Nostalgia
Oh, how I've missed you, Livejournal.
New journal
Guys, I've moved over to my new journal, 
misslethologica, probably for real - though who knows, I might get tired of it within a week and give it up and go back to this one. I'm going to add everyone on my friends list here to the new journal, and I really, really hope that you'll add me back. I'm not really satisfied with how it looks, but oh well. Let's give it a whirl.
misslethologica, probably for real - though who knows, I might get tired of it within a week and give it up and go back to this one. I'm going to add everyone on my friends list here to the new journal, and I really, really hope that you'll add me back. I'm not really satisfied with how it looks, but oh well. Let's give it a whirl.Forget your perfect offering/There is a crack, a crack in everything/That's how the light gets in
Then dive down there with the lights to lead
that seem to shine from everything -
down to the bottom of the deep blue sea;
down where your heart beats so slow,
and never in your life have felt so free.
Will you come down there with me?
down where our bodies start to seem like
artifacts of some strange dream,
which afterwards you can't decipher,
and so, soon, have forgotten everything.
- Joanna Newsom
I hate it when you've got nothing new to read, no books lined up in advance. I don't right now, so I reread both of my Charlotte Bronte books, and I've just re-finished Lolita. The last book I hadn't read before that I read was The Scar by China Miéville, which was pretty good, I suppose. So now it's kind of a toss-up between Hemingway's The Garden of Eden, Lady Chatterley's Lover, and Camus' The First Man, from my small and rather random assortment of books that I actually own.
I am thinking about starting a new journal and moving over there from then on - and maybe making it friends-only? I don't really have any rational reason for it, it just occurred to me. What say you? And I'm not sure what name I should use; I guess I could just use my tumblr username (angelmeat).
My throat is really parched right now. I have the feeling that I'm probably deeply dehydrated all the time, and I'm just so used to it that I barely notice it any of the time. Do you ever think like: If conditions were right, if the perfect combination of elements or alignment of the heavenly bodies or what-fucking-ever, the right circumstances colluded all at once, if the cards all fell into place at the same time, that you'd change your life? You'd make an effort to tidy up all the small things that are somewhat within your control, in tenuous hope of affecting some of the bigger things, or at least alleviating the symptoms. Well, I would actually clean out my closet, get rid of some of the helpless bloated corpse-heaps of clothing that I have no use for, do chores, get frames for at least some of my numerous posters and art prints, eat less junk food and work on my compulsive eating habits, exercise daily, drink more water, and dance in the rain and all that. As if as soon as this specific set of circumstances falls into place, all this I will do and more. Who am I kidding?
that seem to shine from everything -
down to the bottom of the deep blue sea;
down where your heart beats so slow,
and never in your life have felt so free.
Will you come down there with me?
down where our bodies start to seem like
artifacts of some strange dream,
which afterwards you can't decipher,
and so, soon, have forgotten everything.
- Joanna Newsom
I hate it when you've got nothing new to read, no books lined up in advance. I don't right now, so I reread both of my Charlotte Bronte books, and I've just re-finished Lolita. The last book I hadn't read before that I read was The Scar by China Miéville, which was pretty good, I suppose. So now it's kind of a toss-up between Hemingway's The Garden of Eden, Lady Chatterley's Lover, and Camus' The First Man, from my small and rather random assortment of books that I actually own.
I am thinking about starting a new journal and moving over there from then on - and maybe making it friends-only? I don't really have any rational reason for it, it just occurred to me. What say you? And I'm not sure what name I should use; I guess I could just use my tumblr username (angelmeat).
My throat is really parched right now. I have the feeling that I'm probably deeply dehydrated all the time, and I'm just so used to it that I barely notice it any of the time. Do you ever think like: If conditions were right, if the perfect combination of elements or alignment of the heavenly bodies or what-fucking-ever, the right circumstances colluded all at once, if the cards all fell into place at the same time, that you'd change your life? You'd make an effort to tidy up all the small things that are somewhat within your control, in tenuous hope of affecting some of the bigger things, or at least alleviating the symptoms. Well, I would actually clean out my closet, get rid of some of the helpless bloated corpse-heaps of clothing that I have no use for, do chores, get frames for at least some of my numerous posters and art prints, eat less junk food and work on my compulsive eating habits, exercise daily, drink more water, and dance in the rain and all that. As if as soon as this specific set of circumstances falls into place, all this I will do and more. Who am I kidding?
