wow, it’s been a while since I posted. Sorry about that. Lots of stuff been going on in my life.
College graduation
redesigning my website
costume making
planting my garden
TAX season! O.O
and very sadly the death of and immediate family member in the middle of February. Which I have been dealing with since it happened.

Sorry if I haven’t been updating. 
If you are not already a fan on FB here is the link
http://www.facebook.com/ForgottenGraveyard
add me if you like, for updates on my live vlog, and more!

A video I made about our pet turtle. ^.^

This paper was printed just days before WW2 broke out, and other scraps I found were printed a bit after. Here is the video exploring more of the paper.I pretty much NEVER make videos, but I might make more in the future if I get some good feed back  Let me know what you think!

Don’t forget to follow me on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/user/ForgottenGraveyard 
Thanks! 

The house accross the street was finaly being torn down yesterday, so I took tome pictures and some video. Towards the end of the video the guy in the CAT found an old news paper from 1939 in the walls used as insulation.

See next video for more details.

Don’t forget to follow me on youtube!
http://www.youtube.com/user/ForgottenGraveyard 
Thank you. 

For those of you who don’t know I’m a start trek fan, so when i was at the PNE here in Vancouver which is currently showing ‘The Star Trek Experience’ I was offered a job to be a hostess for a star trek motion simulator ride. Who do i do? Tell people about the ride and pull/replace a safety pin on the door when the ride starts and ends. Simple enough right?

Shortest job i ever had because i QUIT after only 2hrs and 45min.

I went in expecting a real job but it was all under the table and sketchy. That was the first sign something wasn’t right. I don’t think this guy is even part of the Star Trek Exhibition set up there, I’m sure he’s just set up on the side or something.

I was told I was going to wear a star trek T-shirt, but instead he had a Star Trek uniform for me. I was excited at first and had even brought my Vulcan ears, until I found out it was an old unwashed Science Officers dress from The Original Series (look it up it’s short!) and it had lots of ware and tare. It was very short, so i had my BF bring me stockings from home so i would feel better about how short it was. I told John I felt uncomfortable reaching up to bring the door of the ride down because i could feel the skirt getting too high! He didn’t care, and didn’t want me to change into my tights when they arrived because it wasn’t as “appealing” to the guests as bare legs. I put on the tights anyway; he didn’t like that. 

He just got worse and worse, until all he did was yell at me the entire time and sucked the fun right out of everything. He doesn’t know how to train people or talk to people for the simplest things, I had to figure everything out on my own by the seat of my pants. He kept going on and on complaining about other people who he hired who had left, and i got to find out just why they left first hand. 

I was forbidden from speaking with the other girl there because he thought we were just wasting time talking, when in reality I was trying to explain to her how to operate the door (again he gave no instructions), I showed her how to make the Vulcan hand signal and how to approach guests and generate business because she was on the shy side. I got yelled at and told to stand 10 feet away from her. She tried to ask me questions about the ride because i knew more about it then her, & she was also yelled at. 

At one point he attempted to get me to watch a child so the parents could go on the ride, I refused because that’s a HUGE liability, and is not my job (the parents agreed with me). He yelled at me and got very upset that I refused to do this. 

One fellow after exiting the ride wanted to know more about it, there was no one in line, and the other girl was on people watch while i was on the door of the ride, so i answered the guests questions for a minute before being waved over by John, who then yelled at me for talking to him. “What are you talking to him for!? He’s already been on the ride! you don’t need to talk to him for an half hour! Now go stand over there!” I was very upset to be treated this way when I was only trying to help and be nice to the riders. 

He yelled at me several times for nothing before I had had enough and quit. Then he tried to jip me my full pay! I pulled out my own calculator and told him how much he really owed me. 

I was polite and courteous the entire time I was working, I had a smile on my face, greeted guests, engaged people in the experience, answered peoples questions and all I got in return was disrespect, rudeness, and abuse from this asshole! 

He yelled at me in front of another guest and her child right before I quit, and then the guest chewed him out for how he was treating me because she saw the whole thing! “How dare you treat this girl that way!” she said, and went on about how she was going to go on the ride but after how she witnessed him treating me she changed her mind. “You are so rude to her and she’s standing there being polite a nice to you!” He told her to take a hike! Even after I quit he continued to yell at me! I gave my number to the other girl and told her to call me if she felt like leaving, i’d come and pick her up. He yelled at me to stop talking to her, and i told him to stop talking to me, I don’t work for him any more so he can’t tell me what to do. He told me i was the worst employee he ever had, I told him, “you just don’t like me because i have a back bone and i know my rights! This is abuse and I have every right to be treated with respect. I don’t like your attitude and i’m not being paid enough to put up with your bullshit.” After I got my money, I left in tears because of how upset I was by this asshole. I have rarely had bad employers but this guy sets a new record! It was such an awful experience. 

