Saturday, December 30, 2006

Too many people from my high school are getting or have gotten married. It's starting to freak me out - it seems like every time I log into Facebook there are new wedding pictures.

On a pleasanter and unrelated note, I am officially done with my work for the semester, so now winter break can begin in earnest. Yay!

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

My last radio show of the semester (and the main reason I actually bothered to get out of bed today):

Sufjan Stevens - The Avalanche
* Jens Lekman - Jens Lekman’s Farewell Song to Rocky Dennis
* Beirut - Rhineland (Heartland)
Beulah - Calm Go the Wild Seas
* Cat Power - Could We
* The Mountain Goats - Woke Up New
Neko Case - Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
* M. Ward - Requiem
TV on the Radio - Hours
* The Gothic Archies - Dreary, Dreary
Wolf Parade - It’s a Curse
Belle & Sebastian - The Blues are Still Blue
John Vanderslice - Coming and Going on Easy Terms
Voxtrot - Rise Up in the Dird
* Built to Spill - Traces
* Boy Least Likely To - Monsters
Mates of State - Think Long
Sigur Ros - Saeglopur
My Brightest Diamond - Something of an End
Pretty Girls Make Graves - Parade
The Dresden Dolls - Shores of California
* Exit Clov - MK Ultra
The New Pornographers - Use It
* The Hold Steady - You Can Make Him Like You
* The Futureheads - Skip to the End
Junior Boys - In the Morning
The Go Find - Igloo
* The Music Lovers - A Hell of a Kid
* Yo La Tengo - Black Flowers
Broken Social Scene - 7/4 (Shoreline)
Weezer - Only in Dreams
Tonight on WSRN there will be a special 2 hour Tuesday edition of my radio show! Phrasing it that way makes it sound much more special than it is, of course - my show is today because we're on a Tuesday=Thursday class schedule to make up for Thanksgiving, and I have 2 hours because the people with the show after mine can't make it. But still!

Anyway, it's my last show of the semester; it starts at 5 pm EST.

Thursday, December 07, 2006

I'm 22. It doesn't feel very different.

This week's playlist:

Wolf Parade - We Built Another World
Of Montreal - Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games
The Go Find - City Dreamer
The Cardigans - Fine
Broken Social Scene - Anthems for a Seventeen Year-Old Girl
Sufjan Stevens - Hark! The Herald Angels Sing!
Sufjan Stevens - Angels We Have Heard On High
Sufjan Stevens - Come On! Let’s Boogey to the Elf Dance!
The Muppet Show - Mahna Mahna
Thurl Ravenscroft - You’re a Mean One, Mr. Grinch
* The Shins - Phantom Limb
Beulah - A Good Man is Easy to Kill
* ...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead - Naked Sun
Dandy Warhols - I Am Over It
* Califone - Spiders House
* The Futureheads - Worry About It Later
*Klaxons - Gravity’s Rainbow
* Exit Clov - DIY

I have one more radio show this semester; due to weird class schedules to make up for Thanksgiving break, it will be on Tuesday. Still 5-6 pm, though. So you should listen. Yes, you.

Monday, December 04, 2006

Quiz time:











And now I sleep.

Thursday, November 30, 2006

This week's playlist, brought to you before the end of the show thanks to advance planning (ooh!):

* Joanna Newsom - Monkey & Bear
My Brightest Diamond - Dragonfly
Neko Case - Margaret vs. Pauline
* The Gothic Archies - This Abyss
Jens Lekman - The Wrong Hands
* Yo La Tengo - The Weakest Part
Voxtrot - Mothers, Sisters, Daughters & Wives
* Beirut - Rhineland (Heartland)
Bright Eyes - The Calendar Hung Itself
Broken Social Scene - Fire Eye’d Boy
* Cat Power - I Don’t Blame You
Beth Orton - Couldn’t Cause Me Harm
Pedro the Lion - Bad Diary Days
Elliott Smith - Pictures of Me
* The Mountain Goats - New Monster Avenue

I think next week is my last show of the semester, but 5 (6 when this show gets put up) of my shows are up on the WSRN website in podcast form. Spiffy, huh?

Monday, November 20, 2006

I don't think I've ever been so happy to hear the clanging and gurgling of the pipes before. Still no actual heat, but it sounds promising.

Sunday, November 19, 2006

It's cold outside. My radiator is also cold, meaning that I too am cold. For some reason, the heat is on the fritz, and I am not pleased. I'm huddled up in a sweatshirt, fleecy pants, thick socks, hand warmers (I finally finished knitting them!), and a blanket. And still, I am cold. Grr. And brr.

Good news: Vanya is over, and a received compliments on the costumes. Yay. Bad news: Now I get to write the papers I've been putting off. At least I have a firm thesis and decent outline for the Shakespeare one... It makes things slightly less bad.

Thursday, November 16, 2006

Playlist:

Sigur Ros - Saeglopur
* The Gothic Archies - Dreary, Dreary
Bright Eyes - Haligh, Haligh, A Lie, Haligh
Wilco - How to Fight Loneliness
Low - Broadway (So Many People)
John Vanderslice - Trance Manual
Stars - Your Ex-Lover is Dead
Tori Amos - Cloud My Tongue
Sufjan Stevens - All the Trees of the Field Will Clap Their Hands
* The Mountain Goats - Wild Sage
Iron and Wine - Cinder and Smoke
* M. Ward - Requiem
* Neko Case - Dirty Knife

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Vanya costumes are done! I no longer have to live in the costume shop! I'll need to go back for some visits (I know there's a hem I need to fix, and socks to find), but the major work is complete, so there will be no more long hours and late nights in the shop. Whee!

I think I'm running solely on adrenaline and sugar right now. I have work to do, but I don't think I could actually focus on anything. I'm still trying to adjust to the fact that I'm not sewing, and it's harder than you might think.

Thursday, November 09, 2006

This week's playlist:

* Neko Case - The Needle Has Landed
Belle & Sebastian - Judy and the Dream of Horses
* The Gothic Archies - Smile! No One Cares How You Feel
Cat Power - Speak For Me
Broken Social Scene - It’s All Gonna Break
John Vanderslice - Promising Actress
Low - Just Stand Back
The New Pornographers - The Body Says No
* The Futureheads - Skip to the End
Pretty Girls Make Graves - Parade
TV on the Radio - Dirtywhirl
* The Music Lovers - Alan Lake
* The Hold Steady - You Can Make Him Like You
The Unicorns - 2014
* Built to Spill - Goin’ Against Your Mind

The Gothic Archies include Stephin Merritt (the guy from Magnetic Fields) and Lemony Snicket (the author of A Series of Unfortunate Events). The album is actually based around the books, and apparently some of the songs are on the audio books. You have no idea how much this delights me. :)

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

I was in Target this evening, shopping with Allison, when we came across this: the FurReal Pony. It's kind of terrifying. It's over 3 feet tall, moves its tail and head (in a rather twitchy manner), and makes noise. In some ways, it's ingenious - lots of little girls ask for ponies, and this is significantly cheaper than buying, feeding, and boarding a real horse. At the same time, it's also very disturbing.

I went to the FurReal website and was looking at their other products, which include a variety of "newborn" animals - chimps, lions, tigers, bears (oh my!), puppies, kittens, and bunnies. By the way, what the heck are "baby bunny sounds"? Because apparently these bunnies make them, but the only noises I've heard out of any baby bunnies are squeaks of pain/fear when Katie finds a nest. And I highly doubt that those are the kind of noises they're talking about - otherwise, there are going to be a lot of little traumatized kids.

On a somewhat related note: I was watching cartoons on Saturday (Which, btw, are not as cool as the cartoons I remember as a kid - a sign of lower standards on the entertainment companies' part, or the beginnings of nostalgic longings on my part? You decide.), and a Barbie commercial played a few times. Featured in this commercial was the coolest version of the Barbie Dream House that I've seen in quite a while - 3 stories with a winding staircase, and spiffy furnishings.

Finally, as this post demonstrates, I am apparently dealing with my impending graduation by regressing back to childhood. Ah well.

Thursday, November 02, 2006

This week's playlist:

Pretty Girls Make Graves - The Number
My Brightest Diamond - The Robin’s Jar
John Vanderslice - Pale Horse
* Built to Spill - Wherever You Go
Spoon - No You’re Not
OK Go - It’s a Disaster
* Pas/Cal - Little Red Radio
Sufjan Stevens - Super Sexy Woman
* Yo La Tengo - Mr. Tough
Mates of State - Think Long
The New Pornographers - Sing Me Spanish Techno
Broken Social Scene - Windsurfing Nation
Primal Scream - Rocks
TV on the Radio - Wolf Like Me
* His Name Is Alive - Seven Minutes
Enon - Disposable Parts
* The Music Lovers - A Hell of a Kid
* Gertie Fox - Modern Love

Thursday, October 26, 2006

Play list for this week:

TV on the Radio - Hours
My Brightest Diamond - Disappear
The Wrens - Boys, You Won’t
The Arcade Fire - Headlights
* The Mountain Goats - Woke Up New
* Broken Social Scene - Handjobs for the Holidays
Mates of State - Running Out
* Boy Least Likely To - Monsters
Beulah - Hello Resolven
* Built to Spill - Liar
* Jens Lekman - Jens Lekman’s Farewell Song to Rocky Dennis
Sufjan Stevens - Vito’s Ordination Song (Acoustic)
* M. Ward - Post-War
* Yo La Tengo - Black Flowers

The world would be a much better place if papers wrote themselves.

Friday, October 20, 2006

Instead of doing my work, I'm busy being productive in other ways. Like poking around the internet for useful information on cool libraries and possible publishing jobs for me and/or a friend.

Among the things I've discovered is Ugly Duckling Presse, a tiny, volunteer-run publisher that works with poetry and artist books, among other things. I now desperately want to volunteer there, because, well, they sound damn cool. Sure, there's no money to be made in it, but it would be an interesting experience and teach me a lot more about artist books (they of the sometimes strange design and high cost, and generally of extreme awesomeness). Actually, the UDP artist books are pretty cheap - the limited facsimile edition of one book is only $250. Granted, that's with 100 copies available, but still: compare it with one of the artist books at Granary Books - 35 pages, 45 copies available... $2,500 each. (Of course, the Granary book sounds pretty impressive - accordion-style, so it can be unfolded and turned into more traditional art to be hung on the wall; each has 15 bits of archival material from the artist's studio, etc.)

Anyways, my point is that I'm much more interested in digging up this relatively random information than working on a paper for theatre class. Maybe I would make a good reference librarian after all.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

The chances that I'll be moving to NYC after I graduate have just gone up. See, I want to work with pretty books. Rare books. Special collections. The cool things that are usually kept in rooms with special temperature control. Art books that are so strange you're not even sure they should be classified as books.

