it's back

The 365 Project: Senior Edition commenced today. Now you can follow it religiously, Mom!

Did I mention that I'm going to the BEACH this weekend?

back in chapel hill

Everything is a blur now, and it all feels so surreal: moving into a house, seeing beloved friends, biking around town, getting ready for classes... classes, right. That's what I'm here for. I'd almost forgotten. They commence tomorrow, as does the 365 Project, Lord willing. I am incredibly distracted and mostly useless for conversation, although I've been having surprisingly good ones lately.

"Middlemarch" was unbelievably good, but now I'm hungry for something else to read. And not an abnormal psychology textbook.

House meeting in 10! A better entry maybe later, but then again, maybe not. I'm going to the BEACH this weekend with the Pratts and I am so excited. I've been talking about it for months.

other things

The Great American Roadtrip was a success and passed surprisingly quickly. Thanks to the generosity of a friend and family (Liz, Uncle Joe & Aunt Suzanne), Safeway, 21 burned CDs and good company, it was a swift and pleasant trip. Kansas had an alien beauty and we were mesmerized by the enormous wind turbines, tilling the air as Emiliana Torrini sang "Gun." Prairie Dog Town was horrible and depressing. Kelsey wore fleece pants on a 95-degree day and then complained about being hot. Guion's hair was surreptitiously braided while he was distracted. Tennessee had a very welcome beauty, as it began to look like home. And then we got off 77 and drove into Davidson, with the windows down and "Wake Up" blaring, guiding us home in our own personal parade.

A few photos are up on Facebook.

Speaking of photos: Jonathan, get excited, because the 365 Project is coming back on Aug. 25! Jonathan and my mom are the only ones who will care, but it's happening again, with a twist: 365: The Senior Edition. First day of senior year to the first day of life as a graduate. It's going to be very weird.

It is lovely to be home. Kelsey and I spent yesterday packing for school and while it took us nearly the entire day, I feel fabulous about being all ready to spring into the car and jet back to Chapel Hill. Returning to my beloved university with an inherited sense of superiority; to the brick walks and familiar classrooms; to delightful, much-missed friends; to a charming house that I get to call my own; to wearing obnoxious stickers at Fall Fest; to looking down on freshmen at Lenoir and thinking, "How cute they are,"; to IV; to my jobs; to the farmers' market; to Davis Library. Oh, Davis, I've missed you most of all!

Almost finished with "Middlemarch," my great summer project. About 90 pages to go.

Going to buy last-minute house things with Dad now. Will write more comprehensive things later.

dreamgirls

Working downtown makes you realize certain things about people, guiding you toward forming swifter assumptions, I think. For example, interns are easy to spot. They always look fresh, a little nervous, talking too quickly with their hands. Sassy young restaurant workers make me irritated. Businessmen check you out but pretend like they're not. Bus drivers might all be a little crazy and like to stop right on top of the crosswalk. Parallel parking will make you sweat. Don't make eye contact with homeless people unless you want to be followed across the street and asked an assortment of questions.

One more story of an encounter with homelessness. If you read this at all regularly, you may recall a post back in June about an unsettling encounter I had with a homeless woman. A few weeks ago, I passed a man crumpled up beneath a lamppost, holding a cardboard sign. I made eye contact with him. His sign said, "HUNGRY PLEASE HELP." All I had in my bag was my tupperware dinner (which I couldn't really give him, since the tupperware belonged to my landlord) and a square of Ghiradelli dark chocolate. Remembering the guilt I felt last time, I stopped and pulled out the chocolate and handed it to him with a smile. He took it from me, looked me in the eye and then scowled. And then he threw it in the gutter.

I was so bewildered I didn't know what to do, so I kept on walking. But what I really wanted to do was go fish my chocolate out of the gutter and yell at him. "Beggars can't be choosers, homeless guy! I want my chocolate back!" And now I'm all confused. Granted, a bit of chocolate isn't a huge act of charity, but it really was all I could give him. (And it was GHIRADELLI dark chocolate! Come on.) Instead, his completely disdainful response has only further hardened me to giving anything to panhandlers. I did give a slightly addled woman a dollar last week (she asked me if I had "98 cents"), quite happily, but again, not immense generosity here. What am I supposed to do when confronted directly on the street? It's still the same question I was asking before and now I feel even more distant from an answer. I know I can't make one ungrateful man a general rule for all homeless people, but now I'm just confused.

I find all the best blogs from Grace. I don't know where SHE finds them, but somehow she does, and they're just marvelous. Two that got me really excited tonight: Fresh 365, which makes me super-excited about cooking at McCauley in the fall, and Hearblack, which just makes me really, really want a great camera so I can catch light. When Jackie and I work the same nights, we also trade links with each other. Tonight, she told me about the Cats That Look Like Hitler and I shared Ugliest Tattoos with her (the Patrick Swayze centaur might be my all-time favorite).

Only four more days of work! The Peruvian adventurer comes on Monday and my dear Irish musician comes on Tuesday! I'm so excited about Kelsey and Guion that I can hardly sleep. Angela sent me a big-type, all-caps e-mail about it this morning that concluded, "GUION AND KELSEY WILL BE THERE SOON AND IT WILL BE LIKE DREAMGIRLS!!!"

Exactly.

quickly

Kelsey has been in Peru too long. She just sent me an e-mail asking if there were "any bookstores or pharmacies in Colorado" she could go to. No, sorry, Kels. It's really weird, but Coloradans seem to exist without them.

Hiking tomorrow at Alderfer/Three Sisters park with Sonya and possibly Reid, David and Steven. Kinda wish Kelsey and Grace could be with me, because it would be very appropriate.

