life is still sweet.

So, my life is not bad. My knee hurts. But my cats are great. People laughed at my story. That's a good thing. It's a funny story. I'm just stalling. I don't want summer to come. Because by then I should have done and finished things that I haven't begun yet. I want to stall in maybe a week or two, when the weather is perfect and I love everybody.

Home. I'm glad I have two places to call home. When I'm in California, I say I'm going home in two days. When I'm in Minnesota, I say I'm going home tomorrow morning.

Today I feel good about

the fact that a bad-ass looking black & white gun in hand Clive Owen is on my desktop,
I got a very decent grade on my history paper where I constantly feel inadequate,
having looked at a house to live in today and having a new one to look at soon,
eyeball skeleton and of montreal,
making a regular routine of dance dance revolution,
i got 31 questions out of 40 on a star wars quiz,
the tiki room has re-opened.

I played about forty minutes of dance dance revolution tonight. Weary bones, rest well tonight.

The Holocaust in American Life by Peter Novick. Read this. I am so glad to have someone of scholarly knowledge share in my politically incorrect skepticism.

Television has been good. I now have shows to watch every night of the week except Friday and Saturday. It sounds silly, but it's nice to look forward to at least one thing each day.

I don't know what I'm going to do this summer.

'Our Beautiful West Coast Thing'

We are a coast people
There is nothing but ocean out beyond us.
- Jack Spicer

I sit here dreaming
long thoughts of California

at the end of a November day
below a cloudy twilight
near the Pacific

listening to The Mamas and The Papas
THEY'RE GREAT

singing a song about breaking
somebody's heart and digging it!

I think I'll get up
and dance around the room.

Here I go!

- Richard Brautigan

San Francisco yesterday was exceedingly beautiful. Danville, California was exceedingly beautiful today as I lay sun-drenched on my bed, sleeping on and off, taking cat naps. Mom pointed out that the hills were bright green after a rain. Let us not forget that I do, at times, profess my love for Minnesota. Walking across the stone arch bridge, legs hot with numbness, only a flask to keep us warm, waiting underneath the light heater in the light rail station, I loved it more. But anywhere you are, you can love it more.

My cat lets me hold her for long periods at a time now. Perhaps she misses me or perhaps she is just getting old. It is hard to watch cats age. They go through the entire life cycle before your eyes, before you even change that much. Eleven years? I still remember her as a kitten.

i'm 40, i'm not 20, 30

This break has been spent with many hours on this laptop, Lappy 486. Too many, in fact, for my lap gets really hot (sounds kinky, isn't) and my brain starts hurting. Wasn't there some inquiries earlier on about how laptops and cellphones cause cancer? Well, I'm pretty sure the tumors on my brain are festering as we speak. Oh, no joking matter, I know, but . . .

Barry Bonds: my family's tired, i'm tired, you guys wanted to hurt me bad enough, you finally got there, WHO? you, you, you, you, you wanted me to jump off the bridge? i've jumped
myvegetablelove: direct transcript
myvegetablelove: what an asshole
Barry Bonds: i'm tired of my kids crying
Barry Bonds: let's go home
urgininthenight: hahaha
Barry Bonds: 'you've already destroyed me, now go pick a different person'
myvegetablelove: geeeeeez.
urgininthenight: nabhabha. whatta whiner

News flash. Barry Bonds is a whiner. Barry Bonds hurt his knee and now might never come back, do you know why? Because he's tired. Of everything. (prompted by his son.)

While watching KTVU news on a mattress with this laptop, I'm looking at lots and lots of study abroad programs. I've got it narrowed down to these:

Here's the shuffle: Cork College/Cork, Ireland, Trinity College/Dublin, Ireland, University of Glasgow/Scotland, University of Edinburgh/Scotland, King's College London, University College London, Goldsmith College London, University of Amsterdam, or Cambridge University (yeah. right.)

I absolutely cannot choose. Luckily, I have time, but really, not too much. I've been playing around with a lot of things - this is what home is for - worrying about real life. College is my shelter from the world, home is my re-opening to it. And the problem is, all my worrying at home is stuffed into a weekend, a week, a few months.

OH NO, the Pope is ailing. Again.

