Thing of the Day: my Etsy shop is open!

I finally buckled down and took pictures of all the jewelry I've made over the past several years. Today's thing is... dun da dunnn... my newly opened Etsy shop. Take a look!

The Faerie Outpost

I'll keep adding stuff as I finish it. Share the link with your friends! Woo!

- KP


Quote of the Day: "I am a biotic god! I think things... and they happen!"

Thing of the Day: A Night to Remember by Betty Who

I just love this. So much. Wow.



I think I've played it like fifty times today. Her voice is one of my favorite kinds of voices and this track has a great groove. Also... she's coming to Olaf on Friday and I'm sooo pumped.

Thank you, Mads, for turning me on to this awesome artist. You always have the best taste in music.

Commander Kip
"We must have seen them when they were new and weird." "No, they're still weird."
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: my Florence blog!

Yo ho yo ho, a Florentine life for me! Chances are I won't be blogging here much in the next few months. Check this link for updates on my travels:

Dancing with Dante

I'll also put it in the sidebar, in case I do post here more and the link gets buried.

Thanks for sticking with me, everybody!

Commander Kip
"Tali, that's a straw." "Emergency. Induction. Port."
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Floridaaa

Yes, a vacation can totally be the Thing of the Day. Especially a good one like the one I just had.

And an excellent time was had by all.

I friggen love that place.

Commander Kip
*plaintively* "I woke up sweating and I said, 'why?'"
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Bat for Lashes - All Your Gold

Found this song through another blog I read. Liked it a lot. Like her other stuff too.



Commander Kip
*writhing on the floor* "Stop!... You are breaking... the English... language!!"
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: 2048

Warning: addictive. Major procrastination tool. You will not get anything done ever again.

But it is such good fun.

http://gabrielecirulli.github.io/2048/

I just won the game, so perhaps I'll be free from the urge to play it for a while.

Commander Kip

"I quit." "No, you don't. That's the problem."

Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: pillow poetry

Thought I'd inform you all of a strange but wonderful Thing my roomate and I have started. I highly recommend it.

Anna and I never really see each other except at meals or when we're asleep. She leaves the room before I wake up in the morning, and when I get back at night, she's already out. She often leaves sweet little notes on Post-its on my pillow, telling me how much she loves me or reminding me of something funny that happened that day. Recently she started leaving short poems instead. We've decided it's good practice, so now we leave them for each other. 

My favorite of hers so far has been:

Octopi are red,

Squid are blue,

If I had eight arms,

I'd devote two entirely

To hugging you.

And the other night she left a beautiful one, just a few lines, about snow and leaf-bare trees. And I left her one about being separated from someone you love. Also, being the creepers that we are, we have both left each other poems about watching the other one sleep.

This is why we are married. 

Commander Kip

"Whoa whoa, what was that Jedi magic you just did?!"

Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Silk

Dude dude dude, I have the coolest Thing for you. 

http://weavesilk.com/

It's a site that lets you make stuff by drawing with strands of silk. You can mirror the image as you draw, or add up to six points of symmetry. It's frickin' awesome.

I have spent way too many hours playing with this over this past week. You can combine any two colors on the wheel, set the symmetry you want, and then save your work to your computer (to use as a desktop or whatever.) There's also soothing music on the site. It's pretty great. Of course, that means I have all my homework to do today. Woot.

Have fun playing!

Commander Kip
"'Lady of negotiable affections?' Who even says that?"
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Nando Lauria's Gloria

Hey dere erebody. Bet you thought I'd died again. Lucky for you, I returned from the grave specifically to share this song with you!



This is one of my all-time favorite pieces of Christmas music. I just love it.

Also, we're going to Christmas Fest tonight! Should be quite a party.

Saw Catching Fire over break. So good, you guys. I started bawling when Katniss addresses Rue's family and didn't stop until the end. Finnick and Johanna were awesome. (Though I might just be biased cuz they're my favorites.) I do sorta wish Johanna had been a little more sullen and a little less insane, though. Oh well, she still rocked hard.

Now I don't get to have fun until after finals. See you on the other side.

