The Cat Lady (thoughts on the game)

Recently, my husband and I settled into a holiday appropriate game, purchased during the Halloween Steam sale for a mere pittance.  "The Cat Lady" is a point and click adventure game, which uses what appears to be pixellated photographs as the main characters, and a background made of digital mixed media consisting of edited photographs, disassembled, reassembled and edited for maximum mood and texture.  It's sort of an artsy mix that I find very basic, but very appealing at the same time.  It's like a moving collage, made by Sorrow personified, in a dread induced state.  So basically, it's awesome, and anyone sharing my taste would love it!

The game begins with our "heroine", Susan Ashworth, staring into her Cat's eyes as she patiently waits for the pills she swallowed to poison her body and bring her to a peaceful death.  This may sound like a glorification of suicide, but I don't see it that way, and I'm not one to romanticize death.  Susan, our heroine, is a truthful portrayal of tragedy as she suffers from a slothful, deep depression resulting from isolation and loss.  It's probably the most refreshingly accurate representation of mental illness and depression I've seen in popular media, so accurate that I have to wonder if the writer drew from personal experience.  

When she fades from our world and crosses over into a world between, she is denied death by what appears to be an old lady, who we surmise to be the Devil or Death.  Susan is then blackmailed into returning back to body (and her empty life) in order to rid the earth of five parasites before she can find her peace.  And so the journey begins!

one of the five parasites

The game is very heavy on story and dialogue, and like most point-and-click adventure games, it relies on problem solving to move the game forward.  You must interact with the environment and other characters around you and pay attention to clues in the surroundings and in dialogue in order to reach your goals.  I find this game method much more pleasing than the ever popular first person shooter games, where the object is usually "shoot so and so" hidden behind a shoddily written story and forced unvarying dialogue (yawn).

The dreaded criticism...

The Cat Lady is an indie game, so it will have an indie feel to it, especially where the graphics and voice acting are concerned.  The graphics are not 3D or computer animated, but instead take on a more cut and paste approach, like an avant garde South Park.  Personally I prefer this, because when a game is too realistic, I often find it too nerve-racking to finish (ahem, Outlast).  The voice acting is not top notch quality, ranging from fantastic for the two main characters, to downright silly for some of the lesser roles.  The Devil or Death happens to be my least favorite, as the actress botched it with something that sounds like a forced fake German accent, which spontaneously changes to an accent that sounds like the voodoo queen from Monkey Island (if you get this reference, then congrats, you're a geek).  Her intonation was good, but I found the accent to be really forced, and downright distracting.  Another thing about the audio that really bothered me, was that the voice actors that played the supporting roles were all obviously using very cheap microphones without any sort of pop filter or volume control.  My husband didn't seem to notice this, but I've owned enough microphones to know that it didn't sound professional.  But, remember, this is an indie game, which means their budget was probably very limited.  All in all, I think they did a great job telling a story and realizing their dream with the funds they had.  It was a very satisfying, exciting game with plenty of story, atmosphere, and suspense, and I strongly recommend it!

You can buy the game DRM free direct from them, or from GOG:

http://www.thecatlady.co.uk/

http://www.gog.com/game/the_cat_lady

Or, if you already have a Steam account, and don't mind DRM, you can buy it here:

http://store.steampowered.com/app/253110

get ready to kick some ass

don't tell me to smile

You're walking along the street, lost in thought and a polo wearing douchebag with perfect teeth and a self assured strut says "Smile!".  Has this ever happened to you?  If so, you're probably a female living in the United States suffering from something commonly referred to as "resting bitch face".   The fact that a normal, expressionless face is even given a name (a negative one, at that) is disturbing to me, because it denotes that there is something wrong with your mug if your lips are not turned up in a cheesy grin 100% of the time.

I've been told that some Eastern European country (Russia, I believe) has a saying along the lines of: "the only people who smile constantly are either crazy or American".  My fellow Americans, there's nothing wrong with the rest of the world because they don't share our affinity for smiling, nay, it's our obsession with baring our pearly whites that is weird.  So that German cashier is not grumpy or rude, they are paid (minimum wage) to do a good job, not to smile their way into your hearts.

