An Amazon Box Fort & The Echoes of Lana Del Rey

It’s Sunday evening, and I’m probably going to explode if I look at another concept for my Ethics final tomorrow. Which means I’ll probably be exploding tomorrow morning.

This blog will semi short (sry) seeing as all I’ve done is school-school-school no matter what for the last 7 days, and as worn out as I am, I can see that shining light at the end of the tunnel that is Vegas on Wednesday. Though, it looks like I may have to be doing one last little school-related thing in Mandalay Bay that first day. Because, as I have learned, grad school will follow you. No matter what. Anywhere you go. It’s always right there.

So, I have had a lot of things delivered to the apartment recently, and I have a surplus of Amazon cardboard boxes that will not fit down my trash chute (I have a trash chute, you guys! Like I live in New York or something crazy like that!) and will not fit into the bins provided on the other side of my giant parking lot, so until I sum up the courage to just leave them next to these bins without feeling guilty, I decided to put them to good use. I realize that was a terrible run-on sentence but I’m going to leave it there. Through minimum effort–not because I don’t have a good ~*~imagination~*~ but because I’m exhausted from sitting and typing and lifting books up and putting them back down again–I constructed a little fort next to my dinner table for no good reason. I don’t totally fit in it–something I never considered would be a problem in my fort-building prime thirteen years ago–and it’s not comfortable. I could put some pillows in it, but then I really wouldn’t be able to fit in it. I tried to eat dinner in it on Saturday and failed miserably. I ended up just lying down in defeat and staring at my cardboard ceiling for twenty minutes, while listening to the sound of my upstairs neighbor jumping rope (I’m pretty sure that’s what they’re doing… It’s been going on a lot).

Speaking of neighbors doing weird things… that has been happening. My next door neighbor, for instance, has a very steady stream of random people in his apartment all the time. I hear numerous voices leaving and coming into his apartment every single day. Girls, guys, whatever. I met his cousin in the hallway once and he said he was staying with him. That was weeks ago. He has the same apartment layout as I do, so I know for a fact that the quarters must be tight as hell over there. I think he’s recruiting people. Maybe for the CIA, maybe to star in a new Barnum and Bailey-type circus. No proof of anything yet. But other than that, the random people in my whole apartment complex as weird as hell. I haven’t spent the weekend here in a very long time, so getting to witness these fools on a Friday and Saturday night was a treat. First, on Friday, I was sitting in my living room, and all of a sudden, eerily clear as the light of day, I heard Lana Del Rey’s version of “Once Upon A Dream” from the movie Maleficent wafting through the air. I walked out onto my balcony, and it was like the person had set large speakers up on their own balcony and was blasting the song through the complex. If you haven’t heard it, it’s kind of a creepy song already. I couldn’t discern which unit it was coming from, and that made it all the more creepy. What kind of person…? Like… and WHY? And it was just that song. And then it stopped, and all was quiet. My first thought was “someone just murdered someone.” Then this morning (Sunday), someone ELSE–I could tell, direction-wise–decided they were going to blast the song “The Hills” by The Weekend on REPEAT for FORTY-FIVE MINUTES out of their window or on their balcony. It was Sunday morning at like 11am. I was studying. All I could hear was a muffled “I ONLY CALL YOU WHEN IT’S HALF. PASSED. FIVE.” for forty-five whole minutes. I repeat. WHY? I could only imagine they were trying to shoot a imitation music video on the balcony?? With all the Swedish models that live in my complex??? And they had to do like fifteen takes???? Because the Pomeranian they were using refused to keep his tiny sunglasses on?????

Long story short, I built a fort and hid from everyone around me. So like not so different from when I was in my fort-building prime. Oh, everyone turns up very loudly on the weekends here. They pound on the walls and stomp on the floor to the beat of the song they’re listening to. And everyone wonders why I spend most weekends in Orange County.

More regular posting will resume next week when I’m home in the Bay!

As Ellen DeGeneres once said, “It’s Friday the 13th! I’m not superstitious but this morning my waffle maker wasn’t working. Coincidence? Maybe. Lemme try to wake her again.”

-Megan

Whistle While You Werq It

Even though my hectic life is currently falling apart at the seams of my Erin Condren planner, I know I have to post something today. I wish I had time to accurately recap the happenings of the last week, but due to my inability to remember about these blog posts until the day I’ve set to post one, I have zero time, so this will be a short one.

