VOLDEMORT CAN'T STOP THE ROCK

So, on a scale from 1 to 20 ninja, I'd say my last two weekends have rated, on average, at about 23 ninja. (Don't you hate when people do that, where they make up some scale and then immediately devalue it by citing a number outside of the scale? It's like saying, "Okay, so last night I either went out dancing or watched Moulin Rouge. Guess which." "Umm...dancing?" "No, actually, I covered a ferret in chocolate chip ice cream and went ice skating on a pond made of frozen goat pee! God, you're dumb." Like, playing by the rules, you could totally never guess the answer.) I was in costume last Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night, and not only that--I was in a different costume for each of those three nights. CRAZY. This weekend was not as costume-y, but it did include maple syrup and Angelina Jolie, so I'm going to count that as a win. Onto the incredibly lengthy and gut-twistingly exciting summary of my life, which, as usual, is precisely 65.4% more fabulous than yours:

Sooooooooooooo...okay, so last weekend was the weekend to end all weekends. Man, there was a lot of "end" involved in that last sentence. The weekend before that was spent being a wholesome, academically inclined young lady (read: thinking about writing papers while constructing a fort out of the beer and soda cans left in Kate and Kel's mod--hey, I was protecting myself AND the Kingdom of Cheez-Its-onia) so this weekend was the time to let loose and be merry. It kicked off Thursday night, when Amy and I went into Newbury Comics in Amherst and I bought the first season of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Pee Wee's Big Adventure. (You know, being in college is, I've decided, is really a lot like being twelve, except you have no curfew, a credit card, and full possession of your hormones. No wonder they call it the best years of your life.) I couldn't watch these gems of the universe right away, though, as I had a pressing appointment with the coolest wizards in rock n' roll--a.k.a. Harry and the Potters. As you know full well if you read my NYC blog or have talked to me for more than five seconds, Harry Potter ranks pretty consistently near the top of my obsessions, which is impressive since I have about 1,456 top obsessions at any given moment. As usual, Kate and I were the only two members of our crew to openly express our love for indie/emo Gryffincore rock, so we got super-swanked-out and headed to MHC for what turned out to be the rockingest night in rock history. Well, that might be a slight exaggeration, but I'd seriously like to see Ozzy Osbourne top what Harry (Year 5) and Harry (Year 7) were dishing out--bat biting is nothing compared to ad-libbed Cho Chang/Dumbledore references. Last time I saw Harry and the Potters, they were playing a slightly different sort of venue (read: a library full of 3 to 13-year-olds), so this was a totally new experience. It was mostly MHC girls, along with a scattering of recognizable Hampshire students, all in varying degrees of Potter-themed costume. I don't have a picture of mine, most unfortunately, but just take a minute to form store this image in your mental database: me in black combat boots, fuzzy white leg warmers over black fishnets, a black and blue plaid schoolgirl skirt, Hogwarts jacket, and GINORMOUS fuzzy white witch hat. What's that word you're searching for? Unbearably hot? Yeah, I thought so. Harry and the Potters even had an opening band (ohhh snap) called--you're going to need a moment to deal with this one--Uncle Monsterface. Wait, wait, one more time--Uncle...Monsterface. The minute I heard it, I was like, "My god...I never realized it, but if I ever formed a band, I think that's EXACTLY what I would have named it." Uncle Monsterface consisted of three guys, one of whom wore a dinosaur helmet the whole time, a sock puppet theater, a projection screen that showed random images like a prairie dog playing the piano in front of a swirling psychadelic background, and a guy actually dressed as Uncle Monsterface, who didn't appear until halfway through the set. They made Buffy references, played songs about Count Chocula and a lobster building, among other things, then called on Uncle Monsterface, who popped out from behind the puppet theater and ran into the crowd (at this point, I gotta admit, I was pretty sure there had been something hallucinogenic in the punch) and came back with Spongebob, Sesame St., and He-Man sheets which the band members wore as capes. At the end, they called a bunch of people up on stage (are you wondering if I went? Do you even have to ask? There was a STAGE. Of course I did) to rock out with inflatable guitars while a white mouse running on top of the world played on the screen. I have to say, guys, I deal pretty well with weird shit, but this...was so...weird. I just stood there, completely perplexed, as was pretty much everyone else, until, somewhere in the middle of "Count Chocula (you're never safe)" I looked over at my companions and was like, "You know what, I'm just going to go with it" and started dancing like a madman. Kate's two comments, which helped me process the whole experience were: 1) none of these guys have ever felt the touch of a woman, and 2) this is exactly the band their twelve-year-old selves would have formed, so really, they're living their dream. That helped me to deal somewhat. I'm still somewhat edgy around breakfast cereals and sock puppets, though.

