So here's the deal: Until I get paid this week, I have less than 200 dollars to my name. When I get paid, I will have slightly under 240 dollars. Christmas is coming.
Fuckin' groovy.

( a meme I stole off Sixty_lilies )( Read more... )

Thanksgiving was interesting. The actual event was sort of panic-attack inducing, actually, because there were so many people all over the house, including a baby and a 4 year old boy. However the rest of the weekend was nice, I got to hang out with my family and do a lot of fun things with my cousins and sister, plus my dad lent me a lot of really good comics and I finished a glove. The blue ink notebook kind of suffered, but I think I'm allowed to have a few days off for family, right?
Ladies and gentlemen, if you get the chance, read a comic called The Ballad of Halo Jones. It starts off kind of annoyingly over-sci-fi, with made up slang and stuff, but as it goes along it gets into some really deep and beautiful comentary about war and adventure and escaping your hometown. Also the main character is a girl who is totally normal and, for the most part, doesn't wear skintight bullshit. It was very exciting.
Also: I have returned with a lot of bad high school poetry, which I am in the process of typing up. I'm serious in my request for bad high school poetry, by the way. It must be legitimately from high school, you can email it to me at one_silent_thing@yahoo.com and I will be super wicked happy and publish a little zine.

And finally, a meme I stole off eosophobia_x's facebook.

So: thanksgiving tomorrow. I think my last post said I wouldn't do anything before then, but obviously I lied.

I've been working on some stuff recently that I'm really excited about, although barely any of it is school related. So here's a little summary of all the projects I'm doing right now:

First off, I bought myself a cheap 50 page sketchbook last week and every day I've filled a page with drawings in blue ballpoint pen. I'm calling it my Blue Ink project. I set up a bunch of arbitrary rules (must do one page per day, must be less than 20% swirls, shading, and other filler, must include less than 5 drawings of Nixon and/or giant squid, etc.). I'm trying to challenge myself to become a better artist through constant practice, and since I can't erase that keeps me from obsessing and ruining a good picture, or even being afraid to start. If something turns out really bad, I can just blame it on the pen and move on, which is good for my self-esteem. I am planning on scanning the whole thing and making a zine out of it when I'm done. At the very least I'll put it on the internet. It's mostly done in coffee shops, because I'm pretentious and you have to admit that they're very stimulating environments.

Another project: I might start doing daily comics as well, although that would mean I'd have to buy ANOTHER sketchbook and spend even more time drawing. However I've been reading a lot of daily journal comics, and that one I did back in October was super fun. I think I'm going to draw them in real life and then trace them into the computer or scan them or something, since my tablet skills seem to have seriously atrophied. I want to develop a style that's distinctly mine and isn' t this weird manga/comic/unrealism hodgepodge I use now.

I'm also going to collect a lot of my bad poetry from my youth when I go home this weekend, and type it up all nice and maybe even perform a medley of it at a poetry slam, if I can do it without laughing too hard. I love the idea of getting a bunch of people to publish a little chapbook of shitty poetry from high school, just as a joke. Anyone who wants to give me their angsty and funny high school stuff, let me know. If no one else gets in on it I'll do it myself, but I'd love to have it as a group effort.

Oh yes, and one more thing. Yeah, seriously. The last thing is this: I am still working on a couple of short stories, most notably the one on getting high off of bad literature, which I need to mess with rather sincerely. The logistics are really problematic, but I'm kind of enjoying hunting down examples, in a perverse way. It makes me feel really, really good about myself.

• I downloaded a bunch of Philip Glass music today, and I'm loving it. I think I'm gradually becoming a fan of instrumental/classical music. I'm not sure why, and I'm still not that jazzed by older classical musicians, but I'm starting to really enjoy minimalist composers, especially if they have a lot of piano.
• Last night I had an awesome time at Ash's party, stayed up waaaaay too late (I finally fell asleep around 4) and slept until 1 this afternoon. I then didn't leave the room until going out to dinner with Amanda. It's now 12:30 and my sleep schedule is ruined forever.
• Recently I decided to do a project, which I'll explain in more detail in a later post. Unlike other projects, I'm not giving up on this shit.
• I have to figure out what to get my aunt for her birthday. HMMMMMM.
• I might start working mondays, depending on whether or not a pregnant co-worker is going to need bed rest. I am kind of hoping she does (what a cunt right?) because I really need the extra hours. Although next semester I'll be able to work an hour earlier, at least.
• Speaking of next semester, does anyone want to see a tentative class schedule? OF COURSE YOU DONT.

Just downloaded so much new music. Bam. Niceness.

