If I call these Vignettes does it sound fancier?

     Basically let's just take a look at some of the weird unexplained crap on my phone and make it weird explained crap. Yeah? Yeah. 

     In case you were curious what I'd look like if I dyed my hair purple, the answer is "an alien hooker from the moon." Glad we could clear that up! Amanda had dug out her purple wig from Halloweens past for some reason, then asked if I wanted to try it on. Girl you know I wanna try on all the wigs. Have we even met? 

     Basically my life in a nutshell. Or my life in a Tumblr error message, as it were. 

     My current favorite Tea Party sign. And by favorite I mean FITS OF BURNING SEETHING RAGE. Like dudes, you can have more than one crisis at a time. Cause we definitely have lots of crises right now. And I'm not even sure this stance is consistent with your party views. Like if you actually go to the website listed on this very sign (I don't know what compelled me to do so -- journalistic integrity, let's call it? -- but it's exactly what you'd expect: a flashback to 1998 before we could do fancy internet things) there's a National Debt counter at the bottom of the page. So clearly they're at least a little concerned about debt. So I'm not sure how they're determining the threshold for when exactly something becomes a threat, here. Oh and don't worry, I wasn't driving when I took this picture, I was stopped waiting for a train to go through off to the right. 

     Hey, surprise, I still excel at getting videogame cars stuck in places that no one else could get stuck in even if they were trying! The best part is that you'd think I was driving up the stairs and got stuck on the corner, but nope. Fell from the sky and just nestled right in there after driving over another car and getting some big air.

Weird Thing Wednesday.

     I mean. That's pretty straightforward, right? It's Wednesday, let's look at this weird thing I bought. 

     It's a leetle bird skull pendant that I picked up at the craft store. I don't know why, it just spoke to me. Well, that's not true, I know why. It's because my greatest life goal is to look like a cool but kind of spooky witch. We all have our dreams. I slapped this puppy (birdy?) on a long chain so I can sling it on over a floaty dress with a kimono and get my hippie recluse on. 

Brain jiggles.

     I spent Saturday riding roller coasters at Kings Dominion with Amanda, and I think it jostled ma braingrapes a little too much. I've had a headache ever since getting off the Intimidator, aka the ride that makes people black out.

     So when I started thinking about a blog post for today it was very ouchy and made me want to go to sleep. Sorry!

Things are wrong with me.

     Like, lots of things. Big things (holla anxiety club!), little things. Ok, a lot of little things. Let's examine this for a second.

THING 1: I GET IRRATIONALLY ANGRY AT PEOPLE WHO SHUCK CORN IN THE STORE

     I can't even explain why this makes me so angry. They put a big bin by the corn specifically to accommodate these people. But it still infuriates me. It's one thing to peel back the husk a bit to make sure it's a good ear. It is completely another to stand there and shuck six ears of corn in the middle of Food Lion while everyone waits to get around you and pick their corn, which they will then shuck at home LIKE A DECENT HUMAN BEING. It's just such a weird thing to do! Do you peel your bananas in the store too, ya freak of nature?

THING 2: I AM INCAPABLE OF EATING A MCDONALD'S CHEESEBURGER NORMALLY

     This is apparently a thing I started doing when I was very, very young, and then just never grew out of, sort of like having an incredibly on-point startle reflex (I spend a lot of time looking like Edvard Munch's The Scream). It has to go pickles first, top bun, then burger. Bottom bun is garbage. When I was very little the bottom bun went to my grandparents' dog, but then he tried to rip my throat out, so he didn't get the bottom bun anymore after that because we were not friends anymore. It's only McDonald's burgers, too. A burger from literally any other place on earth gets eaten normally. Fortunately I pretty much only eat at McDonald's when I'm hungover, so people don't have to witness this spectacle of horror very often.

THING 3: ANIMAL SQUEAL OF DOOM

     I can't not shriek the name of an animal when I see one. It's another one of the ways in which I'm still at the developmental level of small child, I guess. Even when I'm driving. Even when I'm driving alone. Always. There will never be a time that I see a horse and don't squeal "pony!!!!" at a pitch un-hearable by any animal other than dogs, dolphins, bats, and old people with very sensitive hearing aids. Sometimes there is clapping involved. It is somewhat embarrassing.

This cake looks like shit.

     No literally. Because Amanda asked me to make a cake for her coworker/friend that looks like the smiling poop emoji. This is my life. These are my choices.

