AND MY HEART-SHAPED GLASSES AINT EVEN ON

READ IN ITS ENTIRETY. you owe me that much.

"Dear Kara,
I am very pleased to be able to inform you that CHILDREN has won a place in our final, and has been selected for publication in our on-line magazine, ROEHAMPTON WRITES. LOST was longlisted, but ultimately unsuccessful.

We would like you to read the piece at the Creative Writing Day Soiree, December 17th, event beginning 6pm.Congratulations! We are very pleased for you, and as your teachers, very proud of you.

So what next?
There are three points that we would like you to be aware of:
1. The work will be first published in an upcoming 2009 edition of ROEHAMPTON WRITES. This means that the work should not be published anywhere else before we publish it. By responding to this email you accept these terms.

2. That a member of Creative Writing staff may enter into an editorial process with you, to make sure that the work is ready for publication. For the moment, the piece is absolutely fine for reading on the night.

3. That in order to read, you MUST attend a performance workshop, December 17th, 9.30 - 11.30, QB252 to prepare you for the evening performance. We want you to feel comfortable and confident on the night.

Please do get back in touch with me. Any questions are very welcome.
Best wishes,
Leone Ross
PS. This is the formal proforma. On an informal note: you go, girl. You know you hot!"

There is nothing better than reading that after you slave away all day perfecting your essay and article due for submission on Tuesday and after having eaten a FAT tuna pasta salad that you made and ate straight out of the pot in its entirety, which then made you feel like investing in a lifetime of anorexia. My weekend is going to therefore inevitably be heights. This is now making its way around the internet starting with my immediate friends and family. FAMILY! HAH! What a word. If it weren't for my family having this awesome air of fucked-up-ness and choosing to squeeze me out all placenta dribbling straight into the chaos, then this story would not have been possible. Of course you'll get to read it in 2009.

LOOK MOM! I'm happy! No alcohol included!

SHAKE IT TO WAKE IT

I'm going ape-shit over these two very inspiring things that happened in the blogosphere to some very inspirational chicks of mine, and which also helped me realise fully which magazines I HAVE to work for once I hit the States.

So if you don't know Coilhouse, then you best get on it. Here's an interview Gala Darling did with the bevy behind the blog and magazine (Zoetica, Nadya and Meredith) on what it's like to be a magazine founder and editor. What Coilhouse does for my reading pleasure and the magazine world is like what Rasputina does for music. I can't express to you the next level joy I feel that the magazine is prospering with the first issue completely selling out, and the second issue due to hit racks this month. Hoping to get my hands on a copy of that, if it's the last thing I do for the year. AND THEN, a freelance position with them if it's the last thing I do next year.

AND SECONDLY,

I want to write for BUST Magazine because they're fierce and do fierce articles like this about fierce chicks who listen to metal, like Beverly from Reality No-Show, whom I have a total crush on. BUST also had a major craft fair in London this weekend that I had really set out on going to for christmas shopping, but some other expensive-ass venture went down that prevented me from going. But if you're in the US, look out for the US versions and support the mag...These are scans I nicked from Bev's page. Insanely jealous albeit lovin' it to shreds. And can you imagine it gets better? Here's this majorly passionate piece she wrote for the interview on her metalhead ways and means, that totally had me geared up for insane things in my future, and even more insane music. Literally the best thing I've read over the last couple weeks.

My mission in life has so been stamped on my forehead.

CONSULT ALL THE WASTE TO FIND THE KEY

It's crunch time with one week left 'til hand-in of all my third year particulars before a blessed Christmas break in the desert with the fam, and all I can think about are the things I blew all my cash on and the things I want to take out loans for...

£18 £18

and £40. Words are failing me with this travel bag/vanity case/item of demi god status. It's just divine.As for three of my current owned favourite items (not including the stash I picked up this weekend at Brick Lane which will so gets its shining moment later on):

A coin purse/paraphernalia case thingie

Fringe bag from Primark that cost me like nothing and is doing a world of good

And this PVC skirt that I ordered online from Honour for something like 20 quid. Wore it out for the first time this past weekend; or rather it wore me. I fucking love it.

