some days it's all worth it.

some days are perfect
and some simply could not get worse
some days it's all worth it
and some days this life is nothing but a curse

- "inside out", sara bareilles

being sick has taken a lot away from me. i spent a lot of my life being lost, and just as i started feeling like my life was coming together, (i'd gotten my GED, learned to drive, gotten my license, bought a car, started college, gotten my own place) suddenly illness struck and everything changed, literally overnight.

me and my super-smart grampa, circa 2010 or so, before i got seriously ill.
and clearly before i lost over 70lbs. hey there, chubbyface!

from the time i was a very, very small child, i was usually the smartest person in the room. this isn't me being full of myself--i was reading chapter books by the time i turned three years old and when i was given an IQ test at 5, my IQ was a mere two points lower than my grandfather's--a man who was invited to join MENSA.

so when i say that i was smart, i mean in that really awkward sheldon cooper/little-professor way. i hungered for new things, and every thing i encountered that was learnable, i learned it and i learned it fast. i was consistently bored in school because even in gifted class, i caught on quickly and was ready to move onto the next thing while my classmates trailed behind me and my teachers tried desperately to come up with things challenging enough to keep me engaged. and all along that's what i did: i got things. fast.

the frog is very happy about this tubie pad.

so you can probably imagine how hard it's been for me to become one of the most dense people i know. my memory is completely shot. i frequently do stupid or forgetful things. i've struggled through most of my college classes. i just don't get things anymore. if i do get them, i get them slowly and usually only after someone has explained it to me. which, as you might already have figured out, is something that bothers me a lot. i am not used to not understanding things, and for me, the worst feeling in the world is feeling like i am dumb. (and while i appreciate the fact that most of you reading this right now probably don't think i am dumb, that unfortunately makes no difference in how i feel.)

i tell you all of this so that you'll understand why yesterday was such a triumph for me.

recently i decided that instead of spending the summer laying around being bored and sad, i would break out all of my crafting stuff and get working. i am not much of an artist to be sure, but i like making kandy (raver) jewelry, i can knit anything that is rectangular in shape, and i have long wanted to wipe the dust off the 4th or 5th sewing machine i've owned in my life and learn how to use it. despite owning quite a few sewing machines i have never actually been able to use one, and although i've done a lot of clothes altering (of the "funky style" persuasion--no nice neat hems or anything like that) it has all been done by hand.

circles are overrated. as are simple
straight stitches. zigzag 4 lyfe

for those who dont know, sewing machines are actually a lot more difficult to use than you would think. or at least, more than i thought. nonetheless, i glanced at the manual just long enough to determine what each dial did, grabbed some scrap material, and off i went.

my first creation was a "tubie pad"--a bit of material with absorbent backing (i used fleece) and a closure of some kind (velcro or snap usually) that goes around a feeding tube to soak up any leakage. a lot of people make these little pads in any color or pattern you could possibly imagine, and they aren't very expensive and seem(ed) simple enough to make. there are probably better projects that i, as a whatever comes BEFORE novice could have started with, but i chose to start with a very tiny circular thing as my introductory project, and it didn't come out too bad if i do say so myself. it also didn't come out too circular, but hey. perfection takes practice, and at the point i made this all i had ever done with a sewing machine was run some scrap material through it to get a feel for the pedal and wonder why on earth the stitches kept falling out.

"my sewing machine has feet?"

indeed, when i made this little tubie pad, i began without knowing what the difference between a spool of thread and a bobbin was.


not fancy, but it's functional! and of course, once i realized that i actually made something where previously there was nothing but some fabric scraps, i was instantly hooked in that beautiful obsessive way that only an aspie can be.

i liked my new tubie pad, but i wanted to attack a bigger project, despite still not having much of an idea of how to do really anything with the sewing machine.

"i want kan*dee," circa 2001 or so;

i've been aching for a pair of phat pants lately. i've been a lot of a things in my life but at my core i have always considered myself to be a kandy kid. in the deepest recesses of the darkest depressions i've been in, it's always been the rave culture, fashion, music, and ideals that has saved me and pulled me back up out of the darkness. i feel lucky to have such a thing in my life, something that can save my life day after day.

however, i left all of that behind when i moved to new jersey for school. i donated or got rid of most of my "funky" clothes, stopped dying my hair crazy colors, and tried to be "normal".

