Christmas Eve

You remember that "life is like a spiral" thing?
Well I kinda felt that more so today.
Every year my family does more or less the same thing, but every year is a bit changed.
We always have a cheese fondue for dinner and then a chocolate fondue for dessert. Last year my mom couldn't help make it because she had just had surgery.
We always open "presents" after supper. This is the first year that my older sister hasn't been home to open them with us, and instead my one brother's girlfriend was here.
Everyone listens to a story (not necessarily Christmassy) read by my dad. This is the first year my niece was there to distract all of us by being cute.

The traditions repeat themselves but our lives change, so the feelings and memories of each repetition are different.

I went to a Christmas eve service with my friend Steph. It's the first time that I can remember being to one. It was at a church I'd never been to before in St. Jacobs. The speaker guy (not sure whether he was the minister or not) was young. He looked like he should be in high school. He reminded me sooo much of the young priest guy in the movie "Chocolat" (which is lovely). And there were a couple of highlighting moments for Steph and I, like the ill-tempoed pianist and the paper communion dealies. They were seriously like paper. And then almost lighting each other on fire because they had the brilliant idea of giving us candles....

There are some bits, though, that I realized I like about religion. I like the stained glass windows. I like the candles that get lit and the shiny silver dishes pompously holding the bread. I like the idea of people standing together smiling. I like the feeling of singing as a body, and listening to people harmonize, even though my own voice is a pathetic little squeak. I like organs playing in empty auditoriums, and chants filling a cathedral until it seems like there is too much sound for that space, and the roof must fly off or the windows shatter to let it out into the open. I like all that.
The dislikes I have lie deeper. I dislike the people that stand together smiling and with their smiles they disguise hate and prejudice. I dislike the fact that people may not feel like they have the right to touch the shiny silver dishes. I dislike that religion, from the outside, looks so clean and neat and shiny, and the fact is that it's people play-acting, making pretty pictures, and then ignoring the dirt and passion that makes the earth alive.

I'm not exactly sure what I mean, but I'm pretty certain that the whole "peace on earth" isn't meant to be a passive blessing or a nice warming thought. The church should really be proactive about peace. We've (we = churchy people)backed ourselves into one corner and we, from there, preach that if everyone just was happy with their own little corner life would be fine, and there would be peace. But that's not gonna happen. We need to give someone else our spot so that peace can start. It doesn't matter if we don't have a place. Wasn't there a theory behind all this religion that the earth isn't our home anyway?

So yah. Merry Christmas.

I used to stand for something, but now I only sit; sit and wait to be amused like everyone I once disdained. This society like a sleeping pill has rendered me ineffective. So now, what should I do? What can I do?

I could for once get off Facebook and get my face into a real book, where I have before felt so at home. I could shun the call of my homepage and attend the call of the music; the music that is inside being ignored.

Where is the treasured originality or genuine cultural scrutiny? I find in its place a cynical sneer. I've been rocked into complacency by email and internet TV and now I find myself so undefined.

I haven't got blogging energy lately. And nothing in my brain worth exploring.
Whatevs.

Texting and Tea

The title may seem a bit ambiguous.

It's been bumpy patch of time since last post. Exams are running (2 down, 3 to go), and busy-ness just sneaks up on me. I suddenly realize that for 3 weeks I haven't picked up a book just to enjoy reading. I haven't had a cup of tea to sit and think with.
I'm struggling to just survive, sorta. Every day when I get I know I have stuff to accomplish. Not so much a fan of that. Because I'm just holding on to the leash of my life, and it's tearing along ahead of me, and I have the sensation of not being able to catch up.
And life is impossibe to catch up on unless you are magically able to go faster. It is running at a constant speed, and the only way to get any peace about it is to take it firmly in hand and focus on pieces that you can wile you're tearing by. We can't do everything, much as we would like to. I would like to travel and to be a vet and to be a musician and to have a farm and to live in Africa and to own a coffee shop, and a lot of other things. But I have to choose because I have a limited amount of time.
Time is something that a lot of people resent. But is that fair? Without biological limits (because what people dislike about time is that we only have so much of it) we would be so self-contained. If we didn't die, we would never look outside of this planet for reason. Also, emos would have a rough time. And overpopulation would be a huge issue. Eternity is too much for humans, as I know I've said before.

So I cannot wait for the break. I get to work at a job I do well, read, see friends, and hang out with Jemma. That's all I really want out of life at this moment. To do my work well, have a few people to chill with, and a few hobbies to keep my mind sharpish.

Res life has been almost pleasant the past few days. Mostly quiet, and watching movies and playing games and having chats with people. I don't mind it so much. I'm listening to one of the guys sing along to music horribly. Heh.

And as for the texting part: I just do too much of it. It's pretty obsessive. If I'm not in the process of a text conversation, I will scroll through my contacts trying to find someone to text. Generally I end up sending alliteratvie texts to my roomie. Which is more fun than it should be. Hah.

Example: Single shingles sing shindigs.
Try and say that fast. Seriously difficult!

*edited to add*: I bought celebratory boots! They're wellingtons all brown with random hearts. Not a typical becca purchase, but I love them! I can now walk to class without getting soaking wet!

I had a feeling in the back of my head that this person was going to understand. Person would be interested, like me, in exploring universes and photons of thought. Unafraid to look for the whys, the hows, the whats; bringing new thoughts of their own also.
I had this feeling, or maybe all along it was only hoping.
That's why it was so much more disappointing to find an inflexible mind. Person, why can't you at least try to look at the whole picture.
There's more to life than the internet.

I had hoped you would agree.

Eighteen

Yay?
My tummy hurts and I've lost my roomie.
Blue like jazz is the best book ever written.
I dislike res and the girl with the unfortunate voice.
If I could choose a cause to dedicate my life to, it would be love.
What the world needs now is love, sweet love.
I heard a girl sing that song at a concert this past August. She has this amazing, clean sweet voice, and I loved it!
But how does one dedicate one's life to a cause. I don't have any particular skills that would make me useful for the promotion or organization of anything.
Donald Miller wrote that if you believe in something, like really believe it, then people will listen to you because they think you have something that they don't. And what you have is belief.
I want to believe in love (you know the type I mean) like that. So much that people I know can't help but believe in it, or at least want to.
It's the only thing that there's just too little of.

Now for a thrilling game of Find-the-Roomie

New Feature

Just to the right at the top I added a box to post the latest news stories from BBC. World news.
They're really interesting. I like to be up to date on what's going on in the world, and it's really good if you like intelligent conversation. The BBC is by far the most reputable source for global news.
Enjoy if possible.

Sick

That's what the world is.

They threw a puppy off of a 10th storey balcony.

Who does that? It's just a puppy! It didn't hurt you! It makes me so angry that the animal, who wasn't at fault, who just was hanging out happily and can't understand any of the reasons for its painful death, was the one to suffer here. I just want to find the jerk who did this and stick his head in a toaster.

But the world is sick on a grander scale. People are just not nice. 250,000 people displaced because of fighting in DR Congo, half the popultation of Zimbabwe starving to death because the UN can't get financial backing for them, the Burmese government putting a comedian in jail for 45 years because he advocates human rights.
Where'd all the good people go?

And people are infecting the natural world with their pollution and litter and greenhouse gasses.

What then shall we do?

I wish it were summer

But that's not how life works.

This is not my week.

The webcomics, tea, and chocolate are not helping. I really need some alone alone alone time. Like through the desert on a horse with no name.

And I want to talk to a very specific person, and the fact that they aren't available makes me want to cry.

Now then Becca, get a grip, go to bed, the sun'll come out tomorrow

Baptism

So that was this morning.
And I'm happy I went through with it.
Here's the little blurb I gave at the start. Actually, I gave a shorter, less coherent version, but I like this one better cuz it makes more sense.
I made people cry! Yay?

Hi
My name is Becca Schwarz. I’ve only been coming to Lincoln Road for a few months so many of you probably don’t know me.

I want to give you a bit of background on my life and then talk about 3 specific areas in which I have seen God work in my life, which are the pursuit of relationship vs. religion, love in all its forms, and my ability to commit myself to Him.

My parents are both active Christians, and they created a home environment in which religion and the word of God were cornerstones of everyday life. I was home schooled until grade 4, and then sent to a mennonite school until grade 7, so for many years I was surrounded in a richly Christian environment. I went to sunday school, Conestoga Bible Camp, and Awana kids’ club. Here I memorized verses and Bible stories to an extent that still surprises me sometimes. Like a lot of kids in that environment, I accepted Christianity as truth from early on, and have always held a firm belief in God and the Bible. But factual belief and faith do not go hand in hand, and my journey of faith began the summer between grade 7 and 8, when I left my rock solid dome of Christian influence, and began meeting people and encountering situations that shook my understanding and challenged my nice, neat, useless little theology. Changes were beginning to take place in my understanding of God.

