Wednesday November 30th, 2005 @ 11:47 PM
"S" is for Shayla and Super... Coincidence?? I think not.

    I keep having dreams where I'm a super hero. Just lately, I've been Spiderman and a warped horror version of Harry Potter. In the dreams, I'm always up against an enemy who's stronger than me. The thing is, I tend to view the dream like a movie, so I always "know" that I can succeed because I feel like I know the end of the movie.
    Sometimes I think it's a metaphor for my life. I don't know how on earth I'm going to accomplish my goals. Sometimes the world seems like an undefeatable enemy. But I don't really worry about it, because I feel like I already know how it's all going to end.
    In the dreams, I always think to myself, "Ah, so this is one of those stories where the good guy is at a physical disadvantage, so s/he'll either have to grow stronger, or outsmart the bad guy."
    Looks like I've got my work cut out for me. ;)

~Shayla

Tuesday November 29th, 2005 @ 10:17
Quizes are good when there's nothing to say :)

10 Firsts:

1. first best friend: Doggie Blue, or Andrea :)
2. first screename: Luned -->remember, guys??
3. first kiss: Mike :P
4. first pet: My old dog, Mr. Mugs.
5. first piercing: My ears. I let them close a few months later.
6. first crush: This guy Robert in junior kindergarten
7. first music: My mom's eighties music. ;)
8. first car: Matchbox
9. first love: Hahahah my dog Blue... I married him when I was seven.
10. first date: Mike :P

1. last cigarette: Never had a cigarette, although I've had tabacco mixed with weed... does that count??
2. last alchoholic drink: Whatever I was drinking on Halloween
3. last car ride: Home from school, today @ 6 PM
4. last real kiss: Today, at about 3 AM
5. last movie seen: Elf, with my parents. :)
6. last phone call: I called Andrew's house and talked to Jon.
7. last CD played: Hypnotize - System of a Down
8. last bubble bath: YEAR ago... I hate bubbles in the bath :P
9. last time you cried: Wow, like over a week ago! On Nov. 20th, when I came home from picking up books downtown and I didn't find anything, and everyone was in my house and asking me what happened. :P

1. have you ever been arrested: No, but I'm sure I will be eventually, for either indecent exposure, possession or not revealing my sources (the last one's a journalism thing).
2. have you ever dated one your best friends: Does Blue count?? ;)
3. have you ever skinny dipped: Yep, and I LOST MY CLOTHES!! :O
4. have you ever been on TV: Yep, I played keyboard for my dad's band in grade nine when they went on Breakfast TV for a cancer benefit.
5. have you ever kissed someone & then regretted it: Mike :P ...and someone else I don't what to mention...
6. have you ever had a sex dream about someone you knew?: YEAH, LIKE EVERYONE!!
7. have you ever snuck out: Yeah, but not seriously... Andrew and I snuck out of my house to get McDonalds... we "snuck" to avoid a lecture from my mom about eating junk food late at night. :P
8. have you ever been in a fight: ME? Yeah right.

1. loony-tunes panties ;)
2. UTSC sweater
3. t-shirt
4. jeans
5. socks
6. Andrew's ring
7. a smile :)

1. filled out a course evaluation for my crappy course >:)
2. eaten only fast-food :P
3. fallen asleep on the couches at university
4. had my last history lecture with the prof. I LOVE
5. watched "Just for Laugh Gags" on the TV in the student centre @ UTSC
6. played piano for the first time in like FOREVER

1. My room :) It's so BEE-OO-TEE-FUL!
2. My ring... sparkly...
3. My cat, Henry
4. This site :D
5. People who LEAVE ME COMMENTS (that's YOU!!)

1. Andrew
2. Katie
3. Precious (she's better to talk to than Henry)
4. My notebook (I know I'm a geek, but someday I'll compile all this crap into a book, and THEN who'll be the geek??)

