things I think about in the airport...

I'd like to share a few examples of how my mind occupies itself when its plane is delayed for two hours. I scribbled down a few starts for things to eventually blog and apparently today is "eventually." Here they are.

I have a habit of, every once in a while, looking around and thinking "these are the people."

These are the people I will be trapped in this elevator with.
These are the people who will be left alive with me if everything in the world is destroyed except for this room. Everything  except for this specific bank of seats in the B gates at the LaGuardia airport.
These are the people who might (in a survival situation) look at me and think to themselves "could I eat a human being?" Or, you know, vice versa.
These are the people I will be stranded on a deserted island with (if somehow this plane from New York to Atlanta flies over a deserted island. Or an ocean for that matter).

These are the people.

please don't let me spend my last hours on a MARTA train

I will scan the faces of the people around me, trying to judge their character by the way that they talk or laugh or whether they move their stuff and offer the seat next to them. He's a good guy, I think. But will his kindness make him weak? These are the kind of things you need to know. 
(Additionally, which one of these people is most likely to stab me? The small Asian boy. Watching Power Rangers on his iTouch. Just trying to be a hero.)

So this is who I'm stuck with, I think. I already hate the way that woman cackles at her cell phone. That guy over there didn't even bring a book to an airport. He's clearly not the survival type. That muscly guy on his laptop could be useful... Maybe he's a g-man or an ex-cop. 
So as people around me stress about having to deplane and where Gretchen put her boarding pass ("is it in your bag? It's GOTTA be in your bag cuz it sure as HELL ain't in mine!") I am assembling my team. And deciding who to leave behind if we find an abandoned working vehicle in our now post-apocalyptic landscape. 
...I'm looking at you, cackling cell phone lady.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

mmmm light pollution

As my plane was flying over New York on the way back home, I looked down on the sparkling city below.  I had already been delayed 3 hours and thought I might sleep on the plane until I got distracted by the view outside my cabin window.

Then my sense of geography started to fail me.
If that's New York, and we're on the East Coast...it looks like we're going further East right into the ocean! Or maybe North to Canada??  

This worry (that the pilot had no idea where he was going and I was going to be stranded in Canada for the night) began to creep into my thoughts and disrupt my reading.

"Tobacco,  introduced to London the year after Shakespeare's birth,...  

Oh no what if the flight is actually going to Canada?

...was a luxury at first but soon gained such widespread popularity... 

I got in the right gate. Right? B8. Yeah. I got in the right gate. My ticket was scanned. It made that satisfying "ping" noise that means I am supposed to be on this plane.

...that by the end of the century there were no fewer than seven thousand tobacconists in the City....  

Dad would be so upset if he drove all the way to the airport at midnight and I'm actually in Canada.

...It was employed not only for pleasure but as a treatment for a broad range of complaints... 

no. they won't be upset. They'll be worried, won't they? I'll probably end up crying if I have to call home and say I accidentally ended up in Canada.

...including venereal disease,... 

but NO. I won't cry. I'm an adult. I'm a grown-ass woman. I just went to New York all by myself!

...migraine,...

I'll take care of everything. I can get myself a hotel or something, and email work to explain my absence and book a new flight and - yeah. I'll be fine. 

...and even bad breath." 

Shit, I have to read that whole passage again. Didn't take in a word of it.

(excerpts from Bill Bryson's Shakespeare: The World as Stage)

NYC

30 Rock is filmed in Brooklyn. Sad face.

I just got back from New York!  For the first time in my whole life. Until this weekend, all I knew about New York came from movies and TV.  And in the case of a few of those (like How I Met Your Mother, Friends, Will & Grace, and Seinfeld) they aren't even filmed in New York. Or even on the East Coast.
So all I knew came from

• Jungle 2 Jungle
• Home Alone 2
• Big
• Kate and Leopold
• Someone Like You
• You've Got Mail
• Hitch
• ...I don't need to list these. Just think of pretty much every movie ever made. Except the ones by John Hughes.

