e_clare

( No sweeter sight )

I suppose I should talk about the rest of the London trip at some point. Maybe that'll be my reward for finishing a cover letter.

I handed in the last two finals of my college career at 8:30 this morning. Go me. "Selling Fiction as Reality: The Blair Witch Project" and "Theatricality on Film: Angels in America" were not the greatest papers ever written, but they were finished. And that's what really counts.

From 10:30 to 2, I fell asleep watching Shakespeare in Love. Despite the rain, life is good.

It's good to know that even at this point, I'm still able to fangirl my thesis subjects. (Apologies -- I may have posted part of this speech last spring, during finals.)

"Oh - Bosie! I have to go back to him, you know. Robbie will be furious but it can't be helped. The betrayal of one's friends is a bagatelle in the stakes of love, but the betrayal of oneself is lifelong regret. Bosie is what became of me. He is spoiled, vindictive, utterly selfish and not very talented, but these are merely the facts. The truth is he was Hyacinth when Apollo loved him, he is ivory and gold, from his red rose-leaf lips comes music that fills me with joy, he is the only one who understands me.... We would never love anybody if we could see past our invention. Bosie is my creation, my poem. In the mirror of invention, love discovered itself." -- Oscar Wilde, The Invention of Love (94-5).

Why is this play so amazing? Unfortunately, I still can't articulate exactly what makes it all so wonderful. This is problematic, as I'm trying to finish a chapter for tonight. Right-o.

(While I'm here: Aaaaaaagggghh tour groups. How the f*ck are we supposed to be able to work in the bloody library on a Sunday if there are tour groups walking through literally EVERY TWO MINUTES?! Not that I'm not happy to know that there is a student::computer ratio of 4 to 1; and 70/30 PC to Mac; and that the couches in the IC were kept because students especially requested they be saved during remodeling as they are the comfiest sofas on campus -- which is true. I have to move. Otherwise, like Barbara Bush in that one episode of The Simpsons, I'll have to start giving the goddamn tour speech every time people stop at my table.)

EDIT: Okay, we're down to less than a minute between groups. I give up. My death glares are going to start driving the prospies away.

EDITED AGAIN: Wow. That cup of coffee I had for breakfast made me really hostile. Note to self: consider switching to tea?

Giant tour group in the info commons...bemahone, I ♥ you, but I didn't really need to hear the entire roster of famous MHC alumnae. At the top of your voice. Again.


(It's a group of about 25 parents and prospies moving en masse through the library. We've reached that time of the year...and it'll be like this through the end of the month, i.e. my peak time in the library. A thesis-crazed senior could really scare some prospies...must look into this. mwahahaha!)

Newsflash: Catch my roommate Katie's first radio show of the semester tomorrow night on WMHC! Sex Talk with Katie Kloss airs every Thursday from 10-12 pm...those of you outside South Hadley can catch it online.

Sadly, I'll be driving back from A Raisin in the Sun...but Kristy and I plan to call in from the road regardless, and just jump right in to the conversation.

It's going to be a busy night, actually. So far, we have scheduled the play, the radio show, and the last night of figure skating, PLUS a drunken Scrabble death-match with Kristy's boyfriend (someone else may need to keep score).

Tonight we played an excellent game of (sober) Scrabble, in which I used all my letters, banannagoats broke 100 points, and Michael's lowest-scoring word was worth 22 points. I think he won, but I was proud of finishing first anyway. Thank you, blank tile!

In the spirit of skating, which I'm hoping but not sure I'll be able to watch, I give you The Dick Button Drinking Game. Maybe one of us can be sloshed by the time I'm back from the theater.

Also, I have the worst cold EVER and I'm not handling it well. So I am going to bed.

(Header courtesy of Dick Button, my favorite love-to-hate-him sportscaster of the moment. Scott Hamilton may be my all-time favorite sportscaster, period. He's excited for just about everyone on the ice, and always seems like he's really pulling for them to succeed. But Dick Button is bitchy and fantastic, so they make a good balance.)

This is just to say that I had a lovely evening watching the men's figure skating final with banannagoats, and that I accomplished very little of significance today. Furthermore, I get to stay up and read about documentary films and the New Deal, in preparation for writing a paper tomorrow. And then I get to go into hiding for the rest of the weekend, emerging briefly for Drag Ball on Saturday night, and writewritewrite my thesis like the Stoppard/Wilde fangirl that I am.

My major accomplishment this week was organizing all of my thesis notes into a big-ass binder. I have yet to do anything productive with said organized notes...but that's okay. My time will come.

The main task at the moment is writing an article for the Mt. Holyoke News about The Skriker, which goes up next week. I may not be working on the play (...technically speaking, I did act as a substitute stage manager at a J-Term rehearsal), but I'll do my best to get people to come see it. It's one of the more obviously design-heavy shows we've done -- "spectacle" doesn't happen often on the Rooke Theatre stage, not even when we do musicals. Skriker is going to look incredible, no doubt about it.

Interesting use of the collective "we" there. You'd think I could extricate myself from the theater department, but no. In many ways, I'm more connected there than I am with either my major or minor departments. I feel oddly possessive of this show, for all that I didn't intend to work on it. This proves to be problematic when trying to write a compelling article about it: is there a better way to entice people to come see it than simply saying "it has pretty masks and my roommate gives a kick-ass performance of the title role"?

Maybe I'm too close to it to actually write about it. Maybe I'm cowed by the pressure to make this piece really good, since it's likely one of my last for the News...which makes it one of the most important in my portfolio, as it'll be the most recent piece of non-thesis writing I do. Maybe I need to stop overthinking it and just write the damn thing, so I can move on to thinking about my thesis.

I'm on a bit of a dancing kick at the moment. No explanation for that, sorry.

This weekend, I realized that I really need to get my shit together. Not just in a "gee, haven't written for my thesis in a month" sense -- it's more of a truly serious "what will I do after May 28th?" thing. What brought it on? The alum networking event on Saturday night had a lot to do with it, but it's mostly just the fact that the semester is finally starting and the idea of finishing is slowly sinking in. What the hell do I do next? Forget next; I have to figure out how I'm getting through the next four months: will the thesis continue? How will I put out another English newsletter without dying? What classes am I taking -- is it worth it to take the journalism course, or should I stick with Documentary Film, which I know I'll enjoy but is potentially less useful?

Hopefully part of the issue will be resolved today, when I go to Writing About the Arts. If I fall asleep, it's out. Good plan, yes?

Also, everyone in the house kissed someone over break. Except me. And damn am I envious. I can't even blame the usual &#@* women's college sitaution because clearly...So of course this is what I need to be brooding about, instead of my future. asadfkjklargh.

E-mailed the Joyce paper at 10:40 AM, then waited nervously for the prof to confirm he could open the attachment. Couldn't take it, and called at 11:30 to double-check. Success!

Now I am going back to bed. Because I CAN! Yaaaaaaaaay!

(Incidentally, I just realized that I'm halfway done with senior year. This is scary.)

AAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUGGGGGGH, SNOW!

I wasn't ready for it to be winter after all. Now I have to schlep three tons of books to the library and I'm very, very bitter.

Happily, my terribly seasonal icon continues to bring me great joy. :)