tortoisegirl: (OMG Brutal)
30 Day Meme
Day 08 → A photo that makes you angry/sad

My initial thought was to get very serious business about this and find an image that has to do with rape statistics or gender inequality, since those are certainly things that make me sad/angry/want to quit life. But they're not really things you can sum up in a photo and I realized I was putting too much effort into finding pics of things that'll just depress me. So I went the animal route again.

(And yeah, it's two pictures, but they're from the same story.)

Dead animal behind the cut. Nothing gory or too graphic, but sad )

And if you want really scary/sad/angering, here's an interview about pelvic exams performed by med students on unconscious women without their consent.
tortoisegirl: (Rawr pink thing)
30 Day Meme
Day 07 → A photo that makes you happy

Photobucket

Yeah, I know this one's a cop-out too because lol, a macro. Does this even count as a photo? And small fluffy animals, who's not cheered up by small fluffy animals? Soulless people, that's who. Boy am I tired. /half-assed reply
tortoisegirl: (Dan & Laurie's starry night)
30 Day Meme
Day 05 → Your favourite quote

"Well, that's just, like, your opinion, man."
-The Dude, The Big Lebowski

Okay I don't know if I'm serious with this. Quotes are another thing I don't pay enough attention to to have a favorite. But I think this quote at people a lot.

Blah )
tortoisegirl: (Narcissist)
30 Day Meme
Day 04 → Your favourite book

This one's easier.

Photobucket


The books I like best are the ones that evoke emotion, and this book hits a lot of them. There are a ton of characters and it can be tough to keep track of them, but many of them are brilliant; Yossarian in particular is one of my favorite characters every. It's full of the dark humor I love, and the non-linear plot is very well done. It's a sad book, I think, though the tragedy is cleverly disguised and is not so bad by the end :)

Runners-up include Pride & Prejudice, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Lord of the Rings trilogy, Watership Down.
tortoisegirl: (Frankie says grrrr)
30 Day Meme
Day 03 → Your favourite television programme

Eeeh, this is another one that changes and will change depending on a lot of things, including whether the show is still on the air or not. Right now it's Project Runway. I would say Futurama, though I've been a bad fan and haven't seen any of the new episodes (it's on opposite Project Runway ;_; ) And I'd have to rewatch Lost as a whole series before putting it in the top.

And, uhh, for a while now Project Runway, Lost, and Top Chef have been the only non-cartoon shows I regularly watch. The others I considered for this questions were Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends, the Simpsons, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Flapjack, Metalocalyse... I swear, I'm over the age of 12.
tortoisegirl: (Dudley's moment of hearwarming)
30 Day Meme
Day 02 → Your favourite movie

This is a hard one, because I'm very casual about movies and don't really think about them enough to develop favorites. V for Vendetta blew me away when I saw it in theaters, though, and it's one I find myself rewatching all the time. And hey, I love Natalie Portman and I love Hugo Weaving. I have read the comic (after seeing the movie) and I love them both, but as different entities. One of the things that drew me to Watchmen before I really knew what it was was the fact that it came from the same source as V for Vendetta.

Photobucket


In other news, I'm reading John Winthrop's "A Modell of Christian Charity" for school, and it includes this section about the Biblical figures Jonathan and David:

"Jonathan a valiant man endued with the spirit of love, so soon as he discovered the same spirit in David had presently his heart knit to him by this ligament of love; so that it is said he loved him as his own soul, he takes so great pleasure in him, that he strips himself to adorn his beloved. His father's kingdom was not so precious to him as his beloved David, David shall have it with all his heart. Himself desires no more but that he may be near to him to rejoice in his good. He chooseth to converse with him in the wilderness even to the hazard of his own life, rather than with the great Courtiers in his father's Palace. When he sees danger towards him, he spares neither rare pains nor peril to direct it. When injury was offered his beloved David, he would not bear it, though from his own father. And when they must part for a season only, they thought their hearts would have broke for sorrow, had not their affections found vent by abundance of tears."

So...he ships this, right? Way to sneak Bible slashfic into your sermons, Winthrop.
tortoisegirl: (Default)
30 Day Meme
Day 01 → Your favourite song

I'll call this my favorite song at the moment since I'm not sure I have a long-time favorite. But I love this song, and I'm always humming or singing it or having it pop into my head :)

Birdhouse in Your Soul by They Might Be Giants
tortoisegirl: (Don't call my name)
I can't stop watching this video. I'm not sure why, since the song's nothing special and I only find, like, one of the guys in it attractive, but idk. I think it's the bright colors and the inexplicable lack of clothing. And the sense of humor about it all :D (At least I think it's supposed to be lulzy...they can't be serious in this, right?)

Probably NSFW by the way, for bare ass and explicit ice cream.



