Ramblings of an Awkward Turtle

Hello Summer

Fri, 18 May 2012 12:54:36 -0500

Summer, you selfish tease, you’re finally here. It’s about time. Summer break is a funny thing for me. It’s fantastic because for 3.5 months I don’t have to hate myself and live my life around biology. Unfortunately, this freedom comes at a price—the high price of going from a social campus to isolation out in the middle of nowhere. Actually, it’s about 2 hours northwest of there, but now I’m just getting nit-picky.

Being out in the middle of nowhere would bring a calming sense of peace to most people. Of course I must find the complete and utter opposite. I generally don’t find myself to be a paranoid person, but if I’m ever home alone during breaks I give Jack Torrence a run for his money. I probably wouldn’t be so bad if I had siblings or if my mom wasn’t crazy-overprotective. But hey, you get what you get and I got an over the top survival system.

There’s not a lot of traffic on the dirt path we nickname a road, so if a vehicle takes more than 5 seconds going past my house (most people barrel down my road at 112 mph), they’re obviously staking out, trying to find out the best time to strike. Any small noise out of the ordinary and I’m convinced there’s a murderer on my property. I once convinced myself that I heard footsteps when I was in my basement, so I hid in the closet for an hour. I generally avoid the basement when I’m home alone because everyone knows basements are where murderers live. It’s ridiculous, but if I was ever in a horror movie, I’d live. Suck it all you “courageous” ones who go to investigate the noise and die.

Thanks to my yippie little dog, I have a state of the art security detection system. It works as follows: when she’s cool, I’m cool. However, because she’s a yippie little dog, she often has technical difficulties—such as going ballistic over a butterfly. Yeah, that’s happened. Household security isn’t always her main priority. She also likes to spend most of her time sleeping or treeing squirrels. There’s still a few kinks to work out.

If this is what I’m like living at home with my parents, I hate to see what I’ll be like on my own. Obviously, I’ll never be able to live alone. I can imagine my future roommate coming home to finding me in the fetal position in a corner because the air conditioner made a scary noise. Then again, I get like that at the sight of a spider so future roommates are in for a whole lot of fun. Even more fun for future husband, looking at you, Ryan Gosling.

I’ve really got to get a hobby or a job or something. Since home, all I’ve effectively done is sell my soul to Netflix and lay outside attempting to stop blending in with snow. One heck of an exciting way to spend my summer. Knowing my life though, this is just a fake-out and something ridiculous is soon coming.

I Promise to Post Something Real Later

Tue, 27 Dec 2011 20:58:43 -0600

I have a knack for having emotionally unavaliable guys fall for me, do nothing other than flop around and piss me off, then to come back crying how they miss me and cry about their problems and piss me off some more. Warning to future suitors: attempt to pull this and no guarantees that I won’t slug you for it.

Story Graph of my life.

Mon, 26 Dec 2011 21:16:00 -0600

~~Story~~ Graph of my life.

One Syllable is Too Much to Handle

Fri, 09 Dec 2011 17:04:00 -0600

It’s becoming apparent that it’s a miracle I make friends. Normally, I’m a social butterfly. I can make small talk well enough to avoid uncomfortable silences. I’m pleasant and inviting. Rarely is there a time in a conversation where I’m not smiling. Today, however, I was more like a social moth.

Today was just an average day. I was leaving my dorm, making my way off to class. I came up to this guy I’d seen around my hall before but have never actually spoken to. He’s got dark hair, the right amount of stubble, and piercing blue eyes and to top it off, this day he was wearing an adorable little fuzzy aviator hat. The hat and the snow made for a picturesque scene that you’d see in a clothing catalog. So of course with him looking like a winter model and not wanting to run into him since I am a grade A klutz, I l looked at him. Our eyes met and to my surprise, he said, “Hey,” with a slight smile. Naturally, my response was to smile back and inaudibly say, “Hi.” After he was about ten steps away from me, I realized that no sound came out of my mouth. Nothing. Seriously?

It’s pretty impressive how I can completely blow one of the most basic social interactions. I know I have my awkward moments, but good grief this one is a record for me. I’ll play it off on being a mix of stress from finals, running on 6 hours of sleep, and that it was freaking cold when I went outside. At least it’s a funny story and now my roommate Marissa won’t stop mouthing “hi” at me when she sees me.

