frustratingly Shakespearean

The 14-year-old girl in me is really loving this:



It's the perfect combination of semi-recognizable indie stars, cute outfits, and 50's-influenced romantic girlsong. It also features a plot device so frustratingly avoidable and suggestive of dramatic irony that it takes me back to when I was in junior high and went to see Baz Luhrmann's Romeo & Juliet, and started crying 10 minutes into the film because I knew how it was going to turn out at the end.

And speaking of people I once was and no longer am....

I signed in today with the intention of deleting this blog. I haven't updated in so long, and never really seemed motivated to write anything. I had originally started this as an outlet for creativity and random word diarrhea, and then at some point, I stopped feeling very imaginative. Funny thing about writer's block, though... for me it's often more self-imposed than influenced by anything external. The second I sat down and actually started typing, I came up with a million things I wanted to talk about and explore.

This might also have something to do with my raging procrastination issues and the several design projects I've been putting off completing since FOREVER, that I was planning to get finished today. But whatever works.

So the blog stays. Much like my tattoos, some of which no longer represent how I feel as a person, it remains important because everything that I once was has been a factor in who I am at this very second. None of it was inconsequential. While there are things in my past I now know I could have done better, I can't regret any of it. I am thankful for the experiences I've had and for the people I've known along the way, and what all of it has ultimately made me into: a rather great and still pretty wide-eyed, wild-eyed 29-year old with an entire interesting adulthood ahead of her.

The name stays too... but again, and much like one of my tattoos, the significance of which is changeable and will probably take on a subtly different meaning.

The look will probably change. But not right this second... I've got some projects to take care of first.

xo
Without

Some more discoveries (with side notes)

Winnipeg is looking up... the snow is melting, I have actually been outside on a weekday while it was still sunny, and I have some projects on the horizon that I'm genuinely psyched about.

I've also discovered a few great new things!

Cinematheque: A small (like, tiny) independent theatre in the Exchange district, which is quickly on its way to becoming my favourite district in Winnipeg. Plays free screenings of experimental art films, and also great stuff that larger theatres are guaranteed not to feature. I was lucky enough to see the new Mike Leigh (trailer above). Side note: DAMN does that guy know people. And how lovely/horrible they can be to each other in the most subtle of ways. I need to watch Abigail's Party again now.

Parks and Recreation: The first American Sitcom I have actually enjoyed since Party Down. This is rare. I knew Amy Poehler was involved, and yet still had my doubts that it wasn't just a watered-down version of the Office. Nope (Knope), it's different. The humour is more absurdist than slapsticky, and the lead character is a totally likeable, well-intentioned, human person with a few well-written idiosyncrasies. But the whole ensemble cast is pretty amazing, with the one exception being Rashida Jones. She's super pretty, don't get me wrong, but she's about as exciting as a wet dishcloth. Side note: Does Rob Lowe ever age? I would like to know his secret. Unless it's stem-cell smoothies, in which case I'm good, thanks.

Sprouting things: Where has this practice been all my life? Sprouting is so fun and easy, and all it takes is a jar and some beans! I love the concept of instead of making your food more dead (aka cooking) before you eat it, you make it more alive. Side note: if you're sprouting chick peas, never ever stay at a friend's house over the weekend and forget to rinse/refrigerate them. The resulting smell could knock a buzzard off a shit truck from 50 feet away.

Curling! Curling curling curling curling. Side note: Curling.

Thank you and good night :)

I need to meet this mad genius

(Mom, if you're reading this: calm down, I'm not getting a cat. The sea monkeys are all I need. I just think this video is freaking awesome.)

What my phone sees

This is the worst cookie I've ever had. It tasted like earwax and dishonesty.

Beer-tasting tower. Conclusion: the Polish beer was not so good.

Debbie Travis' terrifying countenance will follow you all over Canadian Tire when you're just trying to buy a hammer.

My morning commute-corner. Morning. When is summer again?

Despite the whining above, I actually really enjoy my twilight bus gig. And sometimes I'm surprised by really beautiful scenery like this.

Hoar frost: scandalous name, otherworldly appearance.

