(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

The fact that I'm posting this 13 days late might say something about the (*insert stream of profanities including a new one I made up involving the word BEANS!*) month I had. There were some amazing bits thrown into the vat o' crap (aka a vat NOT on my "giant vats I want to fall into" list) and luckily for all of you some of those amazing things came in the form of giraffe shaped objects!

Now before I go on with the winners I feel the need to talk about three bizarre bits of progress in the project:

1. My dear friend Ali Raimes, the artist that got me my first international show and whose work I ADORE. She was in town to visit and in between gallery and museum frolics we spent much of a day searching for giraffes. She understands how much this project means to me and the last time she was in town we captured tons of them. But this time...honest-to-god we didn't find ANY. Not a one. I couldn't believe it! Barely a day goes by that I don't capture at least one, but every giraffe we walked past that day I said "Oh, I've already got that one."

2. For the 7th time since 2003 I went upstate and tore through boxes in my parents attic searching still for the missing giraffe. While I was unsuccesful, though I was convinced I had gone through every box 17 times, somehow I found two boxes I hadn't before. This gave me way too much hope. My christmas visit will be spent with me up in the attic. Occasionally I'll come down for a canoli or some strufla...

3. A fan of Fluff occasionally sends me giraffe links, actually a handful of Fluff fans so this, but this one in particular sends LOADS and while browsing through them the other day I SWEAR I saw it. The giraffe. THE giraffe! Unfortunately I have strict rules about buying the giraffe online and I won't even show all of you the actual link because I don't want any of you to buy it online either. I'm trying to figure out a way to visit an actual store that sells this, but the only ones I've come across are in California and Alabama. If one of you found it in a real store and bought it THEN sent it to me, it could count and would make a better ending to this long trek, but I won't guide you too much other than giving you this fuzzy image and a hint:

HINT: This giraffe is part of a religious toy set made by Noah's Bean Mates.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

Not a good month for the hunt. Though I've finally got a new camera (thank you thank you thank you to everyone who helped again!) over half of last month was spent without one, making for some slim pickin's and a pouty Colleen. To top off the crappiness of a pet-died-got-mugged-only-ate-toast-for-three-straight-days month my glasses, which now I realize I had for over 8 years, decided to shatter. Does this get our hopeful hero down? NO I TELL YOU! Instead I used it as an excuse to prove my severe case of nerdiness.

Normal nerds would just tape the broken frame together, but I'm not a normal nerd.

And...um...I really like my soldering iron.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

AMAZING NEWS ABOUT THE GIRAFFE HUNT! I'm applying for my first grant for the project, a $7,000 NYFA fellowship. I spent nerely $200 (in imaginary credit card money) getting my application in beautiful shape, between the slide creation and overnighting things just to make sure they got here in time...only to find TODAY that they are making everyone do it digitally this year. ARRRRRG. Says I. Sometimes I get a little too motivated to read instructions. Fingers crossed for me folks. Eyes and legs too while you are at it.

October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. February, the month of the least giraffes, was chalk-full of crap. March giraffes involved blue screening fun. April I finally met some real-live ones. May giraffes were unintentionally pirate themed. June giraffes were wearable and tight in the tush. July giraffes were surreal. And in August I tipped the scales to go over 1,000 captured. And in September I drank one...

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

This month as felt very literary. I've been reading until my eyes fall out almost every night (don't worry I have a whole box full of eyes I got before Odd Job went out of business, only $14.96 and they came with a free spatula and the asian-american version of bendable cheerleader Barbie). Surprisingly, there are a whole lot of giraffes to be found in books. I've started to reread my shelves searching for that single word amongst lines upon lines of text. I think I'm going crazy(ier).

AMAZING NEWS ABOUT THE GIRAFFE HUNT! I'm now over 1,000 photographs of "reject giraffes" and while the elusive giraffe has proved to be...er, elusive...I still don't have a doubt that I'm going to be able to find it eventually. October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. February, the month of the least giraffes, was chalk-full of crap. March giraffes involved blue screening fun. April I finally met some real-live ones. May giraffes were unintentionally pirate themed. June giraffes were wearable and tight in the tush. July giraffes were surreal. And in August 2005 I tipped the scales. Now...
(captured/created by giraffe hunter Ben)

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

It's an hour and ten minutes until I go into my hermitude for 5 straight days, randomly pulling (so perhaps I won't easily remember how to put them back in) the wires out of my magical light box that gives me the internet for a small monthly fee and some occasional sweet loving. (My router loves to spoon.) I COULDN'T let a week go without letting everyone know the giraffes of the month. ESPECIALLY after I found THIS in my inbox! I've been a fan of Robot Comix for a while now and for the BEN to make ME something really makes me warm, fuzzy, and smelly (did I mention I'm not taking showers until I write at least 30 pages each day?) Now ONWARD there are giraffes to be caught!October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. February, the month of the least giraffes, was chalk-full of crap. March giraffes involved blue screening fun. April I finally met some real-live ones. May giraffes were unintentionally pirate themed. June giraffes were wearable and tight in the tush. July...I'd have to say has the most sureal capture yet.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

