tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-41162122008-07-22T16:21:19.435-04:00Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comBlogger267125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-51773795055021935462006-11-14T01:20:00.000-05:002006-11-14T02:04:35.179-05:00

I found myself obsessively cleaning tonight. This is not an overly bizarre occurrence, as I tend to go through cycles of neat-freakery (invisible to my more obsessively clean friends, but within my messy world true marvels of dusting, organising and even sweeping. Dust pan and all.) followed by descents into slobbery, followed by denial and then sudden outbursts of frenzied clearing up. What is

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-15712417973309056362006-11-13T12:30:00.000-05:002006-11-13T12:33:25.127-05:00

As per usual, I'm in the computer lab in the Science Center, trying desperately to write a lab report. I'm on a stupid PC, so I click on Start, go to Programs, go through the list of all the science applications they have, and... nothing. They don't have Word on this computer. Or any kind of word processing software that I can see. What kind of world are we living in when there are 16 different

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-11971495384051727302006-11-09T11:47:00.000-05:002006-11-09T11:49:43.292-05:00

Does this sort of alphabetical order make ANY sense to you? a,b,V, G,d, e, ZH,Z, i!? Seriously? A B V? Russian dictionaries make me want to kill each time I look at one.

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1162876734216356872006-11-06T23:54:00.000-05:002006-11-09T04:18:31.753-05:00

A propos of nothing: "So... how is your knitting going?" Two hats down, one on the needles, half a scarf, almost an entire handbag, and about a million projects forming in my head, thank you. But you're lovely to ask.

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1162778362167255362006-11-05T20:12:00.000-05:002006-11-09T04:18:31.427-05:00

I signed up for Fussy's National Blog Post Month, but it seems I've already failed at the daily blogging thing. In my defense, I have been deluged with visitors and midterms, so haven't really had the opportunity to be on the computer at length. To make up for this, fours are in order to make up for the four days I've missed. Four things that make me happy right this very second 1. My German

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1162441299536830002006-11-01T23:19:00.000-05:002006-11-09T04:18:31.127-05:00

Posting shall now resume. Readers, all two of you, rejoice. I'll write something actual tomorrow or the next day, but for now... I'm so full of pent-up energy that I'm actually twitching. I'm on the verge of screaming. Or getting up and running around the library. But... I suppose I should actually try to apply said hyperactivity to my paper. Sigh...

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1158082194636792022006-09-12T12:25:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:30.884-05:00

Jon and I went to the Grand Canyon yesterday. Stunning, astounding, breathtaking? Yes. Hordes of foreign tourists? Hell yes! But otherwise bliss? Well... You see, the problem was that we decided to go for a hike. Or rather my sly little eyes picked out a minute little trail running down the side of an otherwise sheer cliff, and the rest of me started jumping up and down, pointing and making

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1157824487656539812006-09-09T12:59:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:30.566-05:00

Apparently it takes 4 days to sober up from the drunk that the lovely New Orleans bartender (not waitress) Michelle put on me. Or perhaps, I've just had phenomenally bad luck with finding the internet. We're in Tucumcari, New Mexico right now, en route to Las Vegas, NM and Santa Fe. Jon is napping since he had to get up early to take the car to get looked at by the mechanic, so I'm using the

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1157528356410381602006-09-05T21:50:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:30.296-05:00

I am in New Orleans, and I am in love with a waitress named Michelle. Anything more will require a longer blog entry than I am sober enough to spell.

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1157209912104517402006-09-02T11:07:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:30.031-05:00

12:15 am, Holiday Inn reception. Guy at the desk: You know, if you sign up to enlist, you'll get six dollars off on your room. [Jon, half-asleep, pauses and assumes that it's actually only something involving signing a sheet. He nods vaguely.] GATD: Then again, I'm not sure if the six dollar discount is actually worth having to go to Iraq. I wonder how many people have accidentally been

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1157209587119892572006-09-02T09:04:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:29.740-05:00

Greetings from the Holiday Inn Express in Greensboro, North Carolina! After innumerable setbacks, mainly involving the difficulty of consolidating Jon's possessions into one car, we finally closed the trunk and made it out of the garage, heading (eventually) out to places West. For now, we're mainly heading southwards down the coast, towards Atlanta, where through a strange freak of coincidence

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1156262435845307322006-08-22T11:52:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:29.458-05:00

I just had a Dachshund puppy bite my ear while I was doing Downward-Facing Dog in an attempt to stretch cramping calf muscles. I am officially not a dog person. And there are currently three in residence at my house. A Dalmatian, my old mutt, and my brother's new puppy, bouncing and yapping and growling, and being all needy in the way that only dogs can pull off. I miss just being around my

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1155654952222778512006-08-15T11:02:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:29.148-05:00

It always amuses me to wonder what my grocer must think of me. I have a bordering-on-pathological fear of food bacteria, and as a result do not buy ANYTHING except pasta in bulk (even cans scare me.) I have been known to thrown out perfectly good meat simply because it has been residing in my kitchen for over a day, and the idea of leftovers and doggie bags vaguely disgusts me. This leads to

