|
|
Wednesday, September 3rd, 2008
| |
10:51 pm - Woah, school.
|
To make this simpler (since I'm not typing my life story out again), here is a copy of the e-mail I sent out to my family about the first day of classes:
Today was a pretty awesome first day of classes - I had two (one at 8:30 in the morning and the other at 5:30 at night - talk about a gap between classes!)
Anyhoo, the first class I had is called "World of Animation & Illustration". I knew pretty much everyone in the class because there are only so many of us in the illustration department to take the class. My roommate from last year, Melanie, is in the class which is awesome (she's also in my night class). It went well - basic intro stuff, our professor showed us some of his work (which is 3D illustration, all done on the computer - most of it is technical stuff or space images, he's done the covers for Newsweek quite a few times). The fun part was when he told us we were going to have a little quiz - he showed us about 70 slides and asked us if we could write down the artist that created the illustration. I recognized a bit of it, but I could barely name any of the illustrators (I think I may have gotten 6 or 7 correct - I was proud of myself because I could recognize the Gibson girls and one of the pin-up illustrators - everyone got the Walt Disney slide and most people got the Chuck Jones image). We basically sat there and shrugged our shoulders as each slide came up. The quiz didn't count for anything but after he took our papers he went back through the slides and told us who was responsible for each image and gave us a little background information on them. It was very enlightening. He joked that if anyone knew more than a quarter of the images they really didn't need the class. One interesting thing I found out from that class today - the classic "Jaws" movie poster was actually a book cover, and the movie studio used it without the artists' permission because they thought they had the right to the image (they were tied in with the book company). The artist sued the movie studio and they settled it out of court for a huge sum of money. Pretty sweet deal.
My afternoon consisted of a whole bunch of meetings (being secretary and treasurer for two different organizations means I have a lot of stuff to get done and twice as many meetings to go to as last year because now I'm on the executive boards of the groups). I'm going to be spending a whole lot of time in the student center but it's going to be a lot of fun. I have a say in pretty much anything that comes up at the radio station or class one concerts.
My night class is "Character Design for 2D Animation" and I am super super excited about taking this class this semester. My professor is an adjunct and he's worked for just about every animation studio out there! He spent the majority of the class just giving us an idea of what projects and movies he's worked on, and I kept looking at Melanie in disbelief because the guy has done so much! He knows and has worked with Brad Byrd (from Pixar) a whole bunch of times, he's worked with Tim Burton, George Lucas, and Steven Spielburg as well. He worked at the Walt Disney Studios for a while, he said he helped out on every movie since The Little Mermaid (including Pocahantas, Iron Giant, and a few other animated films during the mid 90s). Now he works at Blue Sky studios which is in Westchester, NY and he's currently working on Ice Age III (he's worked on both Ice Age movies as well as Robots). My professor is the one responsible for the character of Scrat (the little funny squirrel guy) in the Ice Age movies. He's got his own page at imdb.com (search William Frake) which shows all the movies he's worked on.
He gets to go to the Oscars and the Emmys every year (he showed us the cards he needs to get in to the shows) and he gets all the movies that are Oscar nominated to watch shipped to his house so he can vote. Basically, he has the best job ever, and he said he loves being an animator because it never feels like he's working. I'm really excited about what I'll be able to achieve in this class because he will make sure we know how to put portfolios together to interview for jobs and how to present our work. It's so awesome to have someone in the business who has been extremely successful at having a career in animation and knows what it takes to get out there. He said that the studio he works for is always looking for new talent and after this class we should have a solid portfolio to take with us into the job market. Our first assignment is to come up with a character and write a little background description, as well as make some sketches of the character in different poses. I am so excited for this class, it's exactly what I want to do!!! I was getting so worked up over all the stories he was telling us - being an animator sounds so incredibly awesome!
I really lucked out with getting this guy as an instructor, he's going to help us develop characters and backgrounds to put them in and storylines and the whole nine yards - two girls that took this class before with a different instructor are taking it again because the head of the art department (my former illustration professor) recommended that they take it because it's going to be such a valuable learning experience.
Tomorrow I've got Illustration III (which I'm also excited for because I'll be working on a children's book and a comic book during this semester). I'm very very excited about my classes so far!
Yup, I am totally loving this semester already.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008
| |
10:27 pm - Just Realized...
|
...half of my classes are in the same room. 5 out of 6 are in the same building. I really will not see an entire side of campus if I don't go to the library - I have no reason to walk the same paths that I took hundreds (if not thousands) of times living in Freeman for my first two years. It's freaking me out a little bit.
I almost forgot that I have class tomorrow. And it's going to mess me up that school starts on a Wednesday. I won't have two of my classes until next Monday.
Meanwhile, I need to stop. Caring. About. Him. It's nice that we run in the same circles and that we're friends, but now I'm hearing stuff from other sources about him and the girl he likes (who I also know very well) and I just don't want to know. But what gets me is that he doesn't even seem that happy. He's got a lot going on in his life and a lot of stuff to worry about and I can't help him with any of that. He doesn't joke around nearly as much as he used to. It's like the spark has gone out. I know too much, so in the cliched words of the pussycat dolls - be careful what you wish for, 'cause you just might get it. I need to stop snooping and find a relationship elsewhere.
And shit I need to pay that stupid phone bill. I'll take care of it tomorrow I guess. Another 50 bucks down the drain for what I'm not exactly sure. And the first Verizon bill came to my house and apparently they charge us up the butt for a bunch of things we assumed were free. So that blows. But lesson learned - I won't use the stupid applications anymore - just listening to ringtones is a data charge which our plan doesn't cover (of course). So cell phone companies all suck. I do like my phone though - I'm surprised I haven't destroyed it yet. I do have some scratches on the screen already, which kind of sucks because it's a touch screen but whatev.
I just found someone's itunes collection that I respect. Nice.
Oh, and I think I've committed to doing a few things that will make this semester very interesting. More on that at a later date...
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| |
1:37 pm - One of my favorite things to do...
|
...is to check out other people's itunes collection. Living in the apartments means there are usually at least 2 or 3 other collections of music to check out. And the results are pretty hilarious most of the time. I will admit that I am a bit of a music snob because I have access to so much "underground" music at the radio station, and I find ways to get new music all the time. As a result, I have to snicker a little bit when someone's itunes collection is basically what they would play at the soft rock radio station near my house. Not that I don't respect all those Nickelback fans (actually, I can't stand Nickelback, so I don't respect their fans) - but there is so much music out there that people won't get exposure to from listening to the same radio station all the time. Although the XM stations have gone a long way to expand their playlists, so I like those stations though I don't have a chance to listen to them very often (no subscription).
