Best Days

Today was one of the best days of this year.

I played hooky from lab (even though technically it is spring break, i'm supposed to always be in lab)

I went to my Little Sister's school and met her teachers and sat in on her classes
We played chess in her afterschool program...went to my lab..and went to a carribean restaurant for dinner.

I came home to a package!
and my kitty who is naughty but mine.

and talked to my aunty, cousin and neice cousin-who has rechristened me an old nickname...

the sun shone all day today (everyday i know) and it looked a lot like spring was coming.

tomorrow...back to the lab where i have a rekindled sense of hope.

News12

So I called the newschannel today about dominos pizza...
I wonder if I'm gonna be one of those old people that writes to cereal companies

Back At It

I wrote Govenor Perry tonight regarding Shaquanda Cotton.
The state of Texas gets on my damn nerves....
What absolutely drives me insane is the fact that this same state perpetrates THIS nonsense

Worn out

I've been riled up tonight. I seem to get riled up quite a bit...
Dominos has PISSED ME OFF!!!!

So, they have this irritating habit of having the delivery guy use a pen to make an imprint of my credit card at the door on the receipt I sign. I don't know who these people are that deliver my pizza. I don't know who they know. I don't know whether the stores are shredding those tiny receipts or not. I don't like the practice AT ALL!!!

I've called the store trying to handle it.
I've written their online complaint department.
I've called their complaint department.
They don't answer, they ignore, they refer, they forward, they do nothing.
I became livid. Livid is not a good way for me to be.

So tonight I researched the laws on the FACTA of 2003, and when I was certain I was in good standing,

I wrote the BBB
I wrote their online complaint department again, and
I wrote the Federal Trade Commission.

Now I'm tired and worn out. Now to wait and see whether anything will happen this time around.

I'm crazy

Week Ends, Another Begins

Nothing spectacular to report....
except that I'm especially proud of my mom for FINALLY receiving the help she needs for her mental illness. She is doing quite well, and doesn't say mean things to me anymore. I used to cry/get upset after talking with her and would suffer tremendously for needing to do so anyway. Now I look forward to calling her like I do my other girlfriends. It is really nice.

She is adjusting to the fact that she isn't sleepy at 7pm....which is good in my view...She has no concept of the fact that people that "have lives" are actually awake to live them. Now she needs to get busy, but I'm leaving it to her to find her way through this new terrain....

Bumps

I bumped into The Crush that Could Have Been yesterday again. We talked briefly about what he was up to this semester. I wonder if we will be friends in the long run. He has a girlfriend apparently. I didn't really care. We laughed a bit before parting ways.

I'm starving. I don't know why. I ate this morning...atypical..so I should be fine.

My research is yielding negative results.

Part time

I've moved to 4 days a week here at the HoTel. I'm liking it better...but could go down to three and be happier. I don't know why I'm holding on to this job when CLEARLY there is no need to. I think I like to be overwrought and overburdened.

On Friday I saw the Crush that Could have Been..and thought again that he was definitely a cutie. We've bumped into one another pretty much daily since Monday of last week. One-on-One I notice him....but add 5 people to the mix and he disappears. He is very tall. Quite cute.

I've run some experiments and haven't seen the results. Its getting my goat.

"One Drop Rule"

I have never been as militant or black power or just plain black as I have been since I've moved here. I'm not certain if the lack of black people in and around campus is indicative of the backgrounds of the people that have taken up residence here...

Maybe it is a positive thing that students and teachers alike feel free to ask the questions they do or make the statements they make... One could definitely argue that.

I don't mind telling members of my lab why it is that "black people love R. Kelly".
I don't even mind translating some words from our language from time to time....heck I know spanish and now a whole lot of swahili.

What bothers me is the extreme ignorance that appears to be rampant in white people that insist they know (although completely uneducated) what they don't...to the diminishment of our history. This seems to be a trait completely lacking in people that are of other ethnicities.

