i am an artist. my medium is life.

Most people who twitter make me sad.

2009-06-26T03:30:46Z

15:39 Haven't twittered since Feb. It's become cheap&just idiots instantaneously voicing uneducated opinions yet not even investing writing time. #

<3ninakr!stine

Inquire here about friendship.

2009-04-04T06:57:27Z

^{from here on out, friends only.}
Selectively Adding, but please introduce yourself if you sense a connection.

pssst...{also, say hello if you're a watcher...}

1. Learning to Write. Again.

2009-03-28T22:27:58Z

Making a Move Back To "One"
embarking on an expository adventure.

I told my ^{bestfriendroommateeverything} that I had decided to make my livejournal of six years friendsonly and I was met with a very anti-climatic response. But how was she to know {I assign far too much meaning to such meaningless things} that it was possibly the singularly most freeing and truthful thing I have considered doing in the past three years? How incredibly counter-intuitive it is that locking up my thoughts would be the very key to letting my thoughts freely flow! I'm excited by this newfound freedom within my own preset bounds and am going to try my very damnedest to 'get back to basics' so to say by writing as often {also, if anyone knows if I can use the word 'oft' here, please let me know, as it's far prettier} as possible.

I'm starting to feel burdened by our narcissistic bourgeoisie, particularly within internet social circles. The overwhelming ideal seems to be "look at me," which when coupled with the values of celebrity and reality television leads everyone to believe they're to be revered as famous. It's all starting to seem silly to me. The catch-22 of this burden is that as a photographer, a writer, and a general life philosopher...with no spectators, readers, or ears to bounce my ponderings upon, does my art exist at all? It's a reiteration of that quintessential tree-falling paradox. Even writing this feels pretentious and contrived, despite the valid emotions on which it was built. So again, I'm slave by necessity to these things that I abhor. And I still care if anyone reads this. I will still deny my obsession by actively ignoring the tug to check to see if anyone left comments {now I also feel compelled to mention that this isn't me actively asking for comments, even though part of my heart is yelling, "but please please do!"} but doesn't actively ignoring still feed authentication to the obsession with masturbatory narcissism? ^{and I'm supposed to be the non-neurotic one.}

Furthermore, I'm also dealing with a several thousand other troubling new inconveniences ranging from feeling like I've run out of inspiring new music to explore to having hopes of achieving real change squandered by the realities of big business and government crookedness to worrying that I'm losing my vocabulary and wondering if there's any point to be being something other than a survivalist in this cutthroat, tragically beautiful, genius-saved and genius-damned world. As in Lost, it appears there's always more than you can understand and everything you've claimed as real and right just isn't what you thought it was.

I'm learning to reconcile being wrong with being hopeful. It's a dusty road lined with broken branches. I'm writing this for me, but admittedly also so I can reach out and feel a little less alone on this journey. This is me being painfully honest with myself.

I kind of like it.

^{watch this movie and be moved.}

Catch up, give up, grow up.

2009-03-04T10:11:57Z

^{Lolo.
Zaragoza, Spain.

Max.
perhaps Maxine or Maxwell.
Injured dove.
Discovered post-Hawk attack in the park across from my apartment.

I'm sitting up late, watching LOST and keeping an eye on Max as (s)he snuggles up in a wadded up nest of terry cloth. She's taken in a total of 15ml of a sugar/salt/water mixture administered by needleless syringe. The wildlife rescue has noted that a majority of injured birds don't perish from their injuries, but from severe dehydration. The disoriented animals are so much in shock, they can't think to drink. The local wildlife sanctuary opens in four hours.

grow up // We haven't had regular internet access for a few months now and the times when the fix was in, I just haven't had the urge. I guess I'm officially a recovered internet junkie. I've been toying with the idea of deleting my myspace {gasp! without a social network, you don't exist!}, but it's just so convenient when the random character from your past cares to make a cameo. I'll admit, I haven't been reading my friends page, either. If something epic has happened to you and you blogged about it and wonder why I haven't mentioned condolences or congratulations, I apologize.

give up // Life without internet is interesting. More simple. Slower-paced. I've learned to curb my appetite for instant gratification. Between no internet and no cable television, I feel like I've somehow managed to combat our society and media's attempts to intensify our life experience. Not to say I can't keep up, just that I'm filtering through a lot of unnecessary inputs.

catch up // Here's a bit of what I've been up to: planning for Chicago, writing and drawing with actual paper and pen, reading, laundry, being sick, cooking, playing frisbee, designing, getting proper sleep, making hunting knives, seeing old friends, driving to North Carolina, working a banquet, and giving up on job hunting only to surprisingly discover I'm being hunted by several jobs.

