Peter Pan had the right idea

I bought a T-shirt of win today. And by win I mean UTTER AND COMPLETE NERDINESS (on the scale of that one photo I may have purchased in Monterey instead of buying myself a proper souvenir). I also finished a couple of good books, checked out a truckload more from the library, and possibly nearly ran over my riding instructor as I was backing up. It has been a productive few days.

I've also been on Youtube far more than necessary, but I'll probably start doing actual work tomorrow because I've got a billion and one things I'm supposed to get done this break (notice I didn't say need). The key difference there is that the things I'm supposed to do don't get done, while the things I need to do....sometimes get done? The probability for them is higher, anyways.

Also on the topic of probability I almost sort of understand math class although at this point that doesn't mean much, given I'm not sure Kruges understands math class. And the musical was pretty awesome and an epic fail all at once, but I came away very much entertained, which was the point. School in general was not failing as much as it could have, though no doubt that will change in the next few weeks as the history department goes evil.

I'd sort of like to not have to deal with school for a while, but the really sad part is this: this is my last break until summer, because going on an outdoor trip does not count as "break". In fact, it may even be worse than school. I may just have issues, or it may be that people from Seattle are nuts and generally it is not considered fun to go to the bathroom through your clothes, even if you ARE submerged in running water. Either way, outdoor trip=week of pain.

God, also I just realized that there is one very large reason why being a teacher wouldn't suck: SUMMER BREAK. I sort of want it now, because I've really only got this summer and maybe next before I'll have to start working summers. Or rather, working summers at an actual, regular, paid job. THE HORROR.

....Growing up sucks.

Epic mope without the mope

A run of good luck and very little homework has cured me for the most part of my mopes. I know you all are wiping tears of joy from your eyes.

I was discussion pretentious writing with a friend today--he said, quite accurately, that using complex words when there is a perfectly normal synonym to do the job is what makes a sentence pretentious. I wholeheartedly agree--though of course there are a few exceptions. Tempest instead of storm is understandable. Pulchritudinous (WTF) instead of beautiful is just plain stupid.

I am reading a book by a guy named Peter S. Beagle, ten brownie points with awesome sauce on top if you know what he wrote WITHOUT Wiki-ing it. Not that I don't love Wiki. But all the more awesome sauce to you if you DO know it. Anyways, it's a spectacular book despite the title, and I thought of it now because he writes in the most gorgeous language ever. It's a lost art, for the most part--the telling of a good, entertaining fantasy story without having to sacrifice the sentences that make a reader pause and go "Holy damn, that was amazing." I know I am a wordnerd for stuff like this, but honestly there is nothing I love more than a truly well-written book, and I've found one after a very long time. The problem with most books that use elegant language now is that they are also full of symbolism and are interpreted in English classes and are generally ruined by that most sacred of institutions, school. And they have given up plot and originality so they can be "meaningful". I have very strong opinions on books like these, and these opinions often involve lots of swearing and the words "MOST BORING THING EVER". As far as I'm concerned, messages are meant to be stated outright, and there is a very big difference between books that are supposed to make a point and books that fulfill the purpose of being ENTERTAINMENT. Seems like we're losing the latter because now everyone and their tapeworm has a point to make (including me, it seems) and nobody wants to write just to make people happy anymore. This is depressing.

My goodness. Just after I promised no more ranting...there I go again. My apologies.

Anyways, as a solution to this, I've started my own novel! Again! This is probably the seventh or eighth or ten billionth one, but who cares? I'm actually working on this one a little bit each day, so even if I'm not exactly moving at NaNoWriMo pace, I'm not going to abandon it because of stupid writer's block. I give writer's block the finger.

This novel is of the cheese, but it too plays a part in getting rid of the mopes. A lot of things made of cheese will do that. Like Bollywood. Or Kenneth Branagh (who is also made of awesome). And SLEEP. Which I should get.

Ha.

Lumps and bumps and mopes

In this world nothing is certain except death and taxes.
-Benjamin Franklin

Quite true, old chap.

My life has been touched by cancer four times since I came to Lakeside, and I find myself unable to cope. I am lucky--not one of those times has been within my own family--but then, at the same time, I have no excuse to feel so terribly depressed over it. Pity, sympathy, even sadness--all are understandable responses. I seem, however, to go over the top (as always) and get overly emotional.

