Our aspirations are wrapped up in books

I read a lot, and consider myself to be very well-read. I don't know if it's especially apparent when you meet me - I don't think I have the self-awareness necessary to make that claim - but it's true. I majored in English not because I wanted to write, but because I wanted someone to tell me what to read! But for all the highfalutin Smart-People Books Read In College (And Beyond) - literature! - that I read, I am a sucker for most mass-consumed things. I get so tired of hearing all the hype for a book that I end up having to go read it, just to see for myself.

This is how I end up reading things like the first book in the Twilight series, multiple Dan Brown books and Eat Pray Love (yes, really). To my own credit, a majority of the time spent with these books involved throwing them against a wall, because Dan Brown seems utterly incapable of writing anything vaguely resembling a sentence. Stephanie Meyer and Elizabeth Gilbert can't do anything remotely literary. To put it simply, these books sucked and I want those hours of my life back. I am still legitimately angry that I spent time reading them several years ago.

Whenever I walked within 30 feet of a bookstore or tried to buy a book online, I found myself constantly barraged by how wonderful and great Stieg Larsson's Millenium Trilogy supposedly was. And thus the internal monologue begins: "Shut up already, it can't be that good." This eventually becomes "....well, they keep getting more popular. What if they are really good? Maybe I should look into this" which becomes "OKAY FINE I'LL READ IT. But I'm buying a real book too."

Crime thrillers are definitely not my thing, as I'm sure you can imagine; I've found them to be just so formulaic and predictable. If need be, they can make a nice "light read". Or, you know, a really annoying one.

And so with all of that in mind, I started The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, expecting mediocrity. Instead I found out that I could not put it down. This book was so well-written, with an unexpected level of depth. There's a lot more than Uncomfortable Romance Between Characters and Intoxicating Plot Twists Involving Corrupt People! I mean, these factors are certainly there, but you won't care. You will read 300-400 pages in what feels like no time. You will be hooked. It's almost addictive. You finish the first one and immediately start the second one. And by the time you finish the second one you just have to read the third one. There's no stopping you. YOU MUST KNOW WHAT HAPPENS, oh my GOD!!

And although the translation is sometimes questionable - Swedish doesn't go into English easily, and a lot of the smaller details can be lost on a non-Swedish reader - the point is very much still there. The feminism driving these books is surprisingly great and very unexpected, too. (Originally the first book was titled Men Who Hate Women, a much better title if you ask me, but I think the translator changed the title so the three books would be consistent).

Please don't misunderstand - they certainly have their flaws. Critically speaking, nothing is perfect. There are definitely philosophical contradictions between two of the main characters which occasionally severely distract from the plot, and there are occasional narrative gaps which muddle things up a bit. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is by far the best out of the three: it exists both within the context of the trilogy and by itself; The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest makes some of the bloated first three hundred pages of The Girl Who Played With Fire totally worth it. It's a necessary concession for later; once the actual plot of Fire gets going, you are hooked all over again.

Accommodating the American

When it comes to grad school, I often feel like a high school senior preparing for college. Everyone wants to know about it, but meanwhile I don't know very much! Yesterday I received my housing information, saying that I have a place to live. I am going to have roommates! I also finally have an arrival date - 18 September. (I am going to have to get used to writing dates "backwards".)

I have to send back my signed Occupancy Agreement and two passport-sized photographs of myself. This is fine except that Strathclyde needs it all by June 29 and I received this information on June 24. There is a rather large ocean in the way, and it seems that all of my mail is getting routed through Sweden, despite the level of inefficiency this would imply.

Because Scotland follows the UK system of education - as they are part of the United Kingdom, after all - they want their postgraduate students to live in "on-campus" housing, in case they need us for something. From what I can tell sight entirely unseen, they are quite similar to The Gables at UNH. (I personally think this is a much better system than the American one, which is kind of along the lines of "Go find somewhere to live! Good luck!", but I could be biased.) I am living in a small, 100-person building in the middle of Merchant City, a 10-minute walk from campus. I will have flatmates, though I'm not sure how many or who they are yet.


welcome to merchant city

I don't understand how addresses work in Scotland, but I'm living on a street simply titled "Candleriggs" - my address is [redacted] Candleriggs, Glasgow, Lanarkshire. Some roads seem to have "Street" suffixes and others do not; Argyle Street has "street" attached while Trongate and Rottenrow East seem to speak for themselves.

