Today's not been bad for me. I got my limited edition Scarlet's Walk in the mail today (it's so cool, it's like a little prize pack {g}) and my Schubert for clarinet book that I ordered to put myself over the $25 mark to get free shipping. My behaviorism class went well. I didn't have to talk to the teacher, I just got into this girl's group, and she'll call me and tell me what's she's doing. Then Nathan, Uncle John, and I went to Aunt Marjory's for awhile. Now we're back here, and later Nathan and I will go have a late dinner and watch some movies, like The Exorcist and Nightmare on Elm Street III.
Here's a picture of a monster. I scanned it from a book a long time ago. The book is nearly as old as I am. The picture is torn, so don't be offended by the tape.
posted by Beth at 9:10:00 PM
Wednesday, October 30, 2002
Yow, I have a headache, and surprisingly this one isn't sinus-related.
My Russian midterm was today. Kurt Vonnegut's name was mentioned on the test; it was odd. I am largely unfamiliar with his work, nor do I care to become familiar with it.
Yesterday, I lied to a professor, and I've been feeling bad about it. We have to do an experiment in behaviorism, which sucks a whole lot. If I were smart, I'd've gotten in some, any, group, even though I thought what they were doing was stupid. Instead, I tried to come up with my own idea. Last week, it ended with me telling the prof that I'd try to condition my hamster and get her to come to me when I shine a light or something similar. I don't even know why she'd allow it, since 1. This is supposed to be a group project, and my hamster and I are not going to meet with people do accomplish this, and 2. She didn't want us to use animals. Then I decided that I'd be rotten at teaching my hamster a trick. It just sounds impossible, and I think I'd mess it up. I told her Tuesday I wanted to do something else, and she asked why, and I lied and said my hamster was noncompliant, and she bit me once and it drew blood and blah blah blah. Well, I do think Carmelita would be concompliant, but I'm certainly not afraid of her after being bitten. So I don't feel bad because I lied to the teacher, I feel bad, because I feel like I misrepresented my hamster. That's totally weird, but I feel guilty. Class meets tomorrow, and she's like going to ask the class if anyone wants to work with me, and it'll be embarrassing, and blah. Really, I generally prefer to work alone, but after this is done, we have to give presentations, and I don't want to do mine alone, because we aren't *supposed* to. Bah. Then there's Adolescent Development, which I'm not going to. People are just doing their presentations, and mine and my partner's is next week, so why should I go to school on Halloween? I'm actually very interested in seeing the other presenatations, but I'll see enough next week.
I got the 9th Lemony Snicket today, and I'll begin reading it after I finish The Exorcist. I saw that Target also had Scarlet's Walk, in both the regular and limited edition versions. I should have waited and bought mine there instead of ordering through Amazon. I figured that it'd be impossible to find at the store. I was wrong wrong wrong.
posted by Beth at 11:22:00 PM
Tuesday, October 29, 2002
Oh and grr, I suck. For my magazine article writing class, we have an assignment due November 19th where we have to cover an event of some kind. My intent was to write about the Tori Amos show on my birthday. But to be on the safe side (I have a habit of flaking out and not being able to interview anyone), I told myself that this weekend, I'd take notes on either of the hayrides or the parade and interview some people, as a fallback in case the cocnert doesn't work out. So of course for a number of reasons, I wrote nothing about the hayrides or parade. I must must must force myself to talk to people at the Tori Amos show. Oh please let there be freaky people there who are starved for attention and will talk to me willingly and easily.
Now I am off to bed to continue reading The Exorcist, which, so far, is a real delight.
posted by Beth at 5:36:00 AM
Let me get this out of the way before I talk about my weekend.
The people in my Russian class are idiots!! GRAAAHHHHHH!
We had this homework assignment where he gave us a paragraph in Russian, and we had to translate it and write it out in English. So today, he was reading the English aloud, and it was something like this. "This girl hates American radio. All her girlfriends love NSync and Britney Spears, but she listens to Canadian folk music—"
So someone interrupts, and says, "There is Canadian folk music?"
"Who plays Canadian folk music?"
"I don't know, you mean like They Might Be Giants?"
