"If thou fearest West Nile Virus, thou shall not do thy laundry in the facilities provided by apartment complex." So sayest the Lord.


Each building in our apartment complex has one laundry room. And for the last year, the laundry room in our particular building has been gross.


At first, the ceiling bulged under a giant bubble of water. I know because I poked the ceiling with a stick and the ceiling rippled, the way the mirror in The Matrix ripples when Neo has taken the red pill. It was scary.


After the water finally burst, the ceiling caved in. Right around that time the people who lived directly above the laundry room were evicted, and left behind some nasty surprises. I believe I commented on this sometime last semester, where every single item was thrown onto the lawn in front of our apartment building and every single item was corroded with slime, rust, and mold.


Each laundry room also has 2 washers and 2 dryers. But in ours, one of the washers always has stagnant water, and one of the dryers steals your $1.25 and rolls your stuff around but doesn't actually dry anything. Most of the time, the laundry room itself is filled with so many bugs and mosquitoes, it's just easier to walk another 50 feet to the opposite apartment building and use their laundry room. Except everyone seems to have that idea, and so no matter the time of day, the machines are in perpetual use.


But today, Zappo and I loaded up everything--and I mean everything-- that could possibly be washed. Blankets, dish towels, sheets, pillows, pillow cases, clothes, duffle bags... like I said: everything... anyway, we wanted to pack everything clean. We hadn't done laundry in about a month or so, since we were planning on doing all the laundry the day before we moved anyway, and we went to the laundromat about a mile away.


It would have probably cost us $50-$70 and taken us probably 2 full days to climb up and down stairs and search out washers and dryers around the complex. But we were able to do 8 loads (the BIG stuff too, the 50 lbs. washer kind of loads) and then dry everything in only 3 and a half hours. Not too shabby. And it' only cost us less than $40.


Not to mention the laundromat was pretty darn clean and I felt safe. Whereas around here, I do not feel safe because I'm always cat-called at when I'm carrying my laundry, and it just seems too easy for someone to kidnap me with all the blind corners and stuff.


I'll be so happy to leave.


Oh yeah. That's tomorrow.


I'm moving tomorrow.


Woohoo!


So that means I won't be around for about a week as I drive 2682 miles across the country.


I tried to sell stuff today, but the flea market was closed. And by the time I got home, it was too late to set up anywhere else. Besides, the only things I have that I think anyone would actually buy are my clothes and shoes. So I'm bringing those with me, and I'm going to either sell them on eBay or in consignment shops around Hollywood.


I'm a little scared about leaving tomorrow. But also excited. But also nervous. At least I'm going to be near my family again. And what's even cooler? I have a couple friends in the area already! My old friend Kelly, who was also displaced on the wrong side of the country, was born and raised in California. We had so much fun working together! But then two years ago, she went back home and I went back to school and we haven't really talked. But I e-mailed her and she lives about a half hour away from where I'm going to be moving! Also, I have a new friend Brian, who is helping in the effort of keeping me calm in my job search. My best friend since 5th grade, Monica (her name isn't really Monica, but she reminds me of Monica on Friends) is also in California. But she's in the wrong part of California. She's in Sacramento right now. But she and her husband are looking to buy a house, and I'm trying to convince them to move closer to me. But property prices are probably out of a question for that. But still, it's closer than we've been geographically in four years. Thanks be to College.


Well. Wish us luck in our journey!


See ya in a week.



You know you love me,

Samantha Stark

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I want to sell my crap at the flea market this weekend.


But my husband (the infamous Zappo) won't let me. He says it's a waste of time.


Now, there's stuff I don't want and there's stuff that just is not useful and there's stuff that I'd rather not drag 2682 miles across the country.


The things I have that I'd rather not take is mostly: candles, vases, an electric "broom" which is really a bagless vaccum, some stuffed animals, but mostly clothes--and those clothes I know would sell.


My clothes are cool. They're not cool in the sense that they're necessarily in style or anything... but they're cool in a unique kind of way. I used to sell my clothes on consignment back in California, and I made some pretty decent money doing that. 3 years ago, I sold some of my stuff on eBay and made over $100. If I had the time, I could sell everything on eBay before I left, but I just don't have the kind of time it takes to wait for people to pay me.


Now, Zappo would rather donate the clothing and stuff. But I'm a selfish bastard and would rather pocket a hundred dollars, or more, by selling my stuff on Saturday or something.


Would do you guys think? Is it better to donate or sell your crap and then donate what you can't sell? Is it worth my time to go to a flea market for 8 hours and sit at a table and whore my wares?