But where does one go to learn about working with such books? Library school? Yes, but apparently not just any library school. I've now browsed through the websites of most of the ALA-accredited library schools. If I wanted to be a school media specialist and deal with kids, I could go just about anywhere. If I wanted to be an archivist and file away old letters, I would have many options. And most of the schools offer classes on rare books or in preservation. But if I want to actually specialize in rare books/special collections, my best options are in the New York area.

Option 1: School of Information and Library Science at the Pratt Institute. They offer a concentration called Art and Humanities Library Services/Cultural Informatics. It's a mouthful, but "Career opportunities in this area include research and academic libraries, museums and library research, archives and special collections, art and performing arts librarianship, digital libraries and archives." In other words, my sort of thing.

Option 2: Palmer School of Library and Information Science at Long Island University. They actual offer a concentration in Rare Books and Special Collections. And: "Students will develop proficiency in rare book curatorship, archival techniques, the history of the book, rare book cataloging, preservation, and exhibition planning. They will become acquainted with major collections through field trips and internships, and will have opportunity to meet experts in this area." Also, a lot of the classes for the concentration (though probably not for the core requirements) are offered in Manhattan. And they're associated with the University of Virginia's Rare Book School, which is nifty. (The Rare Book School offers 5-day, non-credit classes in various cities on cool topics like Book Illustration Processes to 1900 (Woodcuts! Lithography! General prettiness!) and Introduction to Illuminated Manuscripts.)

Happily, NYC has lots of libraries and bookstores where I can work while working on my degree. Because eating is helpful, and I don't actually want to live in a cardboard box.

Saturday, October 14, 2006

No DC this weekend after all - last night I cancelled my reservations after realizing what I had left to do (Shakespeare midterm, packing, etc), how tired I was, and how early I would have to get up. Maybe next weekend, assuming I get things done this week.

Thursday, October 12, 2006

This week's playlist:

My Brightest Diamond - Something of an End
The Dresden Dolls - Shores of California
Sneaker Pimps - Lightning Field
* Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s - Vampires in Blue Dresses
Sufjan Stevens - Joy! Joy! Joy!
Junior Boys - In the Morning
The Go Find - Igloo
The New Pornographers - Use It
* The Hold Steady - Massive Nights
* Yo La Tengo - The Room Got Heavy
* Beirut - Brandenburg
* Built to Spill - Traces
Stars - What I’m Trying to Say
* Broken Social Scene - 7/4 (Shoreline)
Metric - Monster Hospital
This post is brought to you by my inner geek and my intense need to procrastinate:

Stikfas are some of the coolest toys ever. My brother got me the red dragon and warrior woman combo last year, and it's fantastic. And the other sets they have are also great. Beta Female Demoness? Very cool. Mechana Segmented Robot (in the yellow and blue, of course)? Adorable - the robot has a little bear friend! So cute! Explorer and jungle cat? Nifty. The phantom? So versatile! The scythe for the Grim Reaper, the pumpkin for the headless horseman, chains for the stereotypical ghost, see-through body for the Invisible Man, and a crown for a Stikfas recreation of the beginning of Hamlet! Because these toys call out the need to be used in stop animation videos, and people have done so - skateboarding, fight scenes, even a bit of Star Wars.

Which brings me to some other nifty toys, courtesy of =http://www.thinkgeek.com/">ThinkGeek. I had already come across Darth Tater, a Mr. Potatohead version of Vader, but there's apparently also a Spud Trooper and Artoo Patatoo (complete with a little Princess Tater 'hologram'!). And then there's the plush Yoda backpack, made to look like you're giving Yoda a piggyback ride, a la Luke's training in The Empire Strikes Back. So geeky, but so very neat.

Okay. Time to sleep. Shakespeare midterm in about 8 hours, whee!

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

I have a train ticket to DC for this weekend. Whee!

Thursday, October 05, 2006

This week's playlist (before the show is actually done, since the Decemberists' song still has about 6 minutes left):

* Yo La Tengo - The Race Is On Again
John Vanderslice - White Plains
* Cat Power - Could We
* Jens Lekman - F-Word
* Neko Case - Star Witness
Sufjan Stevens - For the Widows in Paradise, For the Fatherless in Ypsilanti
* Beirut - The Gulag Orkestar
My Brightest Diamond - Workhorse
The Dresden Dolls - My Alcoholic Friends
* Exit Clov - Beast Simone
* Camera Obscura - If Looks Could Kill
* Built to Spill - The Wait
* The Decemberists - The Island: Come and See - The Landlord’s Daughter - You’ll Not Feel the Drowning

Really heavy on the rock department playlist stuff this week, but that's because there's good stuff on the playlist. Most of the show was played off of *gasp* actual CDs instead of my computer! Amazing!

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

So I picked up my Shakespeare book today and flipped to 12th Night. At least, I tried to. 12th Night starts on page 333. My book jumps from 320 to 369 - cutting off As You Like It mid-scene and giving me only the last page of 12th Night. It then proceeds as normal for a bit, with the entirety of All's Well That End's Well. Then there's the intro for Measure for Measure - or the intro to the intro. That gets cut off mid-way as well, giving me another copy of 12th Night's last page, then another full copy of All's Well That End's Well. Then, finally, it proceeds as it should.

So my complete works of Shakespeare has only part of As You Like It, two All's Well That End's Well, and no 12th Night. Lovely. This is going to lead to an interesting discussion at the bookstore...

Friday, September 29, 2006

The Sufjan Stevens concert was excellent; the opening band, My Brightest Diamond, was fantastic. Yay good music!

Playlist from my radio show this week:

* Exit Clov - MK Ultra
John Vanderslice - Coming and Going on Easy Terms
Mike Doughty - I Hear the Bells
Rouge Wave - Are You On My Side
* Beirut - Mount Wroclai (Idle Days)
* Sufjan Stevens - The Henney Buggy Band
Bright Eyes and Neva Dinova - I’ll Be Your Friend
Elliott Smith - In the Lost and Found (Honky Bach)/The Roost
Belle & Sebastian - Get Me Away From Here, I’m Dying
Cat Power - The Greatest
* Neko Case - Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
Mates of State - Nature and the Wreck
Stars - Calendar Girl
* Jens Lekman - At the Dept. of Forgotten Songs
Final Fantasy - The CN Tower Belongs to the Dead
* Camera Obscura - Lloyd, I’m Ready to Be Heartbroken
* Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s - Paper Kitten Nightmare
* Sufjan Stevens - The Mistress Witch from McClure (or, The Mind That Knows Itself)

And now I sleep, because sleep is good.

Sunday, September 24, 2006

I am stressed and unhappy and hating work and feeling unproductive, but at least I have a stomach full of tasty milkshake and quality company for my moping.

Thursday, September 21, 2006

The first radio show of the semester went decently well, I think. It was kind of weird doing just an hour, though I'm sure I'll get used to it.

The playlist:

Sufjan Stevens - The Avalanche
Beulah - Calm Go the Wild Seas
* Beirut - Postcards From Italy
* Voxtrot - Rise Up in the Dird
Mates of State - Fraud in the ‘80s
* Exit Clov - Communist BBQ
Stars - Look Up
Wolf Parade - It’s a Curse
* Be Your Own Pet - Bicycle, Bicycle
Le Tigre - Deceptacon
Sleater-Kinney - Combat Rock
The New Pornagraphers - Twin Cinema
Belle & Sebastian - The Blues Are Still Blue
Pavement - Date With Ikea
* Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s - Talking in Code
* Jeff Hanson - Now We Know
I just received a letter about my culminating essay for English - the requirement for me to graduate with an English major. My impending graduation now seems much more real. Gah.

Off to do my first radio show of the semester now - let's hope we break the tradition of having a bad first show, shall we? *knocks on wood*
The large scale event for this semester has been announced: The New Pornographers. Yay! Also, while I haven't heard of any of the bands coming to Olde Club this semester, it seems like an interesting mix - the usually indie rock, but also some jazz. And a week from now I get to see Sufjan Stevens.

*is encompassed by waves of musical delight*

Monday, September 18, 2006

Evidently I'm no longer capable of sleeping more than about 6 hours in one stretch. I'm not well-rested after these 6 hours, mind you, but I am awake. Last night I went to bed around 1:30; this morning I was awake around 7:30 even though my alarm was set for 9. A similar thing happened yesterday, too... But yesterday, after being up for an hour or so, I went back to bed for another hour, hour and a half of sleep. But I can't go back to sleep right away - after all these years of sleep deprivation and napping to catch up, I seem to have trained my body not to expect anything more than 6 hours. In some ways, this is useful - when I can only get 6 hours, it's nice that my body is reasonably alert. It's bad in other ways, though - namely when I could get more than 6 hours, I can't. At least not without an hour of reading or something before crashing again, anyway.

Friday, September 15, 2006

It seems WSRN loves me more than I love it. I applied for a one hour time slot this semester - I want to do a show, but I already have enough time commitments - and they gave me a two hour show. I almost went with it, but decided not against it. Some rearranging was done, and I got my hour: Thursdays, 5-6 pm EST time. Whee.
Last night I and 3 others took advantage of Restaurant Week (meals at great restaurants for $30 - appetizer, entree, and dessert) and went to Estia. Getting dressed up was fun, getting out of the Bubble was nice, and the food was amazing. So, so wonderful. Especially the lamb we all had for the entree - so tasty! Alas, Sharples today is going to be a bit of a let-down.

I think it may also be about time that I bid adieu to my social life for the semester. This morning I was thinking about what I need to get done this weekend, and it's not a pretty list. Eek.

Thursday, September 07, 2006

Facebook's new newsfeed thing creeps me out. Yes, technically it is all information that was there before - which is why Facebook is the best stalking tool this side of MySpace - but you had to look for it before. You had to go to your friends page, look at who had recently updated their profiles, and then figure out what those updates were. Effort had to be made; now all you have to do is log in. If I even so much as glance at the newsfeed, I feel sketchy. And it's impossible to not look at it, since it's right there, smack dab in the middle, with no way to opt out or avoid it.

Here's what I don't really get. Facebook is free for users, therefore it must make money through advertisers. The advertisers get more bang for their buck the longer a user is on the site, since that way the user will see more ads. The newsfeed compiles all sorts of info you had to dig for before - i.e. it can drastically reduce the amount of time a user spends on the site. Which means it decreases the amount of exposure ads get. This seems like a bad business move on Facebook's part, and that's even before you factor in the number of users who are leaving the site because they're creeped out. So... Why? What's the rationale?

Monday, September 04, 2006

Today is the first day of classes - the first day of my last year in college. Eep.

Friday, September 01, 2006

I deem my hall theme a success! Even (perhaps especially) the Quad of Evil is pleased. Yay!

