Spiders, bugs... why not mice and rattlesnakes too?

Let it be... It catches bugs!
I see... You want an indoor ecosystem!

Say whatever you want, keeping spiders inside doesn't make your house look any cleaner.

APRIL 1ST: 7 Reasons Why You Shouldn't Worry About Global Climate Warming

Didn't it go awfully quiet on that big topic of climate change and drowning polar bears? The media doesn't seem to care anymore about global warming and melting polar ice. Well, neither should you.

I think Al Gore gave us all a big scare and then we were like “Meh, it's not that bad”. So I'm gonna tell you why there's no reason to worry about this carbon-dioxide stuff.

1. You'll die an ordinary death anyhow

When you're an old grandpa or grandma, guess how you'll leave this earth? Diabetes or heart attack, that's how. Nothing to do with global warming.

You ain't gonna get killed by huge hail rains in a tropical storm or by the sting of a monstrous malaria mosquito roaming the temperate climates. Where's the drama?

2. We'll run out of fossil fuels soon

Ain't us burning coal and oil the cause of this global warming thing? But we'll run out of those in a few decades, so then the problem will fix itself. Remember how the ozone layer fixed itself?

3. We got polar bears in zoos

Bummer.

Polar caps melting means polar bears drowning, but that's actually not a big deal. We got them in zoos, so it's not like they will go extinct. 

I just saw pictures of the cutest twin polar bear cubs ever, born in some zoo somewhere. How many polar bears on the Arctic have their cuteness uploaded to the internet? They couldn't be less relevant to everyday life. 

4. If it was really that serious, somebody would do something about it

But instead, everyone kinda forgets that we got an issue here, so it's probably not that threatening. Or urgent.

5. We still got the government

If it looks like we're gonna drown, the government will simply build a sea dike with our taxpayers' money. If it looks like we're melting in extreme heat, or freezing because the polar vortex falls apart (or because we're not used to chilly weather anymore), then they can distribute cooling fans or heaters respectively!

6. You can always move

What if the government fails to do so? Still no problem. 

It's not like you're Bill Gates, but you are still well off enough to just move away when the climate starts to bother you. Village getting flooded every week? Move higher up. Crazy storms and tornadoes? The neighbouring country will do.

You are safe no matter what happens.

7. Global WARMING? Great, you never liked the cold!

Global warming sounds like more bikinis to me! Seriously, a summer short is way more comfortable than a ski jacket. And soon we can get our tan during Christmas break, at home! 

No more dying butterflies when winter comes around, it's gonna be an eternity of sunshine and rose petals! What's the downside again?

In short: don't worry, be happy!

10 Things You Didn't Know About Me

1. I take a cold shower once or twice a day, right after my regular shower.
2. If I say "yeah, it was expensive...", then the correct response is "Ouch, I'm so sorry for you."
3. My favourite food is the pomegranate, but I haven't eaten one in two years.
4. I've dreamed to be a freerunner since I was a kid, but I've never practiced.
5. I make New Year resolutions every Monday.
6. My lowest weight ever (i.e. at current height of 178cm) and my highest weight ever happened happened within the course of six months.
7. I regularly forget my own age.
8. To this day, I feel guilty about killing an innocent worm at age 4.
9. One of the most amazing things about humans is that we don' topple over when we do stuff. You know, like moving an arm. I marvel at our ability to keep our balance.
10. The most important quality to me is Honesty. I believe honesty is interlinked with courage.

As a closing note, air is pretty disgusting. You know that greasy chap you dislike so much? The air you are breathing has passed through his lungs already. Enjoy your oxygen.

Things with Feathers & Things with Antennae

Do you like fluffy puppies? What about birds, gliding through the air? And bugs, with their creepy six little legs and their pinpoint dots of eyes?
As you have read before, I love the forests and the mountains here. (Will I ever be happy in a big city after living here?)

Since I also enjoyed the animals around here, I'm going to introduce those today. Three stand out. The title hints at it already: one is a bird, the other an insect and the last one is a spider.

Praying Mantis

First, Japan's praying mantis. What's special about it? Eh... Nothing. We just don't have them in Belgium.
Here you can pick them up from the streets at will. Well, not anymore since the winter weather has arrived now...

They always look grumpy to me. When you try to pick them up, they'll not move an inch, but they will clasp the ground or wall as tightly as possible with their tiny claws.

