Saturday, July 31, 2010

The first in a series of hopefully consecutive blogs

Wow. It's the last day of July.

(Stating the obvious results in short sentences. . .)

What this means to me:

1. There are exactly 23 days until school starts, in which time I will be. . .
2. Writing blogs.
3. Alternately dreading and looking forward to the start of school, because on the one hand it can't be worse than last year*, but on the other: schoolwork. And waking up at six, the ungodly hour to which I am becoming severely less accustomed to even seeing. . . And actual schoolwork. But I don't have to worry about this for more than 3 weeks.**
4. It's also Harry Potter/Jo Rowling's birthday. Short list is short.

So. See y'all tomorrow. (On the Ning. I'm horrible at remembering to cross-post things--and if I did, to where? To here on my assigned days, and then every other day on my other other blog? Complicated. Plus, I am quite fond of the Ning. It's like the mothership*** or whatever; must return to it. . .)

Footnotes:
* More challenging, yes, but I cannot mentally perceive it as worse. Sophomores have a reputation for being smug, and I'm almost certain this is why: "I've survived one year. Oh hells yes, I am a frakking CHAMPION at this."

** Barely more than three weeks. But still more.

*** Mother-blog-hosting-site?

Friday, July 30, 2010

Procrastionation, Pwned

The school year is quickly becoming an entrance to that long, dark, and metaphorical tunnel that everyone's always talking about. Given that I'm a) going to be a Junior next year which b) signifies the beginning of my "journey" through the IB program, my slight procrastination problem is looking more self-screwing that ever.

For example: right now, I should be finishing my summer math packet, be almost done with Song of Solomon, and nearly finished with the work that accompanies Act 1 of That French Play. In reality, I am a little more than halfway done with said math packet, on chapter nine (out of fifteen) in Song of Solomon, and I have yet to read further than the second page of Les Justes.

(Alex, you're not the only one who has an apparent fondness for fucking oneself over.)

So: partly* to showcase my brilliant anti-procrastination tactics, partly because I'm determined to finish this goddamn math packet before the night is over and therefore need to finish this blog up, here are some screen shots of the beautiful second "Homework" account I have created on my laptop. The idea is that I will do all computer-related homework on this account because I have blocked practically every distracting website I visit. MARVEL IN ITS GLORY.


Organized Word is organized!



New desktop background: because no matter how bad the school year gets, Harry Potter had it worse.
(Also, Harry Potter is inspiring.)


Look at how many websites I can't get access! SWEET FREEDOM.
(I have since added, like, ten more since I took this.)
(Also, after doing this, I realized that I could have just blocked blogspot.com, etc. Oh well. It's more... personalized this way.)



*Does anyone know what the difference between "partly" and "partially" is? I have trouble distinguishing between the two. According to dictionary.com, "partly" is defined as "in part; to some extent or degree; partially; not wholly" and "partially" is defined as "being such in part only; not total or general; incomplete." What? Not helpful, dictionary.com. Any advice? Is there a nuance between them?

Thursday, July 29, 2010

Missing from the airwaves

So, it's 11:47 and Thursday which means 'Hello. It's time for a sufficiently sub par blog post.'

Ick. Please allow me to digress and tell you about the one thing that's been on my consciousness lately. And that is me and my obsession with deadlines*.

I've set three project deadlines for the end of this month. They are, in no particular order:
  1. Finish reading The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
  2. Finish writing the second draft of my novel.
  3. Read Beastly for book club.
There was also something about finishing my art course in order to render Jake, my art mentor, completely and utterly speechless as well as pleased but that was a bit vague so it's definitely not happening.

To give you a better idea of these goals, some number figures:
  • I have approximately 145 pages of Huckleberry Finn to read divided by two days which may not seem like that much as I actually enjoy the book but I still have not managed to read more than 35 pages in a day.
  • I have approximately 12,201 words of outlined novel to write divided by two days which is certainly doable NaNoWriMo style but looking at my recent writing history, is going to be a stretch. I wouldn't call it writers' block, my problem, more, er... boredom.
  • Beastly is going to be the easiest goal and possibly the only one I fulfill (yeah, yeah, I know I should stay positive but... really?). I've just started it today but I'm already about seventy pages in so I'm not worried about finishing it by... tomorrow at one o'clock?
Fuck, I'm screwed. Why do I do this to myself?

*If you're wondering with all the boldness and italicizing, that's because I read somewhere that you should make your blog posts easy to read or in another word skimmable so I'm seeing if that works. I'm not sure I want to be skimmed but it's possibly better than being skipped simply because sometimes I don't know what I'm trying to say until after I've divulged a couple sentences that don't follow a lot of rules of order.


Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Of Blenders and Blunders

This blog comes to you in. . . PARTS. To be added as I think of them.

Part ONE-- (LeakyCon and the factors regarding my attendance thereabouts)
- I do have an HP-obsessed close friend, who has an aunt who has previously shown chaperone-willingness*
- My parents:
a.) will not pay for a trip that is only going to benefit/transport one person...
b.) ...especially if that person is their underaged daughter...
c.) ...who has gone to meet various acquaintances acquired through the Internet.
- Florida is very not near my current location.
HOWEVER-
I *plan* on actually making money between now and 2011.
My parents are trusting of aforementioned friend and her relatives.
Both parties aforementioned have discussed a joint venture to Florida**, which would benefit multiple people***

Part TWO (In which this post becomes more than my squee-ing over LeakyCon)
. . .alright, all I was going to do was squee over LeakyCon. . . did you know that today was Barbie in a Blender Day? Very cool, lawsuits about the first amendment and so forth, and now it's a holiday. Oh, and it's also International Blondie Month. (Not the hair color, not the pastry, the band.)

Part THREE (A tangent in which my blogging character-traits are strengthened)
Very early memory proving my uncoordinatedness, which I will be reminded of until the death of radio-- my mother was teaching me to dance like a raver to this song (by Blondie. . . you see my thought process?), which I quite enjoyed because it consisted of jumping up and down like a hyperactive child set to music. Socks + hardwood floor + overenthusiastic jumping = SCARY SMACKING SOUND****, face on floor.

Footnotes:
* Although this was to an anime convention, ~30 minutes away from current location.
** Specifically The Wizarding World of Harry Potter theme park, which is close to LeakyCon.
*** I don't know why I'm fixated on benefitting multiple persons, possibly so I don't seem selfish?
**** Cue laughter (mom), screaming (me). The sound made it more painful.

EDIT: YES to the week-of-imitating. (Blogger isn't letting me post comments, meh.)

Monday, July 26, 2010

LeakyCon '11

As you two (Alex and Rena) are aware, LeakyCon is next year. Now, I don't know how serious you two are about going, but I for one would love to go if it proves to be at all possible. However, there are several rather large problems that may prove difficult to resolve. I'm going to list them out here just so you know where I am, registration-wise, and as you may have the same problems, perhaps we can discuss them and see if going to LeakyCon is at all feasible...