Annnnd, since I'm a terrible bandwagon jumper... )
tortoisegirl: (Sunflowers)
First two days of school are done, and the prof let me into the capstone I was aiming for! It's a huge relief that my schedule is set. So far the classes seem like ones I'll enjoy and the teachers are likable. We're going to study Maus in my Contemporary Lit class, first time working with a graphic novel academically for me. And one I've read already and can borrow from my dad, at that. There'll be a ton of reading to do, though. Gotta get back into a school & homework swing of things.
tortoisegirl: (Frusciante)
House-sitting at my dad's new place until Wednesday, and it's so quiet and niiiiice here. I was going to spend today walking around the neighborhood to see what around but after a long day yesterday and a long week ahead it was just too nice to laze around all by myself.

And about my long day yesterday! I took the train down to Washington DC for the day, which is something I'd been wanting to do for a while just to see the city and be touristy. And I got to spend most the visit with [livejournal.com profile] sandoz_iscariot! We got to do a lot, though I didn't take many pictures and many of the ones I did take didn't turn out well. I'll share what I've got.

Well first of all there was a little timing fail on my part in that there was a Glenn Beck rally going on that day. There were some teabaggers on the train with me, extolling the virtues of Sarah Palin (thankfully not for the whole ride), and sandoz had issues getting to the metro because it was so packed, but we weren't near the Lincoln Memorial rally site and didn't encounter them that much. Based on the t-shirts I saw their rainson d'etre of the day was "honor" - reclaiming or restoring the nation's honor. Which, now that think of it, makes me think of Zuko from A:TLA more than American patriotism. So, lol teabaggers, lol.

Anyway, onto the good parts.

Photobucket

The above building is one the Smithsonian's buildings. We didn't actually go to this particular one (I just thought it was pretty); we went to the Natural History Museum. It was very large and very crowded, but for exhibits we visited the oceans, dinosaurs, mammals, gemstones, and birds.

Long post is long )
tortoisegirl: (Default)
Still haven't heard any word about getting into that capstone, despite calling the prof's office and refreshing my email every five minutes. But, another prof put the syllabus and all our reading material is articles online, so no books to buy!

I'm distracting myself with the internet. Here's a video of a crab hanging out with an octopus who lives in a rice cooker under the sea.


My favorite part is when the robot arm puts the lid back on, like "Oh, pardon me, ma'am."
tortoisegirl: (Frankie says grrrr)
Got an email and a phone call this morning from an adviser telling me that my capstone course was canceled. The big thesis-paper course that I need to graduate. A week before classes start. I've gone through panic mode and now I'm waiting to hear back from a professor I emailed about getting into another, filled course. Worst case scenario, I end up with a topic I'm not interested in and an inconvenient schedule.

It could ultimately be a good thing. I signed up for the course I did (Post-Colonial Studies, wtf I know nothing about that) because my first choice was full and this gives me a legit reason to beg to be let into the full course. I just wish it wasn't happening this late.

*refreshes email*
tortoisegirl: (Default)
Yesterday there was a big family thing down in Maryland and I went with my dad and his fiance (both sisters skipped out, grrr). I only knew about five people there even though we're all apparently related, so that was a little awkward. I won a Skip-It from this little contest we did. Ah, family.

The location was very cool though; a park (national park, maybe) right on the Chesapeake Bay, and our picnic area was right by a fishing pier. My dad's cousin was crabbing and fishing all day and ended up bringing home about three dozen crabs. There was a turtle pond too with a snapping turtle that loved the vanilla wafers we fed him. And! The park has a rehabilitation center for birds that are injured, and some of them can't be re-released into the wild. There's a really cool habitat for a handful of raptors right in the middle of the woods. No attendants, just a series of wood-and-wire enclosures.

Photobucket

Owls. Everyone is fond of owls. )
After we left the family picnic Marie-Claire had a hankering for some crabs so we explored the area a bit looking out for a restaurant. Which was mostly...driving past cornfields. For like an hour. We did find a restaurant overlooking a marina and Dad and Marie-Claire had their crabs. I've never been to a crab place before so I was kinda 0_0 when they dumped a pile of cooked crabs right on the table. They creeped me out. And I don't eat seafood so I was there with my salad and french fries. Idk, I think seafood will eternally weird me out.

And then this silliness happened after dinner, because we're all dorks sometimes.
Photobucket
tortoisegirl: (Rawr pink thing)
Yesterday's cure for boredom was to cook, specifically things I'd never tried making before. And I took pictures because...idk, everyone needs to see the shit I make, or something.

Another food post. )
tortoisegirl: (Default)
My last entry wasn't a very informative update, so let's try again.

There hasn't been much of anything going on this summer, which has been my biggest downer lately. I haven't actually gone anywhere because of scheduling and time and money and blarg, life, and all the potential fun stuff has been pushed back until around the start of school when I'll be thinking about other things. The planned trip the shore a few weeks ago didn't happen because of the godawful heat, and it's been damn difficult to get people together for other things. I've completely and utterly failed at using free time for things like reading and writing, though that's my own fault.

