Kiss This Thing Goodbye

This has been a long time coming. It's been about a month and a half since my last post, and I think it's because I have honestly run out of things to say.

This is not to say I'm not writing. I have an internship at EW magazine, and actually find plenty to write about on a daily basis. It's more that for the first time in a while I don't feel like writing about my life. I feel like living it. It's really easy to hide behind a computer and tell all the anonymous people who read this what I want to do, and what I wish could happen, or what I'm happy about. But in the end for the past few months I've actually been doing those things. Why go back? Writing about what I've done is a good way to keep track of it, but I'd really rather just remember it on my own.

That said, this has been great. I think it's fitting that I end this at the end of college, as I started it the summer before I started. Things have changed. The people I care about, the things I'm passionate about, my clothes, personality, outlook. But overall I can say I'm a happier person than when I started four years ago. So let's just hope this is an upward trend.

So long and thanks for reading.


Now Playing: "The Good Life" by Kanye West

"Jaya, you only ate 3 courses? ANOREXIC!"

The cruise was awesome. I'm tan and relaxed and happy now. Even sleeping in a closet with 3 other people didn't frustrate me, and neither did the seasickness on the first day. I got day of the dead art, good mexican food, margaritas, and overall it was everything I wanted. I came back to a huge easter feast and lots of wine, so that didn't hurt either.

Unfortunately last night the good luck ended when our house flooded because of a busted sink pipe, and all our furniture is in the middle of the living room. Nothing was damaged, but damn, not a fun way to go home.

Now my arms hurt because Sansone is a meanie of a personal trainer, but I still have awesome breakfast in my stomach and soon there will be an egg hunt involving 120 plastic eggs filled with jello shots. I love college.

Now Playing: Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me - NPR podcast

"Wanna drive me to the hospital?"

I hate Tulane student health and I hate pinkeye.

I, however, love karaoke until 3am. I love everyone dancing on the tables to Charlie Daniels. I love dancing with Sansone to "Beyond the Sea" because we're an old married couple. I love making his ROTC friends sing backstreet boys. I love our whole table singing "Summer Lovin'." I love being flirted with. And now I love classes being done and dressing up like Pris from Bladerunner just because I can.

And I love feeling this happy and this loved. This year just gets better and better.


Now Playing: "The Way I Are" by Timbaland

Final stretch to spring break

This past weekend I saw two concerts, discovered two more amazing bands, renewed my love for dancing/moshing, got a fat lip and my fair share of bruises, and wound up staying sick because of my lack of judgment. But I don't care. This was all ridiculously fun. I've been kind of an old lady recently, staying in and nursing one beer while knitting and watching movies, but I forgot how amazing the energy at a good show is. Flogging Molly was the best I'd ever seen them, and They Might Be Giants were more ridiculous and awesome than I could have predicted.

This week I just have to get through three tests before spring break and everything that entails. And I really can't wait. I'm sure this will do nothing for my lack of getting into the academic mode still (even up until midterms), but this semester has just been so tedious. I hate saying that because I really do love college, and a huge part of me doesn't want to go. I got my cap and gown last week, and I have a newcomb ring, and I bought graduation announcements and my Aunt wants to take me and my friends out to a fancy dinner. It just all seems so surreal. Since when am I old enough to graduate college? Since when am I responsible enough to take care of myself, or independent enough to go planning working at hostels in Australia without anyone elses input? I'm glad though, because that pit in my heart over leaving my friends has almost gone away. There may be some tears at graduation, but I'm not scared of losing anyone anymore. Because it just won't happen.

Man, my lip looks totally badass.


Now Playing: "Mud" by The Reverend Peyton's Big Damn Band

Young professional

Hey, I'm published again!

here

and here

I win.


Now Playing: "M79" by Vampire Weekend

"Single girl is leaving the bar, so make sure to get her number before she goes!"

Karaoke night at the Buddha Belly is officially my favorite night ever. Especially when I am refered to as "Single Girl" because I am the only one in the bar, and Karfunkle tries to shout out my phone number to everyone.

This morning I got up way too early to go meet my editor to get more CDs to review and a book on Lionel Hampton. While on the streetcar I was listening to This American Life. The episode was about testosterone, and how it affects people. There was a really amusing section about a man who used to be a woman, and the changes that happened to him when he started getting testosterone injections. How this once butch feminist was all of a sudden being called a misogynist by other women. But the really interesting part, and the part that kind of freaked me out, was when they interviewed a man who, due to some disease, went for four months without any testosterone in his body. He said he lost all sense of desire. And not just sexual desire, but ambition or envy or judgment. He would walk down the street just objectively observing everything as is, and his objective conclusion was that everything is beautiful.

