Happy Hallowe'en!

So last night was Hampshire Hallowe'en, which is the hugest party in the universe. As in the entire Valley tries to get on to our campus, but we run it like reverse East Berlin and limit the crazies to 4 per Hampshire person. Katie and I decided it would be cool to dress in theme, so I was Elton John and she was William Shakespeare. I found the absolute best purple paisley silk fabric and made a pretty sweet costume of which nearly no pictures exist. Katie did a great job with hers, too, and carried around the skull of Freddie Mercury, which unfortunately just made people think she was Hamlet. Jack decided to use his crazy uniform fetish and be an East German border guard, which apparently every person ever thinks is a Nazi, even though the two uniforms look nothing alike (as in aren't even the same color you crazies). I told him his name was Gottfried Burghart Johannes Friedrich, but he said it was Senor Misterioso, and then I said it was Herr Gottfried Burghart Johannes Friedrich Misterioso, and then he said no, and then I called him Hans all night.
Some of our festivities included watching some great bellydancing, watching our awesome circus be really awesome (things they do: pretty pretty contact juggling, super-neat stilt-walking/dancing things, awesome acrobatic dances, subversive clowns, eating glass) and then some fire-performer-types do a show with fire that was really neat, and then some fireworks that were so pretty, and then eating candy, and then seeing the freak show that Necronomicon put together (they had some sweet freaks like a Wolfman and a Fishgirl and a Clay Man and a Batperson and others) and then we met a S'mores fairy who worried us a little so we did not eat her S'mores (but coming across a fairy in the middle of a dark garden offering S'mores with no one around is pretty sweet) and then we saw a person sitting in a big pile of leaves so Jack went and jumped on her (literally) and we made a new friend and played in the leaves for a really long time. Leaves are awesome. We came in as it started to rain a bit, since we had no interest in any of the 10 or so concerts going on around campus, and watched the Princess Bride because Katie had never seen it, and sometime really late I fell asleep in Katie's bed, not trusting my own hall to be free of revelers when I wanted to sleep (Jack says it was after all). We slept in until after noon today, of which we are proud, and we eventually made it to Northhampton because Jack needed a toothbrush, but we spent more time eating things than anything else. Jack did get his toothbrush, though, and some crackers, and a shirt at the thrift store, and I bought handsoap for the bathroom cause handsoap is good to have. We watched Hair tonight and made fun of it constantly and laughed at Jack because he hates musicals with a passion and this is not a good musical, either. Jack took some pictures of Hallowe'en and is trying to get them to me but his computer is all "no!" so I'll do what I can to share the good ones with you, and 10 billion other people took so many pictures, so I'll steal their good ones and share them, too.

In Bed

Sunlight is breaking through my window
Robbing me of my precious sleep
I don't want to
But I got to
Wake up and clear my head
Make some coffee, toast some bread
But I think I'd rather spend the day in bed

I don't want to get up today
I just wanna stay in bed
My feet feel like they're made out of clay
My head wishes I were dead
I just want to sleep in, okay?
Just let me lie here half-asleep

Summer's gone
Days spent with the grass and sun
I don't mind
To pretend I do seems really dumb
I rise as the morning comes
Crawling through the blinds
I shouldn't be up at this time
But I can't sleep with you there by my side
Wake up, it's a beautiful morning
Feel the sun shining for your eyes
Wake up, it's so beautiful
For what could be the very last time
25, don't recall a time I felt this alive
So wake up Boo
There's so many things for us to do
It's early so take your time
Don't let me rush you please
I know I was up all night
I can do anything, anything, anything
Wake up, it's a beautiful morning
Feel the sun shining for your eyes
Wake up, it's so beautiful
For what could be the very last time
But you can't blame me
For the death of summer
But you can't blame me
For the death of summer
But you're going to say
What you want to say
You have to put the death in everything
Wake up, it's a beautiful morning
Feel the sun shining for your eyes
Wake up, it's so beautiful
For what could be the very last time


Thank God I have a really good wake-up playlist. I finished my essay at 2:45 last night. I don't usually go to bed much earlier than that, true, but still. Will better bring pastries this time.

