twenty-seven

Today is my birthday! I'm 27 today, which puts me squarely in the "late 20's" category.

I went running over my lunch break and thought about how grateful and lucky I am for many things:

• The physical ability to run three miles. To run three miles and feel awesome. The ability to do so on my lunchtime, in the sunshine, without a coat, in February, on my birthday.
• My gentleman and my dog.
• My other family members who really enjoy celebrating birthdays.
• The company of good, old friends.
• To be able to celebrate future birthdays with my new nephew.
• That I am an awesome guacamole maker.
• The delicious birthday meal I'm looking forward to tonight.

January is definitely over.

Birthday Bacher out.

thing i enjoy:

Brinner.



Kari.


Kari thinking Mom doesn't wash clothes well enough and taking them from her.


Kari being the tallest person in 10 miles around (excluding me).


Kari speaking Spanish to every person she meets, including saying hello to the old ladies in the morning.

Kari pretending to be a shark.


Kari jumping in the pool (not as good as me).


Sitting on the beach with donkeys.


Mom teaching people the bunny hop.


Dogs.


Andrew.


Andrew and dogs.


The end.

twins game!!

Last night we went to a Twins game for Andrew's birthday. Why, wasn't that in mid-July? You're right! I bought the tickets in June and then we had to wait nearly 10 weeks for the actual game. It was a pretty good game, though. Twins won 7-6, which is exciting.


We had pretty good seats, but I think people are right when they say there's not a bad seat in the place. We were actually a lot closer than the picture makes it look - I didn't have to zoom for this picture, if that makes a difference. We also were in a wheelchair row, which meant padded folding chairs. Not too shabby, actually. I get uncomfortable sitting in the same position all the time, so it was easy for me to wiggle around.

Also, Joe Mauer hit his first Target Field home run yesterday! I wore a Joe Mauer shirt because I would leave Andrew in a heart beat for him. And not just because he's a gazillionare - he looks good in a baseball uniform too, if you know what I mean.


The stadium has a pretty good view of the MPLS skyline. It's also close enough to our home that we were able to walk to the game.


I remembered my glasses so I could see the game! I kept squinting at the scoreboard and then realizing that I didn't have to - I couldn't see because I was squinting.


Hands down, my favorite part about the field. I LOVE this sign. If you can't tell what it is, it's two guys shaking hands over a river - Minne and Paul. The sign lights up for a strikeout or run too. I would not be opposed to getting some variation of this at some point in my life, either.

Hopefully we'll be able to make it to another game this season. It was really fun and I'm slowly becoming a bigger baseball fan. Andrew said we couldn't ask for Twins tickets or jerseys on our registry, which I think is bunk. Also, the local stations don't show the games - you have to have cable to watch 99% of Twins games. I even hooked up the TV converter box and pulled the bunny ears out of the closet! All for nothing.

a little bit of everything

So... I haven't written anything for awhile. Not because my life has been particularly exciting, because it hasn't. Well, maybe a little bit.



Scones with raisins and nuts.


Chocolate cheesecake for Andrew's birthday! It got a little cracked in the middle - I think if I had taken it out of the oven 3 minutes earlier it wouldn't have cracked... next time.

Chicken Parmesan (with window ledge basil) for Andrew's birthday dinner, recipe from Food Matters by Mark Bittman. We substituted eggplant for mushrooms.


My bruise from giving blood. Pictures are of Day 2 and Day 10. I had the bruise for two weeks, just disappearing before heading east for the JCLorst wedding.

We're not very coordinated. Also, Jake is a fight instigator while Rachel just wants to love.

And then Andrew's high school friends Ross and Linnea got married last weekend, which meant Andrew stood up in the wedding and got to dress classy-like. I enjoyed it.

They really liked those suspenders. I may or may not have encouraged some suspender-action. Your call. Also, I think that's a fantastic picture of Ross (red tie).

Window ledge basil and cilantro! It's doing pretty well in its present condition. I switch between worrying about over-watering and under-watering. They get plenty of sunlight and it's been so hot lately that I've been watering them daily to make sure they don't die. If they die, I can't eat them.

This little cilantro plant didn't turn out too well... I think too much sunlight/heat. Oh well, I can put something else in that pot.


The street broke open and gushed water last week. They're still fixing it (often loudly at 7 AM). There was literally a crack in the street and a bubble of water coming out of it. I don't know how it happened, but it flowed for 24 hours before the city had someone down there. You can see in the picture where the crack is - at a downward angle away from orange vested-dude where the water is shiny.

My DJ set from DDPP last week:

Kari - expect a CD with your package. It's sitting on my counter and I just have to write a letter, burn some CDs, find a present and then mail it. Also, I really wanted to buy a Toy Story 3 padded envelope to send to you, but I thought it might look too fun and someone would steal it.

I am on book 53 for the year, which makes me within sight of my 6o books goal. My last ten books have been Codex, Lev Grossman (Not as good as The Magicians - skip Codex); Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver (seasonal recipes!); Buying In, Rob Walker; God in the White House, Randall "what I like to call ..." Balmer; Pearl of China, Anchee Min (very good! couldn't get into her Madame Mao book though); Picking Bones From Ash, Marie Mutsuki Mockett (recommend it); Sherlock Holmes and the Red Demon, Larry Millett (Holmes in Minnesota - yes!); The Happiness Project, Gretchen Rubin (enjoyed it); Black is the New White, Paul Mooney (really funny. I want to see more of his stand-up now); Where Men Win Glory, Jon Krakauer (about Pat Tillman's life, death and ensuing military cover up).

