Just like the movies!

Previews of what's to come:

* the saga of the gypsy moth training day: a thrill story of sticky fingers, GPS systems, a scary bug, and incredibly huge maps that will only increase my chances of becoming lost

* An ode to assembling gypsy moth traps: the pheromone string, the sticky goop, and--my favorite part--the circles to punch out

* Why I Hate Paperwork

[awkward pause]

So, um....hi! (waves at internet) How are you? Oh, oh that happened? Uh-huh, what then? Oh, well...... Yeah, I'm okay. No, not much really.... No, really.

I'm not really sure why I'm posting, but I feel like it because I'm on anyway, waiting for something to finish on another page, and I'm trying to be good about posting before I completely forget I have a webpage and don't post anything except apologies for not posting.

So, um....

I did some shopping with Mom today, which is always fun because we'll end up spending more time than I figured and run into stuff I don't expect (so almost bought a wig this morning). The game plan was to head to Sam's Club and look for various DVD sets (I was only after Gilmore Girls, but Mom had a list). We ended up [successfully] there, plus a party store (wigs!), the local Wal-Mart, McDonalds (the stepmeter thing said Mom's purse took 1000-something steps sitting in the car - this is my new favorite factoid), a Michael's craft store, and Schnucks.

I finally saw my grades. The only main thing to report is that I actually pulled off an 'A' in my acting class; the one it was supposed to be nearly impossible to receive higher than a 'B' in. (I worked so hard to not end that sentence with "in" and it still happened.) I had a brief, but giddy, celebration that complete distracted me from checking up on my GPA, but I'll assume I still have a scholarship waiting for me next semester since I wasn't in trouble and actually did better than normal this spring.

The scrapbook's coming along beautifully, probably because I've had lots of time on my hands and I got sick of unpacking/rearranging things around Day 3 or returning home. I did my scrapbook store round-up for needed paper and stickers, and, even though having an actual job will slow me down (I start gypsy mothing on Monday), it shouldn't take much longer to finish everything.

Have I mentioned my giant box of Easy Mac? I love my new giant box of Easy Mac. I can't wait to pop some in my dorm microwave.

It's like I'm on the confounded school network!

If I have to sit much longer for BannerWeb to load so I can finally confirm all my grades for the semester, it'll hit the cutoff time (midnight? one?) when it shuts down and I'll have to try again tomorrow morning. What am I supposed to do: pop in a movie and check back periodically? I should've turned it on before I left for the movie; it'd be fully loaded by now.

From Baccalaureate (before I dropped my pen)

Other people crying while speaking = me starting to tear up

Other people trying not to cry while speaking = me actually crying in my seat in the new auditorium


If high school was supposed to be the best years of my life, then these next two years at Truman will have to suck worse than stats class to make up the difference.

I actually stopped listening to the main guest speaker's message and instead focused on his dialect from a [oh, it's coming] linguistic point of view. I pulled out my vowel phonetics sheet and everything. (His accent affected his lax vowels, a statement that will probably make sense to all of two people reading my blog, and that includes me.)

But I'm totally still alive!

Grand Adventure Alert: Due to both my parents hanging out in period clothing and slumming it 1812-style, I was sent to drive [completely unsupervised] to Columbia, pick up my darling brother, and cart us--and all his stuff--back home again.

No, I amazingly did not flip out once during the entire trip. I came close a few times, but never truly managed "flipping out." Anyway. Trip observations:

* I have so many more things to add to the download list, including a great blues song by Jack Williams, Maroon 5's "This Love" (which is apparently *the* song of the moment), and something by Collective Soul that is vaguely stuck in my head. Yes, I had ecclectic radio moments.

* Amount of roadkill viewed on the backroads: over twenty

* Amount of roadkill viewed on the highway: not as much, mostly because I was trying to not think about the fact that I was (1) on the highway, and (2) unbelievably late. I did see something that looked like a small, distinctly orange monkey, though.

* Moment I realized I was on the highway and not dead yet: at a "Roadside Park 5 Miles" sign

* It's always fun to miss a turn off and then try to find a place to turn around or just get back on track.

* Speaking of which: definitely had a moment reminicent of the Hope-Hannah Trip to Six Flags of 2002 when I noticed the exact turn-off right as the car drove past it, in a "Huh. I'm supposed to turn there."-way

* I still hate pumping gas. Always will, I think. I'm making my peace with street lights, but it's tenuous at best.

* I wouldn't have driven so fast on the way there if I had realized how long I'd be in Columbia.

* With that much stuff in the car, inertia is anything but your friend.

* At least I made eleven cents (in two nickels and a penny) from the small change found in Caleb's room.

Sorry, Bill.

