Friday, June 25, 2010

okay, people, so i really don't have time to write a real post because i have a million things to do and we're going to check the luggage in a couple of hours. yay for procrastinating. anyway, like last year, i'm not sure how the internet situation will be, but i'm pretty sure i'll have some since families are building houses and filling up the empty lots around us. and they usually have internet and rarely secure it. 

this is just a warning in case i don't have for some reason that it may be a while before i blog again. if you're a recent follower, go back and read the first blog posts, catch up on anything missed (you know, if you want to.). if you've been here from the beginning, go back anyway. i don't remember what i wrote, but you may find something interesting in there. look in my side bar for all the labels for easy browsing. 

hopefully next time i talk to you will be from the other side of the world. 

Wednesday, June 23, 2010

i really am so stupid

there are times when my stupidity just astounds me.

a couple of weeks ago i couldn't do anything because of a herniated disk in my lower back. i could barely walk or move and i couldn't sit at all. the only time it didn't hurt was when i was laying on my stomach and the second i got up it would go back to torturing me for not taking better care of myself or something. anyway, i went a few days really doing nothing and then spent a couple more slowly easing back into normal stuff. if i sat for too long or twisted the wrong way, it would hurt, but for the most part it was pretty much better. or at least not hurting anymore. i was happy.

today, i finish packing my bag. i didn't particularly feel like moving on to the next thing on my to-do list so i thought that i'd weigh my bag just to see if it was too heavy even though i knew it wasnt. so i go to pick up my suitcase and my back gives me a warning. i ignore it and take it to the scale. halfway back from the scale my back decides that it's had enough and i can barely stand.

now, i am back to stage one. i can't sit, i can barely walk, and i cant turn without shooting pains. guess who has a twelve hour airplane ride to sit through day after tomorrow?

so yeah, my stupidity astounds me.

*I Am So Stupid - Shakira

just sitting around, hanging out this afternoon

okay so i know i've mentioned the whole, this younger generation is not looking for waldo but seeing as this is my blog, i can talk about it again if i want to. my brother had to go in to the doctor for a test the other day and when he came home, me and my sister obviously asked about it. his response, "it was pretty boring and pointless. they put me on a treadmill and the nurse was like 'okay look at this poster and keep walking until you find waldo.' i walked for like two hours before i said i found him, and i dont think i even did." we laugh and say that, yes, finding waldo could be hard. he says, "um.. who's waldo? is he some kind of baseball player?" me and my sister die. of course, not knowing who or what he was looking for obviously made the search harder for him, and there would be know way he would admit to the nurse that he didnt know what he was looking for. this kid likes to think that he knows everything. and something about doctors/nurses make him up his i-can-do-everything levels. a couple of years ago he came home and admitted that he "cheated on his hearing test at school because he had failed the eye one and couldn't fail twice."

on another note, while watching cartoons with my brothers the other day, i realized that the commercials have changed a lot from when i was the targeted audience of cartoon breaks. instead of a hundred commercials for awesome looking toys that immediately make you run to your parents begging for them only to be told no, there was just commercial after commercial of online games. this has been happening for a while, but it didnt really hit me as strange till then. mixed in with the online game commercials are yogurt and cereal ones. then you have a few nintendo ds ads and occasionally there will be one about robotic hamsters or something. and then we wonder why kids sit on the computer all day instead of actually doing something.

*This Afternoon - Nickelback

Monday, June 21, 2010

flicker flicker dim and fade to black

i forgot that i could use formspring answers as a way to pretend i am blogging! so here are the answers. that song in the title, yeah it's kinda stuck in my head in case you were wondering. oh, and i finished nightwatch a few days ago. it was one of my first supernatural stories where the vampires didnt sparkle and i liked it. the vampires and shapeshifters and supernaturalness isnt the main plot of the story which i really liked. i always felt vampire books were centered around a plot of "oh look a vampire!" and then they just went from there.

What household chore do hate to do the most?
folding clothes is the bane of my existence.

india or germany?
i'm guessing these questions are about the world cup, right? if so, i'm very apathetic about the whole thing.

if you're just asking in general, then germany is on my list of places to visit before i die.

us vs england?
umm neither? both? i dont care?

What's the oldest piece of clothing you still own and wear?
i have a couple of tshirts from fourth grade that i still wear.

If you were offered the job of U.S. president would you take the job?
definitely not.

