I know how the aliens in War of the Worlds felt

I have spent the past week more sick than I've been in a while. As a kid, my dad would hear me whine about how I HAD to miss school because I felt like shit, and then he would tell me that I could absolutely stay home... if I was missing a limb or had a fever. Well, I never lost a limb, and I almost NEVER had a fever. I can't remember the last time I had an actual fever (aside from my hospital trips due to infected kidneys). However, my entire spring break was spent with a fever of around 102. Bullshit.

I still have all kinds of muck trying to suffocate me by taking up residence in my lungs, but I'm determined to kick its ass the way deathbed cries of, "Hoax!" kicked the ass of the Loch Ness Monster (that poor, prehistoric bastard).

You know what sucks the absolute most about being sick? The awareness that anyone you actually infect is then your responsibility (once you're better and they're sick... like that ancient Chinese code where you have to care for someone once you save their life... right? That does exist, yes?). Because you know that they will always make their illness seem worse than yours (despite the fact that it's the same fucking illness). And you know it'll ALWAYS last longer than your illness (even though you have an immune disorder, and had the same illness they do... because, you know, they probably didn't catch an entirely different disease than the one you had, um, from you).

I guess that I tend to lose that nurturing instinct for a good two to three weeks after getting over being sick.

Okay, I'm going to go rest. You should go rest, too. But, you know, not too much. Because if you're feeling under the weather, fuck you. Suck it up. Quit your bitching.

All this aggression is making my lungs hurt. Mega owies.

xoxo

Elfor, the LandStander (He STANDS. On LAND.)

Does anyone else love and miss Home Movies? I would be more upset about the lack of new episodes, but for the fact that I find Metalocalypse to be far more awesome, and Brendon can only do so many things at once. It's like if my giant dog had to quit loafing around my house, drooling, leaning on everyone, and barking at invisible pedestrians in order to go be a bad-ass, metal, Great Dane rockstar while also creating a hysterical cartoon about even more hardcore, rocker Danes that live satirical, extravagant lives.

Or, you know, something like that.

Other than watching Home Movie reruns and pondering Lucy's rocker Halloween costume (you have to plan that shit early when it comes to dressing up dogs... they just don't get the whole concept behind "Halloween costumes", I guess), I've been buried in school work. I love my classes this semester, but there's just SO MUCH INFORMATION. I feel like you would feel if handed a giant, old-school Webster's dictionary and told that you were going to have a test on A-J in two weeks. As much as you may love vocabulary, there's NO WAY to learn ALL OF THOSE WORDS in two weeks (especially while trying to learn about the same amount of crap in two other classes, and creating hours worth of art for the third).

So yes. That's what's up.

Also, my dreams have been so horribly off the wall, lately, and I have no idea why. I'm equating it to stress. I tend to have pretty awful dreams, anyway, so it isn't so outlandish to think that my mind has grown tired of the boring, normal bad dreams and is looking to replace them with something more creative (damn me and my creative brains).

My last horrific dream was of a POW in a desert, who was having his face melted off. I'm not talking cheesy, Poltergeist-esque face melting, either (because that shit was great... especially when I was FAR too young to see something like that, and my dad explained to me how they did the special effects using sculpy and a plastic skull with quarter-machine eyeballs we had laying around the house). It was intense, and FAR more realistic (at least, as far as I can tell, having never actually seen a face being melted off of a skull).

I wonder what kind of bizarre secrets the human subconscious holds. I like to think that the moronic, hopeless people I encounter on an almost daily basis have every potential to be functioning members of society, if only they could learn to tap into their subconscious as much as the creative, intelligent, informed, open people I try to associate with.

Thoughts? Perspective? What kinds of dreams do you have on a regular basis? What do you attribute them to?

Love to all. I'm going to go study for a quiz tomorrow, try to write some music, and continue my oddly-timed pondering of the human psyche.

Death by sleeping poorly

I'm slowly but surely dying (more so than normal, I mean).

My neck and right shoulder are KILLING ME. Why, you ask? Well, I tend to hunch over my work, or my studies, or the canvas I'm working on. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I carry a backpack and a portfolio around on my shoulder. I don't have an in-between in my Honda Fit to rest my arms on. I sleep on my side, in the fetal position.

