One Day at Western

Washington inside a fist. Hubcaps. Snowmen. Piano music at 1 am. Iron Chef friends. Text messages from lovers. Family Guy. Nachos with extra sour cream. Suckerpunching/pile driving. Mario Party, $5 on Ebay. Tennis, both Mario version and murder raquet. Studying for the skipped class. Moral duties against math. Two coats, three sweatshirts, a water bottle, Sylvia Plath, washcloth, hairbrush, textbook, coffee mug, 2 throw blankets, slippers, and a pair of earrings (somewhere) all to be removed from the bed before bed. $30 women's gloves that only fit a man's hands. Strep throat. Larrabee State Park drawn with an imaginary pen. Layers on layers on layers. Movie nights that never happen. Lights across the street. More snow. Snow balls that don't miss. Sandals in the slush. Bounding deer. Black coffee dregs and dehydration. Snood tournaments. Big plans for next quarter!

He's Snoring Again. Awwww.

Hi. Ben? Are you listening? Thank you! I took your advice, and sure, it's going to be hard. But it'll be worth it.

nothing will ever be as good as being a girl. a pms'ing girl, no less. yes, yes, i knew it was a bad sign when i spent 2 hours of good, hard work at the gym, then came home, made a playlist of sappy songs, and settled down to eat half the (chocolate) cake i baked last night.

Breathe deep the gathering gloom
Watchlights fade from every room
Bedsitter people look back and lament
Another days useless energies spent
Empassioned lovers wrestle as one
Lonely man cries for love and has none
New mother picks up and settles her son
Senior citizens wish they were young
Cold hearted orb that rules the night
Removes the colors from our sight
Red is gray and yellow white
But we decide which is right
And which is an illusion

james is pretty in eyeliner

last night, loves, made up for over a week of disappointments. a large crew of boys from long beach came up to get faded at michael kimbrough's. what can be said? they have strange back-woods rules for king's cup, but that's okay. james was showing off his emo flag. nick and i controlled the couch with our slouching. elaina and scott didn't speak most of the night, from what i saw. matt bonney called me his teddy bear, and we hugged many many times. elaina had to tell him to stop crowding her cousin. ryan told work stories, joey inspired a mcdonald's run. whitey and i talked loudly and belligerently about donating plasma. we all sat down for a nap around 5 am, and i walked the half mile or so home around 6. my day started at 2:30, 4 hours after my mom called and asked about my thanksgiving plans.

and do you know? the day since has been lovely! nick and i are both really excited - we made friends with someone on our floor! we ate dinner in the backroom of fairhaven, and had ice cream sundaes on plates. jessica joined us and we baked a cake (it's MY chicken!) and played irresponsible games of bombchu bowling. and loves, please. don't forget the laugh track for family guy. some kid i've never seen before walking into our dorm and watched for 3 minutes or so, then walked away with a "everyone on the floor is watching this. thanks for letting me join!"

Celebrity Minds

As frustrating and emotionally harrowing my Criminal Justice class is, I'm going to miss it when it's gone. I'm going to miss Inverarity, with his uncontrollable gray hair that wobbles over his head as he stutters his way through a lecture. The way he throws in such random, ridiculous comments as "Ignore Louisiana, it's a southern state." and "If you have cancer, you're going to die. That's not interesting." His absolute nonchalance about whether you come to class or not, yet demands perfection from those who have never sat through a lecture.

But most of all, I'm going to miss the study nights before exams. The 1 am trips to IHOP for three pots of coffee that is guaranteed to make me sick the next day. Last night was a conglomeration of spanish, logic, literature, and criminal justice. Conversation topics ranged from the current conditions of jails, Offspring, the relationship between math and logic, Dora the Explorer, relatives with quirks, drinking, and conjugating verbs in portuguese. Those nights, I learn more in one sitting than I do for the next three weeks.

Ten Pages in One Hour

I have 100 pages from my Social Organization of Criminal Justice textbook to read tonight. I am very very mad about this. However, I am also taking notes and writing the study guide stuff down too, so maybe I can only plow through 2 chapters and call it good? I mean, really, it's how much I learn, not quantity of the workload accomplished.

