oohh, decisions, decisions!...
anyway, let’s talk about what i did today first. basically, nothing new. nothing that much different from what i've been doing the past few days. browsed the internets, ended up on a website for a zine that i'm not sure it's still being published or what, but i spent a long long time there. the site was full of text-heavy pages, dozens of articles, from politics, esoteric, art, even sexuality articles. i saved quite a few pages that seemed interesting but it's hard to get down and really read them, as they were really basically just text and more text. my eyes get itchy from staring at the computer screen for too long, so i hardly ever read e-books and long articles.
i was googling for pics on riot grrrl stuff and i ended up on a webpage with the Riot Grrrl Manifesto by Kathleen Hanna, then proceeded to satisfy my usual curiosity and went to the main page to see what this site was all about. and that takes us to the paragraph above, as to the reason why i ended up spending most of my online time on that website...
i had read the Riot Grrrl manifesto before, but it's the kind of thing i have to read more than once to really get into it. i think i agree with most of the points in the manifesto, but i still don't really know where i stand in the middle of this Riot Grrrl thing and Feminism and all that. as i've been reading a lot of feminist (or at least, feminist "inclined") zines, i know there are many ways of interpreting Feminism, many "types" of feminists movements and many different ways to incorporate it in your everyday life.
as i went through my teen years, i came to learn the world wasn't all just bunnies and romance, 4ever love and that kind of stuff. i become aware of the social injustices towards women, the need for women’s rights statements and awareness campaigns. now that i'm on my thirties, i seem to feel this even more, as i kind of feel it affects my life and has been doing it since a young age. so i kind of feel myself as a feminist, but i don't quite know how to life my life according to this feeling.
of course, all this talk about Feminism and Women’s Rights as made me think, many times, of how i could incorporate this part of me into the zines. even if i should incorporate these kind of subjects at all, but i feel that society needs to be reminded every now and then, that we Women are here and deserve to be treated with respect and all that stuff that Fem-talk is about.
apart from my online “life”, my real life is just about the same as it was yesterday and the day before...
this Fall seems determined to give me no chance to cheer up a bit, because it’s been raining ‘all the time’ and lots of wind. and to think that when Winter comes it will be worst!... well, at least ‘all the time’ i’m awake during daytime. if you consider i go to sleep late now and i get up late too, usually always after midday and then go straight to the kitchen to have lunch with my parents, then if it starts to rain heavily around 4pm, i don’t get to see much daylight or even the sun at all. when it starts to rain, it gets all gray outside and even with the curtains open i have to turn on the lights if i wanna read something or even just watch tv.
lately, i’ve been coming to my bedroom and set up my laptop and spend the rest of the afternoon and the after dinner secluded in my room. this also helps keeping my parents away, for most of the time, so that i don’t get bugged. i get enough of that when we get together for our meals...
this Fall seems determined to give me no chance to cheer up a bit, because it’s been raining ‘all the time’ and lots of wind. and to think that when Winter comes it will be worst!... well, at least ‘all the time’ i’m awake during daytime. if you consider i go to sleep late now and i get up late too, usually always after midday and then go straight to the kitchen to have lunch with my parents, then if it starts to rain heavily around 4pm, i don’t get to see much daylight or even the sun at all. when it starts to rain, it gets all gray outside and even with the curtains open i have to turn on the lights if i wanna read something or even just watch tv.
lately, i’ve been coming to my bedroom and set up my laptop and spend the rest of the afternoon and the after dinner secluded in my room. this also helps keeping my parents away, for most of the time, so that i don’t get bugged. i get enough of that when we get together for our meals...
today was Sunday, so as a “tradition”, my dad buys the sunday edition of JN newspaper. lately the newspaper has become an important thing because of my (undefined) job/unemployed situation. i almost crave for it because of the job ads, but today it was really poor. i could almost tell it would be, when i picked up the Ads section and saw it was thinner than usual. so, no ads i could apply to, pouring rain outside, no answer/news from my “former” employees, no news on the interview i went to a week ago last friday. any more negative things to add up to this cool list?
