"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen."
-Albert Einstein

Well, here we are. For those of you who don't know (or forgot), today is my birthday. I'm turning 18.
This has been an interesting experience for me, the sort of person who takes birthdays a little more seriously than other people. I think this has a lot to do with how much I think about how big our universe and time and space and all that really is. To quote The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy (and really, why not): "Space is big. Really big. You just won't believe how vastly hugely mindbogglingly big it is. I mean you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist, but that’s just peanuts to space."
I have always been the sort to think of space and time as different representations of a similar thing, too, so for me, birthdays are very important. They are mankind's way of making little, useless, redundant, insignificant attempts to impose order on a system, to which we are more insignificant and unimportant than the smallest idea of a speck of dust, which literally runs on chaos. I like to think of my birthday as my version of standing on a mountaintop during a thunderstorm in wet copper armor shouting "All gods are bastards" (and that was a horrible murdered Terry Pratchett quote. Damn, I'm on a role today). Usually (at least for the last couple of years) I celebrate my birthday by eating lots of my favorite foods, trying to spend as much time as possible in the company of lots of my favorite people, and trying to do lots of my favorite things (most memorably to date, I believe, I dragged several friends to spend the day in The Field Museum in Chicago. The fact that they both went and are still my friends explains why they are some of my favorite people). For some reason, eighteen is considered the magical number where people are suddenly mature and grown up enough to be treated as mature and grown up (I've spent plenty of time around people from 17 to 23 and I've still not seen enough evidence to convince me. Actually, there are plenty of 30-year-olds who have yet to convince me). That said, it's seen as a turning point. I feel like I should somehow be able to make it something important. Or at least my hidden superpowers will finally show up (I'm pulling for teleportation, but I'll settle for being to fly and shoot lighting out of my fingers if I have to). But what to do, how to do it? So many choices, so many ideas. Oh, and what, do you ask, am I doing for my oh-so-special day? Why I am spending a good 4 hours on a bus. And the rest probably waiting around for something. Granted, I will be waiting and riding on the bus which is taking me, over the next few weeks, to CANCUN (!!! <- this, ladies and gentleman, is the sound of pure awesome), but still. Nothing big, nothing special. No fire works, hell, no friends I've known more than a couple of months.
But I've thought about it, and I think that's ok. I mean, I could have some giant party so big they could hear us two towns over. I could be living on a yacht somewhere in the Carribbean, sipping martinis (I've never had a martini, but I think I'd like to try one). On the other hand, I could be living in a trailer park in Louisiana, working at a truck stop and calling myself 'Betty'. I could be in the hospital. Hell, I could be dead (and if I hadn't learned how to skid the training wheels on my bike so well, I probably would be). So here's the thing: I could be anywhere in the world, doing anything in the world, and it would still just be another day. No matter what I think or do, people live and people die. They burn food and forget things. They wreck cars and miss opportunities. People talk, laugh, live. Animals go about their business. Life lives. The world turns. The sun sets and rises (at least until I finally finish that giant laser-thingy I'm building in a castle in the Alps).
This day only makes as huge a difference to me as I want it too. So while yes, I am spending the day on a bus, I can at least make it a non-grumpy, happy day on a bus. And I think that's good enough for me.

On a different note, here's some dumb stuff I found out on the internet about this day. My tree, apparently, is chestnut (ooookay). My signs are Scorpio and the Year of the Monkey (cool). The 21st of November is on the cusp of pretty much everything (i.e. the 22nd is always a different sign, tree, etc). I share birthdays with Bjork and Voltaire (<-how do they know that?). Popes have both been born and died on this day throughout history. Scarlett Johansson turns 25 tomorrow (mmmmhmmmm). I accidentally got myself a weird birthday present by downloading all 7 Harry Potter books narrated by Jim Dale onto my ipod (for those of you who don't know, I have had a crush on Jim Dale's voice ever since I first heard the books more than, wow, must be ten years ago). When I read them, I can hear him reading them too. I haven't heard Sorcerer's Stone for more than 4 years, so hearing it again has been a real treat. It's weird, some parts have the exact same inflection I remember, and some parts I don't remember at all. This has reaffirmed my desire to read those books out loud to my kids before they ever get near those damn movies (my experience with HP was such a huge part of growing up for me, I dream of being able to simulate it for my offspring, should they exist).
In another weird note, I have finally outgrown the Harry Potter books (SPOILERS AHEAD, YOU SILLY PEOPLE WHO STILL HAVEN'T FINISHED BOOK 7). I am now older than the three for all 7 books. I still remember secretly staying up on my 11th birthday, waiting, just in case. How odd, to have outgrown something which creates such a framework, a time-line for so much of my childhood. Oh wait, hang on a second. Doesn't the epilogue take place, like, 19 years later? So I would have to be, what, 36 or something. Whoo, I guess I don't have grow up yet after all! False alarm.
Have a fantastic year, everybody.

"Live as if you were to die tomorrow, learn as if you were to live forever."
-Mahatma Gandhi

Oh great and good lord, please grant me someday the ability to both make enough money to fund this sort of stuff, and the time to do it.

The Domino Effect


The Extreme Version


Thank you, and good night!

