I dont have anything really cool to talk about right now, so Im just going to say that Im looking for stuff. I need some inspiration, off to the interweb!
The Wambles
Yes, thats right, I said “the wambles”. It is an unofficial term coined by me that is used to describe the feeling of weakness in the limbs and the loss of desire to do anything, ever. Some call it ennui, I call it the wambles.
At the moment, I am afflicted by my wambles. I have come to the conclusion that I hate all of my clothes, my life is incredibly boring, and that I am doomed to have role models rather than become one myself. This is a sucky, sucky place to be. I hate it when this feeling comes over me, but I know that it doesn’t come without a reason. I’m not just being emo- my clothes do suck, I never go out or do anything, and I have more role models than I know what to do with.
Ugh. More later, if Im up to it, and I apologize for dumping my wambliness all over you.
COILHOUSE-Why you need it!
Because it is, quite frankly, the best thing out there! The immensely talented and beautiful ladies behind Coilhouse: the Blog have just made the first-ever print issue of Coilhouse Magazine available! I have my copy and I couldn’t be more thrilled with it. Every page is just as beautiful, well thought out, and flawless as the one that came before, all the way to the very last! Even the ADVERTISEMENTS are works of art!
The magazine will be available in stores all over the place very soon, but the copy they are selling online is special and only 1000 copies of the online version were made! So hurry up and get yours!
http://coilhouse.net- They do not disappoint!
Urban Exploration-More than a walk in the park
Yesterday I made mention of one of my favorite subjects, Urban Exploration. For those of you who were intrigued, this is the post that will answer some of your questions and (hopefully) give you some new ones.
I cant really recall where I first heard about urban exploration (to be abbreviated as UE from now on). I was probably playing around on google on one of my more restless days, searching for things like “adventure” and “explore”. Either way, I stumbled my way onto a page that mentioned UE and gave a brief description of it. I thought to myself, “Hey, I like to explore! And I live in an Urban environment!”, so I began a more thorough web search in an attempt to acquaint myself with the phenomenon. What ensued was a little bit like a dream…
The first step for me was a specific google search. I typed in “Urban Exploration” and, lo and behold, a whole list of hits that were actually relevant to what I was searching for. The first hit was the ever-reliable Wikipedia, which gave this short description: “Urban exploration (often shortened as urbex or UE) is the examination of the normally unseen or off-limits parts of urban areas or industrial facilities.[1] Urban exploration is also commonly referred to as “creeping” or infiltration, although some people consider infiltration to be more closely associated with the exploration of active or inhabited sites. In the USA, it may also be referred to as “draining” (when exploring drains) “urban spelunking”, and “urban caving”, “vadding”, “trolling”, “building hacking”, “reality hacking” or “roof and tunnel hacking“.”
Does that not sound freaking AWESOME? I mean, come on, REALITY HACKING? That sounds like something out of a science fiction novel! How industrial!
At this point my interest level went from “Hey, this is neat” to “OHMYGOD, how do I do this?”
Urban Exploration, as I understand it, is quite a simple concept. It is the belief that there are things we don’t see every day that we SHOULD get the chance to see, and that a door or a no trespassing sign is not a really good reason not to see it.
There is a strong code of ethics behind UE that follows some other organization’s motto quite closely. “Take nothing but pictures, leave nothing but footprints”, is how it goes, and I think it was coined by the Audubon society. Urban Explorers take this to heart, and they make it a point to inform those who are interested in the hobby of the philosophy behind it.
I could go on for days about UE, but I wont, because that would be cruel. I will merely leave you with the tools to research it yourself, and hopefully get into it as much as I do. But first, some pictures taken during UE expeditions (not by me, thank google for them):
Neat, huh?
Now to pepper you with links and resources.
UE on Wikipedia-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_exploration
UE resource-http://www.uer.ca/
Infiltration, one of the best sites out there-http://www.infiltration.org/
Urban Explorers Network-http://www.urbanexplorers.net/
Okay, enough links for now. I highly recommend the Infiltration site- they have a book about the subject called “Access All Areas” (see picture at top of post) , which I own and they sell in their shop. It is a great resource for anyone interested in UE. There is also an out of print book called “The Urban Adventure Handbook” by Alan S. North, which I found on Amazon for cheap. It has lots of neat stuff in it as well, though not all UE related. It was published by Ten Speed Press, and my copy has the copyright date of 1990.
Go explore now!
I want to believe…
There I go. Stealing lines from The X Files. I would change one part of that statement, though. Instead of “I want to believe” I would say “I want to know”. There is a difference between believing and knowing, and knowing holds far more weight with me. If you can show me proof, evidence, and logic behind a claim, I will be much more likely to accept it as true.
Originally this post was going to be about Urban Exploration, but I started watching one of those “A Haunting” shows on the Discovery Channel and my enthusiasm shifted elsewhere. So now I’m going to talk to you about ghoulies and ghosties and long legged beasties! Sounds like fun to me!
I love creepy stuff. I think I made this clear in the previous post, but if not, I will reiterate; I love the spooky, the dark, the scary, and the disturbing. Being creeped out is a feeling I actively pursue, and if there is a possibility of running into a ghost/monster while in pursuit, I’m TOTALLY there. I was always the first to enter the creepy old trailer in the thicket by my old house in AZ, shivering in anticipation of having the pants scared off of me. Did that ever happen? Not really, but the anticipation was part of the fun! My favorite place in that boiling, god-forsaken town was the old building of the high school that was no longer used due to a lack of fire exits. I was constantly dragging my friends to the town cemetery at sundown to do grave rubbings and see if we could creep each other out. Creepiness was my FUN.
