My tongue feels burnt, although I haven't done anything in the past few days that would have resulted in a burnt tongue...
I keep away from hot liquids. If I want to eat/drink something I want to eat it RIGHT NOW not wait until the steam stops rising off of it.

Shit. Lasagne. I ate lasagne last night. That must have done it. Rats. I thought we might have some kind of immaculate burnt tongue on our hands.

So I'm supposed to be writing a paper right now. the only paper I will have to write all semester. It's not even a real paper, I don't need a thesis or a conclusion or anything, I just have to answer four questions, all of which we've already gone over in a discussion group. In spite all of that, I won't even think of doing it til after I get home from Jazz Night tonight.

In Leuven everything shuts down on Sundays. There's absolutely nothing open, so you're pretty much left to your own devices, to play soccer (football!) or do crafts or watch you laundry dry...I'm gonna finish a few books and eat my weight in oranges.

I did my laundry yesterday. I've figured out that I only have to do it once every three weeks, which is a pretty good average all things considered. Anyhow, I ran out of change and could only dry my stuff for a half hour, and since ALL of my stuff was in that dryer, the only good it did was to downgrade my clothes from soaking wet to wet. So I tromped home with all of my acoutrements heavy with wet in my pack and then got creative as to hanging everything all over my room so it could dry. And then I cranked up the heat and left the room.

When I returned my room was dank and hot and smelled of clean laundry. My window was completely steamed over.
I had a few candles burning too, and I hope with all my might that someone noticed my window from the street below and assumes it was steamed the old fashioned way. Just because...well, people thinking I have a romantic life is just as good as actually having one.

That being said I think I might have developped a crush on someone, although its been so long I'm not sure if this is a crush or I'm just not getting enough iron.

Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society I present to you, The Tale of The Screw I Found on My Windowsil This Morning
*Fire blazes, musical cue*

So, I found a screw on my windowsil this morning. It could only have come from one of two places.
1-The hinge in my window
2-The bracket that holds my curtain rod into the wall.

the deal is, upon getting up on the sil to check out the two locations where this screw might have escaped from, there are screws already there. Old ones, painted in and rusty. This one is new and shiny and the threads aren't even a little bit stripped. So where the hell did it come from?

If I were to drive myself crazy, this is exactly how I'd do it. Because now, every time I notice something in my room that might require a screw, I'm going to examine it way up close to see if all's well. If whoever's trying to break my mind is sharp, tomorrow I'll find a pile of sawdust beside my desk and no disturbances anywhere else in the room.

One of my dad's old co-workers once disassembled a friends cubicle and then re-assembled it a half foot in on all sides, not so much that you could see it, but just enough so that the edge of his desk blocked the filing cabinet from being completely opened. Genius.

So now I'm left with one extra screw and no logical place to put it. What the hell do I do with it now? Other than the obvious approaching people and asking them if they wanna screw? Zing!

Stupid Y chromosome.

How is it possible that one, microscopic little difference can render two sexes of the same species so radically different?
I love men. I do. They're one of the most useful things in my day to day life. They give me hugs, they make me laugh, they add relevance to situations, they open things and they loan me stuff. They let me correct their french grammar so I feel needed and they laugh at my jokes. They let me use their chickpeas in my pasta sauce. They put on 'girl music' for me when we hang out in their rooms. They give me candles cause they know they won't use them. They're fun to look at, even more fun to flirt with and the most fun to be close friends with. But why, WHY must they purposefully populate their lives with drama and then complain about it?

I like my life as I like my pants. Simple. No gimmicks, so excessive flaps or buttons or unnecessary pockets. Plain, easy, uncomplicated. Pants in the most basic definition of the word. Sure, when things come down to it, stuff gets soiled, things become a little muddy, but with very basic treatment, things resume to their original state. Back to pants.

But there are some guys (yes, I'm not so stupid as to assume you're all like this, much to the contrary view that most men have of women) prefer, nay, insist that their lives be as complicated as possible. And then, once they've gotten themselves as tangled up as possible and are immobilized by all the difficulties they've inflicted on themselves, they start shouting for help. Loudly, at me.

So I show up. I untangle what I can to the best of my ability, I ask them what they want (foolishly) in an attempt to clear away the brambles, and when they undoubtedly reply 'I don't know' (which is always a lie) I start positing situations for them to see what the possible outcomes may be. This gets the loosest knots untied. Once we know what they don't want, we then move on to what they might want. This requires a firmer hand, as it is at this stage where you need to start saying 'well, you can't really have that. I'm sorry, but that's how it goes' and once the last few options are all that exist, you leave them to themselves with a pair of scissors sharpened with your opinion coupled with the fact that you'll support them regardless of their actions, and then cross your fingers and hope they'll do the right thing.

