Sunatic's Blog

So I finally tried the Team Fortress 2 I had bought because everything on the net had convinced me of its awesomeness. And had so FUCKING MUCH FUN I nearly hyperventilated from all the laughing afterwards.

Didn't have much luck playing as a Pyro because I suck at close-range fighting and my shitty mouse makes it hard to toggle between weapons so I couldn't switch to the gun when needed, so yeah... Next I tried soldier. UNF, JACKPOT! It felt sooooo good. Noob as I am, I still got killed pretty fast, but DAMN I made one awesomely sweet kill.

So, I was stopped at a yard somewhere, my teammates gone ahead. Then I looked up and saw flames coming from one doorway. I aimed there, waited a moment and launched. And enemy Pyro goes SPLATTER! Made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside. (And the next moment someone killed me, but oh well. Details.)

Arena battles are really fun, it seems. It's all so goddamn fast-paced and CHAOTIC and MINDLESS. IT ROCKS! Dying doesn't bother me at all, because I pretty much expect it - I know I'm not the best possible player. It's more a matter of staying alive long enough to do as much damage as possible. ^_^

Ah, I never would have thought I'd gush like this about a first-person shooter. Just like I used to think I would never truly like a car game of any kind. Yet there are now few of each of these types I adore - Team Fortress 2 and Carmageddon 2 (1 is good too). Notice the similarity? Both would by genre default have pretty simple objectives (walk around and shoot, drive around in a circle) but these particular games actually reward you for playing around. I LOVE GAMES THAT LET YOU PLAY AROUND. Carmageddon has made it the main point, even. I don't even classify it as a car game in my mind, because... Drive the laps? Why would anyone want to do that when mauling the opponents, squashing the pedestrians and breaking your own car with insane stunts gives more benefits?! And is a million times more enjoyable. And Team Fortress 2 has managed to make the dying of EVERYONE, including the player themselves, JUST SO MUCH FUN. And I swear, if I some day manage to get even one of those achievements, I'm going to faint from sheer fangirly happiness.

Yes, this post was shameless fangirling all through.

I just had to get that out of my system. 8D

I want to babble but roommate is sleeping, so the journal shall suffer this time.

I'm a bit tipsy right now. Quite a rare state, as I don't drink alcohol often and never much. Drunkness tends to resemble flu in my case, and I usually don't enjoy that feeling very much. Floaty light-headedness and badly controlled muscles can only be tolerated if I'm sitting down. I'm also really picky about the taste of alcoholic drinks, so far I have learned to like the taste of only few liqueurs. Drinking is definitely not something to do when I'm supposed to be active and social. No drunk partying for me. I drink when I want to enjoy the taste of my darling liqueurs and when I'm able to sit down, listen to music and do something peaceful and nice. For some reason, I often get the urge to write when tipsy - another reason I'm updating my journal after all this time.

I've been way too lazy with my schoolwork lately. The last few courses tired me out a lot and now I'm having to stress about money because the welfare people are being bitchy. I should put much more concentration into the languages I'm studying, but somehow it feels like the brain activity needed to actually study is just too much. I tire fast, as I have done since the start of my burnout some years ago. Still recovering from that. I should take studies slowly at this point, but it would feel stupid to take too few courses at a time. Besides, a steady and constant stress level seems to be exactly what keeps me going. If I had more free time, I would just use all of it at the computer anyway. Still, I have high hopes about my Spanish studies - it's an awesome language, and I'll be damned if I can't get fluent at it with enough effort.

Yeah, still being a lifeless nerd. I've been reading a lot about storybuilding in TvTropes and Limyaael's blog, and they can take up whole days easily. I also recently bought two new games, as if I needed more things to get addicted to.

Yes, the story and the world, which I've been writing about here earlier. The project keeps getting bigger and bigger as I notice things that need to be thought of to make the world functioning and plausible. It complicates things that I'm trying to approach the world from different angles at the same time. Time itself being the main problem. For example, let's say I want to insert one fact into the world about a thousand years after the humans arrived there. Now I have to consider how this fact affects all the things that come after it. No problem, right? But then I start making stories about a time six thousand years into the future, and I see there several things that I don't know where they came from. And I have to track their history backwards and fit their origins into the grand scheme of things. One mess-up could change the whole history so that the world wouldn't make sense anymore. Aargh.

And now that I've gotten addicted to world-building, two other projects of mine have started to harass me as well, wanting attention. One thing at a time, please! I'd like to get at least the world map and basic history of Bhejenin done before trying to create several alien societies and languages!

Tipsyness starting to wear off now, I think I'll go read some more of Limyaael's ramblings. Good night.

With my artistic inspiration slowly starting to return somewhat, I've been thinking about my fantasy world Bhejenin a lot. If I ever actually get it done, there will be several comics and hopefully one game situated there. The world-building has been progressing somewhat oddly because I started it from one dream vision and then dumped it chock-full of basic fantasy clichés. And now that I'm finally taking it as a serious world-building project, troubles arise. I have to get rid of some clichés and find plausible explanations to some. As much fun as totally converting some fantasy clichés would be, it could turn against me by looking obvious, cheap and ridiculous. Better to just make everything from scratch, in the limits of my original vision and some of the newer things I've gotten very attached to.

At the moment the setting of Bhejenin is a planet quite similar to ours in terms of sunlight, gravity, atmosphere and thus, ecosystem too. On the other hand, not similar. Humans still are from Earth though. They came to Bhejenin a long time ago - how long exactly, still is a bit fuzzy. At first it was a few thousand years, then I cranked it to 11000, and now I'm thinking if it should be even longer, because I need some minor evolutionary changes in humankind to explain one species (or 'race') I have and will not get rid of no matter how unoriginal it might be. And evolution doesn't happen overnight, not even in alien environment, and especially not within a species that reproduces as slowly as humans do.

