Nonsense

Well, England was out of the running for the World Cup a few days ago, and I was a little cross over that then, but I honestly never really cared, so I wasn't that upset. I just thought that they were better than that. What happened to brilliant soccer playing? I thought that was what England were known for.

Did you know that sweat is actually odorless on its own? It gets that lovely scent we all know and love when it mixes with bacteria.

I'm really tired. I should go to bed, but I'm not that tired. Actually, I just might be that tired. Never mind.

I know karate. But not that well. I am waiting for the day when I will need to say "I know karate!" and it'll work because it's the truth. But still, not that well.

Look! Trailers!

• This one is for Flipped, and I flipped (har har. Hmm?) when I saw it, because that book is lovely and hopefully the movie will shape up a lot like the book. I like the song at the end, and I know I've heard it before. But i have no idea what it is!
• And this one is for Parts 1 and 2 of Deathly Hallows! NOVEMBER! I can HARDLY WAIT!

I hate marshmallow Peeps now, but I used to love them when I was little. My tastes were different. Artificial food dye and sugar in the shape of cute animals appeals less to me now.

Wow, I really should go to sleep. I'm starting to sound insane. Marshmallow Peeps? Really? They are SUGARY. And that is all.

Look! More hyperlinks! My cousin (not Questa or B, another one) showed me this site and it's addicting. I know lots of bookish things, apparently!

Artemis Fowl! ARTEMIS FOWL! I'm rereading The Arctic Incident, and Artemis is nicer when he's being evil.

I'm going to sleep.

Later edit: I apologize for this post, but I'm just going to put it out there because frankly, I've nothing better to say.

One MILLION!

If you had a million *enter plural of currency here*, what would you spend it on?

I am fond of making lists, and I always always always think about this question. (I think in dollars because do I really have do explain this anymore?)

I am still on a bit of a happy buzz because ENGLAND IS ADVANCING after they WON a couple of hours ago, so I'll make a more cheerful list than my usual pessimism would permit.

(Sorry. World Cup fever. Normally, I hate organized sports, especially on the wretched box, but my father and brother don't like the English team, so how could I resist rooting for them? It's an effect of living in this house.) (Yes, the United States is advancing, too- but shut up, Sarcastic Susie.)

So. England.

What would I do with a million dollars?

• Go on a trip to England
• Gloat to my brother that I have more money than him
• Buy myself enough sandwiches for the rest of my life
• Save at least a quarter of it
• Buy myself The Beatles Box Set
• Give maybe about half to my parents
• I would go and buy up a Barnes and Noble (or at least all of the decent books in there. I would also save money to buy books online.)
• Donate some to the library/cancer research/are there any orphanages around here? Then I could donate there/The Nature Conservancy/PETA/a science lab/anything else that comes up
• Buy that ridiculous number of nice t-shirts from Threadless
• Buy jeans. I need some jeans.
• Buy some magnetic chalkboard paint (because I'm not sure if it exists) and paint the wall in my room with it
• Go to visit my cousins
• Buy a guitar (so that I can carry it around and look cool, even though I'll probably stop practicing three minutes after having it)
• Bribe someone into giving me a copy of The Lost Hero early, because I made the mistake of reading the excerpt and now I can't wait for it to come out!
• A microphone!
• A black light
• Whipped cream- enough to swim in. And then I'd swim in it, and it would be amazing. But there'd still be enough to eat.
• Music? (I'm actually running out of things to write. I can't believe that.)
• I'd leave it aside until I thought of other stuff to buy. Or save all of it.

My conclusion? Money can't buy most of the things I want, like to actually finish that story that I started two years ago. Perseverance and determination can! *heroic music plays in the background*

And I don't have too much of those, so...

*Music fizzles out*

So.

What would you do with a million dollars?

Superficiality

Yeah. I'm clearly on the computer right now.

The other day, after I published the post, I dragged myself off of the computer and went- le gasp!- outside!

I saw the sun, smelled the grass, saw actual people, and rode my bike for the first time since April. It was very weird, but very fun as well.

I still can't spell weird. I always come up with with either wired or wierd, both of which are so horribly wrong that it's comical. I can't spell 'necessary', either. I always put in two "c's" instead of one. GAH. That's why I prefer paper, because paper doesn't tell me when I'm wrong. I'm never distracted by red and green squiggly red lines when I write on paper, and I can just (pretend to) write, without being distracted by every darn thing that I spelled wrong!

