the gahr of '05

You'll be glad to know or maybe you don't care, but the Great Apartment H Rearrangement of '05 is complete. I think. The furniture adjustments are subtle, but they make a rather substantial difference. And for those of you who have been frightened away by the bare walls, I now have five pictures hiding the institutionalization. I still have one painfully blank wall. I mean, it really looks like a movie theatre screen. I'll have to do something about that. Maybe I should just get a projector and watch stuff on that wall. It's not like I watch TV on my television.

Anyway, I almost have a theme going. It's a bit eclectic, but onlookers will have to make do with what they get. At one point, the cosmos got together and arranged a nice set of train-themed decor. No, it's not as bad as it sounds, and no, that's not my main thing. Just a set of wall-hangings. In one place. Back when I went on a decor shopping spree, I bought a cheap framed, in black, Saturday Evening Post article about early twentieth century trains. It's just been leaning against the wall for eight months--until now. At the Dollar Tree, which I love dearly, I bought two black frames to hang some of my photos in. At WalMart, I printed off about fifteen, and within those were two black and white train photos. One of a stalled train on 293 and the other of a train passing over the Ohio River in Henderson. It wasn't until I bought all these things that I realized what I had on my hands. A group. And so it is.

I also put up some temporary spring decor. I changed my swags over the cabinets from sparkly apples and pine cones to magnolias. I also stripped my DIY wreath of its wintry things and replaced them with more magnolias. I like magnolias.

It's stormy. I don't know whether to be excited or a bit scared. I do like the rolling thunder. Maybe it'll lull me to sleep, and hopefully, it won't shake me out of the bed.

half-rearranged

It's a chronic illness, I swear. This procrastination. I have a paper due tomorrow. What did I do at work today? I'm not even sure. Whatever it was didn't get me going on this paper. Oh, I finished all my KIIS and financial aid forms. Well, at least that's good. But I didn't have my afternoon class today, and what did I do? Come home and write my paper? No, no. I now have a half-rearranged apartment. Half because I did have my night class. When I got home from that, did I write my paper? No, indeedy. I cooked supper. Cooked supper. I never do that. Of course, I had to do something with the sixty-dollars-worth of groceries I bought last night when I wasn't writing my paper. And now. Now where am I? It's almost 9:30, I have a serious headache--whether it's from dashing my brains out on the corner of the freezer door, having PMS, or lacking caffeine, I'm not sure--and I need to go to bed at least within the next hour or so. Ah, but I have an hour and half at work tomorrow to work on this. Plus BarbCobb's letting us use some classtime to tweak. I'll never get this thing written.

i don't know which way the feather falls

About three hours ago, I started a post. That was before my sister called and we talked for roughly an hour. When we hung up, I decided to scrap the entry and do some homework. At which point, I picked up my guitar and furthered the crippling I'm doing to my right pinky. The way I hold my pinky against the body of the guitar while I compulsively pick songs makes the bone above the first joint lean at nearly a forty-five degree angle. It's really sexy, I must say. Think I need to calm down with that intense picking.

Yes, I've pretty much decided that I won't be doing any homework tonight. I won't be writing a thesis for my 404 paper. I won't be reading on Marx's Communist Manifesto for philosophy. And I won't be reading any Adrienne Rich for women's lit. But I will be writing this blog entry.

Random facts to make this post not all about the post itself:

The subsitute teacher Mrs. Sellers taught me how to spell the word pretty one day in Writing to Read. My countrified dialect left me pronouncing the word purty, and something told me the sound-it-out phonics tactic wasn't going to cut it that time. So I called the most feared substitute teacher of my elementary years over to my dinosaur of an IBM computer and asked her how to spell it. P-R-E-T-T-Y. And I never misspelled it again. Thanks, Mrs. Sellers. You weren't that scary after all.

I think I hyper-extended a groin muscle while doing some heavy lifting this week. Apparently, I didn't follow appropriate procedure for attempting to raise one end of a couch with one hand while trying to situate something underneath it with the other hand. Not only was I unsuccessful, but I also have an unpleasant experience everytime I go to stand up. Great.

There for a few minutes, there was that bird outside singing. You know. That bird. The one that used to camp out somewhere around the window when we lived in 325, Holly. I always thought of it as a nightingale because I only heard it when I was in bed at night. For a few minutes, it sang, and I felt like a 3 am insomniac. But it's just after midnight. And the bird stopped singing anyway.

boring ain't bad

Hello. I'm at my mom's office taking advantage of her internet access while she's at some meeting. I came up here to get my picture taken for the company newspaper because I received the location's scholarship, but we also executed some covert operations, like using one of Mom's coworkers to notarize some forms for Spain.

