I hate today. I slept late, got up, ate food, failed at being productive, ate more food, went back to sleep, woke up, ate more food, and now here I am. So I feel lazy, unmotivated, unaccomplished, still tired, fat, and just overall shitty.
On the other hand, yesterday was freaking awesome. Boyfriend got here at four, and it was gorgeous outside, so we went out walking in the woods. He collected some moss for the set he's building and left the bag behind a tree so he wouldn't have to carry it for the rest of our walk. We took a trail I'd never followed before into this part of the woods where I always seem to lose all sense of direction. This is not another psycho walking-to-the-sun story, I just get like a compass needle that's confused by some other magnetic field and doesn't know which way it's pointing. We came out in Hamilton and walked all the way back to Go-Co, and by this time we were both starving so we went to Lane. We joined Jenniferin and some others, and then some others joined us (which was really funny, because Boyfriend got up to get seconds, and people kept trying to sit in his seat. I think I had to tell three people they couldn't sit there. I'm just that popular, y'know. XD)
Then we went to get Boyfriend's bag of moss and I had to grab some negatives and my favorite headphones from the darkroom, where I left them because I am forgetful like that. But Boyfriend couldn't remember which tree he put the moss behind, and it was pitch black and wet out there. As he was searching for it, he called back to me, "You know, this is how horror movies always start." Great.
Well, a little after that, the Go-Co film festival started. They had searchlights out in front of the chapel and everyone was dressed to the nines. The inside was decorated with shiny stars and colorful lights, and a jazz ensemble was playing while everyone took their seats. A lot of the films were very Go-Co-oriented in their subject matter and humor and it was sad because so many of the things that were hilarious to me, like the Fowlers' cat Chester taking over campus and someone having to retake CCC over stealing a likeness of Chester from the new tavern, didn't make sense to Boyfriend because he doesn't go here.
The film that won was basically the only entry we saw that wasn't filmed on campus and wasn't specific to a Go-Co audience, so there was really no competition. As for funniest entry, I was torn. My friend Kevin's movie was about ways to get decent food on campus, which involved stealing various forms of takeout from professors or hunting animals and freshmen around the property. Another involved a bunch of students with superpowers who had to save gravity from Chester's evil scheme. It was a riot, but I'm worried about how the Fowlers are going to take it seeing how offended they were at someone stealing his picture from the Prancing Pony.
After the show, we joined a horde of Go-Co peeps that invaded the local Uno's, and it was such good times! I haven't gone out hardly at all this semester, nor had I hung out with so many of the people there since before Christmas. It reminded me why I used to love it here and made me want that back. I didn't get to bed until 2. How I miss those good old days (or nights) of staying up for no reason but to be with people I loved doing absolutely nothing. That's where all my memories come from. Next quad I am coming back with a vengeance!!! I was in love with this place once, and I shall be again!
As for now, I'm going to see some friends perform. Not Mae, unfortunately, but it should be good. I don't think I have the energy to go into Boston anyway, it's just sad because I was looking forward to seeing Mae way back in December when I heard about the show. It was going to be my first 18+ show and I was going to ask Jacob if he wanted to collaborate on a film project about synaesthesia. Le sighhhh. Next time.
Philosophy
Yesterday in chapel, when they were talking about the meaning of Lent, they said that if it feels like something is controlling us rather than us controlling it (i.e. Facebook, cell phones, iPods), then that's something we should consider giving up. Soooo if I feel that school is not only controlling my life, but in fact, is destroying my soul (in the Glenney sense of soul as one's entire being and, moreover, purpose, not the traditional "floaty" sense of soul), it logically follows that I should give up school.
They also said that Lent is a fast from spiritual junk food, enabling us to feel our hunger for God. So if I give up school, then my relationship with God will surely improve exponentially because I will have actual time to experience and satiate said hunger for God. School makes me a fat Christian, so I should cut it out of my diet.
I like this philosophy. Unfortunately, the president of Go-Co, not to mention my parents, probably won't. Suck.
They also said that Lent is a fast from spiritual junk food, enabling us to feel our hunger for God. So if I give up school, then my relationship with God will surely improve exponentially because I will have actual time to experience and satiate said hunger for God. School makes me a fat Christian, so I should cut it out of my diet.
I like this philosophy. Unfortunately, the president of Go-Co, not to mention my parents, probably won't. Suck.
A series of unfortunate events
This first one's not so much unfortunate as it is hilarious. Boyfriend and I had our first fight this weekend. I mean, we have dumb little fights all the time, like "You're cute." "Well you're cuter." Or "you're retarded." "Oh yeah? Well... buh." Or "fuck you." "Fuck YOU!" But this time we actually argued about something. And you know what it was over?
The shape of the 1990s. Don't question your literacy; you read correctly. The spatial form of the 1990s. Turns out my boyfriend is also synaesthetic. The argument happened because he says the 1990s go down with respect to the 80s, when CLEARLY they're an almost-vertical line, continuing upwards from the vertical line of the 80s, that curves to the right in the second half of the decade. CLEARLY.
But the rest of this entry IS actually about unfortunate things that have happened over the past three or four days. Enjoy laughing at my pain. Points for anyone who gets the music reference. =D
I woke up on Saturday hardly able to move because of a pain in my back. I don't know what caused it, but every little twist of my head or torso suddenly made me want to curl up in a ball and cry.
Later on, I stood up into the corner of something and took off a few layers of skin at the top of my arm. No blood, but it hurt like the dickens.
Then I twisted my ankle running from orcs (a story that I have yet to relate). Ironically, the second it happened, my back felt loads better. At the same time that I hurt my foot, I also ripped my hand open on some thorns, and by the time we got back to Boyfriend's, the side of my hand was all covered in blood and looked a whole lot worse than it actually was. Apparently I also got a gash on my leg at the same time as the other two injuries, but I didn't even notice it until I went to change into my PJs and noticed some more blood on my leg. Mmm, yummy.
Today, I slammed my finger in my bedroom door on the way to dinner. I had gloves on at the time and couldn't see it, but I shook it out, cursed a little, and proceeded on my way to dinner. Then I took the gloves off and realized my finger was all bloody. But I am always prepared! I keep band-aids in my bag for such random situations as these. Disaster averted (or at least, evidence of the disaster successfully disguised. XD). And on the bright side, my ankle feels completely better now that my finger is bleeding! Still, I can't help thinking that at this rate, I'll be lucky to survive the next ten days before spring break.
Then I went to get my food, and EVERYTHING in the hot line had meat in it. If they'd had any turkey left I might've just had that, since I'm not too strict about poultry, but they only had pork. Downstairs it was burger madness night or something. I'd gotten a sandwich for lunch even though I wanted something hot, and I was not about to settle for another cold meal on this cold winter's day, so I got ravioli. I KNOW, right? I do not buy pasta. It was one of those too-much-of-a-good-thing scenarios in high school and I can't eat it anymore. But I got it anyway because there was nothing else.
Then I got back to the table, bit into it, and realized it was stuffed full of meat. >_<
Please stay tuned for what happens next. ^_^
The shape of the 1990s. Don't question your literacy; you read correctly. The spatial form of the 1990s. Turns out my boyfriend is also synaesthetic. The argument happened because he says the 1990s go down with respect to the 80s, when CLEARLY they're an almost-vertical line, continuing upwards from the vertical line of the 80s, that curves to the right in the second half of the decade. CLEARLY.
But the rest of this entry IS actually about unfortunate things that have happened over the past three or four days. Enjoy laughing at my pain. Points for anyone who gets the music reference. =D
I woke up on Saturday hardly able to move because of a pain in my back. I don't know what caused it, but every little twist of my head or torso suddenly made me want to curl up in a ball and cry.
Later on, I stood up into the corner of something and took off a few layers of skin at the top of my arm. No blood, but it hurt like the dickens.