Ok. I have to go buy some QTips. I ran out on Saturday and it's hard for me to do without them. They're one of the things I'd bring to a deserted island. Yesterday it was difficult for me to shower and then not QTip my ears. I can't go on like this much longer.

Bacher out.

another list and other things

60 books up to this point:

The Family, Jeff Sharlet
The Film Club, David Gilmour
Righteous, Lauren Sandler
Death in a Prarie House, William Drennan
Three Cups of Tea, Greg Mortonson and David Oliver Relin
In Tongues of the Dead, Brad Kelln
Manhunt, James Swanson
The Heroines, Eileen Favorite
Che’s Afterlife, Michael Casey
Slam, Nick Hornby
Things I’ve Learned From Women Who’ve Dumped Me
Her Fearful Symmetry, Audrey Niffenegger
The Hardest Questions Aren’t On The Test, Nathan
Brain Rules, John Medina
Team of Rivals, Doris Kerns Goodwin
Offbeat Bride, Ariel Meadow Stallings
Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell
Shakespeare Wrote For Money, Nick Hornby

I just finished book 18, which means I'm three books ahead of schedule of 5 per month. I really enjoyed Team of Rivals and provided a lot of details about what made Lincoln a great president. He was very gracious in dealing with people, even when they didn't deserve it. At the time, some would say to a fault, but usual it meant that people were very loyal to Lincoln when he needed it. Her Fearful Symmetry got a lot of press as Niffenegger's second novel after The Time Traveler's Wife, but I wasn't as grabbed by it as her first novel. It was an interesting concept, but I couldn't like her main characters. They were too whiny, too unbelievable. It was interesting, but I wouldn't read it again. The Heroines was also kind of annoying.

There haven't really been any fiction books this year that really grabbed me... Hopefully something good will come along soon. I've got Food Rules by Michael Pollen at the library for me right now with some others requested. I've been waiting for Barbara Kingsolver's The Lacuna for months now, along with The Magicians (Grossman), Juliet, Naked (Hornby), and The Abstinence Teacher (Perrotta).

As you can tell from book number 16, there may or may not be a wedding in my future. Well, there will be weddings (5 so far this summer. Seriously?) but I suppose my own is in the works. That's right, another one bites the dust. I mean... whoo hoo marriage? Marriage!

Ok, kidding. I'm pretty psyched about it. The engagement was in talks for awhile but then I kind of jumped the gun and proposed to him on the fly. I ambushed him at the door with a loaf of his grandmother's zucchini bread and asked him before he could get both his boots off.

The big bash will be next year sometime, either spring or fall. Yeah, we've got some concrete details down for sure. We've got to save up some money to get things in motion, but I also think it would be helpful to get an idea of how much we need to save also. Which means a guest list, an idea of where things will be, etc.

I don't know if you know this, but I'm a little bit Type A. Ok, more than a little bit. I'm a Type A in Type B clothes. I've slowly begun to realize it in the past few years, but it shouldn't have been any surprise... I mean, I wrote an 80 page paper in college for fun, went to grad school, organized massive community events on a weekly/monthly basis, serve as president of the leadership team where I currently work, etc. Andrew is considerably less Type A than I am, which is nice but I don't want to feel like I'm running things. I feel like my own personality type will feed into the myths about weddings and "brides" that I despise.

I really hate gender stereotyping and the wedding industry is plagued with it in the worst way. Example: We got our fingers sized at a jewelry store so we could order our rings online. I asked all the questions and did the majority of the talking, but upon leaving, the salesperson shook Andrew's hand and not mine because, of course, he's going to be bankrolling the ridiculous diamond bling (These are our rings, btw. No diamonds).

So while most people expect the lady to plan most or all of the wedding (and go crazy about it), I want ours to be planned with equal input and effort and a fair division of labor. This is where my Type A-ness will be difficult because at times I feel like if I don't do something myself, it won't be done right. Generally, not just in relation to this. Andrew's opinion is important to me so I don't want to steamroll him, but that's my general nature. He knows this already, so it's not like it's a surprise. We'll just have to be careful in navigating it.

I'm intriqued and appalled by the wedding industry in general but I feel like it's watching sausages being made. Except at the end you don't have sausages but a marriage. Maybe? Did that metaphor work? Cross out marriage and put wedding. Marriage will be good, wedding will be the sausage. Except I generally like weddings because there are open bars and dancing. Fine, no sausage metaphor.

I just sneezed 4 times in a row. Allergies? No!

Maybe I'll get my hair cut this afternoon. I've been needing it. I think I last got it cut in November.

Official training for the Belling begins next week. It'll be nice to have some kind of structure to my workouts.

Maybe I'll make something different for dinner tonight. Stop by the grocery store after the proposed haircut?

Time to go blow my nose. Bacher out.

round and around and up and down

Today I cleaned the apartment and had to take the trash out. I don't know if you remember my back steps, but this is what they look like.


