Friends Part the Next: The Epic of the Lost Key Concluded

The next day did not prove to be fruitful for the key search. Wolfie called the Methodist Church and was rewarded with a long conversation by a very kind old lady who suggested that she put the key on a key ring and get one of those key chains that lights up or something like that to assist in the finding of the key. She even called down to the maintenance man at the church to have him check the sanctuary for the key, but with no success. However, Wolfie was invited to come to look for the key herself. As the precious old lady said, "It might be worth your time to come look for yourself because I'm sure that no one would be looking for a single key. You know, it just wouldn't cross many people's minds. Even though I told John to look for a single gold colored key, you know, he was probably looking for a key ring. So just come on over, around four o'clock, and you can have a good look around yourself. I really think it would be worth your time. All right, dear, see you at four o'clock."

The conversation at Panera was much less cheerful. After a brief conversation with the burly male voice that answered the phone at the bread company ascertaining that there was not a key in either booth, she was invited to come and look for herself later in the day as well. Wolfie asked all of her friends at the planetarium, but no one had seen a key (strangely, a single silver house key had been turned into the gift shop that was dishearteningly dissimilar to the missing key and which made the ninja-like trip to the alarmed ticket office a bit pointless, though no less epic). After a long day at camp with kiddies, Wolfie trudged over to the church and had a look around herself. She left the church empty handed after a long conversation about birdhouses, brought on by the offhand comment, "I'm just going to hope that a bird took the key for its nest because that's more cheerful." Wolfie trudged down to a key-less Panera and then trudged once more down to the bus stop and back to the apartment.

She found Smalls on the couch beasting another temple in Wind Waker. Smiling apologetically, she explained that she had not found the key anywhere and sighed apologetically as she flopped down on the opposing couch next to Tiberius. Smalls was quite understanding and offered to show Wolfie how to unlock the door using the credit card and Wolfie gladly accepted, feeling that this skill, along with picking locks using hair pins, would come in handy in later life. They headed out the door, leaving Tiberius to jump up to the couch near the window to watch their progress.

Wolfie first handed over her license, since it needed to be renewed anyway. Wolfie, having both recently turned 21 and recently been mistaken for a middle schooler, was not concerned about the safety of a piece of plastic that compounded the problem by declaring that she was underage. She settled back against the black rail of the porch to watch a master at work. She exclaimed when she heard a click but was tempered in her excitement by Smalls' assurance that "That might sound like a good noise, but is, in fact not." She settled back further as Smalls demonstrated the best way to insert the plastic into the space between the door and the door frame and nodded understandingly as she watched the technique. However, the lessons progress was interrupted by the snapping of plastic. Smalls handed back Wolfie's license in two slightly bent pieces. Even in retrospect, Wolfie said that this was not a big deal at all- in fact, in removing that incriminating picture, it was probably actually a good thing. In fact, since Wolfie did not own a car, it would be months before a new license would be required.

It was at this point in the lesson that both the student and the teacher realized that the key to their relief lay on the other side of the immovable front door, both literally and figuratively. A few feet from Tiberius' faithful perch were Smalls' keys and both of their cell phones. Wolfie handed over her check card and Smalls fought the lock with renewed motivation. The oppressive heat, humidity and blood sucking insects of a late Hapel Chill summer drove the two of them to consider various other options. With locked and screened windows and a locked rear door, the only option seemed to ask the community office to let them back into the apartment. Wolfie set off down the road as Smalls had walked onto her porch barefoot. After a brief conversation with the lady in the office, she headed back to the apartment to find Smalls on the porch watching a new neighbor move in what looked like stolen paintings into her apartment from a large unmarked truck. Tiberius had abandoned the situation to hunt down a wild bone in the jungle that the living room must appear to a foot high terrier.

Smalls and Wolfie sat on the front porch shooting the breeze as package after large package was moved from the truck. The maintenance man never came, but the lady in the office came by on her way out for the evening to let them in. Grateful for the artificially cooled air, the two sunk down onto the couches and vowed never to speak of the incident again. Wolfie only gave me details under extreme duress, forcing an oath of secrecy upon me. However, it's too good of a story to keep silent. (For reals, who loses their key, knows they can't open the door with a card and then locks themselves outside without keys? Pretty intelligent and awesome people, that's who.)

