Spam Poetry Take I

I run a blog for my company, and we get a lot of terrible spam. Spam tries to look like real comments by using trigger words, and often it comes very close to almost being a sentence. I feel like the spam is trying to tell me something, if I only listen close enough...

I've become rather attached to the spam comments, keeping them stashed on my desktop now for the past few weeks, and I will often read them out to a coworker when I get the chance. The readings evolved into a kind of theatrical moment for me, as though I was reading from someone's secret diary. I became inspired to make them into more than what they were, and give them the life they'll never have, by turning them into odd poetry.

So here's my first poem (the first poem I've written since college) and every line and word is from a spam comment. I took very few liberties, just let lines from my ten favorite comments jump out at me. I've gotten five poems so far, but I'll share my least favorite with you here, just to see how you like the thing.

Spam Poetry: Access Consistently (titles are from the comments as well)

I simply stumbled upon

Accession.

Capital.

Even faced with the impossible,

Happiness exists inside

Consequent health ramifications

Including nerologogical disorders.

Use smudge sticks.

How to defeat a T-Rex in a Staring Contest

1. Bring Meat. 
1. Did you bring meat? We're talking the equivalent of fish and blood offered to around ten great white sharks--or more accurately, an actual Megalodon. Only instead of fish bring cows. If you didn't bring meat, you won't even see step two because you're already dead.
2. Ride in on a Brachiosaurus
1. What, you thought you could have a contest from your meager height of 5'6" while you're on the ground? You're the one who didn't bring meat, aren't you.
3. Breathe fire.
1. This step is really only for professionals and/ or those who read my blog. I'll teach you sometime.
4. Don't close your eyes.
1. This last step seems like it'd be obvious, but I had to remind you to bring meat, so you're common sense is already in question.

And there you have it. So what else do you need answered?

Follow Your Heart...

...says the wrapper of my Dove dark chocolate pieces, the lyrics of unremarkable and outrageously popular pop songs, and (probably) every movie I ever watched as a child.

To them I say: NO.

My heart is usually only asking me to do one or two things: Drink Wine. Eat Chocolate.

Or even: Eat Chocolate. Drink Wine.

Sometimes it wants me to do both while reading, but I spend more money on books, less on wine and chocolate; the equation becomes disproportionate.

But I cannot drink wine and eat chocolate endlessly whilst reading delicious books. And that makes the phrase "follow your heart" rather misleading--unless, it is meant to dissuade people from achieving success and social acceptance, in which case to those perpetrators of the phrase I say, "Well played."

Hey There, Star Kittens.

I'm officially a writer. I noticed this today, as I published more work to my company's website.

Maybe I've been a writer this whole time. Maybe all the stories and tales of dinosaurs posted within this blog make me a writer. Or maybe the work I did as a college undergrad made me a writer. I don't know.

I do know that you can find my writings on over 200 websites and news sources. And while they're only Press Releases--meant to be reclaimed by the very sources that re-post them--a lot of them have kept my words, words from my technical self that wants to spread news about the industry I work in.

But, my lovely Star Kittens, that's not enough for me. I'm going to publish a book.

In fact, I'm already working on it. And I want you to check it out.

So, should I post bits of chapters here or on a new blog? It is not about raptors (unfortunately) but it is a fantasy book dedicated to humor (like this blog, in a way, but more focused--yet somehow still random...)

Give me your feedback. I'm going to be putting together a Twitter as well in the next few weeks, which I will link here. And maybe I will start a Vlog, so you can see my awkward face as I gush about my aspirations and dinosaurs.

Thanks Star Kittens, you truly are marvelous.

Cat Mentality

So I know I said on my Facebook that I would draw more sharks on fire, but this is going to be about cats.