It's feeling byzantine

Greetings from my town's public library (the first public library in the nation... aww yeah!) where I am hanging out with Victorian-clad (?) ladies, about an eighth of my high school's graduating class (we're all awkwardly smiling at each other to say hello but all actively pretending we don't know one another), and writing my latest column for The Examiner!

After five years and the left temple of my old glasses breaking not once but twice, I finally got new frames. I am very excited about them, mostly because five years is a long time for glasses, but I don't wear my glasses often. I hope as an early family-bonding exercise my parents took me premature glasses-shopping as a baby - Mom and Dad have awful eyesight too. I can't remember a time before corrective lenses. I've been wearing them since I was 7 - switching to contacts was amazing because it meant I got to wear sunglasses!

Cat Power

In addition to job hunting, writing my columns, avoiding our new Guard-Toad (seriously; he sits on the handle of our fence gate and keeps an eye on things) and my latest keep-myself-occupied project, I have also been cat-sitting for the past few days. I have seen only two out of the three of them, because the third is both epileptic and apparently very shy. As you can imagine, this is totally not a scary thought at all. No way. I am most definitely not worried about the third cat.

I've never had any pets, but I like cats. (My feelings about dogs can be summed up by this. Sorry dog lovers.) What's great about cat-sitting is that you can just show up and hang out for a while with them, and they quietly appreciate the attention. I've been going over there to watch TV with them.

This one is Vache, which means "cow" in French. I hope this was on purpose. Vache is also one of the strangest cats I have ever encountered. His favorite toy is his fur brush, and he likes to walk directly into door frames and fall over. Nevertheless, he is the Cat In Charge. This is his favorite door frame. Sampson, pictured below, is very good despite looking perpetually sad. He likes to sit in this little cardboard magazine box. Zorra is the mysterious one, and therefore I do not have a picture of her.

You know how some people want to come off as normal? This lady was not very good at that. I should point out that I had not met her until a few days ago - she knows my dad, they're friends (this might explain a lot). Either way, she introduced herself with "Now, I'm not a cat lady, don't get me wrong, but THESE ARE MY BABIES." Yes ma'am. She also almost forgot to give me a key to her house; she had to go get a copy made and by 7:30 the night before her trip - wherein her plane was leaving at 8 AM for London - I still didn't have a key. Luckily she dropped one off that night. The crazy factor is definitely there, but the cats are definitely cute.

A Day in the Life

Hello blog friends! I have not forsaken you, I promise. It's just that nothing of extreme interest has happened to me as of late. I was in NH this past weekend; it was great to see many people in a very short span of time. Then I came home and continued to look for a (second?) job.

I also started my next casual research project, which is to prove that the latest Muse album is actually about George Orwell's 1984.

Don't get me wrong, I love being a columnist; it's a lot of fun and gives me an excuse to do things I would normally never do and call it "research" - for example, I watched Game 6 of the NBA finals so I could write this article. I might use it as an excuse to watch all of the World Cup next. However, it's not very lucrative at ALL - I have written 7 articles and made $3.53. I have no idea how people actually make a living as a freelancer. Maybe they don't write for The Examiner. Either way, I'm back to job-hunting. I'm friendly, reliable and smart... anything you throw at me, I will pick up very quickly. Someone please hire me!

An Annotated Diagram of the Freelance Writer

Welcome to Day 1 of Living the English Major Dream! Normally I would be sitting around my house, but I decided to drag myself to my local coffeeshop to work.

Just kidding. I totally don't like lattes. That was black coffee.

EDIT (6:28 PM) my column just went up! you can see it at http://www.examiner.com/x-53217-Boston-Linguistics-Examiner

This is a little story about the best birthday present I have received in a long time

Yesterday was my birthday! Aside from a few books that I've been looking forward to reading, I didn't get anything especially exciting until later in the afternoon.

While sitting around the other night, I went to check my assorted Career-Finding-Website newsletters. Presumably if you have used one of these Find-A-Career Dot-Coms, you are familiar with these e-mails. One of them listed that The Examiner was looking for some columnists for their Society & Culture section. Familiar with The Examiner, I quickly skim the list of available Examiner titles: Linguistics Examiner.

"That's me!" I thought. "I could do that!"

