GRADUATED

I graduated yesterday. From college. With a B.A. in art history. With honors! That's all I can process at this point. Words and feelings and thoughts have not yet articulated themselves into anything intelligible in my mind. Too much packing and moving and sadness.

Will update more when my brain is functioning and my life is less chaotic. For now, let me just say I AM DONE!

DONE WITH SCHOOL

FINALS ARE OVER

I have finally slept! Finally Finally Finally! I feel so well rested and not sleep deprived, it's an amazing and yet strangely unfamiliar concept.

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

finals

finals: tests, papers, projects, presentations, posters, all-nighters.....
ruining my life right now and spoiling my last week of college.


will be done on tuesday and hopefully recovered by wednesday after sleeping for first time in days.
LAST CYCLE OF EXAMS/ESSAYS EVER??? ---> if I go to design school, there might be exams and final projects, but i imagine in an entirely different format and in subjects i'm interested in. unlike medieval history, which i just finished a paper in about a dead language, or french agricultural development, which i wrote a paper in last week, en francais. byerk!

recent good things:
michael's fake surprise bday party was fun
art brigade field trips--- well i survived and i consider that an accomplishment after taking 60 poorly behaved hyper kids through an art museum without a docent/tourguide
j and a's birthdays- dinner at donna's, always successful, and then fancy dinner at pazo last night. wore my new high waisted fancy-pants (yes really im calling them my fancy pants) and a's shiny top and heeeels, and ate so so so many delicious tapas. love doing tapas with other vegetarians, makes it a lot less complicado, but man was that place expensive! will go back when have established independently wealthy status/married for money.
what we ate: haricots verts with sea salt and almonds, broccoli (how the fuck do you spell broccoli i never get it right, thank you spellcheck) with chili oil and pecorino, zuchinni cakes with mint yogurt sauce, manchego potato croquettes, crispy artichoke which turned out to mean battered and fried and was my favorite thing, a white pizza covered in spinach, peas, buffalo mozz, and garlic, and for dessert s and i split a brown butter apple tart that was like heaven.

basically ate my weight in fatty, rich, salty foods and then came home and pulled an all-nighter to finish this essay on medieval judeo-french and medieval jewry.  professor said she really liked my research idea and outline and if the essay turned out well she wanted to submit it for the undergrad writing prize, but seeing as it was mostly written between 5 and 10 am on the due date, i doubt it will be that marvelous.

hopking to do just well enough to maintain my 3.5 this semester and graduate with honors, beyond that do not care about grades. just want to be donnnneee so i can celebrate and drink and go out and enjoy my last time here at hopkins!

whoooops!

So after making a fuss about coming back to this blog after neglecting it for so long, i then proceeded to forget about it for over a month. school has just been consuming my time recently, but in an effort to make up for it, here's a very abbreviated summary. cliff notes style.

- spring break was amazing and fun and sunny and full of good food and dancing and drunken sun bathing and the ocean and even a boy, for a brief blink of an eye

- coming back to school after being in lovely warm florida was awful. it was cold and there was work to do and sleeping became a much sought after luxury that i rarely indulged in.

- so many projects! i had a ton of midterms before break and then it seemed like the second i got back i had round two, but it was even more irritating because they were all like rough drafts or preparatory exercises or early versions of FINAL projects. please please please tell me why it's necessary to turn in an annotated bibliography, an outline with topic sentences, a rough draft, or a detailed plan of a final project which will not be due until mid May? Am i in seventh grade? NO. Do i know how to write a research paper? YES. do i need my TA to make me turn part of it in in MARCH or APRIL so i can get their worthless feedback on something i still have over a month to work on? NOOOOOO.

- passover! went to ohio for the first couple of days, saw my aunt and uncle, first cousins, parents, other aunt, and my dear old grandpa. it was pretty fun even though my aunt and uncle live in a small town in central ohio that is pretty boring, to put it nicely, spoiled city girl that i am. Lots of cooking, eating, synagogue, and seders! (and wine)

food highlights:
       - radish salad: grated radishes, tahini, lemon juice, lemon zest, fresh parsley
       - charoset: my favorite passover thing!
       - lemon curd with dessert sooooo delicious
       - potatoes, always so good. dependable and versatile, like a good pair of pants.
       - BORSCHT! yeah baby. summer borscht. cold, lemony, beety, beautiful.
       - my aunt's potato leek soup! creamy and wonderful.
       - kishke! a very yiddishy thing which is hard to explain but it's like jewish stuffing and it reminds   me of my grandma.
       - lots of food memories and recipes of my grandma's, bringing her to the seder with us even though she's not here anymore. here's to you, grandma ruth!

- plenty of partying and drunken antics. including Smcinty's birthday smash! we threw a rubik's cube party in our house, it was highly entertaining and ridiculous. i ended up in all boy's clothes and B ended up in a pair of S's tiny short shorts (hilarious) and A ended up not wearing any pants and S was very very orange! crazinesssss.