Anyway, I try to spread the love - I throw some obscure tracks onto my workout playlists for my exercise classes, and I try to play interesting stuff on my radio show. I'll stick a few oddballs onto every mix cd I make as well. That's another thing - I am very fond of making mix cds, but very rarely do I listen to mix cds given to me. I don't know what that's about.
I gotta go help out at "Red Hawk Day" now - basically a happy fun day for the freshman which was created during my sophomore year. lol - I'm supposed to teach a half hour of my step aerobics class during the festivities because a lot of it is taking place in the rec center - everyone is teaching a little sample of their classes. Should be fun if we can find some freshman with sneakers to exercise for a little bit.
|
|
(1 comment | comment on this)
|
| Sunday, August 31st, 2008
| |
8:45 pm - Yay for Stuffs.
|
So everyone else on campus moved in today, and life is good. The fourth roommate who I thought was a total stranger turns out to be someone I most definitely had a class with (though I have no idea what it was because she's not an art major). She's very nice and has a lot of stuff to bring into the apartment and she's only going to be here for the semester. So I suppose I may be getting another roommate in the spring semester...I dunno how that works. Anyway, my life has been a lot of episode watching recently.
Living in these apartments is like playing house. I'm faking being grown up. It's great. Of course I got my parents to buy as much food for me as possible, but I also had to go out and get stuff like milk. I haven't really cooked for myself yet (seeing as I don't consider microwaving something as "cooking") but I might eventually. I have the teeny meal plan so I gots to be careful about how much I eat on campus and whatev. I figure hopefully not being able to eat buffet style all the time will help me lose some of the poundage I packed on during the summer.
Some highlights of the past few days:
- Found out I'll be teaching 3 classes a week this semester (moneys!) and one of them is kickboxing (awesome!)
- Ally and Clint came over last night and now I can say that I have seen every episode of the Office. It took me quite a long time to finally get through season 3, but we watched like 2 discs worth of episodes last night, so everything is all good.
- Had dinner at Blanton today (the food was ehh but the company was good). Just about all of Ally's roomies are back in Clove so it was nice to catch up with them and hang out for a while with people I consider to be my friends (though I have made quite a few friends in campus rec over the past week and will be invited to more parties as a result)
- About half an hour ago when I came back to my room some guys from across the hall invited me to a party in their room. Although I probably won't go because I have no idea who any of them are, I was pleased to warrant an invitation.
- I finished a book this morning called "I Was Told There'd be Cake". It contains some of the funniest little stories I have read in a while - I laughed out loud at some parts and had to read them to Maeve. I'd highly recommend reading it, and since it's all broken down into little essays, it's a very easy read.
So I'm happy with the way everything is right now (though Maeve keeps abandoning me to be with her boyfriend - which is excusable since they haven't seen each other in a month). Tomorrow I should be meeting up with C1C people and I'm just very excited for classes to start and everything to get underway. It just feels very strange that I've been up here for a week already. Now everyone is moved in and I am ready to roll.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Wednesday, August 27th, 2008
| |
10:54 pm - Surprising Goodwill for Most of Mankind
|
Wow, this year Campus Rec training doesn't completely suck. In fact, I'm actually growing to like people. Past the hey-I-know-you phase. We had to sit through some mad boring lectures on emergency situations/hepatitis b/blood born pathogens, but then we went to lunch and I ate with my Mullica Hill little ones and imparted more wisdom on them. The poor girl from Clearview is a transfer student so she had to move her stuff into the hotel today, but she's going to finish out the week in the room of the girl she's currently staying with. A situation that Ally is also finding herself in (kind of). She'll be staying in my apartment for the next day or two (good thing Maeve hasn't moved in yet) because the apartments she's living in are not through with their renovations. So good job Montclair for leaving all of this renovation work for the absolute last minute. It's not like every other resident is moving in this weekend. Yeah, so they should get on that.
We broke off into our little groups today (which means all us fitness instructors went on our merry way) and it was a fun time. Which is surprising because for the past year and a half I have pretty much come to loath the organization my employment falls under. But now I'm actually on pretty friendly terms with most of the other instructors, and life is good. I just need to get my ass in shape because I start teaching classes the second week of September. I'll be teaching 3 classes this semester, which is rad, even though they are on Friday - Sunday. Whatever, I rarely go home on the weekends, so it shouldn't be a huge deal. And if participation numbers aren't high enough, the classes could get dropped or moved around or whatnot. But my paychecks won't be quite as anemic as they were last semester (dear god, teaching only one class a week got me pennies...lol).
Anyway, I have nothing to complain about and I'm a little pissed off at someone at the moment but it has nothing to do with the recreation department and it may just be that I'm reading more into something than what exists. But I'll shove that at the back of my mind because really it's trivial and unimportant. I'm just not going to be super happy if someone is not telling me the entire truth...anyway, that's neither here nor there, and I'm pretty exhausted.
Tomorrow I get to look forward to a 3 hour recboard meeting, "T.E.A.M.S." Olympics (it an acronym for something but I can't remember exactly what - we're being split into groups and probably have to compete in dodgeball and other events. I just hope we don't have to run because I am very very slow. We also have a end of training fiesta, which really doesn't signify the end of training because we have mandatory things to do on Friday and Saturday. And then school is right on my doorstep. Which is going to freak me out because I've been up here for over half a week and I am not in school mode at all.
Guess that will have to change soon.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Tuesday, August 26th, 2008
| |
8:04 pm - Life Inside Count Basie.
|
I'm not actually living in the body of the late, great jazz musician, but I am living in a building named after the fellow. Pictures of him are in our lobby with the mailboxes. Kind of makes me feel like I'm living in a Disney All Star resort (if only we had giant maracas and football helmets in front of our buildings...)
I just finished eating one of the most satisfying bowls of Frosted Flakes in my life for the following reasons:
1 - I haven't been able to eat cereal for the past three days because I have no milk (I just got some)
2 - I have a giant ass happy cereal bowl with seahorses and fish on it in which to eat the Frosted Flakes
3 - The spoon with which I ate said Frosted Flakes came from Ikea. 'Nuff said.
Feeling very random at the moment. Frosted Flakes make me happy. Went to Target / Shop and Stop / Barnes & Noble with Juliana where I bought strawberry cereal bars / milk / a daily planner. A successful excursion when all is said and done. I can't wait until Ally and Clint move in (Thursday) and Maeve is moving in Saturday because she's going to steal my keys so she can get into the room and the building. She's supposed to move in Sunday, so I'm very happy that she will be here a whole day early. We have a lot of catching up to do. And Family Guy watching.
