About the evangelicals near my hometown.

The really ridiculous thing about them, and about evengelicals in general, is that they don't seem to notice or care that they're often preaching to the choir. When I was a devout Catholic this annoyed me in New York City. The evengelicals would come up for a weekend to convert all the heathens in the city. I paid no attention to them because I was religious (nevermind what they surely think of Catholicism), and yet they chalked this up to me being a heathen. Go figure.

An entry that may make people mad at me.

I'm watching In the Footsteps of Jesus. It really has nothing to do with his divinity, and has every thing to do with ancient architecture and archeology. But it's gotten me to thinking about Israel.

People, lands are conquered. Governments are overthrown. It's the way that things work. You can disagree with it, but it's how our world has come to be what it is. I don't have a problem with Israel, but I have a problem with it's reasons for being. Both Israel and the Palestinians will have to earn peace. And Israel can exist not because of some divine dictate or because "they never gave it up," but because they can conquer the others who also want the land. This is how land and states and independence is won. It's unfair no matter how or when it happens, and it happens to everyone. It is not any more unfair because it's happened to the Jews or to the Muslims. I'm part Native American -- does that mean I get to claim the whole of the United States? May the best military win, and then deal with the consequences.

Something I remember about the people I grew up with.

Some of the honestly believed that men have one less rib than women do.

Pennsylvania.

My parents are weird.

The Evidence:

Incident #1: My parents drove to the city this morning to pick me up, the first time they've made the trip since July 2006. They came in through the tunnel and wanted to leave via the GW bridge, so I told my dad to drive north from my apartment. My father kind of freaked out that I didn't have directions. I tried to make him understand that we could SEE the bridge, we just had to drive. Eventually, we started seeing signs, that somehow my father didn't see. I don't get them.

Incident #2: On the way home, my mother said we needed to get "petrol." WTF?


On a side note, I trimmed the tree tonight. I see no reason Jews can't have trees so long as there are no presents underneath, no Christmas celebration, and no Jesus-related stuff on the tree. I think it can be okay in a winter decorative sense. On that note, my children will not have one because I trim one ugly tree.

My presents are sitting in their shipping boxes next to the couch. My mom hasn't even bothered to wrap them yet. Hmph.

VA and UVA

Last Wednesday, I stayed up all night, was picked up at 2:30 am by the Super Shuttle, arrived at Newark airport at 4 am, and boarded a 6 am flight bound for DC. I landed in DC (Dulles) a bit before 7, and was on another flight bound for Charlottesville, VA, where I arrived around 9 am. I took a very expensive taxi and arrived at the University of Virginia's campus around 9:30 or so. I had arrived at the admissions office where I had a 1:30 appointment for an interview, but first I had to eat breakfast.

The bagels were great. Seriously.

I talked to a couple of first and second year students, then we got a tour of the b-school's campus. The students were already gone for winter break, so we had the whole campus to ourselves. The campus is full of southern mansion-style buildings -- beautiful, if Jeffersonian. Later we had lunch with some faculty/Darden cheerleaders. It was interesting to hear what they had to say. Few people had complaints the entire day, and the people I met, my fellow interviewees, were very good company.

Dreams, Tony Takitani

Last night I had a most horrifying dream, and I think it repeated. I was going to Yale. I was at a party in what seemed like a giant house, or perhaps a dorm. It seemed to be where I lived. Suddenly one night, for some reason I've either forgotten or never known, everyone started attacking everyone else. The first time I dreamed it, I managed to escape unscathed. I hit in bathrooms, closets, pretended I wasn't there. Finally I heard people start coming out of hiding and yelling something like "we're free!". All together we went to some kind of camp where we waited. My cell phone didn't work, so I used someone else's to call my family. I asked them to take me home but they couldn't understand why I would leave. In the end there were 72 dead and several times more injured.

The second time I went through this dream sequence, I tried to remember what I did in the first to get through. I made a mistake and my arm was cut -- but never bled. I woke up before it was over.

**

I'm in the middle of watching Tony Takitani. I remember reading the short story in the New Yorker the first time, and loving a line that said he never realized he wasl onely until he met someone who made him feel differently. But watching the film now, what bugs me is what he says he loves about her: the way she dresses, essentially.

Grrr.

Does bad luck exist?

I think I handle bad luck pretty well. I tend to kind of look around myself and say, "Is that it?", clean up the mess, and move on.

But is it bad luck? Or is it part of something bigger?

I haven't had a single rodent problem in my bedroom until the other day (I moved in March 1). I found a dead mouse in my room. Two days later, I saw a live mouse running around the heater. Tonight, I had the largest cockroach known to mankind hanging out while I watched TV. I also got some other bad news tonight that I don't want to go into, but it just wasn't surprising when it came.

