And These Children That You Spit On As They Try To Change Their Worlds...

Mood: A generalized feeling of bluh, compounded by a specific feeling of bluh.

Watching: Why, "The Breakfast Club" of course

So, while lamenting the passing of the great John Hughes by watching his greatest films, I was inspired to actually complete Principal Vernon's assignment to The Breakfast Club.

The Assignment: Write a 1000 word essay, no more, no less, explaining exactly who you think you are. It cannot be the same word repeated 1000 times.

Well, while I'm neither Molly Ringwald, Ally Sheedy, Anthony Michael Hall, Emilio Estevez, or the surprisingly shmexy Judd Nelson (oooh, 80s Judd Nelson how I kind of want to bone you), I feel that I would have got along well with the kids in The Breakfast Club....okay, that's a lie, I probably would have just made out with Bender in the corner for the whole nine hours...okay, the me NOW would do that, high school me would just pine after him and sigh longingly in his general direction. Anyway, the point being, I'm doing this, so shut the fuck up.

Who The Fuck I Think I Am An Essay By Karen Hainstock I am a tattooed, underachieving, loudmouthed brat. I am an intelligent, efficient and thorough learner. I am a dedicated, overachieving, hard-working employee. I am a smart-ass, witty, sarcastic bitch. I am a nerdy, obsessive, geeky girl. I am an English-Canadian with a weird accent and a bizarre sense of humour. I am a dreamer, a writer, and a thinker of great thoughts of little importance. I am a timid, shy and nervous person. I am an enthusiastic, willing and playful lover. I am a caring, compassionate and loving friend. I am a hopeless romantic who believes that doing things to make people happy is the greatest thing you can do in life. I am a selfish douchebag who wishes more people would actually offer to do things for her every once in a while without being asked. I would be a good soldier if I could get over the idea of being told to kill people I might not necessarily agree need killing. I am one lazy motherfucker. I am a sister, a cousin, and, soon, an aunt. One day I will be a mother. My children will grow up knowing what it's like to fall, get hurt, and get back up again, knowing that there will be someone there to pick them up and brush them off if they can't do it themselves. I am directionless and so concerned about the state of my future that I fear making a wrong choice and therefore haven't made any yet. I am sound, and fury, signifying nothing, but if the end were to come upon me too soon I would rage, rage, rage against the dying of the light. I think the number of people out there with “So it goes” tattoos is ridiculous. I think the number of people out there with Beatles lyrics tattooed on themselves is ridiculous (and, yes, I am one of them). I really do believe that love is all you need, but that love isn't just your boyfriend or girlfriend or husband or wife. It's loving your friends and being loved by them in return. It's loving your job and knowing you're doing something valuable (even if you're not). It's loving your family and knowing they love you even though you don't say it often enough. It's loving your home, your pet, your neighbour. It's loving that crappily knit scarf you made years ago that's lopsided and full of holes but is something you made and can be proud of. I am poor in money, but rich in experience. But I could stand to be richer in both. I have a scary pit of rage that exists somewhere near my stomach and flares up now and again for no reason. And when it does, like Tyler Durden, I just want to watch the world burn. It can never be fully quenched; it smolders on like the ashes of a fire, waiting to spring back into existence with a spark. If I was a sin, it would be wrath, not lust, although sometimes the two come together. While the world burns, I want to rut like an animal on a bearskin rug and bask in the glow of anger. I am also overly poetic sometimes. I am twenty-one and have done things in my life that I am not proud of. I have kept secrets, told lies, and made bad decisions. If I ever went to a confessional, my atonement would be long. By the time I'm thirty-one that atonement will be longer. For every one thing I've done that I'm not proud of, I've done at least three things I am. By the time I'm thirty-one, that list will also be longer. I cry at the sad parts in movies, even if they're absolutely stupid. But then I pretend it didn't happen. I can be one of the guys or one of the girls or a bit of both. I like drinking beer, playing video games, watching sports (in person) and fart jokes. I also like wearing make-up, shopping, and drinking overpriced coolers. Gays/lesbians flock to me. I know not why. I try my hardest not to judge people, because, quite frankly, there are a lot of people who would judge me for the lifestyle that I lead. I believe in God. What I don't believe in are his followers who think that the whole “Jesus is love” thing is selective. I agree with Marx that religion is the opiate of the masses. I've never been in a fist-fight. The day will come, and on that day, I'm going to fight fucking dirty. I think anyone who sneers and spits upon popular music, or film, or literature, is an idiot. Just because a lot of people enjoy something doesn't detract from its cultural value. Even crap is culture, it's just a little different from what you might be used to/comfortable with. I believe that some people are truly too worthless to be allowed to breed. They tend to have a lot of kids. What I think, and what the majority thinks, are often two very different things. I'm quite certain someone feels exactly the same way as me. I tend to rant about things that aren't really that important. Like how hard it would be to mass produce Gear armor. I think if we gave peace a chance we'd give it up in about a week. We like war. We're animals. Deal with it. If we ever ran into an alien species, the first thing we'd do is try to wipe them out. I am whatever you've made me into. I am whatever you want me to be. I am a brain. And a jock. And a basket case. And a princess. And a criminal. And, most importantly, I'm happy just the way I am. If you don't like it, too fucking bad. Learn to love yourself first, then we'll talk. This bitch is exactly 1000 words. I'm just that awesome. So, in the end, thank you, John Hughes. You tried your hardest to normalize the teen experience. You succeeded. And thank you, all of you, who have made me as I am today. If this enlightened you, congratulations. If this causes you to look at me in a different way, just remember, I'm the exact same person I was before. It's just that now you know what you're dealing with. Slainte.

