Temporary Diversion

I worked two hours at Miracle Mart today ringing the Salvation Army bell.  After losing three toes to the cold (why, oh why did my family decide to settle in North Dakota?), I feel that I've learned not only about my hometown, but about people in general and old people in specific.  They put my mom and I in the entryway to the store, because it "wasn't as cold," but really it was just as cold but we weren't being snowed on.  My mom and I talked about various boring things- mostly my boyfriend, Josh Duhamel and Fergie (they spent Thanksgiving in Minot!), school, and Christmas shopping.  Then mom had to go pick up my sister from school.  And that's when things got weird.

One older lady came up to me and in a very soft voice told me that I was such a good person for volunteering, especially at my age.  She went on for 30 to 45 seconds.  What do you say to that?  "Oh, thank you, I know I'm a wonderful person who will surely be accepted with open arms into heaven.  I'm not like the Lindsay Lohan's and Britney Spears' of my age.  I am better than everyone, and you better not forget it."  Instead, I just said thank you.  But all of this passed through my mind.  She didn't even give any money.

Another even older man came up to me, gave some money, and then sidled in real close-like, as if telling me a secret.  It was vaguely harassment-y.  I didn't say anything, but I was a little scared.  The following conversation is exact and unchanged in any way.

Old man: "You know, the Sunday school at my church did a fundraiser.  They gave all the money to Africa."

Me: "Oh?"

Old man: "They shouldn't give the money to Africa, they should keep it here in America!"

Me: "Uh…"

Old man: "You know who it will go to if it goes to Africa, don't you?"

Me thinking: Oh God, don't let him say it.  Whatever he's going to say, he needs to stop.

Old man: "The outlaws."

Then he left.  It made me very uncomfortable, but honestly, it could have been worse.  Not much worse, but really it could have been worse.  Racism, for real.  Look into it.

The mystical day ended when my feet were so cold that I had to put the bell down and walk into the store because I couldn't feel anything from my shins down.  Then my mom picked me up and I ate 2 fruit snacks and a ton of jalapeno chips.  Not a bad day really, it was pretty realistic.  Is it possible to cry yourself to death?

Posted by Cassie at 10:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yes, that's right.  I am making a post about what I might possibly name a cat.  I don't even like cats that much, but thinking up names for them is funny to me.  I am doing this for two reasons only:  Kamran is sleeping and I am bored (that's one whole reason), and I haven't posted anything in awhile so I'm using this as a terrible excuse for an update.  So here are the names we came up with last night:

Bongo (just sounds cool), Pippin (we also threw out Frodo and Sauron), Tits (just sounds cute for some reason), Cunegonde (main female character from Candide, I would like to name my animals after literary characters because it's more badass that way), Q or M (besides Bond, just cool names), Sir (with or without a name behind it), Chum (no explanation here), Chainsaw (Rory thought of that one for his future child, I feel bad for that kid), Pierre (or something French, then we could train it with French commands), Mario or Luigi (or Yoshi, or Peach, or Toad…), Kamran said some weird fantasy role-playing video game names but I said absolutely not, Kamran (that was my choice for a cat name), Rory (going with the "people we know" theme).  I can't think of anymore, but that's the gist of the conversation we had last night.

I favor one syllable names or names that are nouns.  They have more comedy value when applied to a small kitten.

My favorite: Tooth.  Not Teeth, or Toothes, or Fang or anything like that.  Just "Tooth."  Because that would be the greatest name ever.  For anything really.  Having a child?  Name him or her Tooth.  It's a unisex name and can be applied to any species.  A universal name, if you will.

Kamran's favorite: Pixel, Pix or Pixie for short.  I thought that was clever and cute.  Damn you, Kamran.  I don't want a cat anyway.

I just thought of one: Dreidel.  How cute would that be?  This needs to end, it's getting out of hand.

Posted by Cassie at 10:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I thought I'd write a little synopsis about what happened at the concert on Wednesday.  It was me, my dad, and Kamran going to Oasis.  Perfection.  I decided I wanted to document it for when I'm older and don't remember it anymore.