It smells like instant mashed potatoes in here.

Oh, and I just ordered my Lonely Planet guide to Spain. This, I am very excited about. I went to Barnes & Noble to buy it yesterday, but this year's guide was just released this month. It hasn't even made it to stores yet. But mine, ordered directly from the company, should arrive in 4-6 business days. It may get home before I do. I wish I could've had it to read over break.

Hmm, so things are boring, really. That's not so bad. Boring is better than so-busy-I-want-to-gouge-my-eyes-out. So here's to wishing you a boring, or something like it, week.

vacaciones de primavera

Because we hadn't been pulling the wool over Earthlink's eyes for the past year like we thought, no internet for me during spring break. It'll be a while.

Enjoy. Be careful.

i know it's there

There are times when I believe that there is a story, a poem, a painting, a photograph, a lyric, a song, a something or two trapped inside me. They're in there. Sometimes I'm aware of it. I scramble and try to find any canvas I can. But there are layers and layers of unoriginal thought that need to be scraped and peeled away before it can get out. Tonight, I wonder if I'm getting closer.

i need you, crayola

I had an age identity crisis as WalMart last night. First, I picked up a 16-piece dinnerware set for $13. The whole concept of me buying it felt very adult and wifey. 'Cause that's me. Yeah. So I balanced that off by buying a Muppet Babies coloring book and a 16-pack of Crayola crayons. When I got home, I left the dishes in the trunk. (I noticed that among the books I have tossed about in the trunk of the Buick, I have one by Dale Ray Phillips and one by Philip S. Dale. Isn't that, um, funny? Whatever...) I brought the coloring book in and completed several pages while I watched/listened to the Eric Clapton Crossroads Guitar Festival on some public television channel. Good ol' John was on there, playing a three-hour rendition of "City Love."

By the way, while sitting here bored at work, I decided to be a big John Mayer geek and read up on him. I found out that his new CD is rumored not to come out until 2006 and that it will be called Continuum. I mean, seriously. What's up, John? Just as long as he resists the urge to make the title track to the tune of "Millennium," I'll be okay.

So, Dra. Howe broke her leg, right? We haven't had class all week, but we have a quiz tomorrow. I've been told that Trinchet is creating and administering the thing. Wonderful. I should probably study, but I'm not even sure what I should look at. The bigger issue is this: Will Dra. Howe come back at all this semester? Will some other professor take over? These are scary thoughts.

I don't have class today. Dr. Morgan cancelled, so I don't have any homework for that. I really don't have much of anything to do. And doing things in advance for tomorrow is out of the question. Just because. Even though I did bring my textbooks so I could. I should've brought my coloring book.

and this is what i do

I finally get some free time, and what do I do? Play make-believe web designer. I gave the ol' site a spring cleaning scrub-down and added a sister blog, if that's what one should call it.

The reading link above will take you to a reading journal of sorts. I haven't really come up with a system for it yet, but it will be entries about books and other texts that I've read and would like to comment on. I don't want to restrict myself to only writing about books I've completed. There'll probably be posts about books that I'm reading at the time or books I plan to read. I don't know, but I think it's a fine idea. If not for you, then for me. I hate the feeling of having read something and then just kind of sitting there thinking, What do I do now? Unless a text comes up in conversation or shows up on a test, there is no proof I've read something. You know, besides the intellectual benefits that no one can ever take away from me, but who cares about that? ;-)

I got my passport in the mail today. That was an exciting experience. I've been anticipating its arrival only to find an empty mailbox day after day. Today, I forgot about it. When I opened my mailbox, I saw an envelope, but I couldn't figure out what it was. "U. S. Government Official Mail? What the heck could this be?" I asked Tessa. I was halfway back across the parking lot when I screamed, "Oh! It's my passport!" How exciting! Two different instances came to mind when I held my very own passport in my hands. The first was when Mrs. Tucker brought hers to class in junior high, and everyone freaked out because they found out her first name was Esther. (I already knew, of course. Anyway.) And the other was the scene from Bourne Supremacy where Jason Bourne looks through a bank deposit box with several passports with his picture but each one with a different name. Moment to cherish, right there.

