Weekend posts v.1

Well, this is a new feeling. Writing on a saturday. Now, that's hardly unusual in itself: I've only written a blog once on each day of the week so far, not even on some of them. It's early enough that it doesn't feel too strange to be posting on the weekend, but I still distinctly remember saying it would be one post per weekday. I think we need some exterior help here: if the rules state that a blog must be posted each day of the week, does posting an entry on the weekend constitute a punishable offence? Oldfilmnoir, noella, and kristina. Help us out? Who are you, kristina? I know the rest of our followers but you are something new. Leave some info in the comments, you intrigue me.

I have come to the realisation that scary movies are scary. Shocking, I know. But if you're up until 2:30 am watching horror flicks, it has a negative effect on your sleep patterns. Shocking. Luckily, I was lulled to slumber by the sweet chords of Tom Milsom. He's a fantastic musician, and a rather excellent youtuber too. check out hexachordal when you get the chance, I'm sure you'll appreciate it. And if you have already... you get a cookie.

My mind has been rather techno-centric today. I experience feelings of anxiety when separated from the internet or phone lines or anything. This is really not healthy, eh? This morning I showered and prepared as quickly as possible because I wanted to get back to facebook and youtube. That isn't normal. Or maybe it is. I honestly can't say, but I think that I'll have to go cold turkey and not be connected to anyone other than face to face for a day. This challenge frightens me, but I will persevere. it'll have to be a weekend, of course. Unless we start doing weekend blogs too? Then I'll never be able to get away from the internet. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

Scizor is the best bug of all time. Now, dragonflies and spiders are all well and good. But if you have base 130 attack and a steel carapace that protects you from everything but fire? You're well on your way to awesome city. Or nerdfighteria island. The two are synonymous.

I agree that it seems unfair that non-catholic or non-religious people have to pay to support religious based schools in their taxes. And yes, religion does teach love and faith and many good things to children. however, not everyone agrees with that viewpoint. How would you feel if the muslim community demanded that they as well get educational funds from the government? With all the fear and hatred in the middle east right now, would you really feel good supporting children who would be raised with muslim principles?

Now, don't get me wrong here. I don't dislike muslims- far from it. What I mean to say is that many people view religion as not necessarily a good thing. The spanish inquisition, all the God wars, there is proof to all the negative effects of faith. I don't choose a side in this case, but all I'm saying is that there are some proud agnostics or atheists that are upset because their money is going to support beliefs that they do not share. If you reverse the situation, for instance: how would all the catholics feel if their taxpayer money went to fund a school that taught Nazi principles?

That is, of course, a ridiculous hypothetical idea. I'm just trying to find a good analogy as to why this bothers people so much. And as for the idea of religion and it having canadian historical importance, that's not quite accurate. Many people fled the Old World to find religious and political freedom in north america. Regardless of that, in Canada we allow dual citizenships. When immigrants come from Bolivia, for example, we do not insist that they drop all their cultural heritage and become pure canadians. We are accepting of diversity and do not impose our structure on to those who join us. Unlike the states, for example, who typify their status as a melting pot, we canadians are often known as the mosaic. personally, I prefer our nickname.

What I am trying to say with this is that we should not demand that immigrants or people of other beliefs fund the education of children in catholicism. It simply does not seem fair to me. And why is catholic so special? Why not jewish schools, or hindu schools, or buddhist even? Why don't they get public funding?

P.S. I know that I missed lots of capitals here. Honestly, I couldn't be bovvered. I don't follow any religion, and until I get status as an Agnostic, I won't refer to Judaism, Hinduism or Buddhism.

I apologize profusely. I am ashamed with myself for degrading the quality of this blog. And so, I will enter my latest post now, at 12:13 am, leaving myself with a full 11 hours and 47 minutes of time to ensure a thoughtful and complete entry.

I highly disagree with you view on our bug selection Jack. It's not a competition, it's a matter of preference. Some people would prefer to be able to fly, some able to eat things whole. Not better, just different.

Woohoo our first follower! Oldfillmnoir, I don't know who you are, but I have an idea of who you may be. Anyways - you rock my socks.

Alright Jack, here's the deal. I like the idea of different fonts (I seem to be leaning towards Georgia so far). However, to be honest, I don't particularly like the tagging our posts with our names thing. I like the idea of readers having to differentiate between our writing styles, and if there's a mix up - who cares? They'll figure it out eventually. And labels are so...eurgh.

Anways, it says 'posted by ____' at the end of each post.

That's just my opinion though. If you would really like to do labels, I'm ok with it.

My fingers are swollen and clumsy from being outside in subzero temperatures without gloves for an extended period of time. It's creating a prickling, numb yet not unpleasant sensation. The muscles of my core are still shivering, at random and unexpected moments. Oh! There it goes again. I think I like it. My mind is in a comfortably buzzed state, for various reasons which I will not go into here, which also probably explain the hour of this post.

