I've even raped and killed a mountain panda in the hills of Shaanxi.

When I was in high school, I figured I'd go to school in Texas. I applied to schools outside of Texas, of course, but you know. Small town girl. I was still in the top 5% of my class at nerd school, so I figured I'd stick to a small pond. And then I got a huge financial aid package to Duke University, so much so that I only would have to pay for about one year's tuition. Which, you know, was still more than in-state tuition for all four years. But my friend Dale, who was attending said school, pointed out that Duke would open a lot of doors for jobs afterwards, and paying off the loans would be a cinch. (I won't point out the flaw in his plan right now, since I was planning to major in Computer Science - and in fact I'd probably be all paid off if not for all those layoffs. At least I paid off my car.)

So, of course that changed my life irrevocably, opened my mind about 75% more than it ever had been before. I don't think college is for everyone, but for people in the 80th percentile and above, it's a rather essential experience, and I feel private schools tend to enrich this experience more.

Which is funny for me to say, since I thought Duke was the most inane environment ever. Fortunately my freshman year I had a roommate, Ana, who felt the exact same way. Duke is one of those rare beasts, a party school for academics. It was a world-class education, for sure, but every weekend you could go to five different mixers and get wasted off keg beer and stumble into bed and then have a lovely Walk Of Shame. Oh, yeah, and apparently there's a BASKETBALL TEAM!

Ana and I avoided most of this by getting into raves, and the film society. Technically I never belonged officially to the film club, but I went to most of the movies and a couple of the meetings. We also got apartment housing as soon as was humanly possible. Sometimes we were at odds, as I was even more tactless and filthy then, but I tried to learn how to be a good friend from her. We had a group - the Dudez - us, Clark, Holger, Sitar, Norman, and Fara. The latter two were more peripheral members, but they did participate in many important Dudez events. (Fara transferred after her freshman year, but she was still an honorary Dude. Technically the group didn't even form until our Junior year, since most of the members are two years younger than we are.)

We had our fun by mocking the sacred ideals held by the student body - mainly, basketball. I did attend a few games after some long study sessions, and Ana and I hit an 80s night that some frat held, but mostly it was movie watching and subversion. This was helped greatly by Clark's hearse. We even threw our own party, but people only danced to crappy hip-hop. The road trip to New Orleans was classic, though, and after we graduated, I still lived in the area and kept hanging out with the Dudez. I even flew to see Ana and Morrissey and learned to ski! When Holger did a semester abroad in Argentina, we flew down to meet him during his break. And when they finally all graduated, we had a European tour. Good times.

I fell out of touch after moving out west, but Facebook means you sort of know who's married and who has a kid. So this weekend, I finally got to meet Ana's long-term boyfriend (and baby-daddy), Joseph. So this Saturday, we woke up early, showered, put on our finery for their wedding, and drove to a nature preserve in Oakland. (All relevant pics here.) Ana had come out looking at UW for graduate school, but instead she went to Vermont. Another life-changing moment, as she met Joseph there! The man who introduced them, Benjy, chatted with Reg while I put Ana's makeup on. They had already had a proper ceremony in Croatia, but this legal part was for his family, and well, the USA. I got to sign as a witness and all. The "ceremony"/announcement went fast, as her 18-month-old Thomas had to be held the entire time.

It was a gorgeous day, although a bit on the hot side. We were just under a ridge, which was nice and breezy, but where the wedding party sat was just low enough to get hardly any sort of breeze. So we drank lots of nice ginger limeade and hibiscus lemonade, made small talk, chatted with people we hadn't seen in years, and watched the bride and groom dance to a traditional music before the caterer finally finished grilling the meat. Everyone fell upon the food happily, as it was quite delicious. Everything was really lovely, and I was glad to see Ana happily paired off at last. I mean, she'd been happy before I saw her, but you know. Makes it real. That's what the wedding was for, I suppose, to make it real to society. And, as I tactlessly pointed out, to save their son from bastardry.

So I called Reg yesterday when I was feeling all shitty (ha ha ha) and he picked me up and we had the sunroof open and we were blaring GANGSTER GANGSTER by NWA as we cruised over the Ballard Bridge. Fortunately he turned it down when we hit the red light.

I still feel wary when I listen to gangster rap very loudly in a car. It reminds me of when the Duke tradition of burning benches was forbidden one year, and so they had the cops out in force, extinguishing fires and tear-gassing people. Now these benches were built independently, by each dorm contributing time, money and effort, so the only real objection was fire codes, I guess. But after the cops had dickslapped people, a bunch of kids in a third-story dorm started playing "Fuck Tha Police." At the time it was all good fun, but of course situational irony abounded.

Of course that was nothing to the irony of my older brother in high school listening to Ice-T and Sir MixALot while owning a "David Duke for Senate" t-shirt, but he's probably a lot more interesting than anyone who ever attended Duke.

It's a good thing Placebo wasn't around when I was in high school. I had to make do with the Cure and Depeche Mode and New Order and the Pet Shop Boys. Yes, the Pet Shop Boys are a teen angst group. Shut up.

ten things I've done and you haven't:

• can spell and pronounce my hometown of Meaux
• gave away all but a carload of my belongings
• was delivered by a midwife duckierose
• said "Politics is the opiate of the masses"
• told off my ex a year after high school graduation, at the next Graduation
• got pissed off about my younger brother not being a girl
• drove to Atlanta to see U2, Better than Ezra, Pet Shop Boys
• ate dulce de leche ice cream during a winter rain in Buenos Aires
• went to almost every free film in school without actually being in the film society
• threw coins at a shrine during NYE in Tokyo and got pushed along the wave of people massed
• rode a bus from Split, Croatia to Munich, Germany with a little girl puking behind me the whole way and almost managed to get sick myself

(taken from nihilistic_kid)

Go to images.google.com for this one. Type in your answers to the questions below, then post the first image result (or first postable one if the first pic is down or something).
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thx to verybadlady

1. How would you briefly describe your home living environment growing up? IE, what your parents did, what social class you lived in, etc.

For most of my childhood my dad was an offshore welder and chronically unemployed. My mother started as a janitor, moved to being a college student, and finally got her masters and became a speech pathologist. Just after she started making actual dough, my dad broke a bunch of ribs and hasn't really been able to weld since... We were pretty fucking poor throughout my childhood, got all our clothes through charity and Wal-Mart, ten dollars a month allowance, free school lunches.

2. At what age did reading become such a passion for you and why? (for me it was lack of kids around to play with...or I guess lack of kids that wanted to play with me)

It was partly that, but I started reading when I was 3 or so, and I dove straight in. I have an infamous picture at home of me after literally divesting a bookshelf of all its books. I'm curled up in a pile, asleep. I have no memory of this :). Books were just so much more interesting than reality. I read a lot of comics, too, till 1988 when my dad stopped collecting.

3. Do felons need love too?! :)
Maybe...
Just maybe...
Naughty boys need love too.

4. If you had to open a company, what business would you do?

Either a bookstore or a movie theater. Something with a cafe selling fresh-baked goods, at least.

5. List your top five all-time favorite tv shows.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Angel
Seinfeld
Friends
The Wonder Years



THE RULES:
1 - Leave a comment, saying you want to be interviewed.
2 - I will respond; I'll ask you five questions.
3 - You'll update your journal with my five questions, and your five answers.
4 - You'll include this explanation.
5 - You'll ask other people five questions when they want to be interviewed.

edit: woah, that's too many already. stop !