Saturday, August 26, 2006

Long day today - early start, followed by a 1.5 hour bus ride, followed by a few hours rafting on the river, followed by another bus ride... So now I'm going to crash. Hopefully my body will let me sleep longer for 6 hours tonight.

Monday, August 21, 2006

Public service announcement: I have way too many clothes. This message brought to you by the lack of closet space in my new room.

Sunday, August 20, 2006

I'm back at Swat after a week at home. RA training starts tomorrow, and right now I'm working on unpacking. My new room is nice - the bed is comfy (I tested it by napping this afternoon - in my defense, I got up at 6 am today, which is unheard of for me), I have my own bathroom, and the room itself is rather large. And it's not in the basement, which is saying something, since I lived in the basement for 2 full years - calendar years, too, not just academic, since I spent 2 summers down there as well. Having to climb stairs is kind of weird, and I miss having the water fountain fairly close by. More exercise for me, I guess.

Time to unpack a bit more before my brain shuts down completely.

Thursday, August 03, 2006

Because I'm doing just about anything instead of the work I should be doing, I bring you this tidbit of information from a CNN.com article on the horrible heat: "...zookeepers are feeding lions frozen blood to cool off." That's right, the lions at the Franklin Park Zoo in Boston are getting treated to blood smoothies. No word on whether the polar bears are getting the same sorts of perks.

Okay, back to procrastination.

Wednesday, August 02, 2006

I have procured myself a pretty boy.

Monday, July 31, 2006

There's a heat advisory for the area for the next few days. Today - high in lower 90s with heat index in upper 90s. Tuesday and Wednesday? High around 100 with heat index around 110. Whee!

At least I'll be in the air conditioned library for most of those 2 days...

Sunday, July 30, 2006

I have really amazing and intricate henna on me entire left arm, stretching from my shoulder to my hand and covering my ring finger; I also have a smaller pattern on the top/side of my right foot. It's nifty - yay for Allison! Of course, now I have to let it sit and not pick at it, which gets hard as it dries, since it starts itching.

Friday, July 28, 2006

Right now I'm the best kind of tired - happy tired from swinging, sliding, laughing, climbing, running... Yay for friends and acting like a kid.

Thursday, July 27, 2006

Food for a barbecue for 40+ people = expensive. And leads to a very, very full grocery cart. Whee.

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

A rather up and down day, overall. Get to work early - up. Feel crappy and leave after an hour - down. Sleep - up. Still feel nauseous - down. Deal with people - down, then up. Boo to stupid people, but yay for friends. Especially friends who cheer me up by staying up late with me and making brownies.

Saturday, July 22, 2006

The downside of no longer having a niche: when I'm bored, there's no one I can go to and say "I'm bored, let's do something." Actually, there are more downsides than that, but that's the one that's currently bugging me. The boredom and desire for people to do things with is heightened by the fact that I actually have been doing things the past few nights - hanging out and talking until the wee hours, playing a board game here and there, etc. But the people I'm closest to this summer have all gone away for the weekend, and while there are people still here that I'm getting to know better, they're not yet the sort of friends I feel comfortable bothering uninvited. Even with close friends I've always preferred to be the one that got called, rather than the one that does the inviting. I don't know - I have rejection issues or something, I guess.

I could (and should) do research stuff and whatnot. But it's Saturday night! And also, I just don't feel like it. I'd consider wandering outside and into the woods or over to the playground to swing, but it's still raining. And while walking and moping is something I'm fine with doing, walking and moping in the rain is a bit too much.

Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Bush vetoed a bill to increase funding for embryonic stem cell research. I'm doing research for my internship and reading about lovely things like people publishing white supremacist newspapers and defacing tombstones in a Jewish cemetery by painting them with swastikas. I don't even want to glance at the headlines of the NYTimes. All in all, I'm just swimming in happy, uplifting news. Excuse me while I attempt to distract myself by... oh, hell, I don't even know. Grr to the world.

Sunday, July 16, 2006

I think I may be a horrible person. I am, at the very least, a very large chicken. *mope*

And now to deal with the leak in the bathroom ceiling.

Saturday, July 01, 2006

Problem guy outdid himself this morning. Around 3:30 am, I hear a knock on my door. Still half-asleep, I don't respond right away, hoping I'm dreaming or something. More knocking. I stumble out of bed, open the door. And there's problem guy. He asks me where he can find a vending machine. Yes, he woke me up (when my door sign said "Sleeping - disturb for emergencies only") to ask me where he could get a snack. Sadly, I was too bewildered and groggy to make any sort of witty retort about how having the munchies is really only an emergency if a) you haven't eaten in days and are quite literally starving or b) you're diabetic and going into shock. Instead, I just asked him to repeat himself and then mumbled that there were vending machines in the bike room... I didn't add that the dorm isn't that big and that he could have found them by wandering around for about 15 minutes, tops.

I don't think he even apologized for waking me up. Usually people apologize profusely for waking me during a nap or even just knocking when my door says "busy" - and they generally have real issues, like being locked out or having a smoke detector going off or something. I like those people so much more.

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Swimming didn't happen, because the pool wasn't open. Then I was supposed to go to the gym on Monday, but didn't - I couldn't convince myself to go back out after walking home from work in the pouring rain. The weather has been sucky for the past 3 or so days - rain off and on, humidity, greyness, etc. It was sunny for a bit this afternoon, I think, but I only saw it through the window as I was shifting books. Whee.

Good news: the Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins in the Ville is now open, so I can procure ice cream. Yay ice cream. Also, in about 20 minutes I'm getting my hair chopped off - not all of it but still more than a trim.

Saturday, June 24, 2006

This evening has actually been pretty nice. I had a good, balanced meal for once - salad and ravioli - and then hung out with people, only a few of which I actually know well. But they were all very nice, and we played Apples to Apples, and I did well and acquired adjectives that basically added up to being a sexy secret agent. I also got to eat lots of fresh butterscotch cookies. Too many, I think, but they just kept appearing.

Tomorrow: swimming. Now: lazy lounging.
Today was the trip to the Mütter Museum. The museum was interesting enough - though Body Worlds was much cooler - and I learned why Legionnaire's Disease is called that (It first appeared among people staying at a Philadelphia hotel; many of the guests were there for an American Legion convention, hence the disease was named for that). The boy was nice, and I will probably see him again at some point, even if it is just as friends. Because friends are good things to have.

I got back to Swat around 5:50, and it was starting to drizzle. I was torn between going home and picking up groceries; the groceries won, mostly because I'm running low on things to eat. By the time I was done at the store, the drizzle had become actually rain. So I got to make my way back to ML with my messenger bag on one side, two paper bags of groceries in one hand, and my umbrella held in the other. It was not a fun trip, but at least the bags didn't fall apart in the middle of the walk.

Now to cook dinner using my newly purchased food. Yum.

Friday, June 23, 2006

Today I woke up feeling horrible, so after emailing in sick to work, I went back to bed. I didn't go grocery shopping like I needed to; I didn't even make it over to Mary's for dinner and a movie. No, I just slept and loafed, ate grilled cheese for dinner, and have begun to read Eats, Shoots & Leaves (which is now making me rather paranoid about my punctuation, I must admit). Blarg to sickness. Grr to summer sickness, especially. Things like soup and snuggling in bed are not the same when it's massively humid out.

Thursday, June 22, 2006

Today has not been a good day. It hasn't exactly been a bad day, either... just... blah, for the most part. I don't know. I think I need to take a break from reading plays for work; most of them aren't exactly happy. The last one I read was really good, but also really sad.

I need to go buy groceries (though it's too late today, unless I want to hike over to Geunardi's). I need to get a hair cut. I need to do research/dramaturgy stuff. I need to make phone calls.

I don't want to do any of it.

Wednesday, June 21, 2006

Today I took a crowbar to a ceiling.

My main summer jobs don't seem like they should be very heavy when it comes to manual labor. And yet... Yesterday I spent most of my morning hauling metal shelves around at the library; today at the theatre we began the process of refurbishing the room next door that we're taking over. This involved moving things and tearing out the old ceiling. It was kind of fun, though getting coated with plaster and dust wasn't great - especially because it didn't want to come off very easily, which meant I got to remain partially dust-coated on my walk back to the train. Fun fun.

At this point, I don't feel very guilty about not making it to the gym. Between the ceiling destroying, shelf moving, book shifting, and all the walking I'm doing, I feel like I'm getting plenty of exercise. It's exhausting, at the very least.

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Sign number one zillion that I have issues: I think going to the Mütter Museum is a swell plan for a first date.

Monday, June 19, 2006

I really need to stop shifting books for the entirety of my work day... Today I spent the morning working on periodicals, then spent the afternoon in the rare book room. So now my arms and back are less than happy, and I crashed when I got home... Which, of course, has led to me not having a real dinner. Because once 8 pm rolls around, it becomes hard for me to convince myself to actually cook... Which is no good, since I really should eat more substantial dinners than I have been. (Well, Saturday I had a very substantial meal - cider, lamb, and cake at a restaurant - but that's the exception rather than the rule lately.)

Tomorrow: probably more book shifting (hopefully with some other stuff mixed in) and then a gym date with Mary.

Thursday, June 15, 2006

Megan stopped by today on her drive homewards and took it me out to lunch. It was fantastic and fun and made me very happy. Then I headed into the city to do a bit of work - i.e. sit in the office, read plays, and pet Gomez. I managed to get to the office and back to the station without getting turned around or lost once - a major accomplishment for me, giving my horrible sense of direction.

It's beautiful out right now. I just got back from Philly, so part of me wants to crash, just like I always do. Another part of me thinks I need to take advantage of the weather... I haven't been into the Crum for a while now. And I need to break out of this napping habit, I think. I mean, it works, but it's got me on a weird schedule. So stroll in the woods it is, after a quick snack.
Swarthmore now has a mascot: the phoenix. Not really a surprising outcome, given that it's the name of our newspaper and all. I was kind of rooting for the griffin, though, because Garnet Griffins is rather catchy - alliteration is just nice. So now the question is - are we the Garnet Phoenixes? Is phoenixes even the correct pluralization of phoenix? You usually don't hear about multiple phoenixes, so...

Tuesday, June 13, 2006

You wouldn't think that working in the library would really count as exercise, but after spending 6 hours stack shifting today, my muscles feel otherwise. Ow. On the plus side, there is something very satisfying about stack shifting and seeing how nice and orderly everything is.

Also, today I got to see one of the library's prized possessions - a first edition copy of Poe's The Murders in the Rue Morgue. It doesn't look like much, but I silently geeked out over it anyway.

