Of Pumpkins and Blackmail

Halloween approaches rapidly, and I neither have costume ideas nor a decision as to whether or not I'll even dress up this year.

I don't know whether or not fourteen is the drop-off age. My brother stopped when he was about eleven, being far too mature (practically an adult!) for such childish folly.
I've always said that I'd trick-or-treat until I fell over dead, because any day that promotes banging on front doors, demanding your neighbors for candy and them being expected to actually meet those demands is a day I fervently support.

Yes, those "friends" and strangers whose houses you descend upon like wraiths from the dark must grant your sugary desires lest unspecified Tricks rain in a poisonous torrent upon their households.

Ahh, Halloween.

How we adore those nights with our gummy-coated teeth, chocolate-filled stomachs and a nice fire to wash over our bodies so sore from a long evening's haul.

I want to participate, but there comes a point when the old ladies no longer compliment on how cute you look. A time arrives where even the most innocent of teenagers is assumed delinquent purely on the pretense of age. And when you travel in a group, you're most likely a gang of hardened criminals prowling the streets and looking for something-or-other to ambush. It's as though after twelve years of age, a passionate thirst for wrong-doing takes such complete control of your consciousness that, in fact, one can think of nothing else until some felony has been committed. It's like an itch.

The closest thing to criminal action I've ever come to is stealing a Chinese fortune taped onto an old
 cash register in the attic of a junky antique store.

Maybe I'll just go to the Wall of Mart and buy a huge pack of mixed chocolate bars and invite a friend or two over for cheesy old horror movies. I can think of worse fates. And anyway, with each of my compadres dropping out of the Trick-or-Treaters Guild like leaves in fall, I may not have any other choice. (Of course, I could always "chauffeur" my little brothers around the neighborhood and collect candy in an extra pumpkin pail for some unspecified bedridden child at home...)

Of course, not every experience I ever had involving Halloween has been positive. There was this haunted corn maze once that traumatized me for months afterwards. In Disneyland, on the trolley leading to the park, there was a child with a wolf mask on that almost sent me into a relapse.

Allow me to clarify.

It was several years ago, and I was a young sapling with nary an anxiety to prick at my swelling balloon of happiness. My friend Cat and I, as every year, were getting together for that glorious day which legalizes blackmail on massive proportion. This year, we somewhat-mutually agreed, we would participate in the haunted corn maze that her school friends were going to. So we donned our matching ponchos in case any fraction of our best-friendship was to be doubted by onlookers and hopped into the car.

When we arrived, and the group of adolescents looked up from their highly-cool conversation in the dark alleyway to glance our direction, my optimism dwindled just a tiny bit. Public schoolers TERRIFIED me. I was educated in their ways. Entirely inerrant sources, too: I'd seen enough television and read as many novels to know not ONE of these children could be trusted.
But no matter. I couldn't be deterred this quickly. I would just cling to Cat like a leech.

We made our way to the corn maze. Wind drifted through the towering labyrinth and shook the dry stalks. Piercing screams rose up from its center, and the rumble of chainsaws whirred from somewhere within its depths.

I was somewhat terrified at this point, but not wishing to admit the extent of my petrification, I bit my lip. To admit fear was the ultimate show of weakness, and I would not be struck down with such ease.

We rode the hay ride to the maze itself, as deathly solemn as if in a hearse. We hopped off, and when we reached the front of the line a bubbly woman dressed as a green witch greeted us and gave us the rundown. She informed us with a tilt of the head and a chipper smile that even though it might seem otherwise, we had to keep in mind the people in the maze were not allowed to touch us.

Any hope I had left shriveled like a raisin. I hardly realized that I was moving as we shuffled on through the Gates of H3ll. (sorry- if I don't spell it that way our accursed web filter bleeps it.)

They would be getting close enough to touch us.

That close.

We walked through, whipping our heads around and hearts throbbing as though rabbits in a trap. Mist curled and slithered. A figure emerged from the fog and limped toward us, back leg dragged pitifully through the trailing dust. Fear held my breaths in a choke hold. It passed us without even granting us notice, the sloppy face paint clearly visible, and I resumed tentative air flow. Maybe I would make it through here alive after all.

The silence that followed was too long, too complete. Twigs snapped and dirt shifted under our trembling steps, but nothing horrible assaulted us.

Until a wolf jumped out from the corn and charged toward us with all intent of mauling our faces and hellflame reeling in its terrible eyes.

I screamed until my throat scraped like sandpaper and it jumped all around us, twisting its awful back and brandishing its awful claws and dancing inches from our skin so we clung to each other as if for our lives. Two more emerged in the distance and loped with predatory grace. Or like highschoolers lumbering clumsily toward us and enjoying their jobs thoroughly too much. At any rate, one of them chased Cat's mother into the corn and didn't even stop the act when she fell over into it, just twisting and writhing and growling in her face as she struggled to stand up.

She got up. We wailed. She strode over to one of those horrible things and demanded it let us go back. It shook its monstrous head, that wretched thing much taller than any of us.
Now, I don't know precisely what that woman said to that wolf, but the profound respect and appreciation I felt at that moment cannot be documented.

We went back. Cat and I pretended we weren't horrified out of our wits.

At the campfire outside I skirted away from a guy in a wolf costume and made sure to keep at least a ten yard distance at all times.

To this day wolf masks unsettle me a bit.

~Elizabeth

P.S.
That fortune cookie mentioned prior granted me a sprinkling of all-elusive inspiration, so here's a short blurb I wrote about it.
Enjoy.
Or don't.
I don't care.
#CullmanLiquidation



The Cashier


    Brenna, Cashier of the Month for two years running, pushed her overlarge sweater sleeve to the crook of her thin elbow for the twelfth time in five minutes and glided the crackers across the scanner
with a beep. She slid the other items through checkout with the graceful speed of a pianist and the bar codes smoothly ran one after the other. Beep. Beep. Beep. Every night she lay awake, staring at the ceiling with tortured eyes, to that noise resounding against her temple. It was like some kind of horrible tune engraved in her memory.

