My Back Pages

I guess it is pretty obvious that I don't post here anymore. But I still had time to waste on the internets so I got a tumblr. and I am playing around with it nowadays. If anyone reads this (unlikely) and wants to follow me (even less likely), my tumblr. is: http://earthinmywindow.tumblr.com/

Hope you're all well!

I didn't renew my LJ for the somewhat obvious reason that I pretty much never post anymore, and yet being reduced to a mere 7 Userpics still seems especially harsh. Borders is dead. I cut out a few weeks early because the liquidation process became too depressing and hard to deal with. So I am currently unemployed. I do have a sweet seasonal gig set up that starts in November, though. I am going to be a customer service rep for the online store Think Geek, which happens to be based in my area. Other than that, life is...

Grad school is boring and I have lingering regret over the choice to go, but now that I have borrowed a buttload of money and am partway through, I refuse to quit. I am just going to wind up with a Master's Degree, massive debt, and still not be able to get a job that will let me leave my parents house. My Alzheimer's afflicted grandmother is driving all of us insane and I must find escape wherever I can find it. Usually that is indulging in books, manga, and TV.

I dunno if I should be thrilled or horrified by the revelation that, through my little borther's Wii, I have access to Netflix Instant Queue. Add to this the recent addition of HBO and Showtime (along with their On Demand services) to this household and I realize that even with no job I am able to distract myself from my studies very easily. I guess it's not too bad to live here...

I am obsessed with Mad Men right now. I am the type of person who usually avoids things that seem overly hyped then give them a try and fall in love while asking myself, "Why didn't I get into this sooner?" Thus was the case with Hetalia, with Song of Ice and Fire (I am only on Storm of Swords, though), and thus is the case with Mad Men. It always helps when there is at least one character I go fangirl crazy for. In Mad Men, that character is Pete Campbell. Even in the first episode where he was a colossal smarmy creep (and continued to be one to varying degrees until the most recent season) I was hooked. I guess being played by super adorable Vincent Kartheiser* is part of the appeal, but there is something compelling about the smug snake and I am loving watching him mature. And dude can Charleston like a boss!

My other obsession right now is Sailor Moon. Got the first volume, gobbled it up, pre-ordered volume 2. I have had to admit that I never actually read the manga or watched the anime before. Seriously, not a single episode. My knowledge has all come second hand. But I loved the first volume so much. I admit that I have a weakness for magical girls. I love that overflowing Girl Power energy they produce. Sailor Jupiter is my favorite senshi so far, but there is something to like about all of them.

I am lamenting the wait until November when I get my next dose but at least that's a lot sooner than I'll get new Mad Men. Oh, but if they try and pair up Don Draper with Peggy in some future season, I will choke a bitch. Peggy/autonomy=OTP. And Pete/Trudy because they are so sweet together and I think she is the main reason he has evolved. And yet, I absolutely love any little bittersweet moment between Pete and Peggy when it is obvious they are remembering that thing from their past and possibly wondering what could have been as their lives drift further apart, down different paths.

Rambling on, is it possible to have your favorite relationship in a fandom be one that you know don't belong together and you don't really want them together because you know other things are better for them but you still want to have that emotional poignancy of knowing something could have been there, in another life, another time? Yeah, it is hard to explain...

Also, Joan is like the sexiest character on TV.

I have a craving to write fanfiction of some sort, but I don't know what. I don't even know what fandom I'd write for. The desire to write is strong, though.

In conclusion, I miss having lots of icons.

*Much to my own bafflement, I am actually considering watching Angel on Instant Queue to feast my eyes on his younger self. Too bad he's not in it until season 3.

I am not actually dead. The few noble people who once track of me may have thought as much, but I am still very much alive. This summer has been a bummer. I really shoulda taken summer courses... Bored doesn't really cover things. I guess the best testament to how disinterested I've become in LJ is the fact that my subscription account expired and I didn't bother to renew. My interest was already dwindling and then my custom layout was effing up and I had to switch to an unpleasant generic layout and that basically sealed the deal.

So why am I bothering to write in my journal now? Short answer is because I been drinking. Curse the person who came up with whipped cream flavored vodka; you've pretty much assured that I will never be sober for any extended length of time. Mix it with orange soda and that shit is awesome! Right now I am watching Tosh.0 while digest copious amounts of salmon in the hopes of being able to go on the elliptical tonight. It is very strange that I like to watch this show since I find Daniel Tosh himself very offensive and unfunny in his misogyny. I guess it is because the YouTube garbage is the real star of the show.

