Well, I've just completed my first semester at Indiana University and I've got to say I'm rather pleased with it. Oh sure, maybe my classes aren't as hip and cool as their California counterparts, and, let's face it, this education here isn't gonna do me as much good as one from there would have. But, you know what, big deal.

So, let's run down the highlights of the semester and the new life down here:

And while Casa de Ray et 'Tis is not exactly party central, it's great to not have the university have its administrative fingers in every little aspect of my life.

From RAW to Temptation Island II, nothing beats a regularly scheduled TV watching gathering. Except, you know, two regurlarly scheduled TV watching nights.

Never before in the history of the universe have I had such constant access to illegal downloads. I have so many, that I don't actually do anything with most of them, other than burn them to CD and keep them shared with others on the eDonkey network. Also, newsgroups were very good to me and my Dreamcast this semester. (RIP Sega Dreamcast 1999-2001. We hardly knew 'ya.)

Nuff said.

And, of course, the best thing, and really the only thing, is that I am able to rub elbows every now and again with the people that I like rubbing elbows with. Obviously, everyone who's important to me doesn't attend Indiana University, nor do I even regularly fraternize with all the people that are important to me and attend IU, but coming and going, having friends in from other colleges, visiting other colleges to see friends and all... I like it. It's fun.

Now, things that haven't really changed. Obviously, my trademark inability to properly woo is still with me in all of its frustrating glory, but what exactly did I expect? Uh, let's see, what else. Oh right, I still don't have a future, and perhaps I have even less of one. But, as I was thinking just the other day, I'm happy with how things are right now. I mean, is everything perfect? Of course not, hell not even close. And there's alot of stuff I'd change if I had even one of those wands from that big ass wand room in Harry Potter (which I illegally downloaded this semester in both book and movie form), but good and bad, I can hang here like this for awhile. Which is good, because I think I'm going to be here for awhile.

They say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. Now, while the way to my heart is clearly through my desire to be surrounded by destructive chaos, but if you want to get into my wallet, you best get you some food.

Take the other night for example. It's 2:30 in the AM and I'm hungry. Not so hungry that I want to put on the weight associated with a frozen pizza or a homemade hamburger but hungry. So I decide to have some ramen noodles. As a bonus, ramen noodles are cheap and I spend too much money anyway. Just one problem: I didn't own any ramen noodles. Thus, I would have to go to Marsh.

Now, as any middle school home economics student can tell you, it is a mistake to go to the supermarket while you are hungry. And while I like to think of myself as having a high level of willpower-- sometimes I will induce an itch so as not to scratch it-- if I have a kryptonite it's food. So there I am in the oriental section of Marsh at 2:30 in the morning trying to make a sub 2-dollar ramen run when I see it: sweet and sour seasoning. 2 for a dollar. "Wow! It's only fifty cents! Let me get one of those." Then I got to thinking, "what could I use this seasoning for?" Keep in mind, my cooking skillz are so poor that if I were, by some twist of fate, to appear on Iron Chef, my only chance of winning would be if sudden a wave of remorse for Pearl Harbor overcame the judge. "I'll make sweet-and-sour chicken!" I thought. All I needed was an onion, a green pepper, some pineapples, some chicken, some rice, and some sweet-and-sour sauce. Oh, and better get some of those crunchy noodle things that I don't knoiw the name of. Them's be good.. And thus my 2 dollar ramen run got multiplied by ten and I became the proud owner of ingredients that I lack the skill to combine in any way that resembles sweet-and-sour chicken.

So I pledge to sit out the next day in an effort to restore some semblence of order to my finances. No eating = no spending. And, oh, my will was strong. Until, of course, I recieved the fateful IM message from one Mr. Jacob Groves. "R U down for a Steak N SHake run?" read Mr. Groves' oddly punctuated query. "Hell's M-Fing YEAH!" read my oddly punctuated reply. Now, remember I'm trying to work the absitience angle today harder than that lady that came to visit my fifth grade class with the really frizzy hair. And not only am I making a run to a relatively expensive restuaraunt, but I'm also going to one that requires me to pay in cash, something that I don't carry and can only get by paying an extra $3.50 to a machine. So I go in, and I try to put the breaks on. I even order water to drink when everyone else orders a milkshake. But then I see it staring up at me longingly from my placemat: the parfait. And that's when I knew, I had to have one. "Excuse me," I said to our waitress, who considering the fact that this was about 1:45 AM on a Monday morning was a lovely human being, "I'm looking at this parfait and I have to have one. Can you bring it to me?"

The moral of this story: Food is the spear which peirces the Achilles heel that is my wallet. In case, you know, any of you care.

-----

M!ssundaztood by Pink.

Prior to this CD about as much shake as gave to Pink was thinking her the hottest member ot the Lady Marmalade video. But turns out Pink isn't the street-thug that she was made out to be by her record label in an effort to market her debut ablum. Now that she's successful, she gets to be herself and we get to benefit from listening to the maturation of an artist.

Trivia: Pink's real name is Alicia Moore and Pink refers to Mr. Pink from Reservoir Dogs but "Mr. Pink" was deemed too esoteric a name for a solo female musician.