Yesterday, a lab-mate of mine tried to correct me when jumping into a conversation that I was having with another member who had asked about the particulars of certain aspects of our culture.... I was deftly explaining the "one-drop rule"...dumbing it down as it were so as not to have to spend too much time even talking about it when she interjected:

"Thats just a myth!"

I was floored by her ignorance, and equally as irritated with her arrogance in deigning to correct me on my own fucking history. Most white people I know in this country don't have a clue because they aren't taught it in public schools and don't elect to take it in college. We are steeped in the shit from birth.

Don't get me wrong...I like the girl...a lot, but when people make you angry, they do. And I was hot. Still am. So I'm blogging, as usual, to get it out and be done with it.

The gentleman in question heard me out after her interjection, accepted it as truth and we continued our discussion letting it drift naturally back to the work we were doing.

Erasing B'more off the list

I have a list of places that I refuse to live in America. Not because I wouldn't want to live in them, but because I have a personal knowledge of the police impact on life in them. Among them (but not limited to) are the whole state of Georgia and all of Texas. Today, I added the much beloved Baltimore to the list. Frankly, the avenue through to maryland from Delaware to all points south is peppered with so many police that I would add the whole state to the list if I get any further word of mouth from my friends and family.

BALTIMORE -- Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon is weighing in on this week's police arrest of a 7-year-old boy on a dirt bike.
"It is clear to me that the arrest was wrong, that the officers on the scene should not have arrested the child, and on behalf of the City of Baltimore I apologize to the boy and his parents," she said at a press conference Friday, flanked by the police commissioner.

Police commissioner Leonard Hamm, while noting concern over the nuisance of dirt bikes, said that the arrest of the 7-year-old "was not consistent with my philosphy of trying to solve problems in the neighborhoods" and would be investigated internally.

The police commissioner said that the officer had the option of having a conversation with the parent or confiscating the bike. He declined to discuss how the incident unfolded, saying more time was needed to complete the internal investigation.

Mungo, who turned 7 last month, was sitting on the bike Tuesday with the motor off on a sidewalk near his home in east Baltimore when an officer grabbed him by the collar and pulled him off the bike, according to his mother Kikisa Dinkins, who witnessed the arrest.

"I told them to let go of my baby," Dinkins recalled. "Since when do you pull a 7-year-old child by his neck and drag him?"

Dinkins said she called for a police supervisor to intervene, but the confrontation continued to escalate after the supervisor arrived on the scene.

"They started yelling at him, 'Do you know what you did wrong, son?"' Dinkins said. "He was so scared he ran upstairs."

Police confiscated the dirt bike and placed her son under arrest.

At the station, young Gerard was handcuffed to a bench and interrogated, before he was released to the custody of his parents, his mother said. Hamm could not confirm that the child was fingerprinted and photographed. He said that would not have been normal procedure in a non-felony case.

The zero-tolerance arrest policy of former Mayor Martin O'Malley, now Maryland's governor, has become a contentious issue in Baltimore, with State's Attorney Patricia Jessamy, some judges and civil rights activists complaining such arrests occur most often in poor, black neighborhoods.

Dixon, said Friday, that the arrest isn't reflective of her philosophy on policing, and Hamm agreed.

Dinkins said the incident has scarred her son. "This has changed his life," she said. "He'll never be the same."

What I don't and can never understand, is how grown people can look at this story and not understand how this behaviour perpetrated against a small child could easily be translated into a situation such as the Groom Shooting and not comprehend how it is possible that cops can be biased based on training and indoctrination into ignorance.

Further, it galls me that people don't understand how and why grown black men can be afraid of the police when they are not guilty of committing a crime. We are taught to avoid the police at all costs unless you absolutely need them, and never to trust their asses when you do.

How much sex are you getting?

I don't wanna know really.

I just read an article about sex in Japan. Apparently the Japanese are too stressed to have it. What struck me was the following statement:

The situation is dismal," Kitamura said. "My research shows that if you don't have sex for a month, you probably won't for a year."

