Vicky Cristina Barcelona was not good. I remain unimpressed by Woody Allen. I wanted to rip the clothes off Javier Bardem in every scene, but that does not a movie make.

I just made a connection, something that took me about three years. Bel Canto by Ann Patchett, has been one of my favorite books, mostly because I love opera and it's very exciting and beautifully written. I knew that the soprano in the book, Roxane Coss, was inspired by Renee Fleming, who is from Rochester and whose mother was always a ( Read more... )

I don't know how to do this, it's so weird. I'm packing and saying goodbye to people that I will probably be seeing again in another week, just in a different context with everyone in new houses and new jobs and taking summer classes and traveling. I'm visiting DC and I'll see Shana and Andrea and the rest of my life that happens to be there, and ( Read more... )

I can't believe my governor. I just saw on msnbc.com that he resigned, and I felt like I had been punched in the stomach. I can't believe that he paid $5,500 an hour for a hooker and traficked her across state lines, and his resignation somehow makes it feel like the Democratic party has died a little. I don't usually get upset about political ( Read more... )

I'm settling into my new job. I work as a receptionist/office assistant in an office of about 30 people, and the dynamic is quite unlike anything I've experienced before. It kind of reminds me of "The Office." I don't think anyone ever actually does work, they just wander around and get into dumb arguments about butterscotch versus tapioca ( Read more... )

tonight was the lecture with Esther Duflo from MIT's Poverty Action Lab, followed by a discussion with Dani Rodrik. Put Esther Duflo in a room, throw in Sherman Teichman and Maggie McMillan, add five awkward EPIIC students, and you have one of the most thrilling and simultaneously mortifying dinners I have ever had in my life.


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when I was rushing to my connecting flight in Miami, I had almost made it running through security when a guard stopped me. "You're from Tufts?" he said, looking at my sweatshirt. "Yes," I said, trying to keep walking. "Well...you don't look so tough!" he finished. I wanted to punch him in the face. Those were five seconds of my life I would ( Read more... )

I am thousands of miles from home but somehow still caught the midwinter cold that must be circulating around campus right now. This is the most polluted place I´ve ever been. When I get home I am going to stick my head in a bucket of ice water. On sunday I´m going to have that long plane ride to collect my thoughts, the first legitimate stress- ( Read more... )

I got over my perilous case of traveler`s bug, it was weird because I woke up in the middle of the night feeling fine like it had all been a dream. This city makes me cough and it makes me struggle for breath after I go up a flight of stairs. The streets are clogged with hundreds of micro buses filled with campesinos and men in tarnished suits ( Read more... )

the altitude is catching up to me. I thought I was fine the first day, when I was up and walking around, but 14,000 feet hurts. I think it was the hike yesterday around Lake Titicaca that did it, and I also had a very scary experience last night on a bus coming back. We were coming down the mountains into the valley of La Paz, getting thrown ( Read more... )