homing pigeon...no.
i don't like roads. especially the ones that go in both directions. if you turn the wrong way on that road, then you're going the totally opposite way that you really want to go. and it's bad for me, in that i'm not good at finding my way around places unless i go that way often. if i get really confused, i have trouble telling right from left. so, my mom makes maps for me. maybe it's the confusing lines of the fancy maps, or maybe it's the fragrant sharpie smell of my mom's maps, but i prefer her maps to the maps with all the tiny streets. and my friends make fun of my maps. road trip plans are swiftly squelched by my custom made maps. but i never get lost with my maps. and i use them to fill in the missing pieces of my mental map, which is getting pretty large now. maybe, when i'm 25, i won't need my mom's maps anymore.

morons say the darnedest things
sadam was offered some water during an interrogation, and he declined, saying:
"if i drink water, i will have to use the bathroom. how can i use the bathroom when my people are in bondage?"

well, that answers the question of "how can i get kidney stones and a bladder infection while my people are in bondage?"

a real quote from Dick Gephardt:
"everything you care about is vanishing. our good jobs are vanishing, our civil rights are vanishing, our clean air and clean water are vanishing. osama bin laden has vanished. sadam hussein has vanished. george bush needs to vanish."

we care about bin laden? we care about sadam? but he's not vanished anymore, though. i think "dip" gephardt needs to vanish. and they make fun of george bush for saying stupid things.

a holiday moment
i experienced a holiday moment today. it was 6th period. mrs. g had just opened a cutesy little christmas card someone had emailed her. from the speakers came the music of "silent night." i looked out the open portable door and saw the snow falling. and i saw an indian (from india) in a hawaiian shirt licking a light pole.

oh shut up!
i swear, i'm probably going to go deaf. but i'm not sure that's a bad thing. i put on headphones to drown out all the other sounds around me. but it's not working. my sister sings. loud. and totally interrupts my solitude with her warbling. arrrg! and when i tell her to sing quietly or go somewhere else, she sings louder because she lives to be annoying. so i turn up my music until i can't hear her. but i still can hear her. like the tell-tale heart, i can still hear her. so i turn up the volume more. and more. and the angrier i get, the louder the music gets. i can almost hear the cilia in my ear bending and snapping, like my last nerve. maybe i need some of those noise-canceling ear-buds.

the scarlet mustang
i have a certain space i park in at school. it doesn't have me name on it, but it might as well, because that's where i've always parked. well, this lady, a preschool aide, decides she wants to park her red mustang in the space beside me. i was perfectly fine with that. until she crossed the line. the literal line. first her tires, and i would compensate, giving her plenty of room. and i was ok with that. slowly, she began to encroach more and more upon my space. then, one day, i arrived at school, and there was the scarlet mustang, parked diagonally across two spaces, including mine. i held my irritation in check, assuming she was just trying to be cute. but everyday, there she would be, blatantly disregarding any seniority i held over that spot. and i began to become irritated. and so did the the rest of my class, probably because when the senior girls tried to park like that, we were specifically told, "only one space per student." so one day, after a week or two of the crazy parking, i arrived at school and saw jana and karen attempting to block her in, (suggested by a sub that heard our travails). jana parked on one side, and karen on the other, while karen's mom and erin watched approvingly. karen backed up a little so i could park, and we had made our point. it didn't take long for people to notice. the parents who had to wait at the most 45 seconds to get into the parking lot (in order to get in line and wait some more) complained about the students "practicing parallel parking." we weren't practicing. we were teaching a lesson! well, word got to the owner of the mustang, and she was furious. she said we had blocked her in, but we didn't. she could get out just fine and did before 1st period was over. she said she was going to talk to us, even though she didn't know who the cars belonged to exactly. but she never did come talk to us, probably because she knew we would ask her why she was parking like that, and "because i'm too lazy to back in the right way" wasn't a good enough answer. anyway, today she wasn't there, and i had my spot back. she never did talk to us, and the office didn't really care if we were "parallel parking" because they didn't say anything. so i don't forsee anymore problems from that controversial corner in the future.

