"I Don't Do Sketches From Memory"

So yesterday was a day for the comics. First, I had a comic featured over at Stripper's Corner (which sounds dirtier than it actually is). Then I had a comic featured in the Oklahoma Daily, and someone actually sent me an email in regards to said comic (and the email contained words of praise, no less!). Also, the girl I submit comics to at the paper sent me an email about some College Cartoonist Award thing I'm going to try for. So there was a lot of comical love goin' down for the ol' Chuck yesterday.

And now I have another comic in the newspaper again today. I actually rule that paper now, they just don't realize it yet. I keep wondering if the other "cartoonists" (having seen their work, I use that term loosely) are going to just quit. I wish they would; it would mean I didn't have to share my space with hacks.

That's all sounding a lot more conceited than I originally planned, but the fact of the matter is, the rest of the people who do comics here just...aren't really that good. Either their art is crappy (one guy in particular has a style that's way too jagged and has too many corners, while another has characters who always look like this even when they haven't beaten their heads against a filing cabinet) or the comic's just aren't funny, or they're so specific to a certain time, place, and group, that only about five people are even going to chuckle at the damn thing. Then again, I've been trying to draw comics since I was in high school, and I also have existing characters with clearly-defined personalities to work with already. I'm just sort of advantaged in the comiking, I guess.

Anyway, these are all just small steps in my plan to take over the world with humor. The next step is to convince people to pay me to draw funny pictures. Once that's going, then all will be well. Or something.

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: The Wallflowers, "Into the Mystic"

"What Planet Is This?"

Well, I'm starting to finally get in a better mood, though I'm still not entirely sure why I was so depressed/moody all of last week. Perhaps it was the change in the weather, or the fact that I was only able to run like twice (legs were killing me, and weather was not permitting), or maybe just a bunch of crap happened right at the beginning of the week that colored the rest of the week in shades of gray, black, and other murky neutral tones.

Anyway, in the finest tradition of my rants, I'm gonna make fun of stupid people, because they're so damn plentiful and make it too damn easy.

The first person I want to attack/berate/make fun of is this guy who writes for the school paper. I won't mention his name, because it's not really pertinent, but suffice to say he's got high ideas of himself and a low opinion of anyone who disagrees with him. He's also an English major, so I think that might have something to do with his basic pompous nature.

Well, on Friday last, this guy wrote an article for the paper advocating paying the student athletes for all the hard work they do. Because the full scholarships, room and board, and special perks (like having someone like me available to proofread their papers for them) aren't enough. Because having their books provided, laptops loaned to them by the school, and receiving a free education isn't enough compensation. No, since this guy maintains that student athletes have to work twice as hard as regular students to maintain decent grades, and since he believes most student athletes think they'll go on to play professionally (even though [1] he admits that only about 1% of them will and [2] most of them don't actually think that, except for a lot of the football players), we ought to give them monetary compensation. Basically, he wants to pay them for having delusions of grandeur.

If the school's gonna do that, I want them to start paying me because I think I might be able to become a syndicated cartoonist someday, or at least be able to live off my comic (and hey, if I can convince them to pay me, I will be able to, just as the student athletes would be professional ones if they were paid. That's sorta how "professional" is defined: you get paid to do it). The idea is actually rather perverse, I thought, and I was offended down to my very soul by the idea.

Hell, here's an idea--why don't we get rid of all the student athletes and just hire professional athletes? We wouldn't have to give them room and board, or provide them with the academic center, or pretend we're interested in educating them like we do the student athletes (because I'm fairly certain most of the coaches and administration at this school are only paying lip service to the idea of "they're here for education." They're really here to bring the university lots of money). It's the perfect set up; all it lacks is common sense and a healthy dose of reality.

That was rather therapeutic.

