Truth or Dare

I really hate the game Truth or Dare. I never played, because before I was ever invited to join in elementary school, I would sit nearby and listen to my classmates play it. It never once sounded like fun to me. Some people may argue that you get respect for doing gross dares or admitting hard truths; but the way I always saw it, the person doing the hard stuff was only being made fun of.

Why on earth would I ever consent to lick the bottom of someone's shoe, or answer a rigged yes or no question like 'does your mother know such-and-such?' The part that came after 'know' could be the most outrageous lie ever, but the real question was if the mother knew it or not.

I was once promised that no matter what truth or dare I was asked, it wouldn't be as bad as the stuff they were making the others do. I maybe believed that person, because they seemed to have more respect for me than for each other. However, I was not willing to take that risk.

Am I a chicken for not playing? I guess others get to decide that, but the decision won't affect my own choice. I don't trust the people asking the questions or making the dare, so I don't play. Problem solved.

You know, in general, I just hate dares. They don't make any sense to me. When I'm reading about dares in books and such, it can make the story more interesting, but I always just groan at the kid who does whatever s/he was dared to do.

In my personal life, I can only remember being dared once to do something. I was in high school, and my class was trying to get everyone to sing the national anthem - as solos. When the lyrics came to me, I sort of debated whether I wanted to try it or not. I don't know about you, but I honestly don't know how to judge my own singing voice. My mom once told me it was okay, so I guess I'll just trust her.

Anyways, as I was sitting there debating, an upperclassman sitting to my right 'double-dog dared' me to sing it. I instantly passed the lyrics sheet to him without another glance.

I honestly just don't understand why people think dares are such a big deal. It's just a word. It's just someone saying, 'I want you to do this because I think it'd be cool/funny/psychotic.' Take your pick of adjectives. My response to dares, plain and simple, is no.

Brainstorming

Hm, so what should I put in here this morning? (I know what you're thinking: Oh, great, she's being indecisive again. Yes, unfortunately, I am.)

Let's see... I'm pretty much just typing as I think of words, so maybe today's topic could be listing topics? I don't know how much I can come up with, but if I can even come up with just one thing, maybe it could provide me with something to talk about today or tomorrow.

I've been told that books reviews could make a good blog post. I've seen several blogs with a main theme. Could my theme be books? According to Goodreads dot com, I've read more than two hundred books.

Or maybe I could type about grammar. I wouldn't say I'm obsessed with it, because there are times I purposely break grammar rules. But I do like to make sure to avoid mistakes. Same with spelling, but spellcheck has taken that joy (or responsibility) away from us.

I don't like a lot of books that seem to be "classics." I don't like The Scarlet Letter. Just no. I don't really care for Silas Marner, but then again we never finished it in class. Is Narnia considered among the classics? If so, that's something I do enjoy. Narnia is awesome, at least for the first few books.

What about chocolate? I wrote a blog about purple the other day. Maybe I could come up with enough chocolate-related stuff to make a blog about chocolate. Yum. Three Musketeers. Hershey's bar. M&M's. -blissful sigh-

Okay, there's no way I can on a better note than chocolate. Unless maybe Disney. Which I just added. So the end is now, people. Until next time! *curtain falls*

Late

Yeah, my post is kind of late today; sorry about that. You probably don't want to hear the details, but here they are anyways.

I was late getting up this morning. Instead of getting up to lightning bolts flashing across my darkened vision, I woke to thunder crashing in my ears. We all know lightning is faster than thunder, right?

I was late getting dressed this morning. I'm not even sure how this happened, but my clothes started running away from me. And I wear skirts, too, so it's not even like they had legs. Maybe my socks aided in the jail-break. Or my shirt's sleeves dragged itself and the skirt away.

I was late getting breakfast this morning. I couldn't find any fruit, though I searched high and low. Then, silly me, I realized I was at home instead of college. And who on earth keeps fruit in their kitchens at home? Duh, Kaiti.

I was late doing homework. We've all been there, right? I don't even have to tell you what I went through with my dog.

