Today I discovered Star Wars paper snowflakes, and it felt like the last piece of my life just fell into place. There are those times in your life when things just feel right, and rainbows should start exploding all over the sky and you should start pooping glitter. I spent a slightly regrettable amount of time cutting up that bad boy on the left, using those crappy dull office scissors and a box cutter. Because, you know, I only use the best tools. That’s why Boba Fett’s lil helmet thingies look so shoddy. But I was determined. And shocked that I still have all my fingers and spilled no blood. Perhaps tomorrow when I try to tackle the Stormtrooper.

And then there’s this little gem. Before anyone gets excited*, no this isn’t a teaser for a LEGO Lord of the Rings videogame adaptation. It is merely for playsets. But anyone who thinks the videogame isn’t on the way is a complete fool. I’ve been saying for years that they need to do this, and anyone who starts bitching that it “ruins the franchise” or whatever other garbage people spew from their faces is going to get sliced with an Uruk-hai scimitar. Main reason: Gateway for kids to get into the series. Letting LEGO do their fun little adaptations does absolutely nothing to insult the series. In fact, I don’t think anything anyone would do at this point could ever insult the series. Maybe some kids are a little too young to watch the films or read the books. I think LEGO would be a great way to introduce them to the series, especially if (when) the games come out, since they are always great with co-op play. Fun for the whole family! But since we have to labor under the assumption that this is only for physical playsets, I’ll just slowwwwly start putting money aside for a full scale model of Rivendell, assuming that’s one of the options.**

* – I PRACTICALLY FLIPPED MY CHAIR WHEN I FIRST SAW IT and then I realized it was just playsets BUT THEN I DIDN’T CARE ANYMORE.
** – If it’s not one of the options, they’ll be the next to die by Uruk-hai scimitar. OMG what if they did the bigger models as part of their LEGO Architecture series? OMGOMGOMGOMG JUST TAKE MY MONEY NOW.

I’m on an art kick. The evidence is clear. Now my only problem is that I have no walls to put this stuff on. That’s ok though, because I can just put all of it on my Pinterest so I don’t forget about it. That’s usually what gets me out of buying things. I’ll say well, I’ll just buy it later. Then I’ll forget about it, which is a sign that it wasn’t really necessary in the first place, right? But now I have Pinterest, where I can put EVERYTHING I COULD POSSIBLY WANT into organized pinboards for later purchase. Actually at this point, after all the shit I’ve added to these boards, I almost wish Pinterest didn’t exist. But I digress.

The art I’m featuring today is by Jessica Swift, who is clearly suppressing a deep love for The Legend of Zelda, as there are a whole crap-ton of Triforces in the image above. I came across her art on Fab.com today and knew I was in trouble as soon as I saw it. Colors everywhere. Exactly the kind of stuff I want to put in my creative room/office next year, which is where I’ll write, draw, paint, play the damn flute, and have an entire wall made into a bulletin board. I naturally made the mistake of googling her to check out if she had a website, which of course she does, and it is filled with prints and iPhone cases and rainboots and calendars and SUNSHINE AND RAINBOWS AND BUNNY RABBITS. You can even get some of her original paintings for pretty reasonable prices. I can’t wait to pick all of these prints out, have tubes and tubes and tubes coming in the mail, and plaster them all over my office. I’d also really like to have twine hooked throughout the ceiling with clothespins to hang pictures from. It’s obviously going to be my favorite room, and I already get intense bursts of creativity just thinking about it.

Oh and one last print of hers that I’d like to share. I used to hate prints like this. Maybe I was just a miserable little puddle of darkness, but these inspirational text prints used to drive me up a wall. Now I cannot get enough of them. And I think I need one in my life, somewhere I will always see it. I’ve really been way too prone to insecurity and low confidence recently, and perhaps something like this hanging on the inside of the front door would give me a little burst of sunshine for the day. Even in my worst moments of worrying and thinking too much, this is something that I absolutely MUST try to remember:

Let’s start by reflecting on things that are awesome, just to put things into perspective.*