So then, after having our minds scrambled and eaten by sock puppets, it was time for Harry and the Potters. The Hampshire kids got up right in front of the stage, so I was pretty much face-to-chest with Harry (Year 7) which made the whole thing crazy intense. They played the old standards ("Wizard Chess" and "Wrath of Hermione," anyone? Remember those from our wild and sordid youth?) and premiered some Book 6 songs, at which point everyone in the room pretty much passed out from joy. I danced like someone hit with the Dansus Incredibilis curse--okay, more like someone hit with the Cruciatus curse, since I was pretty much spazzing out and screaming occasionally, but it was still awesome. The Harrys crowd-surfed and did lots of jumping up on speakers and were pretty much rock gods. At some point during "Save Ginny Weasley", Kate and I turned to each other and were like, "Man, this is the best night of our lives and we should never, ever mention that fact to anyone we know, ever." Afterward there was a costume contest, based on house, so I entered as a punk-rock Ravenclaw but lost out to Luna Lovegood (that spacey bitch). There was also pumpkin painting, which we did not partake in, and candy, which we heartily partook of. I bought a "Save Ginny" shirt, which you will get to see later, in my Halloween pics, and got it signed by little Harry, who wrote, "KATHARINE--don't let Voldemort crash your DANCE PARTY!" We talked with him for awhile, and I offered Kate $15 to ask him to make out with her, but alas, she is a yellow-bellied fiend. Can you imagine how much your street cred would go up if you made out with one of the Harry and the Potters? I mean, you'd be at like, mega-gansta status. If you made out with one of the members of Uncle Monsterface, though, your street cred would probably just explode and you'd have to live your life in the sewers or something. Not in a bad way, just in a "you are not meant for this world" sort of way.

So, Friday. Oh my, Friday. As you may have anticipated, a large amount of Friday was spent on the floor of my room, trying to figure out how to build a wheelchair out of a zebra footstool, a roly-chair, and 500 LEGO pieces. Because of that whole, y'know, genetic joint disability thing, the day after dancing like a fiend is often known as the day my legs rebel and refuse to fulfill their proper function, but luckily, after a long bath, stretching, and some Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I was up and about again. And thank Joss, because Friday night was none other than Hampshire Halloween. Hampshire Halloween is, pretty much, the biggest deal on this campus ever, and that's not just me misusing "biggest" and "ever" again. It's a huge thing, and our most massive party--apparently it was even on Rolling Stone's Top 10 party list and some point, which means that unless your school has a party that involves lots of making out and takes place in a giant ball pit, surrounded by a lazy river, we kick your asses. (Kate decided, and I heartily agree, that the epitome of luxury is having an estate that includes a giant ball pit and a lazy river. Like, if you've got both of those things, you've made it. You're a success. No question. This past week I amended my personal vision to include a Spaghetti-O's lazy river, complete with full-size Spaghetti-O's rafts, but at the moment that's just making me somewhat nauseated, so maybe it's not the best idea.) On Hampshire Halloween, the campus closes down for this crazy-ass, school-wide party, to which all the good people of the Valley come. You're allowed seven guests, who have to register and whatnot, and they all have to enter at designated spots, meaning, as my friend Kel discovered, that there is a two-hour line to get onto campus. You don't want to leave campus at all on Halloween--you may never get back. Around six, when the lawn carnival started, I started to get suited up as none other than Harry Potter in my Save Ginny t-shirt, jeans, black Chucks, and Hogwarts jacket. I used a red pen to draw on my scar, carried around my Hedwig the snowy owl hand puppet, and stole our mod's broomstick to use as a prop/inconspicuous cane. I even wrote Nimbus 2000 on it--man, am I crafty. I couldn't find my plastic Harry Potter glasses, though, so I went over to Kate's, where she and her best friend from Bard, Christine, were getting decked out as 50s-style B-movie aliens. They had a bunch of pipe cleaner left over from making their antennae, so Christine, the craftiest of us all, constructed a pair of amazingly round spectacles for me using only green pipe cleaners and Sharpie. The only problem with that was that the Sharpie then came off on my face somewhat, so I kind of looked like Harry Potter going through heroin withdrawal for most of the evening. Amy showed up in her mailman garb (complete with postal service hat, dirty postcards, and sketchy glued-on moustache) and Ellen was also there in what was supposedly a red Gummi Bear costume, but was really just her excuse to wear comfy red clothes all night. We went over to Harry's mod, where he had just finished getting Hermesed-out--Harry has this weird theory that because he wore only a loincloth and shorts his first year