not a great weekend, overall. gundam and i broke up on saturday so i’ve been lying around in my bathrobe watching movies and feeling sorry for myself. as for tonight, i don’t know what i’m up to yet. new year’s has always been kind of depressing for me anyway; that whole start of year instinct has always been triggered much more by fall than by winter for me, for whatever reason, so january first just seems kind of artificial and redundant.

anyway. i’m going to go take a bath or something.

well, i’m finally home. and while it’s nice to get back to my apartment and rescue my wilting plants and unpack my xmas goodies, i have to admit i had a really good time in massachusetts. as i mentioned, i was pretty sick for the first few days, but what better place to be sick than at my mom’s house? she poured gallons of tea down my throat and made me wrap up in blankets by the fire, and i’m feeling fine now. i return to new york with a whopping four new bags, all of which are really adorable and at least two of which are going to become my new school bags. i left my ratty old high school backpack at my parents’ house; it put in a few good years but has now been fondly retired.

i also, as you can see in my camstill above, got another hole in my left ear; i already had one in each but i haven’t worn earrings in a long time. i got new silver hoops for all my piercings, though, and when i can take out the piercing stud they used i’ll have them in all three. eventually i want to pierce my tongue, also, and get another hole in each ear.

i spent most of today on the train, and i’m still not completely over my plague of the past week, so i think i’m going to turn in early. tomorrow i’m hanging out with spencer, i think; i was going to tonight but i’m just too tired.

i realized after i got on the train saturday morning that i hadn’t updated before i left, and of course i haven’t had time until now. i’m in massachusetts spending the holiday at my parents’ house, and i’ll be here until friday. unfortunately whatever minor plague i had before i left has developed into something quite nasty so i haven’t been doing much other than trying to sleep and taking lots of vile cough medicines, and reading. i think i’m starting to get better - if moving from feverish and throat-swollen to congested and coughing can be said to be better. it’s different, anyway.

my brother spent the night here last night so that he could be here for our usual christmas morning such and whatnot, so that was nice. we had croissants and coffee and opened presents and everything. i have to thank everyone who sent me letters and ecards and things from my wishlist - i’m always amazed at that sort of thing, especially from people i haven’t even spoken to on irc or anything. my parents have a hard time grasping that people i don’t know actually visit my site and would be involved enough to send me a card, much less a gift - but it happens and i’m very grateful.

i don’t know if i’m going to have a chance to update again before i get back; i hope i will, but i’ll see how it goes. the rest of my family - my aunt and uncle, cousins, and grandparents - are coming here shortly for a big christmas dinner thing, which should be nice. i hope all of you survive your various family gatherings, assuming you have them, or in any case have fun. i’ll be back in a few days.

so tuesday night i went with gundam and mrtails to the first showing of lotr, at midnight at the lowes in times square. i’d been looking forward to it for so long that i was sort of dreading it would be only mediocre, or good but not great, but: it was incredible. the three hours flew by, and even though it finished after three am i felt like i wanted to sit back down and watch the entire thing again. incredible cinematography, flawless casting, probably the best adaptation from a book i’ve seen in years. elijah wood was perfect, as was orlando bloom. i’m seeing it again on friday, which is only because i can’t see it again right now.

today i woke up feeling moderately crappy; my sore throat of the past few days has accumulated a bit of a fever and other assorted shittiness, so i’ve been attacking it with black tea, ricola, and cup noodles. i feel better than i did this morning, but not great. oh well.

tomorrow i am, as i said, seeing lotr again - this time with gundam and the rest of team5, who i know pretty well. carmine was still living in gundam’s house in li when i started hanging out there, although vince had already moved out, and everyone else has gotten used to me hanging around the office a lot. so i get to come for the annual xmas dinner, after which they are treating us all to the movie. hooray.

saturday morning i’m heading to boston to spend christmas with my parents; i’ll be coming back the 28th.

i’m sitting in this crappyass netcafe in times square; gundam and i are going to see lord of the rings in a few hours and we’re mad early to meet mrtails to pick up our tickets, so we’re killing time here.

worked on my dad’s site a bit today; i’m redesigning the whole thing in general but in the meantime i’m making a few changes based on some sales he made at a recent show. also working on some stuff for penny arcade, which is as always way more fun than it is work.

finished all tomorrow’s parties this morning, which was great although i have a sort of confused sense of the trilogy as a whole since i read them out of order. i started with idoru, then virtual light, then parties. still, they’re all really good books. i’m going to reread them, in order this time.

this netcafe is not as bad as it could be i guess, but it does make me miss cybersmith, which is out of business now. there used to be one in harvard square and i’d kill time there when i was bumming around the city. great gaming, decent connection speed, a much more coffehouse-like atmosphere than this place. this place feels like sears with webcams, or something. row upon row of identical crappy little win boxes with identical crappy little quickcams perched on the monitors, bright overhead lighting and no privacy at all. the ‘cafe’ part consists of an overpriced movie theatre style concession stand near the entrance. but still. net accesss is net access when you have nothing better to do.

i finished the last page in my latest paper journal last night, which makes two hundred pages. it’s almost like i wrote a book, although handwriting takes up more space than type. a novella, maybe. this is the first one i’ve finished completely since i started keeping a physical journal again; i stopped after my senior year in high school when all my old journals, this big stack of cvs spiralbound notebooks i’d been writing in since i was thirteen, were thrown away in a misunderstanding. after that i couldn’t really bring myself to bother, until i got frustrated with the self-censorship i have to impose upon my webjournal.

i like having something i can physically flip through and reread some random tuesday from over the summer, or my trip to seattle, or whatever i happen to turn to. i need to get another blank journal soon before i get out of the habit again.

