Sometimes, fearing the shadows is a good idea.

I've been accused of being pessimistic before, and I really don't think that I am.  I always hope for the best, I believe good things can and will happen, I just think that you have to be realistic in regards to what you might be facing, instead of blindly optimistic. The actual interaction below is an example of my "constructive pessimism."


"Never fear shadows. They simply mean there's a light shining somewhere nearby." ~ Ruth E. Renkel

 "Yes, the light the rapist needs to see you walking by as he lurks in the shadow." ~ JRose

OMG IT’S FULL OF STARS!

I find one of the most disappointing thing about celebrities on social media is that the majority of them ignore the majority of us.  I understand they have other things to do and can't spend all day looking at links people send them of the same baby panda sneezing and scaring its mom.  But like, when someone takes their time to paint a picture of a famous person, or for a famous person, I make note of ones who actually respond with thanks and a link to said picture, and I am impressed.

I enjoy getting to know people who like my art and/or writing.  If I ever get famous for it, which I plan on doing, damn it, I'd hire a friend to scour the web looking for things made for me by fans so I could give proper credit, if it got too overwhelming to do myself. That way, I can be secure in knowing that there is no one out there making a voodoo doll of me and covering it in syrup because they drew me an awesome llama-narwhal hybrid and I didn't look at it or more so, thank them.

Hey you, get your damned hands off her!

I was talking to one of my closest friends last night and she was of the opinion that my blarg is entirely too wholesome when compared to the average wholesomeness of me.  A variation of the following conversation was had:

Only she didn't call me George, because my name clearly isn't George, and I don't believe she loves Back to the Future as much as I do (I probably would have called her George if the conversation had been reversed, even though her name isn't George, either, but I'm big on quoting BTTF, apparently). 

Anyway, I think you all can handle it. Especially if you've been following my filthy mouth on twitter. 

He was all hopped up on juice boxes!

My mom received a phone call at seven this morning.
"Hello, Grandma [name redacted]?" and he proceeded to tell her that he and his friends drove over to Toronto last night and that they were speeding and got pulled over and they had a little pot in the car and... he was really sorry, but he needed money to get out of jail.

I suppose this is a good scam, and I know friends' grandparents who have fallen for it unfortunately, but it doesn't really work when your only grandson is a preschooler.

I suggested that she should have said, after listening to his whole story, "Well, sweetheart, you have to expect to be arrested.  It IS illegal to drive when you're four years old..."

Especially when it is a 2000 mile overnight trip with drugs in the car, I would imagine.

As long as it is not part of a shower caddy.

I need a source on waterproof paper and writing implements, or even better, a waterproof digital device of recording that I can wall mount/wear/have implanted into me, because I regularly come up with great ideas for posts in the shower and by the time I dry off, at which point I could make a note or start working on them, I have lost the idea completely.

Be My Valentine Contest Winner!

Congrats, Kellers! You were chosen as my blargy Valentine! 

Please send me a message with your mailing address!

Thank you to all of those who entered! I loved your poems! You would all make fine Valentines! 

(I love exclamation points!!!!)

For visual proof of random drawing AND a generic version of this adorable llama valentine, to share with your llama of love, make the jump!

Sticky Situation

I am almost physically incapable of interacting with syrup without getting some in my hair, eyebrows, arm hair, etc.

I didn't even consume any syrup today. I simply poured a tiny bit onto pancakes my nephew was eating for  lunch and I ended up with a piece of crumpled straw wrapper coated in strawberry syrup stuck to the side of my head.

I am fairly certain other people don't have this problem.

Why WOULDN'T they be jerks?

I've decided Narwhals are probably jerks.  Or maybe I'm not in the greatest mood. It is possible it is both.

Either way, I hope you find this graphic helpful at some point. 

Bacon Mint Toothpaste?

In my estimation, the only thing that mint really goes well with is chocolate. Why then, does the dental care industry insist on making mouth products that are supposed to be used before or around eating, out of the one flavoring agent that makes all other things taste HORRIBLE?!

Really, mint doesn't play well with others. Especially not spearmint! Peppermint, it's okay, since it gets to represent a major holiday it seems to have a better attitude towards other foods, but for the most part, mints are terrible terrible flavor collaborators.


My point is, I really think that more people would brush their teeth upon waking if it wasn't going to make drinking their morning orange juice into an experience of taste torture.

The problem is to find a flavor that is palatable with most things, doesn't leave a terrible aftertaste, and isn't so bizarre as to turn the consumer off to buying it.

My first thought, as it usually is, was BACON! It is the perfect flavor, but alas, probably not going to make for the freshest breath. Gonna need to go with something sweet. Then I thought waffles, mmm buttery syrupy waffles. Might be a hard flavor to recreate.

Perhaps the solution is orange juice flavored toothpaste.  And none of this "orange mint" that was tried, that just makes the prospect of toothbrushing, itself, torturous.  I mean, people like orange juice, right?  It is refreshing, delicious, and full of vitamin C. I'd be willing to try it.



