Graduation Day

Well, they said it would rain—but it didn’t. They also said we probably wouldn’t graduate, but we did. So, EAT THAT, MOTHERFUCKERS!

I must say, it was an absolutely fantasticfuckingday. Obviously, everything begins with the night before—and our drinking to excess. Okay, so not everyone did, but definitely Rachel did. (and where did that stool go? Haha) We went down to Rush Street (you know, that bar out on Main Street—time to get confusing). Dave O. was in town so he joined us for a few drinks. The atmosphere of that bar is something else. It’s not Ann Arbor, it’s not Michigan—it’s not even Midwest. But for whatever reason, I still like it—regardless of the deathly high ratio of Sketch all around. It’s mostly dark—there is some sort of poem written along the top edge of the bar on one wall: plain black letters on a white background—quite large and perfectly shaped. The waiters wear all black and look like they’re keeping the notion of hunger strike alive and well.

Our newest subletter, Mike, the jolly Briton, even came out and joined us. Unfortunately, he was stuck to drinking half-run & cokes, which, ultimately, adds up to little else than simply coke. Damn our outrageous drinking age.

The night stayed there. People came and people went. Overall, it was a very good time. I was surprised that I didn’t think it’d be as sad as it was—kind of the same thing for today. I wasn’t as sad as I thought I would be. I think that comes later with the final farewell. Those are a lot harder—it can never be that sad when you have plans to see one another in the next few days. The problem comes when that plan isn’t there.

[The other funny thing is that… you (read: I) know so well that these things shouldn’t be sad—life goes on and things change. People come and go; then, 1. you meet up with them again in the future and keep in tough, 2. you meet more people and make more great friends. But I can’t imagine not seeing these people. I got to know a fair share of them junior year—so the bonds forged weren’t as… durable, or strengthened, often by mutual scandalousNASS, or (drunken) debauchery. The summer wasn’t as hard to deal with, well due to a few different reasons, but right now—it seems impossible. To look and to think about what might be there, or to not be able to take late night walks, or impromptu trips to the bar. The great unknown. Ug]

So, we happened to stop by and get some good ole burritos on the way home. Brought them back to the house and ate like pigs. Then we went to bed—Shirley and I hijacked Sarah’s bed so the three of us were squeezed in there. Sarah pretended like she really wanted to sleep or something while Shirley and I talked about nearly all the scandalous things (read: liquor + boys + freedom + the folly of youth = hope our parents/the masses never find out) that have happened. That conversation went on until we had only two hours left of potential sleep, so we tried to hold onto that as best we could.

This morning, we all stumbled out of bed like we were the drunkards we aspire to become. There is something so awfully terrible about having to wake up at six thirty in the morning—completely inhumane and uncivilised. I hope to never do it again.

Unfortunately, we didn’t drink at the house as we were planning—and we’d failed to make baked goods (we had been thinking brownies) so that we could have some delightful breakfast and, you know, something to keep us from starving to death on during the impending boredom of graduation commencement.

Then we struck out for that mythical shuttle that was supposed to take us down to the stadium—which, I must add, we were smart enough to be impatient so that we left before it came. Although, while we were pretending to be patient, we sleep-deprived called everyone we could think of and left many a messages of shouting and screaming. The parents around us either looked horrified, jealous, or amused. We ignored all of those who pretended they wouldn’t have done the same had they been fortunate enough to be born in “Generation Network,” as one of the uninspiring commencement speakers so eloquently put it.

Any intelligent human being would have waited for the shuttle so that they didn’t have to endure the 10-20 minute walk down to the stadium. Instead, we made a track much like that stupid kid on the Family Circus through East Quad and down along campus. There was a detour for group urination in the EQ, where Shirley nearly split her pants and we considered just leaning against the railing of the auditorium watching the kiddies and their parents move out. Quickly, we decided against that since we would face the wrath of Parents should we not attend the ceremony and headed on the long path to the stadium.

I must say, our infinite wisdom was not yet known until we walked by Campus Corner and picked up a bottle of apple Smirnoff with the dollars we could muster. Continuing on our merry way, we figured we’d either be drinking it straight while sitting in the bleachers, or we’d find something to drink it with on the way down. Luckily for us, three charming young lads were sitting in their front yard with forties watching the happy parents parade on past. They were kind enough to share two cans of pop with us so that we could drink in style—behind the apartment building just down the block. I’m sure that the parent who pulled up in the lot had a heart full of pure pride and joy seeing us decked out in our best graduation gowns—a bottle of vodka in one hand, a can of diet pepsi in the other.