If any of y'all have been keeping up with the news lately you'll know already that I am going to be losing my job very soon. It was about time I started looking for another one, or an internship, but it is still very sad times anyways. My darling is a supervisor at another Borders store and will be losing his job, too (along with way too many other awesome people). And I am losing my favorite store along with my job. But this LJ is no pity party, so on to more positive things!

Sunday morning, me and my Edward will be heading up to Ocean City Maryland for a short but much needed vacation. It will be my first time to the beach in many years and also the first time the two of us have been on a trip together. I am so excited! And we'll get to celebrate his birthday while we are there, too!

I can't wait for school to start again because I am bored and my family (specifically my granny) is driving me crazy. The one plus is that I've had lots of time to read. I read Game of Thrones and am on Clash of Kings now. I want to make Jon Snow forget his vow of chastity for realsies. Surprisingly, though, I have not seen any of the HBO series. I do not have HBO at my house and when I went over to my sister's in the hopes of catching it on In Demand, it was no longer available. Guess I'll have to wait for the DVD/Blu-Ray release. In any case, Arya and Jon Snow are my favorites and direwolves are awesome.

I am also about halfway through Clockwork Angel, the first book in Cassandra Clare's Infernal Devices series. I am loving it! Especially Jem. I have only read the first of the Mortal Instruments series and I am liking this prequel better. And before anyone asks, I am well aware of CC's wankity wank wank fanfiction past. Frankly, I find it all just mildly amusing and wouldn't let it keep me from reading her books. I don't abide by the unwritten "rules" of fandom anyways... you know, the ones that say what you are and are not allowed to enjoy and what issues you must care about?

I am a fangirl indeed, but I admit that I am a bad one and find many aspects of Fandom (that's capital F version, encompassing all little f fandoms) totally ridiculous. I think what gets me the most may be how sacrosanct everyone's "kinks" supposedly are. You are allowed to judge people as idiots with no taste for enjoying Twilight (not thinking it is great literature but merely enjoying it for any reason) but thinking someone is fucked up for getting off on colostomy porn is reprehensible. Makes me feel like I'm in the fucking Twilight Zone (hurr hurr). If you are turned on by someone getting fucked in his/her stoma, you are a sick fuck! Snarry shippers are sick fucks! These are not all beautiful expressions of sexuality as far as I am concerned!

Moving on... I can't really say what it is that makes me hope aboard some fandom bandwagons and not give a fuck about others. I picked up Blue Exorcist and really like it (of course, as with most fandoms I don't give a fuck about the stupid boyslash and incest that plague it). But some popular things not only fail to capture my interest, but actually annoy me in their ubiquity and all the space that is wasted on them on Fandom Secrets and the rankings on Pixiv. Without further ado, here is the ever-growing list of fandoms I couldn't give a shit about if you paid me.

• Homestuck— sorry but this looks like the most asinine shit ever
• Supernatural— congratulations on being so consistently high on this list!
• Tiger & Bunny— whatever the plot is, it looks like yaoi fodder to me
• Madoka Magika— underage moe shit for fanboys to wank to; also, the characters' heads look way too childish
• Doctor Who— never gonna care about this
• Avatar The Last Airbender— I couldn't bother to care about the "racebending" wank simply because I couldn't bother to care about ever watching this series at all
• Uh... a bunch of other shit I am too lazy to mention this time around but have probably bitched about before

• m/m... just m/m... it's not as deep and subversive and super special as a lot of fangirls seem to think. Really.

Mmm... I have to admit, that kind of embittered cynicism fills me with a strange glee. Ooh! Glee! But I do enjoy the musical numbers...

As a final testament to why I have to throw up my hands and give up on Fandom, this is a comment I got on my Hetalia fanfiction:

"Well it was a pretty good story...only thing was...Finland was a mary-sue...I mean major mary sue going on there. otherwise I liked it, I was even able to like the usuk scenes! even tho i despise that pairing...well I liked it up until You went and called America Mommy...It has been agreed that the only person who tops America is Russia and Russia tops the world. It has also been agreed the only people England tops are (MAYBE)Japan and small children... that being said, you did pretty well~!"

I really wish I had sent this person an obnoxious response, I would do it now if it hadn't been so long ago. Seriously, fans like this are why yaoi fans have a reputation for being morons.

Yay! I made it to the last day of the meme and only had to double up once! Of course, it was just a 7-day meme. Compared to the 30-day memes my friends are always posting, it is a pretty lame accomplishment. Maybe next time I will try to do a longer one. So here is the final day, and they save one of the most fun sins for last. It's LUST, baby!

Day 7 - Lust: 7 love secrets

1. I didn't lose my virginity until I was 26. This may seem like an "anti-lust" confession, but it was not for lack of desire, I just didn't fall in love for realsies (reciprocated and everything) until then.

