gah.

I should have said something... I wanted to say something... but... I suck.

*sigh*

I. Cannot. Be. Getting. Sick.

boo. hiss.


I am not at all sure that the violence in abovementioned sentiment was properly conveyed.

With the exception of time spent with the boy, what a shitty weekend...

So. I am now the proud possessor of five bucks. Until (a) Mojo pays me the last ten he owes me (big whoop) and/or (b) the check from Mom comes in the mail. Still don't know how much she sent. And all, or at least a large portion, of that has to go to Bounds to pay him back for covering me for beach weekend with the Pi Kapps. Which leaves me where?

Five bucks.

I get paid in two weeks. Meanwhile, I have to live off of DH food and the very little I have in my room (mostly food gone bad/expired), plus I can't buy any, say, contact solution, shampoo, soap, toothpaste, etc. Know what I have to say to that? Poop. Chicken poop, to be exact. So there.

On top of that, I appear to be getting sick. There is a tenuous connection to a boy who has mono which makes me very, very afraid of the sore throat I've been trying to ignore and the exhaustion that's been setting in, in spite of getting (mostly) plenty of sleep. Granted, yesterday I was tired because of a lack of sleep, but last night I got LOADS and today at Publix I had trouble standing upright while I was waiting in line. Pathetic. Scary.

I cannot be getting sick.

ANDDDDD.... I am ridiculously frustrated with FUtones and I feel like I'm the only one who feels that way, which makes me even more frustrated. The lack of committment to the group exhibited by certain (key) people is driving me crazy. And to watch that group in comparison to Madrigals just makes me sad. Madrigals is such a young group. There are days when I feel like the only reason we're still going is because I'm kind of obsessive about it. I mean, I started it, I have a right to be a little obsessive, but really, I look at FUtones and see the apathy that's there in people I would never have expected and I wonder if Madrigals even has a chance. Because I know that in general, the FUtones care a lot more than the Madrigals. As a group, anyway. But yesterday, FOUR FUTONES just didn't show. Two of them had excuses. Two of them just never answered their phones. And that's not including the three people who were already supposed to be gone. So we were missing seven. And apparently, I was the only one who gave a shit. I mean, yeah, other people were kind of like 'wtf, mate?' but they were all really quick to accept excuses and say 'oh, whatever, we still did okay, so it's fine that they didn't come.' And to me, that's bull. And it's a dangerous precedent to set to say that whenever you wake up and just don't feel like coming to a performance, that's fine. I mean, I didn't want to go, yesterday! I hadn't gotten enough sleep and I already wasn't feeling well. And there's definitely work I could have been doing, or whatever. But I never even considered just not showing up. Because you don't DO that. You don't ... you don't fucking do that. And you know, maybe I'm more upset by it because I'm in charge of the Madrigals and I see it from the standpoint of a musical director who knows that when you lose even one person you weren't anticipating, it throws everything off. But everyone should know that. No one has an excuse.

And I know that I should say all of that to the group, because keeping it in, or just venting it to other people (and here) is not going to help me or the rest of the FUtones. But every time I think about saying what I think in front of them, I think about what happened to Bounds last year and I get scared of being forced out. I get scared of the politics, the backbiting, the one person I already know would push to have me quit and all of the people that one person can intimidate into thinking the same way. And I wonder if it's worth it to speak my opinion and say what I think, and call people out who need to be called out. I wonder if the ensuing drama and the explosion of negativity, just from one person, is even worth it.

This entry is pretty much a copout way for me to get everything out just in case I don't have the guts to speak up at rehearsal tonight. And I'm really not proud of that. But I know that some of the FUtones read this, and maybe, whether or not I say something tonight, that will help get my point across.

Sigh.

One person should not have the ability to intimidate me this much. I really think if I don't say anything tonight, I'm going to explode.

Easter Sunday

We might be finding out today where we're going to live next year. (!!!!!!!) I hope we got someplace good.

But anyway.

