I won! I've never won anything.

Two things.



I participated in the "Behind the curtain - day in the life of webloggers" project. Boy, was it a pain in the ass putting this photo album together. The actual photo-taking didn't turn out as I'd planned, my batteries were dead Sunday so I started late (hence the Tuesday photos), I didn't document my evening at Candice's, either. But there are 24 photos of work, class and home. The last is my favorite.



Check it out here. The list of the other participants is here.



The second thing: I've obviously been neglecting the site. I have absolutely no motivation to write anything right now. It's partially because I'm busy, partially because I have nothing I really want to say. So, I'll provide to t-u-s to Marcus' h-i-a. Just temporarily. Back soon, I promise.

Not such a great day. I have this insane class called Mass Communications and the American Image, all about how the public's opinion is framed by the media. We have crazy reading and quizzes to accompany said craziness. Our professor is this super accomplished Ivy Leaguer, he founded Channel 13 Public TV and was the founding chairperson of the MPAA ratings system, in addition to his teaching duties (since the 40s!) at Rutgers, Yale and Berkeley. So, yeah, we had a quiz. Short answer. Filling in blanks in quotes!!! Total lunacy.



Then I had my audition for the a cappella group.



Yeah. Mediocre, completely. I am so much better than that. Chromatic scales? Totally forgot. Sight reading? Totally unprepared. My song, "Barely Breathing," was average. If I hadn't fucked up both sight reading and chromatic scales, I'd be okay, but I definitely wouldn't have selected myself if I were in the group... I find out tomorrow, but I'm not holding my breath.



I totally don't have time for another group, but still I feel like shouting.



WAAAAAAAH!



It's very frustrating when you know you're much better than your performance. The strange thing is I wasn't nervous at all, I was totally confident, but my voice was very shaky...loud, but not really strong, per se.



Blah.

Sunny and hot. Highs from the mid 80s at Ocean Beach to near 100 east of Twin Peaks. Light wind becoming west to 15 mph in the afternoon.



:-)

It really feels like Fall today in New Jersey. This is a good thing. My favorite time of year, by far, is Oct. 1 through Christmas, when the air is cold and crisp, the leaves begin falling, the air smells of chimney smoke. Sigh.



It's probably in the high 60s right now and I can smell the cold air. Time to break out the fleeces...



Love love love it.



_



"How cute is cute? Me. Soooo cute. Unbelievably cute!"

Tell me I don’t have time to join an a cappella group. Tell me I’m already super busy and the few hours I have left in the day should be devoted to studying (ha!) or being social. Tell me that even though the most established group at Rutgers (not saying much), Deep Treble, is having auditions specifically because they need a tenor, I shouldn’t try out.



Go on then.

This big story I've been working on, on historically black colleges and universities, suffered a major setbakc today. Everything I did on Wednesday, which was adding two key interviews and writing the first 1/4 of it, is gone. Not on my computer. Buh-bye. Something fucked up happened or I didn't save. I don't know. But I felt like I was gonna die. I've been so psyched about getting it done today that I made an outline this morning about what I wanted to do.



And now I've had to backtrack and reinterview people and try to come up with a new interesting lead because I can't remember the old one at all. This blows, completely. Fortunately, Barbara sensed how upset I was and was totally understanding.



But it still sucks. I hate computers. I hate technology.

Hi. I'm around.



I started my internship/classes/P.E.A.C.E. schedule this week, so I'm a bit discombobulated, not to mention exhausted. I want to write all about Vassar and the organization and work and my insane Mass Communication and the American Image class.



But not now.



Later.

Off to Vassar. Anyone who reads my site go to school there? If so, stop by the P.E.A.C.E. conference and say hello.

Blogger is a beast.



I wrote a long schpeel about how fucked up the MTV awards were and blogger decided to eat my post. Just watch a rerun this weekend, and look out for numerous fuck ups from the Wayans brothers, Britney Spears' almost nude gyrating on the floor and Eminem's "hardcore" stylings. Yeah.

The sign was just a few feet away, but I refused to go near it. Instead, I slowly walked toward the Rehearsal building. After a few minutes wandering the halls and realizing there was no room 200 I paced, then walked into another building near the Levin Theater. Wrong again.



I sat down on a bench, watching a bus load of students cross George Street, staring down the sign with the map of Douglass campus. I sighed as I stood up and paced for a minute before jogging over and scanning the list of buildings for the mysterious ARH I had assumed was Rehearsal Hall. Art Research Hall, across the bridge, was my destination. So I booked across the creaky, wooden bridge and followed a few other guys into the medium-sized lecture hall.



