goodbye 2008!

Well, tomorrow it will be 2009. 2008 has not been bad. 

And I just realized I'm now at sophomore status at UWEC. It was nice being a freshman for a whole semester. Ha. Exciting.

I also got my official acceptance email to the study abroad to Costa Rica and Nicaragua email. I'm really excited. And nervous. But really more excited than everything and anything.

I'm really just excited for the world right now. 

Tonight I'm going to Ian's with Ryn and Becca which will automatically make this New Year's Eve 100x better than last year. Last year's was just plain awful. 

But hooray 2009! I'm a sophomore in college, I'm turning nineteen in March, I'm going to Costa Rica and Nicaragua in August!

And I have boots so my feet won't get too wet. They're coming in the mail though.

And stuff~ I can't make my happiness coherent right now. Ok. 

Looks like it's just you and me at this party, electrical outlet.

I just dug my car out of a snowbank. Mostly with my bare hands, some with the wooden part of a shovel. I am so fucking bad ass. That is all.

so.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/12/25/santa.shooting/index.html

My god. 

I feel horrible. I feel really bad for the guy too- who does that? What drives a person to that? What was his life like, his thoughts, was his head really that bad and dark and awful? Was his world like monsters, did he think he was protecting himself, making it better for him?

How does it get that bad for some people? How can you go so low? It's gut wrenching to think about, to think someone is capable of doing something like that. I never really believe it even though it is on the news, in the papers, on the tips of tongues- 

Oh, I'd give just about anything to go back, just, talk to this man. He must have been in so much pain inside, it must have been so dark, the world must have been such big monsters. I wish I could have gone back and said that the world really isn't like that at all, even though sometimes it feels like it for some people some days. No one's alone even though alienation seems to be a common part of today's society. No one should have to feel so much dark and bad. 

I really, really truly think that everyone is good, some more deep down then others, even if for some people it is painful and scary and the world is monsters to them more than others. 

Everyone must remember when they were five, right? 

I don't understand the world. But everyone must be good even if it doesn't make sense. 

I'm really torn up. 

there is a light and it never goes out.

I don't know what to write but every once in a while I just get in a mood where I really just want to type. I'm worn out and my mind isn't wandering anywhere besides the now. Which is pretty exciting in how mundane it can be. I want to talk to someone, stay up all night sitting and just talking right now. I'm in the mood for conversation and interaction and human. Weird.

I don't want to be sentences but I can be bullet points. Bullet-points. I don't know where that originates from.

• I have my little star lamp on and I'm listening to This Time, This Year, it's almost over and for some reason I really like this song. 
• The way I lie down on my bed always causes where my shoulder and collarbone on the left side to ache slightly. Not enough to the point where it is unbearable but eventually I have to shift and if I don't I lose some feeling in my arm. 
• I'm a little bit groggy and a little bit grumpy and I probably don't have any food in my tummy- - 
• Booop. I just figured out in the process of making these lines that I can do the bullet points thing. It's not like I didn't notice all the buttons and options for the screen post before but I just never used them or cared to experiment really, just out of them being pretty unnecessary for this sort of thing the way I do?
• I can imagine being an old lady because of the way my hands feel sometimes- like they're not even attached to my body. Cold and calloused and not mine. That's how I imagine growing old. I don't want to be old, really, I'm horrified of the idea of being trapped in my body. This is now just reminding me of a philosopher, and although this has been one of my fears for a while, I haven't really touched on it in a while and with the new things I've learned about. . oh. Wow. Self-revelation that no one else will understand.
• I feel really lifted. Annie. I think I have this image of a really amazing person in my head, that's her name. I was thinking about her on the ride home and how she's completely fictional. I had a good grasp of her, falling asleep watching the headlights flick by. But now she's gone, deeper I guess. 
• Sometimes I wish my eyes were brown because of the song Brown Brown Brown by Paul Baribeau. I wish my hair was brown sometimes too because of his other songs. I really, really adore him. 
• I wish I had somewhere to go right now, I feel cooped up inside myself- I just want to see people and places and lights right now. Strangers. Big snowflakes. Streetlights. And frozen water. 
• I can't remember her name, the girl in my story from last year. Did she even have one? I can't remember. I can't remember. I want to continue it on- expand it, more views, more depth, reviserepeat. I put part of myself in that story, a part that I can never get back. I want to see it again. 
• I can't find my retainer and that fact is irritating me. 
• I think it's a miracle just to be breathing. 
• I'm so inspired right now and I know this feeling and I don't like it because I'm getting too worked up with no real outlet right now. I need to calm down. I need to calm myself down. 
• Breathe. Out- in. Out- in.
• Directions for living? Just a reminder, fyi, sketch in a datebook. you know. the usual, with hashbrowns and orange juice- no pulp. 

if god is an astronaut, if this world is beyond shapes and lines.  

Every time I eat a pomegranate it is like a tiny little genocide. My white computer is covered in blood spatters, the only remnants of what was once alive and good in the world. Well, I guess that the raggedy shell remains but no one is going to look at that and see what was once the small little paradise of ruby gems. That is, paradise until the killings happened. All because they were different. Not even that different, but just different enough to inspire such hatred.

I should clean my computer, wipe away the only evidence of what has transpired so no one will ever have to be faced with the ugly truth of what we're capable of doing out of ignorance. But I won't. Until it becomes too much and I break down and admit to it like the rest of them. I'm the same, we're all the same. It's ugly and disgusting. We're ugly and disgusting.

Today is the twenty-third of December, my grandpa's birthday. And the day my grandma died. And the day my grandma's sister died. It feels like so much more than just a day to me. How beautiful, in a sad way. My grandma wasn't even that old- she had a form of disease that was similar to mad cow disease or ALS. Something in her brain. The doctors never quite figured out what it was, but she just. wasted. away. It killed her. She was just in pain, constantly, for years. I can remember hearing her crying when I was little, her small bony frame in the brown recliner chair she couldn't move from. She always looked out the window and she always cried. It was that uncomfortable inhuman feeling where can hear it but you don't know what to do. I was young, I don't even know, and I didn't know if I should look or not. It seemed like I shouldn't, like I should pretend everything was fine. I don't even remember my grandma healthy. 

We wouldn't visit too often because of the whole living in a different country thing, but I remember the last time we did. Saying goodbye to my grandma, by now bedridden, knowing in that strange childlike realization sort of way that this would be the last time I'd probably ever see her alive-- I just want to remember her happy and healthy. I don't want to think of the dark sitting room, the recliner, the window. I don't want to hear it, to see it, to smell it (medciney and uriney, like a doctor but in my grandpa's home), to feel that uncomfortable unease. But I do. 

She finally died, then. This day, years ago. The day before Christmas, my grandpa's birthday. I remember that day. I remember my mom's tears. I hate my mom's tears, they hurt almost like my grandma's. I was young, but when we went to her funeral (that christmas wasn't really like it) I knew grandma wasn't crying anymore.

I wasn't sad when I put the small scoop of dirt over her casket in the ground. Because I know my grandma wasn't in there, she wasn't. She didn't have to look out that window anymore. She was out of her body that had failed her before her mind did. She didn't have to hurt anymore.

One night when I was back home, lying in bed at night, trying to fall asleep I heard my bedroom door open. I looked over, and it was cracked open. I wasn't sure if I'd just left it open or if it had just opened but I convinced myself I'd left it that way, squeezed my eyes shut and buried my face in the pillow, not wanting to think about what could be out and about in the nighttime. I felt someone sit on the edge of my bed, the small displacement of weight and creak of protest. I was afraid, then I felt a hand in my hair, stroking slowly. In a sudden burst of idon'tknowwhat I opened my eyes and looked-- nothing. The weight was gone, and so was the hand.

I'm going to stop now. 

almost, maine~

I just saw a really nice play on campus called Almost, Maine. It was just a bunch of little snippits into people's lives, sweet ones, nice ones, sad ones. . . just bits here and there. The scenes were arranged in ways that you could never be too sure exactly what they were getting at until the end of the scene. It usually consisted of two people, and I can't make words right now to make this make sense to anyone else. 

There was only one that followed up, and it started at the very beginning of the play and was wrapped up at the very end. Just.. awh. It was fantastic.

It was a great play. All the theater I've seen at Eau Claire has been great, I really want to get into the program here because I miss it so much, but I'm not exactly sure how I go about that.

I'm going to find out though. I miss everything about theatre right now.

It's been snowin' for a while now. . .

I need to suck up my hatred of shopping and go out and buy some shoes when I'm on winter break. My worn out, holey shoes are just not cutting it anymore. My mom saw them and was like, "Yeah, you need shoes, and then we can throw those away." But that's where she's wrong. I love my shoes. Too much, perhaps. I didn't even leave them outside my hall on St. Nick's Eve yesterday for our floor because I was too afraid someone would mess with them. Then not only would I be out one shoe but I'd have nothing but skin for my feet.

Well, I guess I could always go about in my heels until I get back home, but let's be serious, that's a horrible idea. Well, I'd look absolutely fantastic fashion-wise (heels are NEVER a bad idea) but I quite fancy having all of my toes and not losing limbs to frostbite.

Winter is a cruel mistress, especially in the seas of Eau Claire, Wisconsin. And I'm assuming that to be double especially if heels were to be factored into the equation.

