I'm A Goner

This was once the blog that told of my doomed abilities at fending off the zombie apocalypse. Sigh.

Images of a Party

Our first official night went off fabulously, all. It was a night of The Faithful with the great addition of Sheila from the bookfloor working on her snazzy sock creation. Pray, I am short on time today, so I shall leave you with a fleeting view of such revelry you shall long for such wondrous good times.




It began with a fierce round of Magic: The Gathering in which Jan was beaten (but you didn't hear this from me, he he he) by Ryan, and then moved on to conquer me with her brilliant artifact deck. Which worked, by the way. I learned a few things, yes I did. In the backround was Valerie, knitting her beautiful wrap and secretly planning her strategy for our match next Monday, goblins and wizards. Hmmmm...



Then we all got back down to the business of knitting our separate projects. The table was soon cluttered with pumpkin spice mochas, mango tea, scones, straight up coffee, yarn of every color and style, books we couldn't help but devour with our eyes, and all the chatter that comes with knitting fiends and their conclaves. It was our first Third Monday, and next week will be our Off Monday. See everyone there. Bring your knitting, your books, and most importantly your stories of your crazy week.

Cheerio.

Great Tidings of Increased Blogging

A new job is on the move. This will be my second job on top of the Barnies and Noblies full time position that I hold. And second job means more money! And more money means Halloween extravaganza and a fixed computer. Yes, my darling, soon you shall function fully and beautifully once again!



As for the Halloween extravaganza, I have big plans for an industrial vampyre costume. Similar to Lestat's (left) look in Queen of the Damned. Well, plus a shirt. I'm not that sexy... yet. I need money for the not-so-expensive fangs I'm buying from Vampfangs, and some chunky silver jewlrey I need for my fingers and ear along with the cross I want for my neck. I think I'll get that from Hot Topic or some other gothic site, or, even better, some little out-of-the-way shop. And that whole cross-of-burning-holy-death thing is such a fable! Well, the whole vamp thing is a fable, but the cross thing has no metaphysical basis. Makes a good story though. I'll get into that the closer we get to Halloween and I start exploring the different folklore and fantasy around my favorite holiday. But the clothes I plan on raiding from the local thrift store since goth/industrial are so damn expensive anymore! Damn goth wannabes! You're not goth, you're just emo with a goth fetish! Arrgh! Okay, I'm done. To each their own.


Yay, Halloween!

Fire and Flight

Sticking with the post-parent rebellion I'm currently enjoying, I went and got my tattoo started this week. It was oh so much fun! It was supposed to be incredibly painful and sore, but I sat through the whole session just fine and today I don't even really remember that it's there. Until I smell it. It's got that A+D stuff on it and it smells like a wet dog at times. Uhhg. But it's not bad. I'm completely pleased with it. It needs a bit of touch up, which will happen in a couple of weeks with the fill-in, and the tips need to be extended just a bit to make it a bit more symmetrical, but not bad at all. I had it done by my friend Molly who just finished her apprenticeship to another awesome guy and is now fully able to professionally tattoo and charge you for it! She does awesome work, so check her out if you are thinkin' of getting a piece done.



The symbolism of the tattoo is one that I've been working on since I was seventeen. It has the Celtic symbol for inner strength and also triplicity of being as is the popular idea today. That also ties in with my Celtic heritage that, while muddied considerably, still is pretty strong for me. The curling fire represents emergence and passion, 'cus who don't love passion! Seriously though, passion is important in any artists life and I draw on mine continuously. The tattoo also has a yin yang element that of course represents balance and duality. That's a no brainer for me. The fire unfurls to represent wings which carry four meanings- the phoenix, which is one of my favorite mythical and metaphysical creatures and also ties in with the fire; flight, when I dream, my dreams are of flying and are usually remembered for a long time after waking and they also are my favorites; freedom, also felt in my dreams while flying, but something I have also come into realization of as my inheritance as a human being in the last few years; and Air, which is the element of my zodiac sign Gemini. So appropriate, too, if you know me at all.

