What's the furthest place you've ever traveled to?

Uh, Bendigo/Benalla/Shepparton in NSW and VIC-Wait, no Melbourne's furthest from me. Went there to visit my friend Duck and his cohorts before going to Shepparton for the OzChat BBQ. Was a good weekend. I miss those schmucks sometimes.

What would you like to know, young Grasshopper?

If you had a "Boss Battle" theme, what would it be? (If possible, please give the proper title and game. e.g. " 'Chaotic Dance II' from Baten Kaitos Origins")

Oh, you mean a song from a game that would be a theme for me? I don't have one. If you mean a song that would be my theme when I was battling a boss then that's different. "Surrender" by Evanescence would be the major boss battle song, for various reasons. But I'd actually have a different song on each level. I reckon I have about 10 to 40 of them. XD

What would you like to know, young Grasshopper?

[Dream] Video clips in Narnia

Yeah, that was the general gist of it, especially towards the end of it which is the part most people remember best.

I'm not sure which part came first, the Narnia experience or the Video clips, but I remember there were 4 of us... Me and 3 others, and we were in some sort of band. I was the lead singer (and I was much prettier cuz we were actually a signed band and something/someone was comparing me to Amy Lee) and we were in this... fantasy setting.

Really the only part of my internal "Narnia" I can remember... Actually, I think the video clips came first. I know we had to make videos for our released singles, and the first one was obviously rather angry because we were trashing the house we were in. Only at times we were doing it faster then the song was supposed to be so that it could be slowed down for playback, which is how the rest of that scenario went. Like we were acting in invisible molasses.

It was actually pretty fun to go through, to "live out" that scenario, moving from house to house and trashing them in slo-mo. But even I realized that if all of these "videos" were the sum of our career then our fans were going to quickly grow bored with the same old same. So I told the producers to fuck off, I have a better idea.

Edit: I believe that over the course of a few "videos" things shifted from slo-mo housing to woods (where we picked up Amy Lee (Lithium)), to gardens from WonderLand (where we picked up/faced Gwen Stefani (who I don't even like! She was probably a manifestation of the Queen of Hearts/The White Witch)), to my Narnia (where Pink was probably something like Aslan, she was there when we needed her, but only briefly before she was gone again).

That's when things shifted to Narnia, only it wasn't a fake staged version, it was my mind's equivalent of the real deal. I remember the important place within my dream was... Well I really want to call it the "Fountain of Souls" all of a sudden. I don't remember much of its design, only that it's large and made of what appeared to be some sort of light yellow/cream sandstone. And the largest feature on it was the design on the side that seemed to be half clock and half decoration.

If I could be bothered I'd try to draw it (still on my 'I quit art' bender, 2 weeks and counting. If only smoking were this easy) because it's hard to describe in words: a downward arc with notches clearly indicated on it, but they were recessed into a channel through the stone, each notch/number drawn in some sort of metal that appeared rusty but was perfectly smooth. And that was inset into some sort of cog on the side of the fountain, but it was not moving and it wasn't ticking like internal parts were measuring time's passing.

The whole fountain was in the centre of a clearing, an english garden only instead of giant hedges around the edge to denote this part of the garden, it was ringed by cliffs about 3 times our height. Not high enough that we couldn't climb out, seeing as there was only one path in, but it was flat rock with no hand-holds. And something instinctively told me there was more to it than that.

If you've ever actually watched Narnia, you'll know that each child has a unique weapon: 2 swords, a bow and a dagger... Plus the horn. In my dream there was something similar. One of the boys picked up a scythe along the way, and it was instinctively his and bound to his soul. He was the only one who could touch it and wield it. And I knew that the curve of the blade would fit in the recessed area. I pointed it out to him and he climbed on the edge of the fountain to try it.

I was right, it fit perfectly and the handle of the scythe then became the lever for the device. Pulling back on it with all his strength the cog turned, or at least shifted... And a large section of the stone wall, deceptively hidden by a well blended alcove, raised up and revealed a hidden pathway. We cautiously made our way towards it, taking our time to cross the river stones between us and the alcove, but by the time we made it there the "timer" had run out and it was closed again.

