smell the ocean in your hair

everyone needs an injection of adams in their day. i could quote so much more but i will limit myself to my favourite section. i think my second favourite is a description of san fransisco that britta would especially appreciate.

**

Arthur looked. Much to his surprise, there was a velvet paisley-covered Chesterfield sofa in the field in front of them. He boggled intelligently at it. Shrewd questions sprang into his mind.

'Why,' he said, 'is there a sofa in that field?'

'I told you!' shouted Ford leaping to his feet. 'Eddies in the space-time continuum!'

'And this is his sofa, is it?' asked Arthur, struggling to his feet and, he hoped, though not very optimistically, to his senses.

'Arthur!' shouted Ford at him. 'That sofa is there because of the space-time instability I've been trying to get your terminally softened brain to get to grips with. It's been washed up out of the continuum, it's space-time jetsam, it doesn't matter what it is, we've got to catch it, it's our only way out of here!'

He scrambled rapidly down the rocky outcrop and made off across the field.

'Catch it?' muttered Arthur, then frowned in bemusement as he saw that the Chesterfield was lazily bobbing and wafting away across the grass.

With a whoop of utterly unexpected delight he leapt down the rock and plunged off in hectic pursuit of Ford Prefect and the irrational piece of furniture.

They careered wildly through the grass, leaping, laughing, shouting instructions to each other to head the thing off this way or that way. The sun shone dreamily on the swaying grass, tiny field animals scattered crazily in their wake.

Arthur felt happy. He was terribly pleased that the day was for once working out so much according to plan. Only twenty minutes ago he had decided he would go mad, and now here he was already chasing a Chesterfield across the fields of prehistoric Earth.

Douglas Adams
Life, the Universe and Everything

don't be amazing or i'll miss you too much

it has been a fun filled month of fashion and frivolity... o wait. i think that must have been someone else's month. mine was more of the procrastinating, then working too hard until i make myself sick variety. but i enjoyed it all the same.

honestly, i love working too much. i really do. it's only when i'm overdoing things to the point where i don't have time to even consider standing still or thinking for any period of time that i stop over analyzing my life. and at any level of activity below that pace i constantly feel i should be doing more. unfortunately, my body doesn't seem to appreciate it the same way my mind does. i have been down and out with a cold for a week now. and it is not pleasant. i'm pretty much over it. i'm down to the hacking cough that explodes inside my head all night. almost better.

it has been a ridiculously long time since i've posted here and i've had bazillions of things that i've thought i'd like to write about. can i remember what they were? of course not. i am quite excited about the comments and suggestions people had about my last post. crappy art night? that's awesome! i'm doing it. and it's gonna be great in its crappiness.

have i ever mentioned how very much i love the sun?

this house is sad because he's not tidy

i fear i have no imagination.

i am constantly humbled, even crippled or paralyzed, by what other people are capable of creating. i have some pretty amazing people in my life who are simply fearless. they can plunge their fingers into dirt and form art without considering that what they are doing may be difficult for other people. they don't wonder if what they do is 'good' - it is original, it is theirs. they ask nothing from it but that they enjoy the process and perhaps learn something. and in shedding the challenges, or maybe not even recognizing their existence, they free themselves and are able to create incredible music, art, poetry, and design.

i think i lack something they have. i've given this a lot of thought throughout my life, as it has almost always been an issue for me. i desire the ability to freely create but something holds me back. sometimes i wonder if it is simply raw talent and other times i think it is the determination and drive. or maybe the courage to fail hundreds of times in order to succeed just once. then again, i also use the excuse that i am a left-brained rational mastermind and perhaps i just have no creative juices flowing through my veins. or they are immobilized by my decided lack of emotion or heart. i have many theories, as you can see.

perhaps i just use up all my imagination making excuses for myself. that and my dreams.

i have read ryan's ideas for strengthening one's right brain and i occasionally remember to do the exercises, though i'm not entirely sure that i'm doing them correctly. and i have been trying to force myself to do things i am not comfortable with, such as writing and painting. even showing it to people. trying not to care what they think but just sharing so as to inspire and encourage one another to continue in these attempts. i don't know if this will ever come naturally to me. any tips?

all the unborn chicken noises in my head

beth says i smell like a library.

love is the heart of fear

i do not enjoy food preparation. i am very likely the laziest person in this regard. i despise having to think about or plan or prepare or anything to do with food prior to eating it. if i was rich i would hire a chef before i would hire a maid. i go through phases of eating pop tarts or popsicles for every meal simply because they are brainless.

it's definitely a trait i inherited from my mother. she cooked out of necessity, not pleasure. and she often told me that we would save amazing amounts of time and energy if we didn't have to eat everyday - and multiple times everyday!

it's true though. if i dedicated as much time to writing, or painting, or playing guitar, or graphic design, or service, or reading the Bible... the list goes on - all the things i'd rather be doing. for the sake of example, let's say playing guitar. if i spent hours everyday and set aside a budget every month solely for guitar, i would have actually learned an entire song before i turned 24.

i just remembered that britt is doing (or just finished) the master cleanse. i did that a couple years back and it was fantastic. except i did miss the joy of eating.

so i suppose in my paradise food will just be lying around waiting to be eaten. platters of sushi, trays of tarts, banquets and feasts randomly set up throughout the earth. perhaps britt and karen will take care of that for me.

imagining lightning striking sea sickness

now he would never write the things that he had saved to write until he knew enough to write them well. well, he would not have to fail at trying to write them either. maybe you could never write them, and that was why you put them off and delayed the starting. well he would never know, now.

