Crushing Krisis

June 3, 2001 by krisis

Things i learned while shopping: Whatever is on the end of the aisle is a impulse buy, even if it’s 2for1 Captain Crunch and you’re convinced that it’s exactly what you meant to eat for breakfast today // Unless you own a lemon farm, buying lemonade in bulk is the same price and the same ingredients [as making your own] // The people who bag groceries really enjoy it if you make light of your stupidity instead of just complaining // Quarts of milk are going out of style // I should buy Quaker granola bars by the gross rather than spending $20 on them at a time // However, if you find something you really like to eat on sale and it doesn’t spoil, there is no reason not to buy as many of them as you can afford // Yet, nonspoilable food tends to just sit in my cabinet while i order takeout, so i have to find a happy medium. // Knives are cheaper at kitchen stores, but they look sharper when sitting next to a lone spatula in the cook-wares aisle // I shouldn’t have to spend money on food for two weeks unless i have a growth spurt. // If you buy a quart of yogurt, you are not expected to eat it all on one serving. Really. // Cream cheese expires too fast to be appreciated. // You cannot free all of the lobsters, and even if you could you’d eventually get hungry and eat your roommate’s favourite one.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/06/3908998/

June 3, 2001 by krisis

As much as you’ll catch me on IM in the dead of the night have deep conversations about emotion in high relief and how The David is really looking in two different directions, i am honestly a morning person. The only problem is, you have to find a way to get me out of the bed, into the shower, and then into clean clothes. Then, and only then, am i truly a morning person. Today Kim and I hit the floor of the sparkling new Superfresh down on Deleware avenue not a second later than 8:15, and we were giggling right down every aisle. Somehow i wound up spending $130 on groceries, which makes sense because i’m cooking a huge italian meal tonight and i decided i should start eating breakfast, but it made me feel like much more of a grownup. Not just because i spent all of that on groceries, but i never once stopped to think “if i just starve myself twice as long as these would last i could have a new guitar.” Somehow valuing the experience of trying to operate a self-checkout lane and knowing i could afford whatever the food came to is worth more (i know, it’s blaspheme) than a new guitar (or a second night of Madonna tix…).

What happened afterwards was the real proof i’m a morning person: i stormed into the apartment with groceries and announced to poor tortured Matt that i was defrosting the refridgerator by hand and that he should put on some good music. And, four solid inches of ice later (don’t even ask…) we have a clean empty refridgerator and lots of new groceries and it’s full-on spring and i just feel like someone flicked the little on switch that’s hidden behind my right earlobe and suddenly now i’m all powered up and ready to appreciate something.

All of that in exchange for three hours of sleep. But, it’s not really how much you sleep, it’s when you wake up.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/06/3908916/

June 2, 2001 by krisis

Revised list: 9 true, 1 false.

I have had exactly one serious scrape or cut, ever, and it wasn’t even that serious.
I used to have a foot fetish before i understood what was supposed to be attractive about people.
True: In my life i have consumed under 1 gallon combined of beer and/or cola.
I still fit into my first pair of jeans.
Before this year i had cried exactly twice since i left grade school.
True: I haven’t shared a residence with more than one person at a time since i was 4.
True: I was the reigning math word-problem champion in our Christian School League for two years running.
True: I have never eaten a cut of steak other than filet mignon when i was little, because my mom liked it.
I have never been outside of this time zone.
False! ~~For the duration of highschool i claimed i had my first and only kiss to that point playing spin the bottle in 7th grade to avoid further romantic scrutiny.~~
Until next year i will have spent a third of my life on welfare, a fifth of my life in braces, and nearly half my life without ever having a friend enter my bedroom.
I learned to subtract from playing Monopoly.
False! ~~After my 5th birthday I have had a birthday party every even-numbered year of my life, until this year broke the streak.~~
True: I briefly organized my 200+ cd spines to make a color spectrum, but the stress of having both black, grey and white Tori Amos cds made me give it up.
True: Up until i stopped knowing what i wanted to be, i wanted to be a veterinarian.
I was the worst reader in my first grade class.
True: A girl kissed me aproximately 3 years, 2 months, and 2 hours after when i originally asked a girl if she’d kiss me.
True: The first time i was ever on stage i didn’t want to be there, and i forgot all of the words.
True: In fifth grade i was the only student who decided to drop music class in favor of private (non-musical) study.
True: I haven’t thrown up since 7th grade save for one nasty experience with Aftershock.
I refused to wear anything coloured navy to the point of a temper tantrum until it became one of my school colors last year.
Both girls i’ve ever asked out on a date wound up kissing my best friends.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/06/3900342/

June 2, 2001 by krisis

Okay, here’s some quickies.