What else...CPR recert. this morning - kind of a joke - I wouldn't be able to do that stuff on anybody...Michelle drove me there and on the way back we stopped so she could go to the post office and Dan and Joe (both of whom I have totally crushed on, though they are both in relationships) they "kidnapped" me to take me to starbucks. It was awesomely spontaneous and completely set the awesome tone of my day. Dan took Michelle's keys to her in the post office (which made her think something happened to her car...haha) and he even bought my drink. Loves it. Anyway, Dan and Joe tried to outdo each other with ridiculous hotel stories. It was very very funny and a fantastic time. I never knew recboard training could be good. It is much better this year than last year (probs because I have had very little to do for the past two days...tomorrow and Wednesday will be packed with stuff).
Went back to the rec center for lunch, but before that we met the new people, and two girls were from Mullica Hill! I just about flipped out, because one girl, Amy something, went to Clearview. They became my instant little buddies because there are not very many people from "deep" south jersey. I also freaked out because a boy was from West Deptford as well as another lad, who was from Williamstown. It was awesome. I also met a girl who is a year younger than me who shares my birthday. Therefore I like these newbies a lot and I will perhaps enjoy going to recboard if I have cool little kiddies to sit near and talk to.
Later on I went to the art building to meet up with Prof Gordley and get signed up for my illustration III independent study thing, and it was fun to talk to him again. I just like getting back here to see the familiar faces. Good times. I'm going be signed up no problem, and the syllabus looks amazing. The semester is basically split up into a children's book, a visual journal thing, and a comic book. I am so happy because this is just what I want to do! So I am really really excited to work on projects for that class and hopefully I'll put like 200% effort into it so all the stuff comes out amazing and I can have some work to be proud of and show off to everyone.
This semester is going to be such good times!
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Friday, August 22nd, 2008
| |
4:07 pm - Scariest dream ever.
|
So last night I had one of those type of nightmares where your logical brain steps in and tries to wake yourself up so you can get out of the hole that is your imagination. (For some reason, I have a reoccurring dream where the grim reaper comes to kill all the My Little Ponies and he tears through the picture of the My Little Pony place just like the end of Looney Toones when Porky Pig comes out of the circles and it makes a sound like a needle falling off a record). Unfortunately after I semi-woke I was dropped back into hell again. I've heard that dreams are how you work out all the problems in your waking life, and I suppose that makes sense that I'm having nightmares because going back to school makes me anxious and stressed (even though I'm really happy and excited to go back). Anyway, let's see what I remember of the dream because I woke up a while ago. Bits are still resonating with me though, which is frightening.
The majority of this one took place on the street outside my house and the surrounding development. It also prominently featured my sister's car (which I've been driving for the past few days because she's up at school and I don't have an automobile of my own). Some kind of violent Mexican gang had moved into the neighborhood and were destroying a lot of property and stuff along those lines, but there was no type of police in my dream, so everything they did went unpunished and they could act on their own accord without reprimand. Also I was going to some kind of party in which I had to bring food or something and there were a bunch of us carpooling together, so there were a few cars and a lot of my friends were jammed in cars, and the car I was following out of my neighborhood had all the food in it. All I can remember about the car I was following is that it was an old and beat up, and for some reason the back seat was full of watermelons, and a lot of them were cut in half (width wise, not length wise which is how we sell them at the farm market - for some reason I distinctly remember this). Anyway, the rear left door of the van/vehicle was open and I tried to call out to them because the watermelons were flying out and smashing all over the road and it made it very difficult to drive. I don't remember there actually being a party, just that it took a lot of planning to get it all together.
Anyway, the next bit I remember is I am sitting in the driver's seat of my sister's car and I'm pretty sure someone I know is in the passenger seat, and a big Mexican thug has a knife to my neck sitting in the back seat with another Mexican thug and he's telling me to drive somewhere but I can't start the car because a piece of the key broke off in the ignition. I guess we drive somewhere somehow because the neighborhood looks normal when I leave.
The next time I see the street in front of my house the Mexican gang has completely vandalized everything so it looks like some kind of surreal circus/Cinco de Mayo celebration with skulls and really bright colors all over the place. The street is painted in blocks of color and designs and it kind of reminds me of some kind of video game how garish everything is. Driving down this street is terrifying because all of the houses (including my own) are vandalized and painted all different reds and yellows and have giant paper banners that look like the Mexican party decorations with the little cutouts in the tissue paper - I don't know, it's like TP-ing a house on Mischief night, just a thousandfold more extreme. And I'm pretty sure I see people bleeding from wounds on their lawns and I'm scared to death that they got people in my family, but I don't think I ever find out because they're just about to kill me as I woke up.
And that's about all I can recollect. I was completely terrified but I couldn't wake myself out of it.
Anyway, yesterday I played the fag hag with Josh and Ryan because we went to Six Flags. And it probably will be my last time ever going to that park (not because I had a particularly bad experience, but I'll explain myself). The point of the trip for me was to see the "soundtrack of your summer tour" which was occurring in the park amphitheater. I had gone last year and had a great time because I was yards away from Gym Class Heroes and it wasn't super crowded even though they were pretty popular. I figured it would be the same deal this year - and I was very, very wrong.
My first clue should have come when we got there around the time that the park opened (10:30 ish) and it took us forever just to park and we were passing all these scene kids with their printed baseball caps and day glo t shirts. I kept pointing them out because it was funny to see so many at an amusement park - it felt like Bamboozle (which is scene kid central) with a few more families thrown in. We paid the kids price to get in (because I totally refuse to pay full price for Six Flags ever). The first ride I always go on at the park is the Houdini ride, because it's right at the front and we like to make fun of the people that get scared by the illusion (it feels like you are going upside down while you're not because the room spins around while you rock back and forth). Anyway, initially I thought the ride was closed but later after examining the map I discovered that the ride is no longer operating ever. Bummer moment #1.
So we went on the runaway train-type ride that is right near Medusa and all the other terrifying roller coasters because I promised Josh and Ryan that I would at least go on that to try to face my fear of roller coasters a little bit, and even though I was shaking when I got of the ride, it really wasn't bad at all. Then they repeatedly tried to get me to go on to every other coaster in the park and I repeatedly told them no which led to a lot of waiting for them to get off coasters (which was fine because I like to people watch and there were a lot of scene kids to examine).
Anyway, bummer moment #2 occurred while we were eating our family feast thing we got from the Papa John kiosk thing (which got us a lot of food which was good because it was the only thing we ate all day). An announcement was made over the PA system that the concert was filled to capacity and they weren't letting anyone in. This was shortly before 5, when it was supposed to start, and stupid me didn't think it was going to fill up quite that quickly even though it's a small venue because of how it worked last year. (Apparently I undermined the draw of Good Charlotte/Boys Like Girls/Metro Station/the Maine - and it did rain hard enough and long enough the year before to deter a few scenesters from coming to the show (perhaps they were afraid their mascara would run)). Since that was the main reason I came to Six Flags (it is not one of my favorite amusement parks by far) I was understandably upset, but we digested our food and then I waited around as Ryan and Josh went on El Toro and later Kingda Ka (on which Josh had "one of the best moments of his life" - he was very very animated after leaving the ride, Ryan less so due to the shock that had kind of overwhelmed him).