Normally I'd try to set up a nice shot with some natural lighting, but I mean. Come on. It's a poo cake. It's not gonna look any better or more appetizing on the credenza in the front room than smiling in the fridge. 

     Honestly, I'm kind of at a loss as to what else to say here. It's made of chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream frosting? The eyes and mouth are white chocolate? WHAT DO YOU EVEN SAY ABOUT A THING THAT IS THIS.

Lemme tell you a story.

     A story of brain fog. A story of loss. A story of how I'm getting stupider with each passing day and should not be trusted to attempt general life without proper supervision. A story of breakfast. 

     Picture it: Virginia, 2014. Jen called and woke me up bright and early to tell me, basically, "GET READY NOW AND COME TO MY HOUSE THIS INSTANT." So I put on the things most closely resembling actual clothes I could find (basically a transition from jimjams to slightly more acceptable loungewear), made a quick but unenthusiastic attempt at taming my hair, and was just about ready to go when I realized wait! I hadn't eaten breakfast! The most important meal of the day (Trailed closely by second breakfast)! But I didn't have any time; the alarm was set and you have 30 seconds to get out of the house before your presence will alert the hounds after you set it. So I figured I'd grab a Toaster Scramble out of the fridge in the garage and toast it at Jen's house. 

     Then my old arch-foe, packaging showed up. No matter how hard I pulled apart that stupid plastic baggie they come in, I could not gain access to my savory tasty breakfast. But I didn't give up. I just kept pulling. I channeled my inner athlete to gain dominance over this bag. But I guess I channeled a little too much, because I went full Hulk-hands and absolutely EXPLODED the bag open, sending Toaster Scrambles flying in every direction. One on the floor, one on the hood of the SUV next to me, one that I managed to catch mid-air. I swore a blue streak, but picked them up within five seconds (Hi, I'm disgusting and don't care about floor germs) and shoved them back in the box, then got on my way. 

     Then this morning I returned to the scene of the crime to see if today I couldn't fetch myself some breakfast without catastrophic failure. I noticed there was one less in the box than there would have been if only the one I had were eaten, but figured someone else must have had one. 

     Halfway through the day yesterday, my mom walks up to me and drops a Toaster Scramble in my lap. "Guess where I found this?" she asked. I shrugged, but had a feeling I was about to be in trouble. "Behind the bug guard on the hood of the car" she said incredulously. This was yesterday, I remind you. The exploding bag incident was on TUESDAY. Which means I left a Toaster Scramble on the hood of a car for two days. And it stayed there through two days of driving! I showed that Toaster Scramble more sights than it had any hope or expectation of seeing. I gave it a good life. Showed it the world. 

     I don't even know how it managed to stay there for two whole days. That seems like it ought to defy physics or something. Like we're lucky it didn't come shimmying up the windshield after a short stop and scare the shit out of someone. Or like if nothing else, a tenacious bird should have run off with it. 

     How do these things even happen to me? I don't even feel like there's a lesson to be learned here. Don't use your Hulk-hands on breakfast-food packaging? Always check your car's exterior for stray pastries? Maybe it's a metaphor for perseverance? I DON'T EVEN KNOW YOU GUYS. 

What even?

     I've been having kind of a creative block so I thought I'd check the folder I have on my computer where I put things that I can't stop thinking about late at night. Supposedly it's good to get them down somewhere because then your brain can rest easy knowing you can pick it up another time. Except... I can't, because what even is this? Why was I so upset about this that I had to get it all out before I could sleep? Direct quote:

"I legitimately thought the lyrics to the Raffi "Peanut Butter Sandwich" song were "Peanut butter sandwich made with jam/ one for me and one for Uncle Sam" for the longest time. Like, whole life longest time. From childhood until a few months ago when Jen got the cd to play for the babies. I guess I just thought it was a cheery little pro-tax propaganda piece telling kids "hey, if you're making a sandwich make sure you make one for Uncle Sam, too, cause that's your civic duty." Now I find out it's actually "one for me and one for David Amram," who is...a composer, I guess? He didn't compose that song, that's for damn sure, so I'm not sure why he's in it. Now I don't know how to feel about it. When I thought we were making an extra sandwich for Uncle Sam I was kind of ok with it, like yeah it's kind of a pain but if you give Uncle Sam a peanut butter sandwich (made with jam) he will reciprocate with funding for roads and schools, and hey that's a pretty ok deal. But this David Amram, what has he done for me lately? What has he done to merit a sandwich? Why would I just make him one for no reason? Because Raffi tells me to? If Raffi told me to jump off a bridge, would I? I mean, MAYBE? I think I only brush my teeth so obsessively because he told me to in a catchy tune, and my propensity for sharing definitely has a direct link back to that song I still hear every time someone looks at a soda or food item and says "Whose is this?" and I answer "It's mine. But you can have some." And that's all well and good I guess, you use your sorcery for good, Raffi. But I'm not making David Amram a sandwich. I don't even know him." 

