"this is not conversation; it is merely mental evacuation."

*while writing this post, i accidentally inhaled 3/4 of a quart of andes mint ice cream and a whole lotta popcorn--be warned*

boston is awesome! lindsay and her family are phenomenal! the fourth of july is so so neat! seafood is sinfully delicious!


the GRE is not ANY of those things!

that pretty much sums up the last six or so days. our boston trip was fabulous, even taking into account the bus travel. the first bus, from dc's chinatown to new york's chinatown, was driven by a man whose capacity for love and empathy i don't doubt for one second, but i can't say he was among the most efficient of humanoids. my mind returned to brazil while my body, held captive in its seat, made stop after stop and the driver argued with various people about whether or not they could get on our already-full bus... what? we'd given ourselves a 2-hour grace period before our connecting bus to boston, figuring it would surely be enough leeway for a 4-hour trip. we were wrong. luckily, after wandering the streets of chinatown in the dark with a bag slung over nick's shoulder for longer than i'm going to admit here, fung wah bus let us switch our tickets--which each ticket very explicitly says THEY WILL NOT DO--for two of the three remaining tickets for the final bus of the night. stars were thanked. lindsay and linda get major points for picking up our ragged, pb&j/graham-cracker-saturated bodies from the station at 2am...

boston is such a beautiful city. at least, i think it is; always one to be prepared for any emergency, i managed to forget both my contact case/solution AND my glasses. i've discovered i have a penchant for sore eyes while on vacation. while the saltwater trick worked superbly thursday night, providing me with only slightly fuzzy vision all day friday. unfortunately, the optical gods decided i needed punishment for this flagrant maltreatment of my eyeballs, and saturday morning found me cursing at my right lens, which ripped in half about 6 seconds after i placed it in my head. one-eyed elyssa is twice as discombobulated as four-eyed elyssa, as it turns out (don't try the math, kids, cuz it's hard stuff--you can trust me; i just took the GRE!). good ole bantering fun was had by all throughout the day, so now i know who to avoid when i'm hanging out with all my blind friends. heartless wenches. behold my vacant stare. and my purse strapped to my husband.

we sampled the joys of boston, including legal sea food--apparently, they're kind of a big deal?--weird british street entertainers,

(proof)

and the boston pops. what a hoot. neil diamond dressed to impress, and "sweet caroline" got an encore, or maybe two, and confetti exploded out of nowhere and bathed the euphoric crowd at precisely the moment of peak america-worship, and the man in front of us jubilantly conducted the orchestra the entire time--from his seat located about 12 yards from the very back of the esplanade [see photo, taken circa 11am]--and we left happy. there was, however, a brief unpleasantry when the cops wouldn't let us back in after a bathroom trip, during which a short old lady with platinum hair kept screeching, "i PAID! i have a wristband, i PAID, and i wanna see the PERKS!" i thought everyone around us was going to mob the place, and for some reason, her shouting fueled the fire, even though the wristbands were all quite free of charge.

even though i guffawed a wee bit during the sing-along america medley as the thousands of voices joined together to praise our country, "where there's never a boast or brag"--are we serious, people? what are we even doing here, then??--i did have a tender little moment to myself during God Bless America. we're pretty lucky people. God bless everybody! whoop whoop! and when the firewords exploded over the river, i was reminded of one of the reasons i love mr. nicholas so very much: one sparkleburst elicited a genuine "whooaaa" from him, which was followed shortly thereafter by a totally accidental "OH, wow!" and he's a physicist, for crying out loud! how could you not love that boy?


so now we're home. thank you, ericksons. our fourth was super.

ps, i'm sorry i hurled harsh words at your dog when he wouldn't get off my pillow saturday night. nick had a nice long pep talk with him afterward, so there shouldn't be any permanent damage.

and, yes, today i took the GRE. all i need to say is that "technical difficulties" prevented me from starting at the same time as the other five victims frequenting the howard university locale today, and i got to wait an hour and a half while the moderator muttered incantations at my monitor. by the time i finally began the test, i was full of irony and sarcasm--i know it's difficult, but try to imagine me thus. basically, my two writing samples may or may not have included direct pleas to the board of evaluators to give me an awesome score, or else.

i am AWESOME at the college thing.