The other girl wanted to leave too but she really needed the money. :( I gave her a hug and told her to call me if she needed a ride home.

Besides the abusive treatment I also believe this ride to be VERY UNSAFE. The inside is not padded, and my shoulder was constantly being bashed into the wall with each movement. I was instructed NOT to put the door pin in all the way because it would jam and get stuck. I felt very uncomfortable sending people in this ride with the door pin only being half way in! The top door is only held on with Velcro! Some of the seat belts inside didn’t work, or were improperly secured, and he showed me which seats were ‘rickety’ and told me to encourage overweight people to set some where else. But he didn’t stop them from sitting there if the ride would be full! The door itself is very ‘red-green’ as in it’s not professionally held together, the cable looks like it was pulled out of a scrap heap! Take a closer look and you’ll see black duct tape holding things together! 

I’m also have complained to the PNE about this. I’m waiting on a response.

He’s just using the star trek community for an easy buck. This was not the Star Trek Experience I was hoping for. 

So on Wednesday the 11th we acquired a turtle!

Our friends daughter (who lives upstairs from us) and her friend found a turtle next to a busy road a few blocks away. They knocked on a few doors asking if any one had lost a turtle but no luck. So they took it home as it was a very hot day and the turtle was very dry. So they put it in some water.



They showed it to me and I said i thought it looked like a pet turtle due to it’s size and also it seemed like it had been kept in a tank… and not very well due to the condition of it’s shell. It was flaking, and there was scum growing under the flaking bits etc. Also i wasn’t sure that Vancouver even had domestic wild turtles but wasn’t 100% sure. I said we should wait for Aryn to get home and he would know since he’s our resident expert turtle enthusiast.

Once he got home he confirmed that it indeed was some ones pet, that it was female, and it was a 8inch long adult Red Eared Slider native to Flordia in the USA. He examined her and found that she looked to have been kept in poor water conditions and had a bit of mildew build up under her flaking shell, other mildew around her skin, and what looked like an abrasion on the underside of her shell.

  
Snapped these photos just after we started cleaning her up.

We talked it over, the girls couldn’t keep it, letting it go into the wild is out of the question, and putting up ‘found turtle’ posters could yield several different people claiming her. We could wait for ‘lost turtle’ posters to show up, but we came to the conclusion that finding the turtle on a busy road with such ill conditions related to tank life, that the owner has for-fit their rights to this life-form. 

So now Aryn and I have a turtle…. a rather large turtle.

Here she is enjoying her self outside in the garden.
  

We were keeping her in a rubber maid for the first few days, with water and a rock to climb on. We also invested in a heat lamp for her that gives both kinds of light she needs. She liked it well enough, but we knew she needed something bigger…. and taller.



We are getting a larger tank off of craigslist, and when we went there to check it out the guy gave us 2 smaller ones for free. One of the ‘smaller’ ones is 50 gallons! So we have her in that right now  and she’s quite happy. 

Behold Turtle Tank 2.0
 
Pimpin’

But a turtle her size really needs about 10 galons per inch on length… so we need at least an 80gal tank for her to really be comfortable. Here is the one we are getting off craigslist.



It’s about 250gal…. the tank itself is 48L x 24W x 31H, and it stands about 5ft tall quite the tank for sure. We figure it’s worth about 2 Grand minimum if not 2.5 to 3, due to its size, the stand, and it’s professionally custom built. But we are getting it at a steal for only $300!

Next we need a filter or two, and we are going to retro fit a basking platform for her (we are only filling it a little over half way with water), there are other things we are going to need too, but rest assured she’s in good hands.

Only thing we haven’t deiced on is a name….

That’s where you come in!

Here is the list of ideas so far

Wednesday - addams family reference, and we found her on wednesday, orphans were often named after the days/months/seasons they were found.
Zora - Zelda reference to a race of aquatic humanoid fish people.
Morla - Shell Mountain Turtle ‘the accent one’ from ‘the never ending story’
Tobla - One of the main characters of Abenaki creation mythology. Tolba and Moskwas the muskrat were the two animals responsible for the creation of the earth, as Moskwas successfully dived to the bottom of the ocean to bring up mud and Tolba volunteered to carry the new land on his back. (can also be a girls name)
Venus - Venus de Milo the female Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle from the live action TV series
wū guī - Pronounced wu-gway, Chinese For Turtle
Kame - Pronounced Ka-may, dragon ball Z reference, and also Japanese for turtle
Cappi - Off shoot of ‘capa’ which is a Japanese turtle like demon.