       She sighed and rapped her fingernails against the counter. She grimaced at their chipped paint. She didn’t know why she even bothered painting them. Maybe the romanticism of the name on the tiny glass jar had appealed to her, comparing the speckled dirt shade to "Distant Sands".

      “Forty-two dollars and fifteen cents,” she said, smacking her pumpkin pie-flavored gum and flicking her gaze up to meet the customer’s for the first time. The old woman stared at her with watery, incomprehensive eyes for a full ten seconds before slowly reaching for her pocketbook with trembling arms. Brenna breathed a sigh and glanced down at the register, running two fingers tenderly over the Chinese fortune she’d stuck there some year ago now (with clear tape nicked from the office). The ghost of a wistful smile tweaked the corner of her mouth into a halfhearted dimple.


                                “:) You will be traveling and coming into a fortune. :)”

        The old woman finally managed to secure a crumpled fifty-dollar bill between her fingers and lifted it slowly toward the counter. She moved as sluggishly as if a stray breath could collapse her like a set of bowling pins. Brenna shifted her weight to the other foot and bit the inside of her cheek in impatience, but she couldn’t stand it any longer and stretched over the register to grab the bill from her.

        She gave the woman her change and bagged the groceries, placing them in a grocery cart and forcing a plastered smile over her face as she repeated the mandatory “Have a nice day” for the twenty-third time that hour. As soon as the woman hobbled away, sputtering along like a dilapidated old car, Brenna sunk back onto the stool and closed her eyes. Someday she’d get out of here.

Trees, Books, and Kara-tay

My life has been rather uneventful as of late.
I suppose that's to be expected when you're a home-schooled homebody like myself, but when I'm older, I'm going to spend nearly every day out and about.
If everything goes according to plan, that is.
Not that I really expect that.
But one can dream.

Anywhoozle, I'd wager to say I've spent at least a good four hours reading in a tree in the past couple of days. There's nothing quite like nestling up against the downy fluff of gritty bark twenty-five feet off the ground, back stiff and sore from craning over a book, legs dangling over empty air. My perch is actually quite nice, if I shift around occasionally to ward off numbness (unsuccessfully). I sling my bag over one of the branches and camp out Katniss-style, and I can climb up a good deal father in it too.

I've lived at my house two flipping years and just discovered it about a week ago.

So I was really bored. I had this unassailable urge to climb a tree, and by darn it, I was going to climb one. Except that despite the largeness of our span of land, we didn't have any trees
a) with branches that were within my tippy-toed grabby-fingered reach
b) that weren't as completely dead as MySpace.

So I lugged this rickety excuse for a stepladder around the backyard and hoped that the boost would propel my unsatisfactory height to the appropriate level for at least some spindly-branched thing. Nothing seemed promising, however. (I was examining a very dead, very prickly number when a huge stripe-legged spider bungeed down in front of my face and sent me flailing backwards in a flurry of yelps.)

The one next to it, however, was golden.
(...Meaning more than marginally okay. Did you really think I meant foliage made of precious metal? My, but you're dumb.)
There are two mild knots perfect for footholds but you still need the stepladder to even reach the first branch, and have to perform a clumsy sloth-like swinging operation to get down, so I'm the only one in my family who can climb up there. Or bothers to. But the net effect is the same.
There are not very many ways to attain privacy at my house, and those even in their scarcity are not always effective, but tree-climbing is quite impeccable. It does ensure my legs are in a perpetual state of scuff and bruise, but that I can deal with.

So I've been doing quite a lot of reading lately.
I went on a bit of a reading hiatus for a couple months, a barren wasteland lacking the printed word, and it had scared me. Honestly. Reading has always been a great joy of mine, but no matter how hard I tried, it just wasn't pulling me in like it used to. I missed the neck cramps and under-the-blanket flashlights, longed for that gripping suspense that when I was younger didn't seem so dreadfully hard to find. Since the discovery of The Tree, however, I've read about five books and I'm hoping this indicates that my battered stumbling through the desert of non-literacy has come to an oasis.
I just hope it's not temporary.
(By the way, the Princess Bride is a good book. For realz. And, as a side note, one with an entirely misleading title you Manly Men of the Order of Raw Meat.)

I also started tae kwon do back up last week. It's fun, but the class is intimidating. Our instructor is a rather planetary grouch-with-a-mustache and most of my peers are super-high belts, and so far the class has been exclusively male.
And they're good.
...
Like, really good.

One of the red belts, an albeit good-natured karate beast who could break your jaw without so much as trying, we just call The Bad Man.

But hey, at least my oppressive guilt for not sticking with it before is enough to outweigh any future desire to quit.

~Elizabeth

P.S. My white belt is dangerous.
FEAR ITS BLINDING POWER.

Hello again...

The Web Nanny is a cruel mistress.

Our dumb internet filter won't let me post or edit previous posts. This one I'm accessing from my mother's iPad, and it's no easy feat to format blog posts via tablet.

So take pity on my neglected, webbernet corner and its hideously disjointed text design.
It's not my fault.

She lurks around every corner with her warning of adult content, feather duster brandished hostilely, eyes burning with hellflame...

It's terrifying.

~Elizabeth

In Which I Have an Impromptu Piano Performance and Drink Lemonade

Saturday was lots of fun.

So my friend Sarah and her little sister have a lemonade stand every year. They live in the middle of our small town in a close proximity to the festival that's going on right now, so there are a ton of people walking by (ideally strutting along with loose change jingling in their pockets and throats dry as old parchment).
Once any one of these hypothetical persons has spotted the colorful, marker-drawn banner reading "Eighth Annual Lemonade Stand", they will undoubtedly do one of these three things. 
a) They are kindly folk who, regardless of their thirst, will come up and buy something. Or just slap a dollar on the table in approval of our avoiding the pull of electronics for an entire day.

b) They don't have money with them but will congratulate us on our ambition and try to strike up a quick conversation, as if that compensates for their lack of monetary contribution. Then they walk away and wish us luck.

c) They spot the stand from a short distance and something just goes off. Shoots a thousand pointy signals to their brains, setting every hair on end across icy skin, alerting every nerve of the imminent need for fight-or-flight; something suddenly explodes in a cacophony of blinding red lights that scream "DEATH. DEATH. DEATH."