High school hit me like a brick in the face. Until that point I had no context in which to place religion, because everything was religious. This may sound naive, but until grade 8 or 9, I had a subconscious assumption that everyone was inherently Christian. I mean, I knew that wasn’t true, but I believed it. Accompanying this changing reality was the fact that many of my friends struggled with depression. I was very much influenced by the constant environment of sadness and became depressed to the point of self destructiveness. I felt like I had nothing to stand on. I had no one to turn to, because my friends all had their own problems to deal with, and my parents had 4 other kids to take care of. But at the bottom of the slough of despond was solid ground. God found me there, and He held me very close through a lot of nights full of fear and sadness. He began to teach me the art of faith, and I feel that was the mark at which positive change began to come about in my spiritual life.

Ever since childhood, I’ve had issues with rules. My mom will back that up. I struggled with the idea of following a bunch of rules all my life, and that’s all that religion seemed like to me during my early years. When I started high school, I had a conscious intent to get rid of religion in my life. I didn’t want to be good. I wanted to be different. I read a lot, looking for something with more validity than religion. I know that I can’t submit to just a whole bunch of rules with no reason behind them, which is what I found in religion. Expectations that I would fall into a very pretty little mould of a church kid rankled me. I read a lot of the Bible, hoping to find loopholes. Where is it written that a Christian teenager must like certain bands or certain clothes? No where, it turns out. What I found was not what I perceived as Christianity. Jesus always spoke about love and honesty, which were two things I found seriously lacking in religion. In finding the differences between what Jesus taught as truth and what was simply tradition I realized that everything I disliked about religion was put there by humans, not God. Over the course of a few years I rediscovered true Christianity through studying my Bible and prayer. God knew I was searching for truth, and He guided me to it just like Jesus said: “Ask and it will be given. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened”. He showed me what the real focus of my life is supposed to be: not a bunch of rules that I need to keep, but Himself. Loving him and trying to make my actions a source of joy to Him is really the point. Of course there’s no way I’ll ever be perfect, but He teaches me about Himself and myself and the people around me, and what it means to love Him in the context of each type of relationship.

God has said to me a billion subtle ways that He loves me. My family, my friends, my home, my horse, and nature itself I feel are all a very personal letter from God telling me that by some strange law of nature, my happiness is worth His time and attention. And because of this love, He made it possible for me to be close to Him. He’s really impossible not to love back. He makes me smile when I don’t think I can. He surprises me every day with his endless creativity and His willingness to help me learn.
I can look back on the past year or so and see where I have changed directly through his influence. God is teaching me through different situations and convictions what love means to each of my relationships.

For a long time, however, I have still struggled with commitment. Probably the most defining theme in my life thus far has been a overwhelming fear of getting stuck in a contract that I can’t uphold or grow tired of submitting to. So for a long time I’ve been very cautious of saying I’m a Christian for two reasons. First, it aligns me with a religion many people view as bogus and hypocritical. Second, it means that all the times I screw up will be marked up by someone as another reason that Christians suck. But I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how God feels about that sort of thing. It’s like not telling your friends who your family is because you don’t want to be associated with them. Even Jesus said that if I am ashamed of Him I can expect He will be ashamed of me. Can I really say to God that I love him if I tell everyone else something different? Of course not. So I decided to be baptised as a way to tell him that I love Him, and that in spite of my fears, when push comes to shove, I want to be with Him. So I'm here today to tell God I love Him and to tell you that I am a Christian.

It's a weird thing. I still am freaking out about commitment. The only reason I had the motivation to do this is that Porky promised that when I got baptised that he would too. Good boy, he is.


But religion, religion; what ever shall we do about it? I still don't like it, and my mom thinks I agree with her on everything now. And my dad thinks I'm cantankerous, whatever he means by that. I am an individual, dear parents. You were, are, and will be unable to comprehend my motives and thoughts, because your minds resonate at different frequencies from mine. I don't know whose is the right frequency, of course. All I know is that I can hear God.

********
And now for something completely different!

Got home this weekend and the place was trashed. I want to leave. Not just res. I want to leave life, stress, winter, mother, and go live with my horse in the woods in a warm place.


Does that qualify as running away from your problems?

Not so much sure what I'm trying to say. I'm just verr.... turmoil-y about life. I don't like the pressure I'm under. It's pressing my mind into an unnatural, unwanted shape. I don't want these things imprinted on it! I want these blocks to go away so that my mind can be free. Free to roam where it wills and expand where it can and ignore the little spaces society tries to shove it into.
I will not grow brain bonsai.

Classical music

When I can't relate any words to the colours and textures of emotion/awareness flowing in and out and around in my mind, I listen to instrumental music.

A guide to what I like to hear when I feel....

All mixed up like: Bach. He's got ridiculous technical skills! I love how (especially in his fugues and inventions) melodies and countermelodies collide and wrap harmonically around one another. I love the way that each brings an unexpected dimension to the others, bending the feeling of the whole melodic line away from the expected. The constant change of focus in the music is so pleasant when my mind is scattered and spacey feeling. I especially love Fugue in g minor.

Thoughtful: Dvorak. I know, he's romantic, not classical, but most people don't even know the difference. He's got these beautiful melodies. Just amazing. It feels like going for a walk, listening to his work. I can hear trees and fields and water in his songs. Right now I love his String Quartet No. 12 in F major.

Bouncy: Schubert. He uses a lot of nifty little rhythms. Ones that are delightful to skip to. What else could one want? I like his Marche Militaire and German Dance No.1 in C Major.

Melancholy: Impressionists in general. Chopin or Debussy. There is less definition to the musical shapes and patterns in impressionism reflects the sort of indefinite feeling of sadness. It's like fog. You feel it, but it really isn't anything at all. I like The Girl With Flaxen Hair by Debussy and I love the Raindrops Prelude by Chopin.

Intelligent: Wagner or Greig. Both these guys were sooooo theatrical in their music. It's interesting to listen to and one can be self-congratulatory on the fact that one is listening to "smart" music.

I just want to be a kid: Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf. A story and an amazing work of art. I remember lying on the couch listening to this as a kid. The lady narrarating does a beautiful job (at least if you get the british one). I love listening to people read or tell stories, so I guess it makes sense that I love this.

So that's all.

And in other thoughts...
Being loved is such a sensational feeling
"knowing that your presence is an addition to [another person's] comfort"

You know how all of Christianity is talking about how God loves people and stuff?
Is our presence an addition to his comfort?
Is he happier because people exist?
If so that's weird, cuz we kinda screwed him over...

Life is weird.
Oh, and the boys in res got a tarantula tonight. Ooooh man....

Where to draw the line

Taken from thisisindexed.com

Haha.! Take that! My brother wants Bush to stand trial in the Hague for war crimes. A bit too optimistic to actually be realized, but we can always hope....

And really, the only difference is that one is American and one is Muslim

Commencement

And a blog of a friend's has made me think.
Wiggle room in life is getting smaller.
And I hate it.
Time is a very restrictive tyrant. If we had no obligations, and goals were not necessary, then the passing of time would a be a pleasant thing to think about. But because we are told we need to accomplish something, it makes time our enemy.
Here's 'my' opinion on the deal:
All I want is a room somewhere
Far away from the cold night air
With one enormous chair
Oh, wouldn't it be lovely ?

Just a warm place to eat and enough to eat every day. I don't waant to accomplish anything more than loving the people around me and doing good in the world. Screw success.
And time keeps ticking away.

She told him she'd rather fix her make-up
Than try to fix what's going on
But the problem keeps on calling
Even with the cell-phone gone
She told him that she believes in living,
Bigger than she's living now
But her world keeps spinning backwards and upside-down Don't say so-long, you are not that far gone
Don't spend today away, 'cause today will soon be
Gone, like yesterday is gone,
Like history is gone,
Just try and prove me wrong,
and pretend like you're immortal.
She said, He said, live like no tomorrow;
Every day we borrow brings us
One step closer to the edge.
Infinity.Where's your treasure, where's your hope
If you get the world, and lose your soul?
She pretends like she pretends like she's immortal,
Don't say so-long, and throw yourself wrong
This could be your big chance to make-up
Today will soon be
Gone, like yesterday is gone
Like history is gone,
The world keeps spinning on
You're going, going, gone,
Like summer break is gone,
Like Saturday is gone,
Just try and prove me wrong and pretend like you're immortal
We are not infinite
We are not permanent
Nothing is immediate
And we pretend like we're immortal
We are so confident in our accomplishments
Look at our decadence
Gone, like Frank Sinatra,
Like Elvis and his mom
Like Al Pacino's cash,
Nothing lasts in this life
My high school dreams are gone
My childhood sweets are gone
Life is a day that doesn't last for long
Life is more than money
Time was never money
Time was never cash
Life is still more than girls
Life is more than hundred-dollar bills and roto-tom fills
Life is more than fame and rock and roll and thrills
All the riches of the kings end up in wills
We've got information in the information age,
But do we know what life is
Outside of our convenient Lexus cages?
She said, He said live like no tomorrow,
Every moment that we borrow brings us closer
To a God who's never been short of cash
Hey Bono, I'm glad you asked,
Life is still worth living,
Life is more that we are

And God looks at all us screwing around and worrying about having to be here on wednesday and then drive to school and do assignments and pick this up and drop that off, and He probably would rather us look at the trees and try to remember that this isn't life at all. This, what we call life, is a test. Real life starts when we ditch time.

