RIP School Survival Forums
August 2001 - June 2017

The School Survival Forums are permanently retired. If you need help with quitting school, unsupportive parents or anything else, there is a list of resources on the Help Page.

If you want to write about your experiences in school, you can write on our blog.

To everyone who joined these forums at some point, and got discouraged by the negativity and left after a while (or even got literally scared off): I'm sorry.

I wasn't good enough at encouraging people to be kinder, and removing people who refuse to be kind. Encouraging people is hard, and removing people creates conflict, and I hate conflict... so that's why I wasn't better at it.

I was a very, very sensitive teen. The atmosphere of this forum as it is now, if it had existed in 1996, would probably have upset me far more than it would have helped.

I can handle quite a lot of negativity and even abuse now, but that isn't the point. I want to help people. I want to help the people who need it the most, and I want to help people like the 1996 version of me.

I'm still figuring out the best way to do that, but as it is now, these forums are doing more harm than good, and I can't keep running them.

Thank you to the few people who have tried to understand my point of view so far. I really, really appreciate you guys. You are beautiful people.

Everyone else: If after everything I've said so far, you still don't understand my motivations, I think it's unlikely that you will. We're just too different. Maybe someday in the future it might make sense, but until then, there's no point in arguing about it. I don't have the time or the energy for arguing anymore. I will focus my time and energy on people who support me, and those who need help.

-SoulRiser

The forums are mostly read-only and are in a maintenance/testing phase, before being permanently archived. Please use this time to get the contact details of people you'd like to keep in touch with. My contact details are here.

Please do not make a mirror copy of the forums in their current state - things will still change, and some people have requested to be able to edit or delete some of their personal info.


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Vatman Offline
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Post: #61
RE: Similar Snowflakes

It's difficult to caress with a fist.

I've noticed a pattern, I only update this wretched thing on weekdays. Is it that my weekends are too busy? If you knew me, you would chuckle.

Speaking of patterns, have you noticed how all the candidates for president are backed by the same big companies. Don't bite the hand that feeds, unless you're Ron Paul - in which you couldn't anyway with the mouth the size of, the size of: how big is an honest man's mouth exactly?

I'd look in a mirror but I couldn't tell you.

Life seems to pan out in all directions inefficient. I always wake up much too early or much too late. Much like bowling, you don't get much done without dropping the ball, don't worry this analogy had holes in it to begin with. Ha. Get it? Holes? Bowling balls have holes.

Enough pandering, my first semester not living at home has treated me oddly. I'm out of my house and my depth. I've found that a world of spending the whole day naked comes at a cost, eventually you have to do the laundry. I make sure mine is plenty dirty. Besides paperwork and trivial tasks though, I have nothing to report on the subject of adulthood. Perhaps I am immune, or am in denial? I'd like both to be true.

I'll end this here, what a pointless post... my walls are made of Sheetrock.

For no reason at all, I caress my wall.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
04-18-2012 09:17 AM
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Pieman Offline
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Post: #62
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Vatman, you've returned!

" I never knew until that moment how bad it could hurt to lose something you never really had. " ~From the television show The Wonder Years
04-18-2012 12:47 PM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #63
RE: Similar Snowflakes

You could almost say I've never left.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
10-03-2012 05:34 AM
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zagix Offline
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Vatman keep getting boned in the ass!
10-03-2012 05:35 AM
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Ky Offline
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Whoa. This magic lamp works - I've summoned one of the more intellectual oldfafs!

Public Service Announcement: First world problems are still problems.
10-03-2012 06:23 AM
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SoulRiser Offline
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Post: #66
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Long time no see, Vatman! Hug

"If you can, help others; if you cannot do that, at least do not harm them." - Dalai Lama
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10-03-2012 07:39 AM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #67
RE: Similar Snowflakes

This one is going to be needy.

The view from this computer lab is unmistakably unique to me. While others may share in the curvature of the stone, the tree's that survived man's need for convenient roads, perhaps even the corner of an abandoned bicycle factory. It's all just mine.