So myself and the scythe's "owner" traversed back again to the fountain, and levered the cog once more so the others could get through. And I somehow knew that it would come free if he wanted it too, without interfering with the timer. We needed the weapon more than anything so I told him to bring it. It took him a few tries but he finally pulled it free, and we could see how the metal sigils made up the timer and how long exactly that we had, so we ran to catch up to the others before the door closed again.

I remember getting halfway across the stream/river, before my alarm went off. I never actually found out what lay in the chamber beyond the alcove...

...But I suppose that's a story for another time, anyway.
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Lest We Forget

Ode of Remembrance

"They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old,

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them."

~LAURENCE BINYON

Full Poem 

For those of you that don't know, today in Australia it is ANZAC day... a day of rememberance for all those souls lost because the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) joined the fight in World War One (and Two). For Mother England that we still held ties to at the time, but more so for the sake of all those who have come to call this country home.

Today we remember their sacrifices that led to our freedoms. Their deaths that gave us life. Their pain and suffering that let us live in peace and harmony. All to easily such things are lost to time, we forget that the world we live in is as such because of what they did for us. It is easy to remember that Jesus gave His life for our sins and to let that rule our world, but more often we forget that our ancestors also gave their lives for us too. That there are people out there in this world today doing the same for us right now, and for our children.

At 6am and at 6pm, the rising and the going down of the sun, we remembered them. I urge everyone everywhere today to take a moment to do the same, no matter who you are or where you're from.

- Lest we forget.

The truth of the matter

I wanna say it's all your fault, but I was already cracked when you found me. And by the time you were done playing with me I was too broken for anyone else. But I put some glue and some tape over the important bits and kept trying anyway.

But these things only last so long before they wear off, and the inevitable comes to pass. I lose a piece, forced to leave it where it lands, and just keep trying to move forward. But it's getting harder to keep walking... So much left behind and nothing to replace it. Not enough gained along the way to justify another step.

So if I can't sit still, and I can't move forward... Where is there left for me to go? Where can I ever truly belong? There's no chance for happiness for this broken doll is there? I'm just going to have to sit on the side and watch the world pass by. That or just give up and crumble to dust, heart and soul.

I promised her I wouldn't though. That I wouldn't give up and would give in, and if there is only one thing I have to hold on to it's honor in Love. I love her and will not hurt her like that. But still I'll die. Eventually she will have nothing left, and that hurts so much. More than anything else.

To do this to myself is to hurt her, and I don't want to do that... But I can't not do what I'm doing. It's confused and bad and wrong... Wrong in so many ways but I can't stop it. I'm caught. Trapped. With no way out. Stuck between...stuck beneath... Stuck.

Badbadbadbad, goddess I don't deserve her. Or him. I don't deserve anyone I have. Anything I have. I never earnt it. Not one piece of it. I have never done something so selfless in my life. It's all been motivated by my own desires, my own needs... I cannot live if I cannot please another.

This I don't understand... Maybe it's from the HiveMind. Maybe a leftover fragment I could get rid of before. Maybe it's just me. Maybe it just is. I don't know any thing any more. Nothing makes sense. I just do. I just go with it. Caught to deep in the flow and I'm drowning in it now.

---

Good job, always getting yourself into shit, aren't you Mea? Caught in a trap one way or another... Waiting for them to pull you out. Well they're not here this time are they? Are They! You're stuck, and it's all your own damn fault and if you can't rescue yourself then you're screwed!

Doesn't matter, you've asked for their help anyway... More than once. And they can't help you either. They tried, but they couldn't. So now you're on your own and no one is gonna hold your hand and pull you to safety. You really didn't think this all through huuh? Thought you had it under control but you never actually did. Thought you could fix it but you just made it worse.

Now your too stubborn to let go, to change, to rescue yourself, let alone others. You should just give up now and save everyone else more pain and heart ache. That is, after all, what you're really best at. Not mending hearts, but taping them back together and breaking them yourself. That's really why you are what you are. Why we're using this analogy, isn't it?

Broken hearts, broken dolls, things unmended, forgotten, lost, tossed aside. Garbage, trash, waste.. Waste of space. Waste of life. Waste of light.

