Saturday, December 7, 2013

An Update on Multiple Topics--Good Things Await Me!

            Today's theme song is Strobe (Extended) by Deadmau5.

            In case you've been missing me, I'M STILL HERE!  Don't worry, I just didn't have much in the way of topics to blog about, and I had a lot of real life to deal with.  Inspections, going on holiday over Thanksgiving week, being snarky and silly on Monday, managing a more normal schedule after being trained by the parents--I've been quite busy, as you can tell.

            I think this blog will be very verbose, so I'll do a summary of it here, in case you decided to be all "Too long; didn't read," to me:

Ø  I passed the annual inspections overall--AND YOU CAN TOO!
Ø  I had a ton of crazy fun (with a little drama) while on holiday in Pittsburgh and in Virginia (Richmond area, that's all you need to know).
Ø  I was snarky earlier this week; it's like Darth Hater was in charge of Karma that day, at least to me.  But that's the thought process I'm trying to delete from my brain banks.
Ø  I ENJOYED MY BURRITO ON WEDNESDAY! (12/4/2013)  AND MOM DANCED IN THE STREET!
Ø  I'm working on a life list; I ran out of ideas on my third page, so I'll consider any suggestions y'all might have.

         Okay on the summary?  Cool, stay tuned for previews of upcoming blog posts I plan on posting soon!  (Just to make you scroll through it all!  MWAHAHAHAHA!)  Want more info?  READ THE POST! >:F

Inspections: When You Wish You Had an Ood Servant


            If you've never lived on your own (or with a roommate) in an apartment (and I'm assuming most of you did rent an apartment), you must know this for when you do rent one:

Most landlords expect you to keep your apartment clean, bug- and mold- and damage-free, safe, functional, and able to meet their expectations.  They would even go so far to include it in your lease agreement and "house rules".  If you do not clean it when it comes time for them to do the annual inspections that almost all of the cities require, YOU CAN BE EVICTED!

            I have the clean-safe-healthy-functional clause in my lease, and in the past, I have failed the first round of inspections.  It's embarrassing for that to happen, and even landed me on the building's "suspect list."
            Not a good list to be on.  (Then again, being on any suspect list is a bad thing.)

            But I was able to address it this year, with the help of my loving, patient parents who tend to be overprotective of me even when I'm out of their house.  And it helped when we were on holiday, because I didn't wind up wrecking the place like I am wont to do (OCD and Asperger's issues; it's where change isn't a good thing, unless I change the apartment myself.  I know it's frustrating but now I'm more willing to accept the help.  Plus, total organization will take a while, and I can be the one who decides how to organize the place.)

            However, on Thursday, December 5th, 2013, just before 10am, the manager and someone who is probably from the Department or Bureau of Housing and Urban Development, showed up at my apartment.  I felt that I was as prepared as I could be, so I let them in (which is important!  Not letting them in means you have something to hide!).  I could see that Brad (the manager) was surprised and pleased (in his usual Brad way, with a straight face--I shit you not, he could pass as one of those guards outside of Buckingham Palace), and that I had a high chance of passing.  Albeit, he noted that I had to organize the closets and the entertainment center shelves, do laundry and clean the toilet's outside ceramic skin, but I still passed overall.  And of course, I called people and texted people saying, "OMG, I THINK I PASSED!  YAYS!  #SQUEE!"

            But to address the long-term issue of organization is quite difficult, which is why I was questing for a specific book while on holiday.  The Nerdist Way by Chris "BigC" Hardwick is perhaps the best chance for me to solve this problem, because even though I'm a nerd, this book can show me how to be organized and more together--by being a nerd and, even better, a Nerdist (a Nerd who uses their nerdy skills to create things and make positive contributions to the world).  I haven't had much luck in finding it in specific bookstores (The Books-a-Million and Barnes & Noble I went to didn't have it in stock--Thanks a lot, guys. -_-) and I'm like, "I FAILED!"  Which really sucks and makes you question whether the people running these stores have the common sense to keep this book in stock for anyone who heard about it and is willing to track it down (like me!).
            However, someone on Twitter has offered to send me an unsigned copy and I was unsure.  That's when I had two offers at once: one from Twitter from a kind stranger saying, "I have multiple unsigned copies," to which I'm like, "YOU COULD'VE HAD THEM SIGNED?!  *dies, but is willing to reanimate as a zombie solely for the purpose of obtaining Big C's signature*" and one from my very good friend who's currently (at the time of publishing this post) living in North Carolina.  He says, "Here, it's a Christmas present."  My response: "Great!  Thank you!  Now, what can I get you that can be equal or greater in value to your gift to me?  Comic books?  Artwork?  ThinkGeek stuff?  BUTTENS?"  Thanks, Jesse, and I hope to complete and send you my Christmas gift to you before you move to the cheesy State of Wisconsin. (#badpuns)

            Note: Mom, Dad, calm down; he's neutral-good!  He'll never stalk and rape and kill me.  Not everyone on the internet is a creeper.  So, BREATHE and have some chocolate or brownies!

