cor aut mors

BUY SOME ART WILL YA

freyja — Thu, 17 Oct 2013 05:10:10 GMT

Looking to expand my newly formed graphic design business by taking commissions for icons, banners, and fan art! The examples shown here are from fandom but I can do hand-drawn/digitally painted or shopped graphics featuring your OCs as well.

Fan Art
Rate: $15/hr
Can do stylized/cartoon or realism!

Examples:

1 hr ($15)

2 hrs ($30)

3 hrs ($45)

4 hrs ($60)

6 hrs ($90)

Icons
Fandom- $2 each
Animations, effects and text- $0.50 extra each

Examples:

Hand-drawn or Photoshopped- $5.00 each
Animations and text- $0.50 extra each

Examples:

Banners
Fandom: $5
OC: $7

Contact me via PM, plurk (kindaxscary) or e-mail (artist at ansatejones dot com). And don't forget to check out my website at http://ansatejones.com for more awesome things!

So. State of the Ans. I guess. (mental illness ahoy, consider yourself warned)

freyja — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 11:40:31 GMT

Every day feels like a battle. I have to will my body to do anything. Today I lay in bed for a good hour debating whether it was worth doing something about my stomach growling. Stuff like that.

I'm not sure how it got this bad. Things were good for a while. I was on Zoloft, I was feeling more confident. I was able to articulate what I wanted and I was able to be kind and patient. And then it all started falling apart again. I started reverting.

My depression has not been this bad for over a year, when I first started taking Zoloft. I've even done an increase in dose but nothing's really happened yet. The worst thing of course is that my life is not that awful, just... filled with nothing. I don't do anything with my day. I don't work toward any goals. I feel like nothing and nobody. My friends are there, and I know this logically, but not emotionally. They never seem to be there enough. I don't think it's humanly possible.

Today I looked up BPD and realized that I fit almost all of the symptoms eerily well. Rather than make me feel any more in control of anything, or hopeful that a different treatment might help me cope better, I just feel like I slid another dozen feet into this pit. I might never be able to climb out.

All days aren't bad. Sometimes I can actually appreciate what's going on around me, sometimes I can have fun, sometimes what I have at the moment is enough. But when I am not appreciative, when I am deep in one of these funks, it hits me with excruciating awful clarity that it isn't enough. That living for the few bright times in my life is not enough of a carrot for me to chase. And that's when things get scary. That's when my mind starts racing with anxiety and my head feels like it's going to explode from all the crazy and that's when I realize I'm not getting better.

There are situational things that have triggered me recently into this depressive state, sure. But even if these situational things resolve, which I don't think they will, they are built on patterns. These patterns have been repeating my entire life. I push people away and then I feel bitterly lonely. I expect constant adoration and attention or else I feel abandoned. I can't have a superficial relationship because at one point or another I can't hold the crazy in, I need to be understood. I need to be loved. And I need to feel like I really matter in someone's life. I don't want to be someone's superficial friend either.

I get angry, and despairing, and nihilistic and then that emotion pours outward because if I keep it to myself I will lose it completely. People accuse me of being aggressive, not seeing that what I'm really doing is beating myself to a pulp. Beating life to a pulp. Telling them to look at me, just bloody look at me, and understand that right now I am in mental anguish, that I don't expect them to fix it but I need them to listen. I need someone to get it. Because if nobody gets it I'm invisible. It's just one more part of me that screams into a void, or is swept under the rug, and I have to deal with it alone. It's killing me.

freyja — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 20:49:08 GMT

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Putting the Girl in the Box (spoilers for up to 6x10 of New Who)

freyja — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 02:31:07 GMT

I think I've figured out something else that really bugs me about The Girl Who Waited, besides Eleven's pathological compulsion to protect this ideal of a fairytale existence for Amy and Rory (really, that speaks volumes to his psychology right there, doesn't it?). But there's something else, something that I've finally recognized as pervasive in at least New Who. Not just Moffat's run, mind (though he does it a lot). And not even just Who-- it's symptomatic of stories everywhere and it's likely the product of centuries of not-so-subtle sexism. It's called Putting the Girl in the Box.

I first realized how many times powerful people are put, figuratively or literally, in boxes in this show. Oftentimes it's the Doctor-- which makes sense, in a way. He's ultra-dangerous. The Destroyer of Worlds. The Oncoming Storm. A freaking TIME LORD, for god's sake, who's killed off his own people for the greater good. He's ruthless and terrible sometimes because he feels he has to be, and he's not immune to making really horrible mistakes that will impact billions. So. Okay. I can understand that most of the Who villains want to put the Doctor in the Pandorica (aptly named after Pandora's Box) to protect the universe from such a menace.

But he's not the only one this happens to. If you look at the series' run over the past six years there's an inordinate number of women this happens to. They show up or evolve dramatically, are generally kickass and maybe just a little unpredictable or feisty. They're unwilling to be controlled or duped, in other words, and they often see right through the Doctor, becoming a match for him in many ways. And then, at the end of the arc or episode, something happens to take all this power away and negate their personal growth. They are, in other words, put back in the box and locked away for... well. For whose safety? The universe's? The Doctor's ego? Ours, as an audience? I'd argue that the latter is most probable, because I see this all the time in popular media. Women have their heyday and it's usually so shortlived. After their allotted forty-five minutes of fame something happens to them that seriously undermines their kickass-ness.

Let's start with Rose. Now I know, I know. We generally think Rose is an atrocious Mary Sue. But look at it this way. Nine and Ten think she's fantastic. She brought the Doctor out of emotional crisis. And she was NEVER content to sit in a corner and wait to be rescued. She thought on her feet, was genuinely adventurous, and her spunk hearkened back to the classic Who days. That the writers started bashing us over the head with shipping during third series really doesn't impact any of that previous stuff. So what happened to Rose? Oh, she got sucked into a parallel universe. And then when she worked so hard to get back to the Doctor? He tricked her into going back there and gave her the job of nursemaid to the Metacrisis. She sealed the box herself when she gave into his advances and kissed him. We haven't seen hide nor hair of Rose since.

Martha. She started out so independent, but got put into one of the most common boxes in popular media: romance. She began to develop serious and clearly unrequited feelings for the Doctor, and as the series went on fans began to see her as more and more pathetic. Any appeal was being swiftly lost because nobody could get past the fact she was clearly just a Time Lord groupie, there to be catty and jealous of Rose no matter how much amazing shit she did. At the end, she left, and bully for her. That character had no prospects the way she was being written. She was swiftly becoming a joke.

Donna. Probably one of the cruelest Who boxes. She not only had to stop traveling with the Doctor, she was forced to forget it all, thus undermining all the character development she went through in series Four. She started out as a sassy, obnoxiously shallow woman everyone seemed to love to hate in the Runaway Bride, and became a freaking half-Time Lord. But just when we were getting used to the idea of a powerful woman on equal footing with the Doctor in the TARDIS, what happened? It all got taken away, and she reverted back to the same woman she was in the beginning. She 'died', as the Doctor put it, and her only crime was becoming powerful enough to challenge him.

