Don't follow the shadows

I. Something fishy is going on with LiveJournal. Ever since the Russians got a hold of it, strange things have been happening. (It’s not that I don’t like Russians, I just don’t trust their government.) A few days ago, my default icon was mysteriously replaced with an image of a Rubik’s cube. This is the second time it’s happened in less than six months. Now there’s talk about the site going under, which would be such a shame. I don’t know of any other blogging site out there that has a real sense of community. Most of why I use this site is for the communities, friends page, and all of the customization options. All I know is that LJ laid off a bunch of their employees and there have been several glitches reported recently. I’m backing everything up just to be safe.

II. I’m getting more tattoo work done on Friday, and for the first time, I’m not looking forward to it all that much. Part of it is because most of the next session will be on the back of my ribs and kidneys, but there are things about the shop that have changed a lot in the past two years.

( Cut for tangent on shop drama and the sexism and sexuality of tattoos )

I’m not so sure I even want to try to get an apprenticeship there after I graduate. Hell, if the economy doesn’t come out of the recession, I probably won’t be apprenticing anywhere because the body modification industry is suffering. If I can’t get a job because my concentration was in painting and drawing, I’ll get an associate’s degree in graphic design because that is something that comes naturally and I enjoy doing. I was going to major in it in the first place, but UWM’s program is ridiculous and has ten more credits of required useless classes than the rest of the visual art concentration areas. As I’ve mentioned before, their printing lab is a living hell every time I’m there (mainly because it’s run by hipsters), so I need to avoid it as often as I can. I just want it to be known that I’m not giving up or lowering my expectations of myself like so many of my peers have been doing. I definitely have a bit of a change of heart about the body modification industry after delving further into it and would be just as happy doing other art-related things. I would also probably be better off getting into tattooing after I’m financially independent, if I even decide to. Just look at Guy Aitchison – he’s one of the best of the best in the industry, and he started out as an illustrator, which helped set his designs apart from other tattooists.

III. On Sunday, my mom and I went to the Starving Artists show they always have advertised on TV, looking for a new picture to hang in our living room. There wasn’t a lot to pick from. The whole show seemed like there were five or six different artists that painted the same scenes from around here, France, and Tuscany. There were also some Harlem Renaissance-influenced and abstract postmodern pieces, but they wouldn’t have matched the style of the room. When my dad was living here, he insisted on spending well over $200 on this ugly piece of scheisse print, and my mom ended up spending just a little over $100 for this framed, hand-painted canvas: 01 | 02 | 03

Although it’s not completely my taste, I deemed it the best at the show, and I’d definitely say it’s an improvement.

Good news first: today I went to Village Hall and voted absentee for Barack Obama! (I’m not registered to vote in Milwaukee County, and since I only live in the dorms on campus, I’m technically a resident of Waukesha County.) This is the first presidential election I've been able to vote in, and I'm glad there is a candidate this time that I can fully support.

This is kind of random, but I just noticed that one of my icons has disappeared and been replaced by an image of a woman I’ve never seen before. I made the original icon myself, so the image was uploaded directly from my computer.

( WTF? )

I’m obviously changing it immediately because it’s not 100 x 100 pixels, which drives me insane, and I want my old icon back. I guess I’m also going to need to change my password, even though I thought it was already nearly impossible to figure out to begin with.

Now for the not-so-great news…

Two days ago, my mom moved my college money over into a money market. Unfortunately, this happened too late. She found out through a mailed statement that with the recent stock market drops, I’d lost about $15,000 from my college funds. It’s a good thing she didn’t wait any longer. I wish she would’ve done it sooner, but my dad is the only one who has access to these accounts. With his self-imposed exile and depression, I doubt he was/is concerned with my college funds. At least my grandpa has been giving away money like crazy, so there’ll be enough to pay for my education. Still, I knew this was going to happen way before it did, and it sucks that I had no control over it. I’m going to need all the money I can get when I graduate, and this is just making things worse. Apparently, my dad only put $5,000 into it when I was born, so it’s not like he’s completely paying for my education. However, he promised he would explain to my mom what he had invested the money in, and he never did. When he moved out 10 months ago, he also moved all his money over into more secure accounts and ignored my mom’s, my sister’s, and mine. I normally wouldn’t be concerned, but not only did I lose $15,000, my sister who will be graduating from high school and starting a two-year college this year lost about $6,000. Luckily, my grandpa was a stockbroker and an accountant; so he’s been giving advice and helping to somewhat fix this. I know this all may sound greedy and materialistic of me, but I’m in college right now, so I need the money. I understand a lot of people have to take out student loans, but most of them will be looking for standard, stable careers once they graduate that will help pay them off, whereas I won’t be. As I’ve mentioned before, the body modification industry in this country is currently extremely competitive, so if it’s impossible for me to get an apprenticeship here, I’m going to need to go and get an associate’s degree in graphic design so I can start out somewhere while still looking for an apprenticeship. Ideally, I’d like to get an apprenticeship here and relocate to Europe where things aren’t so competitive (according to my tattoo artist, anyway).

This story of how a couple murdered a UWM student over his car has been in the news lately, and it’s made me do a lot of thinking. I didn’t know him personally, but he was in my astronomy class. He was essentially kidnapped near where I go to school and live during the week. My farm is also located near where the murder happened, which I also find surprising for such a small, rural community.

In lighter, gory news, I had my bottom teeth crudely stripped some more with sandpaper this afternoon courtesy of my orthodontist. All I have to say is my teeth better look perfect after all of this is done because it was quite painful and I spit blood for quite some time afterward. My ortho looked like an axe-murderer after it was over with all the blood on his gloves. I may have to have this done yet again in six weeks depending on how well my teeth are aligning. But at least I’m, you know, still alive and fairly well.

My paid account expired, and I decided I wanted to start a new journal because there’s so much irrelevant baggage here from high school and in general.

ferrumaeternum

Add at your own risk. The entries I’ve posted so far are a taste of what’s to come. This time around, I don’t want to just focus on what’s going on in my life and I don’t want to water down or censor myself. I’m also going to try to update more often to avoid all those “too long; didn’t read” posts. I also know I’ve somehow turned into the world’s shittiest commenter over the past couple of years, so if you happen to add me, I’ll try to actually comment this time around. However, I want to let everyone know that I do read all your entries. I should also warn you that the Lord of the Rings nerd I’ve been since middle school has finally been unleashed. There will probably also be more geeky-ness about music, film, religion, astronomy (since I’ve always been interested in it and I’ll be studying it for a year), Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett which I honestly and vehemently swear has hardly anything to do with me being pagan, other literature, mythology, astrology, other various environmentalist/democratic/hippie crap (I’m also taking yoga next semester), and of course art.

I’ve actually posted the artwork I’ve done in college that doesn’t look like total shit here: Art Blog (Not Safe for Work). In the next couple days I’ll upload a couple 3-D pieces as well as stuff from my senior year of high school that hasn’t been shown before. And now that the whole Lithium Picnic/Suicide Girls/deviantART legal drama has been sorted out, I’m thinking about returning to deviantART and actually keeping up with updating it now that I’m habitually forced to produce new work. …Even though I have yet to actually draw anything this summer. More importantly, I’ve been messing around and creating things with Photoshop, which I will need to master in order to do well in my digital arts lab this fall. Anyway, if I do go back to deviantART, trust me, you'll hear about it.

Alright, I’m done rambling and whoring out myself, so go ahead and gleefully ignore me, lurk, and/or add my new blog 'cause it's going to be mostly public.