Ad-ventures through natural history

First off, thanks and acknowledgement to one miss mercedes, who prompted me to blog this, and also gave me a titular pun. (insert polite clapping here).

So, I finished up all of my schoolwork last week (YAAAAAAYYYYY!), at least for the next month, anyways. But I'm not heading up to toronto until the 24th, and all my other friends in this stupid town are still going crazy with the worky worky, so I found myself with a big, empty week.

Oh ho! I thought to myself, what a perfect time to hop on the ol' commuter train into New York and go see the big Natural History Museum, since I love me some NHM's and I've never been to that one. I had been contemplating for a while when I might go in and visit, but was always to busy with the school and the whatnot.

Anyways, I knew nobody would be available to go with me, so I decided, oh me oh my, to put an ad up on NYC craigslist seeing if I could find a date to the museum. Here is the original ad, which was reposted with slight differences the next day because the first round of responses were less than what I had hoped for:
******

I'm a curvy dorkette with a love for all things evolution, and I've never been to the natural history museum. I'd be happy going on my own, but thought it might be more fun to try something new, a little craigslist adventuring.

This is only a date - keep your LTRs and other communicable diseases to yourself, thanks - but just because I'm looking for something 'casual' doesn't mean I don't want to be intellectually or emotionally engaged. In fact, the more you like to bend the usual rules of social conduct, the better.

I want you to make me think, make me laugh and make me feel hot. Let's go make out in a room full of dinosaur bones.

******
I would respond to that ad (except that curvy isn't my type, and it was posted in the section for the mens). So I hoped that maybe somebody else cool would, too. I mean, in all of New York City (and the surrounding burroughs) somebody cool has to be reading craigslist, right?

...right?

Well. Maybe my standards are a bit high, or maybe, well... here are a few snippets of responses, the good, the bad, and the ugly. And lots and lots and lots of the mediocre. You can judge for yourself.

We'll start with The Bad:

I had to go digging around in my gmail trash to find some of these again. The dirtiest prize goes to the penis picture, closely followed by the man who said he would leave the museum with my panties in his jacket pocket (ewwwwwwwwww). Although at least panty-man said he'd be stealing my underwear after we'd learned about the pterodon, so I guess at least he actually read my ad.

One of my favorites was this entirely confusing response, which I will quote at length to achieve the full effect:

"On Friday night I went with friends to see the Radio City Christmas specatcular at the Radio City Music Hall and then walked around the Big Tree in Rockefeller Center.

On Saturday morning I went to a Dance aerobic class at my gym. I relaxed at home on Saturday afternoon. On Saturday night I went to a holiday Christmas dinner with friends on Long Island. One of my friends is an actor who plays the role of Santa Claus in the Radio City show. He took off on Saturday night and gave a performance of several Christmas songs. His son who is a student at Syracuse Univesity was his pianist. This morning I went to church and then went to the Harvard Club to watch the Patriots Jets football game and have brunch. Then I went with other friends to the Rose Theater at the Time Warner building to see the Chamber Music Association perform Bach's Brandenburg Concertos. It was awesome. When I got back I had a sushi dinner at Sushi Time on Second Avenue and East 44th Street.

New York is such a treasure trove of restaurants. I live near the UN and there are some great spots to which I would like to invite you. I like novels and biographies. I like U2, Coldplay, Green Day, the Heart Beat Boys, Dido, Josh Groban and Bruce Springsteen."

The picture that came with this reponse was of a man in his 60s, wearing a suit and tie in front of a gigantic christmas tree. The email actually ended with Bruce Springsteen, too, no signoff, no nothing. So, so bizarre.

There was also the form-letter response that probably goes out to all the girls, with a few key snippets as follows:

"I think one of the most sensual things is actually sleeping with someone, not the sex... holding them close, smelling them, ME running my fingers through your hair and of course kissing you a lot... I'm not looking for a woman I can live with - I'm in search of a woman I can't live without!"

And all this with a pic of a suit-and-tied `older genteleman' (60s? maybe even 70?). ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew ew!

Finally, "a very different twist to anything I have seen before.....smart girl but yet naughty....I wonder what other surprises you occult....quick question though, have you ever been engaged by someone older....I do not mean creepy older but yes in his early forties....?"

