the light at the end of the tunnel

rocking out to:
the darkness - i believe in a thing called love


Deadline - Program

• Nov 6 NSF Graduate Research Fellowship
• Nov 14 Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowship
• Nov 20+21 SUNY StonyBrook visit
• Dec 30 Graduate Record Exam (GRE) - great depression
  
• Jan 1 Washington St. Louis application deadline
• Jan 2 Harvard University
• Jan 5 George Washington University
• Jan 10 University of Missouri - Columbia
• Jan 15 SUNY Stony Brook

I see the light, and it rocks like big-haired 80's bands.

• Jan 13 - flight to London
• Jan 14 - arrival in london: drinks with UCL friends, possibly meeting up with Emily G, MEETING LEAH'S NEW FIANCE!!! and hanging out with Saskia's lovely Courtald pals
• Jan 15 - Borough Market (and Portobello Market if I can help it)... mmm epicurian fantasies...
• Jan 16 - MADRID!!! ...possibly running to meet with the Alcala folk!!!
  
• Jan 17 - Saskia & Museums!!! a date with the madrilenos (and re-enacting excavation summer...ie. tapas and lots of liquor)
• Jan 18 - ...
  
• Jan 19 - mmm, escaping to Granada (Marisa has been informed) yay mini-holiday with the *ahem*
• Jan 20 - happy birthday poet!
• Jan 21 - back to madrid
• Jan 22 - back to ny
  

muppet the cornsnake

Feeding time at the museum. Ugh... also known as a terrible distraction. Muppet is one of three. He/she is, by far, my favorite. Mostly because he handles so well, doesn't hiss, and is so damn PURTY!

I may like snakes. In your face Indiana Jones!

AMNH Bone-terns LineDance

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

AMNH Bone-terns Party

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

language is a living thing

The Daily Show With Jon StewartM - Th 11p / 10c

Mike Huckabee Pt. 2

Barack Obama Interview
John McCain Interview

Sarah Palin Video
Funny Election Video

Prop 8 and its denouncing gay marriage as a human right is absolutely ridiculous. As an anthropologist, I find that the 68% of the American population that voted for the ban on same sex marriage are masking their homophobia for a conservative belief that the word marriage is strictly restricted to a life-long union between heterosexual couples.

Really? A 5000 year-old definition should be upheld? Well then, 30-year old men should be allowed to force 8-year old children to marry them. Men should still stone a 15-year old female to death because she was raped.

"Religion is far more of a choice than homosexuality…we protect religion, and talk about a lifestyle choice."

People get so hung up on the definition of a word that they forget languages are living things. It changes over time with the norms and standards of decades, cultures, and societies. It is all hypocrisy in my eyes, and when people finally begin to admit that Prop 8 is just one more way for close-minded folk to spread hate and hang on to their prejudiced hateful beliefs, then a true conversation about equality and basic human rights can begin.


Disappointing.
The worst part is that I'm related to these people.

Begin at the beginning...

...and go on until you come to the end: then stop. - The King, Alice in Wonderland.


Why I adore my friends:
-because when I start a conversation saying a random line of a random song, they continue it but reciting the rest of the song like it was a real conversation.
-because food excites them.
-because they know food excites me.
-because warm and fuzzy feelings are understood to be induced by warm and delicious goodness.
-because they appreciate it when I nerdily insert random information about the human body, human evolution, and bipedalism into everyday conversations about, say, fixing shoes at the cobbler.
-because we talk dirty about good food.
-because they know I love "appreciating" dorks/nerds...and they still hang out with me. hahaha.
-because they share my irrational fears.
-because they come up with random -isms like "It's like when a clown car rolls in, and 40 clowns come out" and use it as an everyday metaphor.
-because they appreciate my macabre sense of humor sometimes.
-because they share my appreciation for irony and sarcasm.
-because they get why I dislike Metamorphosis because it pains me to see unfair things happen to unsuspecting people, even if they are only fictional characters.
-because they totally ARE the coolest people in the world.

Why I <3heart<3>

-because with you guys, the HIGH FIVE is still alive.

-because none of us want to wear jeans and will happily go on living our winter lives with tights if only our asses wouldn't grow out in all kinds of directions like J-lo.

