Dave's musings

1:24am: nothing, as usual
I say bummer a lot in my journal, but not in person. I just realized that after looking over past entries. I'd been thinking of deleting this thing recently, since I don't really write in it and the only reason I read my friends' journals is to procrastinate (no offense to all y'all, I'm seriously quite interested in your lives, but it can't be random that I catch up on my friends' pages mostly when I have papers due). So I'd been going through it, and instead, it inspired me to greater literary works. Or, at least, the roughly equivalent literary work of another inane post.

Living with my parents over the summer is such a mixed blessing. It means that I get good food and accomodations for free in a city that I love to be in (mainly because I can go dancing a lot). But, it also means that my dad nags me a bunch about things like mulching and getting a real job (I did get a real job, actually, but I then lost it. Now I have to find another one, since my fake job won't cut it. That will sound cryptic to almost everybody who reads this.). And, there's something constricting about it, even though my parents would never stop me from doing the things I'd normally do.

I just hung out with a bunch of my friends from high school. I've drifted apart from most of them (well, actually, it was more of a full-speed sailing apart in a couple cases, but yeah). Of the ones who remain, my two closest high school friends won't be in town for much of the summer, and the others are for the most part people I only hang out with in groups whose other members won't be around. It doesn't really bother me very much, though. As long as I can dance, I'll be happy enough.

2:27pm: Dandelion Romp this weekend
Hey Oberlin,

This post is to inform you that the Dandelion Romp's going on this weekend. The Romp is our big contra dance weekend. There will be events pretty much straight from 6:30 on Friday (that's today) through 4 PM on Sunday. Here's a link to the schedule:
http://www.dandelionromp.com/pages/schedule-print.pdf
All of the daytime workshops are free for students, so please check them out! Not all of them are dancing-related. Here are the descriptions of each:
http://www.dandelionromp.com/pages/workshops.html
The evening dances are only $5 for students. Please come by! It'll be a ton of fun. Hard copies of schedules and band bios are available at the Wilder Main desk and at the Romp registration desk in Hales.

11:27am: Virginia Tech vigil
Hey everyone,

There will be a candlelight vigil tonight at 8 PM in Wilder Bowl. Tell everyone you know.

2:07pm: Life
Ooh, what a subject line. I'm so creative and deep. That was a joke. Or, sarcasm, rather.

For those of you who don't know, I don't have classes on Fridays. Also for those of you who don't know, my grandma sends me homemade cookies once a month. If you come visit me, I will give you one (or two). They're not vegan. In fact, they used to be not even vegetarian (she used lard instead of butter). My mom made her start using butter, though. Isn't my grandma awesome?

I had a definite reason for posting, but now I don't remember what it is. Or was. Oh well. Maybe I'll post again later when I remember.

12:53am: classes
I haven't been writing in this thingy so much. Maybe I'll get into a writing mood later for a while. Anyhoo, right now, I'm signed up for four classes, and want to take lessons as well. Technically, I could do that. I don't really want to, though. All four classes are heavy reading ones that meet once or twice a week, and my Wednesdays are just going to be hell (generally 200-300 pages of reading for a seminar, then two other heavy reading classes as well, plus no respite on either end, since my other class is TuTh and also very heavy reading).

So I'm pretty sure I have to drop one. But which?

Criminal Law-- advantages to dropping would be that it's a MW class and with a quite significant workload. Disadvantages are that I won't have another chance to take it, and it seems very interesting, and if I drop it, I probably won't finish my law and society minor.

Loose Canons-- it's a sociology of law class that looks at the classics in the study of law and society. Advantages to dropping would be that it's a MW class, with perhaps a slightly smaller workload but still quite significant (it's a 300 level, 10 person class). Disadvantages are that again I would be much less likely to finish a law and society minor, it's a chance to study how to study, which would be very useful for grad school if I ever want to go (or for my honors thesis if I decide to do that), and if I drop a sociology class I'll feel like all I take is politics classes.

Theories of Justice and Democracy in Contemporary America-- there's no chance I'm dropping my seminar.

Spain and Yugoslavia Under Dictatorship-- dropping this class (another 300-level sociology class) would mean a LOT less reading, especially reading that I only have two days to do. However, it would again make me feel like I'm only taking politics classes, and it would mean all of my classes are on monday or wednesday, which I wouldn't be such a fan of (I like to spread them out).

