The Quirky Protagonist

It's been a tense few days on Facebook for me. A number of my sensitive, liberally focused friends posted the story about Cecil the lion's illegal poaching. This story outraged me, as it does whenever I see stories of animals being hunted for trophies. I dislike the idea of hunting as a sport, but at least most hunting these days is for deer because they are overpopulated, and our country will put limits on hunting if it's been a bad winter and the population is down, etc. Also, many American hunters will use the meat from their kills. To me, there is nothing more sociopathic than paying insane amounts of money to kill a creature just for the pleasure of killing and the bragging rights...especially when they tend to use very unnatural methods to do so. And when the animal is endangered, or protected, this makes me want to cry.

Most people I know are of a like mind, that this man is an asshole, no ifs or buts. But what has frustrated me is the next day the onslaught of "yes but why are we not as enraged about the police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement as much as Cecil, he is an animal!" This pisses me off because A) it assumes I am NOT enraged about that, and I have been reading up and spending more time looking at those stories than I ever did about Cecil. B) I have a problem when anyone makes others feel like their outrage, something that matters to them (well reasoned, mind you - not without cause) is somehow being belittled because there are worse things going on or they try to label someone as a hypocrite because they think you should also be outraged over deer hunting, or should never eat meat if you care so much about Cecil. Showing outrage over a (pretty universally) despicable event, should not all of the sudden open the flood gates to all the other things someone else thinks you should think or feel. Making a person who is already showing outrage feel guilty for not feeling outraged enough, that there are all these other things they should also throw their energy into just feels defeating and rude.

I tried to explain the difference to someone between the outrage over Cecil and over the police murders. I know they weren't trying to start something, they're just very philosophical (literally, I met them in a philosophy masters program) and like to think about such differences, but it still rubbed me the wrong way. Why was Cecil's murder so outrageous across the board? When something is rare, and exalted (like the lion, tiger, elephant, etc) we should treasure it. And wanting to kill one for pleasure is disgusting to me. Wanting to kill ANYTHING for pleasure is disgusting - taking a picture next to something you have just depleted of life is pretty gross, there should be no joy in another creature losing its life. I understand that the hunt and then the feeling of accomplishment when you succeed must be fun, but why shoot to kill, especially if it's a protected species. Endangered species, to me, are like ancient artifacts. We preserve them because they are important to us. We preserve them so future generations can admire them and they are not wasted. Let's say a Western Billionaire paid a poor native money to sneak them into an ancient Biblical site to chip the face off an ancient statue that is revered because they want it for themselves. That is deplorable. That is something for all of mankind to appreciate and should not belong to anyone, let alone because they had money and power. The fact that he had a name, and was well loved just made it worse. When he has a name and was loved, then it's like killing a pet. Pets are like family members, and I think human beings have an instinct to care for innocence. Has it gotten out of hand as far as where it was when we HAD to hunt? Of course. In some societies it is normal to eat cat or dog. It's disheartening to us to imagine someone doing that, to farming them and eating them, but that is their culture. To me, as I said, the worst part is that it was a protected species that was tricked into leaving his protected area to be slaughtered so a rich white man could mount his head on the wall.

The police violence is absolutely awful and something needs to be done, and I've shed some tears over the stories. But yes, humans are different. They have their own voices, they are not endangered and (for the most part) those killings seem less premeditated  -someone got mad or scared and acted if very poor judgment, but they didn't spend thousands to travel the world to do shady business and kill something. Do they deserve as much, if not more, media coverage than Cecil? Yes. But am I glad that Cecil received the coverage he did so that this kind of activity can be publicly shamed and show that it will not be swept under the rug and will be prosecuted, yes. I want the same to happen for the cops that are doing wrong. Should I be more outraged by these murders than by Cecil? Yes, I should. But as someone who has never been hurt by an animal on purpose, but has by a human, I am biased. And we are so desensitived to murder and violence because of TV, it just seems like another episode of Law & Order, frankly. That's very sad.

If I liked people and/or had friends, a dream of mine would be to have a group that got together once a month for a board game afternoon or evening on the weekend. The kind where you get to yell out answers and laugh. I tried to find MeetUp groups for board gamers and it's all the strategy games, not the fun kinds that bring laughter.

This is brought to you by watching lots of Game Show Network.

After a quick googling, I just realized I had been confusing Beth Littleford and Nancy Carell.
Or I should say, I thought there was only Beth Littleford and she was married to Steve Carrell and not that there was another blonde actress/comedienne who also worked on The Daily Show who is married to him instead.