God bless America, that’s all I have to say about that one.

Even though it’s a shitty Michigan day, I must say that it was probably one of my favorite times of sitting in The Big House—even more so than when we killed MSU last October. Especially since we knew the guys two rows ahead of us that conveniently had two bottles of “soda” with them. Also, someone was good enough to have the cajones to smoke a doobie in the Big House. Kids these days….

The photo session afterward with our parents flocking to us like young girls to Michael Phelps was quite impressive. Really good pictures came out of that and I’m glad we got to run into everyone that we did. I can’t wait to see how all of them turned out. I only saw the ones that my mom took and they were fantastic, so I cant wait to see the rest.

When I got home—I noticed a HUMUNGUS box on the front table, just to find out that it had MY name on it and was from SHELLEY. All in all, I think it is the phattest package I have EVER received and I still have a huge smile on my face. So, thank you. :) <3 you. I’m listening to the graduation day mix right now and it’s way damn good. Can’t wait to listen to all of them, can’t wait to watch Story of Us. Sweeet. Also! I don't know how you had such good timing! I got it within a half hour of when I came home. :) Good job!

The overall prognosis of the day: fanfuckingtastic and only to get better. Once I sleep, wake up and shower. Then start drinking again. Drunk twice in one day? If I didn’t know better, I’d think it were Football Saturday.


If I were Puffy, er, P. Diddy—I’d say that this day signifies ain’t nothin can stop us now. But I’m not and he’s stupid, so I won’t. I’ll just say—well, nothing. It’s time for a nap.

let's just keep singin'

It’s really a bad sign when the first thing that you see upon walking into the club is an old man in a suit dancing like he was once Michael Jackson. Bad, I tell you. And not in the good sense.

Regardless, the night was good. It was nice to have most of the people that meant something to me be there, dancing their fool asses off like their momma taught them how to shake it at an early age. I wish more people had been there—but it was a solid group. Very much so. Also, it’s nice to let go to the music and just move the way that the beats invisibly manipulate your body.

They played Murder on the Dance Floor and we all danced like we knew the moves. People looked at us like we were on something [that they wish they had a piece of]—but it wasn’t as bad as the time they played Dragostea. Then, we were strangers in a familiar land.

Later on, we had planned to go to Rendezvous, but they cheated us and closed an hour earlier than they were supposed to. Poor Jack Ho has never smoked hookah and now he’ll have to wait a few more months before he gets a chance to try it on American soil—hopefully he will discover that over the summer in Hong Kong. Furthermore, we learned that Thomson likes the ladies to not only say his name, but to SPELL it also.

We said goodbye outside of STA. The price of a one-way ticket to Rio distracted me and it seemed just right to be saying goodbye to these people standing in front of a list of inexpensive flights to every corner of the world. Because you never know which continent you’ll be saying hello in next. Right?


No entry fee for the ladies.
Dollar long islands.
Dollar rum & cokes.
Minors [not] drinking underage.
Bad music [read: shitty dj].
Good friends.
Half a burrito from Pancheros.
T-H-O-M S-O-N!!!
Mo……Mo!




P.S. Tonight, I had the opportunity to meet the guy from the original Bachelorette, but I gladly declined. He wrote some book about… getting over his anxiety disorder—and he flipped out and made sure that EVERYONE and their momma knew that he’d written this book. It got to the point where it was pathetic and we decided that we knew exactly why Trista, or Trisha, whatever her name is, kicked him off the show as fast as she had. If he had better fashion sense, and never spoke, then yes, maybe it wouldn’t have been so bad for him to have been hanging around the tables tonight. But… yeah.

i want to dance with somebody

So, for whatever reason, I woke up with Whitney Houston holding a concert in my head. And, no, I did not partake in the consumption of any substances last night.

Nineteen years ago was the Chernobyl event. Figures, right? Sitting here in the office, trying to make myself do the work that needs to be done. An exam tomorrow morning that heavily influences my ability to move on with my life and actually graduate.