1) Firstly and most importantly, one must be eighteen or older to attend LeakyCon unchaperoned. Unless you two are planning on aging two+ years in the span of one year, this presents a problem, namely that none of us are going to be eighteen next summer. (Unless, of course, there is something you're not telling us. But I have faith in you.) Essentially this leaves us with the option of attending the conference with either a parent or with another 21+ "chaperone," which is unfortunate but unavoidable. I can think of two solutions to this problem:
a) Get fake ID's/passports that make us out to be eighteen or older. However, I do not recommend this solution as
i) It is illegal and I would rather not have the government angry with me,
ii) It is illegal and also sneaky and I would rather not have my parents disown me*
iii) Regardless of the aforementioned flaws, it is illegal and I would rather not spend all that money only to have the LeakyCon people somehow find out and kick me off the premises.
b) Have a parent and/or 21+ person come with me, which is more difficult than it may sound because
i) We do not have tons of money to throw around all willy-nilly and neither of my parents would be keen on spending upwards of $200 dollars (including a plane ticket or gas money) to register for a conference that they are not the least bit interested in attending,
ii) I don't know very many people who are 21 or older, by which I mean I am not good friends/family friends/etc. with anyone who is 21 or older who also loves Harry Potter enough to pay to go to a conference about it.

2) LeakyCon is pretty expensive and while I'd argue that it would ultimately be completely worth it... it's expensive. Between now and the time that registration closes, but preferably between now and September because after the latter prices go up, I would have enough money to be able to afford paying for the conference and a plane ticket. Still. It's expensive. And yes, I would have to pay for it myself... my parents are wonderful people but they don't buy me everything I want, especially not a $200 conference registration.
a) There aren't really any solutions to this problem, except to, like, make money. w00t.

3) I don't know about y'alls, but I actually don't know very many Nerdfighters/other hardcore HP fans. Of course, it can and should be correctly argued that HP gatherings are the perfect place to meet people, but they are also not the sort of place you want to go to completely uninitiated, you know? It wouldn't be a problem if, say, you two attended, but. (Always 'but.') Easier said than done.

Sadly, LeakyCon '11 is looking to be a mere dream, BUT perhaps it will work out somehow. I'd love to hear your thoughts on it! :)

* They wouldn't actually disown me, but they would be very very pissed off, to say the least. Also I don't think there is any way I would be able to sneak off to Florida without them suspecting something, namely that I snuck off to Florida.

Saturday, July 24, 2010

Nerdfightersecrets

Re: Jeeber-- I don't outright hate him, I hate his haters and I hate his fangirls. Both of which he hath spawned. It takes an incredible person to generate the kind of reaction people have to him. It's nearly scary. If all of those preteen girls devoted as much enthusiasm/time/money to *insert worldsaving cause here*, it would be fixed by now. He's like all of the Beatles* in one terribly feminine package, plus the Internet.

It's funny, one man's deep dark secret is another's "Pssh, yeah, so?" is another's "Yeeeeah... I can top that."** This reminded me of something I've come across on the Nerdfighter Ning, wherein secrets (Nerdfighting-related, of course. There's a more general one, but I haven't looked at it) can be posted anonymously. Some are silly, which might be the point of the blog, to have people read them and relate to them, and chuckle to themselves and feel more connected to Nerdfighteria/thousands of faceless entities in their computer. Others are just fracking deep and sad. Some are a bittersweet medium. Two examples, because I don't want to spoil the rest for you...

1. "Sometimes I wonder what John Green smells like."

2. "Do I love Doctor Who because the show is awesome, or because I'm waiting for the Doctor to whisk me away? I wish there was, just, more to life."***



* Excuse the comparison, Jeeber doesn't deserve it in my opinion, but it's the best I could come up with.

** I don't know what I was expecting from Vita's, I'm just melodramatic with an overactive imagination.

*** I feel the same way, only because after 4 years I've finally accepted that the whisking away isn't going to come in the form of a Hogwarts letter. Oh, fiction. How you burn.

Friday, July 23, 2010

(Eh eh eh) (Umbrella?) (No. J-Biebz.)

Guys.

I have something serious to confess. Like, it's actually as if I'm turning this post into a Horcrux not only because I'm sharing with you a piece of my soul but also because it would be great and ultimately a whole lot safer for me if I hid this post somewhere that nobody (except maybe Harry Potter) could find it.

I do not hate Justin Bieber.

In fact, I find some of his songs almost... catchy.

Yeah, this pretty much is a Horcrux. I'm sure I caused somebody to commit suicide by the thought that somebody, somewhere doesn't outright hate J-Biebz.

(Murder. That's a requirement, right? Does being an enabler count?)

As a disclaimer, let me maintain that I find the whole concept of J-Biebz to be absurdly ridiculous. Like, have you heard him? Have you compared his voice to that of the seven year old boy I babysit? Have you noticed the distinct similarities between the two? Also, Ludacris rapping about a 13 year old girl waking him up in the morning is somewhat disturbing and potentially pedophilic, even if it is meant as a lovely little trip down memory lane.

Plus, the four songs of his that I've heard (One Time, Baby, One Less Lonely Girl, and now - for the first time ever - Never Let You Go) all sound so freaking identical. I just listened to three in a row (the first two and the last of the aforementioned songs, if you're curious) and I can already feel a headache coming on.

Come to think of it, that might just be my brain melting out of my ears. I have the urge to slam my head against a brick wall just to restore something rough and concrete. J-Biebz's songs are so... gooey.

(One may make the argument that hitting my head would, in actuality, hurt my brain and make it less stable rather than more stable. However, the sentiment remains.)

So no, I'm not claiming that J-Biebz is a musical genius or even a particularly good singer. If nothing else, he deserves credit for managing to strike millions of prepubescent girls as extremely adorable. Or "hawtt," if that's more your style.

He's three months older than me (thanks, Google!) but he looks and sounds much younger. And despite the fact that I may be morally obligated to fight for the rights of teenage artists, I have trouble taking Bieber seriously, much less think of him as a serious artist. Or an artist at all. Or even as, like, a real person.

Still... that strangely alluring "eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh, eh" sure does get your foot tapping, or perhaps more likely, your twelve your old heart pumping.

P.S., since he's from the ever lovely Canadia... he's all yours, Alex. ;)

Thursday, July 22, 2010

But the babies need love!

I know, I know. Shut up, Alex, parenting is a touchy subject. But you know what? No, I will not. Kids need love and I am going to stand on this soapbox and tell you that until you all understand (or until dinnertime).

I blogged about this very issue before. And I'm not sure if anyone agreed with me but by the end of this, I hope that you will. Otherwise, I feel bad for your children, should you have them now or at any point in the future. Commence the Love Your Child argument.