And on top of that! I have no food in my dorm that doesn't make me sick. And the dining hall food isn't much of an improvement, unless I'm famished after working out. I am so hungry! And only cereal will suffice! So instead I drink water. Lots and lots and lots and lots of water. Sometimes I make it flavored water with my Lipton's raspberry iced tea mix, but then sometimes that makes me sick too. You know what I really wish I had? Purple Gatorade mix. I saw it once, at the Met. Yumm.

I'm Levitating!

Heute war eine grosse día en mi cuarto. Meine compañero di cuarto und ich moved all our stuff around, und jetzt it looks organized and cleaned and lived in. We even have bailar space in the middle of our room. Unfortunately, I can't get too excited about it. This week is another hell week! Sociology test Friday, and spanish test tomorrow. Not to mention registration coming up! I'm getting my math teacher's opinion on which professors to look into. Hurrah!
Este tarde, Sharon and I ate lunch together. We spent an hour gabbing about boys and school and life in general, and how much college is different from what we expected. It was lovely, and it gives me hope that I won't die of loneliness when Jessica leaves me at the end of this quarter.

move to italy - top of the list!

i haven't seen my suitemates since thursday morning. and even that's questionable. i'm not sure if i actually saw them thursday morning or wednesday morning.
Now, as many of you may have heard (basically anyone who's talked to me at all since Thursday), I donated plasma while fighting off a cold. I know, not one of the brightest decisions I've ever made. But sometimes I get these urges to take reckless chances that will probably end up hurting me in the end. Usually they involve jumping off of something, donating plasma while sick, or not eating for three days straight. They don't really serve any purpose, just a way for me to get out of a rut. This experiment left me sleeping by 5 pm, off and on all night. The only time I spent awake, well, I wrote about that last time. When I saw Frans. The wine made me sick around 3 am, so I sat shivering in my bathroom emptying my body of all its contents. Which wasn't much, but it sucked pretty bad.
The natural conclusion was that Friday would be spent on the couch. When Jessica saw me huddled under all seven of my blankets, watching Life is Beautiful, she laughed. For five minutes straight. And when she was done, she sat down on the couch with me and cried over the movie.
Ahhh I'm losing interest in this post already! I need to make my bed before I can sleep in it. So now come the bare minimum details. RJ came over Friday evening, we spent the night drinking over at Matt's place. Elaina and I were pretentious snobs with a bottle of white wine (RJ would've disowned me if I didn't give wine another chance.) We watched Shaun of the Dead and stumbled back to my dorm room, and slept. Breakfast at Denny's, which was amazing, and I got to drive RJ's truck! (I miss driving so much. I'm going to Centralia over Thanksgiving, and I'm taking the Blazer to do it.) After RJ left, I camped out on my couch for the rest of the day and proceeded to watch: Emma, The Shipping News, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, The Heiress, and Under the Tuscan Sun. And yes, I was wrapped up in my seven blankets the whole time. Aw, don't worry, I wasn't completely by myself. Ryan watched 3 movies with me, and Julie watched 2. We were the cool kids.

how do you cool your lips after a summer's kiss?

Frans is easily one of my favorite people in the dorm. He's chill. Earlier this evening, I had my head pounded and compressed by the sounds of Mar and his friend trying to play the guitar. It was a major sacrifice for a simple jar of spaghetti sauce, but it had to be done! The pain of that moment will be in my memory forever - the headache, the nausea, the aweful out of tune squeals coming from a beautiful instrument.
Frans, meanwhile, introduced me to his friend Mateo this evening. He and Mateo sat and jammed on the mandolin and the same mentioned guitar -- and it was beautiful. Sitting by a forest stream while pixies play and laugh in the water wouldn't be as relaxing as these two boys tinkered with their instruments. And while Edgar Allen Poe may not seem like the perfect addition to this night, sharing his stories was oddly appropriate.
Anyway, I adore Frans. He wore my sweatshirt outside, so now it smells like love. And we watched the Big Lebowski while sipping wine. (Yes, I know, wine. Unfortunately, I'll never be a pretentious snob when it comes to alcohol -- drinking wine is like forcing myself to down a giant glass of pure vinegar.)
All this was within the last three or four hours. Pretty much my whole day was spent in a haze of dragging myself from one class to another, humorously murmuring "braiiinnns!" to myself to get over how dead I felt. There was this one glorious section in time, 45 minutes, where I napped on the big green couch in the library. I think I left a drool spot on the cushion, but that's not gross. It's just a sign of a good time.
This weekend, I have big plans. They involve movies, maybe illegal drugs, calling up Brent (see how those two coincide?), but most likely just sleep and a few good books. Natalie left for the weekend, Matt's supposed to show up one of these days (not sure what I think about that), and I feel like locking myself in the dorm and only talking to a select few people. And only one at a time.