All of these things are working together to kill me, I'm sure.

So between that and the THREE exams I have this week, I've been short of time/energy/patience to post as of late. Forgive me, find me amusing, and smile. Or, you know, get the fuck over it (because at least your neck/shoulder/back isn't trying to KILL YOU).

xoxo, etc.,

Me. 

The Wii fit is a judgmental bastard.

People are so weird. I know this, because I often feel even more strange than the people I interact with. 

What are some of the bizarre things you think that you choose not to say aloud? You can comment anonymously if you feel awkward about it. Or shy. Or are planning to take over the world and would rather not be found out by the government (because those fuckers totally monitor this blog, due to it's insane abundance of pertinent information). 

There's a fun new post coming soon (that's called a teaser). Until then, I'm going to wait for comments and post the most awesome one. Bring it, bitches. Xoxo

Take out your suck it and you SUCK IT! (Suck it!) SUCK IT! (Suck it!)

Do you ever have one of those exhausting days where you feel like everyone is conspiring against you, and that people secretly feel generally annoyed whenever you walk into a room, and no matter what you do in or with your life you'll be wrong? And then, if you even CONSIDER talking to anyone about these odd, unfounded thoughts they choose the moment you approach them to talk about this whiny friend of theirs, or how needy this or that person is, or how busy/irritated/exhausted beyond the point of caring about anything they are? So then you just isolate yourself, feeling bad for doing so but knowing that being around people would make you feel even more upset, despite there being no reason at all for thinking/feeling the way you do?

Well, I never have days like that. And if I did, today most CERTAINLY wouldn't be one of them. And if it were, I would NEVER passive-aggressively moan and groan about it on my blog.***

Anytime I find myself feeling upset about nothing in particular (and, often, when I actually have a reason for being upset) I end up feeling guilty about it. Not the, "I just stabbed and buried a man that I thought was trying to kill me, and then found out he was just coming to give me a hug and tell me I'm awesome" kind of guilty. Just the, "I have a place to live, food, friends and dogs that love me, a cat that has yet to murder me in my sleep, a nice car, and am able to continue going to college full-time, so what the fuck is my problem" kind of guilty.

I suppose I ought to paint a lot and drink a little (wait, reverse that) and try to get out of my head (without the use of hallucinogens, of course).


I've decided to post a list of things that make me feel better when I'm being ridiculous like this. Maybe, hopefully, I can help pull someone else out of a similar, pointless funk.

-I love Bjork. She's hysterical, and an incredible musician. One thing that I love slightly more than Bjork is when people do impressions of Bjork. The best I've seen so far is right here.

-One of my FAVORITE comedians is a man named Dylan Moran. He has some awesome stand up that you can find around the internet, but his best work (in my opinion) is a series he wrote and starred in. It's called Black Books, and it's absolutely hysterical. The first episode isn't the best ever, but every episode has something to offer.

-Web comics make me happy, too. I have two that are my absolute, without a doubt favorites. There's Rock, Paper, Cynic, which is always one panel with brilliant text.  The other is Darwin Carmichael is Going to Hell. It's more story-oriented, so it's best to start at the beginning of that one. But it's awesome. My favorite is Skittles, the manticore.

Okay, that's enough for now. I'm going to listen to some Dylan Moran stand-up and find my art stuff. Though finding the sites for all of my favorite things (in order to link them) has made me feel much better already.

I promise, my next post will be FAR more entertaining than the past two. Happy Wednesday!

***These three statements are entirely untrue. 

Undead P.S.

While I'm here (here being "online, playing with the blog", not "on the planet" or "still alive" or anything like that) I ought to go ahead and post the zombie painting I did of my dad (if you're confused, I'm talking about THIS).

It turned out fairly badass. I dangled my actual, from-my-mouth-to-your-art adult tooth from some black yarn that I painted red, and then pulled the yarn through the canvas and tied a knot in the back.

So here it is, with my dad, in all its glory.

 

Okay, now I seriously have to go get ready for my evening of debauchery. 