And then the next day you find them tangled again, and this time bleeding because they've cut themselves instead of the ropes that restrained them.

I can't keep doing this.
Just choose something. A lifestyle, a girl, a major, and stick to it.
I'm exhausted.

Last night I stayed in and watched Blow and then half of Pulp Fiction with Sandra and Leigh, and for the first time, I actually felt like I was at home.

Ryan made it onto the cast of Boom Chicago! Which is a hugely popular and actually lucrative improv/sketch com group running out of Amsterdam and so now he's going to be making money and doing improv in AMSTERDAM! How did this man get my dream life? Anyhow, my cup runneth over with happiness and pride for this guy, and of COURSE I'm going to visit and see as many shows as I can. My god I miss improv.

My brother is in Winnepeg as we speak, along with a shipload of other wonderful Canadian improvisers for their Improv Festival. It will be grand.

Leuven's festival starts soon and I'll miss out on all sorts of great workshops, but I'm going to one show which will be awesome. I had a dream I went to a workshop and met up with four girls from various parts of the world who were all great and funny and we started a grassroots estrogen improv team. I woke up feeling empty.

I. Miss. It. So. Much. If not for the catharsis and the attention and the praise and the adrenaline, but for the boys. Goddamn I fall in love with improv boys. I'd need to take off my shoes to list them all.

I'm currently carrying around a crush for a boy who I've NEVER EVEN MET because I finally downloaded and watched all of Ben's Olde English videos. That's how potent improv is.

When the Pawn Hits the Conflicts He Thinks Like a King What He Knows Throws the Blows When He Goes to the Fight and He'll Win the Whole Thing 'Fore He Enters the Ring There's No Body to Batter When Your Mind Is Your Might So When You Go Solo, You Hold Your Own Hand and Remember That Depth Is the Greatest of Heights and if You Know Where You Stand, Then You Know Where to Land and if You Fall It Won't Matter, 'Cuz You'll Know That You're Right

My room smells like 'Mulled Berries' and I smell like 'Intense Green Tea'

The first package I recieved from my mother contained, among other things, deodorant. 2 sticks of.
Both kinds were different, one I suppose more like a 'daytime' deodorant? Maybe the other for evenings on the town? I don't know...anyhow, one's regular girl deodorant and it's name is 'Spring Breeze' which I'd love more if there was any truth in advertising because then I'd smell like muddy wind. Of course, 'Spring Breeze' smells like baby powder.
The second kind, the one which I actually like the smell of even more, is called 'Ambition.'

What? How much more obscure can we get? I was under the impression all this perfuming and masking of our natural pheromones was to make us smell like something else, powder, flowers, fruit...something tangeable. But this? Ambition?
"Wow, you smell great...what is that?"
"Ambition."
BAM! I just inadvertantly picked that hypothetical person up. Ambition. Come on. I'm not even all that ambitious. I'm more like...mildly neurotic and constantly amused.

Actually, just imagine if we emitted different scents based on how we actually felt? That'd be AWESOME.
"That's an interesting fragrance, what is it?"
"Complete and total disinterest."
"Itchy and dehydrated."
"Love."

That being said, I smell like green tea, a kind of pretentiously earthy smell I feel like I can pull off.

I can't believe what a big, emotional, irrational pain in the ass I'm being right now.
I'm annoying the crap out of myself.

I finally cried over everything today.
Let's hope that's it.

I don't think I'm going to leave the building today

And this is a pretty solid bet, as it's now 21.47 and I haven't left yet...I just have to hold on to my hermittude for the next few hours and the day is mine!

So here I sit, sipping Sunland Plus! Sinaas plus rode pompelmoes juice from my cracked green Pangaea mug, wearing my doctor pants, Morna's orange t-shirt and running shoes. I've been reading all day, but not reading anything of real value. I've been reading the fine print.
On my housing contract, on my cellphone deal, on all my bank statements, on my tuition receipt and of my classes.

I am now the most informed student in the history of academia. And I've been feasting on oranges so I can proudly say I will not be scurvy's bitch.

I've said it before and will again, hangover days are the best.

