Fall Quarter

So under my "To-do lists" tab on OneNote, I have a section for blog ideas. Because I've been busy with school, I haven't been able to update as much as I'd like to, but I've made a list of all the things I've wanted to write about. Here is that list:

Auction

Detergent

Making out until the end of time

That other dream

Finals

That fanfic

In retrospect, I'm not quite sure what I meant by "That other dream" and "That fanfic." I'm sure those entries, were they to ever come to fruition, would have been magical and fascinating. Alas, I cannot write about something  I know nothing about, so those shall be struck from the list. 

Auction

Detergent

Making out until the end of time

That other dream

Finals

That fanfic

Last year, I was awarded an academic scholarship from my local Rotary club. This year, they asked me to speak at their annual auction, as they were collecting donations for the current batch of scholarship winners. I had a good time. The people there were nice, and it was a very classy event (I dusted off one of my nicer dresses, that was nice). I was allowed one guest, so my father accompanied me. We spent most of the evening evaluating the many items up for auction and not bidding on anything. After dining on a complementary meal of what I am fairly sure was prawns, pork and the most delicious potatoes I have ever tasted, we watched the rest of the auction.

They were selling a puppy. It was cute.

Also, the way our table was set up, there was chocolate cake at every other place, and this odd, gelatinous blueberry souffle in the remaining places. At first, I was placed with the souffle, but then somebody showed up and wanted to sit next to one of his associates, so we all had to move down a seat. While it completely destroyed my unstable understanding of silverware placement, it did move me away from the souffle, which I had a small taste of later; it was reminiscent of rubber. 


Score for me; I got the cake.

Auction

Detergent

Making out until the end of time

That other dream

Finals

That fanfic

Several weeks ago, I was visiting my hometown for the weekend. Coincidentally, my aunt was visiting from Oklahoma. While my mom and her sisters were out, and my dad was at work, I had the house to myself. I had promised I would do the laundry while they were gone, so I had just started the washer and dryer. A few minutes later, I heard a loud "thud" from the laundryroompantry. When I went to check what it was, all I saw was a large, solid blue spot on the laundryroompantry floor. I am ashamed to admit that it took me longer than necessary to figure out that the growing puddle of thick blue liquid on the floor was, in fact detergent. 

I'm really glad I wasn't into Portal at the time. I would have expected to fall through the floor and then been really confused.

That is what Portal does to you.

Every single towel, washcloth, dishcloth and the socks I had been wearing later, we had sopped up most of the detergent, but there was still a large quantity of it underneath the washing machine and the dryer. We had to move them so the detergent wouldn't soak through the wood and damn us all to walking around on buckling floors. This task, of course, was delegated to me.

"Now, Katy," my mother said cheerfully. "While you're back there, I also want you to clean the backs of the washer and dryer."

Despite the fact that I do not do well with dust, I did as I was told. Then, after I and my thoroughly dust-covered clothing emerged from the cramped inferno of vents and grime, my mother informed me that I would have to go back to my previous location to connect the flimsy aluminum-looking dryer pipe to the wall. 


I consider myself flexible in mind, but not in body. This new task required me to be flexible in body. After what I consider in my mind to be an impressive show of my gymnastic abilities (i.e. me blundering about and looking decidedly not impressive), I finally returned to stable ground. 


I didn't do that many chores when I was younger. This was an experience for me.

Auction

Detergent

Making out until the end of time

That other dream

Finals

That fanfic

Wow, um...the Making Out Until the End of Time thing is kind of hard to explain. In fact, I don't know why I put it on this list, since it is based entirely on inside jokes. Let's just say it involves characters in my in-progress novel, roundabouts, take-your-father-to-school day and the contemplation of two really bored college students and leave it at that. 

Auction

Detergent

Making out until the end of time

That other dream

Finals

That fanfic


Not much to say about finals either. I got a C on two of them and a B- on another. The Biology final was incomprehensible. Seriously. I expected to get far less credit. Fun fact: finals make your head hurt, but I expect all of you know this by now. Retrospectively, I was probably going to say something more clever here, but if I was, I have forgotten.

Auction

Detergent

Making out until the end of time

That other dream

Finals

That fanfic


Now, I can check off my entire to-do list of blog ideas. That will be nice. In a perfect world, I would be able to provide a greater quantity of shorter updates, but looking at my trend here, you'll probably just get a lengthy information overload two to three months from now.

That Dream I Had a Few Weeks Ago

Maurice Fischer from Inception was my evil grand-uncle who hated Christmas. He didn't just hate Christmas in an "I'm Ebenezer Scrooge and I'm secretly good deep down inside but a sad childhood has made me miserly and bitter, so Bah Humbug" sort of way. He hated Christmas because he was evil, and hated everything that was good.

I don't know why he was my grand-uncle, but because of this, my parents decided that they should take care of him in his old age. Whether my parents were doing this because they wanted him to leave them all of his vast fortune, or because my parents are nice people is never clarified in the dream.

Anyway, Evil Grand Uncle Maurice Fischer from Inception was evil, and for some reason, he hated me, so I had to move out of the house. After this happened, I changed my name and opened a Japanese deli, which oddly enough sold only ice cream and edible cookie dough (which I've tried in reality. It's not actually that edible). I seemed to be doing well in this entrepreneurial venture.