If we all could just admit that we are racist a little bit, even though we all know that it's wrong, maybe it would help us get along.

I went to the birthday party of a friend Wednesday night, and found myself involved in a discussion about racism. Apparently, the guy I was talking to takes things WAY too seriously. It didn't help that he was a complete and total hipster. He even had the Captain Hook mustache, and the cheap, tacky, fur-lined earmuff cap. Poor sad, cookie-cutter hipster kid.


This whole conversation started with a rather hysterical (and quite racist) joke that I found far more amusing than he considered to be in good taste. As we sat down outside and the conversation inevitably turned toward the awful, serious racism that can be found in the world, all I could think was that it was a shame that I couldn't just break into the song from Avenue Q, and follow him around for the remainder of the evening, yelling singing it at him.


Now, I understand that racism still exists in this far from perfect world. I understand that people have to deal with all kinds of judgments and assumptions that are imposed upon them by others. I understand that that isn't exactly considered fun, or right, or good. I mean, shit. I'm a white girl that grew up in Atlanta. Just like everyone on the planet, I know what it feels like to be ostracized.


(I think Jane Elliot showed the effects of racism best. She's amazing. Watch this if you haven't seen it. Hell, watch it if you have.)

Haha, the dude in the foreground even has the same curly mustache!

Thing is, I also know that things are only worth the value you assign to them. It's like art. Or politics. (Upon comparing racism to art or politics, the kid that was arguing with me went off. "WHAT?! You think that racism, art, and politics are all the same thing?! What's WRONG with you?!" Dude, the only thing wrong with me is that I lack the freeze ray from Despicable Me, because that's CLEARLY the only way I will get you to LISTEN.) If people feel a piece of art is worth $X, they'll spend $X on it. If not, the piece becomes worth whatever the next person that comes along is willing to pay for it. In politics, a politician is only worth the people standing behind him/her. Without the people that support you as a political figure, you're not going to be elected.


That being said, I feel like racism is something that ought to be seen as so ridiculous and archaic that all you can do is write it off or laugh about it. It shouldn't be treated with solemnity, or slight, inward gasps, or eyes darting back and forth, or whispers. That gives racism power. It allows the serious, offensive racists to feel they have sway, and are correct in their judgments. That's bullshit. Instead, people ought to stop taking shit so seriously. Life isn't about covering our ears and wearing blinders when things make us uncomfortable. It's about fleshing it out and learning WHY they make us uncomfortable, and then dealing with them. So either meet racism with a laugh and not a second thought, or (if it's serious/violent/out of hand) meet it with a firm "No, this isn't how the world works anymore," and change that situation.


I tried explaining this, but I think my logic made the hipster-brains in Captain Tightpants Jr.'s head melt a little. He started spouting off random words that had nothing to do with what I was talking about. Maybe he was hoping to confuse me long enough to change the subject. The last intelligible word that he used incorrectly was "existentialist", as in: he was an existentialist and therefore felt as though racism was to be treated as something that either doesn't exist or is far too horrific to joke about. Unfortunately, choosing to argue where lines ought to be drawn, with a perfect stranger, no less, is not existential in the least.

ex·is·ten·tial·ism [eg-zi-sten-shuh-liz-uhm]
–noun; a philosophical attitude associated esp. with Heidegger, Jaspers, Marcel, and Sartre, and opposed to rationalism and empiricism, that stresses the individual's unique position as a self-determining agent responsible for the authenticity of his or her choices.


So, you see, his disagreeable and judgmental words (and general attitude) go entirely against his so-called "existential way of life". If you believe that everyone, as unique creatures, has the right to think whatever they want, how can you possibly argue something that's so ridiculous to such an extent?


Fucking doucher (I'm so eloquent when people piss me off).

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

So, anyway, apologies for the lack of humor in this post. I just hate it when people perpetuate and give strength to anything negative, and then argue about how their doing that is supposed to help the situation. Why can't we just accept that everyone is a person, and that that's all that matters? Why does everything always have to be SO FUCKING difficult??? Ugh.

