I was SO productive today it's disgusting. I worked on my Spanish essay in the morning, walked Kobe, and had lunch with Dale (Old Yeller was there in a little green miniskirt with black polka dots. Something contradictory about that...polka dots are so HAPPY. She kept WATCHING me, too). Had my last real shift at the mail center -- the one "not slow" computer that we do forwarding on has the virus and no one has fixed it, and the other computer's printer wasn't working, so it was rather frustrating not being able to do forwarding. I love forwarding, it's completely mindless and repetitive. But, since I couldn't, I left on time and was able to finish my Spanish essay before dinner time.

Dinner with Dale & Miranda was crazy tonight. First me and Miranda picked out a table out on the patio at Ham/MacG, which was in the direct line of cigarette smoke. Two women were just sitting and smoking, totally oblivious to their smoke wafting into everyone's faces as they tried to eat. Disgusting. So we moved. But we moved right by this big group of "Mohos" talking about very racy topics (at some point I caught a line that I can't even repeat here). Dale was completely annoyed by this and couldn't stand it any longer, so we moved back to where the smoke had been, but no longer was, since the smokers had left. So then we got to eavesdrop on a conversation between friends exchanging gifts, which was a definite improvement. At some point it became known that I was done with my finals. So after the congratulations, Dale picked up a glass of water and held it over my head. I laughed and was like "ok maybe a drop or two?" and Dale proceeded to dump the whole (well ok, half) glass of water over my head. It was so hot out today it didn't really bother me (even though it WAS ice water). Miranda was in shock, and Dale and I were laughing. Miranda couldn't figure out what had happened and why Dale had dumped water on me and why I wasn't pissed. We've decided to make this a new tradition (at least while the warm weather holds out).

After dinner I was basically dry again, so I went to the library to work on the paper copy of The Blackstick Review. Stealing some of Verbosity's formatting, I was able to finish that up in around 2, 2.5 hours. Yay! I'm usually not the one actually handling the mouse while we do verbosity, so it was cool to do everything on my own. Yay complete editorial control!

This evening I also started packing in earnest. Two storage bins in the trunk room so far!

I have a feeling I must have made all sorts of spelling and grammer mistakes, as it's around 2 am. Oh well. Reading this is voluntary =) Speaking of reading, now I can start doing PLEASURE READING!! wow.

Um... I'm not a fan of this new blog style, AT ALL. Note to whoever the hell designs blogger: GO BACK! NO ONE LIKES CHANGE!!

Anyways, now that I have THAT out of my system... I haven't updated in awhile, so I'm going to try to remember things:

Did I ever mention that me and Dale watched The Big Easy & endured Dennis Quaid's horrible southern accent that often sounded more like an Italian accent? Well, we did!

Saturday Jaime & I took an adventure to Northampton -- the bus was like an existentialist play. We saw a man with one huge dreadlock (just one), carrying a world globe and a beaded curtain. And yes, he did get on the bus, although we were lucky in that he didn't sit next to us. But the way back was the worse... the bus driver put on some sort of show tune soundtrack that involved children singing. Then some blonde girl with a cell phone got on the bus and started insulting her mother (and keep in mind, this is the day before mother's day), saying "you should be happy we're coming to see you at ALL!" And we have pictures of ourselves with crazy sunglasses to prove we were in Noho. (PS the vintage clothing store is not as cool as it looks from the outside. You'll realize this when you see the glittery ninja masks.)

Late Saturday night Andrew arrived, which was muy muy exciting because I hadn't seen him for... two weeks? something like that, it seemed like a long time! Sunday was pretty busy... Andrew was still half in Amsterdam time so he kept trying to wake me up and I kept falling back asleep. We went to brunch with Dale, Miranda, & Kate -- Dale made a lovely ketchup and water art piece on her plate. Spotted Old Yeller and pointed her out to everyone. In the afternoon it cleared up (it was raining all morning), so Andrew & I went to Amherst. I almost bought a purse/tote thingy and a wallet, but then decided to hold off a little longer to make sure I get a set that I really like... Had Rao's chai and walked around, bought some candy at Hastings... then I insisted on Fresh Side for dinner =) We ate mostly at the Notch which was lovely (the puddles were perfectly reflective and bugs kept hitting on the water and making ripples). Then back at MHC we took a walk around Lower Lake. Saw the ducks and the bully goose, and we heard a splash that Andrew thought was a duck diving. Really though, it was a beaver! I was excited. We walked around most of Lower Lake with it swimming right by us. Very cute. It chewed on a twig and then turned back away from us.

After packing some of my stuff for the summer into Andrew's car, we watched the last two episodes of The OC. I hadn't ever seen it before. It was pretty good, I think...of course in my TV deprived state anything seems entertaining =)

It was sad saying goodbye to Andrew this morning, because this was the last time he could visit me this school year...next year I'll have a different dorm, a different room... crazy. Yes, very nostalgic...

It was another beautiful sunny day, but today it was actually WARM. I turned in my papers, worked longer than I normally do on Fridays at the mail center, and came to the conclusion that I should do a creative writing thesis. After dinner, Dale, Miranda & I had an adventure in finding storage boxes. We went to grocery stores, liquor stores, and a BJ's looking for boxes for summer storage. Miranda pointed out that there was a distinct majority of men in the liquor stores. We found a lot of boxes that used to hold flowers at BJ's, but they were so large they took up all the trunk and backseat. Miranda & I squished into the front for the ride home. Dale found a cemetary on the way home and decided that we should stop, so we did. Studying names, we found lots of French names, many sharing Dale's last name (spooky). But not Smiths or Richardsons. The sunset was gorgeous, clouds at a slant, blue sky to one side, yellow to the other... At some point it became too chilly to wander about, and we squished back into the car.

We had a hell of a time getting the boxes into Pearsons. Once we got inside we let them all fall around the entry way... Somehow we got upstairs, I ended up dropping all but three boxes because I was laughing so hard. Somehow Dale picked up the slack. So on our floor, in the hallway, we played the annoying kids having fun during finals. We built a fort, took pictures of ourselves in the fort, and fought over who would get to keep which boxes.

After, I read some, but mostly didn't work. Oh well! I only have one Spanish essay left and I don't think I could get less than a 98% on it if I tried...

I had an awesome day! I got up kind of late (it was nice sleeping with the sun shining out my window), and then went to lunch with Dale. [aside for Jaime's benefit: I had a truly lackluster lunch, it was Thanksgiving/Mexican food.] We then went on a Kobe walk, on a different route than I normally take. Kobe about killed me when Dale rescued a bird trapped in the garage area. That dog is a beast. It was a perfect, warm day -- twice some guys working initiated conversations with me and Dale. Luckily we were together so it didn't seem so sketchy and we could joke about it. Like what are they going to do? Ask what kind of dog Kobe is, and then ask for our phone numbers? So we acted really close and stuff so people would leave us be...

Anywho, we then waited for Miranda for awhile, thinking she wanted to go to Flayvors with us. Ends up she didn't want to go, but me and Dale forged ahead with the plan. It was lovely ... ice cream, cows, and working out on the grass in the sun. I got a few pages written, and we napped a bit. The cows strangely connected to what I was writing about... think camel udder boxes (and cows definitely have udders).

After a really relaxing afternoon, me and Dale headed back to MHC. We had dinner at MacG and listened to some truly disgusting conversations while we ate. Like, about really long fingernails, and guys "vacuuming faces." We were basically exposed to waaayy too much information from the next table over, which seemed to be TRYING to be VERY loud in advertising their private info. that me and Dale definitely didn't want to hear. Ick.

Then it was off to the dessert banquet for graduating SAW seniors and us incoming kids (yay!) Yummy chocolate cake and strawberries and cream. Cool shirts. Emily Mack's hilarious mentoring drawings.

And some cool news -- I got a reply from Pearsons Education about an internship. They pay 12$/hour, so if it's full time and 40 hours a week, I'd end up making 400$ more in the space of two months than I would make at warm2kids for the full three months. Going to do a phone interview and see what happens.

Finished my essay for Quillian! So now I just should proofread (but some things aren't fixable, ie, my essay for Siraj).

Oh! And I found out that Miranda and I have a Christopher Pike connection!

Awesome thing that Mer wrote in her blog:
"Possibly the tackiest way to hydrate: "Nylon patriotic water bottle holder necklaces: These adjustable 36" cords will keep your water bottle handy."
You read right. Oriental Trading Co. claims that wearing a water bottle around your neck is ok."

Advice for the day: Whenever you sign on to a job or internship, make sure you get a contract with the salary on it. Because yeah, it sucks when the people in charge randomly decide to change the salary. Yes, I'm getting ready to launch into the story that you have all probably heard, but oh well, if you've heard it you can skip over this:

So I went into Boston late March or early April for an interview at this new company that basically is an online resource for parents and teens on all topics that teens face, etc. etc. And it seemed pretty cool, they offered me the position, said it'd be full-time and $10/hour, and I was sold. About a week, a week and a half later, after I'd totally stopped looking into the other positions I had applied for, I get an email confirming that they want me and that they can offer me $50/day. I figure for an 8-hour workday that's a loss of about $30/day. That seems like kinda a lot. So I give them a call, am assured that they're willing to work with me, blah blah blah. They say maybe I can get a scholarship at the end of the summer guaranteed to help me pay for school books. Problem with this? They'll probably later take that back, too! So I ask for some more time to think about it, and to have them call me again soon. Two weeks go by. I'm wondering what the hell is going on, so I give them another call. Finally talk to the woman in charge of interns. My phone card goes out but I hear something about "not sure about adding another person," "there have been some changes..." So I call back frantically (f$&#!!!! phone wouldn't work!!), and basically just get a confirmation that they'll contact me again ASAP. Of course I'm worried like crazy, thinking I'm going to end up living in a cardboard box (although a very nice cardboard box) on Newbury St. I worry all night, write some emails in response to job offers on Craig's List, send off my resume, and research more job/internship opportunities on the CDC website. I wake up with a fluttery stomach wondering wtf I'm going to do, check new job listings on Craig's List. FINALLY this afternoon, after telling Thomasena and Prof. Pesola about it at the Spanish dept. picnic, I get an email. Good news: They offered me $60/day instead. Bad news: The scholarship isn't guaranteed. But I think I'm going to just do it, and make sure I only work 8 hours a day. The leftover hours will be spent outside the office complex, reading and waiting for Andrew to be done with his job. Wow. And I just finished my essay for Siraj's class. So it's like, all is well with the world again. Except for the damn literary magazine for Eng. 303!!

