The New England Society for Tea Fetishism

Have a lovely day, my friends. And for those of you who do not partake of the turkey, enjoy your side dishes.

I went to get my lunch today around 12:15. For some unknown reason, the basketball team, in their uniforms, stood in the parking lot behind the windmill, milling about. Nothing in the galley looked appetizing, so I settled on a pre-packaged tuna sandwich. I was walking across the porch in front of the Pratt center, which is where I work, with said sandwich in hand when I heard the basketball team let out a collective "Oh!" in the way that young men do when they see something amusing and quite possibly scandalous. I looked down at the Pratt parking lot just in time to see a woman in a little silver car backing out of a space. Her left front headlight caught on the back bumper of the big-ass Chevy SUV next to her, but she didn't seem to mind. She stepped on the gas, pulled all the way out of the space and in the process completely tore out her headlight. Then she sped away, leaving a mess of broken glass and metal on the ground. So I had lunch and a show today.

I had a zombie dream last night. All those horror movies and clip shows from Halloween finally worked their way out of the deep recesses of my brain and manifested themselves--and not in a way I expected. I was having a lovely dream involving a soon to be quite nude Johnny Depp, when something went very, very wrong. From what I can remember I was in an outdoor, two-story shopping area, kind of like the back end of Quincy Market where the jewelry store and the Brookstone is located, for those of you who know Boston. Suddenly the place was teeming with pale-faced, slow-moving, brain-eaters. There was no place to go and people began running up and down the stairs, locking themselves inside the stores. I couldn't find a place to hide or run to, and a zombie bit me on the finger. So I turned into a zombie.

Of course, turning into a zombie basically consisted of becoming very pale, getting really dark circles around my eyes, and feeling slightly nauseated. I didn't even want to eat brains. I had a friend with me who also turned into a zombie (it very well could have been you, Amy) and we decided that we needed to hide somewhere since people generally tend to try and shoot zombies in the head and dismember them and all that folderol. We ran from the crowd and found an empty-looking apartment building, climbed up the weird, wooden, spiraling fire-escape, and went through the window of the top apartment. There was a plump, matronly woman in there who seemed pretty happy to have us, but we didn't want her getting any hysterical, tasty-brains kind of ideas so we turned her into a zombie. At this point you should know that turning someone into a zombie was as easy as sneezing on them. So I did. And she was. When her husband came in and started yelling all we had to do was kind of, ummm, spit on him a little, and he was cool. And we were a happy and safe little zombie family that didn't want to eat anybody.

Way to work through your irrational zombie fear, Sarah.

I had the robots in the ovaries pretty bad on Friday, so I didn't go to Jake's birthday party. From the reports, I think I might have missed a hootenanny. We're talking a whole lotta hoot here, people, with a generous helping of nanny. There were ridiculous drinking games, a cake, and a pinata filled with candy and nips of liquor. One of my suitemates was not aware of the potency of the blue jello shots and ended up performing an amazing feat of reverse-peristalsis straight into her lap. And I missed it.

Over the weekend I read the last 300 pages of Invisible Man, went grocery shopping so I could buy some fruit to eat on the way home, bought two CDs at Best Buy (shhh, don't tell my mom), and had dinner with Tracy, her boyfriend George, and my other suitemate Amber over at Shawn's dorm. We had a veggie platter, snow peas, Melba toast and brie, yellow rice and baked beans. It was a nice evening. Then we went to Jeff's, sans Shawn, and watched Half-Baked. I really shouldn't have invited Amber since I knew that she had a lot of work to do, but I couldn't help myself. She's too fun to leave at home.

I just registered about ten minutes ago. I'm taking memoir writing and modern poetry. I think I'm going to do a drop/add and add my thesis either at the end of this semester or the beginning of next semester. You see, the thesis is six credits, which would put my total at twelve credits. My assistantship only covers 9 credits, so I have to come up with around $1,500 to pay for the extra three. It shouldn't be too hard, but I want to be sure I have it before I sign up.

