fall has fallen
a chill is in the air, the bookstore lines are long, and the parking has been reduced to zero. summer's officially over in my world.
current mood: are those changing leaves??

silver, gold
make new friends,
but keep the old.
one is silver,
the other's gold.
i learned that song when i was a wee little britto in girl scouts (brownies, i think?), and i'm reminded of it more often than most things i learned in nursery school. yesterday i was sitting in a cafe in pacific beach, a cafe that reminds me very specifically about some golden girlfriends of mine, all of whom have dispersed themselves across the world (maine, connecticut, and israel). as i looked around the room, waiting for my chai and thinking "has this place always been purple?" my eyes fell to a lovely grace of a lady standing in the archway. my mouth moved before my head even registered it, and the sound of "mook-lan!" made sense to no one but the important one in the doorway. she happened to be in town, from israel, and i happened to be in her cafe. it was a golden moment.
and to round out my throwback to friendlier golden times, i ended the evening doing something i hadn't done in maybe 5 years... i spent 2 hours talking on the phone to the only person in this world that i'm ever able to spend 2 hours talking on the phone to: the one and only doc-a-roo. and those are the best kinds of friends, as you get older: the kind that you can talk to, falling back in to a groove like time and distance had never passed between you two. i truly am lucky to have a few of them sprinkled about my life.
current mood: blessed

love/hate
there are quite a few things i love in this world (like thanksgiving!) and quite a few things that i don't care for as much (uh, like christmas!), but there are a few special things that i have a love/hate relationship with. here are some examples:
donuts - a dicey terrain to navigate for sure, the scenario usually goes a little something like this: "mmm, donuts!" (5 minutes later) "ugh, donuts." (5 minutes after that) "ooh, donuts!". repeat.
spin class - the lewdest and rudest of curses run like ticker tape through my brain, mostly directed at the instructor, whenever i am sweating buckets all over the stationery bike in spin class. but it makes me feel pretty good, and gives me a great ass!
money - i might have to move this one to the "necessary evil" category, but money messes with my head. when i'm broke, i actually worry less than when i have moola, and when i have it, i don't spend it, and vice versa.
love itself - is it better to have loved and lost? jury's still out. but when it's good, it's good, and all the other times... not so much.
current mood: /what do you love/hate?

gettin' back
in addition to having a fabulous time with my job, i've found that working on campus has opened the door to a number of opportunities for me to participate as a seasoned alumna; doors that are probably not cracked for the typical volunteer. yesterday i pitched in for warren residential life training, putting the new RAs though their paces in an exercise where they have to face extreme circumstances they might encounter while on duty. i was on "the party scene", and had a great time stumbling around an apartment, yelling at people, laughing at nothing, hiding in closets, looking bleary-eyed and telling people my name was azzi teck (my character was from another university). apparently, as was reported later, the poor newbie RAs thought my tap-water beverage of choice really was spiked. tomorrow night, i face them again, along with 750 new freshmen and their parents, plus the rest of warren's administration, as i was asked to emcee the opening night of orientation for new students. i'm excited to welcome the new kids, and get them as enthusiastic about their new home as i am... but i'll be laying off the tap water, just to be safe.
current mood: i bleed blue and gold

the itch
i'm in the mood again, and the urge is starting to get overwhelming. it doesn't help when i see myself reflected in less-than-ideal conditions either, but perhaps that's my own subconscious sabotaging the view. i'm referring, of course, to the 3-month itch i get to lop off the mop that's attached to my head. it's been a long ride with this hair of mine, and when my life starts squeezing me in other ways (in the current case, job hoopla), my reaction is to shake things up by modifying something. back in the day, it was another hole punched in to a body part... and much to my parents relief, i've grown out of that phase. nowadays, the easiest thing would be to take off a few 10 inches or so from the hair that i have committed to growing out. but it's that commitment (to locks of love) that keeps the scissors from my hands, and i have to find new and non-scarring (to me, or my bank account, so shopping is usually off the table) ways to satiate my unrest. (... ps ... i'm open to suggestions!)
current mood: 3.5 months to go!