Smile! It's the weekend!

After a week like this, I could use a 5 day weekend and a massage. Bleh.

But instead I got this:



Hah!

Here's to drowning your sorrows in webcomics!

Aggregate

Which means, by the way, a mix of a few different elements,
Which is what this weekend was.
Friday night was HALLOWEEN! I didn't even end up using my costume, truthfully. I went out and found those awesome previously mentioned WLU people. I think I'm gonna make an effort to see them regularly, because they are.... engaging.
So then saturday I went to see Jemma. She was a little pissed with me, cuz I hadn't been there for 3 weeks almost. Pretty much not since Thanksgiving, I think. So she wasn't pleased. But it was nice to have a fuzzy friend. Then my friend Emily and I went out to chill in KW. We stopped at Petcetera and saw the CUTEST black kitty up for adoption! And it was so friendly! We realized it was very fortunate we didn't have an apartment together because we would have paid the $200 adoption fee and take the little dear home and not been able to feed her. At least I know she probably found a good home. Cats that are sociable get loved. So then we attempted to find Emily a dress for commencement this coming weekend, but no luck. Found earrings and scarves for really cheap though! Yay!

My uncle from BC also came out this weekend. Hugely interesting person. My favourite story of his from this weekend was about his flight here. Apparently he bought the earphones from the Westjet people so he could listen to music on the plane. But the plane didn't have radio music, just satellite TV. He was a little disappointed, but he had brought books with him. This uncle, I should point out, is a surgeon. He had brought some medical journals to read. Apparently there were large colour pictures of people with disgusting tumours and growths and like pics of surgical procedures and such. The guy beside him (he said) looked creeped out. My uncle is one of those people that make me smile.

So then church this morning there was a guest speaker. He was a very interesting little man. Just very excited and bouncy and should have been a children's entertainer like Mr. Rogers. But he was interesting, anyhow. One of his points was that if we don't change we become irrelevant. And I really like that. He was talking about religion in that sense. Like religious structures and traditions can't stay the same forever.

And I think that applies to people just as individuals too. Nature presents most species with the biological necessity of change to adjust to the little changes that the plant makes as it gets closer to expiring. And everything is moving inevitably towards the end of the natural world. It wasn't built to last. Even on a universal scale. But things that are alive MUST change over time. I remember G.K. Chesterton said that the human mind can't handle the concept of eternity, so it has been cut into pieces for us with mortality just like someone would cut toast into "fingers" for a kid. But over our lives we need to change. It all comes back to this spiral idea. If we don't constrict into the boundaries of our own experience we will "run into" our old selves and find the world a very impossible place to live in. In other words, because we are biological creatures, we need to accept biological rules, which means change over time.

This afternoon I listened to "The Crickets Have Arthritis" by Shane Koyczan. I've listened to it before, but it made me cry... again. It's just so true. Life does that sort of thing to you. Once again, death is a part of biology, the center of the spiral. Either that means to a person that the spiral stops or that it bores into the next dimension. I'm a pan-dimensional person myself. It makes more sense. The biological life has a definite starting point and then winds down into the ending point, which must come. But then once the dimension is broken through it winds outwards from the start, so that we can look back and understand what came before, but it doesn't constrict us and there is universally, infinitely more time and space to expand and know and be. Does this make sense? I wish I had a picture to explain it. But the song still made me cry.

I feel like there is something more to say, but not sure what, so I will end this abruptly and post it.

Flobots - Stand up

Stand up
We shall not be moved
Except By a child with no socks and shoes
If you've got more to give then you've got to prove
Put your hands up and I'll copy you
Stand up We shall not be moved
Except by a woman dying from the loss of food
If you've got more to give then you've got to prove
Put your hands up and I'll copy you

We still don't understand thunder and lightning
Flash back to when we didn't fund the dam
Didn't fund the damn levi? No wonder man
Now our whole damn city's torn asunder man
Under water but we still don't understand
We see hurricane spills over on the land
Through gaps you couldn't fill with a 100 tons of sand
No we still don't understand
We've seen planes in the windows of buildings crumbled in
We've seen flames send the chills through London
And we've sent planes to kill them and some of them were children
But still we crumbling the building
Underfunded but we still don't understand
Under god but we kill like the son of Sam
But if you feel like I feel like about the son of man
We will overcome

So Stand up
We shall not be moved
Except By a child with no socks and shoes
If you've got more to give then you've got to prove
Put your hands up and I'll copy you
Stand up We shall not be moved
Except by a woman dying from the loss of food
If you've got more to give then you've got to prove
Put your hands up and I'll copy you

I said Put your hands up and I'll copy you
Put your hands up and I'll copy you
If you've got more to give then you've got to prove
Put your hands up and I'll copy you

We shall not be moved
Except By a child with no socks and shoes
Except by a woman dying from the loss of food
Except by a freedom fighter bleeding on a cross for you
We shall not be moved
Except by a system thats rotten through
Neglecting the victims and ordering the cops to shoot
High treason now we need to prosecute 

So Stand up
We shall not be moved
And we wont fight a war for fossil fuel 
Its times like this that you want to plot a coo
Put your hands up and I'll copy you
So Stand up
We shall not be moved
Unless were taking a route we have not pursued
So if you've got a dream and a lot to do
Put your hands up and I'll copy you

I said Put your hands up and I'll copy you
Put your hands up and I'll copy you
if you've got a dream and a lot to do
Put your hands up

Now shake, shake
A Polaroid dream
nightmare negatives develop on the screen
We sit back and wait for the government team
Criticize they but who the fuck are we
The people want peace but the leaders want war
Our neighbors don't speak, peek thru the front door
House representatives preach "stay the course"
Time for a leap of faith
Once More

Put your hands up high if you havn't imagined
Hope that the pen strokes stronger than the cannon
Balls to the wall, Nose to the grindstone
My interrogation techniques leave your mind blown
So Place your bets lets speak to the enemy
Don't let em pretend that we seek blood
And who's we anyways Kemo Sabe?
Mighty warlord wanna-be street thug
a threat for a threat leaves the whole world terrified
blow for blow never settles the score
word for word is time need clarify 
We the people did not want war

So Stand up
We shall not be moved
Except By a child with no socks and shoes
If you've got more to give then you've got to prove
Put your hands up and I'll copy you
Unless were taking a route we have not pursued
So if you've got a dream and a lot to do
Put your hands up and I'll copy you

I said Put your hands up and I'll copy you
Put your hands up and I'll copy you
if you've got a dream and a lot to do
Put your hands up

-----------------

I love this song. It's got a point. I think I'm a pacifist
except for the most extreme circumstances.
And I hope the politicians hear this and take it to heart

Out in the world

Where it's QUIET! I was about to have a mental, emotional, and convertible breakdown due to the country music blaring through my res. I hate it when a noise drowns out your own thoughts unless you put it there expressly for that purpose.

I lost all my blog thought dues to that.

OH!
Debating tonight. Quite an adventure. I was partnered with this philosophy major guy. Like HARDCORE PHILOSOPHY about everything. But interesting in spite of that. Anyway, we were debating whether Viagra should be marketed to people over 50. No one really had the energy to do a serious case, so the round fell entirely to crap, with our side (against Viagra for old people) bringing up points such as WWJD and sibling incest, and the opposition saying that it would be easier just to kill old people, and the JUDGE even getting in on the action with sarcastic comments. Then there were objects thrown and.... overall, a good debate.

Ok, this is backtracking a little, but I mentioned how philosophy guy was interesting in spite of himself. Like funny and stuff and entertaining. But I fb researched him (he added me!) and like seriously all he is is philosophy. What's with that? That's like having a lot of sauce, but no steak. Who does that?

Anyway

I hate noisy people. I don't mean like loud, just noisy. Just a lot of sound and auditory pollution just eminate from them. And I just want to say SHUT UP! Don't you know what your missing? When you're noising away you can't hear what is going on. You can't hear the world; neither nature nor humanity. They all have a music a thousand times more necessary than this junk you spew out day and night. And even when I can't hear you I know it continues inside your mind, blocking you off from what the trees are shouting and the wind is singing and people are crying and dying but you still don't care Because you can't hear. Get out of your mind and into the world because in the end, you don't matter in the least.

Too much hatin'

Need to fix that.
But it's really so much easier to be negative.
Although I was really disappointed with certain events this morning, I was really determined to not let it ruin my day (although I admit it made me cry)
I went for a walk and had a random chat and found horses on campus.
Usually that would get me right back up to par. Today it took a little extra.
But I did it. I feel ok now. And yah, I was really disappointed and things didn't go like I wanted them to, but I suppose the lesson is that my determination to look on the bright side can overpower the universe's determination to screw me over.

So it's all good. Tea and the hopes of a good weekend coming up and the reassurance of a favourite book and texts from friends make it ok.

Now off to change my fb status, which hates the phone company, and my MSN status, which hates res...

