Les Croissants!

Tonight I was seized by the sudden urge to bake something.  Consulting my Pinterest board that tells me all about the things that I want to learn how to make, bake, and cook, I settled on chocolate croissants.

This necessitated a trip to the local grocery store, Quality Foods, to fetch crescent rolls, chocolate chips, and cheese and salsa.  Just kidding, the cheese and salsa are for something else, but who knows, chocolate and just about everything tastes good, so maybe chips, chocolate, and salsa might be kinda neat.  I also got to stop in at Shopko to get a cookie sheet because I should have one anyway.

I didn't quite follow all the instructions, but they did turn out!

Just look how pretty they are!

These are Brianna-made croissants!

This is really quite exciting because now I have something delicious to eat for breakfast for the next week.  Chocolate croissants and tea, it's going to be absolutely delightful, that's for sure!  And I'm so proud that I didn't burn the croissants or the building!  YEAH!

“Remember the days when you let your child have some chocolate if he finished his cereal? Now, chocolate is one of the cereals.” 

- Robert Orben

What Do You Do?

I thought I had an idea for a post.  Actually, I'm fairly certain that I did have an idea, I just chose to dispense with that idea for now because I stumbled upon my friend, Susan's, blog and I was intrigued by her post today as part of Blog Every Day in May even though I'm not sure that I'll be taking that particular challenge.  I've already got one challenge with my Poem-A-Day Project, and then the whole "figure out your life, Brianna" challenge.

So, Brianna, if you couldn't answer with your job, what do you do?

I write.  Lots of things.  Most consistently, I write blog posts and daily poems.  I write scribbles in a notebook that I keep in my bag at all times.  Every now and again I write a character sketch or an idea for a scene.  Over the summers for the past five summers, I wrote stage adaptations of Grimm fairy tales.  In high school, I wrote one act plays.  My last semester of college, I wrote short stories.  I've written lyric essays, but I'm still not absolutely certain what that means.  I also write letters because when I get writer's block, it's a really great and constructive way to get my thoughts onto paper without forcing myself to write something pretty.  Plus then someone definitely gets to read it!

I read.  As a result of my reading, I also leave books lying around the house everywhere.  I read multiple books at the same time because I suspect I have an attention problem.  According to my Goodreads account, I'm reading a bunch of books that I had to return to the library a long time ago, and if I wanted to actually read them, I would probably have to restart them anyway.  So honestly, I'm currently reading The Friday Society, and I'm carrying around Wonder Boys in my bag with a bookmark shoved between the first couple pages.  I also read poetry, though I haven't been reading quite as much as I want to, apparently I'm getting distracted by novels.  Oh, and comics.  Because that's a thing now.

I watch movies.  Mostly because I adore movies.  The last movies that I fell in love with were probably Perks of Being a Wallflower and Ruby Sparks.  There was a time when I was working through all the Alfred Hitchcock movies that I could find at my local library, then there was the phase I had when I watched a handful of Marilyn Monroe movies, and then there was my F-in 80s movie marathon weekend which featured Fame, Footloose, and Flashdance.  Everybody loves a good theme, right?  I aspire to watch AFI's 100 Years 100 Movies, although I'm kinda leery about a couple of the movies on that list.  Let's face it, I just want to see all the movies.

I intern.  I know this is kinda like answering with my job, but there it is.  Too bad.  Plus now I can repeat things that I've probably already talked about.  I numbered my internships based on the order I got them.  So Internship #1 is at Here's the Story, I'm the Communications Assistant, which means that I do social media marketing, write things, and generally take on assignments from my blue-haired boss.  Internship #2 is at Chicago Kids Company, and I help out the box office manager by taking phone calls and making reservations for teachers who want to bring their classes to our shows for a field trip.

I knit.  There was a time when I got home from Florida when I went into a knitting frenzy.  I knit a Hufflepuff scarf and a failed Hufflepuff hat for my friend, Claire, I made myself arm warmers, I think I knit something else too, but it was insane.  I have a pattern for curled toe elf slippers that I really want to make, but I'm terrified of messing them up because they're not square and flat...those being the requirements for all the other things that I've knitted successfully.

What else?

I'm pretty sure that's it.  I also do other things like clean my room, occasionally, wash dishes or do laundry for the family when I notice that it could probably use doing.  I go to free events when I remember that they exist.  I go out for drinks or pie with friends, so I eat a lot of pie and drink more alcohol than is probably healthy for someone who spends time with one person at a time and doesn't go to bars very often.  I also spend an unhealthy amount of time texting and checking Facebook.   I also watch television shows via Hulu or my friend's itunes because there's no conceivable way that I could possibly remember to watch a weekly show without setting a phone alarm.  Because that's another thing I do: I forget things.  I also procrastinate.  And I guess I job hunt right now.

So...those are thing things I do.  What about you?

"We all want progress, but if you're on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive."

- C.S. Lewis

Hoppy Easter to Every Bunny!

This is it!  It's Easter Sunday for those who celebrate it, and another Sunday before April Fool's Day for everybody else.  It's the end of Lent as we know it, and you know what that means.

No more promises of regular blog posts.

Because I'm a bum.

I'm also a bum who's totally kidding because I should be writing things consistently and not necessarily poetry.

Plus I'm a bum who has loyal readers.

Out there.

Somewhere.

Anyway...