Oh, and the hill. The hillllllllll. For those of you who have never been to my neck of Wisconsin, you have no idea w

hat I'm talking about when I refer to the hill. What's so bad about a hill, you may ask? But no, you must have misunderstood me, because I clearly referred to this as THE hill. This isn't just "a" hill. No. THE. Not with a capital "t" but that's because I'm kind of afraid of what that might connote. 

Some people in my hall are like "OH PRETTY THE SNOW THE SNOW OMG THE SNOW PRETTYPRETTYSNOWFLAKESLOLOMGMYBFFJILL!!!1"

But they are wrong. Yes, it is pretty sometimes, especially when it falls in huge flakes and it's night and I'm happy. But that happiness is merely superficial and the only thing you have left is the angst that snow brings. 

I'm watching this wife swap show right now. And it is wonderfully entertaining, more so then should be necessary. One family is very liberal and anti-war and from Minnesota and all that stuff and the other is incredibly Bush-supporting and Christian and from Kentucky. Quote from one of the sons of the Minnesotan family "Jesus was a carpenter who liked to talk a lot!" 

Pro-Bush mom: "You

 are so a teenager"

Son: "I am so a teenager. And you are so an ignorant American."

Bahaha. Wow. Um. 

Yeah. Monday's tomorrow, which means start of secret snowflake gifts along our hall. I'M WAY EXCITED, LIKE YOU WOULDN'T BELIEVE. I get way into this sort of thing. I made my girl a CD for the first gift. 

It goes like this:

1. Grape Picker - Juniper Tar

2. P.S. You Rock My World - Eels

3. Arms - Seabear

4. 5 Years Time (Sun Sun Sun) - Noah and the Whale

5. Ten Things - Paul Baribeau

6. For Emma - Bon Iver

7. Happyships - Watercolor Paintings

8. The Ghost Inside Our House - Cloud Cult

9. How a Helicopter Sounds - The City on Film

10. Fell Down the Stairs - Tilly and the Wall

11. You're the Good Things - Modest Mouse

12. Lay Down Your Arms - Flowers from the Man Who Shot Your Cousin

13. Raindrops - Regina Spektor

14. Strawberry - Paul Baribeau

15. Cut Your Hair - Pavement

16. Ooh La - The Kooks

17. Decatur, Or, Round of Applause for Your Stepmother! - Sufjan Stevens

18. We Will Become Silhouettes - The Shins

19. Red Right Ankle - The Decemberists

20. I Am John - Loney, Dear

21. Transistor Radio - Cloud Cult

22. At Last - Neko Case

23. Silent Night - Jingle Cats (Hahahaha.)

I worked like, crazy mad hard on this, like looking on her facebook to see what she liked and forming stuff around what she liked. Augh! I'm so excited. 

this time, this year

I've been just having a terrible night for so many reasons that I plan on forgetting.

Walking back up the hill in the snow and freezing, I heard someone walking behind me and I was like, "Ok, I'm not going to turn or acknowledge this person or even be human in the slightest at all because right now no one else cares so I don't either and I'm going to stop trying all this stuff, even if he talks to me I'm going to ignore him and not even think about it."

If you've heard me rave at all this week you probably know what I'm talking about in terms of being human and all.

But anyways, I heard him walking behind me, and as I began my ascent he said to me, "Quite slippery, huh?" And started up conversation with me.

So I talked with him as I climbed the hill. And that was it. That simple bit.

I'd rave about why this means just so much to me, but I don't feel like it. But it really, really did.

Then I was starting to think that maybe the night wasn't that bad after all, but then I was like, oh yeah, that was such a coincidence, like of course that would just happen on the night I'm discouraged and not caring.

Then I saw two bunnies outside my residence hall. Just chilling, in the snow. 

I stood and watched them, and they watched me. And didn't leave or run or anything. I finally turned and went inside because the cold caught up again. 

A sign, yes. Yes. Ugh. But I'd just much rather be in a bad mood, but I can't.

Doesn't change the fact that I got all prettied up and went out for absolutely nothing.

I'm just glad my roommate's out of town this weekend so at least I can just be alone the whole weekend. I'm sick of people. Hrmph. 

The Good Things About Christmas

So I really dislike Christmas. But I must concede there are some good things. 

This is all I can think of. For right now.

1. No school for a month.

2. Candy canes.

3. Ripping up wrapping paper. 

4. Christmas smells good.

5. Jingle Cats & Sufjan Stevens Christmas music. (This one is not confirmed, but Casey says it's good.)

6. Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (That one clay movie that's ballin.)

7. Casey always gets a CD for Christmas. 

8. Holidazzle parade.

9. Snow days! 

This is everything I can think of. Oops.

I never really have anything to say exactly.

I'm back from Matty Pop Chart & Kimya Dawson. It was a lot of fun.

Today has been really good. But kind of sad just because for some reason I'm thinking it's the last day I'm gonna see David before he moves on Tuesday. I guess it was gonna be, but now he's coming to Dunn Brothers with me and Jake tomorrow at 6:30 in the morning. Me and Jake are going to there to do myspace surveys together because we enjoy passing our time in such a manner and now it appears that David will be coming along too.

I'm actually pretty glad because it was really weird saying goodbye to him. He's a really close friend and he's been less than a mile away as far as I can remember. I'm really bad at saying goodbye and most of the time I'd rather just walk away without saying anything at all. I'm not worried that we're going to not be friends or anything because we've been friends for so long it isn't like we're going to drift apart or anything, I'll see him again sometime later, I know it. And I'm really happy he's going because that's such an awesome thing. When I hugged him goodbye and hopped in my car to go to the bus stop I actually had to hold back tears. I've kind of been crying a lot today, even during the concert. It was weird because me and Ryn were both in crying moods so we're just sitting there in tears and it was weird because it wasn't like I was in a bad mood, just a tears mood. 

I'm still kinda in a tears mood even though this has been a really good day and tomorrow will be even better because I'm waking up really stupidly early to go to stupid things with Jake and David, then going to see Ian in Saint Paul. And Sunday I'm going to see Ally in Minneapolis. So this weekend is a lot of driving which I don't like, but it is also a lot of friends and singing loudly in my car, which I do enjoy greatly.

It probably doesn't help my mood that I've had a raging headache the past two days. I think my head is going to explode. But I'm still in a really good mood.

I had to go to the mall of america today to meet Ryn there after she got off work and it was pretty terrible because of black friday which I forgot about until arriving. I don't like people. 

I like my dog and my bed and making cookies and stir fry and when Ryn buys Becca yellow flowers because that's her favorite color. I personally rather despise yellow but I like that Becca likes it because I like her. 

skyskyskyskyskysky!

so turns out i really dig writing about things i like.

i'm going to do that again sometime, maybe today.

i was walking back from art class and kind of feeling like an ant in the whole waking life view of things where i was like, i'm just doing the necessarily things to keep the colony happy i'm not being human at all.

and i was getting a bit frustrated. but then i bought some kid a coke and asked for the rewards cap, and then just bullshitted for a while with him and it was interesting.

he didn't give me the "you're batshit, lady" look, either, so i was actually pretty pleased. he said he'd straight up collect for me too. i don't think i'll ever see him again but the gesture is appreciated. he seemed to really go for my whole "autopilot" talk too, which is always nice when someone gets ya. he was a neato kid. would speak to again.

probably won't ever see again.

shame, this huge university place sometimes.

have i mentioned that i'm inlove with cloud cult recently?

i want to die with love. right now.

ally gave me "feel good ghosts" and "advice from the happy hippopotamus" today. so that totals three cloud cult CDs in one day.

faaack. i'm inlove. with an entire group of people. 

oh goodness. 

i think i'm going to make another list of things i like.

- i like journey of the featherless by cloud cult.

i like staying up really stupidly late just being around people and smiling and happy. 

i like my art 106 teacher's projects, they blew my mind when she told them about us today. i like watching movies that are really good. i like listening to music when the people making it are really cutesy, like paul baribeau, matty pop chart, & especially cloud cult. i like when people smell like orange juice. i like realizing how happy i truly am. i like reading stephen king. i like having to come to the realization that i'm a huge creep. i like wearing purple and green together. i like when girls have longish brown-auburn hair that has that perfect amount of curl. i like trying to teach myself to play guitar and really not getting anywhere but still being happy about it because it has only been two days so i have time.

i make long rambles with my words but i am ok with it.

i got a raise at work today, hurray for twenty-five cents more. i kind of want to quit and not come back to it next semester but my boss like, practically begged me not to go. and my job is easy and i'm going to make more money doing it and i just sit and color basically.

one more semester won't kill me, neh?

i should just quit. but i can't. 

i'm really a huge pushover. sorry guys.

this is the dance that brings the dead to the living. . .

i hated high school. so much, so incredibly much.

i can't believe it, looking back on it. and then looking back to middle school, which was far worse. 

this year has been the best. i can't even begin to comprehend or compare it, looking back on high school. i'm so glad to be out of there, i'm so glad.

i never have to go back, either. never.

this is like, endless summer vacation.

i guess this comes into my head because i've been sort of getting into my weird winter funk where i'm just in an insatiable mood-- ornery and argumentative and just straight up bitter. but then i thought back to last year and everything then, and junior year, and freshman year, and sophomore year, and 8th grade, and 7th grade and how inexplicably horrid that was-- i'm so much better off. 

