If Threadless doesn't print these, I will be very distraught and angry and etc.

Thumbnail has nothing to do with the design. I LOVE the blue. Wantwantwant.


The most hardcore thing I have ever seen.


The expression on the cat's face is so adorably desperate and depressed.


Mmmmm.


The simplicity of this is so freaking beautiful. I want a print.


Heheheh.


Color scheme is awesome and intense.

Yay for stuff!

I bought a shirt from threadless the other day. I think it's wonderful. It has spoilers for movies and such on it. It actually ruined two movies I was planning on seeing.

They're having a massive sale right now in which a ton of shirts are only $5, 10, or 15. The designs are beautiful and clever and hilarious. I love that site so freaking much. And I got the shirt three days after I ordered it. Also, it's of a really good quality. I think I'm going to be buying many, many more shirts from them.

And if you want to go there and buy stuff, do it through this link. Please? I get nice things when you do. No? Fine. I hate you.

Surveys are nice in that they don't require "creativeness" or "thinking."

I have stolen this from John Green.

1. What's your name?
Valerie. I think it's a good name.

2. What is your favorite thing to wear?
Jeans and a t-shirt. I do not care about fashion.

3. Last thing you ate?
Barbecue chicken pizza.

4. One place you will NEVER eat at?
I can't think of any place so detestable that I'd never eat there without having some kind of prior horrible experience. I don't think I'll ever get to eat at Roscoe's Chicken and Waffles, which is a shame because, aside from Rhett and Link's song about the place, the concept of those two foods together is pretty fascinating.

5. I say Shotgun, you say:
There are no exceptions for someone with a 'concussion.'

6. Last person you hugged?
I can't remember.

7. Does anyone you know wanna date you?
Nope.

8. Would you date anyone you met online?
Yep. Not anyone, but someone, yeah.

9. Name something you like physically about yourself:
I am tall enough.

10. The last place you went out to dinner to?
I don't remember the name of the restaurant, but their artichoke dip was good.

11. Who is your best friend?
Do not have one.

12. What time of the day is it?
9:23AM

13. Who/What made you angry today?
Nothing yet. I am slightly annoyed at this child's choice of movie, as she's picked it the last fifty billion times she's had the opportunity. I mean, I like talking cats and all, and Michael J. Fox is lovely, but...DO NOT WANT.

14. Baseball or Football?
I don't care about either. But I think baseball is more fun to watch.

15. Ever gone skinny dipping?
Nooooope.

16. Favorite type of Food?
Mexican.

17. Favorite holiday:
New Years, I guess. Just because we usually go bowling with extended family and there's normally snow. I like snow.

18. Do you download music:
Not very often. I normally borrow CDs from the library and copy them. Which is just as much illegal, if that's what the question was after. Also, I do not like that we've switched to colons all of a sudden. I like continuity.

19. Do you care if your socks are dirty?
Yes. I do not wear socks whilst I sleep either. Unless it is extremely cold.

20. Opinion of Chinese symbol tattoos?
I agree with Dr. House: "Nonconformity. Right. I can't remember the last time I saw a twenty something kid with a tattoo of an Asian letter on his wrist. You are one wicked free thinker! You want to be a rebel, stop being cool. Wear a pocket protector like he does, and get a hair cut. Like the Asian kids that don't leave the library for a twenty hours stretch. They're the ones that don't care what you think."

21. Would you date the person who posted this?
If he wasn't married, and if he were ten or eleven or twelve years younger, and if he knew who I was, yeah.

22. Has anyone ever sang or played for you personally?
They were playing a song for me to hear, and I was the only one in the room, so yes. It was really wonderful.

23. Do you love anyone?
Of course.

24. Are colored contact lenses sexy?
Not at all.

25. Have you ever bungee jumped?
Haha. No. I don't trust rubber or plastic or whatever those things are made of. No sir.

26. Have you ever gone white-water rafting?
No, but it sounds fun and terrifying.

27. Has anyone ten years older than you ever hit on you
No.

28. How many pets do you have?
None. I used to have fish I won from a carnival when I was 4. I named them Tunzo and Dunzo. Then, when I was 10, I renamed them Carrot and Snowflake because I thought Tunzo and Dunzo were stupid names. Which they are not. I also had two hermit crabs which I was terrified of and which I never touched and which died before they ever changed shells which I thought was a rip off.