Books

Are the most comforting thing ever.
With the exception of textbooks, of course. Bleh!

But last night I started rereading "The Screwtape Letters". I had read it once before, a long time ago, and remembered it being very good, but I didn't remember it feeling so much like reading my own thoughts back to myself. There's only 2 other authors I've found that with: Fyodor Dostoyevsky (who wrote "The Brothers Karamazov") and Donald Miller (who wrote "Blue Like Jazz"). C.S. Lewis is probably my favourite author of forever. When I was a kid (and even now when I get the chance) I read the Chronicles of Narnia over and over and over. Then through highschool (and even now when I get the chance) I read the Cosmic Trilogy over and over and over. Just this past while I've found some books of his that are less well-known but are still amazing.
His books are so attractive for me because they blend theory and thought and theology in very subtle ways with fiction and adventure. He is like G.K. Chesterton in that sense. I admit he doesn't have the same wit and humour as Chesterton, but then again I don't agree as absolutely with Chesterton's theories.
Side note about Dostoyevsky: incredibly dark writer. Very much focused on the negative aspects of the human psyche, so he must be taken with a grain of salt if one wants to avoid becoming suicidal. I first read his book "The Double" when I was in a fairly angsty state. I loved it, and still do, but all things considered, I have moved past that moment in time where it resonated with my mind to the extent of lulling it to sleep.

So to promote further sanity, I'm going to finish "The Screwtape Letters" with what time I can afford.

Also, my bio lab was disappointing this week, because a certain character was strangely absent... :( . If my roomie reads this she will snicker. Shut up, you! He's a really nice guy.....

I'm tired.
Don't want to do this anymore.
This = waking up early, working late, walking to classes that don't mean anything, listening to people chatter about nothing, living too far away from my horse, being stuck in the city, building my schedule around assignments...

I found something new I love about university. Our res building is really funny shaped. So when the wind blows all the leaves get swooshed up into funny air currents and make those awesome whirlwinds. I like walking and looking at them. And I like the feeling of being caught in one, with all the leaves hissing and rattling like skeleton snakes on the pavement. I love wind. I love facing it and feeling it wrap around my face and neck every way it can, trying to find a way in, to my brain, where it can carry away all the dust that's built up there from so long living in this building. I know I've only been living here for 2 months, but every day feels like a week and every month seems like 10 years, so I'm old now. Very old. But where my mind has wasted away into wrinkles and sags, the wind blows in and fills it back out, and I feel young again. Young enough not to care for all this bosh about education and society and success. Young enough to set out on adventures and treasure hunts. Young enough to spend a whole day playing outdoors with only a stick and a puddle and my own fantastic worlds to occupy me.

Living with people has made me more weird than when I lived on my own.

And a normal person is coming to visit me tomorrow! Yay for human contact! Because I'm pretty sure the people in res aren't human.

Day in the City

"The city" has meant for my whole life to my whole family Kitchener-Waterloo. "Hey I'm going to the city, need anything?" "Oh yah, pick up a bottle of degreaser at the mall."
And today I spent from 11 am till 7 pm there by myself. It was nice to not have any sort of constraint. I mostly chilled at the Kitchener Public Liabrary, Williams, and Tim Hortons, but I also took advantage of the nice breeze and pleasant chillyness and walked a lot.
One thing sticks particular in my mind.
I was thinking about G.K. Chesterton, and his theory that if we looked at the world the way we would a doll's house, it would hold so much more fascination. You know how it's sooooo cooool when a model city has little mailboxes and iron fences around the wee houses and there are itty bitty plants with bright plastic flowers, all looking so foreign and romantic from your perspective. Today there was a yellow brick house. It had a pretty black fence around the front, and a little veranda, and on either side of the walk there were these pots with bright red germaniums in them. And I was just.... attracted to it. It was for lease. I'm fortunate I haven't got any sort of money, because I would have bought it right there. It's very stuck in my mind. The red germaniums. I think G.K. Chesterton and I talked in a former life, because he says well what I mean. Especially his book "Manalive".

Anyhow, I also went to a performance of Mozart's Requiem by a friend's choir this evening. He died before finishing it eh? How ironic. But it's sooooooo beautiful. Two movements stick especially in my mind. "Dies Irae" (meaning day of anger) gave me shivers. It's like the fiery anger judgement part of death. Then then the "Lacrimosa", which I have always loved. The movement of tears. The grief part of death, the sadness of it. I wonder what Mozart thought as he was writing it. He knew it was his masterpiece, and he also knew he was writing it for himself. His assistant finished it. Mozart was genius incarnate. He composed "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" (well the tune of it) when he was like 4.

And then a brief gallumph with the guys that involved getting covertly onto the KW transit system and re-meeting a guy from camp that totally didn't remember me. Decent. I'm still pretty proud of how I went from Guelph to Kitchener to Waterloo to Elmira without having a car or my parents drive me :D. And that I took advantage of walking time.

A Weird Handwritten Blog

(I wrote this on paper and then typed it out to post, as per directions of a friend. Emjoy :P )

Excuse me if physics notes are mixedin. We're learning about collisions. Elastic collisions, to be precise.
It's weird to blog on paper. It feels more like journalling, which I am pro at also, but it tends more towards emoism.
But maybe it's good to change mediums on occasion. It forces one to think about what one is saying.
There's an xkcd (*heart*) comic that shows two guys on computers typing nasty stuff to each other. Then a random chick floats up and transports the one guy to the other one's room and in person they just look at each other. Then there's a caption that says "it's easier to be mean to words than to people".
So here is a new campaign for me: don't say anything to someone through remote messaging systems that I wouldn't say to their face.
It's weird that I know people with whom every meaningful conversation that has passed between us has been over MSN.
What does that mean to a relationship? I think it shows that I somehow don't connect the wordscoming up on my computer screen with the face and emotions of the person typing.
That's a problem because I lose any and all tact/screening processes that normally stop me from being a witch to my friends. Not that I want to be a witch, of course.
It's like so: I talk on MSN generally at night before bed or if I just have time to myself. At these points in time I'm generally tired and thinking about my own mind/emotions far too much, nad then my poor unsuspecting MSN convos happen along and I type things I regret because whem I'm by myself I dispose of social pretexts and guidelines. It may sound like I'm trying to excuse my behaviour, but it's more like attempting analysis to find a way to stop.
So that's that.
I'm looking forward to tomorrow night! I have a midterm at 9am tomorrow, but after that I will be chilling with friends, getting some alone time (which I need DESPRATELY after this week), maybe seeing the horsey, and studying for my monday midterm. Yay!
Now for a ful analysis of my experience with paper blogging (plogging?)
Pros:

• no need of computer/internet
• formatting is a breeze
• reminds me of journalling and writing letters
• looks like I'm accomplishing something
• change in thought flow
• make less spelling errors

Cons:

• hand cramps
• wastes resources (paper)
• people give weird looks
• can't have hyperlinks to comics
• have to retype it anyway
• no spell check
• not easy to go back and insert words or thoughts

I've also just decided to write some letters to people, because my pen is all warmed up now. I'll scam stamps from my house, becasue the parents have an excess thereof, and I get to save $! Yay!
Also, on the topic of plogging, I like the look of my own handwriting on apage. I feel somehow more accountable for what's on it. I also have discovered it's a mess.
Now back to inclined planes....bleh

Factoid of the day!

There are immortal organisms!
Actually, biologically immortal. But it's still pretty exciting. Hydra are little water organisms. They're really weird in a number of ways, but one of the coolest things about them is that they do not age.
You know how kids heal really quickly from cuts, bruises, fractures, etc? And old people don't, of course. Most living things reach an age of maturity and from that point they experience a pattern of degenerating systems until a major system failure causes cessation of life.
However, the Hyda does not do this. It is eternally young in that the cells do not reach a "maturity" plateau and then degenerate.

I thought that was interesting

Of course, it is still possible to kill the hyda. It just doesn't age. Thus, biological immortality.

I figure this sort of ability wouldn't be good for humans to have

I found them!

All those people.
The ones I knew I would meet.
The philosophers, the rebels, the artists, the nerd, the rainbow souled people that make a university a place of unparalleled learning both in sciences and arts, but in social experience.
I found them! Like 8 of them!
And they were awesome! I walked in and immediately was having an awesome time just getting to know them! We hung out till like 4 am and I discovered a lot about underground media. Mostly that the movies Army of Darkness and Serenity are AWESOME!
And I can't help but think that these are the people I was looking for ever since starting uni.

























Unfortunately, they don't come to my university.

