today i wrote an email to a former professor, asking for a letter of recommendation. this professor is a dear person, but not particularly organized or prompt, most of the time. and busy. very busy.
i was kind of worried that he would never get back to me, but he is one of the two people who i really need to ask. so i sent the message off, and turned to writing to the other professor. and as soon as i finished asking-for-a-letter-of-support message #2, i returned to my inbox to find that only 26 minutes after i sent my initial request, professor #1 had written back! to say yes, of course he'd write the letter!
she's been really into cycling lately, and the other day she told me, "thirty miles is a walk in the park! except i've decided i have a twenty-seven mile butt."
but that if the first song is something from a terrible band like third eye blind, your life is anything but even semi-charmed?
i hate my shared office space.
[also, blogger, curse you for not letting me link in the title. because pandora is actually pretty cool. according to their site, it's "radio from the music genome project," and you can begin with a song that you like, and a playlist will be generated for you based on your initial selection. and if the song you enter at the beginning isn't totally awful, you'll usually end up with some nice stuff.]
so last night i had a ridiculous dream. but in subsequent dreams, i told people about the dream already! so i don't have to tell you about it! and my housemate was safe from special dream recounting time as well.
but just for the record, the dream was quite ridiculous.
[nephew #1 is having a tough time waking up from his nap and it's making him super whiny and tearful.]
nephews' mama: "i know you're tired." nephew #1: [whimpering, starting to cry] nephews' mama: "why don't you get elmo chair?" nephew #1: [getting louder] nephews' mama: "do you need some cheese?" nephew #1: [stops crying] "yes."
"just agree you will have a hug" is a pretty solid search term for fun with. but it really makes me wonder: is it, "just agree, [and subsequently] you will have a hug," a manipulative yet potentially very effective bargaining strategy? or is it the more last-ditch-flavored, "[if you're not going to agree to anything else,] just agree you will have a hug"?
and i haven't been going around asking. i don't like to start arguments related to politics with people to whom i am related. they've just mentioned it.
so, democrats, give 'em a chance to vote for obama, would you?
and, ms. clinton...would you please just drop out of the race already? thank you.
update: bumped from the comments, jess says:
"A high school friend of mine who is a diehard Republican asked me, a Democrat, why so many Democrats were being foolish by voting for Hilary. He and several of his fellow Republicans believe that if Obama wins the nomination, McCain (and any other Republican candidate) won't stand a chance. However, he said that if Hilary becomes the candidate, it's on. He said she's so polarizing that McCain could beat her.
it's just that my dreams, which are frequent and vivid, seem absolutely fascinating to me for the first couple of hours that i'm awake, and, as a result, i tend to impose them upon others. but, apart from the crucial 1980's cinematic history lesson (with videos!) it was probably kind of boring.
although, dude! i've been sick for the last few days, and the combination of a fever and many many hours of sleeping has resulted in some truly amazing ones!
don't worry, i've already subjected several people to hearing about several of them, so i'll just leave you with the following tiny bit of a dream and thisxkcd comic as an apology.
(but i won't promise never to do that again. because that would be a lie.)
the other day (it was daytime; i was sick and sound asleep) i dreamed that i was in my hometown again, and about to cross the highway when i saw two tiny baby giraffes! they were very, very small (like knee-high [human knees, not giraffe knees]) and very grey, because apparently in my dream, giraffes aren't brown and yellow right from the get-go. the two tiny baby giraffes were tethered together, and also attached to one of those signboards that is made of two pieces of plywood joined at the top. the signboard was advertising a turkish circus that was coming through town, and the two tiny baby giraffes had been tied together, tied to the sign, and set free in the town to shuffle about looking sad and drum up business for the circus. (leaving aside some of the more minor yet glaringly obvious problems with the business model, i would like to point out that very few [if any] people in my hometown read turkish.)
and i decided that i had to rescue the two tiny baby giraffes! but then it turned out that they could run really fast, but then brother bear was there to help me catch them, and we were going to try to get this family who owned a fruit stand near the highway adopt them, and...okay, from there it got pretty bizarre, and i was also traveling in latin america, so i'll just stop telling you about it now.