there's so much wrong with high school that i can't even begin to express and go on about right now. i was talking with my friend casey here and was practically in tears about it and just everything. i think that's winter coming in too.

i feel really bad whenever i get this way because i'm not happy like this.

i don't know what's wrong but when i figure it out i guess i'll fix it.

i saw cloud cult monday night.

the song " the dance of the dead " makes me cry. i've been listening to them all day because ian lent me enough money to buy the meaning of eight. i'm so in love with this CD and with cloud cult and oh man. i don't know the words. i'm pretty sure i don't know what i would be doing if i couldn't be listening to cloud cult all day long.

david lent me his twelve-string too, which i'm pretty psyched about. i prefer a six string like hella, but whatever, its not like i'm any good at guitar seeing as i'm teaching myself and i've had this guitar all of one day. 

but it is just so much fun.

i think it will make it easier to get through this winter thing, except i'm going to have to give it back over thanksgiving i think, because that's when he's going to germany. but i still have my paints (watercolor and acrylic), pencils, and charcoal so that's always just a sensational blast. i wonder if my roommate even expects for me to be in here with the lights on.

i sit around with the lights off painting  or playing guitar or yo-yoing far too often to be normal, but i am a-ok with that.

by this time next week, i will be home. i am incredibly pumped. i like college quite greatly, i'm just really bad at making friends and this whole winter-issue is really making me bum about that a lot recently and i'm going to happy to be around family and friends again for sure. i miss my dog so much, i can't wait to see her again. when i said goodbye to her before i left for college, i cried. what is that?

i didn't cry at all saying goodbye to anyone else or anything else-- i wasn't even homesick at all going to college. but saying goodbye to doggy sucked.

i miss her. 

i don't miss high school.

i like ripe strawberries and i love new music.

i like making lists of things i like so i think i will do that now, right here. is that appropriate? yes. yes it is, it is my blog, i make the rules.

i like:

when i wake up in the morning and i feel really good and happy and the sun is shining. i like the seafoam green crayons and i remember when at applebee's we had to buy kid's crayons from target and i took all the seafoam ones home. i like talking to ally on skype because i can talk about anything with her and say anything and i kind of have a hard time opening up to a lot of people. i like walking to just local and talking to the people working there because they're always really nice and it makes me feel better even when i'm having a bad day. i like showing people i like places that i like, and like it when they like 'em. i like when people understand what i'm saying, not just say they do so they can have their turn to talk, but really understand even if they don't really care. i like when the people i want to kiss want to kiss me back. i like digging around in the dark. i like when people make poop jokes because c'mon people quit being so grown up and serious- poop is funny(: i like meeting really wonderful wonderful people and when they think i'm neat too even though there's no way i'm in any way comparable to them. i like words-- what they do, how to say them, how they look on paper or on a computer screen! i like e. e. cummings poetry and if you're unfamiliar with it i think you should read some right now. i like subtly referencing poetry, books, music, and movies throughout my every day conversation. i like when i remember that it is eleven eleven so i make a wish on time. i like human bodies - i want to paint them and paint on them and just touch and explore and feel and know them in a way that is not at all creepy i promise. i like going through the trash and finding coke rewards. i like being in a group of strays. i like singing as i walk around. i like eating orange juice concentrate. i like writing letters and i like getting them but if i don't get them i don't really care just because i like writing them so much! i like making eye contact with strangers and holding it a bit too long. i like smiling except for when its cold out because my jaw always freezes weird and it hurts really bad but i do it anyways. i like drinking grape juice at the caf with casey. i like wearing skirts in the summer and i like pants when it is cold. i like being barefoot. i like crunching the crispy leaves. i like it when people are happy. i like when i can see the stars. i like going to parks in the middle of the night in the summer when it isn't cold but even when it is really cold i usually don't mind too much because i like parks that much. i like large bodies of water. i like rings but i can never wear them because i just take them off my fingers and lose them. i like to learn. i like drawing maps to places even if they're not really to scale or anything, especially when i give them to people to find somewhere secret. i like the ravine, and come to think of it i haven't thought about it in quite a while and i really miss it and i will go back over the summer or in the spring again. i like circles. i like when people talk to me first so i don't have to start awkward conversation. i like when teachers know my name in class. i like art 106 a lot, more than any of my other classes and i'm actually going to be very sad when it ends because i honestly look forward to it. i like when people stand up for me because i'm really kind of a pushover i'm beginning to realize. i like edgar degas. i like knowing my way around places. i like twirling when i get the urge to twirl even if i'm just walking by myself and i probably look weird. i like explosions in the sky. i like when i feel pretty. i like making lists a whole lot but i think i'm done for today. i like ice cream, even when its winter out because i'm not going to let the cold ruin my ice-cream joy! i like when it isn't christmas season because i don't like to hear christmas music when it is out of my control. i like coloring books with cats inside. i like tinsel a whole lot. i like how i thought i was done earlier but turns out i like a lot of stuff.

this is an incredibly long post. but i have a lot to say sometimes and it looks like today is one of those days. 

i have a lot more likes, maybe for a different day. 

i miss talking a lot to people. i feel chatty. 

ok. 

Well yeah.

I just had a wonderful, wonderful Tuesday.

Beyond belief or realization. Usually my Tuesday suck really big, so it was a really nice change. I have tickets to go see Cloud Cult at UW-Stout next Monday but I can't find anyone to take my shift from me at work. Tonight is pretty much my last shot, so I'm going to probably straight up beg everyone working tonight or see if anyone will possibly take even half my shift because I work until nine and the show starts at eight.

Sure, there's an opening band, so maybe even when I get off work at nine I'll still be able to catch them. It takes twenty minutes to go to UW-Stout though, so I'd arrive at 9:20? Probably miss part of the show, but I guess anything is better than absolutely nothing.

I hope David actually can come because otherwise there's no way I'll be able to go. I'm really excited because hopefully he'll be done with his math then too. And if he comes up he's lending me his twelve string guitar. I miss guitars bad. I wish it was just a regular one because the twelve strings kinda freak me out sometimes but hey, beggars can't be choosers. 

I'm listening to The Trapeze Swinger by Iron & Wine, mentally readying myself to go down to lower campus with a book and stop by and turn in my study abroad application, perhaps buy myself a cup of tea and then possibly go read and relax in one of the lounge rooms and then go to art class where we're working on watercolor paintings. I'm painting this skyline of Saint Paul and the Mississippi River down by Harriet Island from a picture my mom took. Minnesota is so beautiful.

It is absolutely wild to think that next year, I could(will?) be in Costa Rica. In case you were wondering, world, that's why I have a huge smile walking up and down the hill in the sleet when the rest of you are all frowny and shivery. 

I should probably go to sleep.

But I'm awake because of an art history paper. Well, rough draft, I guess. But unfinished, none the e less. Tomorrow we have to bring in a draft of our position essay regarding the ownership of antiquities for a peer review session so I guess I better get that done.

I'm not really feeling writing it right now though, so I'll probably just wake up really early and slip that in. I know where I'm going in the essay and everything so I'm really not that worried about it. If it sucks it doesn't really matter -- its officially due the day before Thanksgiving Break and I'll have plenty of time to do that.

This weekend I saw the play Flowers for Algernon back at the ol' PLHS. It was wonderful, I enjoyed it so greatly. And I'm not just saying that because some of the kiddos who were in it also happen to read this little thing, I truly mean it. I throughly, throughly enjoyed it although I must say it is quite strange to watch a play from the position of an onlooker and having nothing to do with anything in the play. I miss theatre so much, I was thinking about it a few days ago and that's practically how I met all the people I'm friends with these days. 

I made up my mind a few weeks ago to join theatre in college and I'm really going to try and get involved in that. I can't be away from it! It's a wonderful addiction of mine, I guess.

On Saturday, I ate an egg with two yolks. Double the embryos for me! That egg was magic and made me magic for as long as I stayed awake after eating it.

I woke up today, my first full day of being unmagic and found out I was sick. Sunday night I went to bed at 9:30- I slept until around 10:30 this morning! Thirteen hours! Then I slept some more from 11:00 until noon. So fourteen! 

I am a sickness vanquishing machine!

I think I might just wake up early and continue the dreaded paper later.

And it isn't sleeping, not while I'm vanquishing the sick! So I guess I can call myself productive in that sense.

Peace.

Doing stuff.

So I'm recently beginning to realize just how much of a creep I really am. I've started getting really competitive (with myself) for the little coke and pepsi rewards. Do I buy the soda like a normal person? Heck no!

Instead, I've taken to rifling through the recycling bin on my floor in search of points for free stuff. Today I realized, wait, my residence hall has four floors-- straight up, that means four recycling bins! 

So I went to every one on every floor. 

Then, going to the cafeteria, I realized, wait, there are a lot of residence halls here on campus. EVEN MORE recycling. So, you guessed it. I went through quite a few halls looking on the floors.

First, I hit up Towers South, one of the biggest places on campus. It took me a bit to find the stairs and everything to get into the dorm areas and even then, I wasn't really sure where their recycling room was because it has a much different layout then my hall. I found it, eventually-- although not in a little room like mine but instead right out in front of the elevators, which made me kind of lose my nerve a little bit. I peeked in, only to find someone had thrown straight up pizza in there. Weird? Yes. No caps for me, I gave up on that hall.

