| o.o |
[Aug. 29th, 2007|10:22 pm] |
I hope this is an omen.
I want to go to the University of Chicago. Of all the places I've visited, I like Chicago the most. It feels right to me. It's old, and modern, and large, and infinitely diverse. The University of Chicago is everything I want in a school--it's a big school, with beautiful buildings in a nice neighborhood fairly close to downtown. It has brilliant academics, tons of resources, and programs in anything I'd conceivably want to study (and I'm sure I could make up something if they didn't have an established program for what I eventually decide on.)
So, back to the possible omen:
1. I loved Barack Obama from the first time I heard about him, as a young senator from Chicago who could possibly run for president. I've since read his book The Audacity of Hope, and decided that, even in cases that I don't agree with him, I would trust him with the fate of America. While reading the book, I discovered that he had taught at the University of Chicago.
2. I compulsively buy books. If there are books for sale, especially if they are a dollar or less, I will stop and pick up a few if any interest me, which is one of the chief reasons why my visits to major bookseller chains are fairly rare. Once, a teacher at the university near my house was out front selling off some of her old books for dirt cheap. I bought some and she let me take home others for no charge, so I was quite happy. Amongst them were a few academic readers, filled with essays about various subjects, mostly in the liberal arts. I opened up one of them (Subject and Strategy: A Rhetoric Reader, Fifth Edition) and flipped through the table of contents. A number of essays were circled, presumably by a previous owner who had to use the book for class. A couple of the circled ones caught my eye, for no reason I can divine. One of them was by Mortimer J. Adler, a high school dropout who got a PhD without actually getting any other degrees. He traveled around a lot, but he also worked, and taught, at the University of Chicago. (By the way, Adler is awesome, and has a library of works that I've not even begun to dip into.)
3. I just purchased a reader for one of my classes this semester. Since receiving it earlier today, I have read four essays. One of them was written by a former student at (guess where,) now a literature teacher, and the other is a professor of English, the humanities and literature at that same school.
In the past several months, I have to have seen more references to that school than any other except for those in this city, where, of course, references abound.
I really hope it's a good omen. |
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| I've not been WoWed. |
[Jun. 30th, 2007|02:48 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  awake | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Rainer Maria - Catastrophe | ] |
So I've sold my soul. Or at least 5.13 gigabytes of it. Yesterday, after seeing an advertisement, I finally broke down and signed up for the free ten-day trial demo of World of Warcraft. I like Blizzard, and I liked Warcraft III (in gameplay much more than storyline.) I then began the long and arduous process of downloading World of Warcraft. I downloaded the file that would download the installer (Blizzard has set up a cool BitTorrent-esque system for this, too, which impressed me,) and began doing other things while it downloaded. Hours later, I was exhausted, but the download was still going, so I went to bed. I awoke to find that it had crashed at some point in the night and there was still data left to download. Thankfully, it let me pick up the download where it had left off, so I didn't delete everything in a rage.
Before continuing, let me state for anybody who doesn't know: I don't like MMORPGs. There's often very little of the fourth and fifth letters, so they degenerate into a process of kill-collect-sell-level-kill-collect-sell. I want to interact, to take part in a story, not to run around trying to level up. That's why I don't like MMORPGs. But yet I broke down anyway.
After finally installing the thing, and waiting for a series of patch downloads and updates, I was in. I selected an RP server, of course (they tend to have the fewest idiots) and was set up with Moon Guard.
Okay, sure, that's a cool name. So now it's time to create a character. In spite of having the full 5.13 gigabyte game on my hard drive, I can't play Dranei or Blood Elves. I'm fine with that; Blood Elves are sexy, but I had already made up my mind to play either a gnome or an undead warlock (and I didn't expect to have everything for the trial, but 5.13 gigabyte games tend to make me overly critical.) So I chose the side of the walking dead and arose from the grave to slaughter the living.
How's it going? Okay. There's notably little actual roleplaying where I am, at least, and I haven't actually slaughtered any of the living yet besides a rat. At the moment, I want my gigabytes back. But I'm only level two, so I will wait out the end of my trial period before passing judgment. If anybody plays WoW, I can pop in sometime and say hi. I do not expect to continue past this trial period (unless I start a new one,) so the offer is up after the ten days are over. As I've said, I don't like MMORPGs. The only one I'm even remotely interested in is the World of Darkness game being made by the creator of EVE Online (which I might actually play.) Coincidentally, EVE Online is releasing a "Mac/Linux" (Unix-based?) client in the near future. I'll get to try it out then. Yay.
( Rejected subjects ) |
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| Girls are like chocolate. |
[Jun. 10th, 2007|11:46 pm] |
It's been a long day. I woke up about fourteen hours ago, went to the local PrideFest, which was today. What followed was a crazed whirlwind of angst, rain, sunburn and the smallest puppy I've ever seen. There wasn't too much angst, actually; I just felt like it made a good component for a crazed whirlwind. But there was a puppy, and I think my neck is sunburned.
