Movie Impossible

Due to the incessant pounding and sawing outside, I had the most fitful morning imaginable. I was tossing and turning, crushing a pillow on my head to drown out the sound, and eventually got very hot and had to get up. I figured it was early afternoon, but no. It was 10:00. Now, there's a constant stream of "BAM BAM BAM"s and "whirrrrrrrrrrrr"s around the house. In addition, I can't find the cat.

And they also left a handful of roofing nails in the driveway after they left last night. Real smart, guys.

In a desperate attempt to leave the house, I perused the paper for good movies to see with no avail. Sadly enough, the best (poor choice of words) movie they had available was "Mission Impossible III" which I have already seen twice and am not going to see again. Hopefully on Friday some new blood will be introduced.

Good news - I found out that you can bring knitting needles and scissors onboard a plane as long as the blades are shorter than 4 inches long. I have a feeling that I shall become hastily crafty while stuck in the airport with nothing to do.

Ten days left until departure back to my apartment. I never thought I would be so happy to resume working at Carmike Cinemas. I hope Stephanie is still the manager - people come and go in that position.

Moreness

My internet just died. It was working well, and all of a sudden the only pages I was reading were "! Server Not Found" ones. I think my computer is trying to tell me something (mainly, get back into bed, it's 2:30 in the morning for crying out loud). So now, I am so desperate to be doing anything but be upstairs in bed that I am typing this out in Notepad. Both my camera and my parents' camera are sitting next to the computer, and I am fighting the urge just to play with them and take silly pictures. That would be nothing but a huge waste of AA batteries, but it's so compelling.

Pretty soon I'll start reading the encyclopedia. I kind of meant that as a joke at first, but now it doesn't sound like a terrible idea. I think we only have random old-looking editions around the house, though. I'd have to suffice with COL-FLO. Staring down at the random collection of books on the shelf (which are mainly there for decor), I am tempted by a Douglas Adams anthology, rereading The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes . . . and that's about it. The rest of them are just old, dusty, and boring.

Oh! We're getting a new refrigerator tomorrow, which is really exciting. It's one of those side-by-side fridge and freezer models, with the ice machine that comes out the door. Another important feature is that it's fingerprint-proof, which is important with my sister around.

I was going to make cupcakes today, and even had the icing and cake mix and everything, but it went up to 92 degrees and even moving seemed a chore, much less sitting and waiting by a hot oven. Those will have to wait for another day.

Hee! The internet came back. The DSL gods are toying with me.

Steak

We all played poker tonight, and I must have some unconscious desire to give money to Rob since he's always the one who wins, but I still like playing. I completely went out the first game and could only sit around and wistfully stare at Thomas' hand, but on the second game (this time for only three dollars instead of five) I totally rocked the house and made $5.70. It's a good thing that I have a hearty dose of frugality in me to temper the gambling streak.

It feels good to be motivated to read again; mainly because it's good to be motivated by doing anything again. I have to return the DVDs to the library tomorrow so I'll peruse the shelves and pick up pounds of light reading.

This evening my father grilled steak for us, to which he said that the cow must have lazed by the beach all day eating bonbons since the meat was so soft and good. It was incredibly tasty. I just had some leftovers.

I get so tired of just laying in bed and not being able to sleep. I try to calm my mind down and just think of like, two unimportant things, but then my brain freaks and flies off on another tangent. Recently, a favorite has been "what should I consider packing when I leave for France?" I'll think about my pants, and shoes, and what's practical, and what's not practical but that I really want to bring anyway, and whether such-and-such shirt is too weird to be worn in a foreign country around people I don't know, or what kind of present I should bring to the host family when I get there. Erin said that gray and black are good, safe colors to wear - lucky me. One of my bigger fears is not that what I'm wearing is weird or bizarre - I'm pretty used to that. I'm worried about looking tacky. That's like, fashion death.

Cat

Oh! I forgot! We got (slightly) lost on the way to the theatre, and so we had to turn around in this nice-looking residential area. As we were backing out of a stranger's driveway, we see this black cat in the classic Halloween pose (back arched and fur sticking straight up) in front of the house next door. What an omen! It gets worse! We were accelerating to turn around, when the black cat crosses the street. Right in front of us! Oh, bad luck galore in that neck of the woods. Good thing we're not a superstitious lot.

