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Ok here. Several people came and then went off to other places, but as of now there are 7 people, 4 dogs, and 1 cat under this roof. My friend's parents, as they work in the healthcare field, had to go to work today in case the state moves all the patients from hospitals along the coast up inland.
Watching the news nonstop since Saturday takes its toll. It's depressing and stressful, but you really try not to think too much about it. Otherwise you just can't function.
Very glad to have a roof over my head, a nice warm bed to sleep in, food to eat, and staying dry and cool for the most part. We saw that there are still around 100,000 people stuck in the city. 10,000 has taken refuge in the Superdome itself but apparently part of the roof had gone. Conflicting reports have been coming out on just how much wind/flooding there is throughout the city. Can't believe that some people in the law school decided to stay and ride out this hurricane. Just why they think they could or how they'd function in a city possibly without power, water, or sewage system is beyond me. Classes have been canceled until next Wednesday and some have decided to make a mini vacation out of this.
Power may go out here in the next 2 hours.
In a few hours, I will have to evacuate due to the impending category 4 hurricane that's coming our way. So, I don't expect to post for several days and would appreciate any mojo. Really don't want to come back to find my possessions swimming in water, looted, or completely soaking wet.
But, in emergency situations you do find out who your friends are.
I had two people repeatedly trying to reach me this morning to offer me either a ride and/or shelter when we evacuate, as they remembered that I have no where to go in this area, nor do I have a car.
I'm so incredibly grateful for having friends who care.
In traditional Buddhist thought, the goal is to achieve enlightenment, to realize nirvana, and ultimately to break the cycle of samsara so that one is not reborn. For life is inevitably so full of suffering that with every rebirth, the suffering perpetuates. To break away from samsara means one will never have to return to the mortal world; one simply ceases; hence, the suffering ceases.
Is it possible for one, whose very core senses and feels, to be a Buddhist?
For letting go of all emotions, all mortal ties, all that makes one human is so extreme that it takes the upmost determination to do so. To simply stop being, doing, or feeling as to break the cause and effect cycle of a karmic existence. Small steps at a time, perhaps, but that is the eventual aim.
I am not convinced that you can be a person with full of passionate ideas and still be a good Buddhist in the traditional sense. To be full of passion and emotions is not to let go. But it is all about letting go.
Amazingly, there is an incredible feeling of other-worldly peacefulness when you do let go. I was once there. That was fleeting. I continue to feel, to cry, to despair, to laugh, to desire. With it, joys, but also suffering. You cannot have one without the other. It becomes clear why leaving samsara is the solution.
For now, I remain. And hope that one day I can reclaim that peacefulness.
On my way to classes this morning, I bumped into some friends and started chatting with them. After a good 10 minute conversation catching up about our summers, I hurried to class with 10 minutes to spare. I was sure of the classroom, went in, sat down, and began to set up my laptop.
Wait...how come I've never seen any of these people before? I know we have a big school, and I may not know everyone's faces, but how could I not recognize even one? Especially, how come I couldn't recognize these Asian girls before?
Before anyone yells at me, I must say that the Asian population in this town, let alone this school, is practically non-existant. In a place like this you KNOW and notice who the Asians are, even if you're not personally acquainted with them.
I then noticed that everyone's textbooks looked different from mine. I turned over to the quiet, almost sullen guy next to me and asked, "Do you know if this is X class?" To which he answered, "No." I couldn't tell if he himself didn't know which class he was supposed to be in, or that the class name I had mentioned was such a foreign concept to him that he had no clue what I was asking. Probably the latter, as I very quickly realized, "Oh <bleep>! I'm sitting in the wrong classroom!" What was worse, I was basically a senior sitting in an all happy-faced freshman class.
One thing about this education is, you develop a thick skin. I didn't even blush before I unhooked my laptop, took my textbook, smiled at some random girl, and hightailed outta there.
I knew the room number I was going to, but I had simply gone to the wrong one. Thus is the tale of you think you're so familiar with something that you actually mess it all up.
I'm such a dork sometimes. 
Even when I'm too old to be doing such things.
Ugh.
Why do crap always have to happen on the night before a big day, like classes or finals? Inevitably?
It's like Murphy's Law, except supernaturally and personally adapted to me. The above is surely merserene's Law of If Things Go Wrong, It Will Always Go Wrong Before A Big Day.
