I Can Think You Under the Table

anisky @ 2008-05-02T13:23:00

2008-05-02T18:35:38Z

I just emailed my recruiter to let him know that I want to be nominated for Secondary Math Education in Africa leaving in November '08!

anisky @ 2008-04-03T00:45:00

2008-04-03T06:15:59Z

So, several questions for you all, for anyone who's observed us but mostly and ESPECIALLY for those who are (like me) of the so-called "millennial" generation.

1.) What do you think are the fundamental properties of the "millennial" generation (the generation which is currently in the process of coming of age, or has done so in the past few years)?

2.) What do you think are the secondary properties of this generation?

3.) What do you think are some experiences they *must* have had; what do you think are experiences that many of them have had?

4.) What are some experiences that perhaps only a small subsection of Millennials have had, but are nonetheless a phenomenon closely tied to their generation?

5.) Which of these experiences are singular to the millennials, which are more universal, and which are inbetween-- affect those generations around our own, but still fairly isolated in society?

I'm asking this for several reasons. First, I'm really interested in the whole idea in general, and have been ever since anotherthink posted an article largely involving the identity of my generation about a year ago (I think; it could well have been longer). Secondly, I'm writing a magic realism piece in addition to Vae Victor. Just as part of the idea of Vae Victor is that Anann has rather forcibly removed herself from her own generation and become in personality somewhat timeless by her seclusion into academia and her mostly un-articulated desire to become a being of pure intellect, part of the concept of my *other* main novel I've been working on is a character who is exactly the opposite. And this second reason is actually the MAIN reason I'm asking this question.

Amora was raised by artists who usually worked in various capacities for acting troupes who toured Europe (though if you can think of other professions for artists that would have them traveling in groups of similar types [or even of different types, I guess], then I would love to hear about them). She (very very unlike Anann) has basically no *country* identity. She's a citizen of both England and America (POSSIBLY a third, as I'm considering the concept that her father's family emigrated to America, but that's not really the point), but she's lived in so many different countries, and as she grew up had so little chance to put down any kind of roots, that she's definitely not a part of any national identity. However, the idea is for her to be VERY MUCH a part of her own generation (as well as a part of various subcultures, though that's another matter). Even her upbringing is kind of hyperactively representative of my generation; I've referred to myself and others like me numerous times as "the generation raised by hippies."

I want Amora, much as she definitely has her own personality, to be intrinsically a "millennial." I want the values and conventions of this generation to be, if not identical to, at least influencing the core of her own values and conventions. And there are certain experiences and observations that she must have.

Obviously, you don't have to have a fully developed system to answer; but if any of those questions makes you go "hey, there's this thing," please let me know!

(Also, this refers to the North Americans and Western Europeans of this generation, since another formulation is absolutely too broad. Obviously, I'm only familiar with the American generation. If any of you are from this generation abroad, I really want to hear from you about what's the same/different [and what a visitor to, but not a native of, your country would absorb]. British sensibilities would be especially useful here, as Amora's supposed to live in London for several years.)

I'll give you examples of some of my own answers to give you an idea of what I'm looking for, but if you have something to offer that isn't what I'm looking for, that is absolutely positively MORE than welcome.

(You absolutely don't have to have such long answers as I'm about to give at times in order to answer my post. Even one word reminding me of a phenomenon I've forgotten can be helpful. Some of these are long because obviously, I've thought about them a lot.)

(Also, if you disagree with some of the answers I'm about to give, awesome! Tell me. Thinking about the multiple sides to the issue and controversy can only help my ability to portray and interpret this character.)

1.) We grew up pretty concurrently with the internet. In a way, the internet's development mirrors that of mine: My family first got the internet when I was 9, and it had been around for a while but was only just becoming popular; it was several years before everyone had it; now that I'm an adult, it's considered essential. When I was too young to understand much of the world very few people used it; the more and more I was able to understand the world and widen my horizons, the more extensive, mainstream and essential the internet became, until about the time when I could start to be considered an adult the concept of *not* having a computer/internet in America became strange. It was young with me, an adolescent with me, and now an adult with me. The generations before me view it as something new and different; the generations after me view it as a complete given and while they may know intellectually it's a recent invention, I believe they will take it for granted. I think this gives the millennials a symbiosis with the internet and a strange sort of personal relationship with it that none others can (this is answering question 5 a bit as well, since this is fairly singular to the particular generation).