So... yeah, next time maybe let's not go scraping the bottom of the barrel for inspiration. There is sticky weirdness down there.

Illustrated Tweet: Cheater Cheater Monkey Tweeter Edition!

     Ok, this is a cheater's edition because I actually didn't do any illustrating this time. I honestly just need some feedback on this one. I tweeted this the other day:

     And I WAS NOT JOKING. Not even in the slightest. I actually saved the picture to my desktop as "makeeveryonelookatthisandfreakout.jpg" because I needed other people to tell me if I was justified in being so disturbed by this damn monkey. So here it is. LOOK AT IT. IT IS SO MESSED UP. Why is it so human-looking and stretched out but simultaneously so much a monkey and so hairy with its tiny little head? It haunts me. I can literally call this picture to mind in the middle of the day and get goosebumps on command. 

     So I need to know. Does this monkey disturb you? Or is it just a cute monkey doing yoga all cute-like, and I have issues? Don't worry about hurting my feelings if it's the latter, I already know I have issues. I'll just add "overly anthropomorphic monkeys" to the list. 

Friday Favorites: A random sample of things from various technologies!

AKA let's look at stuff from my phone and what I've been playing on my tablet lately! 

     I had to take a picture to document that this is a real show that was on, because it's basically the pinnacle of television as an art form. Everybody else can stop trying, it's all downhill from here. You can't top that. You just can't. 

     Ditto for this headline. I didn't even read the rest of the story because I didn't feel like I needed to and there's no way it could even be a real story. This has to be a story they generated by picking words out of a hat. Has to be. This cannot be real life. 

This is the game I've been into lately. It's exactly what is sounds like. You start out as a reef shark and eat everything you can to grow into bigger sharks, eventually getting to MEGALODON. I'm sure it's not the point of the game or anything, but there's barrels of toxic waste and explosive mines and a bunch of random human junk all around the ocean floor and it makes me kind of want to eat all the people floating in their donut rings just because hey, humanity, stop ruining all the nice things like oceans. Team sharks 4eva.

    On a related note, I'm also really into the OCEARCH app, where you can track sharks and see where they're hanging out and stuff. Like, check out Genie, a 14 ft. white shark hanging out off the coast of Virginia. 

     What, you thought I was going to do a Friday favorites and not include some specimen of stunning baby cuteness? Nah bro, that ain't me. Here's a clip of Evie trying to decide if she likes applesauce or not. Spoiler alert: she totally does. 

I can't decide...

     ...whether I hate vultures for the way they insist on hanging out in the middle of the road, even when I'm sitting two feet away honking at them, or if I kind of admire their attitude. 

The majesty of nature. 

     

Apologies in advance...

... to whoever is going to send me an email some time in the future that I have apparently already deleted? That's obviously why I have negative one emails right now. I deleted one I haven't even gotten yet.

Total protonic reversal.

     Or maybe I shouldn't apologize because apparently the content of this future email is so incredibly dangerous that I either invented time travel myself in order to come back in time and delete it before I could read it and alter the timeline in some personally devastating fashion, or the Men in Black got word of it and came in and screwed around with my emails to prevent catastrophic and universal devastation. Which is pretty impressive because most of my emails are just Groupon offers and sale alerts from the Gap. Maybe I was going to buy a really, really tragic pair of pants? Like boyfriend jeans, maybe? And future me was like "girlfriend who are you kidding, no." I don't know. I guess I'll never know. 

Looket this weird thing I bought!

     Whilst I was perusing my local Ulta the other day I found this weird looking little doo-dad. Any guesses what it's for? 

