2003-09-30
Road trip
I am off to Kentucky!
Woo woo woo!
Etc.
np: Ted Leo/RX-You Could Die (Or this Might End)
2003-09-29
Commercials
I really enjoy this food pyramid:
I don't think that I've gotten my daily requirement of Cracker Jacks today!
Also, I really enjoy the movies for the toilet seat/bidet combo thing that can be found here. I like it when they stick a toilet out in the middle of a waterfall to show how natural it looks. And I enjoy the inspiring music, and the way they have to discuss things so very carefully, since they are dealing with activities that most people don't want to have blaring at them from their computer/tv screen.
Ted Leo/RX-Tell Balgeary, Balgury is Dead (someone needs to rotate the cds in my stereo so i'll actually listen to somthing else)
2003-09-29
Flashy media
For some reason unknown to me, the library installed a tv in an unobtrusive spot sort of over the circulation desk. I can kind of see it from my new and exciting post at the fiction and media desk, and even though it is tuned to the Weather Channel and is all the way on the other side of the room so I can't hear it or read the captions, I still have found myself staring blankly over my computer screen at it about a million times this afternoon.
np: work
2003-09-29
It is Welsh overload, is what it is
So, I was pretty much minding my own business and trying to figure out how much the Death Cab for Cutie show at the Majestic Theatre is when I made the unbelievable discovery that Gorky's Zygotic Mynci is going to be in Detroit in about two weeks. No, seriously. I'm not sure I've ever been happier in my entire life. I knew they had an album coming out but I didn't think that they would tour. I actually kind of thought that I would never see them again, since they didn't tour anywhere I could actually see them from 1999 (when I started going to shows) until 2002.
Jessica was initially kind of distressed, since she is supposed to take the GRE the next day. She was eventually worn down by my shouts of "OH MY GOSH I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS" and has decided that she will go to the show, because she would just be stressed out thinking about the test if she sat around at home the night before.
I should start thinking about taking the GRE if I really am going to go to grad school next year. I am only going to apply to one school, though, and the application doesn't have to be in until July, so there's really no hurry.
np: Gorky's Zygotic Mynci-The Girl I've Always Known
2003-09-28
"Name one." "You're a compulsive listmaker." "Name two!"
1. The best thing about my phone is that it has this countdown feature that tells me that it is now only 1 day 23 hours and 52 minutes before I will be standing in a dismal smoke-filled room in Louisville. I have no idea why people with less obsessive tendencies would need a feature like this.
2. Screens keep appearing in our windows that previously had no screens. We have no idea when our landlord is doing this. I saw him the other day, but he just said that he can never do any work here because people are always parked in the end of the driveway and, "I'm not going to walk a block to get here." And he didn't say anything about screens.
3. Yesterday I was standing around in a store, and two girls were talking about a mutual acquaintance of theirs. One asked, "How is he?" and the other replied, "Skinny. . . .and vegan." I giggled and rustled around in a rack full of skirts that only existed in sizes 0-4. Because nothing says "I am not eavesdropping" more than laughing at nothing and then very obviously pretending to shop.
4. If anyone could explain to me the reason for Coldplay's lingering popularity, I would be very grateful. I wrote them off as one hit wonders three years ago, but I think it is pretty obvious that I am not really up on the hip and the happening.
5. Last night I was digging through my closet and I came across a box full of tights, and I immediately wanted to wear each and every pair, and as a result I decided to go the skirt/tights/ long-sleeved shirt/square toed brown shoes route for the SFA concert. And returning the pink tank top and the black shirt will bring yesterday's purchases down to a lean $60. So there.
6. I was at the store yesterday and I saw some things called Natural Cheetos. Those are two words that I didn't really think could go together.
