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Saturday, November 7th, 2020
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12:43 pm - STICKY POST: I refuse to use lj's new profile page.
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UPDATE: I've put all my info back in my profile because ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) opaleyes pointed out to me a super neat Firefox add-on that skins the profile pages to look like the old ones! It's not much of a protest anymore, but at least I get to look at my userinfo the way god intended it. ;)
If you're interested in that, there's more info in this post!
( User Info )
Since LJ has unleashed a huge, seething pile of epic douche-baggery regarding "no opt-out" on the new profile pages, I'm opting myself out. The only thing that will remain on my actual profile page will be my friends and stats, since I have no control over them getting displayed. But my info and interests will be over here, on MY "old" profile page. Where I'm now free to have as many interests as I damn well please. :)
The raw code I used is here: http://kandigurl.livejournal.com/458357.html
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| Saturday, July 4th, 2009
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1:45 am - NEW BELLA CULLEN PROJECT
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I have already ordered my copy. The second song they have a snippet of is probably my favorite of theirs ever.
HELLO EVERYONE. MY PATHETIC AND NERDY IS SHOWING.
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| Thursday, June 25th, 2009
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11:10 pm - Home from Hoop Path Retreat '09 and NOT DEAD.
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Nor am I going to catch up on my friends list any time soon, probably. I sort of eschewed the Internet completely for the entire time I was at the Hoop Path Retreat and surprisingly, I don't regret it at all. I've sort of somewhat a little bit kind of caught up with YouTube, and that's good enough for me for the time being.
Can I just say that hoopers are all incredibly beautiful people? I did not meet a single person this weekend who didn't embody a completely amazing spirit and energy. I do not have enough adjectives for how incredible it was to spend four days in the company of people who so powerfully believe in hooping and its benefits. I camped with three people who provided me with a constant stream of positivity, even when we were away from the workshops. I have to admit I'm having something of a tough time being out of that energy, but I'm working on it, one day at a time. To say it was life changing would be cheesy, but also true. It made me want to clean the fuck out of my apartment. That's how intense this energy was, you guys.
The city of Carrboro, NC was unbelievably awesome. I'm thinking that instead of spending all of next year in California, I will spend some of it in Carrboro and take some more classes from Baxter. (And probably also spend some time in Portland where they have another pretty big hooping community.) I don't know if it was due to the large amount of hoopers, or if this is the way the city always feels, but everywhere we went seemed to pulse with the joy of being alive. The Weaver Street Market alone is almost enough of a reason for me to give up on my lease and move to Carrboro right now*. So much incredible food (Salads for cheaps! EVERY flavor of Naked juice!), live music on Sundays, friendly people, AMAZING.
The retreat taught me so much about hooping and myself. Baxter is an amazing teacher with the self-stated goal of making us all "bad-ass hoopers". One of the ultimate bad-asses himself, he takes his job seriously and it shows. I learned so much. I've been at a place where I felt like improving my hooping was going at a snail's pace. Now, I realize I have so much to work on, so much to practice and learn. The workshops humbled me more than once, which was exactly what I needed, and I couldn't be more grateful. My goal is to continue to hoop every day, even if it's only for twenty minutes, and to continue taking those baby steps.
I absolutely loved getting to meet so many hoopers I admired, and share hooping space with them. It was like YouTube had come to life right in front of me, all at once. During the first night's dinner and meet and greet, we all busted out our hoops and played for at least an hour (if not more) before the food ever went on the table. I spent the entire time in my hoop, staring in awe at all of the amazing people around me, sharing each other's energy and creating a completely magical space. I could have gone home the next morning and felt I'd gotten my money's worth.
I got to meet Christabel (aka HoopGirl), and I had her sign her book for me. I'm not going to lie, I had some preconceived notions of Christabel before I met her. I kind of felt the whole HoopGirl company was a little too commercial for my tastes, I didn't know how I felt about Christabel herself, etc. Well, I do not feel that way anymore. I got to talk to Christabel several times over the course of the weekend, and also watch her hoop. Her spirit is radiant and beautiful, and upon meeting her, it is so apparent that everything she does, she does out of love for the hoop and her desire to share it with others. She performed a dance on the very first night that brought tears to my eyes. If you ever have a chance to meet and hoop with Christabel, take it, you will not regret it! I would love to take classes from her some time.