10-day meme: Day 10
1 picture of yourself
10-day meme: Day 9
2 songs
+ Helium Vola - "Zur Heilung"
+ Cocteau Twins - "Half-Gifts"
It's an old game, my love
When you can't have me, you want me
Because you know that you're not risking anything
Intimacy is when we're in the same place at the same time
Dealing honestly with how we feel, and who we really are
That's what grown-ups do
That is mature thinking
Well, I'm still a junkie for it
It takes me out of my aloneness
But this relationship cannot sustain itself
Intimacy is when we're in the same place at the same time
Dealing honestly with how we feel, and who we really are
That's what grown-ups do
That is mature thinking
I just have to know how to be in the process
Of creating things in a better way
And it hurts but it's a lie that I can't handle it
I still have a world of me-ness to fulfill
I still have a life, and it's a rich one even with mourning
Even with grief and sadness
I still care about this planet
I am still connected to nature and to my dreams for myself
I have my friends, my family
I have myself
I still have me
+ Helium Vola - "Zur Heilung"
+ Cocteau Twins - "Half-Gifts"
It's an old game, my love
When you can't have me, you want me
Because you know that you're not risking anything
Intimacy is when we're in the same place at the same time
Dealing honestly with how we feel, and who we really are
That's what grown-ups do
That is mature thinking
Well, I'm still a junkie for it
It takes me out of my aloneness
But this relationship cannot sustain itself
Intimacy is when we're in the same place at the same time
Dealing honestly with how we feel, and who we really are
That's what grown-ups do
That is mature thinking
I just have to know how to be in the process
Of creating things in a better way
And it hurts but it's a lie that I can't handle it
I still have a world of me-ness to fulfill
I still have a life, and it's a rich one even with mourning
Even with grief and sadness
I still care about this planet
I am still connected to nature and to my dreams for myself
I have my friends, my family
I have myself
I still have me
10-day meme: Day 8
3 films
+ Enter the Void (2009)
Freakin' amazing. Obviously destined to be hated by many, but I think it's one of the most interesting movies I've seen in recent history.
+ Solaris (1972)
Andrei Tarkovsky's Solaris is one of the most interesting science fiction movies I've ever seen, and it's also much more than science fiction. It's beautiful and philosophical, with this visual austerity that gives it an atmosphere unlike any other sci-fi film.
+ Hairspray (1988)
I love John Waters' Hairspray! It's just so much fun and I love its unique style and campiness, and its awesome soundtrack. I've never seen the remake, but it looks like the most hideously cheesy thing ever, and I have no idea why they turned it into a musical.
Here's the link to a clip from the Madison dance scene.
+ Enter the Void (2009)
Freakin' amazing. Obviously destined to be hated by many, but I think it's one of the most interesting movies I've seen in recent history.
+ Solaris (1972)
Andrei Tarkovsky's Solaris is one of the most interesting science fiction movies I've ever seen, and it's also much more than science fiction. It's beautiful and philosophical, with this visual austerity that gives it an atmosphere unlike any other sci-fi film.
+ Hairspray (1988)
I love John Waters' Hairspray! It's just so much fun and I love its unique style and campiness, and its awesome soundtrack. I've never seen the remake, but it looks like the most hideously cheesy thing ever, and I have no idea why they turned it into a musical.
Here's the link to a clip from the Madison dance scene.
10-day meme: Day 7
4 books
+ The Magic Bottle by Camille Rose Garcia
The Magic Bottle is a weird sweet little children's book, more for adults than children (maybe for weird children with relatively advanced reading abilities), by the Pop Surrealist artist Camilla Rose Garcia. The underlying message is environmentalism, but it's filled with so much imaginative goodness that I can't help being okay with that. The illustrations are wonderful, and I actually love the writing as well, they mesh together to create this gorgeous, whimsical, wacky world populated by the strange, cute creatures of Camille Rose Garcia's art. It flows and roils with life. The world has no relation to reality, and I like that. Her cutesy, melancholy, and acid trip-like style features constantly weeping, lugubrious-looking cartoonish characters. Lines from the book:
He has peered inside the ears of screaming bolivian monkeys, and browsed under the graves of dead virgins.