• Coffee mugs with cats on them
• My cat
• Leaving work a minimum of one minute earlier than usual
• Seeing a wild Aston Martin out in its natural habitat, almost crashing my decidedly less-awesome Honda Civic, and living to tell the tale.
• Dave Grohl
• Dave Grohl dressed as a woman

Anyway. Recently I discovered Society6, where hipster-folk go for hipster-y wall prints and cases for their iPhones and artists submit their hipster-y art for purchase. I’m like 40% hipster. I’m not ashamed to admit it. I hug trees and have opinions.**

I spent the better part of two days weeding out my favorite designs and putting them side by side in a file for comparison purposes. I started out with about ten designs, chipped away at them until I had four, and then made the big grand-daddy of decisions from there. Now, not only did I take a long and perilous journey of self-discovery, but I found a new artist to adore and add to my apartment décor pinboard on Pinterest.

This is going on my wall as soon as I move, along with my hand-drawn map of Middle Earth.*** The artist’s name is Valentina. Her art is everywhere. As prints, more prints, on clothing, bedding, iPhone cases, fabric, wall murals, pillowcases, probably on cakes or some shit, who knows. All I know is I want to plaster my walls with it. And sleep on it. And wear it. And eat it. Two more favorites:

One of Valentina’s designs is going to be on my forthcoming new iPhone case which my pops offered to buy me for Christmas. I don’t feel like telling you which, and chances are it isn’t even one of the ones I featured, so you know, use your imagination. Now if you’ll excuse me I have to back to pinning things on my pinboards for the apartment that hovers, torturously, just out of my grasp.

* – this put nothing into perspective, and looking back, served no purpose whatsoever
** – should be on a t-shirt in Helvetica font
*** – accomplishes the simultaneous feats of being the dumbest thing I have ever bought as well as one of the most awesome things I own.

Hi. My name is Ashley, and I have a problem.

I need the iPhone 4S. I mean…I want the iPhone 4S. Which basically means that I need it. It isn’t really a want, because due to a lot of calculating and fanangling, I can get it for $20 or so. So why not, right? I mean it’d be stupid not to. I want to correct the mistake I made last time and get a white one this time. And it’ll be a creamy block sitting there in front of me, its milky sheen whiter than my own pasty white skin tone. I’ll take it out on dates, buy it some lo mein, probably propose to it if things go well, then it’ll probably end up dumping me and kicking me out of our house because it needs “space,” and I know I’m always touching it because I’m obsessed with Doodle Jump but that’s no reason…

Let me start over.

I want the iPhone 4S. There is no justification whatsoever for needing it. I have the iPhone 4. I adore it. But the 4S is betterrrrr. [Insert lots of whining here, where the last word of every sentence is drawn out like thissssssss]

It also stems from sort of immortal tech competition between me and my father. All my life, if I ever found out that he had some newer software or gadget, oh man did I need it. He had an iPhone for at least a year or two before me, and I made sure to glower at him when he’d want to show me something amazing on it. Shortly after that, however, I began to take the reins as the owner of only the finest new gadgets in the family. I got my iMac; he bought one a year later. I got an iPad; he bought one shortly after. I got an iPhone 4 when he still had the 3GS. And then he got the iPhone 4S. And now I’m stewing in jealousy like a beef stroganoff.

Nevertheless, unless something miraculously simple comes along, I won’t go out of my way to obtain it. I owe this to a book I picked up recently entitled Obsessive Consumption, by Kate Bingaman-Burt. Basically going to be recording every single thing I purchase(yes, every useless thing I actually spend my money on) for a year or longer. This will begin on November 1, which seems fitting because this is when lots of Christmas shopping begins. I think it’ll be an interesting project. Also thinking of drawing the things I purchased like Bingaman-Burt did, so I might even post pictures of the occasional day’s purchases. Even thinking of becoming really ballsy and drawing these things in an iPad app with a stylus…exclusively. Because nothing says ballsy like drawing on a gadget instead of using actual pen and paper. Doesn’t get anymore badass than that.

