Bitterville: Population One

I'm back from thanksgiving break in a strange depressive funk for which I have no good reason for. But I know I can pinpoint it down to my love life....or more specifically, my lack thereof. I'm wincing as I write this because it's so completely against my nature to do that mainstream boo-hoo-unrequited-crush junk that seems to be my life. Atleast, I've somehow broken out of that moronic pattern only to fall into a worse one.....giving in to lame bouts of melancholy. Yup, melancholy pretty much sums it up, here's dictionary.com's definition which hit the nail right on the hammer: "Sadness or depression of the spirits; gloom;Pensive reflection or contemplation."
I rather like that last definition....."pensive reflection". I'm pensively reflecting, NOT moping, over my singleness. I think the reason I'm thinking about it so much is that lately its as if I've been sucked into this Black Hole of Coupledom by some of the most unlikely people. It all started this summer when my brother the introvert recluse tells me he has a steady girlfriend he's in love with....and its long distance which is really admirable, in my opinion, if people can make it work. But good lord, I think I was in shock for atleast a week afterwards. My parents really pretend like nothing's happening but on their rare visits to the land of reality, muse at how the first to date was my brother and not me (the seemingly only extroverted/social member of my family). And in my mind, I was really wondering the same thing. Not to be misunderstood, my brother is great and I know any girl would be lucky to have him, but I really thought that being as shy as he is, it would be years before he'd have a serious relationship....boy was I wrong. So all summer long, I've been regaled with tales of long distance love and because it was my brother I suffered in silence trying not to a) roll my eyes or b) retch when sentences beginning with the words "when you really love someone...." were uttered. I happily come back to college to my other 2 musketeers Tara and Patricia, where being single is once again cool and independant. All right!....ah, but this doesn't last long.
Because I'm way too lazy to retell the saga of how Tara and her freaking soul mate Bus Stop Boy Bernard aka Action Jackson aka Bernie Zone aka John got together, I'll just skip to the part that's relevant to this post. They're together almost 24/7, and once again note how Tara, like my brother, who has a long history of scorning/ignoring the opposite gender altogether manages to find someone she really likes...AND who can cook! What are the chances?...Don't get me wrong, I'm really excited that my brother and Tara have found someone because I've never seen either of them so happy ...ever. I mean, I could launch a flaming skunk at them and they'd still walk around with that "Relationship GRIN". Oh yeah, think Joker from Batman.....alright I'm exaggerating, sue me.
So my theories? 1) I have some insane vibe that drive all men around me to treat me like a) cute kid sister b) random person to converse with or c) punch-em-on-the arm-and-trade-dirty-jokes-buddy, 2) Fate has destined me to be ..single...forever...which is....cool *cough*....3) I'm a raving hypocrite who moans about the pain of singledom but when even approached with the hint of relationship prospects, bolts in the other direction, 4) I subconsciously seek only those guys who are either utterly unattainable or completely incompatible with me to crush on as a weird safety net, or 5) I'm really tired, it's 1:32 a.m. and I'm writing about utter crap because I'm bored. Yup, that's enough introspection for today, frankly I'm shocked I even kept at it this long.
(Listening to "Right in Front of You" by Celine Dion....shudder....dear god, Celine Dion? "SNAP OUT OF IT NINA!" ...::slap!::...okay, I think I'm fine now.)
I just need to survive this week and THEN I can....oh wait, FINALS. Dammit. I need to end on a positive note: I rode the subway on my own this week in New York without getting mugged/kidnapped/assaulted/chased by wild dogs ...yes, miracles do happen. I'm going to leave with this singularly awesome quote:

Randall: "Where is it, you little one-eyed cretin? "
Mike: "Okay, first of all, it's "cretin." If you're going to threaten me, do it properly. And second of all, you're nuts if you think kidnapping ME is going to help YOU cheat your way to the top!"
Randall: [Chuckles evilly.] "You still think this is about that stupid scare record? :
Mike: "Well... I did. Right up until you... chuckled... like that... And now I'm thinking I should just get out of here."

