still personally more into the tiger

HELL YES.

Today someone discovered my bloglet by searching for Eye of Gondor Jack o’ Lantern. Godspeed to you, holiday conscious nerdy knifer. Maybe you will come back and post pictures? I apologize for the lack of actual helpful content on this blog to date, but you, YOU, could be the change you desire.

I can, however, offer you:

Eye of the Wookie Lantern

I am

your baby’s in love with

I am running on the flimsy edges of exhaustion, like the threads coming out of a horizontal string weaving. Sitting on my halfway inflated blue yoga ball, halfway so that my heels can hit the floor, blue because everything at our company is either blue or dinosaur colored, with my huge headset earphones smooshed over my ears, listening to Pink Floyd radio, sipping cold coffee apathetically because it’s not going to make a damn bit of difference anyhow, I feel like I could be anywhere at all or nowhere whatsoever. Freaking exhaustion.

We moved this weekend, and it was awesome. Our neighbor Tak drives a short bus as his own personal vehicle, a yellow school bus with forever malfunctioning internals, and we loaded all our stuff into it and drove it over. In one trip. All of our stuff fits in one short bus. Good to know. (this is of course not counting the stuff we have in storage, but hey). (wait what, Tom Petty? Tom Petty right now is making my brain explode. Please to bring back the wispy cold edged electric strings of the Floyd). So we drove all our things in the short bus to our new house, which I consider arriving in grand style. Top that, everyone. My moving vehicle is cooler than your moving vehicle.

After moving all our stuff over, we went to this show. Beforehand I was mostly apathetic about every artist except for Beck (when you love Beck so much all others seem to pale and flicker before one’s eyes), and then we got there and Beck had just finished playing. I was in grave danger of a very black mood for a very little while, but for the twin reasons that I had a free ticket from my very awesome friends Seth and Kelly, and that there was no point in sulking about Beck’s bad behavior to the detriment of the entire evening, I managed to pull my lip in and my chin up and have a delightful time. Which was a good thing, because Eddie Vedder came onstage and instantly invited Beck on, and they sang together a song of such sweetness and beauty that it made me giggle like a cheshire cat for the first thirty seconds or so just to see Beck singing it. So I got to see Beck anyhow, and he did not sing Loser for anyone that night, so I did not so much mind him not singing it to me. Also Eddie Vedder stole my heart clean away from Beck. Clean. Away. The man has a voice like a saxophone. Everyone we saw rocked smooth melting face. I was in a state of absolute top to toe bliss all night. The show ended with Neil Young, and I swear his song Long May You Run made me feel like I was dying and all the persons I loved and had ever loved were flashing before my closed eyes at their very sparking dearest. Long may you all fucking run, my darling hamsters; with your chrome hearts shining in the sun.

Sunday I peeled myself out of bed and drove with Alain and Paul to their mom’s house, where we put the roof on a shade structure for the horses. I say we, but I mostly held ladders and washed roofing and toted things from here to there. This would usually not fly with me, as I love like hell to be the one hammering in the nails and I will especially drop everything and run to be the one on top of the roof…however I was so spaced out and tired that wandering about being vaguely helpful and talking to the horses was nearly topping out my capacity anyhow. Ever since I learned how to hitch up a horse to a cart and then drive said cart, horses have seemed much smaller and friendlier to me. Even Luke, who has hit me in the face harder than anything has ever hit me in the face in my entire accident prone loudmouthed tactless life, now seems very short and generally mellow.

So it was a long weekend, following a very long week (school school packing work school drinking school school work), and today I am just about gone missing. If I happen to disappear altogether I would suggest googling the whereabouts of Eddie Vedder.

definitely not bringing a pig with me

So today I took my car into the shop to have a headlight replaced, and I figured while I was at it I should probably have them discover the reason for the recently illuminated check engine light. I did this with misgiving, because it costs them 125.00 just to check, and 125.00 is still a lot of money for me. However, one cannot just continue to traipse merrily about without heed to one’s check engine light; it is not enough that I almost never drive anymore because San Francisco is a bustling hell hole of angry law flouting impolite speeding maniacs and my delicate system cannot handle this without the aid of the cigarettes I no longer smoke. So I sucked it up sucked it in, and let it begin…I handed them over my keys and I signed away 125.00 dollars of my life on the little electric clipboard, and I went away hoping very very strongly that the check engine light was just having a little fun with me and nothing whatsoever was the little matter. Of course it is silly to assign the personality of Ashton Kutcher to one’s check engine light, but…a girl can hope.