And that's about all for this post. On a side note, Fall is finally here. It swept in on first fallen leaves rustling in the wind. The first day this week was a perfect cold, grey day with just enough sullen beauty in the sky and earth to be appropriately chilling. In the old pagan beliefs and many other earth born people's today it signified the slow fading of the Old God as he made his decent into the Underworld. The Dark Mother began her reign over the land and winter settled in, blanketing the ground until the God was reborn and emerged from the Goddess' womb to cover the Earth with new beginnings. Sigh. I love all the old stories.

Take that eHarmony!

I was going to post my thought on this, but this article sums it up well enough in it's first half. All you ever wanted to know about the scandalous eHarmony and its reasons for not allowing same sex couples a chance on its site.

Pretty f'ed up if you ask me.

Oh, and I love the guy's incredulous look. Reminds me of times not so long ago when I dared. Yup, same look. Lol!

Officially Official

What does the word "official" mean to you?

To all the knitters at the Mondays@7 group, it means that we now are officially sanctioned (oooooo!) by Barnies and Noblies and acquire all the perks theretofor... allowed us. Lol. We will be meeting "officially" (we defy them to keep us from meeting every damned Monday night, ha!) the first and third Mondays of the month, at seven pm, in the south-east corner of the store with a wonderful spread of the mountains visible out the windows behind us. A few expressed their dissatisfaction with our new locale, but I'm quite happy with it.

So there.

Moonlight and a Faun

"...alles ist einfach, alles ist leicht, niemand wird lernen wenn niemand verzeiht..." (everything is simple, everything is easy, nobody will learn if nobody forgives)~ Faun~

So I have another new music obsession. One of so many here recently, I don't blame you if you think I've jumped off the deep end of music blogging and will never come back. I will come back. Eventually. Actually, I just need to get this stuff out there so I can free my tired old head from the nagging "Omgblogmusicomgblogmusic!"

Faun is a group I had maybe heard of before, but I don't know that I ever actually checked them out. They are a German folk music group who's sound has been referred to as "dark Enya." This is probably due to their classification as a goth rock band with a contemporary Celtic sound. As last week I received their CD Totem released just this year. Having now listened to their haunting tracks thick with the rich cultural flavor of ancient Germanic tribal sounds, I can say that they definitely are darkly Enya-esque but by no means do they copy the amazing singer. They have made a name for themselves. When knitting to this CD, I imagine sitting in a grove surrounded by a dark forest which hides all kinds of faerie folk, beautiful and airy, but also dark and shadow bound. Drumming puts me into a semi-trance where the simple repetitions of knitting move to flow to the rhythm. Definitely a highly meditative, and I suppose spiritual, soundtrack that appeals to that dark satyr in me. Makes me happy.





On a whim, I also snatched up Amethystium's new CD Evermind. I don't usually go for electronic/synth/heavy ambient since I figure that's better at a rave or far out club. But this one is so masterfully done I can't help but love it. It gives my apartment an "otherworldly feel." Almost like I'm sitting in the middle of The Dark Crystal or Pan's Labyrinth. The electronic sounds blend over and under each other on so many levels. To follow just one layer is tough since you will more likely find yourself distracted to a whole other level of the song. Each track fits its title so well. Click here for a sample of what I'm talking about. I usually am disappointed with how unlike the track title the music usually is that I ask "What? Did they just randomly slap on a name? Wtf, mate?"



These CDs didn't disappoint though. If you feel like walking into another world while going about your daily activities (i.e. cleaning, reading, knitting, working out) Evermind is a great CD for that. Enjoy the samples I left. Totem should help you get into your deep, dark otherself and fall away from the visible world and the brightness of all we call real. I appologize for the lack of material to play for ya from Totem, but check out the website, it's just as good.



I end this post on this day dominated by the darkened, new moon with a recommendation. Check out The AntiCraft. It's one of the coolest, goofy-yet-gothy sites I've found. They will be coming out with a book in November this year. Can we say excited! They put out a webzine that updates around eight times a year. It's very comparable to Domiknitrix. My favorite for a while was the End of Days Kit, but my love has grown for all their craziness! Sit back and enjoy all the twisted crafts they have given the equally twisted WWW.

