A Week of Fun

L.H. pointed out that my last post ended rather abruptly; to tell you the truth, I ran out of steam and notes at the same time. But you are free to think that I was abducted by aliens at that point, or that I was rendered unconscious by the neighbor's "washing machine music," as L.H. calls it.

***

Life didn't come to a complete halt for us once the university semester was over on July 15. L.H. is just now finishing up the last of his grading, and I had the 2-part Latin exam looming over my head. Plus I had a week of marinating in Harry Potter 6.

I did manage to crank out a baby outfit over the weekend for a friend who is due in August. D.D. and I had checked out 2 DVDs from the book bus, so I spent a lot of my weekend crocheting and watching Monsters, Inc. and Bend it Like Beckham. I'm a whirlwind of activity! [There's a scene in BILB where the heroine is being fitted for a sari, and the seamstress quips, "I'll make these mosquito bites look like juicy, juicy mangos." Damn! Why isn't she my seamstress?]

I have also spent a lot of time being a grouch. I blame it on hormones, or maybe the thought of my second Latin exam poking me in the brain. Of course, one day I think we all got up on the wrong side of the bed, because none of us could be civil. "L."H. even asked if I was "riding the crimson wave," to which I responded that he was a "whirling vortex of suckitude." That put us in a better mood; L.H. has suggested that we start using my new phrase everywhere. [Actually, I *think* I came up with it on my own, but I'm like a word-magpie, picking up shiny words I come across. So I don't want to make any easily refutable claims.]

L.H. had a really crappy Monday last week, even compared to mine. I had the 3-hour Latin exam, but he locked himself out of the house. He was scheduled to pick up D.D. from school and take her with him to a meeting on campus. As it so happens, HP6 was delivered that afternoon, and in his haste to dress (it was a hot, muggy day) and meet the mail man in the stairwell, he left his keys inside. With every window in the house open against the heat, a pretty strong breeze gets drawn into the apartment...and the front door slammed shut. L.H. was so flustered by being locked out that he forgot he had shoes in the wardrobe in the stairwell and went to pick up D.D. *barefoot*. The new neighbors let the 2 of them stay there and tried to call the landlord. When they got ahold of him, his helpful advice was to borrow a ladder from his shop downstairs and climb up the roof to the open terrace door (on the 4th floor). The whole afternoon was a disaster.

Then another day he had a minor accident on his bike.

[Oh, no! The Maniacal Laughing Woman just got on the bus!]

All in all, it was not one of his better weeks.

[Now she is talking loudly to herself, to the point that the guy behind her got up and moved to the back of the bus.]

Yesterday while on an errand, I walked past an unfortunate example of why tanning is bad. This woman was probably 60. She had on a blouse with a wide neck, which had slipped off her shoulder. There was no bra strap, so I got an eyeful of a broad expanse of what appeared to be rich, Corinthian leather. *shudder*

We have spotted more doppelgangers this semester. A friend of a friend was teaching D.D. belly dance, and it turns out that she looks almost *exactly* like my friend Dani, down to the color of her hair and the style of her makeup. And a guy in my Latin class is the spitting image of her husband, Jason, if only Jason grew his hair out waist length and dyed it black. It's getting a little freaky.

Every few weeks, an old, white van will be parked across the street, then after another couple of weeks, it'll be gone. I don't know if the owner has a work schedule like on an off-shore oil rig—2 weeks home, 4 weeks on the rig—or if he just can't always find an open spot on that stretch of the street, but the reason I notice the van is that the back side windows are covered with a poster from Pirates of the Caribbean and a poster of what I think is a VW Golf. Now, I'll be the last to complain about Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom being visible from my house, but it still seems odd for someone to cover their van windows.

On the street that runs parallel to the main shopping street, there is a high turnover in businesses. My newest favorite shop for window browsing sells scented oil and crystal lamps and fountains. If I had an extra 300 bucks to blow on myself, I'd buy the fountain that has a base made of jagged amethyst crystals supporting a clear crystal ball that spins on the flowing water. It is mesmerizing. Of course, if I had it, I would spend all my time gazing at it and would forget to, you know, eat and stuff, so maybe it's better that I enjoy it from the safety of the shop window.

My butt has fallen asleep because I am sitting on the floor in the hall outside my teacher's door, waiting to talk to him during his office hours. Perhaps I will stand and wait. Ciao!

[Added after the office hours:]
I just found out that I made the second highest grade on the final for one of my linguistics classes (German inflectional morphology). The guy whose history course I took (which is only graded pass/fail) said my exam there was "weak for a third semester student." Fuck him right in the ear, says I.