Facebook: the latest drug on the street

Oh Facebook, I avoided you for a long time. You just seemed like another MSN wannabe that would invade my personal privacy and waste my precious internet time. Email after email let me know that friends had named me as a friend (woohoo) and tagged me in photos, which was kinda unnerving but fine- and I ignored them all. The break came when a friend, over the phone (key difference), told me to join because I had to read her profile- and this is a very funny, very wrong friend so I caved.

First came the confusion: what does this do? How do I get there? How do I find people? And of course, indignation- no Facebook can not have the password to my email so it can send an email to everyone in my contact list. But that was it. I found out that my profile is hidden to all those who aren't in my network or who I invite- but that you can see how many friends a person has and anyone can see how many friends you have.

Then the trouble started- very quickly Facebook became a popularity contest and with anything that is stupid, I fell into the stupid well. I started analyzing my profile like a freak- second guessing everything I had written. I grew paranoid that my answers were stupid and revealed me for the vapid nerd I am and that people would mock me endlessly. I was checking it religiously and comparing how many friends I had compared to ex-friends from high school and the such. I also wanted my wall to grow.... I needed the wall posts.

Then during a commerical break in Iron Chef, when I got up to check to facebook- I realized I had a problem. I had to step back, pause, reflect. I realized that who I had become on Facebook was not an accurate protrait of me, and really, I like me quite a bit. There was silence, and then acceptance. I was obsessed and getting freaky. I added all the dorky components back to my profile and left wall posts that weren't edited five times for grammer and coolness. I embrace that I am as dorky on Facebook as I am in life and that if people think I am mad... well they are probably quite boring so who cares.

All this in 24 hours. It was a crazy day.

Now, I'm not saying I'm not a little OCD about Facebook- I still go on quite often and post a lot but I've found that it's an awesome way to contact friends that you otherwise would have never ever seen again. All my katimafriends have posted wonderful photos of our travels and I've contacted a lot of friends from home that I haven't seen since high school. But now I have a new thing- how many friends is too much? I have 61 which may yet get larger cause I have some friends who should be on Facebook but arent (cough-sheenaadriennekayla) but I've seen people with 100 to 250 friends and that's just rather silly. I mean, I can't keep up with all my friends right now.

Yeah. My pink and blue sock still isn't done. I ran out of yarn and they aren't high enough so I'm doing the last five inches in black ribbing. I hope they'll look all right. If I can steal someone's digital camera I'll let you know.

Okay- my tangent for the day is done. And if blogger doesn't crash when I go to post this all will be right in the world.

blogger keeps on crashing me so....

short post, mostly copied from facebook, and Jenn and Podgy have already commented but here's my sketch of a reading list for this summer and suggestions are greatly appreciated.


The Princess Bride by William Goldman
Mists of Avalon by Zimmer Bradley
Naked by Sedaris
Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Tom Robbins
Misery by Stephen King (done)
Kushiel's Chosen by Jacqueline Carey
Punished by Rewards by Kohn
Anasi Boys by Neil Gaiman
Cunt: A Declaration of Indepedence by Inga Muscio
Wicked by Gregory McGuire
The Courtesan by Sarah Dunant
The Keeper of the Isis Light by Huges
What Would Buffy Do by Jana Reiss

Lazy bones

It's funny that my sleeping in is now 10am, when it use to be 1pm or something- and not just any sleeping in, this morning I made myself stay in bed and fall back asleep about four times. It's the first official day of my trip!

And Spike is fine. He's just fat. I miss him muchly right now but it's a good thing for his weight since he's a social eater.

Okay well I just hit some sort of funny key on the computer and it went to standby.

And I have so many pictures to display but I left them at home on my sisters camera so.... sorry. I decided to weave my parents a blanket in less than two weeks so that's why I haven't had much knitting content on my blog. I wove 16 triangles in 5 days than took another 5 days to sew them all together and do a quick crochet chain around the whole thing. It's mostly silk and wool. Jenn helped me put the colours together, she's very helpful.

And seriously, my Mom makes this poppy seed lemon cake that is to die for!