I also got to experience my first time hooping with fire! That was a TON of fun. I wish I had a way to do it more often, so that I could practice with it. It's intimidating and scary, but also a huge rush. For a moment, I forgot everything I knew about hooping, I was too busy going, "Holy cow, there's fire on me. It's freaking spinning around me. I'm going to catch on fire and die," while simultaneously thinking, "This is so cool. This is so COOL." I got to spin fire twice, and watch a lot of other hoopers spin and do things that, were I to attempt them, would surely take my limbs off. SOMEDAY.
My mom put up pictures from our Cleveland/Cedar Point/Indianapolis/Alamosa trip on her Facebook, and eventually I'm going to post about that, too. But I wanted to get everything out from this weekend while it was still fresh!
*Disclaimer: I'm not going to.
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| Wednesday, June 17th, 2009
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1:33 pm - LJ Name Change, COULDN'T BE HELPED.
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Don't worry, not my username. While I love "Always take a banana to a party", I saw the following picture, and knew it was time for a name change.
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1:33 am - Hoop Path
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Spent the entire day today working on a bag to carry my collapsible hoops in, in preparation for the Hoop Path Retreat this weekend. As of Monday, I've managed to bang out car pooling both from the airport and during the event, where I'm staying, picked up last minute clothing and supplies, cancelled my car rental reservations so that I don't have to worry about them charging me for a vehicle I don't need, and made this bag. So now all I have left to do is a whole lotta printing: Tickets, directions, itineraries, etc.
But I am REALLY EXCITED. Lots of hoopers I really admire are going to be at this event, and I can't wait to be in that atmosphere.
BUT ENOUGH ABOUT THAT. Tomorrow, gutterballjen and I are going to see The Veronicas!! We plan to get there early enough to get a good spot, as it's standing room only. (Jeni, we will need to strategically pee before going in to the stage area. NO DRINKING LOTS OF WATER. ;)
And then after I get home from the retreat, I'm going to WRITE LIKE MAD on the Breaking Dawn parody for Xlormp. I had a fit of inspiration this past weekend regarding what to do with Frig's baby, and now I am PUMPED to write. So I will be trapping myself in my apartment with naught but my Alphasmart to keep me company, and writing my head off. My goal is five chapters a day, if I can do that, I should be able to get the thing mostly banged out before I start posting it. Which will be a nice breath of fresh air compared to the stupid procrastinaity way I've done the past two books. SO HERE'S HOPING THAT GOES WELL. I'm actually looking forward to some breakneck writing.
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| Friday, June 12th, 2009
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9:54 pm - Book Update!
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Book 14/15 - The Bermudez Triangle by Maureen Johnson
I enjoyed this book WAY more than I did 13 Little Blue Envelopes. I was engrossed in this story, I appreciated the realism and the differences between the characters, and how those differences both enhanced and hurt their friendships. I enjoyed this book so much that I foisted it upon wickedsin when I saw her last week (I can't believe it's only been a week, it feels like MONTHS, I MISS LISA AND B), because I figured if any book was going to get her reading this year, it'd be one about lesbians. :)
Book 15/15 - Zoe Rising by Pam Conrad
This book was a sequel to a book I LOVED as a kid called Stonewords, A Ghost Story. I read Stonewords so many times, it incorporated ghosts and bizarre time travel and secret passages and mystery, and I found out when I read Zoe Rising that it had won the Poe award for juvenile mystery, the award most recently awarded to everyone's favorite John Green for Paper Towns! So yes, Stonewords, great book, I recommend it to EVERYONE. EVER.
I didn't even KNOW it had a sequel until I managed to stumble upon it on Paperback Swap. I figured I'd check it out, why not? After reading it, I can honestly say it's not as good as Stonewords, the story didn't grab me the same way. Where Stonewords seemed to make the supernatural seem, well, natural, it felt forced in this book. I didn't hate it, but I didn't love it, either.
** ** **
I made it to book 15 already! I am upping my goal to 30 books. I can do it!
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| Thursday, June 11th, 2009
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11:05 am
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I think completely catching up on my fl is a lost cause, but I made it pretty far back (I think through Monday?). If anything important happened, post a link and I'll read it, but, you know...you don't have to?
I'm still in Alamosa, slooowly getting a little more used to the altitude (7,500 feet or some nonsense like that! RIDICULOUS). Looking forward to getting to sleep on my nice bed, though. :) And to get my mail that gutterballjen has graciously been picking up for me! I have a book on Cedar Point waiting for me at home!