This is my last week until my finals, so you can imagine that my usual “heavy” workload is now “The Giant Boulder At The End Of The ‘Indiana Jones And The Temple Of The Forbidden Eye’ Ride In Disneyland If It Were An Actual Boulder And Not Just A Giant Balloon Made To Look Like A Boulder.” So last week was my feeble attempt to get ahead of the curve- I knew I’d be working with my grad-school groups before staying in Orange for a bit, then jetting home for Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday was filled with family and then more grad school work. Sunday was Camille’s fantastic birthday party at a winery (charcuterie board, wine, and chocolate commenced. I now have a hand-decorated wine glass and a new affinity for napkins with phrases like “This drink tastes like I’ll be texting you later” so it was a big success) and then more grad school work. I got back to my apartment very late last night, and had yet more work to complete. And now, here I am, in the early morning of Monday, scheduling this post for later today, still. doing. grad. school. stuff. Maybe one day I’ll be free. Maybe one day I’ll ACTUALLY get ahead of the work instead of just saying I’m going to get ahead of the work. This coming weekend will be the first weekend I’ve spent solely in LA in a month and a half. And I’ll be preparing for my finals. While my idiot friends are at Outside Lands. Which I was supposed to go to. But then I got a little bit responsible. And now I’m staying in LA. And studying for finals. And I’m going to have to deal with the drunk texts telling me just how much fun Outside Lands is. The whole “Literally do not have any fun when I’m not there” plea never works with Chu and the gang. They just flat-out refuse to sit around in a circle and cry when I’m not able to make it to the party. So this is the kind of world I live in. Where my friends have fun without me.

And right after finals, I get to experience Vegas with my family for the first time. Not my first Vegas time, of course. Just… my first time where my family is present. Goodbye XS, hello waking up at 5am to go ATVing. Whelp, here goes nothing! Literally. I have nothing left to give this week.

As J.K. Rowling once said, “‘What are you doing in a parallel universe?’ I’m Zayn Malik.”

-Megan

Just My Luck

What a week, kids. Trying to stay on top of things always has a way of coming back and biting you, doesn’t it? I know I’ll get the hang of it, but for the time being, my organizer is my very best friend in the world.

I feel like I’m living two very different lives here. Sunday night through Wednesday, I’m a dedicated graduate student who’s life revolves around reading for class, doing assignments, and eating healthy. Thursday through mid-Sunday, I’m whatever else is required of me by my friends and family. It’s kind of funny, actually: I haven’t had a day to myself in the last two weeks, whereas a month ago, I was spending every waking moment by myself. I think I need more of a balance. This post is the first non-school related thing I’ve done by myself all week. Don’t get me wrong, I love being with my friends–it takes my mind off of the schoolwork and lets me relax. But I think I need a day with no school work and no other people to just decompress and deal with some stuff. Ah yes, the budding therapist in me is coming out and I love it.

This week, I did a lot of reading and a lot of writing and I got very invested in my professors’ lectures. I also got to give therapy for the first time in a role-play for class, and that was about the most nerve-wracking thing I’ve done in a long time, but it was awesome. What wasn’t awesome was seeing myself on the video afterward–we have to record all of the therapy sessions–but that’s another matter entirely. The session gave me a lot of confidence and a good amount of willpower to get me through my usual tendency toward self-doubt at this early stage. I feel good about it.

On Thursday, I did a brief little trip down to Orange to visit Jordan. We sat on Chapman’s campus for a while and it lifted my spirits. I realize that when fall comes around that I’ll have neither the time, nor the open invitation to grace Chapman’s grounds very often, so I’m relishing these little trips as much as possible before I have to give them up. We talked about our friend group and we walked around the circle and, for a brief moment, it was still senior year and I was still living in the Depot and I had a fiction story due to Professor Blaylock in the morning. The moment was obviously fleeting. I want to believe I’m not the only damn person in the universe who loved college this much. Everyone else seems very okay with moving on to the next stage and I don’t see why I haven’t totally accepted it yet. Other people had just as much fun as I did. I have a steady life plan and I’ve gone full-force into it. It kind of baffles me. But I digress.

