At Home By Myself

for the first time in a long time.

It's storming outside. I'm listening to Rosianna's videos, because her voice is like the auditory equivalent of liquid sapphire, and she's so smart it makes me feel like I'm someone smart, too.

I'm looking for my copy of Frankenstein, because I need to find it for school tomorrow.

School tomorrow.

School tomorrow.

My locker combination is written on my hand. My room's a mess of loose leaf and pens and back to school clothes, all of which shall have to be utilized tomorrow.

This can't be happening now.

(Lack of Title Skillz)

Apparently staring at an inbox devoid of Pottermore emails does not make them show up any faster.

Also, asking Pottermore why it doesn't love you makes you socially abnormal.

These are things I learned today.

It's utterly gorgeous outside, and I am looking wistfully into the last vestiges of summer because my school starts up on Wednesday morning.

This was a good summer, really. It treated me well, and I am not ready for it to be over. My coping mechanism, as school inches closer, is insane denial and not packing up my school stuff because I believe that will fix something. Like maybe school won't start until I'm fully prepared.

That is a crazy idea, but one that I wish would come true.

This is another thing I learned today.

Some of the media I've absorbed recently:
--The Murder of Bindy Mackenzie by Jaclyn Moriarty. It is 400-some pages long and I finished it the day I got it. It is really super good and I plan on reading everything Jaclyn Moriarty has written ever.
--K cajoled me into seeing Rise of the Planet of the Apes with him and my dad yesterday, and... and....
Um.
It was honestly the most horrifying thing I've ever seen in my life.
Not horrifyingly bad, mind you, it was actually fantastic and well-made and I liked watching it, but the way the story ran was terrifying, with the apes taking over and the Golden Gate Bridge and the ALZ-113...
I suggest you watch it, but I think I am done with the Planet of the Apes movies after that one. Oh.
--Primary Faction, which is the prequel to a television-show-hopeful called Chronicles of Syntax. I first read about it here, where it is explained thoroughly. There are twelve episodes of Primary Faction, and the first one is up here, in playlist form. I tried listening to it without bias (the bias being the fact that Liam Dryden is in it and is to be a main character), and it is excellent. I hope it does get picked up as a TV show, and that I can find a way to watch this show from America.
--Sketches from Catherine Tate (a former companion on Doctor Who), which are hilarious, like this one.

Quote for Sunday, August 21, 2011:

"A lady's imagination is very rapid; it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony, in a moment."

-Mr. Darcy

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

Muse for Today:

Should people be allowed to choose the way they die?

Time Travel 5

I think a lot about time travel.

Not only if it would ever be actually possible by people that aren't Time Lords/wizards/Doc Brown, but what would we do? What would be the limitations?

Where and when would we go? (We meaning me, and anyone who would use the time machine for harmless but irresponsible fun things)

Naturally, I made a list, as I am wont to do in situations, and I had 10 places/times at first, but I have boiled it down to an essential five.

Here we go.

1. August 15, 1965 at Shea Stadium, which the Beatles played on their second US concert tour. I think it would have been nice to see the Beatles when they were touring/together/alive together, and this concert just seems fabulous. Come on. Look at this and tell me it was a bad concert. Also, my sport-minded brother tells me that Shea Stadium was destroyed a few years ago, so I will also have the  advantage of going to a stadium that doesn't exist anymore and that I know nothing about.
2. The Chicago World's Fair in April 1893, for the primary reasons that I love Chicago very, very much and that they introduced the Ferris Wheel and spray paint at that fair. And it's a fair! In Chicago!
3. Times Square in New York City on December 31, 1999. While I was alive for the new millennium, I was incredibly small and I wish I had remembered something of it, because there are overwhelming odds that I will never see another millennium again. I will also enjoy it more than anyone else alive, because I will be the only person there who knows for sure that Y2K is not true. Unless there are other time travellers there.
4. September 7, 1533, for  the coronation of Queen Elizabeth I. I think she was the best ruler England has ever had (even if there are all of those sketchy rumours about her being William Shakespeare's mother). It would be nice to see the start of that era, especially since I would be able to experience 1500's England and see what England did for coronations in the 1500s.
5. Back to the beginning of this summer, to tell myself to actually do something before I waste three months. So I could do something before school starts in SIX DAYS. (I couldn't think of any interesting explanation for the last one, so I said something stupid instead of the six others I had on the list! Ta-DA!)

The problem with most historical events is that you know how it ends. You could say "JFK assassination" or "first moon landing", but you know what happens. The thrill is sitting there, not knowing what's happening next, instead of standing in the back, rolling your eyes and mouthing "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" along with Neil Armstrong. That's what I realized as I looked over my carefully prepared list.

But perhaps there's a different sort of thrill in hearing the words spoken by the original speaker for the first time in anyone's lives? Maybe there is a thrill in sitting in a theater with people who are finding out that Darth Vader in Luke's father for the first time, even though you have known for practically all of your life?

