A Post from Panera Bread

Because we'll be moving soon out of our apartment, my roommates and I decided to forgo the Comcast package for this month, meaning I have no internet in my room anymore. Right now I'm sitting in Panera, which is just 2 minutes away from my building, trying to get all the things done online that I need to do before rehearsal at 6:30. I may not have mentioned this, but I'm currently stage managing for a show.

Anyways, it really amazes me that I can just buy a small coffee at Panera and spend hours here if I like, on their WiFi. They even told me they have free refills, which makes me think, why would anyone ever buy a medium or large? It makes no sense to me.

Update on my Mac. I've just downloaded the Sims 3 and it works beautifully, just as the guy at Best Buy promised! Right now I'm creating a love triangle between the Glover family and a Sim called Christopher Steel. (If you have Sims 3 I believe it comes with all of the same people at first) I really like playing with the readymade people because they have their bios and a lot of it is up to chance. Whenever I try to make my own Sims I fall into the trap of spending way too much time making the people, that when I finally begin to play I've spent hours in front of the computer.

Also, I saw The Time Traveler's Wife! I love Rachel McAdams in general, so of course I loved her here. Eric Bana was great as well, and extremely good looking. Why haven't I seen him much until recently? (He also played an Australian guy in Funny People and was hilarious). I enjoyed the movie, but I think that it left out many key plot lines. I'm still reading the book, and already I found that they eliminated many details that would have translated really well on screen. Altogether, the movie was just too short. 1 hour and 45 minutes is nothing in a movie these days.

Last night, I saw 500 Days of Summer, which was utterly perfect. I watched it with my friend at the Coolidge Corner

Theatre, this amazing movie theater that used to be a Church. It was remodeled in the Art Deco style and is really beautiful. (If you're interested, I actually wrote a research paper on the theater for my Art and Architecture in Boston class). If you live in the Boston/Brookline area, be sure to check this theater out. The website is www.coolidge.org This is absolutely my favorite movie theater, and it draws out great crowds. Everyone openly laughs and cries at this place, (though at 500 Days it was mostly laughter. Who knew a movie that purported itself as an anti-romance could be so comedic?) This is definitely a great place for movie lovers. And, as I found out as I was leaving the theater, the food there is really freaking cheap! Popcorn for like 3 bucks. That's a steal in movie world!

Welcome Back to Boston

I arrived last night around 10:00. There was some pretty awful traffic all up the Mass Pike. I did make it before midnight though, which was good considering I thought I would not make it onto the bus at all. There were at least a hundred people at the station, all trying to get to Boston on the 6:15. They called in extra buses and finally had us loaded up at around 7:30 or so.

The best thing was when I woke up on the bus and saw my campus. I saw the sign for the Student Village, the Prudential Center, and the beloved Citgo sign. It was strange, though I've only been here since September, it already feels like home. Boston is the best place I've ever been. Yes, I am proud to be a Bostonian.

Anyway, I better get back to work. This blog post is basically a quick way to procrastinate from reading Plato's Republic. No offense to Plato or Socrates but I completely hate this book. The dialogue is so long and everyone ends up repeating themselves. I'm sick of leading questions. Sick of philosophy really. Too bad I'm taking an Ethics class. Well, I won't knock philosophy entirely. It can be interesting at times. For example we just read Thomson's article on The Trolley Problem. It goes like this: You are the driver of a train that is heading towards 5 people who are, unfortunately, stuck on the track. Your brakes are out and so you cannot stop. However, if you turn into the other track, you will hit only one person. Should you turn the train?

It's a really interesting article. Thomson goes on with examples that get even crazier. My favorite has to be when she asks, if you are a bystander watching this go on and you can stop the train from hitting the 5 people by pushing a fat man off a bridge onto the tracks, who, because of his fatness will stop the train, ought you to do it?

Yeah, crazy right? Anyway I'm going back to reading Plato, wish me luck. :)

Post-Thanksgiving Thoughts

It is the day after Thanksgiving. Coincidentally, it is also my father's birthday. This is the day I choose to write my first post on this blog. Why? I have no idea, that's just the way it turned out. This morning I spent with my family, (mom, dad, sister, brother, cousins, aunt, and uncle) going to museums and walking around the city. (Washington D.C.)

In a few days I will be packing up everything and returning to school. Only about three more weeks until my final exam and I am already stressing out! I'm a freshman at Boston University. Coming from a small high school of only 560 kids, BU was a big change for me. I think I'm starting to get into the swing of things, but all it takes is one bad exam and then I know I'll be freaking out again. Right now I am taking ethics, science, humanities, and sociology course. My sociology course is called "Sexuality and Social Life." It's a really great class and I absolutely love my professor (even though she probably still does not remember my name.) Anyway the professor is young, only like 30 years old but looks even younger, is a feminist, gay rights activist, and jokes all the time about how she gave in and got married. After prop 8 passed she announced to the class that she told her husband she wanted a divorce because she didn't believe in the institution of marriage anymore. She is having us do group projects. My group chose to do a documentary on sexuality and sex on college campuses. It's going relatively well, though I really wish we had more time to work on it. It's been difficult trying to find time that all of our group members have in common. In high school I had classes 6 days a week! That's right, 6. I went to a boarding prep school in Connecticut. So, of course, when I came to college I expected to have all the free time in the world with an actual weekend. But it turns out that time flies even faster in college, when you have so many things you have to do, and so many things you want to do.

And that brings me to my newfound love... Boston. I absolutely love this city. I lived in a small town all my life, where I had to drive 20 min. to get to a Starbucks for God's sake! In Boston I can go to the movie theater, window shop (or splurge and buy one or two things) on Newbury or Charles St., work out at the FitRec, watch a play, see a concert... all just by walking! Of course, there's the T which makes my entertainment possibilities virtually endless. Now, I know that the T gets a bad rep, but in most cases it's really not that bad. I generally only wait about 5-10 minutes to get on. My only complaint is that they shut down way too early! They would make so much money if they kept the trains running past midnight (especially on the weekends). They're missing out on prime-time for college students. Students come back after parties at like 1 or 2 in the morning, and the T is closed. So what happens? A bunch of drunk kids start wandering around the streets of Boston, everyone grabs the nearest cab, storms the BUS, or just crashes where they are. Sorry, that's enough about the T. Really, I have all the love in the world for the train that brings me to Cambridge or the South End. I remember at the Swell Season concert at Agganis, this local guy sang a song about the T called Charlie Runs. Really good song actually. If I can remember what his website was I'll post it later.

Well, I guess that is all for now. I have to try and make a dent in my seemingly endless pile of homework. Thanksgiving Break is so not relaxing. It's more of a time bomb... I can hear the ticking sounds of doom calling out to me from finals week. That said, hope you enjoyed the first entry. Feel free to post some comments. And hope you had a wonderful Thanksgiving day!