Now that I spend 4 days a week digitizing slides and manuscripts, I think it might be a neat idea to scan in photos from my high school yearbooks, and upload them to flickr. Then anyone who wanted a copy could get a nice, neat QOOP photo book. I think I’ll try out it out during spring break, and if the process flows well it could be a major project for summer vacation.
tags: b-cc, photography, work
So, I’m here — Amherst, western Massachusetts, America, Earth.
I don’t really know what to say about it. I like Amherst a lot, the town and the college. It’s really beautiful here. Mike’s friends are nice and interesting and talkative. I don’t feel like I’m getting in the way when I am around them, or that I’m left out at all.
Last night my bus got in a little late, but Mike was still there waiting for me. Katie and Chris were randomly driving by at the same time. They yelled out my name, and then stopped and parked. We drove to Northampton and had supper there at a place called Taipei & Tokyo, mostly because the sushi place that Mike and I ate at every Friday back at home is called Taipei Tokyo. I didn’t get sushi, I pigged out on tempura. Northampton is sweet and charming, even though we had to drive past a string of strip malls to get there from Amherst.
Today I have taken the grand tour of campus and went to the AJ Hastings store “downtown.” (In town?) Mike got me an Amherst sweatshirt. Mostly for sentimental reasons I’m sure, but I need it here; it’s freezing, especially in the mornings and at night. I ate with Mike at the dining hall for breakfast and lunch. At lunch we ran into Adam Bookman from high school. It was surprisingly great to see him, even though we weren’t close friends at B-CC. He seems really happy here. I’m not surprised. Most people seem pretty happy here. Maybe there is something to the whole small liberal arts college thing. We have already run into friends of Mike in the dining hall, wandering around outside and in the gym.
I spent the afternoon reading Sartre and Hobbes in the gym while Mike and his friend Max worked out. I was surprisingly focused and got a lot of work done. I have been sort of anxious and finishing homework here so that I don’t feel overwhelmed when I get back but at the same time trying to make the most of my time here. I have convinced myself finally that I don’t need to finish all my reading for the week over the weekend…that’s what I can do in all those spare hours after class on Monday and in the mornings on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Mike’s dorm is amazing. It was renovated very recently. The hallways have hardword floors and the rooms are carpeted. All of the rooms have high cathederal ceilings. The bathrooms are spacious and brightly lit and the floor and walls are lined with friendly pastel-y tiles. I’m jealous. My dorm is not bad by any measure of the imagination, but it doesn’t have any feeling of community or home-iness that Stearns has. It probably helps that it’s an all freshman dorm, and there are that many rooms per floor.
Just now we got back from visiting Katie and Chris at Hampshire. They gave us the tour. We hung out in Katie’s “mod” (apartment type dorm) for a bit and then walked around campus. It’s very spread out, especially compared to Amherst and Brown. We saw Chris’ mod too and a couple of buildings and a grafetti wall.
We’re going to get food soon at an Italian place here called Pasta e Basta with some of Mike’s friends. I’m going to try to stay up until midnight tonight at least. We’ll see if I can pull it off…then I’ll leave tomorrow afternoon and if all goes well arrive back in Providence at 8pm. A little late, but not too bad — and it was either that or leave here at 11am and get back at 2pm, cutting at close with a 15 minute layover in Springfield.
It’s not over yet but I feel like this trip has been in a way a success. I don’t know why I am thinking about it like that. I guess before I left I was worried that I would miss a bus or a train or get lost or that Mike’s friends and roommate would hate me or that I wouldn’t be allowed in the dining hall. I was also worried about my mood, that maybe I would be depressed because I am only here for a weekend. But everything has turned out all right. It’s great here, and it seems like it’ll be very manageable to visit every other month. It’s definitely nice to get off campus and out of Providence. It’s also refreshing to see some familiar faces…I’ve seen more people I know here than at Brown, it seems. It’s comfortable here. I even got confused when Katie started talking about Parents’ Weekend and I thought it would be cool if our schools’ Parents’ Weekends were the same time that our moms could hang out together…and then I remembered that Brown is not Amherst, not a 10 minute drive from Hampshire.
was wonderful. Eric and I trekked out to Bethesda around 5, so we got there just in time to see the entire show. A lot of the bands were terrible, but fun anyway. Dan’s other band played mostly covers, including Bohemian Rhapsody which was amazing as usual even though they were missing a bunch of the vocalists they had when they played it last year at the Talent Show. Mike’s band played mostly original songs but they weren’t as bad as I expected! They also played Pearl Jam’s Alive, the first song that I ever heard Mike’s band play, way back before I knew Dan or Josh or least of all Mike, in 10th grade at the Talent Showcase held in the cafeteria because the auditorium still hadn’t been finished yet. Mike’s band won and got to play an encore: Rockin’ in the Free World.