What made me this way? You might be asking yourself this question, scratching your head and wondering what on earth makes a girl this crazy. I’ll tell you.
A steady childhood diet of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark and Are You Afraid of the Dark?. I will post a link to the show and the website for the book at the end of this post.
So yeah. Those, along with a myriad of other things that I will probably think of later, are what made me into the weird person I am today. But, as a weird person, I am often conflicted. My dad, who introduced me into the creepiness I have come to love, also instilled in me the idea that reason and logic are and always will be superior to “feelings”. He was a cop for 13 years, and I learned this lesson well. So, whenever I hear a ghost “encounter” from someone, or I read about an experience, this little niggling doubt surfaces. It says “This person could be lying. Or confused.” Then I end up chalking the account up as another story that may or may not be true, and I lose most of my enthusiasm.
I hate thinking this way, but I cant help it.
So, like Fox Mulder in “The X Files” I find myself “wanting to believe.” I’m just harder to convince than he is.
All of my love for creepiness isn’t enough to make a blind believer out of me. I place a lot more credit on my own experiences, which are sadly lacking at this point.
San Diego certainly isn’t conducive to ghost hunting or feeling creeped out, at least, not the San Diego I’ve seen. All of the cemeteries are far away from where I live, legitimately haunted houses in the area are either inaccessible or freaking expensive, and I know for a fact that most of the “ghost hunters” in the area are woefully inaccurate in their histories and ghost encounters. It seems that I am destined to live in a place where it never rains and the creepiest thing you see regularly is the crazy man sitting at the corner licking his lips and talking to himself.
Yeah. I live THERE.
Okay, this post is beginning to sound like a bitch-fest about my area, so I will leave you with some URL’s to creepy places on the web.
Are you Afraid of the Dark? (Episode, YouTube)-http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75FA0QpxFFg
Scary Stories to tell in the Dark (Amazon)-http://www.amazon.com/Scary-Stories-Tell-Dark-Anniversary/dp/0064401707
The Moonlit Road (Scary Stories, free!)-http://www.themoonlitroad.com/
Is your house haunted?-http://paranormal.about.com/od/ghosthuntinggeninfo/a/aa060704.htm
There you have it! When I figure out how to make links, I will certainly clean this up. As for now, well, if you’re up to it, you can cut and paste. If any of them don’t work, feel free to slap me upside the head about it.
Waiting…
AGH!
This is OOMPH!. OOMPH! is German. OOMPH! plays awesome rock music. To learn more, you should go visit their site at http://www.oomph.de
There is an english version of the site, just scroll to the bottom and select it, if you happen to find yourself there and you don’t speak/read German.
I love these guys and have for a while now. At one point last year they were the only band I would listen to. They have a new album coming out, titled “Monster”, which promises to be another shining example of their musical prowess. You can read much better reviews than mine at their website (under the discography, I think) and you can find the entire CD playing for free on their MySpace! (http://www.myspace.com/oomph)
I have been listening to the new CD for the past couple of days and I am speechless. It’s just as awesome as I was expecting, and MORE!
They also have two videos from this new album up, my favorite of the two being “Labyrinth”. Again, I HIGHLY recommend you look these guys up!
In other news, nothing of note has really come up. I figured out a good way to reward myself, I guess. In return for getting the body I want, I am going to get my first tattoo. This wont be for a while yet, so check for updates periodically.
I am excited about a couple things, though. The first being the proximity of my favorite holiday; HALLOWEEN! I absolutely LOVE Halloween. All Hallows Eve, Samhain, All Souls Night, whatever you call it, I love it. I love the candy, the costumes, the decorations, all of it! I have ever since I was a VERY wee little girl. Something about the night itself, the anticipation of creepiness and the all-around embracing of the dark side of our folklore and traditions just speaks to me.
This year I will be thinking about it a lot, about my costume, my decorations (the very best, always!), and of course, ways to get myself in the mood for it. I will probably be peppering you with links to sites cataloguing scary stories from all over the world, Halloween supply stores, Haunted Houses registries, etc. Look forward to the onslaught!
The other thing I am really, really excited about is the availability of the first print issue of Coilhouse Magazine! If you don’t know what Coilhouse is, well, my friend, be prepared for an EDUCATION! Since I am not able or up to educating you myself, you must follow the link! (http://www.coilhouse.net) Read the mission statement, the bios of all of it’s lovely writers and contributors, and let the huge list of tags to the right hand side of the page entertain you! Click on a tag and be led to a page full of oddities you wont find anywhere else on the web! If my profligate use of exclamation points is not an indicator of my sheer love and enthusiasm for this site, then I don’t know what is.
I have my copy of the very special first issue on order, and I cant wait to dig in to its weird and awesome wonders!
I think I’ll leave you alone now. Go peruse my links, readers!
Hi there!
This is the first post of yet another blog. I want to keep this one, because I always want to keep my blogs once I start them. Will I keep it? I believe so.
I guess a mission statement is called for, but I hate those things, so I’ll just tell you what I want to use this blog for. I want to write about things that interest me, collate information, tell stories, theorize about my problems, and have other people read all of it! Sounds like fun to me. Nothing like putting your stupid ass self on the internet for other people to not give a shit about!
So yes, internet and all of your denizens, prepare for TMI!
