Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, Son.

It's about 1 am on a saturday morning, Sports fans, and I'm sitting on the futon in my room waiting to muster the energy to go brush my teeth and go to bed.

As you may or may not have noticed, I haven't 'blogged' since October. I got some harsh feedback on my lack of updating, and then I was just showing off my blog to my roommate and my friend and realized it's not that impressive since the last time I posted I was bummin' hard. I never re-updated after that because most things didn't change during the rest of the semester. One gleaming exception might have been painting an abstract series of Chipotle burritos that were well received.

And as all school things go, I got a break which included sleep, presents, and my cat.

On sunday night I found out that I'd be having class on fridays which is something I was careful to avoid in registration. But the class didn't fulfill weekly hour requirements, so it got extended (can they even do that?), but only until spring break when the class ends. And that's first aid. Which hopefully will be interesting and educational enough to get me out of bed on a friday morning at 9:30 and walk 20 minutes there and back for an hour long class. For attendance's sake, let's hope.

I also have cultural anthropology, which I've had two sessions of, and should be interesting. It's a larger class than I'm used to having for a gen ed. And it seems legit for gen ed as well. The only one I've taken that wasn't an honors course was Psychology, and perhaps I've mentioned this, but that class sucked. But the anthro professor reminds me of a mix of Harrison Ford and Michael Fielding. But he's as tall as a house, and he's so skinny I fear he may break in two.

I'm taking GCM this semester which is graphic communications management, basically print production. My teacher is the 80's. That's pretty much all I have to say about him. The first day he was having technical difficulties, and he called in this guy he knew to help him, and I swear both of them were characters both being played by Stephen Merchant. Rarely do you get to see people who are so comically awkward and unaware of it. I mention this only because I'm sure this means the class has already peaked. Is that as interesting in blog form as it is in my head?

I'm taking Design Theory and Methods. Which I've heard mixed things on. I'm not going to leave myself any room for error. This class reeks of 3D Design which I've decided doesn't stress me out because of my negative connotation and embarrassment from that class, but because of fear of my own inadequacy. So now I need to address that.

And lastly I'm taking a night class. Art after 1950. I'm taking it with my favorite professor who knows my aunt and uncle, who I got an A+ on my first midterm, and who graciously let me make-up my second midterm after I overslept.

happy late christmas

So I know I'll be hunting high and low

I'm having a day where I just can't seem to figure out what I'm feeling. I shouldn't say that I've been feeling bi-polar, because I've been a little bit more sad and depressed than happy. I'm not sure why I'm feeling that way, it's just one of those days, and nothing seems to be putting me in a good mood.

It's one of those days where I'd like to just quit school, because it literally brought nothing good into my day.

I'm currently attributing it to the fact that I have a programming assignment due tomorrow at midnight, and I'm having a hard time concentrating on it. I'd forgotten how stressful it is to have projects that are more mentally taxing than physically. Art projects have such easier solutions, and better ones, and ones that you can create yourself, not that you have to read in a book. I admire the people who are really smart in math and science, but I'm glad I'm not one of them. Usually. Now is a time that I wish I was one of them, though, so this assignment would just...come to me.

I'm also really frustrated at math. My teacher constantly is changing the schedule of when we meet, because it's supposed to be four days a week, but then we've been having increasingly more "independant study hours" where we don't meet and are expected to use the time to study on our own (although, I seriously hope my professor isn't expecting that we actually get up at nine to study on our own, if like me, you don't have another class until later). But the point is, he keeps changing the schedule, and sending out new ones, so I have all of these dates written down that we're not meeting, and then I have to change them, and it gets confusing, and it hasn't really been a huge issue until today, when we originally didn't have class, and I didn't see it on the schedule, so I didn't change it on my calendar, and I missed class, because I thought we didn't have it. I blame myself 75% for not double-checking, but I blame him the rest, because he needs to QUIT CHANGING the schedule. I'm already feeling extremely disorganized right now, he's just making it way worse.

