I'm amazed you tolerated my fangirling for so long. Mike really got a lot of attention for that shirt everywhere we went in Charlotte on Saturday. Everyone (except for those three Twilight fans) loved it!

(P.S. It's "hippiefemme" because I seem to have a knack for creating names that can be spelled a few hundred ways. One of my old names was "cheredemoiselle".)

We can't bring food into the convention, but they might allow cacti and animal bones!

Two things:

1. The last frame of that comic would make an AMAZING print.
2. I would love to bring you a cake or some other type of dessert for your birthday, but we aren't allowed to bring food into the convention center.

That's fantastic! I like the choice of red for the connecting lines.

Very nice. Probably not what you're going for, but the colors are pretty!

Very glad you posted another! I'm catching up on Podcasts and find these incredibly entertaining.