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Nov. 27th, 2009 @ 12:44 am Goals for next semester
Current Mood: assured
1. Hang out with Rachel.
2. Hang out with Emily.
3. Hang out with Rob.
4. Keep in touch with Carol.
5. Greg, Brian, Bryan


Check.
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Nov. 27th, 2009 @ 12:41 am (no subject)
Current Location: bed
Current Mood: thankful
Current Music: bottle of red bottle of white
Sometimes, there are just things you want to say that don't involve the entire facebook community. You have no idea if zero, one, two, three, etc people will read them. Rather than being assured that at least 50 unwelcome people will come trampling unwanted through your page. But still, you'd rather tell like, one or two people.

HANNAH'S RECIPE FOR A TOLERABLE THANKSGIVING

a) Try to cut off at the pass all the people telling you that you're still growing (even though you stopped growing when you were 16);
b) Determine what you're going to drink as early as possible so that you have a game plan;
c) Try to think of interesting ways to answer the question "how's school?" even though no one knows what school you go to, when you're going to graduate, what you're majoring in, etc, even though you've told them year after year. Indeed, no one will remember that you weren't even there last thanksgiving (a tradition that I believe should be continued);
d) Tend towards conversations that are at least a little bit above the obnoxious norm, but not so much out of everyone's comfort zones that all you get are uncomfortable stares, for they will not make the evening go down any more smoothly.
e) Eat the green bean casserole, goddammit.
f) When you need an out from a conversation, go refill your drink;
g) When you need a break from everyone, go help clean up, the movement and distraction will do you good;
h) Afterwards, get in pajamas, put on a sappy movie, and continue to drink. By the time you go to bed, you will have been drinking so long that you actually already have a hangover, and will therefore avoid one in the morning when you actually have to be productive.


Yes, this would have been useful 10 hours ago. But enjoy!
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May. 16th, 2009 @ 01:12 am (no subject)
On day #4 of being home. It's coming along. It's actually been pretty fun so far, though. I got to hang out with Danielle, and hung out with Kelley twice (!). I've smoked a bunch, but haven't actually gotten much done. I'm leaving it all for next week.

I've been bitching a lot, but I can't really say I have anything of substance to bitch about. I'm leaving for Nicaragua in a week, to work with a fuckin' sweet ONG. To travel cheaply around Central America, doing what I love for free and eating awesome food. Then I'm coming back, spending a week down the shore with family and friends I haven't seen in a while, then I'm home for another 10 whole days, then I'm flying to California, traveling around there, then road tripping cross country with my boyfriend and his super-cool-seeming best friend. Seriously, where is there room at all to complain? Everything is sweet. I hope everything is sweet for you too. I love you.
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Apr. 28th, 2009 @ 01:00 am (no subject)
Guys, I'm at an impasse.

So, in the same way I get infuriated about people leaving me notes, I think other people get infuriated by direct confrontation.

Just cause I get back to my room and Beth is like "we need to talk", cause apparently I'd mentioned to a couple people that I was annoyed that on Friday Beth had a party without mentioning it to me, and those people told her, so she got all angry that I was angry and hadn't told her. And I was like uhh... I just wanted you to mention it cause I was going to bed early. I'm just a little weirded out that whenever I mentioned it to somebody, it got back to her. I definitely mentioned it to Danielle the next morning, which I should have known was a mistake, and mentioned it to Callie, and probably should have anticipated that it would get back to Beth. My plan was to talk to her when we had the chance, and I hadn't seen her in a while. I just didn't need people gossiping about me, and I'm a little annoyed that my roommate, who I've frequently come to in confidence, has been potentially gossiping about me all semester.

And she was all pissed off that I asked her to wash the floor; I just thought it was nice, just to mention it, so that I didn't stew about it. It had been sticky for like 4 days, and I had no idea she'd already tried to wash it. By just briefly mentioning it it was all nice and cleared up to me, but she was offended. Christ, how do people interact in this world if I can't just nicely, directly say "hey, can you wash the floor cause you got it all sticky", have her say she's tried to and she's really busy, and then understand each other a little better?