Well, whatever I do, I'll still have no classes on Fridays, which is pretty sweet. Happy hour, here I come. And Thursday night wild parties. By that, I mean I get to go to dance weekends.

10:23pm: crazy
Being alone in my room for too long makes me go crazy. I start talking to myself, to my computer, etc.. I've left my room for a total of about four or five hours since Friday. Oh, finals time. A few minutes ago, I started clawing at the sides of my monitor. I'm not sure why, so I stopped. At least I haven't been drooling this year.

I would make a very bad hermit, my sense is. Or, maybe this is what my inner self's all about, without all the pressures of society surrounding me. At least I'm productive. My 15 page paper that I started (including pretty much all the research) Saturday afternoon and finished Sunday night kicks major ass. Now, it's just a couple of low-stress take home finals, and I'm done. I even got much of my Christmas shopping done, AND didn't get too crazy presents for my family (though I seriously thought about some pretty ridiculous things). Maybe now I'll start eating real meals again. That would be nice.

11:21am: Cookies!
My grandma sent me cookies today. Yay! If anybody wants a cookie, stop by my room and I'll be sure to hook you up. If you haven't had my grandma's cookies before, they're fucking awesome.

In related news, these past two days have felt incredibly productive. I hope it lasts.

12:25am: creepy day
Today was a very creepy day. I don't think I could stand to be here during the summer, or breaks, or maybe even Winter Term. There were only four people in my economics class, which is a normal-size lecture (the cap on the class is 30, and we certainly had more than 20 at the beginning of the year, and usually about 12-15 people show up for class each time). I don't mind small classes at all. I certainly DO mind classes of four in rooms that can seat fifty. It just seems weird and creepy.

That's just the beginning. At 8 PM, Oberlin's usually quite alive. There are people walking everywhere outside, people sitting in the lounge, people playing music in their rooms, people in the bathroom, people in class or at the library or anywhere. At 8 today, I walked around a bit outside and in Talcott . . . and I saw one person, and she was a couple hundred feet away, carrying bags as if she were leaving. It's definitely a weird feeling.

I generally don't mind spending time alone. Heck, I thought this would be a wonderful opportunity to watch some Star Trek in my room without disturbance (I have acquired several episodes I've never seen before, which is quite the rare occurence). But it's different when not only am I alone in the sense that I am not interacting with others, but when I'm alone in the sense of others not being near. Some people say you can be alone in a room full of people. Well, that's not true for me. Even if everybody in a room is ignoring me, it's definitely not the same as being truly alone. Now, I'm sure everybody ignoring me would be quite unpleasant, but I would definitely not be alone.

And the Voyager episodes that I watched ended up being somewhat disturbing. Not the episodes themselves, but what I got to thinking about because of them. One was about aliens that invade your sleep, and trap you in your dreams until your body dies of malnourishment, which is not entirely pleasant right before you go to bed. The other one, though, was about a near death experience, and got me thinking about death. Which I really don't like to think about, since I don't believe in an afterlife at all, so death terrifies me. The thought that any day, everything I have known could end, and nothing at all would replace it, that I would cease to exist completely, can be disturbing. I sometimes wish that I could convince myself to believe in some religion with a concept of a higher being and an afterlife, since, according to several studies, that would make me happier and live longer. And I fear death enough to really want to live a long time.

And, on a similar note, my DVD burner doesn't work. Bummer. I would say it's the kind of disk I'm using, but I've burned to these disks before with no problem. Stoopid temperamental electronics.

5:46pm: decisions, decisions
So, in addition to my decision below about taking a course P/F, I have a whole lot of other academic decisions to make. Oh, how meetings with the advisor bring such things to light.

I have to decide whether or not to do honors, when to graduate (all I've decided so far is that I'm not going to graduate in May), whether to be a full-time or part-time student next year, and then, of course, what to do with my life after I graduate.

The last question is the biggest, and affects all of the others quite a bit. I'm seriously considering grad school, but I'm not even sure what kind of grad school. I've thought about law school, PhD programs in political science, and masters' programs in applied politics (like public policy or whatnot). My grades and transcript, etc, are good enough to get into any of those things, though I probably would not be a candidate for the best few programs. Oh, life.

