I was talking to Wendy a few days ago and she was telling me about the Renaissance Festival going on in Michigan. This prompted me to look up Kansas City's one as I knew they had an annual one too (turned out this was its 29th year). Well, lo and behold, we were right smack in the middle of the festival.

And so yesterday, Phil and I got in the car, drove 4 hours to Kansas City (and then 4 hours back later that day) and checked out the fair.

It was a completely new experience for me. The whole setting and atmosphere of the place (the festival covered about 16 acres) was just incredible. Quaint wooden buildings everywhere without so much as a fan or proper lighting; merchants selling their products left and right -- all dressed up in medieval suits and many of them speaking in, sometimes bad, English accents; they had even organized several people to go walking around in full costume and pretending to be this Lord or that Lady or a jester and interact with the crowd. In fact, there were many in the general public that even joined in and dressed up as well.

Personally, it had a very outdoor-untechnology-mall feel to it (mainly because there were so many shops around). It also had a fair amount of games like those you find at carnivals or arcades.

What set it apart from actually being and outdoor-untechnology-mall-with-and-an-outdoor-untechnology-arcade were the shows.

The festival grounds was split into different areas -- Sherwood Forest, for instance, was one area -- and each area had scheduled shows occuring frequently throughout the day.

We managed to catch the one thing I really wanted to see there... Jousting!


It was just fantastic. They did a good job in building our excitement by interacting with us before the joust (they split us up such that one side supported a 'good knight' and the other supported the 'bad knight' and gave us chants and mottos and such).

The joust itself lasted no more than five to ten minutes, if even, but it was still extrordinarily entertaining. Partly, I believe, due to the involvement they encouraged from the crowd.

First the two knights went at each other with their lances a few times and then they switched to a sword fight and finally, an all out hand-to-hand brawl (we managed to catch that last part on vid).

Ok... Threesomes. The girl-girl-guy kind -- I find the other type to be just a tad overwhelming. What can I say, I'm a giver. (HA!)

So what would it take for me to have one?
That is such a complicated question.

See, if I were to add another girl into an already pre-existing relationship that I have with a guy, I would want her to be hot just 'coz if I were to have sex with a girl, she should, at the very least, be aesthetically pleasing to me. But then, if she is hot, that would make me feel inadequate in comparison and thusly make my self-esteem just plummet.

What if I were the third person?
Another complicated question.

I honestly cannot imagine myself being involved on that level with people I already know. It would just be too weird to continue a "normal" friendship with those people (yeah, that matters). But on the other hand, I doubt I could be the "third" with a couple of people that are strangers to me because I would be worrying and nitpicking at little details that I wouldn't know unless I had some sort of pre-existing connection with them.

Conclusion?
No threesomes!

So I finally mustered up the courage today to get out of bed and get to campus an hour early so that I could see my two professors (well, a professor and a coach), explain my absences to them, and then start going to my Monday/Wednesday classes again.

I am one-for-two :P

I saw my professor that teaches my Hazardous Materials Safety class just a few minutes ago. It was so nerve-wrecking. It should not be so but it is and I cannot seem to control it.

He was very empathetic. He even allowed me to hand in the two homeworks that had been due while I was gone.

I suppose, in retrospect, that meeting went about as well as it could. I didn't get myself in any new trouble, I got myself out of old trouble, and I nipped what could have become my academic downfall in the ass. It was a good, if nervous, experience.

So why did I find myself walking towards the computer lab to waste my next couple hours instead of walking towards the multipurpose building to speak with my coach?

As I was walking away from his office, I kept thinking "OK... one down, one to go!" and my mind was going over what I should say to the coach.

But then I realized that my feet seemed to not want to listen to me. They just kept making their way for this computer lab I am in now.

The walk from the professor's office to the computer lab was one huge mental argument with myself. You should go! No! Go! Why? Coz you need to. Not good enough a reason!