I think honestly the most amount of frustration is coming from the fact that I CAN'T FOCUS on anything these days. I keep getting distracted. I literally can't help it. I can't turn a problem into an answer, I can't write in Java syntax, I can't sketch logos, and I can't paint for long periods of time. I can't do anything. I'm getting enough sleep, I'm eating enough, I just. can't. focus. I think it has something to be overstimulated. Listening to music, watching movies, tv, talking to people, it all sticks with me too much. I think I have ADD. And I don't just say that in a casual way, I'm not just doing random self-diagnosing, but I think I've had it for awhile. Focusing has never been my forte. And honestly, it's at the root of every issue I'm currently having.

Sweet and Tender Hooligan

I don't write blog entries for anyone else but myself, so practice patience people.

It was my birthday a week ago, and it was awesome. The entire week worked out so that I really didn't have much if any homework to speak of, and I used the chance to catch up on my instant queue. I went home last weekend and hung out with Jessica, Tianna and Lizzie. We went to Joe's Garage, just Tianna, Jessica and I, Lizzie was working, and it was reeealy good. And they gave me a gap GC which they all pitched in for so it was a LOT holla (Maddi also got me a gap card, which is good because now I can buy clothes, even though I'm quite poor). I also saw family on saturday night for birthday celebrations which was all good, after much controversy that was had about the fact that I went vegetarian (just for the month, but also semi-permanently because I gave up eating meat at the commons and north point dining at school, because I deemed it kinda sketchy), and everyone wanted meat, and I was all like, no ways man, suck it up, you can stand to not eat meat for one meal of your life, and everyone was being stupid but I won out in the end.

And birthday week included BACK TO THE FUTURE AS THE FREE MOVIE on Monday night because it was Homecoming week, and "Stout to the Future" was the theme, Beth and Krista baking me a cake, and going to Jeff's pizza on my actual birthday with Maddi, and then going to Zanzibar restaurant on friday with Beth and Tegan (where they gave me a french press, which, for those who know, I've been scouring the earth for!) Maddi and I had a fun and quiet weekend other than that "going" to the rugby field (for ze homecoming-ness of it) and going to los cabos, dyeing her hair, watching dirty dancing, jimmy johns, more dirty dancing, harry potter and going to bed early.

All in all, it was an excellent week.

It's time we saw a miracle

Did you know that you don't have to refrigerate organic milk? I guess I don't know if this applies to all organic milk, but you don't have to refrigerate organic valley brand.

Am I the last person to know this?

Look Around You

Ugh, thanks for hassling me, y'allz. Not.

I'm all moved into school (ugh, but not as ugh as last year) and classes start tomorrow, which I guess I can't say I'm too excited about. As the first one is math at 9:00, and it's attached to Applied Arts, which is much farther away from my building this year, and so it's not as close as I thought it would be. I will maybe post pictures later of what my room looks like, which is pretty much the same, but slightly different, with different roommate. I've finally (literally before I wrote this post) got everything put away in the exact spot I want it. So far I've basically just been hanging out with friends, went to Pizza Hut for dinner on move-in day and then we came back an watch Star Trek. And then roommate moved in at like 10, so we took a couple of trips to haul her stuff up here and set up the futon and errthang. It was def my workout for the day. Last night went to dinner in the new dining center and it was my first pasta night (!!) in months. So excellent. And then went to the free movie.

THERE'S MY UPDATE FAMILY.

Ma Belle Amie

If I don't see this:

soon, I'm gonna punch someone in the face.

the angels wanna wear my red shoes

I made this cake today:

from scratch, which is a first for me. Carrot cake with Cream Cheese frosting. I hate to flatter myself, but I personally think it turned out delicious. Although if I make it again, I would take about ten minutes off the baking time. And I need to hone my frosting skillz, as it took me like ten minutes to get it to look all smooth and such.

Just thought I'd share my accomplishment.

Other things that are happening:

-I'm training for a 5k. I've been slacking this week, because I've lacked motivation (seems to be a trend in my young life), but I've been getting back on track, and I didn't technically lose any time because I have an extra week built into my training schedge.

-My parents have gotten use to having leftovers and barbeque chicken sandwiches, so I've had to take up cooking dinner more often than usual. The point of this is, is that I'm slowly turning into a housewife.

-This week I saw Inception on Wednesday. So. Excellent. I just...want to see that movie always. I'm seeing it again on tuesday, and let's be honest, I'll probably see it 5 times after that.

