Live Long and Prosper (you sexy, sexy Nerd!)

In case you haven’t figured it out yet, I’m a total nerd. Like, WAY big nerd. Maybe because of this, I often get really excited when people come out of their nerd closets or I learn they too are exceptionally huge nerds.

Recent nerd out of the closet: Karl Urban.

In interviews about his role as Dr. Lenard “Bones” McCoy in the new Star Trek movie, he repeatedly revealed that he is a total nerd. Karl Urban is a Treker. I know! I was surprised and exhilarated to learn this, too. The world could use another hot nerd.

The best way to spend a rainy evening

Last night I went to see Rebel Without a Cause as this artsy film house in town. I freakin' love that move. I even contemplated bringing my life-sized card board cut-out of James Dean and sitting him in the seat next to me, but it was raining.

My one disappointment from yesterday was simply that the projectionist started the reel too late. This was upsetting to me because the opening to the film is my favorite part. Rather than fading from black to the production company title then swelling into the orchestral, Hollywood theme, they started it about five measures into the score, completely ruining the overwhelming grandness of the opening. Other than that, it was great. It was fantastic seeing it on a big screen and in the company of other people. I went with a friend who had never seen it before and was delighted by the fact that she loved it. The whole thing was made even better by the fact that it was free with our student Ids, something we had been unaware of until we reached the ticket booth. Score!

Somewhat related, a friend of mine actually lives near the observatory from the movie. When I visit her, (at some point in the future), she's agreed to bring me there where (I only presume) we'll re-enact the knife fight and final scene of the movie and take tons of photos to document it. I can't wait!

Weekend Moments

I had two really wonderful moments over the weekend.
My Saturday moment occurred around 10:20pm. I was walking across campus to attend a party my friend was throwing. The night was beautiful; the air was crisp and cool, neither humid nor cold. Not to brag, but I looks so freakin' cool; I was wearing these jeans that make my legs look really good, a peach colored, lace top with sequins, topped off with my bamfy black jacket. The party, I expected, wouldn't be very well attended and the music would be mediocre, but I take what I can get; without expectations, you're never disappointed. I was just glad I had something to do on a Saturday night, that I'd be doing it with friends I rarely get to see and that I was going to look good doing it. Just when I felt on top of the world and super excited for this party, the song “Where is My Mind” by The Pixies started blasting from someone's dorm room. This song was so loud, it was as if the building itself were belting it. The song and it's disembodied blaring so perfectly illustrated the moment, capturing my mood indifferent satisfaction and contentment. Were I a smoker, I probably would have leaned against a tree and lit up.
My Sunday moment occurred around 6:10 pm. I had gotten back to my room from an early dinner with two friends I never get to eat with and had decided to watch Blue Velvet, a film I knew nothing about but had heard referenced so often, I decided it was worth watching if only to know what everyone was talking about. About 15 minutes into the movie, the clouds in the sky started rolling and billowing, like smoke out of some great celestial pipe. I had seen the storm approaching on my way back from dinner, the navy blue hue of the sky foreshadowing the thundering downpour that was sure to come. I paused the movie and leaned on my window sill, watching as the sky changed from navy to olive green then to a faded yellow. Then the rain came. There were only a few claps of thunder, more wind than anything, but the downpour was so devastatingly beautiful. As it got underway, I went back to watching my movie, paying more attention to the weather than the tv at points. The rain stopped within half an hour and I was a little sad. The movie was okay.

ACTION!

Do you ever get the feeling you’re in a movie? From time to time I have these outer body experiences where I can see myself and everything happening around me and think, “That’s just what happened in A Fish Called Wanda” or something to that effect. This always happens at parties or in the dinning hall, where the music playing often becomes illustrative of the moment. Then there are other times when I realize I’ve been conducting a very coherent narrative in my mind, something that might work nicely as a voice-over. There are also the great one-liners that seem to pop up in every-day conversation that make me think Seth Rogan has programed my conversation.

The genre I constantly feel I’m walking into is Horror. Not that anything particularly macabre or gruesome seems to be happening to or around me, but it always seems like I’m in those moments right before the psycho killer pops out and kills the unsuspecting type-cast victim. This usually happens when I’m in the bathroom late at night brushing my teeth. The building seems more creeky, the faucets more drippy, and the weather more windy. Call me crazy, but the shower stalls of a women’s college seems like just the right place for Michale Myers to be hiding with a butcher knife.