so it turns out...
...that this:

may be the most fun, but not the most nutritional follow up snacky to this:


that is all.
current mood: ungh

to reunite or not
although the internet rumblings have been happening for a while compliments of myspace, i officially received my invitation to my 10-year high school reunion. my immediate turnoff from this event is the cost: $90 for "heavy" appetizers (lead crudités?) and -A- drink. oh, and "use of the facilities". it will be held at la costa, so i guess that's an expensive toilet.
admittedly, curiosity may get the best of me, leading me up the coast to the resort to shell out my $90. there are a few people that i would love to see, and these are the same people who have messaged me asking if i was going... so that's motivation. but there are also quite a few people who i could happily continue on with life never seeing again, if not for any reason other than i don't know who they are or don't really need to know where they're going or what they're doing. it's not meant to be mean, it's just fact. i'm pretty sure i would really only survive the night with natalie in tow, and that's a whole new danger to be considered ; )
current mood: reminiscent and thoughtful

Photograph: a picture painted by the sun without instruction in art.

glory be
to the great gods of tuesday who got me in to chicago on time. i ran with the winged feet of mercury and made my gate in heathrow with time to spare (and when i say 'time to spare', i mean they didn't have to open the plane back up for me, but did close it behind me). note to self: in future travels, AVOID HEATHROW for connections!
current mood: recovering

ir y volver
in addition to its vivid history and flamenco dancers, sevilla will be forever home to a few personal memorial items of mine... mainly my mismatched sandals, compliments of la tomatina (they carried me well through streets and alleys, across borders and to monkeys, and only got a few dozen strange looks), my beat up and broken bottle of febreeze (at least i´m leaving soon, so it won´t be a devastating loss) and the contraband towel from the russian mafia hotel... i´ll never forget the time we spent together on that beach in nerja.
sevilla is to me what paris should have been (no offense, katy)... beautiful architecture, cobblestone streets, cafés and accordian players, and of course a cigarette hanging off every other person´s lip. i´m comfortable here, having fallen back in to my single traveler routine of walkingwalkingwalking everywhere, stopping randomly to take pictures or hang back, using my internal direction rather than a map, and attempting whatever language pieces i know when needed. i´ve even adopted the soft lithsp that permeates the whole of spain to different degrees... a practiced and confident "grah'thz'ahs" makes it way out of my mouth on a regular basis. it was easy to let my other travel companions take the lead before, with their knowledge of español and not feeling embarrassed to be seen with a giant map in front of their face. their absence caused a temporary panic when i was dropped off at a distant bus station in a town i had no orientation to. but now i walk with ease, head up in search of cool shade and unique sites. i´ve spent a lot of time in churches already... i think i was more catholic in a past life, as i am always strangely drawn to churches in my travels, but also they are stone and therefore cool inside. and that´s useful, in this 90º+ weather.
i head back to madrid tonight, an end to a long journey. i´m playing the money game right now, wincing at the price of the train ticket i just bought to get back there... i had a lot of unexpected expenses on this adventure, and i´ll be reluctant to add it all up at the end. but what are savings for, if not to be spent on something you enjoy? so with that, i bid you a gracious ciao, and i´m off to linger like a local, if just for a little while longer.
current mood: quisiera un café, por favor

labrynthian
having successfully escaped the mafia (or so we think), we found a hostel in the heart of the cozy boutique town of granada. granada is a place i could see myself in. cute and small, but with enough bustle to make it homey instead of desolate. granada is home to¨"the most famous place in all of spain" (according to our guidebook): the Alhambra... a giant moorish fort within which the christians took over and built their own castle and ruined the fountains. it was pretty awesome, in its sheer immensity and architecture. all this after a night chasing the free tapas offered in the gypsy district, and then getting lost on the way home.
today we leave from nerja, the jewel of the south coast, after planning a day to do nothing more than lie on the beach... and karaoke may have snuck in there as well (surprisingly not my idea!). today we head to gilbraltar, after which i will leave mi compadres, and head towards sevilla solo, while they wander over to morroco. i hate to miss the monkeys with fezes, but i have to get back to madrid monday night for my flight on tuesday. i´m assuming at this point, with what i had to go through to get to madrid (a 2-hour wait in heathrow security, running to the plane and having them open it for me), that i will probably be missing my LON >> ORD leg of the trip, since i have only an hour between flights. i apologize in advance, shama, if i´m not at el aeropuerto when i should be. if anyone´s looking for me, i´m in the security line... or the russians have found me!
current mood: rock´n´road time again