Additional information to consider: Depending on which flea market establishment I decide to patronize, a table can run me anywhere from $8-$25. But I totally believe I would make that money back and probably 4 times as much.

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It's Cicada Summer.


These were taken on my campus.








If you want to hear what the cicadas sound like, I took some audio/visual footage with my camera. It kind of sounds like a wind tunnel.Click Here





Click the above image to see the millions of cicadas all over the plants. It's really cool!

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My family was almost murdered last Thursday.


My mother booked a room in a hotel a mile away from us, because she was afraid our apartment would be too small. Well, the Internet claimed that this hotel was three stars. If that Quality Inn was three stars, I shudder to think what a two, or worse, one star hotel looks like.


First of all, she requested a smoking room and they put her in a non-smoking room. And I tell you that was the most disgusting room I have ever been in. The lampshades were all broken around the rim, so they were falling off of the lamp, and they were ragged. The sheets were filthy with stains of blood, what I can only guess was cum, and pubes. However, there were no bedbugs. I know because everyone checked thoroughly.


My mom complained and they moved her to the other side of the hotel, and that room was an improvement, albeit a mild one. The sheets were actually washed and smelled clean. The lamps were not broken, so the appearance was a little better. I have two younger brothers, and the youngest of the two, CartoonFreak, stayed with me and Zappo. (I've taken to using Princess Blogonoke's method of naming people in her life.)


However, there was a problem with the room--the attempted murdering of my mother and my other brother, George.


Thursday was a long day. I only slept 2 hours the night before because my family got in late, and I stayed up playing Kingdom Hearts with my youngest brother CartoonFreak, who was staying with us. After my graduation, my family and my in-laws, Zappo's family, walked around Baltimore and we went to the aquarium where we all had a fabulous time. We even got to see the new addition to the Amazon exhibit (an anaconda) and the Golden Lion Tamarins were roaming the facilities.


We went to Fuddruckers for dinner, where they messed up our order, and my family got their order a whole lot sooner than our order, or Zappo's family's order, and so when my family was finished, they wanted to leave before it got dark so they didn't get lost when they drove back down to DC (they had rented a car).


So after dinner, Zappo and I drove back down to DC and we hung out with my family for a while in their room. CartoonFreak came with us back to our apartment. I kid you not: two minutes after we got back, my mom called.


"There was a man trying to get into our room, and he had an exacto knife and those Zippo ties and a toolbox."


I freaked out.


A few weeks ago, I mistakenly watched the FOX news station, and there's a serial killer in the area on the loose who has been breaking into hotel rooms and robbing the tourists and killing them. Last summer, our apartment complex sent out a notice warning residents to not let anyone into our apartments, even if they claim to be Maintenance, unless they have identification. There was a stint there for a while when some Mexican men were robbing people by saying they were Maintenance.


Anyway... So here's how the story unfolds of Thursday.


Immediately after Zappo, CartoonFreak and I left, a man walked by my mom's room. The curtain didn't span the whole length of the window, so she saw the guy and his shadow as he walked past--except he didn't continue walking, he stopped at their door.


Now, I checked, and if you're standing outside the room, you can 1) see the light is visibly on in the room and 2) hear the television.


So this dude, not saying a word, was standing at the door, and he tried turning the knob. And he jiggled it for several seconds.


This freaked my mom out, but then she thought maybe CartoonFreak decided to spend the night in the hotel room with her and George as opposed to staying with me and Zappo. But when she was about to say his name, the guy outside said, "Maintenance. Open up!"


It was 11:30 at night.


Who the hell has maintenance at 11:30 PM unless it's some kind of emergency, like a broken toilet or malfunctioning a/c? Neither of which my mother had.


He says, "I have to fix the door!"


All of these ghetto rooms are joined by a door in the wall. Like adjoining rooms for when you book two rooms, so you can go between the two rooms easily. Makes sense. I went with my friend's family to Disneyland and the Disneyland Hotel was like that.


"I have to get in your room so I can fix the door to the room next to yours."


Uh... there were occupants in the room next to my mom's. Why didn't he just go to them?


George, innocently believing that it's Maintenance, opens the door. And he sees the guy holding an exacto knife--blade open--and Zippo ties.


My mom screams, "Shut the door George!"


Then the guy outside starts banging on it, trying to get in. My mom and my brother are lucky he didn't just break the window.


They call the cops. Then they call the front desk and the front desk says they didn't order any maintenance, and that the maintenance guy was off at 7 PM.


But in usual DC Police fashion, because my mom and my brother weren't killed the cops were there for about two minutes and then went on their merry way.