On Friday, Charlotte and I left for a little weekend getaway to a place she knows in Palm Springs. The drive down there was hell in a handbasket–and I’m not just talking about the significant rise in temperature with every mile. Traffic was terrible, so we combatted it with lots and lots of music. Char is like an endless mecca of knowledge when it comes to what I like to refer to as “Vegas-type music.” I’m using that as a blanket term for a bunch of different kinds of “dance and drink” related stuff–Millennials, you know what I’m talking about. So there was a lot of Miley and Lil Jon and artists of that nature. We also got to scream at a lot of different drivers. We had fun. When we arrived, we went straight from our room to the hotel restaurant, which was fabulous. We had a very long talk about getting married and having kids–something we talked about on and off for the whole weekend–and it made me think about how much my life plan has changed in the last few years. I got to think even more thoughts after we went to the hotel bar. After a drink there, we decided to find the nearest thing we could get to a night club. We ended up at a cute little bar where we were the youngest patrons by about twenty years. The was a live singer and everything! No DJ! I didn’t know places like this existed../??!.>.??!!!??!..? It was like the 80s…??!!.?!/…! The singer/piano player was very good. He played a few “modern” songs, and it was funny and a little embarrassing when Charlotte and I were the only one’s belting out the lyrics to “Timber.” We also danced a lot. I remember being twirled around by a guy who was old enough to wear a fedora un-ironically. He was sweet. It was a different and fun night.

The next day, there was some pool-side time, some room service, and some of me watching Ally McBeal in and out of my afternoon nap. Side note, I’m watching the show to connect with my mom, who loved the show when it was airing (late 90s, early 00s) so it’s been an experience to watch Jane Krakowski be someone other than Jenna Maroney, also, watching what my mom watched after putting me to bed is weird.

That evening, we got a little dressed up and drove over to a big casino. Charlotte noted that she didn’t know why, but she loved the smell of casinos. I have to admit, I agree with her. Maybe it’s a Vegas reason or maybe that is just another trick casinos use to get you to stay forever. Either way, kudos. We made dinner reservations, and in the hour we had, we decided to mill about and play some of the slot machines. Charlotte ended up winning $12 after losing $5, so that was pretty special. I wasn’t going to gamble, as I didn’t have any cash on me, but I saw the ATM and I saw the time (45 minutes until our reservation) and I’d never really played any gambling-type games before. So I took $20 out of my account and sauntered over to the Sex and the City machine. I played for five minutes. I won $60. It was a weird moment for me: I’m highly competitive and put a lot of value into winning games that require skill and strategy. This was pure luck. Obviously, it’s not like I won a jackpot or anything, but when you’re not working, $60 is a lot. And for a brief moment (I’ve been having a lot of those…), amid my uncertainty about life and my obsession with college and my need for alone time but no time for that alone time, I got a little lucky. I won $60. I don’t know if it was a sign or just a coincidence or something else, but for a moment, my luck won out. I should also mention that Charlotte and I proceeded to have a fantastic dinner, a great night’s sleep, and an easy drive back into LA, so there’s something to be said for that as well.

I don’t know, but I think I’ll take it as a sign of good faith. Thank you, universe. You could have let me lose $20. But you didn’t. And now, as I put the finishing touches on another grad school assignment and plan my quick trip home for next weekend, I don’t feel as lost. Omg Megan you’re so existential, this post wasn’t funny at all. Ugh whatever this is my life and I’ll be existential all I want. As long as that’s what people read. ~*~*sElLiNg OuT*~*~

As Iliza Shlesinger once said, “Next time you outdo someone at work, turn to your coworker and genuinely say ‘ugh, I am so sorry, stuntin’ is a habit.'”

-Megan

Disney vs. Feet

So I couldn’t write and schedule my post yesterday because I didn’t get home from Disneyland until late and I passed out–which is weird, considering how little I tend to sleep. Needless to say: I’m exhausted, stressed, and sitting on campus to write this post.

Coming down from a Disney high is awful. I won’t compare it to drugs because I have no idea how the two compare, as I am an annual pass holder for Disneyland, but as far as drugs go, taking two aspirin is my version of “tripping.” I can’t think of a worse punishment than letting someone go to Disneyland and then making them go back to work or school. I want to be full of wonder and joy, and instead, I’m re-reading my notes from last week. Plus I’m physically tired: three straight days of Disney will do that to you. Especially if it was raining for 2/3rds of your trip. But whatever, it was Disneyland. Nothing can rain on your parade there. And I literally watched a parade from underneath an umbrella yesterday, so that wasn’t even just an idiom.

