Owl

I remember the first time I heard an owl outside my window it scared the shit out of me. I was only about thirteen or fourteen years old and I had never heard an owl before, so I thought it was a person or a big scary animal. Now, laying in my bed trying to sleep, I find the birds 'hoo-hoo-hoo'ing cute and comforting.

Stone Temple Pilots...

is my angsty music.

Four Times Fourty

One of the most epic albums of all time turned forty today. November 8, 1971 Led Zeppelin  released their fourth untitled (IV, Fourth, ZoSo) studio record.

I've listened to the album in its entirety twice today driving to and from work because the radio stations are legally bound to play it every hour on the hour. (Not really, but it does kinda seem that way)

The first time I can remember hearing this album was when I was about four years old, and listening to it as an adult always give me a sense of nostalgia that I don't get listeing to any other album simply because it is the first music I can ever remember hearing. That is a powerful memory.

Listening to Rock and Roll or Black Dog makes me feel four years old again and, I can remember back to a time when I still had my innocence. It wasn't necessarilly the best time in my life, but things were much simpler. Even if my whole world was going to shit, I could still go outside and play in the sandbox or swing on the swingset in my backyard and every bad thing would go away. Even if just for a little while.

Sixteen (nearly seventeen, whoo!) years later and I find myself longing for such simplicity. The ablity to forget about all of my problems and just enjoy life in the moment, long forgotten. When I hear Battle of Evermore I can remember how it felt and it gives me hope that one day I'll get that feeling back.

To this day, my favourite song in the world:

"There's a lady who's sure all that glitters is gold; and she's buying a stairway to heaven."
.....

     "And as we wind on down the road; our shadows taller than our soul."
.....

     "Standing on a hill in my mountain of dreams, telling myself its not as hard, hard, hard as it seems."

Halloween Costume

    

                 Vampiress                          Witchy Woman

Halloween Playlist

"Witchy Woman" The Eagles
"Devil in Disguise" Elvis
"Black Magic Woman" Santana
"Welcome to My Nightmare" Alice Cooper
"Black Widdow" Alice Cooper
"Sympathy for the Devil" Rolling Stones
"Monster Mash" Bobby Pickette & The Crypt Keepders
"Werewolves of London" Warren Zevon
"Thriller" Michael Jackson
"Highway to Hell" AC/DC
"Twisted Transistor" Korn
"Don't Fear the Reaper" Blue Oyster Cult
"Wicked Game" Giant Drag
"Living Dead Girl" Rob Zombie
"Dragula" Rob Zombie
"Aerials" Systerm of a Down
"Sweet Dreams" Marilyn Manson
"Beautiful People" Marilyn Manson
"Bad Moon Rising" Creedence Cleerwater Revivial
"People are Strange" The Doors

Countdown to Halloween

A video to get me in the mood for Halloween:

Photo of the Day

Lailani shakin' it.

Sleeping Sickness; I can feel it coming....

I've become,

A simple souvenir of someones kill.

Like the sea,

I'm constantly changing from calm to ill.

Madness fills my heart and soul,

As if the great divide would swallow me whole.

Oh, how I'm breaking down.

October: The End

"And suns grow meek, and the meek suns grow brief,
And the year smiles as it draws near its death." -- William Cullen Bryant October. A Sonnet

October is the end of the year for me. Not December.

And here's why: November and December are FUCKING depressing. Expectations. The stigma surrounding the holidays is that everyone is to be happy. It's expected. Encouraged. Demanded.

Traditions. Okay lets break it down...

Thanksgiving, in the U.S. is the celebration of the end of the harvest and the opportunity to give thanks to GOD for providing us with the food and supplies necessary to survive the winter. Except that this is the twenty-first century, and five-year-olds have iPods. So, we've adapted.
21st-Century Thanksgiving= time to give thanks for whatever good shit we have in our lives, and stuff our faces with turkey. Yumm.
OH!, and theres parades and football too. Can't forget the football.

December 21 marks the winter solstice.

