Boo To You, Fashion.

Well, I finished reading Pegasus  ages ago, but I'm still contemplating what I'm going to say about it, so the review is still non-existent.

And the rest of my life is spent sitting around, studying for exams, and eating. Also, my hair is turning a mousy brown color. It has been getting progressively darker each winter (the sun makes it lighter) and now I think it is about to give up being blond. What a terrible time to do so. I'm freaking 20! This is ridiculous.

I finally have a decent (if not large) wardrobe that complements my shape and coloring. My coloring is changing. Boo to you, fashion. Boo to you.

Blinds Are Your Friends

Last time on Solitary Life:  Pegasus was received, and occurrences of terrorism and naked-ness were mentioned!

---~---

Over the past year and a half I have had to learn what neighbors were. Close neighbors that when you look out your window you look into their apartments. 

My apartment complex is built with four buildings in a square. Each building has three floors and two studio apartments per floor (Tall and skinny, hence Tower Apartments). And I would say there's probably...ten feet between my window and my neighbors. So unfortunately, if my living room--slash bedroom slash dining room--window is open and so is theirs, then we get to see what each other is doing. This generally results in my blinds being down 90% of the time.

That percentage used to be much lower until...THE NAKED EXERCISE BALL MAN! Imagine my surprise last winter when I walk to my window, open the blinds, and then am confronted with a rather hairy buttocks bent over an exercise ball. Who the hell leaves their blinds open when they are unclothed?! Who uses exercise balls naked?!

My reaction to this was to double take, look apalled, look even more apalled, and then to throw myself away from my window and make Tyler close it for me. He insists that he saw no exercise man, but I'm assuming this is because naked dude moved out of sight. Why do I assume this? Guess.

You got it. He has made multiple appearances. And though I had hoped of his moving far far away to a nudist gym, he is still here. I saw him a few weeks ago. If I'm not mistaken he was holding a bag of popcorn. I wish I was making this up, but unfortunately....

All of this being blinded by lifting the blinds has resulted planning different ways to keep Naked Dude from opening his blinds. The best one I've come up with is to get a glass stink pellet (Can you still get those at dollar stores?) and use a blow gun (Hey, I was 15. They were cool then.) to shoot the pellet at his window. It will be so stinky he will have to close his window and hopefully his blinds. I am giving him one last chance to get some gym shorts. Then it's stinky time for his window.
 
On a less creepy note: I've become to be more accepting of the craziness that comes from having too much time to talk to yourself. I've made scarves, read a lot, and sometimes I even watch TV.

Pegasus by Robin McKinley or (SQUEEEEEE!)

I just now got my Robin McKinley book I pre-ordered MONTHS ago. I am freakishly excited and there will be a review here Monday if I am not mistaken. I keep meaning to blog about these stupid things that keep happening to me (Things that include a naked man on an exercise ball, and a brown jumping terrorist.), but I keep getting distracted. I'll get on that after the weekend. Until then I shall be looking like this:

This Made My Day

As I'm sitting at a gas station with my door slightly cracked talking to Tyler on the phone, two guys get into the pick up truck beside me.


Me: Blah blah blah, Tyler. Ha ha ha!

Guy 1: Hey look at that girl.

Guy 2: Yeah.

Guy 1: She's pretty as hell!

Guy 2: And not married...She's probably like 17, though.

As I leave the car: I'm 20, and I have a boyfriend.

Guy 1&2: .... ... ...

Me on the inside: HAHAHAHA!


Today I made two rednecks blush. I totally win.

College Cuisine: Bacon Grease is King (or) How To Use One Pan

First, fry some bacon in a medium sized pan. Once fried, fork out bacon, but leave grease behind

Next, put a large helping of kale in pan. Salt lightly. Watch the kale until it is wilted. Dip it out onto a plate, removing all bits from the pan.

Lastly, crack several eggs and scramble them in the same pan.

Oh my gosh, it is SO tasty.

Clubhouse Makes The Heart Grow Fonder!

I have my own apartment. It is an apartment made for collegiate children recently divested of their homes. So, it has one large living/bed room, one bathroom, and a kind of hallway that is also a kitchen. The dreaded studio apartment. What's worse, my carpet looks like this*:

Is it grey? Is it blue? I don't know! But there is a far more straight forward question I can answer. Is that a yellow Curious George alarm clock in my nightstand? Yes. Yes, it is.

So, I have striven in vain to make it a stylish apartment. I have fruitlessly tried to make it look color coordinated! It's mostly a mash up of furniture and decor. I've found on sale with a bookshelf and my junk. This might make some bitter. The sad lack of funds to really live up your small apartment...

But (aha!) not I! It's a third story apartment referred to as King's Towers. This fact inspired me to view my living space not as an apartment...but as a club house! And it may make a rather uninspired first one, it is a freaking awesome latter! Heck yes! The little rascals got nothin' on me.

