August 2002 Archives

i'm sitting in my sister's room in ulc, a dorm that i lived in three different times when i was a student. it only feels strange when i stop to think about where i am, and remember that this morning i was in my own apartment in houston. sometime in my first few years of college, i developed an uncanny ability to almost instantly adjust to being, well, wherever i am. it is an especially pronounced phenomenon when i visit a familiar place, like atlanta, like georgia tech. i forget to remember that i ever left.

the football game was fun, and georgia tech thoroughly beat vanderbilt, 45-3. it was great to see alex and iffy and the old harris crowd; i really miss them sometimes. with them, there is never a dull moment, and at the end of the day my stomach always aches from laughing so hard. they spoke of coming to houston some weekend, and then meeting up with leila and brian to just have a grand old time. i'll look forward to that, whenever it may happen.

weird. sitting here in katie's room, i suddenly feel reminiscent of having a dorm room. in fact, i almost miss it. cramming all my things into a tiny space, feeling comfy and cozy and closed in, surrounded by everything you feel is important. almost miss it.

i love my apartment.

i had an argument with a friend last night that is still bothering me.

tomorrow i head south to macon for the third annual chris baucom labor day bash.

i am looking for someone that wants the job of making sure my alarm clock is turned on each night, so that i don't wake up at 9:27 and go "crap, i'm supposed to be at work!" like i did this morning. it would help if that someone was a sexy guy.

so i came to work hoping hoping hoping that i could pull up espn.com and see the headline "baseball strike averted" but so far i've had no such luck. carter called last night after he heard on the news that negotiations had stopped for the night, and he was sad. i, on the other hand, am angry. baseball owes it to their fans--their customers--to come up with a deal in the next few hours. baseball owes it to me, because i am a loyal fan, and i am their customer. i don't go on strike because i think nasa doesn't pay me enough. i don't go on strike when sales tax rises, or i have to pay more in taxes than i thought i would. i know it's not a directly comparable situation, but if i work hard every day to please my customers, why don't they? why are they allowed to just quit when they feel like it? and why are owners allowed to go screwing with way things are run?

i don't think one side is to blame any more than the other. the players and the owners and the commissioner are equally responsible for all this confusion, and for what looks to be an inevitable strike. i didn't think i'd be able to stay away from baseball for a year, but today i am suddenly angry. i am thinking of adopting carter's stance--no baseball for a year after they come back. if they strike, i'll wait until they come back to play, and then i'll wait another whole year before i set foot in a major league park again.

because while they're screwing themselves over, they're also screwing me. they're taking me--a serious baseball fan--and turning me against them. they've talked for so much the past two weeks about how close they were getting to a deal. and i believed them, all this month i've held out hope that a strike would be averted. and now they're trampling on me! suck it, baseball.

{sigh} grrrr. anyway, here are some random pictures of lance bass in training here this week.

last night we had a surprise going-away party for nick and it worked beautifully. he didn't suspect a thing, in fact, he had been planning his own party for last night, not knowing we had been planning for 2 weeks to throw him the surprise party. i got him out to the pool and everyone was hiding around the corner. when they heard him coming they all jumped out and blew noisemakers. the look on nick's face was priceless! everyone was there, even people who had come up with a bogus excuse for why they couldn't come to nick's party. it took a minute for nick to figure out that curt and lisa didn't really have a late sim at work, and that he wasn't going to be hosting his own party, but once he did, he couldn't stop smiling for at least half an hour. :) we swam in the pool, ordered pizza, and eventually moved to my apartment when the mosquitos started to get bad.

it was great. it has been a fantastic week with so many visitors and activities, and it doesn't end yet! tomorrow i'm headed to atlanta for three days, and labor day in macon for the third year in a row.

(10:52 a.m.)

from the new york times: "Mr. Bass, 23, would be the youngest and presumably most squeal-inducing person to travel into space, as a guest of Russia on a Soyuz flight to the International Space Station in October."

(11:04 a.m.)

no baseball strike! i am sooooo relieved. still pissed that they dragged me with them to the last minute, but happy that the players and owners at least realize that striking again would do irreparable damage to the game itself. yay.

this morning on the way to work, npr had this great story about ernie harwell, the retiring radio announcer for the detroit tigers.

the trip to dallas/arlington for the baseball game was awesome. the park was beautiful, the weather was great, and the seats....oh, the seats! see, carter and i went to the game with my friend jason, whose friend monica lives in dallas. as luck would have it, monica's dad works for a company that has season tickets located in section 34, row 4--the first row behind the camera well at the end of the rangers dugout!!!! i have never had seats that good at a baseball game, and i doubt i ever will again. they were just incredible. we were sitting no more than 10 feet away from edge of the field!! we even got on the matrix board, not once but twice! i've always wanted to be on the matrix board, but never have, and in one night--twice! it was sooooooooo cool. here are some of the best pictures that i took:

a-rod stands at 1st base next to jeff conine after drawing a walk

a-rod gets ready to run in the case that palmiero (at-bat) gets a hit

a-rod hits a home run later in the game and goes into the trot from 1st to 2nd

a-rod at the plate

ivan rodriguez steps in to bat

it was a fantastic night.

anyway. carter left yesterday and arrived home safely; he did indeed make the earlier flight on standby. we got to the airport early enough that i stayed with him for an hour playing cards while he waited. we tested a two-person version of hearts that gave us some laughs--we dealt four hands, but only played with two, so you could never be sure what the other person had, or if the queen of spades was out there at all...and i think it was actually easier to shoot the moon than not. and yet the number of points in each hand could change since there were two hands just lying on the table, so one time i shot and carter got 19 points but one time i shot and he only got 5. it was odd, but entertaining.

last night i rode with nick up to intercontinental to pick up susan, who was able to get an extended layover in houston on her way to a wedding in dallas. we went out to dinner at joe's crab shack in kemah. it is great to see susan, it was like we haven't been apart for two months. i want to go back to stanford!!

(10:44 a.m.)

leila has a funny entry about the john mayer concert and our trip to austin last weekend. :)

when my life is suddenly filled with visitors, i am happy and constantly smiling. within a day, it's like the person is always there, and i forget that soon they will have to leave. when they leave, i always feel a little bit sad, a little bit lost. when christina left yesterday, and carter left today. i miss my friends, and i love it when they visit. it was a fantastic long weekend.

