When I applied to Reed, one of the people that knew the college asked me exactly how many drugs I used. The others, my classmates and friends, just branded it a hippie school that cost enough money to make my ears bleed. I arrived at Reed fully knowing that there would be drug-lovers and fully excited about it, because Reed was my dream school and I could actually afford it. I’ll admit I was partly surprised to find that there were less drug users than even I had previously imagined.
Sadly enough, my friends don’t believe me. Obviously, I’m just hanging out with the right people.
I have been offered drugs several times already and every time I’ve said “no thanks”, they’ve gone “all right, cool. How’s Humanities?” or something to that effect. (And yes, one of them asked me how my HUM 110 conference is going. I remember complaining vociferously about how boring Thucydides is to a very high young woman.)
If most people mention drugs, they aren’t thinking about a scene like that. In fact, if I had been asked a couple of years ago, I would have imagined a seller conniving a younger person into trying it, or a group of people convincing someone by peer pressure. I’ve never had a positive view of drugs and I doubt I ever will, but it does make me glad to see people who do these drugs are actually smart and responsible. (Well. So far as I’ve seen, and I’ve seen plenty already, thanks.)
Tags: drug culture, observations
Dear Americans, and those of you living in America,
Perhaps change is upon us. Whether it is good or bad, we don’t know yet. It is common for politicians to lie and cheat — that’s what the popular definition of “politician” is — and I’m sure that Obama in his four years will have his moments.
(If I were an optimist, I’d hold out for that idea to be entirely wrong in four years so I could rub it in my past-self’s face.)
However, last night’s elections were a defining moment in American history: we have elected our first black president. And not only that, but one that has come across as decent during his election. (Namely, he didn’t pick an idiot like Palin as his vice-president.)
Obama has his past. To get on the ticket for the Illinois legislature, he managed to legally get everyone else scratched off so he had no opposition. Legally, he was in the safe zone, but ethically is another story. Also, the McCain campaign was not the only one with barbs; there was ethically-debatable actions on either side.
It has been an epic ride. Get ready for some change.
Sincerely,
Shona Márquez.
PS. Let us not forget how Illinois joined as a state in 1818. If you don’t know: there were 22,000 residents in the area, but they needed 40,000 signatures to become a state. So they signed on the dead; all the dead in the graveyards. Also, Illinois has had five governors put in jail.
President-Elect Obama, please don’t follow their trend.
November 4th, 2008.
Everyone’s wandering around campus with excited looks on their faces, jabbering away about one thing and one thing only. They’ve all got pins and needles; some people are optimistic and have a good feeling, others not so much.
We fucked up once, we can do it again.
But today is election day, and if Obama doesn’t win, I think I might cry. And so will the rest of campus, except for the lone McCain supporters (I’ve met two). And probably, so will the rest of America. The world will hate us forever and ask themselves “what is America doing wrong?”.
Now, in reality, I don’t like any of the candidates. McCain picked that idiot Palin - she definitely doesn’t belong in politics; I mean, Christ, I can’t believe she thought she was actually speaking to Sarkozy for six minutes - and Obama’s speeches are reminiscent of Jimmy Carter’s. ”Change, change, change, change” — change what? and how? I have yet to hear an answer to both of these question at once (albeit, I haven’t seen all his speeches; so I have some blanks).
Most of the people I’ve talked to are preparing for a landslide. I’ve never seen any sort of excitement like this. Back in Puerto Rico, we did pay attention to elections, both for president and our governor (more of the latter than the former), but never as intense as this. It’s definitely different, and people give me odd looks whenever I mention that I’ve never watched the elections this closely for such a long time. I mostly just paid attention on the actual election day and kept the TV on for a *very* long time.
Let’s keep our fingers crossed everyone.
6:33 PM
I’m in the rather silent DoJo, streaming MSNBC Live Coverage and making massive amounts of cookies (and generally making a nuisance of myself). I wonder why Florida is always under the “Too Close to Call” headline.
10:54 PM
After several hours of joy, screams, laughter, victory ice cream, and walking in on my friend having sex (ah), I post the news that all of America knows by now:
Obama has won the election by a landslide.
There’s parties everywhere, people still screaming and laughing. Some of us can’t believe we’re this lucky, because really, the alternative was Palin. If that doesn’t scare you, you’re either Republican or stuck under a rock.
Tags: feelings, observations, politics, Puerto Rico
Welcome to NaNoWriMo! Pass out the coffee hopefully awash with plot bunnies. I’m giving my word count to Portland this year to help beat Vancouver, who’ve challenged us! First, Vancouver; next, Seattle! And then, the world… yes, you know how this is going to end.
