There is a clicking noise coming from the box above my head
2006-09-30, 3:15 a.m.
My roommate Caitlin just made microwave fettucini alfredo. I know that sounds like something that shouldn't ever exist according to the laws of Proper Italian Cuisine, but holy crap does that stuff smell good. It's one of those foods whose smell exactly matches the taste, like peanut butter, or McDonald's french fries. I'm dying. I need to find something comparable to microwave alfredo, like, NOW. She's eating so damn slowly, like, a piece of a noodle at a time, just to TAUNT me. It's 2:32 AM. I shouldn't be hungry anyway. But I want some of that stuff so badly that my legs are shaking and I'm getting sort of dizzy. Oh Jesus now she set it down to go to the bathroom. WHAT DOES ONE DO? Would she ever know... if I just reached over... and plucked one...tender... noodle...coated with...buttery...garlicky ...fragrant....sauce...........
NO BAD NO
Okay. Entry.
Entry. Entry.
Oh, fuck it, I'm heating up some Easy Mac.
Ugh. This is the version that comes pre-packaged in a little cup so that lazy-ass college kids can just add bottled water up to the fill line and have a piping hot serving of Empty Calories with as little effort as possible. It's a really poor substitute for mac from the box, or (do I dare make the comparison?) homemade mac. This stuff smells nothing like its taste. In fact, it has basically no smell at all. It smells of hot air. It really doesn't have much of a taste either, now that I think about it. I'm pretty much just chewing... matter. Squishy, salty matter.
Well, that was a short-lived high.
You know what's ironic about my agony? That microwave alfredo was MINE until I decided to trade Caitlin for a bowl of "Asian Roasted Peanut Noodles." Ugh.... it sounded promising at the time. Her mom bought it for her and she doesn't like it when peanuts are involved in anything so I, obviously trying to assert my open-mindedness to Exotic Food Genres, told her I'd take it and "she could have anything in my food drawer." O, I am fortune's fool!!!!!!
Aggggh I need to not fixate on this. What can I talk about, what can I talk about?
I called my mom to talk about the potential Philippines trip. Then I called my dad to talk about the potential Philippines trip. Let's see, did they a) like the idea, b) change their mind about not liking the idea, c) express the possibility of ever liking the idea, or d) none of the above?
Yeah. No. D. D is the answer. D for...Don't get your hopes up.
I'm going to give myself a whole weekend to just push it out of my mind and revisit the idea on Monday. I'm starting to understand their concerns. I'm always going to want to go, and the timing will never be better than now. But I'm apparently fixated in toddlerhood and I seek their approval for everything I do, so that presents a problem. Ah! But! Like I said... no thinking about it again until Monday. (Yeah right.)
:: 15 MINUTES ELAPSE ::
WOW. CRISIS. AVERTED.
Katie and Andrea (they live across the hall and the four of us tend to stick together) just left. Just as I ended the parenthesis in my last paragraph they BURST into the room together urgently.
"Guess what I just did." ((this is not a question and was not followed by a pause to invite any kind of response)) "I freaking cut my finger open on my medicine cabinet we have to call 911 I think I saw the bone." - Katie.
Fortunately we did not have to call 911. The cut was deep, but sort of slant-ways and very short, and Katie put pressure on it, which stanched the bleeding. Caitlin, Andrea and I read from a pamphlet in Cait's first-aid kit. We then performed a highly disorganized wound cleaning (soap and water followed by rubbing alcohol. Katie: "Oh this doesn't really hurt that much I think I'm running on adrena HOLY MOTHER OF GOD AIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII) and stitched up the wound using a sewing needle and thread.
Just kidding. We just used a band-aid.
Wow, that was insane. I can't believe how fast we like, sprung into action. I guess it was the urgency of the situation, but I think our efficiency and our intuitiveness about it made me realize something I've been trying to get a handle on since I got here:
The four of us are just getting to know each other really well, but since we're each other's neighbors and closest friends, we've become something more: we're kind of a pre-adulthood family unit. We don't just hang out and have fun together--it's become more than that, really fast. We've taken each other's problems in as our own. When something is going wrong with one person's life, everyone else treats it as if it were her failure as well.
That was a really poor explanation. I wish I had the energy to elaborate, but I'm getting really sleepy. The impromptu EMT training drained me. But I will say this: I always refer to my three friends here in archetypes--Cait's my conscience, Katie's the bad influence, and Andrea's the voice of reason. But now I'm seeing them as something more. In this time and place, at least, these girls are my family. It's nice to know I have a family here.
Tomorrow we're going to the mall to blow off steam and lust over things we can't afford and don't need. Hopefully I'll come away with an interesting story or two and I won't have to resort to stream-of-consciousness drivel about boxed pasta snacks.
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