I haven't been completely honest in these scattered blog posts, I forget to mention that I make mistakes. I'm twenty two years old, and still very much in college for the same reasons I did poorly in high school and the same reasons that the view outside is entirely mine.

I'm supposed to be writing some sort of thesis on something, but I revert, I go back to where I'm most comfortable, being Vatman...which doesn't necessitate being on school survival. I'm Vatman mostly everywhere. I suppose some places I'm uniquely not. But I lose him from time to time, the way hands can never perfectly contain sand. I want to write about how rock faces aren't any different than human ones, how bicycle chains work in a similar fashion to blood vessels.

I guess this post is really to apologize to anyone who reads it, because the oxygen which I take in gains a carbon atom, and when it's released into this world...its done so: specifically to meet you. I'm inside of you, darling reader, you've caught me like a bug and each breath I take is like a prayer. Begging, uniquely, for you to not let me go.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 04-05-2013 05:59 AM by Vatman.)
04-05-2013 05:57 AM
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thewake Offline
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I'll eventually have to do an undergraduate thesis.

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04-05-2013 06:04 AM
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itsurgrlcass Offline
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Vatman, I was just wondering, are you participating in NaPo this time around?

It's just chemicals.
04-10-2013 03:03 PM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #70
RE: Similar Snowflakes

A good question, believe it or not but the Academy of American Poets isn't holding NaPo any longer. A shame, it's such a good exercise. Regardless, I did start writing poems each day just for nostalgia's sake...and well it didn't last. Perhaps NaPo is dead?

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
04-12-2013 04:43 AM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #71
RE: Similar Snowflakes

I'm not above admitting that I could be wrong.

I just can't help but think that we've been shortchanged, life is pretty incredible, and it ends. It just does. Don't point your holy text at me, I'm far beyond comfort foods. Don't get me wrong darling reader, I'm not upset about it. I realized I was going to die on this day, the day before April Fools nearly twenty years ago.

The white house on Clover Hill, it was a fixer-upper and my father had made rust shine and could call a dip in the foundation: the potential for storage. I was storing myself there in preparation for April Fools day; a half finished dresser, more casket than convenience. I hid last years Halloween mask and a bottle of ketchup should I decided to commit to being a french fry. All that was left would be a way to bait him in and of course to decide which position I was to take on my unveiling.

I don't know what what brought me to the subject of death, I like to imagine myself sprawled out like Dracula awakening from it all. I wasn't though, I was a child with my palm on the unfinished floor. I remember thinking about not having thought, about nothing, endless nothing, without feeling or memory. After realizing the inevitable I felt everything I could at once...I could bore you with how the inside of my shoe felt to my toes, or how air tingles when you inhale through your nose. But I wont go into it, the important thing is that I picked up the bottle of ketchup, put a dab of it on my finger and stuffed it in my mouth.

All such occasions are meaningful only if you ascribe meaning to them. I like to. I like the ritual. I like to mark each passing year - even when there are so many of them I lose track. It's anchoring. Time is a shifting sea. It's very possible to drown in it.

I don't know if I'd want to.

Ketchup is sweet, but bitter.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
03-31-2014 07:22 PM
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itsurgrlcass Offline
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http://www.napowrimo.net/

It seems NaPo's not dead, Vatman, and neither are you--which means you should definitely do it this year. It's not too late to catch up.

It's just chemicals.
04-07-2014 11:40 AM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #73
RE: Similar Snowflakes

I'm getting tired of death, of course.

My Uncle died today, and while he didn't raise me, and we were never particularly close. I feel a sinking feeling in my gut when I think about how they carried him out in a dark blue bag around noon. We didn't even have to move our cars which at this point were blocking the drive way. They lifted the bag over my cousins light blue Toyota...high tide... one stop shopping.

The family gathered in the kitchen, someone brought bagels, of course. My Aunt never sat down to eat, filling up time by pouring out coffee. If only there was more coffee and less time. My Uncles sister, whom I'd have to look up online to find out what her title would be in relation to me; Anyway, Edita said, "If only I had been there when he passed"

I think that there may be something to the start and finish of life that people find comfortable. I know, neither event is particularly comforting, both are potentially gruesome. But it's our only link, sure we assume we were born, and that we must die. Just like the first time blinded by an exiting sun, it's the experience of fading light that gives night its weight. I don't know, I think I may have had a point, but its closer to sunrise than set. I suppose it's mourning?

