When you say "I do," oh, I don't believe you

Generally I try to avoid writing about whatever new thing the media's going crazy over. There's a lot I could say about the election in Iran or all the famous people that died, but there's always someone else out there better equipped to explain those things. I realize that shouldn't stop me from expressing my thoughts here (and maybe I'd be better off for it), but more important issues always seem to come up. Someone mentions there's a Michael Jackson Sega game and suddenly my next mission is to find that game and play the hell out of it. Not just for my sake, but for the sake of everyone who heard of it and thought, "Wow, that must be weird." Well, now you don't have to think it's weird; you can know it.





( With a title screen that fancy, it's got to be good, right? Good isn't the word I'd use, but this game does have, uh... flair. )

If there are any terrible Sega games (or Nintendo/Super Nintendo ones) you think I should force myself to play for your amusement, feel free to let me know or even send me the ROMs. God knows I don't have anything better to do with my life right now!

And now for something that has nothing to do with dead celebrities, finally: A moth that looks like a hornet, which could be terrifying but is instead the cutest thing ever. I love fuzzy bugs. I love bugs that look like other bugs. I think I have a new favorite! Also from the same blog, a hawk moth with pink and black stripes. I might as well just link to the blog itself (http://thenaturalstone.blogspot.com/) since there are lots of cool moth photos on there.

Well, more like a couple days, really, since I don't have photos of every day that happened this past week. Things that did happen: Rashied came to visit! Fireworks downtown and in my yard! Bugs and cats (but not at the same time, sadly)! And a hell of a lot of food. Oh god. No more restaurant food for me for a couple months. Things that didn't happen: Taking photos in the abandoned neighborhood again because they tore all the damn houses down. Rashied and I drove around there to make sure everything was as we remembered it before we dragged all our camera equipment over there and it totally wasn't. I guess it's good that St. Louis is slightly less trashy, but it's still lame.





( You know how it goes. Photos of bugs, fireworks, cats, and creepy skulls behind the cut! )

Then Rashied went home and it was sad and blah. Then I had to do laundry and take care of my fish since somehow they're sick again. Voltaire hurt his fin on something and two of my other fish aren't eating. And yeah, I guess that's about it! Good times.

This was on a Target receipt I found awhile ago. Can you guess what I really bought for two whole dollars?!





Here is a catfish.

Rashied gets here tonight... and my car still isn't ready. However, the guy at the shop said he'd set me up with a rental car. Still waiting on Enterprise to call me back, though. Why does everything stupid have to happen when important things are going down?

Today I was going to go to Petsmart to buy more food for my fish, including sinking pellets for my flying fox, but when I looked in my fish tank I noticed old Foxy's dead body. I barely had him 7 months. He was really pretty, but my red tailed shark kept chasing him around. Maybe the stress finally got to him.

Anyway, I went looking for a new fish and found some black upside down catfish. They looked suspiciously large for baby catfish, but guy at the fish store said they only got about five inches long, so I figured I'd be alright with one. I googled it when I got home, and as it turns out, these guys get huge. Over a foot long huge. The fish also had some suspicious looking white spots on its body which was my initial reason for wanting to return him (though I see now those are normal for these guys). The fish store guy was kind of offended that I was returning the fish I just bought, but I'm kind of offended that they don't know about the fish they're selling. What the hell am I going to do with a 14 inch catfish?

I traded it for three little cory catfish, two bronze and one spotted. I don't like them as much as I liked the black one. Though they are cute, they don't swim upside down, and I doubt I could ever hand feed them because they're so high-strung. I wish I had room for a bigger fish tank anyway. I want giant fish. Or a bunch of green tiger barbs. They had one that was gorgeous, but I didn't have room for him and five friends.

I bought another snail while I was at it. Tiny Goth Snail needed a friend, and all the yellow snails they had were insanely huge. I picked a more reasonably sized one:





They're sharing an algae wafer. Keeping them in a bowl rather than my fish tank seems to be working pretty well. Al-Ghazzali (Rashied named him, haha), the betta that was in there, died a little while ago, probably of old age.

( Aaaaaand here are some more photos, some of the upside down catfish )

Rashied is going to be here on Wednesday, which is also when I get my car back (the AC broke during a heat wave. Awesome). I've had to drive my dad's car in the meantime, and it is the scariest fucking thing ever. It's tiny, it shakes if it goes faster than 45 MPH, and it makes all kinds of awful noises. Aaah I want my car back.