One thing that many non-U.S. Americans don't understand is, that smiling is part of our cultural etiquette.  If you don't smile, you may be considered rude or stuffy.  First impressions are truly vital in the U.S., and if you don't put on a good face when meeting a potential boss, friend, partner, etc., then you may just throw a perfectly good opportunity out the window.  On the flip side, Americans take this etiquette as a global fact instead of a cultural phenomenon, and become offended by people from other countries that don't follow this (U.S.) norm.  In my opinion, it's always best to understand your own customs and the customs to other, in order to avoid conflict or misunderstandings.

Personally, I love the fact that Germans don't smile all the time, because it means that each smile from a German is a genuine expression of joy!  Now isn't that just a lovely concept??

I've always loathed having strange men telling me to smile.  I find it condescending, abrasive, and completely inappropriate that some bloke I've never spoken to thinks he has the right to demand something of me, of my body.  I'll do what I like with my body, with my mouth, and if that involves not smiling for randos then so be it!

And with that said, I'm off to work, where I shall walk along the streets with my resting bitch face, unharassed by people trying to impose their will regarding my facial expressions.  Thank you, Germany!

lost in translation

Happy Tuesday, everyone!  I woke up today, on the metaphorical wrong side of the bed, but then this catchphrase popped in my head:  
Tuesday: at least it's not Monday

Right right right, let's move past my incessant ramblings.  I'd like to share a musical collaboration I did before my move, with Tury Saldana.  All Instrumental writing/recording/post-production by him, with my added lyrics/vocals.  I decided to write the lyrics in Spanish, though as to why I did this, I'm not sure.  Maybe it was a last goodbye to the country I called home for four years, or maybe Spanish is just a better language for expressing what needs to be said.  It's funny how much gets lost in translation, and how much I struggle now to be able to say exactly what I want to say in English.  We have so many words, but somehow, I find myself fruitlessly grasping at them, searching for the words that won't betray my thoughts, but knowing they will somehow fall flat.  Part of the beauty of Spanish (and German) is that following basic rules, you can invent words, and people will understand the meaning behind them.  It's like a living, moving language.  English (or maybe just contemporary U.S. English) lacks this creativity, which I find sad, because I like the complexity of our vowel sounds and the lulling, so-called laziness of our consonants.  I guess you can't have everything!

Without much more rambling, I'll leave you with the collab.  It's a reflection on the tragedy of dementia, and the complications that it causes in love-rooted relationships.  Anyway, give it a listen, and download it for free, if you like!

Dear Costa Rica, I won't miss you

As some of you may know, I spent the last four years in Costa Rica, and anticipated a move during the last two years.  The move has finally happened, and we are settling into our new apartment in Northern Germany (there's no fun or privacy in getting TOO detailed as to my whereabouts ;-)).  Is it cold?  Yes.  Is the architecture badass?  Yes.  Am I losing my mind with chocolate and cheese lust?  Yes, definitely. 

My first impressions are good, people are very friendly and polite, the service is good, the food is fatty and delicious, and people actually stop for pedestrians!  I'm told this is most unusual (minus the fatty food) for Germany, and that I must live in a magical pocket of joy and wonder.  Or could this just be a thing of perception, as I've lived in the opposite extreme for the last four years?  My husband pointed out that perhaps my time in Costa Rica has primed me to see the positive, as the service there is horrible, the food is mostly bland, all material goods (incl food) are overpriced, drivers have the temperament and decision-making skills of a 15-year-old, government services are bogged down in bureaucracy and greed, and not to mention a certain infuriating brand of almost dishonest passive-aggressiveness that I thought I would finally be able to free myself from when I moved away from Seattle. 