I went to Towers North next, and just kind of quit right away as well.

Then on to Governer's, which had a similar set up to Towers. I only went down the girl's halls but still found absolutely zero.

Next, on to Sutherland where I actually made very good progress and left feeling really swell, still after only going up on all the girl's floors.

Last, I hit up Bridgeman and was met with equal success. I decided not to go to Murray which was on the other side of campus and didn't go to KT or Putnam either because they are at the bottom of the hill and I was pleased with what I had accomplished.

I have to go back to Towers because although the bins just being right out in the open kind of made me wary at first I have cast aside my inhibitions and am just thrilled by my endeavors.

I give myself bonus points for doing this all by myself. Adds to the creep factor, yes?

And that is all for today.

I feel like it should be midnight with how tired I am in relation to how quickly it got dark. But it is 9:15. Ho hum.

About: My dorm room and roommate.

Moving to college really constitutes one major, basically universal change in most everyone: living in a dorm with a roommate, usually someone you've never met before and usually the first other person besides family you've ever lived with on a one-on-one basis.

This can either be a really good thing or a really bad thing, it is largely up to pure chance and sometimes a little bit of luck. Sure, before submitting a housing application you fill out a little bit about yourself-- study habits, noise-level preferences, sleep patterns, little things that could potentially help out your roommate selectors pair you with someone more adept to your schedule so you don't go crazy and kill each other within the first few weeks. 

Still, this schedule does not always match up perfectly and even if you do both go to bed regularly at 1 in the morning every night, this doesn't necessarily mean your personalities will be in sync and you'll be shown riding off into the sunset on horseback, best friends for life.

When I was first assigned a roommate, I got a basic about her sheet with your basics: full name, phone number, address, and not much else. Also included was a "getting to know your roommate" instructions, which basically gave basics you could talk about such as, what do you do for fun and what kind of books or music do you like, where did you grow up, things like that. It also instructed you to call your roommate at least once before moving in because corresponding through email or via facebook could give you not so much of an accurate perception. I didn't make a phone call and neither did my roommate, so meeting her was kind of a surprise. I didn't regret not calling her, I feel like it would have made for a very awkward conversation. 

I did become her friend on facebook, however, and just basically messaged her back and forth, increasingly more often as the move-in date drew near. Our conversation was very light and mostly superficial, do you party, what kind of music do you like, what's your major, what's your hometown like--- blah, blah blah. But it really helped to get a kind of feel for the person, even though I had absolutely no idea what to expect. 

After move-in, the first few days were kind of weird. I'm basically used to solitary time alone but with another person living in the same little cube as I do, it was kind of strange to adjust to.  I'm pretty lucky with my roommate, however. We don't really have a ton in common and we're not the best of friends or anything, but we get along just fine. We're both very laid back and don't have any problems with people staying over or music or anything really. 

Some of the people I've met haven't gotten so lucky-- not at all. One has a roommate who she has practically nothing in common with and who wakes up really early and goes to bed really early and doesn't exactly talk to her roommate and instead just leaves angry notes around. 

My roommate in particular is from Minnesota as well, although north of the Twin Cities instead of south. She's small and has dark brown hair and listens to country, pop, and some rock. She studies with the TV on, usually switched to MTV or some similar channel, and she has a lot of friends who attend to UWEC as well, and one or two of them is usually in the room, especially on weekends. Her classes begin at 8 AM every morning except for Friday when she has no classes and her first class is her math class. She's a business major and does not really have any idea about what she wants to do later in life, or at least she didn't know when I talked to her about it this summer. We don't really talk about school a lot together or the future or anything really "deep" or even meaningful, but we get along just fine.

The room we occupy together is arranged in a fashion where both beds are on opposite walls and both in the lofted postion. We have two desks at the ends of our bed nearest to the door. Under my bed, which is on the left, is the black futon I brought while under her bed on the right is our two fridges stacked on top of each other and the TV she brought stacked on two of her storage containers. We both have our dressers in our closets and have our clothes and other items arranged in a mostly similar way to the point where our room is divided almost neatly in half. 

A lot of other dorms are arranged in many other ways with different bed lofting positions or bunking or even two beds on the floor and other various assortments of futons and chairs and televisions and other stuff. Our layout works nicely because we have an adequate amount of space to still have floor area and to fold out the futon into a nice comfortable bed whenever we have guests staying.

The residence hall I stay in has four floors and three wings on each floor. I'm living on the fourth floor in 4-North. We have quiet hours that start every night on the week days and Sunday at 10PM. Quiet hours basically means we have to lower our voices, our TVs/music, and shut our doors, no big deal really. On Friday and Saturday, quiet hours begin at midnight.

I can't really think of anything more else to blather on about in regards to my residence hall experiences so I believe this is where I'll end this beast of a post for tonight.

splat

It is really early, I should be sleeping. I want to be sleeping but I'm always so drawn to be doing something else. I need motivation to sleep and just being tired and sitting alone in my room is not entirely significant enough. 

Tonight some student organization was holding a Latin dance night, and me being the Mexican-wannabe I am, went. I didn't know anyone and no one I knew came with me so it was exceptionally awkward but I'm pro at putting myself in those situations so I buddied up right away with one of the other awkward people. His name was Michael and he was pretty nice. We kind of stood on the outskirts of everyone together for the entire time I was there, between his smoke breaks and my random dancing with guys. 

Near the end we just kind of stood up and started joining in more, which was fun, but I left to go to paint the new location for Just Local Foods, the old Johnny's Market near campus with Casey and Kayla. Please note that this was after 10 at night, a time where most everyone else is out or in the process of going out to get sick crunk ya'll. 

Which makes me superior, ha. 

We finished up painting our wall without too many mishaps, the ones that did happen were me touching the wall after I just finished painting it, just I don't even know why, I did it without thinking. And somehow I got paint in my hair too, which is fantastic. I have paint on my legs too and I was wearing jeans, so I'm pretty much pro at getting dirty.

After painting the new JL, Casey, Kayla, and I went to go watch The Happening (sidenote: I do not like this movie.) with Josh, David, and these two other annoying guys. Now, I'm tired. It is really weird, me leaving the house! Hah, having plans!

And tomorrow there's the trusty old farmer's market down in Phoenix Park. I'm not sure if I'm going to go, though, because the people I usually go with aren't. And I don't exactly have any money either way, so suck once more. 

Later on Saturday we're having a pesto making party so hopefully that will be awesome, yes.

I could eat peanut butter sandwiches all day.

They don't even necessarily need jelly because most of the time I don't want to take the effort to spread it and get it from the fridge and everything.

That is all.

sunday again.

I'm all home and stuff from Minnesota. Well, back from Minnesota. Minnesota is still home, I guess. Weird, I don't really know what to call home anymore.

This weekend was so fun but it was over so fast it kind of feels like a dream more than anything that actually happened. I miss Minnesota a lot. I've come to realize that the type of people I'm generally friends with aren't the type to go to college so that's why I'm not meeting a whole lot of people here that I'm super stoked about because they're like my friends. So that's kind of a bummer but at the same time, it isn't like I really put out the effort to make friends anyways. And I'm not too worried about it really, I'd rather kinda just bum around alone anyways.

So I was supposed to work today and I walked down to the building and tried to get in, but the doors were locked. I tried three on the right side of the building and was just like, what in the hell is going on?

I then went and called my boss, no answer. I tried her office building, it was locked as well. After mulling about aimlessly for half an hour and subsequently emailing my boss and trying to call one of my supervisors with no reply, I scratched it and just went up to my room again.

I just got a call from my boss like half an hour ago asking me where I was today and I told her what was up, apparently she has no idea what I'm talking about with the doors being locked because she got in fine. She wasn't mad or anything but now I feel really, really ridiculously stupid. The doors were locked when I tried to get in, but I wonder if the others on the left side had been unlocked.

Jeeze, I just do not feel smart. 

And sucks that it didn't work because I totally came back early from Minnesota to go to work and everything. I really do need hours, but not enough to volunteer my time to work for tonight. Because I'm a lazy good-for-nothing, pretty much.

I just want to lie in bed for the rest of my day, just because I can. I'm not feeling this whole being out and active and stuff today. 

The Two to Tango club is teaching merengue and bachata today, though, and I'm super psyched to get better at those. That's at six-thirty, hopefully I'll be motivated by then.

Latin dance night is also happening next Friday from seven until eleven and apparently they'll be dancing salsa, cumbia, bachata, and merengue there as well.

I'm so going no matter what.

There had better be enough guys for me to partner with or I will shoot everyone.  Seriously. And they'd better be Mexican. Or Ecuadorian. Or Chilean. Or Peruvian. 