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: Yoko Kanno & the Seatbelts, "Space Lion"

"What's Up Sweetcakes"

Do you ever wonder why people sometimes feel melancholy? Why sometimes we're depressed for no reason? Why does the weather affect our moods? If it's sunny outside, we tend to smile more, or if it's dreary and gray, we feel blah and under the weather (no pun intended...I don't think). There's something about late fall and into winter that makes you want to stay in bed all day, not move, not face the outside world. It makes me not want to jog, or leave the apartment until at least my birthday. By the same token, nasty weather (such as rain or snow) always makes me want to move. When I'm restricted to the apartment because of the precipitation, it makes me want to defy that, to go out and go somewhere. I always want to take a road trip when the weather's at its worst, because logic and common sense dictate that I ought to bunker down and wait for everything to blow over.

I was flipping through my photo album this afternoon, looking at the pictures of my friends from these recent years. Looking at all the smiles, all the good times, the moments captured in 3" x 5". It's funny, but most of the pictures are from the last few weeks of school my senior year and graduation, both mine and the one from 2003 (when several of my friends graduated). There aren't many pictures from the four years I actually spent at the school, just from the last few moments I was there. I think that's a part of human nature--while we're in the middle of something, we don't ever think of it ending. In a way, I thought I'd always be with that group of people at Ozarks, that nothing would ever change, that we'd always be there. When it dawned on me that this wasn't going to be the case (I tried to deny it up until about two or three weeks before graduating), I attempted to hurriedly collect evidence that I'd been there for four years, tangible memories and memorabilia to commemorate my time at that place with those people.

I graduate from OU in about seven months. In the almost year and a half that I've been here so far, I've made some rather close friends, people whom I don't want to let go of. And I have nothing tangible to show that I've known them so far, no physical evidence that they've been a part of my life except the occasional faint smile I wear on my face when thinking about them. I need to find my camera. I need to correct this inequity.

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: Yoko Kanno & the Seatbelts, "Ask DNA"

"On Certain Sundays In November"

I find it hard to believe it's already November. Thanksgiving is only a few weeks away. Christmas and the New Year are just around the corner. My final semester here at OU is only two and half months away from beginning. It's hard to imagine I've already been here almost a year and a half.

Each day marks the longest I've remained in one place since I started college. Oh, sure, I kept the same dorm room for three years at Ozarks. Even had the same roommate(s), Chris and JP. But we always had to move out for Christmas (though we could leave our stuff there) and completely in the Summer, stuff and all, only to haul it all back up three flights of stairs in August again (and that was always hell, let me tell you). When I started attending OU, I lived at home because I hadn't had time to look for an apartment in Norman. I'd been in Yellowstone all summer and only found out I was attending OU my last day in the park; when would I have had time to apartment hunt? But the last week of September, I found the apartment at Parkview. They let me move in, and I started living there full time the first week of October. I'm still there, having lived in the same place through the summer for once. That's a little odd to me, but comforting, too. It's nice having a single place to always come back to, someplace a bit more permanent than a dormroom.

Don't get me wrong--after three years, that room in McLean Hall was starting to feel like home. We always had the same room, I always had the same bedroom in our room (it was a little modified suite--a common room and two little bedrooms). There was continuity there. We'd hang up the same posters again, though each year there were new additions (I still remember when Chris got the Army of Darkness movie poster. That was one of my favorites). When I left Ozarks, it felt like I was leaving home. Especially since the home I was returning to never did feel like a real home. See, my parents moved over Christmas my Junior year at Ozarks, and the house we moved in to lacked a bedroom for yours truly. I sleep in the study when I go back to Shawnee. It's called my room, but there's always a part of me that feels it's not home anymore. Instead, it's where my parents live. Not to mention the fact that the longest I've actually stayed there since we moved has been about a month. The summer between Junior and Senior year was spent on the road with my dad every week, so I was only home for the weekends. The next summer was spent at Yellowstone, and we left only a week after school got out. So the longest I ever stayed at home was when I came back from Yellowstone and lived there for part of August and September.

