A Bit of Housekeeping and My Debut as a Fashion Blogger

First of all, I would just like to inform everyone that now that I have discovered how to schedule posts, they won't always be posted on the day that you are reading them.  I will be writing things as they pertain to me now.  For example, if I say yesterday, I mean the day before I wrote the post, not necessarily the day before you read it. Okay? Good.  And another thing, I decided I don't like page breaks.  They just make my home page look like a massive wall of text.  Now onto the second order of business.

I do not plan to become solely a fashion blogger.  In fact, I emphatically refuse to become solely a fashion blogger.  I have way to many thoughts in my head to do that, and if I don't share them, my head will likely implode.  Nobody wants that to happen.  Besides that, my abilities to be a fashion blogger are severly limited, since my camera totally sucks and I don't have a tripod.  I took a ton of photos at different angles in a mirror, but I like the headless "look at my outfit and not my wonky facial expression" one best.  Also, the flash on my camera didn't like the mirror, so I turned on literally every single light in the apartment for these photos.  I also had to unplug my desk lamp and place it at my feet in the living room/dining room/entryway (those are all the same thing) in order to not be all poorly lit.  So headless outfit shots will become a common feature on my blog now.  Without further ado, here is what I wore today.  I included one photo with my head and my wonky expression, just so you could see my hat and jacket.

with coat and hat

playing with angles

the headless shot I plan to continue

closeup of my boots

The hat was a Christmas gift from my grandma last year.  I got the coat from Goodwill last year for $8.  The brand is Tulle.  I have a different coat, also from Goodwill, that is the same brand and I love them both.  The sweater was my Aunt Katy's.  She died of cancer a few years ago and when I wear it, I feel like she's giving me a hug.  I love it, but G calls it my "grandma sweater".  I haven't told him why I like it so much.  I just try to wear it when I won't be around him.  The belt is from Goodwill. It cost $5 and I wore it to death.  It's torn and I'm still wearing it until I buy another.  I got these jeans at Sears for $10 on sale.  They are my favorites and I wear them constantly, since I only have two pairs of jeans that fit.  These are the brown boots I bought from Goodwill last month for $7.  I have already worn them enough to get my money's worth.  I need to make sure I wear socks with them though, because today I didn't and they rubbed my heels fairly raw.  I wear them instead of rain boots, because they're waterproof and I don't own rainboots.  I found a similar pair online for $400.  I love Goodwill.  So this is my debut into fashion blogging, which will be a semi-regular thing from now on.

Rite Aid is Great

I went and shipped the eBay order and found out that I am undercharging my customers for shipping.  I also found out that shipping things is unnecessarily complicated.  Then I went to Rite Aid.  I got so many things and I still have almost $30 left on my rewards card from my bank.

I got a sample size face mask, lotion (I wanted face moisturizer but that stuff is expensive so I'm just going to keep using ordinary unscented lotion), a face scrub, an eyeshadow brush, a new shower pouf because mine has a destroyed handle, 100 cotton balls, my clear fairy lights, and leftover candy corn from Halloween (don't judge me, it lasts a long time and I've been craving it since my Halloween was unfortunately candy corn-less) all for $21.  The lady who rang me up was really cool and gave me the savings even though I don't have a Rite Aid card.  So I saved $4.  So I basically got the eyeshadow brush and candy corn for free : )  And I'm going back tomorrow(which is actually today, since this is a scheduled post) to get Kleenex (which I completely forgot to put on my list), an eyebrow comb, and Sally Hansen nail strips which I've been wanting to get for a while and review.  I'm still undecided between the special Christmas patterns, the sparkly black, and the lace pattern.  Time to drink hot chocolate and decorate my wall.

the haul, not pictured: candy corn, because I ate some and put the rest in a ziploc

Also, G took me bowling this weekend and I beat my previous high score, which was 80.  I got 100!  Also, shout-out to Sinful Colors nail polish.  I buy it at Walgreens for $1 a bottle and it works like a champ.  After bowling 3 games, there were only a few tiny chips.

Annoyances and Plans for Today

First off, I would like to welcome my 22nd follower, Miss Sassy Pants from A Few French Fries Short of a Happy Meal.  She's great not only because she alleviated my OCD from having an odd number of followers, but also because she comments regularly on my blog and writes a pretty awesome blog herself.  There's a post about her calling the police when she thought the zombie apocalypse was happening, guys.  I'm so following.

I would write an entire post on how much DSHS's phone system sucks, but they give me free money, so I'll just complain a little bit (and by a little bit, I mean a lot).  For those of you lucky enough to not know what DSHS is, it stands for Department of Social and Health Services.  It's where us poor people get food stamps and medical assistance from.  Right now I only get food stamps, and I applied a few months ago for medical assistance.  They supposedly sent me a letter that I never received asking for copies of my bank statements and a bunch of other stuff I don't have because I'm poor, such as car insurance and proof of assets.  I never got this letter, but I did get the letter saying they were denying me medical help because I never sent them that stuff.  I immediately printed off my bank statements for the time period they asked for and mailed them with a letter explaining that I had never received the initial request.  They never responded.  I gave them a whole month.  So then I called them.  Or rather, I attempted to call them.  You may remember when I was trying to get food stamps and ended up eating rice sandwiches for a week because their phone system totally sucks and I couldn't reach them.  Well, it took me about a week of continuous calling to reach them again.  It's weird because if you want to talk to an actual person, you usually get a message saying that all of their operators are busy and to try again later, and then the phone system automatically hangs up on you.  Well, the one time that I actually got put on hold, I managed to talk with them.  They were very good about it after I explained the situation and told me they would make it top priority to re-evaluate my case.  Two weeks later, I still haven't heard back, so I am trying to contact them again.  Let's hope it doesn't take a week this time.