More Pictures

October

Sometimes when I am procrastinating because I can't look at Nazi love letters any more I take pictures and then I upload them. Enjoy.

Apples to Apples

I haven't posted a picture recently, so here is something lovely for you to gaze at.

We were playing Apples to Apples, and this is one of three moments:
-I put down "Helen Keller" for "hilarious"
-I put down "Blitzkrieg" for "speedy"
-Jack and I put down "going to the gym" and "lifting weights" for the same word (I don't remember what word it is) and expected Katie to choose between them.

In other news, I voted today (absentee), and I even voted for the Independent Green party candidate for the House! Wheeeee third parties! Now, the only thing I know about this guy (Albert Burckard) is that he really, really likes trains. I also like trains an awful lot, and I know that my other option, Randy Forbes, is the kind of person that I do not agree with on a single issue (maybe the weather maybe?) and so my choice was clear.

Now I shall return to reading Nazi love letters because I have an essay to write!

My brain platzt gleich

So I'm taking a break from reading and reading and reading to tell you about my life. As you may have gathered from my silence, I have been very busy this fine October. I suppose I haven't updated you since Fall Break began? Well, that was a restful weekend, in which I travelled to the land of Longyidow to meet many of Katie's family and friends, Longyidow being only three-quarters of an hour's drive from here. Classes resumed that Wednesday, and Jack returned in the evening to find that Katie and I had covered his room in pennies, which deeply aggravated his OCD and gave Katie and myself a hearty laugh. By this time, Katie and I had determined that we should be celebrating GLBT history month by dressing up, after a coincidence in which we each dressed as San Francisco politicos on Harvey Milk day. Lupe Valdez day brought Texas sheriff's badges, David Griffen day saw me as David and Katie as secret lover Keanu Reeves, Barney Frank day saw more political outfits and ushered in Family and Friends Weekend, in which parents descend upon our humble campus in droves and do such things as sit in on classroom discussions and create excuses for Ralph to host meals in RCC. Saturday (Barbara Gittings day) included a panic on our part when SAGA closed early and we could find no food, but then we found a great Ralph-lunch in the gym and we had mediocre but free sammiches and did not die. That night, Katie's parents came up for dinner with Ken Burns, but a famous Negro Leagues baseball player whose name I have forgotten died that week and Ken was called away to deliver his eulogy and thus sent his ex-wife in his stead. We still had a most delicious dinner and screened a portion of Ken's upcoming documentary The War (about world war ii), and I promise that it will be so incredibly powerful and when it finally premieres Katie and I will camp out in front of PBS for the entire 7-night, 14-hour series. Sunday was Phill Wilson officially but inofficially Goetz Otto, aka German Man from German movie der Untergang, which we watched Friday night. Yes, every man in der Untergang was German, but none was quite so Germanic as German Man, and we fell almost as in love with him as with Bald Man (Bald Men, of course, possessing incredible charisma and causing all who encounter them to fall madly in love. Whenever we see a Bald Man, Katie and Jack and I become incredibly excited). In honor of German Man, I did not go to German Breakfast, mostly because I was sleepy (I have found out since that Family and Friends Weekend events caused German Breakfast to be cancelled for the week, so I feel better). Monday was The Birthday Of Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde, for which we all dressed up and went to Northhampton, where large crowds followed us and sang our praises. We went to Webs America's Yarn Store, which is the best store ever, and I bought yarn to knit Jack a scarf so he does not freeze. We bought other various things of varying degrees of importance, and returned to campus just in time for me to go to Spanish (for the first time in 2 and a half weeks) where I determined that my Spanish class does very little when I skip it. We spent the evening making an Oscar Wilde Birthday Day mix, which is a beautiful collection of Jack and Katie and I's favorite gay songs. Tuesday was Tim Gill Day, aka Kari does her Yiddish project day, aka Worst Day of Jack's Life. I got up early and got some books from the Hampshire library for my project (on Queer Yiddishkeit), grabbed some lunch with Katie and Jack, and grabbed a bus to Mt Holyoke with Jack (who has Spanish there) to get some more books. It began to rain as we arrived, and continued to rain as I left 45 minutes later. Once home, I began reading and Jack called me in his break between class and TA session, and Katie got out of class, and I kept reading. We waited for Jack, who called us to let us know he had missed 2 buses due to getting the schedule mixed up and that he had already eaten. I read him the schedule and Katie and I went to dinner, during which Jack missed another bus by watching it pull up, not realizing it was his bus while it sat in front of him for 5 