bubba

10:05 am: i should be doing something else
these past few days have involved a lot of bumming around. Maybe its the weather, but I've felt like sitting on my butt and reading and not even going outside, and thats weird for me. Maybe today will be different...but wait, i have a paper hanging over my head. It says "Ben, you must do that paper for senior sem on whether its ok to deceive people". damn papers...they're worse when they demand things.

Last night i went out for the first time in a long time. I enjoyed myself, but it gets old pretty quick (club music doesn't do it for me)...i'd rather go to a small bar where i can hear whats being said to me.
blah blah blah....nothing much to say...

09:18 pm: poop
we just got back from Cambridge...it was mostly fun. some good stuff to see.
I got back and remembered that i needed to pay off my visa bill, which is why i feel like poop. i just spent over half of my savings...= bad. i feel like a pauper. it sucks. really bad. no more spending money for me. gonna beg for my food. shit.

oh well................................................................................................................................ heh, fullstops.

ok, i need go find something that will cheer me up...like finish Aladin...yeah.
bye

09:30 am: the greatest achievement ever
yeah...i'm improving in leaps and bounds. this is my second update in, what, a month? holy crap, i'm gonna have to go lie down for a minute.

ok, i'm feeling better now. but the whole euphoria of it all...oh god, gonna have to lie on the floor again...

whooooeeee! if i just stop thinking about it maybe i won't have fainting spells. Ok, this past weekend has been pretty awesome. We spent 4 hours traveling to York to see the Roman wall (or something)(and now my host dad from turkey is IMing me...you all is gonna hafta wait) ok, all is gooder. Oh, and in york we saw the York Minster, which is the largest gothic cathedral in northern europe, and has the largest stain glass window in the world!!! oh boy. and then we went to a city called Saltaire. Which was wicked awesome. this guy (titus salt) built the town, his was very rich (like bill gates is to us, only more) and he had a major ego problem. He put his initials on everything and basically played god with his citizens. it was all fun and games untill the 4.7 hours ride home..my butt is still sore.

i just got up early to do my laundry...who needs a life? not me.
ok, i gotta go do something...i think my butt is still sore, and gettin sorerer by the minute...

latah,
ben

12:17 am: Tonsillitis sucks monkey balls
So, London is pretty cool. (or should i say, Really cool). I'm having a great time here, seeing the sights, drinking the drinks, eating my own slopped together food, and generally having fun.
I'm sure everyone's read about our various adventures in others' live journals, so I won't bore you. except to say that Dover castle was cool, Canterbury Cathedral was sweet, Buckingham Palace was sparkly gold, and rain sucks. I swear, my lungs feel soggy. And my towel never dries out all the way. And the lady at the laundry-mat told us we couldn't dry our clothes there because she wanted to go home...i hate her.

I took my first taxi ride today. Unfortunately i was freaking out at the time. a half hour earlier Erin said that her throat hurt and that she was having a little trouble swallowing and breathing............so i told her to lay down...while i commenced freaking out. I made a few phone calls and then convinced her that we should go to the hospital. So thats where my taxi ride comes in. We took the taxi to the nearest hospital, (Cromwell Hospital) but they told us they couldn't do anything about it...so back into another taxi (My SECOND taxi ride!!! WOOT!) and on to chelsae hospital. there we saw a doctor and she was diagnosed with tonsillitis and given antibiotics. It was fun and she is feeling all right now. And now i'm kinda tired and a little stressed out, so i'm for bed.

How are the shows going and all that? and does anyone know my grandma and grandpa's address?...hmmm, maybe thats a question for my mom and not for ....ok, its time for bed. I'll try to be a good boy and update more often.

love ya'll,
ben

07:18 am: winds from-?
Hmm. So I just tried brushing my teeth. I had just put the toothpaste on the brush and was bringing it to my mouth. Everything was going fine. And then something went wrong. I completely missed my mouth and ended up toothpasting my left cheek. I don't know if it was a combination of me being sleepy and me being really sleepy that just made my motor reflexes really bad? or if it was my new theory that some wind originating from the wall socket at my right blew my hand off course thus making my free my cheek of dental enemies.
Oh well, I eventually got the job done...day off to a good start.

