I'll be the first to admit it, my current life plan isn't spectacular. I won't be graduating with a bachelors' in three years, and I probably won't have the money to pay for grad school after I do graduate. I'll be lucky if I have a job by then, and I'll be able to support myself (and my college bills eventually) but that's about it. I'll be working weird hours, traveling a lot and doing things that might make people mad at me. Seems like a pretty fruitless outlook.
But it is our job to tell someone's (or something's) story, and when you get personally thanked by a complete stranger for your work, it's a pretty damn awesome feeling.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Adventure 18 - Finally, An Explanation
(No, not to why I insist on procrastinating on this paper. Nice try, though.)
The latest issue of our school's alternative magazine, which I write for, came out today, and I'm really not trying to toot my own horn but I really like my article for it. The issue was all about the problems that our generation, as the ones dealing with the college nonsense, have it just a little bit differently than generations before us. My article was about how we're less religious than everyone else, and through my sources, I finally found someone to say basically what my philosophy behind my equal-opportunity heathenism is. Basically, he said that we're less religious because with all the advances in technology and science and society in general, we're starting to see that what we were taught by religion is wrong, and we're responding with, and I'm quoting this directly, "an emphatic 'fuck you.'"
Not only was that the best quote in my entire series of interviews, it's perfect. Granted, I can't say it's exactly what I've gone through because I was never religious in the first place, but it explains everything. I do my own thing because none of the tenets in religions (that I know of, anyway) make a whole lot of sense in the modern context. Take evolution for example. It's about as proved as it can get, and there are people that are starting to see "Hey, maybe it doesn't make sense that people supposedly rode dinosaurs...," yet there are still people pigheaded enough to maintain that Homo sapiens rode on the back of Spinops sternbergorum. Which, by the way, is a new dinosaur we just found fossils for and is the evolutionary stepping stone between Centrosaurus and Styracosaurus because, le gasp! Spinops has the curved spikes of Centrosaurus and the straight spikes of Styracosaurus. So the argument is really invalid.
(Also, I like dinosaurs.)
Anyway. I'm really proud of that article, and I hope I can get more in the future that I'm that passionate about. (As it is, my original article was more than 1200 words and they had to cut it down to 800...)
The latest issue of our school's alternative magazine, which I write for, came out today, and I'm really not trying to toot my own horn but I really like my article for it. The issue was all about the problems that our generation, as the ones dealing with the college nonsense, have it just a little bit differently than generations before us. My article was about how we're less religious than everyone else, and through my sources, I finally found someone to say basically what my philosophy behind my equal-opportunity heathenism is. Basically, he said that we're less religious because with all the advances in technology and science and society in general, we're starting to see that what we were taught by religion is wrong, and we're responding with, and I'm quoting this directly, "an emphatic 'fuck you.'"
Not only was that the best quote in my entire series of interviews, it's perfect. Granted, I can't say it's exactly what I've gone through because I was never religious in the first place, but it explains everything. I do my own thing because none of the tenets in religions (that I know of, anyway) make a whole lot of sense in the modern context. Take evolution for example. It's about as proved as it can get, and there are people that are starting to see "Hey, maybe it doesn't make sense that people supposedly rode dinosaurs...," yet there are still people pigheaded enough to maintain that Homo sapiens rode on the back of Spinops sternbergorum. Which, by the way, is a new dinosaur we just found fossils for and is the evolutionary stepping stone between Centrosaurus and Styracosaurus because, le gasp! Spinops has the curved spikes of Centrosaurus and the straight spikes of Styracosaurus. So the argument is really invalid.
(Also, I like dinosaurs.)
Anyway. I'm really proud of that article, and I hope I can get more in the future that I'm that passionate about. (As it is, my original article was more than 1200 words and they had to cut it down to 800...)
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Adventure 17 - Drop in Productivity
There are three main causes for this: lack of interest in the activity, a puppy and stinking Thanksgiving Break. Good god. I read a little and that was about it. That's pretty sad, considering I also had a 9-hour bus ride (that turned into an 11-hour bus ride but I'll get to that later).
