Where the Rain Gets In

2007-08-18T10:53:00.001-04:00

ch-ch-change...

2007-03-21T01:20:00.000-04:00

find nakiru here.
feel disoriented?
as well you should...but wordpress has some very good options, and it doesn't think that i am a spam blog. besides, no hardship to remember the new address...practically the same!

this is your favorite marine animal on steroids....

2006-11-24T10:59:00.000-05:00

seriously. so prednisone and i...an interesting mix if ever there was one. i went to bed last night around 11, fell asleep around 12, woke up a couple of times and then at 6:30 i woke up and was wide awake. read a little of this book. it's interesting. the emergent church is kind of a dangerous idea if not approached with caution. God's truth cannot have changed over the years just because our worldviews have...Truth is Truth. end of story. i guess you really shouldn't get me started.

alright. i'm calmed down enough to sleep again. so tired, this one.

leave your fear in the fray...

2006-11-22T18:08:00.000-05:00

so this is a new experience in pain. not so much in the pain sense, so much as the fact that i no longer have a neck. my face descends straight into my torso. straight. no tapering allowed. this two-for-one thanksgiving disease thing is pretty cool. "what's that? her immune system is down? strep, you say? why not invite mono too, just to keep it company." my body is trying to kill me.
so sleep, you say. why yes, what a charming idea, except that this danged throat keeps waking me up with this elusive pain.....actually not elusive. i can pretty much pin it right to my neck. and that actually might hurt less. did you know that women actually are supposed to feel more pain than men? ("One of the many defects of their kind. Also, weak arms." - Dwight, The Office) rambly rambly rambly. my family is ordering pizza, a special form of torture when you can't swallow anything....blah.

I got a peaceful, easy feeling.

2006-11-21T18:26:00.000-05:00

As well as two (count them) rather contagious germs, each of different sorts. What are those, you ask? Well, I went back to the doctor today, because my throat is attempting to swell itself shut and the misery is reminiscent of that week back at Bobby and Alisa's...yup, I have strep. Woot. So on the drive home, phone rings again and the doctor says, oh, by the by, your other tests came back, and you have mono.

So I am currently trying to stay awake long enough to pack up some stuff so that I can go home to my parents tonight and sleep the day away tomorrow. Blah. I have a real knack for sickness at holidays...and mono? Really. Sometimes I really wonder about my life. I mean, there's been a lot of stuff going on the last month or so, but this seems a little overboard. Anyway. All my loves to all my peoples.

float into the mystic

2006-11-18T01:07:00.000-05:00

it's the weekend.
i am sitting on my bed, eating sourpatch kids and snack mix. woot. i'm so tired, and i will sleep as soon as i can. nothing better than sleeping. i really really like sleeping in cold weather, when you can wear a hoodie to bed. :-D alright. i'm going to sleep. i know that this is short, but i am tired. maybe i will sleep. or maybe i will just sit here and write a quiz for my kiddos.

and breathe....just breathe.

2006-11-15T02:25:00.000-05:00

today is two years. i love you, tonkins. i pray for you each every day. it's amazing, but it doesn't really feel like two years in some ways...in others, it really does. it's amazing how far we can come. and in so little time, we too will be home. the mind reels, cori. (this is the part where you say, "the mind does reel, coral.")

*****on a different note*****

rachel and i have decided that we could totally be the "what-not-to-wear" for homeschooled girls who need to buy bras with more support. seriously. there are some things that don'tneed to be accentuated that much. (and no, you beautiful lovelies we danced the night away with at the bowling alley, we are not talking about you. we are discussing someone we have known for a long time.) speaking of bowling alleys...so subtle when you send one of your number over for a dollar...we could never have guessed that you were fishing for digits. after all, we are Christians, not stupid. my sister and i have some interesting dance moves for dutch girls though, so that might have been part of it....:-p thanks melly, you really are the bomb. next time maybe i'll come early enough to make it to cru. loves to you alls.

missing you, second glide.

learning, growing.

2006-11-12T20:26:00.000-05:00

doing my homework. i have a lot of it. i'm giving an exam tomorrow morning...lucky little chilluns. i'm sure they really can't wait. i caught up on my latin homework, but now i still need to do tomorrow's. then i'm going to start in on the greek, although the assignment doesn't look too bad. i think i have a presentation the week before thanksgiving too. so much to do, so little time....
my laundry is all over my floor. wow. i used to be such a neat person. one of the guys in my dept. told me that you should never do your homework in bed, because your body gets confused about where rest is vs. where work is. guess i'll go confuse my body, then.

only give you everything i've got

2006-11-11T02:37:00.000-05:00

there are times when you are so tired that you can feel all of the surface area of your eyes. funny part is that i got probably nine hours of sleep last night. tomorrow....homework and work all day!! woot!! today it snowed. or rather, sleewer stormed. there was lightning and thunder while snow was falling from the sky....thunder and snow. it was like the real perfect storm. hehehehe. crazy coral laughter. people at work are starting to do the whole crazy christmas thing. everything is red and gold and sparkly. i found my christmas cards today, and they have a photo of a happy penguin dancing on them...yay!!! i have to start out with some envelope addressing. yup. woot for that. my house is semi-clean. um...wish i had something deep or profound to say...guess you'll have to read my sister's blog for that. i want to go camping. sound a little weird? yup, to me too. i don't normally think, ooh, days in the middle of nowhere. but it sounds nice to be out in the cold and have a fire and have everything smell like smoke and dirt and falling leaves. so crazy. think i'm losing what little mind i've got.
pray for rueben. pray for everyone over there. pray that God's hand in that is as evident as His hand in the rest of my life these days. He is so good to us.

when she lays in your warm arms...

2006-11-07T14:56:00.000-05:00

don't think of me.
goodbye little fhwhgads, hello darlene.

...at the way you pulled me out of time

2006-11-07T14:11:00.000-05:00

So I know that I'm supposed to be writing this outline. I'm in the library. Isn't that half the battle? I thought so. Of course, the only real reason I made it this far is that I was walking my friend Emily from lunch towards her class...and the library was in between, and the guilt caught me and sucked me in (it's kind of like that green smoke stuff that the Joker uses to poison people in Batman...you see it coming, and then next thing you're in the North stacks in a little metal cage with a metal desk, clunky desk chair and cliched round metal garbage can.)
Anyway. Here I am. I'm sitting on the desk. (I never was much good at doing things the way I should...chair, desk, floor...so confused.) I have my back to a little window, from which can be seen both Kollege Klub and a little dentist's office. Yay for Lake Street. (That is Lake, isn't it?) It's pretending to be sunny out, but it's not. Alright. This is ridiculous. I really need to figure out what I'm going to say in this dratted paper. It's only one page, Coral. And only a 10 page paper. You have done six times worse in rougher life circumstances...
Do you think I could hide in here and stay all night? That would be creepy and weird....although, if the truth be told, I find the stacks kind of sexy. Hehe. That was a weird Coral-esque thing to say. I was just thinking though about how much I would like to have so many books that I had to have a North stacks....the day is indeed coming. Be afraid. Be very afraid. Loves to all.

tired with joy

2006-11-05T23:25:00.000-05:00

My brother is back on the field. Or really, as of now, he's in Kuwait, but it won't be long now. It was certainly wonderful to have him for a little while. We are certainly a blessed family. Really blessed. See picture to the right, wherein we are totally embarrassing my brother in Farm and Fleet. (Yeah, the coveralls are kind of a long story, as is the case with most K. family secrets.) Note the I'm not sure I want people to know that these are mine look on the oldest K. fledglings face. But no, seriously. My parents have been married for 26 years, they have raised 4 children to adulthood, 4 children who love the Lord. What more can a family ask? May I never forget what is really important here in this world is the hope we have for the next.

long time, no....

2006-10-24T19:40:00.000-04:00

Coral Rose!!!
did you miss me?
sorry, there has been very very much going on.
Rueben is home!!! has been since last thursday. we picked him up from the airport and are soaking up every minute of our two weeks with him ever since. mostly we just laugh a lot and eat and us girls do mad crazy homework in between games of blokus. yay!!
Buffy came up last weekend, briefly, and we spent a few mad crazy hours talking our hearts out (well, i talked anyway...buffy seemed pretty content to listen, poor soul.) we got one night together and i got a 6-pack...of ale8. :-D
other than that...i had strep over the weekend, consumed more cough drops than rhode island, gave a midterm, took a midterm, took another midterm, am prepping for another midterm...have normal course load, am working the normal amount at work, not sleeping at all, enjoying fall, driving a lot, driving a little more...but it's worth it when Rueben is at one end.
so much joyness.....
loves to you all.

everybody, everybody!

2006-10-15T16:15:00.000-04:00

our very own Setho, on life, the universe and God's plan for us miserables.
so very true. how often don't i look at my life and think "why isn't this easier? why are there so many roadblocks? why am i where i am?" and i forget that this isn't about me. that's why it's not easy. i'm not here to muddle through life in peace, i'm here to follow the footsteps of my Saviour, who chose to walk a path i can't imagine, simply so that my soul can have eternal peace.
and out of gratefulness, i will "walk through the valley, if You want me to."
loves.

"this is new and different."

