inexcusable idiocy

the human brain is a strange and wonderfully stupid contraption.

well, mine is, at least. i still can't believe i just did that. at about 7:30, i got a call from jim, saying that he and a couple others were going to meet at a movie theatre at quarter to 9. now, granted, my clock is in military time, but you'd think i would be used to it by now. anyway, defying any and all possible explanation (there isn't any), i correctly translated the 9:00 part into 21:00 --- and then promptly planned to leave at 21:00, giving me what i was somehow inexplicably convinced was 45 minutes to get there before we were supposed to meet. so stupid! un-fucking-believable!

and it gets worse. :) because my braindead self was so firmly ensconced in this bizarro time-warp la-la land, i didn't even figure this out until i had already taken the bus to the metro station, and was trying to figure out how long i would have to wait for the metro to come. comparing the schedule with the clock --- i then did a triple take at the clock, and barely restrained myself from beating my head repeatedly against the asphalt platform, as i realized the utter insanity of what i had just done. man, it just completely boggles me.

for your own sakes, i hope i'm the only one who does dumb things like this, but if not, tell me, and it might make me feel a little better. we'll see.

hosting is fun

and, amoung other things, it motivates me to actually clean my apartment---which, amoung other things, makes my life a much happier place to be. :)

wednesday evening i had a bunch of people over (oscar, anne, norman, jim, nikolaus, olga, august, emanuella, and me, makes 9; probably my new record) and attempted to make falafel. the falafel turned out to be much more difficult than i had anticipated, simply because even after soaking the garbonzo beans for 24 hours instead of the suggested 12, they were hard as rocks, and i had to mash them a handful at a time with the mortar and pestle. however, once it was made... hot damn, it was tasty. nikolaus even claimed that it was the first falafel he'd ever had that he didn't hate (he actually said he liked mine). and of course there was the lemon meringue pie for desert, which always seems to go over well.

i had originally lured all these people into my lair on the pretense of showing a movie; a french film called "sous le sable" ("under the sand") by a french director i kinda like, francois ozon. but for whatever reason, people seemed to be having a good time just sitting around and chatting it up, so i didn't feel like interrupting to put in a film. strange how sometimes the party dynamic just "happens." the problem is that the times when it doesn't are usually the ones when you want/need it too the most (!?!).

norman turned in his thesis (finally), and so last night he had people over to his place. (yeah! party week!) i think he beat me by a few people, but then again, he's graduating, which is slightly more of an event than a film we don't end up watching... the impressive part is that his apartment is even smaller than mine, but he's done pretty well with it. almost a caltech-like solution; he built a loft. (ah, fond memories of being proud of my resourceful creative engineering in dabney 42. 'tis a shame that they will almost certainly tear it down during the renovations this year.)

i finally finished reviewing my six abstracts for SIS2005, though i probably was more thorough than i needed to be (or rather, i gave more [and hopefully better] feedback than most other reviewers will probably bother to do). can't wait until june; it's gonna be awesome to see some of my socal friends again. i miss you all, a lot.

my certificates are currently in the process of being translated into italian. every day i get a little bit closer to being a citizen! whoohoo! yeah, you know it, i'm excited.

my bonzais are slowly returning to health. i've basically decided that it was a combination of the cold air and overwatering, but i'm learning, and they're doing better now. and if the weather ever decides that it's not winter anymore (we had another random snowburst at the beginning of the week), i'll start planting my balcony vegetables again. maybe this year i'll do it right, and only put one seed in a pot. last year i thought i'd just throw them all in and transplant the seedlings. well, the ones i transplanted died, so i left the rest, which never got very big, since they were basically root-bound. so, if i learned my lesson, and things work better this year, i'll be very glad.

i think i've run out of things to say...

tuesday afternoon (forever afternoon)

let's just get one thing straight: the moody blues, quite simply, rock. that's all there is to it. and maybe if i listened to more of them, i wouldn't be quite so depressed.

i've been trying to make note of little things i do that should probably clue me in to the fact that my brain isn't function properly at a particular moment. like, for instance, when i start exclusively listening to radiohead and similar for long periods of time, i'm probably not myself.

and as i've mentioned before, i tend to get irrationally suspicious and jealous of my friends. the ski weekend was a very trying experience in this regard. i really want to believe that it's all just in my head, and that i'm making shit up, and people aren't really fed up with me, or hate me, or think i'm stupid or annoying, or whatever. i really do. but it feels to me like people describe dreaming: at some level, you realize that what you're experiencing is ridiculousness bordering on nonsense, but it _feels_ so much like reality that it's impossible not to believe that it's really happening.

and of course, you always find what you look for... at these times i feel vulnerable and worthless, and therefore anything anyone says gets twisted around in my brain to reinforce this notion. i distinctly remember several comments that enno has made recently regarding some sort of athletic activity where he pointed out that he is better, stronger, and faster than i am. and every word of it is true, a simple statement of fact---so why does it feel like a fucking knife in the gut? it's highly improbable that he would ever say such things with the menace that i read into them; and he even invited me to a small social gathering at his apartment last thursday. i mean, hasn't that been my biggest whine over the years, that it seemed like i always had to initiate contact with people? have i always been this messed up? do i just not notice when people do initiate with me? ha. and what a beautiful setup i've just given myself for a perfect self-depricating slam about ingratitude. oh, brother. i wonder if i've always been this predictable, too.

i talked with dave about this a little in an email. he's right; most of it stems directly from deep-seated self-worth/esteem issues. after what tien told me last fall, though, i think it's more complicated than that. it's possible (and possibly even likely) that i really do need medication. now i just have to work up the courage to try to get it.

okay, i know, this has been really pathetic as journal entries go, my apologies. the sun is shining outside. after my exam tomorrow, i won't have to take any more classes for credit ever again. i've almost got an italian passport. plenty of fun/nice/good things happening. i just have to force myself to remember them.

hope everybody else's life is smoother than mine right now.