They must avoid the children selling cold drinks at all costs.

We might as well have been serving black plague injections. Or sneaking up on random passer-bys and mugging them in the street.

So what they would do, after spotting this immediate danger of children selling lemon beverages, is cross the street before they reach us. They think, "Well, if I'm walking over here I can just pretend I don't see them. My guilt is quenched."

Sometimes they would just avert their gaze and shuffle past. Because everyone knows if you make eye contact you immediately owe a favor.

So it was one of those particularly slow forty-minute intervals. I drummed my fingers on the fold-table. We slapped lazily at flies. We sipped lemonade that quickly became sickeningly sweet and sticky to our tongues after our third glasses.

I suggested that Sarah go get her violin and advertise for us on the street corner. After all, I continued with a chuckle at my own enormous wit, I'd lug a grand piano out to the lawn but that's not exactly portable. 

Her parents, who had been on the porch unbeknownst to myself, overheard and chimed in. They asked me if I wanted them to bring out their electronic keyboard, thinking I had been entirely serious. I blinked. "Well... I guess, sure," I managed, astonished, and before I had time to register what I had just agreed to they were dragging it out onto the grass with the neon orange extension cord trailing behind. 

After that we fell into a routine. We'd sit, and at the sight of any meandering pedestrians they'd hustle me over to the keyboard and make me burst out in the only music I had memorized at the time and didn't require a pedal, which happened to be the Turkish March by Mozart. Some guy they kind-of knew gave us twenty dollars to split for my "performance" and because I wasn't really getting paid for helping at the stand they gave me the biggest cut, a smacking wad of Ones. Sixteen, total.

My spirits were high, my ego properly inflated, and I was banging those keys with gloriously soar fingers. After about the twentieth repetition of this a-melodic tune their neighbors closed the window to my musical genius, but I was not deterred. Unfortunately, no one else gave me any money, but whatever.

I was satisfied.

We waited for the kids from our class to arrive after closing shop. Alex showed up and we burst into applause, chatting on the lawn for a bit, but the twins were still due to arrive and gave no signs of doing such. We waited. We watched every car that passed with increasing hopelessness that consumed our beings. Sometimes we'd belt out chanting their last name like overenthusiastic cheerleaders, but our rain dance did not summon them to the scene. With heavy hearts we plodded to the festival, faces downcast in depressed delirium, but our spirits quickly rose when it came into sight.

We had fun that day. We ate overpriced roasted nuts that were lukewarm from sitting out in the humid air, bought baubles and useless nicknacks, and bumped into my public-schooled friend whose energetic companions slightly terrified my homeschooled ones. 

I went home with Sarah and we ate ice cream. And played cards. And watched Megamind WHILE eating ice cream like the bosses we are.

Bless all your faces,

~Elizabeth

P.S.

I won a cheap plastic sword at the festival. It'll most like disintegrate within the month, but I totally decked it out with my sharpies and duct tape.

"My name is Inigo Montoya. You killed my father."

"Prepare to die."

Formatting

Yes, I know it's a dragon.
Sheesh.

And yes, the layout of this blog is a work in progress. I'm tired and I don't feel like messing with it anymore tonight though, so I'm doing what I do best and putting it off until tomorrow.

Or the next day.

DON'T JUDGE ME.

But yeah, I'm sorry if things look out of wonk and somewhat hectic right now. I'm working on it!

~Elizabeth

Family Bands and Tragic Love

* * * * *

Yesterday after church I was hanging around waiting for my family to assemble on the sloped lawn so we could pile in the car and head home, per usual Sunday. Then this girl Kate I kind-of know sidled up and started talking to me about how she was going to a concert later that night and how her friend Rudy quite rudely bailed because of school activities. She asked me if I wanted to go in his stead.

It was a band I'd never heard of and of which had no opinion, the Annie Moses Band. One deadly phrase from my bubbly companion quickly painted me a mental image, though, in a fatal brushstroke.

Family band.

Why I associate unpleasantness with this term is uncertain, but it's true.

Immediately an image of children wielding classical instruments sprung to my head, suffocating in their stiff pilgrim-esque clothes, shoes tight, hair prim, every interaction between siblings brimming with openly emotional closeness that's almost cringe-inducing to a coolly aloof sophisticate like myself.

(Perhaps more substantially adding to my lack of friendly terms with this phrase, one of the things in my Closet-of-Jealousy is people who can play lots of instruments.)

But earlier this year an idea surfaced from the ashes of wrong choices I've made. It's profoundly wise if I do say so myself and has the potential to prevent much heartbreak. I now stick decidedly to this idea, and I've only regretted it once when I drove an hour to Sam's Club with my mom for groceries.

And the idea is this.

If the choice is "go" or "don't go", then go.

So I told her I would.

I rode home that day with Spontaneous Plans, and sometimes that's the best kind.

I quickly donned my new T-shirt (see above) and grabbed a fistfull of George Washingtons from my wallet (it's all I've got right now), squabbled with my mom over whether or not I had to bring my own sandwich, and got out the door.

The drive was to be two and a half hours. When Kate showed me how we'd be making this sojourn, I laughed in disbelief.

In my naivety I was excited for it too, at the prospect of something "adventurey".

Their trunk was a small flat space behind the back seats. Big for a trunk, small for two teenage girls with blankets and books and a mini cooler besides. My muscles ached with stiffness and my whole body yearned for relief from the engine heat, saturated by the thick blankets, by the time we got there.

But we managed. It was actually kind of fun.

We stopped at a river-side area for a picnic dinner and afterwards made our way to the church at which this Family Band of Perfect White-Toothed Talents would be performing.

