Surfers in Texas are interesting and I'm a little obsessed.

I am in the process of figuring out a payment plan for the $5,000 camera that was stolen out of my car last week.  It has to be paid off before I graduate in May. (translation: Becky will be working long hours for free for the next 6 months.)

Halloween costume: Lady Pink  because she's awesome.

When the Crew leader asked where my black shoes were, I told him they ran away with the spoon.
He laughed at the time, but shot me a scornful and nefarious glance as I walked out that night.

So I went shoe-shopping. 

And as soon as I find the sparkly glove and a freaky face, I'm taking my act on the road.

1)  Ilsa and Laszlo were never married.  NEVER MARRIED, guys!  Go back and watch it again.  In Rick's office, when Rick's like "dude, ask your wife," Laszlo is totally stunned (Stunned, I tell you!) and confused.  because they were never married.  Don't you think it's a little too convenient that no one ever knew about their marriage?  No one, except Rick, who was conveniently  told the "truth" just when Ilsa needed him to feel loved while simultaneously giving him an out - a way to be noble.

2)  Ilsa left because she wasn't really in love with Rick.  (maybe in Paris..)  She's smarter than all that  "you'll have to think for the both of us!" bullshit, and only said it because she knows that's the way to get Rick to give them the tickets.  yeah.  she's kind of a bigshot.  Yes, Rick is totally cool, and painfully heroic, and incredibly clever, and suave and eloquent and all that, but Ilsa totally played him.  And he never knew.

3)  Ilsa wears cool clothes. 

Elissa and I are starting a zine.
Call if you want to contribute!

Dear Everyone,

Come to my Fourth of July potluck!

Bring food!  Drink beer!  eat TerrorMelon!

It's around 7:30ish, and we may go see the fireworks on ladybird lake.  Depending on how drunk we are.


It'll be fun!  bring ice!

So the Cape...yes, I disappeared to a real place that other week, not an alien vessel bound for the future and/or past.  So if you were wondering whether or not I changed the course of history by going back in time and subtly altering our world leaders' brilliant decisions, the answer is, sadly, no.

Highlights! (for kids!)

Day 1: Saturday, May 30th: Arrival
* Beach volleyball and a wedding and food and cold at a restaurant on the water! (lost phone in the sand)
* First stop on the Cape Ice Cream Tour 2009: Ben & Bill's. Triple chocolate. Delicious.

Day 2: Sheep festival and Ticks
* Sheep festival!  Featuring a border collie demonstration.  You never knew sheep were this exciting.
* Hike to Nauset lighthouse and the Dreaded Tick Incident. Hundreds, no thousands, of dog ticks, covering me, on my clothes, in my clothes, crawling out of my hair, out of my pants.  shudder.  Desperate need for shower.  (lost ID in bathroom wormhole.)
* learned to play Bocci, the itallian alternative to Horseshoes.  Prefer basketball.
* Slept in the haunted basement of Americorps'  Welfleet House.

Day 3: Whales & Ptown!
* Whale watching! Surrounded on all sides.  Mother & calf rocked the boat (literally).  I swear I heard one of them yell 'Charge.'
* Hung around Provincetown (gay Mecca), bought the largest lollipop in the history of the world (it's bigger than my face!) , and I'm still eating it. (Yes, I spent $13 on a lollipop.  And yes, it's worth every penny.)
* Dune hike.  At the top of the highest dune, you can see the ocean on both sides, and the Long Point lighthouse across the bay to the north.  And on the beach, we saw a naked guy and piping plovers and seals! 
* Second stop on the Cape Ice Cream Tour 2009: Four Seas. Best. Ice cream. of. my. life.  I remember it like it was yesterday - Vanilla Chai ice cream covered with caramel and apple cinnamon topping, sprinkled with nuts (of your choice) and whipped cream (if you so desire.) Truly incredible. 

Day 4:  APCC and Barnstable
* Fishing in Salt Marshes with the Association to Preserve Cape Cod. I can't believe this is part of Ashleigh's job.  She teaches old people how to catch, measure, weigh fish in order to monitor the changing ecology of the marshes.  It's awesome!  You tromp around in giant wild grasses and sneaky mud in waders, (fast so you don't sink!) and use giant nets to pull out fish and eels and crabs in bulk, then identify them and take their measurements and throw them back!  well, it's more exciting than it sounds.
* bummed around the town when Ashleigh went back to her office, hid from the rain in a sandwich shop and sat at a table by the window and felt poetic.  Walked to a beach and hung out with dead things and lost dogs.  Found my way to a coffee shop, spied on tourists and locals alike.