Or stuff like that, haha. If they're from there, they make the best dancers. 

fffft

today has been a day of not wanting to do anything, but having to do everything because i left it for the last second. oh, procrastination, when will i ever learn?

probably never and i guess i'll just have to put up with that or drastically alter myself. and that would take a lot more effort than i'm willing to put forth at this place in time.

here's what's up: i'm exhausted. i slept all saturday and i got enough sleep saturday night as well even though my roommate had her loud drunk friends staying the night. i wan to sleep right now. i've wanted to sleep all day. this has been a really really terrible sunday yet i'm still pushing through mostly smiling which really amazes and somewhat annoys me.

i feel like shit but all i can do is kinda grin. beautiful. i guess it is all my fault that i have so much work to do and i guess i can accept that.

i feel all sleep garbled so my words will probably reflect that. ian came to visit me this weekend which was really wonderful. i love when friends visit. friday we actually did stuff, saturday we woke up, went to the farmer's market, and then slept for the rest of the day. 

sounds sort of like a total waste, but no, i've come to learn that sleep is quite wonderful. 

sunday was wake up at around 10:30, get situated, do homework. 

do homework, do homework, do homework. 

at 6:45 eat dinner.

come back, and homework until 10:00.

now i'm just kind of sitting here all burnt out. 

plunk.

plunk.

plunk.

Full-Contact Spoons

Tonight I went out with Casey, David, Josh, Kayla, and Bri and we played full-contact spoons in the basement of Governor's.

Awesome.

The rest of my day has been spent doing. . . well, nothing productive. Class started at 9 in the morning, intro to psychology. Then at 11:00 math. At 1:00 I had my intro to visual arts class. I probably could have spent a lot of my day productively doing homework and just getting ahead in life, but to be honest, I did pretty much nothing. Wonderful!

At 4:30 I met with some people from my psych as a discipline class and we were supposed to go watch this movie at 5:10 but it turns out the people organizing it got the times wrong so we just went to Acoustic Cafe, a really stellar coffee shop downtown. I boosted my karma by buying a kid named Garrett a green tea smoothie because he forgot his blingbling and as we were leaving I boosted it some more by giving some people money for a bus ticket.

They were probably gonna spend it on some druuuuuugs but whatev, karma still goes up and life is still good.

Tomorrow I have a busy-ass day. I should just go to sleep or something but to be honest I just want to sit around and be unproductive some more.

Peace.

my year in lists.

its late.

my room's rather messy, i have studying to do.

tomorrow i go home. i got a call today from a girl named briana.

she offered me a ride that i really didn't need because i had already set one up with some other girl, but turns out this ride is 100% better because she is leaving an hour earlier.

just two more classes 'til i'm back on the road towards minnesota.

feels great, let me tell ya. i love my home state. a lot.

my fam's gonna be out of town this weekend though so that will be kind of weird. i hate being at my house alone, it freaks me out.

i'll probably be too busy hanging out with everyone to be alone though. hopefully.

shit, this is just more procrastination.

peaaaace.

Monday, monday~

Every Monday morning at the bottom of the hill on our campus, there's a man standing in a flatboard sign giving out free high fives to everyone passing.

I always forget he'll be there at the beginning of the week. Waking up on Mondays is always rough  and getting up to walk down the hill, especially when it is all cold and overcast and you're walking to a class that sucks but every time I see that guy down there giving out high fives I can't help but smile.

In fact, no one can help but smile.

Its so nice in a way I can't even describe. You wouldn't think something as simple as a high five would do so much but it does.

On a side note, I just got an email from the guy who was going to be driving me home over the weekend and it turns out something came up on campus for him so he's not going this weekend. I'm calling another girl who was planning on going back to the cities so hopefully she's still doing that. If worst comes to worst, I'll have to beg a ride home off of someone else because there's no way I'm not coming home. I might even skip math class and just try and leave earlier. Oh, what a shame, missing math.

Well, this is stressful.

Peace.

i was out walking and needed to see the moon.

i was with these people i didn't know, i don't even know their names. besides casey, i guess. it was some of her new friends or whatever. it was me, her, another girl, and two other guys.

so basically somewhat of a crowd.

i didn't like the guys.

they were making fun of me for trying to find the moon. And it was in a way where it was like, "ok, you're a freakin' weirdo."

Uhh. K. 

I hate that because when I'm doing something I actually have a reason. It might not be one you understand or believe in or could possibly understand, but for me its legit. I think I'll be truly happy here when I can find people who ask questions if they don't understand me or just shut up. Fuckyoufuckyoufuckyou.

I could go hang out some more and actually have some social interaction but you know what, fuck that. I don't want to anymore. I think I'll go outside and sit in the grass or maybe do laundry or maybe bake a motherfuckin' cake. Shitshitshitfuck.

I'm so angry I don't even know. 

I think I might be the only one in my dorm right now. Everyone else is out.

I think I want to cry but I won't. Because yeah, fuck.

I'm going to go find a baggie of salt and maybe some sugar, 

and fuck, I think I might bake a cake.

I hate this feeling so much. I need to find some people I can relate with or I'm going to crack. It hasn't been bad at all up until right this second. Fuck those guys.

I wish I knew the guy from my psych class. Because I would call him and say "HEY WE WENT ON THAT ROAD TRIP TOGETHER" and then we (and his friends) would elegantly sip wine together because we're winos. Or something.

Fuck this being shy thing. Fuck it.

And those other guys too. Fuck them. Ugh, fuck everything while I'm at it I guess.

I don't think I'm mad anymore. Now its just kind of nothing. But oh well. I don't even know. I'm so excited to go home and see everyone so at least I have that.

Then when I come back again I'll be cool. 

Ok. Peace.

Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day

So I've been celebrating this holiday since either 8th or 9th grade, so that's either four or five years. Years go by so fast sometimes.

This afternoon I'm heading over to the foodlums meeting. Alone, as usual. I really need to make friends. I talked to the one kid I shared a few words with on an early date today and invited him to come along and he said he already knew about it and would have gone but he had an appointment. Its crazy because he broke his neck beginning of his senior year in high school and has basically recovered but has a hard time with words sometimes? I guess?

I don't know but yeah, pretty neat.

He said one of his friends is going to be there, so hopefully I'll find her and be like, hey, you know Brett, please be my friend.

Its parent's weekend this weekend so my fam is coming up.

I feel kind of bad for being so excited just because then they'll buy my broke ass groceries.

Oh, sweet sustenance. 

But yeah, I'm hungry like you would not believe and it's time for foodlums.

Peace.

It starts now.

Abby was talking about how she was too afraid and shy to really approach people and talk to them in order to make friends at wherever she goes in Iowa. She was worried that people wouldn't like her to the point where it seemed like it was really holding her back and without her group of friends to fall back on she didn't want to face what may or may not have been rejection by someone she didn't know.

I don't know for sure, but whatever the case, it sucks.

I can kind of relate, I guess. I'm really shy and in most cases I'd much rather keep to myself than talk to anyone else from the "outside" world. As a result, I'm not really making too many new friends. There have been instances where there have been people who I've really wanted to talk to for no reason besides thinking they're kind of neat but I didn't because I was too afraid. I don't know what I'm really afraid of, its not like they're going to laugh at me or something for being friendly. I just HATE putting myself out there, hatehatehatehate. 

But recently I have been. Just random people. But not a lot of the people I've really wanted to talk to, I guess. Every once in a while I will completely freeze up, and even the times I don't, I still HATE approaching whoever it is I'm talking to and trying to make conversation.

Sometimes in social situations I feel like I'm supposed to talk to people, like I'm supposed to be the one to start talking. When I don't, it just itches at me and I'm just thinking about what I should say or how I should approach them or anything.

So, basically, making friends sucks.

Well, once you're past the initial suck it can sometimes be ok, like when the people I try to befriend are actually neat and actually do become my friends. So, I'm starting something.

I told Abby that in the next class she has she has to turn to someone she doesn't know and talk to them, well, just introduce herself. And report back to me. Like an assignment.

So that way she won't have to worry about not having friends to fall back on, I suppose.

I'm doing the same, actually, along with her. 

The challenges are going to get harder past just sititng in the classroom. I'm thinking some of the things should be sit next to someone you don't know and who is also alone in the cafeteria, talk to someone walking to class... various things of that nature. Just little bits of social interactions to make us both more comfortable. And hopefully get more friends.

So, tonight I did it. Sort of, I was really scared.

We had to go to a speaker today for a class. I didn't know anyone to go with, so when I walked in and saw the auditorium full of people I didn't know, I was kind of worried and wanted to look for somewhere I could sit alone. Then I saw some guy sitting off to the side alone as well and sat down next to him. I didn't really speak or anything, but after a while through the presentation he was laughing along at stuff and seemed really friendly. We exchanged a few words about the presentation but nothing more than that. 

I wanted to introduce myself, I wanted to talk more, but I didn't. But I talked a little, and I sat by a stranger. Good.

I've also been thinking about Meg's conversation. About giving things up, just for the sake of being without them for a while.

Yesterday I gave up buying anything off of a major brand or restaurant as well as eating any kind of ice cream. Already I've ran into a lot of angst because it got really warm and the cafeteria serves ice cream, and any beverages you can get from the main cafeteria or anywhere on campus are a main brand or whatever.

I don't know. Yeah.