In other news, today I am going to mail the skirt to the person who bought it from me on eBay, and then I am going to Rite Aid to get some clear Christmas lights for my room and possibly random other stuff.  I still have $50 from my bank, after all.  And then I'll come back and hang the lights, and string a ribbon through my mask to hang it with, and make my jewelry organizer, and then my room will be decorated to my liking.  And then, if I still feel like it, I'll dye my hair, because my roots are showing and it bugs me.

Until we meet again, enjoy this cozy winter outfit and enter my giveaway.

Keeping Cozy by jaythejedi featuring sequin beret hats

I want some sweater tights right now!

The Obligatory Things I'm Thankful for Post

I'm not doing this just because it's expected. I'm doing it because I really want to.  First of all, I'm thankful for all the people who read my blog, especially my 21 followers.    You guys have been my only friends at some times and you've helped to keep me sane.

I would like to welcome my newest follower, Marvah Gorlorwulu from Nonsensical Babbles. This girl is only 15 years old, but she has one of the most interesting life stories I've ever read and she's a lot more grown-up than most adults. She recently moved from the US to Ghana and her blog chronicles the results of this move and her adjustments to her new living situation.  It's a great read and very well-written.  I guarantee you'll feel a lot better about your problems after reading her blog.  Of course I'm thankful for my friends and my family, and especially for G.  I spent Thanksgiving with G and his family, and it was full of great food, not-so-great-food (really bitter salad and way too much rum in the whipped cream for the pumpkin pie), and Scrabble (which G and I lost at, as a team, because our spots kept getting used by other people for less points than our words would have gotten in the same places).  I got to talk to my mom and dad twice in the past few days and it was really great.  I just don't ever call them because I'm so bad at small talk.  I want to talk to them, but I never call unless I have news to share, a job interview or a doctor's appointment coming up, for example.  My life has been staying pretty much the same for a while, so I don't feel like I have anything interesting to say.  I know that I need to start calling sometimes just to talk though.  I found this quote recently on a blog I follow, one that you should follow to, because it's usually hilarious and always entertaining.   "Unemployment feels like swimming underwater in a pool of jello: difficult, slightly suffocating, and surprisingly delicious at times."-Annah from Red Means Go  It's so true and eloquently put.  When I start searching for jobs, it seems so overwhelming that I have to stop before too long.  Everyone wants you to already have experience, but nobody will hire you so you can get experience.  It's so frustrating and feels suffocating.  But then it can be delicious when you just say, you know what, screw those jobs, I'm going to make up my own job and it will be way better than any of those.  So that's how I became a jewelry artisan and freelance designer, and soon a thrift store reseller.  I am also super grateful that I made both my first Etsy sale and my first eBay sale on Thanksgiving and the following day.  I can't be thankful for things without being thankful for being able to walk.  Those of you who are new to my blog probably don't know it, but last year, from October to May, I couldn't walk and I was in a wheelchair.  It sucked and was completely disheartening and occasionally soul-crushing.  It did give me a new outlook on life, which I'll be forever grateful for, but I wouldn't go through that again for all the money in the world.

And it pales in comparison to everything else, but I'm thankful for the Washington Huskies' basketball team winning this week and the Washington Huskies' football team winning the Apple Cup and getting to go to a bowl game.  Last year was the first year we made it to a bowl game in 8 years, so going two years in a row is pretty cool.  The Apple Cup is where University of Washington plays Washington State University.  It's an intense rivalry, and we won it 38-21!

First World Problems

I want to eat pistachios, but I don't want to mess up my nails.
There was too much rum in the whipped cream yesterday, so I had to scrape it off my pumpkin pie.
I got nail polish on the edges of my fingers when I was painting them, and can't remove it without accidentally removing the polish on my nail too.

So I'm sort making fun of myself, but I also really want to know if anyone has suggestions for the last one.  Does this happen to anyone else? How do you fix it? Or how do you prevent it to start with?

I hope all of you had a fun Thanksgiving.

Dollar Tree/ Bookstore Haul

So my shopping trip yesterday didn't go exactly as planned.  The store I sell my books to isn't buying books this week because it's Thanksgiving week.  The store I want to sell my CDs and DVDs to just bought a bunch of CDs and doesn't have money to buy my stuff.  Then I went to Dollar Tree and got everything I wanted from there, but my reward card from my bank was declined.  I purchased the stuff anyway, since it was 5 nice looking picture frames and one nice piece of wall art for a total of $6.

the frames and art

You can't read it but it says, "Life is not measured by the breaths you take, but by
the moments that take your breath away." It's one of my favorite quotes.

So I have to call and figure out if I need to activate the reward card or what.  On the bright side of that, I still have the full $50 to spend on my fairy lights for my room and on stuff from Goodwill.  Walgreens is selling the lights I want for $4, so I get to buy $46 dollars worth of clothes from Goodwill sometime soon.  That's practically enough for a new wardrobe! I usually spend about $8 for pants and around $5 for skirts or shirts at Goodwill, so I can buy 2 pairs of pants, 5 skirts or shirts (some combination of the two), a cute scarf, and probably still have enough leftover for a pair of gloves (the one-size-fits-all kind).  When I think of it that way, I'm not bummed at all. 