at Hampshire Halloween, he has to be progressively more naked each year. This might make sense if we didn't live in Massachusetts, but because we do, it doesn't make any sense at all and means Harry pretty literally froze his balls off this year. No, really, literally. I think he's now sterile. It was that cold. Luckily, though, the constant rain I complained about last entry had finally let up, so it was dry and actually pretty pleasant if you were wearing an appropriate amount of clothes. Jeff showed up as Oxytocin, the hormone of love (read: he was too lazy to get a costume and made up for it by touching everybody inappropriately), though apparently earlier in the evening someone had actually drawn a big red F on his forehead because he failed so badly at Halloween. Jeff and I frolicked off to the lawn, where they had a bouncy castle, slide, obstacle course, and basketball thing, as well as crazy dance party nonsense. There are three places to dance during Halloween: the big tent on the lawn, where the live bands play; the smaller tent on the lawn, with the DJ; and the RCC, with another DJ. After dropping by Alice's mod and meeting back up with Kate and Christine, we went into the big tent, where ZEBU was playing. ZEBU is a fairly well-known band on campus, but I had never heard them play, and am pretty sure I never want to hear them play again. I mean, it was fine for Halloween, because when you're dancing around with a bunch of crazy people in costume, nothing can really be wrong, but outside of that context I think ZEBU should probably never be heard from. We were kind of standing around, trying to determine if the noises we were hearing were supposed to be musical, until everyone just sort of got into the spirit of things and started dancing to whatever music they heard in their heads. It was actually really good for a Hampshire crowd, I think, because since there was no rhythm, everyone just sort of picked a dance style and went with it, so people were like moshing and salsa-dancing and break-dancing and all kind of nonsense. Dance parties, I've deducted from long years of research, are 78% more fun when in costume, no matter how ridiculous the music may be. There was a guy on stage screaming, "AFRICAN WATER BUFFALO!" and a giant squid head-banging in front of me, and I was like, "Man, this is totally like if one of my dreams came to life. I LOVE THIS SCHOOL." After dancing around a bit, we went to Prescott, which apparently had mini-quiches at some point in the night, but only had nachos and condoms when we got there. Another awesome feature of Hampshire Halloween? Free food. Lots of it. As a semi-independent college student, I will attend pretty much any event that has free food, even if it's like, Skittles. The Greenwich/Enfield house office had an open house the other day and I stocked up on so many mozzarella sticks and vegan brownies--which, for the record, you should never really eat in tandem, both from a political and dietary standpoint. On Halloween, all the house offices have something going on, plus food, so life=good. After Prescott, we went to Dakin to check out the Haunted House, which we actually didn't end up going into since Amy, sketchy mailman extraordinaire, showed up and wanted to dance some more. We went to the RCC for awhile, then to the smaller tent, both of which rocked profoundly. We also just generally wandered, which is always really amusing, since people go all out for Halloween and have the weirdest costume choices. In addition to the giant squid, Edward Scissorhands, and Frank from Donnie Darko, we noticed that this year there were a disproportionate number of unicorns walking around. We counted about a dozen, and though we also counted about a dozen Willy Wonkas, that made sense because, hey, movie. But unicorns? As far as I'm aware, there has been no unicorn-centered media enterprise since, ironically enough, "The Last Unicorn." Maybe unicorns are back, though. Maybe all the cool kids are going to start wearing horns and then some posers will start wearing horns and the original unicorns will laugh at them and call them rhinos and then the rhinos will stampede and destroy all the unicorns. Maybe. Anyway, there were also lots of ninjas, hipsters, and Greeks. In one of the tents we met this girl with an amazing Frida Kahlo costume--I mean, she totally looked like Frida, and had even gone all out with uni-brow and partial moustache. There was a Spaghetti Monster (AMAZING) and my personal favorite, a Cock Block, who was just wearing a giant block and would look for people making out and then get between them and be like, "Nope, nope, can't allow this, I'm a Cock Block, cease and desist." We also passed this Slytherin smoking a cigarette and being generally Slytherin, and I swear he gave me the kind of look Draco would give Harry, the "Merlin, you think you're so cool but you're just a stupid-ass Gryffindor." Christine saw it too, and she was like, "Man, you should challenge him to a duel," and I almost did until I was like, "Wait...we're not actually at Hogwarts. And he's not actually a haughty pureblood, and my wand is plastic." Then I got really depressed because I suddenly really wanted to go to Hogwarts