Then I twisted my ankle running from orcs (a story that I have yet to relate). Ironically, the second it happened, my back felt loads better. At the same time that I hurt my foot, I also ripped my hand open on some thorns, and by the time we got back to Boyfriend's, the side of my hand was all covered in blood and looked a whole lot worse than it actually was. Apparently I also got a gash on my leg at the same time as the other two injuries, but I didn't even notice it until I went to change into my PJs and noticed some more blood on my leg. Mmm, yummy.
Today, I slammed my finger in my bedroom door on the way to dinner. I had gloves on at the time and couldn't see it, but I shook it out, cursed a little, and proceeded on my way to dinner. Then I took the gloves off and realized my finger was all bloody. But I am always prepared! I keep band-aids in my bag for such random situations as these. Disaster averted (or at least, evidence of the disaster successfully disguised. XD). And on the bright side, my ankle feels completely better now that my finger is bleeding! Still, I can't help thinking that at this rate, I'll be lucky to survive the next ten days before spring break.
Then I went to get my food, and EVERYTHING in the hot line had meat in it. If they'd had any turkey left I might've just had that, since I'm not too strict about poultry, but they only had pork. Downstairs it was burger madness night or something. I'd gotten a sandwich for lunch even though I wanted something hot, and I was not about to settle for another cold meal on this cold winter's day, so I got ravioli. I KNOW, right? I do not buy pasta. It was one of those too-much-of-a-good-thing scenarios in high school and I can't eat it anymore. But I got it anyway because there was nothing else.
Then I got back to the table, bit into it, and realized it was stuffed full of meat. >_<
Please stay tuned for what happens next. ^_^
I maked a LOLcat!
Because it amused me =3
I should probably give someone credit for the blender pic, but I don't know where it came from. All I know is I was having a mental breakdown and the Cuddle Rapist thought a picture of a cat in a blender would help.
Also, if you look to your right, you'll see that I've added a Twitter widget. This is to compensate for my lack of Facebookage, which shall commence tomorrow with the beginning of Lent. Note that the Facebook fast does not encompass this blog; in fact, I will probably spend MORE time on the blog because hey, I've got to procrastinate SOMEHOW. But I'm hoping that knocking Facebook off my list of things to distract me will help me be more productive with schoolwork, my book, and, last but certainly not least, my relationship with God. I'm hoping that the time I will spend not on Facebook might translate into time spent in the word of God and in prayer. Will this actually happen? It remains to be seen, but I shall try. I'm toying with ideas about some other things I might give up. Somehow I feel like most of this is less because I want to spend time with God and more because I need a concrete reason to do things that I know I should do anyway. Oh motivation... or lack thereof.
Hopesong of the day:
"I wished it all away; I felt so alone
and the darkness crept its way
like stars that we all know will die too soon.
There is never any sunrise here
in the shadow of eclipsing moons.
Crawling on a tightrope,
the bravest thing I have is hope."
Ten more days of hell... and counting!
I should probably give someone credit for the blender pic, but I don't know where it came from. All I know is I was having a mental breakdown and the Cuddle Rapist thought a picture of a cat in a blender would help.
Also, if you look to your right, you'll see that I've added a Twitter widget. This is to compensate for my lack of Facebookage, which shall commence tomorrow with the beginning of Lent. Note that the Facebook fast does not encompass this blog; in fact, I will probably spend MORE time on the blog because hey, I've got to procrastinate SOMEHOW. But I'm hoping that knocking Facebook off my list of things to distract me will help me be more productive with schoolwork, my book, and, last but certainly not least, my relationship with God. I'm hoping that the time I will spend not on Facebook might translate into time spent in the word of God and in prayer. Will this actually happen? It remains to be seen, but I shall try. I'm toying with ideas about some other things I might give up. Somehow I feel like most of this is less because I want to spend time with God and more because I need a concrete reason to do things that I know I should do anyway. Oh motivation... or lack thereof.
Hopesong of the day:
"I wished it all away; I felt so alone
and the darkness crept its way
like stars that we all know will die too soon.
There is never any sunrise here
in the shadow of eclipsing moons.
Crawling on a tightrope,
the bravest thing I have is hope."
Ten more days of hell... and counting!
The sun still shines behind the clouds
I'm way too back-loaded on work right now to write all about my fantastically epic weekend excursion to Mordor and the orcs that chased us down and how I effed up my foot, but rest assured that the story is coming. It may not be coming til ten days in the future, but it's coming. I just wanted to share a couple of cool things that happened today that sort of cued me in to the presence of God in all the little things.
"It would be so easy
to hold onto this feeling that elopes
misery with agony, but I'll hold onto hope.
In their words they carry hurts buried in myself.
In disarray, the easy way could take me somewhere else.
The sun still shines behind the clouds."
We all know I'm stressed out of my mind; this is not news. Long story short, stuff came up as far as housing/rooming next year, and it was the straw before the straw that broke the camel's back (thank goodness it didn't break my back; I can't sustain any more injuries right now). I mentioned it to Razzmatazz, my friend from La Vida, and she said that she and two friends were looking for a fourth person to complete a suite in Chase. We had talked about rooming earlier this year but we were both tied to so many people that we would need, like, three apartments just to fit us all and we gave it up. But this new arrangement fell into place so neatly and so quickly, and I am immensely grateful for that. I'm going to meet the other girls (or at least one of them) over dinner tomorrow night. The Lord will provide!
Also, I had a couple of conversations with Hacks today, and once again she reminded me of how totally awesome she is. She made me feel so understood and all-around, unconditionally loved. I need that right now. I feel like I'm fighting everyone and everything, including myself. Shout out to Hacks. I love you!!
Last but not least, coming back from babysitting, I had Kiros blaring from my car speakers while I searched for a parking space. The song was "Heaven." It came to the line, "the sun still shines behind the clouds," and suddenly out of nowhere the sun broke through the clouds and lit everything up brilliantly! It was overcast again just a few moments later. I know this is New England and weather spasms are not out of the ordinary, but all the same, it made me smile and encouraged me that, indeed, the sun is still out there and shining and someday soon, I'll find it. I'll take it as a tiny miracle of timing. With gratitude.
"It would be so easy
to hold onto this feeling that elopes
misery with agony, but I'll hold onto hope.
In their words they carry hurts buried in myself.
In disarray, the easy way could take me somewhere else.
The sun still shines behind the clouds."
We all know I'm stressed out of my mind; this is not news. Long story short, stuff came up as far as housing/rooming next year, and it was the straw before the straw that broke the camel's back (thank goodness it didn't break my back; I can't sustain any more injuries right now). I mentioned it to Razzmatazz, my friend from La Vida, and she said that she and two friends were looking for a fourth person to complete a suite in Chase. We had talked about rooming earlier this year but we were both tied to so many people that we would need, like, three apartments just to fit us all and we gave it up. But this new arrangement fell into place so neatly and so quickly, and I am immensely grateful for that. I'm going to meet the other girls (or at least one of them) over dinner tomorrow night. The Lord will provide!
Also, I had a couple of conversations with Hacks today, and once again she reminded me of how totally awesome she is. She made me feel so understood and all-around, unconditionally loved. I need that right now. I feel like I'm fighting everyone and everything, including myself. Shout out to Hacks. I love you!!
Last but not least, coming back from babysitting, I had Kiros blaring from my car speakers while I searched for a parking space. The song was "Heaven." It came to the line, "the sun still shines behind the clouds," and suddenly out of nowhere the sun broke through the clouds and lit everything up brilliantly! It was overcast again just a few moments later. I know this is New England and weather spasms are not out of the ordinary, but all the same, it made me smile and encouraged me that, indeed, the sun is still out there and shining and someday soon, I'll find it. I'll take it as a tiny miracle of timing. With gratitude.
