Roomy goodness

I [heart] Whitney. Talking to her always makes me laugh and smile and feel good, especially when I’m feeling neurotic. And her wedding is going to be the coolest, freaking awesome-est awesomeness ever. It’s going to rock.

And I cannot believe how quickly everything has fallen into place. That’s right. I officially have a roommate. Well, I don’t have any money or signed paper or anything, but I have offered and she has accepted and things are moving forward. She came over yesterday night, which, btw, would be the time the bus is running late, meaning she got there about 1.3 minutes before I did, and I was all sweaty and gross. And we talked for forever, she was very enthusiastic, she’s all into books… And now I don’t know what to do with myself, mentally and emotionally, at least. Especially since I seem to have my thesis advisors knocked out, too. Although I’m still waiting on one to confirm… But yes, so now my mind has nothing to do and is creating problems where they’re not. Or at least where I think they’re not. I can’t imagine why there would be problems. I think my brain needs to take a break and can’t quite figure out how.

Cat Scratch Fever; or a mean way to wake up

I cannot WAIT to get some coffee. Weird statement, I know, but this whole not-having-a-roommate thing is really stressing me out, so I didn’t sleep well last night, didn’t get coffee on the way into work (the Starbucks closest and on the way flooded this weekend), and just would like the warmy, caffeine-y goodness. Plus Cassie, who was being really good but now has started being wild and doing stuff she knows she not supposed to (I think she’s reading my stress), decided to do this thing she sometimes does where she gets startled and starts to jump on something and then instead shoves off of it to go hide. Which is usually entertaining except last night she decided to do it at 4:30am. And the thing she was catapulting off of was my back, my back which was bare because my shirt had ridden up due to my tossing. My back, which is now covered in several pretty wicked cat scratches. We were not amused.

So yes. Still no roommate. Working on it. I’m showing it to a trio of people in the next couple of days and am crossing my fingers (HARD) that one of them works out. I have high hopes for the girl who is supposed to come tonight. She seems very enthusiastic and similar. Plus she has a broken hand, which seems somehow like destiny (why, I don’t know, except my sister-in-law’s brother broke both his hands upon moving to DC and that was one of the saddest things I’ve ever seen).

Poor SB is taking the brunt of my stress, although my mom has gotten some whiney calls. SB really doesn’t need additional stress (he’s still working 80ish hours a week), but that’s what he gets. Especially since he has stolen my dresser and has promised to buy me a new one, but can’t get off work long enough to go with me to IKEA. It was kind of funny, when I found out my previous near-roommate was backing out SO last minute it wasn’t really last minute at all, but first minute of another stage, I had a whole breakdown. He promptly blamed himself, I yelled at him for that, and then sat there, upset for a while (the funny part is coming). So we’re watching the news, I’m sniffling, and then some girl is interviewed for something and her name is Princess. And I cried harder, because someone actually named their daughter Princess. (Picture it. I’m sitting there, crying and SB is all worried and I’m like, “They named their daughter PRINCESS?!?! It makes me laugh, anyways.)

On the positive side, I think my advisors are all nailed down for theses stuff. I did finally hear back from one professor who had responded to my email a while back, but he is too late (unless my second reader doesn't confirm. In which case, he is back on.)

And the housing woes continue

So the move is (mostly) complete. I say mostly, because while I am moved in (but not unpacked), the girl I thought was going to be my roommate backed out two days ago. And so now I am left scrambling, although a loverly girl from my knitting group is helping out and her friend might be interested. Seriously. That group is AWESOME. I [heart] them.

(Although I do wonder at some of the stronger friendships in the group. They seem… somewhat mismatched. Not that it is at ALL any of my business or whatnot. It’s just interesting to watch.)

Anyways, so the stress I thought would abate so far has not. Which I believe is the cause for me falling apart. My foot has started hurting. Not my right foot. That would make sense. That was the foot I hurt last year in the horror of last year’s move (When am I going to have a move without drama and big pieces suddenly falling apart????), and so I occasionally still have problems with it. But no. This time my left foot has decided to hurt. I don’t know why. I kind of hit it with a box, but I don’t think it was hard enough to do any real damage.

And with the start of school… it’s piling up on me, all that I have to do. Cassie, on the other hand, seems to have reentered a stress-free life. The past month or so stressed her out (I think. She is a cat. It can be hard to tell.) as people moved in and out and one of those people brought a dog. But now she runs around, grooms her tunnel, lays sprawled out on the floor… Makes me a bit jealous, actually.

The one good thing is that I do really like my new place. My room, for one, is giant and so I don’t feel claustrophobic at all. And the whole place is full of light and it’s cozy and nice. And everyone I’ve met at the complex has been so friendly, it’s a little ridiculous. The building manager (an older retiree who just does this because he likes it) seems to know everyone around and was giving me tips on who would hook me up because we live in the same place, who could give me advice on bike routes where I won’t die (Seriously, me on a bike in 6 lanes of traffic=death in my mind), and he called me a model to someone on the phone when I walked in. Just adorable.

