It's been a while...

Hello...First off, don't hate me.  Please.  Pretty please.  You don't hate me?  Good.  Second off, sorry...I've been busy doing many super important things like counting the number of squares in my math classroom which is really hard when your eyes are as horrible as mine.

Yea, I've been absent, if you hadn't noticed, and that's bad.  Bad Tegan!  *smack* OW!  Before any of you tell me that self-harming is wrong, I'll have you know that I did not just hurt myself.  I just wrote out a sound effect on my keyboard.  It's all about dramatic effect, which I ruined with this rather long explanation, but hey, I don't do anything correctly.  Doing everything right's no fun, right? Right!  Right!  Good to see you agree with me.

Anyway, I'm sick again.  It seems all I do on this blog is complain about my life.  Weird...I had plenty to complain about over the past few months, although I haven't really had the spare time.  I mean, there was a little bit of time in November when I wrote a book, that I guess I could have blogged about.

Oh yea!  I wrote a book.  A real book with pages and everything.  It's a novel, and it's not complete crap (I think) so that's really cool, right?!  Someone that you found randomly on the internet has written a book!  You can get it on paper!  Unfortunately, it's not quite yet available for download with your latest edition of Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but I'm hoping to get that changed.

In all seriousness, I wrote a book, and it's not half bad, and I'm really excited about it, and I'm really sorry for disappearing for a while.  I can't get away with disappearing for a while because I'm not super funny, so I will do my best to not disappear.  In the meantime, you can go poke a slab of Jello, because that's freakishly entertaining.

Aliens have taken over my Face

I woke up yesterday not being able to breathe through my nose.  Eventually that went away, but I feel like these liquid based aliens pulled a Babel Fish, and crawled inside my head and did extremely unwanted things to my brain.  And when I say liquid based, I don't mean little critters that crawl through water, or living soda, or that thing that lives in the lake.  No, I mean Goo.  The Goo for some reason has decided to inhabit my face, and has done a wonderful job.  If you can imagine this, I have a few globules of Goo in my head, nesting in my sinus', my eyes, and under my jaw, and it hurts.

The main side effect, besides the pain and the oozing, is that it has driven me completely insane.  The goo climbed up into my skull, wrapped around the cookie that I've been using as my brain, and snapped it completely in half.  Earlier this morning, I was stalking around my house groaning "GIMME MOAR ORANGE JUICE."

I freaking love orange juice, but this is a lot, even for me.  I started talking loudly to myself (not to the voice in my head, but to myself) completely ignoring my dog, and I decided to go to school early so that I didn't have to be in my own company any longer.

Whee, that car ride was fun.  Having a semi-deranged teenager conversely singing (badly) along with the radio, and talking to the air is certainly a sight.  I wonder what the other drivers thought when they saw me mourning the loss of my brain cookie.  I truly hope that I can find some fondant to glue my cookie back together before it gets moldy and becomes COMPLETELY unusable.  I've had that cookie for a while, and it has great sentimental meaning.  I don't want to get a whole new one in the beginning of the semester.

But, on the bright side, the breaking of my cookie seems to have erased the voice in my head.

School...blech

As I'm sure I've mentioned, I'm a high schooler.  As I'm also sure I've mentioned, I'm also homeschooled.  Because of the lack of a structured curriculum, I've found myself graduating a year early. Totally not what I was expecting, but according to the people around me, I'm smart.  Anyway, because I'm apparently smart, and because I'm homeschooled, I've been taking classes at the local community college to graduate high school, because it's easier than the last schooling program I was in.

Not kidding.  College was easy.

Of course, I am saying that as someone who is lazily lazing in front of the computer that has a background of "LAZY."  My mom put it up as an attempt to get me to do something, but it hasn't worked.  I haven't even bothered to change it.  When I actually start doing more schoolwork, believe me, I won't be saying it's easy.

That's the lazy part of me speaking.  Last year, when I leave the house at six, the lazy part of me was screaming at me to go back to bed.  It wasn't a very fun experience.  While I don't have to leave the house at six in the morning this semester, I'm still dreading not being able to stay in my PJs all day.

However, I am somewhat excited that I'm going to be reading HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy for school credit.  That, my friends, is just plain awesome.

So, I start school this week.  This post is basically me letting you know that I'm half REEEEEALLY excited, and half dreading it.  Because, as we all know, school turns us into zombies.  Schools are the beginning of the zombie apocalypse, and while I may be immune to the fatal effects of a zombie bite, I'm not immune to the brainwashing of a boring teacher.

In conclusion...schools.  Blech.

I travel a lot.  I'm not a military brat; I don't move around so I've had seventeen homes in as many years.  I just have very spread out family and a dad with lots of frequent flyer miles.  I'm currently sitting in an airport terminal, fidgeting to make sure my butt doesn't fall asleep (it isn't working) and fighting for the remainder of my sanity.  It's about eight in the morning (I know, it's not early.  just keep reading) but I left California at ten thirty last night.

