fun with iphoto.

thou shalt not blog while hungry.

i've been sitting in a coffee shop for the past three hours working on writing paper #1 of, like, 83 that are due in the next four weeks, and i'm getting kind of hungry (ok, really, i'm starving). i had breakfast here, i'm about to have lunch here, and i'm hoping like hell i won't be here long enough to also eat dinner. so while i'm sitting here starving this cute, thin woman in coordinated clothing came in for lunch and i'm watching her eat a (v. small) salad and drink a latte, and i can't help but wonder how people get away with only eating salad for a meal. i mean, how does crunchy water constitute nutrition? how does your stomach not retaliate by eating itself after it realizes that you tricked it by feeding it rabbit food? mine totally doesn't fall for that.

i get hungry about 15 minutes after eating (only) salad. of course, i get hungry every fifteen minutes anyway so maybe it's just me, but i can't help but think that salad woman is probably able to coordinate her outfits--a skill i'm seriously lacking--precisely because of the salad eating. i think i would magically dress better if i ate more salads, only i know that thought is completely illogical and must be a symptom of the ravenous hunger.

oh, wait. salad woman is now eating chocolate cookies. heh.

for the love of my pretty new mac.

i've been so overjoyed with my new mac(book pro) and all its nifty features that i haven't had time to blog. also, i'm drowning in school. not really, but almost. i will be. soon.

unlike susan, my mac love does not manifest itself in monitor licking, though i totally understand how it could get to that point. if i find myself licking any part of my laptop i'll be sure to take pictures.

and once the drowning stops i'll have more to say. like, what made me think going back to school would be a good idea? actually, i'm already saying that but by the end of the semester i'll really mean it.

the heather and jon coffee shop get together that probably took a couple years off my life due to nervousness alone

even though it was worth it just to bask in the dooceness.

so i saw them, but just to get this out of the way: i didn't meet them because last week when i said i felt like i was going to throw up if i was in the same room with dooce? that feeling only got worse the closer i got--and i mean that in terms of city blocks, not in terms of feet or inches once i was in the coffee shop, though that was pretty bad too. so there was a line to get coffee, and there was a line to meet heather and jon (and george! george was there! george looked at me!). i stood in the heather and jon line for a bit before realizing that i didn't have my camera, anything to write on, and i was still on the verge of throwing up. despite amy's very practical take.your.camera. advice, i forgot. i always forget.

upon realizing just how unprepared i was to have a conversation with anyone about anything, i switched to the coffee ordering line instead. i figured, at the very least, it would buy me some time during which i could stand two feet away from heather and act like i wasn't staring (i wasn't, not then) and maybe she would look at me, which obviously would be the next best thing to actually talking to her. though really, i'm not sure my stomach could have handled that. as it was i was scoping out exits in case i needed to make a run for it.

i did get to sit and watch heather and jon talk to people while my drink was being made. the two things i noticed about them were 1. they're really attractive and 2. they're super nice. they were having seriously long and involved conversations with people about i don't know what, when most people in their situation would not have been that personable. also, heather's southern accent isn't nearly as bad as she claims it is. and she was wearing really cool shoes. did i mention the prettiness? i hung out long enough to be blinded by it and to get my drink, and then i quit staring and left.

so, to you people who are disappointed that i didn't get any pictures: me, too! and that i didn't talk to either of them: i know! but i'm happy i saw them. that was good enough.

this could work.

last week i wrote a paper about poverty for my social policy class. really, poverty--and its good friend, welfare--is the only subject i'm allowed to read or think or talk or write about anymore. in response to all the poverty talk, someone in one of my classes pointed out that we get it and the faculty are preaching to the choir. he had a point. it's too bad that all this education is wasted on people who understand these issues. if my instructors really want to be useful, they should go teach a class in washington. but that wasn't my point.

yesterday i got my paper back (with a much higher grade than i expected, yay me). in part of my paper i talked about how social programs obviously need more funding, but i don't see any good solution to that because the money has to come from somewhere and no one is willing to reallocate funds for any greater social good. obviously. because if we truly cared about fixing social problems we would have done it by now.

i thought i was being pessimistic, but my professor totally one-upped me. in the margin of my paper he wrote this suggestion for raising money: "tax on sales of crack and meth?"