"don't make me say the 'f' word!"
the old computer keeps crashing. but that's what i get for using the old one. os x is mucho mas stable. but i guess it's a good thing. this way, i realize that i have other things to do besides flit around the internet like a caffinated moth. of course, i do have two other computers i can get on. but i have to read two chapters of the scarlet letter for tomorrow. amber's giving me a copy of her history notes in exchange for my synopsis of the chapters. i've already read chapter 10, "The Leach and His Patient," and now i have to read 11, "The Interior of a Heart." yeah, arthur is the baby daddy. agh! i should be reading. focus focus focus! there! i said it! i said the "f" word!

turkey day, minus the turkey
we're not a normal family, so we didn't have a normal thanksgiving. we had our thanksgiving meal the day before, and it was barbeque. on thanksgiving we stayed at home all day. we watched pearl harbor, and i picked a wart out of my toe. my sister, the resident foot wart expert, advised me on how to do it. of course, she told me just to leave it the way it was afterward, skin peeled back and tender parts exposed, while my mom said i should put some neosporin on it. so take my sister's advice with a grain of salt. and neosporin. today, we got together with some family and ate more barbeque. and we've got two cakes and one pie for desert. so ya'll can keep your traditional thanksgiving, and we'll eat our barbeque and dig out our warts in peace. happy thanksgiving!

except for hal and skynet
sometimes i feel like i can relate better with computers than people. i'm sure i'm not the only geek that feels that way. in fact, i think that's a prerequisite for being a geek. and people may laugh at us because they don't understand how we'd rather be around inanimate objects as opposed to our own species. but it's pretty clear for me. computers don't judge you. they don't care if you're cool or not. they don't care what clothes you wear. you don't have to worry about hurting their feelings. sure, sometimes they'll make you mad or annoy you, but it's never personal. some people say that computers are stupid because they don't have a brain, but i think the exact opposite. it's because they can't think for themselves that they aren't susceptible to the moronic impluses of humans. do i need a better reason? i could also say that they're not fickle, but that would only apply to certain platforms, and you know who you are. :c)

homeless shelter
we went to the homeless shelter today to serve a thanksgiving meal. it was outside in the cold. we had to pick "buddies" to stick with, and the rules of engagement were pretty stiff. you can't be too careful, you know. well, amber was my buddy and angela joined us since she didn't have one. so here we are, three anti-socials released to mingle with the less fortunate. poor neurotic amber was fighting back the nausea that so often accompanies the social situations she's forced into. angela just stood there with amber. i felt guilty, though. as much as i hate being social, i didn't want to be selfish. i did help a man carry his food to where he was sitting. but amber and angela didn't follow. i was all alone, so i went back. a while later jeremiah tried to get us moving, and i stood by him smiling while he talked and asked people if they needed anything. i should have abandoned amber and angela and stuck with miah. the difference between them and me is that while i am antisocial, i know how to survive in a social world. one has to find a person or group of social people that one is comfortable with, hence deflecting much of the social responibility from oneself with a manageable portion left over. you're vulnerable in the open. hide in the crowd. that's what they didn't understand. and what i didn't fight to do. so while i did want to help and do feel guilty, i probably deserve whatever anyone would think of me for not helping as much as the other for not being proactive about it. shame shame. i'll go bury my self-pity in something productive now.

daisy's alter egos
i've got a little dog. she's a puppy, and her name is daisy. well, sometimes. you see, she's got these other personalities. sometimes she gets an insane look in her eyes and goes crazy, running around the room as fast as she can and making bank turns off the couch. that's "crazy eyes." one has to watch out for that character, lest one finds oneself a victim, pawed, clawed, and slathered with stinking saliva. then there's "randall." randall has no spine and slides everywhere. you've already heard about him. my favorite alter ego is "madam query." she was born out of a strange little game my sister created which involved a rawhide chew "treasure." my sister couldn't think of the exact name of the lady that discovered radium (madam curie) so she called her madam query. madam query would invade my sister's sofa cusion "ship" to steal the "treasure," and my sister would steal it back. well, the little dog looks dejected and alone, so i guess i'll go play with it. :c)