+clears throat+

Well, it’s two things actually.

The first thing was brought on by the fact that I hate sitting here at home doing nothing and I hate paying my student loans without having anything to show for them (I never finished my English degree, but they should give me one anyway. I deserve it). I mentioned this briefly in another post but never really elaborated on it and I’ve actually taken steps to put it in action recently.

In the spring (I don’t know why they call it spring, it’s really winter) semester of 2011, pending my acceptance, I will be going to Pitt for biological sciences, to then proceed to go to med school. You heard me, I’m going to be a doctor. Are you scared yet?

It is something I’ve always wanted to do. At no point in my life have I not wanted to be a doctor or a rock star (or both). There’s really only one of those things that I can actually control, and I’m going to do it, damn it. I know it’s going to be tough for me, especially because I’m not very good at math. I am, however, pretty amazing at memorization and things of a medical nature were always either common sense or easy for me to remember – I don’t know why – and I’m really excited to do this. I don’t know if I’m ready for eight more years of my life to be sucked away by school (I never liked school), but I’ll work through it.

The other announcement is slightly more pressing and way more awesome, at least in the short term.

Chris and I have set a date for our wedding. It is October 10, 2010. 10/10/10 because that’s almost binary and we’re gigantic nerds.

We’ve been engaged for more than (um, I think, I’m such a dude when it comes to dates) two years now and we’ve finally sat down to set a date. Do expect this blog to mention massive landmarks and such in the planning process but don’t worry, it’s not going to become filled with weird flowery stuff a) because it’s not going to be that kind of wedding and b) because I’m setting up a Tumblr for that, and I’ll share the link when I get around to setting it up.

But wait! There’s one last thing!

Thank you guys so much for the amazing positive feedback on my previous entry. I have some of the best followers on here, and Twitter, and Tumblr, in the world! You guys are a wonderful bunch of folks and I probably wouldn’t be continuing to do any of this social networking stuff if I hadn’t met such a unique and supportive group of people because of it.

Shine on, you crazy diamonds.

I am ridiculously vain. I am unabashedly, unashamedly vain. I think I’m hot shit. I have big dark blue eyes and a little chin and soft hair, voluptuous breasts. I love to look at myself. People love to look at me. I’m cute as a button. I’m short. I have perfect legs.

I’m also fat.

I’m five foot and three-fourths of an inch tall, and I weigh between 150 and 160 pounds depending on how much water I feel like retaining. On the hilarious BMI scale, I sit comfortably on the hump between – now get this – overweight and obese. I wear a size 12 pair of pants (not that you’ll ever catch me in a pair of pants). I wear a 36DD bra. Modern society calls me fat.

And I could not care less.

Because both of those paragraphs are true.

I am beautiful. I am chubby. And there’s not a goddamn thing you can do about it. And I wouldn’t, either.

The thinnest I ever weighed, after a terrible bout of a near-fatal illness, was 120 pounds. I was far from skeletal, I’ll tell you, but damned if once a day I didn’t have someone asking me if I was okay. It’s not a weight at which I look correct.

Remember that BMI scale? It thinks I should weight 113 pounds. It doesn’t know that I’m fabulous. I’m like mini Crystal Renn for fuck’s sake.

It might seem contradictory, then, that my one honest new year’s resolution is to complete a vigorous yoga routine daily, and indeed, through my entire self into the five forms of yoga.

Bull. Shit.

I want to be stupidly fit. I love the idea of being in shape. But I don’t care what it makes me look like or how to makes my clothes fit or what it makes middle America think about me. I value my health and my spirituality and my flexibility. I love to dance and to jump around and to sing. But this resolution? This resolution and my 150 pounds of awesome are gonna work together and make 2010 the best year ever.

And we are gonna be famous.

Happy new year, everyone, if you’re into that sort of thing.

N’stuff!

Well, seriously. Kristen over at Carnival of the Random nominated me for The Honest Scrap Blogger Award. Apparently what I’m supposed to do now is list ten things about myself that no one knows about me and then nominate ten people who also blog.

Now, I’m not sure that there even are ten things that no one knows about me, but I’m gonna try, or at least share some interesting facts about myself in the process. ‘Nyway, here are the officiable rules, followed by my answers.

a. ‘The Honest Scrap Blogger Award’ must be shared.
b. The recipient has to tell 10 (true) things about themselves that no one else knows.
3. The recipient has to pass on the award to 10 more bloggers.
d. Those 10 bloggers should link back to the blog that awarded them.

1. The first CD I ever owned was Roxette’s CrashBoomBang. I was five years old and at this point I already owned more cassette tapes and vinyl than most adults could shake a stick at. When my dad dies I get his albums. Morbid? Perhaps. Awesome? Even more so.

2. I hated going to school as a kid. I would put up serious physical fights from age five on, trying desperately to not have to go to kindergarten. I have a feeling this is because I never went to preschool, and ended up in me being home schooled for two years (first grade and eighth – yeah, this wasn’t a phase). Looking back on it, I really have no idea why except for the fact that for seven hours every day I was positively BORED TO TEARS.

