Being vegan is hard!

Or so people tell me. Many of them probably haven't actually given it a shot. They just say some variation of the above. I also hear nonsense like "being vegan means sacrificing" or "I could never do that" fairly often and it's only been a couple months. Perhaps I'm being unfair when I call the latter "nonsense"--I'm sure they know what they can and can't do better than me. Nonetheless, I am very suspicious of the truth of that statement when I hear it, so when someone says it all I hear is them reinforcing their resolve to continue eating animal products by repeating justifications of their supporting frivolous abuse and slaughter. Or perhaps they're just reminding me of their boundaries out of concern that I'll cross them by saying more about the unsavory aspects of their food sources than they're comfortable hearing.

Writing this in a blog post feels like kind of a passive-aggressive move to me. I probably won't post it on Tumblr to lower the chances of anyone who has said this to me reading this. If that didn't work, hello and nothing personal, this is just how I feel and I try not to hurt your feelings too much by actually talking about this sort of thing around you (or maybe by the time you read this I'll have made an ass of myself in front of you and if I did, sorry.) That's a collective/ambiguous "you", by the way, not you personally. Anyway.

I suppose it could be worse--I haven't run into any outright hostility yet. Most people are supportive as long as I don't show any signs of expecting them to do it, too. I'm not naive enough to expect them all to go vegan just because I am, but I do think they should, and I'm not going to say otherwise (although it is their own choice that they have to make themselves--that doesn't mean I don't have an opinion about what choice they should make. An irrelevant opinion, but it exists nonetheless and it won't change.) I wouldn't care as much if so many people being omnivores didn't limit my food choices in some circumstances because omnivores are the ones being catered to. I'm vegan mainly because I think keeping and slaughtering livestock (especially on an industrial scale) is wrong, but I go out of my way to wash my hands of it for the sake of my own peace of mind--it might make a difference, but one person changing their habits won't make the factory farms disappear.

Anyway. Veganism itself is not hard, at least not in my experience and at least not the dietary aspect of it, which seems to be what most people insist is so hard (you can look through my previous posts if you'd like to see examples of the mental circles I've been running around in because of the wool and leather I bought pre-vegan.) It isn't that there isn't tons of delicious vegan-friendly food out there--it's just that it's neglected in favor of omnivorous recipes. Since omnivores can eat vegan food without violating their principles and the reverse is not true, I find this extremely irritating and profoundly unfair. Not that most people have any reason to care about that--it's just an explanation for how I react to omnivorous eating habits. If it seems like I resent them, it's because I do, even if the people who possess them are lovely. Not saying any of them should go vegan to make me happy--I know that will probably just make them resent me if their hearts aren't in it, and I don't want that. Just venting, I guess.

SUGAR--

Christmas is nearly over as I write this, and I do not have a sore throat or (much of a) headache. Context matters here, I guess (although I'm sure you can guess without me telling you.) My family has this tendency to really load up on sweets over the holidays (even past the amount we can conceivably stuff our faces with over Christmas assuming we don't care about the consequences later.) When there are sweets around, my usual reaction is to eat them until they're gone. Because sweets are delicious in any quantity (actually, no, but I forget this easily XD.) However, when those sweets contain animal products (which most of the baked things do), it suddenly becomes super easy for me to not eat them (although Mom's sugar cookies are slightly tempting--perhaps next year I'll make my own batch.)

Regardless of how much I like a variety of sweets (or think I do), my favorite thing is actually Chex mix (which is easy to make vegan, especially when my parents usually make two batches anyway.) This year, I also started a new tradition--gingerbread bats! The Lady of the Manners posted her recipe, and her professed love of super spicy cookies was enough to convince me to try it out (unfortunately, I do not have a bat-shaped cookie cutter, so I cut them out by hand until I got sick of that and just started making stars. Next year there will be more bats >D.) I substituted a flax egg and Earth Balance buttery sticks for the eggs and butter in the recipe and they were delicious (although not as spicy as I hoped--another thing to work on next year.)

I also started making tangine from a recipe my mom found online, which everyone enjoyed. There was some tension over the meals between me and my mom because she wanted me to cook separate vegan dishes and I wanted her to adapt a couple of her usual recipes, but I've found that since I don't eat much anyway, I'm pretty satisfied with tangine and stuff from the relish tray. (Perhaps I'll make some gravy and biscuits for Thanksgiving next year--we'll see.)

So. Hooray for new traditions and not having a sore throat. Happy Christmas to those who celebrate it, and happy holidays to everyone else.

Why stories?

Oh hi. It's been how long? I'm still alive. It's only been a month that so wasn't necessary whatever. Anyway. I kind of fell off the blog in the last month or so of my semester, but now I'm on break, so no more excuses. I've kept track of the amount of posts I've missed (I intended to post every Monday and Thursday... *cough*...) and hope to make them up at this point. We'll see. I've got projects planned (but who knows if they'll get done), so there's some post fodder.

This last semester was probably the biggest workload I've ever faced, and I definitely questioned the point of a lot of things that are emphasized in my department--or really I questioned the point of literary analysis. That class was pretty much my pet peeve of the semester even though the professor and the discussions were awesome and the pieces we studied were decently interesting. You see, I'm not really interested in analyzing literature for the sake of analyzing it, and this class really reminded me why. I think it's good to know how to analyze and to what ends people have analyzed things, but unless I have a reason besides getting a grade, I can't help but find my heart isn't in it when I have to pretend to be objective. "The text made me feel x because the author did x" is way more compelling to me than "x thing the author did means x and that's significant because x". Literary impact and interpretation are highly subjective, so why should I bother trying to write objectively about it, or even write about it at all if it doesn't touch me?

That said, most of the stuff we read does touch me to some degree (although the stressful conditions imposed by the schedule we study them by is not very conducive to me putting out quality product regarding said material.) Not a lot, though, just in a "yeah! that makes sense" kind of way. What I like, I like because I recognize and can relate to it. There's the "so what?". If I go any further, I'll just be talking about myself, not the text. I like it because I see myself in it.

That said, I think literature does more than just make us readers feel lonely. It also helps us understand ourselves and our surroundings better because it shapes and reflects the values of the society we live in. If we analyze our reactions and what about a text makes us react that way, it teaches us about ourselves, the people around us, and what factors shape the ways we think and perceive. It's one big mirror/camera that records more than we can ever hold in our hearts and minds at once.

Not that making us feel less lonely isn't important. In doing so, we grow to care about the characters we read about, which I think is also important. In fact, perhaps it wouldn't be inaccurate to think of the ability to give a fuck as a muscle that needs exercising in order to keep functioning--and caring about fictional characters helps exercise that muscle so we're better equipped to use it in real life. At the same time, it can also validate things we see in ourselves but not in other real people because they're too personal. It seems silly, but humans seem to really thrive on validation from other humans. But when everyone is too scared they're the only one that does something or feels some way about something, none of those feelings get validated even if they're common, and we become basket cases who hide ourselves away because we're sure people will think we're weird. Fiction becomes a safe place to talk about these things where they don't implicate real people (or at least, provide said real people with plenty of plausible deniability), but at the same time, we know it comes from people. So it still works as social validation--which makes it easier to care about our own well-being. More flexing of the care-muscle, in short. And that's why fiction is important?

