1)  Dumb dogs.  Our own lovably stupid beagle-basset-birddog mix got off his chain in the middle of the night last week.  Think he might've been chasing a coyote off the property.  He's protective like that (and so earned himself a hunk of ham).

2)  Wedding snubs.  An old roommate of mine got married.  She spent weeks chasing me around Facebook to get my mailing address to send an invitation.  Hadn't seen one, didn't know if the groom had gotten smart (24/25 is much too young to marry, I'm sorry.  Your 20s are for being stupid, not wed).  Well come to check the wall to find out the wedding was earlier this month.  Thank goodness I got snubbed, I was wondering how to get out of it (we didn't exactly end on the buddiest of notes).

3) How-to-draw technique books.  I splurged on two from Michael's because they were A-MAY-ZING-LY detailed on technique.  They're from a publisher I didn't recognize which is always fun.  Now if I ever want to paint watercolor fairies and elves, I have the books to do it!  PS: [link] this is the author.  Amazon does not have the books I bought....weird.

4)  the Dark Shadows Remake.  It wasn't awful.  I loved the 70s soap (ignore the 90s remake, it is boring as SHIT) and was worried Tim Burton would Spielburg the remake to hell.  The film overall gets a resounding 'meh, s'ok' but the soundtrack is bitchin'.  A little depressing to watch Alice Cooper waddle around re-performing some of his 70s work (The Ballade of Danny and Mr. Nice Guy) but eh.  I'd still dance to it.  Not much more to report than that; it's Johnny Depp in stupid hair and greasepaint, same as it's been for the past 10+ years.  Starting to think Burton's thinking of trading in the first wife of the threesome.  Bonham-Carter doesn't come off too well in this one but I won't spoil it more than that.  

5)  The ability of roommates to cause nervous breakdowns.  I've been gone for two weeks and come back to an apartment in floor-to-ceiling filth.  So I march to the office, tell them that I will be cleaning and all shit that is not mine is going in the garbage, because I'm at my wits end.  The assistant complex manager was very nice; supposed to be helping me get recompensed for the cleaning shit I had to buy (no idea what the roommies did with it all since they sure as shit have NOT been cleaning).  Spent six hours scrubbing and throwing out yesterday; still not done but at least my brother had a cleanish place to sleep over.  

6)  The power of crazy.  This one trails off of the above: one roommate came home while I was scrubbing-scrubbing-scrubbing.  At this point I've already had rage, hand-flapping hysterics, and more rage, and have settled comfortably into dangerously quiet.  She was too unnerved to say anything about what I was doing, which was good because my camel's back is broken and cannot carry any more straws.

7)  Hidden Object Games.  I've gotten into them as of late and I don't know why but they're kind of relaxing...some of them anyway.  Stray Souls: Dollhouse Story is creepier than the usual HOG.  It's a short game, but the story's good so I didn't mind the 6.99 pricetag on two hours of initial game play.  You can download it from Amazon and I really do recommend it--everyone can use a break from hardcore gaming to do some casual point-n-clicking.  [Spoiler] The protagonist is stupid.  She never learned that you don't trust the clown EVER.

8)  Grasshopper cookies.  They're not quite thin mints, but the elves have done a pretty good job from their tree.

9) Stamps.  I don't scrapbook but I love stamps.  No idea why, but I'm collecting away.    Best part is I can stamp, scan, and import into photoshop as reuseable stamps that won't get ink everywhere.  WOOHOO.

10)  The lone summer class.  My university screwed me, big surprise.  But it's one class for four hours twice a week, and it's ceramics.  Really, really hard to screw up ceramics.

11) Updates!  Especially when they're cheerful.    So I figured out which roommate is the filthy, filthy shit-head.  Doesn't really help anything but it was nice to have a grown-up conversation with my name-twin (yes, one of my roommates shares names with me, ha ha) and be able to twitch back and forth about it.  Isn't that how it always works?  You talk to somebody and you're all "And then *twitch*" and they come back with "INORITE *twitch*" and everybody feels better.  

12)  Barbie Basics.  I know, it's weird to still love Barbies at my age, but they're wonderful little art objects.  You can modify them or not, modify their settings, project any sort of fantasy/story onto them and act it out--that never gets old.  But currently, my love has blossomed to the "Basics" line Target is running.  The name makes no sense--they're not basic Barbies.  If they were they would cost  $5, comb with a shitty plastic brush, and have the body shape of a 90s Vegas showgirl instead of an anorexic teen with bad posture.  But that's not the point--the point is, I found one on sale, bought her, set her up, and as I'm looking at her I realized that this doll has my drawing proportions!  The legs are hella-long, the hands are over-large and the arms are longer and thin--all she needs is some vavavoom for her hips, ass, thighs, and chest and she'd be one of my doodles in the plastic.  Can't have everything, especially since Mattel justifies their terrible body type by blaming 'today's low-rise fashions'.  Screw it; Barbie can't be an astronaut if she's only 12.  She can be a badly proportioned adult better than a badly proportioned anorexic slumper.  Man I've gone off on a tangent...

13)  Tangents/rants about dolls.    Or at least, reading about them.