Which sort of goes back to the whole offering-sympathy thing I was talking about a while ago. Because I feel guilty feeling bad when I know that the people who love the sick person most are feeling ten times worse than I am, and I ought to be supporting them--but it's easier to just feel my own sadness instead of trying to help ease theirs.

So, okay. I pose a question to you few, you proud, you who have probably stopped reading the mopefest by this point. How do you deal with other people's sadness? And do you have any tips on what to say to someone who's got family or friends with a major illness?

Yes, I'm being kind of whiny. Yes, I should get over myself. Yes, just because I have a blog I'm going to indulge myself completely because that is the point of a blog.

It's the month of love...

...and yet I'm feeling the hate. Why?

Well, there are two main reasons. One is trite but somewhat understandable, the other is just stupid. I'll leave you to decide which is which.

Reason one: I'm sick. The runny-nose, fatigue, hacking coughs, waking up at five in the morning because the stupid NyQuil stopped working kind of sick. And it's been cold outside, so when I've gone to the stables I've basically turned into Rudolph, but with more ick and less holiday cheer. It's unpleasant.

Reason two: This one sort of needs a bit of an explanation. Once a year, I turn into something worse than Mick Jagger's skin-tight leathers. I turn into a football fan.

On Superbowl Sunday, it doesn't matter that I don't know diddly about football--it doesn't matter that this is literally THE only football game I watch all season. I turn into a raving, jumping, screaming lunatic for several hours. I'm not sure why, it just happens--in the same way that I turn into a soccer fan when the World Cup final rolls around (and I actually hate soccer even more than I hate football, because at least nobody's ever tried to make me PLAY football).

But basically, this Superbowl PISSED ME OFF. Ever since a few years ago, when our own dear (or not so dear) Seahawks made it to the Superbowl and got cheated by those ridiculously biased refs, I've held a grudge against those refs--and against the Steelers. Who made it again this year, and who VERY NEARLY LOST IN THE FINAL QUARTER.

And granted, the reason they didn't lose is because apparently, the Cardinals can't play defense for shit (actually, their offense wasn't too great either), but that is not good enough. KARMA HAS FAILED ME. I am not pleased. Also the halftime show was stupid and I wound up not watching it and instead doing Chem homework. Very disappointing, Superbowl.

Which actually fits in perfectly with the rest of the year. February has some major work to do before it can turn things around.

It's like a New Year's resolution, but not

I discovered long ago that I have a problem with tact. And by problem, what I really mean is a DISTINCT LACK OF IT. I suspect that my brain-to-mouth filter has been clogged by hormone-lint or some other such nonsense.

Granted, this isn't as much of a problem as it used to be. That was why I used to be horribly mean, actually--I'd speak without thinking, and it turns out that the stuff I said on the fly was a lot crueler than anything I actually had to think about. So that sort of explains why Narvel used to hate my guts (part of it, of course, was that I hated her guts, and it's hard to not indulge in mutual hate-fests when you're in middle school).

Anyways, basically I have finally decided that the best solution to this problem is to take an anger management course and practice spiritual, holistic yoga to cleanse both body and mind.

....

......

Yeah, I was lying.

In reality, the best solution is to adopt (in part) the philosophy of the skeptics.

No, really. I'm serious this time. Because their philosophy basically goes something like this: Never pass judgment. Ever.

Turns out if I don't pass judgment on the people I care about (no matter how hard or how easy that task may be), I can't actually piss any of them off enough to start another hate-fest a la 6th grade. And, yeah, this is probably going to be harder than it appears at first, but I have other outlets for anger and frustration with my friends and family--I just need to make more use of them. Taking it out on the people themselves actually does nothing, and I KNOW I never manage to do anything other than make the situation worse. Which, obviously, leads to a whole bunch of bad stuff.

Additionally, in a moment of sap--forgive me--I've sort of come to terms with the fact that I've only got a year and a half left with you guys, and then we'll all be going off to various corners of the globe doing our own stuff, and I am TERRIBLE at keeping in touch with people. Like, horrendously, notoriously bad at it. So I should probably make the most of you all--you're the most spectacular group of people I've had the "playsure" of meeting, as the Epicureans would remind me. Better not to screw that up by being my usual tactless self.