Ok if you skipped over all that, good news for you because that was long and boring. On to my snippets:

Good news today:
-Jaime's excellent mix CD which sustained me through the last three pages and the works cited list of my paper. Yeah Apollonian and Dionysian music! Take that, Adrianne! (I saw her at dinner, btw.)
-Refreshments at the English theses talk.
-Mum & Mer sent me a care package!
-Siraj's essay is pretty much done.
-Did well on peer mentoring assignments.
-It didn't rain today.
-Last night watching Center Stage. (Officially, it was very early in the morning today.)
-The ice cream at dinner. Yum.

Bad news today:
-I saw Old Yeller at the Spanish dept. picnic.
-I again saw Old Yeller at dinner and she gave me the "I'm a scary bitch but I'm going to smile like I'm really happy to see you because I'm not going to confront you when people might overhear me" smile.
-The let down of a cinco de mayo gracious dinner. Just because we've got candles doesn't mean it's gracious!! I've had better refried beans out of a CAN for CHRIST'S SAKE!
-Weather kinda sucked.

Hmmmmm..... more later!

First of all, thanks to Mer for the correction: Moose are not herd animals. I bet no one else who read my blog of April 27th stopped to think about that, but Merrie did.

Important news, stolen from Mer's blog, but arrived at in a conversation together: Be thankful that you're not a whale with triangular eyebrows.

Big news in dining services: "Sweet dreams" herbal tea has been replaced with "Cozy chamomile."

Update on the end of the year: I've done all the classwork, the last day of classes is tuesday, and I have two papers due on friday which I have already done the research for. Well only one really involved research, but whatever, it makes me feel better to think of them as both being done with preliminaries. Then I just have a Spanish paper, which I'm not too worried about. And, perhaps, the paper version of the literary mag. for my creative writing class.

Verbosity update!! We have the magazines (1200 of them) and will begin distributing them at lunch tomorrow!!

Hmmm... So it's been a really quiet weekend. Andrew's off in Amsterdam, and I was catching up on sleep and homework. One great exception to that was Saturday night and Miranda's birthday party. Amazing! We watched Harold and Maude (Mer you'd enjoy it, very absurd), ate strawberries and brownies, and took funny pictures. Yay for Miranda for throwing a real old fashioned birthday party!!

I've had a couple of amazing days, and sad news. Butr let's start with the good news (it's in chronological order that way):

Yesterday: A really beautiful day. Warm and sunny, I was running around, walking Kobe, skipping lunch, to go to Prof. Demas's house. I'd eaten, well, not much -- a banana and milk, some juice and a little cereal -- and we ate cookies, fruit, and cake at Corinne's. Really yummy, but talk about a sugar high. Corinne's house is beautiful, too, and her dog was awesome, as were the donkeys. A really lovely class, with the breeze going through the house, and everyone there...

But in the evening, work set in on the online journal. 8 pm till after 11:30 ... crazy! Luckily Ije and Heather are fun to work with =)

Today: Another pretty warm day! And I slept in! Turned in English department award applications, ate at the picnic with Laura and Dorothy, distributed the first of our verbosities... lots of misdelivered periodicals today! My last peer mentoring class went well -- we had a little discussion of everything that was helpful in the class and we were all bonding like crazy and feeling totally thrilled with ourselves. It was a bubble moment.

Had a long conversation with Mum and Mer tonight... and we're dealing with things =(

Another happy weekend to report on!

Friday night was the student reading for the Glascock poetry competition-- I got there rather early, & sat next to Jamie (half of our eng. 280 class was in the audience). I wasn't expecting Andrew to get to MHC in time for the readings, so I was super suprised and happy when Miranda pointed and asked "Isn't that your boyfriend?" The readings were... well, some were really good, some were rather strange, and others were plain funny. I think we all laughed when the guy from Columbia started singing "A-hunting we will go, a-hunting we will go!" The reception afterwards was good EXCEPT for the fact that the raspberry cream cheese chocolate bars were no where to be found. AND the fact that I forgot my ID so I couldn't have wine (not that I particularly like wine, but still). Finally met Merry, a friend of Andrew's that graduated from MHC last year.

After, we went dogsitting and watched some tv. Saturday morning we took Windy on a long walk and then packed up for the day. I wanted to find some place fun to bring Andrew to since I'm going to miss his birthday (as he'll be vacationing while I'm doing finals, ick). So we went to Mt. Tom state park, which was pretty with a lake (but a bit muddy still). I was really enjoying the peaceful woodland setting, until we spotted these men dressed in crazy bright striped outfits, running through the woods like a bear was after them. Me and Andrew thought the same thing: escaped mental patients. But no, it turns out, it was just a sprint orienteering event. As in, people sprint between hints (rather like a running scavenger hunt) that tell them which way to run with their little compass and stuff. Yeah, you have to be pretty damn dorky, right? So we left and looked at the dinosaur prints in the rocks along the Connecticut River =) I remembered the site pretty well as we had to draw pictures of it for physical geology last year.

After another Windy walk we decided to eat dinner. I finally experienced The Hanger in Amherst, and cheese fries (surprisingly good). Then we went to The Black Sheep for some sort of birthday dessert. Andrew introduced me to the best cake ever, and I tried out the chocolate mousse (which gets extra points for sounding like the large antlered herd animal). Back home we ate dessert and watched Pulp Fiction. Or rather, Andrew fell asleep, and I watched Pulp Fiction. It was my first time seeing it I think, and it was awesome. Very very exciting for me. And Andrew slept right through it =)

Sunday we got a fairly early start out -- ate brunch with Ashley at Blanchard -- and started on our way to Lee. I'd been outlet shopping there once before, so I vaguely remembered the layout. I bought a summery halter top, it reminds me of something Mum would pick out. Then we went into "Lee proper" and found this cute bakery/tea/coffee place. I had some really yummy fruity tea, and we shared a peanut butter brownie. I'm very focused on what I eat, aren't I? I'm just realizing that I vividly remember what I eat during all of my weekend adventures...

Anyway! After Lee & toiletries shopping, we had to set aside a few hours for work. Lots of Spanish, and it took me forever to write one damn little paragraph on the movie for Postcolonial lit! As a reward for actually doing work, we ate some pizza at blanchard and then finished off Andrew's cake. Also watched the first episode of Six Feet Under which I found incredibly disturbing. All the talk about fixing up dead bodies really worried me. It reminded me of conversations had with Mum and Mer on the possibility of being cremated. Ack. I think after that show I'm more convinced that I'd rather be dusty than embalmed =/ (and yes I do worry about these things).

That's all for now! It was quite sunny out and DIDN'T RAIN! Take that, weatherpeople!!

And the story of Old Yeller continues, long after I thought the book was done and closed. =/

Oh! P.S. I am SO pink and sunburnt!

Ahh such a lovely weekend. But I haven't updated in awhile! Last weekend I was dogsitting Kobe, but me and Andrew sneaked in a visit anyways -- he came over Sunday afternoon and we enjoyed the spring weather and watched the sunset... we drove all over! Ended up at Dairy Queen!

So after that brief recap of the last week that I haven't updated, here's more about this last weekend =)

Friday: I met up with Andrew at the mall (after I bought the first version of his birthday present -- a real picnic basket) and we shopped a little, ate, it was fun =) I found some cheap summer and work clothes, yay! Then I was on duty but the dorm was quiet (thank god).

Saturday: A perfect day! Warm finally, and sunny! We took a picnic lunch up to this lake (Wyola or something? Andrew knows, but I'm bad with names), and it was so quiet and calm. Just people fishing, but we had the park area to ourselves. I forgot napkins (which made things rather sticky since we were eating peanut butter sandwiches). Then we continued on the road trip and found this great lookout point over Quabbin reservoir, which Andrew spotted last weekend on his way to work. It's this circle of stones just off the highway, and I found a nice stone to sunbathe on. A couple of other cars pulled over but I think they just stopped because they saw other people there and were curious what the fuss was about. The sun was so bright, you forget in the winter how blinding it can be... So that's now on my list of cool places to go with a picnic.

Afterwards, we continued on our way to Brattleboro, VT. We got lost -- Andrew somehow got us unlost. We got to VT, and Andrew claims you can see the difference (more hilly? woodsy? more church steeples?). Anyway, it was the first time I'd been in Vermont (and we passed through NH, also a new state for me). In Brattleboro we explored the local stores -- a bead store, an antique store, a used stuff store, a record store... and of course Mocha Joe's for coffee (and yummy mango tea).

After walking around and people watching, and exhausting the cool store possibilities, we were pretty tired of walking. So we got back on the road =) Ended up in Northampton, where we ate bagels and walked across that old train bridge. Found a place to sit below the bridge and read for awhile. It was a cool place to sit and read, a little out of context, but a great view. Shopped a bit in Noho, and then Korisha called us as I was right across the street from where they were going to dinner. Also met Netta at this point, we always run into some of Andrew's college friends while wandering around in the valley! So I had my first real sushi experience, Andrew says I handled it pretty well =) Some of the actual raw fish tasted good, but it was hard to get past the fact that it was like raw flesh. I kind of set myself up for failure thinking about what I'm eating... But I think I'll get over that. It was fun to be out with everyone for dinner, too, post-Julia's-MCAT's.

We tried to get ice cream after dinner but the line at Herrell's was SO long. So me and Andrew got some ben and jerry's at the supermarket instead. Yum and convenient! I was on duty again so I was pretty stuck to my room. We started Pulp Fiction but Andrew was too tired to pay attention! Anywho, it was a more eventful night in the dorm but things didn't get out of control.

Sunday was another outdoorsy day. After breakfast/brunch at blanchard, we hiked up Mt. Holyoke. We took the straight up the mountain side trail on the way up, but then took the trail I've always taken on Mountain Day down. Saw lots of cool dogs! We sat for awhile at the top and just enjoyed the view and the sun... I'm finally getting an idea of the geography of the valley... Some views of the park up there really should be in postcards (so I can send them home to mum =) Oh, and I finally discovered why we always end up in someone's backyard, walking around by some old barn. There are now signs posted up -- "PRIVATE PROPERTY" and such -- and signs back to the real trail. Which is much more direct and doesn't drop you off on the highway. So that mystery is finally solved, I always wondered where the correct trail breaks off from the trail I've taken before.

Then we drove to Amherst, returned the picnic basket (after realizing that it wasn't going to be good for our hiking adventures, trying to lug that unwieldy thing around with us -- instead we found a backpack picnic thingy which should be perfect and encourage us to actually hike before sitting down for a picnic =), got food, and wandered around the Holyoke mall looking for said backpack. Said backpack isn't sold in stores, but we found it on ebay! Or rather, Andrew found it. And we won it which was exciting =) I hope next weekend is good weather so we can use it!!

