Recently in My Life Category

Let's change my face up a little...

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the BEFORE picture.
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Chace Crawford's (and my) baby
Do you know an addicting website?  How about MorphThing.com?  It is a place where you can morph a picture of yourself with a picture of a celebrity (or a family member, if you so wish), and it creates astonishingly "real"-looking images of who you might look like if you were part whoever.  You can also mix with people to see what your child will look like, but that isn't nearly as fascinating, in my opinion.

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me and Britney Spears
I'm not sure what it is about this website that is so addicting.  Why do we want to spend forever mixing our faces with those of beautiful celebrities?  Is it because we all wonder what we would look like as an "idol," as someone as adored and celebrated as Angelina Jolie or Britney Spears?  Do we all want to catch a glimpse of what we might look like if we were someone else?

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me and Obama
I'm really not sure.  I know that part of it is the comedy factor.  I mean, who doesn't want to see what your child would look like if you married Chewbacca, or what you would look like as Gollum or President Obama?  This website is a give in if you want to have a thousand laughs... best if you mess around with it in a room full of happy people.

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me and Scarlett Johansson
But beware, when playing with MorphThing.com, you may feel a slight insignificance... looking at your transformation and feeling that a mixture of you and Scarlett Johansson just makes for an uglier picture... because the real Scarlett is so much prettier than you could ever be.

I don't know what is so fascinating about morphing my face with a celebrity's.  Maybe I'm just morbidly curious.  Maybe I'm dissatisfied.  Maybe I don't know.  Take a look for yourself.  What do you think?

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NaNoWriMo Winner!

So today I won the contest, NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, if you haven't heard of it.  Basically, I wrote 30,000 words in 30 days- through the month of November.  Some courageous folks attempted (and possibly succeeded) in writing 50,000 words in 30 days, but as an astonishingly busy 11th grader trying to make my way in life, I settled for a thousand words a day.  And I succeeded.  Three days early.  So I'm proud of myself, because even though it isn't 50,000, it's still a lot of words, and I now have a hunk of my novel written. 

In celebration, I thought I would post a synopsis of my novel, Ashes, here:

I was thirteen when it happened. The fire that burned down my home, killed my little sister, and destroyed everything I thought I knew. Thirteen year old kids shouldn't have to worry about the loss of a sister or how to respond when people try to offer empty words of support that don't make anything better. But that's how it happened. I lost both my home and my sister in a few hours.

Horrified, I fled my old life and lived on the streets, more willing to face the trials of homelessness than the harsh pain of my past. Over time, I found a group of kids that lived together in an abandoned building. They called themselves a Family, and offered to let me stay with them until I got back on my feet. I agreed to join the Family, but my past continued to haunt me, building walls of protection around my every thought, and causing me to wake up, screaming, in the middle of the night.

Life sucks, I realize that now, but just because that's true, it doesn't mean that you have to stop living. You can enjoy what little goodness there is out there. You can find a Family in places you'd never think to look. You can heal from the pain of your past, even when it seems impossible. Sometimes it's okay to run from your past, but in time, you will have to face the truth.

Well, that is the basic outline of my story.  I will probably post an excerpt of Ashes on here later on, when I begin my real editing. 

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