Everyone's sick and tired of sadness–

I can be hardcore too!

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 21:24:42 GMT

I'm such a badass

So today in English we were discussion Hamlet, and I was going off on this (very intelligent, if I do say so myself) exposition on why Hamlet treats Ophelia so awfully in the "get thee to a nunnery" scene and how it ties into the disconnect between soul and body and the "rotten state" of morality thus far. Meanwhile, I was playing with a stapler, because I like to have something to do with my hands. Then OW,I stapled myself in the finger.

Me: "OW!.... hot damn." *pulls staple out of finger. Blood wells up*
Camille: Oh my god, are you okay?
Me: Yeah I'm fine. Okay, remember that Hamlet believes that (etc etc etc)
English Teacher: *cracks up*
(I BLEED ON THE TABLE)
People: DUDE GO TO THE BATHROOM
Camille: *Attempts to wrap my finger in kleenex*
Me: Guys just let me finish! This is more important!
David: You have lost all your credibility.

So I finish my thing, after many interruptions, and everyone starts talking. My English teacher's like "that was such a me thing to do", Thomas is wiping blood off the table, etc etc. So then I went to clean it off. But I think that's awesome

TLDR: I analyzed through my own bleeding finger. I am a hardcore English student.

ETA: I stapled my finger again on Friday. orz

On the ups and downs

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 05:25:18 GMT

I don't get calc again :(

I think I'm getting a B+ right now in that class, which makes me sad. I got an A first quarter! Bet I can bring it back though, with the exam.

I only have exams in two classes, actually. Calc and Econ CIS. (Damn, I do quite suck at econ though). I have projects and papers in most everything else.

Speaking of which: I freaking love Hamlet. He is a snarky bitch, and the fashion motif and the saying/words and the learning– it's awesome. Surpassed Macbeth as my favorite Shakespeare already.

Also I just want to hear back from UChicago and Georgetown. It's nine days until Georgetown though, and UChicago is "mid-December". Agonizing.

I'm never going to get into Yale if I get a B in calc. They would scorn me.

First on-snow ski practice of the year is tomorrow! It's not too cold, either– 22˚ today. I hope we get to free ski tomorrow, I haven't been on snow since last January. It won't be pretty.

I've been in a poetry mood recently– I wrote a poem, edited one right down, and have fragments of a couple more that look promising. I miss original, creative writing. Sometimes in class I get all twitchy about it and spit out a couplet in the margins, but it's bad for focus.

Also I miss diet coke. Quitting an addiction sucks.

2010 world cup! Pairings are out

Fri, 04 Dec 2009 19:24:51 GMT

GROUP A: South Africa, Mexico, Uruguay, France

GROUP B: Argentina, Nigeria, South Korea, Greece

GROUP C: England, United States, Algeria, Slovenia

GROUP D: Germany, Australia, Serbia, Ghana

GROUP E: Netherlands, Denmark, Japan, Cameroon

GROUP F: Italy, Paraguay, New Zealand, Slovakia

GROUP G: Brazil, North Korea, Ivory Coast, Portugal

GROUP H: Spain, Switzerland, Honduras, Chile

It's like the colonies versus the colonizers. It'll be an interesting world cup for SURE– I can't wait for July 10th England/America. I expect revolutionary war songs. I feel for North Korea, except for not, because fuck them.

Hetalia, in retrospect, makes all of this more interesting.

Awesome's correlation to freedom? Must investigate

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 02:19:06 GMT

This is why no one lets me have free time. Ski practice was cancelled tonight and I had marginal homework. Between 5 and 8 I:

Created a secret society
Planned a prank on the sophomores
Executed the preliminary steps
Secured a sponsor
Curled my hair.

Guess I'd better go apply to Yale and write a definitive article on Lithuania, since it's only 8:15.

Sometimes I forget how awesome I can be.

Look it's been a long day

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 03:25:13 GMT

Can I burn all my college prep books and college mail? I just want to.

May also burn my calc book right now if this doesn't start making sense

I'm warning you Isaac Newton

When did I stop using punctuation?

This could be modern poetry?

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 03:15:47 GMT

I should keep a valid lj. I really should. I think about it sometimes.

This week and some in sum:
Debate tournament in Chicago starting tomorrow
I don't understand calculus
or economics
at this point all British scientists should be taken outside and shot
I'm talking to you, Isaac Newton and you, Adam Smith
I seem to have a pretty good grasp on Shakespeare though
and Estonia.
My Chinese class can go to hell
so can Erik
broken finger is still broken
but with the addition of shinsplints
I've decided to write a screenplay
I've almost applied to Harvard and Yale
waiting anxiously to hear back from UChicago and Georgetown SFS.

