Lacking & Catching Up

So it seems I've almost forgotten about this little guy. I guess I just hadn't had much to say lately?
Two days ago, after much talk about the frustration of lack of funds, my mom reminded me that I have several savings bonds in my name. By several, she meant 26. I've been getting them since my first birthday, and usually since then on Christmases and birthdays, up until 2003. These nice little bonds earn money, so my mom encouraged me to find out how much they were worth now. All added up, it came to $1800. I almost choked. That's a lot of money, since I haven't made any in about 2 years. I told her I knew what I would do with it, I wanted my 50D. The Canon EOS 50D is like, a really nice camera for someone who isn't a paid professional photographer. I'd been eyeing it for the past year. But all this money, all these little investments year to year from my grandparents and great-grandparents, still has time to grow. As much as I knew the camera of my dreams (for the most part) would be a good decision, I couldn't help but feel guilty-- especially when my mom says, "I figured you might use it for something important, like your first down-payment on an apartment or something. But that's cool too." Even though that was her initial reaction, and her later reaction was much more optimistic, those words rang in my head for a couple hours, and still do.
I went ahead and gathered the bonds, cashed/deposited them, dashed to Best Buy and snagged the camera, as if I were at the head of a horde of people trying to get it before me.
I feel really great now that I have it. The only part I missed out on in the process was actually seeing that much money, in cash. I just had the bank teller put it in my checking account. I kinda wished I flaunted it long enough for it to have seemed real-- that I ever had that much money in my possession. Whatever...
And now, I have about $220 left. I feel like I should've left out some bonds, so they had more time to earn themselves some interest. Maybe my savings account will do, for the time being.
Last night, I tried out my new child.




Dallas May 2009 & Dallas July 2008.


My mom's been reading the Sookie Stackhouse Chronicles, the books which formed the HBO show True Blood, which starts back up on June 6th!! <3


Tuesday, I went to Berkeley with Dallas, Scott, & Vera (whom we met there) and I got my owl's frame touched up.


I also got this little bee, from another artist in the shop. It was great: Vera and I were getting tattooed at the same time, we were drinking 40's, I spent only $10 that day, and I got to hangout with some of my favorite people :].

Tonight is Keek da Sneak at the Broken Wheel with Vera... lol, we'll see how that goes. I need a good night-out.

Ow

Being broke is seriously the most unfortunate situation I've ever been in. I wouldn't wish it upon anyone. Lack of funds creates lack of confidence, reliability, fun, and who knows how many other things. I've been broke for so long that I'll even say I'm less happy without money. I can't do shit, I can't even afford to buy used clothing! Its just a crazy cycle where I can't buy gas to go to the store to buy new clothes, to make myself feel/look better, to get that job I want, to make the money I need. FAAACK. The only thing that's made me feel better recently is quitting smoking, and I think it's some sort of universal epiphany because I've heard about several other people quitting in the last 2 weeks as well. Anyway... its a pity party over here today.

Barftastic

Yesterday, I woke up with the most fantastic hangover. And better yet, I awoke at 6:30am after arriving home at around 3am. My morning duty was to take my darling kitty/child Rogue to the spay clinic. I semi-wrote directions on a small piece of paper, and headed towards Martinez on a nearly empty tank. No traffic, that was nice. After making one wrong turn, I was in tears calling my mom for some trusty Googlemap help, and with only 10 minutes to spare before the appointment. Rogue was being very calm during my panic, which was even more nice. I finally got to the clinic, waited for my number to be called, then dropped off my now hair-on-end child to her caretaker for the day. After this relief came more panic-- my car barely started, so I tried to remain calm as I searched for a gas station. A Shell station seemed to emerge out of thin air. I handed the woman a $5 and I felt my head surge with pain again, I dared not take off my sunglasses to make eye contact with her. After the five was quickly consumed, I got into my car. As I reached to close my door, I felt my mouth water. I closed my door. I felt it in my throat, I opened my door. It tasted oddly like bananas. I looked at it for a moment, considered my options, and decided to get the hell home before it happened again. I was so tired.