I am currently eating the contents of a chocolate pudding cup that (according to the top label) expired on March 5, 2002. For whatever reason, it was still in the back of our fridge, and I really felt in a chocolate pudding mood. I'm trying to not focus on the fact that it expired before I left for college or the Easy Mac went bad (though, ironically, it's just as bad as the Tavist-D) while alternatingly pushing Paul Kastner's Bill Cosby impersonation (basically saying "Jello pudding cup" excrutiatingly slow - this is really fun late at night or after play rehearsals). This process requires brain power. And more chocolate pudding.


On a semi-related note, I think I'm ready to gross out people and eat the Easy Mac now.

On a more-related note, two-plus years old chocolate pudding gets kinda lumpy and it doesn't help to stir it. This actually makes the pudding mad and it becomes even lumpier. It also tastes like chocolate dipped in a slight soapy-film. I'm not complaining.

End of Semester/Beginning of Summer Thank Yous

* Thank you, Stagecraft, for teaching me the difference between Phillips and Standard screwdrivers. I'd been faking it for years.

* Thank you, Scrubs Season One, for being illegally downloadable off the network so I could watch all of you while messing around with scrapbook stuff.

* Thank you, everyone I know, for being so confounded photographable all year long.

* Thank you, Caleb, for not needing a ride this afternoon, as I may go to the movies now instead. Or just veg on the couch again.

* Thank you, Patches, for not eating the pizza off my plate or the popcorn out of my bowl.

* Thank you, my hair, for somehow knowing when I really need something to cheer me up and automatically looking really good without me making an effort.

Fine, I give up.

My Twentieth Birthday in Bullets:

* After returning back to 315 from the theatre banquet, I immediately plopped in front of the computer and set about finishing revisions to half my portfolio before allowing myself to go to bed. This means I saw my birthday and continued typing for another two hours.

* Defintely woke up still in the dress, though I had enough sense to take off my heels first. (It's not much, but it was generally agreed to be some sort of improvement.)

* Instead of changing out of the dress like a normal person, I sat in front of Merv again and finished poetry revisions.

* Short story revisions kept being cut into by Addiction Solitaire, people stopping by to offer birthday greetings, and my personal lack of desire to finish off my conclusion properly. Cue lunch.

* Still in the dress, yet now in the dining hall eating waffles and scrambled eggs, desperately attempting to not spill syrup all over the prettiness.

* Finally change out of the dress (I really feel like I should be capitalizing all that) after lunch and finishing revisions, because--while it's one thing to eat in a fancy dress downstairs with all the people who see you at meals everyday--it's quite another to walk across campus to turn in my portfolio, especially with the humidity what it was.

* Pop in "Clueless" and half watch the movie, half quote the movie along with the characters, while reading my Student Ambassador handbook and scanning for cool tidbits.

* Wander down to 340 to share nifty tidbits and watch Michael fight evil somethings on some video game or other. I so know my technology.

* Return to 315, pop in "Bring It On," and do some slight packing after spending all morning/afternoon watching Melissa do the same.

* Movie ends. I'm blindfolded by Melissa and escorted out to Jamie's car and driven to unknown location as the two tell me they're headed for Columbia.

* Location = Thousand Hills Park for fried chicken picnicing, water gun fights, eventual swing set time, pink frosted cake, and a Disney Princesses pinata. I love my friends. Definitely kill about 3-4 hours doing nothing when I should study linguistics and stagecraft. Definitely don't care.

* Return home, end up with all the spare candy from the pinata, and try to shuff it off on anyone we meet.

* Melissa leaves to hang with Ben, I pop in "Empire Records" to keep the tradition from last year while doing more packing.

* Michael calls to ask about movie options, and just heads on down the hall. Upon arriving, we both go back and pick up Melissa's random birthday presents from their hiding slot in 340's closet.

* Melissa appears both appreciative and bewildered by the cast iron skillet. I love random birthday lists.

* The three of us watch "Major Payne" because Melissa hasn't seen it in forever, Michael just bought it, and I'd only seen half of it (and that was on a band trip).

* My birthday technically ends while watching the movie, though I'm a firm believer in "the birthday doesn't end until you go to sleep again" field of thought.

* Movie ends, Michael gets kicked out, alarms are set for the morning, and the birthday officially ends.


There, y'all feel informed now? (I should probably edit that sometime, huh?....)

Where's John when you need him?

After all that packing, unpacking, moving around, re-moving around, and general end of semester stress, I'm in desperate need of a good back massage. Takers?

Yes, I know this isn't about my birthday.

I just felt hungry (like I normally do around eleven back at Truman), but decided against zapping some Easy Mac because the microwave's always been kinda loud and I don't want to wake up my parents--mostly because I appreciate them not waking up me--and settled instead on Goldfish crackers and whatever soda I could grab from the box in the hall without actually seeing what I'm doing. It ended up being Cherry Coke, which is fab, because Goldfish and Cherry Coke are one of the greatest combos of "food that just doesn't belong" and I'm so glad that college taught me to combine them in the first place.

(because this is the sort of information worth breaking from linguistics for)

In approximately the past two hours, I've eaten ten popsicles of various flavors in a desperate attempt to empty the freezer.