I think acceptance of homosexuality took a similar course, at least in terms of media and Hollywood (which I think affect our perception of reality much more than most of us realize). Of course, the push for acceptance of gays began before internet, and encountered more resistance, too, especially in recent years. (Though it amazes me how different the atmosphere now is from simply 4 or 5 years ago.) But I was very young (around 7, I think) when the first lesbian kiss was shown on television, and there were only a few movies dealing primarily with gay characters. Now every sitcom and its mother has at least a token gay character. The prevalence of gay characters and icons in mainstream TV has expanded at about the rate that I have been able to understand sexuality and what it entails. In a way, popular media attitude towards homosexuality has, in a somewhat more tenuous way, also matured beside me/us.

I think this trend has led many of my generation to a teleological view of social progress. We DEFINITELY have a teleological view of technological progress, but that's so deeply ingrained, thus I believe it so much, that it's hard to imagine a different model for technology. It is constantly advancing (at what in any century before the 20th would be considered an absurd rate), and unless there is some disaster (cough cough, global warming, cough cough, nuclear war, etc), my own view of technology is too firmly in this camp for me to criticize it.

2.) Of course the other technological advances. Cell phones became really popular when I was about 11, so some of that they-appeared-just-as-I-was-old-enough-to-appreciate-them also seeps into this. iPods; the coolness factor of liking "obscure" bands and disdaining major record labels, to a lesser degree this was a feature of earlier generations as well (references to question 5 again), but things like the internet give a much wider range of possibility. Reality television (which personally I hate, but which can't be ignored as a feature of this generation). Blogs, both personal like this one and political; blogs as an alternative to a diary, blogs as a way to maintain contact with old friends, and blogs as an alternative to mainstream news.
(Speaking of news: Daily Show and Colbert Report.)
A common attitude (mistaken I think) that we are post-racism and post-sexism, and a tension between people who are working to eliminate these things and those who believe that these things are already of the past and that the former types are just crying that they're victims.
Post-modernism and the intense abstraction of art.
Social networking sites.
A kind of simultaneous obsession with a disdain of celebrities. (In response to 5, this is more widespread than just Millennials; but I'm not sure how much people knew about the rehab, drug problems, etc of celebrities of the past. If people part of those generations could answer that would be awesome.)

This is an incomplete list, but obviously I can't list all the secondary features of my generation; but any that you think are important, please comment and let me know!

3.) Ok, of course answering this question tempts one to repeat answers to previous questions; they must have used the internet, used a cell phone (even if they don't own one themselves), and regardless of views grappled with the concept of homosexuality.
We remember 9/11. Duh. However, I'm not sure quite the effect it's actually had on us.
They possibly made online friends, used internet forums, had a blog, taken part in a social networking site, etc. Many had friends or family members come out of the closet.

4.) This one is one of the most open-ended and interesting, I think.
I think that for the younger half of my generation, and the older half of the next one, one "thing" will be to have a parent come out of the closet. Divorce has been common for a while, but the recent swing in attitudes towards homosexuality has been bringing about a lot of cases of a parent admitting their sexual orientation and leaving. It didn't happen much before this generation because it was still too shameful; it will likely decline sometime in the middle of the next generation because fewer people will be closeted enough to enter a straight marriage when they're gay in the first place. This cannot be called a *common* occurence, but it certainly has been happening in numbers much higher than in previous times. And while most members of the Millennial generation won't experience it firsthand, or have their friends experience it, it will be a situation that is not alien to them. The idea that it could happen is much more present than in any other time.
But there are many, many answers to this question, because I think there are a lot of things that happen *more* often now than in any other era, but are still not the *norm*. More examples of this I would love to hear.