First we stopped at Perkin's and my dad made an ass of himself by telling me he was going to ask for a chocolate chip sundae for his meal, but in a weird voice. (The idiocy would later be repeated the next day at the Mall of America when he asked a woman named Belinda working at the SpongeBob store if they sold oven mitts.  Turns out they do.)  My cup had a hole in it so there was water all over the table (and me).  The iced tea tasted like foot.  It was not a good sign.

We got to the Target Center and I was super excited.  I guess I used to like Oasis as a joke but they actually are pretty good. I was almost certain that the Gallagher brothers would get in a fight.  That would have made my night complete.  The first act was Matt Costa and some other guy who I didn't bother to remember.  They were pretty good.  Then it was Ryan Adams and The Cardinals.  They didn't even introduce themselves.  They were okay, but they didn't really rock out or anything. Mostly they just sang Tim McGraw songs.  That was kind of annoying.

Then Oasis took the stage and the lead singer, Liam Gallagher, rocked the shit out of that tambourine.  He was very serious about it, too.  I thought for sure he was going to beat someone up, but no luck there.  He kept putting his hands over his face and just looked really pissed off.  But no one got hurt.  They actually did a very good job, for as much of a joke as they usually are considered.  They had a good presence and used the lighting and screens in the background to good effect. Liam said the f-word seven times, and flipped off the crowd once.  Noel asked us why we would ever choose to live in such a cold place, and asked if we had ever heard of California.  We booed him, because we are stupid.  Liam stood very stiffly as he sang and I think he might have been losing his voice, because he would never fully finish a word.  He pulled away from the microphone a lot.  Also, one of the guitar players was doubled over for awhile, maybe he was sick or something.

The funniest thing for me was the screens in the background showing the band playing spliced in with old footage of other things.  It was a cool effect, but you could really tell that they chose the side angles on Liam and Noel because everyone knows they are hideous.  Never a full face shot.  You gotta love it.

What else happened?  Oh, right, there was a drunk hooker in the audience who fell down the stairs.  I say hooker because she was wearing a leopard-print shirt, schoolgirl skirt, and "hooker boots." You know what I'm talking about.  It may be a stereotype, but I like to think it was correct.  She fell in slow motion and landed on her knees down the stairs.  It was kind of scary, but no one got hurt.  Another drunk woman in the audience kept trying to dance.  She was horrendous.  She would point at people and spin around.  She kept trying to take pictures of the band but was so drunk that she would end up taking a picture of the people in front of her.  Also, it is not badass to get drunk at an Oasis concert. Oasis.  You can do better.

I didn't know two of the songs.  They sang (not in this order): Rock 'N Roll Star, Lyla ("For you to come and fuck me out my mind."), Wonderwall (an audience member kept yelling Wonderwall and Liam said, "I know when to fuckin' play Wonderwall."), Slide Away, The Shock of the Lightning, Ain't Got Nothin', Cigarettes and Alcohol, Waiting for the Rapture, I'm Outta Time, To Be Where There's Life, The Importance of Being Idle (love that song), Don't Look Back in Anger (very good acoustic version), Champagne Supernova, and I am the Walrus (strange how many people love that song).

I really enjoyed the whole thing and I'm so glad I went.  Also, Britney Spears is coming in April.  I almost feel obligated to my twelve-year-old self to go.  On the other hand, I would fell a mix of shame and pity if I went, and I'm so not into that.

Posted by Cassie at 5:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I hate studying for them, I hate thinking about them, I hate discussing them, I hate scheduling them and knowing the schedule, I hate taking them, I hate worrying about them.

So I put it all off.  By watching movies or writing uninteresting blog posts.  Here's my schedule:

1. French oral test: Easy, ridiculously so.  We just have to read some stupid passage out loud, probably about Jean-Claude and Mireille going to Tours or something like that.

2. Research practicum final paper: Whatever, I've had it done for awhile, I just want to get rid of it and never think about it again.  The whole class, really.