Sunday, April 16
Got up at... um... well, early, to get ready for church and stuff. I pretty much looked ridiculous -- I'd made the mistake of wearing a tank top with a higher cut the day before than I wore for church, so my sunburn was very clear. Oh well. That's what choir robes are for, right? :-) We sang for the 9:00 service and sat through the whole thing up in the choir loft... I was in the front row, feeling a little silly for being a complete stranger. But it was fun, and the hymns we sang had pretty harmonies for me to play around with. The pastor's sermon was... well, a little overly doom-and-gloom for Easter, I thought. She actually talked about death and "putrification." ?!?!?!?!? Who uses a word like "putrification" on EASTER?? *makes face* Yuck. So I was unimpressed. I mean, it was a good sermon, it just wasn't appropriate. I was really glad we didn't have to sit through it twice -- we got to leave after singing the anthem in the second service.
Between services we just hung around the church. The Marcuccis were there, too. Sarah looked adorable and Vince and Stephen were both dressed up a little more than they would have liked -- apparently they had to get their family picture taken that morning. Kathy said it was something like the first time in eight months they'd all been at church together. (wow.) And poor Kathy -- she walked into the service a little late, and after the service Brian and Vince were telling her very emphatically how nice she looked. So I got suspicious and asked her what was going on. She said that she hadn't been wearing that dress all morning -- she had had on a little black and red number instead, and on the way to church Vince looked at her and told her she looked like a vampire and that he could only imagine all the disapproving looks she would get in church. :-P What a kid. Kathy was a good sport about it -- she said he was right and that he'd saved her from herself. :-)
After church we went back to Mimi's house and were just going to kill time until dinner (around 4:00). Bounds and I decided to take a mini-picnic with little snacks and hike up to the pass on South Mountain. I've done the hike before and it's not terribly hard and the views are gorgeous. We ended up taking Sophie, Kathy's whippet, with us, and we had a great time. It was really hot though, and both of us burned even more... sigh. We got good pictures, which makes it worth it. (Right?)
When we came back, the cousins were just getting to the house, and so when Matt and I jumped straight into the pool, Sarah almost immediately joined us. We had a great time playing around in the pool with her, although we were already tired and the girl's boundless enthusiasm was rather difficult to keep up with. :-) Dinnertime was a welcome break. Lamb, grilled salmon, some kind of corn dish that was yummy, raw green beans, chocolate pound cake... wow, it was good. Hard for me not to get seconds, but somehow I contained myself. It was nice to get to talk to Vince and Stephen finally, too -- they opened up about school and what they're studying, and I swear, it was the most extensive conversation I've ever had with either of them. Made me really happy. :-) And then we all played cards until it was time for them to get going, which was really fun. We played "go Sarah" (go fish, with the rules dictated by Sarah) and Egyptian Rat Screw, and had a great time.
Then... finally... some quiet time. Sunday night was spent burning Matt's a cappella cds for Mimi, who loved listening to them in her car over the long weekend, and reading to each other, and just hanging out. Since we were so tired, it was a perfect way to end the trip.

Monday, April 17
Flying home. No delays this time, which was good, considering we weren't getting into Raleigh until 9:00 anyway. The one little glitch came when we were checking the bag. It was a whopping 62 pounds, and we had to pay a $25 fine. :-( Oh well. We really should have known. It was already almost too heavy, and we'd put even more books into it on the way home. But other than that, a pretty uneventful trip. The views from the first flight to Dallas were really beautiful. Huge stretches of desert, that sort of thing. It was cool. :-)

So yeah, that was the Easter trip to Phoenix. Basically an excellent time. I highly recommend everyone forcing their grandparents/cousins to move out there so you can visit them. :-)

Time to go. See ya next time.

Phoenix, AZ.... cont.

First of all, I would just like to say to Karen that my suitcase was holding both my stuff and Matt's, and it also had my huge Shakespeare book and a couple others besides. So there. :-)