That is all.
np: Ted Leo and the Pharmacists-Tell Balgeary, Balgury is Dead
2003-09-27
Shopping
Today seemed like a good day for consumerism, so I went out and bought:
1. 3 skirts (1 blue denim, 1 khaki corduroy, 1 grey, plaid, woolish-looking)
2. 1 pink sparkly tank top for SFA concert (I don't have many opportunities to dress up, so I pretty much take every chance I get)
3. 1 black shiny shirt with buttons, to wear over pink sparkly tank top at SFA concert
4. 1 pair of jeans, exactly like my super brown pants, which aren't so super anymore since they have mysteriously gotten pink spots (and it wasn't from bleach or anything, since they just appeared one day when they were nowhere near the washing machine)
5. 1 bra (all of my bras keep disappearing. I have no idea how this is possible.)
6. 1 necklace (also for sfa concert, since my neck looked all stupid and naked)
7. 1 curling iron (mine exploded the other day)
8. 1 purple hooded sweatshirt (I have been looking for one forever (even since before my other one disappeared) and which I finally found in Ypsilanti, purveyor of all things good and cheap. It is the greatest hooded sweatshirt ever.)
Now I am drinking water that has a distinict oniony flavor and I have to go wash a skirt by hand because that is how I spend my Saturday nights.
np: Ted Leo and the Pharmacists-Bridges, Squares
2003-09-26
Mechanic part two
I was sitting in the computer lab yesterday, using (and printing from) the university computers for free (my computing package officially expired at the end of the summer but i just got an email saying that it will be closed down for real on October 8. I have to find somewhere else to host images now.), and I decided to take the bus to a store because the other day I left my hooded sweatshirt at work and now it has vanished*. But as soon as I picked up my phone to call someone to accompany me, it buzzed, and I kind of freaked out because I've only gotten about 2 calls on my phone so far, and each one has caused me to gush with glee.
It was the mechanic! And although there was an awkward pause after he identified himself in which I expected him to say, "I'm sorry. There was nothing we could do," he instead said, "Your car is fixed." I've been living with a car that doesn't start when it is wet for two years and all it took was three hours (and some money) to fix it!
So, I went and picked it up and the mechanic had a pretty cat which sat on the desk and I petted it for a while and then it bit me. The mechanic told me not to take it too personally because it bites everyone.
Then I drove my car around and was a little disappointed, because I won't actually know that it really is fixed until it rains.
Now I am hungry and at work and I wish school groups wouldn't come in to use the microfilm machines while I'm here because all of the machines are different, so I have to show each person how to use each one individually and that really eats up a lot of time that I could be using to read fashion magazines at the periodicals desk.
*This is at least the third sweatshirt that has disappeared after I left it somewhere. It's not like they're nice sweatshirts or anything. This one was almost three years old and had funny spots and fraying sleeves. I keep expecting to see a homeless person wearing it, at which point I will beat them up and get my name in the Michigan Daily under the headline "U-M Alumnus Assaults Homeless Man."
np: work
2003-09-25
Mechanic
I get to go see a mechanic today. My dad called a mechanic in Grand Rapids, who told him about this guy, and then my dad called this guy and he's like, "Oh yeah, it sounds like the distributor cap," and when I called my dad he said, "You should take your car into this guy on Thursday. I think it's within walking distance for you."
I hate going to the mechanic because I never know what to say. So, I guess I will walk in and say, "Hey you talked to my dad! I have a Honda Civic that doesn't start in the rain! It might be related to the distributor cap!" except in place of each of those exclamation marks, there should actually be question marks.
The moral of the story is that I can't take care of any of my own problems and if my dad wasn't around, I would just continue to drive my car as it is, being sad when it doesn't start, but not having a clue about what to do to fix it.
np: the Left Banke-She May Call You Up Tonight
2003-09-23
Blimps, catholics, and garter belts
Today I went to see The Magdalene Sisters, because I've been on a Catholicism kick lately. I even went to see The Order which, as a movie, sucked, but as an idea for a movie, it doesn't sound so bad (unlike, say, The Real Cancun*). I attribute this new interest to the fact that I now live across the street from a Catholic church and school, which spits out adorable little children every afternoon at 2:45. I figured that I would be the only one there, since I wasn't sure who goes to see movies in the middle of the afternoon, but I wasn't, because old people who talk loudly during all/most of the movie ("Sandra! I don't think there's anyone in here!") also go to see movies in the middle of the afternoon.