I think I might write my senior speech on marriage
using the analogy of a time machine
badass y/n
first quarter grades rocked
except for economics....
dammit Zalk.
I love Thanksgiving
got new skis
want to learn to fondant ice a cake
Bad Romance has the coolest music video ever
I overanaylze Lady Gaga's societal implications
and may write a paper about it
and I may submit a Poland thing to our lit mag
I may publish my paper on Lithuania
for real
if I can make it not suck
I think that would be awesome. Since I'm
you know
17. And.

If you are interested in any of the above disjointed thoughts, ask questions.

Drabble~ for Smoke.

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 02:33:03 GMT

From the prompt "chandelier". Feel better bb~

Title: Unexpected Green Thumb
Fandom: Count Cain
Word Count: 370
Genre: gen/horror

There were little bits of broken chandelier all over the floor, which Cain was careful to step over as he worked his way across the room. It was– had been– is a magnificent ballroom, replete with silk and stained glass windows and dark hardwood floors, with all the scuffs from fancy shoes carefully wiped off. It was old, but well cared for, in the way your grandmother's tea set was.

You know, the one Grandpa brought back from Germany in 1945.

There had been one enormous light fixture, suspended a floor above the center of the dance floor, made elaborately of clear and transparent green crystal. Cracked on the ground, it both then and now and then featured as the primary decoration, albeit in strikingly different ways. The room had the appearance of being dusty, although without actually being anything less than spotless. While the windows were stained glass, the little illumination that game through them seemed a dark grey.

Cain picked up one of the chandelier's candelabras carefully and tested his finger against the sharp edge– there wasn't any blood on it, but that didn't dismiss the bodies Riff had pulled out earlier.

Merriweather was waiting at the entrance, loitering about the intricate doors, looking for all the world out of place. Everything around her was beautiful and broken– snapped sofas, shards of crystal and glass, torn velvet, Cain– in dark and ominous colours. She was dressed in yellow and cornflower blue, while he was totally outfitted in forest green.

The count looked around the room, as if checking for his bodyguard, and suddenly noticed all of the furnishings had been completely torn apart. He could have sworn– just a moment ago– wasn’t only the chandelier¬–?

Speaking of which, where WAS Riff? He'd stepped on some glass and gone to bandage himself up, but that had been nearly half an hour ago. Cain felt dizzy. Had it been half an hour? Things kind of started to spin, to blur– everything lost its focus and despite the lack of light, the room was filled with the glimmer glinting off a million little pieces.

He fainted, and green began to spread from his index finger in lovely little tendrils.

Voice Post! and European!

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 03:47:31 GMT

Memes~

Sat, 12 Sep 2009 02:57:25 GMT

Give me the title of a story I've never written, and feedback telling me what you liked best about it, and I will tell you any of: the first sentence, the last sentence, the thing that made me want to write it, the biggest problem I had while writing it, why it almost never got posted, the scene that hit the cutting room floor but that I wish I'd been able to salvage, or something else that I want readers to know. Forced into this by Smoke, by the way. With a gun to my head.

And to catch up on one:
01. Comment to this entry saying 'ICONS!' and I will pick 6 of your icons. 
02. Make an entry in your own journal and talk about the icons I picked! 

1.
Karl Urban, making the spock hand, with lens flare. Everything I love is in that icon, plus it's hella psychedelic and purple. I pretty much saw it and was like, "MUST HAVE." I wish it was appropriate more often, but then again, Karl Urban is always appropriate, so who knows.

2.
The only thing that would make this icon more convenient was if it said "you're" instead of "I'm". Still, it functions mindblowingly well in arguments, and again, Karl Urban. I may have mentioned that I'm a fan. Also, Sulu in orange. Orange is my favorite color.

3.
THIS IS MY FAVORITE ICON. Nothing apologizes like X and nothing puts a mistake in perspective like breaking Tokyo Tower. I should mess up more, just to use this icon.
Also I really love the colors and composition of this. It may be my prettiest icon.

4.
Haha Hikaru no Go is such an excellent show, and that's such a great moment. I knew I needed a Hikaru icon, and actually that feels like my entire life. I get super excited about things, and then head over heels fail. It's a little embarrassing, but hey, fun.

5.
Rarely convenient, but made of brilliance. I kept it in a folder for ages before I brought it out, but it's just too good to hide. Also, the most convincing way to make political criticisms is through The Princess Bride, undoubtedly.

6.
Nothing says "your argument is invalid" or "you wish you were me" or really, makes any statement at all like a glimmerous Klavier. He may well be my favorite from that game– he's hilarious and successful and awesome, I kind of want to grow up and be Klavier. This icon always applies in amazing ways.

Valid.

Thu, 03 Sep 2009 03:04:37 GMT

You see me in a police car. What would you think I got arrested for? Answer me, then repost this.

Buy one get one free (You could consider this a Billy Mays tribute?)