Commander Kip
"Sure, you can pray for me and I'll... dance naked in the forest for you."
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Illumina

Just discovered this Two Steps from Hell album on Youtube. Liking it. Mellower than some of their other stuff. More ethereal and introspective, but with a fair variety of styles.

Some of my favorite tracks:

I Love You Forever


Lost in Las Vegas


A Hole in the Sun


Cloud Maker (holy frick, those vocals)


Eyes Closing


Tasty, right?

Lots of packing today, because tomorrow morning it's back to Viking territory for me! Woohoo!

EDIT: Experimenting with a more colorful look for the blog. May tweak things here and there in the next couple days/weeks. Do not fret. It's the same blog. You'll still be getting that particular brand of Kip craziness.

Commander Kip
"KHAAAAAAAAAAN!!!"
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Steam Powered Giraffe

My friends are so cool. They showed me this song, and now I just want to listen to it over and over until I die.

THE FACE PAINT. AND THE MOVEMENTS. AND THE EVERYTHING. GAAH. Unfortunately, I listened to some other Steam Powered Giraffe songs and didn't like any of them as much as Honeybee. Darn. But Honeybee is fantastic, and also the Thing of the Day.

Speaking of robot face paint, we had free face painting the other day and I had this done to my face.

Pretty great, no? In other news, I went home for spring break and was greeted by a snowstorm.

A week later, by Easter Sunday, it was full-on springtime.

...And then I came back to school and it was cold and damp, gosh darn it. There's like three inches of wet, heavy snow on the ground right now. I like snow, but I'm not a huge fan of slush. Just saying.

We had our Bi-Dormal Formal dance last weekend, and I got some classy pictures of my friends. Here, have an Anna. She looks British. Probably because of the shawl. I am married to this, you guys. *winning*

Alex, my little brother, and Katia, my mistress. We're all related in Kildahl. It's fine.

Matt and I. Yes, I re-purpled my hair.

Darling Claire. We love her because she feeds us foods. Also because she's a delightful person.

 Anna again, looking sexy with a bow tie. Bow ties should always be worn with little black dresses, obviously.

I might post again tonight. Got some drawrings to showya.

Goin' to the monastery tomorrow for Great Con! Woot!

Commander Kip

"I want this because of reasons."

Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: SUNSHINE

You know what I was missing at college, that I didn't realize I was missing until I lived at home for a week?

Sunshine.

I missed it.

It was seventy degrees and sunny at home. I went outside without a parka. I wore a sleeveless dress on Easter and sunburnt my collarbones. It was wonderful. And although I didn't mind the snow before I left for break, coming back to more cold weather was hard.

So I dug through my files and pulled out some sunshiny pictures to console myself with. Sunshine, ladies and gents, is the Thing of the Day.

Ah. I feel better now. Back to work!

Oh, and I listened to the BBC Radio production of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, and it had James McAvoy and Benedict Cummerbatch and Christopher Lee in it, and hooboy it was awesome. Then I sallied forth and purchased a copy of the book forthwith. I really should read more Neil Gaiman. The dude's a brilliant genius. There will be Neverwhere art. It's inevitable.

But first, perhaps a shower.

Commander Kip
"Hey, guys! *bang bang bang* Stop having sex!"
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Halloween playlist

Hai gaiz, let's get into a Halloweeny mood here. Playlist time! Have some eerie/mystical musics.























Not an exhaustive list, but I'm pretty sure my blog will be impossible to load if I put any more videos in this post. Enjoy!

My parents sent me a skirt in the mail. From the Renaissance Festival. Because they love me.

Also, I made myself useful in D&D this week and used a Death Stone thingy to kill an annoying orc while the rest of my team was flailing around with their arms all dead and shriveled. It was awesome. For once. I also got to be psionically linked with a zombie mouse in order to eavesdrop on the Varalosian Council. That was fun too. And then sexytimes in the tavern! Because we have a habit of ending our sessions with either a battle or sexytimes. Yay.

Shutting up about D&D now. Fun stuff planned this weekend, because college is a great idea. Should prolly go finish all the homeworks first. Bye.

