Sunday, August 21, 2011

Hi, There. How Are You?

Because I'm unstable.

I seem to have been suffering from insomnia and/or some sort of hormonal imbalance for the past few days, and you know what I've discovered?  It turns me into someone I don't like.

Namely, a crazy person.

I've been losing my temper, I've been irrational, and I've been a host of other things that I can't remember because I'm tired but I can't sleep.

I feel crazy.  I'm pretty sure I might be crazy.  Why, not even ten minutes ago, I thought that I heard a serial killer in the basement not twenty feet from me, and, instead of freaking out, as I normally would, I looked at the glass mug on the desk in front of me and had a brief fantasy which I will now record for you in the third person because I'm tired and I can only really write fiction stories in the third person when I'm tired.

She stood, slowly, and faced the oncoming threat.  The ominous man in black said nothing, and moved not an inch as she grabbed the glass mug sitting on the desk beside her.  "You wanna tango?" she asked as, gripping the mug tightly, she smashed it against the wall.  Thousands of shards of glass danced in the moonlight as the fell to the floor around her.  Brandishing the jagged piece she held in her hand, her only weapon, she said "let's tango."

Oh, dear.  I do believe that that might be worse than the stuff that I normally write.  

Sleep.  I need sleep.

But I can't sleep.

Well, it's not that I can't sleep at all, it's that I can't stay asleep.  I fall asleep, and then I wake up a few hours later, then I fall asleep again, and  wake up again, and then fall asleep, then wake up in a never-ending cycle of doom and sadness.

I want to kill my brain.  It is being stupid.  I hate this game.

Bah.  I'm going to leave now, before you all catch my crazy.

I'd say something that I think is witty here, but I'm too tired (HA!  Like a bike.  I'm too tired!  Get it?  Too tired, two-tired?  Oh, that is just awful.)

Monday, August 15, 2011

I am Here to Plague You With Songs You Won't be Able to Get out of Your Head

This isn't really a post.  This is just a series of videos of songs that are bound to get stuck in your head at some point. 

This song has been stuck in my head since last night.  That doesn't sound like a long time, but when the only part of the song that you know is a 5-second snippet of the chorus, it gets a little annoying.  Nevertheless, I still kind of like this song just a little.

Come on, Eileen by Dexy's Midnight Runners

I don't really have much to say for this one, except that the only reason that it is now stuck in my head is because it showed in the recommended videos on YouTube for the last one.

99 Luftballons by Nena

And you're all going to hate me for this one.

Barbie Girl by Aqua

Holy flying frick, y'all.  It's in German.  Just kidding.  It's actually Dutch.

But that whole "Dutch" thing just reminded me of this video.

I'm not sure if it's German, or Dutch, or Belgian, or whatever.  All I know is that there is a freaking pig fartin' up a storm.

Saturday, August 13, 2011

I Feel Your Pain, Quasimodo, I Feel Your Pain.

I was at band camp for most of this week.  There was much use of sunblock and bug spray, and much yelling of "winning" and "courage" and much singing of The Cha Cha Slide.  We also talked about doing the can-can, which led us to compose sentences like this one:  I can can can-can. (Do you want to delete the repeated word?  NO.)

There was also a whole lot of talk about cannibalism, naked people falling out of hot air balloons, and dead people in cabins, but that's beside the point.

Thursday was the last day of band camp (my last band camp ever, forever, which actually made me a little sad) and I wanted to do something with all of my friends as a way of celebrating, so we decided to go swimming.

Where did we go swimming, you ask?  Why, at Sassafras Jones's grandparents' pond, that's where.

Everything started out just fine.  Everyone got to the pond safely, and all looked to be going well, until it actually came time to get into the water.

You see, something you may or may not know about me is that I am extremely afraid of the water.  I used to cry at every swimming lesson that my mom made me go to, and I even threw up at one.  Eventually, I did learn to swim a little bit, but I haven't actually gone swimming in a couple of years, so I'm more than a little rusty.

Anyway, everyone, the King/Archbishop of Marching Band, Sassafras Jones, the Drummer Boy, and the Destroyer, a lovely red-headed girl who plays the trumpet and is actually extremely hilarious, was in the deep water over by the diving board and such.  I did not want to jump into the water, so I decided that I was just going to swim out to where everyone was and hope for the best.

Only, there was a problem.

That problem was called "fish."

Now, it has been noted on this blog that I am not overly-enthusiastic about wildlife being overly close to me, so the fact that I literally saw a fish in the shallows swimming away from me freaked me out quite a bit. 