Fubar
I went out to wander the trails after lunch this afternoon. I had a lot on my plate (in more ways than one) and I thought I should go walk it off. It was clear and cold, but I had my wool coat to keep out the chill; I'd left my obligations at the threshold of the forest, and so I pressed onward. The woods were in limbo. In spite of the sunshine and the snow's messy, incomplete transition into mud suggesting the advent of spring, there were no birds, not even one of the crows that perch on the tree by the steeple year-round. My canvas-clad feet made the only sound, now crunching through winter's dirty rags, now squishing through the grit and grime of an almost-but-not-quite renaissance.
I have this habit of getting absorbed in my thoughts while I'm walking. When that happens, walking becomes a sort of compulsion and I can't stomach the thought of sitting still, so I will invent long-cuts and detours to keep myself from ever getting home. It doesn't matter where I go, if I'm retracing my steps or if I've never been there before; I follow where my feet will go and I don't ask questions. This is how it came to pass that, in the midst of my walk, I stopped quite suddenly at the junction of two paths and realized I hadn't the foggiest idea where I was, nor had I been paying enough attention to follow the same trail back to where I'd started.
Standing there, I bounced nervously on the balls of my feet and recited Robert Frost to calm myself. I'd been lost in these woods before. They aren't very big; the key to getting out is picking a direction and sticking to it. And sticking to the trail, of course, because if there is a trail at all, then someone else has been there and presumably that person also found his way out. So all that remained was for me to choose left or right and continue walking until I came to something - a house, a road, anything.
I peered down the path to my right. It was coated with ice and curved sharply back to disappear in shadow behind a snowy hill. The path to my left, on the other hand, had shed its icy shell and was dappled with sunlight. I was cold, and I knew progress would be slow and tedious on the ice, so I took the left.
After a few minutes I was already warmer and my step took on a contented bounce. This was an adventure! Just the thing I'd been waiting for. I wondered what Lucy Pevensie would do now. She would be looking for Aslan, of course, with the help of whatever woodland creatures she encountered. Then I began to wonder what went through a woodland creature's head. Not just in Narnia, but everywhere. Do birds realize how lucky they are to fly? Do snakes appreciate the simple joy of laying on a rock in the warm sun?
As a matter of fact I was tempted to do just that. It had gotten so warm that I had to unbutton my jacket, and moments later I shed it altogether. I hung it on a broken branch of a pine tree, busted off to form a natural coat hook, to keep it out of the mud in the event that I should come back this way and want to wear it again, and continued on my way. But it was as though summer had come out of nowhere, and soon even my hoodie was too much. I hung that on a branch as well and kept going. At least I would have trail-markers if I eventually turned around and tried to find the way I'd come. In fact, I thought, perhaps I should just turn around and try to find my way back. I'd gotten where I was; surely I could get back to where I started if I turned around and walked. But it was so cold back there, and my thirst for adventure lured me on.
The afternoon wore on. The shadows stretched out across the leafy brown carpet of the woods, where not so much as a patch of snow remained any longer. I couldn't believe I hadn't found my way out yet. I was hungry; lunch seemed like a lifetime ago. My legs were numb from hours of walking, and even when I paused, I still felt like I was moving. But of course I couldn't stop for long. It would be dark in a couple of hours and I was not prepared to spend the night out of doors. I wished I'd turned around, but figured by now I must be closer to the opposite side of the woods than the side I'd started at, and going back now would take much longer than continuing to the western edge of the forest.
This was beginning to feel less like an adventure and more like a disaster. And though the shadows grew longer and the day wore thinner, it was still getting warmer. I thought, Maybe I somehow walked the full length of the East Coast and wound up in Florida. Or Mexico. Somehow. All I knew for sure was that I was sweating like a sumo wrestler, my jeans and t-shirt felt like they weighed a hundred pounds each, and no one was around to mind if I ditched another layer to continue the journey in my underwear, so I did.
I was in a stare-down with the sun. Even with the trees filtering out some of the light, it was too bright for me to see where I was going. I noticed at once when the path began to incline, though; my tired legs were actually grateful for the slightly different motion required to travel uphill. The golden hue that comes just before sunset settled on the scene.
But something was very, very wrong. The scraggly trees had thinned out and I could see that the setting sun was enormous. I remembered learning, far off in some long-lost life, that the sun always appears to be less than the size of your littlest fingernail if you hold your hand at arm's length. When I measured it, it took my entire palm to cover the crimson orb. Well, I thought as I discarded the last of my clothing, that explains the heat wave.
And now curiosity gripped me. This path must lead straight to the sun! No one had ever been to the sun before. I would be the first. And when I'd explored the whole thing, I would turn right around and come back down this path and write a book about how wonderful it is inside the sun with all those electrons firing and photons shooting around, and everyone would be amazed, and I would simply tell them, If you look for it, you can find your way there, too. Anybody can go there, and it's a beautiful thing.
The forest was burning. Or what remained of the forest was burning - but that was merely a scattering of valiant trees somehow still standing amidst the black hillocks of their brothers' ashes. They were never enough to offer shade, and always less, until at last I was the only one standing, battered, breathless and barefoot, before a field of embers, face to face with a ball of fire taller than any skyscraper I'd ever seen. It occurred to me that I shouldn't be alive, and indeed, I felt heady and swollen as though everything inside of me was too large to be contained by the outside of me. I peeled off my skin and hung it on the last tree. That was better... marginally.
And I kept going. Blips of light with comet tails were streaking past me in all directions. At first they frightened me, but when I realized they were only light and couldn't actually hurt me, I saw how spectacular they were. I caught one and it soaked into the bones of my hand, causing them to glow. Though my muscles were gone, I could feel myself smile. The smoldering surface of the sun loomed ever larger, stretching out above and on either side as far as the eye could see. I was looking back over my shoulder to see if even a single tree was still visible when all of a sudden I hit a wall. My first thought was, Goddamn, someone has been here, and they're going to charge me admission to see the sun!
But then I looked and realized that it was only a door in the side of the sun. No one was there to take the money I didn't have. At the time, it didn't strike me as odd that the door was made of oak and brass. I didn't bother knocking; I simply turned the knob and let myself in. The door shut heavily behind me, leaving me in utter darkness and silence. And cold. Instinctively I rubbed my arms for warmth, and I realized they had flesh on them again. I reached for the knob to open the door and let in a little heat, but it was gone, so I curled up on the floor and cried. I wanted to go home. The sun was not beautiful. The sun was empty and lonely and cold on the inside, and I was never going to get out of there.
I don't know how long I stayed like that, but when I opened my eyes, they were accustomed to the dimness and I realized that it was not pitch black at all. In fact, there were stars overhead, and a full moon spilled its cool white light on a solitary pine tree, green and living, standing proudly just yards from where I lay. And draped haphazardly over a low branch was a very familiar looking wool coat, none the worse for wear, though it had surely been hanging there for days. I wrapped it tightly around my naked, shivering body and started to walk.
----
Okay. I'm sorry. This one is really weird. I was just out there walkin' and it came to me and I had to draft it right away. So this is what I've been doing since lunch instead of studying for my astronomy exam tomorrow. That's right, I do what I want.
I have this habit of getting absorbed in my thoughts while I'm walking. When that happens, walking becomes a sort of compulsion and I can't stomach the thought of sitting still, so I will invent long-cuts and detours to keep myself from ever getting home. It doesn't matter where I go, if I'm retracing my steps or if I've never been there before; I follow where my feet will go and I don't ask questions. This is how it came to pass that, in the midst of my walk, I stopped quite suddenly at the junction of two paths and realized I hadn't the foggiest idea where I was, nor had I been paying enough attention to follow the same trail back to where I'd started.
Standing there, I bounced nervously on the balls of my feet and recited Robert Frost to calm myself. I'd been lost in these woods before. They aren't very big; the key to getting out is picking a direction and sticking to it. And sticking to the trail, of course, because if there is a trail at all, then someone else has been there and presumably that person also found his way out. So all that remained was for me to choose left or right and continue walking until I came to something - a house, a road, anything.
