deviantART: by:onyxdemoness

deviantART: by:onyxdemoness http://search.deviantart.com/?q=by:onyxdemoness&section=today deviantART RSS for by:onyxdemoness en-us Copyright 2009, deviantART.com Wed, 16 Dec 2009 05:42:48 PST deviantART.com http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://s.deviantart.com/minish/widgets/apple-touch-icon-precomposed.png Schoolwise http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28965662/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28965662/ Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:39:40 PST a) choosing a poem with room for somewhat significant improvement or
b) helping critique? Because that would be lovely.

ETA: Here's the pieces I can claim from ~thefreewriteproject, since those would obv. be the ones which needed the most editing.
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]

]]> ~onyxdemoness More listage http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28719338/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28719338/ Wed, 02 Dec 2009 21:24:50 PST
- Somehow it turned into midnight on me. I finished watching Glee at ten, decided to enter one of the contests for dA going on now at about ten-thirty, started vectoring then, and now suddenly it's twelve! Ugh. (For those curious - it's for the Love Unites contest, and I'm vectoring a closeup of the hands from keeping the stars apart which I am too lazy to link atm.)

- I'm going to go get my hair did tomorrow after school, so it's no longer this growing-it-out mess. I have a couple of ideas but mostly I'm putting myself entirely in the hands of my hairdresser, which is okay by me. (Side note: the salon is wicked cool. There's a giant Audrey Hepburn print on the wall, they have corrugated metal strategically placed, and they were playing early Green Day when I walked in to set my appointment. My hairdresser has black hair with blue streaks in it; if nothing else, it's going to be awesome going there.)

- I have senioritis in a bad, bad way. It does weird things to my head; for the past week, whenever I have free time in school I'm messing with the exposed parts of people and making funny noises. Of course, this is generally par for the course when I'm in a really weird mood, but for like three days in a row it's kind of weird. I'm not too worried, though, because I am not-so-secretly three inside and I'm just showing it more now.

- Aww, skins are gone now. D: Well, it was fun while it lasted!

]]> ~onyxdemoness A list http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28638607/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28638607/ Sat, 28 Nov 2009 20:32:56 PST
- I feel so terribly old. Did you all know that Powerpuff Girls (the show) is ten years old??!! Also, it's moving to Boomerang instead of Cartoon Network. Beloved shows from my childhood also currently in residence: Courage the Cowardly Dog, Dexter's Lab, Samurai Jack, Teen Titans, Scooby-Doo (the original, not the crappy new one). Side note: where did Billy & Mandy end up? I haven't seen it in forever and I miss it (at least the older eps). Also, I am totally getting up an hour early Monday to watch Captain Planet.

- I have started on a long-cherished dream: having a GIGANTIC PuriPuri cosplay group (all three princesses, Sakamoto Jr., and the student council, to be specific). So far I have two princesses, who have voted me Arisada, which extremely pleases me. Also pleasing: his costume should be easy!

- I have also decided that I've given my hair a long enough time to grow dye-free, and it's time to go make some new stains on my bathroom sink. However, before I do that I would like to get it cut attractively and possibly professionally taken up to a blonder blond than I have now. (I am probably the only person whose hair actually lightens during winter. And it keeps getting redder and redder somehow, too.) It might just be a styling sort of cut or I may have some length taken off of it. You all know what my face looks like; right now I have that godawful "I'm growing my hair out" cut, with bangs halfway down my face and sort of a downward angle towards the back, with the hair in the back a little past my shoulders and the hair on the side a little longer than my chin. Style suggestions?

- I have decided I'm going to be cheap and make mix CDs for Christmas! Raise your hand if you'd like one; I probably can't mail you an actual CD, which is a shame, because the notes in Sharpie are my favorite part, but I can definitely upload it to the internet for you. Speak now and give me a sampling of your musical tastes, so I can prepare.

- Also, I have discovered that I really want nothing for myself for Christmas this year. Money? Maybe some clothes? Best Buddy gets to give me a Dinosaur Comics book because she is Best Buddy, but from everyone else I would be content with weird-ass candycanes (for which I hold an unholy love) or hugs or an hour watching terrible TV together as we make fun of it.

- I have a few poems from class to upload, but right now I'm lazy and I'd rather go watch Samurai Jack.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Happy (early) Turkey Day http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28573817/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28573817/ Wed, 25 Nov 2009 17:41:33 PST

touchfood | newspaper blackout poems | dinosaur comics

to those of you in the U.S. What are your plans? This year, I'm pretty much masterminding Thanksgiving dinner, a long-term goal of mine.

(Seattle plans didn't pan out, fyi, but we'll probably go sometime before I graduate.)

To those of you not, have a good weekend I guess? Sorry for our insular American holidays. (Though I guess for y'all it's the middle of the week...good rest of the week, then.)

(one of these mood-things has to have a turkey, damn it. i've seen it before. oh hey, there is a chicken! close enough.)

]]> ~onyxdemoness Good news :) http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28472154/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28472154/ Fri, 20 Nov 2009 16:17:20 PST

touchfood | newspaper blackout poems | dinosaur comics

I got my computer back, all shiny and fixed, today.

Also, I'm going to Seattle for Thanksgiving. Our flight out leaves at ass-o'clock Tuesday morning and the flight back arrives at oh-dark-thirty on Monday, and it's going to be amazing. I love Seattle so much.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Still testing out that journal layout http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28320357/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28320357/ Thu, 12 Nov 2009 18:45:55 PST

touchfood | newspaper blackout poems | dinosaur comics

I am annoyed that dA won't let me post comments, so I'm going to talk in a journal instead.

First: Mi madre bought me a novel, The Court of The Air, by Stephen Hunt. I'm barely into it, but liking it so far. I shall tell you all if it induces keyboardsmash. Anyway, she bought it because it looked like (and is) a steampunk novel, and I adore steampunk. Would anyone like to rec me some good steampunk fiction? Or even some good pseudoperiod fiction? Victorian/Regency are my favorite eras, and I like snark and silliness and non-obnoxious writing styles.

Sidebar: I've been reading a lot of Southern humor lately too. Fried Green Tomatoes is so far, my favorite. Anyone want to rec me some of that, too? Above pluses still apply.

Second: today I nearly died inside. I saw a commercial for Fantastic Mr. Fox which made me cheer (I love anything and everything Roald Dahl did, I have no clue how I'll recieve the movie) and when they said the name of the author, they then had to explain who that was. I get that it's a movie commercial, and I'm totally overrreacting, but I had to pause the TV and freak out for a little bit. (I am the worst television watcher ever, seriously - more on that in a bit.)

Third: THEY SANG DEFYING GRAVITY _AND_ DANCING WITH MYSELF ON GLEE THIS WEEK WHAT. My life is now completely awesome. Now I just need some My Fair Lady and some David Bowie, since they already did Queen. If there was Rocky Horror involved I just might keel over and die of happiness. Also - how much do I love Kurt and his dad? Because I do. (Is that a cliche, me relating most to the gay kid? I feel like it is.)

Fourth: I completely missed out on Nip/Tuck this season. People who keep up with it (who may watch me; do you exist?) - is this season worth it? I felt last one was pretty lame, so if it's more of the same I'll stick to my Rome DVDs this weekend.

Fifth: I spent a good three hours yesterday watching Ninja Warrior (I have it on demand; it comes on G4 sporadically and I do not have that kind of patience) and that shit is crazy. Also, it is crazy awesome. Some clips, to illustrate my meaning: [link] [link] [link] [link] <--- (I have such a crush on this girl)

Basically, it is this pretty much impossible obstacle challenge, and I get really into it. (By the way, when I say pretty much impossible? I mean there have been 20 competitions, each with 100 competitors to the best of my knowledge, and two people have ever finished it. For the women's one, where that last clip is from, she's the only one to ever finish; she's done it multiple times.) I don't normally like sports, but this makes me jump in my seat and scream "GO, GO, GO!" at the TV. And talk back to the clock. A lot. (Sidebar: I am the worst person ever to watch TV with. I talk at it but I want you to be quiet so I can hear what they're saying if I don't have the CC on. I make rude comments and laugh really loudly and yell a lot. I also tend to make declarations of love and favoritism if there happens to be a reference to something I like in it. So, you know. Take the above with a grain of salt.) If the clips don't rec it to you, well, my testimonial probably won't either. But that's okay. Mostly I wanted to use this excuse to talk about Ayako Miyake, who I want to dom me so bad.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Whee! http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28263678/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28263678/ Tue, 10 Nov 2009 08:19:58 PST

touchfood | newspaper blackout poems | dinosaur comics

Mostly I wanted to try out this whole journal skins thing.

But while I'm at it, have some vid links I posted on eljay a while back.

Levi's recent Go Forth campaign. (I watch, like, zero tv, so I'm not sure how many of you are familiar with this, but I figured I'd post anyway.)

O Pioneers
America

I love these commercials. So, so much. They're like little bits of art.

While I'm at it, some other vids I really like:
The Joker - Coming Undone (The Dark Knight)
Mankind is No Island
Mr. and Mrs. Saxon - Oh! You Pretty Things (Doctor Who)
The World Is Just Awesome

]]> ~onyxdemoness FYI http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28222207/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28222207/ Sun, 08 Nov 2009 16:19:37 PST was going to pick up in the next couple of weeks, I swear) will probably not be all that frequent.

Love to all of y'all!

]]> ~onyxdemoness I. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28166033/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28166033/ Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:27:36 PST
...

I. I don't even know what to say.

Except that I'm for sure taking that desktop screenshot down now.

*headdesk x 1000*

Like, seriously. I don't think there's any way I can apologize enough.

]]> ~onyxdemoness I watched some movies this weekend. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28112363/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28112363/ Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:03:03 PST
One was called The Secret of Kells (as in the Book of) and it was animated, very stylized pretty style. It was produced by like three different European countries that I can't be bothered to look up right now, and it tells the story of the creation of the Book of Kells. Also, it involves fairies (actually, fairy and one dark force, but whatever) and we all know I'm a sucker for those. It's not available in America atm, so like all good things in life if you do not live... in Europe, probably? I don't know - you'll have to torrent it. It is in English, so you won't have to worry about finagling with subtitles.

Unlike this next film, which has been one of my favorites for quite some time. It's a Spanish-language film directed by Pedro Almodovar (there's a diacritical mark somewhere in there, but my computer is unable to produce it) whose films always have some really interesting stuff going on and some really interesting characters. This one, All About My Mother (Todo Sobre mi Madre) is definitely no different. The (very) basic plot is that a single mother's son is killed, and she seeks out the father that he never knew about and she never told to tell him about their son. But it's so much more than that, and I don't know how to say how without spoilers. Suffice it to say that it deals heavily with lesbianism, transvestitism, AIDS, and faith. It won an Oscar about a decade ago for best foreign film. I haven't been able to find it for renting, much to my chagrin, and it's hard to find it to buy from an official trustable source¹ so your best bet is the internet, as I have found out. However, on the 'net you are unlikely to find a copy with subtitles meshed to the vid file, so you're best off getting a program like VLC Media Player which can deal with separate subtitle files and downloading them off a site^{2 3}.