So at 11:30 at night, I throw together a quick article about Twitterspeak and a little blurb about why they should hire me as the Boston-Area Linguist.

I receive one of those "we are now processing your information FOR EVER" e-mails. I don't really think too much about it. The next afternoon - on my birthday - I discover they want to give me the linguistics column! And I will get paid per article! (spoiler alert: probably very little.) AND it'll be a legitimate thing (ahem, Beer Summer.)

To recap: I get to write articles about things I already think about. These articles are then published! With my name attached! Other people will read them (maybe!) And then, I will (presumably) get paid for it. What's up, relevant resume expierence. I don't care any more, really, if I don't have a "real job". I am actually using my degree directly out of college! Not only am I going be a freelance writer, which is every English major's dream, I get to read about linguistics and think about language and THEN I GET TO OPEN THIS DISCUSSION FOR OTHER PEOPLE. I, for one, am excited. I hope you are too.

Slick as an oil spill, baby

I am finally catching up on this whole BP Oil Spill. Apparently this happened in April ... and is still ongoing. Shit.

I wonder how much longer this will continue. I'm nervous though; everyone keeps talking about how much this affects the poor animals (I think by now everyone has seen pictures of the ducks covered in oil) but we're saying much less about the ecosystem. And, we're entirely disregarding how this affects all of us. The United States is very oil dependent; it's going to be a huge problem economically, even though it will create a huge number of jobs for environmental scientists, biologists, zoologists/wildlife ecologists, and chemists. Time will tell if this is The Biggest Oil Spill Ever, but there's been some big ones in the past.

This is what it would look like if the spill was where I live (I live in Southern MA).

Careerealism: My Life In Vignettes

BEER SUMMER: officially cancelled
Asking for a copy of my credit report as "acceptance of our offer" and then refusing to meet me in person means that you not legit. Thanks for playing!

Craigslist.com: The Modern Classifieds
Still sketchy. The more I use Craigslist the less I trust it... but it's kind of ideal for entry-level positions. I just wish that more information was required, like the name of your company. Or at least your field, so I know what I'm getting into.

Another Prospective Job Offer; More Absurd Than The Last One
I answered an ad the other day for a company in a town near mine, but in that vague sort of space wherein I know it is near me but have no idea how to get there. Thinking a 30ish minute commute is reasonable, I send my resume on a whim. That afternoon I get a response inviting me to an interview with them next week (on my birthday, too!). This company is called WOMEN WORKOUT WORLD, it is a "Fitness Spa", and I would be an administrative assistant. The level of amusement this job would promise is, if possible, better than the last one.

Mission Statement of Women Workout World:
We are a community of women committed to your well being. We offer the best in a fitness facility, including our exceptional team of fitness experts, high-end cardio equipment with personal TV’s, strength training equipment, over 40 group fitness classes, a private boxing room, babysitting room staffed by CPR certified childcare professionals, tanning, massage, infrared saunas (as seen on Oprah), and a juice bar! At Women, we understand that you are unique. Our qualified, professional staff can help personalize a fitness program tailored to your specific needs and goals, and are always available to help.

People I could be dealing with directly, all summer long:

there is life after college!

I wish I had some exciting unemployment stories for you, but for the most part I have been sitting around watching episodes of 30 Rock for hours on end, reading a lot, conducting important research on pop songs featuring Ludacris (he's the best part of every single one of them, and believe me, he's featured in a lot of songs) and watching Trending Twitter Topics for new words (did you know that this whole Boston water crisis is called the 'aqua apocalypse'?). Oh, and I've been chased around my house by the most terrifying ants of all time - these fuckers are about 1/3 of an inch long and do not die.

As you can tell, it has been an exciting week and a half of unemployment. But now, through some miracle, I have a job offer!

As I have said before, I have a tendency to have very interesting summers, though entirely by accident. This summer I have an offer to be employed by the Budweiser Corporation, a part of the Anheuser-Busch Companies, as a receptionist in Medford, MA. Yes! You read that correctly: BEER SUMMER.

And it would be fun.

But there is a problem: I got this job through Craigslist, without an interview. They want me to fill out a credit report to prove that I am who I claim to be. This screams SKETCHY! I'm hoping to actually go to Medford and meet these people before I agree to anything. I have 36 hours left on my offer; I hope they get back to me!