A Very Cumb 2 Christmas

Picture it: College Park, 2003.
That time in between Thanksgiving Break and Winter Break, and the most fabulous freshmen on campus are spending every waking moment preparing, not for exams, but for the floor decorating competition.

(photos courtesy of Emily although she probably didn't know I had them)




some of the doors...

Emily and Irene pay homage to a claymation classic.

Jamie and Sheena's door was a wishlist...I actually think John Stamos is on there.

I found another Rudolph on Lindsey and Ena's door!

Kim and Ellen went all out with a hearth.

Close up of the letter to Santa...clever.
(kiss)
I think it says Brittany and Colleen.

Uh oh...Santa is boring a hole through the wall above Sarah and Laura's door with his bare hands!

I don't remember whose door this is, but it makes me feel all peaceful.

Candy and Brielle are repping the Christmukkah!

Just Hanukkah for Mindy and Michelle!

Home Sweet 2154! Looking back, I'm slightly ashamed that this was all I did to my and Delia's door.

Casey, on the other hand, poured her heart and soul into Santa's Workshop in her and Nikia's room.
Vanessa even set up a little tree outside her and Indra's room, complete with cookies and milk for Santa...and a fridge full of cold ones maybe?

I was about to mock the person who made the played out "write like a little kid" note...then I realized, yeah it was definitely me.

no bathroom was left untouched...




not only did we have a slender Santa...
but the boy's pocket boasted...Dreidel Man!!!


some of the murals...

Emily worked hard on that one.

Everyone added a snowflake!
The girls' pocket mural, pre-poetry...

...aaaand post!!!

Well, I can't promise that Cumb 2 will ever be as awesome as the days when it was graced with the presence of Alpha Phi Chi, but I know for certain that our spirit still lingers in that hall. And I know this because when I walk by, I see that they never washed the fake snow off the south pocket window.

Aaaah, Cumb 2!

my big fat family Thanksgiving

A friend of mine recently told me that around Thanksgiving, he kinda wishes he was a Grothe, cause we always have so many random/weird/good moments. Maybe the best thing I've heard in a while. And it's true; I am very lucky to have my crazy family. I feel like Thanksgiving has kind of a legacy in lots of families. Mine is one of them.

The Grothe family Thanksgiving (Thursday) is usually interesting enough in itself (stories for another day), but it's the Eaton-Mill Thanksgiving (Saturday) that is really an experience.

When it was only the Eaton Thanksgiving, it was about throwing things down the laundry chute, getting locked out of Grandpa's room and the tanning room by the older cousins, tipsy old people whose names I still don't know, making up dances in the basement, spying on my cousin making out with his girlfriend in the turtle room, and having a fake wedding for 2 of my cousins. Their song was "I Love You, You Love Me" from Barney. One year, Barney actually made a surprise appearance in the piano room, and one of my Grandpa's old men friends kept yelling, "I see a zipper!!"...but I digress.

It's evolved a little over the years. We've since added 3 step aunts and uncles and a (grandma) Diane to the former 7 aunts and uncles, and we've moved from my Grandpa's old house off Deer Park Road in Finksburg into a rental hall in Columbia. As my Grandpa's health faded, the tone got a little more serious. Now traditions include a speech from Diane telling us how much we mean to her, and a reading of the accomplishments of all the cousins. These may include parents bragging about their kids on the honor roll, or my uncle shouting out that his 18 year old daughter is pregnant. Like I said, the tone is only a little more serious. My aunt almost killed him, by the way.

See, the thing is: my family's crazy. Like soap opera crazy, but I'll spare you the details. Every year, I feel like new family secrets are revealed, new lies are told to younger generations for fun, and new people are added. If you are new, be prepared for torture. But, if you can handle them, they accept you with open arms.

The Eatons and Mills have been through a lot. Lots of really hard things I have never had to experience. And in addition to the dysfunction (perhaps because of it?), they are really good people. They have kept my Grandpa's legacy alive: valuing family, and coming together to celebrate life.

I am very thankful for Grothes, Eatons, and Mills.
Can't wait for Saturdayyyyy!!!

but baby, you'll freeze out there!

I really can't stay

Baby, it's cold outside

I've got to go away

But baby, it's cold outside

This evening has been

Been hoping that you'd drop in

So very nice

I'll hold your hands, they're just like ice

My mother will start to worry

Beautiful, what's your hurry?

My father will be pacing the floor

Listen to the fireplace roar

So really I'd better scurry

Beautiful, please don't hurry

Well maybe just a half a drink more

Put some records on while I pour

The neighbors might think

Baby, it's bad out there

Say, what's in this drink?

No cabs to be had out there

I wish I knew how

Your eyes are like starlight now

To break this spell

I'll take your hat, your hair looks swell

I ought to say no, no, no, sir

Mind if I move in closer?