I Obviously Can't Handle Multitasking

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 14:44:14 -0600

Joey: Besides myself, there will only be two other guys there tonight and there's 27 people going haha
Me: Haha, well that sounds not bad

This is part of a conversation I had on Facebook chat while holding another conversation with a person face to face. This was the best response I could muster at the time. My line is best read slowly, in parts. Seriously, how do I make friends?

Snuggies Hate World Peace

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 10:16:06 -0600

I just have a general hate for Thursdays. People who hate Mondays have it all wrong. Mondays are pleasant. Thursdays have it out for you.

Thursdays mean getting up two hours earlier than I normally have to, to go to a class that is three hours long. Thursdays mean having to deal with Boy-thing’s obnoxious face since we have class together. Worst of all, Thursdays mean the most awkward bathroom situation to ever exist. I feel I should explain that our bathroom consists of two rooms: the main room which our two rooms attach to that contains the sinks, then a room for the toilet and shower, referred to as the main room and bathroom respectively.

I’m pretty sure it’s my suitemate’s goal in life to make me feel as uncomfortable as possible when in the main room together. We have this unspoken rule about not speaking in the morning. It’s quite paradoxical.

She insists on wearing a towel as she gets ready in the morning. This is a totally normal behavior. What’s not normal is holding the towel and adjusting it with one hand while you blow dry your hair. I’m no prude, but at 7 AM I seriously don’t care for a reenactment of Janet Jackson at the Super Bowl. With every change of grip, I wince at the possibility. I could look past this if it wasn’t for the fact that there is a perfectly good bathrobe on the door—her bathrobe.

This robe is the bane of my existence. It’s always keeping me from being able to use the bathroom and it’s always there but never used. Actually, I take that back. The one time it was used, it was worn like an evil dress-snuggie hybrid. The top of it was around her chest, with the arms used to tie it around her. I have no remote clue as to why you would ever want to wear a robe in such a way, other than she realized that the whole towel hair-drying situation wasn’t awkward enough.

When I first wake up, there’s nothing I want more than to pee and world peace, in that order. World peace can only be accomplished with an empty bladder. When I come in to use the bathroom and I see that bathrobe on the door, world peace is the very opposite of what I want. At that point, I just want to morph into Godzilla and stomp around and breathe fire until the robe goes away. Why put the robe on the bathroom door? I wasn’t aware our bathroom door needed a doorstop. I would think that the robe would be much more useful if you wear it.

So instead of utilizing her bathrobe for its intended purpose, she’d rather make some kind of rebellious statement about it. Cool, I can respect that. We all have our causes and hers is something related to bathrobes. Alright. All I ask is that if you’re going to make me feel as uncomfortable as you possibly can, can you at least make it quick? Nope. She’s going to try to adjust herself in that towel—or backwards robe—as long as she possibly can. I’m pretty sure that if it takes over 20 minutes to blow-dry shoulder length hair, it’s time to invest in a different hair dryer or a class on how to blow-dry your hair efficiently.

Once again, the intelligent thing to do would be to verbally discuss these issues with my suitemate and resolve them. However, due to our amazing communication, that’s not going to happen. Until I figure out a way to make a post-it note eloquently say, “Please learn how to use your bathrobe and drier, thank you,” I’ll just stick to avoiding the bathroom as long as she’s in it.

It's Been a While

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 15:50:10 -0600

I haven’t posted anything in over a week and I just wanted to let you guys know I’m still alive and my life is still awkward. Yay. I had Thanksgiving break all last week and I did nothing other than sleep, shop, and play video games. It was glorious. Unfortunately, I didn’t work on my posts—much.

I did manage to get a little done, so I hope to get two posted in the next week. I may disappear again after that because I’ll be in finals mode. After that, I’ll have three weeks off and I promise I won’t be so lazy this break.

Beware of Bathroom

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 13:46:48 -0600

College has redefined everything I thought about hygiene.

At first, I thought sharing a bathroom with five other girls was going to be a nightmare due to how many generations of may flies that could experience the circle of life while a girl gets ready. I know first hand. I’m guilty of even my speediest showers being at least 20 minutes. Going from my house where I had to fight only my mother for the shower, dorm living seemed like cruel and unusual punishment. However, much to my surprise, the only issues we’ve ran into time wise is the elegant “I’m about to pee my pants, HURRY YOUR ASS” dance performed while someone had the shower occupied.