By the time I reached the computer lab door and opened it, I knew I had lost that argument. I am so missing another class today and I am already feeling the oncomings of another anxiety attack.

What is wrong with me?

I recently stumbled onto an online travel journal kept by one of UMR's recent graduates as he travels around the world. I have yet to read all his articles but I was interested in this.

The link is to a bunch of articles written about his visit to Malaysia (my homeland). It was a rather new and unique experience reading them simply because I have never really seen Malaysia through the eyes of a tourist.

It is amazing how simple little things have never really registered as "different" to me because I have been around it my whole life and it has just been part of my life. Things -- like how so many shopowners tend to use solar calculators or how tables from a restaurant are placed even on the sidewalk to the point of hindering walking pedestrians -- have never really crossed my mind but obviously made enough of an impression on someone else that they decided to write about it.

Some of his articles I found to be despairingly honest. Like getting ripped off! It made for a horrible example for the country. I know that people ripping others off is an act that can be found anywhere regardless of a nation's borders, and especially to foreign visitors, but it was sort of a slap in the face to realize that it could happen even in my beloved Malaysia.

I found his travels in Malaysia to be somewhat limited. I don't know... perhaps it is just me. If I were traveling around my country, I would have gone for more naturey spots of interest. Beaches. Forest reserves. Watching orang utans. But I supposed that is because growing up, I had gotten my fill of temples and such.

It is driving me insane. I am surrounded by packrats! While I am, myself, far from being an actual minimalist, I do view myself to be more toward the minimalist side of the spectrum. And so the fact that my Boyfriend, my Roomate, and my Roommate's new fiance that is now living with us are all packrats has me constantly gritting my teeth and taking deep, relaxing breaths

All right, so the Boyfriend isn't so bad seeing how I have successfully limited his packratting. But the other two. Oh my!

Roomie's mother recently moved away and thus left various pieces of furniture and other odds and ends behind. Items which my Roomate swooped up happily.

While it is not necessarily a mess in the sense that it is untidy, there is, however, furniture everywhere and things like garish blood red and white "I heart New York" coasters (or coaster looking souvenirs) and other knick knacks that probably has some sort of sentimental value attached but really just takes up space.

Sentimental value... the core of a packrat's mentality.

Well anyway, point is, it is annoying the fuck out of me and this isn't exactly something you can just go up and say "Oh hey, hi, you know that shelf there, yeah, take it away please. I don't like it there."

And so, I have decided that as soon as I find a way to broach the subject, I think I am going to start preparing to move out. Besides, they are a newly-engaged couple. They probably want the space. I know I would

Don't get me wrong, furniture is not the sole reason driving my need to move. Other things like the never ending mountain of dishes is another. Yes, I say mountain because that is indeed what it is. I used to do the dishes on a daily or every-other-day basis but the mountain just kept coming back. I stopped either about the time when they added a new waffle machine to the list of dirty machinery for Sherryl to clean besides the sandwich maker and toaster or when I was thanked for doing dishes. I didn't want to be thanked (even maids get more than a 'thank you'). I wanted them to actually, oh I don't know, do their own dishes?

My Roommate just got engaged last week. I was - well - surprised. Probably because they have only known each other for just a few months. I know there are couples out there that got married after knowing each other for only several weeks and remained happily married for the rest of their lives but still... I just cannot wrap my head around that.

I don't know... Just the mere thought of marriage scares me for the simple fact that I am not ready for such a huge commitment. Plus, isn't 22 just a tad young? I will be turning 22 next month and I still feel and act like a 12 year old.

In fact - now that I am really thinking about the topic - I don't know if I'll ever be ready. Not to mention that with marriage comes parenthood... and that just gives me the heebie-jeebies.

I look back on my life and see how great a job my parents did at being parents. To me, it is a bar set so high that I find myself incapable and unqualified to ever reach anywhere near it.

For as long as I can remember, they have always been just... my parents. Not humans or people, like you and me, but parents. I doubt I will ever be ready for that. To be considered as a 'parent'. I have never even held a baby for longer than a minute.

