I post entirely too much.
Mar. 26th, 2009 05:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yuuagoSupper break! This means I shall proceed to bore you all with my thoughts on yaoi various subjects.
In other words, that "five things on which to elaborate" meme thing that goes aboot occasionally.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
meltedpeep instructed me to g'wan about classics, studiousness, knitting, Estonia, and the weather. And so I shall!
Classics
I didn't know what the hell "classics" were until I went to university. If some'd asked me when I was in high school, I would've said, "uhh... like, idk, my BFF Charlie Dickens?". But now, when I say classics, I mean classical studies - stuffy, dusty old Greek and Roman and Egyptian stuff, and so on. I took some classics courses for the hell of it, and fell in love. Unfortunately, I'm an English major - but I got my fix with a classics minor. Ancient Greek literature, art and architecture, Egyptian archaeology - fuck yes, I'm all over that shit, yo. I even enjoyed the course I took in Roman law, though at the time it was so difficult that it made me want to cry. Er.
Favourite work? Well, I'll be cliche and say The Iliad. It's beautiful. The fact that I no longer own a copy of it hurts me deep in my soul, I tell ya'. Must remedy that eventually. For some reason, I have a thing for the character Sarpedon - strange, because he's so minor, but I can't help it. His death made me cry. Hell, Zeus had blood rain down upon the battlefield in his honour - that twisted my guts in a way no other death scene did.
Anyway. I love classics, and now that I'm no longer an undergrad, I miss taking courses in it so, so badly. And I miss the Classics Society at my former school. I mean, hell - it's a combination of two of my favourite things: fellowship and geekery. You can't get much more epic than lazer tag LARP-battles where the teams are divided into Achaeans VS Trojans. (I was on the Trojan side. Three guesses as to which hero I played, and the first two don't count).
Studiousness
I'm bad at it, and it angers me immensely. Normally I'm not too awful, but this semester has been complete, utter fail. I'm starting to realize that part of the reason for this is the fact that I've basically been high since January. It's kind of frightening. But I need to go on, I need to do it, I need to put my nose to the grindstone and get through it, even if it drives me crazy. Damn the medication.
Part of it is a question of honour. I've entered academia. All right. I can't fail, and I can't give up - doing so would basically mean I'm a disgrace to my entire family. Solution: Study. Devotion. But it's scary. Sometimes I'm so afraid that even though I do my best, my best isn't good enough. And sometimes life definitely tells me, "You might do your best, but your best isn't good enough". I'm terrified that I won't be able to get into a phD program.
Yet, I can't afford not to. If I don't do it - then what? All I can hear is my mother saying "You should have stayed home and trained to be a millwright". The thought makes me sick to my stomach and angry.
Knitting
I'm not very good at it. Part of this is because I don't really have time to practice. I mean, what with school and all, it's hard to get projects started, let alone finished, you know? Oh, well. I must confess, I'm one of those people who learned to knit because of the Harry Potter movies. I wanted to have a scarf like the ones in the movies, but of course they don't really sell ones in those colours at the store, and like hell I'd buy one from anyone, so I decided to make my own. I've gotten pretty good at that. I've made three so far, but only one was for myself. The colours on mine are entirely wrong, because I just plain couldn't find the right shades for Ravenclaw colours. So I used dark blue and rusty orange and it clashes horribly. On the upside? That motherfucker is warm.
Last summer I experimented with some small projects (belts) using real wool. It was my first time working with real wool and, oh my gods, I love it. Then again, I'm a lover of wool garments. Some people can't stand it; I have a cute wool sweater and when I was dating a certain person he would always whine about how it was "iiiiitchy!". Ugh. But I love wool, and I've discovered I love working with it. So, when I have time to do more knitting (uh... hopefully sometime this century?) I want to experiment more with real wool.
Hopefully over the summer I'll have time to knit some doll clothes. This is something I really want to do; I have a cute little ball-jointed doll with a painfully small wardrobe. Poor Renard needs a fashion makeover, seriously.
Estonia
"What the fuck is up withyuuago and Estonia?"
To be honest, I have no idea. Hetalia is to blame.
... Well, that's actually entirely untrue. Let me explain. I've actually had a weird, mostly inexplicable fascination with the country for a while. It started in high school. I was playing an online dog game (Furry Paws), and made a new friend due to our mutual love of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. She was from Estonia (she went under the name Getzka, and later Lizcha). Until that point, I had never had any online friends who were not native English speakers (except for the random Swedes and Finns who hang out on FP and speak English so well that it seems as if it's their first language). When she apologized for her English, and said she was from Estonia, I thought, "Huh? Where is that?" I'd never heard of that country before. I thought it was somewhere down around Bulgaria or Turkey or something. But because I didn't want to seem ignorant, I drew up Google and quickly started edumacating myself.
