Reality: kicking me in the ass once again.

I got my first paycheck since being demoted.

I'm just glad I'm not this guy.

Popped the Twitter cherry today out of boredom. Not sure yet if its something I will get into. 

I revised my previously posted poem. I don't have a title as of yet.

I cannot: Break
your fall
into her;
Be with you
when old nightmares melt
to your waking dreams--all lies;
Claim to hold some truth
nestled between the I and You.

Now you walk alongside
our fallow fields,
where I and You have drifted
leaving that truth to fight
through the thatch
whose hold
I cannot break.

Finished all the stupid homework, got 3 hours of sleep, and didn't even get to really do the presentation I spent so long working on. Bull. Shit. 

Bedtime.

Lost thoughts

If like 40 year old Ben meets his younger self from 30 years prior will the world implode?

Why does Sayid always get the shitty end of the stick?

"A question that sometimes drives me hazy: am I or are the others crazy?"
-Albert Einstein

• The Dollar Girl
  

This girl/woman walks up to me. Based on her appearance it is clear that she is "special".  I ask her if she needs assistance and she asks what we have for $1. I think about it and am pretty sure that 2 lindor balls are pretty much her only option. I try to explain this, but she doesn't really understand and keeps repeating "on dollar?". I eventually take her to the register and show her the candy that she can get and she is disappointed. Then she proceeds to pick up random items and ask if they are $1. I reply in the negative each time. She thanks me and walks away. 20 minutes later she comes back to me and asks again what she can get for $1. She also does the picking up random items thing. Then she asks what pens we have for $1 so I took her into the PC area and FINALLY found a notebook was marked down to $1. So I took her to the register and had Robot ring her up. It was then that we found out that she literally only had 1 dollar bill. I was so willing to fork over the 8 cents just to make it stop. Not exactly crazy, but she definitely drove me crazy.

• Magazine Man

A gentleman approaches the info desk and asks if we have a specific magazine in store (Country Gardens). I take a look at the list of periodicals we carry and tell him that it is not something we have in the store. He looks at me like I'm retarded and repeats the title. I repeat my answer. He then decides to "double check" using the computer to look on our website for it. I tried to tell him that he wouldn't find it, but he insisted on searching. His search, predictably, turned up negative. He then turns to me "Well, where am I gonna get this?". I told him to try the newsstand on Devonshire and Reseda. He tells me "I better find it there". Um, okay. Or what?

• Cross-bearing Customer

I was at FOS and turned around to see a gentleman kneeling on the tile by the front entrance.I was about to go ask him if he needed anything when he lifts up his Borders bag in his left hand and starts to pray. It is then that I notice the GIANT wooden cross hanging from his neck. He continues for about 3 minutes and then exits. WTF?

*******************************************************************************

So I am really proud of myself for surviving a whole day in heels. 

I had a pair of slip-ons in my purse just in cases.

I still have yet to finish all the homework due tomorrow. I just don't want to deal with anymore poetry.

Yay

So I have my interview for the PC job next Wednesday. I decided to buy a new shirt for it. Its a really cute turquoise Michael Kors blouse that apparently is regularly priced at $99.50. I bought it at Ross for $29.99. Normally, I don't like to spend more than like $10 on shirts at places like that, but its fraking cute. Totally worth the 25 minutes in line. I also got a couple other shirts (each under $10) and two pairs of shoes. I love shopping. 

So much homework, so little time. I am a horrible student. Ugh. 

License to Sell

Saw "I love you man". It was awkwardly hilarious. good times. 

FUCK!

Gossip Girl started up again tonight. I was uber excited as I got home, anticipating an awesome Chuck Bass filled hour of delight. I was devastated, then, to find out that my sister is trying to record 4 fucking shows at the same time and thusly Gossip Girl was NOT recorded while I was at school. 

Fuck. 

Now I have to wait til tomorrow when it will be uploaded onto the website. 

Nigga said WHAT?!

I'm still trying to piece together the events of last night. However, of one thing I am ABSOLUTELY SURE: I did NOT defecate all over Amanda's bathroom/carpet. 

And I cannot believe he thought anyone would believe it was me. What a fucktard. 