And when you then do pick them up (a tiny claw is no match for a human biceps, not even when you got six of them), they'll start flexing like "Hey, look at me, what ya got, huh, huh?! What ya looking at, huh?!"

Imma big green mothafucka hell yeeeeah

I just think they're pretty awesome, okay? Just look at this mean big boy:

Black Kite
The next animal in the spotlight: the black kite. This bird is everywhere, from the beach to the mountains. When I leave for school, I can greet them on the telephone lines.

Black kite aka Milvus migrans lineatus

One Sunday morning, I saw the most amazing scene - pure National Geographic material. Three of these were sitting on the telephone line, when one of them dove down and snatched a chick.
Jealous of the delicious snack, the other two started chasing him, making him drop the chick. And then in turn, he'd chase them trying to recover his snack.
As soon as the murder of crows nearby saw that, they started to play chase too.
And there you suddenly got three birds of prey and five crows chasing and bugging and pestering each other, with one dead little bird changing claws every ten seconds.

 

Jorō Spider

They come in one size ("big") and various colours, but I love the ones that carry the colours of the Belgian flag. It was like a little, special welcome: picking the single animal I've got a phobia for and putting my countries on it. I appreciate the gesture, Mother Nature.

Not to mention that I bumped my head into one and panicked and when I rubbed it off, its legs got stuck in my tangly hair and it fell down but lost it legs so I walked around with spider legs in my hair and the effect of a mini heart attack. Yeah, never mind that.

But eh, yeah, they just sit there doing spider stuff. Like this:

Nephila clavata

Just like the praying mantis, they're now slowly dying by the approaching winter.

 

Just chilling.

I'm going to end this post with just a few more pictures. Feel free to point your finger and say things like "Yuck!" or "Awwww...". :)

Shrooms!

Plants!

 

Antennae thingies!

 

Non-Antennae thingies! 

Water thingies!

 

I did it! 50 000 words in 30 days, NANOWRIMO WINNER!

Just a quick update: NaNoWriMo was a success!
I've been neglecting this blog a little bit, haven't I? Didn't I promise you some pictures of cute animals or something like that?

Anyway, I'm now looking for a 7-day and a 24-hours challenge. If you have any ideas, tell me in the comments!

Click the image if you have trouble reading the text.

One-month challenges seem perfect for me though. :)

2013 My First NaNoWriMo: Plunging into Chaos

November is coming. That soul-crushing writing challenge, NaNoWriMo, is upon us. But before that...

Let's start this post with a confession: I totally butchered my 100 day challenge. I didn't make it beyond day 25. Obviously, I entered it half-heartedly. It gets a small mention at the end of the post, and seems quite impulsive in hindsight.
So what happened exactly? The challenge was: “Paint a portrait every day for 100 days”.
It didn't take long before I started to postpone the portrait to right before bed when I'd go “Oooh, still have to do that.” and rush it. Then one day – day 26 – it was one o'clock and I said to myself:
“Well, I can just paint two tomorrow.”
And then I just never did. That was the end of my 100 day challenge.


In positive news, check out the difference between day one and my personal favourites, day 20-21-22!

Day 1

Day 20-21-22

But anyhow, the 100 days are over. Up next: NaNoWriMo. "National Novel Writing Month" is held in November each year, and the challenge is to find a 50,000 word novel by the last day of November.

Okay. Is NaNoWriMo going to be different? I hope so.
To begin with, my alarm is set at 4:50 now.


Yup, 4:50 every morning. The plan: get up, eat a little, write 1667 words and then start my day. Tomorrow is an extra day for practice. :P
In other words, avoid NaNoWriMo interfering with daily life, which could provide excuses to give up!


To keep myself accountable, I also decided to post my daily writings. I had no idea how the NaNoWriMo posting system works, so got looking for a different site to post my updates.
I had two requirements: 1. Free to use 2. Non-users can read & comment.
Note: I made a subdomain, but deleted it after NaNoWriMo was over. Many thanks to you who read my daily writing updates!

Whew.


Now, if you look at the title, you see I don't expect things to go smoothly. I already encountered one difficulty: since I have no plan whatsoever, it was quite difficult to come up with a title... I went for “Golden Fields, Black Snow” because it doesn't mean anything.


By the way, you can sponsor me on NaNoWriMo. If you do, my avatar will get a shiny halo.