(nick is almost here to get me to go get susan from the airport. another visitor! more later.)

i got home from work yesterday feeling completely dead, but a group dinner at mediterraneano's and learning how to play 500 at chrissy's livened me up. i have really enjoyed the past few days, sleepiness and all. i'm going to be sad when christina leaves today. fortunately, i can't get too sad about carter leaving tomorrow because i'm going to atlanta for the weekend! :)

so the game of 500 was fun, if confusing. i kept forgetting that a jack was higher than an ace in the trump suit, and that the jack of the corresponding color is also higher. and that the joker is whatever suit is trump. agh! but carter and i won handily despite my ineptitude because he was able to bid nolo and not win any tricks one hand. when he layed down a 10 and said "ha, that's my highest card," chrissy looked at him, said "seriously?" and when carter responded in the affirmative, she just threw down her remaining hand of 6 or 7 face cards. funny.

today i'm working a half day, and then carter and i are driving up to dallas/arlington to meet jason and his friend monica for a rangers game. apparently monica (who i have never met) has gotten us tickets behind the rangers dugout, so i'm pretty excited. granted, i don't know exactly what "behind the rangers dugout" means, but people don't usually describe seats as "behind the dugout" unless they really are no more than 20 or so rows behind the dugout. we'll see. in any case, i want to see what a $250 million man (alex rodriguez) looks like in person. i figure he must have gold teeth or something.

i want a kitten. uh oh.

the weekend was good, though i'm paying for it at the moment with drooping eyes staring blankly at my code. i just can't stay up late like i used to. ah well. in the grand scheme of things, i suppose that's not really much of a problem. ;)

friday night after work a dozen of us went out for mexican food and margaritas at chuy's. it was a good mixed group of georgia tech people and nasa people, and i enjoyed it. afterward the tech crowd came back to my apartment for scattergories and chatting. after they left, i stayed up too late talking to carter on my wonderful balcony. it was the first time i've really sat out there, and it made me excited for the cooler fall days ahead, when i can come home from work, pour myself a glass of wine, and sit on my balcony listening to relaxing music and watching the birds land near the water. of course on friday though, the company was nice. i've grown accustomed to seeing some of my friends only every few months, and i like the feeling of reconnecting. i like hanging out in groups, but often i don't get as much one-on-one time as i like.

carter and i got up early on saturday and drove to austin to see leila and brian and john mayer. we had lunch at this awesome bbq place called the salt lick. leila and brian and i had gone there the last time i visited austin, and i suggested we take carter. he liked it. we spent the afternoon talking and napping in their new house, which is great. my favorite part is their enormous, open living room/dining room/kitchen area. i am a big fan of open space in houses and apartment.

we went to see john mayer play on saturday night at this place called the backyard. it was a neat venue, and i really enjoyed the concert. not only was john mayer himself great, but i liked both the opening acts (guster and the john butler trio).

yesterday we drove back to houston; unfortunately i got a speeding ticket. i was fairly annoyed with myself for it, but the good news is that i can take defensive driving and have it dismissed. despite the ticket delay (which really wasn't more than 5 minutes), we made it to enron field, i mean minute maid park, and met up with jason, chris and edgar to watch the astros play the reds. it was a pitchers duel--the game barely lasted 2 hours and the final result was a 1-0 victory for the astros. the only run was a lance berkman home run in the 1st inning.

after the game we had ice cream at amy's, met christina and liz for fajitas at lupe tortillas on liz's side of town, then went swing dancing. i had really wanted to go because it was nick's last night before he heads to france. unfortunately, nick left 10 minutes after i got there to take tiffany home because she didn't feel good. i couldn't help but feel annoyed. {sigh} but i did get to dance with him once, and i also danced with jason, chris, james, and a random guy named ben who liked to periodically say "wooo!" while spinning me crazily.

so that was my weekend. full of fun things.

the technique's freshman issue is online this week. it's fun to skim through the pages and reminisce. the ol' paper looks good.

i was just thinking that my life is good these days.

(4:45 p.m.)

ugh. i have this funky feeling in my stomach/throat/chest. some part of my body that i can't readily identify. it's weird. i can't determine whether it's caused by stress or just fatigue or something else. i feel very out of sorts.

but jason's hooked us up with good seats for the rangers game tomorrow in arlington. i hope the feeling goes away.

i can't even think of anything to write at the moment because i am sooooo pissed off at reliant energy.

i'll explain later when i'm not so annoyed. but carter got here safely and right on time last night. :) so did christina, although i won't see her until tonight.

(1:03 p.m.)

hola. i'm back and ready to do battle with reliant. if i could get the stanford bursar's office to bow to my demands, i can certainly tackle the energy company. hoo ha. i'm pumping myself up.

i have two goals for the afternoon--dealing with reliant, and getting stk to work. after leaving rich a note that said "rich!! i have questions!! -you know who" i have been put onto his busy schedule. ;) i love harassing him about being so busy...it's all in fun. i swear he has this sixth sense that tells him when i'm about to come looking for him, and that's when he disappears into a meeting or something.

this morning i was sitting on the couch waiting for nick to come pick me up (i left my car at home in case carter wants to borrow it) and i kept hearing this rushing sound, like waves crashing on a beach. i couldn't for the life of me figure out what it was until nick arrived and i walked out the front door and remembered...this is the weekend of the ballunar festival! dozens of hot air balloons were gliding through the air around my apartment complex and across the bayou. it was really beautiful! (the rushing sound i heard from my apartment was, of course, produced from the flame thingies they use to control altitude.) the top to nick's car was down as we drove to work, and i could barely control myself as i wiggled around in the seat taking pictures as we drove to work. the festival is actually held on the grounds of the space center, so even once we got on site the fun continued. balloons were landing by the side of the road, and there was even on in the middle of the parking lot where we always park.

i'll post the 40 or so pictures i hastily took this morning in the next day or so. :)

what did the world do before cell phones? i can't remember what life was like before i had one, but i must have spent a lot of time trying to track people down, sitting around, and waiting for something to happen. i can't believe i ever resisted getting one. now if only someone could solve the problem of losing the signal when you go into kroger...

by the way, this page passed the 20,000 page view mark yesterday.

last night i was oh-so productive. i went from work to home depot, where i finally bought the paint i need to redo the old sewing table mom gave me and a toolbox to keep all the tools currently scattered across my study. from there i went to bed, bath, and beyond for coat hangers and storage baskets. from there, to aaron brothers frames because they miscut a matte for me last week and i needed them to redo it. from there, home for a while, and then out to the grocery store to restock my cabinets before my weekend visitors arrive. i love how the stores that i need to visit most often are clumped together here in clear lake; home depot to bb&b to aaron's is a mile, at max.

hmm, i forgot to ask rich if he's brought in a picture of him back in his hair band days.

i'm sleepy this morning. more later, maybe.