I started a different blog post the other day, ironically about the iPhone 4S and my thoughts on that, but then Wednesday happened and kind of pushed that out of the way for awhile. So instead I’m going to talk about a complete stranger and how much that stranger has positively affected my life and, in my opinion, the world.
(more…)

Joystiq really tried to pull one over on me the other day. It was September 14th, a day like any other, where I practically did shots of Mountain Dew in order to stay awake at work, and decided to check up on gaming news. The high walls of my cube could do nothing to muffle the sound of my neighbor’s slurping at her pop can, which happens each morning at precisely 9:30. But it just so happened that this was a good thing that day, because once I scrolled down to a certain news story, I sucked in a gasp at the very same time as a particularly loud slurp from my neighbor. I don’t think anyone knew what to think, as nobody made a sound after that. But I saw it, and the gasp was out, and my hand was over my heart and for several minutes I was transported back ten years to the glorious summer I spent playing that game, my favorite game of all time. The headline read: “Square Enix announces Final Fantasy 10 remake for PS Vita – and PS3. And then I plummeted into nostalgia.

(more…)

Seeing as I’ve never raised money for anything except various clubs in high school*, this was a fantastic success for me. Honestly raising ten bucks is a success in my book, but $219 is amazing. THANK YOU to everyone who helped. This, coupled with a great night with good friends, made this weekend one to remember.

So hello, mid-twenties. I hope we have a great few years together, at least until you leave me crushed and broken on the floor crying and screaming “WHHYYYYYY?! I LOVED YOU AND GAVE YOU MY FIRSTBORN CHILD AND THIS IS HOW YOU REPAY ME.” **

Now I’m thinking back to that post I did awhile ago about getting rid of junk and my current ultimate dream of having my own place. This needs to become official. I need to start a project. I need to be motivated and not just be all talk. The overarching goal here is to simply be happier. I’m 24 years old and I have the energy of a 90 year old. In fact I think I know some 90 year olds who have more energy than I do. What I don’t know yet is how to begin. I’m sick of being blah half the time and just wanting to nap. I want to live instead of just survive. What’s the point in any of this if you’re just slogging through life when you only (knowingly) get one life? It’s a waste, is what it is. Now since I have no real sense of how to start any of this, I’m going to just put down a list of things I’d like to accomplish, some simpler than others:

• Do small things immediately (hanging up my coat instead of tossing it on a chair to hang up later, etc)
• Exercise steadily
• Understand and accept what’s worth worrying about and what isn’t (probably the most difficult for me)
• Let things go
• Get rid of unnecessary possessions
• Go to bed earlier
• Stop lamenting all of these glorious things I wish I could do and enjoy what I can do, right now

There will probably be more. I came up with those in about ten seconds so they could probably use some work, as some of them kind of overlap, but I think you get the idea. It feels good already, just to have something down that I know I need to work on. Some people go through this when they’re already married/have kids/etc, so I’m glad I’m diving in early. Although I’ll probably have to rework and add goals after the married/kids thing happens (?), but I think at that point it’ll be nice to look back and see how much of this has stuck around. Ooh! I’d also like to completely revamp the site, although that isn’t a particularly deep or life-altering goal, so perhaps I’ll make a small, short-term list. Anyway, I’ll be turning 25 in 364 days, so get ready for a road trip because I’m renting a car dammit.

* By various I mean one.
** How all my relationships end.

I bet you whatever you are doing is not as important as what I am about to tell you. The other day I decided to do an online fundraiser for my birthday. All I really want for myself is my own olive farm in Italy, but since many of the people I know aren’t legally able to purchase land in a foreign country, I am out of luck. But I had a better idea. From now until the evening of September 4th (my actual birthday), I am trying to raise at LEAST $250 for the ASPCA. Why the ASPCA? Because they help those who have no way of voicing their pain. And I’ve seen too many news articles recently about animals living in terrible conditions with no way of escape. There’s already $135 in and still a little over a week to go, and I literally have not felt this marvelous in a long time. I usually love my birthday, but the past ones have been full of this drama and that drama, and I’m really looking forward to seeing how this pans out. I have never done this before, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. But I’m really hoping that you all will check it out and maybe donate that ten bucks you were gonna use to buy an old Backstreet Boys cd. Rest assured, this is far more worth it.

HELP OUR FURRY FRIENDS!

