now, before you can understand the significance of the title of this entry, you must first understand a little bit about me and my living style. i am a socioneatist. tragic, i know. my apartment is ridiculously clutter-free. you will find no stray objects in my living room—no dirty dishes, no piles of unopened mail, no magazines, no clothing items…everything has its own little place and under most circumstances, i keep everything in its little place. the books on my bookshelves are arranged by type of literature and then subgrouped by author and/or height, whichever seems more practical in the given situation. i arrange the clothes in my closet by type as well, sometimes color if i have the time—pants furthest to the left, then sleeveless shirts, short-sleeved collarless shirts, short-sleeved collared shirts, long-sleeved collarless shirts, etc. i do dishes once a day and laundry once a week. i also vacuum as often as i can, though puck (my international cat of mystery) does not like the vacuum one little bit. i think it offends him, perhaps taunts him even, when i am not home. anyway…the point? im what you would call an anal-retentive neat freak—a socioneatist.

well, this morning when i got up at the butt-crack of dawn to take a shower, i was about half way through shampooing my hair when i noticed a large, offensive, black spot on my inner shower curtain. upon closer examination i determined that not only did i have mold growing there on my shower curtain, but in many other places, AND there was some sort of strange pink algae like substance as well. at first i tried rinsing it off with some hot water. that was pointless and dumb, i know, but when a socioneatist discovers that she is naked and surrounded by mold, she tends to make irrational decisions. then, once i realized that this was going to require the aid of some chemical cleaners and i had only so much time left before i had to be at work, i decided to abandon the project till weekend. i cannot lie though and tell you that it hasnt been on my mind all day. because it has. there is mold in my shower people!! i thought about it at lunch today and have decided that i will simply replace the inner shower curtain later tonight. i still have 2 extra shower curtains left from when my roommates and i stole a box of them from loyola a few years ago.

yeah….i think ill do that tomorrow. and then im going to get some sort of after-you-shower spray to discourage the mold from coming back.

there are plenty of reasons to hate money and the materialistic society in which it thrives. i have taken the liberty of highlighting a few of those reasons here:

1. if we had no money, i would not be at work right now. and, in fact, i would never be at work ever again. using bartering and relying on my own ability to survive “on the land”, i could successfully avoid the need to ever set foot in corporate america ever again.

2. without money, i would have far less junk in my apartment. assuming that in the absence of a paper money system we would revert back to bartering for goods, then in order to “buy” anything new, i would have to trade something i already had, thus equalizing the “in” and “out” flow of my stuff.

3. if there were no money, i wouldnt stand in the grocery store staring at potato chips for 10 minutes trying to decide if the grocery store brand, which is 50 cents cheaper, actually tastes as good as the utz, or if i should just suck up the extra 50 cents and go with the chips i know i will like rather than eating the cheap ones just so i can save a bit more money.

4. if there were no money, i wouldnt own a television, dvd player, computer, or internet connection. and i would be eating mostly fruits and vegetables and probably getting a lot more exercise…..meaning that, without money, my pants size would probably be 2 sizes smaller and id be much more healthy overall.

5. lets just go back to number 1, the important one, the one where i wouldnt ever have to work ever again. the one that means i could spend my days laying on a beach on some little island somewhere rather than staring at code from morning until night.

put simply, is it 5 o’clock yet?

something about cold, wet nights makes me think of college. i think i spent so much time walking across campus in the rain at night to get to class, meetings, dinner, etc that ive learned to associate cold and wet with Loyola. id be really curious to find out what a therapist would have to say about that too, because im sure it would interesting.

i wonder if one day in the future i will be playing with a puppy and he will rub his cold, wet nose against me and all of the sudden i will be overcome with the intense fear that i have an entire textbook to read for a final and only 6 hours left to do it in….i wonder if i would make a mad dash for the closest library…just in case.

hmmm…its something to think about….

happy monday, everyone.

well, today is the first official day of fall. baltimore’s projected high temperature today is 90°. and we are also officially in a drought, having not received any significant rain in over 30 days. yes, thats right folks, summer this year is just refusing to leave. Now, dont get me wrong, i love summer. im a big fan of sunshine. but, as we all know. too much of something really kills your enjoyment of it….except maybe sex…but even then only if you are a nympho…..ok, maybe not, but there is a point when even that can get old. im just ready for something slightly less….hot. the heat and humidity was a nice touch, but im tired of being sweaty all the time and really, my electric bill, is outrageous! see, i have this roommate, and he happens to be a boy, and the thing about boys is, they have the average body temperature of a large, angry volcano (for some reason, testosterone seems to carry the same heat conducting qualities as molten lava). so whenever i leave him alone in the apartment, i come back to a giant freezer. i do enjoy lounging around my apartment in flannel pants and a sweatshirt, but something about doing so in mid-august seems a bit…off. when i open my door and an artic wind blows out of it, my neighbors look at me a little funny. ive tried to explain to them that my roommate and i are actually housing extremely valuable viral specimens which we are using to do immunization research on the side for a little extra money since gas prices are so high these days, but they dont bought it. so now ive just gotten in the habit of checking the thermostat every half hour or so when the roommate is home. he does the same. we go back and forth. up and down goes the thermostat. the funniest thing about this though, is that both he and i are what you would call “non-confrontational” people i think, because we have never mentioned this thermostat war to each other. its just something we do. in conclusion, i say -mother nature, bring on fall, i want to open my goddamn windows.