and Christine was like, "I completely understand," and then told me about this theory her sister and her came up with, which is that in the U.S., the wizard school lets you go to college before they send you your letter, because they want you to have a full education in all ways. So it's like wizard grad school, and there's still a chance we can all get our letters. I was more thrilled by this idea then I should really admit in public. At some point we went into the library so Christine could go to the bathroom, and though there's technically nothing official going on in the library, there were a ton of people hanging out there because hey, warm. We met up with my modmate Kate, who was wearing a $5 Salvation Army bumblebee costume, and she and Amy punched each other for no apparent reason until Christine came out of the bathroom freaked out because someone had been having sex in the stall directly next to her. Just then, this girl dressed as Velma came up to us and screamed in this really shrill voice, "Oh my god, you guys have such cool costumes. Let me hug you!" She then hugged, shook hands, and kissed each of us on the cheek, and as she was walking away Christine was like, "Um...that was the girl having sex in the bathroom next to me." We were like, "Oh, sweet Jesuits...are you sure?" And she was like, "There's really no mistaking that voice," at which point we all decided we desperately needed to go wash our hands and faces. At about 1:30, after lots more dancing, we started lining up for SAGA breakfast. I have this theory that Hampshire Halloween is wholly engineered to make our SAGA seem attractive. SAGA's actually pretty good, but after partying like a motha and standing in line in the freezing cold for 45 minutes, it is the best thing you will ever experience in your life. The breakfast starts at 2 am and is served by various faculty members, including, this year, Ralph Hexter and Manfred (!!!) I was a little too focused on getting TATER TOTS NOWNOWNOW to really pay attention to Manfred, but at least he is now more than a creature of myth. The line for SAGA moved incredibly slowly and by this point we were all incredibly cold and hungry, so we had to come up with various methods of entertainment, including--and this was incredibly surreal--leading the entire line in a sing-a-long of "A Whole New World" and "I Will Survive." When we finally got in, after watching someone set off illegal fireworks near Merrill, we sat in the backroom and inhaled our eggs, tots, and French toast with zest and joy. Christine, Kate, and I headed back to Enfield and met up with Freddy, who, of course, was not wearing a costume because he is, as he told us, "Same as always, same as always." Somehow, in the process of his proposing marriage to Christine, we managed to get him to slip up and admit to us that he is building a time machine, so we now know some small part of his master plan. I came back to my mod to find Sean, who had gone out as a lizard, scrapping pastels off his face and decided to just go to bed and deal with the permanent marker on my face later. Man, that's how so many of my nights end up...

I spent most of Saturday recovering from Halloween by sitting around watching "Pee Wee's Big Adventure"--er, I mean "Cool Indie Movie About Intellectualism and Sophisticated Things that Doesn't Involve Pee Wee Herman"--and ordering Andiamo, which I did a lot last week since I really needed to make a grocery store trip. Andiamo is the nearby panini place, and they have incredible panini and gelato, so despite their slightly heightened prices, I can't resist them. The Andiamo guy walked in to find me sprawled on the couch in my pajamas with Sharpie still on my face and was like, "Had a good Halloween, huh?" He told me that as he walking across campus he just saw people crawling toward their homes or the woods, depending on how desperate they were to find somewhere to sleep. I watched movies all day and then that night Kate, Christine, and I went into Noho to discuss Kate's tattoo options and rock out to Hedwig and the Angry Inch. There was a Hedwig sing-a-long at the Academy of Music Theatre, and if you know anything about me at all, you know a Hedwig sing-a-long is pretty much what I've been waiting for my entire life. I dressed up as Tommy Gnosis, which was pretty easy since he wears all black and 86.3% of my closet is composed of black clothing *exactly 86.3%--I calculated it in my mind. You think I'm making up all these exact figures, but they're totally computed by my Calculator of Everything That You Cannot See Because It Is Also Invisible So Sucks to Your Ass-mar (TM).