06:03 pm: heh
i'm supposed to be writing my paper on why life is painful...or something...but i'm getting distracted by any random thing that goes by the window...it occurred to me that i could shut the window, but then i'd miss the free show outside. Some people just went into the reef (i think) and left a dog tied outside. then life safety drove up and tried to put the dog in the back, but it slipped its leash and ran away, so now some life safety guy is chasing it around campus...its amusing me, and making me not write my paper. now i'm waiting for the owners to come back and find and empty spot where their dog used to be. heh...life safety just ran by again...

ok, amusement is over..i'm shutting the blinds.

for anyone that wants to know: poop is poop spelled backward

11:11 pm: itches!!!!!!
Hmmm...so i'm doing my asian philosophy homework and i'm reading about how buddhist monks had such good control over their bodies and could withstand pain and bodily temptations and all that, and i thought "how hard can that really be?"
So my brilliant mind came up with a challenge. I'm not scratching any itch on my body. So far i've lasted a full 5 minutes, and its driving me crazy. I have this humdinger of an itch on my right shoulder, and now ones developing on the back of my neck...but i'm not scratching them, oh no! definitely not! That would just prove that i'm a weakling and i don't have any self control. Or it would prove that i'm smart and i'd free myself from the stupidness that my mind has just put me into. And it would releive me of some nasty itches. I'm actually getting dizzy from concentrating on doing other things than scratching myself (until i decided to write about it, then homework got shoved back to second place) AAAHHHHHH!!!!!!
Ok, i'll be fine...
so, how are you?

akdugv'a bkajgia a;d fiuav kadsuy;vai zeirtufad ;fajsklf its horrible!!!
ok, gotta go and do something active, like jumping on one foot and reading my book...or something...
have a wonderful and itch free night,
ben

08:55 pm: doing stuff?
supposedly i'm working on my study abroad application. writing my personal statement and such. heres what i'm thinking of writing:
           Hi! my name is ben. I'm scatterbrained. If i ever go abroad, i'll probably end up in a jail somewhere because somebody handed me a bag of cocaine, $376, and an address and said "go"...and the police caught me. In going to London (cuz thats where i wanna go) i will hopefully learn some stuff about, um, theater...yeah. i hope to learn the culture of London and learn their native language, Londonese (this is very exciting, cuz then i'll know 7 languages (english, turkish, londonese, french, italian, thousand island, and ranch)! I think that i am a good candidate for this trip because i always dot my i's. I also brush my teeth (and floss!) every night. I am very dependable in bad situations...to faint dead away or run away screaming like a scared schoolgirl. To my group, i will contribute my infallible ability to do the wrong thing at the wrong time...heh, like that one time i stepped on a cop's foot and tried to pay him off with a nickel...heh, good times. Anyway, i'd be an excellent person to send to London.  **my phone number: 2312; room: Benet G08; for a good time i'm usually around from 8:00pm to 7:30am...if crowded, please form a queue**

Yeah, i'm a winner...well, maybe i should get back to working on this thing...or i'll just print this one off and hand it in...mmmm i'm guessing no.

01:04 am: i'm proud of myself!
I just had a conversation with my host mom from turkey that extended far beyond the usual "hi, how are you. I am fine. How is your work. How is Dilaver (husband). How is Gizem (daughter)." Oh no...we went into realms that i never thought i'd understand. She was throwing around big words like "konuştuğumuza" and "öğretmenliği". and i understood it...or most of it. hmmmm...some of it? anyway, it was good and i miss them and i want to go back and hopefully i will be able to find a way back there when i go to london in the fall. işallah!

09:27 pm: Cleaned!!
yay! I'm cleaning my room. finally. It was one of my goals before i left for christmas break, but it never got done. So there has been a mess in my room, just sitting there, fermenting...waiting till i come back and it can rear its ugly head and say "hey, look at me!! You have to clean me!". Oh, it was so cleaver. It had it all figured out, i'd come back and realize that there was a mess and i'd clean it up and then the room would be happy again...instead of sad (rooms are often sad when they are messy...at least thats what various people have told me when they stop by the room and see the mess, "Sad!") So then i came back and the mess did its duty and reminded me that i should clean it. And i promptly ignored it. and it fermented more. and then i felt bad for the room, so now i'm cleaning it. and eating jelly beans (i love the popcorn ones).
ah well, back at it. Wish me luck. or stop by and help? good idea? no, thats what i thought.
good night
ben