Overall, this did not give me a very good idea of what the city is actually like and gave me a weird set of expectations going into this trip.  Mostly that the city of New York exists to be filmed: with wet streets to reflect lights at night and the streets perpetually bustling around a single person as he or she walks slowly, obliviously through them with a look that betrays the fact that their thoughts are far, far away.  Thinking about him. Or her. Or how to keep their superhero costume from bunching under their day clothes.

But surprise(to me)! New York is a real place. That exists. It exists when the cameras aren't there. It exists when the Glee kids aren't dancing around all over the place and the Gossip Girls aren't...gossiping.  So if I learned anything from this trip it's that New York is real and real people really live there.

There are lots of opportunities to take pictures of people taking pictures.

I also learned all those apartments in shows like Friends don't exist. Unless you have a trust fund. Or you're in Brooklyn.


My goals for this trip:

Eat real New York Pizza.

check.

Eat a real New York bagel. 
- Russ and Daughters - check.


Find Bret and Jemaine's apartment.

check.

See a famous person.
- BAM! Saw Brian Williams walking around NBC Studios wearing hipster glasses. - check.

Overall, a COMPLETELY successful trip that surpassed all my expectations and thoroughly exhausted me.

THANKS MALLORY!

running

This summer, I am fighting my inactive tendencies!

Kinda. A bit half-heartedly, to be honest.
I am running.
If you know anything about me, you know that I hate this. I hate running. I believe that it should be used only in emergency situations and as punishment for real sports.  But when a friend asks says "we should go running! At the park!" what else can you do but take a second to consider your slight jiggly-ness and say "definitely!"

On a good day, I can run for about eight or nine minutes. That's right. Minutes. 
On a bad day, I can run for 20-30 before succumbing to my doom and accepting death.  ...there's a story here. Allow me to explain:

Last week, Kala and I decided to run someplace different: a trail by our house that goes through the woods, under bridges, and past the movie theater. We parked and started off down the trail.
We ran, I stopped to walk after my lungs stopped working, and I walked until Kala turned around and we met in the middle.

As we started to walk back, the sky started getting unnaturally dark for 6PM and the air was heavy with imminent rainfall.  I looked up, and thick, dark clouds loomed overhead.  The trees swayed and I noticed a suspicious lack of bird noise.

Storm's comin'.

"Hopefully we'll make it back before the rain hits!" we said.
Hopefully.

The rain hit, hard. Trees thrashed violently. Lightning cracked and thunder boomed threateningly.
But that wasn't so bad. In fact, it was kinda fun to run in the rain. And then the trees started trying to kill us.
It was a bit like that moment in Pac Man: you're chasing a blue ghost and you've almost caught up to it- you feel powerful and like everything is going your way- then (blink) it's pink again and suddenly you're the hunter become the hunted.
The trees which were normally sought as shelter have become the scariest. things. in the world. Like the forest in Snow White, or the poor interpretation of the last Triwizard challenge in Goblet of Fire (where the maze tries to eat Cedric and Harry).

doesn't look so scary now, but just wait till the trees come to life

I would say I ran for my life, but if that were true, my life doesn't seem that important to me. I had already run more than normal that day, and when the storm hit and Kala shouted "let's just run back" over the rain, my reaction was "sure!"  Actually, I believe at first it was "well, the Mythbusters say you'll get wetter running through rain than walking" but this was no ordinary summer rain.  It was no delicate sprinkle, no short-lived shower.  This was a monsoon.  A monsoon that was hurling trees at me like a kid throws water balloons. Except tree limbs don't splash when they hit pavement, they block the trail or fall directly on top of you.

