Kathryn

Teen Wolf

2003-07-30T20:06:42Z

I was having a really good morning, until I ran into Teen Wolf.
Teen Wolf was this EE kid who wanted to work for a physics prof (black mark #1), who told him that he must take the physics qualifying exam. To prepare for this, Teen Wolf took the order of magnitude physics class the quarter before, where he would ask questions like "Ah, but what about relativity." (black mark #2). I've never met anyone else who could so reliably sound both self-satisfied and stupid. It was around this time that my friends dubbed him Teen Wolf, in honor of his lupine beard.
These are all minor sins, though. Teen Wolf earned my eternal hatred in connection with the qualifying exam.The first day, he came early, sat at one of the nice desks, worked on the exam during the morning, but during the afternoon he was gone. "Poor Teen Wolf," I thought. "Maybe he had some terrible family emergency. Maybe he realized that the exam was just far too hard for him."
But the next day he was back. Again he took up one of the good exams, worked for a few hours, but instead of leaving, he stayed there reading some dopey science fiction book. That would have been bad enough ("How can he sit here in this room smugly reading while people like me are feverishly trying to salvage three pages of algebra gone awry?"), but an hour before the end of the exam, when my relativity problem still wasn't working out, he leaned over and whispered conspiratorially "How are you doing?"
In shock ("Is he actually trying to talk to me?"), through gritted teeth: "I can't talk right now."
Him, acting all wounded: "I was just trying to help." (Sum(n, 3, Infinity) black mark #n)
Fucker.
At least there is some basic level of justice in the world. I passed. He failed.
But this morning, when everything was going so well (trotting off to get my coffee, looking forward to a day of machining, which is much better than recalcitrant electronics), this guy comes out of the EE building, smiling. No beard. There was this moment before I recognized him when I noticed his beautiful stormy-lion hair, and thought "Hey, he's pretty."
And then I realized: "That's Teen Wolf. He's shaved off his beard." And to make things as bad as possible, he came out of the door, and stood beside it holding it open for about five sickening seconds, as I walked towards it, trying to unobtrusively fade the smile off my face, shaking my head.
And then I went in the other door. Which made me feel bad, because it's mean to snub someone. And to top it off, as I came back from coffee, my hair (all pinned up for machining) fell down.

I hate you, Teen Wolf, and all of your works.

grrr....

2003-07-29T02:26:38Z

I was so happy, because I figured out the why of one of the problems with my fridge. Of course, in fixing it I caused another problem. I don't know why I should even be surprised at this point.

alkyone @ 2003-07-26T16:11:00

2003-07-26T23:11:21Z

I'm feeling very smug because in the last two weeks I have 1) brazed together brass and stainless steel and 2) made creme brulee with a propane torch. Incidentally, while one should direct the tip of the inner flame at a metal solder joint, using the same method on custard will just result in burnt sugar. If you're trying this at home, use the tip of the outer flame instead.

alkyone @ 2003-07-25T11:24:00

2003-07-25T18:23:58Z

I was ranting to my Mom this morning about what I had read in Harper's about prison medicine, and she casually said "It's like when I was writing that chapter in Our Bodies, Ourselves."
"What? You never told me you wrote a chapter in Our Bodies, Ourselves!"
"Really? Well, the ladies that were running it were the same as the ones in your sister's playgroup. That playgroup was great. You got four mornings off a week, and then on the fifth you had to watch five children."
Thus reinforcing my feeling that I will never, no matter how hard I try, be as cool as my parents were.

alkyone @ 2003-07-24T18:23:00

2003-07-25T01:23:10Z

I was walking across campus today, and I saw these kids playing the accordian. Well, there were three of them, and one was playing the accordian. I went over to talk to them, 'cause there ain't nothin' cooler than an accordian. And they totally dissed me. But it got me thinking: I should learn to play the accordian. 'Cause if a trio of punk-ass twelve-year-olds who won't even talk to me can, then I can too.

whole foods

2003-07-23T01:36:49Z

Incidentally, before CLMC became filled only with ethnic slurs and the absence of (pick one) beautiful/genuine/laid-back/rich/non-materialistic men/women in/outside of San Franciso, at least 3/4 of all posts seemed to reference BART, MUNI, or Whole Foods. Anyone who can explain to me what it is about public transportation/shopping for expensive cheese and worthless herbal remedies that makes people amorous yet tongue-tied would be very welcome.
So the other night I had been sniveling, because the world was an awful hopeless place that was unlikely to ever get even the least bit better, and then I really wanted to make a salad, for which I needed a lemon. Off, then, to the closest store open after 8 that sells lemons without wax on them (okay, I am unconscionably fussy and deserve no better than to shop alongside the herbal remedy buyers of the world). And I was standing in front of the dairy products wondering to myself whether two whole quarts of buttermilk were better than none at all, and there was a man nearby restocking who said to me without preamble "You are so beautiful."
Um.
So I mumbled something about how kind he was and scuttled off.
But I was thinking about it afterwards, and I couldn't think of how it was a bad thing nohow.
Cause either I had big visible "I've been bawling" dark circles under my eyes, and I was staring at the buttermilk like someone whose puppy had died, and he was trying to cheer me up, or maybe he really thought I was beautiful, which would be nicer than being thought hideously ugly.

alkyone @ 2003-07-21T19:10:00

2003-07-22T02:10:13Z

So I was having trouble writing something, because it was my first
entry. There was a thing that I thought was important that I was
trying to write down, but I couldn't make it come out right. I think it's
not so hard to come up with a convincing lie, but telling the truth
requires a lot of pains and artifice. Because there's the experience, and
there are the words on the page, and there is the disappointing gulf
between the two. But at this rate I was never going to write anything
down, so here is just some stuff that happened:

I was visiting my parents house (where there are starting to be
blackberries) this weekend, and I woke up very early in the morning,
because the light was coming in through too many windows. Whenever I sleep
in a strange bed, there is a moment as I'm waking up when I get confused
about which way I'm facing on the bed, and how the bed is oriented in the
room. But this time there was more. It was almost as if there was a moment
when I could think and feel but couldn't remember who I was. I think that
being inside one's own head when there are no other people around is not
really like being alone. I am always having conversations with (real)
people who aren't there, and with the one (who is I also) who remembers
and judges while I talk. But when I woke up on Saturday morning none of
these were there, and I think that for only a moment I was utterly alone,
as if I had just been born. I wish I could do it again.