The Hall of the Revels is wishing everyone a Happy New Year. Blogging will recommence in earnest once I return to...the Garden State? The Armpit of the Nation? Neither makes much sense in the winter time.
I hope that 2008 brings you all health and joy.
Love,
Nom de Plume
Monday, December 31, 2007
Monday, December 17, 2007
Last night found me rolling around on the floor in almost painful laughter as RussianRoommate read aloud to Roommate J and I from "Harry Potter and the Leopard-Walked-Up-To-Dragon," a piece of Chinese fanfiction badly written (presumably, or at the very least badly translated back into English). There was no leopard in the story. There was barely anything at all, besides purple prose and the occasional copyright infringement (both of Harry Potter and The Hobbit, of which most of the text consisted, with the names changed). SoccerRoommate walked in halfway through this recitation to find me curled up on my side in the middle of the common room, breathless from laughing with tears streaming down my face. Roommate J stood nearby, hunched over in a similar attitude of hilarious distress.
This afternoon I'm having tea with a high school friend and then going out to dinner with 4/5 roommates to celebrate the beginning of winter break tomorrow after classes end.
My real reason for starting a blog entry was to talk about music that reminds me of places and feelings, but I kind of lost that one, going on about bad fanfiction. I remember I was going to mention the intro to Six Feet Under as a tune that will always remind me of last August, when I hastened to finish the series before leaving home. I was also going to mention the Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Snow (Hey Oh)" as the song that was playing as I drove into Princeton for the third time when I talked to the English and Creative Writing teachers, nervous and excited.
But then I lost my train of thought, as is wont to happen at this time of year, when all I can think is something along the lines of:
gotta get my stuff packed can't forget my ticket can't wait TREE! presents oh god thank you notes gotta do that too soccerroommate's shoes are starting to stink what should i say time to go to english precept for the last time don't forget your paper SNOW.
This afternoon I'm having tea with a high school friend and then going out to dinner with 4/5 roommates to celebrate the beginning of winter break tomorrow after classes end.
My real reason for starting a blog entry was to talk about music that reminds me of places and feelings, but I kind of lost that one, going on about bad fanfiction. I remember I was going to mention the intro to Six Feet Under as a tune that will always remind me of last August, when I hastened to finish the series before leaving home. I was also going to mention the Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Snow (Hey Oh)" as the song that was playing as I drove into Princeton for the third time when I talked to the English and Creative Writing teachers, nervous and excited.
But then I lost my train of thought, as is wont to happen at this time of year, when all I can think is something along the lines of:
gotta get my stuff packed can't forget my ticket can't wait TREE! presents oh god thank you notes gotta do that too soccerroommate's shoes are starting to stink what should i say time to go to english precept for the last time don't forget your paper SNOW.
Saturday, December 15, 2007
SoccerRoommate, Roommate J, CC and I are relaxing and listening to Christmas music. Some of us are doing homework, some of us are wrapping presents, some of us are writing on their blogs, but all of us are finally feeling the holiday spirit.
I myself feel as if I have had a 24-hour long IV drip of holiday spirit, starting last night when I went to S's holiday party accompanied by Downstairs Chatterer. The two of us know her from French and had just been to see Sin City (INCREDIBLY violent, but beautifully filmed and a good take on modern film noir for all its flaws). The party was fun and there was Christmas music playing, but we really only knew each other and we were so crammed into her dorm room the mingling was impossible so we stood and talked and ate chocolate-covered apple slices for a while and then left.
Today I made a second trip into New York, once again attempting to see Cyrano and once again failing and once again discovering what a blessing in disguise that was. This time I got a ticket to The Seafarer, an Irish play set around Christmas wherein the devil comes to play cards with a heavy-drinking group of friends. It was amazingly good; the perfect blend of comedy and drama and excellent (of course) accents all around. Before seeing the play, though, I visited Amy's Bread, an excellent bakery, in their Hell's Kitchen location, went shopping at H&M and Anthropologie (too many things to buy at the first, too few things to buy under $50 at the second so that I wound up buying nothing), and stopped in at St. Patrick's Cathedral for some tourism, candle lighting and introspection.
I had no trouble with Penn Station this time around and got a shiny new French-style doubledecker train on the return trip. On my way back Roommate J called me and asked whether I was close enough for her to wait to have dinner with me. I was not, so she went and when I got back instead of going to the dining hall (a bit of an anticlimax) I got Indian takeout and had an hour-long conversation on the phone with "Katya," a high school friend. Then CC offered to turn on Christmas music.
