Saturday, December 22, 2012

First Pair of Socks!

So I've been knitting for a while, but until this last week had never made a sock. It's not that it's so challenging to make a sock, it's more that I didn't have the right equipment. Then this summer I got some more double pointed needles and suddenly, socks were within my grasp. I made some attempts at making a sock while at school, but I kept putting it aside and pulling it out to discover that the stitches had all slipped off while I was neglecting it. So I decided to wait until I was home for winter break.

I got home and then I did it. I made a sock!
The aforementioned sock.
Then I started to make a mate for this sock.
The progress of sock number 2.

For comparison.

This particular yarn is very thin and I got a little bored. I decided that I wanted to knit some socks that wouldn't take as long. I looked through my stash and found I had some wool yarn I could use. Long story short, I now have a pair of knitted woolen socks.
The pair on their own.

And on my feet.

Another angle of them on my feet.
So yeah, socks. I can make those now.

Wednesday, December 5, 2012

Worst Hot Chocolate Ever

I don't drink coffee, and I don't like most teas. My hot beverage of choice is hot chocolate, which is why I get sad when I drink bad hot chocolate. Normally it's just a disappointment. Then there are nights like last night.

I ordered my hot chocolate in a to go cup.
The evil cup.
I left the cafe and took a sip. BLAM! The lid popped off and spilled onto my shirt.
That's the stain. It didn't actually photograph well, but it was noticeable to  people who saw me.
The only saving grace about spilling my hot chocolate on myself? It was less "hot chocolate" and more "warm milk that vaguely tastes like chocolate if you really taste carefully". So I didn't get burned, and the stain could have been worse.

I think the anger at spilling it on myself is what made me take a while to realize that it didn't taste, well, like hot chocolate.

I'm still looking for an explanation as to why I ended up drinking the whole thing.
You can actually see the lack of chocolate-y ness.

Monday, December 3, 2012

Keeping the Weirdness Close


My standard answer when someone asks "where's so-and-so?" is to very casually say "Oh, I killed him and threw him in a ditch". 

This happened at dinner and my friends proved why they're my friends. They responded like this:

Friend 1: *nods approvingly*

Friend 2: "Approved."

Friend 3: "Sounds reasonable."

Later I was walking down the hall and heard someone I didn't know say "Where's my roommate?" I came so close to saying, "I killed her and threw her in a ditch" BUT I DIDN'T! I stopped myself from confusing some poor girl.

I feel I deserve a cookie. 
I tried to take a picture of myself eating the cookie but it turned out...less than flattering.
It was a yummy cookie. 

Monday, November 26, 2012

2 Nice People and a Crazy

I flew back to school yesterday, which meant spending time in the airport. I like airports. They're like magical inbetween places. Still, you don't always want to spend all your time there. Which is why, when I saw that there was a flight that left 2 hours before the one I was scheduled to be on, I wanted on.

I started at the check-in desk, where I met the first nice person. One of the airline employees offered to help me by showing me how to try and switch on the self-check in machine. Unfortunately the earlier flight didn't show up. She explained it was probably full, but maybe I could talk to someone at the gate and get on stand-by. I said good-bye and went through security.

There wasn't anyone at the gate, so I went to the airline lounge thing to talk to an employee. He looked up the flight but unfortunately I wasn't able to switch onto it. Then he did something that made him into nice person number 2. Without me even asking, he started looking to see if he could switch me into a better seat on my plane (he couldn't, my flight was over booked, but still very nice of him).

I went off, wondering what I would do (other than homework) for the next 3 hours in the airport. Then I saw the bookstore. In I went. And that's where I heard the crazy lady. A girl in the bookstore was there with her mother. She asked the mom to get her a particular book and the mom turned her down, claiming the book looked "too mature" for her child. They then left. I looked over at the abandoned book. It was titled "Middle School: Worst Years of my Life". The girl was 9 at the youngest. Yeah, a book about middle school is way too mature for your fourth grader. As I said, crazy lady.

Sunday, November 18, 2012

Impromptu Broadway Melody

There are people in the hallway who've been singing random Broadways songs (with varying quality and accuracy) for about 10 minutes now. They started with "Omigod You Guys" from Legally Blonde, but have since focused mainly on songs from Rent, "One Song Glory" "Season of Love" and they just finished "Take Me or Leave Me". I strongly suspect alcohol is involved.

