Survived another semester, my second to last. This was accomplished, I think, mainly by my becoming more self-dependent/others-avoidant. I have more or less withdrawn into my own little fuzzy stress-bubble of a world, especially in the last few weeks of class, with only a dribble of mutters as my line of communication with the outside world. Honestly, except for the whole stress thing, it was great.

But now that everyone is switching into winter break mode (or winter intersession mode, for my masochistic friends), I am getting dragged out of my shell, out to lunches and hang-outs and bars where I buy drinks I really can't afford. And now that the Boy is back from quaint BFE, I am torn between spending constant nights in with him and fulfilling both my and his social obligations in the outside world. Again, not that bad of a situation, except now I'm spending way too much going-out money when I am now more or less on a fixed income (i.e., no income).

Also on the pro-side and the con-side of my current situation: I have so. much. time. So much. Big, amorphous blobs of time, floating about, smacking me in the face with their gratuitous presence. Yay, I mean, this is what I quit my job for, right? Unfortunately, me being what I am, I mostly just plaster these hours and hours of time with excessive (and I do mean excessive) amounts of sleep. As in, not-wake-up-until-the-sun-is-going-down sleep. It's getting to be kind of a grotesque situation.  I broke out of the rut today by waking up "early" (before noon) to go have lunch with a friend... then came home and went back to sleep. Ok, it's a problem.

So with one month left of the winter holiday, I am going to do something. Preferably several things. No list of goals this time around, at least not yet. But thanks to my new buddy Pintrest, I can give some vague idea of, well, ideas that I like. (See also tasty things that I like, most of which I think are within my realm of ability.) So basically I intend to root around in crafty things, make some motion towards working out, and devour on the cheap some tasty, tasty things. There are worse plans, right?

Thankful Time!

I guess it's about time to be thankful for things.

I am thankful that the weather today was unbelievably beautiful, and that I was forced to spend a good prat of the day outside on a well-decorated patio.

I am thankful to have a Cajun family that sends large amounts of tasty leftovers home with me. Always.

I am thankful that I do not have children.

I am thankful to have left my serving job that was becoming a huge drain on my soul. That is, I am thankful to have the resources to be able to do this sort of thing and continue my education while maintaining my current standard of living.

With that being said, I am thankful that I also have a potential copy-editing type job on the horizon.

I am thankful that there are only a couple of weeks left in the semester, and I am (almost, pretty much) caught up with all my work.

Also thankful I only have one semester left after this.

I am thankful that my loving, handsome, wonderful boyfriend is home for the week, and that when I fall asleep at night and wake up in the morning, he is there next to me--as things should be.

And of course, I am so thankful to have friends and family who not only love me, but who take genuine interest in my well-being and who are generally awesome, fun-to-be-around, intelligent, caring people!

So....Thanks!

More Pros than Cons, really

Up before noon on a day I don't have to be, so yay... but this required my sleeping through most of yesterday evening. What is wrong with me? Surely people should be able to get by without 14 hours of sleep, even on their day off?

Went to the coffee shop, and the woman behind me enthused wondrously about my hair for a few minutes. "Freaking awesome," she says. And me not having showered in two days and not a brush to my name at the moment. So either an esteem boost on my part or a poor judgement call on hers. Possibly both. A nice moment anyway.

In other, geekier personal news, I really really really want to play Skyrim.

Unfortunately, my desktop computer (past its prime but still theoretically able to run Skyrim) is down for the count-- either the video card is fried (boo) or the motherboard (double boo!). It's been out for a while, and I was going to wait until the winter break to get it fixed, so I didn't have a high-resolution, totally immersive monkey on my back for the last few weeks of the semester. But now everyone is gabbling constantly about it and I am practically vomiting with envy. Want. Okay, /geekout.

Time to go try to be productive in the few hours I actually have before work (only three shifts left--so excited!) And to go shower, no matter what that lady said about my hair.

Home is where the... what, exactly?