Hat Started and Finished!

This took me only five hours. I started it numerous times, but I finally finished it last night and this morning. It's a superfine nylon/acrylic blend on US 7 needles. And yes, I can work in the round!

And here is a really dumb picture of me modeling it. Sigh. Why I do these things is unknown. By the way, the lip of the hat is rolled in this picture. Looks like a really small hat...

New Scarf Now in Color

Here is a little emo-ness for you today.

Lol. This is Pon and Zi. They are cute little emo characters created by Azuzephre (Jeff Thomas) from Deviantart. They hit a huge popularity boost a few years back with the online art community that is DA, and have since blown into the mainstream. There are a horde of sites dedicated to Pon and Zi and their cartoons can be found all over the internet. I've left you a bunch of links, so enjoy and keep reading.

I have a new project that I may or may not have mentioned to all webdom. It's my crazy new Halloween scarf!

It's simple, yes, but oh so much fun. It's what I've put into the "grunge" pile to work on at knitting group or whenever I'm doing something that takes a bit more concetration than I can devote to my current UFO. I'm using the orange merino/alpaca blend yarn that I won from A Knitted Peace, and the chocolate highlander wool that I later went back to purchase from AKP.

And that concludes my quickie post on current projects! I'm so efficient.

New Look Brings New Confidence

Okay, so this will fall into the random life and craziness folder, but have you ever just gotten a huge boost of confidence because you changed something about yourself and it turned out to be immensely complementary to your image? For example, a new haircut, a tattoo, new clothes, a boob job, a new workout routine, a mani or pedi, new piercing... You see where I am going with this. Well readers (and adoring fangirls and fanboys), I have recently had two such confidence boosters. You will have noticed the painful lack of any author imagery on this blog and it is because said author has been so bored with his looks that he has merely decided to waive the author picture. Well, no more. As of today, you will notice a new addition to the sidebar and it sports a likeness of His Shmexiness, myself. Now I have revealed my scariness to the world. *Munsters organ music* Yay, confidence!

*-* WARNING *-*

Intense bouts of insanity brought on by muchhappiness evident below. Not for the faint of heart or easily bored. You have been warned. Now go on and read it like you intended to anyways.

I know a lot of my friends who have seen me in the last twenty-four hours will just roll their eyes at this post. It has been an intense few days of reveling in my new look and the afterblast is smoking out the crowd. But I am still reveling, so on I shall revel to all you who have the patience to listen.


I had started with the image adjustment process a few weeks ago when I went shopping with the ever adorable girlfriends of mine, Molly and Joanna, and I tried on a pair of sexy pants... get this... in a size smaller than what I have been wearing! Woo knitting! Why knitting you ask? Knitting has given me something to do with my time besides eating, and often encourages me to walk to my Barnes and knit there, requiring some form of physical excercise. Thus, a trimmer me. With this trimmerness has come a desire to reinvent myself a little. So, I needed a haircut and what did I do? I got one. Duh. I got a fauxhawk! And after the many stares and adoring fans at my favorite bar, JR's, I decided to go another step in the transformation process. Can't stand the suspense anymore? I got my ear pierced! Bam!

*-* Attention *-*

Insanity levels decreasing. You are now safe to take interest again. Wake up, dipwad.

You are now wondering "what the hell is the big deal?" There is a long story behind all of it, and you know I would love to go into detail about it, but I'm not gonna. Simply put, I got to do some things I've wanted to do for years but were never allowed. Now I am free to do what I will and every new exploration of that freedom gives me a boost. The new look has been excellent for my self confidence as people now tell me I look older. Crank in the points! Gone is the 18 year old highschooler look. Thank the gods! I've now graduated to the college kid block. Sigh, new wardrobe someday will help dispel that bracket and move me up a bit more.

*-* Yo *-*

You can go get some coffee.

I am done here. I think I'll move on to a quickie post about my new yarn and project. Yay!

*-* Warni-- *-*

Well, maybe not. Thought I saw the insanity level skyrocket for a sec. God, I need a new job...