After the movie I saw the Goodyear blimp and was saddened that I had switched to my official fall handbag and didn't have enough room in it for my camera**. I did have my phone, however, and suddenly I understood why humans have an innate need for cameras in their cellular phones.
Then came home and set off the smoke detector while frying the world's biggest sweet potato in the world's smallest frying pan. I tried to open the windows, but most of them are painted shut. No permanent damage was done, but some of my potato got burned while I was running around trying to open the windows. However, burned sweet potato with pepper and parmesan cheese is a little more tasty than you would believe. But only a little.
PS-It is fally, and once again my thoughts turn to finding a garter belt that (a) doesn't cost 2 million dollars and (b) isn't slutty looking (though I think that all garter belts are slutty looking by default) because stockings (a) are the greatest but (b) tend to fall down a lot when I wear them. If anyone can help me out, I would appreciate it.
*It took me quite a while to think of a really bad movie, since I generally enjoy cinematic crap.
**Not that the Goodyear blimp is that amazing or anything. I just don't usually see it***.
***Nothing will ever top the day I saw the wienermobile.
np: the Flaming Lips-The Spark That Bled
2003-09-22
Fall
Today when I went out to my car in the rain I was saddened (but not at all surprised) when it didn't start.
I came back inside and asked Jeeves why my car doesn't start in the rain (Jeeves thinks it may be a problem with condensation getting into the ignition system) and made the most obvious fall mixed cd ever. Belle and Sebastian? check. Nick Drake? check. Plenty of dewey-eyed sadness? check and check.
np: my dad on the phone
2003-09-22
If I do get fired, though, I'll be more inspired to get a new job, which is what I'm supposed to be doing anyway
Shit. Apparently I was supposed to work yesterday, although I am quite certain that I wasn't on the schedule that I looked at on Thursday to see if I could go home for the weekend (which probably just means that I looked at last week's schedule because I am dumb). I am not so much concerned about getting fired as I am about the fact that I missed out on six whole hours of money (which would have helped to pay for the cell phone that I bought yesterday while I was supposed to be here). Aargh.
np: work
2003-09-21
Hypocrite
A little piece of my soul died this afternoon when I got a cell phone. At first I was taken in by its wee small cuteness, but now as I sit here waiting for it to ring, I am reminded of the gravity of what I did. Oh how I remember the days when I watched each and every one of my friends descend into cellphoneownership, and oh! how I ridiculed them. I shall be eating crow for a while.
My justification for this is that we don't have a phone in the house (since everybody else has cells) so I really did actually need one. Really. And it would be nice to have while driving, especially in a car as untrustworthy (and devious) as mine. And we all knew that I would fold, eventually, because I always do.
np: Gorky's Zygotic Mynci-The Johnny Cash Lawsuit Song
2003-09-17
Curling iron
Sorry this is hair-related again, but a fact that you might not know about my hair is that both sides curl the same way. Since that might not make any sense, here is an artist's* rendering**:
note: the back of my hair does its own thing entirely, but since I can't see it, I don't worry about it.
Ideally, my hair would look more like this:
Today, though, while attempting to right some wrongs, pieces of my curling iron flew around the bathroom. Some of those pieces were never recovered. The future of my hair looks bleak.
*OK, not so much an artist's rendering, but mine.
**You will also notice that I have a triangular, yellow nose.
np: Al Green-Take Me to the River
2003-09-17
You can hear it before it happens
I finally* saw Ted Leo last night! He stood around before he played, being rock and roll and drinking tea and stuff.
I stood around being simultaneously overjoyed with actually being there and full of hatred for my new, too-short hair.