Maybe not "creepy older," but creepy nonetheless.

The ugly

(ed. note: after consultation with my blogging morality monitor mercedes, it was decided that actual pictures would not be posted to protect the identities of the innoncent. Instead, I will do my best to describe the hilarity.)

Picture choices were "interesting," to say the least. Several featured beer or other alcoholic beverages (not surprising from the Australian, "me sipping a beer back home"), and there was one guy who didn't write anything at all, just sent a blurry topless photo of himself. thanks, buddy. One guy sent four pictures of himself, two of which had women's arms around him but were cropped so the girls were cut out of the picture, and the fourth is of him at some horrid looking party where he's clustered with another dude and three very drunk and slutted out girls, all of them half-lidded and holding red kegger cups, and he is wearing a green plastic lei. A.w.e.s.o.m.e.

One guy sent me a "photo collage" and apologized for the small file size/resolution, and one of the photos... oh, how do I describe it... well, he's sitting on a motorcycle, looking with a smirk directly into the eye of the camera. It's not a bad picture, and he's not really unattractive, but for some reason somebody imported the photo into what I can only assume was "microsoft paint" and used a lovely purple/magenta color to a) draw a sketchedy circle around part of the bike's engine and b) sort of scribbled along the top of his chest and along the top of the white tank top he is wearing. It is hard to capture in words. Mary suggested that it looked something like "80s... electro... neon... um.... something." That about sums it up.

The majority of pictures featured men in suits and ties. Come on, people. There was one dude whose response wasn't spectacular, but wasn't dumb or creepy either, but the two pictures he chose were one of him with a woman, and another of him holding a baby. I mean, maybe they were his sister, and his sister's baby? But he didn't say that. Or explain the woman/baby choice in any way. Why? What are these people thinking?

the mediocre

Some people actually seemed nice enough, but maybe just kind of boring, and the vast majority worked in finance or law or something else that went with the suit-and-tie pics. One guy almost made it to the good category ("Definitely a bit more nerdy, passionate, deviant and
adventurous then your average capitalist"), except that he sent me pics right away and was just kind of a big guy, and not my physical type.

Some quick highlights, far from exhaustive:

• the 20-year old who "always has a smile on his face" and assured me he wanted to be my friend, not get in my pants.
• the football player type who liked sports, but was willing to be dragged to a museum
• people who tried to impress me with their dino knowledge: "did you know that T-Rex wouldn't have been able to run. If that sort of thing interests you then this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship." "I have all 3 Jurassic Park movies on videocassette."
• the man who said he had an IQ of 190, but put "legally blind" in quotes, for no particular reason.
• the use of the royal `we': "Shall we take a stab in the dark? .............What do we have to lose?"
• the classic openers: "Hello Museum it is." "Ok, here's the truth; smart chick are hot!" (true. But please, when trying to impress a smart chick, give yer email a quick readover, eh?)
• the dreamer: "My life long ambition is to be an actor, but at this point im willing to get my foot in the door. Unfortunately the reality of it is that I am a Senior Legal Recruiter for a midtown recruting firm, making a living, just not the one I want."
• the guy who works in fashion and told me that he comes from a good family.
• the guy who told me his body fat percentage (8.5)
• the guy who seemed totally likeable and funny until he declared himself to be a "miserable little man" who would hang out in the gift shop while I went and checked out the giant whale.
• and of course, the ad for deep tantric massage.
  

The... good? ish?

Well, there were just a few that I even remotely considered, so I guess being the best of the bunch, they get to be called "good." There were three emails to which I replied, and in every case, the second email killed it. Or, in one unfortunate instance, it was the picture (sorry, dude.)

1. The most promising, for a moment, was the guy who declared he loved a brainy date, then said " I like to make movies, sneak into movies, ride my bicycle everywhere and i love adventure." OK. He attached a picture of him riding a crazy bikemobile with a funky-awesome house contraption thing built up on the front, with his dog riding in it. He was wearing peter pan-ish ragedy-edged short pants, sneakers with bright pink shoelaces, and a helmet. Also tall and lanky. 100% respondable.

