I'm supposed to be writing my paper, so I'll be (sort of) brief. I played my first game of league handball yesterday! It was against Saint Anthony's Athletic Club, and I was looking forward to playing against Andy Nett. Unfortunately, he switched to doubles sort of last minute, so I played a guy named JJ instead. I won 21-7, 21-20. He served first in the second half and I struggled a bit to adjust. He was up 20-14 by the time I finally figured out a good left-handed return for his lob z-serve. I made some pretty good gets to prevent him from winning, and he was getting pretty worn out by the end. He hit almost exclusively deep pass shots, so that took some adjustment as well. Instead of running up to cover the front for kill shots like I usually do, the better strategy was to hang out right behind him so I could get to either side after he hit the inevitable pass. When we finished I asked if anyone was going to stick around, and everyone declined. Andy said he'd go to the university on Thursday, though. So I get to play him tomorrow.
Another thing that happened yesterday was that I ate a muffin. A chocolate muffin, to be precise. It was the equivalent of putting some oil on a hill in that it created a disastrous slipper slope. The result of which is that I might be dead by the end of today. You see, at some point between yesterday and today my willpower disappeared. I woke up around 5:00 today and revised a piece of writing for my mom. I'll talk about that some other time. I also made breakfast. I had a bit of leftover pancake, a bowl of cereal, and a banana. A bit later, lunch happened. It was amazing. I ate two full lunches consisting of salad, hummus and pita bread, an Indian chicken dish, an Indian vegetarian dish, rice, and dessert. I went through the line twice. Dessert the first time was triple chocolate cheesecake. The second time, carrot cake. I was helpless. A mere 2-3 hours later I was sitting in the cafe working on my civil procedure group project with a partner when the man from behind the counter set out the first round of food. I immediately grabbed a salad with turkey and bacon on top. Then I went back up and grabbed another salad (this one with fruit and walnuts) and a gluten-free turkey sandwich. That was the first round. The second round I grabbed a banana, a container of chopped pineapple, a raspberry and white chip muffin, and an apple fritter.
I found this comic a while back, and only just looked at it again recently. I thought this one was funny:
http://www.lukesurl.com/archives/comic/646-snake-eyes
Most of the comics are just puns. Right up Sarah S's alley, but not usually my cup of tea. Alright, time to write. Thanks for reading!
October 30, 2013
October 28, 2013
I'm so full! OR Embrace the Awkwardness!
The lecture had something to do with Syrian judicial defectors to Turkey and their attempts to set up a court system in liberated sections of Syria. All I knew was that it advertised lots of food. Specifically. As in "Topic sentence. Lots of food." It was not wrong. The advantage to being near the end of the line in a situation like this is that you know you don't have to feel guilty piling the plate as high as you can with as much as it can hold. It was catered by a place called Afro Deli, and the components were pita bread/naan/something, salad, seasoned lamb chunks, and a curried chicken with potatoes, topped with gyro sauce and a green curry sauce. Amazing. And I sort of learned about sort of Syria. But I was so focused on my delicious food I missed a large portion of his speech. The man who was speaking asked to remain anonymous because he might be targeted if his identity was revealed. He was skyped in from Turkey, where he spends much of his time now that he's defected. It was obvious he couldn't really speak English and was just reading off a paper in front of him, painstakingly sounding out word by word. But I did listen after he finished and opened the floor to questions, which was the majority of the time anyway, since his reading only took ten minutes.
One of the questions asked had to do with what he thought of the current efforts to accomplish peace through negotiations and the democratic process. He said he supports the democratic process and is happy the west helped end chemical weapons, but wonders what the West will do about the thousands dead and the crimes being committed every day. If you read my post a bit ago about Malalai Joya, she was adamant we leave Afghanistan alone to manage their own problems. But this guy seemed to be asking for us to do more, so even with my zero understanding of the situation, it seems clear that the decision about whether or not to get involved is basically impossible.