Now if only I wasn’t losing money by the day by paying double rent…

Watching from the Outside

I need a vacation. I never realized how stressful it is having an SO who is completely stressed out. Payback, I guess, for the many months SB had to deal with me being all stressed out, what with not having a place to move into last year to being in jobs I hated for entirely too long. Now SB is going nuts working 70-80 hours a week these past couple of weeks after working 50-60 for the past 6 or so months. At least I understand how crappy stress can be. But it’s hard hanging out with someone who is always exhausted or snippy or exhausted and snippy and not wanting to decide anything because it’s just too hard to think… He can’t ever quite relax, so I can’t ever quite relax. I wish we could just go away somewhere for a weekend, but he has to work at least one day each weekend and is a bit cheap, so really not likely.

As for just me, school is getting ready to start. I’m still working on the advisor thing, since apparently everyone post-colonial is on sabbatical this fall. Classes start next week (Thursday for me), and I’ve got mixed feelings. On the one hand, grad school is HARD. On the other, I’m bored. I need some intellectual activity, even though I’m aware that I’ll quickly be swamped.

I’m also heading rapidly for my move. Still feeling out prospective roommates, although the one I met with last night might be a go. It’s been a little weird, since I’m not actually in the apartment yet and have to meet them at coffee shops. Feels a little like a blind date each time. I’m going to get boxes tonight, though, for the packing, which totally excites me. I like packing. I like packing a lot. Well, as least the first, easy parts of packing like books and desks and whatnot. The miscellaneous odds and ends, I’m less fond of. Oooh. Which reminds me, I should put all the stuff I’ll need for my classes in my backpack, so I don’t pack them up and then have to dig for hours to find them. And I am totally ready to be done with this house. It has been a not-so-good experience that I am all to ready to put behind me. I thought the new roommates for the last month might help, but they only mildly do, mainly because it’s a weird situation where one of the subleters is taking over the lease, and so is ready to take over the house. The house full of my stuff. Which I’d be happy to pack up, but I can’t pack up the kitchen until he starts to unpack his stuff, so we’ll have plates and silverware. Since we’ve been without a microwave for over a week now and since he has one sitting in his car but is too lazy to move it inside, I’m not really holding my breath. (I have asked him to move it inside. It is kind of one of my main things I use in the kitchen. But whatever.)

Girl Crush

I appear to be in crush mode… BUT in an unusual turn of events (or perhaps not, given my dating status), my crushes seem to all be girl crushes. For those of you not cool enough to know the term (and really, if you are that uncool, why are you reading such an awesome blog), a girl crush is a completely non-romantic, non-sexual “OMG, YOU ARE AWESOME, PLEASE BE MY BFF FOREVER AND EVER!!!!!” type thing.

Some of my current crushy state I think can be due to a couple of things. One, SB has been working crazy hours for the past several months (60 or so), which has now added up to about 80 in the past couple of weeks. We are hoping things will calm down. But this has reemphasized my need for more and better friends around the area, as spending good portions of time by myself is good for me, but spending tons of time by myself just gets a little maudlin.

Two would be my knitting group. I’ve been going about a month or so now, and they are awesome. Some more awesome than others, but that’s the way all groups are. So their awesomeness=a couple of girl crushes for me.

Third, I’m looking for a roommate, and have met at least one completely fun girl who is Irish and sings and is totally cool. I’m not sure the whole roommate thing is going to definitely work out with her (not because of personality stuff, but logistic stuff such as her landlady being a jerk and perhaps not letting her out of her lease without the full 60 day notice thing), but I totally want to be friends with her. We are already friends on facebook. (Which reminds me. I met another lovely girl on the roommate search which the situation fell through but she might join the knitting group, and I don’t think I ever friended her on facebook. Or for that matter, my knitting group members. I could have like 15 more friends in a few minutes!)

Head Bored

I’m bored. Being bored is not a good thing for me. Being bored means I don’t do the small amount of work that I actually have. It means I just want to curl up in a ball and sleep. Or watch tv. But instead I am being proactive (not really proactive, but at least mildly active) and writing a blog post instead.

So I had my first ever cavity filled. Yes, I proudly made it 25 years without a true cavity, only to be brought down by my “groovy teeth.” Seriously. That’s how one of my former dentists described them (he then looked a little annoyed when I laughed). I believe it was the same tooth that I had sealed several years ago, not because I had a cavity, but because it seemed probable that I’d get one. So my guess on the whole thing is that the filling fell out, allowing nasty bacteria and whatnot to creep inside and cause a wee cavity. I also totally blame my former coworker, who claimed the cheapest dental insurance we could get was one that would cost like $100 a month, and who, as it was discovered after I left, was completely wrong and off by two decimal points ($1.00 a month, not $100). So I didn’t get my teeth cleaned for a few years, and look what happened. It was, I’m assuming, one of the easiest, most painless cavity fillings ever, though, since I was literally out of there in under a half hour. Plus the dentist thanked me for being such a good patient. (I immediately thought “well-paying,” since he’s made lots of money off of me in the past month, but managed to keep my sarcastic mouth closed.) They are ridiculously nice there, which makes me feel less stupid for picking a dentist on the other end of town from my apartment.

