To the woman who called while I was at the Humane Society the other day wanting to know if she could ditch her cat there, at a facility that uses euthanasia, because it was shedding too much and her baby was learning to crawl:
So, you say your cat's shedding IN THE MIDDLE OF SUMMER, eh? Weird
Invest in a BRUSH, for starters, you daft, parasitic freak. Kind of frightening that you're the mother of an infant, yet you can't wrack your brain hard enough to find a way to maintain this animal until you find it a home, a responsibility you took on when you presumably chose to become the owner of a pet. I think it's reprehensible that someone would rather shove their responsibility off onto someone else than live with a minor inconvenience until a living creature was placed safely in a good home where it belongs. The Humane Society is full to the max right now, not only is there no room for new animals, but choosing to abandon an animal there when other options are available, even if it is adopted, puts one more cat at risk for euthanasia. How is it okay to choose convenience over compassion for another creature? So what if you have to spend time maintaining a cat's coat? That is something you should've been doing the entire time anyway. So what if it's a hassle, if you have to make some calls or write some email, vacuum a carpet, use a lint roller- isn't it worth it if you can find your pet a loving home? Would it be so terrible to just do the right thing?
Lately, when people come to me feeling crummy about something they've done and they want me to say it's okay, you had to!--sometimes you HAVE to avoid responsibility/throw someone under the bus/act like an asshole--when they're looking for justification and sympathy, I just can't give it to them. I really don't care. So good luck with your atonement and all.
Things I'm grateful for:
Friends who are around
Chuck fixing my broken machine/giving me photoshop/giving me pizza
Travis
Things I'm excited about:
Samiam in Portland/Block Party/Wicked
A dirty, loud, chaotic night with pretty fireworks and trash blowing softly in the breeze
Letting the Right One in
It's okay, I was still impressed
Driving Lisa Turtle the cat to her new home in Seattle today
I think I'm in love with Victor Mancini. Brutally honest ne'er do wells who scare away the world at large comfort me in a way nothing else could
Sunny Day Real Estate in October and Samiam in August and I'm in heaven
I'm just not feeling too hot- I'm in a self-loathing cycle and I feel like I have no business socializing or trying to grow until I fix what's happening right this second, right here and now
I can't even string a good sentence together
I'm running late and I don't care
Rumors of a creepy and off-kilter version of Alice in Wonderland have been seeping in through the woodwork on and off over the years, and now it's really happening. I'm beyond siked for this. I think this movie will do something amazing for Tim Burton and everyone involved. Behold- the first stills and photos released from Burton's 2010 interpretation of Alice in Wonderland:
http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=56475
I've never seen Twilight but I love Buffy and this is mildly amusing.
Heh heh.
The other day at approximately 3am I was lounging around in my underwear eating an Otter Pop -- my default state as of late -- and watching the Last Unicorn when I started thinking about how much children's movies have changed over the last twenty years. This wasn't the first time I'd considered it...last July I had a brief fling with the Land Before Time and cried my face off from the time Little Foot's mother bit the dust at the jaws of a killer T-Rex until the ending credits rolled. And the other night...well. Maybe it was Mia Farrow's signature melancholy whine, maybe it was that gypsy witch shrieking as the Harpy ate her like a flesh-snack, it could've been the utterance of words like "Damn" and "Hell" in what was thought of as a kid's movie back then, things that would NEVER happen in today's politically correct film industry for tykes. It just made me think- God. They sure don't make movies how they used to. And we were tough little jerks back then.
My parents smoked in the house...as a result I had asthma as a kid which makes me cackle now. Baahaha. And I always reeked like cigarette smoke. I never had a protective sunscreen in the car or a kid leash. I owned a Slip 'n Slide. I played outside. I cruised full speed down our cracked and bumpy sidewalk with no helmet, even crashing into a moving car one time, so afraid my mom would kick my ass for acting like such a little jerk that I went right home and didn't tell her a goddamn thing, just sat on the couch frozen in fear pretending to watch the Rescuers Down Under until the owner of the car came by to let my mom know about the accident that had just occurred. I didn't even CARE about the Rescuers Down Under.
So today I came across this article which made me say, "Hey!" out loud, because it was so similar to what I'd been thinking about lately.
"Kids today are entertained by talking toys, floating houses and adorable robots. What did we get when we were kids? DEATH, that's what.
Sure, "Up"'s widower backstory is a bummer, but it's nothing like the animal brutality of some classic flicks. You could bet if there was an animal involved in a movie, it was going to end up pumped full of lead. "All Dogs Go to Heaven" wasn't just a movie -- it was a rule. If "Air Bud" had come out in 1986, he would be slam-dunking the dirt instead of playing soccer in a straight-to-video sequel."
http://www.lemondrop.com/2009/06/11/the-11-saddest-animal-movie-deaths-of-all-time/?icid=main|aim|dl5|link3|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.lemondrop.com%2F2009%2F06%2F11%2Fthe-11-saddest-animal-movie-deaths-of-all-time%2F
This was so funny I had to include it in a blog. Baahaha, I sweetly recall watching this show on Saturday mornings while Trav whined at me because he wanted to play Turtles in Time and I munched on Trix. My morning is complete.