¹ PLUR - the raver's core belief system.
Peace. Love. Unity. Respect.

it didn't really go well. trying to be someone besides who you really are usually doesn't.

and so i've been on a mission the past few months to reach inside myself and pull the happy, bubbly, walking rainbow up onto her feet. i live PLUR¹, i always have, and i always will. but there aren't words to describe what a difference it's made in my general outlook, how much more myself i feel. it's really a fantastic feeling, and i truly encourage you,  dear reader, if you have found yourself living a life that doesnt feel like it's truly yours.. stop it. stop it today, right now, and discover or re-discover who you really are. and then be that person, without worrying what other people want or expect from you. because they have their lives and choices to spend how they wish. you shouldn't let them spend your choices too.

care bear themed phat pants from enlightenedlibra.

so now that we've got all that out of the way, i decided that my second ever sewing project would be a rather large and complicated pair of phat pants. i won't even bother trying to describe what phat pants are, because they are whatever you want them to be. phat pants are large, wide legged. if you grew up in the 90s you may know the denim form as "skater jeans" or "pants that could house a family of five". for me, phat pants are super comfortable, super baggy, super cute pants or jeans. they might have fur or bondage straps or cartoon characters or bedazzles or whatever makes the wearer happy.

pants, believe it or not.

my overzealous pins.

i decided to go with a pink base because pink is my favorite color and before i had even gotten as far as tracing the paettern, i had already decided that i would be wearing these pants an awful lot. i discovered along the way that while sewing IS something that has to be learned, it's actually not as hard as it looks. well, at least, it's not that hard to do simple projects. i am not going to pretend that there aren't a LOT of people out there that are ridiculously talented with a sewing machine and can make super awesome stuff thats far beyond my level. but basic stuff? definitely not as hard or scary as it looks. (or looked to me!)

gunnery sergeant tigger² inspecting my work.
for the record, he approved.

 i went a bit overboard with pins on the first leg. i was very concerned that the fabric would just slide all over the place and everything would be ruined forever. by the time i got to the second pant leg, though, i had calmed down and was only pinning what was strictly necessary.

i went into this project intending to make a simple elastic waistband. with my weight constantly bouncing around due to a combination of unstable nutrition, unstable health, and the latest addition to my list of maladies, hyperthyroidism, and the fact that i can't take a lot of pressure on my abdomen, an adjustable or elastic waist is practically a necessity. im hoping to add a drawstring for further adjustability (since they did come out rather large even with the elastic waistband!), and on the next pair im going to aim for less generalized measurements as well.

 ²  yes, my cats have ranks. gunnery sergeant tigger, chief
petty officer tobias, and lance corporal faith. don't judge.

the waist of these pants came out just about as huge as it looks in the photos, but that was okay for two reasons:

• they're phat pants. the bigger, the better,
  and the more comfortable.
  
• with an elastic waist, there needed to be
  enough material to "scrunch" up around the waist for the look i was aiming for.

 i decided instead of just using the same material for the waist, that i would use the contrast material (meant for the pockets and accents, as in the care bear pants pictured earlier in this entry).

and yes, i also used care bears because i love care bears. this part was probably the easiest. i attached the strip of care bear material and then folded it over to create a tunnel for the elastic waistband. while stitching the fold, i stitched back and forth across the original seam that attached the care bears to the pink, thus reinforcing the seam. i left a bit of overlapping pocket open so that i could put in the elastic and possibly later a

drawstring. (for anyone who cares, i used a very tight zigzag stitch to complete the elastic strip into a loop, and i went over it four times back and forth to make sure it would not detach from itself. these pants may be very, very far from perfect but they're strong at least.

at this point they still aren't finished. i still have to hem the bottoms as they're way too long for me, and add all the embellishments, pockets, and accents i want. but they are, as of now, actual pants. they have everything that is required to call something pants, and i'm pretty happy with myself right now.

so right about now i assume you're thinking to yourself, "that's great and all, but i thought this entry had something to do with with triumph and illness and feeling dumb, so what exactly is your point here?"

attaching the waist after 6 straight hours of work and while
obviously very medicated, judging by my eyelids.

the triumph here is that i was, for the first time in a very long time, able to once again get something.. and get it fast. i went into my first project knowing nothing at all about sewing. i had to google many of the words used in the manual, i had to watch videos to figure out exactly how the basic pattern for making a pair of pants (phat or otherwise) worked. i didn't understand what a bobbin was, or why my sewing machine had so. many. dials.

the triumph was that within 24 hours i went from having no idea what was even going on to being the proud owner of a pair of as-yet-undecorated, totally unique, handcrafted with love and my own blood sweat and tears, bright pink care bear phat pants.

the triumph was that yesterday i took something back from the illnesses that have taken so much from me.

and that, my friends, is worth absolutely everything.