Hmm.

If you want, tell me your Time Travel 5. Put it in a comment or write a post about it. Whatever floats your boat. I just hope you lot are a hell of a lot more creative than me.
Now I will listen to Explorers 6 for the nineteenth time and then go to bed.

Favorite Thing on the Internet #45

Personally, I don't watch My Little Pony.
BUT.
If you're ever bored you should head over here where you can MAKE A PONY. You can even make yourself into a pony.
Love, love, love.
I am currently working on making myself into a pony, but first I made this gem:

Think of this as...the ideal FRAS pony. As what I dream I will someday be. I think my subtle title for this picture captures it all- "IDEAL UNICORN PONY WHO IS ALSO A COP."
And so it is.

Writing for You

Things that I have recently acquired:

• 80's Glam skinny Sharpie pens and I adore them very much.
• The Taming of the Shrew and Frankenstein for school. I do not adore these as much.

Things that I am reading:

• An extremely confusing, but tolerable, biography of Coco Chanel that I picked because it had cool pictures and I have the methods of a  four-year-old
• (Rereading, actually) Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, because that is my second-favorite book in the series and the book is good
• Hound of the Baskervilles. Yeah. Because Sherlock Holmes makes me wish I knew him. (Also, did you know there's a TV show? My friend showed it to me a while back on Netflix. It takes some ideas from the Arthur Conan Doyle stories, but it's not bad.)

Random somethings I have on my nightstand:

• An empty bottle of Coca-Cola that commemorates the company's 125th Birthday
• A plush bear that I think I got for Valentine's Day. It has a little pocket in which I keep paper clips. When do I even use paper clips? Hardly ever. But I have them. In this bear.
• A wooden cat, for some reason.
• A partially broken camel from Luxor, in Las Vegas. He has been dropped so many times that it is a wonder that he is only partially broken.
• A guitar pick.
• Three tennis balls for my juggling endeavors.

Things that I have realized that don't affect me in any meaningful way:

• Sandy Olsson, in Grease, looked better before she went all leather. Compare this picture to this picture. I don't know about you, but I prefer the first one.
• Whoever thought of backlit keyboards was a clever person.
• My blog is a hyperlink minefield.
• A man named Benedict Cumberbatch plays Sherlock Holmes on Sherlock.
• Is that not the most fantastic name you've ever heard?
• David Tennant, who played the Tenth Doctor on Doctor Who, is getting married to Georgia Moffat, who is the real-life daughter of Peter Davison, who played the Fifth Doctor.
• BUT
• Georgia Moffat played the Tenth Doctor's daughter in an episode of Doctor Who.
• So she is the real life daughter of the Doctor and the TV daughter of the Doctor and she's getting married to the (former) Doctor.
• Is this weird or what? It feels like this is some convoluted kind of incest when it so obviously isn't.
• Anyway, if you don't watch Doctor Who, I imagine that was somewhat confusing and meaningless for you and I'm sorry. Here is some soap that has a cookies-and-milk pattern. It even smells like chocolate-chip cookies.
• No, but seriously, you should watch Doctor Who.

Quote for Saturday, August 6, 2011:

It's okay to be fat.  So you're fat.  Just be fat and shut up about it.

-Roseanne Barr

Summing It Up

It is a new(ish) month and I, for one, will be heading off to school towards the end of it. So let me start August off with a lazy post.
Frankly, the last week of this month will involve more work than I have done these past two months. Well, three months, since I started counting school as over in mid-May.

1. I am not doing BEDAugust. I was considering it. And I missed the first two days, so honestly I don't think it counts anymore. Also, I am not interesting enough to do this twice a year. I'll stick to April. Anyway.
2. For the first time ever, I went to a real, full-blown concert. There was an enormous number of people there. It was stickily and blisteringly hot. And it might have been the best night of my entire short life. Seriously. Best day ever. Insert your Tangled gifs here.
3. I might have a job working for a company I hate. Well, I say might. They've offered. Did I imagine my first job would be this? No. Is it legal and does it pay me more money than I thought I would get at my first job? Yes. Do I need/want money? Yes. Am I going to work for Evil? ...probably.
4. Also, my friends and I registered for Pottermore beta, for which I am inappropriately excited. For not knowing what is and having serious doubts about the actual function of the site, you could even say there is absolutely no call for me to be so excited.
5. One of my friends and I spent the last thirty minutes coming up with bad pre-set Pottermore usernames, like BezoarSeeker89 or MugwumpMandrake456. Some of these have the potential to be truly atrocious usernames.
6. I am teaching myself how to juggle, and I am actually not doing that badly. I don't know where I will use this, but I do have a plan.

And that is all.
Music: Sunny Afternoon/The Kinks
(Deviating from my usual Quote/Muse format because I really like this song, The Kinks have recently reclaimed my heart, and I wanted to put only this at the end of the post.)