Perhaps a line of drink flavored toothpastes would be best for all day brushing. Orange juice, lemonade, merlot wine, vodka...

Monster Math- Zombies and Negative Numbers

It’s been a while, but Monster Math is back and it's coming to get you, Martha!  Today, we will be battling the number apocalypse with :

NEGATIVE NUMBERS - Zombies and Survivors

First of all we have two teams, positive numbers, which are represented by living humans, or survivors, and negative numbers, which are then, obviously, the undead, zeds, zombies.

positive numbers                      negative numbers

ADDITION

Let’s start with an addition word problem. Addition with negative numbers is just comparing, canceling, and letting the bodies fall as they will.

We have seven humans, hiding out in a rickety old warehouse, with a surprisingly large arsenal of shotguns and buckshot.  Five ambling undead come stumbling out of the local cemetery that has been rained upon by an unknown chemical that reanimates corpses, most likely created by the government as a chemical warfare agent. Who will survive the inevitable fight?

This would be represented as 7+ -5.

Now, our humans are not trained in combat at all, and whether they are or not, to fit the plot of the math problem, we know that they are incredibly bad at fighting zombies and anyone who kills a zombie ends up getting bitten and must die.  As in real life, if there is a zombie attack, it is best to hide and stay out of it, but alas, these are brave, if not foolhardy,  little positive humans and so, they are jumping right into this fight.

Bah!

Sorry, my dog ate my post.

Don't forget to enter the Be My Valentine contest!

And go read the poems. They are great!

It explains Richard Gere

I can't be entirely sure that hamsters are not aliens.  

Be My Valentine Contest (details inside)

My husband is terrible at gift-giving holidays. He is very sweet and loves me more than I ever thought a boy would, is glad to give me money to buy things for myself when we have some (though I have issues with buying things for myself, though that is another post all together), is happy to take me out to dinner on Valentine's day (if I plan it),  but has anxiety about buying presents, so I have a tradition of making my friends my Valentines. It is a win/win/win, the pressure is taken off of him, I get the attention and presents I want, and my Valentine-challenged friends have someone to dote on them.

And since you guys listen to me be silly, and even encourage me with comments, you can be brought into the fold of my super fantastic Valentine's extravaganza!

If you are chosen as my Valentine, you get the following:

A bouquet of paper forget-me-nots, a hand painted ACEO (2.5"x3.5" mini-painting) of a love-lorn llama, and a love-struck llama pendant.
Plus an assortment of candy and a handmade Valentine from me.

Details after the jump!

When gadgets attack!

I love my husband a lot but he has a tendency to go a little overboard when we get new gadgets, to the point that I now have to map out exactly how each new purchase can be misused before buying it.

Like there was a time when we were given a paper shredder, though I had specifically avoided getting a shredder, and he stayed up all night to shred all of the paper in the house. ALL OF THE PAPER. No really, all of it... not only old documents we needed to get rid of but newspapers and printer paper, as well as the drawing my friend's daughter had drawn for me of Ron Weasely... that he took off my bulletin board and shredded when he ran out of other papers to shred.

And then there was the time, when we first moved in together and I got him a vacuum sealer.  At first it was just all of the things in the refrigerator, including making individual packages of salad dressing from the large bottle to take to work with me. That was handy. But then, I came home from work one day and everything in the house that would fit in the plastic sleeves was vacuum sealed. My toy collection, my art supplies... anything he could fit... no matter how inconvenient or ridiculous it was. For weeks after, I would go to look for something and find, oh look, there is my watch... carefully sealed in a little plastic pouch. Ah, the spare dental floss.

Clonerator 3000

During my childhood, we moved around a lot.  I started school in California, moved to Arizona, then to Florida in 2nd grade.  I went to two different elementary schools, a magnet school that was an hour away for middle school, and a different magnet school for high school. That should explain why it is that it wasn't until college, again, that I realized that people look pretty much the same when they are kids as they do when they're adults. College was a big time for discoveries for me.

I realize now, that everyone else knows this, but I had never seen anyone consistently while they were growing up and it wasn't until I ran into a kid from my 2nd grade class in college, who looked exactly the same only taller and with facial hair, that it clicked.  My only frame of reference for aging before that moment was movies and TV. Well, and my sister, but maybe it was just really good casting.  Okay, fine, I have no explanation.

I have a solution though; I think this confusion could be avoided for other people if we just had actors keep a collection of clones of themselves at different ages, just in case their movie requires a scene that flashes back to childhood.

Stompy Love

I would like to say thank you for following me. (Thank you for following me)

Because of a single (amazing) link, I went from 15 followers to 50! I am so appreciative of every one of you and hope I can be funny enough to keep you around and maybe even make you want to share me with friend and random strangers. I plan on doing something special for each (fairly arbitrary) milestone of followers I reach.

And since I like puzzles, I made one for you of today's picture. Enjoy, unless you hate puzzles and then, sorry! Don't go! I can make it up to you! =P

provided by flash-gear.com

(Just in case it doesn't work on the page- http://five.flash-gear.com/npuz/puz.php?c=v&id=3840384&k=21203576)


(Yay, I fixed the missing piece!)