But seriously, my memory gets all blurry after Patrick and Heather left. 

Oh man, I like getting drunk on occasion, but its still best when its with K2.

1st day back as a seller: busy. 

My sister got up early and is out feeding homeless people while I was forced awake by a hangover. 

I never thought I'd see the day when she was the better human being. I'd say I am shocked, but the only emotion I can feel right now is BLAH. 

Back to chugging H2O

Twins?

Love them both. 

I know I stole this from SBTB but...

Its so worth it. 12 minutes long, but freakin' adorable. 

Update: Stress reenters my life

I start IPT on Sunday. 

I hope its not awkward. 

In other news I had two midterms yesterday. One of them was a typed comparative analysis of two issues of one literary magazine published ten years apart. I did the Dec. 1998 issue of Poetry vs. the Dec. 2008 issue of Poetry. I got up super early (i.e. 8am) yesterday and barely got it done before I had to begin researching useful quotes for my other midterm in Modern Poetry. After spend and hour and a half looking up that shit I get to class early  and find out that if we want to use the actual poem we are discussing that we had to have included that in our page of quotes. My reaction: Shit. I thought we were going to be able to have the poem in front of us. So I ended up writing out the lines I needed and severely editing the quotes I got online. Hopefully she doesn't mind that my page of quotes is handwritten and the Works Cited is typed and includes a citation for a quote that is not actually on my paper. Whatevs. I just hope I made sense in my essay.

Poetry workshop was interesting since I had my poem "Stained" being discussed. Pretty much everyone liked it. There was some indecisiveness over the use of the epigraph, but I like it so i think I'm just going to shorten it a bit. As for the general meaning/message of the poem most people understood it vaguely, but I was really surprised when this one girl was like "I don't think you need to add any more explanation to the poem. I thought it was very clear. The first stanza is about [this] and the second stanza is about [this]. It made perfect sense to me with your word usage and everything. I thought you did a great job showing it." Man, she fucking nailed it. I was surprised, mostly because I kinda thought she was an airhead. Now I feel bad. 

I also realized that this other guy in my class is workshopping poems that I have already read. Because he used them in the last workshop class I had with him. Cheater. 

Ugh, well now I have to write a 10 minute play (or at least I think I still do) as a midterm for my adolescent lit class. So not looking forward to this. Drama is my least favorite part of creative writing. 

Two poems in one week, its a record!

I cannot: Break

your fall

into her, Grace

Be with you

when nightmares melt

to waking dreams--all lies

Claim to hold the truth

protected between the I and You.

So walk with Grace

alongside the running

stream of now and then,

reflecting what is and was,

where I and You have drifted 

leaving their truth to fight through

murky waves of Grace 

You and I cannot break. 

Well its a rough draft. I wrote it during my adolescent lit class so it sort of has that teenage angsty feel to me. I definitely have to work out the kinks on structure, punctuation and all that jazz, but I was pretty satisfied with the word usage. We shall see what changes and what remains the same. I also need a title.

The past couple days have actually been quite nice. After Friday I was able to kind of put the whole job situation to the back of my mind and focus on other things like family and friends. Tomorrow Emily and I will be face painting at a Purim festival for 3 hours and that should be interesting. We are potentially going to be making $90-120 each so it'll be sweet to have some extra cash. 

Also I have been researching and, if all goes well, Em and I might be able to take a quick trip up North this weekend. We'd be making stops in Seattle, Forks, Portland, Redwood Forest, and San Francisco. The trip will cost about $200 but I super want to do this. I'm not getting my hopes up about anything anymore though, so we'll see. 

Saturday was my Grandpa's birthday party and I spent a good couple of hours talking with my mom and aunts about traveling through Europe. My mom and Tia Evie are way against this idea because a)they're generally inclined to worry and b)my aunt has seen Taken. My Tia Tree (who has the same birthday as me) on the other hand took a 3 month trip when she was 23 and had an amazing time. She is absolutely determined that I do this and has told me she will help me plan it when I want to go. I am so down with this idea. I just need the money, which is really the main issue. 

