For the most part I don’t care so much about my possessions. If it’s mine, and you need it, feel free to use it and possibly even keep it. With the exception of a couple things.

My journals should not be touched. Period.

And lately, that counts for my laptop as well. Normally I don’t mind if people use it, but lately, it’s been dying horribly on me. My in-laws randomly decide to turn it off by hardbooting it.

I’m running ubuntu on a four or five year old craptasto laptop. It’s got a measly 512Mb of ram. It doesn’t have a dual core processor, just a 1.6GHz celeron. Real shit. But I like it, because it does all the things I want and need it to do. I don’t *need* tons of ram. I’ll never use it. It’ll just sit there, a way too powerful laptop, and it’ll run evolution and open office and VLC, firefox and solitaire. It’s like putting a Doctor behind an assembly line. I could never torture my laptop like that.

My poor harddrive’s failing. Firefox and Openoffice aren’t all that usable anymore, meaning I’m pretty screwed for school, or will be soon. I’ve got backups of all my assignments and info. If my laptop fails, I won’t have much hope for the semester.

So I need to figure out some way of electrocuting anyone who comes within ten feet of my laptop without my permission. Any ideas?

I still can’t get over that weird dream where I killed my webhost. In my dream he was being an asshole and trying to kill me. He was also two people. It doesn’t make sense, because the guy is one of the nicest I’ve met, even if he was a McCain supporter.

My sister moved out. I am so unbelievably proud of her! Now she just needs to finish school.

I have the flu. My whole body hurts. Eh well.

I miss my kitty, who at the moment, is at my house being cat-sit.

My in-laws are just back from Canadia. They brought me a nice new bag.

I think I’ve forgiven my idiot ex-boyfriend. Mostly because I’ve realised that in the two years or so since we’ve last spoken, I’ve changed dramatically. Which probably means he has as well. Who knows? He might not be a manipulative controlling jerk anymore. He could be nice! On one hand, I’d be interested in speaking to him again, on the other hand, I’ve become more of an ass myself. It was all kind of funny in retrospect.

I have to work on Wednesday from 11.30 in the morning to who knows when in the evening. Nice short(?) day.

Tante Dolly is here visiting from Indonesia. She goes home tomorrow. Tante Dolly is amazing.

My brother has a girlfriend (OH YEAH!). He still looks like he comes straight out of the matrix movies.

For the past two days, every cigarette I put in my mouth tastes even more like death than usual. I don’t understand. So I haven’t been smoking.

I lost four kilos.

I have two more parties this weekend, after two last weekend. Then the weekend after, I go to Geneva for a day (BECAUSE I CAN), then have bar duty the next. When did my life get so busy?

I am seriously craving cocktails on a couch with the friend from a previous entry. We’re going to call him Oscar Wilde from now on. There’s something nice about being fresh out of the shower, completely commando in your hoodie and jeans, maybe sipping a cosmo, and discussing Anne Sexton.

I dreamt Oscar Wilde was a cop in a corset and drag-style makeup once. He was arresting Zim.

In the shower today I was daydreaming about neoteny. Neoteny, simply put, is the retention of juvenile traits in adults of a particular species. It’s an evolutionary thing. The example I was thinking of specifically was with people. We share a lot of physical traits with primate babies. Like the fact that our hair is distributed mostly on the head, armpits, and pubic area, and oversized heads. Does that mean that if we evolve any further we might retain the traits of babies? and the new species will have more brain plasticity and the ability to heal themselves? Maybe less hair? Maybe they’ll have more flexible skulls. Who knows? I wish I was Deity’s right hand man so I could find out. Neoteny also delays maturations. Our brains stop growing at about 23 years. A chimp’s brain stops at about 1.

Did you know that the brain makes stem cells? Yeah, they’re in your ventricles. Science just hasn’t figured out how to make them grow into brain cells yet.

Brain injuries during fetal development that occur before cell migration while cells are being “created” (massive oversimplifications left and right here people), are more likely to repair themselves than after cell migration has occured.