i had this dream in which i was visiting with a dear friend, and we were somewhere in the jungle where she was living. one of her other friends was there, and she and i were looking around at our friend's furniture and belongings. in the middle of the jungle, in a little clearing, she had a huge inflatable couch, and also an enormous bunk bed that was covered in inflatable flowers. it was very strange.
and then we were at some sort of campground, and then the boy who i dated in high school and i were riding mountain bikes up a big hill, and his younger cousins found a bright orange car. it was made of paper mache, i think, because when they touched the bumper, it started to spin and spin and eventually flipped upside down into a depression in the road.
and then we had to run from the police. we ran and ran (and at that point, i woke up a little bit, realized i didn't really have to run from the police [although i had been really scared up until then], went back to sleep, considered walking for a bit, but then decided that i don't get enough exercise anyway because of the soul-crushing office job, and went back to running, which had really become more of a full-body upright swim through foam resembling vanilla pudding.)
we reached a campsite, which had apparently been ours, and hid in tents, but then decided almost immediately that we had to leave, and that we had to pack and bring everything with us. (we were still running from the police at this time.) we were furiously throwing things into bags, and trying to disassemble the tent and get everything into cars as fast as we could, and there were a lot of people with us.
then i ended up going over to this huge wagon and talking to the people there. it seems that two women who had been friends for a long time had always dreamed of owning a costume business. it hadn't really seemed like it was going to work out, but then one day one woman decided that they were going to do it after all, and they would start off with a bang by duplicating the costumes of the fire dancers in labyrinth. (you know, the awesome movie from 1986 starring jennifer connelly and david bowie's pants?) okay, okay, here are the fire dancers doing "chilly down," their song from the movie:
anyway, only one of the women had stayed with the costume company, but she had this huge wooden wagon full of costumes and clothing and jewelry and hats and accessories of all kinds, including the fire dancer costumes that had started it all off. because we were all trying to get away from whatever was chasing us all (i don't think it was really the police anymore), she had decided to give away a bunch of her stuff, starting with the fire dancer costumes. i really wanted one, for some reason, but i felt bad taking it since it was such a complicated costume. (they really did look like they did in the movie.) then there was a bunch of awkwardness because i couldn't find it, and she kept telling me to look for it, but they were all gone, and we were both very confused.
then i started to pack other things there, because i thought she wanted me to, but then i wasn't sure, and she had a little boy there who seemed kind of confused and frightened, and i was worried about him but i wasn't sure what i could really do.
and then i was looking at old zip disks (thanks, brother bear!) and found a very, very old journal that i had written in college all about a mean boyfriend, and i was so sad to see how much i had cared about him and how much i had overlooked in trying to be happy with him.
and then i woke up.
ps: check out this awesome video! it's a clip from the making of the labyrinth about the fire dancers scene. remember, dudes, they were doing all this during the 80's, back when movies had to really happen and they couldn't be created in a lab. amazing.
i was in my ridiculous boss's office the other day, and i happened to look over at his desk and see that he has a box of tissues. it is bright purple. and guess what it says on the side? levitra. seriously. i'm not even joking. i couldn't make that up.
you gave us a couple of imperfect candidates, and now we're down to two, and one of them attracts LIFELONG REPUBLICANS in addition to electrifying the grassroots like never before...and the other disgusts most of the right and many of her fellow democrats and is owned by the health"care" industry.
i cannot believe that we are dealing with this again. i think it's pretty clear to most people that all votes should be counted. unfortunately, "most people" apparently does not include the los angeles county registrar of voters, dean logan, and he's going to invalidate 94,000 ballots of decline-to-state voters (voters who have not registered with one party or another [california has a primary system in which voters can't just choose any old candidate; when a person registers to vote, they have to select a party, and if a person has declined to state, they can request a democratic party ballot but not a republican party ballot]) because of a design flaw in the ballot itself (which was brought to his attention before the election.)
94,000 ballots. this is about 50% of all decline to state voter ballots in the state. 19.3% of the total ballots cast in the state of california.