Sorry it's been so long folks. Stuff has been going down, the most recent of which was that the power in my house has been on the fritz for 2 whole days. It came on last night (cross your fingers), hopefully for good for a while, but by then I was too tired to type anything. As it is, 2 weeks of content might be a bit tough to come up with all at once, so bear with me here. I'm going to try a blow-by-blow as best as I can, starting last weekend.
Last weekend, we (my host family including Luis Fernando, and also Arnoud and Joao) went to Tonala in Chiapas for a baby shower. My host mother's family is from there. Beach pictures to follow (Chiapas, at least the bit that I saw, is a lot like a cross between Colorado and the Caribbean). On the way back, we stopped for the night in Tuxtla Gutierrez, incidentally on Halloween night (again, many blurry, Bigfoot-esque pictures to follow -I love my camera, but if there's one thing it cannot do, it's shooting at night). I also got to have the closest thing to the food I love back home since I came here (again, more to follow). I also, for the bazillionth time, got told off for not wanting to go out and party (they can keep saying it, but they can't make me enjoy it. I can't make me like it. Blame my first personality).
After it came the biggest disappointment I've had since I got here. November 2 is Dia de Los Muertos in Mexico. In Mina, everyone goes to the stadium and brings flowers and eats and works on the giant altar and all. I was looking forward to it since before I came to Mexico, since over a year before. So, as you can imagine, I was a little put out when, in the space of 4 hours, I developed a truly spectacular fever and, for all intents and purposes passed out for 12 hours. Insult was added to injury when, the next morning, I was told off again for not trying harder to 'acclimatize'. That was definitely the low point of the last month.
But, things have looked up from there! I still have the flu, possibly exacerbated by some sort of allergy brought on by the bizarre season change, but since pretty much my entire school is identically sick to one degree or another (even so severely as causing a shut-down of the bathrooms for an afternoon to clean up the vomit -charming), I don't feel as special. The season change here is...weird. I usually end up a little under-the-weather around the season changes back home, especially if I am in school or otherwise occupied, since that tends to dictate that I will not be taking care of myself very well or sleeping very much. I thought here, in this soft, tropical climate, I would be fine. But apparently, when the temperature drops, although it may still feel like jeans and a t-shirt weather for us Midwest-Americans, there's still humidity. And the humidity makes it a squidgy, sticky, creeping cold which, among other things, makes it very difficult for someone busy and surviving on 5 hours of sleep a night to get rid of a mild but very annoying cold. On the other hand, the rest of my school is sick too, teachers included.
Now, since this was typed over the course of about a week, and I have trouble remembering what I ate for lunch yesterday (seriously, no clue), than I am going to forget some stuff and refer to it later and you're all gonna be thinking "WTF?", but that can't be helped. Anyway, I have many awesome pictures of Chiapas, which will hopefully make it onto the *___*Picasa*___* page....someday.
School commenced, as previously mentioned, and the week went as normal (Happy Birthday, Patrick!). On Saturday, we drove up to the other house in Veracruz with Louis Fernando. For some reason, I was the only person even remotely worried about the state of the house. This was the first time we had gone up there since the roads had cleared after the last hurricane, about a month ago. I knew the water hadn't made it anywhere near this neighborhood, but I also knew that there's usually a little more to hurricanes than lots of water.
Score one for knowledge.
I'm sure I've smelled something worse in my life (my life has been a little more graphic for my age than most), but for the love of cheese I can't remember what or when. As usual, they had left the fridge fully stocked, to avoid shopping when they came back. Thing you have to remember is, the power in Mexico is very volatile at the best of times (one of the reasons this post took so long is that last week, the power for the whole property was turning on and off every 5 seconds...for 4 days. We still don't know why). So when hurricane winds (not usually known for their kindness to electronics and power lines) blew stuff away, they took the power out with them. And for some reason, when the power came back on for the rest of the street, it didn't come back for the one unoccupied house. Add to that the broken windows, and the fact that with the windows and various cracks around doors and such there was about an inch or so of dry bay-silt on the floors all through the house, and it was not fun. Saddly, I forgot to take a picture of the fridge before they had emptied it out and started hosing it off and...brace for eww....scraping off all the bug casings. I kept trying to help, but no one would let me. Actually, it was sort of interesting from a clinically anthropological sort of way. Petrona and Julia kicked everyone out of the house and wouldn't let anyone back in to do anything unless they found something they couldn't reach or couldn't move. It was hard for me since a) I was bored and b) I'm programmed to try and help when I see a little old lady trying to climb into a cupboard to clean the back. They were very angry, in an unfocused sort of way I'm not used too. It was like they took it as a direct affront to their very old-school Mexican pride in the woman's duty to keep house (which I have been running up against more and more. It will be interesting to see how that comes up in my next 2 families).
That said, it took days to get the smell out of my nose. They actually piled everyone into the car, braved the insanely crowded late-night traffic and parking, and spent 2 hours just wandering around the mall looking at stuff. I didn't understand what we were doing until someone explained we were trying to avoid going back into the house.
Enough of that. School resumed on Monday as per usual, but lead to a breakthrough. As of all the time before, I had kind of been looking for something to learn (aside from Spanish). I've started practicing guitar again, but I can do that at home. I had been thinking about playing soccer, but besides the fact that again, not that hard to do back home, it also seems to be nigh on impossible to accomplish here. It's funny, everyone keeps saying "Oh sure, there's soccer for girls here, I know there is", but no one actually plays it. I've only had one person actually come out and say I'm not going to find that here, but no one seems to have told anyone else. All the adults are still convinced we just haven't looked in the right places. Anyway, the music teacher got trapped inside in our classroom on Monday due to inclement weather (is that how you say that?). I had seen the music students from afar, usually carrying some sort of guitar-like instrument and wrestling a lot (the one's that actually play and don't sing tend to be boys). I, in typical oversight fashion, said to myself that I don't really enjoy mariachi as much (some exceptions), and ignored them. But once I got to hear them practice, I got a descent look at some of the instruments. They are NOT, in fact, guitars, but a sort of cross between a guitar and a ukulele. They come in 3 sizes (accurately called primero, secundo and tercero -first, second, and third) and are as a group called 'jaranas'. It gets better. I've never heard them before (and the Wikipedia page on them is woefully lacking), because they're not played outside of southern Veracruz. The