Side note: The Oscar in the same category the next year was for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which I also love insanely. It used to come on cable a lot; I no longer know if this is true. But on Amazon it's like nine bucks, so. (Actually, Amazon is apparently running a promotion of what they say are indie films - but whatever, Gods and Monsters and Girl With a Pearl Earring are both nine bucks too.)

Also, I have spent like the last three hours staring at X Japan pictures. I WOULD GO STRAIGHT FOR THIS ENTIRE BAND, OKAY, but especially Yoshiki. I have a drummer thing, okay, and also an androgyny thing, and search Google books for Gender and Modernity (and add yoshiki and x japan) and you will see how that factors in. (As a side note, how cool is it that there is a book like that [the full title is Gender and Modernity: Perspectives from Asia and the Pacific] which uses rock stars as examples?) Also, I stole a picture from an ebay listing of an X Japan fanzine (at least that's what I think it is) of this lace coat he wore in 1991 during the Jealousy tour I think, and it's saved on my compute as 'my life is over if i do not own this coat.jpg'. Also, musically I love X Japan too, I promise! But my head really hurts right now (I have a sinus infection) and I am not up to KISS-style guitaring⁴.

Also - happy second day of NaNo, all participating!

_{1. You can buy it on Amazon, but for like forty-five bucks if you want a new one and not from Amazon itself.
2. Please, please, please, please, PLEASE check your subtitles before you download them. Most sites will have some sort of way for you to preview them, and if you don't you may end up with some like this, which I believe are the subtitles which played for quite some time at DragonCon a couple years ago for the Death Note Live Action Movie before somebody found some decent ones. Scroll down to about number 48 and you'll see what I mean.
3. Don't get freaked if your movie starts talking but the subtitles do not. As I have discovered, some subtitle files have a blank track. Simply find the menu and go to Track 2, and that should fix it.
4. To illustrate my Yoshiki point: the Celebration PV, which is totally hilarious, by the way. Anyway, the blond biker with sunglasses at 4:30 and the Cinderella stepping out of the carriage 30 seconds later? The same person. The drummer, to be specific.}

]]> ~onyxdemoness Quick update http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28047024/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/28047024/ Fri, 30 Oct 2009 14:10:17 PDT
Got everything on my report card resolved, to my relief. Apparently there were issues on all three sides, as far as communication goes. Of far more importance to me now are my weekend plans. I'm going to go see The White Tie Affair and Stereo Skylines with Aleesa tomorrow, and then after we'll probably go see the Halloween thing down at Three Rivers.

And on Sunday, if madre can't get ahold of her boyfriend or if he turns her down (a HUGE if) I get to go see Leonard Cohen! LEONARD COHEN. Madre won a raffle for two $125 tickets plus a night down at the Sheraton afterwards (she entered cause it was for charity). I am not at all ashamed at saying I really hope he has to do other things.

]]> ~onyxdemoness You'll have to excuse me, guys http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27964107/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27964107/ Sun, 25 Oct 2009 16:41:25 PDT freaking the fuck out right now. If this isn't fixed, my GPA is screwed and I am not getting into college (or if I am I am certainly not getting scholarships). And I do not deserve that.

Okay, so. Story time! My high school has this program called School Within A School, in which there are two different programs in which you focus on either extreme academic achievement (Scholars Academy) or artistic performance (School For The Arts - I'm in it for writing) in addition to your regular high school requirements. Now, I have always had problems with SFA - I wasn't notified that I was even in it until late my freshman year, which means I had a whole year's worth of credits to make up for. I really disliked the teacher who ran it, because she takes on too much and honestly she's way too flighty for all that responsibility. Last year at the end of the year, I attempted to quit because I thought that even though my class load is reduced, I thought senior year would be stressful enough without added school burden. She talked me into not quitting and putting my last two credits, Writer's Workshop (which I would have taken anyway; I've been trying to get into it since freshman year) and SFA Senior Seminar, which was an independent study and consisted (I was told) of simply writing throughout the year and presenting my works in the Senior Showcase at the end of it, and my grade would be based on that.

Senior year comes around and I am unconcerned, until my WW teacher talks about a senior project for SFA with me, which I am utterly unaware of. Fortunately for me, apparently my hours in his class count toward my project hours. He suggests I start keeping a log, which I do, and finding the head teacher to talk to her. For several weeks I attempt to do so, but this teacher is honestly never to be found anywhere. Then my first and second interims come out, and on both of them I have a 100 for the class. So I stop, because I really do have better things to do with my time, and if I have a 100, I can't be missing anything, right? She must do check-ins and things (if she does them at all) later.

WRONG. There's this service by which parents are notified of grades through the internet, frequently before the paper report card is given out. My mom is signed up because my brother needs some extra supervision, which automatically signs her up for me, too. Today she gets an alert that my grade in there is a thirty-three with no explanation and tells me. I, understandably, flip my shit. Then, later today, she finds out that apparently I missed two check-ins, one in September and one in October.

So, let's review. This teacher convinces me not to quit. I get radio silence from her the whole year, even after I do attempt to contact her. Any information I have is given to me by my WW teacher. She enters my grade as a 100 on each interim, so I don't know anything is wrong soon enough to fix it.

AND THEN she drops my grade.

I'm freaked out, and I'm pissed, and report cards come out Tuesday and I really fucking hope grades aren't finalized before then, because I do make an effort and I do try and I do not deserve the nosedive my GPA will take because of this. I pulled it up after I screwed up a class or two my first couple years of high school, and if it goes back down I will scream.

Does anyone else think that this is unreasonable behavior from her? Because I do. I really do.

I'm going to email her or something tonight, ask if we can talk Monday after school or something, because I don't volunteer on Mondays so I can come back. I'll see if my teacher can vouch for me, and I'll bring my log and see what I can do. My mom said she'll take this to the principal if she has to, and I really hope it won't come to that. But I don't think I screwed up here. Not badly enough for a 33, really.

I. I am about to have a panic attack or something over here, for serious. I'm going to go eat some chocolate if I still have some, and listen to my music, and go bury my head in the internet for a while before I even open up my email so I don't spill my crazy all over and so I don't have a heart attack all over the place.

]]> ~onyxdemoness The Bigass Book Review Journal http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27873796/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27873796/ Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:05:30 PDT Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita - and I quite liked it. It is, to quote the back-of-book blurb, a mashup of "magical realism, film noir, hip hop, and chicanismo," and it's written in 49 chapters - 1 chapter for each of 7 characters over 7 days of the week. I thought the story was pretty interesting, even if some of the author's philosophy was a little California for my taste. (I live in South Carolina, you guys. And also I'm a libertarian. We tend to look at California as this distant land with these crazy escapades and by the way, what's with all those natural disasters always on the news?) I do think it is primarily magical realism overall, so if you don't have a taste for the at least slightly fantastical you probably wouldn't enjoy it, and it's a book that you do have to pay attention to, but I'd recommend it.

I finished Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe by Fannie Flagg last night. Mi madre got it for me, because she really likes this book, and I totally loved it too. It's sort of a slice-of-life Southern story in some ways, and it's a very feminist story in others, and some parts of it made me just giggle madly, but it's also a romance. A kind of subtle romance, but it's there. Also, there's a murder in there somewhere, and some (read: a whole hell of a lot) of racial tension. It's kind of a girl's book, in the way Tom Sawyer is a boy's book, and just about all of the main characters are (nominally) female (I don't care what you say about Idgie, she might as well be a boy, they all treat her like one anyway), so I'd keep that in mind, but I liked it. I'm also starting another book by the same author, Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man, and so far that's just plain funny. Fannie Flagg, by the way, writes strong female characters and favors tomboys a lot. It's nice.

Also, I got myself a new copy of Watership Down by Richard Adams, because you would not believe the shape my old one is in. It is my favorite book ever, full stop. I love the way it's written, I love the plot, I love each and every one of the characters. It's about rabbits, but ignore that for a minute. It's an epic adventure story, and it's about a big group of friends and getting through awful things and about something beautiful and about finding a place. I love it so much I wrote my college admissions essay on it. Look, you guys. Watership Down forreals got me into Stanford. (By the by, the edition I picked from Amazon is my old edition. The one I have now I had to pop sixteen bucks for, which made me angry because the last time I had to buy it [yes, boys and girls, I've had to buy multiple copies cause I've worn them all out, it's that good] it was less than seven bucks.) The amazon review I've pulled up says it's been "a staple of high school English classes for years" but it's been read to me in the car on roadtrips for literally longer than I can remember, and I love love love love it. (You can actually read it online, but my google bookmarks are not cooperating right now. Comment if you'd like it.)

Also also. ~livingcomforteagle got me to get The Book Thief by Markus Zusak for my birthday a few years ago, and at the mo I'm holding her copy hostage. It's about a girl who, because her mother is a Communist, gets adopted by this German couple in the Second World War, and eventually they hide a Jew in the basement, and it's all told from the point of view of Death. As you can imagine, this makes it quite interesting, but Mark Gatiss has a very interesting and unusual style (that I have shamelessly cribbed off of previously). I sobbed like a little baby by the time I finished it. It's really beautiful and moving.

I've also been trying to get into comic books for approximately the last year, and aside from Sandman, that just...hasn't really happened. Those of you on here who read comics: For definite I do NOT like superhero comics. I find the plots overdone and I'm not fond of superpowers. Also, most comics have been running for approximately nine thousand years, and so it's hard to get into them. Would anyone like to rec me some of this? I like blood and gore and I could probably stand horror in comic book form. Asskicking is a good thing... ]]> ~onyxdemoness Poetry Out Loud http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27667433/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27667433/ Fri, 09 Oct 2009 12:20:44 PDT [link] - poems are there too!). My high school chooses to participate in it, and for the first time (and also last, probably; consequences of senior year) I'm in an English class that's doing it. And I really want to at least compete in the schoolwide competition, after the classroom one.

So, here are my four choices of poetry (and yes, we have to use poems on the site, not just any poem, though that would be amazing) that I've winnowed it down to, listed in order from most preferred to least. I would like your opinion, deviantart, on which one I should memorize!

Let It Be Forgotten by Sara Teasdale (i like this one because you can do so much with it!)
Her Kind by Anne Sexton (and i love anne sexton. a lot.)
We Wear The Mask by Paul Laurence Dunbar (=yourpleasantdarkness introduced me to this poem. i love it, and it's also pre-20th century, which is important if i advance and need to show range. whatever i pick, if it's not this one this is the second one i'm going to know.)
Litany by Billy Collins (this was suggested to me last year by mr. stevenson, albeit in a v. roundabout way. it's a lot like what i write, but for some reason i'm not as fond of it as the others.)

]]> ~onyxdemoness Guess who http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27617359/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27617359/ Tue, 06 Oct 2009 15:08:08 PDT
ME, BITCHES. HELL. YES.