Commander Kip
"So Eric's not a necromancer, I'm not drunk, Sam's not a thief, and Matt's not a dragon. What about Austin and Tyler, what aren't they?" "Here."
Normal is overrated!

The Day's the Thing: ARRRRRRRRRGH!

Avast, me beauties, it be International Talk like a Pirate Day! The Day itself do indeed be the Thing this time. In honor o' this joyous occasion, prepare yeselves fer a lollopin' journey through Cap'n Kippy's top three favorite piratical films! AAARRRRR!

Sorry. Anyway. The first one is Peter Pan!

I know, it's not strictly a pirate film, but there are enough pirates in it that it should count. I adore this movie because it's extremely quotable and also visually gorgeous. And, y'know, Jeremy Sumpter. And Rachel Hurd-Wood. And also, this guy. *swoon*

Jason Isaacs = hottest Hook ever to appear onscreen. And probably the only Hook who was more of a character and less of a caricature. The Hook in the animated Peter Pan was basically comic relief. The Hook in Hook (with Robin Williams) was just ridiculous. His hair was a wig. But Isaacs's Hook had depth, a backstory, feelings, reasons for doing what he was doing. And he's also just freaking hot. I mean, look at that smexy face.

My second favorite pirate film is Treasure Planet, because, hello, STEAMPUNK SPACE PIRATES. You can't beat that. You just can't.

Disney does steampunk space pirates! It's a fantastic idea. It's a pity it didn't do better in the theater, but then again, the time of release was poorly planned. (It came out at the same time as Don Bluth's Titan A.E., which, incidentally, I also love.) Anyway, this movie gets me because of the relationships between the characters. Jim and his mother, struggling to cope in the absence of Mr. Hawkins. Jim and Silver, developing that mentor/father figure/mortal enemy thing. Doppler and the Hawkins family as he helps them out in times of strife. Doppler and Amelia, the unlikely lovers. Amelia and Arrow, captain and loyal first mate. B.E.N. and everybody else, because after being alone so long, he just wants to be friends with the whole wide world. And Morph. Just... Morph. A flying pink blob that somehow manages to be the single most adorable thing you've ever seen in your life. They're all so beautifully nuanced and realistic, for an animated movie about steampunk space pirates. Also, two of Disney's hottest animated characters to date: Jim Hawkins, troubled teenage heartthrob (voiced by Joseph Gordon-Levitt, oh that's why) and Captain Amelia, strong, clever, sexy cat lady (voiced by Emma Thompson. Which, again, explains everything.)

And, the third one is - surprise - Pirates of the Carribean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.

Because it's awesome, that's why. And the first one was definitely the best. Zombie pirates. Yeah. And again, just a gorgeous movie. Details all spot-on. and FUNNY. SO FUNNY. Talk about quotable. I loved the tone of the first one because it was just a big rollick. Sneaking, swordfights, cannonfights, daring escapes, zombies, pirate caves, kidnapped ladies, marooning, billowy shirtsleeves, cursed treasure, bumbling henchmen, the whole bit. And as an added bonus, it's full of pretty people, particularly this guy:

Check out the hair. It's epic. And the little braids in his beard? Priceless.

So there be m'top picks fer piratical-type movies, me lubbers. Watch'em, I do beseech ye, or I'll be forced to tar, feather, scupper 'n'keelhaul the scurvy lot of ye. An' don't think I wouldn't, either.

Fare-thee-well, mateys! Don't forget t'speak nautical-like today! An' belt out a shanty or two while yer about it!



Commander Kip
"A firefly!" "A pixie!" "Amazing!"
Normal is overrated!

Things of the Day: Paper TARDIS and YouTube/Mp3 converter

S'up, dudes. 

So, I just returned from the lake with the family of Brenticus, and my hair is all stiff with chlorine still, but I had a freaking awesome time. More about that in a sec - first, the Things of the Day!