And here we are, eagerly anticipating our journeys home on Tuesday (ten minutes for some of us, three hours for others) and hoping for good weather to buoy us thither.
I myself feel as if I have had a 24-hour long IV drip of holiday spirit, starting last night when I went to S's holiday party accompanied by Downstairs Chatterer. The two of us know her from French and had just been to see Sin City (INCREDIBLY violent, but beautifully filmed and a good take on modern film noir for all its flaws). The party was fun and there was Christmas music playing, but we really only knew each other and we were so crammed into her dorm room the mingling was impossible so we stood and talked and ate chocolate-covered apple slices for a while and then left.
Today I made a second trip into New York, once again attempting to see Cyrano and once again failing and once again discovering what a blessing in disguise that was. This time I got a ticket to The Seafarer, an Irish play set around Christmas wherein the devil comes to play cards with a heavy-drinking group of friends. It was amazingly good; the perfect blend of comedy and drama and excellent (of course) accents all around. Before seeing the play, though, I visited Amy's Bread, an excellent bakery, in their Hell's Kitchen location, went shopping at H&M and Anthropologie (too many things to buy at the first, too few things to buy under $50 at the second so that I wound up buying nothing), and stopped in at St. Patrick's Cathedral for some tourism, candle lighting and introspection.
I had no trouble with Penn Station this time around and got a shiny new French-style doubledecker train on the return trip. On my way back Roommate J called me and asked whether I was close enough for her to wait to have dinner with me. I was not, so she went and when I got back instead of going to the dining hall (a bit of an anticlimax) I got Indian takeout and had an hour-long conversation on the phone with "Katya," a high school friend. Then CC offered to turn on Christmas music.
And here we are, eagerly anticipating our journeys home on Tuesday (ten minutes for some of us, three hours for others) and hoping for good weather to buoy us thither.
Friday, December 14, 2007
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Also, as I keep forgetting to mention, I have a photo in an upcoming art opening. The opening, run by the Office of Religious Life, was open for everyone to submit to and has the title "What is Family?"
I racked my brain for something to send in (we have a large and awesome family, and many photographs to prove it) and settled on two: one of me, Mom, and Dad on the tow path, and one of me and Subcontinent. I saw that I was allowed to submit one more and, in an impromptu mood of sticking it to the man, chose this one, which I entitled "June 30th, Paris":
Of course that was the one they chose. I can tell already what people are going to associate with me as an artist.
I racked my brain for something to send in (we have a large and awesome family, and many photographs to prove it) and settled on two: one of me, Mom, and Dad on the tow path, and one of me and Subcontinent. I saw that I was allowed to submit one more and, in an impromptu mood of sticking it to the man, chose this one, which I entitled "June 30th, Paris":
Of course that was the one they chose. I can tell already what people are going to associate with me as an artist.
I'm sure that Toboim's (sic) book will be better
Levels of Ambiguity!!!!
"Aha!" said Captain Turkey
Thus read the e-mail I got from my mother in response to an article I sent her way about Henry James and the plethora of books being written about him at the moment (and over the past couple years). To be fair to her (and to clarify that she is not, in fact, either a)insane or b)horrible at writing haikus) I should explain that line one is a reference to one of the works cited in the article, line two is a reference to one of my favorite things in the whole literary and entertainment world, and the third line is, well, another reference: once in third grade a boy a year below me spent six months working on a story consisting only of that.
I found it whimsical, her e-mail, and decided to share it.
My computer is, KNOCK ON WOOD IN A MAJOR WAY, fixed. I feel like I'm tempting fate writing even that. We'll see. Urgh.
Levels of Ambiguity!!!!
"Aha!" said Captain Turkey
Thus read the e-mail I got from my mother in response to an article I sent her way about Henry James and the plethora of books being written about him at the moment (and over the past couple years). To be fair to her (and to clarify that she is not, in fact, either a)insane or b)horrible at writing haikus) I should explain that line one is a reference to one of the works cited in the article, line two is a reference to one of my favorite things in the whole literary and entertainment world, and the third line is, well, another reference: once in third grade a boy a year below me spent six months working on a story consisting only of that.
