I get really strong impulses sometimes.
My most recent was to just jump in the car with my friend Connor and drive to Alaska.
To no particular place in Alaska, Anchorage maybe (for the name recognition), but I just want to see some cool stuff.
People call these "the best years of your life." These years have been absolutely incredible, but I'm going to do my damnedest to make sure they aren't the best.

"If I could have my wasted days back
Would I use them to get back on track?
Stop to warm at karma's burning,
or look ahead but keep on turning?"

Frantic-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tock.

First Paper of the Semester

I do not recommend beer, Facebook, or Youtube as study aides, and especially not all at once.

Extensive research on teaching English in Germany this summer turned this little morsel up:

Colorado China Council
Non-profit organization searching for college graduates to teach English in China for the duration of one academic semester or year. Travel expenses covered. Excellent mental and physical health required.

Oh boy, sign me up!

Life is fucking hilarious if you stop and think about it.
I don't mean that in a morbid sense either; just think about all of the ridiculous, mind-bendingly unlikely links in the chain of events that brought you to where you are now.
I never fail to smile and shake my head when reflecting on what a strange, wacky journey this whole life thing has been.

---

It's been surprisingly easy to let it go.

It used to occupy my every waking though.
It used to sow the seeds of deep-rooted paranoia: burning eyes, wet cheeks, uncertainty.
It used to fill me with explosive, sublime happiness: more wet cheeks, quiet nights alone with pretty handwriting, an irresistible urge to smile.

And I just tossed it away like an orange peel.
I've become a rather callous bastard. Even the knowledge of that only fills me with a slow, distant sensation of remorse.
Someday it will come back, and when it gets ripped out of me again I might reach down and feel the tender, raw edges with my fingers-- touch the wet, mangled remains and scream and convulse in pain. But for now?

Nothing.

"That, I guess, is the language of the Rohirrim," the Elf commented, "for it is like to this land itself; rich and rolling in part, and else hard and stern as the mountains. But I cannot guess what it means, save that it is laden with the sadness of Mortal Men."

Scenes from the Library

[It is mid-afternoon in the campus library, the sky is bright and blue outside, and the verdant green of the trees is tinged with the yellow of Fall. A patron approaches the desk. She is of medium height. A vacuous expression is on her face, and her brown bangs are drawn away from her forehead by a clip in her hair. A piece of white gum can be seen migrating about her cow-like mouth in between phrases.]

Andy: Hi, can I help you?
Girl: I'm, uh, looking for a physics book.
Andy: [trying to mask the weariness of telling people too look up their own damn call numbers again and again] Do you know the call number for it?
Girl: [completely confused] Uh... What?

[Andy's look of disbelief is barely concealed.]

Andy: Um, you know. The call number for the book? The thing you look it up with?
Girl: No, but I know what color it is.

[Andy is usually patient with this type of patron, and will often look up the number himself, but this is a special exception.]

Andy: Ok. Well, there's a computer right over there where you can look that up for yourself.
Girl: [annoyed] Alright.

[A handful of beats pass as the Girl walks over to the catalogue computer.]

Girl: Uh, this thing isn't working.
Andy: Excuse me?
Girl: [louder] The computer isn't working; it's, like, shutting down or something.
Andy: Ok, then I'll look it up. What's the name of the professor?
Girl: [pausing, deep in thought] Crach.

[Andy searches through the catalogue for the name. No professor named Crach is found.]

Andy: [wearily, rotating the computer monitor around to show the Girl] Well, it doesn't look like he's here. What's the name of the course?
Girl: Ummmm, Intro to Physics.

[Andy searches the catalogue by class. There isn't a single physics class listed.]

Andy: [sighing a little] No luck there either. What's the name of the book?
Girl: "Physics."

[Somewhere in the distance the clanging of a final nail being pounded into a coffin can be heard. The book is, of course, not found.]

Andy: Well, I can't find it, but maybe if you can look it up for yourself and bring me the call number we can help you out.
Girl: [still not getting it] But it's a physics book.
Andy: [now incapable of being surprised or phased] Yeah, but there are at least a hundred books back there, so without the call number I can't find it.
Girl: Fine.

Curtain.

Keep both feet on the ground, or you'll fall over.