Hate comments. And laundry.

I don't know what my problem is.

I have been home from tour for a considerable amount of time now, and I just can't bring myself to do laundry. I had planned on doing it Thursday, and then I put it off until Saturday, and then I put it off until today - it's to the point where I am on my very last pair of clean underwear, so I have to do it today. But I'd rather just stay in bed and work on the next ALL CAPS album and finish my re-read of the Hunger Games.

I enjoyed reading your pet peeves in the comments yesterday. There were things I'd never even considered getting annoyed about (like people who "push" on a door when it clearly says "pull", or teachers missing a spot while erasing the blackboard) but the common thread between most commenters was grammar. While I consider myself an intelligent girl who knows how to string her words together, I won't deny it made me a little nervous. Remind me never to blog while tired, because I had no idea I was writing in front of a bunch of grammar vultures. xD

On the agenda today, aside from the arduous task of doing my laundry (seriously, my hamper is exploding right now; it's delved beyond just a chore to the status of "an issue" at this point) I am finally going to see Eclipse in theatre (which I realize is laughable after my entry yesterday about only seeing Twilight movies for the rest of one's life. Now I'm seeing it by choice).

I waited so long to see this film that I actually had to track down a theatre that was still playing it. I do feel a little better about my decision to go, because I am a Regal Crown Club Member (which means I signed up for the little card thingy and they give me free stuff now and then, basically -- there's no reason NOT to be a Regal Crown Club Member) and when I went to see The Last Airbender last week, the lady in the box office informed me I had received a FREE movie ticket! I think I signed up for the card when I was 17 or something, so it only took 5 years to earn, too! Either way, I will not be paying to see Eclipse. I am pleased about this.


I was given a few more interesting blogging topics yesterday, so I think I am going to finish those up now as my laundry is being washed. One person asked me how I deal with haters.

This is an interesting topic, and my feelings on this have definitely changed over the years as I have adjusted more and more to putting my life out in the open. Haters used to really bother me, when I first started getting mean comments on videos. Obviously it's not a nice feeling to have someone tell you that you're ugly, or stupid, or that they didn't like your video.

A distinction you have to learn early on is that there is a difference between a hater comment and a genuinely mean/negative comment- the former is someone who is not invested in what you're doing at all, and leaves a fleeting, meaningless negative comment that in no way helps push society forward. These types of comments (ur gay, this is so stupid, I want those 2 mins of my life back, omg I hate autotune) have little to no effect on me. It's the comments from genuine subscribers/fans that hated your new video/haircut/boyfriend and they leave intelligent sounding comments telling you why you shouldn't try new things or ever make it apparent that you're making money or dating someone new; those are the comments that are harder to deal with.

You have to grapple with the issue that you put your life out there for people to see and to comment on, but at the end of the day you're still a human being with feelings and problems -- and having the general faceless public dissecting your every move, commenting on your appearance, telling you if a fan video is better than the original one your band worked hard on, or comparing your past and present love interests - these are difficult things for anyone to deal with, and you have to constantly remind yourself that many, many people out there don't think of you as someone with feelings who actually reads comments posted on videos. And you really can't get upset when people pick apart your life, because you made it readily available to them.

I think the biggest thing I've had to learn about haters is that you can't change them. The internet is a breeding ground for people to give their opinion - anonymity sets you free and all that. Giving any public reaction to getting a mean comment is only going to reflect badly on you - because that commenter is generally not going stick around to care what you have to say in response. Or if they do stick around, you're only giving them exactly what they want - a fiery public acknowledgment that proves you've allowed them to get under your skin. It also makes it very public that you can't handle criticism or even that you can't handle being in the public eye.

I think the best way to deal with this is to just be confident in everything you do. If I genuinely believe in the decisions I have made in my life, if I like every video I post, and I know I am living my life in a good way, then nothing anyone can say can really deter me from that mindset. People can debate about religion and music and whether or not someone used the right form of "their", but when it comes to my life, no one's opinion matters but my own.

So I ignore hate comments. Basically. I haven't really gotten fired up over a hater comment in a long time, so either it's a dry season, or I really am developing the think skin you need to be a YouTube vlogger.

I'd like to know what you think! Hate comments - do they rile you up or can you disregard them?

Last google search: Puzzle Quest
Chipotle burritos: 16

Mystical energy is all over the place.

It is a rainy, gloomy day in Seattle.

I went out to run some errands, and among these was getting the carwash that I was so rudely denied the other day. But the clouds opened in anger and I knew washing my car would be futile. After my grocery shopping was finished, I drove right on by the Shell station, my little unused receipt staring sadly back at me from its safe place in my cup holder.

