cast of characters

[thejunipertree]

I've recently gotten a few new additions to my journal, so I've decided to rip off take an idea from chaos_current and post a cast of characters of the people I mention in my journal who are generally non-LJ users. I'll be following this up with a Tara mini-FAQ, since he also did that and I think it's a fabulous idea.



The Engineer: my boyfriend, of about five seven eight years. After living in the same apartment building for years, we moved in together May 2009. A long time ago, I worked in the mortgage industry (and hated it). At one of my jobs, I met a woman who was involved with a pagan discussion group and she was constantly telling me how I'd get along so well with the guy who ran it because we were into a lot of the same things. At the time, I'd been involved in a long distance relationship which was going through a slow and very painful decline, so I wasn't exactly looking for a boyfriend. Friends were, as always, very welcome however. Originally, she'd planned on taking me to a group camping trip so that I could met everyone in the group and hang up, but before she could, I'd checked out the guy's webpage (at the time, he'd just gotten done his senior show in college which was about the burden of beauty. The pieces were huge, made of metal, deadly looking and fucking fantastic). I messaged him on AIM to tell him I was Pam's friend and that I thought his stuff was great. We wound up hanging out a lot, I joined the pagan group and made a menace of myself, and he's been stuck with me ever since. It has frequently been noted that he is an enormously patient man because I can be a very difficult girlfriend. ;)
In addition to being an artist (he's currently in grad school), he's also an officer in a Freemason lodge, which I torment him about endlessly, even though I go to great lengths to support him and the lodge.

Middle Brother: I am the youngest of three and the only girl. Middle Brother is, well, the middle brother of the three of us. In actuality, my two siblings are only my half-brothers (I have a different father), but we were raised to never say things like that and thusly, never said things like that. They're Italian and I'm not, so we really don't look a goddamn thing a like. Middle Brother is very olive-skinned, with dark hair and dark eyes, whereas I'm very pale with blue eyes and naturally dishwater blonde hair (it's currently dyed blue-black, which suits me far better). Middle Brother is five years older than me and we currently are living together, although we don't see much of each other due to very different work schedules. He bought me my first water bong for the holidays last year, which made me an adult. :D

Eldest Brother: Eldest Brother is thirteen years older than I am. We don't speak anymore (Middle Brother doesn't speak to him, either).

My dad: My father is a cast of characters unto himself. He's a self-made hick and proud of it. He lives out in the middle of nowhere in a little house with a lot of trees around it and a regulation sized flag pole in the front yard, which flys the American flag and a POW/MIA flag (he was a survival expert in the Air Force and served in the Vietnam war). He drinks a lot of beer and whiskey, drives a huge red pick-up truck, cusses like a sailor and has my name tattooed on his left arm (which was my biggest influence towards getting tattooed, he got that one when I was four or so and it was all over from there). He's also afraid of any and all medical practioners and therefore does not go to any of them. This has caused him to perform a lot of self-dentistry, which makes me crazy to no end. He's also missing half of pinky finger from a childhood accident (I think it's his right hand) and when I was little, I thought all daddies were like that. He looks a bit like a demented Kenny Rogers and wore a NASCAR jacket to my mother's funeral. With thick red suspenders underneath of it. I love my daddy.

My mother: Holding my hand, my mother lost her battle with stage 4 colon cancer on November 12, 2004. She had struggled with it for a handful of years and during that time, I was her primary caretaker (she lived with me and Middle Brother). We were very close and I am still dealing with a lot of issues regarding her illness and her subsquent death. I look like a carbon copy of her, if her carbon copy was heavier with black hair, tattoos and facial piercings. I scattered some of her ashes in the sea, have some more of them in a little wooden urn on my windowsill, and have plans to scatter some more of them at the zoo near the tiger enclosure. My mother loved her some tigers, which is a grand understatement. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't think of her.

Joanna: Joanna's one of my co-workers, who I have grown very tight with. She lost her mother January of 2005, to cancer-related issues. The two of us are a handful to deal with and the rest of our co-workers are constantly shocked by our dark humour. I love her like a loving thing loves things and would probably go mad if she left the office for another job. Even if she does smell like soup.