ran around trying to get my electric bill paid today; apparently i never actually got a bill last month, so of course they were threatening to turn off my power because i didn’t pay it. i can only assume one of my neighbors forgot to give it to me, or something, but in any case i got it all ironed out today so hopefully my electricity will remain intact. was also supposed to register for classes, but i think my advisor forgot to clear me - i should have been able to register this morning, but there’s still a hold. i’ll give her a call tomorrow.

tomorrow night i’m going to a midnight (actually, 12:01 am) showing of the lord of the rings, with gundam and mrtails, which i’m really looking forward to. i hope the movie is as good as it seems to be from the trailers.

i’m almost done with all tomorrow’s parties, for which i need to thank Lacroix, who sent it to me from my wishlist on amazon. it’s a great book, and of course i’m always surprised (in a good way!) when people actually send me things like that.

the upper camstill is mine, the lower colin’s; they both refer to super smash brothers melee. colin is still in denial about the fact that once i figured out how to stop falling off the edges of the level, pikachu was seriously kicking his ass, which was demonstrated again tonight. uNF.

last night i was at gundams; we played a big online drinking game with monkey, tycho, and croo. the game itself was conducted via irc and a temporary cam portal, and all in all it was really fun. gundam and i only played for a couple hours since most of the other people were on the west coast and have some nutty other time zone, but it was well worth it.

registering for classes at nyu tomorrow, all that good stuff. i’m really tired now.

i’m in a really good mood, it’s been a good couple of days. i met with my advisor at nyu and she cleared me for registration and everything, so i get to make my schedule tonight. but that isn’t the best part - it turns out that while i was gone, they changed around the morse academic plan, which is nyu’s core curriculum. the end result is that i’ve been exempted from three courses i thought i was going to have to take, and i have only four requirements left total. i’m taking two of them this semester, two next, and then i’m free to finish my major. they’re accepting my ap calc score (a three, the only ap test i didnt’ get a five on) as demonstration of math proficiency, which means that while i don’t get actual credits for it i also don’t have to take any more math. i also got out of the second semester of the expository writing program (i already did the first part), and the “expressive culture” requirement - whatever that is, my harvard credits count for it.

it looks like this semester i’ll be taking a world cultures class (i already took one before, but i had to withdraw from it when i got mono), natural sciences I or human evolution, a philosophy course, and something else. possibly an english lit class? i haven’t decided yet. i had expected to be taking at least three or four requirements this semester, so only two is a really nice surprise.

i’ve got something like 48 credits now, which means i need to declare my major probably after this semester. i suppose i’ll stick with philosophy for the moment; i can always change my mind later. if i do change it, i’ve almost completed a philosophy minor at least. tomorrow i have to get on the phone with harvard and have them send an official transcript to nyu; apparently all they have is a photocopy. but that shouldn’t be too hard.

last night i hung out with colin; we went to dinner at zen palate and then to his place, where we played a whole lot of pikmin and super smash brothers melee. both great grames, although colin kicked my ass at ssbm. pikmin is probably the most adorable game i’ve ever seen, i’m definitely going to have to pick it up when i get a cube. we also watched nightmare before christmas and the extras that come on the dvd that i hadn’t seen before, since i have it on vhs. very cool.

gundam and mrtails (from #caoine, irc.caoine.org) and i are going to see the lord of the rings at 12:01 am on the 19th, which is the first showing. we’re seeing it at the big theatre in times square, it should be very cool. i can’t wait. colin and i saw elijah wood on conan last night, which was pretty funny. he was talking about his magic hairy feet and how the hobbits could beat up the cast of star wars.

so i got my letter from nyu today - i’m offically accepted for readmission starting january 22nd (two days after my birthday). they’d already pretty much told me it wasn’t going to be a problem and that the application process was just a formality, but it was still a relief. i’m meeting with an advisor on thursday to figure out what classes i’m going to take; probably a couple of requirements and another class or two towards my major, which is still as of now philosophy. i might change it at some point, but probably not this semester. i’m considering computer science, but i’d have to take some more math first as it’s been almost three years since i took ap calculus in high school. if i do switch to a different major, i’ll probably still keep philosophy as a minor.

so the next couple weeks i’m going to be trying to get all the registration procedures ironed out and everything; i’m leaving for boston on december 22nd to spend xmas with the family. i’m going to spend a week there this time, which will be the longest i’ve been back in quite a while. i’m looking forward to it.

saturday gundam and i headed over to colin’s house for gaming fun. we checked out some baldur’s gate: dark alliance, more metal gear solid 2 (of course), rogue leader, more super monkey ball, etc etc. also watched cats and dogs which i hadn’t seen before (and which was absolutely adorable) and the goonies (which i had, but not for years and years). eventually i headed home and went to bed.

sunday i was planning on doing a photo shoot with my friend jean at sva, but things got all fucked up: as i’m sure some of you noticed, pyre was down for a good chunk of the day because of a brownout in the area the box lives in, so i couldn’t get at the address where i was supposed to meet her or her cell number. eventually i got in touch with her through another email address, but then when i finally got down to the subway station i waited around in the freezing wind for about half an hour before they announced they weren’t running any manhattan bound trains from my station that day because of construction. at that point i gave up, cancelled with jean, and went home to make some tea. my throat has been bothering me a lot lately and it hurts more when i’ve been out in the cold. eventually i’m supposed to have my tonsils out which will supposedly take care of my sore throats, but we’ll see.

today i’ve been nursing my throat mostly; i’m trying to keep from getting really sick. i’ve been drinking endless cups of tea, taking lots of vitamin c and staying bundled up. hooray for winter.