My Uncle's Mother was the only member of her family to survive the holocaust. She had a twin sister and was less than ten years old during world war 2. As the borders of her country were closing her father sold everything to buy gold and with it he bargained for all that he could afford: the life of one of his children. It's unlikely that I'd be here if that didn't happen. My Aunt and Uncle facilitated my fathers ability to come to this country and meet my mother. Lots of what if's. I always find a way to make it about me, of course.

We spent the rest of the afternoon adjusting. Sitting in different orders, in different rooms. A puzzle you can't solve. Isabelle, my uncles daughter-in-law is pregnant, she tells me, "I know its a girl. This might sound weird, but I once saw my children in a dream. I know it's a girl."

My mom asks the room if they can feel my uncles presence. No one wants to say that they can't, of course.

"On the ordinary course", is the route where our stem phrase originates from. It's used as a sort of confirmation today. I think about what it means when my sister asks me if I feel sad.

"Of course I'm sad." I say.

This is ordinary. This is part of the plan, we have always been in route to this point. People die. Of course.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 05-16-2014 06:23 PM by Vatman.)
05-16-2014 06:20 PM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #74
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Is it okay to leave things half finished? Shade in half a smile, leave the crusts on the plate. I resolved at one point that I would never live for possibility. Sure, the latent potential of miracles aren't to be discouraged, but I needed to hold on to something. I needed to feel the heft of my steps and the sting of walking barefoot on what I should have worn shoes for.

I don't like writing about religion. There is this mystic quality to writing about the unknown that gives it authenticity while deserving none. When I was an adolescent I thought that the opposite of living for god is living for knowledge. I tried to learn, about anything really. I didn't have to do well at school or treat my friends with respect, as long as I learned about how a tree could bleed sap or why rocks feel rough to the touch. I'd have checked off something, I'd be moving towards something. It's tragic looking at life in what is achievable. Nothing is really an achievement? Is it better to have cleaned out an overfilled desk drawer or to have created a human child?

I'm over-dramatic, but not wrong. It's all in perspective I guess. Small lies. Lets list whats real:

Hunger.
My keyboard needs to be cleaned.
I put things off for too long.
The fan is set on rotate, computer humming.

I may be scared of silence.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
06-25-2014 09:51 AM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #75
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Starting in similar fashion, we loop the cloth around our neck, over then under. It's an accessory to life.

Hello strangers. You are the eyes meant for cereal advertisements and nip slips, I feel humbled that you should take a moment to read something far more vain than that. I didn't open my eyes today. I'm in this purgatory between being an unsuccessful college student and a particularly unsuccessful adult and the perks include extended periods of standing by. This morning as my phone beeped I didn't open my eyes and used the possibly intrusive finger print scanner to turn my alarm off. As I did so, I realized that I had never before spent a whole day without opening my eyes.

I don't mean 24 hours, It was an impulse really, finding the kitchen slowly holding onto the wall. It gave me a certain satisfaction thinking that not many people had likely ever thought to try it, and then I was immediately upset by the pleasure. I sat down, eyes closed, cross legged on the floor and wondered why I cared. Don't get me wrong, I'm not at all ashamed to crave originality. There is something wonderful about doing something different, that moment when your family does renovation that you are trusted to grab the sledgehammer and bring it through old walls. I once had the idea to advertise this website by tackling the Olympic torch bearer wearing an SS t-shirt. Off track, but I remember coming up with that idea on a schoolbus home from high school. I told the girl sitting across from me whom I'd never really spoken to before and she lit up, laughed and played along asking if I would mention her name when I did it.

I think that it's almost always worth trying something new, when I finally opened my eyes it was dark. It occurred to me that blind people probably don't pay much in electricity.

And that some things you can only learn with eyes closed.