So I guess I'm developing an attachment to my apartment, despite its rather ghetto-esque appearance and general feel. The toilet doesn't work well, there's no central air, the heater sounds arthritic, the floors are ancient linoleum that I can't keep clean unless I'm willing to sweep and mop every other day (which I'm not), and I can hear the train every time it goes by or the football game whenever we're having one. Despite all these things, the place kinda feels like home. It fits around me like a second, clunky skin of mortar and concrete and aging building materials. It's not the prettiest or most comfortable place in the world, but it's a place to call my own, a space for me, and I'm content with that.

All of which means I really do not want to move come May. But I'll kinda have to, or in late July/early August at the latest. Why? Because it's on to the next school. May seems like the most likely time to move because that's when my lease ends, and I don't want to have to sign a new one just to stay there a couple of months. But at the same time, I have nowhere to store all the stuff I've accumulated there, no place to put it at home. I'm a bit torn as to what to do, to be honest. But I guess that'll all be taken care of as it comes up. No point trying to burn bridges I haven't crossed yet. No, that sort of behavior is only suitable for bridges that've been crossed, because that means then I can't go backwards.

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: Rhett Miller, "This is what I do"

"I Gave Her My Best Kiss She Gave It Back Again"

I retook the GRE this morning up in Oklahoma City. It's been almost two years since the last time I took it, back on December 26, 2001. At 8:00 in the morning. Eight o'clock in the morning the day after Christmas is a hell of a time to be taking the GRE. Noon on Halloween is much better.

I've basically spent the day in isolation. Since I took the GRE this morning instead of working, I didn't see anyone from work (including coworkers and athletes). I've seen people in the bank, the GRE testing facility, and on the road, but I really haven't had any conversations with anyone. I haven't smiled at anyone today, though I did laugh at some of the stuff my father said over the telephone earlier this evening. But a phone conversation just isn't the same. All the friends I'd have hung out with this evening had prior engagements--either dinners, get togethers with other people, in Arkansas or some other distant state, or attending parties I wasn't invited to or wouldn't be comfortable at. So it's another solo Halloween, just as last year was. That's okay, though--I watched anime instead, and now I'm going to go work on grad school apps (almost got 'em done, thankfully).

The sad thing is, I really need to sort of prepare myself to deal with a lot of isolation. Come May, I graduate from OU. Come August, I'll (hopefully) be attending a university in some other state: either Missouri, Virginia, Ohio, or Wisconsin. I don't really know many people in any of them (I know one person in Missouri, and a few in Virginia, but the person I know in Missouri doesn't live anywhere near St. Louis, and I'm not even sure if the school in Virginia would enable me to pursue my teaching goals). The fact of the matter is, I'm going to be heading off for parts basically unknown in less than a year. Not only that, my discipline is such that I probably won't encounter many people on a social basis. Sure, I'll see people in classes, I'll see people in whatever apartment complex I live in, and I'm sure I'll even get to know a couple of them. But will I be able to form the bonds I have at Ozarks, or even here at OU? The only reason I know most of the people I know here is because I met them through an old high school friend or I already knew them (mostly because they were former Ozarks students like myself). I've only met one person here who is completely unconnected to anyone else I knew prior to coming here, and I work with him. We were sort of thrown into a situation where we had to interact, and it just so happened that we got along and there were circumstances allowing us to just sit around and chat aimlessly for hours, discovering we had quite a bit in common (and that I amused him, something I apparently do quite well for many people).

The fact is, I don't really make friends that easily. It's not that I'm not a friendly, easy-going person, or difficult to like, or anything like that. Part of it is that I'm an introvert, and my basic response to meeting new people is to either withdraw into my shell or make quiet, wry comments until the person laughs. So far, I've basically gotten by on the skin of my teeth and by dint of the fact that several of the people I've met are extroverts. I can't always rely on either factor.