I was late having lunch. It exploded. Created a crater half the size of Alaska. 'Nuff said.

I was late looking up Disney quotes. It turns out, the longer you wait to look them up, the more that get added. What's up with that? Certainly has nothing to do with there being a new movie released every time I turn around, right? Glad you agree.

Yes, I'm weird. Thank you for pointing that out. I had to come up with something to put here today, after all. Did you like it? Or am I too weird?

I attract purple elephants via telepathy. Just FYI.

Big Sister

Hmm, I wonder if it's Internet safe to talk about this. How many colleges give you a big sister when you ask?

Oh well, I'll tell you about mine anyways.

I'm not an only child; I have a younger brother. But when I moved to college, I gained a big sister, too. There was a certain week this semester that all the big sisters ran around secretly pinning notes and gifts to their little sisters' doors. I got so much awesomeness that week, you don't even know.

She gave me chocolate the first day. Could life get any better?

But then the next day she pinned a self-made poster to my door with the most amazing quote on it! It totally made my day!

Then I got a necklace, which I now wear daily. x3

And finally, I got a very official-looking gift; in a bag with tissue paper and everything. What do you call something that's also handmade but then framed and oh-so wonderful and beautiful? Anyways, I got that and a blue cup, discovering then that blue was her favorite color. n_n

That night, all the big and little sisters got dressed up and went to a thing (is it labeled a party when there's music and snacks?) to find out who their secret big sister was. I met my big sister - and it turned out I have a twin sister, too! (She had two little sisters: me and one of my fellow firstyears.)

Such funness. Too bad it's over, but I still see my big sister around campus sometimes. Life is good.

-Please Hold-

This author is currently freaking out over homework and otherwise close-to-due assignments. Please wait while she works desperately to get ahead of the game again. Thank you.

PS- This is most definitely not a result of her staying out late catching criminals with Robin and tracking down Robin's suitemate the Joker. Don't even consider that, please.

PPS- You wouldn't want to ruin her secret, would you?

PPPS- Not that there's any secret to ruin. Of course.

PPPPS- Just leave now, would you?

PPPPPS- Yeah, this is getting old, isn't it?

PPPPPPS- Okay. Yeah. Bye.

Purple

Purple is the color of royalty. It signifies wealth, magic, mystery, ambition. It's the color of imagination and spirituality. It combines the stability of blue and the energy of red.

The above are all answers Google provided me with, and I must say I disagree with none of it.

Yes, I am a Purpleologist. For you uncool people who don't know that term, it means "lover of all things purple." ;)

Purple has more or less taken over my life. There's one way it's a huge part of my life, but I'm not sure if divulging that would break the rules of Internet safety or not. So let's move on.

My room is filled with purple. Excuse me, rooms. At home and at college, my bed is made with purple-containing sheets and blankets.

At home, I have purple curtains. Or drapes. Or whatever you call those things that are meant to look nice on windows but not actually block out the light.

At school, I have a purple shower curtain that I put over my closet.

I have purple rubber bands that I don't use for my hair. Instead, I tie my flash cards together with them. (Sorry, Mom.)

I have a purple-ish hairbrush that I do actually use on my hair.

A good portion of my shirts are purple. One of my skirts is purple. My dress is purple.

Two of my Bibles are purple.

And all of the framed (or otherwise elevated from just lying around) pictures in my college room have purple strategically integrated somehow.

So, yeah. Purple. Awesomeness. =D

Random Questions

So last night I had what I think was a thought but it might have been part of a dream... Yeah, not sure. Anyways, it was about scientists, generally mad scientists, often those that tend to experiment on themselves.

Scientists generally make vlogs to track their experiment's progress, right? Or do only the ones in sci-fi stuff do that? At any rate, what I was wondering was this: why is it always obvious to the viewer that the experiment is going to blow up in the scientist's face, while the scientist (also test subject in some cases) always thinks it's the greatest thing ever?

Okay, okay, when the scientist is the test subject, I suppose it can addle his brain or something. But still.