music is very fast, big on percussion, slightly repetitive, and really, really happy-sounding (to me at least). I was instantly enthralled. Of course, as with most things I find fun, people reacted to my wish to try playing with one of those "oh, sure honey" looks, while secretly thinking I'll figure out eventually that it's a boy thing. But after Petrona got over her initial shock that I could actually play guitar (another boy-dominated activity), and I wouldn't shut up about the jarana, she started to look into it. I got my first go on Wednesday. It was the polar opposite of Monday (snigger, get it? get it?), so much so that all the students skipped out on their other classes and played a soccer match with an actual referee (maybe I'm reading too much into it, but it seems to me that soccer gets incrementally more violent the more important the score is. Pff. Boys.), or taking the time out to cheer extra loudly from the bleachers (depending on their preference and gender <- if it seems like I'm harping on about it, that would be right, I am. Bear with me, please). I, still exhausted from Veracruz, slept through the first half of the game on the top bench of the bleachers (not on purpose), and I woke up when someone elbowed me in the head (also, I'm assuming, not on purpose). At this point, I noticed the music teacher had piled all his stuff up on one of the big, stone stair/bleach/thingys that hug the elementary school and run parallel to the sports field. I went over, and, after clearing up some initial confusion, he taught me some very rudimentary chords. Jaranas usually have 8 strings, are carved from the core of certain kinds of strings (Chiro, the music teacher, makes his own), and are played a lot like a guitar. I play best on a tercero; it's easier for me to handle and is closer in size to a small guitar. I can play secundo, too (about the size of a standard ukulele), but I have some serious trouble with the ones smaller than that (there's one kind, I think it's a sort of offshoot/soprano thingy which is about the size of a guitar for some sort of American Girl type doll). I LOVE it! I can't play worth crap (it doesn't help that I don't know any Spanish in relation to playing music), but I really want to learn to do this! I was a little put out to learn that I can't really play with the rest of the class. In true Mexican fashion, no one out and told me this, but Chiro is in charge of all the music classes for the whole school, and they're practicing for some sort of competition right now. My friend Patrick was really sweet about explaining that I probably couldn't play with them, since the year before they had had a Korean girl perform with them and gotten a whole bunch of points taken off. I think he was really worried about offending me, which he shouldn't have been. Not only would I not want to play in front of the whole school (I'm shy, I don't know how to play the instrument yet, and all the songs are in Spanish!), but the only people who could offend me through this are the stupid judges! (I was a little put out for some reason. I don't know why, Americans practically invented unfair stereotypical profiling).
Anyway, my host mother found a little school that meets for two hours every Thursday and Friday night (I'm going to have to take a taxi there). The classes are less than $20 USD a month. She was all worried that 'it would be too high'. I tried to explain that my guitar classes back home were about $14 for 1/2 hour once a week and in the U.S. that's reasonable, but I don't think she believed me. So, I'm probably going to start classed once I get back from Ruta Maya on 4 December. The teacher says for now I can use one of his extra jaranas to practice. I can't wait!
Let's see, what else has happened....
Oh! I finally paid for my Ruta Maya seat (thank you guys, I owe you big time, I love you!). For those of you who don't know, it's a Rotary thing (I'm guessing in all countries, although I can only speak for the USA and Mexico) to hold 2 (although I'm guessing that might be slightly harder in places like, say, Belgium). Oh, for familial enjoyment, this comes from a language and country chat I was having with Arnoud and a couple of our Mexican friends a week or so ago. Patrick and I were complaining that most of Europe speaks upwards of 2 languages, were as the U.S. and Mexico, outside of large cities, are almost overwhelmingly English and Mexican Spanish, respectively. Arnoud's counter-argument was that while most of Belgium can speak 2 or more separate tongues, you can also drive all the way across it in about 2 days and it has no mountains to speak of. Jose Louis and I both agreed that we want to go to Belgium. Of course, I followed with: "The question is, why wouldn't you go to Belgium? Belgium."
No one got it. "We are pilgrims in an unholy land".
The real stumper is, why can I remember random lines from Indiana Jones, but I can't remember the correct verb for 'let go of me'.
Also, as some of you may be aware, my birthday is coming up. I'm turning 18 on 21 November. It's just as big a deal here as it is in the states (at least in a legal sense. I think they blow off a bit of the whole 'woo, b-day!' thing with Quincineras). It's starting to look like I'm going to miss my actual birthday completely, party-wise (which sucks, since it actually fell on a Sunday this year). So, my family threw me a party this Sunday instead. It was epic, in a normal sort of way. I got some cool presents (thank you, guys!). Most of the friends I invited actually showed up (at 3pm on a Sunday, which, my host mother was quick to point out to me, probably means they really want to be my friends, which is cool). One person who didn't come actually showed up really late just to wish me a happy birthday and explain why he couldn't make it, instead of just waiting to tell me at school (once again, thanks Patrick!). I had a really good time, and as some people are starting to notice, a truly legendary cake incident (forever immortalized on Facebook. I'm working on getting a copy so I can post it to here. I figure if that many people saw it, what the hell, it was funny!). I promised Jose Louis and Gustavo I would get them back, thereby highlighting another cultural difference. They freaked out a little and I had to explain it's just something you say, as long as you're laughing when you say it you don't actually mean it. BTW, all you lovely folks back home, it was funny here. You try that shit at my 19th b-day, I will put the smackdown on all y'alls. Just sayin'.
Due to my bizarre MentalFloss addiction, I have a fun fact for you. I always thought the Firefly character Badger was named Badger, but it may have been a sly job description. Turns out, a 'badger' was a name for a Medieval age bloke who bought stuff from the people who made/grew/owned it and sold it to vendors or wholesalers, at a profit. Sort of an early middle-man. Obviously, the job was cut out (snigger). Joss is God!
So, party rocked, actual birthday may be spent in a bus on the way to Veracruz (or waiting around for something. This is a Rotary outing we're talking about).
So that brings me to today. Considering how happy I am, it seems more productive to list the only things going wrong right now.
1) I cannot find anyone to come pick me up so I can see the 1st HP7 movie at midnight tonight (and I already have a ticket!)
2) I am really tired (but we should face it, that is not news).
3) I cannot find any stores which sell nice shirts in my size (fun, right?)
4) My freaking ipod finally ate my copy of Zombieland, and The Walking Dead, while good, is severely lacking in both the funny and the Woody-Harrelson-with-a-banjo moments.
And that is it! If I left anything out, take it up with the Complaints department (which, BTW, is a gorilla wearing glasses and reading a 2-day-old copy of The Guardian).
I love you all, good night!