2006-10-12T18:15:00.000-04:00

to quote myself from christmas. hey y'all...
so today is a first...on a few levels (it's snowing!!!! and i have to work with the new kid tonight.) but here's a strange first. i'm looking forward to going to work. i'm anxious, even. like I really can't wait to get out of my apartment and out into the wild cafe world. i'm exhausted, don't get me wrong, but i'm so hyperactive that i can't sit still.
what have i done in the last hour since i got up from my nap? um...i looked at my homework...looked, not touched...checked my multiple emails...

today, i taught my latin class (and colleen's, too) how to say "No two people are not on fire," in Latin...Nulli dui non ardentur. hehehehe.

storytime.

2006-10-10T19:53:00.000-04:00

So, the soulless fingers....

Yeah, about that. Sort of a long story. It started way back when, Rachel and Maria were staying with me and Rachel was setting up her facebook. Honestly I don't have any idea what it came out of (I mean, you know me. Sometimes it doesn't have to have a reason. Or, really, it never has to have a reason.) but I told Rachel that I had sold my soul to the devil, and now I had beautiful fingers. See, not a very fascinating story. Course, it gets better (well, actually just longer.)

So the other night at work, I made mention of this fact over the headsets at work. Uh...yeah. What followed...now D.W. points out my soulless situation at various opportunities, and J. and I had a ridiculously long conversation about how I am no longer able to activate the electronic eyes of paper towel dispensers. Oh, yeah, and another one (or perhaps just part of the same conversation) about how my soulless fingers cast no shadow.

So, there you go. Bet you wish you'd never asked. That really wasn't as cool of a story as it was worked up to be. My loves to all of you anyway.

titius livius. DIE!!!!

2006-10-08T21:38:00.000-04:00

*edit*
I am no longer out of cough drops.

There is no more room in my soul for Latin historians. Seriously. (Part of that could have to do with the rumor that I sold my soul for beautiful fingers.) I am now, at 8:30pm finished with outlining book 2...I still have books 3-5 to do. Dangnabit. I am going to be up until all hours of this morning.
FOOOOOOCCCUUUUUSSSSS coral.
Or maybe I should eat something. Erm...nope. Not hungry.
Cough drops are adequate sustenance, right? Although I might be out of those too.
Speaking of food...
So when is Canadian Thanksgiving? It's time for turkey and large crowds of hungry people already. Setho, are you going to celebrate the Canook or the American holiday this year? Or both? You know you can always eat with the K. cousins. ;-) Besides, I hear you can cook your own turkey. Alright. I'm not really even making sense. Going back to the dead historians now.

clarity

2006-10-06T15:37:00.000-04:00

I'm wearing new contacts. Probably for the first time in.....well, a long time. It's a little weird. You know, that strange continually trying to focus feeling? It's worth it, though, just to have something that is the right prescription. Yay!!

hands open, and my eyes open

2006-10-06T11:13:00.000-04:00

Seven hours of sleep last night!!!!! I slept until 9:30 this morning. My posts on 4 hours of sleep were starting to make little to no sense. I woke up at 6:30 this morning and elatedly went back to sleep for another 3 hours. :-D Alright. Sorry for such a small post. I haven't had a lot of extra time lately, and I have to run to Janesville. Loves.

who would have thought...

2006-10-04T18:08:00.000-04:00

that all it would take to tear me up somedays is someone changing their AIM profile.

So today is beautiful. Gorgeous. Almost as beautiful as Monday. Everything is so....poised for fall. On the brink. I don't know. Babbling is a new strong point of mine. Enjoy it while you can. I am going to prep for my minions tomorrow and for my blasted 8am class...I have a lot of Greek to do before tomorrow. But it's only five, so there's time a plenty.

And of course, the marching band across the way is playing Queen...

reality check.

2006-10-04T10:14:00.000-04:00

Here's a post from Susan, Rachel's mom, that everyone should think about.
Wow. Seriousness from Coral again...sorry kids.
Loves.

when heroes fall, in love or war...

2006-10-03T19:57:00.000-04:00

So here's a good reason not to adhere to an old custom.

"It continues also a custom at this very day for the bride not of herself to pass her husband's threshold, but to be lifted over, in memory that the Sabine virgins were carried in by violence, and did not go in of their own will." -Plutarch, Lives.

Reminds me of Africa, little girls running away from home to try to escape marriage to me ten or fifteen years their senior. To us, this seems a little far-fetched, I mean, if you don't want to marry him, there is always recourse. But think of those little children...rape is a socially acceptable form of taking a bride. In fact, it's kind of part of taking a bride. Sometimes I can't believe how much people must suffer.

Alright. I'm going back to my essay that I'm attempting to write. All my loves.

getting caught in the rain.

2006-10-01T03:09:00.000-04:00

Haven't said anything today (yesterday) so I thought I'd send a little note out into the void. Hey y'all. Guess what!! I have to get up in just 5 hours. Still a good amount of sleep, I think. Work tonight seemed really short. (It wasn't, but I do have to say that we were busy the whole time, and I wasted a lot of time too.) Other than that, not much of excitement has happened. I did a little homework this morning, but mostly I haven't done that much. I only have one class on Monday, though, so probably after teaching I'll just do homework. (And go to work.)Anyway. You all probably don't feel like having a play by play of Coral's fascinating life. I'm trying to think of something funny that I feel like sharing...nope. Got nothing.
Loves to all.

watching my every step

2006-09-29T18:45:00.000-04:00

I heard this song, from this cd today, and it totally cracked me up. I think that I probably ruined some dog's eardrums somewhere with the shriek of laughter.

arboretum...

2006-09-29T12:35:00.000-04:00

okay, so that probably doesn't sound like a song lyric to most of you, but Melly knows what I mean. :-D oh, the good ol' days.

IT'S FALL!!!! I love this time of year. It's so beautiful out today. I know, no sunshine, chance of rain, you all probably think I'm crazy....but I'm so happy it's fall. You can smell it in the air, you can see the lack of humidity. I love the colors of the leaves, the way they crunch under your feet, the way your face feels, hoody sweatshirts, baking bread that actually rises, candy corn (with or without paraffin), the way everything turns greener before it bursts into orange or yellow or red.

Alright. I really am going to do homework now. I didn't really pay attention in reading group, but I went, and I pretended. I am turning into a terrible student, and next week, I really have to organize a little better, because, as suspected, no one brought baked goods.

the laughter penetrates my silence...

2006-09-29T09:03:00.000-04:00

So apparently I was quiet at work last night. I think that George told me three times that he was worried because I wasn't laughing at all. (I did too, just not until later in the evening, when Rachel came by.) I don't think that I'm much fun without my sense of humor.

Rachel stayed the night last night. Which of course meant that I was sleepy almost immediately. She and Maria have come to the conclusion that if someone else sleeps in my apartment, I sleep much better. I guess I hadn't thought about it too carefully, but she's probably right. Whenever the two of them come over I fade out a lot quicker. I think it's just because of the comfort of knowing that there is another breathing human in the house.

And now I'm up early and headed towards my Aristophanes day-of-fun. I was too tired to email and organize the reading group properly yesterday...I hope someone baked something. Drat. Maybe I shouled whip something up before I go....

gotta be more than hoping it's right...

2006-09-28T17:27:00.000-04:00

I think I may actually be addicted to the new Snow Patrol CD. I'm thinking of burning it for you, Alisa, because I think that it would be a good addition to your music collection, and I actually think that you will fall in love with them too...you can't claim age as a factor for all our music. Just because we didn't produce anyone like Dean Martin...(and I promise, it's no "London London bridge" - hehe.)

Today I gave my students their quiz and told them that when they were finished they could go home. This made them much more friendly and talkative, until I actually handed them the quiz and they decided I was the TA from the dark place. I'm afraid I'm becoming 'one of those' TAs. Four of them stayed after the quiz anyway, to do homework for Monday and to ask questions about the material. Couldn't tell with the two guys whether this was a ploy or not, but the two girls were mostly just freaking out after taking that quiz. Wonder if I should give them some extra credit to make it better.

Came home early. Missed lunch with Emily, didn't actually remember until I was half-asleep and she texted. Whoops. She's lovely, though, and didn't mind at all.

This is a rather boring run-down on the life, isn't it? Sorry. I found a paper topic today, while sitting in Lysistrata and having no idea what was really going on because I didn't do the homework. So that's a plus. And I think that next week should be a fun time with my students, with the test coming up and all. Crap, that means I have a meeting at 7:45 on MONDAY. My day to sleep till 7:30. *grumble grumble grumble*
Alright. Off to the job.

barefoot barely breathing

2006-09-27T15:45:00.000-04:00

CK1 left this morning, which was a mixed bag of emotions. (Like the "Autumn Mix" of candy corn now in the middle of my living room, the one that sadly does not contain parafin...) Last night was the first time in the visit that I remembered clearly why we are so close. (FYI: I am not referring to the part of the evening wherein he begged for the silly putty because "I just have to feel it." That was just plain odd.) He left this morning a couple of minutes before I caught the bus to school, and it is now back to life as normal as it ever is.

And by normal, I mean that I am currently posting in the middle of taking a take-home exam. Which I didn't study for AT ALL. Really. Sounds unbeleivable? Last night didn't really afford a lot of Livy time, and I was slightly unwilling just bail to do homework. It isn't that bad of a test. I just got bored of translating Latin and decided to shout out to my faithful readers. I.e. give you all something new to stare at when you are refreshing the page obsessively (you know you do.)