Because I travel a lot, I've become a master of airplane sleep.  I just pull down my shades (oh yeah, sunglasses indoors at night.  I'm a BAMF) shove my headphones into my ears, and I'll nod off in a few minutes.  However, I'm convinced that the government has released a federal mandate that there MUST be a wailing child on every single airplane.  Not just the airplanes with ME on them; I'm not that paranoid (yet).

Generally, a wailing child that I could probably drop kick out of the plane isn't a problem.  Remember those headphones buried in my ears?  Crank up the volume of the stupid songs (probably Disney.  Yes, I know, I have the musical sophistication of a four year old) to drown out the screams.  Well, my usual medium of music is my computer, because my IPod is nonexistent, and the music over the airplane radio is crap.

You know how the airplane staff give you drinks?  sometimes they give you a can of whatever, sometimes they pour it into a cup FULL of ice.  Side note: who really needs that much ice?  It's overkill.  They could save so much money by not putting as much ice in the cups.

Back to my point.  Sometimes they give you the can, sometimes they give you the ice with a splash of soda, and sometimes they give you both.  As you might be able to guess, I find the cup o' ice extraneous, so I ignore it and chug the caffeinated beverage straight from the can.  However, after a while, that cup o' ice turns into a cup o' very cold water.

I had plugged in my music, pulled my BAMF shades down, and was half asleep when the cup o' very cold water decided that it didn't think life was worth living anymore, and jumped off my little tray table.

Straight into my lap.  

I know, right?  What a jerk.  Well, the cup didn't really jump into my lap, but it gave a valiant try.  It sort of toppled over, but the end result was the same thing.  I looked like I had peed my pants, and I swear, that hasn't happened in a very long time.  At LEAST a year.  Kidding, I haven't peed my pants since diapers.  I swear.  Seriously.

Anyway...my computer also happened to be resting on the table that suddenly turned into a small swimming pool.  Because I'm a teenager, I immediately thought to save my computer, and stowed it in my backpack at my feet.

Well there goes my music.  That kid was still wailing, and she wouldn't stop for a VERY long time.

Wait, that's not true. She stopped very often, and I would breathe a sigh of relief.

'Silence,' I would think, 'Finally!'  and I would start to fall asleep again.  Then my ears would get raped by this unearthly scream.  Honestly, I think whoever first encountered a banshee really just ran into an angry kid.  This process happened over and over and over and o...you see hwere this is going.  On a four hour flight, I got twenty minutes of very bad sleep...and this was a red eye.

Oh well, I'm not at my final destination.  I should be fine.  Catch a few 'z's on my next flight, and I'll land in tiptop shape.

Riiiiight.  First, I had to survive long enough to get on the plane, and it's looking very doubtful that will happen.

I sat down on the floor next to a trashcan because the seats next to the outlet were taken, and started internetting and stuff.  All was well until it was about 7:30 (I landed at about six AM) then a bunch of flights started boarding, all within 15 minutes of each other.  Three different women, all with some sort of thick accent, started repeating the same useless information over and over and over and ov...do I need to keep going?

I can deal with twenty minutes of sleep.  I can deal with wet shorts.  I can deal with heavily accented women telling me things I already know.

I can't deal with all of them at once.  I've been smashing my head into the trash can next to me for the past ten minutes.  I've got a big red mark.  It hurts.  A lot.  I'm fighting to keep from breaking down in the middle of the airport, because it was really embarrassing the first time.

The Day that Never Ends (It goes on and on my friends and if you...)

So, I went to Summerfest yesterday.  Summerfest is one of the biggest music festivals in the world, and it just started this week.  I went to see Civil Twilight and Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, and I left with two and a half albums, and an extra shirt, and I was there for about seven hours.  As you might expect, I sit in front of my computer most days, so standing and walking for seven hours is...painful.

Honestly, the small bones in the bottom of my feet felt like they had bent from straight lines into something resembling a squished spider.  Afterwards, as I got my weight off of my mangled feet, I contemplated a way to get out of ever having to walk again.  I've been reading science fiction lately, so I starting contemplating the classic jetpacks.  Y'know, the backpack that lets you fly?  But, I tossed the idea aside, mostly because I am not science-minded, and therefore have no real idea as to how to create an accessory that has the means to overcome gravity, and a fuel source for said means, and be light and stylish enough that people will want to buy it.

Yea, I totally plan on making money for this stuff.

So, I threw away the jetpack idea because there was absolutely NO WAY that I could make it work.  Instead, I turned to the black arts.  What if I could cast a long-lasting and controllable levitation spell?  That would certainly fit the bill, and it looks cool to boot.  Unfortunately, I am not a mage, or a druid, so I can't actually defy gravity for more than a second or two.

But wait...I can create energy by sucking it from the souls of young law students.  What if...no...it couldn't work...yes it could...YES!!!  A plan has come into being inside the cookie masquerading as my brain!