Imagine that covered in 6 inches of snow, all of which needed to be brushed off in order to even attempt going down the ice-covered steps. When I say ice covered, I mean an inch of rounded ice on every step, bubbling up to fit into the arches of my feet. At the bottom is a van parked a foot away from the last step, meaning that when one walks down the steps with a trash bag, one has to either fall off the steps to the right in the direction of the snow pile or one has to use the van to steady themselves to avoid falling into the snow pile. It is not the easiest thing in the world, taking out the trash in the winter. I suppose I could do what my neighbors do - pile it up outside on the porch next to the back door.

Today I am making broccoli cheese soup from this recipe. I'll let you know how it goes. I've been briefly thinking about seeing if we want to do a MRC cookbook for a social events project.

I wish I knew grammar better.

Sometimes we forget about the painful things in our lives until they ambush us suddenly, unexpectedly. It's like they sense we're doing ok and come back to haunt us.

The most played song on my iTunes is Chubby Checker's "Let's Twist Again" from the Mad Men soundtrack.

Andrew made fun of me because I finally put a picture of us in a frame on my desk. Whatever, he's got a beard.

I had two dreams last night, one that this guy was chasing me and someone else around my dad's house, first just scarily and then with a giant butcher knife. I was hiding in my dad's closet behind all the clothes and shoes (where my mom used to hide christmas presents when we were growing up) and then I decided it'd be better to get into the bathroom and lock the door, but just as I went there he ran around the corner with the butcher knife and stabbed me. I woke up before he stabbed me, though. Then I dreamed that the Catholic House was a cabin in the woods and we all lived in one big room with cots lined up next to one another. It was morning and a bunch of us were just sitting in our beds under the covers talking. My cot was next to Josh's. On the opposite wall was big windows looking out into the woods and it was probably November since there weren't any leaves on the trees but no snow. There was also a big screen tv on the wall that we could watch. For some reason, we also were rounding up Santa Clauses and keeping them in a waist high pen out in the yard, which is illogical since they could easily get out. It was like a deer pen, really. We also went to a museum with Bill Murray.

It always seems that whenever I have a scary dream, no one is there to comfort me. Stupid boyfriend visiting his parents. I suppose that's why I conjured up my Catholic House to make me feel better. And it did.

Last week sometime I also had a dream I lost my running shoes after a race. I looked all around, outside where I took them off where the race ended and inside of the restaurant serving post-race food. Eventually I found them with a bunch of other shoes and race stuff outside the bathrooms.

Honestly, I swear my subconscious just does what it wants.

Totally unmotivated in everything

There's less than a month until I'm back in New Haven, and only two weeks that I'll be around here in the Twin Cities. As excited as I am about going back, I'll miss being here (although not the heat... screw 90+ humidity).

I'm reeeaaaalllllllllly ready to be done with my French class. It's just dragging on and I'm not interested in waking up at 7:30 every day anymore to go sit in a loud room to hear people talk in French. There's only a week left, so that's good. I feel if it were any more than that, I'd go crazy. It was pretty easy to pick up at first (maybe because a lot of it was repeat from high school), but now it's harder to learn everything so quickly. I feel if I had more time to digest the stuff, I'd be better at remembering it and all of that, but there's just so much that's similiar it's hard to distinguish and remember. I also feel like the instructor isn't as good at teaching the material as the one first session, so it's probably a combination of all those things. I'm ready to not have class for awhile, before the semester starts up again.

Last weekend when Mom and Erich were here, we had tons of fun. We rode our bikes all around Minneapolis and drank a ton. And saw fireworks! Exciting.

I'm feeling a little less than motivated, so we'll do this the quick and dirty way:
The Dark Knight: Awesome
Flogging Molly at Irish Fair: Awesome
Irish Fest in Milwaukee with Matt, Erich, Mom, Kari, Dawn(?): Awesome
Andrew's multiple birthday celebrations: Awesome
Baking cookies with Kari: Awesome
The cookies that didn't have enough flour: Not so awesome
Margaritas with the MOK kids, Watry and KG: Awesome
Next morning: Less than awesome

That is all.

Beer, birthdays and bittersweet memories

You know the game "Either Or"? It pretty much goes "Would you rather _____ or _____?" and then you have to choose one and whatever you choose says deep, meaningful things about your personality and life (maybe). Inevitably, someone asks, "Would you rather always be too hot or always be too cold?" I feel I always pick the opposite of whatever the climate is at the time because I'm fed up with the side effects of the cold/the summer. If it's summer, I say, "too cold!" but if it's winter, I say, "too hot!" But seriously. Being too hot blows massively and I'm not saying that just because it's been 85+ for several days/weeks now. Remind me of this in the winter when I'm going to say, "I'd much rather be too warm!" Although I do think I've said too cold before since when it's cold, at least you can put on layers. If you're hot and overheating, it's just hideous.