EGUMFfI hated Christmas a lot, so much so that nobody celebrated Christmas any more. However, he still had one group perform a Christmas Pageant for him every year. Apparently, Hillary's mother was part of this group, because she came to my deli one day wearing her biblically-themed pageant costume asking if I could provide her with a fake ID for her friend's daughter. Her friend's daughter wanted to participate in the pageant, but EGUMFfI hated children, and Hillary's mother's friend's daughter was only thirteen years old. She would have volunteered somewhere else, but in the Holiday season, the usual volunteer places are completely packed. She needed volunteer hours for her school project, and the pageant was her only hope.

Then my dream did that thing where it sort of changes the subject but not really. I was trying to get this poor girl her fake ID, but then for some reason I had called April up on the phone. I asked her what she did for Christmas in UaFWTD now that Christmas is gone. She told me that instead of celebrating Christmas, they made giant oil paintings of scenes from Blue Exorcist. To prove her point, she emailed me a scan of her picture of Young Rin and Yukio Okumura playing on a beach (Rin may have been wearing a Santa hat).

Then I woke up. I never found out whether that girl got her fake ID, or whether my parents inherited EGUMFfI's money. 

But I remembered what happened after I woke up, and that it why it was a good dream.

Why I Like the Master

"Shall we decimate them? That sounds good, nice word, decimate. Remove one tenth of the population!" ~The Master - Doctor Who: "The Sound of Drums"

Just to clarify, I like the Master for his correct usage of the word "decimate," not for his desire to kill one tenth of Earth's population.

Also, the guy brought his own soundtrack to the apocalypse, and spread terror by having a publicly broadcasted one-man dance party in his floating space-station headquarters.

He may be a manipulative, domestic abusing, mass-murdering, insane warlord, but he makes for a good respectable villain.

And to go back to my first point: we who know the correct definition of "decimate" have to stick together.

Wait...what? I don't even...

...I've read a lot of fanfiction in my time. I have a problem; I'm not ashamed to admit it. Does that mean I'll stop reading fanfiction? No. Of course not. It's far too entertaining.

Fanfiction is something I turn to after reading a really good book or watching something I really like, mainly so I don't have to let go of the fandom after I've finished going through all of the canonical materials. I read fanfiction when I can't sleep and need something to do, or when I'm really bored but don't want to get off of the Internet.

I know that most fanfiction is...not good. I've read Celebrian (the TVTropes page said that if I could get through that, I could get through anything. I took that as a challenge. I did get through it, but I regret taking that challenge ever so much). I'm well aware that all of fanfiction cannot be that one fabulous X-Men: First Class fanfic that fixed the Beach Divorce in an engaging and realistic way. I'm usually as entertained by the bad ones as I am by the good ones.

But really, I shouldn't pick out fanfiction to read when I'm too tired to think cohesively. Last night, I found one where Erik Lehnsherr's cat was turned into a human. "That sounds kind of odd," one might say. "Why did you read it?" Well, it was really, really weird, and for the first part of it, kind of entertaining. The author may pick really strange stuff to write (most likely) her story about, but she was being very witty and engaging about it. In my tired state, it was making me giggle. Giggling is fun.

To explain my problem, I have to explain the Pros and Cons of the fic:

On the one had, it had Charles Xavier acting like a cat, which is pretty darn funny.

On the other hand, CHARLES XAVIER is a CAT.

If it had just been a regular story about a guy who's cat turns into a person and they fall in love because of compatible personalities, I would be fine with that. Actually, there's a book I loved as a child with that exact plot:

http://www.amazon.com/Cat-Who-Wished-Man-1ST/dp/B0016CF68C/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1320779733&sr=1-2

But this was a fanfiction. About Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnsherr. Two characters that I love and respect. It broke my brain.

I'm no stranger to kitten!fics, I am a fan of Fullmetal Alchemist, after all, kitten!fics come with the territory (for some reason); and as a fan of Doctor Who, I can turn a blind eye to the human/cat-person thing. I'll read almost any fanfic, as long as I know what I'm getting into. Which leads me to my main point:

If you're going to include human/cat-person mpreg in your hilarious, well-written fanfic, for the gods sake, please, please, PLEASE put a warning about it at the beginning before I get sucked in to reading the entire thing.

Book Signings

Last night, my parents whisked me out of the county to go to an undisclosed location. They implied to me that we were driving all the way to a town two hours away, but after stopping about 5/8 of the way there in a bookstore for an alleged bathroom break, they revealed to me that we were actually staying there because Stephan Pastis was doing a book signing.

I've been a fan of Pearls Before Swine since childhood, so it was exiting to be able to meet its writer/illustrator. If you're familiar with the comic, you'd know that the author oftentimes features himself in it as a character. Stephan Pastis the character drinks, smokes, has a sloppy appearance and is extremely cynical. The actual Stephan Pastis was much more personable. He had an adorable sense of humor, and was really a really nice guy. 

After getting our stuff signed, we got fried rice and gyoza from the Japanese place inside the bookstore. I had only had a breakfast cookie and a venti White Chocolate Mocha in twelve hours, so it was the most delicious meal of my life. 

All-in-all, I had a really good time. I got to see my parents, I got to meet a public figure from my childhood, and I got to hang out in one of my favorite bookstores. Despite all of my nagging, I'm really glad my parents didn't spoil the surprise.