Pittsburgh Business Family Road Trip: When Car Rides Make You Feel Like a Trapped Marshmallow

            I hope to be as brief as possible: The Thursday before we left (normal Thursday before Thanksgiving), we cleaned the shit out of the apartment (literally and figuratively) and I stayed over at my parents' place.  Friday, we left a little bit late, headed over to Pittsburgh.  Traffic was crazy bad, and I'm like, "DESIGN YER ROADS BETTERS, ENGINEERS!"  For lunch, I tried Wendy's Bacon Mushroom Melt; it needs more beef.  We got to the hotel (all suites in old apartment buildings), and we had to lug our suitcases up the stairs because of no elevator.  As soon as my sister was free from other obligations, we had barbeque, alcohol and fun!  Saturday was Doctor Who day, and we hit up the Creative Reuse store beforehand and went crazy; I recommend the place to everybody with a creative imagination and the crafting skills (and XP) to redo almost anything.  Watched Doctor Who about 2 or 3 times; it started snowing, and it got pretty bad so we ordered pizza delivery.  That was the only time I allowed an exception to my rule of not consuming Papa John's (for political reasons and personal preference; but I would've said "FUCK YEAH!" to Pizza Hut).

            We had pancakes and latkes at the Original Pancake House (which was delicious and beautiful but very crowded), dinner at Chili's, and a bet going on.  The bet was that the sibling who has the messier apartment (judged by the parents) has to wear a dress without pants; stockings and shorts, yes, but not pants.  Unfortunately, my sister called it off because it would've been too cold for a dress; secretly, I think it's because she knew she lost and didn't want to wear the dress.  That's my sis for ya: hipster-crafty-sly nutcase who loves me.

            On our way to Virginia, we stopped at a Roy Rogers (which is where I found out bitchmode was engaged), before continuing on.  One petrol refill and a pit stop (bathroom break) later, we were facing bad traffic; there was traffic from an accident, and the traffic caused another accident.  It was like, "WHAT THE FUCK?!"  I swore it almost resembled my standing in line in order to stand in line for standing in yet another line for Parafest 2013.  Visited my grandfather, who was doing pretty well.  I had a small Thanksgiving dinner with him, enjoyed chocolate cream pie, hot chocolate, some donuts, some spoilage, etc, before we headed home, with a side trip to an Easy Spirit store and Pepperidge Farm outlet store that sells overstock and dinner at Red Robin with endless root beer floats!

            My rating: 87% pleasant overall!

I Brought Out the Snark: My Annoyance Sounds Like Stand-Up Material

            Frustrations piled up on top of each other this past Monday, to the point where I decided to bring out the snark.  It was mostly silly snarky stuff that only made me lose 2 followers, who wound up being losers.  Which is a win for me: I HAVE GENUINE FOLLOWERS!  Some of which might be dead accounts.
            So, for your enjoyment, here's a couple of the tweets I posted:


I ENJOYED MY BURRITO!  Because It Was An Excellent Day!

            Technically, it was a couple of Eden-tastic tacos, but Wednesday was truly an excellent day, with lunch at Moe's southwestern grille.  Oh, and Mom danced in the street.  It was an agreement between the two of us, but it was very satisfying; but she also said that once my apartment gets even better, she'll do a better dance in the street--QUEST ACCEPTED, MOTHER!
            For anyone not in the loop, "enjoying your burrito" is a Nerdist thing: it stemmed from the Rainn Wilson podcast episode and it talks about living in the moment.  I suggest you give it a listen, because it can really help you get a new spiritual perspective on life (Wilson really is very spiritual, which is probably why he does Soul Pancakes--A YouTube thing I don't pay attention to.  He's actually insightful and pretty cool, though!)

Life List: Because My Life Needs More to It Than Managing My Dwelling

            If you have been paying attention to my Twitter feed on Thursday (Dec. 5 2013), you'll notice that I've been trying to put together a life list.  It's kind of like a bucket list but a little bit different.  The best way to describe it is with Jenny "The Bloggess" Lawson's tweet.  Yes, she replied to me--#SQUEEEEEEEE!!!!  I did fansquirrel a little at that moment, so THANK YOU, JENNY!


            So, for example, if I wanted to go to Japan on a trip and do various things, and someone decides to sponsor the trip (like a tourism board, por examplar), I can do it--but I'll have to write about it, like on the site that allows people to share their stories from the trip, and perhaps a blog post.  The Bloggess did one with Australia, and it sounded like fun, if frolicking in a continent-country that started out as a British penal colony and is now home to megaspiders (*shuddershudder*) is fun.  But the haunted places are interesting!  Not to mention I could also hang with my YouTube buddy The Fat Aussie Barstard. (NSFW NSFK)

            Yes, a 23 year old hanging with a cursing old man--that isn't creepy at all.  #sarcasm  (Stated for Mom and Dad if they're reading this.)

