Ants

About a year ago Ashley, my best friend, and I were viciously torn apart. Sort of. Ashley got accepted to a graduate school in a different state and left me. Although, in her defense, she did offer to let me quit my job and move with her to Idaho. I have a policy about Idaho. There are some states which have a certain ring to them, they just sound cool. New York. If you tell someone you live in New York you will automatically get cool person points. I feel that California, Florida, or Washington DC will have the same effect. Conversely, I feel there are a few states which automatically sap cool person points. . . such as Idaho. So I selfishly kept my job, cried, and didn't move to Idaho.

One thing I love about Ashley is that she Always has crazy stories to tell. One such story was the story of the ants. First of all I feel I should preface this by saying there are two types of people in the world: Type A and Type B. Type A people are the high-stress, I go jogging at 4am so I can shower and be at work by 7, let-me-put-that-in-my-daily-planner, I wear fitted suits and brand name shoes type of people. Type B people are I don't believe in mornings, I eat my ice-cream out of the carton with a fork (because all the spoons were dirty), the last time I wore make-up was five months ago, the floor is my closet kind of people. *This is putting things VERY drastically, most people are a mix of Type A and Type B, I just wanted to give you an idea of the disparity between the types.

Ashley is a Type B. Definitively.

On Halloween Costumes

I have never been very invested in Halloween. I think I was raised with a bias against such things by a rather pious mother. (I also grew up disliking The Emperor's New Groove and Harry Potter 6 and 7.) Also I am lazy. First of all, brainstorming costumes takes effort. Second of all, actually making and wearing a costume? Soooo much work.

In my defense: I started thinking about Halloween in July (of last year, and started this blog post last year, and am finishing it almost a year later). I don't know if I can really call what I did "preparing" for Halloween because I was not thinking of costumes and drawing out plans of what I would wear or how I could look.

What happened was that I was bored on a Saturday afternoon. What I did was make up paranormal valentines with my roommate. Paranormal being the Halloween related part. Ingredients that went into this misadventure: me, my roommate, the fact that we'd been in our apartment too long, the fact that we'd known each other for too long, pen and paper.

Indulge me.

We began with poor puns:

The Mummy: "I'm all wrapped up in you."

The Ghost: "My love for you is transparent."

The Werewolf: "You bring out the animal in me."

On Ducks

Most of my life is lived in a kind of normal way where I say stupid things, and do strange things, and have funny stories to tell. Then, every once in a while, I have a light-bulb moment where I remember that I am a college graduate and have a brain and can think deeply about things.

The most common time this epiphany of academia hits me is after watching pop-movies.  I like to sit down and pick the plots and characters apart with Ashley. By the time I get done with these discussions I feel that I understand the movie so well and know all its weaknesses and strengths that I should become a movie director and leave my drab life behind. I should at least be a film critic. —Or screenwriter. Or director.

Other times I read books and then find myself writing essays about them—in my head, actually writing things out is completely overrated. A book has to really annoy me to get me to the point where I'm actually typing out my critique. Although I did once write a mini-novel review of a book I loathed and posted it to goodreads (because that is where serious humanity majors post their critiques). Why is it that essays are hard to write, but I can think up 3,000 words on a fiction title that bugged me in a matter of minutes?

And then . . . there are the times I have my brilliant epiphanies about things that are not at all scholarly, or even have the slightest potential to make me seem remotely wise.  I had one of these false epiphanies the other day about ducks.  Yes, ducks.

Just a Quick Run. . .

I have a tendency to inconvenience myself. Sometimes I don’t think far enough ahead and I do silly things like leave my lunch in the fridge at my apt. Then I spend my lunch hour thinking to myself well that was dumb, I could be eating right now if I’d brought that food I purposely prepared for myself with me. Unfortunately often I inconvenience myself because I am capricious. (If you don’t know what that means I'm helping you expand your vocabulary -look it up.) Sometimes I decide to go on spur-of-the-moment adventures. . . Adventures are fine. My problem is that I allow myself to be distracted even when I know I don’t have time. Example:

I recently got asked on a date—it happens sometimes. I said I’d go. He said he’d pick me up after work . . . and the day rolled around.

That day I drove back from work, found I had a lot of extra energy, and decided I wanted to go running. Most people would have looked at the clock, thought to themselves oh I only have an hour before the date. I should NOT go running right now. My brain doesn’t work that way.