Utter Rubbish

Ok, so I slept REALLY well last night, which is unusual for me.  Gotta love the feather/down mattress. Anywho, I don't really remember dreaming until this morning, when I do my regular wake-up-30-times-to-check-the-clock-to-see-if-its-time-to-get-up routine.  When I do this routine, I normally come out with wacky dreams...but this one was really vivid... 

So, for some reason I'm a studio audience watching the Colbert Report...or maybe it wasn't even a studio; I might have just been backstage.  Regardless, for some reason Colbert himself comes back to a group of us and starts selecting us to demonstrate some stuff on his show.  I distinctly remember him asking whether or not there were any fencers in the crowd.  Of course I raise my hand.  So, he takes me backstage at the set to get me fixed up with what I assume would be regulation fencing gear.  Instead, we pass through what seems to be an entourage of people getting ready for a huge opera in the same complex as we and get to the shoe section.  Where he hands me a pair of purple sneakers/dance/running shoes.  They basically seemed like a cross between slippers and sneakers.  Not good for fencing.  I ask him about it and he whisks me away to another part of the studio and for one reason or another we lay down on the floor.  He tells me something like, you're a really great person, I read your file! For some reason, I'm only a little freaked out about this, considering that he got my info on the internet.  At this point, I'm guessing that I felt more flattered than weirded out.  I tell him that I should be warming up/practicing all the while thinking about some subtle and non-fangirlish way of asking for his autograph.  Instead, he lays down with me and wraps his arms around me (!), shushing me and telling me we're going to take a nap and then kissing me on my forehead!   

What did I do, you ask, gentle reader? I laid on my side with my head against his chest, wrapped my arms around him and napped, of course! What any good fangirl would do if she were propositioned by Stephen Colbert to fence on his show in front of a gaggle of opera goers in totally inappropriate purple shoes and no other regulation gear!  *facepalm*

I have NO idea what was on my subconscious mind last night, but MAN I had the worst dreams about spiders. I'm not even an arachnaphobe but whoo, this one was a doozy. I just remember going upstairs in my old house (I think it was, at least) and heading to my room and seeing that these two HUGE funnel webs were behind the twin beds up in my new room. As if in response to my entering the room, two of the LARGEST spiders I have never seen in my life came out of those funnels. I'm talking Harry Potter size...at LEAST the size of a medium sized dog. They didn't attack me, but merely scuttled back into their funnels. Regardless, I didn't feel, I dunno, *safe* or at ease anymore in that room so I went elsewhere. But from what little I can remember, they seemed to pop up everywhere I went, thoroughly unsettling me and grossing me out. I could barely get up this morning due to the mental activity of the night before. Stupid spiders.

Before I drifted into dreamland, I remember feeling the most unusual sensation; a band of very light pressure curved over the middle of my brow. I almost felt like I was being eased into some sort of alternate state of being. Very strange, and kinda cool and interesting to my occult sensibility. For a brief moment, I really felt relaxed...more than I have in a long time. It was at that point that I drifted into what promised to be a peaceful dreamland. Stupid spiders.

Fencing has started up. Monday's practice was great...I always get the best feeling when I see the newbies interested in this sport. I'm always very envious of them for being at the serendipitous point at the beginning of their college career. As an old fart, I do miss those days sometimes. Either way, tonight's practice will hopefully find me getting to know new names and faces and getting my butt back in the shape it used to be in!

I've finally narrowed my subject matter down for my thesis. Whatever I write about, it will involve Sappho's influence upon Baudelaire and Swinburne. I haven't figured out the specifics yet, but I need to do something of the sort tonight before I present my thesis advisor with a working syllabus for our course of study. I really like this professor; she and I really connect when it comes to our tastes in literature. For example, she told me a few days ago that my topic really "seemed and felt right". In my relief, I told her the same; it DOES feel right to me and hopefully, the more I research, the more "right" my ideas will seem.

Classes have been great. My Feminist Criticism class continues to show me all the subtle (and not so subtle) nuances of a very involved political, and academical revolution. I'm not sure who I side with (since there ARE sides); the feminists of the 60s and 70s who worked hard at creating one voice for all women, and who focused mainly on women within male texts and recovery of female-authord texts, or whether I hold with the new trends that began in the 80s: the poststructualist and post-colonial camps that work on decentering the idea of gender identity by focusing on the differences between women today, taking into account race, culture, sexual preference and the like. Feminism is working hard to address all the issues that "white" feminism seemed to leave out in the 70's and in doing so, is now appealing to a wider range of groups. Its really fascinating stuff and its great to see new critics working out critical modes that dont splinter feminism through vitrolic attacks and blame placing on "who ruined our peaceful politic?" but would rather encourage its growth through exploration of these multifarious identity modes. Pretty neat stuff.

Well, tomorrow (the 8th) is a special day and a special anniversary. Check back tomorrow for a special entry. =^)