remembering

It's odd how we take for granted the people in our lives. For example, my dad is the greatest guy ever. He has his faults, and yes they have shaped his choices so that he may not be who he wanted to be, but to me is a very strong man who has taken what he has been given and just tried to survive. I saw Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium and they had some interesting things to say. And 'just' doing something was a no-no. But sometimes all you can do is 'just' survive.

I spent the weekend with my dad. I miss him a lot. I really hope that I am able to get this internship down in FL, cause that would mean i would have this one summer with my dad where we can hang out and do things and learn about each other as adults. It would be wonderful.

I have a long list of things I want to do in my life. Sometimes I wonder if I want to accomplish them just because I want people to see that I've accomplished them. Sometimes I think I want to accomplish them because I want to accomplish them for other people I know who were never able to do so. Sometimes I make up stories about my grandparents to make them sound so much more amazing and worldly and accomplished and more interesting than they ever were in real life. I don't know.

I've settled into this life that I have. But I'm afraid that I will let down those who will come after me. Not that my grandparents ever let me down. More like I'm trying to live up to them? I don't know.

Quote of the Day: "Life's an Opportunity. Rise to it!" Dustin Hoffman as Mr. Magorium

Picture i took recently:

Beauty in the Concrete

feeling good

life is going very well.

I had a meeting with Dr. Lee and it seems I am in a pretty good position to get everything i want out of life. Namely to report/copy-edit for a while then go to college and teach for some more time. It makes me happy. I am sending in my applications for summer internships tomorrow (for the Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville, FL and to the Virginian-Pilot in Norfolk, Va.). Both are a step up from the internship at the Daily Press and are really nice papers. Hopefully one of those will pan out and I will get another experience that will send me off on my way to several years in a good job at a good paper and then to grad school. woooo

Dr. Lee was also very proud of the paper this week (as i was). It was like the papers from last year. Good fairly clean copy and a nice layout. Yay!

Now I just need to get through the rest of this semester. I have some plans for being productive over break too. Hopefully they will pan out.

Winter's Here!:
Quote of the Day:
"Don't erase the part of you that's responsible for your will..." ~ "Time and Time Again" Chronic Future

I just had to post a blog whilst I am still relatively sane and in a fairly giddy mood because of the success of the Captain's Log's layout night (pick up a copy if you are in the area at any time).

WEBSITE:
In my quest for some such item of interest, I found this amusing website that only served to increase my happiness in the entirety of this night:
The Church of Google is a satirical site that seeks to prove the irrationality of religions by putting forth a new one: that of Googlism. The page discusses how Google really is a god (a female one at that) and is the only that has 9 scientifically proven pieces of evidence for that conjecture. It is highly amusing. Enjoy...

QUOTE:
Norman Mailer died last Saturday so I will leave you with a famous quote that sums up life in a nutshell, as he was so fond of doing:
"Every moment of one's existence one is growing into more or retreating into less. One is always living a little more or dying a little bit."

Coldness

It's fairly cold out. That's nice cause I get to break out my nice sweaters, but at the same time, its cold!

Found a really cool website where you can draw your own snowflakes. Its awesome! Try it out.

I want to be a pirate too!:

"Every normal man must be tempted at times to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats." ~~H. L. Mencken

Not doing homework

Break was actually really nice. My boyfriend (Travis) and I went to two movies, The Seeker: The Dark is Rising and Resident Evil: Extinction. Both were really good movies. The Seeker is kind of a kiddie movie but it had amazing cinematography and music. Everyone seemed to find it kind of a predictable but I thought it was the use of symbols, foreshadowing, and music that helped you figure out exactly what was gonna be happening. And let's face it, you feel good about yourself when you are able to guess where a movie is going. I thought the plot was actually very good. Resident Evil is, at its core, supposed to be just a zombie movie. But I've decided I like that franchise (if we leave out the first one) because it is more intelligent than just a horror movie. Plus, Milla Jovovich makes me think of Fifth Element and Oded Fehr (Carlos) is just hot.

I've been thinking lately that I have a lot of trouble remembering happy memories. They seem to just fade away on me and all i'm left with is the depressing ones. And even the simple happy moments that I can always count on (snuggling with Travis) are often clouded with the amount of gloomy thoughts I tend to have during those times. Travis and I have this thing (b/c I am really stupid and way too self-reliant). Whenever he notices that something is wrong he asks me if I'm okay. I always, automatically, say yes. Then he says pinkie swear...meaning that I am not allowed to lie to him in that moment and I HAVE to tell him if something is wrong. If i am really okay, then I pinkie swear that I am and we move on. Usually if something is wrong I smile, shake my head and then he asks me about it and he just waits for me to eventually tell him. Tuesday I pinkie sweared when I shouldn't have. I lied. I was thinking about all the bad memories I have and I was getting down and thinking about all the stuff that is happening now and all the stuff that we'll be facing in the future and I was starting to drop off the edge...and I lied and said I was fine. Which may seem small to many, but since we had this major truth session a year ago I vowed never to lie again. I decided that even if i had no idea why i was feeling bad or sad or depressed, I would at least let him know that was what I was feeling. And this time I didn't. And that is a huge thing. And it is making me worse. And making me less able to focus on all this work I have to do. :-(

I am so thankful, though, that I have him. Because he cares and listens and offers advice to comfort or even just sits there and holds me in my silence, which is comfort enough sometimes.


Website of the week:
This one is interesting, especially to a person that is running out of books written by favorite authors. What Should I Read Next? is a site that takes a list of your recent favorite books and suggests books you should read next (just as the site's title suggests). For example, I put in From the Corner of His Eye by Dean Koontz (one of my all time favorites). It first suggested some other Dean Koontz books (I've read them all so I moved on). Then it listed a few more: Edge of the Moon by Rebecca York (part of a series about paranormal events, which also fits the subject of Koontz's book) and Jupiter's Bones by Faye Killerman (a detective book, it fits)among others. And if you register, you can eventually help them guide their choices and make the searches better (kind of like pandora...but with a little less immediate feedback).

Quote of the week:
Freedom, morality, and the human dignity of the individual consists precisely in this; that he does good not because he is forced to do so, but because he freely conceives it, wants it, and loves it.
-- Mikhail Bakunin, God and the State, from The Columbia Dictionary of Quotations