I've also been really strongly tempted to join in on the singing. Seriously, the only reason I'm not annoyed by this group of people is that I like/somewhat know the songs they're singing.

Okay they're singing something new now and I don't recognize it. A google search of the lyrics I can make out strongly implies that it's "Out Tonight" also from Rent.

Okay, they're singing something else now, but I don't know what it is. Other people are also being loud, so I can't make out enough of the lyrics to google it.

Ooh, someone just asked them to be quiet because it's after quiet hours. Fun fact, it's not. Quiet hours start an hour later on Friday and Saturday nights, so they could still be loud for another 48 minutes if they wanted to.

And that seems to be the end of this little variety show.

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

A True Snow Story (aka first snow of the season)

Last night we got our first snowfall here at school. I was very excited. I put on my coat and scarf and walked down from my dorm to the campus convenience store, for a walk in the snow (plus a snack). On the way there I ran into some girls who asked me to take their picture in the snow (Spoiler alert: I did). I went in and got my snack.

I walked back outside marveling in the snow.

Then I heard an odd sound. I look towards the frat quads and saw movement. The sound was getting closer. Snippets such as "This was a bad idea!" and "Why are we doing this?" became clear.

I saw the movement become more clear as it developed into the shape of four boys running in my direction. I stepped to the side of the sidewalk. As they got closer one thing became very clear. They were not wearing clothes. They were running in the snow in underpants and sneakers. And loudly yelling while they did it.

They ran past me, got to me dorm, turned around and ran back, passing me again.

The best part is that while I certainly wasn't expecting to see this, I wasn't exactly surprised by it either. I think college is warping my perception of what normal is.

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

What Dressing Up for Halloween Means in College

It means getting ready a little earlier in the morning because you actually care about what you look like.
My poor rejected bed. How I yearn to sleep in you.
It means being one of two people dressed up in your programming class, the other person being a friend of yours who you encouraged to dress up when she was on the fence about it.

It means being (possibly) the only person dressed up in your religion class.

It also means potentially getting extra credit on your religion midterm. By which I mean your religion professor comes up to you before the test and says the you get extra credit but never making it clear if he actually meant that of not.

It means being one of two people dressed up in your econ class, though this time you and the other dressed-up person don't know each other.

It also means being one of two kids in your econ class to get candy.
That's right suckers! Get it? Suckers? I'm funny, I swear.
It means walking past people and seeing them smile.

It means walking past people and seeing them roll their eyes and give you a look that says, "Really?"

It means people coming up to you and saying they like your costume.

Or at least, that's what it meant for me today.

Happy Halloween!
This is from Saturday. For today I swapped the pumps for pink converse and carried an apple.

Sunday, October 28, 2012

Israel Trip Part 7 (Last Part)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

So the next day was Saturday. Aka, Shabbat. So leaving the hotel before night was a no go. But that's okay. We spent the day together, having some fun by the pool, talking, having a B'nei Mitzvah for the members of out group who wanted to do that in Israel. It was very fun. After the service part we had a party. But not just any party, a 2004-06 ish themed party. Because that's when most of us became B'nei mitzvah at home.


Then night fell. We performed Havdalah. Then we went to the boardwalk.
There was an adorable little pony.

Also shoes. And hats.
 There was a light/water/music show. They projected stuff onto the water. It was really cool.

Then we went off to bed, preparing ourselves for what would be the longest day ever.

It started innocently enough. We went to Tzvat. We toured it and learned its history.


We looked at a synagogue with a super rude modesty checker (We'd been told that girls needed to cover our knees and shoulders, but this guy made us wear shawl to cover our elbows too. Which is fine, if that's their standard but he had such attitude about it.).


Then we went to the coolest candle store ever! Not even a little bit joking here, it was awesome.
This was the shop sign. Are you ready?

Candle.

Also a candle.

Still a candle.

Some candles in the back, with some sweet candlesticks in the front.

BAM! Another candle.

Look how adorable the owl and book candles are!
After the candle store we walked through the city towards the artist colony.