I peered down the path to my right. It was coated with ice and curved sharply back to disappear in shadow behind a snowy hill. The path to my left, on the other hand, had shed its icy shell and was dappled with sunlight. I was cold, and I knew progress would be slow and tedious on the ice, so I took the left.
After a few minutes I was already warmer and my step took on a contented bounce. This was an adventure! Just the thing I'd been waiting for. I wondered what Lucy Pevensie would do now. She would be looking for Aslan, of course, with the help of whatever woodland creatures she encountered. Then I began to wonder what went through a woodland creature's head. Not just in Narnia, but everywhere. Do birds realize how lucky they are to fly? Do snakes appreciate the simple joy of laying on a rock in the warm sun?
As a matter of fact I was tempted to do just that. It had gotten so warm that I had to unbutton my jacket, and moments later I shed it altogether. I hung it on a broken branch of a pine tree, busted off to form a natural coat hook, to keep it out of the mud in the event that I should come back this way and want to wear it again, and continued on my way. But it was as though summer had come out of nowhere, and soon even my hoodie was too much. I hung that on a branch as well and kept going. At least I would have trail-markers if I eventually turned around and tried to find the way I'd come. In fact, I thought, perhaps I should just turn around and try to find my way back. I'd gotten where I was; surely I could get back to where I started if I turned around and walked. But it was so cold back there, and my thirst for adventure lured me on.
The afternoon wore on. The shadows stretched out across the leafy brown carpet of the woods, where not so much as a patch of snow remained any longer. I couldn't believe I hadn't found my way out yet. I was hungry; lunch seemed like a lifetime ago. My legs were numb from hours of walking, and even when I paused, I still felt like I was moving. But of course I couldn't stop for long. It would be dark in a couple of hours and I was not prepared to spend the night out of doors. I wished I'd turned around, but figured by now I must be closer to the opposite side of the woods than the side I'd started at, and going back now would take much longer than continuing to the western edge of the forest.
This was beginning to feel less like an adventure and more like a disaster. And though the shadows grew longer and the day wore thinner, it was still getting warmer. I thought, Maybe I somehow walked the full length of the East Coast and wound up in Florida. Or Mexico. Somehow. All I knew for sure was that I was sweating like a sumo wrestler, my jeans and t-shirt felt like they weighed a hundred pounds each, and no one was around to mind if I ditched another layer to continue the journey in my underwear, so I did.
I was in a stare-down with the sun. Even with the trees filtering out some of the light, it was too bright for me to see where I was going. I noticed at once when the path began to incline, though; my tired legs were actually grateful for the slightly different motion required to travel uphill. The golden hue that comes just before sunset settled on the scene.
But something was very, very wrong. The scraggly trees had thinned out and I could see that the setting sun was enormous. I remembered learning, far off in some long-lost life, that the sun always appears to be less than the size of your littlest fingernail if you hold your hand at arm's length. When I measured it, it took my entire palm to cover the crimson orb. Well, I thought as I discarded the last of my clothing, that explains the heat wave.
And now curiosity gripped me. This path must lead straight to the sun! No one had ever been to the sun before. I would be the first. And when I'd explored the whole thing, I would turn right around and come back down this path and write a book about how wonderful it is inside the sun with all those electrons firing and photons shooting around, and everyone would be amazed, and I would simply tell them, If you look for it, you can find your way there, too. Anybody can go there, and it's a beautiful thing.
The forest was burning. Or what remained of the forest was burning - but that was merely a scattering of valiant trees somehow still standing amidst the black hillocks of their brothers' ashes. They were never enough to offer shade, and always less, until at last I was the only one standing, battered, breathless and barefoot, before a field of embers, face to face with a ball of fire taller than any skyscraper I'd ever seen. It occurred to me that I shouldn't be alive, and indeed, I felt heady and swollen as though everything inside of me was too large to be contained by the outside of me. I peeled off my skin and hung it on the last tree. That was better... marginally.
And I kept going. Blips of light with comet tails were streaking past me in all directions. At first they frightened me, but when I realized they were only light and couldn't actually hurt me, I saw how spectacular they were. I caught one and it soaked into the bones of my hand, causing them to glow. Though my muscles were gone, I could feel myself smile. The smoldering surface of the sun loomed ever larger, stretching out above and on either side as far as the eye could see. I was looking back over my shoulder to see if even a single tree was still visible when all of a sudden I hit a wall. My first thought was, Goddamn, someone has been here, and they're going to charge me admission to see the sun!
But then I looked and realized that it was only a door in the side of the sun. No one was there to take the money I didn't have. At the time, it didn't strike me as odd that the door was made of oak and brass. I didn't bother knocking; I simply turned the knob and let myself in. The door shut heavily behind me, leaving me in utter darkness and silence. And cold. Instinctively I rubbed my arms for warmth, and I realized they had flesh on them again. I reached for the knob to open the door and let in a little heat, but it was gone, so I curled up on the floor and cried. I wanted to go home. The sun was not beautiful. The sun was empty and lonely and cold on the inside, and I was never going to get out of there.
I don't know how long I stayed like that, but when I opened my eyes, they were accustomed to the dimness and I realized that it was not pitch black at all. In fact, there were stars overhead, and a full moon spilled its cool white light on a solitary pine tree, green and living, standing proudly just yards from where I lay. And draped haphazardly over a low branch was a very familiar looking wool coat, none the worse for wear, though it had surely been hanging there for days. I wrapped it tightly around my naked, shivering body and started to walk.
----
Okay. I'm sorry. This one is really weird. I was just out there walkin' and it came to me and I had to draft it right away. So this is what I've been doing since lunch instead of studying for my astronomy exam tomorrow. That's right, I do what I want.
Conversely, heaven is eating quality vegetables.
I am eating leftover vegetables. I know, I know. Leftovers are icky. Vegetables are icky (yes, this is coming from a vegetarian.... or uh, at least a flexitarian XD). But surprisingly, they taste AMAZING. I think that vegetables grown in heaven must taste like these ones. Mmmmmm.
You know what tastes bad, though? The amount of work I have to get done this afternoon. I keep forgetting I actually have a class at one. Ugh, what an inconvenience. I really need to get this reading done for production tonight. But that class is a waste of time too, at least for my group, because no one actually wants to do anything, only one girl actually knows how to contact our client and she's got senioritis too bad to actually work on the damn thing, and I am way too overloaded to take on the whole thing myself. Which is good, I guess, since otherwise I probably would and then everyone else would get to reap the benefits, and man, that sucks. But if the project doesn't get done, then NO ONE gets any benefits.
So why, you ask, am I wasting precious minutes blogging if I have so much to do?
Psychologists have a name for this.
It's called "avoidance."
You know what tastes bad, though? The amount of work I have to get done this afternoon. I keep forgetting I actually have a class at one. Ugh, what an inconvenience. I really need to get this reading done for production tonight. But that class is a waste of time too, at least for my group, because no one actually wants to do anything, only one girl actually knows how to contact our client and she's got senioritis too bad to actually work on the damn thing, and I am way too overloaded to take on the whole thing myself. Which is good, I guess, since otherwise I probably would and then everyone else would get to reap the benefits, and man, that sucks. But if the project doesn't get done, then NO ONE gets any benefits.
So why, you ask, am I wasting precious minutes blogging if I have so much to do?
Psychologists have a name for this.
It's called "avoidance."