Friday, April 14
We had plans to go to Kartchner Caverns on Friday. Our tour wasn't until mid-afternoon, but it was a 2.5-3 hour drive and we were supposed to be there an hour early (to "enjoy" the museum before going on the tour). So we planned on leaving between 9 and 10 so that we could have a picnic in our extra time. Well, I woke up super early and decided to go ahead and get in the pool. I peeked into Matt's room and he was definitely still asleep, so I went on my own. It was really nice... quite peaceful by the golf course in the morning. The water was COLD, but I dove in and just started swimming laps, and it felt so good. It definitely woke me up, and it was really refreshing. My grandparents both came out at one point and just thought it was great that I was enjoying their pool. :-) I'd been swimming for about a half an hour when I lifted my head to take a breath and nearly swallowed a lizard that was swimming along right next to me! I jumped out of the pool to get the net and save the lizard, and as I was doing that, Mimi and Matt both came out. Matt wanted to get a picture of the lizard so when I put it down next to the pool he took a couple, and then he picked the little guy up and took some close-ups. It was funny; I'm sure the poor animal was terrified. Who knows, perhaps we thwarted a suicide. Just kidding. Anyway, I put the lizard on the other side of the fence but he just sat there and didn't move or go anywhere, so Matt decided that wasn't good enough and he picked him back up and flung him into a bush next to the green. :-) Poor flying lizard. We got back in the pool and swam around for a little while, but we didn't stay for too long, because we had to get ready to go. Naturally, once we were ready (by about 9:00, which was when Papa wanted to leave), Mimi took another hour to be prepared to get on the road. Oh, Mimi. She just wanted our picnic to be perfect, and then by the time we got to the exit for the caverns, she'd decided it was too windy to have a real picnic, so we stopped at Subway and got sandwiches. :-P
The caverns ended up being really cool. The museum was ... well, it was interesting, but not for an hour. Matt and I ended up wandering around the gift shop for a while before our tour was called. And then our tour guide was really annoying. And I feel bad saying that, because he only had one arm and I almost feel like it's not p.c. or something to call him annoying, but I swear, he kept telling these awful jokes and saying really stupid things about the caverns to try and make us laugh... it didn't work at all. I would have preferred a "boring" tour guide who just told us all the cool stuff about the caverns. Like the different formations and how they're made, or whatever. But anyway, the cavern by itself was neat. I'd never been to one before, and apparently this is different from most of them because it's "living" - it's still being formed. So not only is it more humid than others, it's also a lot warmer. Most caverns, Matt told me, are pretty dry and cool -- these were a constant 71 degrees with 99% humidity. Crazy. After over an hour inside the cave, it felt cooler outside in the dry 93 degree weather than in the cave. It was like the difference between the Carolinas and Phoenix was right there in front of us.
I like Phoenix better.
So after our tour, we headed back into Phoenix and went back to the grandparents' house. We hung out there for a while and then decided to head out to a pizza place nearby for dinner, where we ran into my cousins and their parents. Sarah, who is eight and (apparently) kind of obsessed with me, hung all over me at our table until her parents dragged her back home. It was funny then, but by Saturday I was honestly exhausted by Sarah's boundless enthusiasm for cousin Kira...
After dinner, Mimi, Matt and I ventured over to the Marcuccis' again and played a game of Scrabble with Kathy and Sarah. It was fun, and Sarah was actually pretty good. (I wasn't. But I never have liked Scrabble. So, oh well.) She exacted from me and Matt a promise to come over again on the next night to watch School of Rock with her. :-)

Saturday, April 15
This morning we were supposed to go to an Easter parade that Sarah was dancing in with her little school of dance. Kathy had told us she'd be there to pick us up at one time, and called while Matt and I were swimming in the pool to say she'd be a good half hour earlier, so we (I) kind of flipped out and ran to get ready on time (which didn't happen). She ended up leaving on her own to get Sarah to the parade on time, and we met them there. Well, when we got to the parking lot by the beginning of the parade, it was full of beautiful old cars -- I guess it was some kind of show for people to bring cars that they'd fixed up, but whatever it was, it was really cool. So Matt and I decided to go back over there and look around after the parade.
The parade itself was pretty much what you'd expect of a neighborhood Easter parade. A couple high school marching bands, a bunch of boy and girl scouts, some dance schools dancing their way down the street... some fancy cars with "important" people in them, you know. And there were some mini cop cars driving around, that was fun. And horses with bunny ears. :-) So it was cute, but I also kind of got tired of it by the end, and Sarah didn't show up until it was almost over, so... yeah. The cars were way cooler than the parade by the time we got back over to them. We took lots of pictures, and Mimi was all excited when she found a car from the year she was born. (I'm telling you, some of these were OLD cars!)
Afterwards, we went home for lunch and to relax by the pool for awhile before heading out again to go see Stephen and Vince in a bike race. Brian's a huge biker, and so he's trying to get his kids into it, too. And they're all pretty good -- Stephen and Vince ended up placing in their age groups, so that was neat for them. We hung around and watched the races for a while, but it was really hot and Matt and I were beginning to really feel the sun after being out in it all day long, so finally Mimi and Papa took the two of us and Sarah to a bookstore they really like called Changing Hands. It has both new and used books, and the used books (when you can find them) are really cheap, so it was a cool little store. And Bounds and I can pretty much keep ourselves occupied for hours in bookstores, so we had to tear ourselves away when it was finally time to go. We had a lot of fun, and found some good buys, too. :-) We took Sarah back to Mimi's house for dinner (hamburgers), where I ended up taking a nap while Bounds played cards with Sarah. We were both exhausted, but he managed to find some energy from somewhere to keep her occupied so I could sleep. Then we had dinner outside on the little patio, which was really pretty.
After dinner, Matt and I took Sarah home while Mimi and Papa stayed behind (they were tired, too). We watched the movie with her and Kathy, and eventually Brian and Stephen as well. It was fun, but I was falling asleep by the end of it. It was nice to go home and fall into bed after that. Especially knowing that we were getting up early the next morning to sing in church with Mimi. Wow.