Step 1: use my magicks (Yes, I did try to make it look cooler by adding a 'k') to create a sustainable energy source about the size of a tennis ball.
Step 2: secure said energy source into a metal container, and pass it off as science.
Step 3: hire a bunch of smart guys to build the rest of the jetpack.
Step 4: sell it at Summerfest and make a killing
Step 5: Retire young and buy a castle in Scotland with lots of really cool secret passageways.

Yep, this'll be awesome.  I stayed up all night concocting this plan and stealing the souls of people in law school, and got no sleep after my full day the day before.  I came out of my basement at a normal time, looking like a teenager that had just had about eight hours of sleep.  In other words, I looked half-asleep.  I went through the day normally (read 'normally' as 'lazing around on the couch') ate dinner yada yada yada.  Then came the airport.

I am bound for California, because the energy pouring from the San Andreas fault is the perfect cooking spot to create my little ball of explosions, and I got on the plane at eight in the evening.  We took off quickly, and about half an hour in, the pilot talked on his little speaker system.

"It appears that the wing is about to fall off.  We're probably going to have to make an emergency landing.  Most of you will probably die.  Have a nice day."

Okay, so that's not exactly what he said, but we needed to turn around.  We landed, back where we started, and some people in jumpsuits and armed with flashlights and duct tape came to look at the injured wing.

"So, ya," imagine a Fargo accent, "You guys are gonna have to get on another plane because this one won't fly.  However, the boys up top say that you have to wait until tomorrow morning, and we're having a whole lot of trouble finding hotels.  Good luck!"  

I had a really bad feeling that the souls of the lawyers that were nesting somewhere in my father's nose (only place I could put them without him noticing) were really pissed at me, and used their cosmic powers to screw me over.

But ha!  I got a hotel room!  One point for me!  However, it is midnight, and my plane leaves at eight in the morning, which means I have to leave the hotel before six.

Yea, I think the lawyers win this round.

It's been a while since my last post, but I like to think I have a good reason for it.  I'm taking a summer class( not summer school.  I passed my classes) and my brain has been overloading with Supreme Court cases and the true identity of Deep Throat.  So, today, I decided to make a post, and just talk about relatively stupid things.  y'know, same as ever.  

So, I realized what school is for.  It's not about maths and history, and it's not practice for beating up small children, or a starting ground for young Mafiosos, although that last one is actually a possibility.  Nah, school is a place to learn how to learn.  I actually learned this watching a Youtube video, and I sortakinda took it a step further.  Personally, I learn best when reading books.  If you want to learn about the world, read history books.  If you want to learn about politics, read diaries of politicians.  If you want to learn about maths...grab a calculator.  

Basically, there are books for everything.  Then there's the internet.  I shouldn't bash the internet, because at the moment, it's my main medium of talking to complete strangers on another continent (hi guys!) but I do prefer books as a learning place.  I don't mean the type of learning where you go, "Hey, I wonder..." and decide to look it up.  The internet's a wonderful place for random questions.  

I read books, a lot of them, but I read fiction.  When you read fiction, you obviously can't learn about history, mostly because fiction doesn't always happen in this world.  Nah, I read fiction to learn about people.  Fiction books don't revolve around the plot, or the world, but the people.  And it's the people that you learn from.  

Oh yeah, and if you want to learn how to make a Pan-Galactic Gargle Blast, read Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy.  

Nightmare Beedrills

Remember what I said about not having many nightmares?  I have weird dreams, and dreams with unpleasant aspects, but no nightmares.  The other night, I had an incredibly unpleasant dream.  It started out nice enough, until I decided to climb a lattice-the kind that has plants growing up it.  Well, I was a good height up when a bee came out.

I'm terrified of bees.  Bugs, kinda icky.  Spiders, whatever.  Bees, run for my life.  When I think of bees, I imagine a Beedrill from Pokemon.  You ever seen those things?  They're TERRIFYING.

That.  That's a normal bee to me.  A nightmarish bee is this thing...but worse.  And there were twenty of the nightmare-Beedrills!  The worst part about dream-bees is that I can't escape the damn things.  A lot of small kids are scared of bees, for stupid reasons.  There're a few that can see reason, and aren't particularly scared of the flying needles of death.  

I wasn't one of them.

But as I left middle school, I started to reason with myself about my chronic fear of bees, and I slowly got over.  By the time I started high school, I could actually stand next to a bee.  Every muscle was screaming at me to run, but I still had some control over myself.  Yea, I kept this fear alive until ninth grade...or for you Europeans...not really sure, but four years away from university.  

Then I went camping.  The act of camping itself isn't necessarily associated with bees, nor was hopping around on a boulder field.  I was jumping around with a few friends, and I was a bit slower than them, being somewhat cautious while they just run around like a goat.  I was on top of a rock about six feet above the other rock that I was going to jump to, and my friends pointed out there was a wasp nest the size of my head underneath another nearby rock.  I, using my brain, decided to jump down VERY QUIETLY and move on quickly so that I don't disturb the bees.  