My day Saturday was quite a series of events:
I woke up at 6:30, ate a bowl of oatmeal and two eggs, and left for power pump class a bit before 7:30. John offered me some sort of liquid he said was "not confirmed as illegal" which I turned down. Power pump class started. Every person got a bar, some weights to put on their bar, a step-up box thing, and an exercise mat. The music started, and the person started giving instructions through her microphone. We did a bunch of reps to music of squats, cleans, lunges, bench, bicep curls, overhead press, pushups, clean and press, abs, dips, tricep extensions, flys, and rows. I just put on whatever weight Dane (another handball player with arms more my size than John's (whose are at least twice my size)) put on, which turned out to be fine until we got to biceps and he put on a good amount of weight. I copied him, and then the music started up again and I quickly realized there was no way I could do this for any length of time. I had to stop a bit early in the first set. Then we went through another set. And part of a third. I looked over to see Dane jerking his back into his motion and I just thought "ah, well that explains why this was such a bad idea." Not only are my biceps not that strong to begin with, but he wasn't sticking to proper form to begin with. Oddly, what hurt the worst were my forearms from trying to get the motion started. So that was uncomfortable, but other than that it was a nice little workout.
The way each set is structured is:
two reps of the motion is slow-motion
a few reps of the motion with a slow start and quick finish (three counts to one count)
a bunch of reps of one rep per count
a few reps with a modified motion
a few cool-down reps
I liked it because it keeps things interesting and activates your muscles a bit differently throughout the set, but it was sort of hard to concentrate on being efficient while also trying to figure out exactly what I was supposed to be doing. For instance, I had never even done a clean and press before, so trying to figure that out while trying to keep time and then keep track of what pace I was supposed to be going was pretty tricky. I dominated at lunges though. That was awesome.
After that we transitioned smoothly into handball, where everyone was pretty lethargic. Except me of course. A lot of times I feel like I actually have too much energy in the handball court. I overrun my shots and get ahead of myself, but lifting beforehand put me exactly into the right pace of play from the beginning. I probably would have gotten tired faster than usual, but that didn't wind up being a factor on this particular day, so I was pleased with the result overall. I played a game of cutthroat, a game of doubles, a game of singles, and then Kristina's mom showed up and I played doubles with her against Kristina and Jessica. Just me and all the ladies. And we were playing with the white ball, which is lighter than usual, so I got to hit lots of show-off trick shots including a couple between-the-legs shots while facing the front wall, (so I hit them on the first bounce with very little reaction time) which is something I've only done a couple times before in total. So that was pretty cool. And now Kristina's mom is undefeated at handball!
Then I played doubles with some old guys, then one on two against some old guys. They joked that I should spot them fifteen points. They only scored three, so I guess I could have done that after all. It was sort of awkward, because I wanted to practice the things I need to work on, but I felt a bit bad about demolishing them with hard shots they won't face in their normal games. They told me not to go easy on them, though, so I did as my alternate title for this post suggests and embraced the awkwardness of beating up on the elderly. After that people were pretty much done. Either tired, old, or just sick of handball for the day. I probably could have stayed and played some games of questionable quality, but I didn't have anything against leaving.
Kristina was supposed to be my ride home, but she was feeling sort of awful because her boyfriend was off partying the whole weekend with his high school friends and she was depressed for some reasons I won't go into. So I said I'd hang out with her if she wanted, and we had lunch with her mom before heading over to John's parents' house. Which is close to a mansion. It has a pool, a hot tub, and a dock on a lake/pond. Kristina moped until the three of us (John, Dane, and I) ganged up on her in a desperate effort to cheer her up. We made every offer we could think of and she finally acquiesced to pizza, ping pong, and alcohol. So we had a ping pong tournament. John threatened that he was pretty good, so I was worried my rustiness might result in a loss, but he lost to Kristina in the first round. I beat Dane, which was a good warmup, and then I triumphed over Kristina because I'm too competitive to let the sad person we were trying to cheer up win. By the end I was playing fairly decently (at least compared to how I started), so that was fun. Then they made the mistake of trying to legalize shots off the ceiling/wall. That happens to be something I've practiced, since the ping pong table I grew up on was in a rather closed-in basement. That legalization was short-lived once I started hitting shots that flew perpendicularly across the table next to the net.