*Those are my pants in my floor that I, pathetically, am too lazy to get out of my chair and move. Not denim fungus in its progressive stage.

So, Robin McKinley...

So, readers, you probably know that I have an extreme love affair with Robin McKinley's books. All of which are amazing and feuding with each other as to which is my favorite. I mean, they're mostly* heroine centered books with fantasy elements and a fluency in writing that very few writers can achieve.

My love of her books has led to a love of her, and a habitual reading of her blog and tweets. Yes. You read that right. Robin McKinley has a Twitter account. Twitter excerpt and direct R. McKinley quote:

"4tunately hellhounds r CUTE. Like apples off yr tree & sweetcorn out of yr garden r transcendently delicious. But OK, I want perfection. So?"

Forgive me, but she is SO old lady it is adorable and hilarious.

And uh, she apparently has a large amount of converse shoes if you pay attention to her blog pictures .

This lady is constantly walking her "Hellhounds" and wears Converse?! How do you do that? REALLY?! I stopped wearing Converse when I had to start trekking a mile to class (When I deign to brighten the classes with my shining presence). Walking in shoes sans arch and squishy soles HURTS. Especially when you're flat footed like I am. Though, I pretend like it gives me super swimming abilities because I'm "flat footed as a duck".


Erm, I'm going to bed now after a completely random excursion onto the blog in the middle of my sleeping. If this doesn't make sense, well then, it goes well with all the other posts.

*Though, God Forbid, that I'm labeling her. Because I'm not. She seems to exude great hatred for those who do so. (But I kinda am.... Ah well.)

In The Great Tangle: Why I Am Semi-Coherent

My mind has been deteriorating for awhile now. Do you remember when you found out you were sheltered? Were you sheltered? I was. I thought I knew what the bad things in life were. I've seen some of them. I thought I knew what a pervert was. I didn't.  I thought I knew what knowledge was. I thought I knew what good and bad was. I thought my black, white, and shades of grey were enough. Why is there green in there? Why is there purple? Is that teal?!

So, my well organized strands of brain matter were squashed together like so much yarn, and now I'm trying to some sense of them. Which you think would be easier as much time as I spend alone in my apartment. I'm still refusing to socialize now that Tyler isn't here. I'll stop being surly about it any day now, but probably not tomorrow or the next. So I don't speak of things that don't  make sense except when I want to appear insane. [

And to celebrate his memory I've randomly taken up video games, which I used to be not so very fond of with few exceptions.  THE HORROR! But I'll live. I've grown quite fond of the Super Nintendo.

I keep meaning to post reviews from the many books I've read this summer up....That will probably come before I stop being surly. I hope.

I am an Old Lady.

I recently bought some pictures to hang in y apartment. That along with the decorating scheme has led to a very cluttered Victorian look, combined with the knitting basket, random tea paraphernalia, and the chocolate chip cookies I  just made...

Why am I old?!?!

Oh my gosh I'm so happy this is the greatest thing EVER!

Guess what's going to be in Nashville, an hour and a half drive away, on November first?


MUMFORD & SONS!!!!!!!

Today I Laughed

My parents came to visit me at my apartment today. Which I really super appreciate because my parents are my favorite parents and I like them.

After we ate some Chinese, I wanted to go to Wal-Mart for some baby dill wholes (which makes my mom giggle maniacally every time I say it). As we checked out:

Dad: Starr, why did you have to go to the self checkout?

Me: Because it's fun! I like the scanny thing. Makes me feel all space age. *Dad puts money into the machine*

Machine: Please take your change! *Spits out four dollar bills on the floor quite vehemently*

Mom: .....

Me: .....

Mom & Me: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Hahahahahahahaha!

Mom: That's how real checkout people should give you your change. Just chuck it at you.

Dad: *eye roll*

It's 1 a.m. and Egg is in Alignment

I'm sitting here at one in the morning listening to Pandora (Based on Mumford & Sons).

This is a rather lovely quiet. I'm lying. It's the quite of the city. Which is quiet with occasional squealing tires and the eerie sound of sirens (Unfortunately not the cool kind of sirens. No Odyssey for me) in the background. I have solved this problem partially by ambient farm noises, or sites like THIS. Though, there's a large chance that you'll creep yourself out with the flute bit, or really super need to pee not long after the creek noises start. I found myself feeling very Native American...

And then mixed together honey, yogurt, and egg yolk for a homemade face mask. Ummm, eww? It was stinky, sticky, and made my face look like a sunflower puked on it. (Egg is in alignment with my face!) Plus side, my face is so freaky smooth is crazy.

Oh, and for those who like a good fantasy RPG, this web comic is good for a few laughs and juvenile humor.

And now I sleep for in five hours I have Espanol. Which I cannot speak. (Or read, or write, or vaguely understand. Hole, porque? Porque!)

