Truth.

I have fifteen pounds to lose.

Sucker

Someone brought me flowers yesterday. It was hokey, so friendly and sentimental it was almost suave, and so ... nice.

I wonder what is going on with me right now that I could be so easily bowled over by a bunch of flowers in a cheesy red plastic vase.

30 days

Well maybe for like 29, but that's how long I have to move into a new place. I'm really scared I won't find one!

Updates

Evacuation Warnings, Statistics

NY Times

Four years later

San Diego is burning again.

Updates

Photos

The big 2-2

Happy Birthday Ms Lindsey!
Today is the first anniversary of your 21st birthday :)

Hundred Dollar Baby

My trachcan is a graveyard for bugs. I've got all kinds, but it's mostly spiders, moth, and silverfish, all smushed with whatever book I happen to be reading. And I feel pretty bad about it! I went through this whole great phase towards the end of my stay in LA, where I captured the bugs in a cup and released them outside of my apt. But the owners of this place have this amazing garden in the backyard that I haven't been able to enjoy because it's cold and there are so many bugs attracted to all the plants. As a result, whenever I open my windows for some fresh air, at the end of the day when I'm cleaning up my room, I always find bugs hiding underneath a bag or my pajamas. There are so many and I'm so tired after a full day of work that I just end up smashing them with a book.

Sorry about the boring post about bugs in my apartment, but I feel really guilty about killing so many bugs. Especially after a full day at my work. This kind of helps

What also helps is It's Always Sunny in Philidelphia. The guys who write that show are messed up in the head, in the best way possible. I also like that they use Danny DeVito to promote their show when really the show is really helping Danny DeVito.

Belated Chronicle

Wednesday, Aug. 29., 5:30 a.m.
Harvard MBTA Station - I'm alone with my small duffel, bus tickets, and an old woman carrying many plastic CVS bags. Thankfully (for the sake of packing) and unfortunately (for the sake of my make-believe vanity), I am going to New York now and not during Fashion Week, so my ugly little duffel holds only extra socks, an extra pair of underwear, toiletries, a towel, and a sleeping bag--no Diane von Furstenburg, no absurd heels this time; there will be no parties for the crashing.

South Station, 6 a.m.

State Street

South Station Bus Terminal, above the escalator

Central Park, 11:00 a.m.
I arrive in the city around 11 a.m. It's hot and the last hour was spent listening to another passenger behind me make painfully ignorant comments about Harlem as we made the inch by inch journey (This point in the bus ride is always the least comfortable; everyone is awake and aware of arrival, but everyone still has to stay on the bus for another hour while the bus squeezes its way to the Port Authority). I am waiting for a friend to call. I toy with the idea going to the American Natural History Museum, as I have just seen the Squid and the Whale a few days prior. I muck around Central Park and marvel at the pages of erotic hotlines in the Village Voice instead.

Reminds me of the opening sequence of "The Critic."


Realizing that my companion won't be arriving any time soon, I go to the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. It is free because they are renovating.

A solar-powered cooking contraption.


Flowers.

He was so excited about the ice cream. Cameo by my sneakers. My companion has called, I am in the final stretch of the wait in front of the Guggenheim.


Finally inside, my friend having arrived and both of us having paid the astronomical entrance fee.

The money shot. Couldn't resist.

I thought his shirt and blank expression complemented the museum nicely.
Next we head to Astoria for the last screening of the outdoor foreign film festival in Socrates Sculpture Park. Put on by the Museum of the Moving Image.
We watch "Crossing the Bridge," a documentary about music in Istanbul. We eat Turkish food. We don't stay for the second feature about bossa nova.

Rather than paying for $40 for a bed at the Hostel International with the wild, backpacking Europeans, I take my generous companion's offer to put me up at his house on Long Island. After munching plantain chips at Empanada Mama in Hell's Kitchen and bemoaning our underage status, we head out on the LIRR.

Oyster Bay, 1:30 a.m.
I stay in the "Library with Bed." I have pulled a volume of chronicles of Siberian travels. I decide that I want my children to have a library with bed. The next morning I meet his parents and they talk to me about art history and their artist friends.

The next morning, early, I return to the city alone-- I tunnel through the humidity in the subway and resurface in China Town. I hope the absurdity of the mannequin's breasts is evident in this photo.

A few blocks and a witnessing of an arrest later, I find myself in Little Italy, where the stalls of ChinaTown morph suddenly into cafes with faux marble tabletops and gaudy red, green, and white signage. I take a coffee and pastry break.

Fire escape; Italian pride.

Finally, I come to my long-awaited (say 2 years?) destination: 11 Mercer Street. And here, my make-believe vanity is lost forever. As I've mentioned, I decided consciously not to bring another outfit for my 2-day jaunt in New York City, let alone a fashionable frock and flats which may have at least shielded me with superficial, designer dignity before I ruined my future in the social circles of Manhattan forever.