Hope all's well with you, internetland.
See you around.
♥}

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2009-02-05T05:08:23Z

01:05 "...you don't think killer whales are intense?" -Tommy during Apples2Apples #
01:06 "Dr. Kevorkian...he has...spunk." -Tommy, Apples2Apples #

<3ninakr!stine

who are you and where have you been?

2009-01-07T07:53:50Z

^{i'll be honest. i really miss being niko.}

I'm spending a few days in South Florida
with Moriabug and her family and basking
in the gluttonous glory of cable television,
guitar hero, junk food, palm trees, gated
communities, starbucks, and sephora. It's
strange, but somehow comforting in this
parallel-universe, who-you-could've-been
kind of way. I'll be back soon... ♥

frenzy.

2009-01-02T03:20:25Z

^{I feel like there's a ruckus going on//like inside of me conor oberst and max bemis are singing at the top of their lungs about all the things they're passionate about while authors furiously scribble inspirational prose on bits of handmade paper. the sheets are dancing around as they're flung over shoulders and caught and read aloud by spanish orators, drunk on red wine and empty promises. my skin is tingly all over from winter chill and restlessness and an aching to create and destroy and become and leave and arrive. oh! to arrive!

i am filled with hope.
kinetic energy in the making.
just waiting to thaw.}

2009.

2009-01-02T00:38:56Z

^{Hello, brave new year.
Are you ready for this?
Everything is changing.

I find it strange that we celebrate new beginnings in the dead of Winter when most things are still in hibernation. The year should change over in the Spring. Or perhaps Spring is when we get a reprieve for all the resolutions we turn into dismal failures. I'd like to hear what everyone is pledging to do differently in two-thousand and nine.

Mister Danger and I have committed to only patronizing locally-owned restaurants and cutting out Wal*Mart altogether. I have other goals in mind for the year {as I always do} but those are our "official" resolutions.

I leave you with one of the most important lessons I've learned in 2008:
Telling the truth won't make people like you, but it will make it mean more when people do.}

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2008-12-20T04:31:39Z

^{camera phone // dirtiest santa trick ever}

20:00 Rule #1 of the Dirty Santa Gift Swap: NEVER pick the biggest box. #
20:03 Murphy's Law of The Dirty Santa Gift Swap: if everyone's winning wine, Baileys, Absolut & Jose, your husband will win AWFUL CHRISTMAS TOWELS. #
20:08 Christmas towels, snowman cheese spreaders, embroidered/needlepoint Christmas tree pillow. DO NOT WANT. #

<3ninakr!stine

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2008-12-15T04:32:38Z

13:58 OMGWTF:40-something Bruce Springsteen wannabe covering "Hey There Delilah" in the gazebo in front of my house. #

<3ninakr!stine

I'm pleased...

2008-12-11T09:35:13Z

tweet:12:56 Shooting my first wedding today. Am just a tad nervous... #

^{update&peek//}

All went terribly well this afternoon. Even with all the rain, traveling a little over two hours away, and typical little mishaps, it was just beautiful. Also, it seems that wedding photography might be just the thing for me: travel, eating a diet that consists mainly of cute miniature foods, pretty little trinkets, open bars, and photography.

^{I also greatly relish the fact that I'd be paid to demand that crotchety elders make silly faces for posterity.}

Photo // Heal Us

2008-12-08T20:50:49Z

Plea for myself, my friends, my enemies, all humanity.
Self-portrait.
2008.

icon post // polariods & pretty words

2008-12-07T04:18:52Z

^{felt inspired to make something small, dainty, pretty.}

^{please credit | contact if an image belongs to you}

Photo // Crinkle Cut Autumn

2008-12-06T11:09:27Z

Assorted fallen leaves, folded then arranged.
Photographed.
2008

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2008-12-06T04:32:36Z

^{photo credit // liftedshadow}

19:22 Am pretty impressed at the human brain's ability to count reps, sing along with an ipod, and think about relationships at the same time. #

<3ninakr!stine

Photo // Tiny Dancer

2008-12-02T22:26:46Z

^{madrid, spain}

...I want to taste the breeze of every great city...

From Foreign Policy to Domestic Bliss...

2008-11-29T00:42:40Z

So, after spending those two weeks abroad {proper photographic evidence and adventure tales still forthcoming}, I've been gearing up for Thanksgiving Weekend 2008.