And then of course the dude just called me back and informed me that my check engine light is on because one of my oxygen sensors has failed, and that will cost me 325.00 to replace. My immediate response to this is to cry in the middle of the street and viciously resent the bucket drummer on 4^th and Market for noticing. I pull myself together and very calmly ask dude what exactly this means, the defunct engine sensor. He gives me very vague answers that equal exactly nothing but doom doom doom when all is said and done, and he says that he does not have the part and I can come get my car with its lovely new headlight and bring my car back next week for the new oxygen sensor. This shoots a ray of whispering hope into the center of my brain; if they are willing to give me my car back and let me drive around in it while one of the oxygen sensors is dead, then perhaps the oxygen sensor is more like Ashton Kutcher and less like Bruce Willis than previously thought. I agree to his terms, and we part tele ways, and I go straight back to work and google oxygen sensors. Then I experience outrage.

Turns out that all newer cars have a set of oxygen sensors to achieve the perfect mixture of gasoline and oxygen, so as to utilize fuel most efficiently and pollute as little as possible. This is what oxygen sensors do, and they do not keep you from blowing the bang hell up, and furthermore there are three of them and so the slacking of one or the other is not going to cost me say my life or limb. Also they are located just inside the exhaust pipe and unless you previously had universal sensors, which require wiring, and said wiring has malfunctioned and soldered itself to the exhaust pipe, they are very easy to replace one’s own self. Finally, they cost 71.00 online. I think we can all see where this is going.

In the interest of not becoming a pixley story, I am

here for all your zombie fingered needs

I am a big fan of how many people have stumbled onto this blog within the last week with the searches ‘how to create zombie hair’ and ‘zombie hair stylist.’

Hell yeah, you guys. You have come to the right place. I can give you step by step instructions, brought to you by experience and Sierra Nevada.

1) generally do not give a fuck

2) drink half of what you would consider a copious amount of preferred liquor

3) call in your best friend and her aquanet

4) do pitiful drunken best to avoid ketchup wielding boyfriend

5) rub ketchup and aquanet mess vigorously with dark colored towel; immediately put towel in the wash or you will be damn sorry tomorrow

6) drink second half of what you would consider a copious amount of whatever liquor is left

7) dance the thriller dance

eight) you got it.

I am

run down the curtain

Quality not Quantity

I’m sure nobody is surprised by this, but I hands down choose quality over quantity in pretty much every situation. Even if we’re talking about bubble wrap, I would rather have a few good blisters to pop with gusto than a whole sheet of halfway flat, pin pricked or smooshy bubbles.

The same goes for life. I would rather have less that is better than more that is worse. I think one of the great tragedies of our era in Western civilization is the prevelence of nursing home living, where people who are incurably damaged are kept alive through many unnatural means. This in itself is not necessarily a problem for me, as every life is its own candlestick and there is no a replacing specific individual even if overpopulation is a growing problem; however, keeping a terminally ill person alive through unnatural methods and also isolating them from any natural interaction and usefulness to their society is dreadful to me. At that point, no offense to anyone, what are they living for? The point of continued existence is to continue to evolve as a soul, share one’s soul with community, receive from and give back to one’s community…basically to live is to be a part of something, and when you are not even very connected with your own mind or body I think it is unnatural to force continued existence through artificial support.

On the other hand, I know that there are many ways a person can be in a nursing home and still have a meaningful life, both for themselves and for others; I am not trying to argue that death should be allowed to run its course in all instances when we have the power to postpone it.