I'm going home on Wednesday. Hooray!! I also have to take the green line, which is a downer, but I'm going to sleep in my own bed and eat a ton of good food and see my mum and see my Tracy, so I don't mind one bit.

I should keep a tally. I'm guessing that at least of third of the new visitors who get to my blog get there through misspelling the word "music." Launch Muise and Free Muise and MTV Muise and Latin Muise. The list goes on and on.

The shower head needs some CLR. It's sending out this one really hard stream of water that's going to make a dent in my head by Christmas time. But, wonder of wonders, it appears that housekeeping cleaned the shower. Whatever that reddish film was, mildew or rust or mineral deposits, it's mostly gone now. I was ready to buy some scrubbing bubbles and do it myself.

I have class in 90 minutes and I really don't want to go. I'm quite sick of classes, but at least we don't have any terrible poetry to workshop today--just three stories that are very flawed but also very promising. I just wish we didn't have to have class with so many undergrads. I mean, bravo to them for wanting to write, but telling them why they shouldn't rhyme a poem unless they're trying to be witty is not helping me grow as a writer.

Exactly one week from this moment I will be waking up in my own bed to the sounds of my mother getting ready for Thanksgiving dinner. I can't wait.

Hey Ms. Nash, what are you doing on Wednesday night? Do you see anti-freezes in our future?

Where else would you hear about this shit?

From the AP

House Republicans approved a party rules change Wednesday that could allow Majority leader Tom DeLay to retain his leadership post if he is indicted by a Texas grand jury on state political corruption charges. By a voice vote, and with a handful of lawmakers voicing opposition, the House Republican Conference decided that a party committee of several dozen members would review any felony indictment of a party leader and recommend at that time whether the leader should step aside.

Good for them. Let me be the first to congratulate the Republican Party on refusing to be bound by its own ethical standards.

I just learned that if you type in a title and then press enter, your blog will publish automatically. Sorry it's taken me a bit to blog, but not much has happened, certainly nothing as exciting as being evicted or setting the apartment on fire.

For example, this weekend I read three-hundred pages of Invisible Man, and now I have to read three -hundred more. We had a game night on Saturday, and I won a game of Trivial Pursuit and a game of Pictionary. And I learned how to play hearts. On Monday I went over to Jeff's house, watched Dazed and Confused and Animal House with him and Peter, and poked Jeff in the nose when he fell asleep. I'm wearing the pants I wore on Monday and they smell like patchoulli.

See? The excitement never stops here at Southampton College. You know what would be awesome? If Amy came to visit. I could really get behind that idea.

Note to self #1: Don't wear the boy-cut fundies with the stretch Canyon River Blues jeans. They make for odd panty-lines.

Note to self #2: Don't mix New England clam chowder with vanilla chai latte. I spent about twenty minutes convinced that there was a ferret scurrying around in my lower intestine, about to pop out of my stomach. I am talking pain here people. But it's gone.

Oh, the weasely bowel condition might also have to do the with anger that I am tightly suppressing at the moment. They're playing musical chairs with the offices again, and, as you all know, according to the rules of musical chairs someone is left without a place to sit. In this round that would be the work-study kids from the Friends World Program. But instead of just tossing them out on their ears, my semi-private (and quite tiny) office will be packed with the little buggers come Monday morning.

I went to get my lunch today at 11:30 and when I came back there were several people in my office discussing what would go where and telling me that I had to clean off my desk and put stuff in boxes for when the movers come and take everything out of the drawers in the L-extension on the side of the desk. Boom, just like that, in the space of five minutes, private office gone. And all I wanted to do was eat my frelling lunch.

I have no authority in this department, except over the cute little work-study girls, and at most all I ever do is ask them to file or shred things. But I kinda sorta have my own office and it kinda sorta makes me feel like a big shot. But no more. I think I'll be spending most of my time now in the big office on the student computer.