So I've been spending this week at my mother's house. They say you can never go back home, but if your mom lives in town, you can sure as hell go to her house for a home-cooked meal and some TLC. It's actually a pretty inconvenient place to stay, considering it's about half an hour farther away from campus and my job than my actual residence is. (But that's a big reason why I don't actually live here.) However, there is always coffee made for me in the morning, breakfast usually, and tasty dinner-- which is way more than I can say for my place right now. I guess living solely on my own for the first time is really getting to me-- not to mention severe senioritis and  the onset of, if not an existential crisis exactly, then at least severe life apathy. The semblance of family life, even the most hectic and dysfunctional, kind of brings me back into things, I guess.  Even if this house has never really been home for me, it has been a sanctuary in times of crises (over-dramatic term, that... I really mean loneliness.) So I'm thankful for that.

More Life Goals (Short-Term)

So, I have recently decided on two small but non-trivial life changes I will be making in the near future (i.e. within the next month).

1. I am going to QUIT MY JOB on/around the first week of December!

This is pretty big for me; this has been my only off-campus job my entire college career. I've been there for 2 1/2  years, and I was expecting to stay there until I graduated. Or until I moved. Or maybe died from server doldrums. But after weeks of daydreaming about quitting (working 8 hour shifts until midnight or two in the morning on school nights is less than optimal), I started to seriously run the numbers, and between what I save this semester, my scholarships and student loans, and the pittance from my student job, I (think that I) can actually pull it off-- and not have to work my last semester of school! Excite! The only downside it that I won't really have money saved up before I graduate, which means I'll probably have to spend some more time working here over the summer or beyond before I can move to a Real City.

That's the bigger change, and now that I only have T-minus 5 weeks, I am really chomping at the bit to get out of there.

2. I am going to start buying one (two?) books of newly(ish) published poetry a month.

Less dramatic, but still an important resolution. More words need to go in my brain, and those words should be new and fresh and innovative and all those other buzzwords. Not that Anne Sexton and T.S. Eliot are losing their places on my bookshelf, but One Must Be Current.


Well, more class now. More procrastination later.

Retrospective Italy Update, Part III

Allora! Been promising this one for a while, and finally grabbed a handful of pictures to represent the last--but not least! part of my trip-- a Roma!

Well, we didn't actually stay in Rome, but in a beautiful little hill town called Frascati, about 20 minutes away by train. Lovely place, with about a dozen family-owned butcher shops per square kilometer-- porchetta (freshly roasted suckling pig) every night, and locally produced, tasty wine! Bit of a strain on the thighs, though, as every walk from the train station to the hotel required going up about 142 stairs. (Literally, we counted.)

Anyway, what follows is mostly pictures of ruins, as that was by far my favorite part of Rome. The stuff with living people populating it mostly just stressed me out (though the Metro was, for the most part, extremely convenient).

Arch of Septimus Severus in the Roman Forum

Trevi Fountain (Yes, I threw a coin in over my shoulder)

Requisite Colosseum photo!

And inside the Colosseum-- it's kind of gone downhill since its glory days.

Arch of Septimus Severus and Temple of Saturn (which is really really big up close!)

Inside of the Pantheon

Some violent sculptures from the Vatican Museum (the tour of which was actually one of my least favorite parts of the trip-- all that beautiful art stuffed together in one hot, crowded, anxiety-inducing place where I can't properly enjoy it. Still remarkable through.)

Oh, but it was worth it for the Raphael Room! Got to see the School of Athens in person. (The Sistine Chapel too. Don't have any decent pictures of that, though, and it's a bit of a strain on the neck after a while.)

Long view of the Roman forum-- this is one of my favorite pictures I took in the city. Can you tell I spent the most time here? Well over three hours (including the Palatine Hill). Shadow being cast is from the Temple of Saturn.

The Tiber River at night, with St. Peter's in the background. The teachers took us on a dinner cruise for our last night-- it was a great way to go out.

Well, that was my trip to Italy, in a greatly condensed and abbreviated nutshell! I intend to go back as soon as possible, and for as long as I can. So until next time!

Ciao ciao!

We have let

in our spirit friends.

We say go forth

and remember

everything I have to do today.

They come back

emptyhanded

and with me burrow

heads under pillowcases.

Tomorrow,

they whisper,

might be another day.