7am. the remainder of what must have been a beautiful sunrise still lingers over treetops and a parking lot. sleepy-eyed and somewhat lost, i stand in the laundry room of my apartment building and watch the day begin. my idea of ironing involves wrinkle-release spray and a dryer so im wearing a coral polo shirt and striped boxer shorts while i wait for my pants to de-wrinkle themselves. the ryhtmatic swishing of the dryer is almost soothing and im beginning to drift off; my thoughts find themselves 9 years earlier in a boat on assawoman bay. im leaning over the edge watching the water pass beneath us and concentrating on the swishing sound it makes as the boat rises and falls. the dryer buzzes. i open the door to the dryer, remove my warm, “ironed” pants and return to my apartment. and so begins another day. quiet and fleeting, it will be gone before i even have a chance to notice it.

berkeley springs photos are up, please take a look at the new images here and let me know what you think of them and/or the new album skin. your opinions are greatly valued as i am addicted to indecision and cannot make up my mind on which jalbum skin i should use for future albums.

THANKS

id like to take this time out of my week to write a special little letter to a special little man to tell him just how special of a job i think he is doing. so…

Dear Mr. President,

Hi. How are you? I hope that this letter finds you well. I know that the recent trips to the Gulf must be really hard on you. I saw a picture of you on CNN today ducking under a low-hanging power line as you and other government officials were being escorted through New Orleans in a military vehicle and I was momentarily concerned for your safety. I would hate to see anything happen to you, especially with Dick Cheney being the next in line for command. That would be awful.

Mr. President, I am actually writing to you today to tell you just how great a job I think you are doing. So often I find that people only write to their government when they have a complaint and that is really a shame. We should write to our government more often to praise them for all the hard work that they do and for keeping us unruly bottom-feeders citizens safe and happy.

I see that the waste war in Iraq is going well and that, depsite the fact that most of the Americans believe that we should pull out of Iraq, you continue to send more and more soldiers and valuable military equipment there. Well, good for you. Its a good thing you had all our amphibious military vehicles protecting the deserts over there or else we could have risked having them further clutter the already dangerous flooded areas of the gulf. Im also glad you cut back funding and didnt waste all that money on reinforcing those levies and rebuilding the natural storm defenses along the coast only to watch them falter and fail under the pressure of the storm. To think, all that money would have just washed away when Katrina hit. And to think some people in those coastal states criticized you for that. You were just thinking ahead! I commend you on your ignorance ability to stand firm in the face of opposition. I am proud to have a man such as yourself representing the image of America to the rest of the world. No wonder Europe and Canada think so highly of Americans.

Yes, Mr. President, I think you have definitely far exceeded my expectations in your response to the Katrina crisis. I would have expected by now that you would be curled up in the fetal position in a corner of the oval office rocking yourself to sleep in a pool of your own urine. But no! You have instead put on those cowboy boots and that flannel shirt and headed down to New Orleans right in the middle of all the turmoil to do publicity shots show everyone just how much you care.

Thank you, Mr. President for all your hardwork and continuous efforts. Believe me when I say that we, the citizens of America, have truly noticed just what kind of a man you really are.

With kind regards,

Steph

well, its a couple days overdue, but ive been catching up at work. so here is the shortest possible description of my vacation to berkeley springs, wv:

day 1: friday. we arrive in berkely springs and discover that yahoo maps has in fact, once again, given me incorrect directions, so i accidentally drive right past our inn. thats ok though, because this allows us to find dairy queen. blizzard…yum.

we check in at the inn we are staying at and the gf decides we are going to start our vacation by partaking in the spa activities that the inn has to offer. so we take a 20 minute steaming hot mineral bath. very nice. then we nap. also very nice. unfortunately, i awake from my nap convinced that i am dying due to the severe blinding pain in my side. after a lengthy period of suffering and debate, i made the gf take me to the ER. since the town has a population of ya know…like 10…there was no wait thankfully and after 2 hours in the ER, a CT scan and a shot of painkiller that did no good, the doctor reports to me that i have a large kidney stone. joy of all joys. and that was day 1.

