TED talk

this is really interesting. i had definitely noticed this happening, but i hadn't really thought about what kind of affect it would have on us.

ice ice baby

i've been having disturbing dreams for the past month and a half/two months.
i wouldn't call them nightmares, because i don't wake up scared, but they're just not good dreams. really dark and twisted things happen.

the other night i dreamed that i was dying slowly and no one believed me. i was leaning over a sink feeling really weak and i had a really bad nosebleed. everyone thought i was just being dramatic and kept telling me that it was just a nosebleed, but i would tell them that it can't be just a nosebleed, i'd never had a nosebleed in my entire life. i was hemorrhaging inside. no one believed me. after a while, someone pulled my shirt sleeve aside and noticed my entire body was blue and bruised, because i was bleeding internally, but now it was too late to do anything about it.

nice hey? hmm.

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side note: i hate winter. it gets way too cold and makes me a hermit. this winter i wont have access to a car like i'm used to, so i'm really going to have to push myself to man up and face the cold if i don't want to kill my social life for a couple months lol. ugh. when you know that it's scientifically possible for any exposed skin to get frost bite in two minutes, and you have a 10 minute walk, and probably another 10 minute wait, for your bus....it gets really hard to leave the house.

songs that have made me cry

one of my friends is being ripped away from her boyfriend and is about to attempt the dreaded long distance relationship. it seems that quite a few people i know have been in that situation. it's weird that one of my first thoughts when she found out his leaving date was "i should see if she wants me to compile a list of sad songs to cry to." then i thought about how that's weird, but she totally would be down.
i think we all do it. some people read something sad, some people watch tear jerkers, and some of us put on sad music. i do it all. sometimes you just need to make yourself cry when it wont come out on its own.

so, here are a few that have made me cry for various reasons over the past few years.









i'm a suck. yes, i know.
i'm sure there are a lot more, but these were the first few that came to mind.

christmas is a solid 3 months away.......but i'm already getting excited about it and thinking about what i could make people.

but first: thanksgiving, halloween and my birthday.

"Don't waste your time with fear. Fear wont keep you safe from getting hurt."

hennorama

my friend brought back henna powder with her from india, and we finally got around to using it. we didn't really have a good tool for application (we literally had a cardboard cone in a plastic bag that we had poked a hole in...), so the lines were really thick and everything was a lot messier than we had hoped, but in the end, it worked out pretty decent....except i forgot how long henna takes to fade away and i would like it to be gone sooner rather than later.

either way, this was the result:

new tattoo

juuuuust kidding. i was bored yesterday and drew this on myself.

but i did enjoy telling my family it was real and watching their expressions. basically, they don't like me getting more tattoos, but obviously, if i were to get one and show it to them, it's permanent, so they're going to try to be supportive, even if they don't think i should have gotten it. it's funny, because you get that split second of the expression that reads "lauren! nooooo," before they say "oh cool, that looks awesome!" haha
i'm a really great sister/daughter/granddaughter.


the "tattoo" was based off of this illustration for the story "faust" by harry clarke. i'd never heard of either before i saw this illustration, but now i'm on a hunt for a book of his. i found a few fairy tale books he'd illustrated on amazon that i might try out. we'll see. you should check out some of his stuff. it's all really eerie and dreamlike, and very detailed which are all characteristics that i love in art.

hair flips

on a scale from 1 to 10, how embarrassing is it that the real reason i want real blinds (instead of pretty much see-through drapes) is so that i will feel less stupid dancing around in my apartment, because i know no one on the street will be able see me..


also, i learned a song in two days. no big deal. i'm still not the best at strumming/etc. and my fingers kill, but it's coming along. :)
(yes, the song only has 4 chords and is maaaybe two minutes long...but still. i'm proud.)
i don't have a pick, and my hand doesn't want to cooperate with me and the strings, so i've been using a guitar pick earring i happen to have. see, jewelery is attractive AND practical.