Later that evening, Wolfie went to have a movie night with Sarah. On the way out of the house at the end of the night, Sarah noticed that she didn't have her keys. Her dutiful friend attempted to pick the lock with Wolfie's beaten and now unusable check card, but determined that the card was too flexible to force the lock back into its slot in the door. Wolfie was now satisfied that she was among three people in her life who were capable of unlocking doors with credit cards and considered the whole experience a combination of cursed luck and awkward happenstance. She slept well that night knowing that an extra key was being made the next day.

Of course, the next day Wolfie was greeted with a voicemail from Panera, where her key had been recovered. She gave it a place of honor on her key chain and smiled ruefully as the clerk at Wachovia mildly judged her when she showed her battered plastic. She would have you know, dear friends, that though her epic ended happily, do not allow your story to become a tragedy. Buy a large exciting key chain that lights up and practice opening your doors with those fake credit cards they send in the mail. Because clearly there are no other moral lessons to be gleaned from this story.

The end.

Friends Part Deux: The Epic of the Lost Key

So I have this friend named Aj Wolfie who was staying with another friend of ours for about a month this summer. The way she explained it, since she wasn't going to be staying at this place very long (which is regrettable because it was a pretty awesome place with a hedgehog [even though he didn't like Aj very much] and great decor and an awesome roommate) she decided that she would just carry the key around in her wallet instead of putting it on her key ring. In her defense, it's really hard to get those keys on a key ring. I'd avoid it if I could. Anyway.

My friend's roommate Smalls was going to be out of town for the weekend. Smalls lives far to the west, about a five hour drive from Hapel Chill, where our story takes place. Hapel Chill, it should be noted, is one of the best places on Earth, with the nicest people and most beautiful campus, not to mention promising sports seasons where they will not (pleasepleasepleaseplease) lose to their non-rivals on Wolfie's senior night football game. I should also mention that this story takes place in beautiful North Carolina. You'll appreciate how wonderful it is only after you've left it for a year or two. Now that the scene is set, we can return to our narrative.

With Smalls far away, Wolfie had no way to get to church on Sunday morning. She bribed her former roommate, C-Stine, with a free breakfast if she would come retrieve Wolfie from her momentary lodgings. C-Stine complied and the two set off in C-stine's borrowed car, since her usual car, Rafiki, was in the shop after having bested a contest with a sleek black wimpy car that didn't pay attention to the important things in life, such as stop lights. They drove to Panera for a quick bagel and then C-Stine dropped Wolfie off at University Presbyterian University Lutheran University Baptist a Methodist Church. Wolfie remembers really enjoying the service, though she thought it was a little awkward coming in because she entered the church from the back instead of her normal front seat. She also had to climb over someone to help usher, but it all worked out in the end.

After the service, Wolfie went to meet her friend, Mary Jane, a red head, for brunch. Mary Jane was in town for the afternoon before heading down the road to meet her contra dancing partner and as she and Wolfie hadn't seen each other in a while, they walked down to Panera and had a good long chat in a booth across from where Wolfie had sat earlier that morning with C-Stine.

Wolfie then had to go to work at the planetarium because apparently weekend shifts are hard to fill in the summer in a college town and Mary Jane came along, having to wait a few hours before she could head out of town. Wolfie was helping a new tech train and spend most of her time before the shows started walking around the building pointing out random quirks and secret passageways. The afternoon shows went well and Wolfie clocked out to go meet her friend, Hermione, to watch a musical at her apartment. On her way out the door, she remembered hearing a metallic clink as something fell to the floor from the table in the student area, but she thought nothing of it.

Hermione had a genius plan which included Squirt, Red Vines, Reeses Pieces and Double Stuff Oreos and pizza. The musical, an online masterpiece of a sequel, often took a while to load, so even though they started the musical around 6, it was 11:30 before they finished the package of their favorite way to say Red Wines in a German accent and were heading back to Wolfie's apartment, since she had to teach a camp the next day. Wolfie picked up her bag at an odd angle in the darkened hallway, but the trip to the car and then to Wolfie's home was successful.

Outside the door, Wolfie fumbled in her bag while Hermione waited to see her safely in the house. In searching for her key, she discovered a hole in the lining of her bag and that her wallet had been left open since her second trip to Panera. Figuring that the key was in the lining of her bag, she motioned for Hermione to go home and sat down on her darkened front steps to search through her bag.