I have felt my blog recently has been a bit too much on the "I woke up, I did this, I did that" side lately, so I asked on twitter if there were any topics people would like to see me blog about.

Among the suggestions of pineapples, unicorns, power rangers, and the lack of bouncy castles in my life, there were actually a few gems.

@krazy_4_kelly wanted to know my thoughts on Buffy so far. As I am now 3 episodes into Season 2, I feel qualified to give my opinion. Buffy is something that's always been in the back of my mind as "that show I never got into when it was on, but lots of people whose opinion I trust like it, but it's such a big time commitment so I'll watch it later". Matt and Lauren were determined to make me give it a try on tour, and it was almost instant love. Even though the earlier seasons are cheesy, and my roommate and I have made a drinking game out of outdated slang, the wearing of animal print clothing, and the term "techno pagan", this show is just so good.

Magical realism is my absolute favorite genre, so the scfi-fi and the spooky invading a high school rates pretty high on my entertainment hierarchy. And I find the outdated 90's trends to be hilarious, not cringe-worthy. I'm not much of a feminist, but it's also a great "girl power" centric show, seeing a girl fight vampire after vampire in high heels, prom dresses, and mini skirts.

I have a little trouble with the episodes like "Out of mind, out of Sight" where they claim disappearing/invisible girls are "physics!" (though recruiting them for some underground government assassin school made me laugh out loud), but I can easily let go of hyena possession, creating life out of spare body parts, and ventriloquist dummies coming to life; because hey, they're on the Hellmouth. Mystical energy is all over the place.

In short, I'm enjoying Buffy. I love Willow and Xander (and their heartbreaking will-they-won't-they tension), Giles makes me smile, and I find Angel's storyline tragic and interesting. The last episode I watched introduced me to Spike, as well, so opinions are forth coming.

@Matthew0007 wanted to know about my pet peeves? I have a lot of little pet peeves.

I hated when kids sat on their backpacks on the bus (you're CRUSHING your stuff!), I hate when people go really slow reading their credit card numbers to you over the phone (I used to work in customer service), on that note I hate that American Express credit cards don't follow the standard 4-4-4-4 pattern of most cards, I hate when people don't organize money with it all going the same direction, I hate when people don't say "bye" or formally end a conversation online (you're still TALKING and it's still polite, even though chatting is more casual) and most of all, I hate that people often wreck innocent trends and words by making it a "thing". Things don't need to be "things". You can just do and say them without notating their existence and instantly ruining them. I don't mean this in a "waah my favorite indie band is on the radio and therefore they now suck" way, I mean it in a "oh you say 'epic'? I love that it's a thing now, I'm going to try to say 'epic' as much as I can" way. Blah. Just talk.

Aaand @DPrAMAZING wanted to know why cats don't have wizard powers. How are you so sure they don't?

@ItsBenCracknell suggested a game of Would You Rather, so I think that's how I will end this post. In the comments, tell me what your pet peeve is, and would you rather endure that thing forever, or find out your DVD player ate your annoying cousin's Twilight DVD and now it's the only movie you can ever watch for the rest of your life? Including movie theatres. And other DVD players. Somehow. This is an alternate reality Would You Rather, apparently.


Last google search: "all caps lyrics" (WHAT. Don't judge me. I was just checking to see if we'd reached the big time yet of having someone else post our lyrics on some virus ridden site full of popups.)
Chipotle burritos: 16

Hurricane Simulator.

I just got home from seeing a show called "Ragtime" at the theatre I used to work at.

There was a long string of events that led me to seeing a show in my hometown tonight; it's funny how life works out that way sometimes.

This morning my dad dropped my cousin Josh off at 7 AM. Much to my approval, Josh wanted to sleep a bit more before we set off on any grand adventures, so I arranged him on the living room couch with a blanket and hopped back upstairs, crawling under my covers and fading out into dreamland for another two hours.

When we finally both felt it was a more acceptable time of day for sightseeing, we headed out the front door so I could first show him around my neighborhood. The area of Seattle I live in is pretty exciting in itself, so we spent a good two hours walking up and down the road, looking at shops and restaurants, and having me introduce Josh to Chipotle (he's from a part of North Dakota that's so small they don't even really have fast food readily at their disposal). He proposed we have a salsa eating contest, and because we're lame people, we scooped chip-ful after chip-ful of the hottest brand Chipotle offers into our mouths, caps tightly on our drinks to cut off lifelines. Looking back, I don't really know who won.

In our short time back at my house, we watched this video together. I did a parody of a Ke$ha song mocking Twilight with Alex Carpenter and Jason Munday, and I have been waiting impatiently for weeks to see the finished product. In my opinion, it was worth the wait.