lesson for the day: people are dumb. even people who work for nasa. to understand why is too silly to explain here, but if you are really curious about today's specific reason why people are dumb, you can just go read this series of emails that i have gotten over the past two days. it's a bit long, but you might get a good laugh out of the absurdity.

last night was the division's 3 sigma suds party. the 3 sigma suds are bottles of beer brewed by a couple of guys who are higher up in the division. it was actually pretty good for home-brewed beer, and i don't even like beer that much. but the party was also fun. it started at 4:30 and i was there until the last people left at 9:30. we were just hanging out and talking (and slapping the west nile-carrying mosquitos off) and having a good time. it was neat to see everyone "outside" of work.

after i got home last night i unpacked the last of my boxes and discovered what i'd forgotten that i had. my high school treasures have reappeared! tons of photos, letters, notes written in class. a scrapbook with newspaper clippings, cartoons, certificates. a video of the marching band's show from my senior year. i popped the tape into the vcr and sat down to watch.

i don't know if this is something that everyone does or if it can simply be chalked up to my quirkiness, but when i think back to my last year of high school, there is always a single day that sticks out in my memory. as luck would have it, part of that day is recorded on the marching band tape that i found last night.

it was a saturday in october, 1995. we had all met at the band room early that morning and climbed on buses that took us to chapel hill--to unc--for our last band competition of the year. we were going to be performing on the field at kenan stadium, the huge football stadium where the tarheels play. (i guess they must have been out of town that saturday if we were able to use their field.) the video shows us marching onto the field to the tap of the snare. it shows leslie calling us to attention, it records our responding shout. we play our whole show, the music dips and swells. moments from the end of the show, just as we form into a long line and begin to march forward, the sun breaks through the clouds and lights the field. the sun coming out matches perfectly with the music; it's as if we planned it. i sat there on my couch last night watching this scene of my life from 7 (has it been that long?) years ago, and although it may make me sound like a sentimental sap to say this, i got chills. just watching the video, i got chills.

of course the video doesn't show the rest of that day. the bus ride, the laughter. changing into our uniforms, the warmup to marching onto the field, or what happened after we marched off it. it doesn't show the group of seniors in the stands later that night, as the awards were announced. we didn't win overall because our band was too small to compete with the 300-member bands from larger high schools, but we won our division. it doesn't show us smiling, hugging, and then crying because it was our last marching competition, because we knew we wouldn't be back next year to repeat our win, because we knew we'd be scattering as we started college. i know that marching band is considered by most to be a high school activity left to the weidos and band nerds, but i loved every minute of it. i hadn't expected to cry that night, but i should have known better. i knew i would be sad to see it end.

later that night, i met up my family. i wasn't going back to charlotte with the band that night, instead, i was going with my family to see my grandmother who lived in chapel hill. but i was with the band to get my things, and help clean up. as we were loading the bus in the floodlight-lit parking lot, the braves won the world series. i didn't get to watch the game, a glavine masterpiece. but i heard the final out live in the parking lot with my sister on her walkman. we cheered, the band buses pulled away, and we drove back to grandmother's to watch the post-game celebration on tv. i stayed up late with the lights off and tv glowing as the champagne flowed in atlanta.

i always say i didn't like high school. but it had its moments.

(12:37 p.m.)

tech is getting a new basketball player from...sweden. yay.

so nick gets this email from another rotary club scholarship person currently in france asking whether he's coming to some welcome weekend. the note is written in english. because the guy's last name is levin, and because the original note sounds sort of like a french person writing in english, nick responds in french. he then receives this:

Nicholas,

Dude. I am from New Jersey. However, if you want to write me in French, feel free. The number on this email is my cell phone. Since there is a 9 hour difference you can call me from either 9am-Noon your time or from midnight on your time.

Looking forward to chatting
Amicalement
Jason

i can't explain why this had me laughing for at least 5 minutes straight except to say that the guy says "dude" and is, out of all the places he could possibly name, from new jersey. that's comedy.

on sunday night i remarked to eric about the bugs in my apartment, saying that i've had ants and seen a few spiders and a random insect here and there, but never any of the little lizards that swarm around my front door every night. well, of course that meant that a day and a half later--this morning as i finished brushing my teeth--i was surprised by a two-inch long translucent baby lizard crawling across my carpet. i couldn't figure out how i was supposed to smush a lizard without creating a mess. also, the thought of smushing him made me think of bubba, my cute pet lizard from 5th to 8th grade, and that made me sympathetic. i couldn't smush him! so i trapped him under a cup, slid a magazine underneath, and deposited him about twenty feet from my front door. he scampered off, probably on his way back to my apartment, but oh well.

last night i was so productive and got a lot of cleaning done. there now are no more boxes left in my living room, and only four left in my study! i have a not-insignificant amount of papers and things that i need to organize and file away, but at least they are in neat and manageable stacks. (i know i am going to get hassled for that by someone.) anyway, i also worked out. i also baked banana bread. look at me, i'm a normal person!

ah yes, this is why living in houston is always, um, "an adventure." oil tankers burning in the ship channel. lovely.

"the world is a book, and those who stay at home read only one page." yesterday i went over to becca's to plan for our upcoming trip to scotland. we called karen and talked to her as well, and we ended up with two potential itineraries. one includes the orkney islands (see them all the way up at the top?), one doesn't. the question now is one of weather, and of karen's stamina behind the wheel of her car. :)

basically, we want to go to the orkney islands because they're off the beaten path, because they have europe's best-preserved prehistoric village (how cool is that), and because the landscape is supposed to be spectacular. the only other thing i want to do in scotland is visit edinburgh, and climb a mountain. becca and i wanted to climb ben nevis, the highest mountain in scotland (1343m, ~4400 ft), but karen has vetoed that already. :( fortunately, it appears that there are many, many mountains elsewhere that we can climb. the cairngorms boast that they have arctic tundra. arctic tundra! cooooool.

while surfing for scotland info, i couldn't resist looking at lonely planet's intro page about sweden:

The country that brought you IKEA, Greta Garbo and Absolut Vodka can almost be forgiven for letting the smorgasbord, the Volvo (driver) and all those zinc-creamed tennis fans out (but not Roxette, no, never Roxette). Since the devaluation of the Swedish crown, Sweden has become quite affordable; at any rate, the simple joys of fresh air, landscape and culture are among the least extravagant and most rewarding of pleasures available to visitors. Stockholm, the country's capital, is a progressive city, though there are pockets which have a village feel (if you don't focus too much on the sleek, ubiquitous IKEA chairs). Once you get out of town, Sweden's starkly beautiful forests and giant lakes lend themselves perfectly to outdoor activities from iceskating to moose-spotting.