Five dimes, an empty purse and fifteen minutes later, Wolfie called Hermione back. She remembered the clinking noise and hypothesized that her missing key was at the planetarium. Hermione drove her over there and together they searched the darkened halls and hidden passageways of the planetarium for the missing key. The metallic noise, upon closer inspection, was a drill bit. Unsuccessful in their endeavors, Wolfie placed a few phone calls to C-Stine and Smalls to see what they could come up with. Smalls was helpful- she provided a phone number for maintenance but also suggested that the door was easily unlocked using a credit card. Armed with the erstwhile keys, Hermione and Wolfie headed back once again to Wolfie's apartment  while C-Stine searched her car for the key with the aid of a flashlight.

Many attempts and that's what she said jokes, not to mention a few exclamations of Alohamora, were wasted on the recalcitrant door. The maintenance man was phoned and the two friends retreated from blood-thirst mosquitoes into the safety of Hermione's car where they listened to wonderful music and jumped for the car door handles every time someone pulled into the parking lot in front of Wolfie's apartment, which was more frequently than expected for approaching two in the morning on a summer Monday. The maintenance man finally arrived in a beat up red pickup truck and let Wolfie into her apartment for the night. She bid her good friend Hermione farewell and thanks and fell almost immediately asleep, determined to search for the key more thoroughly on the morrow.

... To be continued.

Tortilla Chip Castles in the Air

Galileo did not go blind from looking at the sun. Just thought you should know. Please ask me for extensive details about the actual causes of his loss of sight as I just spent an hour reading up on that. Because I'm awesome like that.

So I recently went to lunch at Pancho's with the wonderful Isaac-O and we had fun times. By the end of the meal we were attempting to build towers out of our chips (it's harder than it looks) but before then we were swapping stories about the little sweethearts that we get to deal with when we work with kids and talking about college and education classes and teachers and things like that. I'm not really sure where this came from, but at some point along the way, Isaac asked me if I had invented a time machine yet. I said I hadn't but I had learned a couple of reasons why you couldn't really invent a time machine. He said I invent a time machine and go back in time to tell myself not to be a physics major. I contended that if I went back in time to tell myself not to be a physics major and I listened to myself, I would never invent a time machine and therefore never be able to go back in time and tell myself not to be a physics major. This is the compromise story we came up with (with some embellishment). Imagine that music that always introduces a daydream or a back flash playing as the scene fades in a ripple from a booth at a Mexcian restaurant to the blue rectangular practice rooms of the South Caldwell band room.

High school Addie Jo and Isaac are shooting the breeze at some convenient break time. "So, Jaddie-o," Isaac says, "What do you plan to do with the rest of your life?"

"Well, Isaac-O, I intend to study astrophysics because it's just so much fun to say," Addie Jo replies with a laugh. Suddenly the scrap pieces of music and drill charts swirl around in an inexplicable and instantaneous tornado. Dramatic music based around the sound of magical wind swells and then drops off as the papers settle back to the ground, calmed by the arrival of two figures from a different place, if not a different time.

"Who are you?" Addie Jo demands as the figures approach the two friends. Isaac lists the other questions he might have asked, such as "Why did an inexplicable and instantaneous tornado occur?" or "How did you get here?" or "Are they going to clean up the papers? 'Cause they're all over the place and the tornado was not my fault."

The shorter figure flung back the protective black hood and swiftly declared, "Don't be a physics major."

After a few moments of silence, which the high school students assumed were for dramatic effect, the second figure pulled back his hood and said, "I told you it would take more than that to convince yourself to change your life plans." He proceeded to shrug off the rest of the black robe, revealing a faded button-up plaid shirt over a t-shirt and jeans. Isaac admired the fact that future him still enjoyed wearing converses.

"Maybe I just didn't understand me," the first figure replied. She turned back to her past self and said, "Don't be a physics major. Find something else to do with your life. Just tell everyone that you wanted to be an astrophysicist. That way you can still say it all the time. Trust me, your life will be much easier." She pulled her long hair out of her robe before taking it off and folding it over her arm. Addie Jo noted with satisfaction that her future self got away with wearing flip-flops before she realized what was going on.

"Wait a hot second. You mean to tell me that you came back from the future to tell me change my life? How did you get here?" she demanded of her future self.

"My question exactly," said Isaac.

"She built a time machine-" Future Isaac started, but Future Addie Jo cut him off.

"Don't tell her that! Then she'll want to do it! I mean, think about it- if you told yourself that you made a time machine, why would you want to change anything? Your future self has to be pretty awesome, if I may so say myself." She paused to smirk. "Besides, I think we might be early," she added, looking intently at her past self. "We don't have the same face."