#6 is true. I haven’t shared a residence with more than one person at a time since i was 4. My parents separated when i was four, and since i’ve gotten to college i’ve only had one roommate at a time. This streak looks as though it will be broken next year, since we’re looking at 4-bedroom houses.

#8 is true. I have never eaten a cut of steak other than filet mignon when i was little, because my mom liked it. I’ve had all sorts of processed steak and beef products, but to this point i’ve never had a piece of a cut of steak (and i never liked filet mignon either).

#19 is true. In fifth grade i was the only student who decided to drop music class in favor of private (non-musical) study. After the aforementioned Christmas show, we were all given the option to quit music class to do work during that period; this was the music teacher’s way of telling us that we should definitely keep playing an instrument. Of course, i quit without a second thought, and since i had straight A’s anyway i usually just helped Ms. Mann grade tests while everyone else was in music class. Subsequently, i was forced to teach myself to read music from the from the choirgirl hotel book at the beginning of my Senior year.

However, #10 is false! This statement is an utter and total fabrication: for the duration of highschool i claimed i had my first and only kiss to that point playing spin the bottle in 7th grade to avoid further romantic scrutiny. I’ve never even watched anyone play spin the bottle, let alone participated, and i was pretty vocal about having never been kissed all throughout highschool (probably one of the reasons no one wanted to date me… since i was almost proud of not dating anyone up to that point). I made it a point not to talk about my romantic inexperience when i arrived at Drexel, and thus i had to tell my first kiss that she was my first kiss, at which point we kissed again. So… obviously i was only supposed to gab about my romantic inexperience when i stood to directly gain pity-kisses from it (which is not to say i wasn’t offered pity kisses in high school … i was offered them left and right. However, there’s a difference between a pity kiss and kissing someone for real and then having a pity kiss.)

That leaves the requisite 9 truths and a lie. Any guesses?

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/06/3900280/

June 2, 2001 by krisis

#18 is true. The first time i was ever on stage i didn’t want to be there, and i forgot all of the words. Okay… this one is a little fudgy, but it holds up. I had obviously been on stage before this experience, whether it be to accept my treasured Christian leauge math awards (i obviously intend to bring that Christmas shows. However, that’s not where it gets fudgy; the first two times i was a featured performer on a stage was playing my recorder in fifth grade, and narrating a part of a play in fifth grade. Both events had to have happened in fifth grade because i associate them with the same teacher, and they both had to have happened at the Christmas show because the only other show was the Sping show and that was done by the middle school that year. So, i’m going on the basic assumption that the narration occurred before the recorder playing, but either way this works out because i definitely remember not wanting to play the recorder and not knowing what i was playing while i was onstage.
up once a day now), or to stand way in the background of the chorus in silly school

Anyway, there was some narration in the Christmas play about babies and mangers and love that needed to be read by someone, and anyone even remotely interested in having a part in the show had already been merrily drafted. So, the teacher in charge of casting decided that it was futile to poll the ranks of students for a reluctant actor for such an important piece of the show, but to instead draft the best reader in entire grade school. Which, happily enough, was me. However, i thought the whole Christmas show concept was incredibly silly, as we tended to do essentially the same “god is god, materialism is bad, praise the baby jesus” schtick every year, and i stubbornly refused to take the part. And, then, mysteriously, i was somehow cajoled to do it (i’m sure they preyed upon my ego, as that had to be the only way they could have convinced me).

What no one deigned to mention to me before i agreed to be in the play was that i wasn’t exactly narrating – in that i was calmly reading from a text as a narrator would – instead i was supposed to memorize the whole thing and then spit it back out convincingly while staring into the audience with a smile plastered onto my face.

I honestly tried to memorize and smile and all of that, but it wasn’t in the stars. I was terrible at memorizing things (bible verses were my dreaded nemesis), i didn’t like to be put up in front of that many people to perform (or for any other reason (other than awards, obviously)), and i had absolutely zero projection skills (i was still relatively meek, probably due to my beaver-sized buck teeth). So, when it came time for the show i was ushered out onto the stage protesting that i needed the book to read from even though they had already conceeded that i could have a microphone. So, when it came time for my moment in the spotlight (literally, right as the spotlight hit me) i gave the teacher who was on-book in the first row a combined look of imminent dread and fear, and she raced to the stage and handed me the book, and i wound up reading the narration into the microphone perfectly. The end.

(Ironically, memorization, getting up in front of people, and projection are now three of my most useful traits. I’m not sure if wound up being so performance oriented as a response to this particular incident or not, but i do always remember being vaguely jealous of the people who auditioned for parts in grade school. Also, there are lots of hints about the other truths and lies in this entry, but some of them are slightly misleading.)

https://crushingkrisis.com/2001/06/3899712/