But, then again, looking at them side by side, I think it's pretty clear why I mix them up.


I am apparently far from the only one with this confusion since on googling both of them I found images of the other and even a few similar blog entries. Oops. Now I just feel bad for them, they probably get that a lot.

I went to the dentist this evening and had a filling put in. (Did I mention I went to the dentist a week and a half ago and they told me I had my first ever cavity? Yeah).

My face has been numb all evening and annoying the crap out of me. I had been slapping it, I put a warm compress on it because the internets told me that could help, I drank cold water, ate something warm. Still numb.

Started watching last night's Conan and laughed out loud...there goes the numbness.

Laughter is the best medicine.
(Ok, so it may have just started on its own, but whatever)

A staple in my fridge is Turkey Hill Iced Tea. Turkey Hill being a brand that is originally from Lancaster Co. PA, where I am from, and the iced tea being a staple there, sold in every grocery store, even the wholesale place, and there's a Turkey Hill convenience store about every mile, so it's pretty much everywhere. I think a store there would get a lot of complaints if they didn't have it until they started to carry it, they wouldn't get away with not carrying it. As I said, it's a staple, you go to the store of the essentials, milk, bread, iced tea....and any other brand isn't the same, believe me. Hell, they sell it across the country now, but my brother in California says they don't buy it because it's bottled somewhere other than Lancaster over there and it doesn't taste right, the water they use isn't the same. In Central PA, we know the difference, this is stuff we grew up on. In a blind test I am sure I could tell the difference in the decaf and regular as well, we're purists. They had it in my school's cafeteria, drink options were milk, chocolate milk, orange juice and Turkey Hill iced tea. You get the idea. It is a must have, and moving to Ohio was made easier because I knew they were now selling it in Kroger supermarkets, it made me feel okay about being away from home because it's sort of a comfort food, a taste of home.

Last night I made my monthly visit to Kroger to get iced tea, as otherwise I don't shop there, it's my only reason for going. I did the rest of my shopping and then went to the dairy case where the iced tea is and it wasn't there....they had tons of the flavored kinds but not the classic plain one, they had a few of the single serving size ones, but no gallons, no half gallons. For a girl who was already in a bad place emotionally because of the job situation, this was a bad sign. I paid for my items and then went to the customer service desk to speak to someone, this was serious. He called a few different people for me, finally a buyer, and found out that they will no longer stock the gallons, but will stock half gallons, but are just currently out. If I was SURE they'd always have half gallons this wouldn't be a big deal, I'd just buy 2, but I don't trust them. Anyway, I thanked him for his help and left. I took my groceries home to put them away and then immediately left to go elsewhere to look for it. I remembered seeing it at Target once, so I went there and they actually had it. They only had a few though, but I grabbed 2 and bought them. Crisis averted.

I opened one of the containers and poured some to have with my lunch today and I thought it tasted off...as I said, I can tell these things, I can't even put ice in it, it messes it up. So I looked at the bottle....sell by August 15th. That was almost 2 weeks ago. Great. I still had the receipt so I returned them today. Travis and I already had plans to drive to the gardens in Westerville this afternoon and that's also the closest Turkey Hill convenience store which if anywhere had it, it'd be there. So on our way home from our excursion he swung by there so I could get it. I was able to buy some there, of course I was also wearing my Turkey Hill Dairy shirt which I got at the Turkey Hill Experience (an interactive museum/attraction about the dairy that makes the stuff) and of course the guy working there asked me about it. I just told him that I, like the iced tea, was also "Imported from Lancaster County" as it says on every container.

So now a number of people in the area, as well as my poor poor boyfriend, think I am an absolute freak because I went to so much trouble in the last two days to get this stuff (which I call "the nectar of the gods whenever someone teases me about how much I like it). But as I said, it's something that I grew up on and is a comfort to me. I tried to explain to Travis that "what if coffee was a local thing, and then you moved away and the store didn't carry it and they acted like it wasn't a big deal, how about trying hot tea or cocoa instead". So, now I will probably be inconvenienced by having to drive much farther to get it, but at least the crisis is averted for now.

Okay, I don't get it.
I've always washed my hair every day, and so does everyone in my immediate family, so I don't get how this is supposed to work. Do you still WET your hair in the shower everyday and then go through all the combing and drying of it, just without it being clean? Or are you supposed to wear a shower cap or keep your head out of the water or something? Today I kept my head out of the water. I've tried the wetting and not washing thing before and my hair always just still feels dirty to me, and never looks very good and I think "why go through all this effort of combing and drying then?". What do you non-wash-everyday-ers do?

