Today was not a good day. Last night I got a whopping three and a half hours of sleep, and let me tell you, that's more fun than getting hit in the mouth by a bag of rocks. Well, it is, but not much more so. Anyway. So I wake up this morning, not feeling like doing ANYTHING at all because I'm still a little under the weather, but I wearily eat some oatmeal, drag myself into the shower, and then head off for class.

And it was there, in class, that I discovered that I could not think straight. Not only could I not form coherent thoughts, I found that all of my creativity had been drained by my lack of sleep. I guess it had to catch up with me eventually. Apparently my prof thought it would be a grand idea to let me flounder by myself with no direction, because that's what happened. Thankfully, Goizane came to my rescue with a great brainstorming session. Thank God for that girl, she's so precious! And so revitalized, I returned to the drawing board and came up with some great ideas. Yay.

There's something you gotta know about design: it takes a little bit of finesse and a lot of style, as my cousin Zachary is so fond of saying. And when you have neither, you just have to keep going at it until one or the other shows up. And sometimes that requires making sacrifices. I had to do that today. I swallowed my pride today while working on a logo design. I don't like what I ended up with, but I still went for it. I haven't decided if I want to keep what I did with said logo design, but I think it was something that needed to be done. We'll see what comes of it.

This is pretty interesting...

You Are a Dreaming Soul

Your vivid emotions and imagination takes you away from this world So much so that you tend to live in your head most of the time You have great dreams and ambitions that could be the envy of all... But for you, following through with your dreams is a bit difficult You are charming, endearing, and people tend to love you. Forgiving and tolerant, you see the world through rose colored glasses. Underneath it all, you have a ton of passion that you hide from others. Always hopeful, you tend to expect positive outcomes in your life. Souls you are most compatible with: Newborn Soul, Prophet Soul, and Traveler Soul

What Kind of Soul Are You?

It makes a lot of sense, I've always been a dreamer and an artist. And I have big dreams.

I'd like to talk about loopholes for a minute. Specifically, a certain loophole of a religious nature. Lent is a season for personal reflection and striving to become more spiritually aware. Which is where fasting comes in. Fasting is a great way to grow spiritually and this year I decided to fast from alcohol and coffee for Lent. Which sounds like a lot, but to be honest it has been a very rewarding challenge. In fact, It hasn't been as difficult as I first thought it would be.

Now, one would think that fasting from something during Lent means never touching it during the whole season. But I recently learned something about Lent from a freind of mine who grew up in the Catholic Church. The period of time between Ash Wednesday, which is when Lent starts, and Easter, which is when it ends, is just shy of 7 weeks long. 47 days to be exact. Not 40, and I'll get to that in a second. Because fasting during Lent often involves fasting from food, there's some considerations to be taken. I don't know about you, but I would not be able to go 47 days straight without eating. Which is where the 40 days comes in. Lent itself is 40 days. If it was 47 days, it would start a week later than it does. The reason it is 40 is because Sabbath days are excluded. So that means Sundays (or Saturdays for some) are not ruled by the tenants of Lent, only by the Sabbath. And that means that those who are fasting from food may eat during that day, and those who are fasting from anything else, such as alcohol or coffee, maybe partake of that as well.

Of course that opens up a whole new can of worms, depending on what you are fasting from. If you are trying to quit something altogether, this adds a whole new level as far as willpower and temptation are concerned. But that's a discussion for a different day.

I woke up today and my throat felt like a million small pygmies had built a fire and were partaking of ancient pygmy war ceremonies in my throat. It hurt. A lot. I also discovered I could not talk. Not the most fun thing to go through, I'll tell you right now. So I chilled out for the day, did some homework, that sort of thing. I got my PC up and running the other day, which is the first time it's even been plugged in in like 4 or 5 months. Good times. Maybe one of these days I'll do some recording.

If anyone has chicken noodle soup to donate to my cause, you know where to find me. I can talk again, thankfully, but trying to drown the pygmies in green tea only made them angry. At least the fire's out.

Wow... that's probably the wierdest analogy I've come up with yet.

Remember that midnight blue hair I have been complaining about? Yeah, it's gone. Armed with a pair of scissors and an industrial-strength Wahl electric hair clipper, I lopped it off. I look like a freakin' pirate. It's awesome.

I should mention, though, that the no-hair look was not my original intention. I was originally just going to shave most of it off, until I realized how bad I was at cutting hair. That's what I get for passing up cosmetology school in favor of a less that lucrative career as a stagehand and graphic designer. Anyway, I took one look in the mirror after doing the sides and my immediate thought was "Damn. I'm going to have to shave it all off". I think I did a pretty good job, although I have no clue what the back looks like. I wish someone would come over right now so they let me know how it looks on the dark side of my head.

In other news, I'm almost out of money. Which shouldn't be a surprise to my friends. Thankfully, a shaved head means no need to spend money on a hair cut. Whoo hoo.

I sometimes wonder why I can't work at a normal job. What is it about convention that I constantly cast it off? I am able to function well in society, I am able to do simple tasks that people ask me to perform. Maybe it's the mundane that causes me to lose intrest in and ultimately rebel against jobs. I need to find a place to work that excites me, not necessarily in the way I want to be excited, but rather in a way that challenges me. I hate mindless work, I hate doing things that are repetitive and dull. On the other hand, a good routine is always good for some peace of mind. At any rate, someone needs to pay me to do stuff for them, and fast, because I'm almost out of money.