Once again, I'm out of time... Sunday and Monday later. :-)

ps. I'm going to ITALY!!! Winter Term '07!!!!
pps. Next time you go on a road trip, double check your windshield wipers. More on that some other time. :-)

Easter in Phoenix, AZ

Seriously one of the best trips ever. :-) Bear with me, cause I'm recording it in here whether you want to read about it or not. ;-) Disclaimer: this is only the first two days and it's already REALLY LONG.

Wednesday, April 12
Everyone else had to go to classes on Thursday, but Matt and I were done on Wednesday because we drove up to Greensboro that night! :-) So that was fun. After some seriously last-minute packing and cd-making on my part, we finally got on the road at a little after 5:00. (I love car trips, by the way. I could totally be the kind of person who just hops in the car and drives all over the country, stopping where and when I feel like it... if I could afford that kind of vagabond lifestyle, anyway. Gypsy blood or something.) Got into Greensboro and went to Fuddrucker's with Dad and Michael -- that was fun. Every time I see my little brothers I am newly amazed at how old they're getting. I was really glad I got the chance to have dinner with Michael before we left since I wasn't going to see him again this break. Jack would've been there, but he was out of town, so it was just the four of us. But we had a good time.
Then Matt and I went back to Mom's and visited a little with her and Doc. We went out to Barnes & Noble to buy another copy of Forrest Gump, cause Matt couldn't find his copy before we left. While we were there we ended up getting other reading material too, of course. Cause that's what happens when Matt and I go to bookstores. :-) Then... oh yeah, I modeled some dresses for Matt to pick one for me to wear to Junior/Senior which is... next weekend I think? Fun times. :-) Then bed, because Thursday morning came really early....