It's A New Dawn, It's A New Day, It's A New Life For Me....And I'm Feeling Good

Mood: Content. Like a monkey, after many hours of grooming and random monkey sex.

Watching: DOOM! Aka yet another movie where Karl Urban is a sexy motherfucker.

Current Obsession: Star Trek Reboot macros...like this one!

You know what's fun? Reading old blog posts. Ahhh, drama.

ANYWAY, yearly update. Ready for it? I don't think you are mothafuckas....alright, fine, UPDATE!

1)I really really really REALLY love the new Star Trek movie. If you couldn't tell by the macro obsession. I'm not really a huge fan of the original series (although it's growing on me now that I've gotten over the LOLZ factor and started paying attention to storylines). And the cast is so. fucking. PRETTY. AKA they're GQMFs. For serious.

2)I'm laid off from Sitel. Which is shitty and yet awesome all at the same time. Shitty because I'm on pogey (or will be once I get my final paycheque and ROE) and can't afford to do things (like go to school. THANK YOU GRANDMA! She bailed me out, which makes me feel like a failure, but meh.). Awesome because this is the first time I've had anything resembling a vacation in SIX YEARS. That's right folks, six years. The last time I didn't have a job was about four years ago and it lasted for about a day. Yeah, that's right.

3) I'm single. And really okay with that actually. It means I have a wide variety of avenues to explore and can actually take advantage of them without feeling guilty/instantly thinking that sex=relationship. I'm only 21, I have YEARS to get into a serious relationship and fall in love and get married. And as much as I like BEING in a relationship, it's not high on my priorities list right now. Anyone who knows me knows that as soon as school happens my amount of free time goes down to about 20 minutes a week (although with the whole laid off thing I'm not sure whether that free time will increase or decrease...meh). The last time I was in a relationship and trying to go to school and work at the same time I did a LOT of school skipping. And procrastinating. And generally being a shithead. So, single is good. Give it about three months though, I'll go back to wanting a relationship again.