Thing 1: Fold your own miniature paper TARDIS! (Source: http://commanderkip.deviantart.com/favourites/50909446?offset=48#/d3dvtvd) I saw this on DeviantART and immediately had to make myself one. Props to CyberDrone, who figured out how to  do this! By the way, Brenticus's sister, this was totally gonna be your birthday present, but when I printed it, my parents' demented printer turned it pink. So now you can print your own. XD

Thing 2: a site that converts YouTube videos into mp3's - huzzah!

http://www.youtube-mp3.org/

Once you turn it into an mp3, go into the Properties menu of the mp3 and make sure you fill in the name, artist, genre, etc. Yeah, it's not a perfect system, but it's fairly straightforward all the same.

So yes, the lake. It was a last minute type of thingy, and I have to thank Lady Arin for being flexible and letting me move my days with her to later in the week (I leave for her house tomorrow.) That way I could do both. Both is good. We had some sketchy weather down there, and the water was sorta cold, but we did watch a lot of Doctor Who (I cried - more than once) and sing songs in the car and play Ninja and Groundies and My Cows, which I was terrible at. Also, right before we left, I did a thing... but I'm not telling you what it was yet. It was a rather drastic thing, but I like it. I think.

Also, they lent me Artemis Fowl: The Last Guardian, which is the last-ever book in the Artemis Fowl series. (No spoilers. I haven't read it yet.) I know I'm gonna cry at the end, even if it's a happy ending. Funny how I got into the series as a kid and now it's wrapping up just as I leave for college. Impeccable timing, Mr. Colfer, quite impeccable. ArtyxHolly forever! *geekface*

Oh, by the way; my graduation ceremony/reception combo deal went smashingly. I didn't fluff anything too bad, the Takacs Project was a big hit, and the reception was a blast. It was almost surreal for me, seeing all the people I love, who didn't know each other, in the same room. Got to catch up with some peeps who I haven't seen in ages, like Reedfrost, Dan, and my old pal John (I made my two Johns shake hands - WEIRD.) I also got to see Arin, Ereka, Gecko, Pippin, Amzi (briefly), my cousins, and Brentalope/his siblings. I even got to bring a few of them home for questioning a midnight snack later. Poor Arin - I think we scared her a bit with all our shooting and screaming, but that's what you get when you put me, Brenticus, Reedfrost, Hazmat and my brother in a room with Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and only four Xbox controllers. Screaming and shooting WILL ENSUE. And boy, did it ever. My brother's voice gets very shrill when he's angry/gaming, let's just leave it at that.

Now it's like two in the morning, and I have to finish my thank-you notes in the morning and pack for Lady Arin's. Egad.

Commander Kip
"You're doing it, you sexy thing!"
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: hinged jar

  Since the photos from the workshop are not yet in order (Snuffles took pictures of the Firefly costumes, but somehow I didn't) I have here the most random Thing of the Day you are likely to ever see on this blog. Here we go. I was at Barnes & Noble on the way home from my NEW AND SHOINY JOB that I will tell you all about later, and I found this... thing... on the clearance trolley. What is is? I have no idea. The tag says "hinged jar" and it is the most adorably useless thing I have purchased in my entire life. You all know how deeply I abhor pink, but this hinged jar thing just makes me squee for some unknown reason. I mean, look at it - it's a hinged jar in the shape of an ice cream cone. How is that not awesome?

The other awesome thing I saw at the bookstore was actually in the parking lot: a real live Bumblebee. Lookit.

Bumblebee. For serious. It was like meeting a celebrity or something. Again, I don't even like Transformers but this was frickin' impressive. I sneakily took these pictures since the owner of the car appeared to be elsewhere. I tell you, when I grow up and purchase my own vehicle, it will either be a sleek black car and I will call it the Batmobile, or a boxy van with flower stickers and I will call it the Mystery Machine. (There was very little grammar in that sentence; good thing my mother doesn't read my blog.) One or the other, I'm not particular. But if I were super rich and didn't mind the color yellow, I would love to own this sucker. Isn't it glorious? You know it is.

Now, back to sorting pictures.

Oh, and about the job, I'm working in the office of a place that sells bathroom fixtures to dealers. Better than kitchen knives, I think. Though it is rather warm in the office, but maybe that's because my mommie made me wear long pants since it was my first day. Oh, mommie.