Costa Rica bred in me, a raging irritability, an anger, a frustration, and a generally unpleasant disposition.  At the same time, I felt a feebility, a helplessness, a weakness in my inability to change anything about my surroundings, which only made me angrier.  I don't know if it was the noise, the saddening signs of the populace's disregard for human life, the feeling of entrapment and alienation between the bars built into every property and window, or if it was simply the heat of the burning sun; whatever the cause was, there was always fuel to keep the fire burning and to let it grow, right up 'till the very end when I was mugged, in broad daylight in a public park supposedly full of police officers, a mere three weeks before my departure.  I felt fed up, or as my mother would say, "Ich habe die Schnauze voll!"

So when people ask me "will you miss Costa Rica?" I can honestly answer "no"... "but what about the heat?  You're going to miss that in Germany!" nope.  That's what down coats and hot showers are for. 

As I type this, I am shivering in my heatless-until-October apartment, my feet numb, my nose and fingers icy, yet I find myself again, enjoying the sharpness of my thoughts, and the coolness, the placidity, of my emotional composure.

gothic butterfly

I found this amazing, velvety black butterfly outside our front door and had to share!  I'm always finding weird and amazing insects, and although butterflies are just arthropods like cockroaches (my least favorite insect!), I have a certain affinity to them and their metamorphic cycle.

modern gothic kitchen

Anyone who has ever visited my house knows my obsession with with the black/red/grey/white color scheme.  It's in my paintings, in my clothes, and in my house.  It's a mix of modernity and darkness, and it appeals to my gothic sense, but not in a tacky-velvety-sort-of-way (I'm not anti-velvet, I've just compulsively hated the feel of it since I was a child).  Don't get me wrong, I love dark victorian-style furniture, I just believe that in my house, it would look as out of place as a peacock among hens.  If I had an obscenely large house, or even just fancy baseboards, then I would probably have chosen a victorian theme, but my house is small and simple, and I'm content with being stylish in a minimalistic sense.

Recently we had our dreadful white kitchen cupboards re-painted.  I say dreadful because you can literally see every speck of dirt on anything white, and since Costa Rica's dirt/dust has a mind of its own, my white cupboards turned the color of a coffee addicts' teeth.  It was silly and frivolous of me to splurge on a paint job because of our impending move, but I wanted to enjoy just a few months of real color.

I kept the old handles :-)

laundry day

Laundry day for the average Costarican goth looks something like this...

beauty in decay

As tiny as the country I now call home is, there are many places I have yet to visit.  I've been parasailing in the Pacific, canopy touring along the Caribbean, seen opera in the Teatro Nacional, gone drinking in the capital, melted in the heat of Golfito, walked along the abandoned native ruins of Guayabo, and of course I have seen my share of active and inactive volcanoes, lagoons, rivers and national treasures.  I still haven't seen the turtle hatching grounds, the haunted asylum, the abandoned island prison, caves with eyeless fish, but all in due time!

Last weekend I had the pleasure of going to San Gerardo de Dota, a cloudforest mountain town with a tiny population of about 200 people.  It was the very definition of the boonies.  As we entered some trails, I couldn't help but feel like I was walking through a foresty trail in Washington on a rainy fall day.  My sense of nostalgia was only deepened when I found cluster after cluster of beautiful, untouched fungi.  I was reminded of my autumn walks through a foresty area behind a cemetery, just minutes away from my former childhood home, where I used to wander, looking in awe at various types of fungi springing from decaying piles of forest matter.

On our walks in San Gerardo, I found dozens of types of fungi, some normal, others bizarre, but all beautiful.  Then, we stumbled upon the goth queen of all fungi; a curling dark fungi that I could only decribe as a smalk black calla lily devoid of a pistil in the center.  

To see more awesome fungi from our trip...
click here and here

UPDATE: after nerding it up for a lengthy period of time, I can now identify this lovely fungus as Craterellus Fallax, also known as black trumpet, and, my personal favorite, trumpet of death.  Hooray for the internet!

hell hath no fury...

Centuries ago, my viking ancestors were busy raiding villages and burning houses.  Now, my living ancestors (ahem, my family) are well behaved, rule abiding christians and jews.  Instead of burning houses, they burn candles every friday night, and instead of throwing their enemies to their knees, they instead kneel down to pray for them.  They prefer tame activies such as church potlucks or sabbath service, over their ancestors' raping and pillaging.  Personally, I am not inclined to raping and pillaging, nor am I inclined to being a saintly servant of an omnipotent, power-hungry, war mongering being (wait...did I just describe the god of the old testament, or was that description of a viking leader...?).  