Back in my room we ate Fresh Side (yum), then headed over to Dwight so I could take this dreamweaver course (Andrew sat and read for awhile -- adding to the population of "taken guys" in our library that Dale always complains of). I learned how to do stuff to my webspace which was muy muy exciting =) Then we had a snack/dessert from Blanchard (I got the hugest piece of fried dough ever), and I finished some reading... Which I should get back to now =) But it's so hard to work after having such an amazing weekend... ahh pobrecita =)

Signing off for now!

Pink Poodledog: so cool, merrie on a date! :-)
MuskratFan: woohoo

yay merrie! I'll be thinking of you tonight while I dogsit Kobe and do my homework! =/ poor me!

Crazy busy days. Unfortunately didn't get to the student meeting on dining service cutbacks and cutbacks in general. Next one, I promise... Yesterday I did make it to the forum on "Opting Out" -- women choosing to quit jobs in order to be home with the kids. That was totally different from what I expected...talking to Thomasena afterwards, we agreed on that... we also agreed that we didn't really know what we had expected in the first place. Bottom line: by the time you get out of grad/law/medical school, you have about five years to get your career going and then you may just give it all up. Things to remember.

It was balmy this morning. Then it became overcast (but not rainy). I climbed on top of my desk to get to my window, and proceeded to "wrassle" with my window. I managed to get the storm window up, and I secured it with the putty FacMan put all around my window to keep the cold air out (because I distinctly remember an incident last fall... sleeping and waking up at 3 am to a loud crash -- it was my storm window falling down from its upright position. F-ing ridiculous. Someone's going to have a hell of a time getting that storm window down again. GOOD LUCK!!) I then finally, after much personal injury (aka getting my hands filthy with window grime), managed to get my screen down. So now I can get air AND keep bugs out. What genius!

Oh yes. Advising is next week. Here's what I want to take, must pick four out of the proceding five:

American Lit III: because I really should take some, and I'd love to read some more recent literature...

Independent: because I hope it'll turn into a thesis.

Spanish seminar -- Sex and the City or the Witches and Utopia: because I need a Spanish seminar and I should take it immediately upon returning to campus as the longer I go without Spanish, the worse I become at speaking/reading/hearing/writing it.

Criminology: because I still need a damn social science! And because Prof. Moran is teaching it and my one line in Junior Show was spoken as him (even though I didn't know who he was).

Existentialism: because I've always wanted to take this and it wasn't offered for a full year and a half...

It's been sooo long since my last entry, I'm going to resort to vague updates:

1. Saw The Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Mystic River (both highly awesome).

2. Partially climbed Mt. Holyoke with Andrew and explored the halfway house.

3. Went to Boston with Andrew and did some rushed apartment looking and job applying.

4. Had an interview that went really well and it looks like I have a job for this summer! The same day (almost the same exact time) Andrew found out that we do, indeed, have a sublet! So I have a room and a way to pay for it!

5. Andrew drove me back and stayed Monday night with me at MHC. We had a celebratory dinner and finally just sat and relaxed =)

Ok, so it's time for a spring break update! I took notes so I could remember this all, here you go if you're curious what I was up to:

Friday: I hopped a bus to Framingham in the afternoon, it was PACKED. In fact, the Peter Pan bus people sent two buses on the same route because so many people needed it. At Umass SO many kids were waiting to get on the bus, so I was quite sure I'd be forced to have someone sitting next to me. Which is unfortunate because then I can't sit cross legged. So I kept shifting my bag in the seat next to me, and trying my best to look snobby and annoying. And miraculously, no one sat by me! I think the only empty seat on the entire bus was next to me. Another technique is pretending you're really sick, coughing and blowing your nose, that sort of thing really turns people off to sitting next to you.

In Framingham I found Andrew waiting, and then we went to The Cheesecake Factory for dinner. Andrew was clever and got us seated in five minutes instead of the hour and a half or more wait -- yay! So we had a great dinner and then went back to his apartment. Watched Supertroopers (hilarious) with Jon & Jen.

Saturday: We woke up and Andrew was in the mood for pancakes (which generally happens on Saturday and Sunday mornings). So we had blueberry pancakes before going to the arboretum in JP. Ok so the arboretum in March is not so pretty. But it was really sunny, and I could IMAGINE that it would be pretty, once things started turning green and growing again. Then we went for fast food and to explore Kitchen Etc. We timed things, well, perfectly. At Kitchen Etc. they had just had a demonstration on dipping random things in chocolate, so there were plates of chocolate covered cookies, strawberries, grapes, and pretzels just sitting on the mini display kitchen counter. Yum! We left after browsing and snacking =)

In the evening we shopped and had yummy sushi and round appetizer thingies for dinner. I love eating sushi outside of restaurants because I can't use chopsticks to save my life and I like to pick things up and eat them with my hands, which can be rather messy and impolite looking. So yeah, better for me to avoid eating in public... We also watched this amazing movie, Happy Accidents. I loved it! If you like time travel, romantic comedies, and surreal plots, watch this!

Sunday: First thing, we went for omelets at Sorella's in JP. Yum! We ended up deciding on the same kind of omelet, and it was good. Warm avocado is a very clever idea. In the afternoon we watched most of The Secret Lives of Dentists (finished it in the evening). Strange, almost magical realism, and entertaining. In the evening we met up with Lindsay & her mother & her aunt for ice cream at JP Licks. We had the best ice cream, and wonderful conversation -- discussed summer plans and school -- yay I've finally met Lindsay's aunt and mother!! =)

After all that ice cream, we had soup for dinner. Watched a Sopranos episode which I didn't really get since I've never seen it before.

Monday: Andrew still had work, so I was on my own throughout the day. I did all my Spanish reading on this day, it was a crazy amount to assign over spring break =/ Had a good conversation with Jen as she got home from work before everyone else. Andrew & I went to this cool bar/pub place for dinner, and I had a hard lemonade (and got carded! yay!) Then we did some more shopping, mainly for desserts!

Tuesday: I read Eagleton in the morning and started Fantasia. It snowed like, 8 inches on this day. So Andrew got off work early to avoid driving in the mess, and we ate popcorn and did a bit of work together. In the evening we all went grocery shopping, ate dinner, and watched Masked and Anonymous. Lots of great actors (and Bob Dylan) without a very clear plot or idea or theme. Also, we couldn't figure out where the hell it was supposed to be taking place for a long time. Penelope Cruz was not a very convincing OCD good girl.

Wednesday: This day I started doing applications for internships in earnest. Lots of cover letter writing/revising. Then some more of Fantasia. Andrew got home late, so I had another talk with Jen which was cool. In the evening Andrew & I checked out a summer sublet in Newton, and pretty much decided against it. It was snowing again. Critiqued my cover letter till LATE. We kind of forgot to relax on this day!

Thursday: I wrote tons of cover letters and applied to about four internships on this day. Yay me! In the evening we had a good dinner, tuna I think, and Andrew & I watched 21 grams. Don't believe the little blurbs that say it's "ultimately a movie about hope and redemption." You'll cry halfway through the movie, and in the end you'll feel sad that most/all of the characters are either dead or grieving still. The fractured method of telling the story was appropriate and engaging (you either give up and lose interest or get really involved trying to piece everything together), but Andrew & I agreed that it would be helpful if there was an option on the DVD to see the movie in the proper order afterwards.

Friday: Andrew was "sick" and stayed home from work -- we worked, I applied to Warm2Kids, and we started, tentatively, GRE studying. After dinner (yay pad thai!) we headed out to NY -- it was a fun drive though, and we listened to lots of music. We arrived at Andrew's father's pretty late, but I still (Finally!) got to meet him -- which was good because we were all planning to be out for most/all of Saturday. I was rather nervous, but I think it went ok =) Loved seeing all the pictures of Andrew when he was little, and his old room.

Saturday: Long eventful day! We got up around 10 in the morning, got ready quickly, and then drove around Hastings a bit for the grand tour. Had a sweet (as in chocolatey) breakfast before hopping on the train to NYC. We took the subway from Grand Central to 23rd St., where we met a Moho friend of Andrew's for lunch. We ended up at the Miracle Grill which was yummy (more avocado! and cilantro!) Piya was fun, it seems that I generally like other Mount Holyoke people (something about the admissions process?) Then we walked to The Strand, where I found this obscure book for a class for about half price (and hardcover instead of paperback! Take that Odyssey!!!) It wasn't too warm, but in the sun I sometimes got by with just a sweater and no coat.

We wandered around for quite awhile -- lots of war/Bush protesters, a crazy man in blue headdress playing with crystal balls, an old gentleman peeling carrots and cucumbers and potatoes (selling vegetable peelers from Sweden), and a dog that looked like a very furry caterpillar. Also ran into some of Andrew's friends really randomly at a traveling coffee shop. At some point we hopped on the subway to Times Square -- Where we wandered about and it was quite crowded and it started to rain. I almost bought an umbrella but didn't. We took a look at the new Time Warner buildings -- didn't seem too crazy and busy yet. Then it was time to meet up with Andrew's friends from college...

Andrew's friend's apartment was about a five minute walk. A cool place to live, with a great view. The friend's gf was having a surprise birthday celebration for him, so it was pretty funny to be in on the secret. We all walked out and around the block as if we were going to this restaurant, when his gf led him up to a limo where everyone else was waiting. She pulled it off amazingly well. It was a huge limo, and I tried champagne for the first time. I think me and Andrew were the only ones not drunk at dinner (which was really good, great food, and lots of fun!) I also tried sangria, which I liked a lot, it disguised the alcohol well. Definitely enjoyed meeting all of Andrew's friends, they seem like cool people. Something of a different feel from Mount Holyoke social life, maybe partly because they've all graduated now...? Anyway! So after dinner (and after totally pissing off the restaurant staff), Andrew and I said our good-byes and headed on home rather than accompanying the party to the next bar. Showered and slept -- lovely day!

Sunday: Finally had more time to talk to Andrew's father on this day. We all went to brunch and chatted, and then a trip to Stew Leonard's (what a crazy place to go grocery shopping, decorating and samples that must make the weekly shopping trip like Disney land for kids). Then we got our laundry and packing done, and headed back to Boston. We had a lovely two or three hour period to just relax after spending so much time together and being on the eve of going back to school/work.

Monday: I got on the bus just in time, and was back at MHC in time to do some reading before my afternoon classes. Did some things I had been putting off, and some reading. Was exhausted around 10:30 pm. Went to bed relatively early.