Also here's a meme I stole off eosophobia_x 's facebook.

I think I mentioned a few weeks ago that I might share my shitty story for my fiction class? Well, today is the day you lucky people get to read my shitty story.
I'm not being down on myself here, by the way, this is legitimately not that great. It's kind of rushed and I don't like the ending, so anyone who wants to read a short story and tell me how to make it better will have my undying gratitude. Be forwarned, though, it's about 10 pages double spaced...
Anyway, there are cusses and it's kind of a bummer overall, but I'm sure most of the people on my Flist are not deterred by cusses or bummers, or else they wouldn't read my blawg.

Ladies and gentlemen, I am going to do it. I am going to read XKCD from beginning to end, only skipping the math jokes that I don't understand. This is the face of madness.

In other news: Had a russian test, did okay (probably hopefully). Went on another couple dates with Amanda. Tonight we made Andrew and Aaron tag along while we drove out of town to watch the meteor shower, which...did not really happen impressively. Oh well...
I kind of miss hanging out with other people than Andrew and Amanda...I need to bother my other friends more. This is obvious. What else is new...? I guess I'm a fairly boring bloggist right now. I'm enjoying the cold and the fact that I seem to be turning into something of a coffeehouse-sitter, I'm digging the fact that I can wear the stuff I've knitted, and, yeah. I'm pretty pleased with things right now, I guess.

So I'm kind of doing a comic right now, maybe? I just bought a copy of Jeffrey Brown's book Little Things, and since he's fast becoming one of my favorite comickers he inspired me to greatness trying something. I also just found out that Toxic Ranch, the record store on 4th Ave, sells zines and comic booklets, so if I manage to finish this and make it look good, I might try to sell copies there.
Things with Amanda continue apace. We've kissed a couple times (I like kissing her you guys), and gone on a few more dates, all of which involve Revolutionary Grounds in some way or another. I am torn between wanting to take it slow and wanting to totally rush into things.
Also: Tomorrow night is the massive meteor shower, and if things that are fun don't happen that night, I'll be bummed.

About the title: I read this phrase yesterday and it keeps making me giggle. GLORIOUS AND MANLY.

In other news:
Today I had my date with Amanda. It was awesome. We went to Revolutionary Grounds for tea and then wandered around for a while, finally ending up back at 4th at a hookah bar, then realizing at 8 that we'd never had dinner and going to Lindy's. We talked the whole time and never ran out of things to say. I didn't get nervous or freeze up or start acting like I normally wouldn't. She is trying to quit smoking. I was going to kiss her goodbye but I sort of lost my nerve and there was this weird moment when she dropped me off where neither of us made a move, so I just got out of the car awkardly. We might do something on monday.
I can't wait.
I really didn't think this would happen, actually. Well, I thought the date would go okay, but I didn't think I'd meet someone as interesting and new and generally attractive as she is, and I didn't think I'd go out on a proper date. At least not for a while. It sort of crept up on me and I still can't believe she's actually interested in me, but Andrew says she told him she is, so...hey, I'm not complaining.
This is kind of nice. I like dating, as it turns out. I like doing silly romantic-ish things and starting the relationship in a semi-normal way, rather than starting it drunk or something similar. It's slower but I'm not in a hurry. I guess it's sort of weird that this is happening now, but I might appreciate a gradual start more because of my past dating experience. In any case, I'm excited for monday and I hope this keeps going.

Today I am spending most of the day writing a sad story about a young man who's confused about a lot of things. It's difficult to come up with a clear narrative or a point to the story...I have a good opening, a good tone, a good ending, and a decent main character, but there's no plot and no actual theme. Plus it's already a week late, so I suck at that too. I am literally using mystery google and random articles on wikipedia to give me ideas. As such it's sort of a weird patchwork.
Um, other than that...? I had fun at Erik's last night, it was just a bunch of people I like hanging out. I spent most of the evening talking to Amanda. Ha. I like her a lot, man. I can't wait for tomorrow.
 

God damn, you guys. Regina Spektor's new cd is unbelievably good.

I don't even know what to say today. Given the events of the past few weeks (some minor, some major, mostly school related and therefore boring), I should be in one of my depressions, but as it turns out I'm feeling pretty okay, if extremely tired. I haven't had a full night's sleep since monday, and I've been insanely busy as of late. Anyway, I can't tell if it's a good thing or not that I'm not freaking out. On the one hand it's nice to be able to deal with stuff in a rational way without getting all weepy and hopeless, but on the other hand I feel like this is all going to lead to a delayed reaction. I guess either way it's probably a good thing, because right now I'm playing catch-up with school, which I usually wouldn't do if I were depressed. So if I can just stay okay until I don't need to be productive anymore, I might even be able to avoid freaking out altogether.
Today I dropped off a cd at Aaron's, as a birthday present. I hope I remembered his apartment number right. I hope he hasn't moved, either.
I'm going to post later, when I've slept more and am more ordered, about some other stuff, but yeah. This is just sort of a placeholder because I feel like talking, but apparently I don't care enough to be coherent.
 