Whoever said that we only use ten percent of our brains is full of shit. Whoever says that you can’t grow new brain cells is also half-full of shit. Certain cells can be replaced. But not all of them. The brain is incredibly plastic, and can often heal itself in surprising ways. That said, brain injury is still a scary thing, because depending on the region affected, and the age and development of the brain structures at the time of injury, it can permanently alter behaviour. No real way of knowing except waiting and watching. You can make educated guesses though, but at the end of the day, they’re still guesses.

I tend not to scare so easily. I can pretty much handle anything life throws at me. I think my favourite thing to say in times of stress is pretty much “you can’t do anything to me that someone else hasn’t done before you.” It means I can be on the frontlines at protests and demonstrations without being afraid. I can walk in the scary neighbourhoods where anyone lacking blue eyes is liable to get jumped, without being afraid. I can run across highways and travel alone through Africa or the Eastern Bloc countries. Nothing scares me.

But every now and then something happens. Usually something unsettling, but not really nerve-rattling. Like close calls with the police or nearly missing a flight. Normal shit. But every now and then, for some reason unbeknownst to me, these little things that normally don’t affect me all that much hit me like a pillowcase full of doorknobs. I find myself jumping at every little sound, yelling at the people around me. I don’t leave my house for a while. I become terrified, albeit temporarily, that the situation will repeat itself.

Lately, instead of relying on other people, I’ve tried to work through it by standing on my own two feet, looking whatever challenge in the eye and saying “Try me.” It’s been working okay I think. I’m less reliant on people like my best friend or on Zim.

One of the songs I listen too while trying to teach myself how to stand up strong is Give Me Strength. I do it all for my little sister. She’s been in some of the same places I have, and she astonishes me regularly with her ability to stand her ground. I used to think I was the strong one, but I think she wins. That girl can take anyone and come out on top. I know that the older sister is always supposed to be the role model, but she’s mine. 17, and kicking ass better than I ever could. So today, when I’m sitting on  my own, watching movies and being a general pussy of a boy, I think about Lish, and the fact that right now, she’s probably kicking ass and taking names, a one girl army.

I miss her tons.

I don’t want to hear the things
You say you know all you’ve redeemed
‘Cause I can’t change what’s come before
Build myself some better dreams
And cast off the fear that holds me here

It is still dark outside, which means I can’t quite start hitchhiking yet. My shoulder hurts. I didn’t sleep so good last night, but I usually don’t sleep all that well to begin with. Both Zim and I had a hard time coming apart. Something about waking up and realizing you fell asleep hugging the night before makes getting out of bed nearly impossible.

I’m not really awake. Also, I miss my best friend, in a weird sort of way.

For the first time in the years (off and on) that I’ve had purple hair, did I manage to burn my scalp. It hurts.

So far, it looks like I may be getting a visitor from home this Christmas. I’ve missed my friends a lot lately, and it’ll be nice to have someone over.

This summer might see my little sister and a couple others. It’ll be nice, although finding enough bikes for everyone’ll be a bit difficult. We’ll see how it goes.

And now, I find food.

A little while back, I kind of fell out with someone who meant a lot to me. A few weeks ago, we found each other again — both of us happy in our own separate romantic relationships, (his girlfriend is my idol) and both of us genuinely happy for each other. It was nice. A little piece of familiarity, when I needed it most.

This person used to mean a lot to me. He was the guy that kept me sane when things were going to hell, and when I really couldn’t take it any more, when I was at the end of my rope, completely unsure of what to do next, he gave me the opportunity to build a different future, one that fit me, instead of one I have to squeeze myself into.

We’ve had quite a few falling outs, and I don’t regret a single one — they taught me to stand on my own two feet, that I didn’t need someone to keep carrying me.

It was/is an intense friendship, so it’s kind of hard knowing that you have to limit contact — he sends me into this blissful insanity — allows me to be myself really, and for that to be okay.

He just gets it. He understand things like Right There Behind You, the Window Seat and 10,000 people questions. At the end of the day, I haven’t any other friends like him anywhere.

While to most people, it’d seem like I have a crush on this guy, but I don’t. We tried that. Disaster isn’t a strong enough word. He’s just a friend. A partner in crime, if you will.

I know our friendship will end in a horrible crash and burn kind of event. I know that when it does, neither of us will be the same after.

So, without mentioning names, seeing as you know who you are, I want to say thank you for saving me over and over again, and heaven forbid I ever have to return the favour, I’ll be right there behind you.