Today! Wow, I'm all caught up!! I had class and lunch and work -- Bernice sat us down and told us about some "changes" in mail services thanks to Chris that will be coming up with hiring for next year. I enjoy working with Bernice, I think I'll try to keep working 2 or 3 hours there per week next year. Also, I did some forwarding which I enjoyed, hadn't done that in quite awhile!

Today was rather empty, as Newton, the beloved doggy, has passed on. No more Newton walks, which I enjoyed so much more than walking any other dog. Happy times in doggy heaven, Newton love, if I ever have a PBGV it'll be because of you!

Conversation had with Karuna this evening:
LaMujerExotica: ok
LaMujerExotica: talk with you later
Pink Poodledog: ack karuna
LaMujerExotica: must work on paper
LaMujerExotica: karuna is going to be pulling all nighter
LaMujerExotica: what?
Pink Poodledog: my mom sent me mini vodkas
LaMujerExotica: hahahaha
LaMujerExotica: oy vey
Pink Poodledog: and this tastes SO weird and it makes me cough!!
LaMujerExotica: that's great
LaMujerExotica: you have to do shots
Pink Poodledog: hahaha
LaMujerExotica: you don't taste it becky
LaMujerExotica: you like down it
Pink Poodledog: hahahahah
LaMujerExotica: i love it
LaMujerExotica: your mom sent you mini vodkas
LaMujerExotica: hahahaha
Pink Poodledog: but why would they flavor it with vanilla if they didn't want you to taste it!!
LaMujerExotica: who knows
LaMujerExotica: hahahaa
Pink Poodledog: hehe oh well, this stuff is crazy.
LaMujerExotica: That so is going in my profile

I finally ventured to try the vodka Mum sent me and I guess the whole 80 proof thing is kind of hard to take for the novice who can barely handle wine. I was so curious though what vanilla vodka would taste like...!

Anyway, it was gorgeous today. And I'm quite sure I could smell the mud (spring is coming!)

Happy spring break!!!

It was soooo hard to get back into work this morning! I had the best birthday since I was like five and was insanely excited over everything (so I can't really compete with that, even when I do have lovely times!) So here's a day by day description in case I leave out important details when asked in person!

Friday: Sooo busy! I had to walk Kobe, go to a meeting for the prospective professors in the english dept., work in the mail center, hand papers in, go to class, watch a movie for post colonial lit, and eat dinner! Then I needed some aspirin before watching The Last Unicorn with the ESB and friends down in the living room. It was wildly successful! Andrew caught the latter half of it, I think he found the pirate cat going "oh purr, purr, that be nice" pretty funny. Then we headed off to Blanchard for food and ice cream. We ran into Thomasena and all talked (about such topics as the strange relationship between the spooky talkative guy in the convenience store and the woman with the hats that checks you out at blanchard). Back in the dorm, I finally put my clothes away! They'd been sitting on my drying rack for awhile...

Saturday: Eventful day! We got up at a decent hour and went to Blanchard for food, then walked over to the greenhouse for the flower show. It was gray and sprinkling most of the day. Inside the greenhouse though was so so much better than outside. Daffodils and tulips and a mini golf course lined with flowers, squat citrus fruit bearing trees, every kind of cactus (some that looked like piles of mothballs), plants sprouting out of every crevice and tree trunk...

After, we went to the Big Y and I got some provisions (ie, a lindt white chocolate bar and triple chocolate cookies). Then we played scrabble (which was not fun toward the end when I was losing by 90 some points!!) What else... then we went to Fresh Side and brought back food, and had a lovely quiet dinner sitting on my bed. Then I was lounging about in my sweat pants while Andrew was on the computer, when the door burst open and Julia, Korisha, Beth, Lindsay, and Dale came in with a cake all on fire with candles! I was totally surprised, I had no idea Andrew was planning this with them! So I blew out all the candles (in one try!), and we scraped together enough plates and silverware for us all to eat raspberry chocolate cheese cake! Yum =) Then we all got ready for the V8s jam, which was good and fun -- the guys group was soo dorky though! They sang "Where in the World is Carmen SanDiego" and wore jeans and ties.

There was an after party in Pearsons, which was kinda cool, it was a real college party with beer and guys and dancing. I got shoved into the middle of a dancing circle, proceeded to stand still a moment, and then ran back to the safety of the edges =) Becky is not a dancer unless she is either in a coordinated dance skit on stage or is tipsy! Dale, Andrew, & I ended up going to the Amherst Brewing Company at like, 20 till midnight, for my first legitimate bar experience. The guy actually made me wait the one minute till midnight before letting me in! I had a cosmopolitan and was soon tipsy. Dale and I danced a little, and Andrew laughed at us. Then we ate yummy pizza and drove back to MHC =) Wonderful perfect day!

Lucky me, I also got to open presents since it was officially after midnight =) Mum found good things -- now I have fun reading for over spring break!! Also a watch, in Tiffany blue, so I won't be late anymore!! And Andrew found the perfect necklace to match my tastes in clothes and earrings =) AND I am going to subject EVERYONE to watching The Last Unicorn on DVD with me! (Andrew found it, and who knows, maybe they'll have developed little games to go on the DVD, too... like the unicorns fighting the red bull!)

Also got to sleep at a decent hour so we woke up earlier Sunday morning!

Sunday: Went to Blanchard for brunch, then Andrew & I took an adventurous road trip!! We went to Greenfield and Shelburne Falls and saw all sorts of cool stuff. Lots of backyard businesses between here and Greenfield, a rare books store, and Richardson's candy shop, and glass blowing (Andrew's seriously going to end up quitting the computer science field in order to make vases and bowls.) Geological wonders = pits where rocks carved bowls out of other rocks. Took pictures, and had tea and coffee and a good maple walnut scone. It was sunny but still kinda cold. We wandered around in Greenfield before the falls, looking at DVDs and books (America 24/7, very absorbing to flip through it). Got hungry rather early, so we had an early dinner in Noho. Spoleto's, which was totally new, I had a sculpture made out of shrimp and risotto (is that how it's spelled?) and vegetables. And we got home at an early hour!!

I ate more cheesecake Sunday night =) And we started a movie but it was too sad and I was laughing at all the wrong moments. So I spruced stuff up a bit, and talked to Mom, Mer, & Tim on the phone, and then we lounged about and showered. Good quiet evening after such a busy day!!

Today: I was having withdrawal! I eventually pulled myself through it by writing my Spanish essay and doing some reading. Then had lunch (I wasn't hungry but it was enjoyable to just sit and talk with everyone) and classes... I read the wrong selection for Spanish, but it didn't matter because only like 1-3 people had done the reading since there was a presentation for one group to do today and a paper due for all of us!! Also had the English Department meeting to present our findings on prospective professors. Before dinner I sat and read birthday cards, it was definitely a highlight of the day =) It was snowing today, it was a little crazy. But I'd rather have snowflakes falling on me than rain!

Lindsey: I love the scarf!! And it's the perfect shade of purple, I'm going to match my entire room =) And yay for Strawberry Shortcake, maybe the third generation will look like the ORIGINAL S.S.!!

It was a lovely birthday, thanks everyone!! =)

Despite sad news, I'm looking forward to this weekend and my birthday. It's nearly spring. But Newton is "slowly down," as Rachel says. Must keep this blog light, as there are some fun things I wanted to record...

Today in Post Colonial Lit we were talking about Freud and death wishes and other such disturbing things. I was objecting to it as I hate thinking of people as being inherently violent (so all the rest of the morning this idea haunted me, thinking that people I walked by were wishing me dead. ack!) So Siraj joked "Yeah, when I was reading your posts, I was thinking 'I wonder if Becky Richardson has death wishes?'" The whole class had a good laugh, and it was vastly entertaining. I'm still resisting this idea, but I'll take it metaphorically and still keep some of my sanity.

Yesterday I was trying to put money on my one card so I could do laundry, and my dollar bill was halfway in the slot thingy when the other half, which was folded in half or something, managed to slip in, too. The machine totally freaked out. It kept moving the bill by millimeters in and out of the slot, but not far enough out so that I could grab it. Being cheap, I didn't want to leave it there. Being shy, I didn't want to bother anyone for help. So I took a bobby pin out of my bag and "wrassled" with the machine for awhile. I eventually dragged the dollar bill out with my bobby pin far enough so I could grip it and pull it out. Then I reinserted it, and, amazingly enough, it turned into a positive balance!

Yesterday I saw the white goose trying to drown some ducks while flopping about in the lake. I also saw it with its little cronies walking about on the dead grass, honking like mad. I hate that goose. If I have death wishes, they're all directed at that domineering white goose.

Congrats to Merrie on getting accepted to Linfield! And good luck with the NHS "cult-like induction ceremony." Whoa, glad that phase of my life is over...

So here's a stolen quote from Mer's blogspot, as novice bloggers borrow and real bloggers steal:

"Maybe it's left over puddle shit from the rain." -Mom, said while pondering the possibility of a leak in a pipe.

Oh wow, I forgot I had a blog spot for like, a week. Why? I'm going to blame it on Junior Show. Awesome time! Thursday was like a dress rehearsal that was nearly flawless, Friday was totally awesome and perfect, and Saturday the seniors totally messed things up! But I loved seeing the old characters from last year's j show, the pudding girl!!! Andrew was wonderful sitting through it all, and he definitely got a lot of the jokes. He objected to the Amherst impersonation: "I'm the most pretentious so I'll go first."

Saturday Fresh Side was yummy, and the after parties were kinda fun but I definitely wasn't in the intoxicated state necessary to appreciate them. We wandered around in Amherst in the afternoon and it was sunny and kinda warm. Drank coffee and sat on a park bench. Sunday we had brunch with Korisha and Emily, and then saw The Perfect Score in Springfield. Too much moralizing! For dinner we went to Noho and I ate sushi and ginger with my hands. Andrew laughed at me and said "It's ok, we don't have to come back here!" I probably completely offended everyone who saw me =) Oh well! I like eating with my hands.

Monday: First day of the Flip Flop! Yay! I don't think I did anything extra special today. Pretty normal Monday, reading, lunch, classes, I fell asleep reading, yep yep, normal day.

So I went to Junior Show rehearsal after dinner, and quickly realized that not only was everything backed up half an hour, but I couldn't get much work done sitting in an uncomfortable chair listening to people blabber. So I left. And then there was a fire drill in my dorm. Woo-hoo! Ok time for a digression: Why do we have fire drills? We don't take roll outside so we would never know if someone was totally deaf and needed assistance. And how would "practicing" the "escape" help anyone get out of the dorm? Don't we all know how to get out of the dorm already? And if we don't already know, are we really going to learn? Isn't it pretty instinctual to run out of a building when there are ear piercing shrieks (aka alarms) and flashing lights and, in the event of a real fire, fire and smoke? And don't tell me that they're practicing to make sure the alarms can, in fact, function; they could just as easily test that without the students being in the dorm. Basically, if you don't know how to get out of a burning building by this time, there's nothing that's gonna teach you.

