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Thursday, February 28th, 2002
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4:07 am - piercing woes
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Damnit!
My left tongue piercings has been hurting all evening. I figured that I just tore the tissue from playing with it so much. I went to the mirror to take a look and make sure that it wasn't too red and swollen, and I pulled the bar out a little on each side to see under the bead.
Well, I discovered why it was hurting. About half a centimeter from the bottom ball was a crack that ran almost all the way through the post, so that it was only attached by a tiny piece. It was bent and every time I pulled on the piercings the jagged edges of this break would be dragged through the hole. No wonder it was irritated and sore.
So I took out the barbell and tossed it. This means that tomorrow I have to track down my bag of jewelry, cut a new bar down to size and then thread it. What a pain... PTFE is so hard to thread, even with a metal ball to do it with...
*sigh* I don't need this... I feel all lopsided now. Plus I don't know what I'm going to do if I can't find my bag of jewelry.... it's not like you can really improvise jewelry in a tongue piercing.
current mood:  annoyed
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3:34 am - worn out
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Ugh... I want to write a nice long, deep entry, but even tho I can think of lots of things to write about, as soon as I try and think of what to say about these various subjects I run out of steam after about three sentences... I think I burned myself out for writing tonight, doing up that huge long feedback and critique for Ash... eh, that's what I get for leaving it so long. And I didn't even come close to finishing it... I still have seven more of her images to comment on.
My chest hurts and I'm tired... maybe I'll just go to bed and actually fall asleep at a decent hour tonight.
current mood: in pain
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(1 comment |comment on this)
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2:35 am
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Gah, having a coughing fit on your way to the bathroom when you really, really need to pee is bad. No, no, I did manage to hold it, but damn that was close.
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(comment on this)
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| Wednesday, February 27th, 2002
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4:08 am - Expanding on my previous post.
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In my last post I said I was undecided as to whether I'd share my newly scanned inks with everyone. I think this is because lately I've become rather protective of my art...
I think that this new protectiveness has sort of come from my decision to create a new file naming system and the fact that I've been trying out different colouring methods... it makes me think about how much control I lose over my art as soon as people start downloading it and sharing it with other people. When people I know have my art I know that they're going to respect my wishes (I hope). They're not going to modify it, or change file names or compression or anything like that. But as soon as they start passing it on to other people, particularly in public forums like newsgroups and such, I can't be sure my wishes will be communicated.
The next person who gets a piece of my art may not know anything about me. They might not know that I'm very picky about the way my art is used and distributed. They may not realize that I can't stand to see any of my pieces modified. They may not be aware that it's wrong to copy or edit or use my art on their site without my permission. Or they just may not care.
I guess recent events and my decision to rename all my files has just made me extra aware of this. It's made me really think about the fact that a lot of people may use my art for inspiration or reference and never bother to give credit. Or the fact that someone might decide to crop off my signature and claim that they drew one of y pieces. Or that someone might decide to use my art on their pay site or on a cd that they're selling. I have no way of knowing if this is happening or not and that kind of scares me.
Also, when I do change my file names, all the pics with the old names are still going to be in circulation. Ideally, I'd like for everyone to replace their old files with the new ones when I release them, but I know that that won't happen. As long as people still post Sailormoon hentai I can be guaranteed that there will be some of my old files floating around out there, being distributed by and to people who don't know any better, or just found it to to too much effort to respect my wishes.
I just feel like the more art I put out there for the public consumption, the more I lose control over my creations, and I don't like that. My art is my baby. It's more than that, children grow on their own, but every bit of growth and creation in my art is directly a result of my pouring my love and effort into a piece.
[tangent]
I forget exactly where I meant to tie this in, but I know that it also has a significance in the way I'm feeling right now. To me, inked drawings are the purest for of my art. I don't have too hard a time parting from pieces with original colouring, but I'm very, very attached to my original inks. To me, colouring can always be duplicated, even if the colouring isn't the same both times, it's still the same picture, just different versions. But you can never duplicate an inked picture closely enough so that you could just say that it was two versions of the same picture. Not to me anyway. For me the inked picture is where all my options open up; ink is also very permanent. With pencil, I can change anything I want with a simple eraser, but once the ink is down I'm committed. After inking I can scan that piece as many times as I want. I can colour it one way and if I don't like it, I can change that colouring.
This feeling about inking is why I rarely part with my original pieces, it's why I rarely colour a piece of original line art.
[/tangent]
My new colouring style also makes me feel less in control of my art... I don't have a file naming system in place to properly categorize all the different versions of a pic that I might come up with now, so I've just been naming them whatever. I've done this with so many pics now that it's causing me some anxiety... I don't want all these pics floating around with different filenames and in different sizes.
Also, with my old colouring style I'd work on a pic in a certain size and that would be the distributed size. It had to stay that way because of the coloring style. It couldn't be resized or anything without making it look crappy. With the new blendy one I have too many options for size and compression etc... really, I only want one of each image out there. If I have a certain colourization, I only want it distributed in one size, with one filename and I want it to not change. I don't want high quality and small and different compressions floating around out there... it makes me feel... helpless.
