WE WILL HAVE NONE OF THIS TOMFOOLERY

HEY THERE JUNE

2010-06-21T20:46:00.002-04:00

What kind of substitute is academic-type-learning-through-obsessive-research-and-blog-reading for real-life experience? Allow my next few decades to be the answer! I am well-versed in how to be a Good Person [TM] but not social enough to ever apply these characteristics! I want to be a hermit and escape from consumerist society and advertising oh - my - GOODNESS. But I have grown up seeing money as a way to happiness, and that is very ingrained in my psyche. Also, in my head exists a certain dichotomy that language fails to describe except as: money, or people. Like, if I can't find happiness through money, I have to find it through people. But! Hearkening back to my inept-but-I-fake-it social skills, I don't keep friends long. I have abandoned everyone I knew in middle school; I don't even remember elementary school save for bits and snippets (largely connected to feelings of embarrassment! yippee); even my pack, my lit class, aren't safe. I have kept in constant, face-to-face contact with three people from high school. Even then, that's like 4 or 5 times a year. Now I can see it happening with college people; it always starts as a distancing in my mind, a shuffling of people into specific "categories" (compartmentalizing!). I allow myself to feel guilty about this sometimes, but because it hurts a lot and really sucks, I have been coaching myself into accepting it, and trying to post that Facebook comment I thought of but didn't type, or that reply to an email I composed in my head and thought "well, that's done." It is a process.

Four days ago was a really nice Thursday. I found out some things about myself that I don't feel comfortable enough discussing on a blog that only spammers read (internet boogies!), but! I found a great support community with topics that tackle the whole I've-had-these-questions-for-a-while-but-didn't-think-anyone-did inquiries. Turned a leaf on the lingering bout of depression I've had. I went into work and was able to interact with people-who-often-irk-me like a person! I talked and did that social thing where you share things about yourself. It's amazing what kind of comfort a label can give when you're so confused.

Change of topic! I made a dinner tonight that follows the Formula of Dinners by Nicole for Herself [TM]. Veggies in pan, sesame oil, soy sauce, mirin, garlic, salt & pepper; brown rice cooking up. Finished it off with some peanut sauce tonight. Veggies were carrots, red pepper and onion; added some ginger to try and tackle this stupid sneezing-head-cold I've got bothering me. Drinking a pointless diet coke (CAFFEINE FREE IS NOT FOR ME) and chillin'. I need to remember to charge my iPod. In terms of music! "So Far So Good" by Joseph Nothing is the grooviest Japanese-electronica song ever. Is electronica still even a genre? I am so bad at classifying music. But I noticed some similarities between my top three Japanese "electronica/etc" artists: Susumu Hirasawa, Joseph Nothing, and World's End Girlfriend. Mind you, the latter is much more atmospheric in his music, and Susumu sings, but there exists a parallel in terms of the texture of the exterior sounds in the songs. Guh, this stopped being able to be described. You would have to listen to them with me in the room to understand.

Moving on! I recently revisited an old story idea, with this whole thing about last breaths and overflowing soul mass. Improved some character motivations and applied another level of reality to the situation. Deciding whether to include these two characters who, right now, aren't serving much of a purpose (except to fill a small-child and bald-twenty-something quota); they are part of the group who have too-much-soul-for-the-body and serve as a nice counterbalance to the more-main character with the same condition, but they are horribly two-dimensional.

As a closing note: I have no capability of understanding those who don't self-educate. Like, for what other purpose is the Internet? (Beside porn and cats.) Information is there and the internet has a way of policing its information, so whilst educating yourself with facts, you can also educate yourself about biases and slant! Now that I sound sufficiently intelligent (really, my only goal in life), I bid you tschuess.

ACTION SEQUENCE

2010-03-19T00:23:00.006-04:00

When I was in Ireland, my iPod wasn't charged enough for a four hour bus ride, so I wrote stuff in my journal instead. Inspired by the scenery and atmosphere, and also the lingering thoughts of the divided societies conference I was returning from is this piece of writing, that, LO and behold, contains a semblance of plot. I have only typed up some of it, because the other "chapters" are too rough still. Yeah, and some names are missing and/or stupid, but it's a first and a half draft.

--
Big things were happening in the world and she was stuck on a bus. Cell phones beeped with text messages and the driver was constantly murmuring into his Bluetooth, weaving the coach bus through back roads and shortcuts. The border closed in an hour. Was she going to make it, one of her friends had texted now fifteen minutes ago. Don't know, she replied, trying. SMS was the only thing that still worked. The latest damage to the satellites had wonked up the regular cell service somehow. She appreciated the mulled quiet it granted the bus. The driver's murmur drawled on, urgent and monotonous. She wondered who he had waiting for him.

The bus bounced along an old asphalt road; a few blurs might have been sheep, or cows, or hitchhikers. She pulled out a book of word puzzles to pass the time.

The bus driver blinked his headlights at a few slowing cars and edged around them. The headset cupped around his ear buzzed between police radios and his navigator. He had stopped heading for the official border twenty minutes ago, when the voice in his ear cursed and began to reroute him. There was no way to make it there in an hour but there was still a chance. He glanced at the mirror reflecting his passengers, all of them wide-eyed and using their phones―except the girl with the crosswords. She would make it, he thought. He returned his concentration to the road. Forty minutes, the voice in his ear buzzed. He turned a sharp left onto a better paved road and switched over to the radio channels. Still setting up traffic controls around the border, accidents and pile-ups dotting the near thirty mile backups. No mention of activity near him. He switched back to his navigator and listed his course, naming his next turns and destinations. The voice hummed in agreement and was quiet for a few brief moments.

The girl definitely didn't look [nnnn]. He wondered why she was trying so hard to get through when in a week she could pass through with ease. The only real question, he supposed, was whether she was going to it or from something else.

The girl's phone buzzed, which was odd, because the only person who would've cared to text her already had. She flicked it open with an absentminded thumbnail. Youre not gonna make it, are you The sender didn't even bother with punctuation. She frowned and set the pen down to answer.

I told you I would, so I am. Just make sure you're waiting for me.

The borders closing in forty minutes, where are you

Don't know. The driver's taking care of it. I'll get through.

A full minute went by without a reply, so she picked up the pen to work on the puzzle again. The phone vibrated on her thigh.

I miss you

She sighed and her head hit the rest with a gentle thump. The bus had turned onto yet another rough street that made her teeth rattle. She clenched her jaw to sooth them and read the message again.

Stay strong for me. I'll see you soon.

She tucked the phone away and resumed her puzzle. The bus continued to stumble down the pot-marked street.

The twins in the backseat had somehow managed to sleep despite the ride. One leaned against a pillow propped on the window, and the other leaned on his shoulder. Their hair was exactly the same shade of dark strawberry blonde. In propaganda they were the poster children of the [nnnn]. The photo shoots had brought in enough money to send them to graduate school in Alabesca, and they had grown into their adult faces in such a way that hearkened no immediate comparison to their past. Now those faces had ruined any chance of a future in Muben.

A man and his wife simpered to their feet and shuffled towards the driver, clinging to the seats as the bus continued its turbulent journey. They paused behind the driver and cleared their throats. “Excuse me, sir. When are we getting to the border? We don't have much time.” The bus driver didn't look at them as he answered. “The border's as good as closed. We're going in a different way. Please return to your seats.”

The couple stood still in shock. “A-are you mad?” Their voices carried down the bus, a susuruss of tension following in its wake. The girl looked up from her puzzle and the twins woke with yawns and sore necks.

“Sir--”

“A different way! The man is our only hope!” The man swung his arms wildly as his voice bellowed over his wife's. “If we don't make it through the border we'll be killed! All of us!”

The bus driver never once let his foot drift to the brake pedal or his eyes stray from the road. “Sir, if you show up at the closed border, you'll be a bullseye. In twenty minutes they start the purge. Would you rather be surrounded by trees or government police?”