I thought of lots of things that I wanted to say last night on the drive home, but as soon as I got here I went to sleep because I'd been awake for many hours and couldn't stand to have my eyes open for one more minute. It is a little frustrating that all I can remember now is that I was happy and don't like my hair. Oh well.
Now that it is after 11am, I am going to go eat a taco**.
PS-Irony is a literary device, not a lifestyle.
*After various tragedies and stupidnesses prevented me from going to every other one of his shows within reasonable driving distance for the last year. I thought it wasn't going to happen this time either, since I spent the afternoon curled up on my bed in the throes of some really horrible stomach problems, listening to Belle and Sebastian and thinking, "Oh, THIS is what happens this time, huh?"
**My mom would only ever let me eat breakfast if I got up before 10am (i don't mean she just wouldn't give me food. it was just a little food, reasoning that i was going to eat lunch in a little while). So, I figure that lunch can come anytime after 11. But not before.
np: Super Furry Animals-Missunderstanding (sic)
2003-09-16
Viva Las Vegas
I just spent hours and hours and HOURS (ehm, about 45 minutes) searching the internet for a picture of how I want my hair to look after I get it cut this afternoon. I hate going in and having to try to explain what I want, because every time I do that I just end up gesturing and saying things like, "Well, I want it longer in the back, but not too much longer, and maybe layered and I don't know." Oddly, that just never works out very well for me.
So I did finally find a picture, but it took a lot longer than it should have, because short, straight hair is not possible unless you also want bangs. And although sometimes I think that I would really enjoy bangs, I know that I would get sick of them in about 32 hours and then I would have to wait years and years for them to grow out. So, no thank you.
While I was searching the far corners of the internet for the picture, I encountered an ad which promised "live people fucking," and I wondered if there is a pornography site somewhere which features corpses.
Also, last night I was watching some sort of newsprogram (a housemate was watching the tv with the cable hooked up, so we had to go upstairs and use the air antenna which only gets three channels) about Las Vegas and I learned many things:
1. There are laws in Las Vegas that prohibit stripping in casinos.
2. Strip clubs have recently been making more money than casinos (presumably because you actually get something for your money at strip clubs), and the casinos are mad.
3. Professional poker players make a whole lot of money, but they do so by only playing against amateurs, never other pros.
4. Celine Dion was teased and unpopular and ugly in school. Since every other celebrity ever interviewed has said the same, only one conclusion can be made: I will someday be really fabulously rich and famous.
At last, I feel some hope.
np: work
2003-09-15
Wizard schmizard, this is what really happened to Harry Potter
Last night I was in the store buying popcorn to eat during Conan O'Brien's 10th anniversary spectacular, and feeling smug because everyone was buying the microwave kind and I was buying real kind that you make in a pan on the stove.
But then while I was making my popcorn in a pan on the stove, I thought I had heard my test kernel pop, so I opened the lid. The kernel (which apparently hadn't popped before) popped right at that moment and hit me in the forehead, splattering hot oil around and leaving a faint horseshoe-shaped burn.
Those people might be on to something with their microwave popcorn.
PS- I was going to write this last night, but during the Conan special, I got really depressed because I saw a news promo regarding the possible Ben/Jen breakup. If a couple like that can't stay together, what is left to believe in?
np: work
2003-09-14
Liquid air
Last night I went to see American Splendor, and I was thirsty so I paid 10 dollars (or whatever) for a small diet Coke, but my beverage tasted about as much unlike diet Coke as is possible. I think that if I'd ordered Sprite, it would've probably tasted more like diet Coke than this brown liquid did. And the guy didn't just screw up and give me root beer or regular coke, because it didn't taste like either of those either. It just tasted like nothing. It wasn't even fizzy. It was like drinking liquid air.
np: The Day the Earth Stood Still
2003-09-13
Accident
I saw a car accident on the way home from work. It was really weird, because just the other day I was thinking about how I'd never seen a real car accident before (as it was happening).