In other news, the bookstore was wildly successful.  I bought a hat that doesn't go in my eyes for way more than I would normally spend, but I used my rebate, so it's like free money.  It was $20 and it's made out of alpaca fur and I love it. 

the hat

I also bought some jewelry stuff, including ribbon, hemp cord in 4 great colors, and rhinestones.

the bookstore haul

And I found the coolest paper ever to use on my earring organizer.  It's about the weight of slightly thicker tissue paper, so it will be really easy to poke earrings through.  I couldn't decide between these two, so I got both.  They were only 50 cents each! One has actual sheet music pieces made into it, and the other has shiny gold colored fibers and swirls of white fibers.  I think I'll quarter them and do a checkerboard sort of thing. I'll post pictures when I finish, of course.

the sheet music paper

the fiber paper

And in other other news, I have learned to put on my makeup quickly.  It only took five minutes to do my whole face, minus mascara and eyeliner.  I didn't feel like wearing mascara today and I suck at eyeliner so I usually don't bother.  I think it turned out pretty well.  I even did a smoky eye!  Everything on my face in this picture is e.l.f. makeup, except my foundation.  I still plan to review the makeup, but haven't gotten around to it yet.  Obviously I like it enough to keep wearing it though.

the makeup and the top half of my outfit (bottom half was skinny jeans from Ross and the
brown boots from Goodwill, which turned out to be pleasantly waterproof)
camera necklace from Etsy, guitar pick skull necklace made by my awesome brother

Busy Today

Last night G and I went to the mall and traded in some old video games and bought some new ones.  G finally got his NBA Live 2010 game, and informed me when I woke up this morning that he stayed up until 4 in the morning playing it.  I got Resident Evil 5, because I love zombie movies, so why not get a zombie game? I didn't play it until I got the second Spiritual Stone on Ocarina of Time.

I found out that zombie games are hard.  I only had one grenade when I got attacked by a seemingly endless horde of zombies in the African village, and not nearly enough ammo.  Plus, my computer-generated partner is way better at needing rescued from blood-thirsty zombies than she is at blowing their heads off.  So after those zombies murdered my partner three different times, I gave up for the night.  I watched some Futurama on Netflix, then went to bed.  And apparently G stayed up late playing baskestball.  I didn't know because I am a ridiculously sound sleeper.  I once slept through an earthquake, true story.

Anyway, today I am going to the Ave for a shopping adventure.  I intend to only spend free money.  I have quite a large rebate from the University Book Store.  I plan to get a hat and new slippers from their apparel section, and then see what the art supplies section has for things I can make jewelry with.  I also want to get some fabric there to use in my new jewelry organizer I am going to make.  Then, with the money I discussed yesterday, I intend to do what I said I would, except instead of buying jewelry supplies with the remainder, since I'm getting that stuff at the bookstore, I am going to get some stuff at Goodwill.  I want to get at least one shirt, skinny jeans, and maybe a cute scarf.  We'll see how that goes.  But first I plan to go to two different stores and attempt to sell all my CDs, some DVDs, and some books.  So that's the game plan, and of course I'll share with you if I'm successful or not, probably tomorrow, or Thursday, since G has tomorrow off and we might go bowling.

Free Money

First off, I just want to inform you all that because of the review I did of A Clockwork Orange yesterday, in which I was giving a rather detailed summary of the movie, in which I used the word threesome exactly once, people are now finding my blog by searching "threesome".  So if you're here because you're looking for a story about a threesome or trying to be in a threesome, sorry but you're in the wrong place.  There are no threesomes here.

Now to the actual topic of the post.  Yes, that's right, this post actually has a topic that I intend to stick to.  You may or may not know that nearly all of my posts start out with an intended topic that I plan to stick to, but I almost inevitably veer away from the topic and ramble.  Anyway, the point of this post is that I have free money and I need to decide how to spend it.  Normally, I save my money.  My mother taught me to be frugal, and I never buy anything unless I absolutely need it, with the exception of makeup, which I still buy for the lowest price possible.  Anyway, I received this money because the savings account I opened at my bank reached a certain target amount and my bank likes to encourage people to save their money, so when it reaches this target amount, they send you a $50 card.  This card works like a credit card, except you don't have to pay back the money and you can only use it until you buy $50 worth of things with it.  The point is that I cannot put this money in my savings account, like a normally would if someone just gave me $50.  I have to spend it.  Also, the fine print says that they'll take off $2.50 every month as some sort of a fee, until I spend it all.  So I need to spend it asap, before they take off any money.  There are lots of things I could buy: clothes, nail polish strips, facial masks, jewelry. (I sound like a real girl, my boyfriend would be so proud!) But I have decided that I will buy some picture frames from Dollar Tree.  I have some art that I made and hung on my wall, securing it with pushpins hanging all the way around, not actually poking through the art itself, but over time the pictures have sagged and don't look great any more.  So I plan to buy three picture frames to put my art in, another to frame a mask I made a while ago, and one more to turn into a jewelry holder, since currently my jewelry is just in a pile on my desk.  That will end up costing about $5.  Then I want to get some clear Christmas lights to hang up in my room, because they just make me happy.  I found out that British people call them fairy lights, and that makes them sound so fantastic (In this instance, I am pretending that fantastic means fantasy-related, as well as the usual meaning.)  I have no idea how much they'll cost, but I'm going to buy extra things to make jewelry with, such as ribbons and chain, with whatever is left.  So I'm pretty excited, and I'll share a photo of my side of the room when it's finished, if it turns out how I'm picturing it in my head.

Also, this is the first post I'm trying to schedule posting for, so hopefully it works.  If you are reading this, then I guess it did.  Except it actually didn't, because I forgot to set it to a different date and time to post and didn't notice until after I posted it.  Then, when I went back and changed it, Blogger just left the post up and said that I posted it tomorrow.  So I guess I'm a time traveler now, which is actually pretty cool.  I'll be right back guys. I'm going to go kill Hitler. Okay, I'm back.