The thing about living in a communal student house is that for the most part I have no control over how my room is going to smell for any extended period of time. Sure, I have a diffuser that steadily fills my puppybox with odors of my choice at my whim, but in all reality, it doesn't do much. Today Renato re-heated something with curry in it, so my room smells like curry. Yesterday Katrien was painting in her room so my room smelled of oil-based paints. Simon plays lacrosse and his gear, when he decides to bring it upstairs (which thankfully isn't often) wafts the pungent aroma of hot, sweaty boy through my door.

thinkin' bout gettin a webcam. thinkin' bout taking a shower. thinkin' bout that time I broke my two front teeth.

I'm beginning to get a little lost in all of this. My regression to 18 year old fratboy state of mind is inversely proportional to my sense of self. The more I booze the more I forget about who I am. Tomorrow I will spend time in the park and wander down to where the bakeries are still open and I will purchase and consume a solitary strawberry tart. If I'm going to get myself back I need to feed myself.

buried underneath the avalanche of stuff deemed to important to be placed on a shelf but not important enough to be treated with any kind of real respect is my clock. I bought this clock with the idea that it would be an alarm clock. I deduced that this clock was an alarm clock because the french instructions on the back of the box told me how to program the alarm, yet when I got home it turned out that I just got a regular clock, no bells or whistles. Just time. I've been realizing that's how I view my scheduling. If something can offer me alot of distraction, for instance if I go to Amadee and drink tea AND play chess AND talk to people AND listen to classical music, I'll do it. Today when Mike and Russ asked me to join them for a movie, I turned them down for various reasons, one of which being the fact that in my mind, they had to do better than just that. Sitting in silence watching other people live isn't enough. But here I am instead, all alone. Just time. Somedays you pass the time, somedays time passes you.

there isn't enough grass in Leuven. that isn't a complaint.

Why nature is funny:

I, in an attempt to liberate my inner heartbreaker, have started reading a lot of feminist literature.
Simone de Beauvoir to be specific...and my first feminist though has been 'Beauvoir...dude she's got all the vowels in her last name!' I have promptly decided that men are of no use to me other than friends.

That decision being made, cemented mentally, written down and then signed, has resulted in several things, one of which being who I woke up next to this morning.

Get your minds out of the gutter....but yeah.
Irish.
Nice.

I used to spend so much time on the internet, that now that I've had a few months hiatus, and I find myself bored late at night and revisit these sites (links from Ned and Ben's pages) I feel like I'm becoming re-acquainted with old friends over lunch. Remembering their speech patterns, narration techniques, their senses of humour...it's good to catch up.

I almost got in a fist fight with a man over Captain Planet vs The Raccoons tonight.
I would have won.

Earlier today in a fit of extreme frustration brought on by several factors clearly delineated in the 'travel log' I'm keeping (pimpimpimp) I pretended to attempt to flip over a truck. In a 'Hulk SMASH!' sort of gesture. I did it to alleviate the tension in my mind and to make a friend laugh, as I felt she was beginning to feel sorry for me, and I will NOT tolerate pity.

An elderly Belgian couple stopped walking to watch me try to flip over this truck, so I kept at it a little while longer...after all, I'm no quitter...and then gave up, sighed and walked away...never before have I ever wanted as badly to understand dutch as when they walked past me nodding and smiling...I assume it was a flemish 'you'll get 'em next time'.

The problem with me is, I have such extraordinarily good luck with every aspect of my life, and karma acts almost immediately for me as well, so whenever something bad happens, something good instantaneously arises and all is balanced out. That, or the good just keeps being stockpiled.

So when days like today happen, I just want to fucking kill someone. Where's the justice in that you ask? Well, if I'm going to get shat on by fate, I'm going to retroactively earn it.

Hide your kittens, I'm in a kicking mood.

it's four am and I'm drunk but the way TIME works it's only 10 pm back home so I'm coming across as a lush and maybe I've become alush but I'm just really and truly happy to be alive

I love you

Retrospect is the point of view for the lazy and the cautious, that being said, in retrospect I should have loved you more.

I was sitting in the kitchen dicing tomatoes for what would later be called 'the best pesto pasta ever consumed' discussing the Marquis de Sade when the most tense and awkward situation known to man occured.

Eric and I were talking about what we knew about Sade, I based on the movie Quills and he on some elementary readings when he turned from the stove and looked straight into my soul and said ' that's interesting, because I was just wondering how long you should let something torment you before you take action.'

Eric looked at him, puzzled, and then saw him staring at me and looked back to the garlic he was crushing. I held his gaze and said something soft and useless like 'well, its all relative I suppose, but some things are just meant to stay bottled up, if you can keep them contained sometimes that's what's best' and the went back to cutting tomatoes.

Two weeks prior he kissed me, I asked him to leave, and we haven't spoken of it since.
Please god don't let this happen again.
Please.