However, what I'm trying to say is that going outside is a very nice experience, and I am trying to do it more often.

Yesterday, five minutes after I went outside, a thunderstorm started, so maybe Mother Nature hates me and wants me as far away from her as possible. I don't know. Maybe I'll try again some other time.

But besides my laziness and my lack of desire to finish all of the summer math I must finish, I have a really minor problem.

Superficiality bothers me. It more than bothers me. I have gone on and on about how much I HATE superficiality, and it should have gone on that list of things that I hate.

I know all of these stupid girls who care more about how they look and who they date than what goes on inside their heads. Half of them haven't even heard of malaria, genocide, and other stuff that's actually really pretty important.

Hello, future of the world! (I live in the U.S., and most of the girls I know are like this. Hopefully not too many other girls in the world- whether they're American or not- behave this way.)

I'm not saying that it isn't nice to take pride in one's appearance. It's better if you do that, actually. It shows how you think of yourself. But not enough people stop thinking about that?

What am I trying to say?

Don't be superficial.

What makes someone superficial? If someone is a deep person but is also completely and totally obsessed with his or her hair, what does that make them? Is it even possible to be deep and still have an almost-overwhelming fondness for one's hair? If it's almost-overwhelming, maybe not, but what if you just really like your hair to look nice? If someone usually listens to good quality music but likes one really filler kind of music, what...what is that?

I guess why would be a better word.

Quote for Saturday, June 19, 2010:

"I'm tired of all this nonsense about beauty being only skin-deep. That's deep enough. What do you want, an adorable pancreas?"

-Jean Kerr

(http://quotetoexpress.blogspot.com/2010/06/pancreas.html)

Muse for Today:

How long I can go while avoiding my summer math. I haven't done any since Monday. I have to turn it in tomorrow, though.

Not a Real Blog Post

I came on here and I realized that Hey, I need to actually post something today! because I want to keep up my nice little derived coincidence that I told you about in the last post, remember? That one? Yes? Good.

Too bad my brain is mush from too much music at all times, Beatlemania (about forty years too late, but not my fault: I wasn't born) and lack of inclination. I mean, I actually do nothing all day long except read and write. And there are too many other things that I should be doing. Going outside is an event for me. I need to get up and actually do something that requires movement! Effort! MOTIVATION!

So I write a blog post, which does not...actually...fully fulfill all of the requirements entirely. Do you really want to hear about all this? I'm sure you have enough in your life without hearing from me No, I didn't think so.

I'm getting off of the computer. I need to do something (anything).

Good-bye.

Quote for Thursday, June 17, 2010:

Don't yield to that alluring witch, laziness, or else be prepared to surrender all that you have won in your better moments.

-Horace, Satires

(http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Laziness)

Muse for Today:

I was all prepared to say, "Nothing! Didn't you read the post?" but two exciting things are happening tomorrow: the Harry Potter theme park is opening in Orlando (but I can't go, so I shall have to gaze from afar) and Toy Story 3 is opening. While I am too young to fully understand The Beatles, I am far too old for Toy Story, but I shall go anyway.

Dreaming

Have you ever had anything completely destroyed?

Once, I had this little statue of two women churning butter. It was a nice little wooden statue, and I liked it a lot. My brother was angry with me (for some reason), so he broke it on purpose when I wasn't home. I fixed it with a hot glue gun, but then he just broke it again.

That made me angry. But none of his stuff is breakable, so my revenge was (and is) still uncarried-out.

That isn't what I'm talking about, though. I mean mentally. Like someone told you a fact, and it ruined the little picture you had going in your head.

I'm explaining this badly.

It's like the one guy who 'ruins everything.' You know, that one fact-checker who is always like "Dogs can't fly! That's impossible!" and you just want to tell them that you're just dreaming anyway, idiot, so shut up and let me think!

But even after that, you can never look at what you were thinking about the same way again.

I am usually that person, but I am starting to look upon myself with disdain, if that makes any sense.

It was like I found out that Vertigo was an actual place. (It's a club in Germany.) The song was a little less nice after that.

If I have mercilessly confused you, I apologize. I don't even know what the heck I'm talking about sometimes.

Quote for Sunday, June 13, 2010:

"I told you I was sick."

