I'm tired. I always feel like writing when I'm tired, then I wake up five hours later with the lights still on and ink smeared on my pillow.

I had a rush of happiness a few days ago and I'm trying to recapture that feeling. I read somewhere that good things happen to people who write down all the good things that happen to them. I would like to start doing that, but whenever I begin a writing endeavor, I feel like I have to buy a new journal, and I don't have enough money or room for a new journal right now. So I'll put some things here, for now. I've felt particularly lucky these past few weeks. Finding Tina at Animal Control has brought me the most happiness. Then the little things: acing school, my warm bed on cold mornings, finally finishing my departmental application for graduate school. Drawing check marks inside of my planner. Andy, the only person that understands and can relate to the things that go on inside my head and my heart. Sometimes I devote so much of myself to caring about him that I forget to notice how he cares for me. Then I open my eyes and soak it in and it feels nice, in a selfish way, I know.

I've learned the key to happiness:
Take an anti-depressant and after a month of numbness, get off of it without weaning. I'm not kidding. You have no idea how great feelings of all kinds are until you lose all of them completely. Like having a beer after not drinking for months.

future's so bright?

This doesn't count as speaking aloud, right? Because my life is seemingly coming together all of the sudden and I really don't want to jinx it. As I finish my applications to PSU, picking up transcripts and letters of recommendation and getting ready to send everything in, I feel as though everything I've been brainstorming and fantasizing about over the past few months is finally materializing into something tangible.
I don't like theoretical plans and fantasies, probably because I'm too cynical (I prefer to call it "realistic"). I don't make resolutions that I know I'm not capable of going through with. I don't like imagining the future because it's almost guaranteed to not pan out the way I would like it to. The solid, the tangible, is what I strive for. And I may be approaching it.
I guess it's nice to be wrapping up my final year of college feeling like it wasn't wasted time or a torturous experience. When I started, I was anything but thrilled with the demographic of the U of A campus, and I let that negatively affect my experience as a whole. And I still resent the utter devaluation of the humanities at the school. But as I look at my experience in the English department as a whole, I'm nothing but happy with all I've learned and accomplished. I love learning, and I love what I'm doing, and that feels good. I also love what I want to do in the immediate future, but I'm not going to lie to myself and say that isn't likely to change.

and so it goes.
I am applying for graduate school. I mean, I am, quite literally, applying for one graduate program. I better get in, right?! Either way, it seems my days in Tucson are numbered, and right now I feel more than ready to leave. I can feel myself die inside every day that I spend at Xoom Juice, and on campus, or drinking on 4th. And every status update and uploaded picture I see. I'm tired of people, I'm tired of all kinds of people. I'm tired of people who can't take care of themselves, people who lack consciences, people who can't keep the simplest of promises, people who are ignorant of the enigma that is English grammar. I'm tired of hearing other people's perceptions of themselves, because they always seem to be the opposite. Those who claim to be cynical smile a lot more than most. People who label themselves "fun-loving" tend to be the absolute worst company. We should all resolve to not label ourselves, negatively or positively, because, trust me, you aren't whatever it is you think you are.

home again, unfortunately

hello, i've returned from my (too) short but (too) sweet rendezvous to austin. it was a dream, minus the humid heat and the stomach bug i inconveniently acquired. lots of food, beer, music . . . my three favorite things. naturally, i fell head over heels in love with the city. i couldn't convey its perfection if i tried, so . . . i won't. in short, it was the greatest break from tucson/summer/work i could ask for, but it's also beautiful to come home to a southwest sunset, complete with lightening and thunder in the distance.

i didn't take many pictures on the trip, and the ones i did have yet to be developed, but i just snapped some of what i bought while in austin. here's my loot:



hello kitty pens from toy joy, buddhist calendar for my mom, vintage fantasy postcard and mexican photograph from tesoros, antique letter cards from uncommon objects, rooster tin from the turquoise door, wildflower seeds from zilker botanical garden, stickers from toy joy, and an antique tin from uncommon objects.



better picture of the antique cards. m for miranda and d for donna, my mom.



motafuckin' HOBIE on my bed with my amazing antique tin. it will hold either sewing scraps or drug paraphernalia . . . i can't decide.



better picture of the French fantasy postcard dated 1910, which i cannot stop looking at. it doesn't even make sense.

midnight to noon, i'm a desert child

I knew I was neglecting something. A decent-sized post about the state of my life is on its way. But for now, really quickly, here's a steam of consciousness list:

riding to work every day, cutting all animal products out of my life, saving money, spending money (internet shopping, you will be the death of me), daydreaming about big cities, figuring out life after graduation, itching for my filofax to arrive in the mail, weaning off my meds, smelling like a hobo everyday

o man

I'm tipsy and still covered in mint-green paint. Which looks amazing in my new room. Which matches my chipped nail-polish. I'm sorta loving life right now. I would entirely love it if I wasn't stressing about successfully moving all of my and Andy's things out of here in two days AS WELL AS cleaning this house ceiling to floor. AND transporting Tina. Godammit. Sometimes I make things impossibly difficult. 

finally!