For myself personally I have no idea what sort of a lifespan I would like. I could die at any point and part of me would be sad but part of me would be fine. I expect this will last for the rest of my existence here. For one thing, I love my life; I love this beautiful, tragic, bittersweet world; I love so many incredible, unique, gorgeous beings; I love this precious existence of mine. However, I know every day when I wake up to another morning that this precious existence remains for now but not forever. As long as I live there will be beautiful beloved things to hold me here, but as long as I live a part of my spirit will be always rushing toward the inevitable transition into what lies beyond or doesn’t. So I am not personally invested in longevity. I understand how some people could be, and I can see and empathize with their reasons. But for me it will always be about quality of living. I will always be striving to live each moment as exquisitely as if it were my last, because I am convicted to the marrow of my bones that it very well could be. I try to plan for my future and glory in my past, but more than anything I try to live in the present. I don’t exactly believe that now is all you have, but…damn it all, now is all you have.

To enhance the quality of aging necessarily requires one to believe in more than the now, however. If I truly believed that now is all I have, I would be smoking a cigarette right now. Right this very little minute. And I would be working not to build a foundation for a possible family and secure future for myself, I would be working to buy cigarettes and booze and gorgeous little shoes like I did in my late teens and early twenties. I would be living on buttered toast without guilt, and I would not try to eat salad.

There has to be a balance between preparing for a quality aging experience and placing the most focus on one’s present circumstances. Like all balancing acts in life, this one is extremely important and the tightrope is rarely in the same place twice; you have to bring awareness and intention to every situation in order to really balance out your desires.

I am so totally going to

going to eat a salad I promise

The Aging Process Is Not a Symptom of Disease

Personally I view the concept of aging as a disease to be very offensive. This idea of humanity tottering off in long lines of deepening and worsening illness year after year until their suffering ends is repugnant to me and I think that it is almost wholly against fact. Of course there is the natural process of cell breakdown each year that we are alive; and cell regeneration speed and skill begins to lessen as we age as well. Sometimes the damage to a cell or group of cells is too great for our bodies to remember how to mend, and there will be a permanent imperfection. Our bodies are therefore weakened in many imperceptible ways as we age, and by the time many humans reach old age the damage they have incurred can result in a variety of disease and illness. However, these diseases and illnesses can arrive at any point in a human’s lifespan when the necessary factors are in place; terrible disease and suffering are not reserved for the aged alone.
The most fallible aspect of looking at age as a disease that can be cured is that it cannot in fact be cured. Modern science is still researching why our bodies break down in certain ways over time and fail to repair themselves in certain instances. As of yet there is no cure for free radical damage, or telomere damage…at least as of last term’s textbook. As far as damage caused by layering of harmful life occurrences, such as the tragic affects of cigarette smoking, those diseases can be cured only by awareness and stopping the behavior in time before permanent damage is done. With some damage, such as cigarette smoke, our bodies can even reverse the damage done over time. But you do not have to smoke long or be very old at all for your body to begin to suffer in many ways from cigarettes. Therefore, the damage to our bodies that most of us attribute to aging cannot generally be cured because we do not understand what causes the natural breakdown process; but we do understand the damage that can be caused by harmful habits and lifestyles, so we can take steps to ensure that our bodies never experience that sort of breakdown at any point in our lives.

Aging as a natural process that can be enhanced is a viewpoint I embrace. I am aware that if I live long enough, my body will begin to experience the inevitable cell breakdown that characterizes the life cycle of all organic matter on this planet. As of now there is nothing I can do about that, nor am I absolutely sure that I would want to. If my body never begins to break down, what in the world is there for me to die for? Would I just wander around in my gorgeous regenerating shell until I got hit by a bus? There is something beautiful and reassuring about death. Every one of us is born with the potential to meet it peacefully, regardless of its circumstances. One of the reasons for this peace is that we are in general not in control of the circumstances surrounding our deaths, but we know that they will come to us regardless.
When I think of my aging process, which has fully already began in good earnest, I just want to be as healthy and strong and mobile as possible. I want to retain control of my mental and physical faculties, and I know that I can take steps now to give myself a boost in this regard in later years.

