murder by accident is still murder

This happened to me recently. I'm trying to be more creative, INCLUDING signing up for a DRAWING CLASS, so I thought I'd draw it out for you on MS Paint. Because I'm artsy like that.

I comfort myself with the thought of Spiderman falling off buildings and shooting webs out to catch himself mid-air. SURELY if a man bitten by a spider has that skill, a real spider also does. A long way down = lots of time to shoot out webs.

of all the things that do not belong in my bed

One of the nice things about being a single lady with firm principles is that I get the whole bed to myself. I can flip over, kick the covers off, flip over again, yank the covers back on, punch the pillows, get rid of some pillows, add some pillows, again and again until day breaks without the worry of disturbing anyone. Sometimes, I can read a book literally all night long. LITERALLY. (And you know how I feel about the word literally.) I don't think any of those things can continue to happen if I gain a bedfellow. (Also reason #8 why my dog can't sleep on my bed even though he's a grown-up now.)

So anyway. Here I was, settling in for a night of reading until the wee hours of the morning, When Suddenly. I felt a wee tickle on my thumb and there was a speck in my peripheral vision. I was not immediately alarmed, as I commonly get specks in my peripheral vision, and I proceeded to re-locate the speck so I could follow it out of my line of vision and be done with it, until the next one comes along. (That's how I get rid of them. Floaters, I think is the scientific name?) Scanning to re-locate... scanning...

YOU GUYS. IT WAS NOT A SPECK. IT WAS AN ANT. ON MY THUMB. IN MY BED.

How To Proceed When One Discovers an Insect in One's Bed

Step 1: Immediately vacate said bed. Freak out for a bit. (Quietly, mind you. Be respectful of others in the house.) Turn on light.

Step 2: Shake out hair and clothes, scrub at skin to ensure Insect is not currently residing on one's Person.

Step 3: Silent, hysterical laughter while inspecting ceiling and windowsills for potential Insect Nests whence Insect may have sprung.

Step 4: Proceed to area with a soft space upon which One will spend the remainder of the night. Under no circumstances bring any bedding from original Bed to the new location. Who knows how many Insects are festering therein. Collect assorted pillows, blankets, etc., from elsewhere in house. Fashion a make-shift bed.

Step 5: (Optional) Lifting with One's legs, heave dog kennel (with Dog inside, bewildered) out of original Bedroom and stumble therewith to Temporary new location. Take care to avoid crashing into doorknobs, walls, and such.

Step 6: (Optional) Accidentally awaken One's Mother via Steps 4 and 5. Mother will then tuck One in to make-shift Bed, draw the curtains to block out Ambient light, kiss One upon One's head, and retire to her enviously, fortuitously Insect-Free bed.

Step 7: Sleep fitfully, if at all. All noises will be too loud. All specks, all bits of fluff from blankets etc. will be Insects. All shadows will be Monsters.

Step 8: Upon morning's merciful Arrival, wash everything and then vacuum everything also. Scan with intense precision all corners, crevices, and objects Insects might be inhabiting. Shower, lest the source be some sort of Nest in One's Hair.

Step 9: Take a really long Nap.

houseplants and photo albums are a lot of trouble

Basically I love projects. When I was in school and the teacher was like, "Hey guys here's your new project," I was usually one of the only ones going YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS because projects are one of my favourite things. (As long as I get to do them by myself. Group projects are the worst.) So I found two projects I want to do in my life, which is exciting and I am going to tell you about it, except I'm hesitant about my success because I'm really lazy.

1. THE HAPPINESS PROJECT

A little while ago, as I was driving home from Vancouver with sadness in my heart and rain on the windshield and melancholy songs on the radio all because of a boy who doesn't really matter in the end but I wanted to give you some context and a run-on sentence, I realized that I wasn't really satisfied with my life. I'm tired all the time, I'm lonely, I'm overweight, everything's awful. Luckily, instead of driving my car into the nearest body of water, I thought to myself: so fix it, stupid. Then it was exciting! I made a list of the stuff I didn't like about my life, and then I made a list of all the things I can do to fix them. Then I spent a long time using different coloured sharpies to make a chart of THINGS I WILL DO and how many days a week I will do them. It was bright and amazing.

Then I only crossed like 3 things off the list and it all petered out so that kind of stinks. But then! I got this book from the library called The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, and she was doing EXACTLY what I wanted to do. Which was initially disappointing - if I'd been successful I could've written a book about it and been famous, but instead I failed and am not famous at all - but then was exciting again because she gives lots of good tips and strategies and has a Happiness Toolbox a person can use if they want to start their very own Happiness Project. Which I do!

Anyway, I'll have more to say on that later (just you wait!) but I know you're dying to discover what my other project is, and I want to tell you before this blog post turns into a novel.

2. WARDROBE REHAB

Confession: I'm one of those people who stares despondently at my two (TWO!) closets and whines, "I have nothing to wearrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr." (Important sidenote - one of those closets is dresses and cardigans and pants, and the other one is shirts. They are both small.) The point being, I have lots of wonderful clothes and no outfits. I don't feel stylish and put-together when I am wearing my clothes, and stylish and put-together I long to be. I look at my friends with envy because they are stylish and I feel drab. So I spent a lot of time on the internet at my new job because lots of the time I have nothing to do, and I found tons of websites just for people like me! The trouble is taking the heaps and heaps of advice and boiling it down into something manageable.