And as I said, my discipline is one which lends itself to isolation. We research, we study, we read, we attend class, we write papers. Historians are actually quite boring people. We don't have much time for socializing, and I've noticed that virtually every other history grad student around here is rather...dour. Somber. Maybe they're just really focused on their discipline, I dunno. But they strike me as rather self-absorbed, unaware that there's a world around them, and too wrapped up in making sure they know everything they can about history that they don't care if they have friends or not. I like history, but I want something outside of it for when I get tired or bored of battles, names, dates, and religious controversy involving people who died three or four hundred years ago. I want living people with energy and life in them.

I guess what it all really boils down to is that I'm afraid to move on, afraid to change. If I can stay in the situation I'm in, where I'm familiar with it and comfortable, then I can continue to feel safe and secure. I can remain happy. But if I change that situation, if I move to a new place where I'm unfamiliar with my surroundings and with the people, there's always the chance I won't be happy there, that I'll be very unhappy. Sure, it's a pretty stupid and irrational reason to not want to face change, to not take a risk, but no one ever said irrational fears would make sense. That would make them rational, and a rational irrational fear is nonsensical, thus being very irrational in and of itself. But I digress.

Ultimately, I think what I really want to do is take all my friends with me, drag them along wherever I go like a security blanket while I suck on my thumb. I know I can't do that, and that even though we'll be in different places we'll still be friends, it doesn't make dealing with it any easier, I guess.

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: Tom Petty, "Crawling back to you"

"With A Little Help From My Friends"

So I was discussing social group dynamics with a coworker of mine last night (yes, this is what he and I do for fun--discuss social theory and anime. Sometimes at the same time. He's an intellectual, and I pretend to be one, so it works). He said he'd noticed that in social groups on college campuses that have graduate programs, a group of undergraduates will often have a "token graduate student." He'd noticed these groups were, in general, more stable, but didn't know why. He also didn't know why there'd be one or two grad students in a group of undergrads.

Then we figured it out, and it seemed blindingly simple--these grad students were most likely only recently graduated from their undergraduate work. At a large institution like OU, I'm sure a high number of the people who decide to get an advanced degree remain at OU. It makes sense--you already know the professors, you know the program and what's available, and it's just easier. Granted, not everyone does, and sometimes you get students like me, who are from a different school. But then again, Ozarks didn't have a graduate program (if they had, I'd have probably continued attending there). So the token graduate student was, until recently, an undergraduate, and this was simply the group he'd been in prior to moving on to the next degree. I know that several of the people I'm friends with were not in the same year I was at Ozarks, or even if they were, a good number of them did not graduate when I did. Even though I went off for graduate school, I was still friends with them. I had the unique opportunity to be the token grad student in two social groups--one at Ozarks, and one here. In the Ozarks circle, it was usually like I'd never left when I went to visit. It felt normal, more like I was returning home than visiting from home. The OU circle, on the other hand, is composed of an old high school friend and several of the people she's introduced me to. This new circle also includes several students who have yet to complete their undergraduate degree, but some of those are also age peers. It's kinda weird, really.

But yeah, it all made sense when my coworker and I thought about it--why would someone abandon their social group just because they were done with their undergraduate degree? I mean, you're isolated enough as it is as a graduate student. You aren't on campus very much except for class or research, you take classes at different times from other students usually (all the history graduate seminar classes in the history department are at night). It would make sense that you'd want to retain your old social group for more than the obvious reason that these people are your friends and have been for a while now. There's the added fact that most graduate students do not socialize with one another. I've never gone out for a beer with a fellow grad student. Never gone over to their place just to hang out, or gone to see a movie. We see each other in classes, perhaps in the library. We are peers, but not friends. It's kinda weird. Also, I noticed a lot of the other graduate students around here are too narrow-focused, too serious in their endeavors, too concerned with becoming "professionals" to want to loosen up, relax, and even just smile. I think I'd go insane and strangle someone if I were like that. I need to interact with people, and while I still get to interact with my friends from Ozarks in a limited capacity, I need people I can call up and go visit without having to make long-term plans or worry about whether or not I have the whole weekend free to do so. I need people who are close enough that we can decide to go see a movie that evening 30 minutes before it starts, not 4 1/2 or 5 hours.