I also started, or tried to start, a new knitting project last night. I cast on 3 (or maybe 4) times, and still got to the same point every time only to find that I somehow was one stitch short. I reread the pattern, thought there was an error, went online, was surprised no one else saw the error, reread the pattern again and realized that it somehow was just me. So the plan is to now not try to cast on a lace pattern while exhausted. Particularly not after drinking my sleepy tea, which contains valerian and has a warning against operating heavy machinery. Maybe they should have an expanded warning for knitters. After all, I could have gotten insanely frustrated and… I don’t know… collapsed in a ball on my bed, falling asleep on the knitting needles which then could somehow accidentally stab me, and the sleepy tea would keep me asleep while I slowly bled to death. Or not. Instead, I gave up, and moved back to my sweater, which will hopefully be done by the time it cools off enough to be able to wear it. It’s a cotton yarn, so that shouldn’t be TOO long away. I might try to finish it as a part of the knitting Olympics, but I might just be lazy and not do something. Or I could cast on another project I have in my mind and a timeline for…

Homelessness (or not)

So… yeah, it’s been a while. It’s not that I don’t love you, dear readers (all 5 of you…), it’s that most of the stuff I’ve been thinking about, I don’t particularly want to post about, for a wide variety of reasons ranging from I don’t want to hurt people’s feelings to putting all my insecurities on the internets for all to read makes me fell, well, insecure. Plus the other stuff, which would have been HIGHLY entertaining, let me tell you. Just takes too much energy to write.

BUT. The discovery of a Robin McKinley blog has reawakened me. I don’t know why. But it has. I adore Robin McKinley. Blue Sword=awesomeness. I was a tiny bit disappointed in Sunshine, but have high hopes for her new book. Plus her writing is entertaining AND we totally need to be bff’s and go horseback riding and everything. I’m adding her to my list of celebrities (to me) who are meant to be my soul mates and mentors and it shall happen!!! (Lauren Graham is the other. I wrote a post about that, but I’m too lazy to find the link. Deal.) I was abashed to discover that she wrote Beauty, her breakout novel, at 25. Which means I only have 8 months to write a book and get published in order to not feel inadequate. A GOOD book, unlike my other, craptastic and not worthy of ever seeing the light of day, NaNoWriMo book.

I also discovered one of my favorite people in my new knitting group has a blog, which seems highly entertaining. She somehow manages to write exactly how she talks. Even when I wasn’t sure it was her, I was pretty sure that it was her, just because of the writing style. I think she and Whitney would get along frighteningly well, mainly because of some of her comments on French men. They were wrong. Dirty and funny and wrong.

In more life news, I did sign on an apartment. As of yesterday, I officially will not be homeless for more than a day or so, depending on when the current people get out (I’m hoping to not be homeless at all, which probably will work out. Seriously, this whole having someone move out on the 31st when your lease ends on the 31st and therefore you can’t really wait to move in until the 1st? Messed up.). It’s a two-bedroom, pretty near work and campus and metro and a nice bike trail, and no longer up 1.5 miles (although I have gotten so I always make that hill. Not fast and not pretty, but I make it. ), and is not really sketchy, but five blocks away is sketchy, and it has a really random restaurant called Quarterdeck, which may or may not be affiliated with a Florida seafood chain. Now I only have to find a roommate, which shouldn’t be too hard given the location and whatnot, and the not that expensiveness of it, and move, which should be hard since SB is going out of country conveniently right about the time I’m moving (I think he planned it.). And then I can relax. If by relax, you mean plunge into school and thesis planning and whatnot. Because that totally is relaxing. Like a sauna or a massage… in hell!

Malaise-y

I am in a funk. A grey mood. A malaise if you will. (and you will.) Why? I don’t know. Everything is fine. And not the “I’m fine, but I’m really mad” type of fine, but the actually okay type of fine. But then…everything is fine. And that’s it. Nothing is great, nothing is stupendous. I feel trapped in a haze of mediocrity. Finding a new housing situation: going fine. Relationship with SB: going fine. Work: kind of boring, but going fine. Thesis planning: not really happening much, but what is is going fine.

(I did almost rethink my original concept yesterday when I saw that a girl last year wrote her thesis on Madeleine L’Engle and Philip Pullman. Genius. So then I was totally going to look at how post-colonialism came through in children’s literature, maybe focusing on the use of myths. Which still sounds interesting. I don’t know. But do I really want to spoil some of my favorite childhood novels by researching the crap out of them? I don’t want to be sick of them… that would just be sad. Plus I briefly glanced at research available and in the 20 seconds I looked, I didn’t see much. Which can be a good or a bad thing. It can be good in that you don’t have to struggle to find a spin no one else has before. Or it can be bad in that you have to write broader, because there isn’t the original research to allow you to go deeper. And I go through brief moments of excitement about either topic and then it pales.)

Knitting, well in knitting, I would bump fine up to well. I only have a few more inches on my sleeves of my sweater, and then I can start on the body. Which is good since my mom and I (my dad’s coming up too, but just for a few days) are having a relaxation retreat next week where much knitting shall be accomplished, and I need her help on getting started on the rest. It’s an interesting pattern. We shall see. Knitting may be my salvation.

With SB… I don’t know. He’s working all the time these days, which makes it hard to get things better. And what am I supposed to do about that one? I can’t tell him not to work. He doesn’t have much choice. About the only time he’ll get a break is when he is out of the country for work (working out of the country is still work, but it’s different), which doesn’t exactly help me or us any. I’d like for us to go do something fun somewhere, but he doesn’t have the time or the energy or, thanks to this glorious economy and his desire to buy a place, the money.