-because we all complain about our extra weight, but still love to love food.

I <3 my friends.


Happy holidays!
FYI: this list is only going to get longer...and longer...and longer.

just a little heartbroken

Ughhhh!!! #$%@$#$%$!!!

Oh sure, the ONE chance to see The Ting Tings live, be filmed for New Year's Carson Daly, and party it up FOR FREE, and I can't do it. Sadness. Boo not having a life and freedom. Boo.

boo-hoo.

And boo-hoo, Anne is leaving for Chicago. :-( I like wasting my time in Gisselle's office chatting with Anne about the crazy men she meets in NY and our ideal wedding dresses... and how awesome our outfits and bags are. Booooo.

Enjoy the monkeys, Anne!

Sadness. Heart brokenness. Boo. Boo-hoo.

rocking out to: The Ting Tings

That's Not My Name (Acoustic-awesome)

Shut Up and Let Me Go (Stripped-down sexy)

The Great DJ (ah-ah-ah ah ah Acoustic and still rockin')

dooms days deadlines

Deadline - Program

• Nov 6 NSF Graduate Research Fellowship
• Nov 14 Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowship
• Nov 20+21 SUNY StonyBrook visit

The following have all turned into a December 9 deadline... thank you country-hopping professors...

• Dec 30 Graduate Record Exam (GRE)
  
• Jan 1 Washington St. Louis application deadline
• Jan 1 Arizona State University
• Jan 2 Harvard University
• Jan 5 George Washington University
• Jan 10 University of Missouri - Columbia
• Jan 15 SUNY Stony Brook

Ah, no holiday for me.

Doing that thing you doo

Here we go. The new hair. Before and after (note the obscene natural volume... yeah, that's without the blow-dryer).



Japanese straightening. Now my hair is straight, but I have insane volume, and I'm just too lazy to keep ironing it out. So almost every year (or every other year) I have to get it permed straight so I don't have to deal with it. It's a bitch when you travel a lot and just aren't the high-maintenance type. Besides, constant blow-drying and ironing dries out and ruins hair cuticles.

So on a whim I went to the Hair Village in Woodside (near the 61st St 7-train stop in Roosevelt). Normally after washing it out a little, it stops looking like a wig (i.e. picture 2). I think I'm back to being comfy with it again. I just hate that the lady at the hair salon decided I needed to get a trim. I wanted my regular stylist at Sei Tomoko to do it... but oh well. Saves me a 2-week appointment trip, though I could use their free shiatsu massage (mmmmmm...massage...).

I think this year I'll let my hair grow out before chopping it down to a bob again. I like bobs. Maybe bob it for the spring? Or before excavation season? I don't usually look too well with super-long hair. And it always gets caught in zippers.

Comfort, thy name be Puffs Vicks

Wow this week has been a whirlwind. Not that the past weeks have been easy-breezy, but wow. Between my severe body-shutdown illness/period/thing, exams, and graduate program interviews, I have had the total of 8 hours of sleep this week... and my body craves more.

But yeah... Okay will amplify this entry tomorrow when I get back from a FULL Stony Brook day. SO EXCITED!

On the agenda:
-5am train to the end of the world, aka Stony Brook in Long Island
-chat up all the professors I want to potentially work with
-GROSS ANATOMY (i get to borrow scrubs... and potentially see real dead HUMAN bodies)
-hang out with all the grad students
-drink and have dinner with (and try to forget whether or not i passed out/gagged at sight of human bodies... or felt hungry thanks to formaldehyde)
-take night train back to nyc




Hmm, I'll let you guys know.
Then this weekend:
Saturday night: PRE-THANKSGIVING FOOD-LOVING with Lyssa and friends! YAY! (Which reminds me, I need to stock up on Sangue di Giuda)
Sunday morning: Pancake brunch @ Jess&Alex's

Man, either I have to curb my appetite a lot and resist the temptation of amplifying my love-tires from this summer... or go on a serious diet after this weekend. Ugh... I hate how i LOVE the holiday season.