( Collapse )
They fell through a long earthy tunnel, twisting here and there, catching a glimpse of earthworms and moles, treeroots and molten lava, then straightened and splashed into a jewely aquamarine underworld, slowly moving with the quiet symphony of life.
A giant octopus, red in color with luminous eyes, put his face against the bottle and smiled subconsciously, for he had no lips with which to smile. Whales slept and starfish daydreamed.
+ The Collector by John Fowles
This has long been one of my favorites. It'll always remind me so strongly of early-1960s England. Sometimes hailed as the "first psychological thriller," anyone who seriously uses this label to describe it obviously has never read it. There's nothing of the thriller in it. It's about a lonely, semi-psychopathic young man, a dedicated butterfly collector, who is obsessed with a beautiful art student named Miranda, and after winning the lottery, builds a hidden home for her, and kidnaps her. The first half and last small portion of the book are told from his perspective; his style has a curious effect of somehow both grayness, draining the life and energy out of language, and expressiveness, very effectively suggesting his feelings and attitudes. The middle part of the book is Miranda's diary that she writes during her imprisonment, which is a huge contrast to him.
+ Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami
Murakami is one of my favorite living writers, and Hard-Boiled Wonderland is my favorite novel of his so far. Everything I love about him is in it in spades. It's amazingly inventive, with this wildly outlandish, fantastic, and thought-out science fiction story, I love the quiet absurdity of the characters, and it's totally enjoyable and engrossing.
+ Three Lives by Gertrude Stein
A lot of people can't stand this book, and I can sort of see why, with its constantly repetitive, rambling, circular language (well, it is Gertrude Stein), but there's something very touching and...truthful about real life to me about it. I don't really know how to describe it. But it's become lodged somewhere in my mind as a book that was deeply affecting to me, almost quietly so.
+ The Magic Bottle by Camille Rose Garcia
The Magic Bottle is a weird sweet little children's book, more for adults than children (maybe for weird children with relatively advanced reading abilities), by the Pop Surrealist artist Camilla Rose Garcia. The underlying message is environmentalism, but it's filled with so much imaginative goodness that I can't help being okay with that. The illustrations are wonderful, and I actually love the writing as well, they mesh together to create this gorgeous, whimsical, wacky world populated by the strange, cute creatures of Camille Rose Garcia's art. It flows and roils with life. The world has no relation to reality, and I like that. Her cutesy, melancholy, and acid trip-like style features constantly weeping, lugubrious-looking cartoonish characters. Lines from the book:
He has peered inside the ears of screaming bolivian monkeys, and browsed under the graves of dead virgins.
( Collapse )
They fell through a long earthy tunnel, twisting here and there, catching a glimpse of earthworms and moles, treeroots and molten lava, then straightened and splashed into a jewely aquamarine underworld, slowly moving with the quiet symphony of life.
A giant octopus, red in color with luminous eyes, put his face against the bottle and smiled subconsciously, for he had no lips with which to smile. Whales slept and starfish daydreamed.
+ The Collector by John Fowles
This has long been one of my favorites. It'll always remind me so strongly of early-1960s England. Sometimes hailed as the "first psychological thriller," anyone who seriously uses this label to describe it obviously has never read it. There's nothing of the thriller in it. It's about a lonely, semi-psychopathic young man, a dedicated butterfly collector, who is obsessed with a beautiful art student named Miranda, and after winning the lottery, builds a hidden home for her, and kidnaps her. The first half and last small portion of the book are told from his perspective; his style has a curious effect of somehow both grayness, draining the life and energy out of language, and expressiveness, very effectively suggesting his feelings and attitudes. The middle part of the book is Miranda's diary that she writes during her imprisonment, which is a huge contrast to him.
+ Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World by Haruki Murakami
Murakami is one of my favorite living writers, and Hard-Boiled Wonderland is my favorite novel of his so far. Everything I love about him is in it in spades. It's amazingly inventive, with this wildly outlandish, fantastic, and thought-out science fiction story, I love the quiet absurdity of the characters, and it's totally enjoyable and engrossing.