And, speaking of money, I have my first cavity. (It relates. You’ll see.) I don’t know if it’s a REAL cavity in that it doesn’t hurt any and therefore hasn’t really gone past the outer layer of my teeth (or so SB tells me), but it needs to be filled. I’m not afraid of having it filled; what I am afraid of is the bill. Getting X-rays and a cleaning was pretty much insane. Add to that a filling, in addition to car work I had to have done? I’m going to be broke. Or not really broke, since thanks to grad school I’m already in debt and how can you be broke when you are living on borrowed money, but more in debt, which still sucks.

Plus when I get stressed about all such things, I like to spend money. Which makes me more stressed, even if the amount I’m spending is tiny. (I don’t buy big ticket items. Ever.) Which makes me spend more. It is truly a viscous cycle.

And so it begins.

So the housing thing I was hoping would come through apparently has not come through. Which I’m rather okay with since the girl has not exactly been responsive and is that really something I want to deal with? I’m just annoyed because it would be easy and I’m lazy and moving was SUCH a pain last year. Or rather moving twice because I couldn’t find a place when I needed it was such a pain. Or the whole situation, which was just awful and even thinking about it makes me want to start hyperventilating.

But after I finish with the whole breathing into the paper bag routine… I’m in a better spot. I have more contacts, more people who can help me out. Plus I’m going about it differently. One of the girls I know gave me contact info for a realtor who gets paid by the apartment complexes (meaning she’s free to me) and I’ve contacted her. It’ll be so much easier to just find a place and then find a roommate. Preferably someone who knits. Or crochets. I know, it sounds ridiculous to want someone who knits or crochets, but in general, the type of people who are drawn to that pursuit are the type of people I think I’d get along with, particularly in a housing situation. Plus, if they are better than I am, they can show me stuff and inspire me to knit more. (Since the 1457234879 projects I have started are not going to finish themselves.) I know now what stuff is most important to me in a roommate, I know more about the system, and I hopefully am a bit better about working it. So we are crossing our fingers and hoping for an easier transition this time.

Stitching and Pitching

First of all, happy engagement to E!!

I’ve had the strangest getting sick experience this week. I was fine, FINE, until Sunday night. Sunday I did feel a bit tired, but more the “I stayed up too late, slept in too late” feeling than anything else. But all of a sudden, Sunday night, I was burning up with a fever. I was dizzy. I can’t remember the last time I was dizzy from a fever. SB felt my forehead, and was all like, “Have you been doing something? Cleaning or something?” Never mind that I had been sitting there quietly eating next to him for the past 20 minutes. He was trying hard to take care of me more, probably since I yelled at him recently for failing so miserably one summer during college. Seriously. I was really sick. He said later he thought I might have had appendicitis (my stomach REALLY hurt). But he still left and then didn’t call for nearly 24 hours. Whitney was on standby in case I actually decided to go to the hospital (which I was considering). One of his jerkier moments. But at least he is trying to be better.

Stitch ‘N’ Pitch was on Friday and was totally awesome. For those of you I don’t actually see in real life, and therefore couldn’t share my huge amounts of excitement, Stitch ‘N’ Pitch is a group that arranges fiber-related activities in combination with baseball watching. This past Friday was the one in DC, and my first time at both a Nationals game and the Nationals new stadium. It was surreal, sitting there watching the game and looking over and seeing people knitting or crocheting. I went with two friends in my program who also knit, one of whom I’m totally stealing an idea from. Misskateunderground is knitting an American blanket (not being from here), using a variation of red, white, and blue (her variation being no red-I think-, and the white being more gray) AND (here’s the part I’m totally stealing) doing each swatch in a different pattern. Which is a brilliant way to get familiar with lots of different stitches and whatnot, plus the small size of each swatch would give me the fast completion I don’t get from any other project. (Um… yeah... Totally took me 5 years to finish a scarf for SB. In my defense, I was knitting it on size 5 needles and it was ribbed and HUGE. But still. Although I never did see him wear it this winter… He’d better be careful, or no more knitting things for him.)

As for the game itself, it was a baseball game. Kind of slow. I missed the only homerun while in line for a helmet sundae that I walked really far for before realizing that there was a stand a few feet the opposite way than I walked. I finally saw a bobble head race, although the first time (that’s right. Apparently, if the game is 14 innings, they do TWO races), Teddy didn’t even show. He apparently was hitting on random girls at this beach-type place in the stadium. The fireworks were cancelled since the game lasted until 11:40 or so. We started yelling randomly at players. “Score! We want to go HOME!” and yelling with some girl who was trying to get someone else’s attention (Karen, I think?). All in all, a satisfying first Nats game (they did win, btw), with lovely company. I did completely fail to get the name of this girl who was sitting behind us and with whom I chatted quite a bit. I’m figuring I’ll run into her again eventually. DC is big, but knitting communities are relatively small. Plus I got SWAG, which I always enjoy, and pilfered some of my friends’ swag, as they didn’t want everything they got. What can I say, I’m a sucker for free stuff.