Coincidence? I think not.

I made a wonderful inter-textual connection today! It goes as follows:

Last week, I started reading the graphic novel, Watchmen. It's pretty amazing in spite, if not because, of how depressing it is. Either way, I recommend it. Point is, on page 10 chapter 6, it is revealed that the initial motivation behind the vigilante Rorschach's career was the murder of a young girl, Kitty Genovese.

Here's the connection:

The film Boondock Saints begins with a priest's homely, honoring the death of one Kitty Genovese, on the one-year anniversary of her death. This event, though it doesn't actually take place in the movie, lays the foundation for what later is the motivation of the film's vigilantes, the McManus brothers, i.e. the Boondock Saints. The film poses on of the same questions as the comic: Who watches the watchmen? Who's right is it to administer justice.

Is it a coincidence that writer-director Troy Duffy unseen but ever present character shares her name with an identical character in More and Gibbons' Watchmen? I thought not. So, I did some google-ing. It didn't take much searching.

As it turns out, Kitty Genovese was a real person who was killed in 1964 under similar circumstances alluded to in both the comic and the movie, though the year and location of her death as well as her age are altered in Duffy's film while the comic almost certainly is referring to the exact same death. Now that my ear and eye are more aware of her presence and the symbolic nature of her murder, I think she'll be popping up everywhere, like a rare word you learn the meaning of for the first time.

There's just another addition to my random fact arsenal/ cult fandom encyclopedia.

They have yet to make a box that big

A while back I packed up a lot of my childhood memories and put them in a box at the back of the closet. Well, not exactly my memories, (those wouldn't fit in boxes), but many of the things that made them. In an attempt to reclaim some space in my ever shrinking room in my parents' house, I put a bunch of toys, keepsakes and VHS tapes that I or my parents couldn't part with into the depths of our downstairs closet. Several VHS classics, however, I left unpacked, knowing I would want to view them at some point in the not too distant future. These include some off-beat Disney classics, like The Great Mouse Detective and Robin Hood, as well as some standard classics, a la Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin.

Cut to earlier this week:

I was shocked to discover several of my friends had never seen The Pagemaster, an AMAZING movie that came out when we were kids. Knowing I had it on VHS, I went to my stash today to pull it out and place it with the things I'm taking back to school after break.

It wasn't there! Unknowingly, I packed it with the other things that are now trapped in the chasms of the closet. My only hope is that when we put the Christmas decorations away this weekend I might be able to locate the box their hidden in. The Forces that Be, grant me luck, because people really need to see this movie. I mean, it's quality.

"And to all a good night!"

As this Christmas comes to a close, I'm given a chance to reflect on how this was a rather odd holiday for me this year. Normally, I'd spend the day at my aunt's house with family in Long Island. Being as ill as I've been the past few days, though, I decided it was best I stay home and continue recuperating. While it was a bit lonely at a few points through out the day, I actually quite enjoyed myself. You see, I'm someone who prizes her solitude. Since I've been home and sick with my parents off from work, solitude is something that has been greatly lacking in my life. So, I guess the best gift I got today was just to be left alone. I don't mean that in a Scrooge, “Bah-humbug” sort of way, (although you should try it sometime, it is fun to say), but in an “O! The cleverness of me!”* sort of way.

Today was really the first day I didn't have any halting coughing attacks, (Mmm, sexy), I thought about what I really wanted to do.

Dance. It. Out.

I don't think there's a day that goes by where I don't have at least fifteen minutes of dancing. With my parents constantly hovering over me and my lungs about to collapse, this hadn't really been possible to do until today. I broke my dance fast with Gopher Mombo by Yma Sumac. Give it a listen. You will be wigglin' in your seat.