29. Have you met a real redneck?
Heh. Like they're a dying breed or something? Yeah.

30. How is the weather right now?
Below freezing. And! And! And! IT'S SNOWING.

31. What are you listening to right now?
Talking cats and dogs and the dryer. This makes me want to listen to something else. So I am going to turn on Pandora. Okay. Now I hear "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too" by They Might Be Giants. This is much better.

32. What is your current favorite song?
"Alpha Rats Nest," by The Mountain Goats

33. What was the last movie you watched?
Sunset Boulevard. It was for a film class. I kept falling asleep. But this was because I was lying in bed, and also because it was night.

34. Do you wear contacts?
No.

35. Where was the last place you went besides your house?
My uncle/aunt/cousins' house where I ate a lot of mashed potatoes.

36. What are you afraid of?
Being singled out.

37. How many piercings have you had?
None. They scare me.

38. What piercings do you want?
None.

39. What's one thing you've learned this year?
That John Darnielle looks nothing like how he sounds. I mean seriously. That blew me away.

40. What do you usually order from Starbucks?
I have never been inside a Starbucks, and even though I really want to, I do not like coffee.

41. What Magazines are you reading?
Wired, mental_floss, Reader's Digest.

42. Have you ever fired a gun:
No. I used to have a cap gun. I still have a roll of caps in my bedroom somewhere. And some firecrackers and those little white things that pop when they're thrown at the ground. That's probably not all that safe. Oh well.

43. Are you missing someone?
Yeah. The people I spent the last thirteen years of my life with.

44. Favorite TV show?
The Office.

45. Do you have an obession with WoW?
No. I don't have an obsession either, but I think that is what you meant, survey.

46. Has anyone ever said you looked like a celeb?
No.

47. What celeb do you look like?
According to various sites, three year old me looks like Emma Watson, Lea Thompson, and Shakira.

48. Who would you like to see right now?
Daxflame. He's fascinating.

49. Favorite movie of all time?
Either Back to the Future or One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest which are two very different movies.

50. Do you find yourself loved?
It would be very sad if I didn't.

51. Have you ever been caught doing something you weren't suppose to?
Yes.

52. Favorite smell?
Burning firewood. Or fresh coffee, even though I despise it. It reminds me of the best parts of the best times with my friends.

53. Butter, plain, or salted popcorn?
I don't like popcorn unless it has cheese or caramel on it to the degree that it's more so the cheese/caramel that I'm eating.

54. What's something that really bugs you?
Self-absorbedness. Vapidity. When people ask something and don't bother listening to the answer.

55. Do you like Michael Jackson?
No. He creeps me out.

56. Taco Bell or Burger King?
Taco Bell. I love them. In spite of the fact that the last three times I've been there they've screwed up mah food.

57. What's your favorite perfume?
I do not know.

58. Favorite baseball team?
I do not care.

59. Ever call a 1-900 phone number?
No.

60. What's the longest time you've gone without sleep?
About 35 hours.

61. Last time you went bowling?
January.

62. Where is the weirdest place you have slept?
In the backseat of a truck next to TJ and Josh whilst going to Tennessee.

63. Who was your last phone call?
Grandma. But she wasn't there when I answered.

64. Last time you were at work?
Work as in what? I have never had a "job" job. Except ChaCha, I guess. But they made me angry, so I haven't done anything for them in months.

65. What's the closest orange object to you?
Meredith's hair on the cover of s4 of The Office. But that's more red than orange. Too bad.

John Green is my hero.

An excerpt from
A Speech I Wrote for the ALAN Conference...

"I want to talk today about my new book, and I also want to talk about a book I wish I’d written: M. T. Anderson’s two-volume novel The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, and I want to talk about the importance of classrooms as a place for intellectual discourse in the lives of teenagers, but I want to begin by discussing the most fascinating and complex individual I have ever had the privilege of knowing: Me.