- it really just hit me that there are only two more weeks of classes left. Two more weeks of school, possibly ever? My plan is to work for a year or so and then go to school for design, but if that doesn't end up happening, this could be my last educational experience ever! INSANITY. Also, I really don't want to graduate or leave Hopkins. These four years really have been the most amazing, fun, ridiculous, challenging at times, but rewarding years. I really know who I am now, which is not something I could have said four years ago as a freshman, or even as a junior. I don't want it to end!

midterms = huge time suck

This past week, my midterms started and I have another one on Monday.

I hate exams. I don't feel like they're necessarily a good measure of what you've learned, not for everyone anyways. For exams I just memorize and regurgitate facts and numbers and key points, but if the midterm assignment is an essay, I can actually express what I've learned and show that I'm thinking about the topics of the class on a level beyond flashcard memorization. luckily so far i've had essays or projects for midterms, but tomorrow i have a real test with short id's and a longer essay. and of course it's for the class i HATE because it is sooooo boring and unstimulating intellectually- Medieval Culture & Society. I haven't been doing the readings all semester because I had no need to, I went to lecture and took notes, and I went to section and listened to my stupid TA blather on and on, not really teaching us anything new, thinking highly of herself and making snide jokes which she thinks are funny, ironic, or make her seem "cool." she is very, very canadian. So now i'm cramming; struggling to do 6 weeks worth of reading, typing and organizing all my notes, trying to make an outline or something. not going so well. i'm just so unmotivated!

shmeehhhhh. the one thing keeping me going is that spring break is so soon! by friday afternoon we will be on our way, heading down the coast, me and my 3 dear roommates. so excited! hopefully we'll make it to key west by saturday evening/night but it all depends on traffic and driving exhaustion and whatnot. Going to Target later today, even though I really do need to study for this exam, to get a bathing suit and other spring break necessities. i can't believe i forgot all my bathing suits at home! i brought them home at thanksgiving and forgot to bring them back after winter break. whoops!

good excuse to get another one though, but will i get a one piece or a bikini? two pieces are still a relatively new concept for me, as i didn't even own one till i was about 19. I'm so pale and I've always been very self-conscious of my skintone and complexion, especially with my scars on my shoulders and now my new scars on my back from having shingles last nov-dec, so i guess i'll try things on and see. as always, julianne moore, evan rachel woode, nicole kidman are my celebrity confidence boosters as they are famously gorgeous, fair-skinned ladies! and now that i dyed my hair a gingery shade of strawberry blonde, (i was aiming for a far more gingery, reddish blonde look but the dye didn't have a huge effect on my seemingly dye-resistant hair) i can liken my paleness to their redhead/ivory skin example.

this semester has become so busy so quickly. between schoolwork, endless amounts of less-than-thrilling reading, waking up early for class every day, weekend shenanigans, art brigade responsibilities and teaching, working at the library, and dealing with other issues, i've hardly had a minute to think, much less blog or do my laundry.

i took some time this weekend to just relax, i stayed in friday night and slept for 13 hours, i baked bread yesterday (delicious baguettes which made yummy toast this morning), i tried to find some time to sew or crochet which i haven't been doing much lately due to the onslaught of work. i contemplated my life, my future, my friendships, my relationships. it's kind of been annoying me lately, on an entirely selfish and ridiculous level, that all of my roommates and i are single for the first time EVER in college, since both s and j broke up with their former bf-s in february, and within like 20 seconds they all have romantic interests. i've been single for almost two years, and nada. i know that i can be wall flower-y and it's really hard for me to put myself out there, and that's part of the reason i haven't dated anyone else. part of it is also that hopkins is not the ideal environment to find the kind of guy i'm attracted to: the poetic, creative, artsy, dark-haired boy who dresses well (no sweatpants! no frat t-shirts!), wears thick framed glasses (my weakness), and above all, is interesting to talk to. it seems like everyone here is an engineer wearing pajamas to class. and while i love pajamas and there's nothing wrong with engineers, it's just not what i'm looking for, clearly. of course i'm beyond happy for my 3 roommates in their new romantic pursuits, i like the guys they're seeing now and i'm glad they're enjoying themselves, but i can't help but feel a tinge of envy. it's lonely to be single for this long, to have no prospects, and to watch as all your friends go about in happy couples while you stay home. sometimes i feel profoundly alone, isolated, unattractive, mopey and sorry for myself, which i hate because UGH who likes feeling that way?

of course i know my life is full of amazing friends and family, i'm so fortunate and privileged not to have any major problems in my life, i'm healthy and young and getting an awesome education.... i just wish i had someone to share it with. it's harder having to watch others happy in their coupleyness, it's like i feel more single when my friends are dating. and then i feel like such a pathetic prune for letting my happiness be dictated, well no not dictated, but affected by whether or not i have a guy in my life. i don't need male attention, i'm not seeking male approval, i'm a strong, independent woman, so i feel completely ashamed and silly that i feel sad about being lonely. i just miss romance, i miss being looked at in that way, i miss flirting, cuddling, someone calling just to see how my day was, i miss going on dates, i miss being cared for and feeling loved.

but alas! life does indeed go on. i'll find it again, eventually, and in the mean time, i have my friends, i have my books, i have my art.

this week was a bit of a fail

so this week went by both rapidly and very slowly in weird ways, and two days of it were spent lying around sick, but also in different ways.