Hell is a never-ending traffic jam
Coming back to school, I left myself 20 extra minutes to get there so I wouldn't be late for my 8:00 shift at the writing center. I was making good time; not my best, but pretty good. I was going to be on time, probably even a little bit early. And then I hit exit 32, and quite suddenly the car in front of me came to a complete stop. I slammed on the brakes and the two jars of jam Mama Swede insisted on giving me went flying. This was around 7:15. By the time I hit exit 34, it was 8:15. Yes, that's right: one hour, and I traveled a grand total of two exits. I mean, by the time I got out of this thing, I just wanted to break something. Fortunately my car and my self were not on my list of things I would enjoy breaking, so don't worry. This is not going to be one of Those Stories. But I felt sort of bad about how angry I was sitting in the traffic jam from hell when I saw the cause of it. Just before exit 34, they had closed down two lanes and there were at least half a dozen cop cars along with a whole bunch of other vehicles. The scene was complete with flashing lights and flares, causing the pavement to glitter threateningly with broken glass. Then I came to the accident. One car looked like the top had been ripped off it and the other one was on its side. It didn't look good for whoever had been in those cars; that's all I can say.
Well, I made it to my shift, forty minutes late. Which sucks because now I can't get paid for those forty minutes, and I really need the money if we're going to drive to Cali this summer. Ironic that I would still want to drive 3000 miles out there and 3000 miles back after seeing those cars own each other and after witnessing my own hardcore frustration at bad traffic situations. Buuuut the Pacific beckons.... and how can I refuse?
Well, I made it to my shift, forty minutes late. Which sucks because now I can't get paid for those forty minutes, and I really need the money if we're going to drive to Cali this summer. Ironic that I would still want to drive 3000 miles out there and 3000 miles back after seeing those cars own each other and after witnessing my own hardcore frustration at bad traffic situations. Buuuut the Pacific beckons.... and how can I refuse?
Blather
Hello all. I don't have anything exciting to say so just move right along. I'm chillin at Boyfriend's, singing along to the All American Rejects to the immense enjoyment of anyone able to hear, I'm sure.
But we're gonna talk about not-the-All-American-Rejects now. As usual, Relient K has proved to be a very appropriate soundtrack to my life. This song has been thematic for me more than once, but never more so than now. Enjoy =)
I have an astronomy exam on Wednesday and I know I'm screwed, which makes it really difficult to motivate myself to study. I've heard the prof scales the tests by like, 40 points. I say he should just give easier tests. Or more of them covering less material. Because the one coming up covers 20 pages of class notes, 7 chapters of the textbook, aaaaaand MATH. Yep, I'm screwed. I don't know what I expected from this class but I know I'm not getting it.
No, that's a lie. I'll tell you what I expected. I thought we would have regular classes that taught us principles of astronomy and then meet up in the middle of the night to observe the heavens.... sort of Harry Potter style. I want to study the sky the way the original astronomers did - that is, through OBSERVATION. There are just some things that shouldn't be taught in a classroom, and astronomy is one of them. But then, I am very much against structured education in the form it takes today, particularly at this point in time, so I suppose I'm too biased for my opinion to matter much.
On the bright side, I've only got 19 more days before spring break. HUZZAH! Let's make it even more epic than last year.
Oh, so Boyfriend and I watched this movie last night, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist. When I read about it in AP, it sounded really fantastic, and the premise was good. They spent the movie searching for this band that was having a secret concert, and they were supposed to follow clues to figure out where the show was happening. Sounds brilliant, right? Like don't you wish you knew of a band like that? Music suddenly becomes this magnificent adventure, right?
But the movie was more about dumb high school drama, and in the end, they finally found the venue and (SPOILER ALERT) THEY DIDN'T EVEN GO TO THE DAMN SHOW. They were all "are you sad we missed it?" "No, I'm not, are you?" And I'm just like "WHAT ABOUT ME? I WANTED YOU TO GO THE SHOW. Idiots." The soundtrack was okay I guess. Nothing fantastic. Like Boyfriend said, the whole movie was trying too hard to be like Juno, and it didn't help that Michael Cera co-starred in it. So the moral of the story is don't waste your time watching this movie. Go follow a band around the city instead, and when you find 'em, watch their show. The end.
But we're gonna talk about not-the-All-American-Rejects now. As usual, Relient K has proved to be a very appropriate soundtrack to my life. This song has been thematic for me more than once, but never more so than now. Enjoy =)
I have an astronomy exam on Wednesday and I know I'm screwed, which makes it really difficult to motivate myself to study. I've heard the prof scales the tests by like, 40 points. I say he should just give easier tests. Or more of them covering less material. Because the one coming up covers 20 pages of class notes, 7 chapters of the textbook, aaaaaand MATH. Yep, I'm screwed. I don't know what I expected from this class but I know I'm not getting it.
No, that's a lie. I'll tell you what I expected. I thought we would have regular classes that taught us principles of astronomy and then meet up in the middle of the night to observe the heavens.... sort of Harry Potter style. I want to study the sky the way the original astronomers did - that is, through OBSERVATION. There are just some things that shouldn't be taught in a classroom, and astronomy is one of them. But then, I am very much against structured education in the form it takes today, particularly at this point in time, so I suppose I'm too biased for my opinion to matter much.
On the bright side, I've only got 19 more days before spring break. HUZZAH! Let's make it even more epic than last year.
Oh, so Boyfriend and I watched this movie last night, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist. When I read about it in AP, it sounded really fantastic, and the premise was good. They spent the movie searching for this band that was having a secret concert, and they were supposed to follow clues to figure out where the show was happening. Sounds brilliant, right? Like don't you wish you knew of a band like that? Music suddenly becomes this magnificent adventure, right?
But the movie was more about dumb high school drama, and in the end, they finally found the venue and (SPOILER ALERT) THEY DIDN'T EVEN GO TO THE DAMN SHOW. They were all "are you sad we missed it?" "No, I'm not, are you?" And I'm just like "WHAT ABOUT ME? I WANTED YOU TO GO THE SHOW. Idiots." The soundtrack was okay I guess. Nothing fantastic. Like Boyfriend said, the whole movie was trying too hard to be like Juno, and it didn't help that Michael Cera co-starred in it. So the moral of the story is don't waste your time watching this movie. Go follow a band around the city instead, and when you find 'em, watch their show. The end.
"I'm really not as stubborn as I seem..."
....said the knuckle to the concrete.
Song of the day:
Boyfriend, I'm posting this for you because you said you don't know any of my music. Voila.
Quotes of the day:
We are heffalumps!
Taste the rainbow... BITCH!
Random questions of the day (of equal profundity and relevance):
1. Which should I choose today, showering or eating? You know it's bad when this is a decision you have to make every morning and when you get in the habit of leaving the dorm without even brushing your hair, let alone putting on make-up.
2. a) What the hell is a soul and do people have them? Aristotle sure isn't going to explain it, though he'll make it look like he's explaining it.
b) When scientists discovered DNA, did they think they had discovered the human soul...?
3. Were there any normal animals in the Pokemon world, or were they all just Pokemon? I mean... imagine the implications for the ecosystem if all those little animals we hate like spiders and mosquitos and termites, just didn't exist. I mean what are Pidgeys and Spearows supposed to eat if all the worms are a foot and a half tall like Caterpie? THINK ABOUT IT.
Things I actually want (and kind of need) to do today:
1. I really want to go to the store... I've got to exchange some film for a different type and I need peanut butter and I have to get cash so I can give this girl the $40 I owe her from a failed service project.
2. I really want to go back to sleep... I got up at 7 to go take pictures of the grand piano in the Phillips recital hall because my photo assignment for Tuesday (that's two-days-ago Tuesday) was to shoot a roll of all the same subject, and I wanted to pick something that had enough different angles and parts to it that I could take 36 interesting pictures of it. The recital hall, of course, was locked, but Roomie helped me find an equally good piano in a practice room. Then I realized I probably need new batteries because my light meter ALWAYS says it's too dark and I ALWAYS have to open up all the way and drop the shutter speed down to like 1/30th of a second. Damn; camera batteries are EXPENSIVE. >:(
3. I really want to give up on school and just write my book. Honestly I would waste a lot less time on the internet if I wasn't trying to avoid schoolwork. I want to start that writers group, even if it's just me and Evan at first. In fact I wouldn't want more than four or five people anyway because then it would be too difficult to actually absorb what the other people were working on and give valuable feedback to all of them. Speaking of feedback, my friend Ash sent me the first chapter of a book he's writing. I'm eager to read more. So far there's a nerdy kid, a bully, and an eccentric old man who can't button his shirt right (he's my favorite character thus far ^_^).