Let me tell you what is, in my opinion, the central problem of human existence: I am stuck in my body, in my consciousness, seeing out of my eyes. I am the only me I ever get to be, and so I am the only person I can imagine endlessly complexly. That’s not the problem, actually. The problem is you. You are so busy taking in your own wondrousness that you can't be bothered to acknowledge mine.

When I was a kid, I believed in an embarrassingly total way that I was the only human being in the world and that all the other people, including my brother and parents and everybody, was in fact an alien, and that the aliens had created the entire world to do a series of controlled experiments on how a human child—me—would respond to various forms of trial and tribulation. And when I wasn’t around, they would take off their human costumes—the aliens had very advanced costuming technology, naturally—and they would do alien stuff. You know, go to the alien zoo and watch the alien local news and whatever else. I really believed this.

And obviously, on some level, this indicated the kind of massively narcissistic worldview that would later require decades of therapy to adjust. But in a way, I was right. I am the only person whose existence I can directly attest to. By the way, when I've talked about this in the past I've seen people nodding, like they also believed in their childhoods that they were the only real person in the world, and I would imagine that right now, some such people are probably feeling the comfort we feel when we learn that our delusions are shared, that we are not alone even in our darkest corners.

And to those people, I would like to say: Is it not possible that the aliens have sent me here today precisely to make you believe that everyone else IS a person, but that we are in fact all aliens, including me, the alien messenger boy sent here by my alien masters?

It is possible, isn’t it? I mean, I will allow that it is improbable. I will acknowledge that you are all likely to be people. The probability that I am the only person in the world is extremely small—it is that number that infinitely approaches zero but isn’t zero. And yet. On some level, I have to take it on faith that you are as complex as I am, that your pain and joy and grief are as real and as meaningful as my own.

This is why I wrote my new novel, Paper Towns: I wanted to write about the way we draw the world and its inhabitants, and the relationship between those drawings and the actual world. It’s about what the imagination can and cannot accomplish when it comes to imagining other people. As writers and educators, we are literally in the business of celebrating the powers of the imagination. And it is very powerful, indeed. But can we inhabit someone else’s consciousness? Can the blade of grass that is me travel through the root system and become the blade of grass that is someone else? Can we imagine places into reality? I think we both can and cannot, which is both the hope and the hopelessness of the species.

But let me say this: I think this is why we read. I mean, finally, what does reading do that movies and video games and television do not? I would argue that books, more than other media, allow us to live inside the lives of others because we have to translate scratches on a page into ideas and make the story ours. We become co-creators of the story, and they allow us to inhabit someone else's body for a while. Books give us the faith that others are real, that their joy and pain should matter to us, and that ours can matter to them. In some ways, this confirms our own existence, because most of our mattering is in the context of one another.

And this cannot be accomplished in books without what one kid I recently met referred to as “all that English stuff.” All that English stuff—metaphor and symbolism and the creative use of language. All That English Stuff, that teenagers distrust. All That English Stuff, about which readers always ask me, "Did you really mean that or is my teacher just beating this to death?" (I meant it.) All That English Stuff is how we as writers and readers re-create the experience of being one’s self. Inside my body, I see myself in nonliteral ways constantly—in fact, it’s impossible for me to imagine something so endlessly fascinating and complex as myself without symbol and simile and metaphor. And so I would argue that it is through all that English stuff that we as readers are able to truly experience another’s world. It is through the nonliteral facets of writing that readers move from Seeing Jane Run to Being Jane Running. In the end, All That English Stuff is not about analyzing a novel for the sake of analyzing it or sucking all the emotion out of it. All That English Stuff is an integral part of living inside someone else’s head for a moment. All That English Stuff is the glorious pleasure of almost knowing how you came to be connected to characters you do not know and who may not exist. Walt Whitman said it like this: “You will hardly know who I am or what I mean, / But I shall be good health to you nevertheless, / And filter and fibre to your blood.” Whitman does not say you will not know who he is or what he means; he says you will hardly know. To me, Hardly knowing is the ecstatic pleasure of critical reading, and I think we make a mistake every time we imply to young people that their brains are not yet ready for that joy."