Book Recommedations

this entry will be dynamic as i come across or remember new books i want to add. i will update this list as necessary, adding other categories and more books. this list is by no means complete at all--these are only books that i have personally read or had enough exposure to, to know they dont suck. :)

it only contains categories i am interested in, and some of these books span more than one category but are only listed once. i might eventually add reviews and links for them, but i'm not sure. anyway, i hope this list helps someone find new books to love!

DYSTOPIAN/POST-APOCALYPTIC

• the hunger games (the hunger games #1) by suzanne collins
• catching fire (the hunger games #2) by suzanne collins
• mockingjay (the hunger games #3) by suzanne collins
• divergent (divergent #1) by veronica roth
• insurgent (divergent #2) by veronica roth
• allegiant (divergent #3) by veronica roth
• uglies (uglies #1) by scott westerfeld
• pretties (uglies #2) by scott westerfeld
• specials (uglies #3) by scott westerfeld
• extras (uglies #4) by scott westerfeld
• on the beach by nevil shute
• biting the sun by tanith lee

MENTAL HEALTH/GENERAL STRUGGLES/AUTISM

• the best little girl in the world by steven levenkron
• the luckiest girl in the world by steven levenkron
• wasted by marya hornbacher 
• prozac nation by elizabeth wurtzel
• girl, interrupted by suzanna kaysen
• it's kind of a funny story by ned vizzini
• the virgin suicides by jeffrey eugenides
• looking for alaska by john green
• bad girls by alex mcaulay
• such a pretty girl by laura wiess
• can't get there from here by todd strasser 
• the silver linings playbook by matthew quick
• broken china by lori aurelia williams
• alt ed by catherin atkins
• you remind me of you by eireann corrigan
• icy sparks by gwyn hyman rubio
• house rules by jodi picoult
• prep by curtis sittenfeld
• veronica decides to die by paulo coelho
• look me in the eye by john elder robison
• violet & claire by francesca lia block
• the hanged man by francesca lia block

CHRONIC/TERMINAL ILLNESS

• the fault in our stars by john green (cancer, amputation)
• side effects by amy goldman koss (cancer)
• my sister's keeper by jodi picoult (cancer)
• handle with care by jodi picoult (osteogenesis imperfecta)
• the doll hospital by james duffy (unknown serious illness)

GLBTQAP+

(gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans*, queer/questioning, asexual, poly, et al)

• girl walking backwards by bett williams
• dive by stacey donovan
• keeping you a secret by julie anne peters
• empress of the world by sara ryan
• annie on my mind by nancy garden
• grl2grl by julie anne peters
• am i blue by various (anthology including francesca lia block & bruce coville)
• i was a teenage fairy by francesca lia block

GHOSTS & SUPERNATURAL

• wait til helen comes by mary downing hahn
• the doll in the garden by mary downing hahn
• the "fear street" series by r.l. stine
• the midnighters series by scott westerfeld
• the last days by scott westerfel
• peeps by scott westerfeld
• leviathan (leviathan #1) by scott westerfeld
• behemoth (leviathan #2) by scott westerfeld
• goliath (leviathan #3) by scott westerfeld

GENERALLY AWESOME BOOKS

• watership down by richard adams
• siddhartha by herman hesse
• dangerous angels by francesca lia block
• the secret garden by frances hodgson burnett
• a little princess by frances hodgson burnett
• so yesterday by scott westerfeld

the ziva david theory: NCIS is a buffy spin-off

warning: extreme nerding & fangirling ahead.
contains spoilers for the last episode of buffy the vampire slayer & the 2nd episode of NCIS season 3. i only warn that so the netflix-come-latelies don't flame me. that said, flamers will be doused in water.

i figured out the secret to the allure of one miss ziva david of the amazing show NCIS. if you dont know who she is and you have cable, i don't even want to know you right now.

the buffy episode "chosen" aired may 20th, 2003.

she activated slayers all over the world, of all ages and backgrounds.
every potential slayer became an actual slayer.

then a little over 2 years later (just enough time for a newly activated slayer to get some serious training), on september 27, 2005, ziva david appears in washington, DC as a well-trained killing machine.

how lucky for mossad that they found a super-strong pretty young woman to kill things for them, and she never even has to go to the gym to take out multiple men twice her size at the same time..

brb writing crossover fic.