In our culture, we have this weird idea that you can spoil a child by giving it too much attention, love and possessions*. The Princeton web definition of spoiled is: "Having the character or disposition harmed by pampering or oversolicitous attention." For some reason we think that you can give your child too much attention. That it can feel too cared for. And as a spoiled child, I want to say that I like it. I am so happy knowing that whenever I call out for help, my mom and dad will be there. Whether I'm crying in my room or stranded at a party, I can count on them. Why is that a bad thing?

Babies have basic needs. Yes, food and diapers, but that's not it. As well as physical needs they also have emotional ones. They need you. So if you've just sat down to have a cup of tea while they nap and then they start crying but when you go check on them they're not hungry and don't need to be changed maybe they just needed you. Maybe they were lonely, or scared or just wanted their parent and how could you ignore those needs just before you can't see them? How could you say that they're less important, irrelevant and worthy of being dismissed?

So anyway there's this pervasive idea that if you make a habit of going to your child every time it cries, it will become accustomed to that and start to cry just to see you. But what I'm asking is why is that a bad thing? It wants to see you. It needs you. Babies aren't manipulative or conniving. They don't lie there and think about how they can make their parents miserable. Or at least, I don't think they do. If your baby cries just to see you, maybe it's saying it wants to see you more.

Why do we think a child that feels loved is bad? Why is it if an infant can count on their parents to listen to it, we see that child as spoiled, harmed and overindulged?

I really don't know. What I do know is that whenever I hear a baby crying, I can't stand it. It's like listening to someone ask for help and be disregarded. And maybe I'm getting overly metaphorical here but wouldn't the world be a less sucky place if we all listened to each other's needs?

So yeah, when I was a baby, my mom came to see me whenever I cried. Did that harm my disposition? Technically, we can't know that it didn't, but I'm going to guess that I'm a healthier person because of it. Even as an infant, feeling cared for is important. And I love my parents. I trust them and yes, they irritate the shit out of me sometimes, but I know they'll never ignore me. So thanks for spoiling me, parents.

*And though I agree that you should not give a child everything it asks for, I do think you should give it everything it needs. So I'm not saying BUY YOUR KIDS LOTS OF TOYS AND CELL PHONES AND CARS OR ELSE. I'm saying GIVE YOUR CHILD A HUG. (Sorry for the CAPS)

Monday, July 19, 2010

Commandeered by a pro*

(*Who sometimes has trouble spelling inanely simple words and also some difficult ones.)

First of all, I have something to tell you: This is not Vita.

Now that we've got that out of the way, HELLOOOOO! All thorough today, I kept thinking Did I forget to blog yesterday? I totally forgot to blog yesterday. Then I would actually think about it and realize that I did write a blog yesterday. Refer to below this post.

I actually got so entrenched in the idea that I'd forgotten my normal Sunday routine that I opened up the blog homepage and was going to write an absurdly long comment on Vita's Monday post about how sorry I was that I'd forgotten after you were both just talking of blog quality of late and then I saw that Vita hadn't written a post today but I had indeed yesterday.

So I decided to commandeer Monday. Hello, Monday-ers. It's not going to be Monday anymore by the time you read this because I know that the regular readers of this both live in time zones that are at least two hours behind me and as it is 10:26 here, that would make it tomorrow there. Hi future, what's the weather like?**

This whole taking over your day thing reminds me of this idea I once had where for a week, we wouldn't write on our specific days but rather randomly pick a day if it hadn't been picked already and blog using the group admin (which I believe is called Realta) on whatever days we felt like it without saying who had written it and the readers would have to guess who had written it in the comments. To add to this, we could try to mimic each other's style so as to confuse the readers.***

I thought it would be incredibly entertaining. What do YOU think? Should we DO this? I LIKE it.
I'm becoming mj. Must stop unhealthy mimicking. Also, on the subject of mj, I am TOTALLY doing BEDA.

**Seriously? If I was going to ask a question of the future, it would be about the weather? Not likely.
***To clarify this, I will give an example: It's Wednesday so you go on the RP homepage and see that no one has written a blog today so you log onto Realta (I can tell you the username and password if you've forgotten) and write something, in theory trying to pretend to be the other bloggers of this blog (if you want to throw in some random foreign languages, use French for Vita and Spanish for Rena) (if you want to be Rena, tell hilarious excerpts from your childhood; if you want to be Vita, talk about Drama and gay rights) etc., etc., etc. Or you could just be yourself and half us think you're someone ELSE pretending to be you (it just got a whole lot more complicated)...

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Puffy hair boy

Today, I was sitting in my friend's living room and playing Rock Band like a typical North American zombie when I started telling a story. It started like this: So there was this puffy hair boy.

And everyone laughed. Is this reasonable?

The story:

On Thursday, I went to a volunteer banquet (amazing food) as a prerequisite to volunteering today and sat down a seat away and across from these two boys, one of whom had eerily puffy hair and slightly weasel like look on his face*. The other one was better looking and farther away. In between me and my potential summer romances sat my mom. *facepalm*

Throughout dinner, I stared at them and looked away and they stared at me and looked away. We're teenagers; this is what we're good at. The point is that we didn't talk. I noticed puffy haired boy had a blue shirt and then we went home.

Yesterday, I went to a block party in the middle of town where there was this funny lunatic magician who said he was going to murder a small child but never did and when we were going to find a parking spot, I thought I saw puffy hair boy in an orange traffic vest but he was wearing a white volunteer tee shirt and a hat so I wasn't sure.

On the way home, I saw him again and then proceeded to stare out the window (as did everyone else in the car). And then he looked up and saw me. In the face. I looked away.

Today, I woke up before 9, walked to the beach and got a boring volunteer job at the table with my mom. And then there was puffy hair boy with his better looking cohort. And this time, he stared. Every couple seconds. I was afraid he had recognized me. And I know this because his back was turned to us and who turns and looks behind them multiple times per minute? Starers.

This is my non-story. There's also another part where a couple hours later I went looking for my free volunteer lunch and asked him for directions to the food. I was smooth, like lotion. "Where can I ascertain some food," I said to which he paused and then replied, "Back at the museum." And I said, "Really? After I just walked all this way?" and he stared at me. Hot.

I'm going to go watch a Hugh Dancy story now. And reflect on my non-experiences with the opposite sex.

*this could be considered rude and inappropriate but I'm simply telling it how it is.

Saturday, July 17, 2010

We's Cool, Yo.

It is the time of blogging, peeps!

