i've finished brave new world--i think that makes my fourth time reading it, at least, since my freshman year of high school--and i have to admit i'm not sure i'd still call it my favorite novel. it's up there, though.

i hate playing favorites, but it happens.

starting huxley's much later counterpart to the dystopic bnw, the utopic island. i started reading it once a few years ago, but had to put it away due to mounting library late fees and course-related reading material taking precedence. goodwill had a copy on their disorganized, smelly bookshelves last weekend. much of my book collection is owed to $1 or cheaper books from thrift stores. i have found an impressive number of classics and books i want to read while browsing obsessively. my goal in life is to actually -read- all the books i buy before i die, which, if the spark is to be believed, is sometime around the middle of the century. i think i've got a few good thrifting years left before i ought to get cracking.

in completely unrelated news, i'm bored. well, that's a given, since it's 11pm on a saturday night and i'm blogging. oh, and i got my first tax refund check in the mail today. it came complete with the watermark which i saw when i held the check up to my soft-lit bedside lamp and a spammy order card for collector's coins from the u.s. mint. limited time offer! act now!!!

listening: aimee mann - it takes all kinds

songs from the movie i have yet to make:

• "don't die just yet," david holmes.
  
• "cross bones style," cat power. you have seen some unbelievable things, etc.; lovely sad rhythm. night driving scene, probably bringing home groceries in the midst of a quiet family crisis.
  
• "title track," death cab for cutie.
  
• "my guitar wants to kill your mama," frank zappa.
  
• "sunday afternoon," the kinks. for a rainy winter walk.
  
• "nothing matters when we're dancing," the magnetic fields. a goddamned sweet happy moment, god fucking dammit. it's either this or "how fucking romantic," and i don't think you want my movie to be -that- depressing.
  
• "lost in the supermarket," the clash. um. i just like this song. it's neat.
  

those are the only ones of which i'm certain. if you haven't heard them...i urge you to find them! you can even ask me for them. i heart the internet and mp3s. sshhh.

oh, note that these are not my favorite songs ever or the soundtrack to my life. they are the soundtrack to my undeveloped film. big difference, i hope.

listening: ben folds five - selfless, cold, and composed

oh man! aja is going to come to california, too! and we're all gonna go see ben folds! and watch harold and maude! what better four day vacation could i ever dream?! i am so excited!!@# yay! *trips on self after dropping excess punctuation*

stuck in my head: built to spill - randy described eternity

yay! i have something to look forward to now! i'm gonna go to the bay area for a few days over my spring break. i get to hang out with sammy and kevin, see ben folds in san francisco, go to the beach, and experiment with vegan cooking. i'm all excited.

trying something new for me, but old and cheesy for most other people...
Friday Five

1. Hey, baby, what's your sign? Do you think it fits you pretty well? sagittarius, with moon in cancer and leo ascendant. i learned all this years ago, when i was, for some reason, really interested in astrology as a personality predictor, though it never more than *vaguely* matched my own perception of my personality. it seems to work for a lot of people, though. and i am brutally honest, as sags ought to be.

2. What's the worst birthday gift you've ever received? severed (the already feeble) friendship with my ex to the point of no longer being on speaking terms. age 20.

3. What's the best birthday gift you've ever received? everything i asked for from my mom: inner peace, world peace, happines... ah, a bunch of similar things that were half-joking with related items... and a portable cd player. age 17.

4. What's the best way you've celebrated your birthday thus far? the past few years, sans age 19, have been pretty fun, actually. parties with friends and the like. my 18th birthday involved a lot of pizza, crazy friends, the princess bride, and throwing m&ms, so i think that wins.

5. What are your plans for this weekend? work, homework, and trying to find a reason to leave the house and not be bored shitless. trying to decide between saving money to buy concert tickets and a plane ticket to san jose or blowing it on pretty, pretty music. laundry.

listening: bjork - there's more to life than this

in social psychology, there is the idea that, instead of taking the typical scientific observer's view, we should take the actor's perspective. among the many benefits of this is the ability to better understand the influence of situational factors over the assumption of interior dispositions or traits. turning that around, in some ways, there is a question i've never been able to answer: in the story of your life, who would play you?

who would play *you*? why? (please use comment feature! i love comments. it's like a guestbook, which i have never, ever had on any of my pages,* but without the horrible geocities/aoler stigma. yeeeeeeah.)