-monday: after medieval culture class (boringgg) and work, i had a long long serious talk with amanda about life and so many other things. catharsis x infinty. then we went on a valentines day date! minus celeste, who bailed on us in favor of actually doing her job as a ta and holding office hours. how utterly responsible of her! went to lebanese taverna which was so so delicious! we shared spinach pies, roasted garlic humus (complete with whole roasted garlic gloves on top which were kind of too roasted and brown in color, which made me think they were dates or prunes and i was very confused), felafel which was decent but not the best, and haloumi cheese which was the best thing ever. i am a haloumi addict for sure! and everything was consumed in conjunction with enormous amounts of their pillowy, puffy fresh-baked pita. the staff and other people at the restaurant definitely thought we were lesbians on a valentines day dinner, and were giving us weird looks. even if we were a gay couple, what's it to them!? we had excellent luck with the bus schedule timing though!

- tuesday: french class was boring, we're learning about the political system of France which i already know all about and so basically, the theme of that class seems to be doodle while the professor tells me things i already know. then i had poetics and politics of sex, which is an interesting class, and we discussed casina and lysistrata which we had read for that week, but by discussed, i mean he lectured and occasionally posed questions which he then answered himself. he definitely likes to talk, but what he was saying was interesting at least. he didn't give us a break though and that class is from 1:30 to 4 so i had to run out in the middle so i could go to the loo. i wish someone would speak up and be like hey nils, we should have a break in this 3 hour long class no? then i came home and started my laundry and lazed about the house a bit, if i recall.

- wednesday: didn't go to medieval culture class, just didn't wake up and that class is a major waste of my time. ughhhh. i know i should go, but i didn't. who owns culture was very interesting this week, although rodini also spent most of the time talking to us instead of having a discussion. it was very interesting though, we talked a lot about UNESCO and the relationship between the art market/art dealers/art collectors and the art or cultural objects themselves and also the relationship to archaeology. a few archaeology majors in the class definitely enlightened us on some really interesting concepts, like the art historical provenance concept versus the archaeological provinience concept. Then i taught at Tench for Art Brigade! it was great, we did a civil rights themed project since its black history month, we didn't have too many kids and the volunteers on my day were great. Harley and Ham were there too and it all worked out quite well. then i went home, did work and made pasta.

- thursday: woke up with a ginormous ginormous sinus pressure headache. could hardly see straight and felt like my face was exploding from within. took a bunch of meds and skipped french, thought i would be ok by the time for anthropology and fiction but i was still miserable and in so much pain, so i missed that too and spent the day on the sofa. at night i felt well enough to go to this senior cocktails night, which was fun and weird. we got slightly dressed up, myself embodying both mary poppins and hermione granger while amanda looked like joan jett in her all-black ensemble and rockstar hair. the event was fun, and there was free alcohol, but the food was shmeh and i hadn't really eaten dinner before hand which turned out to be a huge mistake. i thought there would be more food there, but it was all pretty gross and what was good was minimal in amount. i had 2 glasses of wine and then weston's roommate nick asked me to hold his beer while he went to the bathroom i think but when he came back he had another beer so i kept the one i'd been holding. weird beer exchange// he's a weird guy, though he seems nice. then we went to pjs and ginger lunberjack followed us there so he could put the moves on A. s j and i found this incredibly amusing. drank 2 more drinks at pjs --- biggest mistake ever. i'd now mixed 4 types of alcohol: wine, beer, gin and vodka. at some point at pjs, i blacked out.... i don't remember leaving or coming home or getting into bed. woke up at like 7 am in my dress, tights, cardigan and COAT. oyyy veeyyyy.

- friday: spent the entire day INCREDIBLY HUNG OVER. never ever have i had a hangover like this. i couldn't believe i had blacked out and didn't remember the last quarter of the night. luckily i didn't do anything too embarassing, according to jen, except dance wildly in the pub where no one really dances, jovially greet someone i was friends with freshman year but haven't talked to in 3 years, and try to help jen flirt with a tall dude. apparently i also ran around and was hyper and cheerful, and no one could tell i was black-out which is good. sarah was also super hungover so we comiserated and spent the day dying on the couches. eventually i had to go to work at 5 and that was a huge struggle. i have seriously never been hung over this way. it was like extreme hangover: lightweight edition. went to work, rented some dvds and had a movie/pizza/chill night with jen.

- saturday (today): compared to yesterday's total unproductivity, today i am super woman. woke up early and went to the farmer's market with sarah around 10:45/11:00. We got some beets, olive bread, tangerines, green beans, and i got a veggie empenada for lunch/brunch/whatever. delicious! when i asked the guy what was in the veggie empenada he said "the veggie empenada..... it contains.... veggies." UM THANKS CAPTAIN OBVIOUS. "right... what kinds of vegetables are in it?"- me. "ohhh..... *reads lists of ingredients off a piece of paper where he had them all typed out* and cheddar cheese." - empenada man who had ginger dreadlocks. he then proceeded to flirt with sarah. barf. but the empenada was delish. then we went to the bank, i deposited my paychecks (wooooo monayyyy), and then to eddie's to get milk and cereal and a few other things. and then starbucks, because, well just because. accomplished all this before noon! hyper productivity! once we got home we started cleaning the apt because we're having a party tonight, or rather jen is hosting the volleyball teams mixer and its then opening up to an open-party at about 10 or 10:30. im going to a potluck at the ginger lumberjacks house tonight, which i imagine to be covered entirely in rust-colored corduroy and buffalo plaid. trying to get A to go with me, but i think she's hesitant to show up for a communal meal at his house.... awkwardness potential very high. started cleaning my room but it's still a HUGE HUGE mess. oyyyy.