... at any rate. I've got a thing to polish. Maybe I'll have another draft done before the break's up. And maybe one day it will be fit for the general public to view, and someone will read it and obsess over my characters as much as I do and we'll both feel slightly less lonely.

Clothing As Self-Expression

... is really important to me. I mean, I mostly think about how the way I look makes *me* feel when I put together outfits. But at the same time (in a more abstract sense), having a wardrobe that reflects my life offline and my values is also important. And I don't mean catchy slogans or stuff advertising charities/causes or whatever. That's a bit much for me. I'd rather have the history of the garment itself say something about me. Cue overly-imaginative floundering over vintage stuff in 3... 2...

No, that's actually not what I mean, either. I buy used as a way to reduce my contribution to the morbid amounts of waste generated by consumer society. I also don't like to fund countries that send their factories to countries with lax labor laws allowing them to not maintain their facilities and expose their employees to all kinds of dangerous shit without getting in trouble--not that none of my clothing comes from there, though. That's a bit much for my budget (and honestly, even if it wasn't, I'm a cheapass when it comes to clothes that aren't custom made for me or coincidentally perfect as-manufactured >__>). Buying things new in general means an additional contribution to the monster that is the industrial economy. Not that buying things used doesn't do that at all, but at least then the money stays local and/or supports a good cause besides making shitloads of money because money. And even if there isn't some extra cause like housing/feeding people who need the help, if it's from a person/business that primarily sells used, it at least goes to a business that most likely removes more things from the waste stream than it adds.

So, ideally my clothes reflect a distaste for the industrial economy and the colossal amounts of waste and unnecessary suffering that go with it, if only to myself since for all most people know I bought it all new. This is not what is always reflected in what I wear because of the occasional lapse or just because I still have stuff that's from when I was a teenager and still in the process of figuring out clothes (not that I'm not still figuring out clothes--I've just done more of it since then o__o.) I've also recently decided to start phasing leather and wool things out, which will take awhile since boots are expensive (I'll be buying them new since I want them to last and most non-leather boots that I find secondhand are crap, but they're all from countries that manufacture things within the U.K., so not too horrible.) Slightly more noticeable, but still not that apparent (especially since the boots will still look like leather and because sweaters look like sweaters.)

The whole vegan thing has kind of inspired me to be more vigilant about my luxury spending in general--out of the few things I don't buy used, I don't want any of it to be made in countries with substandard labor laws, and I'd prefer it to come from small (or at least exemplary, like Patagonia?) businesses when practical (pretty easy for binders and socks assuming Underworks is as small as I think it is, not so much for briefs--those come from American Apparel for now.) I've been pretty relaxed about this kind of thing before, but I want to be more rigid about it in the future and not buy anything new unless it's something high quality that I'll be using a lot (boots... underwear... coats... maybe a couple Alchemy Gothic pieces? -__-;) that is made in a country with acceptable labor laws and is not made with animal products. And I don't want to do that very often at all because there's still the impact of manufacturing new stuff to think about.

Going through the outfit photos/selfies I have from the past several years, I'm not really able to find many outfits that satisfy that (though there are an awful lot that come close except for the wool beret and leather shoes.) Most of the few photos that could work are from the waist up, or photos where I'm not fully dressed. Here's one where pretty much everything seems to fit--nothing is made with animal products to my knowledge and all of it save the necklace (which came from a seller at a renaissance festival--not sure where it was made) was bought secondhand. I genuinely can't recall for sure what I was wearing under the skirt, but I'm leaning towards socks (rather than my wool tights.)

Useful Dead Things

So I found an awesome overnight bag/suitcase type thing at a vintage store that's the perfect size for my laptop and other school things. AND it's floral with a black background and it goes with pretty much everything I own =D. And the cat enjoys sitting on it, too (she seemed a little creeped out by the leather bag, but still obligated to at least try to make it smell like her o__o.) Trouble is the handle broke--it's being fixed right now, but in the mean time I'm back to using the leather bag (which in comparison with the suitcase is not only made of dead cow but also a touch too small -__-.)

I've still got the fate of my wool and leather stuff running around the back of my head, though I'm not worrying about it like I was before. I'm planning to replace the belts when I can, and my docs are starting to get really worn out anyway, so I'll probably need another pair of boots soon. I'm thinking I'll keep the docs and the above-mentioned leather bag as back-ups (and I'll explain why that's acceptable to me... further down o__o.) That leaves the wool. Finding a jacket has been difficult (sizing and style already made it hard, looks like wool is the deal-breaker as far as me not having to commission a jacket from scratch goes XD.) The sweaters and tights I will replace as they wear out or when I can afford to replace them, whichever happens first. The wool dress pants (and leftover fabric that will be made into a vest when I can afford it) are not going anywhere--if I could go back in time and tell myself to pick something that didn't come from an animal, I would, but I can't, and they're tailor-made to fit me and should last me my life if I don't get signficantly bigger/smaller and I take care of them, so getting rid of them would be extremely wasteful.

Which brings me back to the factor that lead to me keeping around my leather shoes/bag as back-ups. The idea is that it's better to keep the useful dead things around than it is to waste them (which I'm afraid is what would happen if I donated them, since both are a bit beat-up), as long as I'm not relying on them. And the not-relying on them thing is pretty much for show--not that I think anyone is watching, but whatever. I realize that this puts me outside the definition of vegan, at least if you ask some people, but I don't really care. The word isn't the point, but it is a handy shortcut to getting people to understand that I don't want to consume/buy any animal products at all.

The other reason for getting rid of it was the side effect of perpetuating the idea that it's acceptable to kill/abuse animals for the products we can make from them (by wearing them in public.) Which is part of why I'm going to any effort to get rid of them at all, but I still think that wasting something is worse. As long as I don't buy any more, I'll be okay with myself.

Fashion Is Evil

But we love being evil so it's okay >D. (Don't worry, I'm using "evil" facetiously here. Unless that worries you.)

Or maybe I mean style. I think style is what I mean. Aesthetics, not trends. It pleases me ever so much, and yet it's also incredibly indulgent and rather impractical. I don't exactly shirk my responsibilities for fashion or anything like that. And I try not to support companies that use unjust means to produce their product like forcing their employees to work in dangerous/poorly-maintained surroundings (not to mention unreasonably long/frequent shifts) and using toxic chemicals in the production of the garments and killing/abusing animals. Not like I can afford to buy much of those new--better to buy everything used and wash my hands of the suffering that made the clothes I wear daily. They're clean if my money didn't go to the selfish assholes who only care about maximizing their profits, right?

Sometimes I feel like it's a bit frivolous to have so much clothing--like they're just more possessions weighing me down instead of things that genuinely make me happy, although they often really do improve my mood even if it's a piece I've had for years. But every once in awhile I start to forget that and contemplate purging my wardrobe to the point of refining it into a kind of killer black uniform full of black turtlenecks and boots. Then I think of how long it took to amass what I have and it seems like getting rid of it would be such a waste, even if I somehow managed to not miss it.

