Purple Realm

Well, the response to this competition was higher than any so far.
To all who entered - Darko, Rosie, Clint, Lydell, Tim, Kitty, Moe, Carol, Mart and David, (Hope I've not forgotten anyone) thank you all for taking the time to create something funny. I hope everyone has enjoyed it. I know I did!

It was hard to pick a winner from 18 images.
So I got each image as a saved page in Opera Mini, and decided on my favourite few. That wasn't too hard, it was choosing from the final cut that was difficult.
It took a lot of time, and finally I got down to two.

Thing is, I really just can't choose between them...
So, there are two winners this time!
One's a motivational, one's a LOLcat, and they're both fantastic.
The winning pictures are as follows: David's entry:
and this one of Kitty's:

Congratulations, both of you. Thank you for making me smile. I'm gonna need your details and I'll get your little prizes off to you sometime this year . (Sorry, we've got a bit of a backlog here.)

Again, thank you everyone for entering!

As most of you know, since May this year my life has been engulfed with change. Some of it wonderful, some of it just devastating, some a little of both. Some shared, some kept away. And all very unexpected.

Anyway, it's late, and I'm pondering upon everything and nothing, as is sometimes customary for me.

Sometimes I'm threatened and sent off by change, sometimes I welcome it with open arms, but like it or not, change is inevitable, and ultimately... Good. Whether or not the situation is a positive one when it is first at hand is irrelevant - we always draw something helpful from any change, eventually.

Then I started thinking about my family. We're a rather lucky sort - we've not had a great deal of fatal illness at all (and trust me, we've traced back our genealogy hundreds and hundreds of years, one family member's occupation was marked as, "imbecile" though) so far as we know none of us has been murdered or anything, we've never really had that sort of stuff. Just minor illness and a couple of freak accidents. (Perhaps I'll enlighten you all one day.) This led me to thinking about recent events and then onto my view of people.

Know it or not, I despise the majority of people. I don't know why, I just do. I hate most on instinct. I'm not elitist, I'm not someone with an ego to rival the size of the world, I'm just not a people person. Yet, I have a lot of empathy for people, whether I know them or not. You see? I'm eternally ambivalent.

Anyway, I realised that I love quite a few people IRL, despite the things I hate or dislike about them. But on top of the love is something else, something special in people I can't identify, something unique to that particular person, too, that sets a few out from the rest in the small space in my heart. These people are so special not out of sentiment, but qualities within each personality that I just find so... Special, I guess.

IRL, five people have an extra-special place in my heart. I'd trust two of them with my life.

Then I thought about here, and my friends here. I love most of the people on my list. (Some are on trial-basis, I do not want friends who aren't actually friends on there.) And, yep, there are those that stand out for that unexplainable reason again. The ones that mean just that little bit more to me. There are also five here. Funny, huh?

The thing is this - I trust nobody enough to feel I can tell them nearly anything. (I'll never trust anyone ever enough for everything.)

But I have found a person here on Opera that seems to know me. To know when to shut up, when to tell me off, how to say things. This is... New for me. So I don't really talk much to them. I'm kinda scared. Every time I trust someone enough for me to tell them something in confidence, it gets broken. This is just the way of my life, and I don't wanna worsen my view of people by letting it happen again, even though I'm pretty sure this one wouldn't do that... I never trust more than 90%.

Anyway, to this person I just wanna apologise for being so on-again off-again with talking... But hey, I bet you understand, even before I finish this sentence, right? .

Just... Don't break me. I'm outta glue right now.

I want to thank people for just being who they are, too. I'm not gonna do it individually, as I've bared more than I should already, but you know who you are, you know who you aren't. And if you don't, then I can't tell you .

Now, BUGGER OFF!

Kimmie

OH! PS - I'm gonna have a few recipes up before the year is out .

A year ago today I joined My Opera. I didn't really want to though - I had been anti-blog for a long time. I realise now that this was due to the likes of MySpace, Bebo and Facebook. Anyway, I was, at that time, already a member of a WAP chatsite, and that very morning I'd seen something in those forums that ticked me off. So, I made my very first blog post about it. It was also my very first rant!

Now, Opera has given me a lot of bad, a lot of good. Here is the good:

I met Clint very quickly, through Mik. He became my very first Opera buddy. He seemed like a cool guy, and I liked his sense of humour. He helped me with the smileys, and made me feel incredibly welcome. And he's even more special to me today. The next person I met was Issy , also through Mik. She was very kind and sweet to me, and also made me feel very welcome. She's still kind and sweet!

Through Clint, I met Kitty . Now, I was incredibly unsure of her at first. I didn't think we'd get along... And I remember a problem she had with an online shoe company, too. I helped her draft a letter to the company, and she made me feel very useful. Now, I know she's the best Kitty ever, and you know her English is superb. She's someone I wouldn't be happy without. Through Clint, I also met Fan . Again, I was very unsure about her, too, but as with Kitty, this dissolved quickly and she soon became one of the brightest rays of sunshine I'm blessed with.

Then, I met Stomyr , through Issy's blog. I'd seen him comment there and he seemed kinda cool, so I added him. He's always been so helpful and kind, and the loveliest Tiger there is.

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You softie!

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