I did manage to be thisclose to one of the bands (maybe Boys Like Girls - I couldn't rightly identify them) as I waited for the boys to get off El Toro. I was cued off by the flock of skinny girls that came in a mass following these four boys I wasn't paying any attention to since I figured they were just more scene kids. They went to the exit of El Toro, where I suppose they got straight on the ride, and on the way back I noticed who they were because they had the access passes attached to their tight pants and had a security guard escort, followed by the flock of girls who had gone by me minutes before. I'm pretty sure one of the boys smiled at me, but I could just be imagining that. Anyway, I was inches away because I was sitting on the ground and they walked by me. That was my most exciting moment of the day.
The main reason I will no longer go to Six Flags is this: if you are not under the age of 8 or a roller coaster junkie, there are only a handful of rides that will appeal to you. Slowly but surely, Six Flags has taken away all of the rides I have any interest of riding (starting with the crazy cow ride I adored when they built El Toro, followed by the swings, the music express, the bumper cars, that other spinny ride around that area, and the ill fated Houdini ride). There is no reason for me to pay 30 dollars (discounted) in order to wait around for other people to get off rides, or wait an hour to see a stupid 3D motion simulator ride (we did wait an hour to get on it and it was not worth the wait). So Six Flags, you win. It seems as if I have to either face my roller coaster fears (which I am not going to be giving up anytime soon) or I just won't find anything to do in your dirty, poorly planned out park (there are dead ends all over the place). P.S. The glow parade was very knock off Disney and very sad.
Next time I want to ride the rides, I guess I'll head over to Hershey or Dorney (which at least has the water park included, ya cheap bastards). And that's it. Sorry this entry was a million miles long.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Sunday, August 17th, 2008
| |
9:47 pm - Move In Day
|
So it was the big day for my little sister - she's finally in college (thank god). We drove up right into New York City with the car full up with her stuff and her, Bub, any myself in the backseat (a few minutes prior to leaving my dad wanted to know where I was going - since mom told him I had work today - she doesn't know my schedule ever and just assumes I work everyday which for the most part is a pretty good assumption). So I went, and it's good I did because my sister had a lot of stuff to put into her room. Thank god she lives on the 5th floor (the building has 17 floors!) but I am definitely not in the shape I was because going up those flights of stairs with her stuff was not good times. But it's all a warm-up for one week from now when I move back in (into my fabulous, spacious apartment on campus!).
Not to stereotype, but the kids that go to FIT (fashion institute of technology - my sister is majoring in fashion merchandising) they look like they belong there. I didn't see too many girls that weren't what I would consider "dressed up" (but I go to work in my plaid pajama shorts, so I have very low standards as to what "dressing up" actually is). There was a girl moving into my sister's building with flame orange and yellow hair. It was fabulous. As I later remarked to my mom, if I hadn't magically wound up with "scene kid" hair with the blond streaks in it, my hair would probably be a shade of magenta by now.
Anyway, the girls were all pretty skinny with their short shorts and flip flops (might as well be school uniform) and their Abercrombie looks, but I made sure to wear my cute flat black shoes and green t-shirt with the happy fast food creatures on it so I could have passed for an art major on the campus (since I am in fact an art major at my own university of choice). The RA on my sister's floor asked me if I was moving in. Good times. I was crazy jealous of all the room my sister has though! She's at the end of a hallway and she lives in a quad with 3 other girls but this is no ordinary dorm room. She's got this little hallway with a closet leading into a kitchen with a small table and a few chairs, and there are two bedrooms and a bathroom (with a little stall built around the toilet so they don't have to put up a shower curtain like we did.
The bedrooms had 2 beds apiece and there was actually room to move around in them. Both girls had a desk, a bed, and their own set of 5 drawers as well as half of a decent-sized closet. Their beds were also lifted fairly high up so they could store stuff under them. It was very different from my living quarters for my first two years at school, so I was pretty astounded by it. Her roommates are also very nice though I think the shy (possibly brainy) girl will be the odd one out. I helped one of them set up their printer since I'm just a little electronics whiz (more like I'm good at reading and following directions).
It was a long day, but it got me excited for school. And it was also fun to be the knowledgeable one about school and all that. On a completely different tangent, it's probably a good thing that my sister has a boyfriend already because I'm going to say at least 75% of the boys on her campus are gay. Which makes sense for a fashion school. There were some straight boys who I pinned as graphic design majors (they tend to look like skaters), otherwise, lots of well dressed gay boys. Oh, Ryan will have a field day if he comes to visit my sister with me. :)
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Thursday, August 14th, 2008
| |
10:42 pm - At the Drive-In
|
So yesterday night was really awesome - we went to the only drive-in movie theater in Jersey (probably one of the last in the United States) and saw a double feature of Step Brothers and Pineapple Express. It wasn't a bad price and even though the entrance looked really shady. It took us a minute to figure out how exactly we were supposed to listen to the movie (you tune into a radio frequency in your car now instead of those speakers that they show in the drive-ins of the 50s). We should have brought a radio with us because they had electrical outlets in these posts to plug a radio in so you didn't have to run it off your car battery, which we did because we didn't know about the external radio thing. Other than worrying the car wouldn't start when we wanted to leave, it was a good time. We stopped at Target beforehand and bought snacks (I got frosted animal crackers and teddy grahams trail mix - both amazing and remind me that I have the taste palate of a 5 year old).
Step Brothers was surprisingly funny. The last few Will Ferrell films have done nothing for me - the last one I really liked was Talladega Nights because I'm a redneck nascar fan, but I could have definitely lived without Blades of Glory and Semi-Pro (which I wasn't even interested in seeing all the way through). It was good that he was teamed up with John C. Reilly again, because I think they are really good at ad-libbing around each other. The premise of the movie is a little ridiculous, but you kind of have to treat it like a stupid movie to enjoy it. They cursed a shitload in that movie too - I guess to make up for the lack of nudity (there's only one little bit and it's kind of disgusting). I want to see the music video for "Boats'n'Hoes" again. The movie was basically made up of a bunch of random stuff happening that was funny - there wasn't really a reason for some of the stuff happening, but it didn't matter.
The intermission between the movies was cool because they played vintage drive-in movie images - the ones telling you to get refreshments and stuff, and every so often a scary looking clown came out on screen and notified us of how much time was left before the next movie started. Even though there were a crapload of movie trailers to go through (I need to see the movie Sex Drive (it includes a Fall Out Boy performance) and Nick and Nora's Infinite Playlist - Michael Cera is the leading role!) at least the previews were all for movies and not soda/cell phone/television program commercials like they are in the regular movie theater.
