Well, many of you know my total abhorrence toward people putting up only white christmas lights - We use white lights all year 'round, why the hell would anyone want to suck all the colour out of this colourful season by using only white lights? It's not classy, it's super-tacky and looks cheap, like you're not even attempting to try to be in any sort of xmas spirit. Now that that's out of the way ...

Those new LED lights. Sure they look pretty neat, and i like the colours they make ... except ... they're just not christmassy. At least not unless you take out all the purple and pink and allow the green and red to show like they're SUPPOSED TO. All the LED lights these days just emit a purplish blue glow, that in and of itself is very pretty, but is NOT christmassy! At all!!

And it's like a clone-factory, every house that has these lights looks the exact same! There's no character! It all seems more like a gloomy production line down the back allies of dirty, neon-light filled districts where drug deals and prostitution reign supreme.

At least, that's the feeling it gives me. Somewhere between that, and a feeling of a cold industrialized, "Big Brother" police state, with mindless humans droning on like robots.

Let the other colours shine through!! Let the christmas colours show! Red and Green, and white, and blue ... even the crappy yellow lights (which represent the candle-flame) have a place in christmas lights!

Purple and pink are nice and all, but they have NOTHING to do with christmas. You might as well just call these LED Easter Lights, as when they glow that blue-purple glow, they have more to do with Easter than christmas.

When will they start making strands of LED lights with just green and red? That's what i want. Maybe white, too, interspersed at a lower rate than the greens and reds, to make sure everyone knows my house is celebrating this winter holiday, and not Easter. Even blue and yellow would be acceptable, because when those lights combine, they make that warm christmassy aura that just screams, "Warm-fuzzy-christmas-feelings" ... not "cold-gloomy-clone-anxiety" like the LED lights today.

Hopefully someone notices this and it gets changed, and not everyone's a slave to, "Oh, it's new, so i gotta jump on this bandwagon, even though these lights feel completely wrong, i must still use them..."

*Update: All right, we've got 8 guesses, all correct - some i didn't think would be gotten - can we get some more?*

5, 10 and 12 should be pretty easy for anyone who grew up in the 90s, listening to heavy, heavy-ish, and heavy music - but they're not the same band...

20, and 13 are the same band ...

And there are others still that are pairs of the same band, but one has already been guessed ...

This should help, hopefully!

Stolen'd from ~LaMeep's livejournal.


Some of these are a little obscure, but there are a couple easy ones in there, too. Although it tended to play a lot of repeat bands, so don't be discouraged from thinking that one, and the one next to it, or any other one could be from the same band, twice, maybe even 3 times with more than one band.


-Step 1: Put your MP3 player or whatever music player you have - My XBOX360 Music Library - on random.
-Step 2: Post a line/stanza from the first 20 songs that play, no matter how embarrassing the song. Now, i never had to skip any embarrassing songs, but i did have to skip a few that either didn't have singing, or didn't have lyrics i was even familiar with yet, much less did i know the titles. But if i could hear the lyrics and didn't quite know them, but knew the song i did include it.
-Step 3: Post and let everyone you know guess what song and artist the lines come from.
-Step 4: Bold STRIKE the songs when someone guesses correctly


1. "Is anybody there? (Spies in the road) This crap only multiplies! (sharp as an arrow)"

2. Day of the Baphomets, The Mars Volta - ~Dragmir "I've got a prayer that'll make you theirs now, beneath sepulchers. Raise your entrails as an offer!"

3. Fait Accompli, KMFDM ~beekersgirl "Paper, scissor, stone, gamble wisely and be bold, whether powerful or meek, the truth is anything goes."

4. "Relieve me of my duty, as keeper of this body, just leave me with my mind! And i assure you i will be just fine!"

5. "Strip down core, violate and paralyze, flood my soul a coffee dreg - Supersize! Slung low like a whore, (YAH!) Devil want some more, (YAH!) Cupid bought a gun, he's gonna blow the FUCKAHHH!!"

6. "Did you always want to be? Did they try to steal your soul? Did they hurt you with deceit? Could you come in from the cold? Be still, my [Title]"

7. "More than a dream to me, An echo of my scream!"

8. "You go all this way, no hair out of place you put it on a stage, you put right in my face!"

9. Endless Endless, Kraftwerk ~Dragmir "Endless... Endless..."

10. "Told you bad dreams come true..."

11. Waste, KMFDM ~beekersgirl "I hypnotize with alibis, and fingers made of lead.
i sympathize with frozen eyes turned inwards in my head.
I realize to my demise it's better left unsaid,
that columns crash down endlessly and i will end up dead!"