I picked up Rogue around 3pm. She was so drugged up I couldn't help but laugh, then feel guilty about it. Ever since, she's been extremely loving and follows me (or anyone else in my house) around. Last night, she fell asleep next to me while I was Mah-jong-ing and watching For The Love of Ray J for the millionth time.



I was cracking up, because her eyes weren't even closed, and she just started falling over backward slowly but surely.

A litte later than that, as I was falling asleep, I realized she already had done so in my armpit.



As cute as it was, I couldn't move. So I had to make her move.

Today I woke up and ate breakfast with my parents for the first time in months... I'm never awake when they eat. After I got ready, I tidied up my resume and headed over to the Concord Pavilion job fair. After nearly no effort, I was hired as an Event Staff member. It's a seasonal job from May to October. I may or may not even take the job... I've been planning to do a summer Texas trip with my boyfriend for a while now. Honestly I'd rather go out of state for an adventure.

There's still so many things I need to do and complete.

Flickr Update

I've updated my Flickr website, as I spent a few hours in the photo lab today. Chhhheck it.



click!

Candy Shop

(Written at 7pm, 3/31/09)
This weekend was fun, and including doing this with Vera.


Yesterday, I had a really big fight/argument with my parents. After the fog cleared, I realized that I had a paper due in which I had to compare two pieces from the MoMa, and it's due Wednesday. So I got my ass up this morning and went. The drive was nice, and thankfully my dad felt obliged to give me $20 for toll and museum admission. When I got into the MoMa ticket line, a woman came up to me and said she had an extra ticket, then asked if I wanted hers. I was like PHEWWW, now I wont be as broke as I could be.
Upon entrance, I was overwhelmed. Ever since taking my first art history class, seeing artwork I recognize is like running into a celebrity! So, here's some of the things I got to see.

Piet Mondrian



Kathe Kollwitz



Diego Rivera



Roy Lichtenstien


(I was so awestricken by this, it's a recreation of Monet's Rouen Cathedral series! And I love my boy Roy!)

Andy Warhol



Mark Rothko



Kiki Smith



Frida Kahlo



Vasily Kandinsky



Georgio de Chirlco


(I didn't know who this was initially, but I love this nonetheless.)

Rene Magritte



And as I left, the light coming through the sky-window in the MoMa was awesommmme.



My next adventure was in Berkeley for my tattoo appointment. Or actually, Oakland, but Berkeley is like 2 blocks down the street. My artist Ellie at FTW gave me a tough/long coloring session. Now that I'm home I can finally relax. My body's been stressed since 10am. Here's the results.



EDIT: At the current time, 9:09am, 4/1/09.
I'm now up pretty damn early since my class is at 12:30. I have to now use the things I saw at the MoMa to write a comparative essay. Wish me luck.

Los Angeles Weekend

Everything in the past 2 weeks is a complete blur, but I'll try to make sense of this past weekend for ya.
Dallas, his 5 guy friends and I, went to LA for Dallas's birthday (March 23). Scott booked us a hotel, off the 101 on Alvarado.



The first night we're there, all except Dallas were healthy enough to go out, while he stayed behind to keep guard of our stuff. With his machete. The rest of us went to Sunset Blvd for a few hours to eat Mel's Diner, and Danny and I got some drinks at the House of Blues. Expensive drinks.

The next morning, after hearing of our Mel's dinner, Dallas insisted we go for breakfast since he didn't get to go the night before. So we go to the same Mel's on Sunset Blvd.





Scott had a spider in his omelette. My french toast tasted like paper. So we satisfied ourselves with Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf. (I was sick and blowing my nose the entire trip.)



Boifrenz.



We got back to the hotel to "prepare" for AdultCon:
Nick and Chris laid in bed together like gay men and drank beer.



Francisco was racing himself.



Dallas worked on his axing skills.



Daniel looked like an idiot.



By the time we got to AdultCon, half of us were drunk and the other half were making fun of us.



The line was intense. We all walked through at one point, and didn't realize we left Nick behind until he was WAY behind haha.



Since we all bought VIP tickets, we got a ton of free stuff. T-shirts, passes to strip clubs, and a $5 chip to use at any booth. I used my $5 chip to take a picture with some beezy.



Danny used his $5 chip to get a massage from 3 girls. During this picture, he pretty much put his finger in the left-girl's asshole, and he was extremely close to getting kicked out. It was hilarious/embarrassing.



