Richard Dawkins. Yeah. I didn't see it coming either. I've been reading his latest book, The Greatest Show on Earth, because I figured it was about time I understood evolution (when not talking over any explination in defense of creationism). And I've seen one of his documentaries and watched some interviews on youtube. And while watching the other night, I found myself thinking, "You know, he's not bad looking for an old guy."



His British accent, seductive smirk, scientific vocabulary (mmm, say Australopithicus again)...

I don't know!

(I told my boss today that I used to be involved with the Christian Fellowship in my high school. He was surprised that I used to be so religious. It's strange to think that those who knew me when I was younger than eighteen/nineteen and those who know me now will have such a different view of me, based on my beliefs.)

---

I'm getting a big bed this weekend. After spending my nights in half of what used to be my sister and my bunk beds from our childhood, I think it's time to grow up and get myself a double. Or queen. I want a queen, but it'll depend on if I can find a good deal. I feel a little guilty, since last Christmas both parents got me twin-sized bedding, which will now be useless to me, but my dad is coming to Waterloo to help me find my matress, so I think they are supportive. (I also made the awkward comment, when saying I didn't really need a queen to my dad, of "It's not like I'm sharing it with anyone." I kept the "yet" to myself.)

---

I miss Glee! Less than one week more. It's been so long!

---

Oh yeah. Halloween. It was pretty awesome. Roommates and I went as the Sanderson Sisters from Hocus Pocus. I was really worried I wouldn't finish it in time, or get the effect I wanted. The first time I had put on my complete costume was as we were heading out the door, but I'm really happy with how it turned out. We didn't spend a lot of time mingling, but I like to think that we were recognised.
( Pictures! I'll put a spell on you! )

I'm back on nights after a few weeks on the glorious and coveted day shifts. Since my roommates are gone by the time I wake up and are in bed when I get home, it feels like I'm living with a ghost. I don't see anyone, other than the pets, but things are moved around slightly when I get home from where I left them. Sometimes it's kinda fun, getting some alone time, but it's also depressing. By the time I get to work I'm in need of some human interaction and can't stop babbling all the random thoughts that I've had during my silent day.

I'm using my use of the apartment to re-watch Battlestar Galactica. I stopped watching it at the beginning of season three when it was airing because I didn't have cable, and just figured I'd watch it when it was all out on dvd. But then never got around to it. I'm a little bit spoiled for who some of the cylons are, but oh well. I'm really enjoying it, remembering the good times I had the first time around. I'm about half way through season one.

That's about all I do. I should be working on my halloween costume, and cloaks for Laura and Phaedra, but something about knowing I have to go to work in a few hours keeps me from being productive in any way. Hopefully I'll be back on days next week.

Completely unrelated to the above, I can't stop listening to the songs from Glee. I'm obsessed with the show (nothing surprising there). I have a few issues with it, but the singing makes up for it every time. And I rewatch the episodes the next day. I usually have to wait a few months before I'll re-watch something, but with Glee, I could watch each episode over and over. 

( More on Glee )

They are cleaning the windows on our building, so Laura and I thought it would be a good idea to put our Zefron cutout directly in the window, facing outside.

Now we are hiding in my room because we're giggling too much.

Also, Ladyhawke is playing on our television, alone, unwatched.

I'm copying unhappyending  and posting our halloween plans. I can't wait to get started. I've already done costume sketches for all of the characters, and am excited to see how I'm going to figure out how to put mine together with my extremely amateur costuming skills. Hopefully come October 31st, the following will come true:



Excuse my lack of photoshop. I have no idea how to use the program, so I put this together in five minutes using Paint. Hopefully it will amuse.

But we're going to be the Sanderson Sisters from Hocus Pocus!! Me as Sarah, Phae as Winnie, and Laura as Mary. Plus we'll have at least one Binx, perhaps two. (I'm hoping for a Thackery, only because I want him to be quoting all night. "HAST THOU SEEN MY SISTER EMILY!?!")

My biggest fear is how to imitate the corset without making an actual corset. I think I'll be experimenting with cardboard and various weights of fabric. It'll be fun to be blond for a night.

In my more imediate life, I've been working some crazy long hours. Of my six shifts this week, four are at least ten hours, so that's fun. Today was my day off, and I did nothing but watch tv and plan for halloween. Got in some ReBoot, Fraggle Rock and Road to Avonlea, and also finally watched Inkheart after reading the book a while ago. Plus, of course, Hocus Pocus for research.

