These fires are more serious than I thought....

Classes at all SD schools are canceled for the week, so I'm heading back up to Monrovia for a bit.

My thoughts go out to all the people who've been evacuated from their homes.

Smoke in the air

I'm in San Diego! I've been here for a whole 24 hours! And things are kind of exciting. Although not in the way I imagined. There have been huge fires in the area, fires so bad that they cancelled my first day of class 2 hours early, and also cancelled all classes tomorrow at SDSU. I guess the city of San Diego itself isn't threatened, but the people of Chula Vista have "recommended evacuation," and most beaches along the Orange County coast have mandatory evacuation.

The woman I'm renting my room from asked me today if it's alright for two of her friends to stay at her house for a while. They've been evacuated from their own house and don't really have anywhere to stay yet. I hope they can move home again soon, and not because I like my privacy!

Hey, did you guys know that Bittersweet Symphony, made famous by The Verve, was written originally by the Rolling Stones? And that The Verve had to surrender 100% of the royalties to the Stones' copwriters, ABCKO?

So that famous song gave them fame, but much less fortune than one might assume. Crazy.

The highlight of my day

Yes, my day had reached its zenith when this evening I turned onto Foothill Boulevard behind a white truck whose license plate read, and I quote:

"WAHAPEN"

I am sure some of my readers are familiar with the genius of Christopher Guest, including perhaps my favorite film of his, A Mighty Wind. This quote from the film still elicits laughter from everyone in my family, and it will for many years to come.

Coincidence that I was behind that truck? You decide.

Debbie Harry, you slay me

I have a new love for Blondie, after discovering and burning this CD left behind by Leah.

Unadulterated charisma

I really, really want to be Jamie Hyneman for Halloween. I've only watched Mythbusters once, but there's something about that jaunty black beret and walrus mustache that just begs to be duplicated. I think I'm the one for the task.

Everyone said it was bad. My sister. Hannah. The LA Times. But I still had to see it: Across the Universe. It's the Beatles, right? So it can't be all bad...?

It wasn't ALL bad. I liked Joe Cocker's version of "Come Together," the "I Want You" scenes, and, uh...I think that was it. Even Evan Rachel Wood couldn't save this one.

A room with a view

I have finally found housing for my three weeks at SDSU! I'm going to be renting a room a mile and a half (the proximity is so thrilling to me, you don't even know) from campus. Hooray! That means I can bike to class every day, and not have to stress about parking. AND I get my own bathroom.

I'm renting the room from a woman in her mid thirties, which, I have to admit, could be a little boring now and then, but hey...better quiet than crazy, I suppose. I'll be working on a teaching certificate, after all. Now if only she had a pet. :(

I've been practicing my biking around Monrovia. Not that I really need to, after four years living in Davis.

Three weeks til I move in. Aufregend!

Note: Sorry to those whom I've left out of the loop (Hannah!), I've been pretty lazy about updating this. Starting in a few weeks, I'm taking a one-month course at SDSU that trains people to teach English abroad. After the program ends, they are supposed to help us find actual teaching positions abroad. I'm really looking forward to it.

And Meredith, I do live off of Montezuma! If you take El Cajon, I believe you can reach the place I'm staying. I just might hit you up for restaurant recommendations and the like. Thanks!

I think I'm in love

This girl made a meerkat doll. I don't remember the last time I saw an inanimate object this cute.

As I re-submerge myself in film

Every time I come back to L.A., I get sucked into the Calendar section of the LA Times. And I mean I basically read every article in it. And I live for the Friday issue, because then I can read ALL the movie reviews. I have too much free time. But I suppose we all know this by now.

On a somewhat related note....

On Sunday my mom and I drove out to Venice to visit my grandma and take her out to a movie. We pre-select a couple "safe" films we think she'd like to see, such as The Jane Austen Book Club, or possibly Blame it on Fidel. But what does she want to see? None of these romantic, cute films--of course not! No, she wants to see Into the Wild. Because she saw an interview with Sean Penn and Emile Hirsch on Oprah. And their story is very compelling.

I actually wanted to see the film as well--I just was a little surprised to hear that it was my grandma's first choice. And I wasn't sure if I was prepared to be bawling during the final scenes. Nevertheless, we did go to see all 2 hours and 40 minutes of the film at the Landmark.

And it was really good! (Do I ever post about bad movies on this blog? Except for Ghost? Never.) The ending wasn't nearly as heart-wrenching and depressing as I expected, and I really felt like the time went by fast. So the point of all this rambling is, go see this movie. If you are a little interested in nature, or the way human relationships affect our lives, or just to watch a really interesting true story, I recommend it.

