ani ruhama

I’m at the coffee house with my computer sitting in front of me, and since I’m not really doing anything useful besides ignoring the countless cute couples (ah, alliteration!) invading my peaceful hiding place, I suppose I have no excuse to avoid posting.  Week in review.  Sigh.

Posted on Monday about Ryan the Farm Boy.  Immediately, the hits on my blog tripled. I attribute the increase to all his stalker girls that are madly in love with him. I also had a very special visit (and comment) from his mom. I’m honored, he’s embarassed, and all is well in the world.

Worked Tuesday.  Worked Wednesday.  Worked Thursday.  Worked Friday.  Nothing worth noting in this paragraph.  Except that I could’ve said “noteworthy” instead of “worth noting” in the previous sentence, saving two characters including a space.  But instead, by commenting on it I’ve murdered multitudes more.  And alliterated astoundingly again.

Friday night, Rich treated us to a marvelous reading of The Christmas Carol.  Yes, the whole thing in one sitting, give or take a couple stretch/food breaks.  While I’ve certainly read and enjoyed Dickens before, his books were always a tad difficult to wade through.  But reading aloud gives it an entirely different and wonderful feel.  I’d start reading books aloud to myself, but unfortunately I suspect it wouldn’t have quite the same effect.

Saturday night, I opted for a different sort of entertainment, attending the second men’s basketball game of my college career.  And since I haven’t been to a women’s game, that keeps the grand total for basketball at two.  I’m rather not a sports fan, but Ian invited Diana and I–I mean, Diana and me.  Silly grammar.  So we decided it never hurts to show a little school spirit, and were right.  It didn’t (hurt).  Though it felt odd being there, almost as if I’d returned to high school…probably because that was the last time I had any real school spirit when it comes to sports.  Anyhow, we won.  I guess that’s good.

And then, Sunday.  Sunday was church. Church…is church.  Church is good.  No blog posts forthcoming though, just thoughts mulling.  Like apple cider.  Mmm…I want some apple cider.

And then I worked yesterday.  And worked again today.  Work seems to be a common occurence when you pretend you’re grown up, I’ve concluded. And then work finished, and that brings us back to tonight, me sitting in the coffee house typing this blog post because I don’t have anything better to do except alliterate the couples or whatever it was I was doing.

Microsoft’s latest attempts at convincing propaganda, achieving hilarity instead.  Just think of all the time they spent on this that could’ve been devoted to Vista SP1.

Ryan and Cassie visited me on Saturday. This post is dedicated to them. More accurately, it’s dedicated to the Laugh-At-Ryan-Every-Day fan club. I’m just dong my part by sharing his adventures with the world via my camera phone and blog, as I promised him I would. Wouldn’t want to disappoint now, would I?

You see, my basement apartment resides on an almost-farm. Besides the hundred and one dogs my landlords breed, they also have goats, chickens, guineas, and a couple cows. Enter Ryan the city slicker to the scene…

Not only had Ryan never held a puppy, he’d never even touched one: “The only puppies I’ve seen are the ones at the mall in the little cages.” Well, we fixed that problem. Cassie and I oohed and aahed over how cute they all were, while Ryan just sat confused and entranced by the experience. He would’ve stolen one if we let him, but we wrestled him away just in time.

Next, Ryan asked if he could pet the sheep. He seemed disappointed when he learned that those furry things with legs in the field were goats, not sheep. Life lessons learned during this time include the fact that goats aren’t as soft as they look and that when they step on your cool and clean shoes and jeans they become ugly and muddy shoes and jeans.

He thought the sheep-goats would kill him. Unfortunately, he was wrong.

After a narrow escape from those vicious goat-sheep, it was time to meet the equally vicious cow. I never knew one could pet a cow from 15 feet away, but Ryan demonstrated otherwise.

Finally, he met the chickens and guineas. My landlord showed Ryan the freshly-laid eggs. First he asked if they were real. Then he asked if you could eat them. It took him a while to make the connection between those and the little round white things in egg cartons he buys at Wal-Mart.

Much muddier, smellier, and better-educated in the ways of the farm, Ryan went home. I suspect he’s getting a puppy the day he moves out of the dorm. Sooner if he can bribe his RA.

I haven’t posted in two and a half weeks. Haven’t actually said anything about my life since mid-December when I graduated. Sigh.

The last month in review:

Dec 15: I move into my absolutely beautiful 1020 square foot apartment with hardwood floors and fireplace. How much is my rent? Probably not enough.