I found it whimsical, her e-mail, and decided to share it.
My computer is, KNOCK ON WOOD IN A MAJOR WAY, fixed. I feel like I'm tempting fate writing even that. We'll see. Urgh.
Sunday, December 9, 2007
We could have danced all night.
Not really, but it was fun.
Roommate J had the brilliant idea of actually using P Rides, the door to door free campus taxi service, to get us to the formal and back. This was a stroke of genius, seeing as how it was below freezing and short dresses are in right now. I myself wore my graduation party cocktail dress, inherited from Great Aunt Classy. Roommate J, the Downstairs Chatterer, Athena (the awesomely smart girl down the hall with a taste for classics and creative writing) and I dressed in our finest and posed for photos before heading out into the night.
We ran like the possessed to our waiting car, seeing, as we did, two girls from the dorm next door making for it with fixed expressions on their otherwise shiny and giggly faces. Luckily we all managed to fit and we were off, pausing only for the driver to get out and manually yank the supposedly automatic fence into place.
The dance was, at first, underpopulated. Mostly because it was the one for all the campus leftovers but also because we arrived at eleven, which is when most Saturday night things are just getting going. Unfortunately (fortunately?) Roommate J had to be awake early this morning for her EMT class so we reserved a P Ride for midnight, giving us an hour to savor the delights of the best and the brightest bumping and grinding to music only marginally better than what we bobbed to at Damn-Big-Midwestern-University High.
The dance was held at the campus center for "cultural understanding," which, combined with the music selections, which were very danceable and catchy, left me feeling sad to not have a cultural ethnicity with which to identify. And then I remembered I do, and that I like to mock people who take the Irish thing way far, and then I didn't feel sad any more. :)
People eventually filtered in to get their groove on and it became a lively dance. We left while we were still having fun (words of wisdom of my mother that I took to heart, along with, "Don't marry into the mafia.") and our return P Ride was waiting for us outside, on time. Our driver this time around was a guy in a cowboy hat listening to the country station and speaking in a southern accent. Tee hee. Also, he had had friends several years ago who lived in our dorm room. So we chatted about the number of walls and the oddness of its shape and the coolness of having two entrances until we were in fact back at the place in question. We thanked him and retreated to our respective rooms.
Roommate J and I, fired up by the dance but sad that there had been no jazz, as it's title, "All That Jazz Cabaret" had implied, decided to dance around the room to "Sing Sing Sing," thoroughly amusing CC and RussianRoommate. We then moved on to "Danse Macabre" and felt very much like turn of the century boarding school girls, dancing in our pajamas to waltz music with empty arms and not a boy in sight.
SoccerRoommate returned from her evening (she had gone to the same dance, but even earlier than us and had left, alarmed at the scantiness of its crowd, to watch movies with friends). We congratulated ourselves at having been more active than her, for once, and everyone went to bed. The end.
Today I plan to not procrastinate and to back up my computer multiple times over, pending our potential separation tomorrow.
Oh! Also! The Dan Rather taping yesterday was very interesting, more in terms of how these things work than in terms of what was actually said. Still, it's airing this Tuesday on whatever premium cable channel he's on nowadays, and streaming online, and although I don't think I'm in any shots there will be excellent views of my college's common room. So, yay.
Not really, but it was fun.
Roommate J had the brilliant idea of actually using P Rides, the door to door free campus taxi service, to get us to the formal and back. This was a stroke of genius, seeing as how it was below freezing and short dresses are in right now. I myself wore my graduation party cocktail dress, inherited from Great Aunt Classy. Roommate J, the Downstairs Chatterer, Athena (the awesomely smart girl down the hall with a taste for classics and creative writing) and I dressed in our finest and posed for photos before heading out into the night.
We ran like the possessed to our waiting car, seeing, as we did, two girls from the dorm next door making for it with fixed expressions on their otherwise shiny and giggly faces. Luckily we all managed to fit and we were off, pausing only for the driver to get out and manually yank the supposedly automatic fence into place.
The dance was, at first, underpopulated. Mostly because it was the one for all the campus leftovers but also because we arrived at eleven, which is when most Saturday night things are just getting going. Unfortunately (fortunately?) Roommate J had to be awake early this morning for her EMT class so we reserved a P Ride for midnight, giving us an hour to savor the delights of the best and the brightest bumping and grinding to music only marginally better than what we bobbed to at Damn-Big-Midwestern-University High.