I do so love getting the details of an outfit coordinated just right, which of course takes a variety of garments and accessories so I can keep doing it over again. And I love the decadence. Really decadence is a symptom of everything that's wrong with industrial society--but the undead vampires and resin dollies of lolita and the gloriously hollow, glitter-encrusted creatures of '70s glam are so intoxicatingly pretty. And if you can make everything in your life pretty, why should anything else matter?

Kitchen Adventures

I'm finding that most things I eat normally have a vegan alternative (hooray treading a path tread by many conscientious internet users before me =D.) I've been tweaking some of my recipes and also trying out new ones, and here's where I'm at.

Muffins were pretty easy. I substitute canola oil for one egg and the apple sauce I use to flavor the muffins (this page has really been helpful for working around eggs in recipes), and since these are things I eat as fuel throughout the day when I'm at school instead of as a treat, I also use whole wheat flour instead of all-purpose flour, which also works out pretty well. Here's my recipe (as adapted from a Moosewood recipe):

Wet Ingredients:

3/4 cup Vegetable oil (1 cup if blueberry muffins)

3/4 cup Brown sugar

1/2 tsp Vanilla extract

Dry Ingredients:

2 cups Flour (unbleached all-purpose or whole wheat)

2 tsp Baking powder

1/2 tsp Salt

Dash (opt) Cinnamon

Special Ingredients:

1 3/4 cups Apple sauce or mashed banana

1 1/2 cups Nuts (and/or chocolate chips)

OR

1 1/2 cups Blueberries

1. Preheat at 350 F.

2. Mix wet ingredients together.

3. Gradually mix in dry ingredients.

4. Mix in fruit.

5. Mix in nuts.

6. Put cooking spray in muffin tin.

7. Put batter in muffin tin.

8. Put muffin tin in oven for ~19 minutes.

9. Remove and test done-ness with knife.

Another thing I adapted was the "vanishing" oatmeal cookies recipe on the inside of the lids on cans of Quaker oats:

1/2 cup (1 stick) + 6 tbsp. Butter*, softened

3/4 cup Firmly packed brown sugar

1/2 cup Granulated sugar

1/2 cup Vegetable oil

1 tsp. Vanilla

1 1/2 cup All-purpose flour

1 tsp. Baking soda

1 tsp. Ground cinnamon

1/2 tsp. Salt

3 cups Rolled oats

1 cup Raisins or chocolate chips (or some other kind of dried fruit, possibly chopped up)

1. Heat oven to 350 F (175 C). In large bowl, beat butter and sugars on medium speed of electric mixer until creamy.

2. Add vegetable oil and vanilla; beat well.

3. Add combined flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt; mix well.

4. Add oats and raisins, mix well.

5. Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets.

6. Bake 8 to 10 actually more like 10-15 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool 1 minute on cookie sheets; remove to wire rack. Cool completely. Store tightly covered. Makes about 4 dozen cookies.

*and by butter I actually mean Earth Balance butter or some other kind of vegan substitute.

The scones took a few tries (I don't have a picture of them, unfortunately). I've been using this recipe, but they were turning out a bit denser without the cow milk. When I tried putting in almond paste (a by-product from making home-made almond milk) in place of the optional sultanas in the recipe, however, it worked out quite well. I also substituted canola oil for the egg wash (or you can just leave it off), Earth Balance buttery sticks for the butter, and almond milk for the cow milk.

That brings me to almond milk. You can totally get that at most grocery stores, but I've found I prefer the flavor (nuttier) and texture (smoother) of homemade almond milk, which is pretty simple to make (though a bit messy with my parents' food processor that barely holds the water and almonds this recipe calls for, and just time consuming enough that I don't always have time to make it as often as I'd like). You can flavor it yourself and alter the thickness--I haven't tried flavorings besides chocolate, mint, and vanilla yet with this, but if macarons can be made with almond flour and come in as many delicious flavors as they do, I figure more flavors than one might think could work with almond milk.

One thing that's really becoming apparent to me is how we treat dairy flavor as a neutral/default taste for products that call for milk, but that's not because it actually is, it's just what we're used to. That said, some options don't go so well with certain flavorings (*coughgreenteaflavoredcoconuticecreamcough*). But I figure that's like how people don't generally put tabasco sauce or pomegranate juice in milk (... right? o__o). Things like almond milk aren't a nutty substitute that doesn't quite taste like cow milk--they're just different options.

Not that I'll be able to persuade my family of that come Thanksgiving. If I want to eat, I'll actually have to do a lot of my own cooking this year (to share, of course, but I'm guessing it won't be too popular between the cow-milk mashed potatoes and turkey and cheesy things.) We'll see how that goes o__o.

On Names

The pratice of naming your child as an infant with the idea that they'll go by some form of that name their entire life is kind of absurd. Being trans and having been given a name that has very binary/female conotations at birth, my opinion of this practice is, of course, biased. But what happens to so many trans people here is only an extreme example.

What would happen if it were the social standard to name oneself once they were old enough? It seems like the names of people who do so in this society have names more specific to themselves since the factor of "but what if the other children tease them?" and just the general parental lack of knowledge of who the person being named are no longer issues. Not that we should just not give children names or call them all "[surname] number x" or something like that. Just that maybe the names given to babies shouldn't be regarded as permanent. Otherwise, you get adults with names that say more about their parents and a time period the individual barely remembers (if at all) than about the individual themself. Not to say there aren't plenty of people where birthnames suit them well--hell, the connotations of names can change depending on the individuals who carry them.

As for me, it's not like I hate my birth name. I works, the connotation of it is just misleading about who I am as an individual. I'm still figuring out how to deal with this. Right now, I have two spellings for my birth name--the legal one, and the vaguely-masculine-looking one that I put on homework and use with family and school. "Adryrn" was just a screen name at first, but it became a thing people actually called me when I started meeting up with people I first met online. Even so, it's an informal name--it'd be weird to see it on homework assignments, or even Facebook (let alone my drivers' license.) Even if I did change my name, I wouldn't want to take my birth name off my birth certificate--it's still something I used to go by. I can't make that un-happen, nor would I want to--it was just a different stage of my life. It's fine that I was a little girl with a girly name when I was younger--the problem is when people extend those qualities to who I am now.

So, I have two names--one for personal/informal situations, and one for legal/academic/family/business situations. The fun overlap-y bit of this is friends I made because of school (which is the majority of them, because my activites pretty much are my social life--I've just recently started to ask these people to call me "Adryrn", and I think I'll continue doing that when I hang out with people outside an academic context.) More complicated than I'd like it to be, but not impossibly confusing.

There is an upside to not going by my birthname--employers will have a very difficult time Googling me >D. It helps that there's a pretty well-known costume person with the same name. I can have my non-professional online presence and post pretty much whatever I want, largely without worrying about it biting me in the ass (of course, nothing you post online is private and can't be traced back to you--it's just more difficult for potential employers to do so.) The different names work nicely to keep my academic/professional and individual selves reasonably separate in this digital era. So I guess having a wonky birth name has its perks even if I do make it more complicated than it needs to be.