First, a prologue: This morning, it was kind of cloudy and drizzly. So, just after I left, it rained a little. I miscalculated the traction I'd have on one part of my ride, and took a spill. I got there fine, but I have this scrape just over the muscle just below my thumb, that hurts a LOT worse than it is. At Pride, I hung out with people, followed around this girl I've been madly crushing on, met people, ate Tootsie Rolls (aka "chocolate crack"), met more people, and hung out. It was all fine and dandy, minus my being anxious due to said crush (I always get like that -.-.) Then the clouds rolled in again. The weather service said to look out for very, very bad weather. So all the booths packed up early. Everybody else hung around, because the performances were continuing until it actually got bad and there were nice people there to talk to. I went to Steak 'n Shake with some friends to eat. It never got really bad, so we came back. More hangings out, and I met some more people. I got even more anxious, and it was starting to get chilly. Then it started to rain, torrentially. Everybody hid in the tents. I was freezing, having worn only a t-shirt (because it was hot earlier.) Proximity to some friends calmed my nerves a bit. It got less rainy, eventually, and people began venturing out. Then there was a dance (gay events I go to seem to always have dances.) I sat around and watched. Then I came home. Riding my bike always makes me introspective, so I got well and truly contemplative on the way home. And here I am.
Grr. Why are women so beautiful? I mean, I know what I like about them. They're pretty, and soft, and nice, and I can click with them on an emotional level. But I don't know why I like them. It's just such a basic thing that I can't possibly imagine it any other way.
I've been single way too long. I need to attach myself to people emotionally, and I don't have anyone to do that to. (The chief problem: I attach myself to females. Presumably it's not exclusive, but I'm pretty sure it's almost exclusive. I haven't found any guys, anyway. Most of the girls I want to attach myself to like girls. So I have a bit of a harder time finding suitable people to attach to.) |
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| Boo. |
[May. 30th, 2007|02:45 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  weird | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Law & Order | ] |
I'm sorry I haven't updated in forever. I've meant to. I have this thing where I'll often write a LiveJournal post about recent events in my head, so I've been blogging internally almost every day since my last post.
About my tonsils: I had some more trouble with them, then finally got them surgically removed. It was great, except for the holes in my throat. Over the next week, it hurt a lot. Week two was better, though I still couldn't drink very acidic drinks. During this whole period, I was feeling a lot better. Now, I feel an example is necessary to indicate just how much better I was feeling, so I will tell you that, according to my surgeon, my tonsils had become gross, abscessed, and sickly, possibly even before I came down with strep in the first case (I have a genetic history of bad tonsils and it's quite possible that they were subtly poisoning me for a while; they were certainly prone to infection on a yearly basis.)
That's it for now. I'll probably post more later today.
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| Graaargh. ^.^ |
[Apr. 14th, 2007|12:57 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | illness, school | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  agitated | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Iris - Annie Would I Lie to You? | ] |
I'm in one of those places where I can't seem to do anything. There's too much in my head, and I need to get off my ass and take a walk or ride my bike to clear it if I want to either be able to do anything productive or even sleep. The only problem is that it's currently raining. It doesn't sound like much, but it's cold, too. And I'm still sick, though I'm a bit better.
In other news...I can swallow without pain! It feels so, so good to swallow. I want to never forget how good it feels to swallow. And I can talk normally now. And I feel almost well. ^.^
I'm seriously annoyed about school. I've missed a lot of it, I'm not doing as well as I should be, and none of my teachers have responded to the messages I sent them explaining my absence.
And yeah, I made a lot of blanket generalizations in my last post. Politely ignore them. I tend to be very level-headed until something ticks me off about something in particular and then I need to rant about it and get that out of my system. It's a very nice way of venting. Basically, I think I have this big control system set up, in my head. I don't get all overly emotional about anything (unless said emotions are good ones, like happiness.) This allows me to analyze stuff objectively. Shit hits the fan and I don't get depressed. My brain works overtime, trying to solve the problem. Then I'll build up enough of the stored-away emotion and experience it all at once. Sadness, anger, panic. Occasionally, I have lost control totally. This has always left me in tears for no reason at all, just an overflowing of pent-up emotion. I think, over the years, I've set up the store and release system I mentioned earlier, so that I'll rarely, if ever, have such explosions.
So yeah, when I'm venting, my brain disposes with logic and technicalities and political correctness and it just goes. Not all suburbs are like what I've mentioned, and not all suburban people are irritating. It was probably mostly that lady. ^.^
I'm going to go put on my coat and see if I can go outside. If not, I'll never get to sleep.
EDIT: Okay...
Interesting. I have just gotten back from my walk and shall add an addendum to this LJ post. And I shall call it...
"Wait. What?"