Facial features

I remember posting something a while back on how I judge people's personalities based on the way their hands look.
So the question is whether facial features, or any type of physical characteristic affects or gives away a person's personality.
For example: saw a girl today with eyes that were all dark. Not the eye itself really, but like the area around it. Some people just have this sunken, hollow look to their eye sockets. And whenever I see it I think "drug addict" or something like that because they just look unhealthy. It especially creeps me out with kids. Bleh.
Or when a person has squinty eyes I think of them as a happy person.
Or big head = jerk, small head = nice. Only for like noticably different sizes though
Am I coming off as crazy here?
Well I can't be really, cuz a lot of authors agree with me subconciously. The idea of physical characteristics being tied to the personality is very common in victorian/impressionist literature. Dorian Grey and Jane Eyre are two of many books I've read that emphasize this. In Dorian, every time he does something evil, it changes his (or the portrait's) appearance for the worse. In Jane Eyre, the characters openly judge personality through physical traits. (ie: intelligent eyes, proud jowls, determined jawlines, etc).
The question is whether it's reliable. Isn't physical appearance the luck of the draw?
Anyhow.
I'm a little stressed out with school and the like because it's all piling up very neatly on weekends where people are planning fun stuff to do, and I really am not a fan of being in writing exams when I could be out debating or chilling and whatnot. Argh.
But on the upside, I did well on my calc midterm! Yay for 89%!!!! Best I've ever done in math, oddly...

And I'm getting baptised theoretically on Nov. 16. My family is all happy about it and stuff. If there's anything I dislike more than making my family all excited it's seeing dentists, yech. But I should be nice to them. It's not their fault that they are totally from Earth and I am totally from Jupiter. I'm looking forward to it, actually. I'm not sure what to say about that whole thing. It is what it is. There it is.

Monarchies breed inept rulers.

On two levels, depending on the society withchin which the monarchy operates. I’m mostly talking about monarchies of the past, because modern monarchies are more or less a joke.
So:

Level the First: dealing with scenarios where a ruler is monogamous.
Marriages are arranged by a committee of counsellors who have the economic and political well being of the country in mind, and do not consider the personal attributes of either person being married. For example, Queen Elizabeth I was advised to marry a certain Austrian prince. She was, herself, a passionate but very smart person, and she seemed to know herself. At the time she was in her upper twenties. The Austrian guy wasn’t more than 17, and the two rulers didn’t even speak the same language.
The point being that the Queen was very smart in turning him down (or rather, turning Austria down because the poor boy just did what his parents and advisors told him to) because the marriage would have undoubtedly added a level of stress and unhappiness to her life which would have affected her administrational practices. Also, let’s say for the sake of the argument that Austrian boy had a less-than-good-quality mind. The offspring of the King and Queen would have been less capable and fit for ruling than if the Queen had married some really smart un-”noble” person.

*Sidenote*: The term “nobility” is a pet peeve of mine. It is used to refer to the gaudy, petty, greedy ruling class in monarchies. Nothing noble about them. They started off as the knighthood in feudal times, when anyone, including peasants, could become considered noble through their actions. Then as time wore on it became all about family name and connections and the value of the word “noble”, which means of quality or high moral integrity, deteriorated. There was nothing noble about aristocracy. Ok, onwards with actual point....

Level the Second: dealing with scenarios where the ruler is polygamous
This is mostly an issue with Eastern monarchies of the past, but is still seen in... oh shoot.... African nation... oh well, the king has 23 wives or something ridiculous like that.
How can you expect the offspring/future rulers to grow up even remotely normal in a home like that? When the ruler reaches the age at which they gain control of the country, how would they have any idea to manage their subjects who have grown up in an entirely different environment? The ability to relate to the people which they are responsible for and representing is seriously hindered. Also, polygamous rulers often choose their partners based on physical attractiveness, and not their mental capacity or ability to aid with ruling a nation. Thus the offspring are often dumb as nails. Those dumb people then go out and find their pretty but inept partners and the offspring are then *tadaaa!* dumber than nails!
If you take a look at monarchies, often there is a trend of starting off with a really good ruler and then slowly watering down the smartness genes until mediocrity is attained. Then the monarchy is so decayed that either a foreign country takes possession of the nation, or there is a revolution.
This is why democracy ends up working out better. Over time, the weaknesses of one family tree do not affect the good and welfare of an entire country.
But at the same time, I’m not a fan of current democratic practices either. I admit though, in closing that in matters of state and government I am completely and merrily clueless. And I have no actual info to base this off of...

ALSO: my music for the day is the Newsboys. A long time ago, they were cool to me. Then I felt like I grew out of them and just stopped understanding what they stood for. And this weekend I saw the sky and thought of their song "Million Pieces" or "Kissin' your cares goodbye" and it fit my mind and I was happy. Musically they are like soft rock/alternative, but in a very grooving Jack Johnson sense.... I dunno, they just made me smile. :D As did a chance encounter with Chrisss.... wouldn't you just love to know what happened...
Peace

On the other hand:

Res sucks.
The crap left out over the weekend has resulted in our suite being infested with fruit flies. I washed a lot of dishes and cleaned up a lot of mess and took out a lot of garbage today when I got back.
And I got a cold.
But I'm still pretty chillin'.
All this stuff is surface disturbances. Like a lake that gets crapped in by a seagull. The top is disturbed and gross, but way down deep in the cool, shady parts it's still clean and cool and still and zen. And the fish feed happily on the results of years of organic matter that has trickled down over the years and become something useful.
Yummy, metaphors for snack!
And I chatted with Greg today, which was interesting. I like that guy, he makes me smile :D

Thanksgiving

So I feel like I haven't posted in a while. I know, it's only been 5 days. I've just been madly busy.
My calculus midterm went really well on thursday, and then my roomie and I wrote our physics quizzes (fun to say!) on friday morning.
This weekend has been pretty intense so far. On friday night I went out and saw a whole bunch of people from highschool. Im gonna miss Elmira more because of it, but I was so happy to see especially a few of them. And my friend from grade school Glenda is staying with me for the weekend and I love talking to her.
Today we went on an intense hike on the Niagara peninsula. The trees were BEAUTIFUL and the sun was warm and there were interesting caves to poke about in. I had a sweet time just getting out into nature and feeling fit.
And I got to ride my horse yesterday!!!!! It was amazing to get outside and let the silence and sunshine soak into me and wask out all the noisy, angry stress that's been building for a while.
I'm certainly in a healthier state of mind from this weekend. Also I've pretty much confirmed that I'll take next year off school. It's ok with all the parents and school people, and I have a job and vet volunteering place lined up. I'm so excited.
So this Thanksgiving, I'm thankful for things working out. For the magical flow of universe that makes it all ok. We get pushed just outside of where we think we can handle, and then we are brought back into the rich, creamy centre of goodness and realize our world, our mind, our capabilities have expanded and we know, feel, understand, are more than when the cycle started.

Fun is a vector quantity!

My fun is currently progressing at a constant acceleration of 2 laughs per (day)squared. Meaning every day I laugh twice more often than the day before. At about 19 degrees west of north.
My roomie and I had this side conversation in physics. Apologies to anyone who views all that as nerdy nonsense, but it made us laugh.
Today in chem I was juss sitting and waiting for class to start, and the room was filling up gradually, and this blonde fellow with verr blue eyes and an eyebrow ring sat down beside me and asked me if I had been in the last class. I sai yes and he asked what we had discussed and I showed him my notes and stuff. As the class progressed he said he was completely lost, so I spent most of the time chatting with him and explaining stuff. He had switched majors from real estate (that's a major?) to science and was just getting behind because he didn't have the science background that made the class easy. So yah, we chatted and it was nice because I now have a chemistry buddy! And I met a nice person!
ALSO today, in my bio lab: my roomie and I are always partners, but we work in groups of four. We sat down accross from this girl named Elina in who is in th same Bible study thing as me, and then there was a random guy named Chris there to complete our four. And the bio lab was excessively fun! I had an awesome time. We just talked about beans mating and alliteration and allegories and analogies and we all just kept digressing away from what we needed to do. We finished last out of everyone cuz we couldn't focus. But it was awesome! Thanks to someone for arranging a freak combination of people to laugh and joke around. I felt like I was back with the stairwell crowd.
I needed that, cuz midterms have been getting me down.
Hopefully the acceleration is constant.

*sigh*

Had a good weekend
am back in res
am resenting the fact.

I've got a horrible case of cabin fever.
I don't mean to be all emoish and whining about life. It's only cause i'm indoors. as soon as i go outside I smile. But it's hard to study/do homework outside.

Tea

It does incredible things to an evening
I had started to write this on saturday but lost focus.
On friday night, it was a weird thing, but I stayed up till 5 am talking to a boy that I have never previously or ever will have romantic connections with.
Most people would find this weird, because their little minds are under the impression that the only grounds on which genderized minds touch are in a dating/sexual sort of sense.
I disagree.
Because people are people, and our gender does not define us as much as our humanity.
Most of my closest friends are guys. I think it's because they don't like all the weird drama stuff that entertains most girls, and I love that about them. And once you get to know anyone well enough, you stop classifying them as "jock" or "prep" or "nerd". Past that, you stop cassifying them in relation to their ethnicity or religion. After you know someone well enough, you throw out classification systems altogether (including gender and age, which are almost the last to go) and just know them as them. An individual. Of course we don't mave the mind room to know everyone that well. But hopefully the ones we do know in that way are worth it.

Huzzah for tea and talking till 5 am. I quite enjoyed it.