This ties into this book I've been reading about a woman who goes through a nasty divorce, even nastier affair, and decides to travel for a year. Four months of that year are spent in an Ashram in India with her Guru and meditating and writing descriptions of her out of body experiences and becoming part of God. I have approached this with more than my fair share of skepticism. My knee jerk reaction is that I don't need no stinkin' God to tell me what's real and what's good and make me realize that life is great and I can achieve bliss. I can do that on my own. I have. But in one of her out of body experiences she says she fell out of it as soon as she started thinking that she wanted to be there. The mere vocalization of "I want" or "I don't want" kept her from being in a possible divine presence. So if testosterone fuels desire, and we take that away, does that mean we're closer to God? I can't tell if this connection makes me entertain the idea of God more or less. Maybe in this interpretation, God is just a chemical imbalance. Or testosterone is something we can learn to control, and if we can control the chemicals in our body that's a pretty powerful and amazing thing. Or it's the chemical God or Gods or whatever has put in our body to keep us from thinking like a divinity, and therefore challenging its power.

I actually kind of like the idea that God is a chemical imbalance. "Excuse me, my God is acting up, I need a refill of my anti-God pills."


Now Playing: "Rosa" by Lamarque Street

Who spiked my beer with acid?

I had this dream last night where I woke up to Stacey making chocolate banana muffins. Except they were tiny, and we kept dropping them. But then she told me to use the batter to make pancakes, only the pancakes kept coming out in long strips instead of turning into circles. And she was yelling "YOU'RE MAKING POBLANOS!" at the top of her lungs. Anyway, a few snakes came in, one of which was really Jesus, and one walked in on me changing in my room and looked really embarassed. So I went into the living room and the Jesus snake was getting married, and I couldn't step anywhere because all the bugs were invited. And there were mobsters nextdoor trying to find someone who didn't live there anymore, and this guy in leather pants who said he was my brother in a past life came over, and then I found him outside in a leather chair, and the chair moved towards me and I fell on top of him and we started making out (he said it was somehow a prophecy that we would) until he said "Oh look, a perfect dawn" and it started to rain warm summer rain. We ran out of Aron to the Reily quad, and ran into Sarah along the way, until it rained so much the field turned into mud, and we got sucked into the mud and came out on the other side in 1770 B.C. as cartoon characters.

What. The. Fuck?


Now Playing: "Talk of the Nation" podcast (SCIENCE FRIDAY!)

Remember that time?

Hey, remember that time I left Sarah's house, and within 30 seconds had injured myself? Like, how I walked back into my apartment where Kendall and Mary and Jim (who I was actually meeting for the first time) were watching O Brother, Where Art Thou? and I opened the kitchen cabinet and a bunch of pint glasses got pushed off the microwave and shattered on the ground? And then I thought a heavy piece had just hit me on the ankle but it turns out a piece of broken glass cut through my pants and I had this really deep gash and was bleeding everywhere? And Jim had to clean up the kitchen and Kendall had to run upstairs to Sarah's apartment to get bandages and Sarah was baffled cause I had just left? And how Jim called his friend who worked for TEMS who said I didn't really need stitches but might wanna think about it cause it was really deep? And I had to sleep with my leg propped up and this morning it hurts more than it did last night and I can't walk?

Yeah, that was pretty fucking crazy.


Now Playing: "I'm a Cuckoo" by Belle & Sebastian

Dreaming

Last night I watched L'Auberge Espagnole while knitting, and it reminded me of all the best parts of Italy. I got an itch to stay in a hostel again. To meet people from different countries and to become best friends for two to three days at a time. To feel like a minority for the first time ever. To drop everything I know and go somewhere I'm not used to because I don't care. After 17 years of school I want to not think for a while. I don't want to worry about my stance regarding political theory or if my interpretation of Chaucer is valid. I'll have time later to have deadlines. For now, I'm ready to do nothing.

I woke up this morning and thought it was summer. Probably because it was the first day I hadn't been woken up by the mourning dove, but by some bird with a much happier and brighter song. My dreams have become a lot more vivid this semester. I dreamed I went to a Tulane hockey game, while getting a text message from a friend to meet him at a strip club. Of course, at the strip club I run into a few of my professors. I woke up convinced that I was sleeping next to a bartender. Another dream involved waking up at 4am thinking Stacey had come into my room and told me some friends from home were here to visit me. Again, I woke up convinced they were going to be on the couch when I walked into the living room. Why am I trying to kick myself.

Also, why do neither of the democratic candidates have anything about their stances on music and arts in public education on their websites? At this point, I think Huckabee is the only one who says anything about that, which is just depressing.


Now Playing: "Talk of the Nation" NPR Podcast

P.S.- For the past few days I've noticed I actively avoid stepping on cracks in the street, and I've never really been a superstitious person. But walking home from work the other day I would run into the street if there were cracks on the sidewalk. Missing them took on this great importance that I'm still trying to figure out...

P.P.S.- Don't you hate it when people in books describe you and your fears better than you could ever put into words?

Fuckin' Chaucer

So I was really bitter this morning cause all these girls were complaining about how their boyfriends didn't give them good enough gifts. And how it was all Chaucer's fault that we associate romance with Valentine's day. And we went out to dinner last night in a distinctly anti-Valentine's mood to have fondue and we were awesome and didn't care about all the couples around us and stuff like that. And I was all ready to be bitter all day long and get drunk and celebrate the fact that no one would ever send me flowers.

But then I got sent a dozen roses. And Jason in the mailroom came out and stuffed my pockets full of chocolate as I was holding the box. And...I got roses? What?


Now Playing: "Sassafras Roots" by Green Day