            So, with the idea of having new things to blog about (and to make my life and my blog more interesting), I figured I could draft up my own life list before submitting it.  I managed to make it to page 3 before running out of ideas…  Let me know what you think…

Ø  Ride horseback through Sleepy Hollow as the Headless Horseman of Washington Irving's tales on Halloween Night (big idea, possible; I've even ridden horses before…but not at full gallop! >_< but it would make an epic birthday present!)
Ø  Investigate a haunted location with my sister, her boyfriend (which is optional) and the Ghost Adventures Crew (I know of a few that are in my area.  It's just a question of them saying yes or no; and when I say, "them," I mean both the sibling party and the GAC.)
Ø  Do some modeling sort of photoshoots:
v At Columncile (or however it's spelled; The Bloggess' Red Dress thing?)
v At Greyfriars Cemetery in Edinburgh, Scotland
v In the Graveyard District of New Orleans, Louisiana (in character?)
v Steampunk/Industrial style (perhaps my own designs?) inside an old abandoned/not-in-use-since-100-years-ago warehouse or factory.
v Goth style inside of a Gothic nightclub or cathedral; one that SHOULD have a throne in it, and a fancy-looking goblet.  Details, details!
v Poe-inspired in the Parisian Catacombs
Ø  Visit France (Paris, Mont-St-Michel, Monaco, the Catacombs of Paris, etc.)
Ø  Own a truly haunted item (without the negative energies, preferably)
Ø  Throw, and DJ at, a legal and safe rave (with new Tripp pants that fit me)
Ø  Visit Chernobyl with my Russian Internet friend Yuri
Ø  Help Mom feed penguins!  (Because I love her!)
Ø  Dress Dad up as Spock and attend conventions with him. (For shits and giggles)
Ø  Attend a proper ball with Benedict Cumberbatch (from Sherlock; SQUEEGASMIC!)
Ø  Beat the Halo Tricks peeps (especially CMNeir and Tacoriffic) at Halo and League of Legends.  And traditional UNO, just because!
Ø  Attend the Olympics, PAX Prime, PAX East, E3, San Diego Comic Con, Parafest, and Scarefest (with VIP passes to the cons, preferably)
Ø  Visit Japan (Tokyo, Kyoto, stay at a traditional inn, visit the hanging forests, get the samurai and geisha experiences, get a kimono, etc.  Smuggle their rice out of the country.)
Ø  Visit the Vatican with Mom; meet and receive a blessing from the Pope
Ø  Get locked inside with the Cardinals during Conclave (swingability questionable; if we could do it, then MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!!)
Ø  Have my art hang in the Capitol and the White House (again, questionable)
Ø  Go inside the Fort Knox "gold safe" (would need to deal with getting POTUS's permission and stuff.)
Ø  Go inside Area 51 without getting shot and/or killed and/or arrested
Ø  Get an official family crest and tartan, perhaps even a tapestry
Ø  Get a full loom so I can start up weaving again (ain't cheap, y'all!)

            I think life lists should be longer than this, I really do.  Which is why I'm going to consider suggestions from you, my wonderful readers!  Just comment on the Google+ post's thread with the hashtag #LifeListSuggestions or, if you're on Twitter, just tweet @LadyEden1337 with the same hashtag, #LifeListSuggestions.  As for Facebook, you can leave a comment on the Facebook link post's comment section--but only if we're friended, and I reserve the right to ignore friend requests from people I think might be creepers.

            Don't worry, that's just the legitimate paranoia talking.  I also plan on doing a ton of blog posts soon, once I get them drafted (because it's faster than typing it straight into Blogger; it took an hour to do the Doctor Who review straight onto my parents' laptop):
Ø  A review of the all-suite hotel I stayed at while on holiday
Ø  Christmas shopping/crafting gift ideas
Ø  A Christmas music mixtape for those of us who are sick of the songs on the radio stations that only play Christmas music this time of the year
Ø  A review of The Nerdist Way by Chris Hardwick
Ø  Blog post drafts that I never got to publishing yet (maybe)
Ø  The usual other reviews, rants and updates

Which brings us to the point where I leave you wishing for more of my excellent words!  Don't worry, I'll still be on the Interwebz, tweeting and watching videos and perusing the megabytes of delicious nerdtastic awesomeness that make up the ThinkGeek and EntertainmentEarth websites.  If not, I'll be reading that book and figuring out my life with Hardwick's help, along with Jesse and my sister and her boyfriend if I get confused by the roleplaying character creation stuff.  (You don't mind, do you?  Providing you're not busy or sick or asleep?  Please? ♥ )

            Anyways, I shall leave you to enjoy this Lolcat picture, and until the next post gets published, ENJOY YOUR BURRITO!  Or taco or nachos or pizza or cake or pie!  Or whatever else it is that you love to consume by inserting it into your mouth-hole, masticating and digesting it!


            P.S. I'm also working on getting back to taking my medications.  I've noticed that I'm happier and less angry and I curse less in my blogs while I'm medicated.  Anti-antidepressant peoples, here's the reason why I should take them--If I do not take them, I'll be like this kitteh here:

I rest my case.

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