You know how it is, when you lie down to sleep all the thought keep hitting you in the face. Slapping you wide awake when you almost, almost fell asleep. Last night there was lots of rain and it was a bit chilly and perfect sleeping weather really. But then came the brain. Obviously I’m the kind of person who weep when reminded of friends I see far to seldom. Seriously. You can smell the tears on the pillow if you want. (Smell them damn you!)

Moral of this is that force me to choose between my friends and you’re the first one out. And it’s almost too easy to make me cry.

Being in a hick town means around here that from time to time there’s a surge in free verse Christian communities. It’s been quiet for quite a few years now but today I heard song and a PA system from a direction where there had previously been pentecostals. So it might be those that have returned.

It’s Sunday, I want to lie on my bed and read and listen to good music. Their songs are not what I consider good music — give me some Woven Hand or the Handsome Family! And a PA system? In the middle of the town? Sheesh. I had to listen to the Velvet Underground’s the Quine Tapes a bit louder that usual. (I’m not one of those who must have music really loud, so it might have been normal volume to some of you.)

Anyways. The forty minute version of Sister Ray is amazing. Had it existed on soundcloud this would have been an audio post.

Just now noticed that I’ve gone 54 posts past 4000 here. That’s about 1000 posts of gibberish a year. Cool. At times it feels as if I write and post far less but then when I look back I notice that no, I didn’t. The mind is an odd beast.

It’s also not well, still, and this has been reflected in what I’ve drawn today. I probably will not post anything of it. It’s far to morose. Anyways, if I could I would hug you just because. All of you, including you the quiet in the back. Don’t think I haven’t noticed you.

Three gifs that at the moment say everything there is to say.

The birthday — two hours left! — was pretty much like any other day except that I miss all the people from the weekend. Also no cookies. Anyway. Thank you all for your congratulations and well-wishes.

Of course, the best gift was Ardbeg Corryvreckan that I got on Saturday, and the worst might have been that Tumblr choked the ask feature pretty damn hard in their crusade to fight spam with any easy means necessary.

(A friendly reminder: I’m most often available on MSN/AIM/Gtalk/mail whatever if the channels here are being difficult. What to use is hieroglyphed at the top. Not a brilliant conversationalist, but damnit, I try!)

Today’s the 16th. It’s my birthday and I keep the post-meetup depression at bay by drinking Loranga (it’s like Fanta but a lot better) in a plastic cup. It’s not really working. I miss all the people already.

But it’s my birthday and I have no idea what I’ll do. Spend the day that comes after sleep with Kurosawa documentaries? Listening to Psychocandy over and over again?

This weekend I’ve been a part of the team that’s now the Swedish champions in Guyball — legs hurt, now I know how Nicholas Cage felt in the Wicker Man Travesty —, Rikard made us watch My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic as a Saturday morning hangover cure, my brother made the best damn chilli-burgers ever, I got a bottle of Ardbeg Corryvreckan, and someone showed us a whisky called Cromwell’s Royal (!) in a bag-in-box (!!).

This is me.

Helena.

Fredrik, beer, and heads.

Kalle.

The Moon.

Erik, the dog. He has this amazing theory about movies: the perfect length of any movie is 96 minutes.

STS: Dive

We, and with we I mean some friends and I, were in this dive. Not a cosy one, it was cheap beer and loud music and… No, sorry, the room where they had a really bad cover band in was nice until the band started. When that happened we dislocated into a bigger and more anonymous room closer to the dance floor.

Yeah I know.

There was this Black Jack table too, a friend — let’s call him Butch — sat down there and started playing. It went sort of okay I think, memory is a bit fuzzy on that. Next to Butch, his sister — here Sundance — talked to a stranger as one occasionally do in bars. Suddenly Butch leaned over.

— Does he want to sleep with you? Cool!

He said this really loud as he’s prone to do. Sundance blushed harder than anyone I’ve ever seen and went quiet. She couldn’t really talk to the stranger anymore, severely cockblocked in awkwardness by her kid brother. The rest of us found it hilarious. (Sorry Sundance! These siblings are really among my favourite people.)

Looked at the portraits of series one — September 2010 to January 2011 — and it’s silly how the layered improvements are in time. It’s also quite obvious to me about which I felt more confident in drawing, there’s a sloppiness when I doubt myself.

Not that I dislike the old work, I don’t. There are always thing in them that I like.  It’s just that I feel a bit awkward about them now. Like I should have tried harder. It’s a silly thing to do. Silly and stupid and even more stupid.

Part of the brain is under reconstruction. This means everything is going on one track and it’s very confusing. Is this how it is for you lot? Mid-thought something else comes up and the old one crumbles a bit and the logic that was there suddenly isn’t? And it’s very hard to return to the old line of thought because parts are now missing. I have a pretty shaky relationship with logic to begin with  so this is a bit distressing really. Why does this happen?! (I blame the heat, it kills my brain every year.)

Even today, already, there’s been lots of wasted thoughts that seem like they could have been something but are now ruined and stained by shitty brain behaviour.

The same thing is probably guilty of the code-switch increase. I’ve started out writing asks and mails just to realise towards the end that this person don’t understand Swedish or why English to a Swedish-speaking person. It’s awkward.

There are many flaws in this person. Some real, some imagined. There are some notions in the head that are false, I’m trying to correct those. One is that I don’t really dislike people despite what I tell myself — it’s the only explanation that fits with the disappointment when a human turns out to be an idiot. Anyway.

A month or so ago I realised that I could make a comic. I’m not good at scripts but I can draw so a limited length comic? It’s not impossible. It’s also a nice twist since most Swedish comic creators can write but not draw. I’m still riding high on this realisation — not many pages finished and there are gaps in the thumbnailed storyboards but still. There’s a glow that’s for me most often linked to the manic states of fanzine creation, except that it’s not so much manic and this will probably be a good thing in question of quality.

What was the last thing to make you enthusiastic?

One of my ticks is that if I notice it’s raining, I need to ask someone — most often on MSN — “Do you hear that? RAIN!” I’m certain this can be a bit annoying considering that chances are that the other person don’t have rain at that given minute.

Other ticks:

• Whenever I write “hello” or “hi” or somesuch I also wave after I’ve pressed enter.
• Need to smell things. Food, opened boxes, books, medicine, memory cards, other people.
• When trying to solve a problem I mumble like a madman. At least when it’s a problem I care about. If it’s something I don’t care about, there will be no mumbling at all.
• When nervous I tend to dismantle pens over and over again. After a while there’s a big chance I’ve ruined them in one way or another.