Rules

You probably don't know who you are, reading this, and maybe I don't either. But I want to ask you so many questions, and know more about you. I want to find out if I like you more, or less. I of course, wonder if I can play with you and have you for keeps or if you would just be a learning experience, and maybe a good friend.

I feel like this is cheesy writing from an easy-read fiction novel, or I'm 12 years old again. Except I'm not... so I don't think the same way I did then.

Of course life as an adult is so much more intense. Having freedom and educating yourself, not being ignorant, and trying to adhere to the rules of society, and all that stuff. I think what I've learned so far in life is that there are rules, but they are merely guidelines. Most people can't say that they've never broken or at least bent the rules.

I try to keep telling myself that as long as something makes me feel okay, if it is some kind of positive aspect of my life, then stick with it. Even if it isn't exactly the norm. It's okay to bend the rules once in a while.

Milk

I think I heard somewhere that as we get older, most people become more lactose intolerant. I recognize that this may be true because while mammals drink their mother's milk for a certain amount of time as youngsters, humans are the only weird ones who sometimes don't breastfeed their babies and give them formula instead, and we consume milk from other mammals way more than our own. Isn't that kind of weird? Those lacto-orvo vegetarians or whatever they're called may be onto something. I'm not a big fan of eggs, either.

Hot day...

I saw Knocked Up finally tonight. I expected it to be good, but I didn't think I would be non-stop laughing! I like this particular family of actors who were all involved with Freaks and Geeks or Undeclared. Everyone was in Knocked Up! The girl who is on Undeclared and Carnivale wasn't, but everyone else! Pretty much.

Today was a hot day and laughing my ass off was a nice way to end it, though I feel like I may go to bed frustrated, for... reasons I do not wish to discuss here, capisce? Holy hell, I am just sweating here in my room. Hardwood flooring sounds good right now.

Whistling at Target

I normally avoid public bathrooms if I can, but when I go into the bathroom at Target, I'm reminded of why they are weird. In the bathroom, there is a woman in the stall, whistling away. And she's not just random whistling--she may as well have had sheet music in front of her or something... She must really like the song "Red River Valley."

Clarinet

I feel hopeful about the possibility that I may acquire my grandfather's clarinet once again, and hang onto it for keeps. The instrument is not only amazing but it is so special and sentimental to me. It must never leave the family, that is for sure. If there is one thing I would like to do in honor of my grandpa and my love for him, it would be allowing that clarinet to live on. When I originally played it in my pre-teen years, I wanted a flute but ended up with the clarinet. I was pretty good at it, though, and I think it would be cool to pick it up again. Now that I have really come to appreciate a lot of jazz music that has clarinet in it, I want to get my hands on it, pronto.

I learned how to read music playing the clarinet. I went on Saturday mornings with my grandpa out to this older/elderly man's house, way out by the freeway exit by Mall 205 or Division or something, to have clarinet lessons. For a while I really put some effort into it, though I remember really not wanting to go at least one morning because my lesson was at nine or ten a.m. and let's face it, I've never been much of a morning person! But now, if my cousin returns the instrument to me, hopefully he will also have some of the lesson books that I probably returned along with the clarinet when I gave it back to my grandpa.

The interesting thing will be to see how this goes with the family. Should anyone find out that I am trying to take the instrument for my own possession, will anyone make it an issue? Or will they allow me to have it because they comprehend the respect I am trying to show for my grandfather by putting it to use or at least keeping it in the family? That is definitely a main objective. It will be so cool to have it in its cool little case that looks like a fat flute box. Obviously before they took clarinets totally apart and put them in those square-shaped, velvet-lined cases that all the ones at my middle school had, the instrument was just pulled apart in half and laid inside a thinner rectangular one. Or maybe that is just the case my grandfather's was in. In any case, I anxiously await a response from the cousin in Corvallis...

I Love.

