An (incoherent?) update

Fencing season is officially making me go mildly insane!

This weekend was supposed to be a double-weekend meet, with one at Brandeis (in Boston) and the other in New Jersey at Rutgers, but the one at Rutgers today was cancelled so we came back to school instead. We got in at 2.00 this morning, which isn't terribly late for a college student on a Saturday night, but we were all exhausted from fencing and being on the bus for 6+ hours. As a result I'm a bit incoherent, but I'm way overdue for a blog post. Sorry to anyone actually reading this...  =/

Anyway. My birthday was last week so my parents and Madman came to take me out for dinner, which was pretty awesome, and my mom baked my favorite birthday cake--chocolate-less chocolate cake with berries and homemade whipped cream-- which was even more awesome. And they gave me an iTouch, so now I can listen to music wherever and browse the wireless internets and it's so beautiful and shiny and stuff. I would almost say its deliciousness nears that of the birthday cake! It shows pictures really well, surprisingly enough, and so now if people ask to see my artwork for some reason I'll always have some on hand. Now, to get a case...

I owe you all a real update, promise. I will, however, wait until I've gotten more sleep.

An observation

School toilet paper sucks. If you're a tp snob like I am (Charmin 2-ply for the win), bring your own.

Yes, well.

It's been a little bit since I last wrote. I know, I know, what's up with irregular posting? But you have to trust me when I say it's been a crazy couple of weeks. After my last post I tried my hardest to enjoy my remaining time at home. I finished the beret I was working on, though I'm not positive it is actually serviceable as a hat. I also went skating on a real pond for the first time in my entire life!! Which was a spectacular experience I would recommend to everyone!!! It was infinitely better than skating on a rink-- yes, the ice is a little bit rougher, but it's hardly noticeable after the first push off, and being outside while skating is spectacular. The only thing I had trouble with were the sticks falling from a tree hanging over the ice, which my skates somehow found no matter how hard I tried to steer clear of them...

On the 11th I journeyed back to school for a fencing winter training camp, where we fenced for six hours a day. It wasn't as grueling as it sounds, really. Okay, so some of us wanted to die for a day or so, but now when I look at my (mostly not sore) muscles I really feel that I've accomplished something. Today we have no classes because of MLK Day, so I'm just fencing and relaxing and being a normal lazy college student, I guess, to save up energy for the next two months' fencing meet saga. And counting down the days till my birthday (9!).

01022010

Happy New Year, everyone!

A cause for much excitement, besides the whole new decade thing: today's a palindrome!

According to a chain going around on facebook (reliable source, i know), "there will be 12 MM/DD/YYYY palindromes in the 21st century, 12 more in the 22nd and 12 more in the 23rd. But after that, the next such palindrome period won't happen for 711 years and a day like today won't return for millenia." Fun fact, eh? Though really the date depends on how you write the date-- today's just a normal day in Europe, where instead the date is 02012010, which is still pretty cool but not as cool. Sorry, guys. You'll just have to wait 'till   01 February.



In other news, I just found Coco Perez's 17 December entry about condom fashion-- apparently in order to raise awareness about the spread of HIV/AIDS, some company in China organized a fashion show where the clothing was made entirely of condoms. Weird, huh?


Some of the dresses were surprisingly fashionable if you ignore what they're made of, like this one below.

There were some style issues, though; can you say unnecessary close-up of unfurled, ribbed coloreds? And really, the gigantic condom lollipop was a bit much. Thankfully, no pearl necklaces were, to my knowledge, worn on the runway.


[image courtesy of Coco Perez]

'Tis the season for eating Part II

So! Here are the pictures of the White Castle adventure that I promised. Below, our first glimpse of the gleaming white burger haven, a place made even more perfect by the carpet of white snow blocking half the entrance to the parking lot.

Here's our first round: 10 burgers, 2 fries, and 2 cokes that aren't in the shot. Notice how neatly they are all piled up, with the burger holsters shoved together to keep them warm!