]]> ~onyxdemoness My life has slowed down again http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27545568/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27545568/ Fri, 02 Oct 2009 18:59:09 PDT lovely feeling. (yes i am ocd and a less than pristine inbox bothers me, hush.)

Hi, deviantART! I missed you all.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Ridiculousness plz? http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27521158/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27521158/ Thu, 01 Oct 2009 20:23:36 PDT
It must be 24 lines or less, at least touch on all major conflicts/plot devices, AND have an aa bb cc (etc.) rhyme scheme. I think it's the stupidest assignment I have ever gotten, especially for what's supposed to be the equivalent of a college class. That is all.

Edit: It physically pains me to write poetry this terrible. See?

_{Once, in a place called the World State,
There was a man named Bernard Marx unhappy with his fate.
He knew the tricks of hypnopaedia and disdained the use of soma
And found no comfort in synthetic music's pleasant aroma.
While other citizens were promiscuous and socialized
Bernard seethed at his stature and proselytized.
He took a woman named Lenina Crowne
To a savage reservation far outside of town.
There they found a woman the Director had left -
Linda and her son were of civilization bereft.
Bernard brought back these specimens
And forced the director into retirement.
With the help of the curiosity of Linda's son, John
Bernard reached social heights from the savage spawn.
John fell in love with Lenina Crowne
And such knowledge made her quite down.
John grew angry, and called her "whore",
But learned his mother was at death's door.
He rushed to the Hospital for the Dying,
And found workers for soma vying.
He threw it all out the window
And earned Bernard a ticket into
Exile on an undeveloped island
Along with propagandaist Helmholtz Watson.}

*hides head in hands*

]]> ~onyxdemoness Full Schedule http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27418452/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27418452/ Fri, 25 Sep 2009 21:34:03 PDT i really want to articulate the way i say that in real life, but it looks stupid typed up.

So! It is Saturday (barely) and I have not keeled over with a heart attack from stress. I consider this a win. (In other words, this is the post in which I whine about the same stuff I've been whining about for this past week irl. But, uh, with some positives too?)

Seeing as it is my senior year, I am involved in an ever-expanding quest to Make My College Applications Look Appealing. My grades are decent (thanks to the GPA-pulling-up of AP English), and my test scores are pretty enough to get me where I want to go. However, I have one extracurricular, not counting SFA (which I will talk about more in a minute) or anime club, in which I didn't really participate, and no work experience. So I'm trying to make up for that with a variety of things - namely, show choir, book club, and volunteering with the elementary school next to my school, since because of early dismissal I get out at right around two.

The problem with this is that because of my participation in a specialized program within the school, School For the Arts, I have not only a senior portfolio to put together, but a senior project I have to do, involving a minimum of 60 hours of work. Thankfully, project proposals and all that are taken care of with my enrollment in Writer's Workshop, which in conjunction with Literary Society, produces the school's lit mag, Pegasus. Writer's Workshop class hours count as working-toward-project hours, and I am Assistant Editor since I'm a senior and familiar with Pegasus. (A friend of mine is the editor, since she is also a senior but has taken the class before.) However, this will definitely involve quite a bit of afterschool work, especially since due to scheduling things by the school the class is only a semester. This effectively means the bulk of spring submissions are on myself and the editor. (This is not even getting into my workload for Anatomy and Physiology and AP English Lit.)

And so lately I have been freaking out, because I couldn't get in touch with anyone who could tell me when I could do volunteer hours and if I could work around this, or what my paperwork for this senior project has to be, when the meetings and things are, etc. Luckily my WW teacher has dealt with this before (the senior project thing) and could give me some basic info. I still haven't been able to get in touch with the teacher in charge of SFA, but I'm emailing her soon (as in, when I finish writing this journal) so I can set up a meeting or something with her. And I've finally gotten this volunteering thing worked out - I start Tuesday. I met the classes I'll be working with today, and they are wonderful and adorable and so, so sweet.

Also, also - I am in Show Choir now! So far it's awesome. Rehearsals are from 6:30 to 8, so soon I'm going to need one of those DMV waiver things, but I'd have to go back to school for them anyway (I don't have 6/7 periods, the last of the day, the reason why I can volunteer) so that doesn't bother me. I've seen the dresses we're going to order, too, and they are adorable. Also, our prez is awesome and I am BFF with the chorus teacher anyway, and we get to do Walking on Broken Glass, which is my favorite Annie Lennox song, like, ever.

And my weekend is totally overscheduled, but based on my performance tonight it's looking like I can overcome this. See, my mom wants me to clean my room (and actually, as of now it's pretty much clean, except for vacuuming, and then I have like three or four more loads of laundry to do and then I'm done) because she's going to have the Salvation Army take away my bed, which has never been properly put together due to missing bolts and not enough ceiling clearance, and then I'm getting a new one. But I also have a fuckton of incomprehensible Anatomy homework, most of which we haven't learned yet, so I'm going to have to bust out the book and do some serious scavenger-hunting. Also, I have to finish something for English, and Saturday is pretty much out for anything time-consuming because I have family in town and we're visiting Saturday afternoon and then eating dinner with them. And then we're filming a Pegasus commercial Monday afternoon and I have to prepare for that and do a print ad mock-up too. But it's looking like, based on today's progress, that I can just do some laundry Saturday before we visit and then do all the hw Sunday while I put finishing touches on the cleaning. Cross your fingers for me.

Um, other than the whining, though, the upshot of this post is pretty much that my life has exploded in busy-ness. It doesn't mean I don't love y'all, though! In fact, I would like to know what is going on in your lives right now.

]]> ~onyxdemoness So I have reached that point http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27379764/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27379764/ Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:30:53 PDT
Star Wars in Concert - I'm a little shaky on the details, but I got an alert in my inbox from the Bi-Lo Center that this is coming, and the trailer makes it look like sophisticated geeky fun.
Makers of Meaning - I

this shirt design. A lot. And I will be very very sad if it runs out of the last pressing before I can scrape ten bucks together, because I know shipping will be at least four bucks.
Seven Deadly Sins - Some sort of sin...combination chart, or something? I dunno, it looks like a Geometry thing and I was always terrible at Geometry. But funny.
Ric Stultz is an artist of some sort, with some mildly bizarre and amusing visions.
Neave.com Lots of fun interactive thingses.
52 Stories A short story a week for a year from Harper Perennial.

And here's where I got bored with coding and wandered off.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Writing-related things http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27326818/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27326818/ Sun, 20 Sep 2009 18:48:37 PDT
I'm taking anatomy this year, and as expected my total obsession with anatomical terms has only become worse. I expect lots of pieces full of them sometime soon.

I'd still like a texting buddy, esp. someone from the lit community, because I tend to send weird texts having to do with writing (or just plain weird texts in general - not all of my brainspam can go on twitter!). As an example, just now I made a friend give me an unusual color and a type of tree. Also, expect at least one PHALANGES PHALANGES PHALANGES text a month. Note me and give me your number if you're interested!

I am still working on this giant pressie thing for ~livingcomforteagle. I'd have to go into my gmail and check to make sure, but I'm pretty sure I have been for almost 6 months. (HOLY SHIT. checking gmail reveals I started writing this in January. My god, you guys, I work slow.) Anyway, I think so far I've done really well as far as attention-whoring - I've only begged for her to stroke my ego. However, I'm ready for it to be done mostly because, as said, I am a big attention whore. But I don't think these two are anywhere near to resolving their issues yet. Possibly because I am nowhere close to resolving my own issues yet.

I have been listening to Abbey Road on repeat for forever. Dear Beatles: Marry me plz? Kthx, your token lesbian spouse.

]]> ~onyxdemoness I r failure at dA-ing lately. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27267204/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27267204/ Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:05:06 PDT a) my phone number
b) my email
OR
c) my AIM.

And we can talk.

]]> ~onyxdemoness We're off to see the wizard... http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27135124/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/27135124/ Thu, 10 Sep 2009 15:30:23 PDT
On a more relevant note, I am writing this journal to tell you all about my weekend! (Yes, I needed this long to recover enough to write a journal entry. It was a tiring weekend, okay.) The weekend in which I skipped school Friday to drive down to Atlanta with six other people for Dragon*Con!

Unfortunately, the God of School Attendance saw fit to punish me, and I woke up Friday with a recurrence of the sinus crap that's been plaguing me on and off for the past few months. (Yes, I took antibiotics, the whole course of them too. My immune system just sucks.) Which meant I spent a good third of my time there asleep, but that was okay, cause I had fun anyway. Just not as much fun as ~delirious-kitten and ~Flamintwilight probably had.

In short: went to lots of panels, bought lots of stuff, escorted little brother and cousin around, laughed at my brother for being slow, had interesting car-convos, and killed my feet. I spent the whole weekend in either my thigh-high Zydrate Anatomy boots or my five-inch peeptoe platform heels. (Sidenote: My thighs? They are beautiful now. Let it never be said that high heels do nothing for you. At least eight hours a day in them for four straight days does a lot.) I also did a lot of bitching other people out, because I am a cranky bastard when I'm sick, but they all forgave me afterwards, so.

Madre got me these awesome steampunk goggles that you can actually go and have your optometrist put your actual prescription lenses in, and also this silk skirt slit up both sides, and a lacy shrug, and a bowler hat! Probably the time this weekend that I don't spend sleeping, I will make somebody take pictures of me in the variations of outfit I wore around involving these things (except for the bit with the stockings, cause those are Ellen's). I bought myself a mermaid necklace, a unicorn shirt, a Sandman shirt (that I happen to be wearing right now), an X Japan poster, a chainlink headdres with hematite beads, and *~*~rainbow dragon wings~*~*. They are amazing and I plan to wear them all the time. You'll probably get pictures of that, too, while I'm wearing my blue tutu and socks. Raver ftw! I also got my mommy some beautiful stuff, and really really wanted to get some anime DVDs, but by the time we'd gotten around to that table I'd spent most of my money already and the Samurai Champloo full-series set was sixty bucks. (There was another one I wanted, but I can't recall it atm.)

I had so much fun, but I think next year I'll take a break from it, simply to spare my pocketbook. Unless I find a job between now and then, in which case, all bets are off.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Art recs help? http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26981536/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26981536/ Wed, 02 Sep 2009 16:40:20 PDT
What are some pieces of writing (or other forms of art, I'm not picky) that deal with labeling and its impact, either positive or negative? Or opinions on labeling? Feel free to rec your own. I'll go ahead and start with my own this is what your eyes should see, because I am an egotistical bastard, yes, and ~ryu-son's Definition; I'm interested in making a news article on the subject and involving features, so any help would be greatly appreciated and also credited in that final news article.

I'm also interested in conducting interviews on the subject of labels and people's personal experience with them (again, either positive or negative) for that same article; if you're interested, or would like to know more, please note me or comment below!