Logical timeline pains, in addition to tiredness of fictional clichés made me get rid of the medieval Europe type setting Bhejenin originally had - of course it did, because that's exactly the kind of fantasy I was reading daily when I had the dream that inspired the creation of Bhejenin. But I've grown up and so shall Bhejenin. Medieval Europe copy wouldn't make any sense in a world that has never seen even the first glimpses of Middle Ages, or the nations on which European culture was founded, for that matter. So I can (and must and will) base the cultures, their politics, mythologies, architectures and people, on what makes sense and happens to happen in that strange world. They are colonists, only trying to survive. The faeries might help them (more about them in a moment) but there are many things that can hinder them as well. Like, let's see... A totally alien world perhaps? Which plants can be eaten, which not? Is that animal safe to approach or will it kill us and eat us? Is that water drinkable? How fucking long will this winter last, will we have enough food to survive it? OH MY GOD WHAT IS THAT IN THE SKY AAAAA. And so on. Given the long timeline (which really might expand even farther if I can't find a plausible way to fit those minor evolutionary changes in ten millennia) anything can happen. Cultures may rise, they may fall. People die, but never enough to make humans perish completely. And then some of the cultures actually last long enough to have impact on the history, or even be present, of the current setting of the world.

Oh yes, the faeries. They've been somewhat present from the very beginning, but their meaning to the world was very minor until quite recently, as I came up with the theory of faeries having come to Bhejenin alongside humans. I still haven't decided if they brought humans here or was it the other way around, or did they just happen upon the same interdimensional rips together, or what. Anyway, their influence on Bhejenin's written history has been significant.

The 'faeries' in this case mean the highly magical, somewhat chaotic beings with no one stated form. They don't live on the planet as much as they live in the dimensions around it, in its 'neighbourhood' so to say. The wispy-minded live-in-the-moment energy beings that dance in forest clearings all nights long. The dark, furry critters that steal babies. The folklore faeries.

In Bhejenin there are also dragons, which have come there from elsewhere (or possibly evolved there, I still haven't decided and I might even leave that open since the dragons don't know either) and demons. The demons are very much like faeries, in that they're highly magical, don't have a set appearance, and some of them live in the planet's neighbourhood rather than on it. They're not servants of evil (unless the evil pays well or is really fun), they're not the enemies of the world (as long as the world isn't their enemies) and all in all they're not Always Chaotic Evil (check TvTropes if you don't know the meaning of this). They are, depending on the level of intelligence and magical powers, anything from hungry and territorial otherworldly beasts to god-like beings that rarely even pay attention to mortals or the world they live in. If HoofFoot and I ever get that game done, there will be one demon as a playable character.

The dragons. They were very much part of the original vision, and besides they are such an important symbol of imagination to me, that this cliché I was not willing to get rid of. Now the only thing to do is to explain them somehow logically. How can a giant reptile fly? The easy answer is magic. But even that needs a bit thinking. Do the dragons actively use magic to fly? Or is it somehow part of their genetic code to be so awesomelly magically charged that they can defy the laws of physics? To dodge this cliché I've already made two non-flying dragon races and one that consists of ghostly energy beings, and thus can fly without even needing wings. Still haven't decided what to do with the traditional western fantasy dragons. I would like to keep them in honor of the original vision, but they bother my logic senses so badly I might change or scrap them in the end.

And then there are the 'relatives of humans' as I call them. I this case, goblins and elves. The Bhejenin goblins are actually just a different human race, and the result of that 'minor evolutionary change' I mentioned earlier. They are to 'normal' humans kind of like what homo sapiens neanderthalensis were to homo sapiens sapiens, except maybe not even that much difference. The elves are actually a hybrid species of kinds - what the people of Bhejenin call 'elves' are all the children of both human and fairy heritage. Someone with one fairy parent and one human parent is an elf, but so is someone with one great-grandparent of the other species in a family of the other species. I also don't intend to make the elves 'perfect' or 'high and mighty' in any way. Some might be flaky and chaotic like the faeries, or more organized and prone to science like humans, or something in between, but their personalities are their own. And the goblins are not sneaky, stupid, little green-skins. They're very much like humans, just more adapted to the planet Bhejenin.

In fact I might even name those two 'species' something completely different because the names are so misleading. Originally the names were supposed to be a relic of the humans' past home - the elves and goblins were supposed to be named after creatures from old human folklores. But since they came to Bhejenin so long ago that those myths may not have been born yet, and travelling with faeries no less, it doesn't make sense. There's just one thing holding me back from renaming them, and it's the chronology known as 'elven memory' which starts from the children of humans and faeries being given their own name. So any name I give them will also make it to the chronology. It must be something good.

So I have a few name issues, one time issue, and the dragon issue to solve before I can really get into designing the history and cultures. In the meantime, I'll have to finish the world map with all the funny stuff like tectonic plates and mountain ranges so I can know how the ground and climate behave... And only after that I can really concentrate on creating the flora and fauna.

Sometimes, just sometimes, it's really tiring to be such a science nerd.

This time I might actually manage to get away from Raahe. Now that I'm finally well enough to seriously consider trying studies again, finding an apartment shouldn't be that hard either. Not sure exactly when I get to move, but before autumn at least. So while I may not get to enjoy this summer to its fullest because I'm still here, a nice, cool autumn in a completely new city would be full of awesome.

And then I could get to start things again. Everything's been on hold for a couple of years because I haven't wanted to make any commitments in this town, in case I'll get to leave in a hurry. As soon as I finally get to somewhere I'm actually planning to stay in for a long time, I'll start going swimming again, I'll get a dentist's appointment (gotta check those damn teeth again) and I'll buy a bike. I'll get to know the city. I'm going to settle.

In other news, I made some wicked macaroni casserole yesterday. Good to know my cooking skills haven't gotten too rusty.

Didn't really sleep well at all. Had uneasy dreams and woke up with a slight headache. But the day keeps getting better. I managed to go through a really good workout and then I had a rare moment of inspiration regarding my darling fantasy world. I hadn't progressed with the world-building almost at all in the last year or so, and it was getting quite depressing. But just now, I spread the map papers on the table and started sketching. One continent that had been eluding me previously finally got its basic shape. The size of the world is easier to picture now as well, and I can just feel the shapes of the other continents forming in the distance.

Maybe I'll finally start making some progress in this world-building. The map is the most important thing, because I can't really invent anything else in that world unless I know where they happen. The enviroment shapes everything in history, from evolution of species to the developing of nations. When I've finished the world map, I can pinpoint where exactly humans first touched the ground of this new world, and start tracing the pattern of their migration from there. And so the history will start forming.

