From the rental car

I'm sorry but I'm just thinking of the right words to say
I know they don't sound the way I planned them to be
But if you wait around a while I'll make you fall for me
I promise you
I promise you
I will

Making a difference

Actually, it really helps to have a visual aid like this.


more music charts

It's late again wtf

I'm working on this essay now, but I just wanted to state for the record that I kind of resent the phrasing of the prompt. And no, this isn't just be complaining because I don't want to write anymore (though to be totally honest, I would be very happy sleeping right now). Way to be really specific about the type of story you obviously want to hear while still managing to use the word "might."

In an essay, discuss how your personal background informs your decision to pursue a graduate degree. Please include any educational, familial, cultural, economic, or social experiences, challenges, or opportunities relevant to your academic journey; how you might contribute to social or cultural diversity within your chosen field; and/or how you might serve educationally underrepresented segments of society with your degree.

Valley

I've hit a low. It's kinda weird. Got up early today, feels like hours ago, accomplished things to the degree that I wanted them to be accomplished by a given time, then suddenly... it was like the key in my back stopped turning. I decided to take a nap and clear my head of stuff, and that sort of worked. I woke up slightly disoriented as always though with Passion Pit's "Sleepyhead" jaunting around my head, refreshed but somehow sadder than before.

I'm actually pretty sure that it's a function of afternoon light. I realize now that I don't really like afternoon light. It's a little depressing and, counter-intuitively, just doesn't have the same quality as morning light. It seems like once 12 noon rolls around, the rest of the solar cycle should just be a rewinded version of what took place that morning. But no.

I'm really such a morning person, assuming I can ever get my ass out of bed in time. I like the dark before the sun rises, and I like the sparse white light that you get before 8am, and I like how bright the world seems until 11:59. The morning moves more slowly than the afternoon. It's easier to focus in the morning and there's nothing to be afraid of in the morning (well... unless something really horrible is about to happen... usually late morning or the afternoon). If shit does go down in the morning, you have the rest of the day to recover.

It's harder to light a room in the afternoon. Right now, the setting sun is kinda making things dark, making shadows longer and so on, and so I've turned on a lot of lights. You kind of can't tell, and everything's still got that rusty tint to it.

Don't even get me started on evenings.

It's also right about now that everyone's going to sleep back home, so I can look forward to a whole lotta isolation over the next several hours.

Thanks to my deadline, I haven't exactly left the apartment since I got back on Friday afternoon. I've only been able to communicate with a few people, via the internet mostly, since then. I guess that's depressing too. Can't wait until the 6th, when I get a slight reprieve from all this. I mean, I could really only afford to take like a weekend off, but how good is that going to feel? I'm looking forward to the New Year with like every fiber of my being... with the exception of the ones now dedicated to the task at hand. Those cry: "NO! MORE TIME MORE TIME"

Back to work! The afternoon's short (another reason it depresses me), but it's gonna be a much longer night ahead than I'd thought.

I count!

After weeks of hand-wringing and nervous ranting:

So it's not too crazy to believe that my vote was in there somewhere today!

Refugee from another blog

Felt inclined to google myself today... and came across this blog entry on imeem. I decided to move it over here, but deleted the original just because.

The Downfall of my Junior Year

For anyone who's interested, I'm file sharing my art history 395 paper for a limited time. This is the paper that nearly killed me this semester... the one for which I'd had all the info and research for for weeks but which still ended up a tortuous week and a half late. This is funny for a few reasons...

1) I'm only posting it because I saw that there's a section for file sharing but it's the only thing I could think of to share off of my laptop. On the other hand, my sharing it actually makes a lot of sense.

2) Alice is currently my only friend, therefore, the only person who would even have the opportunity to read it if she wanted to.

3) I still don't think it's a very good paper.

Oooh well.

BTW, the picture is from a pattern called "Ladder of Clouds" found a book by Traude Gavin called Iban Textiles. I thought it was appropriate. I honestly loved my topic and my professor, obviously so much that my blood curdled before it could reach my brain, which suffered immensely from the diversion.

Thank goodness that's in the past now. I really do owe a lot to every single person that was supportive of me during my meltdown even though I'm pretty sure it didn't make any sense to anyone.

So.. Onwards and upwards!

Just don't ask me what grade I got. I won't tell!

Don't tread on me

I heard this story after dinner today. A better version, obviously, and in Chinese, so forgive me. I'm a little unclear as to how the scene was set up, but let's say it takes place at Tiantan (the temple of heaven).