Kristina's mom finished whatever errands she was doing (putting new tires on a car?) and asked to meet Kristina at Kristina's house, so we went there. And there I was, hanging out with this mom of this girl I don't even really know. Luckily her mom is pretty cool, but it was still one of those "I guess I just embrace the awkwardness" situations. Also, none of us could think of anything to do. I mean, I looked up things to do in Minneapolis, and still nothing really popped out as a real option. I guess this is a problem wherever you are. It isn't just Iowa! That's sort of a relief. I mean, there are activities, of course, but they require some setup or advance planning. We weren't in a position where we could just go to a museum for instance. I think the reason people say big cities are more interesting than small towns is that they drink alcohol or like to go dancing/clubbing. Because sure, there's probably a better scene for that here, but the movie theaters show the same movies, the theater has the same touring shows (I assume; all I know is that the current one is about a deaf boy growing up and then realizing there is a whole deaf community, which didn't quite make me want to spend money to see it), and the other stuff is pretty similar too. We briefly entertained the idea of bowling, but as Jim Gaffigan says, there are two people who go bowling: the people who really like bowling (aka weirdos), and the people who are like "wouldn't it be hilarious if we went bowling?" We didn't quite fall into either category. Although another of his jokes is that it's a last resort; once you've done everything else, you go bowling. But I guess we just weren't that desperate. Kristina decided to rent a movie. Then on our way to get a movie, Jessica invited Kristina to a Halloween party. She declined, but I brought up the fact that her mom was probably going to go to bed anyway (a fact she had mentioned briefly as we were leaving), so she should go if she wanted. She asked if I would go. I said I would if she wanted to drink, since they'd probably need a driver. So there I was: Ryan Pesch: partygoer.
At least we weren't the only people without costumes. I sat and watched television, which at first was hockey (no clue what's going on, but the team from my state beat the team from the other state, so yay?), but then switched to baseball, which was actually interesting because it was one of the 4-7 watchable baseball games on television in a given year (Get it? Only the world series is watchable. I'm hilarious.) People seemed to be cheering for Boston, but I know people who are die-hard Cardinals fans so I was secretly rooting for them. Boston tied it at 4-4 in the eighth inning, and things were looking pretty intense. Then it ended in one of the more controversial ways I've ever seen a baseball game end (which, granted, isn't particularly impressive considering my weak resume of baseball game-endings). A guy hit the baseball hard at the infield. The second-baseman made an amazing play on the ball. He threw the guy out at home, tagged by the catcher, who then tried for the double play at third. The throw was terrible, though, and the guy sliding into third disrupted things so the baseman didn't make the play. The ball went past. The outfielder grabbed it. The runner got up and started toward home. The third baseman (also on the ground because he attempted to dive for the ball just previously) lifted his legs, tripping the runner. The umpire made a gesture. The runner stumbled his way toward home plate and was not a very fast guy to begin with. The outfielder made an excellent throw and the runner was tagged out at the plate and looked quite foolish. He hung his head and looked very sad. The umpire gestured he was safe. The Boston team was very unhappy. The crowd was very happy. I was very confused. The third baseman was called for obstruction, which I can sort of see, because the way he raised his legs probably isn't the manner one would raise their legs for any purpose other than tripping the runner. If he had been getting up, for example, his legs would have been straight out behind him for pushing him off the ground. But it was a pretty strange way to end the game nonetheless. Plus St. Louis won, so bonus!
Then I spend four hours looking at a wall (embracing the awkwardness?). Or at drunk people carving penises into pumpkins (briefly). Or at the reaction of the guy responsible for the party when he was told they were throwing the pumpkin goop they had scooped out the pumpkins over the edge of the seven-story roof. Or at the guy who brought an ACTUAL SWORD as part of his costume. Apparently he knows people involved in costume departments for films? Anyway, a questionable decision for a drinking occasion. Luckily nothing terrible happened (that I know of). At one point I aided batman in his escape from a creepy guy in a white suit who was chasing him by opening a locked door from the inside and letting him in. On a side note, if you are a girl looking for a halloween costume, apparently the only option open to you is "flapper from the Great Gatsby movie." So I'm sorry if you thought you had any other options. Because you don't. Seven out of eight girls observed at this party were flappers. And the eighth might have been, but she was sort of overweight and her makeup was scary, so I couldn't really make that judgment in good faith. Also, three guys showed up in suits. Luckily, even though I'm sure they all thought they were Gatsby, that's a pretty standard go-to for guys. One audibled to Bruce Wayne and the other to James Bond. See? Easy fix. Halloween is basically cheating for guys. Just put on a suit and voila, you're anyone you want to be!