I think my New Year's resolution (a bit early, I know), is to not be passive-aggressive and to say what I mean. If I think someone's made a mistake with something or being a bit messy or anything of that sort I'm going to come right out and say it, not pussy-foot around. Going hand in hand with that, I'm going to try not to be so defensively contrary when people decide to come right out and tell me that I'm mistaken or have made a mistake. Not to be put into effect until January 1st, 2005, of course.

I heard about this the other day, but didn't remember to look it up until just now.

The Big Dig highway project in downtown Boston is riddled with leaks dumping millions of gallons of water into the $14.6 Billion tunnel system, according to an engineer hired to investigate the cause of a massive leak in September. Fixing the hundreds of leaks could take up to 10 years, said Jack K. Lemley, a consultant hired by the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority to investigate the problem.

Between this and the Kerry defeat I think that the Red Sox victory, glorious as it is, has sucked all the luck out of Boston.

Last night I went over to Jeff's, watched some tv, and tried not to fall asleep. I guess Jeff was having the same problem because around 12:30 he asked if he could take me home because he was about to pass out. I was like, you and me both. My suitemate, Amber, was over there with Seth, but they left as soon as Jeff and I walked in the door. I got the feeling that something was wrong, as did Jeff, and if I really feel like a nosy bitch I might have to ask him if he talked to Seth and found out what was going on. I was kind of disappointed because I like Seth and Amber seems like a really great person and I'd like to get to know her better. But no. They left. I guess we'll have to wait for another time to hang out.

I got an A on my midterm. Hooray for easy to please professors. Now I am rushing to finish a book on writing so I can do a presentation on it in my Advanced Writing Workshop class. I should have started reading it on Sunday, but I was, uhhhh, indisposed. And/or horribly hungover. Whatever sounds better. It's a good book for beginning writers or anyone (me) who might be experiencing a block. Sometimes it helps to go over the basics.

I'm a liar--there was no pizza. Just a bad Sarah. Saturday afternoon, Jeff called me and asked if I wanted to go to the gym with him after dinner. I was all for it, so I ate a rather small meal, expecting to be on an eliptical runner for at least half an hour some time in the near future. Instead I got a call from Jeff around 6:15 saying that he just couldn't get off the couch. I went over at 7:30 with Tracy and George and we played poker with Jeff and Peter for a while, watched Half-Baked, and went home. Well, George and Tracy went home.

I had too much to drink on top of a small dinner and had to go upstairs and lie down, all the while cursing myself for being so stupid. I've never been that drunk before. I knew I was in trouble when Jeff kept knocking my chips over and I found it difficult to stack them back up again. Tropicana makes a good cranberry juice cocktail. It even makes Seagram's Vodka palatable, which, unfortunately, is not a good thing. I asked Jeff if I could lie down in his room, so I went upstairs and tried to angle my body so my shoes wouldn't be on his bed.

Long story short, George and Tracy left at around 1am, and Jeff took me home at 2. I had such a hangover yesterday, I couldn't even look at food until around 4 in the afternoon. Tracy was rather sympathetic, which made me feel bad since I didn't have any sympathy for myself. I was thinking, no, don't be nice to me, I'm a moron. Look upon me with scorn! She's such a nice girl.

So, I'm officially sick of politics. I think that it happened at about 3:45 on election day. It's all just so overwhelming and I'm so very sick of hearing about everything that both sides are doing wrong and everthing that they accuse each other of doing wrong. Am I still going to read Demagogue every day? Sure. But I think that's going to be it for a while. I just can't take all the bitching and moaning. I mean, what can you say except that apparently over 50% of the country has a radically different view of reality than you?