* * *

it was not so much that he lied as that there was no truth to tell. he had had his life and it was over and then he went on living it again with different people and more money, with the best of the same places, and some new ones.

you kept from thinking and it was all marvelous. you were equipped with good insides so that you did not go to pieces that way, the way most of them had, and you made an attitude that you cared nothing for the work you used to do, now that you could no longer do it.

ernest hemingway
the snows of kilimanjaro

proud of ourselves for using so many verbs and nouns

gonna let everybody see just what you are

today i am 24. i do not enjoy getting older. i fight it with all my being but time doesn't even seem to notice my efforts. i've been anticipating this day for months now. i thought it would make it easier on me if i made a list of things i wanted to accomplish before i turned twenty-four. unfortunately, i suppose it only helps if you do the things on the list.

but instead of dwelling on how much i don't want to be older, how i don't feel older, definitely not wiser or more mature, let alone successful or accomplished, i'm going to attempt a positive perspective. what did i do while i was 23?

the obvious: i traveled across the country in a vw van. i made friends in every province and territory except newfoundland and nunavut, climbed buttes in saskatchewan, ate bagels in montreal, watched cirque du soleil in toronto, went to the stratford festival, camped by the great lakes, reached the atlantic ocean. definitely the highlights of the past year.

what else? i auxilliaried as often as i believe i was capable. i persisted in finding work that will enable me to pioneer again (hopefully soon!). i settled into the middle of a new congregation instead of disappearing in the edges. i started learning guitar (again) and actually made some progress. i stayed in close contact with my parents even after moving so far away.

i have many regrets. those are much easier to list. but i won't. at least, not here. i'll put them somewhere else - on a page entitled 'things to change and accomplish while 24.' check back in a year to see how that works out for me.

i saw a spaceship fly by your window

not too long ago, i wrote about a dream i had involving myself and my fictional wedding. it has come to my attention that all i have to do is whisper the words 'marriage' or 'wedding' and some of you people start to giggle like little school girls. (you know who you are.) i'm not here to defend myself. i feel that my celibacy is such an established fact at this point that it is beyond needing justification.

i have a wild and wonderful life in my dreams. some nights i'm getting married; others i'm an international jewel thief being chased by tin soldiers. last week i had a dream that i was wearing a rubber unitard painted like a fish and rollerskating down endless hills; later, that i was visiting with an old friend in a grocery store when a random boy came up and kissed me then ran away. (yes, i said 'kiss' and 'boy.' no giggling.) once i drove from pg to paris on a motorbike in a single night. when i am stressed, i am usually trying to save small children from certain death. last night i was cooking in an unknown kitchen when it was brought to my attention that i was not wearing any pants.

i consider all these dreams to be equally preposterous and unlikely to happen in reality. so me dreaming about my wedding is not a sign of anything. you can stop with the giggling.

i just don't feel much like a scarecrow today

if he was going to have delusions at least he was going to have a clear brain to look at them with.

william faulkner

intruder in the dust

there's a lot of me inside you

monica pointed out to me at some point long ago that i like to collect canned food. i don't know where this started or why i feel the compulsion to buy my food in this form but it's true. i watch myself fill my cupboards with peaches and soups and beans and am unable to stop. i generally prefer to eat fresh food so i think i must be storing up for armageddon. my emergency kit, perhaps? i've decided to ban myself from the canned food aisle until i've used up what i have. anyone have recipes for corn, mixed bean salad, tuna, and pineapple?

here i come to dance around the sun

i've become re-obsessed with the myers-briggs personality tests. it's always in the back of my mind, especially as i meet new people. i'm constantly categorizing n's and s's, t's and f's. beth brought home a book about it the other day because she said she needed to understand me. monica she gets, but apparently i'm difficult to comprehend. who knew? i suppose that's all part of being a rational (an nt). we think everyone else thinks like us but very few do. i wish i could relate to how other's minds work.

i live with an infp (monica) and an enfp (beth). i suppose that's why beth gets monica - they're practically the same. i find i surround myself with idealists. they are fun and creative people. perhaps a little flighty at times.

i'm an intj, if you're interested. (if you're not, you're quite likely an s). that means, among other things, that i am fiercely independent and critical. i am also a perfectionist. so all my rambling discontent - ya, that fits right in. i suppose i'll always be this way. it's just who i am.

guess who else in an intj. arnold schwarzenegger. i'm in good company.

you smile and say the world doesn't fit with you

in my current physics book (thanks to ryan and jordan for starting me on this. my head hurts but i can't stop.) i read today that 'nature always prefers to be in the lowest energy state.' i can't wait to use it on the next person who accuses me of being lazy.