So I went outside. It was cold, but not rainy any more (thank God.) I stood for a moment on my porch looking up at the sky, because the clouds were moving really fast. And I mean really fast, travelling due west. So I walked down my driveway to the sidewalk to get a better view and the weirdest thing happened: as I turned to look northward, I swear I saw a thin streak of light travel north and vanish behind a cloud. It wasn't a helecopter or a plane, since the clouds were moving too fast to obscure anything travelling in a straight line for long. No, it was definitely what pieces of rock look like burning up in the atmosphere. So then I walked to the convenience store near my house, bought a fifty-cent bag of peanuts, and came back. This is seriously the weirdest night (and day) I've had in a while. I'm not saying that the clouds or the meteor are omens or anything. They're just weird. Oh well; now I can get to sleep. The walk and these peanuts are just what I needed. Good night. |
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| Hate. |
[Apr. 11th, 2007|12:14 am] |
Because I feel like ranting like an urbanophiliac madwoman, it's Anecdote Time. Last time I was in Chicago, I got on a bus. Having not ridden a Chicago bus in forever (and never by myself) I took half a second to sort out which end of the card I inserted where (the CTA cards of which I speak are otherwise worthless pieces of paper that you get from vending machines and put money on.) So I got on the bus, found my seat, and looked towards the front of the bus to observe fellow newcomers. There was this lady, and her husband, and one or two kids (I wasn't paying attention to the children.) She was watching as the bus driver showed her where to insert her card. As she gingerly withdrew the card, she giggled nervously and said, "Can't you tell we're from the suburbs?"
I almost killed her. In my mind, not in real life, which is probably a good thing. I certainly wanted to go up and yell at her that just living in the suburbs of Chicago was no reason to not go into Chicago on a regular basis (like every day? ^.^) I, at least, had a reason, living a full eight hours away from the place.
Anyway, I hate suburbs. Gated communities, too. (Have you seen that episode of the X-Files, with the gated community that has something that kills anyone who violates the rules? It's a good episode.) Sure, there might be some intelligent people there, but the entire premise is dedicated to perpetuating the 1950s small-town status quo. (Another good thing to see: Pleasantville. It's a movie about two kids who enter a black-and-white sitcom from the 50s. Rent it sometime.) I hate yards where the grass isn't allowed to grow out a little. I hate the whole idea of dad working 9-5 while mom stays home and gossips with her friends, who also have nothing to do.
Speaking of things I hate, there's the episode of SVU about fraternity brutality. The whole system of fraternities and sororities strikes me in exactly the same way that gated communities do. >.>
Oh, and I have acute tonsillitis. For nearly two months, my throat has been terribly infected. Antibiotics have helped, but only for a time. Then I'd finish up with them and it would come back. Now I'm on my third prescription, with two shots of an IV antibiotic (as opposed to being admitted and having it pumped into me constantly.) I'm starting to improve, a little. It's just a teeny bit less swelling, I can open my mouth about a millimeter wider, and it hurts a little less to swallow. My recovery will speed up tomorrow and the next day. Then, when I'm all (temporarily) better, I'm going to go to an ear, nose and throat doctor (my doctor put in a referral) and have my tonsils excised. Then I will be free! I hope. That's what happened with my mom, and my aunt, when they were both younger than I.
Oh, and my body hurts now. Not much, just I'm sore all over. I wasn't like this earlier. It might be me combating the infection. It probably means I should go to sleep. |
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| Lesbians... *drool* |
[Mar. 27th, 2007|10:22 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | lesbophiliac | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Frasier | ] |
I fucking love lesbians. Mostly in the forceful, emphasizing meaning of the word, and occasionally in the more carnal meaning, of course. You see, there's the world, and it's kind of weird. There are a bunch of little particles and they bounce off things and allow me to perceive the things. And there are electromagnetic fields, which hold things together and repel other things, and by repelling things in calculated directions, you can move them. Then there are the molecules that slide into various receptors and the waves that beat on eardums. It's weird, yes? But then there are these strange and wonderful creatures called girls. They're cute and funny and soft. Fucking beautiful, these girls. And they have these weird fat deposits that the evolutional pragmatist in me might describe as unwieldy and perhaps even a tad grotesque, but that a far deeper, more intuitive sense sees as some of the most beautiful things on the planet. It's really odd. Then you put two of these magical beings together and gah. It's just awesome. And one of the best things about me: I'm one of them. ^.^
I have a new userpic. I cropped it and lightened up some dark parts. I love it, and she looks so badass in that adorable hat.
Anyway, I'll attempt to post more. See you later. |
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| (no subject) |
[Dec. 13th, 2006|04:07 pm] |
| [ | theme |
| | E Nomine - Vater Unser | ] |
Well, this is most queer. I have had the good fortune to discover that I have saved the files on the school computer network. So now I've uploaded them to the Internet. Woohoo! I'm less screwed now! Also, I've found my mp3 player. It's sitting on a table, visible through the front window of the GLO, but nobody was there, so I couldn't get in. But I know where it is now, and I've contacted a facilitator who should be able to let me in later on today.
That said, I'll still have to work my ass off, but I have a nice starting point now. The rest of the paper I could write in a day, with this, and I have two. Plus I have a bunch of new StepMania songs to play during breaks (or to listen to while writing.) |
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| Why this? Why now? |
[Dec. 12th, 2006|10:09 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  depressed | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | The fucking dehumidifier... | ] |
Fuck. I think someone stole my mp3 player. I had it with my stuff, at GLO, and then I got my stuff and it wasn't there. But then, I was probably careless. I left it with my stuff, maybe visible, and I didn't wear fucking cargo pants (of which I desperately need more, so that I can actually carry my stuff around.) So I have no music to listen to. Big deal, right? It wasn't too high-end, and if I got a job I could earn the money to get it back in no time. Every track on it was off of this computer, which isn't going anywhere. The kicker is what else was on there: my research paper for school. What little of it I had written, and it's gone. I was transporting stuff from the school computer home to work on, but never got to copying all of the stuff. Goddammit. The paper's due Friday and I have to re-write and re-annotate a bibliography, as well as re-writing that which I had already done. I was already struggling with it, and now this! I can't do it tonight, because I'm so fucking depressed from losing it that there's no hope of getting any work done. That leaves me tomorrow and Thursday. My grandfather on my dad's side died yesterday morning, and his funeral's on Friday, so I can't work on it on Friday. I have a makeup speech tomorrow and a final on Thursday, too.