There's one thing that I've always wanted.  A white Easter.  Forget snow-covered Christmas, I'll settle for snow on a day when little girls are forced to wear white Mary Janes and flowered dresses so they have to also be forced into their puffy pink winter jackets.  I want little white snowflakes flying around my head as I trek out to the car for Easter brunch with a friend.  I would love for an icicle to form.

I'm not sure when this wish was created, but I was thinking about it, and for the past four years I spent Easter at school because our spring break never overlapped with the holiday.  And my school is super pretty when it's covered in snow.  I highly doubt that Easter could muster a snow dramatic enough to make the campus look like Narnia as it does in the winter, but I would love for snow on Easter.  That'd be great.

If there's a way to request certain types of precipitation, I'd like to submit a form for a white Easter for the rest of my days.  That would make me very happy.  I mean, it's possible.  This is Illinois, and weather is weird, especially with "global climate change" and all that.  So there is the slight possibility that the air might just get cold enough to freeze whatever precipitation might be promised for this Easter.  I'm really hoping that that possibility is high, but considering the 41 degrees that I'm seeing right now, it's more likely to get warmer as the day goes on.  Mildly depressing for the idle snow-wishers, but hey, the people looking for sunshine and daisies might get their wish, so at least someone goes home happy, right?

"Hedwig didn't return until the end of the Easter holidays.  Percy's letter was enclosed in a package of Easter eggs that Mrs. Weasley had sent.  Both Harry's and Ron's were the size of dragon eggs, and full of homemade toffee.  Hermione's, however, was smaller than a chicken's egg."

-  J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Braaaaaiiiins....

"I have a brain, but it isn't mine."

Grant was something of a collector, you would say.  Lining the shelves of his office were jars with wrinkled up balls of rubber floating inside an unidentifiable fluid.  Each of the jars had a neat little label attached to the front of it so he always knew which brain he was playing around with whenever he chose to shake things up a little bit.

Tara wasn't sure whether she should laugh or if she should remain straight faced as she sat in the chair across the desk from Grant.  Behind Grant were the five levels of shelving, each shelf packed with brains.  If the zombie apocalypse ever occurred, they could always send the zombies here and this office alone would feed the brain eaters for a week.

So she settled on clearing her throat uncomfortably and shifting her grip on the briefcase that was balanced on her lap.

"Um, excuse me?" she asked, pretending she hadn't heard what he said correctly.

"I have a brain...but it isn't mine," Grant repeated, this time with a gesture to the jars behind him.  There was no mistaking the poorly timed joke this time, and Tara choked back the bile climbing the back of her throat.  "Anyway, as I was saying, we're on the cutting edge of brain technology so I've had the responsibility of poking around the folds of the actual brains and learning what exactly goes where and what we can fiddle around with."  Grant said all this at a speed that slightly exceeded the speed limit for casual conversation, and indicated that he assumed Tara knew what he was talking about.

Which she didn't.

But he didn't need to know that.

"Mr. Newman, I would appreciate it if you would keep your jokes in check," Tara said primly as she pulled a sheaf of paper out of her briefcase.  "And I wondered if you could look through this and tell me precisely whose brain wrote this document."

"I...I'm not sure that I'm the right person to talk to about something like this, I'm not really a paper read-y type of person," Grant said, holding up his hands, palms out, as if in surrender.

"Please, Mr. Newman, I insist.  You are, after all, the brains of this operation, so called."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I've been watching too much Dollhouse.  Luckily there's only one more episode left and then I get to figure out what new show I can use to procrastinate with.

"The vast majority of us imagine ourselves as like literature people or math people.  But the truth is that the massive processor known as the human brain is neither a literature organ or a math organ.  It is both and more."

- John Green

Living in the Library

Source: writingprompts.tumblr.com via Katie on Pinterest

There are definitely perks to living in each of these places.

Library  --  You get to read to your heart's content.  You can travel wherever and whenever you want through the power of the written word.  You can use the strips of paper and the golf pencils to write your own novel or leave notes in the stacks.  Sleeping in the children's section on a bean bag or curling up in the reference section because it's always quiet.  If you live in a neighborhood library, then there would be movies and music to entertain you as well, you would just have to find some place to play them.

Museum  --  There will always be a food court or some sort of snack-y place here, unlike the library.  You can sleep in the exhibits and explore and learn to your heart's content.  You can play with the ancient toys or musical instruments and you can compare yourself to the height of mummies because I swear they're smaller than contemporary humans.  You can leave notes and play around with the security guards.  Living in a museum reminds me of From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.  If I were to live in a Chicago museum, I'm not sure which one I would pick, though I feel like it would probably be the Field Museum.

Zoo  --  Living at the zoo might be the most terrifying prospect if only because predators could eat you if you went exploring in the exhibits.  Then again, there would be an endless supply of food and you would be able to cuddle with the cuddly animals.  You could climb around with the monkeys and go swimming with the penguins (or the fishes), and then of course you could pet every single animal that looks so soft, but you're always separated by glass.

I would love to live in a library.  As it is, I spend a lot of time at my local library and the libraries of the surrounding suburbs because sometimes the suburban libraries just have a better selection.  Sorry, Chicago Public.  I could easily live in a library because I'm curious about so much, and I would love to read about everything.  I really want to learn more about just about everything with the exception of lots of the sciences because I'm bad at learning about them in the first place.  I know that living in a library probably wouldn't be the most social life because well, you have to be quiet in the library, but I can always invite friends over after hours and we could bask in the silence.  I can just imagine how cozy a library is in all its quiet.