Michelle.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 01-06-2015 03:01 PM by Vatman.)
01-06-2015 03:00 PM
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Pieman Offline
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Post: #76
RE: Similar Snowflakes

(01-06-2015 03:00 PM)Vatman Wrote:  Starting in similar fashion, we loop the cloth around our neck, over then under. It's an accessory to life.

Hello strangers. You are the eyes meant for cereal advertisements and nip slips, I feel humbled that you should take a moment to read something far more vain than that. I didn't open my eyes today. I'm in this purgatory between being an unsuccessful college student and a particularly unsuccessful adult and the perks include extended periods of standing by. This morning as my phone beeped I didn't open my eyes and used the possibly intrusive finger print scanner to turn my alarm off. As I did so, I realized that I had never before spent a whole day without opening my eyes.

I don't mean 24 hours, It was an impulse really, finding the kitchen slowly holding onto the wall. It gave me a certain satisfaction thinking that not many people had likely ever thought to try it, and then I was immediately upset by the pleasure. I sat down, eyes closed, cross legged on the floor and wondered why I cared. Don't get me wrong, I'm not at all ashamed to crave originality. There is something wonderful about doing something different, that moment when your family does renovation that you are trusted to grab the sledgehammer and bring it through old walls. I once had the idea to advertise this website by tackling the Olympic torch bearer wearing an SS t-shirt. Off track, but I remember coming up with that idea on a schoolbus home from high school. I told the girl sitting across from me whom I'd never really spoken to before and she lit up, laughed and played along asking if I would mention her name when I did it.

I think that it's almost always worth trying something new, when I finally opened my eyes it was dark. It occurred to me that blind people probably don't pay much in electricity.

And that some things you can only learn with eyes closed.

Michelle.

Deep.

" I never knew until that moment how bad it could hurt to lose something you never really had. " ~From the television show The Wonder Years
01-11-2015 03:43 AM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #77
RE: Similar Snowflakes

As deep as a champagne flute.

I feel consistently disconnected from tradition. I don't tailgate, trick or treat. You wont find me in line at a Black Friday sale or waiting on Punxsutawney Phil to tell me how many weeks left of winter there will be. I hope you don't misunderstand, I love it all. I like the idea of someone smoking bratwurst before a big game and dawning a mask during marti gras. I just don't fit in.

I do toast though. I often have nothing in my glass, backwash, tap water. I take note of the different notes the glasses make when they cling together. The shift in tone varying between content and willingness to collide.

We don't exactly know where the toast came from, it may have always been there. From the first cup, first coconut? It transcends culture, it predates recorded history. The toast is at least as old as the funeral...maybe that's why we don't toast to the dead?

Often traditions speak to what is important to a people, religious ceremonies, celebrations of consumerism, candy. What does the toast say? It's acknowledgement, there is another person holding something we can reach out and touch them.

Oh I forgot to mention celebrating birthdays in that tradition list. I'll tell you all a secret; I've never make a wish as I blow out the candles.

Anyway. I wish to propose a toast, here and now.

Lets raise our glasses to being apart of something.

We have no choice in the matter.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 01-12-2015 05:51 PM by Vatman.)
01-12-2015 05:50 PM
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brainiac3397 Offline
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Post: #78
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Supposedly toasting derived from medieval paranoia. Clinking the cups together would slosh the liquid within and thus spread a poisoned drink to others, which would obviously deter someone at the table from poisoning a drink for fear they too will be poisoned.

Course one of many possibilities since not everything in history was immaculately recorded, which means that despite this being one of the older reasons...it doesn't rule out older reasons for toast clinking.

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(06-14-2013 08:02 AM)Potato Wrote:  watch the fuq out, we've got an "intellectual" over here.

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01-12-2015 05:58 PM
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Vatman Offline
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Post: #79
RE: Similar Snowflakes

I remember how sarcastic it felt when Odysseus toasted to Achilles health in the Iliad. There are many an old Nordic song referring to clanking cups predating the middle ages by thousands of years. There is even splattered evidence that Egyptians would mix their "punch" in a ceremonial toasting fashion, often with prayers to the god of tits and wine.

