2002-09-30

i thought today was the 29th. which i guess isn't a big difference, except that it means that it will be a new month tomorrow. september flew by.

i made it to part of work on friday - mainly because i couldn't not meet with isaias. we had such a great day too - he learned to round numbers. and he sooo totally got it too. and was sooo excited about it. both of us were. we were high-fiving right and left. he even said he was having trouble writing the answers because he was so excited. rad times ten.

i saw insomnia on friday on campus at the $4 DKA showing... pretty good flick i'd say. then i saw moonlight mile on sunday - at a theatre that costs $14! for a matinee! it was supposed to be all special - "catering to the rich movie going audience" according to the guy who sold us tickets - people can buy fancy food and get drunk at the theatre, but other than that, i didn't see how it was so much better than anything else. certainly not $10 better. stupid rich people.

before the movie, i travelled about the hollywood farmers market, then went to amoeba and bought a new cd - mirah's "you think it's like this but it's really like this" - which i love all sorts already. i'm hoping to go see her on friday.

on saturday (yeah, yeah, i know i'm jumping around all sorts), i went with a group of friends, including tiffany, skye, and april - a pacific reunion! - to see the SC game. we were supposed to lose to oregon state i guess. but we didn't. it was sort of a boring game though - almost all our 29 points (or whatever it was) were from field goals. after a nap, i went to a party at a friend's house... which turned out to be all graduate students, which was slightly awkward. even more so was the fact that they were all musicians, so rather than hearing "what's your major" every five seconds, i had to answer the question "what instrument do you play?", which was sort of funny.

and sadly, my first-ever sunday night dinner was sort of a bust. all my friends except ryan are fired because they all flaked. ryan, april and i ate the awesome macaroni and chreese i prepared, followed by some dope oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. even the simpsons flaked - they showed the matrix instead... so we rented reality bites.

it took me forever to write this all -- between phone calls (is it normal for an insurance agent to call at 8:50 at night?), homework (why must it be so difficult to find a list of the 9 bay area counties?), and andreas' depressingness (thanks a lot, jerko) -- so i'm not really sure if i'm done or not... but i'm gonna stop anyuways.

2002-09-27

hehe... it's been awhile. highlights will have to suffice i suppose. (i don't feel so great today, so i'm skipping a bit of work, which i feel sort of bad about but i sort of have to since i've been informed that i've been working too many hours anyways and have to not work so much. go figure.)

* i got to go home last weekend. it was such a nice trip back. i hung out with mike and andreas on friday - we watched the uhf DVD i just bought (my first-ever DVD purchase) and laughed all sorts. (random note: i recently read that weird al is gonna guest star on the simpsons this season!!) andreas helped me bake a whole assortment of vegan snacks to bring to my family part on saturday - marshmallows, peanutbutter cups and oatmeal cookies. yumyumyum! partying with my family was great fun, and i got to have a real nice long chat with my great-grandparents about their high school and college experiences, which was super interesting. i had a lovely time with my grandma (the one i live with), chatting over high tech burritos ans such and got some dope sparkly halloween stickers with brian. the trip ended with a "fun" ride down to LA with robin in a car lacking ac of any kind (right in the middle of a lovely heat wave). i love
home.

* i hate LA lately. my car got hit - while i was in it too. some jerk sideswiped the side of my car as i was turning into out parking alley a couple weeks ago. the front bumper is scratched up, and now the windshield has a crack in it. and of course, the guy totally ran off before i could even see his license plate or anything. jerks.

* i've gotten to go see gary jules twice this month at the hotel cafe, which has been rad times ten and then some. gary is mike and john's cousin and does the dope ending song "Mad World" for the movie donnie darko. i brought skye and ryan along with me the first time, and we dragged molly and annie along the second time. both shows were awesome.

* i almost killed a hamster. for reals. it was terrible. ryan got a new hamster named flower (though i like to call her harvette) and when i reached into her cage to pet her, she bit my finger. shocked, i pulled it out real fast... with harvette still attached. she flew across the room, but luckily was ok. perhaps she liked the thrill, because now anytime i or anyone else goes near her cage, i swear she's looking for a new finger to bite. either that, or like any animal, she's not so into the whole sitting around in a cage by herself for ever and ever. crazy stuff.