Even vowing not to study an hour before sleep gets preempted by crappy things and crappy people I've had to deal with in the day. Now I can't sleep. Crap crap crap.
Ok, I gave in and took a bloginality test, and apparently I turned out to be an ISFJ (or a Guardian/Protector), despite the fact my Myers-Briggs temperament is INFJ (Idealist/Counselor).
That's ok, though. Apparently they both fit.
Guess what they listed as one of the ideal careers for ISFJs? Paralegals. Ha. If only paralegaling has more growth potentials.
And it happened AGAIN. After I came home from drinking with friends last night, I was in the middle of washing up when there was a knock on my door. Not only was I down to my undies, I had a headband on my head and water all over my face.
Quick! What could I throw on?
Turned out my neighbor needed to borrow some ingredient for her baking. She was sweet to have given me a piece of it after she baked.
But why do they always have to knock when I'm unprepared?!
My neighbors must think it very odd when they knock on my door, only for me to ask them to wait, then only after 30-45 seconds later do I open the door and greet them with a smile.
What they don't know is, I mostly walk around my apartment partially naked. It takes me a frantic 30-45 seconds to throw something on the top and/or bottom, depending on how many pieces I need to throw on.
Now, now, I'm no exhibitionist. My blinds are always down. I am well aware that no stranger and even some friends wouldn't want to see gratuitous flesh from me. But when it's only noon and already 93°F but feels like 106°F (that's 34°C but feels like 41°C for those metrically-inclined), and you don't want a monstrous electricity bill, you take drastic measures. It works when you're a quiet person who lives alone and don't expect people to randomly show up unless they call first. Very much not recommended if you're living with roommate(s), unless he/she is a significant other or are like-minded, or your friends constantly pop over.
I just came back from lugging large, heavy textbooks in this southern heat with about 60% humidity. I barely made it pass the block before my shirt was drenched with perspiration. There's no such thing as looking graceful and glamorous in this heat. All I could think about was to get home, launder my shirt, shower, and sit in the A/C without my shirt. For the sake of all on several different respects, I am going to have to work out a plan where I hide in the school library all day as to get free A/C and avoid the blazing sun.
I also have to do something about the awful clutter and figure out where in the world will I put these new textbooks...
Classes haven't even started, and already I've been dealing with some of the very things that make me so loathe to go back.
Several of my classes already have reading assignments. I have to get my ass up early tomorrow to buy the textbooks! But that's not what's bugging me.
I ranted to a friend recently that it's the people that really get to me. At every school, you're bound to get super competitive people who just aren't nice to anyone; some schools have it worse than others; but they're not the ones that make me dislike law students in general. It's the ones that make it their business to tell you how you should do things, or remind you that they're somehow better than you. Sadly, in lawyers' world, that very much comes with the territory, and there are more of them than you can shake your fist at. Not me though - I'm like the hippie law student who wants everyone to share in the same successes and to be happy for each other. Also sadly, I'm most likely alone in my thoughts.
I am heading an organization next year, and I don't appreciate other people telling me how to run it. I didn't ask for their opinions, and they shouldn't give them to me, especially considering they don't know me or my organization well, and I don't know them. There's a certain boundary you can cross if you're friendly with someone - to give them advice because you genuinely care, even if they didn't ask. Then there's just plain gratuitous opinion feigned advice that they should have just kept to themselves.
* * *
In a little bit happier/bittersweet news, I finished my internship today. It was such a great learning experience; it's sad I won't have the time to return in the fall to help more people. I feel bad for all the paper that will be loaded the wrong way and the staples that will be misplaced, but they're all out of my hands now. My direct supervisor gave me a great bear hug, told me that he will miss me, thanked me for my tremendous help to him, and offered to write nice recommendation letters if I need them. The office administrator, with whom I haven't talked, was surprisingly nice and gave me a hug with bisou, which is the commplace greeting/parting for Europeans but so rare in the U.S., and left me with a good feeling about her and a strange sense of relief. Sometimes you just don't know what kind of impression you've left someone, you know? The clerk, with whom I always talk, stayed way past her time to go just to chat with me. We're definitely keeping in touch.
Guess who was the only one who left without saying goodbye? The old lady who saw me fidgeting with the printer paper tray.
There is a big spider in my bath tub. I don't know how it got there.
Norm MacDonald is a funny looking person.
