I love pink ponies too and rainbow unicorns

I know, I know, this is sooo self-indulgent but look at this CUTEY CUTE CUTEST CUPCAKE OF A KITTY!



Oh look, 2 cutey cute smoosh bums!

Candy trails and leaps of faith

Ayep, yep yep. Still quitting work, although it's been a tornado of indecision. They asked me to think about it for a bit, meaning, DON'T GO!!. I did think about it, because really, I'm not independently wealthy nor terribly qualified for non-annoying, well-paying jobs so...I'm really leaping off into the void by quitting, but here's the thing. What's the thing Monsterteeth? Tell us.

Okay, the thing is, every time I reconsider leaving and entertain staying to make money and ensure that at least my financial life is stable, I want to give up on life entirely. I want to just lay down on a choice piece of ground somewhere and not move while I slowly become compost.

Sounds like an easy decision right? Here's the little bastard of it all though: As soon as I decide that I will indeed stick to my decision to leave, I feel so great, I feel like I can handle anything, even working at my stupid job, which is in and of itself, not clean logic.

Anyhoo, anyhoo, great leap of faith on the horizon, for both me and T. All the more scary for both of us, since neither of us can really get each other's back on the financial front. T's thinking of Mastering up an old masters degree. Professors are leaving candy trails to their office for him and promising their first born and such. And why not indeed! He is quite worthy of candy trails and first-borns.

So what the hell, running jumps with eyes closed and fingers crossed, hoping for the best will be undertaken.

In the meantime, the leaves have turned, the trees look like candies. Trails of candy leading me back and forth to work for a finite time.Hello autumn. Nice to see you, you old stinker.

I think the light therapy may be helping. If nothing else, it helps me draw ridiculous things for half an hour each morning. Can't be all bad.

I did a Google search for "leaps of faith" because I was pretty sure it would turn up some hilarious images. Insanely smiling christians leaping into the arms of a Santa Claus looking jesus or puppies giving the thumbs up as they leap into a pile of bones or whatever...Google did not let me down and even one upped me with the above illustration.

I'm thinking of getting this enlarged and painted wall size in my place. In the bedroom. To remind me of the awesome power of leaping faithfully? Or the awesome power of old dudes with swords? It's represents me lolling my tongue in rage at the demons that would hold me back from moving forward, look at me forging onward, wielding my mighty sword, aging considerably...I must say, his clothing looks quite comfy for such a powerful guy. Looks like a velour leisure suit he's sporting. Anyway.

New Plan, Stan.

Rather than force y'all to view the results of my daily light/art therapy (BOORRRINGGGG!), I've made it a separate blog, so it's optional. See how much I care about your needs! So if you want to see it, here ye go. You can also find the link to any of my blogs by clicking on my profile. How neat and tidy.

Hey raven dude, why so sleepy?

There was a dude this morning. A dude lying on the grounds of the church, on top of newspapers, arranged into a crucifix shape. He was just having a little morning, newspaper crucifix snooze. Perfectly normal.

Today's light therapy drawing is brought to you by the letter C. Cookie. Crusty crud. Crap attack. Thanks letter C, for your support and contribution to word formation...

Uh.

See now, I'm just making fun of myself with the below. My self-conscious is mocking me.

making grape jelly, as a metaphor

One of my co-workers just came up to me and said: "I'm making grape jelly."
"What?", I said.
"I'm making grape jelly."
"What does that mean?"
"Grape jelly."
"Ok, like right now, as we speak?"
"Oh uh, no, at home. I was just talking to my husband and I said something about jars and it made me think that I have all these grapes, well, not as much as last year because I had to cut back the vines from these bugs that invaded but my neighbour has tonnes and tonnes of grapes but I have about 4 pounds which makes about 7 or 8 little jars as nice little gifts to give..."
"Well good. Grape jelly is good."
"Yeah, sorry, I guess I was just thinking out loud."
"I thought maybe you were using some sort of vernacular I didn't know about or that,'I'm making grape jelly' was a metaphor for something maybe."
Blank look. "No, just thinking out loud I guess. Sorry."
"No problem."

I skipped the light this morning because I needed the extra half hour sleep. My cat was learning to polka with an elephant late at night, or at least that's what it sounded like...

The wheel of mice death.

Here is today's installment of light therapy art:

"So, what do we have here?"
"It's a wheel full of impaled mice."
"Mmm-hmm. I notice also that one of them is a baby, that's particularly gruesome."
"Yes, I guess I'm not feeling so great."
"One of those mice is about to be run over and the other is watching helplessly."
"Yeah."
"What sort of a wheel is this anyway? It's bad enough that the mice are impaled but it has extra spikes to hurt whatever gets in it's path? This is a very unpleasant contraption indeed."
"The point of drawing while doing the light therapy is not to censure myself, you know, to just let the subconscious purge itself."
"And this is what you come up with? An impaled mice wheel?"
"What sort of therapist are you anyway? Not a very encouraging one."
"I'm not a therapist. You are having a written conversation with yourself."
"Right. Well. I guess I can't really complain then."
"Try drawing something less childishly tragic tomorrow why don't you."
"You're not the boss of me."
"I am you."
"Well you are the part of me that's sucking right now so I'm going to stop typing out what you say. So there."