I succeeded in the first part of my plan very well...then one of the idiots I call my friends (one of the more idiotic ones) screamed.  Apparently (This is what I've heard) bees can't stand the sound of screaming.  So a bunch of bees come swarming out looking, well, like this.

They were buzzing in bee language, but I can translate for you.

"Agh, the noise!  Attack the nearest creature in an attempt to stop the noise!"  Yea, that was me.  Whee...

I covered the distance I would have taken five minutes to cross in a mere thirty seconds.  And I still got three damn bee stings.  

I now run from bees.  

Today, while examining my relatively dismal financial status, I got somewhat peeved.  Not incredibly angry, mind you, just peeved. As my mood shifted from contemplative to peeved, I suddenly became aware of the voice in my head.  y'know, that little voice that speaks your thoughts.  I don't know what deaf people have instead of a little voice, but my little voice suddenly shifted from an American accent into a British one.  Cockney, to be precise, which is very odd because I have a very hard time maintaining a Cockney accent.  I used to be able to put one on with no stress whatsoever, but now I just can't get it right.  It just morphs into another brand of British.
The same thing happens when I try to do an Australian accent.
There are a few different accents that I can just flip on, both in my head and verbally.  The best two accents that I can do are Scottish, although some say that it's half Scottish and half Irish, but they don't know what they're talking about, and I can also do a good Russian one.  I got my Scottish one in Scotland (no duh) when I was visiting my relatives.
I got my Russian one while watching Despicable Me.
I can also take on a few different British accents, ranging in class and "poshness."  Oh yeah, and my Irish accent drives people through the roof.

Now, some might be thinking, "What's the point of these accents?  They don't really affect anything, right?"
Wrong.
With a plethora of believable accents, the average human can fool a number of supernatural creatures into believing that he/she is much more awesome than first appearing.  The greatest weapon that someone can have against an American werewolf, for example, is a solid Asian accent.  Werewolves, as everyone knows, avoid the middle of Asia because of the climate (especially the Mongolian area) and because the natives know a helluva lot more than the average North American, not to mention that they generally are badass at some martial art.  Werewolves, being short-sighted, probably won't be able to tell that you aren't actually from that area because of your image.
Werewolves of other nationalities might not be as easy to fool as American ones (American werewolves are rather dimwitted, and are easily fooled) so a more targeted accent is necessary.  Pick a specific area of Asia, and learn the local history as well as the accent, and you should be able to hoodwink all but the smartest of wolves.
It should be noted that an accent is not like armor.  A werewolf will not turn and run upon thinking that you are from Asia.  Instead, the wolf will hesitate, which will give you the split second to either hit the wolf or run for your life.  If the werewolf looks out of shape, I'd suggest running, but otherwise, whack the wolf over the head, then run.  A disorientated werewolf is a safe (ish) werewolf.

The Things that go Bump at Night...

So, I think I'm going to get back to the monsters for now...so we'll talk about one of the most popular monsters that many adults tend to underestimate. 

Avoiding the Boogie-Man: Strategies for Survival

The boogie-man may be one of history’s best-kept secrets.  Boogie-men cause deaths and disappearances on a daily basis; they killed Napoleon and every other elderly person with a frail heart.  Most children are aware of the dangers of the boogie-man, yet most adults are dangerously ignorant of this nighttime menace.   Because many people over the age of ten have fallen victim to this monster, the following discussion is comprised of valuable information that will help detect, distinguish between, and defeat all types of boogie-man. 

The most important piece of information you need to know is how to fend off the boogie-men.  But even this knowledge is useless if you don’t know what a boogie-man is.  All boogie-men are pale, nocturnal, and careful.  They cannot be seen in direct light because of a biological stealth mechanism that has evolved with their need to survive; any light renders them invisible.  The only flaw in this ability is that when they become invisible, they also become immobile.  To avoid this helplessness, boogie-men never come out of hiding during the day. 

Boogie-men rely almost completely on scent because they are horribly far sighted.  They can unhinge their jaws to swallow people whole, and the only thing left after the digestive process is a human corpse, dead of heart failure.  Of course, to effectively battle the boogie-men, you must understand each of the three types. 

The most common type of boogie-men is the bed-boogie-man.  As with all of his species, he gets his namesake from his hiding spot.  The bed-boogie-man creates his nest in the warm underside of your bed.  He is generally very short and very flat, easily able to both fit and maneuver in the small space.  His weapons are his long arms which he uses to snag your legs as you walk toward the bed, because he has neither the patience to wait for you to fall asleep, nor the muscle structure to reach the top of the bed.  The telltale sign of a bed-boogie-man is an overabundance of dust bunnies, for these are the bed-boogie-man’s feces. 

The most well-known of the boogie-men is the closet-boogie-man.  This breed of boogie-men holes up in the dark corner of your closet and is set apart from other boogie-men by his height, his skinniness, and his flexibility.  Despite his ability to become invisible in the light, the closet-boogie-man prefers to fold his long, stick-like body, concealing himself between hanging articles of clothing.  He feels safest around corduroys, and abhors flannel, so if you stock your closet with flannel, the closet-boogie-man will break out in hives and disintegrate into a minty scented dust. 