* i can't think of too much more (such is the problem with procrastination - take note bdawg), so I will end with this. i read this quote in david sedaris' barrel fever this summer, and have been saving it on a little imac stickie for brigid all this time, so here it is: "Sallie Mae sounds like a naive and barefoot hillbilly girl but in fact they are a ruthless and aggressive conglomeration of bullies located in a tall
brick building somewhere in Kansas. I picture it to be the tallest building in that state and I have decided they hire their employees straight out of prison. It scares me."

2002-09-09

i have blue toilet paper in my bathroom. for reals. it was a hard decision for me to make. spend $1.29 for regular toilet paper, or buy the stuff on sale for $0.79 - the blue stuff. i guess it works just the same and all, but it's really quite odd to have blue toilet paper. never again.

so the miracle of all miracles happened today: my phone was properly connected (at least it seems to be so far). i woke up early and watched singing in the rain until the phone guy came, and then, rather than make all the calls i should have made, i went to the beach.

afterwards, i went to work and
helped my coordinator make up everyone's work schedules. then, i went to dinner at my old roommates' place and hung out with two of the four girls.

and now, i get to make some phone calls! tee hee...

2002-09-08

this is the second sunday of my senior *last* year of college. for the first time, i live in a fabulous townhouse - a house in which all 6 of us get our own rooms. and, it's brand-new. my room is pretty small, but plenty of room for just me. especially since i don't have any furniture besides my bed and some wire crates. my freshman year roommate, katie, came to visit and she told me not to
worry - apparently, having everything lined up along the walls at floor level is very "in" right now, so actually, my room is very trendy. phew.

i live with two girls from last year (skye and april), two girls i hadn't met until we desparately needed two people to sign the lease last year (mollie and janean), and a random girl (nicole) who lives with us this semester since brigid is in egypt studying abroad. (i actually talked online with brigid today - scary how small the world
becomes with email and IM - and her bootimous journal inspired me to restart mine). it's sort of a funny mix of girls, but things are going great so far.

not that this is too different from my previous years at usc, but this looks like it will be an easy semester academically. not that i won't still learn stuff or be challenged or anything -- that will still happen -- just easy as in super unstressful, which is
always good. i'm taking two PR classes: another writing class and aresearch/analysis class, both of which are project-based, which in my opinion is usually more effective. i'm also taking a fun cinema class where we watch movies that haven't been released yet, then get to talk to someone who
worked on the film - a producer, director, etc. so far, we've seen swimfan (and director john polson), which was fun only because there were bunches of other college students there to laugh at it with) and city by the sea (and casting director cathy sandrich-gelfond), which was sort of slow, but introduced me to a new actor i like to look at, james franco. i'm also taking a bunch of drumming classes from the same professor, angel. it's oodles of fun (especially now that i have drums to practice on - thank you john).

what's been incredible aggravating about this first couple of weeks, however, is the fact that i *still* don't have a telephone. we finally got our cable modem set up last friday, but the phones are what i'm really waiting for. i haven't talked to anyone from home in too long. and, it's terribly difficult to get a hold of friends around here without a phone. supposedly, the phone guy will be here in the morning to set me all up. if so, perhaps you'll be one of the lucky ones i'll call.
either way, now i'll be able to be reached by phone, which will make oh-so-much difference. (yes, i do realize how dependent people of my generation are on all this technology, but what can you do?)

I haven't really been up to much thus far - lots of organizing in the house, my room, the kitchen, lots of movies, a couple trips to the beach, a trip to native foods, and lots of hanging around. last night, my friend ryan and i drove all over los angeles, up and down santa monica looking for some movie theatre i must have made up. we made it to another one to see full frontal, only to learn it's not playing at that theatre anymore. instead we saw the good girl, which was good, although extremely depressing. makes me start to doubt i'll ever get married. tonight, i'm gonna go cook me up something good to eat, then relax with some soydelicious while i watch
the simpsons.