Bella Notte

Friday 11 April

So last night I was too exhausted to blog, but not sleepy enough to stop cleaning every inch of the kitchen in my apartment. My brain is weird sometimes.

Yesterday began with the glorious wave of fuckery called "Organic Chemistry," where I made sarcastic comments to this girl Alice the whole time and panicked internally for this exam that I'd better not fucking fail *deletes 1990's punk rock song lyrics from brain in a futile attempt to make space for reaction mechanisms*

Anyway. Since my law class was cancelled once again, I ended up on Norlin quad and decided to follow a group of senior citizens to Macky Auditorium to hear an event for the Conference on World Affairs entitled "Corporate Religiosity: The Assault on Secular Law."

It was baller. The presenters focused on the Sibelius v Hobby Lobby case currently before the Supreme Court, in which employees of Hobby Lobby were denied access to contraception under their employer's healthcare plans, under the grounds of religious freedom. It's my opinion, based on a long history of ruling in favor of businesses (Lochner era, anyone?) and the latest Citizens United case (and oh my god this majority decision pisses me off so much like you don't even know) that the Supreme Court will rule in favor of Hobby Lobby. Which I think is unfortunate, because I'm a huge advocate of the separation of church and state. I believe this infringes on that because of the inherently public nature of healthcare and the restriction by a "person" (even if that person is a corporation as defined legally) reeks of those two interests colliding.

I don't know. I'm not in law school (yet).

It was also really interesting because I'm pretty sure I was the only student in the audience at this particular event. Like it was all of the senior citizens, and then there was me hanging out in the back with my too-big backpack and iPhone. It was hella awkward. I dunno. As a big advocate of civic servitude, I'm shocked that no one's interested in this issue. Maybe I've got an old soul or whatever and I fit in really well with 60+ year olds. Somehow I get the feeling I'll be there in 40 or 50 years doing the exact same thing. At least, I want to be.

After that, I went home and printed off my narrative and then hung out for a little bit watching Gatsby again (because yay) before I headed off to class with Dani and Paige. We talked about how we wanted to travel (and a lot of people on the Buff Bus gave me judgey looks when I was like, "I don't want to go to frikkin Cabo, I want to go to Mexico City or Oaxaca or someplace that's actually Mexico" and it's like fuck you I want to experience the world as it is instead of how it should be and so what if I get kidnapped by drug lords in the process, at least I'll have lived for a day). I have a great sense of wanderlust that's probably never going to be fulfilled by an associate's salary. First world problems, I know. But after growing up reading too many books about too many places you'll never see with too many adventures you'll never have, you start to dream a little bigger. Which is important.

Writing was grand. I read a grand total of six pages of my reading and my instructor let me off because he knows I have my shit together (ish). I took a nice (though ridiculously warm) walk home, hanging out and listening to Sinatra and Nat King Cole and Bobby Darin and Louis Armstrong like I do. I read A Dance With Dragons outside for awhile until I got too hot, then I took a nap like I do. I replenished our supply of Spicy Ranch (nobody panic okay) and then fucked around on Tumblr for awhile whilst eating pizza and watching The Dark Knight Rises.

Then I went with Dani, Davis, Evan, and Kevin up to Flagstaff to help them with their project observing the ISS flyover (which are always really neat to see if you get the chance—NASA has a schedule for you). Dani and I took selfies in the woods because we're White Girls:

Are We Lost In the Woods? Our Faces Say Yes But Our Friends Insist No.

We hiked up a mountain and I had regret over my footwear choice (as always), and then we found this little meadow and got into observing position and that was great. There was this moment before the flyover where everyone fell silent and the wind started to blow and it was kind of surreal—it's probably because I'm ridiculously sleep deprived, but it was so quiet and the moment just had this bloom of anticipation and it was like "We're alive on a Friday night and something is coming out there in the distance for us, but this here is okay." I dunno. Flyover was A+, the guys got their observations, and we headed down the mountain without falling off a cliff or needing to amputate my bloody feet. Good work, team.

Anyway. We came home, got some Dairy Queen, and watched Due Date because it was on, then Deal With It (a remarkably funny reality game show), and then Not Another Teenage Movie came on and we all flipped out because there was a dildo in the opening scene, and then CAPTAIN AMERICA was in it, and then TED MOSEBY was in it, and then there was a beautiful American Beauty reference and so we watched that whilst talking about tubing and concussions and various other topics. After that one, Evan and Bongi went to bed, but I wasn't as tired as I should have been, so I put on my oldies playlist and jammed while cleaning the kitchen. I read a little bit, and then I went to bed.

It was a very low-key Friday, which I needed. I always feel more comfortable with people I know and adore than I do at a huge party where I can't turn to the person next to me and make a math joke if I get too stressed out (I have weird ways of relieving stress, the first being telling math jokes and the second being writing up case briefs—it's a weird life).

I'm off to study some ochem, so I'll check back in when I'm feeling a little bit better about life.

Thanks for reading :)