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Last night was proof that I am a master at the craft of choosing friends. You see, the people I encounter in my life are filtered through a battery of torture tests to determine whose friendship is worth the time and effort of cultivation. I have them jump through rings of fire, swim with sharks, and trek across the Serengeti with nothing more than the clothes on their back and a pistol with one bullet; when the sifting is over, I end up with only the most outstanding of human beings who know what to do when I don’t, and who help me out when I am in a pickle—the way they did last last night.

Apparently, I spent twenty minutes with my face inside a trash can, regurgitating the contents of my stomach. The next thing I remember is flitting in and out of consciousness and waking up at three different points of the evening: first I woke up slumped over the futon, making a mental note to eat more carbs the next time P swings by with a bottle of Absolut. When I woke up a second time, I found myself sitting upright on the floor with E’s knees straddling my limp torso from behind and my neck draped across his right leg; the third time I woke up, I was lying flat on the ground, my head resting on E’s lap (poor fellow, wonder how long it was before blood circulation in his legs resumed normal operations).

M bravely held down her sensitive gag reflex and soldiered through not one, but two people hurling their dinners out of their oesophagi. She also made a fuss over me when she found out I had exceeded the dosage on my albuterol and spent the rest of my short waking minutes making sure my hands went nowhere near it. K and N shelled out more “Are you okays” than you can shake a stick at, and I distinctly remember my stubborn self shunning good advice—something about not drinking milk in my state—from their well-meaning minds.

I woke up this morning lightheaded and groggy, but otherwise in perfectly good shape. My undying thanks to everyone for not picking up a Sharpie and getting creative on my face, you guys are all too good for me, TOO GOOD I TELL YOU.

Posted on April 19th, 2008 by Antiguit

The wonderful Id of Notbrainwashersafe fame has tagged me for a meme. I haven’t done one of these things in ages, and will probably not be tagged for another in the near future, so do indulge me! Here are the premises:

The “Ten Facts” Meme

Once you’ve been tagged you have to write a blog entry with 10 weird, random facts, habits, or goals about yourself. At the end, choose 5 people to be tagged. Don’t forget to leave them a comment saying “You’re it!” and to go read your blog. You cannot tag the person that tagged you.

1. When I was eighteen, a new friend I made at college thought I was twenty-five. He said there was “something” about the way I carried myself. I think I was just having an ugly week.

2. That friend still has a hard time remembering how old I am (apparently, I was twenty-two last year).

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Posted on April 17th, 2008 by Antiguit

When in a schoolwork-induced rut, I make my way to the library to find a quiet, unoccupied crevice and spend hours flipping through art books at the oversize stacks. I read early-Islamic poetry, Tuareg oral histories, picture books that contain Coptic art and Alphonse Mucha’s works. After a while, my frazzled nerves untangle and my breathing comes to a comfortable slow; but sometimes this method of art therapy backfires because looking at Mucha’s women make me feel inadequate as a human being. His women are soft and delicate and have wonderful names like Camellia, Ivy, and Magnolia. I am not soft or delicate, and my name begins and ends with the most agressive consonants in the English alpabet. My schoolwork-induced rut is then further exacerbated into a more general rut, and my self-esteem flounders.

When this happens, I wander over to the literature section and pick out books printed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. I like hunching over musty anthologies of chapbooks, second-edition Jules Verne prints, and short stories involving ladies who turn into foxes (stories which, I reckon, would make for amazing films). I find warm-and-fuzzy type gems like the following:

“For when we are overcome with the greatest sorrow we act not like men or women but like children whose comfort in all their troubles is to press themselves against their mother’s breast, or if she be not there to hold each other tight in one another’s arms.”

- David Garnett, Lady Into Fox, 1922

I could use a visit to the library. Or my mother’s kitchen. Or something.

Posted on April 14th, 2008 by Antiguit

At about 2.50 PM today, I smelled like bleach after giving the bathroom a good cleaning. At about 3.00 PM, I washed my hands and proceeded to make a tuna sandwich. At 3.02 PM, the can opener slipped from my grip and I spilled water and chunks of tuna all over myself. Now I smell like tuna that’s been swimming in a pool of Clorox. Great.

Posted on April 9th, 2008 by Antiguit

Two Friday nights ago, my flatmates K, M, and N were teetering on the edge of depression with a housing crisis that loomed over our heads: we needed to find a new place, fast. We needed a place that could accommodate five (the four of us, plus E) within walking distance to campus and a reasonable monthly rent. We knew we were asking for a miracle, going apartment-hunting so late into the semester, but the bottom line remains: we cannot stay in our current pad. We have to go.

After several rat holes and many answering machines later, we attended a viewing for a house two blocks way from campus. We weren’t expecting much and were ready to be disappointed, but it was not so. Pulling into the generous driveway of a two-storey house, we oohed and aahed at every bedroom, the large kitchen, the wonderful dining room. Even the basement was beautiful!

“This place is being rented out because some of the guys living here are moving out,” the soft-spoken landlord quips. “If two of the guys decide they don’t want to stay, the place will be open by May.”

Later when we clamber back into the car, the response is unanimous: we love it. It fulfilled our criteria of having nicely-sized bedrooms, a huge kitchen, and a very decent rent rate. All we needed now was confirmation that the remaining two tenants will choose to leave with their buddies. Granted, E was mildly nervous about the prospect of sharing one bathroom with a household of four girls, but we abate his fears as best we could. He calms down and decides yes, the house is perfect.

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Posted on April 7th, 2008 by Antiguit