"They Might Be Giants are Canadian?"
"There is Canadian folk music?"
"Yeah, like Alanis Morissette."
RRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!! I can't even begin to point out what's wrong with that exchange. PEOPLE ARE RETARDED! sdihjfowuiejkjockhaodhf wuier killmurderstabshootstrangle
So anyway... Friday, was really uneventful. I thought Nathan and I were going to see 13th Child, but Nathan fell asleep right away, and I did homework and fell asleep early myself. I still haven't seen it, but I heard that the New Jerseyans are all old hicks, sex-crazed teenagers, and know-it-all investigators. An article in the paper said so, and it was really badly received, especially by people who know anything about the Jersey Devil. The trouble is, the majority of horror movies have stock characters like that, so I don't think it was some attempt to pick on people from the area. Interestingly, the writer talked to a girl who set up a webpage about the Jersey Devil, and they mentioned it; what's kind of neat about that is that I bookmarked the page the day before I read the link in the paper.
On Saturday, Nathan, Mark and I went to see the Halloween parade in town. I'd actually never seen it before. It was kind of low-key, I suppose. TV has made me think that every parade everywhere has rows upon rows of people pushed up against those little waist-high barricade things. There wasn't much to see, and Mark left us to go meet his girlfriend afterward. Oh hey, but I got a blue democrat balloon, Nathan got a democrat baseball cap, and I also got a piece of gum someone threw off a float as well as a pretty flower. People from a local florist were handing out flowers to all the ladies. (Heh, I call myself a lady.) The flower and perhaps the gum were the only things I cared to receive, although I tied the balloonstring to my purse and made Nathan wear the hat. After that, Nathan and I went to Medford for a hayride, because Beth digs the hayrides, and my whole Halloween is wrecked, if I don't go on at least one. It was at a Christmas tree farm, and it was pretty good, though it tried to be funny about as much as it tried to be scary. Nathan bought me a green glowstick and an orange and black pinwheel. I like objects. {g}
Sunday, Nathan, Mark, and I went to the Deptford Mall, so Nathan could get tickets for Frank Black in Philadelphia. I'd go but it's on a Thursday and I'm afraid to miss another class. We got there at 4:35, and the jerky people said they stopped selling them at 4:30. Ticketbastard, indeed. We walked around, and bought candy and fancy drinks at a coffee place. Then we ate at a Pizza Hut. I didn't even know there was a Pizza Hut in Deptford. Then we went on another hayride in Bellmawr. My hat goes off to Nathan for getting to the hayrides in Medford and Bellmawr without a hitch. Anyway, this one cost half as much, and we spent like an hour and 20 minutes in line. My hat goes off to Mark for being able to scream about the monsters in public and not feel embarrassed or look ridiculous. The hayride itself was about 15 minutes long, then we had to get out and walk, which I did not know about beforehand. There was a scary-type path on the way to the "funhouse." I guess I didn't read that article from the Courier Post very carefully. And by "Funhouse" they mean a house where you stumble around through near and complete darkness and almost trip over things. None of it was scary, of course. I had fun as I always do on such things. The scariness was me thinking I'd trip and fall getting off the rickety cart, and walking through the "quicksand" on the path, and the suspension bridge on the path, and in the dark in the funhouse, and across the rickety board in the funhouse, and down the ramp in the complete darkness of the funhouse. I swear, it was something a normal amusement park would never put up, for fear of being sued. I guess the Bellmawr Ecological Center is more gutsy in that respect. (An aside, I've been through a couple mirror mazes and regular mazes, and perhaps a haunted house or two, but I'd never knowingly go into a funhouse. Just because. I remember Dorothea and I refusing to go into one in Wildwood once, and as far as I know, she's probably the only person I know who knows what I mean, when I say I don't like the idea.) After that, we tried seeing a movie, but the midnight movie is dead, in our area, apparently. The movies in Deptford were completely closed, and there were some late-ish showings in Cross Keys (where I heard some guy, who was cleaning up, got shot in the head a couple times last week, and it was 1am and he had to walk to the Wal-Mart to get help, but he lived. Yikes.), but I cannot rationalize paying $8 for something that would only cost me $5.50 somewhere else. So we just went home.