I've been slowly disabused of the notion that I must do honors if I want to go to grad school. I do have to do some sort of big work so that I could get a decent recommendation, but that's it. So I'm leaning towards not wanting to do honors right now. Plus, if I don't do honors, I could graduate early, and if I do do honors, I can't.

Which brings me to another question-- when do I graduate? I don't want my parents to pay more than they have to for my education-- no matter what, I'll graduate with way more credits than I need. I've considered being a part-time student for all of next year. However, that would rescind my scholarship and make me no longer eligible for my parents' health care plan. On the plus side, I'd get whatever housing I want, and would be able to spend my senior year with my friends.

Oh, life.

10:55am: and I'm sick again
So I'm sick again. That's three times in three weeks, which is a little bit silly, considering I've never been susceptible to disease. Unfortunately, I missed a quiz this morning. The professor said that I would need a doctor's note to excuse me. I'm extremely reluctant to go to a doctor for something as minor as a stomach virus, though. Especially if I'm already better. "Hey doc, I came to waste your precious time because I was sick, but I'm better now."

I view my options as two-fold. Well, three-fold. Welll, maybe four. Suck it up, and go to a doctor for no reason. Suck it up, and just fail the quiz and deal with it. Go beg the professor to change her mind. Or, take the course pass-fail. I'm leaning towards the last right now.

1:41am: Why I despise John McCain
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2006/09/30/the_john_mccain_charade/

Great article. And it's by an Oberlin grad, too. If you can't access it, comment and I'll email you my login info so that you can get into it (you might have to be a Globe subscriber). Or, I'm sure you could get it through the Oberlin library website, they tend to subscribe to such things.

Edit: I found another website that might work if that one up there doesn't.

http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewWeb&articleId=12071

2:38pm: Iraq, my ExCo, and other tragedies
Recently, some high-up general said that there was no real civil war in Iraq, only sectarian violence. A big part of his way of justifying this claim was looking at then-data showing that there hasn't been mass migration away from major violence centers, which he said was necessary to call it a civil war. Well, since then, the violence has surged, and report came out today saying that 250,000 Iraqis have fled sectarian violence over the last seven months. This deluge of refugees shows no sign of abating.

In related news, people in my exco have been dropping like flies. One fell and deeply bruised his ankle. Another got mono. Another dislocated her knee, and another had to drop the class because of a chronically hurt ankle. Maybe the contra exco is cursed. It must be Corey's fault. He's definitely cursed. Just look at him. I'm just kidding, I love Corey. And no, my exco isn't actually a tragedy, it just made a good subject.

I generally really like discussion sections for classes. But it's always odd when the discussion section goes a little late, and the professor asks a question for people to answer. I'm left with a quandary. I could answer the question, and keep talking or whatnot, and draw the ire of my peers for causing the class to go late. Or, I could just let the awkward silence reign as nobody wants to speak and thus cause everybody to stay later. But the second option could potentially lead to a longer class than the first option. And, who am I to assume that everybody just wants to get out of class, even when I myself would rather stay and discuss political theory? An interesting quandary.

It's weird that the weekend's coming up, and I don't have any contra dancing to do either night. That's so foreign to me. I haven't had a weekend like that for several months. What am I going to do with my time? What did I used to do before I started dancing? Two full nights. Maybe I'll watch some Star Trek. Or do something social. Nah . . . Star Trek.

2:23pm: yar! mass killings, and other such stuff
I forgot to talk like a pirate for the first half of talk like a pirate day, so decided to skip it for the whole day. I mean, it'd be really silly to just start talking like a pirate after I had been talking like a normal person, or like me normally at least, for half the day. So that was a big bummer. At least this year, I will definitely observe no pants day quite strictly.

It's getting cold. That means I'll have to start using skin lotion on my head, which is always a little bit funny feeling. Oh well. It was about this cold when I came to school, so I figure that by moving to Ohio, I got about three weeks of extra summer. Plus a whole lot of extra sunlight, since the sun goes down later here, being on the western end of the time zone.

My classes have been easy and not much work so far. Well, comparatively speaking, at least. They're interesting, but certainly not nearly overwhelming. Partly because I'm only taking three real classes. It's nice, though. I have time for ensembles, and eating in a co-op, and teaching an exco, and saving the planet from the wild fungus-headed lizard-horses. What? Huh? Oh, nothing.