And since we're talking in 3's here, there are three relentless songs dominating my brain as of late:

Ivan Lins version of A Felicidade (which none of the youtube videos are justifying so I'm not gonna link it)

Psychosocial by Slipknot (still killing myself for missing their show on the 1st)

and Alien Ant Farm's Wish (has me reminscing on my (attempted) skater days and playing Tony Hark Pro Skater 3 and listening to that).

Not sure how the portuguese bossa nova track fits with the other heavier ones but my head never fails to amuse.

IT'S TIMES LIKE THIS IT'S OBVIOUS

AMONG OTHER THINGS TAKING PLACE IN MY LIFE...like my coursework threatening to lose itself in the abyss of technology, like having to stay in this week having spent in the hundreds over the weekend doing christmas shopping, wining and dining at Belgo with privileged friends, drinking and buying cans of fish for homeless people, like being a dirty lazy fuck who hasn't left bed and hasn't gone to class and hasn't been using her intelligence in any way these past few days, like me having my first proper piece published even though the nature of its content is nothing to broadcast about (but hey, a girl can be proud), like having many more worthwhile things sprouting up VERY SOON in my very new publishing career that you need to look out for, yeah...among all of that...
THIS MAN, has FINALLY agreed to be my boyfriend...again.
Panda, we know words can express how much I love you (with the fire of a thousand suns) but let's see how well my actions can. I'm ready to try again for you and I'm excited for what's to come considering what has past between us lol. I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU...and see you in L.A.!!!

P.S. Sorry guys, there's no more of me to be had as of this day, December 8th.

Why. No really, why. This is happening without me. In L.A. On the 13th. I got a personal invite. It's an open bar. I could die. Twice.

MAKE ME BAD

I'm taking some time off writing my reviews right now at the Skin Two office to talk about these epic medic inspired shoes that have been itching my brain like a dirty cast for the past month! Gwendolyn Huskens is obviously the most genius design student I've encountered in a while. I would actually sport the majority of them. Dead serious.

Anyways, I'm pretty excited because, going through this massive heap of perverted/weird books and DVD's at the office, I stumbled across something of Trevor Brown's. I praised his work way back on my old blog at some point, and am now fortunate enough to do a review on one of his books of macabre rubber-clad doll illustrations. Check out his work and blog of similar works and inspiration here....well, if you like cute amputees, bondage chicks, dolls, eerie child play and toys and all that lol...

P.S. Today I'm signing up for a workshop in Bondage!

[image by Rene Van Der Hulst]

I LIGHT A CIGARETTE CUZ I CAN'T GET NO SLEEP

So, I don't smoke. Unless I'm perilously drunk and people are offering (which surprisingly doesn't happen that often). But I like how it looks. So here's some pictures from Le Smoking that I picked up because I SO don't feel like writing this feature right now and am doing everything but.

I'D BE SAFE AND WARM IF I WAS IN L.A.

Gross, huh?
I'm in love. SHHHhhhhh....

AND SOMEDAY I DO BELIEVE I'LL BE BURIED SIX FEET UNDER GROUND

Today's my fake ID birthday. I' m finally 21! Okay, so here's the story behind that. When I was in Trinidad over the summer, my 17 year old brother suddenly showed up one night at one of the clubs I was partying at. And he had this totally legit looking ID on his smug person. He told me his friend from elementary school started making these things for the hell of it. He got it free. So I thought I might as well get one done before heading off to the US in a couple weeks to visit Panda. Got one. But the kid's still a bit slow so...you'll never guess what happened. The D.O.B. on it, for some strange reason wasn't my own, but some made up one: December 3rd 1987! Which made me....20! I didn't have time to blast him because I literally drove over to his house the morning I was headed to the airport (because he was WORLDS behind schedule) and I just assumed that I would be 21 if that's what we had agreed I was going to be (HELLO! Travelling to L.A. in a matter of hours!). Anyways, so I swiped it, thanked him and left. It's only when I got on the flight and could relax that I checked it. 20. TWENTY. 21-1.