We managed to finally get out of the Death Woods, Kala running the whole way. I stopped twice to retie my shoes and a few times out of sheer exhaustion.  I escaped with only a scrape across my thigh, but I learned something about myself: In the case of a zombie apocalypse*, a visit to Jurassic Park, a mugging, an alien invasion, or a missing-identity spy thriller, I am going to die.  I will stop to rest my lungs or tie my shoes and I will get eaten, or beaten, or shot.
I was also reminded why I will never be Sydney Bristow.

not bad for a summer afternoon.


*the Zombieland kind, not the Shaun of the Dead kind.  Zombieland zombies can move pretty fast (Rule #1- Cardio). In the event of a SotD Z-day, I might be able to survive by hiding and/or using my sewing machine to bludgeon any that come close to me.

things grown-ups do

Since enrolling in college, I have found that I am expected to act like an adult and contribute to society. These new expectations can be exciting, but often I find I am not exactly ready to do all the things grown-ups do. For example, I don't exactly enjoy:

• filling out tax forms- this should be easy, but I feel like whoever designed the W4 or W2 made it complicated on purpose, probably out of fear of job security. He/she wanted to make it look like you can't just hire anyone to design a tax form, even though I'm pretty sure you can.
• paying taxes.
  
• "having it all together"- I find that as I get older, I am more responsible for myself, which usually means I have to be better at making up excuses for why I didn't do something I was supposed to, like completing my time sheets.
• being responsible for current affairs- I would be lying if I told you I got my news from sources other than Comedy Central or SNL's Weekend Update. Not only do certain adults shame me for not being up to the minute, there are a fair number of hipsters at school who enjoy feeling superior because they catch CNN as they are rolling up their blue jeans every morning.
• going to the doctor alone- a doctor's office is twice as scary when you are alone. This is a fact. This also brings me to my story:

Today, I was drug tested for the first time EVER! Exciting, right? No.

It all started when I woke up this morning, and participated in my daily routine: pee, wash face, brush teeth, contacts. Not very complicated. However, I realized a little too late that I should have saved my urine for the cup at the clinic. Crap.
I decided to stop by Dunkin Donuts to get an iced coffee, accessing the knowledge stored away from volleyball camp that caffeine is a diuretic, and would therefore fill my bladder and render it ready for bursting. I bought the drink (and some donuts, because, really how could I go to DD and pass up donuts? it's practically a sin) and meandered over to the used book store. I sold a few books, bought a Bill Bryson and a book-club read, and continued to gulp down my beverage as heartily as I could without procuring a brain freeze. I sat in my car, rolled the windows down, and cracked open the book. I waited patiently for the coffee to settle into my bladder and waited for the alarm-bells to start. Except, after chugging at least half of it, waiting patiently is not a valid option.
My attention started to wander, my hands started shaking, and I realized quickly, that in my attempt to pass a drug test I may have OD'd on caffeine. Smart, Claire. My gaze darted around like a squirrel and my anxiety-prone mind began to worry that I would show up at the clinic twitching and they would check the "Deranged! NOT suggested for hire" box as soon as I walked in.
They didn't of course. I passed my drug test, and actually had a bit too much :ahem: material for the plastic cup. Now I just have to wait for my hands to stop shaking. It's been three hours. How much longer could it take?

The Lost Continent

I'm back. Now to business.

I've been reading a lot as I've been driving to and from New Orleans and Isle of Palms, and also spending a lot of downtime either on a beach, porch, or atop a mound of unmade bedclothes in the center of the chaotic den of mess that is my bedroom.

I finally finished Bill Bryson's first book: The Lost Continent. and thank goodness.