I guess I just don't understand where her anger's coming from. And I really don't like living here right now. And the idea that there's less than 2 weeks left seems just so long.

Picture the scenario. You had a gin bucket, people spilled it everywhere, and it had been 4 days. You'd tried to wash it 3 times, frustratingly, to no avail. Your roommate comes to you and says "hey, could you wash the floor?" You say, "I already tried to wash it 3 times, and I have a ton of work to do." Your roommate says, "OK, no problem then, take your time" and walks away. Isn't that better than your roommate being angry at you and not telling you? Am I incorrect in thinking this? Am I being logical where other people are illogical? I really want to know. Am I being unreasonable? Should I have just not mentioned the floor, and not have been annoyed that she didnt' mention she was having a party in my living space, when I was going to bed early? (I've come back several times to parties that I didn't know about that kept me awake, so it seemed a legitimate assumption that it would have continued going late).

Gah. I'm just ranting. The end of the semester seems even farther away than ever.
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Apr. 15th, 2009 @ 03:16 pm (no subject)
Hannah's Expressions of Grief

- irritability
- intense anxiety
- difficulty sleeping (though I've generally had that)
- anti socialness
- inability to focus (probably a side effect of all of these)

I could use some advice on the anxiety part, what do people do to alleviate anxiety? I think I should exercise or something, get out of my head.
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Apr. 15th, 2009 @ 12:49 pm (no subject)
Ah, no tent city setup until tomorrow. It's so cold and miserable out. I need some sunshine.

I'm going to walmart to get origami paper and fishing line. Random much?

I tried on like 5 outfits this morning; I wanted to wear the most lurid colorful item of clothing I own. But all my colorful shirts are really cute lowcut going out kind of shirts, and I didn't feel like wearing them (especially in this weather). So I settled on my Amnesty shirt; it might be black, but the letters are bright yellow, and Emily would like it.

I got a really nice card in the mail today from a girl in my spanish class, just offering to talk if I needed. that was really sweet of her, I should hang out with her more often. Biggest lesson I've learned from Emily: get close to people while you can.
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Apr. 15th, 2009 @ 09:34 am (no subject)
Ugh, I couldn't sleep last night. I had to watch 3 episodes of MASH before I finally passed out. I love coffee, and wish I had time for a nap. I can try that whole going to bed EARLY thing. Unfathomable.

They saved a section for us at Emily's memorial today, which made me happy; I was worried about not having a space, they're having some screens set up elsewhere on campus but I didn't want to do that. Next cup of coffee. This is delicious. And rambly. And I'm listening to Kansas. I think I"ll forever associate them with Emily, and I'm OK with that.

Thank god for Kansas, seriously. Who hasn't related to Dust in the Wind at some point in their lives?

The next couple of weeks are looking to be rather rough, what with coping, lots of Amnesty events, and an ungodly amount of work. Coupled with my complete lack of motivation to get out of bed. If it hadn't been for the thought of coffee this morning I probably would have just skipped my meeting. But I want my routine back. (which would have been to just turn off my alarm and lay there for 15 minutes, haha).
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Apr. 14th, 2009 @ 10:42 pm (no subject)
Christ, this is ridiculous.

I'm having such a hard time balancing grieving with schoolwork.

Professors have been really understanding. My one even sent us a take home exam and told us to hand it in whenever we could. But I have a big exam on Thursday, and she hasn't mentioned anything about postponing it, and I'm having trouble studying. We had a get-together at Peace House this afternoon, grilled cheese and tomato soup, just cause it was one of Emily's favorites and so everyone could see each other, since a lot of people hadn't cause of Easter break and all. It was all right; I didn't feel like being around so many people. But I can't go straight from mourning to doing homework that I don't like; I just can't. I came back and just completely passed out for an hour, I just laid down and then woke up an hour later. Then I read Don Quijote, the reading for next Tuesday, since I already finished the reading for Thursday. I finished the book. It was fantastic. The best book I've ever read. I highly recommend it. I could only do that because I felt the need to get things done, but only things that I enjoy. I can't bring myself to do the less enjoyable homework at the moment.