P.S. I know that typing the bit about the threesome keyword search at the top will probably increase the number of hits I get from people searching that term.  However, since this post uses the word threesome so much, they should be brought here instead of to yesterday's post and then they'll see the disclaimer about there not being threesomes here and then they'll leave without wasting too much of their time.

Weekend Recap and Movie Reviews

I spent the weekend with G, like I usually do.  We watched both the Washington Huskies football team and basketball team lose.  But the Seahawks won, which was unexpected, since they've been doing terrible. In other sports news, Stanford's football team remains undefeated, but we didn't watch that game.  Other than watching sports, we watched some movies and played video games.

I got to the next dungeon on Ocarina of Time and learned that my bomb-throwing skills really need some work.  G noticed that my new owl necklace looks like the owl from the game, only mine has fake gemstones.  I made some smoothies that we both thoroughly enjoyed.  I would give you the recipe, but I don't measure.  Peel and cut up a medium sized orange. That is the part that takes the most time.  Then put in about four frozen strawberries per person and some vanilla yogurt.  Then you just blend everything together.  Serve with or without whipped cream on top.  It's actually a super healthy and super tasty thing to make if you're trying to eat healthy.  Just leave off the whipped cream, and if you're really serious about healthy eating, use non-fat yogurt.  It's also really filling, so you can have it as a meal and be completely full after.

On to movies: I watched four, and I'm reviewing them all plus Gremlins 2, which I watched for the first time a while back when I was sick. G fell asleep at the beginning of A Clockwork Orange and slept through the whole thing, as well as Woodshop.  I watched Terminator with G, and then started watching How to be a Serial Killer, and he went to bed a while after I started that one.  I found them all on Netflix. If you haven't heard of A Clockwork Orange, then I'll try to refrain from asking what is wrong with you and instead inform you that it's a classic. It deals with psychological issues. Do not read past the picture if you do not like spoilers.  I would say it is worth watching once, but I, personally, do not want to watch it again.  It is rated R for a reason.  There is nudity and violence, as well as implied rape.  The rape is not shown but the part leading up to it is, and it is made very clear that it happened. Also, if you're easily creeped out, you won't want to look at this guy for an hour and a half.

A Clockwork Orange is a movie by Stanley Kubrick in 1971. He's the same guy who wrote and directed The Shining. A Clockwork Orange is set in a future version of Britain.  At the beginning of the movie, the main character, Alex,  and his friends, or "droogs" as he calls them are at a bar drinking some drugged milk before they go out for some "ultraviolence".  One of the most noticeable things about the bar, which is a theme that continues through the whole movie is how erotic it is.  The tables are shaped like naked women and the milk is also dispensed by what looks like a white plastic naked woman.  One of the most bizarre things about this movie, in my opinion, is how much erotic art is everywhere, which society as a whole seems to be entirely okay with.  At one point a crazy cat lady is murdered with a sculpture she has in her room, which is shaped like a penis.  After the fellows fill up on drugged milk at the bar, they head out on the streets, where they beat an old drunk man mercilessly.  They proceed to where another group of friends is about to rape a young woman.  They taunt the other group of friends as the young lady manages to run away.  Then the two rival groups brawl.  After this they trick an elderly couple into letting them into their house and then beat the old man and rape the woman, while Alex sings "Singin' in the Rain".  The rape itself is not shown but this scene is difficult to watch nonetheless.  We see Alex, a teenage boy, at home in his room listening to Beethoven music.  He claims that he particularly enjoys the 9th symphony. He also has a pet snake, but this factor isn't important to the movie.  The next morning his mother asks him if he's going to school.  He says that he still isn't feeling very well, so he's staying home again.  His mother says that he's missed a whole week of school.  She says to his father something about him working at night, which is apparently the lie he's told them.  Later, Alex is walking around in his underpants and then realizes that his probation officer is in the house.  The doctor and Alex sit on a bed and talk for a while.  After that, Alex goes out and picks up two girls from a music store then takes them home and has a threesome.  Alex and his droogs go out for another night of fun, and this is when Alex ends up murdering the crazy cat lady with her penis sculpture.  He gets arrested and becomes seemingly very spiritual, while actually picturing himself torturing Jesus and sleeping with maidservants.  He is selected as a candidate for aversion therapy and seems eager to be good.   He undergoes the therapy, which consists of wearing a torturous looking device, including metal things holding his eyes open, while being subjected to films depicting various violent things, all set to Beethoven music.  Then he demonstrates to an audience of important people how the desire to fight and rape now make him feel ill to the point of not acting on his desires.  Everyone is very pleased with what appears to be a great success and they release him.  Upon arriving home, Alex finds that his room has been rented out and he has to find somewhere else to stay.  He leaves with his possessions and then the old drunk who he and his droogs attacked earlier recognizes him and brings him to a bunch of homeless people, who beat him up.  Then he gets beat up by two of his former droogs, who are now policemen.  He struggles to get to a house, which he does not realize is the home of the elderly couple he beat and raped earlier.  The old man is now in a wheelchair and the wife is nowhere to be seen.  The man does not recognize Alex and encourages him to clean up and take a bath.  While Alex is in the bathtub, he begins singing "Singin' in the Rain" and the old man hears him from the other room and realizes who he is.  After his bath, the old man and his assistant encourage Alex to eat some food and drink some wine and then the old man tells Alex about what happened to his wife.  She died of pneumonia, but the man thinks she wouldn't have if it hadn't been for the violent rape breaking her spirit.  At some Alex accidentally informs the man that he has been conditioned against Beethoven music, as a side effect of the therapy.  Alex passes out in his spaghetti, from the drugged wine.  He awakens locked in a room upstairs, while the old man blasts Beethoven's 9th downstairs.  Alex shouts at the man to turn off the music, then bangs his head on the floor in an attempt to make it stop.  Then he decides to kill himself, and jumps out of the window.  He awakens in a cast in the hospital.  The government is in trouble for their experiments on Alex.  The Interior Minister visits Alex in the hospital to apologize for their actions.  He promises Alex a good job where he will earn as much money as he wants, in return for Alex helping the government.  Alex agrees and the press photographs the occasion.  The hospital plays him Beethoven's 9th and Alex imagines having sex in the snow and as the movie ends, he quips that he is cured indeed, friends.  The end credits roll to the tune of "Singin' in the Rain".  I am not going to analyze the movie, only review it.  I was equally bored and shocked at the beginning.  I stuck with it and the exploration of the effects of therapy to remove violent tendencies proved to be rather interesting.  I do not plan to watch this movie again, but it was okay to watch once.  I think it was very well-written, and the actors were very good. Some scenes were very disturbing which I know is what Kubrick was going for, but I wouldn't want to see them again. The movie made me think, which I like, so I give it 3 stars out of 5.

