The tree said, “I wish I could be a different kind of tree.”
Well, this sure is overdue. I’m going to make it a lightening post, and hopefully this will get me back in the swing of it. My life’s been fairly uneventful. Over winter break I saw Juno. I thought it was pretty amazing. The writing was extremely intelligent, the acting was good, as was the directing and costuming, and the soundtrack (which I downloaded immediately) was one of the best I’d heard in quite a while. My local newspaper’s film critic gave it a bad review because she claimed that it “confused” the already complicated and unfortunate situation of teen pregnancy by depicting it in a way that in no manner resembles the actual experience. While I agree that teen pregnancy is undoubtedly nothing like the movie, I feel that the critic was letting personal moral standards interfere with her disinterested evaluation of the film.
For Christmas I got, among other things, and incredibly nice pair of headphones (which I am now using to listen to Sgt. Pepper’s). I feel kind of bad because they must have been very expensive, but they are absolutely amazing for just about anything–low frequencies are excellent, high ones shine, classical music is beautiful, and rock songs reveal details I didn’t know where there before. For my birthday, my family bought me a wollemi pine through National Geographic. It may not seem like a big deal to get a two-year-old pine tree for a gift, but this is no ordinary tree. The Wollemia nobilis has been thought to be extinct for thousands of years. Then, in 1994 an intrepid explorer found fewer than 100 mature trees in the wild growing in a valley outside of Sydney, Australia. Since then, a preservation effort has been underway, part of which is selling young trees to reduce the chance that an unfortunate accident could wipe out the species. Anyway, it’s an incredible plant. You should check out the official page for the distribution company or the Wikipedia page.
Hopefully more regular updates this coming month…
Their shiny, bright standards are waving.
Wow, a lot since the last post, not the least of which was the trip to Florida for the Vandy/Gators game two weekends ago. The 15 hour overnight dive each way was hard. I don’t sleep well on buses, and I’d hardly slept at all the week previous. I didn’t sleep much Friday night either because we had to get up at 5:30 on Saturday morning. It was all worth it though to spend Friday in the Magic Kingdom. We saw the whole thing and rode pretty much all of the rides. There were a lot of people there, somewhat surprisingly, but none of the lines were very long (I think the longest was 20 min.). That night we ate dinner at Planet Hollywood in Downtown Disney. They had one of the original suits from the movie Tron hanging on the wall, which was awesome. If you haven’t seen that movie, then you need to. Then we stopped by the Ghirardelli store and got some of the most delicious chocolate ice cream ever. The game on Saturday was extremely disappointing. I was, in fact, embarrassed to be associated with Vanderbilt. Our team was just awful. Anyway, I spent the last week recovering from that trip and the previous week.
This past weekend I saw the Vanderbilt Theater production of The Tempest. I’ve been working on the costumes for it for the past month. It was great to finally see them finished and in use. The production was great (aside from the amazing costumes). A few people from my theater class were in it, including the writer for my group for the play that is our theater final. Unfortunately, I have to write a paper on the production for Friday.
I also have a revision for my second Faulkner paper due Thursday. I was supposed to have gotten my professor’s edits to the first draft last Thursday, but I accidentally slept through class (the first one of the semester!). So I’m going to get the paper tomorrow instead. This means that I have two days to edit it, rather than seven. I think this paper is going to need a lot of revising, too. Also, I have to sign up for classes by Friday. I have no idea what I want to take, and I still don’t have the adviser code that allows me to sign up. I’ll get it pulled together somehow.
Meanwhilst, I have poems to edit before a meeting with my poetry professor tomorrow to discuss how I’m doing in the class so far. I’m somewhat nervous because we literally only get one grade in the class; the final one on a portfolio of eight of our poems. I have to make sure all of my poems are flawless before I submit them; I really need a 3.5 in my English classes.
The Tron suit:
The movements were beautiful all in your ovaries.
Two weekends ago was Fall Break for Vanderbilt. I went home and ended up doing pretty much nothing, which was a great break for me. I saw The Nightmare Before Christmas in 3D with my sister an mom. It was really cool, and put me in the Halloween mood. I stopped by school, and sat in on band rehearsal. They were playing pieces I remembered from my sophomore year, so it was sort of nostalgic for me. I also visited the lady at the costume shop and showed her the Tsukasa outfit I made for ACen last year. I also said hi to Mr. Bleck; it was good to see him again.
Kevin, Alexa, Sarah, Jessica, and I went to The Rocky Horror Picture Show Saturday at midnight. Sarah and Jessica were RHPC virgins, so that was fun. When we got there, the show was sold out, even though we were there an hour early. I ended up walking up and down the line to get in that had formed outside asking if people wanted to sell their tickets. Most people ignored me, and I got cat calls from others. Somehow we were able to piece together five tickets at a reasonable price. We had a great time, though my feet hurt horribly by the end of the night.
This week has been/is crazy for me. I had a philosophy paper due on Monday. I also had a theater test on Monday which I had 5 hours of sleep for, due to the philosophy paper. I had a villanelle due this morning. I have a Faulkner paper due Thursday. This week sort of sucks for me.