No, instead, I enter the Visionaire gallery in a Banana Republic tee slightly damp with sweat, jeans of a wrong, mismatched wash, and half-broken sneakers from Taiwan whose "label" is scratched out with Sharpie marker. I muster up all my courage to ring the buzzer, and in that fateful motion, I think, lose it all. I hem and haw to the girl sitting at the desk buying Beyonce tracks from the iTunes store, and muck around the spare, one-room gallery. The walls of the "exhibition" are merely white, temporary partitions, and there is doorway which coyly suggests the existence of deeper chambers. In my sweaty delirium, having just emerged from the gaudiness of Little Italy and the smuttiness of China Town, I think it would be a good idea to explore.

The second I slide back the partition door I can feel the conversation and my dignity run out of the room. Do I turn around and go quickly? Do I act with confidence and browse like I belong? The young man and the chic woman siting at a table folding invitations look up at me. I nod and smile in acknowledgment and uneasily look around. I am positively choking on the awkwardness of the situation when finally the woman puts me out of my misery with a patronizing look, "Um. I think she's looking for you." I turn around and the iTunes girl is frantically, "Oh, goddammit"ly coming after me and making every gesture short of pulling me out by the elbow to shoo me out. I leave the gallery shortly thereafter.

I catch my breath and pretend to feel human and wonder why China Town borders SoHo (who could possibly ever be appropriately dressed for both? oh, right.) Escape to the New York Public Library. If there's anything I've done more of at Harvard than lose my fashion sense it's read. I go to the History of Art and Architecture reading room and read about McKim, Mead, and White and New York Row Housing. It's mildly calming and air conditioned. I debate trying to make it to the Statue of Liberty or Coney Island but my nerves are failing me. I pack up for Port Authority.

State Street. 10 p.m.

Basically my new job is to keep you updated on Ray

“I was afraid when I first met them that they'd be like their onstage personas, but they're all really nice guys,” Suen said of his Louis XIV band mates. “I have come to realize, though, that none of my pants are tight enough to be in this band.”

Considering his prodigious musical skills, Suen's wardrobe shortcomings won't be a problem.

Gee whiz, I'd forgotten how clever journalists can be. What a linguistic gem. (I don't mind so much the man's repeated drooling, printed messes of unbridled joy only because they're over my deserving brother, but really? I wish someone else would write about you, already. This guy makes me vom a little in my mouth every time I read . Lindsey, do you think you could plug Ray in the Jewish World News?)

Oh, but who am I kidding, I love Ray enough to smile at things like this:

[Suen's] new gig came about after O (of fluf and Reeve Oliver fame) recommended him as perhaps the only violinist in town who could single-handedly fill the role of the 30-piece, Electric Light Orchestra-inspired string section featured on Louis XIV's next album, due out early next year.

So baller.

Read more here.

My Brother's a Rock Star

Bona Fide. So bright that he's gotta wear sunglasses at night.

He's touring with these dudes all over this dirt-mound. Go see him! Say hello and tell him his sister thinks those glasses are just plain silly!

thought you should know...

I have a job. (<--that's a link)

Oh Well, Okay.

So maybe it's not as easy as just saying so.

I'm choosing classes now, finding I'm not that interested in some of the prospects, and getting really nervous about my whimsical dream of being an architect. I have no qualifications, no experience, and I feel locked in to academic obligations that aren't going to lead to the acquisition to either of those things.

I don't really know who to go to for advice, either. I'm very much more than a little lost, in a way that I haven't ever been while at school. I've always had some conviction or another for the classes I was taking (I'm pretty sure I even came up with a good justification for Choral Conducting freshman year), but now I am not sure why I would take "Body Image in French Visual Culture" (I'm not) and realizing that I can't take the studio and history courses I would like to take because I need to graduate. I am doing things like playing ultimate frisbee and working on a shabby literary magazine when really I should be applying for monkey work entry level positions at an architecture firm so that I can really figure out what I want to do with myself.

Man, I am cranky.

92067

Rancho Santa Fe is the 3rd most expensive zip code in the US.

Rich Motherf***ers.

My roommate listens to Chinese music I don't understand.

Eric went to see Tally Hall tonight. By himself. I wanted to see them last night, when they were San Francisco but I wasn't willing to go by myself. I probably should have, but, that's hard.

Instead, I'm in my apartment, watching Freaks and Geeks and City of God.

Or reading while listening to the NPR live broadcast of the National.

Or on my laptop while listening to the NPR live broadcast of the National.

The National's pretty good.

another thunderstorm is brewing

I should make a photo essay.

LeeAnn predicted that the troops would come back to Half What in September, and it seems as if she was right. September is a good time to start and finish things. The good news is that my calender is just a little more crowded this month than last month (not just because i'm going to see Andrew Bird this weekend and Rilo Kiley next weekend), and my e-mail inbox and phone are just a just a little more happening since I applied for a billion jobs last week. I don't want to talk about it until I have a little money in my bank account and a couple more pairs of black pants in my closet, but I feel like i'm standing with my bathing suit on and my toesies over the lip of a bright, sunny, glistening pool (to steal a well-worn metaphor from a good friend). The only problem is they left the cover on. So i'm waiting for them to take it off. They're beginning to peel it back.