I think that this post is long enough already, so I'll end it here and review the other movies later this week.

An Epiphany

I have realized the one thing that I really want in life is to make things that people will like.  I want to make music and art and jewelry.  And I want it to make people happy to share the things I make with me.  I want people to check the mailbox every day, anticipating the arrival of the jewelry they ordered from me, for example.  In the spirit of making things, and also to inspire and motivate me, I have found some jewelry pieces that cost way more than they should, and I intend to make my own versions of them and sell them in my Etsy shop.  I was inspired by these two lovely blogs that I stumbled upon yesterday whilst wandering the interwebs, being remarkably unproductive.  The search for a job is temporarily paused.  Jewelry making will be my job, for now.

These are the necklaces that I intend to create my own versions of.

The only thing I really need to buy to start with is chain of various sizes and colors. And while I am just about broke, I can afford a bit of chain. Also, some ribbon would be nice.  I really like the look of fake pearls with chains and ribbons.

In other news, I painted my nails yesterday for the first time in just about a billion years, and they're sparkly, and it makes me smile.

I know that most bloggers take nail photos holding the bottle of polish they painted them with.
I am not most bloggers. Deal with it.

Also, this is what happens when I'm bored and online.

Well, I'm off to clean my room now, and then to make some jewelry.

Video Games and Geeking Out

As I mentioned recently, G and I purchased Little Big Planet 2 and Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 recently.  Little Big Planet 2 was intended as "my game" and COD MW3 as "his game".  But he told me last night that he doesn't like it when I sit and watch him play video games.  So we played MW3 on multiplayer and I seriously suck at aiming, but we managed to beat 2 co-op missions.  And then he decided that we should play his basketball game on multiplayer.  It's the demo for NBA something or other...Live Jam something? 2010.  He plays this game religiously.

Every night, after he gets home from work, he plays a tournament.  And this game is a demo, so there aren't a lot of options.  For example, you can only choose between two teams.  He is always the Lakers playing the Magic.  And you can only play at home, so he sets the difficulty higher for the last two of 5 games to simulate an away game.  Of all the things that he has or does, this one is the one that I see him being the most particular and ritualistic about.  So it was sort of an honor to be asked to play it with him.  I soon found out that it only looks easy.  It took me way too long to realize that the extra people on the team are not controlled by the computer and that you can switch to them.  Also, you switch to controlling whoever you pass the ball to, which is weird and frustrating.  I ended up making one shot the entire game, sort of like my 8th grade JV season.  But I did get quite a few steals, and G complimented me on my defense skills.  It was super confusing for me though, and G probably got about as frustrated as I did with trying to remember what button does what, and it's extra hard since the button functions switch depending on if you're playing offense or defense.  I want to get good at playing it so it can be another fun thing we do together but right now it's just confusing and frustrating.  G also let me play The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time on his N64.  He even let me use his special gold controller that he's never let anyone use.  I am a Zelda nerd.  I was drawing pictures of Link and Zelda and trying to get the lettering on the title perfect back when I was in elementary school.  I have played every single Zelda game made for the old Game Boy all the way up to the Nintendo DS (which I sadly had to sell at the start of the summer to pay my rent).  I have only ever beaten the single-player quest mode on Four Swords, which was made mainly to be a multiplayer game, and The Minnish Cap, which was made for the Nintedo DS.  Somewhere in the home I grew up in lives an old gray Game Boy with a cartridge for Link's Awakening in which I am stuck at the final boss.  I am a Legend of Zelda purist.  I refuse to use walkthroughs when I am stuck.  Instead I run around harassing chickens until a giant chicken army appears and murders me.  I do this until it gets boring and then I find a different Zelda game to play, then play that until I get stuck, and cycle through them all until I have a brilliant revelation and get just a tiny bit further and then get stuck again.  All this backstory exists to explain why I played Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time until 2 in the morning last night.  I had to beat the first dungeon! I only started it at like 11 though, and we had a break for dinner.  Anyway, I feel like I'm finally experiencing an important part of Zelda geekdom that I did not have the chance to experience previously, and it's pretty cool.