Now, Moffat's run. Oh man, does he like putting people in boxes. Especially women. Let's start out by mentioning, as was pointed out in fan commentary on the Night Terrors episode, the concept of putting things that terrify you 'into the cupboard.' If you'll notice in Let's Kill Hitler, that's exactly where the Doctor tells Rory to put Hitler. A terrifying figure, surely. But what about Abigail? How terrifying can she be? Well, first of all her singing can apparently save the planet and tame sharks. Second, she's an object of attraction for our curmudgeon-to-be Scrooge-alike, Kazran. For a boy coming of age, of course a first love is going to be terrifying. After all, she also has the power to reject him and break his heart. And where does Abigail live? In a literal box, with days to live that are shortened each time she is released. She's released to help with Kazran's entertainment and personal growth, basically, and at the end of the night back into the box she goes, her work done and her own personal power carefully locked away for later use. By a couple of guys. Do I need to say more about this? In fact, she sounds an awful lot like...

River Song. She lives in a jail, presumably because she feels guilty about killing the Doctor. Even though she can escape whenever she wants, with laughable ease, she always returns to the cell at the end of the episode. She's in a box of her own making, then: one of Guilt.

Melody Pond. We first meet her as a child trapped in a spacesuit, completely under the control of the Silence. She'll be brainwashed into trying to kill the Doctor. She has absolutely no agency in her childhood until she manages, somehow to escape (I bet the Doctor ends up helping with that, somehow). She's the Kidnapped Child and that's pretty much the only role she has-- a pawn and a tool to get at the Doctor.

In Let's Kill Hitler, Mels, the black Melody incarnation, showed up for approximately ten minutes, was AWESOME, and then regenerated into the River Song we know and (somewhat) love. River Song then proceeded to be her amazingly psychotic, feral and independent self for the rest of the episode until, inexplicably, she decided to sacrifice the rest of her regenerations to save the Doctor. I guess narratively that's fair enough, since she is the one who tried to kill him in the first place. But from a thematic standpoint? We took a strong, black woman, and killed her off for a white woman. A white woman we've already seen the softer side of, and who would later shape her life around the Doctor. Just like...

Amy Pond. How many times has she been put into a box in the past two seasons? She was put in the Box of Waiting since she was a child when the Doctor miscalculated and left her waiting for his return for fourteen years. Her entire childhood was centered around him, and as we later found out, she passed that awful virus onto her own child. DURING her childhood. Timey-wiminess aside, that's two generations of unhealthy relationships with the same guy. Kind of reminiscent of that Star Trek: The Next Generation episode where Beverly Crusher falls in love with her grandmother's ghostly lover, isn't it?

Most of Amy's episodes involve her needing the Doctor to save her somehow, whether she's put herself in that position or not. She has to keep her eyes shut in the Weeping Angels two-parter, guided solely by the Doctor's instructions. A box of Blindness. She's also about to get married, and though she puts it off as long as possible the Doctor eventually just grabs Rory and forces the two of them together rather than have her make her own choices. Now she and Rory are trapped in a box together, unable to do anything but deal with each other. Not that trying to stay alive and save the universe with an alien was enough pressure.

Rory dies in Cold Blood, and Amy's put in a box of Forgetting, much like Donna was. At least this time it isn't the Doctor's fault. She doesn't get out of that box until the Pandorica opens. In the Lodger, she's trapped in an uncooperative TARDIS while the Doctor saunters off and plays football (and matchmaker) and has all the 'fun'. Hell, even in Vampires of Venice, though she volunteers for the assignment, she's basically a princess trapped in a castle (you know, by... fish vampire things).

Finally, Amy herself gets put in the Pandorica and must heal over the course of 2000 years. It's done to her, for her own good. And I guess it's better than dying, but it's worth mentioning that here is another literal box that a strong woman is put into until the appointed time when she can be released and do things again.

Now we're up to the current season, where for the first half Amy wasn't present at all. She was really stuck in the Big Daddy of boxes, a Birthing Box(!), for nine months like some sort of farm animal while a linkup to a Flesh duplicate made her think she was participating and kept her blissfully unaware of her situation. This was a slap in the face to many viewers, and I don't blame them. It's appalling to think that forced incarceration during pregnancy actually made it into a children's show, but even more so that the issue has STILL NEVER BEEN ADDRESSED by the characters beyond "Where's my baby?" Anyway, Amy's adventures via the Flesh duplicate were 'real' enough, but I'm sure she feels they were discounted somewhat when she discovers she's been sitting it out in a cupboard the whole time instead.

Now we get to the more recent episode, The Girl Who Waited. Amy ages 36 years while waiting to be rescued by the Doctor and Rory. Again. A simple misunderstanding has landed her in a box-- a huge box full of endless recreational possibilities, yes, but still a box. It's a box the Doctor can't even step into for fear of catching the plague, it's a box built on separate time streams which means she has absolutely no companionship (seriously? how is that not a cruel concept for a quarantine facility? I don't care what the Doctor says.), it's a box she did not choose (on purpose). By the time Rory finds her, she's emotionally a mess. Oh, and pushing sixty. But what a marvelous woman she's become. She's built her own sonic screwdriver (and did you ever see Amy figuring that out? No? Me neither, probably because the series has never given her the opportunity until now to be that clever). She's hacked into the mainframe. Oh, and she's a badass samurai chick, killing motherfucking death robots every day.

Her only flaws, really, are that she hates the Doctor and that she can finally stand on her own. Once again we have a woman who doesn't really NEED the Doctor to save her, and who can see through him and understand his darker, unsavory bits. And the Doctor can't stand it. He lies to her to get her to help the 'real' Amy, the one who's weaker, dependent, more game to go along with his sheer idiocy and callousness-- and then, in a twist that should make anyone bawl like a baby, he slams the TARDIS door in her face and leaves her to die. Not just killed by the 'handbots'-- she will wink out of existence and all the years of her development will cease to be. Nice! So this whole episode, we've had a kickass, strong Amy, the kind many of us have been clamoring for all along, and in the end she gets shut back in the box. The worst box, the sort Donna Noble suffered-- the box of Negation.

And for what? So the Doctor a) doesn't have to be challenged by someone who is actually on his level; and b) so Amy and Rory can have this 'perfect life' the Doctor keeps imagining they should have. Just like poor Kazran, he's not letting them choose their own paths or grow on their own-- he's molding them and shaping them like pathetic bonsai trees.

Now, of course. For Donna and Amy there's always that potential inside them. But left untapped, potential is just that. I have the potential to be a neurosurgeon, but life isn't going to direct me there. I don't know if I could kill off a future version of myself just to avoid the pain of becoming her. Could you? Because no matter what the Doctor says, I think it's the worst crime imaginable. Yes, worse than letting Amy suffer for 36 years.