Thankfully, vats of water aren't the only thing that will keep me cool this week, because it suddenly got a little bit cooler. Beginning: today. And last weekend. In fact, while my family was complaining about the 90 degree heat and lack-of-power in California, I was lounging in the cool evening on Navy Pier, having just survived a trip on the Ferris Wheel. But yesterday it was disgusting. And I know I have to buy a big damn winter coat soon, and i'll be complaining about the cold in a few short months, but right now this respite is nice. My little hidden kitchen in the back of the house with no windows and no air circulation needs a break from the humidity. And my skin needs a break from the harsh, dry (but cold) air of my old little window air conditioner.

I still have yet to decide what warrants posting on a la deriva, and what on Half What. But what the hell, it's September, I belong here.

There were a lot of whats in that sentence.

A Night of Rental Movies...

I'm going to make friends up here, right?

Let's just get one thing straight:

I want to be an architect.

I'm alive!

Okay, if you guys get an email from blogger, totally sorry about that one, I forgot what my login was and they just sent an email to everyone. Also, crazily enough, I honestly forgot this blog existed. I'm sorry, that was really lame of me. Anyways lots have been going on, and I dunno how much you guys know, so here's a rundown:

1) Didn't get into medical school

2) I'm okay with 1) because this means that I can get a job and be financially independent by the next time I apply, meaning I get better loans.

3) The other reason that I'm okay with 1) is that I found out that my dad wants to start his own company and this makes it way easier for him to do that since he doesn't have to worry about paying anything for me (as opposed to having to pay for medical school tuiton and living expenses) for the next couple of years.

4) I've got a job doing research at UCSF, like a real "I'm on salary job not just washing dishes for 10 dollars an hour job"... which means that I'm moving to San Francisco. Currently, I'm looking for apartments.

5) It's been about a month since I got back from Southeast Asia... you guys knew that I was going there for a month, right? Anyways, me and Eric have pictures up on Facebook if you guys are interested. I can't wait to go traveling again!

Edit: Been reading the older posts, the layout looks great leeann. Your posts do intimidate the crap out of me to write anything because I sound like a kindergartner next to you (no offense all you 5-yr olds out there reading this), but they're great too.

remmuS: A Photo Essay

Suckwagon, 2007 BUDA Summer League Champs: In some absurd twist of events, our 8th seeded summer league team won the Boston Ultimate Disc Alliance's summer tournament this past weekend in Devens. We're a bunch of Harvard alumni and students, and we are called Suckwagon. We cheer for dysentery and cholera because that's the stuff that kills you in Oregon Trail (a game in which, I am told, you ride in wagons). I call it an absurd twist of events because for most of the first day of the tournament, we felt and played like this...
ZSRT has died of cholera. Here Lies ZSRT: This is a kid we call "Scuttle." I find that our Harvard teams aren't big on cheering and nicknaming, but a few names stick. Like this one. I think he is called Scuttle because one of his middle names is Sebastian, and Sebastian is a crab in the little mermaid. Speaking of mermaids...
The East Coast: I discovered that East "Coast" is not figurative and that there are beaches, too. And some of them are glorious and lovely, like Singing Beach in Manchester-by-the-Sea. Granted, it costs a $5 entrance fee and an hour and a half of travel on the subway and commuter rail, but that's the price you pay when you live in a godforsaken place like this. I went out to Singing Beach three times (luxury!) this summer, where the water is frigid (brainfreezes from going under!) and there are no burritos nearby. However, there is...
"Eat More Ice Cream": On the ten minute walk between the commuter rail station and Singing Beach is a little ice cream shack belonging to a one Captain Dusty. Not shown in the picture is the flag which commands passersby to "eat more ice cream."

Fresh Frozen Chinese-Takeout: In spite of the captain's orders, my roommate and I tried to avoid consuming an all ice-cream diet. Pictured here is what appears to be Shaw's attempt at spicing up the frozen vegetables section.
More sweets: My mom came to visit, and we hit up the best eats and sleeps of Boston and Cambridge--The Charles Hotel, Casablanca, Legal Seafood, Changsho, Henrietta's Table brunch, Upstairs on the Square, and of course, on the last night, Finale's for dessert and the appropriate dessert wine (here, a Muscat, I believe).

Yellow fever: Went to Chicago, played frisbee, hung out with the Simpsons (and Lindsey!).
Became a Simpson.

The Lube: I worked in a space known fondly as the Cube. It is part of the Media Lab at MIT. It looks like this. It is a Lab... in a Cube. By another absurd and welcome turn of events, I will keep working with this professor and possibly accompany him to his opening in Beijing next year.
Fighting the power, lo-budge: We do wacky things like (clockwise from left) make Unmanned Aerial vehicles to track anti-immigrant vigilante groups on the U.S. - Mexico border, jackets which can be activated to shock aggressive attackers, and unmanned ground vehicles to protest outside Foster-Miller, maker of such military devices as SWORDS.DeWolfe: My humble abode.
The first thing I did when I got to my humble abode was put up the things that reminded me of the good people back home.

Danger!

There were five of these signs on the ceiling of North Station.