So I sent him an email, and among other things asked how old he was, because it was hard to tell from the pic and maybe there was a little gray in the beard. Now, mind you, I've got a little gray at the temple myself, and I actually am pretty open to age differences if the other stuff seems cool (see, er, bottom of posting for more on that...), so it was just a simple question. In response, he not only seemed kind of defensive/weird about the age difference, he also made a fatal spelling error. And I quote, "i am 34 years old, but i relate best with people your age. im totally in shape cause i ride my bike all the time. and i keep my mind yongue by not
working and traveling as much as possible."

yongue? yongue? Oh, dear. Also, staying yongue by not working doesn't necessarily seem like a well-thought out strategy. To totally kill it, he responded to my comment that I live in "the hellhole of new haven" with an enthusiastic "i love connecticut." Goodbye, mr. crazy bike.

2. The saddest, and most guilt-making, was the guy who totally would have been a hot date if he had been at all hot. I dunno, maybe he was lacking a bit of sense of humor, too, but that can be hard to tell in the emails. He was an evolutionary biologist, researching population genetics and phylogenetics of rare species, which is totally rad, and he was number one... until, of course, he sent me the pictures. In which he turned out to be big, pale, and pudgy, wearing khakis and a too-big pale yellow button up shirt... and oh dear, he was just terribly unattractive to me. So when he wrote later to ask if his pics had scared me off, I was just honest, and he wrote back very sweetly and said he understood and was disappointed. "Hopefully you found another evolutionary biologist to go with you or, at the very least, someone who can spell the word evolution." Stupid physical attraction. Why couldn't he have been a tall, lanky, dark-haired evolution super-dork, huh?

3. There was one other guy who wrote to me a day late, told me he was getting an evolution tattoo for christmas, made some awkward jokes about just getting out of prison and how I could ditch him once he got me into the museum for free (he is a member), and something about how the museum should have a room devoted to frito corn chips. A little strange, but amusing, and lacking obnoxious spelling and grammar mistakes. Of course, I got his email after getting back from the museum, but given the fact that he would have gotten a response beforehand, I shot him a quick email. Then, just like all the others, the second email killed it.

The awkward jokes got more awkward, he revealed he was 5'7" (I am not into "petite" in the boy-types), and the evolution tattoo, which I had revealed I was also considering (the tree of life, please and thank you) turned out to be a darwin fish.

"Yeah, I know I run the risk as looking pretentious as all hell but the non-evolution-5000 year old earth -the Grand Canyon is proof of Noah people really piss me off and any time a symbol can be co-opted to make a point against those assholes I'll do it enthusiastically."

OK, so the darwin fish is a little cheesy to begin with, but dealable, but getting a tattoo out of political spite? menh.

So much for the good.

I ended up dressing up in a relatively cute shirt and nice earrings, taking harry potter y el caliz del fuego along for the 2hr-each way train journey, and spending an awesome fucking day wandering around the museum all by my lonesome. I do love me some natural history, hoo boy.

Also, it was not a total loss: I had bought a ticket to one of the special exhibits - the butterflies, where I got to go stand in a room full of gigantic and beautiful tropical flutterbies all flappering around - and on my way out, this guard approached me. I had just pulled out and started to eat an apple, so at first I thought he was going to tell me I wasn't allowed to eat in the museum, but then he asked me if I had been to the other special exhibits and if I had tickets, and when I said no, he told me he had a good feeling about me and gave me free passes to all the other special exhibits (the two I went to were on water and mythical creatures like dragons and unicorns and such). Thanks, cute shirt!

I was pretty sure, but not positive, that he had been hitting on me, but then he caught up with me two rooms later to show me on a map where the exhibits were that he had given me tickets for, and asked if he could give me his email address. I took it, but I don't think I'll email him, probably...

Hope for the future...

Beyond the ridiculous responses I got for my ad, I dug through the M4W ads as well and sent mine along as a response/invitation to the two or three out of hundreds that I found interesting. One guy who seems pretty cool, actually, wrote back and said he couldn't make it because he was working, but that next time I come through NYC I should get in touch with him. So that's nice to think about...