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 18:54:16 GMT

I don't think it's ever too soon for Billy Mays jokes. Anyway-

LIMITED TIME OFFER

School starts on Tuesday and I'm going to be doing even less writing than I already am (I do do some, just... nothing's ready to be posted). So, in order to get it out of my system, I'm going to comment-box fill prompts for the next two days. From... now, until let's say 10 PM my time (CTZ), post one prompt in every comment (comment as many times as you would like) and I will write fills. Nothing under a hundred words, no less, but it would not be amiss to expect exactly a hundred for some. Comment box'd, so not exactly my most polished or edited work. Forgive errors, either grammatical or stylistic.

GOGOGO.

?

Thu, 27 Aug 2009 02:08:11 GMT

I went to Poland, it was cool. Am back. School starts on Tuesday. (Senior year omfg, I am not a senior). Took senior pictures today! We'll see how those go.

The main point of this entry: I wrote two things in Poland. They're kinda... different, though. I don't know what I would label them. They're kind of stream of consciousness, I guess, and kind of personal journalism? It's conversational and switches between fiction and reality and it's all me, narrating, so let me know what you think of it, I guess? What you think it is. Does this even count as creative writing? Am I just a total tool who talks to her computer screen pointlessly? Let me rephrase that question in a more constructive way: Is this something I should pursue?

I guess I would really like criticism on this.

The first is "Poland (#1)" and the second is "Warsaw, you know, rises". As always, anything original is copyright me, whether or not it's worth stealing.

Poland (#1)

Poland is very flat, and looks fairly distinctly like Iowa at points. On the other hand, it changes fairly seamlessly to beautiful forests of indistinguishable age (while remaining flat), which adds a certain old-world charm I rather believe Iowa lacks. It’s very beautiful, all together, and I’ve really come to appreciate it about three hours in to this excellently long train ride to Gdansk.

I would very much like to make it to Gdansk, and I would like to do so with my possessions intact, though several factors have conspired against me. My first impression with Poland did not go particularly smoothly. Upon my arrival in Warsaw, my checked bag was noticeably missing from the collection that arrived off our little charter from Amsterdam. I wrote, rather urgently, to Poland, to determine the truth of the matter.

“Dear Poland,
I’m very pleased to be here but may I ask, where is my luggage? Much love, and looking forward to my stay,
Ari”

Poland wrote back in a timely manner,

“Dear Ari,
Probably in Amsterdam. Enjoy Gdansk! Totally check out the shipyards! Luv,
Poland.”

I really appreciated the prompt response and arrangements were made for transporting my bag to Gdansk. Of course, it is around this time that I come to the realization that neither my father nor I speak a goddamn word of Polish and that this may be a problem. I feel effectively like a small tourist lost under a magnifying glass. “Everyone must know I’m here! I look like a stupid foreigner! Is this how people dress? Should I try English?” It’s very uncomfortable, and I never realized how much energy it takes to be so outstandingly American. I’m very tired.

This does all mean we missed the 12 o’clock train and had to sit around waiting for the three, but we shared a coke and a slice of pizza and I finished part one of War and Peace.

Ah! We passed a lake there, just a bit back, with adorable red-roofed houses on the side and built into the gentle slope of a hill. It’s really picture perfect and I admire it for several minutes as the train… slowly… moves me away. And there! There’s a soccer net tucked into a small clearing of tress. Personality. It’s got character.

Occasionally the road seems built down into the plain, so that on its sides land slopes fairly steeply up. It’s not to worry at all though, because the ground looks soft and easy to climb. Every day Polish resistance fighters clamber limberly up and away while Nazis trip comically over their over-polished boots. You do wonder, though, about the teenage children collecting mushrooms in the forest, who can’t date from later than 1700. Do the bullets hurt them? Perhaps they pass right through. Ghost bullets can’t hurt a ghost child.

The boy next to me on the train is hella cute. He speaks some English- he helped us get seated– but we haven’t spoken since. I’m too afraid to start up a conversation, as per usual. People in general seem friendly, if a little too busy to deal with my self-consciousness as a tourist. That’s good though. It seems everywhere that a kit of construction is going on, which is also good. I’m looking forward to– rather hoping forward too– more signs of prosperity along the way. And to, you know, meeting more people, perhaps even someone to converse with about the golden lines of hay. I desperately want to like Poland, and more than that I want Poland to like me. I want this trip to be the basis of years and years of further study into the region, so Poland, please, be patient with me.

Warsaw, you know, rises

Sometimes, when I’m wandering through the winding streets of European cities– Vienna, Venice, Paris, Rome especially– I’ll be seized with this sense of awe. “Look how old this thing is!” I’ll marvel to myself Americanly. “These stones saw the bombs of the Blitz! This house saw the Congress of freakin’ Vienna! Marco Polo sailed through this same goddamn canal!” I think part of it really is the fact that my country didn’t even exist in the Baroque period, let alone Renaissance or god forbid Gothic. You just don’t wander around downtown Minneapolis… well, ever. Let me rephrase. You just don’t wander ‘bout downtown Chicago and suddenly happen over a 14th century church and two archeological digs. You don’t! There’s nothing to dig for in Chicago but Cubs’ World Series memorabilia, China, and oil if you really get into the absinthe.

