So I need to get back to school. I know where I'll probably end up going, as my nifty associate's degree isn't worth the time I need to tell you about it, but I must say the college system in this country is truly a rich man's game. Even the college my brother Iz (B.S. in Physics, currently working at AutoZone part time) went to, Berea, which was known as the poor man's college because you could go there without being mired in debt for the rest of your life, ended up slapping him with thousands of dollars of debt (they had promised that through his work study he could essentially go for free). So far my scholarships and grants have carried me through without a great deal of bills, but they're exhausted, and I need to get back to it ASAP. College here is nothing more than another way for fat cats to make money, and we all know it, but no one can do a thing about it.

Anyway... I'm considering several different areas of study, since I decided that I quite dislike the sciences (was a chemistry major for a while, but quickly grew to hate it). I'm thinking right now about getting a degree in any one of the following areas: Communications, English (literature/langauge), Journalism, or History (Education). Every one of them seems too daunting to undertake given my current situation, but I know I need to do it, and now it's just a matter of deciding. I'm sort of leaning towards either Communications (love to work in TV or radio) or History (don't get me started on the Three Kingdoms or the American Civil War, it's bad for your eardrums). But it's still a fix. Thoughts?

With Nanowrimo going on this month combined with my increasing sense of apathy towards most all things internet, I don't know how much use I'll be around here. 

Tonight was... awful. I felt terrible, for hours, though my health is just fine. I felt like I'd lost something of great importance. In a way I did. But I can't help but feel like this is just a little stone rolling down a mountain... so far. My sense of optimism is gone. I know what to expect. And I know what to do when it happens. That doesn't make it any easier.

I tire of being *there* for everyone, especially people I don't even know all that well. I love helping, I do. But... I don't know. This isn't right, what I'm writing now. It's just to relieve some of this stubborn pain that doesn't want to piss off already.

I hope for better. Please hope with me.

I don't think I've ever felt quite so frustrated with life in general, ever. 

People, please get active around here! Nothing will ever happen if no one ever tries! I mean, come on! If you want people to appraise your work, appraise theirs! If you want your work to be seen, then do something to make it seen. The publishing world won't let you sit on your merry olde ass while it cradles your manuscript like a beloved child. You have to hustle. Same here!

I watched 'Kingdom of Heaven' tonight. Yes, girls, Orlando Bloom was in it. And yes, he did his part. Not that the acting was all that impressive, the script all that inspiring, the fights all that engaging... but he definitely did his part.

Okay... the guy is the male equivalent of T and A. As an actor he's mediocre, but he's a babyface pretty boy type and so people love him. To me, every role he's ever been in has basically been the same, just with a different costume. But yay for him, who makes big money being pretty.

As for the movie... it was futile. Far too artsy for a war movie, and too much action for an art flick. The whole movie seems more like a chunk from the middle of a much longer movie (though the blasted thing is still a good two and half hours long). The soundtrack, just like Troy, was horrendous. It sucked in the same way Troy's did, in that it had a bunch of slow-ass percussion-free middle eastern music playing at all times, even during the fight scenes.

All of these 'epic war movies' are trying to be Braveheart again. Braveheart was excellent. The characters had depth, the action was believable, the soundtrack had f***ing drums and was always appropriate to the scene. The rest of them are just knock-offs... always historically based, always having an obligatory crying female waiting in the wings, always having the camera enjoy scenes of both the good guy commanders and the enemy commanders. They all end with artsy, tragic scenes, and have about four thousand gallons of blood in them. 

For a knock-off, it was passable. For a stand-alone movie... it just didn't cut the mustard. 

I know that there are a lot of poems uploaded to writersco. So why is it, I wonder, that I can't get anyone to enter a damned poetry competition? I've never seen a place so apathetic in my entire life as WritersCo is right now. But I can't seem to get anybody to want to join up either. This makes my head hurt.

Today I received rejection letter number three. I'll be filing it along with the others, but I'm not going to wait on the fourth one to come in before I start trying something new.

My next course of action with writing will be to start entering various contests, and hopefully in so doing I can get a little bit of credibility and exposure, and maybe a little cash to help fund this shit. I do want to enter some of the writersco contests, but as I have neither a credit card, PayPal account, or any other kind of account, it's kind of an impossibility. Plus... I hate to say it, but I kind of doubt that there will be enough participation to make it worthwhile.

Well... day two of the craft festival. I managed to set it up so that the guys wouldn't have to get up at the asscrack of dawn to go up there today, which is good, because I'm rested. Unfortunately, Rodd used the extra time to go pick up his girlfriend to go with us.

-.-

I honestly hate this person. I didn't used to, but yeah, now I do. A few weeks ago Rodd was in his most fervent 'I'm gonna leave her' modes, and I just smiled at him when he said it. "What?" he asked me.

"Excuse me if I don't hold my breath," was my answer. Of course he was pissed at that, but I explained to him that he had pulled this kind of stunt before, and I had absolutely no faith that he would follow through with it.

Sure enough, now they're all chummy again. Which is fine, everyone needs someone to love. They just don't need to sacrifice the people who have sacrificed for them in the process.

So now its too cold to paint the cars, and I'm out of a job. Well, great. I'm thinking about applying at the bank, where if I was hired I would have to get up early for work. Which would mean no more late nights... which will almost certainly ruin my time with Emily, who has class during the day.  Everywhere I go I run into walls. And I'm just not strong enough to get over them anymore.