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| Wednesday, June 10th, 2009
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5:37 pm - Sorting (or, nerdy HP fandom stuff that you may want to skip if you don't nerd this way)
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Okay, so my sorting post. I've been thinking a lot about sorting and sorting comms and their dynamics vs. canon sorting, stuff like that. But mostly I've been thinking about my own sorting, and how I've changed as a person since I was sorted into Hufflepuff at H_E.
For comparison's sake, here are the two applications:
Hogwarts Elite, Sorted: Hufflepuff, stamped 02-14-05
Hogwarts is Home, Sorted: Slytherin, stamped 06-08-09
Dang, it has been MORE than four years since I was sorted at H_E. CRAZY. That community has changed my life, I'll tell you that right now, friends.
Anyway, if you look at the two applications, you can tell that I am almost a completely different person between then and now. And while I still identify with Hufflepuff, I can see where the different sorts were coming from. What I was not expecting when I submitted my application, however, was how evenly spread my votes among the different houses were. See for yourself; the number of votes I got for each house:
Gryffindor: 25
Hufflepuff: 22
Ravenclaw: 23
Slytherin: 28
( Cut because it only gets nerdier from here. )
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| Tuesday, June 9th, 2009
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8:18 am - UPDATE
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I'm in Alamosa, CO at my aunt & uncle's house. SWEET, SWEET INTERNET ACCESS.
I plan on making an in depth post on HP sorting and fandom and stuff, but in the mean time, DALLAS H_E MEMBERS: I know I joked about it at the last meetup, but who would be interested in having sorting parties? Maybe once a month? THERE WOULD BE CAKE. I bet sorting and getting to discuss applicants in real time with real humans who are real awesome would be a lot of fun. Y/N?
Either way, I still think we should have a cake party.
And in case you aren't following me on Twitter, my final HiH stamp: Slytherin.
I'm as floored as you are. More on that later.
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| Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009
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10:06 pm - BEST STORY OF CEDAR POINT DAY ONE:
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So mom, Clarice and I were riding the Blue Streak, and Clarice had her camera out while they were loading the train, and the attendant told her to put it away. So she did. However, she got it back out as we rolled around and began climbing the lift hill. About halfway up, the train stops. I was excited, I love getting stuck on rides (because I am retarded? Probably), and I'd never been stuck on Blue Streak before, so I reveled in the experience while we watched the attendant climb the lift hill, presumably to fix the problem.
Nopers. It was to ask Clarice to delete the pictures she had taken and put her camera away.
Let me repeat that.
They STOPPED the ENTIRE RIDE just so the attendant could bitch out Clarice for having her camera out. I found it pretty freaking hilarious, and luckily, so did the other riders. I mean, seriously. There comes a point when you just have to let it go, man. Chastise her and make her delete her pictures when the ride is over!
I wish I had time to read my fl...maybe I'll get a chance tomorrow?? Right now, it's late and I'm sleepy and I should probably be sleeping instead of posting but YOU GUYS KNOW HOW I ROLL.
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| Monday, June 1st, 2009
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10:02 pm - On vacation!
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Posting from a hotel room computer! I love posting from unique places. The chair I'm sitting in is quite uncomfortable, though (way too high up for this desk). Mom and I drove to Cincinnati last night, then to Cleveland today, where we met up with our friend Clarice and spent the day at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame . (AUGH, THIS KEYBOARD IS INFURIATING!) I'm not sure what I expected out of the museum, but I had a BLAST. We stayed there practically all day.
We also noticed a very strange phenomenon about the city of Cleveland. If anyone sees you taking a picture of yourself in front of some sort of attraction, they will stop and offer to take it for you. This happened THREE TIMES, and we were only out and about for a few hours! Not to be believed.
I've been bonding like crazy with Twitter, and Tweeting this trip like mad. I'm kandigurl on Twitter, too, if you're not already following me. I worry that I might be getting to that obnoxious Tweet level. If I am, somebody please let me know! It's nice when I can't get to lj, though.
Tomorrow is CEDAR POINT. To say I am pumped is an understatement, I am UNSPEAKABLY PUMPED. And we have Clarice with us! A Cedar Point virgin! I can't wait to watch her face as we go in, wander around, show her the rides, it will be AMAZING. OH, and since we're going three days this year, my mom's decided it would be cheaper for us to buy season passes. I'm pretty excited about having a Cedar Point season pass to take home with me!