The music was good but the best part was seeing all the people. It felt like high school again, but the wonderful part of high school. Mike and Ethan and Dan and their friends and knowing lots of people from class and recognizing lots of faces and friendlyness and smiling. I wonder if they realize what they have right now. Of course, a lot of people acquire a similar sort of community as soon as they get to college. But I didn’t.
Garner from a few doors up gave me Weezer’s new album Make Believe even though it doesn’t come out for another four days. I am listening to it right now, at a low volume because I am afraid I have gone a bit deaf from the loud music last night. I don’t want to push it. It is definitely Weezeresque, but I am not sure how much I like it. I read somewhere that it was supposed to be a combination of Pinkerton and the Blue Album, which would make the best album of all time. But that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Emergency Announcement:
All Montgomery County Public Schools will be closed today, February 24, due to weather conditions, but all administrative offices will open on time. All after-school and community activities in school buildings are canceled.
Hahha it is barely snowing at all. I think this is a sign from God, who Mike does not believe in, that he should come visit me today, especially as I ONLY HAVE ONE CLASS TODAY. Especially as then he could see me at office hours at the RADIO STATION and keep me warm while I freeze in the chillbox. Especially as I barely have any homework. He could bring a football. We could play catch on the Mall.
In completely unrelated news, JAY WON PROJECT RUNWAY, thus giving me one more reason to live.
Where have I been for the past few days? Not online, I guess. On Tuesday after my exam I came home and then for dinner Mummy and I drove up to Catonsville to visit Maddie at UMBC, because she still had an exam on Wednesday. I was impressed and wowed by seeing my first dining hall. It was also my first opportunity to wear my inside-of-a-hot-dog down coat from L.L. Bean, which although very warm is undeniably a fleshy pink hue.
On Wednesday I went to school with all of the old high school lunch group for an “Alumni Breakfast” and then to find Mike at his 4th period and go to the college panel that Brittney was speaking at with him. I also had a chance to talk to Mr. Cole, who luckily remembered me (although I think having Brittney there helped.) He didn’t seem to think it would be any problem resending my transcript and counselor recommendation…so…that’s good. The only difference this year is that the deadlines are much later and I use pink transcript request forms instead of blue.
After school I hung out with Mike until Mummy picked me up for SPAGHETTI at home.
Yesterday I went ice skating with Jake, Brittney, Maurie and Gali which was fun. And then went over to Mike’s again. We didn’t do much, because we were both tired, until around dinner time when we figured out that the Asian Cafe near BethesdaJerry’s Music delivers in Mike’s neighborhood.
Later on we ended up hanging out with Dan, Ethan and Matt which reminded incredibly of last year, except that Dan’s hair was longer and there was a new tablecloth in his kitchen. Also, some girls from B-CC who I didn’t really know came over and were loud and giggly but perfectly pleasant. I didn’t say anything, as usual, but I was also half asleep. In fact, went we went back to Mike’s house around midnight, I can’t remember what happened, because I was completely asleep.
And that brings us to today. It’s Christmas Eve. I need to clean my room and work on college applications and do laundry. I’m also waiting for my final grade to be posted so I can know my GPA for sure.
I saw I Heart Huckabees last night with my mom at AFI. Besides another mom and daughter couple, we were the only ones there. I was expecting it to be weird but I didn’t know in which way it would be weird. After seeing it, the only way I can think of describing the movie is philosophical in the same way the first Matrix was, except in the form of a comedy rather than an action film.
I slept at home last night because there was no point in going back to GWU. This morning I woke up, unintentionally again, at 8:00 am. It wasn’t too lonely because Brittney was still awake (?? at 5:40 am PST) and so was Katie from last night. Even decided there was no plausible way I was going to study all day at home alone. So I took the bus to Bethesda and got to B-CC right before the end of fourth period.
I may not have had the best experience at GWU or at college in general, but Jesus Christ it is at least much better than high school was. B-CC was only a great experience for me because it was comfortable, familiar and full of good friends who I had known a long time. Walking around school with it full of people wasn’t as exciting or as good as I thought it would be. I couldn’t recognise anyone. The bells, the ridiculous schedule, the security guards, the parking lot, all reminded me of all the pointless rules and routines that I took so seriously last year.
Luckily I didn’t stay there long. Apparently Mike and his clan are now too cool for school, so they go to someone’s house every day for lunch. (Wait…this sounds sort of familiar…) Today it was at Ethan’s house.
They had to go back for fifth period and I didn’t really want to go back so I walked to CVS, bought a bunch of things I had been putting off buying at in DC despite the fact that my dorm there is within walking distance of approximately 5 CVS’ and then walked to Barnes and Noble. And here I am! Apparently Barnes and Noble has wifi now, $4 or something like that for a 2 hour block. I have nothing else to do until my appointment with Dana at 3:00, so I figured it was worth “purchasing”.
So now I’ve already been here for about an hour and I’ve just been chatting with people and eating lunch. I should probably do some work so that this day is not completely wasted. I feel like such a Starbucks yuppie.