Next I decided to take him to the Fremont Troll, which is exactly what it sounds like -- the giant troll statue that was erected beneath the Aurora bridge. It was teeming with young children, crawling all over his hands and face, but despite the even larger plethora of parents attempting to pose their kids in front of his stony gaze, it's still one of Seattle's greatest quirks. Even if Josh hated when I insisted on taking a photo of him too.

We headed further south, then, and I showed him the boats lined up in the sound, ready for Seattle's Seafair this weekend. Then it was time to head to the mall, our midway point between my house and my brother's, where I was passing the cousin duty back off to Nick. We were a little early so Josh and I did a loop around Target and then amused ourselves by looking at birds and fish in the pet store. There was also something in the mall called a "hurricane simulator". I had never seen one before but Josh told me they have them all over in North Dakota. He told me he and his friends sometimes drive two hours just to get to the closest mall with a hurricane simulator. You know, for fun.

Essentially you pay two dollars, step inside, close the glass door, and it feels like you're in a hurricane. Basically.

Once Nick showed up we chatted for awhile over ice cream before they headed home and I was stuck on the wrong side of the freeway during the worst time for rush hour traffic. I decided to see what Eia was up to, and luckily enough, she was on her way to Village Theatre (where I used to work) to see a show (the aforementioned Ragtime).

Instead of going home, I hopped back on the freeway heading further east, and before I knew it I was back in the familiar lobby of the place of my employment for the past five years. It was nice to see everyone; both people working in the box office tonight were ex-coworkers and good friends of mine, and even the lobby attendant on duty tonight selling refreshments was someone I was fond of. The show was wonderful, albeit not a happy show.

And now I'm home! I've spent a lot of time at home recently, so it was a nice change of scenery to be out and about all day today. I think I have a long day of laundry ahead of me tomorrow, so I'm curious as to how I'll make that interesting in blog post form.

Last google search: fremont troll
Chipotle burritos: 16

No car wash for you.

I am very late in my blogging tonight.

I had a weird day. It started when I had to drive my roommate to an auto shop to pick up his car, and stopped to get a car wash, paid for it, and then was told the car washer itself was broken down. So now I have a receipt for a $7 car wash, a dirty car, and 13 minutes to write a blog post before midnight. xD

My day consisted of editing and posting a video, getting frozen yogurt at Red Mango, and attempting to start cleaning my bedroom. It's been uncharacteristically hot in Seattle this week, though, and I live on the 3rd story of an old, un-airconditioned house, so after about ten minutes I realized this just wasn't happening.

It's literally ten degrees cooler in my house each time you go down a flight of stairs, so I grabbed a book, a glass of ice water mixed with crystal light and a fan and ended up reading on the couch with the fan pointed directly at me for nearly 4 hours. The final installment in the Hunger Games trilogy comes out soon and I've been meaning to re-read the first two, so that's what I started today. Usually when I do a re-read, it takes me much longer to get through it because I don't have the suspense driving me to keep reading like during a first go-through, but surprisingly that wasn't the case. The Hunger Games is just as enthralling a second time.

Tomorrow I have to wake up early because my cousin Josh is coming over. I am going to show him around Seattle (he's from North Dakota), and my dad is dropping him off at my house around 7 (ahhh), on his way to work. It should be a fun day; I just wish it were going to be a fun day that didn't start quite so bright and early.


As far as witty and insightful commentary on life today... I have none. Eia's birthday is on Monday so we've been planning fun things to do with her, Liz and I chatted on the phone today briefly about our trip to the Bahamas next month, and the Renaissance Faire is just around the corner, but today I was a boring, sweaty, frozen yogurt-eating, book-reading, car wash-lacking girl. And I didn't get to watch any Buffy.


Edit: No way. Literally, as I was writing this, another spider crawled across my monitor. I still had the tissue from yesterday's debacle sitting on my desk so I grabbed it as fast as I could and I GOT HIM. I'm going to now ease my mind by telling myself this was the same spider and not that there may be a spider army plotting my demise by way of monitor attack.


Last google search: "things that are 5'10" "
Chipotle burritos: 15

Lobster hat and spider attack.

I was worried that with coming home from tour, not having a conventional job, and knowing I'm not going back to school in the fall, there was a slight chance I would become a couch potato with a complete lack of motivation, but it's already clear that potato-dom is not going to be my future.

Last night I had my first meeting with the other Zaxy girls (Zaxy.com is the blog I am going to start writing for, and the other bloggers Tara and Brittney are wonderful, fun, nerdy girls). We met up at this sausage and beer place called Shultzy's, oblivious to the fact that we arrived right in time for Trivia Night.

