Tonight I pretty much forced my mother to go see the movie Juno with me. When I first saw the preview, I turned to Amy and said, "I have to see that movie." I kept learning more and more about it. I did not know that Kimya Dawson was the music director until the movie started. As you can imagine, the music is amazing. Perfect. I can honestly say that I can't remember the last time I was so thoroughly pleased with a film. I was afraid that it wouldn't meet my expectations, but as soon as it started, it had already met them. The characters are all extremely lovable. I don't really want to say much about the film, other than that it was definitely the best movie I've seen in a long time and that everyone who loves me should probably make a concerted effort to see it.

In other news, I bought a mattress pad today. I'm very excited about the prospect of being able to sleep well. I hope it's good. I spent a long time deliberating about what I should purchase, so I hope I made a good decision. Now I will have the most comfortable bed in the world.

I've been feeling the need to be creative lately, but not really all that inspired. It's like I want to do something creative (painting, sewing, writing, photographing, etc.), but I haven't determined what my subject should be or what medium I should use. One thing that I would like to work on is an art project that got stunted at the beginning of the summer. Goal number one is to get pictures. I need lots of pictures of the people I love. So put on outfits that make you feel sexy, everybody, and I'll document you. Not that anyone reads this blog...but oh well.

Okay, I think I need to tuck myself into bed. I'm sick of being on the computer.

Yesterday, Nathan and I prepared ourselves for a birthday party. One of the women that I worked with for I-Rise - Tara - had her thirtieth and the theme was "Eurotrash." It was in Cookies, which is essentially the same building as O'Henry's. We walked into O'Henry's, wearing two pretty trashy outfits. Nathan's included a cutoff shirt with 80's graphics and a crazy little necklace with big neon plastic beads. I was wearing silver stilettos and a blinding sweatshirt the color of a yellow highlighter. All of the townies turned their heads and stared at us, as if to say, "What the hell are you doing here?"

Cookies was not open. So we left.

Not knowing what to do with ourselves, we meandered over to Scandals (which, aside from working on P.U.S.H., it was my first trip to the club), where we were the only patrons there. The dance music was blaring. We enclosed ourselves in a corner until they started doing Trivia Night. We called ourselves "The Future" and didn't do very well at trivia. I did, however, win a free pass to Scandals and a $5.00 gift certificate to Tripp's, a pretty terrible restaurant.

Josh called me later to tell me that Tara's party had been moved to Smokey's because Cookies wasn't open. He also said that the party was ending at that point and that no one had shown because the weather was bad. So we didn't really miss much.

After Trivia, we stuck around for a bit because we wanted to see the drag show. It was an "Anti-Christmas" thing, and the drag queens basically came out dressed up in not very impressive costumes, performing songs they didn't know. I would not even be surprised if they didn't know beforehand what they were performing. Anyway, the audience was not impressed. One of the drag queens snubbed us for not giving her dollars. But I'm sorry - I don't give dollars to drag queens that do not entertain me.

Today we spent a bit of time with Emily. We met her for lunch at Laughing Seed and then she made us dinner later. So much good food. I've really felt good spending time with Emily these past few days. It makes me feel bad that I haven't allowed myself this time. Now it's like she might be moving away soon and I have let our time together pass by.

I also had my meeting with Dr. Kelley and Dr. Betsalel today. We talked about what this project is going to entail a little bit more concretely. I'm really excited about working with them. I'm particularly interested in working with Dr. Kelley, because I feel like she and I have a lot of similar goals when it comes to ethnographic methods and whatnot. I am going to be spending a lot of my summer in Asheville as a result of this internshipprojectthing. Which means - I would like people to come to me this summer. Hahaha. Just kidding.

Okay. I'm exhausted. I would/could write more, but I'm tired.

I'll have more to say tomorrow. Right now I feel like going to bed. Except, I need to post the new wine tags I made for Brandy. Nathan designed the pictures for one of his classes this semester. Since I can't draw animals, I asked if I could use his images. He was actually really excited about me asking to do that. But here they are. I love them.

By the way, it is really rewarding to be productive and feel excited about doing arty/crafty stuff. I feel really excited about Christmas this year, just because I've been spending so much time working on these things and I can't wait for people to get them.

This morning, I woke up from a pretty disturbing dream. You know those dreams that for some reason affect how you feel throughout the day? I think that is the way this dream was for me. Throughout the entire dream, I was in a school that was sometimes West Vigo and sometimes UNCA. I distinctly saw Mrs. Longest, but I was also very much aware of being in college. The school resembled West Vigo. I remember there being a lot of green.