I learned something, too: the first action you should take after your car smashes into someone else's is to get out and yell about how it was all the other person's fault, even if you were doing something idiotic like making a left turn out of the middle of three lanes of one-way traffic.
np: nothing
2003-09-12
Whimsy is worse, though
The other night I had a dream that I was at a family reunion/Easter egg hunt, and for some reason it involved sitting next to Kenny Rogers on a bus and discussing the Legally Blonde movies with him.
I hope that tonight's sleeping holds similarly whimsical adventures.
Also, I hate the word whimsical, and using it makes me feel a little sick.
np: King of the Hill
2003-09-11
Enjoying my flashy media
I fixed the very clogged kitchen sink! Me! Ever since I succesfully declogged the bathtub, I have taken all house drainage issues as being my responsibilities. However, after working and working at it, I had no success with the kitchen sink (it actually seemed to get worse after I poured Meijer brand Drain Opener down it). But today I found a plunger in the back yard, and that made all of the difference.
Also, the cable men came early today (!). I am writing this from my very own living room while watching The Simpsons. And last night I found out that I couldn't buy tickets for the SFA/Grandaddy show last week due to some computer problem. The show is, in fact, not sold out, and even as I type this, tickets are slowly making their way towards me.
Something very bad is due to happen very soon, I'm sure.
np: The Simpsons
2003-09-10
Wheeze and sputter
Today, while I was making a right turn onto a scary street where I couldn't see anything, my car died. "Wheeze wheeze," it said, and then it just sat there and almost got rearended by a man who yelled rude things at me when he finally drove around me (for a while he just honked his horn, like that was going to solve my problems). Because I made my car die there on the street on purpose.
It started again, though,and when it did, I drove to Home Depot, where I stood around looking uninformed about what I was trying to do, and wondering why a hardware store was piping upbeat eighties pop hits through the sound system. Eventually I found what I needed: a 63 cent plug to adapt my outlets (all ungrounded), so that I can plug my computer into one of them (it needs a grounded outlet), for tomorrow we will get cable tv and high speed internet access in our very own home. I have a feeling that for a while it will be just like manna from heaven, but after a few hours we will be bored again and wonder why we were so excited about it. Oh well.
np: computer lab
2003-09-09
From a super-sexy mac. . .
So, we didn't go to Chicago today. We decided to go on Thursday, but then that was the only day that Comcast could come and save us from our media*-free life, and then we thought maybe Wednesday, but there is some training thing** at the humane society, so that was out too. So, next week maybe. I don't know when I am working yet, and Tuesday is Ted Leo attempt #4 (cross your fingers, everyone, and hope that I will actually get to the show this time), which rules out Tuesday and maybe Wednesday, but I am sure that someone who works 17 hours a week and someone else who is unemployed can somehow find a day in which they can both make a foolhardy trip to Chicago. What we will lack in spontaneity, we will make up for in preparedness***. And I found some plates on our porch, and that should hold us over until next week.
So, instead of Chicago, today I went to Meijer and bought stuff to unclog the drain with****. It didn't unclog the drain. We will have to call Herr Landlord. We also need to tell him that the oven doesn't work, which I discovered the other day when I put a tray of faux-chicken nuggets inside and waited and waited and waited.
Oh yeah, and last night I broke down and watched whatever I could watch on tv with just the air antenna. I got three channels. They were all crap. Have you seen this Classmates show? This girl wanted to meet up with this guy that she had a crush on TEN YEARS AGO (in high school), and she made him a cake and told him about how she used to go to swim meets and see him. He was like, "Oh, what was your name again? I don't remember you. Oh, and I have a girlfriend." It was painful and I could feel my brain rotting. Then I watched Sur Mes L�vres, which I enjoyed very much, despite it's Frenchness******.
It is a record-breaking day for footnotes.
*That would be the fun, flashy types of media. I've read three novels in the past two days just because I don't have anything else to do.
