unapologetic apathy

"I think it’s a Western notion of demonizing inactivity. No one can be productive all the time. If there’s a period of weeks when your imagination decides it needs to take a nap then maybe that’s what it needs to do." -- Elliott Smith on writer's block

no, i don't have writer's block per se, but i came across that quote, liked it, and thought i'd share it with all of you. i am, however, suffering from ennui. *sigh* i feel a little like this:

i think the ennui and apathy is my body's attempt at deluding itself into thinking that it's not nervous to start grad school, which for some inexplicable reason it is. very much so. i think the nervousness may be the result of having the threat of getting kicked out of the master's program if i get three c's shoved down my throat repeatedly in the past few days. now this probably wouldnt have affected me so much if last semester never happened. but it did. and i got a c (the plus really does nothing to soften it) and now my confidence is shot. kinda. i think if it wasnt the absolute last thing i did for undergrad, it wouldnt have been such a big deal cause i wouldve had a chance to do raise my confidence in other classes. my sister says i'm nervous because "i'm starting something new." i cant bring myself to believe that because school is school, you know?

worse is that i cant bring myself to care... and that makes me more nervous. i just want wednesday to come so it will start and i can prove to myself that i can still do this whole school thing.

*Sleep - My Chemical Romance

just have a little patience

i was getting an enrollment verification thingy from online the other day, and this window popped up:

when did a minute constitute a while? i mean, yes, i dont think i wouldve waited a minute for something to load, but the fact that my impatience was addressed like that made me sit back and think. we used to wait forever for pages to load. forever. and now if a page doesnt warn us that it may take a minute to open, we automatically close it? refresh it? complain endlessly about it?

everyone is always saying that our generation lacks patience. i always roll my eyes at this. sure, we dont have to walk twenty miles uphill barefoot in the snow to get to school, but we are not as impatient as they always make us out to be. we can wait for things when we have to. this makes me kinda agree with them.

*Patience - Take That

stop and rewind

okay, could someone please explain to me where the five week vacation has disappeared to?? because the fact that i am on the last week is just incomprehensible to me. it feels like yesterday that i was saying fairfax county's snow days were stealing the first days of relaxation from me. in fact, i'm pretty sure it was yesterday. and now, all of a sudden, you're trying to tell me that school starts next week?!

i still havent even gotten my paperwork done to get my scholarship extended. i havent given them my transcript, told them i've graduated, or anything. i havent prepared myself for starting grad school. i havent edited sincerely, mr. nobody. i havent worked on anything else. i havent done anything. because all of this stuff was supposed to be done during the break, and the break never happened. i was robbed. five weeks of blissful nothingness have been stolen from under my nose.

i wish i could rewind the past month and see what happened to all of it, but i cant.

so to try and cram everything into a measly five days, i'm going to the embassy tomorrow and will hopefully manage to get everything finished and settled in one morning. then i have orientation wednesday night that will ready me for grad school, i suppose. i've left editing sincerely, mr. nobody to my family. i've postponed working on anything else until the second week of classes.

tonight, though, my sister and i are listening to old music and playing barbie video games. plans can wait.

*Next in Line - Meese

you couldnt be that man i adored

my brothers are obsessed with jeff kinney's diary of a wimpy kid series. they have all the books and it's a struggle to get them to let anyone else read them. they didnt even let my cousins touch them over the summer (ali was willing to let them borrow it for ten riyals an hour until my dad said no).

anyways, there's a movie coming out of it in april that they're excited about. today, i showed abdullah the kid that would be playing greg (the main character and writer of the diary) in the movie. this is him. i think he's adorable:

abdullah was disappointed, to say the very least. his initial reaction was, "but that doesnt look anything at all like greg." i dunno how familiar you all are with the series, but this is what greg looks like:

i tried to tell him that greg in the books was barely more than a stick figure with three strands of hair, and it would be pretty much impossible to find a real person who looks like him. abdullah wasnt convinced and insists they could have done a better job in casting.

*Torn - Natalie Imbruglia

when you're gone

so my parents came back yesterday. you people (well, most of you) didnt know they had left, but they did. they were up in CT for a week because my grandma was sick. she's better now and they're back. i love my parents, what with them being my parents and raising me and all, and of course i missed them (i'm not really the type of person who misses people, but i suppose i did), but there were some perks to them being away.

things i miss from the last week:

*the freedom. sure, i didnt do much (someone had to babysit the two boys) but it was by choice. and when i did wanna do something i did it. without worrying about who would say what or anything.

*the totally chillaxed atmosphere of the house. there were more responsibilities, but somehow there was also less stress and tension.

*being "head of the house" and whatever i said went. there was no one of a higher rank to go against my word.

*my sister's constantly good mood... or mostly constant.

*not having to do the dishes (my sister took over that chore instead of splitting the days like we usually do).

things i dont miss from the last week:

*waking up at five every morning. that was not fun because i couldnt go back to sleep afterwards. i woke up at eight this morning, and it was heaven.

*carrying my phone with me everywhere. i'm not a big phone person and carrying it around the house in case something happened was slightly obnoxious.

*the fact that i couldnt blame anyone for messing up the oven when i just cleaned it besides myself.

i'm sure there's more for both lists, but i dont feel like thinking that hard, so let's just pretend that's it.