And here is rendition one (see original post if you don't know what this is). WARNING: WILL CONTAIN POP-CULTURE SPOILERS! I am not going to go around marking them either, but I'll try to keep them as vague as possible for tender young eyes sake. That said, beware!

Without further ado, Pick Of the Week!

Best Book
Side Jobs by Jim Butcher
Hands down the best book I read this month (certainly the most anticipated). It only works if you're a reader of Jim Butcher's series The Dresden Files (you may know it from a small, quickly canceled TV show on the Sci Fi network -I refuse to use that misspelled name they came up with- that had almost nothing to do with the books at all). If you aren't a reader, I recommend you try them out. They are kick. If you do read them, this is a must! It includes all but two of Butcher's short stories (all very good fun), and one small novelette, not available anywhere else, which occurs 45 minutes after the end of his last book, Changes. It's told from supporting character Murphy's point of view, is very good, and gave those of us still holding our breath after Changes cliffhanger a chance to keep from turning from blue to purple and actually passing out. But, since this is Jim Butcher we're talking about, he doesn't actually answer any big questions, instead leaving his fanbase in the dark until the next book comes out in April (don't read the Amazon synopsis unless you're up to speed. It will ruin the whole series for you). Five months, I don't think I'll last. I swear, some books are like crack...

Best Song
"Temple in Me Heart" by The Hipwips
Not as easy as it should be to get a hold of, I thoroughly recommend everything these guys have done! They have 2 albums out right now, both very solid. This is just my favorite song over all. Good music to listen to in the car (and for me, that's high praise).

Best Joke or Funny Moment
This one was a little more dark-humory than I would have preferred, but it's actually quite amusing in hindsight. See, the local Rotary club has been collecting donations for over a month now for outlaying villages in Southern Veracruz which were hit hard by the massive flooding, thanks to the last 2 hurricanes (yeesh!). The unstable ground around swampy Veracruz coupled with the tendency for villages to cluster around rivers would have been bad enough, but the floodwaters also destroyed large parts of the capitol, Veracruz City, and caused huge road damage and the collapse of several major bridges and roadways, essentially cutting off relief and fresh supplies to lots of outlying arias. In a place where accidentally swallowing to much tap water can kill you, that's not good. We did one run to a nearby village about a month ago (when I say nearby, I mean about 50 miles away, which, with the roads here, means 2 1/2 very bumpy hours) and it went very well.
This time, another club collected even more stuff, and added it to ours to dispense. This is where the fun part comes in: somehow, someone managed to pick a village that was not only outside our clubs jurisdiction (and therefore not our problem), but was over 5 hours away (that's one way, mark you) through some of the most trashy roads I have ever seen (for example, we drove for 20 minutes on something oddly soft which I later realized was just a giant pile of sandbags. The actual pavement had been swept away by the retreating floodwaters. One the way there, one of the cars in our entourage (there were 3 SUVS belonging to club members, and one large lorry-type truck hauling all the donations) got a rock tossed up under it and punched a whole in it's oil pan (which is bad, fellow not-car people). After sitting in the sun for 20 minutes taking pictures and wandering around, everyone split up, managed to cram themselves into other cars (sitting on laps was required), and got the car up to the next village, which happened to have a mechanic. We left it there and went on to the actual destination. Hallmark moments ensued, and we managed to get out around 3pm. We made it back to the broken car to find that the mechanic had fixed the hole. Hurray! (see where this is going?) Just far enough away that there was no way to get back, the oil pan broke completely. Since whoever owned the car did not want to leave it stranded in the boonies of Veracruz (I don't know why. Honestly, it probably would have been safer there than parked on the street back in Mina), they decided to tie to to the car in front and essentially drag it home. Look at a topographical map of southern Veracruz and tell me why this is a REALLY bad idea. So, as much hi-jinks ensued(the lorry had gone on ahead, and since you can't really pull a big car with an equally sized car very fast, we were traveling at about 10 miles an hour), including a rather epic wrong turn:



and constant stops to retie the car and move the increasingly uncomfortable overstuffed passengers around, we went.
I was in a pretty good mood until one of my legs cramped up and the car stopped going again. It wasn't until I was helping 10 other people push a broken SUV up a giant hill on a road that would have been deemed unsafe to drive on in the U.S., in the dark, with a stabbing pain up my right side, no painkillers, no water, and no food that I realized this was getting a little silly.
Eventually, after about 2 more hours of this crap, everyone else figured this out too and banded together to force the hold out car owner to leave his SUV in what was laughingly called a 'parking lot' in front of a 24 hour shop in one of the millions of tiny towns on the road, with the promise they would drive out with someone to fix it in the morning. All 20 or so of us piled back into our 2 SUVs (think about it) and made our merry way back onto the not-really-a-road (by now, it's pushing 9:30). We get back into town by past 10, to find our compatriots from the lorry sitting on the side of the road eating a late-night snack and waiting for us. Not only are they annoyed that it took us so long, they want to know if we 'stopped to help the dead guy'. Turns out, we must have driven past about 5 police trucks parked around a gent who, when they went past, was lying on the side of the road covered in 'some sort of reddish stuff'. We make it home by a quarter to 11, only to find that there's a problem with the hot water heater, and all our clothes that were supposed to be washed that day were left in a wet heap in front of the washer. When I find my school uniform in the pile (bear in mind this is the middle of the week and I need to be up at 5am the following morning to got to school), my host mother announces that no-one is doing anything the next day, and to all just forget it and go to bed. We sleep until lunchtime the next day. Like the bumper stickers say, "Never buy a car you can't push".