The shivering has spread to my thighs. Oh dear.

Alright, I've got a blanket on now. All is good. It's more of a rug than a blanket really, a term I appreciate thanks to the copious amounts of British literature I read while growing up. Enid Blyton anyone?

OK, I'll cut to the chase.

"What do you think of religious schools receiving public funding?"

Hmmm. Well I'm definitely biased, as I attend religious school. And by religious I'm assuming you mean Catholic? Anyways, you asked for my opinion, so here it is.

Our country - Canada, our whole government's origins are deeply rooted in religion, since it was such a big part of everything in those days. And religious schools are probably pretty beneficial to kids, as they are actually required to promote an atmosphere of love, acceptance and strong morals, something public schools don't really need to do. I want to say that since immigrants to Canada (which is basically everyone) are choosing to come and be a part of this country, it's fair for them to be required to contribute to what is considered by the country to be a good and beneficial education for Canadian children. On the other hand, it's not really fair for non-catholic people to have to pay for catholic-children's education, since Canada is supposed to be such an open and diverse country. So I guess...it's more fair for religious schools to to take care of their own funding.

But what do I know.

When people say they're joking, 99.9 % of the time they are most definitely not. It's just a way of saying what immediately pops into your head, and then having a backup plan in case it was inadvertently, or advertently I suppose, offensive. I have no problem with people saying what they think, but you don't need to make apologies/excuses for it if you meant it, or it was true, you know?

It's now 1:26, and we're halfway through Tarzan. Disney is so brilliant, or their old stuff, at least. Jane is actually my idol. Along with Dory from finding Nemo, Pocahontas, Lisa Hannigan (this one actually exists), Clint Eastwood, and ultimately - Chris Martin of Coldplay.

OMHGG Jane's father's name is Archimedes. My day has just been made.

Tarzan has a really nice voice. It's so calm, relaxed, deep and reassuring. Mhhhhm. Him and Jane are absolutely adorable. I love their hand to hand thing - Disney manages to be sensual and PG rated at the same time. Genius. Although Tarzan does peek under her skirt at one point...

I've wanted to live in a treehouse for the past 2 years of my life. Last year I realized that the logistics probably wouldn't work out. But this year, I decided...screw logistics. It's gonna happen, one way or another. I'll start working on blueprints now, if need be. Any suggestion for suitable tree types? You would be pretty helpful there Jack. And any readers of course, input is warmly welcomed.

My fingers are still tingly.

Gotta catch 'em all!

Well. Dragonfly vs. trapdoor spider... I think we both know who wins. You can fly fast, omg. I can eat you whole.

In other, less competitive news, we're nearly done our first week of the blog. Any suggestions on what we can do to improve it? I doubt anyone is reading this yet, but if you do ever happen to find it and decide to go back and read all the old entries, let us know. Did we do it right? Are we forgetting any fundamental rules of web logging? of course, we all know that this participation, though a common current throughout the internet, is really just an easy way to fill up space so that this post won't appear as short and uninteresting as it would sans questionnaire.

Did we notice the new font here? I think it would be helpful, to both we two and anyone who reads, for there to be different fonts for each author. If you agree, sasha, let us know and select a font from now on. I think I'll go with trebuchet. Choose what you like. Oh, and for other identification purposes start tagging your post with your name, shall we say? If we do that then while browsing by tag one could find all with "jack" or "sasha" or whatever you like, it would be an additional way to speed location of poosts. I'll go back and reformat my old ones so they follow this pattern. Agreed? Agreed.

As for the title... I've picked up my old copy of Pokemon Silver and have begun another game. It truly is a fantastic series, and the 2nd generation is still the best they've created. And now that Soul Silver and Heart Gold, the remakes for the DS are coming out- in 45 days from now- I remember why I loved them so as a kid. Simply brilliant.

Well, this was an exceptionally dull post. If sasha were to keep up her end and actually write something engrossing that I could somehow translate into another post, that would be nice. But no, all I get are dragonflies and apologies for the weakness of her writing. Sigh.

I'm only joking. You still need to get on that funding question of mine, btw.

Trapdoor spider!! Nice nice. I remember that from one episode of the Magic School Bus. With the massive praying mantis? And the idiot military dude who used Liz as bait. Like seriously, what a douchebag.

OK, so trapdoor spiders are pretty ninja and stealth, but I think I'd get a little lonely and bored. Soo, I would be....

[drumroll]

A dragonfly!