Weekend

On Friday, I fell victim to extreme emotional whiplash after watching I Love You, Phillip Morris with Scott. The film was a dramedy, which means it was hilarious, but ultimately depressing. If you haven't seen it, you really should watch it. Ewan McGregor is in the title role, which is always good, and for once, Jim Carey plays a part that doesn't leave me wanting to punch him in the face. 

Yesterday marked the beginning of "Parents' weekend" at my school, so mine came to visit me today. We ended up going to one of the planned activities before splitting, buying coffee, and going to lunch at a Hawaiian restaurant. Pulled pork sandwiches, I'll have you know, are similar to Barbecued ribs in that there is no way you can possibly eat them and maintain your dignity. 

Pulled pork sandwiches are also similar to barbecued ribs in that eating them is worth the loss of your dignity. 

It was nice to see my parents. My father and I spent most of lunch conversing in Scottish accents. I informed him that the progenitor of our Scottish clan was actually French, but I don't think he believed me. My mother brought me my old Build-a-Bear Koala, dressed in a witch's costume. She sits atop my DVDs, being adorable.

How I Choose What Fanfiction to read

Me, looking for fanfiction:

I normally don't listen to my shoulder angels while browsing for fanfics. That doesn't mean they ever shut up.

• Me: Oh, this one looks good. It's an AU fic, which I normally don't like to read, but this is a Brideshead Revisited AU. 
• SA: Brideshead Revisited is a wonderful story, although it seems suspicious that someone would be using it in the X-Men fandom. Why don't you click on it to see more details.
• Me: Okay. <clicks>
• SA: You shouldn't read this, madam.
• Me: Why not? It combines X-Men: First Class, and Brideshead Revisited. What's not to like about it?
• SA: It's rated NC-17. And one of its warnings is for "perpetual nudity."
• Me: I guess you're right, this does look like a good fanfic, though...
• Shoulder Demon (Fun fact: he's my shoulder angel's husband. I just thought you should know): Oh, posh. Don't you know that the NC-17 rating only applies to children under 17? 
• SA: She's still a decent young lady, though. She doesn't need to be reading smut!
• SD: You and your hatred of smut. "Smut," and "good writing and plot" are not mutually exclusive concepts!
• SA: I'm sure there are plenty of fanfics out there that don't have smut that she could be reading instead.
• SD: There are, but how many of those combine X-Men: First Class and  Brideshead Revisited?
• SA: <silence>
• SD: How many good Brideshead Revisited fics are there, Katy?
• Me: I don't think there are any Brideshead Revisited fics. 
• SD: Would you pass up the opportunity to read what could possibly be the only fanfic related to Brideshead Revisited because my wife is overly sensitive to the things you read online?
• Me: Heck, no. <clicks>
• SA: You're making a terrible mistake, madam.

And you know what? It turned out to be a really awesome fanfic. It was clever, gorgeously written, funny and not nearly as smutty as the warnings implied it would be. It was definitely worth reading.

The lesson here is: Don't let the disclaimers get you down.

Unless of course, you're watching Mystery of the Trinidad. People who go into a movie looking for a feel-good, coming-of-age film about the relationship between a man and his daughter are probably not looking for a Flowers in the Attic-esque twist involving the man's half-sister.

Seriously. It was a good movie up until that point. And I was watching it with my parents. Awkward doesn't even begin to describe it.

The Internet

Yesterday and the day before, the Internet wasn't working.

That day began with me acting more sane than I usually do, since I had gotten a full night of sleep. This was unusual for me, as my usual actions are full of non sequiturs and a higher tolerance of bad fanfiction.

Before the loss of the Internet, I was a respectable member of society.

But when you take away the ability to read bad fanfiction, any semblance of sanity goes out the window. 

Poor Hillary had to put up with me singing both parts of a love duet from Anna Karenina: The Musical, instating first "Prayer" from The Scarlet Pimpernel and then "Sail Me Away" from Lestat as the tragic theme songs for my loss of the Internet, and then me singing along loudly to Air Supply.

I didn't even remember having Air Supply on my iPod.

The guy from our school's technology center called me the next day, and I'm connected again, but I have found out that my sanity does in fact come from the Internet.

Mufasa

I've been going to school. There's a lot of reading homework, so I haven't had time for much else.

I went to see The Lion King in 3D with Hillary and Scott yesterday. That was fun. Mufasa's death made me cry. Mufasa was too cool for this world (besides the fact that he punched his brother in the face when [Scar] was born, but that's another story). If Mufasa and Iorek Byrnison got into a fight...actually, Iorek would probably win that one, but that's because he's Iorek Byrnison. Just as Mufasa is the benevolent Chuck Norris of the Savannah-Safari-whatever-you-call-it, Iorek Byrnison takes that role in Svalbard.

That is a bad example. Mufasa would totally win if it was anyone else.

Edit: Except Rory Williams. Rory Williams always wins against everyone ever.

Defending Our Room Against the Forces of Evil

Classes start tomorrow, but today was rather uneventful. Hillary and I got up two hours later than we intended, and then had brunch with Scott. After some more icebreakers and a convocation, Hillary and I went back to our room to find its security had been breached by a flying ant. 

Thinking it was just a harmless moth or a crane fly, I was content to let it slide. Then Hillary informed me it was in fact a flying ant and I declared it eligible for a swift and painful assassination.

I have had a deep and profound hatred of flying ants since that time in fifth grade outdoor school when I found one crawling on my leg, screamed, and was promptly laughed at by everyone there. 