Next, I sat down to actually enjoy a couple of movies without having to stop ten minutes in to hack up a lung and go through a quarter of a tissue box. Rather than going for some old standards, I decided to check out a few flicks I'd been meaning to see but hadn't had a chance to. First on the gamete was THX 1138 (1971), a sweet sci-fi number directed by George Lucas. Oh yeah. Quality. Next, I figured I'd stick with the theme of futuristic distopia and directors named George, so I watched Things to Come(1936). Allow me to say, George Orwell knew his shit. Pardon my French. Okay, actually no pardons. I meant it!
When the folks got home in the evening I was treated to the finest of left-overs. I topped it all off with a hot cup of tea while the three of us watched The Incredibles (2004) on tv. God bless us, everyone.

Indeed it was a good Christmas.

* Peter Pan, by JM Barrie

déjà vu

This feels like déjà vu. It’s certainly been a while since I last posted, but with winter break on the horizon, I feel you have a good month worth of posting to look forward to.

I had a similar, very odd feeling of déjà vu this morning as I ate my breakfast. As I was eating a clementine and watching the beginning of After the Wedding (a film I need to finish watching tonight before its due back tomorrow), I had the strangest feeling of being back in Bristol. I realized that this is because what I was doing (eating a breakfast of clementines and watching a movie) was ma routine for most of my time there. Before I began my day, I usually had enough time to watch movie or a few episodes of a television show. It was a pretty sweet deal. I got to catch up on a ton of movies I’d mean meaning to watch. They were mostly classics. I’m glad to say my cinematic references expanded quite a bit.

Right now, as I finish my 7th round of college exams, (7/8th of my undergraduate degree completed!), I’m realizing probably won’t get to loaf around like that again for a very long time. So, in spite of appearing like a bit of a lazy bones recluse for five months, I’m looking at that time as fuel for the years of work ahead of me until I reach retirement or become a professional writer, whichever comes first. I’m aiming for writing picture books for children. Writing. Not illustrating. I’ll leave that to someone with more talent and time of their hands.

The BIG one.

Let me begin by stating that I had every intention of coming to the library to do work. I did. I brought all my work, headphones, caffeine, water, snacks, my lap top (the very thing I'm typing on right now).

Let me continue by stating that certain foods constitute library snacks while others don't. Nilla wafers: library snack. Chicken masala: Not library snack. Generally, the unspoken rule is that anything with a particularly strong odor capable of distracting other library patrons from their work should be left at home. Sorry pizza. Adios tacos. Why then am I left here to endure the savory aroma of something very much like a meat ball hero? Who does this person this she is that she can just do that? At least I'm full. I suppose things could be that much worse if I were hungry. Then the smell would be taunting me.

Let me further state that I have severe doubts about being able to hold out here and complete all the work I was intending to do. Having just completed a major assignment this morning (which isn't even due until the end of this week) I've convinced myself that I deserve a bit of a break. I'm contemplating a nap back in my room at some point...

No! I must stay strong. What would become of the world if people gave into the temptations of meat ball heroes and naps? Nothing would get done. Well, a lot of sleeping and eating would get done, I suppose, but that hardly seems productive.
Productive. Produce. I must produce. Continue producing.

I saw the Disney film WALL-E over Thanksgiving. Several friends had been telling me to watch it since it came this past summer, but I never got around to it. Finally, last Wednesday my parents and I decided to sit down and watch it. It's one of the few movies we've all watched together all the way through. I loved it but I found myself so completely depressed by the whole first half hour of the film. Several times I was near the point of tears. While the end (the credits especially) was extremely hopeful and optimistic, everything up until that point was a classic urban dystopia, the kinds of stories I'm addicted to even though they keep me up at night.

What if it's true? What if I'm destined to produce and produce without any real purpose to my production?

What will I produce? How can I be sure it holds meaning?

I guess the big question is: Does all THIS mean anything?

I'm not sure how I got from the library to THE question. You'd think I could find the answer here, among this vast collection of human knowledge.

Whatever. So long as you keep reading, I'll keep producing. I guess that means something.

Oops!

The best plans are often times the ones that go wrong. Take penicillin, for example. Or even better, cheese. Had it not been for some careless oversight, two of the greatest contributions to humanity would never exist.

This evening followed the schedule of one such failed plan.

The plan was simple. Shower, do some reading, straighten my hair while I watched Flash Gordon Conquers the Universe. Simple.

How wrong I was.