So, that's Putting the Girl in the Box. Basically a trope whereby whenever a woman shows individuality, or too much power, the narrative swiftly puts her in the cupboard where all the scary, dangerous things belong. I'm sure there are many more examples of this sort of thing all over the place, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised it shows up in Who. But that it does so this rampantly suggests to me that there are definite problems with my favorite fandom, and that makes me sad.

Wherein I start talking about moving and end up geeking about music and art (sorry)

freyja — Tue, 28 Jun 2011 08:54:37 GMT

So I'm sitting here eating Nutella and feverishly trying to figure out bus schedules and bike parking and trying to avoid watching more episodes of Roseanne and I realized I never really updated some of you on the San Jose Saga. Rest assured, we did indeed find a place to live. And it is a nice place to live. It comes with a landlord who reminds me of Jeff Goldblum and a guy who rents out the garage and shares the same name with the landlord (no, it isn't Jeff though) and is a film major. And it's all hardwood floors, which the cat has great fun slipping across trying to chase her toys. And it's a bit smaller than our old place, and more money, but that's just the way it goes.

I kind of like it cozy, anyway.

I'm going to try my best to get back into gardening while we're here. The weather is absolutely fantastic here and I've inherited a bunch of plants, mostly succulent, from a friend who just moved to New Zealand. It was basically everything that didn't die from lack of watering between the time she left and I took the plants. I also got some new basil from Ken, in lieu of flowers, after I completed my first dance recital this month. So far it hasn't died, and I've even got to harvest a little, but there was a heat wave recently and it is starting to flower-- in other words, 'go to seed'. Which is BAAAD for harvesting purposes. I wonder if the Internet has any wisdom for me as far as preventing that. Then again, basil is an annual, so maybe seeds are a good idea.

If you're curious about my dance recital, you can see a vid of the rehearsal here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UuPYFCtfUZ4 . The dance was choreographed by Pamela Trokanski, who is one of the few things about Davis I miss. She's a great teacher and I highly recommend her to anyone in the area who hasn't figured that out yet. She's just amazing. Luckily I think I've found pretty good candidates to substitute for the PTDW here, and I'll hopefully be checking one of them out this weekend.

The reason I'm looking up bus schedules is because tomorrow I am going to try to get into some film classes at De Anza College (where our garage-neighbor currently goes). I say 'try' because I am waitlisted for both of them (of course). But hopefully the instructor will take pity on me and I won't have taken an hour-long bus ride both ways for nothing (not to mention stayed on-campus for ten hours since both classes happen to be the same damn day). Oh but who am I kidding, there's an Indian buffet and a Quickly across the street from the college, so it's not like I haven't concocted my own delicious rewards for tomorrow's efforts.

On the music front, Ken and I are trying to finish a 'video song' (see Jack Conte's stuff on Youtube for examples of what the heck that is) for Hypermobility, for some contest he wants to enter. We recorded the piano tonight, and it was just.... oh god, we don't record enough, so it's rare I get to play without having to sing at the same time. It was so freeing to just embellish as I wished and really get into it and focus.

We recorded the strings before we left Davis, with the Dolancs (one half of the Dolanc String Quartet, and just an amazing amazing couple). We'd been subsisting on canned synth crap for so long that it was an absolute joy to hear live cello and violin in our house. I was in awe, and the recordings came out wonderfully. They'll be featured in the song, which hopefully will help all of us get a little more exposure with cross-marketing and such.

The cymbals are also real, since Ken's dad is slowly shipping his drum set to us now that we have a good place to set it up (did I mention this amazing house has a basement?? Well, in California that's a huge deal.). So Ken's learning how to play them as well :)

I'm really proud also of the lighting I've been doing for it. I know next to nothing about lighting, but we have a couple of lamps and bulbs with decent wattage these days, and some 'color gels' (they're really just sheets of colored plastic, wtf, oh yeah, and they MELT) so I've been experimenting and the results are really neat. Everyone has a two-color combination that's somewhat unique, and the lighting is dramatic and moody to match the song.

Anyway, all that's left to record is the guitar and vocals and then we have to put it all together. I can't wait til it's ready to show off.

Besides music I've been trying to draw more. I still have a couple of Art Exchange pieces for 500year_diary to do, which I'm woefully behind on. But then I also signed up for the best_enemies calendar project.... which is due at the end of this month. I started two different drawings before I came up with the idea I think I'm going to stick with. Er. Just in time I guess.

Oh, and I'm trying this all on tablet. It's amazing! I got it for Christmas, but hadn't gotten a chance to really play with it til now. I am probably going to work on the calendar piece some more on the hour-long bus ride tomorrow.

There's probably much more to tell. Time to go to bed, though. Big scary day tomorrow!

Transitions

freyja — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 22:55:57 GMT

Might as well make it official-- Ken got a job in San Jose so we're moving down to that area in a month or so. Yesterday we went down there to check out a couple of rentals, mostly just drive-bys since trying to get in touch with these craigslist people last minute never seems to work. Not many places floated our boat, though there was one we really thought worked well and that was in a decent neighborhood. A property management company owns it though, so we'll see if we ever get an appointment and if they check out. Also, housing is a little more expensive down there, but we're also spoiled from our current place and are looking for non-duplex, detached single families with three bedrooms, garage, and yard. Not a lot of those floating around in our price range.

The one place we got to see the inside of was a front-to-back duplex and it had some very nice features (floor vents? I haven't seen those since I was a child living in Utah, so that was awesome. I have no idea why people go for ceiling vents if heat rises!). But the landlady seemed really ignorant about the upkeep and even the next-door tenants. I mean, I noted the kitchen had a dishwasher and she was like "yeah but I'm not sure if it works." Seriously?

There was one place we saw the outside of and driving down the street it was literally like, "Nice, nice, nice, GOD WHAT A DUMP oh wait that's the house we were considering." It was rundown, had junk stacked on the patio, and to top it off a couple of cats hanging out on the piles of junk (obviously cats aren't bad, but it really did add to the whole motif in quite an amusing way).

Another place seemed ok from the outside, though the description mentioned pool service and there was clearly no pool. Also, the back area was the parking lot of some industrial building and it was just bizarre. Walking back to our car, we passed a little boy who lived two houses down. He was kicking at something on the wet concrete walkway to his house and going "Come On! COME ON!" At first I thought it was a branch. Turned out he was kicking a dead mouse.

And then there were a couple of pretty good places. But they were all at the extreme upper end of our price range, of course. I guess you get what you pay for. One of them did piss me off quite a bit-- not because it was bad but because it looked like it could be a really nice place but the tenants were clearly treating it like shit-- even parking on the lawn right in front of the door. Seriously?

For lunch we tried out the Iguana Burritozilla, a taqueria in downtown SJ with, oh my lord, papitas flautas for $1.50 each. I just about died. This is definitely my kinda place.

I'm going to miss Davis though, despite myself. I spent so long wanting to get out and now it seems that things are finally picking up here. I'm going to miss my friends, obviously, but also my kick-ass superhero therapist, and my dance teacher, and Davis Media Access. Since the job doesn't start til mid-June, I decided I'm definitely going to at least participate in the spring recital for dance. Which means that if we (hopefully) move to SJ by June I'll have to drive up for practice and so on. So there's that, but it's still one of those "why can't I move you with me?" moments. Pam Trokanski is the best teacher I've ever had, not just for dance but for anything. She's amazing and I don't think I'll easily find her like anywhere else.