-I went the the Squeeze/English Beat concert with my father on thursday. Originally my sister was going to go with him, but she said it probably meant more to me. Score! Although, father didn't realize that I knew any Squeeze music, let alone was huge fan, until we were in the car on the way to the show. Ugh.

-I went to the Jack Johnson concert in Somerset tonight. If I never see another grungy hippy smoking pot again, it'll be too soon. Harsh, but fair.

Also, I threw a dinner party about a week ago for Jessica, Tianna, and Lizzie. Kind of as a welcome back from europe Jessica, have fun at Comic-Con Tianna and Lizzie (which they are at right now. It makes me sound insane that I turned down the chance to go. Ugh, again.). Some photos, as literally nothing got screwed up, and everything went smoothly in terms of cooking errthing. Especially since T-pain is a vegetarian, and it was hot and humid, it was limiting.

Greek Salad Pita, and Tabuli salad with vegetables.

Iced Green Tea with Gingerale and Raspberry Sherbet

Homemade garlic bread, which Tianna helped make and supplied the bread. Pretty much she did everything, for which, I thank her.

I'd leave it all tomorrow, there's sorrow if I stay

I'll update for real again soon, maybe later tonight, as there seems to be a mild amount of demand for a post, because I actually do have legit things going on right now, whereas only a week ago, I had nothing going on.

I won't update long-ly for now because I'm going to go on a bike ride to clear my head. I was cleaning my room when I became overwhelmingly depressed and anxious, and so I need to get out and boost my mental health. I think I know the cause, so that's good, but it's unavoidable, so that's bad. I don't feel like I'm having a very good day, and that's happened a lot this summer. Not so much lately because I've been keeping a little more busy, but I've become very disenchanted with a lot of people in my life lately, over different things, and that puts me in an awful mood that I don't like to be in.

Ugh, people truly suck sometimes.

Get with it.

I think this is what every fridge should look like. Just saying.

My wife has moved to Jersey, so mum is not the word.

I didn't die, I just haven't really been in the blogging mood. And don't mistake me- it's not like I've been busy or anything. In fact, it's just that.

As much as I looked forward to this summer, I should have known that I would be bored most of the time. Maybe it's because I assumed I would have a job-- and I will be the first to admit that I haven't tried terribly hard to GET a job, just saying-- and I'm not going on any trips or anything. And of course, one best friend is 1/3 of the way through her 6-week european vacation, another best friend is housesitting in a different part of town, which I didn't even know about until about a week before it happened (and she will adamantly tell you that she told me about it ages ago, but that is a big fat lie) as well as has a job. And other best friend also has a job, but she lives fairly close, so we've actually gotten to hang out. Sister Caroline never wants to hang out, and when she does, she always complains about driving and having to do other things, which are usually going out with people she sees every day. And she won't see Sex and the City with me, except, she invited me begrudgingly to go see it with her and her friend. Sister Emily just got done with school last week, and we hung out yesterday, but her best friend and roommate is getting married in less than a month, and is moving to China immediately after, not to mention she has 6 months to plan her own wedding. My friends from school don't live that close to me, and one of them is going to Europe for a month soon anyway, so that puts off our camping plans that we had until the tail end of the summer.

I'm not trying to have a public pity party, trying to get all sorts of sympathy from people, and I have friends, and it's not like I'm some pathetic hermit, but I don't know, I guess I feel a little lonely right now? Maybe this is my passive way of saying "feel bad for me, everyone I know is being a jerk right now" or something like that. I think I do that kind of thing all the time, whether I realize it or not. I think a lot of people do. It's like fishing for compliments. Although, a lot of the time, people realize that they're doing it. I think I have a sort of a villainous personality, where I seem sympathetic, but I prey on people's sympathies to get what I want. And maybe sub-consciously I admit that so people will tell me it's not true. But I think it probably is a little bit. And all of this business isn't really relevant to the "lonely" think, but I found a sorta segue, so I took it.

It's just that I've had too much me time lately I think, which I usually love, but I think I drive myself crazy. I have too much time to analyze things in my life. I usually think a lot about philosophy in my head, and I how I choose to live, and whether I think it's the right way, or whether I think I should be doing something differently, or how exactly I view the world. It's dangerous to think to much about that kind of thing. But I guess if I thought enough about that statement, I would label it as an imperfect philosophy.