I feel kind of good. 

i like it when my hair is poofy~

it rained today. big droopy rain like tear drops when you really mean it.

we were sitting in the cafeteria when it happened, i watched it.

we walked out and the drops were cold. 

they weren't unfriendly though & i was barefoot in them.

it has been two and a half hours and i'm still a bit damp. i guess i didn't take a shower today, or change my clothes. so these things really even out.

i hate not showering. i feel like it is something i should do sometimes though just to be dirty and all nast for a day or so. makes you really happy when you're not so dirty i guess. 

i don't think the new people i hang around with, excluding casey, really get it yet.

 or me. haha. get me, like i'm some sort of puzzle or math equation. i don't know. 

this weekend ryn and ally came to visit.

yesterday we went to visit ryn's friend marguerite. she's this absolutely gorgeous student at the unviersity of wisconsin-madison. meg is incredibly kind and interesting as well. i'm really glad i got to meet her.

she lives in an apartment building and her entire floor is made up of international students and they've all became really good friends so we had a sort of entire apartment floor party where we just went in and out of all the rooms mingling with so many interesting people from all over the world. 

meg had these friends from iran who she called the persian mafia and they were absolutely awesome. they were kind of my favorites, along with just about everyone else i met that night. oh, and the mexicans were a real treat as well. 

but the best part of the entire day in madison was when meg walked us around madtown and just told us what was what in the town. 

she told us about the religion she made for herself as well & i really like the way it sounds. it harbors practically everything in which i believe but in a sort of concrete way. gave a solid form to my ideas, i guess you could say. it revolves around people and appreciating the world. 

it sounds kind of stupid trying to type it out here though.

its really wonderful. meg is wonderful.

i'm so glad i met her. i'm so so glad.

i have a lot of sleep to catch up on.

but i probably won't be getting much tonight. 

the rain makes me crazy sometimes. 

peace.

yay yay yay.

Ryn is coming tomorrow. Well, today technically.

I'm really excited but I feel kind of stupid because I'm probably too excited.

Tomorrow will be good. I met someone from Burnsville in my math class. He was actually on the speech team and I recognized him so we got to talking. He went to Holy Angels. 

Now I have 2 friends in that class, Melissa and Patrick. Neat how these things work.

I'm only going to psychology tomorrow since I already did the math worksheet we were going to do in class tomorrow so I only have fifty minutes of class. Super duper.

My roommate and I cleaned today and it looks pretty snazzy in here, not going to lie. I also washed up my dishes and did my laundry so I'm feeling kind of wonderful.

I need to do some homework tomorrow and I'll be all set for awesome. 

Yayayayay. I'm so excited to have guests.

Like you would not believe.

I'm exhausted-- today was busy, but productive and fun as well.

So that's nice.

I had a great philosophy class as well. I really love that class. I love most of the things I'm taking, besides math. But I won't think about that. 

Well, blog, its been nice.

Peace. 

there's a man holding a megaphone...

all joking and whatever aside,

i think i may have met jesus today.

i'm not entirely sure. maybe not JESUS jesus. but someone really really like jesus.

i'm kind of.. still in that state of wonder and awe.

like really brought down to earth right now.

i'm going to go hang out with her tomorrow as well.

i'd talk about it more but i'd much rather use my voice.

that's whats weird about being on campus though. i don't know who i can tell and have them seriously listen to me.

you got me good there

So yesterday I was on my way out of class and I noticed this table set up with the sign "free books" sitting out in the campus mall. Naturally, I walk a little closer and one of the girls handing out the books gives me one. 

One look at the cover, though, and I started cracking up.

It was the bible.

YOU WIN THIS ROUND, CHRISTIANITY. 

Them Christians got me good. I was seriously like, free book?! Awesome!

.. Ugh. It made my day though. I laughed all the way back to my dorm.

Today Casey and I went walking 'round Eau Claire. We walked for about fourty-five minutes and got to a gas station where I FINALLY found a 12-pack of grape soda.

I put it in my bag and carried it around for the next three or four hours we were out walking around.

I'm tired. And everyone around me is going to party tonight.

My roommate was in here pouring Cuervo into little bottles with her friends.

Oh, college. 

I've been having really weird dreams here, too.

Really vivid-like. 

i'm in love with strangers--

Today I went to go see the movie Eagle Vs. Shark for a dollar.

I did other stuff too but that was probably the best. Besides walking around town and trying to find a place where I could buy a twelve pack of grape. But I didn't find a place. Nor did I find freezies so Wisconsin is kind of sucking it up.

But anyways, back to Eagle Vs. Shark.

Me and Casey were really early for the show so we just kinda went in and sat down, being the only ones in the little theater thing. Soon, five or so people came in together and I started to try and make conversation with them. I was being really kind of weird, I guess. 

Then more people came. The people who sat in front of us were really cool looking and I wanted to be friends with them but I'm really shy sometimes. I complemented one of the guys on his plugs at that was pretty much it. The movie was hilarious. One of the guys in front of me would always laugh the loudest & it made me really happy.

He probably won't ever think of random girl who sat behind him at the film but here I am, blogging about some stranger. I love strangers because in my mind they become someone really extremely neat. And if they stay strangers, like they usually do, I never have to find out what a true asshole they really are.

Maybe I'm bitter, thinking everyone will sort of let you down in the end. I mean, scratch the maybe, I must be. That's a really bitter, negative thing to say and to think.

I guess I approach people with low expectations so if someone even says hi to me they're already way cooler than I've lead myself to believe.

There was this stranger on the bridge across the river as well. Walking back from the disappointing gas stations, me and Casey saw a pile of ice, and not really thinking, I grabbed a handful and so did she.

I started running towards the bridge and we were both laughing. I told her we had to make it to the water. There was a guy coming towards us on the bridge and he was like, "Where are you going with that?" And we were like, "RIGHT HERE!" and chucked the ice in the water.

For some reason, I really liked him too. Usually when you're out alone and you see a group of people being stupid, you don't really mention it or even really look at them. I liked that he openly laughed at us. 

We went back for more ice and he was crossing the street. We ran up again past another huge group and no one said a thing.

On the way to go see the film our hands started to thaw out. You really appreciate how nice it feels not to have frozen hands when you have to carry piles of ice to dump in the river.

Sometimes you just have to carry ice to really appreciate how lucky you are.

And I think that sometimes you have to talk to strangers and try to make them your friends even if they turn out to all just be assholes in the end. By assholes I mean people who just look at you, I guess. People who aren't... I don't know. There aren't the words sometimes, at least not in my grasp at this particular moment in time. 

I'm glad that I've made friends with some of the strangers I've met and thought were cool. Its always nice when a stranger turns out to be just as neat as your imagination happens to be, even though its rare.

I guess though that if you ever take the chance and extend yourself out, you never get the chance to be let down. And if you never get that chance, you most certainly never get the chance to actually have a stranger follow through with your ideas of their awesomeness.

But on top of all that, even if a stranger does follow through, sometimes its not the same. In a sad sad sad way that I can't explain nor understand.

I've forgotten what I'm going on about here. 

Exhaustion.

Sometimes you just can't hold back the river.

good day,

its morning and i'm up.

when my roommate came in my room again i thought for some reason i'd overslept and like, jumped awake.

but here i am, an hour and a half before my class starts.

its nice out though.

& it took a long time until i came clean with myself~

(i'd come clean out of love with my lover, i still love her, more when she used to be sober and i was kinder. . .)

i'm tired. 

i should just stop all this nonsense and go to bed. i really miss a lot of my friends right now. i haven't really gotten in with a group of people i can really relate to. i've met one girl who i really like, but that's just one. i'm greedy-- always wanting more.

it's gonna take some time, i know.

i'm joining up in all the GSA-type things and all these other things so i can finally meet the losers like me but they don't start until later.

i met a guy who was pretty cool a few days ago, made him salsa dance with me.

but he was too afraid of what other people thought and of being embarrassed to really have any potential as a friend. it was frustrating because i finally coaxed him to dance and he was really getting into it & was really enjoying it... but then he saw all his friends in a corner ready to leave and he left too.

he said he might come back to the actual dance club. but i doubt he will.

i guess i won't be there this sunday so if he is, i won't know.

i don't feel like giving this stranger the benefit of the doubt.

i'm really lonely. & jealous of the other kids who came to school with like an assload of their friends so they're already all just fine. 

but then tomorrow morning i'll be glad to be surrounded by a sea of strangers in a new town in a new place.

"& the next day i'll be somewhere else-- part of me will hate myself and part of me will know that i am pretty cool... the part of me that knows i never cared for being cool."

i've been listening to a lot of kimya dawson lately. just what i'm in the mood for. & everyone who hears it is like, "oh is this the music from juno?"

i also miss people who share my taste in music for hella.

ok. i feel better.

peace.

Steamy

Man, it is so hot. Me and my room mate both kind of forgot to bring a fan too, which blows. Well, doesn't blow, I guess. 

Today I volunteered at a community run soup-kitchen type thing. We served a meal of lasagna to community members in need in this small kitchen basement type place. Since we helped we also got our share of lasagna and food-stuffs which was delicious beyond belief. It was fun to talk to some of the people in there. This one girl had these gorgeous twirly gages. She said she got them at a Spencer's for only ten dollars. They were so nice. I didn't get a chance to talk to her more because by the time we had a break time she had already finished her meal and left. There were also two of the prettiest little girls too. I'm really glad I had the opportunity to do that. 