Oooooo... Union Square HOLIDAY MARKET!!! Yeah, I'm broke this year so unless I find the PERFECT present for someone, everyone else will just have to make do with my home-made presents (which this year won't be a painting, but would most likely be some photograph I took and framed).

yaaaaaaaaaay!!!

officially a pathological procrastinator

Katherine Hepburn as Alice Adams in RKO's 1935 "Alice Adams".

Future wedding dress will be a rendition of this dress... even if I have to marry myself. Haha! I will also have to grow legs the size of Hepburn's otherwise it just wouldn't work as well.



Ughhhhhh... I can't see straight. My nose is stuffed. My throat is irritated. My glands are swollen. I have kleenex all over the floor trailing behind me like Hansel and Gretel's bread crumbs. I've managed to lose my house keys in my house, and on top of all that, I have the wonderful GREs in two days.

:-(
I just want me some warm dance biscuits... And for my neighborhood Walgreens to start carrying the damn Kleenex w/ the scent of Vicks vapor rub (because it makes me feel better sniffing vicks).

Is that too much to ask?

warmed up like dance biscuits

***

Bee skit @ (Nov 15 2008)
by thebeyoncenetwork

My sides hurt from laughing so hard. I just want to say that Justin Timberlake has been on some of my all time favorite skits from SNL (cue in Homelessville). Totally made my evening. I will probably have some amazing dreams of JTim and Andy Samberg in leotards forever.

And yes, Justin TOTALLY owned the "Single Ladies" move.




"We're the dahncers."

The universe wants me to go to grad school!

My ass hurts from sitting non-stop in front of this computer trying to focus and get my last grant in before the deadline after a whirlwind (and chronologically frivolous) escapade out to the west coast.

When I went to upload the missing essays into the grant website, lo and behold in giant red letters:
The application deadline has been extended.
Submit before 11:59 pm (EST) November 17, 2008.

Isn't that lovely? I think God and the Universe actually want me to go to graduate school even though the American system seems to be so against it. Yeah, that's right. If you've had as much stress over the past month and a half as I have had, you would be conjuring the almighty powers that be right about now as well.

So instead of having a deadline 30 minutes from now, it's been moved to 3 days from now. YAY! Not that I'll be heading to sleep before finishing this application, I do have the evil GREs coming up. As a safety, I have decided to apply for Cambridge and UCL as well. Hopefully the European recession will continue to even out the sterling (sorry, I'm a horrible human being sometimes, but 2-quid to the dollar is a bitch of an exchange rate to be honest).




At anyrate, because I need a break (and am so good at procrastinating), I am linking my escapade photos. Very glad some halfway decent shots did come out of it (after a bit of tweaking, because my anciently modern camera is now falling sub-par). I just might take this hobby up into serious-level since my uncle seems to be convinced I have "the eye". Eh, it can be plan C should being all scientific not work out. Plan B is top secret.



Here's the link to my San Francisco escape with Nohemi:
http://picasaweb.google.com/kmarian.viterbo/HaciendoElGuiriStateside#







And the link to my relaxing getaway to autumn California with my aunt and uncle:
http://picasaweb.google.com/kmarian.viterbo/MarinCountyCA#

Nature always seems to have the answer for me.








Future escapades are currently in the works. Yay! Jess is totally in on hopping over to London to have tea with Saskia (and her future Duke-entitled husband). Who else might want to come with? The plan: 7-10 days, but NOT all in London because I will shoot myself if I have to spend that much time in a place that lacks sun.



***

Well here's the rundown:

Deadline - Program

• Nov 6 NSF Graduate Research Fellowship
• Nov 14 Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowship
• Nov 18 Graduate Record Exam (GRE)
• Nov 20+21 SUNY StonyBrook visit
• Dec 15 Washington St. Louis application deadline
• Jan 1 Arizona State University
• Jan 2 Harvard University
• Jan 5 George Washington University
• Jan 10 University of Missouri - Columbia
• Jan 15 SUNY Stony Brook

And then some breathing room... to ponder and worry about whether or not they'll actually accept me. Ugh, this stuff just doesn't end... At least I can do it with a potpie in my mouth, or a tapa?


Two down, and only the rest of my life to go.
I just keep telling myself, one day I'll be able to google-scholar myself!