And then when I got home, skyler told me that his boss, Matt, thinks I'm hot. I have had a mild crush on Matt since I met him last year - he's 43, but cute and hot and dorky and kind of awkward around girls, and also a truly awesome guy. Him and skyler have become super-good friends this year, and while at first I was kind of nervous about admitting/wanting to go out with a 43 year old, skyler and mary both chimed in with "I'd do him!" so that made me feel better. Skyler said he would set us up. We shall see.

And that, friends afar, is the madcap adventure I have had this week in the wild world of internet-savvy singledom. hooray!

Pi

Sometimes I feel just like susan, trapped in that jar.

Now available with run-on sentences

I just looked at my PDX itinerary again, and realized that like a total dumbass, I am flying out of portland on Monday, not Sunday night, and arriving Tuesday, not Monday morning. It is too late/expensive to change this, especially given the thanksgiving timing. This can be interpreted in the following ways:

1) Awesome! An unexpected extra day in Portland! Hooray and good times!

2) Fuck! I'm going to miss class on Monday afternoon, and I already missed one when I was in Argentina! That sucks.

3) Fuck2! Why am I such a dipshit? That's the second airline ticket I have misbooked in a very short period of time. The first time, I was booking somebody else's tickets for Argentina, and the school bailed me out by paying $500 to change the date. Nobody's bailing me out of this one. This is an expensive and stupid trend.

4) Anthropology! While these interpretations may represent contradictory and contested versions of the ticket mistake (and even calling it a "mistake" is to privilege the negative account(s)), all of these viewpoints, including the one currently being expressed in over-comma'd sentences, can in fact be held by the same actor at the same time. In experiencing this divided subjectivity, I am simultaneously claiming agency in the events surrounding the fall 2007 HVN-PDX ticket purchase while also distancing myself from immediate responsibility by accepting the current ticket status as a fait accompli, a simple fact of life which is now beyond my power. In shifting focus away from my own actions, I am able to discursively diminish the impact of negative consequences and instead highlight perspectives of hope and celebration, a move which strengthens both my imagined connections with the to-be-visited community and helps me move into a broader acceptance of this newly uncovered but entirely preexisting flight schedule.

I <3 Halloween

Those glasses ended up being a shooting star on Friday, which was pretty great, and then last night I went liquor treating in the following fabulous getup:

My hair was sprayed gray. I also drank a horrifying amount of sugary rum and shnapps-type drinks at eight different houses, went to bed spinny, made myself puke at 4am in the hopes of it letting me sleep a little better, and am now very hungover and on my way to class. Still, although the drinking-fun was not worth the consequences in this particular case, the costume was worth all of it.

People should throw more costume parties. Maybe without the "pumpkin pie" shots next time.

Two weeks til the deadline!

No, I'm not talking about NSF fellowship applications or PhD programs, this is something far more serious. I'm talking about halloween, peeps. I need some ideas.

On the one had, I have these fabulous future-from-the-past glasses (shown here with entirely appropriate futuristic supermodel face):



but what on earth do these glasses become when translated into the larger scale of full costume? And if I don't build a costume based on this incredible free-pile find, what on earth will I do?

help!

a quick post from the southern hemmy

I should be doing homework now, or actually attending some part of this conference that my school has shelled out thousands of dollars for me to attend, but instead I am surfing the internets, shopping, and then surfing the internets again. Argentina makes me a consumer, what can I say. This country is so fucking cool, so I am trying to take home as much as I can. Like this bizarro ring, which is really quite lovely, which came free with really big bizarro earrings. I bought them from this dude in a park.


Some facts about argentina:
1) the country is beautiful. There are mountains, and lakes with green islands in them, and crazy gnarly red-smooth-barked trees.

2) the people are beautiful. By which I mean hot. Women and men alike, this is a very very attractive country.

3) the food is amazing. And I'm not even eating the meat, which all the meatheads are drooling and moaning about. Apparently the meat is very good here, but so is the fish, and the cheese, and the veg.

4) amazing, delicious, cheap wine. Apparently Argentina is less famous for its wine than Chile, but that's just because historically Chileans exported a whole lot, while Argentians just drank everything they produced. While here, I am helping them out whenever I can. Malbec, yos.