I always hate when teachers tell you not to use Wikipedia as a source, because they just never got it. Wikipedia isn't meant to be a singular reference, just a starting point.

Okay, boring ego stuff done. Lets talk dear readers. I'm sitting in my Market Research class. Surveys, patterns, statics, graphs. People think Amazon.com is a big deal because you can find anything there. It's not, having all these warehouses is passe, a phase one. It's knowing what you buy, how many reviews you read, what other products you looked at before settling on the iphone case you felt most fit.

We aren't mind readers, one cent spent per sale can be millions of dollars. How do I save that penny? I don't particularly like marketing; I don't like trying to quantify people. I'm guilty of many things but pandering, I don't pander. Just because you spend twenty hours per week online doesn't make you a target customer for Dr. Pepper. The cross-hairs are closing in, how much do you spend on candy in a year? I promise we know, and we are making our next Nissan commercial for you, the song that tested best with your age group, the celebrity your friends are most likely to retweet.

Its not like Mad Men. We know you, what brand of backpack you had in middle school. It doesn't seem like it should be important... but the more I fill my notebook in, the more I wonder how much of who I am is what I buy?

Twenty percent off.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 02-05-2015 07:32 AM by Vatman.)
02-05-2015 07:30 AM
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Marketing is a full time task. My last job, two guys handled online sales and the majority of their work was marketing, research and customer service.

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(06-14-2013 08:02 AM)Potato Wrote:  watch the fuq out, we've got an "intellectual" over here.

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02-05-2015 11:08 AM
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RE: Similar Snowflakes

I usually have more intent when writing these little blog posts. Inklings of a theme. I'm just rolling with it now, blindfolded and walking straight ahead determined to crash into whatever feels right first.

I remember not being able to sleep on a particularly hot and damp summer night in Seoul. It's rare to find a hotel in the US without loud and clunky air conditioning but in Korea it isn't a social norm. Even more frustrating is that fans in Korea all have hard-locked timers built into them due to a wacky superstition that leaving a fan running too long will blow every last bid of air out the room. Every fifty minutes the already shared air stream on rotate would shut down, and I would roll out of my bottom bunk, get up, and set it to its max amount of time.

Fifty minutes to fall asleep.

I didn't have much experience sleeping around strangers, my parents didn't allow me to attend the sleepover parties of my peers as a kid. I remember when questioned my mom would answer, "you have your own bed, why should you share someones couch?"

There were 15 bunk beds in the room, it's 5:30am the girl on the adjacent top bunk from me is from Hong Kong. Her English is passable, I had helped her plan her path via subway map a few days earlier in the common room. I suppose it had to be some sort of internship; she was always asleep by the time I got to the room and always managed to wake me as she stumbled by in the morning. I still remember how she was the only thing that smelled nice in that building, and while I didn't care for being woken up so early... even without opening my eyes I knew it was her passing by this morning, by the smell of Lilac.

I lounged until the fan needed to be reset and resolved that I wouldn't be sleeping any more this day. I put on athletic shorts, still wet socks from the day before, and a dark blue t-shirt that read, "Be The Change." I left the bunks behind and entered the common room and saw Seonaid laying on her stomach, legs in air, reading last months issue of Vanity Fair. There were two couches in the common room and an odd gathering of lawn chairs. The building had two large bunk-bed rooms each with 15 bunks and a small bathroom, a common room, a small unused kitchen, and a single bedroom that the owner of the building lived in, but was for rent by the hour if necessary. Seonaid noticed me come in and pointed towards the corner of the room where the owner of the building was sleeping on three lawn chairs spread out into a makeshift bed.

"I wonder who's in his room" Seonaid said, gesturing towards the private bedroom door.

I pulled up a lawn chair by the couch she was laying on, "It could be his main Cee-pal got upset with him again." The owner of the hostel who's name I've forgotten since was notorious for spending the rent money we travelers payed in cash on prostitutes. I had been at this hostel for about nine days and more than once had been disturbed by one of his "SHE-PHALL" throwing some sort of fit after the owner had disputed their payment or whatever else can go wrong when dealing in this sort of trade.