And that, ladies and gentlemans, is how you win an argument with yourself. For more tips on being very sane...look elsewhere.

what the light made me do

Hmm, disfigured, cracked and bleeding heads. I think I may have a theme going here. Wonder what THAT'S about, she said, not wondering at all. It's like I've transported back to grade nine, subject-wise. Great.

There is Light That Will Never Go Out

Well well, someone hasn't been keeping you very informed. Didn't you hear? I'm quitting my damn job. Let's just say depression and bad PMS, plus a tenacious and perhaps foolish propensity toward idealism has brought months and months of deep dissatisfaction to a breaking point. Let's not linger long on this rut of a topic. The short story is, I gave notice. I will be done, at the latest, by mid December.

Onward and upward hopefully. Onward and sideward or onward and downward are more likely, but let's keep hope fresh, shall we?

I have purchased a lamp for light therapy at great expense in the hopes that it will help to keep me from falling apart all together, as is my wont. The fall is so bittersweet. I love the crisp air and coloured leaves and the cooling days, but with it, comes a deepening depression from the change in light.

Yesterday, sitting on a park bench overlooking the river, I saw the shining leaves of huge trees framing the the sparkling waves on the water and felt a cool fresh breeze tempering the warmth of the bright sun. I explained to T that I could see intellectually, it was all so pretty and lovely, but emotionally, I was completely numb to it's pleasure. As if I was a ghost or a machine. A sad ghost or a sad machine.

Let's hope that light, in front of my eyes each day and light, at the end of a long, boring work tunnel, will help that to change.

Meanwhile, having to sit in front of a lamp for a half hour first thing each morning, does give a person a pretty good excuse to draw while they are doing so. So may I introduce the new feature to my blog, of a light therapy induced drawing a day.
I have no specific goal in mind, nor do I claim that these drawings will have any merit. They are what they are, so let's see if we can dig it. Here's the very first one.

Unwashed Feet Crew

I saw ole Allistair Winslow Thurston etc...again. He's still reading "Dictatorship as Experience". I'm starting to wonder if it's a fake out. He should be done by now. Although, he probably reads as deliberately as he eats, chewing each word until it's mush before moving on to the next. He placed the bookmark so meticulously at the end of the ride, deeply, squarely, into the spine, one eigth of an inch showing over the top. I wish I could take a picture of this guy to show you. He is straight out of a book about Victorian ghosts. Speaking of ghosts...

I've recently aquired a CD by the Ghostbees, twin sisters from Halifax. Listening to their music makes me feel like taking up reading tarot cards and casting spells in the forest at dawn. You know? Only wearing shawls knit by orphaned virgins and adopting 26 cats and naming them all after the fairy queens. Stuff like that. Paula, you will use it as more proof that I'm just turning into a big old hippy. I staunchly deny any association with that unwashed feet crew. Hey hiphop artists, feel free to steal Unwashed Feet Crew(UFC) as a name, from me. I will buy your records if you do.

Wallpower

Sigh.

I was rinsing out my glass after having some strawberry soy milk and I remembered the Catholic retreat I had to go to in grade seven for a weekend. It was out in the middle of nowhere in an ex convent or private school, what's the difference really...

It was run by 3 creepy creepsters, one being 300 years old and stinky-Rex. His big deal was word art. Word art to inspire the love of Jesus. And not changing his clothes ever.

Bizarre rules were all over the place. No leaning against the wall. "Wallpower!", they would shout if they caught you doing it. Wallpower? Bloody hell. Unsaintly weakness, like wanting to rest your back since there are no goddamn chairs, will ultimately send you screaming and flaming to hell. How about Fuckyoupower.

Another useless rule was that you were not allowed to rinse your glass out to refill it. They served milk for all meals, and if you wanted water after, you had to drink milky water. Everyone knows a dirty glass with a blend of remnant liquids brings you closer to god than a clean one.

They kept you busy all day and night and made you get up at 6 in the morning. Not surprising that I've blocked most of it out of my memory, except the little bits that were more or less innocuous. Let's not even go into everyone sitting in a circle in the pitch black dark and passing a candle around while confessing a shame. Ok well, let's go into it a bit. I utilized cunning to avoid this "healing confession" by working with the dark. When the candle came 3 people away from me, I got up, moved to a part of the circle that had already had their turn, shoved myself between 2 people and threatened murder if they told on me. As for listening to kids helplessly confess their shames, I tried to just block it all out by singing Duran Duran songs in my head.

Did I mention how godawful the food was? It was godawful. Dishes called: "Teenager surprise." and the like. Things made with carob.

Not a word about anything that happened that week to anyone was mentioned by any of the kids in my class when we all got back to school the following week. Everyone just wanted to forget the whole thing had ever happened. I could think of waaay better things to do with an empty convent. None of which would involve milk or stinky old men.

Gee, more kitten video

A river of beaver tears. (Rhymes with beers, not bears.)

Been a while since I blogged. Indeed it has. It's all too boring to recount. Life sometimes just floats past, wordlessly, like a water logged spongecake in a river of beaver tears. Speaking of beaver tears...here's some photos I took tonight.