The man didn't lose steam. “If you had stayed on course, we would be there by now--!” In his temper, he reached to grasp/grab at the bus driver, pulling his shoulder back and causing him to steer erratically. “Shit--”

The bus clipped a road sign, which tore through the right-side windows. Plexiglass and cold air spilled over the passengers. The bus driver struggled to correct the path but the front wheels dipped into a ditch at nearly 90 miles per hour. The passengers were tossed forward into seats, the bus driver into his steering wheel, the man into the windshield...

The leftover momentum of the bus broke the two front wheels at the axle, and the body of the vehicle skidded forward to bounce along the fenced ground. The passengers flopped back as it finally came to a rest.

The voice buzzing in his ear aroused the driver. The passengers were oddly silent but for a moan of pain. On the road, a car slowed to a halt. The driver switched to the radio stations and swore.
“Everyone! Off the bus! Take what you can!”

Anonymous protests rose. “Why don't we wait for help?” “We need ambulances!”

The bus driver leaned on the horn, sounding it off in three short bursts. “By the time help arrives, the border will be closed. What do you think the police are going to do with a bus full of [nnnn]?” The message settled, and everyone began to move. The bus driver switched back to his navigator. “Change of plans,” he murmured, and passed out.
--

The main characters are the bus driver, the girl and the twins, if that wasn't completely obvious already. The twins get more personality later (I hope). They were a last minute organic plot point in this installment. The next "chapter" deals with the aftermath of the crash, and survival! Maybe I will update with it eventually!

The Phoenix and The Witch (This Heart's On Fire)

2010-02-05T22:22:00.004-05:00

I will be there when you die, your name burning hot on my tongue. I will be there when you rise again, my wrath leaving a paper trail down the aisles of your courtroom business. There will be telephones ringing. I will be answering them, diverting conferences and rescheduling contacts while you are gasping your phoenix breath over the scattered remains of the latest fling. It is bloody. You will eventually complain, when your lungs awaken, of the ruined PDA, the red-pocked faxes, and the waste of a perfectly reasonable high-back executive. But I will be justified, and you will know this. You always know, when that tingling starts at the base of your spine, when that new secretary lights up your eyes, when the casual lunch evolves into complicated dinners. That inevitability stares back at you during every shave. You will take these women and love them and sacrifice them in a graceful smile. Your teeth have always been perfect.

Jilted lovers! I don't even know.
Courtroom is supposed to describe the business in a way that implies wheeling-and-dealing, not anything law-related. Yeah...

I'VE HAUNTED HER STREET

2010-01-30T18:43:00.004-05:00

Apparently Ludo has a new album out, which I have just acquired through legal! means. I do enjoy this band. The creepy songs are so delicious. I highly recommend them to everyone who is cool. It's more of a mainstream-rock kinda sound than I usually listen to, but the lyrics are interesting and creative enough to keep me interested. Hilariously, one of the creepy songs from their newest album, "Air-Conditioned Love," just popped up in my iTunes. Awesome.

This might be a boring post. I haven't written anything spectacular lately. I have started drawing again. I love ink. What I do not love is not being able to find my R4, which has my Etrian Odyssey game on it. I have started the second one without finishing the first, like all champions. I am a master.

Guh. I am bored with this. Here, have something crappy I wrote when trying to force myself to write about a really cool idea I had the other day:

Ward is eating an apple when the email pings into his mailbox. The laptop is awkwardly perched between his lifted knee and the sofa's armrest because halfway through his latest paragraph he decided to watch television. He expects the email to be from his thesis advisor and so is slow in opening it.

"Good morning Mr. Ward Gideon,

It has been a while since we last spoke. My name is Deera Montgomery. We met four months ago at the Humanitarian Conference in Spokane. We exchanged information after the night at O'Toole's, and I have kept you in mind as a possible research associate for the newest project…"

He takes another bite of apple and closes the inbox. Another opportunity. Books and papers and journals and too much reading and headaches and ibuprofen which makes Ward laze around watching cheap thrillers while ignoring emails from the one person who could stop that maddening rut of the past three years. His phone vibrates by his hip.

The text is short and cryptic, like most have been lately. "Baby greens and soft beer. 12091700" He grins and tosses the apple core onto the table, texts back a perfectly boring answer. He turns off the computer and television and showers, slick his hair back, and walks into Gruenblatt an hour later.

It's funny because there are no hints as to the actual story/character idea in this bit. How devious I am! chortle chortle chortle.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

2009-12-11T15:45:00.003-05:00

Jack always snuck into his father's workroom late at night. Michael (because Jack called him that sometimes, when it was prudent to be reminded this man wasn't his real father) had been drinking a lot these past months, and usually always had passed out by the time the moon rose. Jack dutifully completed any homework (or anything that looked like homework, and could render him basically invisible to Michael's eye) until he heard the grunting snores from the living room. Michael hadn't slept in his own room for any two consecutive nights since February. Jack knew why, or thought he knew why, but none of that had any impact on him now standing in the workroom, panning the flashlight around.

The jars were still lined on pristine oak shelves, each brandishing a thin, identifying paper strip, scrawled in a bizarre code Jack had yet to crack. If it was even a code, and not just terrible handwriting.

The flashlight changed the jars' contents from a purply shadow to a shape imminent in form and meaning. Jack had just started sex ed in 7th grade, so he knew what he was looking at. Why did Michael keep such things? They were a woman's business, and he remembered nothing about keeping them in jars.

At least four times a month (once a week), Jack thought about asking his teachers about these jars. But something always stopped him, and Jack was hesitant to call it love.

But Michael had saved his life. When he fell into the underfrozen river that cold January. When the Subaru ran the red light. When the doctors said only an expensive surgery could fix his heart. Somehow all these events held Jack's tongue, though he knew on a basic level that no one should keep these fleshy sacks in jars, mummified in a thick liquid that looked like cough syrup. He held a love in his heart for his adoptive savior. If he told anyone about the jars, he would lose him.
--

Some more stuff related to the whole fetus-story thing. This poor kid is gonna be so fucked up, if I ever get around to actually writing the thing.

I leave Germany in eight days. That is basically a week. I am mildly freakin' 'bout the shit I have to finish up before leaving, mostly in relation to finding my goddamn Hausmeister and checking out, jesus. Can't the man just be in his office once.

My past week started out meh, but then I bitched all over the stupid cold that tried to ruin me. I ate 5 apples, 3 bananas, a pomegranate, and balanced meals over the course of two days and learned that bug. Coughing up phlegm at 4am and drowning in multivitamin juice (yummm) might have played a role as well.

Eventually, sometime in my future, I can see myself going to graduate school. It just seems that everything worthwhile (i.e. rakes in the dollars) needs a master's degree. I don't know if I want to get a Master's in German. I still am really interested in computer science, and even education at this point. Loyola has a nice looking CompSci program (also a pretty website) but my god it will cost bare minimum $22 000. What am I going to do with a degree in just German? I was even looking at College Park's library science program, because hey I've worked a few years in a library, that should count for something...

I just spent maybe 5 hours reading a free book at Google, and I have since completely lost the steam and stamina to finish this in a productive fashion.

DO YOU HAVE TIME FOR A QUICKIE?

2009-11-04T07:28:00.000-05:00

He sat down and tried to describe blood. From the television, dark-lit scenes of murders and betrayals. From the library, poetic nuances of slick. From his own head, nothing. He had never been murdered, shot, stabbed, beaten, victim to a horrific crime, a cop, at war, witness to a horrific crime, a gangster, a doctor, or a janitor. What right did he have to describe all the things a pool of blood entails? He had that same blood pulsing through his own body. But that blood was different from the kind you see in movies, on television, the front page, websites. Looking at spilt blood was like peering into a secret. The blood had something to hide, and when its secret became plastered on headlines, it could only hold its cards close and protest. No, it would cry, don't look! Don't be witness to my secret! But what secret, the boy wondered. Life!