1. black or white: black
2. hot or cold: hot
3. chocolate or vanilla: chocolate

1. Have a home life (have a family)
2. Get published

1. Perming my hair... Now it falls out so much more. :(

Tuesday November 29th, 2005 @ 12:27
[Insert title]

    So today is the day that I get to write a course review on the prof that I've been bitching about all semester... Yes, I'm spending five extra hours at school so I can go to his class and write that review. I need that feeling of justice... and I've been waiting months for this... I hope he gets fired, or at least sent back to whatever crappy school he came from. :P
    So I wonder how long before the prof in this computer lab realizes that I'm not part of his computer class and kicks me out... who thinks I'll make it the whole period? ;)
    Well today's a grey, grey day, and now the grey's all stuck in my head and it makes me unimaginative, unable to think clearly. I'll post again when my mind's sky clears.

~Shayla

Friday November 25th, 2005 @ 3:00 PM
This is becoming a major theme in my life lately...

    Where do you draw the line between your unconditional love and acceptance of someone as they are, and your desire for them to grow and improve themself to become a fuller person? It's not good to always demand more from someone and never love them as they are. But it's equally bad, if not worse, to just sit and watch someone do self-destructive things and call it "acceptance."
    I struggle with this concept in so many aspects of my life. I want to have high expectations for my children, but never make them feel unloved as they are. I want to know if my parents are having problems or if that's just how life goes. I want Andrew to live up to my expectations, someday, of a good parent, but I never want my kids to think that I think he's in any way incompetent. Am I, myself, enjoying well-deserved leisure, or simply wasting time I could be building toward something bigger?
    How do you know when people need your help, and when they need you to back off and let them make their own decisions?

~Shayla

PS. Please still read/comment on the previous entry if you haven't done so already... There too, I welcome guidance.

Friday November 25th, 2005 @ 12:12 AM
Chirstmas is a month from today...

    Isn't it weird how when I'm flooded with essays, I get inspired and feel like writing/updating my journal frequently, but when I finally get an abundance of time my mind goes blank. I think maybe I naturally function better under stress... Maybe journalism is the right field for me afterall. ;)
    So Katie's really starting to think about what she wants to do for a living... which is good, since she's in grade eleven and will be forced to make a decision soon. The thing is, there's never really been anything in particular that she wanted to do.
    We were talking, and she just has different priorities from the ones that are generally promoted these days. Her major criteria for a job is one in which at the end of the day she doesn't have to take any work home with her (Andrew, you can probably identify with that). Basically, she says that she doesn't want her job to become the focal point of her life. She just wants something that will provide her with some form of income, and enough leisure time to enjoy the personal, family side of her life.
    I understand what she means too. For me, I've always felt like my life is becoming somewhat divided in terms of my dreams. On one hand, yeah, I want to write books and get published and be successful. I want that a lot. But on the other hand, and even more importantly to me, I want a family life. I want to get married, and have a house, and raise children. No job will ever be the focal point of life either, because I know that whatever I get into, I want to quit when I turn about thirty so that I can stay at home and RAISE my kids until they start school. I hope I become a successful author so I can stay at home and write. These are my priorities. My book is important to me, but my kids? They will always, ALWAYS come first to me.
    And that's kind of how Katie feels. If I didn't have a lifelong passion for writing, I'd probably be in the exact same situation as she is right now.
    So we went through this career quiz thing she got at school, and I was picking out jobs I thought would be good for her. My favourite right now is an electrician: it only requires a college education (she really doesn't want to go to university), it makes a reasonable amount of money, it's *very* useful, it's cool/respectable, and I think she'd be fairly happy in it.
    I know my parents won't make a big deal if she doesn't go to university. Afterall, I'm the first girl on my dad's side to *ever* go to university (the second out of all the grandkids - Tim's going for his PhD in environmental sciences). It's just hard when everyone (especially her friends, some of them have been bugging her about this) assumes/expects that you want to devote your life to your work. Some people just have different priorities, and that's okay.
    What do you guys think (and Mary, I hope you're reading this entry... Katie mentioned wanting to talk to you because you sort of had to go through the same thing with people's opinions when you chose not to go to university... and I think you made the right choice for you :))? Can you think of any job that might be right for my sister?