{sigh} how could anyone not love sweden??

anyway. eric and jane (and debbie too, since she lives next door and all) came down to my apartment for dinner last night cooked by my personal chef, aka nick. ;) it was incentive to do a little more cleaning (i have until thursday to get everything straightened!), and it is always fun to have people over. eric and jane are both really cool; i'm glad i got to meet them this summer. we had to end the evening early because nick and i were meeting the group to go swing dancing, which was unfortunate. we probably could have sat around talking for another hour. ah well.

i overslept this morning. not by too much, but still. i remember hitting my snooze button at 6:45, and the next thing i knew it was 8:05. i looked at the clock and didn't totally comprehend the time, because i flopped my head back onto my pillow...then a moment later i realized that 8:05 was well past the time i usually get up. so i jumped out of bed and got to work an hour ago. i had been planning to work 9 hours at least three days this week to save up some credit hours, and i've already screwed it up for today because i don't want to stay until 6:30! oh well.

i must go running tonight.

(11:04 a.m.)

jen has dubbed me "the great originator of the on-line diary," a title of which i am pathetically proud. let me count the people i have introduced to diaryland: karen, becca, james, jen,katie, leila, and carter (though his didn't last). also, indirectly, i think i can take part of the credit for jen's john, and now john's friend tommy. hee.

i miss dancing, of all kinds. jammix. class. three days a week. to stupid songs in emily's room. in sketchy san francisco clubs. with too much alcohol in me. with not enough alcohol in me. in my room in the mornings. with susan in the hallway of cromem. on the shores of the pamlico sound. viennese ball.

we went to the melody club tonight. i'm not a fan of the place itself, mainly because of the clientele. but i got to dance, lindy, 6-count, with nick, a good lead.

yeah. i miss dancing.

lisa, debbie and i want to buy darrin's dance grooves, as seen on tv(!), and become hip hop queens.

i need to spend more time at the pool. i need a tan. i need to run, and lose this belly.

i need to go to bed.

i love lazy saturdays that become filled with spontaneous activity. days like today.

i woke up at noon to a call from nick telling me he and tiffany were on their way over to join debbie and me for a swim in the pool. they arrived an hour and a half later with lunch from kroger. we quickly ate, and then headed to the pool for an hour. the water felt great; it was just the right temperature, and the sun was shining brightly.

after swimming, we all piled into the convertible for a trip to best buy, since nick wanted to look at cameras. after a few impulse buys, it was off to the music store for debbie to search for a xylophone. since the music store was next to the mall, we of course had to stop at the food court for some ice cream. which obviously led to a plan to go to the cheesecake factory for dinner! after making some calls, we had a group of a nice round dozen people to head up to the galleria for cheeeeeeeesecake. num num num.

i can't quite put into words how much i like days like today... but on some days, everything just seems to fall into place. one activity rolls effortlessly into another and the laughs come in waves. you're with good friends and blanketed in good conversation. and things feel right with the world.

the braves-giants game last night officially ended in a tie after it starting pouring rain in the 10th inning in atlanta. they will leave it at that unless it affects the playoffs, in which case they'll replay the entire thing. weird.

last night i braved the deluge and flood and went to sherlock's to play trivia with three other people from my division. as a side note, this trivia contest is one of many events in the "space games," something my division and its counterpart at united space alliance do every summer. anyway, last night was a little strange--me the 24-year-old new hire, them the 45-year-old parents that graduated from high school around the time i was born--but i had a pretty good time nonetheless. if they'd asked any questions from the 80s or 90s, i really would have been an asset to the team. instead, the trivia questions were either stupidly easy (does anyone expect a group of engineers to not know what the circumference of a circle is?) or about things i'm too young to remember (why was 9/25/1966 known as "black sunday" to movie theater owners? and who shot j.r.?). i left soon after we turned in our final answer, not waiting around to find out how many we got right. it turns out that my team won! i came in to work this morning and chuck had put my prize on my chair--a jim beam t-shirt. i laughed out loud. becca said it's a classic, that i should wear it to work. hmm. work out maybe.

the bayou behind my house was more full than normal last night. i had been curious to see how high it would get with all the rain, but not worried, since my apartment is on the second floor. ;) anyway, it was probably a foot or two higher than normal--enough to be very noticeable, but still a long way from overflowing. i can't imagine what it must have been like when tropical storm allison came through and filled it.

{sigh} such excitement. whee!

so i know this will make me sound like a ditzy girl, but i have this strong desire to go see the movie "blue crush." not for the plot line, which i think is given away in its entirety in the previews, but for the surfing. i've read a couple reviews that say the camerawork in the film is just fantastic. people who can surf have always impressed me enormously, and the admiration only grew after i tried surfing myself and was royally bad at it.

(12:36 p.m.)

james updates his diary in spurts, so some days there is nothing to read, but some days a week's worth of entries suddenly appears. sometimes i get mentioned. i am always surprised when i get mentioned. somewhat flattered. shocked to get a compliment.

last night carter said i am one of the healthiest, most active females he knows. i told him in that case, he needs to meet more females. the healthy, active females that i know don't have fat bellies. and i do.

oh! here is a picture of everyone in my group that is 30 or under. (that basically means that we were taking pictures for no particular reason, and just didn't bother to gather ray, gil, and doug. besides, we're not allowed to put a group picture on our webpage so there's not much point in taking one.) anyway, it's gavin, george, ryan (our departing co-op) and rich in the back, becca, matt, and me in the front. enjoy.

if this is successful and a hooters airline is created, i think i might just quit my job and bang my head against a wall all day.

so yesterday i finally gave blood, for only the second time in my life. see, the first time, four years ago, was a horrible experience. it took forever, i almost passed out, my vein slowed to the point where they had to stick a needle in my other arm just to get enough blood for my donation to be useable, and i had to sit there for an hour before i could stand up without getting light-headed. so even though i know giving blood is a good thing and an easy way to help out someone in need, i've been more than a bit apprehensive about doing it again. i tried once last summer, but was so nervous that my pulse was too high for me to give.

anyway, yesterday i went to try again, and i learned something quite important about my body. it does not like losing a pint of blood. i suppose this is not surprising, but how, then, do so many people give blood and then just hop up and walk out the door? anyway. i kept my pulse down enough to give, but the whole light-headed, almost fainting thing refused to disappear. almost immediately, i had to ask the nurse to put my feet up. my vein again slowed down at the end, but i managed to fill the bag out of only one arm, which good because she said they weren't allowed to do both arms (which makes me wonder about the jokers in georgia who stuck both my arms). and then i had to stay there for a good half hour after i was done, slowly going from legs up and lying down, to legs down and lying down, to sitting on the edge of the cot, and finally to standing up before i could get up and not get a wicked head rush.

i suppose next time i'll just go in and tell them up front "look, you're going to have to put my feet up, and i'm going to have to sit here for a half hour once i'm done." then i won't have to feel too light-headed, and they won't have to worry about me.

so that's my blood story for this month. la la la.

i got some more cleaning done in my apartment last night...unpacked 5 boxes of books. i didn't realize just how many books i had stored at home! i mean, i don't have books in becca-like proportions (i.e. overflowing amounts), but i do have enough that i am having to put a double row on a couple of shelves. i have two full shelves of space-related books from high school and college, when i bought every book i saw that had anything to do with space. i have a lot more than i realized, and some that look really interesting but i've never read. so i think i have enough reading material to last me for at least a year. :)

tonight i've been talked into playing trivia with some guys from work that i don't really know. nick told mark i'd be good at trivia. ha, no pressure now.