**I don't actually have to go to this, but Jessica does. Earlier when I asked her if she wanted to go Wednesday or what (because she was the one who brought it up in the first place) , she asked, "Would you be really upset if we didn't go tomorrow?" and it made me really mad, because I don't want her to change her schedule to accommodate me. I just wanted her to say one way or the other, if she wanted to go tomorrow or not. And I know that when I get back to the house, she will somehow make me feel like that is an unreasonable request.
***ie, we might actually get to where we want to go.
****A real life conversation:
Me: We need to get some of that stuff to unclog the drain with.
Jessica: Draino?
Me: Yeah, like we can afford the namebrand kind. We will have to get Meijer brand drain unclogger.*****
*****The other day, we were going to buy Cocoa Puffs, but we were at some other store and decided that we would wait until we went to Meijer and buy something like Meijer-brand Cocoa Balls, but when we got to Meijer we found out that they are actually called Cocoa Comets. We bought the Meijer-brand Cocoa Crispies instead. I'm still calling them Cocoa balls, though. I am nothing if not very mature.
******Someday, when I feel up to it, I will explain my animosity towards the French language (but, really, does animosity towards the French language really need to be explained?).
np: computer lab
2003-09-08
Someone had better call the cable company soon
Do you want to know about my Sunday night?
My Sunday night was spent laying in bed watching a giant disgusting bug crawl on the light fixture (no screens in my window, thanks). Words cannot describe the sadness I felt when it flew away.
Would you like to know about my Monday afternoon?
I spent my Monday afternoon contemplating on why my male housemate would park his car in the back yard rather than the driveway (couldn't come up with any good reasons) and wondering if clear mascara was just a clever way to scam me out of two dollars.
And I keep thinking, "This is the way I am spending my first school-free year since 1986?"
Tomorrow, though, I might make a relatively spontaneous and foolhardy trip to Chicago. If I go, expect a blowout of Ferris Bueller-style proportions. Or at least expect me to arrive home poor(er) and with cheap dishes from IKEA. I hope that I ignore the fact that I don't have money for gas and go go go.
np: computer lab
2003-09-07
Three paragraphs
I walked all the way to the computer lab thinking about how stupid everyone is, but then when I got here a boy held a door open for me that would've locked if it had closed all the way, and I was very far away and sort of slowly meandering towards the door, and after I was inside I kept wondering if, had the situation been reversed, I would've held open the door for him*, and it bothers me that I'm not absolutely sure that I would have.
Also, everytime I walk down the street I think, "haha, you probably had to go to school today! and you and you and you!" but then this afternoon the realization hit me that I am a non-student living in Ann Arbor, and I really never saw that coming. I figured four years and I'd be out of here. Oh well.
Finally, I need to go on a trip somewhere. I realize that with gas prices being what they are and with a car that only starts when it wants to, this might not be the most intelligent thing to do, but in honesty, I was really looking forward to that trip to Kentucky that has been called off.
*I mean, if I'd known the door was going to lock, which I didn't today, or I would've just gone to another door in the first place.
np: computer lab
2003-09-05
Something has to change
1. In addition to putting everything wherever I wanted to, last night I danced around in sockfeet on the linoleum and listened to Outkast in the kitchen. My bedroom was christened with spazzy dancing to New Order. I didn't do this in the co-ops because the floors were never so shiny and inviting.
2. I was sitting here at work all afternoon gradually becoming more and more aware of a headache that was going to kill me. How do you know if you have migraines? On my break I took a handful (er, 4) Meijer brand aspirin free pain reliever (I will never buy a painkiller without caffeine in it ever again*) and tried to figure out where in the library I would most like to vomit, if that became an issue. I feel a little better now. I was going to go out tonight, but now I'm not sure that I want to.
3. I am not a fan of ultra low-rise pants, but neither am I a fan of pants that go all the way up to my boobs and I am unsure of why there cannot be a happy medium. I am also not a fan of yanking my pants up by the beltloops every time that I move, but that is what I keep doing.