"A library is a good place to go when you feel unhappy, for there, in a book, you may find encouragement and comfort.  A library is a good place to go when you feel bewildered or undecided, for there, in a book, you may have your question answered.  Books are good company, in sad times and happy times, for books are people - people who have managed to stay alive by hiding between the covers of a book."

- E.B. White

Last Will and Testament (A Draft)

I, Brianna, being of sound mind and body, memory and understanding, and after consideration of all my worldly belongings and valuable assets, do hereby make, publish and declare this my Last Will and Testament, as follows:

First, I declare that I am a resident of Cook County, and the State of Illinois and that as of now I do not have any children or spouse that I am aware of, though I reserve the right to forget that time in Germany because I was so out of my mind that I couldn't possibly have consented to marriage to that random man named Hans.  I maintain that I rejected him multiple times and if he insists that we're married, he's a damned dirty liar.

Second, I require that payments be made to settle all my debts, whether they be my pie indebtedness to certain friends who insist upon buying my pie for me when visiting Baker's Square or the rent on my considerably smaller than would be desired apartment.  I hereby issue a formal apology to my landlord for being behind on rent payments even though I had the money for them all along.  I really just wanted to live a Broadway musical, even if it was just for pretend.

Third, I bequeath my remaining monetary assets to the Girl Scouts of America in order to maintain their camps in the Midwest, most especially my favorite one, Juniper Knoll.

Fourth, all of my material possessions and various junk items may be divided up between my family members and thrown out as they see fit.  Importantly, my guitar must go to my uncle or his next of kin with ridiculous numbers of apologies for never forcing myself to learn how to play it and the shame of having died without learning.

Fifth, all my written matter must be entrusted to one of my most trusted writerly friends with the express purpose of publishing it all in a posthumous collection that will be more famous than I ever was when I was living.  In fact, I would like to allocate some of my monies to the purpose of marketing this work because damned if I won't go to the grave with some luster to my name.

Sixth, I would like to hire a crier for my grave for the first week of my interment.  He should be delightfully handsome and wear bright colors when crying over my headstone.  I would also like a plastic pink flamingo planted on my grave to be replaced every time the colors fade from its tacky plasticity.

Seventh and finally, I demand that my memorial take place in some festive outdoor place and preferably serve chocolate cake, because you all know I would have enjoyed to be there if I were alive if it involved chocolate cake and festivities in my honor.  Please feel free to play charades, Bananagrams, and Apples to Apples in my honor as you see fit.

And so with this last parting message I part this mortal world to join a higher purpose in some ethereal realm.  Farewell, all, I will see you soon, and we'll make as lively a ruckus as we can when engaging in undead shenanigans.

Much love,
Brianna

Day Off

Whenever I feel like death, I typically announce, "I'm dying."  Not only is this an over dramatic presentation of how I feel, but it is also a reference to one of my favorite movies of all time: Ferris Bueller's Day Off. So needless to say the only logical and appropriate response to this announcement of my impending doom is, "You're not dying, you just can't think of anything good to do." And so far there is only one person in my life who consistently gives that correct answer, something that tells me a lot about the company I keep.

I don't particularly like comparing myself to Cameron, mostly because he doesn't possess the natural glamor of a character like Ferris. I mean really, who would willingly cast themself as Cameron? I suspect my disdain for Cameron is rooted in his directionlessness. Not only is he unwilling to pursue The Future, but he would rather hide away in bed and pretend that it's not going to find him or call him out like Ferris does. At the same time, Ferris is cavalier about The Future, but accepts a certain amount of inevitability while he also lives "in the now. In thinking about my own Future, and remembering how I always wanted to be Ferris Bueller, I'm not really sure I'm doing it right. I haven't stolen a car and gone cruising around downtown with my best friends. At the same time, I have gone on mini adventures like the day trip to House on the Rock where our toes froze. So maybe my day off is spread out further, leaving boring days in between the real adventures.

"The key to faking out the parents is the clammy hands. It's a good, non-specific symptom and I'm a big believer in it."

- Ferris Bueller

Hats Off!

Q:  Are you a hat person?

A:  Yes.  Absolutely.  My very first hat was a wool maroon beret that I got when I was 10.  I really wanted to learn how to speak French, and Santa Claus stuffed this topper into my Christmas stocking.  I was thrilled, and had no idea how to wear it even though I had asked for it.  So I experimented with jaunty tilts and wore it to elementary school where the baseball cap wearers who were asked to shed their hats asked my teacher why she wasn't asking me to take off my beret.

In 8th grade I played the Cat in the Hat in a play for my drama class.  Hat.

I'm not sure when abouts, but I managed to acquire an Indiana Jones hat from Disney Land somewhere in here around the same time that I got a black pinstriped fedora, adding two hats to my collection.

In my junior year of high school, I got a hat simply because I was playing Kelsie, a hat wearing piano player, in High School Musical.  That's really a great hat, it has an itty bitty pocket that I keep a shiny penny in...because I'm a dork.

I have a hat that I knit that I wear when I haven't showered and my hair looks gross so, surprise! to all the people who think I look cute on those days!

While I was at Disney, I also wore this hat.  I mean, I wore my costume hats too, but this was my fun hat.
And my Stitch wore a Nala as a hat...