Yes, yes, I am finished with my junior year of college. I'm usually the one person out of all my friends who has her most difficult final at 8 on Friday morning, but for the very first time in my college career, I'm finished on a Tuesday. It feels glorious. I'm not feeling all this pressure to go out and party and I like it. 

Today I:

- returned the 13 library books I had checked out and read over the past semester for my two 20-page research papers. It felt so good to drop them into the return box at the library! I had to carry them all in two bags and I think I looked a little goofy lugging them across campus.  

- organized my favorites bar, which was getting unorganized and out of control. 

- organized my bookcase, which seems a little silly since I'll be moving out of here before the month ends. I will miss these built-in bookcases by the fireplace (not to mention all the wood paneling) in this house. I'm scouring craigslist for something to hold all of my books. 

- cleaned out my makeup bag and bought some new shit for it. I don't wear makeup at work and school, but I effing love makeup. Like, expensive makeup that I shouldn't buy. Like, MAC and Stila shit that costs $30 for blush or whatever. I have lots of problems, but I'm not working on this one currently and it's bad. 

- ventured to the parents' house and went through all of my old CDs. I'll be honest: I'm not one of those people who has deep emotional connections to objects. Other than my Bobo bear and my journal, I wouldn't be too upset if I had to get rid of everything I own. In fact, I think I like throwing/giving things away a little too much. Thus, I have a box of CDs in my car that needs to be sold to Zia or Bookman's. Next to the trash bag of clothes I need to drop off at Salvation Army. 

- ate Inn-and-Out with Andy and listened to the most obnoxious (well, that goes without saying) sorority girls gossip about their friends and say, "If I had a boyfriend here, I would definitely cheat on him when I go back home for the summer." GO BACK TO CALI ALREADY. When I'm at work helping these idiots, I just have to remind myself that after Friday, they will be gone. 

- watched LOST (boring). Guess what, Amanda! My pa is going to be our designated driver for the LOST finale. You best take off work for that. 

Yay, productivity! Now to find a house and figure out what is going on with my schedule for next semester. I'm currently signed up for 2 classes, and I can't figure out this new system. I don't even think I can register anymore. Help me. 

I seriously cried while I was writing my analysis of this poem in my 17-page paper on W.B. Yeats WHICH I JUST FINISHED YEEEEE

This is my favorite poem. I want someone to read it at my funeral, for serious. It's so beautiful and hopeful and magical and gahh. everything good.

"Lapis Lazuli" I have heard that hysterical women say They are sick of the palette and fiddle-bow, Of poets that are always gay, For everybody knows or else should know That if nothing drastic is done Aeroplane and Zeppelin will come out, Pitch like King Billy bomb-balls in Until the town lie beaten flat. All perform their tragic play, There struts Hamlet, there is Lear, That's Ophelia, that Cordelia; Yet they, should the last scene be there, The great stage curtain about to drop, If worthy their prominent part in the play, Do not break up their lines to weep. They know that Hamlet and Lear are gay; Gaiety transfiguring all that dread. All men have aimed at, found and lost; Black out; Heaven blazing into the head: Tragedy wrought to its uttermost. Though Hamlet rambles and Lear rages, And all the drop-scenes drop at once Upon a hundred thousand stages, It cannot grow by an inch or an ounce. On their own feet they came, or on shipboard, Camel-back, horseback, ass-back, mule-back, Old civilisations put to the sword. Then they and their wisdom went to rack: No handiwork of Callimachus, Who handled marble as if it were bronze, Made draperies that seemed to rise When sea-wind swept the corner, stands; His long lamp-chimney shaped like the stem Of a slender palm, stood but a day; All things fall and are built again, And those that build them again are gay. Two Chinamen, behind them a third, Are carved in lapis lazuli, Over them flies a long-legged bird, A symbol of longevity; The third, doubtless a serving-man, Carries a musical instmment. Every discolouration of the stone, Every accidental crack or dent, Seems a water-course or an avalanche, Or lofty slope where it still snows Though doubtless plum or cherry-branch Sweetens the little half-way house Those Chinamen climb towards, and I Delight to imagine them seated there; There, on the mountain and the sky, On all the tragic scene they stare. One asks for mournful melodies; Accomplished fingers begin to play. Their eyes mid many wrinkles, their eyes, Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay.

Gah! My life will be so different in about a month! It's scary.

I usually check out PostSecret every Sunday morning as a habit I developed in high school. I used to be really into it back then, but now I find it terribly corny and/or pointless. Yet, like the Dirty (ugh), I keep up with it now and then out of boredom and slight curiosity. I should stop looking at these pieces of shit websites. The Dirty, for obvious reasons, should not exist. But the more I look at PostSecret, the more I realize what crap it is. This week there are four anti-choice secrets in a row, and an email message calling the site out on its biased, misogynist bullshit. Despite the email message, however, there isn't one secret to balance out the obvious bias and ideology that's going on here. FUCK THAT.

I don't have much to say, as usual, but I thought I'd mention that for the first time in a while I feel particularly good. I've been more receptive to stepping outside of my comfort zone, having a good time, and spending time with people, all without conscious effort. On the level of consciousness, I've been trying not to bitch everyone out and tolerate them instead. I'm nowhere near perfect (as exhibited in my outburst on Niles), but I'm trying. Also, did you know that I'm on schizo/bi-polar drugs? Yeah, it's fucking weird.  

