E-Published! First Edition of Pity Smacked!

Hello Blogspot World:

I have started a blog exclusively to follow my writings and fiction at http://maliaautiofiction.blogspot.com
It's for short writings, musings, and brainstorming writing exercises as well as for writing about the writing process and announcing any developments in full length completed works and such (if I can get to that point!) I did it in high school, I can't see why I can't do it now.

I have released my first ever full length novel's first edition. I wrote and edited this book during the time between eighth grade and sophomore year of high school. And I've chosen to e-publish this edition for kindle. Perhaps I will do print-on-demand available through Amazon once I've done a complete edit and overhaul. This will require getting back in touch with the characters to the point I feel I can accurately explore them on the written page. You really have to know your characters, even better than you know your friends. Hell, you have to feel and imagine for them. It's hard freaking work when you work a full time job. I can see why there's the stereotype that writers have to be holed up by themselves, and I'm just not that solitary of a person. Although I'm rediscovering passion for my projects.

It is imperfect, but fundamentally I think it's a great story so if you can see past little glitches, have a lot of time on your hands, and just want to see a story written from a young pure heart, this is the story for you. All original characters, and all original story line: 

This is available at Amazon.com kindle store. Kindle is functional on PCs, Kindles, iPads, and Macs once you download the software. http://www.amazon.com/Pity-Smacked-ebook/dp/B008CXL0TC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1340989605&sr=8-1&keywords=pity+smacked

Go Ducks Inspired Bracelet

GO DUCKS INSPIRED BRACELET

Available for sale at my ETSY: http://www.etsy.com/shop/mautio

The body of this bracelet includes stars which are started with a combination of circular peyote with petals jutting out. They were then stitched together one by one and larger circular peyote with embellishment star flowers were made with emerald toned Czech firepolish beads. The bracelet is closed with a yellow duck button which was made in Japan. Very cute and shows "Oregon Duck" spirit: perfect for any fan of green and gold or duck and colorful beaded jewelry lover anywhere.

Unicorn Fantasy Necklace

Starting the new month with a new creation!

Unicorn Fantasy Necklace

Overview

Detail, Pendant

Pendant: Miyuki Delicas, Swarovski Bicones, and Crystal Rondelles

Detail: Rose Colored Rondelles, Freshwater Pearls, and Handmade Tubular Peyote Beaded Beads

Malia's Virtual Sketchbook: Open!

I have created a blog solely to share my art and art-related information on the interwebs.

It can be accessed at http://maliaautiovirtualsketch.blogspot.com

I'm excited. I think it will be a fun space to track my progress. It's not like I'm having any formal training (beyond looking up technique-related information online) but I'll do my best and hopefully instict and inspiration will guide me at least partway.

Birds to Fashion: Gang Gang Cockatoo

Gang Gang Fountain by ~pixipatrin on deviantART

Inspired by the Gang Gang Fountain Video (See that blog for the movie! It shows the character of this charming cockatoo.) If I can stay motivated there will be more to come! I regret using the ink. I love pen sketches which are painted with watercolors, but failed to achieve the sketchy effect. And using a camera rather than a scanner for the image didn't help it, either. It's my first watercolor work on this scale, so I'll just view it as a learning experience. I miss prismacolor pencils and using thick acrylic. I really like to pile paint on the paper. Watercolor doesn't work in the same way. I'll get used to it!

The trees are red peppercorns and the berries are one of the Gang Gang's favorite foods.

Watercolor Techinques

Major Mitchell's Cockatoos in Love

Gang Gang Cockatoos, Sorry they only have one foot

I've been spending time with a younger charge (even though I was friends with the neighbor's granddaughter back in the home country, we played tennis from time to time), than I did during my days as a tutor to college students. Anyway, it's a nice chance to get to go back to basics and just have fun without pretenses! (As you become so inclined to do at the higher levels.)

We spend hours water-coloring together. It's fun and a stress relief, so I went and picked up a set of watercolors today. But I would like to learn some basic techniques to get me started ,as compared to other mediums I don't have a clue about watercolors. Hence the state of the paintings I've put in as small images in the blog. I'd like to stick with it (I need to stick to a lot of things these days...) I prefer acrylics, but since I don't have much experience with watercolor I figure I might as well try learning a few techniques, should I like it.