OMG and eli is so not her birth father. he's her WATCHER. /fangirling (i know i know the font. just be glad it wasn't a giant blinking .gif.)

seriously though if you guys write fic about this, link me up so i can see it.. and give me credit.. or i'm sending gibbs after you. :)

i've made a little space for the cheese slices.

Rainbow Smoke Asian Cigarettes?

one of my favorite things to do is research. people in my life know that if it exists on the internet, i can find it. and it's fun for me. i can spend hours looking for the most obscure things, and i find it very calming.

today i saw a post on a dear dear friend's facebook wall. my friend, pixi, is well known for being the queen of all things rainbow and her friend had shared a very cool image of some rainbow smoke, and a very beautiful cigarette pack. it seemed to be photoshopped, but it piqued my interest and it turned out i was far from the first person on the internet to rabidly search for this amazing product.

unfortunately, this image is, in fact, photoshopped. but wait! the smoke in the lower image is what's photoshopped. the top image? totally real. that is an actual pack of cigarettes. don't believe me? check these out:

yep. this is a real pack of cigarettes. and a real carton.

the cigarettes are from china, and they're called "08 pride" (pride is the english translation of the word 自豪 or "zìháo".) the barcode number is 6901028025607 and the packaging included the web url pride56.com, which is no longer an active site. they were manufactured by the chongqing tobacco industry co., ltd. in chengdu city, sichuan and include the customer service phone number 800-8866622. and yes, i said were.


from what i can gather (bearing in mind i don't speak chinese and things DO get lost in translation!) this particular design has been discontinued as the original company was overtaken. "08 pride" cigarettes are still manufactured by china tobacco chuanyu industrial corporation in chengdu city, sichuan. they seem to have retained the same phone number.

unfortunately, "08 pride" cigarettes don't look like that any more. the design is similar, but lacks the rainbow-y holographic-y accents.

and no, neither edition of this cigarette blows rainbow smoke. however, if blowing rainbow smoke is what you're after, there are about a billion filter tips and e cigs to sate that desire.

peace out and smoke 'em if you've got 'em!

thankful.

i have so much to be thankful for this year.

first, i want to say that above everything else i am thankful for the ENDLESS kindness i have been shown. i cannot even begin to name all of the people who have selflessly helped me, sent me supplies, stayed up late talking to me, guided me through this maze of illness, sent cards, gifts, made things for me. in most cases these amazing things have come from people i have never met in person. in some, it has come from people i have never even talked to. i am absolutely blown away by the outpouring of love, of time, of energy and kindness that i've experienced, not just this year but througout my life. every time i have fallen down or seen myself stumbling, someone has stepped to my side and taken my arm and helped me up. especially since i have been here in new jersey, essentially alone and a thousand miles from my family.

"I am calling from a payphone,
twenty three hundred miles away.
Bad things I can not even say.
If not for the kindness of strangers,
I would not be alive today."
- Bif Naked, Story of My Life


which brings me to major point #2---my family. you are all insane, every one of you. you are crazy people. i come from a long line of nutjobs. but my god, how much i love you all. i see so many people who have been rejected by their families, or had no choice but to reject their families. people whose families aren't involved or simply dont care. and every day i am thankful that as batcrap crazy as you all are, you're always here for me. i always know in a crisis that my family will step up, no matter what else is going on, and pull my butt out of the fire. i love you all--whether we share blood or don't, i know that we share love which is a much stronger bond anyway.

i am thankful for j. i wouldn't be alive right now if it wasn't for her, and i don't mean that figuratively. for the past 13+ years she has been at my side, holding my hand and keeping my head above water.

i am thankful for every last one of you reading this right now. i am thankful for my best friends, i am thankful for my friends, i am thankful for every one of you--my LJers, my GTLers, my former-TAA'ers, my whedon-ers, and everyone in between.

and now the smaller things i am thankful for:
- that i live in a time where i don't have to die because modern medicine has designed tubes and bags and formulas and medications that keep me alive, even if i'm not always functioning at the higher levels.
- that i have a medical team that honestly cares about me and wants to help.
- that i have the opportunity to go to school and that i am able to get the accomodtions i need to make this possible.
- i am thankful for marinol. as much as i hate feeling stupid, marinol has enabled me to eat small amounts of certain foods by mouth and kept me off TPN when things were at their worst.
- i am thankful that i am slowly finding what works for me and becoming able to spend less of my life focused on my medical situation.
- i am thankful for the three beautiful loving cats that are currently cuddled up to me trying to stay warm, even if occasionally they are furry little abominations who drive me nuts.
- i am thankful that despite the abuse i heap onto it and the fact that i am well overdue for an oil change, my car---which is solely responsible for my personal freedom--has held up.
- i am thankful for all of the little things in life that make me happy--dinosaurs, sara bareilles, hunger games, harry potter, john green, francesca lia block, joss whedon, jennifer lawrence, west wing, super soft cuddly things, sunsets, my favorite books and authors, my favorite comfy sweatpants.