So, uh... I wish I had something cool to write about or sweet photos to show you, but I have not done a goddamn thing this entire week (except today, when I went outside beyond my front porch and held a conversation with a real human being oh my god!!!!). I went and had my surgery, then came home and spent the rest of the week trying not to die. I believe I have been successful thus far, though it's not quite over yet. Tomorrow could be the day! It probably won't be, but you can never be too careful.

Everything I do is complicated by codeine - either I'm dizzy or falling asleep or not concentrating on anything. It's probably a good thing I haven't had to drive myself anywhere. I just took some a little while ago so I could eat, and then I stopped being hungry. Clearly my priorities are in order as I decided to come to LiveJournal instead. Oh yeah. Now that I've started writing, I want to sleep.

Last month I was playing the Sims 2 again to see what the Stevens were up to. I was going to wait until I had more images to post these, but I really don't care about this game right now, haha.



During the last update, my Sims had a baby named James. I realized I'd never checked his stats, and... yeah, that baby's kind of a dick.

( Continue? )

( SPIDER TIME CONTINUES AFTER THESE MESSAGES )

That's all I really have to share with you, unless you want to hear about how I feel like puke except the sick isn't coming out that way. Also, Rashied is going to be here in slightly less than a month!

Rashied: it was hangover
me: i didnt drink
oh the movie
how was it> haha
Rashied: it was pretty funny
the theater was packed and man
the audience was stupid as hell
me: well, yes
Rashied: WHAT'S THAT?
UUHHH IT'S A STRAPON
HAHAHAHA IT'S A STRAPON
it was a jockstrap
holding a cup

Rashied: well you can add me as a reference
Rashied: as we are a photographer team
cough
me: yes
i will put you down! haha
Rashied: seriously
and also, my title is photographer rocket scientist
not rocket scientist photographer, cause then they think i only take photos of rocket scientists

Rashied: ive timeline all the pre-launch activities of the rocket
which is...
about 1/10th of what needsto be done
or so
maybe less
gahhhhhhh
it looks pretty though!
me: :D
pretty is good
Rashied: id show you but i cant
:(
me: it is ok
i can imagine it
Rashied: i'll tell you that it doesnt matter
the plot is pretty straight forward
the rocket launches
(shhhhh!)

Bugs are everywhere now! Obviously there are photos, since I don't use this journal for anything else.



( It doesn't quite feel like summer yet, but it's getting there )

Important stuff: Side B is in stores NOW, so if you want to read my comic, you can do that by buying the book :D I wish I had better news to report about my art currently, but I'm in the middle of some kind of godawful art block, the likes of which I've never encountered before. Seriously, I update Sconeborough once a week. It can't be that hard to think of a comic, and yet here I am, with absolutely nothing. Why is my brain broken right now?

Next Thursday I'm finally having my tonsils removed. A final fuck you to those lumps of stupid in my throat. Turns out my insurance didn't cover the hospital where the receptionist made the original appointment, which is why she was confused and thought I was on some other insurance.

Oh, also, to finally put an end to the terror that was The Current, Student Life fired everyone on the paper because of poor management and because someone on staff hadn't been a student nearly all of last semester and shouldn't have been working there. Everyone else claims they didn't know, but they were all super BFFs, so I doubt anyone believes them. I'm glad all of the jerkweeds who started this shit got fired for sucking at their jobs, and I'm glad people who weren't involved with the situation are finally starting to realize they'd been lied to by the editorial staff (and how terrible the Publications Committee is). I'm also glad my calls to Student Life about not getting paid ever might have contributed to them realizing how corrupt things were at The Current.

While it's good something's finally being done, I'm disappointed it had to come to disbanding The Current as an organization (not just firing everyone) - It's not gone forever, I know, but it's going to be hard getting the paper going again with all new staff members who have never done this before and have nobody to show them what to do. I am confident that with the right people on staff, the paper can be a great place for students to work again, though. And I'm sure nobody who caused this to happen has learned a damn thing from their mistakes and will continue to go through life blaming everyone else for their problems and expecting sympathy when it's their own fault things don't go their way. Oh well.

I've been watching the Adventures Pete and Pete lately because I got sick of Sailor Moon. Every time I watch this show, I love it even more. I don't know how that's possible, but that's why it's my favorite show. And that concludes my collection of random thoughts of the week!