To make matters even more depressing, the other day I got taken aside by a producer at DMA and was told that she thought I had real potential and she wanted to help me succeed in whatever I decided to do related to television production. And that I should come more often, and tell her when I wanted to start producing my own stuff for the channel. I didn't have the heart to tell her yet that I'm moving but if I'm going to be kicking around til June hopefully I can get some cool stuff done with her first anyway.

Oh, and soon after Ken accepted the job, we played two shows as Never Right Now-- one at a Steampunk Bohemian event (you can read more about that and see pics I took here) and one at Karma Cafe up in Folsom. Both times we got an unbelievably positive reception, were asked back, and made more money selling CDs and making tips in one show than I think we ever have.

So yeah, it'll be tough leaving Davis after all. But I think Ken will be much happier at his new job, and I'll probably be able to find something to do part-time down there, and being closer to SF and the surroundings is something we've wanted for a long while. So mostly I'm just excited, thinking about future plans and looking forward to exploring new surroundings. Could be just the kick in the ass we need.

I really need new icons

freyja — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 23:20:32 GMT

So this is really just a test post, to see if my dreamwidth account is properly synced to LJ. I said I wasn't leaving LJ so this is my compromise for now.

--

I think I've finally come to terms with the rain. The mere absence of the sun used to depress me beyond belief. And while it still has a tendency to make me more sluggish in the mornings and oversleep an atrocious amount, there's something so damned comforting about it. The world quietens, slows down, and life becomes about self-nurture. Right now I'm decompressing from a therapy session, listening to good music and contemplating my next task.

Without music I think I'd be lost. Not just because it's my current career choice, but because it soothes me, galvanizes me, and makes the world manageable. Even beautiful, sometimes. There was an article I reblogged in Tumblr a few days ago theorizing that some people get a prolactin rush when listening to 'sad' songs, for instance anything in a minor key. The feeling is supposed to be one of comfort, as if someone had their arms around you and was whispering to you that everything would be all right. I've never had anyone so accurately describe what happens in my brain before. It's like music itself takes me to its bosom and just... holds me there. Like when you learn how to float in water as a child and you realize you won't sink like a stone but it's going to actually hold you up. Something about that release is absolutely necessary. You're surrendering yourself to a connection with something much larger.

I feel a little bad for people who don't get this rush and only feel the pain of sad music. I wish I could explain to them that it's all going to be all right. Sometimes when people come up to me after a show and tell me that I've inspired them, I feel like I have sort of done that. It's my number one goal, even beyond all the ambitions of success and popularity and moneymaking. Just to know that what I did mattered to someone.

Forgive me for being so... urgh, I dunno, earthy and flowery or whatever. I'm just lately in a pretty good mood, thanks to my cave-in about anti-depressants. It's amazing the good one little pill every day can do, and I never imagined that I could recover quite this much. The high hasn't worn off all the way yet. I'm sure it will, though, never fear: people are already becoming much more annoying.

I've also been delving into my childhood a little and thinking about nurturing in general, the gentleness and emotional acknowledgment I never really received as a kid. Sometimes it's so hard to reconcile all of it, and the last few months have been a proper convalescing period for me. But I think I'm finally coming around to the idea that I need people, at least every once in a while. Annoying as they can be. And I shouldn't feel wretched about asking for or receiving support. I can maintain emotional independence even while socially or financially dependent. That's a big step for me.

freyja — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 23:50:49 GMT

Fuck it, I'm not leaving.

closed indefinitely

freyja — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 21:31:46 GMT

So I haven't been making any real LJ entries in some time, and I'm not really planning on making any more real LJ entries, because I've determined that only one or two people even seem to notice I've said anything here. And this is not a complaint, merely a notice that only one or two people are even going to read anyway, but I think it's about time I closed this thing up.

And I hate saying this knowing how many years I've been here (since 2001!) and how things were very very different in the past, when I felt more of a connection to so many of you and you know, that I wasn't such a ghost here I guess. When I felt what I said was interesting and mattered. But I haven't felt that way in quite some time. I guess it's the trend of the internet, or maybe I wasn't very good at keeping up with any of you, or I don't even know. It's not even so much that I feel I haven't been interesting-- this year I've produced some of the most interesting stuff of my life. I have a band now, and an album, and I'm starting to put a business together to sell my drawings and photographs, and those things are HUGE to me. Maybe not to you.

I have other journals, mainly for RP and fic, so I'm not leaving LJ forever. And I do want to keep some people here on my list so that I can keep up with your lives because as far as I know you aren't anywhere else with any regularity. So I guess not much is even changing. But if you're hanging on to my name in your friends list there's really no reason to pretend anymore. I give up. If you still want me to read your entries keep me on, but I won't be making any more and I'll probably be dropping a fair amount off my own reading list, because it's been at the point I can't keep up for several years now. And I don't think it's fair keeping up with some of you when my comments and posts go ignored. *shrug*

I don't like leaving on such a bitter, nothing note, but I feel sort of bitter and nothing today so I suppose it fits.

In closing, just so at least this entry can't be ignored:

GOODBYE LIVEJOURNAL!

Heh. Nobody ever said I wasn't a complete child.

dreamwidth

freyja — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 00:24:16 GMT

So I got a dreamwidth account. ans99. Now what?

Our first CD release EVER!

freyja — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 22:39:28 GMT

Public Service Announcement: First CD is out for my band, Never Right Now <3<3

Please Play Please is our official first release: a collection of demo versions of our songs. It features new mixes for CrabSong and Motel 6, as well as four brand new songs and an acoustic version of CrabSong!

Now downloadable from BandCamp for a minimum of $4 (sort of variant on the ‘pay what you want’ model). Streaming is of course always free, and you can listen to the entire album on BandCamp.

Everything was done ourselves- the writing, recording, mixing, etc. I did the cover art :)

freyja — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 08:50:20 GMT

In the art world, there is no good or bad. Let me just get that out there right up front. There are people out there who, it's pretty much universally agreed upon, make some amazing things. There are people out there who make some (universally agreed upon) truly awful things, as we have seen on wonderful sites like regretsy.

And then there are people who make some mediocre things, things that don't stand out or that are... halfway decent in some way but lacking in skill or execution. These are the people that either get no recognition for their work, or if they do it's because they've accumulated some measure of social esteem-- in other words, they have friends, and they're well-liked, and it doesn't matter how much their stuff sucks because people just want to like it. And they go on thinking that the stuff they do is okay-- and in the grand scheme it is, yes, but on an artistic or creative scale it is incredibly mediocre and just not valuable.

I am one of those people who does not get much feedback from what I do. And I know that most artists are incredibly down on their own work, never think it's good enough, can never get it to truly reflect its potential and what they saw living in their heads. But sometimes I have to wonder whether *I* am one of those mediocre artists-- bad, but not bad enough to be notorious. Just... bland and sadly lacking.