There are still five left.

If I didn't have a final in about eight hours, I'd totally eat the rest of them and stay up until 2 a.m. enjoying the sugar high. As it is, I probably won't be able to fall asleep for another hour or so.


I'm half-ish packed, half way through a roll of film, none of my furniture is back where it's supposed to be, and--if we would've cooked the bacon tonight--I'd be 3/4 through the package singlehandedly by this moment.

Goodnight, y'all.

Blogger, why do you look so funny?

Here I am, momentarily popping my head up from a pile of Linguistic worksheets, notes, and the tiny radio with headache-inducing headphones to ignore studying for tomorrow's final AND the stacks and piles of unpacked, still-hanging-out-where-they've-been-all-semester things to say...

I'm not actually posting right now.

I have birthday stuff I want to post (Did you hear that I was kidnapped by my friends? Good fun.), plus from finals, and now (apparently) about New Blogger [like New Jersey, I guess], but I don't really have the time. All of that, however, will have to wait until after finals end, I pack everything (including beautiful, wonderful Merv), and lay eyes upon the House in Sullivan for the first time since March. It'll be thrilling, I'm certain.

Until then, or sooner, y'all.

* Thank you, Addiction Solitaire, for letting me win way more than normal. I really appreciate the thought.

* Ben - we need to duet on "Little Shop of Horrors" more often. Maybe when you live across the hall next year?

* It's 11:43 and I'm still in the black dress.

Goodbye, teenage days

Factoid goodness from the early morning hours with precious little explaination:

* Theatre banquet = once more great times with vintage Madonna and En Vogue, way more rap-ish than I'd care for, and a room of theatre people doing what they do best. Whatever that is.

* First song I listened to all the way through after turning twenty: Billy Joel's "Only the Good Die Young." Is the universe trying to tell me something?

* Song playing while I was busy turning twenty: The Get Up Kids - "Hannah Hold On"

* I still have all sorts of revisions to pull together before my portfolio is due tomorrow afternoon

* I never thought I would appreciate Britney Spears

* I'm so totally falling asleep wearing my pretty, pretty dress tonight. I mean, why not?

I can hear the credits music playing

As of half an hour ago...I am OFFICIALLY done, finished, fin with Spanish FOREVER!!!!

What the friggin' awful hideousness?!?

Why do I have to sit and wait through a movie to play Addiction Solitaire? I'm already wasting time, sure, but I at least want something semi-productive to wile away the hours.

"Hi, I'm Hannah. I'll be your dead body!"

I'm dropping the film off today, so the story can only get better once everyone sees photos of me looking all dead and all, but the entire absudity of hanging out with other people wearing blood and fake wounds, lying stylized on the pavement in a pool of fake blood. It was pretty great hanging out with the EMTs and etc, talking about what this wound would come from, previous accidents, and how awful we all look.

I ended up not under the car, but thrown through the windshield (I assume). Basically, I got to lie artisitcally on the road while one of the EMTs poured [literally] a bucket full of fake blood around my head, which slowly slid downhill getting into my hair, staining my neck and the top of my shirt. And, naturally, there was that whole "trying not to look like I'm breathing" thing while Matt L. sat crying over me, his "little sister."

The part that seems to be the coolest to everyone around? Riding around in the body bag--well, I WAS dead. It actually was way freaky to just go all limp and not focus on anything going around me. Sure, the coroner was talking to me the entire time, this is what's happening and "watch your head" type stuff, but everyone was still supposed to pretend that it was the real deal.

Heavy stuff. That's why we spent all "backstage" time joking around, I'm sure. Maybe we Truman students will never see a real accident like this, but those guys will and have in the past.

I'll scan in the pics as soon as I get the film back.

Yes, Really

The problem with having your birthday in the middle of finals week is that you forget it's coming until you make the list of everything to do in the next week and pick up on the fact that you wrote your own birthday down sometime in April so you wouldn't forget.

Letters to People

mock accident dress rehearsal addition!

To Becky Becker, or Dr. BB (as the cast decided yesterday), who didn't get offended that I threw myself at her for a SM/ASM position in my acting journal required for class and instead agreed to let me stage manage whatever show she does next year: Thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you!

To Matt L, who is the funnest person to break into song with, especially when it's the "Elephant Love Medley" from "Moulin Rouge" because he knows both parts and will jump on furniture to simulate the set: You really shouldn't try to kiss a girl for real at the end of that song, and--even when you're faking--you should save it for a time when you're not standing in front of the smoking theatre majors, providing a show

To Alex M., who gets air vac AND chest compressions, thereby gaining all the cool medical stuff while I just play dead underneath a car: You suck. And don't call me squirt.

Bonus! To my drunk freshmen neighbors who woke me up around four this morning, screaming about how invincible you are, "just hit me! hit me!": You have no idea how hard I would hit you at this moment, confounded vice-ridden projectionists.