4. Tomorrow is Dally in the Alley, but I have to work until 6. That is okay, though, because I will still get there in time to stand around in the Detroit twilight and enjoy the twee-pop stylings of Pas/Cal.
5. How many former housemates have I seen on the street/in the library in the past 3 days? Five. One of them hugged me. She might have been drunk.
6. All day I have had the unsettling feeling that I forgot to put on deoderant this morning. It's not because I am smelly, but because I just have no recollection of moving my tube of deoderant. And also because I didn't put the shirt on that I wanted to wear to work immediately after I took my shower, opting instead for an intermediate type shirt because I was sure that I would get some sort of food on my shirt. And I did**.
*I get really amazing caffeine headaches. Really. During the blackout I was sucking down cans of warm mountain dew like you wouldn't believe.
**Hello, I am the girl who gets food on herself and hitches up her pants by the beltloops every five minutes.
np: work
2003-09-04
I am kind of a loser
Warning-sad sighing to follow:
I don't know if anyone remembers my plans to go and see the Super Furry Animals in Kentucky at the end of September, but the trip is off because it seems that the show is sold out. Stupid Grandaddy*. I've been trying to look on the bright side of things (because, this is one of those (many) things that is totally my fault, so I shouldn't really be able to complain about it**): I would've been disappointed with Grandaddy headlining the show, and gas prices are high, and this means that I can go see Mogwai in Chicago on October 2, but none of that really helps. So perhaps we will just have to get into my car and drive to Georgia. Or Washington D.C.
I am in a computer lab that is about to close, and I had lots of other things that I wanted to say. Most important was how exciting it is to be able to put things wherever you want to in a kitchen. Honestly, I stood there thinking, "I will put my silverware in this drawer! Cereal can go on top of this cabinet! OH MY GOSH I CAN HAVE AN ENTIRE DRAWER DEDICATED TO TEA IF I REALLY WANT TO!!!" But, the computer lab is about to close, so I had better be on my way.
*in addition to this (sfa wouldn't sell out on their own, kids), i will always hold them partly accountable for disappearance of my old laptop, as i bought a cd by them on the very same day that it vanished.
**yeah, like that's ever stopped me before.
np: computer lab
2003-09-03
Bored and hungry
So, tonight is my first night in my new house. The landlord is still fixing the kitchen, which kind of pisses me off, since my lease started two days ago and I should have access to all of the house. On the other hand, at least my landlord is actually fixing the things in my house that need fixing, and that seems to be contrary to the way things normally go here.
There was luggage in the living room, and for a long time I tried to figure out if the clothes involved were boy clothes or girl clothes, and I hoped hoped hoped that they were boy clothes because, in my limited experience, boys are easier to live with than girls. I was later informed that a boy is moving into the basement and a girl is moving into the room between Jessica's (who is my friend that I didn't want to live with) and mine. We all need to get together soon and decide what we are doing about the tv, phone and internet situation (right now we've got nothing). Tonight promises to be a rather dull night of unpacking and waiting for it to get dark so I can go to sleep.
I am at the library, sitting here feeling out of place because I am sitting next to the smelly men that come in to look at questionable material. I think that I am going to go home and sit around being bored and hungry.
np: nothing
2003-09-03
A new room that I am not living in
I am not at all where I am supposed to be tonight. I spent the morning moping around about not wanting to move to my new house (this will be explained later), and my dad (who took the day off from work to help me move, so I had to do it today) finally suggested that since I don't have to work until later this week, that we both drive down in one car today and move the stuff that I needed to move, and then I would return to my parents' house for the night and drive my car back to Ann Arbor tomorrow (the original plan was that he and I would drive down in separate cars today and then I would just stay down there tonight).