Commander Kip
*brushing ashes off self* "Christmas Eve on a rooftop. I saw the chimney and my whole brain just went, 'What the hell?'"
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: Assassin's Creed I

So I was doing great on my goal of writing several pages when I got up in the mornings... and then my stupid brother bought me Assassin's Creed I and II at MicroCenter for ten dollars. Terrible idea. I installed AC1 on my shiny!new!laptop and have subsequently not been writing. At all. For like an entire week. This is bad. So this morning, I closed down the game and opened Chapter 2 back up and wrote some actual pages and felt better about myself. But now it's lunchtime and the game is calling...

Whatever. Point being, it's a pretty cool game, although I made the mistake of watching my brother play AC2 while playing AC1 myself, and got a little disenchanted with poor disabled Altair who can't swim or assassinate from hiding spots. It's sort of depressing. That being said, HAYSTACKS. They are my newfound love. I adore how you can jump off a really high tower and land safely in a haystack with a little "flump" sound. It's hilarious when the guards are chasing you and you break their line of sight and then "flump" into a haystack and they're scratching their heads and trying to figure out where you went. I love haystacks SO MUCH. However, playing any sort of action game on a laptop is basically a heinous idea. Mousepads are not built for it. I need a real mouse for this, people. So bad. And a bigger screen wouldn't hurt either. But I would feel pretty beasty if I could say that I played through all of Assassin's Creed I on my laptop.

Have a crappy sketch of Altair. His name, by the way, should have an umlaut over the 'i' and is pronounced "All-tie-EER." Those hoods, man, they're freaking irresistible.

Hokay, back to work. Sorry I'm so very distractable.

Oh, and I forgot to mention - I applied for this job the other day, because the company sent me an extremely ambiguous letter in the mail, and I had to go to this tiny office in a sketchy part of town and do an interview with an overly-cheerful lady. I did get the job, which was selling kitchen knives, but both my mother and I had objections to me, a not unattractive nineteen-year-old girl, going into strange people's houses and selling them knives. It's just not a good equation, you know? So I turned that one down, even though I'm poor. And then, when my mom called the cheery lady to tell her our objections and decline the offer, the lady was all "well, in all my years of working here, we've never had an incident" and my mom was like "yeah, but it only takes one, and I'd rather my daughter not be your one and only incident, thanks." I'd prefer to live, personally. So I'm applying to Michael's now, where I'd be selling art supplies instead of kitchen knives. Thank you very much.

And by the way, I sold almost all my girl toys at that sale. All that's left is most of the Ello, because almost nobody bought it, having never seen it before. That's fine with me; I'll box it up for my kids. Or maybe just so I can play with it some more.

Commander Kip
*covers one eye* "How does Fury see these things?" "He turns."
Normal is overrated!

Thing(s) of the Day: Pogo, pus recent news

I stumbled across these cool videos a week or two ago and decided they were too cool not to share. This guy, Pogo, takes sounds clips from movies and strings them together to make these whimsical melodies. Admittedly, not the kind of thing I habitually enjoy, but I especially like these two (he's done some nice Disney ones as well.)

Mostly I like this one because, you know, Lord of the Rings. It's awesome already. Plus, I find it vastly entertaining that Sam and Elrond scream on the exact same pitch. Anyone else amused by this?

And as for this one, it's got this darling intricate melody that is incredibly catchy, yet I can never seem to remember it later. And by the way, A Little Princess was one of my all-time favorite books when I was a wee lass just learning how to read. A Secret Garden as well. Ah, childhood. Strange to think back to a time when none of the books I read had crazy fight scenes or kissing or anything in them. And now they all do. Lol.


In other news (several things):

(1. I have recieved a very nice financial aid package from St. Olaf, including their highest piano scholarship and second-highest art scholarship, huzzah! *mops brow* Great heaping load of stress off right there, thank the Light. And as for the li'l bro, he got accepted for the Piano Academy there this summer even though he's technically a year too young. They really liked his audition tape. So yay.