EAT from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

brought to you by the same guy who did move and learn.


is it wrong i like covers of this song better than the original?

runrunrunrunrunrunrunrepeat

at mcdicks right now they have a deal of any sized pop or iced coffee for $1. (i still have yet to EAT mcdonalds since April 12, 2006. coffee or soft drinks don't count).
so point of story: since all sizes are $1, i got a large (most bang for your buck!) and drank it down very quickly about 2 hours ago. there was a SHIT TON of caffeine and sugar in that drink and i'm absolutely buzzing right now. still. two hours later. i feel like i'm on drugs and feel very very anxious and jittery. my bod is not used to this much sugar/caffeine in one go.

dunno what to do with myself!

crafty doo da

buttonnnnns. i'm a huge nerd. i kind of collect buttons. i tell myself i'm going to make stuff with them (and i have), but mostly they've just sat around. i had this huge bag that i wanted to sort for a while (again, because i'm a nerd, and i like things organized and color coded...), so that's what i did. i think i'm going to make some sort of framed piece with a ton of buttons, because i have way to many. i'll keep the really cool/unique ones for jewelry and clothes.

also, my friend pete and i are doing an art swap. we did one last week as well and i gave him this trippy/dreamlike collage (that i wish i had taken a picture of!) and i got this rad giraffe warrior girl drawing in return.


this is my thing for him for our art swap this week. he asked for some words and i gave him dreams/nightmares/owls, and he gave my the word octopus...so BAM. here's my octopus for him. and i can't make anything without glitter sooooo, yeah. glitter everywhere. hope he likes it.


i also made some sweet magnets the other day, and am working on a project involving silhouettes. ou la la, art-o-rama.

orgasm

i have a lulu lemon bag sitting in my bathroom. on the outside of it are a bunch of messages that are suppose to be uplifting and life affirming type deals, such as "the pursuit of happiness leads to unhappiness." "do one thing a day that inspires you." "breathe deeply." etc. etc. well, i've never actually looked at this bag until today, and one of these life affirming messages caught my eye....

children are the orgasm of life.

ew, what? yes, they quite literally are i guess....but really? i don't think i like the idea of comparing children to orgasms, thanks.

because i know you were all so curious...

i have no idea what the proper name is for this shade, but it is my favorite color.

say ello to my li'le friend

kind of excited about it



i'm not sure why, but i've always wanted a ceramic animal bust. i think i'm going to make a cool base for it to go on. i found this puppy at pine ridge hollow today when we went for my mom's bday lunch. 50% off! huzzah! i couldn't say no. it was the cheapest animal bust i've come across thus far, and i really liked the horns. i might use it to display some necklaces or something. updates to come. now i just need a name...i think it's a goat, so to be lame (or lamer, some might say...because who names ceramic goats...who OWNS ceramic goats..), i might name him william...or bill for short..get it? har har.

UPDATE: oh shoot. just realized it's a gazel. wiliam will not work at all.

more old posts that i had never posted

for one reason or another. here they are now:

3/21/11
this blog is about 3 1/2 years old.
what the heck.
time flies. so much has gone down since post 1.
so many changes;
changes in relationships, friendships, experiences, interests, etc.

i feel more "me" than ever.
i go through phases of when i feel the need to blog or not.

for the past year though, i feel like i've used this more as an art blog than anything, which is nice. i don't need this to say anything to anyone anymore.

this is all very interesting to me.

sorry if this post makes no sense to whoever is reading it.
but i think that's the point..?

02/02/11
i feel like i want to talk about some things, but i can't for the life of me bring any of these thoughts into words.

so let's pretend

1/25/11
wracked:
Cause extreme physical or mental pain to; subject to extreme stress: "he was racked with guilt".

wracked. good word! i like w-r words.

facetious:
Treating serious issues with deliberately inappropriate humor.

also a fun word to say. not too fond of how it looks though. face. tious.

11/14/10
when you smile,
my heart sighs

11/03/10
"I need to feel strongly, to love and admire, just as desperately as I need to breathe."
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

(if you've never heard of or seen the diving bell and the butterfly, get on it. fantastic and amazing (true) story.)

the best kinds of kisses are upside down kisses. because you both get the bottom lip.