Fog. It's like Heaven on Earth except with humidity.

Just got back from a wonderful break in San Francisco. A fantastic treat spending the weekend with Nohemi and relaxing for a few days with my Uncle Tony and Auntie Bombi. Yay autumn foliage and fog, and green gigantic trees. YAY! Will post later entry on that but the more important news:

New York (JFK)	$208* $237*	Nov 18, 2008 - Dec 17, 2008 Dec 24, 2008 - Mar 22, 2009 Mar 23, 2009 - May 25, 2009
Newark	$198* $237*	Nov 18, 2008 - Dec 17, 2008 Dec 24, 2008 - Mar 22, 2009 Mar 23, 2009 - May 25, 2009

Virgin Atlantic is having a sale!!! Who wants to come with??? Preferably sometime next year, late Jan/Feb or even early march? Let's go visit SASKIA! And then hop over a few days into continental Europe for face-sized pancakes in Amsterdam? Or...wait...yeah not Paris. Or erm...Madrid? Haha, or you know, whatever. Seriously, for us out there who are stressing out over graduate applications. How about joining me on an escape to the other side of the Atlantic?

That Newark fare is looking mighty inviting!

***

By the way, everyone should look up The Flight of the Conchords. I think they're a Kiwi group with music the likes of Tenacious D, except funnier, more ironic, extra dry humor, and actually catchy tunes. I just spent a 6-hour sardine-flight replaying their album.

My personal favorite: Business Time. Here's a snippet of the lyrics:

Ahh yeah, that’s right baby
Girl, tonight we're gonna make love
You know how I know baby?
Cuz its Wednesday, and Wednesday night is the night that we make love.
Tuesday night is the night that we go and visit your mother, but
Wednesday night is the night that we make love.
Cuz everything is just right, conditions are perfect.
There's nothing good on TV, conditions are perfect.
You lean in close and say something sexy like " I might go to bed I've
got work in the morning." I know what you're trying to say baby.
You're tryin to say "Ooh yeah, it's business time, it's business time."  

It's on my GENIUS list.

why do i do this to myself?

Crucial point in my life... and I'm having a quarter-life crisis at the worst possible moment. My timing, as always, is impeccable.

Why do I do this to myself? I should count how many sleepless nights I have. There just never seems to EVER be enough time in the day. Maybe I should just move to Jupiter. Granted its atmosphere hardly affords the beautiful blue sky Earth's got, but blue is overrated anyway. Besides, I've always had a fondness for the warmer hues of the color spectrum, as well as Texan-sized eye-ball-looking storm spots.

Jupiter. More daytime.

The downside, I would never be able to weigh myself on a scale for fear of realizing my density can only be rivaled by three elephants.


I should tell myself I do this so that one day I can Google-scholar myself and be proud I've got numerous entries.


http://cusj.columbia.edu/symposium/viewarticle.php?id=45&layout=abstract

*what what! Bone-a-fide scholar, yo.
:-D

dancing on the tombstones of life

now playing: Jack Johnson - Never Know

Jack Johnson is (surprisingly) rocking my socks off.



In this uberly-globalized world, Philippines now (cheesily) celebrates All Hollow's Eve. The Filipino Channel (TFC for those pinoy-savvy) is filled with odiously westernized celebrities in HORRENDOUS halloween costumes. I mean we have an amazing culture of witches (ie. wak-wak, mangkukulam), monsters (i.e. mananaggal), and scary stories (people are incredibly superstitious for a devoutly Catholic country)... yet the popular media prefer to celebrate lame-ass American holidays (yes, even Thanksgiving--the day Americans celebrate Native American peoples kindly sharing food and turkey to ingrateful Puritans who would later destroy them--has made it across the Pacific). Not saying that I don't like celebrating these holidays with friends and family, but seriously, Philippines has an amazing culture of holidays yet they refuse to give it equal media-time. It leaves a bitter, sad taste in my mouth.