The dance was held at the campus center for "cultural understanding," which, combined with the music selections, which were very danceable and catchy, left me feeling sad to not have a cultural ethnicity with which to identify. And then I remembered I do, and that I like to mock people who take the Irish thing way far, and then I didn't feel sad any more. :)
People eventually filtered in to get their groove on and it became a lively dance. We left while we were still having fun (words of wisdom of my mother that I took to heart, along with, "Don't marry into the mafia.") and our return P Ride was waiting for us outside, on time. Our driver this time around was a guy in a cowboy hat listening to the country station and speaking in a southern accent. Tee hee. Also, he had had friends several years ago who lived in our dorm room. So we chatted about the number of walls and the oddness of its shape and the coolness of having two entrances until we were in fact back at the place in question. We thanked him and retreated to our respective rooms.
Roommate J and I, fired up by the dance but sad that there had been no jazz, as it's title, "All That Jazz Cabaret" had implied, decided to dance around the room to "Sing Sing Sing," thoroughly amusing CC and RussianRoommate. We then moved on to "Danse Macabre" and felt very much like turn of the century boarding school girls, dancing in our pajamas to waltz music with empty arms and not a boy in sight.
SoccerRoommate returned from her evening (she had gone to the same dance, but even earlier than us and had left, alarmed at the scantiness of its crowd, to watch movies with friends). We congratulated ourselves at having been more active than her, for once, and everyone went to bed. The end.
Today I plan to not procrastinate and to back up my computer multiple times over, pending our potential separation tomorrow.
Oh! Also! The Dan Rather taping yesterday was very interesting, more in terms of how these things work than in terms of what was actually said. Still, it's airing this Tuesday on whatever premium cable channel he's on nowadays, and streaming online, and although I don't think I'm in any shots there will be excellent views of my college's common room. So, yay.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
My computer once again hates me, doing the same thing it did before when I was without it for a week. The tech place is closed over the weekend, or I would have been over there this morning amidst much wailing and rending of garments. Luckily, I remembered that it is an intermittent problem, so I tried and tired and tried to get it to start and eventually it did and I'm just not going to turn it off again until Monday morning when I'll take it in to (hopefully) be fixed. Grrr. Much grrring.
There should be good news to report too. Let me think. Well, I'm going to a winter formal tonight. Supposedly a few friends will be there and I think I've convinced Roommate J to come and RussianRoommate to at least come for a little bit and take photos. This is the night for winter formals all up and down The Street, but I'm going to the alternative option for unaffiliated upperclassmen and underclassmen who are awesome, to be held at a University Building under University auspices. :)
Maybe I'll have rollicking tales from that to temper my computer doom and gloom. Maybe not.
I went to two theatrical events last night, the first being a performance by PSAT, the Princeton South Asian Theater group, which was funny, and a performance by one of the improv comedy troupes, which was hilarious, and quite smart.
I also had high tea at Master Awesome's house yesterday afternoon, but he was unfortunately being monopolized by grad students, so Roommate J did not get to monopolize him ourselves, as we had wished. I don't blame the grad students, though. Stuck over on their little hill as they are, far removed from campus, they must be hard pressed to find time to monopolize anyone.
Oh, I can't wait for winter break.
There should be good news to report too. Let me think. Well, I'm going to a winter formal tonight. Supposedly a few friends will be there and I think I've convinced Roommate J to come and RussianRoommate to at least come for a little bit and take photos. This is the night for winter formals all up and down The Street, but I'm going to the alternative option for unaffiliated upperclassmen and underclassmen who are awesome, to be held at a University Building under University auspices. :)
Maybe I'll have rollicking tales from that to temper my computer doom and gloom. Maybe not.
I went to two theatrical events last night, the first being a performance by PSAT, the Princeton South Asian Theater group, which was funny, and a performance by one of the improv comedy troupes, which was hilarious, and quite smart.
I also had high tea at Master Awesome's house yesterday afternoon, but he was unfortunately being monopolized by grad students, so Roommate J did not get to monopolize him ourselves, as we had wished. I don't blame the grad students, though. Stuck over on their little hill as they are, far removed from campus, they must be hard pressed to find time to monopolize anyone.
Oh, I can't wait for winter break.