Then we got on the bus. It was mid afternoon at that point. The smart among us napped. The foolish (and me) did not.

We arrived at our final (non-gas station, non-airport) location. We were going rafting. Unfortunately  I have not pictures of this event. Cameras+Water=bad. But we rafted a little down the Jordan river. When we arrived at the campsite at the end we got to partake in a rock climbing wall (I kicked butt), a zipline into the water (it was awesome) and archery(I...could have done better). Then we were able to retrieve our change of clothes from the bus, and get dinner.

After dinner we watched an Israeli comedy movie, while our bus driver slept, powering up to finish our long trek. After the movie our group leaders mocked us with skits (it was okay, we'd done mocking skits a few days earlier as part of an activity).
You can't tell by looking at it, but they were being hilarious.

Still being funny. Still can't really tell from the picture.
After that we got on the bus and drove to the airport. We had a 5 AM flight so we arrived at about 1 AM to the airport. Again, the smart ones slept on the bus, and again, I was not one of the smart ones.

I also didn't really sleep more than an hour on the plane. And the plane ride back was about 12 hours, plus a layover. Basically when I landed and went through customs I had been awake for 35 of the past 36 hours. I was having fun.

Also when I landed in New York, I was greeted by something I'd forgotten existed about 10 days in Israel. Rain. And not just drizzling rain. Super heavy rain. It was refreshing.

Also, because I am smart, I didn't actually go to sleep until about 6-7 hours after I got home because I wanted to wait and go to sleep at a normal time. Dinner with my parents that night was...interesting.

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Israel Trip Part 6

Part 1. Part 2. Part 3. Part 4. Part 5.

So I left off with the group attempting to sleep in a tent in the desert. It was not the best night of sleep ever. Then again, we went to bed after midnight and got up at four in the morning. So, that probably contributed.

Why were we getting up at four in the morning you ask? So that we could climb Masada by sunrise. It would be cooler for the hike up, and we would be able to tour and climb down before the really hot part of the day.

We ascended via the Roman Ramp. It took about 20 minutes. That thing was steep. Like, I enjoy hiking on steep, rocky things and I was a little winded by the end.
The sign for the Roman Ramp.

The view from the Roman Ramp.

The sign for the Byzantine Gate.

And there I am standing in the Byzantine Gate. That smile is the smile of a  person who is glad to not have to climb up a steep ramp anymore.
Once at the top, we rested a little and watched the sun rise.
I literally have 10 pictures of this with the flag blown out different amounts in each one.

I love the reflection of the sun here.

We also ran into a Bar Mitzvah.

After we finished resting we explored a little and looked at the ruins.


Then we climbed down Masada. This time we took the snake path. The snake path was so named because it winds down like a snake. This meant a lot of tight turns, not all of which had great guard railings where you'd want them. It was also just steep enough to be uncomfortable, but not steep enough to feel really steep. Basically it was awkward to walk down. But pretty! you just had to be careful not be distracted and fall. Which no one did!


We got breakfast after that. It was around 9am. Then we went to the Dead Sea.
That's me. Floating. In the Dead Sea. Just floating away.
We then all promptly got out of the Dead Sea and rinsed as thoroughly as possible. We dried off and went to Ein Gedi, where we said goodbye to the Israeli soldiers.
Then we rode a bus for hours and hours to get from the Desert in the south, to Tiberias, in the North.

We spent the night in our final hotel. The next morning we went out and explored the Golan Heights.
Syria is somewhere in here.




Wave hi to Syria again. It's in here somewhere.
We left the Golan Heights and got to stop at a military base. They had tanks and let us take a picture of one. Only one. And only from the front.
There's a picture of me standing on the tank (with other people) but it's blurry.
The next item on the itinerary was the water hike. I have no pictures of this because for some weird reason they don't want you to bring electronics along on water hikes. I will say that the water hike was amazing. It was also followed up by a swim in the Sea of Galilee.

The best part about the Sea of Galilee was swimming in warm water. I'm from the east coast. Our water is cold. And my school's right on a Great Lake. That's also freezing cold. Warm water is nice to swim in.

Anyway... After the Sea of Galilee we dried off and cleaned up for Shabbat.
Part 7! (Final Part)