It’s already started to be an interesting experience balancing NaNo and college. I haven’t gotten much done on either of the two! Hopefully, though, my Calculus homework will be finished soon and then I can do some work on my Humanities paper (woefully due the 15th of November). I’m not the only one doing this odd balance of course — there are tons and tons of us, and at Reed, I know of a few. In a few days, we might just go genuinely bonkers, ready-for-the-asylum crazy (hopefully after the 15th…).
However, I’ve noticed that Reedies — an especially Reedies who do NaNo — have a better concept of time management than others, at least some of the time. I have managed to get everything done with some time to spare, except for my Humanities papers. I obviously need to plan those better.
Tags: crazy ideas, nanowrimo, observations
This is definitely one of those times, one of those moments that absolutely has to go into the “stupid but absurdly awesome ideas I did in college.” Or at least aided and abetted.
My friends, with a divided double dorm room, just created a Narnia wardrobe. I kid you not, my friends, Meg and Liz’s dorm room is now Liz’s room and Narnia. You have to walk through Liz’s closet to get to Meg’s room. It’s absolutely amazing; it took them and Matt 1, Kath, Frisbee, and Jo an hour to put it all together coherently. I stood around, loitered, and filmed.
Now all that’s missing is to deck out Meg’s door with an image of a forest and a lamppost (Jo’s idea).
Jeez. Crazy college kids. What will they think of next?
EDIT: In a bid to make this less worthless, I’ll be taking a decent photo or two of the wardrobe tomorrow sans people in the way. My only excuse is that I didn’t want a photo with people in it uploaded without their knowledge… or I’m just lazy.
Tags: crazy ideas, daily life, observations
Fall break has begun! Reed campus was more silent this weekend than I have ever seen it. Of course, I went out these past few nights, so I haven’t been around any of the wild parties. If such things exist. I’d rather sleep, frankly.
But at any rate, our week-long vacation has started. It’s going to be full of roleplaying campaigns, Halloween costume making, home-cooking, and sleeping (lots). I would expect most college students go to Hawaii or Cancún, or something silly like that (not that those areas are silly), but I note that about half of campus went home for the week and the other half stayed here. (This is an approximation by how many people have stayed in the dorms I hang out in). I think maybe I’m influenced by the old world of high school.
What do Reedies do on vacation? Probably nothing more than what I’ve already described. The cafeteria keeps the weirdest hours. My classes barely gave me any homework. It is horribly cold out, but my parents sent me yet more warm clothes, which is likely the best thing that’s happened so far. Seriously, you can’t go wrong by sending your children more clothing suitable to their view on the weather they’ve moved into.
Tags: daily life, observations
Oh, Reed library, how I love you. The quietest library I have ever, ever seen; it’s almost creepy sometimes. But it’s useful to complete work, if I don’t have my computer. I’ve been attempting to write my essay for this Saturday for the past week and it’s not. working. Herodotus needs to take a short walk off a long cliff. Immediately.
Well, I mean, I like the dude. The Histories is actually a pretty sweet book; there’s tales of sex and war and ambiguous righteous oracles. Sometimes it gets a little dry and boring when Herodotus is trying to restrain himself from any actual storytelling (like in Book Two: bo-ring!), but he can’t really stop himself from digressing into different tales.
Like the one about the king who was called insane by this man and he was insulted. So he took a bow and arrow and shot this guy’s son through the heart, and asked if an insane man could do that.
Fun times.
My essay is on how Herodotus incorporates the concept of fate into his history, focusing on two or three passages. It’s fun, but I think I need to change my first passage. There’s not much to it. My first passage is when Croesus dreams of an iron spear killing his son. The basic analysis is: Croesus dreamed, tried to protect his son, let him go out of his sight, and the dream came true. Whoop-dee-doo.
Of course, there’s an “unfortunate stranger” and a just-married whiny son who never took his wife to bed stuck in there. Hooray for ominousness! (And I can’t believe that’s a word!)
Tags: daily life, humanities 110
I went to Seattle this past weekend to visit my siblings; it was definitely all I expected. We went to Pike Place Market on Saturday — I bought two posters from Golden Collectables. I still haven’t figured ouut how to get them to stay on my walls. I may be the only person that can’t get stuff to stay up; it’s highly infuriating, especially when one of the posters is a black and white screenshot of Johnny Depp in the bath. (I bet you know what’s going over my bed. A-hah.)