3. I don’t remember exactly how old I was, but when I was little, my parents tried to enter me in one of those creepy toddler beauty pageants. I never ended up going. Why? Stage fright. Yeah. Me. I know, the thought scares me too.

4. All I’ve ever wanted to be is a doctor. Well, okay, or a rock star or a writer, but as far as actual careers that you can go to school for, I’ve always wanted to be a doctor. But I’ve also always sucked at math, so I’ve told myself I can’t do it. When I get my finances in order after living with Chris’ parents for a while, fuck all, I’m going to med school (and I don’t think I’ve told anyone that yet).

5. Though I rarely smoke now (unless I get my hands on a pack of cloves, dear god), I’ve been smoking on and off since I was twelve years old.

6. I have 15 piercings and 4 tattoos and I am scared to death of needles. I can’t explain this even a little bit, but every time I have to get a vaccination I almost puke, but you can sit me in a chair and jam ink into my skin for two hours and I’m like, “Whatev.” Honestly. I have no idea. I think it may have something to do with the fact that when I was in 6th grade, my family had switched doctors and insurances so many times, my vaccination records had been lost and so I was kicked out of school and had to get all of them redone before they let me back in.

7. My mother originally intended to name me Anastasia and my brother Nicolai. When my mother went into labor with me, however, my dad protested, saying that Anastasia sounded too much like “anesthesia” and so I was called Melissa after the Allman Brothers‘ song. My brother is now called Patrick because even though he was born two days before my cousin, my Aunt Kim wanted to name my cousin Nicholas and my parents decided it would be better if two boys born two days apart didn’t have almost exactly the same name. Patrick was named after my paternal grandfather.

8. The first song I have on tape of myself singing is the ABCs. The second is Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man.” I recorded them on the same day with my boombox.

9. I’ve always had trouble sleeping. Aside from it just not being my cup of tea, I’ve never been the sort of person who can get to bed at nine or ten and wake up at six. I can work with variations of this, like going to bed at four in the afternoon and waking up at one AM or going to bed at two in the morning and waking up at ten, but I prefer to sleep for four hours, get stuff done, take a nap, get stuff done, and then sleep for four hours. I love naps. This probably irritated the crap out of my parents.

10. I had my first computer when I was four, in 1992. I have had the internet since I was seven (14.4k dialup, bitches!). I think I still have most of my Doshell tree memorized. I have personally owned every incarnation of Windows from DOS to XP and have used Vista and 7. I know how to use Corel WordPerfect and the C-prompt. I used a DotMatrix printer. I still own floppy disks. I installed my family’s first CD burner by myself, without reading the instructions. I will never use another Windows computer again. So don’t tell me I use a Mac because I don’t know what I’m talking about (huuuuuuge pet peeve of mine). :p

Now, about the abominable nombly-nations. I’m pretty sure I’ve got ten friends, but I’m not sure I’ve got ten friends who are consistently active on the twitters and do that funky bloggin’ thing, so I’m going to nominate the following folks.

1. William the Bloody (he’ll hate me for this, I’m sure)
2. Rose
3. Alice
4. Shonda
5. Mike
6. Becca
7. Kristin
8. Mycki

(And of course I would have nominated Kristen, but she’s the one who sent me here, soooo…)

Guys, I need your help.

Last weekend I visited my friend Colleen. She lives near where Chris and I are about to move and I was very excited to see her. When we got to her apartment, we found everyone on the porch, cooing and awwing at four little kittens, strays, which were playing in the alley.

It turns out that someone up the road had a female cat which they did not fix, and when she became pregnant they kicked her out of the house, so now she and all of her babies are strays.

I am going to take these cats in. I cannot bear to watch these creatures die in the snow because someone was too lazy and careless to get their cat neutered. But here’s why I need your help.

Currently, I am already living in a two-bedroom apartment with one cat. I am supposed to have no cats. In December, Chris and I are moving into the finished basement of his parents’ house. They love cats, but they also already have one. Now, I could probably (and am going to, probably) take one of these strays, if nothing else, but they will need homes.

Also, these cats have lived outside their entire lives. They’re going to need de-wormed and to get their shots. I’m willing to do this for them (because I can’t introduce them to my cat until they are all, at least, de-wormed), but if you can spare any small amount of money to help me out here, I would appreciate it to no end.

Two of the kittens are all-black and two are black and white. I believe the mother is also black and white. As I mentioned before, they’ve been around Colleen, and will let people pet them and hold them, so they’re at least partially socialised.

If you can help with money for their shots, please donate by clicking here.

If you can actually take one of these kittens, please email me as soon as possible. I’m willing to drive anywhere within an hour’s radius of Pittsburgh to bring the kitten to you, so don’t let transportation hold you back.

And if nothing else, please spread the word. I simply can’t take all of these cats (if I could, I wouldn’t be blogging this, I would be laying in a pile of kittens).