I first discovered the joy of a cold shower when I worked at Jesus camp in 2005. The best thing to do on my free Saturday afternoons was to take a cold shower, even if there were bugs everywhere. Since then, cold showers have been a staple of my summers, especially since I haven't lived anywhere with air conditioning for the past few years. Last summer when I worked at Jewish day camp, I'd come home from work, grab a beer and jump in the shower immediately. The best beer for drinking in the shower is Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy, a delicious mixture of wheat beer and lemonade. I'm in love with the Shandy and wish, wish, wish like hell someone in New Haven sold it. The only Leinie's I've found in New Haven has been Original and the Trix-cereal milk flavored Sunset Wheat. If you happen to be a New Haven bar owner reading this in search of adding a Leinie's line to your bar, avoid Sunset Wheat at all costs. Go for the Shandy and you will have my business for life.

Another beer I'm looking forward to at the end of the summer is Summit's Oatmeal Stout. They only brew it for the Minnesota Irish Fair. Drew, Amy and I had the lovely experience of touring the Summit Brewery in St. Paul so we were able to get a preview of the Stout before the fair, and let me tell you, I made plans right there and then to hit up the Irish fair. I'm not a huge fan of Summit - I've always thought their EPA tastes like soap - but the Oatmeal Stout won me over with its dark coloring, sweeter flavor and creamy head (I really just wanted to say creamy head).

When I'm in Milwaukee for the Irish Fest, I think it might be fun to go to the Sprecher Brewery. I've really liked the beer I've had at Irish Fest, and I've been a big fan of the bottled Hefe Weiss and Mai Bock. Plus there's free beer at brewery tours so... there's no reason not to go.

Today's the boyfriend's birthday so we had a delicious Birthday Breakfast at Bruegger's Bagels before I ran off to take my oral exam in French (a lot of b words at the beginning of that sentence). We went to see Ringo Starr and his All-Star Band last night, which was fun. Ringo Starr's an amazing dancer. Here's my video:



Tonight there's a secret birthday surprise and then Friday we're going to the hideous Maple Grove, aka suburban consumer hell, for dinner with his high school friends and then to see The Dark Knight. Saturday we're heading to Blarney's in Dinkytown for drinking in town. Huzzah for birthday plans!

I've been around Hamline and while it's the same place I lived for four years, it's not at the same time. This becomes more and more apparent as time goes on, people move away and things change. Not that it's necessarily bad, just different. I've had the unlucky pleasure of passing by my old, beloved apartment above the Mirror of Korea and seeing lights on in Natalie's old bedroom and my old bedroom. I always think to myself, "Who do they think they are, living in my room. I'll cut them. They had better be awesome enough to deserve to live there." And then I continue on my way, passing houses and buildings where people I know used to live. The whole Midway neighborhood sometimes feels like just a facade of a life I used to know; a place that looks the same, but at its core, isn't. It's sad passing by my old apartment and not going inside, but then at the same time, I'm going to a place that's different but good in it's own right. I don't think I'd want to go back to restart my senior year over again, but I feel nostalgic nonetheless.

I never really felt this way about high school places, but I was never one of those people who thought that high school was the best time of their life - quite the opposite.

Anyway, Andrew's bugging me to go to birthday dinner (can you tell that I just add "birthday" in front of everything that happens on one's birthday?). Later, friends! PS the temperature is sunny and 91 F.

Pictures! Finally!

Ali and I on the train at Bay Beach


Andrew and Grace on the train


Peter, Carla and Katie!


Kari got something in her eye so she wanted Dad to fix it on the kitchen counter.


Ethan, which is really Pete in a baby body.


Me and my cousins!


Mom flicking the geese away!


That damn otter sleeping in the log

Mom and Sarah

Life without Kari

Kari comes back soon!  I'm not going to lie; my life has been a little stagnant since she left.  Well, not completely boring.  On Friday, Andrew, Drew, Amy, Jeff Matzke and I went over to Katie George's swanky apartment and played board games - Andrew is surprisingly good at Apples to Apples and I'm not sure why.  It might be a fluke.  We'll see.  Then yesterday Drew and I went to the Twin Cities Pride Festival.  They were giving out a ton of free stuff - I got some cool buttons and two reusable grocery bags.  Pretty awesome, if you ask me.  Someone was also selling a "I (heart) MPLS" t-shirt that I wanted, but I'll just have to show my TC love some other way.  

Friday was the last day of the first French session.  Now I have a week off until the second class session starts and I'm going to sleep in every day!  Awesomeness!  It's nice because now we can leave for GB earlier for the badass 4th of July weekend coming up.  Fireworks!

I've been riding one of Kari's bikes around while she's been gone.  The 84 bus that goes up and down Snelling is either 2 minutes early (so I miss it) or 5 minutes late (so I miss my connecting bus to the U and am late for class).  It's only a 20 or 25 minute bike ride, so I'm leaving the house at the same time anyway.  Now that Kari's coming back soon, I'm not sure if she'll want it back and I'll ride her other, shitty bike or not.  Anna and Amy bought some bikes at a trade sale this past weekend, so I'm going to see if after Anna gets it tuned up, if I can ride her extra bike.  It's a road bike so that's a step in the right direction.  I'm planning on buying a bike once I get back to New Haven.  Through craigslist, I found a guy who fixes up bikes as a hobby and I emailed him and he's going to fix one up for me between now and when I get back.  There weren't a ton of bikes for sale when I looked this week so it's kinda nice to have it all taken care of ahead of time.