At that point, I realized that I was going to have to jump in, or at least use the ladder by the diving board, which, according to the Destroyer, had a big ol' spider on it.  Neither of this options were particularly pleasing to me.

Eventually, my blue noodle and I made it into the water with everyone else.  Everything was going fine, the Destroyer even went out and got a boogie board thing, then ran around the pond toward where the diving board was, earning her the title of David Hasselhoff.  For that short period of time, everything was going swimmingly (horrible pun intended.)

However, it didn't take long for things to take a turn for the worse.

It soon became apparent that I was not the only one who was not bestest buddies with the water.  In fact, the Drummer Boy was the only one amongst us who could actually swim, though Sassafras Jones was entirely capable of holding her own in the water.  Basically, what I'm getting at is that there were a lot of near-death experiences that night.

The Destroyer/David Hasselhoff also shared my fear of the fishies.  The following is a direct quote from her, after she though that a fish touched her leg.

"My hands are out of the water, my toes are out of the water, and I'm gonna die in this God-forsaken lake."

At which point I very nearly peed myself and/or drowned. 

I ended up sharing my noodle with the King/Archbishop of Marching Band, who almost drowned, then he got his own noodle, then I had to give my noodle to the Destroyer/David Hasselhoff, who was totally not living up to her namesake by also almost drowning.  At that point, I was in deep water without a floatation device and very little swimming ability, how could I survive?  Who could have given me the tools necessary to stay afloat when years of swimming lessons had failed me?  Only one woman:  Tyra Banks.

You see, I used to watch a lot of America's Next Top Model, and, at one point, on of the photo shoots that they did had the models floating on the surface of the pool.  I remembered Tyra teaching the girls how to float by arching their backs, and so that was what I did, and, darn it, it worked.  The only drawback was that, if I had actually drowned, I would have been in much the same position as if I was just floating.

After informing my friends of the one drawback of my nearly flawless plan and asking that they check that I was still alive every so often, they went and got me another noodle, only this one was a wimpy pink noodle that did not live up to my floatation device standards.

And, to top all this off, there were horseflies, and they were attacking us.

At one point, horseflies dive-bombed my head, causing my to seek refuge underwater.  However, when I did this, there arose in my already taxed calves a mighty pain.  An effing leg cramp.  The pain was so bad it caused me to exclaim: "son of a b****, this hurts" in a very loud voice so that everyone, including Sassafras Jones's dad, who was sitting by the campfire, could hear.

But I had no time to worry about Sassy's dad's opinion of me, for I was going to die.  The wimpy noodle was not enough to keep me afloat now that I had pretty much lost all use of my legs.  I was able to keep my head above water long enough to demand that someone get me a decent noodle, which they did, at which point I was perfectly fine, except for the whole "searing pain" thing.

I was totally fine, but the Drummer Boy had decided that I was some sort of danger to myself and incapable of safely remaining in the water, so he towed me back to shore, at which point I discovered that I couldn't really put any sort of pressure on my left leg.  So I just kind of chilled out in the shallows, hoping that no fish would touch me and getting grossed out by seaweed until my leg regained enough strength to be able to manage a hobble-type movement that would allow me to make my way to the campfire, where there was a picnic table that I could sit on.

We ate hobo pies and hot dogs and things.  At one point, Sassafras Jones's dad asked if their were any hot dogs left, but did it in a roundabout way.

Sassy's Dad:  Are there any more processed cow parts left?
Me:  *Questioning look*
Sassy's Dad:  Hot dogs.  They're just cow lips and udders
The Drummer Boy: Mmm, udders
The Destroyer/David Hasselhoff: They're udderly delicious.

Anyway, after we had finished discussing processed cow parts and such, we started focusing more on the mosquitoes.  One of them landed on the King/Archbishop of Marching Band, and the Destroyer/David Hasselhoff had some advice for him.

The Destroyer/David Hasselhoff: Tense up your leg; it'll explode.
Me:  You know this from experience?
The Destroyer/David Hasselhoff: Yes.

Then we walked around Sassafras Jones's grandparents' property and house and things and play songs on their grand piano, after which we went back outside to put all of the pooly things away and I got bit on the eyelid by a mosquito.  THE EYELID.  I didn't even know mosquitoes did that kind of thing.  I mean, I guess I knew, somewhere deep in the recesses of my mind, that they had the capability of biting people's eyelids, but I think I just assumed that they would have the decency not to do it.  Apparently, though, I was wrong, because my eyelid was swelling up nicely, which, coupled with the limp caused by my wonky leg, made me look like Quasimodo, or every evil henchmen in every old movie ever.  I proceeded to refer to myself as "Igor" for the rest of the night.