To be honest, artistically? I feel alone. I don't have a base of friends or cohorts to draw upon when I need feedback or when I have a specific question or problem concerning mechanics of this or that art form, or creative blocks, or any of that. Probably the closest I have is my RPing group, which is likely why I continue to do it. Any real connection art-wise has largely been found there.

After next week I'm taking some time off and trying again to set up something resembling an art career. But I have to tell you, guys, I'm flagging. I'm losing motivation. I need to fix this, and I don't know how. I want to make amazing things, I want to share my ideas with the world-- but nobody's listening. I dunno. Maybe I just have nothing worthwhile to say.

Vincent and the Doctor and Gauguin and Depression and the Master

freyja — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 12:12:14 GMT

I just saw tonight one of the most beautiful episodes of Doctor Who. Since it just aired Saturday in the UK I suppose there are some spoilers, but I wouldn't be too worried since it is mainly a historical type episode and, like, everybody knows what happened to van Gogh. But still.

The premise is pretty simple: the Doctor notices something odd in a van Gogh painting and rushes off to 1890 to fight whatever evil must be there. (It's just one of those really strange Doctor hunches. Go with it.) They find a monster, they fight a monster, the day is won, and so on and so forth. The really interesting bits, and why the episode was really written, are how it handles van Gogh himself and specifically the idea of depression, of art, of being what I like to call "differently thinking", a term patterned after the replacement one for "disabled". It does this amazingly well. It does this so amazingly well.

van Gogh is an outcast in the town, a heavy drinker, poor, a loser, but the Doctor and Amy, of course, knowing what they know (the whole picture, so to speak) see something completely different. They see his house full of paintings and they know exactly what it will all be worth someday. van Gogh does not have that luxury; he must live in the moment. Later that will change, but as we also see, it doesn't really change anything.

As an aside, it's interesting to me that van Gogh is characterized as blind to his future, especially bearing in mind his suicide. It was theorized a while ago that one of the reasons behind suicide for many teens is that they are unable to comprehend that circumstances will change for them. This is because young people in general often tend to live in the moment; they are intensely affected by the immediate situation around them, and can't always look to the future for relief from that situation as us oldies can sometimes do. Of course plenty of older people also commit suicide, perhaps because the pain is so intense at that given moment that they are also blinded. And for people like van Gogh of course, the pain isn't a one-time occurrence, but cyclic. So while the pain may end eventually, he has to live with the knowledge that it will eventually also return. This is a terrifying concept, and one I don't think non- chronically depressed people readily get.

It's established early on, in the form of an invisible monster attack, that van Gogh can see things that even the Doctor cannot. He attempts several times to explain what he experiences, how color calls to him, screams at him to listen. How the stars and the wind look and feel to him, swirling in the night sky. He's so perceptive he can even pick up on Amy's recent loss-- even though Time itself swallowed and erased it, and nobody should have an inkling of it. He just knows. And because he can see all these things so clearly, he constantly derides his attempts at painting them. He knows he'll never get it right.

This is the plight of the artist, but also in part the plight of the "differently thinking." The perceptive, the overly sensitive. What makes someone insane-- is it that their thinking is "wrong" or are they merely perceiving life in a different way, a way we can't comprehend? The Doctor even hints at this, telling van Gogh he doesn't believe the man is insane. He then goes on to try to explain his thoughts on depression, but is cut off mid-dialogue. But I believe he was going to say something extremely perceptive, because if anyone has gone through dealing with someone who's off the beaten track, and had to understand and forgive them time and again, it's the Doctor.

What am I saying? I think you know what I'm saying. I think there is a large part of the Doctor's relationship with the Master wrapped up in his interactions with van Gogh. It's subtle, it's probably not at the forefront of his mind, but it's there. I find it interesting the episode never directly mentions Gauguin, whom van Gogh had met, collaborated with, obsessed over, and driven away by this point (remind you of a certain relationship in Who?). The only hint we get of that is in a scene near the end.

For the most part van Gogh keeps it together in this episode but there is one scene where his depression is manifested rather starkly. The Doctor who's staying with him, visits his bedroom and is taken aback by van Gogh's complete collapse. He's face down in the bed, sobbing, accusing the Doctor of being on the brink of leaving without really making him better, and that everyone leaves him in the end (Gauguin?). Then he's angrily spitting at him to go away practically in the next breath. The Doctor readies to leave, figuring he's done more harm than good, but all of a sudden van Gogh shows up again, practically jaunty (manic?) and off they go to fight the monster. He even waves the scene off as one of his "moods".

Later, when the creature is dying, van Gogh having skewered it with a chair, the Doctor suddenly realizes too late that part of its vicious behavior has been because it's blind. van Gogh is overtaken by remorse, and he suggests that it must have been frightened and lonely, "lashing out in fear and frustration, the way that humans do when they are afraid." The way van Gogh did earlier with the Doctor. The way he did with Gauguin. You can see the understanding in him as he watches this thing die, and the sorrow in that understanding.

So here's the thing, about this episode. What makes it brilliant. What makes it correct. It's the ending. The Doctor and Amy decide they just CANNOT leave van Gogh thinking that he's worthless and that his paintings will never be loved-- so they bring him to the museum in 2010 where they were just viewing his works. On top of that, the Doctor oh so slyly gets the curator, a van Gogh nut, to wax poetic on why he thinks van Gogh is just the besty best artist in the history of art. The curator sums up nicely the writer's probable views on the subject (because Rusty isn't the only writer in the history of Who to use characters as mouthpieces trust me)-- that van Gogh had extraordinary vision and extraordinary pain, and that he channeled that pain into expressive works that will probably never be rivaled, and so on. Beautiful speech. And van Gogh is just steps away listening to this, probably the first praise in forever he's gotten, and he's in tears. They leave him back in 1890, happy, and he proclaims to the Doctor that he's the first that ever really made him feel better.

We're not done yet, though. Because now Amy has an idea in her head. "Let's go back to the museum," she says to the Doctor, "I bet there are tons of new paintings there now!" She is, in other words, sure that they've not only done good here, but done so good that they've completely changed van Gogh's life around with this one small encounter. That now that he knows without a doubt he is loved, and valuable, and that what he's doing is worth the struggle, that when they get back to the museum they'll find out he lived a much longer life. The Doctor says, tellingly, "I don't think so."

And when they get up there he's proven right. There are no new paintings. Some of the paintings are slightly altered, but they were not able to prevent van Gogh from shooting himself in July 1890, at age 37. And from the Doctor's expression, it isn't, I don't think, because van Gogh's death was a "fixed event". No, I think that the Doctor gets it, understands why van Gogh's last words were reportedly "the sadness will last forever." He knows very well, after all, that there are some people where no matter how hard you try, or what you try, or how well you treat them, they are going to sink. There are some people who cannot be saved. They can be loved, protected, comforted for a time, forgiven, and even redeemed. But not saved. Some things the Doctor cannot heal or fix; some battles can't be won.