5.) This question kind of implicit in all of the others. In a way it is less something to answer on its own, and more something to incorporate into contemplation of the other questions.

I know this was long, and probably uninteresting to a lot of you; but some of you, maybe, find the topic interesting like I do. And if those people have anything to add, I would love the chance to incorporate other perspectives into Amora's (who currently houses, sadly, only mine).

Heartbreaking Voices of Uncertainty

2007-11-14T17:04:01Z

I know, I know, big surprise, conglomerates lie. But this is catching them in the exact lies that are the basis for their not negotiating with the WGA. It's just infuriating.

A good explanation of why the writers walked with a bit of Hollywood history here: to live by the pen

anisky @ 2007-10-01T22:29:00

2007-10-02T03:30:40Z

On September 29th, there was a massacre at State High School No.2, Tamwe in Rangoon. Reports have confirmed that an estimated 50-100 students and parents were killed.

I just can't figure out much I can DO that's, you know... actually going to make a big difference.

anisky @ 2007-10-01T11:42:00

2007-10-01T16:49:10Z

Unbelievable. I don't want to believe it.

I knew they were brutal, but that's... unfathomable. I'll give a quote:

"A troop of lone-tein (riot police comprised of paid thugs) protected by the military trucks, raided the monastery with 200 studying monks. They systematically ordered all the monks to line up and banged and crushed each one's head against the brick wall of the monastery. One by one, the peaceful, non resisting monks, fell to the ground, screaming in pain. Then, they tore off the red robes and threw them all in the military trucks (like rice bags) and took the bodies away.

"The head monk of the monastery, was tied up in the middle of the monastery, tortured , bludgeoned, and later died the same day, today. Tens of thousands of people gathered outside the monastery, warded off by troops with bayoneted rifles, unable to help their helpless monks being slaughtered inside the monastery. Their every try to forge ahead was met with the bayonets.

"When all is done, only 10 out of 200 remained alive, hiding in the monastery. Blood stained everywhere on the walls and floors of the monastery."

There have been a few isolated reports of dissention in the army. The general second-in-command, Maung Aye, apparently opposed using force against the monks; it's been suggested that the disagreement between Than Shwe and Maung Aye is the real reason the UN Envoy's meeting with them has been delayed so much. Other generals have refused to follow orders and fled to the border-- and several of them have also confirmed the story about the SPDC killing the monks, claiming they were "arresting" them, and then dumping the bodies in the jungle.

Suddenly the world is paying attention. Suddenly pro-Burma facebook groups, previously unable to get more than 200 or 300 people, are in excess of 200,000+ people. Of course, it's mostly just people who will be activists for as long as Burma is big in the news, and then will fade out again when it ceases to be "exciting." I hope the worldwide attention, and the seeming cracks in the SPDC unity, will do something, but I have to admit I'm pessimistic.

It's hard to be optimistic when plagued with descriptions like the one above.

anisky @ 2007-06-05T14:39:00

2007-06-05T19:42:07Z

So I, procrastinating, just took a look at the full cover for Harry Potter 7.

I don't know why everyone keeps saying that Voldemort is reaching for Harry in that image. He isn't; Harry's too far back, the angle is wrong. Voldemort is reaching for whatever it is that Harry is reaching for, above his head.

anisky @ 2007-05-30T21:44:00

2007-05-31T02:46:25Z

Hey, LJ? Rule of thumb.

If you are unable to explain why you've done something to your users, let ALONE paying customers...

Then you don't have a good enough reason to have done it.

As a member both of fandom communities and kink communities, it's interesting to see how each is being affected. The fandom is, thus far, much larger and more up in arms. The kink communities have been the victims of attempted entrapment, as have the maintainers of those communities through AIM-- yes, really.

And after 88 pages of comments on LJ's news community angrily asking why they did this, LJ still hasn't answered.