Hello and welcome to my time travel machine. It's a cheap model and can only travel one week backwards, but it has a really awesome chocolate milk dispenser built right into the dashboard, so in my mind it was TOTALLY worth the $14.87 I paid for it. Today is now June 15, and it is giraffe of the month day. I had been disappointed this month with the huntage, my usually terrifying momentum lost to piles and piles of work-desk jumbly. I'm starting to feel like this project might never end, which used to exhilarate me, but, having made so many stupid rules (such as the fact I didn't want to do any other gallery shows until this was over and recently had to refuse an invite) I'm so SO ready to BLOW UP A GIRAFFE. I've got a long long way to go. Perhaps this month at the end of the post I'll describe the giraffe I'm searching for...October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. February, the month of the least giraffes, was chalk-full of crap. March giraffes involved blue screening fun. April I finally met some real-live ones. May giraffes were unintentionally pirate themed, and June, well June was a hell of a month when I finally sat down and looked at what I caught. No end in sight yet, but after catching nearly 50 giraffes in KMART this past weekend, the hunt is back on FULL FORCE.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

Arrrr MAY-tes. Yeah, bad pun but it ACTUALLY describes this month's giraffes pretty well. October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. February, the month of the least giraffes, was chalk-full of crap. March giraffes involved blue screening fun. April I finally met some real-live ones...and May, well a very solitary month of that involved me losing my vision and gaining a bunch of eye-patches.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

April (n) = 1. hot ninja turtle friend 2. Pretty damn good month to capture giraffes. October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. February, the month of the least giraffes, was chalk-full of crap. March giraffes involved blue screening fun. Now April...april involved lots of Colleen alone time in Texas, long-distance hunters, and the first real-life unstuffed girr-tastic photos.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

March, oh how I love thee and your wonderful giraffe filled days… October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. February, the month of the least giraffes, was chalk-full of crap, but MARCH now MARCH is what giraffe hunting is all about…

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

I dropped into a black hole this week, avoiding friends, skipping a LLA! without apology, and am now uncharacteristically two days late with the Giraffe of the Month. For those of you that are reading this that don't have access to my occasional friends-only more personal rants and whines, I lost Grandpa V last Friday. I've always been strangely proud that my laugh is loud, obnoxious, inescapably addicting, and powerful enough to knock over a small mule. Unfortunately, I cry the same way. I cried myself into a hole of fever-y sickness I'm only now starting to climb out of. Vitamins, sleep, tea (blah!), and pseudoephedrine hydrocholide have all helped, but I think the thing I really neeed to kick me back into well...being "me" again is a whole lotta giraffe. October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry. January giraffes contained one "carafe" and lots of laughter. And February, the month of the least giraffes captured to date, may have been a month of pure divine crappiness, but there were some gems pulled out of this black hole...

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

It's time for the Giraffe of the Month! Holy crappers. I'm a day late with the posting due to the GREAT LJ BLACKOUT OF '05. I felt a little naked there. Luckily due to technology I can pretend it's still yesterday. While I got a bit too busy to giraffe hunt the end of December, the start of January surely made up for it. October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties, December giraffes made me cry...and this month I've got major proof that I'm starting to loose my mind.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

It's time for the Giraffe of the Month! Okay this month wasn't a great giraffe hunter's dream. It was sorta a difficult one and the pictures...well they aren't pretty. If you like to imagine me being the world's happiest person 100% of the time, don't click the cut link. October Giraffes Were Modest. November Giraffes Kicked Rear-Booties and December...well December is pretty cold.

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

It's time for the Giraffe of the Month! I had a particularly hard time deciding because in the past 30 days I've captured nearly 175 new ones. I must say, thanks to some willing fellow hunters, this month's giraffes DESTROYED last month's. Rather than just praise only one, I decided to go with a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place!

(Before you start to read and get scared...if you don't yet know about my Stalking and Murdering of a Childhood Giraffe project you should click on the pretty-ily colored underlined section of this sentence. If you are still scared after that, don't worry that feeling is quite common.)

I decided every 15th of each month I'm going to feature two giraffes that I've successfully captured. The first will be the official GIRAFFE OF THE MONTH, which will be the oddest giraffe picture or one that makes me laugh the hardest for any of the bizarre reasons things make me laugh. The second giraffe will be the MOST DIFFICULT GIRAFFE OF THE MONTH. I feel the need to showcase the giraffes that I had problems capturing, whether it be due to yelling salespeople, or, in the case of this month's giraffe, severe Colleen giggle fits. (Remember I'm not supposed to be smiling in any of the pictures.)