... while we walk around this town like we own the streets

Ah.

The past few days, weeks, have been a blur, an inexplicable ballet of deadlines, events, and conflicts which I somehow managed to balance like Maya Plisetskaya dancing Le Cygne. The past week has been tests, more tests, presentations, and an excessive amount of kids at work. Next week is the last week of school before finals. I find it somewhat hard to believe that the semester is (almost) over, the year is coming to an end, I'm eighteen, and still remember that oh, I have two papers due on Tuesday.

What I like, though, are nights like these. Of course nothing is accomplished and I've not had enough sleep in the past week and I'm ridiculously tired at this point, but somehow it's worthwhile. People, Perk, park, pictures, perfect.

I haven't listened to this song in... three years at least? I found it on my iPod yesterday ♥

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I have realised that I like getting up early.

Now, I hate it when I have to do it. I hate getting up even at 9 for school and then having to rush to get dressed, and head straight to class. But this morning I got up at 7, went to vote, and then finished my English paper at school and I still have time to spare before French class starts. But I like the extra time that I have getting up earlier than I need to. My problem is just motivation -- if I don't have to be to class until 10:30 and the alarm goes off at 7 or 8, my logic at that time of the morning is simply to continue sleeping, of course! I don't have the reasoning abilities in that half-asleep state to realise that I'd be happier if I got up before the last minute .

Windows, Mac, Linux - What's your preference and why?
Submitted by ramblingsbymark.

Linux wins for being open source and being secure. It's geeky, and I like that in my computers. I remember many years ago, when I first compiled programs in terminal... it's a much nicer feeling than just dragging an icon into the Applications folder of Finder.

But Mac wins for being practical and pretty. Macs are decently secure (far more secure than Windows will ever be), and I can do what I want quickly. It's nice to be able to wirelessly connect without setting anything up or having to even click a button when I switch from home to school to the café. My camera, iPod, tablet, bluetooth connection for my phone, etc... they just work. There are generally alternative workarounds for most of these things in Linux, but Mac's intuitive approach is much appreciated when I have limited time.

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Show us something shiny.
Submitted by princesskasren.

Photo 158

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Most people attach some sort of meaningless significance to turning 18. I say meaningless because I don't really find the celebrations of this anniversary to be inherently significant themselves. People say it's about independence, but I can't recall a single person who was reliant upon their parents and then was suddenly tossed out the door on their birthday. Everyone mentions that you can smoke, or drink (in some places), or do any other number of things that were previously illegal. But I don't really find that significant either... it's not like you're enabled to do those things on your 18th birthday, it just means that you won't get in trouble any more if you get caught.

I'm an avid reader of I Will Teach You To Be Rich, and one of the things Ramit stresses is the importance of starting things now. I have a savings account, stocks, and some CDs, but most of those accounts were started nearly a decade ago and I didn't really understand them. Today I finally motivated myself to browse around some investment firms' websites, and I immediately noticed that many retirement funds are designated for people who are 18-23 years old. And it hit me: that's how old I am.

A retirement fund is hardly the typical significance that people attach to turning 18. I mean, I'm a university student making $7 an hour. But now I feel like maybe I should stop putting $100-200 a month into a Hello Kitty lunchbox for an $800 camera and instead put it in a Roth IRA. Or even in just a 4.4% savings account, that $800 would be worth almost $5800 in 45 years. And then if I somehow were to totally fail at life and investing for the next 45 years, that alone is over 5 years' worth of the name-brand macaroni and cheese which I'd have to live on ;p

Oh, what a perplexing Saturday afternoon.

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I'm really lazy. Plenty of things have happened, but I don't have time to write enough any more. I did, however, start a project of taking a picture every single day for a year to illustrate the day. They're not supposed to be super-artistic or even "good photography"... it's just a visual journal. Despite my constant camera snapping, it's actually rather difficult to find something which illustrates every single boring monotonous day of school and work.

So, here are the past sixteen days.

12.10.2006

13.10.2006

14.10.2006

15.10.2006

16.10.2006

17.10.2006

18.10.2006

19.10.2006

20.10.2006

21.10.2006

22.10.2006

23.10.2006

24.10.2006

25.10.2006

26.10.2006

27.10.2006

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Friday:
harmonious. turbulent. rhythmic. uncertain. illuminated. vibrating. delicious. unfamiliar. tiring.

Saturday:
sleepy. complex. mingling. hasty. bizarre. dreamy. debatable. late. amusing. conversational.

Real entry later, complete with pictures and amusing anecdotes containing 100% more hat-stealing, dance-forcing drunken terrorist ninja doctor and buy-one-get-one-free socks. But for now, sleep, as I have work at 8:45 tomorrow (kdafhjashdfkdhfk naturally, the two days I have off of school, I have work early). The days and weeks are going faster now... it's difficult to imagine that the semester is halfway through. 

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(This will probably come back to bite me in some form, so I'm going to try to keep it vague.)

There are two people whom I've known for a while now. If you know me personally, you've probably heard me mention some of the things they've said. I'm not going to be explicit, but yeah... fundamentalist Christian hate speech covers it well. Blah blah heathens blah they're all going to hell blah blah. Their supposed moral standards are ridiculously high -- children should blindly obey their parents, profanity is completely unacceptable, the lack of mandatory prayer in schools causes school shootings, etc.

These two women also happen to live together.