'there is nothing abnormal about sleeping fourteen hours a day. nature always prefers to be in the lowest energy state.'

i think that will go over very well.

born in the blue market

"invention... does not consist of creating out of void, but out of chaos."

mary wallstonecraft shelley

each time you turn a corner you're right back where you were

today at work weldon said 'happiness is finding what you're looking for.' i thought that was rather profound. he was talking about a lost cheque but it got me wondering what i'm looking for.

beth and monica both disagree with that, which bothers me. beth says happiness is enjoying the journey to what you're looking for. monica says it's being happy where you are. keep in mind they are both idealists. i'm not entirely sure how that relates but it must. they live in the present and i live in the future? i'm never content where i am. and i know it's not a physical location (of course, there is a difference between knowing and living), it should be a state of mind, i suppose.

re-reading that paragraph, i don't think i'm making myself very clear.

i just finished 'feynman's rainbow' which is the autobiographical story of two physicists in the 70s. the writer was young and unsure which direction to take and he was inspired by an older, terminally ill professor. the gist of the story was that we should chase our own rainbow. if we chase someone else's rainbow we have the struggle without being able to appreciate the beauty of what we're pursuing. for example, the author was caught up in the rat race just like everyone else - chasing money and prestige, because these were the things he thought he was supposed to be after. but his conversations with feynman taught him to find what makes him happy and pursue that.

i've always wanted, and tried, to live this way. i've been very determined not to be distracted by what other people think i should be doing. but instead i've become distracted by what i think i should be doing. but i don't think it is necessarily what i should be doing.

o good gracious. what annoying navel gazing. ignore me. i think i'm just upset because i'm 0 for 9 at tim's roll up the rim.

i should end this since my room mates are mocking me. i think they are genuinely emabarassed that i am 'blogging' in their presence. they're telling me that it should not be done in public. in fact, they would rather that i not say the word blog ever. it's amusing when people are ashamed of you.

whatever. monica is listening to 'my humps.' she has not earned the right to be ashamed of me.

ch-ch-ch-ch-chia

why would i hitch a ride when i can drive?

tonight i took myself on a date. after work i went to an adorable coffee shop called the paper chase for a dinner consisting of a curried vegetable burger with couscous salad. i have no problems with eating by myself in a restaurant. actually, i do it far more often than i probably should since i am lazy and don't particularly enjoy cooking. however, after dinner i also took myself to a movie.

the oxford had a one night showing of raiders of the lost ark at 7:00. i love that movie, as i love indiana jones (i suppose i could say i had a date with young harrison). i even love the historical and biblical references, even though they are so often incorrect. as it is a thursday evening and most people i know had their meeting, i went alone.

it was surprisingly strange.

i'm used to doing things alone and it rarely concerns me. why is it that going to a movie, where you sit in a dark theatre, facing forward, not interacting with any of the people you go with, feels like it is supposed to be a social activity? i felt conspicuous all evening.

and it didn't help that i also won the door prize. i think they picked my ticket on purpose to draw more attention to me.

'look eveyone! this girl came to the movies alone! let's all point and laugh!'

i don't really think that. i know the majority people are too self absorbed to bother noticing who else is even in the same room as them. including myself, since i obviously spent the night fretting about being there sin amigos. it was just such an odd experience. i felt i needed to share it.

i could take a sleeping pill and sleep at will

monica has returned from a land far far away bearing wonderful gifts. we spent the afternoon drinking tequila, eating pop tarts, and catching up.

just for the record, tequila and pop tarts do not go well together.

once again that rising sun is dropping on down

before he could leap and spring and smother and blot it from thinking not because you dont dare think whole even to yourself the entirety of a dear hope or wish let alone a desperate one else you yourself have doomed it but because thinking it into words even only to himself was like the struck match which doesn't dispel the dark but only exposes its terror - one weak flash and glare revealing for a second the empty road's the dark and empty land's irrevocable immitigable negation.

william faulkner
intruder in the dust

it's so easy to leave me

last night i dreamed that i was getting married. i was surprisingly calm about the whole thing, especially considering it was after 10pm the day of the wedding and i had absolutely no plans. my mom and my girls were getting me ready and i kept remembering things i should have done, like find a dress or ask people to come, and they would tell me they had taken care of it. then i would wander off and get distracted watching tv or doing something else completely unrelated. finally i decided i should see the guy i was going to marry, since, somehow, this hadn't happened before. it was only after i met him and saw that he had a mullet that i started to worry. thankfully i woke up.

i'm guessing this was prompted by the news that cody cloarec is engaged to his sweet little marissa. i very much want to be at the wedding but unless a miracle occurs i highly doubt it will happen. it'd be fantastic though.

you may notice i've made some changes. i've also finally added the pictures from my trip... it only took me how many months? four? that's progress. at least i actually did it. the links should be down on the right somewhere. enjoy.

i went to cats this past friday. it was a spontaneous whim - read about it thursday and bought myself a ticket for the next night. it was splendid. and strange. so very, very odd. i knew going in that it was all about cats and that the lyrics were taken from poetry by t.s. eliot, but there is a difference between knowing and experiencing. i spent the entire first act baffled but gave up on trying to make sense of it for the second. that made it much more enjoyable.