5) things in argentina are made of wool and leather, and everybody drinks mate all the time, and wears crazy asymmetrical clothing and sports rockin dreadlock-mullets, all while managing to look ridiculously hott (see comment #2). I can imagine Ms. Ramirez thriving here.


In other news, I am getting a bit sick of several of my fellow student travellers, especially the ones who talk a lot. This is not surprising, as generally I don't like to spend 24-7 kind of time with groups of people, let alone outgoing and chatty ones. Two more days, and then I will probably avoid the majority of them for at least two weeks, to restore the balance of actually liking them.

We are, however, turning on the movie-recording function of my computer at regular intervals, most particularly after the consumption of the above-mentioned wine. The results are incredible, and hilarious, and I can't actually believe I have some of these things on tape. Like a very serious roundtable discussion from last night about the dangers of invasive big boobs in Argentina, in which whoever was speaking would put on Carolina's glasses and use the corkscrew/bottle-opener thing as a microphone. Fabulous.

I also have a crush on the minister of sustainable development for Argentinian patagonia - Maria, she's super cute - which I share with two other people on the trip, Laura and Luke. She managed to flirt with all three of us, and even though it was really mostly with Luke, us lesbotrons will never give up hope when it comes to dark-eyed environmentalist beauties. Omigod, she just walked by again and said "hola"... <>.

Also, I am starting to freak out about not having done any work while here, especially work on the NSF application essays, which need to be beyond-perfect in less than a month. Not yet freaking out enough to actually start working, of course, but what are ya gonna do? Drink more malbec, that's what.

Oh, and also, as if it weren't good enough, Bariloche is the chocolate capital of South America, with both a chocolate museum and a serious abundance of fine artisinal chocolate shops that make me want to give up now and get fat.

New plan: move to argentina, date hot development minister, gain weight. Go!

A creative afternoon burst

I made it through a full week of school and classes, kind of the first. Although, really, I have already lost a sense of where weeks begin and end, as my schedule seems to be a constant sisyphian task wherein the moment I complete one reading or get out of one class, the deadline of the next is already approaching. I haven't felt this way since reed. A list of the things I am juggling:

An overload of classes (five instead of four), four of which are writing intensive
A 10 hour per week job
PhD applications (now with new and improved positive response from a dude at Santa Cruz!)
NSF application
Some other scholarship appications, probably
A presentation about zombies
Friendships
House and cat maintenance
A house full of fresh-picked fruit, far too much for the three of us to reasonably consume
Membership in several student organizations
An upcoming weeklong conference in Argentina
Volunteering as both staff writer and editor for a student magazine
A desire to consume various inebriants on a semi-regular basis, for the purposes of "fun" and "relaxing"
Keeping up my spanish (including the attendance of biweekly spanish dinners and the "pleasure reading" of Isabel Allende's Zorro)
A not-for-credit master's student lab/workshop, which our advisors may or may not attend
Weekly crossword puzzles in my planner
And probably something incredibly important that I am forgetting and which will bring me great pain and misery once I remember it and it is too late.


A list of what I am planning on doing this afternoon:

Baking one apple-ginger and one peach-ginger crumble, with the above mentioned fruit
Preparing a handout for above mentioned zombie movied DC presentation
Making a stencil and spraypainting this pink t-shirt I am currently wearing so that it is a little bit more interesting and less girlycute

Tonight there are seven or eight overlapping cool events or meetings that I wanted to go to. I will probably make it to only three or four of them.

Somehow, in alllll of this, I am still getting an average of eight hours of sleep per night. How long can it last?

I WIN!

For those of you following the authorship scandal, check out this most magnificent email I received this morning:

MS#: 2007-02228

Title: Cyclophilin D Inactivation Protects Axons in Experimental Autoimmune Encephalomyelitis, an Animal Model of Multiple Sclerosis

Dear Forte and authors,

I have been alerted to a correction in the author line for your PNAS paper by Forte et al. If the change is approved, Micha Rahder would be added in the 9^th position and Katie Stem would be added in the 10^th position. In order for such a change to take place, we will have to receive approval from every author on the manuscript (including the new authors). The new author line would appear as follows:

Forte M, Gold BG, Marracci G, Chaudhary P, Basso E, Johnsen D, Yu X, Fowlkes J, Rahder M, Stem K, Bernardi P, Bourdette D.