After some invasive flying (from the ant), and some terrified flailing about the room (from us), I killed it with the hard, thick (not what she said) sole of my Dansko, and Hillary disposed of the body.

We fought valiantly.

Boy, it sure is dark in here...

....I should probably turn on the lights, and maybe open the curtains.

The First Dream I've Been Able to Remember in More Than a Year

Last night, I had a dream that someone was trying to poison me. I spent a good part of this dream trying to figure out who it was, and then the dream totally changed directions on me and started to be about my childhood friend who thought the rapture was coming (in the dream, I'm fairly sure she doesn't actually think the rapture is coming). 

After what seemed like days of fruitless searching, I drove to M.P. in a red car without tires or a brake pedal. All the while, I was asking the people in my dream: "Do you know who tried to poison me? Was it you?" but all they wanted to talk about was what was going to happen at school that day. 

Then I said to them: "Why are we even here? All of us have graduated from high school. Most of you graduated more than two years ago." Very few of them replied. One of them offered to drive my jalopy back to the parking lot.

I said: "Yeah, whatever, but seriously now. Someone tried to kill me. Can somebody please help me? You were perfectly accommodating a while ago. Why are you clamming up now?"

I wasn't even scared. The lack of response was just really annoying. 

Then I went to my friend's house. She had called me over because she wanted to protect me from the rapture. I still hadn't figured out who had called the assassination attempt on me, so I decided to just roll with my friend's plan, and figured the assassins would not anticipate me doing this. 

I was especially surprised because apparently, my friend now lived in the house once occupied by one of my other acquaintances, and my friend's mother appeared to be making either drugs or a stir-fry in the cellar (which didn't exist beforehand). My eyesight is pretty worthless in dreams. 

So my friend kept talking about the rapture, and I tried my best to convince her that no, I really did not believe in the rapture. She was having none of that, and decided that I actually did believe in the rapture, but was trying to convince myself I didn't. 

Then I gave up on finding out who the assassin was, and figured I'd do my best protect myself if it happened again. Someone came up to me, and we started discussing the conflict between Renly and Stannis Baratheon. 

I woke up to Dracula waxing poetic about the meaninglessness of his life, and the sun streaming through my very sheer curtains. 

"No!" I thought to myself. "I know I said I had given up, but I really do want to find out who wants me dead!" 

But then I couldn't go back to sleep. 

Tin Man

Today, Kendra and I were watching Tin Man, and we made a rather disturbing discovery.

I first watched this Sci-Fi original miniseries several years ago. It's one of my cherished childhood memories. Watching it now, I...notice...more than I did when I watched it before.

Now, Tin Man is best described as a modernized version of The Wizard of Oz. Actually, it's more of a sequel than an adaptation, but I'm not here to talk about the plot.

I'm here to talk about a) the man with the boobs, and b) the sexual tension.

The Man with the Boobs

For those of you who have seen the show, I'm referring to Azkadellia's manservant who wears the yellow and black latex outfit, and uses a cattle-prod to torture the prisoners.

When I say boobs, I don't mean the flab that men get when they gain weight. I'm referring to a rather trim, bald man who has round, perky, B-cup-at-the-least, honest-to-God breasts.

I mentioned earlier that he was wearing a weird latex uniform. We thought maybe it was just an unflattering costume, and that everyone who wore that uniform looked like they had breasts. Then we were introduced to his buddy wearing the exact same uniform.

He was completely flat-chested

Nobody on the show seemed to notice this, and that drove us nuts. Kendra and I kept having to pause it, rewind it, and watch his scenes in slow motion. I was half expecting him to look up, stare straight at the camera, and say: "My eyes are up here, girls."

Sexual Tension

Cain is the best example, as he has sexual tension with everybody, no exceptions. Maybe it's the angst he exudes, or maybe it's his habit of pushing people up against vertical surfaces, but Kendra and I agree, the tension is there.

The Queen had a huge, expensive looking portrait taken with Glitch. Glitch was her adviser.Who gets a portrait taken with their adviser? It wasn't a secret portrait, either. It was prominently displayed in the front room of the castle where the Queen lived with her family.

The Queen has lavender eyes. Ahamo has blue eyes. DG inherited her eye color from her father; they confirm this in the show. Azkadellia, however, has brown eyes. Now, maybe the Queen or Ahamo has a relation with brown eyes, but if they did, it was never shown. You know who does have brown eyes? Glitch, the adviser the Queen had that portrait taken with.

There are more examples: Such as Ahamo rather creepily referring to his daughter as a "pistol," Azkadellia getting all up-close and personal with her subjects and her objects of torture, and Jeb's hair. 

In all seriousness, Tin Man is a good show, and I'm only half serious about the sexual tension. If you haven't seen it, you really should; it's a lot of fun.

Prompt: Five Pet Peeves

• Facebook status updates that are  made deliberately vague, and often melodramatic so as to draw attention.
• Having a really interesting dream, but then having it go in a totally different direction for no reason.
• People who contradict themselves.
• Open doors.
• Gratuitous text-talk.

Prompt: What did you do before you had the Internet?

The Internet has been around all my life, but I didn't have access to it for the longest time. When I was a kid, my family had dial-up. You may or may not know what I'm talking about, since it's such a horrifying concept. "Dial-up" is a system that slowly connects you to the Internet, and once you're slowly connected to your very slow Internet, you can't use your phone. I think my grandparents still have it, but that is acceptable; they hardly ever use their computer.