Oh, and I've decided to apply at Hogwarts is Home, just for the thrill of being sorted again. The results are pretty freaking intriguing. Once the sorting's over, I will talk about it more in depth, but for now, let me just say I LOVE getting sorted by obsessive, analytical HP nerds. I wish I could do it every day. Or at least once a year. That would be fun.
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| Wednesday, May 27th, 2009
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11:50 pm - It's almost vacation time!
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On Sunday, the mother and I are leaving for EFFING CEDAR POINT. I don't have a Cedar Point icon. I have no idea why this is, but I'm against it.
So I know we go every year, and I had this knowledge of going to Cedar Point over the course of the year, but it wasn't until maybe last week that I was like, "Yes, it is freaking time to ride a crapton of amazing roller coasters." I NEED it right now. I NEED me some Top Thrill Dragster, some Maverick, some Millenium Force. NEED NEED NEED NEED NEED.
So I'm kind of excited about it, Sunday cannot come soon enough. Let's get on the road, go to another state, and RIDE THE CRAP OUT OF SOME ROLLER COASTERS.
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1:50 am - Help out the Hooping Life!
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So The Hooping Life is a documentary about hooping that has been trying to come out for quite some time now, at least since I've started hooping. Help out by viewing the trailier, rating it, favoriting it, etc. They just came out with a new one and I like this one a lot!
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| Tuesday, May 26th, 2009
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4:33 pm - Book 13/15, Boobs, Epic H_E Meetup of WIN.
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Book 13/15 - The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things by Carolyn Mackler
I read this one pretty quickly and was kind of surprised by how much I ended up liking it. It's a fat girl book, and for a while I feared it would be one of those fat girl develops an eating disorder book, but then it turned into a fat girl gets an eyebrow ring and dyes her hair purple and becomes more confident in her body image book and that made me much happier. So this book gets the thumbs up!
** ** **
I figured I would explain the semi-cryptic boob tweet I made yesterday, regarding how I hate it when I get catcalled on the street, but I don't mind it at Scarborough Faire. What happened was this: I was all dressed up in my garb, and Megan and I were taking separate cars since I had to leave early to go to my hoop meetup (which I guess ended up canceled, because next to nobody came!). Well, driving down the road, this truck pulls up next to me and starts honking his horn. I drive with my windows down because I don't believe in air conditioning in the car (and also I guess I am a masochist). I turned to see what all the honking was about, and this dude also has his windows down, and he makes this gesture indicating that perhaps I had something in my car that he would very much like to squeeze. So I switched lanes and sped up.
And then I was thinking, "Well, what makes that different from being at Scarby and having rennie dudes making boobie comments?" I determined that the difference is this: At the ren fair, the dudes are usually in tights or a kilt, and they are using a charming accent or rennie speak, IE, "A fine view it is, mi lady!" or something like that. So, men of the world, there is the solution. Honking and lude gestures, out. Tights or kilts and funny accents, in. GO FORTH AND SPREAD THE WORD.
** ** **
On Sunday, I went to an H_E meetup at unbeguiled's house, a gathering of all the usual Dallas H_E suspects including shouldknobetter, pikacharma, and this time, a visiting from Wisconsin wickedldy who was an awesome addition and can we have her every time, plz? (I swear one of these meetups I'll actually show up sooner than five hours in.) Our plan was to eat delicious food and watch movies. I mentioned the Rifftrax for Twilight* existed, and OH, how the downloading began.
Before we commenced the hilarity that is the MST3K crew mocking Stephenie Meyer's masterpiece on film, shouldknobetter mentioned cake one too many times, and that sent us on a field trip from which we returned with two kinds of angel food cake, a red velvet cake, cinnamon rolls, and a piece of pumpkin pie.
But before we could even begin to dig in to the sweet, sugary goodness, we received a tweet from ladylucius, who had missed her connecting flight in Dallas due to her previous flight landing late. Using the power of our combined H_E awesomeness, she managed to get a flight out for the next morning and we picked her up from the airport and then we all SQUEED LIKE FREAKING LUNATICS and had the best time ever. I think that random H_E members should show up in Dallas all the dang time.
*Guys, this is seriously one of the greatest things I have ever experienced. I've gotten to see it twice in the past week, and it is so epically fantastic I would gladly watch it a lot more. If you love MST3K and you love making fun of Twilight, you will FUCKING ADORE this Rifftrax.