I really do wonder what would happen if people had more freedom to name themselves, though (yeah, it's legally possible to do exactly what I'm talking about as long as you don't stick weird things like umlauts in your name, but the process looks like more of a pain in the ass than it should be). Or maybe just the idea that most people only have one name they keep their whole life should go away. Thoughts? Examples of cultures where this is the norm?

You are all toilet paper thieves! D8

I never really stopped and noticed before how the toilet paper is padlocked into the container in the bathrooms at Coffman Union. Reminds me of how easy it probably would've been to grab a few rolls out of the bin in the bathrooms at the Freie Universität Berlin's Rost- and Silberlaube. Never really seemed worth doing to me, though, even on the days when we were running short on toilet paper and I didn't want to stop and buy some on my way home. Running out the door with a roll or two of obviously-stolen toilet paper in hand would've at best looked really stupid, after all.

I can think of one other situation that parallels this one, although you can't really tell who didn't pay their fare on the U-bahn just by looking at them and U-bahn tickets cost more than toilet paper. Anyway, one of my favorite things about S- and U-bahn in Germany is that there are no turnstiles. It's more annoying than one might think to have to hunt around in one's pocket or bag for one's transit card (or worse, a little cardboard ticket, especially if you're in Paris where they get bent or lost easily 'cause they're so tiny), THEN figure out which turnstile to use (even if all it takes is a quick glance), and possibly grapple with a barred revolving door, and potentially deal with malfunctioning machines, all while you're trying to get somewhere. All in the name of making sure people who didn't pay don't get on. I never liked turnstiles much, and after living in Berlin for awhile I've grown to resent them.

Not that Berlin just lets people ride for free--every once in awhile, transit police sweep through the trains checking people's tickets. It happens very seldom (I could probably count the times I saw this happen in the ten months I was in Germany on one hand), and yet I've heard more than one person say it seems like it always happens to them on the one day they don't happen to have their ID on them, or bought the wrong ticket. Not to assert that there aren't plenty of "Schwarzfahrer" that might manage to get away with it all the time--I have no idea. But plenty of people do get caught, and the transit company doesn't seem to be losing money over the lack of turnstiles.

It seems like there's a sort of general tightfistedness in American culture (and probably plenty of other countries, too, it's just that American culture is the only one of them that I've experienced enough to really be able to say that sort of thing about it) that isn't present in German culture (or if it is and I didn't notice it, then it doesn't manifest itself in such blatant ways.) Our public facilities seem to go way out of their way to make sure that no one takes more advantage of them than they're meant to, to an extent that makes me wonder if they spend more money on precautions like turnstiles and padlocks and card readers than they would lose from the moochers these devices are put in place to ward off.

Even if the more precautious way is more economical, by how much? Is it really worth the inconvenience for the people who aren't looking to freeload (which I like to expect are a majority of people using these facilities)? Or perhaps it would be better to ask if giving everyone the impression that they're a bunch of dishonest hooligans out to rip anyone off that they can in the eyes of these institutions is really worth whatever economic benefit the padlocks and turnstiles provide. Seems excessively obsessive to me.

Hooray studying

I was on the verge of feeling like my information-absorbing stage was over. Ha. Hahahahaha. (I suppose I should stop and explain: I like to think most people go through their childhood and sometimes young adulthood mostly absorbing things, and then at some point they move on to being more productive that absorbant. Not that one should ever stop absorbing things. Still. Stupefyingly obvious yet over-simplified, I know, but ignore that for now, that's not my point.)

There is so fucking much out there that I still haven't read or listened to or otherwise absorbed. Not to mention places I haven't been, but with my current schedule and in the aftermath of returning from ten months on another continent travel hasn't been on my mind too much (with the exception of traveling for the purpose of seeing people rather than places.) I'm reading a lot of Shakespeare lately for a couple of my courses, which is good. I've been meaning to do that awhile (screams the complete Shakespeare collection I picked up from a high school library sale awhile back that totally isn't the expensive-and-probably-significantly-different-in-some-way collection required by my Shakespeare class but TOO DAMN BAD oops tangent sorry hi I resent having to buy textbooks why can't they just put everything we need online and do away with and/or circumvent the copyright laws preventing such action no damnit that is not what this post is about *headdesk*... that's better.)

I feel like I don't listen to enough music, for one. Or at least, not a wide enough variety. (Or enough, probably--listening to music uses up battery power faster and I don't want to bring my laptop charger with me to school because space in my bag is limited.) I have the internet at my fingertips, why do I not actually sit down and really listen to Tool or Fugazi or St Vincent or My Chemical Romance or Ministry or Skinny Puppy or other bands not to mention orchestral music--

Damnit. This was supposed to be a positive post. Anyway. The world itself is not only highly entertaining, but also full of entertaining stuff people made up that I'm totally missing out on. Actually, even more than usual wait no you're sick of hearing about my schedule/classes. Probably. At least I got copies of Pop Kids and Interview with the Vampire from the library and my graphic novel pile that I want to read first is only five six books tall? (Yes, I've never read the second above-mentioned book. Or anything else by Anne Rice. Do you see what I mean by not reading enough? 8D)

Um. I think I'll just stop here. Maybe my mental flailing will be perversely entertaining to someone somewhere somewhen. At any rate, I give you... the mentality behind me not posting for weeks at a time! *turns up music and ponders doing more homework before they have to do it during ought-to-be-sleeping time totally did do that homework during time they should've been sleeping but oh well*

Civilization

There's been this fun dichotomy in how people see civilization and nature as two totally separate or even opposing things. Or how they think we're removed from nature, or that our industrial society is this horrendously unnatural creation.

Life eats itself to survive in this world, and humans are no exception. (Here comes that bit where some omnivores use what I just mentioned to justify their eating habits--that's not what I want to do here.) I just want to remind myself and anyone else reading this that we can't escape the cannibalistic side of the nature of life (if you'll excuse my liberal application of that word)--we must kill things or starve, and most of those organisms we kill at least relied on eating dead things to survive, if they didn't also actively kill things. It's not just our treatment of animals (though that is where it's particularly apparent if you stop and look), it's in all of agriculture and in the very fabric of the economic practices and attitudes that are driving the destruction of the environmental conditions conducive to human life (be it capitalism or communism or something like socialism with the capacity for all the downsides of both of those systems =D.)

We use people whenever we can. Just because we don't actually eat them doesn't mean the system isn't naturally inclined to devour them in order to expand itself if it gets a chance. We tell ourselves this is fair, and maybe we think it's fair because it seems unavoidable (even if it happens very disproportionately more often to some groups of people than others.) And maybe it is to some degree--the phrase "life is hard" is hackneyed for a reason. But devouring animals (human and non) on the massive scale we do is not something I can accept as completely unavoidable.

(Not to imply that I'm some sort of activist or something, or even that I avoid such practices as much as is humanly possible. I'm far too self-centered for that, though I do put some effort into getting close to the latter. Anyway, when I say avoid I mean personally avoid perpetuating, not actively fight the existance of.)

But just because it's atrocious doesn't mean it's not natural. The similarities between our industrial economy and the life/death cycle of other organisms are pretty surprising to me given the attitude we have toward said economy (not to mention civilization in general.) It's an expectable extension of the same instincts and practices that keep other less diabolically clever animals alive.