3 minutes of fame!

and added to my picture in the newspaper with my friends in Grade 7.... which I guess counts as one minute- I still have 11 more minutes to go! (I'm going to try to waste them as a teacher campaigning against standerdized testing cause you know, our government listens to teachers so well)

Anyhoo I was on the radio! Well, not me. My email! And they read it outloud, and then they had some fun with my name which was fine, rather funny. It was the daybreak DJ that I entered and I emailed and said they I wanted to hear Amy Winehouses' Rehab played because it's a graduation theme song. And then I think it was Chris (of Chris and Russell) made a joke about Lindsey Lohan. It was funny. I rule! The CBC rules! Wheee me!

In other news, something not so much fun with the exclamation marks- Spike had an upsetting visit to the vet yesterday. He really, really... really doesn't like going to the vet- there was a lot of hissing and growling and at one point he felt it necessary to reach over and scratch me while I was talking to the vet. Then it was discovered that his liver is too large (just a little) so they had to draw blood but due to the ears back, spitting-ness that is my darling cat, they had to keep him for the day. They were really nice because they figured they would keep him for a little, see if he calmed down, and then try to draw blood, but that if he didn't calm down they would have to sedate him. So yeah, they had to sedate him. And then when I went to go get him afterwards they asked me to come back and get him instead of one of them going back to get him, which is so embarrasing. It's like going to pick your kid up from school and they say 'we locked him in a closet, here's the key- fly at it'. But it was nice in that when we walked into the cat room Spike instantly starting hissing at us until I reached into the cage and then he stopped hissing and literally crawled into my arms. I felt so guilty for leaving him. So we are still waiting for the results of the blood test but I'm sure he's fine, he may just have to take some medication like when he was a kitten. The funny thing is when we got him home he was fun, even a little better than fine. This morning he actually chased the kitty treats, he never plays- he usually just looks on with disdain. The problem actually was Chuck who would hiss at Spike and run away and hide. We are guessing Spike smelled like other cats but it was kinda a crazy cat day yesterday.

In other news, chocolate soy milk with coffee liqueor and vodka with waffles? Very good. Very, very good.

Deciding to cut your bangs the next morning because they are 'bugging you'- not really the best idea but it turned out fine.

And a shot of the hissing kitties at a happier time ontop of the fridge.

Do I look any different?

When I woke up this morning, I was just plain ordinary Leone. Nothing special. But now...

I am Leone, Bachelors of Science girl! It happened at around 11:30am when I handed in my exam. Crazy I tell you, crazy.

Okay, I'm going to go play sims and knit socks now. And eat cookies. The Bears and I make cookies like the cookies that Jim and the Bears made that time, but these cookies aren't as good, there was a lot of cursing and batter sticking to non-edible stuff.

Hey, if I know you, and like you, I am now also on facebook so join too cause it is so addictive.

edited to add: Jenn said this isn't allowing her to comment, is evil (blogger, not Jenn- well...) & Podgy, I just use the ordinary stitch markers from the dollar store but one day I will make stitch markers that have skulls on them.

Friday the 13th

and that is all.

Anthony and Stanton are the SAME PERSON!!!

I keep on mixing up Elizabeth Cady Stanton & Susan B. Anthony, but Anthony wrote the excellent speech after being arrested for illegal voting (I'm pretty sure the word 'excellent' isn't in the original title but it should be) and Stanton wrote the Declaration of Sentiment which is equally excellent. See, isn't your life clearer now? In other news, I really shouldn't blog when I've been studying because I have a hard time thinking outside of the studying subject matter.

Still knitting the pink and blue socks (still on the first one-sigh) but I just did the increases for the calf then found out that I didn't need to do them just yet but I'm not froggin and still working on the Sari Silk shawl, I need more stitch markers.

Spike blogged and yes, I am the human under the pile of kittens on that photo.

I'm so glad Jenn is home. It makes more happier kittens and better food (me on my own= frozen veggies and fish every. single. meal.). I'm going to make an excellent mother, I figure that my kids will be excellent chefs by the age of seven by default. And of course, because I love Jenn. I mean, it's so much more fun to make fun of other people when Jenn's here cause she's totally there with me.

Here's my bleeding-angst-photo-artist shot of my hand dyed sock yarn.