Dec 18: I start fulltime at the Help Desk as a technician. Having been there since my freshman year as a student worker, it doesn’t feel like a huge transition. Excitement: I’m getting a MacBook Pro as part of the job. I just have to wait for my boss Bert to finish migrating from it to his new machine…

Dec 24: I fly to Texas for Christmas. My dad found a $200 round trip ticket, so I don’t have to drive 15 hours each way. Happiness.

Dec 31: I feel mildly antisocial and avoid going to the New Years party until 11 pm. End up enjoying myself in the end.

Jan 1: I fly back to Kentucky. I contemplate writing a philosophical blog post about why I don’t like New Year’s resolutions. I don’t write it, but perhaps I’ll get around to it if anyone cares. You probably don’t.

Jan 8: Scott, the other technician, is at MacWorld. I’m at work. Jealousy. This is the week before classes start, so I have to get the labs up and running. Things break a lot. Stress ensues. Bert still has the MacBook.

Jan 9: Scott is drooling over the iPhone in California. I’m still at work in Kentucky. More jealousy. More broken things. More stress. Bert still has the MacBook.

Jan 15: Scott’s back, and all is right in the world. It’s MLK Day, but we work all day anyhow–it’s overtime, so life is good. Get the labs finished by some miracle. Bert still has the MacBook.

Jan 16: Classes start. No major crises. Bert still has the MacBook.

Jan 18: Long day, compounded by the fact that Bert’s finished with the MacBook, but is wiping the drive 7 times, and OS X can’t seem to figure out how long it’ll take. In the morning, it claims there’s three hours left. Three hours later, there are still three hours left. Torture. I ignore its existence and attempt to fix more broken things, why don’t the broken things stop breaking….? I can’t speak English by 5:00, which wouldn’t be a problem if it wasn’t my native tongue and the only one I can communicate it. I also am entirely unobservant of the fact that Bert’s placed the MacBook in the box on my desk. Scott and Bert laugh at me. I notice. Happiness. (Thank you, Bert.)

Jan 19: I didn’t sleep much last night. I also forgot to eat dinner, so my stomach’s being noisy. I was mildly distracted during both periods of time by my new MacBook Pro. I remember to eat dinner tonight, but only because I have leftovers in the fridge calling out my name.

Jan 20: I sleep till 2:00 pm…wonderful. Ryan and Cassie pay me a halfway-surprise visit. Ryan the city boy has quite an adventure with the dogs, cows, goats, chickens, and guineas. Another blog post will likely ensue in short time about those events.

And I believe that brings us up to the present moment. I’ve been much too lax with myself–I’ll try to remind you I’m alive more often. Maybe. And now I’m off to eat, lest I forget again.

Just to respond to a few comments I’ve received from multiple individuals: Yes, I know I need to update. Yes, I know my last post is not AA and I should at least bump it from the top spot. Yes, I know Matsu tagged me. Sorry, I’ve been busy, on vacation, busy, sick, and/or busy at any given moment in time. But I shall fix all of that…effective immediately.

While I ponder on more thoughtful thoughts, which may or may not be blogged about at an indeterminate point in time, I’ll play along and at least attempt to think of those five vaguely interesting things you don’t know about me. And if you do know them, hush, you’re obviously not the “you” to which I referred in the last sentence.

1. I skipped kindergarten.

2. I’ve eaten two live earthworms and a rather large goldfish. Why? Uh…I’m rather competitive. And I got points.

3. My senior year of high school I was in a speech competition. I maintained that our world’s sad current state of affairs is due in large part to our replacing God with a hundred other gods. My coach told me early on that it was too controversial, would likely offend the judges, and I needed to tone it down to have any chance. I won gold. I never got around to telling him I didn’t change a word.

4. I read Quo Vadis and Les Misérables before age 12.

5. Phillip still has my hat from Downtown Christmas.  Christmas 2005. See below conversation for a not-very-helpful-explanation as to why I think that counts as an interesting fact about myself:

laura: hey. give me a fifth interesting thing about myself, or i’m never going to be able to respond to matsu’s tag
phillip: lol
phillip: i dunno
laura: I know: “Phillip still has my hat from LAST downtown Christmas”
phillip: HAHA
phillip: thats what i was gonna say

I guess I have to tag people now. Phillip…Diana…Alicia…James…Ryan…Ben. To the best of my knowledge, none of you have been tagged, so have fun.