Anyway, I'm leaving a link to a fun WATERCOLOR TECHNIQUE WEBSITE

I will add more links if I pursue this interest in the future.

http://www.johnlovett.com/techniq.htm (Thorough, Easy to Understand, Attractive Layout, and FREE!)

http://www.watercolorpainting.com/watercolor-tutorials.htm (Quite Detailed)

http://www.johnlovett.com/techniq.htm (Good Basic Summary)

Hum,

Reading about Momoyama period ceramics in Japanese has me missing my Grandpa... and feeling nostalgic all over the place.

Feeling a little blue tonight. For no apparent reason. Just feeling down about a lot of stuff lately, each on its own is ok to deal with but definitely feeling it cropping up on me. Just waves of sadness wash over me.

I took some 5-HTP

Ballet is fun. It's sort of like therapy which I was thinking of going to but I think ballet is more of a release for me... and I heard obamacare was reversed so I don't know how that will affect my health insurance situation if I get married. Dissapointing.

And a little overwhelmed by my Japanese class. This ain't easy stuff. But the improvement in my other class is remarkable. So the work I'm putting in is building muscles somewhere... just having trouble knowing how reliable those muscles are. Haha kind of like ballet. I want to get back onto pointe but my pointe muscles aren't strong enough yet. I don't think I'm pointing my foot properly because I'm feeling it too much in my achilles tendon and that's a very important area to take care of in ballet that can be damaged en pointe. Point with the ankle and the top of the foot... w/o clenching the achilles. Simple concept but easier said than done.

We're studying ceramics in my Japanese Advanced Reading class. It makes me think of my Grandpa. I miss him. I miss my family. Why do I always have to feel so darn nostalgic.

Max's brother went home today. They say he's coming back. We'll see if that will happen.

Winter Beading

A repository for recent beaded projects. I like beading... I really want to try my hand at a new stitch as I've been doing spiral stitch for the last 3 or 4 projects I've done. Maybe I'll revisit peyote or get something out of Beadwork.

Duck Bracelet by ~pixipatrin on deviantART

Almost Normal

Almost normal today. Rough start as usual... still night sweaty but no panic last night (with the help of Ativan...)

Met with my functional doc and we'll try magnesium, 5-HTP, taurine, and l-threonine and see if that helps. I sure hope so. Today was almost normal. I'll leave it there before I start thinking of what might happen.

Then I found out I might get fired because I reduced my course load this term and in the heat of it all forgot to sound the alarm to the bureaucratic workings of the university... don't know what I'll do without my job... it's the only thing I have going for me. I guess I can show up to the job and just tell them to go ahead and not pay me. It's not like I quit my classes because I caught a cold or just decided I didn't want to take the classes... hopefully it can get sorted out. I really hope so.

Today I registered for three classes for next term. That is Japanese 4th year speaking part II, Korean 1st year part two (I really need to bite the bullet and learn Korean... I can understand a lot of speaking but can't express anything myself), and an Honors College Lit class. If I'm going to be stuck at uni for another year then I might as well just stay to write a thesis and finish the honors college classes despite my aversion.

Korean is pretty hard at my school... it's pretty project, activity, and memorization oriented but class is really the only thing that motivates me to study it even though I really want to learn so I can communicate with my husband's family. Japanese class really isn't that way... even when there are projects they are no way near as intense.

Look at that. I'm writing about something other than feeling sick. That must mean something is getting a little better.

But I'm really bent out of shape worrying if I will loose my job... I think my situation warrants and exception to the bureaucratic rule mumbo jumbo. I'd feel so guilty telling my student "I can't meet you anymore, I've been feeling sick, doctors can't tell me why, but I'm working on it... though I had to drop some classes..."... because I really like her and she thought highly enough of me to request me as a tutor this term. I suppose I would ask permission if I could just continue to tutor her without pay... if they want to stick to the rules that hard. But I really couldn't continue the classes. The first 4 weeks of school were just nuts and then the most recent 4 weeks have been more insanity and trying to recover. Even without studying though, I got 67 on my first bio exam and 65 on my first physics exams. I do know that I would've never been able to make it through looking at what the weeks since I dropped the classes have been like.