( I found a bee yesterday. )

Yesterday was all kinds of awful (minus finding cool things, I guess), so I won't go into it. I will, however, leave you with a story which details yet another reason why I hate my neighbors. I was taking one of my dogs outside when I heard the husband and wife talking while the wife walked one of their 500 dogs. The husband was in the garage and didn't see me, I guess, so he said, "Just take the dog in the neighbors' yard!" The wife turned around, saw me standing in my yard, and just laughed nervously and said, "Oh, no." Way to be a loud douche!

They let their crazy little pomeranian run all over my yard without a leash and it just barks and barks while my dog goes insane (on her leash, as all dogs should be) trying to tear the shit out of it because she hates other dogs. It's ridiculous. It took me yelling at their dog to get out of my yard for them to finally call it back over. The next time it happens, I'm going to go over there and talk with them. Unfortunately, it wouldn't be the first time someone's complained to them. I hate people who won't control their dogs!

I guess it's about time for another one of these. Man, so much stuff has happened the past week. My mom is on vacation in the Dominican Republic for a week, so I've been taking care of stuff around the house. My brother has been less helpful than ever (when I ask him to do things he just tells my dad to do them instead), though my dad has been helping me out a bit. I'd still have an easier time without either of them getting in the way, though. People have been generally irritating the shit out of me this week, but that may just be because I haven't had any time to sit down and relax properly until today.

Yesterday Melissa and I went to this new stingray thing at the zoo. You pay 3 bucks to get in and pet them for as long as you want (well, at least until 3:30, when they close the stingray pool). It was awesome! The stingrays are so friendly, and they do seem to recognize people if you stay there long enough. There was one big one that kept coming up to Melissa and no one else.



( More stingray photos! Plus photos from Creve Coeur Lake and some other random crap. )

We also went to Trader Joe's on Wednesday, and I got delicious food! And then I made delicious fish and rice for dinner. I wish I had more, but I used all I had and barely made enough food for three people. I'm not used to cooking for anyone other than myself, haha.

I also got a weird call from the doctor's office. I'm having my tonsils taken out in June, but something crazy happened to my insurance, apparently, since Medicare is now my primary insurance provider and United Healthcare is secondary. I shouldn't even be on Medicare because my dad isn't retired, but he said something about possibly being forced into retirement by Boeing because they can't afford to pay people again. I would think he would say something if that actually happened, though. Who knows. He did just randomly take today and yesterday off work.

I hope it's someone reading something wrong at the doctor's office, because I really don't want to call our insurance company and deal with that on top of all the other shit I have to do until my mom comes back. Everything is stressing me out right now, and I hate it.

Yesterday I saw Asobi Seksu at the Firebird, which is really tiny and almost impossible to find. It was a fantastic show, despite the sound being a bit fuzzy, though a band as good as they are should have been in a bigger venue. It was also the drummer's birthday, so they had cake, which they brought on stage while they had us sing happy birthday to him. You know it's a good show when there's cake involved, haha. Later during a My Bloody Valentine-esque noise solo on their last song, they let the noise continue while they left the stage to go eat cake, then came back and finished playing. Hee hee. I got a shirt (because my sense of humor is 12 years old and thinks wearing a shirt with the Japanese slang for "casual sex" on it is funny), and Matt got a CD which he had the band sign. It was a good time!

I'm done with class for the semester, so I have the whole summer to do shit. I am actually going to try and get things done this time. Important things to do include: taking photos of my artwork, updating my resume/portfolio and putting them online, looking and applying for jobs, drawing a ton of awesome stuff, and finishing my project from last semester so I can work on getting it ready for a show in the fall or spring of next year. Oh, and reading those books I got at the book fair.
Pointless things I will probably end up doing instead: Finishing Okami or Final Fantasy 12 (yeah, right), playing The Sims, Alpha Centauri (because Rashied won't let me live without doing so), and The Nameless Mod for Deus Ex. Video games! Argh.
Things I probably should do at some point: Back up all of the stuff on my hard drive since I haven't done it in ages, get a bigger hard drive and new battery for my laptop, and stop swearing so much. I need a filter for the words that come out of my mouth.

There's not much else to say! A lot of stuff is happening, but I don't know which of those things I feel like writing about right now. I'll probably do it later. Instead, here are photos of Melissa's pond from last month and a bunch of weird things I found on my hard drive. None of them are funny internet pictures you've all seen a million times. Maybe they should be, though. It might be more amusing!