Last week was just crazy because everyone wanted to see me all at once. In short:
Last week was just crazy because everyone wanted to see me all at once. In short:
- Getting home itself was an adventure. 6-hour car ride with a friend to Boston filled with Celtic folk rock and killer barbecue, then a roughly 2-hour ride from his end of the city to where I was meeting my stepdad (in the middle of this is where my boyfriend met me and we had a sushi date on the T and it was awesome), then getting lost in Pawtucket trying to find a place to eat and not getting home til after 11.
- Sunday I crashed. Too tired to really do anything.
- Monday I hung out with "the other one"'s ex-boyfriend, who I had met online when the whole polyamory bullshit started but hadn't met in real life 'til then, and we got kicked out of the library for talking too much.
- Tuesday I had a boy date with one of my guy friends who had recently gone through a bad breakup so we went to Five Guys and saw the 3D Christmas Harold and Kumar movie, plus we accidentally drove into the exit of the movie theater complex which was scary as hell but hilarious.
- Wednesday I went back to the high school to drop off a magazine to my journalism teacher and say hi to all my other teachers, and it was really cool 'cause they all let me interrupt their classes.
- Thursday was obviously chaos because it was Thanksgiving, and even though there are only 10 people in my immediate family, we had some extendeds over at my aunt's house so there were 16 but I didn't have to sit at the kids' table so I didn't really care.
- Friday I hung out with my boyfriend, complete with a trip to a local bookstore, MarioKart and lots of laughing about random things.
- Saturday was a point of contention between my mom and my dad/gramma because my gramma came out from Washington (state) and is one of those people who expects the world to stop when she visits, so they had a pissing contest over who got to see me, but I got Heath bar pancakes and a new outfit out of the deal so I'm not that concerned.
- And Sunday was the nonsense of getting back to school. Home to NYC was no problem, but they overbooked my bus back to school so they had to have two, plus we took the really bizarre route through Scranton (even though there was no stop there) and of course the stupid Pennsylvania part is where we hit massive traffic, hence why a trip that was supposed to end at 7:20 didn't end 'til about 9:30.
And during that time, I got nothing done. So now I have 30 pages worth of essays due on the 16th. Hell month, engage.
Friday, November 18, 2011
Adventure 16 - Stop the World, I Want to Get Off
(Not like that, you asses.)
Thanksgiving Break is supposed to be just that, a break, but it's not looking like much of one. It's unfortunate, I could really use one. As you can see, I have been extremely lackadaisical with my posting, and not only that, I'm also in the process of trying to get back on track with my NaNoWriMo story because this past weekend both knocked me off the bandwagon and ran me over with it several times.
Without going into too much background, I feel this can be best explained by an email I sent to my boyfriend last weekend (while he was, ahem, "busy") asking, "Why do boys have to be so fucking difficult?" It fits because it indicates my problem (boys) and the fact that I was angry about it.
What basically happened was that one of my guy friends (the one I went pantyhose shopping with) recently broke up with his girlfriend two weekends ago, so we had kindof a singles' appreciation dinner last Friday, since my SO was also elsewhere. It was really nice 'cause we hadn't really hung out since the weekend we met, and we BSed about all sorts of stuff. Long story short, things happened and he kissed me at the end of the night, which was quite honestly awesome but left me horribly confused in several ways.
Fast-forward to last night, I have a girls' night dinner with one of my dorm friends, who is convinced that everything is going to work out like yet another cheesy rom-com, and I'm finally able to get ahold of my guy friend to drop off some cookies I was supposed to give him last Friday after I left. I'd get up the confidence to spill the beans, and then his roommate would conveniently walk in, and eventually my friend had to get to studying for an Italian test, so I asked if he could walk me out and did confession time outside the building. I had to, it had been bothering me for almost a week and if I had waited any longer, I probably would've exploded from the angst.
It was awkward, of course. I mean, asking someone out under any circumstances is inherently awkward, and this was even more so considering his recent breakup and my current situation. He politely declined, which I kindof expected, but it wasn't so much of an outright "no" as the fact that he wasn't ready just yet. As he put it, he was used to being a housecat and just got thrown outside, so he'll go feral eventually but it'll take a while. It made sense (I really like the metaphor), and obviously I respect him for it, but what followed was probably the world's most awkward hug and then me feeling like an ass for asking even though I know I shouldn't've.
So I think we're ok now, and I feel better now that I don't have to live with not being able to state my case, but it's still kindof embarrassing. I just hope this works out somehow.