Thanks so much for all your help.

I know a lot of you seeing that work right now will shake your heads in adorable fashion and utter to yourselves, “Who did the what now?” (At least that’s what I’m picturing, leave me alone, I can believe whatever I choose.

And a lot of you will have strange and wonderful emotions stirred up when I mention to you that it’s mid-October and my handwriters should set to buying new notebooks and pens and my typewriters should get on stocking up on ribbon and my computerwriters should open their word procession programs and start fiddling around with default fonts now so you’re not screwing with them for hours in November, because, you see, my friends…

November is National Novel Writing Month! (Ooh, it’s a link.)

That’s write folks (ooh, it’s a pun), it’s time to get your creative juices flowing and crank out a novel.

So what exactly is NaNoWriMo? And what is the point? Well, in a word, it’s motivation. NaNoWriMo is a challenge to write a fifty thousand word novel in thirty days, from scratch. Sound daunting? It is. But it’s definitely doable. Last year, I didn’t get started until three days in and I still reached 49K. The only reason I didn’t hit 50K is because I got really disappointed with a plot device in my story, and even though NaNo is NOT about editing – that’s right, no editing! – or even accuracy, really, I couldn’t bring myself to finish it. So this year, I am starting that story over. From scratch.

Now, if you work some ridiculous amount of hours or have children or a really long commute or anything else that would make it virtually impossible to reach fifty thousand words unless you gave up sleep entirely, you’re allowed to set your own limits. If you register on the site, (and I encourage everyone to) obviously it won’t count as an official win, but a personal win is still a win. Remember, it’s about motivation. It’s about having a group of people to talk about writing with, and having a timeframe and a deadline to make your lazy ass (my lazy ass…) get it done. Or at least get it started.

SO WHO’S WITH ME!?

If you’re in, below are some useful links to help you on your November writing extravaganza!

Obviously, you’ll want to check out the official site. That’s where you’ll find all of the official information and rules, as well as getting yourself registered. Also on the site, and especially if you blog, I encourage you to check out the word count widgets to display to fellow Nanos how far along you are. However, sometimes these widgets are ‘down’, sometimes they’re ugly, and they don’t work if your goal isn’t fifty thousand. If that’s your shtick, there are a lot of other counters out there. Try this for a really basic one, and here for a few that are a little more involved (and funny).

Now, obviously you’ll need something to write with. Even if you type or hand write, you’re going to have to verify your word count at the end, which means you’re going to need to type up your story. For my Mac users out there, I recommend Scrivener. Yes, you have to pay for it, but not only is it totally worth it, you can get a 50% discount just for being a Nano participant! Just check out the special offers page. For Windows users, if you’re happy with Word, stick with it, but if you’re not, try yWriter or Celtx. I’ve heard good things about both, though it seems Celtx is more directed towards other forms of media. Now if you like Word, but don’t have it and can’t afford it, go with OpenOffice, every time. OpenOffice also works on everything: PC, Mac, and Linux.

So, you’re registered, you’ve got a program that works for you, and you’re writing, but sometimes you can’t get motivated. That’s when you need Write or Die. Write or Die is, according to the website, a web application that encourages writing by punishing the tendency to avoid writing. Start typing in the box. As long as you keep typing, you’re fine, but once you stop typing, you have a grace period of a certain number of seconds and then there are consequences. And. It. Works. Even if you’re not doing Nano, give it a shot for paper writing or anything else you need to get done.

So that’s National Novel Writing Month according to me. I hope you’ll join me, and if you do, please let me know!

www.paperclippe.com.

I have been staring at that URL for about fifteen minutes now.  I know, I know, it’s no big deal.  Everyone and their grandmother has their own domain name at this point and a site to go along with it.  But damn it, that’s my domain name.

Ever since I decided on Paperclippe (or more, it decided on me, and I’m sure I’ll tell you that story later) as a pseudonym for both my various real-life endeavors and now and more prolifically my online ones, I’ve been doing all I can do dominate the world with Paperclippe.

And so it begins.

I suppose I should open this site by saying thank you to a mister @mgallina (that’s Twitter, you plebeians), who is hosting this page for me and actually bought the domain name for my 21st birthday (I am that much of a nerd), so it’s really his head you’re going to want to bash in.  He does all my technical shit.  I do all his design.  Then we talk about cats.

Then I guess I should mention what I plan to use this for.  Where shall I begin.  Well, I blog (who the hell doesn’t).  I also play the piano, the guitar, and sing.  I knit, and I write (which is different than blogging though the interwebs would beg to differ).  Sometimes I paint or sketch or dance.  Look for that.  I’ll try to keep the links and titles fairly non-convoluted for your stalking pleasure.  Or, you know, you could look around.  Not now, though, there’s not much here.

I’ll also probably provide links to the places on the internet where I plan to stay, the causes I believe in, and the people I support.

So, welcome to the universe, www.paperclippe.com.

Resistance is futile.