So back to the story. I read, I doze, I listen to music. I don't really feel like going back out for junior show rehearsal, but I go anyway. I get there, and Tobe tells us we can all leave. So we're like, wtf? We just walked all the way over here and they're telling us to go back? But it turned out cool, because Alexis, Lindsay of the Philosophy Department, and myself, were walking down from Chapin when I brought up that we'd all be in classes together. Lindsay, I realized later, was in both Phil 100 and Eng 200 with me, and Alexis was in Phil. with us. So we chatted for awhile and it was really cool, because those first people that I met in classes my first year made such a big impression on me. And Lindsay liked Karen C-K, too! We must have been the only two... even though that was an awesome class.

So now I'm back in my room again... Argh, how am I going to write this paper for Friday?

Lots of good stuff on Mer's blog, I hadn't checked it out in awhile! Chickens in "Odull" taking shelter from the rain, surprise birthday parties, Zen accusing her of being tardy to class... I'm afraid I haven't anything that funny to post, but... oh well!

This weekend was immensely boring, really. I went to meals with Dale, which was cool, but then I didn't, well, do anything else. I got holed up in my room doing homework, basically. So I was telling Dale the plan for the weekend apart, and how I was getting reacquainted with being in my room alone again. She was all happy for me. Until I said, "And then I realized how boring it is to be in my room." Yep. Mind-numbing, really. Now I remember why I try to have lots of activities going on constantly. Must remember this in future to avoid leaving having weekends totally devoid of the fun stuff that weekends are made for (movies, going out with friends, shopping, laughing).

Next weekend will be far superior. Junior show and Andrew!

What a day!

I got up at a decent hour and it was a little sad because I knew I wouldn't be seeing Andrew tonight. But then I got busy. I walked Kobe and we met a little white furry dog and Kobe batted at it with her huge paw and got its ear dirty. Then she acted like a dog on crack, or a dog on rabies, and refused to go back inside after we had taken a walk and played fetch. So I finally pounced on her and grabbed her collar, then hauled her back in the house, lamenting all the way about how she was being completely unreasonable. Kobe of course didn't get it, and watched me from the window as I was leaving, as usual.

I rushed back to my room and then thought I had more time than I did; I thought I had to be at the English department at noon for the group lunch instead of 11:50, so when I remembered the real time I booked it over to Shattuck. Luckily, they hadn't left yet. Me and two other English majors were scheduled to eat lunch with a professor MHC may hire to teach fiction writing. His writing samples were awesome. Last night I stayed up till three am reading his stories and something by Harriet Johnson about disabled persons and Singer. Well. Lunch was good, we had a few awkward pauses but on the whole it went well, I think. We almost didn't get dessert-- one student declined dessert when the waitress offered it to us, and the prof. was going to follow whatever we wanted to do. So I said I wouldn't mind seeing the desserts, and it ended up three out of four of us ate dessert. Yay me! Today is the day of inflicting my will upon others! I had a yummy hectagon of tiramisu, and two cups of earl grey tea (I would have stolen tea packets but the waitress took them away from us).

Later, I was able to see the interview-ee speak to the faculty about his teaching philosophy and about how he sees fiction writing classes. He was totally engaging, and I just loved being in the same room as all these profs. I had Profs Demas, Shaw, and Quillian to talk to, it was wonderful. I love our english department! On my way to dinner I ran into Miranda and Dale; we ate at Wilder and Dale made us deviled eggs.

I've relaxed, read, done laundry, and been on duty tonight. Weird. So this is what Friday nights used to look like.

So "A" sent me some news articles online as we're making an inspiration board for my short story seminar out of newspaper and magazine articles. (I think we can all figure out who "A" is.) So A. sent me an article about a camel that got loose in sweden because its stablemate, a horse, wasn't there, and another about a piranha in the Thames. This is A.'s idea on how to connect the two into a really great story:

A: you could do a story about all these crazy random animals
A: maybe about a south american piranha and a mongolian camel who met on the internet and traveled the globe to finally meet
A: but the piranha got lost in the thames, and the camel got sidetracked in sweden by a horse
A: then you could make up the ending! it would be like finding nemo on crack
Pink Poodledog: hahahahah

(just had to post that. yay I've actually updated my blog twice in 24 hours!!)

After yesterday I'm feeling the need to update. And while eating dinner I was reading the creative writing class stories and was feeling the need to write something before reading for quillian's class. So here goes!

Weds was the big day. Two public speaking adventures in the space of 5 hours. The sorts of things I normally stay away from. Weds morning I did some reading for my Spanish presentation, and then met up with my group at the library. We were feeling pretty confident, but I think all of us except for Corinne were pretty nervous, too. I ate lunch over my notecards, rehearsing what I'd say during the presentation. I sat through Lit. Crit. & Theory and then ran off to Ciruti for Spanish. Very nervous at this point, and needed to use the bathroom (drank too much water at lunch). The presentation was going ok, very mellow and comfortable, when Michelle handed it over to met earlier than I had expected. Then my mouth started getting dry and I kept stumbling over long Aztec words. At one of these words (as Corinne told me later) I said "caca" in the process of sounding it out (hey, that's what was written!!). Naturally, a couple of girls in the audience laughed. I didn't know WHY they laughed though, so I just got totally distracted and embarrassed, thinking that they were laughing at me. I think this was the beginning of the end. So I cut out all the cool things I had wanted to say and just ended it in my stumbling Spanish.

But, this turned out ok, because we actually were two or three times as long as our professor had expected. She assured us that we had done a wonderful job and had set a high precedent for the rest of the presentations, but, we all know I didn't do very well on my part!!

After Spanish I ran back to my room to get ready for the poetry reading. At which I hoped to redeem myself. (Yes I know that that was a sentence fragment). I waited in "The Dirty" for awhile, until Kim found me and we drove over as the two MHC representatives. We found the house, and wandered upstairs looking for the hosts. The apartment was amazing looking, very Asian inspired decorations and bookshelves on every wall. A very pink satiny love seat in the living room, and the best flatware, very Martha-Stewart-shopping-at-the-Pottery-Barn-esque. More people kept trickling in, so we kept reintroducing ourselves. Out of ten students reading, only one was a guy. Everyone was pretty cool in very different ways.

At dinner, I got pushed to the end of the table since the Amherst girl had her mother with her at the dinner (wtf?) The conversation was dominated by the two Smithies (talking about playing this game, Assassin) and the Amherst girl & guy (Amherst girl was nice but too much like me when I'm trying to be social so of course I didn't like her. I tend to dislike people that are like me). I sat by the quieter Umass gal, who was a senior and nervous to be reading in public. Neither of us had read in a public setting like this before. The dinner was amazing, rice and some sort of lentil topping and salad with grapefruit sections (beautifully sliced) and duck. Dessert took me awhile to eat because I was shy to just take the dessert fork that was at the place setting next to mine (seemed like bad manners?) But dessert was amazing, we had pie pieces of fig tart and cubes of what tasted like fresh pistachio ice cream, bliss.

After, we walked over to Converse Hall together. I was quite nervous. Loved hearing people read their poetry, all the more enjoyable because I was at least casually acquainted with everyone now. Kim was very supportive, and I read without making any mistakes (even though my voice was a little shaky). Prof. Shaw was there, chatted with me afterwards. Laura came which was super exciting, and we took the PVTA home together (after sampling some amazing chocolate dessert cups with raspberries. Oh raptures!)

It was a very productive day, I don't think I was in my room for more than 2 hours between noon and midnight! Also a day of realizing that I enjoy poetry writing more than fiction writing. And I'm in a short story writing seminar. Oops. Also realized me-as-poet is a very egotistical creature. Seemed like a lot of the five college poets reading were of a similar nature. Or am I just imagining this?

Today I ran many errands and did everything that I was supposed to do (up to this point).

Good things about today: I got a lot of work done in the morning, had a yummy salmon and caesar salad dinner at prospect with Lindsay and Irena, actually went to a junior show meeting, discovered that the decadent looking pie at Uncommon Grounds is, in fact, the pie version of my all time favorite: the raspberry cream cheese chocolate bar. So I just ate that, and wow, wow...

Bad things: I was sad in the morning, the junior show meeting really had nothing to do with my being there and I didn't need to be there (wasted hour, could have been napping), and, uhm... that's all, I guess it was an ok day, overall.

Last week was soooo busy I didn't even post, partly because I was busy and partly because it would have been basically like this: today I woke up, hurried out to classes, hurried to do homework & eat, went to meetings/ did more work. Not so exciting. Two good things: Thursday was our Verbosity meeting and lots of people came!! Yay us! And Lindsay and I had a lovely dinner at the Rockies and she gave me the most adorable valentine's day surprise -- a pink poodle bookmark!

So let's just talk about my weekend now since that was lovely and it was Valentine's Day, after all.

Friday: I ate dinner at Wilder with Hollin and Alyssa, and others that I had just met so I don't remember their names. I took some chocolate pie and challah, and wasn't very productive back in my room till Andrew came. I did start a possible short story, though. When Andrew arrived, we talked with Dale a bit and then started getting his dinner together. Between the three of us, we constructed quite the meal. He had soup, I had bread & dessert, and Dale had salad. So we all sat down in the formal dining room of our hall with Ashley and ate together. That was fun =) Plan to someday eat tv dinners down there at opposite ends of the table and provide some comic relief for the people doing homework in the common rooms.

After, we watched Thirteen, which was a rather disturbing movie about two wayward young girls. Crazy kids, I sure wasn't into that stuff in middle school. We decided to cheat and exchange gifts Friday night (but it was technically Saturday, it was after midnight!!) I showered, and at some point we fell asleep with the lights on, and didn't wake up till like 6 or 7 the next morning. Oops. Granted, I do this pretty often when I'm here alone, but now I'm dragging Andrew into my bad habits.

Saturday: The good thing about falling asleep was that we got up in the morning at a decent hour. I think we got up around 10, so we had plenty of time to get ready to go out for brunch. We took this winding road (was it route 9? I'm so bad with picturing this stuff in my head) that reminded me of country roads back home. It let out right at the breakfast place Andrew had picked. It was a really cute place, a rustic feel and very small and intimate. Old baking tools up on the walls, and signs and such. And really yummy food, apricot bread and cornbeef hash. We pretty much stuffed ourselves. Then we went to the Quabbin Reservoir and walked about, took pictures and had our picture taken. We started walking across the dam but it was too cold. So we drove further up, and we saw this lookout tower thing, and the snow was a sheet of ice on top so it was shiny and pretty.