Tonight I'm not really sure what I'm doing. I know there's a picnic down behind my dorms with cake and stuff, which is nice. Cake is always nice. I was talking to Ryn yesterday night and she's going to come visit me with her friend Allie next weekend and then we're all going to Madison on Saturday and part of Sunday. Allie was supposed to come to Eau Claire this year but instead she is in Minneapolis at MCTC to get some cheap general credits before coming to either here or Madison next year. 

Allie also has a friend here named Cameron. I'm going to go hunt him down later tonight. I know for sure that me and a girl from my hall named Casey are going to go try and catch The Neverending Story.

Classes start tomorrow! Tuesdays also happen to be my busiest day, which is kind of a bummer that we're starting on that day. Haha, I'm so lazy.

I think I'm going to go grab me some cake or something.

Peace.

Exhausted but

Eau Claire is so amazing!

I've been having such a good week or however long I've been here. It feels like eternity. Right now it doesn't feel like college yet, just more like summer camp. There's been a lot of stuff going on for orientation and like a welcome back to campus sort of thing. 

Today there was a huge tie dying party with free pizza, starbucks, soda, and all these other things that were just plain neat. I went over to this group of people and started talking to them (turns out they were upperclas

smen, too!) and they invited me to come with them to a 

rootbeer kegger that's apparently going on later in one of the park places. 

It seems like there's always something going on, its so much fun!

This morning I went to this extremely wonderful farmer's market with my RA and a few girls. I really like the RA. She's doing this "challege" where she only eats locally grown food for a month which is really cool. I've somewhat befriended a lot of the people from my hall so far but I think the one I have the most in common with is a girl 

named Casey from Minnesota.

She is from Minnesota too but she moved here from Scotland when she was 10 or so so she has a really awesome accent. 

We met on Friday standing in line for a free picnic like thing. 

Friday was also amazing. 

We had meetings first with our all freshman class and then within our major's department. Since I'm majoring in psychology, I was obviously with all the psych kids and professors. 

They talked about a lot of stuff and one of the things that came up was this opportunity to work with Autistic kids through a behavior analysis emphasis. In order to be chosen for the internship, there are a lot of prerequisites and you have to basically ace all the classes and have a really good GPA and be on really good terms with all the professors. I want to work with that program so badly. I can't even begin how to imagine how amazing that work would be. The unversity runs a progra

m where parents of Autistic kids ages ranging from 1.5-4 to come in and learn things like communication and coloring and things like that. 

I really want to be in that program. It would be such a wonderful experience, I'm sure of it.

I know if I work really really hard I can do it. I'm passionate enough about it to do the work and get it done. 

I feel like this is something I have to do in order to be fully happy or whatnot. I don't really know how to explain it, but I want it so bad. I have a lot of plans for after college and even though that's in what see

ms like a long time, I know working with this program will only help me get where I want to be and do what I want to do. 

I'm so in love with this town as well. There's a local theater putting on an actual stage production of Rocky Horror, callbacks and thing-throwing and all. I'm going. There's also a really big bohemian part of town and a store that has henna parties every new moon.

These next years are 

going to be wonderful. 

At the farmer's market this morning I bought some beautiful flowers and put them in cut up water bottles in my dorm. 

I love it.

I should probably be out there right now

First day of Eau Claire, and here I am... sitting alone in my dorm room, in my bed, surfing the internets. I should be out talking to people in my residence hall, making friends and meeting new people. 

I'm really not feeling it today though, at all. I don't want to converse or be jolly or even smile at the people who walk by my room. Nothing bad has happened, nothing has gone wrong, I'm just plain not in the mood. I'm exhausted. I think the past two days are catching up to me--- going up to Duluth and barely sleeping only to wake up and pack and then not sleep again the following night. Not that I regret either of those decisions in the least, I wouldn't go back and change it for more sleep if I could. But I really should be out there.

My roommate is nice. She has a ton of friends from her school and stuff. She introduced me to a ton of them but I don't really remember any of them. I ate dinner with them all as well in the cafeteria. I was too uncomfortable to really eat so I just had a salad. The best thing about Eau Claire is the cafeteria has a juice machine and grape juice is one of the options. I drank a ton of that stuff and it was delicious. There are also a lot of different selections of juice which is wonderful because I'm a juice-loving type.

Tomorrow I'm going shopping for some groceries. Hopefully I can figure out the bus schedule so I don't have to haul all that stuff around like a madwoman. 

Maybe I can find someone to come with me. That would be really swell. 

I talked to this one girl, Jenny, who resides a few doors down from me. She's an Eau Claire local so maybe she'd be willing to show me around this here town. I'll have to talk to her tomorrow. She seemed pretty nice from our short conversation. I'd go over tonight but I'm the opposite of motivated right now. 

Last full day of Minnesota

The title just about says it all. I can't believe I'm moving already. It still seems like it should be forever away, like summer can't possibly be done yet. I'm just getting started! 

I'm really excited but really nervous at the same time as well.

The thought of living in a tiny space with someone I've never met before is absolutely insane. I really hope I like this random girl. I'm sure I'll get along with her, I get along with practically anyone--- but I hope I actually get along with her and not that muted sort of "Oh, I have to share this space with you so I might as well make this nice" yanno.

I'm sitting in my bed, tapping into some free wifi from god only knows where, listening to the rain and some Kimya Dawson. I've got a dentist appointment at 1:40 today and later David and I are going to hang out while I pack.

Last night I went to Duluth with Ian, his roommate Kevin, and this kid John. We were going up to see Aesop Rock who was playing at a Pizza Luce. We got there in perfect time and it started at around 10 PM and lasted until about 1:30 in the morning. The drive home was ridiculously long then and I think we ended up back in St. Paul at 4:30. I then had to drive back home, another half an hour. When I got home at around 5, my mom was just getting out of the shower. She was pissed, of course, but yeah. 

Today I just have to pack like hell. I realize now that I don't have a lot of socks or underwear or at least not that I can find. I should really run out and buy some more later which kind of sucks.

I just got paid today though, which is awesome since I quit my job a week ago and its more than I was expecting to be paid.

I bet I have a bunch of tips still in my envelope but in all honesty, I don't want to go back to Applebee's just yet. I'm hungry as hell though. 

I should quit this procrastination thing here for right now and actually go get some stuff done before the dentist screws me up some more.

Peace.

But soft.

Almost everything I post here seems to start something along the lines of "I have so much to do" or some other alternative way of saying that same statement. And this one does too, now. It's true-- I should really just be packing and cleaning and anything but staying up until odd hours typing on this little blog-amajig. 

But here I am, another night like many nights before this and probably many nights to come. I should stop talking about being busy and maybe for once finish my cleaning and such so I won't be busy. Hah.

I was at the state fair today. The crowds were overwhelming. Its really nice to be sitting here alone in the dark just to unwind. I need that some of the time.

I really don't have anything to say to be honest.

we know a place where no planes go - - -

I cracked open my copy of The Great Gatsby a few days ago and since then have been wondering the meaning of and where the quote in the opening of the novel came from. Today I just happened to google it out of curiosity.
The author of the quote is actually a pen name of F. Scott Fitzgerald and a fictional character in one of his other novels. I am moved beyond words, beyond expression, beyond everything else I can feel. The many times I've read this book I've never found out where this came from. I loved Gatsby so much before and now.. wow. Its like the book has come full circle, everything tied together. I'm so happy I could cry. This novel is beautiful.

then wear the gold hat, if that will move her; if you can bounce high, bounce for her too, till she cry “lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover, i must have you!”

- - - -thomas parke d’invilliers.

I don't even care about talking about today or yesterday or tomorrow or anything. I am just moved and tired and a jumble of fluff. I am so indescribable.
I move in five days and I'm starting to realize I'm not going to have time to see everyone I'd like to before I go. I'm really sad but at the same time... I don't know.

.goodnight.

dirty feet

Yesterday night Ryn and I went out to St. Paul to go hang with Ian. We walked around his 'hood and lurked around Harriet Island and the surrounding area until the wee hours of the morning. I don't think I'll ever get over how beautiful the night scene of St. Paul is from the banks of the Mississippi. I love the reflections of the street lights and buildings in the water, the ripples and waves that send little cascades of glowing color all over the otherwise black river like little underwater sea monsters, dipping and diving for our private viewing pleasure.
I love water, any form of it.
In the future I'd love to live near a river and just have the option of walking down to its banks whenever just to be there.
The night reminded me of The Great Gatsby, one of my favorite books of all time that for some reason or another, I haven't thought of in a while. I love that fervent, desperate longing Gatsby feels and how he's so deluded with his life and relationships he wouldn't even recognize truth. His overwhelming rejection of the true reality in exchange for his own reality just pulls at me for some reason in a way I can't find words to expand upon. I can't help but love that its set in the 1920s which is probably one of my favorite time periods of ever, as well. I don't know what draws me to that time. Maybe because that's when cities and skyscrapers were born. I love the city, I love walking through a forest of skyscrapers, I love being anonymous in crowds of the anonymous... I'm starting not to make sense so I'll keep it to a minimum.
For my birthday this year Ryn bought me this amazing copy of the novel with gold pages and everything.

I went to the dentist this morning and the novicane is driving me wild. I feel like its spreading through my face and into my throat. Swallowing is getting weird and my nose and eye are starting to be off too. I wonder if novicane can spread like that at all even. This feels terrible. But I'm in such a good mood that I don't really even care.

