::alio!::

Drinking and Computers: A Bad Idea from the Start

So many updates in such a short time! I'm OBVIOUSLY trying to make this look like I'm more popular than I actually am. *sigh* It's not easy being green.

Anyway, the pressure's off -- for a while, at least. I'm handing in my first application tonight. It'll be sweet.

Going out in a while, but for now I think I'll just sit here with my Tsingtao and contemplate my navel . . .

"Are you stalking me? Because that would be SUPER."

I finished my thesis critique last night and went straight to bed. With the help of a little blue pill, I slept for nine hours. I feel much more human today.

Thanks to those of you who wrote me yesterday, you know who you are. Much appreciated. It certainly made the evening easier.

I was walking out of class this afternoon, and I was forced to elbow my way through a tight mob of PSYC 1000 students outside of Theatre B. Grumbling about freshman, I staggered through the tunnels, occasionally getting tripped up or run into by one of the many newbies careening around this fine establishment.

Then, totally out of the blue, by a door that leads to the Quad from Tory, one of the evil freshman stopped and waved at me. I didn't have my glasses on, but I reflected that the tall skinny boy with the weird hair strongly resembled little Cameron, the youngest of the Clan Anstee. And it was! He actually attends Carleton now. That was as much of a shock as anything that has happened to me recently.

I think I need more chocolate . . .

I feel kind of like a cop-out today for not going to hockey school last night. But I also feel relieved. My elbow thanked me this morning for not having fallen on it (AGAIN) the night before. Anyway, it's too late now to reconsider. I have enough to keep me busy. My second funeral in four months is on Sunday. That's an interesting thing to have on my CV.

Well, back to the grindstone. I have to go to work in a bit, and I'd like to get as much done as possible before I go.

Fina

I've had a rough day, and then I came home and found Canada Post had rejected the application I was supposed to have sent to my prof in Washington. There's no time to resend it.

This is an excerpt from an entry I made on the last few pages of my journal on my way home this afternoon. Forgive the flowery prose: I'm feeling more than slightly melodramatic today.

I write, sitting under a tree in the Experimental Farm. The wind blows tendrils of hair across my shaded eyes and the sky holds a phallanx of stratified blue cumulus superimposed on a backdrop of purple and yellow cirrus. It's surreal, and somehow fitting.

Charles died last night. The school chaplain said he was just waiting for the end, not sure if he was "doing it right." How typical of a sociologist to be concerned with the protocol of dying.

It was expected, even anticipated. He's finally free of his earthly failings and the body that let him down. The Department has made only vague allusions to its lost leader. It's unfortunate that so many young students never knew who he was, and probably don't even care. They'll never miss that benevolent sunny aura that emanated from the Director's office.

It was two weeks ago to this day that I found out he was dying. After everything that has happened this summer, and, especially, in the last month, I feel like I'm failing to evince the appropriate amount of emotion this situation necessitates.

I am overwhelmed, and I can't muster more than a sad face and an air of general apathy.

I should be preparing to go to hockey school. But I've made up my mind about that. More accurately, my body's betrayal and this day have made up my mind for me. I may have been able to grit my teeth against the injuries I have inflicted upon myself and work through it, just one last time, before I made my final decision. But my body has a habit of expressing whatever I'm feeling in my head, and it says no. I don't own anything that doesn't hurt and I'm so exhausted I could sleep right where I sit.

This is all aside from the fact that I'm really not in the right headspace to spend my evening having "fun." I don't want to risk breaking down in the change room like I did to weeks ago.

I'm not going to hockey school any more. It took more guts than I actually had to go there in the first place, and now all my courage has deserted me. I simply cannot bear the humiliation in front of all those strangers one more time. Well-meaning strangers, but strangers none the less. This chronic shyness seems to be my Waterloo. I thought I had it beat, but I guess not this time. I'll definitely try again, and I'm still going to play, but my psyche needs a rest before it can take any more bruising.

I also have many other pressing things to do that should better occupy my time, like my scholarship application. Quiet reflection and a long sleep might put me in a better place to deal with that.

And I'll do it. And I'll succeed with my plan. And I'll dedicate it to Charles.

Thinking Too Hard

D'you ever think it weird how stuff kinda always happens all at once? Or does it just seem like that? Does the world only function in karmic waves? Does time flow in a straight line, a circle, a net?

Ignore me. I'm exhausted and I have too many things to do. But now I have a functional computer, and a brand spanking new, beerless keyboard, and things just keep . . . well, HAPPENING, to me. All my universes are colluding on the top of my head, which, coincidentally enough, is my cosmic centre, according to what I learned today in experiential methodology. So I'm feeling a little weighted down right now. A little stressed, but I have things to keep me grounded.

I'm more -- bemused, I guess, at the pace my life has taken in the past month. A month? Seems more like a year, but it has gone by so quickly that it couldn't have taken more than five minutes. What I need is a week out of time, where I can sleep, take stock, and organize my brain around the enormous amount of information it needs to assimilate before, let's say, this Friday.

As a disinterested aside, have you ever noticed that something can be tacitly acknowledged as being something, yet everyone avoids calling it by its true name? And then someone says it out loud, and everyone is momentarily stunned, but then immediately begins to use that terminology for that situation, almost as if they had always been doing so? Weird.

oh shit . . .

Have I mentioned that I hate computers and everything that is involved therein?

And don't you hate that feeling when you know you've deleted something irrevocably that you really, really weren't supposed to, because it wasn't yours? And said something was immensely important to the person to whom it belongs? And you deleted it because you meant to back it up and then overlooked it at the last minute, due to contributing factors and working through a third party? And you know it's your own damned fault for trusting everything to work out properly?

Yeah, I got that going for me right now.

Regression

Too much to do, no inclination (whatsoever) to do any of it. Too much to consider, no desire to think about it. Too much responsibility, none of it requested. Too much future, not enough past to back it up.

*sigh*

I wish I was five again . . .

as a Mule

Went to another in a long stream of seminars today, got the same old crap poured at me. It's daunting when everyone tells you that you don't have fudge in Stefan's fridge's chance in succeeding in something you've set your heart and future on.

Good thing I'm stubborn. If I can't get there on pure brilliance, I'm hoping originality will get me through. Cross your fingers.

Fifty First Dates?

There is far too much going on in my life right now for me to be forced to concentrate on the legitimacy of social anthropology in the decades following the Second World War. I hereby object, vociferously and vehemently. I have FAR better things to do with my precious time.

Like post inanity on a website nobody reads.

And I hate social protocol, too. It can suck my ass-mar.

That is all.

BIG FRIKKIN' DEAL

It has been pointed out that I'm an idiot. Hear ye, hear ye, I have fixed said infinitesimal mistake.

In the meantime, folks, listen to two things for me: the ENTIRE soundtrack to Garden State, and Black Eyed Peas' "Let's Get Retarded." Then you will be able to identify.

That is all.

fingers crossed

Things are not going so well in Alison Land, but the Red says this thing is nearly ready to go. I will keep you posted, but in the meantime, pray for me . . .

It Starts . . .

The Red is now in a house. He is getting internet today. Harass if you want this to continue.

Hockey school tonight. My plans are unfolding tremenjously.