Winnipeg has its own genus of harmoniums. They cluster on the walls of bus shelters and feed off the vibrations from strangers' conversations. When someone smokes a cigarette inside the shelter, they shrivel up and die.

Of Muppets and Mortality

Eh, whatever, a picture a day didn't happen, at all. Haha... moving on...

I happened to see this book cover in a window display while walking through the mall today:


And my mind immediately went here:


..RIGHT?*

Anyway, upon reaching this, my train of thought's rather odd and unplanned destination, two things occurred to me.

1) I don't think aiming to very literally resemble Janice the muppet is the right strategy to being thought of as sexy. Although she would ostensibly be the "sexiest" of them (cool attitude, musically inclined, big pouty lips), I'm probably within the majority when I say that I've never found a muppet sexually appealing.

2) This could, on the other hand, be some bizarre subconscious effort on Ms. Somers' part to stave off the aging process by transforming into something that isn't actually alive. I guess a lot of today's well-known plastic surgery victims (Dolly, Mickey, Meg, Heidi, I could obviously go on and on...) could be said to be attempting the same thing. Like, in their twisted minds (and yes I do think there is something mentally wrong with these people), it's better to look like Barbie, or Janice, or a blow-up doll, or a cartoon, than to look *gasp* OLD. They would take rigid, plastic, cold, and lifeless over being even the slightest bit wrinkled, or gray.

To which I say... EW, gross. Aging is beautiful, and embracing your maturity and the years of life that have brought you to this moment is one of the classiest things anyone can do. This philosophy applies to both mental and physical aspects of one's being, as far as I'm concerned.

HOWEVER.

On the very very slight chance that Suzanne Somers is reading this blog right now, and this right here is my one and only shining chance to get my message across in a way that will make sense to a silicone-addled botox junkie, I present the following:


That's Hoggle, best (ok, only) known for his co-starring role alongside David Bowie and Jennifer Connelly in the classic 1986 film Labyrinth. Hoggle is a muppet. Granted, he was never really a looker, but he was a bonafide, dyed-in-the-wool, handcrafted by Henson himself, muppet. Made of foam and fibre, plastic and polyurethane, he never breathed, ate, ran or swam of his own volition. His rubbery skin was not designed to wrinkle (further). His tufty hair would never turn gray and fall out (any more than it already had).

But then someone left him in an unclaimed baggage storage locker for 30 years, and now he looks like this:


Suzanne: Did Death Becomes Her teach you NOTHING??????!?!?!!!!?


*(Sidenote, while googling a picture of Janice, I wasn't too shocked to see that I'm not the first person on the interweb to have made this comparison. Yikes.)

(Side-sidenote, who the hell photoshopped that book cover? It looks like her face is two-dimensional.)

A little nostalgin' never hurt anyone

I wish I wish I hadn't smashed that dish.

I can be uncoordinated and illogical at times, but normally I leave the spectacular displays of klutz-dom* to others. This, however, would be an exception to that rule.

I'm not pleased at all that I smashed this pot lid. It was one of the key players in the sophisticated, mostly improvisational semi-weekly performance I like to call "Makin' Curry". This lid was instrumental in the all-important simmering process, and would encourage my creations to bubble and thicken to a wonderfully delicious consistency, and all without losing any flavour. I can't believe it's gone. I've abstained from making any curries since I broke it... partly out of a weird form of self-punishment, and partly out of respect for the corresponding pot, who is probably only at the "bargaining" part of the five stages of grief right now.

Not to mention, the whole set was a wonderful gift from my wonderful mom, who is probably reading this and shaking her head with amused disapproval (I swear to god I was sober! It just slipped off the counter when I was washing up!).

Anyway - silver lining and all - I'll be damned if that pot didn't splinter into a pretty amazing looking disaster after coming to an abrupt meeting with my kitchen tile. So I took a picture of it.


Call me morbid if you will! I DID IT FOR ART!!!!!!!


*I totally can't stand the word "klutz". I guess it's apropos that the word itself is awkward, unflattering, and impossible to say without feeling like an idiot.