That doesn't make it right, of course. Nature is ruthlessly pragmatic--if it works, it goes, regardless of how much suffering comes with it. I suppose I should feel lucky that eating our young is unconducive to the continuation of our genes, and that devouring the weak in a literal sense never quite caught on.

Somehow, someway, being able to think of how our actions affect other beings even when they benefit us as individuals and care whether others suffer managed to be so conducive (or at least not in conflict with) our surivial that we can do it to the degree we're capable of. This is an ability that must be put to use, no matter how contrary it may be to the nature of the perpetuation of life in this world.

 [I'll try to post something more positive on Thursday? ^^;]

Long-lived Dead Things

[Wait what what happened to October oh shit it's already half over 0__0.]

Part three or four or something of the apparently ongoing obsession with being a responsible consumer. Fair warning if you're getting bored with that =D. 

So I just ditched this mindset where I didn't pay attention to how leather is obviously made of dead animals and helps perpetuate the idea that killing things to make clothes you don't need to survive is okay. And now a good chunk of the stuff I use almost literally every day contributes to this societal concept for everyone who sees me.

I had good intentions. I swear. And most of my leather (except for the pyramid-stud belt and the o-ring collar... and the gloves...) was bought secondhand, so it's not like I've supported the leather industry much directly. I tended to specifically look for real leather and avoid manmade substitutes because I wanted things that would last so I wouldn't have to buy more or generate as much waste (most imitation leather that I've come across is cheapass crap that falls apart faster than you can say "meat is murder." And the good quality stuff is not something that seems to pop up used very often.)

So by buying secondhand leather I was taking things out of the waste stream, and decreasing my own future garbage (in theory, at least--*coughleatherbootswithcheapasssplittingsolescoughcough*). I also think that the leather products already in existance should be used. The idea of something some creature had to suffer and die for the production of getting burned or buried or otherwise squandered is kind of awful (as you've probably already heard from me >__>). At the same time, I have a rather unpopular ethical agenda I should probably at least not blatantly contradict every time I go to class.

I do want to get rid of my jackets, gloves, and belts at some point. Those are all in good shape and pretty versatile/awesome-looking in general, so I'm sure they'll find good homes with stubborn omnivores whenever I'm able to replace them. My shoes and book bag, on the other hand, are already a tad ragged, especially the shoes. They've got years of life left in them, especially with repair. But I worry that they'd get chucked if I donated them and that they wouldn't sell on eBay. They'd also be very expensive to replace, and they both have some sentimental value--the shoes have been to all kinds of amazing places with me, and the bag came from a Paris flea market after years of coveting such a bag but not being able to find one at a price I could afford.

I'm thinking I'll get a new pair of default shoes to replace the current pair as soon as I can afford it (I already have my eye on a certain pair) and use my current pair as a back-up for when I go somewhere muddy or do something messy. I don't know yet about the bag. I don't like the look of most fabric laptop bags--they have too much of a clunky utilitarian vibe to them. I'm thinking a canvas bag like the one I was using before would be nice, but the trouble with that is I require a briefcase handle, which most decent-looking canvas bags (including mine) don't seem to have.

At any rate, I'll just have to live with my choices for now. It'll help keep me from forgetting that I used to eat animals, I guess.

Icky Purism

I'm not a very picky eater--but nonetheless, the average restaurant or grocery store I go into tends to carry more food that I wouldn't eat (or perhaps not even consider food) than food I would eat. Part of this is because I no longer eat animal products, but that's just the tip of the iceberg. I also avoid high fructose corn syrup, artificial sweeteners, and pretty much anything with a chemical-looking name that I can't identify. My first impulse upon considering whether to buy something is to check the ingredients label--and often times my next reaction is wrinkle my nose in annoyance or disgust. It doesn't help that I also don't like to spend much time preparing food (although sometimes I wind up doing so anyway), and I'm recovering from a childhood aversion to plain fruits and vegetables. I also don't feel like I even have all that much time to spend eating--especially when I'm spending the better part of my day at my university, where I only eat what I can carry with me because I don't want to spend the money eating out (assuming I can find something I want to eat) and I'm too lazy to stick things in the fridge at the commuter center.

I'd like to reiterate here that I love food--it just has to be good food =/. Preferably also convenient. I feel like I get enough food even if there are hungry periods (I tend to basically eat as much breakfast as I can before leaving, then snack through the evening once I get home.) Most of the problem here is my class schedule, but my standards don't help. They aren't part of the problem, though--I blame other peoples' lack of standards there. Not saying that isn't still my problem to deal with--I don't get to tell other people to alter their diets to make it easier for me to eat out and find food.

Sometimes I wonder if I get too extreme. I don't think it's healthy to think too much about one's food--in my case, it gets a bit too close being an obsession if I let it. I don't think I'm alone here--I recall hearing someone on Youtube saying that they agree with vegans that it's immoral to exploit animals for food and that refusing to support the industries that do so is the moral thing to do, but for that particular person, concerning themself that much with something as essential to their survival as eating would not be conducive to their mental health, so they were content to be immoral in their eating practices. I can sympathize with this, it's just that in my case there's enough vegan food I like so it's not difficult to cut out animal products. It also probably helps that my mom is vegetarian and I was raised vegetarian until I was six and decided I wanted to eat meat (because if it's so bad, why is practically everyone else eating it? thought my six-year-old self.) So I'm used to paying attention to protein intake and eating meatless food--before I cut out meat, I still kept track of protein just because anything high in protein was conveniently filling, which meant less food to carry (assuming I was eating something portable like jerky or protein bars.)

So I can avoid the obsessing-over-my-food mentality if I avoid most restaurants. And meals at peoples' houses. Oh, and supermarkets, because of distaste for processed foods and ingredients. In other words, pretty much everywhere most people get food from. Given that I'm a bit of a loner and rarely go out to eat much anyway, it's not too hard to develop a bubble mentality where all those restaurants and supermarkets don't exist.

But sometimes I start to want to get rid of my leather and wool, even though doing so would clash with my frugality and dislike of waste. To me, not getting as much use as possible (or throwing away *shivers*) something an animal had to suffer and die to produce is much worse than appearing to condone the industries that put those animals through so much misery in the first place. And I'm 93ish-percent sure those abhorrent circumstances aren't what make me want to get rid of the things--it's just this nasty tendency I have towards purism. I do my best to repeat to myself that I won't buy any more, and it would be overly frivolous to replace so many perfectly useful things just because of how they were made. But I think if I can make my somewhat new eating habits more automatic and avoid places where animal-derived "food" is sold, the purist in me will be more likely to lay off. Wish me luck?

"Grendel's Mom"

WHEEE classes. Don't think I've ever been quite this busy with school before. It's mostly fun so far, though (except the lack of sleep. Even that hasn't been as much of a problem, but I should still probably correct that before it becomes one -__-;;.) I'm taking a British literature course that's turning out to be more fun than I expected, and the first thing we read was Beowulf. During today's a previous lecture we spent some time talking about Grendel's mother and it dawned on me that she's a total badass even if she winds up getting killed by Beowulf. Also, the lyrics of "Stacy's Mom" are silly. It would be a much better song if it were about Grendel's mom.

