I spend all of my time in a building designed by M.C. Escher hearing people who haven’t worked in a library in 10+ years prattle on about “What IS information” and “the philosophical meaning of the public library” and how we decide what’s GOOD for our patrons, as if the very fact of BEING a professor in library science weren’t elitist enough. Sometimes other people talk and it is interesting. Most of the time other people talk and they are either A) trying to impress the professor and therefore incomprehensible, B) telling meandering and irrelevant stories about their personal lives, or C) both. When I am not there, I am at home reading the same thing but in written form, and pretending I agree for grades. Sometimes there are also practical assignments, which tend to take three weeks and twenty-five group meetings.

2. I have a job

I get paid to part-timedly do a full time job. It’s like being a public school teacher, but with even more complainy parents and way less vacation.

3. I AM IN GRAD SCHOOL

I don’t think this can be stressed enough

4. The Winterpocalypse is coming

The Weather Channel’s headline this morning was “Winter Misery”. I have decided to just prepare for a hurricane while wearing three sweaters.

5. You can’t believe everything you read

Interesting story: the runner up for the title of my blog was “The Daily Narwhal”. The joke would be that it would neither be daily, nor a narwhal. Hilarious!

Now I am going to read 100 pages of something about how “people negotiate their information needs”, buy batteries, and go to sleep for the first time in like two days.

1. It’s cold outside, but the bus will be a sauna. Everyone will be packed against each other and sweating in their big jackets. It will be disgusting.
2. Slow girls in high heels, short skirts, and tights will walk slowly in front of me, complaining about how cold they are and how far it is to walk across campus.
3. It’s cold outside, but the computer lab where I have my first class will somehow manage to be EVEN COLDER. It’s been this way all semester, the thermostat will argue, why should anything change now? Shortly before I leave for my second class, a light dusting of frost will appear on all the monitors.
4. Since it’s the last day of cataloging, Goth Prof told us to send her topics that we were interested in so that we could look at those in more detail. Just as a guess, I’m betting no one has burning interest in any area of cataloging that they think we just haven’t covered in more detail. Goth Prof will then decide to show us all the different subject headings for cats.
5. Goth Prof actually has a sticker on the back of her laptop that says “Meowist” with a little cat dressed up to look like Mao and a bunch of red stars. I have been staring at it ALL SEMESTER and only realized last Thursday what it was trying to tell me. It will annoy me that I didn’t realize this earlier. I will attempt to take a picture with my cellphone, but that will also fail.
6. Today will probably be the last time I ever see Goth Prof, and I still have not solved the mystery of why she is like 26 and still Goth.
7. I will slip on the stairs as I’m coming home.
8. Having to go to work.
9. Having to drive so far to work.
10. Traffic.
11. My first tutoring group of the day will not stop talking. I will threaten them. They will ignore me. My attempts to bribe them will work marginally better, but not really.
12. My second tutoring group will consist of one good student, one good student who was free basing pixie sticks before coming in (only possible explanation), and one easily distracted student who hates math. Deadly combination.
13. Having to drive so far to get home.
14. I will slip on the stairs (again).
15. My apartment will not have magically filled with ball pit balls.
16. We will be out of sandwich meat.
17. The hot water will cut off about 2/3 of the way through my shower.
18. We will also be out of juice.

1. Getting off an entirely too crowded bus without smacking anyone in the face with my bag Some of the undergrads still need to learn how to do this
2. Looking like an incredibly serious studier in the SILS library when I am really just reading trashy teen girl novels This week’s is about a slutty California girl and a prim English girl who switch places! Recipe for amazing? Or just trite Prince and the Pauper knock off?
3. American Born Chinese
4. Finding information about causes of the American Revolution (still in progress)
5. Wheedling Steven into doing ALL of the cooking
6. And the laundry
7. Being cold
8. Bribing children into doing what I want
9. Writing poorly plotted novels way fast.
10. Negotiating an apartment full of appliances/fixtures that all ALMOST work exactly right
11. Making my parents feel guilty about how I’m Gonna Make It On My Own Christmas is going to be awesome
12. Ignoring my blog for long stretches of time Luckily I don’t think anyone’s noticed. Or maybe sadly.
13. Every program in Microsoft Office Except PowerPoint but we’re starting that today! It’s funny how the waiver form for this course wanted you to know all these programming languages, but the actual course is just an intense semester-long Microsoft Office tutorial.
14. Being resigned Some battles aren’t worth fighting. Like the battle to get my collection development prof to give us any grades ever.
15. Not slipping and falling down the stairs every time it rains You may laugh, but they are MAD dangerous. Three people have already plummeted down them.