I guess it was Wes Craven weekend or some crap, because I showed Nathan The People Under the Stairs (a rather weird movie that gets cornier as I get older) and A Nightmare on Elm Street (a movie that makes me all happy and comfortable and junk). I have this idea that there are movies that everyone should see, because *I* like them, and since Nathan is usually around, I force him to watch most of 'em.
Tonight after my class full of RIDICULOUSLY STUPID PEOPLE, I went to Party City to try to find a costume, and everything was sold out or not in my size (Incidentally, Marilyn Monroe would not have fit into the Marilyn Monroe costume.), so I don't know what I want to do yet. I do know, however, that wearing the same costume more than twice is square.
Man, I sure had a lot more to say than I thought. And it was pretty heavy in both local references and italics.
posted by Beth at 5:16:00 AM
Friday, October 25, 2002
I feel kind of weird for pointing this out. Tonight, I was going through old Halloween and quasi-Halloween tapes, and I was looking for that episode of SNL that Christian Slater hosted, because it had a few Halloween sketches in it. Anyway, that tape also had The Hunt For Red October on it, which I taped when one of the big networks aired it (not to mention Elvira Mistress of the Dark, but you shut up, because I like Elvira {g}). So I thought I'd watch the first couple minutes of The Hunt For Red October, because I remembered it being in Russian and the title being in Russian letters, and I wanted to see if any would sound familiar or whathaveyou. So when it got to the title in Russian letters, I got a good look at it. Well I don't know how this got by, but they use letters that aren't Russian. Well, "red" is correct, but in "October," there's a letter that looks like an "I" and there is no such letter in the Russian alphabet. So there's an "ia" when there should be that backwards R. Also at the end of the word is a forward R, which also is not a Russian letter, because the Russian R sound looks like a "P". Now, I know Ukrainian has a few different letters and so do other slavic alphabets. For example, if you see an I with two dots over it, you can know it's Ukrainian. I just find it weird that no one fixed this, then some lame-ass like me notices it. Strange.
posted by Beth at 8:35:00 AM
Thursday, October 24, 2002
Ha ha, I saw The Ring tonight, and I really, really liked. It does leave me with a few questions, though.
posted by Beth at 12:19:00 AM
Monday, October 21, 2002
There was a Ben Folds concert on that Comcast Music Choice channel tonight. Lucky for me, I was watching the Brady Bunch on TV Land at 9 to find out about the concert which came on at 10. At first, I was sure it was going to be exactly the same as the live DVD. Parts of it were (Tiny Dancer, Song for the Dumped, Philosophy), but others weren't (Zak and Sara, Annie Waits, Gone). I'm glad I didn't stop taping it and watch something else, like I very nearly did. Ben is so great; he has kind of a happy but sad thing going on, for me, anyway. Today was a big, lousy waste, aside from that.
Oh, I forgot to point out a little something about yesterday. Marji's husband Ronnie doesn't ride rides. At all. So it's kind of weird of him wanting to go to a big theme park. He's all about playing games, though. He won Marji four things, including a giant shark, which was taller than any us and big enough around that it was hard to hold onto. It barely fit into Marji's little car, so we had to put the tail in between the front seats and the head all the way into the back almost touching the back window. I have no idea how Ronnie could see to drive. It was weird.
I wish that there was a place near enough for me to walk to, where I could get a parttime job. I'm not counting the bar or the adult bookstore.
posted by Beth at 2:51:00 AM
Sunday, October 20, 2002
Stuff.
1. Nathan and I saw Ben Folds Friday night. Ben is amazing. Ben Lee opened, and he wasn't bad, but when my feet hurt, getting interested in new people is harder than usual. But wow, Ben Folds, and this time, though not too close, we were actually able to see Ben, because the supertall people weren't right in front of us. Yessir, I like the Ben Folds.
2. Saturday night/yesterday/earlier Nathan and I went with Marji and Ronnie to Great Adventure like we were going to do last week, but it rained and Marji and I were sick. It was awfully crowded and we got there really late, so Nathan and I got to ride only five rides, and not the five best rides, either. Oh well, next year, we'll get there earlier and crap. Afterward, I think I had the best Taco Bell food in the universe.
