As those of you who’ve read this site since its shrieking, red-faced infancy may remember, back in the day - we’re talking years ago, now - I was so goth. And the best part of that is the whole site thing barely caught the tail end of the whole goth thing; there was only perhaps a year of overlap before I sort of degerated into the miscellaneously weird-haired chick I am today. So what I mean is that even if you have been around since I was a senior in high school, that doesn’t begin to compare to the gothosity you’d have experienced had you seen me as, like, a freshman in high school, or heaven forbid a sophomore.

Anyway, so the point is: I used to be this cuddly little cheek-pinchable early teenaged goth, and I looked the part and everything. And when I would wander around Boston on the weekends with my cuddly little cheek-pinchably goth friends, people used to comment on our gothosity, comments along the lines of HEY, ISN’T IT A LITTLE EARLY/LATE FOR HALLOWEEN, et cetera.

So a couple of weeks ago, before Kony decided to completely flake out on his own Halloween party and was still trying to impress upon all his potential guests the absolutely essential nature of the costumes we were required to wear, I was trying to think of a costume that would somehow fit in with my plans for the rest of the night, which just so happen to include hitting one or more real live Goth Clubs with the mysterious Crispy. And what sort of came out of all this half-hearted costume planning was: I’m going as me, about seven or eight years ago. I’m going to recapture my cuddly, cheek-pinchably goth adolescence, although possibly without the studying for pre-calc quizzes and spending lunch periods in the Cool Guidance Counselor’s office.

This means that tomorrow, on Halloween, I’m going to be all dolled up in more or less the same way that, seven or eight years ago, used to elicit comments about the proximity of Halloween (or lack thereof). Which, I mean. Ha. Ha ha.

It’s that time again. The big day is just a few hours away, and although I’ve been sporting some gui goodies (like the fantabulous Halloween Dock App!) for longer than I’m willing to admit already, there’s always more to see. The Iconfactory is once again touting its annual Web’s Attic collection, which is not to be missed. In particular, I dig these iFrankie.com desktops, but I think I’ve settled on The House’s pumpkin images rotating as my desktop background, and their other fall images (leaves, gourds, Halloween candy) as a screensaver slideshow collection. (Although the candy corn pattern over at Ben & Jerry’s, of all places, is pretty tempting.) And finally, go and grab yourself a bONER while the grabbin’s good. Delicious!

As for the rest of the seasonal festivities? The pumpkins are carved, the candy corn eaten, the costume assembled. Bring it on.

Incidentally, that lil too-cute-for-words punkin over there? Grab it in the World Of Aqua: After Dark set at Iconfactory! And while I’m taking note of things: the illustrious and pleasant-smelling Colin just so happens to have been born on Halloween, so go and wish him a Happy Happy.

Look, it’s not that I like you so much less than Monday or Wednesday, although all three of you rather pale in comparison to Thursday and Friday, but when I step off the Q after that very long commute and it’s so very late and that one professor’s voice - you know the one - with the literally incredible accent that echoes through my nightmares is still ringing in my ears, does it really have to be raining, too? It isn’t enough that I don’t have any decent soup in the house to warm me up when I finally do get home, or that I forgot that it’s suddenly winter now and didn’t bring a scarf today - does there also have to be frigid water dumped on my head when I arrive, finally, in the dark, in Brooklyn?

Okay, fine. Have it your way. But don’t be surprised when the very thought of you makes me tired and irritable and longing for Wednesday, when even an ass o’clock Human Genetics lab seems like a treat. It should not come as news to you that my Tuesday bad moods are rapidly becoming both notorious and infamous, and that I curse the day Monday let you cut in line.

Kisses,

Emma

For those of you who have expressed an interest in my Dad’s sculpture and who are in the Providence area, his work will be featured soon in Fine Furnishings Show Providence, at the Rhode Island Convention Center. The show runs from 1 November (Friday) till the third (Sunday). If you have the chance, I highly recommend heading over to see his work in person - the photos are great, but they really don’t do justice to the experience of walking around among the pieces themselves. If you can’t make this show, keep an eye on his exhibits listing for more opportunities.

It’s funny when you try to compensate for having crap-ass three dollar grocery store coffee by just making it strong enough to melt holes through the coffee pot (and the kitchen counter and floor and probably the ceiling downstairs). You end up with bad coffee that’s really, really strong - but I’m not sure that it’s not still just bad coffee.