ETA: A bit hard to link, as it's a huge grassroots thing on LJ right now. I guess the most concise link I could send you would be this: http://news.com.com/Mass+deletion+sparks+LiveJournal+revolt/2100-1025_3-6187619.html
Also http://liz-marcs.livejournal.com/266024.html

And if you think you're not seeing it in the news community... go to their most recent post... scroll down to the comments... and check out pages 6-100.

It reached the max limit of comments a while ago.

ETA 2: Also, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Livejournal#Account_deletion_.28Strikethrough_.2707.29

anisky @ 2007-05-12T18:53:00

2007-05-12T23:53:38Z

Hey everyone, I'm looking for help with SCAV HUNT 2007!
It's held at the University of Chicago and is pretty much the biggest Scavenger Hunt in the world. With over 300 items, one of them has to do with getting people to join a Facebook group. You only have to be a member through Saturday, when Judging ends, but your help would be really appreciated!

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2340821563

Thanks! Please invite everyone you know!
We already got mentioned in Questionable Content for an item, so help this should be relatively easy!

Heh.

2007-03-10T02:14:46Z

Couldn't resist. Even though this is probably just asking for a blow to the ol' ego.

Crush this person!
Get your own ThisCrush.com CrushTag!

anisky @ 2007-01-19T14:04:00

2007-01-19T20:05:36Z

Something Shiny!

Or possibly Cute Puppies!

A Leprechan!

Or in general, anything "It" might become to lure you in (see "Something's Got To Give")!

15 characters meme-- gakked from nest_freemark

2006-12-30T13:35:29Z

1. Make a list of 15 characters first, and keep it to yourself for the moment. (That way you're not leading the questions asked to fit the characters.)

2. Ask your friendslist to post questions in the comments. For example: "4, 6, 12 & 15 are starting a band together, what is their name and what kind of music do they play? Also, who's the lead singer, and what instruments do the others play?"

3. After your friendslist has asked enough questions, round them up and answer them using the 15 characters you selected beforehand, and then post them.

Come on, don't be shy-- ask!!

anisky @ 2006-12-18T17:37:00

2006-12-18T22:38:31Z

I'm pretty sure I'm allergic to something in my parents' house. It's making me feel really crappy all the time. I really wish I'd been able to get out of the housing contract; an apartment of my own I could go stay in would be so great right now.

anisky @ 2006-11-04T02:14:00

2006-11-04T08:14:03Z

What American accent do you have? Your Result: Philadelphia Your accent is as Philadelphian as a cheesesteak! If you're not from Philadelphia, then you're from someplace near there like south Jersey, Baltimore, or Wilmington. if you've ever journeyed to some far off place where people don't know that Philly has an accent, someone may have thought you talked a little weird even though they didn't have a clue what accent it was they heard.
The Northeast
The Midland
The Inland North
The South
Boston
The West
North Central
What American accent do you have? Take More Quizzes

HA that thing is good!!!!

anisky @ 2006-11-02T20:31:00

2006-11-03T02:31:31Z

So today at the table in Reynold's club, 111 postcards were signed!

The whole thing didn't fall apart, and amazing thanks to sheridankm, reebchan, and zimjoemar for really stepping up to help out, even though you didn't know much about the issue! You guys really kept it together, thanks SO much, we literally couldn't have done it without you (especially kms, who I horribly left hanging a full half hour after she should have been able to leave).

More tabling tomorrow, but with these 111, plus the 39 I already had, plus the ones that other people made their friends sign that haven't returned them yet, has already made this at least somewhat a success!

anisky @ 2006-11-01T22:07:00

2006-11-02T04:07:55Z

Okay, seriously, NOBODY's signed up. Damn RSO office for not letting me know until tonight!!

Please, please, if you are in the area and can conceivably table for some, ANY, of the time tomorrow or Friday, even if you don't know much about Burma, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE let me know. So far NOBODY'S signed up and seriously, I have lab tomorrow, and classes 12:30-1:30 and 3:30-5:30 then a play i need to leave for AT 5:30. SO basically, it looks right now like I'm screwed.

anisky @ 2006-11-01T18:56:00

2006-11-02T00:56:07Z

So, we are tabling for the Free Burma Project the following times:

Thursday, November 02, 2006

9:00 am - 7:00 pm Free Burma Project (Confirmed) Marketplace Kiosk 2

Friday, November 03, 2006

9:00 am - 4:00 pm Free Burma Project (Confirmed) Marketplace Kiosk 2

This is in Reynolds, btw (at least I certainly hope it is!!)