and finally, i am thankful that i was lucky enough to know laura kostecki-howe, shea heribacka, haley stonehocker, joe 'koker' kayes, and shane cornwell. i carry you all in my heart every day, and i miss you all every day. sometimes the pain is overwhelming, but i try to remember how lucky i am to have known you, and that none of you are in pain anymore, and i try to let that comfort me. i miss you all, and i hope that somewhere out in the universe you're all there, waiting for our friends who are not doing so well, and waiting for me someday. keeping an eye on rontu, fiver, annabel lee, sweet j, christopher, and all the other furry family members that are no longer here.

my life is complicated, and sometimes it feels like its too much for me to handle. a lot of the time i am scared about what my future holds. but i am still here. i am still fighting. i am still screaming for a cure for all of us, every last one of us.

and i won't ever, ever stop.

Review: The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

hunger games catching fire---MAJOR SPOILER FREE, minor spoilers after the warning

parking was a nightmare, even with a handicapped tag. as i arrived a teenage girl bounded out in front of my car and i almost hit her as her friend yelled at her to stop acting like an idiot and get out of the road. she looked sheepish and was wearing a hunger games tshirt so i flashed her the three-fingers and she smiled and ran off. us nerds gotta stick together, girlfriend. and thats the new universal geek gesture that means "we cool."

in the theater during snows "uh.. whats happening" the entire theater started applauding, lol. and then again at the end when the mockingjay logo popped up.

and then on the way out some elderly people were walking ahead of me and this guy says, "are you okay walking?" and the woman says back "yeah, i can make it." and he goes "i can carry you on my back til the fog comes." im not sure what movie they saw of course but i have a hunch. lol

okay onto the review.

im sure some of these will change with future re-watchings, but here's my (and bonus: j's!) basic first reactions to catching fire. no major spoilers for those who haven't read the books, but if you want to go into the movie totally not knowing anything, dont read any further.
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my first-run reactions:
- the popcorn sucked.
- too much time in the district, wayyy too much time in the capitol, not enough in the arena. (i felt this way about the first movie too.)
- too much exposition. bo-ring. and a waste of woody harrelson.
- granddaughter wtf? unneccessary scenes in an already epically long movie
- finnick could have been hotter
- mags could have been older she was basically 156 in the books come on now.
- johanna was not at all how i pictured her and i didnt like her at first but she's growing on me (and i like jena malone so its odd that i didnt like johanna but then shes supposed to be pretty unlikeable so.. win?)
- beetee was way off base from the picture in my head too
- willow shields is awesome and needs more scenes
- jlaw is perfection embodied as always
- really why would you leave out plutarchs watch. thats kind of a big point to miss. js.
- the arena was perfect. a cinematic masterpiece.
- katniss' mom needs to learn how to have an emotion or two. i mean, she sent her child off into the hunger games twice without making a facial expression. im starting to wonder about her.
- "oh mahogany!" i died
- sugar cube scene felt awkward rather than UST-y mostly because finnick could have been hotter
- "all the girls at school wear their hair like this" thx for the shoutout to us fangirls
my rating: 8/10

overall right now, in the throes of severe sensory overload and extremely sleepy and medicated, i give it an 8/10. jennifer was absolute perfection. her emotions, her facial expressions. when snow was talking to her, you could SEE her swallowing hard, she's really just a master of emotions. im really looking forward to the rest of her career cause the girl has got game.

j's first-run reactions: (bearing in mind that she is not a geek and has not read the books and mostly went for me. these are straight from her.)
- the woman next to me had the worst BO on the planet.
- this is the first movie with different hideous outfits.
- katniss is a manipulative whore. shit or get off the pot and pick one of them already, and stop toying with their feelings. (me: STOP LOOKING AT THE LOVE STORY YOU CAPITOL SLAVE. her: there's popcorn on your shirt.)
- finnick could have been hotter.
- "what the fuck happened at the end?"
her rating: "you're a geek."