+ Three Lives by Gertrude Stein
A lot of people can't stand this book, and I can sort of see why, with its constantly repetitive, rambling, circular language (well, it is Gertrude Stein), but there's something very touching and...truthful about real life to me about it. I don't really know how to describe it. But it's become lodged somewhere in my mind as a book that was deeply affecting to me, almost quietly so.
10-day meme: Day 6
10-day meme: Day 5
6 places you want to go
+ Paris
I've never been to Paris (or any other European city, for that matter) in my life, and I have only an inkling of what it's really like, but I want to go there and see if it's as wonderful as I hope it is. One thing that's recently reminded me of how much I want to go there is the Paris scenes in An Education, the Polaroid shots on their trip, even though it was such a little part of the movie, it was lovely. I want to be surrounded with so much cultural history, stay in an old hotel, go into cathedrals, walk down streets lined on each side with stained white facades, visit the Louvre, read in cafes, and do whatever it is you do when you're a tourist in Paris.
+ Alaska
I'd like to go on a whale-watching cruise up in Alaska. I think whales are so majestic and gentle and beautiful/strange, it would be great to see them up close. I remember in fifth grade I wrote this story about a humpback whale migrating and getting caught by hunters, from the perspective of the whale, sort of like Tolstoy's story about horses (can't recall the title), if you know what I mean, anyway it was kind of silly but my teacher really liked it and had me read it in front of the class. Anyway, I love Alaska’s glacial landscape, the icy-blue, untouched, pure look of it.
+ Tokyo
This is pretty much self-explanatory. I want to stay overnight in a themed sex hotel and buy underwear from a vending machine, and go shopping for Lolita clothes and people-watch and eat a lot of various kinds of delicious and delightful junk food. Basically just have good old-fashioned urban fun in Tokyo, the first place I think of when I think of "urban."
+ Irish seashore
It seems so beautiful, impossibly green, the natural landscape entirely peculiar to the place. I'd like to stay in a cottage near the sea or something and just relax.
+ Caribbean islands
Because of those stunning-blue-water beaches, of course.
+ Rome
Again, because of all the cultural history. And because it seems so warm and sunny and well-worn. Because I’d like to lose myself there, amidst ruins and relics and in nighttime streets.
A disturbance in mirrors,
The sea shattering its grey one
+ Paris
I've never been to Paris (or any other European city, for that matter) in my life, and I have only an inkling of what it's really like, but I want to go there and see if it's as wonderful as I hope it is. One thing that's recently reminded me of how much I want to go there is the Paris scenes in An Education, the Polaroid shots on their trip, even though it was such a little part of the movie, it was lovely. I want to be surrounded with so much cultural history, stay in an old hotel, go into cathedrals, walk down streets lined on each side with stained white facades, visit the Louvre, read in cafes, and do whatever it is you do when you're a tourist in Paris.
+ Alaska
I'd like to go on a whale-watching cruise up in Alaska. I think whales are so majestic and gentle and beautiful/strange, it would be great to see them up close. I remember in fifth grade I wrote this story about a humpback whale migrating and getting caught by hunters, from the perspective of the whale, sort of like Tolstoy's story about horses (can't recall the title), if you know what I mean, anyway it was kind of silly but my teacher really liked it and had me read it in front of the class. Anyway, I love Alaska’s glacial landscape, the icy-blue, untouched, pure look of it.
+ Tokyo
This is pretty much self-explanatory. I want to stay overnight in a themed sex hotel and buy underwear from a vending machine, and go shopping for Lolita clothes and people-watch and eat a lot of various kinds of delicious and delightful junk food. Basically just have good old-fashioned urban fun in Tokyo, the first place I think of when I think of "urban."
+ Irish seashore
It seems so beautiful, impossibly green, the natural landscape entirely peculiar to the place. I'd like to stay in a cottage near the sea or something and just relax.
+ Caribbean islands
Because of those stunning-blue-water beaches, of course.
+ Rome
Again, because of all the cultural history. And because it seems so warm and sunny and well-worn. Because I’d like to lose myself there, amidst ruins and relics and in nighttime streets.
A disturbance in mirrors,
The sea shattering its grey one