As of yet, nobody is signed up, so if you can manage any of those times, please let me know! Ideally I'd like two people at a time but I'm not so sure that's possible! I can theoretically do 9-11:30 both days, though I'd prefer not to do all that time (and definitely not alone).

So any time you can table tomorrow or friday, please let me know!!

Seriously, if you can table any of those times, PLEEEAAAASE let me know!

anisky @ 2006-09-20T12:25:00

2006-09-20T17:26:10Z

NOTICE: This journal is friends-only from now on. If you read my journal and are not on my friend's list, just comment and I'll probably add you. :)

anisky @ 2006-09-06T10:04:00

2006-09-06T14:04:35Z

If there is one or more people on your friends list who makes your world a better place just because they exist and who you would not have met (in real life or not) without the internet, then post this same sentence in your journal.

anisky @ 2006-08-01T13:36:00

2006-08-01T06:39:02Z

So, they changed their minds back again and I can stay there, but they won't feed me. I find this provision puzzling, since I've been eating very little even since I got better, and they've been shoveling food onto my plate and I've only been eating a tiny bit of it, but whatever. :) I don't have any problem with this arrangement at all, so that's good.

I was really ungracious before, and I feel bad about it. Constant uncertainty about where you'll be, where you'll live, what will be happening is the way their lives ARE, it never lets up. What I experienced yesterday was just a tiny microcosm of that and it really threw me off guard.

anisky @ 2006-07-31T14:15:00

2006-07-31T07:20:01Z

I'm boooooored.

Why has nobody been online tonight?

anisky @ 2006-07-30T03:18:00

2006-07-30T10:06:33Z

Hey all! Unless you hate my guts, you'll be happy to know that I'm feeling better, kept down a normal breakfast this morning and felt fine. I also found out last night that I'm moving in with my students this evening!!!! I'll be living with some girls from my beginner class, so they don't speak English very much at all, but I think that might actually work out in my favor, anxiety-wise. They can't really talk to me besides the extreme basics, so if I just want to sit somewhere and read, or write, then it won't be rude or anything. I can even both hang out with them AND have privacy, since they won't be able to understand what I read or write or say on the phone with someone anyway. They've got a great camaraderie, even without a shared language you can really tell that they're warm and friendly, so I don't think I'll have any problem being around them without having the stress of trying to think of things to say, trying to perform, etc.

Speaking of the stress thing, these particular students are Buddhist, so I'm thinking about asking them if it's OK if I meditate with them and tell them that I want to learn about Buddhism (seems like the kind of thing that you can at least partially explain using gestures and example, yeah?). I'm still Pagan, but I think even just in general, medically or whatever, meditation and deep breathing are known to help with anxiety. They're also the students who said they'd teach me how to cook Burmese food, so maybe that'll actually happen! :)

Plus, most of the intermediate and advanced students live within a few blocks of where I'll be staying, so I'll be around them more often as well, so they'll also be able to benefit from extra English practice talking to me (more low-pressure than in class too). I'm also figuring that if I'm living with my students, we'll get to be naturally close enough that teaching them will seem like less of a source of stress, because they'll be my friends.

So, I'm feeling well after weeks of being really ill, and I'm sure you know how amazing it is to feel good after you've been sick, so feeling well after WEEKS of being sick just magnifies that extreme appreciation of health. AND, my living situation has turned out exactly how I was hoping it would. So, right now, I'm doing really, really well. I've been writing too—I recently wrote a short piece that could either be an excerpt from a novel I'm working on or its own short story, I'm not sure which. Since my computer died, creative writing goes in those spiral notebooks so that I can write them out of order then tear them out and rearrange them and all, and I'm also keeping paper journal-- it's a nice one, bound in cloth made by Burmese women using natural dyes and everything. I've been writing in it a LOT, actually.