4)Speaking of being poor and school, I don't know what I want to do come the fall in terms of jobness. I mean, obviously I need one. I'm REALLY hoping I can get my job back at Le Chap, not because it was, you know, the most fantastic job ever but because again I loved the people that I worked with. The hours wouldn't be that great, but it might be kind of nice to have a job that doesn't demand crazy retarded things from me. On the other hand, I won't have any money. Like, at all. Between bill paying, gas in the car, and paying back my g-ma (plus, you know, hopefully putting money aside for school) I will have NOTHING LEFT. Which is shitty, because I like having money and being able to do things. It's spiffy. The obvious thing to do would be to try and do what I did before and work two jobs while going to school, but working 40+ hours some weeks while doing at least 12 hours of class (which equals at least 8 hours of homework each week) means I have no time for myself. I mean, lets say I work 30 hours a week (which I was averaging working two jobs, or even just the one job at Sitel. It's pretty reasonable to assume). So, thirty hours a week. We'll say approximately seven hours of sleep a day, which equals 49 per week. A minimum of five hours a day for eating, getting ready, and travel, so 35 hours a week. Then add in those 12 hours of school, plus we'll be conservative and round up to ten hours a week of homework. Throw in about an hour a day for things like going to the bathroom and we have this: 30+49+35+12+10+7=143. There's 168 hours in the average week. Now, okay, 25 hours of spare time is almost a whole day, right? But that 25 hours is spread out over the course of the week. Some of that 25 hours will be spent sitting up at Brock trying to catch up on homework, which isn't really relaxing. Some of it will be spent in extra travel. Trying to catch up on my sleep. Seeing friends. Working extra shifts. Soaking in the bathtub. I mean, take that 143 and divide it by 7, you've got 20.5 hours a day just doing the necessary shit. That leaves three and a half hours of free time and they're probably not consecutive. If I sleep an extra hour every night that means I go down to 18 free hours and only 2.5 hours of free time a day. I did this for three years, and for three years my grades consistently sucked, I didn't sleep properly, I got sick hardcore when my exams were done because my body couldn't take it, and I still generally had no money because more money=more spending. And again, look at the math. If I'm working almost 40 hours a week, instead of the estimated 30 that's going to cut into something somewhere. I like having personal relaxation time, so guess what? Sleep and homework tend to suffer, and when sleep and homework suffer eventually my body just says "fuck all y'all" and I start sleeping through alarms and ditching class. See, it sucks balls. I can knuckle under and do this if I really want to, but what I'd really like is just to have one year where I can say "fuck it" and just focus on school. Unfortunately that won't happen because, guess what, I'm going to be working one job, scraping by, and then come next summer when I try and get a job again I'm going to be fucked for a position because no one wants to hire a student just for the summer. This is why I liked Sitel, because at least they were flexible about student schedules. Of course they fucked me over hardcore, but hey, that's not my problem. Decisions, decisions.

5)On a Sitel sidenote, I kind of miss the people I worked with. Actually, that's kind of a lie, I see the people that I really liked from Sitel fairly often (well, my idea of fairly often, I'm sure other people would disagree). But I liked the atmosphere, especially towards the end when we had a general "we're all in this together, brothers (and sisters) in arms" type of relationship. Well, for the most part. Don't miss the company themselves, don't miss talking to idiots and fuck-ups on the phone, don't miss the job, just miss the people. Kind of hoping that call back happens before the beginning of September, but not really holding my breath for it.

