Continual Mistiming

It is the great frustration of my life that swimsuit season and ice cream season are one and the same.

Things Classmates Do That Annoy Me: A Snark-Filled Compendium

• Pushing the automatic door button unnecessarily. If you are mobile and have both hands free, there is no reason why you can't open a door yourself and help conserve energy while you're at it, you lazy bones.
• Texting in class. Your head is down and you have no pen in your hand. Are you really so self-involved as to think that the professor can't tell? And are you really so self-centered as to think the professor has nothing better to do than have her lecture fall on deaf ears?
• Chatting near the toasters and coffee machines, especially during peak hours. We are here on a mission: to get breakfast and caffeine. I'm glad you're so chipper and ready to re-hash last night's drunken hedonism with your friend, but doing so in front of the bagel basket or the Splenda bowl greatly impedes everyone else's access to such necessary items. Why insist on crowding more bodies in an already congested area?
• Sub-complaint: buttering or cream-cheesing your toast while standing in front of the butter and cream cheese containers. Next time try this tactic called "glop some on your plate, then spread it on your bread once you have moved away from these highly desirable condiments" and marvel at how efficient you can be!
• Printing reading assignments on only one side of the page (particularly if you don't actually plan to read them). Have you seen the number of reams we go through every week? Just because a resource is (ostensibly) freely available does not mean that you are entitled to use it without regard for the cost (both economic and environmental) of its replenishment. 
• Sub-complaint: printing unnecessary pages from downloaded documents. Nope, you don't need a tangible version of the copyright page of that JSTOR article. Or that page with the final endnote (you weren't going to read the notes anyway, right?).
• Using two disposable coffee cups at once. Unless you're planning on saving that empty outer one to use at a later date, just suck it up and either use a (re-usable?!) mug-sleeve-thing or endure hot hands for the one minute it'll take you to walk to where you're going.
• Pausing at the end of enjambed lines when reading poetry aloud. No. Just no. Do you read posters that way? Didn't think so. Follow the punctuation. This is not a difficult concept. 

Given the number of times "(un)necessary" appears here, I think I might be a utilitarian. We cool, Jeremy Bentham, we cool.

Unnecessary Things That Annoy Me Unnecessarily

• Ugg boots
• Class rings
• Cardboard sleeves for hot beverages
• Pennies
• Leaf blowers
• Solid hand soap

A Snarky Explanation for My Lack of Holiday Cheer

This article explains a lot.

As a youngster, I used to cry when I received gifts I hadn't asked for because I felt so guilty that I was receiving an overabundance thereof when I knew that many kids weren't getting any at all. Now when that happens, though I know my mom is just being motherly when she can't resist buying physical objects instead of requested gift cards, I turn into a grumpy misanthrope who goes off on a feminist rant about the sexual coercion tactics of "Baby, It's Cold Outside" while my family tries to retain some Christmas morning cheer despite a noticeable lack of tree and snow. But more than some holier-than-thou refusal of presents that stems from an overwhelming generosity of heart (because goodness knows I rarely get off my lazy ass in service to others*), what it comes down to is that I'm not good at faking appreciation or accepting surprises, and I really would rather have something practical (like money, instant coffee, or, yes, even a novel) than yet another tchotchke.

I think this means that I officially prefer Thanksgiving—all the food and family, but without the materialism and acquisition-of-stuff-I-will-never-use-but-need-to-pretend-to-be-thrilled-with-anyway.

*I do always ask for donations to various charities, though, but none, to my knowledge, were filled this year—which is especially weird given that you'd think my parents would be more willing to contribute toward research that could find a cure for their daughter than giving her novelty toys... but maybe once I am myself a mother, this insistence on unwrapping bulky items instead of simply opening envelopes will be made clear.

A Taste of Gender Inequality

Well, it's 11pm and the boys just slipped out for the night—which means that we girls basically have to stay in. Rome so far has seemed pretty safe during the day, but once the sun goes down, the catcalls, whistles, and date rape drugs reveal themselves (or not so much "reveal" as "conceal [in drinks]" for that last one). We've been warned that going out even as pairs of females is unsafe, and I am certainly not going to ignore that advice. I have no desire to end up in a dark alleyway (of which there are many in this city meant for chariots instead of Chevrolets) with an intoxicated man, be he amorous American or romantic Roman. In a place and culture (and under a legal system) that are foreign to us, we women cannot forget that we don't have the independence or protection here that we might back home. Part of that protection is supposed to be provided by our compatriot males, but apparently we may be cramping their style in their weekend bar-crawls, so tonight they didn't even ask us if we'd like to escape the residence for a while, thus resigning me to yet another night of browsing the internet in my pajamas while eating Nutella with a spoon.

RANT RANT RANT

I am SO FUCKING BORED.

I am literally turning into a blob of nothingness.