Okay, so. All week, when I haven’t been craving kappa maki, I’ve had this little nagging voice in the back of my head reminding me how long it’s been since I’ve really had some God Damned Hummus. It’s been whispering sweet nothings about the fat free roasted pepper medley available at my friendly local hippy-mart, but I haven’t been home and so my hummus needs have gone unfulfilled.

This morning I woke up, and it was still there. It’s all like: "Dude. Fucking hummus, already. Seriously. With some celery sticks? Shit yeah." I finally agreed that shit yeah, I could really go for some hummus, and managed to get up and dressed in only about another three hours. There was rain, but I was on a mission. A hummus mission.

So I get to the hippy-mart and I’m looking around because I’m easily distracted by shiny things and bright colors, and because it’s still such a novelty to have a grocery store on my street where that which is being sold is not only packaged in English but isn’t even expired yet. I’m checking out the blue corn tortilla chips and the slightly suspicious instant miso packets and finally I make my way over to the fridge case, ready to grab some serious armloads of hummus.

Only, there’s no hummus. No, I mean really: none. Not even the gross kinds I don’t like that much. There are things in hummus-sized little tubs that at first give me the impression that there is hummus, but on closer inspection they prove to be things like vegan butter (hold me, I’m scared) and various types of paste. My entire world is collapsing, here. How can there be no hummus? I even ask the surly, burly proprieter what exactly the deal might be with the whole no hummus thing, but he is unsympathetic.

So I mean, I got some mushroom soup and these sesame seed flatbread things, but it’s so not what I wanted at all, and now I’m too lazy to heat up the soup so I’m sitting here hungry and morose and still craving hummus. It’s tough to be me.

Crispy and I had some excellent (albeit painfully hip) Thai food and caught Spider-Man tonight, making that three times I’ve seen it. It’s not a Great Film or anything like that, but it’s one of those that really won’t be worth seeing on a small screen (although the DVD does come out next week), so we figured that since it was showing for free at NYU, it couldn’t really be a waste of money. Watching feature films at Cantor is always a little strange, and not just because I’ve had classes there (so I keep waiting for a professor to come in and hand out lecture notes). The theatres are relatively small as theatres go, although quite large as lecture halls go, and the fact that the audicence usually consists of NYU students gives the whole thing the atmosphere of being someone’s very large, cozy living room. When Spencer and I saw the same movie at the big-ass Union Square theatre, there may have been stadium seating, but there weren’t flocks of smartass twentysomethings making fun of the painful action-movie dialogue. And really, what’s an action movie without smartass twentysomethings to make fun of it?

I’m very fond of cats, in general, and for the past couple of weeks I’ve been particularly missing having one of my own around the house. I haven’t had anything to shed on me or claw up my furniture - well, nothing feline anyway - since I moved to New York over three years ago. Even if I were allowed one in my apartment, I don’t feel I’m home enough to really take care of a pet. I can barely handle a houseplant with my current schedule, and there aren’t even vet bills involved in that.

However, despite my constant, nagging desire to just give in and get a kitten or something, I’m once in a while reminded of one of the many reasons I can be glad I don’t have a cat. Usually, it’s the smelly canned food or the hair I don’t have to perpetually and ineffectually try to remove from my clothes, but once in a while - just every so often - it’s that troublesome radioactive poo.

I totally scored that cucumber roll today, regardless of the mildly lukewarm reception received by my suggestion of post-exam sushi. I was insistent. I was enticing. I was victorious. We went for sushi, and I endured all the kappa-maki-isn’t-real-sushi remarks from Kony and kompany, and it was so good.

Midterms are now over for a whole two weeks, almost, which feels like a break until I start thinking about all the reading I need to catch up on that I’ve neglected since midterms started three weeks ago. I’m not even just talking academically: you should see my inbox. Or maybe you shouldn’t. In fact, I’m not sure anyone should see my inbox right now.

But I mean, like, cucumber roll.

Midterms, midterms, midterms. While in theory I approve of the whole practice of giving two lesser midterms instead of one whopping big one, it’s not so great when all of my classes get in on it; this term ends up being more or less continuous midterms as of about two weeks ago. Until, of course, we hit finals.

I’m averaging somewhere between a 98.5 and a 100 in my C class, and craving an inside out cucumber roll like you wouldn’t believe.