(2. My mommie more or less required me to apply for the Great Conversations program at St. Olaf, which is basically a combination of core classes for your first and second year in which you read/analyze/discuss great works of art and literature, beginning with the Ancient Greeks and Romans and progressing as far into the present day as the professors feel like going. It's extremely comprehensive, as well as extremely hard to get into, because if I remember correctly, there's only forty spots. You write an essay, and that's all they have to go on to evaluate you. I wrote a crappy essay, my mom edited it, I wrote it again, she made more edits, and we worked it along until both of us were fairly happy with it. Apparently it was good enough, because I made it in. XD Thanks, Mommie.

(3. I just found out that an art piece of mine won some Grand Award thing in the Shawnee Mission district art show. Tomorrow I have to go to the awards ceremony, and it's gonna be on TV and stuff. I think that means I have to look pretty or something. Crap. *shambles into the corner, muttering to self*

(4. So my chamber choir always has their progressive dinner thingy the night before State every year, mostly to discourage kids from partying late, since we have to ride the bus at a ludicrous hour of the morning. We went to three different houses and ate them all out of house and home. I sat at a table full of boys at the second house and we had a heated discussion about whether the Avengers movie is going to suck or not. (I, personally, fear the suckage. I mean, the Iron Man movie was lame, Thor was reportedly lame, Hulk = whatever, Black Widow didn't even get her own movie, Captain America had a weird ending... basically, the precedents are not good. We shall see.) Anyway, after the dessert course, we did a scavenger hunt that led us on a merry chase all up and down my choir conductor's neighborhood. We had to cross a creek in formal wear. It was bloody brilliant, although I did accidentally dip the hem of my dress in the water when I was leaping from rock to rock in the pitch blackness, since I sort of forgot my flashlight. Whatever, I found out this morning that my team won. Peachwave gift cards. Heck yeah. Although I have massive cramps in both legs because we RAN THE ENTIRE TIME and I am woefully out of shape. Like woefully. As in, borderline extremely fat. At least, it feels that way to me.

(5. Got up at five a.m. this morning to get on a bus and go to Emporia with my chamber choir for State (our performance time was 8:40 a.m.) We did really well at District - got a I rating with like 74 points out of 80. Today at State, we got a I rating with 79 points out of 80. So that was cool. Although I'm totally dying right now. I'm so spoiled - I'm hardly ever out of bed before eight anymore. Yes, I know I'm spoiled! Quit smacking me! I WILL MAKE YOU BLEED!! Ahem.

(6. At the used book sale last week, or whenever it was, I was fortunate to encounter the entire Star Wars: Jedi Academy book trilogy, which I immediately snapped up, because they were like fifty cents apiece and I can never find all three of them in one place. Just finished the first one, Jedi Search, last night. Ah, more nostalgia. I love Han and Chewie. That is all. I remember when I watched the movies with my parents for the first time, and every time a new character came on the screen, I would be all like, "Is that a good guy or a bad guy? It's a good guy, right? What are those little hooded things? Are they nice? Why do people always fall down when that black-cape guy is around?" Imagine me saying all those things in my reedy small-child voice, and you can probably imagine my parents repeating over and over, "Just watch the movie and see!" Oh, right, book sale. In addition to the aforementioned Star Wars books, I also picked up a copy of Divergent, because I decided I liked it enough to own it; Delirium, which my book-buddy friend at school is currently raving about; I'd Tell You I Love You, but Then I'd Have to Kill You, which Lady Arin has been bugging me to read for ages, and I finally read it! There, happy? I'm sorry, but I think I missed my window. I probably would have enjoyed it far more if I'd read it when I was fourteen. Now I was like, Holy crap, this chick is such a fifteen-year-old girl. So. MUCH. I swear, she uses the word "totally" like twenty times a second. But granted, there were a few funny parts.

(7. Other book stuff. Recently finished both Hamlet and Lord of the Flies for English; enjoyed Hamlet quite a bit, but not so much the other. Lord of the Flies just reminds me of the mutated love child of Lost and Peter Pan. It's rather frightening. But mostly just gory. Gorier than I tend to like. Not a huge fan of skulls splitting open and brains spilling out, thanks very much. However, I am also simultaneously in the middle of Incarceron (borrowing from my school book-buddy) and A Game of Thrones, which I like so far. I've had a few spoilers on account of my brother having watched several episodes of the show at my grandparents' house, but it's still a rich read. Dawww, Bran! *huggles the little climber* Dude, I really want a direwolf as a pet. Especially one that would defend me from jerkwad snotty princes. That would be freaking awesome.