I did get to see Inception, which was awesome, and hang out with friends and cute little baby. I've been using my Art Museum membership (saw the Renoir exhibit!) but I'm such a philistine that there's only so many times I can go there and stay interested. Damn all the museums here for costing so much money >:|

So the lack of updates was just because of a lack of things happening, that's all. I think I'm too boring for Livejournal.

Hmph.

Aug. 5th, 2010 07:01 pm
tortoisegirl: (Narcissist)
What a disappointing week. Things keep getting worse.

But anyway, it's been about a month since I got my tattoo redone so I guess it's time for some pictures. I don't think it's entirely healed yet; it's still shinier and sharper than I've seen in other black-ink tattoo, and since I actually want the faded, blown-out look there's still a ways to go. It'll happen eventually though.

Photobucket

Take two )
tortoisegirl: (Take that Rorschach)
One of my wisdom teeth has been hurting a lot over the past week, enough to need a painkiller, plus my gums would sting terribly whenever I drank anything. Went to the dentist today. The pain and stinging is apparently common wisdom-tooth stuff, but it turns out I have cavities in all four of my wisdom teeth (my first cavities ever ;_;) My options are to either fill them or have all the wisdom teeth pulled. I guess I'll have them pulled, since the dentist said they're likely to develop cavities again and wisdom teeth are jerks anyway. Certainly not something I'm looking forward too, though.


And so this isn't just a post about me and my teeth, here are some creepy disturbing videos featuring cats.

And they're animations, so no actual cats were harmed.> <object width= )
tortoisegirl: (Narcissist)
So we already know the current Old Spice ads are awesome and full of diamonds, but holy shit, now Isaiah Mustafa is doing personalized video responses to comments on Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, and blogs.


http://twitter.com/OldSpice






There are dozen of them! I've never been so enamored with an ad campaign before!

And, um, I may have already @replied to him on Twitter. Pick me, pick meeeee!

Moar dots

Jul. 9th, 2010 07:33 pm
tortoisegirl: (Frankie says grrrr)
Went back to No Ka Oi today to finally get my constellation tattoo fixed. Luckily Anna remembered our consultation months ago and knew just what was up. BUT when she was explaining my options for fixing it she said that the shop doesn't guarantee brown ink and won't touch it up for free - which NO ONE TOLD ME. I talked to FOUR different people there about this tattoo, and not one of them mentioned that brown ink is harder to heal, or that it would cost me more to fix it if something went wrong. The original artist barely spoke to me, and though Anna was much better on that front she never told me that policy about brown ink. Uuuugh. She made an exception this time and didn't charge, but I definitely don't want to go back there for any further work. Not when they suck at explaining store policy and crucial tattoo info to their clients.

Anyway, ranting aside, I got it redone in black ink rather than brown in the hopes that there won't be any color loss issues again. It hurt less than the first time, weirdly. It's swollen and red and gross looking at the moment, and it's staying slathered in lotion so it doesn't scab up as badly as it did before. Also finding it very hard to position myself so that my inner arm isn't touching anything. But if it doesn't heal right this time I'll probably just say fuck it and chop off my arm.
tortoisegirl: (Look to the skies)
Uh, happy late birthday America.

So the 4th of July happened, and there were fireworks and water ice and sunburn. I was cat-sitting at my dad's over the weekend because poor geriatric Stripes can't eat on his own and needs to be hand-fed. Poor kitty is so skinny now. He's still very good at waking me up at 5am for his food, though.

On the 4th I went to the Art Museum area for the street fair and concert and fireworks. Saw a few breakdancing groups, a guy who was doing flips over the heads of volunteers, and one guy with a GIGANTIC python who was charging people to drape it around their shoulders and take pictures (idk...snakes for America, I guess). It's also interesting that, considering the holiday, there were very few American flag around. I think I saw only two vendors selling them and very few people carrying them, even the mini ones. Glow sticks and coloring flashing accessories were far more popular.

Anyway, I pushed my way through the crowd to get a fairly good view of the concert stage. The Roots were fantastic. They were really into it and good at working the crowd, and the music was the kind of upbeat funky stuff you want to hear at a summer holiday party. The Goo Goo Dolls were the last act (there was some other band before The Roots, but idk who they were and they only played two songs). I don't know if it was bad planning or what, but the whole concert was running behind, which delayed the fireworks, so by the time the Goo Goo Dolls were on I just wanted them to get on with it and get to the fireworks. I left the stage area to find a better view for the fireworks shortly they started playing, but the concert ended up being an hour and a half longer than scheduled. When the Goo Goo Dolls came back on stage for an encore some kids near me booed, haha (I didn't boo, but I was fucking tired at that point and just wanted them off the damn stage).

The fireworks finally went off at 11:00, and they were shiny and colorful and wonderful, and there were some weird music choices happening in the background. Afterwards I practically ran back to City Hall to get the subway before the masses of people clogged it up too much. It was a good day, if unreasonably hot, and I'm glad I took advantage of the free concert. Yay America!

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