Sunday, June 11, 2006

I'm on my second mug of hot chocolate of the day. The first one, this morning, was to help myself warm up after a cold shower -- the hot water has been out for almost 24 hours now. This one is just to warm me up in general. I've been cold lately, at least in my room. Outside, things are fine. In my room, it can be a bit chilly. I suppose it's better than being miserably hot, but still...

Tuesday, June 06, 2006

I hate people.

The latest: two guys are living in a room that they're not supposed to be in - they've both been assigned to other rooms. In fact, someone else is suppose to move in there, only she can't, because all their shit is in there. In addition, they have an AC unit (not allowed), the smoke detector covered (really, really not allowed) and they have a hookah (technically, possibly allowed, but not if they're using it in the room). They also haven't picked up their keys to their real rooms, so the only way they can get into the dorm is through less than legal means.

Which brings me to my second reason for hating people: propped doors. I just got back from checking every door I could think of, and I think all of them were propped open. I understand wanting to let the breeze in, I really do. And I'm fine with the front door being open during the day as long as someone is around. But every door in the dorm? Of a dorm that's in a residential area, where anyone could easily walk in? Swat's not exactly a crime-laden area, but thefts in ML do tend to increase in the summer, and it's partially due to stuff like this.

So now all the doors have been closed (except ones that have been broken - thanks people!). And I really want to talk (ie, berate) the two guys, only they're not home. At least I got to turn off their AC and uncover the smoke detector. Perhaps a bit bitchy, but sometimes, it's got to be done.

Saturday, June 03, 2006

After many hours at the computer, I can tell you the following:

There are 56 ALA-accredited LIS programs (American Library Association, Library and Information Science). The breakdown, by location:

1 Alabama, 1 Arizona, 2 California, 1 Colorado, 1 Connecticut, 1 D.C., 2 Florida, 1 Hawaii, 2 Illinois, 1 Indiana, 1 Iowa, 1 Kansas, 1 Kentucky, 1 Louisiana, 1 Maryland, 1 Massachusetts, 2 Michigan, 1 Mississippi, 1 Missouri, 1 New Jersey, 7 New York, 3 North Carolina, 1 Ohio, 1 Oklahoma, 3 Pennsylvania, 1 Puerto Rico, 1 Rhode Island, 1 South Carolina, 1 Tennessee, 3 Texas, 1 Washington, 2 Wisconsin, 7 Canada.

So 7 are in Canada, which is appealing, but only to a point. 23 are in states that I cannot, at the moment, see myself moving to voluntarily. 2 are on islands (Puerto Rico and Hawaii), which, while nice, seem a bit unrealistic. 24 are in states I could actually consider moving to after I graduate.

As far as dramaturgy goes... I haven't found very many graduate-level theatre programs that allow you to focus on it. The ones I have found: University of Iowa, Virginia Commonwealth University, UMass at Amherst, Stony Brook University, Brooklyn College of CUNY (City University of NY), Yale, and Columbia. UMKC (U of Missouri, Kansas City), WashU, Miami University of Ohio, and Hunter College of CUNY seem to have general M.A. programs that at least mention dramaturgy specifically.

No matter what, I'm not going to grad school right away. The idea of theatre apprenticeships - namely ones focused on literary management - is leading the pack of possible post-grad plans, along with a possible post-bacculaurate position at the library here at Swat.

However, the possibility of becoming a hermit and living in a hut in the Crum also sounds pretty appealing. It wouldn't require me to take the GRE or become fluent in another language, at the very least.
The power is back on. Finally. It's been out since about 4 in the afternoon, thanks to the big storm we had. At least the rain cooled things down so being without my fan wasn't too miserable... But I was bored. In the 8 hours without electricity, I read two plays, did some crossword puzzles, played on my laptop until the battery ran down, talked to my mom, ate the melting ice cream from my fridge, attempted to sleep (and failed, sadly), played the music quiz on my iPod, played solitaire on my iPod, stared into space, and eventually sat in the hall and played with a bouncy ball until Mary came back. And just as I was going to try sleeping again, the power came back on. Now, of course, I won't sleep - I have to revel in the light.

Sunday, May 28, 2006

Congratulations class of 2006!

I got choked up a few times during commencement itself and managed to fight back tears through most of the pictures. Then I sobbed, but only a little bit.
Since about 9 or so Friday night, I have been in hiding. I left the cookout and went home. I've shut myself up in my room and tried to disengage with reality. I have watched a lot of Grey's Anatomy (Thanks for the new addiction, Mary!). A lot. I have let myself become wrapped up in the lives of fictional characters for hours on end... because right now it hurts too much to be wrapped up in my own life. Commencement is in less than 6 hours at this point. No one is abandoning me, but everyone is still leaving. Part of me knows I should have hung out with people tonight, but all of me knows that I wouldn't have been able to handle it. I'm a wreck right now. The crying has started, and it doesn't look like it's going to stop soon.

To all my senior friends - I'm sorry I didn't see you tonight (Er, last night, whatever - staying up into the wee hours of the morning screws up time). It's not that I don't love you. It's that right now, I love you all too much. At this point I could either glom onto everyone or detach myself; I can either care too much or try not to feel at all. I want a happy medium. I don't want to deal with the inevitable changes. But I guess I don't have much of a choice.

Friday, May 26, 2006

Everyone is sending out their updated contact info. It's nice in some ways, as it's helpful and useful and all that. But almost every email starts out with some variation of "As you may know, I will be graduating from Swarthmore on Sunday..." and each time I read it I get a little sad. After reading it a lot of times, I'm a lot sad. And now I'm heading over to campus for a cookout with a bunch of my senior friends and their families. We were talking about it last night, and it was decided that name tags would be extremely helpful. "Hello, my name is ---. I am with -----." Possibilities suggested for my name tag were "Jen the Junior" and "with all of the seniors."

I'm going to cry so much on Sunday.

Thursday, May 25, 2006

It's been a busy and long day... But also a lot of fun. The Six Flags trip got off to a late start (big surprise there), but things were fine once we got going. Mary, Megan, and I broke off from the larger group when we got there. We ended up meeting up with various people on and off, but it was nice to have a smaller core group to wander with.

The rides:

Batman and Robin: The Chiller - A long, long wait, which sucked. And the ride is really short. But it's also tremendously intense, especially as it was the first roller coaster I've been on in a while. Shot off at like 60 mph, loops and twists -- and then everything backwards.

Ferris Wheel - Because sometimes you just need to let your heart return to a normal pace.

Skull Mountain - A pretty basic smaller roller coaster - some twists, but no upside down loops. It's in the dark, though, so you don't know what's coming. The ride was made less pleasant by the presence of annoying, loud, obnoxious, immature teenage boys.

Superman Ultimate Flight - A roller coaster that you ride on your stomach. It's basically the normal harness thing - no floor but your feet are locked in - and then they flip it. Very cool, kinda freaky on one of the loops where you end up on your back.

Log Flume - Basic and refreshing.

Skull Mountain - Much better without the annoying teenage boys. This ride also had no line, which was an added benefit.

Musik Express - It spins and you smash whoever is on the outside of the cart. I rode a very similar ride all the time at Kennywood before I got over my fear of roller coasters. It was nice to relive a bit of my childhood.

Medusa - There was no line for this by late afternoon, so we got right on. It was fantastic - many loops, harness seats with no floor. Probably my favorite.

Runaway Mine Train - A traditional non-looping roller coaster. Fun and made more interesting by riding with someone who's not big on roller coasters.

Sky Ride - A gondola to the other side of the park. Yay for not having to walk.

Skull Mountain - Because there was no line, and at that point I was with someone who hadn't gone on it. This time I actually heard the "spooky" sound effects - ghoulish laughter and screams - and was entertained.

Nitro - No loops, but lots of hills, including some camel backs/double dips. A good way to end the day.

In other news: The Wilma finally got back to me to set up a meeting. However, by this point, InterAct has managed to respond to me, interview me, and offer me a spot, which I accepted. It also seems like the InterAct one will be more fun - more actual work, less clerical stuff. So yay. But it's still nice to hear back from them and feel wanted.

Now I crash.

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

There are times when I hate people. When I'm washing a bunch of dishes that aren't mine because I'm sick of having them piled in the sink is one of those times. Grr to people who don't have the decency to clean up after themselves! Grr to people who clog up sinks! Grr to people who just dump their dishes in the sink! Double grr to people who dump their large knives in the sink! (Seriously, there was a 5 inch knife just sitting there. I could have seriously cut myself)

It really just boggles my mind, though. I know that I'm a little on the obsessive side (though my room is currently rather messy, especially my desk). I can understand messy rooms, though. It's just when it spreads into public spaces - empty (or even worse, half empty) Chinese food containers from last night in the lounge, laundry that sits there for a week, dishes that are just left... Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Hate hate hate.

There are also times when I love people, of course. Right now is just not one of those times.

EDIT: Oh my god, do I ever hate people. Hate hate hate hate. I was just up in the breakfast room kitchen. The sink/dishes situation isn't as bad, but the counters are nasty, and... SOMEONE LEFT THE GAS STOVE ON. Yeah. Apparently someone got "Low" and "Off" confused.

I hate people.
I have spent nearly the entire day in bed. Boo to summer sickness.

On a happier note: going into Philly yesterday was a lot of fun. My main goal was to get a dress for the wedding I'll be going to this summer, but... Well, I got two dresses. One is far too formal (floor-length black sheath dress for $12... I love thrift shops), and the other might work (knee-length black strapless with white designs), but I'm not sure. Part of me has issues with wearing either white or black to a wedding. Weird, but hey, so am I.

Also good: various activities with friends through graduation. Six Flags tomorrow, general hanging out, and a cookout with family and friends. The bad part of this: graduation itself, where I am likely to cry like you wouldn't believe.

Despite the super-stress of this past year, this semester my grades are actually pretty damn good. A- for both my costume design project and dramaturgy, and credit for my playwriting class. The only thing I'm still waiting for is ToN. I'm hoping for a B; I don't expect anything higher.

Off to finally shower and get ready for the day (or what's left of it).

Monday, May 22, 2006

I have very easily and quickly fallen into a routine of sleeping, reading, and watching movies. While nice, I needed a bit of a change tonight. Thankfully, an opportunity presented itself in the form of an 80's dance party. I went with a few of the girls, and we had a blast. And in about 12 hours, I'll be heading into Philly with most of them to go shopping. Yay!

Now, however, I'm going to collapse. 2 hours of dancing is pretty damn tiring.

Thursday, May 18, 2006

Dear Junior Year-

It's been real (real-ly stressful, I mean). Have fun torturing people next year; I'll be hanging out with your pal Senior.

-Jen

Yeah. I'm done. Woot, I guess?

Speaking of torture - Of all the books I checked out for my dramaturgy (most of which I didn't end up using), I've decided to hang onto one to read for the hell of it. The book? The History of Torture. Yes folks, I'm reading about torture. For fun. I suppose that says something about me. And probably nothing good.