The closet-boogie-man’s hunting technique differs greatly from the bed-boogie-man’s.  He is much more patient that the bed-boogie-man and can easily wait until you have fallen asleep before strangling you with his long fingers.  The closet-boogie-man is very difficult to detect because he makes almost no noise, and disposes of his waste by spreading an odd smell through the air.  Therefore, there is only one way to tell if he is there.  Despite his extreme anorexia and lack of muscle, the closet-boogie-man still has both mass and weight, and therefore causes some clothes to fall from their hangers.  If you discover that some of your hanging clothes have been displaced or have fallen, you surely have a closet-boogie-man. 

The final and most rare breed of boogie-men is the window-boogie-man.  This boogie-man has only appeared a few times in history and therefore, all that is known about him is that he has bat like wings.  Despite the lack of information regarding his appearance, his other characteristics are unmistakable because his hunting style is significantly different than the common boogie-mau78n’s.  The window-boogie-man is the only boogie-man that does not actually inhabit your room.  He prefers to roost just outside your window.  He also hibernates.  You will only meet this boogie-man on warm summer nights, when you cannot help but open your window.  Then, he sneaks into your room, and waits for you to open your eyes, at which time he pounces.  The window-boogie-man prefers his victims to be sleepy, and he muffles their screams with his wings.  The window-boogie-man generates a good bit of wind when entering your room, and that wind causes the curtains to flap noisily.  Therefore the only clear warning that will tell you that the window-boogie-man is in your room is the sound of the curtain blowing. 

If you believe that you are being targeted by a boogie-man, your first priority is to conduct a thorough search for the telltale signs of invasion.  Because of their stealth mechanism, using your eyes to search is nearly useless, but rather you should use your other senses; specifically, your ears.  The easiest and most common method of check your bedroom for infestation is to lie on your bed at night, and listen very carefully for odd sounds that you wouldn’t hear during the day.  One of the easiest sounds to recognize is the characteristic moaning made by boogie-men when they sense prey is near.  Another sound to listen for is more of a creaking noise.  Boogie-men, because of their hiding places, do not get to move around much, for moving would alert their targets.  The creaking is caused by them slow movement of their arms and legs in preparation for their attack.

If you notice any signs that point to the presence of a boogie-man, precautionary measures must be taken.  Your first step is to place a working flashlight within grabbing distance.   The next defense you must put in place is to arrange a circle of fierce-looking toys around your bed, for boogie-men cannot discern that these toys are inanimate, and they will flee at the slightest sign of a fight.  Finally, you must dress in pajamas that will allow you to move quickly because boogie-men can be quite swift; wearing cumbersome clothing will do absolutely nothing to help you.  It is imperative that you put all the precautionary measures into place while the light is on.  If the light is off, you are a sitting duck for an opportunistic boogie-man. 

Now, you must reach the bed.  If you do not have a light switch within arm’s length of your bed, you must be extremely careful.  The bed-boogie-man is exceedingly skilled at grabbing legs when you are walking to your bed, so you must be sure not to come within his reach.  Of course, the only sure way to do this is to take a running leap onto your bed.  Not only will you have gotten past the first danger of the night, but you will have startled any other boogie-men enough to give yourself an hour or two of safety. 

Most bed-boogie-men are not able to reach you when you are in your bed; they are not nearly as flexible as their closeted cousins.  In fact, their arms are not physically able to lift more than a few inches off the ground.  So, if you have cleared this hurdle, then you have taken care of the bed-boogie-man for the night.  Now the danger rests in the closet- and window-boogie-men.

If you are a light sleeper, you are guarded against most closet-boogie-men because they are incredibly fearful of confrontation and will not attack you if you are either awake or are likely to wake.  However, there are a few brazen closet-boogie-men who will emerge from their hiding places to feed, even if you are moving around.  The safest way to block these boogie-men, brazen or not, is to shut your closet door.  Because of the lack of anything besides skin and bones, closet-boogie-men, as a whole, are extremely weak.  They can barely lift themselves off the ground to attack, let alone open a door.  If your closet doesn’t have a door, then you must create another semicircle of toys around the doorway. 

The flip side of the coin is that if you are a light sleeper, you are much more susceptible to the window-boogie-man.  As you may recall, the window-boogie-man waits for you to open your eyes to eat you.  If you believe that a window-boogie-man has entered your room, then the first thing you must do is squeeze your eyes shut.  Under no circumstances should you open your eyes.  If you open your eyes, even just a crack, the window-boogie-man will notice.  This is where the flashlight comes in handy.  If you have prepared correctly, you will have placed a flashlight within grabbing distance.  Now, without opening you eyes, you will grab the flashlight, click the light on, and shine the beam directly at the foot of the bed.  The window-boogie-man will always wait at the foot, never at your side, because he only moves in large swoops, and the foot of the bed is the perfect distance for him.  Once you have focused the flashlight on the foot of the bed, you must flick it off for a brief moment, then back on, and wave it around. 