We got a seat up in the balcony and waited. Kate had been to a music camp these people put on and actually got to be good friends with the youngest member, Jeremiah, and was hilariously jittery to see him again. She fanned her pink face with her hand and said "it's not funny!" as I laughed, but it was. Quite so.
There was a harp on stage like a golden boat it was so big. Violins, a cello, guitar, drums, keyboard. Meanwhile Kate mimed her heart about to burst out of her chest with a flapping hand.

Then they came out.

Their fingers flew over the strings, as un-followable as a street performer with that elusive ball underneath one of three cups. I expected to see smoke streaming from their hands, a microphone combust into a cascade of flames, perhaps the instruments to spontaneously disintegrate from overuse. And the man on the cello looked visibly angry with passion, swaying back and forth with the bow.
It was really cool.

And the whole time Kate was just trying to make eye contact with that guitar-strumming Jeremiah boy. She got up and walked to the stairwell and back in the hopes his eyes would flick up at the motion. Eventually he did glance up and his gaze fixed for a second, but he had other present obligations and had to look away.
Kate never did get to talk to Jeremiah though. After the performance he remained conveniently distant from the meet-and-greet table, but wasn't on the stage either, but seemed to have vanished in a cloud of magical purple dust or an instant transporting laser.

Kate claims his parents don't like her at all because he once put his arm around her at the table. (Now, they seem like lovely people, but this does reinforce my subconscious stereotype. xD) This also may explain his abrupt disappearance- his parents may have given him orders to not even greet her and held him hostage backstage.

Oh, tragic love.

The ride home was eventful. In that I mostly slept and got even more stiff in that "backseat" of theirs.

Kbaifo'now! :3

~Elizabeth

Remember that "nice paper target" I mentioned in my previous post?

Akhmed took quite a beating the other day.

* * * * *

I got saved on Sunday!
I'd been saved for a while, I think, but God wanted me to walk to the altar and say so. It was absolutely terrifying and looking at it in hindsight I can hardly fathom I actually worked up the courage, but I know it was only the fact that I was in God's will that I was able to. I prayed the night before that if He wanted me to walk up there to give me some kind of sign at the sermon. And so then the sermon was all about tests from God and faith needing to cost you something, because if it doesn't it's worth just as much. I knew then I needed to swallow people's image of me and just do what I needed to. After all, if He could die on a public cross for me, couldn't I take a few steps in front of the church to acknowledge it?

~Elizabeth

P.S.

...Man. A printed-out terrorist blown full of holes and God in the same blog post. I imagine I'm seriously reinforcing those stereotypes about the south.

Ah well. There are definitely worse reputations!

P.S.S.

The ending to Avatar: The Last Airbender. IT WAS SO BEAUTIFUL. ;_;

I'M TEAR-BENDING.

Guns n' Thangs

Today I went shooting with my dad, his friend, and his friend's son.

I'd never gone before, despite the enjoyment my dad and brother get from it. They even go out to our neighbor's plot of land they use as a shooting range on a semi-regular basis, but for whatever reason (perhaps that perpetual laziness of mine, which grip I have to shake off every day to be a semi-functioning human being) I never acted on my dad's suggestion that I go with them sometime.

I was excited and, I won't lie, a wee bit nervous as we rumbled down the woodsy road and bone-dry creek bed toward the range. The last time I'd shot a gun was in our backyard with a little pistol my dad had and thought I might like to try out. It looked like a toy. It felt like a toy in my hands. If someone had painted it neon orange I would have thought it a squirt gun. But when I pulled that trigger and a sonic boom rang my ears like church bells and sent the world spiraling around me, I quickly made a leap to the opposite conclusion.

On the way there we stopped at a gun store, grabbed a nice paper target and some earplugs, and got on our way once again. I liked that place (the employees were such characters with their camo and drawls) but I didn't at the same time. The walls were lined with all kinds of taxidermy, casting their shadows on you as you walked up and down the aisles, their dying expressions erased and placed with ones of blank solemnity.

Creepy.

We pulled into the stretch of ground and started unloading the sleek weapons. It's a really pretty piece of property actually, and because they hardly do anything with it its got a really nice rustic feel with its slightly dilapidated barn and knotted rope swaying from a high tree branch. I love my own house, don't get me wrong, but the surrounding land is overrun with dead plants, spiky plants, itchy plants, and bugs. (And every time I run into one of the cobwebs, whether or not its the third one in two feet, I do a unique little dance which involves flailing wildly, smacking people in the five-foot vicinity and bellowing "Gerreroffmee!")

So after we set up the target and everything I actually got to take a shot at shooting. (...I'm so clever with puns.)
Boy, were those things loud. I hated sticking the little orange earplugs in, because sticking things in one's ear is rarely a pleasant sensation, but it was necessary for sure. It was super fun, though-- I loved the feel of the shotgun in my hands as opposed to the pistols, and strangely enough, the recoil felt GOOD against my shoulder. My dad said I'd really enjoy skeet shooting, and if I get the chance I definitely want to give it a go.

It was a bit awkward, though, because my dad's friend's son was my age and so we were together for a couple minutes while our dads shot, and he was uncanny in his impression of a lamp. Or a brick wall. Or something else that doesn't speak, because he was unbearably silent. Any attempt I gave at conversation sputtered and nosedived, because whether or not it was a yes-no question he'd give a one-word response and say nothing else.
"So what school do you go to?"
"---- school."
...
"So have you ever been shooting before?"
"No."
...

So long for now, fellers!
~Elizabeth

Wookie Cookies!

As it turns out, there are plenty of OYANers in Kentucky.

Which is just epic epicness.

So after some foruming and PMing and dilly-dalling in various decision-making processes, we finally agreed to have a gathering for an afternoon last Saturday. (Of course, we didn't actually make plans for any activities with which to amuse ourselves during the course of said afternoon. Time just has a way of slipping quickly enough on its own at these kinds of get-togethers.)