so now i'm just sitting at work, blogging instead of doing the readings for poetics/politics. need to come up with a way to shorten the name of that class, a la maniere de "anthro-fic" for anthropology and fiction, for which i have readings to catch up on. ayyyy. but it's the weekend and i survived a massive hang over so REJOICE.

anndd we're back

it's been so long since i last blogged (haha i almost wrote globbed) but it doesn't seem that way to me. Well, the first few weeks of the semester have been busy and tiring and full of random fun but also beaucoup de frustration. highlights:
- Celesteypoo turned 21!!! We went out to dinner at Mezze aka where the HEAVENLY food comes from
        spinach fritters, greek salad, out of control beet salad with oranges and walnuts, marinated feta cheese, fresh humus and babaganough and pita of course and more but who can remember the details when they are in a food-induced state of euphoria? i want to take my parents and noosh there when they come for my graduation because mediterranean food is our favorite and we won't have the whole meat-eater v. vegetarian tapas issue, except they will eat fish.
- C, A and I have begun dressing in theme every day so we wear things in our warddrobes we normally don't wear and also to combat the monotony that is the school day. So far we've been equestrian, zoological, Norse/viking, soft, russian (but like old country/ fur hat russian), and oceanic. A often wins ipso facto because her warddrobe is ginormous and she has a knack for theme costumes. I'm glad though because without these themes or any other direct encouragement to dress cute i tend to fall into my pattern of a grey shirt (why is half my warddrobe grey???), jeans and my caramel colored cardigan.
- things i've cooked: spinach-zucchini-feta patties, ginger blueberry clafoutis, mac-n-cheese-n-squash. lots of yumminess. and fattiness because CHEESE. i should start dieting/eating less shit soon so i can get in swim suit shape and also so i can snag a fella!
-classes: they're ok. la france contemporaine- ehhh kinda stupid and all things i already know, but ham and renee are in the class with me so that's fun. the radiator melted my shoe last week. medieval culture- so early so early so early, feudalism. poetics and politics of sex- too much reading for my sanity's sake, interesting discussions, hermaphrodites v androgynes. who owns culture- way too much reading, interesting guest lecture today, prof loves to give me the death stare when i come in 20 seconds late or drink coffee in class. doesn't she know who i am? ----> girl with coffee mug perpetually attached to right hand. anthropology and fiction- interesting reading, only had this class once so far, so we shall see how discussion/workshopping goes.
- getting closer to opening etsy shop. weeooooo!
- sleeping a bit more....
- drunken weekends
- picked up a shift at the circ desk since i didn't get as many hours as i wanted at av, interesting change, but involves more real work and less sitting at a desk and doing homework while people think you're hard at work as a student librarian.
- sooooo many textbooks
- dulce de leche amanda brought back from argentina = sex in a jar. speaking of sex, there are ZERO attractive/nice/friendly guys anywhere. got flirted with at av one day by a boy who was clearly a fresher. no thanks, 18 year old, take your little self elsewhere. got eyed by a fellow library worker who was fairly cute and wearing thick-framed glasses (ie sarah magnets) but couldn't tell if it was because a) he thought i was cute b) he didn't know who i was since i don't normally work circ and he was wondering who the new person was, or c) i had like spinach in my teeth or coffee in my hair or writing on my face. all of these things are not rare occurances.
- update complete!!!! also lemme just say this, ITS COLD AS A FUCKING ANTARCTIC WIND TUNNEL. frozen solid inside an ice tornado every time i go outside.

last semester ever.... maybe

Tomorrow is the first day of Spring semester, my last semester of college, which is hard to imagine/comprehend. Intersession went by very fast and now its back to the grind. taking five classes, possible i might have to add a sixth, but let's hope not. bought my books today, one class had 14 books, one had 9, and two had 1 each, and one had none, so..... i came home with 26 books. heavy heavy load, luckily i was at the bookstore after an art brigade meeting with ham and nona d and michael was there so he drove me back to my apt. ginger lumber jack hopped into the car on the way because he spotted us and needed help running an errand on shifty street near shifty, inferior liquor store. discussed focaccia with him and other bread goods. only way to not make it awkward with a boy you know for a fact used to have a thing for you and who knows you were nowhere near interested in him but want to be his friend is to limit the conversation to the only two common interests you have: baking and conspiracy theories. we always either discuss bread or zombies or aliens. anyways, it was less awkward than usual so wooot. great to see ham again and be reunited with her and nona d, or donasaur as we now call her, as we are the power trio! we had a lot of work to do for art brigade so our meeting was like 3 hours long, but we ate at carma's so it was tolerable, plus at least an hour was spent catching up. i had an apple alexander and a honey cappuccino, standard. the split pea soup looked more like green mashed potatoes and the girl eating it at the table near the front did not look particularly enthused so i went for the old standby instead of trying the soup.