After having a headache five days in a row I decided to make sure I never slack with exercise again. I have started putting a reminder in my cellphone for every day to help me actually get it done. I also went and bought (really, BOUGHT) a new mattress and a pillow. Buying furniture instead of dumpster-diving it makes me feel like such a normal adult (NOOOOOOO!) but it can't be helped. My body is way too sensitive to handle that old, crappy excuse of a bed anymore. Waking up with a stabbing pain in my head every morning is not fun, so I'd rather not experience it anymore if possible.

Got around to actually cook some real food today. With mostly dumpster-dived ingredients. I just had to use that chicken for something so it wouldn't go bad. I hate wasting food.

So, as usual the options are a: fry it, or b: boil it. Not in the mood for fried chicken, I decided to make impro-soup V.2. (Impro-soup V.1 is made with canned SPAM, onions, macaroni and whatever vegetables available. Spicing depends on the mood.)

A browse through the kitchen provided impro-soup V.2 with these ingredients: chicken slices, onion, leek, mettwurst and spaghetti. For spicing I used a stock cube, some butter, salt, allspice, black pepper, white pepper, tarragon, marjoram and rosemary.

The soup was quite delicious. Damn I rock.

When I was depressed I wrote here quite often. Now that my life has gotten better, I do so rarely. It's not that I didn't have things going on in my life, but I just don't feel like writing so much anymore. It also feels very pointless to write my "thoughts" or "feelings" or "happenings" on the net, since no one reads my journal. So even now I'm just babbling to myself, or to some imaginary audience.

Maybe this journal would have more readers if I was more known in the net. But I don't make much of a noise about myself and am not very active. I lurk on a few forums and write on one of them. I browse art here and there but rarely comment. My Elfwood gallery and homesite have been dead for years - I just haven't gotten around to doing anything about them even though I actually own a decent scanner now. I don't see any reason to remake my site until I have new art to put there, and that will have to wait, because my artistic inspiration is still dead. I can only make clothes now, maybe colour a little, but drawing still causes me discomfort. It's frustrating and scary.

I've been trying to get back on my feet and change the things that depressed me. I still haven't gotten out of Raahe, but now that I'm relatively healthy again, I just might be able to start studying again, which should help me get an apartment somewhere. I'm not so enthusiastic about studying right now, but I need some way to get out of here. If I actually manage to get a degree, that's just bonus.

I finally got a diagnosis for the twitchy symptoms. I have Tourette's Syndrome. Yay, I'm officially not neurotypical. It does put my mind to ease to know what causes the tics and some of my behavioural "problems".

Still waiting for Change to come. This winter has shown all the signs of a warming climate, and it thrills me. The clock is ticking, mankind. Either you get a hold of yourselves and do a complete U-turn at how you've been treating the world, or the world will do it for you. I don't care which one it is, both scenarios have their good and bad points. I just want to see what happens next.

Despite still feeling quite apathetic and tiring very easily, I've been trying to get something done. I've been sewing clothes, lifting weights and practicing shielding and lucid dreaming. I should continue cleaning and packing as well. I'm ready to leave at a moment's notice as soon as I get an apartment.

MY COMPUTER EXPLODED.

And not even in that fancy earth-shaking-boom-and-10-meters-high-flames kind of way. It just gave a loud bang and died and killed the fuse too.

Okay, it went like this. I just bought that computer about 2 and half months ago (used, but it was supposedly in a good condition) - and it had a warranty of (wait for it...) two months.

I was just browsing the net as usual. Went somewhere for a minute or so, maybe to get tea, and came back. The computer had frozen, totally so. Nothing moved, nothing worked, it wouldn't respond to anything. Used to that kind of behaviour from my previous computer, I just shrugged and tried to find the reset button. Except the computer didn't have any. So on to the next option, holding the power button down until it shut. Okay, no apparent problem so far. Just wait a moment and turn it on again, right? Well, when I turned it on, it started making this infernal noise - long, really loud beeps. Like "boooooooooooooop, boooooooooooooop...."

Okay, what the hell? Was it angry I didn't reboot it the right way, as in ctrl+alt+del? It's not my fault it didn't work when I tried that earlier! So I shut it off again and decided to turn the main power off, unplug all the wires and let it cool for a good while before trying anything again. Went behind the computer to look for the main power switch - and found only something that didn't quite look like one, but was the only button there, and in the place the main power switch usually is. I flipped it - and the computer gave a bang and blew out some smoke. Lights went out as well, because the fuse had broken.

Like, what the fuck?

A couple of days without a computer, and then my roommate's elite nerd boyfriend (RENB) came to visit and checked the casualties. So, apparently the switch I flipped wasn't the main power switch, bad me. (I don't remember what he called it, but it had something to do with the amount of electricity stream or something like that.) However, the initial freeze was NOT my fault. I also shouldn't have bought a computer that doesn't HAVE a reset button nor a main power switch.

RENB said it's not that bad of a loss, since the computer wasn't very expensive, but on my budget it certainly was costly enough. And now I have to buy a new computer once again. Nothing else, luckily. The hard drive miraculously survived - and that one is the most important anyway. If mine and other roommate's stuffs had been lost, a lot of grievance would have been had. We're talking some 3+ years and 200G worth of stuff. Collecting all the music, anime, games and pictures would have been a pain in itself, but there's also our own creations - stories, art, poetry etc. - that is irreplacable.

But they're safe. The hard drive works. The modem, keyboard, mouse and screen work. I only need the computer itself, and I'm going to buy a new, unused one this time. Might take some time though, as I don't have much savings at the moment. Spent them all in the summer.

So, while waiting for the social services to give me money each month, I'll just have to tone down the spending even more (must dumpster-dive a lot) and use roommate's computer. Good thing the fuse break didn't damage this computer, or there would be hell to pay and heads to chop. Now we'll just have to fight over one computer between three people - even better, three internet nerds.

At least I can still play Gameboy.

Thinking, thinking... I have a little problem I'm desperately trying to solve.

The fantasy world I have created for my original stories has some of the typical fantasy species and also several of my own creation. The thing is, I'm trying to avoid the most blatant and annoying clichés, and yet I have somehow managed to make two species that are so (bad kind of) cliché it makes my head hurt.

The problem with elves might not be as bad as I thought, I've already come up with some good solutions. But the problem with mirus... Their appearance is not only a bad cliché, it also doesn't fit well with the rest of the world. I might have to scrap their concept entirely and start again from scratch. I'm just worried what that might do to the miru characters I have made thus far. I want to keep the mirus a separate species, but of what kind? Going the lazy way and making those characters humans or some other already existing species would ruin the characters and a lot of the species-related dynamics the world has.