And I've been listening non-stop to The Decemberists since seeing them in Toronto earlier this month. I wish I had listened to their most recent album more before seeing them, though I still had a great time. I wasn't sure how it'd go, playing the entire album through, but it was pretty rocking. And having listened to the album and learned the story, I can't listen to The Hazards of Love 4 without crying because I'm lame. Stupid Decemberists with their sad love stories. I wish they'd come back sooner so I can see them again.

Now I'm just putting off going to bed, since tomorrow I don't have to work until 5. Why sleep if you don't have to?

I am eating chocolate ice cream at 3:30 am while I'm supposed to be packing for a three day trip to my mom's place. My bus leaves at 9:30 tomorrow morning, but I don't care because I have chocolate ice cream. I'll probably regret this tomorrow night when I've forgotten to pack my pyjamas or underwear or something. But for now: chocolate ice cream!!!

Been thinking about growing up and what being a grown-up means lately, and I've come to the conclusion that a lot of the sentiments expressed in this xkcd relate to me. Which is probably why it makes me laugh out loud every time I read it.

I'm going to go back to reading Harry Potter now, instead of talking about my feelings.

I was feeling bored and restless last night. I think it's because I had just returned from a great vacation and I was having trouble readjusting to Real Life. I was in the mood for some good escapist fun, but reading or watching a movie wasn't cutting it. So I wandered around my apartment, moping, until I came up with a plan. I proposed it to my roommates, expecting to get a negative response.

Me: Hey guys, do you want to play dress-up with me?
Laura and Phae: Sure.

I love my roommates.

( The Results )

I just dyed my hair for the first time ever. It's a reddish brown. My wonderful roommate unhappyending helped me/did it for me. THe following took place while rinsing my hair of the dye in the tub.

Me: [The rinse water] looks like blood.
Phaedra: Yeah, you have to rinse it until it runs clear.
Me: Aw...
Phaedra: Yeah, it reminds me of Farscape too.

I enjoy that I didn't even have to say anything and she knew I was thinking of D'Argo.

Well, I've finally finished my room. Obviously there will be small aditions and subtractions, but I'm happy with how it is at the moment.

( large-ish images of my room because I know you want to creep (I would) )

I hate summer. I really really am hating it. When it first got hot, I was all nostalgic about the summers of my childhood. Then it got hotter and I remembered I never liked summer and couldn't wait for school to start again in September. And as an adult, the few good things about summer are gone. I don't get to sit in the shade all day and read. I have to go to work, which is even hotter than outside. I don't get to go to the beach every weekend because 1) it's far away, and 2) I don't get weekends.

But I did get to sleep outside on our balcony last night. That was actually nice, and I think I'll be doing it whenever it's too hot in my bed. I bought a fan today, so that should help. I've also been practically living off of popcicles, which are yummy, if unsubstancial.

There have been a few good things happening lately. I'm going camping in just over two weeks, which should make me less cranky about summer. And I discovered Harry Potter the Musical via anteka, which is like the next level of wizard rock. Voldemort tap-dances, a Zefron poster is a huge plot key, there's no Emma Watson, and singing! Their Draco is my favourite. Actually, I love the entire cast, other than Bellatrix. Even though there's no Lupin.

I want to go swimming.

I watched Tombstone for the first time since grade nine tonight. I was in the mood after watching the OK Corral episode of Star Trek TOS last week.

This was my first Val Kilmer movie. The movie that started The Obsession. I'm pretty sure Val was even before Ewan McGregor. We watched it in grade nine English. We had to do an assignment on it, so that our "hot" young English teacher (who I just googled and found out he's now at Oxford. Random hockey picture of him. He used to play his guitar and sing to us, and apparently he once dated the girl from Aqua while in Europe.) had an excuse to show us movies. I once went to him and asked if we could watch more Val Kilmer movies. He showed us The Saint. Which lead to an embarassing moment for me as he fast-forwarded through a sex scene.

This movie taught me a few things. The word lewd , for example, which deirdreaurora  and I used to use when describing Val Kilmer on the French room chalk board. (We didn't really know what it meant.) It also taught me about foreshadowing in film. Like when a guy gets pushed, and knocks over a row of leaning coffins, it means he's probably going to die. And there's religious allusions and symbolism. And, again, it introduced me to Val Kilmer, which lead me to films like The Prince of Egypt (actually, I would have watched that even without Val), The Ghost and the Darkness, Top Gun and Batman Forever.

I didn't see Willow until this past year, and I think it's my favourite.

I pretend he never did the voice of the car on the new Knight Rider.

I miss Val Kilmer. Maybe I'll finally watch At First Sight.

While watching TNG today I wondered who would be cast in a reboot of the series. I got as far as Wayne Brady and Neil Patrick Harris as Jordie and Data. My mind was too busy with visions of them singing a duet in Ten Forward to get to the rest of the characters.