2. One of my major erogenous zones is my shoulders. I love to have them kissed and bitten gently.

3. I really want to get married one of these days but I am acutely aware that my parents can't pay for a fancy wedding so I wonder how it will ever happen.

4. I still go all ooey-gooey inside every time my boyfriend says "I love you."

5. I consider myself heterosexual for all intents and purposes, but have had some very intense crushes on other females. I guess it's all part of the fluidity of human sexuality.

6. I am a horribly lazy lover, always opting to be on the bottom because it is less work.

7. I am very worried that I have become terribly boring now that I am in love. I even had a nightmare about my own mother telling me as much. I am trying not to talk about my romance too much, but it is hard.

I left out my biggest lust secret because it could get me into a little trouble...

And there you have it. Seven days, seven sins. Anybody have any other good multi-day memes to recommend?

( Something else...Collapse )

For Day 6 I am wondering, since it is gluttony, should these guilty pleasures be food? Or is it just any sort of overindulgence in something not good for me? I think I'll go with the latter, though many of them will probably be food because it is my greatest obsession and greatest weakness.


Day 6 - Gluttony: 7 guilty pleasures

1. Candy. I loooo~oooooove candy! Favorites that deserve special mention are jelly beans (I could seriously eat buckets of these, any brand), dark chocolate (I use the antioxidant excuse to lessen the guilt, but it doesn't keep me from eating too much of it), candy corn (a lot of people think they are gross, but I crave them all year round).

2. Homemade sweet treats. I can resist cookies and cakes from the store (doesn't mean I always do, but I am pretty good about it). The homemade stuff on the other hand... Oatmeal cookies, pineapple upside-down cake, strawberry shortcake... It probably helps that homemade treats don't have nutrition information attached so you can pretend they're low-cal.

3. Buying manga. This is something I seriously need to work on. One of the problems is that I don't like to stop following a series that I have started to collect. I am a completist, I suppose, but it is really a waste of money to keep buying a series that I am no longer thrilled by. It is kind of obsessive-compulsive.

4. Coke Zero. I drink at least 2 each day even though I know it isn't good for me. I keep saying I will quit or cut back, stop flooding my body with aspartame, but I have no follow-through. I hope it doesn't ruin my health in the future.

5. Booze. Rum and whiskey are my favorites. I never have gotten falling down or throwing up drunk, but I certainly revel in the tipsy feeling after one or two. But it gives me a headache after I come down and I know it is bad for my liver.

6. TVtropes.org. It is a great site, but horribly addictive. When I wind up spending hours there and not accomplishing anything, I'd call that a guilty pleasure. Definitely a non-food object of my gluttony.

7. Glee. Love the show even though I know it is silly. I'm one of the people who loves it for the musical numbers, cute boys, and frivolity, not for any of the teenage melodrama. I have no interest in dissecting it or discussing how it is "problematic." I don't care about that stuff in Glee, I just wanna enjoy it.


Day 7 - Lust: 7 love secrets

Okay, to me, Day 5 seems an awful lot like Day 2... But what do I know? I will take Worldly Material Desires to be things that are a bit more frivolous and decadent than, say, health insurance. These are not things I desire because I lack them, but things I desire out of sheer desire. Nothing I actually need made this list.




Day 5 - Greed: 7 worldly material desires

1. Le Crueset cookware, in "cassis," or "carribean," or a mixture of all the colors. A complete set would be very nice.

2. Manga. If I have to specify an amount, I can only estimate it at either buttloads or gobs and gobs.

3. Rosetta Stone software for Japanese and French and Italian.

4. A smart phone. Okay, this was also on my Day 2, but I really, really want one.

5. Jewelry from Tiffany, Cartier, or other upscale names. Of course, there is one very special gem in particular that I am jonesing for, but it is too soon... You know what I am talking about.

6. A totally awesome kitchen. You know, with two ovens, an indoor grill, one of those islandy things.

7. A vast and fabulous wardrobe of gorgeous, perfectly fitting clothes that flatter my figure and make me look like a hip, fashion icon.




Day 6 - Gluttony: 7 guilty pleasures
Day 7 - Lust: 7 love secrets

Okay, I missed a day so I will have to double today. There is a certain amount of glee that goes into the Day 3 answers. I could probably have come up with a lot more. That is probably not a good thing. I dunno, I revel in the occasional spell of internal rage.