Sigh. The idea of mirus has clashed so badly with the logic of the rest of my world that I should have realized from the beginning it wasn't going to work. I should have put them in some other world instead or let them stay in my head entertaining only myself, but nooo, I just had to get to use them in this one. And now it bites me in the ass. A perfect lesson for a n00b writer - "it sounded like such a good idea then" should be kept in mind at all times. No matter if it's a story plot, character concept or anything, it should be stuffed into the far corner of the drawer for at least a few months before taken out and looked at again with critical eyes. I made the mistake of using mirus in the same form they were when they came to my mind for the first time - and that was back in my teen years, when I wasn't wery smart or critical regarding any kind of literature or art, least of all my own.

Actually I have only three significant miru characters that would suffer from the change. Rasir I could maybe imagine being of a different species, but Cecilia and Rydia not so much. If I change their appearances, they're not the same characters anymore. So what do I do with them? Sure I could keep from using them at all and simply keep them in my head, but the story of Cecilia and Rydia happens to be my most advanced story and I have already started drawing it (I make my stories in comic form). Granted, the story is already a bit outdated, because my depression kept me from continuing it for a long time and during that time I grew up plenty, so if I managed to actually complete it, it might have the place of just-an-exercise from the moment it was born. I wouldn't want to treat a story so dear to me like that. Either I make it seriously and with care, or not at all.

So which one am I going to do? No idea.

And I still don't know what to do with the mirus. Going back to thinking about it now.

A couple of days ago I was thinking about my hair and realized that it was high time to change it. In my whole life the actual style hadn't changed at all (save for one time I got forehead hair. And I didn't even like it), just the length. Not even very much. I had always been trying to grow it long and all medieval-princess style. To no avail. I always had to cut it shorter for one reason or another. And I finally admitted to myself that it's really too fragile and fuzzy to look good that way, or even grow so long.

Another reason: my mother and I looked almost identical, especially when my hair was open. Ew. And when my hair was tied, I looked like some nice, normal girl-next-door. Which I'm so totally NOT. So, I got tired of seeing someone else than myself in the mirror all the damn time.

Third reason: The fuzzy hair hanging on both sides of my face felt annoying. I don't like anything covering my face. And that long hair got dirty and greasy very quickly, or at least it felt like it was greasy. And it felt heavy. And I don't really need hair on the other side at all. It just gets in the way and feels uncomfortable and makes me look like my mom. The other side still needs hair, for oogling and handling and petting and twisting around the fingers. But the other side? Naah. It had to go.

The hairdresser was horrified. She kept asking if I was absolutely sure, and almost didn't dare to shave my head. Damn this backwaters town and its boring people.

Now my head feels light and nice and I look pretty damn good. The only question is: why the hell didn't I do this sooner??

Lately the terms "waiting for the end of the world" and "after the end of the world" have come into my and my friends' speech. We genuinely believe that some kind of catastrophe is going to happen sooner or later and rip the society off its roots. At least we hope so. Guesses about the nature of this armageddon vary from flood caused by greenhouse effect to a nuclear winter caused by World War III. I hope it comes and soon, because the whole world is so rotten to the core and built on idiotic, unnatural values and rules that small changes won't be enough anymore. We should start from the very beginning and try not to do the same stupid mistakes this time.

And what if the catastrophe comes? What is one day the ice caps really do melt and the ocean level rises some 15-30 meters and floods very large inhabited areas of the world? Total chaos, yes. But I don't mind - in fact, I'd really like that. I have grown to hate this society I am forced to live in. I would be happy if I could rely on my own strength and wits to stay alive to see the next day. And if I were to die away, then it would just prove that I was weak or stupid, in which case I would just totally deserve to be off the gene pool, or then I would have just bad luck, in which case I would have to admit that shit happens.

But more about that later, probably. I want to write so much about what I have to say, but it's difficult to actually get them in written form, especially the topics that are so simple and clear to me that I can't even comprehend how someone fails to understand them.

Living with a psi-vampire is quite interesting. I have grown to recognize when she's hungry, sometimes even before she realizes it herself. Then I just have to shoo her outside to feed on people's energy, or else she'll become restless and cranky - just like I am when I'm hungry. You should really see me when I'm starving, I'm pretty scary then. The best thing about her feeding off of big crowds is that she takes only little bits from every individual, so the strain is almost nonexistent and totally unnotifiable. She can't feed off of me when we're home because I have such strong astral shields around me. It amuses me greatly how she can taste different kinds of emotions and mindsets. According to her, most people in our town taste "stupid". No surprise there, this is, after all, RAAHE.

(Why do I have to explain my sexuality? Why doesn't heterosexuality ever need to be explained, why isn't heterosexuality ever questioned, why isn't heterosexuality ever doubted? Why does the world demand me to explain something I happened to be born as? Well, I'll explain it once and for all now. Maybe someone even understands.)

I'm a lesbian.

Why? Why do I classify myself? Why as a lesbian?

I classify myself because it makes my life easier. Classifying gives a feeling of belonging and helps in finding others of the same likeness. I don't hold this classification as definite, because sexuality if anything is unclear on the edges. But if someone asks what my sexuality is, I answer "lesbian". It's easier than a long explanation, and still truthful enough.

Lesbian, because I don't feel any wish to date, make love to, or share my life with a man. Instead I wish to do these with a woman. Why a woman, why not a man? Especially if my sexuality isn't definite? Because I appreciate certain qualities of personality and physicality. And women just happen to have them more often and probably than men. I have yet to meet a man who would fill the criteria I have, while many women fill them easily. I don't hate, loath or fear men. I have a good relationship with my brother and my dad and I have several male friends. But the way most men think, feel and act doesn't fit with mine in the sense of a romantic relationship. I also don't find male body almost at all sexually attractive. But with women I fit just fine, and I find female body very sexually attractive.

And yes, I search for a partner who is in a way - preferably even in many ways - like me. Is it a bad thing? Is it wrong to want a relationship which wouldn't on the very first steps fail because of misunderstandings, differences of objectives, and clashing of life views? Is it wrong to want a partner who I can really know and trust myself to? I also like many of the qualities I have and I'd be happy to find a partner who has them too. Is it wrong to search for a partner I could like?