Also, when it blows up and the research facility is trashed, why is it always the video camera (or the thing that shows what the camera recorded) that is the sole surviving technology of the place? Does it know it's the only thing that can provide witness, and therefore purposely avoid breaking?

Not that I'm complaining. These stories are very suspenseful when the hero finds the clip that has the scientist talking like a lunatic, then the video cuts off abruptly and goes to static, often when background screaming ensues (whether the screaming is in the video or behind the hero, it doesn't matter).

However, maybe someone should at some point make a vlog on how they have a bad feeling about the experiment from the start and the evidence coming in is only confirming that, so they pack up all their stuff and destroy the research and move back home. It would save heroes a lot of trouble in the end if they had one less potentially deadly site and/or lunatic to deal with.

Busy, Boring Life

Yeah, so I'm kind of already starting to run out of things to talk about. I'm in college, yes, and I'm busy, yes. But do I consider my life interesting? No, not really.

I have yet to decide on a major, so I'm just taking the general education courses for now. On the bright side, the college I attend is actually glad I'm coming in as undecided, since people tend to declare one quickly, decide it's not for them, and change it two or three times.

Maybe English would be a good major for me. It sounds so vague, but people say you can do anything with an English major.

I've been told Communications would be a good one for a lot of stuff, too.

Another helpful major would probably be foreign languages. I just got through telling you about my transition difficulty from Spanish to French, and honestly I don't know if a foreign language major would require me to take both. However, being bilingual would really help in a lot of stuff too, right? Or maybe I could just minor in French. Well, we'll see.

Just don't try to put me in as a Biology major. For those of you who do it, congratulations. I really admire that, and I'm sure you'll have no shortage of job opportunities, right? But it's just not for me.

There are probably tons of other majors I haven't even thought of. Art major? Music major? Is there such thing as a History major?

Anyways. Yeah, this is my life. Busy with school and indecisive about school. And now this indecisiveness is leaking into my blog. But I can at least blame my indecisiveness on my being a girl, right? Right. ...Right?

Spanish and French

Spanish and French are so alike but so different simultaneously. I learned bits of Spanish throughout my childhood, then I took two years of it in high school. Now in college, I'm switching over to French.

Personally, I think that Spanish is easier, if only because of word pronunciation. "Catorce," which is fourteen in Spanish, is pronounced just like it's spelled: ca-tor-say. The French word is just similar enough to confuse me in both memorization and pronunciation: "quatorze." Because I'm switched from "English" mode to "foreign language" mode when trying to read this, I immediately rebound onto Spanish rules and try to say qua-tor-zay. But no, French doesn't work that way; it's ca-torz.

Hrm, listen to me complaining. Shame on me. French really is awesome, and I'm excited to be able to speak some sentences with it. I've recently been assigned more verbs to learn, so soon I'll be able to do a lot more.

Besides, switching from Spanish to French was a choice, not something mandatory. At my church, anyone who speaks a foreign language speaks French; and I'm pretty sure that most if not all of them learned French first, English second. I switched so that I could communicate with them in their native tongue, and I don't regret my choice at all. (And it doesn't hurt that I get to practice on them, either.)

Well, that's about it for today, I guess. Bottom line: French is awesome.

A demain! (See you tomorrow!)

News vs. Entertainment

I actively try to avoid newspapers and online news sources. Why? Everyone wants to put the world's problems and dirt into each of the stories. Gun control. Syria. Important stuff, granted, but not interesting to people like me. The only "good news" I've ever seen was an advertisement for a concert in which a really old violin would be played. (I've heard that old age in a violin is a really great thing; they reach their highest potential about a century or so after they were made. Whether this is true or not, I can only guess that my source (anime) was being honest.)

So instead of news, I focus on the fun stuff.

Games. Harvest Moon and Rune Factory are so oddly addicting. Animal Crossing can be an interesting challenge, too.

Videos. Nancy Drew walkthroughs by Arglefumph are the best. In fact, just plain Arglefumph tends to be pretty amazing.

Books. The Mysterious Benedict Society. The Seer and the Sword. Awakenings. Must-reads.