Off to eat cake and celebrate now.

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

83 pages. Man. Granted, 63 of those are the script and footnotes, but still. And most of it's single spaced, too. And there's a lot more I want to look into if we end up doing this for Senior Company, too. There are a handful of books I checked out of the library that I didn't actually use.

Now I just have to finish my play. *sigh* Maybe I'll learn from this and start super-early on all my work next semester. But that seems pretty unlikely.

Sunday, May 14, 2006

Sometimes, spell checker is weird. In a very related note, my spell checker would like to change "hegemonically" into "hegemonic ally." Which makes me think of little warrior hedgehogs lining up to help out their friends in need. Have I mentioned I've been on a strange sleep schedule? Because I have. Man, I'm looking forward to the laziness overload that is Tuesday.

ToN paper done.
Casebook started.
Play... Well, that's tomorrow's task.

Friday, May 12, 2006

I have a sneaking suspicion that the paper I'm writing is not exactly the paper my prof wants. I also have a rather certain feeling that I don't really care at this point.

12 hours left until it's due.

Thursday, May 11, 2006

The great thing about ML - just because the power's out on campus doesn't mean that it's out here. My condolences to campus folk who are trying to write papers or study at all. Hopefully the power will come up soon.

Monday, May 08, 2006

I did not actually do any more work last night... Big surprise there. However, I have achieved the summer triumvirate! (Where my use of "triumvirate" is incredibly improper and bastardized) It hasn't been finalized yet, but I was offered the theatre internship, so yay!

So, for this summer I have secured:

1) Housing (Free, as I am the summer RA)
2) Income (Working part-time at the library)
3) Resume fodder (Jobs from 1 and 2, plus the internship)

I have also ensured that I'll have only a little more free time than I do during the school year, but whatever. I get to spend time in an office that has a cat, which trumps all.
It is oddly comforting to discover that life is just as awkward for other people. Also, long talks with nice people are good, even if they extend my supposedly 2 hour or so study break into a good 5 hours. (Brain shut down at 9, play festival at 10, long talk from 11 until 12:30 or so, walk home).

On the plus side, I feel kind of invigorated again, so I may get a bit more work done before sleeping. It's not like I have a normal sleeping schedule anyway...

Sunday, May 07, 2006

"Ow," says my aching head. "Ouch," says my sunburned back. "Suck it up," says the inner voice of productivity.

I'm holed up in McCabe, doing research for my d'turgy casebook. It's the project I don't mind so much, so it's getting done first. I'd rather work on it than my English paper or my play... Anyway, research, research, research. Mostly of the Google variety, but in this case it's completely acceptable. I've been trying to figure out a production history of the play I'm working on (Ellen McLaughlin's Days and Nights Within), and I've reached a couple of conclusions. 1) There needs to be a website that just lists productions of plays en masse. Perhaps when rights are granted for a performance it could be added to the list? 2) People need to put dates on their resumes. I'm glad you played Elsa, Ms. X, but would you mind giving me a clue as to where and when? No? Damn you.

Whenever I get done with this, I may go over to Wikipedia and expand on Ellen McLaughlin's stub. They have next to nothing on her, and after this, I'm going to have a list of just about every play she's written, what awards she's won, and so forth.

Back to work... Damn sunny day taunting me through the window...

Thursday, May 04, 2006

The internship interview went okay (the place has an office cat and a dog that comes to work regularly!)... I should find out tomorrow or so. Other than that, my feet hate me (stupid heels), Jamboree was good, free massages rock, and I really need to get work done.

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

For a group of friends that doesn't drink all that much, we certainly managed to produce a lot of alcohol for tonight... Everyone just brought what was in their rooms, and well, it was quite a bit.

Sleep now, because sleep is good. ML barbecue tomorrow (today), internship interview on Wednesday.

Monday, May 01, 2006

Zoo Story is done, meaning 1/4 of my credits this semester is done. Woot. Now I just have to do massive amounts of research and writing...

There is a nice playground about 4 blocks away from ML that I and some others discovered today. It has swings - good ones, even, with chains and rubber seats. Very cool discovery.

Saturday, April 29, 2006

3 shows down, 2 left to go. The blood still isn't doing exactly what we want it to do, but it's also not completely malfunctioning, so whatever. All in all, it's going pretty well. Interesting note - the director, who had been super-involved up until this point, has now disappeared. It's fine by me, but it's just kind of funny.

Friday, April 28, 2006

My body just keeps on betraying me. For the fourth or so day in a row, my alarm has failed to wake me up. In fact, most of those days I had two alarms - my clock and my cell phone. This whole oversleeping thing is screwing with my productivity. Luckily, today is the last day of classes...

Off to playwriting class. Hopefully the prof brought food as promised, as I ate breakfast but skipped lunch in order to get things done.

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Last playlist of the semester:

Metric - The Police and The Private
* Mates of State - So Many Ways
M.I.A. - M.I.A.
The Holy Ghost - Genghis Khan
* Arctic Monkeys - Perhaps Vampires is a Bit Strong But...
Enon - Leave it to Rust
* Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Phenomena
Fischerspooner - We Need a War
Dandy Warhols - We Used to be Friends
Rouge Wave - Nourishment Nation
Ambulance Ltd. - New English
Elliott Smith - Junk Bond Trade
* Neko Case - Star Witness
Stars - Your Ex-Lover is Dead
The Mountain Goats - Dilaudid
#* Scout Niblett - Lulluby for Scout in Ten Years
* The Joggers - Ziggurat Traffic
Yo La Tengo - Georgia vs. Yo La Tengo
* Head Like a Kite - Words of a Friend
* Arab Strap - If There’s No Hope For Us
Built to Spill - Big Dipper
Beulah - A Good Man is Easy to Kill
TV on the Radio - New Health Rock
The Arcade Fire - Neighborhood #3 (Power Out)
* Belle & Sebastian - White Collar Boy
The Decemberists - July, July!
Elf Power - Drawing Flies
Cat Power - He War
Weezer - Only in Dreams
Due to "an unforeseen scheduling conflict" Enon won't be playing at Worthstock after all. Boo.
Tonight's my last radio show of the semester... The webcast is back up, too. So tune in from 6-8 pm EST to hear the best of what I played this semester.

Monday, April 24, 2006

The group project for d'turgy is (basically) done. Whee.

My lack of sleep is palpable. 2 hours or so last night. And I won't be able to get a ton tonight, either - I need to write a position paper for ToN, as well as do my intro paragraph/thesis for the final paper. In theory, neither of those should take very long. However, when you add in the reading that should get done before I do either of them... Well, then it gets a bit worse. Tonight is also the second housing lottery (rising juniors this time), so that will eat up some time.

Off to campus to deal with costumes and blood.

Saturday, April 22, 2006

A sign that maybe I was a bit more sleep deprived than I had realized: I took a nap around 7 pm, setting my alarm for 10:30 so I could be at Mertz by 11 and go to Nifty Fifties and do things with people. I woke up around 3:30 am. Oops.

Thursday, April 20, 2006

I would just like to say one thing: Booyah. The damn paper is finally done! I'm going to go print it, and then I can hand it in and finally look my professor in the eye again.
I finished outlining the rest of my paper last night, and then my body gave out on me. I went to sleep around 12:30 or so, planning on getting up around 4 or so to finish things up. I was woken up at 7:30 by my second alarm. And my body is still not happy - my head feels out of it, and my eyes don't want to focus. Grr.

On the plus side - Enon is playing Worthstock! It has been verified! I'm thrilled. :)

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Playlist for the week... A pretty good show, all in all, I think.

* Head Like a Kite - Noisy at the Circus
* Rouge Wave - Are You On My Side
Longwave - Everywhere You Turn
Elf Power - Drawing Flies
* Arctic Monkeys - A Certain Romance
The Arcade Fire - Wake Up
* Quasi - Invisible Star
* Little Mountain - Draw a Little <3 in the Sand
Elliott Smith - Sweet Adeline
* Voxtrot - Soft and Warm
Final Fantasy - This is the Dream of Win and Regine
* Albumen - Circle Down
* Neko Case - Margaret vs. Pauline
Neutral Milk Hotel - King of Carrot Flowers Part 1
* Belle & Sebastian - For the Price of a Cup of Tea
*Tapes ‘n Tapes - Just Drums
Stars - What I’m Trying to Say
* Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Cheated Hearts
Asobi Seksu - Sooner
Beauty Pill - Rideshare
* The Crabs - I Surrender
Enon - In This City
* Mates of State - Punchlines
Sleater-Kinney - The End of You
Built to Spill - Made-Up Dreams
Yo La Tengo - Big Day Coming
Spoon - All the Pretty Girls Go to the City
TV on the Radio - Staring at the Sun
Beulah - A Good Man is Easy to Kill
* The Joggers - Era Prison

Enon may be at Worthstock this year. I don’t know for sure, but I hope it’s true...
I have an interview for the InterAct internship lined up for the first week in May. *grin*
Monday did not exactly have a stellar start. Appointment at Worth, being really tired and frustrated at failing (yet again) to finish my ToN paper, and then 3 hours of listening to Allen talk.

But it got somewhat better. The first summer housing lottery went by without too much trouble. I reattacked the paper, deciding that I should start over (sort of). I've got a full page done. Considering how slow it's been going, that's fantastic. I walked home about 10 minutes ago, enjoying the clear sky and listening to music.

I got to my room to discover that my voicemail light was on. 3 messages! The first was a wrong number. The second was the same wrong number, but a more detailed message. Delete, delete. The third one, however...

The literary manager from InterAct called! I need to call him back and talk with him, perhaps go into Philly for an interview. They didn't look at my cover letter and resume and just recycle them! I admit, I'm more drawn to the Wilma -- I liked their mission statement and production history a bit more (though a lot of that might be because they seem to really like Stoppard...). But really, at this point I'm just thrilled to get a phone call.

Sunday, April 16, 2006

I swear, if I can ever actually get this paper done, I will have to throw myself a little celebration party.
I've spent much of today outside, reading in the sun. It was nice, as was my nap. Now, however, I have to get down to work. So I'm in McCabe. Hopefully this will yield productivity, but I'm not betting on it.

I've been super mood-swingy lately, and it's starting to get to me. It's draining. Also, people and life have been rather disappointing lately. There have been some notable exceptions to the rule, granted, but they're vastly outnumbered.
...And... absolutely no work getting done, because having a massive mood swing is so much better. Just as time consuming, but easier to get going on.

Saturday, April 15, 2006

Remind me never to do a show with blood ever again. It's just annoying to deal with. On a very related note, I need to procure a catheter bag and an IV tube ASAP. Blarg.