I have heard many people doubt this aspect of me, even those people I thought would support me. I have heard my lesbianity be just a passing phase. Oh, really? Let's see. Since elementary school I wondered what was so great about romance. Many girls my age were already talking about their crushes, giggling and interrogating their friends about who was interested about which boy, sighing longingly at pictures of boy bands. I didn't understand the fuss. I didn't dream of marriage, it just didn't interest me at all. Every now and then I pondered about how nice it would be to have someone to be with and get love letters from. But a life with a man? I just couldn't grasp the concept. The same confusion continued in pubertet. I just didn't get what was so wonderful about guys. I've fancied some boys during my childhood, but it hasn't been so much in the sense of wanting to date them as it was in the sense of wanting to be their friends, wishing for their respect and friendship.

When I found porn magazines for the first time and as a curious pre-teen immediately ended up reading them (and masturbating), the pictures of men and stories about their on-goings weren't very interesting. But the pictures of women and stories about them - especially one about three young women who ended up together in a stable and decided to have some fun, with stuff like a horse whip as their toys - they made me wet. Even now I like two things very much in sex and porn, especially at the same time - women and sex toys. I've also enjoyed watching female pole dancers since I was a teen.

Even then I didn't realize what I was, I just kept wondering what was wrong with all the other people, what was so great about dating and marriage, why were all the other girls fussing about boys.

When I was seventeen, I briefly saw through the bus window the most beautiful girl of my life so far. She was about my age and had short, curly, blond hair. She was like an angel. After that the stories I made in my head for my own entertainment had an angelic-looking girl character. One of my former alter-ego characters became her girlfriend, and thus I had the first lesbian couple of my fantasies. This couple was the closest and most realistic one of all the relationships between my imaginary characters so far. I could feel the love between them, while with earlier couples I had merely imagined it. For the first time I also started to dream about dating and making love, marriage and everyday life with a woman. From there began the explosive discovery. I wondered why I hadn't realized it sooner. I started to consciously make comparisons between the girls and boys of my school, speculating who I could consider dating. Girls won with overwhelming might. I pondered and speculated my feelings, reminiscented my earlier life, started to search for information from websites related to the subject. It was true. I didn't feel fear or shame because of myself, but I was a little wary to come out of the closet to my friends and family.

First I told my former roommate, who had during and after our shared year of studies been like a big sister to me. She was happy and proud about my discovery and encouraged me to be freely what I am. Several months later, after having gotten familiar with the thought, I told my dad. He told that everyone has their own way to live and be and that he doesn't care what I am, he loves me anyway. I had been very afraid of telling my dad, because his acceptance was the most important to me then. His words took a weight off my chest and I felt invincible. I don't remember exactly when I told my brother, but to him it's always been quite unimportant how and in which ways we are different, because we love each other even despite all our banters. My relationship with my brother has always been "nobody picks on my sister/brother except me" and my being a lesbian wasn't nearly enough to change it. I told my mom much later than to the others, because my relationship with her had already started to grow cold, and she didn't feel worthy enough to know something so important to me unless she earned my trust again. Nevertheless, I ended up blurting the truth out during one afternoon coffee break, when I had had enough of her hinting about me finding a boyfriend and making babies. First she laughed and told it was just a passing phase. Well, if a whole life is just a phase... Then she took the martyr approach and whined loudly that she wanted so much to became a grandma. Well excuse me for living for my own happiness instead of your dreams, mom. To my little sister my lesbianity was shortly mentioned, and her question "what's a lesbian" was answered simply and truthfully. Her attitude was a simple "oh, okay." Telling my friends and relatives has become easier and easier with every out-coming, and I haven't been afraid to tell new friends as well. No one has yet abandoned me, I've been lucky compared to many others whose stories about losing all their friends and family I have read.

I have been asked how I can know I'm a lesbian even though I've never had a serious relationship with either a man or a woman. Well, if the thought of dating/making love/living with a man fills me with stale rejection and indifference, while thinking of women in the same context fills me with enthusiasm, lust and tenderness, I can be pretty sure I know what I like. Even without physically testing it. Besides, following the "try everything" logic, I would have to try jumping off a roof to know whether or not I'd like the result. And if I can't know if I'm a lesbian, then how could anyone else know I'm not?

I also don't understand why anybody bothers to try to find reasons for why or how I "became" a lesbian. Even if there was some reason originating from my childhood or youth, it wouldn't matter anymore. Maybe I was born straight or completely without a sexual preference and grew up to be lesbian - so what? Maybe somebody thinks that finding a reason would somehow magically "fix" me, but scientific study, common sense and my own feelings agree that lesbianity can't - and DOESN'T NEED TO - be fixed.

Maybe I could fall in love with a man's mind and heart, but what kind of romantic relationship would it be when I couldn't feel the desire to make love to him, but to someone else? That's why even the most wonderful man can be a friend, trusted one, soul brother, pack member to me, but not a loved one.

So yes, I call myself a lesbian.

Year changed. For the first time in my life, I didn't buy fireworks for the celebration. It just didn't feel important enough to waste my money on, especially since almost all the fireworks in the shops are the exact same ones as last year, and the year before, and the year before... I've seen every model many times already. So instead I went downtown with my friends to watch the town's own firework show, the big, pretty, not-available-for-normal-consumers fireworks. That was surely worth my time. They were BEAUTIFUL. And loud. I felt every bang like a hit to my chest. Too bad I now have a slight headache thanks to the noise. My friend jokingly asked if I were going to make any new year's resolutions. Well, I've never had that tradition, so I just pulled out of the hat something that I would most probably keep no matter what.

"I promise to not tolerate idiots any more than in the past years!"

When I was younger, the passing of years felt like such a big deal. Now I just wonder what makes it so special. And why is the new year in the middle of winter? And not even in a solstice, which would be much more logical. And why was year 2000 so big a deal too? As if the universe cares a shit about the calendar based on one religion of one intelligent species of one little planet. And what makes decimal numeral system so special either? "Omg, 1000 is important! 2000 is even more important! Omg, the apocalypse is here, we're all gonna diiieeee!!" And hey, wasn't this guy Jesus really born some 4-7 years before the "after Christ" calendar started? At least according to historical research he was. So the Apocalypse should have come already, but here we still are, alive as ever. The apocalypse has been prophecied how many times now? And the date has never been right. Sorry fanatics, you've lost all credibility in my eyes. Not that you had any in the first place.