3. It seems that I missed a local TMBG show, and the sun still came up and the world is still here.
4. I only just found out about this 13th Child movie, but I'm all excited about it. I remember hearing a little something about it being filmed in the area, sometime ago, but I'd forgotten. I haven't even seen any trailers, yet; on the carride home, we heard a commercial, and it intrigued me. I hope it isn't cheesy. I mean, I adore local folklore and it's my area and woo and wee! It opens on Friday, so I must go see it next weekend.
posted by Beth at 8:17:00 AM
Thursday, October 17, 2002
I meant to blog this last night. After my Russian class, my uncle and I had dinner at Friendly's. Our booth was right next to one containing some kind of contestant from the World's Worst Dad Contest or some crap. He had two little kids with him, and he was trying to make small talk with his kindergarten-age kids or something. So he said, "Do you want to be on TV?"
"No."
"You don't want to do commercials?"
"No."
"Not even for Hot Wheels and toys and stuff?"
"No."
"But Natasha does commercials. Don't you want to do commercials?"
"No."
Like who is he? The dad from Magnolia? It was so creepy, him trying to force his kids to want to be on TV so he could make money and all that crap. And the way he was talking to him, it was like he didn't even freaking know them—his own kids! "Do you like ice cream, Grant? Ew, you like mint ice cream? I don't. That's a stupid question anyway, 'who likes ice cream?' Everybody likes ice cream."
Last Christmas, someone gave me a pack of stuff containing a little bag, lotion, bodywash, a puff for the bodywash and a candle. Most of that stuff is long gone, but I'm just now starting to burn the candle. It's called "romance," but it's kind of stinky and smells like Play-Doh. Yet I burn it anyway.
posted by Beth at 7:41:00 AM
Monday, October 14, 2002
WATER OF AIR. You're aloof, depressed and seasoned. You'd make a good psychologist, executioner, black widow, arsenic poisoner, heretic queen or commentator. You're too witty for your own good. Have to get up early in the morny morn to fool you, as you spot lies a mile away. And WOE TO THOSE who dare attempt such a stupid move. You're Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween, when she cuts Michael's head off. You're Anne Robinson, the host of The Weakest Link!
Hey, I *would* be good at those jobs. And I do like Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween, but I do not act like her. I'm no Ann Robinson, though.
posted by Beth at 8:04:00 PM
Saturday, October 12, 2002
Okay, it's not very good-looking, I know. I'm not color-minded.
Tonight, I had to go to the mall to ask wobblehead vendors about them. The Hall of Heroes place that usually had them didn't have any, this time. I didn't really look very hard, as I was distracted by the Sanrio stuff (they had a big sweater that looks like erin's Chococat shirt, but it's a sweater. It's so great and...brown!" {g}), so maybe they did have some. I ended up going into a sports collectibles store and the guy there was helpful and nice, but I'm such a loser. Gah. I didn't write the questions down beforehand or anything, so of course I got the stage fright and mumbled a couple quick questions, and he provided answers, then I ran away and wrote what I remembered, rather than writing while he was talking. I'm such a spaz in those situations. I have crazy social anxiety problems. A bunch of online wobblehead collectors have been answering my questions, and they're all really nice about it, too. Trouble is, they all collect sports types, and I wanted to talk to a more varied group. It's okay, though.
Last night, I downloaded "Plantman" by Gary Young. That song is the greatest. A long time ago, Dorothea and I saw the video on Beavis and Butthead and became mildly obsessed with it; we could never find the album, Hospital, at the store, though, so we never bought it. I've been told that a Sonic Youth person is in the video. I think it's the drummer, and I think he's dressed up as a flower. Man, it's such a neat song. {g}
Oh oh, and one more thing—my uncle gets Interview magazine and tonight he showed me an Aimee Mann interview by, of all people, Janeane Garofalo. I must clip it and read it.