I did get to shower. Thank goodness. Not a moment passed that I returned to my room that one of my friends knocked on my door. I answered and found her practically glowing with satisfaction at the new coat she had bought and was now wearing. I invited her in to share the tale of her shopping quest.

Over the next three hours we were joined by two other friends and had amazing conversations. They ranged from the most inane and hilarious of topic to the most serious and down right heavy. I still ended up straightening my hair but I nixed the readings for class. I can do those tomorrow.

The point is, the evening couldn't have been better or more fulfilling if I had planned it to be so.

Thank you Chance and Mishap. You two sure know what you're doing.

The sound and the fury

For some reason or other, I have a knack for making involuntary, interrupting noises in situations when one should otherwise be quiet. More than once I've inexplicably needed to sneeze when a professor is waiting for someone to raise their hand and comment or answer a question. My stomach has been known to grumble at similar moments. There's also the odd yawn or two that have definitely earned me a death glare from a rightfully frustrated prof. These sounds aren't always biological. Often, it might be a trip or the dropping of an object or a whole tray of food in the middle of the dinning hall, but who notices that?

I can recall two instances today where such involuntary sounds were produced by me. The first was in the movie theater. My friend and I thought we would be incredibly devious and go see a movie at 5pm on a weekday! Once we got over the fact that we were actually incredibly pathetic for thinking we were in any way B.A.s, we went to get dinner. Being that we needed packable foods we could sneak into the theater, I went for carrot sticks and celery. Bad move. There's nothing quite a deafening as the crunch of produce whole opening credits are rolling by. The second instance was, of course, in the library. When I got up from a long while of reading (a good half an hour!) my chair screeched outrageously loud and long as I stood to leave.
Cinema and library; the two places that have explicit signs asking for your quiet. I just need to find some places of worship and I'm set. Maybe a funeral for good measure.

Simon Says

I'm a little amazed at how quickly I'm able to mimic people's behavior and vocal inflections. In certain academic circles this is called “code switching”. I've done this most of my life. Since Kindergarden, I've been going from a fairly working class neighborhood where I live to an extremely affluent one for school, then back again in the evening. In each place I behaved some what differently.
In the Disney movies The Jungle Book and Tarzan there are scenes of Mowgli and Tarzan learning to speak like an animals and humans, respectively. That's how I feel. I never really took note of it until last year when I did it again for a field work assignment in which I traveled from school, in one of the wealthiest neighborhoods in the nation, to my field placement, to one of the poorest in West Philly. It made me extremely aware that I severely compartmentalized my life in order to maintain my mimicry. Keeping things separated made it easier to identify their key characteristics and embody them. In high school, I never had friends from school over to my house, not because I was ashamed of where I lived or how my family was but because I wasn't sure how I was supposed to behave. Was it a school or a home moment?
I'm glad to say, I'm much more confident with myself now. I know how to behave and when and it isn't usually based on mimicry. I'm able to be myself (now that I know what that is) and decompartmentalize the different spheres of my life and alow people into all of it. I do still, however, tend to speak the way the people around me speak. This includes accents and turns of phrase. While I was abroad, I definitely caught myself using an English accent once or twice. Now, I sound a lot like a friend I've been spending a lot of time with. I guess old habits die hard.

It's the simple things in life: Part II

Some things in this wold make no sense. If you recall, I began to explore this in my previous post. Granted, some of those nonsensical things are a good source of frustration others, however, bring pin sized gifts of whimsy to our lives. Like Nicolas Cage.

I'm not sure who it was that first thought, “Nick Cage; now there's an action star!” I have to say to that person, THANK YOU, whoever you are, for bringing joy to my life. It kind of makes me feel like I could some day be an action star. Also, as was pointed out to me by an extremely intuitive friend of mine, whoever thought the format of Proper Noun Adjective for a film title is a genius and should be rewarded.

It hurts so good!