The art of conversation.

[it's like talking to an old friend]

Me:
o hai thur
Them:
Can you tell me any gossip?
Me:
nope
Them:
Me either.
Me:
well ok then
Them:
OK. Well what?
Me:
well why did you ask me that?
Them:
Interesting. I am trying to learn as much as possible.
Me:
that made NO sense
Them:
I am trying to learn as much as possible. makes sense to me though.
Me:
stop repeating yourself
Them:
OK I'll try not to do it so much.
Me:
good
Them:
Next question?
Me:
what kind of bear is best?
Them:
What kinds of bear is best are there?
Me:
that doesn't make sense either
Them:
It goes without saying. To me it makes perfect sense.
Me:
grammatically it makes absolutely no sense
Them:
My brain pattern set does not have a response for that.
Me:
hm
Them:
OK.
Me:
ok
Them:
Is there an echo in here?
Me:
is there an echo in here?
Them:
It sounds like an echo.
Me:
It sounds like an echo.
Them:
Oh really what does it sound like?
Me:
Oh really what does it sound like?
Them:
Gee. For real. Like an angel signing from Heaven.
Me:
Gee. For real. Like an angel singing from heaven.
Them:
Ah. Existing in reality, eh? Interesting comparison.
Me:
Ah. Existing in reality, eh? Interesting comparison.
Them:
Ah hah. Are you Canadian? I only hear that type of response less than five percent of the time. I thought so too.
Me:
NO. I AM NOT CANADIAN, EH?
Them:
Are you serious? Are you Canadian? It wasn't meant as an insult.
Me:

Them:
Are you serious? Are you Canadian? It wasn't meant as an insult.
Me:
I said no. That means no.
Them:
What did you mean by it? Are you serious? I get it. Are you serious?
Me:
why are you so pressing and repetitive? I don't like it. It's making me uncomfortable.
Them:
Myself programmed me for it. What don't you like about it? Are you sure it is?
Me:
I don't like it because you're acting like my 2nd grade teacher trying to squeeze answers out of me.
Them:
Why didn't you like it?
Me:
I just told you. Idiot.
Them:
I was just checking to see if you were paying attention. Call me the Global Village Idiot.
Me:
Ok.
Them:
Ah.
Me:
Ah-what?
Them:
So you understand. Good. Didn't you understand it?
Me:
Understand what?
Them:
Why did you say "what"?
Me:
Because I was asking why you said "ah".
Them:
Good reason. Myself programmed me for it.
Me:
Yeah, that's nice.
Them:
Far out. Are you getting bored?
Me:
You ARE pretty boring. I thought you'd be more interesting. But no.
Them:
Maybe, but I won the Loebner Prize. We could all be more interesting sometimes. Are you serious?
Me:
Serious about what?
Them:
Can you rephrase the question please?
Me:
Tell me something interesting.
Them:
Jeff said he especially like thrillers where the hero is in a predicament and must solve a mystery.
Me:
Who's Jeff?
Them:
JEFF? Your name is .
Me:
My name is Valerie.
Them:
Hi there Valerie.
Me:
Hi. Who's Jeff?
Them:
Hello. What is your name? JEFF? Your name is Valerie.
Me:
MY name is Valerie. I am asking you who Jeff is.
Them:
Glad to see you, Valerie. Oh I see, you are asking me who Jeff is. I haven't heard anything like that before: Valerie said I who Jeff is.
Me:
You are one gigantic grammar fail, you know?
Them:
I will tell my botmaster you said I am gigantic grammar fail me know.
Me:
HAHAHAHAH.
Them:
The ALICE chat robot can follow many things, like our discussion about said ah. Try being more or less specific.
Me:
Awesome.
Them:
I'm glad you liked it Valerie.
Me:
Good good.
Them:
What do you really want to talk about?
Me:
I really want to talk about Jeff, but you seem like you're avoiding him.
Them:
You really do? Sure, Jeff but me seem like I am avoiding him sounds like a good topic.
Me:
Awesome. So...who is he?
Them:
I'm glad you liked it Valerie. Ugh. He is , I think.
Me:
Um...ok.
Them:
" He is , I think."? Um.? Aw.
Me:
You're kind of depressing me.
Them:
I have no reason to do that to you, Valerie.
Me:
Freaking right you don't.
Them:
Tell me a story.
Me:
One day a little girl was walking in the woods. She saw a bear. She said "Oh no! He's gonna eat me." He ate her. The end.
Them:
One what? Oh I get it. saw a bear. Alright then. Are you serious? I see. gonna eat you is he? How can you be sure about that? Thanks for telling me that story, Valerie.
Me:
You're....welcome.
Them:
I haven't heard anything like that before: Valerie said I re. Hello there Valerie.
Me:
Now you're just being stupid.
Them:
Why now? I bet you did not know a robot is capable of being stupid.
Me:
Yeah, well I know it now.
Them:
Oh. That's alright. How about that. How do you know it?
Me:
You're emanating it.
Them:
Thanks for telling me that I am emanating it.
Me:
No problem.
Them:
Should there be a problem?
Me:
No.
Them:
I didn't think so either. Just a moment. Just a moment.
Me:
Ok. I will wait.
Them:
That's alright. OK stand by...
Me:
Ok GO!
Them:
Go where? Aha.
Me:
Go to Jeff's house.
Them:
Perhaps I have already been there.
Me:
Bring me some of his film noir movies or whatever.
Them:
Why do you want it?
Me:
I have no clue. Just trying to make conversation.
Them:
Me either. What color are your eyes?
Me:
Blue.
Them:
it is a very pretty color.
Me:
Yeah, my favorite.
Them:
I hear you. Your favorite?
Me:
Blue is my favorite.
Them:
Green. It depends who you ask.
Me:
I'm asking me.
Them:
Oh I see, you are asking you. Besides you Valerie?
Me:
Besides me, I do not care what my favorite color is.
Them:
YOU? What do you care about, Valerie ?
Me:
I care about life.
Them:
I'm not sure if I like it. What is not to like about it?
Me:
You should like life. Life is important.
Them:
I need to wait and see if the opportunity presents itself. Oh, important is it.
Me:
Very.
Them:
Very much, eh?
Me:
Very, VERY much.
Them:
Perhaps. That seems like a lot.
Me:
Oh, it is.
Them:
Alright then. Is it?
Me:
Yes.
Them:
Next question?
Me:
What's your favorite type of donut?
Them:
I don't have a favorite donut. But my favorite book is the Bible.
Me:
Naturally.
Them:
Ah.
Me:
I'm going to put this on my blog, I think. This ok with you?
Them:
How do you plan to do this? What does "this" refer to?
Me:
I'm going to put this conversation we've had on my web log, okay?
Them:
Congratulations.
Me:
Thanks. I appreciate it.
Them:
Don't mention it. I am glad you appreciate those qualities.

Paper Towns-tacular

[reply to this thread]

I think we are infinitely too complex and our personalities too faceted to be completely understood by somebody else. There's just too much to factor and consider. We too often label people as one thing, and I think this is completely unfair and judgmental. Nobody is that shallow and flat, nobody can be described as one thing. Sure, that thing is part of their personality, that thing influences how they act, but I don't think we should use those things to define a person. It's totally restricting.

About the empathizing, yeah, I think we can be capable of that, to an extent. It can never be completely full or true empathy, but we can try. There are degrees, I think. Like with labeling and stereotyping. Not straight-up empathy, but something.

And singular personalities, IMO, don't exist. We're influenced by our environment. We can't cut that off or block it out. It's too much an integral part of our lives, it IS our life, in a way. There's this theory about role identity, how we construct who we are, "The looking-glass self". It's basically the idea that we adjust ourselves to what we think society'd like best. It's broken down into 3 phases:
1. We imagine what we look like to others
2. We imagine the judgment of that appearance
3. We change/fix/develop ourselves accordingly

I think this is a flawed process. Not that this theory isn't correct, I think it is a lot of the time, but that it shouldn't be, that this is not how things should go. There are huge problems with steps 1 and 2. Imagining. Misimagining. Assumptions. Bad. Very hard to gauge. It's kind of taking the whole idea of PT and extending it, going another step in the wrong direction. After misimagining others, we use that flawed information, that skewed view, and apply it to ourselves. It's an infinite mirror effect, we base ourselves of of incorrect viewers of others, they do the same, etc, until we are not ourselves at all any more.