12. "Boiling my corpse in the blood of his children, praying for his god to prevail. Burying us with loved ones to sleep with the shelled children. (Of the 6th dimension...)"

13. "Introspection, termination, can't tell right from wrong. Fed up with this whole system, it's gone on far too long..."

14. Witness, KMFDM ~beekersgirl "When we get on the spaceship we must not flip, we have to be fearless, it helps to keep smiling, are you ready to join us, avoid the disaster, and be with the master? (And be with the master!) Surrender. SURRENDER!! Bend Over!! I will always praise my maker. I will always return to my taker. I will never be a faker. I will never be a forsaker."

15. Showroom Dummies, Kraftwerk ~Riveroll "We start to move, and we break the glass.
We are [title]! (x2)
We step out, and take a walk through the city.
We are [title]! (x2)"

16. Down by the Water, PJ Harvey ~tangledupinbrown "I lost my heart under the bridge, to that blue eyed girl, so much to me. And now i moan, and now i holler. She'll never know just what i found. That blue eyed girl (that blue eyed girl), she said no more (she said no more), that blue eyed girl (that blue eyed girl) became blue eyed whore (became blue eyed whore)..."

17. "You're the antenna catching vibration. I'm the transmitter, send information."

18. Amish Paradise, Weird Al ~fairybelle2002 "And i've been milkin' and plowin' so long that even Ezekiel thinks my mind is gone!"

19. "Her mouth hangs low, cataract covered eyes, she smells like dog. Give up! But it feels good, just like the way it should. Sex was meant to kill you!"

20. "I am your nightmares, true scares, that dream when you can't stop from falling. Can't fight, can't run, can't stop the person you've become."

You know how it goes. Or maybe not, i only learned people were doing this about 2 years ago - where they take a fortune cookie's fortune and add "in bed" after to make it kinda funny.

Well, i got one last night that made my night:

"You are always welcome in any gathering" in bed.

Sweeeeeeet!

I don't tend to sink into blue moods very often, but sometimes i just feel lonely. I'm back with my family, i have a girlfriend and her family likes me, i have made some friends at work, and have reconnected with some older friends ... but i still feel lonely. None of these people get me the way i feel everyone deserves to be "gotten" by someone else. No "soul mates", to use a common myth that refers to a probability. There's no one i feel excited about getting gifts for, no one for whom i'm awaiting a big reaction.

I'm tired of some of my games, tired of my TV shows (well, not House or Heroes - but the most important person i'd want to watch them with is on the other side of the country, so i can't quite enjoy them the same way - and no i don't mean i want to get back in a relationship with her - but we still loved Heroes and House the same way, and it feels empty watching them without her).
Some of the people online and off that i believe i should still be close with don't seem to respond to me anymore, or comment, or invite me to things. Maybe like someone said it's just due to the busy holiday season, but it feels like more than that. I'm not being a dick or an asshole to anyone, but i also tend to always leave the responsibility of communication in their hands, because i'm too shy to do it myself..

It finally snowed, but during the day just as i'm borrowing the car. The brakes feel like i can't quite push the petal down because there's snow in the mechanism or something. That's just what it feels like, i'm not a mechanic, nor mechanically minded.

The snow has stopped, but there was a lot of it and it is sticking. It's beautiful, and I hope it snows again later on when it's dark so i can have a toke, strap on my Fleet Foxes CD, or perhaps one of my christmas ones, like Oscar Peterson (excellent album), Diana Krall (though she kinda ruins many of the songs with her newer, goofier, unappealing singing style), and the Charlie Brown Christmas Soundtrack (can you tell i love that jazz piano at christmas?) and take a night-time stroll among the street lights and falling snow. One of my favourite things to do this time of year, such tranquility is unmatched among my own life experiences. Although the toking is a new addition to that. I've enjoyed these walks and can enjoy them without weed. But the enhancement is always fun.
Though, i'm getting tired of that, too.

I'm just a bit unsatisfied with my life at this point. That's probably the first time i've been able to say that, because usually i don't care. I live and enjoy the things i enjoy and let other people be unhappy if they want as long as they leave me out of it. When i'm unhappy, i analyze why this is so. Once i understand the reason behind the unhappy feeling i no longer feel unhappy. Usually it goes along the lines of understanding that i'm just an evolved organism with certain instinctual programs, along with everyone else, and people will be people, nothing is pre-determined, we're all trying to survive, so ignore the inconsequential crap, be aware of the tricks others will attempt to pull on you, do what needs to be done, try not to hurt anyone, and enjoy what you like.

I'm just not enjoying much anymore. When all the relationships you have with other people (from customer to lover) are based on convenience it wears the spirit down. Yes, yes, i know i don't believe in spirits: what i mean by spirit is the general feeling you get when you think about yourself and your life. My spirit is telling me that I need out. On many levels. Not so bad as to do anything rash, i'm not prone to thoughts of suicide at all, but my entire self says i need out, i need another way.

