Tried and true

I don't know. This blogger/gmail thing confuses me. Has it occurred to anyone how dependent we are on passwords and pin numbers? At work alone, I have to memorize four passwords to get through the day. And then I have one for my yahoo, my blogger, my netflix, my friendster. And the list goes on.

I am going to be very busy this year (this I realized three months into the new year, on the first day of spring, no less). If all goes well, next year I will have learned to drive, be a US citizen, be in business school, and be in Europe for spring break. Sounds fabulous, doesn't it? If only I could get my act together.

I did manage to take the TOEFL two weeks ago. It went well, besides the fact that I was too impatient, was the second person to walk out, and as a result have no idea whatsoever what range my score is in . It was very distracting having everyone around you trying to speak clearly into their microphones while you're trying to listen with the non-noise-blocking headphones. While I was in the middle of writing an essay, my keyboard decided to get stuck and I had to summon a proctor who had to summon somebody else, while my time was running out. Also, I had bought Ticonderoga No. 2 pencils for the occasion but didn't get to use them as only pencils provided by the testing center were allowed. The test center was awful, by the way; their system consisted of a person calling out room numbers, which we were supposed to locate on a hand-written list posted on a wall somewhere. It was all very confusing.

Anyhow, as evident in my non-presence on the internet, I have been kept busy by other things such as weekly trips to Costco, outlet shopping, laundry, magazine recycling and the like, and will probably continue to be if I everything goes as planned and I get ahold of Shaun T's Hip Hop Abs video. In other words, I have been gaining weight like crazy (hello bacon and eggs everyday) and in dire need of an activity that doesn't involve typing.

This makes me giggle every time.

The Flea

MARK but this flea, and mark in this,
How little that which thou deniest me is ;
It suck'd me first, and now sucks thee,
And in this flea our two bloods mingled be.
Thou know'st that this cannot be said
A sin, nor shame, nor loss of maidenhead ;
Yet this enjoys before it woo,
And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two ;
And this, alas ! is more than we would do.

O stay, three lives in one flea spare,
Where we almost, yea, more than married are.
This flea is you and I, and this
Our marriage bed, and marriage temple is.
Though parents grudge, and you, we're met,
And cloister'd in these living walls of jet.
Though use make you apt to kill me,
Let not to that self-murder added be,
And sacrilege, three sins in killing three.

Cruel and sudden, hast thou since
Purpled thy nail in blood of innocence?
Wherein could this flea guilty be,
Except in that drop which it suck'd from thee?
Yet thou triumph'st, and say'st that thou
Find'st not thyself nor me the weaker now.
'Tis true ; then learn how false fears be ;
Just so much honour, when thou yield'st to me,
Will waste, as this flea's death took life from thee.

- John Donne

Ah, life was so much simpler back then.