However, on Sunday morning as I was walking down the stairs to leave the apartment house and head off to the train station, I tripped. I missed the last step and curled up on the bottom to scream. I’m now on prescription-strength Ibuprofen, 600 mg of it. It may not seem like a lot to some people, but it’s a lot for me. And I’m pretty sure I’m the only person who gets happy on Ibuprofen. The RN that saw me didn’t tell me if it was fractured ofr if it was inflammation, but I’m pretty sure I’m going to go get it X-rayed today so that I can finally know for sure if it’s just a sprain in the area of my tarcels or a fracture.
I missed my classes yesterday because I was in so much pain, my foot combined with cramps. And then I slept on a couch with three other people last night in another dorm (I may note thatit was actually two couches pushed together) and did it in an odd position, so now my shoulders hate me. They hate me vociferously, you might say.
Let me tell you something. If you’re a college student, try to not be a klutz or a sickness magnet. It doesn’t help with the studying/work thing we have going on.
Tags: daily life
I am sitting in the Dorothy Johanssen house (the DoJo, tutoring center, in case you’ve forgotten) awaiting one of my discples. She’s 15 minutes late and I’m wondering if I’ll still get paid for sitting here without any of my books or my computer. (Which was, by the way, a really stupid move, but *I* was going to be late if I didn’t get a move on and I left all my stuff there. I arrived at the stroke of 8 exactly…)
The peppermint tea I’m drinking, however, is very good, and now all I want to do is talk about tea. Tea and coffee are huge things here at Reed. VERY IMPORTANT and whatnot. Barring coffee, these guys take their tea extremely seriously. It’s extremely strange to me; tea was a very minor beverage back home. Puerto Rico is coffee central. Suddenly, I get here, and tea is absolutely everywhere and offered to cure your most major or minor ailment.
“The guy you slept with last night turned out to be gay? Have some of this earl grey tea.”
“You failed your calculus test? Have some of this weird mint tea.”
“Your mom died? Have some green tea.” (Okay, I exaggerate.)
Since I’ve gotten here, I’ve had, besides the peppermint:
1. blackberry black tea (which was ridiculously good; I had a religious experience in the middle of the library with that tea!)
2. vanilla ginger mint tea chai (with soymilk; and it was excellent)
3. English breakfast tea (I only sipped it; it was pretty bloody awful)
4. earl grey (I’ve always had a fascination with this one).
I shall always view tea as the “calming” beverage; something you fill a mug with and curl up somewhere and look quaint. I laugh every time I read “awake” on those tea bags because tea always makes me feel a mix between sleepy and joyful. It might be good to note as well that the cafeteria here doesn’t always take things as seriously as the students; one of my friends from England can’t stand the cafeteria tea and he’s gone and brought his own. He lent me a green tea that’s apparently absolutely awful to him; I’ll have to try it tomorrow and tell him what I think.
In the course of this post, I’ve drunk all of my tea and I have another half-hour of sitting here and waiting. I could just up and leave, but if she does get here, I could still tutor her. There’s an abandoned pad of paper with very pretty molecule designs (uracil? cytosine? what? I’m not a chemist) and a mechanical pencil that looks very pretty. I’m going back to get more tea from the kitchen and try not to think about the vice-presidential debates tomorrow.
Oh, Sarah Palin. You make me laugh. I’ll keep my thoughts on that quiet until this weekend.
Tags: daily life, feelings, lists, observations
Public transport in Puerto Rico: taxis. And a small subway that goes around the capital and not much else; 100 miles away and extremely useless to the other 2.5 million people on the island.
Public transport in Portland: TRIMET, Amtrack, Light Rail, Greyhound… And there’s probably more, but I haven’t bothered looking them up yet. Are all stateside cities like this?
I went on my first bus yesterday with a friend of mine (for those that live in Portland, I took the 75 to 39th and Hawthorne) to go to Red Light Clothing Exchange (also my first visit to that place) and Safeway. It was… extremely odd and very fun. It’s a good thing my friend knew the bus, because if I had to pull the yellow rope thing, we would have missed our stop. And coming back, we pulled it too early and ended up walking half the way back to Reed.
“Real women walk everywhere!”
Or at least, that’s what we told ourselves, especially when we hit the intersection closest to Reed at the same time as the bus we had taken!
I’m anticipating riding the bus everywhere when I have more time, because the people on the bus are great for character sketches. And it’s pretty cheap too. My friend had to explain the concept of zone tickets to me, of course. I kept checking that bit of paper to make sure I hadn’t forgotten what the time was, or that I hadn’t read it wrong.
Now the fun ends; I have two midterms this week. And for those of you who want to know about romance, just wait a little longer. I’m sure there’ll be an update on that soon.
(Also, pardon my vague disjointed schedule. I’ve been getting sick extremely easily, and I’m still trying to figure out a study schedule.)
Tags: daily life, Portland