AND I WILL BE GREATER--FAR GREATER

2009-10-27T16:04:00.003-04:00

I am a big fan of making allusions. Mostly in situations where it makes no sense and has no direct correlation to the events happening, except for the tags my brain has given it. Ugh, I just used internet-speak to describe my brain. Certain situations remind me of certain songs, through subject, word, and god knows what else. If I ever meet someone who gets the above allusion I might have to be his/her friend forever. Rockin' it old school (lawl 90s is oldschool now).

I cleaned my desk today. I should've taken pictures of the before and after because Jesus. Christ. I have a few uninvited flying guests to deal with, but I have a can of Febreeze, and hell if it can kill a spider why not? I have finished all the requirements for today and now it is just music and internet without a sliver of guilt.

Lately I've noticed how I sorta miss literature analysis. It's mostly because of the short story class I'm taking this semester. Like, themes and foils and blah are nice, but I think when I say "literature analysis" I mean "let's examine every word and see why the author picked it." I can trace this desire back to yesterday night, when I was thinking out a little paragraph in my head. The sentence I was mulling: "There was a sense of something that had just ended, that they had just missed, and that would start again." Now if you make it this: "There was a sense of something that had just ended, that they had just missed, but that would start again."

Huh. That is the first time I have smashed a fly and seen blood.

Anyway! Awkward parallel structure aside, the choice to use "and" or "but" changes the meaning of the last clause in a subtle but significant way. The former implies that the ending and the starting are constant. Yes, it will end, yes, you have missed it, but (hilarious!) it will start again regardless. Also I think the "and" is bit more menacing. Meanwhile, the latter sentence is more forgiving? because the "but" signals, to me, a message like "it's okay you missed it, it'll happen again." There we go. I lost the thread of thought for a second. So. The first sentence doesn't care if you missed it, because it will happen again. The second sentence does care if you missed it, and so it will happen again.

In the end I went with the former sentence, and the paragraph it came from is this: "It was when the air still hummed with the resonance of the church bells that they found the body. There was a sense of something that had just ended, that they had just missed, and that would start again." Inspired by walking home from the train station and listening to the echoes of the bells. I have grandiose plans that this is the opening to a murder mystery. I had also played with the beginning phrase "it was when..." but I think that's enough overanalysis of words for today.

These past few weeks I have been pondering religion (derp derp). I'm an atheist, and of the general principle that organized religion is anti-intellectual (as are most of my parentheticals). But besides the logical, the emotional side of religion appeals to me, in some way? I have been trying to figure out why, for example, I can be moved by poems like those by Gerard Manley Hopkins, which are blatantly religious, but I don't believe in God. The conclusion I've reached is that for me religion serves a purpose as a literary construct. It is good fodder for stories/poems/etc because it is so rich in emotions and archetypes that shoot straight through logical thought. In that way I'll never not use religion, but I'll never be a user of religion. That's the easiest way I can describe it in mouthspeak.

Also surprise I still like anime. Just finished rewatching Majin Tantei Nougami Neuro and then I went and read all 202 chapters in a day or so. The series is nice and stands firmly apart from the manga, which knocked me flat with its ending. One, thank god for authors having the guts to kill off important characters in a serialized publication. Two, god damn. I would buy this series with real money (gasp shock) because it is magnificent. Character changes! Layers of plot! Motivation! But I still have an issue with things ending, those things being quantified as books/brain-involving media. But it's okay! If I buy it, and or reread it, the ending of the series becomes internalized, and then it is dealt with. I am getting better at this. Anyway omg omg fangirl lul.

And now to leave with a snippet/tangent piece of that story I started writing on my way back from Berlin. Warnings for spoilers! For something that doesn't exist yet!

Stepping into that other world, she closed her eyes and held his hand. The boundary passed through her body. For a white moment she experienced nothing, then it had moved onto her eyes, nose, mouth. Her throat closed like a serpentine vacuum, air clawing at the boundary to pass into her starving lungs. When it reached her heart and squeezed--oh god it squeezed--her memory went and she came back on a bed that was like her own but different. He slept lightly next to her and an arm twitch brought him awake and leaning concerned over her shoulder. "We've made it."

ANATOMY? SURELY YOU JEST

2009-10-17T07:33:00.005-04:00

I had a nasty little image pop into my head this morning and I decided it would be wise to write it down and share it with the internet. So, um it is somewhat disturbing, and I didn't research anything related to the biology I'm tackling. In my defense, I always have fucked up thoughts after waking up and for some reason I was thinking of The Constant Gardener and the wife's death and yeah. I didn't originally mean for the character to be male but it just sorta worked that way.

Before he knew it the lady was dead and hung upside down and her eye sockets still smoked from the hot poker he threw back into the fire and her belly oozed purple tissue and curls of intestine and something small and shrimp-like caught his eye and there was his hand squelching inside and ripping through connective tissues and brandishing a tiny, heavy thing the color of a tongue and the consistency of an overripe banana as he squeezed his fingers around it experimentally. No real bones to give it solid form just pulpy tissue and

He reached for a jar.

Then of course I thought up a story to go with it which I'll probably not write anytime soon (haha) and it involves pseudoscience growing fetuses into babies and the complications that arise from having a kid when you're a fucking monster who still messes with preggers and their packages.

God, isn't it immature to constantly think of anything "noun and (possessive) plural noun" as a band name? Preggers and their Packages' new hit single "Just Shut Up and Go Away."

I see the light is holding up my heart

2009-10-13T16:39:00.006-04:00

I've been going through the fiction archives over at Strange Horizons, looking for a particular story, and of course reading a shit-ton of stories in the meanwhile. Today I was struck by just how much talent is on that site. I followed author bio links to really awesome blogs and it feels like the Internet is alive again. Basically this is an excuse for me to post this excerpt from "Up In the Air" by Richard Larson:

"Break-ups are sometimes necessary, and they are painful, and actually they're always entirely unnecessary. They make you feel worthless, like you wasted your time. Break-ups are like big battles in ancient wars where two armies run at each other from opposite ends of a field, waving big wooden weapons. Break-ups are like being hit in the head with a big wooden weapon after running across a field while knowing all along that you are about to get hit in the head with a big wooden weapon."

It is pure genius, and I think it has everything to do with the relationship of the last two sentences. There's that initial letdown of not carrying through with the metaphor of the armies, and then Larson attacks it from a slightly different angle (we last left the armies whilst they were still running, and now we are at the time after that running) that perfectly fills the expectation of using that metaphor. An added bonus is that note of fulitily that reflects the relationship it's representing. Marvelous.

I have a lot of favorite stories at that website. Link droppings!
Tim Pratt: Another End of the Empire - Clever reversal/antithesis of the "typical fantasy story"
Leah Bobet: Bears - Wonderfully bizarre
Alaya Dawn Johnson: Down the Well - The cincher is that small epiphany the narrator has about his education
Kit St. Germain: As He Was - Tragic, but damn
Tina Connolly: On the Eyeball Floor - One of my all-time favorites

I have started classes here in Germany and it's going as well as I was expecting. If everything gets counted as the classes I want, I'll be on my way to graduation and the overwhelming world that lies in wait. I've been playing with the idea of staying longer and picking up a few minors and maybe "cum laude" but then I remind myself to be a realist. I'm going to have an assfuck of student loans to pay off.

My spare time is generally made up of lots of thinking, and these days I'm trying to be more constructive with what my mind meanders through. Lately it's been on the separation of one's actual, inner self, and the presentation of self that various media give. I don't know if any of you whopping 2 people who read this do it, but sometimes I catch myself thinking of my self in terms of some outside source. Then the question becomes, is there a self of my own that exists without these outside sources? I don't have an answer, because the me that is thinking this doesn't exist without influence from an outside source. I have been raised around people, radios, televisions, the internet, and globalization. People are raised by people, with or without all the technology of today. So has there ever been a definite sense of one's own self? If our universe is our interactions with the world, where is one's self in that tangle? I can understand the urge to hermit oneself, to rip one from the "modern" (read: connected) world in a desire to solidify/form that elusive self.

