Sunday, October 31, 2010

Lord of the Rings Solution

Sometimes I wish I was in Lord of the Rings. Because if those guys have a problem they find a SOLUTION!

And it's usually a solution involving attractive men in plate armor and riding horses... sometimes involving lofty elves and stocky dwarves.

If Aragorn was with me right now... I probably wouldn't be writing this post... but if he were with me and I wasn't attracted to him I would have him solve all my problems.

Him: "You are having a problem with another young lady in your class?"

Me: "Yes I am. She called me stupid. And she's not a lady! She's a fat and ugly witch!"

Him: "Well I shall avenge your intelligence!"

And then he'd run off and behead her in some fantastic battle with 2,000 men.

Her true form would look something like this:



I drew that really quick, it's pretty good for a caricature. :)

For me, my problem is indecision. So if Legolas, Gimli and Aragorn wanted to come and tackle that problem for me... that would be wonderful.

When I start to think too hard about going to medical school, I start to wonder if there is anything else I can do.

I wanted to be writer, I wanted to be a filmmaker, I wanted to be a lawyer, I wanted to be a journalist, I wanted to do... anything you can think of! I'm pretty sure I've wanted to be in the Lord of the Rings movies (which are already made, but I can dream).

But for some reason I've settled on doctor.

I know a lot of my posts are about this, but Halloween seems an appropriate time to talk about this kind of thing.

Since it's the day where you pretend to be something you're not.

I feel like going to medical school will be like the battle of Helm's Deep. Work and reading will be on one side of the wall, the men of Rohan, and I will be like the Uruk-Hai, attempting to scramble over the giant wall so that I can finish off all the work I have to do.


And sadly if we're looking at it that way... Aragorn and Gimli and Legolas will not be on my side, they will be effectively fighting against me... which at this rate my metaphor is failing because now I'm losing. So I'm going to go and try and figure out a new way to explain this.

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Friday, October 29, 2010

Lies

I told a LOT of lies when I was a kid.

And I can actually remember a lot of them. And some of them have the best stories behind them.

I think my favorite is this:

My dad told me when I was about 11 that we were Irish. Now I didn't know what this meant at the time. I mean I did... but for some reason I saw it as something special. Like not many people were Irish. (Pretty sure almost everyone has Irish in them, the Irish are like rabbits.) So when I entered a new school I decided then was a good time to try on my Irish heritage for size.

I was sitting in the locker rooms one day during 6th grade and I was talking to a couple of other girls... and we started talking about... something I can't remember what. Girls talk about all kinds of things in locker rooms... anyways I mentioned that I was Irish.

To which one of the girls asked, "What does that mean?"

"Well it means that I am descended from the Kelly Clan." I responded with perfect ease. I had researched the Irish pretty heavily after my dad told me about it... and by research I mean googled it.

Of course all the girls wanted to know what that meant, so I obliged.

"You see the O'Kelly clan ruled over Ireland for a long time, so I'm descended from a number of Irish royal families."

All of them were impressed with that. And asked what that meant.

"I'm a princess, my real name is Julia Morgan something something Bor'de'can Kelly [Insert Real Last Name*]." And thus began the rumor that I was an Irish princess.

I love to make stuff up.

The second of my favorite lies would have to be one my father caught me in.

Sometimes I think I'm smarter than I am. Or maybe that I'm more cunning than I am... or something, I haven't decided which of these is correct yet.

But this is one of those times.

In Kansas City it likes to snow. We'll go for months without snow or just a little spittle and then all of a sudden the gates of heaven open up and half a foot will drop. This time we had just returned from Mexico and I had started middle school again.

My best friend Victoria lived down the street from the school and I didn't know if I should go home with her since our vice-principal had said that we can't go home with other people without a note. (This was in the time before idiot children had cellphones. Or should I say "the time when idiot paranoid parents gave their idiot children cellphones".)

So stupid me asked if I could call my dad to pick him up because a bus didn't deliver children to my home.

My teacher thought I was stupid and continued to argue with me about whether or not a bus could deliver me home.

Of course what I mentioned was that we had moved outside of the district line, meaning that I would have had to go to a different school and my dad didn't want me to go through the hassle of switching schools yet again. (We had just moved back from Mexico in the middle of the school year.) So he was driving me every day to school and picking me up because a bus couldn't take me (of course I didn't start riding the bus until my Freshman year in highschool... and that only lasted a year).

That's when the poop hit the fan.

I hurriedly attempted to lie to cover up what I had said. I backpedaled, trying to explain what I had just said.

"I-I-uhm I mean... I need to call my dad because he's outside of the line." I tried to cover up... of course all I did was make more trouble for myself.

So I lied that my dad had kicked me out and that I was living with my best friend so I had to go home with her.

Now if you know my dad, you know that he would rather dissect himself than kick me out of the house. But this lady didn't know that.

And yet again I had to backpedal.