But I guess I'm just saying, hang out with me. Ugh.

L'Etranger

a few things:

I served my first day of Jury Duty today. Dull as tombs. Sat around for a long time, got called for a jury, got dismissed, have to come back tomorrow and probably have the same thing happen all over again.

I feel it is now safe to say that my sister Emily got engaged about a week ago. I found out on wednesday when she and her "betrothed" came and visited me at my dorm, and surprised me with the news. I get an honorary award from Derek for the best reaction to the news ever.

I'm finished with freshman year, so I came home on friday night, and now my stuff is everywhere. my room is quite a mess.

Today is the two-year anniversary of my face being broken into by a window. Nuff said.

I had to make a website for my digital imaging class, so, I made a wordpress blog. There's not really anything on it, but it has a fuller portfolio of my artwork. There are really few of my drawings/other things that I'm actually proud of after a considerable amount of time after I've completed them, and often times they look worse in picture form, but whatevs. addieroyce.wordpress.com

on seeing my reflection i'm looking slightly rough

So, I've been starting to pack up all of my stuff in my room for move-out on friday. It's really weird to see how much stuff I have, now that it's all sitting out on the floor in boxes and bags, it makes the room so much messier. There are some things that I refused to take down until tonight, like my bulletin board. I thought it would look too empty, and I really liked my colorful arrangement of pictures and such, but I figured, since all of my crap is piled up around my desk, I wouldn't be able to sit there anyway. But now it really looks bare. I have to pack it all up now because I am leaving about 2 hours after my last final, and I won't have time to pack on friday at all. And tomorrow I'll have to work on my 3D final project, so I won't have much time then, either.

Yes, I know that's not terribly interesting..sorry about that.

Also, roommate bought be a present which completely caught me off guard, and I was embarrassed because I had not gotten her one, but she also wrote me a little card, and filled a big red (my favorite color) basket with all of my favorite things. She bought me a 2-liter of Diet Coke, a big bag of Salt and Vinegar chips, 2 Warm Delights (molten chocolate cake, and carmel molten cake, my favorite flavors), a 54 pack of trident gum (my favorite gum), and season 1 of friends. Can you believe her? It was probs the best present I've gotten in a long time.

I also just wanted to post some pictures of drawings that I recently completed. They're in color, which I don't think I've posted any of on here yet. I'm not completely satisfied with them, but I think they turned out better than many of the drawings I've done in the past.

The three R2D2's are for our perception of color and light project, and we had to take three photographs of the same or similar image to draw them at those three different times of day. My small lego R2D2, as you can see served as my model. I really hate the backgrounds on all of them, mostly because I hate drawing backgrounds. It's not really my thing.

This is my final project, which was a self-portrait, and it is also huge, like 3 or 4...ft tall? I might be making that up, I'm not good with perception of measurement. This is it when it is almost done. This is what I showed at the critique, but I drew a little blue on the whites of my eyes, because as you can see, they flatten out a bit, after the critique, because that was one thing my professor said he'd like to see change. I was surprised that people commented on the eyes, because the thing that was giving me the hardest time was my nose, because it kept looking so big, and also my eyebrows, because in my opinion, and compared to the photograph, they are too low, and a little too dark. I also obvs took the tape off the edges.

I'm all lost in the supermarket

Saw Iron Man 2 at midnight on thursday with Beth, Tegan and Melissa. So awesome that Cinemagic in Menomonie does midnight shows. It was the perfect thing. We went and bought our tickets beforehand, although we didn't realize that the theater doesn't even open until 6:30, so we went to the Dollar Store to kill some time, which I found to be an absolute GEM. I'm so excited to go shopping on the cheap there next year. So we got our tickets, came back at 11, it was raining, we waited outside, they let us in, it was epic, the movie started. The movie was AWESOME. So love it. I'm really glad that it lived up to "Dark Knight is a sequel potential" meaning that it was just as good, if not better than the first, although, I really really love the first, so it's hard to say whether it was better, I'd have to see it again. But the addition of Sam Rockwell, and Don Cheadle, how can you possibly go wrong? I mean, Mickey Rourke wasn't that phenom, I gotta say. He kind of annoyed me actually. And I eternally dislike Scarlett Johansson, so that's whatevs. Ugh, the RDJ craze is back on. I love the spring, because it always gives me awes movies to obsess over. Last year was Star Trek, the year before that, Iron Man, the year before that, Silver Surfer. They just keep getting better and better.