Anyway this feeling, right, this historical paralysis– Elizabeth I walked these steps, can I even believe that? – I don’t get it in Poland, well, in Polish cities. Not even in Gdansk, where say the Lenin shipyards actually still exist and Lech Walesa really did stroll the same streets I’m strolling. I mean, don’t get me wrong; I love Poland, and you do stumble over a church every thirty feet. (Good god, Krakow! There’s no way in hell or, more appropriately, heaven, you could need so many churches). And the reconstruction’s brilliant, actually genius. Everything looks amazing, I especially can’t say enough about Warsaw. It’s lovely, the Old and New Towns, the palaces and the sudden gardens.

But something in me knows the Jagiellonians never paced the paths I’m tracing through the replacement palazzos. Kosciusko didn’t stand here and over look the Vistula; Dabrowski never paraded down this avenue. The actual avenue Dabrowski might have wanted to parade down (look, take what you can get with Polish military history) was blown up by the Prussians, then by the Russians, rebuilt, torn up by the Nazis, twice, restored somewhat, totally exploded by the Russians again, paved with concrete, then torn up and restored with fragments of the original bricks in 1989 according to paintings showing it in the mid-18th century.

Polish architecture is like a quilt, a beautiful quilt that you cried over a dozen times sewing together and that perpetually reminds you of the slow, painful death of your loved one as they suffer over and over again– or at least it does in the dark patches. But in the light patches this quilt brings you an unbearable hope and lightness– Poland fights, Poland is not yet lost against every odd. And thus the country you love suffers once more another day, but it’s kind of a glorious suffering, the kind that says “I chose to have a choice and I chose to die on my terms” or even more Polish, “I chose to fight for freedom because no matter the result, that fight is in and of itself worthwhile”. It’s heartbreaking like watching the conductor of some malfunctioning train terribly out of rein struggle violently with the controls to try and stop them from hitting schoolchildren, only to break them more and get himself thrown on the tracks as well. That kind of tragedy, where everyone dies at the end.

But… as they say, Warsaw rises.

I probably have too many works in progress.

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 13:40:18 GMT

"Post a single sentence from each WIP you have (or as many as you want to pick). No context, no explanations. No more than one sentence!"

He loosens his tie and pulls off his black Versace suit jacket, slinging it over his shoulder, and grins.

This is largely practical, since she never answers questions after they are asked.

Look, I’m just going to take a moment here to defend the South.

“Your language makes no fucking sense.”

She made it five steps before she turned around and retrieved the coffee.

Denmark and Sweden are sitting across a table from each other, and both look tired.

But these are the future memories, not memories of the past.

The doors to St. Mary Magdalene’s Church shuddered, splintered, and shattered. Screams, smoke, and sanguine slaughter.

The sky looked like latex, and they were probably too late.

Guess the fandom!

Fucking bitch hell damn on rollerskates.

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 18:41:00 GMT

My day has been awful and it's not even over. I'm going to whine about it on my lj, because goddammit, that's what an lj is for.

So I stayed up until two working on my goddamn flight homework.

At flying, I spent an hour and a half (most of which was even after my lesson was technically over) arguing with my flight instructor. Apparently he's a pre-1850s, extreme capitalist who, essentially, doesn't believe in any of the things I believe in, including that every human has the basic right to health care and education. He doesn't believe that imperialism is a bad thing. He doesn't believe in any kind of welfare. He thinks a private police force would be not a bad idea. To finish up, he assigned me three more chapters of homework.

And then on the drive home some Somali woman on her cell phone in a fucking black Range Rover nearly wiped my car out of existence.

Goddammit, I need a nap. Public Service Announcement: I'm fucking cranky right now. I'm damn near cantankerous. And Erik is coming over later. Fucking– bitch– arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrg.

Sulu~~

Mon, 06 Jul 2009 06:18:34 GMT

HAPPY BIRTHDAY IAMBICKILOMETER!
He turns 18 today, as many may have noticed due to the epic 546 comment'd post. (Thank you Smoke). I also wrote him Sulu gen, because my love runs deep. ~~my love is like a shiny, shiny fencing foil oh my god I'm sorry Robert Burns~~ In other news this entire thing is a tremendous abuse of the fact that I can actually fly an airplane. In fact, I fly a DA 20.

Title: Put The Nose on the Horizon to Reach the Sky
Rating: G for gen as fuck. Except for the swearing, which happens. So, like, PG-13?
Characters: Hikaru Sulu, mentions of Pavel Chekov and Scotty
Length: Exactly 500 words, which took some cutting.
A/N: Dedicated to Iambic. I hope you like it, and I hope you have a ~wonderful~ 18th birthday.

“Flying Cloud Tower diamond 3-8-9er delta Charlie on runway 1-0 left requesting takeoff with echo,” he finishes with a flourish, and waits to copy.