We took a little trip to Target for Buster supplies and candy and a dvd. We looked at plastic tubs for quite awhile, it was funny. Had a dispute about shades of blue. At some point we came back here and relaxed for awhile. We got an early start out to Northampton, where we wandered about looking at books before heading to the restaurant. It was a really gorgeous place, The Union Station. It was also a very crowded place, so luckily we did have reservations! We waited awhile, but it was pretty entertaining because we were sitting next to this really snotty couple for awhile (the feminine half of which I think goes to MHC, ack!) and they were bickering. By the time we got seated we knew just what we wanted to order, and then we attacked the salad bar. I had the biggest salad ever. I think we kinda filled up on it, because we had leftovers for Sunday's dinner. Everything tasted good though, and I had real cottage cheese (as opposed to dining hall cottage cheese)!

By the time we got back home we were pretty stuffed and tired. Andrew fell asleep, and I followed suit. We woke up about an hour and a half to two hours later, around 2, and brushed and went back to bed. But then we got up early, again!

Sunday: I woke up a little after 9, and urged us out of bed, ready for another full day of weekend! We looked for Valentine's day candy at the Big Y (they were lacking in the post V-day sales), but ended up going to CVS in Amherst for such things instead. We intended to eat at Thai Corner, but as that was randomly closed we went to Fresh Side. Which was good, because it definitely improved my impression of the place, I had help ordering =) Yum!

Back here, we started watching Fargo. Really intriguing and hard to stop watching. But we had to stop at some point to rest and eat and then head off to the library where I had to meet my Spanish group. We both were in the lobby, me with my group and Andrew with his book. Then we went to Kendade for my Post Colonial Studies movie. Black and white and slow and hard to follow (maybe because it was in French and we just had subtitles? Hard to get to know characters' voices). Andrew fell asleep. I ate candy and stuck it out. Finally it was over and we were able to leave! We finished watching Fargo, which was super disturbing and what's the word, poignant? And showered, and went to bed. Sunday nights are always sad.

This morning we got up before our alarms and rested awhile. Monday mornings are always so sad =( Now I must do my reading & homework, blah!

Work is so difficult after a lovely happy weekend! And the happiest Valentine's ever =)

Ack now I can't remember what I did last week. Thursday is kinda blurry, so let's start with Friday:

Friday: It was snowing/raining/gross out, and I wasn't sure how I was going to get to Boston for the weekend. None of the pathways had been shoveled yet, even by 11 am when I was heading out to run some errands and eat lunch. Everyone was slipping all over and the snow was avalanching off the roofs. The mail center was closed (the door was locked and I could see a paper sign with something about the weather scribbled on it). There was a festive feel at lunch, I sat with Stephanie and Erin and looked at alloy catalogs. I was quite antsy to get out of Peer Mentoring, since it was probably the only class meeting that afternoon in the whole valley. It turned out that another member of that class was catching the Boston bus, so we headed over together. We met some cool people on our way, including this gal running by who wanted us to delay the bus so she'd have time to get her birth control pills! It was a really nice bus ride, no bus switching or anything, so I napped and read some.

Andrew arrived about 5 minutes after me at the Framingham stop, and we headed to the mall right away to eat something. We wandered around for awhile and sat right by a big plotted plant. At his apartment I sat through the last Ed of the season(which, I admit, was pretty funny). A night of firsts, I enjoyed Ed &, well, yeah.

Saturday: I didn't leave the apartment all day! Very relaxing and pleasant day. I read a little, and we baked cookies (with smokey results, we discovered that wax paper does it, but we didn't know what was wrong and Andrew was worried about leaving me to get his hair cut, but it was fine, the smoke alarm didn't go off!), and we had pad thai for dinner and a game of scrabble (he won, by a lot). After dinner we all watched Seabiscuit, which was highly entertaining and good due to lots of horses being in it. Then we watched a little bit of SNL (for weekend update, the rest wasn't very good...) and I showered and we went to bed.

Sunday: After an apple & croissant dough experiment (which turned out pretty yummy) and breakfast, we read a bit and then headed out. We wandered around Newbury St. and got some good candy, looked at music and exploratory fun stuff, and had coffee (or tea, in my case). Then we got to see his friend Carlo's new apartment, which has been very tastefully and elegantly re-done. His parents were there, which was cool, so we all ate dinner together. And I met Kiwi the pug, who was single-mindedly going after my wool scarf and mittens. I was a little sleepy on the way home, but perked up as we watched The Royal Tenenbaums.

Monday: Very hard to wake up. Slept on the bus and read a bit. Elizabeth was on this bus, too! So we sat together. It was a little strange getting back into the swing of things... Then I had the awards ceremony at 4, and Lindsay was there! Sarah W. scholars pretty much just stood up and sat down, but still! Then I socialized a bit over snack food, and met one of the gals next to me, Darcy. Then me and Lindsay met for dinner, and I found out that the girl I'd just met, Darcy, lives right next to Lindsay. Small campus! I was pretty sleepy after the huge gracious dinner... but it was fun, Dale, Miranda, Lindsay, Thomasena, Rachel, and Jos were there. I ended up sleeping a bit over my homework, until Michelle called to update me on the Spanish presentacion. I must sound strange when I first wake up.

Today: Was crazy. I woke up and immediately started trying to find a sub for today in the mail center, because Rachel F. needed a babysitter and I thought the prospect of spending the afternoon with Hieu and Newton was far more appealing than working in the mail center! So I found someone during ballroom dance (learned the foxtrot today) and proceeded to have a relaxing afternoon playing dogopoly and petting Newton! Also managed to pop a huge yellow balloon, but luckily H. forgave me.

Oh, and my mother sent me Valentine's Day window decals! Which are now all over my window and mirrors! And my book came for SAW, and a little care package from Grammy & Grandpa's church.

And I am full-time worrying about this oral short story due Thursday.

Classes have been figured out: 300-level English: Intro Post-Colonial Studies, 300-level English: Short Story Writing, 200-level English: Literary Criticism & Literature, 200-level Spanish: Latin American I Lit, 200-level Interdisciplinary: Peer Mentoring (so that I can work in the SAW center next year and get paid for reading and attending classes instead of working for Res Life). Yesterday was a good day because 1) I figured out these classes to take (oh and I'm taking ballroom dance!), 2) both of my ebay buys arrived, and 3) it snowed beautifully & I had a nice dinner with Lindsay & friends! Things definitely turned out well even though I started the day off on a hectic note when I slept through my alarm and woke up about 25/35 minutes before my first class started!

Today was also quite busy... I read, had lunch, turned in some stuff for Karuna at the CDC, read some more, sat around with everyone waiting for the door to be unlocked for Eng. 280, had a happy class, rushed to the bathroom and to Ciruti and still got to my Spanish class about five minutes late, participated more than usual to make up for my tardiness, read for an hour in 1837 before dinner, had a lovely dinner with the ladies of the English Student Board, then came back here! Quality quote from dinner: "I didn't want to serve Justin Timberlake a nasty hot dog." - Emily, who did, in fact, meet J.T. Megan had her point proven that any subject and verb can be made to sound dirty if said in the right tone of voice: "Hey, wanna tie my shoes?"

Things seemed to move slowly today, it felt like I'd been awake longer than I had been. Maybe because last night I fell asleep with the lights on and without brushing my teeth, so at 8 am I brushed and turned off the lights, then woke up again at 9:30. Strange. Must stop doing that. But my bed is so comfortable...

Oopsy it's been awhile... Very busy. Can't figure out classes yet. I had my best ever snowy walk with Newton last Thursday, we met a cockapoo named Willy. I had three meetings with Quillian on the subject of my classes, one while I was running from Shattuck to the Tower Room looking for our creative writing class, and Quillian called "So have you decided?" and I yelled back "No!" and kept running. One of those MHC bubble moments, there. My first Peer Mentoring class was interesting and strangely parallel to Res Life training. "Are you a hammer or a nail? An ocean or a forest? A leader or a follower?" My first shift back to the Mail Center was odd but good, it's been awhile, and Bernice and I, surely, have some catching up to do! New rule: must push the pulley rather than pull the pulley. Why? It could cause back pain.

Now the weekend I can recall in more detail, so here we go:

Friday: After my Peer Mentoring class I got ready for Andrew's arrival, and tried to round people up for dinner! I rushed Andrew from his car to Wilder, and we had a crazy dinner! It was a Thanksgiving-ish dinner (turkey, squash, mashed potatoes, stuffing, that sort of thing), with challah bread and two desserts and matzoh ball soup (without any matzoh balls). Lindsay, Korisha, Emily, Beth, Andrew, and myself were there, and it was crazy, I think we were all talking the whole time! I couldn't stop laughing, Korisha did the "food testing" test with Andrew and he responded the same way I did for the last like 2 years. And Lindsay had her hilarious dorm-life accounts, which are definitely accurate (esp. the blow drying in this cold weather!) After dinner we went upstairs for a game of Cranium, but me and Andrew weren't allowed to be partners! It was still fun, of course, even though me and my partner had a little trouble getting off of start!

Saturday: Since we got to bed at a decent hour the night before, we managed to get out in time for brunch. We tried Karen's Kitchen, which was yummy and rather casual, with a "store feel" inside. We sat and drank coffee and tea afterwards, in the midst of the closing chaos. We decided against going into Amherst, and instead we headed back to MHC to get some work done. We took a little stop at Atkin's to avoid said work. Finally though, it couldn't be put off any longer, and we had a nice work session in the English lounge of Shattuck (which may become my second home, soon). After the sun stopped steaming in through the windows we decided it was time to go out for dinner. Took a bathrrom break and hurried off to see if anyone wanted to go with us! Everyone was pretty much in for the night, so we went to Amherst by ourselves for dinner. I had Bueno y Sano for the first time! It was good, except there was a hair in my burrito =/ But at least I didn't dump my burrito on the floor, scrape it back onto a plate, and eat it, like the girl at the next table over from us!

We found ONE book I wanted at the used book store, not the greatest luck! Had a tissue incident. And a trip to CVS. And a cold walk to the car! Back at MHC we had coffee and dessert from Blanchard, and then speed walked over to see Pirates of the Caribbean on the big screen in Gamble. It was really good, even a second time around. Very entertaining! We almost watched some Sex and the City at the hall activity, but the room was too packed looking.