And it was his old friend from Gallifrey who taught him that lesson. I think he's finally coming to terms with it.

Tripping, Falling, etc.

freyja — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 08:22:19 GMT

I feel like I haven't updated in a while and I guess I have a lot to say, although none of it is really all that good past about a month ago. So, fair warning that there is a whinefest ahead.

In fact the only really good thing I can think of is that music has been somewhat progressing. Although not the speed I'd prefer. We did an open mic back at the end of March that was .... thrilling. Successful. Everything I wanted from it we got. We networked, we didn't screw up, people loved the song. I had really high hopes.

That night I started getting a sore throat and it was all downhill from there, I swear. I very quickly came down with pretty much every flu and cold symptom I could. Sore throat progressed into fever, getting up to 101.3 at one point. Being that sick I always have the notion I'd be better off shot. Sometimes I really do beg Ken to just put me out of my misery, and then I feel even worse for being so pathetic. So that was not a very good night.

I started recovering from the fever the next day but gained a cough that was so bad at one point I couldn't get any sleep. So Ken got me some cough suppressant-- Dexamethasone. It worked ok, but I was still waking up coughing, so I went to the doctor and she prescribed me, among other things, codeine.

Can you see where this story is heading?

Okay guys just in case you do not: I tried the codeine and I was still waking up. In fact more than with the Dexamethasone. So after waking up twice I took some of the cough suppressant Ken had gotten me originally, not really thinking about it. Just wanting to get enough sleep so I could go back into work because I had already run out of sick time.

Cut to a few hours later when my alarm goes off. I get up, feeling a little off-balance but not too bad, make my way to the shower...

...and nearly pass out on the bathroom floor. Ken helped me back to bed but I was shaking and feeling extremely warm, and then cold, and then warm again, and my anxiety levels were through the roof.

I looked it up later online and felt like a complete idiot. GUYS. I WAS TRIPPING. DXM and codeine is, as you probably knew, a drug combination people take to get high.

So after that I just gave up on the codeine. That's my funny illness story. What's not so funny about that illness is that it took me two weeks to feel halfway normal, and even then I just barely got my singing range back last week. So, no open mics for us since.

So just after I'd recovered from that cold/flu thing the second tragedy hit. As you may know, I've recently re-discovered my love for dance. Well, last last Monday, dance did not love me. I have always been pretty awful at en dehors turns, and well. Everything. But I'd been able to console myself so far that at least I've never fallen. Now, folks? I have fallen. Hard. On my left ankle. Yes, the one I sprained 6 years ago. Yes. THAT one. It is now re-sprained.

:(

So for the past week I've been hobbling around on crutches and in chronic pain that never really gets completely masked by the painkillers. I had to stop taking ibuprofen because it started making me feel really stoned and weird and was hurting my stomach. So I've switched to Tylenol for now. Maybe codeine later. We'll see. I'm already stir-crazy, frustrated and guilt-ridden over this. I hate not being able to fend for myself, or to move, or to be useful. I've watched more TV per night than I did when I was unemployed. I've gained 2 or 3 pounds.

Oh but the news gets much worse.

As a consequence of spraining my ankle, and the Craft Center not having disability access to the classroom where I teach... taught... drawing, I had to beg out of teaching the class. That makes sense, right? I can't get to campus even, really, with this thing because parking for teachers does not exist and I obviously can't bike, and crutching on the bus will probably kill my other ankle to be honest. And I'm in so much pain still I don't think I even could string a sentence together verbally. So I canceled last week's, obviously, and I thought that the manager would, you know, call me back and we'd figure out what to do. Because who gets a sprained ankle and is fine to climb a huge flight of stairs to a classroom in one week?

Well, she never contacted me so this week I called up her supervisor (she wasn't there, she's never there) and asked what we could do. I suggested a sub if possible, for the rest of the quarter and the supervisor said she'd see what could be done on that front.

Today I got an email from the manager telling me that she was going to use a complete newbie TA as the teacher and that she was already as qualified as I was to teach it (rub it in much, bitch?), and also that she didn't want me teaching next quarter because she wanted me to re-evaluate whether I wanted to continue teaching this course. She went on to explain what a fucking HARDSHIP it was for her to reschedule missed classes, and so on. She referred to my difficulty making it to class last quarter, but she really must have been referring to the two classes I had to reschedule two full quarters ago, as proof that I guess I'm a shitty teacher with no commitment to this job. One of those times back in the Fall was due to illness and one was due to a dying pet being rushed to the vet (Wilson, whom we ended up having to euthanize).

So now I guess I'm fired from my part-time art teaching job, which I loved, and I feel like this is thinly veiled discrimination. Not sure what to do next. Part of me just wants to say screw it because it's not nearly the only problem going on in my life right now, and everything is slowly spiralling down the drain and I'm almost ready to say seriously that I want off this ride.

I don't even have a therapist anymore guys. Not to mention that the roleplay game I was enjoying so much issued me a reprimand on my birthday because someone apparently has it out for me and made up some bogus complaints that don't even make sense. And now with those three safe havens gone I sort of feel like I have nowhere to go. Doesn't help that I've been going crazier than usual and really need these things much more than I might have at another time. I dunno. Feels like everything is abandoning me the instant I find happiness with it. Maybe the universe just doesn't want me to be happy.

Sorry for the moping, lj but I'm sure the three of you that might read through all this will forgive me :/

and so it is.

freyja — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 09:05:10 GMT

i didn't know what a brute i was.

i dipped my cigarette and rode the bus. Vengeance built me hastily, and i dragged the clanging notion
i was ~~nobody,~~
                                                                                                                               ~~nobody,~~

                                                          ~~nobody.~~

all i had was:

my Invention.

~~and My Love Invented All of You.~~

(oh look what thoughts can do what thoughts can do if you're not by now dead and buried you're most certifiably married oh married)
....././/..!!$/*/.,/,/gJFj/*9!!!!!!!!!!?/h/./t/.re77****m***.*,**./7r%%../../*868&&&**^452&(IYuU.-- ,.p[-

I'm sure you're sleeping sound,
with the Mistress of the Hours. ~~The hours that grind your life to dust~~
///////.../../*%#.^....^^^^^^,,.^^^**#///////r/4/4$$$3/4
/././.k

Your easy loves You keep like pets.
Denied them, You are powerless.

.....whatever keeps you sleeping through the night....