Eh, long preach. I just got carried from one topic to another. Stream of consciousness, dudes.

Happy new year!

Annoyed at feeling tired all the damn time no matter what I do and falling asleep at random moments as if hit with a sledgehammer, I decided to take a drastic measure and try getting myself some outside energy. Psi-vampirism for the win! So, I went downtown with my friends and tried my darnedest to leech energy off of people passing me by. Not quite sure if it worked as it should, but I do feel very hyper now and I'm hot even though the room is cool as usual. Hmm.

On our way to the library we saw a waxwing on the ground. We tought it was dead, hit by a car or something. We went closer. It didn't really look injured. We poked it. It turned its head and looked at us. Confused at its behaviour we decided to pick it up and take it away from the road, or a car might really hit it. It didn't seem to mind being handled by humans, just sat comfortably in whoever's hands it happened to be. Maybe it even thought that warm, mittened hands were nicer than the cold ground, because when Hinata tried to put it under a tree, it wouldn't let go of her hands. Instead, it hopped and fluttered its wings and took a steadier position in her hands. After I took it again (it was so nice to hold it) it started to move more and finally flew off.

That was an absolute overdose of cute for today. It was a frigging waxwing! A real, living, breathing wild animal! A cute bird! And it was so tame it sat in my hands! I even pet it (such soft feathers!) and it just gave me a "dude, wtf?" look.

At the grocery store Hinata tried to play some poker with the game automat. The automat crashed. We watched it reboot (it had Linux, btw) and then Hinata finally got to play. And even though I had only intended to buy like, some catfood and milk, we ended up coming home with several bags of food. I just never learn to not shop when hungry.

And right now the mood is happy, a bit hyper perhaps. Conversation topics range from candy animals' species to songs with extremely repetitive lyrics. There's a ham in the oven, causing our other roommate much confusion (it's not even Christmas yet). Luna is knitting herself Nightcrawler gloves, Hinata is chatting and making funny faces at me when I try to think of the next thing to write. And now I'm going to play some Neopets games.

I'm wide awake at a really weird hour because my sleep schedule is totally off. Not that it matters much, though - after all, I don't have school to attend. Luci is sleeping on my lap, purring loudly when I pet her. She's overly cute and I love it when she climbs on my lap and curls up, but when she stays there for long, it starts to get uncomfortable. I can't change my position and my legs start to get numb and sometimes my back starts to ache. And she's very very warm. Even if the room is usually quite cool and I prefer to wear a bathrobe over my other clothing, the moment Luci climbs on my lap it's time to start shedding clothes. But I just don't dare to lift her off, because she's so. Damn. CUTE. Ah, where would I be without my cats? They give me my daily dose of cuteness. They keep me sane. Even when my roommates are elsewhere, the cats are always here, and the apartment is never empty and lifeless. I love my cats. (Lol, Luci is dreaming something right now. She's twitching. ^_^)

I'm listening to power metal and browsing art sites for pictures of chubby women. I like my ladies with some meat on them. Sure, skinny ladies may look graceful and flawless and all that junk, but that's exactly the problem. With anorexic barbies I kinda feel that if I dare touch them, they may break. They're made for looking, not handling. But the chubby ones... Hoo boy, now that's something truly molest-worthy. Besides, I love hips. I don't understand why many women nowadays want to get rid of their hips and asses. Buh? Why, god, WHY? What is there to grope then? Where is the softness then? And then there's the weird fashion of wanting inexistent hips but huge breasts. Ergh. A body like that looks so... unbalanced. Everything on the top and nothing at the bottom. Those chicks are gonna fall over, I'm telling you. And of course, it's very improbable to have that kind of body naturally. No, one has to thin themselves to lose the hips and then put silicone in their breasts, because without any fat in the body, the breasts will be small. And silicone breasts... Well, they're just like skinny women. Maybe good to look at (and it even gets boring very fast), but not nice to touch.

I miss forests. There's nothing but a few trees wide "forests" near where I live now. The real forests are far, and I don't have a bike nor a car. I would have to walk half a day just to get to a forest. And they're mostly dry, sandy-soil pine forests. This area is former oceanbed. And of course, flat as a pancake. I miss the forests of Kuopio, where I grew up. Huge forest, high hills, lakes, swamps, all that jazz. And I only had to step out of the door and walk a couple meters to get into that wonderland.

I still can't do much art, or anything else for that matter. It's suffocating. I've been artistic all my life, but the school, the depression... It broke me. Now, when I try to draw, it feels horrible. Just holding the pencil, trying to get something on the paper, it feels like I couldn't breath. It used to be the other way around - if I couldn't get to draw the ideas out, I would feel like not being able to breath. I've been trying to find ways around this lately. I've ceased drawing altogether and instead started using other techniques. But even that won't help in the days when I'm too tired to do anything. Sometimes I would really, really like to work on something - but the moment I try to get started, I start to feel horribly tired. Sometimes even ill or like I couldn't breath. (That's no wonder though. This town is making breathing difficult on daily basis. Maybe I should get asthma medication or something.) So, simply put - I feel bad for not being able to make art, and I feel bad when I try to do it. Fuckdammit. And I don't HAVE any other "productive" or "useful" hobbies than making art. I don't do sports. I'm not musical. I'm not into politics. All my hobbies just involve sitting on my butt and doing things with my hands and brains. I guess I really ought to revive the one and only sporty hobby I used to have years ago - swimming. Sure, going to the swimming hall is helluva expensive, and the chlorine isn't good for my skin and hair, but it would get me exercising, and out of the house. I really need exercise, for both treating the depression and getting my body in a better shape. Maybe I could fight the constant tiredness a bit better, and maybe my lungs wouldn't fail so fast. I have to stay alive until I can get out of this town.

Power metal. Not the only kind of music I love, ohhh no. I listen to many kinds of music. But if asked about my musical likings, the first I would mention would probably be power metal. It has a very dear meaning to me. Back when I only knew a few bands and had a few CDs and cassettes to listen to, my brother influenced my tastes a lot. He introduced me to fantasy, and he introduced me to metal. For a couple of years I only listened to power metal, and started to read more and more fantasy. My tastes have widened since then, but the effect power metal had on me has never been forgotten. And fantasy swept me away.