Sulu’s got this cute little thing, a Diamond 20 (slant golf, if you must know), basically two seats with wings, propeller and engine. It’ll blow over if you so much as whistle at it, and a perfect landing is rendered more or less impossible by the size of it, but it’s fun to fly, responsive to input, perfect for messing around. Not powerful, hundred-n-twenty knots maybe at maximum cruise, but that’s okay. He’s got the Enterprise for warp, warp eight, eight point five, eight point nine, warp nine.

Nine point one, nine point three, c’mon, Scotty, give ‘er everything, nine point seven, warp ten…. Well, not yet. Yet being the operative word. Sulu goes down every so often to mess around with Scotty, see what they can cook up when they put their adrenaline-junkie minds together. They both love the Enterprise, want everything out of her she’ll give them. Sulu likes Scotty– good guy, good drinking buddy.

‘Course, Sulu likes most of the crew; they’re all well and nice. And he likes the speed and smoothness of the Enterprise, the weightlessness of space, even though sometimes space feels more like floating than flying when flying’s what he loves. And sometimes Starfleet’s a little too smooth, even with Kirk as captain, and while volunteering for crazy away missions helps with that, helps put the rough-around-the-edges and turbulence back in his life, it’s not enough. And despite Pavel’s allegations– “Goddammit, Hikaru, you’re going to get yourself killed trying to show off and then who’s going to fly this thing,”– who he is needs the feeling of air rushing past his shoulders or his shuttle.

(He first went skydiving at nine, spacediving at eleven, and although this is his little secret, under an assumed name he won the annual San Francisco to DC single-engine race by a record margin at thirteen. He wasn’t even legally allowed to have his license to fly until he turned 17, but the people in the tower always did like him.)

Pavel’s sitting beside him now, looking scared out of his mind that this antique little plane is just going to up ‘n fall the fuck out of the sky. He told Sulu over dinner one day he’d never been up in a real plane, the kind that got replaced by transporters and upper-atmosphere shuttles, and that simply couldn’t be allowed to stand. In exchange, he’s spending the next week of shore leave in Saint Petersburg, because they were both convinced the other’d never really lived. So Sulu’s got his tank full of gas, a diamond 20, the beautiful open sky and his best friend strapped into the copilot’s seat. He taxies onto the runway, throttle to full–
airspeed alive–
rotate at fifty–
and before you know it, they’re off the ground (flaps to cruise at 400) and setting the nose on the horizon.

Meme~ Memes?

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 22:39:04 GMT

Here are the rules :

Reply to this meme by yelling "Words!" and I will give you five words that remind me of you. Then post them in your LJ and explain what they mean to you.

Iambic's words:

Holy Grail, Minnesota, politics, life-altering injuries, happy endings.

Holy Grail: Wow, it's been a fucking long time. Jeez, I still have the whole rest of it planned out somewhere. The thing about Holy Grail is, it exemplifies a whole lot of both what was wrong about my early fanfic, and a whole lot of what was right. A lot of crack- both good and bad. Not a lot of originality- bad. A lot of the dialogue was directly from the script. Speaking of dialogue, how could you tell when different characters were speaking? And on another writing note, I fell often into the mistake of not having any description. Basically, the opposite of block text. It was bad. On the other hand, my tone really began to show up, especially around the time I started talking about Rhode Island. It wasn't too short, which is a problem I've always had in writing.

I'm torn between thinking I really ought to go back to it and I really shouldn't. It would be very, very different now, ahaha.

Minnesota: One of those crazy random happenstances, like me picking up Tsubasa and stumbling into fandom. I never wanted to live in Minnesota, I hated the very idea of the place. And there are still a shit ton of things I hate about it, don't get me wrong. It's insular, culturally, lacks diversity, and has none of the charms of the metropolises I was used to and my family is attracted to. On the other hand: I can imagine who I would be if I hadn't moved and I don't like it. To be quite honest, it's been an amazing place to grow up. I've made amazing friends, gotten a great education, and matured into a much calmer, more self-aware person while keeping a lot of the eccentricities that made me me. I'm afraid that, had I stayed in New Jersey or even Maryland, I would have been confined to either a 'popular' category or an 'eccentric' category, and wouldn't have had the chance to form a blend, because I was so comfortable there. I was always going to have friends on the East Coast; I was not always going to have friends here. This place has been almost undefinable in its effect on my present character.

I'm still moving the hell away though.

Politics: I care significantly more than I should. Although, by the way my next campaign: Entenza for Governor. 2010. Tell your friends. If you have any in the backwater state I have just confessed to secretly loving. My parents brought me up watching the news and reading the paper, and I grew up believing in social justice (I actually wrote a personal essay (in Spanish) on how reading fantasy and science fiction taught me such). So I've pretty much been political my entire life. I'm very liberal (for the United States), and while both my parents are fairly democratic, my dad "can't wait for me to make money so I can have it all taxed away"– I may be too socialist for him. It happens. I've worked for a couple of campaigns, which is both more fun and tedious than I thought it would be. What I really care about is foreign policy, but I suck it up and follow domestic and economic policy too.