That’s what we got so far! Finding the right name for turtles can be tricky because they are almost like little sages unto themselves. As you can see we like names that are a little more inquisitive and have a bit of meaning behind them, be it another language, a folklore character, or some reference to geek culture. 

We want to avoid names like ‘Shelly’, ‘Nibbles’, ‘Bubbles’ etc (if we were going that route we might as well call her ‘poopy’) but we are open to suggestions otherwise. We love classic names, and names relating to movie characters, video games, comic books, mythology etc. and the more turtle or aquatic related the better but not necessary.

So give me your suggestions people and also tell me which one of ours you like best!!

————————————————————

Also……

Worried? 
Do not worry. Some people on VF were concerned and thought perhaps we should take the turtle to a zoo, and others were giving advice on how to take care of the turtle. But I’ll say again; do not worry.  Like I said Aryn has had many of this exact breed of turtle before throughout his life. He’s a turtle enthusiast and knows what he’s doing. The first thing we did was check it’s health. Aryn knows a LOT about these turtles. Inside her mouth everything is pink and her eyes are shiny, so that right there is a very good indicator of good health. The only thing that worried us was the state of her shell and it’s all better now.

Feel like giving advice on how to take care of the turtle? 
No worries, we have the internet too! If you have some personal experience tips or tricks that aren’t widely know, please share, but if it’s common knowledge you can find on the internet then know that we have already read up on everything.  Including what her shell looked like. It mainly looks like she didn’t get enough basking time, or the heat lamp she had wasn’t rated for BOTH the kinds of light turtles need, also the mildew was an indication that she was in a dirty tank. But she’s cleaned up, is way more active, and has adjusted nicely to her new surroundings. ALL very good signs she is now fit as a fiddle.

She was turning her nose up at anything that isn’t pellet turtle food, which makes us think that was the only thing she was fed. but she’s starting to nibble some lettuce and some crickets/bugs we gave her. These guys need some bugs and vegetables, along with other vitamins and supplements. So after observing her we think that also might have been contributing to the state of her shell. She’s much better now after we cleaned her up.

Mainly I have been the one ‘googling’ and reading up on turtles. Aryn is pretty much the ‘know it all’, but i wanted to educate myself as well. We’ll take her to a vet if we feel she’s not acting right or her behavior suddenly changes, but otherwise we feel she’s fine.

First thing we bought after food was a tank thermometer so we can make sure the water is the right temperature.

Again no worries guys, we got this. 

All set for a tea party in the garden. I had some salad with lettuce freshly picked from my garden, strawberries with a small scoop of ice cream, a bagel with jam and butter, and my favorite loose leaf black tea, with cream and brown sugar.

I often like lemon balm in my tea ^.^ so i grow it fresh in the garden.

Some reading material.

I also invited some friends for tea. I offered the metriod some tea, but he seemed more interested in my other tea party companions.

Teddy with his tea cup.

Here is Totorro about to enjoy his tea.

And that’s me creepin in the mirror, wearing my purple sarong and a large sun hat.

Hope you enjoyed!

For the airbrushed clothing theme we were in teams of two, so Aryn and I partnered up. The assignment was to do a shirt, but we choose to bump it up and do a mini dress. The style of dress we chose was a Chinese QiPao. 

We had a few hang ups with equipment and other things but we powered through it and managed to finish just in time. The clasps are real and glued on, we both did the base coat of red, Aryn did the wrinkles, I did the trim and flowers, he did the two dragons. We took pics in the hallway of the school in front of a white wall and chose later to do a background swap. The umbrella was hand a hand painted prop by yours truly. Enjoy.

Our grade for the project: Not Marked Yet

I replaced the background for this one with a carousel, it wasn’t to hard but needed some work here and there. An extra touch that i added was to lower the opacity of the blue sheer fabric around her arms and legs to make it semi see through in some places

My grade for the project: not marked yet

For the mythology make up theme I choose to do a satyr inspired make up. with grape vines painted on. The costume belongs to the model (my friend), he had made it a few years ago for Halloween.

The background was pretty hap hazard, but it was the best we could do. A background swap wouldn’t work because of the fur. Too much work, but i made do, and here is the final image.

My grade for the project: not marked yet

For the comic book make up theme I choose to do a Frank Miller inspired make up.
The idea was to make her look like a comic book from every angle. The shadows are painted on. 