6)So I'm going to be an aunt. Which is amazing, and a little scary, and kind of gives me a feeling of pending dread and responsibility. For most people, aunt or uncle is kind of one of those "hey, that's super, I'll have to buy some presents" type of deals. But for me it's kind of important. Really important. I didn't have any little brothers or sisters to help raise, I was the last kid born in my family (except for my cousin Kevin and he's only six months younger than I am, so yeah), and I never really got into the whole babysitting thing. But lately I've been hanging out with a lot of people who have kids (and the aforementioned kids) and I realized that I LIKE kids. And kids like me...not in a creepy way, you pervs. I have no problem looking after little monkey children, and maybe it's because I'd only have to do it for a short period of time, but I'm proud of it. And I'm proud of my brother and his awesome wife, and I know they'll be amazing parents, and that little girl's going to grow up surrounded by people who love and spoil her (I mean, she'll be living with one set of grandparents, her other aunts and uncles will literally be up the street or two blocks over, and her cousins will be there for her to play with). I just hope I get to see her alot, which I know means that I need to take a more active role in the whole family thing. I'm not ANTI SOCIAL, per se, but I'm different from most of the people in my family, and sometimes I forget how to be "normal" which means I tend to avoid situations where that's a requirement. And the downside of me being almost five years younger than my brother is that we didn't really get to be that close growing up, so it's not like it's perfectly natural for me to just show up at the house. But I'm going to try, because my niece needs to get to know her weirdo aunt. That kid's going to spend a day with me and come home hyper, smeared in chocolate, and excited, with a little mohawk and a cool t-shirt and awesome stories to tell about going to the zoo, or seeing a movie, or going to the playground and falling off a swing and skinning her knee and crying and then having Auntie K buy her a popsicle and kiss it better and then go off running and screaming and having fun again, or reading a really awesome book and watching some classic Disney. Basically, I want to make sure that this kid gets to experience a little bit of what made my childhood awesome. Her mom and her dad and her other aunts and uncles are going to be kickass and do all of this for her too (I hope) but I like to make sure I have my hand in it as well. I'm crazy like that, I know. But I still can't wait :D

7)So, my mom's been kind of sick of the last little while. Which is shitty. She's getting better (well, better in that she's preventing the same thing from happening in the future) but still. It sucks balls having a mom who's sick and who spends a few days each month feeling like crap. But it's actually shown me that what I think is the worst that can happen really isn't all that bad all the time. I mean yeah, she feels like crap, but she doesn't really show it. She doesn't whine or complain to people about how terrible she feels. I mean, obviously she's allowed to feel like shit, but she doesn't mope. It's a trait in my family that when shit goes down that isn't pleasant or fun we make jokes. We laugh about it. We don't underestimate the seriousness of the situations, but we poke fun at it. It's a defensive mechanism and a lot of people don't get it or understand it, but it's made things a lot easier. As my mom put it "I'm not taking it seriously and moping, so no one else is." It's infectious, and it's how my family deals, and it's yet another thing that I'm really really proud of, and part of my family's legacy that I hope to pass on to my kids some day. Along with the generosity, which is something else I've inherited, mostly from my dad but also from my grandparents. When I was a kid if I was going to Canada's Wonderland for a day with the school, or if I was going on a class trip, or even if I had a good report card, my grandparents would also send over something, whether it be a gift or twenty bucks. Same with my parents, they always found $20 for me to go to the movies, or buy lunch, or whatever. Even now, when I need money for gas or in the case of this year for school, my parents and grandparents are always willing to help out. And again, that's something I'm thankful for and proud of, even if I don't show it often enough.

8) I'm embracing my inner (and outer) geek. Before I was a little bit ashamed of being such a nerd. Okay, so my geekiness has been challenged recently by people who are intensely geeky, but you know what, I don't care. I play video games. I read graphic novels. I can go off on tangents about anything Joss Whedon's ever made. "Big Bang Theory" is my favourite sitcom ever and I want to marry Leonard. And it's actually kind of working for me. Not that it gets me laid (well, not all that often), but it does mean I get to have amazing conversations with some truly awesome and surprising people, some of them new, some of them old. There's nothing at all wrong with being a geek, and for all those uninteresting, boring, sad motherfuckers who think that geekiness is pathetic? Guess what? There's a hell of a lot more of us than you think. And we're fucking hot. FOR THE WIN!

9)My basement flooded in the beginning of April, resulting in me being evicted from my room (which I thought was temporary). It's now July, and I'm still stuck upstairs in my hot as fuck bedroom. As a result I'm not sleeping all that great because a)it's hot as fuck b) it's loud since my parents are both loud talkers and the living room is about ten feet away and c)when the sun comes up my room is pretty much filled with light (particularly since the blackout curtains on the window above the bed aren't the correct size and the sun comes in the gaps). It kind of sucks balls, and it makes me feel like a kid again because I can't do anything "fun" since my parents are right next door. Well, I can, I just have to be all ninja like about it. It's not that great actually.....

Well, that's pretty much all I can think of right now. So yeah. That's me. WOOOOHOOOOOO!