This is all I have to say right now. I'm clipping through "Middlemarch" at a pleasant pace. Hit page 640 this afternoon before work. Just about 250 more to go! It's so nice to read big books without any idea what's going to happen. So many modern novels are too predictable. Not Eliot. I've also grown increasingly fond of Dorothea; I think she's a wonderful creation and far more complex than Rosamond or Celia. I believe Eliot's talent is most well-displayed in her.

It's fun, having Mondays be your Fridays. It really warps your sense of weeks, but I like it. I believe it accelerates time.

ONE WEEK until Kelsey and EIGHT DAYS until Guion!

As excited as I am to see them, I am going to miss this place. I'm already trying to figure out a way to get back here.

the stationery life

The three of us at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, during "half-time," as Jonathan said

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Jonathan was here for the past three days and I can't say just how lovely it was to have him here. Every day was perfect. We laughed so much. We went to the grocery store; fell in love with downtown Boulder; had the utterly perfect, classic picnic (brie, gouda, grapes, dark chocolate, freshly baked bread and "wine"); saw "Much Ado About Nothing" and barely escaped the rain; made a pizza and a sour-cream chocolate cake with chocolate satin icing; watched MTV with Claire; had many long, happy chats on the couch with Kitteh. I'd forgotten how sincerely wonderful it is to have someone around without having to explain the context for every story and reference. I've missed good, old friends and he was exactly the respite I needed. I was sad to see him go, but glad that he was off to love on the Barge Train in the District before they headed back to Chapel Hill.

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Holden Thorp and the love child of Nicolas Cage and Tom Green also made an appearance in "Much Ado About Nothing."

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Can I name a child Esme? Or at least an Australian Shepherd?

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I want to read so many BOOKS! I cannot read enough! Boulder must have the most independent bookstores within the smallest space in America and it was driving me mad. I was speechless with distraction. Jonathan and Sonya had to pry me away from the stacks. Top of my list for fall: "Lamb," by Christopher Moore, and "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close," by Jonathan Safran Foer, and "The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao," by Junot Diaz.

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I'm ticked with Sen. John McCain from Arizona. Remember him? Because of his poor decision-making skills, we're going to have to hear about the former Gov. Sarah Palin for the REST OF OUR LIVES. That's such a bummer. We will hear every crazy and nonsensical thing she says from here forward. Because that's her genius; she will not vanish, even though she has no message to give us.

Slate, regarding of her resignation speech, said it perfectly: "Watch it as many times as you like; you still come away feeling you've been treated to a cozy chat with the Mad Hatter. The media are bad. Those ethics complaints are expensive. Alaska was a great idea. She is not a dead fish. Put it all together and what do you get? A born fighter who has given us no sense whatsoever of what she's fighting for."

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Jonathan has told me to start my 365 project again--but with a twist. Start with the first day of our senior year, Aug. 25, 2009, and finish once graduation is over and "adulthood" has commenced, Aug. 25, 2010. I think I'm going to do it. Obnoxious? Dumb? He says he misses it. If Jonathan likes it, it's worth doing again. So, friends, assemble!
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Thumbs down on wearing a tiara on your wedding day. This is not prom.
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Jonathan and I have unequivocally decided that this is the year of GOYA: Get Off Your Ass. Following GOYA, I've decided to buy a used copy of "The Joy of Cooking" and try to make at least one recipe a week. And if not from that book, at least make something new every week. (This is also a subtle plan to make Guion love me more.)
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CAN NO ONE IN THE BLOGOSPHERE SPELL "STATIONERY" PROPERLY? Gosh, cute blogging women, you do NOT love "letterpress stationary." Letterpress is only ever stationary, unless you're actually chucking it at someone or have given it wings.
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How wonderful: 100 salads for summer. Add this to list of new recipes and things to try.
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Yesterday my Uncle Steve, my dad's eldest brother, came to visit and we took a long drive up in the mountains to see the mining ghost towns beyond Black Hawk and Central City. I really enjoyed our time together. Even though the last time I talked to him or even saw him was probably 10 years ago, I kept feeling this sense of the undeniable connection of family. We had this bond because we were related and as he talked, I saw my father in his lips, my aunt in his eyes, my grandmother in his cheekbones. And I was happy, to be with family again.
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Grace has a new blog and it is much cooler than mine.
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The Audacity of Hops! I'm a little dismayed that Obama's beer of choice is Bud Light.
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My heart is so happy in Chapel Hill and Davidson and I can't wait to return to those two places.

curiosity

Things I have learned today:

- Making challah is fun
- North Korea thinks Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton looks like a "schoolgirl." Or a pensioner going shopping.
- The famous Spanish Civil War photograph of the soldier being killed may have been faked
- "Middlemarch" continues to be delightful
- I like fresh mango
- I miss my sisters
- Bluebell ice cream is divine (thanks for having a birthday, Mark!)
- I don't want to read another story about Honduras; I'm sick of hearing about "ousted President Manuel Zelaya"
- New Jersey rabbis get busted for trafficking kidneys on the black market. Why is this so funny?
- Living without power for two days makes you more introspective. And feel like Laura Ingalls Wilder.
- I like wearing a bun
- There's nothing better than an e-mail from Guion to brighten your inbox
- Foil yogurt lids may occasionally explode all over your face and shirt
- I think Obama's idea of tying teachers' pay to student performance is a bad idea
- The new nightgown from Anthropologie was totally worth it
- Sometimes people like to cling to untruth and total ignorance. Like Rush Limbaugh, who still insists that Obama is not a U.S. citizen.
- Earl Grey tea with milk is a wonderful thing
- Hiking might be the best form of exercise
- The days pass quickly when you have things to fill them with