day 2: saturday. we drive 9 miles out of town to cacapon state park where we have reservations for an 11am horseback trail ride. they give me what i believe was the smallest horse they had. it also seemed to have a small allergy issue as he kept making sneezy snorty like sounds. so, here i am sitting on this horse which is wheezing and snorting and refusing to stay still and the only thing i could thing was, great, they gave me the retarded horse with the crack addiction and as soon as we get out on the trail hes going to decide that this, YES THIS, is the exact right moment to make his escape and run freeeeee…. but he didnt. the ride turned out wel with the exception of the end where ellies horse decided to JUMP and break into a run and my horse followed that example. ive never been on a horse, how the hell am i supposed to know what to do if a horse JUMPS?! but i didnt die, so its all good.

day 3: sunday. we drive back to maryland (all 10 minutes of a drive) to hancock where we rent bikes at C&O cycles and head north on the western maryland rail tral. i meant to head SOUTH, but i left my compass (yes i carry a compass) in the car! so we enjoyed a lovely scenic tour of rt70 on our 1950’s style cruisers. and the bike seat shaped bruise on my lower regions complimented the horseback riding bruises from the previous day very nicely. afterwards we went to the “beach” at cacapon. which turned out to be nothing more than a white trash watering hole, so we didnt stay there long

day 4: monday. once you have gone to the hospital, gone horseback riding and biking, what else is there left to do?? HIKING! straight up a mountain. on monday we headed back to cacapon state park to try out their hiking trails. i took the nikon with me as well so there should be some good photos when i get them developed. we tried out the green trail first. which really wasnt much of a hike at all. kinda lame. so then we decided to keep going on the red trail which looked much more exciting. after climbing to 2,200ft we were drenched in sweat and pretty damn tired. but we made it to the end of the trail and i took pictures to prove it. and to complete the vacation with a bang ellie had scheduled us a “roman bath and swedish massage” at the state park for that afternoon. it was definitely a different experience as it was truly a “roman” bath involving being completely nude except for the sheet which they promptly took away from me. but my masseuse said i did very well for someone who had never received a massage before. so lets recap….buck naked bath in 102 degree water with gf and then half hour rub down by attractive woman armed with tons of olive oil—im not complaining.

and so that was my vacation. i hope you all enjoyed the recap. hopefully i will have pictures posted in the album soon. stay tuned for such…

well, tomorrow i leave for vacation, so tonight i decided to do laundry. yes, i know, what a happening gal i am on a thursday night! so after doing 4 loads of laundry, and then folding them all very nicely and placing them on my bed….i now have no where to sleep. so, i thought this would be an excellent time to whine about how much laundry i had to do and how i dont feel like putting any of it away and i could really just sleep on top of it but then it will become all wrinkly like and if i roll too much to one side a pile of t-shirts might fall on my head and then i will suffucate. now that would be embarrassing. so im going to put the clothes away.

i’ll be in west virginia all weekend which i hear is quite a pretty place to see, so hopefully i will have new photos for ya’ll come wednesday…

so ive been reading the news a lot recently, keeping up with the hurricane recovery as im sure a lot of people have, and i have to say, this is one of the most disgusting, disgraceful displays of humanity that i have ever seen. i am honestly embarrassed and sickened by what i have read about the situation. there are hundreds of people standing on roadsides screaming out for help- food- water – anything from anyone, but there is no one. And you can see images of this on the web or on the television and you have to know that there is someone behind the lense of that camera, someone who could be out there helping those people rather than documenting their suffering. im sure a lot of peeople from the national media sources arehelping. but at the same time, im sure theres plenty more who arent. and there are people stuck on their rooftops still, others trapped in collapsed buildings, some just dying in the streets and who is there to help them? where ,mr. president, is our military and their amphibious vehicles which are specialized for terrain like this? where is FEMA? a tsunami hits across the world and we are there for those people immediately with our military and civilian volunteers and aid immediately, but a hurricane hits our own homeland and we just dont have the resources available to help our own? im sorry, thats unacceptable. the most powerful country in the world and we cant even take care of ourselves? its an embarassment. i just keep reading story after story of aid not able to make it to the survivors, no leadership, complete chaos…

and then there are the looters, who are just taking everything they can get their hands on, stepping over the injured and stranded, stealing from then even, and i even read today they were shooting at rescue vehicles and helicopters. i just dont understand that.

but i have to throw in here as well that its not all bad. i have also read stories of men and women who have lost everything, but have stayed to help neighbors amd to rescue those still stranded in flooded areas. i dont know about all the states but i knwo that our maryland national gaurd has already been mobilized and sent to the area to help. the new york yankees and the NFL have both donated a million dollars to the relief fund. there are still people out there who are trying to do what they can. but unfortunately their good is overshadowed by the images of just how awful mankind can be to his own. it just makes me really really sad.

where is the unity that is supposed to make up america?

if you can, you should make a donation to the red cross at www.redcross.org. i dont normally support the red cross as i have issues with some of their very outdated and ridiculous policies involving blood donation, but i made an exception in this case and i encourage others to do the same.