I will gather myself around my faith

What's your "go-to" movie?  The one you watch when you need to just get away from it all?
Submitted by uncagedbird.

Depending on what kind of time I have:

Loooong time slot available:  The LotR trilogy.  Also my go-to books. 

Galadriel and Frodo

Littleish time slot available: "Ever After."  I love this movie, and having watched it a good.... 3 billion times... I'm still not sick of it :)

Escape - Ever After

What is one thing you MUST do before you go to bed at night?

tea.  I must have chamomile tea, or I will be awake and staring at the ceiling all night. 

Show us your guitar.
Submitted by Sean J. O'Rourke.

shadow

What are you most looking forward to this weekend?

There's a concert tonight and it's going to be SOOOOO much fun! * grin *

Miley Cirus has issued an apology for a "racy" Vanity Fair photo shoot with legendary photographer Annie Liebovitz. Considering the photograph is just of Miley's back, do you think this apology is necessary?

Oh man.  I got so sick of hearing about Miley Cyrus yesterday.  Every time I turned on the radio, there she was.  When I was watching the news last night... there she was.  It was a *bit* annoying.

Anyway... I don' t think it *would* be necessary but for the fact that she is a Disney Channel actress, and it wasn't "just" of her back - it was suggestive, she wasn't wearing anything except for a blanket or sheet or something she was holding over herself in the front, and it's not the first suggestive photo of her that's showed up.  If she were any other celebrity, it would be fine, but she's so young, and she's someone that even younger girls look up to, someone they admire and probably want to be like.  So the pictures were a little inappropriate and sending the wrong message for those much younger children that she acts as a role model for.

Facebook is rolling out a chat application that will function much like Gmail Chat. Will this change how you instant message with your friends/co-workers?

Agh.  I noticed this a few days ago and I don't know how I feel about it.  It seems kind of useless and maybe the application could use a little more work.  I don't think I'm really going to use it much, as I already use AIM, MSN, and Google Talk.  

What most excites you about the way you're living your life right now?

I'm finally figuring out how to really define who I am - something I've been trying to do for a long time and am just now finding a way to succeed at...

It was part intentional, part unintentional (I meant to take a year off of school, and I knew that I had some healing to do emotionally and that was honestly one of my reasons for taking time off.  I did not mean to be at home for the better part of that year - I meant to be in Italy doing something productive while still being able to have time to figure everything out), but it's finally happening.  Since I've been home I've been A: relieved, B: at times, depressed, C: recently -happy and D: free to do all of the healing and searching that I desperately needed with the help of A, B, and C. 
And having been able to do that (and continue doing it - it's kind of an ongoing, neverending process, I think) has allowed me to still be frustrated with my family sometimes, but remember that I love them.  To be with friends and not, after a certain time, feel the need to withdraw into a corner and hide from the world, to actually truly enjoy myself in large groups of friends (small groups I never had trouble with).  To be in a relationship - the beginnings of one, anyway -  and completely be myself, to not let "me" disappear into "us". 

It helps to have kind of purged my life of any emotional... toxicity, I guess, is the word I want to use.  I've chosen to simply not have anyone in my life who makes it more difficult, who makes me feel stifled on any level, who makes me feel any less "me", who does more harm than good simply by being in my life.   As a result, my close friends are few, but some of the most wonderful people I've ever known.  I've just stopped talking to some people - I'm not rude, if one of these people tries to contact me, which happens from time to time, I'll respond, but I don't try to contact them.  And if they want to see me I usually have other plans.  I'm dating someone, but only after I felt comfortable that he wouldn't try to change me into someone who I'm not (and we have a lot in common, so it definitely doesn't look like that will ever be something I should worry about). 

So I guess that what excites me the most about the way I'm living my life right now is the fact that, for the first time in quite a while, I'm living my life as the best and truest form of myself, and nothing is standing in the way of that :)

Because Crimsonsilk said "feel free to be tagged" ......

The Rules:
1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.
2. People who are tagged, write a blog post about their own 8 random things, and post these rules.
3. At the end of your post you need to tag 8 people and include their names.
4. Don’t forget to leave them a comment on their blog and tell them they’ve been tagged, and to come back and read your blog for the whole story.

1.   I'm a klutz.  As in painfully, horribly, sometimes dangerously wobbly and klutzy and walking into things/getting hit in the head with things/nearly getting run over/if I were a cat I would have used up all of my nine lives and then some.

2.   I can't *not* sing along to music if I know the lyrics.  It's almost physically impossible, even if I just have to sing very quietly or hum along because the situation calls for quiet or whatever..

3.   I love Tomb Raider.  I realize that it's a terrible movie but it's so bad that it's good and I absolutely adore it. 

4.   I haven't written even one poem in... easily a year.  And that's kind of frustrating.

5.   I think that Chocolate Skittles are kind of the best thing ever.

6.   I'm knitting a cute little cap sleeve top out of sparkly green bamboo yarn and it's very exciting.

7.   I really want to cut my hair, because it is so incredibly long that it's getting a little bit unmanageable.  But I haven't had time/I'm also kind of scared of having shorter hair/I don't really have enough to donate and still have my hair long enough to be comfortable with it.