After all the business of moving and traveling out West, I came home to working 108 hours in two weeks. Unfortunately those weeks were on different pay cheques, so apparently I won't be getting any overtime, but that's another matter. This week I'm only working 29 hours, so I can actually spend time in my new apartment!

My room was finally unpacked last week, and today I went to put stuff on my walls. I know I was going to go for a more grown-up look, but I can't help putting pictures of Remus Lupin on my wall. I won't post pictures until it's absolutely finished, which will hopefully be by the end of the week. I think the best touch would be to find that gnome pattern that was used on George's wallpaper on Being Human that I posted about a while ago - that pattern on fabric so that I can turn it into curtains.

The rest of the apartment is pretty much finished. We're just waiting for some bookshelves that my mom is bringing up at the end of May. So our books and crafts are still in boxes, awaiting us to finish that area of the living room. But other than that, I love how our place has turned out. And I'm not sharing with stupid boys anymore, but with people I actually like. It's like where I lived in second to fourth years, except geekier.

And as an example, I decided to set up all of our action figures on a shelf today.
( and at night they come to life! )

I guess I can admit that most of them are mine, though Phaedra made the Merlin, Sam and Dean in the back row. More fun can be seen with the Star Trek figure on facebook or here at Phaedra's post. Funny story about that day, but also a little embarassing, so not being told here at this time.

Now that the television season is over (and nothing to look forward to over the summer except So You Think You Can Dance and Glee), Laura, Phaedra and I are watching Battlestar Galactica. All of it, all the way through. I gave up beginning of season three, mostly because I had trouble getting a hold of new episodes back then, and also because I was tired of the previous story line. I am excited to watch it this way, especially because I'm not completely spoiled as to who all the cylons are. A few, yes, but not all twelve.

New Guinea Pig is doing very well. She's actually sleeping right now, which is rare to see. If she knows you are there, her eyes are open, even if she's laying down. My rats were like that too, usually. I'm glad I'm not on the bottom of a food chain. Oney's sleeping on my bed at the moment. I don't want to have to put her in the living room, but she'll just keep me up if I let her stay in here, with her sitting on my pillow and breathing in my ear.

I actually get a day shift tomorrow! Which means I can go and get stuff done after work! Also, it's not 12 hours long. Weird.

So much so that I can't sleep.

1. We are finally moved. And most of the apartment is set up. We're waiting on bookshelves from my mom before we tackle the book set-up, but other than that, everything is good. Except for my room. But I don't have time to do anything to it! I work, then (awesome) day in Toronto, full of ROM-y and Flight of the Conchords goodness, then I go home Thursday so that I can be ready to leave bright and early Friday for the flight to Calgary. So, yeah. I don't have time to sleep, let alone get anything set up in my room. I have boxes I haven't unpacked since I moved out of my place on Village on the Green, eight months ago, which was packed hastily and haphazardly.

2. While I love my new place, I do not like the distance from work. My shift finishes at 11pm, but my bus doesn't come until 11:38pm. So I get home soon after midnight, because thankfully at this hour, there are few stops. I wish I could bend space, or bore a hole through the Pattern (still reading Wheel of Time) or something. Hopefully I'll find something closer (and in the same city as I live) for September.

3. I finally understand the reference to Rufus Wainwright's song, Gray Gardens, thanks to an article I read today about the tv movie, Grey Gardens. There's an audio clip at the beginning of the song, ("It's very difficult to see the line between the past and the present" or something like that. I'm too lazy to look it up) that I always wondered what it was from. I'm assuming now it's from the 1975 documentary. I had given up trying to figure out what it was from. It's bugged me since first year, when I got the cd. Yay closure.

4. I like clicking spell check and having the only things pop up being "yay" and "Conchords." I blame reading.

ETA
5. AHH! I almost forgot! I went to see 17 Again - the one with Zefron and Matthew Perry. Yes, I went to see it for Matthew Perry. No, I actually went to see it because it looked amusing. And it was! So amusing! I'd totally go back and see it again in theatres. No shame! (I won't go through my reactions to individual scenes. That just might get too embarrassing.)

6. Aaaand, I just wrecked my spell check victory by trying to spell embarrassing with only one r.

7. Laura's cat is such a creeper. She's freaked out about the new apartment, so she's hanging with me in my room. Every few minutes I look around to find her staring at me from another location. I can't wait to introduce her to the guinea pig in a couple of weeks.