If I had to choose between being in a room with Freddy Kruger and being in a room with our toilet, I would actually have to pause and give great consideration to both possibilities. On a usual given day, our toilet would appear to be made of speckled marble. It’s not. I’ll let you pause to gag now. I have no clue how our toilet gets so ridiculously gross, especially in places where you wouldn’t normally have to worry about getting dirty. Have you ever seen the back part of the toilet that sits on the floor have debris on it? Me either, until this year. I’m still flabbergasted as to how that happened—twice. Most guys’ toilets would put ours to shame. Heck, most port-o-potties would put ours to shame.

It’s pretty shocking how much hair six girls can leave in a bathroom. I’ve been the brave soul who decided to take one for the team and try to tame what we dubbed, “The Hair Monster”. Initially, this endeavor would be made easily known by the loud heaving noises. After living in a dorm for two months now, I have a complete tolerance for hair. This unsettling discovery was made when I was eating dinner with my mother (the infamous dinner of CHAMPIONS) and I found a small hair in my burger. My mother freaked. She was about ready to take my burger to the counter and demand a fresh, untainted one. I merely shrugged, plucked out the hair nonchalantly, and resumed eating. What has college done to me?! On the plus side, I can clean hair out of drain without even batting an eye.

Why does it get so bad? My roommates and I, granted, are not anal neat freaks. Sure, Marissa has her occasional cleaning spree when she makes our room shine brighter than Snow White ever could, but we still generally keep above liveable conditions. When we make messes, we clean them. Simple as that. Our suitemates, however, don’t always follow the same code and apparently, they have a much greater tolerance for filth than we do.

Our suitemates rarely take it upon themselves to clean the bathroom. Usually Marissa does it because otherwise it’ll reach a point that will send her into a germaphobic panic just by stepping foot near it. Madison and I will contribute to the cleaning effort as well, but effectively it’s just our room that cleans it. After noticing this, we decided to have an experiment. Since it’s always us that takes out that nearly overflowing trash, we wanted to see how bad the trash could get before our suitemates would take the trash out. Our results were appalling. The trash had piled a good half a foot above the can when we took it out.

So how do you talk to your suitemates about the messes they leave in the bathroom? Well, probably the best way would be face to face. However, our communication with our suitemates is just about is good as their cleaning habits. So for now, we’ll stick to post-it notes with smiley faces. Smiley faces make everything less offensive.

Guess Who Just Got a Friend Request?

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 01:23:26 -0600

That awkward moment when Madison barges into the bathroom freaking because we just got friend requests.

How suave of him to wait 24 hours before requesting. We’ll see what comes of this.

All Because of a Pea Coat

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 00:05:19 -0600

That awkward moment when you and your roommate are getting hit on by a guy and she thinks he’s a complete creeper but you think he’s good looking and funny.

So it’s apparent that Madison and I have completely different tastes in guys. Rarely do we ever agree on whether or not a guy is attractive, let alone his attractiveness level. She has a thing for Asian guys, I like guys with beards. Given this, there’s no surprise that we had two totally different takes on our dinner one night.

We had planned on just picking up some food from the SUB and taking it back to our dorm. On our way out, I saw a guy that lives in our dorm sitting at a table with another guy and politely nodded at him. He waved and said hello. His charismatic friend attempted to start conversation with us from 15 feet away, then asked us to join them for dinner. I thought, why not? It could be more exciting than just eating dinner and watching Sex and the City.

This guy you could tell already is quite full of himself. He’s got Prince of Persia hair, so I’ll give him that right. He was very social, engaging us in conversation before we even sat down. He asked us about our majors, talked about his. He had a tremendous amount of energy, which I’m guessing is from the ego boost of having two girls come and join him for dinner. With this ego boost comes flirting—lots and lots of cringe worthy flirty.

His flirting was unbelievably blunt and cheesy. Pretty much every other sentence there was some quick line inserted. At first, I just smiled and thought, Hahaha, oh my goodness, you did not just say that. It was ridiculously entertaining. There was even an attempt at Madison along the lines of, “Oh yeah, you with the pretty hair, the gold nails, and the cute earrings?” Seriously, I couldn’t keep a straight face at this point. It doesn’t help that he made direct eye contact with us the entire time. It was all I could do the entire conversation to not burst out laughing, but this was too much. Between his lines and the look of pure horror and oh my god, please make this stop on Madison’s face, I lost it. Even as we were leaving the SUB, he fished for compliments on his looks and his hair.