~Shayla

Monday November 21st, 2005 @ 9:00 PM
"All Style, No Content" is one year old today!!

    Well, site, we've had some good times over the past year. You were there to help me keep in touch with my friends, you were there to help me bitch my thoughts to the world, you were there when I was sad/pissed and had no one else to talk to, and most importantly, you were there when I was bored and had nothing else to do but update (oh, how far away those days seem now!). ;)
    After managing my own site for a full year, there's really no going back to a service-hosted journal... I'm a control freak now. ;) Although I do miss the private entries on my scribble, nothing can beat full site-designing capabilities. :D
    So here's to another year of angry political rants, sob stories, daily reflections, and all the other little intangible moments that define us. ;)
    Random thoughts, dirty dreams and good intentions. Who couldn't use more of those?

~Shayla

Sunday November 20th, 2005 @ 3:22 AM
WARNING: Contents may explode under pressure

    If this essay doesn't start working out REALLY soon, I'm about to become a real bitch.
    My dad drove me out to the Mississauga campus library tonight at one in the morning because I needed a book for this essay, and because the UofT website said the library there would be open extended hours tonight, and I can't go tomorrow (today, actually), because I'm booked solid. So we go there, and the library's closed. I hate Mississauga.
    So now I'm cancelling plans to see Harry Potter with Andrew tomorrow and dragging my ass downtown to three different libraries to get more books. I thought about skipping class Monday and going then, but those lectures are actually important.
    And if THOSE libraries are closed when they're supposed to be open, I might have to kill someone.
    And if I'm late coming home and I miss part of the Santa Claus parade (my family's planned this big thing) and my mom bugs me, I'm going to storm out.
    And if Andrew bugs me about ditching him, I'm going to scream at him.
    I'm not perfect, and sometimes I get really tired of trying to be. It's essay season, so everyone just GET OUT OF MY WAY.

~Shayla

Friday November 18th, 2005 @ 2:38 PM
A November Snowfall...

    I think the first snowfall represents a psychological barrier for us. The snow means that it's really winter, and it breaks us out of the denial that fall won't last, and destroys any glimmer of hope that summer might return. The first snowfall is like, there's no going back.
    Which is ridiculous, because there's no going back anyway. ;)

~Shayla

PS. Sorry for all the short posts lately... I'm swamped with essays until the 24th, but I want to keep in the habit of updating regularly.

Thursday November 17th, 2005 @ 3:27 PM
Subconscious reflections...

    Last night I dreamed that Katie was trying to shoot me in the forest. Instead, she shot Andrew by accident, and he turned into my old dog, Blue. I was too small to lift him when he was alive, but now I'm much older. I carried him home.
    What do you think it means?

~Shayla

Tuesday November 15th, 2005 @ 1:01 PM
I'm not used to being judged at face value...

    I hate when people ask me about the plot of my book. It's the same sort of way I feel when people ask me about the events of my life: sure, there are some bigger events, but it is the small, intangible parts of my life that are the best, that define me. The large events of my life seem so trivial and unimportant alone. Summarized on paper, my life seems pretty unremarkable. And so does the plot to the book.
    I tried to explain this to the person who asked about the plot of my book today, but I don't think he understood. When I told him that the plot was not the most important aspect of the book, he asked if maybe it should be more important because, you know, people tend to read books for their plots.
    Every once in a while something like this comes along and shakes me up a bit. It makes me realize that I really have no proof that anything I plan for my life is going to work out. All I'm really standing on are my dreams and faith in my abilities.
    On the bright side, I guess that's all anyone has, really.

~Shayla

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