It should never have been yours to begin with. You're not only not worthy of it, but you're too pathetic to figure out how to use it properly. If you had half a handle on it you wouldn't be in this predicament to begin with. Things would be much better, and much easier, and much... much... much happier if you even half deserved what you have and what you are.

Whoever chose you was a FOOL. Bet they're regretting it now, huh? Wishing they hadn't done it. Wishing they could take it back. Wishing they could change it. If they'd forseen THIS... Thing, whatever you are now... Bet they wouldn't have done it after all.

If -you- could have truly foreseen this like you thought you could... Would you still have done it? Suffered like this. Ached like this? Hurt like this? Endured this pain? For -this-? To end up here, broken and battered and irreparable?

---

Yes. It will be worth it. In the end when there is only light left, it will be worth it. When the darkness is back in its place, it will be worth it. So hard right now, so much pain and confusion, but when it is over, it will have been worth it. I will make sure of that.
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[Vent Art] - The trouble with twins

Characters & Art © Me

...is that they won't leave you alone, even after you've given the up to a better home, and tried to move on with your life.

/endofstory

Well not really, I was hoping that in drawing them out that would be the end of things but obviously not. I'm in a worse mood now then when I started. Especially when I look at Bastian, as he was known in my younger days. He looks just like the father he was supposed to have, to the point that they would have been mistaken for brothers rather then father/son probably.

They're a mixture of Blynx (like me), Kitsune (like my girlfriend) and.... honestly who knows what, between us there's dragon, kistune, bobcat, lynx, vampire, succubus/incubus, wolf... and a bunch of minor things that have been collected throughout the eons.

This is one of those pictures that I simply let draw itself at work today and inked when I got home. I had no say in the details, I was just the medium for it's creation. And think, overall it turned out better and more accurate then I could have hoped to have drawn had I been actually concentrating on it.

Problem is they're still sitting there in the back of my head staring at me longingly.... even after a glass of alcohol that should have drowned the hate and anger. :\

Revelations in the shower

"Pretty, pretty please
Don't you ever, ever feel
Like you're less than
Fucking perfect.
Pretty, pretty please
If you ever, ever feel
Like your less than nothing
You're fuckin' perfect to me..."

When I was... younger, I had this... idea in my head that when I was older I was going to be just like my Mum. Okay, maybe not -just- like, but... I was going to meet a boy in high school and fall madly in love with him. And when we graduated we were gonna get married and have a house, and have 2 kids; a boy and a girl. Twins. Before I understood the difficulties of a single pregnancy that was.

High school... well I was an outsider. A foreigner, in a land I didn't belong. I changed schools in year 10 and got picked on just as much as I did in my previous school. None of the boys were interested in me, even if I was interested in them... or maybe they were and I was just too shy and insecure to be able to tell if they were picking on me cuz they liked me. As boys in high school did.

My dream had to change, to grow with me. Marry my true love in high school became meeting him in University, but my insecurities followed me, and by then were too ingrained in me for me to be able to see a way to change. I was just as shy, just as nervous, and I'd lost all ability to see if a boy liked me or not. I began assuming that every remark and every glance was a statement about my physical appearance. And not a good one either.

I wanted people to like me... to see me for who and how I was. Not on the outside, but on the inside. I just... found it hard to accept that there might actually have been people who did, and I'm ashamed to admit that because I walled myself off I probably missed a fair amount of chances. My life right now could have actually been very different, and more like I'd dreamed of.

But things happen for a reason. I am not ashamed to admit it, or to talk about it now, but during my time at University I became so despondent over my shattered imaginings, that I actually tried to kill myself. Believing in my darkest moments that I would never find love, and lost to the thoughts of a world better off with out me. Once I tried to simply drown myself in a warm shallow bath, but I have this remarkable ability to hold my breath for about 15 minutes, and my ADHD gives me an attention span of about 12 minutes, meaning I got bored of the bath before I lost my breath.

The other 2 times I took an artist's scalpel to my wrists, I pressed until I hit bone, I put all my weight behind it... And it didn't even leave a mark nor draw a drop of blood. So angry at the time, believing I was being denied an option... But now I tell myself that I am ever so thankful for what my Guardian did for me. Thankful for him stopping me, doing whatever was necessary to keep me alive. To keep me here.