But yeah, what I NEED to do is spend the next hour wading through more Aristotle so I won't be clueless when Glenney slaps a quiz down in front of me today. Muck it. And sorry my recent posts have all been horribly boring. That's what happens when you spend all your time in class and reading... i.e., nothing exciting whatsoever. Merh.
Song of the day:
Boyfriend, I'm posting this for you because you said you don't know any of my music. Voila.
Quotes of the day:
We are heffalumps!
Taste the rainbow... BITCH!
Random questions of the day (of equal profundity and relevance):
1. Which should I choose today, showering or eating? You know it's bad when this is a decision you have to make every morning and when you get in the habit of leaving the dorm without even brushing your hair, let alone putting on make-up.
2. a) What the hell is a soul and do people have them? Aristotle sure isn't going to explain it, though he'll make it look like he's explaining it.
b) When scientists discovered DNA, did they think they had discovered the human soul...?
3. Were there any normal animals in the Pokemon world, or were they all just Pokemon? I mean... imagine the implications for the ecosystem if all those little animals we hate like spiders and mosquitos and termites, just didn't exist. I mean what are Pidgeys and Spearows supposed to eat if all the worms are a foot and a half tall like Caterpie? THINK ABOUT IT.
Things I actually want (and kind of need) to do today:
1. I really want to go to the store... I've got to exchange some film for a different type and I need peanut butter and I have to get cash so I can give this girl the $40 I owe her from a failed service project.
2. I really want to go back to sleep... I got up at 7 to go take pictures of the grand piano in the Phillips recital hall because my photo assignment for Tuesday (that's two-days-ago Tuesday) was to shoot a roll of all the same subject, and I wanted to pick something that had enough different angles and parts to it that I could take 36 interesting pictures of it. The recital hall, of course, was locked, but Roomie helped me find an equally good piano in a practice room. Then I realized I probably need new batteries because my light meter ALWAYS says it's too dark and I ALWAYS have to open up all the way and drop the shutter speed down to like 1/30th of a second. Damn; camera batteries are EXPENSIVE. >:(
3. I really want to give up on school and just write my book. Honestly I would waste a lot less time on the internet if I wasn't trying to avoid schoolwork. I want to start that writers group, even if it's just me and Evan at first. In fact I wouldn't want more than four or five people anyway because then it would be too difficult to actually absorb what the other people were working on and give valuable feedback to all of them. Speaking of feedback, my friend Ash sent me the first chapter of a book he's writing. I'm eager to read more. So far there's a nerdy kid, a bully, and an eccentric old man who can't button his shirt right (he's my favorite character thus far ^_^).
But yeah, what I NEED to do is spend the next hour wading through more Aristotle so I won't be clueless when Glenney slaps a quiz down in front of me today. Muck it. And sorry my recent posts have all been horribly boring. That's what happens when you spend all your time in class and reading... i.e., nothing exciting whatsoever. Merh.
Skittles and Combos
I'm having a pretty fantastic day right now. I'm done with my photo test and my sociology midterm. Both went well enough, especially considering how little I studied. The sun is shining and it's warm enough for me to walk around in my Relient K zip-up hoodie. As an added bonus, the snow is melting, creating big ol' puddles all over campus, AND I HAVE RAIN BOOTS. Nuff said. Ducky (from summer camp) surprised me with a visit. She brought a whole bunch of crack - I mean, uh, Skittles. Skittles. I only got like 6 hours of sleep last night and even after I napped between chapel and astronomy, I still felt pretty woozy, so Ducky and those two bags of Skittles were a God-send. Then we got totally high off all those Skittles and sat there and laughed our faces off at this:
Love you, Isaac, my one-time imaginary boyfriend. XD
I nabbed some linear diffraction windows from my astronomy class and I've been taking pictures through them. I've got to find some more interesting subjects, but for now I've got these:
Taste the Rainbow.... pshh, who needs Photoshop?
Boyfriend is on his way here and we are going to go gallivanting about the Go-Co woods. Yes, I will be wearing my rain boots. Yes, I will still be acting like I'm on crack. I think he's pretty used to that though....
Love you, Isaac, my one-time imaginary boyfriend. XD
I nabbed some linear diffraction windows from my astronomy class and I've been taking pictures through them. I've got to find some more interesting subjects, but for now I've got these:
Taste the Rainbow.... pshh, who needs Photoshop?
Boyfriend is on his way here and we are going to go gallivanting about the Go-Co woods. Yes, I will be wearing my rain boots. Yes, I will still be acting like I'm on crack. I think he's pretty used to that though....
After this day, it's this week all over again.
[title unrelated]
Oh man, this is hilarious! I can think of a few scenarios in which it would come in handy, too.... HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY, ANGRY FRODO!!! XD
Wisdomatic ponderings of the day:
Complete globalization is impossible. There is no common denominator low enough for the liberals and no standard of conduct high enough for the fundamentalists. Seven billion individuals can’t be made to agree, or even behave civilly toward one another, and until we stop trying to force them, we will never have world peace.
In other news, I wrote like an entire sentence of my story this morning. YAHOO! Merh.
Oh man, this is hilarious! I can think of a few scenarios in which it would come in handy, too.... HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY, ANGRY FRODO!!! XD
Wisdomatic ponderings of the day:
Complete globalization is impossible. There is no common denominator low enough for the liberals and no standard of conduct high enough for the fundamentalists. Seven billion individuals can’t be made to agree, or even behave civilly toward one another, and until we stop trying to force them, we will never have world peace.
In other news, I wrote like an entire sentence of my story this morning. YAHOO! Merh.
Hey, we want an anthem!
This post is going to be all about music. I got some rants and I got some raves. Here goes.
RANTS:
Last night, this guy named Elijah Wyman came to play at my school. Another guy named Tom opened for him. I liked Tom a lot; he reminded me of a Christian version of Conor Oberst, so I'm not really sure what compelled me to like him. Maybe it's just been a while since I sat around and watched someone play music. I've always said... hand a guy an acoustic guitar... and I'm happy just to sit and listen. I didn't like Elijah as much, which is not to say I didn't admire him: he's totally just doing his own thing with music. His guitar was from like 1940 and he had this other weird stringed instrument that he played one song on. But if I don't like someone's voice then I don't like their music, and his voice just didn't agree with me, so since I had stuff to do and sleep to make up, I cut out early.
Now a word on contemporary worship music. I'll keep it brief since I've ranted about how bad contemporary worship sucks on many an occasion. On Wednesdays in chapel, there's always a praise band, and, you know, I'm all for it, since it's closer to my genre of preference than hymns. But I hate the way it's done. The band picks songs nobody knows, or they do re-makes of classic, well-loved worship songs so we can't actually follow the tune even though everybody knows the words. It's such a show. It's so fucking fake. I always just want to sit down and curl up and hide from how awful it is, but I don't want to be rude so I don't.
Magazine subscriptions are AWESOME when you're in college because they guarantee that something will show up in your mailbox at least once a month. And getting mail is REALLY exciting (except when it's stupid promotional things for like, chapel and bread groups). It's even better when it's a magazine you actually want. I have a friend who gets American Girl catalogs once a month, and I know she enjoys getting them - their entire apartment based their Halloween costumes off it and dressed up as the anti-American girls. But I really do enjoy AP magazine and I actually look forward to reading it.