Most of today was pretty good, other than play stuff. I hung out with some people outside Sharples, and ended up pestering Saka. That was a good plan, since it resulted in us spending time talking together and watching the first disc of Firefly. Yay for quality bonding.

Now, though, I should really get some work done. Most of today was eaten up by costuming stuff, and I really need to get a lot done. Especially because, in theory, I should head over to the mall tomorrow. Because the coat we have does not, in fact, please the director. So I need to find another one. And that trip will also eat up a large chunk of time. Grrowl.

In other news - I'm pondering, as I often do when my hair is making me grumpy, getting a radical haircut. Summer is coming up, perhaps I should actually try short hair for once. However, the likelihood of this actually happening is slim... I don't really know what I want, and there's no sort of place that I can go to and just let them do what they want. Also, I really don't know if I'd deal well with short short hair - I'm so used to being able to pull it back when I don't want to mess with it. But still. I always get tempted.

Friday, April 14, 2006

My last five moods, according to imood: lonely, weary, exhausted, bleh, and now sleepy. Hmm.

Though I am sleepy right now, I am also kind of excited. There will be people for me to hang out with this summer! Miriam, Allison, Julia, and Blair will all be here, which is fantastic. Yay people!

Also - last night I printed up my resumes/cover letters/envelopes and will be mailing them out today. So we'll see how that goes.

Thursday, April 13, 2006

I was able to file my federal taxes online, but Pennsylvania had to be difficult. So I'm actually going to have to mail it in, grr. On the plus side, I picked up some lovely paper and envelopes for my resumes/cover letters at Career Services (thanks, Cari!). So I can get those printed out tonight, then mailed tomorrow, and then feel like I've at least tried.
Tonight was the night of study breaks - ice cream floats at 9 pm, and then my showing of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy at 10 pm. Both were pretty well attended and fun. So, yay. And I have pretty drink umbrellas in my hair - they were left over from our luau, so we broke them out for the ice cream float party. My hair seems to attract umbrellas. Or at least my fellow RAs like to place them there.

Now, of course, I need to get work done. Boo work. I really just want to sleep, but I need to do this close reading for ToN at the very least. I'm clearly not going to get my paper done (again) for tomorrow... *sigh* I need something to hand in so I don't feel like a complete slacker.

I was a slacker earlier today, of course. The really strong need for sleep - as well as the desire to hate the world a little less - compelled me to not go to playwriting today. I just wasn't really in the mood to listen to people's stuff get criticized and everything. So I slept, then made my way to campus for the judging meeting of the Newton Book Collection contest. Yay library internship.

I also worked on cover letters. I need to get envelopes for sure, and maybe nicer paper. I'll buy that tomorrow and then mail things out on Friday, I guess. Which is pushing the deadline for one of them. At least it's the one I'm less interested in (I like the other theatre's shows more), but still... I really should have gotten this done a lot earlier. *hangs head guiltily* At least I've felt like a competent RA the past few days - having supplies people need (cups, scissors, color pencils), throwing study breaks, answering questions about housing, etc.

And now work.

Wednesday, April 12, 2006

Operation branch out into other social groups to prevent being depressed when all my friends graduate seems to have begun in earnest. Interestingly, it has not begun intentionally, it's just sort of happening. I know some people, so I sit with them and chat, and other people are there, so I start talking to them, and so on. This has led to me sitting outside of the science center in the sun two days in a row (hence the sunburnt arms) and sitting out in the hall just now drinking birthday wine with people. It's nice.

Of course, I will still be horribly sad come graduation of this year. Also, I will not be able to partake in any of the possible post-graduation festivities (trips, etc), which is sad. But at least I'll be here to see everyone graduate.

Off to do some work now, then sleep. Because sleep is good.

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

Playlist du jour:

* Quasi - Poverty Sucks
Longwave - Everywhere You Turn
Luna - Weird and Woozy
The Decemberists - The Legionnaire’s Lament
The Weakerthans - Our Retired Explorer (Dines with Michel Foucault in Paris, 1961)
* The Mountain Goats - Dinu Lipatti’s Bones
* Neko Case - Dirty Knife
* Built to Spill - Untrustable Part 2 (About Someone Else)
* Mates of State - Think Long
The Magnetic Fields - Meaningless
* Head Like a Kite - Pour Me a Drink!
* Ambulance Ltd - New English
* Belle & Sebastian - The Blues are Still Blue
Beulah - Your Mother Loves You Son
Elliott Smith - Junk Bond Trade
Wilco - Kamera
Stars - Reunion
* Arctic Monkeys - Red Light Indicates Doors are Secured
Criteria - Self Help
...And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead - Caterwaul
Desaparecidos - The Happiest Place on Earth
Doves - Sky Starts Falling
* The Joggers - Ziggurat Traffic
* Eels - Bus Stop Boxer (from With Strings - Live at Town Hall)
Pedro the Lion - Of Minor Prophets and Their Prostitute Wives
Of Montreal - So Begins Our Alabee
Architecture of Helsinki - To and Fro
The Go Find - Summer Guest
Enon - Old Dominion
* B. Fleischman - From To

Whee... I didn't get my ToN paper done, so I hung my head in shame in class. *sigh* Last night, the sleep just won. It's been doing that a lot this semester, which I guess is okay for the most part. I just need to get stuff done. At least the weather is lovely right now - I sat outside for awhile today, which was great, except for the slight sunburn on my arms.

Monday, April 10, 2006

There was a voicemail for me from the manager of the costume shop saying that the costumes for my show are missing. They were in the dressing room, and now they're not. This is bad, obviously. I emailed the director, stage manager, and cast to see if any of them knew what had happened. I've only received a reply from the director, which, despite the RE: in the subject line, is not actually a reply in any way to my email. He didn't express concern about the missing costumes. Hell, he didn't mention the costumes period. The costumes for the show are missing, and the director doesn't even seem to care. Can you tell I'm a little upset? I will be really happy when the show is over. From now on, I'll stick with dramaturgy, I think.

Right now I'm attempting to finally revise/expand my position paper. It's going alright, I suppose. I can salvage most of the "this is what the article argues" stuff from my previous attempt, and then I just need to make a point. Right. "Just." Blarg.

Edit: The stage manager has the costumes, apparently. While I'm glad that they're not gone for good, I'm still grumpy over things like lack of communication and... Oh, I don't even know what all is making me grumpy at this point.

Sunday, April 09, 2006

My head is reaching that awful numb state where I can't focus on much of anything and my eyes just seem to glaze over. This is bad because I need to accomplish the following things:

1) Finish reading the revised script for King Lear
2) Write my ToN paper so I don't have to hang my head in shame in class on Tuesday
3) Write cover letters so I can apply for internships
4) Do my taxes

And I just got an email from Adriano; he'd like to see 5 to 10 new pages of stuff for Wednesday. I've barely thought about my play lately. The most productive thing I've done is read No Exit, since that's the sort of direction it seems to be drifting towards. *sigh*

On the plus side, when I was sitting out by the science center, two little girls put a bouquet of dandelions on the arm of the chair I was using as a footstool and called me "lady." Their cuteness almost made up for the devil child in the mall yesterday. Almost.

Friday, April 07, 2006

Choir is done for the semester. Brahm's Requiem is a gorgeous piece, and I think we did a pretty good job. It was miserably warm in the concert hall, though. Blerg. Ice cream with my parents after the show made things better, though my brain still doesn't want to function very well. Because of that, I will probably be going to bed fairly soon.

*crash*
One of the best forms of procrastination is cleaning. It's productive and useful, so you don't feel as guilty. Plus, if you're crazy like me, organizing is kind of soothing. Anyway, I got going on a cleaning rampage this evening. It started with vacuuming my room, and then it continued on down the hall to the storage room.

If you have never entered the ML storage room (or any dorm storage room), consider yourself lucky. It's a scary place. Smashed boxes spilling their contents across the floor, broken lamps, shattered mirrors, moldy fridges... I enlisted Adam (he was nearby, always a mistake when I'm going cleaning crazy) and attacked.

It's still not fantastic - there is plenty more work to be done, including writing down people's names and telling them to get their belongings out of there (seriously, if you've graduated, haven't lived in the dorm in 2 years, transfered schools, etc. your stuff should not be there) - but you can walk from one door to the other. And you can even do it without stepping on broken glass, which is quite amazing.

Thursday, April 06, 2006

I walked into my room about 15 minutes ago, and it looked different, or felt different, or something. It took me a second to realize that it was the sunlight streaming in through the windows. It's been so long since I've come home when the sun is still up. A lot of it has to do with daylight savings, I suppose, but still. It was weird.

Also, another sliver of my 15 minutes of fame: my very first letter to the editor.

And now I'm going to go take a nap, since I'm barely functioning at the moment. Seriously - I think of something I need to do, then 5 seconds later I've forgotten. I'm out of it. Sleep will help. Sleep always helps.

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Okay, so when did a become a go-to person for Drama Board? It started with costume design, but I just got an email about doing d'turgy for a play next semester. I've never even been in a Drama Board production...
There was a confused robin scurrying around outside a few minutes ago. He looked pissed, and I can't say I blame him. I was a little upset to see snow flurries outside of my window earlier. But now it's switched over to hail, which really sucks. Curse you, you bizarre weather.

Tuesday, April 04, 2006

So apparently there was a memo about a mass exodus of MLers that I missed. So many people are trying to live elsewhere next year. Which is cool and all, except I now have this feeling of being abandoned. It's totally not intentional, I know. But I was determined to stay in ML my senior year because I knew people here, because this is my social group that isn't made up of solely seniors. But half of that social group is leaving now, it seems. And that sucks. Yeah, ML will still be ML, but... I don't know. There are a few people whose departure completely took me by surprise. And those are, of course, some of the people I was most looking forward to leaving near.

On the plus side: Katie got her SAM position, so she and Allison will be just a few doors down the hall from me next year. That's going to be nice.

In other news - today ended up being a mental health day. I was going to go to campus for dinner and my radio show, but then I started coughing a lot - the sort of coughing that I did the Tuesday from hell, where I nearly throw up. So yeah. I need to get some cough syrup tomorrow so this thing will just go away.
Dear Blogger,
Why did you post the last entry but not the numerous attempts before? Including one made about five seconds earlier?

What I've been trying to post since around 1 pm:

My body and frustration won at least a small victory today. Last night, after putting together my annotated bibliography for ToN and still having nothing to say for my Orlando position paper, I decided to sleep. It was about 2:30; I thought I'd get up around 7:30. I did. I checked my email, read comics, got some food... And realized that I still had nothing to say about Orlando that would fill more than a page. And I also realized that I was still really, really tired. So I emailed my prof with my annotated bibliography, assurances that I'm working on rewriting my other paper, and an acknowledgment that no, I haven't written the position paper. I then I went back to sleep. I feel bad about letting her down again, but... I don't even know right now.