So, I'm saving my studying for tomorrow. But tomorrow is the memorial service, with events before and after for Emily, that I want to go to, where I'll be mourning, and then unable to study afterward. I just can't go back and forth like that!

I just really hope my professor moves the Thursday exam, cause I got C's on the first two and really need a good grade on this next one. We have class tomorrow, so we'll see.
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Apr. 9th, 2009 @ 08:43 pm (no subject)
She was an incredibly happy person. She smiled a lot, loved peace, loved activism. She'd just helped start a new SDS branch. She was going abroad in the fall.

She was from New Jersey. She always wore a yellow beret and wore really cool clothes. The first time I saw her I remember thinking how pretty she was.

I'd never thought about the concept of stabbing someone. When the news say someone was "stabbed" I never really think about it. But the fact that someone could thrust a knife repeatedly into her bleeding screaming beautiful body is entirely unfathomable. Seeing the pictures of her surrounded by candles just made no sense. I just looked at them and thought how I just couldn't picture it even more, seeing her bleeding and then dead.

But she's dead. And I'm crying. And don't understand.

No response is necessary. I just didn't want to say this to everyone else today, because they don't need to hear my morbid thoughts right now.
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Apr. 7th, 2009 @ 07:59 pm (no subject)
I miss Iguazu.

I miss Bariloche.

I miss Buenos Aires.

I'm so ready to go to Nicaragua.

Fuck the US.
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Apr. 4th, 2009 @ 06:50 pm (no subject)
Kelley I thought you would like this, even though it's not done, so I wanted to share it with you.

To A Boy with a Camera: Intimations on Little Round Top

What pictures do you hope to take here?
What eerie images are you willing to your static screen?
Are you hoping to capture squealing babes frolicking on the unknown bones of a forgotten skeleton?
Do you want to proclaim with a million dollar grin,
“We were here. We came here. And we didn’t learn a goddamn thing.”
Will the mossy stone smile at your camera’s eagle eye,
Blinded by the glib glossy finish of photoshop’s prowess;
Does your family photo of the misty glimmering groaning graves impart in part what happened here?
Will you remember this blinding blissful trip to hell with a smile,
Or will a wailing ghost travel forever in the corner of your eye,
Your periphery perpetually nagging to know
If your soul can see
What happened here.

Do you want your child to remember this place, these redstone rocks,
As fawning patriotism or entropic annihilation?
See red not in stripes on a flag,
But in the ghostly bloodshot eyes of the boy whose head cracked and bled on the rock where you sit smiling.
Save your smiles for the living, for the ghosts care not who won or lost or went home to their TV dinners or beat their child or spent the whole night sleeplessly snoring.
They care not, for they are dead.

Your camera, for all its platinum pride, cannot capture what they see.
Trust not the triumphant dead, look for those who glimpse past their flag draped coffin to the soul of this rock, the heart of the hill.
The hazy mist harrowing your pleasant memory is noiselessly screeching, but you will not hear it.
Your ears are stuffed with crude cotton, your mind a blank slate, your eyes hung with lies.

The camera sees brown swaying grass that bore witness to this mound’s crucification.
The reeds and rocks are the sole witnesses of the macabre massacre that happened here,
But history gagged them while news stations draped them in a gilded disguise.
The camera sees majestic mountains, but the earth cannot be convinced.
Death was here.
Death came here and enslaved the enthralled heart of America to do its bidding.
Death was willed by the blackboard mind of man which was later erased time and time again,
Tricked by fanciful phrases and mob mentality.
For though we later hallow the heroic dead,
The boy who bled and cried and screamed and snatched his last breath on this rock is not convinced, for the last time he checked he was still
And a hundred thousand times again
Real dead.
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Mar. 29th, 2009 @ 02:57 pm (no subject)
This is a homework break update; because I probably update most people on a regular basis anyway.

I GOT MY NICARAGUA INTERNSHIP! So yes, things stopped going horribly wrong, as I knew they would. I leave on May 23, and come back on July 25. SO EXCITED. I can't believe I'm actually going back!!

