Act natural

( Tuesday, Dec. 03, 2002 7:07 pm )

>Allie, don't let me disappear

So I'm in charge of buying a Christmas present for my 13-year-old cousin Emma. If you were a thirteen-year-old girl living in Alabama, what would you want? This is the question that haunts me now. I made my first foray today, going down to Barnes and Noble to look for The Perks of Being a Wallflower because I've heard it's the new Catcher, but I had to see how graphic it is, because her parents are very Christian and I'm not sure they let odd books about teenage boys past the Alabama border. But I couldn't find it. I also realized that while I had thought I could easily get a retail job with the holiday season here, in actuality the constant Xmas music would drive me insane. I worked at a movie theater over one December break, and man has Mariah Carey ever recorded a lot of Christmas songs. I was never happier on December 26hth.

Tonight for dinner I made something I used to get all the time in the PCU cafeteria. It was supposed to be African, I seem to remember, and it consisted of a quatered yam arranged vertically and surrounded by rice and beans and corn, with a little cheese on top. This sounds horrible as I write it, but actually it was really really carbolicious. My version tonight tasted exactly the same and looked exactly the same, but it was not served by a large singing Greek man griping about how they try to force him to wear plastic gloves. That was the only difference.

Oh, I remember what I was going to write today. Something unflattering, for a real big change. The thing is, pretty much all week I've been suddenly thinking back on Nathan-era things. I'm not sure what triggered it, but all of a sudden I recall some schmoopy-type shenanigans and sort of smirk to myself a little. I mean, good memories and all, but I can't help wondering if anyone will ever feel like that about me again, and if they do, will I feel the same about them. The usual. At the bookstore today, there was a studenty couple in front of me on the escalator all close and smoochy like they couldn't get through a twenty second ride without kissing each other, and I was tempted to garrotte them both with my mutlicolored scarf. I didn't though.

I'm on a new plan now, wherein I do not drink beer at home for no good reason. I don't like this plan.

Here's what I like: drinking on weeknights.

Here's what I don't like: when Juney comes home in Snooty Mood.

Now I must go and shake the stubborn Christmas lights, they've gone out again.

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