Kudos to the sister, by the by. You are my hero.
Also, Sarah, here is the link to the post you referenced in your recent post. I haven't deleted it. Thanks for thinking that I am unpredictable. I mean, you work so hard to do things completely randomly, and you slave away, day after day, and you think no one is noticing how hard it is to take a new tack every minute, and you get discouraged and say to yourself, tomorrow, I am going to just repeat today, I'm going to be boring like everyone else, but you know you can't, and you struggle through, a thankless, creatively draining job...and then someone like you comes along and says something charming like that. Thanks.

You don't pull the mask off the ol' Lone Ranger...

2006-09-25T23:52:00.002-04:00

*edit*
this post took TWO HOURS to post. don't know what was with blogger. but here it is, in its glory.
yay for it being tomorrow already.

So today was a little weird. Accomplished my day with what I found out later was only two hours of sleep. My kids were a little unruly (by which I mean silent) in class today, and they were unresponsive to me and my jokes. (Well, they like ninia, niniae, f. 1st, ninja (so did McKeown later when I told him - kudos to Greg and me!!) but that was one of those things that you can't help but appreciate. cur pirata interfecit meam niniarum manum?)
But oddly enough, today was good. Sometimes dramas end result is confusingly comforting.
Maybe tomorrow the sister will come up and spend some time with me and my company. That could be really fun. Mmm.....hobbit demise...
Alright. Really need to finish the homework for the 8am. *sigh*

2006-09-25T01:47:00.000-04:00

today i won a game, and my prize is a keychain shaped like a sheep that makes a definitely horse-like sound. :-) farewell tar-tar. good luck in CA. other interesting things about my day, girl talk with my sisters in front of my dad. he looked more uncomfortable than i have ever seen him. i think he must have said "such a different world than the one i grew up in" 6 times.
the end of my day was, to quote courtney: "awkward!"
i'm not quite sure of all the dynamics of what was going on there, but something was not right.

people say your dreams

2006-09-24T10:04:00.000-04:00

are the only things that save you.

I had company last night. Rachel let herself in (I lent her the key) and I vaguely remember her saying hello...and I woke up this morning right before Matt called to let her know he would be by to wake her up. Long enough to do the short synopses, but not really long enough to catch up properly. Mostly that's my fault. I think I was out by midnight last night. Weird. I was wide awake and then suddenly . . . sleep! :-D I think this is the perkiest I've been since who knows when (not counting the adrenaline high of the middle of last week, but that doesn't count.)
we are missing maria. maria, you and your florida-ness are so uncool. all sun and christmas without snow...you think you're so cool.

anyway. been up since about 8, and am now going to run office-errands for the week, and then church here in town, then home for a farewell for tar-tar, back here....

thoughts from a fevered mind.

2006-09-24T00:27:00.000-04:00

I was thinking today about tic-tac girls. I'm sure that at least my sister knows what I mean - you know, girls who, if stuck in an elevator, would only be thinking about where their tic-tacs are. (For further reference, see chick flick A, You've Got Mail.) We always used to tell my brother that if he brought home a tic-tac girl, we'd let him (and her, knowing us and our charm and tact) know right away. So, (avoiding for now the fact that I nearly choked on a tic-tac earlier this week while talking on the phone) if you were stuck in an elevator (not if you were just traveling in the elevator, which at work is sort of a loaded situation), what would you do?
I think I would start by reciting the alphabet backwards. Melody and I used to have contests late at night when we were supposed to be asleep, reciting the alphabet backwards. Way back in the day, Melody's bed in the old house had an alphabet chart hanging over it. Then, if I was there with someone else, I would make them name 3 songs that they were ashamed that they loved. Then I would probably (knowing me) start talking about food, because I can't help it. Then I would push all the buttons on the wall, because I could. I would hug the person on the elevator who most looked like they needed it. I would consider what the elevator carpet would look like in my apartment...

This is what you get when your inner monologue hasn't been properly socialized...why is KY time an hour ahead of me?! You can't call people at what is essentially 12:30am....I'm still awake everyone.... still awake!!!! Someone call me, please.

shine down on the place that I call home

2006-09-23T09:29:00.000-04:00

Alright. I am awake, again. My brain is getting out of hand. I opened my German notebook last night to do my homework and discovered that during the last class period, Thursday, I didn't write anything down. I had the assignment for Tuesday written at the top of the page, and the rest of the page is disconnected phrases that have nothing whatsoever to do with German and geometric shapes colored in with heavy pencil. Very helpful, Coral. I am going out for breakfast with H., to do the check-up chatter before she goes searching for apartments today. Sounds good, because maybe I can distract myself and maybe my inner monologue will feel neglected and go talk to someone else again. (On second thought, maybe she should just get some sleep. I'm not sure talking to other people is safe either, since she isn't very good at the self-edit and could potentially create some interesting situations.) Anyway, after H., I am going to work to spend my day catering to the masses.

(I'm going to have to start Melody's one post every day trick, or you all are going to be so sick of reading my thoughts. Trust me, what you're reading - not even the most interesting parts.)

odi "amo, amas, amat"

2006-09-23T02:01:00.000-04:00

et "sum, es, est..," et "possum, potes, potest..," et linguas mortuas generatim. maxime odi scribere discipulis meis probationes.

I hate "I love, you love, he/she/it loves..," and "I am, you are, he/she/it is..," and "I am able, you are able, he/she/it is able..," and dead languages in general. Most of all, (I could think of a better Greek construction for that, but I can't type in Greek on blogger) I hate writing tests for my students.

keep in mind, we're under the same sky

2006-09-22T23:22:00.000-04:00

Guess that's my own fault. Figures I'd bring up a song that would then haunt the rest of my day. I am currently taking a break from the productivity that has been today...which is partly sarcasm, and partly...
You know that I have a day off and entirely to myself when I post twice. Probably this is my way of being extraverted while alone. Besides that, I had such an overwhelming comment response to my last post (unrivaled except by that time that I laid into that kid for saying that death is beautiful) that I thought I'd offer y'all an opportunity to speak your minds again!
I'm trying to prepare for next week, but my brain won't shut up. I can't get anything done when my mind interrupts me every seven seconds like a small ADD child. So if I assign those sentences on Monday, then on Tuesday I can teach them the forms of the to be verb...I wonder why Emily hasn't texted. Did she go home this weekend? Focus, Coral! Alright, then their quizzes should be talked about...B average is a lot lower than last...I wonder if...I'm crazy. So now it's ten at night (or probably a lot later) and I'm going to do more homework. Because I should. And there's really no one to stop me. (Oh Buffy, how I wish you were still around to drag me out for coffee once in a while.)
Alright. Back to the Latin, in one form or another. (hehehe.)
amo, amas, amat, amamus, amatis, amant...

head start, cosy in the rocket...

2006-09-22T15:42:00.001-04:00

so...this should be the part where shame overtakes me and i shut up...but sadly...
does anyone know anyone with a tv who may have taped the season premiere of grey's anatomy? i know that is a ridiculous question for me to ask, someone who has no tv has no right to be completely obsessed with any tv show, right? i have a feeling that thursday nights are going to be national coral-visits-a-friend-with-a-tv-day. :-D everyone has to have one or two ridiculous guilty pleasures that they can deny in a tight corner (i have never sung along at the top of my lungs to kiss the rain or more recently, howie day's collide! i can't believe anyone would tell you that! (buffy, you are prohibited from making any statements about my music choices, or i shall reveal to the world your secret jessica simpson obsession.)) or their lives just aren't worth it.
may i just say, studying greek all morning was more fun than a barrel of monkeys (although just how someone would know that, i don't know, since i have never actually encountered anyone who had personal one on one experience with a barrel of monkeys - i think if i ever met someone like that, they would be my hero for at least a couple of minutes, until i was distracted by something shiny) and something that i would recommend to anyone.
now to go examine my empty fridge and decide that food is overrated.
loves to all.

would have stayed up with you all night

2006-09-22T01:35:00.000-04:00

so today on the bus, had shoved my phone down my sweatshirt arm because it was easier than putting it into the backpack. i get close to home, and can't find phone, don't remember where i put it at all. get a little frantic, realize my sleeve is heavy. sigh relievedly, and stand up to get out and my phone falls all the way out the back of my sleeve and onto the bus floor. sometimes, you just can't win.

my tongue still misbehaves...

2006-09-21T14:34:00.000-04:00

(and the song lyric titles are back!)
Sorry about the maudlin post last night. Will try to avoid in future. Personal feelings are much better not announced loudly in 12 point font on a webpage.

I woke up late this morning. My alarm didn't go off (not that I really wanted it to) and I rolled over at 6:47 and realized that I had a bus to catch in 15 minutes. I sort of went to class looking like a hamster just woken from its nest of cedar chips. Good thing my bed isn't really cedar chips. The main irony of situation is that I realized at 4:13am that I was still staring at that weird spot in my ceiling, and then boom! it's 6:47 and I'm late. Stayed under the radar in Greek class, was better than when I actually prepare in Latin 103 and had finished the German homework while my minions were taking their quiz. Had lunch with Emily, with whom I had a lovely chat about lice and other crawlies, and am now looking forward to a wild night of work with a George who is completely and utterly freaked out. Maybe I'll take the chocolate to work with me....

today was...

2006-09-20T23:48:00.000-04:00

both one of the best and one of the worst days ever.
there are so few people in the world who can make me laugh that much in the course of just a few hours. (and seriously, who else would let me make statements like that one about brain cancer? or offer to have a fight with me about t., at the top of our lungs in a chinese restaurant?)
right now, i'm going to have a good cry and do my homework, not necessarily in that order.

p.s.