Movies - mostly if they're Disney. Or Dreamworks. I can be talked into the superhero stuff (Marvel and DC Comics are the two big ones, right?) if it's something I get to do with my family.

Recently I had to write a paper on What I Read, See, Hear, and Care About. My mind immediately translated that to 'news.' Indeed, many of my classmates chose topics that are circulating throughout America today.

But then (bless her) my teacher told me it doesn't have to be anything in magazines or newspapers. Just so long as you could link it to today's world, you could choose anything under the sun.

Guess what I chose? Entertainment! More specifically, fairytale retelling! Even more specifically, Little Red Riding Hood.

Have you guessed the most specific yet? I did mention it in my first post.

Hoodwinked! (Cue applause.) Thank you, thank you.

What would you have written about if you'd been given this assignment?

Names

I've grown up knowing that names have power; another wording is that people tend to take on the nature of their names.

Last year in my high school life skills class, my teacher had all of us look up the meanings of our names. She commented later on how each of our names seemed to fit us "to a T." For me, that was no surprise, but it was always cool when confirmation of what I was taught came along.

Sometimes I feel like I take it to almost an extreme in that I can't even name my fictional characters without knowing the name meaning and making sure it fit. But a couple years before I started doing that, back when I first started role playing online, my characters never seemed to turn out in practice the way I specifically described them in their biographies. The general information and personalities would stay the same, but I would often be surprised when typing out their actions and thoughts. One character ended up lonelier than I would have thought. Another more bullheaded.

Since I've begun looking up names beforehand, though, that gap between biographies and actual role play has lessened. I can't say it's vanished completely, but it has definitely lessened.

I see a pattern there. Do you think it's just coincidence? Have I just gotten better at fleshing out characters via biography? Could be, I suppose. Regardless, I'll continue looking up name meanings before assigning them to anyone or anything.

-----------------

Shifting for a moment from name meanings to names as identities, I'd like to share a story about my own name. Kaitlin. Nice and simple, right? Kaiti. Weird spelling, but easy enough to say.

My problem used to be this: Am I Kaiti or Kaitlin?

I am Kaitlin at school and when I'm in trouble. I am Kaiti at home and at church. Everyone knew that. Everyone knew me.

But then I started going to different places. I met new people. And these new people started expecting me to speak for myself when they asked, "What's your name?" And in that split second before I responded, I forgot whether I was supposed to be Kaiti or Kaitlin. So my response would often come out a strangled, "Kaitlee." And these poor strangers would have to try to decipher what I meant.

Now I think I'm finding firmer ground again. Being at college five days a week, going home only on weekends, I'm Kaitlin almost constantly. No one at church has to ask for my name; they all know me by now.

So yesterday, when asked for my name from a lady who works at my college, I was able to confidently say, "Kaitlin."

Please excuse me while I pat myself on the back.

This Is Me

So I created this blog on what some might call a whim, but I think it will become gradually more important to me. I want to increase my writing skills, and what better way to do that than to write and write and write about just anything?

This first one should probably be about me, though. It sounds selfish even to me, so let's get it over with quickly.

My name is Kaitlin - or Kaiti, if you would rather. I am a college firstyear, and I am a female American citizen. And I'm secretly Batman.

I read. Gail Carson Levine, Shannon Hale, Victoria Hanley, and Trenton Lee Stewart are the authors I like and from whom I have read multiple works. But perhaps I should mention that my all-time favorite Author is God.

I write. I'm starting a blog (clearly). And I have a fanfiction.net account; but no, I will not tell you my penname. Maybe later, but for now I want to enjoy anonymity.

I crochet. I've made blankets, shawls, purses, bookmarks, and even some necklaces.

I do different accents. Sometimes British, sometimes Irish, sometimes Scottish, sometimes southern, and I think I've even attempted Australian before. Also, for those of you who know the movie Hoodwinked, I have a bad habit of mimicking Japheth.

Disney is awesome. Don't even try to dispute that point. Just don't.

I draw. Mostly just Hamtaro and friends, and the occasional anime original character.

I love you. Because I just do.

And I look forward to seeing where this blog takes me. ;)