What was the last book you read?
The Year of the Locusts, but i'm nearing the end of Nightwatch.

What was your favorite book as a child?
walter the lazy mouse.

*Anytime - Eve 6

and there's so much i want to say

june 2010 is apparently not a very good blogging month for me, and i really have no idea why. i mean, i could tell you about all the fun stuff we did at my nephew's first sleepover the other day (which includes gems like him and my brothers and parents all going to sleep at nine and me and anisah forgetting he was here as we stayed up). or i could tell you all about how we are leaving on friday when i thought our flight was sunday (because our flight is always sunday) and i still havent started packing for our two month trip. i could brag about how awesome the scrapbook of my cousin's visit i'm making for her is coming along and how i told anisah she could help but then did everything so far by myself. but then, you didnt even know i was making a scrapbook, did you? i could also go a completely different route and just tell you all the short story about the field of weeds and sour milk love which sounds a lot better than you are probably imagining it, but it seems to like staying in my head completely written and i havent been particularly persuasive of late. i could casually mention that cousins that live in the same house should try and talk to each other before sending requests. because when they dont i go out and buy stuff for one cousin only to have her sister ask for the same stuff two days later. did i tell you guys about the marathon of hilariously bad movies me and anisah watched yesterday? no? well i would, but i cant for the life of me remember a single one of their names.

see why my blog has been pretty boring this month?

oh, and according to google, today is the first day of summer. so have fun with that or whatever. you know, hiding from the heat in your air conditioned houses and watching tv or whatever you do for the summer where you are.

*Please Forgive Me - David Gray

Thursday, June 17, 2010

there is nothing you can say or do, i called to let you know i'm through with you

i want you to know that, you and me, we're done. i'm through with pulling apart my bones and tying capillary bows on them just so you can say you don't want them. i'm through with peeling off my skin to keep you warm just so you can complain that it doesn't match your shoes. i'm through with sacrificing myself at your altar every night just so you can demand moremoremore in the morning. i'm not going to pave your roads with my dreams anymore when you don't even watch where you step. i'm done.

there's no use trying to be the bigger person because when i'm with you i don't get to be a person at all. i'm spare parts and spare dreams and spare effort, but you can't even spare me a thought, a second, a glance. i'm done.

i'll rebuild my shell. i'll fix my broken smile and find the laughter i lost ages ago. i'll put myself back together and you'll forget that i ever fell apart. but i will never forget. and i will never forgive. underneath every smile i grace you with, know that there is a hidden glare. know that my blood is boiling under my laughter and my lovetrusthope will never again be left in your care. whenever you succeed, know that under the false cheers falling through my lips i'm wishing you got what you deserved. my skin will crawl at the thought of you and my stomach will churn at the sound of your name, and you will never even look close enough to notice.

and though you will probably not be able to tell the difference, i just want you to know that, you and me, we're through.

*Through With You - Maroon 5

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

embarrassed by the crowd

The reason that I haven't been writing in this book for so long is partly that I haven't had one decent coherent thought to put down. My mind is, to use a disgustingly obvious simile, like a wastebasket full of waste paper, bits of hair, and rotting apple cores. I am feeling depressed from being exposed to so many lives, so many of them exciting, new to my realm of experience. I pass by people, grazing them on the edges, and it bothers me.
~Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath: Journal 38

she said it better than i ever could. but today, i have thoughts! yay me. sooo we went to my old high school to watch my brother get an award for student of the month. and then we watched the sixth grade graduation because they put them together because "the graduation is not an accomplishment that should stand alone" according to the elementary school principal. in their teacher's speech she said she was proud of them for becoming a "community of people." as opposed to what, exactly, none of us were exactly sure. did they start out the year as animals? 

you know the best thing about watching elementary school award assemblies? well, first you get to comment on how cute all the kids are. dressed up in suits and ties and looking all proud of achievements that won't mean a thing to them a couple of years down the road. and then, once you're done with that, you get to make fun of all them. and what is there not to laugh at about a bunch of children acting kinda awkward cause they are taken out of their natural environment and thrown under the spotlight in front of an auditorium full of people. of course, i think some of the parents around me and my sister got a little annoyed by our comments, but we pretty much balanced every "mean" thing with an awww so they had no reason to get all huffy. 