At least I'm gonna say that I tried

What's the sense in hurting my pride?

I really can't stay

Baby, don't hold out

Ahh, but it's cold outside

I simply must go

Baby, it's cold outside

The answer is no

Ooh baby, it's cold outside

This welcome has been

So lucky that you dropped in

So nice and warm

Look out the window at that storm

My sister will be suspicious

Ooh, your lips look so delicious

My brother will be there at the door

Waves upon a tropical shore

My maiden aunt's mind is vicious

Gosh, your lips look delicious

Well, maybe just a cigarette more

Never such a blizzard before

I've got to go home

Oh, baby, you'll freeze out there

Say, lend me your comb

It's up to your knees out there

You've really been grand

I thrill when you touch my hand

But don't you see?

How can you do this thing to me?

There's bound to be talk tomorrow

Making my life long sorrow

At least there will be plenty implied

If you caught pneumonia and died

I really can't stay

Get over that old out

Ahh, but it's cold outside!

just brushin up on some skills

This is my ode to tryptophan
One fine amino acid
Consuming it in large amounts
Will make you feel quite placid

You'll curl up on a comfy couch
And try to watch the game
But soon your eyelids won't stay up
And tryptophan's to blame

This is my ode to giblets
Those frozen, packaged guts
For gizzards, livers, necks, and hearts
Just reach up birdie butts

No one knows quite what to do
With all those juicy niblets
So toss em out or heat em up
It's your choice with the giblets

This is my ode to wishbones
Those sternums that you break
They've brought me years of happiness
And wishes I can make

So grab a side and grab a friend
And yank that bone in two
And if the top stays on your half
The wishbone favors you

This is my ode to stuffing yourself
To dark meat and to white
To wings and thighs and drumsticks
To breasts, both left and right

All this is just metonymy
So if my point is murky:
I do adore Thanksgiving fowl
This is my Ode to Turkey

still pumped and thankful though!

Do you ever just have a day that's so good, you almost get sad cause you wish it could be even better?

That doesn't make any sense, but it's the best way I can describe it. Maybe it goes back to that whole idea of John Eldredge's...we get glimpses of the way things are supposed to be, and it just kinda makes us long for a time when things can always be like that.

That still doesn't explain why when I'm around people I love, doing things I love, enjoying myself and being thankful for life...why those are the times I get kinda lonely.

I'm just weird, man. One big contradiction.

99...

100th'd!!!!!

I'd even splurge for a digital camera

That is so cute. I don't actually know this baby, but I still wanted to share how cute babies are. If I had my own baby, I would post lots of pictures of it. And I'd send them to everyone I know. And then I'd put glasses on it and say, Ooooh look, it's my baby in glasses. Then I'd put a hat on it and say, Ooooh look, it's my baby in a hat. Then I might wiggle my baby's arms around like my baby was dancing. Then if someone else came up to my baby and tried to wiggle it's arms, I'd probably be like, Geeeez, leave my baby alone. My baby is tired and wants to get some sleep!
I wonder what it'd be like to be that crazy about someone.

it was the bee's knees, mac

It's a dark and eerie night in the District. Tension fills the air at Casa de Luz, a speakeasy on H and 10th. The hooch is flowing, and a dame sings sultrily in the corner, the eyes of every cat in the joint on her. I sidle up to my partner the op, the man I carry a torch for, to get the scoop. We're gunning for the mob boss, but it's gonna be tough to catch him.

I tip a few and spit with everyone in the drum, making sure not to put the screws on anyone and blow my cover. I'm trying to get a lead on the mob boss, and I find out a lot of hinky stuff in the process. Turns out the canary's a real chippy, skating around with every bird in the place. I also find out that my cat is keen on her too. The senator had a fling with her, but now his frau has showed up. Pretty soon, we find out she's packing heat as she pulls a bean-shooter on him. In all the commotion, the singer kicks off and collapses on the floor.

The canary got zotzed, and we got a stiff on our hands.

Ya follow?

Here's what really went down: Noticing my partner's crush on the singing sheba, I get jealous. I decide to chill off the chick. Luckily, the bird handling the gin mill's also a dope peddler who's dizzy with me, so he gives me week's worth of drugs, even though I've got no cabbage. I dump the lot in her drink, making a strooong Mickey Finn, and before you know it, she nibbles one and kicks off.

My partner and I block off the crime scene and move everyone into the other room to do some gumshoeing. There are some other snoopers there, shamuses at that, trying to crack the case before we do. I thought I'd made a clean sneak, but one of them is a real sharper. She sees that I'm stuck on my partner and, with a little help from the servant, crabs what happened and solves the case. She points the gat at me, and I sing! I'm nailed. It was me! I bumped off the broad! It's off to the big house for me.