I mean, I’ve got to give this guy credit. He’s got two girls with their attention on him and he just goes for it fearlessly like he’s the best thing that’s ever happened to the world. Even when we laugh and it has to be painfully obvious how bad the flirting is, he keeps the lines coming. I rather admire that. Most people, myself included are too concerned with what will happen if we let our guards down and actually go for what and who we want. Granted, Madison fails to see his admirability. He is very much still a creeper in her eyes and after finding out later that he was trying to play a make-shift game of footsies with her, I respect her opinion. I’m not 100% convinced he’s a creeper, but I understand her general discomfort. Lesson of the night: say yes to life. It might not lead to dramatic changes instantly, but you might get a good chuckle over a pb & j.

Am I going to fall head over heels for this guy and dream about our future together? Oh no. That’s absurd. Am I going to have a good laugh for at least a week about how shameless his flirting was and how Madison could barely keep a straight face? You betcha.

To Your Left, You Can See My Patience Running Out

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 19:16:38 -0600

For some reason, I enjoy spending one Saturday of each month giving college bound seniors and their families a tour of the place I currently call home. I like to think I’m a pretty likeable tour guide. I’m bubbly, engaging, and constantly smiling. I’ve received a decent amount of compliments from satisfied families. This last time, I found that some parents are just never satisfied.

As we were waiting at the main desk for the families to start to trickle in, a lanky guy in a purple full body spandex suit nonchalantly strolled in. Please note that if this ever happens to you, it is incredibly hard to stifle sniggers and it is socially tolerable if you let a few out. Nobody is perfect. Imagine absurdity somewhat like this:

So we stood there, tour guides and purple man. As I greeted the incoming families, purple man decided this was the prime time to pop a squat next to one of the moms. He then proceeded to accent what I was saying with spastic arm movements and clapping. The parents must have thought, “What a spirited school! Such an adorable, happy little mascot. Sugar and rainbows!” These thoughts would immediately leave whenever I started the tour and purple man darted down the hallways and proceeded to pelvic thrust in my doorway. It was at this point when the father of this group began to hate my entire being and doubt his choice of allowing his daughter to come here.

I’m not sure what it is, but there is something about dads and dorm bathrooms. It drives my dad nuts that he can’t use the public bathroom in my dorm because it’s always locked. He’d rather wait than use the one in my room. I thought he was just ridiculous about the whole concept. I now know there is worse.

After leaving my room, we passed by one of the public bathrooms and the barrage of questions began.

“Can anyone use those bathrooms?”
“Yes, but they’re generally locked, so you have to get a key from hall desk if you need to use it.”
“Why is it locked?”
“I’m not really sure why. It’s not a major deal since every room has its own bathroom and if you ever need it, you just go to the hall desk and get the key.”
“What if someone’s in the bathroom and my daughter has to go? Can you use your key to get into it? I just don’t see why have a bathroom that’s not functional.”
“She could always go to someone else’s room and ask to use theirs. Honestly I’ve never had this as a problem. I’m really not sure if my key can open it or not. I’d have to ask.”

At this point, I attempt to move our tour onwards but alas, he was still unhappy about the bathrooms. He asked me if I had my key so I could try it in front of him to which I told him no as I slid the key bulge in my pocket out of view. It was obvious that he was extremely disappointed with me and had lost all hopes for a competent tour guide who could answer his questions. This was great for him, because I’d be unable to answer his next question.

There are always programs being put on by the various houses and they advertise them with fliers. We passed one of these fliers advertising a “Pants Party” with Steve Carell’s character from Anchorman. Of course he would see this and ask about it in that all you college kids do is have gratuitous amounts of sex tone of voice. I honestly had no more clue about it than what the poster said. He was unimpressed. In his eyes, I was trying to hide the fact that my dorm hosts orgies.

These minor set backs were not going to keep me from showing this family all that my dorm and my school has to offer. What better way to show him that we are a respectable university with mature students than to have him go by the bulletin board of facts of sex and guys which is conveniently located to one of the exit signs:

I could feel his look of disapproval and hate searing into the back of my head as we walked on past.

One of our lasts stops on the tour was the kitchenette. The mother and daughter thought it was nice. Dad was—surprise—completely dissatisfied. He inquired about how well students cleaned up after themselves in it. I assured him that the students were pretty responsible and there hadn’t been any issues. I could have been speaking in Wingdings. He was too preoccupied with the alcohol safety bulletin board next to the kitchenette.

“Kids don’t come in here at 2, 3 in the morning trashed and make big messes?”
“I have not heard of that happening.”
“I doubt that.”

I could not win with this guy. It dawned on me that the only place of education that this man would be fully satisfied to send his daughter to would be a convent because any other place, especially my school, would corrupt her.