*Killing Me Softly - Roberta Flack

Saturday, June 12, 2010

well, i think you're crazy

i know that part of being an IT student is getting ridiculously excited when new tech stuff comes out, and i know that i have failed miserably in that respect in the past (okay so there were a few moments when my IT geekiness was in fine form, but i'm just going to look over those for now). this is not a post where i will redeem myself. sometimes, i feel like tech companies are just throwing stuff out there just for the sake of throwing stuff out there. for example, the sony dash personal internet viewer. sounds pretty cool from the name, right? well, it's not. and anyone who tries to tell you differently is obviously either brainwashed or extremely unstable. so run away from them.

what is a personal internet viewer, you may ask? well, an alarm clock with apps of course! i'm not going to get into all of the details about it, but let's suffice it to say that they put linux on an alarm clock so that you can "browse the internet without being tethered to your pc."

first of all, with everything else on the market, i dont think there are many people who are "tethered to their pc" when they want internet. second of all, it doesnt have a battery (though they say future versions will) so you're basically tethered to a wall. third, there's no browser which seems like an important part of an internet viewer and apparently the apps are limited.

it is basically a way that you can check stuff like your email and facebook first thing in the morning (literally) without having to wait for your computer to start up or your phone to be picked up. and if you are that desperate to know what has happened on facebook in the few hours you were asleep, well, i think you have problems. instead of buying a sony dash maybe you should check into some sort of rehab because that is not healthy.

do we need internet on our alarm clocks? no. does that stop people from buying it? no. and what do the people who buy it and realize how stupid it is do? they try and get their friends to buy it so they don't feel so stupid, of course.

what brought on this sudden hatred for sony alarm clocks? well, i was making fun of the commercial for them last night with my sister. this morning, i wake up to a facebook message from an obviously delusional friend who thinks i should buy one. no thanks.

*Crazy - Gnarls Barkley

Thursday, June 10, 2010

tell me all your secrets and i'll tell you all of mine

If you could go back in time 10 years and tell your younger self something, what would it be?
that the whole "you can do anything you want...anything is possible" is a lie, at least for someone with my circumstances. not in a depressing way, more in a just-accept-it-young-so-you're-less-disappointed-later kind of way. it wouldve made things a lot easier.

If you could get anything to appear before you right now, be it food, an object, or a person, what would it be?
i've been saving this question in hopes of coming up with an answer, but i honestly have no idea what i want. :/

i'm kinda thirsty, so a vitamin water zero?

If your life was a story, what type of character would you be?
i should probably say the heroine, but if that were true than this must be one boring story. i'd like to say the villain because they get some of the best scenes and lines and everything. but at the moment, i'm probably the added 2d character inserted for occasional comic relief and for coincidences to move the plot along for other characters.

What are you doing?
right now? answering formspring questions and eating black licorice. five minutes ago, though, i was watching The Outsiders: The Complete Novel.

Preference: hands or feet?
hands.

Preference: tan or pale?
generally tan, but there are always exceptions.

Why did you study computers and not writing?
several reasons: one, it's obviously the more practical choice of major. two, i really do think it's interesting. three (and probably the most significant), the embassy people wouldn't pay for it.

What's the best place near you to get a drink?
the kitchen.

What are you most excited about right now?
august 24. it cannot come fast enough. for those of you not cool/smart/awesome enough to be looking forward to this day, it is the day of the release of BOTH mockingjay and LOST complete series on DVD.

When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?
an author, an artist, and a farmer.

chronic constipation vs. chronic diarrhea?
i think they pretty much suck equally.

If you could be on one TV show which one would it be?
i was going to ridicule this question because of it's oh so obvious answer, but then i saw the ONE and got stuck. i'm going to pretend "one" is really "two" and go with LOST and Gilmore Girls. how could i possibly choose between the two?

If you could have been the author of any book, what would it have been?
hmm... that's a hard one. i actually don't think i would want to be the author of any of my favorite books because i would so much more critical about them. i'd rather write something new myself and have that published.

do u really thing youre smarter then me? i dont believe that, prove me wrong on here http://bit.ly/bwh0je
umm i don't know you, but judging by the fact that you can't tell the difference between 'then' and 'than' i'm going to have to say yes, yes i am.

global warming - a theory or reality?
reality in the sense that the climate is changing and we probably are destroying the environment quite a bit, but i also think that a lot of climate change should just be chalked up to nature. it's happened before, it'll happen again.

Want to spice up that special evening? http://tinyurl.com/free-victorias-secret-giftcard
umm not particularly, no.