Pineapple Express was pretty good, but it was a lot more violent than I thought it would be. I guess where the "action" part of the "action-comedy" thing comes in. James Franco is really hot as a slummy drug dealer (I find him more attractive with long hair even though he was wearing pajamas during the duration of the movie). I think it was funny, but it would be a lot funnier if I was either smoking weed during the movie or had had experience smoking weed prior to the movie to understand what was going on a little bit better. Some parts were really funny, but then other parts grossed me out (I'm not big on blood or close up shots of wounds and there was a bit of it). Not bad, but I don't know if it's a movie I'll "have to have" once it comes out on DVD. I thought Step Brothers was funnier even if it was random. Pineapple Express just seemed to drag on and on - it didn't help that the movie didn't start until around 11 and we were at the drive in past 1 in the morning. Good times though, most definitely.
I got a new cell phone today (my family signed up for the Verizon family plan so we all got new phones which is fine with me because I haven't had a cool phone ever). Now the one I have has a touch screen and it slides up to display one of those Qwerty keyboards to make it easier for me to text people (which is all I do with the phone anyway). I still have to do something in order to get my old phone number transferred to it because Montclair is stupid and there's no account number for my Sprint phone for them to access, but I'll get it worked out soon so I can use it and be awesome.
I'm kind of sad that the summer is ending so quick (I only have 4 days of work left at the farm market!) but it's all good. Not really looking forward to the rec board training, but whatev. I'll deal. I made it through last year which should make this year even less to deal with. In unrelated news, I really love www.swaptree.com - it's awesome and everyone should use it if they have shit they don't want anymore. Today, in the trade of all trades, I am getting the Live in Phoenix Fall Out Boy cd/dvd in exchange for my copy of Cicero's "De Re Publica" textbook I needed for Latin class freshman year. Sweet deal!
Ok, I'm done with all this for now. I actually have the morning shift at the market for once tomorrow. Woo!
|
|
(1 comment | comment on this)
|
| Saturday, August 9th, 2008
| |
11:08 pm - Yay Olympics.
|
Today has pretty much been divided up into the time I have spent watching the Olympics and the time I've been at work. I think that pretty much sums up my day. But I have also discovered something that's slightly bewildering and slightly frightening - my tendency to relate everything to theme parks.
I've probably been to almost every major theme park on the east coast, and I really like them, but one of the reasons that I like music from other countries (Mexican music, polka, etc.) is that it reminds me of being in the country-themed places in theme parks . When I hear polka music, I think I'm in Busch Gardens / the Germany pavilion in Epcot. Mexican music makes me think I'm in Chi-Chi's / the Mexican pavilion at Epcot. Surf music / tunes from the Beach Boys make me think I'm at Blizzard Beach. In fact, I purposely put on some of this music at work so I can pretend I'm at a theme park. It's a little sick, I think, the way I can get my mind to think I'm in a different location by music alone. Kind of awesome, but a little pathetic that my view of nations outside the United States is based on country pavilions from amusement parks.
The larger problem is that I completely buy into these stereotypes of foreign countries and cultures - like wholeheartedly embrace them. Hence my love (bordering on obsession) with the "it's a small world" ride in Disney World. I seriously seriously seriously love that ride. If I had to go on one ride in the Magic Kingdom, I would pick that one. Other people think that ride is horrible and annoying, but I love every little bit of it, from the little singing dolls to the kaleidoscopic colors that paint all the scenery. I'm obsessed with collecting the pins with the little kids in the outfits of their country. I also seem to feel the need to perpetuate these images. I made an image in my printmaking class of a little Hawaiian girl that was based off images of the Hawaiian dolls from that ride. I make sculptures of gnomes / small people in cultural attire. I draw little dudes in outfits and always want to make a series of them to encompass a number of countries.
I'm a little sick in the head I think. I really need to finish the painting of the Mexican man eating a taco but I've been such a lard ass in the past week. No exercise or nothing. Not so good for my health.
But tomorrow is another day, and I don't have anything to do until nighttime so I think I may actually do something productive.
That is, if I don't spend the whole day lounging on the sofa watching the Olympics. And congrats to Michael Phelps for his first gold medal. I was really nervous watching that competition, because there was a point in the race where he was not first. It was scary.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Thursday, August 7th, 2008
| |
9:09 pm - Farm Market Follies
|
I have a feeling that if I ever do anything in the graphic novel / comic-type field, I will base most of it off stuff that happens to me at work, because people are weird and random. And pretty fantastic as well. It certainly makes every shift an adventure. Here's what happened to me today:
Let me preface this with a description of what I looked like today - my clothing was pretty much what I slept in last night (plaid pajama shorts that I frequently wear as regular shorts because I gained weight and don't fit into my regular shorts quite as well) and I changed into my green marching band shirt that I wear all the time (the one that I designed, thank you very much). I had no makeup on, and my hair was pretty blah - pushed back with a headband. I just want you to know that I was not dressed spiffy or looking particularly good, because today's events were a little baffling.
I'm used to people calling me honey / sweetie / darlin' / something akin to those words all the time at work. It's just how we talk at the farm market. Plus I am normally super friendly to the customers, because I like it when people are polite and nice to me when I'm a customer. It makes me happy to see other people happy. Anyway, once in a while I have people tell me that I'm pretty or that I have beautiful eyes or whatnot (which every-so-often happened to me working at Subway) and I awkwardly mumble a thank you because I am not super socially capable and don't know how to respond to compliments regarding my physical appearance (although I can't lie - the compliments make me happy).
So today, the one guy in the farm market asked me if I was the girl on which they modeled the logo for the farm market (which depicts a waist up drawing of a girl with kind of long wavy hair and a sun bonnet holding produce in a basket, drawn by Mrs. Sorbello). I don't really look anything like the drawing. I don't know where the guy made the connection, but that led to conversation #1 on how pretty I am by Debbie (my boss) and the customer.
Conversation #2 is the one that really threw me off though. I'm used to male customers saying something about the way I look, but this one came from a middle-aged blond-haired woman (who just moved here, which I learned from our subsequent conversation). Let me try to get the exact wording, because it was a rather awkward start to a conversation - "You're really beautiful, and I bet you don't know how beautiful you are" - something along those lines, while I'm trying to add up her bill. Debbie once again chimed in on how pretty I am and joked that I probably go home and look in the mirror and realize how pretty I am. Then the lady went on to say I looked very wholesome and it was appropriate that I was selling fruits and vegetables (which I guess is why that other customer thought I was the girl in the logo?). Somehow we got to discussing how I used to be much more shy and how this was a good job for me because I could interact with the customers and whatnot. It was very surreal. So anyway, I'd like to thank that woman, wherever she is, for boosting my self-esteem (although I believe I have a pretty healthy level of self esteem - I rarely get down on myself and I'm pretty accepting of how I look).