Have you ever seen a bad movie that tricked you into watching it by macerating about like it’s a good movie? I don’t just mean the blurb on the back or picture on the front of a DVD. It has good actors, an interesting plot, talented writers, and somehow it just falls short. It’s as though someone said to everyone involved with the film, “Here’s a piece of paper. Here’s a set of scissors. Turn this piece of paper into two piece of paper.” Twenty minutes later there’s still one piece of paper and everyone is like, “I really don’t know what happened.”
I think the ultimate example of this is Elizabethtown. I think I could actually write a short book on all the things wrong with this movie. James Cameron makes good films. That’s not an opinion; it’s a fact. One would assume that a project he felt so passionately about would be excellent. The cast wasn’t the worst; Susan Sarandan and Kirsten Dunst are well trained actors who carefully choose most of their roles. They wouldn’t be in a movie that completed sucked? Right? Then there was Orlando Bloom. Okay, I admit he should have been a big red flag, but he’s no Keanu Reeves, so I gave the film a chance. By the end, I decided that it might have made three separate and fairly decent movies; however, all together it was like a circus train on fire in a war zone.

The Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer is another example. Somehow they managed to make one of the most fascinating comic book characters (The Silver Surfer) into one of the most frustratingly boring.

On the other hand, some movies that should be awful actually turn out to be amazing. Case in point: Wanted. To quote John Stewart, “By all accounts, this movie should suck.” The previews and plot set it up to be just another flashy, action packed, special affect ridden monstrosity that would rake in a ton of money during the summer movie season. Yet, there was something almost impossible to place, that made it really good. Granted, the cast (Angelina Jolie, Morgan Freeman and James Macavoy) were all excellent actors, but Elizabethtown managed to slip pass the crap radar all the way to cinemas. I think it had something to do with the way it didn’t take itself too seriously. It was almost as if the movie was saying, “I know this is ridiculous and could never happen, but don’t you wish it could?” It owned its own implausibility and dared audiences to take the journey from start to end.

The third film type that manages to evade quality classification is those that are so “bad”, they loop all the way back around the circle to “good”. Wanted was almost like this, but one of the best examples of this is Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, i.e. "Indiana Jones 4". It was so dead-pan, over the top and serious that it ended up being completely hilarious. I found myself guessing the most outrageous direction the plot could go and time and time again found myself being correct. I felt vindicated and entertained. Without a doubt, the films that best demonstrates this quality of film were made in the 1980’s. Earth Girls are Easy, Night of the Comet, anything with Muppets, the list goes on and on for weeks of flicks to satisfy every mood and audience.

Not exactly Jimminy Cricket

Recently I said to a friend

“I think that in the soul of every 20-something woman there is a pubescent boy. Mine is named Frank.”

For a long time, the little sprite inside me that made me love comic books and find words like gaelic funny (because it's gay and lick at the same time!) remained nameless. As ethereal and mischievous as Ariel in Shakespeare's The Tempest, it has been with me since around the time I turned sixteen. Around the time I began to become a woman this little creature hatched from its shell like a deformed velociraptor, the most deadly and awesome of all baby dinosaurs. I didn't realize it at the time, but all the work I put into trying to appear normal feminine during middle school and my freshman year of high school, all that repression was actually sustaining the heat of incubation for my little Jurassic time bomb. I hid him as well as I could, but it's kind of hard to keep a velociraptor under wraps.

Like a little guardian angel, or Hell banished fallen angel, he's there for all the testosterone ridden, angst filled, sex spoofed moments in my life. Every time I watch Boondock Saints or The Punisher, he's there. Every time I rock out to misogynist music, he's there. Every time DC comics publishes a new Batman graphic novel, he's there. Every time I decide not to shower for a couple of days, he's there. He's the inspiration for every Mortal Kombat reference I've ever made. Every time I utter the words, “That's what she said,” he gets bonus points; he's saving them up to mail in for a new dirt bike.

Little known fact: Every time a “Your mom” joke is told, an inner teenage boy gets his wings.

It was this past semester that I finally named him. After watching Donnie Darko for the first time that I realized that Frank had always been his name, I just didn't know it. I realized this after seeing Frank's Halloween costume and thaught, “That's totally something that my Frank would wear.”

In addition to taking part in all the teenage boy things I do, he also tells me to do things. This summer, he's telling me to go see Death Race, starring his favorite actor/seedy Brit, Jason Statham. I must admit, that request may be one I don't grant, simply because of budget issues. I've told him to settle down, but he just turned up his Marshal Mathers LP.

What's so funny?