Grendel's mom has got it goin' on
Grendel's mom has got it goin' on
Grendel's mom has got it goin' on
Grendel's mom has got it goin' on

Grendel, we killed you, so your mom got pissed (totally pissed)

She snuck into Heorot last night from the mist (from the mist)

We didn't even know you had a mom (had a mom)

But now we gotta kill her, 'cause she killed Aeschere (killed him dead)

You know, you killed a lotta guys before you got killed
We didn't have to send their mothers after her, but

Grendel's mom has got it goin' on
She's all I wanna be, but I know I'm not as tough
Grendel, can't you see you're just not badass enough
I know it might be wrong but I wanna be Grendel's mom

Grendel's mom has got it goin' on
Grendel's mom has got it goin' on

Grendel, do you remember when you ate my son? (ate my son)
'Cause your mom never taught you better (so fucking rude)
I didn't go after you 'cause I'm such a wuss (such a wuss)
Unlike your mom, I'm no good at resolving blood feuds (why'd you eat my son?)

And I know that you're dead, so you can't hear me
But since you have no dad, your mom had to avenge you

Grendel's mom has got it goin' on
She's all I wanna be, but I know I'm not as tough
Grendel, can't you see you're just not badass enough
I know it might be wrong,
but I wanna be Grendel's mom

Grendel's mom has got it goin' on
She's all I wanna be but I know I'm not as tough
Grendel, can't you see you're just not badass enough
I know it might be wrong but oh oh
I wanna be (Grendel's mom oh oh)
I wanna be (Grendel's mom oh oh)

Waitaminute

Grendel can't you see, you're not badass enough for me

I know it might be wrong, but I wanna be Grendel's mom

Harm Reduction

As you may have gathered, my stance on buying things is pretty much assume-something-objectional-was-involved-in-making-this-item-available. I try to strike a healthy balance between making sure my money doesn't support practices I don't approve of and not getting obsessed with the latter or beating myself up over small purchases. Right now, I do this by making an effort to buy local/organic when it's not too inconvenient, not eating meat (although I've had things with rennet and gelatin in them since last November, which I'm now trying to be more vigilant about), and buying most non-food objects secondhand (exceptions for underwear and books or CDs where I want to go out of my way to support the creators).

Until recently I've been getting a lot of my protein from dairy products (even though I do think it's immoral to keep animals in captivity in order to harvest product from them), but I'm starting to get uncomfortable with that. When I first cut out meat, I was still of the attitude that it would be way too inconvenient to cut out all animal products and I shouldn't make myself worry about that, too. But now I'm starting to feel like that's more doable than I thought it would be. I don't know if I'll ever totally cut out animal products (I like macarons, damnit--and it's not like I get to eat them often anyway), but even just contemplating it and making an effort to cut back has made it easier to leave things like cheese and milk alone (even though I used to love both).

The difficult things for me will be getting enough protein in the first place (I get sick of nuts and beans), but the worst will probably be the baked goods I can probably no longer have (I'd really been wanting to experiment with making madeleines) and the green tea lattes I suspect won't work so well with almond milk. I could be wrong about those, though. I don't eat that many sweets, and I tried substituting all the animal products out of the scone recipe I've been using. They turned out alright--not as fluffy, but not bad. Maybe good enough--we'll see how I feel after I've made them this way a few times. Vegan muffins work pretty well, at least. And I doubt I'm the only person who's ever wanted delicious baked sweets without animal products--some more Googling around will probably lead me to more vegan sweets than I thought could possibly exist. They might just be enough.

After all, vegetarianism isn't difficult because of a lack of variety. The inconvenience is social in nature (unless you're anemic or you have some other health condition that makes it more difficult than usual for you to cut meat from your diet)--other people like to eat meat, so that's what's widely available when you go out to eat and what most people put in meals at their homes. I suspect the same applies to veganism--although it's probably as easy as it is today due to industrial technology. I don't think it would be nearly as easy to grow everything you needed to get a sufficiently nutritious diet by yourself, in one climate zone. Maybe within my life we will shift back to an economic situation where a healthy vegan diet is near impossible due to economic restrictions. But for now, I can eat vegan, so it seems like the right thing to do.

That said, I haven't decided how much I'm going to push myself yet (specifically, I'm feeling resistant to giving up macarons -__-;). I don't think "vegan" will ever be a good word to describe me since I'm also not willing to give up the leather and wool things I've got even if wearing them does help support the idea that the practices involved making those things are okay (they were mostly bought secondhand, though not all). In fact, looking into the secondhand leather thing made me realize that although I do want to cut animal products out of my diet, what motivates me to do that isn't quite the same thing as what seems to motivate most vegans--I don't actually mind using dead animal parts as clothes, or making use of dead things in general. What bothers me is excessive or frivolous murder of animals (i.e. where pretty much all of the meat in developed countries come from, since most people could avoid animal products and still eat a healthy diet fairly easily if they were so inclined) and the inefficient resource use that goes into such practices. Not wasting a perfectly useful item that an animal has already been killed to make is more important to me than not promoting the use of leather (as long as I can avoid directly encouraging the production of leather by not buying things new.)

Another thing that seemed too troublesome before but now feels reasonable is boycotting Monsanto. I've printed out a list of companies that lobbied against GMO labeling in California (and companies that supported such measures) and plan to take it grocery shopping. My mom seems open to at least trying to avoid companies that are against GMO labeling and/or (most likely "and" XD) knowingly use GMOs in their products. 

One thing I still refuse to worry about is fabric sources when I'm getting things for cosplay or any other sewing I do (or American Apparel's cotton >__>.) That still feels way too overwhelming (excuses, excuses.)

Anyway. Hooray for damage control, even if all it does is make me feel slightly more in control of the impact of my lifestyle. Minimal as the difference the effort makes is.

Focus

My focus is starting to drift away from my classes I'm awful at time management. That bit you see to the left was the beginning of a blog post I wrote in May but never had time to clean/post before it became outdated. I'm more focused on classes than ever right now, and I'm fairly certain that's because I'm back at my home university, which instead of scheduling class once a week like the Freie Universität did has each class several times a week (but with a roughly equivalent homework load. Probably. I think?). In other words, I don't have to manage my time here because the U manages it for me. Whenever I'm not in class is homework time 8D.

That wasn't even a sarcastic smiley. The schedule itself can be a pain (an English lit discussion can be great fun for around one hour but starts to get old after that, especially when it focuses on super close readings and lecturing), but I'm finding it oddly less stressful to get my homework done when I have less time to do it in. Having it all be in English probably helps, too, I guess.

There was another bit in that post about a quote about how the thing you do when you procrastinate is the thing you should be focusing on. It resonated with me, but I don't think it's necessarily true--my procrastination comes from a place of dread at not doing the thing I'm putting off properly or not enjoying the task. I don't usually put things off because I don't think they're worth doing, it's because there's pressure to do them right and within a certain time frame. This is why I'm writing blog posts instead of my response paper that's due on Monday and my one-page/probably-German report that's due the Monday after. They're all things that I should get done because I see value in them (well, the German report is more an obligation than a thing I see intrinsic value in. Still. An obligation resulting from doing a thing that was and will continue to be more worthwhile than a lot of things I've bothered with). There's some self-imposed time pressure on the blog posts, too, but the consequences for missing a day are not nearly as great as not doing my assignments, so they're lower pressure.

