Sniffling

Every time I go out my front door in the morning, I regret it. The world seems to get a little more disgusting every day. Not in the way you might think, like seeing prostitutes or homeless people fight over a slab of meat or riding the murder mystery car (I think they are commonly referred to as "public buses."). No, I am talking about the change in seasons.

Don't get me wrong: I love Fall. It is probably my favorite season, what with all the crunchy leaves and grey skies. It just makes me want to drink a latte and read a book or hold a warm, fuzzy animal. Every year I look forward to the days when it rains and the dirt makes the special good smell, which I refer to as "rain yums."

However, the Fall and Winter season also bring with them the most disgusting thing in th world--colds. Yes, colds. The cold itself isn't disgusting, it's the side-effects. I don't mean the excessive snot, big red nose, runny eyes, or general cold induced stupidity (it's a real thing). No, I mean people who, rather than be an adult and blow their nose, sit there a sniffle like crazy.

Allow me to elaborate. Baseball Joe, who sits next to me in my calculus class,like to go for long early morning runs. As a result, he is always very sweaty and generally gross. In the Fall season this is extra true because not only is he dripping with his on sweat, but he is also covered in a layer of fog. This fog also infiltrates his nasal airway, stimulating the excess production of mucus to keep the water balance right in there or something. He is also being exposed to colder morning temperatures, which makes him more likely to catch a cold (which he now has)

As Baseball Joe sits next to me, I am very aware of his affliction. How so? Well, he leans his head down on his left arm and inserts a Vick's vapor inhaler into his nose and really lets lose on it. It's utterly shocking how much he can inhale for being so congested. While I am in awe of his lung capacity, he then proceeds to "clear" his throat by loudly hacking and gargling the mucus which is now stuck to his tonsils. This goes on for about 40 seconds. Sometimes it goes on while I am eating a banana. When it is that latter, time seems to slow down and the sound of his actions are magnified by about a million. I feel as though I need to pierce my ear drums with knitting needles to keep from vomiting. I have to stop eating my banana, which without fail turn a hideous brown color before I can safely resume eating it. When the ordeal is over, he looks at the people around him and snuffles out "Sowwie. I had uh culd."

Really, I couldn't tell. You do such a good job of hiding it, what with the nostril shaped Vick's inhaler you take hits off of every five minutes.

Battle of the Calculus Seating Chart

Every day while most of you are tucked up all cozy in your beds, I am dragging myself out of mine (at 6) so I can get to class on time (9:30). No, I don't take an obscenely long time doing my hair in the morning; I have a 45+ minute commute to Ukiah everyday. I actually leave the house at 7:45, go pick up my boyfriend, and then finally leave at 8:30. It's arduous, especially when I know on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays I am going to have to endure a form of psychological torture.

I always thought that in college I would be able to waltz in and out of class at my leisure and sit wherever I wanted (mostly in corners or the back). This is true of all my classes...except one. My calculus has an implied seating chart that most decent people respect; it formed the first day of class and everyone has been obeying it. The first day is the only day I have ever cared to be on time for because I have the pick of the "blenders" (seats at the back of the class that allow you to just kind of blend in with the wallpaper so the teacher never bothers you). Unfortunately for me, someone decided that jocks need to be educated.

No offense meant to people who go to school and play a sport; that's all fine and dandy. But, let's face it, there are people who play a sport and go to school. These people have infiltrated my classes; they slow the rest of us down because they miss about 75% of the classes because they are off "being athletic" (sleeping in). Normally, I wouldn't care; I'd just put my head down and do my homework in class. As I mentioned before, my choice of blender has been infiltrated. On my right sits my friend the wall; he is comfy to lean my head against and he supports our pal the air conditioning/heater. To my left sits a guy I call "Baseball Joe" because in the time since we have been in the same math class (a year and a half) I have yet to learn his name. He looks like Viktor Krum minus the attractiveness; I guess you could call him potato shaped. He has a tattoo of the American Major League Baseball logo on his arm.

Every time I see it, I want to ask him how drunk he was or how much he got paid to get it on such a visible body part. All these things are unoffensive, if not entertaining but Baseball Joe has one repulsive habit: he chews tobacco.

In my ear

All class long.

Every day.