The intention was to get to know each other and at least attempt to have a psuedo-meeting, but it was pretty difficult to discuss anything serious with Mr. Announcer Face blaring questions about motorcycle nicknames, celebrity love scandals, and old-school video games in our ears all night. So despite our depressingly low score (a measley 3 points due to lack of participation and motorcycle knowledge) we did manage to go over the exciting events we have lined up in the next few months, including a Zaxy sleepover, podcast interviews, and the festivities surrounding PAX that we're going to be attending.

I am a relatively well-informed nerd, but I have operated in the same niche nerd bubble for most of my life, so I am kind of excited to be broadening my horizons. Going to a gaming conference and writing for a blog that isn't focused around Harry Potter or Lost or YouTube News is going to be a challenge for me, but it's going to be fun and I am looking forward to the new experiences. And the parties. Apparently PAX has lots of parties. And a Tri-Wizard Drinking Tournament.

Speaking of new things, I just finished OH MY GOD A SPIDER JUST CRAWLED ACROSS MY MONITOR. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. MY MONITOR!! WHO DOES THAT.

I just went to grab a tissue and now it's GONE. THE SPIDER IS GONE. Probably walking around on my desk or down in the carpet or ON ME.

What I was going to say before was that I just finished Season 1 of Buffy, but I don't even want to talk about it anymore.

I do not like spiders. I am going to end this post now while I tear apart my computer desk area trying to find and destroy him.


I will leave you, today, with proof of why I love both webcomics and my mother. Below is a photo of my Mom in the hat she bought this weekend at a street fair, and yesterday's Natalie Dee comic. No relation.


Last google search: northern lights in washington
Chipotle burritos: 15

Kristina Minus Kristina.

I am an early riser. It's weird to admit that, since it's summer, and I don't have a standard job, and there is no reason for me to be an early riser, but nothing changes the fact that I am. I rarely sleep past 9, and when I do, it's because I am either sick or was up distinctly late the night before. The issue is that I have an incredibly strong internal clock, so regardless of what time I go to bed, I am generally up around 8. Which is great for productivity, but terrible for general tiredness when I don't get to bed around midnight.

The point is, yesterday I slept for most of the day (because I was sick). And then, at the Indian place where I had dinner, Eia and I ordered our favorite chai tea (which is incredibly caffeinated and they fill your glass about a thousand times before you leave) so I came home around 8:30 pm just absolutely wired. Generally around 10 pm I start falling asleep on the couch no matter what's on the TV, but last night I was bouncing up and down in my seat asking Justin "so what do you wanna doooo?!" while HE was the one falling asleep.

I couldn't get him to watch any Buffy with me, but we ended up talking about silly things in the amount of time that we could have watched three and a half episodes of Buffy (so I'm counting it as a win) and when he finally went to bed, I stayed up even later catching up on SHAYTARDS videos. I finally went to sleep about 3 hours past my normal bedtime, and all of this is a very long-winded story to tell you that on the one day I probably would have ignored my body clock and slept until noon, Luke decided it would be fun to call me and wake me up bright and early before his morning raft trip.

I was half asleep for the early portion of our phone conversation but I do remember hearing him giggle (yes, he giggled) when I answered the phone with a half "hello" and half "mmrrfhhf" noise.


Now I am wide awake (weirdly, as I only got about 6 hours of sleep last night) and it's still so early that I doubt anyone else is awake in my house.


I don't know if any of you read the comic strip "Garfield Minus Garfield" - the premise is that without Garfield in the strip, John Arbuckle leads a depressing, sad life by himself in which he spends a lot of time talking to thin air. I think it's hilarious. The point of me telling you this is that last night amidst my ridiculous caffeine high I told Justin that I was starting to imagine our interactions without me in them and it generally made for much funnier situations. So for instance, I had this mental image of a comic strip in which Justin is arguing with himself over whether or not he should watch Season 1 of Buffy, then he yells "Fine, but only because I have nothing better to do!" and then he's sitting all alone on the couch, with only himself to blame.

I called this scenario "Kristina Minus Kristina."

Somehow I think I found it more amusing than Justin did, because it was also around this point that he said, "I missed you [while you were on tour], and I like spending time with you, but right now I want to throw my laptop at you."


I have started seeing "Back to School" signs, which 1. furthers my theory that they come earlier every year and 2. made me start to realize I'm not going back to school. It's because of that fact that I am going to try to be productive today. Which does not in fact mean that I am going to do my laundry, but that I am going to work on some writing this afternoon. So maybe I'll post something on my blog at some point, if I come up with anything I like enough.


Last google search: "green" (I always feel guilty when this isn't exciting, but come on. "Green"? That could mean ANYTHING. Oh the intrigue.)
Chipotle burritos: 15

Shark Week disappointment.