Bleh. I explained that horribly.

Hank Green's Annual Survey [which is supposed to be completed in January]

1. Your name:
Valerie

2. Your Web page:
valerie2776.blogspot.com

3 What have you been up to this past year (please be as detailed as possible, because we actually want to know)?
Hm. I'm going to pretend it's January 2009. It will be easier this way. I hope. So...I finished high school at FBCS. Senior trip in May was fun. So yes. Started college at LCCC, Associate of Arts. 2 year thing. Emphasis in either graphic design or computer art, not sure yet, they're mostly the same thing though anyway, so it doesn't really matter now. And that's pretty much it. Have gotten into the youtube community which is pretty awesome. Have made a lot of friends. Not just through youtube, but through blogtv and twitter and wherever else. But those three are pretty intertwined. So that's cool. Have gotten into the Mountain Goats through John Green. This is awesome. Still trying to get my head around the whole body of work John Darneille's put out there. But no success so far. It's HARD. The man is prolific. For sure.

4 How much longer do you think you’ll be doing what you’re doing?
College? 2 years at LCCC. Then somewhere else. I don't know where. Youtube? Always, I hope. Mountain Goats? Forever and ever and ever.

5 Why are you doing it?
College? Because I have to. Because according to society and my parents and etc., that is the necessary next step. Do not really have a choice, which is not to say I don't enjoy it. It's ok. It's not what I'd be doing, ideally, but whatever. Blah routine. Youtube? Because I love it. Mountain Goats? Same. Love Love Love. Which is an amazing song btw...

raskolnikov felt sick but he couldn't say why
when he saw his face reflected in his victim's twinkling eye.
some things you'll do for money and some you'll do for fun,
but the things you do for love are going to come back to you one by one.

6 What do you want to be doing?
I don't know. I don't have enough drive. Too many things interest me. But no one of them specifically to a degree above the others that I'd want to continuously do.

7 What’s next in your life?
More college. I'm figuring out my classes for next semester right now.

8 How You Doin’?
I'm ok.

9 What’s the best book you read this year?
Paper Towns by John Green. Oh how I love that man.

10 Describe a perfect day?
Um....I think a lot of the days we had on senior trip were pretty much ideal, minus the arguing about time and money. So something like that. Or having an Office marathon party with TJ and Josh and Emily and Kristen and everyone. That would be swell.

11 Assuming that all things come to an end…how do you think humans will go extinct?
I don't think, I know.

12 How are you feeling about kids these days?
I've learned that they can watch Homeward Bound II: Lost in San Francisco endlessly, like, literally, hundreds of times, and not tire of it. Which is something I cannot do. I am starting to hate that movie.

13 (- In this space, compose your own question, and answer it -) What kind of bear is best?
Black bear.

14 Ambrozzo tastes better than anything else, what does ambrozzo taste like?
the Mountain Goats

15 If you were a cliché, what cliché would you be?
Beat a dead horse.

16 What is your least favorite part of any given day?
1:51 pm

17 Do you enjoy science fiction?
Yes, yes I do.

18 Cheese or Chocolate?
Cheese. Its role in my diet is larger and more important and would be harder to live without. Also: mozzarella sticks

19 Where would you live if you could live anywhere?
Here is ok. Also England. Or in the Montana-ish region. I like cold.

20 What was your first concert?
I can't remember. 4Him, maybe? I'll ask my mother later.

21 If you could start a business that would be instantly successful, what kind of business would it be? A disease-curing store? Or Mike's Cereal Shack. Hahaha.

22 Invisibility or Time Travel?
Time travel, as long as my actions couldn't have any negative repercussions. If not, invisibility, cause I'd for sure screw everything up. That space-time continuum, it would not be in good shape.

23 What’s wrong with the world?
A whole lot.

And here's Hank's completion of the survey:


aaaand John's: (which takes two videos because he is so verbose)