Well, I'm sick again. The good part about this particular kind of cold is that, even though the days are miserable, I sleep like the dead who aren't quite dead but just sleeping and thus easily confused with the dead at a casual glance.

Hey, note to everyone. If you're happy, don't ever tell anyone who isn't directly responsible for it. Seriously, people love to take it as a slap in the face when someone else is happy and talks about it.

Moving on... I'm going to bed.

Despite what the amateur literary world at large seems to think, all poetry does not have to be about death, dying, or killing! 

Favorite song at the moment:

One More F*cking Time by Motorhead

Hey, if you haven't had a chance to meet cranky Moorn yet, right about now's a damned good time to do it.

This is definitely the kind of night where one wonders just how the hell to make things happen.

New story at: 79.On a Moonbeam.

I feel cold. Tonight was a hard night.

Hm... what to talk about tonight. 

Who's up for some materialism-bashing?

A forum community called Gaia has my attention tonight. It has an economy system that allows users to purchase appearance upgrades for their personal chibi-avatars, in the form of clothing and various accessories.

And yup, people are greedy and aggressive when it comes to these things. Even fake items, fake money, things that only exist in digital form, are coveted and hoarded by people who have, like most professional athleteres, forgotten that what they are doing is a game. Fun for the game, not the spoils.

I keep hearing people groaning about how awful the United States has become. Foreigners especially, who know absolutely nothing about the country other than the basest textbook knowledge and a flood of rumors and yet still believe they can make insulting generalizations about Americans. These people are pure idiots. There are also Americans who groan and bitch about the system, without doing anything to change it themselves. These people are also idiots.

Now, as much as either of these two groups complain about my country, I know for a fact what the worst facet of American nature is. Materialism. Everybody in this country is raised from birth nowadays to make as much money and hoard as much treasure as possible during life. This cheapens life, but people have no choice... if I don't hoard money, someone else will. But that's the problem in this country. Materialism and the lust for money and stuff.

on a happier note. Blah blah blah!! Whee! o.o

There are a lot of depressing entries in the public blog. So I'll list what I'm happy about, and see if anyone else can overcome that wall of antagonism that goes with being a writer of any merit.

1. Emily Ann Karnes.
2. The comedy channel
3. Ramen
4. Blueberry Tea
5. Movies
6. Stories
7. Enhaya
8. Ink Pens
9. The clique.
10. Good poetry.
11. Empathy.
12. Nightshadow
13. Emily. 

There we go. Happy thoughts!

Good day, bad day, good day, horrid day, good day, great day, dammit. Ever have one of those days? I did today.

I'm tired. I have answers for other peoples' problems, but not mine. It's getting old. 

And I really hate this 'log right into your received messages' thing. I vastly prefer the mainpage. I usually just click the damned mainpage button right away anyway. What a waste of time.

Emily and I have an anniversary coming up in about a week. A whole year, she's been my star.

Gads... it hasn't felt like a year with her. A few blissful moments, perhaps, not nearly long enough.

... will forever be long enough, I wonder? I'd love to find out.

If I've got jobs I'm supposed to do for you, have patience. I just need to be left alone for a while.

Well, I got a little work done here today, amidst a long, endless, did I mention long day full o f setbacks and frustrations. Now all I have to do is kick the GIMP until it can accept that cool calligraphy font that Kaimee sent me, and then I can get to the banners and such that need done. Patience pollywogs, I'm doing my best.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be able to walk normally. Today was much better than yesterday, in that I could go from one end of the house to the other without having to sit down. Though I still had to do the dishes sitting on a stool. Maybe tomorrow I'll make it outside.

The last few days have been inredibly long for me. The next few don't look that good. If someone happens to have a WritersCo duty for me, and I can't get to it in the next little bit, I apologize.

"Say what you want about me, I don't care"

"I am who I am, so deal with it"

Diagnosis: You suffer from a mild to severe case of low self esteem, and in order to get people to give their opinions about you and/or be angry with you, you have said that you don't care about their opinions. This is called displacement. You are in effect shifting the blame for your own feelings of personal self-worthlessness to others, so that you don't have to deal with the fact that it's you who is at fault for those feelings. You push people away as a cry for attention, because secretly, so secretly that even you might not know it, you want people to notice you. The fact is that people don't care about you either, because you are a total stranger to people. In time they might have come to care about you, except you pushed everyone away by trying to prove your independence (and thus gain respect). Therefore it is your own fault that no one of worth cares about you, and your personal problems are your own doing.

Seriously people, I've met so many different types of people that say things like the quotes above, and it's just not necessary. I can't understand why people would purposely act like assholes to others, when life is so short and so precious. News flash you egocentric sons of bitches, no one has to 'deal with it'. They can do as most probably do, look at you in scorn and turn away to find someone who will smile and treat them well. And when you're all alone, you'll have no one to blame but yourself, because you drove people away.

Smile. Laugh. Your life might be bad, but it's never as bd as it could be. Be happy for what you have, hold life precious, and hold the love of people precious. Otherwise, have a nice, lonely existence and stop raining on everyone else's love parade.

Well, I've agreed to take over Kaimee's responsibilities now that she and Shanra are gone, at least where graphics are concerned. It's a pretty intimidating load, and I have to say that I'm somewhat gobsmacked about it, especially when one considers that I find myself with less and less time to dedicate to these communities nowadays. I'll do the best I can, though. I'd hate to see writersco stalled over a tiff.