Knights, turtles, my ancestry (of sorts)

I was looking up the definition of "vambrance" to make sure it meant what I thought it meant (I was right and yes, I am a great big nerd, how ever did you guess?), and I came across a webpage--British, of course--that had listed the different parts of plate armour and where they were meant to go. And I sort of felt a small amount of glee when I realized that I knew some of these already. And no, I'm not getting excited over the fact that I know what "helmet" means. But anyways, mostly I just wanted to share some of my favorites. Like besagew. Which, and I quote, "block blows to the vulnerable armpit area". Or sabaton, which is a "foot protector" (read: pointy metal shoes).

Also, I think I reached new, dog-whistle pitches today when I discovered that my favorite cop show once mentioned one of the Bollywood movies I love to hate. This. It just pushes all the buttons of win and fail to make me spontaneously combust and at the same time wake all the little yippers in the neighborhood.

Which we have a lot of. Though really, it seems on Mercer you can categorize people by what kind of dog they have. There are the people with yappy, obnoxious little rats--they're older folks, and they simper and coo a lot. There are people with labradors or Golden Retrievers. These are the people who jog, walk the trails, and bike (they're not the Hardcore Bikers, though--that's an entirely different subgroup). And then there are the people with mutts and ridiculously rare dogs. I actually knew a guy who had a dog from Africa. These people...are the weirdos, but they're also the folks who will smile and not cross the road to save poor Fluffy-kins a heart attack.

Or maybe I'm just wrong. Still, I remain convinced that there are totally weird people on Mercer, and it's not just because we're all senior citizens and ex-Microsoft and send-their-kids-to-Kumon-Asians.

No, wait. That's exactly why.

That's sort of why if I come back after college, I'm not living here. You don't find hobos on Mercer, but neither is it the sort of place that produces intelligent, moderate, social human beings. It produces people like me. And I'm a hermit. And a turtle. And possibly just a distant relative of Hugh Laurie, waiting to blossom.

....

.......

..........

Or at least, a distant relative assuming all turtles are descended from a single African man-turtle:

See? Case in point.

Viva myself!

Someone (I can't remember who) told me that my blog posts are incredibly random and I have a chronic inability to stay on one topic for more than a few sentences. This is true. But at the same time, it's really hard to do unless I wish to rant on a single subject--and to be honest, I did that for a while, and now I have actually RUN OUT OF THINGS TO RANT ABOUT. I never thought the day would come, but it did, and that's why I stopped posting for a while.

Anyways. Basically, the purpose of having a blog has stopped being "entertain other people" and is instead "ramble about life". And life, unfortunately, is so dull that I have to glean little bits and pieces from all over the place. Also, most of you guys spend too many waking hours with me, which means there's a pretty large number of things I can't write about because you were all THERE. This is clearly an epic failure on your part.

And hey, that was two paragraphs on the same subject! Viva myself!

Also, we are starting a new novel in Spanish and it's about Cuba and I am already upset because someone is named Pilar, which is just not an attractive name. I think of it as the Spanish equivalent of Bertha. And it's about Cuba. We've already watched a fatty documentary on Cuba and it is not that important and I really think the US needs to stop having spasms of sulky rage over it.

Clearly, what I have spasms of sulky rage over is so much more mature. I've started throwing tantrums over Arthurian legend, which in case you didn't know or care is fucking depressing. It's all roses and sparkles and shiny swords, and then FOR NO APPARENT REASON everything goes to hell. Merlin goes and gets himself stuck in a cave for all eternity, Arthur goes and gets himself stuck asleep for all eternity, and basically the rest of the poor schmucks are left with the small hope that Arthur will come back when Britain needs him most. Which won't be before they're all dead. As for Merlin, we have to assume that he eats crabs for the rest of his life and is responsible for global warming.

Speaking of global warming, I'm really glad the fuss over An Inconvenient Truth has died down, because when I finally saw it, it was actually a letdown and the fact that it won an Oscar...Well. I remember back in 2000 the only reason I supported Al Gore over Bush was because he was better looking. Sad how much things can change in 8 years.

I somehow got to Youtube videos of the American Idol Davids singing their respective Andrew Lloyd Webber songs. It was more depressing than An Inconvenient Truth. Actually, I'd sort of expected more from the David who won, but his rendition of "Music of the Night" was TERRIBLE.

So of course, to cleanse my brain I went directly to....Village People. And. Well. You guys need to all see "In the Navy". It is more magical than I could have possibly imagined. Not that it tops JPop, but it's still pretty damn magical.