A more personal explanation of the circumstances surrounding this can be found here, since I want to make this an accessible journal without anyone having to wade through my drama.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Irony: http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26939721/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26939721/ Mon, 31 Aug 2009 15:37:53 PDT
Plus, that college is hella expensive, so.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Indie music and terrible movies. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26920871/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26920871/ Sun, 30 Aug 2009 17:16:39 PDT artist.~*~*

But, you know. In a good way.

First, a piece of news that is probably not really news: I love things that are terrible and full of cheese. Like, a lot. See: my addiction to B movies, trashy drugstore romance novels, 80s movies, 80s music, 80s culture in general, and my choice of actual paperback reading material. Some of these I love to laugh at, and some of them I just plain love.

Secondly, another factoid: I have very little tolerance for pretentiousness, in just about everything. I like my life to lean towards the weird. Marylin Monroe once said "It's better to be absolutely ridiculous than absolutely boring," and I agree 150%. (I also really agree with the rest of the quote, but let's not get into that atm.) I'll tolerate it in literature, if it's balanced out by an appropriately good concept, or in music, if it's balanced out by other elements, but, uh, that's just about it. If it's a sendup, then I'll tolerate just about anything, but that's because it's slyly poking fun and that is what I live for. But then, sendups usually migrate from the pretentious into the total cheese relatively quickly, so. So do most ridiculous things that take themselves too seriously. As a general rule, I don't tolerate pretentiousness in my fashion; sometimes I do, if I want to look professional, but, okay. Two items of clothing I have actually worn out in public: my dominatrix boots, and a blue knee-length tutu. And those are two totally different sides of cheese in clothing. This is the reason that I get really tired of most indie music really fast, and why most of the books I purchase are relatively-cheap-for-the-sheer-amount-of-paper fantasy. I simply cannot tolerate too much depth in things, which, yes, is a failing. MY TINY BRAIN CANNOT HANDLE IT, OKAY.

And yes, this was an excuse to talk about myself, but somewhere in there I was going to give you some long rambling stuff about True Blood and link you to my Repo! meta and also to the Bureaucrat Song. And then I was going to talk a lot about Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez and The Lost Boys and They Live, but I think you've had enough of me talking at you for one day, right? Maybe if I could shut up about myself once in a while, it'd help.

But. You should still watch this Futurama clip, because it is awesome: I am Bender, please insert girder.

]]> ~onyxdemoness !!! http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26855410/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26855410/ Thu, 27 Aug 2009 11:51:46 PDT Cirque tickets!!!!!

That is all.

(yes, i am buying them, of course.)

]]> ~onyxdemoness titleless. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26840611/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26840611/ Wed, 26 Aug 2009 16:22:35 PDT
I'm bored! You should call/text me at a number available upon request, because all my stuff is free after seven (it's 7:19 right now as of this moment) and I like connecting with people. Alternately, you should IM me - I'm xxpixii on AIM and Google chat.

Or, y'know, you could just comment right here.

]]> ~onyxdemoness I. You will never believe this. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26821521/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26821521/ Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:12:25 PDT
Like, okay, I was trying to get a jump start, okay! And this particular (local) college didn't accept the Common Application (some bits of which I have yet to fill out) and so I started filling in the form, because I thought I could save and edit it later!

No, apparently I hit the wrong button, which I discovered when I got the call from their admissions office today.

Oops?

]]> ~onyxdemoness I'm underwhelmed. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26714172/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26714172/ Thu, 20 Aug 2009 13:30:55 PDT
Aside from that, I'm really flipping out. I've had sort of a crisis of faith as far as what I want to do with my life, but I've recently decided (special education). Unfortunately, that makes my top choices for colleges so far pretty impractical.

What I have decided:
-I want to live near home but not necessarily at home.
-In-state would be nice. Actually, I'd really like to live thirty minutes tops from my mother's house. I could do an hour, but I don't really want to.
-Though I'd really like to take a year off and catch up with everyone age-wise at college, I really don't think I'll be able to.

So I'm looking for local colleges with good special ed programs. I'm not sure my application will be all that stunning, so I want to be able to apply by early decision dates, but waaaah, I'm not even sure where to apply!

In other, less-whiny news, taking Writer's Workshop is probably the best decision I could have made for this year. I'm really glad I'm in it. Also, I'm mostly done with one of my Amber Sweet costumes for shadowcasting (actually, I'm mostly done with two of them and halfway to a third; the fourth needs the most work) and it is the fugliest thing I have ever laid eyes on. It's awful.

]]> ~onyxdemoness oh darling, where art thou? http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26573480/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26573480/ Thu, 13 Aug 2009 16:33:24 PDT official nicknames? I find it strange indeed.

But that's off topic. I'm going to go visit my grandmother's sister this weekend with her, and we're going to be traveling today and tomorrow. I'll have my computer with me, but no guarantee of an internet connection until Tuesday at least.

While you're pining away for my inestimable presence, console yourselves with the thought that I love you all, and I'll be wrestling with trying to make the girl with morals get to know the autistic girl I've made her fall in love with. (dear ~livingcomforteagle - i hope you know i love you, because i'm guessing at this rate it's not even going to be done by your birthday. miss mackenzie rose does not like me in the slightest; she likes angsting instead.) Yes, there is a story behind this, a big long one that I hope to present to you all within the month, but I'm not making any guarantees, as writing anything beyond five pages is like pulling teeth with me.

]]> ~onyxdemoness I <3 memes. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26440530/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26440530/ Fri, 07 Aug 2009 08:54:55 PDT If you read this, if your eyes are passing over this right now, (even if we don't speak often or ever) please post a comment with a COMPLETELY MADE UP AND FICTIONAL memory of you and me.

It can be anything you want - good or bad - BUT IT HAS TO BE FAKE.

When you're finished, post this little paragraph in your LJ journal and see what your friends come up with.

Posted on both here and eljay.

Come on, tell me your made-up ridiculamus stories about you and me! I want dragons! Unicorns! Mermaids! Mishaps! Concerts! Camping trips! Outrageous behaviour in public for two people not under the influence in some way!

Alternately, we could both sit at home and watch TV, but only if you let me watch Rescue Me or Leverage and also you let me worm into your lap like a cat, because I do that.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Hey, it takes less out of me than Catholicism. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26257583/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26257583/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 15:01:57 PDT

.

_{although you should still go to my last journal and tell me about yourself. i'll write for you!}

Ten things I wish I could say to people:
1. I'm hopelessly, desperately in love with you, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I'd be happy with just that.
2. I think you're making stupid decisions again, but all I'm going to do about it is keep my mouth shut.
3. Honey, you are getting way too wrapped up in this relationship. I just hope it doesn't end up with you getting hurt.
4. I don't hate you, but I'd be perfectly happy if you moved to Rhode Island and I never heard from you again.
5. You, on the other hand, are a manipulative bitch who needs to learn the meaning of 'work ethic'. It might make your insecurities better.
6. I wish you would stop shoving your daddy issues onto me.
7. I feel so, so terrible for you, and I'll come back as often as I can stand it (or swing it, depending on what my future is like) to try and make your life less terrible.
8. I like girls, and I'm tempted to tell you just so I'd never have to see you again.
9. If you make her cry again, I will kick your ass. I don't care how much mass/muscle/age you have on me, I will find a way to make your life miserable. I can be a scary-ass bitch when I want to be, and trust me, there's no quicker way to make me want to than hurting her.
10. I love you, but you've got to accept I'm getting older and more mature sometime.
_{...yes, it's probably easy to guess most of these if you know me; even if you think you know what i'm talking about, please don't assume, and send me a note if you want to talk about it, because i like my secrets to have some degree of anonymity.}

Nine things about myself:
1. In case none of you have guessed by now, I'm pan with a heavy emphasis towards girls; I find boys very nice to look at, but utterly incomprehensible in a relationship context.
2. I'm kind of a slut. And I'm okay with that.
3. I hate kissing, I think it's gross, but if I like you I'll kiss you if you ask me.
4. Sometimes, I really think I'd be happy being a big truck driver.
5. Shoes are my one true vice. I will drop truly ridiculous amounts of money if sufficiently motivated on them.
6. If I go too long without a live concert, I literally start getting withdrawal symptoms.
7. I'm secretly a huge narcissist.
8. I want to be a riot grrrl, who plays the drums and wears G-strings and short skirts and boots with heels I could kill with and has shaved/pink hair and is covered in tattoos. That's my unrealistic dream, and honestly the one I want the most.
9. The one food I will not eat under any conditions is banana. I won't even eat banana bread any more. I think they're disgusting. Funny story: I love banana pudding, but I eat around the bananas. My mom laughs, and asks me why I don't just call it 'vanilla pudding with Nilla wafers'. The answer: banana pudding is shorter.

Eight ways to win my heart:
1. Music! Sing me something, write me something, it's all good. A capella especially.
2. Have an awesome and slightly sick sense of humor.
3. Watch a marathon of gory movies with me.
4. Touch. Cuddle with me, hold my hand, rest your head on my shoulder, let me curl up against you, walk with your arms around my shoulders, whatever. Love=touch to me.
5. Play with my hair or let me play with yours.
6. Be witty. I don't even care if you're intelligent (that sounds bad; saying 'I don't care if you're brick-stupid' doesn't sound much better), you just have to be quick and sharp.
7. Don't be an asshole.
8. I want to be romanced! Give me chocolates, open my door, send me love notes, dance with me! But don't give me roses; I pretty much hate roses except for yellow ones, and I always got those on my birthday from my family, so not really romantic associations there.

Seven things that cross my mind a lot:
1. What the fuck am I even doing?
2. Hey, how bad would x freak if I did y?
3. Where did you get your license, free in your breakfast cereal?
4. What happens when I die?
5. Please, shut your mouth or I am going to hit you. I cannot believe Darwinism has not gotten you yet. Please do not produce any progeny with your obviously inferior genetics.
6. What would happen if...
7. ~onyxdemoness If you are a dreamer, come in. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26176500/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26176500/ Sat, 25 Jul 2009 18:43:25 PDT why yes, i am on a shel silverstein kick lately. when i grow up and own a house of my own, that poem is going on my front door, for serious. eta: lol for me screwing up the title; in my defense, it was from memory, and i haven't read that poem in a while.

Anyway, pretty recently I got this beautiful comment on a recent piece, and it made me think - as a general rule, unless I know you irl or you're a pretty constant presence in my dA life, I don't really know any people on here that comment on my stuff or that watch me, though I'd like to. At the most people are just vaguely familiar, because I'm made of fail like that.

So I'm going to attempt to take a break from my recent bitchery to ask you all to introduce yourselves, whether I know you or not!

Tell me something about yourself you've always wanted someone to know, or something that's just never come up in conversation before, or your favorite word (and why, preferably, though it's not essential). Even if you tell me you like Twilight and think it's an example of good writing, I won't judge, I promise. (I'd offer to tell you something about myself, but I'm pretty sure that just combing through journals and my authorial comments will tell you anything you want to know about me and several things you definitely could have lived without.)