When I'm not glued apathetically to my computer, I am sleeping, eating, or flopped on some lounge-y piece of furniture bemoaning this lame-ass summer.

Besides my stint at camp, I haven't seen a friend since mid-May.

My town has no sidewalks, or look-out points, or cute boys behind the counter at Panera.

I had better stop being dead before my plane leaves for Rome in nine days.

Dear Emma Watson,

Please stop being so bloody gorgeous, intelligent, and lucky. You're making the rest of us want to crawl under our beds and decompose into dust.

Case in point: this Vanity Fair article. Selected quote (my emphasis): "Then she started meeting people: a roommate who had no interest in Harry Potter (phew!), some really friendly rower guys, and eventually one Rafael Cebrián, who's a rock musician and actor in his native Spain and has reportedly become her boyfriend."

Sincerely,

Envious in Ohio

"Bad Poetry? Oh Noetry!"

 

 (Amazon Page)

Sadly, I look like that girl right about now (the original facepalm?). 

I am also experiencing deep internal conflict: do I suck it up and get off my high horse or do I bemoan the fact that the art of writing has, apparently, been taken over by Verbosity for Verbosity's Sake, Shock Factor, and Eighth-Graders Crying for Sympathy?

I sincerely wish I could do the former, but it's proving harder than I imagined it would.

Writers' Block Blah Blah Blah

Here is a set of problems:

1. I have lots of phrases stored in my brain for use in a poem, but can't find the ideas to tie them together.
2. I have lots of ideas stored in my brain for use in a poem, but can't find the phrases to convey them.

Here is a second, though subordinate, set of problems:

1. I can't seem to write anything by hand in a notebook without drawing meandering lines.
2. I can't seem to write anything by keyboard in a computer without hitchhiking through the internet.

Here is a third, even more subordinate set of problems:

1. I am rather good at thinking of titles for poems that don't exist.
2. I am rather bad at thinking of titles for poems that do exist.

Here is the most important and most frightening set of problems:

1. Obviously I am not invested body and soul in writing poetry.
2. Obviously I do not experience the world deeply enough to write poetry.

Here is the conclusion:

1. I am going to catch up on "30 Rock" instead.
2. And knit a beanie, because that I can do. Quickly. And without frustration. And with an end in sight.

More Like "Wept-ember"!*

The crisp beauty of September is always ruined by the swamp of work. Couldn't you once let us enjoy the fading days of summer so well complemented by the coloring of the leaves, o gods of higher education?

*This is a terrible title. I don't apologize.

Not a Barefoot Contessa

Okay, really?
Are you really going to change the television above our respective elliptical machines to the Food Network, of all channels?
Yes, you are?
Are you a sadomasochist? I feel like I'm running up Mount Everest in hundred-degree weather in a vain attempt to shave fat off my protruding stomach, and you're going to make me watch chocolate truffles being made?
This is too much.

You've driven me to buy a smoothie downstairs—and just before she finished the tiramisu!

That Punk Punxsutawney

Killing a groundhog isn't met with capital punishment... right?

What Enzymes Have Made Me Realize

When it comes to boys, I suffer from the effects of competitive inhibition.

What I need is an allosteric regulator to help induce a conformational change.

Too bad that infatuation usually follows the first law of thermodynamics.

A Complaint

The great irony of a teenage girl's life: no one will love you until you love yourself, but loving yourself is difficult until someone loves you.

Corollary: teenage girls are doomed to years of therapy.

Will People Ever Learn?

It's never just sex, and it's never only money.

You'd think the mistake would have been made enough times by now.

It's Past Time for the Nation's Pastime

One person can get $180 million over eight years just for throwing and catching baseballs while an astonishing number of American families are having to choose between meals and heat?

Dear US,
Please re-evaluate your priorities, stat.
Formerly fondly,
A Pissed-off Citizen

The Integral Derivative Post

I am good at baking cookies, being organized, smiling at children, writing thank-you notes.
I am not good, even the second time around, at calculus.

So if I am so obviously destined to be a domestic house-wife with flour on her cheeks and toddlers at her side, why the fuck did I allow my self to be submitted to such torture?

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

If we put a moratorium on tacky Christmas lights for five years, I bet we'd conserve enough energy to power actually useful stuff, like generators in New Orleans or water wells in Kenya.

C'mon, neighborhoods of the Midwest—forgo your blinking snowflake festoons. Save the planet and my eyes.

Consumer America

Black Friday crowds are terrifying.

Days like this make me lose all faith in the US—what material object could possibly be so important?

I Get My Back Into My Living

Fact: Radio DJs who talk in the middle of songs are hella annoying.

How am I supposed to perfect my air-drum entrance if some hot-shot named Dexter is promoting a sports bar meet-up or some such nonsense during the intro to "Baba O'Riley"?!