The dream featured Amy perhaps more than anyone. The two of us were spending a lot of time together, but it was getting confusing because we didn't know how to be with each other without being physically affectionate. I kept realizing that we were kissing or that I was touching her knee and then pulled back quickly. The whole situation made me feel uneasy. I started getting severely depressed. I was crying a lot in the context of the dream, and was generally just trying to pull myself together throughout the dream. I eventually went to class, and it was a dance class in West Vigo's concave gym. I obviously did not know how to do the dance, because I'm pretty sure I've never been able to do a choreographed dance in my life. I had been wearing a hoodie throughout the dream, and putting my hands inside the pocket. When it was my turn to do the dance (we were split into three groups), I pulled up my hood on my hoodie and glowered against the wall with my hands in my pockets. This repulsive man came over. He was a mixture of every male authority figure I've ever hated, and I suppose he was supposed to be some guy in power, like a dean or something. He asked me what I was concealing in my pocket. I made some statement about how the only reason he remotely suspected me was because I had put my hood up. He placed his hands just below my breasts to feel for something. He grabbed my stomach, and asked what it was. I screamed at him, "It's my stomach!" He then placed his hands inside my front pocket and started saying something about how I could probably take him to court if he wasn't careful. I yelled, "I can take you to court for this! And I will!" He said, "At least you aren't anyone special at UNCA," and walked away. I said to his back, "You'd be surprised."

And I woke up.

Now I am with Laura, watching Flinn's DVDs of Veronica Mars. I've never seen this show, and I'm not paying attention. Nathan is sleeping in my bed. We may go to Over Easy if we get ourselves together in time. We'll see. After that, Nathan and I will go to super Goodwill to shop for Eurotrash clothing that we can wear to Tara's party tonight. I hope we have a good time. I haven't been to a party in a long time, and I'm not sure how good I am at them. From what I recall, I've never been very good.

I woke up this morning with a knot in my stomach. It started last night, and I'm not sure what it is. I hoped that if I wrote about it, it would go away. It is a ball of stress. It is round and large, and it is rolling around inside of me. Sometimes parts of it break off and come up into my throat. It is the feeling I get when something is wrong. Because of this something wrong, I wasn't able to get to sleep until nearly five or so. I just managed to fall asleep before my room turned blue from the sunlight streaming in. I thought it might have been the fact that it was so late and I couldn't fall asleep that was keeping me awake. That happens occasionally, particularly when the hour of sunrise looms nearer.

But the ball was still there when I woke. I am not particularly tired, even though I only managed about five hours of sleep. I am just anxious. I doubt this has anything to do with Nathan coming. I doubt it has anything to do with anything I'm anticipating in the near future. I just want to know the source of this tension. I may not know it until it goes away. Wish me luck, people, I'm going to go on with my life. And I may take a bath on my way there.

So now that I have time, I decided I might start writing. I don't know what I'm going to be writing here, and I'm sure no one will read whatever it is that I do decide to write, but that doesn't bother me. Last night, I decided to read back over my old livejournal posts. I'm absolutely not ready to jump back on livejournal, but I do realize that it's a useful tool to have an online archive of thoughts, ideas, and other kinds of things that happen in your head that you put into words. No matter how seemingly meaningless those words may seem at the time, it's amazing to be able to go back and look at them later. It's helpful to have a concrete shape to your experiences, your thoughts about your experiences, and anything else that you might think is important.

I can't believe how serious I'm being in this initial post. Don't take it as a sign of what's to come. I'm rarely this introspective.

Which, I suppose, isn't necessarily a good thing. I hope to become a little more introspective these days. I am trying to learn what I want from myself. I am in desperate need of a little bit of self-love and a lot bit of not ignoring what it is that I want and need.

The most important need I have now is to be creative. I've been doing a pretty good job of it, I think, but I need more of it. I need to remind myself that the apartment has no decor, and that I'm fully capable of changing that.

I've recently been working on Christmas presents for my family members. I've nearly finished my sister's present, which is a set of twelve wine tags (so people know whose wine is whose). She likes vegetables and she loves wine (possibly an inherited trait?), so I figured it would probably be a good present for her. I made the little veggies out of Shrinky Dinks. I designed them myself. I think it's fair to say that I'm a proud person, so I have of course been showing them off to everyone I know who has eyes. Which is all of about three people these days.

I'm also making my brother the game of Liar's Dice. Which isn't remotely finished. I'm sure I'll figure out some way of putting a picture of that up before long. That is, if I keep doing this whole blog thing.

Tomorrow, Nathan is coming to Asheville to visit. I am extraordinarily excited about this. He has perfect timing. I've never needed him here more than I do right now. I just want to wrap myself up in the people I've neglected for the past long while. They make a great blanket.

Before we pick up Nathan, Laura and I are going to meet Alex in Charlotte for an Urban Outfitters excursion. I am so happy that we'll be hanging out with her. Alex is one of the most important people I've let slip through the cracks of my life, and I'm anxious to start spending time with her again. I'm especially looking forward to it now that I know (and enjoy) other Alex, who for all intensive purposes, I will continue calling Sheila, especially since I know that she will become a more important figure in my life in the near and distant futures.

But for now, I think I should try to go to sleep. I've been waiting for the laundry to be done. I think it's close. If not, the most important parts will be (the mattress pad and pillow cases), and that's really all that matters.