Future Isaac contended that they did and that he was right. After a quick discussion, the story came out. After a discussion at lunch one day, Isaac had stated that Addie Jo should build a time machine in order to convince her past self not to be a physics major, since it had added unnecessary stress into her life. Since actors are better at conveying confident scientific information than scientists are, Addie Jo had believed him that such a thing could be accomplished and set out build a time machine, a task that she achieved in a remarkably short period of time, given the current financial crisis in the sciences and the lack of research on the topic. They both recalled that at that first fateful discussion of time travel, Addie Jo had insisted that her past self would immediately change her mind if given the opportunity.

"Then why did you come, Future Isaac?" asked Isaac. Future Isaac shrugged. "To see what would happen."

"Listen, past self," Future Addie Jo began again, "You don't want to be a physics major. I know why you picked it and I know what you're thinking, but it's not going to turn out the way you want. You're just not suited to it and you're not going to want to work through it and all it will give you is pain and suffering."

"And a time machine," Addie Jo retorted.

"I didn't remember that you were that snarky," Future Isaac interjected.

"If I told you that someone else would invent the time machine and you just made a cheap copy of it, would you change your mind?" Future Addie Jo asked herself pleadingly. Addie Jo turned to Isaac. "Am I really that bad of a liar?" Isaac shrugged and tried to look innocent. "Yeah, I guess I am."

"Well, you know, it was a lot of work and I never got any credit for it. I mean, seriously, the flux capacitor by itself-"

"Flux capacitor? Really?"

"Listen, maybe you can tell yourself to be a little more creative with names. It'll be your idea if you don't change your mind now."

"Oh, well, by all means, if thinly veiled copyright infringement is my future, I have to change my mind." Addie Jo rolled her eyes.

"Gee, if self-depreciation is my past, maybe I should go back and change it, too. Oh wait, I can. Too bad you can't do anything about your future," Future Addie Jo practically snapped her fingers in her past self's face.

"Maybe I will," Addie Jo said.

"Good."

"Fine."

"Change your mind."

"I just might."

"No, seriously, change your mind. NASA shuts down your senior year of college and the graduate programs in astrophysics are some of the most competitive in the country. You'll live on chicken Ramen and peanut butter and jelly."

"Ah no! I hate the chicken kind!"

And with that fateful statement, Future Addie Jo started to fade from existence, swept away by the changing mind of a child. All the attention was turned to Future Isaac, who had confusingly in place.

"Why don't you disappear too? If I'm not going to build a time machine, you can't come back," Addie Jo said definitively.

"You must not have changed your mind all the way. See, look, you're fading in and out," Future Isaac replied. He and Isaac paused to watch as Future Addie Jo, hands on hips and glaring eyes, flickered in and out of existence while her past self changed her mind.

"But I built a time machine!" she said in protest. Finally, the flickering stopped.

"Oh, crap," said Future Isaac. "Quick, remind yourself that you need to charge your cell phone so you can go to Pancho's," he implored his past self.

"Charge your cell phone so you can go to Pancho's," Isaac reminded himself confusedly. Future Isaac laughed and then faded determinedly away.

"I don't even like Mexican food," Addie Jo said to Isaac as they stood up to start cleaning up the papers that had inexplicably flown around the room. "Apparently you don't like chicken Ramen either," Isaac commented. "It's just so salty," Addie Jo contended.

"So what are you going to do with your life now?" Isaac asked Addie Jo as they turned to leave the papers in a pile on their way out to the student parking lot.

"I dunno. I always wanted to be a photographer..." Engrossed in their conversation, the two friends headed out into the spring humidity, both failing to notice the photograph that fluttered down from an untraceable height. Their distraction was probably all for the best- no good discovering an iconic image fifteen years before it was taken.

A Create-Your-Own Adventure: History of Rome style

Happy LDOC.

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It's the first day of classes of the new semester. Bookless, clueless, but with two new 3 ring binders, you walk from your dorm to your first class of the day, wonderfully starting at 11 AM. You wonder what you're going to do with your mornings as you pull your coat closer, trying to avoid the biting winter wind. You fully intend to sleep in until 10:30 every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, but perhaps something will inspire you to get up before then.