At the beginning of the summer, I devoured countless books of his; accounts of treks through the Appalachian wilderness or sunburnt Outback. When I began reading Lost Continent, I became slightly put off at his attitude, writing style and general view of the country he was exploring: small town America. At first I thought I had simply had too much Bill; this was the last book of his I was reading, as I had exhausted all the others in the used book store. Then I decided it was his position in life that made him sound different, annoying even. He was fresh from twenty years in England and back to his homeland to gripe about the changes since the 60s and the excessive number of spray cheese flavors. It was also his first novel. Maybe, I thought, he's just more charming as a self-deprecating, balding, old guy. However, my judgement early on began to affect how I was reading his book. My inner monologue became hostile towards him as he described the south as backwards and stupid (how original!) and frequently made up town names that show his general feelings on the area: "[it was] in some place like Firecracker, Georgia, or Bareassed, Alabama." This was dangerous. Once I make up my mind about something, it's hard to stay objective, and once I notice something, it tends to poke at me (like the frequency and consistency of my R.A. using the word 'um' while delivering the fire safety talk: "...and um, if you could um, just make sure you know um, how long to cook your um, popcorn, we'll um, avoid any um, annoying fire alarms. um. um. um."). So, naturally, I began to dislike this favorite author of mine line by line, comparison by comparison, state by state.

Many things that annoyed me I chucked up to being a sign of the times (published in the U.S. in 1989), like his relative lack of political correctness. Perhaps today we're just too restrictive of certain terms, but it still bothers me in any publication to hear Asians referred to as "orientals" or all of latinamericans summed up as Mexican. In Lost Continent, Bryson refers to a college student in the news as "a black." Not "a black person" but: "[the students] were a twenty two year old black from Mississippi...and two white guys from New York." Just doesn't sound right to me.

Bryson goes looking for the perfect small town to bring his British family to, or as he calls it 'Amalgam;' a mixture of all the perfect elements a small town can have that don't actually seem to exist in the same place. Basically he quests after the perfect pleasantville of Leave it to Beaver, or more currently, Stars Hollow from Gilmore Girls. In the end, I know from reading his books he ends up living in New Hampshire near Dartmouth. However, in looking for perfection, all he really finds is hatred. His attitudes seem too polar. Either he LOVES something, or it is despicable trailer trash. I do like that he describes Charleston as "perfect" but ultimately decides he could never live there because it is in the South which means upon moving his entire family would become uneducated and start speaking at the rate of dripping molasses. to which i say >:P

Overall, I did not enjoy the book nearly as much as his others (I highly recommend I'm a Stranger Here Myself). I was so eager to write about it, I began keeping a notepad next to my bed to write ideas, or more often criticisms. Among these are bullets like

• more cursing


• less apology for drunkeness??

or "he disses the Smithsonian!"

I can't even rate it. You read it and tell me how you feel.

not to harp on...

The anatomy of a summer bedroom is simple and yet incredibly messy. At the moment, I have two fans spinning perilously; one at my window (which, until noticed by my brother, was blowing air OUT), and one, of course, on the ceiling. The floor finds itself littered with sandals, a tool box, boxes full of unpacked dorm gear, unhelpfully warm blankets and a bathing suit or two. The bed lays unmade, a resting place for a book or the remote control. The comforter sits at the foot, folded and forgotten. Sheets are crumpled but clean. The fan in the window cancels out bird noise and wafts in smells from the grill outside. The air moving is hot. My keyboard is hot. My knee-pits (which do not have a medical name) are sweaty. How lovely.

On days like this, it is best to lie, inert, on the closest flat surface. Also helpful would be a drink, itself sweating with condensation and a paperback book about living in Alaska. Or the top of a mountain. Or the inside of a Coca Cola bottle. However, this immobility, no matter how comfortable, always comes with a side of guilt. At least in my family. My mother feels guilty pausing to watch something on TV, yet feels no qualms about farming* on Facebook, probably because it feels more "active." All joking aside, this is a popular rationalization within my family. My father believes he is going faster by taking a shortcut around traffic as long as the car is in motion. I feel it too. I have convinced myself that writing this is more productive than watching iCarly or another episode of Clean House, but is it really?

I know the answer is no, but it still feels like a yes. And now that I've accomplished something today, I'm going to take a well earned break and turn on the tube or read some Bill Bryson. The sad thing about summer is that it will be more than what I did yesterday.

*I love my mother and think fb farming is pretty cute, but also kind of ridiculous. right?