e_clare | Entries tagged with spring break

Tori Amos and/or Neil Gaiman fans take note: the Neil tribute album is coming soon. (link via pink is the new blog)

Looking at job postings is a lot more fun that actually applying to them. I spent 30 minutes tonight browsing various media job sites, and came up with two internships and numerous other jobs that I'm not yet qualified for. Writing the cover letters for these jobs might kill me -- but I had a nice moment when I realized that my past experience matches almost every one of the internship duties described by a specific magazine. I'm qualified for something, yay!

Spring break continues to be less productive but more fun than a week in South Hadley should be. The thesis is coming along, although it could be better; the drama paper has barely been touched. Mostly, my days consist of lots of movie-watching and reading (Neverwhere and Anansi Boys), cooking, and washing dishes.

Thanks to all for the birthday wishes! (

newredshoes is still a genius.) ♥ ♥

So far this morning, I've written a page of my new-and-improved thesis introduction. On the one hand, it seems counterproductive to be re-typing all of this content that I already have down in a rough form. But on the other, it's been ages since I've actually thought about TS Eliot's "Tradition and the Individual Talent" or many of the other non-Stoppard texts I'm using.

The rest of the time, I've been zoning out at a table in the library's main reading room (the stained-glass college seals on the windows are mesmerizing), and finding more things to help me waste time later. Almost Famous magically appeared on the DVD return shelf, I renewed Pi, and found out that our library actually owns a copy of Neverwhere. (I spent most of Saturday and Sunday finally reading Anansi Boys, and obviously one book wasn't enough.)

Anyway. Does "19th-century flamboyant playwright-critic-author-poet-martyr" sum up Oscar Wilde adequately enough for everyone?

10:38 a.m.: *dances the dance of She Who is Now 22*

10:40 a.m.: *gets back into bed because omg it is too early*

This is my first domestic birthday/St. Patrick's Day in two years, and it's shaping up to be rather fantastic.

Yesterday, after much waffling back and forth about what constitutes "too much Irishness for the Italian/Lithuanian to handle," I agreed to take up

mirror_dancer's invitation to come to Springfield. So the four of us -- Kristy, banannagoats, the Boy Wonder, and I -- hopped into the van and got lost on the way. We eventually made it, and spent the evening crammed into a basement bar with a hundred-some drunken Irish folk, which was great fun. Collectively, we lasted until midnight, when Maura got the band to sing Happy Birthday to me. And then we came home and crashed.

Plans for today aren't set, but they mostly involve sleeping, baking, and maybe hitting a bar in Northampton tonight. Spring break is the best.

In other news,

newredshoes and I are geniuses. That's all you need to know.

I'm really just not in Tom Stoppard mode today (which is a problem, 'tis true), so I'm doing a fabulous 21st b-day update instead. Because, hey, milestone and all that. (Plus I have energy now -- yay coffee and naps -- but clearly don't want to waste it on writing a paper.)

Birthday, Round 1: The day started off well, last Friday, but the evening turned into a bit of a bust. Kloss, Kristy and I enjoyed a most excellent birthday dinner at an Italian place in town (topping off my week of pasta meals with one that I didn't have to cook myself :) ). There was wine and it was happy.

( And it continues...into Round 2 )

And that's why I accomplished nothing today. On the up-side, I get to see my mommy tomorrow, AND we're having sushi. Hooray!
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kmmatero is adorable. She was plugging away on her set model last night, and I was quietly reading/periodically cheering her on. Precisely at midnight, she looks over: "Happy Birthday!" Thankee. :)

St. Patrick's Day was pretty low key. I spent the evening baking cookies, watching Scrubs, and cutting out wee people for Kristy's set. Her room is close enough to the dorm bar, however, that we could easily hear the revelry and pretend to be a part of it. Tonight will definitely make up for it: fancy dinner, plus huge end-of-term party -- briliant.

Cheers, all.
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Happy (early) St. Patrick's Day!

I've been in Canterbury since Tuesday afternoon, and the weather's just lovely. (I'm expecting it to rain cats and dogs today or tomorrow, in order to make up for the beautiful SPRING days we've had.) People were very confused when I returned from visiting Kloss and Kristy in the fall, without having been to Canterbury Cathedral. At the time, I blamed the short length of my stay. The truth is, the cathedral just doesn't compare to the thrill of sitting around Kloss's kitchen, shooting the shit. Seriously. (Having seen the cathedral now, I can say that for certain. It's not that the cathedral is boring, or even somehow less cool than sitting around and trading gossip; it's just that it's not any more exciting.)

Most of my time has been spent sitting around talking about random things, catching up on MHC gossip and legitimate issues like the ongoing budget failure, and squeeing about how awesome it would be if some of us ended up in the campus apartments for next year. (We find out on Friday -- yay!) My other major accomplishments were reading Stoppard's The Real Thing (homework on break, yes, I know) and starting a Facebook group for campus techies ("I Sold My Soul to the Theatre, and All I Got Was This Lousy Black T-Shirt"). Big things, folk. Big things.