Sunday: We got up fairly early, and then recruited Dale & Miranda to eat brunch with us! We went to Abbey for the crepe bar, which was pretty good. I ate my old classic three plates, but without the old bloated feeling. Ahh I miss you, Kathleen!! We ate with Alyssa, too, and ran into an old Amherst friend of Andrew's (and his first year MHC gf). We did a bit of reading in the afternoon, but soon got distracted. So we played a game. Took a trip over to The Thirsty Mind and continued reading, then we picked up supplies (for the Super Bowl get-together, and my floor activity on Tuesday) at Big Y. Before going to Phoebe's, we picked up Fanny, a really cool gal from France who's here for a year and knows Phoebe from a class. This marked the first time in years that I watched a football game, and kinda sorta enjoyed it! It was pretty exciting towards the end, we were all hoping for the game to end without a tie and overtime! Finally got to bed, I had a weird dream with Torrey's architecture and Andrew. I need to have a more coherent one before Weds so I can turn in a dream fragment for my creative writing class!

Now I'm sitting about with tea, about to do some reading! Then I'll print out some more reading at the library, read that, have lunch, and start with classes! Oh and make signs for my floor activity...

Yesterday was the oh-so-exciting Res Life mid year "retreat." What we were retreating from, I'm not sure. It was basically a time to listen to some cliched PC discussions and to bitch about everything wrong with MHC (ie, the budget). But I was strangely awake for it all. Which was good, because I hadn't slept much. After, I went with Lindsay and Adrianna to the "convenience store" (some clever Mohos have dubbed it the "inconvenience store" in way of protest). The checker guy from Wilder was there, and I had a Silence of the Lambs-esque moment when he started stalking towards me and said in a low voice "Hello, Rebecca..." Yeah. At that point Adrianna decided she was NOT leaving me alone there! It turned into a normal enough discussion about the weather, luckily. We also had a rather cool hall committee meeting at The Thirsty Mind, where I had a yummy decaf vanilla latte and sat in a beat up old chair.


Last night I was SO tired, I actually climbed into bed while talking to Andrew a bit after 11. I then promptly fell asleep. I woke up again at 3 am, and decided it was a prime time to take a shower. So I did. Then I let my hair dry a bit, and went to sleep.

I woke up this morning, slept in a bit, and woke up again. Then I went on my Kobe walk and ran some errands. Then I had a a "social outcast lunch" (meaning I sat by myself in an insanely crowded dining hall) before going to walk Newton. I still haven't gotten the rest of my books (maybe it would have been good to preface that with a comment about how I went to check my mail. oops), but I did get my final paper back from Quillian. It was a "satisfying end to the course" but not quite the same quality as my mid term paper. Argh, I will always be trying to beat that paper!

Continuing with my day of solo adventures, I read some English theses for about an hour. Lots of original poetry, plays, stories... someone wrote on Pynchon's Crying of Lot 49 (among other things). Then I felt like a grown up going to pick up my dry cleaning. Simple pleasures, right?

I fell asleep again this afternoon, and Dale came a couple of times to wake me up. I got to dinner rather late, and had a nice meal with Lindsay and Irena. Yay for Wilder being open again!! When I got back to my room I didn't know what to do with myself. I had a very active evening. Looking for things to do before classes start tomorrow, I redecorated my door (actually it was hardly decorated in the first place), organized my top desk drawer, made a collage, and tried to get my paper lamp shade on a lamp (not exactly successful on that one).

So yeah, in honor of the first day of classes I've decided to dress up tomorrow!

To begin with the beginning:

Thursday: I don't really remember Thursday anymore. I think I walked Newton and Kobe, I'm sure I ate stuff, but mostly, I wrote my paper. I decided the weekend WOULD be free and happy, so I sat down around 3 and started writing my Sappho's Muse paper. I was definitely the first one to hand it in!

Friday: Jill emailed to cancel my Kobe walking duties for today, so I had an unexpected amount of time on my hands. After my last Sappho class, and a weird thrown together lunch, I cleaned my room, braved hurricane-like winds to get another rug from a student living off campus, and got ready for Andrew's arrival! For dinner we went to Blanchard, but the new station wasn't even serving anything good. So we just stuck to the old menu. After, we watched Ed with Korisha and then headed back to my room.

Saturday: We got a fairly early start today! After eatching "brunch" at Blanchard we went to Springfield to see Love Actually. It was really great and sad in parts but always entertaining. Then we went to the mall so I could return my two right shoes. I proceeded to buy a toggle sweater and a too short skirt (which we'll be returning next weekend). I returned the toggle sweater after finding another one very similar for less.

Afterwards, we hurried to Northampton for dinner. I met Phoebe (an Amherst friend of Andrew's) and her bf and we had a happy dinner and then ice cream for dessert. It was really cold though! I don't know why we feel like eating ice cream in this weather, but it's just too good to resist. We had a brief stop in a candy store before saying our goodbyes and speed walking to the car!

Since we got back home at a decent hour and SNL was a repeat, we didn't know what to do with ourselves. So we talked and relaxed and got to bed rather late.

Sunday: We made it to brunch where they weren't serving the promised banana bread french toast we saw on the menu. But we did get a chance to schedule a Balderdash (beyond balderdash, actually) game with Korisha. And Dale somehow made it to MHC just in time to eat brunch with us! After finishing a weird movie that I don't think we ever really got into (The Everlasting Piece), we learned how to play Balderdash and proceeded to win! Everyone else was sick of playing by the time we won, but... oh well =)

At this point we were quite hungry, so we went out to the weird Chinese food place where the waiter was a little, er, stand-offish? Same instrumental music and everything, but we've now figured out that it's on shuffle play, because last time "Dream" was followed by that song from Ghost and this time "Have you ever seen the rain" was the following song. Decided that the huge goldfish in the fish tank must be the object of some cult worship. Then we watched Y tu mama tambien, which was pretty racy but I think we got the driving points. Then it was beddy bye time!

Now I'm trying to stay awake before getting ready for Res Life training! Yes, again, res life training... it never ends!

This morning I woke up, oddly, before my alarm even rang. After last night's drifting off and having a bad dream REM stage within like 45 minutes of being in bed, I would have thought my body would want to sleep some more. But no, it woke up promptly at 8 AM. So after lounging in bed awhile I eventually dragged myself out and got to class on time after a quick breakfast. I was late for lunch, as I stayed after to get approval from the professor for my paper idea. So tomorrow I need to write my paper, and then Friday I'll turn it in so the weekend can stay free!

I had my last creative writing group, only three of us today. It was short, but pretty productive. Then I had some free time before waiting waaay too long at the bus stop. I stood there, staring into the sunset, looking for the Amherst bus, for at least 15 minutes! It did arrive (luckily), and Lindsay and I chatted on the way. We had another super leisurely dinner, and met a certain Emily R. of Valentine, who filled us in on the Amherst view of things. They do, in fact, call us "Mo hos," and we're seen as rather, well, I'd say floozy to sum up. Of course my explanation for this is that the only Mohos people see are the ones that get off this campus, which generally is the same thing as saying, the ones that are drunk and partying. Anyway. We had a good dinner, despite the fact that the dishwasher was out of commission (which meant that we ate off styrofoam with plastic utensils). Lindsay bottled some pineapple juice. And I stole some tea.

Our class was pretty awesome. Prof. Sanderson seemed rather excited at the prospect of colored chalk, and proceeded to write on the chalkboard in blue and pink (she eventually thought better of it after the color rubbed off on her, too). She talked about how marriages become less happy when the first baby is born. But, as good news, she told us that all marriages experience a decrease in satisfaction. Her explanation: "You know, like we all like oxygen but we don't appreciate it every day." Pretty clever, huh? And her conclusion: "Marriage is a whole hell of a lot of sacrifice." We clapped.

On the bus ride home, it was just me and Lindsay. We talked relationships and guys (of course, after our class, who wouldn't!) Our bus driver pulled over in Amherst on the way, left the bus running, and ran across the street to a little gas station mini mart. Me and Lindsay were rather confused, and considered taking over and driving ourselves back to MHC! Luckily he came back before we resorted to such drastic measures.

Now I'm waiting for my clothes to dry, as they were dripping wet from the washing machine. They're on their second dryer run as I type. Yay for over priced, moldy, decrepit washing machines!

Back at MHC after the best weekend ever, it's kind of hard adapting! But the problems of constructing my spring semester schedule and obtaining textbooks has been offering plenty of distraction. Here's where I was and what I was doing:

Friday: After a botched attempt at french manicuring my nails (yeah I know I'm making up verbs) I swore off self-nail painting (although I know I won't stick to that). I finished getting ready just in time, dragged my baggage downstairs, and had a surprise meeting with Ashley! Then Faith (the kind soul that drives me to/from Boston) showed up, and I was on my way! I realized soon into the trip (within the first, oh, ten minutes) that I hadn't eaten much that day. The next logical realization was, of course, that I was hungry. Looking through my bag I had one fruit snack packet and two fortune cookies. I ate the fruit snacks and then had a fortune cookie for dessert. The creepy thing? I picked the one that read "You are almost there." So you know where I'm going from now on when I need advice (no, not the Career Development Center or my advisor): Fortune Cookies.

For awhile I kept awake in the car by playing The Alphabet Game. But after getting through the alphabet one and a half times I got rather bored, as playing against one's self isn't very challenging. So I fell asleep. By the time I woke up we were nearly there, and I needed to pee. I wandered around the Alewife station until some woman (who must have heard me lamenting on the phone to Andrew that I needed the bathroom) came up and directed me to the restroom, warning me that she didn't know how clean it was. Indeed, it wasn't just not clean, it was filthy. But no one else was coming in, so I used the big handicapped stall to keep my baggage safe and prevent me from bumping into any mysterious substances on the walls, etc. By the time I got back to the pick up area, Andrew was there!

We ate at a great Thai restaurant in Harvard Square, and ducked into stores as necessary to avoid the cold while walking about. And we got to see Big Fish, which was wonderful but really sad, I was all choked up for the last like half hour! I get a little sentimental about movies... Anyways, we then had a little supermarket visit and dessert and attempted to start a fire (in the fireplace, don't worry).

Saturday we had a leisurely breakfast and then went shopping in Boston. Andrew found cushy down slippers and I bought two right shoes (which we will be returning NEXT weekend =/ ). Andrew found the one last pink unicorn shirt at the American Eagle, in a size XL. But, after taking his advice that I should ask someone that worked there if they had any left in the back, I was presented with an XS, a small, and a medium! So now me and Mer have matching shirts!