speaking of soup, i made over the weekend a delicious curry- butternut squash- sweet-potato-apple soup that is soooo delicious! slightly sweet from the apples (though i used granny smith so not overly sweet), spicy from the curry, creamy, thick, warming, squashy..... major yum. thanks barefoot contessa, as always, inalicious! the reckster is supposed to get back tonight, Smcinty too, but seeing as its 1:23 am and neither have showed, I guess it's going to be Monday arrivals for them both. Miss them both but Jenbot and I have bonded a lot which is great. We have had regular date nights which ranged from cooking and watching bones on the couch (with wine), football party with homemade snack foods, going out to dinner or bars, and more often drinking tea and crafting while watching tv like the little old ladies we are. it's cold as balls but my new coat is awesome, though still entirely too big on me. never managed to get it altered when i was home. i'll wait till there's a warm week (above 37) and then i'll take it to some taylor michael recommended. speaking of, i haven't talked to taylor-dailurgh in ages. i miss her. she's awful at keeping in touch, though it's not like i'm super great. i should send her an email since she never responds to texts or gchats. i want to see philadelphia before i finish school on the east coast, or we could make a trip to dc together and see all the GW APA crew.

I was super nostalgic for France last night, and my experience there, and gruyere cheese. i was just missing the sense of adventure i had while there and how everything was a new experience, and just thinking back to how this time last year i was just starting off on my french semester, well, it's kind of sad now that it's over and a year away from present time. i loved france and want to go back, and i miss all my friends from the program. i was also anxious last night and kept having half asleep dreams that someone i knew was in the hospital. first it was annie, my biffle, and i had to go to upstate ny where she lives to see her in the hospital, she was in a coma and her parents were considering pulling the plug and wanted me to be able to say goodbye. talk about the absolute worst nightmare i've ever had, and i wasn't even fully asleep. even after i snapped out of that dream, i kept feeling anxious and sad about hospitals and sickness, until finally i fell asleep around 5 am. today i found out that my grandpa is in the hospital, admitted yesterday, and seems like he had a small stroke. he's fine now and there were no lasting effects, but it was bigger than the TFA he had during Rosh HaShanah, but the man is 88 it's bound to happen. he's almost 90 for goodness' sake. Still, the thought of him dying is absolutely unbelievable. he's my last living grandparent, since my mom is estranged from her family so i don't have contact with her father, who is most likely still alive because we haven't heard otherwise. frankly he's an awful person so i don't care one way or another, but my dad's dad, grandpa arthur, i love whole heartedly and being near him in college (since he lives in Maryland) has been such a treat for me as i saw him only once a year as a kid. Two of my good friends have lost their grandfathers lately, so that on top of the dream anxiety and the fact he's in the hospital have me on edge. He's spending the night just for observation and more tests, and he's on a new medication that should help, but i can't help but worry. i made him a scarf for his birthday this winter, and seeing his reaction to it and how special it was for him that i made it just for him was probably my most rewarding experience of 2010. i'm not ready to lose him just yet.

But he's fine, so I should stop waxing melodramatic and get to sleep. School tomorrow! Last first day of school possibly ever, and definitely for the next year or so! Wow! What a thought. I have no idea what I'm doing with my life but I am free and young and healthy and live in a peaceful democratic country where i have all my rights (what's up with egypt btw? i should call yoni) so i think i'm doing pretty well. fingers crossed for a good first impression tomorrow, maybe i'll even meet a cute boy!

jacquard crochet update: i started a jacquard crochet project that i'm really excited about, after starting a bunch of other ones that didn't end up working out because i tried to design them myself and the counting was off. i'd actually seen these slipper booties a while back in an issue of a crochet magazine that is sometimes slightly granny-like but usually okay, and at the time i'd wanted to make them but didn't have the time or good yarns for the project. since i have done two major craft stock up trips this winter and have plenty of yarns and since i'd been super excited about trying out jacquard crochet, now was the time! here is the pattern, it's for cool slipper booties which was another factor in deciding to make the pattern since my pair of slipper boots is currently hanging on by a thread. I never wear them in public (unlike my regular slippers which can pass for moccasins) because they resemble the dreaded uggs, but they're so nice in winter when its fucking FREEZING outside, like right now at a blustery 24 degrees. i have always hated how they look, so it's an exciting prospect that i'll one day have an awesome, colorful, patterned pair that i made myself. knowing me, i'll probably try to find a way to attach soles to them to make them outside-friendly and then i'll wear them in public haha.

friday update

still have not done laundry.
made cookies instead.
jen maybe broke her toe?
finished one intersession class that was only a 2 week thing.
zombie apocalypse movies.
pumpkin spice latte from chocolatea.
it's the weekend.


also, had a weird dream that had something to do with my blog last night, don't remember details but someone had read my blog who i barely knew and they knew all this shit about me..... weird thought.

major crochet geek-out:

JACQUARD CROCHET!!!