But anyways, since it's a foreign license from a third world country, the bouncers in L.A. totally just let me in anyways. But the first night I went out there I tried switching around the dates telling the bouncers that my birthday was actually the 12th of the 3rd month rather than the 3rd of the 12th month, and that worked too.

Anyways, so here I am, 21/19. I am planning a birthday party soon but as for tonight I'm just home chilling, listening to Paradise Lost (can't be arsed to get out of my PJ's). Plus this book I'm reading that I nicked from the Skin Two office is going pretty good : My Girlfriend Comes to the City and Beats Me Up by Stephen Elliott. Pick this up and...take a shot for me! :)

NOVEMBER IS ALL THAT STUFF FROM A MILLIONS

This weekend I moved all my shit into my flat, cleaned and sorted out my room, watched the movie above for research purposes, donated pubes to a friend's in-the-works poetry/art project (and will continue to do so til about mid-december), bought Panda a Christmas present that I'll have to mail him soon, did a teensy bit of Primark perusing and purchasing as a reward, went to a private member's BDSM club and discovered some really interesting shit, had a couple drinks and a laugh with some really interesting and fun people who I will be meeting up later this week for a drink, for the LAM (London Alternative Market) and after party, and for a workshop in Bondage put on by Bondage conoisseur Chanta Rose. I have been shortlisting people's creative entries for a Creative Writing Competition our school's putting on that I'm helping out with, entered two of my own pieces, went to see Tacit Theatre's latest production called Scaramouche Jones that I got into for free because I agreed to be the press and review it for their website, got piss drunk at the producer's flat and spent the night there, scrambled home early the next day to write an article on cocktails for Societe Magazine that was due the night before (but which since it's a mag based in the US, I just about made the deadline, being 8 hours ahead), searched in vain for a secondhand copy of Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress which I am supposed to read for tomorrow's class but for which I will just have to use my memory (read it in my pre-teens) and keep very quiet, bought a book on Buddhism and one on Hinduism and made very tasty risotto.

And now I have the flu. But I wrote this because I felt bad that my absence has approached the 7-day mark, and I still want you to read me. But I'm afraid, this week is going to be just as hectic as the last so posts will remain sporadic. I've got about 3 articles due this week, more competition entries to shortlist, class, work experience at Skin Two, severe reading, a fake birthday party to plan and the bizarre list goes meandering on, and on, like the fucking yellow brick road. So have a look at the blogs on my list, will you, until I return next.

SO I TAKE MY TIME GUIDING THE BLADE DOWN THE LINE

Really busy schedule ahead of me for the rest of the month, and all the way into December: coursework, articles, BDSM reviews, satanic clubbing, daddy visits, fake ID birthdays, friend's legit ID birthdays, Russian BBQ's, Neon Nights, writing competitions and travel. Which brings me back to satanic clubbing. I might be going undercover for my fetish project to Club Anti-Christ for AC Lite on December 5th. Come and hang with me...if you even recognize me post-geared up. Here are some of the Satanic Sluts totally owning it. Jealous. Almost.

Bleed for Me:

Verdandi:

Tempesta:

Razor Candi:

Darenzia:

Eva Morgan:

Morella:

Nitrogene

Listening to Lacuna Coil tonight. Always a favourite.

THROW DOWN YOUR UMBILICAL NOOSE SO I CAN CLIMB RIGHT BACK

de~sen~si~tize
1.to lessen the sensitiveness of.
2.to make indifferent, unaware, or the like, in feeling.
3.Photography: to make less sensitive or wholly insensitive to light, as the emulsion on a film.
4.Printing: to treat (the design on a lithographic plate) with an etch in order to increase the capacity to retain moisture, and to remove traces of grease.
5.Chemistry: to reduce the sensitivity of (an explosive) to those stimuli capable of detonating it.