In exchange, since the reward of talking to me (haha yeah right) probably isn't enough motivation, I'll write you something, up to 200 words in length, using either a prompt of your choice or something in your comment that spoke to me; length cap because I tend to write pretty short things. Ask me for a poem or a quick short story or prosetry or even fanfic, because fanfic is easy and I've been known to dabble in it, a lot. You can ask for something else, too, but let it be known that my functionality in crafts other than that of words is pretty limited.

Come! Speak! Introduce! Let me know who you are!

_{If you are a dreamer, come in.
If you are a dreamer, a wisher, a liar
A hope-er, a pray-er, a magic-bean-buyer
If you're a pretender, come sit by my fire
For we have some flax-golden tales to spin.
Come in! Come in!}

]]> ~onyxdemoness Why I've lost all respect for Ellen DeGeneres http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26093573/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/26093573/ Tue, 21 Jul 2009 18:23:28 PDT
I direct your attention to the opening line of this commercial.

Verbatim quote, for those of you who don't like youtube or those of you youtube doesn't like: "Inner beauty is important, but not nearly as important as outer beauty."

I realize some of you may not find this as immediately horrifying as I and my mother both did (for example, my little brother threw up hs hands and heaved a sigh and said "It's just a commercial") and so I will explain, in very small words because I am very angry, why, exactly, this hits my buttons so hard.

Ellen DeGeneres is a lesbian. This is a widely acknowledged fact; she came out some time ago, and is in a steady relationship with Portia Roccanera. She was the first person I ever saw on television who was out and proud, who was that constant media influence saying "Hey, most everybody is straight, but it's okay if you're not!" She's a social icon and a pioneer for acceptance.

What she is saying in this commercial tells me, as a woman, that no matter how smart I am or how hard I work, if I'm not pretty I'm not going to get anywhere in life, effectively setting the feminist movement back several decades. Now, I'd be pretty mad if this came out of the mouth of one of your standard makeup-commercial actresses, but no. Previous to this incident, this was a woman I enjoyed watching on television and actually respected as a person. It's almost like a teacher telling you the same thing. It's the same sort of sentiment that causes women (and men) to starve, purge and exercise themselves to death in the pursuit of the airbrushed media version of beauty. It is the exact opposite of what my mother (and also grandfather), at least, have been telling me since birth: it's what's on the inside that counts. And that horrifies me to my very core. That someone famous would publicly endorse this - take money for this glorified bull to come spewing forth from their mouths - is completely disgusting to me.

Maybe I'm overreacting (though I doubt it). Maybe it's not that big of a deal. Maybe it's due to the fact that yes, I am a girl raised in the South, albeit in a more urban area, and I do know several people who genuinely think that a woman's place is barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. But I don't think so, and based on all the media attention to eating disorders and all the comparisons drawn recently between what you see in photographs and what the cultural image of beauty is, I think that some of the world would agree with me.

I've written a letter to Ellen DeGeneres (or at least filled out the "contact" form on her show's webpage; it's incredibly pared-down, due to character limits - I get wordy when I'm angry) basically summarizing these sentiments, and I just wanted to get this out there, even if the rest of you do just sigh and roll your eyes. Thanks for listening.

]]> ~onyxdemoness My Eternal Love Affair With B-Mod http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25929127/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25929127/ Mon, 13 Jul 2009 20:07:55 PDT
Okay, so for my sixteenth birthday I was promised the tattoo I've wanted for four years, the Chinese symbol for dream-the-verb on the back of my neck. But I've been looking up stuff on the internet, and frankly the amount of room for misinterpretation and just plain error scares me. Unless I get someone who actually reads Chinese, like, natively (no offense to the school system, but I've been through their idea of competently teaching me a language and if I didn't have some honorary family who speak it natively I'd sound like a fricking moron, and that was in a language that uses the same alphabet) there's no guarantee that it'll be exactly what I want it to be, and that shit is permanent.

So I was thinking, what I really want out of that tattoo is a symbol that is widely recognized to mean 'dream' without explicitly writing it out in English. But the only thing I could think of that wasn't foreign language was a dreamcatcher, and while I love them and think they're beautiful, I wouldn't really want one tattooed on me for several reasons: a) I want all my tattoos to be done in straight black ink; colors are beautiful but not for me, not unless I find something really special, and dreamcatchers don't really look good just sketched out; b) My mother has one tattooed already, and I really don't want some cutesy mother-daughter thing; and c) I still want it in the same place and approximately the same size, and personally a dreamcatcher has to be a certain size to look right.

Anyway, my point is: Can any of you think of a symbol (from mythology or pop culture or whatever) that symbolizes 'dream' (preferably the verb, but seeing as it's a symbol and not a complete sentence I'm not picky) or is closely related to it in some way? Something that would look good in just black lines, please, and that can feasibly be shrunk to about three inches on either side.

Thanks so much for help.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Some random stuff + a meme http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25783207/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25783207/ Mon, 06 Jul 2009 20:26:21 PDT
Someone requested one of my proof sheets as a print today, so I put it up, because it doesn't cost me any money afaik. There was a notice about quality control, in which case I'm not sure I'd make the cut, but that's okay. Person-who-requested-the-print: if you're turned down, I'm pretty sure I still have the original proof sheet. I'd be more than willing to send it to you if you pay for the shipping when dA inevitably turns down the print request. It's not huge, but it's a proof sheet. It's not supposed to be. (I still have the original negs, too, which is why I'm willing to give my proof sheet away.)

Oh, the point of this was: if you'd like any of the rest of my photography stuff as prints, I can put them up on dA or if you're willing to cover the cost of mailing it out to you, I have multiple copies of a couple of things and am willing to mail the extra copies off to the first person who asks. (I also have a couple I haven't yet done anything with dA-wise, and I should maybe get on that.) Actually, if you want the original I might make you pay, but I have a copier that prints on photo paper and I also have photo paper, so if you want something, speak up! I'm under no illusions that someone would shell out money for my stuff, but if you want a free copy it's yours.

Also, I'm sorry I've been so weird lately and have been failing with commenting. It's due to a few different factors, the biggest of which is that I'm just in a weird headspace right now. But I'm also trying to get a little more in touch with myself, my beliefs and my lifestyle for the future and all that heavy shit. None of you are probably interested in my giant lesbian freakout (still ongoing, due to factors that I think I've told to one person) and my ongoing battle re: my ethics v. my religous beliefs v. my self-control and biological urges (um, bad as this sounds this last has nothing to do with sex and everything to do with what I eat, I promise) so I'm going to get on with the fun stuffs.

Um, meme tiemz?

LAYER 1: ON THE OUTSIDE.
Name: Emily, but I prefer Em or Emma Claire.
Birth Date: 28th of March.
Hair Color: When it springs from my scalp it's dark brown, but due to excessive sunlight and chlorine exposure, it's fast approaching a dirty strawberry blond.
Righty/Lefty: Righty, but I'm involved in an on-again-off-again effort to teach myself to write with my left hand.

LAYER 2: ON THE INSIDE.
Your fear: Um, I used to be terrified of the dark. Now I'm terrified of being alone.
Your dream of the perfect date: Depends on the person, I guess. Should involve either live music, the ocean, or sunsets, ideally all three.
Goal you'd like to achieve: Saving the world. Hey, if you're going to shoot, aim high.

LAYER 3: YESTERDAY, TODAY, TOMORROW.
Your thoughts first waking up: Which, the first time or the second?
Your best physical feature: My cheekbones.
Your bed time: Wildly varies. Generally whenever my body notifies me I'm sleepy and my brain grudgingly agrees to go along.
Your most missed memory: Oh, we're not even going into that, seriously.

LAYER 4: YOUR PICK.
Pepsi or Coke: Coke. I'm from the region where quite a few people I know refer to every carbonated beverage as Coke, okay, it's inevitable. Also Ellenface would kill me if I said otherwise.
McDonald's or Burger King: Burger King's onion rings are the shit. Also, their burgers come with actual vegetables and look like they at least looked at a real animal once or twice, unlike Mickey Dee's. But I'd still rather go to Wendy's any day. I am addicted to their chicken nuggets.
Single or Group Dates: Both have their merits.
Adidas or Nike: Docs.
Chocolate or Vanilla: Depends on my mood, and also what with. And what kind's available. I'm seriously picky about my chocolate, but I'm definitely not about my vanilla.
Cappuccino or Coffee: Coffee. Somehow my father has gotten me hooked on the really expensive Jamaican shit that you have to fly in or else get at most 10% in another blend, and I drink it with just a splash of milk because doing anything else to it would be criminal. It's beautiful.

LAYER 5: DO YOU.
Cuss: My grandfather was a Marine. Extrapolate from there.
Take showers: Uh-huh.
Have a crush: Oh, lord.
Like(d) school: I kind of liked it, vaguely, when I was younger. Now I just wait for it to end.
Believe in yourself: *waggles hand*
Believe what goes aroun... ]]> ~onyxdemoness Something positive for once! http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25422129/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25422129/ Fri, 19 Jun 2009 18:59:06 PDT mood icon is disinclined to change. actually fairly happy for once, note!

School is out, and I'm trying to get a job. Basically, it sucks.

But! This is not the reason I'm posting this journal. The reason I'm posting this journal is to ramble about twitter, and five people I follow that you should too. If you have a twitter, pretend it's an extended #followfriday.

1. @persiankiwi - Genuine, real-time updates on the #Iranelection.

2. @neilhimself - The twitter of Gaiman. Amusing tweets about bees, ghost dogs, and many other things. Frequently breaks the internet (aka #neilwebfail) and is immediately contrite.

3. @mishacollins - I will admit, I have watched only a little Supernatural, and none of the latest season, which I am given to understand his character appears. This, however, is irrelevant - the man is insane(ly amusing) and his tweets make my day.

4. @qikipedia - Random trivia, for that extra 'WTF?' factor you never knew your life needed more of.

5. @PlayRadioPlay - Dan Hunter and his snobby hipster bitch of a self makes music and amuses us all by posting dog facts and lyrics.

_{don't get what's up with all the wacky lingo and funky symbols? join the #twitterlution with us, and you'll be @replying and hashtagging with the best of them in no time!

_{yes, yes, i know - even though i think i'm clever, i'm really not.}}

Also, I feel the need to let you all know about how much Gabe Saporta owns my life right now, due to this particular paragraph right her. Taken blithely and unashamedly out of context from his blog - if you want it, here it is, but the part that I care about goes:

"the wonderful thing about music in particular, is that itÂs a highly social art form. the audience can participate, and thus they can be in touch with and transfer the same energy that the artist was in touch with. a show is just a transference of energy through music. you give it to the band, the band feels it, the energy grows, and they give it back to you. and THAT is your scene. itÂs not one thing you can point to, but itÂs a network of bands and kids who all feel the same thing, the same energy, the same emotionsÂÂ and itÂs slipping through your fingers."

