I'm now in Boston for senior week -- catching up on sleep!

Tuesday: I was nervous about the English Dept presentation on my thesis, and talked to Anna for awhile to procrastinate. I helped Maryanne set up a bit to distract myself, and arranged the room in a small, intimate circle. My hopes for a small & informal talk were dashed when the circle widened and widened to eventually include the entire Cassani Room. When Prof. Hill yelled at Azeen to speak up, and she had to stand up to be heard, I knew that we had definitely crossed the line from cozy talk to formal presentation. Of course, I had to go last, because of my last name. Damn it, why didn't I take Duckwall instead of Richardson? Then I could have been 2nd or 3rd from last... argh. Anyway, I got through it, and read the first couple pages of a short story that doesn't include dialogue till the third page (I can't distinguish by voice the different characters, without sounding as though I'm reading to children). Afterwards I got to talk to everyone, and Sarah & Miranda consoled me with beautiful flowers =)

Afterwards we had our last dinner at Wilder (sadness!) and I started packing stuff up & throwing things out. In the evening I played Trivial Pursuit with Karuna & the gang -- this time I was on Claudia & Kim's team (and of course they won). I was a bit tipsy afterwards... & Karuna & I went to M&C's.

Weds. I barely remember... I know we had a farewell dinner at Prospect (my last night eating in a real dining hall!), and I got lots of pictures with Sarah & Miranda & Ariel! In the evening I stopped by Esther & Jen's get-together to socialize a bit.

Thurs. I had a lovely afternoon sitting out on the grass in the garden by the art museum, writing out cards. It was just warm enough (although a bit windy), and the sun was wonderful. Dinner was awful though... We went to Blanchard and I stupidly ordered the special -- fried rice. It was soaked in soy sauce. I tried to eat some of it because I was hungry and that was my entire dinner swipe. Eventually I gave up, and Sarah tried it to compare it to hers. When she agreed that it was not edible, I complained to the checker & got a sandwich to replace it. Ick!! It's crazy... there's so much sodium in soy sauce, I don't understand why they would soak the rice in it... YUCK.

Friday I finally was motivated to take the bus to Boston -- in part because there was no way I was going to survive Blanchard food for the full week! The ride went smoothly, and I even saw my firstie Zainab for the first leg of the journey. All the elevators were working so I didn't have to drag my wheelie suitcase around, and the trains seemed to show up just as I arrived at the subway line. I took a nap finally when I arrived (sleepy from the lulling bus ride!)... and then we went out for Indian food in Davis Square. I prefer the place in Noho for my favorite masala, but the portions were definitely bigger here... and more in the way of extras (we had some sort of spicy plum sauce that was amazing). We started I heart Huckabees, but promptly fell asleep.

Saturday was a wonderfully lazy day. I slept tons trying to fight off this cold, and then we went out in the evening to Merry's birthday party. We talked to Merry a bit, who is great fun, but then found ourselves talking together and feeling awkward that we weren't mingling more... The problem being, that we both tend toward the wallflower mentality. And it seemed like everyone was already in their groups... And the people willing to strike up conversations with us were a bit, well, hard to get into. First there was a girl from Western Mass. who seemed rather hippie-ish and assured me that I really NEED to go to the Oregon Country Fair. Not just go, but find a vender (back in Oregon we call them carnies) to sneak me in overnight. OK. Maybe it's just me, but I would not feel super safe staying with a carnie overnight at the fair. After that awkward conversation ended, we soon found ourselves talking to a guy that Merry might like the day before. Apparently he's from Moldova. Luckily Andrew had at least heard of this country, because I'm not so good with geography. Once we extricated ourselves from that conversation, I think we were both ready to head out.

The highlight of the evening, though, was Merry's friends singing "Oh Merry" instead of "Oh Sherry." I wish I'd known Merry at MHC -- she's hilarious and so energetic. We're adoping each other for Big/Little Sister, because mine deserted me and she was abroad junior year. Another highlight was the strange coincidence of Dan -- who was also having a birthday. His gf, who he was flying out to see the next day in Seattle, was an intern with Andrew at Microsoft AND went abroad to Amsterdam at the same time with him. Strange.

Sunday was pretty quiet, until Andrew's roommate Mo started in on his Star Wars marathon party. Andrew & I ducked out to Jon & Jen's for dinner on the new grill. We hung out till Desperate Housewives was over (sooo good this week). The party was still going strong back at the apt. It sounded as though the apt. was under attack, with side commentary compliments of Mo. The place was pretty much trashed afterwards, and I finally deigned to turn off the tv at like 5 am after realizing that Mo had, in fact, decided not to bother. This morning I decided I couldn't stand it, and took out half the trash bags & cleaned up the counters & rangetop. The dishes, however, are all Mo's. Those I'm refusing to touch! Further proof why I NEED a studio at Stanford next year, and why I'm never living with any guys except Andrew (who's as OCD as me, and cleaner than any other representrative of the male species that I've ever known). Andrew was equally irate -- and is looking forward to his own place starting this summer that he can keep obsessively clean. I've never seen any guy but him actually PICK UP CRUMBS off the floor immediately after dropping them. In fact, he did it just last night at Jon & Jen's. Wow!

Today I was watching TV and decided that I should really read something instead of vegging to VH1's celebrity moments on tape. So I was looking at this article from the NYT, I think it went out on the 15th, about class in America. It made me feel vindicated in leaning toward Marxist theory and claiming that class is still a valid issue today...

Anyway, now it's time for vegging again!