*House Lights - Steven Strait

Tuesday, June 8, 2010

cant. wait.

but at the same time, i kinda dont want it to come.

wipe that smile off your face

i am not usually classified as one of the "happy people." you know, the ones that have rainbows and butterflies oozing out from every pore on their bodies. i'm not all doom and gloom 24/7 either, though. i'm more of a pessimist with my head in the clouds, if that makes any sense. anyway, negative people are always looked down upon by the more obnoxious half of the population. for some reason, they have been branded as the "wrong" ones.

my younger sister just sent me this article, which just goes to show you that grumpy people are just that much more awesome than cheerful ones. it's scientifically proven.

An excerpt from the article:

"An Australian psychology expert who has been studying emotions has found being grumpy makes us think more clearly.

In contrast to those annoying happy types, miserable people are better at decision-making and less gullible, his experiments showed.

While cheerfulness fosters creativity, gloominess breeds attentiveness and careful thinking, Professor Joe Forgas told Australian Science Magazine."


i think it's important to note the difference between grumpy and other kinds of negativeness. i'm pretty sure when you're really mad you dont make the best decisions, and people wallowing in undeserved self-pity all the time are not an awesome kind of negative. they're even worse than the happy people.

the article reminded me of this comic that i have in my picture collage above my bed:


if you don't read pearls before swine then there must be something wrong with you because it is the number one comic strip ever. rat is awesome and would be my best friend.

*One and Only - Timbaland

Sunday, June 6, 2010

it's so beautiful, our lunacy

have you ever watched iCarly? if you have, you might know that one of the segments on their show is random dancing where, yes, they randomly dance. we (my siblings still living in the house) and i remind me of them because we will have random dance parties. like tonight. all four of us were sitting on computers in my room doing our own stuff (or i was doing my own stuff and they were all playing club penguin. yes, you can mock them or at least my sister) and being complete lazy bums when my sister suddenly says "dance party!" so of course we turn off three of the computers and all the lights, close the curtains and door, turn on our disco ball thing (one of those spinning lights with all the colors), blast the music, and have a dance party.

one of the best things about our dance parties are the things my brothers do later. for example, ali (the one obsessed with parsley) comes home after school the day after one of our previous dance parties and tells me, "i almost got in trouble today."
me: uh oh. what did you do now?
him: i told the teacher *attitudey voice* we are not what you think we are. *face lights up with a cheesy smile and draws a rainbow in the air with his hands* we are golden. we. are. golden.
me: *laughs* what did she say?
him: there was nothing she could say. she just stared at me then laughed and told me not to interrupt.

*Disconnect the Dots - Of Montreal

please forgive me if i act a little strange for i know not what i do

I wake up every morning to the sound of my alarm clock shrieking i-told-you-so's and yesterday's regrets tangled in my hair.

My reflection in the bathroom mirror can't look me in the eye as I try to brush the failure out from between my teeth and wash the disappointment from my eyes.

I count out my mistakes on shower tiles and drops of hot water and try to wash them down the drain with the soap suds or lose them in the steam.

My bedroom carpet is stained with cigarette burns, hot chocolate, and bad decisions, and they just won't scrub out or be ignored.

I sit at the kitchen table and I'm filled to burst with weak coffee and weak excuses and a weak resolve to do better next time, but this is the only time I get.

And I'm doing the best I can but failing miserably all the same.

***

a couple of weeks ago, i was sitting alone at the table doing a crossword puzzle and drinking coffee my dad had made but then decided he didnt want. my dad likes his coffee weak. very weak. anyway, the second to last line came into my head out of nowhere so i scrawled it onto my arm deciding that i might use it in something eventually. this is it. kinda short, but whatever i added to it just didnt seem to click, so as of now it's staying like this.

i am posting this so that years from now when i look back at my blog, i'll know what was going through my head as i wrote some of these.

also, when i was reading this over when i first wrote it, my mind thought, "i wake up in the morning feeling like p diddy." when i just read it right now, it thought, "i wake up every morning with a big smile on my face, and it never feels out of place..." maybe i should change the first line so it doesnt inspire my brain to sing random song lyrics?