So that is what we did. My new room is superhot*. It has a huge window and a shiny brown floor and a closet that is nearly as big as my bedroom was in the co-op. And the whole house is so clean. Co-ops are dirty as soon as you move in and pretty much stay that way throughout your entire stay. But they are cheap, so you just look past the constantly dirty carpet (heck, I went barefoot on mine) and the overwhelming stickiness of everything in the kitchen. You wear shoes in the shower and live with it because it is so so cheap.
So, you may ask, if you are living in such a remarkably wonderful place, why didn't you just stay there tonight?
And I will tell you: it is because I am living, for the first time ever, with someone that I know.
Previously, I have always lived with strangers**, and this has worked remarkably well for me. I get along with pretty much everyone. I mean, I may have complained extensively about former housemates, but I was always nice to them. I kind of enjoyed not knowing who I was going to end up with.
Oh well. My room, as I mentioned before, is the sexiest room ever, so if I end up having to spend a lot of time there, it'll be ok. And there are two more as-yet unrented rooms in the house, so hopefully a couple of more people will move in and I will still get to live with strangers.
*Photographic evidence of this would be here, but when I whipped out my camera to take a picture, I discovered that one of the buttons had broken off. It had a warranty, though, and we took it into Best Buy and they gave me a new one. It's a little sad, but I guess I will learn to love my new and identical camera as much as I loved the old one.
**Sometimes they weren't strangers, but it was only because I had lived with them the previous year.
np: Gorky's Zygotic Mynci-Her Hair Hangs Long
2003-09-02
Weekend
The weekend involved too much driving. We drove all the way to Mackinaw City on Saturday, and then on Sunday we drove to Sault Ste. Marie* to watch boats go through the locks, but we got there a half hour after the only boat of the day passed through. Instead, we watched a miniature model boat go through a miniature model of the locks. The boat jerked along and the water level inside the locks never actually changed. I complained about the model's crappiness to a total stranger, then stood in a corner and read a brochure and laughed about the name "Poe Lock."
Since we weren't going to see boats, we loaded back into our vehicles and went to Tahquamenon Falls, which is where everyone else who happened to be in the upper peninsula also was. I was mad because all of my pictures had people that I don't know in them. And also because I had to ride in a rowboat and I am really more of a land-based person**.
Then this morning I got up at 5:45am to walk across a suspension bridge. I was worried about being cold, so I wore jeans, but by the time we were done, the sun was sunning everything nicely and I was hot. Everyone was standing around being indecisive about what we should do next, so I walked a mile back to the car and changed into a skirt in the parking lot. Later, I walked across some sharp rocks to wade in the lake, but after I got out, my dad pointed out a sign that said to stay out of the water due to high bacteria levels. Honestly, though, bacteria could do nothing but help my feet at this point.
Later we drove home, stopping only to watch an Amish kid plowing a field. My dad made my mom pull the car over to the side of the road, and he kept waving to him every time he was pointed in our direction. I felt really bad about it. I mean, I knew that my dad, having grown up on a farm, was far more interested in the workings of a horse-drawn plow than in the Amish kid, but it still felt wrong to pull off the road and stare at someone. I laid down in the back seat of the car so he couldn't see me.
And now I am going to bed, because I am moving into my new house tomorrow. I wish I was more excited about it.
*In fourth grade, we used to have spelling bees with Michigan place names. Sault Ste. Marie was always the hardest. You'd think, "Hah! I know this one" and correctly spell "Sault," and think that you were the smartest kid ever, but that 'e' on the end of Ste. would get you every single time. French. Who needs it?
**I don't remember boats being a problem for me before. I used to go canoeing at summer camp, and I've been in other rowboats, but this one was just terrible. I think it was because of my camera. I can swim, and the water was probably pretty shallow, but in the even of capsizing (which, honestly, wasn't all that far-fetched, as we were involved in a nasty, three-rowboat pileup, which we are blaming on my cousin), my camera could probably not survive total submersion.
np: the Reindeer Section-If There Is I Haven't Found It
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