Weather

I've just realized that this is my 105th post. As in I've passed 100. And I still keep on top of it! Woah
Other than my journal, this is the longest I've kept up with anything. I may pick up with the journal again, but it's hard to get alone time, which I prefer for that sort of thing.

So yah, I have naught about which to blog.
This weekend promises to be insanity. Not sure how I'm getting from place to place or times or people, but there's gonna be stuff HAP'NING!

I had deep thoughts today, because it was a crazy weather day. Every time I went outside the weather changed. But there's a definite chill in the air, like winter is creeping up. I hafta bring back a new jacket after this weekend because the ones I have now aren't quite warm enough.

It's the time of year made for reminiscing about lost dreams and sad happenings. But truthfully, I'm not feeling it. I wander between my classes in the wetness and half smile to myself because I like the sound of water in my shoes (which have gaping holes in the bottom) and the feeling of cold misty wind down my neck and I LOVE being able to sneak up to people after getting in from outside and put my freezing cold hands on the back of their neck and watch them freak out.
But it does make me miss home too. All the things I'm used to with the changing of the season just aren't here. I can't leach heat off of Kyle every morning in music class. I can't freak teachers out by showing up to class drenched and shivering but intensely happy. I can't go wandering about philosophically in the adventurous feeling breeze with Jemma.

I don't know why I can't get away from that place in my life. I want to be living in the present, but it's really not that enjoyable. With the exceptions of juice and my roomie's guitar playing and the lack of mother, it's pretty bleak. I mean indoors. The moment I step outside I feel comforted, like I'm taking a walk with someone, but there's no one around. Inside there are people but they all are so shallow. I don't mean shallow like they only care about clothes and getting smashed every wednesday (WHY?!). I mean that too, but they're just one dimensional. You see a face and that's all they are. And yah. I'm not getting into that.

I'll just focus on when I'm happy. I love minute maid!!! Seriously, their frozen cranberry juice is more energizing than caffeine. It's also intensely sugary. Also, this weekend: I'm not sure where it's gonna take me, but I'm gonna be with the people that I love and that love me, so no matter what happens, I'll be down with it.

And getting good marks in uni is frikken HARD! oh my gosh! like one mistake and you get like 60%. I suppose I just wasn't prepared. Yay midterms next week...

And puddles: reflect infinity and are full of light.

Time

Time is, in current human understanding, a physical dimension. Sort of. So you know how there’s the first dimension (a point) and the second dimension is a line that you can move back and forth along. Once you get to the third dimension you can move in all sots of cool directions. But if you add time as a fourth dimension, you hit a problem. Instead of introducing a new range of directional freedom, it becomes a restriction. This is because time only can move in one direction and it is not possible to experience the same time twice.
And I think it’s this way for a purpose.
If time were truely fully dimensional, time travel would be possible. It would be possible to be living in any time of history. But there wouldn’t be history. Our brains can’t handle the concept that being able to move back and forth through time at will would make time an inconsequential measurement. There would be no such thing as progression or growth. Growth is a measurement of increase in size or amount over time. The only ultimate clock would be biological.
Age would be obsolete because let’s say I was born in 1990 and then in 1996 I warped to 1774 and in 1800 I went to 2009. How old would I be?
Also, people would abuse the ability to move to any age they felt like. I have a suspicion that technology wouldn’t advance because no one would stay in one place long enough for there to be science. But then at certain times there would be extreme overpopulation, and other points where bad stuff supposedly happened would be nonexistent.
It’s all a big schmozz. But I’m glad it’s not possible. It gives each individual a definite span in which they must live their life for good or bad.
Today has been exceptionally good. My roomie and I have both be giddy and silly for the past two days, so randomness and giggling are plentiful. And it’s raining outside in a way that’s nice to wander in.
AND my roomie had her chemistry lab partner over today to work on something or other. Quel garcon!
great taste in clothing&music, really friendly, smart, likes to debate, artistic (can play gitaur and sings), good looking, likes Flight of the Conchords and Bobby McFerrin...I’m oozing, I know, but he was kool!
It was pretty awesome.
Yeup.
And I’m really happy here at uni, which is new. I think it has something to do with the ridiculous volumes of juice I’ve been drinking.

Homesickness

Who'da thunk it?
I really am homesick. It manifests itself in weird ways.
On nice days I look outside and think "What a beautiful day to ride Jemma...oh wait"
I saw a guy today with hair like my buddy Porky Lewis (huge black curly) and I almost yelled hey, but then I realized I'm not in Elmira, I don't know everyone.
I went to Tim Hortons and couldn't chat about life with the employees
It's never dark outside at night
I can never wander around and sing and talk to myself, because there are people
Walking in barefeet is too dangerous, so I gotta wear shoes
On friday night when I'm chilling by myself I can't phone up the boys and organize an adventure
I can't stay up all night arbitrarily
I have no one to tease like my little sister
I have no one to pick on me like my older brother and his friends
No one ever sings or plays the piano for me
I have no piano to play in the dark
I never see my teachers at the store
I don't have the huge bookshelves with books I've read a hundred times and still love

That's what my home is to me: familiarity.

But I'm starting to settle in better. Mostly I've found comfort in books: both new discoveries and old favourites. And listening to familiar music. Jack Johnson *heart*! And I've found things I like about where I am.

Williams!
The public transit system: still a novelty
People watching is actually interesting
Shopping for myself
Skipping class to hang with my roomie
Being in cool clubs like fencing and debating
Learning (sorta)
The ridiculous things my physics prof does
Facebooking and blogging during class (guess who's in latin!)
My new cell phone

I'm having a pretty happy day. I got a letter from my friend Jenni and it made me so ridiculously happy. And I went to lunch with 2 friends and had some awesome banananana...(oh crap!) bread.

Skipping down the cobblestones and feeling groooovy!

*edited*-- if you ever need a random passtime, read a bridal magazine. It'a actually pretty cool to look at al the pretty stuff. aesthetically satisfying, because I *heart* shiny stuff!

*edited again*-- I HATE THE WORD "ONUS"!!!!

*and again*-- http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7642774.stm . What is the world coming to? I hate mondays!

Res life

Sucks.
Someone pulled the fire alarm yesterday at 5am and then again just now at 1 am.
Drunk people piss me off. A lot. A LOT.


I really miss my Elmira life. It's possible that even my mother would be better than this


I'm having a really crappy evening.



"The sun'll come out tomorrow. Bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow there'll be sun"



*edited to record a SECOND fire alarm at 230am*

Tesseract

I like hypercubes a lot.
I linked to the wikipedia page on them in my other post today.
But I love how they supersede the common understanding of physical dimensions. I understand that they are way over my head. I also love them because they are one of the concepts in the book “A Wrinkle in Time”.
That book is one of my long standing favourites. It’s got more or less everything that a good book can be asked to give: adventure, romance, depth, humour, string theory, and much more
It’s always been one of the books that takes me away from places I don’t like to be (like when I was living with my parents) and let me be in an entirely different universe. And I love it for that too.
I’m still unable to adjust to this residence life thing. Most of the time I just want people to GO AWAY.
I may get used to it. I may not. I doubt I’ll live in res next year, all the same.
Remember like 2 days ago I had that weird post about a crazy idea?
So here’s the plan. Do not try to talk me out of it.

I want to take next year off school and do crazy stuff.Take the midnight train going anywhere. Work, of course, for money, but then go see the world.
The weirdest thing has brought me to this. I’ve been thinking about taking next year off for a while, and I’ve been feeling intense cabin fever, and questioning the 9-5 lifestyle. I can’t do that. I’m seriously freaking out because I don’t want my life to be a job or a career. I want to be a person, not an employee. I don’t want to wake up every morning, shower, go to work, come home, watch a movie, and go to bed. I WILL SNAP if I don’t get what ever is poking at me out.
So I was talking to Amalie, who is far away in Waterloo, and she’s hating university, so I was like “I have a crazy plan” and she said “So do I”. So I told her what I was thinking, and it turned out she had the exact same idea. Angsty minds think alike!
So that is the plan if I can make it work. And I hope more than anything that I can.
Anyone else want to come along?

In other news, I'm going sailing, and I'm getting a cell phone, and there's a very VERY drunk guy stumbling around my living quarters. Aaaaand I skipped Latin today. Again. To go downtown with the roomie. Again. And I aced a physics quiz which is worth like 5% of my mark. Huzzah!

School is getting ridiculously busy now.

Already people have midterms. I stayed up till 315 am the other day to do my physics homework. Granted I didn't do anything in the course before that, but I'm still gonna whine. Procrastination is my favourite.

So everything is going well except for chemistry which has a lot of online stuff (Assignments, quizzes, etc) and I suck at online stuff. I can't focus as well. I'm not sure why, but I think that my brain doesn't connect the computer with homework. Or any type of work, for that matter. It's very nicely connected with Plant Tycoon and Facebook :D

And I realized how much time I waste on silly stuff like that. I'm thinking about allowing myself only 3 facebook checks a day and possibly getting rid of plant tycoon.