Like Vita said, I'm pretty sure the quality of my blogs dropped off somewhere. I should try and fix that, yes? Yes. But, in a way, it's because the pressure to blog well has gone down. When we started out with this group-blog, I felt the need (even if it was all in my head, like most things are) to keep up the façade that I have an interesting, bloggable life/endless ideas for thought-provoking blogs, because I saw that both of you did, and thus if I didn't I would be FAILING YOU. Now we've done this for over a year, I know it's okay to skip a day or blog about having nothing to blog about/daily life or whatever without being labeled an utter failure at the Internet. Not that I'm saying it's okay to give up on this*, but we're cool that way.** And, these types of blogs are more like everyday conversation (take that whichever way you will, whether standard communication has been reduced to mindless chatter, or whether we're familiar enough to carry on normally via-blog), rather than near-daily soliloquies of intelligence, wit, and observation.

Planning my blogs ahead of time would not only produce more readable and "deep" content so as to be more entertaining to the readers of this blog, but it would probably improve my writing skills as a whole. And they could stand some improvement. Ah, well. There's always BEDA.***

Footnotes
* Although I haven't. I don't know if it looks that way. My life has just been average and void of suitably bloggable thoughts as of late...
** I mean "cool" in the pseudo-gangsta "In my mind we are close enough to do this without it being stressful because others will still understand/accept it"-way. Or should I say we're jokes? Yeah.
*** Assuming you guys are participating? Shall we go back to the Ning? (Methinks MJ's been updating it or something.)

Friday, July 16, 2010

Bloggity Blog Blog

Today in chronological order:

1) A 3.6 earthquake literally jolted me out of my slumber at about 5:00 this morning. Talking with my friends, we realized that we all had the same reaction: "That feels like an earthquake... but it can't be; we're in Maryland. Maybe it's a really huge truck?" My biggest regret is that I was only half-awake for it and thus the entire experience feels somewhat dreamlike. I think it helped me go back to sleep, though. It was sort of relaxing. (I know that earthquakes can be massively destructive and I'm not making light of that, but c'mon. You have to admit that when they're not doing any damage, earthquakes are pretty damn cool.)

2) After handing in a potentially crappy essay and consuming two extremely greasy pieces of pizza (courtesy of the IB office), I finished my two-week IB "enrichment" program for the summer. To put it simply, it was basically a summer school that one attends not for lack of passing classes but to prep for IB next year (99.5% it was compromised of former MYP students entering IB). Unfortunately - but hardly surprisingly - it reinforced the fact that for the next two years I am going to be juggling a truckload of work. On the plus side, all of the teachers (whom I may not even have next year, but no matter) were really cool and despite the fact that it was mostly just review, I actually feel like I learned something.

3) I took a two hour nap. Sleeping is fun.

4) I changed my guitar strings for the first time and I think it was largely successful! I ought to have done this, like, a year ago... oh well. It's actually kind of fun after you get over the initial shock of "oh crap I'm taking my guitar apart."

5) I lied and once again did not post the extremely vague post that I said I would post in a post two posts ago. (Hehe.) I f'reals promise that I shall post it this upcoming Monday.

6) I start Driver's Ed on Monday. Not really looking forward to it, especially because my friend who was maybe going to do it with me never actually signed up for it... haha, but it'll be fine. I'll be getting it over with so that I can hopefully get my Provisional before the end of my Junior year. Speaking of, I still need to get my permit... but I'm going to do that after I finish these classroom lessons. Better to wait and pass the test the first time, right?

My goal from here on out is to, essentially, get better at blogging. Strangely, I feel like my blog posts a year ago were better than my blog posts now - you'd think I would have improved, but no, I've just been getting lazy. The problem is not that I don't have good ideas but that I procrastinate and then end up delivering you a blog post of similar quality to, er, this one.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

I want a lot of things

It's bloggity blog blog time. Huzzah. Once more I am faced with a conundrum. Nothing to write about. Nothing is severe. I suppose I could talk about rice crackers or this one time when a guy in Prince Edward Island asked me for a massage (serious creepy times) but 1. rice crackers aren't extremely interesting, however crunchy and delicious they may be and 2. I don't really want to relive that scene and it's weird that I brought it up in the first place.

I don't want to bore you. I hate wasting people's time. Time is invaluable and we don't have unlimited resources. Allow me to pause for a moment and thing of something meaningful... okay, all else has failed and I've made up my mind. I'm showing you a piece of writing that I've been debating whether or not to share with anyone. Now the debate is closed and I'm hitting publish.

As a note before this piece, I'd like to say that I've been reading a lot lately and thinking (in syncronicity with my older sister) that I want to meet a boy and have a summer romance. And this is incredibly naive and somewhat shallow of me but that's what we both want. Experience in the field. So this is about that, sort of.

I want a lot of things
I want to fall in love.
I want to lie in the grass with my eyes closed as the sun kisses my fingers and I kiss you.
I want to wake up smiling and not open my eyes so that I can hold on to the dream of you that I can already feel myself forgetting.
I want to hold your hand and have you hold me back like a lifesaver in the ocean, your one chance for survival.
I want to taste your breath and feel your heart beating, as fast as mine, under my hand.
I want to sit cross legged on the sidewalk facing you, as people navigate around us, and stare into your eyes like they contain the secrets of the world, or, at the very least, a glimpse at you, behind the physical exterior.
I want to know you, not too much so that you can still surprise me but enough that I can feel like I'll never know enough.
I want to trace the lines on your feet as you lie on the couch watching actors on a screen play characters with emotions of love that don't feel remotely similar to ours.
I want to memorize your laugh and your smile and then realize that's impossible.
I want you to think I am beautiful, not just that I look it.
I want us to sit on the beach and watch the trains go by and not say a word because silence isn't always scary.
In short, I want a lot.
Probably more than I deserve.
I've always been selfish and greedy
but maybe if I had these things,
I wouldn't need to be anymore. Maybe if I had you,
I wouldn't want anything.

Poetry is subjective. I know this and I think Vita was trying to prove this point with her poem, or maybe she wasn't. I didn't find those last three lines to be the saddest I've ever read. I don't know what I thought of the poem exactly.

I have to go. Bedtime. Tense house. Need sleep. Catch you on the flip flop.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Writing/Naming Styles

I've been analyzing my writing using this thing for quite a while, only stopping to start this blog about it because it's strange and awesome and could very likely be of use to you guys. The first thing I tried was my blog here on the 4th of July (the last blog wherein I actually talked about things), and I got Stephen King.

So, yeah.

But then I decided to do a very decidedly scientific thing and analyze other samples of my writing to see if the results were consistent. They weren't. I got JD Salinger twice, George Orwell once, Shakespeare once (I know, right?) with the most frequent being Margaret Atwood. I wasn't familiar with her style of writing enough to be flattered by this, so I Wikipedia'd her. I like the comparison now, but I still can't form an opinion as to whether or not it's accurate.