This is I suppose a catch-all entry for random crap I've been thinking about.

Yesteday was the second day I dressed as zombie. This time I stood on the mall and harrassed people about whether they want to go see zombie flicks. I also freaked the hell out of my Russian teacher, who thought I was in some kind of car accident. This made me feel slightly guilty rather than triumphant.
I dreamt that someone had gotten into my computer and was printing way too many pages, this may have been because Caitlynne was printing, but I'm not sure. I'll ask her later. I also had a second, extremely strange dream, which will not be gracing this page due to it's private nature. It was weird though, I can tell you that.
I'm trying to write a Gabriel Garcia Marquez-style short story about a baby girl who grows fangs, but it's not working. I can't think how to end it. Like the last time I had to write a story for my fiction class, this one is not coming easy. I have the one about getting high off bad fiction, but I will not be turning that one in except as a last resort, since it almost directly references some stuff other people in the class have written.
It's been actually really cold here for the past two days, maybe it's the start of winter or perhaps it's just more bait-and-switch.
I need to come up with some way to ensure that, once my alarm goes off, I will not simply turn around and get back into bed. If I had a harder time falling asleep it would be no problem, but I sleep easily and a lot, and therefore I am missing my morning class AGAIN. The reason I'm retaking it is that I skipped way too much of it last year. There has to be a good motivator in place because I am not retaking this class only to get a "C". It is "B" or better or I am wasting my parents' money.
Today I am so excited by the prospect of actually having something to do that I've been looking forward to going to work since saturday. I have not had a particularly brilliant week but the worst is over, I have interesting things to do tomorrow and saturday. Next week will have to fend for itself.

Russian Test is over, now I have a research paper for African lit and I'm not exactly sure when it's due. FAIL.
What else? I'm kind of being an antisocial douche but I am going to Sprite this evening. I might cut out early, but at least I'm kind of making the effort. Especially since I'm not going to be around for Erik's halloween party, as I'm going to my cousin's place instead for her different halloween party. I was going to try for both, but since she lives way out in Marana and it's a pain in the ass for me to go from one place to another, it will end up being her place. Sorry Erik.

It's a meme! It's a meme that lets me be a pretentious asshole about music, no less! I got it off some random blawg, look at it:

The idea is to exam­ine, in glo­ri­ous detail, the Depths of Suck­i­tude of the music that was pop­u­lar when you got out of High School. Phi­los­o­phy being, I sup­pose, that the music that was pop­u­lar dur­ing the time you made that high school-to-college tran­si­tion is the music that shaped your Sonic Consciousness.
What­ever.
Any­way, here’s what you do. You go to the Music Out­fit­ters web­site and type your high school grad­u­a­tion year into the search tool. Select the “list of the 100 most pop­u­lar songs” and you will get the Raw Mate­r­ial for the next step in the process, which is to look through the list and decide which songs you hated, which ones you liked, and which one was your favorite.
Post the list on your Online Jour­nal, strik­ing through the songs you hated (or still hate) and bold­fac­ing the ones you liked (or still like). Bold and under­line your favorite song. No opin­ion? Leave it as-is. (note: I'm italicising songs that I never heard but know I'd hate an

 

So yeah, after like 2 years of the same journal layout, I've changed it to this grey/orange/blue thing which I rather like. I had to fight the CSS for most of yesterday though.
I did the zombie walk, which was great fun, and which resulted in one massive bruise on my leg and one massive splinter in my left hand (removed later, naturally). Also I am dressing up as a zombie again on wednesday to help advertise for a showing of I Am Legend and Dawn of the Dead at the campus movie theater, and then again on halloween. Everything is zombies forever.
Currently I'm wearing a slightly ridiculous outfit that would work better on a person in a post-apocalypse wasteland, and I'm going to go fail a russian test and then do laundry. Photos of various zombies including myself will maybe be up here, but more likely will just show up on facebook and Deviantart. 

I guess I'm finally getting into the halloween spirit of things. There's the zombie walk later today, and I can't stop listening to Ryan Gosling's horror band Dead Man's Bones, and I finally did this meme that's been going around.