Possible Explanations for (ex)Boyfriend's Disappearance
After two and a half weeks of no word—including him ignoring my emails and phonecalls, hanging up on me twice, and finally sending one text message saying he'd call (heh)—I feel I can safely assume I am no longer in a relationship. Below are my possible explanations for his behavior, listed roughly in order of preference. Feel free to contribute more.
1. Dead
2. In coma
3. Hit by bus: amnesia
4. Got back together with evil man-eating ex-girlfriend
5. Went undercover for CIA: prohibited from contacting subversives
6. Cyborg: actually, not just figuratively, heartless
7. Decided it'd be fun to try to ruin someone's holidays
8. Just another coward
(. . . I of course don't really want it to be any of those. I wish there were some rational, valid reason for a sweet guy to suddenly turn into a cruel wall of silence. But there doesn't seem to be much hope for that at this point.
Oh well. I'd rather receive humorous suggestions to add to my list than expressions of sympathy or outrage. Though I won't necessarily turn down knee-breaking schemes ; )
at midnight mass—surrounded by cheerfully grotesque christmas sweaters, trying to remember the names of people i went to high school with as they walked by for communion.
Evening
on the mississippi river bridge, headed into baton rouge from a day with relatives—venus and a sliver of moon set in a silver grey sky above thin winter clouds and the rusty colors of sunset.
Now
at my parents' computer (stupid dial-up)—cold fingers, headache. christmas doesn't seem like a fair time to have to give up hope on anything or anyone.
Ah, holidays. Holidays are great times to get in touch with people you haven't talked to in a while. Y'know... maybe let them know what's been going on and why they haven't heard from you. You'd be amazed how you can make someone's day with just a phonecall or an email or a messenger pigeon—lifts that thin layer of gloom right off what should be a nice, relaxing break. They will appreciate it, believe me.
Done done done! Sent off the Berkeley stuff and lived through the Peace Corps interview—the local recruiter has nominated me to the Dallas office, who do the nominating and inviting from here on out.
At the end of the interview, I was given four choices of very vague program options to rank in order of preference: my top choice is a forestry & ag extension assignment in Africa, described as "Urban/periurban agriculture. French is more important than experience. Experience in tree propogation, agroforestry, fruit tree grafting, and awareness raising preferred." "Periurban"? "Fruit tree grafting"? Sign me up!
My second-ranked choice, however, wins the specific-yet-still-totally-vague award: "Forestry extension. Interest in beekeeping, gardening, formal/nonformal education, youth/sports activities, income generation, HIV/AIDS prevention, gender issues."
I've had fun theorizing about the possible jobs for this one—teaching poor female bees with AIDS how to play soccer in a garden? Beekeeper suits as HIV prevention for women gardeners who play badminton for money?
Anyhow, all that was followed by wine and cheese and then cookie baking and then what I would say was a very successful party, judging by the ridiculous quantity of beer and liquor bottles covering every surface in our house this morning.
Yet still so far... My academic semester is now officially over—the RTF screening was this evening at 5pm. Daniel and I "finished" Big Chicken at, oh, say 4:15 or so. Watching it in a room full of people wasn't nearly as painful as I expected. They laughed at the right times and even gasped at the right times. Thank you to Maryann and Kathryn for attending and providing much-needed moral support.
The exciting part is that tomorrow I not only have to whip a finished Berkeley application out of my butt but also have to sound competent and enthusiastic for my Peace Corps interview, when all I really want to do is curl up in bed with a book/movie/beer/warm body and never ever leave.
But then, c'est fini. And drinks will be drunk and cookies made and parties partied come Tuesday night. Huzzah.
Don't they tell you in language classes that you know you're fluent when you dream in the language you're studying?
I dreamt about chickens last night.
I had about eight of them. I was trying to keep them in a room with two doors. Then I got down on the floor and coaxed one out of the room through the crack under one door. Then they were all in my car, and I had to make sure that they couldn't jump out the windows.
I have the sneaking suspicion that I conversed with them in English at some point.
I'm trying to decide what exactly fluency in chicken would mean—and whether I want it or not. Only a week of editing left for this semester's project. We'll see.
The DV lab is going to suck my brain dry. We have a "rough cut" due tomorrow... Hopefully "rough" means "totally incoherent and lacking structure and meaning." If not, Daniel and I are gonna be in trouble. Not due to any fault on his part—he's completely saved my ass on this project in the past few weeks and did some mighty fine editing in the process.
The screening for my doc class's final projects will be Sunday the 14th from 5-7pm in CMB 4D. Everyone should come cheer loudly—there should be an interesting variety (everything from possible UFOs in Marfa, Texas, to fire ants to the Aggie bonfire)... plus how can you pass up the chickens? I mean, really.
DaimlerChrysler's Dodge unit is sponsoring a pay-per-view "Lingerie Bowl" during half time of the Super Bowl Feb. 1, that will feature models dressed in lingerie playing a seven-on-seven tackle football game, according to a published report. [...]
"We definitely skewed it male, but that is fine," Eberhardt said. "If all of a sudden we lose female Caravan [minivan] buyers, it would be an issue. I don't think we have."
Good to see they've done a thorough cost-benefit analysis of this one.