I'm going to start with this classic, a pair of paper bag puppets Melissa and I made for our friend Adam for his graduation. I've posted these before, but they deserve to be seen again, because they're amazing. The heads and limbs were my doing (thanks to Meathead Perspective for the Trent Reznor face template) and Melissa did the clothing. Sadly, someone dumped a cooler of melted ice on Adam's head while I was taking a photo of him with the puppets, so they got all gross and mushy :(

( Talking trash cans, dinosaur carnage, a cute frog, and baby geese! )

Here's my post about Coachella, which is going to be even longer because I have unrelated crap to add in at the end. I never want to write much when I start these things, but once I get going I end up writing too much. In any case, The Coachella bit is mostly pictures. It's easy on everyone!

( Robert Smith makes the best worst faces. Some girl takes her top off! Also, there are some drawings. )

I got my Side B book a few days ago. Here is a photo!



It looks great! You guys should all get one, haha. If you're interested, go here: Side B pre-order info.

Now for the really nerdy/boring part of this post! I finally got around to watching Ponyo, Miyazaki's latest film. I was going to wait for the english release this August but decided I couldn't wait that long after reading about it for the 853645th time. I'll see it again anyway, because it's so adorable! The animation and plot are both pretty minimal for a Miyazaki film, and it's very much like Totoro in that sense (which was probably the goal of the movie since it references Totoro a bit - one of the characters in Ponyo starts singing the Totoro theme song). There are some nice scenes, though, and some interesting imagery with the water either having eyes or being shaped like fish. You all know I love anything that has to do with fish or the ocean so fuck yes to that. Fuck yes to all the prehistoric fish too! And to Ponyo being the cutest thing ever. But fuck no to Lisa's crazy driving. Bitch be trippin'. I also had a dream once that looked very much like the last 30 minutes of the movie where everything is flooded. Crazy!

ANYWAY. It is a movie very much worth watching. I recommend it to everyone everywhere. Speaking of Ghibli films, I still haven't seen Tales of Earthsea yet. It's the only Ghibli film I haven't seen (excluding some of the pre-Ghibli ones). I heard it wasn't that great, though. Has anyone seen it?

I've also been re-watching Sailor Moon for no reason, in English because it's nostalgic and I don't care enough to try and take it seriously. There are too many special awful moments in the English version for me to miss out on, like all of the characters having random accents and the editors trying as hard as they can to hide the fact that the show is Japanese. The Sailor Moon transformation sequences totally mesmerized me when I was a kid, too. They play them every damn episode and it never gets old.

THIS ENTRY IS WAY TOO LONG. i waste too much of my life writing in LiveJournal, though I'll be glad for it when I'm old and can't remember a damn thing.

Last night a chemical plant exploded! Matt and Melissa and I tried to drive close enough to see it, but police cars had blocked the road. We could only watch from the trailer park as firefighters tried to put out the flames rising from the structural supports of the building, which was all that was left. This happened just a mile or two from my house, so it's pretty insane. Fortunately, there don't seem to be any immediate health concerns from whatever chemicals were in the plant, but if I wake up with a third arm or something one day, I'll let you guys know.

We were watching Dragonball: Evolution when it happened. I hate that I'm even admitting I paid to see this movie, but we all saw it voluntarily, having grown up watching Dragonball. I would never make someone see this movie with me unless I wanted them to suffer, because it is bad. I do have to give the creators some credit for making a bad movie that isn't boring, despite being all kinds of terrible. In a way, it is like the explosion that took place during the movie; we knew it was an awful thing, but we still spent twenty minutes driving around to find the burning building because we couldn't not witness something so insane. I can't believe Akira Toriyama let the creators of this movie put his name on it. The man must have no shame whatsoever. And neither must the actors. Good God.

This weekend was a weekend of Stuff Happening! Friday I went to the art museum with people (the same people, with the addition of Alberto, who I had not seen in forever!) and saw the Ming Dynasty exhibit, finally. After that we went to get dinner and had a very long discussion about what happened at The Current, since neither Melissa or I can let it fucking go, apparently. Then we went to That 80s Club (minus Alberto, but another friend of mine showed up) and did a lot of white people dancing to 80s hits.

Saturday I went to Jefferson Barracks with Matt and some of his friends. I almost didn't go because I felt sick (dairy before bed is always a bad idea), but it was such a nice day outside. So I have pictures of that, because that's what I do.



( And here you find out where this entry gets its title from )

And that's it. I guess I can also mention that on Thursday, Rudy and I watched Dead Alive/Braindead, a ridiculous New Zealand zombie film. Oh my god it's amazing. And disgusting. But mostly amazing. And then Sunday was Easter at my cousins' house, which is right next door to Matt's house. How crazy is that, haha.

