Raise your hand if your a journalism dork
Tuesday night I went to a lecture on personal journalism or writing in the first person. Walt Harrington, good ol' MK and a writer from Esquire were on the panel. (It's like the J-school dream team. If only they could have worked in the New Yorker somehow, too.) The discussion was so interesting it made me long to have the time to write something besides quizzes. And afterward there was a reception with free wine from the J-school, very flashback to when I was an intern. Dean Sqaured was even there, so I heard the word Missour-ah more in about an hour than I have in years. And to top it all off, I (very brief) conversation with Walt. I really only had time to shake his hand and tell him that he gave the commencement speech at my graduation. I was still really excited.

Let the countdown begin
OK, guys, if I make it through the next 28 days, it will be a miracle. The issue from hell finishes shipping July 20, so I just need to make it through then. I might have to start camping out at the office or something, though. I'll attempt to blog occassionally so you guys still know I'm alive. And there's a trip to Maine and a show at Shakespeare in the Park coming up in July, so I've got a little incentive to survive that long.

I'm ready for my close-up, Mr. DeMille
So today I make my small screen debut! After a lot of panic and the purchase of a really over-priced shirt, I taped a bunch of segments for that astrology show at the beginning of this month. It actually ended up being a lot of fun. I had my makeup and hair done in their studio. I wish I had enough money to hire that woman full-time. I looked pretty fabulous (and she even shaped my eyebrows for free!) It took about three hours to tape, which kind of sucked, and then I got stuck in a downpour and completely soaked my favorite grey suede flats, which really sucked. (But I got them for free, so I guess I can't really complain if they get ruined.) But I didn't really care, but I was so relieved it was over and I hadn't made a complete fool of myself. Or at least I don't think I did. I haven't seen the finished product yet, though, so maybe I did make a fool of myself. Um, I'll let you know. Or if you have the right cell phone service, you might be able to see for yourself.

Snakes on the Subway!
That reminds me. On my way to the taping, I had one of my scariest subway experiences ever. I was sitting on the A train, reading my book, when I noticed that the guy across from me was holding a snake. It was a so small that at first I thought he was just playing with a piece of rope. But then the rope started to move on its own.

I tried to ignore it, but then another guy walked up him and started showing off his snake. The second snake was a lot larger, at least four feet long. I know that because this guy started gesturing with his snake and holding it out to its full length and telling stories about how he feeds it and his vast collection of other poisonous snakes and other creepy crawly things (a tarantula and a scorpion).

And he was standing right across from me and not holding on to anything! I kept waitng for snake boy to topple over and land in my lap, big scary snake and all. Or for the snake to get loose so he'd have to chase it all over the subway car. Or at least for someone to notice the snakes and start screaming. (This didn't happen. I suppose they were afraid of pissing off the guys with the snakes.) I spent the next 100-plus blocks trying to will them to get out off a the next stop, but they didn't budge. Then I started to worry that there might be more of them, and that the subway car was full of guys on their way to some sort of snake convention. It would be like a scene from that cheesy horror movie that's coming out, Snakes on a Plane. But the real kicker is that I'm not sure these guys even knew each other! One got out at Times Square, and the other was still on the train when I got off it.

College Flashback
So I went to reunion weekend at the boys' college the other weekend. It was rainy and gross, but there was still an alumni rugby match that we got to watch and a drink-up his friends threw after. (Drink-up is rugby speak for lots of beer.) We ended up crashing in an open dorm room for the night, and it was a little freaky because it looked so much like FARC. It had exactly the same furniture and everything. I kind of expected to walk out into the hallway and run into Johnny.

Just more proof that real estate people are shady
My landlord sent me renewal papers, and they're upping my rent by $155! Not only that, my roommate asked them about signing a new lease on her own with them, and they wanted another $100 on top of that. Good thing I'm already planning to move to Hoboken, or I'd definitely be headed to a borough or maybe the creepy part of Manhattan where my bus station is. I think that's about all I could afford.