MILES to GO || before I sleep

So I saw "Eclipse" the other night with Stephanie. I didn't pay for it: she used passes! So I have kept my promise of never paying for anything involving "Twilight," except for the time I saw the first movie, and that was genuinely for the LULZ. I was so obnoxious--and I admit it!--during the screening that it more than made up for the cost of the movie and the Junior Mints I think I ate. I wasn't quite as obnoxious during this screening, but it was great to know there were other folks in the theatre who just saw it for the LULZ.

( FURSPLODE! )

I spent too long on That Site and ended up stumbling across this one, about Console RPG clichés.

A few stood out to me for there being a game I knew/played/was popular that broke the mold. Yay, fandom! Sometimes.

Interestingly, some are just plain wrong. And others made me remember all kinds of games and their characters, big and small. I had no idea clichés were so prevalent, but now I am thusly enlightened: and you can be, too!



And that's all...for now, folks!

On my way home from school today, I spotted a squirrel in its death throes. It had gotten run over right near where I usually meet Baba on campus: across the street from the fountain on Etiwanda.

It was flailing around like crazy but unable to get up off the pavement. Suddenly its tail snapped around a few times, and then it just flopped to the ground. I didn't know what had happened-- I hadn't seen a car hit it, and no one else near me on the sidewalk seemed to notice or care. I walked up to it and saw what happened: its head had been nearly crushed; its brain was leaking out the top of its head. There was blood all over its paws and the street. I saw it stare for a minute, and then its eyes started to close.

I was crying like a basketcase when Baba came to get me; I didn't know what to do, since it was already dead, but I would hate if Baba ran over it again, so I kept trying to say, "Don't run over it, don't run over it," even though she couldn't see the squirrel. She said it took her five minutes just to understand what I was hollering about. Thankfully, she didn't run over the squirrel again, but I still feel awful for some reason. It's not as if there's anything I could have done, whether the squirrel was alive or dead. But I felt disgusted that I was the only one with a sense of compassion for the poor animal.

And let me just say right now: I hate humans that don't pay attention to what they're doing. Not just to animals, but to anyone. Why should you do anything with half your attention? Put all your attention and knowledge into performing any action, do everything with full knowledge and understanding of as many possible impacts on as many outside parties as possible. BE AWARE. There's no downside.

Anyway, I've been trying to be more chipper. We had the second NSLS Presidential Call. Not as funny as the last one, but still helpful. I have the second part of the Presidential Training this week, too.

( Someone get Life & Style a copy editor! )

In order of appearance:

FanLib's going to disappear, as everyone predicted it would when it first made its bright, shiny appearance some 15 months ago (or so). I think it improved a whole lot since the wankfest first started, which is why I bothered to sign up against it, but I'm not crying over the loss. It's not like half the stuff there is any good anyway, whether that's writers or readers/reviewers. Anyone I did bother to read there I knew from other sites, namely this one, DA, and/or Fanfiction.net.

The thing that sucks is that they didn't just come out and say why they're going under, nor did they invite discussion of the topic on their homepage. Everyone on fandom_wank says it's because they're out of their $3 million (srsly!?) investment, which wouldn't surprise me, but since I haven't seen any sort of official statement regarding the "why," I'll take that with a grain of salt.

Twilight - Cause for fangirls of all ages to be bitches, mainly because the poor sap who's playing Edward in the upcoming movie is "hot." Me? I haven't heard anything good about the book series OR the upcoming movie, but my roommate (who is a few months older than me) got into the series via her (14-year-old) sister. She admits that the series is targeted toward a younger audience than even Harry Potter (thus making both her and her sister part of that oddball crowd of fangirls), but she likes it so far, as it's a "simple read." I cringed a bit when reading the back cover, but don't dare to actually explore beyond that (yet?).

Why? Well, I went to the Anaheim Public Library tonight after work and finally got myself some other books: two on the craft of writing (one's a standby favorite on the Middle Ages, which I use as a great reference for "The Rose Chronicles"), one dark rewrite of "Snow White" and other fairy tales (love those sort of stories!) and one Myst novel (because I've never read them and I thought it was high time I ought to). Oh, and a High School Musical book.

