Damnit, Smithies!
Reading Huelo and Meg's recent entries has gotten me missing Amherst extra today ... so in solidarity with Huelo's bout of extreme missing Portland/Amherst, here's the things I miss doing with my friends, in no particular order:
1. Play Scrabble. I have an online client here but it's not the same.
2. Play music. Duh. The Shark Spaceship, jazz with people I know well, musicians who aren't ridiiiiiiculously flaky (I got blown off for ANOTHER rehearsal yesterday!) Really, though, it's The Shark Spaceship that I miss. I hear that they're not playing many parties this semester and that makes me sad. So I really hope we get things going again in the spring.
3. Valentine meatball subs. Not much I miss about Valentine, but that would be one thing. And being able to eat as much as you want.
4. On the topic of food: WINGS.
5. Still on the topic of food: Antonio's Pizza.
6. The radio show. I had a dream last night that a bunch of freshmen were applying to be WAMH GM next year and that I wasn't going to be it. I was bummed.
7. Copying music to my computer from the radio station and the music library. So much good stuff. Good thing I got to recharge a little bit at Everyday Music in October.
8. Buying used CDs. Even though I can copy so much stuff, I like buying my own sometimes. Nothing can replace the experience of finding a copy of "Duke Ellington & John Coltrane" at Mystery Train for $4.50.
9. Good teachers. Seriously, I have really missed the academic standards that Amherst has. Classes here have felt like high school. Spanish especially is a joke. And my classmates, both the Americans and the Chileans, are disappointingly uncreative and just not as energetic and intelligent as my Amherst peers. I've relied on e-mail contact with people at Amherst and side reading (right now I'm still trudging through Dewey as recommended by my English advisor -- dense but so interesting). Side note: I do NOT, however, miss the pointless divisive red/blue political debate or the intellectual masturbation that I'm sure is still commonly practiced at my home institution.
10. Academic politics. I miss writing inflammatory articles in the Student, chastising the Dean of Students, and continuing my crusade in support of the arts at Amherst. The Jazz @ Amherst initiative, which I left in the hands of two friends in my absence, has lost a lot of momentum this semester. But that was to be expected.
11. Watching basketball. I try to follow the hapless Blazers on the ESPN gamecast but not being able to see more than highlights stinks. I want to see Iverson lighting up the league, LeBron and Larry doing their thing, the Spurs' quiet domination, Rasheed and the Pistons running their new offense under Saunders, the Knicks and Lakers with their new high-profile (and high-paid) coaches, whom I despise, routinely humiliated on national TV. And, of course, I want to be able to see the development of my young Blazers. I realize that posting a diatribe on sports in a livejournal is like showing a Charlie Chaplin at a National Federation for the Blind conference, but whatever. I miss it.
12. Intramural sports. I was very sad to miss Mr. Scruple Ph.D's season this year and am lookingforward to returning to Boomshakalaka! for basketball season.
13. Portland rain. I'm sure I'll have a chance for plenty, being there for two weeks in December/January. Good.
14. Driving. Just a litte bit.
15. My family. I'm glad I'm seeing them in just over two weeks.
16. Really what I miss more than everything though is my friends. It's the people that make me miss these things so much. Music with The Shark Spaceship, the radio show with Bear, watching basketball with Mike, playing Scrabble with Emily, music crusading with Austin, teachers like Profs. O'Connell, Schneider, and Marshall, driving around Portland at zero o'clock with Michael, Banah, Lochlan ... I'll stop, but I just haven't made the kinds of friends here that I miss so much in the US of A. Boris, Jorge and Papo here in Santiago; Russell and Ryan as fellow studiers-abroad; Gissel in La Paz; Santiago, Joaquin and James in Buenos Aires ... I guess that's more than I realized. Still, it's not home friends.
Next week I'm going back to Buenos Aires I think to give a proper goodbye to my friends there, and maybe do a trip to Montevideo, Uruguay with James. That should be fun. I'll have a week to myself before my family gets here. I'm just ready for it all to be through.