So...that's the crop.

"and remember, your opinion counts"

There are some random places in Columbia Mall that I bet you never knew about. Today I found myself sitting in some sketchy little back office with a mint in my mouth answering the question, "how would you rate the clean feeling the mint gives your tongue as you suck on it?" while Christie sat in a wheelchair taking the same survey in another room.

"Um...seven?" I said.
"Do you remember when you put the mint in your mouth, if you placed the blue side with ridges on the roof of your mouth or your tongue?"
"On my tongue."

And then they paid me eight dollars.

Oh yeah, and then I went to this concert thing and this dessert place with some people I know.

+

+

+=

What a quality day.

hlh (cwmsac)

highs: I like being a pseudo-professional...getting up early to take the metro to DC for my placement with my Express paper and my SmarTrip card and smiling knowingly at all the tourists as they take pictures in front of the monument and then I hop the metro back to work (NERD), date night with the roomies

lows: my mentor teacher doesn't really want me there, I HATE feeling like people think I'm incompetent!

huhs: got some digits today...from a sketchy 35-year-old on the metro after I repeatedly told him I wasn't interested, the barista's special at Starbucks was ice

confession: sometimes I post stuff just so that other stuff gets out of the way when I start to feel self-conscious about revealing my thoughts on the internet

why my sisters are cool: They just come up with good ideas, then DO them. Kirsten, for instance, dressed up as Viola Swamp for Halloween for her second graders. And Brita for no necessary reason is taking a SCUBA class with an instructor who's actually named Scuba Steve.

crazy white people!

The thing about white people is, they mean well, but they're often pretty ignorant. The MBSA hosted a discussion about Crash today. And naturally, since they are a group of multiracial/biracial people, they asked a question about how any of the stereotypes/prejudices shown in the movie could cause problems for people growing up in a mixed household. Several people shared their experiences. Then some white kid threw in his two cents. He basically said,

"Yeah I can sympathize with your problems. I mean I don't have any stories that can compete with yours, since I only have one race, but we're all human. We all have the same problems. But people in biracial marriages have one thing in common. Does anyone know what it is? I'll tell you what it is. Love. No one looks at their spouse and says 'That's my Chinese wife' or 'That's my black husband,' they just love each other. And love is a choice. And we all need to make that choice. "

Well thank you Mr. Race Relations Expert and savior of humanity. That is typical of something a white person would say. You see, white people always think color blindness is the answer. We should all just get along and be friends, ignoring our skin color. Racism is bad! They are self-centered enough to think that because race doesn't impact their own lives that much, it must not be that big a deal to everyone else. They often confuse I'm not a racist with I can completely understand what everyone else is going through.

Newsflash: That's just not true. When you are part of the majority, there are some things that you just don't notice. You don't know what it's like to feel the color of your skin and be judged by it on a regular basis. I am not saying that white people are never judged for being white, but it doesn't become such a huge part of their identity. We are all coming from different places, so to say that we all have the same problems and to proceed to condescend and tell everyone else in a room how to fix those problems is just ignorant.

Forgive me for saying "they." I just don't feel like I identify with some things that I characterize as "white." I'll switch to "we" now.


I have a theory about white people:

We don't like feeling left out. That's one reason so many white people think they can use the N word. We think we're entitled to be part of everything. We're so used to being the majority and having control of things that we feel left out of minority groups. We're just not used to it, so we get all bent out of shape like, How dare they exclude me? That's racist! We like to think we are so "educated" about "diversity" with all our "diversity" credits in such a "diverse" school that we won't admit that we just DON'T know what it's like to actually be part of a minority. We get all jealous when people have a discussion that doesn't involve our own experience, so we throw it in for no reason. We try to fix people's problems in some shallow way without knowing what they really are.

I really feel like a large part of white people's job in the "racial discussion" or whatever you wanna call it is to swallow our pride for a minute and listen. So as opinionated as I am being right now, I have tried just listening as well. And just experiencing being the minority for awhile. My advice to every white college student is to take the time and effort to make yourself a minority in some group on a regular basis. I've been talking about race, but other groups are included as well. This is probably your one chance to ever do it. It's just a glimpse, but it's something.

And please don't make the obvious comments of Anna, you're white too. I know I am. That's the only reason I can speak so harshly about white people and make such ridiculous generalizations in the first place. Maybe I'm just...pro-minority. Works for me.

photo thieving and made up games

Another glimpse into the life of 2301: just randomness

Home after a late night at Marlbrough, Jayme decided we were hungry and should have some...Pizza Bolis!!!! Oh man, if you have not experienced it, you need to meet my best friend in the world. He works at Pizza Bolis late at night, makes a mean pepperoni and pineapple, and throws in free 2 liters of soda if it's Becky's birthday, even when she's demanding. That's pretty much why he's my new best friend.