Gah, this has been so rambling, I don't even know the point of it anymore... it's very hard to articulate these feelings of anxiety in relation to my art. It's all so abstract in my head.
current mood: protective
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3:38 am - Scanning binge
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I just finished scanning and cleaning up every finished picture in my sketch book. I'd scanned them all previously, but with my mum's sketchy scanner and the line work was slightly skewed in some places. Also, after that first scan I went and thickened up the outlines of most of the pics so that they're bolder and pop more.
Great as it looks on paper, utilizing all the space on a page in my sketch book makes for some miserable scanning. A kitty girl t-shirt design I did needed to be scanned in three parts because it was both too wide and two long for the scanner. Luckily it's not an overly complex piece, and I got lucky with the angles of the scans, so stitching it together was fairly simple. Well, if you discount the fact that the image I was working with was so big that even at a 256 shade grey scale I'd have to wait about 15 seconds for the picture to reappear every time I moved a piece. I'm amazed that I got anywhere with it. Same for my Holly pic...
So, the list of scanned pics:
- three different rabbit furries
- a hardcore pic of Sailorpluto
- another hardcore of Hotaru
- a yuri picture of Haruka & Michiru
- a fully clothed Holly
- a Hino Rei pinup
- the Divi Kitty t-shirt design
- a Sydney inspired Utena
I'm tempted to start scanning stuff from my folder but it's getting late and I really should sleep. Plus my back is really starting to kill me.
Maybe tomorrow I'll resize all my newly scanned pics and post them somewhere for everyone to see... or maybe not, I haven't decided yet. <--- remind me to expand on this thought in another post.
current mood:  accomplished
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12:56 am - Random stuff...
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[star trek]
I need a tv in my room so that I can watch Star Trek and work on the computer at the same time... Or a computer powerful enough to have Star Trek playing in the background while I work on CGing. No, a tv would be better...
Speaking of Star Trek, I'm all out of books... I've read all of the Star Trek books I own, plus ll of the ones in the library as far as I can recall. On top of that I've read all the other books in my little collection, except for some of the stories in one sci-fi anthology. I'm getting desperate for some new reading material, but I have no money.
[computer]
The lack of reading material has had me working on my art a lot tho... I finished the flats for the Nekonerds group pic, but that's as far as I'm going to be able to get with it on this computer. The working file is now over 26mb. I shudder to think what it will be like after I've added some shading. It currently takes over 30 seconds to just open the file. >_<
I wish this who house thing wasn't so fucked up, or I'd prolly have my money by now. Then I could go out any buy my much needed new computer. I guess I'll see if my dad will lend me the money when I'm down in the states. He said he would before, but he hasn't sent me any, and I don't want to nag too much.
I think I'm going to need to pick up a new scanner too... my current one works fine for scanning in inked drawings, but it's crap when it comes to coloured work. Plus it's soo old and bulky. I think I'm going to get one with an 11x17" scanning bed, so that I don't have to deal with the frustrations of stitching together all of my sketchbook images. Can anyone recommend a good quality one of this size that's also reasonably priced?
[income]
I've been thinking, I won't be able to get a job for another three weeks at least because of my up coming trip. If I did, I'd still be in training when I had to leave, and even if I wasn't I'd never be able to get 11 days off that quickly. But I can't go for another three weeks without any cash at all... I have two credit cards and library fines to pay off. So I'm debating about whether I should start selling more of my art or if I should go sell tickets at the Bal or something.
The art way would be more to my current tastes, but I hate parting with my pieces and I'd have to wait for auctions to close and money to be sent to me. I don't particularly want to so dancing again right now tho. I haven't danced in months, I'm out of shape, and I'm just not in the mood to be ogled by dirty old men. I don't know... I'd rather not, but it's prolly the fastest way to make a decent amount of money quick. If I went just three or four nights I'd prolly be able to make enough to pay off my excessive library fines and make a decent payment on both my credit cards. Get my Visa well below my credit limit at least. ::sigh::
What I'd really like right now is some modeling jobs... I could prolly get some fairly quickly with some more mainstream amateur sites, but I don't want to. They'r not the kind of sites that appeal to me, and I don't want to do anything involving penetration or any guys. Oh well... I do want to do another set for Nakkidnerds soon, but I dun think that it'll happen with in the next week and a half.
[amanda]
I'm getting kind of worried about Amanda. Jasmine hasn't heard from her in a couple of weeks at least, and I think it's been about a month since I've talked to her. She doesn't answer any of her pages and she hasn't bothered calling. I'd be more worried, but this is pretty normal for her, so I guess I'm more annoyed than worried. It bugs me that she can't be bothered to call us back when we're her best friends and we've been there for her for years.
It's not like she doesn't have time, because even when neither of us have heard from her in weeks she'll call up out of the blue and be telling us about all the bars and clubs she's been hanging out at and all the new friends she's made. I dunno, it kind of pisses me off. And it's not like we can call her, because she doesn't have a phone, so after we page her it's up to her to make contact with us.
It seems like she mostly only calls when she wants something now days...