Life-altering injuries: I don't like them. Overlord-verse Ariana has them- fucked-up hands and legs, to be precise- which is interesting, theoretically. WW1-with-pirates-verse-Ari really, really doesn't want Iambic to get them, which is Fair Enough. I'm only slightly concerned that this is one of the first things associated with me.

Happy endings: I can appreciate a good, artistic, heartbreaking ending like any other writer or critic, both of which I am upon occasion. Most of my favorite books don't end happily; mostly, real life doesn't end happily. I know this. But at heart I am, have always been, and always will be, a sucker for happy endings. I almost always write them– imply them, at least, or leave them open for assumption. Deep down, I really just want everyone to have "and they lived happily ever after", or "and they adventured happily ever after" written on their tombstone.

Smoke's words: Yellow, phone, Daphne, history, plane

Yellow: ...? It's a good color. Happy! Energetic! Positive! Warm! I like it. Not my favorite, but hey, it's the color of the sun and the closest approximation in my 64 crayola box to gold. Gotta count for something.

Phone: ...Smoke, where are these words coming from? Well, I used to hate my cellphone. Then I learned to text and started carrying a purse. Now I have a crackberry, and it is my true love. Do not mess with the crackberry. However, my phone is almost always dead. It's like a law of nature. My family mocks it. Often. When my parents drop me off somewhere, they have a checklist: "Is your phone with you? Charged? On?" The answer is almost always no to one of the above.

Daphne: She means from Terry Pratchett's book Nation. The character Daphne does bear an uncanny resemblance to me. It's very strange. She's both like me and not like me at the same time, in ways I can't pinpoint, and it unsettles me. I'm not sure I like it. She's awesome though.

history: I LOVE history. Seriously. Not only is it one of my best subjects in school, it's one that has always fascinated me. As an added bonus: I think nothing is more fun. I've been reading history books for leisure since I was little, and there's no topic, time period, or region I think not worth covering. Seriously. I want to know about the unification of the Great Wall of China, I want to study the global implications of Finland's civil war. (I wrote a paper on that. Of my own free will. And then compared it to Ireland's.) I love the insights history gives me into culture, language, sociology, psychology, modern politics and economics, among other things.

Plane: learning to fly is fucking hard! Seriously, it's getting ridiculous. But I love the feeling of being in the air, when nothing's going wrong– and it's pretty empowering to know that you can fix whatever goes wrong, too. Stall? No problem. Generator failure? I got it covered, kids. Engine fire? Buckle your fucking harnesses and watch me be a gq bamf with my smooth-ass emergency landing. And there's really a feeling of freedom, too. I can just go flying. Screw airplane tickets and security, I just need a flight plan.

That was a long freaking meme. Next one~

ROLEPLAYME!

( my thread: here! )

I love this meme, seriously. Fun times.

Sparkles?

Mon, 29 Jun 2009 05:15:04 GMT

It's my BIRTHDAY!

God I feel old. Sixteen's supposed to be this fabulous year, right? It kind of sucked. Oh well. Onwards!

ITT: awesome sparkles and the codes for them, because that's what I want for my birthday.

Tried a new restaurant today with Ben. It was good to see him, and we have a lot of fun. Food was excellent, too. Then we came back to my house and he beat me at Mario Kart. I'm out of practice!

Am I awesome? [y/n]

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 21:46:21 GMT

THE TESTIMONIALS OF AWESOME MEME! // ME!!

Logic indicates that I am.

Home again...

Wed, 10 Jun 2009 02:44:59 GMT

Back from my college tours. Both places were supposed to be sunny and warm; in both it rained. Iambic you should have come, I'm sure you would have reveled in it. I was pissed.

College and school and War and even Peace.

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 04:41:05 GMT

First college trips tomorrow; I'm going to St. Louis and then on Tuesday to Chicago. Should be.... not particularly fun. But on the fun side, I am working on the arrangements for my dad and I to go spend ten days in Poland in August, which will be *awesome*.

Got my grades; they were good. Somehow managed to pull off an A in Chinese, mostly probably because the final was easy as hell, although my working my ass off second semester probably helped too. Got the highest score on the math final, with over a hundred percent, but that was because my teacher decided to make it out of 124 points instead of 135. Whatever, I'm just glad that class is done. My China/Japan teacher is keeping the three manga panels I drew and laminating them as an example, which I think is hilarious because they're actually terrible. I can't foreshorten so I just.... didn't. Still no word on APs, how agonizing.

Decided I'm reading War and Peace this summer. We'll see how that goes. Anyways, will update after Chicago!

Fic? Who even does that anymore?