I should have spent this time taking a nap before conversation class, but no. I fully redesigned and updated (but look for more reading entries soon), and I'm sleepy as all get out. 'Swhat I get.

to revel

Wow. Two days in a row. What happened to those days when it was normal to get at least one entry, if not two entries, popped out in one day? Long gone, my dears. Tonight, I'm excited I have time to do this. Tomorrow, there are no papers due. There are no tests. From here to the end of the week, I see none. It's exhilarating. I took a two and half hour guiltless nap this afternoon. That is a beautiful, beautiful thing.

So isn't this just the week of holidays? Today is none other than Pi Day. I didn't even realize it until I saw someone wearing a 3.14 tee shirt. Only today did my I like π button not seem completely retarded. Anyway, tomorrow is the Ides of March. Beware. And Wednesday? Okay, I can't think of anything special about March 16. But, oh the green glory of March 17. SPD '05, ladies and gents. And what, you may ask, is the significance of March 18? Well, back in May, I had a dream about March 18 and some heinous crimes on Faculty Hall elevator #4. So maybe it's not a holiday, but it has some ominous cloud hanging over it. But! It is the first day of Spring Break, and that makes it the holiest of the holidays of this week.

And now, I'm going to use the next couple hours not writing a paper and not studying for a test. I'll probably read. And what, oh what, shall I read? I have so many options. I could read some Kate Chopin or Marx for class. Or I could read on The Wind in the Willows, How to Read a Poem, The Giver maybe, or some C. S. Lewis. I could do some minor homework. I could do just about anything. Maybe I'll just revel in that fact.

poetry and me

I'm beginning to tire of the TV-as-computer-screen set-up. It works and I'm thankful for it, but the drawbacks are starting to wear on me. I'm just being whiny, I know. One day in the future, I'll get up the nerve to actually get a new computer or something. Something so that I can numb my brain two ways at once, through both computer and television. Someday.

I wore houseshoes out today. They're the kind with actual soles, but they're houseshoes, nevertheless. As I was turning onto Poplar, I remembered being a kid and riding with Nana to Sureway, and she'd be wearing her houseshoes. Of course, they were the granny terrycloth kind with white soles that are made somewhat like flipflops, not the pseudo-suede loafer-style things I'm wearing. I remember sitting in the passenger seat of her car and seeing her drive with them on. I don't remember whether I thought it was funny or normal, but I do remember it. And today, I had a reason to remember it. I was driving with houseshoes on, too.

Now for my soapbox:

So I'm trying to make peace with poetry. I have a revision of a BobCarb paper due tomorrow, and it's supposed to be a thorough explication of one of the four poems we were given to choose from. Maybe I'm being whiny again, but I just really dislike this assignment. First of all, I think the subject choices are too narrow, but I can get over that. Secondly, and more importantly, I've come to a place where I have a respect for poetry--all literature, really. I don't believe it was meant to be shredded into indistinguishable bits. I have no problem with critical analysis or searching for meaning. I enjoy seeing the ways a writer puts together a work.

There's a fine line between appreciating a work and becoming obsessed with its nuts and bolts. Teetering on that fine line is fun, but there comes a problem when you look at something and all you see are the nuts and bolts. I'm not saying you can't glean appreciation from knowing the inner workings of something. I gained a greater appreciation for art and theatre after becoming involved with the making of them in high school. But I also became distracted from the whole of a play's production because all I could focus on were the technical aspects, which would leave my theatre experience in disjointed shambles.

This is possibly the result of being a novice, knowing just enough to screw my whole perception up. Maybe this is a weak example of a little knowledge being dangerous. In some ways, that's how I feel about the study of literature, at least the study of literature that I'm being forced into with this paper. Instead of exploring the facets of a poem to find one of many meanings, I feel like I'm being made to find the loose end of the raveling so that, if I pull it just right, I can tear the entire poem apart beyond recognition. The goal seems to be to leave no two pieces of the puzzle together. Instead of coming to a mutual understanding between the reader and the poem, I feel like I have to poke and prod at each word in the poem to torture the meaning out of it.

In an effort to overcome this, I pulled Molly Peacock's How to Read a Poem...and Start a Poetry Circle down from my bookshelf. This book I acquired when I purchased my texts for my introduction to creative writing course. We never used it, so I suppose it was Ann Neelon's suggested reading material that Bradley Book Co. stuffed into my plastic bag. When it came time to sell books back at the end of that semester, I'm not sure why I didn't sell this one back. Maybe I thought it looked neat.