2006-09-20T00:21:00.000-04:00

work tonight.
j. and i were talking about something...yeah, i don't remember what...and he said that if i wasn't wearing glasses, he would deck me. (no, for those of you who don't know him, which is all of you, he wasn't serious.) anyway, i told him that it wouldn't matter, if he tried that, most of the B-town employees would probably take him down out back after work. he looked at me and responded that it wouldn't take them that long, that they would probably take him down immediately. can you imagine? a nice little brawl, right in our own cafe...
and i think t. is sick of me pointing out that they would never fire me. :-p

a response to "anonymous"

2006-09-19T23:45:00.000-04:00

to anonymous:
"Well, as long as you know that being a missionary means you are part of the Western post-colonial enterprise and that Bibles aren't going to do squat to help with AIDS, genocide, and extreme poverty in Africa."

Interesting point.
However, just because you have issue with colonialism, and thus post-colonialism (which, given colonialism, is a little inevitable at this point - post-colonialism is simply the adjustment of living after colonialism) doesn't mean that you have to categorically oppose Western influence on African culture.

Western influence on African culture is more than just proselytizing and slave labor. Those happen, of course, and I'm assuming by your note that in your eyes the former is comparable to the latter. However, there are also many other benefits for the Africans themselves. Cleanliness, education, health...we may not be able to stop the AIDS crisis (in Uganda, as in most African countries, the establishment and ubiquitous presence of the military is the most common agent of spreading AIDS/HIV), there are other diseases that are equally serious.

For example, did you know that malaria kills more people every day than AIDS/HIV? It's true. That's because people don't have access to medicine or can't afford it or can't take the time to go to the doctor. One clinic in one town can provide an opportunity to hundreds of people from miles around. That is what the Nakaale mission does. Every day.

Does what you do every day save millions of lives from death? Of course not. But if you were given the chance, wouldn't you reach out and save one person? I would hope so. Just because 16 Americans living days' travel from Western civilization aren't changing social policy or political climes in Uganda, doesn't mean that they're not making a difference. One person at a time is good enough for me.

joys of money spent

2006-09-19T16:04:00.000-04:00

as in, pretty much all the money i've got. i love my parents for getting me gift cards which result in me looking fabulous for my stressful observation. i am a nervous ta already, (imagine coral on coffee...i can't shut up, and i can't focus, and i say all sorts of things i shouldn't, and i later think through the classtime and cringe.) and having my prof in the back of the room making squinty faces doesn't really make it better. anyway. the downside of looking fabulous is that my class is already half in love with me. :-/ had coffee with emily, which was lovely. am now going to do some serious homework so that i don't have anything to do tomorrow night. hopefully. if i work a miracle, maybe. or maybe i'll just go to class unprepared...
going to work tonight. will give p. an update on the minion status of my class. i have potentially 6 or 7, one of whom is particularly burly and will be great for rough weekend jobs. :-D

nolite in via ludere.

2006-09-19T00:31:00.000-04:00

which means, "don't play in the road." it's appropriate to today in more than one way.
but before we get into that (by which i mean, i make obscure references to things that none of you know enough about to see the connection, and you keep reading, because you're addicted.) -
my dear friends in Lexington had a boy! Jackson, and he is adorable, if the pictures I recieved today are any indicator. of course, i am kind of prejudiced, in that I pretty much think that all of todd and guinever's children are the epitome of children-ness. :-D i miss them so badly.
alright, i've changed my mind. no obscure references for you. use your imagination. i had a normal sort of crazy day and did a decent amount of homework tonight. by decent amount, i mean i didn't finish reading that henderson article at all. it was too long. and i have class in about 8 hours, so i'm going back to thursday's greek assignment. loves.

as per the usual

2006-09-17T15:03:00.000-04:00

Yesterday's rejoicing was premature. I literally set the computer down, got into bed and shut off the light, and the phone rang. It was a girl from work, and her boyfriend had just moved out. As in, told her less than 5 minutes before his parents came to move him out. Um...yeah. So, me and my sleepy self took comfort food and moral support across town. I slept on her couch and woke up this morning and took myself off to church in J-ville unshowered and slightly disoriented. It was worth it, of course, I'm not trying to complain. I don't think that anyone should be left alone after something like that. We talked about relationships and boys and high school and first kisses and last kisses and goals and international travel and movies and love and leases and heartbreak. I had never thought about how complicated it would be to move out like that though, because every now and then she would just bust out with, "Oh, that's his. I'm going to put it on his pile. I don't want anything of his. Nothing." Can you imagine? I'm sure some of you can, but I certainly can't. Anyway. Know that I am still unsleeped, for the most part. *sigh* Apparently there is something bigger here than Coral's REM cycles. Like, the homework, which now calls me out into the sunshine.

sleeeeeeeeeeeeep.

2006-09-16T22:31:00.000-04:00

i think that tonight, the insomnia is going to give. it is 9:30 and i am ready to fall asleep...matter of fact, i can feel it coming. so much sleepy goodness. today was a good day all around. the classics picnicky thing was good. so much food and talk and more food. and work...work was just plain good. :-D it was the usual, book-looking-up and checkout skills, but it was just good. sometimes its just good. parts of it just felt too short. i think i smiled all day.
and i'm smiling now, because tomorrow i don't work (yay sunday!!) and i can do my homework. and i like the weekend. it is MINE.
to all of you - loves.

study groups, jobs and homework.

2006-09-15T23:22:00.000-04:00

So really, grad school life is exceedingly boring. Well, not boring, really. But monotonous. I mean, not monotonous, but mostly...today I was at work at eight am. Woot for work. I made $8 in tips in the first two hours (J. thought that sounded a little creepy, since the majority of the morning customers are old men. I maintain that nothing inappropriate occurred to facilitate said tips.) After work? I came home and baked scones (that lasted about 8.2 seconds, grand total, once there were hungry people in my apartment) and muffins. Then the kids from Aristophanes came over and we read maybe half of what we should have, about 99 lines. (Actually, exactly 99 lines.) Not as far as maybe we hoped, but not bad for a study group about Attic comedy (it's called that, oddly enough, because it's funny) which is carried out over wine and tea and scones. Then I sat down and stared at my homework, realized that a book that I should have picked up while at work earlier (yes, Rachel. that is the REAL reason I went in. email me if you want to say something snarky (I really like that word right now) about it.) so I went back in (to the jeers of my coworkers) and picked that up. Now I'm home, watching some delicious DVDS that Rachel blessed me with, and not doing homework at all. I'm really tired. I might capitalize on that while I can.

fun times with the rachel.

2006-09-15T01:52:00.000-04:00

i must say, there are few things in this world than a good shop and chat with a close friend. :-D rachel and i have very dramatic lives. (i wave my arms around a lot and laugh really loudly, anyway) and so we had eight million things to talk about. i spent my birthday gift card at target and some of the one for kohls...ah, my life is so spoiled.
tomorrow: work at 8am.
which brings us to point number 3. sleep.
loves.

so ... no.

2006-09-13T19:27:00.000-04:00

*edit*
So today, Greg and I came to the conclusion that since there is no Latin word for ninja that we would just give it first declension endings: ninja, ninjae, ninjae, ninjam, ninja....etc.
:-D Gregory is the best padawan any Latin TA ever had.

Hehe.
The Jehovah's Witnesses just stopped by to visit me, and argued with me for 10 or 15 minutes about God and evil. Granted, they argue pretty darn meekly for people who are certain that they're on a path that I'm not on. They busted out the question "Have you ever thought about where the Devil came from?" early on, but never gave me a chance to respond until after discussing paradise here on earth. Which I don't think is going to happen till a LONG time from now. So I said that I didn't think that this world was going to ever regain Eden-like status, but that would have to wait till the new heavens and the new earth. They didn't seem to like that, quoting the Lord's Prayer and saying that we are praying for His will on earth as it is in heaven, which apparently to them means that the world will become a paradise. (Their literature is full of happy pictures of sick people recovering and little girls in wheelchairs walking, so I'm sure you can imagine how that made me feel.) So I quoted Amos 3.6 (reminded of its location by Alisa's recent post) "If there is calamity in a city, will not the Lord have done it?" That kind of stumped them, for the most part, saying that surely the answers to my questions (I didn't ask one) would be found in my Bible, if I was willing to read it. I just smiled and said thank you.
And came back in to my Greek homework. The joys.

bringing [fingernails] back.

2006-09-12T22:57:00.000-04:00

I have stopped biting my fingernails. Again.
This is probably the fourth or fifth (serious) time that I have attempted this in my life. Apparently I have always been fixated on my hands, because there was quite the struggle when I was five to get me to stop sucking my fingers. Not my thumbs, mind you, my fingers. The first two on my left, and the middle two on my right hand. I believe that the end result was my parents bribing me with a Popple of the soccer ball variety. This later (somewhere in the middle school years) developed into a nail-biting habit. I never had nice nails anyway, you know, between the woods and dirt and ink and general childhood muck, so it didn't seem like a big loss. The trouble came when I hit college and it began to be a stress thing that would result in bleeding fingernails. Not cool. So I have quit several times, but (in a way that is strikingly similar to smokers) when big stuff happens, the fingernails go. I guess you could say that the fact that I am managing to keep my nails intact is a good sign. Or it could just be that I have been wearing ridiculously bright nail polish all week and I'm so shamed by the tiny bit of nail I have to cover with bright green that I am not biting them simply out of judgment on myself.
At any rate, it's working. For now....

who will save the children?

