This listening to a clip of "Arrival at Aslan's How" from The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian:
Good writing should be like good music. It builds, it lifts, it moves in you, and when it's finished, you go back to it again and again, a reaching hand in the dark for a thing you can't see or hear or fully understand or really even articulate, the kind you can only feel, the kind you only want to feel. And so you fall into it, turn it up, let yourself be moved to somewhere only it can bring you.
Monday, August 25, 2008
Friday, August 22, 2008
i am never going to sleep
i took an at least 2 hour nap today from 4-6, then proceeded to lay around and fall in and out of sleep until about...10??
it is now 1:08am and i am tired, yet weirdly awake and feel the need to keep finding things to do.
i've looked over all my pictures on my computer, checked my e-mail 35498 times, submitted to atlantis, looked up tons of nonsense with google, played 7825 songs on my ipod, and am now here writing a pointless blog.
at least i don't have class tomorrow, so if i end up not falling asleep until 5am, it's ok because i don't have to get up in 4 hours and walk all the way to kenan. speaking of, somewhere between the union and SLB1 are two syllabuses (syllabi??) from my ANT 207 and ENG/FST 317 class that i managed to already lose 5 minutes after i left them, so if anyone spots those floating around chancellor's walk, you know to whom they belong.
ok, i'm gonna watch a movie or something and hope i can regress to how i felt at 4pm and just pass out. wish me luck!
note to self: never do this again.
it is now 1:08am and i am tired, yet weirdly awake and feel the need to keep finding things to do.
i've looked over all my pictures on my computer, checked my e-mail 35498 times, submitted to atlantis, looked up tons of nonsense with google, played 7825 songs on my ipod, and am now here writing a pointless blog.
at least i don't have class tomorrow, so if i end up not falling asleep until 5am, it's ok because i don't have to get up in 4 hours and walk all the way to kenan. speaking of, somewhere between the union and SLB1 are two syllabuses (syllabi??) from my ANT 207 and ENG/FST 317 class that i managed to already lose 5 minutes after i left them, so if anyone spots those floating around chancellor's walk, you know to whom they belong.
ok, i'm gonna watch a movie or something and hope i can regress to how i felt at 4pm and just pass out. wish me luck!
note to self: never do this again.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
drivers of the world...
This is a public service annoucement. The roads, from this moment on, will be a safer (or much more dangerous) place. I've just gotten a new phone, and it's got a keypad, which, ironically, means it's much harder for me to text now. And what that really means for me is this: no more texting and driving.
Actually I hardly ever did it. I could probably count on my hand the number of times I've actually done it, and mostly I tried to keep it at the stoplights, and since our city is mostly stoplights and stopped traffic, it stays fairly safe. But at least for now, until I get very, very used to my phone, all's safe.
Not really much to say, although you should go see Tropic Thunder, because it's amazing hilariousness. Having lived two years of my life with a black family, there's something really funny about white people who think they're black. Maybe it's because it's so ridiculous, and maybe it's because I know very well about the things they're imititating or whatever--sort of like those ''you know you're from wherever when" things--and of course it's a generality and of course it's exaggerated, but it's got some truth to it somewhere and it is just hilarious to me. And besides, I love my black family--and in my heart of hearts, I know how much cooler/more rhythmic they are than us (BY THE WAY I'm white) and I know I can't touch it, so (can't touch this, can't touch this, it's hammertime).
(insert: go Jamaican dude who just set the world record for the 200m. Dang he's fast.)
But nuff about race stuff. 'Cause please see my post about the Olympics, and apply here, and understand that I think it's silly to be colorblind, that we can be one people and not all be exactly the same, and it's wonderful how we're not.
And OH MAN, speaking of white people who think they're black--happy early birthday to Bo Burnham because he is also awesome hilariousness and I love it! Everyone please go listen to 3.14 Apple Pi and I'm Bo Yo and laugh until you can't breathe. You'll thank me for it later, I promise =).
cheers.
Actually I hardly ever did it. I could probably count on my hand the number of times I've actually done it, and mostly I tried to keep it at the stoplights, and since our city is mostly stoplights and stopped traffic, it stays fairly safe. But at least for now, until I get very, very used to my phone, all's safe.