Anyway, that is what I had access to when I was young, but even then, I wasn't really aware of it. My first contact with the Internet was in fourth grade, when I made my first email address. I accessed my inbox through Outlook Express, so I wasn't even in contact with an Internet browser.

When I was a kid, I was only allowed to watch PBS, and even then, it was for two hours a day at the most. My parents encouraged me to spend my time reading. While they spent a lot of time monitoring what I watched on television, they let me read almost anything. On the upside, I did really well on all my standardized reading and writing tests, and it increased my vocabulary and my understanding of grammar. On the downside, that meant I did not spend a lot of time interacting with my peers. During recess, they would trade Pokemon cards (a reference to a show I didn't watch), play on the monkey bars (an activity I lacked the upper-body strength for), play four-square or tether-ball (games I didn't understand/considered dangerous, which also had huge lines), jumped rope (something I could never quite figure out) or engage in those nonsensical hand games (an activity my misplaced elitism considered stupid. Actually, I still consider them stupid, misplaced elitism aside).

I had a few friends, but until the fourth or fifth grade, I rarely saw them outside of school. 

But what of the neighborhood children that youngsters such as myself would have been interacting with? Well, to put it bluntly, I didn't have that kind of neighborhood. My parents and I are pretty sure that there were drug dealers across the street at one point, I wasn't allowed to leave the cul-de-sac unless I was with one of my parents, and all of the kids in the cul-de-sac were either much older or much younger than me.

(Okay, that sounds really bad. I didn't live in the "dangerous part of town" or anything. The alleged drug dealers were fairly unobtrusive, they just acted suspiciously. Otherwise, my neighborhood was pretty peaceful).

Also, it rains here all the time. Kids don't play outside.

There was a prompt here.

In addition to all the time I spent reading, my parents read to me all the time. My dad likes Charles Dickens, so he read me Great Expectations, Nicholas Nickleby, Our Mutual Friend, A Christmas Carol and a lot of other Dickens' novels. My mom read the first Harry Potter book to me when they were first coming out. Literacy is really important to my parents, and it's important to me, too.

I also had a doll house. It came with a family of plastic dolls. There was a blonde mother, and a brunet father, along with their two blonde daughters (and possibly a son, I can't remember) and their brunet male and female babies. As I mentioned before, they were made entirely of plastic, except for the mother, who had a flimsy cloth skirt. This didn't last long. She became a housewife in a teal leotard. They did not have names.

I also had Playmobil dolls that my aunt gave me for Christmas one year. My favorite was a doll I had dubbed Clara. She was a red-head, I'm fairly sure. I remember liking her because she appeared to be the oldest, and she had this really awesome clip-on bonnet. She also wore this really pretty blue dress (as pretty as a compilation of hollow plastic cubes can be). She had a brunette sister whose name I can't remember. They weren't packaged together or anything. All of the dolls in the doll house were siblings except for the parents. 

Anyway, Clara's brunette tomboy-ish sister was a farmer. This could potentially be boring, but it wasn't, because she came with a scythe/sickle. Thus, she could use it as it was intended to be used: as a weapon. 

Their brother was Robin Hood. I didn't actually refer to him as Robin Hood, but he looked the part. He also had a clip-on hat. 

They had two younger siblings. One of which was a little girl named...Marina, I think, who for some reason had a baby. This disturbed me, so I ignored it. Marina lost all of her hair - and with it most of her skull - in the hands of my brother. I disliked the unfinished lobotomy project she had become, so after that, I ignored her along with her baby.

There was also a Barbie and a Kelly doll. The Kelly doll was fun because I could pop her head off all the time, and then just pop it back on. If I weren't so naive during my childhood, I would have labelled the Barbie as the promiscuous aunt in my doll family.

Those are just the humans, though. In the cast of my doll house, the main players were the cats.

I was obsessed with cats when I was younger. Because of this, I had upwards of twenty cat figurines. I made use of all of them. They would protect the house from an unknown yet ominous, enemy; and would fight the humans for dominance of the estate (I was biased towards the cats. They always won).

Sometimes, when I got bored of playing in the doll house (or the vet's office, or the stable, which I also had), the dolls would move to their submarine/cargo ship/fortress. My brother had a Duplo set which I would play with all the time. With it, I would make a...less traditional...homes for my doll family. Often, the change of living arrangements would be because of their status' as fugitives. Because of this, I would be sure to include lots of hidden compartments. 

Remembering all this, I now understand where half of my story ideas come from, and why I insist on my characters having huge, convoluted, dysfunctional family trees.

While I am notorious for starting things and not finishing them, I did complete at least...two, I think...latch-hook projects.

Then, I discovered the Internet.

Updated Reading List

• Guilty Pleasures
• Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
• Part One
• Part Two
• A Song of Ice and Fire
• A Clash of Kings
• A Storm of Swords
• A Feast for Crows
• Basilisk
• The Handmaid's Tale
• The New Testament
• Religious Literacy

The Beach Episode

Yesterday, Scott, Hillary and I went to the only sandy beach within and comfortable radius of our hometown. We walked around in the water for a little bit, but otherwise, we sat on a blanket, read, ate and occasionally talked, which was really nice. I started A Clash of Kings, wrote in my Non-Fanfiction Dragon Journal and I even slept on the beach for a while. It was all very relaxing. While I usually get covered in sand, it wasn't as much of a problem this year. However, I kept finding some in my ear even hours after getting home.

