Non-Joyce-esque Stream of Consciousness

Reference to the Very First Post: I, uh, didn't write my senior editorial about caterpillars. But I DID write it about something totally random: pets! And at the end I very forcefully made it into a Life Metaphor (which is appropriate only when done tongue-in-cheek, let me validate). Evidently I made quite a number of people cry over it. I'm rather proud.

Ohmigosh! I'm in college!

Okay. I HAVE to talk about my rhetoric teacher. He is adorable and hilarious. Today I spent most of class staring at his clothes because he was wearing this shirt that fit perfectly with the jeans he was wearing. Is it weird that I notice that? I'm so not attracted to him (given disclaimer). But still. I always notice what people are wearing, and more importantly, how they are wearing it. Every day he wears a button-up shirt rolled up at the arm to right below the elbows and tucked into his pants, which are held up with the same black belt. Today was the first day he hasn't a) tucked in his shirts or b) worn slacks. So casual! I was shocked. He very obviously does not say "like" in his speech (as is appropriate for a Rhetoric and Writing/Philosophy major who is definitely metro), but he replaces it with "sort of." Which he says constantly. He's very interesting, though. He speaks very well and makes interesting points. And he showed us this as an example of needing context. Followed (after a discussion of the previous link) by this. (Duchamp rocks my world. Art is very odd.) Fascinating class.

In other news: my mythology professor thinks that Moby Dick is the greatest American book ever written. I'm so disappointed.

My Biology teacher is Hispanic, I have finally figured out. Not Italian or Spanish. Also, he is very fascinated by plants.

I've been obsessing over my DeviantArt for unknown reasons (read: NEW CAMERA). Posted eight hundred (or maybe fifteen...) new pictures and thus got spammed by cuddlysalmon (this is definitely the weirdest thing that has ever happened to me) (other than... the rest of my life). No idea who I was talking to. DeviantArt is fascinating. My pictures aren't great, but whatever. That's why I'm signed up for a photojournalism class in the fall. I can't wait!

I'm rambling a lot. I have nothing in particular to talk about. Books! How about books? I love books!

Books I've read recently. The Goose Girl is excellent. I read it about a year (???) ago, from 11 pm to 2 am in the morning one night (morning one night? ... whatever) because it was awesome and I literally couldn't put it down. Shannon Hale is an intuitive writer. Enna Burning wasn't as good, though. I might not have finished it, actually; I became sort of disinterested. I mean, it was much better than, you know, most other books in the world, but it was just sort of... I don't even know. It went on and on and was dramatic and she overdid characters in that book and it bugged me. I don't like when characters understand each other too well, which leads me to My Life As A Rhombus, a pretty excellent book about abortion/the suckageness of being a teenager/dealing with parents-who-don't-understand, but the characters just worked too well with each other. They were too nice, too mean, or too perfectly in love or in hate. It got irritating. Next, Catherine Fisher, The Oracle Betrayed, and its sequel, The Sphere of Secrets. Terrible titles; insert old adage about "not judging a book by its cover." Quite good. Once more with the sequel not being as good (hate it when it that happens). Also, there was that old problem with a series of books that never ends. It never says, in the fronts of the Oracle books, that it is going to be a trilogy or a duet or a quartet, or... whatever Harry Potter was (septet?)... It just goes on... and on... and on... maybe... None of the villains have died yet, which makes all of the successes watered down. But Alexos is a cool character. The god in general is quite well done, actually. And Mirany is just antisocial enough. Read an Avi book, Nothing But the Truth, which was depressing, Is He Or Isn't He?, which should have been good but was instead just a stereotypical gay book (I HATE the fruity hand-flip paisely-wearing fashion-obsessed gay man SO MUCH), and Are We There Yet?, which is a Levithan novel and thus superlative in every way shape and form. That man can write. He gets the Moment idea, the concept that we're all living for the split amazing second. He describes people as they move, not as they sit, and imagines the scope of things through his character's eyes. What an individual sees, how each individual sees it. All different. Each different.

Then I read Feed. I don't want to talk about it. Man, just thinking about that book makes me depressed. I nearly deleted my Facebook because of it.

Nerd time. Goals for college/life:
• Make only two B's per semester in any non-liberal arts classes. Only A's are acceptable in liberal arts classes.
• Get an internship with a publishing company.
• Do undergraduate research.
• Graduate with an English major, Digital Arts and Media certificate, journalism major/minor, possible rhetoric and writing major/minor, possible evolutionary biology minor.
• Go to an excellent graduate school.
• Write a book already.

I've talked too long. Homework now. Laurel out.