Not really much to say, although you should go see Tropic Thunder, because it's amazing hilariousness. Having lived two years of my life with a black family, there's something really funny about white people who think they're black. Maybe it's because it's so ridiculous, and maybe it's because I know very well about the things they're imititating or whatever--sort of like those ''you know you're from wherever when" things--and of course it's a generality and of course it's exaggerated, but it's got some truth to it somewhere and it is just hilarious to me. And besides, I love my black family--and in my heart of hearts, I know how much cooler/more rhythmic they are than us (BY THE WAY I'm white) and I know I can't touch it, so (can't touch this, can't touch this, it's hammertime).
(insert: go Jamaican dude who just set the world record for the 200m. Dang he's fast.)
But nuff about race stuff. 'Cause please see my post about the Olympics, and apply here, and understand that I think it's silly to be colorblind, that we can be one people and not all be exactly the same, and it's wonderful how we're not.
And OH MAN, speaking of white people who think they're black--happy early birthday to Bo Burnham because he is also awesome hilariousness and I love it! Everyone please go listen to 3.14 Apple Pi and I'm Bo Yo and laugh until you can't breathe. You'll thank me for it later, I promise =).
cheers.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
...this blog ain't big enough for the both of us...
so...has anyone noticed that there seems to only be one of us that gets around to blogging at a time?
who's in colombia...or just busy...or working immensely... or trying to unpack their life again...
honestly, why has there been such a long time from when there were posts one right after another and lovely little comments left on each other's blog??
*sigh* this depresses me.
hopefully once school picks up things will get back to normal... otherwise i fear the fate of the stolen pants!
who's in colombia...or just busy...or working immensely... or trying to unpack their life again...
honestly, why has there been such a long time from when there were posts one right after another and lovely little comments left on each other's blog??
*sigh* this depresses me.
hopefully once school picks up things will get back to normal... otherwise i fear the fate of the stolen pants!
addendum: more feet in the mouth
Meant to put this in the last entry but I was watching ER and forgot. However, it was the best one of the night, so I can't possibly leave it out =).
First, it's important to tell you that I have a crazy strong sense of smell. Actually, it's probably no stronger than most people's, but I'm really sensitive to smells, and I can almost always smell if something is there. Except sometimes I get them switched up, like, for some reason, when I smell popcorn popping, it always smell like a ham and cheese biscuit to me. No idea why. It's gonna be horrible/probably pretty humorous when I'm pregnant. I'll be walking down the bread aisle at Wal-mart (which always seems to be right near the seafood section) smelling bread mixed with fish and I'll probably just throw up right there.
Well, during the soccer game last night, I went outside and stood by the window where customers order so I could cool off. And I kept smelling what smelled like dog poop, and it was nasty. Now, earlier, some grown woman came up with her dog-child (you know those women who treat their pets like kids?) and asked for a plastic bag and I figured she needed to pick up after the dog, but I also figured it was somewhere on the other side of the stadium and didn't think any more of it. And, just saying, pets aren't allowed into the stadium. But like I said, after she took the bag I didn't think any more of it.
So there I was, standing in front of the stand and there was this horrible smell and I just couldn't contain it, so I turned to Greg was like, "GOD something smells NASTY. I keep smelling crap, I know I smell it. UGGHGHG, what is that?" And so on like that. So Greg says, "I know what it is." And, overhearing, the rewards program staff standing about twenty feet away nodded. Since I couldn't see the thing he was pointing at, he had me take x steps forward, y steps right, a little farther, a little farther, until I was standing right in front of the place that, apparently, the dog had taken a dump. About eight feet from the stand, and completely in the space where people line up.
First, that dog was tiny--fit in your purse tiny. Second, the place it had gone was like four inches wide, which is at least three inches bigger than the rest of the dog. And third, retarded woman really did not clean it up all that well. She'd, like, scraped the top layer off the grass or something, but she'd left a fair amount behind. But like I said, I am sensitive to smells, so when I walked back to the stand and could still smell it, I had to do something. So I found a cone from last year, one of those little bitty cones that people sometimes use for megaphones. Grabbed it and put it on top of the spot. Problem solved, couldn't really smell it much anymore.
Well, it gets better. There was a little three or so year old boy running around who kept trying to drive off with our golf cart. Cute kid, apart from that. And all of a sudden, I look over and Greg is laughing and pointing out the window. Little boy had the same cone, holding it to his mouth yelling through it (don't worry, it was the end that wasn't on the ground). So I ran over, the best I could without falling over from laughing, and grabbed the cone from him.
