antm

Today one of my students told me I should go on America's Next Top Model. It felt awesome.

I thanked her and laughed and told her I would rather use my brain.

what a bitch

Aww shucks, my little brother's girlfriend just dumped him spectacularly, one week before they are to go to prom together, a month before they will be working side-by-side at the same summer camp, and a semester before he joins her at SF state.

What the hell, right?

May music

I have my first major "find" on the inherited ipod. It didn't come from me shuffling, I hate to have to confess to that, but rather from my father wheeling through and pointing out what songs he knew. He is a huge blue-grass fan, and he forced me to listen to Nickel Creek's Smoothie Song on the Austin City Limits Music Festival 2003 album. It's an amazing fiddle song. I pretended to be bored, but when he went home, I lay on my drool-soaked strep pillow and listened on repeat for half an hour. Finally I moved on the the rest of the album, which is pretty awesome, too. My second favorite song is Different Light by Steve Winwood. And then Melancholy Love by Abra Moore. She is kinda Norah Jones-ish.

Also, BJ burned me Amy Winehouse's latest. Gosh, I just love her big ol' head. I mean voice.

More also, Benja found this gem online: Little Potato. We used to listen and sing about that little potato that lives underground fucking ALL THE TIME. It was his favorite song when he was like five years old. It's a sweet, darling song that actually still sounds good fifteen years later.

happy fifth of mayo

I HAVE BEEN AWAY!!

Not actually AWAY away, I've been in Los Angeles for the past week, but the most things happened in the past eight days than . . . most eight day periods.

First there was the new subletter calling and telling me he took another place, and could you please rip up the security deposit and rent checks.

Then there was me calling back informing him that no, his check was already deposited in the bank because the rent agreement starts in TWO DAYS.

Then there was some rapid Craigslisting and phone calling and finding a Better! boy to move into our apartment. My new roommate is awesome. I'm going to call him Mike, because that's his name. Even though I keep wanting to call him Matt. He is tall and skinny and came with some fish and a turtle and today we went out to eat at Versailles. He is already a TOP NOTCH roommate because he offered to chip in for kitchen sponges and soap and called me from Ralphs to ask if I wanted to eat tortellini for dinner and showed us how we could replace the deadbolt on our front door so people can't get in with their credit cards. Stephanie's contribution to household harmony was posting a sign on the thermostat telling us not to leave the heat on.

After that, I got strep throat. So you can imagine that I did not work on my thesis much. Instead, I missed two days of school and took four naps on each day. I also went to the doctor and when she pulled out the giant Q-tip to scrape the back of my throat, I started crying, so she said I didn't have to take the test. I have a severe phobia of throwing up, which is somehow related to the swab test that makes you gag. But I got drugs anyways. I got a big 'ole container of pink penicillin. And a squirty syringe. I asked for the kid kind because I am a baby like that, I can't swallow big pills. But I forgot that it's amoxicillin that tastes like bubblegum and penicillin that tastes like poison, so I've been regretting my decision and thinking maybe I shouldn't have been such a pussy.

And actually at the same time as all this drama, we cancelled cable (YAY!!!) which made our internet go out for a few days. Thank God I have this darling little laptop, so that I could mooch wireless off of my neighbor "Matt" when I sat at the dining room table just so. Thanks Matt! Maybe one day we'll meet! Maybe I'll find out that's not actually your name, just the name of your internet network!

In case you are wondering, during my sick period I swallowed approximately thirty five extra-strength Tylenol and only choked on one.

Just now I went out for Cinco de Mayo with BJ, my Friend Who Takes Me To Really Cool Bars As If I Were His Girlfriend But I'm Not. We found an Italian restaurant that had a mariachi band and confetti and chips and salsa. Or maybe "Antonio's" is a Mexican name. In any case, we had fun trying to talk above the guitara / violin / trumpet / singer / loudgroupofgirlsnexttous. And we had drinks! BJ had two very strong Margaritas and was very slurry. I had a virgin pina-colada (antibiotics) which was the best pina-colada I have ever had outside of Mexico or my aunt Naomi's wedding. Then we did poppers, not the drugs, but those little plastic bottles where you pull the string and it POPS! and confetti flies out. Then we went back to his house and I made a long list of iTunes that he has to iBurn me.

Tomorrow I will work on my thesis in earnest for it is due in FIFTEEN DAYS. (I will also work on the tub of Ben and Jerry's in the freezer so that new roommate Mike has room to put his frozen goods. I am so considerate that way.)

orange bottles / silver cans

This girl is my new obsession. She is helping me become promiscuous.

I totally owe her.

I'm in bed at eight pm

I've been re-listening to Lauryn Hill's Miseducation for a week now, and I've realized it's one of the best albums, ever. From start to finish, it's fucking awesome. Like, every song is awesome. Especially That Thing, in which I can rap the first stanza along with Lauryn. (Poorly.)

So I thought I would write a little list of other albums that rock out on every single track. These are the CDs that stay in my CD carrying case permanently, because they never start sucking. In no particular order:

• The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill
• Revolver by The Beatles
• Kanye's College Dropout
• Shrift - Lost in a Moment
• Zero Seven - When It Falls (hard to choose just one album, but this is the one I tend to put on repeat)
• The Best of the Ella Fitzgerald Gershowin Songbook
• Celtic Voice, one of those "mood" CDs that you find at Target with a pretty cover, but this one is so freaking soothing and pretty and makes me wish I lived in a castle shrouded with fog. With no electricity. And a horse and canoe as my only means of transportation.
  
• Justin Timberlake Justified
• Wicked
  
• Dave Matthews Band Busted Stuff (I've actually worn my way through two of these albums and have to get another copy. No one I know has or has heard of this album, even though it got to number one on Billboard.)
• My own personal Erykah Badu mix CD

That's it for now until I find something fab on my new ipod.

sometimes it's uncomfortable how open we are

My mother climbs into the backseat of my brother's CLK Mercedes coup and remarks, "It's so small back here, how do people have sex in cars anymore?"