Is that a fact? I can do you one or two better Kitamura.

Who Knew?

who knew that backstabbing was so prevalent in graduate school?

what i don't understand is the need to compete with members of your cohort when, in the end, we are all going to get the same fricking degree....why must you try to trip me on my journey? it never works people!!!

i hate working with some of my classmates....they are dumbasses.

and they grin a lot too.

Doing good

The professor of the course I TA told me that he was "glad to have me on staff as a TA" today. That felt good. He is a reknown scientist, and a great teacher. It wasn't a meaningless compliment.

The Thing About Malaika IX

83. I ABSOLUTELY LOATHE DELL COMPUTER TECHNICAL SUPPORT!!!!!!

The Thing About Malaika VIII

We're almost there folks. Here is the latest installment of what I plan to be 101 things about me. Search the archives if you are interested in the rest...




73. An idiotic fear I have noticed that I have is the fear of opening the bathroom stall at my night job and finding a dead person inside.

74. My favorite word is YES

75. My least favorite word is NO

76. I love the sounds of acoustic guitar, piano, children laughing

77. I hate the sound of the banjo, any sound going on during my quiet time or movies, and fingernails on chalkboard.















78. If I could choose a profession other than my own I would like to be an architect or property investor.

79. I want about 5 kids....All at one time.


80. I'm also afraid of the Blue Man Group.
On my most recent trip to Boston, my friends wanted to go to one of their concerts. I was thrilled when the plan was scrapped. I was terrified of being the One Person that got pulled up on stage with them, or worse yet...the person they interacted with when they "popped up" somewhere in the audience. I envisioned myself screaming and crying in terror.

81. I'm an Aries. But I don't really believe in that stuff.


82. I can't NOT answer a ringing phone.

Fortune Cookies and Crushes

I ordered chinese yesterday..

My cookie said: "You are headed in the right direction"

Now thats what I'm talking about!!!

************
I have a new crush! I sound excited huh?
I've been trying to find a crush since Red Dot left last semester and have really been coming up empty. There was one guy that I thought I could like...but I noticed that everytime I saw him in a class or something I really DIDN'T notice him. When the teacher would go around the class and have everyone say their name, and he'd say his, I'd say "Oh its him". But before he spoke up, I wouldn't even know he was in the room.

This other guy I notice, no matter what. I'm not crazy about his look or anything like that...but he has an air of mystery about him. Tres sexy...sort of.. So, I'm calling him Mysterio. Cool huh? He is taller than me which is positive...and I think he has a girlfriend at home..would have to. But since it isn't confirmed and never will be...he will suffice.

I've actually mentioned him here before. He was the "white guy". Yep he is white. Again, I hold no hope of getting with this guy...from everything I can ascertain about him, we have nothing in common except studying science, and I can live with that. Life around here was getting somehat boring without a crush though. We'll see if I can become gaga over this dude or not.
***********
Poppin Fresh gave a talk today. It was really good. He is really getting swole around the midsection...like I can talk...

Boston

I drove to Boston over the weekend where I spent the evening with my friend and met someone new. It was really nice. I was wicked sleepy when I got home, but whatever it was worth it.

Naturally I got lost....but it wasn't as bad as usual.

I've decided to switch to part time here....I don't really dig this gig anymore.

Sleep deprived

I lost an hour of sleep tonight...because of my girl L. She is really tripping!!!
I can't deal with it anymore. Or her...I decided a long time ago (well last year really) that anytime someone caused me stress such that I was left in a sleepless or teary state, they had to go. She's gotta go.

My friend

My friend L is tripping. HArd. I can't be bothered. I actually snapped on her. Good or bad...the email is sent and I'm not really sorry I did it. I was feeling intensely irritated by her method of re-contact. My family invented the guilt complex. I'm fricking immune.

If she writes me back cool...if not...cool too. Its been too damned long, and I've been making efforts along the way. Efforts that were met with nothing in return. Get a grip chick.