Bikes
Originally uploaded by liz bernunz

I love riding bikes, and I wish one of these in the picture were mine. Tonight when I rode my bike over to SE it only took 23 minutes. I felt like I went the route that a bicyclist would most sensibly take, but whenever I am on the road sharing with cars I always have this fear that they are hating me as they're driving past me, passing me because I slow them down. I worry about drivers on the road that dislike bicyclists.

I don't think I do a bad job of sharing the road and following the rules, but I know there are a lot of people out there that do. This group, Critical Mass I believe they are called, go riding past my apartment one night and I'm looking out the window as literally a mass of bikes just keep coming and coming. My friend tells me about their deal, how they do these bike rides to kind of say "we're here" and "share the road" and all that.

That's fabulous.

And more power to them, if they were doing it better. Along with "Ding ding!" (which got some bell responses) I yelled out my window, "Ride single file!"

Reading this, you're either or person who would yell something out their window, or not. I am, and it felt like it needed to be said. I'm sorry, but what is the point of saying to drivers, "Share the road with us" if we are not going to follow the rules that we are supposed to obey as vehicles on the road? A bicyclist is generally allowed to ride in the street and in doing so they must obey all the laws that drivers of cars do.

There's even... a bicyclist manual. I have a little improvement to do because riding in the street as a car does mean you need to know the rules, and, well... I need to get my license.

But the night Critical Mass rode by a theory surfaced: the annoying bicyclists are actually bad drivers who are lowered to riding a bike for some reason, such as financial problems or a suspended license. And this theory makes sense, if you consider the need to know the rules of driving in order to be good at riding.

Flying again

Another flying dream last night. This time I had more control over my flying, and I actually flew towards a car and came into the driver's sight just in time to freak them out and cause them to swerve their vehicle. And I seemed to take pleasure in that, which is weird...

I do not remember all that happened in the dream, since as usual more and more of it is forgotten as the day progresses, but it feels like I was around some people who were convinced I was going to jump or fall off this ledge, and then I just took off into the air like a bird or something and began flying away.

Dreams always mean something, in my view. I have had many dreams about flying, that I can remember, over the last few years, and each time I wonder what the symbolic meaning of flying in your dreams is.

"I want to get away, I want to fly away, yea, yea, yea....."

Get outta the fountain you clowns!

Get outta the fountain you clowns!
Originally uploaded by liz bernunz

I love Peninsula Rose Garden, in North Portland at Albina and Ainsworth. A funny aspect of the park is the fountain you are not supposed to swim in. There are small signs on the light posts around the fountain stating that you are not allowed to wade or swim in it, but as most of us know, people don't really read signs. And the signs are only in English. The smell of chlorine as you walk by the fountain signifies to me that the city knows people swim in it anyway, and they probably add chlorine to avoid any possible lawsuits or other disputes. What is amazing is the close proximity of an actual wading pool to this fountain, in the other part of the park, closer to the community center. I have been at the park and witnessed people getting kicked out of the fountain a couple times now. Every time I see people going in the fountain with their children and dogs, I think of all the things that could possibly be in that water and hope that the chlorine works! Ew!

Ummm....

I grew up being using mostly correct grammar, having been taught well in school. Or, having paid attention in school. It is interesting to me how good grammar still seems to be valued these days, but not used a lot. I think one factor is the use of shorthand words for text messaging. Or I at least wonder if that could be a reason for so many people confusing "you're" with "your." Because in a text message, you usually get away with "ur" and it is understood what you mean. But when people are actually typing out everything they're saying, people have become too lazy or something. I see a lot of, "Your so nice." People leave out punctuation, sure, "cant" instead of "can't", but the your/you're thing is just weird because they mean different things. You are (you're) the person that annoys everyone when you correct people's bad grammar, so I don't usually say anything about it, I just cry a little inside...

Is it Fall already or what....?

BRRRRR!! I thought Portland was supposed to have at least two seasons: rainy, and August? Last I checked we're in the 8th month of the year now, and the sun should be shining repeatedly and consecutively!