On a completely unrelated note: I have decided to attempt to recreate a fanfic of mine into a regular work of fiction. At this point I am thinking it'll probably end up being a short story, but I'm not quite sure it will fit the criteria. I shall have to write it and then investigate. I made this decision based upon the realization that I am freakin' good at writing fanfic, but lack the motivation to create works of original fiction. So I've decided to compromise and try to rewrite my existing plot/story lines using completely original characters. I think for this first attempt I shall keep the occupations of the main characters the same and just create my own world. I know this probably sounds like a no brainer to most, but knowing the story like I do its actually quite tricky to accomplish this without it sounding like a rewritten work of fanfiction. Anyways, we shall see when I actually get down to business with this since I have to do a comparative analysis of a literary review for Thursday and write a 10 minute play for Monday. Not to mention an in-class analysis of a poem on Thursday as well. Its Midterm season if you haven't guessed. 

New poem

Stained

“Out, damned spot! out, I say!...Here’s

the smell of the blood still: all the

perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten

this little hand.”

- Macbeth, William Shakespeare


I’ve contracted this new life:

the ramifications forcing me

to change my clothes, give explanations.

I thought at first

It can be removed,

but its been inside my skin

highlighting the lines at the sides

of my mouth, my eyes,

my fingertips.


My severance of these two lives

requires more answers.

But how do you explain away what was not—

or never will be?

Those answers remain

a stain on the corpse

of my conscience with its

delicate mouth, eyes,

fingertips;

never letting me erase the memory

of the one mistake I fixed.

Some people doubt my intuition

I've gone to work everyday for the last month or so thinking that this could be the day I lose my job.

Bitch face

I love when I'm right

So the vampire chick in Paris, Je t'aime is totally that stupid actress from Hitman. I totally called that shit. 

And people think the Rewards card isn't worth it...

Some guy came into the store today and purchased like 80 items that had just been marked down to a dollar. His total came out to around $93 and he had $95 in Borders Bucks. He saved a total of $2400. I wish I could do that. 

Although, he would have had to have spent $2850 in order to earn said Borders Bucks. So, its a toss up really on whether I would want to do that. 

I have to analyze one of my fellow classmate's poems and its horrible. I can read poems about sex. That's fine. But this one is ridiculous. Its like if Chuck Palahniuk wrote a sex poem. There is no grace, no emotion, and no point. And the writing leaves a lot to be desired. Clearly I am not a huge fan of Chuck's writing. But he is quite amusing in person. 

Anyway, now I am stuck with the tasks of telling this person that their poem is crap. Plus I have to write my own poem to be workshopped next Thursday. I have no ideas. 

Words are hard.

Ack! I writing too much today. I'd just thought I'd share the final result of my advertisement analysis. It is clear towards the end that I am rushing and there are some terms you may not be familiar with, but overall I am quite proud of the results. Here is a link to the ad. Its not the actual ad but the picture the takes you to the collection is the same, along with the copy. The layout is different, but that is made clear in my description. Please enjoy.

Fashion at a Fraction

What could a Target ad possibly be doing in Vanity Fair, a magazine known for its high-end fashion advertisements? Its offering you just that: high-end fashion…at a fraction of the cost. This Target ad has tapped into hopes, fears, and desires of contemporary America. In the face of an economic down turn, the likes of which the country hasn’t faced in several decades, American consumers are reevaluating their budgets and being forced to abandon the luxury of keeping up with those ever-fashionable Kardashians and those like them. But Target tells us, through their well-placed advertisement that we don’t have to abandon our bling or our budget.