The only problem here is this sunburn. It's not a normal sunburn. I swear, when I put on the sunscreen, I applied it everywhere except for my legs (which for some reason never seem to get sunburned), Yet for some reason, I have one on that actually spirals around my left arm except for my elbow; I also have one that completely covers one side of my neck, except where there's a hand print. I'm just glad I didn't get one on my shoulders.

I hate getting sunburned; thus, I am really careful about applying sunscreen. I use SPF 70.

So really now, what happened here?

Space Thunder Kids: A Love Story

Space Thunder Kids - Television Tropes & Idioms: "Ho Yay: The evil general looks like he is on the verge of tears from a broken heart during the scene where he orders the execution of his green skinned colleague. War is hell indeed..."

TVTropes ships the Piccolo rip-off and his pregnant evil general/dictator/priest assistant guy. I have never loved TVTropes more than I do at this moment.

Obligatory Update

Last night, I went out for gyros with Andrya, James, Kendra, Noel and Riley, then we went to see 30 Minutes or Less. I thought the movie would be completely crude and full of tasteless humor, and in some parts, it flirted with those categories, but overall, it was actually pretty funny.

Riley's leaving for college on Thursday, making him my second friend who is abandoning me for Utah. Speaking of which, April is state-side for the next two weeks. April, I know you occasionally look at this blog; we need to hang out.

The gyro place serves Italian sodas. I'm filing that away under "super important information that I can never forget."

Today, my parents left me with express instructions to clean up all of my old stuff that I've been going through. I always have good intentions when I say I'll do things, but today I got distracted.

Yesterday, I watched the series one finale of Sherlock, which is an amazing show; if you haven't seen it yet, you should. It's only three episodes, and the second series isn't starting for a while.

Of course, now that I've finished the show, I've been reading the fanfiction, which has reminded me of the always-known fact that most people put milk in their tea. I personally have never had milk in my tea before. Yesterday, I thought that putting cold milk in one's hot tea sounded disgusting. I mean, tea is a water-based drink; we don't put ice cubes in milk for a reason.

But then I figured that I like milk, and I like tea, and that maybe, just maybe, they might be shippable.

So instead of going through my old stuff, I have spent an hour and a half of my afternoon experimenting with tea. I've even been pouring it out of a tea pot, rather than just taking it directly for the kettle. I've tried Earl Gray tea and Orange Spice tea, forgoing the honey that I usually use as a sweetener.

Although, maybe I should try it. "The land of milk and honey" is considered a good place, after all.

So instead of eating lunch, I had two tea pot-fulls of tea, in the process trying not to finish off our last carton of milk for the week. We should be having more delivered tomorrow, but my parents actually like milk in their cereal (which is most emphatically not shippable).

Milk and tea however, are shippable. What's more, the milk lowers the overall temperature of the tea, making it so I don't have to get out the little square tea-holder things.

The live action version of The Hobbit is coming out in 2012. I really wish I would have remembered this fact at a later date, because now I really can't wait for it to be released.

That reminds me, I have to watch the first two Batman movies again before The Dark Knight Rises comes out.

But, before I do that, I need to watch the season finale of Leverage. I don't want to be the loser who hasn't done that yet.

Day Nine: Something you’re proud of in the past few days

Yesterday, I got all the way through Blade Runner. I am proud of myself.

Oh, and graduating, too. I almost forgot about that.

Day Seven: A picture of someone that has had the biggest impact on you

My parents. They're awesome.

Day Six: Who is your favorite superhero? Why?

Never compromise. Not even in the face of Armageddon. That's always been the difference between us, Daniel. ~Rorschach. Watchmen.

For those of you who haven’t read Watchmen or seen its fairly accurate movie version, you really should. It has violence like you wouldn't believe, but it is insanely good.

Watchmen gives its audience a view of an alternate reality where superheroes exist, and it is not a very nice place. It’s an alternate history story, where Earth is on the edge of nuclear war. The plot itself is very complicated and would take a long time to explain, so I shall not do that. All you need to know is that its protagonists consist of a group of semi-retired superheroes.

My favorite of these is a man named Rorschach. He is a vigilante who dresses in a pin-striped suit, a trench coat, a fedora, and a white mask with moving inkblots. He also has a voice reminiscent of Batman. His mother was an emotionally abusive prostitute, and he was tormented by his peers all through his childhood. As a superhero, he has no powers. Out of all of the superheroes in this story, there is only one with any special abilities; all the others are just highly proficient in hand-to-hand combat. Rorschach is wanted by the police, and by criminals he has sent to prison. He is considered by the general public to be a mass murderer, but in his mind, he is a crusader.

Rorschach’s intentions are laudable, but his actions are indefensible. All he wants is for there to be justice in the world, but his black-and-white view of everything coupled with his ridiculously high moral code means he oftentimes takes his anger at humanity out on people who do not necessarily deserve it. His way of dispatching wrongdoers is unnecessarily violent – he has enough skill in hand-to-hand combat to defeat his enemies without doing too much damage, yet he still makes use of meat cleavers, cooking oil and toilets to get the job done.