Point is, she was so nice, and I was learning something new (which is something I love), and she was a photographer so she sent me tons of pictures of the area she lived in, and it was just - I don't know. It was just cool. I was so fascinated by her photos - so many gorgeous buildings! I loved hearing her talk about her country - and she loved hearing me talk about Canada.
Then it got interesting. One day I was talking with my mum about my internet friends, as I occasionally do, and I said, "Oh yeah, I made a new friend recently. She's from Estonia."
"Where's that?"
"Mm, Eastern Europe. It used to be controlled by the USSR."
Mum immediately told me not to talk to her again, because that part of the world is bad, and people from those countries are bad, and so on, and so forth. She actually said a ton of really horrible things that I won't repeat. And she went on about the Balkans for a while, indicating a geography failure similar to the one I'd originally had.
I immediately backtracked and said "Nono, it's a Baltic country!"
"Where's that?"
"It's in the north! It's up near Finland! Actually, it borders Finland!" I conveniently didn't mention this is a water-border. I don't think she would have considered that "adequate". I continued to babble about Finland for a while, and about how Estonia is oh-so-similar to Finland, and the language is close to Finnish, and oh yeah, my friend can speak Finnish, and no she is not Russian, mum, and she's very very nice! And did I mention, mum, she has a Cavalier spaniel, just like granny does? Really!
*sigh* Yeah. My mother is... uh... special. Eventually she said it was okay if I continued to talk to her, but I shouldn't say too much. *facepalm*
Anyway, the point is, that's where my fascination with Estonia started. This translated into a love for the Hetalia character. I'm not sure if I would have liked him so much if not for my earlier interest in the country, to be honest. He's cute, yes, and I love scholarly types, but would I have written as much fic about him (including a twelve-page still-in-progress practically epic thing)? Probably not. Then again, who knows? It's hard to tell, because he doesn't show up in the strips much. I find it kind of strange that I've written so many stories about him. The number is equal to, possibly higher than some of my other favourites. Why? I have no idea. Though many of the things I write about him are sad, it's not generally outright whangst, unlike the things I tend to write about, say, Lithuania. Perhaps that has something to do with it.
The Weather
Like many Canucks, I love complaining about the weather. :| There's certainly plenty to complain about. But! What doesn't kill you makes you hardcore, AM I RIGHT?! Pussies down south don't know what they're talking about, yo. Temperature drops below zero and they get a few CM of snow on the ground and they're crying.
-40C. KNEE-HIGH SNOWDRIFTS. That's right, bitches.
But, I'll let the photos talk for me.
First, some that were taken in January; after that, some that were taken today.
January:
Check out my kickass zoom lens. Oooooh. (I'd just bought this camera, and was fiddling with it)
Today:
Notice how the two main differences are that it's sunnier and there's less snow on the bridge? Yeah. And let me remind you, it's almost APRIL.
Welcome toSiberia Saskatoon.
Oh, and by the way - that cyclist? Yeah. They ride all through winter. THAT'S RIGHT. ALL THROUGH WINTER. Slap some chains on the tires and go. Actually, a lot of 'em don't even use tire chains.
Conclusion: Cyclists in Saskatchewan are fucking hardcore.
And now, here, have a photo of me looking Very Serious:
Actually, I kinda' look like that all the time. Kind of all, :| ish. No wonder people think I'm cranky. xD
In other words, that "five things on which to elaborate" meme thing that goes aboot occasionally.
meltedpeep instructed me to g'wan about classics, studiousness, knitting, Estonia, and the weather. And so I shall!Classics
I didn't know what the hell "classics" were until I went to university. If some'd asked me when I was in high school, I would've said, "uhh... like, idk, my BFF Charlie Dickens?". But now, when I say classics, I mean classical studies - stuffy, dusty old Greek and Roman and Egyptian stuff, and so on. I took some classics courses for the hell of it, and fell in love. Unfortunately, I'm an English major - but I got my fix with a classics minor. Ancient Greek literature, art and architecture, Egyptian archaeology - fuck yes, I'm all over that shit, yo. I even enjoyed the course I took in Roman law, though at the time it was so difficult that it made me want to cry. Er.
Favourite work? Well, I'll be cliche and say The Iliad. It's beautiful. The fact that I no longer own a copy of it hurts me deep in my soul, I tell ya'. Must remedy that eventually. For some reason, I have a thing for the character Sarpedon - strange, because he's so minor, but I can't help it. His death made me cry. Hell, Zeus had blood rain down upon the battlefield in his honour - that twisted my guts in a way no other death scene did.