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| Saturday, May 23rd, 2009
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4:41 pm - HELP!!
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Amphigory.com is out of Atomic Pink for a few months! Where else would be a good place to get it in quick? Thanks!
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| Friday, May 22nd, 2009
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1:05 pm - YESSSSSSSSSSSSS
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11:44 am - OH HEY, LIFE, HOW'D YOU GET SO WEIRD?
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So one of my uncles died this past Sunday. I never met him. But he recently friended me on Facebook. It's weird, his Facebook is still up.
All I ever really knew about him was that he'd gotten his life into a lot of trouble with alcohol, drugs, what have you. Apparently he spent some time under bridges in Dallas. And he wasn't the most awesome person as a kid. But recently he'd been getting better, getting his life back on track.
Yesterday I went with my mom to his memorial service, and I learned a whole lot of stuff I didn't know. Like that he was a veteran. Or the fact that he was seven years sober. Or the fact that he'd gone back to school and gotten a degree in psychology. Or that he had inspired a whole slew of people who were working on getting sober or struggling to stay sober, inspiring them to work hard, to change their lives, and to be proud of who they were. Enough people that the memorial service lasted an entire hour due to everyone wanting to get up and say something.
It's crazy how I never met the guy, but I'm glad to be part of his family.
And of course I did the whole "Would people say anything so nice about me when I'm gone?" thing, and we all know how that goes.
After the service, some of his friends invited us to come to their apartment and eat, and they made up a ton of food: brisket, chicken and potatoes in French dressing, homemade fried rice, all kinds of stuff. I ate and ate and ate and it was awesome.
We also took some time to go look at his room and see if any of us wanted any of his things. I felt awkward taking anything, since I didn't know him and also since I'm trying to clear out my apartment of any and all crap, but I did end up with an unopened jar of grape jelly and a thing of peanut butter, some index cards, some Febreeze, and a couple of Garth Brooks cassettes.
SO HOW WAS YOUR YESTERDAY? Death free, I hope?
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| Tuesday, May 19th, 2009
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12:23 pm - ALSKDJFLDSAKFJLDSKFJ.
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My video is video of the day on hooping.org!!!!!!!!
*FLAILS*
*FAINTS*
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| Monday, May 18th, 2009
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3:49 pm - Muse on cellos = HOLY CRAP.
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I love Zoe Keating. Oh my goodness. I was searching for something entirely different, but I stumbled upon this:
She is covering Muse's "Time is Running Out". ON THE CELLO. By herself, using naught but a laptop and looping software. And her cello, of course. What a freaking incredible woman.
SO ANYWAY, Vanessa and I took a trip down to Austin yesterday to see RENT with Anthony Rapp and Adam Pascal again. I'm so glad I got to see it a second time, my memory is terrible so the more times I can witness/experience something, especially something awesome, the better.
The only downside was that I was freaking exhausted from two days of running consistently from one event to the next and going to sleep late like a moron. I slept like nobody's business today. Oh man, did I sleep.
But in between all of that sleeping, I got a case of the crazy and decided (after waking up at two in the morning from a five hour nap) that I wanted to rearrange my apartment furniture. So I went down to my car to get out my iHome so I could hook up my iPod, but while I was down there, I thought, "I really want to listen to my RENT soundtrack. Maybe it is in here." (You see, I have not been able to find my RENT soundtrack ANYWHERE. I've found the case, but that's it. Maybe I should just bite the bullet and order it from swapacd.) So instead of rearranging my furniture, I cleaned out my car.
You have to understand that I clean out my car maybe once, twice a year? And between those times, it accumulates all sorts of bizarre crap. The last time it had gotten a good, thorough cleaning was in December before my drive to Colorado. So it wasn't too horrible, and I didn't find my RENT soundtrack, but I did find the Dresden Dolls cd I was looking for about a month ago, as well as a shitton of clothes, some stuff from Christmas, yarn, books, and one and a half trash bags full of junk.
And then I went upstairs and climbed back into bed and proceeded to have dreams about finding my old cat Gus, going to parties, and my bedroom closet leading to a Subway restaurant that was fully staffed and wouldn't hire me which is lame because, come on, talk about convenience.
Anyway, I hope everyone's having a grand and spectacular Monday, I am hungry, but I don't know what to eat.
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| Sunday, May 17th, 2009
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1:37 am - Hooping, Eight Months
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