I'm really interested in philosophy, but it seems like such a huge subject to broach. In order to understand modern philosophy, I have to understand the ancient, and somewhere along the lines I just get distracted. Leads to trolling wikipedia a lot. Today I was reading about solipsism and fallibilism. The former is basically the tenant that one's mind is all there is; everything else is out of one's own context and therefore uncertain. Fallibilism, in short summary, states that all knowledge could be wrong, for nothing is objectively knowable. When I was trolling TED.com earlier today, I watched this talk and it echoed some of (what I understand of) fallibilism and all that. Really nice insights. I seem so intelligent today, jeesh.

Another thing about not knowing about philosophy is that I don't know if what I'm mulling over has been mulled over before, and with better results. I need a walking talking philosophy encyclopedia.

Started the bare bones of a story during the trip back from Berlin. It was refreshing, because it's been a while since I've felt comfortable enough to do so? I think a lot of it had to do with having a row of seats to myself (us BCA-ers had the entire top of a train car) and with really inspiring music, by which I mean Elbow. What's funny is that the whole thing erupted out of some mindless doodling, which is really the first time that's happened. What sucks is that I started with a terrible, mindless droning of a prologue before getting to characters, so the world is set up in my head, but not on page as an easily accessible port for a reader. But I was in a German mood so I made a German character which is a shameless blatant ploy to use random German sentences. Mwhahahaha. German German German.

OH DEAR LOOK AT THE TIME

2009-09-15T16:53:00.004-04:00

Things have aligned to point to the universe that today is a good day for me. Even though my Vienna class was more like a competition to see how many stairs we could climb until we passed out. I wish my camera battery wasn't dead; it was such an idiotic oversight. I believe it is safe to say I climbed probably a thousand stairs, up and down. Just here:
imagine this in the sun
see all those people? see how tiny they look?

That, on top of walking around for three hours beforehand, climbing staircases to and fro and to and fro the U-Bahn stations. And she didn't even pay for my Eis. Sigh. But! It is pumpkin season and everything here follows the seasonal availability of foods and so every restaurant has all this delicious pumpkin stuff that I want to imbibe. I mention it only because I got a scoop of pumpkin ice cream today. First, Viennese Eis is so resplendent and amazing. Second, I had mouthfuls of toasted pumpkin seeds. !!!!

This post will now never be anything but banal, because I feel like going to bed a bit early. Viele Gruesse aus Wien!

THE BIG TWO-OH

2009-08-12T23:58:00.002-04:00

Leaving for Germany in almost two weeks, and dealing with last minute flipping-a-shit financial problems. But the proper emails have been sent, and we'll see which direction things head. I'm at a bit of a low point of excitement because I have no language skills, and things at the house have been thrown off by my uncle's death. There's a lot of monthly bullshit to pay off/cancel subscription to, which I should make a list of.

My current list of things to do before leaving country includes silly things like finishing the continuation of my bookshelf comic project. This will not happen because I am never home and suck at knowing my artistic limits. Lol what is perspective? I get the basics but of course I go for the complicated changing-angle shot. Sigh. Also the only working copier in the house isn't, so unless I cut up the book I won't be able to even put the "words" up anyway. But I did paint a river and it looks like a mean river.

I'm not sure what I was thinking, dropping myself in a foreign country by myself. I'm a tad lacking in the social skills, but I've begun to conclude that a lot of the time this awkwardness is internalized. I can hold conversations with people if they line up with my level of humor. That last sentence doesn't explain nearly at all what I wanted to say. Anyway, I guess when it comes down to it, I don't remember how I made the friends I have now, so the same will happen again. I inherited some sense of natural charisma from my father.

I have a problem with my overwhelming naiveté. I subscribe to the "Sweep It Under The Carpet" notion and I sugarcoat the world when I see everyday what a terrible place it can be. There is not enough realism to temper my idealism, I have been told in a roundabout way. (On a side note: stop taking the opposite side to every argument.)

Whelp I am bored with this now

PREACH ON

2009-07-10T23:39:00.003-04:00

Extra family members are throwing off my groove. I have to tiptoe around my room after eight due to small child. Umm but I think I am good with kids because my idea of fun can be very simplistic. Maybe that is not the word I'm looking for. A less-conscious-effort-needed sort of fun, like just settling into repetitive roles that everyone's familiar with? God this shit only makes sense in my head. Perhaps I do mean simple and I am just overthinking this all.

Still have not unpacked all my stuff from moving out of Erickson. Tomorrow I vow to make progress however. I need to take my fridge and microwave out 'cause I ain't using them. My closet really needs to be cleaned out, but honestly I don't know if I'm up to that. The pile of crap in there is basically as tall as I am, and probably almost as old. Think I need a new bookshelf too, so I can clean off my dresser and work on my paint/comic/thing more.

Speaking of which, I was brainstorming more stuff for that painty-comic (combining lines of poetry with crappy acrylics) and came across the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins. His work is quite interesting. I don't quite know what it means when I can relate so well to deeply religious poetry. I love how he messes with rhythm, and the imagery used is shockingly modern for the time it was written in (mid-late-1800s). Like, there's something so powerful about a well-placed parenthetical exclamation.

I made a delicious dinner! I have this staple now, where I cook some rice, saute some veggies in soy sauce/honey/ginger and heat up one of those pre-cooked chicken patties. I usually season the patty with soy sauce, but today at Wal-Mart I bought some teriyaki glaze and delicious fruit. So I sauted some green beans and mushrooms, and they were chilling while I waited for the rice. The chicken was in the oven getting delicious and I decided "hey dammit I bought canned pineapple and I'mma exploit that ish*" so I dumped about half of them in the pan and got everything heating through. Most of the time I add a quickie-egg on top but I wasn't in the mood. No matter! It turned out so wellllll (well except for the undercooked green beans). The mushrooms were melt-in-your-mouth soft and the pineapple and teriyaki were ridiculous partners of culinary crime. I also bought some peppers, so I might throw them in next time. (Guys yellow peppers are the greatest.)

*verbatim

My bad wrist has been giving me such problems lately. Wednesday, during billiards (an actual course at UMBC!), I (literally) just pressed down on my hand and something seized up and completely sucked that entire day. Not even ibuprofen could help. It was something tendon-y, but it thankfully went away with sleep. Except it's still a little sore. I am sad. This follows the terrible shift-and-I-can't-breathe muscle sprain in my back on Tuesday, and the teeth-edging burning ache of pulled muscles in my shoulders/neck from Thursday. Blargh. I didn't want this kind of grown-up.

Positive note!

PANDORA HOLD MY TONGUE

2009-06-24T21:29:00.003-04:00

I work too fast. It leads to free time, which is paid free time!

LOCAL BOY HIT BY TRAIN A FUCKING IDIOT

HAGERSTOWN - Shawn Lonsey, 14, was playing by the tracks last Saturday night when he was struck and killed by a passing CSX train, leading neighbors and friends to label him a "fucking idiot."

"We used to play together by the tracks, yeah," said friend Michael Billinger. "But we grew up a bit and realized the dangers. Shawn was always the stupidest of our bunch."

"It's tragic, losing a son at that age, but, man, can you imagine what he'd grow up to be?" Shawn's father, Andre, works as a logistical engineer at Lockheed Martin. "I mean, natural selection exists for a reason."

A funeral is in the works for the young boy. Signs have been seen around town with the following: "He was stupid but we maybe loved him -- Say goodbye to Shawn -- July 1, 2009 -- Markson Bauer Funeral Services"

--

I had this headline pop into my head while riding the shuttle over to campus (thank god for shuttles even if they are late and almost pass me) so I decided to write a little diddle on it. Sort of inspired by those short little articles on The Onion. Reminds me of journalism class in high school. Now I think I miss writing fake news articles. It is so much fun!