At any rate, normally Filipinos celebrate November 1st--like Mexicans and Spaniards (thank you 300 years of colonization)--as All Souls' Day, and November 2nd as All Saints' Day. When I was little, my town would have all the girls dress up in amazing gowns and we paraded across all the barrios holding candles and flowers, praying and processing into the local church to offer gifts to the Santo Nino and get presents for being the prettiest girls.

On All Souls' Day Filipino families head over to the cemeteries to pray for their deceased loved ones, and then party and dance and eat Lechon afterwards. Yes, we quite literally party on graves. It's pretty fun actually. We spend the night lighting candles, then eat. Yay for fiesta!




Ah, but those were the days. Mine, on the other hand, has been spent locked up in my room listening to Pandora-dot-com and my surprise mixes of Norah Jones, Jack Johnson, John Mayer, Bob Dylan, Allison Kraus and Dolly Parton (my study, read, write mix). My eyes are burning and I can't seem to get past one sentence.

I am a hot mess, if I do say so myself. And no, it is SO not a good thing.



On a happy note, I've finally managed to send off those postcards I've been meaning to send. I hope they make it to their wonderful destinations. It took me a while to write a measly paragraph on each of the postcards... I hope they're not too cheesy or stupid.

Side note: The best book of NYC postcards I've found (I've spent weeks scouring New York for beautiful postcards) has to be the New York Times's book of New York City postcards chronicling decades of the newspaper's best historic photographs of NY. It's really pretty and I can't bring myself to rip out the postcards to send to people. It's just too good of a compilation and I wants it all to myself.

I really should take Paolo's advice and just print out my own postcards since I have amassed an entire collection of stunning NYC scenery... Except I do enjoy finding gems in unexpected places.

headless horseman in the museum... creepy

Ironic. A headless horseman at the American Museum of Natural History (yes, an adult in full threads) creeped me and Anne out. Yes, the two of us who are so accustomed to knockin' them human bones around up in the collections of the museum. Ironic.


Halloween in New York City. If only I could enjoy this week with friends considering:
a) The spaniards invaded the museum, and among them is a dear colleague from Atapuerca and Pinilla, Bea.
b) Museum fun!
c) Children and adults masquerading and trick or treating ALL OVER THE MUSEUM
d) New York City's official debauchery launch of the holiday season (turkey day, chrismannukwanzakah, and New Year's are just a hop, skip and jump away).

But no. Instead I spent the whole day running around like a chicken with its head cut off. Drugging myself with burnt-tasting excellent espresso (I can't believe I already destroyed my 2-week old Moka espresso maker), dragging myself to the museum to have a really quick (and incredibly nerve-wracking) chat with Dr. Dan Lieberman (who nearly dashed my dreams of graduate school thanks to my lack of actual math and biology in college... FUCK ME for being such an overachiever in high school... thusly achieving far too much, and apparently NOT FUCKING ENOUGH in actual COLLEGE). At least he was nice enough to me about encouraging application, and really trying to sell the Harvard program.

So why do I seem unhappy?

Because I get star-struck, like the DORK that I am, with very talented and intellectual people. So like that time I nearly impaled myself with an office desk and knocked my teeth out with the door exiting Prof. DiFiore's office after chatting with him, I basically BOLTED out the room after having a very pleasant chat with Dr. Lieberman.

Dear lord, why am I such a DORK?!?!

At any rate, today was a photocopying-mad dash through libraries and collections day. I MUST finish these grants by this weekend. Therefore I am putting myself under HOUSE ARREST for the rest of this week (minus election day because seriously, I'll be too preoccupied to be typing off).


Anyone want to help me edit? I would love you forever... and bake you a cookie. Or two.






Happy halloween!











Upcoming events:
Nov. 1-6: House arrest. Full lockdown. No contact with outside world...except for finding new Moka espresso pot.
Nov. 8-12: San Francisco, CA!!! With Uncle Toni and Auntie Bombai... and NOHEMI!!! Yosemite National Park! YAAAAAY!!! TREEEES!!! :-)
Mid-November: Grad program visits, GREs, etc
Late-November: pre-thanksgiving gatherings!!!
December: Graduate program applications. Another round of LOCKING MYSELF UP FOR THE MONTH.