Fuck. I have to work my ass off, but I could make it. Do one of those things where I write something and turn it in with little to no revision. See, this is where I could use someone to help me. Someone to cry on. Someone to talk to while I desperately figure out what to write.
The best I can hope for is to attempt to contact someone with a key to GLO and get them to unlock the door tomorrow morning and let me look around. If I can't find it, I'm screwed. I was going to do some more writing tonight, but I can't do shit when I'm depressed. |
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| It's Almost Over |
[Nov. 12th, 2006|02:14 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | creating change | ] |
| [ | mood |
| |  contemplative | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Semisonic - Closing Time | ] |
Everything comes to an end. So it is fitting that that end come to the tune of music. Music speaks to us. It helps us communicate, both with others and ourselves. The complex interplay of emotions and melodies can help us see new sides of ourselves, and release feelings long pent up. Many creation myths posit that reality began with a song. Whatever the real beginning of existence, this may not be far off, whether the song be the thrumming of matter and antimatter as it speeds in all directions from where it had seconds before been an infinitely small clump of matter or the purest songs of the angels in praise of God. Certainly, a song makes for a plausible creative tool for whatever force molded our universe. The prevalence of music in just that small corner of it that we percieve seems to add credibility to plausibility. There are songs of beginning and songs of ending. Songs of opening and songs of closing. Songs of happiness and songs of joy. Songs of anger and songs of triumph and songs that don't even know what emotion they invoke.
I myself get lost in music. I let myself get carried away within it. The right song can make me happy, or sad, or angry, or calm. This doesn't work terribly well with music too discordant with my mood, but a wide enough array of tunes works wonders. But I digress. Let us go back to the subject of endings.
This conference, Creating Change 2006, is ending. In the next twelve hours, it will be over. Those who travelled here from all corners of the United States will go back to whence they came, or in some cases will continue on their journey to wherever they are to alight next. Tonight, the goings-on ended with a party, for the myriad youth who had attended the conference. It was interesting. With the exception of a couple of songs, it was all good. The lighting was wonderful. A perfect variety of patterns and colours, changing every now and then so as not to get repetitive. I sat for several minutes and watched the ceiling, which seemed to pulse with the music as if a living thing. The cause, of course, was a series of flashes of near-total darkness, where all the main lights were turned off for an instant. This was imperceptible to the human eye when one looked at the dance floor, because the immediate shift to a new colour of light made the eye completely forget about the blackness. It was visible only in two ways that I could tell: either you saw the ceiling pulse and comprehended why or you were sitting further out and could notice the flashes of black (don't ask me exactly why that is. I'm no lighting technician. As for the pulsing, darkness makes things seem smaller. Whenever the darkness flashed, the room seemed smaller for an instant. If I'm wrong, please correct me.)
I guess it's also fitting that I wasn't really partipating for the first hour or so. I sat outside, watching the people dance. Watching old friends and new friends comingle. I eventually joined in, of course, and it was fun. It wasn't as fun as I'd have liked it to be, but it was decently fun anyhow. It'd have been better if I had someone to dance with. I did for a moment, here and there, but such is the nature of the dance floor that groups of friends oft get dispersed unless they have a driving reason to stick together. Like love. There were a few couples on the dance floor, celebrating the closing of this meeting together and only together. Naturally, my eye caught most on the lesbians. Meh. I'll not go into that. It'll only make me feel lonely again.
So thus it was with music and comraderie amongst the youth of the GLBT community that the Saturday of the conference drew to a close. Meanwhile, I stood awkwardly around the edge while my muse narrated into my brain much of that which I have here written. I would really feel better in the middle, without her narrating to me so immediately, but rather telling the LiveJournal database the whole story from scratch later on so that others might peruse it if they see fit. Such is my lot in life, I guess. Perhaps it will change when I get estrogen in my body and grow breasts and all that. Perhaps I will feel bolder, more confidant. Perhaps not. I would feel better, anyway.
I'm dying for some sort of social interaction. I'll probably go and talk to those friends I came here with, since everybody else seems to either be asleep or busy. I guess that is to be expected at two in the morning. The lobby is still full of people, but many of them I don't know and the rest I don't feel like talking to. All of the ones I did feel like interacting with have left the public area and I don't know if anything is currently going on in any hotel rooms.
