One year ago: A Yellowstone sunset

I have been migrating from place to place, trying to collect my thoughts. A few minutes ago I was sipping ice water from a Styrofoam cup and digesting a Caesar salad at Horton Plaza. I stared into space as the water level slowly diminished, thinking about everything and nothing in particular. When you can hear the people you’re watching, you can only take so much, especially if some of them aren’t moving.
Now I’m sitting in yet another downtown Starbucks, sucking on 12 ounces of sugar-free relaxation. I certainly have a lot of thoughts to collect from the past two weeks. I have not really slowed down since getting sick and sleeping a lot, but that feels like a part of my life that never happened. I started school this week with the daunting task of crashing all of my courses. I succeeded.
Having gone to the college for nearly three years and met just about every man and woman there is to meet, it’s overwhelming and a little disheartening to walk into classrooms with 40-50 complete strangers. I wonder, how could there be so many people I don’t know?
The week was not without its memorable moments, like anthropology professor Dennis O’Neil challenging a man to maintain an erection with a shotgun pointed at him, or philosophy professor Zack Seech blowing away an entire audience with a lecture on open-mindedness, or my asking the lovely geography professor Cathy Jain if anyone has ever tried to steal the North Pole. In philosophy, I sit a next to the same girl I sat next to seven years ago in eighth grade.
Adding to the S&M (stress and memories), an hour-and-a-quarter visit with a counselor yesterday revealed some surprising information about my transfer to a university, which is set into motion this October. I still have 29 units to complete by the end of spring, which means one more course this semester, a Speech class during the intersession, and HE during spring. So last night I found myself scrambling to enroll in a fast-track CSIS 105 (Fundamental Computer Concepts) class, which is good for three, juicy, UC-transferrable units. All these phone calls and catalog searches, combined with a little more caffeine than I’m used to, gave me a big headache.
But my worries are over, because an instructor suprised me with an e-mail message welcoming me to his Internet (bonus!) class, and I promptly enrolled.
His message came moments after a meeting with Russell and Mike, my beloved editor and director and KPBS. It looks like I’m going to be an on-call reporter and also work in the newsroom every Friday. With a full-time academic schedule, I couldn’t ask for a better deal. If you missed it, my feature aired Wednesday morning. (I originally lied about the air date.)
This week has definitely been of goals and personal refinements, of new, or at least improved. I received the shiny new “Jason Mraz Live at the Eagles Ballroom” CD/DVD set, and it’s phenomenal. I listened to the CD first in my car and was not as extremely impressed as I’d expected. However I was pleased to hear that Jason chose mostly classics and non-mainstream songs for the discs, showing his Jane-come-lately fanbase what he’s really all about. (Sadly, “The Remedy” still received the most thunderous cheers.) The DVD changed my mind — it’s stunning. The direction was superior, especially for a genre that doesn’t shine in that department. (“Dave Matthews Band: Live at Folsom Field” comes to mind, with its awkward cuts and overambitious effects.) Even better was the editing, which seamlessly interlaced the musical numbers with short video stories. These did not slow down the experience, and I found myself waiting to see the next one. The special features, too, were exceptional and worth the price of the set. Jason’s true creativity and spirit shine through in this release.
I also updated the James McGreevey/Candidate Zero post this week with comparison photos, because you were too lazy to click through the links and see for yourself.
And I received voice mail from Sam that’s worthy of the archives:
(Warning: Vulgar)

My eye is twitching, so it’s time to get some rest.