The most recent hat that I've worn though has been a mortar board.  It's my personal opinion that these hats look dumb and no one looks good in them.  On my graduation day, mine kept slipping backwards because the hair pins decided they didn't want to do their job.  Needless to say they were fired after the event.  Anyway, mortar boards.  I'm not sure what they're supposed to look like or what the tradition is, but suddenly it feels very important for me to consult Wikipedia to find out.  [this is when Brianna went to consult Wikipedia about the mortar board]  Because everything on the Internet is true.  Well then.  It seems that the mortar board was adapted from hats that the clergy wore.  And there are so many variations on how schools in the U.S. use them, it makes my head spin a little.  Oh, and whatever you do, don't throw them...you'll hurt someone because they're like ninja stars...

Isn't that a lovely thumnail?  Enjoy "Exchanging Hats" by Elizabeth Bishop.

"Some hats can only be worn if you're willing to be jaunty, to set them at an angle and to walk beneath them with a spring in your stride as if you're only a step away from dancing.  They demand a lot of you."

- Neil Gaiman, Anansi Boys

Writer's Block

This morning I couldn't decide what to write.  I still don't really know what to write (as shown by the title of this post).

I was going to write:
- about espresso and puppies, taking a prompt from a picture pinned to a board on my Pinterest, I had this short-lived plan to write about myself as a fictional character who gives a small child a shot of espresso and tries to figure out where to get a puppy so that she can live up to the promise on the sign, but that fizzled.  Maybe it'll happen later.
- about this list I read on Flavorwire: 10 of the Most Powerful Female Characters in Literature.  I was really excited about this article because Hermione Granger and Katniss Everdeen and Lisbeth Salander are on it, as well as Jane Eyre...and I know all of those characters.  I've even heard of the ones that I haven't actually read before.  The problem here being that I didn't know what to write outside of gushing at "Oh, the cleverness of me!"  And I didn't want to brag or anything.
- about another list I read on Flavorwire, something about the most divisive characters in literature, but then I realized that the character I would have argued about would be Bella Swan from Twilight, and that's been done about eight billion times already, so not going to go there today unless I can come up with something original to say.

Why I might not be inclined to write this morning or why I'm more indecisive than usual:
- I spent the morning finishing Scott Pilgrim vs. The World instead of reading Cymbeline for my Shakespeare class, and so maybe it's a little guilt factoring in here.
- In my only class today, I'm going to get my wretched story critiqued, and I'm terrified that my classmates will like it.  Because they really shouldn't.  Trust me.
- I have a meeting today.  And I don't wanna....
- It should be Spring Break.  Right now.  Because I really want to go home.  This break is the first time my break and my brother's overlap since we were in grade school, and I'm really excited to see him.  Plus I haven't been home since January 1st.  It's been a long time without family for Brianna, and it's starting to take a toll on her sanity.  Heh.
- I can't even decide what to write for Poem-a-Day March.  This morning I wrote a poem called "Cute When You're Angry."  I may have hit a new creative low.

And Pessimistic Brianna gets sent through snail mail to Alaska, leaving Semi-Cheery Brianna to go to class this morning.  Cheers!

"The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say."

- Anais Nin

Music Prefs

Q:  So what kind of music do you listen to?

A:  I listen to a lot of music, I'm not sure I can describe what kinds.

Q:  Try.  Try real hard.

A:  Well fine, there's no need to be snippy about it or anything.  Gosh.

I love listening to the radio.  With my old car, I particularly enjoyed rolling down all the windows and listening to the radio.  And singing.  Shamelessly.  Because a teenage girl cruising in a white station wagon and singing along with the radio is nothing if not charming.  I'm kidding, I just really thought it was fun until my hair blew into my face, which was irritating.  My biggest objection to taking my mom's old car when my car got sold was the fact that my mom's car didn't have a functioning radio.  It worked, but it needed a hair tie to keep the volume knob in a certain place so the circuit completed and provided the driver with music.  It was air conditioning that it definitely did not have.  Anyway.  I kid you not, it wasn't even a month of driving that car when the radio crapped out.  The radio being my main source of entertainment while driving, travel was no longer as much fun.  After switching the radio out, getting a functioning radio for about six months, the FM tuner is out in that car again.  I spent winter break listening to news radio.  I wanted to cry.

At home I listen to The Mix.  I used to listen to Q101 and The Fresh as well until someone decided that they wanted to get rid of two thirds of my favorite radio stations in the Chicagoland area.  So that left me with The Mix and the country station that I flipped to when the commercials on The Mix bored me.

I also listen to Pandora.  Of course.  I'm pretty sure the majority of my Pandora stations probably sound eerily similar, but I'm trying to build a station made up of French music.  We'll see how that goes, but so far Lily Allen is still showing up there, and she should be on my Kate Nash station.  Hm.

In elementary school I used to listen to N*SYNC.  I also listened to them while I was packing to come back to school after winter break, but that's not really relevant.  But it was glorious.


I don't really like rap.  I don't mind country, in fact I listen to it sometimes, especially when writing Wild West poetry.  I'm not really a fan of hip hop, but meh.

Then there's wizard rock and Time Lord rock.  Yes.  I listen to multiple collections of music inspired by Harry Potter or Doctor Who.  I can only admit to knowing the lyrics to one song out of all those though.