Yesterday, a group of 8 of us, mostly volunteers and interns, rented motorbikes to ride up to the hotsprings and caves up north for a day trip. I was going to ride on the back of one of the others, but I decided hey, I only live once, and rented my own (It was only 150 baht, or about $4 for a day) so I could drive it myself. I was nervous about it, and since I was nervous about it Andrea got kind of mad at me for doing it, but come on, I've ridden on the back of motorcycles plenty of times with Dad; I wanted this experience. So I rode the motorbike, and it was marvellous. It wasn't a proper motorcycle of course, but we were going a good 80, 90 kph on the road-- that's about 50-55 mph-- so we weren't exactly just chugging along, either. We were riding up into the mountains, and the scenery was just so beautiful... the palm trees, the mountains, the sky, the valleys... oh my gods. I forgot my camera, but others took pictures and promised to either email them to me or put them on their Myspace accounts.

On the way there, the sun was shining. I was in my black halter top, because I wanted to get rid of the extreme t-shirt tan line I've developed because of how modestly I have to dress when I teach classes. Well, it's gone now-- I have an extreme sunburn in its place. My shoulders, arms, chest-- red as a lobster. It hurts, but actually I don't really mind. It's only mild, in a few days it'll develop into a nice tan, and a little bit of pain after the weeks of being sick is nothing.

My jeans had a rip in the knee, though, so I have a sunburn about three inches across in a semicircle right above my knee, but nowhere else on my legs. LOL. That'll look funny.

We rode to the caves, but we were all wearing sandals, and we were told that it was much too dangerous to climb the mountain to the caves in them, we just had lunch there and decided to go up to see the waterfall further north. Unfortunately, there was a military checkpoint, and one of our friends was Burmese and illegally in Thailand, and since obviously we did not want her to be deported and sent to jail and tortured for years, we decided to turn around and drive awaaaaaaaaay from the scary army people. We rode along in the sun slightly aimlessly (this is probably about when I got the burn) and then happened upon the only Burmese-style Wat (Buddhist temple) in Thailand, so we went in and sat/looked around for a while. The Burmese girl showed me how to do a little bit of formal Buddhist praying.

When we rode back it was raining, but I actually really enjoyed it. I had my poncho, so I didn't get that wet except on my arms, which were sunburned so it felt good. It was very private, somehow; with all the rain, nobody would be able to hear me, so I sang campfire songs on the way back, just because. It was all very pleasant, and I'm really glad I went, even though my arms and shoulders do hurt a bit.

After that we went to a party at Aryca's, and I met a lot of people and was talking to people almost the whole time, which was nice—sometimes I end up just sort of standing apart awkwardly and feeling uncomfortable at things like that, you know? But I felt really comfortable and was having good conversations the whole time, so hopefully that's a sign that any social anxiety I've been having is clearing up. I still don't have anybody who I really think of as a FRIEND-friend, but there's definitely a group of about 8 of us, BVP volunteers and other young interns and stuff, who hang out together, go out, watch movies, etc. I'm not particularly friends with any of them, but I'm definitely a member of the group, so I at least have somewhere I have a feeling of belonging, you know? And now that I'm feeling better I've taken to sitting in restaurants and cafes and drinking tea while reading or writing, and you pretty naturally strike up conversations with the people around you in that sort of setting, so I'm feeling less isolated. I also met a couple of guys at the party last night who I'll probably run into again who I think I might become friends with—you know, the kind of people where the conversation just never lulls but keeps on fueling itself? So I'm hopeful, at least.

I really really hope I don't get sick again, but right now I'm SO glad I stuck it out, you know? I feel better, and things seem to be working themselves out. Knock wood, of course.

I haven't applied for the job yet—boo me—but since I'll have more access to the internet living at my new home, I'll probably be able to get to that tonight or tomorrow.

Of course, I was supposed to get off the computer and start moving my stuff HOURS ago, but instead I'm just lingering online... I really ought to go soon... gah.

