I offered Ron an apple today and he did what I, for lack of a better term, am going to call the apple twist game. You know it. You have some girl you're interested in, and you convince the apple it's meant to be by twisting the stem off as you recite the alphabet. When the stem comes off and it happens to be on the first letter of the girl's name (or, if you're desperate, her last name, or middle name, or any of the letters in her name or that make you think of her name...) then you know it's true love.
That's kinda how my week has started, only my twisting has met with a lot of resistance. Now that I'm in Advanced Chinese, I realized that I really don't want to take Chinese any more. I started taking Chinese freshman year because I hated Spanish but thought cultured people should learn another language and study abroad. So I learned Chinese and went to China, and had crazy experiences and sucked at Chinese in decreasing amounts for seven months. And now I'm back and I can have a brief conversation with any Chinese guy I meet at the pool. I can impress my language partners because they don't know an American with as good of Chinese as mine. I can talk about Chinese culture and life.
And I'm still horrible at Chinese. Some people ask me if I want to go back, but right now when I think of going back I dread not being able to say anything. This sounds silly, and I might've said it before, but in America any word I can think of I know the word for. "Drowning"? It's "drowning." "Recoil"? It's "recoil." "Magical"? I know that one, too. Taking another year of Chinese would make a dent in what's left to cover, but not enough for me to set a goal to do it. I don't think there's anything to be gained by continuing.
I haven't done anything drastic, although Dan urged me to. I get to withdraw penalty-free from two classes every 60 credits and I'm seriously considering withdrawing from both my Chinese classes. Culture class is a waste of time, and I'm coming into language class a month behind. If anyone has any wisdom, speak now or forever hold your peace.
And with that matrimonial phrase, I return to the apple twist game. I remember when I was little I liked some girl whose name started with 'e'. My twisting skills weren't highly developed at that point, though, and the stem didn't come off when I got to 'e.' So I kept twisting, subconsciously making my fingers slip so it had an air of legitimacy when I finished the alphabet, came back to 'e', and broke the stem. "Wow," I thought. "It's meant to be." I think in some way this is a good analogy for my life right now.
Before I end this post, I wanted to mention a few housekeeping issues. First, I've decided to start labeling my posts, so when you visit the real website and not the Facebook version, you can sort all my posts by the labels. So any post where I've used a fake name you can see already catalogued with the "fake names" label. Or entries in which I talk about entries (or almost blow up my house) under "housekeeping." And so on.
Also, my blog has Gator colors now. In fact, I looked up on UF's website what the official hex codes were so I'd get the color right. Links, even to my old blog, have yet to appear in the sidebar because life is too stressful for that. Next twist, please.
Showing posts with label housekeeping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label housekeeping. Show all posts
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Fall Cleaning, Part 1 and 2
This story has two parts. First, Dan and I decided to clean. Then, we decided to clean some more. Read further and you'll see what I mean.
Dan and I have a problem saying no to things. Over the course of the two years we've been roommates, we've acquired lots of stuff that we don't use.
Like pots:
Keep in mind, there are only two of us. This picture isn't a close-up because we wanted to focus on the counter full of pots, it's because that's how far you can back up in our kitchen.
So Dan and I toss things out with abandon (literally) into a to-Goodwill box or two. Exotic spices, years-old food coloring, insect repellant. "Have you ever used this?" I asked Dan about a pound of sea salt he was storing on the top shelf.
"No, but I will. Really."
"Good, because otherwise we should just throw it out now."
We moved things that we wanted to keep but wouldn't use (like a salt and pepper shaker set from Dan's deceased grandmother) to the private clutter of our room. For example, out of the twenty plus knives we had piled up at one point, only five made the cut. But Dan and I both couldn't part from our knife sets complete with the block of wood you stick the knives into.
Eventually we finished throwing things out and I left for the evening. While I was gone, I got a text. "You might want the bug spray after all..." it said ominously. What did that mean? Was there a colony of ants in an undusted corner? But then I got home and saw that Dan had taken the idea of use-it-or-you-lose-it seriously:
So Dan and I camped out in the tent two nights ago.
And so the first cleaning was finished, and part two begins. I'll start with the "after" picture so you don't worry that our house burned down. We're trying to look penitent but have way too much adrenaline from not being dead:
But then Dan and I were talking last night about how when you feel in a rush all the time, watching a flame is good for tranquility. Dan took a pan lid from the to-Goodwill pile, found the birthday candles we had thrown away, and we discovered the joy of fire. For several candles-worth.