Monsters Inc.

58 cents...Don't spend it all in one place

This day....wow. Pittsburgh has done its best to put a damper on my excitement about escaping to New York for thanksgiving....how?...in every way possible. First, I wake up aching all over thanks to a combination of weekly aerobics, and daily workout sessions with my crazed boot camp roomie Patricia, who continually reminds me "Well...you SAID you wanted to go hardcore." And apparently my muscles were still very very pissed off at me for that mile long jog around Phipps Conservatory yesterday and decided to punish me during kickboxing. I walk out of there feeling like shit ran over twice, and probably looking that way too. There aren't words in the english language to describe how bad I look when I come out of that class....shudder. Anyway, despite the lactic acid threatening to melt my insides, I say "No nina, you must go get your paycheck !". This is, of course, "conveniently" located in Chevron....and I got to enjoy the joyous trudge up an almost completely vertical hill.
Ah, but no...the fun doesn't end there! As I get there, I run into a cute guy from SJP (a club I go to when I have time)....and instead of greeting me with hello, he blurts out "Where have YOU been?".... that did wonders for my self esteem really. I was tempted to blurt out "From the depths of Hades!" But no...I swallow the humiliation, and continue into dreaded Chevron to retrieve my well-deserved paycheck from Toni Webber....another obstacle.
"Hey Toni, I'm here to pick up my paycheck." Me
" ...They don't come until the end of the month." Toni
"NOOOOOOOOOOOO!" Me.

Switching to a new color...ah...anyway, I'm in dire financial straights... I have 58 cents to my name!! ...No, I don't lie. I seem to deplete any funds almost as soon as I get them, and I swear I'm not a clothes junkie like my roomates or have a taste for belugian caviar or something. And now....I have to go through THanksgiving ...in New York....with 58 cents! How is this fair? It's not folks.....

And yeah, despite my BEST efforts to not burden my parents, I'm going to have to use their dreaded credit card (that thing is the devil!). Hmph. Nothing ever works out the way I plan it. Groan, now to call the folks and endure the incredulous "We just SENT you money..."....yup, and now its all gone. I think I'm going to play piano today, I need a stress reliever....something angry like Beethoven would be perfect. Cough, this is of course assuming I remember it....uh oh...OH WELL.
("Barber of Seville" from Looney Tunes playing)

Quote of the Day:
Mr. Krabs: Patrick, you're fired.
Patrick: But I don't even work here.
Mr. Krabs: How would you like a job, starting right now?
Patrick: Boy, would I.
Mr. Krabs: You're fired.
Spongebob Squarepants

Okay, I'm going to try to be more positive....here's a wish list::
1. See the Spongebob movie in the very near future.
2. Buy the following DVD's: Aqua Teen Hunger Force season 3, Golden Girls Season 1, Looney Toons Collection, Spongebob season 2....
3. Get a coat whose buttons don't decide to pop off randomly after a month.

That's it, see...that's a pretty modest list right? cough...::nina runs to withdraw 58 cents::
Now I'm gonna take care of some errands, and then enjoy the rest of my government sanctioned holiday!:)

Laptop Suicide!