*When You're Gone - Avril Lavigne

i'm happy just because

because he writes "colon closed parenthesis" when he smiles and has never once neglected a punctuation mark.

because he runs his hand through his hair when he's nervous and has a smile that starts in his eyes long before it reaches his lips.

because he reads books along with playing sports and has a voice that makes your heart forget to beat and your lungs forget to breathe.

because he knows just when to make a joke and has never felt the need to fill a comfortable silence with pointless noise.

because he keeps a pencil always tucked behind his ear "just in case" and has eyes you could drown in.

because he can't boil water and always burns the toast and has the ability to make everything okay by just being there.

because he recognizes book and movie references when i talk and never needs me to slow down so he can catch up.

*At the Bottom of Everything - Bright Eyes

even with the lights out we'll glow

ive been trying to write a post since last night, but it looks like the four hour nights and busy days are catching up to me, and exhaustion is making me a pretentious egotist. i swear, everything i say comes out sounding so wrong - cocky enough that i think hitting the publish button would guarantee the loss of all my followers.

so until i can control my subconscious mind's big head, i'll leave you with some words of wisdom from Jane Austen:

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”

i truly love this quote... and agree wholeheartedly with it. i could go on about this quote, but i think i'd be falling into the problem mentioned at the beginning of this post.

and an interesting fact:

humans glow! really. right now, you are emitting a glow that is 1000 times less than what human eyes can see. cool, right?

*Glow - Alien Ant Farm

you gotta say what's on your mind

i.

i want you to stop wanting me.

i need you to stop needing me.

i'd love you to stop loving me.

you don't know me, and i prefer it that way.

ii.

you're blind to reality and swear it's the only way to live.

you've got your head in the clouds, and your feet have forgotten what it feels like to be grounded.

you live in a dream world and want me to share it with you.

but we dont speak the same language, and i'm tired of being misunderstood.

iii.

we hardly ever talk anymore.

i rarely know what's going in your life; you know almost nothing of what's happening in mine.

i even think i've forgotten what your voice sounds like.

but i still think of you as one of my very best friends.

iv.

i just wish you would stop trying to fit in all the time. the moments you let your guard down is when you look your best.

you think what the latest tabloids tell you to think, and

you change your opinion on things so fast it gives me whiplash.

i'd like you better if you weren't just like everyone else: caught up in pretending to be unique.

v.

you are selfish.

you are naive.

you can be completely dense.

but you know me better than almost anyone else. you get me... when most people dont even begin to understand.

vi.

there are days when you are the sun lighting my world, the air i need to survive. and

there are days when you drive me insane, completely mad, and i want nothing more than for you to just disappear

forever.

but i'd walk to the moon and back if you asked me to. i'd collect all the stars in the sky to keep your room bright at night.

vii.

i know it's not your fault.

i know you had no more control over anything than i did, but

when i let my thoughts wander off on their own...

i blame you. for everything. even when i know i shouldn't.

*The Truth - Good Charlotte

i'm so excited, and i just cant hide it

oh my god.

i come home today after lunch and shopping with my brothers and sister's family. everything was calm until we parked. then, brother number one was screaming because he was cold and i had opened the car door. brother number two was screaming that he couldnt find one of his peanuts (dont ask). nephew was sleeping. i was struggling to carry a zillion things and get the door open so that everyone could get out of the cold asap. brother number two closed the car door in brother number one's face. brother-in-law yells at both brothers. brother number one gets upset about the car door and being yelled at. this was all happening in the span of about two and a half minutes, along with some other stuff.

anyways, as im opening the door, i notice a package. i refuse to get excited because my mom orders stuff from online all the time, and just because i was waiting for a package doesnt mean it's for me. everything calms down a bit, and i look at the box. it has my name on it. i open it, and come face to face with this:

which i then turn over to see this:

and finally open up to see:

is it not beautiful? does it not fill you with joy? does the sight of my name written across the front page (and the spine) of a real book not send chills down your spine at the thought of the possibilities of the future? okay, so maybe it's just me...

there are some changes i need to make (like adjusting margins and stuff and the blurb on the back needs to be changed) before i make copies for people i know, but those can wait. for now, i'm going to continue to stare at my book and eeeeeeeeeeeee.

(for those of you who knew me/knew of me in high school, the picture of writing on the cover is from The Story. i found it on my computer. i dont remember why i took it, but yeah...)

*I'm So Excited - Pointer Sisters

happy new year, happy new year

did you know that it was 2010 already??

i mean, i knew yesterday was new year's eve. i knew because i was complaining to my family about how i think it's pretty stupid to celebrate it. today is just like yesterday and just like tomorrow... just with a different year tacked on at the end. i also think new year's resolutions are some of the stupidest things ever. why do you have to make such a big deal about resolving to do the same things every year that you know you most likely not end up doing? and i really dont see why the mail can't be delivered today. what are you going to be doing on new year's day? (according to my sister, recovering from hangovers.) my mom was also saying how stupid it is to wish someone a happy new year. you're really wishing someone happiness for a whole year?? that's a tall wish. wish them a good day, okay, but a year? don't we just sound like a delightfully cheery family?

so i knew it last night, but this morning, when i saw mention of 2010 everywhere i was shocked. 2010 was going to be a big year for me... kinda like 2006. 2010 was when i was going to graduate, which i guess is technically still true even though i finished school in 2009. 2010 was when the real world was going to start, though i pushed that back a couple of years for grad school. 2010 was going to be when all the pieces magically fell into place and i would know what i wanted to do with the rest of my life. i'm still just as lost as ever, and today, i'm okay with that.

*Happy New Year - ABBA