(8. I am amassing a list of things I need to read/watch/play/do before college this coming fall. It's gonna be a super busy summer if I even attempt to get through it all. The list currently includes: finish all three Tomb Raider games (probably too ambitious, but oh well); finish Twilight Princess; play through Portal; have Firefly marathon with Brenticus; watch every episode of Teen Titans ever created; watch Aladdin; play Assassin's Creed (probably just the first one - there's no way I'll have time for all of them); paint up the spare Nerf guys I have lying around in my room; oh yeah, clean out my room so the bro can live in it; SEE MILADY; play more Skyrim (although that's quickly losing its glamour - plenty of better things to do); take another crack at Myst V perhaps; write second draft of Erimon Hill (hopefully BEFORE workshop, but seriously, can I make that happen? Probably not); read moar Shakespeare (specifically Macbeth, The Tempest, and Romeo and Juliet... that's my own personal list); sell a bunch of my old crap; get a new computer; work at the Taekwondo studio and earn some actual monies; watch Scott Pilgrim vs. The World; go see shiny new movies coming out (Dark Knight Rises, The Hobbit Part I, and others); catch up on movies I missed in the theater (John Carter, Sherlock Holmes 2, and whatever else); eat lots of Peachwave, cuz I doubt they have those in Minnesota; get my Ipod situation fixed (we don't have Itunes on any of our computers anymore); prepare for my graduation showcase/ceremony in early August; and basically hang out with my family and high school friends as frigging much as possible. *gulps down some air* Whew, I thought I was going to asphyxiate there for a second. See how much stuff that is? I could not sleep a single minute this entire summer and still not get around to it all. Ack, so much stuff!

But first, school. I am so done with it, guys. Please. Take it away.

Commander Kip
"Are you guys done yet?" "Shut it! This is going to take HOURS. HOURS... and HOURS."
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: DIVERGENT by Veronica Roth

I wasn't planning on this particular Thing of the Day, but there's life for you. Always throwing wrenches and crow's feet and sticky grenades in your plans. Silly life. Annnyway.

My friend from school lent me this book, DIVERGENT, and I started it yesterday and finished it... yesterday. So I wanna talk about it for a sec. (By the way, it's set in dystopian Chicago, and I've been to Chicago, so nyeh. 'S cool to read about a city you've been to. Like when Percy Jackson accidentally blows a hole in the St. Louis Arch and stuff while fighting a chimaera. But that's sorta beside the point.) Point is, this particular dystopian society is separated into five factions, which people sort themselves into at the age of sixteen depending on their personality. However, the protagonist, Beatrice Prior, also/later known as Tris, doesn't fit nicely into any of the factions and is therefore considered Divergent, which is the same thing as "extremely dangerous to the government," because she can't be controlled. Apparently, Divergence is very rare in this society. Now, here's what's funny. My parents have raised me Divergent all my life. They sat me down and gave me a big serious talk about divergence right before I started public school. My whole family is majorly divergent. So reading about this chick who was raised in a theoretical box and whose life is constantly in danger because she's just discovered that she's Divergent is fascinating to me. It's like, whenever she thinks she should just fit in and do what her faction is doing, I'm going, Nooo, that's not the way to do it. Do your own thing, Tris! In fact, I believe that if everyone were more Divergent, the world might even be a better place for it. Instead of hordes of sheepul who do and think whatever theyr'e told, we might have a community of aware people who know what's going on in the world and aren't afraid to speak/act differently than perhaps the government wishes they would. In the book, the five factions are based on the qualities of selflessness, kindness, knowledge, truth, and courage. You have to pick one. You don't get to be all of them. But one of the characters, Four, says he wants to be all of them, and that everybody should be all of them. They can't work as well independently of one another. Here's me in total agreement, you guys.