Earlier my nemesis, Kyle, was here and we decided to dupe the rest of our friends we were hanging out with tonight into believing that he was pissed at me and wasn't going to talk to me ever again. Ruthie bought it and wasn't happy about learning that we were just putting on an act. But it's all good because she nabbed a metric buttload of digital music from me. Anyway, it's been decided that if Kyle and I team up we are unstoppable and we can destroy anything. Seriously. Anything. One of these days we're going to take over the world. It's just a matter of time.

Guess what? It's 5:30 am and I haven't been to bed yet. Why sleep when I can hang out with my peeps at Leela? Which reminds me, a Chai Tea sounds really good to me right about now...

It's Friday kids, and we all know what that means. Everyone is giddy excitement because Friday means the weekend is just hours away. We are t-minus 4 hours to beer o'clock and counting. Be safe this weekend and don't do anything I wouldn't do. Or maybe it should be don't do anything I would do...

We need to talk. We need to talk specifically about design. I'd like to introduce a new feature today, a new editorial column of sorts. We'll call it "Your Design SUCKS" because, well, that's what it's about.

As a designer I am very sensitive to things of a design nature, and I am also very picky. So when I see a bad design, I get emotional. I get very worked up, and I cannot help but think to myself, "Someone who thought they were a designer made that." And it hurts me inside. It slowly kills me. It kills me that someone thought it was OK to create something so horrible that my eyes bleed and I want to shove a red-hot fork in my ear and through my brain. Repeatedly. Until I'm dead.

Today's bad design is a morass of awfulness. It is the web site for the Hispanic Contractors of Colorado. And it makes me want to commit homicidal acts against small kittens. Let's start.

First off, the graphics are horrible. I'm not sure what kind of color scheme they are trying to bring across, but to me it says "waste management facility". It's possibly that they were trying to go for some Southwesty looking colors, but they should have stuck with something that says construction. The rivets on those side buttons almost do that. Except not. And who the hell made those buttons, anyway? A four year old child?

By this time I'm sure you've heard the very thing that shocked and horrified me. Yes, that is the Macarena you hear. In MIDI format, too. I can only help but think, "Why?" Perhaps they are trying to undermine any and all chances of race equality. Perhaps they think it's funny. Perhaps they need to have their eyeballs gouged out with dull, rusty spoons.

Let's talk about the design and layout. Or rather, the lack of. It looks like someone just puked up a few logos and buttons, slapped a header on there, and went off to go puke some other stuff up. There is no apparent heirarchy of any sort, and did they even try to align anything? The worst of it is the collection of "sponsors" on the bottom of the page. Dreadful.

I won't even get into the scrolly wanna be news ticker. Mostly because I need to go shoot myself in the face. I hoped you enjoyed this inagural issue of "Your Design Sucks" as much as I did. Please remember: violence against kittens is needless and cruel. Please commit your violent acts against inanimate objects. And no, goldfish are not inanimate.

I've always found our nation's obsession with sexual deviation interesting, and I've been keeping an amused eye on the subject of the Pornography industry. I don't see any other nation where porn has become something of pop culture. In Europe sex is looked upon much more differently than here in the United States, and although I'm sure they have an adult entertainment industry as well, I can't imagine it being as expansive as ours. Upon doing some reasearch, I found out that pornography is a 1-billion dollar a year industry. And I have to ask myself, "Why"?

I think it's our society's view on sex, and most of all how it changed with the "Free Love" movement. Before the 60's there was an almost puritanical view of sex. Things changed, we had a revolution, but instead of becoming more knowledgeable, our libidos got so enormous and promiscuity blew up in our faces. And here we are today. With an adult entertainment industry that makes almost a third of the revenues that Hollywood generates. And porn stars who venture into more acceptable lifestyles like winemaking.

Aparently I'm 48% evil. Thank God I'm not over 50%, because then I'm in lost cause territory.

You Are 48% Evil

You are evil, but you haven't yet mastered the dark side. Fear not though - you are on your way to world domination.

How Evil Are You?

Have you ever had the distict pleasure of having blue hair? Well, I happen to have that distinct pleasure right now. My hair is midnight blue.

You must keep in mind, however, that I didn't not forsee my hair being blue. No, I planned to dye my hair black. And it was black. For two days.

There's a moral to the story, kids. Don't dye your hair a color you don't know. You should trust your hair color as though your life depends on it. And if you end up with blue hair... well, pray to whatever deity it is you pray to that you are not ridiculed for the rest of your life.

I thought I'd let you all know that even though it's 3:12 am and I should be going to bed, I'm not. Instead, I'm listening to the Beach Boys' "Pet Sounds". The re-issued, re-mastered, full-on stereo version. And I'm in heaven.

It's recently crossed my mind that I might need a job. Just maybe. So today I have set out upon the world with my new plan to gain employment: The Coffeeshop Domination Project. It involved applying to every coffee shop in sight. I feel that it's only a matter of time before they give in, break under my amazing and ferocious tenacity. Yes. Tenacity.

I'm trying to be more professional with this whole blog thing, and so this... thing you are reading before you was born. MySpace is filled with way too many emo kids, and Livejournal is just... I dunno. Amateur? Nothing against my friends who are currently afficionados of those particular sites, but I want something a little more expansive.

And so here I write, from Leela, my favorite hangout. I will eventually be resurrecting the former glory that was Yodasuniverse, although I won't be calling it that anymore. I haven't decided upon a final name, but I think My Mind Is Dangerous is especially fitting.