Happiest/Best Moment I Could Take A Picture Of


Location: Iglesia de San Andres, San Andres Tuxtla, Los Tuxtlas de Catemaco, Ver. MEXICO

This exact moment was cool looking, but actually a little dull. The day around it was fantastic. If I ever get the money (or the opportunity) to retire to some little relatively hard to reach place, I'm probably coming to live in the Tuxtlas, around Lago Catemaco (use a map, you geographically-challenged internet addict, you).

Best Movie
Sarah Jane Adventures, episodes 'Death of the Doctor', Parts 1 & 2
The name says it all. I always consider Sarah Jane Adventures and Torchwood to exist for the sole reason of keeping the frankly terrifyingly large Doctor Who fanbase from rioting halfway between the end of a season and the Christmas special, but this episode was just good clean fun. Giant bird people that looked like they escaped from Farscape, the return of the infamous Joe Grant. Gratuitous misuse of the long-suffering Clyde, small blue men with difficult names, a rather obvious setup for a continuity issue they're going to run into pretty soon (hint: I don't think that number is gonna take so well. A plot arc would work better!), and that's not to mention the rather prominent cameo of a very specific character whose name is rather prominently displayed in the episode title (To quote Mr. Twain "The report of my death was an exaggeration").

Best Quote
"You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline - it helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer." - Frank Zappa

Best Obscure Pop-Culture Reference That Most Of You Aren't Going To Understand
I found a way to involve the audience AND make this unnecessarily mean! I'm going to come up with a line, or part of a line, from something. You have to figure out what it is and post it in the comments WITHOUT using Google, Bing, or you're resident nerdy relative. For those of you to culturally illiterate (or lazy) to come up with anything, I will be posting the answer to every weeks question the following week. I'll start with something simple.

"Gym was canceled due to the extreme dead guy in the lockers".

Come on folks, I know at least three of you know this one (and two very specifically don't, for which they should be taken out into the road and pelted with wet Lucky Charms).

Best Dumb Thing
Despite long hours of meditation, I think the subject of 'Best Joke or Funny Moment' was a double header this week. I can't really top that.

Best Random Thing
This won this week, hands down (there is also a picture, but I didn't put it on here, since it's kinda puke-worthy. If you want to see it or to read more, go here).

"The Taiwanese city of Tainan looked like the set of a slasher movie after a 56-foot sperm whale exploded on its way through town. At the time, the whale was dead, having beached itself earlier, and was being carted via flatbed truck to a research facility for autopsy. As the whale lay rotting in the sun, gases began to build up inside its carcass until they detonated in a flood of whale guts."

Looking for these kind of 'accidents' has long been a hobby of mine, although I am not very good at finding them. So far, my favorite one that I found was a 4 car pileup involving an open-top lorry full of ripe avocados. I still have the newspaper clipping in my room back home. For more interesting 'it fell off the back of a truck'-type stories, check out this.

Best Meal



And I'm not kidding, these suckers are good eating (especially the soft bit at the base of the throat).

Best TV Episode
Although there was a solid runner-up this week (Supernatural's most recent installment, "Live Free or Twi-Hard", was sensational -I leave you to guess at their Freak of the Week), I have to give the honor to 'Point Blank', the second season finale of White Collar, if only for finally delivering, with their usual amount of flawless style, TV's first real (in my opinion) use of The Heavy's 'How You Like Me Now' (and in this seasons coolest scene, no less). I hope more of their music is to follow. I love The Heavy, and I've thought their music fit right in to White Collar's aura of glamor, drama and daring heists ever since I first heard them perform on Letterman.



Note: I was going to attach the video of the song on White Collar, but I couldn't find one. Then I was going to attach a recording of their performance on Letterman, but I watched the music video and it was so good it won. You can see their performance from Letterman here (I recommend it. They were the first group on Letterman to get asked to perform an encore ever).

Add to that their stunning cliffhanger (the most shocking I think they're allowed to be on the USA network), and I will definitely be coming back for their premier in January, no matter how bored I was with some of their episodes this season.

So that's it, folks! Comments, questions, criticism and recommendations are appreciated, just click on the little speech bubble with the number in it at the top right-hand corner of the post. Thanks for reading!

I've been considering this idea for a while now, so I thought since I haven't actually forgotten it yet, I should give it a try.
As you may have noticed, I tend to be very opinionated about certain useless things, and I also like to share all the funny stuff I find and that happens to me on a daily basis. At home, that tends to be shared, involuntarily, with whomever I can find first, but here, since I can't really explain things like Buffy the Vampire Slayer in Spanish (and no one would care if I could), it has to be you, dear reader. At the best, it should offer you a sort of peek into my psyche and give you something to look at as well. At the worst, well, at least it should make me put SOMETHING up here once a week.
I originally came up with the idea of posting, in December, a sort of 'Best Of' for the year of 2010. This became a little unfeasible, however, since I could only think of contestants for the myriad of categories I could come up with from the last couple of weeks, which kind of defeats the purpose. Who remembers January in October, anyway? So I thought some more and came up with this: Every week, sometime around Friday (Side note: I would have preferred it be Sunday, but since posting would require that I am 1) in someplace with internet access, and 2) conscious, Sundays are usually out for me) I will be posting a list of the 'Best Ofs' for the past week. This does not mean that all the things are from last week (as in released/occurred during), it means I found them the best of their sort of thing I was exposed to in the last week. So far, categories include (subject to change):
Best Book (will include things that are old, I have read previously, and may repeat depending on the subject and it's relevance to me)
Best Song (again, may repeat depending on my fancy. Also, may not actually be that good, just really catchy)
Best Joke or Funny Moment (may be a nth-way tie most of the time)
Happiest/Best Moment That I Managed To Take A Picture Of
Best Movie (includes films, Youtube, and home-made)
Best Story (thing that happened to me, thing that I heard about, read about, came up with, urban legend, etc)
Best Quote (may be from literature, real life, funny only in or out of context, etc.)
Best Obscure Pop-Culture Reference Not Everyone Is Going To Understand (if you know me, you know why this may also be a nth-way tie most of the time)
Best Dumb Thing (including dumb things that happened to me, dumb things I saw or heard about, and dumb things that happened in the world at large)
Best Random Thing (this is sort of a catch-all for cultural tidbits)
Best Meal (this may not refer to the quality of the food, it may refer to the type of food, the situation, the company, or some other factor)
Best TV Episode (does not necessarily have to be from this week or even this year. May only be picked for one reason, ignoring the overall quality of the episode/show. May not even be very good. May repeat. <- get the joke?)