I spent most of election night at Jeff's house. We watched the tv until 3:30, waiting for Ohio to come in, and then I decided that I really needed to go home and get in bed so I could get up at 8 and go to work. And we cuddled, which was very nice. I really miss human contact when I'm here. There's no one to hug. Last night I swore up and down that I was going to stay in and get some schoolwork done, and I did get fifty pages read for my American Novel class. But around 9 I went over Jeff's house and watched tv with him and Pete and the cat, Bitty. Bitty's a petite little black cat that Peter yells at all the time because he's allergic to cat dander (the cat belongs to Matt, their other roommate). The picnic table is in the kitchen because the kitchen table was too small to have a poker tournament around. That was about a month ago, and the picnic table has yet to go back outside. Anyway, Bitty was rubbing herself all over everything in the kitchen, including the picnic table, but when she walked to it she would clunk the middle of her forehead on one of the cross beams underneath. I'm talking about a good, solid *clonk* that echoed through the kitchen. And she did it at least ten times. And I cracked up every time.

We watched a show on Bravo that's about Ewan McGregor and his ugly friend who are motorcycling from England to New York City across Europe and Asia and, I'm assuming after they've gotten across the ocean, parts of Canada. Very entertaining. So around 2am, Jeff's head was in my lap, so I poked him in the forehead and asked "Guess what time it is?" I was expecting him to be a little more creative than "Ten?" I thought he'd come up with my answer, which was, "Time to take me home." So I asked again, and he said "Twelve?" Finally I said, "It's two o'clock." He didn't believe me until he looked at his phone, and then apologized profusely for keeping me up, which wasn't his fault because I knew damn well what time it was. I'm a tired puppy today. And he doesn't have to go to work until 5pm.

I've been clicking on the "next blog" button this morning and, not surprisingly, most people are writing about the election. Or maybe it's just that all the politically minded blogs are being updated like crazy today. I love it when people equate Lincoln and Bush, because they're both Republicans, ya know. Call me crazy, but I think that the Republican party has gone through a few changes in the past hundred and almost fifty years, especially since the party of the Great Emancipator is now trying to challenge voters in mostly-minority communities.

This election season has been hard, mostly because for a lot of people, Kerry is just a shape to fill a void. They are not voting for him, they're voting against Bush. So I'd like to list a few things about Kerry that I like.
He's articulate.
He can correctly pronounce the word "nuclear" and is against proliferation.
He projects intelligence.
He will defend Roe v. Wade.
He is against the FMA (although still not pro-marriage. maybe he'll change).
He knows that there is a difference between criticizing policy and criticizing people.
He recognizes that Iraq is a mess.
But I guess that when you get right down to it, I'm just completely sick of George W. Bush. To get really personal about it, I don't think that he represents any of my interests at all. Maybe it's because I'm one of those Massachusetts liberals that he keeps putting down in his campaign speeches.

So tonight I am going to an election party hosted by P.E.A.C.E., the environmental group on campus (and boy did they laugh when Bush brought up his "clear skies initiative" during the debate), leaving by at least 10pm to watch the Daily Show. The suspense is already starting to knot up my stomach. Maybe I'll just go out with Jeff, get really drunk, and find out the election results tomorrow morning, so I won't be in front of the tv all night biting my nails to the quick.

I love socializing, but there is a downside: rhinovirus. Maybe it's just that I went to bed an hour later than I probably should have, but today I feel as though I could be coming down with something. I spent most of last year alone in my room, but I didn't get sick once. I can take a cold, but this office is so hot and I'm in here 9-5 three days a week, so I will probably be miserable. If I am sick, expect some very pathetic blog entries this week.

I watched way too many horror movies and specials about horror movies this weekend, but I didn't have any nightmares. Instead I dreamed of robbing a store with a bunch of people. We had to break into a safe, and in that safe was . . . . . . . . . a cage full of peas. Solid top, solid bottom, bars on the sides, and full of peas. Why were we stealing them? I have no clue, but apparently it was my idea. Maybe they were rare heirloom vegetables. I spent the rest of the dream worrying that the cops would catch us and I would go to jail.

Tonight at 6pm is my one midterm. I haven't started studying yet, but all I need to do is read over my notes a few times. Four essays and three hours to write them. It shouldn't be too difficult, unless he asks us to compare the styles of Dreiser and Faulkner. Or anyone and anyone. I'm not so good at that.