02:46 pm: GA
wow...been awhile. been a long time, as jerry was happy to point out. so, here i am, not knowing what to write in this thing. Mostly i've been living. i guess. not much more than that. doin homework...no wait, i SHOULD be doing homework, but i'm not. and now i have a headache. I just got off the phone after talking for about 2 hours to my host mom in Turkey. I finally forced myself to call them. I've been afraid of doing that because my Turkish is somewhat...what...lost? yeah. nonexistant? yup. and i was afraid of what i should say to my mom because her brother had just died, and i've been out of touch with them for a long time, so i felt wierd talking about it. And guess who should be the only one home? my mom, who doesnt know much english. but i slugged through the hour and a half conversation with her, consisting mostly of trying to explain why i'm not in Turkey visiting her, and then my dad and sister came home, so i talked with them too. and holy shit, i didnt think i could be homesick for someplace other than my home. but, i am. i wanna go back so bad. but tickets are so fuckin expensive that i'd have to sell my illigit daughter to saudi slave dealers...ARRGGHH!!! i just found out too that my mom had sent me a package back in april that i never got. she had put a whole bunch of goodies in there that i would have loved getting, but no, somewhere along the line the postal service fucked up, and so i dont get my nazar boncu and tatihlar and...and whatever else she had in there. BAH! madness. maddened. whatever.

on a lighter and much happier note...i love kittens.

so the other day, we went down to the cities for a play. masks, and puppets and all. i am in awe of what you can do with a mask...and how a mask dictates your body movements. for rehearsal on saturday, adam had us all make masks out of paper plates, and we played with them for a while, and its creepy how they change your...everything, the way you stand, walk, sit...everything. and then after the show, we (fogle, conway, dickers and jen) went to the casino and made a donation. although dickers did win, so that was good. and then we got lost on the way home...damn you opportunity drive!

holy shit, i've got a bunch to do yet...
so, till next time.
ben

*and by next time, i probably mean "in a month"

02:59 am: horray for pepperoni!
ok, so here i am, sitting in front of a computer down in bennet basement because my computer is busted, i'm supposed to be writing a paper thats due in...6 hours for kaarin, my friends are all watching 'latter days' with tom fokken who is visiting, i'm concentrating on the 'muse' cd i just put in the player, i just read the cast list for ghost sonata, i'm updating my journal instead of writing my paper, and all i can think of is "thank god for pepperoni"...i just got my pizza out of the oven, and the heavenly smell has given me new vitality to write something...unfortunately i'm writing the wrong thing, but oh well, it'll get done...be happy with what you get, kaarin. Rehearsal tonight was interesting as usual and the more i think about it, the more i think adam is a demi-god sent down from dionysus to lead us in our crazy rehearsals. So, i bet ya'll are wondering what the cast is huh?...well too bad, i dont feel like telling you.






no really...i dont





on to other topics, such as puppies. i like puppies, i've always wanted one, in fact, if given a choice, i'd choose a puppy over a cat any day. but, i'd go with a kitten over a grown dog. but i'm still divided between a kitten or a puppy. but puppies are so cute!...ah, but so are kittens, replies the other side of my brain. and kittens have sharp cast list claws. hmmmph, but puppies bite, and dont think i didnt notice that little 'cast list' hint in there.










OK FINE
here it is

THE OLD MAN Kyle Conway
THE STUDENT John LaRue
THE MILKMAID Katie Muggli
THE DARK LADY Alice Lousberg
THE CARETAKER’S WIFE Shari Gubash
THE COLONEL Ben Lauer
THE MUMMY Kathy Cosmano
THE YOUNG LADY Nicole Kessler
THE DEAD MAN YuMin Lu
THE POSH MAN Mark Knutson
JOHANSSON Jerry McMurray
BENGTSSON Jake Vos
THE FIANCÉE Heidi Jedlicka
THE COOK Amanda Scholz


holy shit, now i'm more excited to do this thing and see how/what everyone does with thier roles.

ok, i've spent way too much time doing this when i could be doing something much more constructive, such as sleeping, or petting puppies, or eating pizza, or looking at the sun, or counting blades of grass...but heaven forbid doing my paper...oh hell no.

gnight everyone!
ben

12:31 pm: hmmm.....

