Seems to Me

Seems to me... I've got this song stuck in my head... seems to me... living alone my drive me mad... seems to me... my sanity has just walked away!

If you listen to that song and it doesn't make you want to get up and dance and burrow it's way into your mind to be hummed and sung to yourself at random times (such as in the shower) I just don't think we'll ever understand each other.

It's Day Two of my house sitting gig in the West Village. I'm loving it here, but I don't think I'd do very well living alone permanently. Abner (the cat I'm watching) likes me, but is still a little weary of me, and hasn't snuggled up to me yet. I'm hoping by tomorrow when he realizes that I'm the person who's feeding him routinely he'll start to become more affectionate.

Last night Jordana and I went out and sampled a few different places. We started with sushi (for her), I skipped lunch so I went for the bigger chicken teriyaki dinner. I had another few hours of drinking ahead of me, so it was important to get something a little more substantial in my tum. After a fantastic dinner we wandered around Hudson and eventually Bleecker for a bit. We ended up in a bar 1856 or 64 or something like that, which I'm convinced I saw a blurb of in New York Magazine or maybe Time Out. Either way, it was a western themed bar with a wonderful wall of confiscated fake IDs. The bouncer looked at my own ID five or six times, they must be pretty tough there.

After a few minutes of deciding should we stay or should we go, and if we do stay how to get to the very crowded bar, a dude offered to buy us drinks. Lovely. He was a nice guy, from Morristown actually, but kind of boring to talk to. If he wasn't so persistent about getting Jordana's number before he left (he wants to take her for dinner) I'd think he was uninterested in talking to us. After he left, and we were debating how long to stay for another guy offered us drinks. Vodka pineapples for us all night. Well, actually, I had a Malibu pineapple as my third drink, which was much better, but the vodka pineapples were a better choice for going the drunken path. Packs a bit more of a punch. The second guy (whose name I know starts with an "A" but I can't remember the rest) succeeded where Keith failed. He got us to take shots. It actually wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I haven't taken a sober shot in a VERY long time. And I did not make a fool out of myself. WHOO HOO! While "A" was friendly, Jordana and I were starting to get bored and decided to tell him that Adelle (who was home watching the Olympics with the fam) was texting us from Gasoline and was waiting for us for over an hour. While Jordana was in the bathroom "A" became super touchy and I knew we made the right choice. Ew.

Three free drinks, two shots, and not a penny spent later we started making our way up to meatpacking. Funny story, last week while having dinner with my grandmother she asked where I've been going out at night and when I told her meatpacking she had a horror filled look on her face and said "WHY?!" not realizing there was any nightlife and thinking I was hanging out by butcher shops. Anyways, after walking for what felt like forever Jordana needed to use the bathroom so we decided to stop at the next place we came across. We decided to stop at the place with the velvet rope, because doesn't a velvet rope make everything seem more appealing?

I don't know the place of where we were, but it was a small place with tables and couches everywhere, one of those bottle service places. Jordana was shocked to hear I've never had bottle service before. A guy named Orman or Omran, something like that, offered to get us drinks at his table. Unfortch, his table was empty of drinks, so we started dancing for a minute while he waited for the waiter to come back over. That's when he made a shocking relevation- he went to camp (and spoke very highly of) a ditzy jappy idiot we went to high school with. Our respect for him dropped very quickly. While he and J started dancing a foreign guy walked over to me and said "I'd like to buy you a drink from my table". He poured me a VERY strong seabreeze and we started dancing. Five minutes in I realized I needed to get away from this dude. People complain about girls who use guys for free drinks, but seriously it's just not cool when they start groping you and being very inappropriate while dancing. I'm not a prude, but I'm not going to let you touch my boobs because you gave me a drink. That doesn't make me a tease, I think it makes me not a tramp! If these guys just turned down the skeeze level a bit they'd probably get the girls to stick around a little longer, and not just until the drinks run out (or until their skeeziness scares us away). Jordana was dancing next to me and I started blinking the morse code, SOS. She didn't catch on. Eventually I got my point across with other body language and we escaped to the back of the bar. A cute guy from Holland tried to talk to me, but I couldn't understand half of what he was saying and his shouting in my ear was painful, so we parted ways. I sat down and drunk texted while Jordana danced, pretty bored. Around 2ish we left in search of a better time.