Day 3 - Wrath: 7 things that piss you off

1. The traffic in Fairfax County
2. Teabaggers, Birthers, Fundies, and other right-wind assholes
3. England/Japan, Kaname/Yuuki, Allen/Lenalee (and other ships I find vile but can't think of at the moment)
4. The terms "dirty blonde" and "dishwater blonde"; is it that hard to call it dark blonde?
5. Those "stop having fun" types in fandom, you know, the "As a queer, asexual, FTM who has never met or spoken to you, I am entitled to tell you that you should feel bad/be offended/ not like X" types
6. No dust jackets on US manga releases
7. No generic for Nuvaring™ + no insurance + the fact that it is apparently the only thing that can tame my excruciating monthly cramps


Day 4 - Sloth: 7 things you neglect to do

1. Put away my clean clothes
2. Look for internships/volunteer opportunities/library related work
3. Visit a dentist (due to a combination on no insurance and sheer terror)
4. Get my oil changed
5. Update my Facebook
6. Wash my car
7. Clean my room


Day 5 - Greed: 7 worldly material desires
Day 6 - Gluttony: 7 guilty pleasures
Day 7 - Lust: 7 love secrets

Time for Day 2!

Day 2 - Envy: 7 things you lack and covet

1. Health insurance
2. A place of my own
3. A smart phone (iPhone or Android, I'm not picky)
4. An oven that works properly
5. A real career
6. The ability to whistle
7. Charisma



Day 3 - Wrath: 7 things that piss you off
Day 4 - Sloth: 7 things you neglect to do
Day 5 - Greed: 7 worldly material desires
Day 6 - Gluttony: 7 guilty pleasures
Day 7 - Lust: 7 love secrets

I have always been reluctant to commit to one of those 30-day memes just because, well, it's a lot of days in a row to post. But strawberryburst is doing this 7-day one that seemed like something I could handle. So here it is, shamelessly ganked, the 7-Days 7 Deadly Sins Meme.

Day 1 - Pride: 7 great things about yourself

1. My brain has an amazing capacity for TV quotes, especially from the Simpsons.
2. I have a natural talent for amigurumi and can make them up as I crochet.
3. I am liked and respected by my bosses at work.
4. I eat my veggies.
5. My manga collection numbers in the hundreds.
6. I have catlike green eyes.
7. I got 1450 on my SATs without studying (this was 10 years ago when it was just math + verbal)



Day 2 - Envy: 7 things you lack and covet
Day 3 - Wrath: 7 things that piss you off
Day 4 - Sloth: 7 things you neglect to do
Day 5 - Greed: 7 worldly material desires
Day 6 - Gluttony: 7 guilty pleasures
Day 7 - Lust: 7 love secrets

It is Mother's Day and my dear mother is... somewhere else at the moment. My mother took her mother to a baseball game on this holiday and they are still there. I am home alone after work. I can't wait to see her, though, and give her a big hug. My mama is one of my favorite people in the whole wide world and she deserves more wonderful things than I can afford to give her. I did give her an awesome cookbook, though. I hope all the awesome mom's out there know how awesome they are. Perhaps one day I will be a mother, and if I am, I will do my best to be as great as my own.

I am done with the semester, by the way. My last day was last Wednesday, took a cataloging final that I do not know how I did on yet. I got a 90 on my Universal Usability final paper, though, which is an A. It is still hard for me to get used to 90 being an A since I went to a high school where, at the time, you had to get a 94 for it to be an A. Pardon the language, but that's just bullplop. Add that grade to the 93 I got on the midterm paper, and things look good for that class. I really would be thrilled to get another pair of aces and maintain my 4.0 GPA.

I feel kind of lazy only doing school part time, but my school is a 90 minute metro ride away... Still, I am going to try to finish in 1.5 more years instead of 2 by taking more classes in semesters to come. My life is very pleasant right now but I am getting impatient for autonomy and true adulthood. I am going to try and volunteer at a library this summer to gain some experience in the field. I also think I might take a Zumba class to tone up. And I want to do as much pleasure reading as I can. I am on the second book in the Mercy Thompson series. They are really good, similar to the Sookie Stackhouse series thematically (they are both urban fantasy with first-person female narration), but better written and with a cooler heroine. Mercy is just so awesome!

Of course, I also hope to spend some quality time with my honey this summer. It is funny how much better the relationship is the second time around. I guess our time apart taught us both how to treat each other better and what mistakes to avoid. I am giddy in a way that bores my friends so I know it must be love. I even resumed activity on Facebook because I am no longer ashamed of the life I am living. I hope me and Edward get to go to the beach this summer. He says he is determined to make it happen, so I am optimistic. I actually bought a bathing suit for the first time in years.

Finally, I've decided to justify my addiction to buying manga as supporting an industry that needs support. Tokyopop is dead and the others could go the same way if I don't do my part.

Also, I am tipsy on rum and coke and WAHAHAHA! Glee is going to have a performance of the infamous "Friday" before season's end! Wicked!