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1155576178609443252006-08-14T11:11:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:28.886-05:00

I went on a walk around the islands in the northern part of the city the other day, and stumbled across the dwelling places of the newly-rich and not-so-famous. Beautiful buildings mostly left untouched, occasionally given horrific Nouveau Russian facelifts (the current vogue appears to be for the Swiss chalet look.) Lots of shiny black Mercedes with tinted windows. Occasional Hummers. The

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1155473438530677672006-08-13T07:45:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:28.557-05:00

I've always had a dread of taking showers. It's not the shower itself that I'm worried about. I'm a clean person, and I actually find showering to be quite a pleasant experience. You're all warm and lovely, and then you get to be all clean... former roommates of mine can attest to the fact that I take the longest showers on earth, once topping out at a remarkable 50 minutes. A horrible waste of

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1155300608095923682006-08-11T08:01:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:28.274-05:00

I have a grand total of four suitemates here in St. Petersburg. Two are a pair of perfectly lovely Spanish girls, while the other two... I like to call the Germans. Not that I have anything against Germans, per se. I dated one for a year, and have various friends from there. My problem, however, is with the male half of the couple. While the girl is perfectly nice, though a little strange, (

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1155212602466865232006-08-10T07:38:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:28.018-05:00

Jon went home yesterday, and I must confess I find myself at a bit of a loose end without him. Not that it's unpleasant to be on my own again, but I'm a little thrown off, I must say. I went grocery shopping yesterday, and marvelled at the possibility that my cart could contain just bread, cheese, smoked fish, pickles and fruit. No manly quantities of sugary cereal. No Belgian waffles. No juice

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1155201314334793432006-08-10T05:05:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:27.803-05:00

We were talking about the news in one of my Russian classes (mysteriously named SMI-- I'm truly not sure what that stands for. It doesn't seem to differ in any significant way from other classes.) and the tedious Finnish missionary (he's learning Russian so he can go convert people or something like that. I wasn't able to quite make anything out through the thick Finnish accent.) said, with true

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1155153563629954582006-08-09T15:55:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:27.531-05:00

-You know, when I first met you, I thought you looked a lot like Hilary Swank. -This is the point at which you really need to specify... Hilary Swank at which precise moment in her career? Apparently he meant at the Oscars. But still, I think the clarification was in order.

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1154939997276470682006-08-07T04:31:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:27.253-05:00

Jon and I went out clubbing last night. This is remarkable on two counts: firstly, it was Sunday, when you think any respectable person would be sleeping off their Friday-Saturday hangovers and preparing to make a dashing impact on the working week. The club, however, was bizarrely packed. Perhaps the term "Stylish Club" tacked on to the brass sign (newly added since last year) at the entrance

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1154682720998057062006-08-04T05:03:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:26.985-05:00

I go downstairs to the internet cafe in my dorm, ready and willing to give over my money for contact with the outer world. I request twenty minutes and hand over a fifty ruble bill. Deformed-face woman at desk (rudely): You can't. Alex: But twenty minutes is twenty rubles. D-FWaD (r): I have no change. A: But I only have fity rubles. D-FWaD (r) (gesturing at post-Soviet building complexes out

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1154590386285061702006-08-03T03:17:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:26.742-05:00

It's nasty and cold and rainy today, and strangely enough I have lost all desire to sit in Russian class and discuss current events. The plight of Russian women, forced to uphold the economy while their drunk spouses punch them and hold the actual positions of power (or that's at least the gist I got from the article) is truly compelling and fascinating. Today, however, there's just a little

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1154507404163136142006-08-02T04:02:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:26.443-05:00

I had bear for dinner yesterday. Jon and I finally managed to get it together enough to drag ourselves out of the room, where we had sat around for hours eating obscene amounts of Cheerios and watching bad movies, consult the good ol' city guide for actual-date-worthy restaurants (as opposed to restaurants of the simple eating variety, without the date intent. Or as opposed to imaginary

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1154443603886661902006-08-01T10:31:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:25.975-05:00

Jon is now in St. Petersburg with me, and we're already set on making our stamp on the town, reclaiming it from last year's memories and forming new ones. For the first little bit, it was weird being back here on my own, without familiar faces. Shops have been closed or moved, and I'm living in a whole different dorm, which made it a little bit better, and a little bit more surreal, as I'm down

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4116212.post-1153588025988824672006-07-22T13:04:00.000-04:002006-11-09T04:18:25.614-05:00

I just watched "Mr. & Mrs. Smith" and... I think we just need to all take a minute and contemplate just how beautiful Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are. Separately, together, any way you like them. Perfection. Also, I have to confess that I really liked it. Then again, I'm starved for English these days, and it's raining, so I would probably like a movie featuring wet ferrets dancing, as long as

Alexhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01845652796169005996noreply@blogger.com