I think I have done so, however, and so the first thing I did was buy a wide, black belt. It's pretty awesome. Then I went through my closet and got rid of some stuff. Then I made a list of the things that I should have, that apparently everyone should have, and they are the ONLY things I am allowed to buy. I tell you I am already on my way to being the most stylish person you know.

Anyway. Those are my projects. I will keep you updated as you wait with bated breath for the outcomes.

took the stars from my eyes and then i made a map

So I'm in love with Florence and the Machine, and I think you should be, too. I'm not talking about Ceremonials, which is the new cd that I haven't heard and therefore cannot vouch for; I'm talking about Lungs, which came out a while ago and which I got for Christmas and which I have been listening to obsessively since then.

I love it because she has an amazing voice, and the lyrics are interesting, and there is a heap of instruments that contribute to make a full, complicated sound. There are slow songs for when I'm sad and fast songs for when I'm happy and no bad words. (Not happy songs, though. Once I'd listened enough to sing along to all the songs I realized that the general theme of them all is obsessive, unreciprocated love. Like, super obsessive. Like, wanting to wear his skin like a wedding dress obsessive. The nice thing about that is that it made me feel normal when I was sad about a boy situation. [Hardly a situation; it didn't last very long and I don't even think they were really dates.] Yes, I was sad and I thought about him ALL THE TIME for a bit, but at least I never wanted to wear his flesh as a wedding dress. I think that's important.)

Anyway. Don't let that deter you from listening to it. Here, I made you a playlist. My favourites, if you want to jump right to them because they are fantastically amazing, are Cosmic Love and Blinding. I routinely skip Kiss With a Fist, because it's about beating each other up, and Girl With One Eye, because it makes me uncomfortable, and You've Got the Love, because it's boring and happy. But the rest! The rest are awesome. I've been listening to the rest for two months. Go listen!

so maybe speed it up a little

One of my favourite pastimes is eavesdropping. I love to sit in a crowd and listen to what everyone is saying without having to make the effort to contribute to the conversation. Digging interesting words out of my brain is exhausting. So, I guess I like eavesdropping because I'm lazy. I wonder how many of my other favourite things stem from languidness?

1) Purple: Eyes drawn to purple items from habit? Too much effort to muster up some enthusiasm for the rest of the colours?
2) Reading: A very sedentary habit. Especially because I prefer reading in a reclined position as opposed to, say, reading on a treadmill.
3) Lemon pudding: Can't be bothered to make the rest of the parts of the pie?
4) Singing in my car: I could just drive around with my mouth shut, so I think I'm probably good here. Plus, if I don't know the words I usually head-bob enthusiastically. That's basically like exercise.

I heard on the radio today that a naturally slow gait is correlated to DEMENTIA. Of course I have a naturally slow gait. I'm a lazy bum. However, a weak handshake is connected to heart disease and stroke, and I have like the best handshake of all time. I'm pretty sure that's why I've gotten all my jobs. So... I'm probably good, then. I'll just keep shaking hands firmly and everything will be fine.

the easy solution involves a hammer

So my new mouth guard and I have a terrible relationship. After I nearly barfed when they made the mold of my mouth, I thought, Hey, it probably won't get worse than this. As usual, my optimism was horribly misplaced.

WHY MY MOUTHGUARD IS THE WORST
1) It tastes like perfume, no matter how many times I soak it in stupid vinegar water.
2) It doesn't go soft and gently encase my teeth like I paid the big bucks for it to do.
3) It causes my lips to slowly part and then remain parted so as to become dry and cracked by morning.
4) It makes my face look like a duck.

Nutshell: boo mouthguard.

i'm really only supposed to be here until three

I can see now that it's been beneficial for me in the long run to have been forced to wait A LONG TIME for some things. Like this one time, my parents and I were going to Seattle, and the border line-up was literally 4 hours long. It was some random coincidental simultaneous occurrence of several things, like a Canadian long weekend and an American long weekend and the dollar was quite good and something about baseball. It seemed like a slow death at the time, but now, whenever I go to the border and it's a long wait and people groan and complain, I say, "Hey, at least it's not 4 hours like that one time."

And also, I just requested a book from the library that is apparently very popular, and I'm 4th in line. Previously, I'd be like, "FOURTH!?!?!?! ARGH. Just forget it." But then there was this other book that I really wanted to read, that was popping up everywhere and even had a book trailer! And when I requested that one I was number fifty-five. FIFTY-FIVE. I have never known a library waiting list to be that long. But now, being fourth, I'm like, "At least I'm not fifty-fifth." (Incidentally, I am still waiting for that book. Side question: does anybody else check their request statuses on the library website? I like to keep updated. Sometimes I can even do the math with how many copies they have, and when all the due dates are, to predict when it will be my turn. But maybe that's just me.)