I had a great time in Bath; huge thanks again to Dorothee and Bridget for hosting me, and keeping me entertained as much as possible (while allowing me ample time to entertain myself, which I appreciate). I finally made it to the Roman Baths (totally worth it) and experienced a Sally Lunn Bun (which was slightly less worth it but ultimately saved by the lemon curd topping). My fabulous British vacation has been fabulously low-key, but I like that. Vacations are supposed to be relaxing.

I'm getting a lot of reading done, taking a lot of naps, and finally catching up on all my delayed correspondence from earlier in the semester. My pen pals in Chile and Scotland have a little something-something to look forward to in their mailboxes, as will many of mes amis aux Etats-Unis (once their postcards are purchased and written -- still behind on the Americans, sorry). There's a very good chance that I could finish all of my break-time homework, which would be amazing, since I'll have two papers and a proposal to produce within a week of my return.

Furthermore, Kloss, Kristy and I have decided that we need to facilitate the return of karaoke to the MHC social world, and that our housewarming party/Kristy's 21st birthday bash will be the perfect venue to do so. Consider yourselves warned, and start practicing now. *g*

Thanks to everybody for the good-travel wishes. My Gmail inbox feels loved. :)

I have nothing to say, really, except that I heart Bath. Also,

sweetcncrd's bed is comfy,

neuilly's pictures are awesome, and I wish I'd been not-jet-lagged enough to make it to the Uni last night -- but I'm gearing up for St. Patrick's Day, and Friday, and didn't want to overdo it. Plus, I thought it'd be good to wake up at some point today.

Now, of course, the problem is finding something to do with myself. I need to go putter around the city and do some shopping -- saving the Pump Room for tomorrow afternoon (scones!) -- thanks to a surprise e-mail from Jessie McD, I feel the urge to send postcards to everyone I've ever known. Must do something about that.
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It's an absolutely gorgeous day today; finally, spring has arrived. It's basically caught up to the weather in Dijon--I have to admit that it was like this all last week in France, and I had quite the climatical shock coming back.

Hitting the diner w/ members of the Brel cast last night (and special guest banannagoats) really helped my mood. I still feel really distanced from the cast for the most part, but I also feel like it's going to get better. *fingers crossed*

As tonight marks the first of our Friday night rehearsals, I'm off to do homework. Yay.

But first: eeeeeeee!

Current Mood: content
Current Music: "Eye of the Tiger" (rock on, WMHC dj!)

I can't believe it's Wednesday already. This week is just whipping by--and I'm sure the weeks are going to just keep going faster. We have just about four weeks until the show goes up--four weeks exactly from tomorrow, I believe. I don't know about anyone else, but I'm definitely feeling some anxiety over the whole thing: getting the entire cast to rehearsal on the same night is stressful enough; forget about actually dealing with a performance. (On the other hand, after the scheduling nightmares of the past two months--two months, almost, we've been rehearsing!--the performance problems will probably seem way easy.)

And now I'm torn, because I have a film screening tonight, and I really should go to it, but we just had that lovely "conversation" last night about the trauma of scheduling everything, and...auuuuuuggggghhh.

I think part of the rushed feeling can be attributed to actually having plans for next semester. That's right, y'all: I'm going to England! I'll be studying in Bath for the fall semester, then back to good ol' MHC (and my dear banannagoats ;) ) for the spring.

This makes me extra glad about spending spring break in France, because I now have the confidence to negotiate international airports and railways. When I have to do it again in August, it'll even be en anglais, which will be a joy indeed. :)

France was lovely, by the by. Aside from building my traveling skillz, I had a great time just relaxing and hanging out with Becky P. and her friends (French, American and otherwise). Highlights included the Musee de Beaux-Arts, a trip to Carrefour (basically, the French Wal-Mart), going out on St. Patrick's Day, having "Happy Birthday" sung to me by slightly-drunken Frenchies and Americans in a pub--and then by French schoolchildren just twelve hours later, and stopping in at cafes for two-hour coffee breaks in the afternoons.

Current Mood: nervous

Salut tous! This is going to be much shorter than it should because I`m a) working on borrowed time in a computer lab at the Universite de Bourgogne, and b) attempting to type on the tres confusing ordinateur francaise.

Suffice it to say that I arrived safely, with minimal difficulty. Merci encore to

krikkit911 for the ride to Newark--I spent enough time on trains on Saturday to appreciate not having to do it two days in a row.

Everything`s good; miss you all and hope that break`s treating you well. Gotta run.

A bientot!

Current Mood: rushed

Italian and English are finished.

Film will be as of tonight.

And tomorrow I head to France. Yee-haw!

A plea: Does anyone have a copy of this year's Oscar issue of Entertainment Weekly? The man wall's looking kinda sparse. Donations of other magazines are welcome, too. We've still got two sections to fill. :)