Something in the Pipes 2 (w/ video)

As an addendum, here is the actual sound the shower makes.

This is the sound of the water being turned on in the basement as heard in my bedroom.  Seriously. It actually shakes the walls. Terrifying when you don't know it is coming... like at 4am when you were sleeping soundly and it goes on with its jackhammering racket combined with your husband screaming from the basement because it scared him too. 

 If you would like to draw your own version of my pipe monster, please, feel free!

Something in the pipes.

There is a nightly ritual in my house. It goes like this:

Me (yelled throughout house): TAKING A SHOWER!!!
Family (yelled back through house): OKAY!!
Me, happily showering.
Burbling clicking sound.
Water slows to a trickle.
Horrid screeching monster sound from pipes as a result of family member turning on water despite my making them aware I would be in the shower and they should not flush toilets/do dishes/water the lawn.
Me, being angry/frightened/concerned by my bleeding ears.

I've had water systems before that didn't like other water being used, but seriously, the pipes in my house now sound like they are possessed by some sort of terrible terrible creature.

Don't miss the video of the sounds  in the next post!

Kids, it will grow back!

Yup, I have no reason for painting this.  I just really like the movie "Dragnet" and thought it would be enjoyed. Though I do have a sneaking suspicion that my sister, who classifies herself as a pagan on facebook, may actually be referring to P.A.G.A.N. instead of the actual established Pagan religion.

Smoke-butt get away from that fire!

When my computer broke, I got a lot of twitter spam about getting a free computer (if I just "filled out some survey") when I complained about the death of my hard drive. I got one the other night, when tweeting about my husband getting me dinner, offering advice on how to deal with men.  Once, I mentioned my best friend from college who died tragically and how she had come to my wedding, and was sent spam for wedding favors (I assure you, they got 140 angry characters back).

And so I have (almost) learned that you cannot mention certain things on twitter without expecting messages from obnoxious spambots:
Smoke, at all... kitchen on fire? Got a new gray cat? Like LOST?
Diets... Anti-diet? Gluten-Free diet? Diet Pepsi?
Harry Potter. No, really. Learned that last night.

Of course, there are lots of bots on twitter that redeem the whole random tweets from stranger-bots thing, like Sue Ellen Crandell who responded when I said "I'm right on top of that, Rose." Or how when you mentioned roads, the (now suspended) Doc Brown bot responded "Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads!" Totally makes spammy tweets like " Watch the new Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows movie for FREE!!! JUST CLICK THIS SKETCHY LINK!!!!" bearable.

It's a DOG!

I think I would like a pet goat, but seeing as I live in the middle of the city and... in a condo, it is probably not feasible.  Of course, I could just tell people it was a dog and then get really irrational and angry with them when they tried to point out that that was not the case so they would leave it alone.

I imagine it would go something like this:

Me, happily walking along with pet goat.
Neighbor: You can't have a goat.
Me: It's not a goat, it's a dog.
Neighbor: It has horns...
Me: IT'S NOT A GOAT! IT CAN'T HELP IT HAS HORNS! YOU HAVE HORNS!!!!
Neighbor, retreats inside.
Goat and I high-five.

Cake is a lie.

It is shameful to say that it wasn't until I was in college that I knew what the phrase "You can't have your cake and eat it too," meant.  Mostly, because it was never taught in any class I was in, and the phrasing makes no sense.  I mean, the only way you CAN eat cake is if you have some, right?

I would like to petition that the phrase be changed to "You can't eat your cake and have it too," because then, it would actually say what it means and make sense.

Phoenix, You ARE the Father!

There has been a bit of discussion in the comments of my previous post of as to what Sparkles' offspring would look like, after the assertion that boy unicorns MAY NOT exist and that the Phoenix may in fact be the father.
I have rendered a few of the options mentioned, though the favorite that I imagined was a penguin (Phoenix+Unicorn=Unix?).

Of the bunch I drew, the one perched in the grapefruit tree whom I have dubbed "Sprinkles" is my fave!

Sparkles is Pregnant??

This is actually in response to the following post from Jen Yates of Cakewrecks and EPBOT

http://www.epbot.com/2011/01/how-we-amuse-ourselves.html - wherein she and her husband describe the wildlife in their background.  I felt it needed illustration:

Edit- There has been some discussion on what Sparkles' offspring should look like in the comments- now illustrated here.

Care Bears: Autopsy

I suffer from insomnia on occasion and it happens to keep me up past when anything decent is on TV.  Once I have run out of variations of Law and Order to watch (SVU is my favorite), I usually turn to On Demand. And when I am exceptionally tired but cannot sleep, my ability to read things properly is GREATLY diminished. It usually turns out pretty funny, like this month on Stars On Demand, they have the movie "Care Bears: Oopsy" which I have absolutely no interest in watching, but every time I scroll past it late at night, I read it "Care Bears: Autopsy" which seems like something else all together that I don't want to watch.  Here is an imagined scene from that movie:

OCD Robot

I would never make it as a robot because I cannot stand my hands smelling like metal.