a fair warning: this post is going to be way more on the “dear diary” side than my usual social commentaries in today’s world that are filled with insight and well-thought out perspectives and analysis. well, that’s not true at all. what is true, though, is that this post will be way more gushy and girly than anything i’ve posted ever before, so i thought a warning/disclaimer should be in order. (more…)

i am blessedly able to say that i have, not just one but, several best friends. most of them are scattered around. a few in austin, one in new york, another in college station, tx, but, once again, blessedly i have a friend who chose to attend the same university as me. we spend lots of time together, because friends as close as she and i usually do things like that. i totally love her to death, and if she wasn’t around as much as she is, i seriously would be way more unstable. she definitely helps keep me grounded. among her many, many special qualities that make me (and lots of other people) love her, we also share lots of things. well, maybe not that many. i really believe that a major reason we’ve been such good friends for so long is that we sort of mush together. we complement each other. whereas i, at times, lack a social filter, and consistently put my foot in my mouth, she is much more guarded and tactful. and so on. however, we do have similar opinions regarding lots of things. we like a lot of the same music, movies, and books. (more…)

i’m taking this american literature class right now with the theme of women and the houses they live in. we started with some pretty typical stuff: anne bradstreet’s “upon the burning of our house”, emily dickinson’s “there’s been a death in the opposite house”, but now we’re moving on to more contemporary stuff. last week, we were supposed to read toni morrison’s beloved and i absolutely hated it. i know that toni morrison is supposed to be this amazing writer, and i don’t doubt for a millisecond that she is. it’s just that i’d never read anything by her, and all of a sudden, i’m expected to read beloved and it’s crazy. definitely too heavy for me. there’s all this talk about dead babies and their angry ghosts and cow-fuckers and i hated it. i couldn’t get past the first few chapters. i know i’ll have to, because i’ll be tested on my knowledge of the course content, but i’m not looking forward to it. i’m simply not. (more…)

here in town is a bar/restaurant-type place that can be a nice hang-out. tuesday evenings at this establishment are really nice. the mood is quiet and relaxed, the bartenders are at ease and friendly, and people are usually nowhere to be found. my friend and i discovered this well-kept secret a few months ago, and we enjoy going there. however, one day one of us suggested that we perhaps go on friday, because …. well, i don’t know the reason now, but we went. instead of quiet, the mood was loud and obnoxious. instead of the bartenders being at ease, they were rude and agitated. and instead of there being no people around, there were people everywhere. and of every kind. there were the type of people with whom you hoped you would never have to share a roof, people you hoped you’d never have to see after high school, and people who should never leave their homes. cages. whatever. (more…)

most of my close friends know about my current crushes. i pluralize the word because there are always several, and i use the word “current” because i tend to fall in and out of “love” quite often. however, in the proverbial spinning rolodex that contains all the usually inadequate objects of my attentions, there has been one person whose contact card has not been crumpled up and thrown out. for obvious reasons, i won’t actually name this lucky fellow. i can imagine that if i did, someone who is acquainted with him would take a sudden yet totally innocent interest in this blog, see his name, raise their eyebrows in a somewhat high degree of incredulity, and bring it to this certain person’s attention. (more…)

i signed up to last.fm, the music community website, almost three years ago. i don’t know anyone really in real life that uses it, but to put it simply, it’s kind of like the website pandora and facebook would produce if websites could get married, go on a honeymoon, and bam! nine months later, have this beautiful social networking/internet radio baby. to use last.fm, you have to set up whatever media players you use on your own computer. this way, whenever you’re just working on your laptop and listening to music at the same time, last.fm is quietly working away in the background, keeping track of everything you’re listening to. this is called scrobbling. scrobbling lets you do lots of really cool things. for one, last.fm keeps track every single artist you’ve listened to and the amount of times a particular song has been heard. it also puts together a radio station just for you and everything it knows you love to listen to. however, not only do you get a radio station with the music you hear, you also get a station made up solely of recommendations, artists and songs last.fm thinks you would enjoy listening to. scrobbling also helps out by finding people with similar tastes and calling you neighbors. (more…)