I wrote something else while at work but I do not know what it is exactly about? Also it uses silly little poetic devices. But um here it is anyway...?

There was something moist, wet and heavy inside her. Moist like a towel after the thunder, wet like the spurt of saliva at a sour candy. She considered these differences. Sometimes it grew wetter, and sloshed through her insides as a sieve. When it lost physical moisture it hung in her frame like a stormcloud that wasn't ready for you yet. She hated this second moisture. It bundled up like wet cotton through her body and she felt ready to rain from her pores. This kind of relief never came. For it was only moist just long enough to become wet again, it just bid its time until the water grew too much, and unflowed. Times like these she wished for steady fingers.

This also follows the Formula (*dundundun*) and it is not supposed to be about the babymaker. The front line popped into my head and then the image/phrase about the saliva and the candy, so I just went from there.

I had to go to the dentist like a bazillion times in the past few weeks because I'm an idiot. I have noticed that, after those goddamn needles are jabbed into my gums, the entire procedure consists of me just slightly... quivering. It was bizarre. My own little primitive reaction to stress and threats of bodily harm. But then I wrangle back control of my brain chemicals and am all calmed-the-fuck-down and just crusin'. I like the angle of looking up at faces that are inches from your own. Though I thought it would be weird if I looked in their eyes. So that was that. Now I will stop being an idiot and hopefully never have any more cavities. (Twenty years strong goddammit!!)

Whelpers there goes my time for leaving work. I get to return to dogs that need to pee! So exciting.

LIMITED TIME OFFER!

2009-05-31T18:40:00.004-04:00

News flash: I have many coupons scattered about my desk.

So man, I'm for real going to Germany in the fall. Today my program sent me a handbook, sports bag, luggage tags (d'awww) and my International SOS card. I am so done with being nervous; one benefit of overthinking things is a lack of surprise (that is not the word I'm looking for) at new stuff. I suppose I'm confident enough to forge ahead, or, as I think is more likely the case, I'm not emotionally involved.

I've been pondering this to myself for a while now, because pondering is something I'm good at. There are two sides to me, the emotional and the rational, and I am a rational girl. Emotions are nice, but they aren't the driving force in my life. This would be why I appear to have no desires, I suppose. I tend to lean toward the action that gets me direct results. I picked German as my major because it leads to direct results of employment, i.e. translation, etc.

Being so rational makes it really hard to come home, because I've grown to believe that the people there are ruled by emotions. My dad is stubborn and quick to anger, my mom flies into tantrums, and my little sister is a teenager. I just don't really see the point of being angry, though I often am compelled to ire myself. I won't spout out crap reasons like "we have too little time on this earth" because that's not the reason I think that way. I'm really good at distancing myself from a situation and getting a smidgeon of perspective (sometimes that's all you need). I am most often angry when other people can't do this because to me it is so easy.

Blah. In conclusion, I am glad I know myself. I'm pretty happy with what I ken.

Friday is the library picnic! I am currently torn between two recipes, one for pink lemonade cupcakes and the other for blueberry mint lemonade. I had originally wanted to make something with matcha or Earl Grey tea, but then I didn't. I am sorta leaning toward the lemonade because I don't think many other people will be bringing specialty drinks, and I want to stand out. No salad from this enterprising ~~holy shit I'm not a teen I can't use teenager~~ chef.

Slowly starting to write and draw more often. There was a period of time after moving back when everything was still packed up and I was lazy. The latter still holds true, but my itch had to be scratched. I'm considering adding something else to my bookshelf comic, for as of now it consists only of the top half. I've been scouring through random poetry books I have, and I think I have enough stuff to slapdash a continuation together. And I saved all that acrylic paint from the dump-drive, so the materials and inspiration are there. Need the motivation and the lack of clutter. Maybe I'll be completely unpacked by the 4th of July. That is my completely sensible deadline.

Here, some word vomit that has a direct inspiration. It doesn't exactly express what I wanted, and it got away from me a bit at the end there.

When he played with the children, he was always the monster. It awoke something primeval in him, a rush of secretions and hormones that flashed through his brain in wave after wave. The children tried the usual tactics, the valiant sword fights, the yelling and screaming, but just when it appeared the monster had succumbed to their might, he rose again from the blanket-castle. They would learn eventually that not all monsters can be defeated.

Outages

2009-04-15T00:02:00.005-04:00

If you tell people mistruths for years it starts to be the truth in their minds. I didn't mean to lie to them, or mislead them, or misrepresent myself. I came up with excuses to hide some fundamental confidence issue and now I'm afraid there's no undoing this. The one thing I'll never know is what other people think of me, and I tend to forget everything except who I know I am at the moment. Other people's opinions of me don't grow as mine does, because I am the one who lives with myself. Sometimes other people are too complicated to deal with. I'm enough complication, thanks. How do I reconcile this with a larger, airbrush love of humanity? I ignored that woman asking for help across the street, damn it, and how can I tell myself I love all people? Why can I never look at people as I walk past them? Why do I fib to get out of social situations quicker? I don't want to be this disconnected, but I've brought it upon myself with the damn fantasies I escape to. I am so naive, guys, and it hurts so much because I can see how naive I am. But if I lose this naivety, I might lose my optimism. My optimism is all I have.

It totally and completely bothers me when, say, I'm walking down a hallway behind someone, or their back is to me (say they're sitting at a table) and they turn to look at me, see who's there. I, uh, have other senses? If the person behind me knows me, they also know my name? And you know, footsteps. SO I've taken to just staring at him/her like a creeper until they turn around. It's only a second or two, but god damn does it bother me.

I haven't written in a while. I just can't get a drive going, or find good time, or a good reason. I pass through important parts of my life and just pass them by. I still have all these ideas, but I don't use them as writing fodder. If I do, they're never finished, because there's always been a distinction between ideas for me and ideas for the page. One of them I like better? It's all a bit muddly, because I'm so removed from a world where people write all the time. This is a science college.

But! I have been working on my drawing style, and guys now I draw necks! My legs are getting more realistic, and I am kinda half-assing proportions and etc. I think I'm pretty good at working from a stock image, at least when it comes to proper arm bends and hand-stops. I can totally fluke a pretty collarbone. I still need to deal with overlarge heads, but I've been using guide lines to keep them roughly in scale.

And I have recently been obsessed with The Office and am now in the middle of season 3. It is kinda ridiculous. I sorta can't stand Michael sometimes, god damn.

I feel like my real friends have graduated already, and I uh, don't have much more than my roomie and some conveniences? This becomes clearer and clearer as the semester continues. It really makes me sad/terrified/pissed. Surprise, even I am a social creature!

WE WERE HAVING SOME FUN

2009-04-03T14:03:00.002-04:00

I am at work! I recently skimmed through some old livejournal entries and I was struck by my monetary struggles. I used to stress out over a $10 monthly payment? This is what it must mean to be an adult. I have "financial documents" now (really just one) and my tolerance for money has increased. What do I mean by that. Um, that now I pay nearly $60/month on my phone bill and it doesn't flip me out? Also, I am rolling in the money this semester. Twenty hours a week at $7.75 equals, minus some taxes, $300 paychecks. Like the one I got today. It's weird to consider that, if I saved two paychecks, so many things would be in my grasp. A car. A new computer. A plane ticket. Also, due to my "financial documents," I am not wasting money on as much junk. Except groceries. oh god groceries. My one weakness.

This weekend, I think, will be glorious. It stopped raining here at some point (I am locked in a windowless basement) and the clouds are still puffed and rimmed with hints of the morning grey. I, sorta did not want to come back. Damn you social and monetary restraints!