"I don't think so, I saw the owner at the disco last night and the door to the room was already closed when I got back." Seonaid replied not taking her eyes off the magazine. Seonaid lived in Texas before she started traveling, she was a senior in college when her grandmother died, and the semester before she was to graduate she found out that her mom had been holding a good deal of money that was meant for her. Seonaid managed to get ahold of a chunk of the pot and had been traveling ever since. Over the next six years she had traveled to six continents and over 60 countries.

As I watched her flip past the advertisements in the magazine I realized that this was a hostel common room to me, it was Seonaid's living room.

She planned for this to be a laundry day for her, or at least I had gathered that from her complaining to me that she had been wearing the same bra for a month. I was going to visit Lotte World, and she told me to bring a change of shirt. I ended up not taking her advice, and later as I was shivering in line for the aquarium I cursed myself for not heeding her advice in my sweat drenched clothes.

The door to the private roomed opened up and a shirtless Brian came out and hopped onto the front end of the couch ontop of Seonaid's magazine. Brian put a finger to his lips and Seonaid and I both tried to peek into private room to see who in the world would accompany Brian. I leaned as far off the lawn chair as I could and saw a Korean girl laying in teal underwear on the bed. I looked at Brian and he nodded his head proudly.

"Who is she?" Seonaid asked

"A local?" I asked as well, not really knowing the entirety of the hostels occupants that well.

Brian loudly whispered, "My mate Dylan had her other Korean girl tell um she fancied my haircut. You'll bet I'll give mi Dresser a tip when I get home."

I had known Brian from a hostel in Busan and had come up into Seoul before him, it was a coincidence that we found ourselves in the same hostel again. I had thought Brian didn't like me much, as when he was looking for people to see Gyeongbokgung temple with; he hadn't invited me although I had expressed an interested in going. (I saw it later with a Samoan/Mexican gentlemen I had met through Seonaid)

With some pushing from Seonaid to get off her magazine, Brian got up and tip toed over to the door and closed it and then returned to sit next to me on another lawn chair.

I asked Brian what her name was and he had thought it was, "Sung-min." That seemed likely to me, alot of Korean girls names were Sung something. I had asked the question kind of spitefully, and I think he picked up on it. "Look she was all over me, she spent alot of time talking about the British actors she liked." Seonaid chuckled and punched him in the shoulder playfully and got up adjusting her tank top as she stood. "I've got to go grab my clothes. Vatman, make sure to bring an extra shirt."

Oh it happened in that order. I guess I don't know where this story is going. Brian and I somehow ended up talking about how his parents had died a few years earlier, about the restaurant they left him and how his uncle was running it while he traveled. I think I was struck by how this immature seeming guy could get his life together following such a tragedy. I also wondered how I had gone from feeling snubbed to having an intimate conversation with him while his one night stand slept.

Abit later Sung-Min woke up and joined us wearing just a long slightly sheer shirt and sitting on Brians lap. Her english was very good and I used the opportunity of having a local to have her help me find this shrine I was looking for that didn't seem to be on any tourist map.

She was a big help, and later while I sat by a large wooden statue of a raccoon. I wondered if this were to be a story, who the main character would have been?

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 02-19-2015 07:37 AM by Vatman.)
02-19-2015 07:35 AM
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Vatman Offline
Foreplay in Ink

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Post: #82
RE: Similar Snowflakes

The snow melts and my shoes are wet.

Six big tests, what should I do during spring break? Remember not to drain all of the pasta water; the starch helps bind the pasta to the sauce.

I've been eating an apple a day my dear school survivors. One paper after another, bibliographies and MLA format. I realized sometime in high school that you are only ever writing the same paper over and over again. Knowing this I made templates. Thesis, supporting paragraphs, conclusion. Wording between points, I have separate pre-laid formats where I simply madlib the topic and my varying points into the document. I'm a senior in college and I'm still using the same templates with pretty consistent success.

I should thank the university system for helping me develop my new trick. Write one paper.