So I've always really loved the look of traditional Scandinavian sweaters, which are usually knit. The intricate patterns and colorwork are so impressive. Anyone who is familiar with the fiber arts/handicraft knows that colorwork is basically the hardest, most intricate, eye-squinting, and frustration-inducing type of knit or crochet that exist. For those who don't know, when you crochet or knit a piece with multiple colors, like a fair-isle sweater (what's up posh spice?), you don't cut the yarn and tie on the knew color every time you need to switch colors, because then the sweater or whatever you're making would have knots all up in its grill and would be all lumpy. Instead the technique, which is hundreds and hundreds of years old, is to run one color through all the stitches you're making in the current color in such a way that it's hidden inside/behind the stitches, and then switch to that hidden color when you switch colors. That way there are no knots and constant tying on new colors, but it means you're working two strands of yarn at any time, and possibly many more if the item you're crocheting has many colors. What results are beautiful crocheted pieces with pretty colorful designs, just like knitting, created in a traditional Northern technique that people in Scandinavia and the Baltic area have been using for centuries. Being of partial Baltic descent myself (sup Latvia) I find this connection to craft history really cool. I always thought fair isle was just for knitting and that crochet didn't have an equivalent, and I had major knitting envy, even though every time I try to learn to knit i end up injuring myself, others, and my ego. Then I found out about this! It's called either jacquard crochet or tapestry crochet, because like woven tapestries it's colorful and pictorial. I'm so excited about trying some of this stuff out. I've been eye-ing some crocheted mittens done this way but I think the pattern is too advanced to attempt now, I'll try to make some test swatches and just play around first. I found this site, wow!, which is amazing so I'll be futzing around with this all winter I'm sure. Also, you've noticed I figured out how to post links on the blog, so no more copied and pasted websites guys! Gotta go crochet for 10000 years now!

oops! forgot to blog this week.... well, it was basically the same as last week. intersession classes are tiring, have too much reading, and way more work/hours per week than their measly 1 or 2 credit status. Maybe it's because the other years I did intersession I took art history classes so I was more interested in the material, but these classes seem way harder than the norm for intersesh. Blegh! I've been staying up super super late, like 5 or 6 am, and sleeping horribly late on the days I don't have class, and mostly pulling all nighters on the days I do have class. I can't seem to make myself start on my reading before midnight the night before, and then I finish everything class-related by like 8 am, sleep till 11 or so and then get up and go to class. It's not a good system but i can't seem to function like a real human. I'm exhausted all the time and just want to crochet and sleep and watch gilmore girls and do nothing else.

some proactive things i did manage this week:
finished two scarves for etsy shop
started a pair of glittens/convertible mittens. very excited about these!
read for classes and did class assignments
went to the grocery store and stocked up on foods
made lentil soup (delicious, easy)
avoided getting caught in the two snows we've had so far
called mimz and caught up with her
made awesome girl rock/female singers mix to cheer up jess about her stupid schmuck of an ex-bf

still need to do:
tidy room
organize all craft supplies
sleep regularly
laundry
B&N run- need books and supplies and tape for wall decoration project

fun things i did this week:
watched football game with jen and john, which involved lots of snacks and then me falling asleep after i lost interest in the game. jen made her delicious and oh-so-bad-for-you onion dip and her chili cheese dip, which involved cream cheese en mass quantities so i only ate a bit of that, and i made cheese straws- classic cheddar/cayenne and mozz/parm/pesto which are so good it should be illegal. Also drank New Orleans beer that I discovered while there and is delicious and probably the only amber beer I like. Also found kriek and black currant flavored geuze at the liquor store when j and i went there to get beer for the football game. Waiting for A and S to return so we can all experience it. v. excited about the prospect of anything black currant flavored. one of the all-time best macarons i ate while in france was a black currant (cassis in french, there's your french word of the day) in honfleur while we were on our weekend trip to Normandy. Droooool.

Being back in Baltimore is going well despite the cold cold cold weather and the immense amount of reading for each of my classes. it seems totally absurd that my one credit 100-level class has tons more reading than my 300-level 2 cred class, but both have way too much for intersession. In the 1 cred class, citizenship and nationalism, we have really good discussions though and it's an interesting topic, especially because the prof is from a former soviet state so she has a unique perspective. plus i think she likes me because on the first day she asked us what our citizenships and nationalities were and i said i was american of latvian and polish descent, and she's lithuanian so we got the baltic thing in common. my other class the teacher just lectures and we had to read an essay line by line all together because he seems to think we've never encountered any text more challenging than the tv guide, so.... yeah. We get to talk about the apocalypse and zombies and nuclear war a lot though, so that's lively.

j and i are going out tonight to get afghani food and drink even though i have reading to do for my classes tomorrow. it's not like i would start it until midnight anyways so it doesn't matter. i'm crocheting new things for etsy! yayyy! its 27 degrees out oy vey! instead of saying jesus christ like people do when theyre like its so cold jesus christ or something like that, im going to toss random jewish figures into my vernacular. Its so cold out, moshe rabeinu!!!! You can go straight to Gehenah mothafucka! Need to think of a Jewish/yiddish equivalent for douchebag.