Read This While I Impart Some Knowledge

On Friday, I was using my laptop like I do.  I was just finishing up my first eBay listing when everything went very wrong.  While everything was being the exact opposite of what it should have been, I would have not been surprised if dead kittens appeared in my bedroom and started shooting lasers out of their eye sockets, and they had sharp teeth too.  Keep in mind that I have a fever right now so my writing might appear anywhere from mildly to severely insane to all you 98.6 degree readers.

There were no kittens, no dead kittens, no undead kittens, no living kittens, no cryogenically frozen kittens, no laser-eyeballed kittens, and no fire-breathing kittens.  There was, however, someone remotely controlling my laptop.  First they deleted my eBay listing as I was just adding the finishing touches.  Then they started opening and closing various programs so rapidly that I could not do anything about it.  I barely managed to open a Microsoft Word document and type that they need to 4-letter-word off.  They seemed to deliberate this suggestion while highlighting and centering the text that I had typed, then adjusting the margins to their liking.  Then they disappeared without a trace.  My assessment was that some merry prankster, probably a teenager, had learned to remote access computers and was having what he or she thought was a bit of fun.  They had left without a trace, so I redid my eBay listing and posted it, then got ready to go to G's.  When I got to his house, I relayed the incident and he had a much different interpretation of events.  He thinks that a hacker accessed my computer and probably has all my passwords now and will soon wreak havoc on what small amount of money I have.  He encouraged me to change all my passwords, which I did without hesitation.  He also told me to look up how people remote access computers when I got home, which I did.  I learned that it is possible to remote access a computer if the user has remote assistance enabled.  This feature allowa a person to call customer support or even a knowledgable friend and then the person helping you can access your computer from their own, without having to travel to wherever you are.  That is its intended purpose.  However, really anyone who knows how can access your computer in this way and do whatever they want to.  To disable this feature, go to "control panel", then click "system", then "remote settings", then uncheck the box that says to allow remote assistance to your computer.  You can thank me later, after your kitten nightmares finally stop.

In other news, we got Little Big Planet 2 and Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3 on Saturday.  The Huskies lost the football game, and Stanford continues being undefeated.  On Sunday, we went down by the waterfront to G's school.  He finished writing his presentation, which is the final thing he has to do to earn his master's degree.  I did a lot of reading in a very good book.  We had planned to walk along the waterfront a bit, but didn't end up having time, because we had to pick up our tickets for the Husky basketball game that evening.  We watched the Seahawks game, which by some miracle, they actually won!  Then we went to the Husky basketball game, which they won by 6 points.  They were up by 19 at one point, but became complacent near the end.  It was really fun, and I'm happy that we won.  Then we went home and I made spaghetti for dinner, and we also ate the rest of the chicken soup that I had made earlier in the week.  So my weekend turned out pretty good.  Now I have a fever, but it's a good excuse to eat ice cream for breakfast.  And today I will watch Hulu while finishing listing things on eBay.

Tastes Like Christmas

One of my roommates and I went grocery shopping at Safeway this morning.  We bought a bunch of junk food and a little bit of healthy stuff.  We almost got a bag of oranges for free because there wasn't a bar code, but then the guy went and found the box with the barcode on it.  We got ice cream because we're both insane people who enjoy eating ice cream when it's cold.  I got 2 new boxes of maggot-free hot cocoa mix, at least I hope it's maggot-free.  And we got egg nog!  I'm so excited that they're selling it now.  I drank some when I got home and it tastes like Christmas : )  So I am a happy camper today.

Now I have to call DSHS and see if they ever received the information I sent them so I can get medical assistance.  And even if I have to wait on hold for one million years, I have chocolate and egg nog and ice cream, so they can't ruin my good mood.  Then I'm going to actually list my clothes for sale on eBay, for reals this time.  And G and I might be getting Little Big Planet 2 tonight.  And he planned a super fun day of awesomeness for us on Sunday that I'm really excited for.  I'll tell you about it afterward.  (If you haven't noticed, I'm taking my Prozac again.)

And you know what else? We totally made it back to our house and inside right before it started pouring rain.  That always makes me feel like a winner : )

This picture is of a meme based on a joke made in a post on the best blog ever.
The picture links to that post and if you haven't already put these words and pictures on this blog into your eyeballs,
then welcome to the internet, there's lots of cool stuff here :)

How to Save a Life

I found this today and I don't know why but I really feel the need to help in some way.  This is really the only way I can help, so please read this and spread the word.  I don't know this man at all, but I do know what it's like to lose someone to cancer.  I lost my grandpa to stomach cancer when I was in 8th grade and my "aunt" (a close family friend) to cancer when I was in high school.  If I can help save people the pain of losing a loved one, I am going to do anything and everything in my power to make that possible.

If you don't want to click the link and read about it, I'll just tell you here.  The man is an acute leukemia sufferer.  That means he has cancer.  He has less than 20 days to find a bone marrow match.  For the majority of the population, there is an 80% chance of finding a match.  But since Amit Gupta is of South Asian descent, his chances drop to 1 in 20,000.  All it takes to see if a person is a match is a swab of saliva.  It is virtually painless and only takes about 10 minutes to fill out paperwork and take the swab.  You can take 10 minutes out of your day to possibly save a life, can't you? To find a swab drive in your area, click here.  And make sure you spread the word to everyone you know.  1 in 20,000 may seem like terrible odds, but with the internet and social networking, it's so easy to reach 20,000 people.  So please, don't just ignore this message.