Angel: My former boss at my current job. She lost her step-mother to cancer (there's a reoccuring theme here) a couple of years before I did and we bonded heavily over this. She's a natural redhead and inspired me to start eating organically because she's a giant hippie. I miss working with her.

my cats: I have five four three two cats, which were my mother's. As you may have noticed, there used to be five. In order of age, they are: Baby (21 years old, his real name is Tigger), he's an orange marmelade cat who wants nothing more out of life than to roll around in ectasy on someone's lap. All the other cats beat him up. Misty (deceased at 19 years old, full name Mephistopheles, which my mother couldn't pronounce, so he became Misty), he is a grey tabby with hyper-thyroid disorder and is thusly terribly skinny to the point of looking like a skeleton. He's on medication for the rest of his life, to control the thyroid issue, but that seems to be getting less and less effective as the days goes by. He's very clingy and likes to stomp on my head in the middle of the night. Mittens (deceased at 17 years old), black and white tuxedo cat who weighs about twenty-eight pounds. He's not as fat as he sounds, he's honestly just an enormous fucking cat. He also likes to wander up and down the hallway in the middle of the night, yowling as loud as he can. Tinker, (16 years old), another black and white tuxedo cat (who can be distinguished from Mittens by having an entirely black face) and is very bad. He torments everyone else and steals the bottle caps from people's sodas. He also gives me head butts and chirps whenever I wake up or come home. Nympho (deceased at 14 years old, roughly) is my cat. He's the only purebred out of the bunch (Russian Blue) and damn well knows it. He's very regal looking and acting, and can hold a grudge with the best of them. He's diabetic and has to get insulin shots twice a day.

my rats: One boy rat also lives here, Simon. Simon is frequently known as the "Golden Rat Who Can Do No Wrong" because he is so goddamn cute. He's a hooded dumbo rat with one of the sweetest faces imaginable. He's over three years old and has not been doing very well lately. Simon finally died, at the age of three and a half. :/ I no longer have rats and got rid of all of my rat-keeping equipment. They don't live long enough and it's too much hurt for my heart.

Howard: Howard Phillip (named for HP Lovecraft) is my ferret, I used to have two (the other was named Edgar, he died a few months ago, much to my unhappiness). Unfortunately, I developed a nasty allergy to ferrets a couple of years ago and I am unable to take care of him in the manner that I would like to, but I make do because he is my responsibility and part of my family. Howard is completely insane with a rather large bottom. He's also very fond of escaping from his cage every second he gets. Howard died peacefully in his sleep in 2008.

Aristotle: Aristotle is my pastel ball python, who I bought in January of 2008. He was hatched in October 2007 by RC Reptiles and is my baby boy. He's nearly tripled in size in the time I've had him and is one of the more beautiful ball pythons I've seen (bias, much?), but is also one of the stupidest snakes I've ever met. All beauty, no brains. He does not live up to his philosopher name.

The Amazing Larry: TAL is the Engineer's best friend and also a very good friend of mine. We also refer to him as Larry the Lousy Wiccan because he's the only Republican Wiccan I've ever met and models himself after Archie Bunker. We met him through the pagan group the Engineer ran and we haven't been able to get rid of him since then. I throw Larry under the bus almost every chance I get. ;)

Wemble: can be found at wemble. My best friend since freshman year of high school. There couldn't be anyone more opposite than me, but we still (mostly) get along. I loves her.

Miss Robin: Miss Robin is also known as aprilrobin, but rarely uses her journal anymore. We accidentially became friends a few years ago and have been wrecking havoc ever since.

Miss Stephanie and DJ Justin: Miss Stephanie is techanically my oldest friend, since we kind of knew each other in third grade and lived in the same apartment complex. After many moves and schools, we met up again in high school. She's done so much for me, I couldn't even begin to list it all. DJ Justin is the human embodiment of Tigger from Winnie the Pooh and exhausts everyone around him, while simultaneously charming them to hell and back.

Commander Jurin: is a good friend and former roommate. He's in a band, lives in New York and snorts when he laughs. I don't see him so much since his band got big, but I plan on selling him out to VH1's Behind the Music for twenty dollars and a carton of cigarettes in fifteen years.

Punk Rock Plaza: is a house that a whole slew of us lived in. Me, wemble, tony_s, rhiann31, Commander Jurin, and a whole bunch of other people all lived there at one time or another. It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times. I don't remember a lot of it, but what I do remember is fucking hilarious.

my car: a 1985 black Cadillac Eldorado, which is the most ghetto fabulous vehicle you can ever hope to see. Thumbtacks hold up the headliner, the power locks don't work and I have to unlock it from the passenger side, and it horribly needs to be painted, but I love it. Before I got a CD player installed, I used to have to slam the ashtray to get the radio to work. My baby, she goes fast and makes noise. I have recently been making plans to get a new car because funeral school is in Trenton, which is about an hour away from me. I'm thinkin a Mini Cooper, but don't say it too loudly in front of the Caddy. She gets jealous.

In February 2009, I finally buckled down and bought a 2007 Mini Cooper named Mary Margaret. The Eldorado was sent to live on a farm where she can play with all the other Cadillacs and be happy.


I think that's everybody, but I could be wrong. A lot of other people can largely be found in my user info, I tend to not link people to their journals when speaking about them, so it can be a little confusing, but a lot of the people I talk about generally have the same name as their LJ handle. If that made any sense.

Next entry will be the FAQ. Yay for stealing Lucas's ideas!