Manners

There are useful manners, and then manners that people are like "what the fuck is that about?" when they hear them. But all manners had some use at some time. Many of the ones I was all "what the fuck is that about?" were useful back when servants were common.

Example: breaking your bread over your plate, buttering it over your plate, and popping the morsel into your mouth. WTF? But if you think about it, even the softest bread generates crumbs. So, breaking it over the plate means all those crumbs land in your plate, and your servants have less to sweep up over the night.

No elbows on the table. WTF? Why not? But if you have wine on the table and someone who likes to gesture with their hands, well, no elbows on the table keeps them from knocking the wine over as often. And wine stains, so it's even more important to keep it from hitting the cloth.

Ask for items to be passed instead of reaching for them. This one also keeps the person who needs the item from knocking things over and making a mess.



These are all I can think of for the moment, but I'm sure there's others.

Pomegranate

So, we bought some fresh pomegranate. He likes the juice and we both like the dried chocolate-covered ones, so we thought we'd try it fresh.

Today I finally got around to looking up how to do this. That's imperative with any new fruit- find out what part you eat and what part you don't, and if it's complicated to get to teh part you eat, how to do that as well. This one is complicated.

You don't eat the pomegranate itself. you eat the seeds, and the fleshy bit that surrounds the seeds. Imaging a grape. Make it smaller, about a quarter the size. Now turn the vine inside out and make it thicker. That's what a pomegranate is like (as far as how it's put together, that is).

I followed the directions here: http://localfoods.about.com/od/pomegranates/ss/How-To-Eat-A-Pomegranate.htm

It took me about an hour to separate out the seeds. An hour! The juice from them got everywhere, including on me (luckily I was naked as I did this). But they are good. I don't like the juice, and the chocolates, while okay, leave a strange aftertaste in my mouth. The seeds have a bit of nuttiness to add to the flavor of the flesh (which is what I can taste in the juice and the chocolates). That, to me, makes all the difference. Plus the fact that it's a smaller dose.

All in all, I would recommend that anyone who likes berries try it at least once. But bring some friends! I ended up with about a cup and a quarter of seeds. That's a full cereal bull to me!

Random Ideas- Cam room Fun

To understand the reason behind these ideas, my roommate does not like it when I take the camera out of the bedroom. His reasoning is that he can't then go into whatever room I'm taking up. So my thoughts have been, how can I do a shower show in my room? How can I do messy stuff in my room? What sort of cooking could I do in my room?

Enter the ideas!

Shower/mess shows:

Get a small inflatable kiddie pool and a large inflatable kiddie pool. Put the small one in the large one. Do my show standing in the small one, the large one is there just to catch any overflow.

Cooking Shows

Get a couple of those hot plates they sell for dorm rooms, along with a hot pot and a metal rack so I don't burn anything. Cook away.

Of course, for either of these to work, I need to buy some stuff, and that would get expensive. Anyone wanna get part of it for me? Send me a private message somewhere (twitter of mfc mail) and I'll give you my po box to send it to.

This week I'm kinda excited. I'll have spending money for once! I get that about once a month, and it usually ends up having been a mistake, but there's some legitimate needs:

-white stickers
-bulb for lamp
-lube
-duck tape
-hand towel for bathroom
-razors

Missing People

For years, I've been trying to figure out why I miss people and why I don't. Because there have only been two instances of truly missing people in my life. One was my adoptive family, the second is my current roommate.

I blamed foster care on my lack of missing people. But is blame really the right word? I think I've finally figured it out.

There are two commonalities in when I miss someone:
-I *really* care what they think about me
-I am afraid that the distance will affect our relationship

This means that in order to miss someone, I have to believe that they are willing to let the fact that we haven't seen each other in a long time affect how they feel about me. Which means all the people for whom I don't miss but I do care about, I don't feel afraid that they will do that. I've had it all backwards. The people I care about but don't miss are the people I really need in my life.

Luckily, with my adoptive family, we've gotten to a point where I'm not afraid that they will cut me out. So I don't miss them when they're gone anymore. I've never really missed my biological family, because I've always been of the firm belief of "once family, always family". I can't lose the status of being their family, that right is mine from birth. And our family has strong ties; always have, always will.

So to anyone I care about but I say "I miss you", it's not this gut-wrenching I need to be there right now missing. It's more a light, "I wish we were together". The gut-wrenching need is a bad thing. The light desire is so faint it's hard to tell it's there. Because I've trained myself to not want what I know I can't have. Unless there's something I can do to work towards it, and then I only mildly want it, in such a way that it's hard for me to remember that I do, but occasionally I feel the desire to spur me into working towards it again.

(sorry if this isn't very coherent, woke up early and couldn't sleep till I wrote it out)

Tarot Reading

I am spiritual. I believe in God, and I believe firmly in the message of Love. That is to say, we should treat everyone with as much dignity and respect as we can, and eliminate hate from our lives where possible.

I have two decks. One, the Gilded Tarot, is really accurate no matter who I use it with. The other, the Sacred Geometry Oracle, I only ever get a reading that makes sense when I use it specifically for myself.

Sometimes I use reversed meanings (what it means when the card was placed upside-down) and sometimes I don't. I always specify which I'm doing before I start the reading. This reading, I did not use reverse meanings, and I used the Sacred Geometry Oracle Deck.

11/12/2011
12:54 pm

Mind:

18- Hexahedron
-hemmed in
-radical change necessary
-get some perspective

Body:

7- Owl/Raven - Yin/Yang
-union of opposites
-process of balancing is at work
-begin designing ways to bring yourself into balance with your true nature
-acknowledge dark within light, but see your light shining in the darkness

Spirit:

52- invoking the infinite

-actively involved in a healing process
-heal self first, then assist others
-probably spiritual healing needed

To be burried

School starts Monday, which means my new schedule starts Sunday. In the interest of full-disclosure... I am physically awake from noon-2:30 am, sometimes later. I am mentally awake from 2pm-2am.

Sunday: Laundry, MFC 9pm-2am
Monday: SM 4pm-6pm, Class 7:30pm-10:30pm, SM 11pm-2am
Tuesday: HW 2pm-4pm, Class 5pm-8:30pm, MFC 11pm-2am
Wednesday: HW 2pm-4pm, Class 5pm-10:30pm
Thursay: HW 2pm-4pm, Class 5pm-8pm, SM 10pm - 2am
Friday: HW 2pm-4pm, MFC 5pm-2am (1 hour break for dinner)
Saturday: Errands, DnD (sometimes on camera)

This semester runs 11/14/2011 - 2/10/2012

Red week will be December 3rd - 8th
I will also be gone December 11th-16th to see my adoptive brother get married.