posted by Beth at 11:46:00 PM
Oh yikes, yesterday, I saw the most disturbing episode of Good Times ever. I haven't even seen that many episodes of Good Times in the first place, but this takes the cake of weirdness. I missed the beginning. When I came in, there was this boy at their apartment, and everybody thought he was slow. He didn't answer people, and they thought he was in his own little world or something. But then they see that he can draw, and he kicks the son (not J.J)'s ass at checkers. ("There are only three things in this world that will never happen. You'll never walk on water. You'll never outsmile smile Donnie and Marie. And you'll never beat my son at checkers.") Then the mom, her name is Florida, right? She notices that the boy isn't slow, he's just hard of hearing. He can read lips, so he only answers people when he's looking and whatever. Then the boy's mom comes to bring him home, and Florida tells her what the deal is. She says no, and they're going to send him to a special school and all this crap. His mom tries to prove he can hear. So she gets him to turn around, then she calls his name and he answers, and Florida was all, "yeah, because you YELLED at him." Then it turns into this huge "don't tell me how to parent" argument. While they're bickering, the boy says he's leaving, and the mom just sends him off, not really paying attention. Oh, I should mention that the elevator is out, and they live on the 70th floor or something. So after some more arguing, they realize he isn't there, and they go to stop him from trying to use the elevator. Everybody runs to the hallway screaming his name. The elevator door opens, he turns around to greet them, they're screaming, he thinks they're seeing him off, he backs into the elevator, he falls, the credits roll.
Yikes. That was so weird and scary, and what the hell?
(And I won't ask how, if he can hear his mother, when she yells, he can't hear five people yelling.)
posted by Beth at 7:47:00 AM
Friday, October 11, 2002
ACK! I was a stupid loser, so I downloaded AOL 8.0, and it sucks worse than ever. So many wastey things, like different color backgrounds and purple smileys and animal smileys. And yet I can't use these >'s to quote my email. I still have no option to stop the HTML quoting that non-AOL people can't even see right. Feh.
And I went to Mark's house tonight, and it's a really nice place.
posted by Beth at 4:33:00 AM
Thursday, October 10, 2002
I have a really hard test tomorrow. I'm very worried about it, and I haven't started to study yet. Instead, I keep thinking about how ridiculous that new Justin Timberlake video is. What's with the dancing at 7-11? And what's with the dirty rap in the middle that has nothing to do with the dorky rest? And what's with the way he, er, talks and stares at the camera? And what's with him saying, "drums"?
This isn't a new reaction, I'm still just not getting it, after a couple weeks. {g}
And not that it matters or anything, but that song smells more than any N*Sync song I have ever heard in my life, and I am no fan of N*Sync. There. I said it. {g}
posted by Beth at 2:55:00 AM
Monday, October 07, 2002
Hmm, I haven't blogged in what feels like a long time, so let's see what I'm up to.
Last Thursday, I crawled out of bed to order tickets for the Tori Amos show in New Jersey next month. I'm still pretty surprised that I'm going to go to a show of hers. And of all days, it happens to be on my birthday. But the Internet presale on TicketMaster kills me. I forgot how much I hate the reloading and the trying again for something better. And this time, TicketMaster's site was being temperamental. This was also the first time I had to enter a password. I had the email with the password in it, but I didn't realize that, so I lost a few minutes' time. I ended up with row N in the orchestra. I really hope that's good. And I'm on the side, so I hope she gets up and stuff, so I don't just see her back the whole time. And to make the zillionth ever complaint about TicketMaster, and the most obvious one—it kills me how two tickets valued at $80 cost $100. Well, it's my birthday. I hope that's a valid excuse.
I now have a new nightly ritual of taking care of my pets' health. Everynight, I make my rounds around the house. I brush Dewey's teeth (something I wish I did with Sam, because he was just so tolerant, and his teeth did get kind of bad) with special enzymatic toothpaste. He's getting to be very good at that. Then I give each cat a one-a-day vitamin; I'm very glad that they think they taste good, since the damn things are bigger than a Rolaid and I could never get them to force down that many broken up pieces of it. Then I give Carmelita a treat. I'm kind of thinking I should brush Gypsy's teeth, but I don't want to do it in the morning, when no one else is home. I can't do it while Harry's home or Gypsy will bite me. She's only really good to me, when Harry isn't around.