Hmm. I really have no complaints about my life. I will show the world that not-conflict is not-boring.

I AM A SHADOW CAPTAIN

2009-03-30T00:37:00.002-04:00

Guys, vague allusions to songs are awesome. Hello it is very early in the morning and a small fly just flew in front of my face. Typing in the dark is hard, a bit.

Well hello to everyone who reads this. God damn it took me a while to find that period. I sorta feel bad because my roommate is sleeping and my keyboard is not that quiet. If need be, I can justify it by remembering she dries her hair at 8 in the morning. Thank god her internship is over. I think such terrible thoughts when I'm awoken at 7 am.

Things here are swell. Just a few more weeks of class left (how the hell did that happen?) and then a lovely summer semester. A bitchin' professor is teaching a class about "War in the Modern World." I am ridiculously excited--this is the same guy who taught the American Intelligence class last semester. I was all !!!!! when I saw his name in the summer catalog. I wish his class was at a different time, because another awesome professor (my first college prof, actually) is teaching a class about the Crusades that isn't ungodly early. But there is a scheduling conflict, boo. Also, expensive (!!) like woah.

By the time this semester is over, I will know whether I'm going to Germany or not. It um, is weird to think about. I sort have been assuming I'll be going, like when talking about class registration and dorms and all, but in that way of "it's not really happening" and if I get in--well, then it's really happening. I will be all panicked out by the time I get there. I am confident in my ability to adapt, because I can look behind me and note situations in which this quality came to light. Also I tend to glaze over things once they've happened. I guess schooling myself to live in the moment worked? I am sorry if I forget something important you tell me.

I am still working out the kinks and details of my DNIR universe. It is difficult to make it more realistic, people-wise, because I think the general idea is that young, hip people are the awesome computer hackers, but these guys are older? And not so stereotypically cyberpunk? I keep adding layers to the story, and they are all fringe layers. I still don't have a resolution or arc for the main plot. It's so delicious to build outlying intrigue though, and I am not a girl to resist its temptations.

I cannot wait until it is thunderstorm season. Today the clouds were large and billowing and glorious and I just wanted to watch them for ever. It is like watching people walk. Absolutely hypnotic. I get such a rush of emotion from towering clouds--I can't even form the idea into words, but sometimes I just look up and bam. I'm in love. Do not inquire as to how many photos of clouds I have on my phone, because the answer is many. Thunderstorms are a different beast; the humidity fills the air and everything is moving and static at the same time. I like hearing the differences in rain, and the thick rumble of thunder in my chest. My future house will need to have a covered porch to accomodate my infatuation. Guys I like weather.

Well besides that there is not much going on in my life. I still like earrings and I still have all my fingers.

THOSE KINDS OF WORDS

2009-03-11T16:39:00.005-04:00

There was a welling of pressure at the base of her stem and her spine and she woke from the dream. There were sprinklings of dust underneath her fingerpinks, misty white and translucent. Too much sugar in the bones.
--

I feel like a lot of my free writing begins the same way. Past tense + vague female character + words not used as the proper form of speech + ending sentences that are on a slightly different track (wow that was eloquent). Oh well.

Yesterday I turned in my application to the study abroad office. Now all I'm waiting for are my recommendation letters, and y'know, if I get accepted or not. I really want to go. This is something I'll congratulate myself about when I'm older. My only fear is that it won't mean much, once it's over.

Tomorrow is my last day of classes before spring break! And of course they're the most work intensive. However, in my German history class we're interviewing an 98 yr old about stuff (the class is based in oral histories). But I still need to muster through Parzival (Parzival......!! *fist*) and ugh. Taking classes you don't have prerequisites for: not always the best. But then I'm free!

And then it is time to cook! I'm planning on making apple steak and (I can't find my list) stuffed onions and chili and bratwurst and maybe black bottom cupcakes. I love kitchens! And cooking supplies! I do not like buying groceries! I would protest if I didn't need them so hard. C'mon, seriously? Spending ~$50 a trip (or more) on shit that'll be gone in a week or two? It makes me angry.

Whelp here have another tiny freewrite (which, lo and behold, follows the Formula):
--
Being sick was a way to know her body. When she heaved she felt the hot line of esophagus reaching into her belly, and every pore of her lungs as she gagged on the bile retching. Broken bones to feel where her muscles began and sprains to feel the boundary of a bone. She could tell you how each allergy tasted and paint you a picture of nausea. Her body was a masterpiece under duress. She was not a fan of doctors.

The Ink Mistress and the Man with Eyes of a Vulture

2008-11-22T20:47:00.002-05:00

The ink fell thick and liberal from her tongue and she smeared it across his chest. His eyes like vultures watched her paint, the valleys of color that stained her fingermoons and dripped down the flat plain of his stomach. She retched and coughed and gagged low in her throat as the flow continued. This was sacrifice. This was love in the making. He grabbed her hands and guided them lower. They formed black pools on his hips and he began a shuffling waltz, the rainbow dribbling from her mouth and staining their feet.

----------

Her spine curved against the cold marble as she stretched. Her feet touched at the toes and she crossed her arms up to her elbows in front of her. The long legs of her scarf breezed the floor and she then realigned. Her eyes met those of the man behind the counter and a metallic taste tickled the back of her tongue. Her eyes moved to the imposing steel vents protruding from the ceiling. She recalled a dream the same color as they, a deep greenish grey in which she had carried small innocence to safety and sacrificed her flesh to the wolf. It might’ve been a mistake, but she was awake now. She paid for her postage and left. The cool breeze of the snowcloud day emptied her thoughts. She gulped a mouthful of air to banish the copper resting in her throat.

A vulture sat on a signpost across the street. It watched her, or rather, watched a spot behind her until a speeding bus lifted it away. She followed its shadow on the sidewalk as it circled the post office. The sky began to snow. The fresh petals danced under cars, serpentining and doubling back until the safety of a gutter or patch of grass was reached. If she was a musician, she would’ve thought of a melody to match their effervescence. She rewrapped her scarf and walked away.

Lynford and Natalie, part 2

2008-11-22T19:33:00.002-05:00

There is so much blood coursing through his veins. The first barrage brings her to tears and through the mist she sees the slow motion of his first blow. Her throat pounds as a heart and she falls against the trees. There is a question she knows down to her fingertips and her breath is the answer and dissolves among the branches and a low mumbling shakes her feet. The trees are gasping and unfurling in the dusky air and she can only think to murmur "Yes."

2008-11-11T22:46:00.002-05:00

Move away. Pack your life in flimsy cardboard and haul it across state lines. Call your friends, pay off your debts, sell your dog to Ms. Edna down the street. Do not hesitate. Do not be swayed by your father’s questioning brow, your sister’s clinging eyes, your mother’s photo albums.

Arrive in a new city. Find a roommate and a job; unpack half your things on the first day’s adrenaline rush; leave the rest rotting in their boxes for another month. Use public transportation, but keep your eyes lowered and stare only at the grey-grimed streets. Learn to hate tourists. Buy fresh fish every weekend. These are just mental preparations.

Live this way for three months. Console your roommate when his girlfriend leaves him, but refuse to meet his friends. Remove yourself from social situations. Drink only water. Do not laugh at office parties. These are proven methods that will make the final step a breeze.

Wake up on a beautiful morning, a tower of solitude. Leave your share of the next month’s rent taped to the microwave; bring no regrets. We try to make ourselves available throughout the country. Though our methods are experimental, we have a high success rate. Finish living your current life and find us. It will only take five minutes. Tomorrow is a new beginning.
--

A short-short I wrote for my fiction class last semester. It's a tiny bit vague, but I didn't feel like changing that. Just figured I'd update with something over here.

Cheating

2008-10-17T20:14:00.002-04:00

She sat at the oak table stringing beads,
each specimen carefully lifted and inspected.
In one hand the gossamer string; it quivered
as blood pulsed her finger pads.
With windows opened to the spring chirping of birds,
she threaded: a small clink joined the silence of the kitchen.
This was factory work with grace. She continued.
Her threading lasted until I came home,
stringing lies in my head.