But oh well. I'll be a little late. So what? I'll say there are important things I had to take care of online. It's not like they'll be going to bed at 7 or something, and I'll bring all my stuff over myself on my bike. I don't have to worry. That's just what I need to keep reminding myself: I don't have to worry.

anisky @ 2006-07-28T12:25:00

2006-07-28T05:42:57Z

So, I've reworked my classes because of problems with attendence and things like that. I'm teaching 4 hours a day now-- a beginner class for an hour and a half in the morning, an hour and a half advanced class in the evening, and then a special, unofficial, informal "catch up" class the hour before the advanced class for students who don't quite feel ready for the advanced class (the beginner class would be no help at all to them). I mostly formed it for the two intermediate students who were showing up every day-- it felt really unfair to them to make them sit in a class where they knew everything or a much-too-difficult class just because their classmates weren't showing up. One of them was sitting in on the beginner class every day, but I knew he was getting nothing at all out of it, so I felt bad. But I've talked to some people and I have the feeling that some of the advanced students are going to sit in on it, since we've been using a recent Newsweek as our textbook recently and it's really quite advanced, so the unofficial class might end up larger than I first meant it to be.

I don't think this class will be that much more stress though, since it's an hour per day more than I'm required to teach, so there's no great pressure to be great-- all I have to do is give students extra practice time, yeah? It'll probably be mostly focused on helping them learn to form their own sentences and speak them without feeling too uncomfortable and nervous. Probably a lot of vocabulary and grammar, too, but since I want it to be informal I'll try to go for a more fun, less structured class. Reading stories, that sort of thing. I wish my computer were working so we could watch videos in it!!

Speaking of which, I still haven't sent the computer off. I need to ask somebody where the post office is!!! But I HAVE gotten back my passport! Yay!! (The hospital took it when I didn't have enough money to pay my bill as an insurance that I would come back and pay it. It was only $250, so my parents sent the money no problem, it was just more than I actually needed for the rest of my two months here, so I didn't have it on hand when I left the hospital.) The hospital couldn't contact the insurance company though, and it was a big fiasco, so we'll (I'll?) just have to try to get a refund when I get back.

It looks like my students might be finding a place for me to stay, which would be AMAZING!!! I'm not sure how much I've explained, but right now I have to ride back and forth every day, and as it's the rainy season, I'm getting drenched all the time. Really, I would love to live here at the newspaper. They said they'll let me know tonight or tomorrow whether or not there's a place for me, so cross your fingers for me! That would be GREAT.

I've officially let the Dean of Students know that I will be attending UChicago in the fall, so that's all taken care of. She's going to arrange a meeting with a counselor to check if I should continue therapy once I get there, and a meeting with my advisor on the first day of classes, but from my end it's all taken care of.

However, I haven't send in the math TA job application yet. I should get on that!! It's kind of hard to arrange because I need to know my classes first, since I have to be available for all of the classes and the tutorial session for whatever class I'd be TAing. But I don't know my schedule, since I can't sign up for classes until I get back!! I'll just have to guess, I suppose.

I've done a lot of writing, and I feel like it's pretty good writing, so that makes me happy, even if I am going insane.

anisky @ 2006-07-27T19:03:00

2006-07-27T12:04:34Z

Gertrude Stein decided to be a genius.

I think that's kind of inspiring. Right now, I'm deciding to be a genius, too.

I am going to be a genius. I am going to write brilliant novels.

anisky @ 2006-07-24T18:23:00

2006-07-24T11:23:59Z

<td align="center"> Mel --
[noun]:

A lewd street performer

'How will you be defined in the dictionary?' at QuizGalaxy.com</td>

anisky @ 2006-07-14T05:27:00

2006-07-14T05:28:25Z

I'm going to Chang Mai this weekend (leaving 8 am tomorrow), but I can't manage to book a hostel online, so I'll get to have that fun little "let's wander around a foreign city not speaking the language trying to find somewhere to sleep tonight!"

I actually am looking forward to it. I’ll be in my natural habitat, after all.