I was fizzing with that kind of feathery nervous excitement that brushes up against the insides of your stomach as we pulled in, OYAN T-shirt donned, Dalek key chain clipped obnoxiously in sight on my messenger bag. It was a warming sight, all- Alexis with her allegiant frying pan firmly in hand, Esther and Adrienne and a motley of other quirky writing folk I knew only by way of keyboards and computer monitors. We made good comradeship immediately, and formed a little talking-circle thing; we would talk for half an hour, move ten yards, talk for another half an hour, drift a little bit... I believe it took us forty-five minutes to get from the parked cars to the picnic table, and they were hardly a front-yard-in-suburbia away from each other.

Alexis also brought a chocolatey wonder she called a Wookie Cookie, and it truly lived up to the epicness of its title.

So basically, all day, we explored the tiny perimeter of the lakeside and rambled endlessly on the thoughts that go whizzing in their blinking spaceships through our kinky writers' brains.

There was some excellent tree-climbing to be accomplished there as well, and being the half-monkey people have insinuated me to be it was hearty, knee-scraping fun.
* * * * *
Now that school has started, all those hours that went piddling on by and trailed half hearted clouds of dust in their wake are absolutely brimming with busy-work. For instance, added to my already staggering load, this week I have a creative writing assignment to write a 500-word story with a twist ending.

Calvin is unparalleled in his profound wisdom.
I am not worthy.

I mean, really, truer words have never been spoken.
How does one go about plucking a twist ending from the air on command?!
And assuming one does get that far, how do you compress it into five hundred words?

~Elizabeth

P.S. I discovered a new word today!

pet·ti·fog

 [pet-ee-fog, -fawg]

verb (used without object), pet·ti·fogged, pet·ti·fog·ging.

1.

to bicker or quibble over trifles or unimportant matters.

2.

to carry on a petty, shifty, or unethical law business.

3.

to practice chicanery of any sort.

The Spider-Man Franchise Has Been Re-Done Seven Times Since You Started Reading This Post

Mystery Science Theater 3000 is one of my favorite TV shows of all time.
Joel's (and later Mike's) solitary march across space on the Satellite of Love is clutching-the-stomach, rib-aching humor, from evil Dr. Forrester and bumbling, square-haired TV's Frank, to the ridiculous invention exchanges, to the snarky little skits and brilliant commentary during the laughably horrible films they were forced to watch in their perpetual suspension above earth.

So when my older brother informed me that MST3K's riff of Manos: Hands of Fate would be shown live in theaters for one night only, I knew I had to go.

There was some uncertainty in whether or not we'd be able to attend this momentous, life-changing film extravaganza, but by seven o'clock that night I was snug in the backseat, irrationally proud of the home-made MST pin on my messenger bag, and jittery with excitement.
As soon as we pulled into the parking lot we knew these were our people.
Super-hero T-shirts, to-the-ankle dreadlocks swaying with every step, pudgy guys at the ticket machine chiding in gravelly frustration, "Twelve dollars? That's retarded!"

The movie was fantastic. There were some tasty little appetite-wetting slides before the previews, reading snippets like "Did You Know? The Spider-Man Franchise has been re-booted seven times since you sat down in this theater!" and "Manos: The Hands of Fate, the worst movie ever made that's not a Transformers movie, is showing tonight! And you payed to see it!"

Then Mike, Bill, and Kevin sauntered on screen from some blessed live stage, and showered viewers across the country with their hilarity. I was laughing so hard it hurt and breath eluded my heaving chest.
Then, around halfway through, the unspeakable happened.

The connection to the live stream failed.

Instantly the theater was a sea of nervous chatter, cell phones illuminating every face. Thunder rolled like crashing boulders outside, muffled in enormous room. Precious, irretrievable minutes slipped.
Four, then five.
A theater attendant entered the room and a strained hush came over immediately as she updated us on the situation, carrying with her also the promise of a free movie ticket to any showing of our choice in the future. That was a tremendously generous compensation and we clapped, but the IMAX screen remained dismally dark.
Eleven minutes, twelve.
My hopes steadily deflated like a forgotten party balloon in the dark shadow of the elephantine error message, mocking the audience with its facade of simplicity.

But then, vibrating to our bones, we heard Bill's booming voice rise out from nowhere like that of some satiric deity and seconds later the screen sputtered back to life. Uproarious applause reigned for a moment or so and we fell back into the rhythm of gleeful, geeky comedy.
I left satisfied, grin stretching and stomach soar from laughter, and with a crisp white ticket in my hand for the Birdemic: Shock and Terror one-night showing in October. 

That movie, the RiffTrax of which I've already viewed, is so indescribably life-altering it's unutterable. No mere mortal can ever comprehend.

"...Such as seals."

~Elizabeth

P.S. RiffTrax is the official reincarnation of MST3K. MST was a full show, and in order to shamelessly mock whatever horrible movie was on set for that episode they had to buy the rights to it.  So they were mostly old "films" (and I use that term loosely) accessible for cheap or nothing at all. But now the guys just do audio files of the commentary, to be played alongside the movie they're "riffing", so no rights are necessary. Thus, they can do all kinds of the modern-day train wrecks of our time like Twilight without shattering their metaphorical piggy bank! Huzzah!

Ghibli Love

~Me Whilst Watching Any Ghibli Film~

(minus the giant mushroom cloud, given I haven't done anything remarkably imbecilic that day)

~Elizabeth

Lake Time!

------->
Epic blogging commence.
------->
So this past weekend my family, my friend Catherine and I went to the lake.
(I did mention this in my previous basically useless post, but redundancy is one of my many skills.)
Cat spent the night the night before, during which epic adventuring sleepover timez we lay limp, draped over random furniture in my room like tossed rag dolls, watching Doctor Who (arguably the best British program about a time-traveling extra-terrestrial on television) and yet another Ghibli masterpiece, Castle in the Sky.
I loved it.
So much.