Because 1) They have CRAZY flight skills. They can fly forwards, backwards, sideways, they can hover, some species can evenvfly across oceans! 2)They belong to the order Odanta, which means toothed jaw. Intense. 3) They have sex in the air. Woahh!! They 'fly in tandem' [tandem is SUCH A NICE WORRD] and then they do this thing called the wheel formation, in which the pair of dragonflies actually form a heart shape. Awwhhe. 4) They have incredible eyesight and they see in colour - their eyes are multifaceted, and cover most of their head. AND they have another set just to keep an eye on the horizon, to make sure they don't get disoriented. I like that holistic approach. I'm sure we'd all benefit from an extra pair of eyes to remind us of the bigger picture.

I had broccoli chowder for lunch today, and the oil droplets were floating on top of the soup in this beautiful shimmering film. It made me think of an old story, which I will not post here, because I'm running out of time. Sorry Jack, I didn't leave you much to work with. But I had to clean my room, I was playing around with oil pastels today, and boy are they messy.

Hypothetical Bug

If I were a bug. You might expect, sadly uninformed readers, that this question might have caught me off guard. Not to say that Sasha warned me about it, oh no. We never tell each other what is being written here. What I meant to say is that I likely spent far more time than the typical person considering what sort of creature I would be- subdivided into phyla, of course. And the bug I would most like to be?

Trapdoor spider, all the way. Now, some of you may not know what these are, and so I will take it upon myself to educate those poor souls who don't know of the Czenidarians. They are medium sized arachnids (by that, I mean about 10 - 15 cm from legtip to legtip), and unlike most other spiders they do not spin a web. Instead, the dig burrow under the ground with hinged lids sitting on top. This feat of engineering is impressive enough for a creature with a brain the size of a pea, but even more than that they will sit directly underneath this flap. And when a suitable prey walks over it- which they sense by feeling the vibrations from the footsteps on the lid, connected to them with threads of silk- they pop the door open, snatch their prey and retrieve it to the safety of their burrow. Genius.

And if any predators were to force the cork open and expose the spider within? Good luck. They can hold their door shut with a force equal to 3 times their body weight. general consensus: trapdoor spiders kick arse. (And yes, I deliberately chose a spider because you killed one. Now this vengeful arachnid will haunt your dreams.)

But I actually enjoyed your scientific discussion a lot. It was truly fascinating. I appreciate your little asides, they really make your writing. And I bet our readers- well, if they exist yet- agree with me.

What do you think 0f religious schools receiving public funding? Yes, I just brought the serious levels up.

Mhhhm.

Inclination

Incline

To want to do something sort of, is what comes to my mind. But I like the term best when applied to people, bodies. An inclination of the head, for example. Small gestures that can signify so much sometimes. I biked over to my friends house today, on my way back from Longos [which was a long and arduous journey involving single-handedly carrying my bike down from the attic - literally - single handedly, the other was grabbing the ladder for dear life. Yes, I am a tank :D] where I purchased some lovely purplish white turnips [really, the colour was mindblowing]. ANYWAYS, we spent an afternoon dissecting [not literally this time] people. We're both fairly observant some of the time, and people are incredibly fascinating. The discussion probably started somewhere with Dave Matthews - I was showing her the youtube video of his performance with Neil Young on the Hope for Haiti telethon. From what I've heard of his music, which is regrettably not much, he seems pretty awesome. It's always interesting to see how two established musicians interact with each other while playing music together- how well they connect, or if one is just obnoxiously trying to outdo the other. When the song finishes - Dave Matthews looks straight to Neil Young, smiling, maybe a bit nervously, and doesn't take his eyes off him. It's nice to see famous people are capable of respecting people, of being humble.

He's got a nice face too, there's something intelligent about his forehead [yes, receding hairline and all], these thinking creases between his eyebrows, and honest eyes. The corners of his mouth have those little...I want to say tuckers, but I don't think it's the right word...these sort of little downward folds that bespeak frankness. On top of all this is a great smile, and that under the chin/jaw flub stuff that makes him look reassuringly real and dadlike.

Yeah, I think I'm going to look into his music...

I love crayons! Ok, I never really used them that much, they are completely inadequate when compared to the wonder that is pencil crayons - but still. Their unfailing ability to make irregular shapes no matter how regular your lines are is pretty respectable. And wax crayon rubbings are sort of kind of awesome. Oh man! I miss those.

I think I'll make one sometime...

I killed a spider today. It was a tough decision, I shouldn't have the right to decide whether he lives or dies. But my only other option was to put him outside, where he would probably...die...

And I couldn't just leave him for someone else in my family to stumble across. My sister would've freaked out, she's been talking about a spider following her around lately.

So that got me thinking about exoskeletons. What a crazy notion! I remember learning about it in grade 2 - pressing my face up against the window to try and see this miraculous outer skeleton of the bug on the other side of the glass. Standing there, trying to imagine all my bones on the top of my body instead of inside it. Mindboggling stuff.