The March 2009 issue of Vanity Fair features President Barak Obama as their cover model, stating that his ERA BEGINS! It seems fitting then that amidst page after page of designer clothing advertisements we find one lone Target ad proclaiming that you can get the “glam without pricey drama”. In this singular ad Target “targets” one of the greatest issues facing American citizens today, one which President Obama himself is addressing while in office: the economy. In this advertisement we see a young, classically coiffed and made up blonde, white female leaning happily and dreamily with her cheek cupped by her right hand. On her wrist, fingers, neck and ears are colorful and sparkling jewelry that perfectly compliment her skin tone, eye color, and makeup. She seems unadorned by anything else, including clothing. There seems to possibly be a hint of white material at the bottom of the page, but it is insignificant in comparison to her gleaming skin and jewelry. Just beneath her chin, next to a Target symbol, we read “Target delivers glam without pricey drama, Erickson Beamon starting at $14.99”. In the bottom left corner we are given further information about this sale: it is running from “February 15 — June 26 and we can preview this collection at Target.com/ericksonbeamon”. We can also “Expect More. Pay Less”. And there in lies the key to the success of Target thus far. They promise to give us more and not charge us for this luxury. This is exactly what consumers want to hear especially in economic times like these. Those young “strivers” in the VALS2 network would be highly appealed to by such a prospect. These people who wish to appear to have the money and success but don’t might very well find the prospect of purchasing jewelry made by a designer featured in magazines like Vogue and Elle an amazing opportunity. But this ad isn’t only playing on the consumer’s financial fears, its also addressing the fear of not fitting in.

Henry A. Murray’s taxonomy of needs lists many of the different desires being appealed to in this advertisement, but just under that need for sex (i.e. the nearly naked model), is that need for affiliation. This advertisement is telling you that you too can have that glamorous life that you see within the pages of this very magazine without filing for bankruptcy afterwards. You can have that life, for $14.99 plus tax. Perhaps the most obvious testament to this promise is the three words at the very bottom of the left corner. Design for All. It is the populist proclamation that everyone has the right and now the opportunity to wear designer. By appealing to this desire to belong to this group of people who can afford designer jewelry in an economic crisis, Target is also appealing to the consumer’s need for prominence, for attention, and to achieve. They want to belong to this elite sect, but since they don’t, they want to look like they do. It’s a populist advertisement for becoming elite.

The analysis of gender in the ad is tricky to directly define. It certainly follows the “Men’s Woman” pattern of young, white, blonde, attractive, scantily clad, and unattached to any form of significant other. However, surpassing all of that is the fact that it presents one of the biggest concerns of a “Women’s Woman”: “the desire to attain and maintain her physical attractiveness” (209). This woman in the ad is beautiful. Not only is she simply beautiful, she is glamorous. What higher level of attractiveness is there than that? This advertisement tells the female reader: Don’t you want to be glamorous like her? And now they can for under $20. With gender mostly identified, race becomes a whole other matter. The woman is white. Does this tell us that only white people can be glamorous? It is unclear based on the aesthetics of the ad itself. Most of the other advertisements in the magazine focus on vibrant colors and spring collections. If this is Target’s “Spring Collection”, as the dates seem to imply, then the model they chose compliment the colors perfectly. As stated before, the colors of the jewelry (gold, pink, white, and blue) perfectly match the physical appearance of the model: white with blonde hair, pink lips, and blue eyes.

Through careful analysis it is clear now that the seemingly out of place Target ad in March’s Vanity Fair is actually a clever response to both the needs and desires of contemporary consumers. They targeted the nationwide economic panic and its retail and social implications with a well-organized appeal to the penny-pinching consumer. It wouldn’t be surprising if similar ads begin to surface, making even more promises that you can have it all at the fraction of the cost.
 

------->I just wanted to add, for my fellow GG fans. This is also an Erickson Beamon piece. 

XOXO

Apollo 13 is on right now. We all know what I shall be doing for the next hour and 12 minutes. 

I know too much of a good thing is bad, but what about too much of nothing?

I continue to procrastinate and am watching Jake 2.0 on Sci-fi, a show starring Christopher Gorham, one of my faves. He's just precious. 

In one of the episodes I was rather delightfully surprised to find him paired up with Carly Pope, his "Popular" costar. 

In this episode Grace Park, of BSG fame, has a quick appearance as a bio-tech of sorts. Even though its an itsy bitsy role, I don't know if I really want to see her face given last week's BSG episode. Hmm...

Ugh, I guess I'll go back to analyzing magazine advertisements. I foresee horrible grades this semester. 

Are you excited about this Kellie?

I just watched the preview for Kendra's new show on E! and I laughed throughout the whole thing. I cannot wait for this show.