10/1/10
i just woke up from a nap of sorts. i'm not sure if i actually fell asleep for any of the hour i was laying down. you know when you're not quite asleep, but your mind is off wandering and you start having semi-awake-asleep dreams/thoughts? well that's what was just happening to me.

i was having some sort of dream, because i remember kind of waking up and thinking i've been out for an hour then i looked at my watch and it had only been ten minutes.
i had my window open and a large flock of geese flew over the house and as they got closer they got louder and i thought "the geese are screaming." and had an image of a bunch of geese in the pond near my house, and all of them are looking up towards the sky screaming.

weird.

09/30/10
after years and years of walking on eggshells constantly. i'm getting very exhausted.

12/13/09
"Dare I say I miss him? I do. I miss him. I still see him in my dreams. They are nightmares mostly, but nightmares tinged with love. Such is the strangeness of the human heart."
-life of pi

"When you develop an infatuation for someone you always find a reason to believe that this is exactly the person for you. It doesn’t need to be a good reason. Taking photographs of the night sky, for example. Now, in the long run, that’s just the kind of dumb, irritating habit that would cause you to split up. But in the haze of infatuation, it’s just what you’ve been searching for all these years."
-the beach, alex garland

11/16/09
it's strange how many divorces there are these days. if you think back to our grandparents age, people stayed together a lot more often. maybe it was because people were more dependant on one another. now everyone is able to support themselves, so they let smaller things push their relationships apart. also, people usually got married a lot younger back then. did a lot of them marry their first love? maybe that's the trick. it always takes people ages to get over their first love, so what if you never had to. even if you fell out of love down the line.

11/09/09
why do i find light eyes and dark hair attractive?

i think it's because brunettes are dark and mischievous looking, and bright blue or green eyes are innocent looking. when you put them together you get an exciting/spontaneous person who's secretly super sweet.

08/12/09
i had yet another nightmare. most of the nightmare i was having a really nice time with my friends and we were just hanging out having fun at a summer camp type situation. all of a sudden i couldn't breathe and i curled up in a ball on the ground and i told my friends that i'd been hiding the fact that i had tons of tumors in my back and i was dying. a friend of mine was rubbing my back to comfort me and then pointed out all the lumps from tumors on my back. then i died and woke up.
it was sad and weird. usually when someone dies in my dreams, it signifies a new beginning associated with my feelings toward that person or our relationship, so i guess i should expect some changes to occur within myself?

07/31/09
i had another very odd dream.

i was at my friends apartment with another friend of mine (i'm not sure who) and we were trying to take the elevator, which was more like a small room and there were buttons to tons of floors, but they weren't in numerical order so it was hard to find the floor we needed (16), so i picked floor 14 and planned to walk the rest of the way up. the elevator had about 20 or so people in it and when we arrived at the 12th floor the doors opened and the entire floor was on fire, somehow we found out that all the floors below us were also on fire. the group of people, my friend and i decided it was best to take the stairs to the roof and figure things out from there. when we arrived at the roof, my friend and i discovered that the roof of the buildings next to the roof we were on, were close enough that we could jump from roof to roof and climb down to safety. everything was covered in snow and it was really dark out. my friend went first and i watched her easily make it on to the roof, but then her coat caught on fire. i screamed at her to warn her and she quickly got her jacket off. i turn around towards the group of people still with me on the roof and they told me this was all a plan to kill me and my friend in the fire. so i ran off to join my friend and we both ran and hid from the giant group of people, who apparently had magical powers or something. my friend and i managed to get away from the bad people but were freezing cold wandering in a desert of snow. we eventually saw a small town that looked like it'd be on the cover of a christmas card. somehow my friend and i found new snow suits and were making sure to only look at the snow because the evil people cold tell where they were by what we saw or something. we ended up finding a sled and curled up and went to sleep in a field covered in a blanket. we awoke to some woman saying that my friend was her son, and the people who she was with took us and put us in her red station wagon.
something happened and my friend was now an old boyfriend. i was really excited to see him and the dream wasn't a nightmare anymore for a bit. then while we were together this girl comes in and they kiss. it turns into a nightmare again and i ask who she is and he says she's his nurse. i ask when they met and he says months ago when he was going through treatment. i asked what he's talking about and the nurse said "the tumors!" i got really upset because i realised that he was dying.
and then i woke up.
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Back to the present. an that's that.