I'm legit going to tear up at the memory of its sheer unsurpassed brilliance, so I think that's a post for another time.
* * * * *
The next day Cat and I squeezed into the backseat along with Wolfie, my German Shepherd who is a perfectly human being thank you and will sit primly in the seat as such, for an hour and a half of blip-blooping DS games, fierce rib-elbowing in the fight to protect the sacredness of the personal bubble, and two-player fruit ninja combat.
Boating was awesome, and tubing especially so. Cat's perpetual face-scrunched, mouth-agape expression of utter horror was hilarious enough, as we bounced and conked heads in unforgiving, bone-bruising harshness, leaning desperately one way or the other in a futile attempt to keep the balance. Many delightedly terrified screams later we wiped out, needless to say, and smacked on the water like skipping stones. We emerged feeling as bruised as fruit in a washing machine, but it was totally worth it.
Then came the jumping rock. Fifteen feet of adrenaline for puny-minded swimmers like ourselves, lurching up into the sky. Challenging us. Mocking us with its immensity.
After several minutes of pacing and undecided facepalming I did manage tap into that puddle of steely nerve of mine, buried deeper than it's almost worth it to expose, and backflipped. I was feeling pretty great about myself, chest all puffed up and smirk in place, until this one guy did some kind of triple-quadruple-backflip-corkscrew-dive thingy without a moment's hesitation.
...
Dang teenagers. They'll do anything as long as it's stupid and risky. (And firmly yanks Elizabeth out of her momentary smugness.)
Later that day Cat and I also decided to go on this cute little nature trail meandering off the main road.
Or should I use its proper moniker, the CrapFest Nature March of Death.
It lead to a dead end, but Catherine was all like, "Ooh, I'm so nature-y and curious like the imp I am, let's see where it goes!". So I'm just plodding along behind her with my frustrated cloud of smoke curling from me and cynical scowl furrowing my whole face.
I was getting cranky, I'll admit.
But then the absurdity of calling the nettle-lined death march of insect bites and dead branches a "nature trail" was enough to make us both laugh hysterically in disbelief.
The meteor shower later that night was stunning. I was in a hazy stupor as I stumbled down to the dock, exhaustion rendering me a blob of weak muscle, but it was definitely worth it to see the streaks of shooting star bleeding through the atmosphere. My mind was admittedly on hiatus most of the time, and only broke back into consciousness after the cries of wonder and delight had gone with the meteors I missed, but even just to watch the night sky all dusted over with pinprick stars was amazing enough.
As we stood to leave we saw the sudden drop in temperature was making mist curl up off the glassy water, like ghosts rising up from the depths. It was beautiful, even to my heavy-lidded eyes.

Kbai, until next time!
~Elizabeth

In Remembrance

I don't have time for a long post right now as we are embarking for the lake very soon, but I figured I'd type something small at any rate.
* * * * *
Well, the Nuzlocke Challenge has delivered its first casualty.
It wasn't an intense battle, tears streaming trails through the grit on my face as I barred my teeth in agony. I didn't avenge the poor creature in a flaming massacre fueled by the low, chest-tightened pain of grief.
The truth is much more pathetic, in several ways.

When the Splash Attack just doesn't cut it anymore.

~KNIVES~
in memoriam

P.S.
Here's the Dream Team as it stands thus far. I have no idea how I shall fit my gyarados, Syren, into this image, but I will manage it somehow. *thrusts sword into air valiantly and stares off into the horizon with blind, emotional courage*

Meanwhile: Another Piece of Crap Joins the Team

Pokemon: a staple of my childhood.
There's a photo of me at around six or seven, curled up on a porch swing and clutching my lime green GameBoy Color, dinked-up Pokemon Crystal cartridge sticking out the back. I spent hours and hours in that virtual world, training up the cutest and quirkiest of the creatures to become deadly killers to carry out my bidding. Countless crime syndicates- Teams Rocket, Aqua, Magma and Glactic- fell under my unbreakable fist of justice.
(You did have to wonder about the gym leaders who devoted their lives to the ancient art of battle, though, when they could be easily vanquished by any adventure-seeking adolescent with a free afternoon.)
I even forced my friend Lindsey to play Pokemon trainer with me at recess. The shadow of the plastic tunnel at the playground became our campsite, the area by the spring-mounted frog and squirrel rides our perilous battleground.
HOW I IMAGINED I LOOKED ENGAGING IN SAID ACTIVITY:

HOW I REALLY LOOKED:
(...Well, I can't do a google search for this, but if you can just imagine a dorky second-grader running around a playground and shouting "I choose you, charizard!" you'll have a pretty good mental image.)
In short, I was unstoppable.
Even now the games encompass so much warm nostalgia when I play them (like hugging a pony), and the gameplay is undeniably addictive. But as somewhat of a veteran player who's completed games from every generation, it does get repetitive. A change of a pixel avatar, some fresh monsters, and a new group of bumbling antagonists to bring down every couple of years isn't exactly a complete overhaul.
Enter the Nuzlocke Challenge.

When I saw this comic I flexed my fingerless-gloves, adjusted my pikachu cap, clipped on my pokeball-holder belt and knew I had to embark on this journey.
I've only just begun, but feel more fierce devotion to my rattata (Tate)

mankey (Petra)

and butterfree (Indigo)

than I ever thought I would for pokemon of such low caliber. I rejoice in every victory and my heart pounds viciously with every attack, although fortunately I've had to move none to my PC box labeled "The Fallen" yet.
I can only hope the remainder of the Challenge will be so carefree.

Good day to you, and may you catch 'em all.

~Elizabeth
Le Cool Trainer I've always been

More Movies!