The class: Intro. to Music Theory. After the debacle of Intro to Music last semester I am determined to make an effort. Fortunately, the class is designed to force students to participate. We have tons of assignments we have to complete through the Web site, which is interesting (and lends itself to a bit of help from knowledgable friends).



The professor, though, is a total tool. He is kind of old, and talks in that really condescending way. He speaks slowly and repeats himself excessively. Have you ever seen the company computer guy skit on SNL? He's almost there. But he seems like he genuinely wants to help us, so I can't be too negative after just one class.



As I was leaving, the guy sitting next to me rolled his eyes and sighed. "It's gonna be a long semester," I said to him.

Reflections whle watching "Say What? Karaoke."



TJ: You know what sucks more than being a midget? Being a really, really good-looking midget.



Lauren: I know! Cause you know you'd be hitting it all the time if you were normal-sized.

The are pros and cons to Rutgers' layout. Having completely separated campuses throughout two neighboring towns has its downfalls, the obvious being travel time between classes. But each campus has a unique feel to it. Each time I walk across George Street - Douglass campus, from the New Gibbons parking lot to Hickman Hall, I feel like I'm at camp, in a woodsy, quiet area that's cut off from the rest of the world. In a sense it is, because every class I've had in Hickman (except one) has been Spanish. So, my way of thinking changes. Despite my early morning nerves, I am normally very comfortable in my Spanish skills, so I almost strut to class. I'm sure that sounds ridiculous, but I do tend to walk with my back straighter and my chin higher up as I head into the building.



-



Despues de leer el Targum fuera del edificio, camine por los pasillos hacia el cuarto 118. Me sente y busque a Leslie, pero ella nunca vino a la clase. Creo que cambio su horario, que me frustra mucho. Pero he tomado una clase de espanol con algunos de los estudiantes en esta clase. Por ejemplo, tome 333, literatura de Latino America, con Nilo, un latino (creo que es cubano) muy inteligente y es un encantador. Es uno de las personas que he conocido con quien quiero hablar y ser amigo - Melissa fue otra persona asi. Bueno, el profesor entro y inmediatamente yo empece sonriendo. El es un caracter. Es un viejo muy feliz, con mejillas rojas, que siempre esta riendo. Pero es espanol, y todos mis otros profesores han sido latinoamericanos. Por eso, el acento es muy distinto y es un poquito dificil entender (porque el pronuncia una "c" como si fuera "th" - Valenthia en vez de Valencia), pero voy a Salamanca, Espana durante el verano que viene y tendre que oir este acento todos los dias durante el programa. Bueno, me gusta el profesor, pero no me gusta el silabus. Dios mio, es que tenemos que leer tantos libros en espanol: "Las mocedades Del Cid," por Guillen de Castro; "Lazarillo de Tormes," por Francisco Rico; "Novelas ejemplares," por Miguel de Cervantes; y "El garrote mas bien dado," por Calderon de la Barca. Tambien hay bastantes handouts que tienen cuentos, poesia y articulos. Tendre mucha tarea, y no me gustaba leer literatura de la epoca medieval ni reacentista durante la clase AP en la escuela secundaria, pero espero que estas lecturas, y mis companeros de clase, sean interesantes.



After reading the Targum outside the building, I walked through the hallways toward room 118. I sat down and looked around for Leslie, but she never came to the class. I'm guessing she changed her schedule, which totally frustrates me. But I've taken a Spanish class with some of the students in this class. I took 333, literature of Latin America with Nilo, a super smart latino (I think he's Cuban) who is a charmer. He's one of theose people que I've met who I want to be friends with a talk to - Melissa was another one. Anyway, the professor came and I immediately started smiling. He is a character. He's a really happy old guy, con red cheeks, who is always smiling. But he's Spanish, and all of my other professors have been Latin American. His accent is really distinct and a bit difficult to understand (because he pronounces "c" as if it were "th" - Valenthia instead of Valencia), bought I'm going to Salamanca, Spain, during the summer and I'll have to hear this accent every day, so... Anyway, I like the professor, but I don't like this syllabus. Christ, we have to read so many freaking books in Spanish. "Las mocedades Del Cid," by Guillen de Castro; "Lazarillo de Tormes," by Francisco Rico; "Novelas ejemplares," by Miguel de Cervantes; y "El garrote mas bien dado," by Calderon de la Barca. Also, there are tons of handouts with stories, poetry and other articles. I'll have a lot of homework, and I didn't really like reading literature from the Medieval period and the Renaissance during AP Spanish, but I hope these readings, and my classmates, are interesting.