No, it wasn’t the rain that threatened my weekend… it was my feet. Since I was little, wearing flip flops for long Disney trips has been my trademark. (“Don’t your feet hurt?” “NOTHING CAN HURT ME HERE”) I have no need for padded shoes, I was young and invincible. That is, I was young and invincible until this weekend. I wore tennis shoes the first day, and my feet had the familiar low throb by the end of the day, but halfway through our second day, my feet were burning, and that feeling didn’t go away. In fact, they still hurt. It’s the worst: having to stop every few minutes to sit down whenI knew Camille was anxious to go on another ride. Every time I sat down, I gained a little bit of feeling back into my feet, but that would only last five minutes or so after I started walking again. I don’t know if it’s because I’m older and I can’t handle the walking anymore or what (aren’t I supposed to be this unstoppable force at twenty two? I thought that’s what twenty two was… besides watching friends get engaged while holding two handles of vodka in the middle of Target–see one of my previous posts). It’s silly. But hey, we got all of our favorite rides in, took some great pictures, and ate cake pops and corn dogs. It was a hell of a weekend. And after a crazy debacle with Southwest and LAX, I’m glad she’s home safe and sound. Thanks for a fantastic weekend, princess. 🙂

As Rita Rudner once said, “Some people think having large breasts makes a woman stupid. Actually, it’s quite the opposite: a woman having large breasts makes men stupid.”

-Megan

Not Quite A Quarter Life Crisis

So it’s officially a Sunday night, but I’m scheduling this post to go out on Monday, so we’re all challenging ourselves this week. Maybe thats the theme of the week. It’s my theme for sure. I already have a midterm on Wednesday. Yeah. A midterm.

Before I start, a quick recap of my week: I got to see Lauren and Stephanie for dinner and we bitched about everyone and everything. Then I saw Devon for lunch and we bitched about everyone and everything (wedding edition). I saw Charlotte for a movie and we only had time to bitch about our over-priced sushi before “Minions” made me feel like I never wanted to bitch again. And I talked to my little. And we bitched about boys. So the spark was back.

So hey, here’s something: grad school is hard. It’s different from undergrad in that there are fewer classes and you’re with the same people 24/7, plus there’s a million times more reading. But you want to read, the reading is so interesting. That’s the problem. I don’t want to skip over anything. But it’s impossible not to. Because of how much there is. I’ve never really had this problem before. Oh sure, I was interested in a lot of the things I studied in undergrad, but it was never this dense. It’s like trying to snorkel in Hawaii when the weather is bad. I’ve been watching ocean documentaries again, guys. That’s my down time.

So, naturally, quarter life crisis ensues. Honestly, I’d been doing so well the last few years: everything seemed set, I wasn’t scrambling at the last minute to have post-grad plans, all was going according to schedule. I should have learned from my past that trouble always brews right when I’m getting comfortable. In this case, I was in the longest “comfortable” streak since I was, I don’t know, five? So I wasn’t as alert. I thought I recovered pretty quickly from graduation, but it turns out, I may have sped through the grieving process a little too quickly. Ah, I fall victim to my own hubris once again! But if the movie Inside Out taught the world anything, it’s that sad times are necessary, so I guess I’ll just do what I usually do and pretend I’m Amy Poehler and make hurtful, hilarious comments about myself until I feel better. ~*~*sElF dEpRiCaTiOn*~*~

It’s funny that I’m studying therapy while I’m feeling all of these feelings. I can’t tell if school is making it better or worse: we talk about feelings A LOT. I might be understanding myself better, but I also might be overthinking everything and making myself feel worse. I can usually tell whether a thing makes me happy, sad, or indifferent. I genuinely cannot tell with my graduate program. Again, it’s amazing and I’m learning so much–that is obvious to me. But of course I, like every other new grad, am going through the whole “is this what I really want to do with my life” crisis, which I guess is the root of the quarter life crisis to begin with. Well, that, and “what the hell am I going to do with my life” but now I’m thinking that those two phrases go hand-in-hand. So I may not be going through a full-on, break-out-the-self-help-books, maybe-I’ll-move-to-a-convent, my-degree-was-worth-nothing, maybe-I’ll-live-on-the-beach-for-a-few-months, bring-on-the-tattoos, get-a-pet-bird-and-name-her-Sylvia-Plath, decide-to-move-to-New-York, decide-that-would-be-counterproductive-to-the-whole-“I’m-lonely”-thing, end-up-dyeing-my-hair-for-the-millionth-time quarter like crisis (*big, deep breath like Nicki Minaj does in that one song I know all the words to*) but, it’s like… a semblance of that. Like I can cry whilst listening to “Apologize” by One Republic for an hour but then I’ll watch Sharknado and order take-out and feel like I have my shit together.