Okay, time for my LAST CLASS OF THE SEMESTER! Bye, folks.
1. Play Scrabble. I have an online client here but it's not the same.
2. Play music. Duh. The Shark Spaceship, jazz with people I know well, musicians who aren't ridiiiiiiculously flaky (I got blown off for ANOTHER rehearsal yesterday!) Really, though, it's The Shark Spaceship that I miss. I hear that they're not playing many parties this semester and that makes me sad. So I really hope we get things going again in the spring.
3. Valentine meatball subs. Not much I miss about Valentine, but that would be one thing. And being able to eat as much as you want.
4. On the topic of food: WINGS.
5. Still on the topic of food: Antonio's Pizza.
6. The radio show. I had a dream last night that a bunch of freshmen were applying to be WAMH GM next year and that I wasn't going to be it. I was bummed.
7. Copying music to my computer from the radio station and the music library. So much good stuff. Good thing I got to recharge a little bit at Everyday Music in October.
8. Buying used CDs. Even though I can copy so much stuff, I like buying my own sometimes. Nothing can replace the experience of finding a copy of "Duke Ellington & John Coltrane" at Mystery Train for $4.50.
9. Good teachers. Seriously, I have really missed the academic standards that Amherst has. Classes here have felt like high school. Spanish especially is a joke. And my classmates, both the Americans and the Chileans, are disappointingly uncreative and just not as energetic and intelligent as my Amherst peers. I've relied on e-mail contact with people at Amherst and side reading (right now I'm still trudging through Dewey as recommended by my English advisor -- dense but so interesting). Side note: I do NOT, however, miss the pointless divisive red/blue political debate or the intellectual masturbation that I'm sure is still commonly practiced at my home institution.
10. Academic politics. I miss writing inflammatory articles in the Student, chastising the Dean of Students, and continuing my crusade in support of the arts at Amherst. The Jazz @ Amherst initiative, which I left in the hands of two friends in my absence, has lost a lot of momentum this semester. But that was to be expected.
11. Watching basketball. I try to follow the hapless Blazers on the ESPN gamecast but not being able to see more than highlights stinks. I want to see Iverson lighting up the league, LeBron and Larry doing their thing, the Spurs' quiet domination, Rasheed and the Pistons running their new offense under Saunders, the Knicks and Lakers with their new high-profile (and high-paid) coaches, whom I despise, routinely humiliated on national TV. And, of course, I want to be able to see the development of my young Blazers. I realize that posting a diatribe on sports in a livejournal is like showing a Charlie Chaplin at a National Federation for the Blind conference, but whatever. I miss it.
12. Intramural sports. I was very sad to miss Mr. Scruple Ph.D's season this year and am lookingforward to returning to Boomshakalaka! for basketball season.
13. Portland rain. I'm sure I'll have a chance for plenty, being there for two weeks in December/January. Good.
14. Driving. Just a litte bit.
15. My family. I'm glad I'm seeing them in just over two weeks.
16. Really what I miss more than everything though is my friends. It's the people that make me miss these things so much. Music with The Shark Spaceship, the radio show with Bear, watching basketball with Mike, playing Scrabble with Emily, music crusading with Austin, teachers like Profs. O'Connell, Schneider, and Marshall, driving around Portland at zero o'clock with Michael, Banah, Lochlan ... I'll stop, but I just haven't made the kinds of friends here that I miss so much in the US of A. Boris, Jorge and Papo here in Santiago; Russell and Ryan as fellow studiers-abroad; Gissel in La Paz; Santiago, Joaquin and James in Buenos Aires ... I guess that's more than I realized. Still, it's not home friends.
Next week I'm going back to Buenos Aires I think to give a proper goodbye to my friends there, and maybe do a trip to Montevideo, Uruguay with James. That should be fun. I'll have a week to myself before my family gets here. I'm just ready for it all to be through.
Okay, time for my LAST CLASS OF THE SEMESTER! Bye, folks.