Thursday, April 13
...6:15, to be exact. Phew. Early. But that's when Mom's alarm went off for her to get ready for work, and that's what woke me up, so I went ahead and showered and packed and stuff. We were on the road to the Raleigh/Durham airport at 8:00. More fun car trips. :-) We got to the parking garage at the airport and Matt was all excited because it has one of those swirly roads up to the different levels of the garage -- he says you only ever see those in the movies, so he thought it was very cool that we were driving up one. Haha, I love my boyfriend. We went and checked our bag (we just shared my huge suitcase cause it made more sense to do that) -- it was 49 pounds! *whistles* Very heavy. And just under the 50 lb limit, although we didn't really think about that until later... anyway. So then we had to go through the security stuff. I was telling Matt about how I've been stopped and felt up - I mean, searched - a couple times; seems to be just my bad luck. And then (surprise) it happened again. I went through the arch and it beeped, and I swear, they made me take everything off but my clothes and it still beeped at me. They probably thought I had drugs or something. I had to go get frisked while Matt watched me with a look that said he was torn between feeling bad for me and wanting to laugh at me. *sigh* Silly airport things. I wasn't even wearing anything metallic but the hooks on my brastrap (which were setting it off).
Anyway, then we just killed time until our plane left. And by "killed time" I mean I talked to my dad on the phone like 37 times about how our plane was on time, I'd call him in Dallas (where we had a 1.5 hour layover), etc. My poor dad. He gets so anal about stuff like that. Our plane left at a little after 11:00 and we had almost a three-hour flight to Dallas... uneventful, we just read and relaxed. I love flying. I love traveling. :-) So then, in Dallas, we grabbed some lunch and found our gate and just hung out and kept reading. We find out after a bit that our plane's thirty minutes delayed. (It was supposed to leave at 2:30 Dallas time, and had been postponed to 3:03.) So I call my dad (again) and let him know, and he says he'll call Mimi and Papa. Then the flight gets delayed again, till 3:30 this time. Well, we didn't start boarding until around 3:30, at which point the pilot tells us that the reason we were so late was because the plane had had maintenance work done earlier that day and had been playing "catch-up" since then. Well, fine, just get us in the air, already, right? Wrong... apparently the delay had resulted in a seriously undermanned gate because of timing, so after we'd sat on the plane for 20 minutes or so we heard that they hadn't even finished getting the last flight's luggage off of the plane, much less started loading ours. All told, we didn't get in the air until after 4:00, over an hour and a half after we were supposed to. Kind of annoying, really. :-/ But we got to Phoenix safely, which was the important thing, and we even got there in time to drop stuff off at the grandparents' house before going to their church's Maundy Thursday dinner/service with them. We met like the entire congregation, none of whom I really remembered, of course, but Mimi was thrilled to be able to introduce her oldest granddaughter and her boyfriend, so Matt and I didn't mind. Dinner was soup and bread - plain, but yummy. The service was nice, depressing, but nice. I mean, it was Holy Thursday. So what'd you expect. This random woman came and sat next to Papa and Matt and me and when the pastor asked for prayer requests she kept raising her hand and asking for stuff. It was kind of sad, really... she seemed pretty bad off and actually asked for money, without really asking. One of those "I'm in need of money, so please pray that I get some" things. Papa gave her some after the service, which isn't necessarily something I would have done, but then, they have money to spare, so they can afford to be generous. When Mimi introduced us to her choir buddies, they came up with the idea that Matt and I should sing with them at the Easter Sunday service, which was kind of unexpected, but of course we were up for it, so Mimi brought the music home for us to look at. It was kind of cool just to be asked to sing with them like that. :-)
After the service we went to my cousins' house to say hi, and so Matt got to meet Kathy and the kids (Vince, Stephen, and Sarah). Stephen, Sarah, and Kathy all played the piano for us, which was cool. We didn't stay long cause the kids had school on Friday, but it was nice to see them. (Brian hadn't yet gotten back in town from one of his two-week business trips to Asia. Crazy.) Then we just went back to the grandparents' house. They have a pool in the back, with a view onto a really pretty golf course, and they're in the foothills of the small mountain range in Phoenix, so the vista is really gorgeous. We spent the evening out by the pool (we were both in suits, but I opted not to get in after Matt jumped in and, teeth chattering, tried to convince me that it wasn't cold), just talking and relaxing. Matt started reading Forrest Gump to me (we read to each other, it's just something we both enjoy) and was reading in a voice pretty similar to the Tom Hanks version, and my Papa stood at the door and watched for a little bit, looking really confused. It was very funny to me -- very embarrassing for poor Matt when I told him later, haha. :-) But such a great beginning to the weekend. Wow. Arizona = beautiful. My family = absolutely great. Matt = amazing. Kira = happy girl. :-)

More to come later....

ps. props to Karen for having FOUR SOLOS in her Chamber Singers concert this Friday night! Sorry I can't be there, Karen...
pps. FUtones/Improv show this Friday at 5:00 in Burgess. :-) In Greenville? Come on by!

blah

Lack of sleep is beginning to seriously affect my mood.

And I am not a fan.

We were talking about high school theatre in Playwriting today -- actually, Ian asked Doug about it and Doug was talking about it. That's the way he works -- he'll talk for ten minutes about something and you don't really discuss it, you just let him talk and then if he wants to discuss you can, but generally he moves on to something else. Which is usually okay with me because I tend to agree with Doug. But today I really didn't and wanted to say something, and never got the chance and it bothered me.