You can help as easily as making this your Facebook status:

Don't let this man's family and friends go through the pain of losing someone to cancer. He has less than 20 days to find a match for a bone marrow transplant and, being South Asian, his chances are 1 in 20,000.
http://www.amitguptaneedsyou.com/

Happy 20th Follower to Me

You guys, I did it! I got 20 followers by my 20th birthday! Everybody please give a warm welcome to follower #20, Tiffany from Omg Wtf?!  Her blog is hilarious, so if you're in need of a good laugh, I would direct you there, unless you tend to be shocked and appalled by big kid words.  Her blog comes with a parental advisory.  But if you're willing to put on your big kid pants and realize they're just words, head on over there and take a read, then follow.

Hi there, Tiffany.  Thanks for following my blog.  I really appreciate it.  I apologize since you came at sort of a weird time when I'm depressed.  But hopefully soon, I'll be back to my old self.  For some reason, your RSS feed isn't updating in my blogroll : (  Things you should know about this blog are that I write about just about anything that crosses my mind ever.  Sometimes I vent here and probably nobody really reads those posts, but it's mostly for my own benefit.  I like sentence fragments.  More people get here by googling some sort of search query involving pandas than anything else.  I'm a college dropout who is currently on food stamps, but that's not what defines me.  I'm a huge nerd and I just got into Doctor Who.  I love to watch movies and often review them on here.  I am also sort of a fashionaholic, which consists a lot more of looking at it online and not being able to afford it than anything else.  I am going to be a graphic designer.  So that's pretty much everything you need to know about me.  If you get lost or confused, talk to Lauren or The Tsaritsa.  They've been here the longest and they've helped me get through some tough times.  Enjoy your stay and thanks for flying Air Jedi, or something like that.

Why Does the Universe Hate Me?!

As you know, I've been in a mood of general gloom lately.  Well, one of the things I've been doing that helps cheer me up a little bit is drinking hot cocoa.  I just boiled some water and made hot cocoa from a packet.  (Now this is hot cocoa packets that I had leftover from last year, but they were completely sealed and I've already used two of them. Shudder.) I noticed what looked like a grain of rice on top of my cocoa after pouring it in.  Upon closer inspection, I spotted a few more.  Even closer inspection revealed that it was not rice, but maggots.  I'm glad I noticed before I took a drink.  I dumped out the whole mug and threw away the rest of the packets.  So now I am still depressed and cocoaless as well, also fighting back nausea caused by there being freaking maggots in my hot chocolate!  I have reached the conclusion that it is time to go back on Prozac, which I haven't taken for about 5 months now.  Depression sucks.

Guilty Pleasures and Hulu

I'm trying not to be absent from my blog for very long, so I'm trying to write short posts, even when I don't really have anything to say.  So today, I'm sharing with you all the shows that I receive in my Hulu queue.  Some of these are shows that I would consider guilty pleasures, because I wouldn't want to admit that I kind of love them, but I really do enjoy watching them.

So, in no particular order, the shows that grace my Hulu queue are: Pretty Little Liars (guilty pleasure), How I Met Your Mother, Modern Family, Raising Hope, The Middle, America's Got Talent, The Office, Switched at Birth (guilty pleasure),  Misfits (guilty pleasure; it's British and completely ridiculous and I love it), The Nine Lives of Chloe King (guilty pleasure), The Booth at the End, Whites, Friends with Benefits, The Lying Game (guilty pleasure), New Girl, Once Upon a Time, Grimm, Suburgatory, Alphas, and Whitney.

The ones that I dearly love to pieces and would highly recommend to anyone who is willing to listen are: Raising Hope, Suburgatory, Whitney, and New Girl.

Raising Hope is going on its second season.  It's about a guy having unprotected sex with a girl who he doesn't know is a serial killer and getting her pregnant.  Then she gets the electric chair and he's left raising the baby.  It sounds weird, but give it a shot.  Suburgatory is sort of a guilty pleasure.  It's about a girl with a single dad being moved to the suburbs after her dad discovers a box of condoms in her drawer.  The show is about her battles to maintain her sanity in suburbia while trying to spread a little originality and common sense.  Needless to say, it's not going too well for her.  Whitney Cummings is my new favorite comedian, and each episode of Whitney is based on one of her jokes and they're all completely hilarious.  It may take a bit of getting used to it being taped in front of a live studio audience, but it's well worth it if you need a few laughs.  New Girl is about a girl finding a place to live on Craigslist, then finding out all her roommates are guys, and moving in anyway.  The girl is played by Zooey Deschanel, my favorite actress, and she does a great job of convincing us that she's a complete dork, even though we all know otherwise.  The guys try to mold her into a respectable and date-able lady, but they have their work cut out for them.

So if you have some free time and want to watch a good tv show while curled up with a mug of hot chocolate, I would recommend those four.  What are some of your guilty pleasure shows?

Little Red Riding Hood

I've been watching Once Upon a Time and Grimm and I love them both. They inspired me to create some fairy tale-inspired looks.  I'm loving this lace skirt, but it costs more than I would pay.

Little Red Riding Hood by jaythejedi featuring a knit coat

Stella McCartney silk shirt
£175 - harveynichols.com

Knit coat
$422 - asos.com

TopShop bow skirt
$76 - topshop.com

Vans lace up wedge
$45 - needsupply.com

Dueling the Doldrums

I'm just feeling sort of meh today.  Both my football teams lost this weekend.  On Friday, I had the opportunity to make $12 an hour calling people and reminding them to vote.  I wouldn't do that again for a million dollars.  I did work that day for 10 hours, so I made a little bit of money.  But there's just something about knowing that nobody you call actually wants to talk to you along with being hung up on almost constantly that leaves a person feeling pretty exhausted by the end of the day.  Thankfully, there was free Dove chocolate, or I wouldn't have been able to stay for as long as I did.  Then the changing of the clocks has my sleep clock knocked off-kilter.  The combination of that with the dreary weather that's taken over is just making me feel unhappy.  But I did get my new coat and boots just in time for the cold weather.