Scott used his chip to take a picture with some whores.



Dallas put on the free sweatshirt he got, and immediately upon taking his beanie off, he looked like a child molester. I cried from laughter.



Nick used his chip to take a picture with some asians with gross titties.



I wish I was there to witness this:



After AdultCon became less fun and more creepy, we were starved. We drove... somewhere, and in the process of losing half our group of friends, Scott and I searched the roof of the mall parking lot/took strong pictures even though we were scared.



Super tight.



Upon getting back to the hotel, we drank some more before heading out to the "after party" strip club. Esha joined/drove us!



Two 30packs = Beer City.



Kitty patch.



The strip club was small and weird. Not even my lack of sobriety could force me into having a good time. All I could think about was how low you had to go to put your vagina in someone's face to retrieve their dollar bill. It was even more upsetting when my boyfriend did it for $40... so I left, I didn't want to watch, I was going to throw up. A girl, on my boyfriend? No thanks. And from that moment, he and I didn't talk until 24 hours later, for different reasons I'm sure. But it doesn't matter so much now.

The boys got back to the hotel at 1am, while Scott, Chris, and I were watching a movie. The next morning, we woke up at 4:05am. Upon realizing Scott left his wallet in Esha's car, half of us drove to fetch it immediately. Thankfully she was still awake..? The other half went to stand in line to get tickets for the 11am Price is Right taping. The birthday boy Dallas:



After getting the tickets and successfully burning off all the taste buds on the tip of my tongue from hot coffee, my half of the group went to eat at Denny's, while Dallas's half went back to the hotel to sleep. I later wished I had done that. After wht seemed like forever at Denny's, we drove back to the hotel. Navigating the streets was slowly becoming more natural to us at this point. Instead of sleeping when we got back, I decided to take the opportunity to fully shower while no one would be awake to hassle me and make me hurry. The only people awake were Chris and Nick, they were laying in bed together looking over the pictures we'd taken so far, and camwhoring.



Nick also asked me to take part in his tiger photo shoot.



And as I suspected, when I was 10 minutes from being done getting ready, the boys awoke and scrambled to get as clean as they felt necessary. Those of us who had gotten free shirts from AdultCon decided to wear them as our team shirt. Then we were off to wait in line for the show taping.





The show ended up being full. Both the 11am and 4pm tapings. The whole reason for the trip was now impossible. To concentrate our anger and disappointment, we pow-wowed at Johnny Rockets. Other options for the day were: Disneyland, Knottsberry Farms, or Magic Mountain. We decided on Magic Mountain because its awesome, the price was good, and the recording on the park's telephone said it was opening day, and closed at 10pm. In order to buy and print tickets, most of us gave Danny some cash and he bought them online via iPhone. Next we drove in circles trying to find a Kinko's using Danny's GPS system on his iPhone. Finally we arrived there and met up with everyone else in Dallas's car. We ended up spending an hour and a half in Kinko's. Why, you ask? I'll give you one example: After putting his credit card into the machine next to the computer, Danny was prompted on the Magic Mountain website to type in his credit card account #. He forgot it, so he had to take his card out, which made the computer restart, and he had to do the whole process again. This happened several times. Nick and I took the honor of sleeping on the floor during this.



FINALLY we got everything printed and it was about 2:30pm by this time. I drove my group (Scott and Danny) to Magic Mountain, while Chris drove Dallas's car and got them lost in Beverly Hills. We were already parked and had paid for parking at Magic Mountain, and they were still lost. It may have been for the better however, because when we paid for parking, we saw that the parked closed at 6PM that day. If we had waited for the other half of our group to arrive, by that time we'd have 2 hours tops to be at the park. (It was incredibly windy in the parking lot, and Scott was pumping himself up for rollercoaster riding.)



So, we left. After all that... trust me I begged the boys to stay anyway, (it was the only thing I had even truly looked forward to the whole trip). At least I had Scott to keep me company on this drive. We got home (to Nick's) at 9pm and by that time I was so delirious, I really didn't know how I had made it. Dallas and I finally got to speak when we got to Nick's room to relax, and I finally got to sleep.