Later some staff from the athletics department cleaned it up and put dirt over it. But the smell was still there, and occasionally it was awful. Come to find out, the smartest (and most considerate) pet-owner on the planet ever had taken the half of the poop she'd picked up and put it in the trash can right next to the concession stand. The same trashcan right next to the window that the hotdogs were just inside of. Worst thing ever.
So I know sometimes I just let the worst things fall out of my mouth and I don't even know why I talk at all, but oh man I hope that woman heard me. And if nothing else, she provided a very entertaining evening =).
Anyway, I would also just like to say that several months ago, our creative writing department sent out one of their emails about different places accepting submissions, and one was a magazine calling for stories about wolflore and fairytales and that sort of thing. And it just so happened that about a month before that I'd had to write my own version of Little Red Ridinghood for my English class. It was just one of those things I'd done the night before it was due. Really straightforward, the girl wore a red jacket with a hood, she was visiting her grandma, etc. The story was cute, I guess, but had little real depth and I would never workshop it in a writing class, so I just sort of sent it in because of the coincidence and didn't really care because I know I can do a heck of a lot better and just whatever. One of those "shrug, what the heck" kinds of things.
Well, I heard back today from the editor. Now, the magazine is really small I think--the guy has a facebook and added me. And I didn't get the story in, which I expected. He said the things I thought would be issues, about it being really straightforward, etc. But he wants me to revise it for publication. Which is really cool, I'm pretty excited about it. But thing the thing I'm really, really happy about is this: the response he sent me. Whether he had flat out told me they didn't want the story or if they told me it was the most amazing thing they ever read, the fact that he sent me a personal email--and not just a few sentences. This email was five or six very long paragraphs long, full of suggestions and advice and thoughts about the story. That just amazes me. Like I said, I know it's small, so I suppose he has more time to send out personal messages like that, but the fact that he did, only that he did. I got from him as much as I would get from any professor whose job it is to do that. And I think that's wonderful. I wish all editors were/were able to be like that, and I hope that if I ever decide to become an editor that I could be that kind, and doubly so if I ever teach, which I hope to.
But right now, I'm getting dizzy again and I don't know why, so time to end the post.
cheers.
First, it's important to tell you that I have a crazy strong sense of smell. Actually, it's probably no stronger than most people's, but I'm really sensitive to smells, and I can almost always smell if something is there. Except sometimes I get them switched up, like, for some reason, when I smell popcorn popping, it always smell like a ham and cheese biscuit to me. No idea why. It's gonna be horrible/probably pretty humorous when I'm pregnant. I'll be walking down the bread aisle at Wal-mart (which always seems to be right near the seafood section) smelling bread mixed with fish and I'll probably just throw up right there.
Well, during the soccer game last night, I went outside and stood by the window where customers order so I could cool off. And I kept smelling what smelled like dog poop, and it was nasty. Now, earlier, some grown woman came up with her dog-child (you know those women who treat their pets like kids?) and asked for a plastic bag and I figured she needed to pick up after the dog, but I also figured it was somewhere on the other side of the stadium and didn't think any more of it. And, just saying, pets aren't allowed into the stadium. But like I said, after she took the bag I didn't think any more of it.
So there I was, standing in front of the stand and there was this horrible smell and I just couldn't contain it, so I turned to Greg was like, "GOD something smells NASTY. I keep smelling crap, I know I smell it. UGGHGHG, what is that?" And so on like that. So Greg says, "I know what it is." And, overhearing, the rewards program staff standing about twenty feet away nodded. Since I couldn't see the thing he was pointing at, he had me take x steps forward, y steps right, a little farther, a little farther, until I was standing right in front of the place that, apparently, the dog had taken a dump. About eight feet from the stand, and completely in the space where people line up.
First, that dog was tiny--fit in your purse tiny. Second, the place it had gone was like four inches wide, which is at least three inches bigger than the rest of the dog. And third, retarded woman really did not clean it up all that well. She'd, like, scraped the top layer off the grass or something, but she'd left a fair amount behind. But like I said, I am sensitive to smells, so when I walked back to the stand and could still smell it, I had to do something. So I found a cone from last year, one of those little bitty cones that people sometimes use for megaphones. Grabbed it and put it on top of the spot. Problem solved, couldn't really smell it much anymore.