Obviously, he isn’t my favorite superhero because of how good of a person he is. I like Rorschach because he is interesting. He isn’t limited by the bonds of the classic superhero archetype; he is not committed to justice in a way that traps him in the life of a good and pure person. His commitment to justice is so strong that, while to some degree he’s aware that his actions are wrong, he doesn’t care what he has to do to achieve said justice. Rorschach has many obvious, defining flaws, and he wears them on his sleeve. He isn’t written in such a way that the audience is expected to overlook these flaws. His faults are as much a part of him as his good qualities; seeing his actions in the story, the audience is forced to see him as a whole person.

I think I’m the type of person who enjoys anti-heroes more than classic heroes. Anti-heroes tend to be multi-faceted, and bring a slice of reality into an otherwise unrealistic situation. They catch your attention and then make you think about them. They aren’t likable in spite of their flaws; they’re likable because of them. 

Day Five: A picture of somewhere to which you have been

The ancient library in the background? Hot. The girl in the foreground? Not.
It's the backpack straps. They're messing up her posture.

Two years ago, I went to Greece with one of my teachers and a few members of the Latin club. I was one of the younger students there; and I had obviously spent a lot of time with my classmates in the club meetings, but I didn’t really get to know them until I spent time with them on this trip. We all had a really good time. Unfortunately, most of my fellow travelers had graduated that year, so I haven’t seen them since.

This particular picture was actually from the day we stopped in Turkey to visit the ruins of Ephesus. The building behind me used to be this huge, comprehensive library.

We mostly toured the ancient ruins, such as the Parthenon and the Oracle of Delphi. The rest of our time was spent walking around Athens. It was nice because except for the tours of the various sites, and the fact that we had to be back in our hotel rooms by curfew, we were mostly unsupervised. The only rule was that there had to be at least one male in our group. Our teacher told us that in heavily patriarchal countries, unescorted females are assumed to be prostitutes. I am not sure whether the perception there is actually that severe, but none of the girls really wanted to take that chance.

We were allowed to consume alcohol there. The drinking age is lower in Greece, so as long as our parents signed the alcoholic consent waiver, we were permitted to have a glass of wine with dinner. Some of my classmates took a lot of liberties with this, and I found their obsession with obtaining alcohol odd. On the last day of our tour, I had my first glass of wine. To say it was a disappointing experience would be inaccurate, as that would imply that I was expecting it to be a positive event in the first place. The wine tasted like a mixture of cough syrup and liquefied potato bread.

We also went on a four-day cruise around the islands. Everything was beautiful: the bright, whitewashed buildings; the calm, deep-blue water; the clear sky; the sunsets; and we were shown to sights that we would never have seen back home.

Rhodes is a walled city on an island of the same name in the Mediterranean Sea. While on the island, I swam in the sea (which was salty enough to make swimming quite easy), I went to a nude beach, and I went shopping in the city. At least, I think it was a nude beach. I saw a lot of topless women, but I don’t know if that was the lax rules of the beach, or if that’s just how they roll in the area. I wouldn’t put it past them. All the major cities we went to sold pornography in the newsstand right out in the open between the soda and the postcards.

Anyway, my point is that the city was much more interesting than the nude beach. This is a vague memory, but my teacher told me that it was established by northern Europeans during the medieval times. This is evidenced by its architecture (it’s structured like a typical medieval castle. That city was really the only place in the islands that wasn’t painted white), and the fact that there were suits of armor standing on practically every corner.

And on top of walls.

Members of our group could go on an optional excursion to see the monastery of Saint John on the island of Patmos. Anyone not going there could have free time on the beach. There were about 17 students in our group. Six of us went on the excursion.

I know it’s free time on the beach, but come on, it’s both a monastery and a castle. It had been partially converted into a museum for ancient religious artifacts, but it was actually still a working monastery. In fact, we saw a monk talking on a cellular phone. Now, I know that monks are people just like you and me, but this guy was wearing long black robes, had a long white beard, and was wearing a hat that can only be described as incredibly pious. Also, he was standing in the entrance to a building that was both a castle and a monastery.

It's a castle. And a monastery.

I apologize if I’m a little hung up on that detail. We don’t have castles where I come from.

My main memory from Santorini was not the donkeys, nor was it the ridiculously long set of stairs we had to descend to get back to the boat. No, my strongest memory was the gelato. This gelato did not taste like a combination of liquefied bread and cough syrup. It was perfection. It was heavenly. Some angels work in children’s hospitals, some in rehabilitation centers, some on the freeways, and some work in bars, and then some worked in this gelato shop. I don’t actually remember the people who worked there, mind you, but I do remember their gelato.

This picture does not convey how sexy this gelato was.

Also: Kittens!

There were quite a lot of cats, actually. I have many more pictures in the folder.

And a super-cute dog, too.

Day Four: A habit you wish you did not have

I have bitten my nails ever since I can remember. It’s probably a nervous habit. You might not know it by interacting with me now, but I’m painfully shy, and am not a very confident person.

It’s strange, though. I bite my nails in situations that do not really warrant such behavior. I’ll be watching television, relaxed as can be, and I’ll be biting my nails. Most of the time, I don’t even realize I’m doing it. In fact, I don’t even notice that anything is wrong with my nails until I brush a bit of my hair out of my face and end up scratching it (my face, not my hair. I would not notice if I scratched my hair. Hair does not feel pain) because of how jagged my nails are.