Also:
"when you make something great, you are just a vessel for it. because great art is never created, it is born. it comes from an energy that already existed before the artist. the artist is fortunate to come in contact with that energy and thus gives birth to it."

]]> ~onyxdemoness somebody hold me, please. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25305604/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25305604/ Sun, 14 Jun 2009 09:13:41 PDT
my mom asked me to say her piece when she did her mother mindreading thing, and she said i'm going to kick myself for not trying it at least next year. but see, the thing is, i've been pretty much resigned to the fact that i'm coming home within the week that i can get all my shit refunded for a week, and the whole thing still makes me so terrified i have to call my best friend and get her to talk me down. and it's not just hormones, like has been suggested to me.

so, um. in conclusion: i am not going to cali this summer, i am staying here and getting a job if i can find one. expect some more weepy posts sometime in the near future as i complain about how my father and the major fight we just had.

]]> ~onyxdemoness A lot about me + a promotional meme http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25279467/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25279467/ Fri, 12 Jun 2009 19:14:59 PDT - Celebrating my release from school!
- Visiting my paternal grandparents in Charleston.
- not!preparing for my Stanford trip (you guys there is NO WAY i can communicate how scared shitless i am of this thing, now that i have A WEEK WTF til cali)
- Being distracted by fandom
- Letting a post (for eljay, probably) about the ethics of women in (especially a sub position in) BDSM relationships and the cultural ethics of such, as it they fit in to the current climate of extreme political correctness, and my personal opinions thereof, percolate in the back of my head.
- Thinking of a way to construct the above thought in ways that are at least slightly comprehensible.

In other news: so this webcomic I just recently discovered while TV Tropes was eating my life is like everything I loved about Cartoon Network in my childhood. (For those of you unaware, that was like six or seven years ago, but still.) Also, I am looking for someone to con these shoes out of, because I love boots with a fervor uncontested, and velvet flocking and Victorian-esque motifs probably own a portion of my soul, what with all the cash I have plunked down over the years on it. Also, because Docs are hella cool and comfortable, for closed-toed shoes, and also last forever. I've had my pink pair for at least two years now, and they're my go-to shoes for concert abuse, and they're not worn out yet. And I go through shoes like. I dunno, is there a shoe-worm that eats them? I go through them like that.

In other other news, apparently I imprinted on the sci-fi shows that I watched with my parents every Saturday night for a long, long time - Stargate SG-1, Star Trek: Enterprise (and sometimes TNG), and Andromeda, if you're wondering. I know this now because my brother watched an Enterprise marathon on Sci-Fi Channel the other day, and I wandered in about midway through (and also at various points throughout the day) and realized that I recognized all the episodes. Despite having not even thought of the show, much less watched it, since I was about seven years old. Also, he's found all of our SG-1 DVDs and is going through them at an incredible rate. While I can have in-depth conversations about the Tok'ra and the Asgard and Danny's ascension now, I quit watching it cause it got stupid at some point and I'm pretty sure he's coming up on that soon. That is a show I have kept up with a little better, but aside from some Season 1 bingeing several months ago with a friend, I haven't really done much with it since Jack became a general. I am extremely proud of myself, and also of the geek indoctrination my brother is going through.

Lastly, now that I am finished with both of those monster paragraphs, I believe I owe a promotional meme to ~Fading-x-Roses. Comment if you want some of this.

WANT SHAMELESS PROMOTION? HERE'S HOW.

1- Be one of the 14 first people commenting on this journal entry, and I will add you to the Promotional List
2- For each of the 14 first people answering this journal I will put his/her avatar and the three deviations I like most from his/her gallery on the list.
3-If you answer, you'll have to do the same on your journal, putting me on the first place, completing this way the list with 15 people.

1. - lovely graphic artist, pieces pieces together in an entirely unexpected way. I love it.
Oh baby, baby | When It Rains | You Are Not Special

2.

3

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15.

]]> ~onyxdemoness HA. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25003635/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/25003635/ Thu, 28 May 2009 18:50:47 PDT
Also, I am officially done with caring about any of my high school classes, except for chemistry, and that because we have a test tomorrow and our exam on Monday and Tuesday. In fact, I barely care about chem. But I'm almost through with this school year, and I am so. RELIEVED.

Tell me what's going on in your lives lately, babyfaces! Inquiring minds want to know. In fact, let's have a meme here that I just made up:

Post one perfect line here. Maybe it's just a turn of phrase you really like, maybe it's a line begging for a poem but you could never think of anything to quite suit its wonders, maybe you just made it up now because the words flow so well into one another, but comment with a line. In return, check back in a few days and pick one line from someone else you really like and write something with it. I'll start.

'trading kisses for causes'

]]> ~onyxdemoness Post of Whining and D:-face http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24704461/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24704461/ Mon, 11 May 2009 14:17:01 PDT corneal abrasion! Isn't that awesome? (Well, yes, actually, as opposed to 'i'm going blind in my left eye from an infection i got from not cleaning my contacts properly', which is what I thought when I got up this morning and because my eye couldn't adjust to the light level in the room, it watered so much I couldn't see out of it when I had it open anyway.) I had to call my mom, out at breakfast, so she could take me to school this morning. (Which I missed today, by the way; when I told her why she needed to drive me, she said 'go back to sleep, I'm calling the doctor.' )

Anyway, went to the doc, got referred to the ophthalmologist, made my mommy hold my hand when they stuck the dye in my eye so they could see what was going on, got some hourly drops and some overnight ointment, and have an appointment tomorrow to see how I'm progressing (i.e. whether they need to write me something so I take Form B of the AP English test instead of taking it Wednesday). Apparently on prom night something got under my contact and scraped my cornea. Which is fun, and I'm really looking forward to the fluorescent lights at school tomorrow. Also all the tiny writing and board-staring-at. (I got an eye patch today, by the way, boys and girls, because it hurt so bad to keep my eye open; this means that I spent the day not quite making it up the curb and thinking doors were closer than they actually were. Results: tragic.) I am actually typing this entry with my left eye closed, since the numbing drops they gave me at the eye doctor's are effectively worn off now. Which means that I'm going to wrap things up and stop bitching pretty soon, as I would rather sleep.

]]> ~onyxdemoness A quick informal poll: http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24641397/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24641397/ Thu, 07 May 2009 19:15:06 PDT
And to make this journal somewhat worthwhile, a mini-feature!

pretty lady by ~OneDeadCop
Going for a ride. by ~coffeexatxmidnight
Broken by ~lawlipoper
tap by ~ecekalabak
Grown by ~weenarwifjam
You are by ~iPawed
Obbsessed With Fences by ~LilahOnTheRoof
Adam and Eve by =mngamojemo
infrared roses by ~august-west1991
If Weeds Could Dream by ~gumfreak

]]> ~onyxdemoness The WIP amnesty post http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24604386/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24604386/ Tue, 05 May 2009 16:03:11 PDT
Okay, no, you don't really have to, I just felt like quoting Shakespeare and he always makes for a dramatic opening. The actual point being:

I feel like I am making significant progress in getting through the piles of deviations and journals that are sitting in my inbox! To celebrate, I figured I'd tell you guys a little about the three big projects I'm working on right now, all ongoing and thankless and laborious tasks that I LOVE SO MUCH, ZOMG. And you can also read what I've got so far in each of them on my eljay, because I am a feedback h0r and it spurs me into progress. I am also deathly afraid that I will never finish any of these and I will be too ashamed of that to let them see the light of day then, so I'm exposing them now because I do want my words to be read. Let's pretend the preceding sentence made any sense at all.

First in priority is this children's book I've been thinking about for a while. I CAN YOU SEE YOU ALL LAUGHING OVER THERE AT THE THOUGHT OF ME AND IMPRESSIONABLE MINDS, OKAY. No, but I love children's literature kind of a lot. And I want to write a very simple children's book, one of those with one or two sentences per page which are illustrated, and I'm hoping I can con ~delirious-kitten into drawing the pretteh pictures for me, but I want it to sort of have a message, too, you know. Like, 'it's okay to be different and yourself!' Only I'm hoping to be a little more subtle about that. And not nearly as hokey.

Rose-Girl

And then there is this thing which, in my head, is titled The Stylistically Improbable Novel. This is an inaccurate title for several reasons (it's not going to be nearly long enough to be an actual novel because I lack that patience, lots of people have probably tried this style, etc.) but it's what it feels like to me, okay, and there's not really much more I can say about it. Except that it's kind of an expansion on the third bit of a conspiracy of the universe, with the girl and her mother and all. (I still love that piece a lot. That one and blank slate.) I just have a little bit of it written (but all of it planned out in my head) because it is such slow going because of the style.

The Stylistically Improbable Novel

And finally, there is my gift for ~livingcomforteagle, because I love her. Though at the rate it's going, it will likely be for her sweet 16. It's also the one on this list most likely to actually be a novel. The file name on my computer is 'this is so twisted.odt', so you know you're getting into some weird territory when I'm freaking myself out. Anyway, it's the romance of a highly autistic girl and a poor Southern girl, set in a rickety old plantation house that stands mostly empty. I kind of love it the most of anything on this list.

For LeeAnn

Hopefully now that my writer's block has fled a little, I can eventually produce something out of these ideas for you all.

]]> ~onyxdemoness dear world: http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24450166/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24450166/ Sun, 26 Apr 2009 17:14:53 PDT
Apparently the universe does not want me to comment or respond to anything. Generally I save all that up for the weekend, so I can take time for proper responses and critique, both of deviations and for journals and comments. But last weekend, the weekend after my triumphant return, I spent down in Georgia looking at a potential future college, so no dice there. This weekend I spent 90% of in bed asleep, as I is a sick puppy.

It's not that I don't love you, it's that time is just running away from me! So if you get a comment or something, like, three weeks late from me, I'm sorry! I will eventually get around to reading and responding to it all.

]]> ~onyxdemoness did you know http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24277669/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24277669/ Thu, 16 Apr 2009 16:48:17 PDT ...on average, you breathe 23,000 times a day?
...the first mention of soap was on Sumerian clay tablets dating about 2,500 BC?
...Duran Duran took their name from a mad scientists in the movie Barbarella?
...when Alexander Graham Bell passed away in 1922, every telephone served by the Bell system in the USA and Canada was silent for one minute?
...the shortest war on record took place in 1896 when Zanzibar surrendered to Britain after 38 minutes?
...one in ten people in the world live on an island?
...the opposite sides of a dice cube always add up to seven?
...Greek philosopher Aristotle wrote Meteorologica in 350 BC yet it remained the standard textbook on weather for 2,000 years?
...the fourth wise monkey is called Shizaru (Do no evil)?

]]> ~onyxdemoness Lucy, I'm home! http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24206936/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/24206936/ Sun, 12 Apr 2009 18:39:16 PDT ETA:
#amazonfail
Amazon Rank
Smart Bitches Trashy Books elaborates
Affected books
Link roundup
IMPORTANT ISSUE PAY ATTENTION PLZ. CLICK THE LINKS AND READ.