I started out my day today by somehow sitting on my pinky fingernail and bending it up in a way that makes my skin crawl even remembering it. It's one of those things where you just look at yourself and think, "how many times have I sat down in my life, why on earth would this time be any different, what is WRONG with me."

Other than that, I am wearing my VidCon shirt and boxer shorts and writing today off as a sick day. Last week I was still stuck on East Coast time and found myself waking up at 6-7 AM all week, so it's kind of nice to look at the clock and see that it's 11:45 in the morning and I only have gotten out of bed once to open my window.

It's now 10 o'clock at night and for having an uneventful day, I sure had a weird day.

First I forced my roommate Justin to watch three more episodes of Buffy with me (I am on episode 9 of Season 1) and then Eia and I went down to our favorite Indian food place for dinner. I was so excited to get out of the house after a sick day that I told her we needed to walk there instead of drive (it's only about 4 blocks). The weather was perfect; not too hot, but just right for walking around in a tank top.

At the Indian place, they were gracious enough to give us a complimentary appetizer… twice. I don't think they meant to give us free food twice, but Eia and I were definitely not going to send it back.

It was on our walk home that I definitely regretted our decision not to drive. We were walking up the road, enjoying the evening, and out of nowhere this shady guy appeared, standing behind a tree. He looked kind of suspicious but I wasn't paying much attention, and I wasn't sure why Eia seemed to be bee-lining it home. Right as we'd past, he asked me what time it was, so being a good citizen I turned around to tell him "eight o'clock". It was only then that I noticed he was standing there with his wiener out. Just holding it. Not doing anything else. Just standing by a tree, wiener out, wanting to know the time.

We hurried home. Probably never walked faster in my life.

Now I'm sitting in my living room, all excited about Shark Week, and thoroughly disappointed that none of the Shark programs on tonight seem very enthralling. Hence why I am now watching Silent Library. If you have never watched SIlent Library, you should definitely check it out. It's playing on MTV2 right now (the American version) but I would say the episodes you can find on YouTube of the actual Japanese version are way funnier. The premise is that six people draw cards and the one who gets the skull and crossbones has to do some horrible painful thing. But silently, as they're in a library.

I'm currently watching girls shave a man's hairy back and use the loose hair to make a beard for the girl who lost this round. Okay, and a few minutes later, on a new episode, a guy is brushing his teeth with a used toilet brush. Now a guy is wearing a Godzilla costume and being forced to walk barefoot across a town made of legos. NOTHING hurts worse than legos on bare feet. Call this trashy TV all you want, I think it's hilarious.

The moral of the story here is that I doubt I could ever be on a show like Silent Library. I felt this way about Fear Factor too, and about Wipeout. I just don't think I could handle eating fishbait muffins or being put in a wind machine full of dead bugs for 30 seconds for ANY amount of money. And Wipeout? How many of those people do you think have to be carried away to hospitals because of severe head injuries due to poor landings off giant red bouncy balls?

I'm not saying these shows are any less entertaining, I just know I couldn't do it. I will watch safely from my living room couch like most of America. My question for today for the comments is do you think you would survive one of these horrible endurance-based TV shows?

What! Now Jenna Fischer is doing an acne commercial. What the heck. I didn't even recognize her. Let's be serious right now; who HASN'T done a ProActiv commercial? The Avril Lavigne one just aired a few minutes ago as well. I can guarantee these stars do not use ProActiv. I had horrible skin in middle school/high school and I tried it, and it never worked for me.

Okay, instead of narrating my boring Monday night TV watching, I'm going to end this blog post here.

Until tomorrow!

Last google search: "silent library" (I mean, what else would I have last searched for?)
Chipotle burritos: 15

"Make her stop being so NICE."

For my first day of BEDA (that's Blog Every Day in August, for those of you who don't already know; coined by the infamous author/blogger/twitter connoisseur Maureen Johnson) I am going to tell you a story.

So I'm starting BEDA off poorly; my nose is running, I have a terrible cough, and if I put my head down on the arm of this couch for more than ten seconds I would probably fall asleep. BUT. I am committed to doing BEDA this year, so blog I must.

Anyway. The story.

I went to Idaho this weekend, to see my family and attend my cousin Korrie's wedding. Korrie is a cousin of mine that lives in Tennessee, but before he moved to the south, he actually used to live up here in Seattle. And for a while, he actually lived with my family. Korrie was more of an older brother to me than a cousin, and I was crushed when he moved away (because I have seen him very few times since then). But obviously I still care loads about him, and was overjoyed that tour didn't overlap with his wedding, as I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

My story isn't about Korrie or the wedding though. It's about fighting with my brother.

My brother and I get along pretty well, though we've had our moments. I mean, we're siblings. Of course we're going to argue and bicker over stupid things. When we were younger our family used to drive to North Dakota every summer, and 19 hours in the car with your family is enough to make ANYONE fight.