Next up was the Hotel Gansevoort. Jordana and I were talking to these two guys on the roof. It was beautiful up there! My guy, Colin, recognized some blonde girl walking by and swore he would be right back. After about five minutes, which felt more like ten, this hot guy I had been making eyes at all night swooped in and sat down. We started talking and it turns out he was German. I couldn't remember his name (I kept thinking Claus, but it was actually Cristian). Just when the German sat down, of course Colin returned. He saw his seat was occupied and walked away. I was a little bummed. The German was way hotter than Colin, but I actually though Colin was fun to talk to. Oh well. The German and I went inside to get a drink, but ended up making out instead. I was kinda creeped out. I have a weird thing with Germans, I don't know if it's their accent or too much history class, but they scare me a bit. I'm still not entirely sure why I gave him my number. When he called on Sunday my gut told me not to call him back. Sorry Claus- er Cristian. C'mon, he was a tourist anyways.

BoneheadedEST moment of the night- I walked back to the apt by myself at 4am. I pretended to be on my cell phone the whole time (it was too late to actually call anybody, Jordana was the only person awake and she was on the subway). It was actually a little fun, I got to basically converse with myself out loud, like a crazy person :) And since I'm able to post this, I obviously made it home in one piece.

A Very Busy Weekend Part Un

What a busy weekend! It pretty much started Thursday evening when I went to McMurphy's with the ladies (Cobb, Kath, Sam, Katy, Lauren H). On our way there we were talking about the "free cash Thursdays" a raffle McMurphy's has been doing since Spring Break. I suggested that if one of us won we buy the rest of the group a round of drinks. Sure enough, Katy won! I screamed. It was pretty exciting. Katy was supposed to win $30 but they accidentally gave her $40. The night was pretty much amazing all around.

The next day I managed to roll out of bed and off to my 11:15 discussion on time. At noon I had my second meeting for my trip to France. I'm SO ridiculously excited for this trip. It's going to be absolutely incredible. We picked out the rooming for the trip, as well. I had the choice of a single, double, or one triple. The triple is the biggest room in the villa we're staying in. It's got a giant balcony (as you can see in the picture) and is the room that everybody wants to come hang out in. I made friends with the two girls who were asking to be put in the triple, and am now going to be living with them this summer! I'm not worried at all about living in a triple, I've lived in mutliple triples at Alpha Chi and even a FIVE and loved it. I think this will be a blast. And the balcony is GORGEOUS. I cannot wait to live there! This summer is going to be amazing. I think I've said that a number of times, but the level of my excitement is through the roof. I'm going to be a wreck at the airport, I'll probably be bouncing off the walls. Just the fact that the trip is a little over a month away makes me squeal. I can't even write this entry without grinning!

Friday night we (Kate, Lauren H, Katy, Sam, Kath, Cobb) decided to get our dance on, and broke out of our McMurphy's comfort bubble and went to the Pub. For some reason there was no cover fee (nice!) and the dance floor was open. It's become quite obvious that guys seem to ignore my friends and I when we stand in a circle, so we attempted to spread out into groups of two or three. It was quite successful. There were some cute guys who came over to dance with all of us. I was mostly excited about the rockstar look I had, thanks to my dance instructor, Katy doing double duty and styling my hair. It looked so cool! We had a great time. Unfortunately, we had also decided to attend sigep's final frat party for old time's sake. It was pretty lame, and even weirder that most of the younger brothers didn't recognize us. All in all lots of awkwardness. What are you gonna do? We ended up leaving on the earlier side, not before making fun of skanky freshman girls of course. If you're looking to find the fakest baked, short skirt wearing, thong-hanging out, dancing on table (sometimes without underwear) whores then a frat party is the place to go. It's kind of like watching a train wreck. You're disgusted and try looking away, but part of you is just so fascinated you have to turn and watch.