So close to finished, but it's slow agony. We'll see if I can weasel my way out of having to take that class in the Spring--I hope above all hopes that I don't have to take it, as that will make me Poor McBrokeass.


This time tomorrow, I will be cuddling with my bed and wishing to never leave. Maybe if it's nice out, we can go back into the Diag and play that one game that made Greg seem like a HUGE whore--17%?! Holy shit!

I come home tonight with a few new [free] cds. This is what I like about working in a book/music store--all of the free things you can bring home. I won't admit what a lot of the titles are because they sound a lot worse than they really are [and of course I brought some just to see if they really were as awful as they seem--and, NO, I did NOT grab that Amy Grant cd]--but two of them are soundtracks, two of them are spanish something or others [this is how I find a lot of the Spanish music that I have and enjoy], the Donovan Frankenreiter disc that I ALMOST bought about two weeks ago [but had the good, aka brokeasscollegestudent, sense not to purchase], the last mya cd and um... perhaps that is all?

I will admit that I did bring home that Chloe Does Yale book by whatsherface because I simply couldn't leave that on the shelf. I figured people in the house would enjoy that and it turned out that I was as right as always: it hasn't left Amber's hands yet. I figure that once she's done with it, Arnaub can give it to his little sister since she's going out there. Might give her a few worthy tips about campus, knamean??


Reason #632834 to leave Michigan: it fucking snowed today and even stuck. There is slush everywhere right now. Fucking bullshit, if you ask me. Makes me dream that much harder.


So, at the all store meeting--it was hard to focus. Being there for one billion years and thinking about the paper that I must come home and write--difficult, to say the least.

I get to meet Pattie Griffin later this week. Got her cd for free, so I need to give that a listen before then. Laurie Notaro is coming in the following week, so I need to make sure I'm working that one. Maybe it should be my plan to shake hands and not gush about how I liked her first book [butmaybenotthesecondoneasmuch,ksorrythanksforasking].



Graduation is in less than a week. It all depends on a few classes--we'll see. I think one spring class is in order, regardless, but it is a good class and I am not really regretting that. We shall see!



What I would rather do instead of study:

• Have a [well-made] tequila sunrise
• Sit on the beach somewhere nice
• Watch a good movie [something with a little action, maybe intellectual if need be]
• Alphabetise my cds
• Daydream and stare at the ceiling--wondering at the glory of a perfectly lit room
• Dance until the sun comes up [but only if it's with someone who actually understand what rhythm feels like in their bones]
• Take a long walk somewhere warm with the pooch
• Get another piercing
• Then a tattoo.

The one thing I wouldn't want to do:

• Clean my room.

Four William Faulkner novels sit at my left elbow [Absalom, Absalom!, Light in August, The Sound and the Fury, and The Hamlet], but my mind is everywhere else. I sit here thinking about how gross it is outside--what happened to that beautiful weather that let me walk around iin a tank top late last night?

Michigan is on its way onto my shit list. I'm dreaming of days spent next to the ocean, or at least just riding the public transpo in San Fran. Sitting on that grass in the hill of that park we stumbled across--some of the nicest grass, I'm telling you. And that's what Michigan is lacking right now: nice grass.

I've been fiending for some Washtenaw Dairy. Not really because I've been wanting ice cream, but I just miss that building with the uneven bricks painted an ugly beige. We used to walk there when I was in early elementary school--get those little things of vanilla ice cream in styrofoam containers, then eat it with those cheap wooden spoons



Sarah and I took this walk around town last night after she cut off a few inches of my hair. Honestly, I never see much point in paying for a haircut when it's a lot easier to find my sharpest pair of scissors and get someone to cut it evenly for me. Usually, it's a nice exercise for my heart either way. And, if it turned out particularly awful, I could always go get it fixed. Or, you know, go buy that Detroit Tigers hat that I've been wanting for a few months.

But we took this walk and I told her how funny it was to finally be able to leave Ann Arbor, how I feel like I've lived in three different Ann Arbors throughout my life.

I never thought I'd come back after I left it for high school, but I found myself in the places I've known all my life that felt and looked completely different. It's difficult to convey what it's like to be moved around like that without having a voice in the matter. Coming back to Ann Arbor after high school was one of the hardest things I ever did and it bothered me for years to be here. I still don't like going down into Pinball Pete's and you'd find it quite the feat to get me to play another game of airhockey down there. Well, maybe not now, but before.

