My Amazing Exploding Mind Trick

It's not that amazing--but it is really, really messy.

Part One: My Lost Textbook
As if paying too much for a book isn't enough of an irritant, I seem to have lost the textbook I was so pointedly against purchasing. Now I have to buy another. Life just isn't fair. And before you tell me to just look a little harder, let me assure you--I have torn this room limb from bloody limb. It's no where to be found. All hope is lost.

Part Two: My Disappearing Cash
In an act inconceivable for the minds of scientists and philosophers alike, my money keeps on disappearing--vanishing into the nothingness of space. Cash, cold and hard, has disappeared from my wallet. Don't get smart. I didn't spend a single cent.

Part Three: My Treasured Purple Bear
For our 6 month anniversary (I know that is a misnomer--shut up already), Shane gave me a Princess Di Beanie Baby and tickets to see the Goo Goo Dolls. The bear is MIA (the concert, for those who care, is over). My mom says that it was in my sister's room. I can't find it. Now I'm being yelled at because it is worth a fortune (although Shane didn't spend a cent on it) and I'm not devoting more than 1/10 of my life's work to finding it. [Sidebar: Why is it that I'm expected to deal with other people's concerns incessantly? Do I look like someone with time to waste? I'm worried about where that thing went too, but would it kill Shane to ask Meg if she's seen it? Really? WOULD HE DIE?]

Part Four: Missing Spares
I had Shane's spare keys in my purse, now they are gone. Maybe not really gone--they could be any number of places, but I don't know where they are. It seems to me I might have put them somewhere very deliberate so that an occasion like this one could be avoided; but I have no clue where that deliberate place could be. Maybe the purple bear stole them, my cash, and decided to take the text too just in case she felt like brushing up on her knowledge of magazine writing if selling herself on Ebay didn't pan out as expected. It's possible.

Part Five: The Part You've Been Waiting For
This is the part where my brain goes splat. Or my mind goes kerboom. Or something. This is my amazing exploding mind trick: like the disappearing cash and missing keys you can't make heads nor tails of it. So stop trying. I know I will. The only thing worse? I swear Shane put as many Spice Girls songs as Goo songs on his ipod--not a word of a lie. And that is the secret to my amazing exploding mind trick--complete and utter tomfoolery and madness.

This Might Mean War!

I deal with people a lot--way more than I would like to really. But sometimes I find myself in these arguments and I just wonder, does this person even hear what we are saying to each other? I want to bust out laughing at the whole situation, but I don't want to give in...

For reasons that are still somewhat mysterious even to myself, I've decided to go home on the train tonight rather than riding back with Amanda in the morning. It's January. Do you know what these two facts mean when they are combined? Today, I got to buy a new ISIC (International Student Identification Card). I know, please tell me the excitement ends there--this is almost too much to take.

Being the diligent young woman that I am, I dutifully printed off a recent photo of myself and got up early to make these arrangements. Here is how my conversation with the Travelcuts destination officer went:

ERIN walks up to the counter where the BITCH is doing something on the computer and talking to a coworker about how a costume party someone is attending as the tin-man.

Erin [polite as always] : Hi, I'd just like to buy a train ticket for the 720 tonight to Aldershot. And I need to renew my ISIC as well. [Puts relevant information and that lovely photo on the counter.]

Bitch: That looks awesome...No don't worry about that. Oh, hi.

Erin [still trying to be nice]: As above.

Bitch: Oh, you need an ISIC?

Erin: Yup.

Bitch: Okay...Oh wait I can't use this.

Erin: Can't use what?

Bitch: This picture. It has to be printed on photo paper.

Erin: Why's that?

Bitch: Because that's the rule.

Erin: Okay, but what difference does it actually make? It's a recent picture. It's better than the one I've been using for the last year. I don't understand the problem.

Bitch: I can't use this one. You need to print it on photo paper.

Erin: Okay, but I can't and I need to buy this ticket. What am I supposed to do?