* becky and i had something we *called* a guestbook on a.o. for awhile, but it wasn't really. we didn't post the results anywhere. it was more of a directed email to us. it evolved into more of a questionnaire/poll with questions that pleased us for their amusing qualities.

i often envision the people i know in films/novels, not necessarily more than their personalities and part of their stories, but i never picture them as played by actors i've seen in other films. they're just characters, and it's hard for me to match character roles and known actors before the fact.

on a complete and utter side note, turntablism is incredibly sexy. i love guitars and rock and roll, but vinyl and its manipulation for musical beauty is so lovely. ...so i have a bit of a sexual thing with music... can you really fault me?

what songs are in the soundtrack for your movie?

if people care, i might post some of mine.

this is one.

listening: david holmes - don't die just yet

the words i thought just moments ago are still there somewhere, i'm sure... or have all washed away with the rain... i always think these things that i want to write, and come home, all ready to go, and the sudden change of pace apparently translates to a lack of inspiration and the words disappear. if only we could record brain waves and thoughts as words... ah, but surely the technology would be used to evil and not good. god bless paranoia and centralized governments.

speaking of which, must study. american politics test upcoming in a matter of hours.

listening: bjork - joga

sometimes all the beauty in the world hits me at once, most of it beyond my perception, and manifest itself in a little nose twitch. perhaps this an explanation for my allergies, and by taking medication for it--a nasal spray, in fact--i'm blocking my beauty receptors.

or not, really.

listening: jeff buckley - grace

it's 9:45am, and cibo matto's "moonchild" is driving me absolutely BATTY. it sounds so much like the stuff i listened to in middle school for some reason, and i've had it stuck in my head ALL MORNING. aggggggh! you might THINK that music from middle school would be a guilty pleasure that i would be extremely pleased to have found a credible alternative in cibo matto, but NO, it's driving me BATTY. thank you.

i like the rest of the album, but that one song. is. making. me. crazy.

it's possible that i should be working this morning/afternoon, either on test preparation for poli sci tomorrow (speaking of which, must remember to pick up a green book) or covering for a coworker. i offered to cover part of the time she needed covered and didn't hear back from her. soo..i dunno. if she calls, i'll go in, otherwise, i'm staying the fuck home.

the weather is finally gray and rainy. AS IT SHOULD BE, since this is WINTER in the fucking northwest. hi, we have rain, i swear! no, pay no attention to the blue sky behind those puffy white clouds!

i am typing with a lot of all-caps-for-emphasis this morning. maybe i have some hostility issues.

ok, actually. i'm feeling like a dork. this quote, added to the harem blog last night, unbeknownst to me, did not make me laugh. no, actually, i was kind of afraid people would be offended. because it's kind of...offensive. i have...issues with race jokes. i dunno. too many years of sensitivity conditioning, i guess, make me feel bad for being white and guilty about facilitating any sort of humor that derides non-white people. ok, hell, derides general groups of people when they're not really self-chosen groups. for example, making fun of raver kiddies is fair game; making fun of people from iraq is not. my philosophy is not sound, and i know it probably has its decidedly hypocritical points, but... this quote... made me sad. i'm not going to censor it, but it makes me uncomfortable. and i don't like that, for a number of reasons. anyway.

listening: beach boys - god only knows

when someone asks me a question about locations of books, i speak very slowly--think nicole kidman, dancing with the stranger at the party in eyes wide shut, only not dancing and not drunk--because i somehow think i should know the answer, but it does not immediately come to me. the thing is, i *don't* know the answer, and the correct response is, "check with the librarians downstairs." however, this response takes me approximately three times as long as necessary to spew forth, because i think i should know the answer. how stupid is that?

today is 20/02 2002, if you date things european-style. that's cute. i was writing the date at the top of a page of notes in my poli sci notebook, and it must have looked weird. i felt like a deranged numerologist.