At this point, he disappeared somewhere and I used this time to ask his wife and daughter if they had any questions about the dorm, college, and life. Theirs were lacking in the rage and loathing so it was a pretty pleasant time. When he finally appeared again, he had a smirk on his face. He had went and tracked down someone and had them attempt their key in the bathroom and found that it did would not open it. Congratulations sir, you found the answer to the biggest concern of my life. Thank goodness we had you to find that out.

As we concluded our tour back at the hall desk, I asked them if they had any last minute questions before their depart. He did. He asked one of the hall directors a question he had asked me earlier. Turns out, I was wrong and an instant look of smugness and demonic joy appeared on his face. He finally had his definite proof that I was the most incompetent tour guide to ever exist. However, this was no comparison to the look of rejoice I had on my face as I waved them goodbye as they left.

Its been three days without a post from you!!!!!!!!!!! Not counting the reblog thingy!!! When do you expect to write more???

Sun, 06 Nov 2011 21:14:59 -0600

My apologies! I’ve had a pretty crazy last few days, so I’ve not been able to really sit down and finish anything. I’ve got half a draft of a new post in the works and it’s looking to be a bit lengthier than previous posts so hopefully it’ll make up for my absence.

Photo

Sun, 06 Nov 2011 00:20:34 -0500

If you ever decide to change your relationship status to engaged...

Sat, 29 Oct 2011 20:31:07 -0500

If you ever decide to change your relationship status to engaged as an inside joke, be prepared for numerous aunts to comment in horror and rage that you didn’t tell them personally.

Carney Island > Coney Island

Sat, 29 Oct 2011 16:39:15 -0500

Justin: I want to go on a carnival date!
Me: Me too! That would be fun, but there's never any carnivals around here.
Justin: I know. We need to go to Carney Island!
Me: No, that sounds awful. That is the last place we want to go.

"OMGoodness, Gentry! … You really are a peach! Love you!!"

Sat, 29 Oct 2011 16:27:00 -0500

““OMGoodness, Gentry! … You really are a peach! Love you!!””

- My mom is so adorable with her attempts to Facebook.

I'm in Love and I Don't Care Who Knows It

Sat, 29 Oct 2011 16:19:07 -0500

So obviously Justin and I are a thing. I’m always up in his room in the late of night, we stroll the quad together, and we study together. We have inside jokes. Basically, we’re dating.

The fact that I’m completely infatuated with another guy that I talk about frequently and openly is irrelevant. The fact that both of use social media like broke cocaine addicts on their last hit and don’t have ourselves set to “in a relationship” or post gaggingly cutesy statuses or updates ever is irrelevant. The fact that we never show public displays of affection is irrelevant. We are dating and that is fact.

Right? No. Justin is actually happily dating someone and I’m—well that’s a story for another post. We are besties. Bestieship between a guy and girl can be quite difficult to understand for many. It is quite a perplexing phenomena. However, the best way to figure it out is to just ask. No need for indirect asking of other besties. Simply ask me. Granted if you’re afraid to ask me because you don’t want me to think that you like me (which we’re pretty sure you do), then just ask Justin. We’re besties. Nothing more, nothing less.

This would be a totally valid post if we hadn’t just changed ourselves to engaged. “Fueling the fire,” they say? Maybe we’re just a couple of pyros trying to make sense of this crazy world. Or maybe we’re just two college freshmen procrastinating in the most bizarre ways possible.

Going for Gold

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 23:10:00 -0500

If I had to describe my mood right now, it would be “BLARRRRRRGGGbsfnsjhalafeljgdlg blehhhhhhhhh”. Translated into coherent words, I made a poor dinner choice and now I’m essentially dying.

My friend Justin told me to suck it up and take medicine like an adult. To that, I said:

I hate having an upset—upset being used loosely, like gran-gran’s wrist skin loosely—stomach, but I loathe the thought of taking Tums or Pepto. I just don’t see how anything that tastes like gravel could quell the insurrection taking place in my intestines. Sure, it would be much more logical for me to just take the medicine. That’s too easy. Where’s the glory? I’ll tell you. There is none.

No, in order for there to be glory, you must suffer through like a CHAMP. Medicine? Pffft, that’s for wussies. Champions tell their tummy aches to STFU. That’s exactly what I’m going to do. That, or end up hurking my brains out in the middle of the night. Most likely, it won’t be the latter because that would be too easy. Plus, I’m a classy lady. Classy ladies don’t hurk.