I'm going to go make hard-boiled eggs from the massive pack that Kari left here.  I can't eat 18 eggs alone, plus I haven't had hard-boiled eggs in a long time.  Ok, May was the last time, but seriously, before that it had been a long time.

50 books update:

Lincoln and Douglas - about the 1858 Lincoln/Douglas senate debates

The Mermaid Chair - pretty good

Right now I'm reading The Time Traveler's Wife (KT George lent it to me) and it's pretty good.  Interesting concept and how she structured the book/how the time travel works is interesting.

If anyone wants to read Kari's blog from her trip to Peru, she's been updating it while she's there.  Here is the link:  Peru!

Life in June in MSP

Everyone is leaving me.  Mom left on Monday for Bulgaria, Andrew went to his friend's cabin today and Kari leaves tomorrow for Peru.  Am I smelly or something?  Seriously, I can shower.  Just please come back and be friends with me.  

Apart from my whining, things have been good with me.  Busy, but good.  I actually feel more busy now than I did during the school year, which seems kind of backwards to me.  I have French in the morning and I work most afternoons, so I'm out the door by 8:23 (to catch my bus which when I'm on time, runs late, and when I'm late, runs early) to be at the U by 9 (the saga of the late bus has me arriving 3 minutes after my class starts... boo).  Then I eat my packed lunch at the U, catch the bus to downtown St. Paul and work during the afternoon.  Then I take the bus home and get back around 5:45 so I can do my French homework.  The days I don't work are nice just because I have the afternoons free and I can do my homework so I can have fun at night with Kari or Andrew.  

I've discovered a new favorite tv show that I knew I was going to like ahead of time, merely because of its subject matter:  the BBC's Robin Hood.  I am in love.  Robin is smokin' hot.  Not to mention the show has really good characters and plots for each episode.  You'd think that the Robin Hood storyline would get old quickly, but no, it doesn't.  The biggest problem now is that Andrew's going to his friend's cabin for the rest of the week so I have to wait until Sunday to watch the two new discs I just got in the mail today.  He thought it was kinda cheesy at first, but pilot episodes are always a little off from the rest of the show.  TV shows have to stretch their legs and they need time to move past impressing tv execs in the beginning to impressing the general audience, and sometimes that's not allowed to happen (ahem, Studio 60, I love you).  Now he likes it, just like I knew he would.  I also think everyone in my family would like it, so everyone in my family should watch it too.  I love it and I liked it first (ha, Kari).

I'm glad to be back in the Twin Cities.  I forget how much I like it here.  I like the Midway but I wish I lived closer to either one of the downtowns (maybe Minneapolis because I like the light rail).  I've noticed that I can't stop looking at the Minneapolis skyline.  When I'm driving by, when I'm walking, whenever.  I don't know what it is about it, but I like how it looks and it makes me feel like I'm here.

50 books in 2008 update

Last 6 books I've finished:
Have a Nice Doomsday, Nicholas Guyatt
Jesus Freaks, Don Lattin
Fun Home, Alison Bechdel (highly, highly recommend)
What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, Raymond Carver (love)
The Dracula Dossier, James Reese
This Common Secret, Susan Wicklund

Books waiting to be read:
Plotted, Shot and Painted, J. Cheryl Exum
Breathing for a Living, Laura Rothenberg
The House of God, Samuel Shem
Lapdogs: How the Press Rolled Over for Bush, Eric Boehlert
The Name of the Rose, Umberto Eco (on my reading list for 5+ years now... the day I finish this will be the day I get a real job)
God's Problem, Bart Ehrman
The True Story of Hansel and Gretel, Louise Murphy
I also have Nick Hornby's How To Be Good waiting as standby. I've already read it but I know it's good.

Books I've started but haven't finished:
Shakespeare's Wife, Germaine Greer
The Veil Unveiled: The Hijab in Modern Culture, Faegheh Shirazi
The Call of the Weird, Louis Theroux

Most of the books waiting to be read are library books so I have to have somewhat quick turn around, or at least renew them. Some are from the U library and some are from the Minneapolis Public Library, so the non-U of M books need to be returned in about three weeks. I'm getting a lot of reading time in while I'm on the bus to and from work. It's about a 35-40 minute bus ride, so I get plenty of reading time.

Andrew comes home today!

Long overdue update!

Well, I've successfully handed in papers, moved out of my apartment, flown home to Wisconsin, enrolled at the University of Minnesota and returned to the Twin Cities for the summer... all in the past week.

It was my great grandma's 90th birthday party this past weekend, so I was able to see my extended family for the first time since Christmas, plus we all congregated at a bar with pictures of the pope. Not too shabby, if you ask me.

I wish I could have spent more time in Green Bay, but my summer class started today so I needed to be back. My mom got a cold this weekend, so I could have stayed at home with her to cook her soup and take care of her! We went to downtown DePere for the Memorial Day parade, which was fun. Kari says she wants to be a Civil War re-enactor after seeing them in the parade. I got sunburned.

