Q is for Queen Anne, the Notorious Anklegator of the Wilds

Did I ever tell you guys how much I hate people?  Not any of you, no, of course not.  You are all fine examples of human beings, and a general exception to this rule.

But aside from you all, I really don't like people.  So you know what that means?  That means that I MUST have at least five group projects this semester, with five different groups.  That's twenty people I'm working with that I don't know and probably don't like.

So far it's all been okay.  Half of the teams are usually pretty nice, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't rather just be writing all of these group term papers myself.

Positives: there is this foreign exchange boy from Belgium in one of my groups.  His name is Jelle and he is sweet.  And a girl from South Korea, named JiHyun.  She is quiet.  They are my favorite group members, probably.

Negatives:  There is one overbearing girl in a serious group project we are conducting.  She does not know how to compromise and is full of generally terrible ideas.  She also doesn't understand punctuality or responsibility.  No, you can't call in sick when your group is giving a formal presentation in an hour.  We discussed this last night.  You said you were taking the last two slides.

Anyway, it's getting chilly out!  Time for sweaters and tea and hot foods.  Crock pot season.  I'm looking forward to being generally cozy around my house.  Also, snow.  Also, winter break!  I won't be home until New Year's though, so I hope you all keep that night clear for some more basement shenanigans!

And for those of you wondering what an anklegator is, they look like this lovely lady below:



In any case, I've been doing a bit of game-playing recently.  I acquired Bastion last semester, and didn't sit down to play it until last month.  It was a fantastic game.  Bright and colorful art, good game play, nice plot with all sorts of hidden information, and a few moral considerations here and there.  Also an awesome narrator.  I highly recommend it.




Before I even played the game, though, I listened to the soundtrack.  All summer long.  It's what got me through work and sad times.



And just for the heck of it, here's the whole soundtrack:

"That would be such a dick move. It'd be like a 10.0 on the Dick-ter scale!"

I feel like every time I post on here, it's never anything good. But, I suppose that is the tone of the semester, especially considering that it is about midterm time here.  And with all of my work and the fact that everyone here is going completely insane. I don't want to get into details here, but the gist of it is that I spent a vast majority of the past two weeks about 2 or 3 steps away from a complete mental breakdown.

So junior year is a blast.

BUT I AM ALIVE! I SHALL PREVAIL!

I am never sure what to put here. So here is a song by some hipsters that graduated from here not too long ago. They are super chill.

I love and miss all of you. I cannot wait until we are together again for Hobbits and Gatsby.

Guh, What Have I Done?

Seriously. What the hell was I thinking, scheduling my classes this way. Wednesdays are AWFUL.

Posting as per Morgan's request. I've not been up to much except school stuff and video games. A quick list:

• Wednesdays are awful. I cannot stress this enough.
• Borderlands 2 is giving me so many feels. I am nearly at the end, and oh my god. I think...I think it may have done the impossible for real. I think it just took BioShock's place as my most favorite game ever. I know I said I thought it might a week ago to some of you, but after that mission last night....Holy shit. I have never had a game fuck with my feels like that before. 
• My OCD is experiencing an upsurge in inconvenience. Hopefully it'll knock it off soon. 
• Writing another novel (maybe I'll finish it? hahaha what am I saying) for my lit class.
• Speaking of writing, got a few things in the works with Mouse. We'll see where it goes!
• I can't wait for winter break (Morgan returns! Everyone returns! HOBBITS!)

And that's...pretty much it. Would appreciate some Autumn-appropriate musics, por favor, and some reading recommendations. Is anyone else on Goodreads? Get on Goodreads. Friend me. Send me recommendations. DO IT. 

The Violet Hour by the Civil Wars~

What Year Is It? An Update

So I'll have been in London for two weeks tomorrow and my brain doesn't know what year it is. Two weeks alternately feels like two years and two days. And morning doesn't yet feel like morning, though night is definitely night because, shit, it's dark. On top of that, even though it's October, classes just started Monday and all the trees are still green. WHAT YEAR IS IT.

But at least I'm beginning to settle in at long last. The first week I was a walking ball of anxiety and tears and now London and I are getting on pretty well. Who knows where we'll end up. London has got excellent biscuits though (oh my GOD I'm bringing as many Hobnob packs back with me as can fit in my suitcase - and then I will make you eat some), so it's made the adjustment easier hahaha. Enough about me and my strange process of settling in.