Also, I just signed up for Pandora, can't believe I didn't do it sooner. So far, this is an awesome playlist.

Also also, I'm so excited to go home, I only have 6 days. 5 days until I'm done with finals. 2 days until I'm done with classes.

And after eating a muffin and a half, I'm off to dinner. Don't...don't judge me.

The Raw Deal

I just read this article on Glamour.com (I won't apologize for love glamour and visiting their website every day) and I just thought it was interesting. Enjoy.

Good Morning, Starshine, Good Day, Sunshine, Good Night, Moon

I just wanted to say that I just watched the documentary "No Impact Man" which you can all watch instantly on netflix, if you happen to have netflix, otherwise, please rent it and watch it, because it really is just so good. I can't say I love documentary's in general, but I have nothing against them existing. Sometimes I have an issue with the philosophy of the documentary, or the message, or if it's being to preachy, or if I feel they approached the object in the wrong way, but I had no such feelings about No Impact Man. It's about a family in New York City (mother, father, small daughter) trying to make no net impact on the environment for a year, and the steps they take, and the phases of the process they go through. The wife is kind of whiny sometimes, which can get a little annoying, but I appreciate so much how passionate the man, Colin Beavan, is about the project (it was his idea) and his enthusiasm to understand what he and others are doing to the planet, and what it's like to change, or adapt to different ways where there might not be such a negative effect on the planet.

What I like so much about about it is that it's not saying all of these shocking facts that are supposed to terrify you into be eco conscious, I believe watching this family's eco routine motivates and encourages me personally enough to do what I know I should be doing, or even showing me the alternatives that I may not have thought about before. He pinpoints classic cases of people being eco-light, and that would be thinking that recycling is the answer to everything, when it really is not. People feel okay about using plastic if they recycle it, but what many people don't know is that it degrades in quality after recycling it so many times, so really, it's better than throwing it away, but there are so many other alternatives, such as glass, which can be recycled forever without losing it's quality (and would also take 4000 years to break down in the environment if not recycled, so that's even more incentive to do it!) Many people recycle the wrong way, too, but that's a battle for another blog post. I also also appreciate about this movie is that it addresses the social stigma of being an "eco-nazi" and how it can negatively affect you socially, and how people view you. I consider myself to be mid-range eco friendly, which I would say means that I do better than some people, but really not as well as I should, or would even like to. I say this because, even with the way I live now, I feel pretty embarrassed sometimes about my efforts, or feel completely judged because of them. My roommate in particular has a special talent of making me feel stupid because I want to turn off the T.V. when we leave the room for two minutes, but it's important to me, and for that reason, I don't feel like I should have to feel bad about it. It's a negative attitude that discourages me because I do something that I know is the right thing to do. A friend of mine threw out a plastic bottle that still had liquid in it, and I felt like a complete ass fishing it out of the garbage and yelling at her for not dumping out the liquid and recycling it.

One last thing I will say, is that I know that I'm "liberal", and therefore tend to think differently than most "conservatives" about the merits of eco living, and I appreciate that people have different views on the subject, and I know there's a whole thing about recycling and whether it actually does make a difference, but could you give me a good reason to have every single light on in the house while you're sitting there, or even out for the evening? Or generating more garbage than is humanly necessary? Or taking the worlds longest shower? (I am so so guilty of this one, because I've always loved showers, and I'm cutting back on my time, but I'm still not perfect at all, let's be honest) Would you feed your body a high fat diet every single day, and justify it by saying that you eat a salad every once and awhile? (minimal earth friendly effort would be the "salad" in this scenario) I should hope not, and so don't do the same to the planet.

I'll get off of my soapbox now.

Alison, I know this world is killing you

I registered for housing next year today, and I'm really excited about it. I'm rooming with the aforementioned friend from drawing class, Maddi. What's even more exciting is that we registered for the building which will be newly remodeled for next fall, and it's connected to the new dining/fitness center/convenience store. It's on north campus so it's farther away from all of the buildings that I'll actually have class in (a.k.a. the only building I'll have classes in, Applied Arts, which is also the farthest away from north campus.) But it's really close to the co-op, which will be nice, because as it is now, it's a five minute walk up the hill. It's also much closer to Penco. And it's literally right next door to subway. The subway that I haven't gone to at all this year. This doesn't mean I'm going to spend a ton of money next year because it'll be a lot more convenient, I'm just saying it'll be more convenient than it is this year to do the shopping that I already do.