Oh, I've also had a crush on Emile Hirsch since I saw him in Dangerous Lives of Altar Boys. So I'm sliiightly biased. But not much.

Things is happening!

I really shouldn't use bad grammar--I need to start perfecting my sentence structure in the future, since I'm gonna (going!) to be helping my mum as an ESL assistant.

Actually, I've already been in the classroom! I've come in about three times, and today I had to teach (gasp!!) the class for two hours, while my mom took out groups for testing. I had to teach the sound "ch" as well as the idioms "at last," "as usual," and "to find out." It basically went OK--I think the students are afraid to ask me questions, since I'm not their regular teacher, and I think they also got a little bored, since I'm not nearly as talkative and mobile as my mom.

So far, my tactic seems to be to just kind of stand at the front of the class and wait for someone to ask me a question. Not the best tactic. But I think it'll become more natural to walk around and keep talking as I get more experience. And I have to teach again on Thursday!

Living at home. Amazingly, I'm not sick of my parents yet, which is wonderful. I even attempted a yoga class tonight with my mom, which wasn't too bad. I always feel a little guilty because I'm not such a fan of yoga (My mom's been doing it for over 20 years, but it sucks when you're impatient and not flexible!), but I decided I should give it another try, since the health benefits seem to be worth it. And every now and then it can be relaxing.

I've also gotten re-obsessed with movie reviews, as anyone who's seen me in the last few weeks may have noticed. Generally, I base all my movie choices on reviews (the ones in the newspaper, usually not friends' reviews, which I suppose can be insulting :/ ). I guess it's my somewhat subconscious attempt at being literary and discerning. Who knows. Does anyone want to see Across the Universe, Blame it on Fidel, or The King of California with me?

Oh yeah, I also need to stop spending so much money.

Alright, I think that's it for now! Anyone who reads this (I'm not sure if anyone actually does anymore), let me know if you're in Monrovia! I'll be here until the end of October.

Before I go

I'm all moved out of my room in our house on Pine Lane in Davis. I still have a couple of boxes of clothes in the living room, but that's it.

I'm leaving on a road trip to the Grand Canyon tomorrow with my good friends Liz and Kaylan, in which we will be roughing it like a trio of hooligans (or hopefully something resembling hooligans) while we hike down into the Canyon to camp for a couple days.

Then we will return to Davis in about a week, and then I will drive back to Monrovia a couple days after that. Because I have an appointment with the oral surgeon. Why else?

I plan to stay in Monrovia for most of September, followed by a move down to San Diego at the end of October so that I can take a training course for teaching English abroad.

Lately my emotions have been welling up inside without actually breaking through, but I think it's safe to assume that by the time I'm back in M-Town I'll have had a good cry. But I'm pretty sure that's healthy.

I'm happy for you

You've made it hard for me
I counted on your company
You are staying with your friends tonight
I'm feeling sorry for myself
I keep taking everything to be a sign

I'd rather be in Tokyo
I'd rather listen to Thin Lizzy-oh
And watch the Sunday gang in Harajuku
There's something wrong with me, I'm a cuckoo

Apparently living in D.C. for spring quarter made me tanorexic...photos may appear soon.

When all else fails, discuss Harry Potter

Either Harry Potter or the Spice Girls reunion tour. I'm learning that these are excellent conversation starters when talking to people you don't know very well.

Lately I've been hanging out with my roommate Kaylan's work buddies, (all Starbucks minions), and it has been quite entertaining. I already hear enough about all the crazy customers they get from Kaylan, so I feel like I can join in practically any conversation.

Also, while hanging out at Sudwerks last night, I got to meet some new Germans (YES! FRESH GERMANS IN DAVIS!). And not only were they German, they were actually cool to boot! (This was indeed a rare find.) I probably lost of coolness points because I spent a good part of the conversation explaining to them how great the Harry Potter books are.
Unfortunately, it turns out that they are all leaving Davis in a week. My only hope is to Facebook them and then try to track them down when I visit Germany again, whenever that might be--hopefully within the next couple of years.

In other news--I'm home again (Monrovia) for the weekend. WOO hoo! It's always nice to be home for a while, as long as my stay doesn't last longer than about a week at a time.

The animals are TAKING OVER! We live in the foothills (ie at the bottom of small mountains), and because of the drought, all the wild animals have been leaving their forest homes and taking over the suburban areas. My mom told me that a bear broke up an 8-year-old's birthday party last week! Skunks are EVERYWHERE (they keep getting hit by cars, too, which is sad and makes the area smell horrible), and my sister ran into THREE rattlesnakes last week on the hiking trail. I just don't know what to do. This could be more serious than anything in the Middle East.