Let's face it.  I'll listen to just about anything.  I have a soft spot for happy pop music, feel good, catchy, sing-a-long tunes are always a lot of fun.  I enjoy them.  Oh, and if I can dance shamelessly to them in my dorm room...bonus points.  I also have a respectable collection of soundtracks from musicals because I have a problem and MUST sing along with any music that I'm listening to.  Even if it's instrumental.  Which I also like.  I have a bunch of movie soundtracks, and I'm particularly pleased with myself that I have the Star Wars soundtrack as well as the Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack.  SO good.  But I found that listening to the Indiana Jones soundtrack is perfect for when you're doing homework because then you can pretend you're on an adventure!  Because I'm a dork.

"After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music."

- Aldous Huxley

Little Things that Make Me Happy

So (SPOILERS!) I'm making a bulletin board for February on Random Acts of Kindness.  I'm doing a lot of looking into things that make people happy and little bits of kindness and all that jazz, and I found a list of lists of things that make people happy.  Little things.  So I thought I'd follow suit and write up my own list of little things that make me happy.  In no particular order...

• Folded over potato chips
• Burnt popcorn
• Hugs
• Warm socks
• Cuddly old man sweaters
• Cuddling in general
• The smell of books
• Writing with a new pen in a new notebook
• Shopping for school supplies, even if I'm not actually purchasing anything
• Wind farms
• Black and white photographs
• Ruffles (not the potato chips)
• Getting in the car and turning on the radio to a song I know
• Dancing in the aisles at the grocery store
• Wax seals
• Stamps
• Finding change on the ground
• Walking in the fire lane
• Sitting at a campfire when it's just cold enough that the side of me facing away from the fire gets cold
• A good hair day
• Sudoku
• Baby animals
• When someone recognizes one of my references
• Opening the door before someone knocks on it
• Clean laundry smell
• E-mails or messages from a friend I was just thinking about
• Sunrises
• Being able to read the French on random labels
• Snail mail
• Riding a bike down the gigantic hill on the bike trail through the forest preserve
• Typewriters (the romantic old kind)
• Those bells that you can ring on the front counter of certain stores
• Fortune cookies

We Need a Little Christmas

Yesterday I went to my friend Molly's house to help her make a buche de Noel.  Which for those of you (like me) who didn't know, is a Yule Log.  And when I say "help," I mean that in the loosest sense of the word because I did a lot of quality control.  And chocolate chip eating.  Though I did separate eggs.  Which was pretty cool.

Anyway, while making this baked magical goodness, the question of "why a log?" came to me.  So I'm going to attempt to explain three Christmas traditions before Googling them all and bringing back what I learn off the Internet.  Fun, right?  Heeeeere we go!

1. The Yule Log
A Yule Log is a delicious rolled up sponge cake frosted to look like a log.  It's usually decorated with sprigs of holly or pine needles and sometimes powdered sugar snow.  Part of the challenge of making a Yule Log is to make it look as realistic as possible.  You can even add mushrooms made out of meringue, but we didn't do that because it took too much effort and time.

Now, why a log?  Well.  In the olden days in Europe, there was a time when everything was scarce.  Food, water, sugar...dirt... The only thing that was plentiful was wood from the nearby forests.  So every year during Christmastime, families would go out into the forest and cut down a small bit of wood off a tree and bring it home.  There they had the option of either roasting it up and slicing it for a dessert after their scant dinner, or they could roll the log into the fireplace and have a single evening of warmth for the holiday.  Nowadays since everything is significantly more plentiful and heaters have been invented, the people of Europe remember their difficult times and make a Yule Log in remembrance of their predecessors' struggles during a time of need.  Plus cake is much tastier than tree.

Wikipedia informs me that the original Yule Log was part of an ancient fire festival to celebrate the winter solstice.  It also says that in some countries an entire tree was cut down to provide maximum warmth and endurance and that the thickest part of the tree was put into the fire first while the rest of the tree hung out into the house.  The connection between Yule Log and cake is unclear, just that the cake exists and it's meant to look like the log ready for fire.

2. Mistletoe
Well.  Mistletoe, if you didn't know, is poisonous.  So they actually hung mistletoe from the ceiling to prevent the nargles (J.K. Rowling knows...) from infesting Christmas parties around the world.  Unfortunately, those who knew about the poisonous properties of mistletoe were unaware that mistletoe actually attracted nargles. This meant that there were little buzzing creatures hanging out in households of ordinary and magical people alike.  The plant was hung in doorways to discourage nargles from entering the house, but when the host was seeing their guests off after the party they would kiss each person in turn.  It was then discovered that when kissing beneath the mistletoe, the nargles were lulled into a state of calm which ceased the buzzing.

Not only is mistletoe poisonous, but I've also learned (from Wikipedia) that some forms of it are parasitic.  Excuse me, they're "hemi-parasites" though they have some medicinal qualities.  Further, I had to look up kissing traditions to figure out why kissing under the mistletoe was a big deal.  References to kissing under the mistletoe didn't occur until the 18th century, and that was explaining that young men had the privilege of kissing a young lady if he met her under the mistletoe.  He would then pluck one of the berries from the sprig, and once all the berries were gone, that privilege ceased.  Otherwise it would be bad luck.  Although there's also a theory that the tradition hails from Norse mythology.