Saturday I went to the mall with Cobb and Lauren H on a mission to get a striped cotton dress from Victoria's Secret Pink and maybe some shorts. I couldn't find the dress in my size, but I did stumble upon some really cute AF shorts on sale. They're perfect for France!!! We had to race back to Amherst because my cousin Austin texted me that his train was actually running on time (not late as he had previously told me). I picked him up at the station and hung out at the house for a little while until we joined the gang for Chili's.

Austin was here for the weekend to check out UMass/party with me. He's 17 but definitely a lot wilder than myself. My family had bets going on which one of us would corrupt the other more this weekend. Being the good cousin I am, I purchased two forties for him and let him mix me some drinks while I found a party for us to attend. Mindy's friend was having a party on Kellog St, just around the corner from the center of town. The party was a little empty at first, but picked up rather quickly, to the point where the rooms were bursting with people. I lost Austin a few times, and was a little nervous. My friend Jen told me I looked like the girl in "Can't Hardly Wait" looking for her friend the whole night. I was making sure he wasn't wandering off, getting lost, or stealing stuff (like the rice cake seen in that picture). Still, even with all my worrying it was a great time. Austin and I bonded, caught up on family back home, and even won a game of beruit. I bumped into a fellow blogger, and an old high school classmate. And people say UMass is huge. PSssshhh! Austin and I walked over to Antonio's at about 1:45, got some pizza, and rejoined the party. Unfortunately, he was pretty exhausted so shortly after we walked back to my house. As I was heading into Sam's room to recap her and Kathleen on the night, Austin wandered past me and went into my friend's room, thinking it was mine. OOPS! Yeah, I guess he was pretty drunk at that point. He woke up a very sleep deprived Dubs, who was not as amused as the rest of my friends. I sent Austin to the correct room while I spoke with my friends. Kathleen decided that she wants to marry Austin- he's "gorgeous". He's also 5 1/2 years younger than her, so I found it pretty amusing.

Oh my, this blog is SO LONG! I'll have to recap the second half of the weekend (which was a little more relaxed) in my next entry. I don't want this to look TOO convoluted!

My Last Formal!

So I never found a date to my formal. The livejournal thing was a riot, but deep down I knew it wouldn't exactly pan out, although I was flattered by my fellow blogger's support. Ex-roomie Mindy thought maybe her friend Adam could go, but he wouldn't know if he was available (due to an unfinished lab) until about an hour before the formal. When I found out he couldn't go I started to cry, which was really lame of me, but more so stupid, because I already had my mascara on. I had to tilt my head backwards and hold q-tips at the corners of my eyes for a few minutes to avoid the onslaught of black ink that would run down my face the second it got wet. I was successful, and the night was somewhat successful as well.

The formal was at the Hotel Northampton, which was beautiful. It's a senior tradition in our house that first the seniors take a limo uptown and then meet up with the rest of the party about an hour later. Of course we went to McMurphy's, because it's not even an option that we go anywhere else. It was really fun walking into an empty (except for four people who looked kind of shocked at first) McMurph's in our formal dresses. Since it's somewhat acceptable to drink after 5 (this was approx. 6pm) I think I will have to go there again early when it's completely empty. It was as if we had rented out the bars for just ourselves (and let the other few people hang out since they were harmless). We had complete control of the music, and only had to fight each other for the bartender's attention. It was a blast. And of course we had a photoshoot. The picture to the left was taken from six different cameras at minutely different angles (all the guys were in a row).

It was sad to leave the limo when we arrived at the formal (driving around in a limo all night could really be a party unto itself), but the Hotel Northampton was gorgeous. The food was amazing (I had prime rib), the dancing was fun, and the drinks were pretty good, just super expensive since I was buying for myself all night. But I'm an independent woman and I can take care of myself dammit! Not to say that I didn't appreciate two of my friends lending out their boyfriends for dances, and my friend Lauren sitting with me on the bus home while her boyfriend sat across the aisle, despite my objections that I was alright (I was a little bummed when I saw everybody all cuddled up on the bus). The only time I really cried was along with all the other seniors during the last song, because we realized this was the last time we would all be doing this together. Because of my amazing friends and the great time I always have with them, my night was a success. And my Little won the "Smiley Award" which made me incredibly proud. Despite a broken nose in a car accident a week earlier, she still showed her beautiful face, and smiled :) She's amazing.