(12:50 p.m.)

it sucks having to get up in the morning when it's gray and raining outside. it sucks even more when you're coming back from lunch and it's still raining and you notice that the roads are starting to flood and the national weather service has issued multiple flood warnings. yeah.

a lot of randomness today.

1)the english patient. i'm not reading it, but i just found the quote somewhere and it sort of fits me. "she had always wanted words, she loved them, grew up on them. words gave her clarity, brought reason, shape. whereas i thought words bent emotions like sticks in water."

2) the oakland a's. i consider them to be my favorite american league team because i lived in the area, they have great fans, and i like their indomitable spirit. from espn.com: "the a's like to think of themselves as 'the chihuahua that won't let go of your ankle.'" quote from gm billy beane. cracked me up, and made me love the a's even more.

3) lance bass. all these articles about the will-he-or-won't-he go into space saga is starting to get old. make a decision and shell out the big bucks already, lance. sheesh. that said, i hope he goes. sure, i'll be jealous that a 23-year-old pop star gets to go into space before i do, but i think lance bass could bring more positive publicity to the space program it's seen in years.

4) west nile virus. it's spreading from nighttime (culex) mosquitos to daytime (asian tiger) mosquitos. "unlike the culex mosquito, which is a dull brown, the aedes albopictus is dark, nearly black, with white marks on its legs. a single white stripe down its back can be seen with the naked eye, but parsons recommends that the curious slap first, and look later." knowing that i taste good to mosquitos, i figure i'm as good as dead.

5) holiday in spain. i'm thinking of taking one. or more likely, it's my current obsessive song courtesy of the counting crows.

anyway. last night i was a bum. really. i think step class sucked all the energy out of me, because i just went home and sat there for two hours surfing the internet and watching baseball. i didn't get up until nick came over about 8:30, at which point i made chicken stir fry that amazingly didn't taste that bad, which we then ate as we watched more baseball and talked about typical nick/sarah topics. we are an old married couple, and we're not even dating. it's very sad. ;)

i had a glass of wine with dinner, and it made me sleepy. after nick left, i alternated talking to carter online and cleaning. i hung a picture and unpacked a box of books. wow. carter's right, i clean much better when i'm under pressure. hopefully this means that as the days remaining until carter and christina's visit dwindle, i will revert into all-out cleaning mode.

(1:28 p.m.)

i am in love with my old navy essential pants. i have them in black and gray, and feel the overwhelming need to go back and buy them in whatever other colors they may sell. this could be because they fit me really well, or it could be simply because old navy says that they are "essential." either way, they stand to make more money off me.

whew. here it is, almost 5:00, and i'm just now updating for the day. believe me, there's a reason--from 8:00 until 3:45, i was stuck in STEP class. STEP, of course, as anyone would know, stands for "safety through everyone's participation" and is a day-long class where i sit on my bum as it gets more and more sore as the hours pass and i listen to people drone on and on about hazardous materials, preparing for hurricanes, and not standing on rolling chairs to reach things on high shelves. basically, a day where people lecture you on common sense. {sigh} i just sat there resisting the urge to scream "FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, I WORK AT A DESK ALL DAY!!!" i mean, seriously, the worst harm i could possibly cause to myself or any of my officemates is if i staple a finger or trip over my own two feet.

anyway. i just kept telling myself that i was getting paid for doing nothing all day.

this morning i woke up to a downpour. i think it must be the first morning i've woken up to a cloudy sky, as my apartment seemed unusually dark. i wished my garage was actually connected to my front door, but fortunately i have a large umbrella.

yeah. there's really not much to say today. blah blah blah.

wow, i can't believe i'm back at work already. it feels like i spent the entire weekend at the ballpark. oh wait, i did spend the entire weekend at the ballpark! :)

it was a nice way to spend a weekend, watching the braves win two of three, just as i'd hoped. the best of the three games by far was the first game on friday night--the thirteen inning marathon i described earlier. yesterday's game was fun for me because i got to see the braves hit just about every ball that came their way (chipper jones went 5-for-5, how cool is that?)...but i have to admit, any game that ends with a score of 13-3 isn't as much a game as it is a rout. oh well. at least it was my team doing the routing.

yesterday i went to the game with a bunch of people from work. it was a lot of fun to see people out of the office environment. my boss brought his son, who is about to begin his freshman year at texas a&m, my boss from two summers ago brought his 2nd grader, and rich brought his pseudo-girlfriend. at some point today, becca and i are going to hound him for details about her. mwa ha ha. anyway, after the game we all went out for pizza. it was a good time.

oh. becca got her half dome pictures developed finally, so i put up a couple of them here. a picture of me coming down the cables, her in front of nevada falls, and two of the rock itself.

the exercise room was crowded this morning when i made my way over there for my third try at this whole morning workout thing. i had to use the sucky treadmill because the good one was taken. you wouldn't think one treadmill would be that different from another, but i've found that they are. or maybe i'm just picky. anyway. so i ran for 20 minutes, and headed home to shower and come to work.

i need to figure out a way to run that i enjoy. 1) i'm not a fan of running in the morning because i never have enough energy to go for long; ideally i'd run for at least half an hour, but so far, my morning runs have stopped at either 20 minutes or 2 miles. 2) i don't really like treadmill running all that much either, compared to a road or trail or sidewalk.

however, i'm semi-forced into doing both of those things. 1) if i don't run in the morning, that often means i won't run at all, since i usually have plans in the evening. 2) it's too damn hot to run outside unless i go running before 6 a.m. (yeah right) or after 10:00 p.m. (at which point i would be slightly worried for my safety).

so i haven't figured out a solution yet. once fall arrives and the days cool down a bit, i'll be able to run outside. but even then, i don't live in an area that is especially suited for running. i'll be dodging traffic and running along curbs, unless i drive somewhere else. oh well. i will figure something out. in the meantime, i will just continue to miss the running heaven that is the stanford campus. :)

so there's my running rant, just in case you'd missed me writing about boring exercise topics lately.