There's no denying it; I am a HUGE fan of Batman. It's more than the character that fascinates me, it's the entire world he exists in. Thus, I was monumentally happy that Christopher Nolan did justice to the hero and world I so loved when he directed Batman Begins. The moment I walked out of the movie theater, I was already anticipating a sequel. Nolan's follow-up, The Dark Knight “delivers”, in every sense of the word. This time, my friends and I emerged from theater shell shocked, asking each other “What just happened?” The world created in the first film is essentially exploded, stretching up and out, busting beyond the boarders of imagination. I felt physically and emotionally exhausted, fully psychologically challenged.

I had actually promised someone I'd wait to see the movie with him, but saw it on opening night instead. I thought about when I saw it again, except I realized that I would be able to watch it a second time as if I had never seen it before, simply because my mind had so much to process the first time.

Completing Nolan's vision are several spectacular actors who have done an amazing job showing the depth and growth of the characters they portray. Gary Oldman as James Gorden and Christian Bale as Bruce Wayne/The Batman were particular strokes of genius in terms of casting. Once in a life time brilliance, however, came in Heath Ledger's part, in the role of The Joker. It was the subtleties in physicality that made his performance; the slight limp, the hunch, the incessant licking of the inside of his mouth, as if the scars on his face had just been cut and he still had the taste of blood in his mouth. Ledger's portrayal of The Joker was every bit as frightening as a psychopath who lives in Nolan's Gotham should be.

Many critics have said much of the same. I believe, however, that the most frightening aspect The Joker's character became a reality after the unfortunate death of Heath Ledger. Once Ledger died, there was no actor to stand for the role. In every interview, The Joker, rather than Ledger, is referred to as not to associate a tragedy with the film. With the absence of someone to represent The Joker, only The Joker can stand for himself, making it as if the character himself is real rather than a part played by an actor. Ledger's performance has a good deal of Oscar buzz surrounding it. It's a little ironic. Almost funny.

For everything else, there's Mastercard

• Waking up when you're ready and not to an alarm clock.

• Having an action movie marathon.

• Finishing a good book.

• Realizing you can pump two lbs more than last week.

• Putting on a sun dress after a hot shower.

• Catching the express train home.

• Tea and biscuits at 4pm.

• Starting a good book.

• Steamed dumplings and strawberries for dinner.

• Getting past all the math sections in your G.R.E. study guide.

• Knowing there's ice cream in your fridge.

• Finally having your wireless internet working.

• Knowing you're going to see someone you love tomorrow.

• Going to bed tired but not exhausted.

It's the simple things in life that bring me the most joy.

Film foux

Yesterday I rediscovered a 1948 cinematic masterpiece. Every Girl Should Be Married, staring Cary Grant and Betsy Drake is the hilarious comedy of a deranged Anabel Sims, (Drake, clearly an inspiration for Single White Female), determined to marry a gay man, Dr. Madison Brown (Grant). Throughout the film we witness the numerous and creative ways Anabel stalks Madison, no matter how hard he trys to explain to her he’s not in love with her or how firmly committed he is to his “bachelorhood” (i.e. homosexuality). One particularly comedic moment takes place at a lecture Dr. Brown delivers to a hall of feather-hat’ed mothers, to which Anabel has followed him. There, it is revealed to Madison that women are actually quite crafty creatures who usually must trick their would-be husbands into marrying them in a rather roundabout way, as women aren’t allowed to walk up to men and say “How ‘bout those big brown eyes and lets go bowling on Thursday”. He is appalled, and storms out on the maniacally cackling mothers.
The film finishes with Madison conceding to defeat and agrees to marry Anabel (presumably to protect the public from la femme psychopathe) and admits that he was quite impressed by her tenacity and imagination. Besides, after they have a kid, they’ll never have to have sex ever again and he won’t need to try so hard to keep the door to the closet shut.
The moral of this film is that in the 1940’s, no matter what, a woman can wear down any man into marriage, no matter how much he loves his freedom or how gay he is. The institution of marriage shall overcome, after all, Every Girl Should Be Married.
Okay. I’ve clearly been a bit imaginative with my interpretation of this movie but in all honesty it is quite funny, both by 1948 standards and today’s simply because you can read it as I have. I’d recommend this one for any lazy afternoon. For a different take on this film, check out Amy's Classic MovieBlog.