My guess is that she's just been out of town. It bothers me that she doesn't bother telling either of us when she does leave town for work tho. I mean, she doesn't have any family that she tells, so no one but the agency and maybe some of her stripper friends would have any idea where she was going. Jasmine and I have been like her family the last few years... I mean, what if something happened to her? No one would know where she was, no one would be expecting her back and take action if she didn't show up... it worries me. But over that worry I'm mostly annoyed, because I even when nothing is wrong she doesn't bother calling us back or anything.
Another thing that annoys me about this whole thing is that she's supposed to be paying me back all the money she borrowed over the last couple of years... she said she'd pay me back $200 a month and she gave me almost that whole amount for January, but she can't very well pay me back if she never sees me or gets a hold of me. I almost wonder if she's avoiding me sometimes just so she can go out and spend her money on herself instead of taking care of her responsibilities. I know she's done that in the past.
I never know whether she's becoming more responsible or not... I mean, she'll seem to be managing her money really well and be paying all her bills and stuff one month, but then the next she'll go out all the time and get drunk a lot and get her hydro cut off... she's like a pendulum.
::sigh:: I don't know, maybe Jasmine and I should have a talk with her. We're both kind of annoyed and worried about her... Although if she never bothers to call us again it's going to be might hard to do that.
Hoi...
current mood: annoyed
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| Tuesday, February 26th, 2002
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3:32 am - Fucking retardedness
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Sometimes I wonder how people manage to keep their jobs.
There's been some serious problems with the sale of our house. It seems that both our lawyer and real estate agent are complete unethical morons.
The transaction was supposed to have been completed on February 1. We handed the house over to them and the lawyer was supposed to transfer the title of the house to the nw owners and make sure that the money was transferred to us.
Well that never happened. My uncle took the new owners to the house on Feb 1 and gave them the keys. They accepted the house and it all seemed like it was going to be fine. Not so...
About five days later they decided that they didn't want the house anymore. Their flimsy excuse was that there was still some stuff left in the house. Pretty pathetic excuse, considering that they knew this when they looked at the house and accepted the keys on Feb 1. My mum even arranged for someone to pick up the few pieces of furniture still left there.
So they decide that they don't want the house after they've changed the locks, but they still haven't given us the keys or anything. They also haven't paid for the house, even tho the transaction was arranged three months in advance.
Now, you'd think that since we are paying for their services, the lawyer and the real estate agent would be on our side. Ha! I wish... The real estate agent is apparently friends of the buyers, so she's doing everything she can to get them out of the deal. Bitch. And the lawyer has suddenly become belligerent and unscrupulous. He isn't doing anything to get this sorted out. He refused to speak to my grandma and told her to get my uncle to speak with him. When my uncle went to his office he kicked him out without speaking to him. The lawyer also lied and said that the title of the house was transferred on Feb 1, which is was not. And now the asshole expects us to pay him! Right...
Isn't what these people are doing illegal? I mean, there had to be some sort of contract or agreement or something right? If you agree to buy a house aren't you bound by that agreement, especially if you change your mind after the date you were supposed to pay for it?
Isn't it illegal for the lawyer to lie to my family about who owns the title to the house?
Isn't there something that we can do about this? I'll be incessed if we have to sell the house all over again. It irks me that I went through all that stress and hecticness moving for nothing. It was truly hell for me.
Right now, I really want to make sure that lawyer loses his license to practice, as well as that fucking real estate agent (if they even require a license). And the buyers can burn in hell. I don't need this, my family certainly doesn't need to deal with all this shit. I feel so bad for my grandma and uncle.... they've had to deal with all the mess of this move and now they're getting screwed around. They don't have a car so they have to take the bus all the way out to St Vital to see the lawyer, and now he's not even helping them. I'm so tempted to go down there and give him a piece of my mind, followed up by a nice hefty lawsuit.
Grr... I can't even remember when I've been this pissed!
Not to mention that I'm supposed to be getting a third of the money from the sale of the house. Who knows when that will happen now? I was kind of counting on that to pay off my credit card and get a new computer. >_<
I feel like punching someone.
current mood: enraged
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2:35 am - Art frusterations.
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I finally got my Nekonerds group pic scanned, but so far working on it has been one major frustrations after another.
It's too big to fit on my scanner properly so I had to scan it in two pieces and stitch it together. I have never had such a hard time doing this with any other pic. I scanned this one eight times I think before I got two pieces that would come even close to matching up...
I guess I'm used to working with pics that have fewer lines that I have to match up, cause no matter how much I fiddled with the angle, no matter where I created the joint I just could not get all of the lines to match up. In the end I decided to just make it as close as possible and then I edited the join line so that the pieces would meet up where accuracy would be the least important. If you could actually see the line where the pieces are joined it'd look all jagged.
After that was done I started working on flats. It was okay at first, but I'm up to about 9 layers of flats and I still have one or two more to add. The working file is already over 21mb, which means that everything is lagged horribly. I'm not a very patient person when it comes to computers, and this is just incredibly infuriating. I'm not going to be able to work on my art on this computer any more... it's just more than I can handle, and if I try for too long I can feel anxiety attacks coming on from getting so frustrated.