Donate to my ASPCA fundraiser and not only will I have an awesome birthday, but you WILL BE helping abused and neglected animals! :]

*I’ve been told that it asks you to sign in with Facebook when you donate, but that isn’t required. I think it lists you as “anonymous” if you don’t, but just leave a comment on the page or on this post if you like.

It’d be hard to fake this photo. Actually it’d probably be very easy, but I’m erring on the side of optimism and extreme hopefulness right now. This is obviously a physical product that I must have in my possession the day that its sku goes live in the system. Whether it’s a full dvd set or just a pretty box with the Elder Wand on top, it must be mine.

I ran across this over at Mugglenet, and simply had to gush a little over here. Ok maybe a lot. Maybe I’m already thinking of setting money aside for this marvel of magnificence, perhaps even pushing back my expected date-by-which-I-need-to-have-my-own-place. Maybe I’m looking at my bank account right now and wondering why the hell I bought this Gotham, Pennsylvania tshirt for $20 from CWPress when that $20 could have gone towards the aforementioned higher cause. MAYBE I’M AMAZED AT THE WAY I REALLY NEED YOU.

Mugglenet seems to not actually have the Amazon France listing on their post, so I did some digging myself. And here it is. Now I’m slightly worried because it seems to say that it’s exclusive to Amazon France, which is simply unacceptable. I’ll be writing many angry letters if this is true. I know there will be tons of “limited edition” sets with lots of extra goodies, and if this is a French exclusive then I need a US exclusive that is somehow forty times better. This must be done.

But I did just find this for what appears to be years 1-6, also on the Amazon France site:

Going to go write my letter to Santa now.

…Or Catsunday, if you’re bad at keeping to your own schedule.

Clearly I picked the perfect weekend to read Homer’s Odyssey by Gwen Cooper. I tore through it in about a day, mostly because I legitimately could not wait to read more of her three cats’ antics. I really loved the hilarious way that she narrated these snapshots, where I could just picture all of it with perfect clarity. It was impossible for me not to relate to the way Gwen was so fiercely protective of them. I miss my little baby girl Sophie all day when I’m at work. At the ripe time of 5:30 AM she is almost always crawling around my head, chewing on my hair and gnawing on my arms. She walks all up and down my bed, demanding in meek, though still authoritative, meows, that I get up right this instant. I’m a notoriously grumpy person in the morning, and she really does try her best to get me up, but sometimes after so many times of me moaning “Ughhhh I hate the morninggghdjkhflkds” into my pillow, she suddenly relents. She will come over and lay right in front of me so that she can stare at me, and out of nowhere she’ll emit a little mew, reach her paw out, and touch my cheek. I’m not sure why she does it, but it’s like she’s saying “I’ll be right here when you get back, and I’ve tried my best thus far, but you really need to get the hell out of bed.”

Obviously I’m an avid cat lover and really want to find homes for every shelter cat on earth, although that’s a pretty lofty and, admittedly, impossible dream. In fact, I don’t think there should really even be a ceiling for how many animals we’d like to rescue. The goal should honestly just be to help as many animals as possible, so I think I’ll revise my dream to reflect this. Yesterday I stumbled across an event that the ASPCA is doing from August 1 until October 31st that’s entitled the $100k Challenge. The basic gist is that if your shelter is the one that sees the largest increase in animals saved in relation to the same period last year, you’ll receive the grand prize $100k grant. I’m a little surprised that my favorite local shelter, Animal Friends, isn’t involved, but then again it is a national competition, and they may not have gotten enough votes to be one of the final competitors. I’ve been following the @aspca and their hashtag for the event, #aspca100k, on Twitter this weekend, finding myself really impressed by the numbers that some shelters are putting up. Hundreds in one day, in some cases. But even if your local shelter isn’t a contestant this year, that doesn’t mean you can’t go over and pick up a new kitty or puppy from them, because that could increase their chances of winning the grant next year. Of course, you mostly just want to give an animal its forever home and someone they can always depend on. If any shelters near you are participating though, I’d really love to hear what they’re doing to raise awareness to the cause. Send whatever you’ve got, except cheesy chain mail involving touching e-cards from Blue Mountain or wherever the hell those abominations come from, to ashley@thewanderinggeek.com.