On the brightest of sides, Camille is ~*~FINALLY~*~ coming down next weekend for our annual Disney trip and I feel like it’ll be both the break I need, and the break that will kill me the following week. Cam and I go HARD for these annual trips: I’m talking hella gear (shirts, ears, jewelry, snow globes) and hella tears (World of Color, Fantasmic, the fireworks, ANY PARADE) and we do it all in a timely, organized fashion while we cackle at the bewildered tourists as we zoom by them on our way to another FastPass and we hear them say, “I don’t get it… where does the line start?” HA. Them and their maps. To quote myself on last year’s annual Disney trip: “I got 99 problems but a map ain’t one.” I said that about 38 times over the course of the weekend. Most of the time I yelled it. To the tourists. With the maps. But they didn’t hear me. Because they were distracted.

By the maps.

As you can tell, I’m excited for this annual Camille and Megan time. We’re gonna get Mickey Mouse ice cream and those frozen lemonade things they sell outside of Matterhorn. And we’ll see my favorite little show ever: Mickey and the Magic Map. The only map I will tolerate. Because of it’s magical properties. I have to go to bed before I explode.

As Natalie Tran once said, “If I could crack my own back I’d never need to see another person again.”

-Megan

I Like To Move It, Move It

What’s up, y’all.

So, because of grad school and scheduling, I’ve now realized that it’s pretty much unrealistic of me to except to post on Mondays, so I think I’m going to switch to posting on Sundays. Obviously, I realized this too late this week. I am unprepared. But it’s only because I’ve spent so much time being prepared for my first full week of grad school, so like that’s a good thing, right?

Anyway, sorry this post is so short and really only explaining things. I’m currently sitting on campus reviewing for my first quiz, so slack should be given, right? You guys don’t care that much about the blog, right?

My Fourth of July was fantastic. Friends, Food, and Fireworks (not that we actually saw any, but whatever). We got the city of West Hollywood basically to ourselves because everyone was at the beach. I have never gotten anywhere faster than I did this Saturday. It was #blessed, bros. Love my life.

As Betty White once said, “People have told me ‘Betty, Facebook is a great way to keep in touch with old friends…’
.. At my age, if I wanted to keep in touch with old friends, I’d need a Ouija board”

-Megan

On the Cusp

With two days until I start grad school, I finally feel like I’m on the cusp of a daily routine instead of floundering around every day and living with the weirdest sleep schedule I’ve ever had. I’m really hoping things get sorted for me come Wednesday.

This week has been my last eclectic week of the summer. I spent most of the week in LA, organizing my apartment and trying to figure out when the best time might be to go two blocks down the street to Ralph’s for groceries. Going anywhere in LA is a hassle. I’ve never seen so many people grocery shopping at 2pm on a Wednesday. What are work schedules around here? I don’t know why I didn’t consider that there would be significantly more people in a major city than in a tiny suburban town that no one outside of Orange County has ever heard of. But, yet again, I fall victim to my own unpreparedness.

Learning when traffic is the worst/the best (because the only time there isn’t traffic is when I come home from Orange at 2:30 in the morning) has been the name of the game this week. I’ve been to USC a few times and I have yet to find a “magic hour” of any kind, so I’ll probably be leaving my house an hour early every day. No last-minute homework-doing for me, I’m going to have to be super prepared. I had orientation on Wednesday, and it got me incredibly psyched for the program, but also served as a reality check of just how much work I was looking at for the next two years. It’s going to be a lot. At one point, one of the professors was speaking to us about the workload and said something to the effect of, “How many people are listening to this and thinking that any moment, the faculty and staff are going to realize that you aren’t cut out for any of this and call your bluff?” Never has someone who didn’t know a thing about me known exactly what I was thinking before. Of course, she assure us that she knew everyone in the program was more than capable and USC believed our applications proved that, but Im not so sure. I’m hoping I can pull this off.