etsy etsy etsyyy

so i'm getting closer to my new year's resolution of getting an etsy shop up and running (other new years resolutions include: stop biting nails, find work after graduation where i can learn new things, don't lose sight of my goals or my friends after graduating, try new things, find a nice jewish boy, and take risks, which i'm horrible at.) anyways, i went to michael's and bought a ton of supplies, which i'm very excited about.

now it's down to the finer details, like naming the shop. i was brainstorming with jess earlier and after coming up with many horrible ideas, i came up with a few cuties. input from anyone would be lovely as i'm the most indecisive person to walk the earth.
-in the lead we have, chartreuse crafteuse
- clementiny was takennnn waaahhhhhh
- tangeringaling but i'm not wild about that (mostly a reaction to seeing clementiny was taken)
- craftycat or crafty kitten but i feel like that's basically ripping off the name taylor and i came up with together and i don't want to steal it.
- bramble scramble (bramble is my favorite word in the english language)
- teacup picot (pronounced peeko, its ironically my least favorite crochet stitch)
- curl-up-cozy crafts

some are cheesier than others. littlebird crafts already exists, and petite oiseau is a bit hard to pronounce for les americaines so i nixed that idea. also if i ever open a maternity store for any reason, it will be called chrysanthemummy, i claim this. dumb people will think its chris and the mummy and that will allow me to feel superior which is always a pleasant little boost.

for some reason i cannot make myself do school work. it's my first reading assignment for intersession, and i can't even make myself finish it. usually at the start of a new semester i have a new burst of energy, but im still exhausted from travelling all day (had to sit with an annoying fellow hopkins guy who i know from hebrew school, can only tolerate so much saccharine my goodness). I think i might use parentheses too much. (but i love them). maybe i'll get fancy and switch to brackets. {maybe not}. Break was great over all despite catching a cold, endless rains and lack of sunshine. I didn't want to leave, but it's nice to be back in the apt in Baltimore. Desperately need to go to the grocery, will try to find time tomorrow. Lentil soup is in my future.

leaving for baltimore tomorrow. blergh. not excited to leave the warmth here and return to snow and freeze. also none of my friends' breaks are over yet so they're all still going to have fun and i have to jump ship early. intersession will be fun and i need the s credits, and i always love being at school, its just the process of packing, flying alllll dayyyy lonnnnggg and the prospect of the weather that deter me. yurk.

packed: about 75% done
sandwich for plane: made and in fridge
flight: in 5 hours
leave for airport: 2 and a half hours
sanity: nope
sleepiness: yesss
adhd-like distractions: shiny!

currently working on

Hey all! i'm still sick as all hell, but the good news is that it's giving me a lot of time to crochet and watch house reruns, which have already proven their importance as purveyors of wisdom in my life.

Currently crocheting a little baby outfit for my baby cousin Charlotte who i get to meet for the first time on Saturday night. I'm so excited to finally see this little wriggly thing in person! My second cousin Shayna was the first to get married the summer after i graduated high school, and then a bunch of other cousins followed suit in the years that have followed. Now she was the first one to have a baby, last September after a difficult pregnancy, so I'm hoping more cousins will have more babies soon! My cousin Ross's new wife is pregnant and due soon (they had to move their wedding up by like 8 months hahaha good job Ross! she was 4 months pregnant when they got married lolz) so there will soon be more babies to crochet for. I started making Charlotte a baby blanket with mini granny squares but i realized i wouldn't finish it before Saturday so I started making a little sweater for her instead. It will probably fit her when she's bigger, maybe like 9 months? And if I finish it soon enough I will make little crocheted leggings to go with it. SO cute! Basing it off a vintage crochet pattern from this site, which has a lot of cool vintage and antique patterns.
http://www.freevintagecrochet.com/free-crochet-patterns-for-children/five-piece-baby-set-american6e
Color is a nice fuschia/dark pink. I think the leggings will be a warm tan color, which i will use to trim the baby sweater, and use the dark pink to trim the leggings. Might make a little flower applique in the tan for the sweater also, which i need to find some chunky wooden buttons for. I know I have some around here somewhere. I'll post a picture when I'm all done with it. It's so little and cute! Babies aaahhh!!!

Back from New Orleans and a New Year

well new orleans was fun but kinda a bust because it's such a seafood-centric food culture, there was nothing for me to eat, and just slightly more for my parents and my brother who eat fish but keep kosher and therefore don't eat shell fish. i basically had side orders and salads all week and the rest of my family didn't even seem to notice as they were getting far too much enjoyment out of their fucking shrimp. it almost got to the point in when harry met sally where she has the fake orgasm in the restaurant, i mean the way they were carrying on about the damn shellfish was ridiculous. i don't care when people eat meat or fish in front of me, keeping kosher or being vegetarian is a personal choice and i don't care what other people do, but when theyre like making a scene in a restaurant its just like ENOUGH ALREADY! so the food issue was frustrating but new orleans itself was fun. it was good to see the family and its a neat city, but it's like las vegas; debauchery is the endgoal, means to the end, and starting point. if you're not up to your ears in alcohol, there's nothing to do. it got kind of tiring after a while, since i'm not into drinking for absolutely no reason all the time. i'll post a day by day of what we did while there later.