Also, while lying in bed earlier, I was mulling over some of the research I had skimmed last night. Specifically the differences between the fantastic and fantasy. While the average person would probably call American Gods a fantasy, based on the definitions I've encountered, it's probably more fantastic. There is doubt about whether what's happening is really happening. The main character doesn't believe things at first. In fantasy, the fantastic elements are usually much more of a given thing. There is magic in those worlds, and everyone knows it and accepts it. So. Do I still use American Gods? Do I switch over to another book, like The Golden Compass or Sabriel? Both of those definitely fall into the realm of fantasy. But they also fall into the realm of young adult. Which doesn't mean they're not good books; I think both are fantastic. But I need a fantasy book to at least somewhat compare with Rushdie's Midnight's Children. And I think being a young adult book automatically gives something a disadvantage when it comes to being taken seriously. I mean, I guess I could just note this in my paper and move on... I don't really want to read a book that's completely new to me for this paper. I'm fine with rereading something - that can be mostly skimming - but given time restrictions, a whole new book is not a good idea. And since I'm most familiar with quality young adult fantasy, well... Hmph.

I guess at this point I'm trying to decide between American Gods and The Golden Compass (which wins over Sabriel due to number of awards it's won, I guess). If I wanted to get really ambitious, I could do both as well as Midnight's Children; that way I'd have examples of fantasy, fantastic fiction, and magical realism. But that's a bit too ambitious for me at the moment. But still. Um, Mom, can you bring me both American Gods and The Golden Compass?
Dear Blogger,
Why do you keep on trying to tell me that my blog doesn't exist? It hurts my feelings.

Monday, April 03, 2006

I have "upgraded" my status from weary to exhausted. I am functional, at least to some degree, but not very happy about life in general. Today there were various frustrations (I thought the costume shop was open when it wasn't, which messed up my oh-so-nice plans, I felt thwarted yet again when it came to design stuff, and I just felt generally inept and grumpy). I called home, and talking to Mom cheered me up some... And after dinner I skipped Housing Committee to go to McCabe and try to get some work done.

And I did get a bit done... I did a bit of research for my final ToN paper, which gives me a nice working definition of magical realism and some of it's common elements. I think that for my fantasy book I'll work with American Gods (Mom, can you bring that up this weekend? I don't know if it's in my room or somewhere in your stuff, but hopefully it's been unpacked...), at least partially because it, unlike other books I was considering, doesn't really fall into the category of young adult fiction.

Still to do tonight: Orlando response paper, annotated bibliography for my ToN paper, perhaps some other reading. I really wish I could think of something coherent and interesting to say about Orlando... My thoughts generally drift towards Woolf's construction of sentences and the abundance of semicolons, with occasional moments of thinking about identity and liminality tossed in for good measure. WFC, you have tainted me.

Okay, off to try to get some work done before my eyes glaze over any more.
It's been a few weeks since I've gotten only 4 hours of sleep, I think. I now remember why I try to avoid it: it makes me very grumpy. Also, my eyes have this unfortunate tendency to close against my will.

Blarg.

Sunday, April 02, 2006

I am listening to Brahms's Requiem, on repeat, with my headphones on. I'm hoping that I'll learn the music by aural osmosis or some such thing. I'm also hoping that my vocal cords and throat will feel inspired by the music and stop with the scratchiness and coughing. I really need to be able to sing on Wednesday, and I really, really need to be able to sing (and sing well, if at all possible) on Friday.

In general, today was interesting - my d'turgy class went to Baltimore to see a show at Jim's theatre. The show was okay (and the set was fantastic), the tour was kind of nifty, and pizza with Joe and Emily afterwards was fun. But it ate up 8 hours of my day, which is very sad. Even sadder with the amount of work I need to get done. Usually I'd do a bit tomorrow morning, but I have to be on campus by 10:30 to take care of costume stuff for Zoo Story. Boo. Though it looks like I'm going to win the battle of the hoodie, so that makes the late night ahead of me a bit easier to take.

Alright. Back to King Lear I go.

Thursday, March 30, 2006

I am tired. People are going to Pub Nite right about now, but I'm too tired to even attempt it. Anyways, I still have work to do. And I don't really like beer either.

So I am tired, but I am also incredibly proud. After dinner, I went to the costume shop. I had told people who are participating in the murder mystery dinner to stop by so we could find things. I found myself a skirt and blouse, and then I helped some of my friends find stuff too. The real pride, however, comes from the sewing. The skirt I have is black, with grey ruffles at the bottom, and white trim on the ruffles. The trim was coming off in places, and I fixed it. Also, the skirt has this nifty faux bustle effect due to folding parts of the skirt over and snapping it in place (no, I can't think of any better way to describe it). But doing that makes it too tight, so I added other snaps that create the effect while still allowing the skirt to fit. Problem solving AND sewing skills all at once. I feel accomplished.

And now to read library stuff.
Okay. So if my (very rough) math is correct... I've finished inputting data for 203 comic books. This is about 4 of the little boxes. I have 9 boxes left on the cart, and then 13 more on the shelves in the library. So that makes for 26 boxes in all. If I've done about 200, that means that's 4 boxes at 50 each. So 26 boxes with 50 comic books each... Is 1,300 comic books. Damn. That's a lot of comics.

It took me about 6 hours to get through 203 books, I think. That's about 34 books per hour. 1,300 divided by 34 is... About 38 hours or so. So yeah. This first part of the comic project (which is the bulk of the project, I think) will take me about 38 hours total. So... 32 hours left.

Off to do some reading, or maybe to nap in the sun.
The weather outside is gorgeous; I'm wearing flip-flops, a skirt, and a t-shirt, and I'm perfectly comfortable. And now I'm going to go work in the library to catalogue, etc. more comic books.

I'm so not going to get a tan this summer (again).

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

I am not so much the costume designer as much as I am... God, I don't even know what? Possibly costume coordinator, though even that may be too generous at the moment. No, I'm not bitter at all. *sulk*
Playlist!

* Belle & Sebastian - Dress Up in You
Wilco - Jesus, Etc.
*Matt Pond PA - Several Arrows Later
Yo La Tengo - Don’t Have to Be Sad
# Marianne Faithfull - City of Quartz
Death Cab for Cutie - Your Bruise
* Mates of State - Nature and the Wreck
Final Fantasy - That’s When the Audience Died
Low - Point of Disgust
Longwave - I Know It’s Coming Someday
Cat Power - We All Die
#* Scout Niblett - Handsome
Laura Veirs - Icebound Stream
* Neko Case - Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
* The Mountain Goats - Love Love Love
Matt Sweeney and Bonnie “Prince” Billy - Beast for Thee
M. Ward - Poor Boy, Minor Key
Camera Obscura - Suspended From Class
Sufjan Stevens - The Tallest Man, The Broadest Shoulders (Part I: The Great Frontier; Part II: Come to Me Only With Playthings Now)
Pavement - Embassy Row
* Albumen - Raven Black
* The Joggers - Since You’re Already Up
* Ambulance Ltd - Straight A’s
The Decemberists - The Soldiering Life
Elliott Smith - 2:45 am
That Dog - Holidays
* B. Fleischmann - Gain
The Postal service - We Will Become Silhouttes
Enon - Drowning Appointments
* Built to Spill - Kicked it in the Sun

The fire alarm went off in the middle of my show, sometime during Low's "Point of Disgust." I think. I ignored it and muffled it with the headphones. I realize this was not a good thing to do, really, but 1) there is a fire escape right by the studio, 2) by the time I would have made it all the way down the stairs the alarm probably would have been turned off, 3) it is my duty to keep the music going, and 4) I assumed it was a false alarm, because that's usually the case. If I'm ever caught in a real fire, I'll probably die. Many a 3 am alarm has made me jaded, though being an RA has made me a bit more responsible again. But since I wasn't in my dorm, I did not feel the need to go into firefighting RA mode.

Work now, I suppose.
I am tired. Very, very tired. I was up until 3 am on Sunday night, but last night I went to bed pretty early - I think I got a full 8 hours of sleep. But I'm just feeling very run down. Worrying about classes for next semester, dealing with summer stuff, tons of work, and so forth. Last night was nice - I curled up with Orlando and read till I fell asleep. But sadly, most nights for the rest of the month (at least) won't be like that. I have to finally rewrite that English paper that was giving me so much trouble; I have to finish reading Orland and write a response paper to that; I have to start working on my final paper for Theory of the Novel; I have bunches of plays to read; I need to retackle my own play; I have to get costume design stuff done. Blarg.

And now, back to work...
A little sliver of my 15 minutes of fame: my library Staff Pick from the reference section.

The book is really interesting and made me rather late to dinner one night.

Monday, March 27, 2006

So the deans didn't okay having gender neutral 2-room doubles everywhere on campus. It makes me grumpy, and I have expressed my disappointment in an email to the Housing Coordinator (she did ask us to write her if we had any questions or concerns...). That's now the second time this semester I've questioned/expressed frustration with an administrative decision. Weird - when did I start to care so much about things like this?

Part of it, I'm sure, is a continuation of the ranting I've been doing throughout the day... This is especially the case in d'turgy class, where there was a minor moment of confrontation. I worried Mr. Magru - he was afraid it was something he had done that had upset me - but I assured him later that it was not, in fact, him. He's a good, amusing prof; my frustrations with various members of the class at various times are not his fault.

The real reason I care so much about the gender neutral housing issue, however, is probably Patrick. Things like this will effect him, and being friends with him has made me aware of these things. He could play softball now, but as soon as he starts testosterone, he can't. I honestly don't know what the administrative stance on housing in this case is. Gender neutral housing just makes life easier in this case and in other cases like it, I think. Similar personal reasons were involved in my talking to some deans about the RA selection process. Applicants from ML - ones I had recommended - got slighted, and I got upset. I know these people would be great RAs; I know that who's on the committee definitely effects the choices. People who aren't know by members of the committee aren't appointed. MLers aren't so known by the current average RA. Fellow sports people and Student Council people and what have you are. And the gap between ML and campus - which sadly does exist - gets a bit wider, I think.

Okay, enough rambling. Dinner now. Reading Orlando tonight. And really, sleep might be good as well...
*bangs head against desk repeatedly*

Okay, so earlier today I discovered that Performance Theory and Practice is 6 hours a week. I'll be taking this course next semester. I have to take this course to be a theater minor. Most courses are about 3 hours a week. So... 6. 6 hours, 1 credit. 6 hours with a man that really likes to talk. And I have no choice. Damn it. I was already thinking of not doing choir next semester, but this secures it.