Today was my first French class since high school. It was pretty good... A lot of stuff I remembered quickly and some I didn't. I looked up my instructor in the U directory and apparently she's not even a PhD student but a Masters candidate. I don't have any problems with her teaching the course or anything, it's just a little depressing that we're at the same education level and she's teaching a class. True, it's Beginning French, but still. She's getting paid to be there and I'm the one paying her. When do I get to start teaching classes? I think I'm going to put together a syllabus on Jesus movies for a teaching opportunity through the residential colleges at Yale. Non-professors apply to teach self-made seminars at the residential colleges, so I'm going to apply for that at the beginning of the year. I'm going to work on my syllabus over the summer and get feedback from the various advisors/professors I've worked with over the years. Take that, French instructor! Just kidding. She seems cool.

I told Kari that after one day of class, I can already tell the difference between MY schools and a public state-school education. hah, it's fun pretending to be elitist. This is the third university I've been enrolled at... lots of fun.

Andrew comes home on Saturday! yay! I'm excited. I miss him.

I've passed the halfway mark for my 50 book goal. I finished Raymond Carver's What We Talk About When We Talk About Love before I left New Haven and The Dracula Dossier (soon-to-be-published) the other night. Now I'm 30 or so pages into Shakespeare's Wife by Germaine Greer, a book I've been wanting to read and one that Tessa highly recommended. Exciting. Now that I'm a U of M student, I'm going to get an ID card tomorrow so I can check books out of the library. When I told Kari, she said I was like the guy in Breakfast Club who gets a fake ID so he can vote. At least I'm not committing voter fraud.

School's out for ... someone that's not me.

Well, finals week is over so that means that finals are over. Except for people like me, who have papers due much later than everyone else. A blessing and a curse, let me tell you. It's nice that I didn't have to rush to get my paper done this week, but at the same time, having a deadline so far in the future (May 24) makes it hard for me to actually be productive now. I need to be productive now, since I'm flying home in 10 days and I need to pack and move my apartment by then. When I look around my apartment, I'm like "yeah, I don't have that much stuff!" but then I remembered moving here and all of the things I've acquired since then (thank you, YDS bookstore).

As finals end and people are more free to have fun, I'm kind of sad that I won't be around for the summer. I like New Haven and I like all of the people I'm living with next year - plus the current roommates who will be in the catholic house for the summer. I spent this weekend pretending I was done with work, which was nice but now I have to start writing my paper. Friday was Community Dinner, which I'm actually going to be coordinating next year, so I went early and helped set up. It was a ton of fun, mostly because after the dinner, some people still around started dancing and we had an impromptu dance party. True, much of it was fueled by the keg and wine from dinner (not to mention the beer run before the liquor stores closed), but it was so much fun. There were maybe 15 or 20 people still left, and some more came when they heard the music from the common room. I felt like shit the next morning (and afternoon) - but let me tell you, div schoolers know how to dance.

Then yesterday I went out with some friends for Chinese food and then to the bar (a really loud screamo band was playing. yuck). They'll all be around for the summer, working or taking classes or some of my friends are going to Israel for awhile, but they'll all be here having fun. I suppose I'm going to have just as much fun in MSP, but it makes me sad nonetheless. But Andrew's not in New Haven, or Kari or Mom or Amy and Drew. Plus I promised Nat I'd come visit her in Nebraska over the summer and it's a lot shorter drive from MSP than New Haven.

I'm going to go eat some leftover Chinese now... Procrastinate a little more before I get my work done. I'm self-imposing a deadline of Thursday, hopefully Wednesday. Tessa is probably coming down on Friday, so I want to hang out with her and I want to start packing. Bacher out!

Crappy day.

These past 24 hours haven't been the best of my life, to be honest.

I saw the Daily Show had tickets available for their taping in St. Paul during the Republican National Convention in early September. I'll be back at school by then, so I sent links around to my friends in the Cities, to Andrew, to Kari. They had two days open so I thought they'd have a great chance to get tickets. I get a message from Andrew a few hours later asking me if I had reserved tickets. Yeah, they were already all booked by then. Damn it! I should have just reserved some and not forwarded links. I felt really bad about it since I saw there were two days available, but I didn't think to. Anyway, I reserved tickets for the regular taping in New York the weekend of Andrew's fall break, so hopefully he'll be able to come out and visit me and we can go then. It's the first weekend in May and already I've reserved tickets for late October. Crazy.

Second disappointment was this morning when I was getting ready, I accidentally knocked my amber cross off the ledge into my sink, where it broke into two pieces and fell down the drain. I would have tried to fish it out but it was already broken and I was going to be late for work. I got that in high school in Lithuania... I've had it for a really long time and I'd been meaning to get a new string for it. And now it's gone forever. I feel really bad about that too.

Apart from that, life has been just regular. So regular + bad things = crappy day. I'm just going to hole up in my apartment and do nothing all weekend. I'm going to see if I can wear my sweatpants all weekend long. I think I can do it. I have a paper due on Friday that I should start, but that can wait still. I usually don't get down about stuff, but those things separately blow and together just are super, super lame.

Oh yeah! Plus last night I had a dream that my whole family ended up dying and my parents died and Kari died and I don't know if Erich killed them, but then I knew I had to leave our house (I knew it was our house but it wasn't our actual house, if you know what I mean), but I could go and it was sad but then Erich died too... I don't know. It was kinda upsetting.