Now it's time for Stuff I never Posted in my Journal, Part 1! I found a bunch of photos I took last year (in February, I think) in downtown St. Louis with Rashied and a friend of his. I think I just got sick of looking at them when I was picking the good from the bad and then forgot about them. But here they are now! St. Louis is kind of an interesting city in that in the same place you'll have areas that have been developed nicely and others that have been completely forgotten about. All of the things in these photos are a short walk away from each other, but they're so drastically different it's almost like looking at two different places.



( More St. Louis! )

I also went to see Beach House yesterday! They were pretty good. I have some photos of that, too, though because of the bad lighting they didn't come out that great. The original sized photos look a lot better. Red is just a color that gets totally fucked over by JPEG compression. For some reason they weren't allowed to turn the white lights on.



( About eight or nine more, not too many )

In two weeks I'm going to be in Los Angeles (yet again) for Coachella! Going to see My Bloody Valentine again and The Cure. Did I write about that already? Maybe I did. Either way, I'm excited!

HEY GUYS CHECK OUT NINE INCH NAILS' NEW ALBUM, STROBELIGHT! http://www.nin.com/strobelight/

Featuring songs like "coffin on the dancefloor," "clap trap crack slap," and "everybody's doing it (featuring chris martin, jay-z AND bono)." DON'T FORGET the fucking amazing photo of Trent Reznor in terrible 80s glasses. Also, a reminder from NIN: Copyright 2009 Nine Inch Nails !!!DO NOT STEAL!!!!

Oh my god I love you NIN.


I wasn't going to update LJ right now, but I couldn't not share NIN's masterpiece. So while I'm here, I'll throw up that "Who would you marry, fuck, or throw off a cliff" meme that everyone on my friends list has done already. From cheshcan, my choices were Neil Gaiman, Bjork, and Eddie Vedder. I guess I can not be lazy and add photos or something, too.

( HERE ARE MY ANSWERS HOW EXCITING )

Wow, a post where I didn't have photos of anything! Weird. Next time I'll do my "things I should have written in this journal but didn't" post. Right now I need to draw my comic.

edit: I knew there was something else I wanted to add. Anyone who's interested in ghosts/the paranormal should check this link out: http://www.seeingthingsthebook.com/ a bunch of people used old polaroid cameras to take photos in a house, and words and images would appear on the photos. There are some videos and photos on the site, though not nearly as many as I'd like. Even if you don't believe in this sort of thing, it's still interesting to read. And spooky!

Awhile ago I mentioned taking photos of my random collection of cat crap (excluding CDs, books, and DVDs), since Rashied sort of fake challenged me to do it, and I think I've finally got photos of everything. I'm not going to post all of them, since there are almost 100 pictures, but I am going to post a lot of them. So there's your "tons of photos" warning, not that you need one since I'm sure everyone who reads this journal knows all I do is post tons of photos. There would probably be less of them if I ever threw anything out.

If you've sent me cat-related things, you'll probably see it here! If anything, you'll see a lot of embarrassing moments from my childhood and teenage years, like the ugly clothing I wore, the retarded shit I was into, and the awful music I liked and made mix tapes of. It's a good time! ...For you. I probably wrote about a lot of these things in this journal at some point.

( Catcatcatcat )

Voltaire ate Kisker, my little yellow snail, the other day. Tore his foot off and sucked him right out of his shell, which I still have. Voltaire is a fish with issues. I got a bigger yellow snail, Jones, to replace him. That gourami I got that killed my other gouramis (Destructofish!) is alive but still isn't eating. It's starting to develop sores on its body. Nothing I've treated it with made any difference. I'm convinced this fish is fucking cursed, and I know it sounds awful, but I'm just waiting for it to die at this point.



A photo of my snails hanging out together (the yellow one is Kisker before he died).



I treated my tank with antibiotics after my two adult gouramis died just to be safe. It turned the water yellow, then pink. I kind of liked it, haha.

Nothing much has happened since the last time I updated, obviously. Animal Crossing got here today! Tom Nook is an irritating little ass. All of the characters are, really. I wish I could replace Nook with someone who wasn't such a douche.

Sometimes my appearance confuses people, I guess. Last Saturday, my mom's friend wanted to say hi to me as I was leaving to go to Petsmart. I waved at him, and then he stared at me for a bit, looking confused. Finally he said, "Oh! I thought you were a man." ...OKAY. I have a weird history of being mistaken for a dude, but I thought I'd finally escaped it. I can't even be offended at this guy because he was old, but still, what the fuck. I don't look anything like a man, and that assclown in high school who used to make fun of me by saying I did can suck it.