We Have Arrived

Today, I learned an interesting fact. Actually, I'm not sure if it's fact or not, but if it is, then it's interesting. Matt says there's a Long Beach in every state of the US. Elaina and I don't believe him. I mean, come on -- Long Beach, South Dakota? It just doesn't compute, folks. So I pretend to be fascinated and impressed, but inwardly, I'm skeptical. Google'ing it didn't help much either. Google.com thinks there's only one Long Beach, and it's in California.

skep·ti·cism 1 : an attitude of doubt or a disposition to incredulity either in general or toward a particular object

In other news! (Tonight was a fantastically good night, considering it was a Monday. o lunes.) I froze my toes for one fantastic view: coming in from sailing, watching the mist rising off the placid lake. Yes, placid. As in NO WIND. Ahh, kinetics, how I hate putting you into use. After, Jessica and I made the trek into downtown Bellingham to the Fantasia Cafe for Poetry Night! I stuck around for an hour and a half -- fantastic poetry, amazing readers, and the community feeling of everyone there was overwhelming. The regulars heckled and laughed and put everyone into an accepting, open-minded state. I almost cried at one point, though. Here is where I tell you about my self-loathing. Before the poetry reading started, I sat nursing my peppermint mocha and observing the people. As always, I immediately spotted the grossly overweight guy. He was balding, pastey, and overflowing all corners of his chair. I see a lot of people like this at the pool (especially during water aerobics), and I've developed this terrible habit of imagining them in bathing suits. My imagination goes overboard with the folds of flesh and (trust me, it's almost universal) ugly birth marks or skin discolorations. ... Really, have I offended enough people yet? Obese people are fascinating to me, in a disgusting and degrading way. Anyway, after I mentally ostracized this guy, he got up and read a "very personal poem that's hard for [him] to share". The gist of it was how no one has ever found him attractive, how he has found intellectual partners and friends, but no one who will love him physically. And how he's wondering if he'll ever find intimacy before he dies. I felt so guilty, as if I personally was responsible for all the pain and humiliation he'd ever been through. And there was nothing I could do. I still found him repulsive. But on top of that, I felt a sharp stab of guilt because I knew, 100%, that this was a real person with real feelings who probably feels worse than I ever have on a regular basis. And I still wouldn't be able to talk to him without seeing his obesity first.

Anyway. It's 1:30 am right now, RJ called right in the middle of that post and I had so much more to say... I just can't anymore. I'm tired. I want to sleep before I get up and shower before class tomorrow (which I haven't studied for or done the homework. Yay!)

the first set of sailing pictures!

kingsley zissou. he even had a cap gun!

this was the whole team, all dressed up for the occasion.


friday night, sharing stories on the porch.

sunday afternoon, all decked out in sailing gear! our models are andrew, matt, and alex.

oh randy.






janna is my lovely skipper.

jake and his orange hat.


it's kramer guys! you know, from seinfeld?? yeah, yeah!!


our carpool, minus sam and jon. we are hardcore cool, man.

so the story goes like this. i go out onto the porch, and janna starts wondering who smells really really good. is it jake? hmm, no. alex? nope. turns out it was my hair. yay for awesome conditioner!
this was the cool band making their way up to vancouver, bc. the kid on the far right is wearing a real rabbit fur hat. i loved that hat passionately and wholeheartedly for the whole... minute? that i got to play with it.

those are cherl's shoes. come on. how amazing can she get?

ashley and florian!

so i have no idea who the girl in spandex is, or what she was dressed as, but she had the greatest costume by far.

ashley and cherl!

alex, andrew, and kyle.

alex is singing cher. "do you believe in love after love?"

what are we goin' to do?

last night was a bad night. ben made it not so bad. thank you, ben.

indigent

This is amazing. I am amazing. Elaina is amazing. Phil and Becky and John are all pretty amazing, too. I like the word amazing today. It fits well. It rolls out of my mind and baffles (amazes!) me whenever I think of what I did, why I feel the way I do.