This may be contradictory, but there are two viewpoints I solidly agree with from each side: love and mercy (christian), and sweet sweet vengeance (the vikings, obviously).  No I won't turn the other cheek, but I will forgive you for slapping me, after I cut your hand off.  Perhaps I'm wrathful, but there is something inside of me that cries"justice!" that wants to punish people for all of the cruelty that they have forced upon others, instead of waiting for them to die and be reborn as a dung beetle.  I want fairness, I want evenness, and most of all I want people that act out of selfishness to pay for their actions.  

My latest watercolor

anatomy of a god

What is it about demented surrealism that makes it feel so calming and grounding to paint?  

Anatomy of a God, watercolor on paper

Clockwork Woman

The last couple months have been weird.  The murkiness of our future has been hanging over my head so heavily for the last few months, that I actually stopped obsessively dreaming about hungry black holes sucking me into nothingness.  Instead I had these ridiculous, attending-school-without-pants dreams.  You know, the one where you show up late for a class that you forgot you had (even though you are long done with school), and have to take an exam that you didn't study for, and then, to top it all off, you glance down only to discover that for some bizarre reason, you have neglected to fully dress the lower half of your body.  Fan.tastic.

We sat around waiting to see if we would move, and to which of the possible five locations we would move to, and in the end, the only option was not a financially viable one.  Doctorate applications for big U.S. universities are a nightmare, especially if you are a Non-U.S. student in a tiny country, completing your masters in a university no one in the U.S. has heard of.  The University where my husband was excepted, unfortunately, wanted us to show them a bank account with 80,000 US dollars, just so that he could be admitted and then look for funding within the system.  Just reflecting back on this makes me laugh somewhat bitterly, as we live in a country where the average monthly pay is 30 USD per 8-12 hour day.  That's 600 USD per month.  Of course, now that the exchange rate has changed, and not in our favor, it is more like 550/month.  Meanwhile the price of food and rent continues to climb, as pay for blue collar jobs and unskilled workers remains the same.

I spent a good two solid weeks trying to cheer up my morose and disappointed husband, putting on the best happy face that I could.  Let me tell you, "happy face" is exhausting!  Especially when while smiling, you are taking the (rude) brunt of someones disappointment.  I suppose in a way, I was trying to avoid my own disappointment by discouraging his.

The problem with happy face, other than being annoyingly exhausting, is that once you finally give in and confront your "negative" feelings, you are too exhausted from pretending that everything is ok and putting on a brave face, to successfully rationalize and overcome those "negative" feelings and the reasons behind them.  Some of the darkest women I've known were peppy, smiley, vivacious women, who on the inside, were secretly dying a little each day.

If there is a moral to the story, it would be to confront your fears, your disappointments, your anger.  Don't let it fester underneath the surface while pretending everything is ok.  Holding back your tears or suppressing your anger does not make you a strong person.  It makes you a broken robot.

My clockwork lady.  Watercolor on paper, reference photo for the non-clockwork lady features used (from Vogue).

geisha in watercolor

Last year I taught English at a "Japanese" school (not actually in Japan, I should note).  The principal asked me to make a painting for it.  I really struggled with what I would paint because I tend to gravitate toward sort of intense emotive portraits which my mom describes as "schreklich" and "geistlich".  So, I settled for a geisha doing a fan dance, using a snapshot from the movie "Memoirs of a Geisha".  It wasn't very original (There are literally a dozen paintings on the internet of this particular film shot), but it was a great opportunity to practice my watercolor techniques.

Apocalyptic Seattle

Do you ever wonder what your home will look like in 1000 years?  What if humanity is wiped out and our concrete forests are just left to the mercy of time and the elements?  I feel terrible for future generations, because although I might not live to see it, we will eventually run out of places to stuff our garbage, and it is inevitable that our natural resources will be depleted if we don't change our habits (clean oxygen, anyone?).