* I also put disgusting amounts of grease on my hair and drew a silver cross on my forehead, which I thought would get me more weird looks than it did until I remembered I was just going to be around Hampshire and Northampton, where nothing, save nothing, is weird. So we went to Lucky's, the piercing/tattoo place in Noho, where the tattoo guy had a heart-to-heart with Kate about the tattoo she's been wanting forever. Like I mentioned in an earlier entry, which you must know because you've been diligently memorizing each word I post, Kate's dream has long been to get three ants tattooed on her shoulder. ANTS. And not just your generic, run-of-the-mill ant: oh no. Kate had a specific ant in mind: the Argentine ant. (Yes, okay, I did have "Evita" playing in my head every time she said its name. Shut up.) That's actually a link to the exact image she got, by the way. Oh yes, accuracy in reporting, what what. The guy convinced her to just get one ant on her back so it could be all creepily detailed, and Kate decided to come back the next day to get it done. So we went to the Academy of Music and met up with Jeff and Erik to sing along to the best movie ever conceived. It was really pretty full, for having an $8 admission tag, and even included drag queen songleaders, which are necessary for pretty much every event ever, especially like, church functions. Everyone was so into it and had great energy, but really, in the face of Hedwig on the big screen, how can you not? Afterward Kate, Christine, Erik and I went to Osaka for a late dinner--mmmm shrimp tempura. Osaka apparently has the best sushi in the valley, but as I try to stay away from fish that's not so much, er, cooked as much as possible, I can't verify that. After Erik drove us back, Kate, Christine, and I went back to my mod to watch Reality Bites, this 90s film with Janeane Garofalo, Ethan Hawke, Ben Stiller, and Winona Ryder that I had never heard of before but was completely revelatory. After watching it, all of us were like, "Um, number one, we feel so much better about life after college, and number two, where has this movie been all of our lives?" Sunday Kate awoke me to ask if I wanted to come into Northampton and watch her get an insect permanently inked into her flesh. Of course I said yes, and we met up with Amy to go into town. It was one of the most gorgeous days...ever. It was warm, sunny, and like...amazing, especially after the Rain Plague of recent weeks. I felt all frolic-y inside, which translates to my outside as a sort of joyful hobbling. We went to Haymarket for breakfast, of sorts *milk and a slice of Boston creme pie, in my case--mmmm, nutritious* and then went down to Lucky's for Kate's fateful date...with destiny. And a needle. She went in the backroom while Amy and I looked on over this half-door thing that made it feel like Kate was a horse we were watching in a stall or something. The tattoo guy was playing Miles Davis and talked to us about squids *which sent Amy into a panic, naturally* and his love for bugs, which made me queasy. Watching someone get tattooed is kind of a weird thing, but Kate said it didn't hurt that much, though I sometimes suspect Kate is an android and it probably wouldn't hurt if you like, fed her to a bear. After that, we got lunch at Pinnochio's Pizza and I went to go see Thumbsucker while Kate and Amy headed home. Thumbsucker was good, but kind of disorienting--I'm not really sure why, though I suspect it had a lot to do with Keanu Reeves being in it. I was sitting at the bus stop when Mara came by and offered me a ride, and of course I said yes because I wanted to get back to campus and get started on my work as soon as possible *read: eat my Chef Boyardee Spaghetti and Meatballs as soon as possible.* I got to take in the loveliness of the day while walking across Merrill quad, where people were chilling out and enjoying what may well be one of the last days until March we can be outside for more than ten minutes without wanting to die. This past week, though, I have to say, really has been beautiful. I mean, short-sleeves, Frisbee-playing beautiful. Remind of that in two months when I'm setting myself on fire to stay warm.

Tuesday night I went to the DeVotchKa show at the Iron Horse, and oh my, were they the amazingness. DeVotchKa is this multi-instrumental, Eastern European-inspired rock band, and by that description alone you should be able to tell how much they rock. They're apparently good pals with Gogol Bordello, one of my other favorite gypsy rock outfits, who apparently came to Noho just before I discovered them--curse you, crafty gypsy rockers! I had never been to the Iron Horse before, but it's right in downtown Noho and is a really nice space, kind of a bar/cafe set-up with a stage. I got a seat right next to the stage, which was awesome, since I was right in front of the accordion play. Rock on. There are four people in DeVotchKa: three guys and one girl, all of whom play a weird variety of instruments, including, but not limited to, the drums, the trombone, the saxophone, the guitar, and some weird metal thing that warbles when you ding it. They were so very, very good, and their frontman is so very, very hot. I mean, guys, I may be gay, but I think I have a serious man crush with this one. He kind of looked like a cross between Simon from Firefly and Joaquin Phoenix in Walk the Line--yeah, exactly. SO. ATTRACTIVE. Also, he sings like a god. After eating at Cafe Fireside I went back to campus to watch Heavenly Creatures with Amy and Kate, which was really disconcerting. Heavenly Creatures is Kate Winslet's first film, and it's directed by Peter Jackson, which, if you've ever seen and/or heard of it, you will agree is really bizarre. It's about crazy New Zealand lesbians--just the thing for a Tuesday night.