i want to go swimming tonight. on saturday night after i got home from taking leila and brian back to their hotel, i decided to take a 1 a.m. walk around my apartment complex. the place is actually bigger than i thought, and i finally got a good look at the lap pool that's down at the other end of the complex from me. it's nice, and is actually a reasonable size for swimming laps--25 yards/meters. not sure which, i was just eyeballing. but the point is, you could actually be effective swimming laps there. i'll have to try it out. tonight i just want to sit in the pool though. maybe i'll see if nick wants to come over and hang out in the fancy pool.

you know what? things are just going really well here in houston.

well except for the fact that the braves lost to the astros today. last night we had the good fortune to see a great game (at least if you're a braves fan like me). down 5-2, the braves came back in the ninth as billy wagner blew the save. the game remained stuck at 5-5 until the top of the 13th inning, when gary sheffield finally smacked a solo homer. smoltz came on in the bottom of the 13th to record his 41st save, but not before causing some excitement that resulted in the final out being made on a great relay by furcal as craig biggio tried to make it to home plate. braves win, 6-5!

today, however, was another story. the ball must have looked about the size of a grapefruit to the astros, because they were racking up hit after hit. the astros won, 8-5.

the other great thing about today though was that i got to hang out with leila and brian all day. we met at the ballpark, watched the game, i laughed at them via cell phone as they got lost in the museum district. when they finally found their way, they checked into their hotel, ditched their other friends (who were off to bar-hop their way through houston), jumped in my car, and we headed down to my side of town (clear lake). we had dinner at saltgrass steakhouse, then came back to my apartment to hang out for a while. then i took them back to their hotel.

now i'm quite sleepy, so it's to bed, and then the astros-braves series finale tomorrow at 1:35!

baseball, babe...you know i love you dearly, and i won't ever give up on you, no matter how hard the world tries to tarnish you.

but i'm sorry, this article just doesn't do it for me. to all you young players like jay gibbons (mentioned in the afore-mentioned article) who are making "only" $200,000 a year, i have this to say: suck it up and deal. if you insist on striking, so be it, that's your choice. there's nothing i can do to stop you. but i'm not going to ever feel sorry for you because you're losing a few months out of your 6-, 7- or 8-figure salaries. at minimum, you get $16500 every month. and you're complaining that if you miss a few months of salary, you'll be on your way to the poorhouse, eating from taco bell and giving up your baltimore apartment??

give me a break! i'm a staff engineer working for the government and earning barely a fourth of your minimum salary. civil service is not the way to get rich, i know, but it's what i do anyway. with the money i make--a downright measly sum next to your riches--i can do the following things (and this is just what i can think of off the top of my head) in one month's time:

• save/invest 15-20%
• pay the rent on a very nice apartment
• buy groceries
• pay my phone, cell phone, electricity, dsl, cable, credit card, and car, health and renters insurance bills
• keep my car well-maintained and full of gas
• make a payment on my student loan
• go out to eat 3-5 times a week
• buy a coke every afternoon at work
• see 4-5 movies
• buy a couple new shirts, a skirt, and a pair of pants
• pay the entry fee for two road races
• buy a plane ticket (not every month, but a few times a year)
• and between april and september/october, see 3 baseball games that pay your salary!!

so forgive if i don't quite feel your pain, mr. baseball player.

{sigh} anyway. despite that little rant, i'm looking forward to my weekend plans which involve a glorious three baseball games where i get to watch my braves play the astros. tonight i'm going with james, chrissy, liz, jason, and nacho--a mixed georgia tech/nasa group. tomorrow leila and brian are coming to town with their group for the game and other houston fun. then sunday is nasa day at the ballpark, and i'm going with becca, nick, rich, and a bunch of other people from our branch. i hope to see the braves win at least 2 of 3. :)

last night i hung a new picture in my apartment, with much help from nick because it was in an awkward spot--on the stairwell wall, but high enough to be visible through the cutout in the living room wall. nick ended up having to stand on the ledge of the cutout and lean across the three-foot-wide staircase to get the nail into the wall, because it was too high to reach while standing on the stairs. but he did it! he is so helpful!

also, i found a coffee table. hooray! after work yesterday i rushed a few exits south on i-45 to this sussan furniture place that had been recommended to me. it was rather sketchy looking on the outside, but inside it was ok. not very organized, but then again, it was a discount furniture store, not a showroom. anyway, i walked around and looked at all the coffee tables and finally spotted one that was perfect! upon closer inspection, i realized it was the exact same coffee table i'd seen wednesday night at star furniture--the one that was an insane $450. only at this sussan place, it was $229! still more than i wanted to spend, but hell, i bought it anyway. after looking at 4 different stores in person and another 3 stores online, finding nothing i liked at 5 of those stores and then picking out the same table at the other two, i figured i should just splurge and get it. so i did. i'll have it on monday. :)

becca complained this morning that i don't update enough. i can only imagine that her comment was code for "you don't update early enough," because i do update every day. it's just not the first thing i do when i get to work. besides, today i am not giving becca anything that she wants because she got that eminem song stuck in my head. "it feels so empty without me." so sue me, the song amuses me to no end. i just don't like having it stuck in my head. anyway.

i cannot believe how difficult it is to find a coffee table in this town! i couldn't find one at ikea, and last night i couldn't find one at roomstore or star furniture. actually, that's not entirely true--i did find one i liked at star furniture...only it was $450. no thank you. i really don't understand. my requirements are numerous, i'll admit, but not all that complicated. i want something:

1. rectangular (not square)
2. not too high (ikea's table was the perfect size, except it was like two feet tall)
3. in a darker wood (to match what i already have)
4. simple (meaning not ornate, which is officially referred to as a "contemporary" design i believe)
5. reasonably priced (less than $150, ideally less than $100)

i didn't think i would have such a problem finding something i liked that fit into all those categories, but apparently i am lacking in the furniture knowledge department. if anyone has a suggestion of where i could find something i like, please let me know.

actually, when i got home last night i was looking through the ikea catalog and saw a coffee table that would be perfect, but i don't remember seeing it at their store. nor is it listed in their catalog...but it's picture is there! it's a mystery. i'm going to call today and just say "yeah, on page 74, do you have that coffee table, will you send me one??"

i just realized that i'm becoming an old woman. agonizing about furniture. this is just lovely.