I don't know who I would've LIKED to have gotten (*cough*MaureenJohnsonJohnGreenDouglasAdams*coughcough*), nor do I know all the authors entered into the analysis-thing. Or what criteria it bases the results on (I'd say it's more on word choice than genre or subject, though). I just thought it was entertaining. And in theory I could continue to search through everything I've written that's conveniently accessible on my computer and analyze it until I get the result I want.

My last scientific venture was to submit an excerpt from my novel instead of blog posts, so that the writing would reflect how I write dialog and whatnot in SERIOUS WRITING FORM as opposed to rambling about my life non-seriously. Unprecedented results. Woo. Chuck Palahnuik, the guy who wrote Fight Club. I haven't even seen the movie but I'll take that as a compliment. Yes? OH OH OH AND: Excerpt from my uncompleted Harry Potter-Doctor Who crossover fanfiction (bask in the supremely nerdy glory of that phrase...) got JK ROWLING. Previous results have shown subject is irrelevant, so that proves the style is at least somewhat right. Right? Whatever. Yay.

Also (I sense this post is getting long, but I guess that will make up for my recently very short ones), I finished Catching Fire (the suspense was ruined for me by my knowledge that there had to be another book, thus realistically no one important would die...) I like everyone except for Katniss now (I'll go into specifics later, in another post/the comments). Which was probably not supposed to happen, but I'm definitely going to read Mockingjay. What interested me more were the names of the characters, which can be broken down into 4 categories:

Plants And Nature: Katniss, Primrose, Gale, Posy, President Snow, Haymitch arguably
Random Cool-Sounding Nouns (Correct Spelling Optional): Peeta, Rue, Marvel, Glimmer, Cashmere, Twill, Wiress
Names Ending In A Long E: Annie, Bonnie, Rory, Posy, Effie
Roman: Cinna, Caesar, Portia, Brutus

At first I just thought these were weird choices, but then: what do most modern/common names mean? Most are foreign and/or archaic, about God/justice/defense/peace/hope-- concepts that have probably been corrupted for these people, having to watch the country fall into ruin and then watch their kids go on a killing spree to make up for it. So they just pick things relating to their occupation or that sound cool.

There's a Hunger Games name generator somewhereabouts on the internets, which I can't find. But here's what I remember of it + my addendum:

1.) Second syllable of your middle name (If it's one syllable or you don't have one, or you're rocking the Harry Truman initial-only thing: second syllable of your last name)
2.) Add "ket" to that = first name
3.) First letter of your favorite teacher's last name = middle initial (if you want a whole middle name, pick a word you like the sound of that starts with that letter)
4.) Plant
5.) Add a verb to 4. = last name.

Mine: Chelleket Whistle Basilrun-- I'm pretty sure I'd get killed on the third day.

Monday, July 12, 2010

Poetry: Abridged

So.

This isn't what I promised I would write about today. Sorry; that will for sure be on Friday. I didn't have time to finish writing it today, what with my summer-school-going and Harry-Potter-marathon-watching and my poem-analyzing.

Which is what I'm going to (very briefly) talk about: poetry. Perhaps you recall the many times that I expressed my disinterest in poetry, primarily because I didn't understand it? Well, I have by no means been transformed into a poetry expert, but I have at least been enlightened to the ways of poetry. It's all about emotion - not the poet gushing out their every heartbreak, but the reader or listener's (that doesn't sound like a word) reaction. It's what you feel. It's what the poem means to you. And yes, even with all that open ended interpretation, it is still possible to interpret a poem incorrectly, but there is no right/wrong answer per say.

Anyway, read this poem and then read it about four more times and then tell me that the last three lines aren't some of the saddest and most beautiful words you've ever read. (If you don't know what the Vietnam War Memorial in DC looks like... it pretty much looks like this, but bigger.)

Sunday, July 11, 2010

Cheating and Soccer (completely unrelated to each other)

So I read this book (The Sky is Everywhere, by Jandy Nelson. READ IT. I'm not even kidding. It's like Sarah Dessen meets John Green--okay, so maybe adding John in there is extreme, but still. It's GOOD). A really, really, good book. I've read a couple really, really good books lately. I love reading good books. On a side, I'm possibly developing an inferiority complex in regard to my own work.

But that's not what this decidedly purposeful blog is going to be about. I feel the need to add a disclaimer but I don't know what said disclaimer should announce. So I'll just give it to you. I don't even know where to start or how to go about this but I do have something to say so I'll just say it.

Cheating is bad. I know that. And I mean the unfaithful, kiss/have sex with another person who is not your significant other kind of cheating, to be clear. I'm not saying you should forgive someone for cheating* and I'm definitely not saying you should stay with a cheater but if someone is trying to give you an explanation, I think you should listen.

I've never been in one such situation and I can't know how I'd react but whenever I read or see a fictitious character completely shut someone off based on anything from walking in on the person with another person to hearing it from someone else, I can't help but lose respect for that character. If you ever loved a person or even liked them at all, wouldn't you give them a chance to tell their story? Why do we have to be dramatic and tell people we never want to see them again?

I'm not saying that cheating is cool. I already said it's not. If someone agrees to be with you and only you, you deserve better if they break that agreement. But please don't be silly enough to forget that there are multiple sides to every story. And what's the worst thing that could happen if you hear out the cheater? Your broken heart hurts a little bit more and then you make an informed decision to never speak to the cheater? I think that's better than hot headedly writing them off forever. But again, this is all theory.

Anyway, maybe this quasi rant wasn't any better than my sleep deprived musings but I felt the need to get this off my chest.

I feel the need to mention something about the World Cup because it happened today but I don't really have anything. I think losing sucks and I'm really sorry that Netherlands lost (or that anyone had to lose, in fact). I know losing sucks. When I was a kid, I cried at the end of every Monopoly game.** If it makes you feel any better, Scotland didn't even qualify (have I ever mentioned that my dad was born in Scotland?). And not getting a chance sucks almost as much as being second place. Or maybe more.

*can I just say randomly that I find this a word inadequate? You cheat on your diet, you cheat at Monopoly but cheating on a person? I guess if you have written rules to your relationship it could work but do we have no other word we can use? I put forward butt-faced miscreant. But that's two words unless you count the hyphen as a word break.
**Which, by the way, was invented by a Quaker who wanted to demonstrate the pitfalls of capitalism.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Nostalgia: Always A Good General Topic

It's not even 10:30 but I am insane amounts of tired right now. As I should be, having driven myself to near-pointless insomnia as of late. Anyway...

Were either of you guys on Neopets when you were younger? Pre-YouTube/Twitter/Other social-networking-what-have-yous Neopets was teh ultimate awesum. I was an addict in 4th-7th grade. The games were time-consuming and fun and besides that there was an entire virtual world to do little tasks in. The pet creature-things (among other species, unicorns, wolves, and dragons could be owned. Awesome.) never died but loads of points were spent on food anyway. Those things were REAL, dammit. I went back on it for the first time in years once I decided on this as a blog topic, for research, and wasted about 2 hours on it. It's changed, but I still got drawn in really quickly. Ahh, nostalgia. It's strange to think of a.) The Internet and b.) a period of time in my life that ended only 3 years ago as being nostalgic, but it is. If/when I ever have to explain to future generations that a pet-based computer reality was how I spent most of my free time and have fond memories of during my childhood, it's going to be awkward.