I've been trying to practice lucid dreaming, for several reasons. One of them is to get rid of the distressing dreams that have been haunting me during my depression. Mainly, I want to kick the asses of all those shitheads who piss me off when I'm trying to enjoy my dreams.

Well, learning lucid dreaming isn't so easy, but I've had a little success already. In one distressing, annoying dream I suddenly became aware. If I recall correctly, my exact thoughts at that moment were "Hey, I'm dreaming. I don't have to put up with this!" And then I woke up. It still amuses me.

The training shall continue.

Some conversations with my roommate have revealed an interesting fact.

We both have had dreams of The Pond Of Big Fish before we even met each other. We also both see many same fish in there. The difference in our dreams seems to be that I don't go close to the fish and don't interact with the pond. My roommate has seen the trilobite-manta-flounder type of fish eye to eye and very close, I have only seen them going away from me.

She told me of a theory she read somewhere about the people and places in dreams. They are real worlds and real people, and we just visit them in our dreams. The things we see may be distorted because they are like ghosts to us, and likewise we are like ghosts to them. Someone I have seen in my dreams might wonder every now and then "What the hell was that? I thought I saw someone moving there." And I do the same here, waking from weird dreams every morning. "What the hell was that?"

They say that ignorance is bliss. I think that's bullshit. At least to me it just doesn't work that way. I've never been ignorant. Sure, I didn't know much when I was a kid, I don't claim to be very wise, and I'm sometimes pretty naive, but not ignorant. As soon as I learned to read, I started reading, a lot. I learned about the world around me. When I encountered something I didn't understand or know about, I didn't shrug it off, but tried to find out more, or made my own hypotheses. The more I know the more I want to know. I've never tried to hide from the pain of knowledge behind the mask of ignorance.

Ignorant people confuse me. As far as I know, it doesn't make sense in any level, not even biologically. Humans don't have very sharp senses. They're not predators, they're not scavengers, they're not herbivores. They don't have claws, fangs or horns to protect themselves with. The only thing that has given humans such advantage in the game of survival is their brains, their intelligence, their curiosity. That's what evolution gave us, and that's what we should use. But some people embrace their ignorance and stupidity. They're not curious, they don't want to learn anything new. They rather stay ignorant than find out the facts. Do they think it gives them power, to be able to be absolutely sure of themselves based on nothing? Do they think it gives them safety to make all development stop and stay still for all eternity? In the long run, it won't. The world changes around them, and they're going to be left behind unless they dig their brains out of the closet and use them.

I like seeing dreams. They are very interesting and an important part of my life. Well, nightmares are never nice, of course.

I've always had quite realistic-feeling and interesting dreams. They've just gotten more and more realistic over the years. For example, I couldn't feel pain in my dreams when I was a teenager. I got shot in the shoulder in one dream. I felt the bullet go through my shoulder and shatter the bone into tiny pieces. But I didn't feel any pain. But a couple of years after that I got hurt in a dream again, and that time it really did hurt. A mad scientist stabbed my back with an injection needle, and the pain was just like it would have been in the waking world. I know what needles feel like. After that I have always felt pain if I've gotten hurt in a dream.

I've also always had coloured dreams. I was really surprised to find out that not everyone's dreams are in colour. It's baffling to me. I mean, really. How is it possible to have black-and-white or greyscale dreams when most of what a person sees during their life is coloured? I'd like to learn more about this. The only time even a part of my dream has been without colors was when I went to Limbo. Everything was grey there.

I can use all my senses and feelings in dreams. I can see, hear, feel, smell and taste. My feelings range from joy to sadness, from irritation to happiness, from pain to pleasure, from wistfulness to hopefulness, from fear to killing intent. Anything and everything. I have had fun with friends, I have run from monsters, I have been lost, I have read letters, I have eaten, I have slept and woken up, I have had arguements, I have made friends and watch them leave or die, I have loved, I have hated, I have saved worlds, I have been the villain, I have killed and been killed. I have been old, I have been young. I have been pregnant, given birth and raised a kid. I have been myself and many other elses.

The places are often twisted versions of places I know. Sometimes they're so different I can't exactly point out if I know the place or not, sometimes they're very familiar and obvious. And sometimes there are places I've never seen or even heard of.

There are some things that repeat again and again. Mostly places, but other themes and details as well.

-The Light City.
This City looks a lot like the big cities and towns I know, especially Kuopio. White, modern buildings, lots of hills and roads. Usually I have trouble remembering any happenings or details in the dreams that take place in this City.

-The Dark City
This City is darker, usually it's night-time there, and the buildings are older-looking and made of brown stone and wood. I remember the happenings in this City much better. Often I go into the buildings, and sometimes the City may even be given a name by someone in the dream.

-Cliffs (also Mountains).
High, rocky places that I climb, usually with other people. Sometimes we just have fun, sometimes we're actually going somewhere. Sometimes there's a town on a mountain. I often jump down from impossible heights on the Cliff, which is odd considering how badly scared of falling I am in the waking world. Or maybe it makes sense after all.

-The Pond Of Big Fish.
Now this one is bizarre, and one of the most memorable ones. Also one of my favourites, because it's so interesting. It's a very deep pond. Sometimes it's quite big, almost like a lake, sometimes its just a pond. But it's always so deep that exploring its depths would require a very good submarine. And there are very big fish living in it. I'm not talking salmon-type big, but whale-type big. About the smallest fish I have seen in TPOBF looks a bit like a pike, but it's a couple of meters long. The biggest ones are big as whales. There are also big trilobites, or something similar to them. A cross between a trilobite and a manta, perhaps. I never go into the pond, not even on a boat. I just watch from the beach as the gigantic fish rise from the depths and swim around. Sometimes I collect pretty stones from the beach.

-The Forest And Cottage By The Lake.
Not so important, but still worth noting. It's simply a happening place for many dreams. A foresty slope goes down to the lake, and right by the lake there is a house. Very much like every other summer cottage here in Finland.