Then birthdays, Christmas, (maybe kwistah?), SASKIA!!!, CHRISTINA!!!, New Year's... and who knows!

another pancake day

Do you have the slightest idea (No, I don't)
Why the world is bright with you here? (Oh, is that so?)
Stay a while and wait and see (wait, and see)
If things go right we're meant to be...

on the playlist: Sondre Lerche - Modern Nature


I hate movies that make you cry. So why do I love to watch them with a box of Kleenex ready at hand? Here are some suggestions:

ATONEMENT: stay away from it!!! Unless you're prepared to sob and have a near heart attack because John MacAvoy should ALWAYS get his girl, and not letting him have a happy ending is just cruel and wrong. Or maybe read the book first so at least you're prepared to confront stunning imagery and cinematography of your heart being torn to shreds.

DAN IN REAL LIFE: you'd think, well here's another wonderful Steve Carell flick that's bound to get your cheeks and stomach hurting from laughter (cue Little Miss Sunshine). BUT NO. Much like Will Ferrell's Stranger than Fiction, it is masked in a lovely, warm and fuzzy family goodness... and then just tugs at your heart strings enough to make you well up in warm and fuzzy tears.


No, I don't know why I put these DVDs in my television in the first place. But I am now lacking a full box of comforting Vicks-infused Kleenex. One good thing did come out of this cathartic episode. Sondre Lerche and the soundtrack to Dan in Real Life. It's on the same note as the Juno soundtrack. Quirky, warm and fuzzy acoustics.


I need pancakes today. Fluffy light pancakes. Preferably swimming in syrup. Yep, warm and fuzzy pancakes.

my favorite kodak moments

Take a gander. My travelogue photo portfolio, courtesy of a website created by some friends. It's pretty brilliant. give it a look!

Since I royally suck at keeping up with blogs when I'm on the go, here's a quick catch up of what I did over the summer through some of my favorite photographs. Hope you guys relate as well.

http://shuttercal.com/calendar/kmarian/

Sleep no more! Macbeth does murder sleep.

on the playlist:
Chairlift - Bruises


Insomnia still sucks. I think I'm making myself ill. I've begun to detest all these consecutive October babies celebrating birthdays every weekend. Celebrating birthdays and going out on the weekends have become chores...

What is wrong with me? All work and no play... or maybe I just need to get laid? Hah!

Ambrose Bierce said that "dawn [is] when men of reason go to bed". Saskia's historical boyfriend Benjamin Franklin once said, "Sleep later. There will be enough sleep in the grave." Bon Jovi, The Cure... "I'll sleep when I'm dead".

It's three in the morning and Marisa Tomei and Robert Downy, Jr. are on the tellie making me absolutely nostalgic for Italy. (On a side note, Robert Downy has gotten better with age. Take note: Iron Man vs. Only You.) I have bags under my eyes the size of that welcome entrance to the Louis Vuitton shoppe on Champs Elysees (yeah, my under-eye baggage would make Lady Liberty proud), and yet I am still searching the depths of the world wide web for scientific articles on bones whilst wishing I was a speed-reading machine.

Why hasn't anyone created a topic-specific scholastic search engine? Oh, wait... Google Scholar, love of my life, just one-up your system and make it Anthro-specific, please?


Thank goodness for my late-night companions: espresso and the Turner Classic Movies channel.


Here's the poem they referenced in Only You (1994).

You who never arrived
in my arms, Beloved, who were lost
from the start,
I don't even know what songs
would please you. I have given up trying
to recognize you in the surging wave of the next
moment. All the immense
images in me-- the far-off, deeply-felt landscape,
cities, towers, and bridges, and unsuspected
turns in the path,
and those powerful lands that were once
pulsing with the life of the gods-
all rise within me to mean
you, who forever elude me.

You, Beloved, who are all
the gardens I have ever gazed at,
longing. An open window
in a country house--, and you almost
stepped out, pensive, to meet me.
Streets that I chanced upon,--
you had just walked down them and vanished.
And sometimes, in a shop, the mirrors
were still dizzy with your presence and, startled,
gave back my too-sudden image. Who knows?
perhaps the same bird echoed through both of us
yesterday, seperate, in the evening...

-Rainer Maria Rilke