That seems like a weird place to end the rambling, but I'm not sure I have anything else to add. I guess I just consider myself lucky to be included in so many social groups, token grad student or not. To you, my friends, I say thank you.

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: Counting Crows, "Einstein on the Beach"

"Steal My Heart Away"

Perhaps it's because I've been listening to a lot of Van Morrison lately, but I've been thinking an awful lot about relationships of late. About what I want out of one, what I expect out of love and a significant other.

I think the other factor is that I keep reading Dav's Live Journal, and Lord knows that's a running theme in his.

Anyway, what do I want out of a woman? There's the usual schtick, I guess--smart, attractive, funny, warm, generous, laughs at my jokes (not all of them, because frankly, they're not all funny), can take care of me (I need taken care of, really, and someone who can keep me organized, because I can't do it myself), etc. It's basically the list of attributes you'll get from virtually anyone of a similar disposition. I want someone who appreciates spontaneous romance, doesn't mind holding hands in public, but also doesn't mind a quiet evening hanging around and doing not much of anything (something I'm very fond of).

But a girl could have all those attributes and still not be right for me. I know I've run across several women who met all or at least the greatest majority of those requirements, yet I did not want to date them. Why?

I actually figured out the answer to this quandary just yesterday. I want someone who is all those things, but who is most of all my equal. I don't want someone who simply looks up to me. I don't want to be on some pedestal (who'd be insane enough to put me on a pedestal remains to be seen). I want a partner, an equal, someone who admires me but is not so in awe of me or what I do that she relates to me in a subordinate manner. I'm not a dominating person, and anytime I've been in a relationship with a girl who was that submissive, it didn't work. It drove me nuts, because I'm indecisive, a natural beta, and I can't do it. I need someone who can make decisions for herself, who can speak up when they disagree with me, and who isn't afraid to tell me when I'm being an idiot (or isn't too blinded by some bizarre, misguided hero worship to even recognize when I'm being an ass). I don't think it's too much to ask, but my recent dating drought might indicate otherwise.

Oh, the Oklahoma Daily, the OU school paper, has been publishing one panel gag comics of mine for a couple of weeks now. Just click on "Opinion," look for Staff Cartoons, and there you'll find me. If you search the archive for "Staff Cartoon," you'll pull up all the stuff I've done for them so far. It's just one more step on my path to world domination.

*Insert maniacal laughter and crack-boom of lightning and thunder in the background here*

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: Van Morrison, "Only a Dream"

"Sail Us To The Moon"

I had this nifty rant about diversity on college campuses all written up, and I keep losing it when I try to load the post. I keep forgetting how to work this stupid thing, so instead you're just getting a random rant about whatever I come up with.

We had an idiot in the Writing Center Friday. Now, idiots showing up in the Center is not anything extremely out of the ordinary. With a student-athlete population as high as OU's, there's bound to be a fair percentage of them that's dumber than a box of rocks, and just happened to make it into college because they could play a sport (probably football). Well, this guy was an idiot for new reasons. See, we have recruitment tours that come through the place every so often. It impresses the parents of prospective student-athletes to see the academic services center we have here at OU (which is deservedly impressive--the folks who work here, and I'm not just talking about the Writing Center, are quiet good at what they do). Anyway, this moron decides to announce to a tour that we have written papers for him. This is patently absurd--we don't write the papers for students. So it reflects poorly upon us, and I don't like that sort of thing. Now we are even more limited in how we can edit the papers, because any stuff we were doing that might be considered borderline cheating (such as suggesting words to replace for crappy word choice, something we do quite a bit) we can no longer do. All because one idiot thought he was being funny. In reality, he only hurt himself and us. On top of that, we then had to have a meeting with our boss about this crap, and that was unnecessary, really, or should have been. I swear, it only takes one fool to reflect poorly upon all student-athletes.

~chaos cricket

Song of the Moment: Radiohead, "2 + 2 = 5"