I bought this cinder-block sized Oxford dictionary a while ago that I'm just chuffed about. Something I've liked doing forever since I could read whole novels is opening the dictionary to random pages and learning the most attractive words off of it, making notes as I go (I guess I'm a born writer). I'm hurt. I think I also just fucked up a really good Venus razor. I really just want to go to bed, and that really isn't much.

I'm going to a Russian Barbecue today to do my part to save the earth and get drunk off my ass on some Stolichniya while listening to Regina Spektor.

So Panda doesn't want to live with me anymore. Didn't really have any plans after that. What am I doing tomorrow? Someone please come and get me.

TAKE ME TO YOUR LEADER

And here we have Pixie Market understanding my lust for exemplary plaid. Seriously, my wardrobe is fast becoming infested.

I THINK THAT STATE PATROL CAR'S STILL BEHIND

[Epicly Later'd]

Excited for this. Graduation. Moving to Cali. Happy Hippie Poverty. I promise to be the best bum I can be.

On another note, while I got all dolled up and met some friends for an outstanding Chav rendition of Othello at the Lyric theatre, (and Jen is gonna choke) MOTORHEAD was playing across the street!!! I was wondering why the sudden barrage of long-haired, dazed, leather-jacketed people at Hammersmith tube station. Seriously. My brain....

LEAVE ME HERE IN MY STARK RAVING SICK SAD LITTLE WORLD

So, I've been doing research and work experience at the popular fetish magazine Skin Two, which means, quite rightly as my friend put it, truly tarnishing any innocence I once had. But I think it's being tarnished for a good cause: journalism.

Anyway, so Tim the editor let me take home some of the overflowing BDSM/fetish/sex products he gets sent (including shit like this) for me to look at and see if they're worth me doing a review on. We had a good laugh watching the before trailers on this DVD and Philippe Leroy's house in the film is an awesome paragon of true 60's sex..and James Bond. I love ridiculous old Grindhouse-type movies so I bagged this film to finish at home.

CALL IT WOMEN'S INTUITION, BUT I THINK I'M ON TO SOMETHING HERE

Anything to distract me from the task at hand (today's un-ticked collegiate tasks in my planner)...

FIVE THINGS IN MY BAG:
-Esse Menthol Cigarettes bought in Abu Dhabi months ago
-A very tiny bottle of CK One Summer from the travel edition pack I bought in NY duty free (can you tell I'm showing off?)
-Curious Pleasures: A Gentleman's Collection of Beastliness (picked this book up from the Skin Two office and plan to do a review on it maybe)
- microwave popcorn packets for later
-White quilted Chanel wallet given to me for Christmas by a really nice girl back in Dubai


FIVE FAVOURITE THINGS IN MY ROOM:
-this really pretty colourful demon mask I haggled for outside the Great Wall (yeah, don't think I'll be stopping with the boasting anytime soon. Too smug right about now)
-my Sony Vaio laptop
-fake fur coat I bought in a Charity shop recently for £20
-sunglasses collection
-mom's vintage Madonna-esque bustier that I brought over with me for my last year of London mayhem

FIVE THINGS I'M CURRENTLY INTO:
- the London Fetish Scene : PVC, Femme Doms, violet wands and BDSM merch (working on a big article)
-planners and calendars (my life has been meticulously documented as of late due to busy-as-fuck-ness
-Diana Wynne Jones novels, particularly Howl's Moving Castle and Castle in the Air
-being a real journalist (I'm working on like 7 different pieces at the moment, all due next month)
- butter on toast

FIVE THINGS I'VE ALWAYS WANTED TO DO:
- volunteer to be a body snatcher in Thailand
- speak fluent Japanese
- own a tansier monkey
- be a violently seductive bitch
- write a novel

I WAS CAUGHT LIKE A MOTH WITH ITS WINGS OUTTA SYNC

Mafia Hunt brought this guy Richard Sorger's shit to my attention. Not much into all the other glittery sequined particulars on the website but these are worth mentioning I think.