I thought I would have made a good doctor or naturopath. Or both. But I'm just not cut out for the bureaucratic requirements, course requirements, grade expectations. I don't function that way anymore. I can get through in subjects I have innate ability in such as foreign language (but that isn't so good because I have little contact with friends now... it's the horrible feeling of being an outsider in your own life...) My Japanese would be so much better but I haven't been able to go to International Coffee Hour once this term (the most lively meetings are the first in the term anyway, it peters out toward the end when the same old faces and same old groups of friends come together... much harder to get in to get to know people, maybe it's just something I imagine but it does feel harder when everyone already knows who they like to get drunk with on the weekend...) And I can't even keep up with the exchange students when I am feeling healthy... feel like you gotta be the one to initiate everything... they don't have the same course load (although I am sympathetic to the issues of adjustment, cultural differences, and perhaps not feeling comfortable just asking people to do things... they are out of their element... having a lot of fun... but still out of their elements)

Proof that I was happy once? Jan 1st, 2007, Ichinomiya, Aichi, Japan OSHOGATSU

And maybe deep down this whole time I really have just wanted to go back to Japan, or at least in my area of passion. Although I cannot say that I am not passionate about wanting to help people and see more right than wrong in this world, or at least look at the medical issues from different perspectives. There's deep conflict in my personality and ambitions... maybe it's because I'm two star-signs? But they sort of work together. Sagittarius/Scorpio. Sagittarius is always on the move and looking for action... and Scorpio is intense, vengeful, and perceptive. But I'll just have to put those things behind me. But I don't see how those elements couldn't work together.

Sorry about the wonky formatting... I couldn't figure out how to do away with the underline.

Cautiously optimistic that this might be turning around, cautiously. That does not mean that I am not freaked about what's been going on, the future, and what's going on with my job. But I really hope my boss trusts me and that there is something that can be done... I do have the documentation to prove that things have been going crazy.

Two Good Days and Backslide

I gave a homeopathic remedy from my naturopath a try the other day... along with the 5-HTP and basic multivitamin I've been taking and had a very good night Thursday...

Friday I felt basically normal... weak and tired... but basically almost normal. I rode my bike to school, went confidently to the grocery store before riding home and ate a slice of pizza. Probably no good... no documented gluten sensitivity yet but I guess even people without gluten sensitivity can be negatively affected by it. Who knows. Sick of thinking about the world so critically when I just want to live. I just want to eat whatever and go out with friends... although I'm basically estranged from all my friends right now.Kinda have what I don't feel is an unfounded suspicion that they just think of me as someone who "always doesn't feel good." And I get really sick of being a wet blanket... so I guess it's for the best that I'm so distanced from everyone right now. Everything seems to be falling into place for everyone. I remember that feeling in the past... but it just feels like such a distant memory... almost like none of those wonderful things ever happened. And I wouldn't want to ruin such beautiful feelings for anyone. Although I feel so crushingly alone. So guilty for my family having to go through this.

I had energy to pick some stuff up around the house... tend to my birds as I wish I'd been able to tend to them throughout this whole flare up... I felt holey moley the worst actually might be over. My dad came and we had a good night... able to eat dinner heartily and then watch a movie... then just go to sleep and fall asleep without further ado.

Saturday I also felt good although I craved onion rings in the worst way. I also had a hamburger. And I ate a bunch of snack foods... so many things I truly have no idea what triggered last night's set-back. And I was fine until I went to try to sleep and then so many symptoms came back and I felt just awful all throughout my body in ways the English language doesn't even really have words for. So I'll leave it at that. Couldn't sleep until I took .5mg of an Ativan at... 7:00 am.

This has got to end... uggh I just wish I knew what triggered this. I'm sick of feeling miserable and making everyone around me miserable. On Saturday (before the evening) I almost thought it was time to let all my friends know "Oh my gosh, I'm feeling better now! I think it's over... let's hang out... time to pretend it never happened" and that things would get back to normal.

But I guess all that is just a pipe dream.

Change

"I don't remember how that day started. I certainly didn't think my life would change at all. The day was the result of change. School had ended the day before, I'd gone home to do my normal chores and to sleep, and then I was awake again. Change can happen as simple as that-just closing your eyes, and opening them again. No matter what, when you open your eyes the world will not be the same as the world you left by shutting them."

From a story I wrote years ago, in high school. The opening paragraph. However, it sums up a lot of feelings I'm going through right now.

I went to my naturopath today. We're reassessing the situation and hopefully will be on the move soon. In the meanwhile, Ativan is the only thing that is bringing me some relief but it also drugs me and makes me feel as uncoordinated and wonky as I'm feeling in the first place.

I was able to make it through class and tutoring easily today, but still feeling much trepidation and worry about what's going to happen and if I will ever feel better or not.

Peace out.