Lynford and Natalie

2008-08-11T19:10:00.001-04:00

There’s a crowbar in the trunk because I won’t wait for time to break down your defenses. It will be a quiet night, a dark forest clearing where even the trees will join in my chorus of worship. And the first blow will take you away from them and closer to me. My hair’s your breath and your clenched teeth are the sinews threading my heart. One pound, two pound. The sighs from your lips power this ancient engine churning inside. I have worked myself to perfection to serve you gasping under the starlight. The veins in my skin pump viscosity to spill it at your feet and the only answer I need is “Yes.”

IDLE RIFFRAFF

2008-08-04T22:42:00.002-04:00

My parents went to Dover Downs Saturday night, and I was responsible for taking out the dogs Sunday morning. By morning, they meant no later than 7am. Completely unacceptable. So instead of sleeping for five or so hours, I decided just NOT to sleep. What did I do? Watched Heroes season 1 and drank (count 'em) 10 cans of diet coke. My little sister, who endeavored upon this quest with me, didn't quite make it (she offed at 5). We made Velveeta around 2. I had some bread sticks and yogurt to keep me metabolizing. It was a night, definitely. My final hour count was 40. I got about 9 hours of sleep, which my body decided wasn't enough for lucidity. Bit of bad timing, since I had a test this morning. I didn't bomb it, but I could recognize a significant difference in my performance. Oh well.

Hey guys here's an awesome experiment! Comment if you read this! (hahahaha)

So I finally finally started my bookshelf painting thing again. It was pretty nice. Of course I changed the original panel design, but I can't draw cats, so it's okay. I learned how to draw stairs~ That sort of thing makes me think I could one day draw for srsly but honestly I was just looking at a Google picture the entire time. But! They look convincingly like stairs. If drawing didn't involve things like perspective and 3 dimensions, I'd be rolling in the money. Now I only have one panel left! And three weeks to do it (that's cutting it close haha)

Yeah, ask me how much of my to-do list I've accomplished, and the answer would be no. I wanted to write a story or two, I wanted to write a sestina, I wanted to sketch some ARG I would never start, and what did I do instead? Stick figures. Mind you, the addition of legs was a nice improvement, but I could've been doing so much more. Sigh.

I'm going through a fantastically interesting period of German learning. Like I can feel myself actually learning it. It's weird, because I've done it before (with English), and now I'm conscious of what is happening. It's hard to think of myself as a brain and some flabs of meat, but this drives the point home. My brain is rewiring itself.

Hhhhhhuh. Guys, I still struggle at expressing myself. I think to some level I'm screwed up in the head. I can easily shun people. I make up complex character-based melodramas in my head just to experience a kind of emotional connection. I criticize my actions and then criticize my criticisms. I'm a hypocrite who loves humans on the large scale but can ignore the woman across the street asking for help. (in the moment we are monsters) Sometimes it's easier to lie to people, especially when it gets me away from awkward situations quicker. I think I hate my family, but I hate that I hate. I can pull meta-bullshit out of my ass.

Well. That's enough meta for now. I think my body wants to sleep.

Some stream of consciousness writing

2008-07-14T22:37:00.004-04:00

Just some words that have been floating around my head in various incarnations and finally found a way into reality.

The oblivion wraps her in warm breaths and silken fingertips - should she give in? - she hasn't felt at ease since she first discovered her body was fallible. Everyone tells her it's just youth and that feeling of indestructibility will fade until talk of dying becomes just as faded and inevitable as one's first apartment, or love.
-and why should she give in? It is more painful and alive to fight. She rejects this oblivion. It does not reject her.

I always have an issue typing up my stream-writing because I hardly ever punctuate or capitalize or (in one case above) use the correct words. Oh well. Raw writing.

I have noticed lately my responses to certain phrases, lines of dialogue, slogans, etc are hyped beyond normal. These words hold a significance to me, but I can't explain why. Some of them have come from dreams, some are connected to unrealized stories, some are just there.
FIELD-STOP hotel
as touch forbids, so sense compels
It loses something in translation
work quickly; we haven't time
"I wasn't lying."
she's there to stop him he's there to play it down
the terminal hand
the outsider/the observer/the one-who-came-before
The Harbinger brings word of your brother's death, Marley! do you rise to the challenge?
he burned out at 30 'cause he smiled too much
Ambrose Gilchrist has a twin
in the moment we are monsters

Well, German class is going well. I have not doodled once, and it feels great to have an energy outlet. Also, learning a language is a sweet way to feel hella smart.

The Ghost

2008-06-27T00:00:00.003-04:00

So remember that brain cancer story I wanted to write? I pumped out a preliminary scene last night because I had a lot of energy that needed an outlet. It's rough, as in I haven't added in much setting description nor decided on the narrative tone I want to take. Actually it's mostly just dialogue. I got to know the characters a bit better. My little "theme" one-liner that I had in the back of my head (and at the top of the .doc) was "She was haunted by the ghost of the person she used to be." I thought about using that as the first line, but then I didn't.

She woke up an hour later, a sizable ounce of her brain gone. The entire tumor had been removed, they told her, but she would still need a few more months of chemo and would she mind posing with the surgeons? Such a rare operation needed to be documented properly.

Joachim shuffled in after the doctors had gone. He still carried the paperback he had walked in with last night. The bookmark had inched its way along while she was under the knife.

“You were on page 137,” she greeted.

He smiled. He rubbed his eyes and sank onto the corner of her bed. “Yes, honey.” He rubbed his eyes again. “How do you feel?”

“Nothing, mostly. I don’t feel any different.” She shifted. “What page are you on now?”

“316. The doctors said that the area of brain they operated on dealt mostly with memory. They’re going to have to test you out, to make sure you’re still ok. I was talking to a nurse, and she said the tests are mostly word memorization and basic history, like Independence Day and 911.” She stifled a yawn. “But, ah, that won’t be for a few more hours. Give the brain time to recover.” He traced his hand over her cheekbone. “I’m so glad you’re ok.”

“I think I remember everything important,” she said. “How was your night? Did the book get any better?”

“No. No, it stayed about the same. I read when I could, tried to sleep, drank some coffee.”

“You do seem a little red in the eyes.”

A pause. “I was going to call your office, tell them the news. Any special messages?”

She hummed and tapped a finger. “Wish Angela an early happy birthday.”

He kissed her cheek. “I’ll do that now.”

The end. A horribly empty piece of writing. I have major issues with setting. I don't usually write any setting details until the next go-through, because otherwise I get super distracted and I don't finish writing what I had in mind. It's horrible and I get a lot of smack about it in workshop. I have to think about setting with a different part of my mind, and once I'm out of the writing track I am SO out of it. Like ugh. Also I think I have a thing for guys who ramble; it's so adorable to me.

Speaking of adorable, and soccer, since it is Euro 2008 season. I love love love love love it when soccer players head-butt a ball and fall on their asses. Like, when the goalie throws/kicks it across the field and some dude tries to knock it down and he gets a hit in but then just flails from overbalancing and plomps on his behind? POSSIBLY THE MOST ADORABLE THING EVER?

HELLO

2008-06-14T00:46:00.003-04:00

It is so laborious to blog/keep an online journal. Ugh. I should be in bed trying to sleep but instead I am awake and writing run-on sentences and possibly in a weird mood. I have concocted a bold print "To Do" list and tacked it to my wall. I need to save money for a trip with some girlfriends later in the summer. This will be difficult because I do not have many hours at the library this time around.