It's nice to be in the process of leaving. The getting rid of things, dreaming of places to be--studying for the GRE so that I can have those scores on ice for the next few years so that I can apply when I'm good and ready. Downtown is changing. I still hate that they changed everything so it's two-way. It's probably the dumbest thing ever. Funny to think that we can never sit on that triangle that held the traffic lights in front of the State Theater, or that it takes about 586 times longer to cross the street.

Decker Drugs is long gone--replaced by a bright yellow storefront that now houses The Noodle Company. Even Ashley's painted the front of their store some ugly color--hopefully, it's only primer. Harry's Surplus is gone and done. The grandparent's are leaving--soon, there wont' be much family left in this town, just a lot of memories.

I've never understood the people who get so upset when their parents move, sell the house they've grown up in and relocate. Ten different places that I've called home in about twenty years--I'm a pro at packing. Maybe this is a sign that I need a more exciting life, like that of some international spy. I can be packed and gone in under seven minutes. The best thing I think I've learned is that home is not a building, it's a feeling.

Ok. Fuck this. Time to go to the bar. Who needs studying anyway? Faulkner can wait.

The Science Journal Reading Room is on the third floor of the Undergraduate Library (AKA, the UGLi) and the walls that face the Diag are made of windows. We are sitting next to the windows and the sun is a bit warm. Ok, that's a lie. It's still too early in the day for the sun to be shining into these windows, I suppose.

I have spent more time in the library within the last few weeks than I have in all of my undergraduate career, perhaps with exceptions of when I take about ten years to find the books I want in the Graduate Library. There's something about that whole 828 floor (that's fiction for those of you not as nerdy and/or cheap as me). I still find it a bit funny that I only now begin to show some semblance of the ability to study and it's the last few weeks of my college career. Oh, yes, of course I'll have that one class in the spring, but that's not that big a deal--you know? It's going to be about Pulitzer Prize Winners and I've already read at least two of the books.

I still haven't finished my final paper for my Faulkner class--I'm working on that right now, if I can ever focus. Yesterday, I finished three novels: Middlesex (you should read it), Lives of Girls and Women (you should read this one also) and The Known World (once again, read this--but just be weary that it is a bit like Faulkner, but much easier to read).


Thursday, David Sedaris made me promise that I would start smoking again when I turned down smoking with him. I don't know what I was doing and/or thinking (that's right, I wasn't thinking, I was too busy thinking: holyfuckingshit this is DAVID SEDARIS that i'm standing next to--don't say anything stupid!). If David Sedaris asks you if you want to smoke, you go smoke. You don't say, Oh, I quit. You magically unquit and go force yourself to inhale.

Beside that, he also made me promise that I'd come back from Brasil pregnant. I told him I wasn't sure on that one, but, if I do, I'll be sure to come back smoking and pregnant. He even enscribed that in the book I gave to my stepmom's. She got a kick out of it, my dad didn't.



I don't know why it's so hard for me to write this paper. I could talk about it for about five years, but for some reason I don't want to put it down in print. Really, I just need to give a synopsis of Imitation of Life (1934) and Pinky(1949), then say why Faulkner isn't against biracial peeps, but that he was giving a social commentary.

Then I need to finish White Noise and Housekeeping for the exam on Monday. I also need to watch some movies tonight: Nueba Yol, El Super, Nuyorican Dream and Maruja. I'm not so concerned about Maruja because I feel like it's going to be the same as Imitation of Life and/or Pinky, but just in Spanish.


So. Here goes. Maybe I'll stop looking out the window and watching everyone stumble into the library with that killer hangover and start writing this paper instead.

So it goes, right?

lo que sientes, se llama obsesion

Sarah's birthday festivities really began when Kim convinced me that skipping class to go eat with her was the best thing for me to do. It took her all the way from CC Little to nearly the front doors of the MLB to get me to cave in, but I did in the end. I told her that we should meet in the diag then figure out where to go from there [obviously, the answer was Za's--the newest restaurant to open up in the campus area of Ann Arbor. The veggie pesto sandwich they have is really like a chunk of heaven condensed into sandwich form for you to bite, chew and digest, all while having the taste of blissful delight swirling, dancing upon your taste buds].