-----------------------------l,,m------ttxtttxttxtxtxxxxxxxt---,,,.-------98---------------------9
*&xxxXXXxxxXxxx/x//x/x/xX(())-

i'm not the man you thought i was.

my love has never lived indoors
i had to drag it home by force
hired hounds at both my wrists
damp and bruised by strangers' kisses on my lips

but.

you're the one that i still miss
you're the one that i still miss
((((And It's Ruthless That It Comes As No Surprise))))

I'm Not the Man You Think I Am.
I'm Not the Man You Think I Am.
I'm Not the Man You Think I Am.
I'm Not the Man You Think I Am.
I"m NOt the Man YOU Think I am
I Am Not hte Man you think I am
I'm not the Man you THink I am
I'm noOT THE Man yOu THink I am

I"m Not the Man YOU thINK I am

I'm not the man You THink. I I am
I'm not the Man you think I am I'M nO T TH em an youathanik I am i 'm not th nalm them man you oTHINK I AM Ii'm nto the man you think I am i'm not not he Man you Think I a'm NO tythe man You THInk I am I'm not ehte man yotyouthink lj;ljklma m ma i 'm not hthdhalntiot th not ontnot no tnot not not notna the man you Think I THINK I THINK ITTHINK THINK I am. . .. I"m no thoi thnot hthtyou thought yoU li iie I'm mo not NO TNO NOT NOT NOT

all thanks go to purpleprimate really

freyja — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 04:09:07 GMT

If you see this, you'd better post some goddamned poetry in your muthafuckin' lj. Or summat

Today's little slice of life vignette comes from John Lennon and is entitled, "Good Dog Nigel":

Arf, Arf, he goes, a merry sight,
Our little hairy friend,
Arf, Arf, upon the lampost bright
Arfing 'round the bend.
Nice dog! Goo boy,
Waggie tail and beg,
Clever Nigel, jump for joy
Because we're putting you to sleep at three of the clock, Nigel.

:D

freyja — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 08:45:33 GMT

ZOMG you guyz, we just played our first open mic. We were told it was "beautiful." Definitely have to keep this up. Very excited. Just wanted to share.

Oh, no wait, there was something else. Also, we have a myspace and bandcamp. With a free song. Will try to get a facebook page up soon. And more songs. Tell everyone.

("...Everyone?"
"EEEVVVVVERRRRRYYYYYYYOOONNNNNNEEEEE!")

EEEEEEEEEEEE

Maybe all art is pain, but it's a pain I kinda like

freyja — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 11:41:28 GMT

notemily has got me thinking about figure skating again, something I hadn't been hooked on since I was in high school. I figure skated for about a year in high school but after I grew out of my skates I never picked it back up. I'm not really sure why; I just got distracted by other things I guess. It was a little different with dance class and gymnastics; I quit those on purpose. Some sort of thing I thought at the time was justified proto-feminist rebellion but was probably much more a product of my frustration and pride. You see, when I don't pick something up right away I do tend to drop it. I like things that I can do, and that come easily to me, so that I can feel accomplished. Many people probably feel the same, particularly if they have an issue with overly competitive behavior.

While dance class never really seemed difficult to me (the reason I quit it was that they wanted to hold me back a year and I'd thought I was doing better than that), gymnastics was painfully difficult. Keep in mind I was a 12-year-old going up against kids as young as 7. There was really no way I couldn't feel like a complete chump for not being flexible, strong, or even brave enough (backbends tend to terrify me because of the surrender to gravity, and HOMG the balance beam). I also just didn't like forcing my body to do things it was screaming at me I should cease immediately. It's one of the reasons I like yoga much better, actually; there is no sense of competition or forcing going on there, but just relaxing and doing what you're capable of doing in that moment-- and then maybe pushing a little more.

Now that I'm taking dancing again it seems much harder. In fact I don't know what I was on when I was younger, or if I was really even properly paying attention at all, because I surely do not remember learning all the shit I am learning now. Especially posture-- OH. The posture just kills me! There's this great 9 Chickweed Lane comic (yes, I read 9 Chickweed Lane, deal with it) where someone visiting the main character, a ballerina, has decided that she's going to quit grad school and become a dancer too because of the glamorous and graceful life she's sure her friend leads. After watching her friend practice to exhaustion, however, she changes her mind. "Your lives aren't glamorous," she sputters. "Your lives are the Iditarod." And it's true. Dance may look so effortless and carefree in the hands of a professional, but it is surprisingly restrictive, in posture alone, never mind many other factors (costume, long practices, the inevitable foot and pelvic injuries...). I didn't realize that until I started again, I suppose because I finally decided to actually try to learn it properly.

Anyway back to my main point. Every form of art seems effortless from the outside, if done right. And we look at it from the outside and all we see is the end product and how beautiful it is, and we think that is all there is. But there is the flip side of that-- the effort, the frustration, the worry, the struggle and indecision, and the pain that goes into making that art appear beautiful and effortless and inspiring. So it's really easy to say "I wish I could do that" but not many of us will end up doing that, precisely because we'll hit a wall at some point that we just won't want to make the sacrifices to climb. And we'll realize then that particular thing is not for us.

I happened to catch a couples skating routine tonight. One of the skaters was 15 year old girl. Her routine was, to my eyes, flawless. The two of them smiled at each other as if they were having the time of their lives but I could see the posture and the calculated precision now that I couldn't when I was 15. Figure skating and dancing are not so dissimilar. They were smiling and they were graceful but they were working their asses off to do it. And I know that I could never do that for a living. And I think today I was finally okay with it. I couldn't do it, but these people can. These people not only look like they are having the time of their lives, but despite the effort they actually are. Eventually if you're lucky you do find something like that, that is worth it to you.

Today I realized that music does that for me. I've loved music all my life; most of us do. It is rare I am able to get through a day without it. And I've always played music. I've been at the piano since I was 8 (my parents started lessons when I happened across one and just started tooling on it) and when I sit down and start I get sucked into a deep hole that sometimes doesn't spit me out for hours. I used to be so tied to regular playing, in fact, that when we went on vacation somewhere I'd have to find a mall with a piano store just so I could play one. I've been singing for even longer than that; my parents tell me I used to just constantly sing cheesy love songs as a 3 or 4 year old (it must have been young enough that I don't really remember it). I am practically incapable of stopping myself singing along to whatever happens to be playing now. But it never occurred to me that this is what I'd be striving towards as a life thing, you know? Even though I've been singing and playing and writing songs for a very long time I never put the pieces together until now. But I think this is my figure skating. This is the thing that takes hard work but is totally worth it, that I smile through because I am thoroughly enjoying it despite the discipline and attention and effort it requires. This is the thing I want to be doing, and Ken and I have both remarked to each other that when we go to shows now we get extremely jealous that we can't play. I just want to jump onstage and just take it over.

And maybe we will, LiveJournal. Maybe we will.

oh this is entirely too perfect.

freyja — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 09:57:49 GMT

Suddenly, I found myself without you
One day, someday, you will be alone, too
For now, I see you walking down the street with him
And I will smell your breath on every gust of wind
Why do you do it to me?

The last time I went shopping
I bought your favorite kind of ice cream
It's still sitting in the freezer
It's screaming, "You still need her."
Why do you kiss so softly?

I love to watch you on the stage
You sing about love; you sing about rage
But your song is fading so fast
You didn't write this kiss to last
Why do you do it to me?

I can't help but notice the way you kiss her
It's so much like the way that you sing
You couldn't be any prouder
When you kiss me, kiss a little louder
Why do you kiss so softly?