-written on Jeremiah Johnson's grave

(http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Epitaphs#J)

Muse for Today:

http://aircastlefancy.blogspot.com/2010/06/toast-song.html

and I saw Toy Story 2 yesterday and I feel so, so OLD. I'm not that old. I hope.

A Trying Feat

Look! I am back!

(Although you probably had no idea that I was even gone, since my posting is infrequent at best.)

I really am back, though. I just came back from a trip to Arizona yesterday. But more on that later.

I am trying to orchestrate something marvelous. It has almost been one year since I started this blog, and this is my ninety-second post. I am trying to have my one-hundredth post on this blog's one-year anniversary. This, however, requires more posting than I am used to.

So. It is now June 10th. I have a month and eight days to post eight times.

GRRR. It's not like I ever have anything useful to say, anyway. I mean, just blather on and on all of the time. I'm sure I can make it. I hope.

So. Arizona.

F.R.A.S'S Rules for Visiting Arizona:

1. Bring a water bottle. Honestly. We went in June, and that's not even the hottest month of the year. And it was really, really hot.
2. Bring chapstick. Arizona is one dry state.
3. Go there for kind of a long time. DO NOT try to squeeze all of the sights into one or two days. You will be half-dead by lunchtime. Spend all day at the Hoover Dam, all day at the Grand Canyon, all day at Montezuma Castle, all day at wherever-else-you-are-going.
4. Jeans are a bad idea. Especially if you're hiking all day- they start sticking to you. I saw this fate in most of the hikers we saw at the Grand Canyon. Yuck.
5. Make sure your camera has a wrist strap. Actually, make sure that you have a camera before you buy a wrist strap. There are lots of things to take pictures of, and lots of places where you can lose your camera.
6. Do your research first. There was this great place called Oak Creek Canyon. It's called the 'cousin to the Grand Canyon.' (Why?) Well, my parents read about it in an outdated guidebook that didn't mention how you can swim in the creek. There's this bit that is all slippery, and people sit on the current and just slide. K and I didn't bring swimsuits. So we just went down in our clothes. It was really, really fun, but I do not recommend it because it took all day for my clothes to dry off. So plan ahead! Make sure you know what you're doing, and bring everything you might possibly need.
7. Bring lots of books and notebooks. This is only if you drive around a lot and like reading and writing. My family and I had a lot of time in the car, so I read and wrote. Just bring something to do, like a music player, for the driving.
8. Bring a camera charger. Actually, bring a charger for everything. Battery runs out fast.
9. Don't go on a plane. Where did the peanuts go? No snacks? Only drinks? They charge you for blankets and pillows ($8). It costs twenty-five dollars to check in one piece of luggage. Flying on planes in America used to be fun. Now it's just vaguely annoying.
10. Bring lotion! My mother and I snuck into a Bath and Body Works at an Arizonian mall so that we could use the testers of lotion and perfume there on our hands and dusty feet. Planes don't allow the full tubes of lotion, and hotel lotion stinks. So bring the sample sizes. You'll need it.
11. Don't go with your brother. He will drag you into stadiums and cry when they aren't open. LEAVE HIM AT HOME.

I hope those rules helped.

Quote for Thursday, June 10, 2010:

Richard: His head is shaped like a football.

Emily: It is not.

Richard: If he fell asleep in the park, someone would try to punt him.

-Gilmore Girls: Season 2 (Sadie, Sadie)

(

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Gilmore_Girls/Season_2

)

Muse for Today:

Twitter. How can such idiots be on Twitter?

Something I find very amusing

For those of us who have read The Artemis Fowl Files, are ardent fans of Artemis Fowl II himself (so, only me) and wanted to listen to their kind of music would have looked up I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For by U2 (Butler's favorite song, which he said could have been written for Artemis) and It's No Game, Part 2 by David Bowie, Artemis's favorite song by a current artist.

So anyway.

I was listening to It's No Game, Part 2, and I looked at the comments on the YouTube page, and every single one of them was about Artemis Fowl. Some people who like David Bowie because he is David Bowie must be baffled.

I bet Minerva Paradizo's favorite song ever is Party in the USA. Or Eoin Colfer will spite me and have her favorite song be I Want To Hold Your Hand or something decent and tasteful and classic like that. But I hope it isn't.