My love...

When I acquired basically an entire record collection from Bill after getting my own turntable, it took me a while to discover this jewel of an album. Supposedly of the psychedelic genre, this album, Just for Love, by Quicksilver Messenger Service, is superb, to put it simply.

It is really refreshing to listen to after being subjected to the same 15 songs over and over on Jammin' 95.5FM or the same 100 or so songs from my playlist of favorites in iTunes. Now I am afraid that I will overplay the 10 min 32 sec song I love, called "The Hat." It's so easy to just pick up the needle and replay the song again and again! I have been told that isn't good for vinyl, but hey, nothing lasts forever!

Looking at this album cover, I don't know what one might expect of their music, but this is definitely a good record to put on and just chill out to. I can handle listen to "jam rock" (like Phish for example) so this music suits me just fine. There aren't many other people I know who indulge in this sort of music very much, so I guess listening to this album is a unique pleasure of mine.

Less is more

I have made the conscious decision that I would like to cut down on my usage of the Internet, especially sites like Myspace. All the coolest people don't even have an account on there. I get bored so I like to do funny things like make an account for Linda Goodman. But surely there must be other things that I can do. I believe that I have a lot of areas that could use improvement and upon my doing so other areas of my life will be greatly benefited... But it's oh-so-hard to think about being able to be strong at a time when I have barely any money to do anything.

Can we please just go to Sicilia and pick oranges?

Talkin' Smack

It has to be a natural human inclination to talk badly about other people. Some people wait to be provoked into doing so, others are totally random about it, and many people, in everyone's best interest, keep it to themselves. I'm guilty of doing it, but some people really need to just slap themselves!! ...one time...

Mission Hill

I watched this animated show and I always laugh about this one girl the geeky boy meets and has a crush on. He tries to be smooth and gives her flowers and she scoffs at him and says something like "Why do people always give a plant's sexual organs to each other as gifts?"

I think that is spectacular--one species' sexual organs helping out another's.

Flowers are pretty and happy!

________________________________________________________

What Netflix says about Mission Hill:
This uproarious animated series from the former executive producers and head writers of "The Simpsons" follows a tight-knit group of slackers who work dead-end jobs in the hipper-than-thou neighborhood of Mission Hill. The debut season introduces protagonist Andy French, a 24-year-old waterbed salesman (and wanna-be cartoonist) whose world is disrupted when his geeky teenage brother becomes his roomie, along with a slobbery pooch named Stogie.

iMic

I borrowed the program iMic from my best friend Ariel and am currently recording what I consider to be a fabulous album, Just For Love by Quicksilver. Last night she said her dad, our expert on pretty much most types of music, said that they are psychedelic when we're talking genre. I don't know but they have this song called "The Hat" and I don't know how much they talk about a hat at all but the line I love is, "Whatever you're doing, you do it the right way, whatever you're doing, it's all right with me." The first side of that album was my first choice to record and use to try and make sense of this program. Audacity, it's actually called. You have the audacity to record that album?!?! I'm pretty sure I can guarantee I'll be making the best mix CDs now. Not that anyone listens to CDs... Haha, last night I stated that I don't think there would be a point to burning the the new Distillers album for me because I probably wouldn't listen to it and I said that I'd put it on my computer, so Dylan says "Don't wanna commit to a CD?" Very true... They're becoming obsolete (Music Millennium on 23rd is closing... I think that's some proof). But then, I still listen to vinyl...! Hey... It's tight. And as long as there are DJs there will be LPs.

amazing.

LB © 2007

This picture is even cooler, the glowing edges effect. I really like how the skin looks for some reason, aside from the obvious coolness of how my eye looks. "Coolest picture EVER"~my sister.

Back

So I got back into photography pretty quickly and with a bang! Sort of. I have started using Photoshop, finally, and just started playing with cool effects. I don't remember what this one is called, but my lashes are like that because the mascara is turquoise. Macro is awesome...