Eventually father was called, we got in trouble, and I'm pretty convinced my dad most likely locked me in my room for a week after what happened.

My third favorite lie, is not as elaborate. But it is elaborately convoluted.

Laptops were the coolest things in the world when they came out. And there was this girl, who we shall call... Megan... for now. And she and I had a bit of a rivalry. My dad was wealthy, her dad was wealthy we just couldn't help but compete.

She said she had two computers. One desktop in the sitting room and one laptop in her dad's office.

So I mentioned that I had five or six, and all of them were hidden around the house. There was one in my dad's study, one in my room, one under my dad's pillow, one under my bed, and one downstairs or something like that. In reality my dad and I each had a laptop. Mine was a dirty great blue Toshiba, which was the best at the time.

...let's just say that this came back to haunt me later in life... since girls are catty and they never forget anything. I was always trying to cover up for my not having a mom to take me shopping.

I mean certainly my dad took me to get clothes... but he's my dad. He has the same attention span for shopping that a goldfish has for... well... anything.

I would claim things I never could. In fact most people didn't know I didn't have a mother because I covered so well, I came up with stories about her and what she and I had done...

When in reality the only thing she had done with me is birth me.

Sometimes I think I fell into the same trap a lot of kids do. I thought that lying would get me attention. I thought that negative attention was the same as positive attention.

Which it's not...

EDITED (10/31): I realized this morning that I had cursed in this post! So I took it out! There should be no cursing in my posts!

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TXTing

I used to text message quite a bit. In high school I once sent over 15,000 text messages in a billing period. Who do I have to say that much to?

Anyways. First you should know that I grew up in the age of the internet. I am the first of the "digital natives". Which apparently means that I am the first who has been in school where the internet has been a main source of information.

Though, if I remember correctly, my father and I had dial-up until I was... oh... 8? So until 1999? Which is probably when broadband came out anyways.

Anyways so I am a part of the generation that created "chat speak". Though the younger groups seem to think they invented it... which is false, since anything they think they've created, we used before.

Chat speak used to be cool.

When you were chatting... on the internet... on (I can't believe this) AIM. (Which was the big thing in middle school.)

Now for some reason people seem to think it's okay to use in their daily lives.

If I get a message from you that reads like this:

lyk i need u 4 1 minute. c u dere?

I will ignore it.

Despite the fact that I can read it, I shouldn't have to. If you were "LYK" dying then maybe.

Chat speak is one thing, but it's not English, and incorporating it into English is practically a sin.

Speak English!

Don't say "LOL!" instead of laughing!

WHO DOES THAT??

If I was talking to someone and they said "LOL" instead of laughing I would probably be so angry I would punch them in the face... or maybe go all Christian Bale on them.

So the moral of this story is:

If you're TXTing, it's fine, but if you ever speak to me in chat speak again, I will hit you... and it will not be a nice, soft warning hit. It will be a full on "break your nose" hit.

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Thursday, October 28, 2010

Considerations

When you are thinking about doing something like changing colleges it always comes down to what it is you want to do.

Me?

I want to be a doctor.

I don't know what kind of doctor yet.

But a doctor.

Why do I want to be a doctor?

Well that's an interesting one. You see... I don't have a straight answer.

Perhaps it's the think I feel most comfortable with. I'm a tender heart. Which can be bad for someone who wants to be a doctor. I like to take care of people. Taking care of people makes me feel needed and it boosts my self esteem.

And being a doctor means you have the respect of anyone who meets you. They know how hard you worked to get there. Or how hard you should have worked anyways.

I want to be a doctor because it will make the people I love the most proud.

But most of all I want to be a doctor to show everyone that I can be anything I want to be. I was always browbeaten in high school, even my History teacher told me that I wouldn't be a very good doctor.

That makes you feel good? Doesn't it?

You high school teacher telling you that you can't do something.

It's sad really. Someone that you look up to telling you that you can't do something.

Anyways I'm going to prove him wrong. And everyone else wrong that said I couldn't do something.

Of course the most important reason is this: I want to. I want to be a doctor more than anything else in the world.

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Monday, October 25, 2010

Dear Neighbor Above Me

Dear Neighbor above me,

I have already had this problem with neighbor to the left of me and you and I are about to have a whole different problem all together.

I don't know what kind of pet you have in your room. However I suspect it is a baby elephant.

Either that or you really should stop drinking.

Because you are either throwing things against the floor or falling over said items and it is your body that is making the sounds from above me.

Now I will come up there and tranquilize your baby elephant if you'd like. Or perhaps I can tranquilize you. Or maybe I should just show you a proper weight loss system so that your gargantuan size can no longer shock me out of my doze when it hits the floor.

How is it, as well, that you know I am falling asleep when you throw yourself on the floor in another one of your infamous trantrums?

Are you watching me?

Are there cameras in my room, upstairs neighbor?

