& redhedinsanity

reasons why I should sleep more

Do you know the despair of wanting so badly and so deeply to feel something, to understand life on an intense, visceral level, but to somehow know that you're incapable of reaching it?

I fear I've let my roots grow too shallow, and now I have no clue how to go deeper.

My life up to now has not been lived.

Sometimes...

There are times in my life where I look at how I've developed as a person - my morals, my values, my education - and feel proud of what I've accomplished. There are times when I look at my worldview - my rationality, my analytical tendencies, my good-natured skepticism - and am grateful to be a (mostly) clear-thinking individual. There are times when I look at what I've been granted - my intelligence, my charisma, my general optimism - and think how lucky I am to be me and me alone.

Then there are times when I realize how selfish that all is, that none of what I've accomplished or been given exists in a vacuum (though I tend to act like it does) and that my focus on sheer logic has divorced me from being a feeling human being. I pride myself on being reflexive, yet I'm really not. What am I afraid of? Why am I afraid to feel, and feel vulnerable?

When I was growing up, as my mother tells it, I was super soft-hearted. If a kid on the playground fell down and hurt herself, I'd cry along with her. I'd cry at the end of movies, happy or sad. I constantly felt angry, or happy, or excited, or anxious; I felt. Looking back, I'm bewildered; where did that boy go? I feel that my current self is an emotionless robot (except for anger)...which, paradoxically, makes me overwhelmingly sad. I'm not sure what needs to change, but I can't keep going as an empty shell of a person. I need to feel.

Since this whole conversation is so different from my normal routine I should probably explain the catalyst: GivesMeHope.com. It tags itself as "Like FML, but for optimists," and it truly is. Since my story probably isn't heart- and gut-wrenching enough to be featured (and would most likely be seen as self-serving to the site *cough like MLIA cough*) I'll post it here:

On Gives Me Hope, people post personal stories about dreams, joy, kindness, sorrow, graciousness, compromise, unity, and love. Reading these accounts of beautiful human interactions GMH.

WHY I LOVE GLEE

"Thank you so much it really is a pleasure while the boys chose a selection of songs that cast an eye inward on the irresponsible life choices and sexual hunger of today's modern teens we have chosen a selection of songs that speaks to the nation as a whole during these troubling times filled with economic uncertainty and unbridled social ill because if there's two things America needs right now it is sunshine and optimism.

Also angels."

Oh, True Blood

While finally catching up on True Blood (WHY CAN'T IT BE ON ALREADY?) I discovered a great respect for the writers of the show. Though I'm sure some of their portrayals of life in the South are egregiously stereotyped, the witticisms and epigrams written into the script were delightful. As I watched I compiled a list of my favorites, and decided to post them here to get them off my desktop. In (mostly) chronological order:

"You are sweating like an ice-water pitcher, honey!"
"His dancing looks like an epileptic on meth."
"Those will go faster than fritters at a fat farm." (Love the alliteration!)
"Thank you Jesus, Santa Claus and Hare Krishna!"
"You're just Satan in a sunday hat."
"I'll kick your ass so hard you'll be shittin' boots!"
"He's takin' a vacation to Jesus." (Said about a character who was killed the previous season)
"I'd wear him like a scrunchie!"

So yes. True Blood = ♥.

lol @ me

I figured today would be a good day to add another blog entry, considering it's the last day of May and what should be the final day of my BEDiM self-challenge...which went by the wayside about 21 days ago. Yay me. Things that have happened:

» Trip to NYC

» School ended

...and that's really it. Awesome. Ugh I'm sleepy. AND I NEED A JOB OK BAI.

why am i doing this AGAIN

Today was the rookie tourney at Sac State, which everyone on the team was required to judge at. Mostly a recruiting effort, it's the first year we've actually had such a tournament so it was pretty small; only around 24 debaters showed up. I got lucky and only had to judge the first round (it was only 2 rounds total), so I snuck upstairs and helped put together the mementos for our graduating debaters and graduating coach. After getting out at 1, everyone reconvened at Kristen's house for our party at 3. It was SUPER fun - the weather was gorgeous, her house was adorable, the company was great! Oh, and the entertainment was the best part - we semi-organized a talent show, and surprisingly enough (almost) everyone was a good sport and came through! The absolute BEST talent, though, was Michelle and her debate rap, set to the tune of "Ice Ice Baby" - watch it on Facebook video. Please, please watch - it's amazing.