The first beam of light focused on the window-boogie-man shocks and immobilizes him, the moment of darkness gives him the chance to move out of killing range, and the wild slashing of the light frightens him out of your room.  Only after you have waved the flashlight for a good minute may you open your eyes.  Give your room one cursory look.  Check to see if there has been any activity by the closet- or bed-boogie-man, then turn the flashlight off and go back to sleep. 

If you follow these guidelines to the letter, your chances for surviving the night are markedly increased.  Just remember that boogie-men have almost no reason in their minds, are completely driven by instinct, and that nothing is completely guaranteed to fend them off. Trusting your intuition and playing it safe will be your best option.  

Undead Monkeys

Not that long ago, I decided that I wanted an undead monkey for a pet.  A lot like the monkey from Pirates of the Caribbean.  But these guys are hell to get, because there's only one island in the middle of the Pacific that exports them.  Normally, it'd be easy to get a monkey from this island, but it's in the middle of a civil war, and each side created an embargo for the other.  

In other words, no monkey.  

I was trying to figure out a way to get a monkey, because I really want one, and a friend reminded me that this guy owes me from a thing with a Chinese woman and an elephant.  Because this story was a large part of my past (hell, it's the reason I have this name and face and life), I decided it was important to share.  

I was in Albania (doing work with cars for the Mafia) about three years ago, with my dad.  He wasn’t as much into the physical stuff, he preferred hacking, but the Mafia didn’t really trust a thirteen year old.  Anyway, we were driving through Albania, having just delivered a truckload of cars, when we pull over to get a bite to eat in Tirana, the capital of Albania.  This guy comes up to us while we’re eating, looking really nervous, and asks if he can sit down with us, just for a few minutes.  We were in a good mood, considering we’d just been paid a good deal of money, so we said sure, why not?  I mean really, this guy looked harmless.  What could possibly go wrong? 

So, it turns out that this guy jacked the shipment of cars we’d just delivered for another Mafia family.  He was running, having hidden the cars somewhere, he never told us where.  He assumed that an upstanding gentleman like my father with a cute, albeit odd, daughter such as myself would never be involved with the Mafia.  So, when we told him that those had been our cars, he started to freak out.  Before the police were called, we calmed him down, because we didn’t care what happened to the cars, now that we had been paid.  We asked this guy why he needed to steal those cars in the first place.  He said that he needed a good way to smuggle some cargo into another country. 

At this point, my dad was sort of out of his depth.  He mostly stole things, and changed deliveries.  The smuggling was more my area, so he left.  Now, it was just me and this guy, who said his name was John Smith.  Riiiiiight.  So, I told him my name was Sam Eyeam.  Yea, not that original, but whatever.  It got the job done.  I asked him what he was trying to smuggle and where. 

Smith said that he was smuggling papers.  Official documents, passports and the like, in and out of Korea.  Yea, Korea.  The north one.  Pretty big business.  So, me, having been in and out of Korea a few times, decided to help him out.  He brought me one of the cars, along with the pile of documents he had made. 

So, getting into Korea was no problem (it’s a lot easier than everyone makes it out to be…or at least, the way I take is) but somehow, the Mafia that I had been working for found out that I was helping Smith, so they were now gunning for the both of us.  Anyway, we get into North Korea, and it turns out that he had done this job to help pay for these passports and stuff to get a bunch of families OUT of North Korea.  So, we got them out (boy, was that fun) but now we’re on the run from the Mafia.  So Smith and I hightail it to France.  I spoke French pretty well, so it’s not like we were fumbling around with no way to survive.  Actually, we joined a circus.  THAT was fun.  I worked with animals, and Smith was a clown. 

THAT’s how I met the elephant.  Her name was Tiffy, the nicest elephant you’ll ever meet.  I got her to do tricks for the crowd, mostly standing up on various legs, but the really cool thing she could do was juggle with me.  Oh, the crowd loved it.  But she wasn’t treated very well backstage.  None of the animals were. 

I get word that there’s this guy in India that can help Tiffy, and I decide to steal her.  Smith comes with me, I said that he owed me because of the whole North Korea thing, and we steal Tiffy’s trailer.  Now we’ve got the Mafia and the French police after us.  Fun, right?  And the Mafia have a wide reach, so we needed to get Tiffy to India without being found.

We get a boat.  I load it with food for us and Tiffy, and we decide to sail around France (we were on the Northern side), around Spain, into the Mediterranean, and into the Black Sea, and drive from there to the Persian Gulf, avoiding any major war zones whenever possible.  So, we drove through Georgia and Azerbajain, and into Iran. Then, we went down to the Persian Gulf, and onto another boat. 

As it turns out, Tiffy had been pregnant.  I didn’t know this until the vet we had hired told me that she was giving birth.  A couple of hours later, we had a baby elephant. 

This presented a problem.  The guy in India said that he could take care of Tiffy, but not her baby.  Eventually, Smith got him to take the baby, who we named Sebastian.  