Wednesday I spent dying of leg malfunction, but I managed to get up and about enough at night to go the screening of "I Exist: Queer Voices from the Middle East in the U.S.," which I really wanted to attend one, because, hey, awesome, and two, because the QCA was sponsoring it and I figured we should actually go, you know, actively sponsor it. Thursday was really nice and sunny, so after work Kate and I went out to the big tree near the Red Barn to enjoy my Atkins basket and have a reading party--I lent her my copy of Anansi Boys and I started Infinite Jest, which is proving to be an amazing book, except that it's like 3 million pages long and I only have time to read it in about two minute spurts. We stayed out there until after dark, which really doesn't mean anything because it's started to get dark at about 5:00 here now, talking about science fiction (I'm cool, guys, seriously, don't hate) and our new idea for a Div III, called "F--- you, DIORAMAS!" The concept was inspired by the Chem assignment Kate was working on, which required her to write the biography (in comic or story form) of the element of her choice. This is especially hysterical if you know how often Kate puts down the humanities for being all touchy-feely and hippie-ish, and swears that there's nothing like that in the science world. I suggested she just do a diorama, which got us thinking about how long it's been since we did a diorama and how amazing they are. I mean, really, dioramas in shoeboxes were such an inspired idea. So we decided we could do a Div. III art installation piece of all dioramas, which then evolved into a life-size diorama, and then a theater production that actually takes place inside a diorama about living in a diorama. Oh my god, dioramas. I can't even take the genius. After hanging out with Kel at the QCA, I went back to my mod to watch Aladdin with Kate, where she attempted to make microwave popcorn (MICROWAVE popcorn, people. And you think I’m incompetent) but burnt it, causing our kitchen to fill with smoke. We freaked out because we thought the smoke alarms were going to go off and everyone in Enfield was going to yell at us, but they didn’t, which was good for us at the time, but which seems really bad, now, actually. I mean, shouldn’t they have at least beeped a little? Anyway, there was so much smoke in the microwave that we actually took the entire thing outside to air it out. It was a little ridiculous, so is pretty much everything with me and Kate.

Friday was spent errand-doing, including a much, much needed grocery trip. I was pretty much licking my mod mates’ dirty dishes, I was so desperate for substantial nutrition. Oh, but before all the shopping goodness, Kate and I had our meeting for the Ireland trip, which I am now officially going on (thank Joss). It sounds like it’s pretty much going to be the best thing ever—plus we’re apparently staying near my distant Irish cousins, so I might do some family-type bonding (read: awkward interaction with complete strangers in the hopes that they will feed me dinner or something.) Right, so after that Kate and I got lunch at the Bridge, then met up with Kel and Amy to gallivant about town. We hit the bank (because I finally got my paycheck—ahhhh sweet), Barnes and Noble, Stop N’ Shop, then Amherst. When we got back, I went to Kate and Kel’s mod, since they had promised to make me dinner, and ate French toast and scrambled eggs while watching, for some reason, FOX News than BET. They kind of messed with my head, especially one right after the other. Afterward Kel and I watched Palindromes, this movie I’ve been waiting to see since it came out and Kel really wanted to watch. It’s a weirdly amazing concept—there’s one main character, this thirteen-year-old girl, but she’s played by a different actor in each segment. It’s one of those things that could go horribly, horribly wrong, but ended up working really well. Sean came over to distract us with the revelation that he plays Dungeons and Dragons during it, then I think I must have gotten home at some point that night and gone to sleep, but I can’t really verify that statement. Saturday I got up extra-early (read: 10:30 a.m.) to go with Erik and Skim to Vermont on a random road trip. We decided we wanted to get out of the Valley for awhile, so we drove north until we hit Ludlow and stopped for lunch in this place called Trapper’s, which was decorated as a hunting lodge, save for the giant and inexplicable posters of Maui on the walls. It was a brilliantly gorgeous day, so we walked around town, pausing to laugh hysterically and take incredibly tourist-y pictures with a painted llama statue, shop in various