On a different note, I got to do Disney twice this weekend, so I’ve gotten the happiness boost I needed to get me on track. I went on Friday with Jason and Jordan, and though we couldn’t go in the park, we had drinks at the Grand Californian and Trader Sam’s, so that made the three of us pretty happy. We stood in the courtyard of the Disneyland Hotel waiting for the geyser to go off for a good fifteen minutes. I think I yelled, “C’mon geyser… GEYSE.” Jordan and I ended up coming back and going into the park later that night. We teared up whilst watching Fantasmic and rode Dumbo and Alice in Wonderland when Jordan declared loudly that he “wasn’t drunk enough” while we were falling down the rabbit hole. I went yesterday with Lauren for the entire day, which was so fun. We got to go on all the major rides and see the Aladdin show and eat some yummy food. Lauren is a fantastic person, and I’m lucky us feminist killjoys could have a magical day by showing the tourists who’s boss. In case your wondering, we were boss. We were the ones. That’s what I was alluding to.

It’s been a big week, y’all. Oh, not for me. For America. I’m so happy that LGBT+ couples can now legally marry in all fifty states, but this is just one check mark on the road to equality. I’m glad that this county took a step in a positive direction for equal rights.

And now, here I am, preparing for my first day of school like I’ve done practically all my life, picking out an outfit and stocking up my purse, praying to God I can find a parking spot and that the other kids like me. It’s a scary notion, going back to school. I just hope no one tries to steal my lunch money. Because I was going to buy a cocktail with that cash.

As Whitney Cummings once said, “A true friend will go with the Instagram filter that flatters you.”

-Megan

Strategies of the Ill and Bedridden

I knew it was only a matter of time before I got sick again, and now, here I am! All shut up in bed, staring out my window at the people who are living their lives while I drink from a canteen while my body temperature teeters between “sweat lodge” and “Arendelle after Elsa’s meltdown.”

I think my body is just super confused. I’m doing a lot of the same things I’ve been doing all through college–staying up really late, driving around, minimal yoga–but with the added twist of not putting on makeup and, giant gasp, not drinking nearly as much. I’ve only really actually drank twice since graduation, and both times I proved to be a bit of a lightweight, which is not me, and also, not cool. Though I really did have so much fun at Char’s birthday dinner and after-party: it’s been a while since I’ve been out in LA and it was good to see Warwick again. So proud that I woke up in my bed with my keys and wallet. What an accomplishment, drunk me.

But the aftermath was where the sickness came from, so I’ve been dealing with that all well and nice. How am I possibly getting through the tragedy of not leaving my apartment, you ask? Well thank you for inquiring, reader, I will tell you: I’ve found a new show to latch on to. Okay, I guess “new” is a loose term, this show has been on for years, and my family and I used to watch it religiously back in the day. I’m talking about Survivor.

I found every season, starting from season 12, on Hulu Plus. This show used to be an addiction for me, so I knew if I started to watch it, I was going to binge. And I was not wrong. I’ve watched three whole season in the last few days and I do not regret it. I have an excuse, since I’m pretty ill, so I feel confident in the decisions I have made. Of course, any show you watch for that long will start affecting your real life: I’m now strategizing my job-search plan and how I’m going to balance that and my schoolwork and the alliances I have to make in both of those camps. I find myself yelling at the computer a lot, and I’m getting very invested in some of these people. If I’ve learned anything from this experience thus far, it’s that I have even more opinions on things than I thought I did. That’s a weird thought.

I wish I had more to report on, but being out of commission when you haven’t started school and you don;t have a job yet is pretty unexciting and uneventful. It’s mostly just me changing out of my pajamas and into another pair of pajamas, just so I feel like I got dressed today. I did that this morning, and let me tell you, it gets the moral up. I cannot stop saying the words “moral” “flint” “power player” and “drop your buffs, it’s time to merge tribes.” It’s been a long weekend, friends.

As Julia Louis-Dreyfus once said, “I”m about to enter a national ass-kicking contest. With no legs. And a massive ass.”