-



After Spanish I met up with my Aunt Laura, who's taking master's classes at SCILS. Very bizarre - but in a good way. Tomorrow: no class until 6:10. Ha! So, who's gonna stay up with me on AIM tonight?

Off to my first class. Looking decent. Kind of nervous.



I need to start thinking in Spanish.



Hola, me llamo TJ, soy un estudiante de tercer ano. Mis concentraciones son periodism y espanol. Quiero hacerme periodista porque a mi me encanta escribir. Y el estilo de periodismo es muy conciso y el escritor esta informando al publico. Bla bla bla.



How do you say diversity and internship in Spanish? :)

New entry up in hee-ya.

At the Orientation Fair I signed up to audition for OrphanSporks, one of the two co-ed a cappella groups at Rutgers. As I walked away with Rennie I said, "I am such a chicken shit when it comes to auditioning, but I have to do this. I will do this."



I don't know if I can do this. It's simple. I just go in there next week, sing a song a cappella, sing some scales and harmonize with other members.



But ... what song do I sing? I mean, I have to find the one perfect song for my range, one that's not too low for me, so when I get nervous and my voice gets shaky I can try to salvage it. And I haven't done scales in forever. And harmonizing! So nerve-wracking. I mean, this is all stuff I can do, but can I actually do it when it counts.



Auditions freak me out.

Labor Day will be full of work for me.



I'm about to go to the Orientation Fair, to represent Targum, before heading to my final edit board meeting at 2 p.m. to announce that I'm not coming back. I need to get a haircut (the weird, sun-dyed hair has got to go), buy at least some of my books, print out my schedule so I have a clue as to where I'm going tomorrow. Then, most likely, I'll have to put the paper online tonight, since I said I'd help out for the first week. I really don't want to do any of this, but I will, and I will smile, and I will have as good a time as possible.



Dream: I was at our old house on Knolton Road in Allendale, it was a big family gathering. But for some reason I was feeling like the asshole, my family ignoring me and giving my attitude. I glanced at my mom, said I'm leaving in a bitchy voice, and ignored Laura as she tried to hug me. I got into John's car, for whatever reason, that retarded Saab station wagon (if you're going to get a Saab, for the love of God, do not by a wagon) and drove off. As I got to the top of the hill to turn onto East Crescent, three police cars came toward the street, and turned, coming into my side of the road. I backed up, with no concern for the car behind me, because I was deathly afraid the cops were after me.



I also dreamed about high school friends, a big portion of the dream was about Matt Kraus. Maybe I should email him.

And finally, I was sitting in my car at the gas station and I look into the little booth and realized the attendant was playing Nintendo 64. How bizarre.

Related to the last post, I have been writing down bothersome thoughts or dreams or whatever on a post-it and sticking it in a little box so I can make the thought real.



It's been nice.

It sucks. Good word. It ... sucks ... when I have something I want to vent or discuss or lament, and I can't because too many fucking people read this site. The lines between the web and real life have blurred to the point where I have to bite my cyber tongue as much as my real one. And it's kind of unfair. I refuse to write anymore allusive, obnoxiously vague entries I hope the right people might understand and the wrong people will ignore. Yeah...



(You did it. I'm glad I could help, in my insignificant way.)

The humidity is oppressive. As I was assembling the new computer chair I bought today (amazing how much a good chair can make the web experience much more enjoyable) sweat was dripping off of my face. It was really disgusting.



Also disgusting: it's the last weekend before classes begin. Ben is in San Francisco for good.



Less disgusting: I am drinking with Lauren and Jeremy. Hopefully I'll be totally bombed by midnight.

Lauren moved in this morning. That means Snickers, our beloved wonderdog is back. He had his testicles ripped from him a few days ago, so the poor thing has one of those insane cones around his neck. And since he's stupid (well, stupid or persistent) he keeps trying to lick himself and continuously knocks his cone into walls. Very much like the dog in that John Cusack 80s movie, I think it was "One Crazy Summer."



Also, the two amazing couches her parents gave us would not fit through the stairway. Wonderful. Back to Allendale they go.