Sometimes I wonder which is actually more insane, my current lifestyle of “education” and toenail clipping or the version of me that appears when I’ve had a little bit too much to drink.

I am tempted to cut off all my hair, make up my own language and live in a tree in Rembrandt or Vondel park. Most of the trees in vondelpark are already occupied though, and I don’t know if I’d like my neighbours. It would be fun though. You could steal food from picknickers. You’d never have to wear clothes. You’d never have to sit and smile while people make catty comments about your lack of ability to fit in. What if I don’t want to fit in huh? What if I think you’re all morons? What if the only reason I put up with you is because I happen to need you for some reason or other. Like to blow me.

But seriously people, what is more insane, modern society, with its credit cards and fake liberalist idiots who seriously think they are too smart to be discriminatory, or crazy people in trees?

If I had the balls, or the right partner-in-crime, I would be in a tree right now.

GOOBILY BOOHEEBEEPEEBEEBEEBEE LOOLAAHHAHAAAMAAAAAABUMBUMBUM

I am BUSY.

There are things to do, governments to watch, family to worry over, school, kitty, roommates, and of course, the monkey in my closet.

This is why I haven’t been online.

Furthermore, a friend of mine (KEITH!!!) is visiting, and is somewhere in Amsterdam this month, but I have no idea where or how to get in contact with him, which blows, because I really wouldn’t mind meeting up with him.

When I realized I was getting dangerously close to turning into one of those slimy unwashed crust punks I live with, I decided to dye my hair purple, in a vain attempt to reclaim my femininity. Also, I missed my purple hair.

So. I need some R&R time. Just a bit of fear and loathing in Amsterdam. You know, me time, with my old friends and such. Just a nice, nazi free couple of days. No racists, no protests, just goolies and drunkenness. Just a normal kind of thing that normal twenty one year olds do.

Yep.

Dear Nazis and assorted idiots:

You make me sick.

Love,

A buitenlander.

p.s. Try me. Please. I’ll show you how us Canadians deal with assholes.

Everyone else, groetjes en zo.

Let’s just say, visiting my crazy parents was the dumbest thing I’ve ever done.

According to my mother, I was making it all up. I only had the crap kicked out of me once and that was because I provoked him into it. I would have started to doubt my sanity only because she seemed so sure about herself until my sister burst out laughing. Only once? HA. It was a near-daily occurence. If not physical abuse, then it was the verbal, the yelling, the name-calling, or the emotional, spitting on me (literally), talking about giving me up, telling me I’m the reason their lives were so verrot.

Of course, while trying to show how great parents they are to zim, telling him that his wife owes them an apology, because she was so rude, right after calling my sister a dumb fucking slut and telling her boyfriend to “have fun fucking her” and weeks later, pulling out a “unloaded” weapon because I happened to yell at him for beating my dog.

Yeah, I came out of that with the realisation that if you let assholes go their own way, without teaching them how to behave themselves properly in society, they end up like my parents. The world would be a better place without people like them in it. The whole thing made me sick.

I came home from Canada a different person. Much harder. Meaner even. I used to be really nice and sweet but now? Now I’m just sick of it. People disgust me. Like the asshole who came into my house and dared to tell me that I had spread the rumours about myself. Yeah, he used to be a friend, and he knew a couple things about me that were kind of secret, and he blabbed them. I didn’t tell everyone he has a certain STD he doesn’t want people knowing about. Because I am nice. Or I was. But now I’m not.

It makes me sick to think about people who actually genuinely get off on hurting people. Like voorpost, that horrible nazi terrorist group creeping into my region. The assholes set synagogues and mosques on fire, and if they had a chance, they’d set people like me and zim on fire too, just for being different. Well. I hope I meet one of those jerks. Non-violent me can still do a lot of damage with her mouth.

I hate being told that I should just ignore these assholes. Ignoring them is pointless. If you ignore them, they get worse because they think they can get away with it. With the herpes asshole, I just told people the truth when they asked. Nothing more, nothing less, and that, added to the longer list of complaints other people had, and well, he ruined himself. But of course, that’s my fault too.

What the hell happened? When did the world get so damned ugly.