#i should sleep soon ive got people to see tmrw

[trainsgenderjamie]

My uncle owns a couple houses in Vegas, so i used to be there a lot as a kid. Looking at it now, as someone who's hardly old enough to consider themselves an adult, it really is this strange fucking alien world out there. There's the deserts, yeah, but the city itself, and The Strip, are so wild to me. An entire city built off of criminals and gangs which might still be around and running things. Built off of tourist traps, gambling, and sex appeal. A city unlike anywhere else in the world, though I don't think I can say that as a compliment.

It has its highlights. I liked going Go-Karting there and there's this sick-ass water park we used to go to. But beyond the glitz and glamour of those expensive, high rise hotels, those bright, flashing, loud casinos that stink of cigarettes, and those fancy restaurants that are only expensive because the waiters wear suits and the ingredients happen to be from a country most of the patrons couldn't even spell, there's a weird, sinister feeling to the place. Maybe I'm being overly dramatic, or I'm just projecting my hate for casinos, but the entirety of the strip is oddly unsettling to me. The whole place feels like some kind of amusement park. There's attractions and things to do around every single corner. There's billboards driven around the city on the backs of trucks for sex hotlines and sex shows. Almost every single hotel has a casino built in somewhere, and they're all themed like it's some kind of new area in Disneyland. The fancy restaurants have a 50/50 chance of being actually really good Italian food or some kind of restaurant that's avant garde and will serve you portions hardly big enough to feed a 12 year old. Vegas is showy, that's the kind of city it is, and that it's intending to be, buy part of me looks at it (in particular The Strip) and sees some weird Capitalist Dystopia where the rich old white folks go to spend their retirement money and generational wealth, and are fed advertisements no matter where they look so they will spend their money, and are prompted and coerced to gamble and attend shows and buy everything so they will spend their money. Vegas is weird.

I don't say all that to act like there aren't an abundance of great things in LV. There's plenty of great people there and plenty of great businesses, !buy I feel like in my mind (mostly because I don't live there) the good things are largely overshadowed by that weird, sinister money trap, power hungry, elitist, cigarette stained energy that The Strip embodies. I dunno, I'm probably just talking to the wind here, but I can never shake that feeling about the place when I'm there. I don't really like it there cuz of that. I go to some casino on The Strip for dinner with my family for some special occasion, and my head starts hurting .The food is good, and I enjoy my family's company, and I appreciate them spending so much money on food for me, but being on The Strip just makes me feel bad. I think it's the nature of the place. It's too bright and too loud and it always smells like cigarettes or alcohol or both, and that definitely makes the headache worse. There's good things there, sure. I'll never not appreciate La Cañonita in The Venetian, they're one of a few things I actually look forward to if I go to Vegas, but I just don't like it there outside of those nice, short moments. I've not been there in a long time, but I'm not exactly looking forward to going back.

las vegas is a special kind of horrifying compared to the rest of the southwest because you get three different flavors of horror all together. there’s the strip, obviously, the hypnosis of the casinos. you know they intentionally don’t put clocks in casinos? and they put mirrors wherever they can? they’re trying to disorient you so you stay inside. they’re trying to trap you. and the casinos are different but they’re all the same underneath, slots and shows and roulette wheels, the same bones in different bodies. but then you get outside the strip and you’re in the suburbs. it’s flat. barely anything outside the strip is more than two, maybe three storeys. everything is in a strip mall. the houses are identical wherever you go. even the schools - there are two major architectural blueprints for high schools in las vegas. if you’ve been inside one school you can navigate them all. it’s all the same and it’s all normal, in defiance of the neon of the strip. (you can see the beacon from the luxor from anywhere in the city, you can always find your way to the strip, but- is that better, than being somewhere that you know? somewhere that’s the same wherever you go?) and then of course if you step too far outside you’re in the desert. much further and you’re in the mountains. the suburbs are creeping out further and further, taking over, but there will always be desert. summer will always be 120 degrees. there will always be heat and scorpions on the edges and no matter how far you push out you will not be able to build on the mountains. no matter how hard you try the desert will find you. and none of these things are mutually exclusive, not as much as you think. there are slot machines in grocery stores. there are houses behind casinos. there is undeveloped desert in the center of everything, reminding you that the desert was not built to hold you, the desert was not built for this, you should not be here. you shouldn’t be here.

[smireyac]

yea boi u already kno what it issssss 🍾🎆🎉🍾🎆🎉

hey so i started writing this at 8 o’ clock so i would be ahead of the game and actually have more than an hour to write but HEY its already 20 after midnight so who the eff care amiright ladies

WOOOOO 🍾🍾🎆 🎉 🎆 🍾 🎉 🎉 🍾 🍾 🍾 🎆🎆 🎆 🎉 🎆 🎉🍾 🎉 🍾🎆 🎉

so.................... its 2019.....................

i watched vox’s “2018 in 5 minutes” video and cried so thats how this year has been :^) a lot of lows......... we always think we leave the shittiest year behind then lo.............. the next year rears its ugly head and we never learn............ despite this, im gonna try to keep a positive outlook on the new year......... its literally just another day and i have to be in at work @ 9 tmrw but its what ever im already super fucking tired whats losing another hour of sleep anywahy?? its practically expected of me any way what with being a youth,,, ANYWAY i spent my time ringing in the new year watching spiderman homecoming so i think that wa sGREAt its also great  that im gonna get to see spiderverse AGAIN tmrw after work so SUCK ON THAT im ringing in the new year RIGHT!! its a very spidey new year and i wouldnt have it any other way heh.....

alright

so its time.... to reflect...........

and actually reflect this time last year was weak sauce compared to the first year “im too unfocused right now happy new year or whatever” *scoffs* what r u too good for self reflecting now a days huhh

been doing a lot of self reflecting this year,,,,,, but today we will look back on how the previous years have gotten me to where i am today...

if 2016 was the year of change and 2017 was the year of getting used to things.............. 2018 felt like............ the year of getting TOO used to things, of not ENOUGH change............. like alright i scratched a few of the bigger things on my yearly “to do” list/resolutions, i. e. finally going back to school and getting a job at the library, but like.......... i definitly dont feel like i did enough........... my art game was SO WEAK and i feel like i wrote less than 10,000 words ALL YEAR (not counting my academic papers) i didnt really CREATE anything this i dont have ANYTHING significant to show for this year............and to get more negative i didnt even make any friends all year NONE FRIENDS im only *just* starting to get more friendly with people at the library thank GOD theyre nice and gave my shy ass a chance to open up but i still dont feel like ill make FRIEND friends theyre just work friends and u kno what thats making me so pissed bc its tricking my dumb ass into thinking i have a crush on someone at work aND that i want a *romantic* relationship with them!!! OUTRAGEOUS im so peeved.......................... i also still havent gotten behind a wheel but at this point im not sure if i will anytime soon bc im That Way..... grrrr im just mad thinking of all the things i didnt do so motherfucker i will make 2019 the year of DOING!!!! and i had so many resolutions last year i feel like the more i had the less i felt like i had to do them, like i was just saying all that to be like “oh wouldnt it be nice if any of these things happened lmao” so yeah 2019: the year of DOING... and since ive kinda sorta figured out that writing is my thang.... i think i wanna focus on doing that.. and anything that will help me do it

SO: #GOALS for 2K19

-WRITE AT LEAST 50.000 WORDS U COWARD, more than just “brainstorming” too bc thats like a cop out, write like stories or dialogue or scenes or scripts or WHATEVER just make it to 50,000 pls some people do that in like a month

-READ UR GOD DAMN BOOKS, u *cant* buy anymore if u dont read the ones u’ve already bought,,,, im willing to make an acception re: checking things out from the library................ but u rlly shouldnt IT WOULD’VE BEEN SO EASY TO WIN THE BET DUDE srsly..... maybe .... an hour b4 bed ? try to read ? at least try to read once a week dude....

-heres a curve ball WATCH MORE MOVIES !!! u say u love film well fuckin act like u do...... u only went to the movie theater 5 times all year and three of those were all in the last month to go see spiderverse, more than that HOW MANY movies are there on netflix that u see and go “oh i should watch that finally” or “people say thats rlly good bro” and u scroll right past to watch the same 3 fuckin movies i s2g

-oh yeah back to the writing thing, to reach that 50,000 goal u should write about what you read and watch, there u’ll prob meet the goal b4 summer if u do that bro but....u actually gotta do it....................

ok those r the 4 im REALLY gonna work on and try to keep track of in either of the journals sien got me :^) these next few i rlly want to happen but..... we’ll see

-make some friends pls.... pls be more friendly......... ENGAGE  people when u have the opportunity askQUESTIONS about them like if they have a dog or a hobbie jesus h christ

-go out..... on ur own..... do stuff............by urself if u have to... go to the movies by urself go to a park, walk around down town for the fuck of it idk DO STUFF

-finish something............ for once in ur miserable life...................................... finish the vlog or the scrapbook..... or the reading list or this set of goals PLEAsE ANYTHING

im not even gonna put draw/art blog related stuff on here bc........ its not what i want........ like i love drawing and i dont think im terrible at it, im at a good place with it but i dont wanna put my energy this year into drawing stuff for the sake of me being able to say “i did it” like...... last yr and the yr b4 i rlly RLLY wanted to get better at art to idk prove that i could?? but like i havent picked up my drawing tablet in months ... that makes me really sad but i dont really feel like picking it up either? ? i said i wanted to take a painting/color theory/ life drawing class maybe i will this yr and it’ll reinvigorate my love of drawing........ tbh spiderverse got me *this close* to being pumped about art and animation and like yeah i still am, i love the medium and its still a dream of mine to be apart of it but it feels like a pipe dream if i try to go thru the art angle........ so many people r better than me at that and its not really what i wanna do,,, i wanna CREATE STORIES and worlds and characters and like i used my art to help *me* develop those but... i dont wanna use my art to do it for someone else i guess............. the art of animation itself still facsinates me so they door isnt close yet but,,, i wanna focus on the other aspect of myself that im more and at the same time LESS confident about lmao WRITING like alright,,, i think im a good writer .... sorta ? like yeah people tell me i am and sometimes when i look back on things ive written im like “dAMN i wrote this ???” but like,,,, there are some things to writing that still. escape me... like poetry.... and a lot of other aspects to it that i cant describe write now bc it would take too long and im getting cold and tired SO YEAH hopefully this english class will help me, even tho its just writting for college essays, i need to start somewhere and if shes rlly as good of a professor as rate my professor says then ill learn smthg new

where was i

well the year wasnt ALL bad, like i said i got the job at the library i wanted and FINALLY got to go to school, stressful as that mightve been........ and i got to see my love, my darling, the light of my life rhys again for one glorious week,, hopefully ill be able to see more of my friends this year? either in miami or milwuakee idc which MAYBE BOTH lmao im not that rich but hey i can dream,,,

alright its 1:12am i think im ready to sign off,,,,,,,,, here’s to DOING in 2019

🥂 cheers