Yule: the Norse celebrated Yule starting on the solstice. The men would go out and find a huge ass log to burn on the hearth, during which time the family would feast; sometimes up to twelve days. Saturnalia: My personal favourite, Saturnalia was celebrated by the Romans, not for a day, not for twelve, but for an entire MONTH. For one month, beginning the week before solstice, the entire Roman Empire was turned upside down.  It was the largest scale switcheroo in history.
Peasants ran the city's; slaves became masters; businesses and schools closed down so that EVERYONE could join in the festivities.

Hanukkah:  aka The Festival of Lights. Meh. Hanukkah basically means 'dedication'. It begins on a different day every year (because Jewish people are crazy and have their own calendar) and commemorates the rededication of The Holy Temple in Jerusalem. You light a candle; you get a gift; you eat shitty food; for eight days straight.
Which brings us to Christmas:  which basically, in the simplest terms, stole all the cool shit from the other holidays and combined it, tied it up with a bow, and called it their own. Oh, and later they added some shit about a fat man in a red costume who gave flying reindeer to children who only ate cookies.... or something.

POINT BEING: There's so much bullshit surrounding the holidays, that in the end it really doesn't matter what you are celebrating anymore. Its all moot.

 And commercialism has turned any cultural tradition surrounding that time of year into The Hulk on steroids. And PCP. And Meth.

So, here's to Halloween. Live it up. Because its all downhill till New Years.

The Serial Killer In The Garage

11:30pm. I have to wake up early for work tomorrow, but I'm not the least bit tired. So I get the great idea to make my self some hot chocolate milk. I get the cup out and pour the chocolate into it (I always put the chocolate in the cup before the milk because its easier to mix) and go to grab the milk out of the refrigerator only to discover we are out of milk. That plan is scrapped. I get the idea that I could have Mt. Dew instead, but I'm not sure if I should or not considering how much sugar and caffeine it has for this time of night. I convince myself that it will be okay as long as I don't drink the whole can and go to get some. The case of Mt. Dew is in the garage just inside the door. I open the door- I don't bother turning the light on because there is enough diffused light coming in from the open door to see the box- and go to grab myself a can. As I bend over, I look up and around the garage and notice how dark it is. The morbid part of my mind notes that someone could be in there watching me and I wouldn't know it because of how dark it is. Then I think, it would be nifty if a serial killer lived in the garage.

Lies

"I'm the most terrific liar you ever saw in your life. It's awful. If I'm on my way to the store to buy a magazine, even, and somebody asks me where I'm going, I'm liable to say I'm going to the opera. It's terrible." --Holden Caulfield, The Catcher in the Rye

Photo of the Day

Sky today driving home from work.

YOGAGAGAHHH

Dani went shopping for jeans today. While I was watching Jersey Shore, she had me try on a pair of yoga pants that she bought. She said when she tried them on they didn't even cover her ass and they only went down to her ankles, so of course they were long on me. Mom paid for them so she had no problem letting me have them and I was so excited because not only have I never owned a pair of yoga pants (which are amazingly comfortable) but they are the girly-ist pants I've ever had. They are all black but they have a wide waist band that is grey leopard print, folds down and over your butt in silvery metallic writing it says NEW YORK. When I tried them on I looked in the mirror to see how they looked and I was like, "Dani! I've never had a pair of pants with writing on the ass. I'm not going to be able to stop looking at my ass!!". Dani responded, "I think that's kinda the point. They're supposed to make guys want to stare at your ass." And I said, "Yeah, but its not like it makes my butt any bigger. Its still nonexistent, it just has sparkly writing on it now. They'd be like 'oh, there's a book on that girls back'".

I shot a man in Reno just to watch him die; happiness is a warm gun.

Photo of the Day

Me at about 18 mo. and my mother.

Dani: feel free to steal this from me...

Mission Statement:

So we follow our wandering paths, and the very darkness acts as our guide and our doubts serve to reassure us. - Jean-Pierre de Caussade