Kristina didn't drink for a decent part of the night, at which point I considered bailing. We were only four miles from my apartment, so it was a viable option. Then I realized I didn't have my keys. So I would have to go to Kristina's anyway to retrieve those, which turned out fine because she eventually did drink (when she had time to do eight shots is beyond me), and it was good they had a designated driver. So I got them back to Kristina's and had to make the call between crashing there or getting home. I decided to forge my own way, since I wasn't quite exhausted and I had recently talked to Sarah S about her running, putting me in the mood to do some of my own. So I tightened the straps on my backpack as tight as they would go and set off. I made it four miles at a pretty steady pace, then alternated between walking and jogging for the last couple miles after my knees started hurting a bit. I was worried they might be sore, but it turns out they are not. My biceps, on the other hand, are in agony. I can't even straighten my arms without them hurting. Argh.
I went shopping yesterday. That's about all I did yesterday, actually. I made sure I got extra quarters from the cashier, which gave me exactly the right amount to do laundry! I like it when things work out that way. (She could only give out a maximum of a dollar's worth, but my groceries had a total ending in an amount that resulted in an additional three, so it turned out perfectly.) I wrote some more emotional poetry trying to figure out my own brain. It's not even really poetry half the time. I'm just journaling and then it becomes stanzas. Maybe with extensive editing? I don't know. I did like one thing I wrote, but I left it at my apartment, so I can't include it here right now. But here's one that has Pandora's song just now to blame:
She can't sing half as well as Elton John
But I can't skip it because it's "Your Song"
Which used to be an Our Song
And the feeling lingers pleasantly
Suspending momentarily
That disbelief which is reality
And oscillates radically, alternately,
With the fact that, as she is no Elton
We are not an us.
Perhaps this is an appropriate song
Her bastardization of his beauty
Can be a "anti-our" a "not-us" song.
As she kicks off the moss,
I can feel a faint buzzing
As through the dead matter landed
On an electric fence,
A disconcerting echo of its deadly force
Faintly flowing through my body
With a vague dissatisfaction.
My group for my next project (same group, different assignment) met just before this in the cafe we usually use. One time two weeks ago the guy set out free expired sandwiches. I took two. They both said gluten-free, and I was like "free food and it's healthy? Could life be any more perfect?" Yes, yes it could. You know what a major component of bread is? Apparently GLUTEN! That stuff was gross. The first sandwich I was like "man, this is dry; it's probably because it's a bit old." And I ate it anyway because I was hungry. For the second I was hungry after 5:00, so I just picked the ingredients off the bread and ate them. I saved the bread though, because I'm a thrifty guy these days (cheapskate). I later used the bread on either side of an egg sandwich. Ruined the whole sandwich! This time, though, the guy put out baked goods. I grabbed the healthiest-looking thing, which turned out to be a sugary raspberry/blueberry thing. A bit stale, but way more dessert-y than anything I've had recently, so it was practically decadent.
Our group adjourned and Greg asked me about Magic: the Gathering. He said he had played with Ian (a fellow section-mate) this weekend with one of his old decks and gotten trounced. I said I played pretty seriously, a fact he didn't quite get until we had talked for a half-hour and things became a bit more apparent.
This reminds me of an interesting point: It turns out I can pass for just about any sort of person. I talked with John's dad about the construction they were doing on their house intelligently (they are scraping paint and refinishing some stuff), talking about my parents' remodel work. I talked nerdy with John and Greg about Magic. I talked with a different John about Science Fiction books. I talked with Kristina about relationships. I talked with some guys about baseball (I can pass if I have to...). I talked with handball people about law school. I talked with Kristina's mom about my diet and how I decided on my eating habits. I talked with John about lifting weights. I talked philosophy in torts today (he posited a hypothetical scenario based on the trolley problem from philosophy). I talk science when people talk about bias. I talked big picture with drunk people who only wanted to hear sweeping reassurances. And none of it really feels real. I feel like I can pass any social conversation/test, but I still end each of them walking away and rolling my eyes at the waste of time it felt like.
Anyway, Torts was fun. The professor seemed impressed, but that was probably because I don't talk much, so he wasn't expecting me to say something smart... We're talking about it more tomorrow, but I'm not that eager for it, since everyone will have looked up the stuff I talked about by then and I won't be unique anymore.
One of the questions asked had to do with what he thought of the current efforts to accomplish peace through negotiations and the democratic process. He said he supports the democratic process and is happy the west helped end chemical weapons, but wonders what the West will do about the thousands dead and the crimes being committed every day. If you read my post a bit ago about Malalai Joya, she was adamant we leave Afghanistan alone to manage their own problems. But this guy seemed to be asking for us to do more, so even with my zero understanding of the situation, it seems clear that the decision about whether or not to get involved is basically impossible.