I bought a pair of fire engine red sandals for $5 today. That is, shoes of a deep red shade, not that they're shaped like fire engines.
Checking legal citations is the pits. Makes me want to strangle myself.
People are still a mystery to me.
Bed time.
Why in the world did women get stuck with PMS? When we evolved (or when The Powers That Be created us - take your pick), couldn't someone have decided, "Okay, Women, you get multiple orgasms AND no PMS because after all, you will have to go through childbirth"? I mean, were we gipped on this aspect or what?!
Been feeling rather crappy the past couple of days. Blasé and nonchalant one minute, and the next feeling completely overwhelmed and stressed out about everything. There are the academia-related ones: Impending start of the semester, whether or not to work, where to work, what to do, how to get from here to there, what topic to choose for my research, when to have meetings, what to do if no one shows up, who what when where how. There are also personal-issues related ones: What the heck do I want to do with my life, why can't I decide, why is everyone ignoring me, why do I let little things bother me, why do I have to be so sensitive about everything, why don't I have the guts to to something drastic, why can't I meet more people like me*, why why me me. Good god, it's like someone decided to play a little game with my moods but decided not to send me the memo about it. Suddenly I'm reduced to a bumbling 13 year old with low self-esteem, paranoia, and depression.
But just for this one week. I hope. When you're in the midst of it all, it never seems like it will ever go away.
(* This one I can answer - see temperament entry from August 10th. Duh, we're a bunch of quiet introverts who don't go out and meet people! Still, this bothers me to no end, even when I'm not PMSing.)
I've been tagged by R to do a meme on movies for some time, but it's taken me a while to figure out to how to formulate it. It asks me to name my favorite movies by age, but that's a tough categorization. We never went to the movies when I was young, save 1 or 2; most of the ones I did see, they were from the TV. We saw few movies, thus my scope was limited, and my cinema addiction only really took off after I started working. So, I will answer accordingly, then put my own spin on the meme.
Childhood: from birth to age 12
I vaguely remember having seen "Back To The Future Part II." I do remember wanting to see it because Michael J. Fox was going to play his own daughter, thus donning female attires. It was a fun movie to watch, and probably 1 of 2 or 3 that I did see in the theatres. If I can pick something from TV, though, I'd have to say "Escape to Witch Mountain" and the sequel, "Return from Witch Mountain." Only later did I realize that famous folks like Eddie Albert, Donald Pleasance, Bette Davis, and Christopher Lee were in it. Also, "The Never Ending Story." As you can see, the sci-fi/fantasy fan started young.
The Teen Years: from ages 12-18
"The Remains of the Day." I don't remember with whom I went to see this, but I do remember being so gripped by it that I cried. Emma Thompson became my favorite actress because of this film. Merchant & Ivory were fantastic filmmakers. The eternal sap in me adores this movie. Outside of the theatre, most of my favorite movies came from my French class. To this day I still love (and own) "La Boum," Sophie Marceau's debut, and "L'Argent de Poche" by François Truffaut.
The College Years: from ages 18-22
Saw very few movies during college. Except for the remastered releases of "Star Wars," and one attendance at "The Rocky Horror Picture Show." Oh wait, I saw "The Matrix." THAT has got to be one of my favorite movies of all time, too. Totally blew my mind with its ingenuity in cinematography, blend of spirituality with sci-fi, and Keanu. Everytime I see this, I still find myself going, "Holy crap! (Or, more aptly, Whoa!) This is good sh*t!" And I liked "The English Patient," too. It's a beautiful movie!
Post-College Years: from ages 22 and on
Well...tons of movies here. "Le Fabuleux Destin d'Amélie Poulain" ("Amélie" for short), "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, rest of "The Matrix" trilogy, "Batman Begins," "The Magdalene Sisters," "Memento," and "Napoleon Dynamite."
On Video/DVD (because I missed them in the theatres when they were first released)
Star Wars (original trilogy)
Cinema Paradiso
Edward Scissorhands
La Cité des Enfants Perdus ("City of Lost Children")
Roman Holiday
Breakfast at Tiffany's
The Shawshank Redemption
The Sound of Music
Jean de Florette
Manon des Sources
ETA: After doing this meme, I just had to watch "Breakfast at Tiffany's." It makes me cry, every time! But every now and then, one can use a movie crying fest. It's cathartic.