Trader Jack's

Naps can be terrible things. I'm up again at 2:00, as I have been for the last two weeks. I finished The Odyssey as well as The Canterbury Tales, and some fluff reading not worth mention. Oh, at Trader Jack's this morning I picked up several great finds. First there was a table with neat plates on it (retro '70's flower print) that were two for a quarter. Of course I bought them. We walked around for awhile in the stifling heat (Trader Jack's is not known for its shady trees) and then I bought a phone. No real reason, but the one up in my room is ancient. This is a cool, heavy black and gray number. Nearing the end of the visit, Thomas was occupied checking out this old camera and I, quickly bored, shuffled down the line. On one of the tables was a glass, hollow head! Completely clear, it apparently was used to model hats. Oh, I had to! She said ten dollars at first but I gave a little mournful look and got it down to eight. Then, over at the side, it said "$1 table". I was checking it out, and the lady was like "oh, you can just make it a whole bag for a dollar". Woo!

So I felt a little guilty, cause this whole table of stuff could have fit into one bag so I didn't want to seem greedy. I got salt and pepper shakers shaped like deer, two banks - one with something about Iowa on the front that's shaped like a suitcase and the other in the shape of a dirty Howard Johnsons. I tossed in this odd candleholder-like thing that is shaped like a ship's wheel, as well as this retro clock that she assured me still worked. Then I bought the glorious head.

Travis and I drove all the way to Regent Square to see Dr. Strangelove. It was one happening place! Surprisingly enough, most of the patrons there were seniors. As in, senior citizens. I sweet-talked the box attendant into giving me the student price although I didn't have ID (like she really cared) and then bought a black cherry beverage in an actual glass bottle since all the concessions were so cheap. Then I got a small popcorn because it smelled delicious and tasty (it was). Afterwards, we went to Wendy's and got Frosties. God, it's like I'm a starving person. The old folk were holding some question and answer seminar after the movie, presumably about the dangers of nuclear energy. Oh well.

I bought this CD at the Dollar Tree a long time ago called "Bookshop Classics". It claimed to have over 1000 titles on just one disk. Well, I'll buy anything for a dollar. So I finally loaded it today, and it's true! They have like, every book on there. However, you have to scroll down while reading it and my eyes hurt after awhile. But they have some neat things, like Ben Franklin's almanac(k)s from several different years, and the CIA handbook to guerilla warfare. Never know when you'll need that.

Horrid, Wicked Boy

The roofing guys were supposed to come this morning at like, 6:30, so I prepared myself for some very bad sleep ahead. But hooray; they aren't here right now. I don't know if this is a mistake, and I should call someone, or let my mom know, but for right now I'm not going to do anything. Wow, how unusual for me.

The cake is gone. I needed a sugar fix desperately the other night so we went to Wendy's and tried their new vanilla frosty. I didn't know what size to get but I was afraid that the small would be like, a dixie cup, so we went with the $1.39 large. God, they weren't lying! They were enormous! But luckily they were also very tasty.

I forced Thomas to enjoy a little pre-20th century Prince Edward Islandian culture yesterday by watching the three hour marathon of Anne of Green Gables. I think they did a really nice job. They didn't shirk a bit in the scene where Gilbert pulls Anne's braid and whispers "carrots! carrots!". When she broke the slate over his head, she did it well! Oh, the scandal!

Dooo doo doo. Nothing left to say.

Googlism

I just found googlism.com where you type in your name and a bunch of weird, random things appear. Examples:

alaina is sawing her bowdrill and cora is watching

alaina is a silent and unseen witness to their machinations when these episodes occur

alaina is special in another way

alaina is not one of them *walks out of the room and back into kitchen*

alaina is lying under dirt

alaina is a tall naive girl audtioning for a long leg contest

alaina is keeping you busy


Craziness! I have a lot going on, obviously.

Cakefest Part II

It was Arienne's birthday today, which meant, (hee) . . . more cake. All right! I totally pigged out at Applebee's today and consequently couldn't eat anything else for the rest of the day. I still feel pretty loaded down. Watched Lilo and Stitch, and I'm sorry, but the only thing that Lilo needed for the first hour was a backhand right to the face. Stitch too.

I worry that I'm becoming dangerously addicted to sleep. It seems that the more days that pass while I'm at home, the more and more often I start thinking about how good a nap would feel. And then the nap turns into a marathon night sleep. And then I'm up until 2 in the morning typing out a web entry. Good news for you, I suppose.

Oh, I got Arienne a Pirates of the Caribbean t-shirt that I found in the little boys section of the thrift store. It's a tad wee but she likes her shirts tiny anyways. Kristi got her the exact same thing except with Johnny Depp's visage and the correct size. Oh, perfect her.

Irony, eh?

Travis and I went to see Art School Confidential today. Halfway through my old manager comes in, sits down next to me, and hands me an envelope. "Here," he says, "this just came yesterday." Huh? So I open it up, and it's a check for $108.00. Woo! Turns out, it was just a replacement check for the one I lost earlier this year (oops). But anyway, free money!