Do you wait until I look like I'm about to fall asleep, then suddenly throw your television on the floor?

If this continues I will have to take extreme measures, like one day you may return to feed you baby elephant and you will find it has been sold to the circus.

Or maybe I'll just take everything out of your room, thus solving the problem of you throwing things on the floor.

Or maybe you'll walk in your door one day after fumbling with your keys for a while and you'll find me in a state of sleep deprivation and mild insanity as I slap the shining ivory tusk of your baby elephant in my hand, preparing to beat you with it until you understand that YOU SHOULDN'T STOMP WHEN YOU LIVE ABOVE SOMEONE!

Hopefully one of the following actions will teach you not to make so much noise:

1. I will bang incessantly on the ceiling with my Swiffer handle until you cease your sounds.

2. I will bang on your door at odd hours of the night.

3. I will begin to scream out my window when I know your window is open, so that you know how upsetting your baby elephant is.

Thank you,

Morgan

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It's not often

It's not often that I think about things like this... but today my cat curled up under my arm as I sit at the computer. Sit at.

Really I'm not sitting at my computer, I'm stretched out on my futon with my cat tucked under my arm and my computer in my lap.

Anyways, I started to think about this:

She was 12 weeks old when I got her. Her life had just begun and I took her and she became mine.

Of course now she's a giant 17 lb cat, but she's mine.

She likes to snuggle, but only with me. She likes to play but she really only plays with me.

She misses me when I'm gone.

Most people don't think cats really care.

But for some reason mine does. When I leave to go to Mexico for a week or so Amber misses me like no other.

When I come back I can't get rid of her. I can't even go to the bathroom by myself because that is seen as abandonment by her constant-state-of-kitten mind.

I feel so terrible leaving her, but sometimes I just need to see my dad.

I wonder sometimes if this is what having a child would be like. Minus the cute fuzzyness and warmth.

If a baby came with fur and pre-fed then maybe I'd consider having one. Unfortunately for babies I think they're all together disgusting, plus I don't trust baby humans that can't speak English. I don't speak CRYING BABY, and honestly I don't want to.

Motherhood is overrated anyways.

If you have a baby there's a chance that the man will leave, and who the heck wants to take that chance?

Certainly not me.

So I'll just stick to my pets.

At least they're grateful for the affection I give them.

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Sunday, October 24, 2010

Pushing Buttons

It seems to me that I've been avoiding posting anything for a few days. I haven't really had anything funny or upsetting to talk about. Though I prefer funny to be honest. And yesterday... well yesterday I was working all day.

Which must seem strange to all of you who know me. ME? I have a job?

Funny joke.

I ran an elevator for 6 hours yesterday.

Yep.

I spent 6 HOURS in an elevator.

Haha. I bet you're laughing because you think I'm kidding. That's cute.

Basically I got paid over minimum wage to stand in an elevator and shuttle people from one floor to the next. I expected to get paid to watch the MU homecoming game... instead I watched the people watching the game...

The drunks, the Governor of Missouri, congressmen, businessmen, police officers, children whose parents have too much money... and basically all the "elites" of our country... and apparently one of the stars of Mad Men was there... but I didn't get him in my elevator, and if I did I don't know what he looks like so I wouldn't know anyways.

I was verbally harassed, backed into a corner, ignored and chided. People made fun of me, and teased me: asking what I had to do to get the job, what kind of training I needed, told me I was doing a good job...

All in all it was a patronizing experience.

All I could think was: "I AM A PRE-MEDICAL STUDENT!!!!!"

And suddenly I realized how many people I did the same thing to.

I didn't even think about it. It's not so much that I choose to be rude, when you make a joke, sometimes it's to lighten the mood, sometimes you're trying to keep things from getting awkward between you... but sometimes what you think is funny isn't funny at all.

In the first 3 seconds of meeting someone... you make a judgment of them.

You immediately decide whether this person is worth your time or not.

And someone pushing the buttons in an elevator for 6 hours obviously didn't seem like someone these people could talk to.

I had people talk down to me like I was some kind of retard.

Even when the governor of our fair state stepped onto my elevator he didn't even acknowledge THE VOTING AGE YOUNG WOMAN STANDING IN THE CORNER!

At least his bodyguards smiled at me.

I guess we know who isn't getting my vote this year.

I must just look like a Republican.

I mean did anyone ever think that maybe the reason I was standing in the elevator was because I didn't have to do anything but stand in one place and push buttons?

I really didn't. Standing there and pushing buttons, despite my aching feet at the end of the night, was the most fun I've had on a job for a while.

Anyways, the idea behind this rant is this:

The next time you see someone in a menial service position. Think about this: maybe they're there because they want to make money. Maybe they're not there because they're not good enough for anything else but because they just needed to do something with themselves.

And remember this: You are never too good to say hello or thank you to someone.

Especially if you are an incumbent Democrat this year.

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