So. After approximately three weeks of brain-break from dA, I'm back to gracing you all with my presence once more.

The time away did me some good, took some of the stress away. Other things relieving the stress:
- final word from Stanford on summer program (yes, if I get the paperwork in in time)
- gaining a therapist
- finalizing most of my plans for the immediate future
- feeling like I'm finally actively doing something
- getting my academic shit together
- working some personal shit out in my head
- a week to just be.

I have produced one or two things during the time away, but I don't personally think they're much good. May or may not post them, we'll see.

My backlog of deviations and journals and other assorted messages for three weeks is kind of ridiculously more than I can handle at the mo, so I'm pretty much trashing them all. If there's something you'll absolutely die if I do not see, note me or comment here and I'll get to it, I swear.

In the meantime, I have fourteen more notecards to do before tomorrow, and I need to avoid them for another hour before I actually suck it up and finish (if I do; I'm going to the DMV to test for my license tomorrow morning, so I may be tempted to skip the last few) and avoiding them involves more hardcore timewasting than journaling on dA does. Love ya, bbs. Kisses.

]]> ~onyxdemoness fucking EVERYTHING. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23822074/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23822074/ Sat, 21 Mar 2009 21:32:09 PDT everything is shitty.

you guys, you guys, i love you dearly, just so ya know. i do, really. but for some reason, i am not an okay person in my headspace recently (really, not at ALL okay) and i just don't really want to interact at all.

but yeah, i love y'all. it's just FUCKING EVERYTHING ELSE that i hate.

i hate my hormones.
i hate my school.
i hate my classmates.
i hate people in general.
i hate my state and its stupid fucking governor.
i hate pop culture and the way it glorifies violence, blatantly harmful behavior, and everything shitty that it espouses and tries to insinuate as normal and good and not that big a deal in all our minds.

i hate my culture as a whole, every last decadent consumerist 'me, me, me' self-centered jealous greedy 'more, more, more' 'drill baby drill' 'mine mine mine' grabby fucking scrap of an aspect of it. i hate how we're all so wrapped up in ourselves and our own problems that we cannot even remove our heads from our asses long enough to actually care about what's going on in a place that's not here, and that includes myself.
because lately? i hate myself most of all. hate myself, hate my life, hate how fucking useless i am at everything that really matters. i am a shitty friend, a shitty giver, a jealous person, a self-righteous person, an arrogant and hypocritical person that cannot practice what she preaches. i am a child crying on the inside for attention, validation, and pity. i am a hateful, vitriolic, supremely unhappy being, and i hate the shit out of that. i am needy as all hell. all i have to contribute to anything are my random thoughts, the ones that i think are more important than anyone else's, and the hyped-up elaborate gaudy purple language i spew out of my pores when i get emotional.

fuck this. seriously, fuck everything. fuck the whole goddamn world. it sucks, and some days it makes me want to cry. and those are the days when it doesn't make me want to just lay down and ignore it and go to sleep so i'd never have to pay attention to it again.

jesus christ, i cannot even get to a fucking point lately. which is, essentially: until i'm feeling better, or at least more creative and a little more at peace with myself, i'm going off dA. i will probably post my happy thoughts and shit on twitter, and eljay will still get my pointless ramblings, since all that involves is just my fingers working without the cooperation of my brain. i may still ramble on youtube from time to time (my first yt ramble i finished uploading today, and it's pointless and stupid and i may yank it soon) when i'm feeling halfway decent.

but dA, i feel, deserves something a little better than that. it is a serious artist place and each and every one of you on here deserves my full attention, my serious consideration and thoughtful, constructive criticism of your work. and i cannot give you that if a good seventy-five percent or more of me at all times is screaming away for attention on the inside. it may be an hour when i feel better and i come back on. it may be a week, or a month, or six months, or even a year. but do not doubt that i love you all, that i hope you keep producing lovely, quality works, and that my respect for you as an artist is not at all gone. i just cannot give you all what you deserve at this moment.

and so i bid you adieu. kisses, babyfaces. i love you.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Devious Journal Entry http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23579633/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23579633/ Sat, 07 Mar 2009 18:10:41 PST and screenshot policy still applies. I just have more important things to tell you about.

Like Watchmen. Which is OMFG SO AMAZING AND I LOVED IT SO MUCH. (That's my short, spoiler-free review. On eljay, where we have cut tags to protect the unwary from spoilers, I may go on about its amazingess for quite a bit.) I've never read the comics, but my BFFL, who has, says that surprisingly the movie was not a horrible adaptation like normal.

Also, I may have to turn in my teenager card; due to those of my friends who are licensed not being able to drive after six until tomorrow, and also my own state of licenselessness, me and Ri and Ellenface had to rely on parental transportation. (Mi madre made me drive, actually, through the middle of a busy outdoor shopping center. I hate driving at night.) And mi madre, who was picking us up, didn't want to be out past nine. So we were all home by eight-forty.

Tomorrow it's supposed to be nice and warm, so I'm planning to get up when I get up (probably early-ish, as it's nine and I'm sleepy for once, so as an insomniac I'm going to take advantage of that) and spend the rest of the day that involves sunshine outside, reading. Which reminds me, my darlings - pray for me (or keep me in your thoughts, whatever, pray sounds cooler), for tomorrow I bust out the nail glue to repair my copy of Lord of the Rings and attempt an undertaking which I haven't for at least five years, probably six; reading the thing.

(The nail glue and repairing is incredibly necessary; my mom found my copy a few days ago while looking for stuff to interest my little brother, and I have the edition that came out right around when the movie did, you know, all three books in one plus appendices, with pictures of the actors on back and the movie logo on the front. Anyway, huge bulky book, and in fifth grade I literally sundered the spine in twain; I can make the two halves of the back of the spine touch each other, and the pages are coming loose from their bindings. Honestly, if any book ever really needed a hardback it would be the LotR omnibus, but of course it doesn't get one.)

If my brain melts from too much Tolkien I will either nap in the sun or start rereading Inkheart (maybe this time I will actually get around to Inkspell!); either way I plan to soak up as much sunshine as possible. I missed it.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Nearly 5,000 pageviews http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23560076/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23560076/ Fri, 06 Mar 2009 16:19:09 PST
_{and now for some shameless self-promotion! somehow i ended up writing lyrics for three songs at school today, only one of them sucked. so i busted out my shitty mic and recorded myself screwing around with tunes. the links to them on imeem, along with lyrics, are here if you're interested.

disclaimer: i am a chorus singer. my solo voice is shitty. so is my mic. so are my composition skills. if it sounds incredibly similar to another song, i probably copied it without knowing it. if i did so, PLEASE let me know - i really srsly don't mean to, there's just a lot of music rattling around in my head.}

]]> ~onyxdemoness Dos Cosas http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23183126/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23183126/ Fri, 13 Feb 2009 20:58:03 PST
1. There is a distinct possibility I will be spending 8 weeks of my summer this year in Palo Alto (if I get in to the program, cross your fingers for me!) This means
a) Those of you who live out in Cali: get your butcher knives ready! I'd like to meet y'all.
b) I will likely be freaking the hell out over the next month or so. Please don't be put off.
c) If I do get in, my summer will not be the oasis of productivity you are used to it being; I will have eight weeks of academics instead.

2. Things planning a sixteenth birthday event has taught me:
a) Organization is hard.
b) I am not good with details (this one I knew already).
c) Details are really important to certain aspects (this one I didn't).
d) I can be incredibly self-centered, and also emotionally retarded.
e) I have the best real-life friends EVER.
f) As soon as one piece falls into place, I drop another one.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Impromptu pollish thing! http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23146424/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23146424/ Wed, 11 Feb 2009 20:03:46 PST

And I was going to do this thing with a planetarium, but due to circumstances it turned out to be too much of a pain in the ass. Anyway, so for my birthday I'm going to take a select group of my friends to a Fall Out Boy concert, almost a month after my birthday, but whatever.

Anyway, I was wondering whether I should have a tiny at-home celebration - just cake and presents and a movie thing - on my actual birthday as well as the concert since I'm not going to be able to take all of my friends and also because a month is kind of a long time to wait, even for Fall Out Boy with cheap tickets and Cobra Starship and Metro Station and All Time Low and Hey Monday. And of course the way I resolve all my life decisions is asking the internet!

(While we're on the subject of life decisions, though: advice/opinions/flobatinum on summer college please? Especially those of you who have actually, y'know, been to college. That would be a gigantic help for me; I'm trying to decide yes or no by the end of the week, especially since I know for a fact now it can be paid for.) Looked at pros and cons; decided I want to apply.

]]> ~onyxdemoness let me get the words out before i burst http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23076681/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23076681/ Sun, 08 Feb 2009 07:37:02 PST ottersandsky.

1. Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 18, and find line 4.
"...with the last golden rays of the sun." Not that you can tell in any way, shape, or form from that quote, but it's from The Privilege of the Sword, by Ellen Kushner. It's a great fantasy of manners, and you are all perfectly capable of operating a Google search so I'll stop raving about it.

2. Stretch your left arm out as far as you can. What do you touch?
Either air or my mattress. Red flannel sheets, warm. *snuggles happily

3. What is the last thing you watched on TV?
Bones, the latest episode thereof. It was on our DVR yesterday. (I don't watch a lot of TV.)

4. Without looking, guess what time it is:
Ten-ish?

5. Now look at the clock. What is the actual time?
10:08. I was close! Of course, you must take into consideration that every time I want to do something on the internet (like look up the correct wiki link for Bones, as above) I sort of glance at the clock. So I guess I cheated, but I didn't look at the clock for the question! Normally my time sense sucks.

6. With the exception of the computer, what can you hear?
My mother moving around downstairs. My dogs running around and playfighting.

7. When did you last step outside? What were you doing?
I went to go get the rest of the groceries from the car yesterday around four - we went grocery shopping yesterday and I just took the cold stuff in and put it away before crashing out, because grocery shopping exhausts me anyway but my mother had totally tricked me into it, taking me to the little restaurant next to the grocery store (which was good, by the way) without saying a word until we went to go pay the bill. And food always makes me sleepy. (For an insomniac, I sleep a lot. It's just at unusual times and unusual durations, I guess.)

8. Before you started this survey, what did you look at?
My gmail inbox and my dA inbox.

9. What are you wearing?
HUGE t-shirt. I'm still in bed, fools! I don't have to get dressed yet!

10. Did you dream last night?
Not that I remember.

11. When did you last laugh?
Uh. I can't remember? But that doesn't really mean anything, as I can't remember anything for more than five seconds at a time.

12. What are on the walls of the room you are in?
A mirror, an art I paid for, some Asian wood-screen things, a couple of HUGE fans, my Rocky Horror poster, my Labyrinth poster, and my Dark Crystal Poster. Also there are a billion little things that my aunt brought back from her trip to Japan in the sixties and gave to me to decorate my room with, but it'd take way too long to list them. Normally I'd have my Jack Sparrow poster up too, but the nail fell out of the wall.