Now, I've personally avoided jumping to conclusions. It is slightly odd for two grown women who've both been married and divorced to be roommates, but there are certainly stranger living situations.

However, I was talking to someone else today, and apparently some of our clients have left because they walked in on these two women. Together. Like that. In front of kids.

Don't get me wrong, I'm 100% in favour of gay marriage, gay rights, etc. with no exceptions whatsoever. And I'd be just as confused if it'd been a guy and a girl. How can anyone have such high "moral standards" and then display such behaviour not only at their workplace, but also in front of children?

I know that it's been said 143970749 times before, but I think that this just shows once again that people who flaunt their supposed morals or shove them upon others mercilessly are only doing it to cover something up. It's an instant red flag. I know plenty of people who probably have the same moral standards as these women -- very religious, very conservative, whatever... I've grown up all around very devout people. But they don't spend all day talking about it in a holier-than-thou fashion, and I've yet to see them do anything even remotely similar to this.

So yeah, from now on, anyone who fits the aforementioned criteria of flaunting or shoving morals can consider themselves on my list of people to be suspicious of.

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... is wicked eventful.

October:
13: some local show?
16-17: fall break from school (which just means I work twice as much)
17: pumpkin patch field trip with the kids
20-22: Tallgrass Film Festival
26: promotional posters advertising St-Chappelle and l'Orangerie due
30: eighteenth birthday
31: Halloween (I'm in class; but my brother's a dinosaur)

November:
2: jour d'immersion (this thing we do for local high school French students)
3-5?: perhaps go somewhere (see: 30 October)
7: election day
10: Margaret Cho

And then it's Thanksgiving and finals and Christmas and the semester and year are over!

industrial gardens

Yesterday I was walking on this slightly old, forgotten sidewalk at school and a worker looked at me a bit oddly. I half expected him to bust out with "This hasn't been a public sidewalk since 1974!" You see, when I was out exploring with friends on Saturday, a railroad security officer came up to us and informed us that we were trespassing on private property. Nevermind the fact that the road was clearly marked on a city map as public, because apparently this man knew better. I mean, I don't mind being told to leave if I am trespassing, but he was just blatantly lying.

Aside from that... today I was offered five bibles for free. Oh my god, those people were everywhere. And when I walked into math class, one of the desks had a pile of them on it as well. I don't even mind if you're proselytizing at my public university, but I don't need 375079325 of your books.

Also today, I walked by this girl who was (very loudly) listening to "Chain Hang Low" on her mp3 player. I did not realise people actually listened to that song... it's one of those songs that you play with your friends and lolololol at, perhaps whilst singing and dancing along stupidly.

Capture_1

That makes me excited :D I'm going to Target to buy this adorable (and warm!) hat now, bye!

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And sometimes when you're on
You're really fucking on
And your friends they sing along
And they love you
But the lows are so extreme
That the good seems fucking cheap
And it teases you for weeks in its absence

(Rilo Kiley - A Better Son/Daughter)

I think for some weeks (or maybe months) now, I've identified well with this portion of this song (full lyrics / listen). This weekend, though, perhaps it's finally changed.

I didn't do anything spectacular. I didn't go see the Rolling Stones (thank god), or even KMFDM in Kansas City, or go to the renaissance faire. In fact, I didn't do a single one of the Eagle's eight "must do" events for the weekend (which really, for the most part, were horrendously snooze-inducing).

But I did go to Final Friday, the monthly indie art event here. I caught up with an old friend, and we had coffee and eh... attempted to explore the Secret North New York Industrial Complex on "the bad side of town" at night. I slept until past four in the afternoon, which I haven't done in months now. I lied in bed watching movies until past two in the morning with someone whom I dearly love. I went to a five year old's birthday party. I made chai. I spent a lot of time doing nothing productive or fit to discuss and it was fabulous.

Of course, there were some eh... moments. My sinuses went bizarre on Saturday, prompting the sleeping until past four, and I horribly overreacted at aforementioned person whom I actually dearly love for waking me up repeatedly. I went to the doctor's office to pay a bill, only to find out that they weren't open (despite what their website said) and the bill is now past due. I had to get up ridiculously early on a Sunday to go shopping for the birthday girl. I procrastinated the entire weekend on homework and I'll be regretting it tomorrow. I'm ridiculously broke.

But I think finally, despite the lows, the good is overshadowing the bad again. It's 2:00 and I should be asleep. I have to wake up early to do homework before school, and to run to the doctor's again. But I don't even care that I'm going to be tired. There's too much good to feel to worry about sleeping.

subway sarin gas

I used to feel like this all the time. We'd sit in the park until 3 in the morning (provided the police didn't catch us after the park "closed" at midnight) talking for hours on end about nothing and everything, despite the prospect of waking up in a few hours for school, and not caring at all... I missed that feeling.

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Graffiti, please

IMG_5248

IMG_5254

IMG_5255

More pictures of the warehouse here.

I don't care to make a proper entry, but I will include a list of things which are currently on notice:

1. The Rolling Stones
2. The university for allowing the Rolling Stones to mess everything up for an entire week
3. Pickup trucks
4. The option to mark voicemail messages as "urgent"
5. These tacky multicoloured flats I have which I only like because they're tacky
6. The blister I got on Saturday from aforementioned flats which STILL has not started to heal properly (partially because one time the bandaid fused with my skin and I had to rip it off again and oh my god ow)

At least now I have these Hello Kitty bandaids.

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