Oh yah, plant tycoon is a really lame sounding computer game that I found a few months back but on a windows computer the demo only lasts an hour, and on my mac I can play for as long as I want. It sounds lame eh? And seriously all you do is grow and sell plants, and it takes like half a frikken hour for a plant to grow. But it's so freaking addictive! Just ask my roomie. I was playing it in class one day (shame, Becca, SHAME!) and she was watching and then she started playing and so now we're both hooked. It can eat like 3 hours of your day, no sweat.

And here are 3 "poems" I wrote the other day. Not in connection particularly with anything. I know that if the guys read this they'll be like WOAH! but that's perfectly fine. I'm hypercubical like that.


Do you know, right now
If you rolled over a little closer
And I could feel your breath warming up my back
I wouldn’t move away?
And if you had to settle yourself,
And asked if you could put your arm under my head;
Right now,
I would say “ok”
And the urge right now is incredible
To curl up against you
And disregard the knowledge that right now
It couldn’t work.




Nothing feels better than having someone to cuddle with when you’re sleepy
Like kittens all warm and ergonomically aligned
My bones sink into you and yours into me
There’s no point of discomfort
Your arm across my belly is weighty like a quilt
And we laugh about nothing
Because we like the feeling.



It was beautiful because it was transitory.
I know it was a wave of emotion
But it was a warm, salty, strong wave.
I know it was one ridiculous evening and neither of us meant anything
But it felt good, good, like lying in the sun.
It warmed me up all the way through
To be in love with you
For one day.

There we go. And cheers to the weekend!! I'm going sailing tomorrow!

Crazy plan

If anyone is free (ie:no specific plans) from May '09 to august '10, contact me for a sweet idea :D

See-saw balance day

So the day didn't goe exactly as planned. Emily didn't end up coming along, which made me less happy, because I really wanted to see her.

But there were unexpected positive things. I had an awesome time talking with my buddy Eric whom I haven't seen/talked to in a long time. Just being goofy with bits of serious at random. I love band camp bonds. And I played on a real vintage mechanical pinball! It's so awesome! Lights and bells and lots of fun! I even got the highest score out of everyone (I also played like a LOT of times)

I got asked by a guy's sister if I would go to a movie with him. I said "yah, sure, as long as he understands that I don't to any extent like him in 'that' sense". Then I was told I was going to marry him, to which I strongly objected. He's not rich enough. Band camp jokes.

And on the less happy side, I ate 3 pieces of pizza today. My digestive system is displeased. Screw that.

But I had an awesome time. Even though the majority was me having random little chats with people, and random long chats with a few others, it was awesome. I don't even care that I spent nearly $40 on gasoline to drive from Elmira to Kitchener toToronto to Missisauga to Milton to Elmira to Kitchener to Elmira...

I had a pretty ballin' time.

What is love?

Yes, I know it is 303am
Yes, I know that in 4 hours I hafta be up to drive to toronto
But I had coffee with dinner and I just watched the first and only season of the show "The Class"
And it accidentally made me think.

Accidentally as in the show wasn't trying to make me think.

And of course it's about love. What to lame sitcoms talk about if not their 2 dimensional people and their silly relationships?

I've got a lot in my brain, and I can't make it come out sounding anything like sense.

Ok, so here are my previously mentioned principles:
1: There is no "one" other for any given person
2: People can't know one another completely
3: People suck (actually that's a really generally applied principle, but it relates)
4: My perfect guy doesn't exist

Would all that added up be depressing? Am I sad about it? I know I've mentioned this before but it keeps coming back because of certain factors in my life just now making me psychoticly horomonal and emotional.

And every time, it comes back to God. I owe him at least a mention in my blog. I don't know why I'm always so pussy about actually saying his name. Am I ashamed of him? I hope not. I always feel like I shouldn't commit. I don't know if I'm more afraid of letting him down or committing to a religious group I oppose.

But with him, all those reasons become irrelevant. God is the best parts of everyone. Every beutiful dimension of every personality came from his imagination. He has to know me completely. All the stupid songs I sing to myself in my brain and all the scenarios I invent for myself but never have the courage to get to. And he avoided sucking by not being a person, which is nice. And then, if all that is true, and he still loves me, then finding a guy can't matter.

Why could I be lonely? Trees are like.... beautiful.

I don't know what all that was, but I'm happy it's out. I don't want to be scretivw about that part of me. It's so big inside but I can hardly ever let it leak out cuz I don't want people to be like "Oooh, she's a Christian. That means she's a good girl, loves her mamma, loves Jesus, and America too..."

I wish I didn't hafta say christian. I just love God. He made trees. Am I too obsessive over trees?

And no apologies.

Weekend!

Amazing how the prospect of a change of scenery can cheer you up :D
And of course nice comments from friends :D

Tomorrow I'm going to a band camp reunion in Toronto. I'm driving, so we might not make it the whole way there, but some of my favourite people are gonna be along, so it's gonna be an awesome trip no matter what.
Band camp people are the ones I can chill with and we always have an awesome time no matter what. We laugh, we do crazy stuff, we lounge, we sing, we dance (yes, we are like a traveling theatre company), we get lost, we beat the crap out of each other (it's a game, no worries)...etc.
I love seeing these people because I know that I'm going to smile. And it's weird, because most of them are the types of people I would never have met other than camp, and we only see each other every 6 months or so (if that), but we're close. Yay for the band camp bond!

Next weekend is also gonna be pretty awesome. My dad is renting a sailboat for two days, so it's gonna be crazy fun. And my brother is gonna come visit me some evening next week.

AND it's sunny out.

Wow.

I haven't really been able to do much blog style thinking. I'm still trying to get used to this new schedule and school and stuff.
But I had a really good debate with the one guy living in my suite. Steve, actually. About the war in Iraq and American foreign policy. I didn't realize how much of a pacifist I am. But in the end, politics don't matter much to me. Yah they're important, but as long as I can chill with my horse and make enough money for both of us to eat, and occasionally see my friends, I'm happy. The only reason I prefer Layton over Harper is the hair issue. And he's more likely to legalize marijuana :D

I really do miss Jemma though. And being able to get out into nature entirely alone and stuff. Hopefully I have time this weekend to go see her.

Cheers! May everyone's weekends be sunny and restful and exciting!

Why do I not have social skills?

I would trade my horse for the ability to meet people naturally and make a good impression.

It's very traumatic to be completely inept at making aquaintances.

I know I'm a jerk, but I don't know what to do to fix it.

*growl*

I'm gonna go sleep. When I'm tired I have negative social skills.

Something new!

I got my ear pierced.
Like the upper cartilage part. My roomie and I went out this afternoon (I skipped Latin) and took the bus downtown. We wandered around forever trying to find the right place. It was a really reputable one, too. My roomie got her eyebrow pierced. It was actually really exciting, but it hurt like burning you mouth. Not too horrible, but you keep feeling it forever afterward. Also, I have cold so water tastes funny.

I hate country music! There is barely anything that can cause me so much frustration just by its existence. The stupid lame metaphors, the stupid lame ideas, the stupid lame chord structures, the stupid lame twangyness, the stupid lame people who think it is the only style of music... ARGH!
I shouldn't be able to sing along with the song the first time I hear because of its sheer predictability! My roomie just agreed with me. Props!
Actually, country music is good for one thing: hoedowns. Two-stepping and square dancing wouldn't be the same.
I prefer the polka myself.
Or not dancing. I'm reeeeally good at that.

So it's been an interesting day. I may or may not be addicted to getting piercings now...

And I start pilates tomorrow!!! And I have to go to debating,which kidna sucks, because I think I mentioned that they think I'm a dumb nincompoop. Oh well. I get free trips out of it. I'll just try to be a little less overpoweringly Becca for the next while and hopefully they will get used to me. But seriously, the one guy there was the cockiest little numbnutty butt-wipe I've ever met. And that's who's supporting Stephen Harper. Yah you may be winning, but no one likes you :P

Apologies to any readership who supports the Harper government. He has goofy hair, and therefore cannot have my approval.

So, about giraffes

We talked about them briefly in biology today.
There was a scientist named Lamarck who thought that the things that animals changed about themselves or learned would be inherited by its offspring. The example was a giraffe who needed to eat tall leaves, so it grew a longer neck and passed it on to all its children.
Then of course Darwin came along and was like "You're ridiculous".

But yah, if I could just will myself to have a crazy biological trait it would be photosynthesis. If I didn't need to have food ever, I wouldn't have to work. I wouldn't have to go to school. I could literally live in a field with my horse and we would chill. If everyone in the wolrd could photosynthesize, it would totally overthrow current forms of government. Haiti would be one of the healthiest places to live. And Africa wouldn't have to worry about too much anymore. It would make living in Canada a bit icky in the winter. Not that it's an fun now :P.

And if people were green all conceptions of what a beautiful person is would be totally changed. Would we change colours in the fall?

No, I don't have anything better to do with my time.

Except maybe get a piercing :D

Shame on me!