It got worse when I was at Petsmart. Some lady who worked there asked how old I was (you're not allowed to be in the cat area unless you're over 18) in front of this lady and her kids, because, according to her, I looked like I was 14. Embarrassing, but not as embarrassing as the kid who wouldn't stop acting like a dinosaur in public. I think she felt bad when I told her I was 22, since she said I'll be thankful to look young when I was her age. Yeah, I'd be even more thankful if you would tell me what about me makes me look 14. I'm shaped like a lady! Nothing about me looks 14! Why are your eyes broken, old woman. Why!

The rest of the day got even weirder after Melissa invited me to this party full of 30-something guys (and a few girls) who all used to work at Mid Rivers Mall together in the more 'alternative' stores. The realization that these people probably witnessed my mom paying for my ridiculous Giant Goth Kid pants at Hot Topic when I was 14 occured to me... aaaand that was about the point where I started drinking. Anyone who knows me well knows I'm not that into booze, but Jesus Christ, I needed a drink or twenty after what happened later on.

This one guy would not stop hitting on me. At first I didn't care, but it quickly went from "haha, loser" to "personal space violation! woooah," I guess because he knew I wasn't going to be impressed from the get-go and hit on me anyway just for kicks. I also saw this married couple I used to work for when I was 16 or 17. They set up a haunted house called Mall of the Dead, and it was the most disorganized piece of shit place I've ever worked for. It's a story in itself, but it's for another time. ANYWAY, they're fucking creepy people, and the wife kept eying me like she remembered me but never said anything. The husband drank my beer, too, that ass.

Later I ran into a girl from high school who also worked for the haunted house with me and was part of some OH NOES DRAMAZ with the married couple/cops. I don't know what she was doing there! Then again, I don't know what the fuck I was doing there, either. I was seriously not expecting to see any of these people at a party that took place five minutes from my house. And it is so fucking creepy to run into people you were glad to never have to see again. I felt gross for days.

This is one of the many reasons why I hate living in the midwest. Either you get the fuck out after you're done with college like a smart person with ambitions, or you get sucked into the low-income, aimless suburban trap and never, ever leave. Nothing happens here; it's an ok place to have a family, but if you stay here through your 20s and into your 30s, you've effectively screwed yourself out of ever doing anything with your life. And then you end up like that married couple who hang out with 30 year old drunks who act like they're still in high school, and you can't keep your random comic book stores in the mall open for more than a few months because you suck at life. But you keep trying, because you're convinced that one day everything will magically work out, even though you're a failure and you suck with money. Also, you're a horrible person who STEALS MY BEER.

Ugh. Uuuughhhhhhghghghgh. Okay, onto some good things! I'm going to Coachella in April with Rashied to see My Bloody Valentine (again!), The Cure (Robert Smith is old and fat now so watching him will be hilarious), and whatever other horrors we feel like witnessing that day. It's going to be awesome!

I have some artwork in a show that's opening a week from now at the NAC gallery in Ferguson. Any of you St. Louis people are more than welcome to come! All none of you who read this anymore, haha. I think I'll try Facebook instead.

In fish news (I KNOW NOBODY CARES), all of my original three gouramis are dead now. The new one I got to replace the one that died originally is exhibiting the same symptoms (not eating, looks really thin, doesn't respond to anti-parasite meds/antibiotics). My other two gouramis died shortly after I bought the new one. I got a second new gourami later, and then my last original gourami suddenly up and died. I was there when it happened, and it was really baffling. The new ones might be carrying something that killed the originals - the only thing I can think of is the Dwarf Gourami iridovirus, though these aren't dwarfs. None of my other fish seem to be affected at all, in any case. It's been pretty frustrating trying to figure out just what the hell happened, but I don't think I'm going to be buying any more gouramis for awhile. I don't want to say never since I love them, but goddamn, dead fish are sad (and sometimes scary).

I did finally buy Animal Crossing DS after my plane tickets to LA were way less expensive than I thought they'd be. Why do I always want to buy things when I don't have a reliable source of income? I know some of you guys have the game, so if my stupid wireless thing lets me, I might be able to come visit your towns or whatever it is you do in Animal Crossing.

