Thanks for telling me about this David!

Alanis Morissette - "My Humps"

Happy Valentine's Day.
Watch and enjoy:
http://www.zefrank.com/valentine/



also this is way too cute...

Current Mood: flirty

There are a lot of really bad things that have been happening recently all around me - Some to me, some to others, but all difficult to deal with.  Something happened to me at 10:45 am yesterday morning that I was feeling somewhat ambivalent about. Yesterday, when all I could think about was my mother getting mad at me for ruining our new car, I felt like something bad had happened to me. Today, when I realize that I survived a major car crash without a bruise on my body (the couple in the car behind me were not so well off), I feel like something really good happened to me.

I was locked out of my apartment all weekend – another long story – and my best refuge was in Toronto. I came home, and I stayed with my mum who is alone, because the rest of my family is in Italy – another long story.  Because my father is away, I was given the car to bring my groceries and other such things back to London for the week.
Just passed Woodstock I found myself behind a cop car. Everyone slowed, cars changed lanes and the rhythm of the road changed.  What would never have changed was the huge stretch of ice on the road and the wind that came at just that moment. I heard from any number of sources that a) there was nothing I could do and b) that they have been pulling cars out of that ditch and others nearby all day long (I was even shown the skid marks of other cars that had just gone into the ditch, and all of the holes where cars had fallen). Apparently that stretch of road is the worst on the 401 and all of Ontario.  That area has no snow fences, and the trees are not tall enough to the block wind.

From my perspective what happened was that Boreas himself (I thought Zephyr at first, but I thought wrong), the wind, came and grabbed me with one fist and another vehicle in his other fist and tore us from the road.  My initial reaction to the swerving was “my mom’s going to kill me if I scratch the car” and then when I was on my side and then on my head it was “any second now, I’m going to die.”  The really weird thing I felt was the sense of deja vous.  I’ve never been in that situation before, but it all felt familiar- the smell, the crunching of glass and metal, the way snow coated the car and I couldn’t see out, the falling and spinning and even hanging from the ceiling by my seatbelt.  I just braced myself to get down, spun around a bit, and wiggled out of the car as if I’d done it before. I went back for my cell phone and purse and I couldn’t get the car to stop playing the Smiths (Louder than Bombs cd) – and no, it was not “There is a light that never goes out.” Long story short – someone took me home. His name is Dan Fischer and he makes model trains.  I went and gave a quiz to the class I TA and then got a bit of flack for not doing any Latin. Then I went home.

I know that there’s nothing I could have done to stop what happened, and I know if I’d left a minute before that it would have not been me in that gust of wind but someone else – someone who may not have been so lucky… as I said above, the couple in the car behind me were injured. So I chose to say that yesterday something really wonderful happened to me. I rolled a car on its top off of the 401 and I got out alive and well.  Jason seems to think I swallowed a horseshoe. If I go in for X-Rays (just in case) I’ll have them check that out.

Apparently to every thing there is a season.
I feel like I'm in the season of mist.
Everything is murky and damp.
London has never felt so cold.
A man I love very much once told me that to get over my cold I should drink a bottle of whiskey, and a bottle of wine and then wake up strong like  a lion.  I don't think it was age or senility or a language barrier thing. My nonno is just a really different sort of man. He was the kind to make his own kind of music.
He ran off from my father, uncle and nonna in order to visit his family in America in the late 50s. They left during the war.  He promised he would return every holiday -but he didn't. My father's natal family packed up and left Italy on a boat, giant sewing machine strapped to my dad's back, and aimed themselves at Buffalo - that great American city. 
My nonno, the tailor, who only had a few years of grade school, looks like a hobbit and I love him very much.
He recently started singing songs he learned in kindergarten - mostly about the seasons and months, and he thinks that these are important poems. They are important, they mean something to him. How strange that so late in his life he has started to remember these  poems from youth about the seasons. About summers. I miss him.

As you may or may not know, Lynley and I just got back from San Diego.
We went to the APA (American Philological Association)/AIA annual meeting. No we did not go shopping or to Sea World or to the San Diego Zoo. We more or less spent the entire time in the hotel.
It was long, there were no breaks for food or coffee (and the meeting ran all day), but it was all worth it. We saw tons of 'famous' classicists, and many of them were authors of books and articles I have been reading lately - which was especially exciting.
We ventured out of the hotel a few times - mostly at night, for a short period of time, and once for food.
This proved to be a big mistake...
We went to a pseudo Sicilian place near the hotel called Assagio (it seemed like a good idea at the time). We ordered a ricotta and spinach and meatball deep dish (it seemed like a good idea at the time) pizza. But some EVIL FAMILY took our order from the pick-up counter.
look how EVIL they clearly are... eating our pizza.
they ordered a 'meat-lovers' which is full of ham and sausage and pepperoni and meatballs and a couple of other unidentifiable meats. It was about two and a bit inches high and full of grease.
Look at how gross it obviously is!
Lynley and I only agreed to eat it because we did not want anything to go to waste.