I also have begun my first crochet garment. I’m using cheap yarn, but the pattern calls for cheap yarn, and I already had it. I have a few inches done, but have discovered that casting on for crocheting sucks so much more than knitting. The book did warn me, though…

One is silver and the other gold

I’ve been thinking a lot about friends lately, probably due to the several catching up sessions I’ve had lately. This past weekend I went to visit A., who has been one of my best friends for 15 years now (she did the math, but it seems to work out), which was fun but always a little weird. Not weird because that connection is gone, but weird because it’s not. It seems like no matter how much time passes, we still manage to pick up at about the same relationship level we’ve always had. We joke that we are like family, but really, we kind of are. We mock, we get annoyed at each other. She knows things about me that I had forgotten. Like I apparently bruise like a peach. If you had asked me before this weekend if I bruised like a peach, I probably would have said no. But thinking about it, I do bruise rather easily. How did she know that and I didn’t?

At the same time, though, that we have all this history, we also have very different outlooks on life. We always have, really. She’s trying to get me to wear uncomfortable pointy shoes, because they are “hot.” I say they are uncomfortable and make me want to cry and I have to walk a fair amount, so no. She’s more concerned with her appearance than I have ever been. We’re both insanely stubborn, although I’m more argumentative. Yet despite our differences, despite our varying perspectives and any arguments, the relationship has stayed basically the same.

Then last night I talked to E.. Which had a different feel, and I'm not sure if it's because we have only been friends for 8 years (seriously?!?! 8 years since I was a freshman? That's nuts.) or because A. and I had learned how to stay close while not talking really while we were in different colleges or because growing up together automatically affects things. Not to say that I don't love E. and that talking to her wasn't a blast, because I do and it was. But the distance seems more obvious. It took us a good 15 minutes to get into the conversation. It's strange how little we know about each other's lives. Which is also true for A. but it doesn't feel as true and I don't know why. Of course I also haven't seen E. in real life in three years, which might play into it. Though we were talking a fair amount like a year ago, and there was none of this feeling. Which means it might just me overthinking things too much and feeling all emotional because bunches of friends are engaged or nearly engaged and I remember having the same conversations they are like four years ago which makes me sad.

Either way, I feel like there are so many awesome people who have been a part of my life that I don't get to stay in near enough touch with. Even CW, who lives in the same city as I do, and I don't get together or talk that much, mainly because we are both busy and live in different parts of the city. I wonder if this whole moving constantly and meeting new people is changing how we as a society manage relationships. How many friends can one actually stay close to, particularly when everyone is scattered across the country? How can you choose?

In less depressing news, though, my weaving project is going beautifully and is going to be STUNNING.

Epiphanies and whatnot

This past week has been a strange one for me. Full of ups and downs, aided by the spawn of a bad cold and allergies taking up residence in my nose/chest/head/body. Actually, this whole month has been weird. Started insanely stressed out, to the point that I could hardly think, breathe, rest, knit, or anything else. No panic attacks, though, or the return of the horrible stomach problems that give me a weird taste in my mouth that peppered stressful times at my last job, or the stomach stabbing pains from England. I think that deserves a pat on the back for me. Maybe, just maybe, I’m learning to deal with my stress. Starting to, anyhow.

Then I thought I would be happy to be done. I was relieved, but at the same time, didn’t know what to do with myself. I hadn’t had free time in SO long. And I don’t mean like hours free time, I mean any. Practically every minute had been planned, leaving me completely exhausted and mentally drained by eight or nine or so. (Later if I had to work on papers. Which I did. Constantly. In which case I was still mentally exhausted, but plodding onward.) When I did all of a sudden get minor free time, my mind had stopped working, I was still remnant stressed out, and I could hardly stand to move. And then, unsurprisingly, I got the aforementioned beast of an illness. And discovered I had not gotten the grades I felt I had earned. In either class.

Which has been good for me. I know, why would something like that be good for me? It’s a strange phenomenon. Except. Except school has always been easy for me. Toss off a paper the night before it’s due, get an a minus. Put a tiny bit more effort into, get an a. When I graduated from undergrad, SB told me I needed to figure out who I was outside of school. Which I did relatively well, although it was a somewhat traumatic experience. Now I’m figuring out how to base my self esteem on myself, rather than outside accolades I never had to really strive for. Why do I need a grade to tell me how smart I am? I know how smart I am. I live with it and its effects every day. I know I can never get my mind to shut up, that I’m constantly analyzing and writing and rewriting things in my head. I know my ideas, my papers were pretty damn good. Not perfect, no, but why should they be? Given more time to focus on them, more guidance, they might get that way, but not the way school is set up. Plus, I’ve also come to realize that different universities teach different writing styles. And it is HARD to change that basic part of your writing to fit another. I don’t mean styles in how the sentences are formed or how the paper is structured. All English majors do that for nearly every class they have. I mean style as as basic as how you go about writing a paper, the way you form your thesis, the items you focus on in that paper. The nucleus of the paper, not the protons or neutrons. And that is what grad school is trying to change.

Then all of a sudden this week, I was spontaneously happy. I don’t know why, except maybe I feel like I am finally clicking with people (mostly the people in my program who are leaving, but whatever…). That and the whole previously described epiphany. It’s been nice.

Except that every day, I realize more and more that I want to live by myself. Not a slight to my current roommates, with whom I have many things in common except for personalities, which has made sharing a very tiny house interesting. But all that analyzing and rewriting and stuff? The thing that nearly shuts it up is being alone. I like, no, love to be alone. Not all the time, but I need to feel like I can shut myself away for a while, no interruptions, no judging. The more stressed out I get, the more I need that. And right now, that need is what I’m focused on. It makes it very hard for me to care about anything in relation to the house, but getting out. I need a change. Since I can’t afford my own place, I at least need new people to avoid.