I mentioned earlier that the autofocus on my dad's camera was being wonky... here is a weirdly-focused shot of Madman holding a burger for some size reference. I told one of my hallmates that I ate 11 burgers and then had to explain that no, I was not the gigantic fatty that they thought I was, thank you, because each burger is about the size of a deck of cards.

And... the first round's devastation. I didn't manage to get any pictures of the second round because I was too focused on not vomiting to take the camera out again. Sorry, guys.

End of Part II. Hope you all enjoyed.  ;)

A snuggly tribute & muddy adventure

On of my favorite blogs on the entire internet is Spoon Facts (spoonfacts.blogspot.com), a tribute to the most spectacular and comfortable of all pastimes: spooning! My dear friend and author of this blog, however, hasn't posted in a looong time, and so hopefully this next expression of love for (platonic) spooning and Lil' Spoon will inspire her to write more, and soon!

In college we're at the age where hormones are raging and we're all yearning for some human contact. Obviously. No one can deny this. We can, however, deny our most carnal of urges and just go for the luvverly platonic stuff. Namely, spooning! Spooning is the most fantastic way to tell someone that you're there for them. My hall is full of spoon-addicts-- if asked, "if you were a utensil, which would you be?", we would probably all answer, "well, our most favorite curved soup-and-ice-cream compliment, of course!" and all cuddle together in our proverbial silverware drawer. We love each other, and it's probably because of how much we spoon. I know things about my hallmates that most people at our school don't know-- one girl always worries if she's smothering you with her hair, and if you even mention being a little spoon to one of the guys he'll lecture you on how he always has to be the big spoon, or else. A hall adoptee used to wear Polo Black for our late-night snuggs sessions, and another one always loves to hold your hand, whether it be a normal hand-grasp or warlocking (refer to Spoon Facts if this reference is lost on you). In short, spooning brings people together. And reading about it is highly entertaining. Come back, Lil' Spoon!

And because trying to segue from spooning to jumping around in mud with rain boots is giving me a headache, I'm just going to jump right in (er... no puddle pun intended?). We've been getting a lot of rain in this part of the country recently, so a couple of days ago the nearby canal oozed-- nay, galloped-- into the surrounding landscape. My dad and I went for a walk near a ranger station we thought would be far enough away from the canal to avoid most of the flooding-- we wanted to dam up engorged streams but not have to squelch through miles of murk-- but ended up in the thick of it! The canal expanded about a mile past its borders and filled the slight valley we had planned to peruse. It was pretty wonderful, actually. We found a wooden walkway that had floated off its supports and was just hanging out in the water and followed it to its end. It was so exciting because there was nothing under it but water, so as we walked on it it sank a bit, and looked really sweet when we jumped on it and the water shot through the gaps between the planks. We spent the rest of the day unplugging streams of collected leaves and started trudging home when the sun set... all in all, a wonderful way to break up the ho-hum days.

'Tis the season for... eating?

I know the stuff-your-face season is typically Thanksgiving, but gosh, what an epic adventure I went on today that totally rivaled T-day’s ability to make me stuff my face.

I suppose it started last night around 10.30 when my brother and I had huge cravings for hamburgers. Because my favorite school-time burger joint—BRGR Joint—is woefully far away, the plan was to drive around, looking for someplace that was still open. But alas! The ‘rents quashed our fast-food dreams because a) they thought it was too late to even be thinking about food and b) the roads were icy. So we went to bed hungry. Gosh, it is so weird to be home.

This morning I woke up at the very college-like time of 11.30 to find that my brother, Madman (his blog alias—read it here: Mad Man and the Goonies) and I were still craving burgers! So even though I generally abhor fast food because it has the uncanny ability to make me want to vomit for about a week, because of our burger slight the night before, what do we decide to do?

Go to White Castle, of course!

And, even better, there was one only thirty minutes from our house!! Best day ever, right?

Naturally I took the camera to photo document this epic adventure, and naturally I took my dad’s point-and-shoot so it was having trouble focusing…. And the original plan was to upload them, but Blogger is freaking out on me. So, unfortunately, the pictures are going to have to wait until I can successfully attach them to a post.

All in all, an epic adventure. Definitely worth it. Though not necessarily one to repeat...?