Original Journal Cover

This is the cover of my very first journal. 

Quote of the day from Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life From Dear Sugar by Cheryl Strayed:

What do you do when you don't know what to do about something?

I talk to Mr. Sugar and my friends. I make lists. I attempt to analyze the situation from the perspective of my "best self"--the one that's generous, reasonable, forgiving, loving, bighearted, and grateful. I think really hard about what I'll wish I did a year from now. I map out the consequences of the various actions I could take. I ask what my motivations are, what my desires are, what my fears are, what I have to lose, and what I have to gain. I move toward the light, even if it's a hard direction in which to move. I trust myself. I keep the faith. I mess up sometimes. 

5/30/12 to 6/5/12

House Stark motto:
"Winter is coming."

House Fletcher motto:
"Christmas is coming."

5/22/12 to 5/29/12

Quote of the day from I Heart Huckabees:

Albert Markovski: I'm talking about not covering every square inch with houses and strip malls until you can't remember what happens when you stand in a meadow at dusk.

Bret: What happens in the meadow at dusk?

Albert: Everything!

Mrs. Hooten: Nothing!

Albert: Everything.

Mrs. Hooten: Nothing!

Albert: Everything!

Mrs. Hooten: Nothing!

Albert: It's beautiful.

Tommy Corn: It's beautiful.

From the archives: bodybuilder with a ballerina head

Shout-out to Kirk, since the women's head and bodybuilder came from a zine he made. (Kirk is the winner of sending me one of the most memorable letters I ever received.) Photo of tree was found at Scrap.

I just watched the movie Stories We Tell, which I highly recommend. The movie opens with the following quote.

Quote of the day:
"When you are in the middle of a story it isn't a story at all, but only a confusion. . . . It's only afterwards that it becomes anything like a story at all. When you're telling it, to yourself or to someone else." --from Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood

5/14/12 to 5/21/12

Quote of the day:
Mike: You're a slut for sleep. 
Claire: Yeah . . .

5/6/12 to 5/13/12

Quote of the Day from The Newsroom:
Will: Yeah, I get that there are moments, small moments, infrequent moments, where I'm not the easiest guy to work with, but who the hell is?
Charlie: I am.
Will: Well, it helps that you're drunk most of the time.
Charlie: It certainly does. 

4/29/12 to 5/5/12

Quote of the day:
"Let's shag ass." --Royal from The Royal Tenenbaums

4/21/12 to 4/28/12

You may have noticed that this entry jumps forward two months from the last entry I shared. That's because I'm a time traveler. I was visiting the renaissance age. . . . It was okay―a little overrated. 

Quote of the day: 
“Discipline isn't a dirty word. Far from it. Discipline is the one thing that separates us from chaos and anarchy. Discipline implies timing. It's the precursor to good behavior, and it never comes from bad behavior. People who associate discipline with punishment are wrong: with discipline, punishment is unnecessary.” 
―Buck Brannaman, The Faraway Horses

2/1/12 to 2/3/12, 2/5/12, and 2/13/12

Quote of the day:
"There is such a place as fairyland―but only children can find the way to it. And they do not know that it is fairyland until they have grown so old that they forget the way. One bitter day, when they seek it and cannot find it, they realize what they have lost; and that is the tragedy of life. On that day the gates of Eden are shut behind them and the age of gold is over. Henceforth they must dwell in the common light of common day. Only a few, who remain children at heart, can ever find that fair, lost path again; and blessed are they above mortals. They, and only they, can bring us tidings from that dear country where we once sojourned and from which we must evermore be exiles. The world calls them its singers and poets and artists and story-tellers; but they are just people who have never forgotten the way to fairyland."
―L.M. Montgomery, The Story Girl 

1/23/12 to 1/31/12

Quote of the day from The Office:
Holly: Michael, you cried at that tagline for a movie you made up.
Michael: He had no arms or legs. He couldn't see, hear, or speak. This is how he led a nation.

1/14/12 to 1/22/12

Quote of the day:
“There is no sunrise so beautiful that it is worth waking me up to see it.” ―Mindy Kaling, Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? 

12/31, 1/1, 1/4/12 to 1/13/12

12/9, 12/10, 12/12, 12/25, and 12/26/11

11/21, 11/22, 11/24, and 11/29/11

And so it begins. More entries. With days missing. Because I was lazy and took a lot of days off randomly.

Book recommendation: Eleanor & Park

Quote of the day: 
"I began to realize how simple life could be if one had a regular routine to follow with fixed hours, a fixed salary, and very little original thinking to do."--Roald Dahl

From the Archives: Frankie

“To say I’m an overrated troll, when you have never even seen me guard a bridge, is patently unfair.” 
―Tina Fey, Bossypants

From the Archives: Slips and a Door

Don't you want to know where the doors lead? They do lead somewhere, but you have to physically open them to find out . I'll give you one clue: they lead to . . . magic (but not of the unicorn or new shirt variety).

Things in my life: giant hole in my house, oranges, a pile of books, untied shoes, a mopped floor, and homemade granola.

Quote of the Day from The West Wing:
Sam: I'm just going to change my shirt.
Leo: You look bad. You're tired. You slept in the office. It's Friday. Go home.
Sam: Why?
Leo: Because I think you're putting too much faith in the magical powers of a new shirt.

From the Archives: Shining Girls

This is from my 2003 to 2005 journal and is the first piece I made inspired by The Shining (see an earlier post with another shining painting here). I stopped watching scary movies, but I think I need to make an exception and watch this one again. It has been too long. A friend also reminded me today that I need to watch Fear. What a great and classy double bill. Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire, Peanut butter and jelly, The Shining and Fear. 

11/12/11 to 11/20/11

Currently reading: The Uncommon Appeal of Clouds by Alexander McCall Smith

Currently watching: The West Wing

Currently listening to: 1999 by Prince 

Quote of the day:
"Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life."
--Mark Twain

Red Balloon 3

Currently reading: 
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain
Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater


“Their very imagination was dead. When you can say that of a man he has struck bottom ... there is no lower deep for him.” 
― Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court