My day Saturday was quite a series of events:
I woke up at 6:30, ate a bowl of oatmeal and two eggs, and left for power pump class a bit before 7:30. John offered me some sort of liquid he said was "not confirmed as illegal" which I turned down. Power pump class started. Every person got a bar, some weights to put on their bar, a step-up box thing, and an exercise mat. The music started, and the person started giving instructions through her microphone. We did a bunch of reps to music of squats, cleans, lunges, bench, bicep curls, overhead press, pushups, clean and press, abs, dips, tricep extensions, flys, and rows. I just put on whatever weight Dane (another handball player with arms more my size than John's (whose are at least twice my size)) put on, which turned out to be fine until we got to biceps and he put on a good amount of weight. I copied him, and then the music started up again and I quickly realized there was no way I could do this for any length of time. I had to stop a bit early in the first set. Then we went through another set. And part of a third. I looked over to see Dane jerking his back into his motion and I just thought "ah, well that explains why this was such a bad idea." Not only are my biceps not that strong to begin with, but he wasn't sticking to proper form to begin with. Oddly, what hurt the worst were my forearms from trying to get the motion started. So that was uncomfortable, but other than that it was a nice little workout.
The way each set is structured is:
two reps of the motion is slow-motion
a few reps of the motion with a slow start and quick finish (three counts to one count)
a bunch of reps of one rep per count
a few reps with a modified motion
a few cool-down reps
I liked it because it keeps things interesting and activates your muscles a bit differently throughout the set, but it was sort of hard to concentrate on being efficient while also trying to figure out exactly what I was supposed to be doing. For instance, I had never even done a clean and press before, so trying to figure that out while trying to keep time and then keep track of what pace I was supposed to be going was pretty tricky. I dominated at lunges though. That was awesome.
After that we transitioned smoothly into handball, where everyone was pretty lethargic. Except me of course. A lot of times I feel like I actually have too much energy in the handball court. I overrun my shots and get ahead of myself, but lifting beforehand put me exactly into the right pace of play from the beginning. I probably would have gotten tired faster than usual, but that didn't wind up being a factor on this particular day, so I was pleased with the result overall. I played a game of cutthroat, a game of doubles, a game of singles, and then Kristina's mom showed up and I played doubles with her against Kristina and Jessica. Just me and all the ladies. And we were playing with the white ball, which is lighter than usual, so I got to hit lots of show-off trick shots including a couple between-the-legs shots while facing the front wall, (so I hit them on the first bounce with very little reaction time) which is something I've only done a couple times before in total. So that was pretty cool. And now Kristina's mom is undefeated at handball!
Then I played doubles with some old guys, then one on two against some old guys. They joked that I should spot them fifteen points. They only scored three, so I guess I could have done that after all. It was sort of awkward, because I wanted to practice the things I need to work on, but I felt a bit bad about demolishing them with hard shots they won't face in their normal games. They told me not to go easy on them, though, so I did as my alternate title for this post suggests and embraced the awkwardness of beating up on the elderly. After that people were pretty much done. Either tired, old, or just sick of handball for the day. I probably could have stayed and played some games of questionable quality, but I didn't have anything against leaving.
Kristina was supposed to be my ride home, but she was feeling sort of awful because her boyfriend was off partying the whole weekend with his high school friends and she was depressed for some reasons I won't go into. So I said I'd hang out with her if she wanted, and we had lunch with her mom before heading over to John's parents' house. Which is close to a mansion. It has a pool, a hot tub, and a dock on a lake/pond. Kristina moped until the three of us (John, Dane, and I) ganged up on her in a desperate effort to cheer her up. We made every offer we could think of and she finally acquiesced to pizza, ping pong, and alcohol. So we had a ping pong tournament. John threatened that he was pretty good, so I was worried my rustiness might result in a loss, but he lost to Kristina in the first round. I beat Dane, which was a good warmup, and then I triumphed over Kristina because I'm too competitive to let the sad person we were trying to cheer up win. By the end I was playing fairly decently (at least compared to how I started), so that was fun. Then they made the mistake of trying to legalize shots off the ceiling/wall. That happens to be something I've practiced, since the ping pong table I grew up on was in a rather closed-in basement. That legalization was short-lived once I started hitting shots that flew perpendicularly across the table next to the net.