I've always washed it everyday, but now that I have the expensive color in it, and don't want to be spending money to get it re-done often, I want to try to make it last if I can. The last time I got color it seemed to go away pretty quickly. I thought maybe it was because I was using the cheapest shampoos I could find at the time. So I upgraded to a less cheap shampoo, but by then the color was already gone. Yesterday I went to the store to buy some shampoo for color-treated hair, I bought it, but it says "makes color last up to 40 washes!" and I am thinking "only 40 days?!" but of course, 40 washes is a long time if you only wash your hair once a week!

I just can't even imagine doing that though. I also bought some "dry" shampoo yesterday that is supposed to help with oiliness on days you don't wash your hair. I tried it today, it's okay, but when you're used to having fresh clean hair everyday, and never use products in it, it just makes it feel heavy and weird. But my biggest complaint right now is that the shower in the morning is usually the one thing that wakes me up and makes me feel ready for the day, but apparently if I don't let that hot water hit my scalp it's just not the same. I have bad sinuses, and letting it run over my head significantly helps them, and so right now, having showered and used that weird ass dry shampoo instead, I still feel like crap and just want to sleep all day. I do NOT want to feel like this everyday.

At this moment, I think I give up and am going to wash this weird dry shampoo out of my hair and feel like me again and actually be able to start my day for real.
EDIT: And I just did and I feel marvelous. I may just have to give in to the fact that I am someone who just has to wash everyday to feel like myself, color be damned. *sigh*

(x-posted)

So, you may have already heard about the It Gets Better Project which is aimed towards LBGT youth who might be considering hurting themselves in the wake of the recent suicides across the nation. Basically, there's a ton of YouTube videos posted from both gay and straight people encouraging these kids that it DOES get better, that high school is NOT the prime of your life as some have said, and that the bullying and hate and despair they're feeling isn't something that they're always going to have to deal with and that they aren't alone in feeling the way they do, and that there is support.

I felt inspired by this movement, as well as by my recent watching of the series Freaks & Geeks for the first time, to make a mix about how you might get picked on and things might not be easy growing up, but that doesn't mean you're not going to grow up to have an awesome life and be way cooler than those kids who are talking smack about you now.




( tracklisting, links and lyrics behind the cut... )

[ Mix Zip ]

Day 1: Your favorite song.
Day 2: A song that makes you cry.
Day 3: A song that makes you dance.
Day 4: Your favorite male singer.
Day 5: Your favorite female singer.
Day 6: Your favorite band.
Day 7: One band/singer you're ashamed to admit you like.
Day 8: One band/singer whose popularity you will never understand.
Day 9: A song that reminds you of an ex.
Day 10: A song that reminds you of your father.
Day 11: A song that reminds you of your mother.
Day 12: A song that makes you want to have sex.
Day 13: A song you sing in the shower.
Day 14: A song from the year you were born.
Day 15: A song you liked in high school.
Day 16: The first song in your mp3 folder.
Day 17: The last song in your mp3 folder.
Day 18: An instrumental song you like.
Day 19: Your favorite love song.
Day 20: Your favorite breakup song.
Day 21: A song that makes you want to break stuff.
Day 22: Your favorite song from a movie.
Day 23: Your favorite duet.
Day 24: Your favorite cover song.
Day 25: Your favorite song from 2010 (so far)
Day 26: Your favorite music video.
Day 27: One song in your mp3 folder you're pretty sure no one else has.
Day 28: One song that needs to never be played again.
Day 29: One song that gives you the creeps.
Day 30: A song you'd like played at your funeral.

Day 29: One song that gives you the creeps.
Tori Amos - "'97 Bonnie & Clyde"

Tori did an album of all covers because she had to release a few more albums to get out of her contract with a record company that was treating her unfairly and she didn't want their dirty mitts all over her own material. So it was a concept album, each song was a song written by a man, but re-told from the voice of woman instead.

In the case of this song, a song originally by Eminem, it's a song about a guy killing his ex-wife and then disposing of the body and bringing their young daughter along for the journey and making her feel like an accomplice, which is the most disturbing part. But instead of it being from the perspective of the man, the killer, it's the perspective of the wife who is now dead in the trunk of the car and hearing the words her murdering ex-husband is saying to their little girl. As if the song wasn't disturbing enough originally, as Eminem is living out a fantasy of killing his ex-wife because he's so mad at her, now we see it from the perspective of a woman with a psychopathic ex-husband and as a mother knowing her young daughter will grow up with him and how it will affect her.