-Megan

YOLF + My Parents + IKEA

What a week it’s been, friends. There are so many people traveling and working and being adults, it’s the weirdest thing. And then there’s me, struggling to put together and IKEA chair.

On Wednesday, I ventured back down to Orange to go on an IKEA adventure with Jordan (the only acceptable guide through that crazy, crazy place) and we stoked up on all of the furniture I needed for my apartment. To reward ourselves for our hard work, we (of course) went to Disneyland. I got to see the new parade and fireworks show for the first time, and Jordan got to see me see the new parade and fireworks show for the first time, so really, he was the real winner. At 12:30am, we sped back up to LA and stayed up until 6am talking. We slept (napped) until 9:30, and then we were up and at ’em, lugging furniture from the car to the apartment and setting everything up. That night, we traveled back to Orange. Then I got to live at YOLF for a few days, and dear lord, was that an experience.

For those of you who are unaware of Chapman and Beta and the general shenanigans of the area, there is a Beta house called YOLF (You Only Live Forever… just the douchiest possible name. I’m not wrong) and Jordan moved in there a few weeks ago. It’s one of Beta’s main party houses, which means I had yet to see it in the daylight until Jordan moved in. General PSA: if at all possible, AVOID SEEING YOLF DURING THE DAY. It’s like seeing a Disneyland ride with the lights on, when you can see all of the dirty machinery and rope systems and buttons. Except this isn’t Disneyland. It’s where people come to get drunk and make out with randos. So obviously it’s so, SO much worse. But the guys that live there are great, so I took comfort in that.

Being on campus was weird, but not as weird as I expected it to be. We sat on the steps of Memorial for a while, which was strangely comforting. We also got no sleep whatsoever when I was there, so that may have added to the blissful delirium… I have no way of knowing, really. Wait, you see that little blue guy in the corner, too, right? He’s there, right? I am not crazy.

Anyway, no parties were held at YOLF when I was there, which made me appreciate the place a little more. Jordan’s done a fantastic job with his room and after a while, I stopped noticing the “questionable” stains on the living room carpet. Though I never took off my shoes. I mean, come on.

Today, my parents were here helping me set up all of my brand-spanking-new IKEA furniture and basically bring my apartment up to about 75% on the “how set-up is this place” scale. Now it looks a little more like an actual apartment that a person actually lives in. There are barely any trash bags full of clothing and shoes laying around in the hallway. There’s an actual lamp in the living room. I don’t know, guys, I feel like I gained 20 adult points today. Don’t ask me about the adult points scale, I don’t want to talk about how behind I am.

Anyway, my parents are basically the best. My dad set up arguably the most complex IKEA dresser I’ve ever seen, and he did it completely by himself (not because mom and I didn’t want to help, we totally tried) so, of course, we all went out to eat Italian food and drink wine to celebrate tonight. And that’s why this post is so late. And now I want to ride this wine-buzz all the way into bed. I’ll see you nerds next week.

As my mother once said, “I’m just standing here… you know… thinking about Mad Men.”

-Megan

LA, Orange, San Diego, & the Internet

Hey party people. I’m officially and full-flegedly (yeah I’m making that a word) BACK. The immediate shock of graduation has finally worn off to a level that I can function as a normal human being and I am back in action.

Granted, for the last few days, I’ve barely left my apartment, but that doesn’t mean I’m not fully-functioning inside this little space! Oh, the clothes I’ve hung up! Oh, the food I’ve put away! Oh, the things I’ve thrown in the hallway closet because I don’t really know why I have them but I’m a hoarder so I can’t throw them away!

No but really, I’ve been applying to jobs and registering for classes and shopping for furniture online, so it’s not like I’ve just been laying around watching Catfish all day because that would be silly even though yes, I am consistently watching Catfish. That show is so addicting. Why didn’t I major in that?

I promise, this whole week wasn’t a total bust. On Wednesday, I got my ass back to Orange because I missed Jordan’s birthday and we had to go to Disneyland to celebrate. We rode the updated Matterhorn, took great faux-mountain-climbing pictures and drank some wine: so like, the stuff Jordan and I normally do. Of course, it wouldn’t have been a Jordan pow-wow session without airing our grievances about other people and our deteriorated love lives, so that happened as well. When I got back to our Orange home base after Disney (in case you’re wondering, home base is now The Charter House AKA Conner’s old house AKA Michael, Jason, and Jordan’s old house AKA Michael’s house, because it’s the only place we have left to go now) some of the idiots and I packed up my car and headed down to visit Conner in Carlsbad (for blogging continuity, we’re referring to Carlsbad as San Diego, so deal with it). Chu, Matt, Kalyn, and I played car games and I played my Taylor Swift CD for them.