Don’t ask.

 

Now, I owed Smith a favor.  He put me in touch with a friend of his, another smuggler, and told me to solve his problem.  So, this guy lived in Japan, and his name was, weirdly enough, also John Smith!  Him, I call Smithy, because I like him better than the original Smith.  So, Smithy was having some trouble delivering some gems to a buyer, in Thailand.  I told him to put them into a bag, and shove the bag inside a melon, and get an elephant to eat the melon.  I’d been hanging around Tiffy long enough to know that she loved melons. 

Smithy didn’t exactly have an elephant on hand, so…yep, you guessed it.  He borrowed TIffy.  And when I say he borrowed Tiffy, I mean that he convinced me to take Tiffy to Thailand, and then meet him once nature had taken its course, and the gems were out of Tiffy’s digestive system.  It seriously didn’t take much time at all to get Tiffy to Japan, get her to eat the gems, and to get to Thailand. But that’s when I met this girl.  Nah, girl’s not the right word.  Woman.  She was travelling to Thailand to visit family, but she was originally from China.  She bonded with Tiffy immediately, and decided to stick with us on the way to our buyer, and then go to her family.  We got to where we were going, Tiffy delivered the goods, and we met Smithy.  

He fell in love with Piun Dao, and she him.  I’m not kidding.  Head over heels, bad romance movie, Romeo and Juliet with a happier ending in love.  They ended up getting married. 

So, summarizing, the guy who owes me is Smithy, and he owes me for introducing him to his wife and for lending him Tiffy to finish the job to let him go straight. 

As for the Mafia, they caught up with Smith, who pointed the finger at me and Smithy, and now him an Piun Dao are on the run.  I came here two and a half years ago, took over this identity, and have been Tegan  ever since.  I still get letters from Smithy every once in a while; he still thinks my name is Sam.  It’s actually really amusing.

Vampires in the Basement!

When I was young, I had very few nightmares.  I would have a number of scary thoughts, mostly because of a book my fourth grade teacher read to us about witches in America turning kids into pheasants or hot dogs and having out parents eat us.  I had a particularly vivid imagination, so I had a perfect picture of my abductor in my mind.  I slept in a loft bed (think a bunk bed without the bottom bed) and I would hear creepy noises, and I thought it was someone sneaking into my room to kill me with a knife.

I was kinda paranoid.

Anyway, one of the few nightmares I had was about vampires.  I wasn't scared of vampires.  I didn't even believe in vampires.  I didn't even watch or read much about vampires.  My dad showed me two episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and that was about the extent of my contact with vampires.

So, one night, I was laying there, thinking about how a witch would kidnap me and try to turn me into a bird, but I would kick her in the face and run away with her wig.  I didn't really take into account that while I was flexible, and could kick quite high and quite hard, my legs weren't long enough to reach a full-grown woman's face.  Nor did I remember that witches don't take kids from their bedrooms, but hey, that's just details.  So, there I was, planning my defense, until I fell asleep.

Most of my dreams involved either flying or running around underground with my friends.  I particularly enjoy the flying ones.  But no, this one was much more malevolent.  I had to go downstairs into my basement, which if you remember, is quite creepy.  My dream basement was even creepier.  It looked the exact same, but there was this woman there.  She looked regular, but then she grew fangs.  And not the regular fangs that you usually see on vampires, but her teeth turned into freaking drill bits.  You know, the long thin kind that are all twirly and look like they should be on a Christmas tree?  Or is that just me?  But, that kind.  And they were three feet long!  Scary...

Then I died.  Or, woke up.

It was only hours after that, after I'd gone back to sleep and woken up again, that I realized that I should have just grown four feet taller, and sprout my own Christmas-tree-ornament-drillbit-fangs, twice as long as her.  Alas, if only I'd thought of this before the vampire woman killed me.

Anyway, since then, I've been extremely hesitant to go into my basement, and I realized that my basement is host to a variety of creatures.  Now that I'm older, taller, and able to sprout fangs of my own do I dare venture down there alone.

Also, I keep a stake on me at all times.

Day AFTER Easter.

The day after Easter.  All the candy is on sale, and stuff goes on as normal.  No real impact from what everyone was yelling about the day before.

Now, some people, people more religious than I, would not understand the serious repercussions of celebrating someone coming back from the dead.  Do you know what it means?

Zombies are gaining our trust.

Yes, zombies.  Shambling corpses, hungering for brains and entrails.  Half magical, half scientific creatures, the walking dead.  One of the many monsters this world knows, and they are gaining our trust!  Bad juju...very bad juju.  Zombies had always been things that were stupid, beings of muscle and numbers as opposed to brains (haha) and cleverness.  We only needed fast feet and a big gun.  Now, however, we need to keep our brains (Okay, I need to stop these brain puns now) about us, because the zombies are fooling us.  Like I said, bad juju.