I believe I've spent more hours in a darkened room watching films this year than any other of my life. The bottom of my tennis shoes should probably be caked with candy and coke residue by now.
But hey, I'm not complaining.
The day before yesterday my friend Lindsey and I went to see two movies at the theater- however, before we could do that, we much less enjoyably stumbled and rolled out of bed like heavy-lidded zombies to leave for some sports shoe sale she wanted to go to. Our goal- well, her goal enforced upon me- was to get there 20 minutes early. Being the classy, experienced Wally World/ internet shopper I am, I was scrunching my eyebrows and thinking to myself how frivolous that was. Why wait nearly half of an hour, fighting to keep your ten-pound eyelids open and legs trembling in the early morning stupor, to wait for a shoe store to open? I mean, what was to gain? Surely nobody would show up for that.
I mean, it was just a stupid sale.
When we pulled up next to the strip mall, the line of tanned, steel-muscled cross-country fanatics with the same mindset she had stretched all the way to Big Lots.
That tiny place was a complete and utter mad house.
A picture of that unfortunate hour and a half involved fighting through throngs, getting elbowed in the ribs, and shuffling through a rolling sea of bodies with pulsing heat suffocating all breath, all while clutching a tower of shoe boxes for footwear she was mildly considering (which I dropped several times and risked getting trampled trying to retrieve).
I did see two guys that are going to the same homeschool group I will be this year and briefly said hi to them but got swept away, clawing and kicking, by the frenzy in a matter of seconds.
The movies made up for it, though. It was a cute, cheap little theater that showed movies that had been out for a while already, so we decided on The Avengers (my third time) and more tentatively Snow White and the Huntsman. We walked into the chilly, darkened room and settled into the fold-seats with our brimming bags of popcorn and lukewarm nachos, already making bets on how many facial expressions Kristen Stewart would make to expand on her single pained "I don't understand" one. 50's swing music accompanied us as we waited instead of previews, and when it started the screen sputtered and flickered like an old film reel.
It ended up being okay. Not terrific, not horrid, but okay. The acting- okay. The plot- fuller of holes than Swiss cheese, but okay. On a whole, mediocre and forgettable but entertaining enough to hold your interest for a while.
Avengers, of course, was epic.
Again.

"Scrunch up, Legolas."

~Elizabeth

 And one more li'l note on Snow White... Here's something I typed up earlier on a forum.
"Only one thing really sticks with me, and it's not positive.
*LE SPOILERS AHEAD*
Okay, so Snow White is "the fairest of them all" because of her innocence and purity of heart. The wicked queen is all kinds of dastardly and all-together no good from the beginning, which is what makes the two beauties so contrasted. There's a scene where the huntsman is showing Snow White how to stab someone in hand-to-hand combat, and she looks at him, and says "I don't think I could do that." Maybe we don't really care about her hollow, paper-thin character, but we at least feel a mild respect for a moment or two.
And then the epic fantasy battle comes in. If we can get past the fact that Kristen Stewart is charging in armor on the front lines, through a series of events she ends up in a final showdown with the witch.
It ends with her stabbing the queen, knife blade deep in flesh.
...Say what now?
Wasn't Snow White supposed to be fairest because she was pure, innocent, childlike in her naivety at the beauty in the world? She doesn't take pity on the witch, doesn't establish herself as any different, but kills her with her bare hands.
I don't get that."

Of Hawaiian music and dancing elephants

My ukulele arrived in the mail today.

A perfectly average box of cardboard and clear tape lay in quiet unassuming on the porch, so humble a means of delivery and yet stirring suspense in every soul to ever receive one... an unquenchable curiosity as to what measureless delight dwells within that corrugated cube of wonder, what beautiful something lies tucked carefully into a loose bed of packing peanuts. I pried it open, fingers trembling, and there it lay, my mahogany instrument with its corresponding Hawaiian-themed introduction pamphlet. It feels solid and yet weightless in my hands, and to see the correct note flash up on the little electronic tuner fills me with ridiculous satisfaction as I sloppily trail my fingers down the strings.

I didn't get much time to practice my new-found calling, however. My cousins (well, cousins by default- I'm not really sure their relation to us) from Austria came to visit today. Their son, Patrick, has the most adorable German thickness to his boyish voice, although he often uses it to demand treats or squeal for various reasons, whether from delight or dissatisfaction. After dinner we sojourned out to the local theater to watch "The Seussical", a play our neighbor has a few minor roles in.

It was very... colorful?

Let's just leave it at that you could easily discern those with prior theater training and the community volunteers who
A) had mothers were intent upon seeing their children dressed up in bright candy-corn wigs in front of an audience, despite their pleas for a few more hours on MineCraft, or
B) really had nothing to do all summer but watch reruns on TV and thought to themselves, "heck, why not a musical?".

(Okay, I'll admit it wasn't that bad. They did a good job, and the tunes were catchy. xD One of the monkeys, a shorter guy who really had the evil all-fours slink down, could seriously belt out some notes... I'd buy his album. LIVE FROM THE SEUSSICAL: THE SHORTEST MONKEY.)

Goodnight!
But before I leave, a few words... and here they are.
Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

~Elizabeth

Why I Like Autumn

It's hot.
...
Quite hot.

This isn't the kind of heat you find mildly uncomfortable as you walk to your car but promptly forget about with the turn of the air conditioning dial.
It's not the kind of heat a glass of lemonade and an awkward floppy hat can solve.

I mock those naive souls.

This is oppressive, heavy heat that presses down on you like a fog, so solid you could jar it, so crippling it transforms even the most outdoors-inclined to liquified blobs steadily becoming one with the sofa. It gets under your skin, melts your brain and mutes your thoughts to the capability of an average insect.
Basically, it makes you feel like one great big sticky puddle of melted ice cream that seeps all down the sidewalk cracks and glues itself to the bottom of your shoe.

Ugh.

So to help break the monotony of my stir-crazy existence, I've been writing my autobiography with stick figures. It's quite entertaining, as it so happens, and really caters to my sophisticated art medium. Also, with any luck (and given that our mail delivery person isn't preoccupied sorting out their alter ego as an underground crime-fighting warlord), my ukulele should come tomorrow!

I should go outside at least for a bit before my body turns into a complete gelatinous mass of unused muscle.

So long, sleep tight, and drive home safely!
~Elizabeth

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE.
Speaking of frozen dairy deserts, today my mom and I ventured out to the Comfy Cow ice cream bar. A dull, jingling cow bell hangs above the door and a colorful blackboard over the counter proclaims an array of mouth-watering textures that made my eyes the size of saucers just to stare at. Man vs Food's very own Adam Richman took on their Comfy Cow Sundae challenge, fifteen monstrous scoops (around 5.5 pounds of sugar and brain freeze), and failed. Our choices were a bit more modest- peach for her and black raspberry chip for me, a heaping mound of dark, creamy deliciousness set magnificently astride the crunchy, flaky, chocolate-dipped cone.
Simply wondrous.