He then told the crowd he disagrees with McCain on a number of issues, but that he'd given the matter a lot of thought and if he fought on all the way to the Republican convention, " I forestall the launch of a national campaign and frankly I'd be making it easier for Senator Clinton or Obama to win. Frankly, in this time of war, I simply cannot let my campaign be a part of aiding a surrender to terror." [emphasis mine.]
Romney added, "If this were only about me, I can go on. But its never been only about me. I entered this race... because I love America, and because I love America, in this time of war, I feel I now have to stand aside, for our party and for our country."
um, yeah, mitt. naturally, if a democrat won, they would totally surrender to the terrorists. it would actually be the very first thing they did, even before they got sworn in. jackass.
1. "YOUR GRANDMA DIED?" 2. "WAS IT EXPECTED?" 3. "HOW OLD WAS SHE?" 4. "WHERE DID SHE LIVE?" 5. "WERE YOU CLOSE?" 6. "IS THERE GOING TO BE A FUNERAL?" 7. "WHY DID SHE DIE?" 8. (and my anti-favorite) "WAS SHE IN A LOT OF PAIN?"
*this list may also be applicable in the case of a recently-deceased grandfather, mother, father, brother, sister, husband, wife, son, daughter, friend, beloved pet, etc.
update: excellent friends, please don't feel like this is directed at you. if we know each other, #1-#7 are acceptable questions (if we're friends, i don't think you'd ask #8.) brother bear and i get into this in the comments to this post, but this is really about people who i don't know very well and to whom i'm not particularly close getting super nosy and all up in my business when they hear about my grandma. i love you folks.
these are brand new ways! i've collected them, from several subjects, in the last 48 hours! fresh!
1. live hundreds of miles away from the object of your pursuit. 2. be crazy. (okay, this one isn't really brand new.) 3. be old enough to be her dad (and not in the "yeah-i-guess-an-eleven-year-old-could-technically-father-a-child" way. in the "dude,-people-totally-are-married-and-intentionally-procreating-at-that-age" way.) 4. lead off with a quote from javier bardem's totally insane character in "no country for old men" (imdb describes him as "an emotionless, compassionless, killing machine." ew.) 5. cheerfully mention the incurable, contagious diseases you have. 6. get real nosy about her sexual history...on the first date. which is a blind date. as in, you've never met each other before. keep asking questions and then guessing at the answers after she's clearly, directly, and politely indicated that she's done talking about it and has already changed the subject.
update!: 7. wear a ron paul sticker. 8. be involved, in any way, in the flying of a giant ron paul banner over my neighborhood today.
i was already planning to vote for barack obama tomorrow on super tuesday. but thanks for the telephone call, all the same.
i need to go outside and garden now, but i hope that you all will consider doing the same. (receiving recorded calls from scarlett johansson, gardening, and voting for obama and not h. clinton.) obama certainly isn't perfect (is anyone?) but he is a step in the right direction, he inspires people, and he's ready to try.
furthermore, i think we have a much better chance at moving away from the recreational war-starting model of foreign policy that we (and much of the rest of the world) has been suffering from over the last eight years without hillary clinton at the helm of our country. she supports the war, in a somewhat inconsistent and shape-shifting fasion (she seems pretty mooshy about most things, actually.) she's also the #1 recipient of moneys from the healthcare industry, so if you have any fragile hopes of perhaps starting to maybe think about taking steps toward possibly trying to fix our spectacular healthcare crisis, you can't vote for her.
also, i think she's pretty much totally unelectable. i think there are few living politicians who inspire the kind of visceral hatred that she does. and i'm not saying that's right, but if democrats could (take a deep breath; this might be kind of shocking) THINK STRATEGICALLY FOR ABOUT TWO SECONDS, i think they might actually realize this.
tomorrow the nephews' mama is coming to visit (HOORAY!) and so i have to decide: do i drive to pick her up from the airport (19 minutes; 12.7 miles) or do i take public transportation to the airport to meet her (53 minutes; $5.10 per person per way)?
i'm leaning toward driving, because i'm tired and i want to sleep in, but i hate the fact that i am.