Let them eat... Cupcakes!

When trying to decide what to do with all my free time, now that my first year of grad school is over, CW suggested to update here. Well, her first suggestion was to drink, but I quickly decided both for my health and my wallet, that wasn’t quite a feasible way to eat up the time.

So here I am, talking about cupcake wars. Yes, cupcake wars. Those of you who frequent the Georgetown area may have come across a new, always busy locale called Georgetown Cupcakes. It has been featured in various write-ups, received rave reviews, and pretty much constantly had a line of some sort since it opened on Valentine’s Day. Now, previous to Georgetown Cupcakes, there was Baked and Wired, a place down M Street a bit. Baked and Wired has been around for while, and has also been known for their baked goods, particularly cupcakes.

Now people in Georgetown have too much disposable income or are students or students with too much disposable income (the most hated of the groups), all people who are willing to pay for an amazing sweet rush. The battle lines have been drawn, although I’m not sure Georgetown Cupcakes really is aware of Baked and Wired. I’m assuming when they did their market analysis, they noted B and W’s existence, but they have been completely overwhelmed by their success, and every time I’m in there, seem a bit frantic just trying to stay on top of things.

As that last statement might suggest, I’m in the GC camp. One, they are more convenient. Close to my work, not so far down M Street from campus, and close to one of the bus stops I hit. Two, their mocha cupcakes are to die for, in my opinion. With amazing frosting, the kind that is crunchy on the very outside and oozy when your teeth puncture that surface. Moist cake, a delicious little chocolate espresso bean on top… Makes me drool just thinking about it.

I will admit, I’ve only had one B and W cupcake, and I enjoyed it well enough. I wouldn’t go out of my way to get another, and probably won’t dream about it (as I have with GC’s), but it was delightful enough. The cake portion might actually have been a bit richer and moister than GC’s, but the frosting was too thick and too gooey. (Gooey loses to oozy in this case.) And the woman in front of me professed that their cupcakes were SO much better than GC’s. She’s not alone; I’ve heard other people say similar things (not as many as have raved about GC, but GC is new). You could tell, though, that they are quite aware of GC’s existence.

And really. This is the type of war where everybody wins (except maybe B and W’s bottom-line, assuming GC is cutting into it). Maybe we should fly over hundreds of each store’s to Iraq or Lebanon or some other war-torn country, and let them fight it out. At least it would change the terms of engagement for a while. And who can be THAT angry while enjoying delicious cupcakes?

Random Musings

I think I actually have a topic for one of my final papers. This is a quasi-exciting deal, as by this time last semester, I was burnt out and had nothing to say. Of course, I had Awful Professor, who seemed to want to crush us all, especially anyone who challenged her in any way. Jerk. (I’m not bitter still. Letting it go, letting it go…) And in my other class last semester, I picked a ridiculously complicated topic that I still can hardly wrap my head around. You try and define intelligence. Just do it. How do you? Do you include outside skills? Cognitive science? Should it be defined differently depending on circumstance? Can you be dumb and skilled? Yeah, try writing a 20 page paper with all those comments. It was slippery, very slippery. Of course, I am a bit worried, since this professor has been a hard grader and I’m not 100% sure I know exactly what he wants, but he also is ridiculously nice and will bend over backwards to help me figure it all out.

I am a bit bored at work, mainly because I apparently work too fast. I did have a HORRIBLE dream last night that I was volunteering at my old place of employment. Ugh. About half-way through the dream, I realized I didn’t have to volunteer. They weren’t paying me. And I could quit. Quitting again was rather nice. And CEO was of course being a snot, as always. I probably somewhat dreamed about it because I was trying to decide if I could go to Vegas with CW and her friends. Sadly, I don’t think I can. I want to, I really do. But I’m trying so hard to keep my debt not only under my original goal, but $15,000 under. Whee!! Which is so much more manageable. More like an expensive car-splurge than a “dear God, was it all worth it and can I pay it all back?” experience. Or basically, a little less than one year’s salary. Or considerably less, depending on what kind of job I get. [crosses fingers]. But anyways, spending a whole paycheck on a long weekend trip just seemed a bit exorbitant. I could probably swing it, but I’d spend the whole time feeling guilty and trying not to whine about money. And I didn’t want to hold them back from doing exciting things they could afford and I can’t.

I should be excited about Sunday, what with the whole Easter and being able to have sweets thing. But I didn’t miss sweets nearly as much this year. Of course, I did cheat, kind of. See, you’re supposed to be able to eat what you gave up on Sundays, which I didn’t. I did, however, take the number of Sundays and called them cheat days, which I then sprinkled in. But no desert on Valentine’s Day? That just seems sad. The other cheat days, I probably could have done without, but whatever. I think I may try and keep up this whole approach to sweets, though. I mean, if I haven’t missed having them more than a few times in several weeks, why not always eat like that? Though I did already by myself a Cadbury egg… SB is supposed to give me an Easter basket (I’m making him one, too), but we’ll see. I’d rather have at least back-up on that.

Pro-Hill: Or why I refuse to jump on the Barack Bandwagon

I have a confession to make. I [deep breath] am a twenty-something, educated person who is pro-Hillary. I know, I’m breaking with so many demographic studies in this admission, but I don’t care. I really like Hillary. I’m really uneasy about Barack.