Doug said that he thinks no one under 18 should perform "serious" theatre. By which he meant difficult plays like Shakespeare, O'Neill, etc. The specific question was whether high schools could pull off The Glass Menagerie. And he said they should never even try, because they're too young. It's not going to work because you have to have someone older playing specific roles. Which is also, I think, the idea behind casting Jay, a professor, as Prospero in The Tempest. With which I completely, entirely, with every fiber of my being, disagree. Part of the joy of high school and college theatre is the opportunity to play roles like Prospero -- the majority of high school and college actors will never get that chance ever again. Part of the study of the craft is taking roles that are literally impossible for you to play and performing them to the best of your ability anyway. Doug's idea about teaching theatre at the high school level is to focus on the basics of theatricality, to stick to improvisation and technique, to do smaller, easier stuff, rather than to study the difficult shows and attempt greatness with the talent you have. And I couldn't think he was more wrong. I think that to say "we don't have the budget or the range of talent to perform a musical the way it should be done, so we just won't even try" is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. In an academic environment there will NEVER be an equality of talent, and that's something you need for any show. I have yet to see a show here at Furman that had an equality of talent, or that was performed to the best of our ability. Because when you cast student actors according to who is the best for each role, you end up cutting out some of the students who are less talented or less experienced -- making better shows, but not teaching as much. So a good university theatre department should focus on not only casting well, but casting responsibly, so that actors also work on other aspects of theatre and so that less talented but equally intelligent/passionate students get their chance onstage. And as far as I'm concerned, that means not casting professors in the shows.

*climbs down off of soapbox*

Sorry. I've just been really missing the theatre recently, and thinking about why I felt like I had to give it up, and that juxtaposition of FU theatre's ideas and mine has a lot to do with me dropping the major.

Sigh.

Gorgeous day, and I'm stuck in the RA office again. Someone up there hates me.

I wanna go home...

Countdown

Life is weird.

Have you noticed that? I mean, life is just crazy, nuts, stick you in a straightjacket and hang you out to dry strange. And sometimes I feel like I don't belong.

I had my interview for the foreign study trip to Italy today, and it went as well as it possibly could have, but I don't think I'm going to get to go. Not because I don't deserve to as much as (or more than) the other people who applied... it's just a feeling I have. They asked me questions about the most random stuff... I mean, I was expecting "can you eat these foods", "have you ever been to italy", "why this trip instead of another one", etc. And I got asked if I would mind if my roommate drank while we were there. And I mean... I know that there are definitely people, especially here at Furman, who would be seriously upset by a roomie who was drinking. But I really don't care. I mean, I'll probably want to go out and drink sometimes, since I can in Italy, especially if other people are going, so I can't really get upset about it. And so I said, you know, of course not, I wouldn't care, it doesn't matter. And all of the questions kind of went that way. I was just really easygoing about all of it and I felt more like I was being interviewed about rooming situations than about the actual trip, which wasn't really what I had expected... I don't know. I'm way overanalyzing this interview, I know. It's mostly because I have not gotten enough sleep this weekend AT ALL. And so I'm inclined to assume the worst about stuff. And I really ought to just forget about it, now that it's over. I'll hear about it after Easter so I should put it out of my head until then.

Should.

My life seems to be a series of countdowns recently. There's the countdown till Wednesday night, when I get to go home for a night before heading out to Arizona for Easter. There's the countdown till *whenever* next week when I'll find out about the foreign study trip. There's the countdown till beach weekend. (Gah. That's a scary countdown. I need to start my diet like... yesterday.) There's the countdown till the FUtones/Madrigals spring concert. The countdown till graduation.... that's another scary one.

I wonder, sometimes, if the Madrigals are going to stick around after I graduate. I really want them to. But I'm not sure how to ensure that it happens. I guess all I can do is keep at it while I'm here and keep my fingers crossed. I'm discovering that I'm not the kind of person who likes things to be taken out of my hands. So that countdown, though it's a looooong way away, is also scary.

Talked to one of the girls on the hall today about her life before Furman and how sheltered so many students here are. It was a really interesting discussion. Scary to think how out of touch with reality most of us are. Or rather, how out of touch with other people's realities. I can count on one hand the number of people here who know certain things about my background that don't really fit in with the cookie cutter Furman student, and that's not because they're my only friends, it's just because there are very few people here that I would trust to understand where I come from.

I like it here, but I've become a much less outspoken, outgoing person since I've come to Furman. And I don't know if I'm a fan of the new me.

I really want certain stressors in my life to just leave me alone. Some of them are my own fault and some of them are things I can't control, and I want all of them to go away. It really bothers me that I have to walk on eggshells with certain people and in certain situations, and I'm so damn tired of it that I've come real close to making some real bad decisions about how to handle it. I don't even know who reads this thing, but if you've helped me through some of those near-misses then thanks. And you should know who you are. :-)

I hope Phoenix is fun. I really want some fun.