3. Reindeer
Reindeer are a thing because they live near the northern parts of the world.  So naturally when the legend-writers were looking for a steed for His Jollyness, the reindeer was the obvious choice.  A tribunal of reindeer has gathered every year since that time in an attempt to find a different steed for Santa Claus or at least to increase the rights of reindeer workers at the North Pole (they don't have the same rights as elves or anything).  Dasher and Dancer acknowledge the image of a flying reindeer is important to the winter holiday, but Comet maintains that they should just go underground and forget about the whole flying thing.  The fairies who provide the fairy dust and happy thoughts for the reindeer to use while flying agree that their resources are dwindling in this tough economy and that reindeer should be allowed a break too.

According to Wikipedia, the reindeer thing came from the poem "The Night Before Christmas," and we're all familiar with that.

"It is Christmas in the heart that puts Christmas in the air."

- W.T. Ellis

A Letter to Hospitals

Dear Hospitals,

I am writing to inquire as to whether you are intentionally uncomfortable or not.  I only ask because upon visiting a hospital today, I realized that hospitals make me nervous.  Number one, because my dad and I got lost because the hallways are inconceivably complicated.  For no good reason.  Number two, because it's a hospital.

Being in Resurrection Hospital in the same season that marks the birth of Jesus made me giggle internally, and then I remembered that that was probably offensive, and I laughed a little more.  All in my head.  This was only because I noticed the Jesus statue near the entrance of the hospital.  And the chapel.  And the prayer room.  I had no idea that there were so many places for religion to live in a hospital.

That brings me to my other concern.  Hospitals generally hold people who are ill.  Sick.  And sometimes on their deathbeds.  That's what you think of when you think of a hospital, right?  The dead and slowly dying.  But it occurred to me while we were wandering the hallways today that people are born in hospitals as well.  A place where death and life mingle, get together and have lunch, is bound to make someone nervous.  Especially the superstitious, which I am not.  Not too much.  Just thinking about a nurse tending to a newborn baby and then going to aid someone who's dying...is a strange thought.  Although I realize that there are different nurses for different departments (or whatever they're called in hospitals), the same idea holds.  Just a little unnerving.

The rows of closed doors.  The wheezing.  The groans.  The people rushing from place to place with purpose.  I swear my dad and I were the only two people in the entire building who had no idea where we were going, wandering aimlessly as we tried to find the door.  The machinery.  Heart monitors, oxygen tanks, gurneys...

Hospitals, I would recommend adding some color to your decor.  The nameless paintings on your walls do not, in fact, add to the homeyness of your halls.  I promise that the pattern of your carpet does not make me feel like I could stay there forever.  And the white?  So sterile, and it makes me want to turn around and walk out immediately.

That is, if I can find the door.

Cheers,
Brianna
A Concerned Visitor

Secret Secret

"Three can keep a secret if two of them are dead." - Benjamin Franklin

Okay.  So if you have a secret, you should keep it to yourself.  Simple enough.  Right?

But there's always the option that you can tell two dead people.  Which would be nice.  I can imagine myself going to a visitation and kneeling down next to the coffin and whispering in the ear of a corpse a particularly juicy secret about myself.  For me, I have to tell someone.  I have to tell my secrets or my news to someone.  So telling a corpse?  Might work.  But then I'd have to find a second corpse.  So I'd have to go all the way to the cemetery and find a name that I like and talk to the gravestone.  Which I wouldn't have too many qualms about, if it was light out.  That would be fine.  Dark and I are not friends.  Not usually.
So two people are dead, and they know.  Easy as pie.  Simple as that.  Problem solved.

But what if you tell two living people?  Is Benjamin Franklin suggesting that I kill those two people so my secret's safe?  This doesn't sound very generous on the part of that founding father of ours.  Well, one of the founding fathers.  Anyway.  Killing people doesn't sound like a very good way of keeping a secret, especially considering murder becomes a second secret.  And then I have to tell someone about that, and then it's just a long chain of murder and death and secrets and complications, and that's just messy.  And irritating, I'm sure.  Not that I've ever killed anyone before, but I would imagine it's both difficult and annoying.

Then there's the issue of the undead.  What if the people that I told secrets to (and then killed) or the corpses I confided in became zombies?  Or vampires?  What if these people could speak again?!  What then?!  Granted, zombies probably wouldn't be as articulate as vampires, and vampires probably wouldn't care about my trivial secrets when they have their own bloodthirsty vices to conceal, but what IF these people did care?  What if they rose from the dead with the express desire of sharing my secrets with the world?  What would happen then?  Well, if I follow Benjamin Franklin's advice, I should probably kill them.  And then there's another cycle of killing and death and secrets!

What I'm getting from this?  Either don't have secrets or don't tell them to anyone.  Good to know.  Thanks, Franklin!

"Secrets, secrets are no fun, unless they're shared with everyone!"

Even More Things I've Learned

Today is a good day.  It's also a spectacularly good day for writing a list.  So here we go!