i'm rereading brave new world right now. it's interesting, because i haven't read it in over a year, and with all my brand-spankin' new edjumacashun, it's...different. i look at it in terms of psychology, historial contexts, the 'politically correct' ponderings about references to people of color and such. the psychology is especially fascinating, though. they talk about behaviorism (if you're familiar with b.f. skinner and training chickens to play piano), which is quite possibly my *least* favorite explanation for human behavior, but in here, it's accepted as fact. it's a simple explanation, yeah, but it leaves a lot of stuff out. there is also hypnopaedia or subliminal messages during sleep, which are something i've always found curious, because i don't think there is a lot of evidence that it works... subliminal messages, yes; during sleep, maybe not? at the same time, it has a lot of deep explanations of why their society is the way it is, and unpologetically so; what sense of impending doom existed in the late 1920s/early 30s england for huxley to play on that fear? the effects of the industrial revolution (denoted, of course, by the references to Ford and the way everyone works on a societal assembly line of sorts?)...? i don't know enough history to have a great idea.

anyway, i'm just babbling. if i had bothered to become a lit major, i might have expanded this into some sort of senior thesis about dystopic novels or something... ah, dystopic novels. how i love thee. does that make me weird?

who am i kidding? i was BORN weird. hehe. but if i was born this way, does this make all my weirdness less of an accomplishment? hrmm.

enough with the ponderings, back to the readings.

clouds this morning look perfectly painted, as if by bob ross, set against the blue sky. everything else in the picture is less bob ross, but the clouds hover over the frame...

soon is the time in which i must choose classes for next quarter. this february is winter, looks like summer, feels like fall... so, naturally, spring is coming.

i'm still congested and somewhat fatigued, so i need to skip karate again. bleh. i feel ok enough to do everything BUT the kind of stuff karate makes me do--that is, more intense physical exercise than i do by just walking around campus or grocery shopping. having a coughing fit in the middle of taikyoku shodan is a bad idea. i told my boss today at work that i had a cold, and he got a little twitchy, asking if i was contagious. "umm.. i infected a couple of my roommates over the weekend, but i think i'm better enough now." i didn't sniffle much all during work, though. had a cough drop at one point for pure amusement value from the effects of breathing in menthol. ricola is so yummy.

last night, i went to bed before 10 and slept straight through until 7am. it was BEAUTIFUL. i was also mildly drugged with some contac. after i woke up, i copied the active ingredients into #n00n at sammy's request, to which he replied, "i love it when girls talk chemistry." actually, i think it was dirtier than that, but scroll doesn't go back that far. contac is basically a combination of several cold and flu medications, targeting the major symptoms, in tablet form. it has not the notoreity or icky aftertaste of nyquil, but astonishingly similar effects. i felt so much better! i think, anyway. sometimes it's hard to tell.

people have told me twice in the last 24 hours that i was being too "perky" to be sick. i think i was being sarcastic and they failed to notice that. i am probably normally too "perky" to exist on the low caffeine dosage that i do, but no one comments on that. but you get sick and have a gravelly voice, and all of a sudden you're "perky." i don't understand, but i am amused.

i like cheese.

this entry is lame. i'm having a hard time being interesting lately; i've just been busy, i guess.

today i ran into an old friend, jen the cute one. i love jen, she's so cute. sometimes i'm afraid that my hearing is going, which makes it extra hard to hear her, because she speaks so quietly. not shyly, mind you; she just has a small voice. it's very odd. i said something that i always say to her: "we should do...something! sometime!" and she said, "email me!" as we parted, i told her i "actually [would] this time!" maybe i should get on that. i never know what to do or say. first there is the other person to consider--what would they like to do? i guess there's always going to lunch or dinner or something of that nature. that's what normal people do, isn't it? i always go by myself, tag along with people, or convince people who are readily available to go with me. i've had bad luck in the past coordinating efforts between those who are not immediately in my presence. hell, coordinating those who are is a bitch. there must always be some purpose to going out, something to talk about besides our boring lives, even if they're not boring in the slightest, because conversations just drag and i fear that. i spend my life talking, and i'm always on the verge of running out of words.

