New icon, keyword _modhat. I have been wanting, for a while, an icon to represent when I'm not just flaunting my status (like the Suggestions Queen icon), but actually speaking with all authority of my status. And I've been wanting it with an actual physical hat on me. This icon is the eventual result.

This stars me, a little more lipstick than I usually wear, my purple hat, its many buttons (among them "I don't do 'Normal'", "Coffee's not working. Get the jumper cables!", and "I feel pretty, witty, and gay"), the mirror on the door of the closet in my kitchen (I'll have to do a photo tour of the apartment after everything is all set up), my happy little camera, the necklace that doesn't come off, The GIMP, and a font inspired by a source that some of you may recognize.

When I use this icon in suggestions or note_to_cat, I mean srs bzns.

I have had this hat since ... can it have been 1992? 1994? It was either a trip to Anchorage when I came back with green jeans and two sleeveless shirts, or it was a trip to Sears where I got a rainbow-corded belt and the hat. It had less bend to it then, and didn't have an orange paint stain. The hat saw me through high school, when I started pinning assorted buttons to it. You could sometimes tell the sort of mood I was in, by what was on the Hat. People started calling me "Joan of the Purple Hat" (as an alternative to "Pen Lady", for the pens hanging from the single beaded strand of hair). I was me. I had the hat. I had a status. I was recognizable, if not categorizable.

Mama was not exactly upset that I kept it, after the paint, but not happy that I was choosing to hang on to ruined clothing. I didn't care. It was my hat, my purple hat, and a little orange paint was not going to make me throw it out.

It's collected different buttons, over the years. I should probably review them and swap them out. It's battered and the wire in the rim has different little crimps and wobbles, but it's my hat.