I guess I'll sign off here. To those of you who have left comments recently, I promise to say something back to you when I get home, which will be tomorrow in the early evening. |
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| Shiny |
[Nov. 11th, 2006|01:41 am] |
Yeee! I'm in Kansas City, Missouri, at a GLBT conference (Creating Change.) It's fun. People are talking about all sorts of stuff. Plus there are a lot of cute lesbians. Some not-so-cute lesbians, but a lot of cute ones. ^.^ I'm here with the Springfield (the town that I live in) youth group, and we're staying in the Westin, a big, fancy hotel with a waterfall and everything. It's shiny, and the beds are wonderful. At night, the city lights up and all that. You can see it all from the elevators, some of which have windows. I miss the city so much.
The people here are all really nice, as many queers are. They all know what it's like to recieve flak from everyone else and they don't like giving it back. I've made some friends, who I'll probably never see after Sunday. It's all cool, though. Heck, some of them might stop by GLO when they're passing through Springfield. I wouldn't be surprised if Cassie gave some of them her MySpace name, either.
The highlight of today was a three hour and forty-five minute workshop with the poet Alix Olson. She's really cool, and cute. And Alix is a cool name. There were a bunch of pretty and cute girls there, too. We made a poem. A really big poem, with each of thirty-six people reading one line.
And I feel weird. Cassie and Lotta are probably up in the room and having multiple orgasms and coffie at the same time. That's not why I feel weird, though. I think I know, and you can probably guess. (I'm pretty sure it's because I feel like I'm an insider looking in from the outside. I'm a lesbian, among lesbians, but due to this body I have been saddled with, I don't get percieved as such. Not until hormones, anyway...)
I'll get off now. By the way, the lobby is still hopping with people, even at 1:41 AM. I love this! |
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| *Sammi explodes* |
[Nov. 8th, 2006|01:31 am] |
| [ | mood |
| | agitated | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Eiffel 65 - Move Your Body | ] |
Ho. Ly. Crap. Holy Carp, even.
Well, I'm sure those of you in the US are quite cognizant of the goings-on right now. The rest of you might be in the dark for now, unless you've been checking CNN or some other live update website. Well, this is it. Polls closed, votes in, the last straggling districts yet to report back. Virginia, Montana and Missouri senate seats up for grabs still. Thirty-three House seats undecided. Five governorships undecided. The Democrats control over half of all House seats and governorships. The Senate is split 49/48 in the GOP's favour with three very close races. And by very close, I mean that Claire McCaskill is currently beating Jim Talent by 25,125 votes. Webb is beating Allen by 3,726 votes. Tester is beating Burns by 9,752 votes. (All statistics from CNN.com as of 0651 GMT.) Shit. Any of these races could go either way or to a hand recount by the time it's over. I'm in agony over this. I've been nervous ever since about two hours ago, when the local races were all over but the Missouri races were still running. Apparently, we got done early, since only ~52% (if I recall correctly) were reporting in at that time.
And Larry King just signed off. Two hours and fifty-four minutes ago, he joined CNN in discussing the four Senate seats open. Four. That was two hours ago. Since then, we've had one win. One! So you see the pain I am in. The only likely recount is Virginia, but the possibility still remains for the others.
So it's been nearly thirty minutes since I began writing this post. It's been a momentous night. One house of Congress has changed control completely. The other is going to be a one-vote margin. Some of the mighty have fallen, and the rest are in the process of falling suit. Bush's approval rating is in the trash, for one thing. Santorum stood by his president and he is gone now. Foley has resigned. It's certainly been an eventful six years, and I imagine that it will be an eventful two more before November '08. I wonder how the Bush administration will react to that (probably by focusing on the war, gay marriage and abortion even more than they were. Never mind Foley and Haggard. Two more years, and another third of the Senate will be up for grabs, as well as the presidency. We all know who I'm supporting for that.
Talent ceded, which means Claire is the new senator for me. Hurrah! Two more races, both with the Democrat in the lead. I'll stop ranting for now, so peace out. |
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| Barack Obama has a cool name. |
[Nov. 5th, 2006|03:11 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | anticipatory | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Muse - Our Time Is Running Out | ] |
Obama '08
'Nuff said. If Obama wins the election, the next four or eight years will be gravy. Clinton doesn't strike me as the presidential type, but she would make a wonderful vice president. Warner would also make good a president, but I don't like anybody as much as the skinny kid with the funny name. I don't know if anybody else is being talked about for president. All three of these people are sharp of intellect and possessed by common sense (with the possible exception of Senator Clinton on the subject of video games.) They all have governmental experience and they are all allied with, I think, the right people.
EDIT: Apparently Warner has dropped out of presidential politics according to MSNBC. So Obama all the way.
This is assuming, of course, that people are so dissatisfied with Bush that they'll want all the Republicans out (there has been a trend of that sort in the past and in this country, there are only two entities: the Democrats and the Republicans. Much as I abhor the two-party system, this will no doubt work in our favour.)
So, on Tuesday, I'm going to be working in Sara Lampe's office (probably overseeing food for volunteers or organizing stuff) after I vote myself and then going to the watch party. It'll be fun. I expect a great deal of celebration of the magnitude of the partying when Sara Lampe won, multiplied a few times thanks to a great deal more Democrat candidates winning. According to MSNBC, there are a few Democrats about to unseat Republicans. Santorum is trailing by 20%, and that's only the most extreme example.