Anyway. I love classics, and now that I'm no longer an undergrad, I miss taking courses in it so, so badly. And I miss the Classics Society at my former school. I mean, hell - it's a combination of two of my favourite things: fellowship and geekery. You can't get much more epic than lazer tag LARP-battles where the teams are divided into Achaeans VS Trojans. (I was on the Trojan side. Three guesses as to which hero I played, and the first two don't count).
Studiousness
I'm bad at it, and it angers me immensely. Normally I'm not too awful, but this semester has been complete, utter fail. I'm starting to realize that part of the reason for this is the fact that I've basically been high since January. It's kind of frightening. But I need to go on, I need to do it, I need to put my nose to the grindstone and get through it, even if it drives me crazy. Damn the medication.
Part of it is a question of honour. I've entered academia. All right. I can't fail, and I can't give up - doing so would basically mean I'm a disgrace to my entire family. Solution: Study. Devotion. But it's scary. Sometimes I'm so afraid that even though I do my best, my best isn't good enough. And sometimes life definitely tells me, "You might do your best, but your best isn't good enough". I'm terrified that I won't be able to get into a phD program.
Yet, I can't afford not to. If I don't do it - then what? All I can hear is my mother saying "You should have stayed home and trained to be a millwright". The thought makes me sick to my stomach and angry.
Knitting
I'm not very good at it. Part of this is because I don't really have time to practice. I mean, what with school and all, it's hard to get projects started, let alone finished, you know? Oh, well. I must confess, I'm one of those people who learned to knit because of the Harry Potter movies. I wanted to have a scarf like the ones in the movies, but of course they don't really sell ones in those colours at the store, and like hell I'd buy one from anyone, so I decided to make my own. I've gotten pretty good at that. I've made three so far, but only one was for myself. The colours on mine are entirely wrong, because I just plain couldn't find the right shades for Ravenclaw colours. So I used dark blue and rusty orange and it clashes horribly. On the upside? That motherfucker is warm.
Last summer I experimented with some small projects (belts) using real wool. It was my first time working with real wool and, oh my gods, I love it. Then again, I'm a lover of wool garments. Some people can't stand it; I have a cute wool sweater and when I was dating a certain person he would always whine about how it was "iiiiitchy!". Ugh. But I love wool, and I've discovered I love working with it. So, when I have time to do more knitting (uh... hopefully sometime this century?) I want to experiment more with real wool.
Hopefully over the summer I'll have time to knit some doll clothes. This is something I really want to do; I have a cute little ball-jointed doll with a painfully small wardrobe. Poor Renard needs a fashion makeover, seriously.
Estonia
"What the fuck is up with
yuuago and Estonia?"To be honest, I have no idea. Hetalia is to blame.
... Well, that's actually entirely untrue. Let me explain. I've actually had a weird, mostly inexplicable fascination with the country for a while. It started in high school. I was playing an online dog game (Furry Paws), and made a new friend due to our mutual love of Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. She was from Estonia (she went under the name Getzka, and later Lizcha). Until that point, I had never had any online friends who were not native English speakers (except for the random Swedes and Finns who hang out on FP and speak English so well that it seems as if it's their first language). When she apologized for her English, and said she was from Estonia, I thought, "Huh? Where is that?" I'd never heard of that country before. I thought it was somewhere down around Bulgaria or Turkey or something. But because I didn't want to seem ignorant, I drew up Google and quickly started edumacating myself.
Point is, she was so nice, and I was learning something new (which is something I love), and she was a photographer so she sent me tons of pictures of the area she lived in, and it was just - I don't know. It was just cool. I was so fascinated by her photos - so many gorgeous buildings! I loved hearing her talk about her country - and she loved hearing me talk about Canada.
Then it got interesting. One day I was talking with my mum about my internet friends, as I occasionally do, and I said, "Oh yeah, I made a new friend recently. She's from Estonia."
"Where's that?"
"Mm, Eastern Europe. It used to be controlled by the USSR."
Mum immediately told me not to talk to her again, because that part of the world is bad, and people from those countries are bad, and so on, and so forth. She actually said a ton of really horrible things that I won't repeat. And she went on about the Balkans for a while, indicating a geography failure similar to the one I'd originally had.
I immediately backtracked and said "Nono, it's a Baltic country!"
"Where's that?"