After the party finished - around 7pm - a few of us decided to head back to TP's, to hang out and watch her play with her new gift from the team:

...a KitchenAid.

Highlights of this portion of the evening included Will serenading us on TP's brother's guitar:

However, I got super tired super fast and checked out early. An awesome day all around.

why am I doing this again?

I'm at Sac City College, helping out at yet another rookie tournament. This time it's even better - only parli debate, no policy at all. Oh joy.

This campus baffles me. It's quite cute, with red brick and nice lawns. And then you walk into the cafeteria and are confronted with this:

...I have no idea. I just want to meet whomever painted it.

the duel 2 and dead things

Went to TP's apartment last night to watch MTV's "Real World/Road Rules Challenge: The Duel 2". She made dinner and dessert - a fantastic (and spicy) pasta carbonara with spinach and asparagus, and strawberry shortcake. Amazing. It was rough times, though - we had to battle the smell of dead things. Apparently everyone in her hallway had smelled something awful for 4 days, and when they talked to the landlord the maintenance people investigated and discovered a huge, dead rat in the attic. They removed it but the smell is lingering :(.

The show itself wasn't that exciting - the challenge involved the male in each partnership holding the female over a cliff for as long as possible, until their grip failed and the girl plummeted hundreds of feet into a river gorge. Derek and Rachel win, decide to save Landon, who will pick Brittney - and then they stop planning (finally, no more endless negotiation of 'the list'). Bottom two:

Ruthie

and Isaac

Ruthie calls out Kim and pulls Back Off, Isaac calls out Landon and they get Spot On. Landon demolishes Isaac, and Kim somehow finds courage inside her gangly little frame and soundly beats Ruthie (which made me sad a little bit).

Team photos and money collection tomorrow!

sitting on babies

I spent most of today looking after my niece, Hannah. She's 16 months old; she was born on the same day they showed my Price is Right episode! She's super adorable:

Today was pretty fun. We hung out all day - she woke up from her nap around 2, and we had a snack (I had pita+hummus, she had chocolate Teddy Grahams and grapes), and then we turned on Shrek 2. HER. FAVORITE. MOVIE. EVER. I swear, this kid can sit and watch the entire movie without getting fussy, though today she was more energetic and wanted to play as well. I read with her and she played on her horse. A pretty chill day.

and then there are those times

Most of the time I'm pretty happy with who I am - I'm not one to dwell on my imperfections, whether they are physical flaws or problems with my personality. However, occasionally I feel completely inadequate...especially when I consider what my life would be like were I able to wear things like this:

...or this:

It's enough to make me miserable that I wasn't born a waifishly thin European woman. Or that I was waifishly thin, and could make a convincing European woman through transvestism. Ugh, why do dresses make me so freaking excited and so freaking depressed at the same time? I swear, when I have the money, I'm going to buy my own couture dress, even if I can never wear it.

lazy day

After spending almost 4 hours on the phone last night, and staying up until past 7 this morning, and then sleeping until 3pm...I feel lazy. I was originally going to be babysitting this evening (and this afternoon) but my task has been taken over by my father, so I'm in my room, already tired and thinking of just turning in for the night.

I feel so useless :/.

wipe out

Back from the tourney. SUPER RIDICULOUSLY tired. It was fun though, all the little debaters were so cute, with their "arguments" and their "evidence". The campus was both stupid and gorgeous - it's on this giant hill, so we had to carry all of our stuff from the bottom (where the parking lots are) to the top (where the tournament was going on)...via stairs. We climbed 12 flights of stairs to get to the upper campus.

However, once you were at the very top, there was a GORGEOUS view of the valley, and the Bay.

We also got to visit my debate coach's mother, whom I was meeting for the first time...she is AMAZING. I can definitely see where she gets her persona :).

I need sleep now.

and homepage fixed!

Sweet, I managed to get the blog up and running and fit into my stylesheet, etc. and I've now incorporated the homepage into the schematic as well. Yay!

P.S. Smultron is absolutely my favorite text-editing program. Ever. If I didn't have it, I would have given up on designing this CSS nightmare long ago :)

I think I can handle this BEDiM challenge I've set myself...but well have to see. Ugh, I need to be up in 1.25 hours...I might as well give up on sleep.

First Post!

Yeah, I guess I've decided to try and do SOMETHING with this domain, and the first part of this is probably establishing a blog to keep me looking at the domain. I think I'll try establishing a "BEDiM" - "Blog Every Day in May" routine. This'll count as the first post for May, even if it's dated May 2 :)

Testing links: