Short Post and a Song #124: When my eleven-year-old self beats me at writing.

Translation: "I guess so," Jen said. Jenna ate a big dinner and slept in one of the many guest rooms. The next day she took a chariot to Kindors cave. She slowly went into the cave.

"Hello!" She hollered with a shivering voice. Then she saw two glowing, red eyes. Jenna screamed.

"What are you doing in my cave, little one?" Kindor said in a fake sweet voice.

I love that Jenna can just catch a chariot, like a taxi.

Translation: Jenna, sounding braver than she felt, said, "I know what you did to this place and I'm gonna fix it."

"Oh, you are. Well, why don't I just fix you," Kindor said. And he zapped her with his horn. Jenna felt all her happiness flushing out of her. *Obnoxious purple pen in lieu of italics*  Something funny. Something funny, she thought. *Back to equally terrible pencil* Then it hit her. In second grade her grandma picked up one of her classmates and said,

That's right, guys, eleven-year-old Jill stopped in the middle of a sentence and was just like, "Fuck this page, I want a new one".

Unless it's a cliffhanger, and eleven-year-old me was breaking formatting rules to create suspense. If so, well done, younger self. You are probably a much better writer than I am now.

~*~*~*~*~

"Montreal -40°C" by Malajube

I am astounded by how much I like this song. Despite the fact that I don't really listen all that closely to lyrics, I still don't usually get into songs in languages I don't understand. (I tried to look up the meaning and this one appears to be about having a big ol' boner for Montreal.) This silly French song is also just not my usual style and borderline obnoxious.

But I can't help it; this song makes me so happy. I can't help bounce-dancing around in my chair whenever I hear it. I think it could work great in the background of an old-friends-having-lots-of-fun-together sort of scene in a movie or show.

Short Post and a Song #123: Scaredly

Do you know what time it is? Do you???

Of course you do, since right now you are either using a computer, tablet, or phone, and all of those things have clocks.

But do you know that it is also Story Time? For the past few weeks I've been posting pages from Amerex: Land of the Unicorns, a book I wrote when I was eleven years old. If you wanna catch up just go back a few posts, I'll wait.

...

...

...

Have your eyeballs recovered from that blast of sheer awesomeness yet? (Or at least partly? Honestly I'm not sure they'll ever really be the same again. I'm not a scientist.) Okay, now let's get back to it!

Translation: Ralph quickly replied, "Of course, dearest. Right away." After the tea had come the four people sat in the parlor talking.

"Do you know why you're here, Jenna?" Hillary asked.

"I really have no idea, but if you don't mind my asking, why do all of you look so sad?" Jenna asked. Hillary's face darkened.

"That's what we wanted to talk to you about," Ralph said "Years ago an evil unicorn, Kindor cast a spell of sadness over Amerex. A daughter of Eve is the only thing that could break the spell."

Translation: "How would I break it?" Jenna scaredly asked.

Dolly answered, "We don't know. We just know only you can break it. Tomorrow we shall take you to Kindor's cave."

Jenna, getting more frightened by the minute asked, "What weapons shall I have?"

"None." Hillary said, "The spell can't be broken by violence. Will you try?"

I used to think I was pretty intelligent kid for my age at eleven. But that's kind of gone to hell now that I know that I believed "scaredly" was a word. But Jenna's quest has finally been introduced: Solve Amerex's depression problem by meeting an evil sadness unicorn.

Just look at that line of ladies there. They look more pissed off than sad, probably since my lack of ability to draw hands forced them into kinda confrontational poses.

Get ready for Kindor the evil sadness dragon in the next installment! Maybe Jenna will throw some Prozac at him.

~*~*~*~*~

"The Idea of Growing Old" by The Features

This is an irresistibly sweet song, and one that suits writing romantical-type scenes very well.

Short Post and a Song #122: Mutache

Brace yourselves, guys: Today you're getting not one, not two, but three pages of Amerex, mostly because I feel bad the first two pages don't have any pictures.

Translation: Then she saw the purple haired girl. The girl said,

"We've been expecting you Jenna."

"But this is just my dream last night, isn't it?" Jenna asked.

"I don't know about your dream but this isn't it." she said, confused. "Now lets get you cleaned up."

She washed off Jenna's cut and put a bandage on it.

Translation: After that Jenna realized how beautiful the castle was It had tons of chandeliers and their rugs and furniture had beautiful unicorns on them. The girl with the purple hair was named Dolly.

"Come and meet my parents the king and queen!" Dolly exclaimed suddenly, pulling Jenna into the prettiest room of all, the throne room. Jen saw a man with green hair, a mutache, and nice clothes.

Translation: Next to him was a beautiful lady with purple hair and orange streaks.

"These are my parents Queen Hillary and King Ralph," Dolly said proudly.

"Oh, hello!" Hillary said. "Welcome to Amerex: Land of the Unicorns."

"Mom, this is the daughter of Eve I dreamed about," Dolly said.

"Oh!" Hillary said, "Ralph, order some tea and scones so we can talk to Jenna."

So there's not a whole of note in those first two pages (except "mutache" lol), but that third one, hoo boy. I love how Queen Hillary welcomes her to "Amerex: Land of the Unicorns", like they have to say the whole thing every time. It would be like if someone saw the girl from that terrible Dirty Dancing sequel dancing, asked her what she was doing, and she replied, "Why Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights, of course". 

I also enjoy King Ralph's hideously weird proportions:

I lost half my arm in the war and my leg is actually a broomstick.

You'd think being a king he'd be able to afford better pants.

Also good job straight-up stealing "daughter of Eve" from C.S. Lewis, child self, A+. 

~*~*~*~*~

"For Once in My Life" by Stevie Wonder

It feels like a Stevie sort of Sunday.

Short Post and a Song #121: It hurt a lot!

Well Merry Christmas and Happy Birthday, Velocininjas, because I have decided to give you not one but two pages of Amerex today because I am a wise and generous soul.

Translation: I must be dreaming, she thought. Soon she found herself in a castle, standing in front of the most beautiful girl with purple hair...

"Wake up Jen Jen, time for school!" her mom yelled. So Jenna woke up, got ready and went to school. At recess, she was sitting with her best friend Tommy, talking about the dream.

"Maybe you'll have it again tomorrow, and you'll get to see how it turns out," Tommy replied.

I like the ellipsis after "purple hair". It makes her hair seem so ominous.

Translation: "I hope so," Jenna said. That night she had the dream again but it was different somehow. She soon found out why. At first everything was the same but when she cut herself on the glass, it hurt. It hurt a lot! It started to bleed so she rushed to the castle from last night.

In case you didn't get it, it hurt when Jenna cut herself. It hurt a lot!

~*~*~*~*~

"Impossible Germany" by Wilco

The first two and a half minutes of this song are all well and good, but it's what happens after that point that makes the song the masterpiece that it is. I'm linking a live version of the song since I personally get a little bit of a proximity-to-awesomeness high when I watch those amazing guitarists go.

Short Post and a Song #120: Jenna is unimpressed.

We have finally reached the proper story of Amerex: Land of the Unicorns, so let's jump right into it.

Translation of Pencil Cursive: Once Upon a time...

One night Jenna had the weirdest dream. She seemed to be standing on a cloud. She saw tons of unicorns some flying, some walking around. (in obnoxious purple pen) None of them look happy, she thought. (back to hard-to-read-pencil) She saw lots of sharp glass things on the edge of clouds She walked up to one and touched it. She got cut. It didn't hurt or bleed.

My favorite thing is how thoroughly underwhelmed Jenna looks by all of this. "Standing on a cloud? *shrug* Seeing tons of unicorns? I've seen better. I'll just touch some of this pointy glass, I guess."

~*~*~*~*~

"Feeling Good" by Nina Simone

I am actually not feeling good at all, due to having been sick with this bug/flu thing that has left me feeling like a balloon overstuffed with mucus and grossness for a full week. But I hope listening to this song might help to jumpstart the recovery process.