My other two major projects that need to be finished ASAP are my bookshelf comic-painting and my Council documentation. The first is almost there, just two panels left. I overestimate my artistic skills because I am surrounded by beautiful art in so many aspects of my life. I see images in my head that I want to recreate but I don't have the skill to live up the expectations my mind forms. I also give up too easily, I have learned and been told. But I am satisfied with the project so far (well ok this latest panel sucks). The idea behind it was to create a story using poem snippets as the text. It came to me one night when I was trolling my poetry books. I have picked lines from Byron, Tennyson, Eliot, Collins, Shearin, and Pound. It gives me an excuse to paint, which gives me an excuse to make pretty colors.

The Council documentation won't be talked about much, because it's too personal to be discussed with any embarrassment. I have just plowed through my sophomore year journals, and things are going well. The basic idea behind this project is to rifle through my high school lit journals and type out all the Council-related material (just think of it as a universe of characters). I don't know how I ever passed my fiction class, or any literary class for that matter. All I typed was adverbs and lacking descriptions. The Council is the greatest proof of the fallacy of living too much in one's head. After I have typed up everything, I have grand plans to create a basic time line of events, but I've had that aspiration for almost six years now.

Lastly, there are two ideas for stories I have wringing through my head. One is a quasi-high school drama with a character who pays too much attention to the wrong things and loses the big picture. I have had this idea for a while, as in maybe half a year. It started out as a mild journal word doodle, playing around with tone and author's license (I can't exactly call it poetic license). It will give me an excuse to use my human anatomy book more.

The second idea is very recent, fueled by my paranoia and the mood of some fiction I've been reading online (at Strange Horizons). See, the other day I had a horrible headache. Heat headache. It was disgusting. Oh, I think I wrote something about it, hold on. The pain was ferocious. It flowed in a thin river across her forehead and echoed into a deep waterfall at the base of her skull. There were puddles of intensity pulsating past her ears and she felt her entire existence would forever be stuck in this heightened state. It woke me up at five in the morning, and I had to go downstairs to find pills and interact with people. Afterwards, I passed out in my bed and slept for another five hours or so. The problem was, I had that phantom headache lingering with me the entire day, like if I was to turn my head the wrong way, the pain from that morning would come and crash down my walls of peace.

Anyway, a few days after that, I woke up dizzy as dizzy could be. It was Thursday, and I was supposed to work. I managed to take a shower somehow, after swaying my way through brushing my teeth and walking down the stairs. Then I started to get nauseous. Usually I walk to work, but I couldn't even walk to the kitchen without stumbling and falling to the side so I called out. The majority of my day was spent sitting down, staying very still, and drinking small sips of water and coke. Somewhere along the day everything got better. Now that phantom headache/dizziness is really infringing my thoughts, so I thought (obviously) brain cancer!

I do not have brain cancer. I thought about a character who had brain cancer and had a hunk of it removed. She wakes with vague clues to what she can only half remember but it's important to her because it used to be a part of her, and sets off on a journey to find whatever it was she lost. I say no more about it.

Well, I can be rather long-winded at times, can't I? One last thought: I recently started playing Etrian Odyssey again (I have an off-on relationship with that game). I am quite convinced it will take me ten years to finish and that it is an amazing game. Not as amazing as Pimp Professor Layton (oh my god so pimp), but up there. Goodnight.

YOU HAS FORGET?

2008-05-19T12:56:00.007-04:00

There is a competition and a drawing of matches. He gets the short and takes his place atop the shaky wooden bridge. He knows what he now faces and his eyes water until red and dry. It comes with a burp of air pressure and is nothing like what's expected. The air shimmers and rolls over the arena. This is the finality. He sees it lean toward him, all mottle-skinned and asp-like, and his fears leave him in the final second. He is swallowed in purity. It leaves him convulsing and screaming, raw animal yelps and deep sucking pants. The finality departs and the sun sets.
--

More examples of how I don't include many details and description in my writing. I live too much in my head to successfully transfer the imagery to pen and paper, and a lot of times I can't express what I experience in my mind because I'm untrained at conveying emotion. Or I haven't tried enough. I like writing tiny things for myself, which imply entire worlds. Most of my writing is a stepping stone that allows me to experience the events in my head. I am my characters because there's no way they could exist otherwise because I'm all that there is. My universe is myself and my interactions with other universes.

Her anger comes on too strong and she doesn't let up. The cupboards are rattling at the stiletto of her pace. She rumbles back and forth across the lofty kitchen. The cats are curled in their window perching, flicking ears at every footfall.
--

Well I thought about continuing that, because I've got another page or two in my journal, but it is mostly bad. Some of the phrases in the first paragraph are cute, so I'll share that. It's a fascinating trip to read back through my journal, because I find tiny gems. Tiny as in maybe a sentence or two. I like writing one-liners (see above, stepping stones).

"A great pleasure that is, being renowned for what one does for a living." -- This was a dialogue line that squeaked into my head one morning, probably in January. It had something to do with an older writer man, mostly cynical and dry witted. He was probably talking to a younger person when he said this. Maybe a reporter, or aspiring writer. Something along that feeling. Well, this is about the end.

CRUISE CONTROL

2008-05-09T19:08:00.005-04:00

She slept and next remembered perching on a cloud, staring down blindly at the city below. She felt the presence of another beside her but her senses did not encompass it and so there was a blank spot in her mind. She saw the city waking, and at the same time was in the city, riding through morning traffic in a duality only possible in dreams. Images of cars melded with the tiny cumulus clouds that dotted the early sky. She reached out to one of the car/clouds and saw a tiny vial of liquid in the grasp of her fingers. The presence that wasn't beside her pushed her arm down and away from the tiny puff of air; "We do not touch the children."
-

This is an important part of the Beth/clouds story, but I haven't yet figured out why. I do know, however, that I'm leaning more towards YA for this story (or at least, my idea of YA). It's become clear to me now that Anthony is involved with this whole mess somehow more than just being her brother, and I'm working towards making the mother less outright villainous. Which is hard, because it's easy to keep her a bitch. I'm fairly certain Anthony isn't her biological son though. Baby steps.

I love the idea of creating a seamless mythology of creatures/ideas/etc. I sorta did that with the clouds and the shadows, but I'm holding back on publishing anything until things straighten out. It's just so much fun. You should give it a try.

With the sudden onset of summer I'll be reading a shit ton more, and that's exciting. I still have a bundle of Banks books to read from my last BN run, and I've got a cool book about modern German culture that I'm sloughing through. Also recently I checked out this cool book Darwin Among the Machines: The Evolution of Global Intelligence, because free time = I get obsessed with post/transhumanism all over again. I wait for the day there's a philosophy class about this, because it's happening now and it's going to change everything. I'm excited.

End of the semester stress has shortened my temper drastically, and tiny things are pissing me off a lot more recently. I don't like losing my temper, at least around other people, so it hasn't caused any issues. Besides, I'm totally ADD when it comes to grudges and hating people. Someone told me once (possibly middle school), "it takes too much effort to hate," and I guess that's my personal motto. I'm glad that I came out the other side of puberty a nice person. Humanity is wonderful and if I ever start sinking I just remind myself how fucking awesome it is that I'm alive and able to accomplish so much. Optimistic sap, mwhahaha. I'm excited to live and I'm excited to die (eventually haha). I don't plan on giving in.

MOOT POINT

2008-05-05T20:40:00.002-04:00

I have just made cupcakes. They are delicious. I added some honey to the cake mix because at the party there will be no icing. I am of the opinion there needs be none. Tomorrow's party is the last meeting of the Tea Empire, our "Mad Hatter" tea party, where we will wear crazy hats, eat delicious food, and drink a shit ton of tea. I'm so excited.

I don't know what I plan to accomplish with this blog, but I grow weary with LJ sometimes, namely because I don't bitch at all over there, and my bitchiness needs an outlet. And by bitchiness I mean talking about myself. Maybe I will post more of my story stuff. Maybe not. This could end up being a nice outlet for all of the writerly instincts I may develop over the summer. I will try not to be too silly. I can guarantee nothing.