There were SO many good shots it was hard to choose. Here are 2 of the best one before i added blood and one after. I submited the first one to be marked.

My grade for the project: 98.5%

For the ethnic make up theme I choose a voodoo priestess. I bought some fabric for a head wrap, and the rest of the costume is fabric the school had. I hand made the tooth necklace, and many other props that didn’t make it into these photos, such as a death rattle and a voodoo doll.

Here are 2 of the best shots, though i ended up submitting the candle picture as my final image.

My grade for the project: 96%

(Content re-blogged from my facebook account)

ok So in school (college) I just started a module for photography and I have 5 projects to complete in 5 weeks. one week per project. I’m in charge of make-up, photography, wardrobe, background, and photo editing. I have a week to do the project 4 hours for make up, wardrobe and photoshoot, then 1 week to submit ONE photo to be marked.

The themes for each week are:

Ethnic
Popart/Comic Books
Mythology
Carnival
Airbrushed Clothing 

week 1 starts today! I’ll post the photo when it’s complete!

So we had to do a make up design for our final project, we were in teams of two, and Aryn and I choose to kick some ass and do a body painting. Which we were allowed to do if you supplied our own paint. We were the only ones who choose to do a body painting. Here is what we came up with.

There was a lot of thought put into this project, and it was also kind of a homage to your photography teacher Ray, whom we would not be having again, X-Ray (lol bad pun)

The model was AMAZING, I’m looking forward to working with her again some time.

Final Grade: Still haven’t been told…. *pout* 

So Aryn and I were going to go snowboarding Saturday but I really wasn’t feeling it. I by chance got an email from some one needing a last min make up artist for an interesting photoshoot, so i choose to do that while Aryn went to the hill to tear it up.

I haven’t gotten all of the photos back yet but here is basically what i did.

Only thing I wanted from the shoot as payment was all the RAW photos taken. I mean before cropping, before, deleting repeat shots, and most of all BEFORE any photoshop

So far he’s only sent me a few shots, and some i can tell have been touched. I hope he does send me the raw photos as agreed. We’ll see.

So what do you think? It was kind of a rush job, and last min, I went in with no idea what i was doing and no plan.

Sunday Aryn and I went snowboarding. We have some free all day pass’s that include rental, and also a few private lesson passes. I’ve been skiing twice with my dad, about 10 years ago lol, so this is new. My winter coat and snow pants are in storage at my moms back in the koots, so we went to value village to see what we could find. Black snow pants my size were easy, but we also scored a REALLY awesome ski jacket for only $20! It was practically new, and as a bonus it didn’t look ugly as shit. SCORE! So happy we found that, so i didn’t freeze my ass off. 

We didn’t make it in time for lessons, but we booked some private lessons for next weekend. This time around Aryn just showed me what he knew. He suggested I leave my glasses in the locker so they wouldn’t get damaged or fog up, so i did. Learning the basics was easy enough, i still need to learn to work my feet better. Aryn is an ok teacher, but he’s kinda vague and some need to know points i felt. He was off his board, but didn’t want me holding on to him for support, he wanted me to kinda dive in like he did. I didn’t like that very much. Also once i got going and wanted to stop, (he was behind me and could stop me), he would say “but you’re doing so good!” and wouldn’t stop me, but i was bloody terrified and wanted to stop NOW. But i think the root of the problem was that i didn’t have my glasses, I couldn’t see, i had tunnel vision and everything was blurry. So I told him that felt in order to do this i needed them. He has a weaker prescription then me so he left his glasses in the locker, but i think my eyes are just lazier or something because he can see father then I with out glasses. After i put on my glasses it was like this:

Only with vision instead of walking. :lol

Who would have guessed what terrifed me the most was not sliding down a hill… but doing it while blind :p

Also I talked to my BF about the ‘stopping’ thing, and i said that it has to be like having sex; if the lady says ‘stop’ you bloody well stop! :lol

He agreed finally, and after that is was WAY better. I got the hang of it more and more every time, and he was impressed by how fast i was picking it up. 

Here’s me at the bottom of the hill after a run, just about to unlatch my board when Aryn took this photo of me ^.^.

Yes, those are bunny ears on my hat :3

It was getting late and Aryn was colder then me which is strange, but then again he wasn’t sporting as epic of a coat as I. Also we were getting hungry, so we called it a day and went home. Well… we got some sushi, and then went home and watched the documentary “alien planet”. :p

I can’t wait until next weekend, we’re giving some of our passes to our friends to come with us if they can make the time. It’s sure to be fun. So if you are a friend of mine, live in Vancouver and want to hit the slopes next weekend, send me an inbox!