I went to a sick anti war protest in DC last weekend. We delivered flag draped "coffins" to Boeing and Lockheed Martin. It was pretty powerful for me. I keep meaning to write an article about it, but I've been busy (some excuse).

Also busy organizing Amnesty things; I have a Darfur event on Wednesday, and we have a Tent City refugee awareness camping out 4 days at the end of April, and while I'm not the main organizer, it's time to step up and officially plan specific events rather than the event as a whole.

I have a sweet apartment for next year-- with a SINGLE! And nice roommates.

Classes are looking good for next year-- I'm hoping to do a Spanish independent study project in the fall, and a psych one in the spring.

My parents have been up this weekend for their 25th anniversary, and they've been uber cute.

I've been doing a lot of partying recently; I think that instead of breathing in the little spare time I've found, I'm just like "fuck it". I think I'm gonna take a couple of days off, if only so I can sleep and veg instead of get fucked up. My brain is crying for a break.

But yeah, things are hectic but good. And Jefferson Airplane has been on my record player for a while now. I love them.
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Mar. 18th, 2009 @ 12:07 am (no subject)
Meditation is fantastic. It makes everything easier. I remember things better, I can think more clearly, I don't get needlessly stressed. It's fantastic! I totally recommend it to everyone.

Let me make my list for recent weeks:
- rejected from CPS
- don't appear to be winning the scholarship I applied for
- didn't win the contest I really really wanted to win
- Maddie gets rejected from her favorite contest
- waiting to hear back anxiously about the Nicaragua internship

Basically, it's been rough, but hey! I went for it! We went for it! We're fantastic human beings! We wouldn't know the joy of winning if we hadn't suffered the depression of losing!

After that, I wrote a sort of silly poem! Here it is!

We did it!
We went for it!
We’re fantastic human beings!
What grace, what joy, what enigmatic enthusiasm!
We couldn’t fathom the rapture of winning had we not been plagued by the locusts of losing!
Here’s to the loser!
May he teach us to savor the honeysuckle summer that is winning!
May his banged up bloodshot bereaved eyes soon spout the rainbows of champions!
We the champions we the vivaciously victoriously triumphant!
South the hell horns, dance to the tintinnabulation of beatific bells!
The terrorizing turbulent alarm bells of cataclysm serve no purpose but to initiate the shimmering frolicking fornicating frittering heartening hoping delighting cheering promising praying basking giggling tittering jubilation of the golden bells of success!
Victory! Success! Superiority of our dreams, supremacy of platinum caliber, fifty carat diamond, accomplishment, achievement, triumph, YES, YES, WINNING!
Save your tears for the whales, for this is but a temporary setback!
Just wait till next time!
We’ll get ‘em, champ!
Left hook, low bat, stiff upper lip, that’s the stuff!
Here’s to the loser!
May your forlorn failure not provoke your forfeit!
Take a bandaid for your banged up knee, some ice on your elbow, have another go!
Just wait for the win!
It’ll be huge!
It’ll be spectacular!
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Mar. 10th, 2009 @ 09:48 pm (no subject)
You know what, I've spent my entire life dealing with a sister who treated me badly. I'll be damned if I'll put up with it again.
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Mar. 6th, 2009 @ 11:59 pm (no subject)
So my plan was to stay at school Friday night, then leave Saturday for break. Steve and I had some plans to go rock climbing, and I was pretty excited about it. But it's Maddie's last audition for colleges, and she really wanted me to be there-- but I was like "no, I'm going rock climbing." So my mom talks to me about how much Maddie wants me to be there, Maddie tells me herself, I'm still just like "whatever", until Maddie gets rejected from Shenandoah, her safest school. She was pretty upset, so I was like "OK, I'll come home and go to the audition with her to make her happy." And already, within just tonight, both Maddie and my dad got upset with me for the utmost of trivialities.