Zappo and I sped over there as fast as we could. We took a kitchen knife. And I tell you, I was ready to disembowel any fucking guy who so much as looked at me cross-eyed. My mom had packed their bags while I had been driving over, and we brought them back to our apartment. George refused to stay in the room, though, while my mom was packing and ran to the front desk with the intent of cussing them out. But then George saw The Guy behind the bullet-proof glass with the clerk. And he said, "That's The Guy!"


The front desk tells George that The Guy is a manager of the place.


And my brother says, "He just tried to break into our room!"


My brother runs back up to the room as we're about to leave and tells us The Guy is at the front desk. And suddenly George is calm. Like suddenly everything is alright because the deskie knows who The Guy is.


That doesn't make me feel better--just because The Guy's a manager doesn't mean he isn't a criminal.


Besides, what a great alibi. The Guy ran back to the front desk so he couldn't possibly have been up at my mom's room. Right? I mean, if he really was up there for maintenance--why the hell didn't he tell them "I am a manager of the hotel, and I have to fix something." He never once identified himself at my mother's door. He just banged on it like he was trying to break it down.


As Zappo and I walk my mom to the front desk, The Guy has "left and will be back tomorrow morning at 9 AM. You can talk to him then." Uh. No thanks. I'm not willingly going to come back to a location to be sliced up right nice.


I mean, what kind of a manager leaves when their customers are freaking out about someone trying to break into their room? Managers are supposed to put a compassionate human face on a scary situation. That guy got out of there so fast because George recognized him!


I'll be glad to get the fuck out of here.

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Southern Management, the company that owns my apartment complex, sent out a notice to residents. Turns out the gunshots we heard a couple weeks ago actually were gunshots--silly me, I've gotten so used to the sound of gunshots and cars backfiring that it's hard to tell the difference anymore, no, I'm serious--and we're supposed to be willing to work with the county police department if they question us.


Well, I guess it's better than at the last apartment complex. The poor lifeguard was shot twice--on separate occasions. Poor guy.


"And as always we're supposed to be safe!"


Thanks SM.

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I took my last final ever today.


I graduate on Thursday.


I am scared out of my mind. And sad. A certain kind of melancholy has nestled into my heart over the last two weeks. But today it really clearer than it's been so far. I mean, I cried on my last Thursday class ever, and I cried on my last day of class ever... but I didn't cry during my finals. That's good, or else it might be weird and mess up my concentration.


But I got home today and had nothing to do. No test to study for. No paper to write. Nothing to procrastinate.


And I felt my heart break.


Everyone keeps asking me if I'm excited about graduating. Everyone keeps assuming I'm happy about it. When really I'm devastated.


How am I supposed to broaden my mind and learn if I'm not in school? And I suppose people are going to say what my brother did last night, "Life experience! It's time to get life experience!"


I'll tell ya, I have had a lot of life experience and I'm only 22, and none of it has really broadened my perspective, horizons, or mind.


I will no longer have anyone to discuss Ralph Waldo or Henry David unless it's via e-mail with my friends Scott & Tim. No one will make me mix CDs of music he thinks I'll like, the way my friend Scott did. No one to swap graphic novels with anymore. No one to write notes to or playing hangman with until 10 o'clock on Wednesday nights, the way I did with Valarie. No one to scan notes for when she missed class, the way Sang did. No one to share the horrors of tutoring with the way T'Ha and I did. Most of all, I'll miss my friend Laurin. We saw each other 4 days a week this year, and survived Spanish 201 and Badminton together.


Oooh 24 is on. Real life can wait.

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I took my finals today. My Neo-Classical & Romantic Literature final was from 1-3 PM and my Spanish 201 final was from 6-8 PM. I took the full two hours for the literature test--and filled an entire blue book as a consequence. However, I had three hours between the tests, so I used it for studying Spanish.


We had two hours for the final, but the profesora said we wouldn't need the entire two hours, and she was right. I only needed 40 minutes. And I felt really confident after I was done.


It's good to feel good.


And it's good to be almost done with finals forever.

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So today sucked. It was muggy and hot and entirely too productive.


Since we're moving at the end of the month, I've been apartment hunting and made a new friend in the process: Brian Bartelt and I have been talking about the L.A. area and he's been giving me the down-low on the living situation. Ya know... so it doesn't become a repeat of last year when in a single semester we had Scary Violent Neighbor Guy threaten our lives, someone break into our rental car and attempt (and fail) to steal the radio while our car was in the bodyshop, not being able to sleep on account of all the noisy parties and doobie parties thrown by the new Annoying Pothead Neighbors. I do so love their horribly off-key renditions of such James Taylor classics like "Fire and Rain" even if they only know one line, and repeat it over and over and over with Energizer Bunny-like frequency.