Art School Confidential was good for the first, about, half-hour. Then I realized that it didn't really have much of a story. It seemed bitingly on about the stereotypes of art-schoolers.

Thomas now has a duck nesting on the underside of his house. This at the same time he was chopping up a duck for dinner. Oh, delicious irony.

Cakefest

My sister thought it would be a good idea to increase the number of pets I'll have to give away come August, and for my birthday present I received Bettie, the beta fish. I'm a little concerned for Bettie right now, since it seems that she doesn't like the pellets that came with her. My last beta fish lived for about a year, so my mom is going to have to deal with her now, too. Maybe it will keep her company.

I made the uncanny observance yesterday that Travis sounds exactly like Phillip Seymour Hoffman. No, really. It's eerie. Just like him.

It's that time of year again when I get to gorge on all the leftover cake for a week, and then it's Arienne's birthday so I get to do it all again.

The mice were up and frisky this morning (it's currently 5:38, arggh) and I got so frustrated with that horrible screetchy wheel sound that I got out of bed in a rage and just stood next to their cage until the mouse got out of the wheel and stood on her house. Then I felt bad for interrupting their fun times and gave them an oyster cracker. Now I'm here.

Thomas and I spanked Rob and Travis in spades last night. It may not have been the fairest of matchings, given that Travis had never played before. But hey; a win is a win.

20 Years

Oh, happy birthday to me! Woo! My present from this parents this year was the best thing I could have asked for - a luggage set. Now, that wasn't bitter online sarcasm - I love organizational tools. It is a snazzy six-piece number in red and black. Let's see if I can find a picture . . .


Beautiful, no? I also didn't realize that you could check two bags in the cargo hold, so that got me thinking about many packing possibilities.






I was laying awake thinking last night, and perhaps I do want a homestay during the fall. One of the main selling points in favor was "do I really want to travel all that way, intensively study the language for three weeks, and then . . . arrive home to an empty apartment?" It would be kind of nice to have someone waiting for me. I don't know. I think I'll call them on Monday.

Damn Alarm

I was rudely woken this morning at 7:45 by the stupid, stupid alarm clock in my parents room. I couldn't even get up to turn it off, because that would entail getting out of bed (a great feat in itself), getting dressed, stumbling over, figuring how to work their alarm, stumbling back, and falling asleep again. So I skipped half of those steps and just got up.

I had this bizarre dream last night that somebody stole my keyboard out of my apartment (like, the musical instrument keyboard, as in something I don't own . . .) and I got so mad that I grabbed this long stick and started whaling on them with it. Then I deliberately broke their glasses. I am not a kind person while asleep.

My mother took me to the Post Office to retake my passport photos because Wal-Mart people are grossly incompetant. The setup where you have to sit down is really creepy - they take you behind this one-way mirrored door and into the manager's office. Eww. I came outside and told my mother that the picture was fine but I had to take off my clothes first.

Water

So after Ryan and I went to McDonalds and came back to Simmons, I saw this guy from my Law class standing with a big group of people in the hallway. I raised my hand to wave to him, but in the meantime dropped the whole cup of water on my foot, sending a splash carreening onto the floor. Oh, god, I was mortified. At first, I was like "well, this isn't so bad. I'll never see him again". But then I realized that this was going to be his last impression of me. Nothing I did during the semester can erase me dropping an entire thing of water on my foot.

I'm meeting Montpellier Mina tomorrow at the travel agency in the HUB so that we can talk to someone again about flights from here to France. God, it's such a hassle. I've been trying to ignore the fact that my passport application is still pending since I need to resubmit the photos. Oops.

Poetry

Despite yesterday being my first final, it was a pretty good day. I awoke at the leisurely hour of 11:00 and strolled to the library to finish a grueling 5-page essay, which I believe turned out nicely. I wrote the first draft, printed it, and didn't read it again cause I just didn't want to work anymore. Good strategy, I know.

The final for CAS 321 consisted of one question. We knew this in advance, and we knew that it would involve us replying either with a concurring or dissenting opinion. Not too bad. So the professor is reading out this lengthy case, and I'm taking notes already mentally forming an opinion. At the end, she says, "Forget all that."

It turns out, the question that we have to answer is whether or not we agree with a justice on the Supreme Court writing his response in poetry.

That was it. The final question. I could have been absent all year and still finished this. She wanted us to include examples, but how? It was ridiculous. I was the first one done.

Argh, I am eating an apple for breakfast and already I'm getting itchy. Why do I do this to myself?