What do you think? I encourage comments! I am already working on the list for this week (warning: may include stuff I already posted. Deal with it! I will probably add or delete fields as I see fit, too.
So, without further ado, introducing.....Park In The Rear's Pick Of the Week! (friends should get that very old, not very good joke).

What happens if a big asteroid hits the Earth? Judging from realistic simulations involving a sledge hammer and a common laboratory frog, we can assume it will be pretty bad.
- Dave Barry

This isn't going to be a very long post, since I'm really busy right now and I have to leave in an hour and I still haven't taken a shower (sorry, I'm having a run-on sentence issue today). I just wanted to point out that there are 2 new albums up in the gallery (captions to follow), and there should be a third up by tonight or tomorrow. If you have any questions or comments about anything, pictures or otherwise, you can email me with the 'contact me' button under the About Me section in the sidebar, or comment on this post by clicking on the little speech bubble with the number inside in the upper right-hand corner of the post.
Some random, small space taker-uppers to waste your time:
If you haven't read Side Jobs, you're not as cool as you could be. And for those of you who are making excuses, look at me. I'm living in southern Mexico, learning Spanish, living 3 hours from the nearest bookstore (if you didn't wince, you're a bad person), and living in a house which loses it's internet connection for 10 minutes every time someone turns on the upstairs shower and the back burners on the stove at the same time (don't ask me, I don't know), and I still finished it before you did. Because I have my priorities strait. Hi, Mom ^_^ !
Even if you haven't, but you're a fan of The Dresden Files and have read a good way into the series, you should check out this for fun warm-fuzzies (beware of mild spoilers, it's relevant until the last book -which, incidentally, ROCKED).
In other news, here is life:


Ah, perfection. Coke in one hand, sleepy puppy in the other.

And here it is folks, your moment 'o' zen:

Steven Fry on Language

Since I've been letting things go a bit, and because I'm feeling in a bit of a festive mood, I thought I'd use some variety in this one.
First on the list:
I think I mentioned before that I had written a post on paper at a party about 2+ weeks ago. I can't remember the exact date, but I still have the 'post', so I thought I'd better put it up before I lose it, shred it, or accidentally write something else over the top of it. This was written at about 2am while I was hiding in the atrium, so it was edited slightly for content. I don't really like loud parties at the best of times, but here I was wearing the portable torture devices on my feet, and let's face it, at around midnight I usually turn back into a pumpkin or a pile of mice or whatever (also if my sentences seem a little disjointed, it's because I'm writing on my tiny little laptop screen and I can't see the whole post at once).
Post begins here ->
You know, everyone hypes the learning experience of exchanges, but there are some things I'm learning that I wasn't expecting (free of charge!).
1) I will never take up smoking. EVER. I knew I didn't like the smell, but apparently if enough people start smoking in a small enough space you can run out of air. Who knew? Worst headache ever.
2)The limits of dresses (and parties). So, I'm not ever going to go for the whole big-skirt, lots-of-lace look. The little wacked-out princess who vacations in my head likes the look, but those skirts are just to much work.
Which sort of leads us to: 3) Wedding Planning. I spent this Saturday night (and very early Sunday morning -no, never gonna like late parties, neither) at a Quincinera for a girl in my school. It was probably one of the largest, loudest, and most expensive parties/gatherings I've ever been to. Seriously, I can't think of a wedding which I have attended that could outstrip it. I don't even know this girl. Which, incidentally, brings me to my point: If I ever bother to get hitched (assuming the whole institution hasn't been outlawed as ungodly or something by the time I get there), remind me not to buy into one of these things. Not that I think I would. I don't like going to them, and the very thought of planning one can make me spontaneously break out in hives (seriously, it's cool). But if I ever got married I wouldn't want to: A) spend that much money! Seriously, the outdoors is there for a reason. And two words: open bar.
And B) have strangers there. I would only want people I knew (or who knew whomever I happened to be marrying).
Oh! And the dress. Be it wedding dress or any other option, never let me go strapless! It's not flattering (in my opinion), and I don't like wearing something that can fall off if I jump up and down more than once. And I don't even get me started on the equipment! (cover the ears here, you delicate gents out there) I spent half the night in the bathroom fighting with my bra. Seriously! It's like wearing spring-loaded underwear. I kept thinking "Any minute now, my dress will slip and I'll take someone's eye out". Why don't I just wear a shoulder holster next time? At least it'd keep the dress on.
I'm learning a lot about myself and alcohol too. Don't look at me like that! 'A lot' is all relative. And believe me, I'm a hell of a lot more responsible than, well, anyone else. I pretty much guaranty it. And considering that when I left home, drinking over-fermented Kombucha could make me tipsy, I think of this as a sort of personal growth. Or at least personality growth.
And now:
Beer: okay. I could definitely learn to like it, but I think I'm going to follow in my parents footsteps and be a semi-picky, micro-brew connoisseur. I will never like Corona. Honestly, it tastes like someone mixed a single shot of Tequila into a whole jumbo-sized bottle of bland, sour mineral water. Why bother? Coke tastes better and I don't like Coke.
Tequila: don't worry, not gonna happen. I can't even handle the smell. I tried this on accident the first week I was here. I didn't understand anything anyone was saying to me, and they just handed it to me. If you've ever tried Tequila, you know that this may have something to do with why I don't like it. Of course, I also tried it again to make sure. Yeah, definitely not gonna happen.
Wine: I actually didn't try this one here, I know I don't mind it back home.
Kahlua: good with dairy-based products!
Whiskey: tried this one on accident. Tastes kind of like someone dropped crystallized sugar into a cup of paint thinner. And yet somehow, I think I could be persuaded to like it. Like oysters. Or Blue Oyster Cult, come to that.
Rum: I tried this one mixed with Coke, but I'm fairly certain it's the only hard liquor I might enjoy so far.
Please: If you know me (and if you're reading this, I sure as cheese hope you do), then you know I'm a very responsible, smart person. I know how to handle myself and I know my limits. All of these were tried in stable, adult-supervised situations, and the key word is tried. The only thing I drank more than a sip of has been Corona. I drank half a bottle of Corona in the cafeteria of the Corona plant after I took a tour. I never knew so much work could go into such a bad drink! But at least the tour was cool.