priorities, or not.

i feel bad that i haven't had much to say lately (here or in real life, assuming this real life that i hear of actually exists). i've been busy with classes, and when not with classes then with sleeping, and then eating. those are my priorities these days. actually, eating is ahead of sleeping. peeing is somewhere in the middle. oh, and sometimes tv watching. also, hanging out with other students and talking about how and why grad school makes us want to cry. it's enlightening. sometimes we all cry together.

this is why i'm such an awesome student--i have priorities that involve peeing--and why my blog has become so uninteresting. you'd think that if i'm neglecting everyone (i totally am), i could at least make up for it with a good story. but no. if my bladder were more accomodating and less insistent about the peeing thing, i'd probably have more time to communicate with people. just a thought.

meanwhile, beagle dog reeks of beagle-ness. i really wish he could take care of that problem himself because the thing where he rubs his dog ass on my couch is so uncool.

ETA: dooce will be here on monday for SXSW, and she's planned an informal meeting at a coffee shop to meet people! with jon! she is so going to be mobbed! the thought of seeing her makes me want to throw up, in a good way, but still. once i get over the wanting to throw up part, i'm so there.

i only say the E word when i need a really good laugh.

today alvin and i were driving around running errands, and for about the fifth time we got stuck in a parking lot full of many, many slow people who couldn't figure out that the secret to making their cars move was to press the gas pedal. alvin normally has way more patience than i do but today it was too much even for him. he then proceeded to mock the slow people's inability to just fucking move already in a high-pitched nasally voice that made me laugh. this means that alvin was being extra fun and, naturally, was about to pay for it.

once we got out of parking lot traffic and into street traffic he cranked up the radio in what was meant to be a show of defiance but was more like payback from the karma gods. i was surprised he turned up the volume at all since green day was on and they're so overplayed lately that he refuses to listen to any of their music. unfortunately for him the song was brain stew, and the next lyrics to come blaring out of the speakers were: my eyes feel like they're gonna bleed.

most people who know alvin know that he has a serious problem with any mention of the word eye, and even any reference made to eyes will immediately cause his to turn red and water profusely. it took me a second to realize what was about to happen and when i looked over at him tears were streaming down his face. at least he saw the humor in the situation, so when i laughed so hard that i cried he sort of understood. sort of. of course, my watering eyes just made his cry more.

this was the second time this week that his totally unsympathetic sympathetic eye response has caught him off guard. on thursday night we went to a social gathering with a bunch of people i go to school with, and after a few margaritas the conversation turned to how to make liquid shoot out your nose, followed by someone confessing that they blow air out their eyes when they laugh too hard. i was really amused by that, but alvin's eyes? not so much.

oscar porn & eye candy.

this morning on the today show--or good morning america, i'm not sure--there was much anticipation about the academy awards. so much, in fact, that they devoted a good deal of live coverage to preparations at the kodak theatre, including showing the place settings (8,000 pieces of china were made for the event), demonstrating how the lighting works, and talking to wolfgang puck about the nasty yellow liquid stuff he was making that was maybe soup or custard or, more likely, liquid gold being prepared for the amusement of the beautiful, rich people dining on new china under the special lighting.

i watched for about 10 minutes until the coffee started working and i realized i was being subjected to oscar porn and then i thought, if we could reallocate the money being spent on entertaining hollywood people to, say, fund public education or feed hungry people or even just pay off my student loans, it would be much better spent.

but. despite the fact that i want to boycott the oscars on a matter of principle, i'll probably watch anyway because jon stewart is hosting and the man makes me drool. ellen did a mock award segment with him on her show this morning and the two of them were hilarious together. they have great chemistry, and at one point they abanonded what is probably my very favorite social norm--the idea of personal space--and sat kind of on top of each other with their faces about one inch apart. it was weird because, personally, if i were that close to jon i would consider it an opportunity to forget that i'm married*. i wonder if ellen considered forgetting she's gay? i say that only because this is jon stewart we're talking about, and later on she definitely gave him this oh my god i love you look after he said something funny. i think it's probably just the look you give jon stewart when you're in his presence, but still. there should be more ellen & jon comedy and i wanna sit in his lap.

*the forgetting i'm married thing only applies to jon stewart, and maybe to ellen because the woman can dance.