You may make your reply directly to this message.

***Please reply quickly so that the publication of your manuscript is not delayed***

Regards,

-Livingston Sheats

Editorial Coordinator

PNAS Editorial Office

202.334.1972


Oh, that's right, bitches. I never actually heard back directly from Gail, but I'm glad that my special patented blend of outrage and guilt-tripping worked. I also sent her an email to thank her right away, because god knows I still might need some ref letters out of her.

Hey, I'm totally published! In a field completely irrelevant to my career! It's rad!

everybody dance now

so, folks, here's the deal. I am tipsy, having just consumed a large strong margarita on a yet-reducified guateabstinance tolerance. I spent the morning dancing around to mixed cds, doing dishes and attempting to turn off the music to do reading, but getting sucked into just dancing crazy around the big empy apartment instead.

This apartment would be fucking fabuloso para una fiesta. Pero no se si S&M lo querría...

But really, what I want is a dance party, right here, right now, in my house, with awesome folks dancing to awesome music.

But really, what I have right now is a big empty apartment, with awesome animals who don't know how to dance, and awesome roommates who are out at some kind of midwifery potluck.

"Midwifery potluck" is like the opposite of "dance party."







I am writing a blog because my friends are far away, and not here dance partying.





grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr



um. relevant updates:

1. new glasses (unsure about the "wacky" factor on the sides, but dealing with it. Also my hair mostly tends to cover the sides anyways):






b) I think eloise might be going on the inside-belly-hip, like jumping out of my underwear, which I think is hilarious and awesome because she is soooo un-sexy. I will ignore Tara's parentish rant, but stick with peyton (the many-tattooed)'s advice to get the first one somewhere relatively invisible or coverable.




Only worry: if I get pregnant, and/or very fat, will she get all warpedy looking? Will I ever get pregnant given my strong feelings about the state of the human population and the world? Will I ever let myself get so fat that my belly tattoos would warp?

Serious business, peeps. ser. i. ous.

Speaking of which

So, this one is kind of awesome, and fairly simply in terms of lines but still capturing eloise-y goodness. The stairs are kind of good, but not quite right... But then, I dunno, do I actually want this on my arm?

Filled with doubts. Can't think of other things I'd really want, either. Kind of want eloise to go somewhere (where??!) else, for some vague reason. doubts! help!

Also, the pdx visit is a go, so I've got to figure out this tat business soon, and how! woot!

Time for Tat?

So I got this tattoo the other day with skyler, who got a swashbuckling pirate dude in the same spot. We got them to celebrate a very portland sort of day, and also the fact that skyler scheduled his surgery for April, something he has been waiting to do for many many years. It was great, so I commemorated the occasion with this delightfully classic anchor being strangled boa-style by a very non-boa-type cobra snake.

It is starting to flake off around the head. Skyler's bubbled up and started falling off within hours, because he has hairy arms, and apparently the 25-cent type tattoos don't like to be applied over all that fuzz.

Jed thought it was real. Apparently he thinks I am the sort of person who enjoys anchor-strangling cobras. Our friendship is now in question.

But here's the thing. The more it sits there in my peripheral vision, the more I wish I did have an awesome tattoo right there. It looks good with this half-sleeve sweater. I could put something pretty right there instead of a serpentine sailor. Now I just have to figure out what.
Of course, now that my tattoo-artist buddy who lived here last year (and who did mercedes' octobiker) moved out to Minneapolis, there is no way in hell that I am going to get a tattoo in New Haven. The goal is to have an idea/design by my next visit to Portland.

Any suggestions?

Tragedy Strikes! Triply!

Tragedy #1: The case of the overambitious haircut

I wanted it to be like last time I cut it, when I thought it was too short but then actually it was cute, and like this:
But instead of accidentally doing a great job while stoned and having no idea what it would look like (see picture above, again), I was sober, thought I was totally in control, and ended up overcutting it so it's short n fluffy, like this:I mean, it's OK, in a third-grade-teacher-who-wears-turquoise kind of way. Even though it's just as choppy-layered as exhibit a, because it's too short it just adds to the fluff factor. Fortunately, hair is the kind of thing that grows.