On a positive note, however, the band is going with the football team to Florida for the game this weekend. We leave Thursday night and will get in early Friday. Since the game isn’t until Saturday, we have all of Friday free. This means Disney World, the happiest place on Earth. Honestly, that’s what’s getting me through this week. I’m so excited.
The fish, cut into jagged pieces, bleeds quietly in the pan.
Life at Vanderbilt has been hectic. Last weekend was homecoming for us. Kristy came down to visit Thursday through Sunday. It had a great time (and I think she did too). She ended up helping build the band’s float for the parade for most of Friday while I was in classes and rehearsal. Saturday was filled with band for me. My call time for the parade was 11:30, and homecoming-related band activities ended at 9:30. I was exhausted by the end of the day.
My homework has suddenly gotten crazy. I have a theater paper due tomorrow which I haven’t started. I’m not too worried, though; it’s short and should be relatively easy. I have a Jewish Studies paper due next Wednesday (right after our Fall break). For my JS paper I had to fill out three worksheets correctly, read the American Sociology Association’s guidelines for the ethical treatment of subjects, sign something that says I read and understand the ASA guidelines, and then interview two Jews. After I complete all of this I can finally start my 7 page paper comparing the two individuals’ constructions of their Jewish identity. I have a meeting at 9:15 tomorrow morning (aka way too early) with the professor to discuss my paper proposal. Also due next Wednesday is an 8 page paper in my Gender & Sexuality class discussing contemporary constructs of the “male” and “masculine” as inspired by Simone de Beauvoir’s quotation “One is not born, but rather becomes a woman.” The week after that I have due an 8 page paper discussion the positioning of Darl as an omniscient super-narrator in Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying.
As last weekend drew to a close, I realized that there was no way I was going to be able to complete all of these assignments on time and retain my sanity. As per usual, my procrastination and voracious appetite for wasting time got me into a tight spot. So yesterday I asked my JS professor for an extension on the paper. He said, “No. It was given well in advance.” I was sort of expecting this answer, but it made me feel like a jerk for asking for an extension. Because of his rejection, I then asked my G&S professor for an extension. She was more than willing, given my explanation (simplified and exaggerated for effect though it may have been), and now my paper is due a week from Monday, which takes considerable pressure off my shoulders.
I turned in a sestina for my poetry class on Tuesday. I had never written a sestina before, and I found that I really, really liked it (or at least liked it more than the other forms). I wrote my about fat, using the keywords “book, leaf, hate, becoming, food, and fat.” Some of the students snickered at the title “Sestina for Her Fat,” which is understandable, but entirely not what I had intended, as the poem is rather serious and actually kind of disgusting. I really hope that they like it. We don’t have class next week, which is a blessing and a curse. The poems due for the following week are villanelles. He said that we were given two weeks for the villanelle because it is the hardest form.
This coming weekend is Fall break, which I’m super excited about. I get to go home and hang out with my sister, mostly. I think I’ll also visit school and show Ms. Halajian the costume that I made for the convention last May and tell her how well I’m doing at the costume shop on campus. I’m planning to see Across the Universe this weekend with my whole family, and hopefully The Nightmare Before Christmas which is opening in 3D on Imax tomorrow. I’m pumped. The downside is that I will be working on my papers for most of the break, as teachers decided to have them due right afterwards. It’s really unfortunate that they all fall not only at the same time, but all right after my break (essentially negating the relaxing effects of the break).
Well, I really need to get back to work if I’m to get any sleep tonight. I leave for the airport at 5pm tomorrow. Everyone have a great break!
Here are some cats, because cats make just about anything better:
Welcome to Plan B.
Okay, well, several things since last post. Two weeks ago we finally had a weekend off from band, which was refreshing. I didn’t end up doing much, but it was good to have a relaxing weekend. We watched Sphere. I had forgotten how good it was. I think the book is even better, though. I would highly recommend both of them. This weekend we watched The Breakfast Club, one of the great 80’s coming-of-age films. It was filmed at a high school near my home town, and the final shot of Bender walking across the football field was filmed at my high school’s stadium.
Next weekend is the Vanderbilt Marching Invitational where the Spirit of Gold hosts a high school marching competition. The event is run entirely by SOG students, and the money we make goes to our scholarship. It should be a lot of work, but a lot of fun. We’re required to work half the day, and TBS people have to work the whole day. I’m not in TBS, but I signed up for the whole day in a desperate attempt to garner as many brownie points as I can in my quest to become drum major next year.
Unfortunately I had to miss rehearsal on Friday. It was the only rehearsal I’ve missed so far, and I haven’t been late to any. Anyway, I missed it because I went to hear Salman Rushdie speak. He was incredibly articulate (as one might hope) and very funny. He had some interesting things to say on the role of the author in the 21st century. It was interesting to see how his opinions were informed by his own situation and literary history.
During the Q&A:
Audience member: “How do you think one should cultivate an appreciation for literature?”
Salman Rushdie: “Well, reading helps.”
Reading: Light in Ausust (still) William Faulkner
As I Lay Dying William Faulkner
Midnight’s Children Salman Rushdie
Norwegian Wood Haruki Murakami
Listening to: Five Iron Frenzy