Classes all follow a syllabus that generally defines the kind of assignments a class will have in a given semester. I simply pick the classes that have papers on a topic that is flexible enough for me to have to write one paper for multiple classes. I have one paper on the nucebo effect I wrote in 2012 that I've handed in eight times now.

That isn't even my most handed in paper. It makes me wonder...what if I wrote a short sentence so flexible that I could use it in any situation forgoing all other speech.

I love you.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 03-16-2015 01:39 PM by Vatman.)
03-12-2015 05:46 AM
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Ky Offline
Shadow

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Post: #83
Similar Snowflakes

Flexible short sentence, huh? I'm a fan of these two: "So, it has come to this." and "What do you think?"

Public Service Announcement: First world problems are still problems.
03-12-2015 05:55 AM
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Aureate Offline
Renegade

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Given 86 thank(s) in 36 post(s)
Post: #84
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Previously, I had so few "Thanks" that recipients would always recognize the weight of my gratitude. It would be as if you, Vatman, deemed a second post worthy of such acknowledgement; the person whose thoughts it graced would surely find its value incomparable to that of the forum frequenter with thousands under his belt. The former would be equivalent to worship, while the latter might amount to the tip of a hat.

Since curiosity drew me to this eccentric blog, I have dispensed so many "Thanks" that I can only guess what damage their meaning has sustained, and what feeble iota of attention they might command when this thread has finally run its course.

Yet I feel strangely compelled to offer another:

Thank you.
03-12-2015 10:57 AM
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brainiac3397 Offline
Machiavellian Amoeba

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Post: #85
Similar Snowflakes

I still have so few thanks.(given)

Personality DNA Report
(06-14-2013 08:02 AM)Potato Wrote:  watch the fuq out, we've got an "intellectual" over here.

Hidden stuff:
[Image: watch-out-we-got-a-badass-over-here-meme-240x180.png]
Brainiac3397's Mental Health Status Log Wrote:[Image: l0Iy5HKskJO5XD3Wg.gif]
(This post was last modified: 03-12-2015 11:45 AM by brainiac3397.)
03-12-2015 11:44 AM
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Vatman Offline
Foreplay in Ink

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Post: #86
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Who is to say what problems can't be solved from a particularly ornate carpeting. Rags to dishes, what wont Windex clean?

An older friend of mine closed on a house with his girlfr....fiance. I was invited, as the morning; to brighten the old place up. Something about empty rooms and the echo of small talk makes a man think. Do we have to clean behind the washing machine? What color should we paint the mud room? Why does mortgage sound so much like the morgue?

What is home really? Disney reminds us often that home is where you are surrounded by people who love you; but what about those people immigrating to new lands to pursue their passions, what about those who are in all actuality: alone. Those people exist, have homes, and are worth mentioning not only to make a point.

Homes are often unfinished, homes are non-permanent, homes can be uncomfortable. I think a home must be where we feel like can feel like ourselves, even if there aren't four or more walls around us.

_________________________________________

Golden Boy,

The damage is done. You've exposed me to the world. I have a timorous nature with the endlessly updated features of the online world. I remember distinctly how trapped I felt in 140 characters, my heart a flitter.

I feel embarrassed that with all the thankfulness I feel for this forum and its members that I didn't even notice till this moment that the "thanks" feature existed. I in fact read your (very handsomely written) message four times trying to figure out what in the world you were talking about until I realized braniac was responding to you.

The question now is which post did I thank? Was it a confession of relinquished lover...a comment on political inequality, perhaps someone talking about how they aren't allowed out on the weekend.

The weekends ends.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
03-23-2015 05:44 AM
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Vatman Offline
Foreplay in Ink

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Post: #87
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Twelve dollars and forty-nine cents to print eight hundred business cards.