Now, some might be wondering how I could possibly be uneasy about Barack. “He is such an amazing public speaker,” you say. “His message of change is SOOOoooo inspiring.” First of all, I don’t care. I don’t need a president to give me goose bumps, I need a president to give me real policies. Public speaking is a useful skill. I, as my mother so frequently reminds me (at least a couple of times a year), have been known to bring tears to my listeners’ eyes. Does that mean I should be president? I would think not. For one, that’s not even legal, due to my young age. Second, public speaking just means you can work a crowd. We have a president who can work a crowd and I don’t like him. He’s been awful.

As for the message of hope, here’s why it doesn’t work on me. The system is in place. It has been for 200 years. Yes, there are things about it that I’m not fond of. There are flaws. But a good portion of those flaws and things that annoy me (minus things this administration has done, which can’t be blamed on the system but only on their assedness) are flaws within the Congressional system. How is he going to change those? He’s in an entirely different system (executive versus legislative, for those of you who don’t remember social studies well). He can try, but I don’t think it’ll work, and really, his energy should be elsewhere.

Then there is the dearth of experience. Foreign experience is hugely important to me right now. The world hates us. I’d like to change that. Navigating the treacherous waters of foreign politics is hard and takes practice and knowledge. He listed living abroad as part of his foreign experience (I mean, seriously. Another reason I should be president. I too have lived abroad. Twice. TWICE.)

Add to all this that I genuinely like Hillary, and it’s not surprising I hope she overcomes the numerical odds and gets the nomination. She makes me feel safe. She’s experienced. She’s tough. She’s proven herself willing to take on challenges, willing to try hard even when failing is likely. And for the argument of how divisive she is and how Congress won’t work with her. She has managed to get a remarkable number of bills through for a junior senator. Conservatives in New York love her. And she has worked her butt off for her constituents. What more do we need? Change? Hah. Call me bitter, but you can’t change the system. We vote on a message of change and we will be disappointed.

Of course, according to the History Channel, the world is ending in 2012, so I guess it doesn’t hugely matter anyways.

Where are the weirdos?

Victoria’s Secret apparently is attempting to rebrand itself, as the CEO says they’ve gotten “too sexy,” and people have stopped shopping there. Which I think is somewhat true. I’m tired of commercials and ads screaming “IF ONLY YOU LOOKED LIKE US,” with the quiet, subliminal text “too bad you don’t.” I mean, it’s not like VS’s stuff is cheap. If I’m going to spend that much money on a flimsy piece of gauze, I want to do it in a place that makes me feel good about myself, not self-conscious and judged. Besides, three-fourths of the stuff is impractical. I don’t have money to waste on stuff I can’t wear on a regular basis. So my advice to VS is brand yourself to all women, not just tiny 17 year olds, stop with the sickeningly pink design scheme, practical it up, and try to make women feel better about themselves, not worse.

Not that I buy anything there anyways. Like I said, they are too rich for my blood. Plus nothing there fits me right. And I don’t like the cashiers.

Of course, that doesn’t seem unusual as I seem to be liking people less and less these days. Which I’d be okay with (after all, people in large clumps ARE insanely annoying, and teenage girls giggling loudly are a bit ear-piercing), except it all seems to be accompanied by a loss of my weirdness. Not that I’m not still strange, but I used to find the strangest things funny. I’d smirk walking around the streets, all by myself. Now… I just walk. And I’m not okay with this. I mean, you can say it’s just a part of growing older, but I don’t believe that. I think it’s just that the people who brought out that side of me are all spread out over the country. (You quirkies know who you are… J) I’m tired of talking about serious stuff, like politics and global warming and budgets and taxes. I want to be giddy, to say things and have people look at me oddly (I know that’s a strange thing to want, but that’s a part of my point). I want to hang out with a bunch of people and wind up making a hat out of a knife and a napkin again. Basically, I need to find the weird people here who can make me laugh and remind me about that part of myself. You’d think my program could do it, but no… we’re all shockingly normal, besides the whole being completely nerdy thing. (I mean, really. I would hate to come to our parties as an outsider. Three fourths of the conversation is literature or class related, and the other quarter leads back to classes or literature.) I wonder where they are all hiding….

And yet happiness abounds

I am seriously getting SO excited about this weekend. It really is all that is keeping me awake right now (lack of sleep? Just a bit.). I mean, I’m stupidly tired, as in couldn’t really figure out how to run the mail machine and had to ask our office manager person like 6 questions about it. It’s not like I’ve not used it before. Okay, maybe only once and that was several months ago. But still. And I used the meter at my old office a ton before we moved. I knew how to work that thing. Up until you had to put in codes or zones or something. But not today.

Plus having whined to several people in my program about how it’s “making me doubt myself” and all that other crap like that, I feel better. It helps that my boss used a draft I threw together for her in a couple of hours nearly word for word. The other draft I rewrote seems to have been made messy, but a good portion of my work is still there. I don’t entirely agree with the changes, since it’s made it all confused and not crisp, but not my decision. And I was told that I’m too fast of a worker (as in they can’t keep up with giving me assignments to do, not in that my work is shoddy) and my former supervisor now coworker keeps telling me that not having me as an intern and working with the others makes her realize again how wonderful an intern I was. Not that I want to be a superb intern my whole life; I’d much rather be a superb upper level, well-paid and trusted employee, but it’s a start. A salve, if you will, after crap last job.