OK, that's all I got for now. I need to become more literate and learn vocabulary for the GRE. No magazines for me! I'm trying to read Herzog, by Saul Bellow. Has anyone heard of it? I saw it on a "Books Everyone Should Read" list somewhere. The plots really slow so far, but I'm only on page 41.

Apparently I am a Type 3

Has anyone heard of enneagrams? They're these psychological tests that put your personality in a number category, ranging from 1 to, uh, 8 I think. Leah took a psychology class and already knows that she's a four, the "individualist." Like the French intellectual Proust, apparently. And the closest category that fits me is a three, the "achiever," the category also taken by Irving Berlin. It's all rather strange.

But one does things like personality tests when one has entirely TOO MUCH free time on one's hands. Not that I'm complaining. It has been wonderful relaxing the last few weeks. I'm in SoCal for the week, awaiting news on the healing of my gum grafting on Friday. So much fun!

But for now, Happy fourth!
I'm going to Six Flags tomorrow! It's going to be DEATHLY HOT. But I will try to survive.

Mir ist langweilig

And here I am, back in Davis!
I'm back in my Davis house, with the six roomies I love (well, minus Liz unfortuantely since she's at band camp, but now I get to sleep in her bed!), and I'm in Davis for possibly the last time in a while! Although I actually kind of doubt that, since three of my friends haven't even graduated yet, and I really hope to visit them soon.

The weather is HOTTT here! It was 104 yesterday apparently. I forget how drastically different the two coasts are. Just last week I was pouring off sweat and getting frizzy hair at 1am while walking around the monuments, and here I am pouring off smaller amounts of sweat, but still sweating in a dry heat. Yikes. So far, Monrovia wins for best summer weather.

So we woke up today (me, Jessica and Alicia), and our TV was missing. We hadn't locked the door last night, so were a little panicked at first. However, it was kind of weird because the Playstation was still there, and the antenna for the TV had been carefully unplugged. What kind of criminals do that? Alicia went to the next door neighbors' house, the six boys who like to come over and visit randomly when drunk, and whaddya know? It was in their garage. Funny, funny.

So this is becoming a very boring post. But I felt like I should update. I guess I'm not that good at reflecting with deep thoughts at 10 am. And I'm definitely already in summer mode.

Na ja, that's all for now. I'm going to the POOL later! An OUTDOOR pool! (Something that apparently has not yet been invented in the East). Can't wait!!

Unique New York

The last few weeks have been filled with paper writing (bilingual education and two-way immersion--ask me about it sometime! On second thought, don't), presentations (more bilingual education, Cherry Trees of Washington D.C.!), making cookies, making birthday cakes, and not least of all, traveling to NEW YORK CITY for the first time over Memorial Day weekend.

I loved New York. I want to live there. Does anyone want to move there with me? There's just SO MUCH to do and see, and the people are cool (we didn't meet anyone mean in our extensive 3-day visit), the style is funky, the atmosphere is edgy, the vibe is marvelous. OK, I don't really know what that last sentence means.

But I did have a marvelous time on our speed-racer tour of the city; we saw the Statue of Liberty, Brooklyn Bridge, SoHo, Greenwich Village, Wallstreet, Central Park...you name it, I saw it. I also got to see Liev Schreiber in the thought-provoking Broadway play Talk Radio, and afterwards I talked with him and got his autograph!! And, as all fans say about whatever celebrity they love, he was really nice! I was a bit starstruck. Then I met two women from Jersey who joined me in analyzing all the possible interpretations of the play.

Also took a whirlwind tour of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (yeah, I actually only saw two full exhibits, both of 19th century paintings, which is pretty cool anyway), and the MOMA.

All my pics are on Facebook, should you wish to see some visuals!

And so, my weeks in D.C. are rapidly drawing to a close. The final research paper is due next Monday, followed by five days to soak up the culture in D.C., and then we all fly home on June 9th! And then I graduate.

Books: better than friends?

After months of trying to check out the book Children of Men at the library, I finally gave up and just bought it. Apparently all copies are always checked out because of that movie. That same movie I was semi-obsessed with because I found it so enthralling and thought provoking. Those of you who heard me rave about it can attest to this.

Let me tell you kids, the book is just as, if not more, intense. Sometiems I find myself grimacing while I read it. And the plot's more interesting and more believable as well. If anyone wants to borrow it, or just have it after I finish it, let me know! I want to spread the good-bookness around. I bought it on powells.com for $6, including shipping! Thus the willingness to give it away.

I wish I were talking to a pretty boy

...rather than sitting on a hot oven.

Could time pass any slower than it does at work?

And yes, I'm at work now. The fact that I can blog here should tell us all something.

Real post coming soon!