Meanwhile, Sara's opponent, Steve Helms, has been sending out literature attacking her alignment with gay rights groups. Sorry, Steve. That was tried two years ago and failed. Sara's constituents now know how great a representative she is. Last time, she had only the fact that people in the district know her and respect her. Now she has two years of successful legislation under her belt. There is no way that you can compete with her.
On the off-chance that Sara does lose, I have no idea what will happen. But I know that she won't lose. People like her too much.
Two days until we take the houses of Congress. ^.^ |
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| -.- |
[Oct. 30th, 2006|02:48 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | sad and tired | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Law & Order | ] |
God, I feel awful. Today, in my public speaking class, not thirty minutes ago, a classmate of mine had a seizure. Possibly complicated by some other things, too, since she looked ill before her body began seizing (she had a light cough and had had to leave the room to get a drink or something earlier.) Needless to say, class was dismissed very shortly and I walked out of the room feeling horrible.
First, I need to say that I have always been the type of person who has always been confidant that they can act calmly and rationally in an emergency. My panic reflex, instead of causing hysteria, pumps my brain with various chemicals and allows it to function at absolute peak efficiency (with the result being that, when I have plenty of calories, sugar and caffiene in my body and go into panic mode, I do stuff with the greatest expedience and efficiency. Granted, I crash after that, but it's allowed me to write an A- paper from scratch in six hours.) So here I am, with my fortuitous panic reflex as well as my first aid training, and I have no idea what to do. It's not an athsma attack. I've had those, and they don't look like that. She hasn't indicated any left-arm pain, is pretty much exactly my age and so is too young for cardiac arrest unless it was caused by something else. She has about exactly as much body fat as she should, so diabetes or fatty deposits in the blood are exceptionally unlikely. The most likely suspects, in my opinion, are an allergic reaction or a compound illness. I sincerely hope it wasn't too bad. I've had asthma attacks, as I said. I've felt the horror of my trachea constricting and preventing me from taking in the amount of oxygen to which I am accustomed, of losing control of one of the most basic biological processes. I would be utterly terrified if that lack of breath stimulated a string of random and possibly violent nerve impulses. Moreover, a total loss of physical control concurrent with barely getting any air would put someone in a very bad position when it comes to staying alive.
I do hope she's okay. I could have helped her, but I failed. I could have turned out her purse and sifted through it for any medicine. I could have called 911 and described her condition. I could have removed my hoodie and stuck it under her head to provide cushioning. I could have done any number of minor things to aid her, and I didn't. And me with all my experience with almost dying (four asthma attacks is a lot) and I didn't help someone who might have also been in a similar situation. I didn't even check to make sure that she still had breath and a pulse (breath was at least partially a given, since her chest was expanding and contracting and she was giving light coughs on occasion, but it would have still been practical to check.
I have class in seventy minutes. I have to head to class in fifty-five minutes. Less if I want to get something to eat. I really don't want to go to class, but it's a once a week course. Maybe I will stay home. I don't know if I could even work up the energy to go to Taco Bell to get something to eat, much less class. |
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 29th, 2006|01:56 am] |
| [ | Tags | | | nanowrimo | ] |
| [ | mood |
| | tired | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | "Negotiator", with Samuel L. Jackson and Kevin Spacey | ] |
I'm obssessed with Jump, by Madonna. It's an energetic, technoish beat, it has nifty lyrics and it has singlehandedly brought a character in my NaNo who had no personality at all a motivation, an identity and, most importantly, an actual physicality within my story. By the end of November, Jump might be as much-played as Hung Up. Yes, I've listened to Hung Up, also by Madonna, 25 times. That's not counting the probably many times I've preempted its end and switched to something else (iTunes doesn't add to the play count unless the song ends all the way.) So Hung Up is my third most-played song. My first most-played is Suddenly I See, by KT Tunstall. I love that song. My second is Hallelujah, covered by Rufus Wainright (much better than Cohen's version.) Now, here's where things got surprising: my next most-played songs are Hips Don't Lie by Shakira (featuring Wyclef Jean) and The Distance, by Cake. I had no idea that I had played those songs that many times. iTunes is cool.
So, yeah, I'm doing NaNoWriMo. This year, I actually have a plot. It's a novelization, embellishment and expansion of the myth of Isis and Osiris. I've got a lot of words in my head right now, and they want out. Unfortunately, I can't let them out until Wednesday.
Aaand, I really need to work on some school work or else go to sleep, which I will do after this movie finishes. |
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| *cries* |
[Sep. 27th, 2006|12:18 am] |
| [ | mood |
| | lonely | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Death Cab for Cutie - When Soul Meets Body | ] |
Oh god. I hate being single. I have plenty of human contact, and all that, it's just that I need more. I need to have someone to hold, and care for, and someone to hold me and care for me. I need somebody to love.
Today, I was sitting on a couch with two of my friends cuddling and being all lesbian together and all that. Don't get me wrong; they're a very cute couple, and I enjoy watching them, but lately I've been waxing lonely and missing Lia. I dreamt about her the other night, and I was yearning for her all day. I spoke to her on AIM for the first time in months and we didn't say much. I didn't know what to say. I know that she said she's not ready for a serious relationship. I appreciate that. But, until I find someone else, I think I'll still need her. Desperately.