I'm also having some concerns about the palette. The colours just seem sort of flat and dull... but I don't want to change any of them, because they're the colours that we would actually wear in real life, and they look good in real life. Maybe I'm just not used to working with colours that aren't extremely bright and vibrant. This pic does seem to call for a more muted palette. I'm not going to worry about the colours too much right at the moment. I often have misgivings about my choice of colours when I'm doing flats, but adding shading usually makes everything better. ^.^
I guess I'm going to have to try and find some time to get onto the computer downstairs to work on this... I hope I can and I hope that it's not too difficult. The mouse down there seriously sucks... I get annoyed with it just browsing. I guess if it gets too frustrating I'll take the tablet down there... tho that's turning into a lot of work. :(
I don't know... all I do know is that I need to take a break from CGing, or I'm going to go nuts. I'm super frustrated with the slowness of this, and even with the tablet in my lap my back and neck are killing me.
current mood: creative
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(1 comment |comment on this)
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| Monday, February 25th, 2002
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3:41 am - Birthdays!
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3:33 am - Aches and pains...
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Ugh, my back has been killing me lately. It's getting to the point where it's as bad as it was before I started acupuncture. I think I should prolly go back and get another couple of sessions of it. I should also go back to my regular doctor and get that prescription for massage therapy reissued. I'm so annoyed that I lost it and then was too lazy to go get it written up again.
I think a lot of it prolly has to do with th fact that I've been doing so much inking and drawing hunched over on the couch. Plus my current computer desk couldn't be helping. There's no slider, so the keyboard and tablet are about four inches higher than is really comfortable. It's okay for short stints at the computer, but I don't do short stints.
I really wish that there were pillows and mattresses that would conform to your body depending on what position you lay in. Idealy, I should have my feet slightly raised and nothing under my head with only a bit of neck supprt when I'm laying on my back, but that totally changes when I roll on my side. I need a fair amount of head and neck support, and a small pad under the curve of my waist to keep my spine straight. Now If there was a bed that actually changed to accomodate this I'd be in heaven...
I do need to do something about this back pain soon tho. I'm back to having a constant painful tightness across my neck and shoulders, and frequent pain in my lower back, alternating between a dull throbbing and sporadic stabbing pains. It's very bad...
I wonder if my back woudl bother me so much in a zero gravity environment... eh not even going to go off on that tangent right now...
current mood:  sore
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(2 comments |comment on this)
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3:21 am - Comments, comments, comments.
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Hoi... I've been trying to reply to all the comment that have piled up, but I'm out of steam... I'll get to them later.
BTW, I think I'm going to turn off anon commenting for a little while at least. So if you want to comment on my journal, make sure you log in <--- Riki!. If you don't have an account and you are a personal friend of mine then let me know. I think I have some spare referal codes laying around... However, if I don't actualy know you, then don't bother asking... you'll just be out of luck, and I guess you'll just have to find someone else to give you a referal code... or better yet, pay for an account.
current mood: drained
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(comment on this)
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3:16 am - Star Trek, Team Canada, art, scanning and misc other stuff
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Today wasn't too bad... There was a Star Trek mini-marathon on TNN which made me very happy. Of course, this meant that I didn't watch the hockey game, but I heard it was excellent and hey we won. I'm just a bit burned out on sports. I never gave a shit about sports or the Olympics before in my life, but this year I actually watched quite a few events and rooted for Team Canada and such. I blame this all on Lee of course. What with watching sports in my presence and telling me interesting stuff about them... I got sucked in.
Anyhoo, I'm very glad we won... I was actually anxious about the outcome of this. And everyone seems to be very excited and happy wit the results. Well except for all you non-Canadians I'm sure.
Anyway, while I was busy watching Star Trek instead of the game I inked up another small batch of pics... maybe I've ben over exaggerating my art woes as of late, cause even tho I feel like I'm doing horrible lately, I was looking through my sketchbook and inking stuff and I realized that I've done quite a lot of pics that I'm very happy with in the last week or so. I think I"ve finished about 15 or so, which definitely isn't too bad. I still feel like I can't draw right at the moment, but I'm not quite so worried.
I really need to go pick up some new pens. Out of the five that I have, only one of them isn't running out of pigment. It's only a 03, which is what I need for most of my inking, but it's a bitch to try and do a bold outline with one of those. I need to pick up a fresh 05 and a 07, plus a bunch of new 03s and a 005 for detail. I wish they weren't so expensive. At $3.50 a pen that adds up pretty quick. But it's worth it... I ruined so many pieces before I discovered these pens... I'd end up with ink that either half erased away with the pencil so it came out all grey and fadey, or ink that bled horrible no matter what paper I used, completely obscuring any details in the pic.
I was looking at my ink work on that Haruka and Michiru pic. I'm extremely happy with the way the roses turned out. I redid all the pencils for them before inking, because they old sketched in roses looked like crap, and I must say, i'm very satisfied with the work I did on them. I've always had trouble with roses, but these look good to me. I really want to colour them, but I'm not going to even try working on this pic till I have a decent computer.