I should get back to work, writing about mass killings in Germany in WWI. Or, I could write about a German labor camp in WWII. Nice, sunny topics to brighten up my day! Or, maybe I should call my congressman about Darfur and tell him to do something about it. Nah, the House is utter crap. Maybe I'll just call John Bolton directly. Anybody know his phone number?

12:57am: confession
Ok, this is my first real confession in a livejournal post. The confession is, I'm drunk right now. It didn't take a whole lot to get me drunk, and yes, this is my first time being anywhere close to drunk (no, I've never been tipsy before). And I am a pretty stupid drunk.

Now, I could probably debate philosophy with the best of them, when I'm drunk. I could probably go into great depth about the nature of the nation-state, and could debate political theory or different structural theories of political economy. However, when faced with a basic decision, I was dumb.

So I don't think I plan on drinking again any time soon. I probably wouldn't be writing this post if I were sober-- maybe in the morning I'd rather just forget it all. I hope I don't get hung over. I'm very tired right now, but don't want to go to sleep. I want to feel myself sober up before I climb into bed, and that hasn't happened yet. This is pretty shocking to me-- I never expected to get drunk. Not at all. Maybe drink socially once I'm 21 (which I have been for a couple weeks, for those of you not in the know), but I didn't expect this to turn into drunk. Oh well. I doubt that it will anytime soon.

In a lot of my posts, I say something like, "in related news," and then say something completely different. I don't really want to write about anything different, though. I hope my grammar's ok. Ooh, I know.

in related news, my grandmother is sending me cookies!! My grandma rules. If any of you want any good, non-vegan grandma cookies, stop by my room Monday or Tuesday. They should be here by then. The post office is actually very efficient. Unlike the Italian post office, which is utter crap. Ok, I'm done posting.

12:12am: I hate empty subject lines. They're so naked. But no, I don't hate nudity.
So Lincoln Chafee won the primary in Rhode Island. Not good news. He'll have a chance in the general election, while the more conservative candidate would have been trounced. People seem to give him too much credit because he opposes Bush on many issues. He's still a Republican. He's still more rightwing than all but two or three Democrats, and I for one find all but a couple Democrats to be far too rightwing for me. I hope he doesn't win the seat. But I think he will.

I just made an awesome pot of Darjeeling. It's Puttabong, a rare, tasty variety, and ooh, it is so good today.

In other news, I just found out today that I can't be an OSCA board rep. And it's all Corey's fault. Actually, that's not true. It's really not his fault at all. But he's a convenient target, even though it's so hard to be mad at his cute, fuzzy face.

The plus side of that is I can go to Columbus to dance on Saturday. Should be fun. And my ExCo starts tomorrow, which should also be fun. I will turn from normal Dave into Professor Dave. Well, maybe not. It'll still be fun, though.

I like it here better than I like it at home. So how come I just spent literally an hour and a half looking up what contra dances I can go to when I get back home again, and lamenting that I'll miss certain ones because I'm at school? Maybe it's that home time is time I feel the need to fill. Or maybe I'm just crazy. Well, I'm definitely crazy, but I'm not sure if that affects it at all.

1:06am: my day. not a routine one. not at all.
Today was an interesting day. The 40th anniversary of Star Trek . . . yet I did nothing at all to celebrate. I did not watch a single episode. Too busy, I suppose.

I took a break from posting. Mainly, because my life became increasingly routine, and I think I've lost the ability to find interesting things in my regular routine. Well, at least I've lost the ability to express those interesting things in a journal with interesting words. Interesting. Meow.

Our first contra dance of the year was tonight. The sound sucked, but besides that, it went really well. I was surprised at how few people showed up-- probably less than half the number who showed up last year. Maybe more of these people will keep coming to dances, though. We'll see. Or, I'll see. Depending on who you are, you might not see. You might not care. But oh, I do.

School has kept me extremely busy. I like it. I particularly like how I'm kept busy with a different thing each hour. Not the same boring delivery route, or even the same workplace. Different buildings, different people, different schoolwork. I went five days without showering and didn't even smell very bad. There's something magic in the air here, I think. Either that, or my deodorant kicks ass. And no, I'm not going to count on the magic, I do plan on showering somewhat reguarly in the future. But it's nice to know that if I can't for some reason, there might be some magic there to save my hygiene.