Day 5: Martha's Vinyard
* I like ferries.
* Gingerbread Houses in Oak Bluffs were not, sadly, made of gingerbread (I learned after biting into one) but they were amazingly pretty.
* Oldest Carosel in the U.S. was CLOSED!  Disappointment of the century!  But we did get to spy on it through glass doors and listen to a local talk about how his dad used to sneak away from home on weekends to ride it.
* Cliffs.  I mean cliff.  It was ok, I guess.  But I've been cliff-spoiled by NZ, where you actually get to walk out on the cliffs, not just admire their beauty from afar.  it was a funny little tourist trap, though, and the people on the bus ride back were awesome!  It was worth the trip just for that weirdass buss ride.
* Oh my god, Family Dinner.  I want to join Americorps just so I can participate in the Bourne house family dinners, the most exciting debate/roadshow in the nation (everyone's talking about it!) in which thirteen different people crowd around one large table and yell all at once about the origins of mozzarella, which dissolves into laughter at least 3 times an hour. A real circus.  my kind of place. 
Oh, and then they all got their Assasins assignments, which immediately turned into a 13-person watergun fight, every man for himself. I got soaked just trying to get to the bathroom. 

Day 6: rest, etc.
*Did my own thing at the house while everyone else worked (hah!)  which included: Biking to coffee, beaches, ice cream.  Basketball.  Made friends with an old couple who thought I had a 'darling' accent.  (I played up the Texas for their benefit once they started guessing where I was from.)
*Trivia at (bar).  I've never seen so many grown men look genuinely terrified and respectful of a handfull of twenty-somethings at a bar.  Team Energy apparently has a reputation, and it's not Joan Jett's.  So. Fucking. Awesome.  So I acted as if I knew anything about anything and fit right in.  What is the organ between the esophogus and the duodenum? : only question I got right that contributed.  I MISSED the one about Zappa. MISSED it!!  damn.  oh well; it's been a good while since I listened to any of his non-instrumental stuff, which is the best, by the way, and yes I might be a music snob, but at least I'm not a computer game snob, or a bigot, or Hitler.  We (and I mean tthat in the loosest sense) won second place.    good times. bad beer. great company.

Day 7: Oyster Shells
*That's right, oyster shells.  I awoke at 5:45 to make a lunch, jump in a car (which conveniently stopped for free donuts and pick up(?) lines at 7am) and drive to a whale graveyard (I am not making this up) to move 2800 bags of oyster shells.  THIS IS WHAT AMERICORPS DOES!??!   as it turns out, in order to culture oysters, you have to release fertilized eggs (or fetuses or whatever) into a salty sludge with cracked oyster shells already in it, so that they (the young'uns) have something to latch onto while they're growing into fine, strapping young oyster girls and boys. then they make their own shells.  It was actually kind of fun, moving the bags.  lots of laughing and endless pirate jokes, thanks to jacs.
* the second half of the day, we cleared trails in the rain, and Korinda taught me all about cormorants and osprey after we saw an osprey nest (they mate for life, you know!)  It was bigger than my room.  And mommy and daddy werent' to keen on the idea of us trekking around it, either. But we made it out alive, and with only one tick, too. 
*collapsed on the couch when we got home, watched the L-word with Nicole, Amanda, and Korinda, and tried to argue why "straight rights" was oxymoronical...I think I just made up a word. 

Day 8: Woods Hole
*Slept in, which means 9 in this house.  Visited the aquarium, the Marine Biological Laboratories, the Oceanographic Institue's visitory museum thing.  There's so much marine science going on at that place, it's crazy.  The whole time, I was thinking about Chrissy.  Got some pastries and Coffee and birdwatched and peoplewatched and headed home.
* Sunset Hike in Welfleet.  Ash dropped me off at a place, and I met up with Maria and a bunch of old people and we all set off across the second most beautiful place in the world.  Marsh, woods, dunes, ocean, sky, in that order.  Plus Maria is delightful.
* Afterwards, we met Ashleigh and all of Wellfleet house at the Drive-in and watched Up and Star Trek (double feature!) while I munched on my hugeass lollipop.  But it got cold after a while, so we headed into Ashleigh's car (which eventually became crowded with sleeping boys in the backseat). and before long my disgustingly smelly shoes (still wet from trail cleanup the day before) were making the place unbearable, so I took them off & left them outside the car door.  And then we left.  Without my shoes. Because I am an idiot.

this is awesome!

It was part of the white glove tracking project.  Was anyone aware of this while it was going on?

Taxes are due.

must...find...house...

My wisdom teeth are coming in. 
The top right one is loose...or at least part of it is.  (Wait, is that even a tooth?)

and I just spent $200 on glasses because my old ones broke over thanksgiving.


:(


[...you all get postcards and Artchurch projects for Christmas.]