3. Saturday: French written final.  Not easy, but not overly difficult.  I think it'll be mostly memorizing a bunch of bullshit about how to pronounce eau and eu and u and ou.  But who schedules a final test on a Saturday at 8am?  That's a poor planning issue and it needs to be dealt with.

4. Thursday: (I just realized that I skipped this one and don't want to renumber.  Also, I went from labeling in terms of tests to days instead.)  Cognitive psychology test, online.  Not hard, I get to use all my notes and my book, so I can cheat all I want.

5. Monday: Film final paper due.  Oddly, I took this class for fun, but it's turned out to be the one class that I'm a little worried about.  I already turned in my rough draft, and I really don't know what to expect for feedback.  Probably that it wasn't that great.  I just want it to be over with, so I don't have to think about it anymore.  And anyway, I hate classes where I have to basically make up interpretations that are bullshit and could be applied to anything and not even a film in particular.  But that's just me.

6. Child Psychology Final: I really enjoyed this class, but I'll still be glad when it's over.  We spend about twenty minutes each week listening to stupid questions and wondering why these people still believe that single case studies prove or disprove a hypothesis. 

That's my schedule.  I have nothing else to say.

Posted by Cassie at 9:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I just finished this book last night, and I have to say, I didn't expect it to scare me the way it did.  I had about 200 pages left when I picked it up at 11. I couldn't go to bed without finishing it, I had to know what happened.

I've never seen the movie, and I've heard it's terrible.  I got the book for free when the book store I worked at shut down.  I almost didn't grab it, but I'm glad I did.

I've tried to explain the plot to about ten different people, and every time I say it, I get strange looks and raised eyebrows.  Yes, it's about a plant that kills people.  But somehow, the author makes it work.  The vines that are trying to kill these college students are terrifying, for some reason I still haven't figured out.  When I fell asleep last night I was afraid one of them would crawl out from under my bed and smother me in my sleep.  It's a bleak story, and it will stay with you.  I read it with the lights on and my feet were not touching the floor.  That's one thing I always do when I watch scary movies or read scary books.  I lift up my feet so they aren't touching the ground; you never know what monsters could be hiding under your bed, waiting for you to be scared already so their jobs are half over.

The best thing about this book is the fact that you can see the ending a mile away, but you want to see how the characters get there, you want to see how that ending is possible.  And some of it just made me sad.  There isn't a whole lot of room for character development in a story like this, but even so, you get to know and love/hate the characters.  When Amy died, I was shocked (yes, I ruined it.  Go cry to your mom.) and appalled.  I really thought she would survive.  And the brutal way she dies is awful, it reminded me of the semi-rant I went on during a past review where I complained that good horror has an out, by which I mean there has to be hope, it can't just be death-death-death.  But here, that works.  I couldn't see it any other way.  If it weren't like that, there would be no horror in it.  It makes me think about what I would do in that situation, which character I would be most like.  I've decided on either Amy or Stacy, not just because they are females, but because of the circumstances that kill them off (oops, spoiler alert).  I must admit that I don't think I would have used the same method of death as Stacy chose (I would have had the Mayans shoot me, with the gun though, not the arrows), but I definitely would have taken the same conclusion.  I wouldn't have been as strong as Jeff, as stupid as Eric, or as calm as Mathias.  And I sure as hell wouldn't have been as ridiculous as Pablo.  Why the hell would you volunteer to go down into an abandoned mineshaft with a thin rope holding you from your death?  Shame on you, Pablo.

The other thing that really bothers me, and I realize it's fiction, these people were not real, but it bothers me that they were so young.  They were all going to grad school or med school or whatever future they had planned out.  And they didn't get to realize it. That just makes me sad, because of course that happens all the time.  Not the evil vine thing, but the young death thing.  They'll never again feel love or happiness or anything really.  I would have used those tequila bottles to burn down the whole forest.  But that's just me.  If I have to die at the hands of a stupid vine, you bet your ass I'm not going down without a fight.

Posted by Cassie at 7:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)