Lynley simply laughed at our misfortune. I got ill. And for reasons I cannot explain, Assagio tried to make things better by bringing us $3.37.  And I think their pizza cost more... so it couldn't have been the difference. 
We went back to the hotel quickly, where I was not 'sick' euphemistically speaking, but was sick to my stomach.

once more Lynley laughed at my misfortune.
Then she peeled me an orange, called me Cynthia and put on "Desperate Housewives."
The trip was fun. The hotel was beautiful and I only managed to spill things on myself or others 4 times in as many days.

I spilled hummus on this shirt I was wearing it, but luckily we were at a plaza. I got a shirt that says "I dig Scrawny Pale Dudes" with a picture of Jack the Pumpkin King's girlfriend (from "The Nightmare Before Christmas").

Also, at the conference book sale there was a stand for "Age of Bronze" and the artist/writer was there. I got myself a T-shirt. He was kind of standoffish. But none the less I am enjoying my purchase.

Turns out school and funds are a little screwed up now - they don't wanna reimburse us - but no matter what happens the trip was fun (aside from the pizza incident described in my photo essay above). and... ok we did go to A plaza, so we shopped a little.

Happy New Year too all .5 of you who read this blog.

I hope you all made or did not make resolutions that give you hope for the new year. I do not make large lists nor do I make huge resolutions or else I know I will never meet my goals. I like nothing less than an unfinished list, so I avoid making ones that are impossible to complete. I prefer individual resolutions for each of the people in my life. I have yet to meet the year I know I can resolve to floss once a day but I promised myself I'd do that before I turned 30.
I suppose the only public resolution I have is to be better at communicating with all of my friends long distance.

What are your resolutions? did you get anything amazing for Chanukah or Christmas? (I got the Dr.Who Mega collection!)

I decided to give you another google video (thanks to jason)to laugh at. You really do have to watch it through to the end to experience the full narrative. I hope you all have a happy and healthy year ahead.

"Happy New Year!" on Google Video
I love you David Hasslehoff!

Current Mood: awake

"Panda Sneezes" on Google Video
This is the cutest thing I've ever seen!

Jim Carrey - Ice Ice Baby

If you don't listen to the words it sounds like a real song.
I promise it is much funnier the second time around.
Thanks for showing this to me Cole.

-on a different note - what should I get my mum for Christmas?

Current Music: clearly JT

Other than the obvious mocking I was subjected to by Darrah after I let out the phrase "Oh no! White wine spilled all over my Uggs!!!" I had the best birthday of my life.
This was a combination of the wine (etc.), the friends who were able to come, the ones I know would have come had they not been far away etc, the person I was with, and the fact that FOR ONCE nobody brought someone I hate! Hurrah for everyone finally listening to my invite/evite instructions.
It was also wonderful to see so many of my friends happy. Honestly, I don't think I've ever seen so many of them in a "good emotional place" (even if life is handing them shit). Moreover did everyone I know start a relationship just after I sent that invite saying I had tons of wonderful single friends you could all flirt with!? Are you pairing up just to prove me wrong? Either way I am happy to see so many happy people.

THANK YOU SO MUCH BAYLA FOR BEING THE BEST HOST EVER.

I don't really understand why everyone is so upset about getting older. This was perhaps my first milestone (25), but if milestones are supposed to be scary I didn't feel it. In the spirit of lists, and Francesca (who also loves lists and sadly was not in town for my birthday) I would like to make a list of 25 good things about getting older:
1: more and more memories of my loved ones
2: making new friends
3: being able to tell my father to leave me alone because "I'm an adult now!" (I'll let you know when he actually sees this as a valid argument).
4: being able to choose my own dinners - even if it is junk food
5: getting to travel
6: hearing "you will understand when you're older" less and less
7: yet another banana cream pie made by my mom to celebrate the big day
8: choosing your own clothing (and getting to chose clothing for the men in your life)
9: closer to not being carded
10: getting to read more and more of those "classics" I didn't have time to read in highschool
11: Seeing people I love have babies - who believe it or not are just little people too!
12: not being looked at like a potential shop-lifting-teen-menace when I go into stores
13: learning from my mistakes and getting to make new ones
14: being old and bitter is a respected and ancient image of mature individuals - when you're young people say you have "teen angst" - which is much less cool.
15: being able to hold my alcohol a bit better (this does not count my birthday...)
16: no more kissing boys with braces
17: having friends in cities all over the world to visit and write letters to
18: getting more snail-mail addressed to me (even if now they are bills)
19: It is more socially acceptable to hide inside and read the older you get (this is no longer geeky or antisocial, but adult alone time)
20: feeling like that eye cream I wear is starting to have a use - other than burning a whole in my wallet
21: seeing more and more of my friends quit smoking
22: yelling at stupid teenagers feels more justified the further away I am from being a teen
23: being that much closer to finishing my Master's
24: being closer to my happily ever after - and further away from the emotionally exhausting thing that is dating
25: More things to blog about

go see pics in the gallery!

Current Mood: awake