Then we realized that all the olive oil we were donating to Goodwill would be a good addition. We were disappointed that no matter how we swished the various oils around, they didn't light on fire. "I thought oil was flammable," Dan mused to himself as we moved on to the lighter fluid I usually reserve for my juggling torches.
The lighter fluid gave a nice effect because it sat on the top and gave a small lake of fire:
The problem was that the lighter fluid diluted the mixture so much that the wax wouldn't congeal again. The solution, of course, was to transfer our concoction to a to-Goodwill pot and heat it up. All the excess would boil off, and we'd have a wax factory on our hands.
When it started smoking, I guessed that something was wrong. "Dan, we should turn the stove off. I don't know why it would smoke like that." We decided I was overreacting and I just moved to turn the heat down.
Then either I jostled the pot or the heat finally got to the solution, because it erupted in flames. When I say flames I don't mean baby coming-out-of-a-lid flames. These flames were at least a foot high and had smoke pouring through the house like they couldn't advertise our disaster fast enough.
This did not help our tranquility. I suggested suffocating the fire with a lid, but we rushed it and only covered half the fire. Dan took out the fire extinguisher.
"Dan, that's a bad idea. It's going to blow everything away!"
But in the heat of the moment, we canned my "use a lid" idea and Dan just opened fire with the fire extinguisher. Flaming oily wax splattered all over the walls that had just been repainted this summer, leaving half the mix still in the pan. I used the lid again, contained the fire, and brought the pan outside, where it suffocated in peace away from our house. And so we decided to do some fall cleaning, again:
The picture is foggy from the smoke. Don't play with matches, kids.
Dan and I have a problem saying no to things. Over the course of the two years we've been roommates, we've acquired lots of stuff that we don't use.
Like pots:
Keep in mind, there are only two of us. This picture isn't a close-up because we wanted to focus on the counter full of pots, it's because that's how far you can back up in our kitchen.
So Dan and I toss things out with abandon (literally) into a to-Goodwill box or two. Exotic spices, years-old food coloring, insect repellant. "Have you ever used this?" I asked Dan about a pound of sea salt he was storing on the top shelf.
"No, but I will. Really."
"Good, because otherwise we should just throw it out now."
We moved things that we wanted to keep but wouldn't use (like a salt and pepper shaker set from Dan's deceased grandmother) to the private clutter of our room. For example, out of the twenty plus knives we had piled up at one point, only five made the cut. But Dan and I both couldn't part from our knife sets complete with the block of wood you stick the knives into.
Eventually we finished throwing things out and I left for the evening. While I was gone, I got a text. "You might want the bug spray after all..." it said ominously. What did that mean? Was there a colony of ants in an undusted corner? But then I got home and saw that Dan had taken the idea of use-it-or-you-lose-it seriously:
So Dan and I camped out in the tent two nights ago.
And so the first cleaning was finished, and part two begins. I'll start with the "after" picture so you don't worry that our house burned down. We're trying to look penitent but have way too much adrenaline from not being dead:
But then Dan and I were talking last night about how when you feel in a rush all the time, watching a flame is good for tranquility. Dan took a pan lid from the to-Goodwill pile, found the birthday candles we had thrown away, and we discovered the joy of fire. For several candles-worth.
Then we realized that all the olive oil we were donating to Goodwill would be a good addition. We were disappointed that no matter how we swished the various oils around, they didn't light on fire. "I thought oil was flammable," Dan mused to himself as we moved on to the lighter fluid I usually reserve for my juggling torches.
The lighter fluid gave a nice effect because it sat on the top and gave a small lake of fire:
The problem was that the lighter fluid diluted the mixture so much that the wax wouldn't congeal again. The solution, of course, was to transfer our concoction to a to-Goodwill pot and heat it up. All the excess would boil off, and we'd have a wax factory on our hands.
When it started smoking, I guessed that something was wrong. "Dan, we should turn the stove off. I don't know why it would smoke like that." We decided I was overreacting and I just moved to turn the heat down.
