Know Your Name and Go Your Own Way

If you're shocked, it's just the fault of faulty manufacturing

Lately I've been feeling a vague tug somewhere around my heart/lung area, which I'm attributing to a sense of Wanderlust, and not, say, the plague. Between my 3-ish jobs I'm working more than full-time and getting less than satisfactory sleep, but I've got this nagging feeling that I'm not doing much. My life consists of my path beween NCC, the condo, Friday's, and the radio station. Every so often I'll drive the other way on 55 and spend a few hours staring at The Boy, or mosey a couple miles to the west to see my dad, but all in all I'm on a very narrow wheelbarrow path.

I want to get out and experience life outside of my Naperbubble. I want to move away. Just get up and go. Start my grown-up life in a place where I'll be forced to make new friends, learn new roads, adjust to a new climate, shop at a new grocery store, find new parks to walk in and movie theaters to frequent and bars to loiter in. I want a new view out my window where, for a while, every day feels strange and fresh, and perhaps even a bit lonely. I'm getting clasutrophobic surrounded by all this familiarity.

In the meantime, I'm making a pledge to myself to simply experience life. I'm going to read the newspaper and actually figure out, as best as I can, what's happening to our economy outside the scope of dwindling restaurant business and lackluster tips. I'm going to start conversations with people who are passionate about this election, one way or the other, and find out what makes us tick. Come election day, I want to be in a crowded room with other people delirious with hope, so we can be lifted up or crushed together. I'm going to take more walks where the air actually moves around me and the temperature changes from shadow to sun instead of sitting in my climate controlled hive watching crime dramas. I'm going to laugh more, think more, and attempt to feel more, so that when I do feel a minor twinge of emotion it's because it's something genuine and true, and not just a random misfiring of my robot heart.

Who wants to come with me?
Thrine

Berlin soon

I'm the kind of human wreckage that you love.

While driving home in the pouring rain this evening, I encountered this sign on the side of the road: "Caution Wet Pavement". Gosh.

My skin has never been very thick, alabaster, baby-bottom soft, or really any other flattering term, but when faced with the imminent possibility of having it flay itself off my body, I've begun to appreciate it a lot more.

Saturday afternoon United flight 944 will be whisking me away to Frankfurt, Germany. "This is such a bad idea" were, I believe, the words that came out of my mouth when my professor handed me my plane tickets. Important things tends to lose themselves once in my possession. Past items include: my purse, my purse again, my driver's licence multiple times, $25, shoes, and pretty much any piece of jewlery bestowed upon me.

Playing nursemaid is not my calling. Sick people freak me out, not to mention the sound of other people throwing up makes me queasy as well. Offering chicken noodle soup is about the best I can muster, even though I know that nausea isn't the best appetite whetter.

Phrases that annoy me:
"Congradulations"
"Irregardless"
"Supposably"
"Reason why"
"I could care less"
"ain't got" or "got no" or, God forbid, "ain't got no"

Lietzenburger Strasse!
Cathi

panic!

Someday you will find me caught beneath the landslide

It's always easy to tell when I'm really stressed out, because all my blogs get silmultaneously updated in a burst of procrastination. Currently I'm procrastinating on getting dressed and going to Sears Optical, because setting foot in that place and purchasing new glasses will make the fact that I'm a money-wasting idiot a reality. My opinion of myself is really rather fragile, and it seems important that I lie to myself for a little while longer.

Only 7 days left in this school term. Which, on one hand, means that in a week I'll be mostly free from school obligations until January, but on the other hand means that I have 7 days to write two 5-page papers, a 10-page paper, finish a TV news wrap, and write/create/produce a 10 minute radio drama. Plus actual final tests as well as working every day. Goodbye friends, goodbye Boy, goodbye family, goodbye TV, goodbye sleep. Hello panic.

Of course, as usual, I'm approaching both these situations with my usual calm demeanor, telling myself "things will work themselves out, they always do", and crossing my fingers that I will stumble upon the magical balance of finding time to not fail school and earn enough money so I can make rent/bill payments for the next two months.

If anyone ever tells you to go take 20 days off work to spend an undetermined large amount of money in a foreign country, make sure you take the time to figure out if having a negative income for 20 days won't cripple you financially. I'm lucky enough to have parents who don't want to see me struggle through life, and lucky enough to have a soft enough conscience that I'll let them help me out, but the guilt and worry is still ever present.

It's too bad they don't make chalky-fruity tablets for the kind of stomach ache that worry/guilt/disappointment/stress cause. I'd live off those.

Champange supernova,
Cathi

Pre-poland

We'll walk around this town like we own the streets, and stay awake through summer like we own the heat

Pre-Poland Blogging Extravaganza!

I'm currently finding it incomprehensible that in something along the lines of 48 hours I will be almost 5,000 miles away from home. I hear it's a lot like Wisconsin.

Some things that I try to pretend don't exist:
- Allergies
- 80's Music
- Responsibility
- Giant Squid

Being a grown-up would be a lot more fun if grown-ups didn't have to pay for things. I demand a trust fund, and possibly a time-share in Aruba!

While reading Dave Barry's witty quips and insights into the male mind, it suddenly dawned on me that I, like a stereotypical guy, was somewhat unaware of the fact that I am in a "relationship". I don't think I've ever actually been in a decent, real one before. I'm not even sure I know what it means to be in one. I've heard rumors about words like "give" and "take" and "making pies", but I'm sort of fumbling along as I go. Don't tell Durbin*.

Hopefully, in a month, I shall have a place of my own. If you or anyone you know would like to live with me, right on campus but not in a dorm, for $400 a month, let me know.

Nasawaym sie.
Cathi

*a phrase popularized by Daniel Ramig

Interesting entry at last.

Live your life just like a dream without the pain of goodbyes.

I've decided that I'm never going to share anything ever again. Not thoughts, opinions, feelings, cake slices (not that I ever shared those in the first place), or things I love. I will be wholly selfish when it comes to my passions. If I find a band I like, I will keep them to myself, because it's sharing news about bands that ruins things that are "mine" like Fall Out Boy, and hopefully LBC eventually. If I love a restaurant, no longer shall I take my friends to experience it! I will keep the knowledge of the delightful atmosphere, charming ambiance, and delectable food to myself, so that no one can scoff or counterdict me. There's nothing more hurtful than having someone you care about be entirely disinterested in something you love. Now I know how middle school teachers feel.

For anyone who is concerned about my life and limb, I leave for the land of Auschwitz and Chicago's main supply of construction laborers in less than a month. People keep asking me why on earth I want to go to Poland, and my triumphant yell of "back to the motherland!" never seems to satisfy them. I think we all need some sense of history in order to fulfill our silly need of cosmic purpose, and getting a glimpse of the country where perhaps more than half of my bloodline can call "home" seems important for some reason. Teaching English to a people whose language I speak literally 5 words of ("mówimy po polsku" and "Nazywam sie Cathi") is somewhat secondary to the mere act of setting foot on Polish soil. I shall have to curb the urge to start barking orders in Geramn, just to see how many people drop whatever they are doing and surrender to me.

Disappointment is a funny thing. Sometimes it crushes your soul in a vice-like grip administered by a piercing glare, and other times you feel sorry, but not too sorry, because becoming consistantly better at golf is not necessarily your fault.

Nevermind,
Cathi