The Big, Juicy Van.

So this weekend I went down to Yale to see my brother's girlfriend's senior project, Five Women Wearing the Same Dress by Alan Ball. It was really excellent: hilarious, moving, and all that happy horseshit. Although I enjoy going to the theater, often it entails a couple of minutes of actively thinking you're enjoying something rather than sitting there enjoying it without convincing yourself. This is probably especially true of college productions. Not so with this play. Although I do have a problem with how Alan Ball writes Christians or "straights" (not sexuality-wise, but cultural-wise). This had a little bit of that. I like to call it the Kushner tendency. Still, it was a very good, "Steel Magnolias"-esque production that I loved.

The real story of the weekend, however, was the big, juicy van that I rented from Hertz.










I had requested a small, compact, cheap car to drive down to the Haven, but they gave me this weird SUV-Van hybrid at no extra cost. On the outside it looked like an SUV, but on the inside it was full-scale van. Totally weird. Despite the fact that gas-prices cooked the cost-effectiveness of this venture, it turned out well because I was able to drive my brother to the airport and help his girlfriend strike the set. Let me tell you, there's no fun but parallel parking a big, juicy van. Or driving one. The whole experience was transplendent. I loved it.

Of course, this being my first driving venture in New England, it was also my first brush with real life Massholes. I was a pretty bad driver since the whole experience had my mind somewhat removed since all I could think about was the fact that I was driving. a van. in massachusetts. alone. So yeah, I got a few honks since I didn't really care to use my mirrors ALL the time. But I figured that's the Masshole way. So anyway, in a line to pay a toll, this car comes from the side and bypasses the entire line to try to squeeze in at the front. I have NEVER seen anything like this. The person was not letting him in either, and he kept pushing forward. Eventually he gave up and just took the space behind the chicken match. I can't believe people behave like this. They just don't follow the rules of a civilized society. You'd think they'd all grown up on the Upper East Side or in a wild cave raised by a she-wolf. (Is there any difference?)

Oh, I've also gotten a Neti pot which I talk about non-stop, so there's no point in mentioning it here. If I haven't discussed it with you yet, then you've got quite the conversation coming up.

One of Those Stories You Hear About

I awoke this morning with an email from Johnny Mac telling me to go pick up my thesis readings, because I was going to be pleasantly surprised. So I did, and boy was I. I got a Summa reading from a very prestigious, brilliant, tenured faculty member, whom I will henceforth refer to as Hot Pocket (take that as a hint, but if you need more help, I'll oblige you...he's kind of a big deal). So I take it back to my room, in a state of euphoria. Then Johnny Mac emails me saying that something's amiss in Hot Pocket's reading. The comments do not match a Summa ranking. They seem more like a very low Cum reading.

So we talk about it and decide to keep hush hush because 1) Hot Pocket is notoriously weird 2)The reading and criticisms were lazy, skimpy, extremely poorly argued, typed in Courier, and handed in weeks late. As a result, I rationalized that Hot Pocket figured that the strengths were self-evident and reflected in the ranking, so he'd just point out the flaws.

Not so. A few hours later, I check my email, and Hot Pocket has emailed me with the subject "Thesis." Oof, my heart skips. Will I get a really low Cum reading, or worse a No Distinction? Only clicking my mouse will tell. It turns out I did fine. I got two Magna readings, so I'm incredibly proud, especially since Hist/Lit seems to hate my writing style. But after getting a Summa reading for several hours, a Magna is anticlimactic. And some members of the Hist/Lit faculty are really upset at Hot Pocket for not taking senior theses seriously. But who the hell cares! If you would have told me I would get Magna in the death throes of January, I would have probably slappeed your face for being so cruel, Zsa Zsa style.

On another note, this doesn't really affect my graduation at all considering I don't really come close to having Summa grades. So unless I bomb my orals, I'm sitting pretty. Not that any of this matters considering I do not have a job for next year and honors don't matter for bunk in the real world. But it's still a pretty nice thing.

Toilet Humor

In my suite, the bathroom is immediately adjacent to my room, the living room. There's no corridor, no corner to separate it. It's right there in the middle of a wall of the room, in a very conspicuous location. In fact, when the door to it is open, you can actually look at the toilet while you watch tv. The only sound barrier this bathroom has is a door with a pretty big lip on the bottom. It's safe to say that there's really no sound barrier at all. This of course presents a problem because anyone who needs to use the toilet has absolutely no privacy.

Over the last year, the subject matter of a frighteningly large percentage of the conversations between Schno and me have focused on bodily functions and other disgusting subject matter. I think it can mostly be attributed to the bathroom being in the living room. Any reason to suppress such conversations just doesn't exist. There's no reason to pretend like I don't have an intimate knowledge of the state of my roommate's digestive system.

And I must say, it makes for pretty funny conversations. Bodily functions, disgusting or not, are never dull subject matter. The only time this presents a problem is when you're at your friend's house eating with her parents and the tub of sour cream describes the contents as "so thick, so rich."

Hurricane Whitney

I'm sorry, but this is too good to pass up. According to CNN, because of the numerous awful hurricanes last season, they are retiring five names and adding five new ones. Among them, Whitney. That's right, Hurricane Whitney. Judging by the Enquirer story, this does not seem to be anything new. It appears Hurricane Whitney has already appeared, localized entirely in an Atlanta bathroom. Can you say Cat 5?



How long till this appears on Gawker?

Ojo Rojo...Oh No!

So I've got the exact same migratory infection that plagued me in Spain when my family came to visit. It starts in the nose and throat, causing much pain and congestion. Then it moves to the left ear, cutting off much of my hearing in it. Then, just when I think it might be getting better, it traverses some duct and enters my eye, ending in, you guessed it, pink eye. Or as the Spanish call it, ojo rojo. I find their terminology much more charming...it rhymes, get it? Seriously, this thing does more traveling than a band of Mexican field workers. Badumching! Honestly, there's nothing that pisses me off more than xenophobia. The dirty little secret is that so many businesses rely on illegal aliens to do the workload. But then again, they are brown, and don't we have enough of that riff-raff in our country? That's pretty much the only reasoning I can see behind the other side's argument. Oh, and *gasp* they don't speak English. God forbid we turn into a bilingual country. Besides, isn't it the American way to neglect English and just have your kids assimilate. Honestly, who has ever had the time to learn a non-phonetic language with far more exceptions than rules. That was a sidebar.

In other news, there is no other news. I've spent all my time here failing my course in convalescence and struggling to write papers for every course I'm taking. Each one has a paper due this week. Is that not obscene?

Next week is Passover. I won't be Sedering in Jersey this year since Franklin Delano Cashew will not be going home. Instead, we will be enjoying the lovely food at Hillel...waaay better than dining hall grub.

My birthday's next week, too. On Good Friday. I think I'm hitting up the Cantab for some Little Joe Cook action. I think the blasphemy could get a little out of control. Good Friday and birthdays are not a good combination. I can only imagine the perverse sacrilege my mind will concoct.