     I feel like it looks like you'd use it to trim your nose hairs or something, but it's actually a heated eyelash curler, a thing I didn't know I wanted/needed until I saw it. It says on the package that it "creates a dramatic false-lash effect" or something, so I got suckered in and bought it because I want the most dramatic lashes possible. I want to blink and cause a gust that stirs idle tumbleweeds into motion. I want people to look at my lashes and fall to their knees, incredulous at the sheer drama of my lashes. Yes, I have big dreams. Anyway, I thought I'd do a little testing and see if this thing works. 

     First let me get the basic info out of the way: this thing is by the Ulta store brand and was $15 (I had a 20% off total purchase coupon so I paid slightly less). It comes with a AAA battery that you stick in by removing the gray part from the black part. You're supposed to let it heat up for a minute prior to using it, and the box recommends using it after you put on mascara. Once your mascara is dried, you hold it against your lashes at the base and sloooowly pull it up, like you're putting on another coat of mascara. It doesn't get hot enough to ever hurt, much less burn you -- I put it directly on the back of my hand to test this, because apparently that science safety video from 7th grade made no lasting impression on me other than the guy saying "Then my teeth actually began to shizzle!" because he used his mouth to pipette battery acid out of his car or something stupid. 

     But here's the part people will probably care about: the before and after. 

Also an excellent opportunity to get super familiar with the frightening number of veins visible in and around my eyeballs because I didn't put on any other makeup for this and I am secretly a scary ghoul. 

Pros: It curled my lashes better than a traditional lash curler, mostly because I could do it all in one long slow swipe, rather than having to do that whole "crimp three times from the base to the tip of the lash" thing that you're supposed to do with a regular lash curler. I can never get that right, so my lashes end up either curled only at the base or weirdly angular and crimped, so I do like the ease of use on the heated one. The curl is also a little more long-lasting than a traditional curler because it uses heat (duh) and you do it after mascara, whereas using the crimpy kind after mascara can rip out your lashes (ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh), so it has that extra bit of hold already in place. 

Cons: It's kind of time consuming. I felt like I had to do it a few times to get the result I was after, but that may just be because I'm new to it and trying to figure out how to make it work its best. Also because you're messing around with mascara after it's dry on your lashes, there's the potential for flaking. I had a few little flakes on my eyelid when I was done, but again, a caveat: I was using a mascara I hate because it's the least dramatic one I own, which seemed the most fair to test this out with (if I used a crazy dramatic one, obviously it would look like something had worked magically). So a better mascara, like the Estee Lauder Sumptuous Extreme volumizing one I usually use and have never had flaking issues with, might not have the same problem.

Final verdict: I think this would be good for someone who isn't comfortable with the normal kind of eyelash curler that looks like it's going to melon-ball your eye out. If you can't get the hang of that kind without pinching yourself, this one would be good for you. I don't think it's going to work miracles on very straight eyelashes, just because it doesn't have that squeezey motion to force them into place with heat (though they do make the squeezey-kind that's heated too, they're just harder to come by). I think if you're going to get either this or a decent-quality traditional curler (like the plastic Tweezerman one -- I prefer it to metal ones because there's no risk of the pad coming out and chopping your lashes off), I'd tell you to go for this one since it's in the same price range, is easy to use, and gives a more natural looking, longer-lasting curl. 

    

"I'm fighting a great and powerful evil right now...sadness."

     Title quote is from this comic, which is amazing and applicable to my life much of the time, so... do recommend. 

     Anyways, I'm feeling really down today and couldn't come up with anything to post about, so here is a hodgepodge of things off my phone that I thought may appeal to a variety of interests. 

IF YOU LIKE GROSS THINGS

    Then here is my gross blackened bruise from where I keep running into the pointy dangerous corner on the footboard of my bed. Amanda drew a lightning bolt on it to make it look more badass. 

IF YOU LIKE CUTE BABIES

     Then enjoy this picture of my niece lookin' fresh to death in her shopping outfit. 

IF BABIES AREN'T YOUR THING

     Then have a cute dog picture instead. 

IF YOU'RE LOOKING FOR SOMETHING SNARKY

     Then you'll appreciate this picture I took ages ago of a brilliantly honest description of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

IF YOU WANTED TO BEAR WITNESS TO A WEIRD CONVERSATION THAT MADE ME CHUCKLE

     Then you can peruse this one, but before you ask, I don't know what turning history off and on actually does, it was just me accidentally hitting buttons with my big meaty paws. So no, I'm not a time lord, unfortunately. 

That's all I got. The rest of the pictures on my phone are all various iterations of babies, cats, and food.