Thanksgiving Break is supposed to be just that, a break, but it's not looking like much of one. It's unfortunate, I could really use one. As you can see, I have been extremely lackadaisical with my posting, and not only that, I'm also in the process of trying to get back on track with my NaNoWriMo story because this past weekend both knocked me off the bandwagon and ran me over with it several times.
Without going into too much background, I feel this can be best explained by an email I sent to my boyfriend last weekend (while he was, ahem, "busy") asking, "Why do boys have to be so fucking difficult?" It fits because it indicates my problem (boys) and the fact that I was angry about it.
What basically happened was that one of my guy friends (the one I went pantyhose shopping with) recently broke up with his girlfriend two weekends ago, so we had kindof a singles' appreciation dinner last Friday, since my SO was also elsewhere. It was really nice 'cause we hadn't really hung out since the weekend we met, and we BSed about all sorts of stuff. Long story short, things happened and he kissed me at the end of the night, which was quite honestly awesome but left me horribly confused in several ways.
Fast-forward to last night, I have a girls' night dinner with one of my dorm friends, who is convinced that everything is going to work out like yet another cheesy rom-com, and I'm finally able to get ahold of my guy friend to drop off some cookies I was supposed to give him last Friday after I left. I'd get up the confidence to spill the beans, and then his roommate would conveniently walk in, and eventually my friend had to get to studying for an Italian test, so I asked if he could walk me out and did confession time outside the building. I had to, it had been bothering me for almost a week and if I had waited any longer, I probably would've exploded from the angst.
It was awkward, of course. I mean, asking someone out under any circumstances is inherently awkward, and this was even more so considering his recent breakup and my current situation. He politely declined, which I kindof expected, but it wasn't so much of an outright "no" as the fact that he wasn't ready just yet. As he put it, he was used to being a housecat and just got thrown outside, so he'll go feral eventually but it'll take a while. It made sense (I really like the metaphor), and obviously I respect him for it, but what followed was probably the world's most awkward hug and then me feeling like an ass for asking even though I know I shouldn't've.
So I think we're ok now, and I feel better now that I don't have to live with not being able to state my case, but it's still kindof embarrassing. I just hope this works out somehow.
Monday, November 7, 2011
Adventure 15 - Losing Track
I had to check to see what number post this is because I honestly forgot, it's been so long since I blogged. And now that I know I have at least one reader, I suppose I should put in some amount of effort to post somewhat regularly.
I apologize for not having blogged in over a week and a half, but I can explain myself in one word: NaNoWriMo.
For those of you not in the know, NaNoWriMo (a.k.a. National Novel Writing Month but that's just too long to have to say) is an annual competition to write a 50,000-word novel during the month of November. I tried it last year, got about 6K words in and ran out of things to talk about. So far this year I've written 11,039, so I'd say I'm off to a good start.
NaNo has actually been a pretty neat experience for me because it got me to do a lot of things I normally wouldn't've. I went to the city write-in at midnight that first night and stayed out 'til *le gasp!* 3am, on a school night nonetheless, and that's only because I was about to fall asleep right in the diner. My other write-in so far was at this loungey cafe place on campus I had never been to, and if you can't appreciate a few hours of writing with fun people, tiger brownies (squares of brownie and chocolate cookie stripes and absolute deliciousness) and Disney songs (as a result of a bet between the supervisor and the barristas), there's something wrong with you.
As a result of this madness, blogging will probably be light, especially considering I have another theme paper (the 5-7, 6-8 or 7-10 pager) due after Thanksgiving Break and a 15-20 page research paper due in December. Some people have No-Shave November. I have No-Life November.
I apologize for not having blogged in over a week and a half, but I can explain myself in one word: NaNoWriMo.
For those of you not in the know, NaNoWriMo (a.k.a. National Novel Writing Month but that's just too long to have to say) is an annual competition to write a 50,000-word novel during the month of November. I tried it last year, got about 6K words in and ran out of things to talk about. So far this year I've written 11,039, so I'd say I'm off to a good start.