I was going to do some homework tonight, but I'm too goddamn lonely. I'd just get the first problem done and get depressed. I might get depressed if I don't do homework, too, but work always seems to make it happen sooner if I go into the work feeling bad. |
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| I feel like an amateur Hollywood swinger now... |
[Sep. 14th, 2006|11:10 pm] |
I just went to see a movie before it was shown to the public. Legally. And I spoke to the directors and everything. Sure, it opens tomorrow, but I'm still one of the handful of people in Springfield and elsewhere who have gone to the pre-showings. Which movie was it? Jesus Camp. Now, whether you've heard of this movie before or not, you need to wait a little bit before dedicating yourself to any particular point of view. Also, if you've seen an advertisement for the movie, ignore it. I hear they're terrible about looking like the movie is biased. It's not, though. It's very in-the-middle. Very liberal and open-minded. Heidi Ewing and Rachel Grady are very cool people. I'm not the biggest fan of Becky Fischer's views, but she's nice. In a nutshell, the movie is a documentary about a summer camp which teaches little kids (the youngest whose age we were told was ten at the time, and the eldest was twelve) to be Evangelical Christians.
The kids are cute. There's this girl (Rachel, if I recall correctly) who wants to be a manicurist for Christ. She figures that people are more open to listening in an atmosphere such as a manicure. Also, one of the boys wants to be a preacher. He can do it, too. Even at twelve, he's a natural public speaker. So if you see a preacher named Levi O'Brien in the next few decades, you know where he got his start.
One interesting thing about the movie is that even within that one ministry, there is a variety of views. For instance, while some people revere Bush (to the point of bringing out one of those free-standing cardboard figures of him,) the mother of one of the children took exception to the implications of that part of the movie, saying that her religion and her politics were kept separate. Some parts of the movie could seem biased one way or the other, but for every time that Becky Fischer yells out for an "army of God" or states that we need to do with our children as the Muslims are doing, there's another portion where she preaches kindness. Take any five quotes out of context, and you can bless or damn the movie in anybody's sight. Yes, I think she's a hypocrite, but the movie's great. Go see it. It's a good documentary. Check out the (very niftily designed website) at www.jesuscampthemovie.com.
Also, I've discovered new stuff I like. For instance, the artist Brom. He's cool. And Not Ready to Make Nice, by the Dixie Chicks. Also, one thing I hate: the iTunes 7 skin. It's ugly. What's more, I cannot seem to find a way to change it (I've searched online for ways to alter the iTunes skin, but the only one I can find is a plugin for Windows.) Grr. I have submitted a concise and forceful feedback comment requesting this option, and will post on the iTunes forum tomorrow, seeking some sort of Mac plugin or else a way to revert to iTunes 6. My hope is that this is remedied soon, but it might take a back seat for the developers behind fixing the problems that some people had with the new program. I have been having no problems at all. |
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| Aaaaaaarrrrghhhh! |
[Aug. 11th, 2006|05:21 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| |  apathetic | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Chrono Symphonic | ] |
Shit. I have absolutely no motivation to do anything today. No fucking motivation to do anything. Just sit around online and not accomplish anything. I'm trying use music to make my mood different. For all of those who don't know about the Chrono Symphonic project, check it out. It's a bunch of really awesome remixes of the soundtrack to the game Chrono Trigger, composed by Yasunori Mitsuda. If you've played the game, you know how terrific the music is. If you haven't played the game, you should listen to it, and if you are into video games, you should play it. The game is as beautiful as its music and equally fun, with the most replay value of any game I've seen. These are twenty-five orchestral remixes of the music, often based on one or more source songs. In case you're wondering, this is completely separate from the Chrono Trigger orchestral soundtrack. A worthy tribute to great music.
So far it's helping a little. Not as much as it was last night, but a little. God, it's so great to have mp3-quality Chrono Trigger music. Maybe I need to eat a little something, too. Or play the actual game. Get my ass kicked by Masa and Mune. That is how a pivotal boss battle should be: so that someone who has beaten the game multiple times and fought that battle at least twice as many times should be able to go through and, with only minor levelling up, get their ass handed to them 50% of the time. It's not a hard battle, it's just hellishly unforgiving if you make a mistake. Have Crono attack instead of heal and then Marle gets smacked with a tornado and you're fried. I never level up in games unless there's some cool ability waiting for me at the next level and I always level up abilities faster than stats. It's so much more fun to fight battles with fifty different tactical options at your fingertips than to kill your opponent in one strike.
Still have no motivation. Too bad Chrono Symphonic is one minute too long to put on a single CD. That would be awesome.
I'm learning CSS to build a web site. Originally, I was going to do a take-off of this theme, but now I'm going for something somewhat darker. I'm also going to do web design for my dad and for the local Democrat political campaigns, probably. |
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| Transitions |
[Jul. 29th, 2006|04:07 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | thirsty | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | Dogma | ] |
I'm changing. Online, I mean. I hate my email address, I hate my LiveJournal username, and so forth. More to the point, I hate what my email provider, Mail.com has become, and all the ads that open up every time I check my mail. Also, my email address is stickfigureonfire@whoever.com. Proper English dictates that it should be stickfigureonfire@whomever.com. It bugs me every time I type it. From now on, I'm switching to my Gmail account, stickfigureonfire (at) gmail.com (to avoid spambots.) I'll probably get my own email address, eventually, when I get my own website, which I will. I will continue to use my Mail.com account, but I would prefer for anyone to mail me at my other address.