The common business card is three and a half by two inches. It should have the givers name, company or business affiliation (usually with a logo) and contact information. "You should print business cards, it would give you an edge over all the other people interviewing.!" I'm told by the son of my grandmothers cousin. Since I graduated college every person I tell congratulates me with one hand and offers professional advice while making deep eye contact. There was something socially coveted about being a perpetual college slacker, something envious in their tone when I'd say, "I'm still in school." and they would say, "Live it up while you can." or "stay in school as long as possible" and I'd give an acknowledging chuckle where I'd both be avoiding the social pressure of moving on to financial self-sustaining adulthood and espousing the mythical property's of the "college experience"

You should keep your business card as efficient and organized as possible to show the recipient that you have a structured sense of decision-making and take yourself seriously as a professional. I've had a switch in perspective since I graduated. I used to think that I was capable of doing well based on my competency and my passion of which I could dedicate it's charms upon whatever subject I fancied. Something's changed though.

I no longer believe I can do anything on my own. Every step in life has to surpass the barrier of someone hoping they can get an extra fifteen minutes on their lunch break. Interviews for apartments, interviews for jobs, interviews to use this goddamn hipster supermarket. Since when did I have to prove myself to the background characters in my narrative?

Business cards are printed on some form of card stock, the visual effect, method of printing, cost and other details varying according to cultural or organizational norms and personal preferences. I'm not totally lost, I knew this is what life was in the pleasant nine to five world. You see sitcom characters navigate it through laughtracks, my parents ploping on the couch exhausted. I had the map, but now that I'm trying to find my way it feels like I'm exploring Antarctica in crocs and a Darth Vadar onesie.

In an international world, it is more and more important to have different language printings on the opposite side. I wonder if it's not what I want though. To be approved by the HR departments of the world; the blue, black, and grey clad stories waiting for the commuter train to arrive around sunrise. If I handed you one of my eight hundred business cards, could you see past my rehearsed smile? Would my professional email and work phone number tell you where to reach my hopes?

Traditionally many cards were simple black text on white stock; today a professional business card will sometimes include one or more aspects of striking visual design. I'm overdramatic as always, I know. I've had to fit in before, and it isn't something that goes away over time. I somehow thought though that if I could be enough of myself, I wouldn't be black text on white stock. I am though, and it horrifies me.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 03-02-2016 08:54 PM by Vatman.)
03-02-2016 08:52 PM
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Vatman Offline
Foreplay in Ink

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Post: #88
RE: Similar Snowflakes

About a year ago I started working at an advertising agency. I wore a sweater over my tucked-in button down. I shined my shoes in the morning and rehearsed what I would say, "It's not Gin, it's a lap dance." It's the whiff of her perfume, the flow of her body. I would explain that the eye contact a bartender gives and the one from a woman with gyrating hips are equal. They are apart of the same ritual - anticipation. I would click the next slide and the image our design team prepared would show up behind me.

The client has been pressured to increase their sales with the male demographic. They don't think it can be done, and to be honest... I don't either. So I give them something human. Their bosses can latch on to it, I can quote sales metrics on anticipation based marketing in the 18-35 male demo.

I was fired last week. It was inevitable. It's not Gin, it's a sinking ship. Afterwards I drove to the beach; I took off my shoes that wouldn't shine on a cloudy day. I moved my feet in the sand, my toes make zen gardens.

I think I'm going to spend some time traveling, I'm not sure where I'm going to go, how far, or how long. I somehow thought that by age 26 I would know what I wanted to do with my life.

That's a lie.

I knew I was lost. I never had any grasp on it. The routine of waking up, dressing up, seeing the same people... It's so tangible. I think I understand how people can do it everyday - you forget how alone you are when people depend on you.

I don't have to tell you this, you know it. I get angry though, thinking about how I'll never know you. Not really. The surface maybe, but beyond that? I know it isn't hollow, but when I try and tap it

I hear the void.

Some cupid kills with arrows, some with traps.
(This post was last modified: 11-23-2016 06:14 PM by Vatman.)
11-23-2016 06:14 PM
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Username Offline
Drunkard

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Post: #89
RE: Similar Snowflakes

Fuck girls.
11-24-2016 02:30 AM
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vonunov Offline
Badgrr

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Post: #90
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Please check out everything2.com and see if you're inspired to contribute. At least crosspost these day logs. They'll love it. This is precisely the flavor of thing e2 eats up. Biggrin
(This post was last modified: 11-24-2016 04:35 AM by vonunov.)
11-24-2016 04:34 AM
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