Kristina's mom finished whatever errands she was doing (putting new tires on a car?) and asked to meet Kristina at Kristina's house, so we went there. And there I was, hanging out with this mom of this girl I don't even really know. Luckily her mom is pretty cool, but it was still one of those "I guess I just embrace the awkwardness" situations. Also, none of us could think of anything to do. I mean, I looked up things to do in Minneapolis, and still nothing really popped out as a real option. I guess this is a problem wherever you are. It isn't just Iowa! That's sort of a relief. I mean, there are activities, of course, but they require some setup or advance planning. We weren't in a position where we could just go to a museum for instance. I think the reason people say big cities are more interesting than small towns is that they drink alcohol or like to go dancing/clubbing. Because sure, there's probably a better scene for that here, but the movie theaters show the same movies, the theater has the same touring shows (I assume; all I know is that the current one is about a deaf boy growing up and then realizing there is a whole deaf community, which didn't quite make me want to spend money to see it), and the other stuff is pretty similar too. We briefly entertained the idea of bowling, but as Jim Gaffigan says, there are two people who go bowling: the people who really like bowling (aka weirdos), and the people who are like "wouldn't it be hilarious if we went bowling?" We didn't quite fall into either category. Although another of his jokes is that it's a last resort; once you've done everything else, you go bowling. But I guess we just weren't that desperate. Kristina decided to rent a movie. Then on our way to get a movie, Jessica invited Kristina to a Halloween party. She declined, but I brought up the fact that her mom was probably going to go to bed anyway (a fact she had mentioned briefly as we were leaving), so she should go if she wanted. She asked if I would go. I said I would if she wanted to drink, since they'd probably need a driver. So there I was: Ryan Pesch: partygoer.
At least we weren't the only people without costumes. I sat and watched television, which at first was hockey (no clue what's going on, but the team from my state beat the team from the other state, so yay?), but then switched to baseball, which was actually interesting because it was one of the 4-7 watchable baseball games on television in a given year (Get it? Only the world series is watchable. I'm hilarious.) People seemed to be cheering for Boston, but I know people who are die-hard Cardinals fans so I was secretly rooting for them. Boston tied it at 4-4 in the eighth inning, and things were looking pretty intense. Then it ended in one of the more controversial ways I've ever seen a baseball game end (which, granted, isn't particularly impressive considering my weak resume of baseball game-endings). A guy hit the baseball hard at the infield. The second-baseman made an amazing play on the ball. He threw the guy out at home, tagged by the catcher, who then tried for the double play at third. The throw was terrible, though, and the guy sliding into third disrupted things so the baseman didn't make the play. The ball went past. The outfielder grabbed it. The runner got up and started toward home. The third baseman (also on the ground because he attempted to dive for the ball just previously) lifted his legs, tripping the runner. The umpire made a gesture. The runner stumbled his way toward home plate and was not a very fast guy to begin with. The outfielder made an excellent throw and the runner was tagged out at the plate and looked quite foolish. He hung his head and looked very sad. The umpire gestured he was safe. The Boston team was very unhappy. The crowd was very happy. I was very confused. The third baseman was called for obstruction, which I can sort of see, because the way he raised his legs probably isn't the manner one would raise their legs for any purpose other than tripping the runner. If he had been getting up, for example, his legs would have been straight out behind him for pushing him off the ground. But it was a pretty strange way to end the game nonetheless. Plus St. Louis won, so bonus!
Then I spend four hours looking at a wall (embracing the awkwardness?). Or at drunk people carving penises into pumpkins (briefly). Or at the reaction of the guy responsible for the party when he was told they were throwing the pumpkin goop they had scooped out the pumpkins over the edge of the seven-story roof. Or at the guy who brought an ACTUAL SWORD as part of his costume. Apparently he knows people involved in costume departments for films? Anyway, a questionable decision for a drinking occasion. Luckily nothing terrible happened (that I know of). At one point I aided batman in his escape from a creepy guy in a white suit who was chasing him by opening a locked door from the inside and letting him in. On a side note, if you are a girl looking for a halloween costume, apparently the only option open to you is "flapper from the Great Gatsby movie." So I'm sorry if you thought you had any other options. Because you don't. Seven out of eight girls observed at this party were flappers. And the eighth might have been, but she was sort of overweight and her makeup was scary, so I couldn't really make that judgment in good faith. Also, three guys showed up in suits. Luckily, even though I'm sure they all thought they were Gatsby, that's a pretty standard go-to for guys. One audibled to Bruce Wayne and the other to James Bond. See? Easy fix. Halloween is basically cheating for guys. Just put on a suit and voila, you're anyone you want to be!