My Work Week of Hell is over. I got my sentence shortened from eight to seven days, thanks to a nice coworker who wants more hours so she can buy a car. I finally lost it tonight. After staying late the last two nights, scrambling for the entire shift trying to get customers served, preparing chicken (of which there is never enough of), and trying close, plus the thoughts of moving and trying to get everything packed in time, it was too much. So I freaked out about a serving of onion rings that wasn't even there. But after some crying and yelling and cookies, I felt better. Plus it startled my boss, and he stayed until an hour before close and was nice to me for the rest of the night.

Sometimes I think that if I had been upper class 150 years ago I'd be said to have "weak nerves" and I'd get lots of trips to the sea and Bath. Now I just eat chocolate.

Because I got my pent up anger out, I wasn't as hostile to the customers that come in too close to closing. Instead I got a little passive-agressive.

Me: Is that to go?
Customer: No, actually, it's for here.
Me: *blank stare*
Customer: I know it's late, but we'll try to be fast.
Me: Oh, okay. It's just that I've been trying to mop for a while now, but people keep coming in.
Customer: Don't you close at 11? (It was probably 10:20)
Me: Yes, but we have to be completely closed by 11. We don't get extra time after to mop and finish up. Enjoy your meal! *smiles*

Only two more shifts until I get my vacation. Flight of the Conchords concert, a trip to the ROM, and then nine days in Calgary with my family.

Plus, we start moving tomorrow. My dad is coming for the weekend to help me. I still have some stuff to pack up (Balls! I just remembered I left one of my packing boxes at work!), but I'll finish that tomorrow. I just can't wait to be out of this place and into a prettily painted apartment that reflects me, and where I have roommates that I like! And I'm getting my sister's guinea pig in May.

My sister and her boyfriend are on the cover of their university's panphlet. This makes me laugh, and hope that they get married so that I can post it at their wedding.


( Covergirl and boy )

Athena just died. I woke up to lots of moving noises coming from her cage which suddenly stopped. I knew what it was, but was still too asleep to do anything. My last two rats I was able to hold while they died, and while it's such a horrible death to watch, I feel horrible that Athena had to do it alone. I don't know. Maybe animals usually like dying alone. But I still feel...I just lost another one of my little ones. She was getting old for a rat, and I knew it would be soon, but whenever it happens, I still feel this way.

Yes, yes I am. Though I usually don't comment on an episode of something right after I've watched it live. Not lately, anyway. 

I'm a Supernatural fangirl, and I am not ashamed!

( Supernatural 4.18 )

In the Real World, yesterday was our New Aparment Day. We went, got our keys, paid our rent, and now it's ours. We can go there whenever we like. And it's ours. Painting begins next week, when my mom and sister come to help. Hopefully we'll be done fast. I'd like to get the majority of the paint smell out by the time we move on the 19th. I love it. After hanging out, eating take-out on the floor while watching How I Met Your Mother on Phaedra's laptop, it feels more like home than where I'm living now. And that's even when it's completely empty with white walls. I really want the next two weeks to go by fast. I know they will - time's been flying by for no reason - but I'm impatient.

Happy birthday Ewan McGregor. When I was 15, you were twice my age and I was in love with you. Now I'm 23 with a thing for Scottish accents and kilts. Thanks.

Happy birthday, Christopher Walken. You're creepy yet cool. Teach me?

I have so much that I feel like ranting about, but instead I'll just post a few pictures from Lord of the Rings online. As unhappyending  posted here, the Spring Festival is on, which means lots of fun running around through mazes and learning new dances, and getting really really drunk.
( Click here for wild Hobbit fun! )

And, since I can't hold it in, a quick overview of my life:
-I'm getting tired of my job. I want a big-person job, but am not qualified for any, which makes me panicky if I think about it too much. Plus, recession and whatnot.
-Going to Retro Prom in two days and am very excited. Have my ugly 80s dress (purple with shoulder pads and pearl buttons down the front) and sparkely tights all ready.
-I really really really really really really really want to move. I hate my place more and more every day. But I don't have a subletter yet, and while my landlord will let me out of my lease two months early, that still means I have two months of paying double rent. With my food industry pay.
-My youngest sister visited me last weekend. I hope she had fun. Didn't corrupt her too much this time. Middle sister also visited on Saturday with her boyfriend, and all four of us hung out. Chris will be a good addition to the family in a couple of years.
-Finished Book Five of Wheel of Time and want to continue. And I was going to only read to Book Two, just so I could role play with Laura in Netland Towers. I have to wait until tomorrow night to get book Six, though, and I have no idea what I'm going to read until then.
-Counting down the days until I get to go to Calgary. Maybe I'll feel better in my job after I've had a good vacation. Probably not, but I'm trying to be optimistic.
-I want to move. Did I mention that? I want to move so badly!