You make it to the lecture hall, a few minutes early because you had the building confused with another one and had no idea where the classroom actually was. You wait as the class before you files slowly out and smile and wave at a high school friend who is planning on dropping math logic. You exchange a couple of witty comments about the math department and the varying types of people in classes as you both swim through the sea of students in opposite directions. Upon entering the lecture hall, you sit down on the right side of the room. Your personality is such that you pick your seat carefully- you fully intend to sit in the same seat all semester. Not too near the front, not too near the back, against the wall so you're not blocking someone else who might come in late. You settle in, readjusting a few times because your back is protesting your backpack and really, existence. So the semester begins.

Two days later, armed with a syllabus and a better idea of the people in the class, you arrive a few minutes early to reclaim your seat. You see a friend of yours, one with whom you could sit, who would keep you focused, generally on task, and who would ensure that you'd come to class, since this class has an attendance requirement. You:

(a) wave to your friend and sit a row behind her, since she's already got a group she's sitting with. You have to move seats, but you figure it's worth the risk. Continue reading at Roman numeral I.

(b) wave to your friend but sit in your usual seat (you're much more comfortable there) and plan to just have several study sessions with your friend. You proceed to stay there the rest of the semester, mindlessly passing the attendance sheet to the people around you and Facebooking, with a slightly detrimental effect on your grade and a slightly improved social life. Fin.

(c) studiously look down, giving yourself time to think over the situation. By the time you look up, the seats around your friend are filled and you must remain where you are. You sigh and promise yourself you'll try again later. Continue reading at Roman numeral II.

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I. Your friend's friends are a little weird, maybe because you've just met them and they have absolutely no interest in knowing you. One of them talks incessantly about the Romans she knows, from Scipio to Pompey, and you're a little intimidated because the only Roman you know is Caesar. Other than that, you've got Hannibal, and he's Carthaginian. You're not really a fan of sitting beside them, but give it another day. At the end of that day, you:

(d) decide it's not really for you. Continue reading at choice (b) above.

(e) suck it up and sit there for the rest of the semester, make a couple new Facebook friends and have a good time studying for the midterms and finals, not to mention getting a great resource for proof-reading and bouncing ideas off of. All in all, not a bad way to spend the semester- you come to class and you have a new friend group for your next-to-next-to last semester of classes. Fin.

(f) really intend to sit with them the next day, but aren't disappointed that you're a bit late. Continue reading at III.

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II. You don't really try again later. In slight despair and with a lack of self-confidence, you start skipping class. Eventually, around the time that Scipio is mentioned for the first time, you decide that you don't really care about the Romans and drop the class. You plan on taking History of Sea Power the next semester. It fills the same requirement and has less papers. Fin.

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III. You run into class late. You've overslept because you have a Quantum Mechanics problem set due at 2 and you promised yourself that you wouldn't be working on homework for another class during this class so you stayed up until 6 working on it and "took a nap" that lasted until 10:50. You're still in your pajamas but you make it to class just as the professor starts talking. The seats around your friend are all taken. You:

(g) find a seat on the same side of the room, noting with a quiet despair that it's completely different than the place you picked for yourself at the beginning of the semester. You're so deep in sadness that you don't ask if you can sit in the empty seat, you just flop down. Continue reading at IV.

(h) whisper loudly to the boy who's sitting two seats down if the seat beside him is taken. He says no and you sit down, trying to minimize the sounds of pulling out your now slightly used notebooks. Looking slightly harassed, you try to pay attention but end up zoning out for most of the class and asking your friend, who you intend to sit with again. You go back to sitting with your friend, despite your earlier misgivings. Continue reading at (e) above.

(i) whisper loudly to the boy who's sitting two seats down if the seat beside him is taken. He says no and your sit down, making no effort stop disturbing people. He looks over, slightly annoyed and you shoot an apologetic look back, while noticing that he's vaguely attractive. You smile at him and he smiles back. Continue reading at XI below.

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IV. The same thing happens several classes in a row- you run in a little late and ask if the seat's taken, but get better at paying attention in class. You're actually a little fascinated by the Romans you're learning about, and are starting to do better on the papers. You're a little disgusted by proscriptions of Sulla, but admire him for trying to restore the empire. You slowly loose respect for Marius, though you're entranced by his name, being the same as your microwave and the character from Les Miserables, who you don't really like anyway because he should have picked Eponine. One day, you show up to class a little earlier (you learned how to do your homework before the night before) and you:

(k*) ask if the seat's taken as you have all the times before this. You continue in your routine and eventually start coming to class a few minutes earlier so you don't have to sign the attendance sheet at the end of class. You write pretty decent papers and have a good semester, feeling confident about your midterms and finals despite not really having anyone to study with. Fin.