Whoah...it has certainly been forever since I've written.... but a ton has happened so I might as well recap for the negative four individuals that actually read this thing! Ahem, first of all I destroyed my laptop...yes actually I still maintain that it committed computer-cide, but does anyone believe me? NOOOO!
Okay let me start from the beginning. I might of mentioned how physics is completely taking over my soul, it seems like every day i have to do something else for this class. Anyway, last wednesday, I was typing furiously away on my laptop for a formal physics lab report that I THOUGHT was due the next day....and since its customary for me to start labs the night before thanks to my extreme penchant for slacking off...I pulled an all nighter to finish this lab...meaning I actually saw THE SUN COME UP! Yeah, it was fricking 6 a.m. when I finished, I dragged my sleep deprived form into lab only to have the TA Liu (who enjoys mocking me at every turn) inform me that the lab was only due next week. I swear I could have cried. I mean, to top it off, I had a physics midterm the next day which I COULD have been studying for had it not been for aforementioned lab from hell. Anyway...what does this have to my destroyed laptop you ask? well..yes, i'm getting to that. So that Thursday, I pulled ANOTHEr allnighter to study for the physics midterm, so by friday morning I was really in bad shape mentally. I don't know how I made it throught that physics test but by the time I got home I was ready to dive into my bed for the nap to end all naps.....but did I GET that nap? NO!
Here's what happened: I stagger in after the test, ready to fall into bed....only I'm so clumsy, my foot gets caught in the cable wire attached to my laptop...I'm so disoriented I hardly notice the loud CRASH behind me. By the time I extract my foot from the wire, I notice my laptop lying on the floor...not breathing....not RESPONDING!. So almost in slow motion, I run towards it, cradle it in my arms, yelling for it to come alive, but no...there's this enormous crack running over the monitor. And because it's a laptop, and all the bloody parts are connected to each other, I find out after a 2 hour convo with a Dell technician from India named "Sue" that my LCD is broken and it's going to cost me...$450 dollars to have a new part shipped to me, and then another $200 to have it installed, all because I don't have complete warantee! Yeah, cough...this is the most expensive accident I've ever been responsible for, but I'd like to think I've learned my freaking lesson....I mean for the last couple of weeks I've been forced to return to the overcrowded computer labs, not to mention endure countless lectures from my parents on responsibility and of course the "back in MY day, we didn't HAVE laptops! And if we had we would've guarded it with our SOUL!". Yeah, well as soon as I get it fixed, I swear I'm going to encase my precious laptop in lead, with a freaking force field surrounded by kryptonite. There is NO way this is ever going to happen again....
But I suppose, in an odd twisted sort of way, some good came out it. Since I have no laptop...and hence no internet to distract me, I'm sorta doing more work than usual. And also, when I dragged my roomate Tara along to drop my busted up computer off at CompUSA....I initiated a bit of matchmaking between her and this guy at the bus stop. Boy, that sounded creepy. He was a guy at the bus stop who knew a friend of ours....there...now it sounds slightly more normal. Well, I kind of went overboard with it, but in the end, I'd say it's going really really well between those two....score one for me! If med school doesn't work out....I can complete my spinster image by going into matchmaking...lovely...
Well, I voted today, that's right...I did my civic duty, and so help me god it better pay off. Because if Bush wins, I'm going to OD on chocolate to numb the pain. But then again, if Kerry wins, I'll still binge on chocolate out of sheer happiness....hmm, making that stop at Rite Aid today I guess. Speaking of which, after a weekend of STARVATION, I have $115 in the bank account. I keep printing out statements just so I can look at that lovely...round...number. Cough. I'm going to stop now.
Hmmm...what else...oh yeah. Lately, the dark sceptre of doom that is MCAT/Med school is weighing heavily on my mind. Maybe its always been there but in the last few months, its been so oppressive I honestly can't bear to think about it. I'm not even the nervous/panicky type, and yet I dread next semester. O.Chem 2 w/ lab (SHUDDER), Genetics (Nina having spasms), and....Calculus (the one class that refuses to die, I blame myself for not having taken it earlier). And of course....I have to finish off in April by bombing the MCATs. I can't afford those insanely expensive Kaplan courses, so I'm stuck relying on myself to construct a strict study routine...HA! And we all know how successfull I've been with THAT in the past! So bottom line: I'm screwed, totally totally screwed. In fact, the only thing pushing me to even attempt at med school is that if I don't, it'll invariably mean staying at home with my parents until I'm too old to realize how miserable I am. Boy, this is one depressing post. I swear, this semester hasn't been THAT bad. Maybe it's just today...hmmm...I'm going to end with a couple of Fresh Prince quotes to brighten me up:

" Carlton, I don't know what's worse; dying a slow agonizing death or staying alive and listening to you." Will Smith

"I could yell...I could even scream...but one of us has to be the mature one.....and it AIN"T GONNA BE ME AUNT JEMIMA!" Will Smith