listening: pj harvey - kamikaze

written 16.2.2002 in a cabin in the olympic national park

the room is warm. i am surprised, in my zombie state, as i imagined death to be colder: mitochondria stop producing energy, not go into overdrive, right? i wonder how they'll react to my dead body in the morning, when i've finally gotten enough rest. these visions plague me in my dreams, i guess; is it any wonder i'm exhausted? i only wish to assure everyone: if i go quietly, in my sleep, at rest, my ghost won't haunt you in a bad way. wish i could be more reassuring and verbose, but i -am- a zombie. we are the creatures of the night of few words.

to dream of death in the woods where one cannot see another residence, lot alone people, is almost cliche, but something about it begs to be dreampt.

anna goes to bathe, nude, in the bathtub outside, heated by a fire she's spent hours tending, scurrying in the cold february night, draped in a towel and carrying a jar candle. i don't want to bathe, but getting naked sounds good... communal, friendly, awkwardly comfortable.

there are silences in this house that invade me. my eyes well up and fill the sensory void with displays of light and shadow, easy to see. candlelight blurs with christmas light and plays with every piece of eclectic furniture in the room.

after inhaling smoke all day, my chest feels heavy. i'm not sure if my increased cold symptoms--NOW WITH NASAL CONGESTION!!--are a byproduct of that, or the virus's natural progression.

i've not the concentration to do anything i ought to do at present, so i'll make due with an arm cramp and a breathing problem.

i need a vacation. this was supposed to suffice, but it's not working that way. i still can't sleep well, and it's too small to be truly comfortable for me. i'm needy about personal space. there is an insane amount of snackables here, and i have a tendency to eat compulsively given ample opportunity, which is terrible. it is beautiful, but i'm too zombified to pay good attention...

a weekend away from it has has done nothing to cure me of this random, stupid cough/cold/infection. maybe i will wake up tomorrow and it will be magically gone, but it actually maybe feels worse, so i'm not betting on that. i also infected two of my roommates! that's what you get for encouraging Sick Girl to join you in a small, cold cabin for two days.

the weekend was, however, very lovely. there was a lot of beauty to behold in the national park and surrounding areas, as well as pleasant conversation to be had among the harem members. we passed around a book that josie's friend had at the cabin about zodiacal sun and moon signs. for some of us, these descriptions were dead freaking on (i.e., anna); for others, they were a passing amusement, but of little apparent merit, despite our rabid interest in them (reid and i). we ate a LOT of junk food. oh man. i have not allowed myself to do that in so long. it's terrible, because when it's available to me and i allow myself to have some, it doesn't stop. even if i'm not hungry, it sounds amazingly delicious and i just want more. and that's bad. really really bad. so i'll have five peanut butter cups and a couple chips ahoy! with cream cheese frosting on them (which i highly recommend, by the way, for the palate, but not the rest of your body) instead of tasting one and munching on carrots for an hour to contain myself. i will still eat the carrots, though.

at my parents' house, my brother played me a piece he's been working on by a 21st century composer whose name i can't recall, but the piece is crazy, and paul plays it well. well, as far as i can tell. he said part of the notation instructs him to "improvise," which he does nicely. my sister is attempting to secure a job within walking distance of their house. she believes she has a strong lead on getting a job at schlotsky's deli or the sizzler. she thought about applying to the fashion bug, but i told her i would have to call her jean teasdale if she got a job there. my parents are having work done on the area outside their bedroom--they just had french doors installed to the backyard so there would be easier access to their new hot tub. i sat in the hot tub this afternoon, since i hadn't tried it yet, and my mom was more than eager to show it to me. we also hit up goodwill, where i picked up a couple books... their record selection was shit this week, though; almost entirely christmas lps. yech. ah well, win some, lose some, whatever.

i had NO MUSIC from halfway between olympia and the cabin (josie's cd player died) until this morning. i nearly cried last night when the computer's cd player was not working with me last night and i just wanted to play friggin' red stars theory ...and sleep came slowly while i went to bed on the couch in my parents' living room at 11pm. i figured the stereo in the next room would be too loud to play, and i could attach headphones to the computer, BUT NO. ghahhkjklj. i don't understand, but it is ok now because i have my computer with my noise and all is right in the universe.

except this fricking cold. bleh.

listening: jeff buckley - hallelujah