I rearranged my computer desk today... cleaned up the bits of paper and stuff that was scattered all over the tiny bit of free space and I moved my tower over to the other side of my monitor. This is good for a few reasons. I now have a decent amount of space for the tablet, the webcam doesn't face right into the light anymore and I was able to hook up my scanner.
I really, really hate my scanner. It's so finicky and it took three installations of the software for it to start working again. I dunno why it's so troublesome, maybe because it's so ancient. It never, ever works right the first time. I always have to mess with it for an hour before I can get my computer to properly detect it and access it with out an error of some sort. I had a little trick that I always used to use to get the scanner working when I had to reinstall it, but it didn't need a reinstall for such a long time, and then the few times after that it worked alright so I completely forgot my little trick. Well, i'm really glad I was able to remember it cause otherwise I'm sure I'd still be sitting here, fuming and scannerless. For my own reference, to get the scanner to work, I need to go to settings >scanners & cameras, remove the scanner, click cancel, restart the computer and have Windows rebuild the driver database.
Anyway, so I got a fairly recent pic scanned and I'm in the process of colouring it. It's a t-shirt design, conceived by . I had to give up on colouring for the night tho... I'm trying to work on it at 300dpi and at a decent size, but with all the layers I'm using, this means that the working file is over 20mb. Which equals slow, slow slow. I'll resume my work on it when I have more patience. Or maybe I'll take over the computer downstairs for a bit to work on it...
It's so weird... I've almost forgotten how to colour cell style. I mean, I know how to, but I find myself having a hard time figuring out where the edges of the shadows and highlights should fall... it's kind of annoying, cause it used to come so naturally to me. Grr... Oh well, i'll figure it out... I think I'm just going for too much detail and complexity.
I think maybe I'll go to bed now. It'll be nice to get to bed at a decent hour (for me anyway). I wish my bed wasn't covered in paper and other crap... I hate cleaning when I'm tired... ::sigh::
current mood: tired
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(1 comment |comment on this)
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| Saturday, February 23rd, 2002
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10:04 pm - Painting
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Grr... I really wish I coudl have more user icons. I've been experiementing with painting over grainy webcam shots of me and I really like how they're coming out. Like this icon. I want to make them all the photos I've worked on into icons, but I really don't want to get rid of any of the ones I have up right now.
It's a great outlet for my creativity right now, because it's not frusterating at all, and it's making me really examine how light and shadows look on a face, which I know will help me when I star colouring again.
I wish I had canvas and acrylics. This really makes me want to paint with real media.
current mood: artistic
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(2 comments |comment on this)
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6:06 pm - Traveling
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Tickets are confirmed. I'm going to be in the Washington, DC area from March 8 - 19. If anyone on the east coast wants to hang out at that time I'd love it, just email me and we'll make plans.
I don't know if I'll be staying with my dad or at a hotel. I'm leaning toward hotel, cause my dad currently has a one bedroom apartment that's packed full with all the furniture from our old house. So I doubt he'd have room for both my brother and I to sleep there. So if I'm in a hotel, and Carolee or Lux want to come visit, you're welcome to stay with me.
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(8 comments |comment on this)
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3:12 am - Art positive.
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Well, because I can't seem to come up with any good art concepts or really draw worth shit lately, I've been working on inking and fixing up some of my old art.
Tonight I finished inking one of my favourite pieces ever. It took many, many hours to finish, but I'm quite happy with it.
I don't know if anyone rememebrs the piece, but a while back I did a few Haruka and Michiru pencil sketches and posted the prelims. I think that I posted three of them together. One of them was of Haruka and Michiru reclining in a plush bedroom. Lots of pillows and drapes and roses. Haruka's leaning back and feeding Michiru strawberries and chocolate fror a silver tray at her side.
Anyway, I finally finished this piece. I had to fix up bits of their anatomy and almost completely redraw the background, because it was sketched in so vaguely. I almost went mad doing all the detail on the roses and trellis, but it was so worth it.
Once I have a capable computer I'm going to CG this one huge and make poster sized prints of it.
current mood: accomplished
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(3 comments |comment on this)
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3:07 am - Mail
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I thought that I should mention some of the happy mail I've gotten in the last little while.
Today my Xmas present from Widya arrived. Loose socks!! I'm sooo happy. They're super big and baggy and comfy. I wish I could wear them everyday. I <3 loose socks.
I also recieved another package from Postcardx. Interesting little bundle with some little cards, hair elasticls, a couple of bangles and a party flyer.
A while back I reveived another piece of mail from Postcardx. It was a lovely postcard, hand painted in acrylics... all blues, purples, greens and some mustard, with a fine layer of glitter paint over the whole thing.
I also got a Valentine in the mail from Melon, a few days after Valentines Day. A cue, classic Valentine made from construction paper and doilies. Thank you Melon! ::hugs:: Yours was the only Valentine I got this year.
So yeah, thank you, Widya! Thank you, Melon! Thank you, mysterious strangers at Postcardx!