I'm really tired of the negative energy. Ever since I got back from Argentina everything in this house has just been an emotional vacuum. I do my best to keep things positive, try not to get offended, try to mediate, try to back out when I think it's necessary, but all of these things done to foster positive energy for whatever reason just make people even more angry. I suppose that's not an entirely uncommon phenomenon, but it's a very frustrating one, when I'm not only doing it for their benefit but for my emotional well-being.

I didn't think I was that upset, but I got a nosebleed, which is weird; I've gotten like 3 or 4 nosebleeds ever, and every other occasion was when I was positively hysterical.

So now I'm ending an entirely unsatisfying night with Maddie walking off all annoyed with me for smiling to myself about something she said, because she was convinced I was laughing at her. I attempted to assure her that I was indeed not laughing at her, but she stormed off in a huff. Not only did I come home early and forsake really fun plans for her, but I went with my dad to pick her up from a friends house just now when I was completely exhausted, cause I knew she wanted to see me. And within an hour she got angry. Jesus christ, what the fuck is this?
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Feb. 27th, 2009 @ 07:14 pm (no subject)
I'm currently sitting in the basement of the chapel. I did dinner with Jason here, cause this is where he works on his thesis (I don't really know why). I didn't even know the chapel had a kitchen. But we had peanut butter on homemade bread, cous cous, and scrambled eggs-- surprisingly (to me), cous cous goes very well with scrambled eggs. Not so well with peanut butter, but I'm not the biggest peanut butter person.

I've been really busy lately. I finished most of my first study for Methods class-- looking at mortality salience and how its effects are influenced by salient norms (look it up/ask if you're intrigued). We were looking specifically into how salient egalitarian norms influenced attitudes towards arabs, with the hypothesis that when an egalitarian norm was coupled with a mortality salience condition, negative attitudes towards arabs would decrease. By looking at the means, it looked fantastic; however, we didn't have enough participants, and we didn't get a significant result probably because of that. I was sad, cause I was really excited by it, and we had gotten 40 people already. It sucks being a college student with no way to force people to take part in your study except guilting your friends.

I had my last round of interviewing to work at the Center for Public Service next year, and I'm pretty pumped, I think I did well. It was a group interview, we were meeting with all of the people who we would be working with depending on which project we'd coordinate, and I spied on the guy from the Literacy Council's paper, and he wrote next to my name "the most intuitive in the room". SWEET! I really enjoyed the group interview, even though it was like 2 hours long, because it was fun to connect with people in the community who center their lives around helping people and change. I put working with the literacy council as my first choice, a program for at-risk youth (predominantly hispanic) second, and a tutoring migrant kids program third. I couldn't really decide between them, I would love to work with all of them. I had like 3 tiers of interest, but I had to number them 1-7. Ugh, I hate deciding things like that. But if I get the job, it means no more phonathon next year, thank god, because that job is mentally, emotionally, and spiritually draining.

Tomorrow I'm going to sit down and fill out my application for Nicaragua. It's a bunch of essay stuff that I hate answering, like "why are you applying?" and you feel like they're judging every word. Well, I suppose they are, but I try not to think of it that way. I also have a movie sometime tomorrow with a friend who I feel like I've gotten closer to this semester, which makes me glad.

(I'm just killing time now until Steve calls, btw. I think I'll do that through another medium. Chau)
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Feb. 18th, 2009 @ 10:06 pm (no subject)
I'm getting back into it. Well, right now I'm annoyed cause my roommates want to have a meeting (aka bitchfest about how they don't think things are clean enough when I don't give a fuck), and I just watched this documentary about rape in the DRC so I'm really not in the mood. I can't decide what I thought of the documentary; I almost couldn't relate to it. Well of course I couldn't. But I've watched documentaries that had me BAWLING, shaken up for hours, that were about the same things. I just had to google the title of the movie I'm thinking of specifically... War Dance, it's a documentary about Uganda, it's nominated for best documentary, it looks like from their website. And GODDAMN, it was fantastic. Cause it wasn't just like interviews/information, they had a story, they had a plot, they had a climax, etc etc. I don't know if this is coherent or not. Anyway, I just didn't feel a really strong connection with the documentary tonight. I felt it was all very emotionally detached-- which I suppose is not very surprising. But yeah.