At the Temple of Heaven, the grass was full of ducks, and it was very difficult to navigate around them. God declared that anyone who stepped on one would be sorry. There were three women in the park, and the first started to walk through the grass. However, she accidentally stepped on a duck. God then paired her with an ugly husband. The second woman started walking through the grass and tried to be as careful as possible to avoid stepping on a duck. Unfortunately she also accidentally stepped on one and was paired with an even uglier husband than the first woman. The third woman was terrified, and started walking through the grass. She managed to make it through without stepping on a single duck! She was paired with a strong, tall, handsome husband. A catch, if you will. She couldn't believe her luck! Wondering how she could ever have been so fortunate, she turned to him and said, "Wow, what did I ever do to deserve a man as wonderful as you?" He replied, "I don't know, but I stepped on one of those ducks back there."

Soundtrack of my Life?

So, I did this twice on Facebook already, to pretty dismal results... my library is just full of stuff I've either never actually listened to or actively choose not to listen to. My answer to that was simply to cheat by shuffling from my largest playlist, which is 453 items out of the total 3325, so it's a bit lame, but a bit more pleasant.

Directions:
If your life was a movie, what would the soundtrack be?

1. Open your iTunes library
2. Put it on shuffle.
3. Press Play.
4. For every question, type the song that's playing.
5. When you go to a new question, press the Next button.
6. Don't lie and try to pretend you're cool.
7. Don't skip songs.

My Movie:

1. Opening credits: Happy Endings- All American Rejects

2. Waking up: Counting the Days- Goldfinger

3. First day of school: We Are the Champions- Queen

4. Fight song: Change Your Mind- American Rejects

5. Breaking up: Hand in My Pocket- Alanis Morissette

6. Happiness: Such Great Heights- Postal Service

7. Life's okay: Drowned World/Substitute for Love- Madonna

8. Mental breakdown: Everything You Want- Vertical Horizon

9. Driving: Straitjacket Feeling- All American Rejects
(I sorta wish it wasn't)

10. Flashback: If It Were Up To Me- Rooney

11. Getting back together: Amsterdam- John Denver does Jacques Brel
(apparently it's not under the best circumstances... unless maybe we're at a revue?)

12. Wedding song: These Are Things- Wheat

13. Birth of first child: White Days- Juliana Theory
(oddly appropriate, but... harrowing!)

14. Final battle scene: Private Emotion- Ricky Martin and some female

15. Death scene: Breathe- Wheat
(i'm trying to picture the most upbeat death possible... i was standing outside too long?)

16. Funeral song: Elephant and Castle- Houston Calls
(i never knew that this was actually the title for this song)

17. End credits: Patience- Guns N Roses


I SWEAR I didn't make these up!

NOW IT'S YOUR TURN!!!!!

Actually, if anyone who reads this has any free time to press the advance button 17 times, I'm really interested to know the results you come up with!

I'm better at this than Ross

1. Alabama
2. Alaska
3. Arizona
4. Arkansas
5. California
6. Colorado
7. Connecticut
8. Delaware
9. Florida
10. Georgia
11. Hawaii
12. Idaho
13. Illinois
14. Indiana
15. Iowa
16. Kansas
17. Kentucky
18. Louisiana
19. Maine
20. Maryland
21. Massachusetts
22. Michigan
23. Minnesota
24. Mississippi
25. Missouri
26. Montana
27. Nebraska
28. Nevada
29. New Hampshire
30. New Jersey
31. New Mexico
32. New York
33. North Carolina
34. North Dakota
35. Ohio
36. Oklahoma
37. Oregon
38. Pennsylvania
39. Rhode Island
40. South Carolina
41. South Dakota
42. Tennessee
43. Texas
44. Utah
45. Vermont
46. Virginia
47. Washington
48. West Virginia
49. Wisconsin
50. Wyoming

Last night, Alice and I were watching Friends, and we got to the Thanksgiving episode where Ross can't name all 50 states. I wanted to give it a shot and could have done it in like 2 minutes, only I couldn't get more than 49. Eventually I googled a map, and LO, I forgot Wisconsin. Which makes sense, since it's in the W's, which just seemed like they were thrown in there to begin with. Also, I have a really hard time visualizing Wisconsin on the map. It's just that with Michigan, the sillhouette is very much like that of Minnesota, which I already do remember. So I draw the outline of the US fairly regularly, and like... Minnesota and the Michigan peninsula merge into like this one single pointy thing and Wisconsin is lost. Anyways, now I know and hopefully I won't forget again. By the way, the only reason I can do this at all is because of Mrs. Niehaus, who taught us a song that lists all the states in alphabetical order in 5th grade. I wonder if I'll still remember that song in like... 50 years.

Should I take this as a sign?

I've been led to the Small Batch website through two separate, totally unrelated avenue's twice within the last 24ish hours.

Yesterday afternoon I ventured there after a google search inspired by an episode of friends to find out just what an 8 year Small Batch of Basil Hayden's was.

Today, it was through a link to the beverage warehouse from an online comic.