Bitch: Come back with another picture or let us take one of you.

Erin: There is no way I'm paying you 6 bucks for a picture when I just gave you one that would work fine.

Bitch: If I make an exception for you, then I have to make it for everyone else.

Erin: I don't think anyone will even notice. This place isn't exactly crawling with people who think it would be great to make you put a normal picture of them on their ISIC.

Bitch: Well, I can't do it. Don't you have any regular pictures? A picture of you and your friends or something?

Erin: Do I really look like someone who has friends? I think that you should just take this picture because I can't afford to pay you 6 dollars for one. If I do I can't eat today. Do you understand that? I need the ticket now. I don't have any more time to argue about this.

Bitch: There's nothing I can do. You can either let me take your picture or pay full price for the ticket [Sidebar: I save the money I spent on my ISIC the first time I use it to buy a ticket].

Erin: Well, no I can't do that. Just take the picture I guess. I hope you know this is ridiculous.

Bitch: Okay, you have to fill out the top to parts of this form and I will process that for you.

Twenty minutes later, another girl has come and left with both her ticket and a new ISIC [She didn't argue, but she came after I had started to fill out the form.] ERIN finally leaves with no ticket in hand, just a voucher for a ticket--don't get her started on the system.

Bitch: There you go. There's an extra picture for you to use next year.

Erin: Perfect, if I ever come back to this hellhole for kicks.

Bitch: Have a nice day.

Erin: I hope you die.

The END.

I know that I named myself Erin and the bitch BITCH and by this account it seems like the titles are reversed, but she was a twit at very least and most of those things were said under my breath or with a degree of irony that the bitch didn't quite get.

Tonight Rory wants to show me and Shane something super exciting. If the train makes me late I'm going to Paris. There I will become bilingual so I can get hired at VIA. I will spend the next ten years of my life slowly breaking the company down from the inside, after which I will publish a damning expose about misused funds and the real cost of a passport-size photograph that will gain me international acclaim and hopefully a Pulitzer (the first of seven I think).

Why, Why, Why

Why do camels drink water? Why, oh why, oh why? Because sometimes camels get thirsty just like you do...Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.

Some days I love old Anne Murray songs that I used to listen to when I was about 4 or 5. Some days I wish I could remember more than one line, and remember it correctly. But why? Why bother? Because, because, because...

Today I'm tired. There's no good reason for it. I didn't oversleep or not sleep enough. I'm not sick (even though about half the population is--or so it seems). It's just that "Oh, yuck" feeling. It's just the freezing rain and the cloudy skies (and the inability to get to Marble Slab where all of my dreams would come true). Why do they call them the winter blahs? Because "blah" is the word to describe how everyone who can't claim legitimate illness feels. Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye...

And now, now that you're near, there's nothing more without you, without you here...Today is an irrevocably goo day. All the same songs, all on repeat. I can't find my headphones so I've decided to never leave my room again. Why are you so green? Because, because, because...

I'm allowed to have a pre-nuptual fling. There are only three conditions:

1. I can't get pregnant.
2. I can't contract an STD.
3. I can't do it with Rory.

What fun does that leave? (Umm, all of the fun of a prenuptual fling, actually. Like Burns and I would do that anyway--HA!) So, I don't know where I'm going to put the sign up list, or how I am going to go about asking for those interested to enroll, but it could still be fun. Did you know that in many native tribes, the princess had sex with every man in the tribe then picked the one she liked best to be her husband? Why did we ever let a tradition like that die? Why oh why oh why? Because we're stupid. Goodnight, goodnight, goodnight.

Seriously, good night.

Good Reasons to Freeze to Death (Revised Edition)

As written by Rory Burns, upon announcement of my engagement. Also, as found in his wallet a month and a half later, but picture it fancier.

Good Reasons to Freeze to Death (Revised Edition)

--You just found out that you will never marry Rory Burns.

---End of List---