2006-09-12T00:16:00.000-04:00

This is why I was in Africa.
Baby Amy was eighteen months old. Her first months of life were healthy and happy, they say she was a very chubby baby (the epitome of African baby bliss), but then her mother started spending her money on alcohol instead of the children. Now Amy's older brother carries her everywhere on his back and frequently leaves her crying on the ground as he plays with the other children. Once, during our little Bible study, Amy was facedown on the ground, still, and I actually leaned over and picked her up mostly to see if she was still alive. She coughs and cries, and sleeps fitfully...if she's even still alive.

and things like chemistry.

2006-09-10T01:35:00.000-04:00

D.W. at work reminded me today (by asking inocuously about the People magazine by the front registers) of a dream I had last week in which the elusive Suri Holmes-Cruise was unveiled to be a child by another name. I woke up freaked out, and then was even more freaked out by the fact that I was dreaming about celebrity children with such vividness. D.W., of course, thought it was hilarious. He suggested that perhaps this was my way of subliminally telling myself that I wished I was Suri Holmes-Cruise. Um...no.
I've had a lot of weird dreams recently, when I was actually asleep. Not that this surprises anyone who knows me at all. I dreamt the other day that I was growing a foot out of my right calf. I also dreamt that I had finished my homework for the 2nd week of class. Speaking of which...

yeah...

2006-09-08T01:16:00.000-04:00

things not to do when you have newly pierced ears - pull your t-shirt off over your head. pull your headphones off your ears. fall asleep on your ... ears. it's weird. it's like having a weird earlobe bruise. loves you all.

these mishaps you bubble wrap

2006-09-07T16:02:00.000-04:00

i feel kind of like the fog is lifting. the class is getting better, i'm realizing that the enthralled grins of the majority of the male sea of faces are probably not a bad thing, and today, when i made a joke about insomnia and the latin pronunciation guide on my professor's website, there was actually a wave of laughter. (they thought it was funny!!)
and on top of that glorious news: my rent check is not going to bounce!! i made it by over $50!!!
as for the picture of the ears .... i don't have a digital, and any one who saw the majority of my africa pics knows that any time i try to take pics of myself with my current camera, it ends up as a blurry grin. (appealing, yes, but not very handy.)

to leave you with just a snippet of my day:
"Die Zeitung leist die Frau." (the woman reads the newspaper, or the newspaper reads the woman? so much confusion!)
"You are just an awkward person." - Colleen.
"Coral is such a nice name, and then there's a crazy polysyllabic eastern European Kravakawakowitz name to follow." - Matt V.

They don't trust, you, me, we, us.

2006-09-06T23:59:00.000-04:00

Apparently I'm addicted to blogging things now.
I just can't stay away. But then, that's no great indicator of blogspot's hold, that's more an indicator of my weak self-control. Today was a day of guilty pleasures. I sat in the sun by the lake when I should have had office hours (c'mon, they're not going to show up), I made gingersnaps, I haven't focused on the Aristophanes the way the Aristophanes wishes to be focused on. And that's just the start.
My class - is. So far, no deaths.
My ears feel bruised. *pouty face* If this ends up ruining my ridiculously adorable ears, I don't know who I'm going to blame, since I'm 23 and plenty old enough to make my own decisions. Mostly I'm just not pleased that it hurts to fall asleep at night (as if my head and the pillow weren't having enough issues with one another.)
Rachel, it's your fault that I'm addicted to Imogen Heap. I'm totally lost on her song Goodnight and Go. You can probably imagine. You are such a terrible influence. Got any other music you want to share? I'm SOO procrastinating right now. Alright. Back to the grindstone.

smeared black ink

2006-09-05T10:41:00.000-04:00

i have 25 minutes here to think about my life before i go in and teach.
my life is flashing before my eyes. :-D i'm up in our office, which is even cheerier than last year, thanks to a hot pepper plant which joy bought at farmer's market and now adorns the sunniest corner of courtney's desk. our office is right next to the pillinger library on the ninth floor here, and so overlooks the social science building and the lake, if you crane your neck. i'm sitting on my desk instead of in my chair because i don't like sitting with my back to the door, and besides, i like sitting on the desk. i have cold coffee with no sugar. joy had splenda but i am fully committed to dying of natural causes, i.e. sugar. (or freezing to death. really, it' s not that weird to think about how you want to die. at least my method is not violent.)
alright. heading out now. wish me luck. in case you couldn't tell by my nervous posting, i'm terrified. but once this is over - by 3pm i'll be at home homeworking (not at work!) and beginning to chill.

no, you can't die from insomnia

2006-09-05T00:08:00.000-04:00

watching fight club (don't ask. my movie habits are unintelligible these days) and knitting. this should prove to be a long night, since i'm terrified. the irony of watching the beginning of it, where he cures his insomnia by going to support groups and crying. it's times like these when i want to just go out for late coffee with someone and pretend that it doesn't matter that two hours of sleep isn't enough. oh, and george at work told me that maybe it took me this long to get my ears pierced because i'm afraid of commitment. i didn't quite see the connection, but with george, it's always possible that he's talking about something else entirely. *laugh* i'm afraid of needles, georgie, needles through my body parts. every time i twirl these things, i remember those pins in my arm back in the day when i broke my shoulder. it kind of feels like that, only without the tingling in my bone. maybe because my ears don't have bones. yay.

i'm a big girl, i can handle myself

2006-09-04T16:31:00.000-04:00

yay for being really busy and productive:
finished my syllabus.
made copies for the class. (okay, so i didn't, because the copy room is locked, but i printed them out at home, which worked just as well.) i'll still have to be at school at 7:00am tomorrow, because i don't have copies of the first chapter, but hey, i'll be up anyway.
got my notebooks, and all that jazz.
made bread (may i just say that my bread rising appears to be somewhat of an elusive and sporadic art. it took twice as long today, but it turned out, and my apartment smells loverly.)
went grocery shopping for the last time, both because of the semester and because i have absolutely no money.
and i did my laundry!! woot for my last day of freedom in forever.

i was thinking it's a sign

2006-09-04T10:53:00.000-04:00

um, so yeah. rachel, i'm so sorry you had to hear about my ears from melody's blog. you must be devastated. *pauses for a moment to clean the sarcasm that dripped from the screen onto the keyboard* she probably described my face better than i could any way. yeah. two holes. i didn't say anything because i keep getting this odd feeling that maybe this is something that people would have been excited about if i'd done it ten years ago, but now, as my 10-year-old cousin pointed out "even i had mine pierced before you." last night in the middle of the night i rolled over and brushed against my ear with my hand and nearly jumped out of the bed in fright. seriously. and i look in the mirror and i have this terror that i look 12. and i know i've been adamantly against it for forever, but...melody held my hand. :-D yay for sisters. (and yay for critiquing the entire mall together. i was there last week with the chicas from work, and h&m is a heck of a lot funnier when melly's there.) alright. i have to run up to the office and photocopy some stuff. loves.

2006-09-03T21:40:00.000-04:00

it is raining. it's not quite dark, and it's raining. you can smell it in the air, the metallic penny smell mixed now with both green and dying leaves. i like the way rain feels on my face. i love the way it sounds when it smacks the pavement. right now, it's making me tired. one day more.
i'm writing in my textbook. just the one for the class i'm teaching, really. i'm trying to figure out what i'm going to teach them on Tuesday. 26 little souls. *eep* i'm also eating dinner - frozen pizza and guinness. how do they make it so foamy? (drat you, rachel and maria, for leaving that bottle in my fridge!) it's like drinking alcoholic espresso. but not. sigh. i think i make more sense in my head. at any rate, it's a nice way to end the day. latin, pizza, and a good dark beer.

i got a letter from hugo yesterday. that means one of these. just one. when we were little munchkins, cuter than we are now, my brother explained them in his own way. hugo is the abominable snowman, and this is how he communicates. we would catch one of these and bring them to rueben (the only one allowed to know how to translate them, at least until we got a little older and i was allowed in on the secret) and he would let us know what hugo said. i don't really remember any of the messages. i'm sure they were little meaningless things - actually i think they were mostly about how hugo was going to come visit, but he never did. (even wisconsin is not cold enough for abominable snowmen.) anyway, i got one yesterday, and it made me think of rueben. i wonder if they have letters from hugo in afghanistan, where he is. somehow, i doubt it, since the above is what it looks like there. it's funny, though, that one of those seeds, and the first thing i think of is that boy with the ak47 on his chest. can you pray too much for one person?

today was...