But the doldrums will not be victorious! (Sidenote: doldrums is a fantastic word that I originally learned from an equally fantastic book, entitled The Phantom Tollbooth, which I read ages ago, when I was in 5th or 6th grade.)  G helped me to fight the doldrums this weekend with a Resident Evil marathon.  I had never seen any of them before and I sort of have a thing for zombie movies.  Then we watched X-Men Origins:Wolverine, which I had never seen before.  The X-Men movies are some of my favorite movies ever, and I found out that G has not seen 1, 2, or 3! I am going to try to find them cheap somewhere so we can watch them together.  Another weapon I used in my fight against the doldrums was peppermint ice cream.  I hadn't even seen it for at least 5 years, and I found it recently at Safeway.  G thinks it's disgusting, but that just means more for me :) I bought him mint moose tracks ice cream and it tastes super amazing, so he's a happy camper. I discovered Aah! Real Monsters on Netflix yesterday and watched a couple of episodes.  I used to love that show when I was about 6 years old, now not so much, but it was a kind of cool walk down memory lane.  Today I plan to continue my doldrums combat by taking a hot bath and watching some of the stuff on my Hulu queue.  I also want to list some of my stuff on eBay, but that might wait until tomorrow.  Also, I received my 100 free business cards in the mail today.  They look awesome and will hopefully inspire me to get going on my new website.  I'll let you know how that goes.

Gearing up for Winter/Enjoying Fall

I had the most successful shopping trip ever yesterday.  First, my friend Jessica and I had lunch at a Mexican place and caught up on life.  We hadn't seen each other since about May, so it was really fun.  The food was fantastic.  I had a ginormous plate of steak nachos, and only finished about half of it.  I brought the rest home for G.  Then we went to Goodwill, Buffalo Exchange, and Crossroads Trading Company.  I was hoping to maybe find a warm winter coat or some boots that I liked and fit me well.  I did not even think of expecting that I would find both.  However, I found two pairs of perfect-fitting and super-cute boots at Goodwill for under $20 total.  I especially love the purple ones, because not only are they adorable, they're also the same color of purple as the University of Washington Huskies, which is where I went to school for two years and G is an alumnus of.  So that was really exciting, and then I found the cutest winter coat at Buffalo exchange.  I ended up having $10 left of what I had budgeted for one pair of boots and a coat.  The coat is from Juicy Couture and would have cost about $300 new.  I got it for $30! That's 90% off!

purple boots and Juicy Couture coat

So my plans for today are to bake some more banana muffins, edit pictures for eBay, list my clothes for sale on eBay, then edit pictures for my blog if I still have time.  And I plan to do it all while catching up on my Hulu queue.

I also finished my Christmas shopping yesterday, and some of the things I ordered online for my roommates showed up today.  They're so cute that I had to share.

Would you believe that each one of these adorable necklaces is under $2 each?!  Sadly the owner closed down the Etsy shop after I made my purchase, so I can't go back and buy one of each of these necklaces for myself.  On the bright side, I only have two roommates so I still get to keep one of these necklaces :)

Sweet Somethings

Today is my two month anniversary of officially dating G.  We've really been dating for about 4 months, but anyway... He says some of the sweetest things to me. Yesterday we celebrated Halloween by watching The Simpson's Treehouse of Horror and not wearing costumes or anything. He said a couple of things that, yeah it's mushy but deal with it this is MY blog, made my heart melt.  That's right, I said it!  The first thing he was, when we were cuddling on the couch watching TV, he smelled me and said, "You smell like... *sniff sniff* heaven."  And then later, when he was leaving the room, he looked back and said, "You're so pretty."  I never ever get tired of hearing that, ever.  But the sweetest thing he's ever said to me was last month, when he stopped himself from arguing with me about religion.  I'm a Christian and he's agnostic.  He just said, "The best reason I have to believe in god is that there must be a god, because he had to have made you for me."  It almost made me cry, and I'm not an emotional person, at all, at least not outwardly.

Anyway, enough of the sappiness.  I took a bunch of pictures the other day, and it was actually really fun once I figured out a good technique using the 2-shot self-timer on my camera and a cereal box as a tripod.  It's for the stuff I'm selling on eBay for my starting capital.  So far there are 14 items, and I haven't even gotten to my t-shirts yet, which there is a massive amount of.  I've been meaning to edit them but the task is pretty daunting, since there are about 6 pictures of each item, so that's a lot of editing.  In other news, I was supposed to have a job interview at Goodwill last Friday, but once I got downtown, I found out that the bus I was supposed to transfer to in order to get there no longer runs.  So I came back home, 2 hours wasted on bus travel, plus more of waiting for the bus before realizing it wasn't coming.  The good news is that I called Goodwill and talked to them and they transferred my application to a closer store, one that G drives past every morning on his way to work.  So I'm waiting to hear back on that.  I really need to get a winter coat and boots, but it's difficult on a budget, since those are fairly expensive items.  So I'm hoping the thrift stores on the Ave will have something I can afford, so I don't freeze to death.  I found some stuff online, but I never buy clothing or shoes online, since I really need to try them on in person.  Plus I don't want to spend more than $20, and some of them cost that, but with shipping, they cost about $40.

I just noticed that my blogiversary has come and gone without me even noticing.  I started blogging September 30, 2010, so I guess soon I'll reflect on what this blog started out as, and what it has turned into.