realization:

"oh my god!! do you realize what we're doing?!"
"what?"
"dinner and a movie!"
*horrified faces*
"the world is going to implode"

the ticket sales guy seemed quite amused.

Solstice

brainstorming ways to celebrate Solstice with my Dad: "we could ask [the incredibly Baptist neighbor next door] if he wants to have a drum circle!"

there is no way Jesus was born in december, even that close to the equator. those poor [fictional] shepherds.
in case any of you still had any doubts about it, the Gospels are mythology, and the Nativity stories even moreso. nobody was around when Jesus was born. they made up stories about what they thought should have happened because, as my Origins of Christianity prof put it, "all great men must have extraordinary births."
way to go early Christians for co-opting a pagan festival to convince the pagans that they were already practicing your religion anyway.

that said...
if people realized that every newborn child has the potential to change the world for the better, that every person who has ever been and will ever be born has a story to tell, that Jesus was just another man, albeit one who was charismatic enough to make people listen--maybe the world would be a better place, and maybe Christmas would serve as the reminder it should be.

Things learned/confirmed in the first semester of grad school:

-Grown-ups only pretend to know what they're doing.
-Life is way more important than school.
-Things get done.
-Shit is pointless, but we do it anyway.
-Several things i don't want to do with my life.
-My family is actually pretty awesome.
-So are my friends.
-So are most people, if you give them the chance to be.
-I couldn't have gone anywhere else.

Personal efficacy

i just overheard some boys in the hall talking about how they don't need to re-register to vote once they move because "we won't be voting again for another few years anyway." then one said, "unless you vote in local elections," and another laughed.

THIS is why city politicians can get away with proposing things like taxes on college tuition!!

Lecture, revisited (or, Peer Education)

at the bar (paraphrased):

I learned in class this semester why I can't do shots. One of the classes I'm taking this term is called Dysphagia, which means swallowing disorders, so I get to spend a semester learning about swallowing (cool, huh?). There are a bunch of different stages of a swallow, the part you do in your mouth and the part in your throat and the part in between. So there are two main types of oral preparatory stages: the tipper swallow and the dipper swallow. Most people use a tipper swallow, where you hold whatever's in your mouth on top of your tongue and then push it straight back when you're ready to swallow. But 20% of normal healthy young people, and this number increases with age, do a dipper swallow, where you hold whatever it is under your tongue until you're ready to swallow, and then dip down with your tongue tip and move it back. And that's what I do! which i never knew before, because i never knew that such a thing existed. So it makes perfect sense that I can't do shots, because I hold the alcohol under my tongue before swallowing it, and that just doesn't work out. It's nothing I'm doing wrong, I'm just physiologically indisposed to taking shots. (or, if you prefer to think of it this way, i'm part of a perfectly healthy swallow-related minority.)

i told my professor the story of this mini-lecture after class this week, prefaced by, "Can I share something completely ridiculous with you?"

moment:

the crazy security lady today told me she listens to talk radio, and has probably been doing so "since i was in vitro"

Midnight adventures

"Someday, we're going to go on a normal date, and it's going to be the weirdest thing ever."
"What, you mean like, dinner and a movie?"

leaving at 11:00 because we just had to go somewhere
"my carbon footprint hates me"
getting in the car and choosing our own background music
getting lost, or not lost,
because it doesn't matter where you are
driving and driving and not knowing what was on fire
ending up in West Virginia
just to eat waffles
"i feel like i'm driving guitar hero"
on Rte 79
missing Pittsburgh entirely
because we ran out of gas
(almost)
ending up in the middle of the woods in Beaver county
on the opposite side of lost
"you can't call me from the middle of the woods and ask me to google-maps you"
the dude in the bitchin car who caught up
after i opened up
and played a game or had a conversation
depending on your point-of-view
if i had a car like that, i would too
but what if i was just being a dick
and he was just trying to change lanes
and we were really just in each other's way?
either way,
we were there,
and we shared it,
and it woke me up
and opened my eyes
and let me know
that even in the middle of nowhere,
even when you have no reason to think you are,
you are not alone.

"What's the name of this one?"
"I don't know, the jewel case is in the glove compartment"
"Which one is it?"
"Track 12"
"...Home."

hypothesis:

Introversion may be fundamentally exhausting.