And in many ways I actually am. Thankful that I'm still alive because now I -do- have love in my life and can see it for what it is. If He hadn't saved me I wouldn't have been alive to meet my girlfriend, Midnight, my heart and my soul. The major reason I'm still around. I wouldn't have met KB, my Sweetie, who is far too good for the likes of me. I would never have become a furry and made such wonderful friends who care about me so deeply even though they have never met me IRL. I wouldn't be here to see my little Niece, my Bubba Rugrat Isabelle... Izzi, be born. To hold her on her first day in this world or to watch her grow up, grow into her body, develop her soul. Become her own person.

All these reasons I have to stick around, but some how so many more reasons to leave too. I wouldn't have had 3 ex-boyfriends who each, in their own way, destroyed a part of my soul. I would never have learnt who I truly am, I would have died a naive human, blessed in my ignorance. I would never have spent another 10 years living with the pain I have now.

A pain that just seems to be getting worse no matter what I seem to do. This dark loneliness that I can't ever adequately describe and which no other could ever hope to understand. Because no one else is me. No one else thinks like me, or sees like me, or believes like me. Understands like me. Knows like me.

How can anyone who can't know the things I know, ever hope to love me for exactly who and how I am? How can they ever accept me with all their heart, if they can never see things eye to eye with me? Let alone live with me... spend their life with me... raise children, have a family with me, grow old with me and still love me every single day?

The idea... of having a temporary love, of not having this whole permanent thing... A forever family... kind of scares me. The idea of being so in love with someone that I would bring a child into this world, only to grow apart with the father... to lose that love... to have it breed hate or contempt between us... and to then raise a child in that kind of broken family...

I've seen it don't too many times before and I've seen what it can do to future generations. I love my parents, the way they've raised me and my brother, the fact that so many years on they're still just as in love now as they were when they first met. Sometimes even more. I see it every time they look at each other. I really wish I had that, but at the same time I can't see it any more. Not like I used to.

Bastian and BJ, my twins... My children, my future, my life... they don't exist in my mind any more as anything other than a distant dream. Something that might have been if I were merely yet another human. If I never opened myself up to who I really am. To what I really am. To my greater part in the whole scheme of things.

But in learning the bigger picture, I realize the little dreams that I lost... It's the little things I want so desperately. To wake up and feel arms around me. Little kisses on my cheek when he comes home or leaves. A single flower left behind for me to find. A hand to stroke my forehead when I'm ill. To rub my back when I'm sore. And these two little bundles of joy created out of pure love.

---I mourn their loss on a daily basis and I don't even truly realize it. I don't let myself think about it. It's one thing to be a lover. But it's another thing entirely to be a Mother. To give life, and have unconditional love, and to bring light to it. To them.---

This is the darkness in my soul that truly brings me down. Not my own lack of love. I have plenty, even if it's not "IRL", more than most people can ever hope for. And every day I am grateful for it. Don't get me wrong. But my life and soul are incomplete, and I feel like I'm running out of time. In more ways then one.

I am nothing more than a child myself, despite my age and my wisdom and my experience. So much knowledge I want to share. To pass on. But I don't feel like I can, not under my current circumstances... And definitely not to an infant that knows no better. That's why I really need someone with me. Someone to hold my hand and give me strength. To let me know that... in the moments where I stumble and fall, and I -know- that they will happen... someone's got my back to catch me.

To remind me that I'm fucking perfect, just the way I am... and to be able to...

...to...

...to make something... someone, even more perfect... Before it's too late. Before my time is up and everything changes on me again. I want that reason to keep going, to keep moving forward, to stay alive until my purpose is done. To do more then just simply exist in this world until my time is over and I have to go Home again.

I dread not leaving behind my unseen mark... Though the logical part of me knows that I have already done so, on more lives then I can even count. I know this is the part... the though I need to be listening too. But I don't know how.
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Weird Night

To Twitter @ 6am "Filmong the police segment with Miss Anne, buffy's dream within a dream, old english garden/bridge, damn cats woke me. Back to sleeP noa."