tips for girls

1. if you're going to a house/apartment/etc. and all the people who live there are boys, bring some tp/kleenex in your purse. it's almost a guarantee they wont have toilet paper and nobody likes to drip dry. (tmi? too bad.)

2. try to learn to take things at face value. especially when it comes to boys. you can't read their minds, so stop trying to over analyze and fill your head with "what ifs.." just wake up and see what happens. (it's hard i know)

3. "do you wanna come over and watch a movie," "do you wnat to come in and have a cup of coffee," etc. are all still codes for "do you wanna come in and make out." beware.

4. if you don't want someone calling you/you're not going to pick up when they call, DON'T give them your number. easy. just say no. or lie and say you have a boyfriend, that usually works.

5. sometimes guys aren't playing games, they just really are that oblivious.
ex) you text a guy, he takes an hour to text back. you think "he waited an HOUR to text me back?! well, to make sure he knows i'm not desperate, i'm going to wait an HOUR AND A HALF to text HIM back! he can't play games with me!" uhhhh. he's probably just busy. you're the one playing games girl.



(i'm going through my archives of posts and found a bunch of "saved as drafts" that i haven't posted. this was on of them.)

i saw a name for an art show the other day:

you are not alone, unique or dying.

not sure why, but i really liked it and it made me smile.
to me it says "shut the fuck up, you're fine. who cares."
it's kind of negative, i guess....but didn't see it that way at all.
i'm not saying that i, personally, needed to hear that, but i just thought it was funny, and i know some pretentious/dramatic/feel-sorry-for-me people who i'd like to say that to.

ear wear

i made a new earring today! i found a blue jay feather the other day and found myself with some spare time/creativity and BAM....earring.

only thing is, i would like to make something to go with it, but i only had one blue jay feather...i'll figure somethin out.





[side note: my hair's gotten really long out of no where!]
[more side notes: this wedding a friend of mine is getting married, and i have been dubbed the unofficial official photographer as well as the bridesmaids hairdresser. aye yi yi! pressure to perform!]

With what a deep devotedness of woe
I wept thy absence - o’er and o’er again
Thinking of thee, still thee, till thought grew pain,
And memory, like a drop that, night and day,
Falls cold and ceaseless, wore my heart away!
— Thomas Moore

pa pa pa peculiar

pleasantly pleased to be plagued by perplexing and peculiar dreams.

one section of my dream last night was extra strange. i think i was filming a show about Siamese twins. the Siamese twins were actually these weird creatures though. they were all under 5 feet and chubby, with tons of rolls. they looked like mystical woodland creatures or elves. they were connected by things that looked like antlers that came out of the palms of their hands and connected to their twins palms. the show chronicled a day in the life of these twins, and how they functioned without the use of their hands. i was hanging out with a set of twins, where one twin was normal but her twin was one of these creatures, except that her antlers were connected only to her own hands, but in a way that one arm was always twisted behind her. i remember she was struggling to bring her hands from behind her back over her head and it was pulling at her face and this goo was oozing out of her skin.
ick.

i wasn't scared or grossed out or anything in the dream though. it was only after, when i woke up, that i realised that my dream was really freaky.

also, i was woken up by a phone call, and you know when your dreams incorporate things going on in real life? like a phone rings in your dream, but it's actually ringing in real life? it made me wonder...how fast do dreams occur compared to normal time? my mind had time to make another character in my dream start talking on a phone, and then my phone started ringing, so i had to pick up my phone, which rang a few times in my dream, but in reality, i picked up after the first ring...

just a thought.