And later Debbie came up to me again and said "I don't know what you do to my dad [Mr. Sorbello], but he can't stop talking about how he is shocked that you don't have a boyfriend and the boys don't flock to you". Then she joked that it must be my plaid pajama pants bringing them all in. To which I responded: "Yes, my pajama pants bring all the boys to the yard". I totally said that.
Also a few other farm market notables:
-Today a photographer from the Gloucester County Times came to take pictures of the farm market and wound up taking a lot of pictures of Debbie holding peaches and the Sorbello grandchildren holding a variety of produce. Once again I forgot the media was hitting up the farm market and dressed like a slob, but it's ok because I was not in any of the photographs.
-A little boy who was probably 6 or 7 lit up when "Funkytown" played on my iPod playlist because he knew the song. He started shaking his hips to it and dancing, which was made even better because he was dressed only in swimming trunks with a bag of Cheetos in his hand (which he later attempted to weigh on the scale). He also enjoyed "Miracle" by Cascada, which followed "Funkytown" in the playlist.
Today was also a good day because:
- I finally walked over to the bank to deposit my money
- I found the new Less Than Jake and Foxboro Hot Tubs (a Green Day side project) CDs in the library, as well as a Shins CD which I already had on my computer
- For dinner my family drove down to the Sonic in Vineland and it was pretty delicious. I had a chicken wrap, and it was super crowded and really awesome to see all the girls in the uniforms skate out to the cars. As my father pointed out, this is doing nothing to stop obesity because the food gets delivered straight to the car and you even pull up to a trashcan to throw stuff out. There were some hot slacker looking boys that came to eat right when we were leaving.
- Mom made choco-chip banana muffins with all those super ripe bananas from the farm market. They are one of my favorite things ever.
- I have the day off tomorrow! Yay!
|
|
(1 comment | comment on this)
|
| Monday, August 4th, 2008
| |
5:30 pm - Redneck Weekend
|
Just got back from the Poconos & the 2nd nascar race of the season up there. It's pretty good times, but I wish one of my friends could come along one time. We will probably always have an extra ticket since I don't think Allison is ever attending a race again because she always has something better to do, and Bub really does not like nascar at all and would stop going if he could.
I love racing and didn't move from my spot behind pit wall the entire race. I didn't get any food (which didn't look all that appetizing anyway), I didn't use the bathroom, I didn't try to find shelter during the brief rain shower that paused the race for about 40 minutes. Yeah, I'm kind of ridiculous but it was a good time, especially since I was right behind the pit crew of my favorite driver (yeah Matt Kenseth!) and they had really nice, large tv screens so I could see what was going on during the rest of the race when the drivers were not on the front stretch. Matty managed an 11th place finish (which is good for him at Pocono) but it was a little upsetting since he was in the top 8 almost the entire day. Due to the rain and the cycles of pit stops, he had to take 2 while others only needed one, and therefore he finished outside the top 10. A few other drivers who had really strong cars all day were also affected by this cycle of pit stops and it was kind of sad to see them finish further back then they should have.
Carl Edwards won and did his backflip off the car. It was pretty awesome. I wish I could do a backflip period.
So that's about it. There were some really drunk obnoxious girls (who are probably only a few years older than me) that were messing around with the pit crew members of the stall next to Matt Kenseth's, and it just made me sad. I am very close to those girls in age, and nothing else. They don't really care about racing at all, they just come to get completely plastered and obnoxious. I will never be one of those girls. Thank god.
Oh, and Art School Confidential came today. I love that movie - I can totally relate to some of the scenes, and I would highly recommend it to anyone (especially those who have taken a few art classes).
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Thursday, July 31st, 2008
| |
10:47 pm - We Will Vacation, You Can Be My Parasol
|
I'm addicted to the punky bratty rock music of Be Your Own Pet. I'm a total sucker for chick vocals. There aren't enough bands that have girls in them, seriously. Not enough rock bands anyway. And I'm all for girls in rock music, but then all girl groups (like the Donnas) I don't like as much. It's weird. I like Paramore type bands better because there's a girl fronting the band but there are guys that make up the rest of the band. Which probably leads to interesting relationship problems. It's good if there is a brother-sister vibe going on, but if you don't watch out you get the No Doubt dynamic, where Gwen went out with the bassist (Tony I believe is his name) but then you have a song like "Don't Speak" after the break up which I absolutely love even though it makes me think of middle school and the one I couldn't have and gets me all muddled up inside. So many songs are tied into so many memories. But that's the way it should be.
"Montauk" by Bayside...don't even get me started. The mere mention of the town Montauk gets me going, even though I've never actually been there. It's where they go in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and it gets a mention in a whole bunch of other media forms. I think I need to do a beach day there. Just sit and listen to the song on repeat. Though god knows I listened to the song on repeat for an hour straight on the train ride up to NYC one time during the fall semester last year.
Anyway, learned an interesting tidbit of information at work today. Apparently Mr. Sorbello (Julianne's grandpa) repeatedly tries to set Kyle (Julianne's cousin and a fellow co-worker) up with me. It makes me laugh, especially because Kyle is going out with Angela (another co-worker) and they are around each other ALL the time. Like sun-up to sun-down. I don't think I could ever tolerate a person for that length of time even if they were my favoritest person in the universe.
So, according to Julie (Kyle's mom & Debbie's sister - I don't know why I'm making all these distinctions because no one is going to understand the dynamics of all this) Mr. Sorbello said something along the lines of this to Kyle - finish shucking the corn and then take Erika to the movies. I can't explain how much this makes me laugh because Julianne's grandpop and I don't say very much to each other - when it's just me and him in the stand he just sits in the back while I sit behind the counter and read, but it makes me happy that he likes me so much. Especially since I have no grandfathers of my own. I'm like a surrogate member of that family because I wind up listening to all the drama from all of the Sorbello girls.
I love my job just because of stuff like this. Oh, and Julianne's grandpop (it seems weird to refer to him as Mr. Sorbello for some odd reason, same goes for her grandmom - they are simply Julianne's grandmom and grandpop to me) well he approved of me because I am "stable", which I guess would be a contrast to Angela because she can get kind of loud and emotional about stuff. Kyle's cute, but I'm not going to encroach on that whole situation. I'm not a homewrecker and Angela would probably rip me to shreds with her manicured nails. Heh.
It just makes you think sometimes, that's all.
current music: Be Your Own Pet
|
|
(1 comment | comment on this)
|
| Tuesday, July 29th, 2008
| |
8:04 pm - Boo-ring.
|
Woke up early this morning for the sole purpose of going to Cowtown, and all I bought was a milkshake from the Mr. Softee truck. It was tasty though. And Ryan came along so that was fun because he hadn't been to Cowtown before. It is quite an eye-opening experiece. Just for the people watching. I wish I had my sketchbook with me.