IHOP is amazing. Instead of sitting around waiting for some distracted, uncaring server to refill your coffee cup, the IHOP waitresses gave us a pitcher of coffee each and left us to it. Other groups of college students were there when we showed up, but we were the last ones standing by far. An old man came up and told us a joke. When he left, we laughed and smiled and agreed, “Old people. Oh yes.”

It’s raining outside, right now. My window is streaked with rain, but before the sun came up it looked like patches of ice. When I say the sun came up, I really just mean the clouds got a little lighter and now I can see my way around my dorm room, instead of turning on lights and risking waking up the roommate.

It’s 7:30 now. I’m typing this in Word because I don’t want Firefox to crash and lose it all. I’m going to call Elaina in ten minutes, and then we’ll meet at the shuttle to fill our thermoses with coffee, have one last cram session in our creaky 70’s classroom desks, and maybe ask the professor what the hell is up with Brown vs. Mississippi.

Home Again

It's 8:45, and I'm completely ready to go to class. Class starts at 10. Yeah, this morning went a little faster than I thought it would... Now I can do crazy things like play music until my roommate wakes up, finish my homework, or maybe even give myself a manicure! Oh my oh my, the possibilities. What I really want to do is hit up the grocery store for foodstuffs. Our pantry is running low. And when I say low, I mean the only thing left to eat is ramen. Miles upon miles of ramen. ICK. Ramen is good when it's the first time you've eaten it all week, but every time after that it loses it's charm a little. It's like watching a polished, sophisticated sorority girl get drunk, only instead of watching the destruction, you're eating it.
I keep thinking it's a new week now. I went home Tuesday night and told myself it was the weekend. And basically, it was! Chanel and I bought a pack of cigarettes from the Shell station, then crossed the street to our old stompin' grounds: Denny's. The first thing I noticed made me almost poop my pants with happiness. The old man with the beard who sits and smokes and reads a book was there! His beard was just the same. His black-rimmed reading glasses were just the same. His checkered button-up shirt was still tucked in. My memory tells me he was wearing cowboy boots, but I think I just wish he was. So Chanel and I both went buckwild at Denny's: we laughed and we cried and we ate seasoned fries with BBQ sauce and ranch, and we threw our hands in the air and annoyed the waiter, we drank too much coffee and had to pee constantly for the rest of the night, we ate our shoplifted candy from the Shell station, and we both realized that no one will ever be able to take the place of our sister. I miss Chanel more than anyone. We drove to Steel Lake and reminisced about our summer mornings lazing in the sand before work, I listened to her bitch about work and pretended I had stuff to bitch about still, and we swung on the swings until our stomachs hurt and our eyes were drooping. We called it a night then, but it was just like old times. I fell asleep happier and more satisfied than I've been since I left for school. Yeah, I guess I am homesick after all.
One last story before I leave to go do something else. We went to the Auburn Goodwill to look for surplus army jackets (there weren't any). What we found instead will be my own image of heaven. We found rows and rows upon rows of like-new books for a dollar each. Yes! I came home with 16 new books, and I'm so excited to start reading them that I can barely get myself to finish the one I'm already reading. But honestly, Chanel's auntie put me to shame. She bought out almost every book in that place.

oh, you know. just another generic night at western. i was a little disenchanted with the place when i first got here - things just weren't going the way i planned. don't things always do that? it's a good angry-making machine, that whole plans-going-awry thing. hey now, no worries! everything has cleared up. i have friends across the street who communicate by airhorn and window signs. my cousin and i are on better terms than we've ever been in our entire lives. (she used to hate me, you know. i didn't know that. she only started liking me once we hit junior high. i've adored her forever!) sailing is fantastic. today, again, corey and randy tried to feed bugs to the spiders. jessica is such a laugh to be around, honestly, because of her i rarely do "the right thing" and work on all that schooling stuff. we ate a panini at the rec center today, and it was glorious.