Blogging in class. I know, I'm a horrible person.
This is actually one of the less horrible classes. Physics. I've mentioned my prof before, haven't I?
Very excitable British/African man. I'm a little scared of how excitable this person is, honestly. Uniform motion is really not that exciting. Right now he's speaking to his laser pointer....

Anyhow, I've been a lazy bum lately. I haven't done my laundry, haven't done my homework, haven't been social.

I just want to stay home and go on fb and read and drink tea. It makes this whole university degree business verr depressing.

Stuff in general has been trying to gwt me down lately. My teflon shield against negativity is wearing down. Just friends being wonky and school being busy and mothers being stressful...

Ick.

I found a new stress avoidance tool though: Jeff Dunham!
He's a ventriloquist, actually. He has these weird acts with puppets named Peanut and Achmed the Dead Terrorist. I'm sure you've heard of him. If not, Youtube!

And people watching continues to be interesting. My roomie is obsessed with this one guy that's in a whole bunch of our classes. So we always try to find him in lectures. Entertaining, at least.

My prof concluded that life is good. I should pay attention now...

oh, and I don't feel as guilty for blogging. The guy beside me is reading a book and totally not even in the room. Hah.

The Catcher in the Rye

I had heard from a lot of people that it was amazing, that it was their favourite book, that it was life-changing, etc. And some of these people were respectably smart.
So when I saw it at Chapters for cheap, I thought "Hey, it's gotta at least be decent" right?

Wrong! Dumb book!

If I wanted to listen to someone curse and whine about life, I have several emo friends who use a more diverse vocabulary than this stupid book.

And now I have cursing back in my brain, so I hafta focus when I speak so that I don't curse every other word, which is annoying. It will take me a while to get it all cycled back out.

However, I also bought "The Illead", "The Odyssey", and "Emma" at about 3.50 a piece. I wonder what Homer would have thought about that. Or the guy who translated Homer's books to English. Each one took him a decade and he considered them his life's work. On a 3/$10 rack.

Why would you dedicate your life to something like that? Seriously. How does it really impact the good of the race? I bet after he finished all that process, and he could finally sit back in his easy chair the first night after all the publication hubbub was finished, he was like "Well what the heck am I to do now?"....

If I'm going to make something my life's work, it's going to be something momentous, like world peace or teleportation.

Now I'm going to finish my tea and go to bed.

Disappointment on an empty stomach

It's pretty rough, let me tell you.
I haven't been shopping this week, so today I ate rice for dinner, and that was all.
Kinda 3rd world in that sense. I shouldn't complain.

But then I went to this Campus for Christ thing. I was really looking forward to it, actually. I was hoping incredibly much that I could meet some people with both brains and God, which are decidedly rare. And I was hoping for a connection with God. And I don't mean a sink into the mellow wave of emotion that is brought on by the closeness of people singing the same song. I get that from choir rehearsal. I mean a connection in my mind. Newness of perspective.

And I was incredibly disappointed. Not a brain in the room. Emotion enough to start a Save the Children campaign, but no minds. Example: one of the songs was about shouting praises and whatnot. Right there = problem. I've heard shouting before. We sing about shouting from mountains. Thousands of people have heard that before, and we all know that no one is climbing Everest. What about debating in parliament? That is vastly more practical and truthful, really. Anywhosie, I digress. Spoke of shouting.
What did the song leader do? Invoked the emotion factor. I mean the slow down, drop the instrumentals, and repeat until everyone's 'godly passion' makes them trail off into prayer...
heLLO?! SHOUT?! THINK PEOPLE!!! I was considering shouting, really, just to prove a point. But I stopped because it's not my place to redirect the herd. But seriously, THINK about what you're saying, people. Yes, you may feel good, but there's more to this God thing than emotion. YOU feel fuzzy, but what does HE feel? THINK!

So I wandered home singing old hymns with meanings and thought much about religion and what it is to me. And I decided it's something inseparable from the other factors of me. And I found some other conclusions, but they are less definable.

On a positive note: guess who is coming to speak at the cafe on tuesday night? Oh, it's no big deal, just a little someone called SHANE KOYCZAN!!!!
I'm still not sure if I can make it, but I will fuh shizz try to be!! Huzzah for thought!!!

My latin prof

seriously talks like the shop teacher in this video. Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uK9ZFhPodZ8

There is nothing better than a bit of Three Dog Night in the morning. Start your day off with a smile and a dance!
My faves are:
"Black and White"
"Summer in the City"
"Your Momma Don't Dance"
"Joy to the World"

The numbers of smiles these songs have given me is probably a world record or something.
And buddies from last night are still drunk. Hah. Nancies.

To digress

from the general purpose of this blog, I would like to say that after a certain point, drunk people are no longer funny, they are annoying.
We've spent the last 2 hours trying to get 2 COMPLETELY tanked and caffeinated drunk guys to bed. One of them wasn't too bad. He just threw up and laid there. The other one has been kicking walls, smashing his head against them, ranting about going to LA, and waltzing around in his whitie tighties.
At least I don't have class at 830 am...

I never got around to completing that thought from bio, did I?
Ah well.
Here's an addition to it.
There was a little bug crawling around on my laptop just now (I'm outside). He crawled under the "alt" button, which I then hit repeatedly and rapidly. Here is what we know of the situation:
size of bug= small
mode of death = violent
lifespan = short
intelligence = negligible.
Knowing these factors, can you derive his purpose?
It is either infinite or zero. I don't know which because those two numbers are so alike.

An hour on the steps

I'm going to people watch and document it. Here we go:

1: Fellow in a red sweater with beard
2: Old couple looking worried
3:Blonde guy
4:Blonde girl all in black, very angry-business-type
5:Guy in black sweater vest, friendly looking
6: Punk in yellow shirt. Looks like he stole something
7: Preppy girl with shiny purse
8:Girl who looks like Julie Andrews in the sound of music...
9: Guy who looks like my brother with bright red hair.
10: Squirrel!!
11:busy looking asian guy
12: totally not busy looking girl in pink. probably likes high school musical :P
13: prep couple. all giggly. ew.
14:girl with disgusting coloured leggings. did you puke on your legs?
15:girl with strange wooden device. probably for torturing the squirrel.
16: girl with red shorts walking really really weirdly. probably repositioning her shoe.
17: guy with very cool artistic clothing but unfriendly face.
18: guy with ipod who smiled at me :D
19:guy with orange shirt and shiny water bottle. intensely healthy, prolly.
20: 2 nerds discussing something smart.
21: nerd couple discussing something with money
22: girl with pink sweater and shopping bag. looks average and friendly. she's cool.
23: two guys with white shirts and jeans. probably planned to coordinate. they were the type who would.
24: girl with ugly turquoise boots
25: girl who sighed like the weight of the world was in her backpack
26: little professor on yellow bicycle. very funny looking :D
27: guy on cell whining about biology.
28: guy with ridiculous plaid jacket. get a fashion sense!
29: guy with extreeemely long strides! slow down!
30: jock couple: guy puffed out his chest like a pelican
31: eldery hippie type lady. looked very serene.
32: guy with funky skateboard and green headband. should give some of his fashion sense to #28!
33: guy coming down steps while texting. glared at me :P
34: couple across street. looking at me suspiciously. yes I am writing about you! hah!
35: fellow with loosened up tie. looks like he needs tea
36: asian guy with awesome stripey shirt
37: guy in business dress with funky sunglasses. looks like he should be in the matrix
38: guys with iced caps.... can i have some?
39: threesome of jock/cheerleader chicks. ergh!
40: nerd with environmentalist tshirt. DON'T RECYCLE! hah!
41: girls reading and walking. bad idea. you will trip
42: scary girl with awful hair that i see everywhere. very keen on school.
43: guy with aviators telling a "funny story" to his buddy
44: guy with green and white gift bag. i wonder who it's for. prolly his girlfriend. she's prolly mean. he looks nice.
45: guy with green sweater and a smoker's cough.
46: guy with combat boots and a purpose
47: group of people with posters.
48: two guys. one is texting. the other looks bored and socially uncomfy
49: tall aggie nerd type. hehe, funny looking
50: two jock nerds. i love jock nerds.
51: drama freak couple. black sweaters and weird hair are a dead giveaway.
52: very confused looking guy with a heavy looking black bag. may be a cocaine addict, keeps touching his nose.
53: intense little goth guy. crazy boots and chains. blonde though, and looks like he's in grade 8. prolly hasn't hit puberty yet. why is he here?
54: matrix guy again. from #37
55: guy with nice face. the friendly intelligent sort.
56: girl who almost runs me over. DO NOT WALK AND TEXT!!
57: annoying jock/punk guys. one with poster. prolly a stupid one like Brittney spears. jerk.
58: girl with crazy hair and brown boots. i don't like boots season.
59: girl with hair so blonde it's almost green. maybe she swam in too much chlorine this summer
60: lady all in black with a chain on her glasses, like the ones librarians wear. heheheh.
61: guy in orange hollister tshirt and flip flops. not a fan. actually, he has a nice smile. semi fan.

traffic is speeding up too much, and it's almost class, so there we go. that was actually really enjoyable in spite of funny looks.