Seriously. I'm just as weary when good things come in streaks. It's all too strange. There might be a very logical explanation for it all, but I don't know what it is.

On the upside, I got a really great massage tonight.

Brief quote:

Best quote of the evening last night:

"You know, like in the movie, "When Harry met Potter....."

-Tanya

My dilemma.

I've always felt like I was close to God. I'm not sure if that sounds weird or not, but my mother took me to church all of, maybe, 3 times when I was growing up. I remember what I wore the first time, what it looked like. I never forgot it. I remembered it when I went to college, and the desire to be Catholic was so strong that I just couldn't not be anymore. My mother raised me (oddly not my brother) with the rosary and with the Catholic prayers, but not with the sacraments, and I got on that my sophomore year of college.

This is weird to me because I'm between religions at the moment. I feel like one should feel right and one should not. But they're just different.

Since I've left Catholicism, I've still felt like God is very present in my life. There are certain things in life that I consider (and this is very personal) to be signs of God working in my life. I think that our lives are, for the most part, under God's control. Coincidences, to me, are, more often than not, not a sign that to pay attention to what the coincidence is so much as a sign that God is present. Coincidences for me tend to come in bunches, which furthers this thought in my mind. You might think that's silly, but that's how I see things.

Catholicism was different. I felt close to God, but mostly in an emotional way. Not to say that I don't have an emotional connection to God now, but it's different. God is there when I reach out to Him and when I don't. But Catholicism has definitely affected the way in which I approach my affinity with Judaism -- the way I'm used to approaching God doesn't rely on specific prayers or language, so I don't dedicate much time to learning those things.

to be continued...

So it goes.

I'm in the middle of the waiting game and I think I'm about at the end of my rope.

I went to New Haven on Wednesday (was that yesterday?) where I probably walked five miles in heels, broke my feet, and almost starved in 28-degree weather.

It wasn't quite that bad. But I'm tired, I have a raging headache, and in 2 weeks I have to go to to VA to do it all over again, leaving on a 6 am flight from Newark and returning at 11 pm in the same day.

News and a Ha!

Firstly, I finally got the interview invite from Darden. I was randomly checking my status last night, continuing what I thought was my exercise in futility, when there it was -- the call for an interview. I haven't scheduled it though, yet -- it will definitely cost me several hundreds of dollars to go down there the week before Christmas, and I'll probably have to go down and back in the same day. On the upside, it's my last b-school trip.

Secondly, it's a good thing I have a "no boy" rule on my apartment, because what I wear around here is decidedly not hot. I might do a photo shoot tonight to distract myself from Y-A-L-E tomorrow, but picture this: grey sweatpants, bright pink Duke t-shirt, a wide beige turban holding my hair back, black slippers, and a fleece bathrobe on top of it all which features skiing sheeps. I mean, I know you're all swooning, but I just wouldn't feel hot, you know?

See Bee run.

This weekend Sasa came to visit. Sasa and I were originally supposed to be in Honolulu this weekend, running 26.2 miles and then collapsing by the pool with a shi-shi drink in hand. This didn't work out for 2 reasons: she's trying to become a doctor and has no time to train; I have a new job, no vacation time, and no time to train. So instead she came to visit. And she still managed to inspire me to get my ass back on track.

I registered for my first race for 12/15. I registered about a week ago, actually, and so far it has provided the motivation and distraction (from b-school admissions results) that I had hoped for. Today I did the the first 5-miler I'd done in a while, and I'm feeling it now. But by the end of the week I should have another one or two 5-miler under my belt, and a few shorter ones, so hopefully the 4 miles I'll be doing in 2 weeks won't be so bad. I'd also like to do a 5 k (shortly than 4 miles, so I'm doing them out of order) and a 10k in the New Year, and maybe do that midnight run on New Year's. I'd also like to do a half-marathon in the early Spring (and I might just make that into a trip to Austin or Arizona).

Saturday: parties, thoughts, etc.

The evil roommate finally moved out. So what does this mean? I scrubbed, I rearranged, dusted, tidied. Our living room is immaculate, which is just how I like to keep my living space.

On another note, I think people should need a license to reproduce. If they are unfit, they aren't allowed to keep the kid. There are too many bad parents in the world. The other day I saw I saw in a woman, in the subway station, grab her son by the neck, push him about eight feet, and then beat him over the head. The ability to have sexual intercourse does NOT make one qualified to have children.

Lovely little party at Ginelle's tonight. Among those attending: Sasa, Monica, Aaron, Mike, Lindsay, Susan, boyfriend-for-rent (William), Lauren, Debbie, and Amirah.


News tk very soon regarding my future. Cross your fingers for me.