THE ARTIST MUST RETAIN HIS SWAGGER

Hi. This is a picture of a guy called Neon. Neon. Nothing more awesome presented itself to me this week (actually not true, but, yuh kno...). I want that nickname. Can I be the female version? And that reminded me that there's a neon night party coming up VERE soon that I consider myself the guest star of and am totally amped and ready to own it with my new laces. Anyway, just so I don't get in trouble, that picture's taken from this epic chick's blog called Reality No-Show, and this is her:Beverly Battle, otherwise known as a member of the bevy of girls of my dreams, which includes, and certainly isn't limited to Gnarlitude Jen, Tasha Tilberg, Omahrya Mota and Meli over at Mafia Hunt.

And I got word back from my marriage proposal to Dan Hillier in a really nice email that'll have me over at Brick Lane's Sunday Up Market for sure next weekend (and not only because I'm going Christmas shopping with Becks. And not only because I have to exchange a sweater) :


"Hey Kara,
Thanks very much for your comments - always nice to see where my work's popping up, though you'll have to ask my father's permission for my hand in marriage and he's a hard nut to crack...
Your blog's great.
Hope to see you by the stall again sometime.
Take care,

Dan x"

HI DAN! BYE YOU!

I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS

Currently distressed as fuck. I was just having a conversation on skype with Panda and he sent me a link on current news on the creature above, the tarsier. As a child, I used to leisurely flip through this intricately detailed and picture laden cinder-block sized manual of all God's animal wonders and picture a day in the life of them. Well, one such animal I marvelled at and fell in love with back then was the tarsier. So finding out that I would rather have one en lieu of a real life baby but that it's impossible to own one because they're endangered, hit a soft spot just now. We started stringing together these wild thoughts of me volunteering to care for them in the Philippines for a brief period some time after graduation. And that made me tear up, because I know that's never going to happen. What's even worse is that I think if I were to spend some considerable and ridiculous amount of time with one, I would be able to stop taking Prozac. I could see myself a happy hippie with this thing in my palm (THAT TINY!). So allow my misty-eyed self to reminisce on what it would be like to care for a tarsier.

HOW TO TAKE CARE OF A TARSIER [courtesy eHow.com]

Step1 Be careful. Be safe. Tarsiers are a tropical, endangered species that can carry and transmit parasites and worms to humans.

Step2 Protect yourself and the Tarsier. Tarsiers are an endangered species. I may have mentioned that). They are illegal to trap and sell as pets, and may be illegal to keep as pets. You may be looking at a very nice fine if you have one.

Step3 Tarsiers are nocturnal animals that seek tropical forests environments at night to feed on insects and small creatures. If you are keeping one while waiting to give it to a rescue sanctuary, keep a supply of live crickets, termites, grasshoppers around for it to catch and eat.

Step4 Also note the word tropical- heat your place up, install a swamp cooler to add moisture, and plant trees- otherwise the little fistful of joy will go looking for his natural environment. At 4-6 inches in length the little escape artist will be easily missed.

Step5 Do not handle during the day. The tarsier is nocturnal, and disrupting its natural biorhythm will cause it stress- it may stop eating or start head-banging. Tarsiers in captivity live an average of 12 years, as opposed to 25 years in the wild. Tarsiers in captivity have been known to suicide. (DUDE...anorexia? head-banging? suicide? meant for each other much? but seriously, this makes me all the more blurry-eyed)

Step6 If you truly care for the tarsier as a species, don't consider keeping one for a pet. If you have one, contact your local animal rescue, zoo, or primate rescue to inquire about what to do. If you are worried about fines or the legality of your situation, ask anonymously.

*countless sighs...*