 

oil pastels on crappy paper

eye candy (the importance of taking pleasure in natural beauty)

I found this delicious little creature on my fig tree.  My dog, in overenthusiastic jealousy, knocked it off with her tail, but it managed to fly over to another plant.  It's sort of like a giant ladybug, but without the spots and with a color much more vibrant.

I take enormous amounts of pleasure in looking at living things that have naturally bright or deep colors, so this was, what I would consider eye candy.  If you don't know how to break off moments out of your dreary day to take pleasure in the things around you, then I strongly encourage you to do so!  Go for a walk, and let yourself be filled with beauty.  If you live in a city, then go to a park, or for a drive.  This cookie cutter design of life that everyone expects us to lead is far too dull to be fulfilling or nourishing.  Nourish yourself.

look at that shade of red! 

preparing to take flight

The Art Rut

Stuck in an art rut?  Do you hate most of the art/music/writing/cooking/crafting/sewing that you do?  Fret not my artsy friends, the first few years of your career or non-career as an artist are supposed to suck monster balls.  Its true, because Ira Glass said so.

Lets be honest, we oftentimes expect great things from ourselves with little to no practice.  We are lazy and childish in our artistic habits.  We dream of creating amazing works of art, but when we first begin an art form we tend to be sort of...well, terrible at it.  When my sister in law started dancing a few years ago, I'm certain she moved about like a clumsy ogre.  Now she moves with the grace and fluidity of a hummingbird.  The first time I made Alfredo sauce it was a wretched clumpy mess of cheese and liquid.  Now, after lots of practice, I'm a great cook.  When a friend of mine first started painting, her techniques left something to be desired.  Now she has grown substantially in her non-career as a painter.

What I'm trying to say is, don't beat yourself up for being mediocre, and don't let it drag you down!  Do lots of boring technical practice to hone your skills and you will eventually turn out exceptional work.  Don't only paint things that you want to paint, paint things that you think will help you improve, like still life paintings (I am anticipating your angry sighs, still life is the bane of our existences).  Or if you sing, practice your vaccai and scales every day.  If you are a cook, repeat a recipe with your personal changes until the recipe is amazing.  Second to practicing, you must have patience and be understanding enough that eventually (if you keep practicing), you will be great at whatever you do.

Don't let your dreams of greatness weigh down on your expectations, instead let them power you forward like a goal for the future.  Good luck!

why I love this country

I love plants.  I've always considered myself as a bringer of doom as far as plant life goes, but here in Costa Rica I am a green fingered goddess.  As long as I give things room to grow and leave them outside (and occasionally dump some coffee grounds or compost on them), then they flourish beautifully!  The juxtaposition of plant growth in Seattle compared with plant growth here is simply bizarre and leads me to wonder if this place really is magical.  Probably not, but what if...

Everywhere you go, there is greenery, and it rises up brightly like a song to the gods (too tacky? haha). However, one of my favorite green places is a botanical garden in the central valley, which I believe is owned and run by the biology department of the University of Costa Rica.  It has an entire room full of orchids, some of which you have to use a magnifying glass to properly view.  That's right, tiny anatomically perfect orchids exist, and they are no less beautiful than your average-sized orchid.  Below are some pictures I took the last time I was there.

This is one of those tiny orchids I was referring to; it was the size of the tip of my pinkie finger.  It was the smallest one I could get with my current lense, but there was a little area with tinier orchids and a magnifying class for viewing pleasure.  I wouldn't even have noticed them, if it weren't for my husband's uncle pointing them out (a botanist of sorts).

 water lilies!

 Another orchid, this one with a very interesting mechanism for pollination.  An insect lands on a petal, slides down into the "bowl" and then has to crawl back up, thus dragging pollen up with it.

This was some very thick bamboo. 

I found these beauties off to the side of the cactus garden!  I have no idea what they are, but they reminded me so much of pretty little lanterns. 

NOW do you understand why I love this place?!  The plant life is revitalizing!