And get this; just for kicks, I took the faction quiz in the back of the book, which is supposed to determine which faction you would be in, and my results were... inconclusive. I had answers in every category. I can't be classified. I'm Divergent. I KNEW IT! And the really funny part is, Divergent wasn't even a choice in the results. Just the five factions. They didn't actually build Divergence into the quiz. Isn't that interesting? And the even funnier part is, I took the quiz before I actually read the book, and I didn't know what it meant, at first, that none of my answers matched any one single faction. Then I read the book and I was like, oh, I get it now.

So basically, I'm so glad my parents didn't raise me in a way that lets other people put me in a box. I like being Divergent. Yay padres especiales! It's wasn't a particularly well-written book, slightly sub-par to Hunger Games, I would say; but it did make me think. Which is good.

Now I gotta go clean the house and vacuum up some wasp carcasses before the fam gets here for Easter tomorrow. Later, all!

Commander Kip
"What if they solve the case first?" *derpface* "Nah."
Normal is overrated!

Thing of the Day: The Hunger Games movie

It's the Thing of Yesterday, actually, but who's keeping track? I'm posting about it today. Because I can, or whatever.

So guess what?

THE MOVIE WAS AWESOME.

I'm serious. It was. Sure, there were minor discrepancies between it and the book, but aren't there always? Yes, because how are they gonna stuff the whole story into a two-hour film otherwise? (Lord of the Rings doesn't count in this discussion - truly the only movies that were "as good as" the books.) People always gripe about how the movie wasn't an EXACT REENACTMENT of the book, but srsleh ppl, the movie would be like five hours long if they did that. See why books are awesome? Because they're easy to carry around, and they hold more hours' worth of content than movies do. A movie is not the "ultimate form" of the book - the book itself is as close to perfect as the story will most likely get. The movie is just cool because it's a visual interpretation of the book. With books-turned-movies, I try to hold the two separate in my mind and appreciate each for their strengths. For example, Percy Jackson. Fun book. A blast, actually. Movie: also a blast. But COMPLETELY DIFFERENT. But still really cool. Now, some books-turned-movies are truly and seriously terrible, such as Eragon. *shudder* That was just a bad movie. But back to the topic.

*SORTA SPOILERY, WATCH YOURSELF* Hunger Games made an interesting movie because they could show stuff Katniss couldn't see in the book, a minor downside of first person POV. We got to see the Gamemakers messing with the game in a tricked-out control room thingy with touchscreens and holograms all over the place, and it was super freaking cool. They also showed, on several occasions, President Snow and Seneca Crane in a rose garden, discussing how the Games were progressing and how to contain Katniss while still putting on a good show. There were several little added things like that, things we missed in the book because we only ever saw what Katniss herself saw. It was cool how they fleshed out Seneca Crane's character, because he's not physically around much in the book, but in the movie they gave him this fantasic fancy beard and a center part in his hair and he looked freaking awesome.

The only thing that actually bothered me about the movie was the shaky camera work. I know it's supposed to look gritty and immediate, but really it just gives everyone a headache. Something else that bothered me, but not nearly as much, was how little time Katniss and Peeta spent in the cave. In the book, that's where they develop most of their relationship, but in the movie, they had like one kiss and that was it. Huh? There could have been more making out, in my opinion. Some of the stuff they abbreviated, I was fine with; like, nobody actually wants to watch Katniss flail around in the forest for three days looking for water. Boring. And certainly nobody wants to listen to Cato screaming for hours and hours while the mutts tear him to pieces. Gross. But I do think the cave part could have been at least a little more substantial.

Whatever, I'll stop spoiling the movie for you. I thought it was awesome. Can't wait for the next installment!

And to celebrate this momentous occasion, look what I found. The first drawing I ever did of Peeta and Katniss!

I think they're supposed to be on top of the Cornucopia, but then again, my drawing skills were less than fabulous in 2009 (this sketch is from my old sketchbook; I've found so many fun little unfinished things in there!) The first time I read the book, I was under the impression that the Cornucopia was an actual cornucopia, except really big and made out of metal. Well, yeah, whatever. The point is, there are plenty of things wrong with this picture, but I like it for sentimental reasons. Peeta has always had beautiful hair in my art. XD

Commander Kip
"I mean, she's just leaning against the tree and then Peeta's like, 'BREAD!'"
Normal is overrated!