(whisk maracas)

just ragin'

God, I suck at posting. Lately I can't write decently. 

I've been on a rage streak since school started (aka today). Everything pisses me off to no end. I filled out my census this morning and it was ridiculous how mad it made me. Today Andy forgot to lower my bike seat and I'm too frail to do it myself so I was late for my test. During my test the girl that always has to take her shoes off to reveal her janky toes DID and I was furious. In my last class everyone talked shit about Lady Gaga and Alexander McQueen but of course my social anxiety was inflamed by my anger so all I could think was FUUUCCKKK. Then I walked outside in shorts and sandals to cold rain. What the fuck? Oh and I'm trying to sell shit on Craigslist because I'm broke and all I'm getting is South Africans who want to scam me or robots. AND I fucked up my sewing machine and it costs $80 dollars to repair (although when they told me that I said that I'm on a budget and have boobs, well I didn't say that because it's obvious, and they said they'd try to lower the price).  ANWAY everything is bullshit. But not in that depressing, I might as well die way, but in that ironic WHOOP-DEE-DOO way, you know?  

Let's see, what else is new...I have some hash but I don't know where it came from. Like I looked at my stash of shitty weed and it was there and I was like...what? Also, Oscar Zeta Acosta (aka Dr. Gonzo) is the shit. That's all i got guys. 

PS Whenever I feel down I look at this picture: 

I think it's because I imagine myself as red shirt dude.

Bahh Telephone is out guys:

I'll write more about it later when I get the chance. All I gotta say is Beyonce with bangs is A+, I don't want to see her any other way. I also love Gaga's yellow hair, but she's looking a little skeletal. It frightens me. But those ciggy glasses....

I almost forgot how much I adore Beyonce. I like this:

I should (fingers crossed) start getting the internet at my house tomorrow, and is it not surprising that I have an entire to-do list of youtube videos, blogs, and wikipedia entries (not to mention lostpedia...) to catch up with? No, not at all. Without the internet, I watch eight episodes in a row of It's Always Sunny and get pretty fucking close to catching up with all my reading for ENGL 496...we're doing Invisible Man and the autobiography of Malcolm X this week...that's 1200 pages or something. What's wrong with me? No one should ever be completely caught up in a class like that.

This post is an IOU...an I owe myself...who knows. Without the inspiration to write something of importance I have resorted to journal entries lately...is that good or bad? Well, I think it could be worse, because you don't even know what's in my sleepingpill/antidepressant/whatever the fuck else I'm on/addicted to brain right now. Seriously guys, it's weird, weird shit. I've been pulling a Hamlet nearly on the daily but no one else seems to think it's nearly as funny as I do. Am I going insane? Well, yes, I think I am, and perhaps my life isn't nearly as amusing as I think it is, but who cares?

I haven't written in so long, mostly because the internet Andy and I steal suddenly stopped working. We're pretty torn up about it. 

My days are busy lately, especially compared to last semester, when I would spend most of my time streaming television shows and pestering Andy to hang out with me. I'm technically only taking three classes this semester, which is awesome because two are 400-level and one is a graduate class with 9 people.  Renaissance Drama, Victorian Poetry, and "Literary Representations of the Racial Other." Not much to say, really. School is school and I'm pretty much over it. 

I'm getting three credits this semester interning at CHAX Press, where I package and ship book orders, help with bookmaking, organize bookshelves, collect donations at poetry readings, and do random odd jobs. It's pretty sweet working for a poet and the studio is in the same warehouse as Small Planet Bakery, so it always smells like bread. 

I started tutoring this Mexican dude that comes into my work in English. It's pretty adorable. I help him understand the books he's reading and check over the vocabulary worksheets he gets assigned at Pima. It's nice to make some extra money. 

I'm currently on no medications. Fuck that. I'm seeing a hippy psychiatrist and she is awesome. 

Other than that, lately I just sit in my freezing house and read. 

Image Dump

I'm writing to mark the first day of my adventures in medicating and treating whatever the fuck has been wrong with me this winter break. I'm on antidepressants and seeing a therapist, yay? TMI? I don't really give a shit. My personal philosophy for a while now has been to be completely, and most of the time painfully, honest with people, so there you go. I never quibbled with teenage angst in high school, so maybe it's catching up to me, you know? That's how I try to rationalize all the bullshit that's been happening to me lately. Truthfully, I feel like I shouldn't be on antidepressants, but whatever. I spent all day at the doctor's yesterday getting blood tests and taking mental health tests, so I guess I'll take her word for it. In case you're wondering what's wrong with me: my heart rate is abnormally high, I have anxiety, and severe insomnia. It started during winter break, completely randomly. At first I didn't think much of it, but after I had gone 4 nights in a row without sleeping, I started freaking out a bit. It took me 3 weeks to finally see a doctor too, so fuck that. Anyway, that's what's going on with me. Feel free to bitch about your own life as much as possible to me, I'd actually appreciate that.