He smells like a third world country; he runs before he comes to class, so he is caked in smog and sweat. As if these aromas weren't appealing enough, he decides to throw chewing tobacco on top. Okay, okay--I know; these are bearable offenses for le blender extraordinaire. But one thing is not endurable. He spits his tobacco liquid into a tin can that makes this little "ping" sound every time he spits in it. So, all I hear for two hours is: "So, if the limit doesn't approach" "ping" "thing then it doesn't" "ping" "ist. You see, techincal" "ping" "speaking, if some" "ping" "approaches infinity it doesn't have a li" "ping."

The kid next to him wears hearing aides. Every day before class starts, he turns off the one in his right ear and cranks up the left one. How I envy the hearing impaired sometimes. While I am listening to baseball-zilla chomp his way to mouth cancer, he can learn calculus.

Monday, we had a test; Monday, my boyfriend decided to take an extra long shower and made us late. Monday, war was declared.

As I ran in just in time and headed for my normal seat, a tiny girl ninja-ed her way in front of me and sat in my seat. Well, haha--joke's on you. Enjoy not being able to focus on anything for the next hour and a half as you are serenaded to "Tobacco swill in F." But, sadly, there was a rather attractive looking Indian girl in Baseball Joe's usual spot. As further proof God hates me, the only spot left was in front of my professor, next to Baseball Joe. Feeling slightly homicidal, I approaced the seat-stealer after class and kindly asked her to "please let me have my seat next time. I have such a hard time seeing the close to the board." (Lie). To which she responded "Not my problem, Baby." She called me Baby. Seriously. I have resolved to make her life horrible in that class. I haven't decided how yet, but I feel like Baseball Joe may be my ace in the hole. Stay tuned for the resultant warfare. This seat is too good to let go of so easily.

When Good Food Rebels

Today I, like an optimistic fool, made a lunch for my boyfriend and I at 6:45 AM. Lots of things go on before 7 AM...many of them I have no control over (rain, genocide, burglaries--that sort of thing) but I have concluded that one of those things should not be the preparation of anything edible besides cereal or raw fruit. "Why?" you may ask. Well, this is why.

This morning, I stumbled into my kitchen at 6:30 like I always do--slowly and with much resignation. The meal of champions was anything that required minimal thought and cooking skills--toast. Insert bread, wait, flip bread over, wait, search for butter. The toast was so unremarkable in every way that I decided I should make myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with it for my lunch. I then went about my merry way with my morning ablutions, stopping occasionally to scare my cat away from the ham sandwich I made for my beloved.

Lunch rolls around. It is a bleak day--sky a skatter'd with clouds, trees creaking ominously in the wind. Not a good reception to your pb and j. After eating my food, I laid down in my car for a pre-physics nap. While I was just drifting off to dreamyland, my stomach made a sound that can only be described as sinister and I experienced a pain which can only be described as stabbing in my abdomen. "Fantastic," I thought as I felt the contents of my stomach curdle. "Nothing to look forward to except and hour a half of excruciating pain and physics."

I was correct on all accounts. Thankfully, when my teacher started going about sine and cosine, my stomach started to feel better. Thinking I was over the worst of it, I went to the library and read "Sideways" while I waited for my boyfriend to get out of his class (about 2 hours). "Sideways" has a lot of long, descriptive narratives about wine--focusing specifically on the smells. Fifty pages of "under-ripe pear", "blackberry", and "pungent gourmet cheese" later, I found my head sweating, my stomach rolling and and my legs shaking. I became paralyzed with fear when I realized I had to do the unthinkable: vomit in a public restroom trash can.

I don't know if you've ever been in this situation before, put public restroom trash cans don't smell very good. Probably the only thing that smells worse is the public restroom toilets. You get the distinct impression you weren't the fist person who regurgitated into the industrial tin spray painted receptical. Also, it is a very public place, which invites very loud public comments about your decency. Well, fuck you--I am vomiting.

After regaining control of my body and concluding that I couldn't fashion a clever disguise out of the contents of my purse, I went back to the library and took a nap on top of "Sideways."I awoke feeling renewed and pleasantly nausea free. I concluded I had been food poisoned by the strange jelly I put on my sandwich this morning. I should know better than to trust pink goo in a jar anyways.

When I got home today, I decided that toast would be a good choice on a still shakey digestive system. When I opened the cupboard, the wheat bread was missing. So, naturally, I yelled "What you guys throw away good bread for?" To which I got this response: "That bread wasn't any good. It has mold all over it." Horrified, I opened the trash can to see several slices of bread growing green mold on the bottom crust. I had ate four slices of fuzzy, moldy bread.

I have been betrayed by one of my favorite foods. I thought we had each other's backs, whole wheat. Why have you forsaken me? WHY?

I may never be the same again.