The highlight was listening to these 3 old women sitting on the porch of a restaurant hitting on the old men that passed by. Ryan and I wanted to befriend them, but I was scared by their self confidence.
Set up Allison's laptop today and she took some of my sweet jams from my external hard drive to help fill up that ipod touch. It is a pretty cool thing to mess around with, but I prefer my ipod video because I'm used to the way it navigates and I like the little scroll wheel thing.
Finished a fantastic book today called The Cheese Monkeys - it's about a boy who goes to a state university to study art and has a crazy graphic design professor. There were many connections to my own life doing the same thing, so I liked it. And maybe, just maybe, I will learn to appreciate the professor I hated because maybe he did actually teach me something. Or maybe not.
Anyway, I have the sequel to it as well, so I'm gonna blow through that in no time. I love reading. So much. I think I'll get a head start on that book before I Survived A Japanese Game Show comes on.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Monday, July 28th, 2008
| |
9:19 pm - I miss my laptop :(
|
Finally took the laptop in to the apple store in Delaware to get it fixed today - the touchpad's only been dented for, hmm, about 3 months now?
Anyway, even though I have the protection plan, it seems as though they do not cover "accidents", which blows, because I couldn't think of a non-accidental way to explain the giant dent in my touchpad. That stuff doesn't happen on its own unfortunately. But the guy there was really nice and didn't charge me the labor fees (which were about 85 bucks) but I'm still going to have to pay about $140 to get the touchpad fixed and I think they're going to put a new inside cover on as well because there is a minor crack in that which occured some time ago when a book dropped on it while it was closed.
It's good I haven't spend much of my earnings this summer, huh?
The lesson learned here is to not load up my shelves of my desk with gigantic, heavy art books and materials that don't stay up on their own volition and cause a domino effect which pushes the metal picture frame straight onto the touchpad. But it could have been a lot worse - the techie guy said if I had cracked my screen, it would have been in the area of $700 to get it fixed. And that would have made me a very unhappy and poor girl.
It's going to be weird without my laptop around for the next few days. Have to use the dinosaur desktop PC here.
Oh, and the second reason for visiting the apple store was so my sister could get her own laptop/printer dealy. And just like the deal I had which involved me getting my ipod (which I cannot live without), my sister got an ipod touch. I hadn't even heard of these things - they look just like the iphone without the phone call capabilities. My sister can go on the internet, look at pictures, listen to music, GPS thingy built in, watch videos - all that crap. They are fairly expensive, but she is going to pay my mom the difference for the upgraded model she selected (16 GB).
Meanwhile, I am quite happy with my 30 GB video ipod, which doesn't seem to exist anywhere in apple land because it is a whole 2 years old. Which makes me sad. I just need my ipod to play music, not do everything I need in life. Even though music makes up a large majority of my life. I wonder if my sister has leopard built into her compy. I wonder if she's got the disc so it can be installed on more than one laptop...
This whole deal may work out in my favor!
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Sunday, July 27th, 2008
| |
10:13 pm - the internet is good for impulse shopping
|
So I just bought a sewing machine. But this wasn't as random as it sounds. I've got some preliminary stuff done in order to make a quilt out of my old t-shirts, and the little piece of crap seen on tv thing I had (to which I lost the pedal) is pretty much out of commission. I tried in vain to get it to sew some stuff at Becky's house earlier this week, and it was no good. So I just bought a real one. Yay!
It shows that I've been watching waaaay too much Project Runway, because I bought a refurbished sewing machine that is a Project Runway model. So easily influenced by my favorite reality show. I'm interested in the next reality competition show slated for Bravo - apparently Sarah Jessica Parker is hosting this show where artists will compete in different mediums and stuff. I'm intrigued, but I don't know if art works the same way these other disciplines do. It kind of takes a while to make artwork (not that it doesn't take a long time to make an outfit or design a room or anything, but there's a lot of creative brainstorming involved and yeah, the physical part of making art can take some time).
I've been reading some books I found in the library about marketing oneself as an artist, and I should have read them at the beginning of the summer because they've got my creative mojo going again. I started a painting (I don't like painting very much), I've though of some possible ways to make money making greeting cards (which I could reproduce with my printmaking skills) and sell them at the Clearview craft show, or I could ink images of historic buildings around town (I did some large drawings of my house with micron pens and they turned out super awesome - I have yet to put them on my deviant art because I am a total slacker). I think tomorrow if the weather is nice I might go around town and take some pictures of buildings - some can look really cool if you take the shots at dynamic angles.
I just need to get to work on some stuff that has some cohesion to it - the work I do is so scattered and all over the place, I just want a series of something. The only real series of anything I have is the 3 large drawings of my house and some of my photography. I really like drawing architectural stuff in my scribbly style of doing things, because I'm an organized person that loves structure. It makes sense I think.
Anyway, hopefully this creative kick will last me through school, because I think I'm going to take some reference photos in the poconos when I'm up there for the race this weekend. I need some good woodland pictures, and I think it would be cool to collage photos of the wilderness with my gnome stuff. I also like the houses up there, lots of interesting architecture there as well. And maybe I'll draw some abandoned barn type places. I love those as well.
We'll see what happens.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Friday, July 25th, 2008
| |
5:46 pm - Just Another Day
|
Nothing really to report on - just felt like typing stuff.
Last night I had a dream that I found a really cool dress for really cheap at some type of outlet store and it made me very happy. A lot of stuff in my dream store had sequins on it. This probably has something to do with the fact that right before drifting off to sleep I was thinking about getting new leggings and putting together some cool outfits to wear when I'm back at school. Outfits that include my snakeskin knee high boots that I barely ever wear because they have a little heel at the back and when I wear any shoe with anything resembling a heel I walk like I'm severely intoxicated. Or a retarded dinosaur. Pick your favorite.
Also in my dream I was disappointed because I could not find a cool coat like the one Christina Ricci wears in Penelope. It's a purple coat that is almost like a long peacoat / military style jacket, and it has orange piping and all different buttons down the front. I love it - it's very artsy. If I wanted to dress up and wear heels everyday and had money to buy lots of fabulous clothing, I would dress just like her character in that movie (which was really cute - having James McAvoy in the leading man role certainly didn't hurt things). I definitely need a new winter coat because my poor peacoat is worn to pieces. I've already had to sew the buttons back on it several times and there's a lot of pilling on it. I would totally buy a long purple jacket if I could find one.
So I guess I want to go shopping. I'm probably not going to buy any jeans because I will lose weight once I go back to school and get back into my everyday workout routine & not eating shitloads of junk food. I think it would be a challenge for anyone to live in my house and not gain weight because of the foods we stock up on. We have soda out the butt, we almost always have some form of ice cream, usually there are cookies and chips and all that stuff. This is a deadly in combination with my lack of discipline / self-control. But whatever. I'll just wear skirts until the weight goes back down. So I should probably buy more of them.
