the prestigious...

In these final days of cleaning out our apartment, the best discovery I've made is a bag filled with the moldy remains of 2 sweet potatoes. They were hiding behind other boxes of food and did not smell at all...until I moved them.

Goodbye, The Hanover.

hopefully my manly voice would not be a deterrent

Inspired by a few recent conversations with friends, I have begun to think again about my dream job. There is a show on PBS called Globe Trekker, in which a traveller goes to a certain country or city, stays in hostels, tastes local fare, participates in either tourist-y or local activities, and hosts what ultimately becomes an hour or half-hour long documentary-like show.

For the past 5 years of my life, this has been my ideal. I have on several occasions checked their website to see if there is some sort of application or information about employment opportunities with Globe Trekker or Pilot Guides, the parent company I suppose. I hadn't found anything as of a few years ago, last time I checked.

Today I took a look at the Globe Trekker host bios to see what the common denominator was. I guess several of them have some communications or extensive travel background, but the main thing they have in common is that they are well-rounded and infinitely cooler than me.

I finally found some application guidelines. Basically, there are absolutely no 'requirements.' They just want someone interesting who presents well on camera. I just have to submit an under 5 minute video of me doing...pretty much anything while talking to the camera. I never minded performing, but I don't do creativity under pressure very well.

Any ideas for my entry video??? I need help!

curb alert?

Ever since I was 17, I have moved every year of my life. This has amounted to 6 moves, not including the transitional summer moves into my parents' house. This has never bothered me before, but I am starting to feel like a nomad with no real home. At least it keeps me from accumulating too much stuff.

This year, I not only moved into and out of my apartment, but into and out of a classroom. I hope I can build up a better track record soon. Right now I am waiting for a confirmation email from craigslist, so I can start craigslisting away my old furniture. Let me know if you want a glass end table, 2 tall cabinets, a kitchen table, a nice big desk, a little junky desk, a round end table, or a Medusa lamp.

submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society

As you may know, I used to have magical powers when it comes to food. For about 2-3 years, I was able to obtain free food, simply by desiring it. I went out to Potbelly with my good friend Anne a few weeks ago, and she asked me to conjure something up. I had to admit to her that it hadn't happened to me in a while. Sadly, my powers have faded from existence.

Though I no longer possess any special food-getting abilities, I assumed I was just back to normal human-being level. A few days ago, though, I realized the power may have been reversed altogether.

It all started when Laura and I were running some errands. We stopped at PG Plaza to pick up some things. All I really wanted was a Cinnabon that day. I felt a little guilty eating it without any lunch though, so I perused the food court. Nothing caught my eye, but as I was looking at a salad and burrito place, the lady behind the counter called me over and started explaining the ordering process to me.

Aaah, I thought. This place looks like Chipotle. Sure enough, it had all the fixings you would find at a real Chipotle. I ordered the equivalent of a Burrito Bowl and sat down, immediately realizing that I wasn't hungry at all and had been duped into buying a very large meal. My next bad idea was to eat it. Right away, I realized that this place was clearly Chipotle's evil twin. If you ordered Chipotle in Hell, I think this is what you would recieve. It looked exactly the same but tasted terrible.

I put away the rest of the salad and decided to ease my pain by sharing a Cinnabon with Laura, now that lunch had been attempted. We went up to order it.

Laura: One Cinnabon please.
employee: We don't have that.

I slowly craned my neck up to look at the neon Cinnabon sign above our heads, not so much to see if I was indeed at the correct counter, but more to make a statement to the employee behind it. She was not amused, and offered no further explanation. I had to drop the sarcasm.

me: Do you not serve them, or do you mean that you don't have any right now?
employee: We don't have them right now. They'll be out in 20 minutes.

I'll spare you a speech about good customer service and skip to the part where we try going to Auntie Anne's instead, to get a cinnamon sugar pretzel, a poor substitute for Cinnabon, although still delicious. They were all out at Auntie Anne's as well.

0 for 3 so far. Next stop: grocery store.

At the grocery store, I picked up a few things. Juice, cherries, cucumber, jam, etc. Now the cherries were not on sale but I figured, Oh well. I love cherries. After I got my receipt, I realized I had in fact spent 18 dollars on cherries. My mind instantly started reeling with the many things I could have bought with 18 dollars, none of which were edible or would be gone in 2 days.

I was just listing for Laura the many things that the money could have purchased, when I realized it. I'm under a food curse! I became fearful of eating or buying anything for the rest of the day. Every time I tried to eat something, it was an opportunity to either reverse or further the curse.

other indications of the curse:

• My Honey Bunches of Oats with Almonds only had 2 almonds in the whole box.
• I found an unopened bag of slimy lettuce in the crisper.

Chalk it up to coincidence if you like, but the facts are clear to me. Either way, I think I was finally freed by a good experience at Rita's that night. Plus, the cherries were heavenly. Ask anyone who partook.