I'm ailing. Spiritually. Musically. Lovingly. Ly.

"Excuse me? Would you like to see some bathing beauties? ... http://www.tubzfremont.com
Come put your tootsies in our tubs."

Late night commercials. No time for self reflection.

And tomorrow? Evita. They need to adore me, so Christian Dior me...

"The pain struck like a bolt of lightning, exploding in my chest and spreading out down my left arm with paralyzing intensity."

What does this passage describe?

a. A seizure brought on by too much morphine, as described by Susan Kay in Phantom.

b. A person's reaction the exact moment his or her heart is broken.

c. A bodily reaction occurring after withdrawal of meds for one too many days.

The answer, is, of course, all three.

Finally, a triple triple.

I am at home, on my family's new laptop. It's glorious. For example: I am now sitting upstairs in the bonus room watching figure skating whilst checking my e-mail and doing a bunch of other crap. Now I can completely maximize my time efficiency. My free time will double. Or I will spend twice as much time on the computer and in front of the television because my whole life can be set up here in this room. I can sleep here, I can watch TV, I can eat, I can play with Legos, I can watch Disney movies, watch DVDs, and be surrounded by stuffed animals. Honestly, I don't know what I'm going to do with all this time.

The last couple of days were strange, but satisfying enough. They went by quickly yet slowly, and were delightful yet heart-wrenching.

(I am so glad this girl did a triple flip triple toe. It shouldn't be rare that girls do triple triples. It makes me upset that it is. )

I was woken up by my cell phone ringing - my grandparents were downstairs and I had overslept. Hungover and having acquired only 4 hours of sleep by 7am, I stumbled through my packing and just barely managed carrying the kittens down the elevator and into the waiting car. Then they asked me about lesbians. They asked me if my friends were lesbians. My grandma said that she heard that "Macalester has a lot of homosexuals." Yeah, I said, all my best friends are homosexuals. I mean, this isn't true, but it could be.

Okay. My mind is wandering.

I'm clearly drunk. And I clearly adore you. That's why I was petrified. That's why I ran out of the room. Can't you see?

I'm still immature. I still kick marinara sauce over neighbors' doors. I hate that. Today was going so well, and I don't think I have the courage to make tomorrow the same.

february stars

Today I was prompted to look through one of my photo albums - I'm actually doing it right now. I adore pictures - especially these of my latest trip to England. That was a fabulous trip. I was happy, I didn't fight with my parents - I found that always being in a positive mood and excited about seeing things, even when your dad is grumpy, tends to make him considerably less grumpy. Even though I feel a bit guilty for going to England, a "safe" place, for my study abroad, I doubt that I'd be feeling guitly if I were anywhere but Macalester. I love England with all my heart. To live there without having to worry about jobs or real life just quite yet - it will be fabulous.

I love photos. I want to share my photo albums with everybody. Is this self-centered? I like to look at other people's photos too - as long as they are not just pictures of them and their friends - up close face shots - because thsoe are boring. I want stories behind them.

So I just finished my big history essay. It will probably be up for some editing tomorrow, but I'm essentially done with all gross stuff until spring break. I have editing, a couple history packets to read tomorrow, and a 2 page 'Principles of Art' paper that will be a piece of cake.

It's funny - the first thing that I'm going to do after I step off of the plane is get a haircut. That's such a lovely college student at home thing to do. Three more days and then I'm going to see my little brother, finish my fun book, sing Les Miserables in the car with Michelle, go see Evita on stage for the first time, do another painting, read Richard Brautigan, see friends in San Francisco...

my user did it

This is the truth: I am a romantic. One of those hopeless ones.

But here's another truth: I love romantic love in stories and movies, where it is real enough to be possibly real but when you really think about it, you know that sort of stuff doesn't happen. People don't talk like that. Feelings aren't really so amazing and easy to articulate. See, if I saw any of the stuff in books and movies and television in front of my eyes, three dimensional in front of me, I'd laugh and roll my eyes. That's just what I'd do, even though I'd secretly long for it myself. But only if I were a fictional character, or else those shoes wouldn't fit me. You see? I don't understand what I just wrote.