More Things I've Learned:

• Carry a fork.  It's good for eating ice cream, pudding, and eggs.  All in the same day.
• The Kool-Aid jammers (or whatever they're called) will not tell you where they're made/manufactured.  You will be convinced they come from China.
• Do not kid about buying alcohol for the underage resident of the underage RA who's with you at the time...
• There will be a question of coincidence versus fate when you pick up that trashy romance novel to find the name of a person you know in the synopsis.
• The cashier at Target will question your intelligence.  You will resent this because you go to the better school in town.
• The answer is always "pretend you like someone else" if someone's creeping on you.
• Ukulele on a porch swing?  Always yes.
• I've got the moves like Jagger.  Sometimes.
• My favorite fall jacket is eerily similar to my boyfriend's.  Although his probably doesn't have a hole in the pocket.
• Nothing in "Go Getter Greg" was planned...naaaah....
• Kyle just wants to dance.
• I am only semi-cliche.  (Teddy bear with a butter knife.)
• Hugs in parking lots.  That's it.
• Drinks that are neon-colored are delicious.  And taste like Kool-Aid.
• "I'll have a shot if she does."  Challenge accepted!
• Some contacts are frightening.
• Yes, you can make a scene in Target.  And Kroger.  And Jewel.
• Bats don't like being woken up and will not "glide" if you drop them in the bushes.
• Seize every "loppertunity" and push down dead trees.
• Hang out in the kitchen and you will get fed cookies.
• The Brat Stop is terrifying.
• River Song is only slightly better than I thought she was.
• Notes are always better and more educational if you write them in pretty pen.
• The first time you use your disappearing TARDIS mug, you will use it to eat vanilla ice cream (from goodness only knows how long ago) with a fork.
• You will wake up after a night on the town with a strange craving for greasy food.
• I have written over 40 poems as part of my poem-a-day project (and I have just realized that this can be made into the PAD project.  I'm not sure how I feel about this.)
• It doesn't matter how determined you are to "work" on Fall Break Day, you will spend the majority of your time travelling around town, ranting to your friend in a sorority house, and worrying about the work you need to get done.

That's all I've got for now, we'll see if I can learn more things before the end of this weekend!

"Personally, I'm always ready to learn, although I do not always like being taught."

- Winston Churchill

Travelling

Q:  In what ways have you traveled?

A:  I feel like this question might be a little mundane, so we'll see where it takes me, and if it gets iffy, we're getting a second question.  Cool?  Cool.  Great.

Car.  Of course I've traveled by car.  Being American, and living in a city, it's a little difficult to avoid traveling by car.  Especially since a lot of the most important places (grocery stores...) we go are a car ride away as opposed to being within walking distance.  I mean, Dominick's is within walking distance of my house, but we prefer going to Jewel, don't ask me why, I have no idea.  The farthest we've driven as a family was Washington D.C. and Pennsylvania when I was in 8th grade.  It was pretty intense.  I remember driving through Ohio and thinking that though it was fairly boring, it was quite pretty!
Police car.  I was not arrested.  You figure that one out.

Airplane.  I've been to California (twice), Arizona (twice), and England/Scotland via plane.  And listing all of those out I've discovered just how much time I've spent on airplanes, which isn't as much time as I originally thought.  Strange.

Train.  I've traveled by multiple types of trains.  I've of course been on the subway/"L" in Chicago (because SURPRISE! that's where I'm from).  My mom, my brother and I used to take the train downtown to the museums when I was littler.
I've been on the Metra to get to downtown Chicago, because the blue line doesn't go to Union Station.  And that's just irritating.  The Metra is nice, it's double-deckered, and I always have to sit on the bottom level because all the business people sit on the top level and doze off.  Jealous.  They sell tickets on the train, and they're old-fashioned looking and you have to clip them to the seatback in front of you.  Then of course the conductors wander around the train in old-fashioned uniforms, which might be a little strange considering the streamlined metal exterior, but hey.
I've also been on the Amtrak, which is the nicest way to get from school to Chicago.  When I get a window seat, it's pretty much awesome.  When no one sits next to me, it's even better.  Unfortunately, that doesn't happen often enough for me to hope for it.

Bus.  City buses, suburban buses, double decker buses (in London and Scotland), and long distance buses, I've been on them all.  It's really thrilling, I know.

Boat.  I've been on small boats like a little one motor dodad, and then I've also been on a sailboat on Lake Michigan, which was spectacular.  It was a beautiful day, it was Talk Like a Pirate Day, and I got to help steer.  What could be better than that?

Horse.  I feel like this shouldn't count, because we weren't really traveling, but I still rode a horse, so...we're going to count it for now.  It was at a dude ranch.  Two, actually.  I've ridden a horse...three times.

Person.  I've hiked.  I'm a Girl Scout, there's little chance that I could get out of that one.
Piggy back rides.  There's nothing more to say about that.

"I travel not to go anywhere, but travel to go.  I travel for travel's sake.  The great affair is to move."

- Robert Louis Stevenson

Sunset and Sunshine

Friday morning at precisely 8:15 AM, Brianna's phone vibrated under her pillow, shaking her awake.  After springing out of bed and very hastily (taking the span of an hour) doing everything that needed to be done without getting dressed in real clothing, Brianna sat down in front of Jacques and realized that she hadn't written a blog post in ages.  Which could be considered a problem, if she didn't realize that she had a very good reason for neglecting said blog.  Because she forgot.  That not being the point, Brianna shook her head and remembered the wonderful poetry slam which she had attended the previous evening and how she had spent two hours after the poetry slam doing nothing but lying on her tile floor staring at her accounting homework and wishing she could write some poetry.  That sentiment will manifest (hopefully) itself in today's blog post.

"Create a poem using Emily Dickinson's 'Bring me the sunset in a cup' as a starting point." - creative writing prompts

Here we go.  Yay rough draft!