Well, it gets better. There was a little three or so year old boy running around who kept trying to drive off with our golf cart. Cute kid, apart from that. And all of a sudden, I look over and Greg is laughing and pointing out the window. Little boy had the same cone, holding it to his mouth yelling through it (don't worry, it was the end that wasn't on the ground). So I ran over, the best I could without falling over from laughing, and grabbed the cone from him.
Later some staff from the athletics department cleaned it up and put dirt over it. But the smell was still there, and occasionally it was awful. Come to find out, the smartest (and most considerate) pet-owner on the planet ever had taken the half of the poop she'd picked up and put it in the trash can right next to the concession stand. The same trashcan right next to the window that the hotdogs were just inside of. Worst thing ever.
So I know sometimes I just let the worst things fall out of my mouth and I don't even know why I talk at all, but oh man I hope that woman heard me. And if nothing else, she provided a very entertaining evening =).
Anyway, I would also just like to say that several months ago, our creative writing department sent out one of their emails about different places accepting submissions, and one was a magazine calling for stories about wolflore and fairytales and that sort of thing. And it just so happened that about a month before that I'd had to write my own version of Little Red Ridinghood for my English class. It was just one of those things I'd done the night before it was due. Really straightforward, the girl wore a red jacket with a hood, she was visiting her grandma, etc. The story was cute, I guess, but had little real depth and I would never workshop it in a writing class, so I just sort of sent it in because of the coincidence and didn't really care because I know I can do a heck of a lot better and just whatever. One of those "shrug, what the heck" kinds of things.
Well, I heard back today from the editor. Now, the magazine is really small I think--the guy has a facebook and added me. And I didn't get the story in, which I expected. He said the things I thought would be issues, about it being really straightforward, etc. But he wants me to revise it for publication. Which is really cool, I'm pretty excited about it. But thing the thing I'm really, really happy about is this: the response he sent me. Whether he had flat out told me they didn't want the story or if they told me it was the most amazing thing they ever read, the fact that he sent me a personal email--and not just a few sentences. This email was five or six very long paragraphs long, full of suggestions and advice and thoughts about the story. That just amazes me. Like I said, I know it's small, so I suppose he has more time to send out personal messages like that, but the fact that he did, only that he did. I got from him as much as I would get from any professor whose job it is to do that. And I think that's wonderful. I wish all editors were/were able to be like that, and I hope that if I ever decide to become an editor that I could be that kind, and doubly so if I ever teach, which I hope to.
But right now, I'm getting dizzy again and I don't know why, so time to end the post.
cheers.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
open mouth, insert foot
I am absolutely the all-time leading ruler ever of putting my foot in my mouth. Honestly, it's awful--funny later, but pretty bad when it happens because when I do it, it's one of those really horrible awkward ones and I never mean to do it but combined with not always thinking before I speak and being a bit uncensored with those kind of things anyway, things just kind of go down that way. So. Twice, just today.
First, we were in the dining hall on campus getting ready to go volunteer to move in tiny freshmens. And while we were waiting this woman came up to us and she was showing us her shoes. They're Rainbows, but they're teal. Apparently some guy who now works for the Ellen Degeneres Show convinced the company to make them in teal specifically for our school, which is cool, except for the first thing I thought when I saw them was oh God those are ugly. Now, I thought twice, decided not to say I thought they were ugly, and then asked if they were real leather (looked like the rubbery shower shoe kind). Come to find out later, that woman was the chancellor of our university. Would have been fabulous if I'd told Rosemary DePaoulo her shoes were not workin'.
And then later, I was working concessions and it was about eight thousand degrees in the wooden shed box we work in. So, called my roommate, she brought me some shorts and flipflops so I wouldn't die, but by the time she did, we were pretty busy. Before, I was just going to kick out my coworker (he's probably in his late thirties, I don't know) and change real quick before anyone could see, but since we were so busy couldn't close the stand for a minute, and I didn't have time to run to a port-o-potty or anything. But I just figured I could change in there, we could manage. So without really thinking I told the customer that I'd be back, I had to change. And Alicia, who was with me, who shielded me while I took my pants off with the door to the stand open and Greg serving customers, said, "Man that's so unsanitary." And I realized it totally is. I don't know how I'd feel if I knew the person handing me my hotdog was standing next to the hotdogs not wearing pants a minute ago.
