I’ve had tons of stuff going on in real life. Most of it is banal crap they would be better served by not becoming a permanent fixture on this blog. Anyway, here’s what I’ve been up to lately. Just for the record, I love bulleted lists:

• School: Bllllah. As always, so so. I sometimes feel like I’m doomed to a eternity of extraordinary mediocre academic performance. The solution to this is to keep my chin (and self-esteem) up, and to “keep on truckin’,” as the proles like to put it.
• Sleep: Not so bad really. I’ve found that if I stay up really late on sunday, that it really isn’t so bad if I sleep through monday and make it up on tuesday. By the time I get home (i.e. Now), I’m feeling great. Not ideal, but good enough for the time being. Mentioning this to my psychiatrist, she offered me some sleeping pills, I politely denied them.
• Vacation: Winter break approaches, but this time it’s going to be a bit different. By the looks of things, my mother is boycotting the annual post-xmas trip down to see the age’d grandparents and their umbrella of spawn. I do actually want to see the cousins, and especially the new addition Logan, but the chances of that occuring are slimming by the moment.

I have been feeling pretty good lately, with the exception of having to deal with an exceptionally frustrating acquaintance I’m forced see daily. Fortuitously, I just found an article on dealing with impossible people that offers some worthwhile coping skills. Worth a read if you find yourself having to combat anyone unreasonable.

Best Wishes ~ Fergus

I did have a happy birthday, and thanks to everyone who said so: Hannah, Chas, Cecilia, Lydia, Berta, Amy, Duncan, Maham, Hwaran, May, Alissa, Kali, and so on.

Here’s the required bulleted gift list (Now with 33% more commentary):

• From Parents:
  • Black sweater
  • Plum collared shirt
  • Ferruche gold t-shirt with brown trim
  • Lucky brand brown corduroys
  • Clothes are always considered a lame birthday gift, but I have to say these are pretty awesome
• From Hannah: A wonderful handmade book of photos of us. It’s super cute and because she made it late at night, super silly.
• From Amy:
  • Rock ‘em Sock ‘em Robots pen: This thing is way more fun than it should be
  • Modeling clay: Everyone love modeling clay
  • Journal with a big purple flower. Inside joke about our advert design class: I try to stick a flower in my projects whenever possible.
  • Assorted Candies: Mmm.
  • Rubber Ducky Soap: Is she saying I smell bad? :)
• Duncan: 3 crisp fivers. Duncan’s all about the cash monay.
• Maham: Limericks. They were too awful wonderful to reproduce here. Trust me. Bad Enlightening. I guess it’s the thought that counts :)
• Alissa: Sign. She made me a big sign that said ‘Happy Birthday Fergus!’ I felt a bit self-conscious walking around with a sign that said that, but you know, it’s cool.

Thanks again everyone!

After school Duncan and Hannah came over. We partook in delicious black bean lasanga and lemon poppyseed cake courtesy of my Mother. Delicious. Hannah and I snuggled and watched Osamu Tezuka’s Metropolis. Now I’m writing this, and going to bed contented.

Life goes on. Let’s see what happened in these last two or so weeks of bloglessness.

School started, I’m now a senior. Schedule:

• Japanese II — Same as usual. The class is filled with anime fans of the socially inept variety. The teacher appointed me the Japanese Club president out of the blue, so I’m going to have to find some sort of way to manage them without stabbing my eardrums out from all the Yu-gi-oh talk.
• AP Environmental Science — Like my previous science class, this one looks like it’s going to be valueable. The subject matter seems pretty manageable, yet it also seems like I’ll be learning alot.
• AP Psychology — Whoah. The teacher is a bitter old man: he sits in front of the class seething until someone raises their hand to ask a question, then he begins a lecture. It goes on like this until the bell rings. The subject matter is pretty eye-opening, I hope I don’t end up a nihilist by the end of it.
• AP Computer Science — Bah, this class is almost a waste of my time. I already know how to program, but now I’m having to do it in older, crappier languages. Bleh.
• ‘D’ Lunch — Worst. Lunch. Evar. It’s the last lunch period of the day, so I’m rediculously hungry by the time I get to it, and I know all of two people. Oh well.
• AP English — I wanted to be in the middle level class, but the lovely counselors stuck me in the lowest. The only option was to move up the the highest. I hope this doesn’t manage to mangle my grades.
• Advertising and Graphic Design — I really, really like this class. I’ve had the same art teacher for three years, and even though she isn’t the best, she gets the job done. The class is also an excuse for me to buy some awesome art supplies ^__^
• Algebra III — This class is sadly easy. It’s the math class for people who don’t want a math class. It’s just a review of the first two algebras. Get it? Algebra 1 + 2 = 3?

Between the Enlglish fiasco, I’m excited about the year. Despite this, I’m still ready to get out of home: the faster this year goes by the better.

My family bought a new Toyota Prius. I think this is the first time we’ve own more than one functioning car in close to a decade. The price was marked up like hell becuase of the scarcity of Priuses in North America, but the car itself is a dream. It handles great, although it takes some getting used to after driving the land-yacht station wagon.

More importantly, we’ve driven the car 225 miles and the gas meter is only down halfway. I don’t have the exact MPG figures at the moment, but I think it’s around 50. Pretty freaking impressive. I like to think of it as a mobile ‘Fuck You’ to the oil companies.

My house has been invaded by carpenter ants. I’m sure it’s just a summer occurance and not a serious permanent condition, but even then I can’t help developing a sort of love-hate relationship with the bugs.

I’ve only ever seen a single one at once, so it’s easy to imagine that it’s simply one ant following me around to different rooms. He’s walking on the wall behind my computer moniter. He’s eating some toothpaste off the bathroom counter. He’s standing on the oven’s fume hood.

When I get really close and actually observe, I start to see little nuances in the ant’s behavior. They stand on their back legs and clean off their antennae with their front two, almost like a cat grooming it’s ears. Despite this, it’s hard to emphasize with something hundreds of thousands of times smaller than you. It’s easy to flick them away, and it’s easy to imagine one crawling down your back while you sleep.

(Side-Note: Most species of ant don’t actually bite, they sting with formic acid. Apparently, carpenter ants lack the delivery method to inject formic acid directly into our skin, so when threatened they attempt to bite and then inject the formic acid into the bite wound. I never actually had a carpenter ant bite me without having me actively trying to coax them into doing so.)

An Ant, by M.C. Escher