And with that, I bid you buenos noches. (Obligatory promise of better blog later. Seriously though.)

Friday, July 9, 2010

Albino Black Sheep

Hey, y'all. I desperately need to go to sleep, so I leave you with the promise of a legitimate blog on Monday. (I already know what I'm going to say, promise!)

In the meantime: Did you guys ever hear of a website called AlbinoBlackSheep? It was all the rage when I was in fourth, especially fifth, and maybe even sixth grade; Youtube wasn't invented until I was in sixth grade, so it was sort of the go-to place for stupidly entertaining videos. It's where an entire generation (or at least my entire fifth grade class) learned the enthralling beat of the Badger Song, the seductive allure of I'm a Kitty Cat, the genius of the Llama Song... and, of course, the now-infamous Numa Numa lip-syncing incident.

'Twere good times. Of course, we have since moved on to far more mature things, such as Mister Raisintoast and Obama Rick Roll'ing McCain...

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Broad Fantasy Statements

I should really start to write these things before 11:20 at night when I'm about to brush my teeth and I can barely keep my eyes open.

I'm really tired right now only I can't bring myself to get out of this chair. I suppose this is all due to the strenuous day I had in which I didn't change out of my pajama pants and stayed in the house all day (unless you count going to the mailbox). You know how it is with the reading fantasy books (really just one, though) and knitting and eating brownies and ice cream bars. It's tough.

I'm so shallow. Urg.

I don't really enjoy fantasy books. That's a pretty broad statement, I know and also flawed seeing as how I'm a self professed Harry Potter nerd but I'm limited in my fantastical scope. As for context, I'm reading Sabriel, by Garth Nix, for book club and it's not exactly gripping.

Today, at my dinner table we had some insanely mental conversation, some of which involved what it is we don't like about the fantasy genre exactly. I wasn't completely satisfied with any of what we came up with except for that Sabriel is very much a reactive characters. She only makes decisions when she has to. She only reacts, never does anything without an external push. It's infuriating.

That's all the thought provoking material you're going to get tonight. It's now 11:33 and I'm apparently going on a hike tomorrow in the 30 degree weather. I don't know what that is in American but last week it was no hotter than 17 C so it's a dramatic change. And I just talked about the weather... yeah.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

The Case For Complaining and Worrying About Things Arbitrarily

It's funny how three and a half minutes can put me in my place.

My life is not bad. My life is not particularly hard. I really have almost no legitimate grievances with my personal state of being. I shouldn't complain about things. But, I do. A sampling of such things: (just from today, mind you...)

--It's HOOOOOT.
--I got almost no sleep last night because it was HOOOOOT.
--I had to get up at 7 in the morning today.
--I have blisters on the backs of my heels and they hurt like mad.
--I have 8 mosquito bites on my left ankle and they itch like mad.
--I have writer's block.

Are any of these things life-threatening to me? Not really.* Yet they're what I think about. Things like the video about Esther and the HPA make me feel sort of guilty that these things are what I devote my worry to. The world is much bigger and could be much worse than the part of it I see. But in a way, that ignorance is sanity. If my time was spent worrying about all the issues and tragedies and just plain bad shit that happens to everyone-who-is-not-me in the entire universe my brain would explode. Thinking about distressing things but knowing that you have no realistic control over them produces a mind-bending amount of stress and a sense of personal worthlessness. **

So, I present the idea that vapid, personal small-worry is good. It's distracting. Not, like, bad-distracting...in a more prioritizing-type way. ("Okay, there's a splinter in everyone's eye but there is a motherfucking plank in yours. Like, it's probably really damn painful. Possibly held in place by a rusty nail. What are you going to do first?"***) It has focus. Steps can be taken to fix it. Once it is fixed it feels like an accomplishment; it's relaxing to have nothing trivial to angst over, and then the focus can be directed towards concern on a more global scale. Which is good.

Does this make any sense or am I just yammering my way around the fact that, basically, I'm sorry other people but I kind of enjoy being wrapped up in myself? I don't know anymore, on with the footnotes:


* Though it could be argued that this list encompasses global warming and the threat of death by sleep-deprivation...
** I was like this for a bit. It's depressing and infuriating if you dwell on it. So what I'm trying to say here is: don't.
*** Bible quote (probably unsuccessfully) paraphrased. I added the rusty nail.

Monday, July 5, 2010

meh

*EDIT/Preamble*
I just watched this video and now I feel like an even bigger jerkface. Gosh, I don't know what to say except... mrrrrrghgksljsfkakalf I don't understand how the world can be so incredibly good and so incredibly bad at the same time. Also, I no longer believe that I have any right to complain about anything today. I'm sorry, I don't know how to articulate what I'm feeling, partially because I'm not sure what that emotion is, but... yeah. Perhaps you understand.

Today's blog post comes to you in the first five letters of the alphabet:

a) The fourth of July was really fun, as it always is. I hung out with some friends and a quasi-stranger (but nice) guy from Texas and then walked over to the nearby college and watched the fireworks. We sat around playing cards for an hour and a half or something and it was so nice to just be. To just be there and enjoy our time together and celebrate our country.

I've never understood people who are content with watching the fireworks on TV. Nothing can replace that amazing feeling of being in close proximity to hundreds of other people who are all there for the same reason. Besides, TVs can't transmit that ground-shakin' (hand-clappin'!) firework-blastin' boom. I mean, who wants to miss those precious seconds during which you genuinely fear the loss of your hearing?

b) Have you ever gotten irrationally overprotective when a friend started liking something you like? It would have been fine if we both liked this thing to begin with and then happened to find out that we both liked that something later on, but because I've always liked this and a friend just started liking it, it kind of pisses me off. Normally, I don't mind; in fact, it's kind of cool, because it's one more person to join the party, you know? Right now, though, I sincerely wish they had never heard of it. I think it's because it's something that I love a lot (no, not Harry Potter) and it has a really special meaning to me, and from my previous experiences with this person, I guess I just feel like this person doesn't appreciate that. I'm sure I sound like an asshole right now and I'm sorry, but I guess I just don't want them to trivialize it because it's so important to me and I really don't think they understand that. I think they just think it makes them "cool" and "unique" and "indie" for liking it, when in reality, a) it truthfully doesn't and b) even if it did, that's not at all what it's about.