I haven't really made any new friends since coming to school. I've met some new people, certainly, and maybe I'm even friendly with them. But last year and the year before, by this point, I had made at least a few fairly close friends who I would keep for a long time. Maybe it's because I'm an upperclassman now, in an upperclassman dorm, eating with other upperclassmen for the most part. Or maybe I don't care as much. Or maybe I've lost social skills. I'm leaning towards the second one.

I want to dance more. Like, now. But, that's not really an option, so instead I'll go to bed and dream about dancing.

1:24pm: Crazy week
This week is an incredibly crazy week. And I don't mean just for me. I'm including tunnels collapsing and Israelis killing civilians with wild abandon. I for some reason agreed to play in the pit for my younger brother's musical, and so I have to be at rehearsals and performances all this week. I tried to get Sunday off from work so I could go down to Falcon Ridge, but it was to no avail. Which really sucks, since I very much wanted to go. I'd get a chance to see a bunch of my dancing friends from school, and also some who are scattered around who I don't see too often. Oh well. Maybe next year. Nah, scratch that. DEFINITELY next year.

I have Tuesdays off from work, and I forgot to turn my alarm off Tuesday morning. However, it either didn't go off, or it went off and I turned it off but have absolutely no recollection of doing so. This scares my a little, since if either of those options had happened on a day when I have to work, I'd be screwed. Speaking of my being screwed, I'm going to be wicked tired the next few days, since rehearsals will seriously cut into my napping time. I might just skip the early parts of them so that I can get enough sleep. I won't be able to sleep more at night, either, since I've been getting out around 11 or later, which doesn't exactly leave much time for sleep (I usually get up at 3:30 AM).

I've missed my second Monday dance at Concord this summer already this week, and I'll probably miss my first whole Springstep dance on Thursday, or if not, come late again, which I've done a couple of times. I'm thinking that I really shouldn't have done this stupid play, since I'm not getting paid, it's leaving me ridiculously tired, I've had to miss dances (and I might even have been able to go to Falcon Ridge for a day or two if not for the play), and I don't like the music. So, definitely not doing it next year.

If anybody who reads this sees either of the two following people at Falcon Ridge, please tell them I say hi and miss them. They're two friends from school who graduated who I won't see at all this summer and probably won't see for quite a while:
Adina (short, has curly red hair, freckles, likes to wear a red dress dancing)
Martha (also short, a little stockier, likes to wear light colored skirts (ok, not very distinguishing, sorry), brown hair, probably wearing a splint or brace on her right (I think) wrist)

Ok, that's it for this update.

11:59am: I haven't updated in a long time. Mainly because there's not much going on in my life, really. All I do is work, dance, sleep, eat, and play my saxophone. All of which I have written about extensively at some time or other. I haven't even been watching the Red Sox, since I'm mainly too tired to watch at night. It's after my bedtime and all.

I went to the beach with some contra-types on Sunday. 'Twas mightily fun. Unfortunately, I was incredibly tired for work on Monday, but thankfully I get Tuesdays off, so it wasn't too bad. I've also gone back to saying "hot damn" and "hot diggity dawg" way too much. I wonder why.

Big Papi lost the home run derby after ANOTHER amazing first round. It seems like he does that every year. I'm disappointed. He's the type to be able to win it. Oddly enough, to most of the people who read this journal, that first sentence probably sounded like pure gibberish. Kind of like the next sentence. Ugly purple was pinpointed flower in when went over through his to dance is through.

Ok, this update's done.

11:59am: Update on my employment status for the summer
So, I've kicked my job search as of late into high gear, since my dad's been grumbling. As a result, I've found what amounts to three full time jobs. I will only do one of them, although another I might do part time. The first that I got was a really, really stupid job selling kitchen knives. It doesn't sound stupid, until they tell you that you actually have to find the customers yourself, and charge a commission. If I wanted to do that, I'd just start my own business buying shit wholesale and then selling it to gullible people who don't need it, which I won't do, because it's ridiculous. Then, I also got wind of another friend from high school who's painting her house and needs help. This is in addition to my friend Will, with whom I painted a house last year, who is painting his house as well. Between the two, I could probably eke out a full time summer, but I might do it on my days off now. The job that I accepted is working as a driver for a pastry shop. The people there are really cool, it smells really nice, and I'm perfectly content with it. The pay is low, and the hours suck (I have to finish the delivery route before bakeries open . . . which means, start at 4:30 AM), but it's full time, and I don't feel at all like I'm selling my soul. Plus, I'm generally extremely good at shifting my sleep schedule when need be, and these terrible hours will at least let me dance at night and won't interfere with any of my gigs.