I wonder what XXXX means...(modern goth bedroom furniture)

We had this bed and night tables custom made to fit our wants/needs.  As much I love victorian style furniture, I find that it looks tacky in a house that is not pompously oversized (even then, it tends to look pretentious).  For my own house, I prefer a more sleek, simple, and modern look.  This bed features carved out X's on the headboard and footboard.  We actually requested three X's, but somehow ended up with four, probably because of the bed size we ordered.  Did you know that there is a bed size in between queen and king?

We bought this bed with our honeymoon money, insisting that we would have our honeymoon at a later date.  As it turns out, when you're in love, every day, anywhere, is a honeymoon.  At least, that's what I tell myself to avert the attention away from my loathsome art of procrastination.

I wanted to keep the bedroom as simple as possible.  We have one black wall, three grey/blue walls (to create a relaxing atmosphere) and black heavy curtains to keep the room dark.  And what would a love den be without some tacky Ikea heart lights to set the mood?

Metropolitan (drink recipe)

I write this as I sip on a delicious dark drink that I just finished concocting.  I wanted to make a cosmopolitan, but decided to substitute the regular triple sec for Blue Curacao.  It ended up looking quite pretty, and equally delicious.  I also added extra lemon juice because I'm a sucker for sour things.  If you like sweet drinks, then you will most likely love this.

2 shots vodka
1 shot blue curacao (I used Bardinet)
1 shot of freshly squeezed lime or lemon juice
1/2 cup cranberry juice
lemon peel or slice for garnish

Mix vodka, curacao, lime juice and cranberry juice in a mixer.  Put desired amount of ice in a cocktail glass and pour in your wicked mix.  Enjoy!

It is a blackish drink with a charming purplish hue

 That's right, I buy vodka in jug-size ;)

Beauty in Vinegar

I've recently become quite enamored with apple cider vinegar.  It literally smells like death (and tastes like hell), but works like some magical fairy dust, curing many ailments.  I may sound a bit like some 1800's peddler, selling my wunder-tincture out of the back of a horse-pulled wagon, but I swear on my un-dug grave, it really is a wunder-tincture.

I take about a tablespoon with a glass of cold water twice a day, and after a couple months, I now require a belt to keep my pants up.  It aids in digestion, and supposedly increases your metabolism and helps move lipids out of your intestines.  Here are some things that I can contest to that ACV works on...

~weightloss:  take a teaspoon of raw organic apple cider vinegar mixed with a glass of water 10-20 mins before each meal.  Most people say it works slowly.  Perhaps they are just impatient, but I've decreased pant sizes pretty rapidly, and I'm not even overweight.

~digestion:  ACV makes your stomach a very unpleasant place for candida and other nasties.  If taken regularly, it can help with chronic bloating and diarrhea, and generally just help you digest your food more easily.

~hair care:  mix about 1 teaspoon in a cup of water.  Shampoo your hair as usual, and follow with this rinse.  Leave it in for a couple minutes and rinse it out with luke warm water.  It seals the hair shaft and reduces product build-up, making your hair shiny, light, and very manageable.

~psoriasis/dandruff:  apply with the hair rinse above, or mix the vinegar 1:1 ratio with warm water and apply to psoriasis with a cotton ball before bed.

~skin care:  ever wonder how Scarlett Johansson has such flawless skin?  She uses apple cider vinegar on her face as a toner.  You can mix this 1:2 ratio and apply after washing your face.  I prefer to use cream afterward, but that is up to you.

It is important to get raw and unfiltered ACV because of the nutritional properties of the sediment at the bottom.  If you are like me, and live in a country where only filtered vinegar is available, you can easily order it online (I order from Vitacost, they ship to outside of the US).

Enigma de Ultratumba

Today I thought I would share a piece of music of which I partook in making a while ago.  Arturo Saldana, an intelligent, creative and talented musician asked me to do the vocals/lyrics (and flute) for some darkwave songs he wrote.  Here is one of those songs, called "The Donors all Die".  Give it a listen, and download it (for free) if you like.



Other songs from this album can be found at the link below and are also available for free download.
https://soundcloud.com/enigmadeultratumba/sets/enigma-de-ultratumba-violetta