(I'm sorry for being vague; I don't want to get into specifics and then be an even bigger jerk for talking about them on the internet...)

c) With the obvious exception of wizard rock, I rarely listen to "indie rock." It's too difficult to keep up with, and more importantly, it is often too crappy to endure. However, I have somewhat recently discovered this band known as The Indelicates and I sort of love them a lot? If you're interested, I recommend listening to this and this and this. (And another one called "Our Daughters Will Never Be Free," but I can't find a good version of it on Youtube.)

d) I'm really trying not to be mad at the organizers of Roflcoptour, because I understand that they can only play where they have a venue and they can't stop in every state and they don't have tons of money or time... but I am certainly mad at the circumstances, at least. Originally, their 7/22 show was going to be MD, VA, or DC. And then they changed it to MD, VA, DC, PA, or NJ. And now it's confirmed to be in NJ. And I am starting to realize why people hate New Jersey so much... it takes your dreams and EATS them. Screw you, New Jersey.

...Perhaps I am being harsh. I don't hate New Jersey, even if I am incredibly jealous of it right now. Still, this sucks. Like, nobody I love comes to DC and I don't understand WHY. It's the frigging capital of the country; surely there is a law about this?

ALSO ALSO ALSO, they are playing TWO shows in North Carolina! TWO! I mapquested them because I was pissed off and they are either half an hour or four and a half hours away from each other, depending on the location of the second town... so I will give them the benefit of the doubt and say they are four hours away from each other... but STILL, the fact that there are two shows in one state and yet there are none near me makes me want to cry. And yes, I am only about two and a half hours away from NJ, but a) my parents are definitely not going to drive me that far to see some show that they don't care about and b) even if they were willing, I have driving school that day and while I could make the show IF it were close-ish to me, I can't freaking skip driving school to see Roflcoptour, much as I wish I could! UGH.

e) Currently, I'm reading Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison, Les Justes by Albert Camus, and I Am the Messenger by Markus Zusak. The first two are for my English and French classes respectively. I should clarify that when I say "I am reading," I mean that I read thirteen pages of Song of Solomon about a week ago and haven't picked it up since and that I intend to read Les Justes in the near future. I'm sure they're both very good; it's just that the first is difficult to get into at first and the second is, er, in French.

Sunday, July 4, 2010

A General Update

It's 11:02 and I'm tired so rather than come up with something meaningful to write, I thought I'd give you a brief update on the goings on of my oh-so exciting existence.

Update 1: My keyboard is spazzing out. The keys are being difficult and I have to work twice as hard at typing.

Update 2: My sister saw Kellan Lutz (who plays Emmet) at the Eclipse premier in London but she said that she would have rather seen How To Train Your Dragon with me (which, incidentally, is a very enjoyable movie). I do miss my sister.

Update 3: Eclipse was mediocre. The third time is apparently not the charm. I feel really bad for Taylor Lautner due to the fact that he must feel horribly objectified what with not being allowed to wear a shirt ever. Rpattz is, as ever, himself. Kristen seems to be grasping at straws to show emotion. Charlie remains the best character they have in that... (series, saga, movie, atrocitity...) whatever it is.
We--being my strange posse and I--did dress up as Harry Potter characters for the midnight release. I knit myself a tie and wore it and it was generally awesome.

Update 4: At the Eclipse midnight showing, as we were walking through the parking lot someone yelled out there window to ask what corner we were working, making a prostitute reference. It must be said that one of us, not me, was wearing a rather short skirt but, even so, these things are hardly appropriate. We did not think to yell back "Ask your mom," though, if we had, it would have given us immense satisfaction.

Update 5: I read a crazy good book called Thirteen Reasons Why (by Jay Asher). It was the first time this summer that I stayed up until 3:30am reading a book but I had to finish it, for some reason. Note: suicide is ridiculously selfish. That is all.

Update 6: It's not all that warm here. Apparently, it's going to get hot on Tuesday but I'll believe it when I don't have to wear a sweater around my house anymore.

Update 7: I've started watching Glee.

I think that's it. Well, no, there's probably more but that's all you're getting tonight. I shall be more lively on Thursday, in theory.

Saturday, July 3, 2010

Apple Pie is Dutch (updated)

Very, very late. But since the blog is set to Alex's timezone I'm not. I had a semi-blog planned in continuation of discussion of naming/parenting/small children. But I'm sleepy. List of things:

--Saw incredible fireworks (a day early, but who cares? More tomorrow.)

--Ate the best apple pie I have ever had in my (albeit short) life.

--I have a problem with people who take pictures of fireworks. They're meant to be ephemeral little bursts; the point is that they're pretty for two seconds and then dissolve into smoke and memories. They will have still existed even if you don't have photographic evidence of them. To me that's like cheating.

--Am very, very tired. Going to indulge myself and sleep on the couch.

Explanation/continuation later. Check back soon kthnxbaignight.

----marking passage of time line----

And so: it is now Sunday night and my day has gone kind of the same. Minus pie, and that makes me sad. Also plus mosquitoes, which makes me sadder. Going to sleep on the couch again, it's cooler (and impervious to the sound of fireworks) in my basement. I'm still short enough to fit across it comfortably, and it's all cushiony. It's like camping or something, I don't know. I just really prefer couches to beds in general for sleeping purposes--in bed it's like sleeping is imperative, couches present more options: reading, talking, the lulling quality of television, anything you can do sitting down. Plus the knowledge that you're sleeping on something you shouldn't but doing it anyway.

Have you ever had the fact that you look like a *insert name here* come up in conversation? It's odd. Never just *name*, either-- A *name*. As if all people in the world with that name are in some sort of category based on looks. I get Jessica and Amy a lot. I don't look like anyone but myself, to myself. ("Renata" is not the sort of name someone would probably pick at random, though. It's not even recognized by spellcheck.) I don't get it. Do I look like someone the person making this observation knows named Jessica? Are they cleverly following the sociological trend in baby naming and deduced that Jessica was the most popular name given to girls in the year I was born? Are they offering it as a suggestion if I ever want to change my name? By the same token, though, it's kind of interesting to see what people associate with a certain name (and the defiance of them, like Vita's excerpt. Like a total pacifist-vegan-Jewish guy named Adolf. Except that would be more like irony. . . but seriously, what do you expect from anyone named Adolf?). I can't come up with any real stereotypes for the name Jessica (generic, pleasant enough probably), nor do I think I fit them.

Or I'm overthinking this and it's harmless smalltalk that even I've subjected others to. (That and the "guess my middle name" game...)

Oh, and the 'ignoring your infants makes them self-sufficient' theory is in my opinion kind of crap. Babies need to be babied--that's why it's a flipping VERB. It's what you DO to babies. At some point this can stop before it reaches spoiling them, but since I'm not a parent I can't estimate this well. . . I'd suggest before they learn to be manipulative.* During the course of this editing, I've been listening to this in a continuous loop. Enjoy...