You are the Fool card. The Fool fearlessly begins
the journey into the unknown. To do this, he
does not regard the world he knows as firm and
fixed. He has a seemingly reckless disregard
for obstacles. In the Ryder-Waite deck, he is
seen stepping off a cliff with his gaze on the
sky, and a rainbow is there to catch him. In
order to explore and expand, one must disregard
convention and conformity. Those in the throes
of convention look at the unconventional,
non-conformist personality and think What a
fool. They lack the point of view to understand
The Fool's actions. But The Fool has roots in
tradition as one who is closest to the spirit
world. In many tribal cultures, those born with
strange and unusual character traits were held
in awe. Shamans were people who could see
visions and go on journeys that we now label
hallucinations and schizophrenia. Those with
physical differences had experience and
knowledge that the average person could not
understand. The Fool is God. The number of the
card is zero, which when drawn is a perfect
circle. This circle represents both emptiness
and infinity. The Fool is not shackled by
mountains and valleys or by his physical body.
He does not accept the appearance of cliff and
air as being distinct or real. Image from: Mary
DeLave http://www.marydelave.com/


Which Tarot Card Are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

06:33 pm: 24 hours of play and festive making
YAY!!!
24 hour play festival!! YAY!!! so i just got home and am a little...ummmm...tired? or maybe obliterated. yeah, thats the word. Me and kyle conway stayed up all night brainstorming and came up with a bunch of kick ass stories. we chose one of them, probably the more kicker assed idea of ours, but now i'm worried as to what will happen to it. and excited...getting giddy actually. Our idea started out as the best thing in the world...both of us had the same vision for it, but as the night went along, getting the blasted thing on page was feckin hard. there were times when we just stared at the screen dumbly searching for something to write. but we got done. and then we went over to oconnels for breakfast (houghton told us he loved eating really greasy food when hes tired...it tastes SO good and then, just for this one meal, you can say you are doing the Atkins diet and not feel bad about eating all that greasy food.) then we fell asleep on the couches in the entrance to oconnells...but then schmitz came and meyoooowed in jerrys ear and rubbed my face and we all woke up...oooooo...the madness. so now i'm just biding my time till play time...(and my bro (sam) is cooking korean).

ummmm...im tired and i could use a drink.
yay! for no sleep! and aspirin

hope everyone over there is happy and having a grood time!
miss ya'll
ben

05:20 pm: discouraged contact attempts
wow, my timing sucks. Chort just IMed me while i was reading live journal, and i didn't have my noise on, so i didnt hear it...so i was 2 minutes too late noticing that she was talking to me, and by that time she had gone offline. So, Chort, i'm sorry. And sorry Britt, that happened to you too. I stepped out of the room, came back, and found a message with words "Britt has signed out" and i thought DAMN, i suck. And speaking of which, whats the best way to communicate with you guys. e-mail? and if so what addresses? (britt, your hotmail address didnt like me and sent back my mail) or should i just send a letter...(in which case i'd need your addresses there too, which i want anyway). or is this the best way to communicate.

well, i'm hungry, and so will go and refuel my tummy.

byes

ben

ps. why does god allow beautiful sunny days during class hours?

09:10 am: lost?
ok, so i've been kind of keepig track of whats going on on this site (i apologize for any missing or extra 'n's and 'b's because my keys are sticking and i either hit the key too hard annd put two letter on, or not hard enough), ut i'm not sure if i have all of my frieds o my Friennds list. maybe if a few of you could help me out there??

life lately has bbeen a lot of fun. i am spendig more ad more time with friends than i should be ...what homework? so then i spend the rest of the ight doinnng homework...which is alright i guess. last nnight was a smashing success. Wednesday ight at jerrys ad dickers'ss's. i had a lot of fu hanginng with you guys annd i wannt to do it again. And thenn the midnight swimming was awsome...gotta do that againnn too. ad ow my two uttos decided ot to work at all...so o ' 's ad o ' 's...i hate my keyoard.

ok, gotta go ad read somethig efore class...
YATTA!!!!!!!