i was going to go watch softball last night, but the games were rained out. as i was leaving work at 5:30, it was pouring down rain, my car was a good 1000 feet away across the road, and lucky me, i had no umbrella. nick, being the wonderful person that he is, volunteered to run to his car and then come pick me up and take me to my car. now let me explain--there are two parking lots for my building. one is out front and one is across the road, but because of reserved spaces and the fact that we don't get to work at 7 in the morning, parking across the road will actually get you closer to the building.

so off nick went running into the rain to the lot across the road, because that's where we always park. so i watch him go, and then a moment later, i see him running back. about halfway back, he takes a left turn and runs through the other parking lot, the one next to the building. at this point i started laughing out loud and had to explain to the two guys staring at me strangely that nick forgot where he parked and was still running around in the rain. it was amusing, even he admitted so.

last night i subbed for kylie on a coed softball team. it was the first time i've played softball in a while, but it went quite well and was a lot of fun. i played three innings in the field (right center, where kylie usually plays i guess) and got one at-bat before a 10th team member showed up and i got benched because i was only a sub. oh well. but my at-bat was a success--i hit a bloop grounder toward third base, which turned into a double on a throwing error, and then two batters later i scored a run! i told the team (i know half the players on it already) that when the next season rolls around this fall, i'd like to join. fun fun.

i'm also supposed to play soccer this fall, so that will be good too.

i also went to ballet class with nick last night; well, not really to class but rather to a private lesson tiffany was giving him. i'm sorry, but i just don't think i'm meant to be a ballet dancer. i went because nick really wanted me to, and because he likes it so much and thought i would too...but i dunno. ballet involves so much balance and grace, and it's all about being very aware of your body and how you're holding your arm, or leg, or how straight and tall you are standing. i think to be a successful ballet dancer, you have to have a lot of confidence in your body. i don't have that (as much as i wish i did). i tried to follow what tiffany and nick were showing me, but i just looked like some fat idiot trying not to fall over. i think i will stick to social dancing.

i came home yesterday to find a wasp in the early stages of building a nest in the corner of the doorframe of my front door. lovely. when the wasp flew off to find more building materials, i swatted its nest away and sprayed the area with ant spray, which i figured might either a) kill the wasp or b) really piss it off. i'm not sure which happened, but i haven't seen the wasp again, so i hope it was option a. otherwise there is a really angry wasp looking for me.

yes. can you stand the excitement?

so here is a shameless paragraph in which i actually address a specific person who i believe reads this diary. i usually try to avoid doing this. the thing is, jen has returned to the country after her 10 week stint abroad. and i can't find her email address. jen, i have info about trail races around stanford that i wanted to send you now that you are back. send me (sarah@nique.net) your email address!

tonight i think i'm going to take it easy, go home, and clean. i have two and a half weeks to get my apartment straightened for real before christina and carter arrive. yes, carter has now decided to come to houston as well. both of them will be here the same weekend, as well as james. and of course chrissy and liz, since they already live in houston. i am already anticipating a fun-filled weekend filled with six flags, baseball games, and chilling by the pool at my luxurious palmas. in fact, the only thing i can think of that would make it better is if we could get kent and chris to come along as well.

this morning i dragged my sleepy butt out of bed a half hour early (at 7:00 instead of the usual snooze-button-induced 7:30) and ran on the treadmill. boo yeah. go me.

(4:16 p.m.)

last night i went out to ride my bike for the first time since the movers brought it three weeks ago, and...they totally screwed up my bike!! the front brake has been jerked apart so that it is non-functional, the rear brake is out of alignment, the rear tire is completely flat. oh, and the little meter that showed me what gear i was in is totally ruined--the needle is broken, and the cable that connects the gear shift to the meter is broken as well. i was so mad! i don't know why i didn't check it out when they first brought it. regardless, i called the moving company and they are sending me a claim form so that i can get it fixed.

matt just walked past and declared the new cherry coke can design to be "sexy."

it's official! becca and i are going to visit karen from september 6 until september 15. we fly from houston to london heathrow via chicago. from there, we'll take the train to cranfield, meet up with karen, and pile into the little purple car for a road trip into scotland. the only definite stops so far, i believe, are edinburgh and the orkney islands. but seeing as how those two are not exactly next to each other, there will be other stops along the way.

last night my apartment hosted its first dinner party! i say my apartment hosted because, well, i wasn't the one doing the cooking, i was only the one offering the kitchen and eating space. nick came over after work and made a lebanese dish called majadarrah (sp?), salad, pasta, and even some chicken for those who didn't like majadarrah. becca, julia, debbie, curt, and sara all came over to eat, and it was great fun. i felt so adult-like. ;) i even had all the right pots and pans and dishes and everything, even though i don't really have enough places to everyone to sit. we just sat in the chairs i had and on the couch.

i'm being paged for lunch.

tonight my apartment will be hosting people for dinner for the first time. nick is making lebanese food. hooray! this means i have to get home from work quickly though, because even the living room is pretty much impassable at the moment.

last night i laid out a bunch of posters along with the frames i bought yesterday, but haven't finished the project. one of the posters is just a hair too big for the frame, and i haven't figured out the best way to shave just a little bit off the side to make it fit. i'm thinking an exacto knife and a yardstick (or other long straight edge) will do the trick, but i have neither of these things. what would be ideal is a bigger version of the photograph cutter that i have that's like a paper cutter with a razorblade on a track. but i don't know if they make something like that. perhaps i could just take it back to the frame shop and have them do it. i don't want to mess up the poster. it's this really cool picture of the big sur coastline.

someone in my building turned 40 today, and there are signs posted everywhere to embarass her. when i turn 40, i'm going to try to keep it a secret. i don't want to be embarassed by my coworkers. becca promised to tell everyone anyway, but then we realized that neither of us will likely be working here anymore when we turn 40. in fact, becca plans to be living in australia enjoying her retirement. retirement. at 40 years old. yes, she can dream.

in other news, i am a big wuss. i just can't deal with even remotely scary movies. last night after i turned out my light and was lying in bed all alone in my dark apartment, i got scared that aliens were going to sneak up and get me. all because of mel gibson and his silly signs movie! argh.

i forgot to mention that i did end up getting to see james and chrissy this past weekend--we had dinner at mamacita's last night. it was fun, even though chrissy is still not feeling too hot. she has some sort of upper respitory infection and had a horrible coughing attack. i hope she feels better soon. as we left the restaurant, we worked out plans to go see the braves play the astros on friday along with liz and some of my friends, so it's official--i'm going to all three games of the series! woohoo! friday with james, chrissy, liz, etc. saturday with leila, brian, etc. sunday with work people (it's nasa day at the ballpark). i've been telling people i'm going to see the braves, and they always correct me and say "don't you mean you're going to see the astros?" i guess it is houston and all...but the important thing to me is that i get to see the braves. :)

and another weekend ends too soon.