It's really like a coat of armour I suppose, like those hardcore beetles with the pincers and the horns and everything?

Their insides must be so mushy.

OH! And bugs don't have red blood! It's like, clear or yellowy or greeny. This is apparently because their blood doesn't transport oxygen, they have this sort of massive inner trachea, connected to these tiny holes called spiracles for the air to get in.

They're practically aliens.

If you had to be a bug, what would you pick?

But Master's our friend! No he's not. You don't have any friends. Nobody likes you.

On that cheery note, welcome to our blog. As you can tell from our introduction posts, we are rather strange. But that's presumptuous of us, as no one is likely to go on the internet and say "I'm a very normal person. There's nothing unusual about me at all." Unless they're an undercover cop on a paedophile chatting site. But I can assure you that we... well, I am not an undercover police officer. I appear to have been sidetracked, let me return to my train of thought.

I think blogs are meant to be like online journals of a sort, so perhaps I should fill our audience in on what I've been up to? I recently watched the Lord of the Rings trilogy for the countless-th time. It was good fun, and I highly suggest anyone here who hasn't seen it does so immediately. If you didn't know, that's what my introductory statement was about. Gollum does have the best lines, especially when arguing with Smeagol. But what am I saying, I'm on the internet on a self proclaimed anagram obsessed blog. Our audience has a far higher nerd-per-capita than average, I doubt anyone who stumbles upon this will have not seen- or at least read- LOTR.

I really hate crayons. They never appealed to me, and having come back into the spotlight of late my horror has returned. What's the draw? They're little waxy sticks. And you cannot draw a straight line with them, no matter how hard you try. Is this like nerdfighter-blasphemy, to not like them? It's close to saying you don't like Harry Potter. Not that that's true, in any way shape or form. I love harry potter.

Along with nerdy loves, Doctor who is my... there are no words to describe the level of good-ness I find in it. And finding out about David Tennant's departure was one of the most traumatic experiences of my adolescent life. I desperately hope that my/our readers are well informed, there are so many references that I hardly know what someone would think without at least basic knowledge of nerdfighteria.

I had a lot of trouble thinking of anything to talk about here, and if we intend to keep to our goal of daily postings then I assume that Sasha will have an equal amount of trouble. To that end, I've decided that you get a word to play with. Sasha does, that is. Not our readers. Though feel free to comment with your thoughts. Or ideas. Or reckonings. Anything really, input is warmly welcomed. That's what the point of a public, online blog is. Otherwise we might as well just converse on Facebook.

Inclination. That is all.

Salutations internet!

I am Sasha. The other half.

In significantly less than thirty words I shall attempt to describe myself as aptly as Jack here has done his self. Warning, my grammar shall be nowhere near as impeccable.

Lover of life. Of music, art, literature, sunshine and key lime pie. Of people and cold showers while listening to Coldplay. Of anything that is different, interesting and true.

Hater of hate.

Whimsical, nonsensical, logical, and paradoxical, but aren't we all.

I have an 'addiction to hands and feet' in the words of one of my favourite musicians - dearest Regina. I have a feeling she'll be making her way into this blog quite frequently.

I suppose you could call it a fetish. To hands that is, not Regina Spektor. Although I imagine that is quite possible, she's rather lovely.

I'm completely new to the whole blogging thing, and don't know how much I'm supposed to talk about myself, but don't know what else to talk about - so I'll give the figurative mike up to Jack.

Anagrams 101

Well hello internets. This is one half of your newest favourite blog. Presumptuous? Oh yes. And you love it. But in all honesty, neither of us are nearly so egotistical as that. Well, not much.

So. You might be wondering, with good reason, why this blog has come into existence. That is, if there's anyone reading this. It's entirely possible that nanojokes will languish forever in the depths of that most depressing of places, the black internet. If there is anyone out there, please comment/email/voodoo doll us. Any feedback at all would be lovely.

Well. I'm Jack, one half of this collaborative project. I wish we had some sort of important reason to set this up, but sadly there is none. Just felt like it, to be perfectly honest. And if anyone discovers this, then not only will they find a veritable plethora of subpar writing but they can claim first discovery. On the internet, that's important. You must be the first to know or else you don't matter. Harsh but true.

I suppose some introductions are in order. Let's try to do this in less than 30 words: nerdfighter; youtube addict; lexophile; homosexual; math geek; doctor who fan; musical appreciator; secretly (or not so secretly) obsessed with previous childish interests, including pokemon, nintendo, arthur and 90s music.

Well, that was surprisingly successful. Oh semi-colon, how I love thee: let me count the ways. Anyways, now you know me. You'll just have to wait to discover the other .5 of this blog. But let me assure you, unknown internet persona, you will be pleasantly surprised. Or so I'd like to believe. And on that notable cliffhanger, I leave you for now. Gentle morrow to thee.