Over the years, I have made attempts to stop myself, but none have worked. My most successful attempts have been painting my nails (something I do not do often) an obnoxious color. While the nail polish is on, I don’t bite my nails. I worry more about consuming the chemicals in the nail polish than I do the germs on my fingers; however, once the polish starts to flake, I’m back at square one. I have found it impossible to develop the anti-habit.

Day Three: A picture of you and your friends

Natalie, Scott, April, Chelsea, Hillary, Myself

Top: Riley, Noel, Legolas, Andrya, Gandalf the Gray, Kendra, Samwise Gamgee, Myself
Bottom: Frodo Baggins

The above picture was drawn by my friend Noel.

Day One: A Picture of Yourself and 15 Interesting Facts

1. I ship chocolate and peanut butter.
2. I enjoy the Fantasy and Sci-Fi genres
3. Winter is my favorite season
4. I took Latin for four years
5. My favorite color is dark or forest green, but my favorite color to wear and apply to objects is medium to dark blue.
6. I don't sleep very well.
7. I enjoy watching the rain; sometimes I even like being out in the rain. I am ambivalent about the sun.
8. I dislike extreme temperatures.
9. I only had access to one television channel until I was around ten years of age, so I have never seen Scooby Doo, Bugs Bunny or Kim Possible.
10. I am addicted to fanfiction.
11. This week, I defeated high school.
12. I enjoy nature from afar.
13. I live in a place that recycles.
14. I've played the piano since I was six.
15. I played on the tennis team for all four years of high school.

Haiku

No inspiration

Poetry is not my thing

But I am quite bored

Heaters are fickle

They are far too sensitive

Fire hazards, too

I bite my nails

I’m trying to stop, and yet

I keep forgetting

Bears can be quite cute

They can also maul your face

It is sad, but true

I don’t trust TV

These commercials are sketchy

I wish they were gone

At this point, I’ll stop

This takes too much energy

Poetry is hard

Landscape Domination

Snow has fallen all of the present day and the day before, and he can’t help but feel like a failure.

The children are home from where ever it is they go when Snow isn’t there. Snow doesn’t know how to feel about them. They impede his progress, with their snowmen and sledding cutting swaths away from the blanket he continuously tries to lay over the ground, but he also takes delight in the fact that they take delight in him.

Snow tries to do as much as possible – it is normally not cold enough for him to visit this area. He hasn’t been this far south in months. In his mind, it is imperative that everything within birds-eye view is covered.

Unfortunately, he and this area have no chemistry. He can still see the greens, browns and grays of the ground, and he doesn’t want to see them. Snow sees enough of the earth and the pavement every day from his perch in the sky. He doesn't mind the landscape, but right now, he has a project to complete. The little town has had its time, as it will again once he is finished. He just wants to borrow it for now.

Snow doesn’t like taking action half-heartedly, so he tears off pieces of himself and lets them fall. At first, he is tentative, for this action is painful to him. Snow consoles himself with the knowledge of his imminent regeneration, but he never likes to waste his resources.

Rain helps him, or perhaps she doesn’t. She had been useful to him as they are laying a durable foundation of hail for Snow to stick himself to later, but after a while, she starts to be a hindrance. How is Snow supposed to stick to anything when Rain keeps using her warmth to wash his work away?

He tells Rain to leave him. He would get the job done himself. Rain understands his frustration, and leaves, albeit temporarily.

Looking at his fruitless attempts at landscape domination, Snow concludes that he must double his efforts. He is angry at himself, for Snow is a perfectionist. A layer of snow on the ground that can be undone by a gust of wind or the light steps of a squirrel is not perfection.

Rain comes back, acknowledging Snow apologetically before making her way over the earth. He melts.

He tries again later. It is darker now, and colder. He has more of a chance.

This time, he doesn’t hold back. He lets himself fall. There is now less of him in the sky than there is falling out of the sky.

At first he is unsuccessful. His flakes fall to the ground and melt instantly. He sees the drab, cool, colors where he doesn’t want them to be. Becoming more panicked, he severs more and more of himself and lets it go.

Flakes fall from the sky, some taking a fast, diagonal track down to the earth, others dancing, whirling and swarming like gnats around each other. No matter what their mannerism, they all seem to fit together.

Finally, he starts to stick. At first, the flakes are just tiny dots on the pavement and foliage. The pavement is gray. The snow is white. More flakes fall, fitting into the blanket like puzzle pieces. Snow sees that he has succeeded and breaths a sigh of relief, blowing his flakes every which way.

The children are playing. Snow ignores them. The animals are hiding in their respective shelters. Snow knows that they can take care of themselves. Adult humans are slamming on their breaks and skidding every which way on the roadway. Snow doesn’t really notice them. Plants freeze under his blanket. Snow has faith in their resilience. Snow doesn’t care about the living. This is his moment. Those on the Earth will have to contend with him, at least for a few more days.

He looks across the landscape; his landscape, at the moment, and smiles.

First Post

This is my first entry, so I shall try not to alienate you with a multitude of obnoxiously long, wall-of-text paragraphs. Those will come later. Hopefully I can convey that I am a charming, fun, moderately attractive, witty, intelligent individual whose blog is most definitely worth reading, and take up as little space as possible.*

It currently lacks a theme, but I believe in evolution.

*I used to be conceited, but now I’m perfect. :-)