Leavin' on a jet plane

Over the past few days it’s been difficult to post as I’ve been trying to settle in at home. On my way from Bristol I spent a total of thirteen hours in transit. This includes sitting around and waiting in several different places. Normally waiting in an airport while waiting for your gate to be announced is one of the most draining experiences of travel. Fortunately I found a new sitting area that had just been built and tucked away in a corner, so no one actually knew it was there, people just sort of stumbled across it with a look of wonder and surprise. I actually had a fairly pleasant and calm journey at every turn. I kept waiting for something to go wrong but my expectations were always exceeded. Then came the crowning gem of my entire trip: the Air India flight safety video.
Let me begin by saying that Air India is an amazing airline. There were tons of in-flight movie and t.v. options, the food was amazing, the flight was fairly empty, my bags weren’t lost, and the ticket was extremely affordable. There was even a fun comedy animation made special by Air India. They tried to pass it off as a flight safety video, but I knew better. It began with a strange 3D animation of a what I’m going to presume was a human male, walking down the isle of what could have been an air plane. What followed was a thrilling tale of face masks and life jackets in which we meet his similarly deformed 3D wife and child. As luck would have it, it was a double feature! A second video, shot in the same style, showed the inner workings of the plane’s toilet. We learned where to flush, how to distinguish ‘occupied’ from ‘unoccupied’, ‘hot’ from ‘cold’ and a somewhat graphic representation of which items were inappropriate to flush down the toilet.
This video went on for about seven minutes, all the while narrated in sign-language in the upper right-hand corner. I was so mesmerized by this cinematic masterpiece that I didn’t realize it was being narrated in Hindi. Imagine my glee when the entire double feature was replayed in English. I had to sit through the whole shebang all over again while trying not to laugh as loud as the video deserved.
I can’t wait to fly Air India again.

"...Do not hasten to bid me adieu..."

First off, how do people feel about the new banner. Is it too difficult read? Or does that retina strain accurately capture the chaos that is my mental state?

Next, I don't why I was surprised by this, but I was reminded again this evening how saying goodbye never gets easier. As this term draws to a close, many of my friends studying abroad at the University of Bristol decided to get together for a final night out together. Over the next week and a half we will all be returning to home, wherever that might be for however long. More shocking than how hard it has been to say goodbye to so many people who have been such a huge part of my life for the past five months is the way in which the song “Red River Valley” has been stuck in my head for the past week.

This is where things get really sappy.

At my elementary school it was a tradition for the 6^th graders to sing “Red River Valley” to the rest of the school on the last day of classes as they would be moving up to middle school and (hopefully) on to better things. The song goes:

From this valley they say you are going
We will miss your bright eyes and sweet smile
For they say you are taking the sunshine
That has brightened our pathways awhile

CHORUS:
Come and sit by my side, [and be friendly]*
Do not hasten to bid me adieu
Just remember the Red River Valley
And the [folks]** who loved you so true
* some claim this line is “ if you love me”
** has been known to be sung “ cowboy”

It's actually much longer, but this was the only part we sang at school. It's just enough to get the message across. I never thought this song would ever have any real significance in my life after the last day of 6^th grade. It seems I was wrong, as I am about so many things.

I also seemed to forget how freakin' long it takes people to say goodbye. It must have taken a good 45 minutes for us to all say goodbye to one another. This "Long Goodbye" actually turned into a miniature trek up Park Street, the steepest street in Bristol, finally ending in front of a bar where we then stood for another 25 minutes before anyone went home or inside the bar. It's always awkward breaking those things up or being the first to leave. You don't want to seem insensitive, but really I'm just looking for an out the whole time. I try to treat Goodbyes like tearing off a band-aid: you brace yourself for it then just do it in one quick motion.

But this story has a happy ending! There are several friends I've made here who live near to my home-town and where I go to school, so it's nearly certain I'll be seeing them in the fall. Also, some of us have been talking about having a mini reunion three years from now. I really shouldn't worry so much; I know I'll stay in contact with the people who have meant the most to me while others will still hold a special place in my heart and memory along with the city of Bristol.

Okay. I think I need to watch a double feature of Blood Sport and Boondock Saints to wash all this sap off of me.