And so ends the post!
Most of the edits were spelling. Everything starts to look blurry (and for some reason seem funnier) when you get that tired. On to more recent matters!

I learned much in school today, I guess. I certainly learned lots of semi-useless things (which is what happens when we have extra computer time and I´m bored.
I learned that on in January of 2008, the world´s coolest wedding took place.



It was sci-fi themed. Among the attendents are: Ming the Merciless, Darth Vader, several Jedi, a Doctor Who Time Lady, and Professor McGonagall. Also in attendance (but not pictured), where Arthur Dent, Dracula, a Ghostbuster, and Jack Skellington. Read more about it here.
And for more instances of George Lucas, Gene Rodenberry (and Klingons. I think they deserve their own mention in this instance) intruding into other peoples happy days, you can go here.

For something a little closer to home, I can promise I am not going anywhere near the Coatza shoreline for a while, not after I found out what they found floating in the Gulf of Mexico:



Anyway, onwards and upwards. If I can avoid getting my head absorbed off by Stygiomedusa Gigantea, I will post to you all later!

Since I want to do a post over the weekend, but I do not acutually want to have to come up with original content, so I thought I would introduce you to two video clips which kind of explain some of my interests. As some of you may know, I want to study anthropology with a concentration in religion. If you are asking ´wtf?´, you are not the first. I thought these two manage to sum up my feelings in a basic, roundabout sort of way. Warning: Contains Funny.
First up, an anthropology major explains her views with a song (I got this off a link on the Smith College anthropology department home page, if anyone cares).

The Anthropology Song



And secondly, probably one of my favorite comedians at this time explains why he, an atheist, loves religion (if you get a chance to watch this whole show, go for it. It is pee-in-your-pants funny).

Sky Cake by Patton Oswalt



Note: If you´re interested, this sketch and others like it can be found on the CD Patton Oswalt: My Weakness Is Strong, available from Border´s everywhere (unless you go to the one in Chambana, which does not really have CD´s anymore for some reason).

BTW: I am not trying to inslut anyones beliefs or anything by saying this is funny, or that this is the reason I find religion so fascinating. I find it fascinating because, in some way, religious beliefs of some kind or another are, in one way or another, generally a base cause of most of the most evil and most good acts in history. How do you define religion? If you stick with something as simple as, say, "a set of beliefs or rules which govern how you choose to see, interact and understand your world", than everything from pop-culture, science, and Oprah could be said to be religious belief systems of some sort or another. Now are you interested?

Since I apearently couldn't think of anything better to do with my time than this yesterday, I thought I might as well post it. I realized I talk a lot about my home life, but I almost completely ignore my time at school. Since this is where I am from 6:40am to about 2:00pm 5 days a week, I thought you could use a view. Here is a relatively regular Thursday:

6:54 - Welcome to Hell

School starts before the sun comes up.

7:05 - Morning Muster

The girl in the foreground with the blue ribbon in her hair is Lulu. She's in my class.
Every morning, the entire school meets in the courtyard for somthing I affectionately refer to as 'morning muster', and might be less kindly refered to as 'lineup' or 'roll call'. Basically, everyone lines up, supposedly with their ties on and shirts tucked in (or at least on right-ways-round), and states the school motto, followed by a short 'mentally stimulating' exercise, usually something like waving your thumbs in a counter-clockwise circle 8 times or something (this week it was repeatedly squeezing the bridge of your nose with alternating hands). Mondays are more strenuous (and longer), as they perform the flag march (I'm sure it's on Youtube somewhere), and sing the -very long- national anthem. It's basically an annoying but kind way to force everyone to get to school at an ungodly hour of the morning without seeming unreasonable.

7:12 - Geographía

Everyone's a little blurry (you have to take pictures fast here, look to bottom of post for reason), but here is everybody right-to-left (please excuse name mispellings): Naohmi, Monica, Oscar (sorry he's so blurry), Amihrany, Alma, Patrick, and Daniel (notably missing is Gustavo, who usually sits in front of me. He wasn't in class this day).

First class of the day is Geography (which also doubles as geology and earth sciences). Since the test was the next day, the professor just supervised the class and answered questions while everyone talked or worked on other projects. I listened for a while and then turned on Creedence on my ipod and went back to translating my linguistics textbook.

8:08 - Historía

The one on the desk is Patrick...


History doesn't interest some people (right to left, top bench first: Oscar, Karen, Saiid, Joao, Edgar, Arnoud, Daniel -the one in the backround in light blue is the teacher)

Recent history is next. There was some issue with the projector...

8:58 - Computadoras

Everyone worked for about 45 minutes, and than the building lost power, automatically wiping the computers and deleting everyones work. Welcome to Mexican technology.

9:44 - How To Eat

A perfect time to avoid the line.


Usually the food is pretty good, but not so much today...