Tragedy #2: I have no left arm

So I woke up last night around 4am in the middle of some kind of funny dream, and when I woke up I remembered the dream, but then I was distracted by the fact that I had woken up because something seemed to be wrong with my left arm. Specifically, it wasn't there. I couldn't feel it, at all.

I sat up, and looked over and it was to my surprise still attached, but I couldn't move it, and when I reached across to grab it with my right hand, I didn't feel my own fingers around my forearm. It was like a disgusting rubbery fake arm attached to my body, all limp and panic-inducing.

So I sat there for a minute and concentrated really hard on wiggling my fingers, which started to work, and then I could move my wrist around, and then my arm came back to me, slowly. After a couple of minutes I got some pins and needles in my hand, and could once again feel things all up and down my arm.

I think I must have been sleeping in such a way as to have pinched off the nerve, somehow, because even when the circulation is gone you still get the pins and needles business, but this was just dead. And terrifying.

My arm still feels a little funny today, just the slightest little tingle all up and down itself, as if it had a bit of champagne with breakfast.

I was scared to go back to sleep.

Tragedy #3: Sahlins got a big ol' butt

Apparently too big for his catbox, because he keeps peeing over the edge. Repeetedly. Like, every time.

All of this is taking place in my lovely new room, with its lovely wood floors, which now smell like lovely sahlins urine.

I am going to go shell out for one of those walled-in monstrosities, fer my little pissmonster. I loves the aminals, but jesuchristo sometimes they are a pain in the big ol' butt.

Shhhhh... don't tell

I give up. Sahlins has been blogging for a year now, and after finally giving in to the pressure and promising to write a travel-type blog about the Guateventures, I find myself wanting first to write about my new house, etc... The travelog will have a different address, and I'll just link to those postings from here whenever I add something to it, because that one will be accessible to a much wider circle (eg. my mom, eg. my mom's entire address book), and there are some stories (like the Tono saga) that don't necessarily need to be read by everybody whose sister ever changed my diapers.

So, New House News: we have named it Portland, and it is complete with Powell's bridge poster and an absurd number of feet running around. We are happily located in the closest thing that New Haven has to offer in terms of a NoPo or Felony Flats-ish neighborhood, with folks that ain't just rich and white, and who sit on their porches and yell out to ask you if you have a lighter as you bike by. Also 1.5 blocks from the only natural food grocery store in town... hello, fresh bulk tofu! Still have to drive out to Hamden to hit the TJ's, but such is life in the 'netty.

"netty" is my new name for Connecticut. I just made it up.

Skyler and I have an ikea date today. Last night we had an all-you-can-eat sushi date, which was both delicious and painful. It was good sushi, best I've had here yet, and for $18 you get to order whatever sushis and normal rolls and fancy rolls you like, even though the fancy rolls are listed in the menu for $10-12 each. They make it all fresh to order, and then you die because you order a second round when the first one is finished, and then realize that actually you are getting fuller and fuller just sitting and waiting for the second gigantic plate of lobster-mango-sweet chili sauce and crunchy eel rolls... and then after all of it, when you can no longer possibly eat another bite, you get the tempura-fried bananas and red bean ice cream for dessert, because dessert is included and everybody knows that if you pay $18 for an all-you-can-eat meal, you must consume at least $50 worth of food.

And then we had to bike home. oof.

We both passed out in our respective Lay-Z-Boyz in front of Batman. I think that this will be a good year.

It's strange how quickly I get used to being back here. At first when I left Paso Caballos I was disgusted and angry at how much food there was on my plates at the restaurants - every meal was as much as I ate in a day out in Paso, or more. And now here I am stuffing myself to the gills and happy as fresh red clam sashimi. Where are the tortillas? Why am I allowed to have all this money and comfort and easiness? Why do I get to leave that hard place, leaving everybody else behind to sweat and grow their milpa and fight to feed their eight kids?



When can I go back?