But we're older now. We don't need petty arguments over whose side of the backseat is bigger to keep us entertained on long car rides anymore. Right?

Wrong. Seriously, I don't even know what came over me. I'm 22 years old and Nick is 17, but two hours in that car together and we were fighting like we were both kids again. First he started using his iPod to glint the sun directly into my eyes, and then I smacked him and told him to quit being stupid, and finally my parents had to split us up so my mom sat in the back with me and they had Nick drive.

This spurred a conversation about the highly ingenious ways Nick and I used to pick on each other.

Our bedrooms are right across from each other down a long hall, straight back from the kitchen. Just perfect yelling distance when my mom was making dinner. When Nick was 9 or 10, he'd sit in his room all alone (while I was minding my own business in my room reading Harry Potter or something) and he'd start shouting "Ow! Tina Stop! Stop it, Tina. Why are you doing that? Mom! Make her stop!"

Then I'd hear my mom get so sick of it she's be like "TINA, WHATEVER YOU'RE DOING TO YOUR BROTHER, CUT IT OUT!"

And I would just storm out of my room, Prisoner of Azkaban in hand and say "What the heck Mom, I'm not doing anything!" We'd just hear Nick cracking up in his bedroom.

So I decided to get back at him, and on a road trip one time, instead of being mean, I was just overly, sickeningly nice to him. I kept hugging him, and telling him how much I loved him, and kissing him, and offering to do anything he wanted.. and finally he was like "MOM, MAKE HER STOP!" When my Mom asked what I was doing, he replied, "Make her stop being nice to me!"

Needless to say, I never got in any trouble when I used that method. xD

Anyway, I don't care what age you are, family trips are tiring. I just got home, and it was really, really nice to see some of my extended family, but I am happy to be home. I got a nasty cold while we were gone and I am ready to take some medicine and go to sleep.

I hope everyone else's Day #1 of BEDA is going well, and happy August! You should tell me what you're most excited for this month in the comments. I'm most excited for the Renaissance Faire in two weeks. I haven't been in a few years at least.

Last google search: "andy dick"
Chipotle burritos: 15

Tour blog #8

Now that I am home, I am having a hard time finding the motivation to finishing typing up the remainder of tour in blog post form. It was such a fun activity while on the road (I would generally get my laptop out in the car and type away the hours it took to get from one city to the next) but here, I am already dealing with this weird post-tour culture shock (and not knowing what to do with myself because jumping right back into my normal rhythm feels wrong) so the prospect of reliving the days on the road has been tough.

But tonight I am going to my parents' house so we can leave early in the morning to drive 6 hours to Spokane (finally, something here at home that will feel normal xD), so I wanted to wrap up tour before my next adventure. So here I am.

Old Bridge, NJ - I had a blast at this show, in part because my and Eia's good friend Colin now lives on New Jersey and came to hang out with us at the show, but also because it was another night filled with awesome people at an awesome library. During the Parselmouth's song "Please Harry", Justin added something new to his bit; there is a part in the song where we threaten to poison Hedwig and he started screaming at us "Noooo! Nooo nooo! I don't think that's funny!" and stamping his feet, and I almost lost it right there in the middle of the song. He also started rubbing his "scar" when he came onstage, and I told him it was just his new membership to the Voldemort fanclub and that the whole scar-hurting thing would pass. We're such dorks.

Someone gave me the coolest necklace at this show! It's a little robot girl with a dangly body, and she's wearing a purple bow, just like my costume in the Don't Unplug Me video. I love it. Cannot even express my amazement at how wonderful people are.

Before I conclude the Old Bridge portion of this blog, I want to point out that as we were bringing our merch and equipment in, I noticed a display set up near the front called "Murder at Sea". Upon further inspection, I realized this was an entire collection of library books involving murder -- on a boat. I had no idea this was such a popular genre.

Also, the library had automatic doors; the kind that are made of glass and just slide open when you walk close enough to them. But this particular library had very low sensitivity automatic doors, because there were a few instances where I walked up to the door, stopped, felt dumb, waited, and then watched as the door slid slowly open at its leisure.

That night we went out to eat at this restaurant that Lauren's parent's swear by, and it was delicious, but the REAL treat that night was when Justin prank called Luke. So Luke finally got his phone replaced from the pool accident, and didn't have any of his old numbers programmed in yet. So Justin excused himself and "went to the bathroom", and then Luke's phone rang. It was a reporter from some NY newspaper, who wanted to do an interview with ALL CAPS the next day. He really had us going for awhile; I think Luke was on the phone for over 5 minutes. He said he'd been talking with Alan for weeks about this interview (for the record, we were SO mad at Alan for a little while there before we realized what was going on) and that they'd rented a room for us, and that they'd rented suits for us to wear… it wasn't until he started asking if we were vegan, or if we'd consider going vegan for the day for the sake of the interview, that Luke realized someone was messing with him. By this point Eia had realized what was going on and told me, and Matt could actually see Justin on the phone from where he was sitting - so all of us were just laughing our asses off, trying not to wreck the joke.