this afternoon i ventured out into the traffic of tax-free weekend, but not to buy anything tax-free. ah well. i didn't need any new clothes or shoes. instead, i needed things like picture frames, a spatula, and index/recipe cards. i guess i should get used to shopping trips that wind up with me buying a completely random set of products, because every day, i think of some new little thing that i need for my apartment or most likely, my kitchen. i wonder how long it will be before i have "everything" that i need? that's a subjective term, of course, "everything."

i found the pictures that steve took when we went surfing back in april. ah, california.

i met up with jason this afternoon for a matinee showing of signs. it was ok. i'm not a fan of scary/suspenseful movies, so i didn't really like the whole aliens-overrunning-the-house segment. but the moral of the movie is a good one. the best summation of the film is pretty much what ron told me before i saw it--it's less of a movie about aliens, and more of a movie about faith.

back to work tomorrow already, and i've made hardly any progress on cleaning the mess that masquerades as my study. {sigh} my goal is to have it done by the time christina comes to visit. that gives me three weeks.

the trip to dave and buster's last night was fun, but geez, i just can't stay out like i used to. by 11:30, i was starting to fade. by 12:30, we were on our way home and by 1:30, i was in my bed dead to the world. what happened to being able to stay up until the wee hours?!? i'm 24 years old and i just can't party anymore. i guess getting up at 7 every morning to go to work will do that to you.

today we went to rodizio grill for lunch. it's a brazilian steakhouse, meaning there is a salad bar to eat from, and then servers just start coming around the restaurant with big hunks of meat on sticks--sirloin, pork, ham, roast, chicken, you name it. it was quite good, and i left thoroughly stuffed. becca invited me to come to the movies with her to see signs, but i declined. i sort of implied to jason that i'd go see the movie with him, and i could have called him today, but after the big lunch i just felt like hanging out in my apartment and not doing much. i am full and sleepy. actually, i am going to unpack some things though, so i won't be totally unproductive.

james and chrissy didn't end up going to san antonio this weekend because chrissy isn't feeling great, so maybe i'll get to see them for lunch tomorrow or something. that'd be nice.

yesterday i got the stub from my first paycheck that will be deposited on tuesday. it's only half a paycheck since i started work in the middle of a pay period, but the good news is that my salary is actually higher than i thought it was! not by any enormous amount, but not by a mere hundred bucks either. that was a nice surprise.

i also got the stanford banner i ordered for my office. rich has his michigan flag, george has his texas flag, becca has ordered a georgia tech one that will be delivered soon (for us to share), and i got a stanford one. i love my group.

my mornings at work follow a fairly set pattern. i arrive sometime between 8:30 and 9:00, and immediately turn on my computer. it boots up while i put my purse away and open my notebook to see what i have on my list of things to do for the day. i say hello to becca. i log on, open my email, and read any messages sent after i left work yesterday or before i got here today. if any replies are necessary, i write them.

i am not a morning person, and it takes me some time to get going. after email, i read the news on five different sites. cnn gives me national news, the houston chronicle gives me local news (though i'm not a big fan of their website), and sfgate gives me a lot of interesting stories from the san francisco/stanford area. out of those three, sfgate (run by the san francisco chronicle) is my favorite. they always have neat stories, written in a slightly tongue-in-cheek or sarcastic style that i enjoy.

(side note: i miss living on the san francisco peninsula!)

i also check espn just in case i missed any baseball news the night before, and space daily because, well, my daily work involves space. finally, i update my fantasy baseball lineup and read becca, james, jen, karen, and leila's journals. sometime in catching up on the news, i go get coffee from george and rich's office, and say hello to them.

this whole news-reading, coffee-drinking part of my morning lasts for about an hour, and then i work for a couple hours before it's time for lunch. we eat, we come back and work until around 2:00, at which point my whole group migrates en masse to the coke machine two floors down. this is a "group meeting" that we affectionately call the "coke break," and it is usually instigated by one of us walking from room to room jingling 60 cents in our hand.

yes, my life at work is quite predictable. the exception is friday, when we all go wild and wear jeans to work. ooooh. if anyone was curious. ;)

last night i got to see james for a half hour; i picked him up from the airport and drove him to chrissy's apartment, since she was up in the woodlands for some kind of training for her job at exxon. we were hoping to get some ice cream on the way home, but we got to the place 10 minutes after they closed, and even though the door was still open, they had already put the ice cream away. boo. it's this new place called goodie's, i believe. i haven't been there yet, but james said he and chrissy have both enjoyed the smoothies there. i'll have to check it out sometime. it already has one big thing going for it, in my opinion--the fact that they are open until 11:00 on weekdays, and midnight on weekends. as a general rule, i like anyplace that stays open late. some coffeehouses, denny's, the good ol' waffle house...

(side note addendum: i miss california but i am already completed adjusted to being back in hosuton. driving to the airport felt extremely normal.)

tonight a bunch of us are going to dave and buster's. this should be fun, as i've always wanted to check out this place but never been around when everyone else goes.

sometimes i wonder how my friends put up with me. you see, unfortunately, i am pretty much a tit-for-tat kind of person. it's the way i grew up, the way my siblings and i treated each other. it's not that we don't like each other; in fact, we all get along very well. but all four of us (at varying levels of severity) definitely like to get our "revenge" if we feel attacked or hurt or even just annoyed.

i have discovered in recent years that even though this mannerism is usually suppressible, it is hard to erase entirely. if you reach my breaking point (the location of which is difficult to pinpoint) or say something that hits one of my nerves, there is a chance that i will snap back at you with something sarcastic or biting or just plain mean before i think to hold my tongue. i feel like this makes me a spiteful person at times. i don't like it. but i am working on it.

last night i did something that i can't quite qualify, except to say that it is a uniquely texas and redneck activity. i went to a bingo hall and played bingo. as in, i went with debbie and paul and debbie's sister and brother-in-law to a large barn-like stucture that was formerly a country western dance hall and has now been reincarnated with long tables full of strange-looking people who shell out big bucks on reams of bingo cards, and quietly sit listening to a caller annouce things like "b-15...b-one-five..." and then cover the square with ink from a bingo dauber (available in many colors). yes. and i am ashamed to say that it was actually fun, despite the fact that none of us won anything.

today is george's birthday, so we all went out to lunch, and now suddenly it's almost coke break time. woohoo.

rotary international says they won't let nick go to his school of choice in france because it is too close to paris. this makes me angry. but nick is writing them a letter to plead his case, and if anyone can get someone to change their mind despite their assurances that the decision is final, it's nick.