Then either I jostled the pot or the heat finally got to the solution, because it erupted in flames. When I say flames I don't mean baby coming-out-of-a-lid flames. These flames were at least a foot high and had smoke pouring through the house like they couldn't advertise our disaster fast enough.
This did not help our tranquility. I suggested suffocating the fire with a lid, but we rushed it and only covered half the fire. Dan took out the fire extinguisher.
"Dan, that's a bad idea. It's going to blow everything away!"
But in the heat of the moment, we canned my "use a lid" idea and Dan just opened fire with the fire extinguisher. Flaming oily wax splattered all over the walls that had just been repainted this summer, leaving half the mix still in the pan. I used the lid again, contained the fire, and brought the pan outside, where it suffocated in peace away from our house. And so we decided to do some fall cleaning, again:
The picture is foggy from the smoke. Don't play with matches, kids.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Here's the Kick Off
Let's face it. I'm back from China and my mom and at least two other people have said that I should keep blogging. I did have a fantastically well-received blog (for a day at least), but I think it's more that blogging is just a hard habit to break. I still go through the day storing up anecdotes but don't have any release for them.
Nevertheless, there are some changes from my blog about being in China. The most notable from my side is that I will be able to actually visit my own blog. Something about America and freedom of expression. Other than that, though, is the fact that people in America speak English. And if I write about them, they can read it. So I have to be careful not to make knowing me a liability. (If I had a problem learning people's names before, I predict it's going to get worse, because now I'm going to be making up a lot of names.)
This blog, to be updated roughly every other day, is geared toward everyone. For convenience, I divide that into "old geezers" and "geezers-to-be." As a college student, I am a geezer-to-be, and if you haven't even heard of Numa Numa then you're an old geezer.
For us geezers-to-be, I will include pop culture references. But for the old geezers, I'll try to explain them. Did you catch the Relient K allusion? Not if you're not a real fan. (Alternate lyrics to Kick Off provided here:
Here's the kick off
Hope you're not sick of
Will's blogging way
Or all the posts he made
Cuz then you'll wanna click a different page!
(duhn duhn duhn dun, dun, boww)
I encourage you to sing along while listening to the YouTube'd version.)
Other housekeeping matters: I intend to import these blog entries as Facebook notes. When I do that, I won't know how many people read my blog because Facebook won't tell me how many people are just reading it on their site. But why have a smaller audience just so I can count the smallness? Comment to let me know you're there, because it makes me feel happy. And otherwise it's practically eavesdropping, and that's not polite. I'm willing to comment now, too. I don't know why I thought the narrator should be so haughty in my last blog.
I'll link to other people's blogs, and make it look less ugly. But not tonight. Right now I have some math proofs to do.
This is college life. Go Gators! And get excited, because Will has a blog.
Nevertheless, there are some changes from my blog about being in China. The most notable from my side is that I will be able to actually visit my own blog. Something about America and freedom of expression. Other than that, though, is the fact that people in America speak English. And if I write about them, they can read it. So I have to be careful not to make knowing me a liability. (If I had a problem learning people's names before, I predict it's going to get worse, because now I'm going to be making up a lot of names.)
This blog, to be updated roughly every other day, is geared toward everyone. For convenience, I divide that into "old geezers" and "geezers-to-be." As a college student, I am a geezer-to-be, and if you haven't even heard of Numa Numa then you're an old geezer.
For us geezers-to-be, I will include pop culture references. But for the old geezers, I'll try to explain them. Did you catch the Relient K allusion? Not if you're not a real fan. (Alternate lyrics to Kick Off provided here:
Here's the kick off
Hope you're not sick of
Will's blogging way
Or all the posts he made
Cuz then you'll wanna click a different page!
(duhn duhn duhn dun, dun, boww)
I encourage you to sing along while listening to the YouTube'd version.)
Other housekeeping matters: I intend to import these blog entries as Facebook notes. When I do that, I won't know how many people read my blog because Facebook won't tell me how many people are just reading it on their site. But why have a smaller audience just so I can count the smallness? Comment to let me know you're there, because it makes me feel happy. And otherwise it's practically eavesdropping, and that's not polite. I'm willing to comment now, too. I don't know why I thought the narrator should be so haughty in my last blog.
I'll link to other people's blogs, and make it look less ugly. But not tonight. Right now I have some math proofs to do.
This is college life. Go Gators! And get excited, because Will has a blog.
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