The activity affectionately refered to as 'lunch' here is usually a 3-4 step process which can last anywere from 8am to 1pm. Since there are only 2 cafeteria workers, all the food is made by hand at the time of ordering, and the entire school eats at the same time, it's very beneficial to duck out of class early to get your food on time. To get for your food, first you have to go to the school shop, fight to the front of the line (and I do mean that literally in some cases), and buy little plastic tickets. Than you get in another line at the cafeteria and trade in the tickets for food. It takes forever, and it used to really annoy me until I realized it's kind of a similar system to Parkland, except no one keeps hitting you with their backpacks, and the food is a lot cheaper, and generally better and more plentiful.

9:52 - Francés

(right to left: Professor, Edgar, Monica, Karla)

Seriously, nothing better than not being able to understand what's going on in two languages. I only stay in this class because the professor is trilingual, very funny, and swears more creatively and more often than anyone I know.

10:36 - 'Lunch'

Some people catch up on their beauty sleep... (pictured: Marelyn)


Others catch up on their schoolwork. (pictured: Amihrany)

Since everone has (usually) eaten by lunchtime, there are other things to do. Some people sit in the cafeteria and talk, or play soccer or basketball. I was tired this day, so I ended up in homeroom working on my textbook translations.

10:56 - Probabilidad y Estadistica

Pictured, right to left: Lulu, Amihrany, Maestra, Alma, Naohmi.

This is probably my least favorite class. I don't even understand this stuff in English. I usually ignore it, and work on another online math program back at the house.

11:33 - Mundo Contemporanea

Pictured, right to left: Jose Luis, Christian (in red), Oscar, Monica.

This translates basically as 'contemporary world'.It's kind of a mish-mash of recent history, art appreciation, and philosophy.

12:12 - Sociología

Pictured, right to left: Jose Luis, Oscar, Saiid, Cristian, Pamela (in front of Amihrany)

Next is sociology, another class that I have a lot of trouble understanding. The teacher is currently focusing on schools of philosophic thought in the 1800-1900's. I don't know why. But he didn't show up this day, so we threw the basketball at each other until we got bored and went back upstairs.

12:32 - Antropología

Right to left: Christian, Pamela(?), Saiid, Jose Luis, Monica, Amihrany, Oscar.

Easily my favorite class, and the only one where I even tried to submit a midterm exam. I got almost everything wrong. I knew the answers to all the questions, but I'm not very good at translating the meaning of whole,complicated sentances yet, just the words. It was fun anyway.

1:32 - Teoría de la Communication

Right to left: Oscar's elbow, Maestra, Amihrany, Monica, Pamela.

This class is Theory of Communication. The textbook is actually very interesting, but I have never really seen the professor do more than tell the students off for talking to loud and assign odd homework assignments.

2:01 - Homeward Bound

The exit gate at the back of the school.


Amihrany has her own car, so she can go home when she likes.


The whole school makes it out eventually.


School officially ends at 2pm, although most people don't make it to the gates until about 2:10, and everyone's lucky to make it home by 2:30.

Other Notes:
For those interested, here are my fellow partners in crime, Arnoud and Joao:


And this is what happens in Mexico when you're too slow taking a picture (and why all
my pictures were so blurry):



Special thanks to Arnoud and Cristian for the demonstration.

And that's pretty much a normal day. Today (Friday) is a little different, obviously, but not much. Yesterday was hot and sunny, today it rained all morning and remains overcast. It feels like spring in the pacific northwest. We also have 3 hours of computer class on Friday mornings, which is how I had time to write this. Now if you will excuse me, Saiid found the Muppets performing Bohemian Rhapsody on Youtube, and I'm gonna go watch. ¡Viva Mexicó!

Well, I don't really want to write anything right now. I'm not in a writing mood, I'm more in a 'snap-at-everyone' mood, so don't be surprised if this is a little clipped. There. Thou hast been forewarned. I didn't get to school today, either, so not much to say on that front. Sort of a boring day. Oh! I guess I could use this time to explain something to my ignorant American friends (insert snarky French accent here) so they can stop bothering me. The idea of personal space in Mexico is nothing compared with the United States. For some reason, a picture of a boy from my school and I has everyone freaked out (if you didn't see it, don't worry. It's seriously not worth the fuss.). Christian tripped on the hem of my dress and fell on me, just as my friend Jose Luis was taking a picture. It's actually a pretty funny picture, truth be told, but I knew all my helpful family members back in the states would pull a good old Chicago-style panic, so I asked them to get rid of it. But this is Mexico, so it ended up on Facebook before the day was through. Seriously, there is no such thing as personal space here. You should be able to figure that out from the way people greet each other here: men greet with handshakes and hugs, and anyone greeting a girl or women gives and gets a kiss on the cheek. This counts for everyone, from people you're related too to random people you meet on the street. This doesn't bother me because a) it's an accepted part of the culture, so no one makes a deal out of it, and b) all my friends back home are thespians. Do the math. Anyway, I only say this to point out that all my friends who aren't in Rotary here are from my school, they all like their cameras, and there are several very good reasons why this is a total non-issue. Firstly, I'm me. You guys all know me, lack of responsibility is not one of my defining characteristics. Also, there's another very good reason, which Allan and Cameron should be giggling about already...
My point is, haha, funny picture. Aaaand, moving on.

In other news, I'm trying to plan ahead in my free time right now (no books I can read and no English TV makes free time a little more...interesting...than I would usually like). I only bring this up since this is mainly what I was doing today and I'd like to add more to this post than annoyed venom and I can't really think of anything else to discuss. Currently, sometime in the future I am planning to finish out my gen eds at Parkland and transfer out to another university. But have you ever tried to find a good university with a good anthropology program over the internet if you're a homeschooled student with over 10 hours of dual credit who happens to be living in Mexico (and also happens to have a lot of very exacting criteria)? It's exactly as much fun as it sounds. Ah, enough with the pessimism. I'm going to bed.

Note:
Since this post was so pessimistic, I would check back soon for a new one. I don't like the idea of this being the first thing people read on the site for anything longer than 24 hours.