By the way, I understand that this isn't terribly interesting, but I've been having a bit of writers block lately on what to blog about, and I legit like to blog, so any suggestions would be nice.

Also, I've been craving sweets a ton lately. I usually have like literally no sweet tooth, but lately I've been craving dessert after every meal. Not breakfast, obvs, because that would be silly. I still like a really bland breakfast. I am not a huge fan of sugary cereals, as evidenced by the box of apple jacks that is still sitting in my food crate that I bought in, I believe, november. It was a fleeting craving, and I've been trying to pawn them off on someone for a while now, but nobody wants an old box of apple jacks. I just finally found someone to take all of my ramen, because once upon a time I thought it would be a good idea to buy 12 packets when I already had 5 in my room. But the point is...sweets. I like the occasional dessert, but even now, I really want to go get a snickers ice cream bar right this very second. I think it's because I've been eating so healthy, it makes me want dessert every single day. When I was staying with my host family in france, I remember loving how they had dessert every night, and made me have some too, even if it was just a treat like a fancy yogurt thing. And they also bought me the snickers ice cream bars, and made me eat them and a glass of diet coke in the afternoon. They had my best interest at heart. So it's stuff like that, sometimes I'm like "I should really be eating super healthy right now, but at the same time, I feel like I should just enjoy myself, so long as I stay within reason" I feel the two are not mutually exclusive. And sometimes it's hard to care.

The Last Tycoon

Spring Break went a little too fast, for my taste. HOWEVER, coming back to school was not as bad as it could have been. Even though I had to finish my 3D Project, I haven't had too many stressors. My Wellness class is over, so now my Mondays and Wednesdays don't start until 2:30, which is really nice. And as always, I don't have class on fridays. But this week is particularly nice, as Mid Program review for art students is on thursday, so all art classes are cancelled. I'm so glad it's on a day that I have 3 art classes. And on TOP of that, my Digital Imaging class was cancelled today. So basically I come back, and I'm already done by 11 on thursday morning, and then get to go home. Also, I don't have classes next monday. So this is a really huge joke week, but I'm going to appreciate it, because I have a feeling things will pick up a little bit more. I would do as much homework this week as I can, but I literally have very few assignments right now, and I can't go much further with my 2D project without discussing with my teacher. So...I'm just going to take it easy, so there.

On another note, I'm just so excited for summer, and most especially the cabin. I have a feeling it's going to be really awesome this year. But when is it not, really?

(Although, I think we can all agree, Summer '04 was nothing to write home about)

Fortune found me, fate just crowned me, I'm the King of New York!

I believe I am getting sick. Which I would say makes no sense, because I've been eating super healthy, and you'd think that I would be anything BUT unhealthy, but I probably haven't been sleeping quite like I should be. Late nights, or all-nights, it's bad news bears. It probably also doesn't help that it is 3 in the morning as I write this, but in my defense, it's daylight savings. I'm not sure really why I'm writing about this specifically, because everybody gets sick, bfd, but if you haven't noticed, I'm into posting lately. I believe it keeps me healthy. Mentally, clearly not physically.

It's all over Danny Bailey

I couldn't find any rubber bands, so I tied my carrots with a red ribbon. Which will make my next snack feel like Christmas!!

On my way out, I was even going to shake his hand, but just in time, I remembered that I had killed a man

I just wanted to give a shout-out to my novelty items today. I got back from class early, and I noticed, (as I was in a rush this morning) that my breakfast dishes happened to be comprised my favorite novelty dishes.

A little grody, I know, but I was seriously in a rush, and I can guarantee that they are rinsed now.

Obvs, just the ones in the foreground, the James LEGO mug which held coffee (which, as I mentioned on facebook, I'm getting addicted to for the caffeine, as I gave up pop for lent) and my clone wars bowl, and lightsaber spoon. Who knew breakfast could be so awesome?!