Land of Oz

Hey everyone! I've always been obsessed with dream worlds and alternate dimensions. Books, movies, shows that take place in our world but slightly different. All of this just gets me so interested.

Recently, I've encountered an entirely new dream world inside our own. At school, we started learning about the light spectrum and wavelengths and I was... I can't even say how much I loved the whole thing.

My teacher gave us these spectrum glasses that look like the old paper 3D glasses and I stepped into my own little land of Oz.

And I adored every minute of it.

Big Break

Hey everybody! I'm baaaaack. I'm in the musical at my school, and rehearsal gets super intense around February so I've had literally no time to do anything. I promise that I'll keep it up starting now.

Anyway, yesterday was my birthday. I'm sixteen!! And I am so grateful for my entire family and all my friends and how great they all make my life. I'm in a bit of a rush, so here are some pictures I'm ucuurently obsessed with:

Princesses in historically accurate costume by Claire Hummel

My personal favorite, Einstein wearing fuzzy slippers:

And my new desktop wallpaper, The Giant Rubber Duck in the Sydney Harbor:

Groundhog Day

Wow, you guys. This is kind of embarrassing. I've been totally offline for weeks and I'm super duper sorry. Now it's time for a catch up.

I've been watching a ton of movies lately on my laptop. That's probably what kept me away from my little corner of the internet here, I always got distracted before I could start to type. Yesterday I watched Shaun of the Dead (hilarious, I'm apparently still in love with British humor) and Orgazmo (also funny, but definitely rated NC-17 or something. The whole thing is about porn).

Recently, I've also seen The Men Who Stare at Goats, Monty Python and the Search for the Holy Grail, Red (Bruce Willis is totally a dream boat, I don't care what anyone says), and Django Unchained, but I saw that one in theaters.  There might be a few more but I cant remember.

I love watching movies. It's not only fun, but it really helped me relax after a long period of stressing over school work and midterms. And it's nice when you can appreciate how beautiful the movies themselves are. When I saw Skyfall, I realized for the first time how freaking gorgeous it was. I mean, look at it. LOOK AT IT

There are a lot of shots where I was just in awe, for the first time, of how the camera moved. I know you can't tell from these pictures, but the light in this movie and the way it was used was phe. nom. in. al. Like, seriously guys. You have to see this movie.

Secondly, Saturday, February 2nd was Groundhog Day in America. Our silly little tradition of turning to a small rodent to predict the next two months of weather. Here's the little guy now, Punxsutawney Phil: 

Well, I was there. My family, another family, and one of my friends drove overnight in a rented, fifteen seat van, to be in Punxsutawney for the unveiling of the groundhog.

And it was COLD.

This is how it all went down: We arrive in the town a little bit after three in the morning, electric signs everywhere screaming at us that it was below ten degrees outside. Around 3:30 we park at the Walmart where you can buy tickets for a shuttle bus that will drive you up the hill to Gobbler's Knob, a little clearing where the actual ceremony takes place. Right before 4 a.m., we all take the bus up to get to the bonfire and hopefully warm up a little, only to find that the bonfire was not just small, but sending up a ton of sparks that burnt holes in a few of our coats.

There were these guys dancing around on stage the entire time, along with a huuuuge crowd of people, and then we found the "Family Section" and found a spot closer to the stage.

To cut a long story short, my group and I spent about four hours standing in 4 degree weather. I couldn't feel my toes, and there was much speculation and joking that my friend would probably never speak to me again.

Thanks to an aggravating trip to the porta-potties, I got separated from my group and spent the last hour of the ordeal in the student section, surrounded by people getting drunk off of alcohol they smuggled in. Well, most of them were already drunk and chanting I'm drunk and I wanna see Phil. One guy demanded to warmers in exchange for letting a group pass to get a better spot to see, and that was pretty hilarious

And to top it off, I never even saw the groundhog because I was stuck behind a tree.

Words cannot express....

I truly apologize if this sound whiny. In all honesty, the experience will seem fun in hindsight. Maybe in twenty years I'll look back on that day with fondness and humor. But for now, I look back on that day and just feel like shaking my fist at the sky.

Well, it's been fun catching up. I prooomise to keep on top of this! Love y'all!

Metamorphosis

I think I've become Angela Chase.

Or at least, I kinda want to be her forever.

I discovered the glory that is My So-Called Life about three months ago when I was on the search for another show I hadn't yet devoured. After looking it up, I found that the entire series was on Hulu. What could be the harm in watching?

Over the course of four days I watched all nineteen hour long episodes and barely ever left my room except for necessities, like school and food.

Within a week of the marathon, I noticed I was starting to talk like her, with lots of um's thrown around, and uh's at the forefront of every sentence. Pretty soon after that, I realized I was starting to become weirdly introspective at inconvenient times, specifically Chemistry class.

Angela's whole shtick is that she's trying to find herself, and understand her mind, while in the process try to make other people make sense. And she's insecure about it, which really helped me fell less like an outcast than I have in the past. As a tv character, she's one of the most flawed I've ever seen, and that makes her more real to me than anything. Angela was a real person and was someone I wanted to be like because as confused as she was, she never really tried to change, or at least not for long.

Since watching the show, I've become more confident and happy. I'm more sure of who I am right now than I ever have been and I think Angela Chase and the entire show helped me more than I can possibly say. They all have problems never fully resolved, and questions that are never fully answered, just like real life, and I've learned to just let them go and deal with myself before I force me on other people.

Honestly, I think of her as a friend. Just another sort of weird fifteen year old girl trying to figure it out, and someone I depend on.

Story Utopia

I've come to you all with a topic near and dear to my heart: books. Now, I know people who wouldn't agree with this description, but books are absolutely the best thing ever. They provide an escape when you need one, and ground you in your humanity when you've been floating for too long.

When I was in second grade I was introduced to my first favorite book, Matilda by Roald Dahl. If you haven't read this, dear god find the closest library. It's about this little girl who's a genius, reads a lot, and is so smart she can move stuff with her mind in order to terrify the dictatorial principal of her elementary school.  Basically, Matilda is the definition of coolness in my younger mind.

Now everyone should know exactly what I'm about to rant on here. Harry Potter. Just the whole thing. I started reading this a bit after Matilda, when I had started my whole obsession with supernatural powers and stuff, and my eyes were opened. I admit, the writing in the first few books is kind of iffy, but everything about the flaws only makes the overall series more perfect.

I openly say that I cried like a baby when I was reading the last book. I also admit that while the burial scene did make me tear a little, I basically thought Dobby was just really annoying a lot of the time. Deal with it. But part of what I find incredible about this series is that this was the first book I read where and entire second universe was opened up to me. The idea that there could be another secret world out there

Seventh grade was the fateful year that I first read this amazing thing here. Its about Craig, who is depressed and suicidal. He checks himself into the emergency room and through a series of misunderstandings, is obliged to spend a few days in the hospital's mental ward. It one of the most wonderful things I've ever read.

Honestly, I don't really know why I like this book. A lot of it is really sad. A lot of the people and characters that you love hate themselves.

I think that what I like is that is isn't trying to spread some deep profound meaning. It's just a guy and how he feels and how he deals with it. The words don't sound pretentious because they aren't trying to sound above anyone. They just are.




I feel a bit distracted by the book that I'm reading right now, so I'll leave you all with a picture of a puppy

Bye!