Twittinesis no more

freyja — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 03:05:59 GMT

Hi Live Journal (Live Journal? Really? That's how the site wants to spell itself? I'd always thought, like probably 90% of users, that it's Livejournal or LiveJournal or even good old plain old LJ, but whatevs).

Lots of things have been going on for me, and thus there has been a fair amount of change. Some of the simpler ones:

1. No more Twitter feed straight to LJ (as you could probably tell by the subject line of this post)

Yes. Hopefully, unless I fucked it up, I unsubscribed from Twittinesis. Why'd I do that? Because I now have an LJ RSS feed for my Tumblog. How I got that will be explained a little later, as it's not quite as simple but it's so damn clever it makes my teeth hurt. And yes, I do say so myself.

So yeah. If you've ever been curious about Tumblr, or want to know the awesome things I look at all day when I should be working (they really are awesome and inspiring), but can't be bothered to cart your ass off to a different website, this feed is for you: ans99tumblr

2. No more all-lowercase funtime extravaganza (if I can help it, and as you also probably noticed if you pay attention to that sort of thing)

And why this? I dunno. I work at a job now, I suppose, where I need to converse in normal-speak, and I also rp a fair amount of time (I log into my rp journal faaaaar far more than I ever do this thing), where if i typed like this all the time people would probably throw me out and then i'd be sad and say fuck you lj. So that's sort of prompted a habitual switch from "no caps" to "sometimes caps". But also? It just really seems to annoy some people. Enough that I was beginning to get the feeling some of them would actually refuse to read what I read at all. Yes, this is capitulating to snobbery and to the status quo in some sense, but I think it's more important to make friends at this juncture than to stubbornly stand by some half-assed philosophy I basically made up when I was 18 and typing nonsense into Microsoft Word and realizing it was correcting all of my lowercase "i"s for me. Oh the nerve of that program.

3. In addition to my Tumblr feed, say hello to my new art blog feed.

hieratic_art is the RSS feed to hieratic, my new WordPress blog, which replaces my old B2evo blog that recently got shat upon by spammers. I won't be updating my Livejournal regularly with art, because I still don't find it highly reliable. Plus, I'd also like to keep my whining and my art at least a little separate. Just makes things less embarrassing.

4. I may actually start writing here again.

I'm pretty busy, so we'll see how it goes, but I have felt the urge now and again to jot down some thoughts that have seemed inappropriate for hieratic (so very unprofessional), Tumblr (too many shallow connections), Facebook (family members), or Twitter (too restrictive).

We'll see, LJ. We'll see.

Now you may be asking yourselves (probably not, but maybe one of you is asking yourself this-- I've got to have faith), "Why all the RSS feeds, Freyja? And HOW?"

It's true this account is unpaid. And likely will remain forever. I just haven't seen the need to get a paid account just to get some extra icon space (why bother if I never post?) or to make a few feeds (that's what friends are for, yes?). But I'd been thinking for a while that it would have been nice to have some extra icons for my rp journal.

This might strike you as odd; wouldn't 15 be plenty? How many expressions can one person have? This might strike you as odd unless you'd ever actually roleplayed, written out a tag (think of it as the next line or two in an ongoing story, for those unfamiliar with the terminology), and then spent the next few minutes trying to find an icon that fit it at all. Or found yourself using the same one over and over and over. Pretty boring. Bottom line: I quickly found that 15 faces is not nearly enough for the character I play. But on the other hand, I'm a cheapskate. I wasn't going to shell out money to a website so I could have extra icons; that's not even a tangible commodity and I'm always skirting broke lately as is.

That's why the vgift charity drive for Haiti last Thursday-Saturday was so appealing. During that period of time Live Journal pledged to donate all proceeds from vgift sales to a couple of organizations providing relief in Haiti. I'd been wanting to donate anyway but had not found the time.

Also. Incidentally, did you know that for every $10 you receive in vgifts from someone within two weeks, your journal also gets credited two months of paid time (hey, I don't make these rules up)?

I think you may be able to guess what I did at this point. So my rp journal now has 60 silly vgifts, 35 icon slots, and a year of paid time. And the Haiti relief effort has $60 of my monies. And LJ has none. Tee hee.

Well, that's my story. If any of you are still reading, kudos and hello!

From Twitter 02-01-2010

freyja — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 10:03:13 GMT

10:16:30: Photo: San Francisco’s Answer to Westboro Baptist Church via mario LOL. my favorite: “I’m Tired” http://tumblr.com/x6t61ibs5
16:55:11: Photo: fuckyeahghosttowns: ok Ken I will go to THIS waterpark. http://tumblr.com/x6t61tnqg

Tweets copied by twittinesis.com

From Twitter 01-29-2010

freyja — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 10:04:00 GMT

02:15:14: Video: Charlie Brooker - How To Report The News via PrivateCustard via John Dies at the End classic. http://tumblr.com/x6t5xz42c
18:15:20: Photo: Big Fat Whale - Corporate Persons Are Jerks via Doug W. http://tumblr.com/x6t5ylwmk

Tweets copied by twittinesis.com

From Twitter 01-27-2010

freyja — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 10:03:18 GMT

14:05:34: Photo: purpleprimate: http://tumblr.com/x6t5wbocr
14:06:31: Photo: A tornado made of steel wool, cotton, ground parsley and moss by Matthew Albanese. adamquinn: http://tumblr.com/x6t5wbp5x
14:16:01: Photo: What Happens When You Cross A Goat With A Gun? This Shoe, Apparently via notemily WANT. http://tumblr.com/x6t5wbuik
14:16:30: Photo: eatsleepdraw: http://tumblr.com/x6t5wbuz8

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From Twitter 01-25-2010

freyja — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 10:03:00 GMT

14:03:45: "A generation from now, when these children become adults, what kind of country will the United States..." http://tumblr.com/x6t5u7rra
14:05:21: Photo: fuckyeahtrannies: http://tumblr.com/x6t5u7tha
14:08:20: "My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray..." http://tumblr.com/x6t5u7wp6
14:59:00: Video: Star Trek: I Will Survive (by m185874) http://tumblr.com/x6t5u9dys
15:01:53: Photo: eatsleepdraw: http://tumblr.com/x6t5u9h23
15:53:16: Free Online Books, Poems, Short Stories - Read Print Library - 1984, Canterbury Tales, Pride and Prejudice,... http://tumblr.com/x6t5ub0pc

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From Twitter 01-22-2010

freyja — Sat, 23 Jan 2010 10:03:46 GMT

13:01:16: Photo: ideasareawesome: http://tumblr.com/x6t5r20d7
13:05:26: "In his book, “The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power,” author Joel Bakan makes..." http://tumblr.com/x6t5r23rb
13:50:17: Video: A short clip from 2007 of Neil Gaiman training a bat (or pretending to, at least…). via purpleprimate http://tumblr.com/x6t5r35ex
14:15:56: clientsfromhell: ?? wtf, there are warm blues. what kind of designer are you?... http://tumblr.com/x6t5r3rx8

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