I've had the creative itch recently, and I would get to work on my t-shirt quilt but I don't have the cool rolly cutter thing that belongs to Becky - I think she's going to drop it off before she goes on vacation for a week. Then I can try to get all my squares put together and assemble this thing before I go back to school. I really want a new bedspread and this is what I'm doing in order to have one. I think I may cut down the size of all of my t-shirt squares though, because the projected size is gigantic and I don't think I need something that big. Smaller stuff means less work too (hopefully).
Anyway, since I can't get to work on my quilt, I was thinking about knitting something. Even though it's 80-something degrees outside. I think there's a thing in my book for a headscarf type thing, which I could definitely use. I'm rather fond of wearing bandannas nowadays and I could use more of the same.
Time to find my knitting stuff!
|
|
(comment on this)
|
| Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008
| |
11:33 pm - I'm A Terrible Person Who is Going to Hell (Apparently)
|
So, I did totally flake on somebody yesterday, but hear me out on this one.
I had work for 5 hours on the last day of the heat wave, it was something like my 10th consecutive day of working, and that stuff wears a girl out! I got home and took a shower in anticipation of doing something with Stu (we planned on seeing the Dark Knight although I think I am the only person in the universe that really doesn't give a rat's ass about whether I see this movie or not - I am not a big movie person at all). Instead of going out I passed out - for about 3 hours. It was a total dick thing to do, but I was exhausted and may have fallen asleep in the movie theater, and that would have been a total buzzkill. Anyway, I texted him my sincerest apologies, and I think we may be hanging out later in the week.
In other news, my super spiritual sister tried to have a conversation about my "faith" with me today. It turned ugly pretty damn quickly when I tried to explain that I really don't see the difference between bible stories and any other mythology filled with gods and goddesses. In my opinion, they're just stories. Then my sister goes off on this rant that the bible has never been proven wrong and Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John didn't know each other but they all knew the same stories about Jesus, to which I replied that many people know the same stories about mythology without knowing each other - it's not really that impressive. Then she went on about the differences between the Old and New Testament and how I never really made an attempt to really read the bible (I did make a valiant effort for about a week years ago and gave up after kind of making it through the Adam and Eve debacle).
This lead to an interrogation of my believes (or complete lack thereof) and my sister demanding to know what purpose I felt I had in life. I told her I was completely content living my life the way it was and she starts rambling on about the true happiness I won't find because I'm unwilling to believe in God. I went to Catholic church faithfully until my confirmation and then kind of dropped off of the whole bandwagon. I never really saw the appeal. I liked the stories and sometimes I liked the songs, but I didn't like the sermons. I have very high moral standards for myself and others (which has made it difficult at times to get close to certain people) but that's all on me. I was just raised that way and it has very little to do with the idea of some ethereal authority figure keeping tabs on how much community service I perform.
My sister was getting frustrated with my disinterest in any sort of faith in anything and asked if I thought I was going to heaven when I died. To which I replied I didn't know if any sort of afterlife exists, we might just end up piled in dirt or maybe reincarnated as something else. I sort of like the idea of reincarnation, I'm kind of a hippie earth child sometimes. My sister freaked out on me for even mentioning the idea of reincarnation and talked about how Christian faith is the only faith following the one true god and all other religions are following false gods. Then I wanted to know about what happened to all those pagans and druids that were around before Jesus and didn't know about this one God - my sister said that the religions died out because they were following false gods. I don't think it's really fair to fault them for living before the arrival of Christ. Just bad timing.
And this holier-than-thou kick my sister has been on since going to her Christian faith (*cough* cult *cough*) meetings is really not appealing to me at all. She isn't any nicer to me than she was before, and she still flips out on my parents, and I really don't see any kind of "Christian love" radiating from her at all. I'm still the one that respects mom and dad a lot more and behaves in a "Christian" manner. Other than the faith thing. And this thing my sister is involved in is supposed to be non-denominational, but she is very close-minded towards the idea of any religion not centered around her one true god. She says it's not a religion because religions have rules and her explanation didn't make any sense to me but it was a little rough to hear my sister tell me I could look forward to an eternity in hell because I didn't believe in God and focus my life around my faith.
I don't really like religion because it divides people and creates conflict everywhere when people don't share the same beliefs. So much evil has been done in the name of one god or another, it's just hard to believe any beneficent god-like figure would allow that kind of stuff to go on. There's the free will aspect of everything, but it's kind of impossible to tell what is fate/gods will and what is just chance. I don't really like the idea of being fated to do anything - people should be able to change any path they're on by their words and actions. Good, moral people should not be subjected to hell just because they don't believe in anything. Scare tactics should not be used to coerce people into believing something they wouldn't care about otherwise. And since no one knows what the afterlife is like (if there is one) I don't know if people should spent so much time fretting about what will go on after they die. There's enough bad stuff going down in the present to worry about what happens after I die.
But maybe I'll be reincarnated as a butterfly. I would like that.
Sorry for being so philosophical or whatever, but my sister's zealous behavior kind of struck a nerve.
|
|
(3 comments | comment on this)
|
| Tuesday, July 8th, 2008
| |
10:47 pm - I Have "Ecclectic" Musical Tastes.
|
...Yay for borrowing CDs from the library. It's where I can get my fill of Latin music! I seriously love music from Mexico and all those mariachi bands and everything. They are super awesome. Even if I don't understand a word they say.
I was pissy at work today (customers were annoying me and the heat made me grumpy), but life was made better when I came home and finished another book (I started it yesterday). One girl who is also an art major (animation stuff too!) and her mom came into the stand this afternoon and it was cool to talk to someone about that stuff. She was really nice and asked me how I was doing before I even said anything. Apparently there is a very very slim field for 2D animation at the moment (considering how hot CGI is currently) and one of her friends who just graduated is back at school learning how to do the computer stuff. So I should pay attention to those computer animation classes I'll be taking a little ways down the line.
I seriously love this Mexican music. I'm gonna play some of it on my radio show, for real. And people are going to be really confused. And blown away by its awesomeness.
Oh, and Julianne you need to give me the link to that blog with the poorly photoshopped stuff.
|
|
(1 comment | comment on this)
|
| Sunday, July 6th, 2008
| |
11:00 pm
|
What a gloomy day.
At least it was a day off. Which means I did almost absolutely nothing!
I'm just happy that I have managed to do some form of exercise every day since July started, which doesn't sound like much, but seeing as how I am completely unmotivated to do anything but read during the summer, it's a good thing. If I can exercise everyday this month I might get myself something special. Since I rarely go anywhere or do anything other than work and read.
What a life.
|
|
(comment on this)
|
|
|
|
|