just saw a couple of tasty-looking recipes.

Okay, so this first one isn't vegan, I know, but it looks absolutely delicious to me. It may be the juxtaposition of the green with the white and yellow, I don't really know. But possibly replace the egg with a really nice campari tomato and a nice bit of macadamia cheese, salt, pepper, and voila! Vegan.

The second recipe  is vegan, and raw, too. I've been interested in this whole "raw revolution" deal that seems to be popping up at random times (well, I guess if you research the things that I research, anyway) and intriguing me every time. I always think to myself, "I could try that! It would be so easy!" but then I remember that my fridge is only...so...big, and by that I mean, it's not big at all. Perhaps, when I have an apartment or something (and a much bigger fridge), next semester I will be able to make the "raw revolution" happen to my diet, because I feel incredible when I eat as raw as possible.


Okay, so that is the end of my foodie talk for now. I found out yesterday that I made an A- on my Russian 442 paper (would have been higher if it had been longer) and a B+ on my midterm (missed one identification question), which translates to me, I AIN'T DOIN' THAT BADLY AFTER ALL! I have been incredibly worried all semester about that class, admittedly being unable to finish a single one of the reading assignments in their entirety. After all, they were all hefty, at least 150 pages per 2 nights, and sometimes more over the weekends, and I have been ever-blessed with a slow-but-meticulous ability to read quickly...or interestedly.

And it was never that I found an assignment to be uninteresting! Absolutely not. I find Russian literature to be enrapturing, intriguing, and revealing, to a tee, the most delicate and dark issues of humanity...

I'm just a slow reader. A distracted reader. A reader that falls asleep while reading. It's a horrible thing to happen to a college student.

But, ah. There wasn't a single correction mark on my paper. I was so anxious; I simply turned the paper over when he handed it to me--I wasn't even sure that he knew who I was because I am quiet in class (another thing I need to work on). I was planning on simply looking at it later on, under the privacy of some shady tree or lofted bed, but then I saw the mirror image of an "A-" from the back of the stapled pages, and had to look to make sure that I wasn't hallucinating.

The A- gave me the courage to look at my blue book, also known as my midterm...the midterm that was based on all of the readings that we had done up until that point...so, about 4 books and 4-6 short stories or so (and by short story, I mean 30-70 page reading assignment). I figured that I was going to be B.S.'ing the crap out of myself (no nasty potty-pun intended, here) for that test before I took it, for obvious reasons. Ah, it worked out well. Well enough for the last half of the semester anyway.

I have vowed to take responsibility for my free time and actually do my reading assignments to the best of my abilities for the remainder of this semester...yes, that's what the suckage of Spring Break did to me...motivated me for some reason.

Anyhow, Physical Fitness Assessment (PFA) in the morning (0545) for AFROTC...and a hell of a lot of Spanish catching-up to do before I can feel fully satisfied with my life.

Hah. Just kidding. It's probably never going to happen with this young chile.

3-14-2010, moleskine

Ink in the well.

Rocks in the well.

Water in the well.

Baby in the well.

3-15-2010, moleskine

...It made me wonder how I got there,

who dealt me those cards--

It wasn't even about me

or because of me.

I was simply there, I had fallen,

for myself, into that well,

and it had nothing to do with those cards.

moleskine entry X

"I am in a state of disbelief: I want the world in the context of reality...but where has it gone? There is no way to know what is going on, what is behind the surface, what is real or false or superficial. But, at intermission of my downtrodden state, I surface. I don't think about any failures I have endured, I just move forward like an apathetic green soldier headed to the battlefield for the hundredth time. To survive; it is the only way. To rely on some blind faith, some supposed guardian angel. Or to simply march. No reliance. No cure. No anticipation. Remote. Rote. Just forward. Just action. Just success and needless credit."

I remember writing this, I believe it was in or after my biology lab some time in October, and I was in such a frenzy to just write something on the page. I had a bunch of words inspired by my frustrations with being behind with every thing expected of me--normal for a first semester college freshman, they say--and then catching up and failing. I had to find a way to boost my morale and find a motivation to continue to try at this lifestyle. And, like my writing process, I had to just start somewhere and keep going. The Try comes along the way, kind of like riding a bike for the first time: you have to push off and then find your balance to pedal.

I still haven't found that perfect balance yet. In fact, I'm no where near a "good" balance. But, I'm going. I'm staying on the seat of the wheels, and from that point, I go.