Which is why it's so disappointing when it comes and I see stupid, cliche, emo/screamo/mallcore bands gracing the cover in all their cliche-swoopy-haired neon anti-glory. I've got no problem with the weird regression to the 80s thing that's going on, and we all know I love neon, but please, boys, restrict it to its proper place at Cobra shows. If you're going to scream about your angst like a million other terrible bands, fine, whatever. But please wear the appropriate attire.
Then I open the magazine only to find more neon-emo advertisements for bands with increasingly retarded names like "Fear Before the March of Flames," "Bring me the Horizon," and "Watch out! Theres ghosts" (which particularly pisses me off because it just screams "bad grammar"). God, try a little harder, you don't fit the cliche yet. Your band name should not be a sentence long. I'm already sick of you by the time I'm done saying it.
RAVES:
I hadn't listened to Mute Math in a really long time, and then I saw this:
That's right: effing brilliant.
Boyfriend and I were talking about the road trip we want to take this summer and how we haven't really coordinated with the other people we want to come along. I've been thinking how kids like us always make grand plans for road trips like this and their plans go down the tubes, so I said, "I can see this ending up as just you and me driving around the country in a car." Of course I don't think my parents would be too keen on that.
Without the ostensible purpose of finding Ravin's family, we would need another reason to drive thousands of miles all over the continent. So I said we ought to start a band, and we agreed that the genre should be Schizophrenic Dance Metal, and that way we'll both be happy. Sooo I'll take bass, I guess, and he'll probs take drums. If anyone wants to jump in, we still need a keytarist and a shredder, among other things.
To conclude, I've compiled this list of ten albums that rocked my world and continue to rock my world on account of their innovation, timelessness, or life-change-ability. Go on, let em rock your world, too.
Dream Theater – Octavarium
House of Heroes – The End Is Not The End
Mute Math – Mute Math
Brave Saint Saturn – The Light Of Things Hoped For
Goo Goo Dolls – Let Love In
Matchbox Twenty – More Than You Think You Are
My Chemical Romance – The Black Parade
Relient K – Two Lefts Don’t Make a Right… but Three Do
Switchfoot – Nothing Is Sound
Anberlin – Never Take Friendship Personal
RANTS:
Last night, this guy named Elijah Wyman came to play at my school. Another guy named Tom opened for him. I liked Tom a lot; he reminded me of a Christian version of Conor Oberst, so I'm not really sure what compelled me to like him. Maybe it's just been a while since I sat around and watched someone play music. I've always said... hand a guy an acoustic guitar... and I'm happy just to sit and listen. I didn't like Elijah as much, which is not to say I didn't admire him: he's totally just doing his own thing with music. His guitar was from like 1940 and he had this other weird stringed instrument that he played one song on. But if I don't like someone's voice then I don't like their music, and his voice just didn't agree with me, so since I had stuff to do and sleep to make up, I cut out early.
Now a word on contemporary worship music. I'll keep it brief since I've ranted about how bad contemporary worship sucks on many an occasion. On Wednesdays in chapel, there's always a praise band, and, you know, I'm all for it, since it's closer to my genre of preference than hymns. But I hate the way it's done. The band picks songs nobody knows, or they do re-makes of classic, well-loved worship songs so we can't actually follow the tune even though everybody knows the words. It's such a show. It's so fucking fake. I always just want to sit down and curl up and hide from how awful it is, but I don't want to be rude so I don't.
Magazine subscriptions are AWESOME when you're in college because they guarantee that something will show up in your mailbox at least once a month. And getting mail is REALLY exciting (except when it's stupid promotional things for like, chapel and bread groups). It's even better when it's a magazine you actually want. I have a friend who gets American Girl catalogs once a month, and I know she enjoys getting them - their entire apartment based their Halloween costumes off it and dressed up as the anti-American girls. But I really do enjoy AP magazine and I actually look forward to reading it.
Which is why it's so disappointing when it comes and I see stupid, cliche, emo/screamo/mallcore bands gracing the cover in all their cliche-swoopy-haired neon anti-glory. I've got no problem with the weird regression to the 80s thing that's going on, and we all know I love neon, but please, boys, restrict it to its proper place at Cobra shows. If you're going to scream about your angst like a million other terrible bands, fine, whatever. But please wear the appropriate attire.
Then I open the magazine only to find more neon-emo advertisements for bands with increasingly retarded names like "Fear Before the March of Flames," "Bring me the Horizon," and "Watch out! Theres ghosts" (which particularly pisses me off because it just screams "bad grammar"). God, try a little harder, you don't fit the cliche yet. Your band name should not be a sentence long. I'm already sick of you by the time I'm done saying it.
RAVES:
I hadn't listened to Mute Math in a really long time, and then I saw this:
That's right: effing brilliant.
Boyfriend and I were talking about the road trip we want to take this summer and how we haven't really coordinated with the other people we want to come along. I've been thinking how kids like us always make grand plans for road trips like this and their plans go down the tubes, so I said, "I can see this ending up as just you and me driving around the country in a car." Of course I don't think my parents would be too keen on that.
Without the ostensible purpose of finding Ravin's family, we would need another reason to drive thousands of miles all over the continent. So I said we ought to start a band, and we agreed that the genre should be Schizophrenic Dance Metal, and that way we'll both be happy. Sooo I'll take bass, I guess, and he'll probs take drums. If anyone wants to jump in, we still need a keytarist and a shredder, among other things.
To conclude, I've compiled this list of ten albums that rocked my world and continue to rock my world on account of their innovation, timelessness, or life-change-ability. Go on, let em rock your world, too.
Dream Theater – Octavarium
House of Heroes – The End Is Not The End
Mute Math – Mute Math
Brave Saint Saturn – The Light Of Things Hoped For
Goo Goo Dolls – Let Love In
Matchbox Twenty – More Than You Think You Are
My Chemical Romance – The Black Parade
Relient K – Two Lefts Don’t Make a Right… but Three Do
Switchfoot – Nothing Is Sound
Anberlin – Never Take Friendship Personal
I'm in a Relient K mood this morning.
MORE BIZARRE ACID DREAMS! YAYYY!
Last night, I dreamed I was at a mall during vacation, so somewhere a little ways away from home. My sister Jay May was supposed to give some sort of show or speech or presentation or something, and I knew I would be nervous if I was in her shoes so I wished her good luck. This made her inexplicably angry with me and she yelled at me, so I stormed out and refused to go to her presentation. Instead I went to this random store full of miscellaneous trinkets, where apparently my photography class was working on a project. I whipped out my camera (that I just HAPPENED to have with me) and joined them. It was all very experimental. I was about to take a really nifty self-portrait using the mirror inside someone else's camera when my family came to get me, and they were none too pleased I'd ditched my sister's thingamajig.
Then my dad and I were sitting in a couple of seats in the middle of the corridor while my mom and sister got ice cream or something and this guy came up and took my dad's briefcase. He didn't snag it and run away or anything, just picked it up as if he was inspecting it and then walked away with it. My dad wouldn't stand for it and we grabbed the rest of our stuff and followed this guy. I had my messenger bag with Jesus the Lappy inside and Dad had some other random luggage; I don't know why we were lugging all this around the mall but anyhow.
We came to this one store that didn't really have anything in it and the guy and his associates opened my dad's briefcase to reveal one of those tiny little slivers of a Macbook. Then I realized they wanted computers and that I should probably have left Jesus the Lappy sitting in the middle of the mall. It would have been safer. But it was too late by then. I fought them tooth and nail because my story was on Jesus the Lappy and I hadn't backed it up (lies and heresy!) but they took it eventually and locked us up.