Anyway, I began reading it yesterday, and I think the author is going to help me reconcile these hard feelings I've formed for poetry during the first draft of my essay. I had come to the point where I felt like I must be a "bad English major" if I don't get some sick sadistic pleasure out of mutilating literature. I think Peacock understands my view. She likens tearing a poem apart to ripping wings from helpless bugs. Understanding a poem doesn't have to be an act of bullying, but in class on Friday, that's what I felt like I was being asked to do. In the middle of all the ravenous explicating, I turned to Tessa and said, "Poetry doesn't deserve to be treated like this. It wasn't made for it." So when I revise my essay about Nims' "Love Poem," I'm going to try not to make it a cruel autopsy of a poem I've killed, but rather a conversation with an entity of breathing words that deserve to be heard.

How's that for being an English major?

shuttlese

My sister surprised me with my very own copy of The Wind in the Willows. Now I don't have to lie about what the book looks like over there in the reading section of the sidebar. (Amazon didn't have the cover of the 1934 edition I borrowed from the library.) I also don't have to lie and say I'm reading it when I'm not because I had to return it to the library over a week and a half ago. Of course, just because something's over there doesn't mean I'm reading it vehemently. It means I might pick it up once a week or so to read a couple pages. Those four make it into rotation. Okay, Descartes really doesn't count because I'm "reading" it for class. Anyway, I'm excited about The Wind in the Willows. Last night, I actually read the preface. Maybe I'll eventually pick back up at chapter four where I left off.

I had a test in teaching reading last night, and the strangest thing happened. I was the next-to-last to finish my exam. I'm not sure why it took me so long, but I think it might've had something to do with trying to write legibly. I don't know. I was writing along, and then suddenly I realized how awesome my handwriting was. And it didn't look like a dude's, which is important. So I had to make sure I kept that up. But I did finish my test at 6:30, which meant I still got out an hour and a half early. I used that time to do some much needed cleaning. I felt like I haven't had time to do anything, so I was excited about taking the garbage out, doing laundry, doing dishes, and even cleaning the bathroom. What am I becoming?

Last week, we were supposed to go to Asian Buffet for conversation class, but hardly anyone showed up. So we didn't. But we're going this week. That makes me very happy. It should make you happy, too. ;-)

symmetry

It's been gloomy all day. And then as I was leaving Faculty Hall to walk home, a torrential downpour came flooding in. It felt like a Freshman Year Friday Flood. By the time I got across the quad, I was positively drenched. The umbrella didn't mean a thing. I fought against the pounding rain to get in the shelter of Wilson, just before it began to hail. Just little hail, but hail nonetheless. I waited for it to slow up, and it did. So I walked home in a flood, no longer torrential. It was lovely. Really.

I'm beginning to wonder what the heck I was thinking when I signed up for eighteen credit hours this semester. Surely, I wasn't thinking at all. But it has brought me to a new place in my college career. With so much to do, I'm having to turn a paper in a day late. It's not going to affect my grade, but it's the first time I've done this. Okay, I take that back, but the CIV book review doesn't count. This is in my major. But alas, all will be okay.

Oh, so I've got the most symmetrical midterm grades I've ever seen. Three Bs and three As. My two English courses: one A and one B. My two education courses: one A and one B. My two not-in-my-major courses: one A and one B. But most of them don't mean anything. For instance, I have a B in philosophy, but the only grade I have in there so far is my midterm on which I made a 94.

Okay, that's all. Here's to another gouge-your-eyes-out boring post.

completely inappropriate

This, my dears, is March 1. Do you know what that means? Dairy Queen opens up for the season! But how inappropriate this day is. This is the day with a 39 degree high and occasional snow flurries. It is not ice creaming-eating weather. It is ice cream-like weather, rather. But I'm pretty sure I'd much rather eat it with a red plastic spoon than have it slamming me in the face at a west-north-westerly 20 mph. At any rate, this is practically a holiday, you know.

By being March 1, it is also the day another month gets added to my archive links. I'm not sure why that excites me so, but it does. Movin' on down the line.

I took something like a thirty minute nap yesterday afternoon. This should be a regular routine. It was quite satisfying, and it fit in my schedule, which is of most importance. I could take one of those naps right about now. That's why I just yawned like nobody's business, and it was one of those yawns. You know the embarrassing ones where I make that strange not-quite-sure-what-that-was noise? Yeah, that one, and there was a guy standing here stapling a paper. That's attractive. Keep that up, that's what I tell myself. And so I do. There it is again. Lovely yawny noise.