When You Believe

MML #21: When I'm sitting in a cafe or am shopping and the perfect song plays over the speakers.

The current song of the moment is a cover of "When You Believe" and is one of my favorite songs from the movie "The Prince of Egypt" which I've been wanting to watch for a couple of weeks now. Plus it's a Sunday, and I've been hooked on every Christian song I possess as of late. Lent has that effect on me. : )

Which reminds me, how AWESOME is it that Barnes and Noble is playing Christian music on a Sunday? I mean, it's quiet so I don't think it would bother any non-Christians, but it's nice. Yay for going to a bookstore less than a mile away from a Christian campus.

Dexter

MML #20: Dexter

I don't really have a long or interesting blog post about this, but I finally got around to watching the last three episodes of season four of Dexter, which airs on Showtime (meaning I had to watch it alternately on the internet or at Emily's house). I'm not going to spoil any plots points, but all I have to say is that I never thought I could watch a show that would cause me to actually root for the serial killer, but that's exactly what has happened. I suppose I can reconcile my moral compass in the same way Dexter does: he only kills killers.

For those of you with Netflix, the first two seasons are available for watching instantly. I'm constantly impressed with how great both the writing and acting is, and am always pleasantly surprised by the new and interesting ways the show keeps viewers hooked each season. Put it on your list, it's definitely worth watching.

Ukulele

MML #19: Having Gina serenade me with some Damien Rice on ukulele.

And she's in France right now! Modern technology is amazing. I think I'm really going to appreciate iChat and Skype this fall when I'm abroad in Scotland.

Tiny Chicken Disease

MML #18: Being able to identify separate phases of sickness.

Is it starting to sound like I enjoy being sick? I don't. But I do admit that once I accepted that I couldn't really accomplish anything while sick, my stress levels went down significantly. Of course, they'll be abnormally high in a day or two to make up for it, but I'll worry about that then.

All I'm saying is that I like that, despite being sick for several days, at least there is a certain amount of progress that can be found. And if there is progress that means it will be over soon, right?

Also, I appreciate that thanks to Hank Green I now have a great metaphor for my illness: tiny chickens. It's a reference from one of there first videos, which you can watch here, if you like.

Pre-sickness Evening: Very tired. Headache. Welcome to college, what else is new? Apparently this is when the tiny chickens invaded my brain.

Sick Day #1: Woke up dehydrated, then realized throat hurt. Head began to actually throb. I suspect that this is when the tiny chicken eggs were laid in my brain.

Sick Day #2: Coughing. Tiny chicken eggs hatched, thus, the runny nose.

Sick Day #3: Today. Cough mostly gone, but excessive sneezing. I'm assuming this is my body's natural response to the tiny chickens, attempting to expel them from my brain.

Sick Days

MML #17: Having people to talk to when I'm sick.

I know this seems kind of silly, and obviously I hate being sick, but despite the fact that since the minute I woke up this morning I've been able to little more than sit in a chair, cough, and breathe abnormally loudly, today hasn't been so horrible. I took the day to try and recuperate so that I can face the rest of what looks like to be a very heavy week, and in the meantime caught up with a few tv shows as well as my parents and a few friends I hadn't talked to in awhile. It was nice. You know, aside from the annoying head cold.

Being sick sucks, and I remember how miserable I was the first time I got sick away from home, without my mother there to take care of me. But there's something empowering about realizing that I can handle being sick all by myself, and something comforting about discovering that I really don't have to.

Barnes and Noble

MML #16: Going with a friend to Barnes and Noble and sitting in the café for hours, reading, writing, chatting, and getting some work done.

(NOTE: Reading, writing, and getting work done are all optional.)

And I got to do it twice this week!

I go to school in the middle of rural Virginia, so let's just face facts: there isn't a ton to do out here. Our campus is small and cut off from the surrounding area, endearingly and appropriately called "The Pink Bubble" by its inhabitants. My sister calls it "Beauxbatons" because it is pretty and small, in the middle of the mountains, has a lake, horseback riding is really big here, and it's an all-girls school. Of course, as any true Harry Potter fan knows, Beauxbatons is not actually an all-girls school in the books, only the movies.

Anyway, the weather has been particularly bad lately (not to say I don't like snow, but I dislike not being able to drive off campus due to ice-covered roads), so I haven't done this as much as I like, but one of my favorite weekly rituals is grabbing a friend and chilling out at Barnes and Noble for an afternoon or evening. This probably isn't terribly surprising, seeing as I'm an English and Creative Writing major who loves coffee, books, and talking. Me and a friend (Annie on Wednesday and Emily today) hop in the car and get off campus, bringing enough work to do so that we feel less guilty, but for the most part we just get sucked into a series of random discussions, ranging in their levels of depth and seriousness. Topics this week have included: death, gossip, teachers, dreams, and lies we plan to tell our children.

Roommate Bonding

MML #15: Realizing that my foot is the same length as my roommate's leg.

So, after hanging up with a friend over video chat, Emily and I were unusually awake for it being one in the morning. For whatever reason, I pondered out loud whether or not my foot would be the same length as Emily's calf, since she's barely five feet tall, and at five foot nine, I have fairly large feet.

We figured the only way to determine this was, rather than simply measure my foot and then her calf and compare the measurements, to place my foot up against her leg. I should mention that Emily was already laying on the top bunk. Again, instead of having Emily get down, we figured I should just try to lift my foot over five feet in the air.

Just in case anyone is wondering: No. I am not that flexible.

Finally I sat in a chair and she hug her leg down and we determined that yes, my foot is the same length as her calf. I wanted to post this funny fact as my facebook status, but Emily argued because people already think we are weird roommates. Her words were, "Without context, why would your foot ever be pressed up against my leg?"

Giggles ensued. So I posted it here, since I'm pretty sure no one at school reads this.