It's creepy beyond belief and I try not to listen to it very often. But the creepiness is exactly what she was going for with it, she wanted to reveal just how disturbing this music can be, and show the consequences of some of the male rage in music. And as you might remember, back in 2001 when this album was released, there was a heck of a lot of that on the airwaves.

Day 1: Your favorite song.
Day 2: A song that makes you cry.
Day 3: A song that makes you dance.
Day 4: Your favorite male singer.
Day 5: Your favorite female singer.
Day 6: Your favorite band.
Day 7: One band/singer you're ashamed to admit you like.
Day 8: One band/singer whose popularity you will never understand.
Day 9: A song that reminds you of an ex.
Day 10: A song that reminds you of your father.
Day 11: A song that reminds you of your mother.
Day 12: A song that makes you want to have sex.
Day 13: A song you sing in the shower.
Day 14: A song from the year you were born.
Day 15: A song you liked in high school.
Day 16: The first song in your mp3 folder.
Day 17: The last song in your mp3 folder.
Day 18: An instrumental song you like.
Day 19: Your favorite love song.
Day 20: Your favorite breakup song.
Day 21: A song that makes you want to break stuff.
Day 22: Your favorite song from a movie.
Day 23: Your favorite duet.
Day 24: Your favorite cover song.
Day 25: Your favorite song from 2010 (so far)
Day 26: Your favorite music video.
Day 27: One song in your mp3 folder you're pretty sure no one else has.
Day 28: One song that needs to never be played again.
Day 29: One song that gives you the creeps.
Day 30: A song you'd like played at your funeral.

Day 27: One song in your mp3 folder you're pretty sure no one else has.

This is dumb. I mean, unless I wrote the song and sung it, recorded it, and never shared it, then SOMEONE else has it somewhere, if only the original artist. As far as stuff goes that no one reading this has...I am not even sure about that. I have some bootlegs, but have shared them fairly extensively. I have some music some friends of mine made, but mutual friends are also on my list they might have it too. So yeah, I don't know. I have vaguely obscure Disney songs, but I have Disney fans on my list, so that doesn't mean they wouldn't have it. "Tara's Theme" from Gone With the Wind? Maybe that. I mean, people like the movie, but I doubt I have anyone on my list who likes the movie enough to keep it's theme on their computer. Okay, I'll say that then..."Tara's Theme (Main Theme)".

Day 1: Your favorite song.
Day 2: A song that makes you cry.
Day 3: A song that makes you dance.
Day 4: Your favorite male singer.
Day 5: Your favorite female singer.
Day 6: Your favorite band.
Day 7: One band/singer you're ashamed to admit you like.
Day 8: One band/singer whose popularity you will never understand.
Day 9: A song that reminds you of an ex.
Day 10: A song that reminds you of your father.
Day 11: A song that reminds you of your mother.
Day 12: A song that makes you want to have sex.
Day 13: A song you sing in the shower.
Day 14: A song from the year you were born.
Day 15: A song you liked in high school.
Day 16: The first song in your mp3 folder.
Day 17: The last song in your mp3 folder.
Day 18: An instrumental song you like.
Day 19: Your favorite love song.
Day 20: Your favorite breakup song.
Day 21: A song that makes you want to break stuff.
Day 22: Your favorite song from a movie.
Day 23: Your favorite duet.
Day 24: Your favorite cover song.
Day 25: Your favorite song from 2010 (so far)
Day 26: Your favorite music video.
Day 27: One song in your mp3 folder you're pretty sure no one else has.
Day 28: One song that needs to never be played again.
Day 29: One song that gives you the creeps.
Day 30: A song you'd like played at your funeral.

Day 25: Your favorite song from 2010 (so far)
Sleigh Bells - "Crown On The Ground"

I've found 2010 to be fairly boring musically, but I must say that is "so far" because I recently went through a list of upcoming new releases and there's a bunch of stuff I was excited about for the Fall. The easy answer would be for me to say Marina & The Diamonds since her album came out in America this February, but alas, her album came out in other parts of the world in 2009 and I have heard it before the year began and even included my favorite track among LAST years best when I posted my favs at the end of the year.

So I will go for one of coolest new bands of the year, and a song I've played a lot. They definitely have a unique sound, and one if you described to me I'd probably think I wouldn't like...but somehow it works.