I went to get a new gourami at Petsmart after class yesterday since it was closer than the regular fish store I go to, and they had black mystery snails. GOTH SNAILS. So I got a big old fat one and named it Obsidian. I also found another kuhli loach while I was there, so ( here are the obligatory photos )

I also found some old stuff my grandpa gave me - some old currency and what appears to be a bank statement and dog tag from a Japanese soldier in World War II. He told me all about this before he gave it to me, but my memory is awful and I've forgotten anything interesting.





( Continue to the rest of the photos, plus some extra pictures of a weird bug and a tiny plastic animal )

I never make music posts in this journal, or any journal, I guess, since this is the only one I use with any regularity, so I figure it's time to try that shit out. So here are some artists I've been listening to lately, with some links to their music you can listen to for free online so you don't have to download anything and feel cheated if it turns out you hate it.

Fleet Foxes
These guys are a very harmonic indie folk band that got a lot of attention recently, probably because Pitchfork named their self-titled album number one for 2008. I don't actually read Pitchfork, I'm just going by what last.fm says, haha. I got the rest of the album after listening to "White Winter Hymnal" and was a bit disappointed that not all of the songs were as interesting, though overall it's not bad! When they want to write a good, catchy song, they sure as hell do it. If anything, you should at least listen to White Winter Hymnal and Ragged Wood, which I think are the two best songs.

White Winter Hymnal on YouTube (official).
Ragged Wood on YouTube (fan video).

Vitalic
Vitalic is a French electronic artist who writes a lot of good songs to dance to in clubs, even though I'm not exactly a fan of the usual club dancing music. Take that as you will, I suppose. If you're looking for something mindblowingly deep, you certainly won't find it here, but his music can be pretty intense and is a lot of fun. If that's all you require from your music then you'll probably like this guy!

Poney Part 1 on YouTube (official). This is my favorite song, and the video is really fucking mesmerizing considering it's just a bunch of dogs flying around in slow motion.
Vitalic on Last.fm - the only songs available here are the first three songs on the player's list, My Friend Dario, La Rock 01, and Darkwave. My Friend Dario was my favorite of the three, but they're not hugely different from each other anyway.

The Kamkars
"The Kamkars, an Iranian Kurdish family of seven brothers and a sister, are undeniably one of the leading musical ensembles in Iran today." - I think that explains it better than I could. These guys play traditional Persian and Kurdish music, so even though they've got different songs, they all start to run together after a certain point. But if this kind of music is your thing, you won't be disappointed (if you aren't listening to The Kamkars already, of course).

The Kamkars on Last.fm. All of the songs are good, though the ones from Kani Sepi are my favorite. You can listen to some of them on their main artist page, or listen to the whole thing on the album's page.

Phil Ochs
The only reason I didn't put Phil Ochs first is because if anything on this list should be listened to by anyone, it's this guy (but the other stuff is worth checking out, too). Rashied told me about Phil Ochs ages ago, but I never bothered to listen to him until now. I don't know what I was thinking, because Phil Ochs is amazing! His usual style is writing acoustic guitar-driven protest songs with clever and often amusing lyrics (no doubt thanks to being a journalist). On his later album, Pleasures of the Harbor, he puts away the politics for a bit and adds in some piano arrangements to make much softer and more emotional folk music, though he doesn't neglect the chance to write a pretty sweet burn with the song I've Had Her. I really like this album, though most people will agree his protest songs, of which there are so many, are probably his best work.

Phil Ochs on Last.fm. You can listen to a ton of his music on here. Honestly, I'd just start with "I Ain't Marching Anymore" and work your way down the player's list. If you find yourself really digging those, the full albums A Toast to Those Who Are Gone, Pleasures of the Harbor, and Rehearsals for Retirement are also available. If there's a bad Phil Ochs song, I haven't heard it yet! They're all wonderful.

Sparks
I'll probably keep trying to force Sparks on everyone I know since you all would love them (so listen to them already, goddamnit). They've been around since the 70s and have done all kinds of crazy shit since then, but I think the best of their work is during the 70s when they were picking up on the whole glam thing. They're silly and fun to listen to, and if I had to choose a more modern equivalent it'd probably be Of Montreal, if Of Montreal wrote glam rock or something. If you don't like Of Montreal, it's ok. I don't care for them either, and I still love Sparks (Of Montreal puts on a great live show, but I still can't get into their music. Eh).

Kimono My House on Last.fm. This whole album is great! Songs of note are "Amateur Hour" and "Barbecutie," though if you like one song, you'll like them all.