I, and my sisters, have believed for some time now that our cats Priscilla and Charolette, may they rest in peace, have been haunting our house for the last few years (since their death I mean. Although cats haunt places when they're alive as well. They're really just haunters). And probably we are crazy for thinking this (and I know I'm probably crazy for a number of reasons--no just kidding, I'm normal. Look, here's a shark <O< ) but recently a Dashing Young Man (aka my boyfriend) came by and, whilst he was relaxing on the couch, remarked, "I say, is that a member of the feline species stalking your stairs? Forgive me, it was just a trick of the---" "GHOSTS" I finished for him (even though he doesn't talk like that in real life). And thus it was that a third party, unaware of the previous suspicions held by me and my sisters, came to reaffirm in me that my old cats DO stalk these halls in death...

Which is why I'm writing about cats. Because after the Dashing Young Man retired for the evening, I began to wonder what my old cats must have thought during their alive years. And this is what I came up with:

Charolette's Thoughts Regarding Humans

1. The humans cannot be left alone. They seem to be afraid the moment they find themselves without other company. Yet they continually lock me out from places. No matter, to protect them I scratch for long minutes upon the doors, reaching to try the handles. Eventually I am let in, with reluctance I don't understand. 
2. Humans do not have fur and therefore, I am sure, will die of cold very quickly, even in warm weather. I try to help them with this, by curling upon their laps. It is tiresome, resting upon their bony legs, saving them from death, when my only reward is hardened food morsels.
3. There are strange noises from the place beyond the invisible doors. I watch the humans come and go from the place, but I cannot fathom what could be more important than lying in the sun beams on the floor. They do not seem to grasp the true simple joys of life. I wonder what it is they could be seeking...

Wow, I was going to work on that being more like the funny images in my head (a drawing was going to be included) but I'm actually having a little difficulty continuing...Erm, I didn't think it would be this sad to write about my old cats. Damn. I thought I was Stone! Beyond the emotions of mortals!

To make up for me going into the Sadlands, here's a shark that I drew/colored: 

Things Are Looking Good

Also titled: Scott Pilgrim Starts to Get it Together

(Image: Bryan Lee O'Malley. Occasion for posting image: Because)


I made myself Scott Pilgrim. Alyssa vs The World!

Waitressing: It's what's for dinner.

One of my favorite professors from Whitworth told me to get a job after graduation that allows me to still be creative. I just started waitressing at a sushi restaurant, and while it's not something that exactly makes me feel like rainbows might come out of my eyeballs, it leaves me with a lot of free time during the day. And free time is the time given by the Fitzgerald gods to do things of worth. (Fitzgerald's free time was the sober periods of his day between the "I'm-still-drunk-from-last-night" mornings and "No-seriously-why-are-we-in-France" evenings, and the occasional "When-did-I-get-a-daughter" Saturday afternoons.)

I bring up the Fitz, or as I like to call him, Fizzy, because he was a great writer who spent most of his life feeling worthless, getting kicked out of fancy clubs, and then completing a book in one week.

It's hard in the Facebook era to not 1) try to spell "era" "are" and 2) compare oneself to everyone else on one's newsfeed. At times I feel so overwhelmed by appreciation for things others are accomplishing and abject despair that I am not accomplishing anything. It's a kind of emotion that is bottomless: Fill with amazement at awesomeness other people are doing; all that feeling is emptied by the bottomless hole that is your despair at not doing anything. Repeat.

All the juvenile comparisons aside (and a duckling's teardrop wiped away), what I'm worried about the most is that I just don't enjoy the very basic delights of life. I don't really know what else to say about that, except to give a metaphor: It's like I keep forgetting that dinosaurs existed.

That's really the best way to put how I'm feeling about life right now.

One of the ways I'm dealing with my abject despair or dinosaur amnesia is to apply to everything that I think would make me sound really cool to be doing. But I really don't think that's going to make me feel better in the long run. Dinosaurs must be restored to the gaping head wound.

I'm also working on my sketch art a lot. Latest is the anime character Ururu from "Bleach" because she is such a badass. I kind of mixed her with some Mord-Sith details. Maybe I'll post it later this week when I'm trying to boost my creativity midi-chlorians.