Sat, 30 May 2009 19:33:46 GMT

Star Trek fic? Much love to smokexscribbles for taking a look at it for me <3, but I'd like to get a little bit more feedback on this before I go about cross-posting it. It is the first non-anon piece I've done in a while. So.

Title: K (or Constant)
Characters: Kirk, Chekov, Sulu; Sulu/Chekov
Warnings: Um, swearing? Introspection on a large scale. Probs spoilers for XI. Switching from 3rd to 2nd person and back. Chekov, which in rare cases causes heart palpitations and fainting from adorable.
Summary: There is no universe where Captain James Tiberius Kirk believes in no-win scenarios.

There is no universe where Captain James Tiberius Kirk believes in no-win scenarios, Chekov thinks.

Now, there’re probably a couple universes out there where Captain James T. Kirk doesn’t cheat on the Kobiyashi Maru. He probably just straight up, flat out wins, to be quite honest; while the odds of that are… (negligible, if he runs them, more rounding error than anything; an outlier, an irregularity, regularly dismissed) James-Tiberius-fucking-Kirk-like. There’s probably even a universe (maybe two, if he pushes the numbers like Scotty does every time they take a hit) where J. T. Kirk of the starship Enterprise is celibate, god rest his eternal soul. But his captain, this Jim, the one that pulls them out of black holes and doesn’t back down from fights and jumps off a drill and dives after Sulu and trusts in everyone – he doesn’t believe in no-win situations.

Pavel Chekov wonders what characterizes him, in every world. Is he always Russian? It seems impossible for him not to be. Is he always young, always smart, always record-breaking? Is he always so shy, so nervous? Does he grow up so fast, does he always join Star Fleet, can he always save Sulu when he’s falling? Better question – does he always love Sulu?

He can’t pinpoint his own defining characteristic in that way, can’t see it so clearly. It just shows so strongly in the Captain, like it does in no one else. It doesn’t matter, Chekov realizes, if Jim isn’t or won’t or doesn’t cheat on the Kobiyashi Maru. It doesn’t matter if the test itself even exists. This is a man who is always cheating the Kobiyashi Maru, in the sense for which it is. If that even makes sense, which it doesn’t, for what it is.

It’s easy to spin yourself round in circles in your head, until nothing makes sense and your brain gets dizzy. Words start to sound wrong if you say them enough, turn them round in your mouth and over in your head. Sometimes you can’t over think it, because if you do you start doubting and then they die.

Lieutenant Hikaru Sulu is Hikaru Sulu and Pavel Andreievich Chekov can’t imagine changing a damn thing about him in any universe because he’s perfect right now. Maybe that compromises him, like Commander Spock, First Officer Spock, XO Spock is always saying. Maybe he’s not fit for his position because his eyes drift to Hikaru’s hands and his mind spins that word round and round again, hi-ka-ru-hi-ka-ru until it’s not right. And then he puts it back together again with pieces of words Hi-ka-ru has said to him today, with fragments of the smiles Pavel gets and thanks God for every Sunday in space.

Whichever parts of Hikaru are kept a constant (K? K=H? For what values?) and whichever parts of Pavel stay the same, he hopes the part of Hikaru that smiles at him in the mornings and kisses him like that before his shift always stays. He hopes maybe whichever part of him it is that Sulu loves stays, so that maybe in every world that’s the same. If the constant part of him was Hikaru, and the constant part of Hikaru himself.

Captain James Tiberius Kirk can keep his goddamn Kobiyashi Maru.

First post in forever, ye gods

Sat, 30 May 2009 18:39:03 GMT

Wow, actually, it's been a while. I'm definitely going to update more now– finished my last final exam yesterday! No grades yet, but surely you shall be hearing about those soon-ish. AP grades are the third week of July, and oh TRUST me you will hear about those. If they're good, there will probably be sparkles.

No, so I saw Star Trek for the second time yesterday. It's so. freaking. good. I've been working on a bit of fic (Smoke's seen it) that'll probably go up later today. Indoctrinated Erin anyways, she thought she was a proper nerd but hadn't ever seen Star Trek. What the hell. About 75% of my time now is dedicated to thinking about Star Trek though, which is probably bad. Also bad that everyone that's seen that movie with me came out, looked at me and said, "You're Bones." Literally, that was the first thing Heather said to me after the first time. But I'm okay with that.

I had my first flight lesson today! My instructor's super nice (and actually really adorable... albeit married and too old for me) and we're going up in the air tomorrow. He though I was 21 and smart, one of which is totally false and one of which is partly false, since I don't know a godddamn thing about airplanes. Twas fun though, and I'm looking forward to learning!

Thursday went to a Twins/Red Sox game with my mother, which was... interesting. Redmond, Gardenhire, Varitek, and Frankona all got thrown out in less than 20 minutes and 1 inning. Can they even *do* that? Plus, that umpire was SO biased for the Sox it was ridiculous. But cool to see and fun, even if we lost (3-1). Beckett pitched a great game.