*Please Forgive Me - David Gray

nothing else to do, may i waste your time too?

it seems my whole graduating thing has been stretching on for months. probably because it kinda has, but that's not the point. remember the post title that says, "the sun comes up then goes away, so does graduation day." yeah, my graduation apparently didnt hear the memo and thought it should last a good half year. yesterday was (i think) the final ceremony/graduation/celebration/whatever to announce the ending of my undergrad college career [that ended in six months ago in december]. it was the one hosted/put together by the saudi embassy so there was just a bunch of random students thrown together from all across the country. 600 random students to be exact. it was fun. probably because i knew people there and the food was good. i have to say, though, i don't think i heard a single one of the speeches completely and only a couple of sentences of the ones that did manage to catch my attention a bit.

and now i dont think i have any major plans for the summer until june 25 when i will fly halfway around the world to the desert house (otherwise known as jeddah). oh, except for my plans to do a serious cleaning of my room, because it is in desperate need of it. and i need to organize my bookshelf because it is a mess.

so i'm pretty sure that i had a point going into this post, but then my brothers distracted me and it flew right out of my mind. that happens, you know, because my mind is not the best thing to hold points in during the summer. or ever.

* Sassafras - Green Day

Friday, June 4, 2010

am i at the point of no improvement?

and sometimes it just feels like this was all so terribly pointless, and the fact weighs down on me until it is almost more than i can take. you know those plot diagrams with the rising action going up to the point (climax) and then coming to falling action? yeah. sometimes it feels like everything i've been doing in my life, everything i've just chalked up to rising action, isn't. so i'm struggling to climb the steep slope and working hard just to put one hand over the other. then, i get to the climax and prepare to look down to another slope of falling action, but see nothing. not nothing, nothing, but that there is no fall, no new slope. the path just continues on straight. and so i look back to the slope i had just struggled to get over and realize that that was just as flat as the road ahead of me and the road stretching out on all sides.

i've been working for something my whole life, but somewhere inside of me i know that that "something" doesnt exist. it's just a mirage shimmering in the distance and i've deluded myself into thinking that all i have to do is get there and everything will be perfect. but it never gets any closer and my store of hope and optimism is falling dangerously low. everything is pointless because it will all end up the same way, no matter what i do now, if anything. so the years of education might as well have been spent practicing my gossiping skills which i'm actually not very good at if you can believe it. and those will be way more helpful to me in a couple of years than any knowledge of computer forensics.

book reading has done nothing but open my eyes to a bunch of worlds and ways of life that i will never be able to experience. they sit crowding every available space in my room and just mock the pathetic existence i have been sentenced to until a part of me just wants to pile them up into a summer night bonfire and watch their hope and freedom burn into what mine have become: nothing.

i have been trying to keep the hopelessness out of my blog lately (don't think i've been overly successful) but yeah, guess i've given up on that. *sigh*

I throw up my hands
"Oh, the impossibilities"
Frustrated and tired
Where do I go from here?
~Relient K

*For the Moments I Feel Faint - Relient K

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

it's an obsession

my youngest brother is newly obsessed with parsley. it is his "secret ingredient" in everything he makes and the best spice in the universe as far as he's concerned. what brought on this obsession? well, this weekend while my parents were out of town, i gave my brothers complete control of the kitchen... or supervised complete control. some of the meals were successes, while others were merely a step to a successfully refined recipe later on. because, yes, we were just making things up as we went along.

we made chicken rolled in oatmeal, but one brother didnt want to add any spices. so we didnt. while not exactly bad, it was pretty bland. imagine oatmeal without the sugar or the raisins or the honey or anything. yeah, it was a bit like that but with chicken. the chicken part was good and honey mustard/bbq sauce added flavor. so while not a complete failure, we've all tried better things. the roasted potatoes we made were delicious, though. and the boys both were super excited to be allowed to use the knives to cut the potatoes and raw chicken. touching all the raw food was totally up their alley, too.

while making himself an omelet, the younger of the two said he needed to add another ingredient to "make it his." he looked through the spice cabinet and decided on parsley leaves. when his omelet was done, he fell in love. i told him it was good after trying a bite and he said, "aww shucks... you're only saying that cause it's absolutely true." no worries about insecurities with this one. he also pointed out that how sometimes the omelets i make him are not folded perfectly in half, his was. if i want tips, he can teach me when he gets the time. he'll also help my dad to let him know the perfect time to add the cheese and secret ingredient.

anyway, he just made himself a bean and cheese burrito for lunch tomorrow. with lots of parsley.

*Obsession - Frankie J