Then, we all went home, and I'm just now remembering that I may have left caramel syrup in the back of my car and that I should maybe go and look for that.

Sunday, August 7, 2011

I'm Sure I Could Control the World if I Weren't so Darned...Tired. What Was I Saying?

Today was the first day of band camp.

I would tell you more, but I am about to dissolve into a large puddle of ick.  It was very hot, and I am very tired, seeing as how I have not had a decent night's sleep in over a week (remember the raccoons?  Yeah.  That's their fault.)

However, I will share with you all a video that I probably posted before, but I'm going to again, and then a little story.  Or the other way around.  Yes, the other way around.

Anyway, I got to drive an actual car today, which is really exciting, even though I've legally been able to drive by myself for over a year now (I don't have my own car, and my dad works a lot, so driving a real live automobile is a real treat, let me tell you.)  So, since I got to drive an actual car to band camp, that meant that I had a car that I could drive home from band camp.  This also meant that I could give Sassafras Jones a ride home, so I did. 

On the way there, I, being the picture of class and grace, was taking large swigs of water out of a glass bottle that I have always felt would be perfect for holding moonshine.  I finished all the water in that bottle, but I was still thirsty, so I tried to reach into the back seat where my other water bottle was.  Alas, it was too far away, prompting me to say "Damn.  It's too far away."  However, I don't remember saying this because my  brain has shut down all unnecessary functions.  Sassafras Jones did hear me say this, though, and proceeded to start reciting lines from this YouTube video.  Enjoy.


Oh boy.  It's naptime.

Friday, August 5, 2011

My Name is Buzz Killigan and I'm Not Particularly Fond of Camping

I just got back from a week-long family camping trip.  It wasn't so bad, considering that it was only my nuclear family, and my dad's a pretty good sport about letting me sit in the camper and read my books all the time.

Anyway, I thought that I'd treat you all to a brand-spanking-new post, but don't get used to it, because I'm going away to band camp next week, so I shall fall silent once more, but then I'll come back and probably have hilarious stories to tell you about marching incidents and canoe trips.

What was I saying?

Oh, right.  Camping.  Yeah, camping isn't exactly my thing, but do you know what is my thing?  Staying up late at night reading.  This did not work out so well for one reason, and one reason alone.  Do you want to know what that reason is?  Well, I'll tell you.

Raccoons.

I didn't think that it was possible for me to fear more things than I already fear, but, when confronted with the knowledge that a possibly rabid beast was foraging through my food fewer than ten feet away from my sleepy little head, I was forced to admit that raccoons are scary as frick.

Here are some things that I wrote down on those scary nights when I heard the raccoons.

There is a raccoon outside right freaking now, y'all.  Fo reals.

If raccoons get into the camper, I will be the first to die.  The door isn't latching properly.  I'm going to be attacked by a raccoon and die of rabies.

The raccoons are effing fighting each other, y'all.  This is starting to freak me out.

For the record, the sound of raccoons fighting each other is fricking scary and I wouldn't want anyone to have to live through that.

I spent most of that night wrapped up in a blanket, even though I wasn't cold, because I was convinced that raccoons would be too stupid to recognize me as a human if I was wrapped in fabric.

I fricking hate raccoons.

Oh.  I should probably explain some more things about my camping trip, or else you all might get a little confused about it.

The title of this post says that my name is Buzz Killigan, because it is, apparently.  You see, the whole week I was, I am told, being a "buzz kill."  However, I would like to point out that if educating the ignorant when they make an erroneous statement makes me a buzz kill, then I will gladly be called a buzz kill.

Another thing that went on during the week of camping was the excessive wandering of my mind.  I think it might have had something to do with the fact that I was staying up as late as I normally do, but waking up much earlier.  Anyway, here are some non-raccoon-related things I wrote down over the week:

"Ain't be havin' none of this"--no need to conjugate (look, ma! No conjugation!)

It's true.  I ain't be havin' none of this, you ain't be havin' none of this, he, she, we ain't be havin' none of this...

There are not nearly enough situation is life in which an impression of a T-Rex is called for.

This, tragically, is only too true.  I keep having to invent situations in which a T-Rex impersonation is appropriate.

Pet monkey stories=blogging gold.  Also, more effing raccoons.  They are surrounding this biz-nitch.  It is freaking me out.

Okay, first of all.  About the pet monkey:  My dad, when he was very little, for some reason or another, had a pet monkey.  I don't remember how he got it, and I don't really want to ask him right now, but maybe, someday, if I still like you all, I will tell you about my dad's pet monkey and some of its shenanigans.

Second of all, effing raccoons. I.  Hate.  Raccoons.  That is all.