HOW ARE YOU LOVELY PEOPLE DOING? Even though I'm really loving this city and my classes are great and my flatmates are good people, I miss you all terribly. Since everyone can speak English and England looks very similar to the bit of US we're from at certain moments, so sometimes in the early morning it's easy to forget where I am. It takes me a minute to remember I can't just drive two hours to see Amy or four hours to see Sarah and Megan, or take a jaunty walk down the street to visit Trisha, etc.

So, when you get a chance, let me know what you're all up to! Even the everyday stuff! Especially the everyday stuff! Or just music! While the UK has got wonderful, chocolate covered cookies at every turn, they don't have Pandora. I'm trying to make friends with Spotify. We'll see how it goes. I did find this, though.

An update, now with 67% of your daily requirement of statham

SUP CHICAS. Here's the run-down on the life of ye olde mouse.

I have a job. It rocks. I love it. It is kind of stressful but damn do I love it. Volunteered my time (or my time was volunteered is more accurate because when your boss says 'hey there's a race coming up, you should tend the booth and bring the massage table, "no thx" is not an appropriate answer) at a 5k run for the local theatre. That was cool. I felt that I really made a difference, even if it was only for twenty or so folks.

Things are still going well with Mike, too. He has rekindled my desire to create! I have been writing little snippets of stories every day, even when I'm tired or listless. I've come to realize that I won't have time to do the things I want, so I have to make time which is less about time travel and alchemy, and more about gritty determination to get something done. Like a classic American cowboy or Jason Statham in CRANK 2. Because life will try to poison you, cut out your heart and replace it with an artificial one, and you will total some cars, and people that you thought were your friends might betray you, and people that are your friends will stick by you in bloody shootouts, BUT BY GOD, when your precious time is limited, all it takes is a mess of determination to get what needs to be done, done.

And if life lights you on fire? PUNCH IT TO DEATH.

Tl;dr I am happy with my job, I am writing and drawing again, and I am setting aside to SEE YOU FOLKS AGAIN. So beware, the mouse runneth over.

Welp it's 2a.m. and I've stayed up writing this so I guess I'll post it even though it's ridiculously overdramatic why do you guys put up with me the music's in the links

I have not been doing too much. July was a weird blur with some lovely colorful bits of wonder mixed in. Like a Passion Pit song. I avoided some responsibilities. I made a habit of sleeping too late. I worried over the question of what I’m going to do with my life (no really oh my God what am I going to do with my life). But I also wandered about a twinkling fair ground and ate delicious food with some of you lovely people. I traipsed about the city with some more of you – someone tell the story of the parking victory! Maybe I will next! – and we danced together in the street with strangers. Here, have some Foxy.  

And suddenly it is August? And suddenly it is 67 years since Nagasaki was nuked? So I am Even More of An Adult now?

Or something? Birthdays, man. I never know what to do with them when they are mine. But I came home, poked at another email, checked the blog and realized that I haven’t written in a while and I don’t know what else to write about so here, hear about my day?

It was a quiet birthday, but a good one. I got some Official Stuff done (writing thank you letters for scholarships, emailing about visas, stuff like that), plus a bit of cleaning, and ironing which I actually find quite calming. Ironing, I mean. Cleaning only sometimes. And I listened to a couple chapters of The House of Mirth which is so fucking Edwardian and shit. Like damn it's so Edwardian you feel like you're drowning in Gibson Girls and dapper gentlemen. 

Thursday birthdays are weird, especially when there are Things That Must Get Done to do, but even though it was a normal-ish day, it felt special anyhow. Like, in addition to the usual electronic b-day wishes (I love you all by the way), I got a card from my next-door neighbor who is an old, tiny, Austrian lady. It contained exactly 21 dollars and was signed “love Ann and Oliver.” Oliver is her surprisingly talkative, very friendly orange tabby cat. She was not a cat-person a year ago when she got him and now he co-signs her b-day wishes and is her constant companion. We go over to visit her and she brings us up to date about his kitty life, as if he is her third, furry child. Ugh. How is life that gorgeous?

And the sky was so lovely today. Like the ocean had dissolved into a mass that hugged this little bit of world for the day; it was faintly rainy and gently cloudy, cool and clean but not exactly crisp. It smelled beautiful and felt like a waking dream.

It was one of those strange days where life seems balanced and you smile because you’re happy for reasons that exist, but whose exact specificities elude you. Where you feel effortlessly at home in your own skin without realizing it until you suddenly don’t feel that way anymore. Where there are things you should be freaking the fuck out about, but instead life seems do-able.

So I made dinner and polluted half of the block with garlic fumes – and all for nothing because the green beans burnt but oh well the crab cakes were delicious – and then my mom got home from work and we ate the edible food before I was whisked away.

