So the prompt here was favorite animated character, and we should probably talk about this because I'm not sure about favorite, but Maid Marian was certainly the first to come to mind—Disney's Maid Marian, that is, because when I was little I thought she was hands down the prettiest thing on four paws, plus she played badminton, and then Robin Hood slipped that posey promise ring on her finger and I was confident there had never been a better love story, in Nottingham or otherwise. Are you singing along at this point? Love, it seems like only yesterday . . .

But I'm not all into the cartoon scene anyhow, so favorite's a bit strong. There's a whole handful in the Disney drawer: Anita Dearly, Belle, Rajah, that girl who Mowgli falls in love with. 

Still. That's just Disney. And Disney is great, but then there's Samurai Jack. For Samurai Jack, I have no words. In fact, some episodes don't have words. Which is what I'm trying to say here—this show went so beyond animated I hesitate to even put it in this category. Samurai Jack is more a study in cinematography; the animation itself is super simple, but if you take a step back and consider what the series would look like in live action, there are few that could match it in artistic sense. Then there's the storytelling and the styling and the soundtrack. No wonder they cancelled it. What else do the networks ever do with the best of television?

If you've no idea what I'm on about, repent. Then reclaim your childhood and talk to me. May or may not own the entire series.

True story: I fell asleep typing this. And now it's seven a.m. But since this post passed the point of no return long ago, let's go back to Robin real quick and take a minute to appreciate that this happened.

Hey. Saturday morning, y'all. Go watch some cartoons.

belated.

Neon pink spray paint. A cast-off card from the art museum. An honest-to-goodness true line from an actual book that really said this, no edit necessary. How could I not.

Also, mugwumpery is a real word. As is mugwumpish, or the delightfully rhythmic mugwumpian. 

And people ask me what I'm going to do with my English degree.

dare disturb the universe.

a few of my favorite things: 

stars and stories about stars, planetariums, charts celestial, telescopes, constellations, the southern cross, magellanic clouds, summer nights and winter nights and also autumn and spring, the deep navy black of dark mountain midnights, that translucent turquoise along the night sealine, watching stars with the one you love, feeling the earth move, the mystical moist night-air, the first star, the second star to the right, written in the stars and star-crossed lovers, starry-eyed.

foxes and folklore about foxes, the tail of it, llwynog from llwyn, reynards and vixens and kits and fuxs, all in a skulk or a troop or an earth. in Mali they are the trickster gods of the desert, chaos incarnate, and in Peru they are mind-fighting warriors and in China they have nine tails and did you know, the word shenanigan is considered to be derived from the Irish sionnachuighim, I play the fox. red foxes, kit foxes, fleet foxes and meine gedanken sind wo die Fuchs und Hase gute nacht sagen geblieben.

also, modernists; particularly poets, cummings and eliot and thomas and pound plus whitman and sylvia and edna, too. (sun moon stars rain)

_________________________________
Yet another page from The Essential E: A Pocket Guide.

you guys.

I forgot a pen today. Forgot. A. Pen. I also woke up twenty-two minutes before class started (it takes, on average, 9.7 minutes to make my morning sprint up the hill to campus), threw on the clothes I wore yesterday (plus a scarf),  tossed my hair around for a second (after it fell out of my first-attempt bobby-pinned bun), and left without breakfast (this is actually not that unusual).

Made it to the humanities building three minutes before the bell rang. Felt pretty smug about it, too, until I tried to take notes.

I am lost impossible incapacitated without a writing instrument of any sort. 

Spent most of that morning lecture in various stages of irrational anxiety and practically sprinted to the nearest copy room the second class let out.

me: Do you perhaps have a pen I could buy?

kid at the counter: (looks around, vaguely, shaking his head)

kid at the counter: . . .

kid at the counter: I've got one you could have, for free.

me: For keeps?!

kid at the counter: Wow. If you're that excited, yes. Please. Take it.

me: So shines a good deed in a weary world (Gene Wilder version).

kid at the counter: . . .

kid at the counter: I hope your day gets better.

So now I have a pen and only wish I had more time to write with it, write the things that really matter, that dog me day and night and in and out and through and around every other crazy necessity on my midterms schedule this week. I have so many words in my head I can hardly sleep. And even when I finally do, the words wake me up in the morning like tousled toddlers, big-eyed and blinking. We're still here. You made us, now raise us. We have still so many things to say.

So many things. Music and parties and pasta. Star charts and road maps and song sheets. Love letters and eulogies and thank yous---especially thank yous, because I have received several soul-swelling emails of late and I thank you for reading my writing and I thank you for writing to tell me that you're reading. I am getting around to replying, I am I am.

But until then, just know that I have a pen. And that's a start.

what am I doing here.

It is a very funny thing that the sleepier you are, the longer you take about getting to bed. 

C.S. LEWIS

okay?

catsthattalk // cats that speak the secrets of my soul.

photo | so wake up, wake up and do it. whatever it is, whatever it is.

 first official all-nighter of winter finals week 2011.

um . . . yay?

wrote a seventeen-page research paper for yesterday

and need another fifteen for tomorrow (today).

the library's open til two.

A.M.

and we talk about how that's possibly inhumane,

how it only perpetuates procrastination,

somehow sanctions insufficient sleep patterns

advocates inordinate amounts of caffeine

encourages unhealthy eating

(not to mention)

catchpenny compositions we turn in minutes before deadline

shipwrecked, sunk, incurious.

anything but

allowing us to finish at our best.

still. my sister says

you know what? at the end of this, we'll still be alive.

and my mum quotes Brandon Flowers

because she's kool lyk dat.

. . . . . . . . .

TELL the DEVIL THAT HE CAN GO BACK from WHERE HE CAME

HIS FIERY ARROWS DREW THEIR BEAD in VAIN

and WHEN THE HARDEST PART is OVER, WE'LL BE HERE

AND OUR DREAMS WILL BREAK the BOUNDARIES of OUR FEAR

crossfire | FLAMINGO