Somehow the whole family got locked up. A loooong time passed. I don't know how long. But Jay May and I finally managed to sneak out, and when we got to the parking lot, neither of us could remember where we'd parked because it had apparently been YEARS. I contemplated stealing a car just to escape, because there was no way we could beat these dudes on foot and we knew they'd come for us. So were computers really the reason for all this? Probably not.
We heard the guards coming and booked it into the woods. They were hot on our tails but never quite caught us. Somehow we got split up. I was clinging to a cliff face over water. It was the sort of cliff face that juts out at the top, so if you climb down a little farther, the ridge of it will hide you from anyone looking down at the water. I don't have that kind of upper body strength in real life, but thankfully I did in the dream. I was wondering where Jay May was and what I should do if they caught her, and how thick this strip of woods was and whether there would be houses on the other side where we could seek refuge. I also planned to climb way up the first humongoid tree I could find until the men went away. I also considered flying. Don't know why I didn't use that to my advantage. I woke up after that. Oh, and I'm not sure but I think I was Princess Mononoke for a good chunk of this dream. XD
The night BEFORE last night, I had another one of those paralysis dreams, but this one was different again. I thought I had woken up from almost-sleep and was about to roll over when I felt the paralysis start to form in my limbs. I panicked, thinking, "no no no, not this again, no no..." (because I already couldn't say anything). But I thought it so hard and fought it so violently that it wasn't very long at all before I shook it off, shouted "NO!" and woke myself up.
All right well. Off to contemplate the nature of virtue some more over an omelette at Lane until sociology at 9:10. Coming up with the concept for the paper wasn't as painful as I'd thought. Stretching that concept out over seven pages might be. BUT I AM A WRITER, AND THIS IS ONLY A ROUGH DRAFT. It will be fine. Also, I'm totally stealing this link from Dee because these photographs are brilliant. Makes me want to travel.
Last night, I dreamed I was at a mall during vacation, so somewhere a little ways away from home. My sister Jay May was supposed to give some sort of show or speech or presentation or something, and I knew I would be nervous if I was in her shoes so I wished her good luck. This made her inexplicably angry with me and she yelled at me, so I stormed out and refused to go to her presentation. Instead I went to this random store full of miscellaneous trinkets, where apparently my photography class was working on a project. I whipped out my camera (that I just HAPPENED to have with me) and joined them. It was all very experimental. I was about to take a really nifty self-portrait using the mirror inside someone else's camera when my family came to get me, and they were none too pleased I'd ditched my sister's thingamajig.
Then my dad and I were sitting in a couple of seats in the middle of the corridor while my mom and sister got ice cream or something and this guy came up and took my dad's briefcase. He didn't snag it and run away or anything, just picked it up as if he was inspecting it and then walked away with it. My dad wouldn't stand for it and we grabbed the rest of our stuff and followed this guy. I had my messenger bag with Jesus the Lappy inside and Dad had some other random luggage; I don't know why we were lugging all this around the mall but anyhow.
We came to this one store that didn't really have anything in it and the guy and his associates opened my dad's briefcase to reveal one of those tiny little slivers of a Macbook. Then I realized they wanted computers and that I should probably have left Jesus the Lappy sitting in the middle of the mall. It would have been safer. But it was too late by then. I fought them tooth and nail because my story was on Jesus the Lappy and I hadn't backed it up (lies and heresy!) but they took it eventually and locked us up.
Somehow the whole family got locked up. A loooong time passed. I don't know how long. But Jay May and I finally managed to sneak out, and when we got to the parking lot, neither of us could remember where we'd parked because it had apparently been YEARS. I contemplated stealing a car just to escape, because there was no way we could beat these dudes on foot and we knew they'd come for us. So were computers really the reason for all this? Probably not.
We heard the guards coming and booked it into the woods. They were hot on our tails but never quite caught us. Somehow we got split up. I was clinging to a cliff face over water. It was the sort of cliff face that juts out at the top, so if you climb down a little farther, the ridge of it will hide you from anyone looking down at the water. I don't have that kind of upper body strength in real life, but thankfully I did in the dream. I was wondering where Jay May was and what I should do if they caught her, and how thick this strip of woods was and whether there would be houses on the other side where we could seek refuge. I also planned to climb way up the first humongoid tree I could find until the men went away. I also considered flying. Don't know why I didn't use that to my advantage. I woke up after that. Oh, and I'm not sure but I think I was Princess Mononoke for a good chunk of this dream. XD
The night BEFORE last night, I had another one of those paralysis dreams, but this one was different again. I thought I had woken up from almost-sleep and was about to roll over when I felt the paralysis start to form in my limbs. I panicked, thinking, "no no no, not this again, no no..." (because I already couldn't say anything). But I thought it so hard and fought it so violently that it wasn't very long at all before I shook it off, shouted "NO!" and woke myself up.
All right well. Off to contemplate the nature of virtue some more over an omelette at Lane until sociology at 9:10. Coming up with the concept for the paper wasn't as painful as I'd thought. Stretching that concept out over seven pages might be. BUT I AM A WRITER, AND THIS IS ONLY A ROUGH DRAFT. It will be fine. Also, I'm totally stealing this link from Dee because these photographs are brilliant. Makes me want to travel.
How I Sold my Soul to the Dean of Students
My new theory is that Go-Co likes to tell us our souls belong to God so we won't realize we've actually sold our souls to the institution of education.
Do I actually believe that? Not quite yet... but I'm getting close.
This week...
- For tonight: read another 40 pages of the textbook that didn't arrive in the mailroom til Friday (and without its exciting counterpart, the 3.5" disk of special features... I kid you not) as well as two chapters of the book that has not yet arrived. Also, as of yesterday afternoon the prof decided we should all watch the Superbowl ads, pick our favorite, and write about it for tonight's class.
- For the rest of the week: Read like 3 chapters for astronomy because I haven't read a word of that book in over a week on account of all the other work I've had and I'm now behind.
- Photography - read two chapters, BS some stuff about some more library books. Also get supplies that I still haven't purchased on account of not having time to go to the store. This will have to happen soon as I'm also nearly out of food for the dorm room and have been for some time now.
- Sociology - midterm is next Monday (already?! Damn. At least that means it's halfway over.) Also have to pick an essay topic soon.
- Philosophy - write a paper about how we know the soul is immortal or the nature of virtue or other impossible matters. WTF GLENNEY?
- Tartan articles... at least one, maybe two...
- Figure out how to get the damn film on the damn reel without being able to see it.
Holy frick-muffins, this looks even worse when I write it all out. Consequently, being "tired," or even "exhausted," "beat," or "drained," is not an acceptable reason to sleep. Being dead might be. Experiment is still in progress.
Do I actually believe that? Not quite yet... but I'm getting close.
This week...
- For tonight: read another 40 pages of the textbook that didn't arrive in the mailroom til Friday (and without its exciting counterpart, the 3.5" disk of special features... I kid you not) as well as two chapters of the book that has not yet arrived. Also, as of yesterday afternoon the prof decided we should all watch the Superbowl ads, pick our favorite, and write about it for tonight's class.
- For the rest of the week: Read like 3 chapters for astronomy because I haven't read a word of that book in over a week on account of all the other work I've had and I'm now behind.
- Photography - read two chapters, BS some stuff about some more library books. Also get supplies that I still haven't purchased on account of not having time to go to the store. This will have to happen soon as I'm also nearly out of food for the dorm room and have been for some time now.
- Sociology - midterm is next Monday (already?! Damn. At least that means it's halfway over.) Also have to pick an essay topic soon.
- Philosophy - write a paper about how we know the soul is immortal or the nature of virtue or other impossible matters. WTF GLENNEY?
- Tartan articles... at least one, maybe two...
- Figure out how to get the damn film on the damn reel without being able to see it.
Holy frick-muffins, this looks even worse when I write it all out. Consequently, being "tired," or even "exhausted," "beat," or "drained," is not an acceptable reason to sleep. Being dead might be. Experiment is still in progress.