minutes, then realizing as it pulled away. Deeply upset at his own stupidity, Jack proceeded to wait in the rain for the next bus that never came. Taking immense pity on him, Katie and I convinced the ever-saintly Madelaine to use her powers of Automobile to drive us to Mt Holyoke to pick poor drenched cold Jack up since buses obviously hate him. All other plans for the evening thus ruined, Katie and I determined that we should do laundry, which we did while reading for WWII class. After an exciting laundry session, the three of us had the best idea ever and decided to create Sims of ourselves and our respective significant others, all of whom turned out to be eerily accurate. Highlights: Jack Sim got food poisoning almost immediately (I have never ever had a Sim with food poisoning before), Katie Sim has the worst insomnia ever (and, ironically, loves to play chess), Kari Sim, when very tired, chooses to nap in Jack's bed rather than her own. We've begun populating the neighborhood with all our favorite people- Oscar and Bosie are already working on love affairs with Jack and Frank, the cast of Velvet Goldmine has moved in across the street, and Ralph and Manfred are planning their first garden party. We have plans for an Artists House featuring Andy Warhol and Friends, and Walt Whitman will certainly show up, and maybe even Bernard Shaw (we have been discovering that my beloved Bernard was totally friends with every single famous person in England ever). Of course, we have real lives too, and had to do things like go to class on Wednesday (which is pretty much all I do all day long Wednesdays) and then Project Runway had its finale (which was overly dramatic and the wrong person won and we are sad) and there was a fire alarm (after a fire drill on Monday morning, by the way) but we perservered. Thursday brought Bayard Rustin Day, aka Communist Day, in which Katie and Jack and I became card-carrying members of the communist party. It was also Heather's birthday and I had to give my Yiddish presentation (it went well) and we had to go to the Smith library to do research for WWWII (Smith has a pretty great library and I have a pile of books, in German, that I have to read and write an essay about by Wednesday). Of course we did nothing productive on Thursday night, because we had Sims to play, after having a giant phone party in which we had very long phoen conversations with someone. I talked to Mary in both German and English and I love that girl so much more than you. Friday brought Jim Kolbe day, aka Log Cabin Republican Day, aka Kari Wears a Top Hat Because People Respect a Top Hat day. We had class and we had lunch with Will and I had more class and Jack left to go have dinner with some lesbians and sleep at their house so Katie and I bought chips and watched The Laramie Project and made our Lord Alfred Bosie Douglas Birthday mix (mainly because we realized that Oscar's mix had too many glaring omissions such as ABBA and David Bowie). And we stayed up forever doing nothing of great import. Today has been quiet- it is Adrienne Rich Day, so we slept in and ate and we have spent our afternoon reading for WWWII because Jack is not home but we have his keys so we can't leave him or he won't get into his room. I think I will call him now and see if he's still alive, and then I suppose it is back to homework. Tomorrow is Ian McKellan Day, aka Lord Alfred Bosie Douglas's Birthday Day, aka a certain duck's birthday. It shall certainly be festive.

Happy Birthday Love!

Today is Oscar Wilde's birthday (which is a High Holy Day in these parts). I will not tell you how old he is because that would be rude. I will regale you with Oscar Wilde quotes, and promise to sit down and tell you what I've been up to when I get some time soon.

Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.
I am not young enough to know everything.
One should play fair when one has the winning cards.
When I was young I thought that money was the most important thing in life; now that I am old I know it is.
Work is the curse of the drinking classes.
The world is a stage, but the play is badly cast.
It is through art, and through art only, that we can realize our perfection.
Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination.
Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.
It is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either charming or tedious.
People who count their chickens before they are hatched, act very wisely, because chickens run about so absurdly that it is impossible to count them accurately.
There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.
The truth is rarely pure and never simple.
Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong.
I can resist anything but temptation.
I never travel without my diary. One should always have something sensational to read on the train.
When we are happy we are always good, but when we are good we are not always happy.
I sometimes think that God, in creating man, somewhat overestimated his ability.
Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing is worth knowing that can be taught.
Between the optimist and the pessimist, the difference is droll. The optimist sees the doughnut, the pessimist the hole!
A true friend stabs you in the front.