-The Melted Ice Pond.
(Okay, having difficulties translating that one into English...) Probably my absolute favourite of the recuring places, because the dreams about this place are always fun. It's a hollow (sometimes also a frozen brook) where lots of water gather when the snow and ice melt in the spring. Just imagine it, a pond so big and at places deep that your parents wouldn't like you to go there. Just put you rubber boots on and go splashing there! Poke the tiny icebergs with a stick and watch them float around! Jump on the ice so it breaks and melts faster! Make little streams at the edges of the pond so the water gets moving! These dreams probably come from the many springs in the waking world when I've done that. And when I lived in the countryside, one paddock near our house had a hollow that gathered water just like this. Even with my tallest rubber boots on, the water would at some places be too deep to walk in. Frogs loved to spawn in that pond. And the stream from the pond went under the road to the other side, to a forest clearing, where there was an even deeper pond.

-The High Building.
A very big and maze-like high building. It may be a hotel, a museum, even a ship. Quite often it's a twisted version of one of my old schools. Whatever the Building is, it's full of twisty staircases, elevators, corridors and rooms. Very often it's dark or dim there. Sometimes I'm running away from someone there, though not always in the panick-y escape way; more like a game of tag. Sometimes I'm looking for something or someone, or simply exploring the place. The weird staircases in the Building sometimes seem to cause me more fear of falling than jumping from the Cliff. Weird. The Building is one of the oldest themes, I have seen varitations of it since childhood.

-Space.
Space itself, and everything closely related to it. The Space always gives me a feeling of seeing more, understanding more, it's truly mind-expanding. I may be in a spaceship and go to a planet millions of lightyears away, feeling every lightyear, seeing the whole distance, watching galaxies go by. Or see a meteor coming towards me, see it with bare eyes as clearly as if I was standing next to it. Or talk with aliens, watch them go their planets, sometimes go with them.

-Secret Tunnels.
Found in a house or a castle. Small, narrow tunnels that have to be squeezed through and lead to secret parts of the house. Usually been out of use for a long time. There's always something interesting to be found in the secret places.

-Sailing And Swimming.
Floating on something, going somewhere, just swimming around, exploring, whatever. The boat may vary from raft to yacht to a swim ring.

-Games.
For a life-long video game fan, this is hardly surprising. Whenever I see dreams about Games, it's never quite clear whether I play the game or am in it. Sometimes I play a game in the beginning of the dream, then I go into the game to be part of it.

-Gathering Crystals.
This is not a place, but a theme of what I do. There are incredibly beautiful stones, crystals and half-gems growing right out of the bedrock near me. I collect them joyfully, finding more and more I want to take with me. It's always near a body of water, a couple of times it's even been near TPOBF.

-Time.
Sometimes accompanied by the Space. I find signs of an old culture, or an ancient building made by the aliens, and I see the millenia go by, the aliens leave to their homeworld, the people of the old civilization forget the legends about their past. I haven't seen very many of these, but I still count it as a recuring theme.

-Car-driving.
I don't even have a driving license and don't really know what driving a car feels, but this theme comes back every once in a while. It's just me and the car, going somewhere or getting away from pursuers. The crazy tricks and stunts in chases would make any action movie hero proud.

-Flying.
Well, duh. I have yet to hear of someone who hasn't seen flying dreams. Flying is the oldest theme as far as I remember. It's very dear to me, because I love flying. It's gotten easier over the years. When I was younger, I couldn't fly without something like running down a slope and jumping, or rowing a flying carpet like a boat. As I've gotten older, I can fly easier and easier, it's not so tiring anymore, and I can go higher and faster than before.

-Lost On The Road.
This is always a distressing theme. I'm walking or taking a bus home, and the road feels impossibly long, gets darker and twistier, and I never get where I'm going before I wake up. The road is always the one that led to my home when I lived in the countryside, and it was 5 kilometers to school from there. The bus trip took half an hour, and about half of it was narrow roads through the forest. I just don't understand why these dreams are so nasty and haunt me, because I love both those forests and traveling by bus.

-Red.
The weird or important details in my dreams are often bright red. The shirt of a friend, the tower I was in, the ruins of a house, the car I'm driving... Of course I see all colors in my dreams, but I always notice and remember really well if there's something bright red.

-Trying To Leave.
This dream often comes during spring, when I'm restless and wanting to travel. In the dream I'm planning to leave somewhere, or from somewhere. Once it was after a war and the world had fallen to chaos. I planned to start traveling alone and make a life somewhere else. Once I was tired of this world and wanted to go explore another world through a portal I knew of. In this dream I always start packing my things, thinking about what I will need. There are lots of things, I never finish the packing and get going before I wake up. I kinda like the dreams themselves, the eager-to-go feeling is nice, but I'm always very disappointed when I wake up, because I didn't get on the road in time, and because it was only a dream.

-Lots Of People.
There are almost always lots of people I don't know in my dreams. Watchers, passer-bys, followers, enemies, friends... Sometimes I have familiar people in my dreams, like family or friends, but more often the people in my dreams are total strangers. I might know them in the dream, but not in the waking world. The numbers of the people range from few to hundreds. Sometimes there are fictional characters in my dreams.

-Trees.
Not forests, but specific trees that I climb into, hide in, make a wood house in or admire the height of. This is quite a new theme, only a few years old, but it's recuring enough to mention.

-Running Away.
Not, in fact, a nightmare, or even a distressing dream. It's like a game of tag, even though the pursuers are serious enemies. I never run away alone, it's always with a friend or several people. The place may be an open place like a town centre, or a maze-like Building. These dreams are fun.

-Sex.
Or actually masturbating. I don't remember ever really making love to someone in a dream. Either I never get to the actual intercourse with the person I'm with, or I just masturbate alone. Damn. Fun nonetheless.

Some themes are specific to my life situation, like the two current nightmares/distressing dreams. The other one is School. Not any of the earlier schools I've gone to, but Lybecker, where this burnout and depression developed. In the dreams I enroll there again, or continue studies from where I left them. It feels awful to study there again even though I'm so sick and tired of it all. Waking up from School is a relief, but the memory of the dream usually dampens my mood for the rest of the day. The other distressing theme is Mother. As one earlier journal post shows, I really dislike my mother. In the dreams she harasses me again and again, demanding attention, ranting out her self-pity, wanting me to babysit, do housechores, be her slave with no respect... just like it was when I lived with her, and long afterwards. Usually I just do my best to avoid her and do my best to fend her off as politely as possible when confronted by her. These dreams show just how badly school and mother have tormented me.

I can't come up with anything else to say on this matter at the moment. Maybe in some later post I'll write about specific dreams. At least written down I wouldn't forget them so fast myself.