Footnote: This requires knowledge of said child. I used to lie face-down, unmoving, in the middle of the floor to freak my parents out when I was around 3.

Friday, July 2, 2010

An Excerpt from an Ironically Untitled and Largely Unfinished Novel (erlack)


Condemning your flailing and defenseless newborn child to be known evermore as “Vladimir” is admittedly... strange. It’s sort of like calling your daughter “Violetta” in the hopes that she will blossom into a reserved yet wildly creative poet with skin four times more ivory than your own and with dark flowing tresses straight out of an American Gothic. Or like naming your son “George” in an attempt to preemptively protect him from drugs and steer him towards a higher caliber of society where he will make friends with the similarly well-bred James and Phillips. Except it’s worse than both of those because at least Violetta has a certain quaint flair to it and George is still pretty socially accepted, even if it does demand a necessary ass-kicking at some point in the poor guy’s life.

(Seriously. People in this town aren't patriotic because they love America but because they, like, detest England. When I was in fifth grade, our Revolutionary War unit coincided with Halloween. The boys in my class forced this kid George to dress up as King George III just so they could be American Rebels and shoot him with Nerf guns. Tragically, the rebels wouldn't accept a white flag from him until our teacher - she was dressed as Sandra Day O'Connor - intervened and made everyone sing him an "I'm Sorry" song.)

(We're also big on creativity.)

Personally, I think my parents' chose name for me is currently contributing to my slight narcissism problem. Some people (my mom) call it being conceited, but I swear I'm not. I mean, I'm not obsessed with my hair or anything. That would be a total waste of time, considering my face does what it wants whether I give a damn. It's just that every time I visualize a “Kelly,” I see this soccer mom with a bad blond dye job inhaling jelly doughnut after jelly doughnut. Then I have to go look in a mirror and make sure I'm still sixteen and childless.

Anyway, being a Vladimir sucks. The weird thing is, his parents are totally normal. You would think that they're into creepy underground vampire cult shit, but they're not. They're Unitarian Universalists for God's sake. They've let me know that overly pale skin gives them the "heebie-jeebies" ("No offense," his mom quickly added, looking down at my undeniably pasty complexion). It's just that they have this name fetish, and one early morning in May when a hospital nurse came knocking on their door in the maternity wing, something possessed them to take in their baby's curly blond hair, his chubby arms, his cherubic face, and write down "Vladimir Phillip Rankin" on the birth certificate.

"They're taking it out on me," Vlad told me once.

"What do they have to take out on you?" I asked him. "They're in love with you. If incest wasn't illegal, they probably would have proposed to you by now."

"That's disgusting," he said. "Also, no, because they don't want a suicidal son. Also, polygamy is illegal, so I couldn't be married to two people at once. So basically, no."

I shrugged at him and gave him my best gloomy eyes look, which involves me pretending to be a sad puppy. He flicked a paper clip at my head.

"But seriously, think about it. They've dealt with being called Raleigh and Gladys their entire lives. I think they, like, subconsciously hate everyone with a better name than them. They probably made me a Vladimir to make themselves feel better."

He had a point, though. I've seen them at my parents' parties. Even if Raleigh and Gladys were in a corner snorting Ecstasy, people would ask them why they aren't happy. "Aren't you supposed to be really glad?" they inquire, barely concealing their smirking mouths, thinking they're being original and clever.

This is why I hate people. People are never original or clever. They're usually just annoying.


---

YO YO YO! Right, well, that's a sort of "glimpse," if you will, from my brand-new novel type jaunt. It doesn't really have a plot yet? Or anything else? But that's okay? And I'm going to stop writing in question form now.

Basically it's about somebody called Kelly, who I have kindly drawn for you in Paint, and her potential boyfriend Vladimir (I mean "potential" as in "I haven't figured it out yet so for now we're just going to say they're dating"). Also it's about how we perceive people based on their names. And stuff.

(Don't give me that look. I'm only about 1,000 words in. I have time...)

Haaaaa so sorry if it's not very good right now; it's 12:19 am and I have been awake for far too long today/yesterday so I don't really have a filter right now, but um, yeah. Just wanted to share that with you/I'm too lazy to write an actual blog post today/yesterday.

P.S., I can't draw in real life and drawing using a touch pad on a laptop is even harder, so please don't judge my lovely lovely picture KAY THANKS. (Just kidding; you can judge it, I won't mind. I mean... it's sort of like a Picasso, except instead of being awesome and abstract, it really just sucks. whoooo)

:)

Thursday, July 1, 2010

Babies

I've had a strange upbringing. We all have, I suppose, but I can't help thinking how remarkably different I am from my peers. The weirdest part, though, is how okay I am with that. I've gotten over the part of my life where I wanted to fit in. Mostly. I mean, I still like wearing skinny jeans and having my hair straight, but I do that for me, not them. And yes, sometimes I get that weird twinge of wanting to fit in. Wanting to go out and buy pretty, trendy clothes and talk about boys and silly, vain things that don't really interest me. But then I blink and go back to laughing about how awesome and fun it is to dress up as a Ravenclaw student and go see Eclipse at midnight on a Wednesday night.

Being nerdy is so much fun and I'd rather fit in that way than attempting to conform to a cutout.

Then someone says something and I'm struck by how wrong they are. Not in a 'I'm right and you're wrong' way, but in a 'My beliefs and opinions are startlingly different from most other people's'.

Exhibit A
(Not sure if either of you watch my video blog so forgive me if I'm repeating myself) My friend said the other day that you can't always go to your baby when it's crying because if you do it'll get spoiled and too accustomed to you coming around. It made sense in context. I couldn't really say anything. I was just struck by how much I disagreed. Then I said something about how ignoring your baby is similar to ignoring another person and their needs. It's like saying, "Oh, I can't listen to what you're saying right now because otherwise you'll get too used to being treated well." Maybe that's harsh but that's how I see it.

Feel free to disagree with me (not sure why I need to say this, but I'm putting it out there). I know attachment parenting is foreign to some people. I understand the spoiled myth and where it comes from. But really, wouldn't you rather have a "spoiled" child who knows that you love them than a neglected child who feels like you don't care?

I'm not a parent. And I don't think you should give your child whatever they want, whenever they want it. I'm not advocating being a total pushover who folds to their child's every whim. I'm just saying that if you're wondering why your teenager doesn't trust you, think back to when they were an infant and maybe it'll connect. Or maybe it won't.

Also, if your baby realizes that you'll come every time it cries and then it starts crying more often just to see you, maybe you're not spending enough time holding your baby.

There's a lot more to this. Parenting is kind of a controversial thing. I'm going to go though without giving you the slightest review on Eclipse. Maybe Sunday. I hear fireworks in the background. Yay Canada? Though, really, as made apparent by Wheezy Waiter, Canada wasn't fulled independent until 1982. So that's nice.