I Feel Pretty

  

Rosenrot

I suppose this moment with at least half my college gone (including all my best buddies) is a good time to update you on what's happened since my return from Boston. Well, Tuesday started out as non-eventful as any, especially since there was no Katie. But then Jack decided that his stomach thing hadn't gone away, and that he wanted to die. I insisted that dying was not a good idea, and promptly spent most of my midday trying to make him feel better by running around and finding things for him and looking at him with concern and finally getting him to go to Health Services, where they told him that he had an appointment the next afternoon. Jack was insistent and they managed to squeeze him in, and determine that he might have an ulcer and should be tested. Got Jack back to dorms, Katie was home (yay!!), looked at Jack with deepening concern, ate food, decided that Jack needed this one over-the-counter thing the doctor had recommended and some Jello, went to Northhampton. CVS is across the street from the bus stop and had the Gaviscon, and had pudding, and had ginger ale, but did not have jello. Knowing that Jack was curled up in a tiny ball of pain and hunger in my bed (Tuesday was a day that Jack decided he liked my bed better than his), Katie and I walked half an hour to the Stop and Shop, where we bought vast quantaties of Jello, then walked back to the bus stop and came home, sweaty and aching and bearing goodies. We found Jack looking relatively chipper and watching Rammstein videos on my computer. We told him how much we suffered for him and fed him Jello, which made him happy, I suppose. Katie wrote an essay while Jack and I poked each other and we felt in general that Jack would live and life would be grand. Enter Wednesday. Get up, go to class, Jack doesn't want lunch, Katie and I eat, Jack goes to doctor for wonderful fun stool sample, Jack returns, Katie and I get out of class, lots of homework gets done. Think about going to Soul Force presentation, skip it because of homework, go to Yiddish screening to watch really long but really good movie version of the Dybbuk (great Yiddish play, great movie), come back at 9:30 to find Katie and Jack waiting more than anxiously, because we all need to do laundry. As in, are all wearing our final clean pair of underwear, Jack is wearing his two single socks that don't begin to match, I am out of pants and have 1 summer-time skirt left. Katie apparently has a vastly larger wardrobe than either me or Jack, because she wasn't as desperate, but she had a lot of laundry to do, too. We dragged all of our junk down to the basement and discovered a big Project Runway party, which we crashed while washing and drying our 6 loads (2 of blacks, both dominated by Jack, 1 small red load, 1 whites, 1 greens-browns of which Katie had none, 1 brights dominated by me). We watched that episode of Project Runway (the reunion special) a total of twice, thanks to the joys of reruns and of laundry taking forever. We also saw the Daily Show and the Colbert Report, making us very happy. Crawled into bed after bringing overflowing laundry basket back upstairs and slept until some loud person on my hall awoke me at 10 as happens every Tuesday and Thursday. Met Katie for lunch after her class (Jack having no appetite), went off to Yiddish. Arrive at Yiddish, waiting for prof Rachel, Katie calls, says "Jack's being taken off by EMTs and I'm not sure what's going on. I'll keep you posted." I say "okay" and proceed to worry, except then we spent the whole class discussing memorials and museums and Holocaust education and all these vaguely-related things because of the Eisenmann lecture happening (Eisenmann is the dude who made the Holocaust memorial in Berlin) and it was fascinating. Left class, called Katie, who had not heard from Jack and had no idea where he was. Spent some time worrying about him, finally heard at 5 (as we were heading off to the Eisenmann documentary) that he was on his way back from the hospital. Skipped documentary to wait for Jack, determined that he was not dead because they gave him good medicine and a prescription, decided to skip lecture to go to CVS to fill Jack's prescription. Went to CVS, discovered that Jack did not have his insurance card (not that he was with us either), discovered that medicine costs lots and lots of money if you don't have insurance, decided not to get Jack medicine. Shopped at neat stores until bus came (buses are infrequent in the evenings), went home, told Jack bad news, sat in Jack's room while bass pounded doing WWWII homework. Watched Jack want to die. Helped Jack pack. Convinced Jack not to die. Fell asleep. Met Katie for breakfast this morning (let Jack sleep), went to class, had lunch with Will to whine about bass-blasting hallmate (cannot repeat the names Will called him, but Will is undoubtably on our side), Katie's mom came to take Jack to airport. Jack left pretending to be alive, Katie is spending the night with her parents because I guess parents like seeing their kids sometimes or something. I went to Sound Patterns class, where Mark said he had hoped we wouldn't show up, but we definitely had a minyan, so class went on and we made pretty spectrographs of speech and I really love that class so much. Now I'm kinda lonely cause the campus is really emptying out, which is sad, but Katie comes back tomorrow, and Heather's coming up, and life should be fun.