In other news, I haven't danced too much lately. I'm going to see if I can get used to this new job's hours before I start doing anything particularly crazy (like driving to Greenfield for a dance, then coming back at 2 AM, sleeping for two hours, and going to work). I'm pretty sure, though, that I'll be able to work stuff out. I get two days off every week, and possibly three if they hire another guy, and they're generally flexible about which days, though it's supposed to be Tuesday and Wednesday. I might be able to convince them to give me Thursday and Friday off during Falcon Ridge so I can head over there for Thursday's revels. I will probably have to skip my family vacation, but I don't even know where they're going yet. The last few years, we've been to Hawaii, Italy, France, and Nantucket (ok, not as cool as the others), but this year, my dad's practice hasn't been doing so well, and I doubt we can afford a fancy vacation. But we've always gone somewhere for two weeks, for as long as I can remember, so it's out of the question to NOT take a two week vacation, but I think my parents are just trying not to think about it right now.

My apologies for the boring entry. There will be incredibly stimulating, interesting views of my romantic, adventurous life soon. And by "soon," I mean, probably never, but I'm still retaining some hope.

11:49am: my health, Star Trek, and other wildly interesting things
I woke up feeling sick this morning, which mildly sucks, but I suppose I deserve it. I ate Rose's half-finished pancake last night, despite her being sick, and figured a few germs wouldn't hurt. Apparently, I was wrong. Or maybe it's something completely different that caused it. I've always thought I'm allergic to my younger brother, but my dad says there's no medical basis for believing that. It's not that bad of a sickness, and it's actually gotten better since I woke up a little over an hour ago, but it's enough to keep me from wanting to leave my house for a while. And today would actually have been cool enough for me to bike somewhere without sweating my ass off.

I'm probably going to miss Springstep on Thursday, or at least most of it, since I have rehearsal until 9 in Dedham. My attempts to get the day changed were shut down. Last time, though, it got out early, so maybe it will this time. Even if it gets out right on time or a little late, if I can be quick about putting my crap away and not socializing, I'll make most or all of the second set. I have a couple of gigs on Thursdays and Mondays throughout the summer, which kinda sucks, but whatever.

I've been doing very badly lately at keeping up with the news. Which is weird, because I have tons of time to, and in fact usually read the entire Boston Globe every day. But none of it sticks in my head, and I haven't been reading my usual array of left-wing blogs and magazines. At least I've been watching the Daily Show and the Colbert Report most of the time. Being home with little to do definitely is not good for my television habits. I don't watch a lot, and I never will, but the combination of Star Trek being on for 5 hours every day and my usual boredom has made me fall prey to that advertisement-driven demon. I decided a few days ago that I don't want to own a television when I grow up. I will, of course, subscribe to the Red Sox on mlbtv.com, but that's cheap. And yes, I will grow up, eventually. And yes, my kids will hate me when I don't let them watch tv except for the Red Sox and Star Trek on my computer screen, the latter of which will be ancient history by then.

It's nice out. I'm going to go read outside. Bye, dedicated LJ readers.

11:56am: I need to find something to do. Life can get boring sometimes. It's been raining in Boston for a month and a half, with a couple breaks, but hopefully that's clearly up now, so I can actually do something outside if I want to. I've also already seen all the Star Trek episodes they're showing reruns of right now. And for some reason, even though I really enjoy both of my books I'm reading for fun right now, I can't get myself to sit down for more than half an hour to read them. Maybe something's wrong with me. I could be diseased. Or maybe I've forgotten how to read for fun.

I also have rehearsals for the next two weeks scheduled on my two favorite days to contra dance, and the Red Sox have been losing. Wow, I'm such a whine-fest today. On the bright side, it's supposed to be nice tomorrow, so I can finally read outside or do something wildly fun and exciting like that.

