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Just what I needed this week: my iBook is on the fritz, and I'm afraid it's already crashed entirely. Documents were recently backed up; music and photos were not. Frell.

Dear Santa: Please save my computer, or least help me find an inexpensive way to do so. For my peace of mind in daily life, I need my computer to be operational almost as badly as I need to find a job. (The two are not unconnected, obviously.) I've been pretty good this year, I think, and far too much of my life is packed into that little Mac for it to be gone.
Thank you for your time and consideration -- apologies for the lateness of this request.
Love, Emily

What else? That's pretty much the news. The drive out here wasn't too, too bad, and because we were running late, I got to spend the night at my grandparents' house in Cincinnati. Grandma taught me how to knit, and it's totally my new favorite hobby -- which nicely enhances my old-lady lifestyle. Last night I started knitting at the end of Ocean's 11, and went all the way through My Best Friend's Wedding. Tonight, I'm waiting for Swing Time to come on Turner Classic Movies, and for the Yuletide archive to go live.

Happy holidays, all!

You might well ask. It's been one week -- a week that hasn't been interesting per se, but it's gone by. I've read two books and started two others. Even though I'm not usually a girl who loafs around all day in front of the TV, that's what I've done for the past two days. I'm making up for months of hardly watching anything, apparently. Total number of boxes unpacked thus far: two. What a success story, eh?

Unfortunately, it's clear that I've fallen into the dreaded slump. I'm fighting inertia on the job front, loneliness on the social front, and boredom -- TV aside -- on the home front. The best thing about my day is driving to pick Mom up from work. I roll down the windows, crank up the iPod, and cruise through the student housing near campus, feeling a mix of joy and regret that I'm finished. Joy usually wins out, especially if I'm blasting really excellent tunes.

And to save this from becoming the biggest downer of all time, I'll just say that I had my first haircut in a year on Friday, and I couldn't be more thrilled. It's just over my shoulders now, instead of halfway down my back, which is a significant improvement. I didn't realize how much it was really bothering me until it was gone...and then I was very, very happy. The days of crazy long hair are officially over, and it's a good thing.

This is the last time I'll sleep in my childhood home. : (

It started to hit me -- this move is actually happening -- when my uncle came to get my car this weekend. I don't remember a car before the Mazda; it's the car I learned to drive in -- learned to drive stick, no less (yes, that was a traumatic year); this car, as Jenna once said, smelled like high school, and it also had the remnants of my crayons melted into the back seat cushion fom the summer of 1990. It was a good car.

My room is 90% packed. Twenty-one boxes. The worst part isn't moving; it's not knowing where I'll be next time I come "home", compounded by the fact that I don't have the slightest idea where my other home will be, after May 28th. Grandview has its flaws -- it has many flaws -- but it'll always be the place I grew up. No matter what time of day it is, the odds are good that I'll someone I know if I walk down the street. No trip to the local library can last for less than 20 minutes, because I visit with at least one of the librarians in any given department. The strong community at Mount Holyoke has never surprised me, because I've only ever known a close-knit community; it's why I never wanted to go to a bigger school. It got stifling after awhile -- I didn't want a bigger school, but I didn't want one in Ohio, either -- but it always feels welcoming and embracing rather than oppressive when I come back.

Yesterday, I needed a hot glue gun. I called my neighbor, who didn't have one, but she took me with her to Science Olympiad practice at the high school, confident I'd be able to borrow a glue gun from the woodshop. Nobody was there when I walked in, so I went upstairs to the physics classroom, and Ms. Godez immediately agreed to loan me hers. (She also acted not at all surprised to see me, even though I haven't spoken to her since my first year of college. This, too, is typical.) On Tuesday, I borrowed my seventh-grade English teacher's car to run errands.

I ♥ my town.

What did I accomplish with my week? Not a lot...but I made a shiny Moulin Rouge soundtrack. *geeks out* Thanks to newredshoes for her detective work on tracks ripped from the film, and for providing the original drive behind the project (although she didn't know it at the time).

( *clicky* - track listing & links )

Otherwise, my week was good. I worked a bunch, saw a concert, and had lunch with high school friends, brunch with my seventh-grade English teacher, and birthday dinner with Kim (happy birthday, once again!) and work-folk. Blah, blee, don't wanna pack up to go back to school -- the usual.

I'm home, and it's great.