Well played, Justin. Well played.

Poughkeepsie, NY - Our very last show of tour! This show was awesome because I met a few people I'd only ever known online before that day (well, except you Alex/kira902k, since you swear we met at LeakyCon haha), and it was so great to finally be able to put a face to a name. I also met this lovely boy named James whom I have been emailing with that wants to design a dress for me. I think I am spoiled.

Anyway, the show was just as awesome as I would have expected our last show to be. During our last song, Don't Unplug Me, I noticed that not only was there some excellent dancing going on in the audience, but there was some SYNCHRONIZED excellent dancing going on in the audience. A bunch of people had choreographed a dance to the chorus of the song, secretly taught it to a bunch of people at the show, and started an ALL CAPS flashmob! I never even knew to make having a flashmob done in my honor a life goal of mine, but there you have it. Life goal, accomplished.

That night we said goodbye to Kathleen after the show and we were down to six. Then we drove back to Rhode Island, dropped off Justin at his house, and we were down to five.

Saturday - The next morning we went out for brunch with the whole gang (minus Kathleen) and then it was time to drop Eia off at the airport. We took her to Boston, said our goodbyes, and then we were down to four. Which was sad.

However, Matt, Lauren, Luke and I had so, so much fun together the next few days. That night we ordered spaghetti calzones in from Matt's favorite pizza place and they force-fed the first 4 episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer to Luke and I. I know the first seasons are cheesy and it gets better, but I was actually quite enjoying it and plan to finish the rest at some point, though it would be fun to continue watching it through with Luke. That night we may have started a Buffy drinking game to let off steam from tour, which ended in a hilarious night for everyone.

Sunday - The next morning we slept in, went to Matt's favorite wing place for lunch (because he knows how much I love my Wingzone here in Seattle) and then they took us around the Brown University campus a little bit (mainly the trendy street with fun shops, including their bookstore, an Urban outfitters, and a cute little candy store). Then we went to Matt's favorite little pub, drank a few too many drinks, had the greatest double date of our lives at a place called the Snuggery (seriously) and then went home for a night of video games and eventually packing up our merch for our flights the next day.

Monday (going home) - This was a sad, mildly disorienting day. I got so used to being around everyone on that tour so much, it was hard to let go of that and know that getting on my plane was taking me back to my home, to my very different life, to a place where I spend a lot more time by myself. It was especially hard saying goodbye to Luke, since I spent the most time with him this past month.

On my flight home I tried to read, I watched a bit of that Jennifer Anniston Bounty Hunter movie (bleh) but mostly I thought about the future. I thought about what being done with college means for me, and what I want to accomplish for myself, and what I already have accomplished for myself. I am so thankful to have had the amazing experience that tour was, and I think it came at the perfect time in my life. I really feel like I can accomplish anything right now. So let's hope I'm right.


This is the end of my tour blog series. I'm home now, life is slowly starting to get back to normal - but I doubt my life will ever truly be normal. As if to prove that, I am happy to announce I am going to try my best at BEDA this August. I'm not actually as insanely busy in August as I seem to be the rest of the year, so now seems like a good time to try it again. I hope you'll join me as I attempt to make blogging my priority again! See you on August 1st.

Thank you thank you thank you.

Chipotle burritos: 15
Last google search: "jo rowling"

Tour blog #7

Decatur, GA - I absolutely loved our show in Georgia. I had never been to Georgia before, and everyone was super friendly and super excited, which somehow just really energized me for playing another week of shows after the insanity of VidCon and then Infinitus back-to-back. There were almost 200 people there, and they also brought us a lot of really nice presents (including delicious cupcakes, stuffed sparkly snakes, and this adorable little pink haired rocker girl figurine that I love).

The show was supposed to be in the library but it got moved last minute to the basement of a church (on account of broken air-conditioning, so this was a very good thing). The highlight of this show for me was that I met the girl who was the first one to tell me about the hilarious phrase that is the "5head". We took pictures of our 5heads together.

Apex, NC - This was the start of our two-show stint in North Carolina. The funniest thing happened there; Luke and I started talking to this super nice couple that came to our show, and I kept thinking the guy looked familiar, but I didn't say anything. He and Luke were talking music production, and the girlfriend and I were talking about how we always just smile and nod when our boyfriends are talking music production.. and then FINALLY, the guy (Scott) turns to me and says, "You probably don't remember this, but you know the YouTube username fiveironscott?"