The next night I attended a toga party at my friend Dan's, and saw two of the guys who turned me down for the formal. One of them actually had a job interview, and he had gone out of his way to have Dan tell me to have a great time. The other one asked me how the formal was and told me he felt really bad I didn't (because he didn't like "those kinds of things") but hoped I had a good time. I quietly grinded my teeth, but told him I had a very nice time (which I did, but I would have preferred a date). Speaking of the toga party, it was my first, it was also my first time shotgunning a beer (classy, right?), and being at a party that was broken up by the police (they just waltzed right in as we were all jumping up and down singing "You Shook Me All Night Long"). Once again, another great night, capping and excellent weekend, and leading up to my 22nd birthday (which will have to be addressed in my next blog entry.

Greek Goddesses

Hi! My name is Maggie and I am a CREEP!

Okay, so maybe I'm not a total creep, but I do look pretty creepy in this picture. In the past week I've had so many photoshoots, that on Friday night I came to the realization that my friends and I are out of our minds. We were at Panda East and I looked around the table to realize that at least five of us had cameras with us. Come on, why take all your pictures on one camera and pass that camera around afterwards to share the pictures when you can try to compile two or three pictures from four other cameras? That's silly. Nobody thinks like that.

I'm not sure what my point was, but Friday was about reclaiming that lost youth from Thursday. Maybe I should go back a few steps, since I seem to be into telling stories completely backwards. How very artsy of me.

Thursday we had bid day, and then a party later on to celebrate the new girls/the end of recruitment. That's when it occurred to myself and a few other seniors that we are OLD. It's been three years since I was a new member watching all the older sisters talk about how excited they were to get to know us and be done with the hell that can be recruitment. THREE YEARS. Even three semesters ago feels like yesterday. This was too scary. Not to mention all the guys that I spoke to were freshmen and sophomores. This led to a minor anxiety attack the next day.

My dad told me a story about how one of his most depressing moments in life was when he realized he was a senior in college. And that's when I said WHAT? I'm a senior in college? I thought I was a senior in high school! Actually that's not what I said, but I do sometimes feel that way. He then proceeded to tell me that it's been eighteen years since he graduated law school, something i remember fairly well seeing as I was three or four at the time. This only made me feel older. In a wow, I'm old enough to remember eighteen years ago kind of way. Thanks for the pick-me-up Dad. Eventually he calmed my nerves a little bit by reminding me how young I still am, and to enjoy every moment of it.

That's the cue for Panda East to enter the story. My friend Cobb decided we'd celebrate her 22nd birthday by starting with Scorpion Bowls at Panda and then moving up to McMurphy's (our perpetual hangout). First of all, I just want to state for the record that the service at Panda sucks. It has in the past and it did again last night. But where else can you get Scorpion Bowls? I split two big bowls with my friend Lauren, and it ended up that each of us basically drank an entire large scorpion bowl. On my hunt to reclaim my lost youth I found myself opening up a tab at McMurphy's (no cash makes getting drinks feel like freebies at that particular moment, therefore you end up buying more). I purchased a shot (what was I thinking?! I hate taking shots!) and two drinks. This doesn't sound like too much, but let's not forget the giant punch bowl of rum and 151 I had guzzled down an hour earlier. I was so drunk that I forgot to take a million pictures! How ever will I remember such a crazy night years from now? That's what this amazing blog is for! Why else would I announce to the world that I am very much a lush?

I arrived home to find three lost boys with a 30 of beer. Which I proceeded to happily drink. This morning I woke up and my head did not feel so good. All day. And even a little bit at night. As my roommate Courtney likes to say, "Oh My."

AND YET... I felt like I reconnected with my younger self of about two years ago. Crazy nights aren't as common once you're too old and too cool for frat parties. Money runs thin, tolerance grows stronger, and last call is at 1am. There is more of a limit. Last night I not only took it to the limit but went above and beyond. Sure I paid the price the next day, but my anxiety over age seems to have calmed a bit, and I had A TON of fun. I just wish there were more pictures :-P (which brings us full circle again to why I'm a creep).

Let's check back in and see how I'm doing in two months when I'm 22!