For my birthday, Stefanie gave me this most fabulous, satiric apron: "How To Keep Your Husband" featuring tidbits of advice from well-meaning 1950s housewives.

I'm not sure all of the well-meaning housewives in my family got that it was intended as light-hearted social commentary, but c'est la vie. I ended up making asparagus and rosemary cream cheese phyllo wraps {self-created recipe!} for the big family get-together on my side and tomorrow, Aaron and I will be heading into Alabama to celebrate with his family. I'm doing a variation on green bean casserole {keep your fingers crossed!}.

As if that's not enough to qualify me for a white-picketed house in Stepford, today I made calimansi juice {it's somewhere between a lemon and a kumquat} with a hand juicer and bought a mini food processor during the Black Friday madness.

If you're going to do anything, do it up right, right? ;D

♥Mrs. Danger

Thanksgiving Leftovers Party!

2008-11-25T23:34:29Z

Since most everyone is going to be celebrating Thanksgiving with their parents/grandparents/cousins this year, we decided against trying to force everyone to gorge themselves multiple times on the same day and we're holding a Thanksgiving Leftovers soiree instead. If you're going to be in the area, please come out! We're crossing our fingers for a fire pit and a keg!
♥♥♥

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2008-11-25T05:03:07Z

13:01 What kind of opening line is "My mother drove me to the airport with the windows rolled down." ?? Twilight, you best not let me down. #
19:49 Is it easier to be sad for someone because they didn't get to do certain things or angry at them for shirking responsibility to do them? #

<3ninakr!stine

Belated Birthday!

2008-11-22T07:20:31Z

Since I was out of the country for my birthday {more on that soon},
my lovely flatmates and I celebrated my two-five tonight with
sake, wine, art galleries, trolley rides, and fondue...

The Flat...{our library}.

"make your most metal face..."

Trolley ride downtown to visit the local art galleries...

Chocolate fondue: dark chocolate & Bailey's, milk chocolate/rum/pecans/caramel, cheesecake, rice crispy treats, strawberries, bananas, brownies, and marshmallows. Yeah, I know.

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2008-11-17T04:57:59Z

15:09 OFFICIALLY STATESIDE! Ripped every one of my fingernails off grabbing my luggage off the carosel. Ew, but totally metal! #
18:26 Good run. Hit the gym at the hotel... Gotta work off 4000 pounds of European cheeses. ;) {so worth it} #
18:40 7:30pm and I'm [soclose] but sooooo far from the City. :( Ah well. Tomorrow, tomorrow. <3 {Newark, NJ} #

<3ninakr!stine

Post from a disconnected Nina.

2008-11-12T02:40:31Z

(This is the first time I get to speak on Nina's behalf as her husband, so if I screw it up, don't tell on me, please.)

Nina left last week on a two week trip with her Lolo. I talked to her (all too briefly...) and she wanted me to let everyone know that:

-She is having an amazing time with Lolo. They have stayed up talking and laughing and enjoying eachother's company every evening. He has even broken out running to race Nina to the next stop. Which is just awesome.
-There are actual seasons in New England. Unlike Florida.
-Portugese keyboards are very hard to type on quickly.
-The US Dollar to Euro rate sucks.
-She has been video blogging and taking lots of photos to share when she gets back.

I'll share any more information as I get it.
Bye!

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2008-11-07T04:44:59Z

^{TSA frisking a nun.}

15:42 3 long hours in the airport...but soon we'll be en route to Europe! #
16:24 As inconvient as it is, I kind of enjoy the circus and charade of going through security. You get to see everyone's socks. #

<3ninakr!stine

Daily Tweets: updates on the go

2008-11-06T04:55:40Z

08:52 My God. I can't handle the news. Watching everyone full of so much hope for our country makes me tear up and feel like my chest'll burst! :D #

<3ninakr!stine

We voted.

2008-11-04T21:58:18Z

For those of you in Florida, Proposition 2 - VOTE NO!
It doesn't just affect the gay community - it affects any domestic partnership!

So if say, your old, widower grandfather has found him a widowed ladyfriend to keep company with...if something happened to one of them - they wouldn't be allowed to go back into the hospital room to hold his/her hand through the pain.
This isn't just a ban on gay love...it's a ban on any kind of unmarried love!

As much as our presidential figurehead human may matter, it's those local politics that are really gonna hit ya at home - so do the research on amendment propositions, mayor, sheriff, city council, congressional representation, senate, house, environmental committees, and make your voice heard!!