I wouldn't say that I'm depressed about this stuff, but I'm not happy about it either. I don't know. Maybe I'm just ready for the semester to be over. Maybe it needs to stop raining! It was sunny out last week and I was in a good mood. Now it's rained and been cloudy the past few days. That's it... It's the weather's fault.

More from Ireland

Tomorrow I come home from Ireland (sad). But it's been a lot of fun since I've been here, so that's nice.

This morning I made cream cheese french toast for Andrew and he said that it was so good he's going to hold on to me. What a compliment. But I think Mom and Kari should be pleased to know that their experiment ripping off IHOP will get me men.

We went to Dublin this week from Tuesday to Thursday. It was pretty fun, even at the same time as being tiring. There's so much to do in Dublin and we had so little time, so we tried to pack as much in as possible. That meant on Wednesday we went to 1. Dublin Castle 2. Chester Beatty Library (scraps of 1 c. parchment/Gospels!) 3. Christ Church 4. Guinness Brewery Tour 5. the place where Barney Kiernan's used to be (a pub where James Joyce set a chapter in Ulysses, a chapter on Andrew wrote a paper) 6. the Post Office 7. National Musuem of Archeology and History, 8. National Library 9. sushi for dinner! 10. Davy Byrnes (another Ulysses reference, where Leopold Bloom had lunch) and then finally to our hotel. Some places we just briefly stopped at (Christ Church, Barney Kiernan's, the Post Office), but all in all, we saw a lot and walked everywhere. I was v. v. v. tired by the time we went back to the hotel. Sushi helped my exhaustion, but there's only so much raw fish can do.

Thursday we went to another bunch of places before getting on the bus and heading back to Cork. We went to an exhibit at the Musuem of Decorative Arts and History (weird combo) about the Easter 1916 Rebellion and then to the James Joyce Center. We also walked through St. Steven's Green where the waterfall was NOT working. Bullshit! Dublin is about a 4 hour bus ride away from Cork, so by the time we got back to Andrew's apartment, I was pretty tired again. Not as tired as on Wednesday, but tired nonetheless.

Last Saturday we also went to Blarney Castle to kiss the Blarney Stone. I have a lovely picture of Andrew kissing it, but not me. I blame this on Andrew. He didn't take a picture of me kissing it because "it was the wrong angle. It would have only been your legs." Laaaaame. He's a jerk. (In his defense, he did offer to buy me a copy of the one the Castle takes, you know, like on a rollercoaster. I think those are ripoffs to begin with, and since you couldn't even get it printed on a mug or mousepad, I didn't want one.)

Today we're going to go to an Easter beer festival held at a local brewery here. I'm pretty excited since I love beer and I love Easter. You know, Jesus dying and raising and all. Then tomorrow I fly home where I land at 11:00pm and take the midnight shuttle, putting me back in New Haven at 2am where I can sleep for a bit until I have work that afternoon. I'm going to go see Tessa in a few weeks, so that's exciting too. The semester is almost over - I have about four weeks of classes, then a reading week and then exams period when all of my papers are due. Crazy.

Dispatches from Ireland

Right now Andrew is asleep and I am checking my favorite internet sites I haven't had a chance to check on. He got up early for class while I slept until 10, not to mention after we got home from our afternoon excursion, I took a nap. So he was a little more sleepy than I was tonight.

Ireland has been a lot of fun! I've been here for a week and I'll be here until next weekend, so there's still lots of time to do stuff. Andrew took me to Killarney and we went to see Ross castle, which was very pretty (and cold). On the walk there, the weather couldn't decide if it wanted to be sunny or hail, so it did some of both. Probably the only day that I've been hailed on and got a bit of a sunburn too (on my face - just a little pink!). Ross castle was built in the 15th c. and traded hands many times before present day, which adds a lot of interesting information to its history. It had just opened for the season, so barely anyone was there. We had our own private tour of the castle, which was really nice. There were monastary ruins that you could get to by boat from the castle, but the boat drivers weren't there or it wasn't open; either way we didn't get to see the monastary ruins. Not as bad as missing the Sistine Chapel, but pretty lame.

Today we went to Cork city Gaol (jail... pretty phonetic). It was kind of creepy. I'm usually not a big fan of touring places used for imprisionment or torture, but at the same time I feel that the point of visiting these places is to make sure conditions and situations like those never happen again. We also hit up the Cork City Musuem. Pretty interesting to see the history of the city... although the exhibit did make a big historical jump from 600 BC to 600 AD in one glass case. I think they're probably just working with what they have, though.

Tomorrow we're going to Blarney Castle to kiss the Blarney Stone. Exciting! Andrew feels weird about kissing a stone that millions of people have kissed before, but I told him he's pretty much doing the same thing every time he kisses me. Haha!

Tuesday is Dublin. Monday is St. Patrick's Day - there's a parade and everything! I'm excited. I should probably head to bed so I'm not tired tomorrow... although I seem to be tired more often here. It's probably all the walking. Much more than I'm used to, but not an extreme amount. It was about a 2 mile walk to Ross Castle, but it's also about 2 miles from Andrew's apartment into the city center. Anyway, more walking than just around the library bookshelves like I'm used to. More later. Love!