(l) ask if the seat's taken as you have all the times before this. You're in a particularly social mood, though, and notice that you've been asking the same boy for these past few weeks if the seat's taken. It never is. You muse silently on this fact and show up early to class the next class. Continue reading at (k).

(m) ask if the seat's taken as you have all the times before this. You're in a particularly social mood, though, and notice that you've been asking the same boy for these past few weeks if the seat's taken. It never is. You strike up a conversation with the boy, asking for verification of these facts. He smiles and says that yes, you're pretty consistent. You laugh it off and listen to the now starting lecture, smiling and thanking the boy when he hands you the attendance sheet with the page that he has just initialed facing up. Continue reading at V.

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V. Several weeks go by with this routine. The Republic dies (gee, thanks, Julius) and some great Shakespeare happens. One day, back when Cicero is still spending his days bad mouthing Antony, you have to miss class because your back is acting up again. It's gotten worse- either you have to choose between being in pain or being able to pay attention and you really can't sit for more than half an hour, at absolute best. On top of that, you lifted some cases yesterday and it was a terrible plan. You can't walk down the hall, much less make it to class. The next day, though, you're doing better and though you wince excessively, you go out to dinner with your roommate and her friend. It beats watching a basketball team screw up.

Surprisingly, you see History of Rome guy, as you've dubbed him among your friends, sitting at the bar. You:

(n) look down and pay attention to your friend's conversation (inconveniently, she's seen a friend of hers and is now engaged in a discussion that you have nothing to do with) and studiously avoid looking over at him. You succeed and finish out dinner regretting the fact that the game is playing on a TV right above where HoRg is sitting. Continue reading at (l).

(o) look down and pay attention to your friend's conversation (inconveniently, she's seen a friend of hers and is now engaged in a discussion that you have nothing to do with) and studiously avoid looking over at him. It's a failure, though, because he says hey and mentions that he didn't see you in class the other day. You:

(oi) smile and explain about your back quickly, finishing your order and saying that you'll see him at the next class before fleeing to a table, slightly embarrassed and not sure why. Continue reading at (n).

(oii) smile and explain about your back in some detail. He mentions something about those little handicapped golf carts and you smile and agree and say that you'll see him in class. You fail to listen to your roommate's conversation at dinner because you're looking at the bar but only slightly regretting that the TV is playing the game right above where HoRg is sitting. Continue reading at VII.

(oiii) smile and choose not to say a word about your back, instead fabricating on the spot a wonderful story about something exciting that has not happened in your life. He smiles and doesn't really believe you, but you've started a good conversation. You ditch your roommate, who is much more interest in conversation with her friends and sit at the bar for the rest of dinner. Continue reading at XI.

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VII. You muse to your friends about HoRg but nothing really comes of it. You start saying hey to him at the beginning of class instead of joking around about the seat being open. You notice that he keeps on passing the attendance sheet over to you with the page he just initialed facing up. You can't find a good way to look without being conspicuous so you:

(p) fail to ascertain what his name is. Continue reading at VIII.

(q) ask him what his name is and he tells you. You exchange names and laugh that it's taken this long for you two to introduce yourselves. After class, he asks if you're going anywhere for lunch. You ditch the plans you have and agree. Continue reading at XI.

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VIII. You've made it almost all the way through the semester by talking about the class before class starts. You mostly say that you don't really read the book, that the lectures are pretty much the same as the book and that one of the TAs is super chill (yours) and one is a pretty terrible and biased grader (his). On the next to last day of class, you:

(r) wear a T-shirt. Nothing much happens. Continue reading at IX.

(s) wear a low cut shirt (boobquake day!) and:

(si) spend the entire class self-consciously worrying about the choice and what HoRg is thinking about it. You avoid looking at him and hurry out at the end of class. You go home and change. Continue reading at X.

(sii) feel very manipulative and hope he puts no store in it. You don't really worry about it, though. The whole purpose of boobquake day is prove that, contrary to a recently made statement, low-cut shirts do not cause earthquakes by increasing lust, because we all know that men lust enough without the aid of low-cut shirts. Continue reading at IX.

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IX. It's the last day of classes, holler praise. You wake up a little late, happy because you've finally understood a problem set for quantum. You:

(t) put on some make-up because you're convinced that today is going to be the day and whatever that means, you want to look lovely for it. Not a lot of make-up. That requires effort. Just some. You head out the door in time to be there a few minutes early. Continue reading at X.