I love getting mail. It always brightens up my day to get a package or a leter that isn't just a bill or a bank statement. ^___^
current mood:  happy
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(3 comments |comment on this)
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| Thursday, February 21st, 2002
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9:30 pm - Projecting inadequacy...
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| Wednesday, February 20th, 2002
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5:56 pm - Dreams of elves and such.
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I don't really remember the first part... just that I was outside this warehouse type building in the summer. We were in a car and were picking up strippers who were hanging around outside the warehouse.
The next part was at the old co-op that I lived in, the one I want to move back to. I was moving back into our old townhouse, but it was different, very subtly. There was a street that ran in front of my front door. There was a row of tall, old oak trees on the boulevard between the street and the houses. There was no front yard to speak of, and it seemed like the back entrance was meant to be the primary one.
It was early spring. There was still some slushy snow on the ground and it was very overcast, almost dark. I was with a bunch of other people and I recall going in through the front door and thinking how everything looked just odd, but still very much the same. I don't know what I did in the house, but I came out again a few minutes later. I got back in the car ad one of the strippers was still there. It was some girl that I really didn't like at all, and the feeling was obviously mutual. She challenged me to a contest of some sort.
We got out of the car and went over to a very big, gnarled tree in front of the house. There was a big space in the trunk and we looked in there for some reason. A few minutes later the dream shifted.
We were now in the world of Chip's Challenge, except that instead of an old skool video game it was a beautiful, fully rendered fantasy world. I was teamed up with an elf and a halfling and I think one other person, and the other girl was working with a creepy old man.
Somehow I entered the game far before the other girl did and I completed half the level before she even appeared. When she finally did show up I was up to a maze like part. It was pretty identical to level 34 in Chip's Challenge. We had a map, so we quickly traversed the path and the code was right in front of us on the map.
I don't remember what the next part was, but after that came the final part of the level. I came to a narrow path between two large boulders. The one on the right was covered in moss and earth and there was a huge willow growing up behind it. There was a human skeleton propped against the rock and next to it there was a little moss covered ledge that had been chipped out of the rock. There were two tiny treasure chests on the ledge and lots of old fashioned iron keys scattered around. I found the key for the first chest on my first try and unlocked it. While I was doing this, the old man had somehow caught up. The girl was no where in sight. The man ran past me and grabbed another key from a little pool of water that was to the left of the chests.
I panicked, because I knew if he unlocked the chest he would win the challenge. He held up the key for me to see and laughed at me. Then in my mind I saw a parchment with a final clue written on it. It said the key I was looking for would still have all it's edges on it or something to that effect. I ran over to the pool and dug around in the pebbles on the bottom and came up with a flat aluminum key, similar to what you might find on a cheap diary lock. Meanwhile the man was struggling with the other key. I pushed him aside and stuck the little flat key in the lock. I turned it and a firey wheel appeared in my vision. Everything else faded into a bright spring green.... I kept turning the key and with every turn something would appear in the wheel and a sprite or a fairy or a goddess would appear above the wheel.
After about twenty turns the vision faded and at the end of the path there was now a cliff covered in bright green new vines. Over the edge of the cliff a pristine waterfall poured. It was one of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen. Where the path ended a rope and board bridge began. It passed under the waterfall.
My companions and I went to cross the bridge. I followed last. The ropes were soft and strong and the boards were a natural green wood. After we passed under the waterfall the cliffs fell back to reveal a crystal clear river. On the other side was a bright lush forest. I knew that one the other side of the bridge was the world of elves.
My companions and I ran across the bridge, even tho it appeared unsteady it didn't feel at all unsafe. About three quarters of the way across we cam to a gap where the boards were missing. At first I thought that it could be no more than two feet but as I came closer the gap seemed to widen to over ten feet. My companions and I crossed by hanging from the ropes meant to be hand holds.
I remember this quite vividly. The rope seemed to have a lot more give than it had before and I was quite nervous about losing my grip, as my upper body strength is pretty non-existant. The bridge was suspended very high above the water, tho my perceptions kept changing.
I got about half way across when I woke up.
This last part has to be one of the most beautiful dreams I've ever had. The colours and the smells and sounds were just so bright and beautiful, almost artificially so, but I knew it was all natural. All my senses were heightened and the world had a magical glow to it.
I really wish that my painting skills were better, because the scenes from my dream deserve to be immortalized. I wish I could share them with everyone.
current mood: whimsical
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2:11 am - New icon
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Mmm, new user pic. I really wish that I could have more than ten. I love making new icons, but I hate getting rid of my current ones. I don't see why you can create your own set of user pics on a separate server, the same way you can with mood themes... ::pouts::
current mood: artistic
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| Tuesday, February 19th, 2002
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7:29 pm - Stupid cam!!
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Grr... I'm trying to get mt webcam set up again, and I'm getting so frusterated. ChillCAM is pissing me off to no end, but I have no idea how to fix it.
The preview displays properly, but when I capture all that gets saved is grey, shawowy grid, instead of what appeared in the preview window. I've tried all the versions available on the ChillCAM page and I get the same results with all of them.