moment of love: watching tv, and they mention plasma in passing. matt, across the room, shouts "plasma! whoo-hoo!"

rancid - la bamba

alright! today was a real adventure. it was innocent enough - ben, nick and i all wanted to see serenity. but because ben is an RA, he couldn't drive us there (not that he has a car anyway.) no one really wanted to drive us, or loan us their car, so we ended up begging tuey for a ride and hoping we'd catch the bus back. we almost did! but we went to taco bell, things happened, and we walked outside just in time to see the bus driving away. now, in case you don't know, sunset is pretty far from western. like, 4 miles or so. we left at 6:45.. and just now, at 9:30, here i am. home. with aching feet, frizzy hair, not as much time to do homework as i'd hoped, and listening to etta james. and even though i'm completely exhausted, i am so very glad we missed that bus. because now i know more about aliens v. predators, getting out of headlocks, and wookie breeding habits than i ever thought possible. shazzam!
word on the street has it that lemon cake and chocolate frosting don't mix well. i tested that theory, and it's true. don't do it.
yesterday i hung out with frans! that boy is one of my lifelong pals now. it was nice just walking around campus with him, talking about all the things we want to do. our big plan for our future is to smoke a really nice cigar together.
natalie's home now. i liked living on my own.

firefox has generated an error

i just want you to know how upset i am right now. i spent a good half hour writing an amusing piece on my adventures in the city today. literally, as i was putting the last finishing touches on it and about to publish, FIREFOX GENERATED AN ERROR AND SHUT DOWN. this makes me very angry. and upset that rj didn't fix that before he left me up here at western. i mean, really, what kind of friend lets firefox continue to generate errors and destroy all unsaved information?! so, just the gist of what i was going to write: i went downtown today, bought things, watched a movie, and came back 4 hours later. i then watched arrested developement with my cool plasma-donating neighbor, and the other plasma-donater from upstairs. yes, we are cool, we donate together.

deep inside of you

I would change myself if I could
I'd walk with my people if I could find them
And I'd say that I'm sorry to you
I'm sorry to you
And I don't wanna call you
but then I wanna call you
I don't wanna crush you
But I feel like crushing you

but what can you do? i spend my days wandering around narrow hallways in search of something to occupy my time. found loads of information on becoming an english teacher. found flyers for teaching english in japan. found the peace corps. found my spanish teacher's office. tomorrow i'll look for a job grading math papers. i finished reading my soc work. explored the library again. applied for that job as a reader for the magazine.
i found a new hobby! bathroom testing. there's a great bathroom in the basement of the library that i like to visit every now and then, just for a moment or two away from sight. today in the humanities building i found a bathroom where the women's handicap stall has a sink, mirror, trash can, and paper towel dispenser all inside.
i need to take vitamins. eat healthy. somehow sort out this mess in my head that doesn't let me sleep at night.

another night out on the town

today was my "day off". i donated plasma for $$!!! and i made new friends to carpool with, we're going back saturday morning sometime. me, elaina, and this boy from her stack all went to open mic night at the viking underground (something my roommate's done, and i was jealous). it was a shindig of musical talent. then we trekked it back to matt's, and piled into the minivan to go see serenity. i can't believe it took me so long to see it! i'm already making plans with my RA to go see it again.
these last few days have been really rocky, by the way. skipping class, waffleing between enthusiasm about sailing and pessimism. i really don't know what i want to do with my time anymore. i'm going to save my parents the money for now, hold off on buying sailing gear. take winter quarter off like i planned. if i miss it so much, i can always roadtrip out to helly hansen. meanwhile, elaina is signing up to be a reader for western's magazine, and i think i'm going to do it, too. right now it's raining, but the room has a musty smell to it. i can't decide whether to leave the window open or close it.

jessika's cousin is an idiot.

go watch american history x.