"It's in the north! It's up near Finland! Actually, it borders Finland!" I conveniently didn't mention this is a water-border. I don't think she would have considered that "adequate". I continued to babble about Finland for a while, and about how Estonia is oh-so-similar to Finland, and the language is close to Finnish, and oh yeah, my friend can speak Finnish, and no she is not Russian, mum, and she's very very nice! And did I mention, mum, she has a Cavalier spaniel, just like granny does? Really!
*sigh* Yeah. My mother is... uh... special. Eventually she said it was okay if I continued to talk to her, but I shouldn't say too much. *facepalm*
Anyway, the point is, that's where my fascination with Estonia started. This translated into a love for the Hetalia character. I'm not sure if I would have liked him so much if not for my earlier interest in the country, to be honest. He's cute, yes, and I love scholarly types, but would I have written as much fic about him (including a twelve-page still-in-progress practically epic thing)? Probably not. Then again, who knows? It's hard to tell, because he doesn't show up in the strips much. I find it kind of strange that I've written so many stories about him. The number is equal to, possibly higher than some of my other favourites. Why? I have no idea. Though many of the things I write about him are sad, it's not generally outright whangst, unlike the things I tend to write about, say, Lithuania. Perhaps that has something to do with it.
The Weather
Like many Canucks, I love complaining about the weather. :| There's certainly plenty to complain about. But! What doesn't kill you makes you hardcore, AM I RIGHT?! Pussies down south don't know what they're talking about, yo. Temperature drops below zero and they get a few CM of snow on the ground and they're crying.
-40C. KNEE-HIGH SNOWDRIFTS. That's right, bitches.
But, I'll let the photos talk for me.
First, some that were taken in January; after that, some that were taken today.
January:
Check out my kickass zoom lens. Oooooh. (I'd just bought this camera, and was fiddling with it)
Today:
Notice how the two main differences are that it's sunnier and there's less snow on the bridge? Yeah. And let me remind you, it's almost APRIL.
Welcome to
Oh, and by the way - that cyclist? Yeah. They ride all through winter. THAT'S RIGHT. ALL THROUGH WINTER. Slap some chains on the tires and go. Actually, a lot of 'em don't even use tire chains.
Conclusion: Cyclists in Saskatchewan are fucking hardcore.
And now, here, have a photo of me looking Very Serious:
Actually, I kinda' look like that all the time. Kind of all, :| ish. No wonder people think I'm cranky. xD
Yuu. Fic writer & book lover. M/Canada.![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 12:43 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 01:57 am (UTC)ROFFLE. "What doesn't kill you makes you hardcore, AM I RIGHT?!" AHAHAHAHA. Oh Rhys, you slay me. xD O Canada, our home and freezing cold wasteland.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 08:36 am (UTC)Man, us Torontonians have nothing to complain about concerning the weather when compared to what it's like up north. I think the worst we had this winter was -27C something along those lines, which is still pretty lame, but...you guys are seriously hardcore. :>
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 03:19 pm (UTC)I kind of like having bragging rights, but at the same time, it sucks because I have to live here. D:
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 02:37 pm (UTC)*steals your ginormous amounts of snow* I just want a little to see March out with a bang... D:
Your mom is a little on the odd side, perhaps. o.~ That's quite cool how you learned about Estonia, though!
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 03:15 pm (UTC)Surely what you meant to say is "Yer mudder is a crazy douche who thinks everyone in eastern Europe is a commie and who forgot that the USSR fell kind of a long time ago".
=p
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 03:17 pm (UTC)HURR IM SMRT
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 10:05 pm (UTC)... and by "kind of a long time ago" we mean "WITHIN MY LIFETIME OMG WHY AM I OLD NOW." @.@
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 10:06 pm (UTC)Well, it happened within my lifetime too, but I was too young to know about it. So. xD
no subject
Date: 2009-03-27 10:08 pm (UTC)And, dude. If it snowed more often, y'all would probably be complaining about it as much as we do. So. =p It's pretty, but that's about all it's good for. Too dry to make snowballs with. Pff, no fun at all.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-30 06:13 pm (UTC)And yet it is also incredibly sweet, and friendship is always good. &hearts
The snow is almost gone in Montreal now! Just some random melting ice sheets up around the mountain and park where people haven't been walking as much, but I can see sidewalks again downtown. Glad to see you haven't frozen yet in not-Siberia.
no subject
Date: 2009-03-30 06:32 pm (UTC)It's ridiculous to the point of being almost laughable. For some reason the only cultural groups that get her approval (aside from Albertans) are Scots. And Italians. But only Northern Italians. e.e;;;
I ENVY YOU AND YOUR LACK OF SNOW. And most likely lack of cold, too. Damn you. My house still has no heat and it's still freezing RARRRRGH