I poured funfetti mix into tiny ice cream cone, slapped some more paint on my little wooden box, and molested Amy’s couch. So there were crafts! And baked goods! There were twins! And adorable movies! Which was excellent! And a tequila shot! Which was not quite as excellent actually my throat hates me now BUT WHATEVER MAN IT WAS FUN. I GOT TO PUT THE SALT IN… what was it again, nature’s snuff box? Hehehehe!

And then, sometime around the Taking Leave of the Werner Residence and the Drive Home the weather and the date on the calendar and the conversation about Second Thanksgiving and New Years and my own overdramatic nature – everything sorta hit me.

I got to wear a sweater today, guys. Sure, yeah, it was paired with jean shorts BUT THAT IS NOT THE POINT IT WAS STILL A SWEATER. And I layered that sweater. And my little sister got her class schedule and is starting sophomore year next week. And I keep day-dreaming about hot chocolate. And my tumblr dashboard keeps giving me pictures tagged #autumn, featuring fiery, sunlit trees in all their September glory. And slow songs with acoustic guitars keep caressing my earlobes.

And I keep pressing the replay button.

The way I feel is like when you bite into a blackberry; it’s fucking delicious, but hell if there isn’t a bittersweet aftertaste. So you reach into the plastic carton for another one, but the minute you’ve devoured the thing the deep purple shade of want and regret has stained your tongue.

The way I feel is a half-embarrassed echo of June, a half-whispered wish for December, even though I can’t wait for September to come and close. The way I feel is that day-dream with the hot chocolate, except expanded. Like, not only have we all got a cup, but the picture’s hazy edges are widened to encompass an old Victorian fitted with a wraparound porch. There’s a swing and a white wicker rocking chair. There’s a bowl of plums in the kitchen. I don’t know who owns the old Victorian.  

I know there’s a word for it – or maybe a made-up word for it – the way I feel, but leaving it unnamed does the feeling more justice than if I cracked open a dictionary with the intent of pinning down every syllable. And I feel like I should be able to deal with all of this shit that my weird, overdramatic nature is harping on about, but despite the date on the calendar and the inner calm I felt all day, I do not feel like Even More of An Adult now.

But I guess that is normal or something? Or I will adjust?

In the meantime, please, somebody take me dancing.

ALSO! Rachel, your adventures sound magnificent and I look forward to the stories you will tell me. Because you will tell me. What day are you coming back and when are you leaving again because Things Need to Happen while you are here.

AND! Those who are going back to school etc should post dates of when they are leaving AND returning for fall breaks, weekends, Turkey Feastings, ETC.

I am leaving September 19th and will tearfully Skype you all at Second Thanksgiving. So the etc. up there includes addresses because I want to send you people letters. So enable me? Maybe? 

This has been a ridiculously long-winded, all-over-the-place post. I have to get up tomorrow. We'll see how that goes.

Annnnnd Scotland

Since no one else is posting, I figure I'll post.

I'm in Scotland. Tonight is my last night here. And it's been pretty jammed packed with action and adventure.

Thursday morning, we got up early, piled on a bus and drove. We stopped at Hadrian's Wall, which was really rad. I pretended to be a Roman Centurion, on patrol, climbing on the wall, being all cool and stuff. Trying and failing to pet sheep. There were a lot of sheep. But it was so pretty.

Friday was dominated by my going to the Olympic Womens Soccer Quarterfinals. It was United States vs. New Zealand. So of course, we (me and my friends who went) got all decked out in our finest American swag and were the stereotypical tourists. It was really fun. The seats were amazing and THE US WOMEN WON! 2-0! IT WAS SO INTENSE!! THE KIWI'S (New Zealanders are called Kiwis) GOALIE GOT KNOCKED UNCONSCIOUS!

And then Friday evening the program took us to the Edinburgh Castle and we watched the Edinburgh Royal Military Tattoo, which was awesome and beyond describing.  There were so many bagpipes and so much dancing. It was fantastic. The even played music from Brave. It made me so happy.

Today was mostly wandering around Edinburgh, exploring the sights and such. We went to the Castle and actually went inside. (I'll upload photos eventually). And in the evening, two of my friends and I made the trek up Arthur's Seat, which is this intense mountain-esque land mass. It was an intense hike, but I am so out of shape it's not even funny. And it was super foggy, so we literally couldn't see anything. I was convinced we had died on the mountain and were wandering around in limbo. But we survived. I only fell down once, and managed not to break anything.  a feat, really.

Um, yes. That's what I have been up too.

WHAT HAVE YOU GUYS BEEN DOING?!? YOU SHOULD POST AND TELL ME THINGS?!?!

...please?