Ireland!

Today I bought my plane ticket for Ireland! Whoohoo! I'm leaving March 7 at 8:30 AM (yuck - means I'll have to be up early early to get to the airport) and arriving in Cork at 11:25 PM. Then, on the way home, I'm leaving Cork on March 23 at 4:00 PM and arriving at JFK at 11:00 PM. And then there's another 2 hour drive home. So, apart from the annoying drive to and from the airport and the annoying long flight, it's all very nice. The nice part is the time in between the flights when I'm in Ireland with Andrew. He's my boyfriend. He's nice. So many nice things. Now that I've spent the majority of the money I saved in the fall on my plane ticket, I have to save some money to do things in Ireland, like see castles and drink beer. I'm working more hours this semester, so that should be helpful, at least. Plus it's my birthday soon and it's tax time (rebate! unless I've been screwed by The Man). I have to save lots of money. I put away about $50 every week or two this semester, so it should be easier now that I'm making more. I think once I'm done saving for the trip I'm going to keep up saving at this rate. It's a good habit to have, plus it'll come in handy next time I have to pay over $250 for books for one ONE of my classes.

I started second semester and all of my classes are going well. It's way nicer to have afternoon class as opposed to morning class. Less of an opportunity to sleep through it. Here's my schedule:
M: 1-6 work at the library
Tu: 9:25-11:15 Cinematic Spectacle, my Film class downtown
1-6 work at the library
7-9 Theology and Cinema
W: 1:30-3:20 Christianity and Culture
6-10 work at Holy Grounds
Th: 3:30-5:20 Reading the Visual Culture of American Religion
F: 9-12 work at the library
S: Nothing!
Su: Nothing!

I'm so excited not to have to work Saturday morning. I hate hate hated it last time. But now that Susan, my boss at the library, loves me, I don't have to worry about working crappy shifts anymore. Sunday I even got to train one of my friends and close the library. You know, the high rolling stakes of being a circulation desk employee.

My classes all look great. They're all about stuff I'm very much interested in and potentially classes I hope to teach at some point, so it's nice. Lots of reading for my Visual Culture class... although the "Reading" in the title kinda gave that one away. But I'm reading some pretty cool books, so no worries there. I don't know if I can read the pretty cool books at a rate of 2 per week though.... so I lied about the no worries. There are some worries. Small worries. I'm especially excited about my Christianity and Culture class. The professor is very cool and he's paired some really traditional theology of culture readings with pieces of literature, art and music. It's a pretty interesting way to do it.

I went to bed early last night (10:30 Mom, just like you) and slept until 10... it was great. I woke up a bit and rolled around, but I always got back to sleep right away. I had some crazy dreams, none of which I can really remember. I used to be really good at remembering my dreams. I need to start doing that again. I need to put more importance on writing my dreams down right away once I wake up. I have my journal by my bed, but I need to move it to a more prominent position, I think.

Ok. Goodbye.

Winter break, numbers style

Number of...

Times told by my dentist my teeth looked perfect: 1

Political Mario/Luigi '08 t-shirts received: 1
Sizes too big of said t-shirt: 2
Days of Bush left in office: 383
New Presidents to elect this year: 1(!!!)

New digital cameras bought: 1
Best Buy camera salesmen who hit on me while buying camera: 1
Boyfriends in vicinity while being hit on by Best Buy employees: 1

Instances of sushi eating: 4
Instances of making sushi at home: 2

Times I myself have driven between Minneapolis and Green Bay: 3
Times driven through a snow storm/falling snow: 3
Forays into the ditch on the side of highway 29 because of said snow: 1
Cute cousins that missed Christmas because of a snow storm: 3
Christmas services attended: 1 (down from 2 last year)

Books planned to read cover-to-cover* in '07: 50
Actual books read in '07: 47 (48 if you count the Clifford children's book I read last week)
Books planned to read in '08: 50
Books sitting on my desk waiting to be read: 10
Books finished in November '07: 8
Months it took to finish the first 8 books: 2 1/2

Roommates reunited with over New Years: 4
Champagne bottles emptied: 2
Hangovers of roommates: 0 (down 500% from last year)

Boyfriends who left the country on New Years Day: 1
Weeks until I see him: 9 1/2
Weeks I'll be in Ireland visiting: 2
Days until I return to New Haven: 11
Upon my return to New Haven, number of weeks until I see Andrew: 8

Times I want to watch this video: 10 billion

How much I wish I was an otter, floating and holding hands: very much.


*My goal is defined by completely finishing a book, front to back. Unfortunately, this rules out a lot of books assigned for classes based on the sole fact I only read specific sections of those books, not the whole thing. I've read parts of more than 50 books, just not 50 whole books.

MSP!

Here's some brief highlights from my visit to the Twin Cities so far:








Today Amy gets back from Indiana, so we get to see her and reunite in all of our roommate awesomeness. It's good being back with my old friends again. Nat and I were saying that we're more reserved with other people - not that we're not ourselves, but we're different. I know personally I swear less and make less sexual innuendo when I'm not with my roommates. But I suppose that's just me.

Andrew leaves tomorrow for Ireland, so we're hanging out today and it'll be fun. More pictures to follow.