In other news, I have been skipping my Monday/Wednesday classes the past two weeks (going on third week if I don't get the balls to nip this).

My weight training class is the first class of the day and everytime I think about it, I get this sort of anxiety attack. I think about how unfit I am for that class; about what others will think when they see me struggling with the tiny amount of weights I can lift; what will be going through their minds when they see me suddenly appear after being absent for so long; about how crowded it is in there with all my classmates in it; about how everyone else is probably into the groove of it and knows what to do, except me; about the 'A' in that one stupid class that I've probably thrown away because I've skipped two weeks worth of class.

Yeah, yeah, I know what you are probably going to say... There will always be the same old answers to all my problems; I hear it from Phil, I hear it from my parents, I even hear it from me. But they just don't click with me and, after hearing them so many times from so many people, they are just fucking irritating now.

And so, in a little puddle of fear, I lie in my bed Monday and Wednesday mornings willing myself to sleep so that I may sleep the fear away... which leads me to skip the class after that. Now I get the same anxieties for the class after weight training too. It all just sort of snowballed and now I am in a hole again. And I am perhaps the least educated and trained person in hole-get-outtery.

After one too many people commented on how my cat was heading down the road towards obesity, I decided to put him on a diet. Instead of his usual free feeding, I switched to feeding him a set amount twice a day.

It has been working great except for one thing. If he is really hungry, when I finally go to fill his bowl again, he will gobble it all down as fast as he can. I don't mind his fast gobbling abilities as much as the aftermath. You see, about five minutes after his epic gobblefest, you are more than likely to hear retching sounds followed by the magical appearance of kitty vomit on my bedroom carpet.

He doesn't always pick the carpet though. I think he just goes about his usual business of scouting the bedroom to make sure there are no predators and wherever he is when he feels the need to thow up, that's where you'll find the emptied out contents of his stomach.

I am contemplating on stopping this diet and going back to free feeding. I know that would mean he will likely get fat but when a cat vomits on your favourite shirt and you feel the warmth of fresh puke on your body... well... that is where the line ends for me.

"If I Had A Million Dollars"

by Barenaked Ladies

If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well, I'd buy you a house
I would buy you a house
And if I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Buy you furniture for your house
Maybe a nice chesterfield or an ottoman

And if I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well I'd buy you a K Car
A nice Reliant automobile
And if I had a million dollars,
I'd buy your love

If I had a million dollars
I'd build a tree fort in our yard
If I had a million dollars
You could help. It wouldn't be that hard
If I had a million dollars
Maybe we could put a little tiny fridge in there, somewhere

You know, we could just go up there and hang out
Like open the fridge & stuff
And there'd be foods laid out for us,
With little pre-wrapped sausages and things.
Mmmm
They have pre-wrapped sausages but they don't have pre-wrapped bacon.
Well can you blame 'em?
Ah, yeah!

If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well I'd buy you a fur coat
But not a real fur coat, that's cruel
And If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well I'd buy you an exotic pet
Yep, like a llama or an Emu

And, If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well, I'd buy you John Meric's remains
Ooo, all them crazy elephant bones
And if I had a million dollars
I'd buy your love

If I had a million dollars
We wouldn't have to walk to the store
If I had a million dollars
We'd take a limosine cuz it costs more
If I had a million dollars
We wouldn't HAVE to eat Kraft Dinner

But we WOULD eat Kraft Dinner
Of course we would, we'd just eat more...
And buy really expensive ketchups with it
That's right, all the fanciest Dijon Ketchup!
Mmm!

If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well I'd buy you a green dress
But not a real green dress, that's cruel

And if I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well I'd buy you some art
A Picasso or a Garfunkle

If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
Well I'd buy you a monkey
Haven't you always wanted a monkey?!

If I had a million dollars
I'd buy your love

If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
If I had a million dollars
I'd be rich