Have I already mentioned how much I love buttered toast? I hereby resolve for the umpteenth time to eat more food groups. I have been living on buttered toast for two days now…mm buttered toast.

I am

damn in love with buttered toast

The Decline Narrative

The most disturbing aspect of the decline narrative is its method of operation and the ways in which it manifests. It creeps insidiously into our subconscious minds by means of ‘innocent’ portrayals of youthful beauty, joy and health in nearly every advertisement for nearly every product; it is therefore never balanced out by portrayals of beauty, joy and health in any of the other age ranges. This has created the new fate worse than death: aging. Because the best features of life are purported to exist solely within the paltry decade between one’s blossoming teens and the onset of one’s late twenties, it is unfathomable for exposed minds to presume that aging is anything other than decline; in beauty, ability, acuity, success and possibility of happiness.
The decline narrative is also blared at us shamelessly and without disguise throughout pop culture. Live fast and die young, party hard and die pretty…these are the mantras our youth are supposed to espouse, and totally do. The phenomenon of a quarter life freak out at age thirty is no surprise…most of us never had any concept in our minds of life after our early twenties, and when bodies begin to age, responsibilities begin to weigh, and the sudden stretch of long, unglamorous life before death begins to sink in as reality, what are we supposed to do except freak out? We have been given precious few examples of peace, beauty, grace, joy and fulfillment achieved in later stages of life; not even lipstick is marketed toward older women by older women; how are we supposed to buy lipstick?!
Decline is not inevitable. I firmly believe that despite certain emerging wrinkles and sundry crackling joints, I am a better person than I have ever been, and happier also. My happiness makes me more beautiful than I have ever been, this beauty makes me more contented than I have ever been, and my contentment makes me more fulfilled. This is something I anticipate growing and improving over the years; I intend to die an absolutely stunning creature ringing with accomplishment, passion, wild tangy enjoyment and expansive humor.
We can decline to decline by taking the focus off of the wrinkles and muscle pains, and placing it on the evolution of our minds and spirits. Also, taking good scientific care of our bodies beginning at an early age can greatly slow the definitely inevitable decline of the physical self. There is no denying that our bodies begin to crumble with age, but intelligence and vigilance can keep most drastic health issues at bay almost for our entire lives, barring the intervention of ‘natural disasters’ such as HIV or cancer.
If declining to decline is simply an instance of living in denial, damn fine. Apparently a little denial is good for the heart, mind, spirit, soul and blood pressure.

I am

way more into sidewalk strut

I am

betting on the both of them

Here is my absolutely favorite thing about Justin Beiber:

I am

the buck has to stop when it hits the table

I have something to say about strippers.

Some people have some really mean things to say about strippers, and I just do not understand this. Whether she’s crawling on a tabletop or snaking down a pole, whether you’re not getting laid, or getting laid in the same old way, or just need some more woman in your life, a stripper is there for your pleasure. So be fucking pleased. I do not see why one person or the other has to be demeaned in this exchange. Is it just because one or the other of you is uncomfortable with the exchange? I hear people say the nastiest things about strippers, not nasty in a sexual way buy nasty in a character defaming way. I hear strippers laughing at all the poor pathetic dumbasses who part with perfectly good money just to see a naked lady.

What I don’t understand is, when this relationship is obviously mutually beneficial, why the hell can’t it be respectful? You can fully respect your stripper, even if she is spreading her pussy for money. Your stripper can totally respect you, even if you’re parting with your paycheck just to see her pussy spread. At the end of the day, I think that this is on the same level as ‘a person who is not nice to the waiter is not a nice person.’ It is my belief that you should show every person you interact with respect in as much as you possibly can. Even if your interaction happens to be an accidental encounter with a yammering drunk old broad who’s screaming at you for looking like her lying cheating no good ex husband, don’t you want to acquit yourself like a damn gentleman? After all, the only one it will reflect upon is yourself.

I do not understand why