And then I FREAKED out. THAT'S why he looked so familiar! Back when I started on YouTube (before I even had my first 1,000 subscribers or anything) this guy fiveironscott used to leave me video responses and comment on everything I did because he seemed sure I was going to be famous on YouTube someday (and I just thought he was crazy). It's been over a year since I'd even heard from him, and 3 years since he used to leave me video responses, but yet I still recognized him. It was awesome to meet him, and it occurred to me how many people from my past on the internet I have encountered on this tour.

I forgot to mention this in the relevant blog post, but at Infinitus I was hanging out at the merch table when this girl comes up to me and says, "Hey Kristina, you used to go to the site Portkey.org, right? And you used to chat on that exclusive thread called Wonky, yeah?" I nodded, and she goes, "I did too. My username was TurletheInsane or something." And I was like "Courtney!" because yes, I did remember her, because this weird little thread on this weird little Harry Potter shipping site was a huge part of my life for over a year. There are so many people scattered across this country that I have been getting to meet and I feel so, so lucky.

That night we stayed with the Blibbering Humdingers (well, Matt, Lauren, Eia and Justin stayed with them, while Luke, Kathleen and I stayed at their friend's house 5 minutes away) and we had this amazing feast of macaroni and cheese and chips and salsa and the most amazing pesto (made by Kirsten) that I've ever had. We invented this Triscuit/pesto/sliced strawberry combination that sounds gross but was amazing.

Apparently there was a ghost named Dennis at the house we stayed at that night, and Luke/Kathleen/I were not sure if she was serious about the ghost or not (she seemed pretty serious about him - told us that he hates new people and that he'd try to keep us up at night) but I heard nothing out of Dennis.

Chapel Hill, NC - Before we headed over to the show, Kathleen needed to go to a comic book store to get the next book in some series she's reading, and even though she ended up not finding it there, Luke caught sight of the Magic The Gathering starter packs. He's always trying to turn me into a bigger nerd than I already am, and TCGs have been on his list of things to get me to like for awhile, so he bought one for each of us. I got the blue/white kit with a pretty sweet looking sphinx on the front. The rest of roflcoptour made fun of us. I reminded them that they play music about Harry Potter. They shut up.

Luke didn't actually know exactly how to play (since he used to play the WoW TCG, which is similar but not the same) so we pulled out the directions, and after we set up the merch tables and the sound system, Luke and I played our first match right there in the Chapel Hill library (before they let the fans in) and I totally whooped him. Yess!

Our second North Carolina show was pretty on par with the first one; we played in this cute little meeting room and had a pretty similar sized crowd. We met this girl who was dressed like Luna, and I don't know if she was acting or just being herself, but she was the most like Luna Lovegood that I have EVER met in anyone. Luke an I decided she made the show for us. There was also these two girls who we deemed the biggest ALL CAPS fans ever, who showed up in homemade ALL CAPS thirst and gave us this AWESOME gift basket. I'm looking at it right now on the seat next to me, so I am going to name everything inside.

1. Monsters Inc. activity book.
2. Transformers coloring book.
3. Twistables crayons.
4. Travel sized Hungry Hungry Hippos.
5. Rainbow cookies.
6. Cupcakes in a popcorn tub that LOOK LIKE POPCORN. The girls made them themselves, with little white and yellow marshmallows.

Probably the best gift we've received on tour yet.

With only two shows left, I am starting to get a little sad about tour ending. I definitely went through my "I am tired of this and want to go home" phase last week, when my voice problem was really bad and we still had Infinitus ahead of us (which I knew was going to be an exhausting weekend); but now that we're on the other side of that obstacle, I'm starting to get a little sentimental. Aside from the troubles, aside from the ridiculous amount of driving, aside from waking up early and never getting quite enough sleep, aside from being in confined spaces with the same people for almost a month… this has been an amazing experience and I'm reluctant to let it go. I've loved meeting new fans night after night. I'm not even tired of the other band's sets yet. I've enjoyed playing foursquare all across the country, and spending time in the car with Eia/Justin/Luke, and staying in hotels, and eating at new restaurants, and really, just being part of something like this.

Touring is really fun. It's tiring, and at times it's hard, but it's so, so fun. I'm going to remember this experience forever, and going home (though it will be amazing to sleep in my own bed) is going to be such a lifestyle change after being on the go for this entire month. Especially since I am now done with college, and don't really KNOW what going home is going to mean for me. I'm excited to begin the next chapter of my life, but turning the page on this chapter will be sad for me.

Chipotle burritos: 15
Random street sign right now: Speed limit enforced by AIRCRAFT.