So, while eating our Pizza Bolis...we decided, hey, we don't stick things to our foreheads often enough in this apartment! So, that's just what we did. Then we made the person ask yes or no questions to find out who they were. Classic late night entertainment.

"Pizza Bolis...aacchchhaghghach" (that's my best attempt at a Homer Simpson noise)

That's right Julie...you got Punk'd!!!

us: So let's recap...you're a white female, you used to be on TV, you wear little leather skirts, and one could say that you are "royalty."
Ryan: ...Queen Latifah?

She guessed that she likes food a lot. She also called Jayme "Pizza."

Little did I realize after several minutes of guessing...my pants held the answer the whole time!

for a duck may be somebody's mother

The thing about spending all my waking moments writing a Junior English paper is that I need a break for some type of creative outlet. I guess that's what this thing is.
The other thing about spending all day writing a Junior English paper is that I don't do enough random and interesting things to write creative posts about.
Sooo...I will leave you with...an announcement.

Re: Chapel Bells and Carillon

As all my Terps know, the Chapel chimes on the hour, every hour. And a few minutes before the hour, it plays the Alma Mater.



little-known fact: One year, after Maryland Day or something when the carillon was programmed to play all kinds of random songs, the bells got stuck. Somehow, Friday afternoons at 4 pm, it plays a random song instead of chiming. Listen next time. It's something different every week. Sometimes it's God Bless America; sometimes it's that song that I only know as Be Kind to Your Web-Footed Friends; sometimes it's some kinda beautiful haunting melody that I don't know at all. I guess they're patriotic songs, being that the Chapel is dedicated to veterans?

However, it has been brought to my attention, and I have also noticed, that sometimes on weekends, random songs can now be heard across campus. Why, you ask? I...have no freakin clue. As much as I like to pretend that I am the expert on all things Chapel, the bell questions elude me. We've had people call in to ask when the bells stop chiming at night. Um...let's go with 10pm. I don't know! It's a mystery. Maybe the Chapel really is haunted. I dunno. I've heard stories from co-workers, but nothing spooky has ever happened to me, minus the computer thing.

So...should I call the bell people to see if we can have this weekend song thing remedied? I kinda like the surprise factor. Oh well, I'll see what I can do.

Yeah, so now you know.

you can dish it, we can take it!

On bitterly cold days, I would have to drag myself out of bed...practically pry my fingers from the edges of the comforter that surrounded me with snuggly goodness. Nothing makes a good bed more inviting than the thought of having to trek from North Campus all the way to, say...Susquehanna! WORST! It was days like that I seriously looked into teleportation. (I mean, it has to be possible, right?) And then hearing my friends on South Campus brag about how they rolled out of bed 5 minutes before class...that was just too much.

Basically, I detested walking that far in some kinds of weather, while I was already tired, and that resulted in me missing lots and lots of morning classes (Mom and Dad, read: taking the time to rest my mind and body so as to be able to put full effort into my studies). Well, this is the first semester of my college career that I have missed zero classes. I have not slept through a single one! I have not chosen bed over class! Amazing! Could this be due to the fact that I get to sleep in on Mondays and Fridays? Possibly, but possibly also because I live so close to everything.
The farthest I ever have to walk is from Commons to Cole. And it is incredibly nice to live 1 minute away from work. However... I do kinda miss the North Campus life, and the first half of my college career.

Freshman year, I would just look at all the brick buildings on our big, beautiful campus as I walked to class, and sing the theme from A Different World. And I would just think to myself, Man...I am actually in college! It was almost surreal, but there I was, carrying all my books, looking at frisbee-playing kids on the Mall, people eating lunch in Nyumburu Amphitheater, and groups chalking on Hornbake Plaza, thinking...it really is college! Nerdy, I know, but I miss that.

I sometimes played games in my head to entertain myself as I made the daily tours around College Park. Games like: "Count the iPods" or "Make a Musical." The latter was when, on nice days, I created a musical in my head, and everyone I passed got a part. People were singing, snapping their hands in unison all Sharks and Jets style, twirling in the sunshine. James Gist was pirouetting across Regents Drive. I miss that. I see Gist every day, but he never pirouettes anymore.

Now I live in a very small radius of Commons 2. I don't need to find clever places on campus to take my breaks, cause I can just come back to the apartment. I don't need to eat lunch with people, or even venture to the Dining Hall for every meal, cause I just come back to the apartment. I don't run into as many people. I eat healthier now, but my body feels worse. I can only guess that that is attributed to the huge decrease in walking. I never went to the CRC last year, but I did do a lot of moving all over campus.


Chances are, when the temperature drops again, I'll be glad I'm living here. But for now...I do miss the hike a little.