Anyway, I made a list of all the things I miss about H-Town that I want to be sure to do while I’m there. Then they were all restaurants and I realized I couldn’t eat lunch twelve times on Friday. So I’ve decided to dig deeper, and think about what non-food things I miss about H-Town.

1. On-Ramps

It's like I'm living in the futuristic dystopia... TODAY!

Steven has always said that, unlike him, I’m a “natural Houston driver”, which I assume means “not a total wuss”. I really miss the needless enormity of the Houston highway system. Sure, it ruins the landscape, but I always feel like I’m entering a giant game of pinball as I speed up the oddly inclined on ramps or am about to rocket into a hover car skyscape a la The Jettsons. Sure, North Carolina roads are less intrusive and more in tune with the natural environment, but they make me feel two-thirds less like a super spy.

2. Brian Reinhart

If I were still an English major, I'd make some kind of innuendo about cheese

3. The Shoe Hospital

The number of pictures of this on flickr makes me happy

1. Due to either the massive amounts of cottonwood pollen or possibly just fatigue, both of us are sick.
2. Tiredness
3. I’m sick of driving for eight hours every day
4. Steven’s sick of waking up early
5. I’m almost positive I’m dying of malnutrition
6. Trixie is starting to become really whiny and picking angry bagpipe songs on my iPod just to annoy me
7. We only have one Kresley Cole romance novel left to read
8. We’re almost out of money

It is not, as Trixie would have you believe, because we didn’t think anything could top Minneapolis. Syracuse, I’m sure, would have blown that carousel out of the water. I called Rob on his birthday to break the news. He said he was surprised we’d made it this far. I’m glad I inspire such confidence.

The plan was to drive South to Tennessee where, among other things, there are free relatives houses to stay at, and then to Florida. I assume Steven will make us stop to see the Coke museum in Atlanta as well.

Scottish person: You’re from America! That’s cool! Have you been to LA? Have you seen Zac Efron?
Me: No. And no.
Scottish person: New York?
Me: I mean… this one time in middle school… okay, not really.
Scottish person: The Grand Canyon?
Me: I mean… it’s just a big hole in the ground…
Scottish person: Wait, so… where in the States are you from?
Me: Florida. Texas. Kind of.
Scottish person: Miami?
Me: No… it’s like a ten hour drive from my house.
Scottish person: Right. Okay. (awkward silence)

So that’s why the tentative route looks something like this:

Nothing Personal, Arkansas. Just that you're boring.

In summary, the plan is to see so much of the country that I never have to travel again, but can still be interesting at parties when I know way too much about the World’s Largest Non-Stick Frying Pan and other amazing and noteworthy parts of our beautiful country.

Basic sights to see on the list so far:

1. The Grand Canyon
2. Las Vegas
3. LA and my movie cousin; it’s always nice to have a free place to stay, and someone capable of taking you to work on movie sets where you will inevitably meet Zac Efron and become his BFF.
4. Seattle
5. Glacier National Park–Jeremy Caves tells me there will still be too much snow for me to see anything in June. I assume this is a lie since nothing can have snow in June unless it is of the Sno-Cone variety.
6. Medora, North Dakota–As part of my ongoing crusade to prove that North Dakota is nice (in the summer); what could be better than prairie dogs, buffalo, and Teddy Roosevelt impersonators? NOTHING.
7. Bismarck, North Dakota–General Custer’s ghost! Grandparents!
8. Minneapolis, MN–The Mall of America! My illustrator!
9. Niagara Falls–I want to visit the Museum about people going over it in barrels.
10. ROB MCAULIFFE–and maybe also Syracuse’s fabled salt history museum
11. The Ben & Jerry Factory
12. Hershey, PA
13. Washington, DC–Steven Wiggins has never been. As a former DC resident and noted big-mammoth-in-the-Smithsonian-lover, I find this shocking.