Someone should come visit me sometime. Hampshire's a neat place.

1:30 in the morning update: Jack has a very good movie collection, and I am beyond glad that he left me his keys.

Dracula from Houston

So I went to Boston on my honeymoon this weekend and I guess I didn't tell many people I was going sorry? But ummmm Jack and I got married (I hope Jack's boyfriend doesn't mind) so Katie and Jack and I went to see Heather in Boston and it was great fun. Let me think back to
SATURDAY MORNING
Woke up early, realized SAGA opens late, thought about what to do for breakfast, decided to go across the cornfield to buy delicious pastries. Got on bus, went to Northhampton, waited in bus station forever, got on bus, went to Springfield, switched buses, went to Boston. Took some naps in there sitting beside Katie while leaving Jack to make new friends. Got off bus, met Heather, Jack felt nauseated. Went to eat food, look at Jack with vague concern. Got on T, went to Heather's dorm, met Heather's one roommate, discovered that other roommate was away for the night and that Jack and I got the bed (as opposed to the floor: very good). Immediately settled in to nap on each other puppy-style while Katie and Heather went to find Jello for Mr Stomach-Aching Texas. Ordered pizza, ate cookie dough, watched Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, fell asleep happy that Jack's feet do not remain frozen for too long.
SUNDAY
Woke up lateish, discovered that Jack was recovered but Katie's cold was still around, decided to head into city for Fun, got caught in a lot of rain and very very wet. Ate food and shopped a little bit and decided that the rain was too much and went back to Heather's dorm to put clothes in dryer and have a 4-person cuddle-fest on Heather's bed, which is a top bunk and makes things precarious. Cuddles turned into massages and then our clothes were dry and we were warm and happy so we got dressed and took more umbrellas and went back out into the city to shop and then try to find a restaurant without a name, which Katie said was delicious, and which was far away and hard to find. Got lost in the rain for a while, finally figured out how to get there, discovered that restaurant had limited menu that failed to satisfy Heather or Jack. Ate food, went home in rain, ate cookie dough/made cookies, watched Boondock Saints while being annoyed by random people from Heather's school (experience is showing that all-girls school girls are really scary in groups), realized it was 1 in the morning, went to bed (Jack and I on the floor because Roomie #2 had returned. Floor is not as nice as bed because Jack has this tendency to stay more than 3 inches from me and I thus get cold).
MONDAY YOM KIPPUR
Woke up late, dyed my hair (it is strawberry blonde- basically what it was before, but a more even color now), packed, went to South Station to check luggage, ate food, wandered Downtown Crossing for a while, got luggage, got on bus, slept on Jack while listening to Rammstein (Jack has taught me to enjoy Rammstein very very much) (also Katie did not come back becuase she and Heather are going to a concert tonight and Katie is coming back earrrrrly tomorrow morning but Jack has class and needed to come back today and I didn't trust him to make it home alone), switched buses in Springfield, got back to Northhampton, ate crappy pizza, got on bus to come home, called my mother, internetted.
Jack and I were going to wash socks and underwear but he has disappeared and I guess he is going to have a sock shortage tomorrow morning because I am too lazy to make him go do laundry with me.