I feel bad about missing Neko Case in Philadelphia last Tuesday, but I was too afraid to miss class.
I have a sore throat which developed about two days ago. It's doesn't hurt a lot, but it's kind of a nagging irritation. I hope I'm not getting sick. I'm going to have to bring a bunch of hard candies to school tomorrow.
I feel wracked with guilt in that I will not be seeing TMBG in Philadelphia next weekend. They rarely play Philadelphia, and I've seen them only once this year, but there are so many other expenses, like Ben Folds who will be at the very same venue the day before TMBG will. This TMBG show is costing $25 (kind of a lot), and it's also a McSweeney's show, something I don't really care about. I can rationalize my ass off, but I just have weird feelings about missing Them. I haven't missed 'em in over three years. Bleah.
Speaking of said expenses, this Friday, Nathan and I are supposed to be going to Great Adventure (or Six Flags, if you will). My cousin Marji and her husband Ronny are supposed to meet us there, and there's a small chance that Dorothea and John will come, too, which would be neat. But man, the park apparently did away with their "50% off after 5pm" policy, meaning that we could stay from 5-11 and pay $50 apiece. I've been looking for good coupons; I found some $10 off ones, but that isn't good enough, no sirree. Marji found some that say "$10 off" on the front, and the back lists dates as far as November 3rd, as well as say, "50% off after 4pm." I have every reason to think they'll be valid, yet I have this fear of getting to the gate and being told, "we can't accept this." I agonize over worries like that.
I hope I can write my trend paper about wobbleheads. I hope there's enough to say and research available. It would be a cool thing to pursue, and I don't have any second choices, anyway.
Last weekend, I found a tape with a Halloween episodes of Martin and Family Matters on it. Now I see that I have not one but TWO Halloween episodes of Family Matters on tape. You are jealous. Now if I can only find that episode of Drexel's Class...
I think I'm going to force myself to change these colors by the end of the weekend.
Oh oh, and today, I got a postcard with Miss Dolly Parton on it in the mail from Colleen. :D
Whoa, sarah left the 100th comment. She deserves a scented candle (or some rap music) or something. Well, I can't afford that, right now. {g}
posted by Beth at 3:19:00 AM
Tuesday, October 01, 2002
Oh, and dig this. For that same class mentioned below, one of our books is a collection of light articles from the Wall Street Journal. The ones we've read so far have been pretty interesting. Today we were discussing an article from the past week's reading about a trend where more and more guys in their 20s are moving back in with their parents and more girls of that age are moving out. The article was from 1997. I thought it was really cool, and I can think of a lot of people who still live at home. According to the article, the guys are doing it mostly because their moms are willing to do their laundy, the rent is cheap, there's food, and they can use extra money to buy whatever toys and cars they want. The girls aren't staying at home because they're more likely to be nagged and would feel less comfortable bringing a guy over, so they lived in cramped apartmenes with very little cool stuff..
Anyway, in class, a bunch of kids were saying, "yeah, that's me." And the Aussie girl was saying, "that's my boyfriend, and I wish it weren't." And I was thinking, "haha, that rocks," because, while I admire everybody who can get out and live on their own, I value my toys and junk more than I value my own independence. But this one lady who was in her early 40s and who had a 21 year old daughter was downright offended. It was crazy. She was acting like it was so disgraceful that some 27 year old guy was living with his mom, because he'd rather save up for a cool car. She said something about how it was disrespectful or something, and her son had "better be" out of hte house by the time he was out of college. I dunno, I was just wowed by her anger toward the whole thing.
posted by Beth at 11:43:00 PM
Well, now, why don't you people who read this (whomever you might be) help me out with something?
For my Magazine Article Writing class, I need to have a rough draft turned in by the 15th of an article about a new trend. It can be about anything, but I have no ideas. The teacher's examples were things like the bottled water craze and how body piercing is popular, although those things aren't brand new trends. I'll have to do a little research on it, like looking up statistics and asking some people some questions, but nothing too huge. I just don't know what to write about, so if you are nice, you will suggest something. {g}
posted by Beth at 10:26:00 PM