“Is this at least her most recent album?” asked Chu.

“No. I got this in high school. It’s been in my CD player for six years.”

“Ugh. Great.” He has been looking forward to hearing Bad Blood, I could just tell. But Matt was into it. To everyone’s general surprise, Kalyn said nothing. Not a single word. He usually talks so much. And his voice is so high-pitched. It was weird. If you can’t tell, all of this is sarcasm. Because Kalyn’s pretty quiet. And his voice is like James Earl Jones level deep. That was comedy, you uncultured swine.

We pre-gamed the bars with wine and beer at Conner’s parents’ house, and I must say, I’ve never felt a bigger need to tone it down than sitting in that beautifully-manicured kitchen, sipping wine from an actual glass, and looking at all of the framed pictures of Conner as a very small child. It was almost chilling. Anyway, we went out and hopped around to maybe four or five different bars (I had a Long Island and a shot or two at each of them so my memory starts fading around bar three) and then we got Mexican food. I remember eating two giant burritos and a side of rice. I passed out on Conner’s bed. Sorry, big.

We returned to Orange in the morning, and Chu and I played a rousing game of Would You Rather (other idiots asleep in the back) and I think we found one of the best websites for Would You Rather questions. All of them were, of course, very inappropriate, but I expect nothing less from Chu at this point. Upon our return to home base, we were met by the open arms and warm smiles of Jason and LD. Lol jk they were playing mortal combat.

After an hour or so of watching them play video games and having to deal with the parking enforcement ladies, I was informed that the idiots (in this case, Matt, Chu, Michael, Jason, Kalyn, and LD) wanted to go hiking, and I decided to tag along. We went through a canyon and drove up a pretty steep road to get to the top of this mountain in Laguna, and I swear, you could see most of Orange County from up there. There was a period of time when Michael, Matt, and I sat on a rock for an hour straight just looking out on everything. It got way existential. I ruined it by asking really awful Would You Rather questions, but hey, I’m the only girl so I can get away with shit like that. I talked Matt and Michaels’ ears off at one point. They didn’t seem to mind.

When we got back, we ordered a pizza and watched Game 1 of the NBA finals (Go Warriors, as if there were a question) and we just couldn’t stop commenting on how just absolutely HUGE these guys were. I think every few minutes another one of us would say, “But like LOOK at him. And look at the OTHER guy.”

“Steph Curry looks like a small child next to them and he’s taller than every guy in this room.” -Kalyn

“LeBron looks like he could destroy me with his pinky.” -Me

“*Mumbling about basketball*” -Chu

Then we all got drunk. Then Kimaya brought her parents to the house. Then we couldn’t stay at the house. Then we wandered the streets of Orange. Then we went to Kyle’s house. Then we played King’s Cup. Then I played with Kyle’s dog. Then we went back to home base. Then the boys all set up their sleeping bags in a cute little row on the ground. Then I just stayed on the couch, hoping no one would notice or say anything. Then no one said anything. Then I decided I was just going to sleep on the couch. Then we watched Power Rangers Turbo until we fell asleep.

The next day, I sped back to LA to meet with the guy that bestows WiFi in people’s apartments, and he did just that. And now I have the internet. Then I got to spend the night with Alex on her last night in LA, and I got to hang onto her until she left the house for the airport in the morning. I’m so proud of her. I know she’s going to do great things. Also, her new closet in Oregon is the size of my bedroom in my apartment. “Blessed.” -Alex Biston.

I love all of my idiots. I hope Chu, Matt, and Jason are being safe on the Mexican cruise right now (“We don’t need to run super fast, we just need to outrun Matt.” -Chu) and I hope Alex has been to Bed Bath and Beyond enough times in the last two days to never go again in her life. Though, she’ll probably go anyway. Because everyone loves the Big BB&B. I love my friends. Orange, I’ll see you again real soon.

As Iliza Shlesinger once said, “The weekend is very important. The weekend represents the 48 hours you have to wreck the life that you create for yourself the rest of the week.”

-Megan