Anyone have any ideas?
current mood: annoyed
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| Monday, February 18th, 2002
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2:27 pm - :(
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::sigh::
I've been really worried about my dad's health lately. He's been living in Maryland, all alone for the last 6 months. His job has been stressing him out to no end and he's been working every single weekend since he started I think. He doesn't know anyone there, and knowing him, he won't have made time to make any new friends... he's so isolated. On top of this all I'm sure he hasn't been taking care of his health. He never eats right, prolly mainly because of time, and I don't think he's been to see a doctor since before he moved. I know that he's just getting his health insurance sorted out now. It's crazy to me that he left it for so long when he's got a serious medical condition, but that's just the way he does things.
My mum got an email from him the other day saying that he's been feeling more run down and he's been forgetting stuff and other bad signs. I don't know if he's got his insurance in place, but I really think he should go see a doctor regardless, even if he has to pay for the whole thing. I'd rather have him have to shell out a little money than drop dead from brain swelling or have a seizure while he's driving or something horrible like that. I'm not even sure if he's been diligent about keeping up with his medication...
My brother's going to go live with him starting next week, which I think will be really good for them. MY dad will have a family member to live with and they can take care of each other. Plus my brother can make sure he's taking his medicine and eating right. And if anything should happen (god forbid) he'll be there to take care of my dad... get him to a hospital or whatever he needs. So much responsibility for a sixteen year old. ::shakes head::
I just emailed my dad to see if I'd be able to come for a visit at the same time that my brother leaves. That way I can help them get settled in, find a school for Ankar, help them apartment hunt if need be, and stuff like that. I know my dad doesn't have time to do all this himself, and he doesn't need the added stress of having to find time to do this.
I have a bad feeling about all this. I don't think that my dad's health is going to hold out for long. I rather suspect that he'll be back in Winnipeg after not too long. But then, I'd much rather have him here where I can see him regularly and we can take care of him if he deteriorates further. Having a good paying job is nice I'm sure, but not if the stress from it is literally killing you! Plus if he needs to come back he can always get on disability. It's not a lot, but it's enough to live on.
::sigh:: I really hope I can go visit next week. It'll mean putting off job/house hunting for a little while, but I think this is much more important. I really don't know how much longer my dad is going to be around. In August 2000 the doctors told him he had less than a year to live. He's held out well so far, but...
If anyone in the DC area would like to hang out with me and my brother and show us around and stuff that would be very cool.
current mood: worried
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| Sunday, February 17th, 2002
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11:38 pm
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Yay, my mum cut my hair for me tonight. She was just going to trim my bangs, but it turned into a full fledged cut. So now I'm back to my Vulcan-esque hair. I still need to go to professional stylist to get it layered or something... I wasn't sure what I wanted to do with it, so I told my mum to just cut it straight across.
So yay, I don't have to wear a bandanna every day anymore. I was getting sick of being blinded by my own hair.
current mood: well-groomed
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(comment on this)
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10:02 pm - Random stuffes
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Tried to post this last night but it didn't work. :/
Yay, my mum found my resume! So now I don't have to try and remember everything that was on it, cause I never would have been able to. I never would have thought of half the stuff on there.
I also have copies of Ben and Amanda's resumes too, if either of them need it.
So now I just have to re-type mine and find some way of getting out of the house to distribute them. I so badly don't want to have to find a job, but I can't stay unemployed. I need a job so that I can find a place to live, and even if I stayed here, my mum would not tolerate me being unemployed for long. She's already starting to bug me about getting started on my job search. This is kind of a pain, but it's also a good thing, otherwise I'll keep procrastinating.
I also need to find a different adult-ed program and get my stupid high school out of the way. I'm going to call up my brother's school tomorrow and see if they have any space. It's an off-campus alternative program and it's right downtown, so it'd be convenient and I wouldn't have to go all the time. Plus they've been super accomodating for him and he actually likes it there a lot, which is a super good sign.
I've had a headache all day, since I woke up... I think it was from either sleeping too long or from being dehydrated. Prolly a combination of both. It's subsided for the moment, but then, it's been doing that and then flaring up again all day.
I made sushi last night. It turned out pretty nicely. The only problem I had was getting a thin enough layer of rice for the maki. I tried rolling some small ones with half a sheet of nori, but they were always slightly too large to seal up properly. I ended up just making the rest big rolls. I did mostly California, with some plain crab ones for Lee and a few plain cucumber ones. Very yummy, but making sushi leaves such a mess to clean up. I'd rather just go out for it and be able to enjoy the beautiful presentation as well as effort free food.
I'm going to have to go buy more Star Trek books soon. I only have three left that I haven't read... so they'll prolly end up lasting me about a week or so.
l with my banking info so that he can deposit the money...
current mood: tired
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| Thursday, February 14th, 2002
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6:15 pm - My cup floweth over... or something.
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I've been so bursting with creative energy the last few days it's almost getting to the point where it's frusterating, because I don't know what to do with it all. I have all these projects that I want to start, but I either don't have the time or the supplies or the skills... either way, something is lacking.