Well, tomorrow is my birthday. Tonight I'm being kidnapped by my darling TeriWife and SnarkMinion and taken to The Clermont in honor of said birthday. I'm hoping the rest of the weekend is just as full of crass, dirty, drunken shenanigans (at least until dinner with my parents and grandparents on Sunday).

Love to all. Best wishes and all that. And remember, Depeche Mode said it best. xoxo

Snow Day; it's more than just a shitty movie from the mid-90s.

Late Sunday night, as I was up working on art and getting my shit together for the start of classes at GSU, I had an amazing view of the gathering snow from my front window. I smiled, because my furnace was fixed, I had food in the fridge, and my dogs were safe at home. "What could go wrong?" I thought to myself.

Monday morning, the snow was about 6.5" deep. It was the most snow I had seen in Atlanta since 1993. The sun came out, melting the top of the snow so it refroze into ice. Then I let the dogs out. Because Lucy is so giant and built like a deer, the scene in the back yard went almost exactly like THIS. It was one of the most hysterical moments of her life. She loved it, though.

Then I went out to check on the car. Because I live on a hill, there was no way in hell I was going to attempt to move my car. It would have been like trying to climb up a slide wearing only socks (and don't deny it, you know you've tried that at least once in your life). So I made some food, and settled in for the day.

Tuesday, classes were canceled. My car was still surrounded by ice. It looked as though no one on my street had even tried to leave their place. People getting cabin fever all around Atlanta started attempting to venture out. A lot of them failed, and ended up abandoning their cars on the interstate. I managed to get out of the house and down the street without busting my ass, and went for a long walk to cool my claustrophobic nerves.

By Wednesday, the whopping 10 snow plows we have here had cleared a lot of main roads and interstates. Unfortunately, neighborhoods and maybe 40% of surface streets were still really dangerous. In an effort to keep me from going completely mad, a friend of mine braved the ice and drove the 30 minutes to my house. He had to park a few streets down, but I didn't care. I grabbed the dogs, a backpack of clothes, my art supplies, and high-tailed it out of there.

The roads are now less insane, but people here in Atlanta seem to want to continue driving like they're half-drunk, half-retarded, and entirely lacking an awareness of common rules of the road. Morons.

So now, until next time, I'm going to go paint some more, maybe eat something, and take solace in the patches of grass that I can FINALLY see outside.

Oh, and for all of you bitching about the snow, realize it only sucks because it kills our roads. Were we prepared, the snow would have been AWESOME. Plus, Lucy's ice-capades more than made up for the inability to use my car. Crazy giant dog.

Better 10 days late than never, that's what I always say.

Hi! It's a new fucking year! How exciting! In honor of the new year, I have made a few resolutions.

Why did it take the calendar year changing for me to try to better myself?  I don't know. I blame peer pressure. And, for the record, I also blame a lack of peer pressure to better myself the other 364 days of the year.  Damn, my friends need to quit slacking. Either that, or they just think I'm already perfect and awesome.

Okay, yeah, they probably need to step up their game.

So, about those resolutions. My life has been tumultuous at best lately. Though, one good thing about that is that I get to over-use the word "tumultuous". It's one of my favorite words. I think it's because the word itself reminds me of Templeton (the rat from Charlotte's Web, for those of you not up to date on your animated, supporting movie personalities from 1973). He had the best song ever. 

I rarely make New Years' resolutions. I always felt as though people only made New Years' resolutions because they were expected to change faults they could no longer deny. And most people just hope their friends and family will forget about New Years' promises (which hold less meaning than normal promises) by the time the resolution is given up on. By April Fools' Day people are right back to the way they were December 31st. Well, not exactly the way they were. They almost always have some strange, lingering  pretentiousness because at least they tried to do some soul-searching/ fix a personal flaw/ change a bad habit. Screw the outcome, right? A for effort and all of that.

This year, however, I have decided to jump on the Holier Than Thou Bandwagon and make a few promises I more than likely won't keep (though I will scoff and look down my nose at others because of the superiority gained by my frail attempt at bettering myself).