souvenir-type places, and take in the town biker gang (consisting of four people) and uni-cycler. We looked ridiculously out of place—not only were we dressed in Hampshire-type attire, but Erik has a BMW that he feels must perform at top speed at all times, which means he doesn’t really blend in on the back roads of Vermont. We dropped by a reservoir Alice, who in her youth had a summer cabin in the area, recommended, and then went to Chester for tea in a real-life tea house of tea-ness. It was like being in every old woman’s house ever. There were various chachkas for sale everywhere, and everything was sort of pastel-colored and comfortably old. It was all very soothing. We were the only people there, and it was only run by one woman and her dog, which hung out with us while we ate. We got tea, of course, and I got a homemade ice cream sundae, which goes way better with tea than you might think. Never doubt my ability to combine a hot fudge sundae with any meal imaginable. After tea, we drove around to take in the Vermont-ness of Vermont some more, including the apple pie stands, lack of billboards, and general quaintness of the place. We weren’t that far from the Valley, but it was like an entirely different land—probably because the Valley is an entirely different land from everywhere else. Before leaving Vermont, we had to do something syrup-related, so we stopped at a sugar shack and the woman let us sample some of her syrup (purely in a literal maple sense) and showed us the workings of her syrup-making machine, though I still don’t fully grasp the whole thing and prefer to let it remain a “good on waffles” type mystery. After returning to Massachusetts, Erik and I decided to go see—of all things—“Chicken Little.” No, I don’t know either. It was actually pretty good, though, and we managed to get away with buying child’s tickets, which I think is fair since we were seeing “Chicken Little” and all. There was a gay pig, Amy Sedaris, and this hilarious fish, so it all turned out well. Afterward Erik and I met up with Kate and Kel at Ellen’s mod, went to Prescott to party for a bit, then went back to my mod to watch Hackers. Really, guys, I somehow missed a large and crucial part of 90s cinema. Hackers, if you’re horribly culturally unlearned, like, apparently, me, is an Angelina Jolie/Matthew Lillard/Marc Antony (HA!)/other random people film about, naturally, Hackers. Only it was made in 1995, so all the super-cool technology they use is just laughably ridiculous—like, all the laptops are the size of suitcases and the computer graphics just make you want to cry. It’s amazing. It has the motto “HACK THE PLANET!” and tries to make it seem as though hackers and gamers were somehow cool in the 90s and rode motorcycles and went to gamer nightclubs instead of sitting in dark basements for hours and hours and hours on end. This past week could really be re-titled, in my the internal spreadsheet of my life, as the week of OMG 90s MOVIES. I mean, first Reality Bites, then Hackers, then, on Sunday, due to Sean’s suggestion, Singles with Kyra Sedgwick and Matt Dillon. The 90s-ness of my cinematic choices comes mostly from the fact that Sean only has VHS tapes, all of which he purchased five years or more ago, so I have access to all these films I feel I would never otherwise encounter. Sunday was eaten up by sleep, Singles, and work, then the Boondocks at 11 on Adult Swim. Adult Swim has ruled my life lately. I mean, now they have the Boondocks, which is amazing and smart and actually makes sense, unlike 12 Oz. Mouse, which I actually love, but for entirely different reasons. Has anyone else seen 12 Oz. Mouse? Because…yeah. I don’t even know, guys. It’s like Uncle Monsterface—plus 500. I don’t even…I can’t even…I mean, the fact that 12 Oz. Mouse is actually on television makes me wonder if everyone in the world is just secretly like me, and civilization is soon just going to fall apart. I could watch it for hours. Literally…seconds. Only a lot of them. So…hours. What?

Okay, it’s late now, as is clear from that last sentence. I just got back from watching House of 1000 Corpses with Kate, Harry, and Amy after a long day of doing not so much. I did meet with Joel Dansky, though, the Disabilities Service Coordinator, who was actually able to come meet with me in my mod so I didn’t have to go to Prescott at 9 am. Ooooh, maybe as a disabled student I can request that all classes be moved from wherever they are to my mod living room. Or better yet, my bedroom. And instead of “classes,” they can be changed to “hot model make-out sessions/ice cream parties.” Sweeeeet cuppin’ cakes, I think I’ve finally found a use for this handicap.