Hello, my imagination.

Hello Blogosphere and Many Many People Who Are Imaginary,

Thank you for your continued following in my absence. I have been incognito for awhile. This happens when I have dial-up, am lazy, or somehow wrangled my way into 8 a.m. classes everyday and one three hour night class that lasts til 9.

I don't have dial-up anymore, but the others are still applicable.

Nothing terribly interesting has happened in the recent weeks. My boyfriend is taking a semester off to put money up for college and is working at home since he has had the same summer job for four years at a pharmacy and they like him there.

This means I'm alone in my apartment pretty much all the time. I tend to go all Edgar Allan Poe when I spend large amounts of time by myself. Thankfully I can't bury any hearts under the floor, though. I live on the third floor. It would just plop bloodily onto the guy who lives underneath me who probably wouldn't notice because of all the wafting pot fumes that seem to continually be surrounding his door. Kinda reminds me of a high school bathroom, really.

I absolutely must put a list of books I read and liked this summer up (here or on Inside the Shelf). I a rather lot of young adult fantasy books in order to have a larger selection to recommend to my future students....WHAT?!

And now, I suppose I'll start getting re-acquainted with the wonders of blogging and talking to people who aren't my family or farm-life.

Tick tick tick. Time passing. Hello, time.


I wish I was as Sylvia Plath, because I feel just as angsty and slightly insane and don't have any poetic ability. I've been on anti-anxiety medicine for awhile. It makes me sick. I'm 5'7 and I weigh 129 pounds now. (Sorry, I know this isn't a personal ad.) It does not look healthy on me. I cry a lot. I write a lot of journal entries about nature because I dislike humanity. Also, I'm going to school to be a teacher. Leave your kids with me? Please? Please?! I'll teach them how to spell onomonopoeia!

I have the internet because I had to come back to my apartment after summer break started to get my plant. It's this lovely vine that I keep in the bathroom. I walked in and it had crawled half way down the sink (with it's leaves, no appendages to move about with.) There was also a pan that had heat up chicken Parmesan in it that I didn't deign to wash and is no a biological weapon. I'm keeping it in the closet.

One of my friends is moving into the apartment building next semester, so that's nice. She came in while I was napping today and told me I looked high. I'm not high, I'm just really tired. But I appreciate fresh frankness. It reminds me of Rhett Butler lines.

P.S. I'm on the look out for a sassy gay friend.

What are you doing? What, what are you doing?!

If I had a sassy gay friend I'd let them help me with my hair. As it is, I have to do it myself. Unfortunately I have really thin blond hair that refuses to hold curls, or even retain a modicum of volume. (I know, right?)

But I recently got this hair thing from Wal-Mart that is the JUNK. So I'm sharing the hair cool-ness.

An Excerpt From My Math Notes:

I'm sitting in my college math class and have absolutely no idea what is being droned at me. This has been a reoccurring problem since seventh grade pre-algebra.

I look around at my class fellows and observe their glassy-eyed blank faces. They remind me of computers in sleep mode.

Four minutes until freedom. He'll utilize every last second to reiterate the simple concept we all grasped before half the class period was over.

I pretend like I'm in Poe's The Pit and the Pendulum. It is an improvement.

Now The Day Can See Me

Today I woke up. This has happened every morning for over nineteen years. Almost every morning I am faintly surprised. Again God? I have at least one more day to go before I rest. I brush my teeth and methodically apply my makeup. Tick. Tick. Tick. Clack. Clack. Clack. My life is a steady rhythm. If it breaks I will have to examine all the abstract variables that are right off the path. Waiting, waiting, waiting to become obstacles. Large smears of foundation to cover the emptiness. Blush brushed on for a facsimile of life. Blackest black eye liner carefully curved around. Carefully, thoroughly until no vulnerability shows. A faint purple lipstick so that I can speak. Now the day can see me.

You have seen me with no make-up on.

I have a childish dream of loyalty, purity, and faith.
I want the world to be a good place.
I dream of a time where trust is not misplaced.

I wish I were a fairy tale.


And I will fight for every tiny infinitesimal ground I can get towards my ideal.

Okay, I'm fine. I am just really tired. I miss my family. Maybe things won't seem so cruddy after Christmas break.

The Many Lessons of Life

I haven't really been active on here. Or anywhere else for that matter. The reason for that comes down to this: I'm tired. I am so tired. I want to go home.

But I can't. I have a year lease on my apartment, so I couldn't go home to community college if I wanted to (and I do). I can't tell my family any of this because I don't want them to worry. I just...Everything is so hard. I'm doing fine in my classes. I'm making A's and B's. I just want my family. I want for some of the things I know now, to unknow themselves. I want to grow up and be able to deal with all of this, but I don't know how.

I miss when I thought I was a grown up.

But I won't quit. And maybe things will get better.