High School Musical - So, working at Disneyland means I see this High School Musical stuff every day, and I often dealt with (child) Guests who would come up to me screaming about how HOTTTTTT Troy is (If I had to pick between Zac Efron and Robert Pattinson or whatever his name is -even if he was in Harry Potter before- I'd pick Zac any day of the week. The other guys IS somewhat cute and has nice eyes/hair/smile, etc. but Zac just seems... well, more human. And this is my impression of Rob based off an interview where he WAS NOT in Vampire!Mode) and I would have NO idea what they were going on about. I took a glance at the Junior Novel and decided that it sounded fluffy enough for me to warrant getting the movie as soon as it came back into our Clubhouse rentals, so I grabbed it as soon as it did. And... it's pretty darn catchy! The acting isn't half-bad, either, which is saying something, especially when you look at some of the other Disney Channel stuff (*cough*Camp Rock*cough*) So I got the second one too, and I like it a lot! I'm really looking forward to HSM3 coming out on the silver screen in October, and I'm betting I'll get a first-hand look at some of the merchandise before it hits the shelves, too! :D

That said, I'm already half-in the fandom, but in the way a cat might be in a bathtub-- one paw in, hackles raised. At FFnet alone, the tripe level is at an all-time high; people can't seem to summarize AT ALL in the HSM section (and again, this is FFnet, so that's saying something!, and they confuse the real-life actors with their characters, so you'll often see pairing portmanteaus like Zanessa or Zashley. Uh, hello, people? Zac =/= Troy, Vanessa =/= Gabriella, and so on and so forth! Let these people have lives outside their movies, please! Besides, RPF isn't even allowed on FFnet! (If everything that was RPF got taken off there, I'm sure 75% of the section would be gone.)

But for every 100 or so horrible fics, there might just be one good fic (emphasis on the might there). I've already read a few, but usually once I do, I discover one of two things:
* I can get through the author's other good HSM fics (assuming there are any) rather rapidly, even if they're multi-chapter; I'm still left wanting more
* If the author DOES have other HSM fics, they suck, and then I'm back to square one; it's one of those "rare moments of genius" circumstances, and then I don't know what to tell the author that, moments ago, I'd been praising and now want to thwap with a Clue-By-Four

That's a dangerous place to be in, mind, because it's got me thinking "I could do better than these people!" Especially with writing challenges like those of ZAAngels (or something like that), which explore topics that Disney will NEVER EVER do, e.g. how Gabriella officially became Troy's girlfriend (because at the end of HSM1, they were just "best friends," and by HSM2, they were quite clearly in a romantic relationship, broke up, and got back together again in time for HSM3), or Troy and Gabriella's first time. ^_~

Me, I'm horny don't you know, my love I want you so...
At least, that's how "Rapture" by iio sounded to me, until I bothered to check the lyrics. :P My mom has this book of misheard lyrics called "'Scuse me while I kiss this guy" (the real lyrics are 'Scuse me while I kiss the sky"). Pretty funny read.

Anyway, I'd say right now, I'm about... oh, 98% done with my packing for Disney? If you don't know, I'm "moving to Disneyland" in two days-- on Monday morning (EARLY Monday morning). I'm actually moving to the dorms/apartments nearby, because I will be working there until about 3 January.

I won't be dressed up as a character; in fact, all I know about my role at the moment is that I'll be a "Store Operations Cast Member," which means I'll be selling something somewhere in the park.

Packing is a pain. On the one hand, I am moving my whole life for about 7 months. On the other hand, two humongous suitcases plus my wheeling bag seems a bit much... o_o Originally, I was going to try and cram all my clothes into my smaller suitcase, but that just can't happen. Clothes for 7 months do not fit in a weekend-sized suitcase. So I'm leaving that suitcase, packed and ready to go for Shaina's wedding on Memorial Day weekend. I'm going to try and come back here to Northridge from Anaheim via Amtrak on Friday night so I can take the shuttle to the airport with Baba and Grandpa.