And so, without further sarcasm or general passive-aggressive bullshit (haha, see what I did, there?), my New Years' Resolutions:

1. I will not allow anything to keep me from the grades I want this semester.
2. I will make the time to write in this blog. That time will be enough to allow me to post weekly, at least. I'm making this resolution because this is something I enjoy, but that I let myself neglect in order to do less fun, but slightly more responsible things. I think I can make time for both.
3. I will keep and maintain a budget (by "maintain", I mean "actually, seriously, FOR REALSIES maintain". I totally suck at handling money. I want to change that).
4. I will be a good dog-mommy. That means walking at LEAST twice a week, regardless of weather, and also at LEAST one trip to the Piedmont dogpark per week. I mean, shit. It's like 5 minutes away.
5. I will make up my mind. On everything that I can. One of my biggest fears is being trapped in monotony. That fear causes me to avoid making decisions and commitments, and decisions and commitments can be amazing, wonderful, fun things. I'm going to start small, like by deciding whether I want to paint a wall in my bedroom or re-paint the bathroom (I hate painting walls when I'm not doing murals. Did someone say boring? Oh, yeah. It was my sense of creativity), or by choosing to wear the first outfit I put on, instead of pending 15 minutes putting on and taking off clothes before leaving the house in what was my first choice. Or by going an entire 30-minute drive without hitting the next button on my iPhone (I put the damn songs on the phone. Why do I love them when selecting them, and HATE them when in the car?).
6. I will get up (ON TIME) and walk to the train once a week, instead of driving my car to class, however begrudgingly. I mean, shit, it's the same cost to park at school as it is to take the train. Greedy, sMarta bastards.

Has anyone else made any resolutions this year? You know, if you think about it, it's your last year to make a resolution and keep it according to hysterics and Nostradamus.

I have so many other stories and things to share that I've written about in my notebook but not had the time or energy to write about here. For now, I'm going to go find my paints, snuggle with my dogs, and nurse my whiskey. Love to all. You're perfect with and without your resolutions. And happy day.

Whut ha' happend was...

 One gusty November night in Atlanta (where it was still 75 degrees), a young girl sat at home with her dogs and her schoolwork. Her tailless, heathen cat was meandering through the front yard, returning from torturing some innocent, adorable, and rather unlucky creature. Inside, the fans were on and the windows were open, letting in the fresh air that smelled just like autumn would smell, only warmer.

Delia knows that she's about to be yelled at for pouncing Lucy. She does it anyway.

The girl looked up from her studies, and watched as her Australian Shepherd puppy bounced through the house, and bounced up on the great Dane that was trying so terribly hard to sleep on the couch, and bounced over to the front window. There she half-yelped, half-growled at the heathen cat, despite having  met her 1,000 times before. Strangely, the puppy still can't quite figure out what the cat is or how to react to her. The great Dane raised her head, wondering if perhaps, finally, the puppy actually managed to discover some potential threat (like a rogue squirrel, or a family of pedestrians, or a car that stopped within 100 yards of the house, or a Gila monster). The puppy looked back, grinning and open-mouthed as if to say , " Oh my god, bark-yelp-growling is FUN!!! Why don't we make noise more often?! Look at all the stuff outside! I want to bark at everything and see if it moves!! "

The puppy whipped around and went back to her excited grumbles. The Dane just stared for a minute, eyes half-closed as her brain struggled to wake up and figure out what just happened. She looked at the girl, who shrugged her shoulders. The Dane then put her head back down, deciding that sleep was more important, and started snoring softly.

The girl smiled to herself. Her little, furry family was hysterical. She turned back to her studies. They had been taking up the majority of her time for what felt like years, but was really only a matter of months. When she wasn't studying, she was looking for a job. She didn't know whether to laugh or cry as she thought to herself, "If only my bills could learn to pay themselves."

She decided to stop distracting herself with thoughts of bills speaking to themselves ("Here's that $100 that's due. Why, thank you. My pleasure."), and thoughts of her dogs getting jobs and contributing to the house ("Lucy is so big, she could start a grocery-carrying service, and Delia could power the house by running on a shepherd-sized hamster wheel...."), and thoughts of the tragic demise of her social life. Back to work. Always back to work.

But maybe, one day, she'll be able to get back to that blog she had so much fun writing.

xoxo