Y'all need to see Murderball ASAP. Screw the penguins -- this summer is all about the crazy, amazing, inspiring quad rugby players. (Saw it first at Silverdocs; dragged Mom to it again tonight, and even she loved it -- a sure sign of success, 'cause she's picky.)

The next three weeks are going to be wicked busy, and I can't wait.

It's delightful to be home. Delightful, and a bit dull already. It's clear I'm not going to get the sort of hours I wanted at the movie theatre, which means I'll have lots of time to spend mooching free movies off of my employer. (There's that holiday spirit!)

I've been going through my 150-some digital photos from the past four months -- and damn, some of them are bad. It's amazing how you can't really tell how bad a picture will turn out when you see it on a 1" x 2" LED screen. Things look so much cooler when they're that small -- and a lot sharper, too. Oh well. This is why all the important pictures -- Oslo, people dressed up at events, some of the house -- are on the trusty 35mm. Here's hoping those, at least, turn out nicely.

Regressed a few years last night to hang out with people from high school: met them at Stauf's, moved from the coffee shop to Meijer at 11:30 (I can't get over how big stuff is here, nor how late it's open), then from the superstore to Waffle House, and after Waffle House, two hours of Simpsons Jeopardy. There's something about surreptitiously passing around a bottle of peppermint schnapps in the car, and running around Meijer late at night, that makes me feel much younger -- and not necessarily in a good way. At any rate, it was worth it to get to see people -- even if it was an inescapable reminder of how little things change in Grandview.

Looking forward to going back to work tomorrow. [To-do list] Have to decide if I want to go back East with Dad on the 31st, or work the extra two days and leave on the 2nd or 3rd; have to do laundry tonight. What a thrilling life I do lead.

This was a killer weekend for the theater. Good for business...bad for poor, exhausted workers. As you might expect, many people requested one or more days off this weekend, so those of us who did work were pretty much there all three days. Hapless Zach got forced into the Spidey suit every afternoon and evening for a couple hours at least (Sunday afternoon we were shortstaffed, so Spider-man helped out by tearing tickets--'twas a rather amusing sight), and the rest of us just laughed and laughed. Fortunately, we were well prepared at concessions (except for the poor guy whose first day behind the stand was Sunday afternoon--we expected to break last year's record of 1200 tickets sold this evening), and kept up with the crowds tolerably well. I've got the next two days off; my only plans are to wash my car and sleep a lot. Brilliant!

Saturday, I woke to the sound of the doorbell and an unexpected visit from my friend Cat, whom I thought would be spending the entire summer in DC. It was great seeing her, and having somebody to talk about girl stuff with again. Possibly the thing I miss most of all about school is having girlfriends to talk to. I've got Aaron and Jackie at work to talk about/drool over guys...but everything else (your basic "Dammit, if boys are so annoying and dumb in public, why do I want one of my own?" conversation, for example) is out, just 'cause I don't know them well enough.  *pout* Looks like I'm adding "Hang out with Cat" to the to-do list for the next couple days.

Any more, my life consists of sleeping, reading, work, and watching movies (more or less in order of importance). In the past week: finished three books, worked almost 40 hours, and seen four five movies.

( lists and reviews, including A Movie I Actually Liked )

Hopefully, this week will bring more fun. llogan--we need to get together.

The evil cat woke me up at 3:15 this morning. Now she's conked out on the floor next to my bed...and I'm still awake. Yay. Ultimately, I just gave up and caught up on fanfic e-mail.

Troy wasn't as bad as I'd led myself to expect. I was pleasantly entertained most of the time, and the bad dialogue merely made me roll my eyes and laugh. It took me a long time to really get into it--maybe 45 minutes, before I could actually make myself see Paris, Hector, Odysseus, Achilles--instead of thinking "Orlando. Eric Bana. Bean. Brad Pitt."--and noticing the behind-the-scenes stuff, like the way people's native accents (Bana's Australian, Pitt's American, Diane Kruger's German) kept slipping through the All-Purpose British just enough to be distracting.

I'm sure it's a good thing that I can't recall most of the details of The Iliad; the ten years' war boiled down to two weeks and the tacked-on Briseis/Achilles Twu Wuv story offended me on principle, but everything else worked. Character development was lacking, though it's silly to expect it from a summer action flick. Helen has so much potential, as a character, but it never gets played up (not just in this movie, but in anything I've seen/read). The principle love story as a whole was underplayed, which isn't really that surprising, again--just disappointing...and I'm blathering aimlessly now.

Off in search of breakfast.