Now, we must figure out a way to combat these zombies, and the best way to do that is to survive.  If you don't already have one, go and get one of these.

or any book of the same sort.  Maybe, you should write your own, after killing a few hundred zombies every Zombie Jesus Day.  Er, Easter.  Sorry, force of habit.  If you do write a survival guide of your own, give a copy to a friend.

There are a few things to do with zombie fighting that everyone should know.  First of all; run.  Seriously.  Zombies are slow, and it is more important to survive than to kill.  Second; Kill them all.

Yes, I'm aware that these two seem slightly contradictory, but trust me, they make sense...if you don't have much of a brain (Ok, I needed to put one more in there.  Last one, I swear)  Let me put it another way.  Take care of yourself, then take care of the zombies.  Does that make more sense?

Just, trust me.  I know what I'm doing.  I've had experience in this type of thing.  You want to know why?

I've got a creepy basement.

I woke up this morning, and this is what it looked like.  No, your computer isn't malfunctioning.  It's just gray.  Yesterday, it looked like this.

Not kidding.  There were birds singing, gophers walking around, deer skipping with flowers on their heads.  The garden gnomes were going chores, whistling on their merry way.  It was a scene straight from Cinderella, or Snow White.  Probably Snow White.

The weather, wherever I seem to go, is bipolar.  Or indecisive.  It'll be raining one day, and beautiful the next. It's like the weather can't make up its mind.

There was a point behind this, but I can't remember it right now.  Oh, wait, I got it.

Yesterday, because I didn't get much sleep that night, I took a nap.  But, because the day was straight from a Disney movie, there was constantly light in my face.  I cannot sleep well when there is light, so I drifted into the semi-conscious zone where I had my eyes open but I was still dreaming.  And it was in that state that I have my weirdest and most random ideas.

As I was lying there, my eyes started to get really dry, and I got incredibly aware that I was wearing my contacts.  Then, for some reason, I came to the conclusion that contacts were like underwear for your eyeballs.

Like that.  And glasses are eyeball-clothes, and sunglasses are eyeball-coats.

I tried to explain this to my mom, but she gave me this look, and nodded sympathetically, while thinking something along the lines of 'THIS is what goes on in my daughter's head?'

Of course, that thought has probably crossed through her mind many times before.  I mean, this eyeball thought isn't the first of this breed of thought to cross my mind.  Most of them happen in the middle of school, and I don't generally say anything because my mom thinks that I focus on these weird thoughts, and focusing on weird thoughts when I should be focusing on schoolwork is frowned upon by parents.  In fact, it's more like the thought drops into my head, instead of me searching for it.

It doesn't really matter how I think these thoughts though, the important thing is that I do.  and, I guess that's what makes me, well, me.  so, I think that's what I'm going to blog about.  These thoughts that pop into my head for no good reason.  Maybe I'll share stories that might help to explain why I think that eyeballs coverings need to be classified into specific types of garments.  Who knows?

first post!

Hi to all of...wait, no one's there.  Well, for anyone who is in the future who decided to look back at my posts, thanks for caring enough.  Or being bored enough to look through all the rambling that is sure to come.  Anyway, to anyone who decided to read this, I guess I should talk about myself.

Hi.  I'm Tegan.  Nice to meet you.  As you might be able to tell from the title of the blog, I'm verbally dyslexic (really hoping people get the title) which is my way of saying that I screw up what I want to say.  A lot.  I'd add an example here, but I can't think of anything in particular.  I'll let you know of something when it comes.  It'll probably come a bit later in the post while I'm talking about something completely off topic.

Hmmm...what is there to say?  I'm a teenager.  Learning how to drive.  Remind me to get my mom to take pictures of me while I freak out behind the wheel.  Naaaah.  I think I'd rather be some imaginary face and voice in your head.  Adding a face to your mental picture sort of ruins the whole "mental" part.  I'll just draw a picture of my face.  Not EXACTLY sure how that will work out, seeing as I'm a particularly good artist.

Anyway...I don't think I'm going to delete much of what I write in posts, so you get to see how my brain works!  If there's stuff you don't understand...Google it.  I'll probably be rambling on and on about the Babel Fish or something of the like, and if you're thinking "What the hell is this kid talking about?"  seriously, Google it.  Babel Fish, while uncomfortable at first, is a magnificent tool.  Waaaait, it sort of started a whole bunch of wars.  Never mind.

I have a feeling that most of my posts are going to be like this.  Possibly longer, and hopefully with a point.

OH, feel free to email me at ExplodingSammich@gmail.com.  Cuz, y'know, homeschooler.  I sit in front of my computer with nothing but schoolwork all day, and not only do I have verbal dyslexia, I also have chronic procrastinitus.  Yes, it's real.  No, not really.  It's just me wasting time.  It happens a lot.  Too often for my mother's comfort, but there you have it.

I feel like leaving a thing at the end that at first makes no sense, then it sort of makes sense, but then you realize that it's just rambling.

Don't give your money to squirrels, because they use it to get high, and high squirrels is the last thing we need.

Yea, that works.