For dinner I had my first real not in a dining hall sushi experience! And it was surprisingly yummy. And after picking up kindling on the walk home (we must have looked sketchy rummaging about in the dark in the little plots of grass), we had a real fire! Ahh, very romantic =)

Sunday we had a great brunch in Jamaica Plain (Lindsay you will be familiar with this place?), and even though it was in the 30s and "slushing" (mix of snowing and raining, I think it should be a verb), it felt downright balmy after the negative temps BEFORE wind chill. Keeping in the Asian food theme, we had Thai food for dinner! We watched this crazy new show on HBO called "The L Word" which was pretty racey and fun to watch. The next day was kinda sad just because it was the last day I could spend there! We ran some errands, watched Flirting with Disaster, had some ice cream, and stayed up late.

So that brings us up to today! I took the bus home, got a lot of reading done, walked the dogs, checked out the textbook situation, had lunch and dinner with Korisha, and watched some hilarious American Idol try outs! And now I need to get to bed!!

So cold here. Yesterday I whined to FM until someone came over and ripped my curtains off, a side effect of the intended action: to seal the edges of the windows. Definitely has cut down on the cold draft effect.

Lindsay and I decided to try out the Amherst College cuisine while we're on campus for the psych course. Turns out centralized dining doesn't seem that bad at all. They have JUICES! And not just orange and apple juice! But, me and Lindsay got yelled at when we accidentally left our silverware on our trays instead of throwing them down the specified shoots. Oops.

Last night was the first ever scrabble match between Andrew, my mum, and myself. Andrew won, mom beat me, and I definitely lost. Typical!

Yay Merrie! I just read your blog, a perfect documentation of the weather conditions back in Oregon. I especially loved the snippets from the Letters to the Editor: I hope that superintendent loses her job over such poor decision making. All she had to do was turn on the weather forecast and her decision should have been made. Especially considering that it rarely snows so much in our county, it's ridiculous to risk the health and safety of children just so they can get to school late, sit in freezing classrooms, and then endure a perilous journey home.

Speaking of bad weather conditions, the "high" tomorrow will be, oh, 7 degrees! I will be trudging about between my classics course, lunch, creative writing get-together, dinner at Amherst College, and close relationships class. Busy day! Looking forward to the weekend!

I am finally back on campus!! Andrew rescued me from Windy's house, and we had a good weekend despite the frigid weather. Saturday we stayed in the village commons, played scrabble (not just scrabble, deluxe scrabble) and ate dinner. SNL wasn't, well, as good as it could have been. Being John Malkovich (I hope I'm spelling that right) was a brilliant movie, why didn't I see that when it first came out?? Sunday we did lots of new things: Andrew had his first Holyoke Mall experience (we bought sweaters! I refrained from buying another really really cute scarf set), we both had our first Springfield $2 movie theater trip (second run movies, since you never see everything the first time around, a nice cheap option! School of Rock was much funnier than I expected, and the little blonde girl was so so cute), then our first trip to this Mexican and South American restaurant in Noho, La Cazuela (really yummy, I gorged myself. but the rice and beans aren't as good as the Crazy Pepper's back home). We had a scrabble game in the evening with Korisha and Emily, Andrew definitely won but I was close!!

Today it was back to the routine... I did most of the discussion leading in my "group" but that was fine with me, I had lots to say about everything. And I had an, uhm, overly eventful Kobe walk... First she dragged me to the neighbors' house for dog biscuits, then she refused to move from their driveway until they gave ME the dog biscuits. Then someone's dog that was obviously loose, no leash or anything, followed us and got Kobe really excited, which meant lots of tugging and lunging that, well, isn't too safe with slick roads and sidewalks. So I dragged Kobe back to her house, the other dog was like, in the middle of route 116, and then finally after I got Kobe safely situated inside, the other dog left. Yeah, not cool to let your dog roam around loose on busy streets...

Dale came up for a visit today! She went to a very lackluster dinner with me and Lindsay, then accompanied me to Amherst for a movie showing, Beautiful Girls. Which we loved! The entire room was laughing when Will was going after the 13 year old girl, and I was practically in Dale's lap when Birdy was getting beaten up.

Tomorrow is going to be a busy day...!

Uh oh, I haven't updated in awhile! Uhm... I'll try to remember stuff...

The rest of Monday: After realizing that me and Lindsay had a movie to attend that night, I raced to Windy's (basically so that silly dog could piddle and eat some cheese off the top of his dog food that he still hadn't eaten from his previous dinner) and then back again to scarf down some food at the rockies and literally run with Lindsay to the bus stop! The movie was pretty good, Singles. And it started snowing so I had a nice very late night walk back to Windy's. And I took a nice bath, dragging my laptop into the bathroom for music!

Tuesday I blissfully did nothing but laze, give Windy a couple of walks, and read. Lots of reading. Finished Slaughterhouse 5 and read all the Sappho fragments and the packet of poems for comparison. Also started the novel we're reading in the classics course. Oh, and Mum called, saving me from falling asleep in the afternoon! There was a "snow squall" during my evening walk, it was a clear night and suddenly there was a gust of wind and snow just started falling. Within about ten minutes there was half an inch on the ground. Luckily it did not continue at this rate!

Weds. was another crazy day (like Monday). Walked Windy, walked to school, had my classics class (that sounded funny, didn't it?), ate lunch at the Rockies, had a brief kinda-sorta creative writing meeting (as in one person showed up and we chatted for awhile), walked back to Windy's to give him a walk and dinner, walked back to school for a lovely thanksgiving-esque dinner with Lindsay, had a leisurely walk to the bus, had an awesome first relationships class at amherst, bussed back to MHC, walked to Windy's while it snowed very lightly. Then I took a bath and relaxed!

Thursday: Another day like Tuesday. See a pattern developing? I slept, read, watched some "must see tv." Friends was great, Ross in a woman's sweater... disturbing. The Apprentice is more entertaining than I expected, unfortunately I had to take a break to shower. Good news: I'm only a packet and a chapter away from having my reading for Monday done!

Friday: I'm sitting here, having woken up indecently early (6:45 am) in order to check my email for creative writing stories. Uhm, no one has sent one yet! So if they send them all an hour before class, obviously I can't comment much on them since I won't have time to read! Oh dear. Well, we can always read everything aloud since there are only 8 possible people who could show up, and if it's anything like Weds not everyone will...

Good news of the morning, grades are posted and I maintained my A's!

Thursday morning I woke up around 9 am for my antibiotic, and looking out the front door I saw snow, and only snow. Everything rather foggy and white, steady snow falling. Not thinking much of it beyond "that'll be fun to take a walk in later with Mer," I went back to bed. I woke up to widespread panic. Tim was doomsdaying, Mom was looking for a ride to the airport, and I started a whirlwind packing spree. All caused by some snow. Yeah. So Mom and I waited for 2 hours for a bus that showed up after we had left and decided on a Plan B... Tim drove us down an extra tire (in case we had tire problems...) and me and mom slowly, slowly drove to Portland. Actually we kept up a decent clip, but we had PLANNED to drive slowly...

In Portland, the cheapo motel was booked up, so we went to a nicer hotel and had a nice dinner and ice cream and I attempted to get some sleep. That didn't work out, however. Very nervous at different points. Esp. in the plane after taking a nap. The panic hits me after i've drifted off and forgotten about it.

Everything went smoothly, despite my worrying. It was lonely at first, being back in South Hadley, but Andrew surprised me and drove out on Saturday! So now I'm recovering from another lovely weekend, we wandered around in Northampton (and I had ice cream!), fixed dinners together, watched Annie Hall & Mona Lisa Smile, and played games. I enjoyed Mona Lisa Smile more than I thought I would!

In a particularly bright moment I didn't mark in my planner that my J term class started today, so I had a panicked run over to the prof's office! Luckily he caught me up and I'm ready to start the reading!!

Now I'm rather hungry... will update more later!

Monday night the pipes froze. Which meant that we didn't have water. Which meant that Mum's emergency water stash (ie, the water she stores in old pop bottles and milk jugs under the front porch "in case there's a terrorist attack out here"). Which meant that we were all a little grumpy about the water being icy cold, and, well, not so readily available.

At some point Tim identified the point that was frozen. Luckily, Mom prevented him from using a propane torch. Instead, he used a hair dryer to warm up the pipe. Cries of "It's dripping!" and "It's running!" and "We have WATER!!!!" were heard throughout the house, as we turned on every faucet full blast. Then for some reason Tim climbed on top of the shed and fiddled with the electricity (turning it off, then on, then off and on again). Somehow he slid off and fell. But he's ok now, except for a rather sore back.

After the madness ended (as much as it ever ends around here) Mum and I headed out for the Dalles. We had wildly successful trips to Maurices and JcPenney's and Fred Meyer's. I picked out a shirt and sweater for Mum, and she got some cute flattering jeans. Yay Mum! I bought lots of cute stuff. Mum almost lost her JcPenney's gift card in the bathroom of the store, but luckily she ran up at closing time and found it after realizing it wasn't in her wallet.

Fun times, shopping.

Today Mer went with me to a Crazy Pepper lunch with Audrey, Joanna, & Lindsey. We had lots of catching up to do! It was lots of fun, I brought pictures of me and Andrew and the twins had all sorts of updates about our class. I never hear any of the gossip!

After, me and Mer watched the third Lord of the Rings. Wow, amazing, fantastic, perfect. Makes you sad when it's over because, well, it's over, and you don't live in the Shire or with elves or exciting battles of good vs. evil. Hell, you don't even live in a time when you can easily identify what good and evil are. I guess that's why they call them fantasy. We could speculate on why fantasy movies are suddenly so popular in mainstream culture...

But, anyway. So now I have either reading those books to look forward to, or the next fantasy movie that comes out. The Last Unicorn should be awesome. I wish they'd make movies out of The Last Vampire and The Blue Sword.

Tonight was kind of crazy. Scott and Linda brought Nibbles, the very old and very strange red-nosed dog with gas problems. We ate, talked, watched some of the John Lennon video and Twilight Zone episodes. Then of course we watched the ball drop! Happy New Year! =)

Funny things:

"Jack Lalanne isn't dead, he says it'd ruin his image if he died." - Tim after a quarrel with Scott over whether or not JL has passed away yet or not. Scott had some story about him dying while dragging a tugboat in the English Channel or something equally far-fetched.

"A tree that's green
Is a sight to be seen
A tree that's brown
Can burn your house down"
- clever poem brought to you by the Hood River Fire Department.

"I still wouldn't let someone with AIDS lick the salt off my potato chips." - Merrie, very late at night while eating Pringles. Merrie just now, not so late and perfectly in her right mind: "Do you think that might be offensive to some people though?" Me: "uhm...no?"