(u) stay in bed because you understand everything and have already read the chapter (yeah, right). Why go to more classes than you have to? You sit in the back for the exam and call the class a success. Fin.

(v) put on some make-up because you're convinced that today is going to be the day. As you leave your room, though, a friend from down the hall has been locked out of her room. You:

(vi) help her out. After all, what are friends for? You didn't want to be on time for class anyway. You go in and sit down and make some small talk, hurrying out after class. Continue reading at XII.

(vii) say that you're running off the class and apologize and hope it gets better. You head out the door and get to class just a few minutes early. Continue reading at X.

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X. You enjoy learning about the end of the empire, feel prepared for the exam and come back on the last day of class on time, listening to the professor, laughing at his random, probably not that funny, jokes. You give the class a great evaluation. At the end of class you:

(w) introduce yourself. The two of you laugh that you've never done this before and he asks if you want to go out to lunch. You say yes. Continue reading at XI.

(x) take too long filling out your evaluation. Continue reading at XII.

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XI. You really start to like this guy and large amounts of time walking around and humming, to the point that one of your friends asks you who he is and you say, "No one." "And yet it is hum-worthy? You know, it's none of my business. I'm just happy that you're happy about something other than quarks... Not bad, with the quarks?" "Excellent." Continue reading... or not, because at that point in time, you've got a life to live. Messy and complicated and beautiful, so go live it.

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XII. You go out to lunch with some friends who convince you that you should look up HoRg's name (you think it starts with a D or maybe a B...) on the blackboard roster and invite him to a party that night. You:

(y) do. He agrees. Continue reading at XI.

(z) don't. Life goes on. You find someone else to hum about. Tomorrow.

Arg, Writer's Block...

I have a book review due on Thursday, but I also have a paper (on the Punic wars- darn those Romans with their excessive military activity and copious amounts of historians willing to record it) due on Friday and a problem set due two hours after the paper's due. I'm suffering massive writer's block, so I'm going to tell you, dear readers, about Orhan Pamuk's book My Name is Red.

The book is set in Ottoman Istanbul. I am currently enamored with the city of Istanbul (you would be too if you took a glance at the Aya Sophia or the Sultan Ahmet Mosque) but I know little about the Ottomans. I don't even know anything about their reputation, which is the second of the three things I'm supposed to write about. I'm supposed to talk about the Ottomans, how they're perceived historically and how the book is used as a foil for current issues today. Can I say that I have no clue what current issues are in modern-day Turkey, other than the fact that they want to be in the EU? This is probably why I'm at such a road block.

So, Ottoman Istanbul. Well, from what I can tell from the book, there are coffee houses, a lack of modern conveniences, and a lot of sex and violence. Ah, no, that's unfair, but if you go to read the book (which I quite recommend), be prepared for a little bit more information than you wanted about the character's personal, personal lives. The premise is that the Sultan of the Ottomans has commissioned a book to made that tells a story about the Sultan and contains his (gasp!) portrait. That's a main theme, right there, the idea of Venetian (from Vienna? See, 'cause I thought they were from Venice, ah well) painting which puts humanity front and center. This is a problem because 1) The portraits could become an idol for people, 2) The portraits are painted not from God's perspective but from the perspective of the artist and are thereby taking away God's creativity (Only Allah can create), and 3) they don't tell a story.

This story is told through the eyes of four miniaturists (each of which could be a murderer), their boss, his daughter, her sons and her childhood lover. The miniaturists' illustrations also speak. The beginning of the book is narrated by the corpse of the dead guilder for the miniaturists, killed by one of his compatriots. He was killed because he threatened to tell on his fellow miniaturists, to carry tales to the local religious extremists, who hate coffee (apparently Muhammad refused coffee like he refused wine) and artists in general. I'd lobby for a modern commentary on the treatment of artists, either by the government or by the people around them, but I don't know enough about Turkey to say that that's what the author's saying. And my TA shot that down.

There's an exorbitant amount of material about art in this book. They're all miniaturists (which means they draw little illustrations? I never got this- maybe on the margins of books or maybe like tiny little pictures? Glorified doodlers) and so they all talk about miniatures. They'll talk about drawing Chinese clouds and Persian horses in the style of the great masters of the past (and there's a good long section where two of the characters get locked in the Sultan's treasury to look at books and that's just a gigantic chunk of research wasted right there, because none of us appreciate it as much as we should) but they never complain that they are Ottoman's using the hybrid style of the past. Instead, most of the protestations come from people trying to blend Venetian and Ottoman styles (the daughter of the boss of the miniaturists regrets that the Ottoman style of painting will be gone, but she's willing to accept a new, happy life) and, indeed, the murderer is a proponent of these new forms. The word modernity keeps on coming up in lectures. Too bad I have no clue what kind of modernity problems Muslims in Turkey are facing today.