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
Oh it's so wonderful being in a place where it snows for real. My most common refrain during the winter months in Midwestern Town was that there was no point for cold weather without snow. Here, in the Bubble, each day that it has been below 33 degrees, it has snowed.
I also thought of Midwestern Town during biology lab the other day, when a powerpoint slide had as a footnote the decal of Damn-Big-Midwestern-University. I have to admit to letting out a marginally stifled squeak, the origins of which only my lab partner, also from the Midwest, appreciated. She also commiserated on the confusing aspects of the Jersey Transit System and she and I may attempt a visit to the mall this weekend, via bus, fingers crossed.
Today I did something that I had promised myself I would not do, but I was in the mood to read (snow was coming down outside, I had hot chocolate; how could I not be?) and, looking for something I could start and finish quickly before getting to immersed in pre-break work that I would forget the plot, I picked up the novel given to me by my creative writing teacher, written by her and apparently an "erotic thriller."
The part of this story I regret is that, knowing myself as I do, I started to read it without finishing her class first. I don't regret reading it (I think it's good so far, but I'm not done yet), but I do regret reading it (and doubtless finishing it) before class this coming week, when I will have to meet her eye and not think of the book.
(Those of you who know her are SWORN TO SECRECY.)
I also thought of Midwestern Town during biology lab the other day, when a powerpoint slide had as a footnote the decal of Damn-Big-Midwestern-University. I have to admit to letting out a marginally stifled squeak, the origins of which only my lab partner, also from the Midwest, appreciated. She also commiserated on the confusing aspects of the Jersey Transit System and she and I may attempt a visit to the mall this weekend, via bus, fingers crossed.
Today I did something that I had promised myself I would not do, but I was in the mood to read (snow was coming down outside, I had hot chocolate; how could I not be?) and, looking for something I could start and finish quickly before getting to immersed in pre-break work that I would forget the plot, I picked up the novel given to me by my creative writing teacher, written by her and apparently an "erotic thriller."
The part of this story I regret is that, knowing myself as I do, I started to read it without finishing her class first. I don't regret reading it (I think it's good so far, but I'm not done yet), but I do regret reading it (and doubtless finishing it) before class this coming week, when I will have to meet her eye and not think of the book.
(Those of you who know her are SWORN TO SECRECY.)
Sunday, December 2, 2007
Happy Birthday to me! Yay! I headed over to the best bakery ever thins morning to pick up the cake that my parents had lovingly reserved for me, and it was SNOWING. Yes. We have about 1/2 centimeter of snow on the ground. I told nasty Mrs. Middle School Art teacher that my birthday was in winter and not in fall. She pulled the solstice on me. Well, take that!
New York yesterday was fabulous. I got up at eight so as to be at the TKTS line in plenty of time and I was. My seat for Rock 'n' Roll was in the fourth row(!) and my promptness gave me time to take a nice long walk around Manhattan before curtain. The woman sitting next to me said something to me to the effect of: "Aren't you a bit young to understand this music?"
Well.
I said to her, "Tom Stoppard is my favorite playwright. His pacing is pitch perfect and his characters are always believable. Also, my parents like this music, so I learned by example."
She took me more seriously after that, and even watched my stuff while I sprinted to the bathroom during intermission.
The only low point of the night came when I somehow misplaced Penn Station. It was dark and all of a sudden my Mom genes kicked in and I had no idea where I was. So I called the Ps and had them talk me down and then I asked a nice concierge how to get there. His directions were perfect and I jumped onto an extremely crowded train back down.
New York yesterday was fabulous. I got up at eight so as to be at the TKTS line in plenty of time and I was. My seat for Rock 'n' Roll was in the fourth row(!) and my promptness gave me time to take a nice long walk around Manhattan before curtain. The woman sitting next to me said something to me to the effect of: "Aren't you a bit young to understand this music?"
Well.
I said to her, "Tom Stoppard is my favorite playwright. His pacing is pitch perfect and his characters are always believable. Also, my parents like this music, so I learned by example."
She took me more seriously after that, and even watched my stuff while I sprinted to the bathroom during intermission.
The only low point of the night came when I somehow misplaced Penn Station. It was dark and all of a sudden my Mom genes kicked in and I had no idea where I was. So I called the Ps and had them talk me down and then I asked a nice concierge how to get there. His directions were perfect and I jumped onto an extremely crowded train back down.
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