Kristina didn't drink for a decent part of the night, at which point I considered bailing. We were only four miles from my apartment, so it was a viable option. Then I realized I didn't have my keys. So I would have to go to Kristina's anyway to retrieve those, which turned out fine because she eventually did drink (when she had time to do eight shots is beyond me), and it was good they had a designated driver. So I got them back to Kristina's and had to make the call between crashing there or getting home. I decided to forge my own way, since I wasn't quite exhausted and I had recently talked to Sarah S about her running, putting me in the mood to do some of my own. So I tightened the straps on my backpack as tight as they would go and set off. I made it four miles at a pretty steady pace, then alternated between walking and jogging for the last couple miles after my knees started hurting a bit. I was worried they might be sore, but it turns out they are not. My biceps, on the other hand, are in agony. I can't even straighten my arms without them hurting. Argh.
I went shopping yesterday. That's about all I did yesterday, actually. I made sure I got extra quarters from the cashier, which gave me exactly the right amount to do laundry! I like it when things work out that way. (She could only give out a maximum of a dollar's worth, but my groceries had a total ending in an amount that resulted in an additional three, so it turned out perfectly.) I wrote some more emotional poetry trying to figure out my own brain. It's not even really poetry half the time. I'm just journaling and then it becomes stanzas. Maybe with extensive editing? I don't know. I did like one thing I wrote, but I left it at my apartment, so I can't include it here right now. But here's one that has Pandora's song just now to blame:
She can't sing half as well as Elton John
But I can't skip it because it's "Your Song"
Which used to be an Our Song
And the feeling lingers pleasantly
Suspending momentarily
That disbelief which is reality
And oscillates radically, alternately,
With the fact that, as she is no Elton
We are not an us.
Perhaps this is an appropriate song
Her bastardization of his beauty
Can be a "anti-our" a "not-us" song.
As she kicks off the moss,
I can feel a faint buzzing
As through the dead matter landed
On an electric fence,
A disconcerting echo of its deadly force
Faintly flowing through my body
With a vague dissatisfaction.
My group for my next project (same group, different assignment) met just before this in the cafe we usually use. One time two weeks ago the guy set out free expired sandwiches. I took two. They both said gluten-free, and I was like "free food and it's healthy? Could life be any more perfect?" Yes, yes it could. You know what a major component of bread is? Apparently GLUTEN! That stuff was gross. The first sandwich I was like "man, this is dry; it's probably because it's a bit old." And I ate it anyway because I was hungry. For the second I was hungry after 5:00, so I just picked the ingredients off the bread and ate them. I saved the bread though, because I'm a thrifty guy these days (cheapskate). I later used the bread on either side of an egg sandwich. Ruined the whole sandwich! This time, though, the guy put out baked goods. I grabbed the healthiest-looking thing, which turned out to be a sugary raspberry/blueberry thing. A bit stale, but way more dessert-y than anything I've had recently, so it was practically decadent.
Our group adjourned and Greg asked me about Magic: the Gathering. He said he had played with Ian (a fellow section-mate) this weekend with one of his old decks and gotten trounced. I said I played pretty seriously, a fact he didn't quite get until we had talked for a half-hour and things became a bit more apparent.
This reminds me of an interesting point: It turns out I can pass for just about any sort of person. I talked with John's dad about the construction they were doing on their house intelligently (they are scraping paint and refinishing some stuff), talking about my parents' remodel work. I talked nerdy with John and Greg about Magic. I talked with a different John about Science Fiction books. I talked with Kristina about relationships. I talked with some guys about baseball (I can pass if I have to...). I talked with handball people about law school. I talked with Kristina's mom about my diet and how I decided on my eating habits. I talked with John about lifting weights. I talked philosophy in torts today (he posited a hypothetical scenario based on the trolley problem from philosophy). I talk science when people talk about bias. I talked big picture with drunk people who only wanted to hear sweeping reassurances. And none of it really feels real. I feel like I can pass any social conversation/test, but I still end each of them walking away and rolling my eyes at the waste of time it felt like.
Anyway, Torts was fun. The professor seemed impressed, but that was probably because I don't talk much, so he wasn't expecting me to say something smart... We're talking about it more tomorrow, but I'm not that eager for it, since everyone will have looked up the stuff I talked about by then and I won't be unique anymore.
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