I mean, there's the presentation of religion in the book. It's ubiquitous. The people who aren't especially moral pray to Allah in times of crisis, like some other people I know, and the people who have killed other people still go to evening prayers like nothing's wrong. Yes, there's bashing of extremists (or maybe they're not extreme... I could have read that wrong) but there's no hating on religious people of every kind. And there's tongue-in-cheek secularist references (here's where I get in trouble with my TA because I don't have the space in a two page paper to include multiple, supportive examples of my arguments and still have it sound decent) but he's not pushing an agenda. The author says early on (when the corpse is talking, actually) that he's not talking about everyone's religious views, only his own. And I respect the kid for that. I guess I should respect him for his Nobel Prize, too.

So what have we got? A depiction of Ottoman Istanbul: check. A commentary on how the Ottomans are remembered: Not so checked. If I'm reading between the lines, they're at war, they like art and architecture (EPIC architecture), and they, like every other nation in the world, have to confront new ideas and decide how to make them their own, without losing all of their history. Oh, and they're Muslim. For the most part. There's a Jewish lady in the book. And a commentary on how social issues are foiled in the book: mildly checked. I think there's a lot to be said for how every religion must grow up into the world it's in or be left behind. No one worships Marduk anymore. Can I put that in my paper? No.

On the bright side, I can now spell miniature without having to check spell check. Mission accomplished.

Because My Blog was Feeling Lonely

I'm a terribly inconsistent blogger. If it makes you feel any better, you're mentioned in the novel I wrote this past month. I spoke to my dear readers quite often when I couldn't for the life of me think of anything else to say. You served to be my outlet of literary analysis. Unfortunately, I feel like all my intelligence went into writing this thing (which is hardly worth reading, much less printing, though if you want a laugh bad writing and a nonsensical story line you're welcome to it- I'll fix it up one day) and so my everyday thoughts were much stupider. Some of my favorites:

Where is my notebook?

I should really give up Facebook. Right about now. Nope, not happening.

I wonder if I could give up basketball for Lent. Hahahaha.

Why do I do my best writing between 11-2 at night/morning?

Why is my best writing so terrible?

No, seriously, where is my notebook? Ahhhhhhh....

Why do I consistently fail at English?

Why is occasionally so hard to spell?

Haha. Lettuce. Haha.

But seriously, lettuce? It doesn't even look like...

Notebook? Notebook notebook notebook?

Screw physics. I'm going to drop out of college and... well, drop out of college at any rate.

Also, screw boys. They're jerks.

PS- Love of my life, you're not a jerk. You're just very confusing. Please don't walk out of my life again. Love, Addie Jo.

I hate football. And bowl games. I hate the football team. Eff eff eff. Gee.. eye...

How do you say H phonetically? ache? ... incorrect.

Maybe I left my notebook in Phillips? In Hill? At the Planetarium?

How have I never seen a complete Bond movie?

Sometimes I think people just cut their hair for attention. But mine bounces now!

Taking apart your TV is fun!

Studying for exams is not!

I always feel so productive when I write out my schedule.

And now I don't, because I haven't done a thing on it.

Blogging isn't on my schedule. Maybe I should write that down.

How does your building not have a lost and found? I need my notebook!!!!

Also, snow? Haha snow. Snow and lettuce and icicles. And two cool points for those people who are laughing right now. And two innocent points for those of you not.

And, sadly, I probs won't be blogging much until... well, when life gets less busy. So we're shooting for late April. Don't hate me. I'll probably procrastinate, so that's four posts in the next two weeks alone. Bon courage, mes amis! The time is at hand! Happy Advent, kids!


A random sign from my first group of kids over the summer. Enjoy the random.

Upon a Monday Evening

Clouds fly across a bright full moon. Life has given me much that I don't want to think about, but must. If this is living, I don't know how much I hate life being this way.

Upon a Monday Morning

Clouds fly against a grey sky, leaving small lonely patches of blue and reminding me that recent life has given me much to think about and little time to think.
And I don't know that I mind life this way.