My week of self-indulgent New York bliss is coming to a close and it’s probably about time. I’ve spent a lot of time and money being not very productive, but it’s been a good time. The party last night was a blast. I amassed nearly ideal quantities of booze, beer, mixers, and cake. There are a few half-full bottles left, but not as many as you might expect if you’d seen the spread. I ended up with three beautiful cakes: an 8″ chocolate layer cake from The Chocolate room, a 7″ spicy pumpkin cake from Sugar Sweet Sunshine, and a 6″ cheesecake from 2 Little Red Hens.

They were all amazing, but I think the spicy pumpkin was my favorite. The layers of moist cake became the slightest bit battery where they met the cream cheese frosting which created this wonderful sticky fluffy texture of pumpkin spicy goodness. Going back to the party, the crowd was almost as good as the cake. Brendan’s crew was there, plus Alex and Robyn and Erin and Claire and Seth and Amy…so many good people, which made for a sea of interesting conversations. Sara and her roommates invited their friends too, so it ended up a medium-to-large gathering. Still not enough to crowd their mammoth apartment, but a good number.

I’m back at Sara’s now after checking out of the hotel. She let me take a shower, which felt great. I didn’t have time to shower earlier because the hotel wouldn’t let me check out late, but this was even better because the apartment shower has intense water pressure and now I have the whole living room to myself and a bowl of cereal. I’m not looking forward to the next however-many hours of lugging suitcases and sucking recycled air and standing in lines, but it will be good to get back to work. This has been a really long break but it’s been good and refreshing. And while I already miss my family and friends a little I just have to remember that spring break is right around the corner and it’s their turn to visit me.

I wanted to let the news sink in before I posted, so I’m lying in bed with the computer atop my lap. A few hours ago Barbara let me know that my insane asylum burned down. It happened last Thursday while I was just settling into Berlin.

I don’t have much to say since I didn’t read much about it. I looked at the pictures, many of which are framed just like the pictures I took only these were enhanced with billowing flames and smoke. The fire started in the south wing, the men’s wing, where the bookshelf that I pillaged was. Apparently it was struck by lightening.

I’ll need to write a new conclusion to my thesis. This raises too many questions about space, temporality, virtuality, memory…etc. to ignore. I am brimming with ideas and the whole thesis will be richer for it, but what a price. How many bookshelves lined those rooms? How many boxes of photographs went up in smoke?

This is tragic, and not in any dramatic or abstract way. I feel like the rich mesh of documents, stories, and lives that I sifted through for months has suddenly detonated. I knew these networked memories were fragile but I didn’t suspect explosive. I wish I could wander through the wreckage. What a fitting time for that Walter Benjamin quote I love so well, the one about cinema…I’ll find it later and post it as a comment.

Faith chides me for over-quoting Benjamin and I won’t say she’s wrong. I wish I’d brought some of him, though, being in Berlin. He resented this city.

It is not love at first sight, but it – Berlin – is growing on me. I walked quite a few blocks through Prenzlauer Berg this night/morning at 3am before hopping a night bus. The most threatening figure I encountered was a scruffy old man wearing a fluffy white dress. He was brandishing a liquor bottle and yelling at a darkened storefront when I passed him. He didn’t pay me much attention.

In keeping with my airplane delay streak, my flight to Berlin was two hours late. The family’s plane to Oregon was two hours late for the same reason. Apparently Prez George W was flying into (or out of?) Newark just as we were trying to leave, and nobody is allowed to share his air space. One stewardess announced over the speaker, “If you are curious you can see the cause of all our problems off to the right – Air Force One is taxiing past.”

The delay didn’t bother me much, I slept straight through 2 hours on the ground and 7 hours on the air only to wake up in Berlin.

I don’t know what I would have done if the hostel manager hadn’t emailed me instructions for what buses to take. My head and contacts were both so fuzzy, I could only trudge mindlessly like a luggage-laden zombie from terminal to bus to underground. The place I’m staying, JetPack Hostel, is clean, friendly, and secure. I just took the longest warmest shower in this weird contraption that shot water at me from all angles. It was nice, although the wall sprayers kind of hurt. The bathrooms/showers are shared but private (they are in individual rooms with locking doors), which is pretty luxurious (a far cry from stinky coed Vassar dorm showers).

I am meeting with the apartment lady today. Apparently she has a headache at the moment, so we’ll meet later in the evening. That’s fine with me. I want to explore, but I’m afraid I’m going to pass out. I don’t want to induce jet lag, but that shower made me so warm and comfy…

So you all know, my phone number is +44 79 24 40 03 86. It doesn’t seem to be ringing consistently, but I can call out and receive messages.