NaNo has actually been a pretty neat experience for me because it got me to do a lot of things I normally wouldn't've. I went to the city write-in at midnight that first night and stayed out 'til *le gasp!* 3am, on a school night nonetheless, and that's only because I was about to fall asleep right in the diner. My other write-in so far was at this loungey cafe place on campus I had never been to, and if you can't appreciate a few hours of writing with fun people, tiger brownies (squares of brownie and chocolate cookie stripes and absolute deliciousness) and Disney songs (as a result of a bet between the supervisor and the barristas), there's something wrong with you.
As a result of this madness, blogging will probably be light, especially considering I have another theme paper (the 5-7, 6-8 or 7-10 pager) due after Thanksgiving Break and a 15-20 page research paper due in December. Some people have No-Shave November. I have No-Life November.
Thursday, October 27, 2011
Adventure 14 - Winter is Upon Us
Also, a post on how everyone is overreacting about the appearance of a few flakes this afternoon. I know that there are people here from across the country and world that may have not seen snow before, but the fact that there are snowflakes physically falling does not warrant a total conniption fit. Yes, it is technically snowing, but this is not snow, and it is certainly not typical upstate New York snow. Just wait until we have two feet and they don't cancel classes.
Anyway. I'm not thrilled about it being cold enough to snow in October, but I would much rather have snow than this barely above freezing sleety slushy crap. Rain and snow have this tranquility about them; the sound of falling rain (given that it's not a hurricane or other torrential downpour) is soothing, and snow (again, not talking Snowmageddon here) brings a calming stillness to the scenery. But when Mother Nature can't decide between the two, the slushy result is nothing short of dismal.
This "storm" won't bring much of substance, perhaps an inch or so, so instead of frolicking in the white stuff (get your heads out of the gutters, you perverts), I'm going to be spending the evening editing my essay on Herodotus' The Histories, reading up on prostitution in ancient Greece for my research paper and, if I'm lucky, watching the Rangers win the World Series.
Anyway. I'm not thrilled about it being cold enough to snow in October, but I would much rather have snow than this barely above freezing sleety slushy crap. Rain and snow have this tranquility about them; the sound of falling rain (given that it's not a hurricane or other torrential downpour) is soothing, and snow (again, not talking Snowmageddon here) brings a calming stillness to the scenery. But when Mother Nature can't decide between the two, the slushy result is nothing short of dismal.
This "storm" won't bring much of substance, perhaps an inch or so, so instead of frolicking in the white stuff (get your heads out of the gutters, you perverts), I'm going to be spending the evening editing my essay on Herodotus' The Histories, reading up on prostitution in ancient Greece for my research paper and, if I'm lucky, watching the Rangers win the World Series.
Saturday, October 22, 2011
Adventure 13.5 - Like a Movie
Life's a bitch. It really is. Because as much as chick flicks are sometimes entertaining to watch, they suck to have to live, and this trip has been proof of that.
Don't get me wrong, I loved every minute of my time in Boston. It's such a great city, and even though I definitely didn't get to see as much as I would've liked to, I got to walk around some, including the Harvard Bridge at 2am. Plus, hello, I got to see my boyfriend, who I hadn't seen in almost two months and was kinda the reason I went out in the first place.
But no, the movie-esque shenanigans started early, about a half hour after that last blog post to be exact. My flight to Philly got cancelled around 11 because of high winds down in PA, so I had to go back to the ticket counter to see how else I could get my ass to Boston. Fortunately, there was a flight from Syracuse to Boston that had one seat left, so I got to partake in an hour-long, 40-buck cab ride with 5 complete strangers who were also supposed to be flying into Philly. But hey, I got to Boston and only about 3 hours after I normally would've. The cab ride to Syracuse was actually longer than my flight to Boston; then again, the cabbie was also pushing 80 on the highway because one girl had a 1:30 flight to catch.
We finally meet up at the airport's T station, nice long hug, the usual rom-com deal. We walked around quite a bit, ate some sushi on campus and pasta at this little place in the North End, talked about the T because we're dorks like that, we had ...other miscellaneous shenanigans... and of course our late-night walk over the bridge, which I would highly recommend doing, especially when the moon's out. We even had deep, intellectual conversations about completely useless crap.
Of course, the conflict came in the form of references to his other girlfriend, but I was good and didn't say much. As such, that will be the extent of which I cover that because it makes me sad to think about.
