Michelangelo sibyl from the Sistine Chapel

 

cardboard gravestones

Directions. In my opinion most people do not know how to give good ones. For example, when I was in Europe, I learned the hard way that right is not a direction, but in fact a vague way of saying somewhere over there. When my brother and I were told to take a right from a certain square we ended up going in the wrong direction three times and wasting close to two hours of our time before we finally got to where we wanted to be.

As far as I am concerned, right denotes a side of an object and not a direction. A direction to me would be north, south, west or east. Those are directions. Left and right are not directions or at the most they might be considered poor ones. I find actual street names to be much more helpful than take a left here and than a right.

The reason for this odd rant is that I decided to go watch The Picture of Dorian Gray at my professor's house tonight. Sadly she did not give good directions. Nor did she hand out maps. All that she gave was the street address and said that she was near the lake.

Now I knew the road that she mentioned, but I had no idea where her address fell along it and I ended up circling for about twenty minutes before I gave up and went back home to sleep. I was not a happy person and my trying to be social at that time would have been a struggle. Not only was I tired, but now I was irritated as well. All of the energy had been drained out of me from driving around for so long and getting nowhere.

In hindsight I know that I should have gone online and gotten a map before I left, but my time was limited and I thought it would close to the campus. Then again maybe it is and I just drove by it a dozen or so times without realizing it. Now as to what I'll say on Tuesday as to why I wasn't there has yet to be decided.

I know that I must have been close, but trying to read house numbers at dusk going forty miles an hour is not one of my better talents. I would have gone slower, but the road is a fairly busy one and creeping along wasn't really an option for me.

...

Today in class J Crew girl led the discussion and I finally learned her name and it seems to fit her. Not only did I learn her name, but I made eye contact more than once with her while she was giving her presentation. To let her know that I was listening, I smiled and she smiled back. At this rate actual conversation might happen any day now.

Before class ended I also learned that she wasn't going to be at the movie so I didn't miss a chance to talk with her there.

Yes, I suddenly sound as though I were twelve.

...

When I walked into work this evening, Ann was in the midst of a full rant and I did my best to calm her down. About half an hour later, she left me with a pile of problems, but she looked like she needed to get out as quickly as possible so I didn't mind that much. Besides on Thursday night there is another person there to help me after she leaves.

...

It seems that I managed to insult if not truly hurt Donna earlier this week. I had made an offhand comment about a project that is her responsibility and she took it very personally. Everyone else in the department thought that it was funny though so I have a feeling that what I said had some truth in it.

...

Each day that I come home I see new Halloween decorations on my house. This is fine with me, but I still find it amusing to watch the progression. At first my downstairs neighbors had filled those large garbage bags with leaves, but they didn't have enough and the plastic pumpkins looked shrunken. Now real pumpkins line the front steps and orange lights circle the windows and I have to wonder what they might add next to enhance the effect.

 
yesterday | index | tomorrow | one year ago