Ok, it’s naptime or exploretime or something.

I spent much of this morning in Baldwin, after investing a few hours of yesterday afternoon in the same activity. I have to go back tomorrow. I have to pass all kinds of medical clearances before I can move along with this Fulbright process, and it’s just a million hoops to jump through. A bunch of my tests came back screwy in some way, probably because I’m coming down with a cold. They’re sending the blood work back for a mono test. Wouldn’t that be cute, if I got mono at the very second that I need to acquire medical clearance AND to enjoy a week of near-constant pretty dresses and drinks and dances? But that won’t happen. I just have a cold, and I have plenty of time to rest up and make it go away. It seems utterly ridiculous that a minor cold could hold up the process like this.

This, too, shall pass. I’ve found that peppermint tea helps a lot with the sore throat.

There’s not much else to do around here besides write and play WoW and sleep and pack. I’m out of books to read, but more should arrive from Amazon.com on Monday. I just realized that if I’m going to apply for grad school at NYU I will need to take the GRE during my brief Oregon visit in August. The application is due in January and the GRE tests abroad are infrequent and paper-based. Very different from the ones administered in the states. That gives me a whole stack of archaic English vocabulary to acquire in addition to beginning German and Norwegian!

Aaron just took his last final today, but everybody else in my house is still working hard, so it’s not a very exciting place to be. Tuesday is the big one – I may have people over to start finishing off our reserves of food and drink. Erin is leaving on Sunday morning to attend a training session for her summer job, so I’ll have the bottom floor to myself. She’s coming back for graduation and to help us move out.

That’s about all the news here. There was an absurd 5-minute storm the other day that just about wiped us off the face of the earth. The rain fell in hard sheets, and I couldn’t see through the quantities of water that were streaming off the roof in front of my window. I’ve never seen anything like it. Thunder, lightening, everything. Ten minutes later there was blue sky. Something tells me this coming week – Fulbright hoops, sore throats, parties, packing, graduation – will be something like that. At the end of it I will roll off a plane into Berlin and start all over. Absolutely crazy.

There has to be a better way to distribute senior week tickets.

The week between exams and graduation is senior week. It is stuffed full of activities that our class council subsidizes — most of them relating to the consumption of alcohol. Many of these activities have a limited number of spots. They distributed tickets in a brief window from 2pm-5pm this afternoon.

I was a little nervous about showing up too ridiculously early. What would I do? Wouldn’t I feel absurd sitting there at the crack of dawn? I trekked to Main to check my mail at 11:30, figuring I could squeeze in near the front of the line, but it had already wrapped around half of the second floor. I took a spot at the back of the line (unlike many of my peers — dirty line cutters) and waited it out. After the doors opened at 2 it took me another 1.5 hours to get to the front of the line. At 3:30 I squeezed into one of the very last spots for the activities I wanted. I shouldn’t be complaining. Sure, I waited for 4 sweltering hours, but I got in. Yay!

Speaking of checking my mail, I began receiving papers from Fulbright today. This first packet is calling for all kinds of medical histories and examinations. Apparently I’m going to be bombarded with paperwork from them, and I have no idea where to have it sent after next week…

Thank you all for the congratulations and support, by the way. I haven’t responded very aggressively (honestly I’m still in a little shock) but it really means a lot to me that so many people care so much about this Fulbright thing. I’ve got some wonderful friends and family!

So, the schedule for Senior Week goes something like:

Tuesday (May 22):

• Champagne Kickoff (5pm)
• Senior Formal (6:30-11:30pm)
• Karaoke Mug Night (12-2am)

Wednesday (May 23):

• Faculty Lunch (12pm)
• Booze Cruise (6pm)
• TH Block Party (10pm-2am)

Thursday (May 24):

• Winery Brunch (11:30am)
• Capture the Flag (1pm)
• President’s Reception (4-6pm)
• Yearbook Distribution (6-8pm)
• Pub Crawl (10pm-2am)

Friday (May 25):

• Commencement Rehearsal (9am…ouch)
• ViCE Jazz Concert (7-10pm)
• Bowling (10pm-3am)

Saturday (May 26):

• Family Reception (2pm)
• Baccalaureate (4pm)
• Bonfire (12am)

Sunday (May 27):

• Commencement – Terry Gross, speaking (10am)
• Reception (noonish)

Those aren’t all the activities, they’re just the ones that seem interesting enough for me to (maybe) attend. I’m posting them here mostly for my benefit, because it won’t take me long to lose this little schedule card, but maybe you guys are curious about where all that tuition money is going? I’m not sure exactly what the family plan is, but I heard something about a Friday night arrival. Goodness it’s coming up, isn’t it?