And all that is just a fraction of how off the wall things have been lately. Craziness, crazy day. And everything's just starting, so here goes.
(p.s. I told you I never wear pants.)
First, we were in the dining hall on campus getting ready to go volunteer to move in tiny freshmens. And while we were waiting this woman came up to us and she was showing us her shoes. They're Rainbows, but they're teal. Apparently some guy who now works for the Ellen Degeneres Show convinced the company to make them in teal specifically for our school, which is cool, except for the first thing I thought when I saw them was oh God those are ugly. Now, I thought twice, decided not to say I thought they were ugly, and then asked if they were real leather (looked like the rubbery shower shoe kind). Come to find out later, that woman was the chancellor of our university. Would have been fabulous if I'd told Rosemary DePaoulo her shoes were not workin'.
And then later, I was working concessions and it was about eight thousand degrees in the wooden shed box we work in. So, called my roommate, she brought me some shorts and flipflops so I wouldn't die, but by the time she did, we were pretty busy. Before, I was just going to kick out my coworker (he's probably in his late thirties, I don't know) and change real quick before anyone could see, but since we were so busy couldn't close the stand for a minute, and I didn't have time to run to a port-o-potty or anything. But I just figured I could change in there, we could manage. So without really thinking I told the customer that I'd be back, I had to change. And Alicia, who was with me, who shielded me while I took my pants off with the door to the stand open and Greg serving customers, said, "Man that's so unsanitary." And I realized it totally is. I don't know how I'd feel if I knew the person handing me my hotdog was standing next to the hotdogs not wearing pants a minute ago.
And all that is just a fraction of how off the wall things have been lately. Craziness, crazy day. And everything's just starting, so here goes.
(p.s. I told you I never wear pants.)
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
way #789 to piss me off
Sit in the parking lot in your SUV with the engine running, waiting for whoever to get out of the grocery store. Seriously? Seriously? Because I haven't been driving anywhere at all but to work and the grocery store for the last three or so weeks because gas was more than $4.00 a gallon when I got back from South America and basically I spent all my money while I was down there and now it's either gas or some other bill. And everyone's like oh, whatever we need to do to lessen our reliance on foreign oil, and No drilling Alaska when I'm pretty sure it's all going to run out anyway eventually, whether it's ours first or theirs. And since we can't make up our mind what we want to do, our best in-between is sitting in running parked cars because THAT conserves gas.
And not even kidding, I pulled up next to this SUV which, as I've said, had its engine turned on, and when I finished shopping and rolled up next to my car, guess what was STILL THERE with its engine STILL ON with the same skinny beach ho reclined in her seat, hair blowing in the air conditioning wind.
There's this movie called Fried Green Tomatoes, and if you love southern movies for women--Steel Magnolias-esque, only less classic--it's quite lovely, and funny too. So there's this part where one of the characters gets really mad that these two young girls stole the parking spot she'd been waiting to park in and all of a sudden she just snaps. Goes from letting everyone walk all over her to ramming those girls' car about seven times. Movie-style, in my head, with my little car and its band-aid on the back, that's what was happening.
Seriously though. If you want to waste your gas that way, shut the hell up. Or fill up my tank. Or buy a Hybrid and turn it off when you're not driving. Thanks guys.
cheers.
And not even kidding, I pulled up next to this SUV which, as I've said, had its engine turned on, and when I finished shopping and rolled up next to my car, guess what was STILL THERE with its engine STILL ON with the same skinny beach ho reclined in her seat, hair blowing in the air conditioning wind.
There's this movie called Fried Green Tomatoes, and if you love southern movies for women--Steel Magnolias-esque, only less classic--it's quite lovely, and funny too. So there's this part where one of the characters gets really mad that these two young girls stole the parking spot she'd been waiting to park in and all of a sudden she just snaps. Goes from letting everyone walk all over her to ramming those girls' car about seven times. Movie-style, in my head, with my little car and its band-aid on the back, that's what was happening.
Seriously though. If you want to waste your gas that way, shut the hell up. Or fill up my tank. Or buy a Hybrid and turn it off when you're not driving. Thanks guys.
cheers.
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