2006-09-02T23:43:00.000-04:00

and that is not a song lyric.
i managed to pay the rent today, without bouncing the check for the tax on my new car. i had to cash in all summer's tips to do so, but i did it, and i feel pretty happy about it. i went to target to buy notebooks, and they're out. (they're OUT!!) so...yeah. i feel a little disgruntled. maybe i'll find some on monday, or maybe i'll start class without new ones. that would be weird and really random. i bought pencils though. we all know what i'm like about my writing utensils. (at work, i have a name for stealing all the register pens and ending up with one register with 10 or 15. i'm kind of a pen hog.) i haven't finished The Looking Glass Wars yet, but i have a feeling that i will do so and then fall asleep. (sleep!! it hasn't evaded me for two nights in a row.) little michael at work offered to beat up anyone i thought needed it today, all because i got off the phone with someone and said "i am not stupid, i am not stupid, i am not stupid." it's an easy thing to forget when customers insist on giving you the second book's title and author before you could possibly have finished typing in the first's. seriously, at what point did you want me to let you know whether or not i had that? to top it off, paulo coelho's veronika decides to die is a drastically different title to me than valerie's time of death, and it seems a little odd that you think that without the author's name, i could get the one from the other.
alright. whining over. my favorite point in the day was when d.w. was standing at info desk with micheal and this woman by the door yells his name, calling for her son, and all the employees in the FOS cracked up. "d.," i told him over the headset, "when your mother calls you, you should respond." ah, it's the little things in life. like your arteries. or liver.
loves to you all.

take a look it's in a book

2006-09-01T16:31:00.000-04:00

reading rainbow! (I have had to resort to PBS shows for song lyrics - we have entered a new era..) Rachel, why is it that you are the only person who can ever make me feel like filling out these things. Maybe it's just my obssessive interest in the goth commenter that has spawned this. (Seriously, time for school to start.)

1. One book that changed your life:
Plutarch's Lives. Yup, I'm that nerdy. It's the book that introduced me to the ancient Greek language back at the turn of the century. (I just like saying that.) Nearly nine years later, and we're still just as in love as ever.

2. One book you've read more than once:
The Beacon At Alexandria. Been reading it every year since my senior year of high school. I found it while shelving when I worked at the library. May I just say that I did work some of the time I was there.

3. One book you'd want on a desert island:
I think that The Count of Monte Cristo would stand the test of time. And sand. And extreme sunburn.

4. One book that made you laugh:
I Capture the Castle by Dowdie Smith. What's not to love about a protagonist who sounds exactly like the inside of my head? I'll find the line I think she stole from me and post it later.

5. One book that made you cry:
The Sparrow, by Mary Doria Russell. Seriously a good book. I don't know why Melly didn't like it.

6. One book that you wish had been written:
Glaciers and Coffee Grounds, by me. Or maybe I'll title it the ever popular The Vocabulary that Killed My Love Life.

7. One book that you wish had never been written:
The DaVinci Code. Seriously, if I have to find that blasted book for one more blasted customer...

8. One book you're currently reading:
The Looking Glass Wars, by Frank Beddor. It's an advance readers edition, and it's really really good.

9. One book you've been meaning to read:
Nicholas Ostler's Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World. Actually it's the one on my bedside table that I haven't dipped into yet. But it looks incredible.

10. Scariest book you've ever read:
The Secret History, by Donna Tartt. Terrifying.

Alright, now I'm going to be late going back to work. RACHEL!!!

sleeping is giving in.

2006-08-31T03:53:00.000-04:00

doom doom doom. doomy doomy doom.
*insert picture of gir, who might actually be me in dog/robot form, dancing in circles round a spaceship here* you know i'm losing it when i search the web for pictures of cartoon characters to post in my middle of the night blog entries. actually, there should be a lot of signs that i'm losing it. tonight i actually had to leave the info desk twice to gain control of the laughter. i guess M. and i are friends again. i was nearly asleep on my feet more than once at work tonight, but here it is, nearly 3am and guess who's still typing away. (and NO, i did not mean the helper monkey.) i miss asbury just a little these days. not curfew. or cafeteria food. but having bex down the hall. and parking illegally on the semi-circle, sometimes overnight. screaming in the courtyard in the rain. laughing on the green. laughing in cpo. laughing in the cafeteria. getting in trouble for throwing cookies at charlie. getting told for dancing on the cafeteria tables. making fun of the snow. skipping class and then running into prof. dickens. pretending to pay attention in hebrew while really doing greek homework. pretending to pay attention in greek while really doing latin homework. really paying attention in latin because i couldn't get away with anything else. ghetto picnic (2nd ghetto, represent!!). waiting to get out of chapel. getting out of chapel early because your seat assignment was an end seat 4 semesters in a row (priceless!). the ark. getting cpo, sometimes five or six times a day (seriously freshmen, sometimes the cpo ladies forget to put stuff in your box and you'll find new mail later. ;-)) i miss not being a grown-up. i miss the days before rent and trying to find time to buy groceries and bus schedules and work schedules and class schedules ... but at the same time, i'm glad i'm done. yay for being close to my mum and dad, and melly and em. and on that nostalgic, saccharine (is that how you spell that?) note ... nights, kids.

I find the map and draw a straight line.

2006-08-30T14:47:00.000-04:00

Guess who's here!!!! (Yeah, I don't know what was going on with my hair in that picture, but hey, it was late at night and there was like a foot of snow and we were going sledding.)
Gina, my one and only Madison roomie! (Unless you count the Helper Monkey, the philandering cheat. ;-)) We did the State St. coffee thing this morning, walked home together and talked and talked and talked. She's going to stay the night, and maybe tomorrow night too!!! Yayness. We're going to stay up late (because that's hard for me to do) and sit around and chat in our pajamas, just like old times. Oh, the good old days, when I would come home from work and we'd make hot chocolate and talk instead of study. I'm so glad she's visiting. :-D

shut your eyes and think of me.

2006-08-29T23:49:00.000-04:00

Today:
I worked for someone else and, as usual in these workish situations, I got told by a customer in return for my good deed. This lady told me that I needed to "get my life together," something she certainly hoped I could do, since I had just asked a "woman dying of pneumonia" to get her own lid, and then had (supposedly, personally I think she made $5) messed up her change. She said it in such a tone of disgust, I almost believed her. But then I'm easily hyped up these past few days, usually I don't take something a woman who has yet to have her coffee so seriously that I want to just crumple. (I really need to stop with this girly thing.)
However, the day had its high points. J. found me a advance readers copy of The Looking Glass Wars (woot!) because P. asked him for me. :-D I never manipulate anyone. *innocent face*
But tomorrow has promise.
And Melly, did you get my email about the code for the flickr flash thingymabob?

The cookie crumbles but in whose hands

2006-08-28T17:32:00.000-04:00

hehe.
I don't have homework till next week, suckers!!
(Course, I've been writing syllabus and working on lesson plannish things and studying ahead...)

But I don't officially have homework for another 7 days.
7 days of freedom.
Woot. (to quote the littlest K., who is already back in class tomorrow.)

And now, I'm going back to the work land, where the coffee is hot, and the girls are hotter.
Don't you wish your mocha was HOT like me?

So you're with her

2006-08-28T12:07:00.000-04:00

...not with me.

This post is for my new baby. To quote Melly, "Don't you wish you had one?"

My mother thought the whole photo shoot thing was ridiculous, but she took pictures anyway. She really didn't get the part where we were singing lyrics about the King Tut exhibit to Timberlake's Sexy Back (which still reminds me of hairy back.) "We're bringing King Tut back, them other pharaohs don't know how to act." Yeah!
Anyhoo.
Melly did some fancy fingerwork and moved my stereo from the Cavy to the Olds. Man am I glad that I have that talent just mulling around the home fort, because once she and dad started the "Maybe if we just jimmy the..." yeah, I totally lost any clue. So now, not only do I have a stereo, I have a stereo and a car that has more than just one speaker. (Woot!)
So I did the DMV runaround this morning, and brought the new golden oldy home. Watch out Mad-town, Coral can't even figure out which side the gas tank is on, much less how to steer her.
(Yes, those guys in the truck next to me at the gas station thought it was hilarious. Yay for me.)

This post is very random, but I just thought I would give y'all something else to read. Obsessively.

Eyes they always sparkle me.

2006-08-27T03:06:00.000-04:00

So I'm really sorry that my last posts have been rather short and snippet-like. There really is a lot going on in my life. As my friend Rachel told me just a few days ago, I may be a drama queen, but the drama is real stuff. And I just don't feel like sharing. Which is funny, because it is now 2am and I'm exhausted and bored, and I've seen the movie I'm watching eight million times, and I can't really text message anyone this friggin' early in the morning. If I were a guy, I would just go for a run, but we all know that that just isn't a safe option for a female. So I'm stuck staring at the clock as if that will put me to sleep.
I have to be up at 7:30 tomorrow morning in order to get home in time for church. It takes an hour from here, which is the same as when I used to drive from Bobby and Alisa's to Wilmore to pick up Jilly and from there to C.C., usually (usually!) in time for Sunday school. Jilly and I used to put the windows down and sing whatever happened to be on the radio at the top of our lungs. If I fell asleep right now, I could get 5.25 hours of sleep. Theoretically. If I didn't wake up eight times in that time period. This morning I was awake at 5:30am. Doing what, you ask? Nothing. Laying there staring at the ceiling. Thinking.
Things I should be doing:

Researching my Masters thesis.
Writing my syllabus.
Reading those two books on my desk.
Balancing my checkbook.
Cooking some meals for the school panic that is coming.
Finishing that afghan for someone little who is about to be borned.

All of those are things which I am significantly not doing. I am instead laying here watching Season 1 of Grey's Anatomy for the eightieth time and writing in my blog for the second time this evening. Alright kids. Signing out. Loves.

P.S. D.W. made fun of me at work for choosing my headset number based on prime numbers. I only ever use 17 and 11. Is that really that weird?

If you have a minute...

2006-08-27T01:06:00.000-04:00

So tonight was an interesting night at work.