Also, the Far show was as crucial as I thought it'd be, made
even better by the announcement a week prior that it'd been changed to
a 21+ show. Suck it, kiddies! I saw a couple of old friends on the
floor and it felt awesome. Job's Eyes and What I've Wanted To Say were
my favorites.
Brooke has all the good photos, I only have a couple of camera phone shots. Will post soon.
The other day somebody asked me whether or not I believed in capital punishment.
Sometimes I can't believe that in our modern and supposedly civilized society we still sentence people to death, and the story below is an example of the biggest reason why the capital punishment upsets and unnerves me:
Original article here: http://www.bvblackspin.com/2009/06/06/exonerated-by-dna-evidence-what-happens-now/?icid=main|aim|dl4|link4|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bvblackspin.com%2F2009%2F06%2F06%2Fexonerated-by-dna-evidence-what-happens-now%2F
Exonerated by DNA Evidence: What Happens Now?
Although Halsey had confessed
to the brutal 1985 murders of his live-in girlfriend's 7-year-old
daughter and her 8-year-old son, he maintains that the confession was
coerced. According to the Star-Ledger:
While
"still suffering the effects of alcohol," Halsey was taken to the
Plainfield police station the day after the crime and "questioned
aggressively and in an accusatory manner for the next 12 hours,"
according to his lawsuit. No evidence was found on his clothing, and
Halsey made no admissions, but the following day he was interrogated
for another 12 hours until he signed a detailed confession, the lawsuit
states.The case of Halsey, 48, brings the number of post-conviction DNA exonerations in the United States to 238 since 1989.
Black men make up an overwhelming majority of those who have been freed through DNA evidence, according to the Innocence Project, a nonprofit organization that worked on the Halsey case and provides research and legal help for prisoners seeking to have their cases overturned by DNA evidence.
This year alone, 12 innocent people who were convicted have been exonerated, according to the Innocence Project.
Last month, former Tennessee death row inmate Paul House had all charges dropped in his 1986 murder conviction after DNA tests on key evidence failed to match House.
In upstate New York, Steven Barnes served nearly 20 years in prison for a murder he did not commit. He was freed last month after a DNA examination of the murder victim found evidence from another person.
Once a wrongly convicted prisoner gets through the years of legal appeals and court appearances to unearth the evidence needed to be freed, he often finds getting compensated (if there is any just compensation for losing years of freedom) for the wrongful conviction difficult.
There is no federal standard for compensation, so the wrongly convicted find themselves at the mercy of a patchwork of state laws that determine whether they'll be compensated at all and if so how much.
Halsey is seeking unspecified damages in the suit after serving 22 years. He had faced the death penalty after his conviction in 1985.
After numerous appeals, DNA evidence from the case was released in 2006. It was discovered that DNA taken from the crime scene matched Halsey's neighbor and co-worker Clifton Hall. Hall is scheduled to stand trial for the murders in September.
Meanwhile, Halsey struggles to reintegrate into society. When
arrested, he was 24 years old and held a steady factory job, according
to the Star-Ledger. After his release, an attorney on his case said he
struggled to find work and reconnect with family. He now has a job at
Newark Airport and lives alone.
"He's done everything he can in his power to make the transition, but the littlest things are hard, [his attorney] said. "He is understandably angry."
Until recently I felt kinda scared and obsolete, thinking that nobody out there knew who I was, I mean really. I don't wanna make a scene. I don't wanna cry anymore.
Remember Penny and Johnny in Dirty Dancing? They weren't together, at least they hadn't been since they were kids, but they were best friends and loved each other.
"Who's responsible for this girl?"
"I am."
The past 24 hours have been bittersweet but I will say this:
I feel loved, so fucking LOVED that I could keep breathing for a million years. I feel validated, like hey, I exist after all, And I feel lucky. Even if I feel lonely.
This playlist I made is gonna heal me.
"Lonely girls, lonely girls
Lonely girls, lonely girls
Heavy blankets, heavy blankets, heavy blankets
Cover lonely girls
Sweet sad songs, sweet sad songs, sweet sad songs,
Sung by lonely girls
Pretty hairdos, pretty hairdos, pretty hairdos
Worn by lonely girls
Sparkly rhinestones, sparkly rhinestones, sparkly rhinestones
Shine on lonely girls
I oughta know, I oughta know, I oughta know
About lonely girls"
Years ago I watched a documentary about Daniel Johnston with Jessica. It ranked way up there with some of the best films I've ever seen, it was rad, and not just for a music documentary. One part I never forgot was a family member talking about his mental illness and strange will for tragedy, how his heart was broken but it was almost as if he basked in it, how the only woman he ever loved left him for somebody else and how that person was an undertaker as a profession. This person said that D seemed to love that fact somehow, that the man who took his love away from him was an UNDERTAKER.
Moving on, this is important-- I'm making something, well, writing something rather. And I need some input on a certain subject.
What happens when/after we die?
Please answer this however you see fit, specific ideas and beliefs are preferred over vague notions, please interpret this until you can't recognize it anymore, I want to know the answer to this question.
Godspeed, guys. Let's try and make it through one more day together.