Which I actually kind of find myself missing. Not the job itself and DEFINITELY not some of the people. But CW and J and occasionally T. CW and J and I spent a lot of time chatting, particularly about politics and whatnot. I can hear J’s responses to some of the things going on now. They’d be pretty entertaining. T I worked with less, and working with her could be difficult, but she’s still a good egg.

ALSO EXCITING. My brother’s sister-in-law just had her first baby!!! Who is healthy and cute and a girl. I’m so happy for the couple. She was a big baby, too. Eight pounds 13 or so ounces, 21 inches.

Help, I'm trapped in a malaise

I need next weekend to be here now. Seriously. Next weekend will be loads of fun, as I'm going to see Whitney. But I may explode before then.

See, here's the problem. I never expected grad school to be so hard. I knew it would be a lot of work, but I didn't know it would screw up your head. Maybe I should have. But every single professor wants you to write in a different style, with a different focus on a different type of criticism. Not only do you have to write in a different style, you have to excel at it nearly immediately. You don't get to find your own voice, because the base of what you're writing is constantly shifting.

And, even more fun, this is apparently effecting my work skills, since when I write stuff there, the whole style confusion comes through. It just is exhausting, mentally, physically, and emotionally. I'm tired of being told that I have the ideas, but the style or voice just isn't quite right. All the training I got in undergrad, all the writing skills I learned still just aren't up to snuff.

Plus SB seems to be having some sort of "I'm getting old" crisis, so he's all not helpful and creating other stresses. Add to that the fact that he hated grad school, so all my whining tends to get a very bitter response... And I just found out an old flirtation is engaged. I'm happy for him, but I really wish I hadn't found out now.

Renter's Rights? What renter's rights?

So yeah. My house has no heat. Which is just INSANE, especially since our landlord and his assistant have absolutely no interest in actually caring about us. The heat went out Tuesday afternoon, when the furnace nearly blew up. J, one housemate, immediately called our landlord, his assistant, and the furnace guy. She could get the furnace guy’s number because rather than our landlord actually DOING his job, he’s been trying to get us to organize switching furnaces. Which has led to T, another housemate, spending hours upon hours calling back and forth between the oil company to get them to drain the oil they stupidly put into the tank after we told them not to, our landlord to try and make sure this lack of heat didn’t happen, and the furnace guy when what our landlord said made no sense.

But yes. Furnace nearly blows up, heat gets shut off. Now by Virginia landlord tenant laws, the heat going out in the winter is an emergency situation and the landlord has to either fix the heat or provide some kind of amenable situation within 24 hours. Ha. See, the problem is that all the laws have been set up to protect the landlord. There is no kind of emergency, “my landlord is an ass” type service where you can call them and they will force him to do something. No. Instead what you get is a bunch of rigamoral, no grand collection of information, no list of “here’s what you can do if your heat goes out and your landlord doesn’t care.” Instead, after much research, you find out that you can go to court, file a complaint (at the charge of $50), and try to get something done. You can also terminate the lease, but who wants to move right now?

Our landlord is in California. His assistant cares mostly about only working part-time and covering her butt. Over the course of many phone calls over the past two days, we have been blamed for a. not scheduling the changing of the furnace (um. Not our job.) b. not calling her back when the one person she actually deigned to call didn’t have time to get back to her, c. being mean and cranky about the fact that WE. HAVE. NO. HEAT. And d. not informing landlord about my cat, when we did, he’s seen her, she’s on the application… We were also told, when we brought up that it was going to be pretty freaking cold, that we could a. leave on the lights all the time and b. buy ONE space heater for the whole house.

The thing that really sucks is that they are going to completely get away with this shoddy treatment of us. We’re all tempted to bring in our parents and let them yell at him, mainly for the satisfaction of him getting yelled at by someone he may actually respect, but beyond that? The system is stacked against us. It’s ridiculous that we can be treated so shoddily with no real recourse. This guy keeps on taking advantage of us and there isn’t a huge amount we can do. Big stinking jerk.

Culture Shock

It's kind of sad, but the one thing going home showed me is that I really want to move. It has very little do to with my housemates, who are perfectly fine, and more to do with the small space. Especially since I would rather be living by myself. There just is no where I can go to escape people in general. I can hear EVERYTHING, so even with my door closed, I might as well be a part of the conversation. It makes it very hard to get my work done when any one is home. It would be hard even if I got along splendidly with them and was like bff's or whatever. But I'm not, and while they are nice people, the lack of my own space makes me cranky and I don't like who I am in this house. Alas, I've signed a contract and am lazy, so it makes it unlikely that I'll move before August. I'm hoping that some of it is just culture shock and that I'll get used to it again.

Class has officially started and so far, I'm very pleased with one of my classes. The other I'll have to see about. I like the professor, who is hideously cheesy and entertaining, but it seems like an immense amount of work. He has no qualms about assigning 5 pages of writing per class, and doubling the assignment for this week because he messed up in writing his syllabus and assigned homework for the class last week when we didn't actually get the syllabus until the class itself. So we have both for this week. I wish I could tell more about how he was going to be as a professor. Luckily the reading isn't incredibly page heavy, since it's a poetry class. The class I got shut out of I'm actually thinking might have been too much reading.