Posts (page 2)

If I could be a day, I'd never be a Thursday. I'd be a Friday or a Sunday or even a Wednesday. Wednesdays are somehow fun, even though it happens bang in the middle of the week. Wait, half the week is over? Hey, half the week is over! Thursdays just sit there, getting in the way of your week-end. Everyone's just waiting for the day to be over when Friday will come along.

Andddddd I just wrote an entire post on Thursdays. Oh yeah, I'm on fire today. 

Makes mental note -  Don't talk drivel.

Speaking of which, yesterday was open house at the department. They're trying to recruit students from the campus for the doctoral program. Well, after the faculty had had their say, they wanted some of the grad students to say something. There I was, sitting quietly, except for some non-verbal communication with my friend across the room, consisting mostly of grins and eye-rolls (that will never stop being fun, never. Why is that? I will be 60 and one of my greatest pleasure in life will still be finding someone to roll my eyes with.)  So..anyhow...back to me, minding my own business and suddenly someone suggests I get up and say something. Which I did, coz I didn't want to seem like I was nervous. Which I was. Sigh. Another memory for 'The Vault'. Three minutes I am going to pretend never happened. Afterwards some of the gathered said I'd done a good job. Psh. Oh, which totally is my new favorite word to write lately.

Be Friday already!

I could say more about the weather. I have plenty to offer on that topic, I assure you. And this practice of day-light savings. But you see, I exercise great restraint and stay silent. I will instead wax eloquent on the subject of pumpkin carving parties, chocolate-covered brownies, dinners with friends, my new hobo bag which I'm most pleased with...and oh, what a nice two weeks this has been.
Of course, there are a few rain clouds. There's the matter of not getting paid this month and the fact that...well, this other fact and that other one. However, as these are things beyond my control...and in the meantime, there are always brownies and poker games.

Little York, New Jersey, picked at random is currently 75 degrees. In North Sioux City, South Dakota, also chosen randomly, it's 65 and sunny. Seattle is 61, also sunny. Here, where I live, way down south, where it hasn't snowed in the four years that I've lived here - ever! - it's 57 and completely cloudy. And colder than the places mentioned. Huh?

Ooh, the window lit up as I was typing. We now have some sun.

I wish it would make up its mind.

This week-end was lots of fun. But what made it a crowning success is that after weeks of looking, I finally found a pair of jeans that fit me right. People, I am so excited. Clearly, I'm also easy to please but let's leave that aside for now.
It's been a lot like the old days lately. So very, very nice. I will treat this like a gift. It won't last long but while it does, I'm going to savor every second.

Now that my HP fever has died a smidgen (as in, I've stopped compulsively reading Book 7 over and over again) I thought I'd take a break from Hogwarts and see what Naruto and his Ninja friends have been up to lately, having missed the ongoing action for at least 7 months. But of course, being me, I wasn't about to just pick up where I left off. Oh no. Where's the fun in that?
Hence my careful use of the word 'compulsive'. Always start at the beginning of anything, the nagging voice inside my head tells me. And if you stop before you get to the end, start over. Do not even think of continuing from where you had stopped, you might cause the complete collapse of the new world order (it says) and we can't have that. Ever tried to ignore the little nag? Can't be done. You end up wedged into some corner, mumbling to yourself and sucking your thumb. Pretty sight, hey?
So anyway, here I am, 5 days and the first 100 set of episodes later, completely immersed in the various adventures of the Genin crowd. And as I was watching episode 101, I just had to stop. And gush.
Nothing is better than a good story. (Football, says you? Psh, says I)
And this one? Well, gosh!
Episode 101 is a filler, in that it does nothing to advance the story-line. It's actually quite silly, and purposely so, in order to provide a few laughs. It also appears mostly inappropriately, occurring as it does right after the 5th Hokage's selection and Lee's decision to undergo surgery. And yet, in spite of all this, in spite of the fact that the series is filled with other episodes that are charged with suspense, emotion, action.....this side-story about Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura's attempts to see their teacher's hidden face, remains one of my very favorite. I love it so because, in a life filled with such loneliness and suffering as Sasuke's, with the heavy burden of being an avenger on his young shoulders, it is a touching reminder (and the only one, there are no other in the series) that he is, after all, a kid. And it is nice to think that once in a while, he allowed himself to be one. All darkness the rest of the time, that one.
Silly to get so involved in fictional characters, says you?
Ahh, what do you know, says I.