As luck would have it, there was a break dancing troupe in the diag that we could watch while we called a few people to rally them into a wonderful good-tastefest of food at Za's. The break dancin' foolios challenged a few people to a dance-off when they passed so, when we passed, they did the same. Kim tried to say that I would do something like that, but psssh. We all know who the real MJ is around here [for those of you who are slow, this is me inferring that it is Kim].

When we pass them, I say to Kim that we should get them to dance for Sarah. Being that Kim is never one afraid to speak to strangers [especially those who are male and when it comes to requesting them to dance for her], she lead the march back to ask if they'd be willing to dance for our friend, since it's her birthday. They agree, so we quickly call Shirley and get her to pull Sarah into the diag as quickly as possible.

Let us simply say that they also thought what I warned Kim against when we asked them if they'd perform for her [see, that one sounds bad too] and they said, hey, we're not chip'n'dales. I tried to invite them to go to the bar with us later in the weekend, but we were told that we should come to Necto since the guy with the delightful tongue ring will be MC'ing.

It's not that difficult to figure out where we'll be on Saturday, right?


From there, we went to The Brown Jug to get Sarah her free birthday blowjob. You know, the shot--piled high with whipped cream and the one that you're not allowed to use your hands to take. [toma, toma toma tooooooommmmaaaa] For whatever reason, the waiter decided it'd be funnier to serve her drink in an ash tray, which, to me, seems a lot more like a muff dive than a blow job. Either way, there is now a nice photograph out there in the world with some anonymous white substance on Sarah's upper lip. All I know is that it appeared after she finished her free blowjob. Whatever that means, I will not comment upon further and shall leave the floor open for speculation.


Then we were off to Charley's. I'm not really sure why we ever go there--it's always a hassle. Either you're getting odd smiles from the guys at the front, or your waiter/ess seems to be serving the entire restaurant on their oddy knocky, or it's just a general pain in the ass. Maybe it's because the one guy looks like Gaston from Beauty and the Beast, you know, a straight blast from the past.

The long islands that we consumed perhaps did manage to make me a bit tipsy--I won't say either way, but let's please just remember that I am significantly Irish and have not been drinking for the past few whiles. What that means, we'll leave in ambiguous ground. By the time I finished reading those [incredibly racist] books for the research on the paper I must write and complete tomorrow, I was completely sober and almost forgot that I had something delicious and alcoholic hitting my lips tonight.

I had two books that I read at the end of the night, just enough notes and enough information to pump out those glorious 10-12 pages tomorrow in the space of a few hours, that made me want to commit libricide. Yes, you read that correctly. I, Colleen, wanted to murder books--and I think my love of the written, spoken, whatever word is well-known as sacred.

One was written in 1956, the same year that my mother and her twin were born. I could hardly believe my eyes. I couldn't fathom that I was holding something so... out there... in my own hands. It even said that it's scientifically proven that "Negroes have smaller brains."

What blew my mind more is that the one written in 1906 seemed to be more progressive, for the most part.


I think that miscegenation is one of the ugliest words that I've ever come into contact with. If it were a person, it would most likely be the unfortunate offspring of the world's worst human beings--maybe the love child of Celine Dion and Pinochet, for example.



I tried to watch Birth of a Nation for my paper, but I just couldn't do it. Nothing in me wants to watch it. You don't need to watch a movie like that to know what it is--all it will do is upset. Once you get to a certain point, I don't think it's necessary that one immerses the self in fact to know how ugly it is. I bet I could dream up every scene of that movie from the clips that I have seen. All 158 hateful minutes of it.



Once this paper is finished, I must read read read read until my eyes might fall from my skull. Too many novels to finish for early next week--makes a girl wanna panick, you dig?


Also, I hate that they bastardized my favorite spanish song with the shittest english version I've ever heard in my life. You can't take a beautiful bachata song and turn it into crap--that's just not right. I demand at least some decency in the world. There are some things that are even a bit too awful, even for me.

Graduation: too soon

I overheard the oddest conversation this morning at work. I had just come in and saw that I was stuck at the music info desk--which normally means that I get to tool around and shelve music until a customer comes and gets up in my grill.