My 'to do' list is still missing but I think I've got a handle on things. 750 words down on the essay, 1000 more to go. Schwing.

today i walk alone

I love it when bands like Green Day (whose name refers to the first day that one smokes pot) have songs that are 4:20 long.

I lost my TO DO BEFORE SPRING BREAK list. I was making decent progress on it and was very excited to cross out 'final architecture model' and 'read history packet' today but when I couldn't find it I felt hopelessly lost. It's one of the first times I've ever really committed to a 'to do' list and now that it's left me, I doubt I can ever commit again.

I've been busy. But bored. Throw me what you've got.

vote for anne harris on tuesday march 15. please. she's my aunt's friend. your wildest dreams will come true if you vote for anne.

supposed to call our congressman about cafta tomorrow and the worst activist ever,
kfizzle.

life goes easy on me...most of the time

"In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: It goes on."
- Robert Frost

I'm glad I am forgetting. But the fact is, I thought hardily about the fact that I was forgetting. I remembered that I was forgetting. Isn't that a futile thought, then?

So many people here are so smart - I feel a complete and utter fool in my history class. Matt came up with this theory that the amount of knowledge in that classroom is directly proportional to the amount of pounds that they pack. Well, this is only the case with the really heavy people. There are four large people in the class - two of them being the teachers - and they're ridiculous. Granted, the teachers are over 50, one of the students has already graduated and is 28, and one of them is a senior. They're the extreme examples, however - we talked about post-modernism thought in the study of history and all I could think of when the idea finally *clicked* was that painting by Magritte - with the depiction of a pipe underneath which is written, in French, "This is not a pipe." And I wanted to shout it out to the world - I GET it because I GET art, but that's nothing to brag about or discuss.

Why am I a history major? The passion I used to have for it, for the stories, is almost gone. I hate looking at primary documents and analyzing them. No, that's not true. I don't hate history. But I don't plan on doing anything with it once I'm done with Macalester, so what's the point?

PSHAW. Giggle giggle giggle. PSHAW.

I'm still quite down. It's this aching inside that sort of makes itself known whenever anybody asks how I am and I say "fine" or "pretty good" because it is just a big fat lie. I am lost. I am in still waters pathetically dog paddling, because that is the only kind of swimming I can do. (I mean, not really, but metaphorically, of course.)

mother said straight ahead not to delay or be misled

I was working at my desk this afternoon, sun streaming through the skylight. Suddenly a shadow flitted over my head and I looked up, thinking it was a plane or a bird. It was a plastic bag. I was listening to 'O Mimi tu piu non torni' from 'La Boheme' (one of the most gorgeous songs in the world) and it struck me that I was.... stuck in 'American Beauty!' Before I knew it, the plastic bag wavered back and forth three or four times and then disappeared.

In other news, the re-inflammation of tendonitis in my right knee has not gone away after a week. It is sore almost all day long. My mom said 'I told you so,' and I said, 'You're right. You did.' What she had told me was to keep stretching everyday or else it would come back. But come on, I didn't even stretch when I was skating every day so how did she expect me to stretch when I wasn't skating at all?

These are the three things that make me the most angry:

1. Losing things. Nary do I ever get so painfully angry as when I misplace something. May it be an earring, a checkbook, a coupon, or my car keys, I become somewhat dysfunctional when I am aware of something missing that I have been looking for. I run around the house/dorm room, crying, "If i were my earring/checkbook/coupon/car keys, where would i be?" or "where the fuck is my fucking earring/checkbook/coupon/car keys?" Nothing can pull my mind from this one missing item. It is absolutely disgraceful and disheartening. It is also dismal. I hate losing things, especially when I had JUST seen them and then I put them down somewhere and a minute later can't find them. I really hate losing things.

2. Getting lost while driving. Michelle thinks I'm scary when this happens. I probably am. I hate wasting time and gas turning around, stopping at stoplights, making illegal U-turns, waiting to make legal U-turns just to backtrack and go where I've already gone or perhaps get even more lost and far away from my ultimate destination. I go, "fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck" and after I've found the place, I feel really badly about saying all those "fucks." I get so angry that I turn down the music really low and won't talk at all except to ask "didn't we already pass this tree?" I hate getting lost. I've gotten lost about three times trying to get to my brother's house in Long Beach. It's not even that hard to get to. I feel like such an idiot when I get lost driving.