Yesterday after I had finished posting, I suddenly realized how bored I was with the theme and just...everything about my blog. I was tired of looking at dull red and beige. The anime picture I had so liked several months ago had lost all its charm. Even the name struck me as being unbearably blah. So I started making changes and before I knew it, I had practically a whole new blog on my hands. Yayyy New Blog!

It was only afterwards when I had wandered over to my neighbors' blogs that I realized that practically everyone seem to have been struck by the same madness and desire for change. Yayyy, all the fresh coats of paint. Oh you Autumn, you. Look what you have done. You've made me think of doing something different with my hair.

One of the things I can count on in my life, governed as it is by Murphy's law, is that I will be sick on breaks and/or on occasions I am travelling out of town. The precedent for this was set in November last year and has failed me only on one occasion since. It is Fall Break right now, also the week I'm going to see my 4-month nephew for the first time, and predictably, I'm down with something better than a fever but worse than a bad head cold. This thing I'm having...it's a...a....a fold. Let's go with fold. Just humor me, will ya? The person who gets the shots calls the shots. All the sympathy votes, you know.

Also, did you know that at this very second, somewhere, a Tom is wondering whether T.V, TV or tv is the more authentic term? People are cute. Aren't they cute? This alone would make it possible for one to get through days when it's easier to just tape a tissue across your face, leaving your hands free to google or wiki or vox.

P.S. Its TV. You know you were wondering.

Like most people, I have several credit cards but typically use two, because of the rewards. I didn't have credit cards for a long time because I tended to think of them as The Devil's Trap Into a Life of Debt and Overconsumption. But having to pay deposits for practically everything except the air I breathe due to "insufficient history" quickly got old, so I caved. And now the idea of spending money I do not have is one I have gotten pretty comfortable with.

Because I am anal and things like a bad credit report cause me to lose sleep, I am very particular about making payments on time. And so yesterday I was online paying my bills a full two weeks before they were due. It's a chore on par with getting a root canal, not least because I am always shocked at how pennies will add up. This is a difficult concept for me. Those lunches were cheap! Yes, they were six of them but still...our sides were sauce!

In spite of this phenomena, I knew at once the latest bill couldn't possibly be that high. I did a little checking and discovered, to my horror, that I had somehow missed the payment for September which then got added to this month's statement. Now that was the month I had to move apartments and start all over in a new place I hated, two weeks away from My Big Exam....just your average month from hell.     

I lay there on the couch in the throes of an anxiety attack, my face buried in my pillow, trying to think of the irreparable damage this one slip-up has caused my until-now spotless history and wishing death would come quickly. That's one of the ways I deal with stress. Lying on the couch, hyperventilating and imagining ten thousand likely and unlikely worst-case scenarios, because, you know, such a thing helps you gain perspective.
Another way I deal with stress is to call my long-suffering friend and confide my troubles in a high-pitched voice that dogs can probably hear.
"And this is the first time I've done this, it was an accident, they don't know how rough the past two months have been, and oh my god, my life is over."
"Will you calm down? This kind of thing probably happens all the time. I'm sure one missed payment will not kill all the good credit you've built up in the the past."
"But now no-one will loan me money! I won't be able to buy a house!"
"Are you planning to buy a house?"
"No. But what if?"
"........."
"Well, a car then."
"You don't even drive."
"That's not the point! What if I was dying? And I needed the money?"
"Why would you need money if you were dying?"
"Arrghhhhhhhhh! Must you be such a guy right now? You're all so..so..."
"Sane?"
"Unsympathetic."

It rained torrents from 3 this morning all the way to after 11 without a pause. Un-believable. You'd think school would be closed considering there have been flash flood watches in effect all day but no. And what the hell kind of name for a hurricane is Humberto anyway??