The idea is that I'll visit them often enough so that when it starts to get cold, I can trade out my "summer" clothes for winter ones, thereby saving me the trouble of trying to cram three seasons' worth of clothes into one suitcase (no matter how large). The only problem is, Disney's got a "Look" which is essentially "winter" in feeling: all collared, short or long-sleeved blouses (and most of my collared blouses are long-sleeved), non-denim pants, no leggings/shorts, skirts or pantsuits, and NO t-shirts, tanktops, sundresses, etc. Goodbye, summer wardrobe!

Hopefully I'll be working indoors, where it's air conditioned, so things like jackets or long sleeves won't bother me so much. I get that I'm supposed to look professional, but it's tough when you're sweating like a stuck pig in the sort of heat we get here in SoCal. (And this is when someone from Arizona reads this line and rolls their eyes. Go on, do it.)

I went to the mall today to pick up a few things, since I had gift cards to all these stores... Plus, I got some gifts for the ChixFlix blog gals (one of them is Margeaux, who recently had her birthday, so I got her something a bit bigger), the latest Shojo Beat (I really should just subscribe already), and a bunch of hair accessories from Claire's. One of them is the Hairagami, which I cannot figure out for the life of me. It works like those old snap bracelets from elementary school. I managed to get it twisted in my hair somehow, but either my hair's too short, too layered, or I'm just too stupid to figure out how to get it to work. :P

It's hot and I'm hungry... and I already finished the last of the milk! AAAAH!

Okay, here's some oddness for you:
(1) 'Mokuba' is apparently a brand of hair accessories. I've seen them featured in the last two month's issues of Glamour, primarily with ribbons.

(2) A person came into the Walk-In center today named Akhnaton. "Akhenaden" or "Akunadin," much? Hey, it's a real Arabic name!

(3) I've also seen Shadi mentioned in Glamour somewhere-- it might have been a jewelry brand or maker, from what I can remember.

( Extreme Makeover: Scandal Edition! )

Meredith: The default MacBook Pro comes with 512 MB and an 80 GB HD, running the Intel Core Duo. Bother with an upgrade?
Sean: does it have a dvd/cd burner?
Meredith: yes
Sean: then nope
Meredith: :)
Sean: cause you can just back up any anime or large movies you download to dvd
Meredith: :D
Sean: and i can't imagine you needing a blazing fast processor
Meredith: yeah, me the l33t hardcore gamer
Sean: unless you're doing hardcore...fanfic writing
Meredith: WHOO Yu-Gi-Oh Online at blazing speeds.
Meredith: YEAH!
Meredith: HARDCORE SMUT!~
Sean: at 25,000 words per second
Meredith: type that fanfic!
Sean: er...25,000 characters a second
Sean: in any case you don't need it =P

Occasionally, he is funny.

It's an odd pastime of mine-- I collect quotes. I go to websites sometimes, and one of them that I found (and lost, sadly) was one that had images styled to look like bumper stickers. ;_; If anyone knows where this site is, please let me know!

In the meantime, I get quotes from The Great American Bathroom Book, various sites, signatures, Engrish.com... away messages, too. ^^ So add on to my list, please!

( Don't quote me on this, but... )

I pledge allegiance to My Goddess
Because women rule
And boys drool
If maturity is measured in hours
Or days, shoe sizes, or hamburgers one can eat
I guess I'm at the bottom of the ladder
But if it's measured in how much you express yourself
How you feel, when and where
Then maybe I'm up a few rungs
But no one can tell me that I CAN'T
Or I SHOULDN'T
Because I am me
Not Emily
Not Mary
Not Michelle or Kelly or Elizabeth
And even if I have to wait
Have to put up with intolerance and discrimination
I know
One day, I will make it to the top
I'll hang off that ladder with one arm and a leg,
and I'll sing
At the top of my lungs
I MADE IT
ALL
BY
MYSELF!

This is a list of, as the title implies, very random excerpts. From everywhere and anywhere-- people's email or BB signatures, AIM away messages, fortune cookies... this is probably only edition 1. ^^ I hope these brighten your day.

( Queen of Random! )