My Exploding Cat

Archive for June, 2012

Blog–Augustana Summer College Post #1

I’m at Augustana Summer College right now, taking a class on creative non-fiction writing. Today was their intro day. I packed last night, and arrived at 4:30 this afternoon. Dad took a few minutes to actually find the building, but it was surprisingly easy to locate. There was a convenient map near where we landed, and it seemed like we weren’t too far off.

 

This place is actually pretty nice. The lunch rooms and cafeterias are clean, the campus is landscaped beautifully (there are little forest-y patches everywhere, and the trees incorporated into the landscaping cast everything into necessary shade), and the place is relatively easy to get around. There’s always a map nearby, too. The only thing that’s kind of annoying is that there are pretty much no water fountains, but I don’t really use those anyway because they tend to make me sick—my immune system is pretty bad.

 

The rooms are two-person and not bad as far as space; they’re each connected to a second room, making a suite, and there’s a bathroom in between. The bathrooms are—like I said—clean, and pretty big. Our room is painted beige, and the bathroom is kind of a turquoise color that doesn’t look bad. We even have a window.

 

My roommate’s name is Maria, but she likes to be called Margie. She’s nice and pretty laid-back. The girl in the other half of our suite is called Andrea—she’s cool too. We’re all in the same writing program… I guess the only writing program, since the poetry one got cancelled.

 

I met up with a friend who happened to be going here. His name is Gordon. I had a crush on him back at school, but kind of gave up on trying to get through to him. I mean, I asked him to Spree… he says he freaked out, and couldn’t go anyway because he had a jazz band thing. (That’s a story I know to be true, actually.) The guy’s a huge nerd, and I’m pretty much the female version of that nerd. Except maybe he’s better-read, and I’m better with technology and maybe some kinds of art. (I think. I don’t know about his skills in that department.)

 

The day ran like this.

 

First, we arrived, and found the building; there were some people going in, so we knew where the entrance was. There was a big room that looked a lot more crowded than it actually was. I filled out a form, handed over some very important-looking papers to (fortunately) the right person, and collected some sheets that feel like the ones you get in hospitals. Dad and I went up to the second floor, where my room is right by the elevator—awesome!

 

I wanted to set down the suitcases and go look for the tour guide who would lead the tours we were going on in a few minutes, but Dad wanted to put the sheets on the bed “because there were two of us.” As there were two beds—one high, one low—and my roommate hadn’t showed up yet, I wanted to wait a little until she got here before unpacking and forcing her into the other bed. But Dad kept pushing for me to take the lower bed, in case I fell out of it. I finally let him tuck the sheets over the lower bed to keep him quiet.

 

Then we went on the tour: long walks around hilly areas, and over a lot of steps and curves. I know my way around now, but during the tour, the parents lagging behind us were being obnoxious and complaining constantly about the stairs and hills, which weren’t actually that bad. I was a little footsore and in need of a drink near the end, but they made a huge deal out of the stairs from the first staircase. Their kids were nearly as bad, jabbering at each other all the way. The jock in the group made a very big point of convincing us that he was a jock, asking if the weight rooms were open, running up and down hills for no reason, and talking about his weight room experiences. The tour guide was a foreign student from Serbia, but spoke perfect English. His name was Vuke (sp?). In Serbian it apparently means “wolf.”

 

… I didn’t finish this part of the post, because I was trying to fall asleep on a nasty dorm mattress. I didn’t get to sleep until 3:00 in the morning, and since I’m using my newly downloaded Hamlet eBook as a sleeping aid, much of that time was spent thinking in iambic pentameter… involuntarily… even when it had nothing to do with the book…

I had trouble finding the right building for my first class (along with needing to go back to my dorm for my computer, which I’d left in the room to charge). I was told it was across the street from Old Main, a really impressive-looking building that was easy to spot. Impressive and also big. This meant that there were three different buildings that could be considered across from Old Main, and I had issues finding the right one while I was already late due to going back for my comp. Aaarrgh.

Apart from that, the food is really good here and the campus is actually very beautiful and shady. I spent most of today exploring and climbing trees. It was fun. There are so many potential nooks and crannies that one might be able to hide in–the place is really introvert-friendly. Also, the number of students is fewer than that of my high school… meaning the place is either pretty selective or not that sought after. Don’t know which. But they have a five-story library, so it’s going on my potential-college list.

More updates later. I’ll probably check out the pool or something tomorrow. Actually, maybe not tomorrow–the Hogwarts program is playing Quidditch tomorrow and that’s something I’ve GOT to see.

A political comic

Political commentary on Obama in relation to businesses.

This is why we don’t have jobs, folks.

(And guys? Unemployment hasn’t actually gone down. People have just stopped looking for jobs, period. -_-)

Click it to see it. It’s kind of funny. It has a French Fry carton with a cat face on it.

New Page: The Scrap Box

If you’ve been here recently, you might have noticed that one of the tabs at the top wasn’t there yesterday. The Scrap Box is a brand-new page filled with assorted… well, scrap writing. Or scrapped writing. All sorts of stuff that wasn’t important or finished enough to be put on MyExplodingCat: my idea records, for instance, or developed ideas that formed first chapters and nothing more. Quick stuff. A section with my poems will show up soon, too, but there aren’t very many of those.

Anyway, check it out here.

Poem: Potion

Potion

It winds, it works into the flesh

It seeps into your skin

For potency, we keep it fresh

The potion’s sinking in

 

You’ve no control of what it does

No choice but to allow

The liquid scare will make you buzz

And furrow up your brow

 

So sit and wait, no turning back

There’s nothing else to do!

It might just fill in what you lack

Or it might poison you

 

Within your cells occurs a change

And what, then, will we find?

Experiments that may derange

But could strengthen a mind!

 

Don’t just sit in the corner, then!

The taste is nice and brisk!

Go take a vial, you know you can!

Or won’t you take the risk?