8.  I have been successfully vegetarian for three days in a row now, which is actually a huge accomplishment, considering how it's been a bit of a rough start for me.

And I tag everyone.  

Go to the Wikipedia home page and click random article. That is your band's name. Click random article again; that is your album name.Click random article 15 more times; those are the tracks on your album.

The Treachery of Images

^^ post title: from the song "Shiny", by the Decemberists, which has been on repeat in my head for a few days.  It just won't go away.  Not that I'm complaining... but damn, it's persistent...

So I guess I haven't posted anything in...what, a week?  The veg thing is going...hm... how is it going?  I guess it's just... going.  It's kind of a pain in the ass on certain days, especially since I've been working with my dad and not able to cook for myself as often as I was before.  Ex: the other day we went to a pizza place for lunch, and I had a Greek veggie pizza with side salad... no protein, except for the small amount in the cheese.  Then ordered Thai food for dinner, which is usually easy on the veg side of things, but as I was feeling ...under-proteinated... (give me a break.  I'm exhausted, I'm allowed to make up words when I'm this exhausted), I ordered the pineapple curry, with shrimp.  And I still felt in need of protein so I went home and chugged about half a carton of soymilk. 

I just don't want to get really anemic and weak again.  That was a shitty shitty time in my life and I just need to take better care of myself than I was then.  Of course my life is kind of overall a little better than it was during that time, but still.  I feel like being sick could throw me back into a downward spiral. 

I guess it's been hard because I really don't feel like my family is being very supportive.  Ex: If my mum is planning dinner and I just throw it out there that "oh, by the way, this is one of my two veg days this week so can there please be an option for me?", she rolls her eyes.  She did tell me that I should email her best friend's daughter, who is vegetarian and could give me some good advice since she's been doing it successfully for a while now.  But it would help if I had a little more support beyond that.  It's also frustrating that freaking Montana is still so ass-backwards and hicktown that it's near impossible to find vegetarian options and still be healthy, even in the grocery store.  I found myself wandering through Smith's today, stocking up on tofu (which I love, so I don't mind that it's one of my only options, but still.. variety? anyone?) moaning "I miss Trader Joe's...." (I've also emailed the Trader Joe's folk 999,999,999.99 times begging them to open up a store around here). 

I shouldn't take it out on Montana.  I've finally warmed up to the idea of living here once again (it took me a while, especially since winter around here is a rough equivalent of every circle of hell as described by Dante mixed together and baked in a giant hell-pie) and remembered that I really kinda miss certain aspects of living here (I am the weirdest mix of city girl and outdoorsy girl ever.  But it's awesome, because I can survive anywhere...) and even kind of love it here.  But it's just the grocery stores that really get on my nerves.  Vegetarians may as well be second-class citizens.

Really though - does anyone with a similar dilemma (small town, not enough choices, not enough support from your small town meat eating family) have any advice?  I will take just about anything right now.  Tomorrow is a veg day on my weekly calendar and I'm already stressed out.  It shouldn't suck this much.

...on to anything else.  Stress is bad.

Have I mentioned yet that I knit?  And it's freaking AWESOME?  I joined a couple groups on Vox today having to do with knitting.  I started knitting a few months ago - so far I've finished a million random practice swatches, a hat, a felted bag, and I'm just now finishing fair isle fingerless gloves that pretty much add up to every kind of awesome.  Next project is going to be a sweater of sorts -- I'm sifting through patterns over the next week so that next Wednesday, when I have my next knitting class, I actually have something to do.  I'm almost worried about having too much to do, actually.  Knitting is, suddenly and unexpectedly, the equivalent of crack in my world.  That used to be an award reserved solely for Trader Joe's Peppermint Jo-Jos - not the story since I met my yarn dealer.  I am addicted beyond belief, I am living breathing eating sleeping knitting, I am dropping huge amounts of money in my local knitter's heaven, and at any random time of day I can usually be found passed out on the couch tangled in a ball of yarn, circular size 2 knitting needles in hand.  If I have nothing to knit around 8 pm (my most productive knitting time) I go through knitting withdrawal that makes me an extremely unpleasant person to be around (understatement.of.the.year.).  It's a little bit sick.  In a wonderful way.

So, yeah, I'm a yarn freak.

One last update in my life lately: There's a guy.  A new one.  Someone I've known for a while but just really started to actually get to know.  Turns out we have a lot in common, and he is incredibly sweet and really fun to be around and a great dancer and kind of just really great.  I'm a little bit extremely crazy about him.  Friends are fairly sure he feels the same.  I think they might be right.  I'll update more on that if anything comes of it.