Bring me the sunset in a cup
or perhaps just a shotglass
of sunshine.
Let it warm me
up like a glow light
from my stomach
radiating outwards.
Reaching fingers and toes,
transforming them into Disney
flashlights a la Beauty
and the Beast.
I want to drink in the sunlight,
or bottle it up and save it
for one of those rainy days
when I really need
a "pick me up."
But sun also burns
and what if I'm scalded
from the inside?
Searing internal organs
and blistering my heart
until its scarred over
past recognition
neither broken
nor whole.
I want to drink the sunlight
because the danger is too much
to resist.

"Bring me the sunset in a cup,

Reckon the morning's flagons up..."

- Emily Dickinson

I Meant to Write...

And that was when my pen ran out of ink...

Just as I was about to write that letter to you that I promise I've been meaning to write.  I mean, your letter's only been sitting next to my computer for about two weeks now, and I still haven't found the time to write back.  Maybe it's because I'm lacking in bright colored paper at the moment.  I'll have to scurry off to ORL to steal--I mean...redistribute some paper into my personal stores.

Just as I was about to write that poem.  I should probably have written it earlier, especially with all that free time I had in my accounting class.  And I had a really great idea too, about a nerdy Romeo and Juliet type thing.  It was going to be really funny.  Okay, well, maybe.  You might have chuckled.

When I really had to write down the assignment for my marketing class.  And notes for the murder mystery that I was helping with.  But that's alright, I have another--no, wait.  That pen's out too.  Two of my favorite pens, the Bic "crystal" black pens.  I love those pens.  They never run out!  I swear I still have one of them from my freshman year.

Right before the cops stopped me and demanded that I sign away my soul on a burrito wrapper.  I'm not quite sure what they were planning on doing with my burrito-smelling signature, but as it is...they couldn't have it.

Just as I was considering what black ink would taste like.  It was a sign.  I shouldn't try to drink ink.

Just as I got a great idea for a cure for the common cold.  I'm pretty sure it would work this time, I just need to add woolly socks to the mechanism that I already have in place.  The one made out of old paper clips, pencil shavings and used Post-It notes.  It's going to be big!

Right before life threw me a lemon.  So I couldn't even stab the thing and make it bleed inky droplets of lemony goodness.

Just as I was writing---

Facebook Fast

For the past couple years, my friend has given up Facebook for Lent.  Forty days without Facebook?  I thought she was crazy.  And deep down I knew I couldn't do it.  Mostly because when I log onto my computer, one of the first three websites I check is Facebook.  And even then, I can be innocently surfing the web, and I'll just naturally gravitate back to Facebook to see if one of those little red notifications has popped up.

After a good ten minutes on StumbleUpon, Brianna pressed CTRL + T and opened up a fourth tab in Google Chrome.  Without even thinking about it, she typed "fa" and Chrome finished the word she was about to type.  "Facebook."  The sign-in process is second nature with auto-complete for her e-mail address, and lightspeed typing of her password that she's used for everything since the eighth grade.


A little red notification attaches itself to the little world in the upper left hand corner.


The excitement builds as she mouses over to the notification.  Was it a comment on one of her cleverly worded statuses?  Was it a Wall post?  Or a picture?  Or a video?  Or was it a request from Mafia Wars?


Click.


"Someone has liked your status."

So basically I check my Facebook every five minutes for nothing.  I just can't convince myself that nothing's going to change!  As much as I tell myself nothing's going to change in five minutes, I can't resist.

Last year, I decided to go on a Facebook fast for a week to see if I could do it.  Completely cold turkey.  The week went well, but I realized it was impractical, because there were (believe it or not) people trying to get in touch with me via Facebook.  That realization brought me to the conclusion that I could fast during the school week.  Sunday through Thursday.  Because Friday's not technically a school day even if you have class...  Freeing up so much time, it helped me with my homework and my real social life, instead of my social networking life.

Today's the second day of classes, and I've decided that I need to do this again.  I'm going to have to write a paper for Senior Seminar, the longest paper I've ever written, and I'm taking three business classes that I'm worried about.  Not to mention I'm a senior and I deserve a social life.  So no Facebook for me during the week.  Let's do this!

Welcome to Facebook!

Lessons Learned

In the course of the last week or two, I've learned quite a bit.  So it seems as good a time as any to create a list.

• Paper will probably burn a lot better than you want it to when you only want to burn the edges.  And it'll leave a really nice "burnt" smell in the air for a long time.
• Mass brewings of Earl Grey tea covers up the smell of burnt paper quite nicely.
• Guy Fawkes was one of a number of conspirators, and is burned in effigy on Guy Fawkes Night (or Bonfire Night).
• The library will not have what you're looking for.
• It will rain torrents on the day you planned on walking to the library.
• Pizza is better when you have to wait for it to be cooked fresh.
• Chocolate milk is the best thing to drink after a work out.  (Apparently...)
• Michael's does not sell gray foam.  But Hobby Lobby does.
• That Borders gift card that says it had $15 on it?  It lied.
• Every book that you want will cost $15 or more, even the eighteenth edition of a short classic.
• Your brother and his girlfriend will insist that the window paint you put on the car will never come off.  Even though you know full well that warm water and soap'll fix it.  You know because you cleaned multiple windows at school that way.
• Having your own "workshop" for crafting is REALLY convenient.
• Tom Felton is in the Chicagoland area.
• Stories about drunken unicorns won't write themselves.
• Neither does your blog.
• "You have a little something just there...oh.  Wait.  Nevermind.  That's a hickey."
• Teenagers are endlessly obnoxious.  But is it really their fault?  (I can't believe I'm just learning this now...)
• "And now...we dance!" - Life in Ruins