Tonight my Euro class is havin' a party at Ms. Helbrecht-Wilson's house. It will be hilarious and fun. I believe we're playing Risk and watching WW2 movies. I'm going to make cookies, though, so I'd better get a move on and get to the store. Also, wash my car. He looks disgusting.

ETA: Helbrecht-Wilson thing is actually tomorrow, but car is washed and cookies are made. Also fic is posted.

Sun, 26 Apr 2009 15:51:52 GMT

OH MY GOD EURO AP EURO AP EURO AP I NEED TO STUDY

I'm only on, like, the freaking wars of religion. I have SO MUCH WORK TO DO

In other news, the English Civil War is like a messy divorce. See my study guide:

The spacing copied weird, but whatevs.

e. English Civil War: take note, Hobbes will write about this
i. Elizabeth dies: crown goes to James
1. James is descended from Banquo
2. Macbeth is dead, the bastard
ii. His son is Charles I
1. And Parliament hates both of them
2. And won’t give them pocket money
3. And both bothersomely insist on divine right
4. And try and enforce religious conformity
a. High church style
iii. Meanwhile, Calvin had SPREAD
1. KOLKOLKOL– sorry
2. Called Puritains, and they staged a coup of the House of Commons
a. A CALVINIST coup
b. By which I mean they were legitimately elected
iv. Charles and Parliament kept fighting over financial issues
1. Until they were separated (Charles dissolves Parliament
2. They get back together to try and put down a rebellion in Scotland
a. Parliament takes this opportunity to pass the Triennial Act (has to call Parliament every three years)
b. Dissolves Star Court: triumph of Common Law
v. Finally, they get a messy divorce
1. A messy, messy divorce, in that it leads literally to open warfare
a. Puritains=Round Heads(or, in a remarkable coincidence, Eggheads)
i. Lead by Oliver Cromwell and the New Model Army
ii. Divided between Presbyterians and radical independents
1. And they chuck the moderates out anywho
b. But either way they beat the King’s Cavaliers
i. Predicting NBA history
c. Then they behead Charles. Oh well. (1649)
vi. Interregnum: Parliament gets sole custody. This does not work out as well as anticipated.
1. Under Cromwell, who calls himself Lord Protector
a. I could not make this shit up
b. Ruled as military dictator, much in the style of San Lorenzo
i. Failed at domestic affairs
1. GOD DAMN this metaphor is good
2. Puritains literally forbid public entertainment
a. They fail to realize how much masturbation this leads to
b. British get sick of these dickweeds
3. Cromwell dies (unfortunately naturally) in 1658 This a reference to the earlier "Bitches don't know 'bout my assassination techniques", in reference to the 30 Years War
a. His son just fails at carrying on the Protectorship, probably a result of NOT being a douche.
vii. Restoration: Charles II comes back from France and custody is split again
1. Good ol’ C of E is restored and religious toleration is abolished.
2. Test Act excludes non-Anglicans from military and civilian offices
a. Fine, we don’t want your goddamn officer corps anywho.

Seriously, how awesome is that metaphor? On the usual scale, that is, from sparrow to velociraptor. Also, I had a lot of fun tagging this entry.

Weekend Update

Sat, 11 Apr 2009 01:43:30 GMT

Ugh stressful week. Anyway, happy Passover! Celebrate that all your first borns aren't dead, ye goyem. I'm going to celebrate not-being-a-slave. It's a good feeling.

Art left for Japan today; I'm jealous.

Had a college meeting with my councilor and parents. Gods I hate this process, I can't imagine it's worth it. We narrowed the list down to thirteen schools though, which is much more manageable.

Fell in love with Billy Collins' poetry. He was the US poet laureate for two years, and he's... modern. Mocking. Really really good. Here's one: http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/litany/

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 23:56:45 GMT

I'm back from Puerto Rico.

If I hear one more derogatory comment about my appearance or my work ethic or my intelligence or my grades, I am either going to burst into tears or punch someone in the face, and I'm not sure which is more disturbing. My phone is broken so I can't call anyone because I don't know numbers, and I started to hyperventilate and took a shot of my inhaler, which is not the best solution but it works and fast. Called Natalie because I memorized her home phone but she was at a movie... I really need to get out of the house but I'm a little shaky so I shouldn't drive.

I have to deal with prom dresses tomorrow which is bad for my emotional stability (hah, joke) and see if my camera and phone are fixable and my mom wants me to replace my dying computer, but I can't really afford to do that right now.

Hetalia - WTF moment by undame
Name
Age
Country
Ate your last nectarine
Crushed your car into wall
Will marry you
Killed all your friends
Used bazooka to destroy your computer
Wants to have sex with you
Wants to rape you
Will give you money, if you marry him or her
Your father
The person who killed your father
Your childhood friend who is in love with you
Caused your death
Will give you ice cream after this quiz
Hides under your bed
Will read bedtime story for you
Died while you were reading this quiz