Songs I like by artists I don't really listen to

Freda Payne's Band of Gold on YouTube.
I have a few other songs by Freda Payne that are pretty good, too (Unhooked and Easy Street are my other favorites), but this song is undoubtedly the best. It's been covered by many other artists, including Bonnie Tyler, and is a fantastic pop song. Freda Payne's voice is amazing, too. Other things to note: the guy who made this video really needs a fucking proofreader, haha.

Barnes & Barnes' Fish Heads on YouTube. You'll need to wait for this video to load and then skip to around 2:20 because that's when the song actually starts. I'm including it because this song was a pretty important part of my childhood. My brother and I used to sing this all the time! I recorded it off of some radio station and played it over and over again. Good old fish heads.

And I think I'm done for now. If you guys liked this and want me to do it again later, let me know! And if you have any music you want to share with me, feel free to do so! I'll give just about anything a chance, even if I know I'll probably hate it, haha.


In other less exciting news, my sick gourami died the other day. I'll probably go look for another one today, if I stop wanting to puke. My stupid tonsils started hurting again yesterday, but I found some leftover steroids and shit from when I was in the hospital. I feel a lot better today, but my sinuses are draining and everything tastes like snot (which is why I feel like puking). I'm going to go to my doctor and schedule some kind of tonsil removal procedure at some point over the summer so I never have to deal with this again.

Rashied challenged me to take pictures of everything I own that is cat-related, and I have done this. My next post will have about a million photos of all of the dumb shit I own I never bothered to throw out. I invite anyone with a camera to do the same (though it doesn't have to be cats! it can be a collection of anything), because it's kind of fun, if not a good way to waste time.

More than one would expect. Here are some ways to tell if your snail is dead:

-It hasn't moved at all in three or four days.
-Its body is grey instead of pink.
-Poking it with a net handle causes goo and tiny fleshy particles to come out.
-Holding the shell up to the light reveals the snail's insides have turned to mush (ew ew ew they were sloshing around in there all gritty and gross-like).
-It smells like rancid eggs.

I don't know how it happened, but Tompkins the snail died. Kisker is still alive, though. I went to get a new snail and got a big one (named Nantwich).



( And, as usual, more photos of Nantwich and my other fish. Voltaire made it in a few of these! )
While I'm talking about my fish (because this is the only interesting thing I have to write about), here are some interesting articles from National Geographic, but the first one is the best:

Check out this fish with a transparent head. You can see its eyes (the green and grey things, not the two sensory organs on its face) and some other crazy shit. Goddamn. Nature is awesome.

And here's a cool thing about a wild jaguar being caught in the United States, but today it was recaptured and put to sleep after they found it was suffering from kidney failure.

Finally, an article about an octopus flooding an aquarium in what appears to be a "what does this button do" moment.

Well, time to go back to working on stuff for class. Ohhhhh boy. I wish I could graduate sooner.

The other day I bought this really nice origami paper at Michael's to use for a project based on the Chinese Zodiac I'm doing for one of my classes. I thought maybe I'd make some origami animals, but after looking up what I thought were simple dog-folding instructions and completely failing to follow them correctly, I remembered how much I hate origami. I hate it because I fucking love paper animals, but there's always one whacked out step I get stuck on where they do 20 folds at once and my brain dies trying to figure it out and I end up with crinkly paper. On the off-chance the Magical Origami Stars align and give me the wisdom I need to complete the instructions, this happens:



Fuck you, origami! The only thing I was smart enough to do was use crappy paper for these. Apparently there's some thought process that's needed to fold paper into fun shapes, and my brain does not work that way. So I did the only thing I knew I could do with it and cut up all the fancy paper and made a dragon:



Not quite as awe-inspiring as a fancy folded one, but you know, whatever. Maybe I'll still get points for... uh... being really skilled with scissors. My gluing needs work.

More Stories of Origami Failure: When I was in fifth grade, we had to do a project which entailed memorizing a set of instructions describing how to make something. Then we had to repeat these instructions to the class and have them do whatever you were doing. I decided to make paper cranes, because I figured it would be easy and fun. Oh, how wrong I was. I was awful at them, but I kept going because I didn't want to do anything else. When I finally made a successful one, I figured, "Yeah I remember how to do this," and did whatever the hell I did with my free time in fifth grade. Playing Sega, probably.

When I got to class and tried to give the instructions, I got lost halfway through and some kid had to come up and finish the damn crane for me. I don't even remember the grade I got, but I know it wasn't good, haha. Someday I'll defeat you, origami, but today is not going to be that day.

I could end this entry here, but as usual, I have more photos of things. ( Today's photos include a fish with butt worms, sour stars, and tiny plastic animals. )