Calf on the Bangerter highway today!

suspenders

I bet that man thought he was the only one wearing suspenders today on campus.

back

Well, I've debated and debated it, and I think I ought to take up blogging again.

J.K. Rowling Fairy Tales

This might be of interest.

This Is Real!

what if

What if your name were Maya, and it was pronounced Mah-YA! (like sushi-YA!) ?

beret

After weeks of searching for my blasted beret - in real life, at Forever21 and similar stores - today I made a breakthrough. I found it online!

why?

Why is it that the moment you start crying in a deserted-for-the-holidays university department, a second-language student suddenly appears and needs to use a stapler?

Abby Puts On Sunglasses

By the time I get home there will be another niece the same age as her.

3 Weeks!

since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world

my blood approves,
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
--the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids' flutter which says

we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis

-e. e. cummings

losing hair

What Your Hair Is Telling You About Your Health

Serious shedding

"Seeing a swarm of strands in the shower drain every morning isn’t necessarily a cause for alarm—or a signal that anything is wrong with you. It’s totally normal to lose about 100 strands of hair every day. And even if you think you’re losing more than that, remember that your head carries at least 100,000 hair follicles, so it’s possible to collect a handful or two out of the bath or hairbrush without it visibly changing the appearance of your mane. And since those 100,000 or so follicles have different growth phases, even as several strands fall out, dozens of new ones are just on their way in to replace them. So unless you’re starting to notice visible thinning of your hair or bald spots on your scalp, chances are the loss is nothing more than natural, everyday shedding."

Hallelujah!

Faust Arp

Radiohead - Faust Arp

One, two, three, four.

Wakey, wakey, rise and shine
It's on again, off again, on again
Watch me fall like
Dominoes in pretty patterns
Fingers in the blackbird pie
I'm tingling, tingling, tingling
It's what you feel now
What you ought to, what you ought to
Reasonable and sensible
Dead from the neck up
Because I'm stuffed, stuffed, stuffed
We thought you had it in you
But not, but not, but not
For no real reason.

Squeeze the tubes and empty bottles out
Take a bow, take a bow, take a bow
It's what you feel now
What you ought to, what you ought to
An elephant that's in the room is
Tumbling, tumbling, tumbling
In duplicate, and duplicate,
And plastic bags, and duplicate and triplicate
Dead from the neck up
I guess I'm stuffed, stuffed, stuffed.
We thought you had it in you
But not, but not, but not.

Exactly where do you get off?
Is enough, is enough.
I love you but enough is enough, enough
And now stop - there's no real reason.

You've got a head full of feathers.
You got melted to butter.

who

who did this?
Between the hours of 5pm, Tuesday and 2:00pm, Friday.

delightful

My thoughts were occupied with checklists and checklists of things I had yet to do. I walked past several people on campus, but I was stuck on my dramatic song. A towering gentleman in a black coat, slowed as I passed by him on my way to some campus errand, "Hey, I like your scarf." My wandering mind trying to conquer all of the blasted things I had to do this morning stopped. I looked up. "Oh... thanks!"

Thank goodness for people who can stop you in your worrisome thoughts.

----------

Late for class because I procrastinated a paper, I hurried up the hill that would later turn to ice by the time I got to leave campus. I heard some shouting, but cast it aside. When I reached the top, I noticed a certain gentleman in an orange coat and a face that indicated down syndrome, shouting to the world about the fantastic song he listened to on his ipod or cd player. And I smiled. Oh to live life without inhibition!

----------

I explained my paper to my little nook in my class, "Yeah... mine is on Dadaism and Radiohead's Kid A." No one said anything. I don't think they know who Radiohead is.

ice skating

As I walked down the hill by the Smith Field House and the RB I thought, "What would happen if this soaking wet pavement turned into pure ice?" I pulled out a sticky note from my folder, and jotted down "ice skating on hill," and suddenly my feet slipped.

Could you imagine, an entire slippery slope on the way home? I watched where I was stepping from then on.

easier

Grizzly Bear - Easier

I know
I know
the doors won't close
the pipes all froze
just let it go

Argue with me
I've got plenty of dishes and time
cords in a bind
knots that we make
fatal mistakes
let's recreate an easier time

Because I still can't find you

i ran away

From the retiring of the flag on campus yesterday. I was walking down the stairs to the basement of the JFSB when the familiar sounds of the National Anthem were broadcast across the campus sound systems (those hidden speakers above buildings like the ASB and the library). I scurried down to the entrance of the basement. I didn't want to be stuck there.

Oh man. Sometimes I'm rotten.

hazardous gas

I swear somebody's leaking hazardous, maybe deadly, gas into the vents in my office.

Too bad I can hear it!

breakthrough

I've made a breakthrough. My body woke up naturally at 7:43AM. I hadn't set an alarm clock (which might have been tragic), but there I was, eyes opening naturally and my feet being forced to exit my little cocoon of satin sheets and onto my forest green carpet. After 2 1/2 years of 8AM work time, you'd think my body would figure out when it's supposed to be awake.

Turns out that going to bed at 11:20pm really does help (and maybe the heat being turned on).

Spare-Ohs

Step 1: Read lyrics

Andrew Bird - Spare-Ohs

The finches and sparrows build nests in my chimney
what remains of the small flightless birds that you failed to protect

but their yolk isn't easy in fact it's a drag
as they're blowing through cornfields and mountains of rags

all over the suburbs
across the great lawns
crop-dusting gardens all over this town

but nobody cares when it gets in their hair
it gets in their lungs as it floats through the air
it gets in the food that they buy and prepare
but nobody cares when it gets in their hair

across the great chasms and schisms
and the sudden aneurysms
where the black ink will drip
across the crespice of your
eyes and your teeth
are worth more than you can spare-
-oh don't tell me that it just isn't fair
don't speak about the cycles of life
'cause your thoughts are so soft
I could cut 'em with a spork or a bride's knife

and the wine made our mouths too loose
such a reckless choice of words
when you tell me that I'm too obstruce
I just thought it was a kind of bird
I just stood there not saying a word

Step 2: Watch
Take Away Show: Andrew Bird - Spare-Ohs

Step 3: What are these lyrics about?

'I had 26 chickens and now I have zero chickens. I wasn’t able to keep the raccoons away from the chickens. And then for a year after that happened the chicken feathers are still around from the massacre. There’s just hundreds and hundreds of sparrows around my barn and they were taking the chicken feathers and stuffing my chimney with them to make nests. And then I would have a fire and I would see the smoke coming out and I would see little feathers reminding me of how I let down the chickens. And the whole line, “Don't speak about the cycles of life 'cause your thoughts are so soft I could cut 'em with a spork or a bride's knife.” The whole cycle of life thing was so apparent I was like, "Oh come on, this is just too obvious." Yeah, but then it also kind of talks about the implications of the cremations and the remains of animals and people floating and landing in our hair without us knowing it.'