But even if the blog (and the Tumblr) are worthwhile pursuits because they get me cranking out presentable pretties/written work on a more regular basis than otherwise, I don't exactly take that much pride in what I post. Presentable is the key word. That, and I'm half-heartedly trying to build up some web presence for whenever I do something worth really spreading around (if the novel I'm working on doesn't get picked up by any publishers I'll send it to if I finish it, I plan to post it online, for example.) I haven't really come up with anything I'm really proud of so far. Or at least, not finished anything. I'm really proud of what I'm thinking that novel has the potential to be. But I might disappoint myself. I'm awfully fucking obsessed with the two main characters, though. I can't help but have faith that there's something worth extracting there. I just have to translate it to words clearly enough.

Not that the novel has gotten tied into anything for school at the moment, though. So I haven't found much time to re-write it (although studying Beowulf lead me to an epiphany that'll really help me improve what I've got.) I'll get it done some time or another. Other than that, I can write these blog posts, but they're not exactly the cream of the internet. Same with the photos. My sewing and drawings are mediocre for now at best, though the sewing's improving. Writing comes most natural to me, I just need to do more of it. Which I'm doing right now (both here and for school--hooray, three writing intensive courses at once 8D).

Anyway. The bit I ended the other post I was talking about was pretty much spot-on--I've got this personal weakness where as soon as I feel too pressured to do something I don't want to do it no matter how worthwhile it is. Not like that's unusual or anything. All there is to do is work around it, so I guess I'll just keep working on doing that.

[And speaking of not doing shit on time, I kind of dropped the ball with this blog the past couple weeks, so I'm going to post things this Tuesday and Wednesday as well as Thursday to make up for it >_>.]

AFI at the Varsity Theatre (12. September)

Once upon a time (I think maybe around 2007 or so) someone at a party thought I'd like AFI. I checked out Decemberunderground from the library, latched onto a few songs for awhile, then quit listening altogether. Fast forward to last spring when I decided to listen through the whole album again (I'd ripped the CD onto my computer the first time I'd checked it out, of course). And again. And again. And again. I think you can figure out where that lead. Then once I got back from Germany, I happened to find out that AFI is releasing a new album for the first time in four years. And they're touring. And they'd be starting that tour in my home city. And as a nice little bonus, they were playing at one of my favorite venues (said venue is also located pretty much right next to my university for extra convenience).

I bought my tickets as soon as I could.

This was my first time seeing AFI, and I thought I'd check out the front of the venue a half hour before the doors open. Then I was on campus earlier than expected and thought I'd get some homework done first, so I got there a little later than 4:30. There was maybe a twenty-foot line, but I was hungry, so I got pizza first and got in line around a quarter to five. In spite of all this dawdling, I wound up in the second row, which was super fucking lucky for me since, as I learned much later, the Varsity apparently doesn't let people line up until an hour or two before a show, which I'm guessing was the reason for the shortness of the line (or at least, going off some online discussion I found after the event).

AFI is one of the most energetic bands I've ever seen live. This might not mean much when one takes into account that I'm not usually a fan of hardcore or anything else as heavy as a lot of their material, but it anyway. The way everyone in the band not bound to a stool runs around on stage and jumps off things and stuff was really endearing and fun to watch. I also enjoyed the audience, which was not only super energetic but also seemed uncommonly friendly (not sure if this is general to AFI fans all over, or a combination of the band and the location, or just the result of the people I happened to wind up standing near at that particular show). The only show I can recall going to that was as strikingly energetic was the first time I saw Lykke Li, although her energy is very different from AFI's (it came more from her as an individual--I recall my first impression of her being that she was "super hyper". She was energetic in a chatty, bouncy way while AFI and Davey in particular are energetic in a running-around-and-being-super-loud-and-eliciting-a-corresponding-audience-response kind of way. In fact, they're so different that I almost wonder if the connection in my brain is coming more from also having seen Lykke Li at the Varsity.)

I suspect I would've been able to hear Davey very clearly (unlike other concerts I've been to where the vocalists get covered up by the guitars) if the audience hadn't been singing along so loud with every song, but there was something exhilirating about seeing and hearing how much these people really love this band, so it didn't bother me as much as it normally would've. What I did hear above the crowd (bits of the vocals and pretty much all of the instrumentals) was extremely clean and together, which was especially impressive when taking into consideration all the running around that was going on. The set list included a wide range of older and newer material and even their version of "Just Like Heaven", which I've listened to repeatedly on Youtube and never expected to get to hear live, so that was a fucking amazing surprise.

I feel like I'm starting to do a lot of stating the obvious instead of personal impressions so I'll quit here. At any rate, I will not be missing any more AFI concerts occurring in the same city as me 8D.

Brain Candy

Complexity --> Flexibility --> ??? --> Profit

Or at least, so it seems, when it comes to literature. Or art in general. Substitute "greatness" for profit (hooray for old memes?) Though I'm sure plenty of money has changed hands where re-prints of works are concerned.

It seems to me that one thing that contributes greatly to whether a work makes a lasting impression on human culture is how open to interpretation it is. It can't be devoid of meaning, mind you, but if you cram enough into it and somehow manage to make it coherent and let it stew for a century or several, just about anyone can get something out of it. Granted, for it to last at all, it must first be beautiful. For the first century or so after Paradise Lost was published, for example, most critics seemed to only focus on the style and the language of the poem instead of the content (then the Romantics got ahold of it. Mwahaha.) Or Shakespeare. Shakespeare was meant to appeal to the masses, and yet now it's regarded as great literature (and unfortunately lofty and unaccessable in some circles -__-.)

The concept extends to music, too. I recall reading at least an essay (that may or may not have been part of a whole book on the subject) detailing how Beethoven's music was co-opted for pretty much every political purpose under the sun in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.

In short, it would seem that under the right circumstances, if a work is beautiful enough so people remember it and keep reading it over the centuries, it seems to gain this extra patina full of different interpretations (liberally applicable once the author is dead so they can't contradict anyone beyond what they wrote or said in their own lifetime, of course) that perpetuates the work even after societal standards of beauty have changed, turning it to chewy delicious brain candy for geeks and over-thinkers everywhere.

Of course, this all seems pretty obvious once I type it out. I think it's one of my favorite things about literature and art in general, though. Great works continue to generate new meanings as long as people are still reading them. They just need that initial something to capture peoples' attention.

Wardrobe Practicality

I've admired some comparatively over-the-top strains of gothic and lolita styles since my mid-teens, but have always had difficulty obtaining all the pieces I needed--and then often times when I did, I found myself realizing how impractical some of it is day to day. Only now, at twenty-two, am I finding myself actually satisfied with what I have. There are still things I could use (*coughvestcoughcough*), but no deeply felt, urgent "needs" like in years past. The following things might not apply to you since everyone's situation is a little different, but here's what I've done to feel more comfortable in my clothes over the years.