13. Seen anything weird lately?
Every damn day, bbs. I live in a nuthouse. A lovable nuthouse, but a nuthouse nonetheless. Mostly 'weird' is normal to me now.

14. What do you think of this quiz?
It's good for wasting some time.

15. What is the last film you saw?
Uh, remember that whole five-second attention span thing? OH WAIT - I remember! Mallrats was on cable and I watched it, because I love Kevin Smith films. But I've been watching Paper Moon in increments with ~delirious-kitten, as she can get away as she's never seen it before, and the latest twenty-minute slice was after that. So either one of those, depending on your reckoning

16. If you became a multi-millionaire overnight, what would you buy?
OH GOOD GOD WHAT WOULDN'T I? I'm so selfish and greedy. Shoes, lots of shoes. And some more clothes, lots of band memorabilia, lots of geeky things, and of course, my baby. (1965 Mustang convertible, black, soft-top, all-leather interior in cream, genuine wood detailing, for those of you who are newly acquainted to me and my dreams. It's my daddy's car, and it was SUPPOSED TO BE MY FIRST CAR

BUT HE'S MAKING EXCUSES SO IT'S NOT, AND ALSO HE DOESN'T LOVE IT LIKE HE SHOULD.)

17. Tell me something about you that I don't know.
Uh. The only stuff that the world-at-large doesn't know is pretty much seriously personal stuff. I doubt there's any real aspect of me that some person, somewhere (and likely more than one) doesn't know. I am not an intensely private person - pretty much the opposite. Maybe the fact that I have a sweet exterior with EXT... ]]> ~onyxdemoness Uh, WHAT THE HELL. http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23055042/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/23055042/ Sat, 07 Feb 2009 06:56:47 PST
]]> ~onyxdemoness happyface! http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22767189/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22767189/ Fri, 23 Jan 2009 18:41:57 PST
[link]
[link]
[link]
[link]
And finally, the big guns: [link] I have yet to find someone whose day cannot be improved by tiny tiny bottlefeeding kitten with adorable tiny meow to match!

]]> ~onyxdemoness WHAT http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22734439/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22734439/ Thu, 22 Jan 2009 13:27:56 PST
_{SO I DON'T TAKE WELL TO CHANGE. THAT DOESN'T MATTER; IT'S STILL WEIRD-LOOKING, LIKE THE FUGLY NEW ELJAY USERPAGES. THANK YOU GREASEMONKEY FOR LETTING ME NEVER HAVE TO SEE THEM AGAIN.}

]]> ~onyxdemoness quick update on the Life of Emily http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22720060/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22720060/ Wed, 21 Jan 2009 18:17:44 PST
Other things: New semester. Have photography course, both digital and b&w film (YAY DARKROOM) which looks to be fun, and chemistry course, which looks to be...not. Dropping down from honors because it was a true-life miracle that I passed Bio last year; my GPA could not handle a repeat. Also have Voice, with =livingcomforteagle, ~Flamintwilight, and my sis ~delirious-kitten. (This last I am especially happy about, as she is graduating this year and I thought we wouldn't have any classes together and I would miss RiRi when she was at college, even if she was right next door still.) Still have AP English and CP History. Have most of my credits now, I'm pretty sure, so my senior year I can get the four required classes I still need (probably just about all the first semester) so last semester I can fuck off.

Uh, still high on cough&cold meds from Monday night (shut up i am ridiculously sensitive to them, okay) so really have nothing more productive to add.

Oh! Except I finally got my hands on Slaughterhouse-Five by Vonnegut and I'm really happy about that as I've been meaning to read it forever. Next on the 'really-i-mean-it' list: The Bell Jar. (tyvm, kristen!) And then, uh, somebody I know, I'm not sure who, has a copy of Invisible Monsters that I'm gonna steal. While I'm at it, anybody else have any book recs - stuff I ABSOLUTELY MUST READ? I'm open to just about anything.

]]> ~onyxdemoness oh good lord this is kind of ridiculous http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22627076/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22627076/ Sat, 17 Jan 2009 05:02:45 PST wide awake, what the fuck. (i've woken up twice before this, so i'm just going to let it go now. i've been sleeping for ten hours, which is a lot more than i can usually manage.) To make up for this ridiculousness, I am posting more ridiculousness, a lot of which may make more sense if you know me IRL. Then again, it may not.

- I dreamed there was this permission slip for school that I needed my mother to sign, for this school trip up to the Arctic for a week, and it cost more than a thousand dollars, and I wasn't quite sure if I wanted to go or not. But then I found out it was only for one night, so I decided I did. And I had to talk my mother into it, including explaining to her that after Ms. Bull (the hosting teacher, btw) had taken some 'mind-expanding' drugs, she wasn't nearly as uptight (in fact she was kinda trippy) and only 103 kids were allowed on the trip, because it was for potential psychics. My mother wasn't sure, so she met with Ms. Bull, and they discussed parkas on sale somewhere for like eight bucks, and around then I woke up the first time.

- Then I dreamed Ellen and I (

) got engaged. That she proposed to me, to be exact. Well, first there was this confusing bit about this girl at school whom I hardly know being over at my house, and some confusion about which pot pie was hers, and once I got it sorted (I thought) it turned out she found a ring in hers, like that classic gold-band diamond engagement ring, one of the kind I really honestly hate IRL and so I don't know why I dreamed of it, it's not classy in the slightest. (Oh wait now I know. It was my mother's ballerina ring, and mi padre got it for her sometime later when he could afford something with a giant rock for her after she lost their engagement ring, and that's the one I always saw on her finger. So there was definitely some class to it, but I still don't like it.) Anyway, so she just laughed and said something along the lines of 'well, now i definitely know this one is yours' and I said something extremely intelligent like 'bzuh?' and Ellen kind of flipped and went to wash the ring off and I passed it off as some garden-variety crazy like the kind that goes on around me all the time, until she came in and presented it to me, and I squealed and accepted, despite the many factors that would have made me refuse IRL (which we won't get into here), and then I put it on the wrong finger. How do I know this? IRL I have this skull ring I wear all the time, but on my right hand, and I remember distinctly putting it on the same finger that was on. Also my dream!mother, when I went to go show her, pointed it out.

- I tried something new to get to sleep last night, which might have influenced The Night of Weird-Ass Yet Relevant to My Life Now dreams. I played subbed anime in the background; don't ask, foreign languages soothe me to sleep.

- Also, the bike at the Y? Left bruises on my ass. I'm not even kidding here.

- Blah blah blah PMS related bitching. Surprisingly, no 'my muscles ache!' bitching, considering I went to the gym yesterday to do exercise stuff for the first time in three months.

]]> ~onyxdemoness a couple of things http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22508477/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22508477/ Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:24:18 PST
1) Words! Give me your favorite words again, and after - say, I dunno, a week - I'll write a piece and try to incorporate as many in there as I can. Give me as many words as you want, and if you'd like a word in a different language, I can probably work with that. You'll have to give me translation and connotation though.

2) I'm looking to publish head in the sand, my prize piece. But I'm aware that I need to do some definite revision for it. Concrit the hell out of it, please. Take your virtual red pen and make giant strike marks through it. I already have some plans, but I figured the more opinions the better.

3) Music! I like music. (I'm also running out of space on my iPod, but that's a moot point.) Rec me some of your favorites; I'm always up for a new band, and there's not a lot of stuff I don't like. I do lean towards the indie scheme of things, but I also adore anything and everything hardcore and also classic rock. They have not invented a metal too heavy for me - all my brother's Dimmu Borgir and Cradle of Filth and Swedish black metal bands with names I cannot pronounce was once the possesion of the angsty-preteen edition of myself. Also, I am particularly interested in who puts on the best live shows.

4) I collect links like a tomboy collects scars. I also have the same unfortunate propensity for showing them off and bragging to my friends.
The Accidental Video Game Porn Archive
Unconventional Book Use
Write Something
How Many TV Shows Can You Name in Two Minutes?
Help I'm Bored

5) Pretteh artses!
[link] [link] [link]
[link] [link] [link]
[link] [link] [link]
[link] [link] [link]
[link] [link] [link]
_{apparently i have to be a subscriber for the pretty previews. POOH, dA. POOH. to make up for this utter lack of consideration for the financially destitute, i've added three more links.}

6) I got featured by =yourpleasantdarkness, because of my mad guessin' skillz. THANK YOU VERY MUCH! ^_^

7) Who here also likes really cracked-out fic? Good! I have links to share with you if you choose!

8) Some weeks I get enough indications in that direction that I genuinely start to believe in my own faint psychic powers. This week has been one of them. Strange things are strange.

9) There was going to be bitching and moaning here, but instead I'll ask: Who can you name that's honestly just plain weird-looking but is still strangely attractive? I'll start: David Bowie. Liv Tyler (because even though she is smokin' I do have to admit she takes after her father). Tim Curry (as Frank-n-Furter). Anyone else?

10) I really wanted to say something else, I know it, and I've been stalling for time since 6, but I cannot remember it and it's driving me CRAZY.

]]> ~onyxdemoness FEATURRRES http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22407806/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22407806/ Mon, 05 Jan 2009 05:00:19 PST

's journal as part of a way to get more art visible on DA. In the same spirit, if you comment on this journal, I'll select and post links to three pieces of your artwork (visual or literal).

_{note: whenever possible (i.e. if i've known someone for a while or watched them for some time, i like to do my features a little more in-depth. this does not mean i love them more, okay; it just means we're a little better acquainted.}

*-

A new artist putting the best foot forward! - [link] [link] [link]

1-

She has a deft hand with words, and she draws, too! *totes envious*
[link] {this here is my favorite piece of hers. i have a copy that i read onto my mp3 player.}
[link] {Your eyes are the color of the sunflowers we had in our yard when I was young. The prettiest ÂweedsÂ IÂve ever seen. enough said.}
[link] {okay - i admit to a weakness for this not just because it was my prize and therefore has COLLARBONES HIPBONES WRISTBONES OMG but also because of the obvious motion in it. plus i love ink drawings.}

2-

Photographer/writer extraordinaire. In all of her work, there are always extremely vivid emotions, and I love that.
[link] {this is a wallpaper? i forgot this is a wallpaper. it's really pretty, i may have to use it. aka: EM IS A SUCKER FOR TEXT ARTS.}
[link] {beautifully expressive. like i said, always with the emotion.}
[link] {honest, and therefore kind of horribly beautiful. but check out her entire gallery - you won't be disappointed.}

3-

Keeps things short, sweet, and utterly lovely. [link] [link] [link]

4-
5-
6-
7-
8-
9-
10-

If this idea appeals to you, please feel free to reciprocate and feature other artists. Together, we'll dig out some pieces of which people can be proud.

]]> ~onyxdemoness Attention anyone with expertise: http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22400301/ http://onyxdemoness.deviantart.com/journal/22400301/ Sun, 04 Jan 2009 17:49:37 PST
]]> ~onyxdemoness