Got a Brand New Bag

soooo....... new blog 'layout'. What do you think? Have I forgotten anyone's blog on the side there? Anything you think I should add? Any of the colours garish?

progression of chat

I'm very tired. little chat.

so first is the categorization of all the poems, then they are put on cue cards and sorted for the layout Then I put them all together with a spiffy border and because there's so many pages I used a hammer and nail to get holes to weave through which did mean many evil pointy ends. Then I wove the border with the bamboo I used on the cover
The cover is knit from bamboo and sock wool, I knit it fair isle from a pattern I made on photoshop and I glued that stucker on. The next page has the title of my book, then the Detail poem(with the columns), then the fire poem (fire), then the last page which is my flower poem.

I'm going to bed. Look at all the birds!

barf barf barf & a poem

ugh, I'm about to go to a poetry reading for my creative writing class. I'm sure it will be fine but my artsy friend is in Boston (giving a paper on the simpsons, how cool is she?) so I'm not alone, I'll know a lot of people there, but I'm not going with someone who I can fall back on so meh. And I get really nervous before readings. I'm reading a poem I just wrote two days ago but it's my favorite by far. Barf barf barf.

Things to do Before I Die
~by Leone (me)

memorize Necropsy of Love by Al Purdy which I wrote on my ceiling in lipstick when I was 17 going to high school living in my parent's basement with no older sisters my father painted over it when I left so he could turn the room into a train-room

read every book by Robin McKinley or just read Sunshine over and over again because vampires and dessert turned out to be the best book subject ever

sometimes I think I want to get my masters, in fine arts, in creative writing, in psychology, in education, but then I try to write a paper then I try to stay conscious during my class with the professor who likes to tell us what those feminists think then I try to study for a class where the only motivation is my GPA which I've never really fancied then I try to wake up at 6am to catch a bus that takes 45 minutes so this one isn't a concrete item

at least six more tattoos but no repeats, no dragons, stars, watercolour flowers, easy swirls, or skulls well maybe one more skull but definitely no more dragons

have some kids at one point I guess

walk into a classroom in excellent shoes and my unruly hair totally prepared for the year ahead with colour on the walls and a package of new unbroken rainbow chalk clean chalkboards and textbooks with spines not yet snapped in two and a crown with a name for each student on their desk before the bell rings

knit myself a sweater that doesn't itch or make me sneeze out of yarn that I dyed myself in my kitchen without poisoning anybody or permantly dying my counters pink and the yarn was spun in my living room on a wheel but I'm totally fine with someone else shaving the sheep and processing the fleece because sheep smell like crap

Paganni wrote 24 caprices for the violin and I just want to be able to play the last one, number 24, the hardest one, the most breath catching piece written for the violin and this one may take me the longest to complete but it also makes me cry

sing lullabies to children and hot have them place their hands over my mouth and say 'shhhh'

no more piercings because dammit those things just hurt then either my body rejects them or I never use them and they heal over, I mean, anything that heals over should you really be getting it so anyways no, no more piercings for me

always own a cat not just to embrace the spinster stereotype but also because when it's night and I have to go into the basement I know it's safe if the cats go down the stairs with me

what is that clique again? dance like no one is watching well I already dance while no one's watching so it doesn't apply to this list. I'd rather dance with the ones I love in the room dancing with me or eating cheese and bringing me homemade jars of raspberry jelly and books with dogeared pages

one of these days the entire day spend it in a tree in a treehouse with a kettle for tea and possibly hot chocolate depending on the season or the location and books that haven't been read just yet and are waiting for me shade from leaves even if there is no sun just leaves for the feeling of secrecy from the astronauts -shifty bunch- and of course a perfect skein of yarn and all my grandmother's needles and no pattern just the stitches my fingers have already memorized and maybe music drifting in and out because the windows of my house are open

paint a wall in any house in any paint paint faces bodies paint line of flesh and stroke of colour

never stop writing never put down my pen or my pencil or stop typing even if nobody else reads it even if nobody else likes it even if it is never published and I'm known as the knitting tattooed teacher with the cats who writes poetry that nobody wants to read never stop writing