Anyway, I plan to ask for suggestions and do some research (meaning I googled “Most haunted places in America”) to add more to my list of things to see. Like today at lunch, for instance, when I added “Jeremy Caves’ House” to the list, mostly so I could call him and shout “GUESS WHO I’M WITH??? YOUR MOM!” But unlike the other twelve times I’ve done that, it would be the truth.

1. The West Side Story Mafia

“But, Patricia,” you will say. “Everyone knows that West Side Story was over last weekend and so you have no more reason to complain.” WRONG ON BOTH COUNTS, MY FRIEND. I can always find a reason to complain, and they only want you to think they have disbanded. These people practiced for at least four hours a night for three months. Now that the show is officially over, their lives are filled with empty holes and devoid of meaning. A mob without a purpose. Just waiting to wreak untold havoc and reveal its secret agenda. I have a hunch about that too. Because the Wiess commons currently looks like this:

Laziness... OR DIABOLICAL PLAN??

What are they planning on doing with all those stage pieces? Clearly, they will soon institute Phase II of their plan to take over Wiess by using them to build a giant barricade around the Wiess Commons, forcing those of us who still resist them to give up our claims to Wiess or starve to death.

The Plan: Graduate! In a month, I won’t care who owns the commons! Until then, I think I can subsist on the box of Triscuits I just found in my room. DO YOUR WORST, CAITLIN MILLER!

2. The Third Floor Pigeon

Cute... OR PURE EVIL???

Oh, sure, it’s cute. For disease-carrying vermin that eats garbage. Around Rice though, I usually spend more time worrying about the squirrels than the pigeons. However, this one has chosen to build a nest on the third floor landing of the Sketchy Stairwell (you know the one I mean). This is like two threats in one: 1) the pigeon will undoubtedly become vicious when protecting its nest from anyone it sees as a threat (i.e. anyone on the stairs) and 2) any pigeons born there will think of Wiess as home and plague us with their food-stealing, Bird Flu-spreading wrath.

The Plan: I asked noted Pigeonologist James Fox what we could do about this situation and he said: “How do you fight that which flies?…. BURN THE AIR.” When I just stared at him blankly he continued, “It’s like killing fish by replacing the water with JELLO, I don’t know.” I immediately became suspicious about Bridget’s untimely death. Therefore:

3. James Fox

Pirate Fighter.. OR FISH KILLER??

From this second-rate artist’s rendition, we can see that the James Fox is merciless in his persecution of harmless sailors and, apparently, fish. I’m not trying to point fingers, except that now I am 85% convinced that he murdered the immortal fish god Bridget (15% of me still thinks she’s just on vacation in Atlantic City). WHEN WILL HE STRIKE AGAIN?
The Plan: Spread rumors about free hot dogs, the James Fox’s only known weakness. That, and being without his Magical Windbreaker of Strength.

4. The Fourth Floor Rat

Annoying Company Mascot... OR PLAGUE-CARRYING VERMIN???

We all know the horrors of the Fourth Floor Rat. It lives by the trash cans, is about as big as a squirrel, and leaps out at the unsuspecting. According to Brent, who is some kind of SE so must be good at counting, there’s at least two of them. Probably, they are only here to give us plague, but what if they join forces with the Third Floor Pigeon??? It may already be too late.
The Plan: Clearly we should use any remaining money that Jason hasn’t needlessly squandered on bling to flood Wiess with an army of cats to eat the rats. Then dogs to get rid of the cats, and then cheetahs. Then we should be good.

5. Zombies

Walking corpse with a taste for human flesh... OR WALKING CORPSE WITH A TASTE FOR HUMAN FLESH??

This has to be on any list of Things That Spell Our Doom. Because a) Dawn of the Dead traumatized me as a child and b) we live right next to the medical center in the fourth largest city in America, basically trapped next to a likely focal point of zombie outbreak. If you need me to tell you why this is a threat, you may already be one of them.
The Plan: Basically, we’re screwed. Unless you can convince Charles Lena that you are in some way useful (I can drive stick?).

Hopefully all five things on the list won’t happen at once. But, if they do, at least you’ll have been warned. You’ll thank me when the Zombacalypse comes.