6:40pm: Iron Dancer weekend
Hi everybody. I thought I had updated Monday night really late about my weekend, but apparently I didn't. Well, I think I wrote the update but it didn't post since the internet's been a little spacey at home, and I never reposted it. So anyways, here's take two. This time, I'm posting on enough rest to sound coherent.

Memorial Day weekend (and maybe Labor Day weekend too, I'm not sure) is Iron Dancer weekend. If you dance Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday at the Dawn Dance, and Monday in Nelson, NH, then you qualify to be an Iron Dancer. Almost everybody dances Thursday at the VFW/Springstep now, which is what I did. Friday and Saturday, I danced at Concord, and it was ok at best. A lot of other dances were going on farther away both days, so not all the best dancers were there, plus Friday was mostly squares. I decided to go to expand my horizons or whatnot, but it was crap. I really don't like squares. The Dawn Dance in Brattleboro was amazing. Tons of fun, lots of good dancers. I drove straight home afterwards so I could make my grandmother's birthday.

Monday in Nelson wasn't as good. I got to call a dance, though, and it went really well. I'm going to try to see if I can get guest calling spots at other dances around here. It's weird, I wasn't really tired at all in Nelson despite being on about two hours of sleep, but I'm much more tired now that I've had some recovery time. I got a nice medal and certificate from Lisa Sieverts for being an Iron Dancer, which is really cute. I also met a lot of dancers, and I'll be seeing some of them quite a bit this summer.

In other news, I've gotten pretty bad grades for me so far. My worst semester at Oberlin, and in fact worse than any in high school, either. We'll see how it goes as more of them get in. I'm a little annoyed, since this was a semester without a whole lot of work for me until the very end, when there was waaay too much work. Bad distribution. Since I haven't started either of my summer jobs yet, my dad has pounced on my perceived idleness. In addition to normal chores, like the family's laundry, dishes, mowing the lawn, etc, he's having me wash all the deck furniture, wash the deck itself, and paint the deck. Should be wicked exciting. And yes, that was dripping with sarcasm.

I'll hopefully be emailing people to keep in touch this summer. I don't like to send mass emails, instead I try to send personal ones only, and when I'm thinking of a particular person. If you want to get emails, you can comment here or let me know, but I may very email you if you don't want to get them or don't particularly care, so only comment I guess if you think I don't think about you much. This has the potential to be a somewhat lonely summer for me, as my two best friends from high school won't be around too much, but we'll see.

12:55am: I danced at Springstep tonight. 'Twas really awesome, I brought one of my best friends from high school along, and we had a blast. Lift Ticket and Beth Molaro . . . awesome. I liked her a lot better tonight, possibly partly because it was a much better crowd. She still had some unclear moments, but that was mostly the sound reinforcement people's faults, since we could barely hear her in the back when she called squares, which just happens to be the only time we actually NEED to hear her.

I'm seriously considering doing the Iron Dancer thing this weekend, which is dancing tomorrow at Rehoboth or Concord or Greenfield (for me it's probably going to be Rehoboth but maybe Concord), Saturday in Greenfield, Sunday night the Dawn Dance (which I will go to no matter what), and Monday night in Nelson, NH. The least likely one is Satuday night in Greenfield, though. It'll be an awesome dance (5 1/2 hours long with Lift Ticket and Airdance!), but it's just so far for one dance, and I'd have to find somebody to stay with that night, then spend all of Sunday idle. Plus I may have to go up to see my grandparents sometime, too, and Saturday would be a good time for it. We'll see.

Well, regardless, 'twill be much fun. I'm already psyched. On another note, I've barely seen my mommy so far since I've been home. She went on a business trip last weekend, and got home Tuesday, but Tuesday I went up to stay with my grandparents to watch over my grandfather until Wednesday night. I saw her today, but tomorrow morning at 5 AM she's going on another business trip all weekend. It's very poopy.

4:50pm: Woohoo, Mike returned the Ipod. Now, I can unpack stress-free!

3:14pm: If anybody who reads this and is still on campus sees my erstwhile roommate, Mike McGee, PLEASE tell him to call me. I had to turn in an Ipod that I borrowed for a class, but when I went Saturday the office wasn't open, so I asked Mike to do it for me on Monday. The professor emailed me yesterday and said he had never gotten it, so I've been calling and emailing Mike frantically all day today and yesterday, and he hasn't responded. So if any of yous see him, please tell him to contact me, I'm not sure what else I can do.