So. I am working on a web page, but I just saw a couple of really cool websites and now I feel like I can never make one as cool as them: VQ's Universe and acid-stars.com. They're really cool.
As for my own future website, I was thinking about giving it a similar colour scheme to my LiveJournal. I have a couple basic pages created, and cool stuff saved for future reference, but not much beyond that. I also had a portion of another web site saved for my use by this one really nice girl, but I haven't heard from her in ages and don't know what's up with that. I really need to look into it. As for layout, I have no idea what I'll do. I'm looking around to see what I like. I'm also looking into cascading style sheets, so I can do some cool other stuff. And change pages without re-editing every small thing. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jul. 22nd, 2006|03:20 pm] |
| [ | mood |
| | contemplative | ] |
| [ | theme |
| | KT Tunstall - Suddenly I See | ] |
She. It's impossible how much I love that word. She. Ella. Sie. Zij. Lei. It's such a beautiful word. And it feels like everything.
Sure, I can use the word "he" in relation to other people, and I get that it refers to a penis, but whenever someone refers to me by that word, I feel nothing. Absolutely. Nothing. Just emptiness where there should be an embrace. Just chill where there should be warmth. A void. A vacuum. Not even a vacuum, since the vacuum of space still has a bunch of stuff in it. Rather, the place outside of space, past the edge of the universe. That is the place to which the word "he" opens up a portal.
But "she". "She" sends me to a place where the eternal state of everythingness is that of two girls held in each other's arms, sitting alone at home during the rain and watching a scary movie, like Se7en, or sitting in a place of idyllic peace of mind, like the square. (Yes, I know that it is not the most peaceful place in Springfield, but my mind gets restless without at least some activity or conflict, and I am most at home in urban environments most of the time.)
"She" brings with it softness, and strength, and courage, and kindness. The soothing 's' sound changes the blunt 'h' into a much nicer compound phoneme.
I hung out on the square (again) last night. It was fun. I really wish Cassie or Lotta or Matthew could have come. But I hung out with Morwen and all was fine. We had fun, hung out, talked and generally mucked around. I discovered that I am much better with foam weapons than bokken. Guess I need to work on my strength. Then Morwen left. So I stood around for a little bit. Randomly looking around, I spied Caitlin and Curtis and this girl with really cute hair. So I ran and caught up with them and it turned out that they were going to Martha's Vineyard. I had never been, so I tagged along.
Wow. Clubbing. It's fun. Kind of warm in there, with all the people, but it was fun. I got really self-conscious about my lack of breasts, but I tried my hardest to ignore that. Did a little dancing, did a little sitting around, did a little standing. It was fun. There were some really cute girls there. I might go back tonight, if Caitlin's going again.
I got hit on, afterwards. My first time having a guy hit on me, but he was gay, so that kind of negates the novelty since he obviously identified me as male. >.> And he was obviously predatory, attempting to hit on and pick up some young guy to have sex with. *shudder* He was relatively aesthetically-pleasing and charismatic, but no way, even if I liked guys. He was just creepy, and I am, fortunately, not some weak-minded, just-turned-eighteen kid. I was a little hesitant at first in responding, since the question he asked was ambiguous and this was the first time I had been confronted with the situation. He asked, "Are you gay?" It betrayed no identification of me as male or female, but he quickly followed it up with the explanatory, "Do you like dick?" This was ultimately repulsive to me and I gave an immediate "No."
However, there was some identifying of me of a different sort earlier that night, when I was sitting on a bench with Morwen. This guy asked, "Are you sisters?"
We looked at each other and grinned and I said, "No."
He then proceeded to say, "Okay, with that look, you're girlfriends."
I said, "Nope. We're just friends."
He replied, "Well, you're still girlfriends."
Finally, the girl sitting next to him said, "That's a dude." She had seen me multiple times before, so that was excusable. The whole thing was pretty funny, though, and tells me that I don't need breasts to present as female to some people. I still need breasts, though, since I am the kind of androgynous person whose face and chest are both glanced at to see if anything can be detected as to sex. Not much is more embarrassing for many people than mistaking a person of one sex for that of another. So a glance both at face and chest is usually in order, especially in this day and age of ever-increasing androgyny. I've found it very easy to glance at the neck or so, and let the peripheral vision take in and process the presence or lack of breasts, since it keeps the eyes from visibly lingering on the breast area.
So, I'm going to Nixa in somewhere between thirty minutes and an hour. My dad and his girlfriend are going to have a meal, and he's bringing his family. I don't want it to take too long, but it'll probably be about an hour or a little less to prepare (he mentioned specifically that they would be preparing it together, and perhaps they will attempt to draw on us the children for cheap labour (if you ever want to get around child labour laws, have kids. On a side note, I am no longer legally a child. Huzzah!) But if they wind up not having too much for us to do, I'll have some free time.
Caitlin, if you want to bug me about tonight, you have my phone number.
KT Tunstall is sexy. That is all.
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nigirimeshi's journal
confused
introspective