This semester has been accompanied by unnecessary construction. For some reason the complex deemed it necessary to remove wood from every apartment's balcony and replace it with a newer piece of wood. And all the balconies needed painting... I don't know why, they look exactly the same... and if you ask me, a tad bit worse because the paint job is really poor quality. So most mornings for the last two months I've been woken up at 6 AM by ear-piercing electric saws screeching in the air. And if the construction doesn't wake me up, Annoying Potheads wake me up with their really bad singing at 6:30, or if it's Sunday, loud copulation rituals at 8:30 AM on the dot.


I'm not a voyuer... the walls are just that thin. Plus, the design is really stupid: our bedroom wall shares their living room wall.


Anyway...


I'm freakin' out because I don't know how to use Past Subjunctives in Spanish. I've got the whole future conditional thing down and I can differentiate between habitual actions and pending actions. And I can use both the future conjugation and then with a conjunction of time conjugate the verb into its proper subjunctive or present indicative form. But then we get the whole new conjugation with Past Subjunctive that combines Preterite with Subjunctive... and I'm completely confused.


And my final is tomorrow at 6 PM.


I have two finals tomorrow... Blah.

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Interview with Madelaine L'Engle:


If the Bible is not literally true, does that mean we don't need to take it seriously?


"Oh no, you do, because it's truth, not fact, and you have to take truth seriously even when it expands beyond the facts."


It's such a short interview but it's one of the most profound interviews I've ever read.

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So I was watching Dateline tonight, which is something I try not to do because they're usually talking about murders and scams and when I used to watch it as a teenager I became exceedingly paranoid. I broke the habit of watching, and my paranoia has ebbed. Somewhat. But tonight I watched it because there was going to be a tidbit on Matt Le Blanc's show next season Joey.


I'm a Friends fan, and I don't care that a majority of my friends think it's a stupid show. It was special to me because no matter where I lived Friends was there. The year that I moved to four different states, lived in three different time zones and attended three different colleges, experienced 9/11, and dropped out of a dream: Friends was there. When I was 3000 miles from everyone who loved me: Friends was there. When I was growing up in the boonies and only had one friend and only one TV station came in on our fuzzy attenna, I grew up watching Friends and Seinfeld.


From the time my friend L and I were 12, we watched Friends. In 7th grade, her parents pulled her out of school and put her on homeschool, but every Thursday night, in between commercials for Friends and Seinfeld we called and laughed about how funny the show was or how stupid it was. We had this routine until we were 18 years old, and I moved across the country where Friends came on three hours before she got to watch. But we'd still call each other and talk about it. It's been a staple of our friendship. And now that the show is over, it's like the end of an era. And she and I have to grow up a little bit. We're both 22 years old (I'm exactly 31 days older) and married. She's been at a stable job for a phone company for the last four years, and I've been transferring schools and working on an English degree, which will culminate in an overrated graduation ceremony in just a matter of days.


So last night, I was glued to my television screen and crying. Not just for Friends but for what the show represented to me for the last 10 years. I've grown up a lot, and this show has been with me since I was 12. I can chronicle my life by the seasons. My parents' divorce was final during the first season. My dad got married to my step mom right around the time Rachel was dressin' up like Princess Bubbleyum at the end of Season Two. My mom got married during that summer and was going to forbid me to watch the show anymore. I convinced her to give the show a shot and when it came back she saw The One Where No One's Ready and we all laughed together. When Ross and Rachel broke up, for real, later that season, I was breaking up with two of my psuedo-friends from school who had tried to peer pressure me into watching Beavis and Butthead, and when I said that I didn't want to watch it, they told me to go fuck myself. As I cried for the breaking up of their relationship, I called L and cried about how awful every friend was except her.


Through leaving and moving and never being sure where home actually was... Friends always helped me feel like whatever state I haphazardly chose to inhabit was home.

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Your Homocidal Rampage! by crash_and_burn
Your name:
Weapon of Choice:	A muppet
Your Favorite Target:	Televangelists
Your Kill Count:	1,175,339,528
Your Battle Cry:	"Mutha fuckaaaaaaas!"
Years You Spend in Jail:	41
How Much Money In Damages You Cause:	$6,712,762,462,981
Your Homocidal Insanity Level:: 96%
Created with the ORIGINAL MemeGen!

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19 days 'til graduation.


I'm freakin' out man.

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