Okay, so the general gist of my dream last night was posted at 6am when I was woken by the cats. I got about 15 mins more sleep after that before they were at it again, but that's neither here nor there.

The first part of my dream that I can remember was set in what I guess was supposed to be the "CrimeStoppers" set (for non-Aussie it's a news segment where the Police ask the public for help on recent and/or unsolved cases). There was a meeting at work, and I was made to attend, though I have no idea why. I'm just a grunt, but my boss "Miss Anne" as I called her (who hasn't been my boss for 2.5 years now) thought I was important enough to go along.

I had to sit up the back, I tried to sit in relative obscurity, because I simply felt like I did not belong there. More so after I the Commissioner of Police walked in and sat down... Right in front of me. I was on a chair against the wall, and he sat down at the table in the middle. And of course instead of all the camera's focusing on Miss Anne as she talked, the moved to face him. So I got in the background of filming. Not what I wanted so I excused myself for a "smoko" break.

Soon as I exited the room the dream changed, as dreams often do... And I found myself in Buffy's kitchen. Kinda.

Only reason I knew it was her kitchen was because it appeared like it was filmed in the same lighting (if you've seen the "night-time in Buffy's kitchen" scenes you'll know what I mean). Well that and the fact that Buffy was actually there too. In her pajamas having a glass of warm milk. I'm not sure she even knew I was there, it was almost like I was observing her dream, but it -felt- more interactive than that somehow.

All I remember is that something happened and all of a sudden there were two of them but one was a fake. Real Buffy and Fake Buffy had a fight, without breaking too many things actually. And then Real Buffy shoved Fake Buffy down the garbage disposal. I have no idea how she fit but RB threw FB in the sink and she got chewed up in a spray of blood that ruined RB's pajamas and coated the splash tiles behind the sink a lovely shade of red.

Then someone... My friend who Miss Anne seemed to morph into (they had the same feeling even though they were 2 visually different people) grabbed my arm and dragged me out the door before Buffy could wake up and trap me/lose my consciousness. Or something. Too much Inception/Jumpers.

Soon as I exited (read: got dragged forcefully out of) the room I found myself in a different world. And I say that because I felt like Gulliver in that place. 20ft tall throwing "people" into a river like stones into a creek. I don't know what the size difference was about, or whether they were real people or just statues of some sort. But I remember the throwing "someone" into the river from the side of the bridge.

I think the bridge is probably more significant then anything though; it was huge, even compared to me, grey stone decorated with plant boxes containing a complete old English flower garden. You know, the ones filled with scented bushes neatly trimmed into box shaped. Somewhere I must have shrunk back to normal size, and I -think- it was because I caught wind on the Lavender bushes (which I'm allergic to IRL) so they were kinda like my Kryptonite I guess.

I remember Fala was there for a while, leading/dragging me through the maze that was the bridge-garden. Again I think it was the same dream guide just in his form, only s/he was tugging on my hand trying to get me to hurry, and I'm trying to avoid the death-blooms. :/

I remember I eventually pulled my hand from his/her grasp just in time to avoid being pulled face-first into an immaculately square box of Lavender, and then...

The cats started yowling from somewhere in the garden. Both in my dream and IRL. My youngest, Scrubs, was having a conversation with someone else (another cat) down the back of the yard, loud enough to wake everyone. No hissing/spitting/fighting, just yowling at each other loudly at 6am. >_<;

I had to get up and yell at them, before attempting to pass out again. It only worked for about 15 mins before they were at it again. I had to get up and get breakfast for myself, and then for them, before it stopped.

That kitten is ruled by his stomach. He eats like an elephant. @_@;

Which reminds me... Was paranoid of running over the/a cat on the way outta my driveway, and had this random epiphany... How do cats know that bigger things will hurt them?

Like, my cats have never met an Elephant (as far as I'm aware) and yet I would assume that they would know not to get caught under it's feet least they be stomped on. Why? Where is it in their genetic coding that says bigger things = death?

Most experiences teach us, and some things our parents teach us, but this concept (the cat-elephant theory) is innate... What part of our DNA though it should be included so that all "small" creatures are wary around bigger ones?

There's a thought. If that can be included in our Instinct DNA what else is in there, and why do most people NOT use such common sense?
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