I’ve coined a new term for myself: directionally retarded. It was, afterall, my own fault that I ended up in the middle of nowhere today while driving to the designated voting area for my precinct. In my hurry to get out the door, I mapped out 111 Upland instead of 1111 Upland Ave. Thus, my attempt to be a responsible citizen and make my vote count ended with me on the phone with a friend and his computer screen while sitting in my car in the middle of a dirt road, staring at a threadbare abandoned sofa and it’s loveseat mate, trying to ignore the dead skunk that lay in a pile of congealed blood and guts just beside my car (I didn’t kill it, I promise), and inhaling the red dust thrown up by every single Ford F-150 that passed me by. There is something to be said about the pleasure that some of my neighbors must derive from leaving furniture on the roadside: here a sofa set created an almost sarcastic seating arrangement on the roadside, and just two days ago I almost suffered a head-on collision with a torn up mattress while driving south down the only elevated loop that runs around this great city in West Texas. Between these sightings and the massive tumbleweed that perpetually threatens to scratch away the already rusting paint on my poor car and to replace my arm hairs with spiny thorns, I can never forget that I am in cowboy country. And what better reminder than the fact that, as I stood in line to cast my vote at the obscure middle school on the country road, I was for that moment the only voter not voting in the Republican primaries.

As I was driving home from school today, I noticed a sign on a local grocery store. Apparently, Foodarama is having a sale on pork butt loin, for 88 cents a pound. Mind you, that is a very cheap source of protein. But, who eats PORK BUTT LOIN?!?!?!?! That’s so nasty!!! Ewww!

This will be my last post in a while, because the next two weeks will be spent chilling on the shores of Waikiki Beach….

Hasta la vista!

Yesterday was absolutely awesome! We’re doing this project where we’re sending Eid gifts to the Muslim children of New Orleans, and we spent a good 3-4 hours in WalMart this weekend doing our shopping for the project. Yesterday was the gift wrapping dinner, and I was really dreading it because I figured that everyone would wrap a gift and leave, and I’d be stuck with the 50+ gifts excess we have over MSA members. But, people who aren’t even part of the MSA showed up! And, we had an entire assembly line running! So now we have 100+ wrapped Eid presents that I can send to New Orleans to help brighten up Eid for these children!

“This is an A and B conversation, so C ur way out before D and E F you up!”

It’s really weird how many girls I know that do the full Islamic hijab or burkah, and how I can’t recognize them for the life of me when these particular sources of covering are removed.

Thank you to everyone who has expressed concern over the past few days regarding my family in Pakistan. Thanks to God, none of my relatives live far enough North to have been affected by this weekend’s devastating earthquake. Some of my family did feel the tremors in Lahore, but didn’t suffer anything beyond a bit of fear and excitement. What makes this latest natural disaster scary for me is the fact that I spent part of my summer touring some of the Northwest Frontier of Pakistan, and as I watch the news I see images that look strikingly familiar. For anybody who’s interested, my Pakistan photo albums have pictures from this journey. This was definitely a region of the world that already had nothing, and all of the lucky individuals that survived the earthquake now need us to pray that they survive through the upcoming Winter.

‘Tis a weak person who, in a disagreement, attacks their opponent’s morality and character rather than attempting to understand their opponent’s ideas. Debunking an individual’s credibility will not prevent others from independently developing similar ideas, but by fully understanding an individual’s ideas you can devise a logical and convincing argument to sway their opinion.

Thanks to Saqib for sending this picture to me. I’ll keep it in mind next time I’m trying to devise an ecology experiment =)

I was sitting outside eating my egg salad sandwich when a pathetic looking squirrel came up to me, stood on his hind legs, and held out his hands like he was begging for food. Generous soul that I am =), I tore off a piece of bread and tossed it in his general direction. He picked it up, nibbled off all the dark part of the bread crust, and left the white part behind. He then proceeded to beg again. Does this squirrel not understand the consequences of wasting food?!?! Imagine the number of squirrels that must go hungry every day because he is willing to throw the white part of his bread on the ground! There are starving squirrels all over campus that would love to have that piece of bread! And, where was this squirrel when I was a little kid who didn’t like to have the crust on my sandwich?