got home late on thursday night after a frustrating travel day of delayed flights, crying babies, lack of food choices in southern airports and smelly dogs on the plane. new years eve day, i got a haircut at a new place, happy with it. after my last haircut from carolyn in france, it could only get better haha. then i went home, helped mom cook for shabbat dinner, and then it was off to laura's to get a ride with her to jessica's party. jess always has new years eve parties and they are always insane, this year being no exception. the ex-bf was texting me annoyingly, i answered the first one, the ignored a bunch, then seeing as i was drunk, i decided it was a great idea to text him random letters and numbers. he hasnt texted me since so i am pretty happy with that decision. also at the party, i apparently was flirted with by people. it appears i don't notice when guys flirt with me, i can't differentiate between flirting and just talking. jess's advice is to just always assume everyone is flirting with you, and flirt back. i like this idea and will now be executing it. hey, how you doin'? that's right. but yeah, the party was tons of fun, from what i recall. slept over at jess's and the next morning, after we all regained the strength to stand up and get dressed, despite MEGA HANGOVERS, and went to norm's for breakfast around noon.

i love norm's. SO MUCH. cheap greasy spoon, walking distance from jessica's apt and home of the best hangover food ever: loaded hashbrowns. for like $2.50, you get hashbrowns covered in cheese, tomatoes, green onions and salsa. DELICIOUS. it was the perfect hangover food, even though i was almost dyingggg. took a note from A's book and had some seltzer. laura drove me home after we finished breakfast and cleaned jess's apartment from the party mess, and then i spent the rest of the day recuperating. and then yesterday i went to andrew, and old camp/usy friend's graduation party and saw a bunch of the old usy crew. then once i got home, i seemed to have caught a cold. i thought when i woke up feeling congested, it was just allergies, but now it's clearly more. today has been miserable. i am queen of tissues and mucus and tea. ugghhh headcolds, why can i never fully escape you, especially when im on winter break?

time for more medecine and a nap!

Away Till Thursday

I'll be in New Orleans until next Thursday for a family vacation! Woooo! Here's to hoping I don't get horribly sick of all my relatives too quickly! Already dreaming of beignets. avec un cafe creme peut-etre? je le manque immensement, le cafe francais! mais tant pis, il y a des coffee bean and tea leafs ici en la californie, alors on ne peut pas plaindre. maybe i'll get to brush up on my french this week in Nola, though I don't know if the french down in La Nouvelle Orleans is too different from the french i know. i mean, french canadians are like a huge mystery to me as far as their language is concerned (a mix of modern french, pre-revolutionary french, and english. like the friction alkool!) so we'll see how New Orleans French compares. i should definitely be doing more french things this break so i don't forget everything. i must have a book in french around here someplace.

Ok then, off to sleep before my early flight tomorrow! A plus tard!

weekend

spent the day at e's helping her cook for the twenty family members she's expecting tomorrow. together we chopped up and then caramelized 13 onions to make onion tarts. a labor of love, let me tell you. love and onion-tears. mixed the caramelized onions with eggs, nutmeg, salt and pepper and put them in pie shells, topped with kalamata olives and baked. mmmm! then we watched easy a, after eating some trader joe's veggie pizza. surprisingly funny movie, and it was pretty cute. has this guy in it http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0046112/, like every teen romance movie ever, but he's super cute so i'm not complaining. if only he were more keatsian, then we'd be talking. it was great to see e and catch up after so long, hadn't seen her since summer. she gave me a mix cd which im excited to rock out to later.

been planning my etsy a lot, so many ideas it's hard to know what's a feasible of amount of projects to actually aim to get on there, and where to draw the line of whether the project would be worth the labor and process for the price i would get for it on etsy. i definitely need some stash busting projects since i have like 8 skeins of lime green yarn and a bunch of other random colors. smhm would tell me to make 10000000 lime green coasters. she would LOVE that. currently watching house and needlepointing, and one of the characters asked house, "why do you try so hard to not be human?" very interesting question, i think that's probably something we all struggle with. trying so hard to extend ourselves, be all we can be, push push push ourselves, reject normalcy, reject adequacy, strive for more. sometimes that's good. sometimes we all just need to chill the fuck out and take a power nap. that's my life philosophy. finally understand that after 4 years of hopkins and before that 4 years in a crazy demanding magnet program, constantly berating myself for not doing better, not getting the grades i felt i deserved and not achieving every single thing i set out to. but you know what? that shit doesn't really matter. i mean, of course it does, but not nearly as much as my academic institutions had me believe/would continue to have me believe. and also, i am doing pretty well, so i don't need to stress so much. thanks for liberating me, house reruns. awesome.
in other news, linzer cookies are soooo good. i should make some with the lingonberry jam we have back in baltimore. yummm! my brother told me he had a piece of gooseberry pie last night. first of all, what is a gooseberry? second of all, where did he go at 1 am on xmas eve night and find an open restaurant serving exotic pies? why, dupar's of course. you can always depend on diners, that's another life philosophy. power naps, diner's, humus, yogurt, crafting, and bear hugs. yup.