I'm fine with my job, that's ok for me. I'm actually being noticed as a good worker by the bosses and got another raise last month (in secret, so shhhh, don't tell my co-workers!), but what am i accomplishing? The desires of another heartless corporation interested in only money. But i do my job well, and it's perfectly suited to my personality at the moment (except for the dealing with customers part*), it's a series of tasks that aren't too difficult but that i still have to work to accomplish, and it's usually enough work that it makes the time fly by so the shift doesn't seem to be neverending like most other jobs, and i actually do feel good that i'm doing well. But i'm still only accomplishing an artificial goal just to supply myself with stuff that i have to give away to keep alive, a home, food, indulgences, etc...

*(don't get me wrong, i'm good with customers, but i just hate being interrupted by customers when there's other work i need to be doing - so, do your local Subway closer a favour - don't come into the store if it's 1 or 2 hours before closing time - and try to order the orange cheddar, that white shit is so annoying to peel apart!)

I could say my artwork still helps (and it does, i do still get messages and emails from those who've felt a positive boost in their self-esteem), but people don't seem so eager about my work anymore. But that is to be expected with anything that doesn't really change, or regresses from a higher standard that it once had.
But still, you know? It's not a good feeling. Plus i haven't been drawing much this last year or so either, so that tends to let some eyes drop.

I don't know.

Sorry to bore you, but again i don't often become down, so indulge me or ignore me. This'll pass. I hope.


Another couple of metal bands i recently sampled that i'd like to mention because they're fucking awesome:
Daath (Just really good stuff, has a scrowler that's almost just right)
Mastodon (Ok, i finally gave them another try, and they're fucking awesome, too! i definitely was mixing them up with "Mumakil" when i said they sucked in my first metal list, which if you know what both band names mean, you'd know why i mixed them up)

And here are the others i believe to be the supreme excellence in heavy metal music:

Atheist
Burst
Devildriver
Evile
Machine Head
Mastodon
Opeth (i must own the entire discography one day, fucking brilliant)
Sanctity

I would love to have a Metal Christmas album if these bands made the songs ... even the "christ-y" songs that annoy the fuck out of me might sound awesome ... Does such a thing exist? A Metal Christmas album of any sort (besides hair-metal *shudder*)
Please point me in its direction, if so!

I made my own special chicken thing, using the same principal as Oregano Chicken, but with a lot more spices, and all sortsa veggies. Turned into a sorta chicken stew, because i also bought some breasts (bone-in, of course) and cut them up for meat in the stew, too. The rest of the pieces are drums. It's kinda like Chicken Goula-strone, hehe. Maybe it's like Chicken Paprikas (sp?), but i wasn't looking at any recipes, and i'm not yet familiar with that Hungarian dish.

Anyway, It's a lot better than i thought it would be!

I made a rub (something i saw how to do on the Food network with Carolyn a while ago) with oregano, seasoned salt, garlic powder, basil, marjoram, paprika and pepper and rubbed it all over the chicken and let that absorb while i chopped veggies.

I diced up potatoes, carrots, yellow peppers, chopped up onions and celery and added a can of diced tomatoes. I put the veggies in one of those black roasting pots with the little white spots, which was sitting on the burner on low heat to glaze the onions and cook the veggies a little beforehand. I put some oil and lemon juice at the bottom before putting the veggies in. I threw the rest of the rub spices on the veggies that weren't able to go on the chicken, and stirred it all up, mixing them around as they were simmering.
And THEN i put the rubbed chicken on top, closed the lid and put them in at 325 for 45 minutes. Then i opened the lid and put it back for 15 more to crisp some of the chicken. Didn't really do much since more than half of each piece was submerged in the liquid of it, hehe, but it crisped some of it, and it was all cooked through even after the 45 minutes.

Half the chicken wouldn't even fit in my roaster, so i baked the rest on a cookie sheet for 45 minutes. The difference was obvious between the breasts baked in the pot and on the sheet - the breast meat IN the roaster were so moist and juicey, i could barely experience that dryness that's a trademark of breast meat. The ones on the sheet were really dry, though, so i cut those up to put in the soup. The drums turned out good on the sheet, though.

I know i used too much spice, but not enough to ruin anything - it's just really flavourful, but a little too much, but not TOO too much.

The potatoes and carrots were still a little too hard, so i put all the chicken in a plastic container and put the pot with the veggies back in the oven for another 20 minutes, and now it's perfect. The only thing missing is barley and beans, hehe.

Very tasty! Try it out!