There I am, standing at the info desk trying to alphabetize a box of cds when I hear the crisp sound of track pants moving quickly. Obviously, I turn because this is potentially an amazingly attractive male that will need my assistance in finding some sort of music that signals he is both sensitive, educated, culturally aware and, most importantly, incredibly masculine and manly.

Unfortunately, it's just a middle-aged man with a beard that needed trimming and a rapidly balding head. Interesting that he's wearing track pants, I thought. The style, overall, was not something I would imagine him donning. Rather, I'd picture him as one of those annoying mid-day shoppers that come and mess up the merchandise so you have to go over and fix everything up--dressed in slacks and a dark-coloured, light-wearing sweater.

I'll admit that I turned around a bit disappointed, but, while turning, I did happen to notice this young gentleman with a backpack and tattoo right on the back of his neck. Of course, I made a face because he appeared to be snooping through the electronica, which wasn't exactly the section I'd peg for someone with a tattoo like that on the back of his neck. They were both pretty into looking through the music, so I, once again, went diligently back to work.

Then I heard the older guy (Old Dude) ask the younger guy (Young Fella) if he likes rap. My first thought was that he was about to ask him what he should purchase for his young adolescent son (something that would satisfy his tastes, yet was age-appropriate). Usually, it's nice when customers ask one another for help because then they'll stay away from bothering you... so I didn't mind of course. Then, once the conversation continued, I was sure it was Old Dude's way of picking up Young Fella. THEN, their chatter went along a route in which they both admitted that they were into underground hiphop.

I must pause here to say that there is no way I can describe Old Dude so that you'll understand my shock and how I became so sure that this was some sort of comedy thing going on in the upstairs of the bookstore. I know, I know. Looks aren't everything--but they are when it comes to business, especially music. Even the most optimistic of us cannot say that Old Dude, being middle-aged, white and... well, looking completely Ann Arbor. Those of you who have spent a decent amount in the town [beyond campus, but the city proper] will know what I mean.

The entire time I stood there and shelved cds, I just wish someone else had been around. When Daragh got there, it was too late for him to understand the magnitude of what I had just heard. I am still convinced that it was either a comedy routine, or Old Dude trying to pick up Young Fella. They exchanged numbers and everything. Young Fella even told Old Dude his first and last name, plus the name of his group, his phone number and even the number of his producer. He even explained the glory and wonder of that which is myspace.com.

I hope they don't expect me to pick out Old Dude in a line-up when Young Fella goes missing. Didn't his mother ever tell him to not speak to strangers?





Eight more days of classes. This is potentially (and hopefully) the last of my undergraduate career. Perhaps the end of classes forever. Who knows. Who knows.


AIESEC twin will be here in five days (!!!!!).

If I survive the next two weeks (and survive them well), it will be nothing short of a miraculous feat.

This is the last full week of classes--why didn't someone let me know that a few weeks ago? I have about five or six novels to complete [White Noise, The Lives of Girls and Women, Housekeeping, Typical American, The Hamlet, Light in August, The Known World--ok, so it was more than I thought...] so that I can take two exams in the following week.

Right now, I'm frozen in that moment where something jumps out and not only scares but terrifies you and you haven't yet figured out it's just one of your friends. That one moment when everything is uncertain and your demise is a distinct possibility.



Regardless, that's not why I began this entry. Honestly, I should begin it by saying that blogger is a piece of shit and lost my perfected, drunken entry the other night about cute boys that can't dance. I won't do that though. I began this entry to talk about the beauty of Virginia Woolf, even though I've never finished one of her novels.

I'm sitting here reading reviews for this paper I must write tomorrow [2-3 pages--a review of reviews, worth 25% of my final grade. What. A. Load. Of. Shit.] and they're all about The Hours by Michael Cunningham. One of the reviews upset me for its blatant homophobic stupidity, while the one that I thought would do that did no such thing.

Virginia Woolf reminds me of a woman I knew named June--which wasn't her real name, but I've never put her real name in print, so why start now? I knew her when I was in high school and she used to read some of the things I wrote, which were all awful and terrible and embarrassingly emotional. I think I still have some of her poetry somewhere--it was just the way that she wrote twisted my mind in ways that could sometimes prove painful. Just the way that the poems were formatted, or what she said. Not even that, mm I'm not sure. Not what?