Also- My grand scheme was to take Shakespeare and Survey I: Beowulf to Milton and finish out my pre-1830 credits. No. Survey I isn't being offered. So I need something else to take. My choices that fit into my schedule and fill the pre-1830 requirement: Food and Literature with Campos or The Lyric Poem in English with Schmidt. The course description for the class with Schmidt doesn't sound appealing to me - while it's not Modern American (or British) Poetry all over again, there is probably enough overlap to make me not want to deal with it. I'm kind of poetry-ed out at this point. But Food and Literature... Well, there's no course description to be found anywhere. So yeah, that's not good. But I hesitate to push off filling this requirement until Spring 2007 (when I could take English Drama before 1642, which is also not overly exciting, but...). The idea of an unfilled req (besides my culminating essay) during senior spring is nasty. I also want to try to finish out my creative writing emphasis, and there are more options open to me in the spring - Fiction Workshop, Poetry Workshop, some classes at Bryn Mawr (Screenwriting and Creative Nonfiction). But Food and Literature? What IS it, even?

This is, of course, what I'm supposed to use the shopping period for. But... I would just like to have things settled. Grr.

I need to figure out some other stuff (i.e. Do I have to take any more theater after Performance Theory and Practice? Is there any chance Lyric Encounters can be used as a pre-1830 class and make my life easier? What other requirements need to be filled? Is it too late to find a mad scientist and offer myself up as a test subject for his radical new human-to-cat transformation? Should I just hide out in the Crum Woods and become a hermit?)

And oh, I should figure out what I want to do with my future - which involves researching grad schools for library science and theater stuff, figuring out if I need to take the GRE, and all that fun stuff. *whimper* While that can be put off until this summer, it's still sort of looming over me. Bah!

Also, random note: why the hell didn't I use my Pass/Fail options?! I don't think I will get a chance to use them, since I can't do it for anything in my major or minor. I should have used one for CS, and then another for Philosophy of Religion or something. Yay hindsight. Boo average grades.

Okay. Time to read some Orlando and then have dinner with the ML RAs. Whee...

Sunday, March 26, 2006

Sager was interesting. I had fun at times, and it was nice going with a large group of friends. But I've determined that Sager is not something to be attended sober. And I was, mostly. The drinks from hanging out and dressing wore off before we got there, and Olde Club (where other drinks were) was too much of a pain to get into. But mostly it was fun. But then waves of loneliness hit when we headed back to Mertz. Inexplicably, I can feel incredibly lonely even in the midst of large groups of people.

Bed now, or possibly a shower and then bed. There are many things I should get done tomorrow, but I think I'll treat myself by not setting my alarm and just sleeping. Yay sleep.

Friday, March 24, 2006

Being the organization freak that I am, I took all the info I had entered on the comics from the spreadsheet and put it into a database format. It has drop-down menus for genre and condition! I can sort by series title, and then volume number within that, and then issue number within that! It's so cool! (Yes, I am indeed a geek.)

Note: I am grumpy towards whoever did The Avengers comics. Okay people, why did you not pick a name and stick with it! Either The Avengers or The Mighty Avengers and either Avengers West Coast or West Coast Avengers would have been fine. But no, you had to have them all. And no, they are not actually different series as far as I can tell. Based on issue numbers and publication dates, I am inclined to assume that they are actually the same series and story line... And someone just decided to make it hell for anyone who tried to catalogue them in any organized fashion. Gov docs do this too, changing titles of serials and switching around numbering systems... It's very frustrating.

Wow. That... That was really geeky, wasn't it? And I also just went and changed some entries from "The Avengers" to "Avengers, The" so that it would sort all happily. I think I'm going to back away from my computer now and get some sleep...

Thursday, March 23, 2006

I set out on a mission this evening. Well, sort of. I went to CVS to pick up some stuff. I got Rx (oh, insurance, how I miss you...), candy to (finally!) restock my stash, and some insanely bright red lipstick on sale (it's not so insane when applied, but it's kind of terrifying-looking in the tube).

What I did not get, and what I desperately need, is a tape measure. I have one for carpentry sorts of things, but I need a cloth one for sewing/costume purposes. There's one in my sewing kit, but it's only 2 feet long... And 24 inches is not overly useful when you're trying to take someone's measurements. I looked in CVS, I looked in the dollar store, but no. Nowhere can I find a tape measure. I think I may have to take the actor to the costume shop and take the measurements there - they have 2 measuring tapes there, but they won't loan them out since they're worried they won't come back.

Grr towards stores and their lack of tape measures!
I started my library/comic project today. I spent 3 hours looking at comics - 119 of them, in fact - and sorting them. I've set up a spreadsheet which contains the following information for every comic the library has: series name, issue name, volume number, issue number, date, condition, genre, publisher, and any notes I need to remember.

So far the three genres I've concocted are superhero, sci-fi, and other. Other will probably be broken down further at some point, but for now, it's a catchall category. Sci-fi got its own because of the number of Aliens books. Superheros are winning by quite a bit, however. There are especially a lot of Avengers, Alpha Flight (which I've never heard of), and Azrael (also a new one for me). I got through the As (or at least the As that were in the correct spot) and got a bit into the Bs. It is a formidable task... They don't look like much on the shelf, but you start going through them one by one and it gets a bit time consuming...

Off to dinner now, because my stomach is making funny noises at me.

Wednesday, March 22, 2006

16.5 pages of play oddness. And now I sleep.

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

Playlist:

M.I.A. - Bucky Done Gone
Fischerspooner - We Need A War
Sleater-Kinney - Combat Rock
The Dresden Dolls - Gravity
Criteria - Kiss the Wake
She Wants Revenge - Tear You Apart
Editors - Munich
Nine Black Alps - Cosmopolitan
The Subways - Rock and Roll Queen
* The Joggers - Neon Undercarriage
* Arctic Monkeys - I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor
The Wrens - Faster Gun
The Holy Ghost - Seein’ is Believin’
# The Washdown - Learning Makes You Handsome
# Shoplifting - Contrapuntal Prancing
The Kills - Fried My Little Brain
Death From Above 1979 - Romantic Rights
Bloc Party - Helicopter
Franz Ferdinand - 40’
The Rapture - Olio
* B. Fleischmann - First Times
* Mates of State - So Many Ways
* Built to Spill - Goin’ Against Your Mind
* Arab Strap - There is No Ending
* P:Ano - Foot Hills
Autolux - Angry Candy
TV on the Radio - Satellite
* Portugal. The Man - Elephants
* Belle & Sebastian - White Collar Boy

And I have about 16 pages of stuff for playwriting tomorrow, which I am now going through and making happy in regards to formatting and the like. Whee.

Still to do tonight: Meet up with people to see if their costumes fit, show someone the available rooms on my hall, and have an RA meeting. Oh, and sleep. That would be good too.
I'm now up to 11 pages of random weirdness. It's growing on me, though I have no idea how the class will react to it. *crosses fingers*

Monday, March 20, 2006

I have 5.5 pages of something really random and weird that I don't entirely hate. Yay?

More coffee if it's still there, then home for ToN reading and bed.
Okay, definitely been spending too much time in McCabe lately. I've got things down to a routine...

I enter McCabe to do work. If I have a lot of writing to do and need space to spread out papers, I choose (A). If I have reading or straight typing to do, I choose (B).

(A) I go to the 4th floor (3rd floor now, I guess?), the "back" of the building. I sit at the table by the doors to the central staircase. I work here until I am done, need a change of scenery, or run down my laptop's battery.

(B1) I go to the 3rd floor (er, 2nd), the nook at the "front" of the building by those stairs. I sit in the black leather chair.
(B2) If this seat is occupied, I go up a floor and sit in that blue chair.
If both of these are taken, I am sad and see if spot (A) is open or look for another comfy chair elsewhere.

No matter where I end up lately, it seems that my battery starts to run low. Sadly, there are no convenient outlets by (A), (B1), or (B2). Therefore, there is (C), where I am right now.

(C) Top floor, study carrel near the back of the building. By a window, but more importantly by a power outlet. Located by PR 115.W - 479.P6 I. I keep coming back to this one desk, though I'm not sure why. I'm a creature of habit, I guess. I have yet to deal with having this spot taken.

So now my computer is plugged in and happy. I am less happy, but I am wired in my own way, as I am reaping the benefits of free coffee from downstairs. Whee.

Back to my bland attempt at a play.

Sunday, March 19, 2006

In an interesting turn of events, I am not crying for myself as much as I am crying for all of my friends. Everyone is stressed, upset, unhappy, and it's horrible to see. I want to do something for them, but it seems like I can't. And that's really sad.

I thought I had an idea for a play, but while it sort of worked in summary I have no idea how to actually write it. So yeah. I'm getting a tiny bit stressed over it.
Many props to Shydoubie for throwing a really great party tonight. Electronica is fun to dance to, but strobe lights make me feel at least twice as out of it as I really am. Still, very very fun. And on that note, I collapse in my bed.

Friday, March 17, 2006

Today was nice... The weather was pretty good, I had an interesting library class, there was a poetry reading, and I went to the reception (in a swanky house) afterwards. But now I'm going to be lame and probably read and then crash. I'm so, so tired... I went to bed at 4 am Tuesday, 2 am Wednesday, and then around 2:30 am last night. So I'm sleepy. Also, most people are off seeing V for Vendetta tonight - which I want to see, but I was already committed to working at the poetry reading.

Also, life in general is looking up, at least for me. Some of the awkwardness seems to have dissipated, which is quite good. But things are not all good in the lives of my friends, and that makes me sad.

Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Today has been much, much better. My ToN prof replied and was very understanding... We're going to meet tomorrow and try to sort things out. I got in touch with my costume design advisor for the play I'm working on, and we're going to meet tomorrow as well to look at research and all that. I have ensured myself at least partial employment this summer (at the library again, to supplement the internship I hope to have). My stomach seems to be cooperating.

Not everything is great, of course. I'm still worried/upset about various things. And I really, really need to write for playwriting. I need to write something substantial, too. And I have no real place to start. Grr.
The saga continues...

I was up until after 4 am trying to come up with a way to salvage my paper. I have yet to figure anything out. I am, as I told my prof in an email, "adrift in a sea of summary and explication without any thesis in sight." (Yeah, crisis can bring out the poet in me.)

My stomach is still uncertain about its relationship with food. I've eaten some things and kept them down, but I can't get rid of the sense that that might change any minute.

I have nothing done for playwriting, nor do I really have any ideas about what I could write.

I woke up this morning to discover that it was flurrying outside. It was 70 and sunny out on Monday, and now it's snowing. Even for March that's a bit freaky.

I feel like going back to bed and hiding under the covers for the rest of the day. I'm not really depressed about the situation, which is surprising but also nice... I just think that if I hide, nothing else can go wrong. At least, if something does go wrong, I won't know about it. Ignorance is bliss, and all that.