Color coordination

Or at least, making sure your whole outfit goes together nicely if you don't like things to be "too matchy". (*coughcoughsnickersnerk*) I will of course concede that outfits can still look great if they aren't color coordinated, but I personally prefer things that way. Of course, I don't have a lot of patience for it, so this has contributed to my mostly-black wardrobe (in the photo you can see a velvet blazer, a scarf, and a knit top with a mock turtleneck that look okay if not great with nearly everything I own, partly because they're all black). However you do it, if everything you're wearing looks good together, you don't need as many stand-out pieces. Sometimes it can be cheaper and more practical to make the outfit as a whole stand out instead of wearing bondange pants with the perfect coating of hardware and straps or a rococo-inspired dress with a ginormous petticoat under it.

Stand-out pieces

That doesn't mean that having one or two stand-out pieces per outfit doesn't help a lot, though. I'm sure we've both heard this before, but it's worth repeating. In my case, a fishnet shirt (or if you can't find that, a pair of fishnet tights with the crotch cut open and the feet cut off) or a dog chain as a necklace work wonders for an otherwise plain black outfit. Even my pyramid-stud belt helps a lot (providing it's actually showing--it took me awhile to figure out that my t-shirts actually do look better tucked into my jeans/cords if I'm wearing a nice belt.)

Shoes

it makes a huge difference when your shoes look good with the rest of your outfit, and it's entirely possible to find shoes that look okay and are comfortable. For example, my default footwear is a pair of thick-soled black leather boots. They look good with most of what I wear and make great walking shoes. I can also wear them in pretty much weather, although I've heard a few people comment on how hot my feet must be in the summer even though they don't feel any more uncomfortable than they would in a lighter pair of shoes. That last bit might be a personal quirk, though. Anyway. Coordinating your shoes with your outfit instead of wearing the same pair of sneakers every day can work wonders for making your outfit look like more than the sum of its components.

Loliability

Or gothability. Since goth is a much more flexible and diverse style, I'll stick with loliability. Most lolita clothes, especially clothes aside from the fundamental blouses and skirts/dresses, are actually not that difficult to find off-brand/secondhand. When I finally got around to buying my petticoat (a relatively expensive purchase for me), I found I could make lolita coords right away (I bought a chiffon A-line petticoat, which fits nicely under a circle skirt and and an A-line dress I already owned and had been wearing without a petticoat before. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm guessing it might look okay under some pleated skirts, too). The trick here is watching out for material and colors--a lot of square dance skirts will look more clownish than country lolita because of the bright colors they use, for example. Also watch out for skirts made from generally cheapass materials. Same goes for blouses--workable blouses CAN occasionally be found in thrift stores. Ditto knit shirts that work for casual lolita (like the one in the photo, for example). Just be careful of the quality of the material and make sure they fit right.

The other part of this is accessories, especially jewelry and bags. Even if you don't have a petticoat or a skirt, be conscious of how any accessories you buy would work with lolita. Try to find things that work well with both lolita and non-lolita clothes. Keep in mind that you don't have to look like you popped out of a Baby the Stars Shine Bright ad to be lolita (although if you wanted to, you could still probably do that without buying all your accessories from them, or by only buying an accessory or two from them and getting your dress from a cheaper source.)

Everyday items

I mostly mean bags, but it also applies to things like jackets and lunchboxes or wallets. It seems to me like a lot of people just get whatever's cheap and effective regardless of what it looks like, but when I do this, it drives me up a wall with longing for something prettier. Another thing about bags that I've found bothers me is shoulder straps. Sometimes it can't be helped because of the textbooks I need for my classes and the distance between where I live and my university, but I really do prefer bags with handles instead of bags with shoulder straps because of the way shoulder straps pull my clothes around and the extra couple seconds it always takes to disentangle myself from them when I'm not in transit. That's just my preference, though. The thing to take away here is to take the time to figure out your priorities when buying things you use daily and always apply them to your purchases.

Unified wardrobe

Here's another thing worth repeating that you've probably heard before: try to make sure as much of your wardrobe as possible goes with everything else. It's quite a challenge to make sure EVERYTHING goes with everything, but the closer you get, the easier it is to have satisfying outfits to wear every day. Wearing mostly black has helped me a lot with this, but color isn't the only important factor in putting together good outfits--style, fit, and quality are also more important. I have a preference for a clean look over craploads of lace or hardware, which has served me well in this respect. For example, the scarf I'm wearing as a neck bow in the first photo works well for multiple levels of (in)formality because of the material and the simplicity, and even though the mock turtleneck on the shirt adds an elegant touch, it's still basic enough to work with more punkish or masculine-looking outfits. Black wool sweaters have also become a major staple for me whenever it's cold enough to wear them.

It's also important to think about what you'd wear a garment with BEFORE YOU BUY IT. Assuming you don't have money to burn and infinite space, it's very helpful in the long run to only buy things that go with things you already own, unless you're in the early stages of building a wardrobe (in which case, substitute careful planning of purchases to make sure the garments you're buying will go well together.)

That said, the above is merely based on my personal experiences. If you have other ways of wardrobe building that have served you well, I'd love to hear them.

Travel

I was supposed to start classes for my new semester this Tuesday. Then my bus broke down, so I had to leave a day later and miss my first two lectures. Ahahahaha D8.

At least they refunded my ticket. Lesson learned--leave buffer days between travel destinations when it's important you be somewhere before a certain time. Anyway. This sort of traveling (as I write this I'm on a nearly-six-hour bus trip to Chicago, where I'll be hanging out for several hours at the train station because I don't want to run around the downtown area carrying my plastic bag full of dirty clothes with me and I don't have money to spend on a locker, then taking a night bus to Minneapolis) has started to feel routine to me. I'm starting to like this. I'm comfortable enough with it to be able to concentrate on writing this post while on a crowded bus.

It's interesting in that it's sort of as predicted, sort of not. Traveling widely became a priority for me while I was in my late teens, and now it's started to come true, although so far most of it's been because of studying abroad in Europe (and therefore taking all the chances to travel that I could in case they didn't come around again) and being in a relationship with people two states away from me. Still, I'm starting to learn how to make this more cost-effective and getting used to fun little screw-ups like transport breakdowns and other delays. I've still got stuff to learn (I'm thinking I'll need to start looking into sub-letting apartments and couchsurfing once I'm closer to finishing my degree), but even so, I'm getting pretty comfortable with running around a lot like this.

Staying in one place wasn't very appealing in my late teens, and it becomes even less so the more I do it. Right now I'm hoping to find enough short-term or portable work to be able to switch places every few months after I graduate. I'm thinking I'd do a lot of switching between Minneapolis, Chicago, and possibly St. Louis. I also want to spend some time in New York City, but I'd have to get there to see how long I'd actually want to be there or how often I'd want to go back, if at all. It looks like a fascinating place, at any rate.

In order to do this, I'm thinking I'll have to get better at finding jobs (I'm starting to get to the bottom of stuff I can sell on eBay in order to make travel money fast) and get rid of more stuff. But I feel like I've got a much better idea of what I want to do after I graduate now than I did a year or two ago, even if my goals haven't changed that much. Hooray, personal progress?