The ordinary put into terms that made it... you know, one of those words: fabulous, wonderful, delectable, splendid, fucking amazing. She used to speak about Virginia Woolf all the time and, six years later, now I understand why.

fatally yours

That's it. The days are winding down--everyone's starting to write entries about that. There are sugar cubes up in the office. Senior farewell is next week (could that really be my last GMM? fuck, dude).

But, fret not, I am not reminescing just yet (we'll save that for when the stress of these papers has passed and maybe I'm feeling a bit better).


Today, I read this thing that a girl I've known since very, very early high school wrote about me. It was probably the nicest thing that anyone's ever said about me, even though I've heard some pretty damn snazzy things before. I was trying to figure out why it was so good--then it kinda hit me that the ways that we think complement each other. So it was just... all of the things that I think of myself as--those were the things she commented on. I hear a lot of things that are nice that are AIESEC-related, but it's been so long since anyone has complimented me or commented on the things that I'm crazy-passionate about outside of AIESEC.

Then it also made me think about how weird it is to never see someone and feel like you're out of the loop in life in general if you don't know what's going on with them. I can list three people that I feel that way about and never see. Odd. I'm wondering how much that list will grow after graduation.



Since I got this mini-iPod thing, I feel like my life finally has the soundtrack it deserves. This also means that I'm obsessing hardcore on Michael Jackson songs. You can see me moon walking across the diag several times throughout the day. At other times, I'm on the steps of the Grad Library reenacting Thriller.

So, maybe not. But it's nice. All of this music I used to listen to--constantly in my head. It made me realize that most of it is boys and their guitars. I'm such a sucker for that.

I suppose, lately, I should be more of a sucker for homework, but that's never happened, so why begin now, right?



It's about time I take another trip out to Cali. I need to contact the brother and see if he'd like to partially sponsor a trip so that I can lounge in SoCal and hang out with the hippies in Haight-Ashbury again. Maybe that one-eyed, tall, Jamaican woman still owns her store. Perhaps, this time, I'll purchase one of her beautiful, foreign pipes or retro spoon rings. Most definitely, I will become a Jamba Juice junkie once again.

cada vez

Something in the air is making my head a lot more clear than it has been in a while--and that's not just because everyone is wearing a third of the clothing they were about three weeks ago (although that is quite the bonus). There is something about spring and summer, even fall, that seems to add electrons to the atmosphere. I'm super pumped about nearly everything, except school work. But! I do have phatty paper topics so I'm actually interested in doing them, believe it or not.

The first: looking at the films of Tomas Gutierrez Alea and seeing if auteur theory really does apply and the portrayal of both women and gays throughout the Revolution.

The second: a close examination of the "tragic mulatto" in Faulkner's Light in August and in Absalom, Absalom! compared to the representation of the same figure in popular media, along with academia from the time of Faulkner's career. This means that I'll finally watch Pinky. Unfortunately, I may have to watch The Birth of a Nation, which makes my blood boil any time I see it--did you know the KKK would probably still be dead if that movie was never made? It had been dormant since 1871 and then someone who became obsessed with the film and reviving it. Not to say that another group wouldn't have created itself and come back into play.



The more I think about what I've planned for the future, the more right it feels. Also--the weather has made me decide that I will never again live in a cold region of the world. Maybe if I know it's super-temporary or... I'm not sure. There'd have to be something very, very important to get me to live in a cold region.


I'm not sure why, but I've been jonesin' to do some gymnastic-like things, which I would probably kill myself doing since it's been years. So perhaps I'll lay off it.



Regarding the strike that I've been on--I think it's time to come off of it. Of course, that would only be a very selective thing. Beyond this whole thing, I've been considering stopping with a lot of the vices that I perhaps indulge in. Like smoking and drinking and eating shitty food. I think I might go for it. With the drinking, maybe not stop completely, but only drinking selective things. And no more pop. I started drinking that again maybe once a week and just ick. Food-wise, I'm considering no more meat. I've already cut out beef since I can't bring myself to eat American beef anymore.

Drink more water, eat more veggies and fruits, go running more often, read a lot more, write all the time, enjoy the sunshine.

Hopefully, I'll be able to spend more time with the dog this summer. That will make life more enjoyable.

Time for sleep.