These two kids came in and shaving creamed the floor in several different places in the store, including the elevator. So I spent a good portion of my final hour at work wiping up men's shaving cream. My hands now smell like mens' shaving cream, and I can't get it off. The smell, that is. The shaving cream came off just fine. Seriously, what is with kids these days?

And the picture is for the baby who is going to be no more. Goodbye Fwghads. It's funny how much I'm going to miss that little mess of a car. Been remembering some of the good times, like that late night run to Walmart with Alisa and Bobby when I didn't know that my tranny fluid was out. Translation: I didn't even know that there was such a thing as tranny fluid. Hey, cut me some slack, it was a rough year. Or, that time that we had like eight girls in there going for coffee. Katie M. singing Hot Chocolate's You Sexy Thang out the window at pedestrians. Paralell parking, which is, for me, probably a thing of the past. Let's be honest, I don't think that a Cutless Ciara is going to be small enough for me to maneuver in the same way. *sigh*

Alright. Gonna get my laundry and then (hopefully, cross my fingers) sleep.

Hide the bodies on the way home

2006-08-26T02:57:00.000-04:00

I cannot sleep at all. Again. This is night number 4.
Stress is the weirdest thing ever.
Less than two weeks before we start the schoolness.
*sigh*

fearless, fearless.

2006-08-25T00:24:00.000-04:00

sheer exhaustion.
i really didn't do much of excitement today. i bought a car yesterday. or really, the parentals did the actual business end of that deal, but i have a new car. joining the fleet of cutless ciaras - yet another, this time one that apparently is the same color as the Fhwdgads. apparently the little one is not going to survive. *sigh*
well, i guess that the choice not to go to KY was a wise one. doesn't make it much easier, but...
anyway. to bed.

Well, you're never gonna get it.

2006-08-23T01:31:00.000-04:00

SLLLLLEEEEEEEPPPPP!!!!!
Please?
The mind, it is racing. Just a week and a half till school starts. BLAH!

American Fast Food

2006-08-22T11:33:00.000-04:00

I bought my school books today. I told myself that it would have to be under $200. Guess the price - $201.03. Sigh. Still, that's like $150 cheaper than last semester, and nearly $250 cheaper than the one before that. Yay for taking fewer classes.

I was going to say something stunning, but I don't remember what it was.

I was thinking on the bus today how different the bus in summer smells from the bus in winter. The summer bus smells like sweat and hot rubber, chlorine, deodorant and cigarette smoke. In the winter it smells like sweat and wet snow, cold pavement, wool and damp socks. I can't remember a distinct smell for autumn, but I'm sure it smells like dying leaves which is my favorite smell of all. It's funny, because for the longest time I couldn't smell anything, something to do with asthma medication, I guess, but I had the most vivid memories of smells.

This is turning into a ridiculously random post, so I might as well continue that trend. I saw the movie Boondock Saints last night, and I'm confused. It didn't make any sense to me, really. Those guys healed ridiculously fast, and the inspector's sudden change from hunter to help-mate didn't really make sense. Was that what they really did for a living? Did they really just start killing people at the beginning of the movie, or had they been killing for years without a trace? Just curious. Maybe I was too tired to be watching, I don't know.

So I'm sitting outside again, working on my tan (i.e., improving my intake of vitamin D before the school year starts and I go back to my hermitage in the library and Van Hise. Besides, this is Wisconsin, and you never really know how much longer it's going to be so pretty out. Alright, I'm going now, loves!

Bring me java, bring me joy

2006-08-19T14:39:00.000-04:00

Lord Tennyson was not quite right (write! haha!) when he penned the immortal, and over-quoted, "In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love" line. When you work in a bookstore in a university town, it's quite the opposite. As the year fades and the weather starts to cool off (or in this case, just turn into a solid state of humidity that actually resembles a brick wall), "love" is just starting.
For one, the students move back to Madison. This means all those summer flings and girl-next-door romances are wrapped up neatly and set on the shelf to be picked up next year where they left off, obsessive phone calls fade after just a few days, and thoughts wander back to whether that girl who was in that 103 Spanish class last year still lives on Willy St. You think I kid? I wish.
In the bookstore, it simply means that the flirtation with the coffee girls is amped up. Guys give you significant looks over their hazelnut lattes, ask you foolish questions about how work is going that day, and laugh at pretty much anything you say. (Seriously, I think I could tell some of these winners that I spit in their drink and they would giggle appreciatively.) I was telling R. something about Canada the other day and this guy literally wouldn't leave the counter. I pretty much had to pry my personality from his grimy fingers and leave him and his decaf soy whosawhatsit to flirt alone. "Oh really? You're Canadian? Don't you just love their healthcare system? So good for the masses!" "No, it's not. It's a socially acceptable form of euthanasia. Old people are put on the back burner and die for lack of major surgery." (You'd think that bluntness would work, but no . . . ) My biggest problem is that I bloom under that sort of pressure, turning into an incarnation of acerbic wit, which really just eggs them on. My co-workers find it hilarious, sometimes even abandoning me to the especially persistent ones. Great. As if listening to 15 minute stories about that time you broke your arm when you were drunk with your roommates was my idea of true love. Good thing it was your arm and not your liver, which was already under plenty of pressure.

Must...learn...to...shut...mouth.

Guess Who's Back

2006-08-19T02:31:00.000-04:00

Well, I think that we can safely establish that in this case, it is not *scratches* Slim Shady.
I got my new power cord today, and I'm now 23. (Well, that was yesterday.)
I'm tired now. I just saw Match Point with Kylee and her boy, and I have to go to work in less than 7 hours. So....
Night kids.

2006-08-16T00:23:00.000-04:00

so my power cord died, and tonight, when the power on my computer dies, it's over until the new cord arrives, hopefully next week. call me, if you know my number, or don't. just don't expect to hear from me much. sorry. it's inconvenient for me too, for what it's worth. :-D
loves. (p.s. you can leave comments, i'll just get them in one glump next week sometime. doesn't mean i wouldn't like them.)

girls don't like boys.

2006-08-15T01:14:00.000-04:00

only 7 out of my 26 students are female.
weird.
do you think that's because the TA's name is "Coral"? or because Latin is attractive primarily to XY chromosomes? rather confused here.
hmm. tonight, i must write a syllabus.

Asleep, my life will be a pillow.

2006-08-14T11:16:00.001-04:00

Sundays. They're definitely the best day of the week. I had a nice relaxing one and accomplished a lot of little things that I don't normally get to, like watching the season finale of Grey's Anatomy on You Tube, finding my comb back, folding my clean clothes, getting ready to send a little package to Uganda...

The insomnia is coming back. I'm about ready to have malaria again. I tell you, that Larium may have involved really crazy dreams, but at least I was asleep within ten minutes of hitting the pillow. Several times in Uganda, I fell asleep before the game of Trivial Pursuit in the next room had even reached peak noisiness. Last night I saw the clock at 3:30. Three-thirty!! I have an eight am class this semester, so there's not really a lot of room for the night-watch. Three AM only has magic if there's someone around to share it with you. If it's just you, it's a terrible time to be awake. The shadows are longer, everything you think possible in daylight seems just out of your reach, and you see your whole life through pessimism and panic.Or, at least, I do. I tell you. These last two years have been a whole new experience in sleeplessness.

Funny thing though, the other night I thought I was hallucinating, because at 2:30, there were things crawling all over the dumpster that is just out my back window. It was 5 raccoons, trying to get in and at the good stuff. After about 30 minutes of scrabbling, I almost went out there and opened it myself for them. Don't worry, I refrained. Rodents don't really need any encouragement.

Today we have a meeting about the class I'm teaching. I'm going to bring my knitting and prepare for the worst. :-D I wonder whatever happened to my coffee cup/science experiment from last year . . . oooh, and I get to see my new office. More excitement than one person can handle. Alright kids, I'm starting to ramble. Loves.

All kinda crazys.

2006-08-08T12:18:00.000-04:00

So yesterday, I'm at work, and the Italian guy comes in to get coffee. I saw him come into the store, and I almost started his medium latte right away, but he didn't come up to the counter, he just sat down to read, although he was watching the counter a lot. Anyway. R. goes on break, and I'm all by myself and he comes up (naturally) and asks for his usual. As he's paying, he asks "So, is it too early for you to laugh?" I smiled and said that it had been an early morning. "Well, can you laugh for me." I smiled and said no, not really. "Just once? I've been sitting here an hour and you haven't laughed once. Just once, that crazy laugh of yours." "I don't laugh on command," I respond, completely weirded out. "Hmm. What if I told you that you looked like Mandy Moore?"
I'll admit. I cracked up. Who gets their kicks by convincing the coffee girl to laugh by telling her outrageous lies? It was slightly creepy. Later, R. was back and I dropped something and cracked up, and from out among the tables comes his voice "There you go! That's what I'm talking about!"

Um. Weird.

I don't work today. I am sitting in the sun and I plan on sitting here until I get a decent sunburn. Because it makes sense to me. That's why. Why is it that the simplest decisions leave me completely paralyzed? Maybe that too is a sign of adultness.

Life's been good to me so far.

2006-08-06T23:28:00.000-04:00

Sucks sometimes, and you feel kind of like a heel.

Today was not a good day. Except that Emy is home and she has wonderful stories, and we spent the day with our grandpa. I tell you.

It's rotten when you wake up and realize that there are some hurts that a bandaid and a popsicle can't cure, and it's rotten when you realize that some people really are that...twisted.