on the positive side, i got some music from Hole and Bif Naked (still waiting for Bikini Kill tunes to download), because i had seen references to some of their songs on Amber’s zine «Culture Slut» and also on her twin sister’s (Maranda) zine «Telegram Ma'am». i’ve seen references to some bands i hardly know and others i don’t know at all, in many of the feminist/riot grrrl zines i bought, so i decided to go find new music. since i’m a music whore - meaning i like music very much, i like many different styles and i’m always willing to try new music - this isn’t a hard task for me.
last night i finally took some time to read and “examine” Niku’s «Hello My Name Is Niku personal zine pack» i got in the mail on tuesday. the Pack is made of 3 minizines but i got an extra mini, which is great, it’s another mini treat for me to examine and contemplate.
i gotta say i hadn’t read them when i first got them or in the days after because i needed to clear my head from clutter caused by the problems with my job. Niku’s minizines seemed - and are! - so rich in details and full of inspiration and ideas on copy-paste. the fact that she can make a mini out of an A4 page, with many imagery and a few words made me rethink my whole concept for my zine project. that might sound like a bad thing at first, but i don’t see it that way, i see it as a good thing!
the extra minizine i got, was made in one day(!), for one of those 24hour zine projects. i find the 24hour zine projects to be an amazing way to encourage immediate creativity and DIY techniques. i even thought about participating into one of those projects...if i wasn’t such a procrastinator, and a chickenshit!
besides, i’m still all alone when it comes to real life zine makers, zine communities and projects where i live (or anywhere nearby) that i lack that first push it takes to begin and makes you get your hands dirty. i know there are some handmade crafts groups around here, from the time i was “into” that stuff, the time i become obsessed with handmade crafts, but they are mostly into sewing, jewelry, polymer clay, drawing/painting and stuff like that. i really don’t know if anyone is into zines now, because i sort of “abandoned” my flickr account and blogs on the subject... it wouldn’t kill to browse flickr for that or even ask around in the forums i was in, i know, but when i think about that, i see myself getting sucked into the flickr-addictive (virtual)world again.
and that means i will be spending more time looking at the pretty pics of beautiful crafts other people are making than really trying to make new connections and looking for zine makers or anyone curious about them.
i gotta say i hadn’t read them when i first got them or in the days after because i needed to clear my head from clutter caused by the problems with my job. Niku’s minizines seemed - and are! - so rich in details and full of inspiration and ideas on copy-paste. the fact that she can make a mini out of an A4 page, with many imagery and a few words made me rethink my whole concept for my zine project. that might sound like a bad thing at first, but i don’t see it that way, i see it as a good thing!
the extra minizine i got, was made in one day(!), for one of those 24hour zine projects. i find the 24hour zine projects to be an amazing way to encourage immediate creativity and DIY techniques. i even thought about participating into one of those projects...if i wasn’t such a procrastinator, and a chickenshit!
besides, i’m still all alone when it comes to real life zine makers, zine communities and projects where i live (or anywhere nearby) that i lack that first push it takes to begin and makes you get your hands dirty. i know there are some handmade crafts groups around here, from the time i was “into” that stuff, the time i become obsessed with handmade crafts, but they are mostly into sewing, jewelry, polymer clay, drawing/painting and stuff like that. i really don’t know if anyone is into zines now, because i sort of “abandoned” my flickr account and blogs on the subject... it wouldn’t kill to browse flickr for that or even ask around in the forums i was in, i know, but when i think about that, i see myself getting sucked into the flickr-addictive (virtual)world again.
and that means i will be spending more time looking at the pretty pics of beautiful crafts other people are making than really trying to make new connections and looking for zine makers or anyone curious about them.
** i made some zinester references on this post, they are all amazing girls that make really cool zines, so i feel they deserved some free pub (hahaha) right here! **
http://wemakezines.ning.com/profile/NikuArbabi
----- p.s.: sometimes when i post, i have some problems with text formatting on this blogger thing... and it's getting on my nerves! i have to edit the post after i publish it, sometimes twice or three times! aaarghhh!
----- p.s.: sometimes when i post, i have some problems with text formatting on this blogger thing... and it's getting on my nerves! i have to edit the post after i publish it, sometimes twice or three times! aaarghhh!
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