The goodbye was more bittersweet than baking chocolate (which I've never actually eaten but I've had 70% and that's pretty close, plus it's just a lame simile for the sake of being silly). Last night and especially this morning were awful. We ate our breakfast in silence and neither of us wanted me to go. Of course, it didn't help that he started talking, both last night and this morning on the T to the airport, about how we've stayed so close even through all the crap we've been through and how we're not going to see each other again for another month. I tried to keep my composure, but it's really hard to do when everything being said is true and dammit he started sobbing first, I couldn't help it.
(Note: this "composure" of which I speak also does not include anything that happened in either Logan, LaGuardia or back here, though some of that was a bit of an act of masochism on my part because I wanted to listen to a song on my iPod that I like because it's kindof "our song," as stupid as that sounds, and I knew it was going to make me cry but I couldn't help it.)
It sounds pretty chick-flick-ish to me. The only part missing is that scene at the end, where the couple says their last goodbyes at the airport (or train station or whatever means of transportation is used), the girl leaves, the guy runs after her through some questionably legal maneuvers, professes his love for her and they live happily ever after, the end.
But that's not how life works. Happiness is not handed to you. It takes a lot of effort, a lot of know-how and the occasional 40-buck cab ride when things go wrong. Sometimes it feels like happiness isn't worth the inevitable shitty feeling that follows when it's gone. But when it's good, it's golden, and that's the one thing that rom-coms get right.
Don't get me wrong, I loved every minute of my time in Boston. It's such a great city, and even though I definitely didn't get to see as much as I would've liked to, I got to walk around some, including the Harvard Bridge at 2am. Plus, hello, I got to see my boyfriend, who I hadn't seen in almost two months and was kinda the reason I went out in the first place.
But no, the movie-esque shenanigans started early, about a half hour after that last blog post to be exact. My flight to Philly got cancelled around 11 because of high winds down in PA, so I had to go back to the ticket counter to see how else I could get my ass to Boston. Fortunately, there was a flight from Syracuse to Boston that had one seat left, so I got to partake in an hour-long, 40-buck cab ride with 5 complete strangers who were also supposed to be flying into Philly. But hey, I got to Boston and only about 3 hours after I normally would've. The cab ride to Syracuse was actually longer than my flight to Boston; then again, the cabbie was also pushing 80 on the highway because one girl had a 1:30 flight to catch.
We finally meet up at the airport's T station, nice long hug, the usual rom-com deal. We walked around quite a bit, ate some sushi on campus and pasta at this little place in the North End, talked about the T because we're dorks like that, we had ...other miscellaneous shenanigans... and of course our late-night walk over the bridge, which I would highly recommend doing, especially when the moon's out. We even had deep, intellectual conversations about completely useless crap.
Of course, the conflict came in the form of references to his other girlfriend, but I was good and didn't say much. As such, that will be the extent of which I cover that because it makes me sad to think about.
The goodbye was more bittersweet than baking chocolate (which I've never actually eaten but I've had 70% and that's pretty close, plus it's just a lame simile for the sake of being silly). Last night and especially this morning were awful. We ate our breakfast in silence and neither of us wanted me to go. Of course, it didn't help that he started talking, both last night and this morning on the T to the airport, about how we've stayed so close even through all the crap we've been through and how we're not going to see each other again for another month. I tried to keep my composure, but it's really hard to do when everything being said is true and dammit he started sobbing first, I couldn't help it.
(Note: this "composure" of which I speak also does not include anything that happened in either Logan, LaGuardia or back here, though some of that was a bit of an act of masochism on my part because I wanted to listen to a song on my iPod that I like because it's kindof "our song," as stupid as that sounds, and I knew it was going to make me cry but I couldn't help it.)
It sounds pretty chick-flick-ish to me. The only part missing is that scene at the end, where the couple says their last goodbyes at the airport (or train station or whatever means of transportation is used), the girl leaves, the guy runs after her through some questionably legal maneuvers, professes his love for her and they live happily ever after, the end.
But that's not how life works. Happiness is not handed to you. It takes a lot of effort, a lot of know-how and the occasional 40-buck cab ride when things go wrong. Sometimes it feels like happiness isn't worth the inevitable shitty feeling that follows when it's gone. But when it's good, it's golden, and that's the one thing that rom-coms get right.
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