Read the news today, oh boy.

2006-08-04T00:40:00.000-04:00

Today, while S. and I walked down State St. after dinner, we were talking about knowledge bases and how in order to begin a new train of understanding, we first have to establish a base in order to ...nevermind. Long story short, this was offered as a new base for knowledge. Apparently, according to S. (and I quote) "all you have to do is drag a kitchen sieve behind a boat and gather whale dandruff." *L* Dinner was lovely...Frida's for Mexican, with a long walk up State St. and then a long walk back down to stand by the lake and debate which lake was which. There was also a brief discussion about getting matching tattoos, but that was dumped because of my reticence. I'm a little slow on the uptake when people bring up permanently scarring their bodies, my body or both in stereo. (Can you use the word stereo when talking about body scarring?)

In other news, if you're into dead languages and stuff - this is pretty cool. The differences between spinach and ancient inks are definitely fascinating. S. seemed to think so, but that might just have been an attempt to to distract me from the earlier whale dandruff discussion or to avoid the next conversation topic, which was street preachers and tracts. As you can tell, one thing we didn't lack was conversation topics...and tomorrow, the littlest K. comes home!!!!! YAYAYAYAYAY!!!! I think I might go home tomorrow night and see the little bugger.
Anyway. This was just a little note to say hey to the friends, I am going to sleep like a human now. (As opposed to...?)

Remember, softly.

2006-08-01T15:32:00.000-04:00

So I thought of what I meant to say last night.

Thirdly. I don't know anyone else who is allergic to bandaid adhesive. So I had ringworm (really not a worm, but a fungus) and I was covering it while I killed it. (I killed it dead real good. It's so dead that it has forgotten it ever breathed . . . wait, it was a fungus and it never breathed. Or something like that.) So I wore a bandaid for about a week, and the ringworm is RIP, but my arm is covered in a rash caused by the stupid bandaids. Seriously, what the hey is that? Why do I have the weirdest problems?

Alright, it's really hot and I think maybe I should go to the library. Air conditioning!!!

My only bad habit, comes with lovin' you.

2006-08-01T03:44:00.000-04:00

Mostly bad ones.

First off. I never go to bed. Not properly, anyway. I go to bed, and I need a drink of water. So I get up. In the kitchen, I see the open bag of goldfish. I bring those back to bed and eat and read and eat. I finish the glass of water. I remember that I have frozen lemonade in the freezer. Hmm. Sounds pretty good. I get up and make lemonade. While making lemonade, I find last week's cookie dough. I bring that back to bed. Wait. Cookies and milk . . . sound bad? I can do that for hours, literally.

Secondly. I dance in the grocery store and burst into song at moments that make even my most patient co-workers cringe. Today, I was dancing through the pickle and peanut butter aisle at 12:30 at night. And I sang "Wind Beneath My Wings," to my pregnant coworker while we brewed coffee. She thought I was crazy. Funny, that was an old L.-K. clan favorite. Although, we got a dollar tip from that guy who thinks it's funny that I call automatic coffee "soul-less." But that also might just be because he thinks I'm hilarious even when all I say is "Room for cream?"

Thirdly. It's after two again and I am going to sleep. If you are really lucky, I will write in this tomorrow. Or something. Loves.

One last call.

2006-07-31T02:51:00.000-04:00

Drinks. Cold ones. Like the iced Elmo that my sister and I drove home for the first time tonight. A new Cutless Ciara joins the family...only this one, unlike the others, has carpet that's like a cross between Tickle-Me-Elmo and Blue Raspberry Slushie from 7-11. Thus, the name. In the K. family, we like to christen our cars as early as possible, even before their first turn into the Hundred (Dying) Oaks driveway. So, we did the honors. Naturally.

But I confuse myself. What I was actually going to say was that every cold summer drink (you know, the ones that I am drinking compulsively and using (along with the ice pack currently on my neck) to keep my body from going into the Midwest-is-running-a-higher-fever-than-a-malaria-relapse-without-Larium summer shock...whoa. I totally lost my train of thought in that sentence. I think that I have also lost a parentheses in there somewhere. Okay. Rewind and start over. Again. Every cold summer drink that I have been pouring down my greedy throat is really just a version of a warm winter liquid.

Iced tea - granted, I don't take my iced tea with milk and sugar, I mostly drink it black. And I never drink iced chamomile tea or Earl Grey. (How weird would that be, iced tea with a touch of bergamont - pinkies up!) On the other side, I do drink a decent amount of hot black tea plain. Reminds me of my mom's mom.

Water - Okay, so maybe a bit of a stretch...but hot tea is really just hot water. Especially the aforementioned chamomile.

Chocolate milk - (For the record, I admire the fortitude of anyone who can stomach white milk plain on a regular basis. It makes my entire digestive system want to turn inside out just thinking about it.) Really, this is just hot chocolate without the marshmallows. And the heat. If we were in Karamoja, you could just add those little hot cocoa packets to water and then even your chocolate milk would be powdered. (I know, not really funny, but I'm dying of laughter over here. Maybe it's only funny if you've been there, seen Mr. M. fill his water bottle with 4 scoops of yellow powder that smells like lamb's milk powder and then tap water, shake, and retire for the evening. Ah, rituals. They keep the world spinning.)

Lemonade - This one is a stretch too, but if you think of lemonade and Tang and then consider them as ingredients in that weird Russian tea powder stuff...okay. Even I can see that's not true. I guess that means that lemonade and orange juice are out for the count of this little listy thingy. What is this anyway? If I weren't stone sober (i.e. if this were someone else's blog I was reading) I would call this a drunken rant...onwards and upwards.

Coffee - This is one of my ultimate favorite. So many ways to do this lovely hot drink as an icy sort of thing. Iced lattes. Really great stuff. You can put like eighty different syrups in it, mix and match. Plain iced coffee. Black. With a little cream. With a lot of cream. With flavored cream. With milk and syrup. With coffee ice cubes in it. With regular ice cubes in it. With frozen raspberries and raspberry syrup. With honey. Plain espresso over ice with whipped cream. *sigh*

Alright. That was crazy. I'm crazy. You think I'm crazy. You think I'm crazy and now you're scared to admit it because you think that I'm so crazy that I might bite you and you'll get rabies and you'll have to get those really painful rabies follow-up shots right in the glutes. Good luck with that. I hear those are quite the kicker. Loves.

Still got sand in my shoes.

2006-07-30T03:36:00.000-04:00

Shoes. And my love affair with them. Mostly unrequited, that is.
Today I was contemplating my favorite clogs tonight at work, while reshelving Heideger and Hegel in Western Philosophy. I'm really sore, so I was sitting on the floor and contemplating the wear pattern on my treads. I love those shoes. They're so comfortable. And I've had them for nearly a year. They're all worn in.

A good pair of shoes is like a security blanket.

I think that if someone could develop something that would keep your neck cool without being wet . . . they would be rich. I know, air-conditioning would keep the whole body cool . . . but I don't have that. I have cold water and a lot of ice cubes.

And once again, it's 2am.
*sigh*

My brownie downtown.

2006-07-29T03:13:00.000-04:00

Talked to a friend tonight when I got home from work. It was nice outside, nicer than in my apartment, which since the note under the door last night, has been pretty much under lock down. The note said that someone had broken into an apartment and "touched a woman on the foot." I have been making sure that my windows are locked in their barely open positions and there's no room for a fan in the front one. Coming home at nearly midnight isn't fun if you have to check every corner for intruders. Anyway, I lay outside on the pavement while we talked, and the pavement was cool and the weirdest people come and go at 1 in the morning.

Work was fun. I brought brownies and my boss made jokes into the headset about how they were psychedelic (I can't spell that) and he was seeing "the prettiest blue butterflies" - I was laughing so hard that I nearly snorted, and my customer, who couldn't hear the headset hilarity, just looked disgruntled. It progressed to comments about how the cafe food suddenly looked edible, and D. looked like an ape. It was pretty funny. Also funny - D. pulling a plastic bag over my head and then apologizing by drawing a picture of us and labeling it "BFF!" L.'s last day of work was today, and she spent 10 minutes saying goodbye to me, which totally cracked D.W. up (which I think was part of the point, since he is apparently the new hot stuff) and then she called from the parking lot to tell me that she missed me. Hehehe.

Alright. It's really really late here. And I think I'm tired.
I think I am, but I'm never sure if that actually means I'm going to sleep.
berzerk

My mind is on the blink.

2006-07-26T13:52:00.000-04:00

Tireds. I don't think that's a word. I'm very tired.
I know this isn't a real post, and I'm sorry, to those of you who read this, but I have been leading a life of danger.

To everyone he meets he stays a stranger
With every move he makes, another chance he takes.
Odds are he won't live to see tomorrow.
Secret Agent Man. Secret Agent Man.
They've given you a number and taken away your name.

I finally got those picture CDs for random people I don't know ready . . . it took a while, since my computer wasn't real keen on converting from a DVD-R to a CD-R . . . I know, prolly not confusing to you, but to me . . . so bad. I also reorganized my planner pages. Found some really good little folder thingies at Tar-jey that have 13 pockets, and I can put every month in its own pocket. Woohoo. I read Greek for 2 hours this morning with the girls. 50 whole lines of Homer. Makes you wish that you were smarter.

That's all I've done this week. Now I'm going to sleep.

2006-07-05T20:05:00.000-04:00