A Caped Vigilante

I watched The Dark Knight Rises yesterday.
...I still have shiny-anime-eyed, suppressed-squeal giddy afterglow from the sheer epicness.

So there I was on the porch yesterday afternoon. Doctor Who shirt proudly donned, DS lite in pocket, shoes sloppily tied, money to pay for my tickets settled comfortably in my brother's palm. And then our neighbors drove up in the most amazing car in the universe.
It's gloriously tiny, enough to make a troupe of circus clowns drool puddles. Bucket-like seats, barely enough backseat room to support a chicken-legged six-year-old, a ceiling tailored for the likes of hobbits. Horrible Nicki Minaj music pounded through the speakers and vibrated to my bones, and the wind from the sun roof gusted on my face in an unrelenting torrent that drowned out all possible conversation.

I was beginning to get a crick in my back from stooping by the time we got there, head pressured against the rough fabric of the roof. We rushed inside, complimenting each others' nerd shirts on the way ("The Angels Have the Phone Box" and a rage face mash-up respectively), grabbed a packet of Swedish fish at the counter, and settled down into the cool, comfortable darkness of the theater to bask in the flicker of TV's warm glowing warming glow.

And then it began.

I have a sudden urge to spoil things for you folks, but as I am a gracious, hospitable human being, I'll suppress it and spare you said agony. Jerks.
My little frenemy, nicknamed by moi as Pepito, wasn't quite so chivalrous however. He shouted the game-changing phrase of destruction it as loud as his shrill vocal cords would allow when visiting at our house, purely for the malicious pleasure of seeing a great plot turn smashed upon the concrete, like a dropped glass ball, in front of our disbelieving eyes.
BUT, said spoiler turned out to be a false lead, which in turn made the ACTUAL twist ending even more discombobulating...
So his frenemy status remains un-toppled.
I don't know what to do with that kid.

Kbaifo'now!

~Elizabeth
Supreme Overlord of All the Things

A novel unfinished

Greetings, friends and potential mortal foes.

So.
Last year was my first year of homeschooling.
(Well, other than once in fourth grade. But my schooling past, involving skipped grades and half-levels, is too complicated for me to delve into at this point.)
And through the various homeschool emails and webbernet groups my mom subscribes to we found this super-fabulous curriculum called the One Year Adventure Novel (loving shortened to OYAN by its devotees. Pronunciation is a subject of debate).

So, there I was with this book in my hands, pages all crisp and white, that new shiny textbook gloss glistening up at me, so much potential and excitement within that brick of papery goodness. I was set, I was ready to go. TIME TO WRITE A NOVEL IN A YEAR!
...Well, here I am again nearly a calendar year later, with 140 typed pages under my belt. And barely six chapters of the outlined twelve. I can feel my interest in my own story dwindling further by the day, sputtering out of the balloon that was so inflated at the beginning of this that it was near exploding; in my mind my plot becomes sillier and even more needlessly complicated in a story world that can't sustain it by the day. I'm a procrastinator, plain and simple. A procrastinator and a perfectionist, two labels that when mixed produce an almost deadly concoction of lazy.

I'm still going to finish this thing, though, if it takes me another six months to get my second wind.

But make sure you don't get me wrong: the curriculum itself is brilliant. I've learned more about writing- well, not just writing, but how to truly tell a story- this year than all the other years in my life combined. And the summer workshop? Absolutely AMAZING. The community that has formed around OYAN is something simply wonderful. Deliciously nerdy, enthusiastic and fun, bursting with the Holy Spirit. Someday when I have a couple hours of boredom I'll tackle trying to describe that five-day interlude of nerdfighting, Doctor Who cosplaying, cheering for Jeff Gerke whenever he took a drink on stage, craziness, worship, and of course, writing.

Until then,
May the soot gremlins hide faithfully in your attic.

~Elizabeth

P.S. My brother, who has been gone for five weeks at smarty scholarship camp, is coming home today! We cleaned his basement cave of a room (a task that should have involved shovels and pickaxes) and painted it, so I think he'll be pleased.

In which I fall from the sky and land in an ungraceful heap

Well, here I am in the blogosphere.
As I sit up, muscles creaking like old floorboards, I'm looking around as panicked and confused as a cat thrown into a bouncy house at a five-year-old's birthday party. I've got scrapes on my elbows and a throbbing lump on my head, and this new world should prove interesting.
I don't know if there is a particular set of note cards that illustrate the way in which one is supposed to launch a blog- perhaps there is, but the Google search bar is too far away for me to bother- so, instead, I'm just going to wing it.
I think you'll find I'll be doing that quite a lot.
This is most likely going to be recording of my day-to-day expeditions: my monster-slaying and magic-finding in the chigger-infested realm of my backyard woods, my thoughts, as rambling and incoherent as they sometimes might be, and my little projects that most of the time amount to me, on my bedroom floor, surrounded by scraps of paper and hands coated in glue.
Although some days are rather less adventureful, I'm ashamed to admit. Me, plodding about the house, picking up things and setting them down again, skipping aimlessly through the meadows of the interweb. I hope to change that with the start of a new school year and the clipping of the metaphorical blog ribbon.
I'd like to think I've already set the Calvin and Hobbes wagon downhill. For instance, just yesterday, I ordered a ukulele via the amazonian internet shopping services. As far as I'm concerned, it's the perfect instrument- portable, unique, fun, and self-teachable. Tiny Tim is my new idol.
Since yesterday I have also made it up to "T" learning Morse Code.
(Flash cards are lovely, useful things. Do not underestimate their power.)
Hopefully both of these hobbies will amount to something or another and not tossed into the wastebasket in the back of my headbrain, with my motivation sputtering to a rather embarrassing halt in the middle of the road.

Well, for now, may confetti be sprinkled upon all thine heads, and the guilt-monkeys not descend because of that unfinished project you know you should be working on right now.

Allonsy!

~Elizabeth

 

P.S. ...Don't blink.