e

07:54 pm: whew
ok, so finally i decide to do this live journal thing again. actually, this is the first time at school that i've even been to the website. sorry everyone.
but then again, you guys see me everyday, so why do anything on here when i can tell you in person right? but then there are those in london who i wont be seing again for 4 months, so maybe i should tell you guys what happens in my life from time to time. if youre lucky. and if i'm not feeling lazy. and i have something interesting to tell you. and if......nope, i've got nothing else. So, my brother and i finally cleaned up a little bit in our room, so its actually kind of livable now. I did the dishes, but it wasnt quite the same without liz or jerry helping. now i'm searching for (cheap) ways to decorate my room...maybe i'll scatter random leaves around the room...naw.

well, i really should be doing homework...and not hang out with people tonight, but nope, i'm gonna hang with friends. A guy my dad went to school with (here actually) looked at me once and said that this should be the best time of your life. so, i think i'll take that to heart and make sure i have a helluv a good time. which brings to mind what my calc teacher in high school told me...they don't look at your grades when you apply for a job...just at the school and what classes you took..grades don't matter in the real world. So screw you homework! (probably not the most constructive philosophy at the moment...but for tonight it sounds great.)

Well, i'm missing everyone over there in london. i'm always looking around for lizz's brilliant smile...or jess's calming nature...or waiting for britt to say something that makes me think again...and everyone elses various personalities. i miss you all already. but, knowing that you will be coming back (unlike poor Newcomb) makes me feel all fuzzy and warm inside. So, i'm looking forward to the end of 4 months.

You guys rock!
love ya'll
ben

12:35 pm: CURSES!!!
ok, finally got on a puter with internet...still dont have it at home, we are too far in the boonies and it would cost an arm and a leg for us to get a highspeed connection out there...and i dont think wireless will reach us out there, so i am left blind to your guys' happenings...it hurts. so i'm using the libraries puter. and this wont happen very often. sucks.

anyway, life moves on, dont think that'll change. unless i die...i'm full of happy thoughts today (its a dark and gloomy day).
i'm planning about doing this potter party, but not sure about the chorts party. maybe if the god of parties is smiling on me and beats the crap out of the god of my parents and the god of work. and the god of transportation. and the god of freak accidents.
and i have limited time on this puter..so gotta run

if you want to get hold o me..its better to call 1(320)352-3961

miss yous
ben

01:22 am: mad rapist
ok, so tonight our symposium class had an indian meal with the hooker, which was great (kudos to hooker). and then some of us stayed later and kibitzed for a while. We got out of there around 11? or so. I was with Matt Brossart and Zack (fill in a last name); and fogle, kallie, and kyle were in a car in front of us. We had matt's van, which is a chick magnet and is huge and has no balls whatsoever and couldn't do 0-60 in 20 seconds if its life depended on it (nor if its life didn't depend on it). Kallie's car could do 0-60 in 7 seconds, easily, which she demonstrated to us a couple of times. Then she thought it'd be cute to go really slow through town and not let us pass her. This continued onto the freeway and onto the off ramp to st. johns. By this time matt and i were in stitches from laughing so hard at them and zach said he was ready to punch somebody. But the boys got the last laugh. At the end of the off ramp, kallie started backing up. So i got out of the van and ran up and tried to open both passenger doors.
By the looks on their (kyle and erin) faces, you'd a thought an ugly burly black man was trying to get the car open and rape them. It was HI-larious. i almost peed laughing so hard. Unfortunately the doors were locked to protect them from ugly burly black rapists; otherwise i'd've tried to drag one out...bummer.
it was the hilite of the night.
HA

and now i'm going to sleep to get my body to forget that i got hammered last night and that i haven't gotten a decent nights sleep this weekend yet. see ya'll at the picnic...or otherwise.
ben

03:15 pm: WHHEEEEEE!!!!!
ok, wow. I had the greatest weekend. and i'm talking about this weekend, not the one 27 weeks ago, although that one was good too. There were the one acts this weekend which rocked the shnizzle (or something). and then it was the willow viewing, and the non-stop partying. Thanks britt for letting me sleep it all off on yer sofa...or floor (stupid jess) thanks to all of ya for making waking up in the morning worth it: jerry, jess, and erin...it was great. We've got to do it again before the end of the week...Please??

and then i came home to you know who. its the lowlite of the day. and it was funny, because he was reading this over my shoulder and then i had to x-out and start over because i didn't want him reading about himself (this is the second draft). can't wait for this insanity to be over.


well, love y'all,

beon