My last day of work is tonight. Its kind of sad but happy at the same time. I had some good times at the 'Bees.

today was not wasted

Here I am, writing from early Tuesday morning. In seven hours I will wake up fully into the Tuesday ahead of me, fully begin living the day. But for now these are the hours of Tuesday without any drive or goal or real destination.
This is the real Tuesday and the first Tuesday of the rest of my life because while these early hours of the morning may seem like they are wasted, for what better use could I put them to? Right now I'm content and complacent, eyes barely open and entire body tingly and numb with the smooth night-hour air. It feels different right now than it does from any other time of the day and I can appreciate it without worrying about things that need to be done or something else pressing and mindnumbing.
It's so easy to be swept away in the daylight hours, so easy to think that life has this huge goal and purpose and meaning behind it. If you're not working or doing this or achieving that, you're wasting what little life you have. Allegedly, I guess. What does it all add up to in the end?
Your hours spent in a career you hate, earning money to pay off a house and raise your family and all the while racing your biological clock, every tick echoing like Big Ben across the vast London of your insides seems to be the real American dream, hell, anyone's dream. What everyone works for.
Go to high school so you can go to college so you can get a job so you can make money so you can find a hot wife so you can have kids so you can move to the suburbs so you can raise a family so your children can go to school so they can support you when you're older than dirt and can't remember how to poop so you can wake up every morning and do the same thing over and over. That's the purpose driven life, what everyone wants. To put this meaning into their lives.
But I don't want my life to have this huge overhanging meaning. I don't want the pressure of having to achieve this and that and make money or raise a family. I don't want to try and beat death, try and make the most money or land the hottest piece of ass. I don't want my life to be spent waking up to do the same thing as the day before: commuting to work, driving under the overpass, aptly tagged with "good morning lemmings".

People always say life is so short when really, what can you do that's longer? There's the belief of the eternal soul, I guess. But when you die, you probably just die.

Shit, I just want to do what pleases me, if I'm broke off my ass and smiling you couldn't find me happier. Other people seem happier knowing something has a purpose, a reason. But no matter what you do, you die. Any route you take, any move, or mistake, or choice. . . anything. You die. I don't understand why so many people don't just live out their lives how they want instead of having so many regrets, moments where they say "I should have done this, I should have done that. . . " There is no rhyme or reason behind life. Even if you get super rich and have a huge family, you die just the same as a train hopping hobo on the sidewalk. As long as you die with a smile on your face you're probably doing it right. Even if you die all cool and covered in blood and guts and stuff its still probably pretty awesome.

It's like the song 10 Things by Paul Baribeau. Well, not the bloody gutty part but you know.
I think I might sleep now.
See you on the flip side, blog.

Nothing but a lazy day.

I spent the night at Abby's once again last night as well as the night before. To tell a long story short, I'm exhausted and quite looking forward to sleeping in my own bed tonight. Spending the night is fun--- although most of the time I'd rather just go home and wind down by myself.

To tell a long story long----
Friday night there were quite a few people over, Jake, Whitney, Kat, Jacki, Wanda, Shawn, Josh, Nate, Dan, Chloe... A number of people who I haven't seen in quite some time. It was a nice get-together and a lot of people overnighted as well so it was all-in-all a good time even though I got roughly an hour of sleep and the morning after Wanda and I were out at the Rennassiance Festival with Josh, Shawn, and Alex. Exhausting but totally worth it.

On Saturday night we had a "Welcome Chris back from his perpetual state of being gone" celebration with basically the group of people Chris hangs around with -- Alex, Jackie, Kelsy, Jenna, Josh, Becca, Nate, and Meghan plus Wanda and me.
I don't usually hang around with that group of people and I can't really say they're the closest friends of mine. It's not that we just never spend time together or something but I'm not entirely compatible with that group so I always feel sort of blah.
I'm not entirely certain on how to explain such but being around them I feel out of place and just too different. I always get the whole "Oh, you're really random/weird/*strange glance* from them and it gets really old sometimes. I'm not really random at all. They all just think the same & I guess I don't.

Anyhow, later in that night Abby went to drive Jenna home and on their way out they saw a young golden retriever outside her door, just sitting. Alex and Jackie apparently accompanied Jenna and Abby outside but when they tried to return they could not get back in due to the dog trying to get in. After a while, Jackie came in and told everyone Alex couldn't get back so I went out there and got everyone in. The dog was still sitting there, though, and I couldn't let her just sit out there in front of the door. Since Abby was gone dropping Jenna home I couldn't ask her if she knew who the dog belonged to so I just sat outside with her.
I looked at her collar and found out her name was Abbie. There was a phone number but I didn't bother calling until Abby got home, just in case she knew the owners. She was a sweet dog and very persistent. Any time you'd even think of going near the door she'd be there, begging to go inside. When she realized I wouldn't be going inside any time soon she was fine with just lying down next to me and chilling in the nice night.
The whole time I was out there I was rather surprised that the other people, including those who had at first "discovered" her were so ok with just leaving her out there. I was the only one who was up with her and Abby and I were the only two who were out to give her back to her owner. Everyone else just went back to watching the movie like nothing happened, not caring at all what happened to the little golden retriever outside on the front step.
She wasn't just wandering around or passing through, she stayed outside in front of the door to Abby's house. You could go back in the house and come back outside five or ten minutes later, and there she'd be, right out in front of the door, tail wagging and smiling and begging to be let inside. It was strange that so many of the people there didn't even come up to see the dog in the first place and even those who saw her first barely seemed to care what happened to her.
Abby lives just off highway 13, she could have been killed trying to cross it, anything could have happened! But no one really cared.

Later that night a lot of the people had to be home and some new people who were a little more chill and my type of person swung by. Shawn and his brother Richard came over too which was funny because when I was a junior Richard was in my German IV class. Actually, I don't know why that's funny. It just is. Nate and I were the only people who overnighted on Saturday for some reason or another.
On Sunday morning we all awoke and Abby had to go work at Air Traffic. Nate and I stayed behind and helped out Abby by doing chores and cleaning up her house for her because after work she had to go pick up her parents from the airport. No big cleaning really, just unload the dishwasher, sweep, make the beds, pick up the guitar hero and rock band from the previous nights-- the usual sort of tasks.

Also, somewhere within the insanity of the weekend I went to Unique with David and Wanda and bought myself two new and fantastic skirts. I'm so excited to wear them about. David came to hang out with me a bit before we went to Unique and he brought me the painting he painted for me. I'm really pleased and somewhat flattered to have inspired this painting.

I really want to go out the ravine. I haven't been there all summer long aside from maybe twice and its such a shame that an amazing location such as that should not be graced by my presence. Hah.

Peace.

I know a fun song and it goes like this~

I have so much work to be doing, preparing for college. Sorting through student loans and things I still need to buy while the date creeps closer and closer. I'm really procrastinating a lot of it and that's really bad but I'm also trying to spend a lot of time with friends who I won't be seeing as often now that I'm kind of a state away. Everyone says, "Oh, yeah, we'll keep in touch and we'll visit and yeah" but I'll believe it when I see it. I really hope I don't forget about a few people and lose touch with them because they're kind of awesome. But the rest of the town and people I went to high school with can go screw themselves as far as I'm concerned, hah.
I'm kind of a jackass.

I just got emailed a total tuition bill and I kind of want to throw up as well. Oh, education. You best be worth it in the long run.

I have to work tonight for the 'bees. Its weird thinking that in 5 more days I'll never work there again. I don't think I'm going to miss it. I'll miss some of the people and some of the times and definitely the free range soda experiments I've undergone, but other than that, thank god I'm out of there. I love it but there's only so much of a certain thing I can handle before I just need to leave.

Peace.

Tired

Everything about yesterday was just an epic win.
It was Tuesday so Wanda and I were either going to go salsa dancing or if that didn't work out go visit Ian. Turns out we did both. At the same time. Hah.

We ate some Super Dragon and were just in the Cub Foods parking lot and bought some Grape Drink and watched a huge storm roll in.
It just started down pouring like you wouldn't believe, but the sprinklers were still on for some reason. Naturally, we ran through them but we were completely drenched before we even reached the sprinklers. Then we went inside Cub all drippy-like to pee but when we came out the rain had stopped.
I thought it was the end of our shenanigans but then when we went over to where Wanda was waiting in the car that area of the parking lot had flooded and there was standing water probably up to our shins or higher.

So naturally, we played in it. Even though it was probably dirtier than the average water. We were already soaked and nasty anyways, so no harm done. We christened the lake by breaking a plastic bottle over a shopping cart. We stayed in Lake Aquafina until the last bit of her dribbed down the storm drain.

I can't believe me, Abbi, Ian, and Wanda were the only people playing in that huge lake. Or in the rain at all. It just seems like a natural reaction. I guess no one is awesome anymore these days. Sucks.

Well, we realized it was around nine so we had to go get ready for salsa dancing. We picked up David along the way and even through complications we eventually made it there at around 11 even though we thought it ended at 12.

Fun all in all. I danced with some really big creepists, though. One of whom decided it would be a good idea to kiss me. Not a good idea. I was just kind of like, O_______________O
I saw Diablo too, who I work with. He's a really big creepist as well. He always gave me shit no matter what before, now its going to be a thousand times worse.
Christ. My life rules sometimes.