Like I said... I'm getting back into it. I'm feeling good, and surrounding myself with better people.
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Feb. 15th, 2009 @ 10:33 pm (no subject)
A friend commented today that I get angry a lot. He's right; ever since I got back from Argentina I've been a lot more irritable. I think it's just general adjustment to our uptight rigid culture. I remember coming back and people were getting angry at such little things that didn't bother me anymore; my mom was upset that I took an extra couple minutes to get ready for something. Maddie was getting upset about things that seemed so trivial to me. Emily was freaking out when Justin was a few minutes late; it was all like a daze to me, I just didn't care like I used to. Now I care, and almost moreso. This morning I sat down and had a cup of coffee for 5 minutes instead of running out the door to be on time. But I can't do that with class; here, people are on time for class. In Argentina, it was fine to walk in whenever; I even just got up and left early a couple of times. The professors were late. I showed up 2 hours late the day after the election. But things aren't that loose here.

Eating dinner in a restaurant is weird. Cause it's like you sit, order, eat, leave. Instead of sit, sit, order, sit, sit, eat, chat, chat, CHAT, CHAT, leave. I had a 5 hour long coffee date once. I had coffee and medialunas, and finished them in like 30 minutes, and then sat for another 4.5. Cause people go out and chat. Do we not talk here or something?

I've also taken to bringing coffee to class. It makes me miss just sitting down and taking the time to drink a goddamn cup of coffee in the morning. Do we need to move so fast that we can't even sit and have coffee? Does it take that long?

I'm feeling frustrated with America.
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Feb. 3rd, 2009 @ 06:36 pm (no subject)
Option A: do all-expenses paid but food internship in Gettysburg, plus making $2,700 this summer, working with migrant workers and their kids;

Option B: Go to Nicaragua to do an internship, ALL expenses paid, but make no money.



My brokeness and my love and ardent desire to return to Nicaragua are fighting. Cause I've made migrant workers/illegal immigrants my focus at Gettysburg, but the reason I applied to Gburg in the first place was to go back to Nicaragua. I'd be doing good work in both places. I would be living with other interns in Gburg, and in a host family in Nicaragua. Working with people/things that I care about. One makes sense practically (Gburg), and one would be utterly glorious and would never come my way again.

I could use some advice, please.

From anyone who reads this.

Cause I'm really torn.
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Feb. 2nd, 2009 @ 12:04 am (no subject)
I really like the 25 things about you thing that everyone and their mom is doing on facebook. Because I don't know, it's really cute, and not obnoxious like most of those fb things that everyone catches onto and says SO I FINALLY GAVE IN and I'm like "bitch please if you didn't want to do this you didn't have to."

I think I'll go to DC next weekend. Or maybe just to my uncle's, my parents/Maddie will be there cause Maddie has a college audition somewhere nearby. Something to get off campus would be great. I'm feeling really cased in.

So yesterday I started to make empanadas, because a) I was missing Argentina, and b) I was making them for a superbowl party. I made the fillings/dough, and had 3 big bowls of things to chill overnight, so I assumed that my roommates wouldn't mind if I moved my milk to their shelf for the night. But no, I woke up to a reprimanding email, telling me that SOME people in the apartment feel that the fridge system isn't being "honored". They're so uptight about this shit it's ridiculous. I understand that people like things clean, and I understand that they made this system up last semester, but as I am now a functioning part of our little suite family, I'd think that maybe my feelings could be taken into consideration as well.

And I just think that it's really weird that whenever clean people and messy people live together, it's the messy person who needs to learn to clean up. The clean person can't learn to deal with leaving a couple things on the counter overnight. I like things clean as much as the next person, but I also don't have a problem leaving a TINY mess in the kitchen when I'm running out the door.

(I've been really pissed about this all day. Cause I mean, my roommate sent me an EMAIL about it? I've known her for like 2 weeks, this isn't getting us off on the best foot. I hate people who communicate their feelings through the internet/texting etc, because I always end up getting offended, and they usually don't mean it. Don't text fight, it's stupid!)

I'm going to do other things now...
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