3. The fact that Audrey Tautou is starring in the movie version of 'The Da Vinci Code.' Because I ADORE and RESPECT(ed) Audrey and I loathe 'The Da Vinci Code.'

PS. I found my 'Garden State' DVD AND my roommate.

I pose one question: who has my 'Garden State' DVD???

like a bird stealing bread

For some reason, my disloyal brain and psyche decided to cook up a horribly painful dream last night. I've had bad dreams before, scary ones - but they were unreal. They took place in unknown places or involved ghosts or monsters who could run faster than me. But this one - this related directly to an event of the night before, and while some of it was foreign to me, the core of it, the part that hurt, was so possibly real. It was jarring and disconcerting. I woke up way too early, 7am after going to bed at 3, and felt pretty ill. This feeling lasted a lot of the day.

Well, you know. Here's to Monday. This week my goal is to make every day productive in some way. And this productivity will make me happy. And then I will be happy.

who loves the sun, who cares if it shines

Last weekend was probably the best weekend of my college career.

This weekend was probably the worst. I'll get over it, right?

i win

The other day I opened up my impromptu purchase of Diet Coke and looked under the cap. It said, 'You win a 20 oz. Coke product.'

I think I will pick up that 20 oz. Diet Coke with Lime today.

I am going home for spring break. My little brother has been depressed. I hate to hear it.

sheep go to heaven

There are days when I am really busy - I run around like a mad, grumpy chicken - snapping other people's heads off and pretending like I am really important and stuff.

Then there are days when I have no priorities and I wander up and down the hallway, watch TV, and wander between random rooms and spots on campus. I wonder as I wander - what am I doing with my life? (By life I dont' mean LIFE. That would just be silly, whereas what I'm thinking is not silly at all and very serious.) What could I be doing to further the happiness of my life while I am wandering doing nothing? And while I'm perfectly 'happy' on busy days, when I can cross things off of lists, I wonder during my wandering days about the significance of the items that were crossed off.

It's a cycle. It's not bad. I'm not unhappy. I'm going home for spring break, I think. I would not go home if my little brother were not there.

I think sibling love is the best kind of love in the world. The end of Catcher in the Rye makes me ridiculously happy. I love my little brother so much that I would shout it out to the world. I will probably tell you tomorrow how great he is. My love for him is absolutely unconditional - there is no question, and if there was a gun aimed at us, I'd probably jump in front of him. I remember I used to hang out with my brother on weekends during highschool instead of the friends who I had so much less in common with. We had our inside jokes. We had poop jokes, bathroom jokes. People think it's hard that he's 6 years younger than me, but, oh, it makes it so easy for me. I don't want a brother who is in the same stage of life as me. My favorite room in the house is his room - with the toy train track running around the wall near the ceiling, the X-Wing fighter hanging from the ceiling, the stuffed animals still in his bookcase, the whiteboard that we draw Trogdor and Homestar Runner characters on... does he still have his Toy Story comforter? I want to show everybody his room. I was there when the train track was being built, I was there when he and Dad painted the desk, I was there when he got the Star Wars glow-in-the-dark stickers and I've got several Rollercoaster Tycoon games saved on his computer. I love playing computer games with my little brother in his room. He likes it too. When he is playing Warcraft, he doesn't want me to leave, so I sit on his bed watching or flipping through his Lego magazines.

This is what I would miss if I never went home.

I am restless. I want to live in so many different ways, in so many different places. I want to say I am from California, Minnesota, London, Australia, China, Norway, Chicago, Nice, Florence, Scotland, Barcelona. I want the workers at Cahoot's to know my name and know that I do not like coffee and that I think they should work on their Chai latte because it is not very good (don't tell, but Starbucks' is better.) I want to work with big cats, with clothing, with books and writing, with photography. I want to work with houses, flowers, canvases, and ice cream. I want people to know my name and think fondly on it. I don't want people to avoid the name Kristina and all of its forms because it reminds them of me. I suppose this is what all people want. Not all people want to see good movies, though. So maybe what I just made was a very broad, generic, and false statement.

as fond o' yo as yo are o' me, kfizzle.