I've been working on my art... tweaked the inking on my Nekonerds group pic, so that it's much bolder and sharper. I'm much happier with it now. I need to get it scanned and coloured now. I think I may start working on character shots for Nekonerds, or maybe the comic, now that I actually have a style that works for me. Much as I love the old one, 90% of the pictures I started would get scrapped because it was a difficult style to work with. This one, tho more cutesey, is a lot easier. It flows better for me.
I feel like doing some art to sell... I think I'll finish the commission I've had sitting around for ages and get those out this week if possible. I feel awful for sitting on them for so long, but I find it really difficult to force myself to draw specific characters in specific poses. I guess because almost all of my drawings start off as a doodle of eyes, with no planning. That's how I like to work, and I can't do that with most commissions. So untill I've learned to buckle down and just work on a piece, I promised myself I woudln't take any more commissions.
I've been dying to sew something... I really want to make a pair of pants or a hoodie or something. I have all these great clothing designs in my head and on paper, but I don't have the pattern making skills to actually create most of them. Plus I don't have a serger, which is kind of a neccessity. Top that off with no fabric and no place in the house to set up the sewing machine and I'm pretty much out of luck. All I'm left with is this terrible desire to sew and a feeling of impotence.
I want to start a business. I've been thinking about it so much over the last few years. I desperately want to start a clothing company. This is something I need to do, to make me happy. I need to be independant and self-sufficient. I need a career that will let me be creative and do what I love. I need a steady income and a feeling of accomplishment, and I don't think I can get all these working for someone else. Designing clothes is what I really want to do for a living, more so than drawing.
I'd almost rather keep my drawing a hobby, on the side, to keep it pure. I could see myself getting disillusioned as an animator or an illustrator or what have you, and completely stop drawing for pleasure. Being under pressure every day to create art that I don't enjoy would make me bitter I think. If I could find a company to hire me to illustrate covers or do pinups or something that woud be a dream come true, but I doubt it could amount to a career for me.
Back to my business... in addition to creating my own clothing, I'd like to start an import business, mainly for kogal type clothes and possibly school uniforms, which seem to be impossible to find in North America. I don't know how feasible this wouold be, but it's something I really want to look into.
There's so much I want to do right now, but I can't and it's driving me crazy.
I'm going to go draw.
current mood: creative
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| Wednesday, February 13th, 2002
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8:33 pm
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*sigh*
I feel crappy. Very out of touch with my body, like my mind is on another plane and they can't communicate properly. I can't tell if I'm tired or getting sick or just PMSey or what. All I know is that I feel yucky and I don't know what to do about it. I think I might be hungry or something, and I know my back hurts a lot, but other than that...
I think I'll go meditate, get something to eat and have some tea or something.
current mood: crappy
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1:33 pm
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Ugh, stupid cramps... one of the things I hate most about menstrual cramps is that they make the whole lower half of my body hurt. It wouldn't be so bad if the pain was localized in my abdomen, but if I'm crampy I get stabbing pain in my lowerback, which in turn makes my legs hurt. PMS should affect my legs damnit!
current mood: PMSey
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12:41 pm
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Fuck. The hard copies of my resume aren't in the folder I thought they were. Nor are they in any of my other folders that I've looked through.
This in itself would not be a problem if I hadn't forgot to back up my documents folder last time I formatted the harddrive.
Retyping and formatting it would have been simple. Completely redoing my resume will not be so simple. It's been over a year since I applied for a job and hell if I remember all the stuff that was on there. I'm going to have a hell of a time remembering all the dates and duties at my old jobs.... and then having to all phrase it correctly. ::cries:: This sucks so much... I wonder if I even still have a copy at all or if they somehow all got thrown out...
::goes back to searching::
current mood: annoyed
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(3 comments |comment on this)
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2:34 am
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I'm reading Star Trek: The Return... it's a book about reserecting Kirk after he was killed in Generations. Naturally, it was written by William Shatner. I think he's a bit too obsessed with being Kirk. On the plus side, he seems to be a pretty good writer. Unless of course, it was actually written by his co-authors and he just came up with the concept. ::shrugs::
current mood: sleepy
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(3 comments |comment on this)
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2:18 am
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Does any one remember Beep? It was this orange drink that came in a carton... I always used to get it as a kid, but I don't recall seeing it around for quite a while. I doubt that it was particularly wonderful, as its primary ingredients were likely sugar and water, but it's just one of those childhood things that has good memories attached to it...
I wonder if you can still get it.
current mood:  nostalgic
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(5 comments |comment on this)
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1:58 am
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I'm in the mood to sew... I feel like making a huge plush cozy hoodie. Something super warm that I can cuddle up in. Unfortunately, I have no marerial to make a hoodie with, and there's no place to put my sewing machine.
When I get my new place I'm going to set up a sewing corner for myself.
Speaking of getting a new place, I have a resolution for tomorrow. I'm going to get up early, update my resume and go drop it off at a few of the places which I wouldn't mind working at. I can't keep putting it off. I've been unemplued since September I think and I really am dying to have my own house. I should also start looking for a less sketchy adult ed program, but that's slightly less urgent.
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