was. 
Friday, March 25th
Every now and then I am forced to amend material on my website (take off ugly pictures, delete suggestive comments). I don't want to be mean, this site is not made to make fun of people (well, maybe a little bit, but only at their discretion). So I have a solution: CHECK MY SITE OFTEN. That way, you will see the pictures and comments before I get emails and phone calls to delete them. Thursday, March 24th
Hanging out in Mike's dorm.
To no one's interest, Mike wonders what to wear to an interview, and settles on a shirt from the laundry basket.
And later, George and I take a cab ride to Dojo's for dinner. Wednesday, March 23rd Ok, so I shouldn't have gone out at all. I have a thesis due soon, as well as much more- papers, presentations, work... But I thought I'd go play one game, and I ended up playing until after 1 AM, when I finally lost to this girl, Leah. But I'm still happy. I beat William, Ronnie, George, AJ, and Kyle, in one night. My game with William was the best; I almost ran the table. I played very well. I should've lost to George, and maybe to Kyle, but it's their fault if they decide to get all fancy with their unnecessary bank shots. I'm sure George was just being nice though, and didn't really want the table. And with Kyle, I banked the 8-ball myself. And I'm very happy that I beat Ronnie. I know that if I say something to him, he will say either that he wasn't really trying or that he didn't know we were playing league rules (I played a good safety on him), but I think I deserved to beat him...with the coaches from George, of course =)
Monday, March 21st I found a 24 friend =)
Sunday, March 20th Went to see Butusov of former Nautilus Pompilius (with ex-Kino guitarist Kasparyan) at South Paw in Brooklyn. Pics and clips from the concert are in the music section of this site (TAKE ME THERE). We waited after the concert and I got a photo of me and Butusov!!! So awesome. This is sooo replacing the former ass pic of the week.
Saturday, March 19th
I love my cat. ~
Unfortunately some minors (ahem, Andrew) tagged along, so we went to Commonwealth.
Kevin David Leon Shapel Andrew
~ Second stop, some small family bar. I went in for the pool table. I needed my fix. ~
So I went searching around and found them at the metal bar.
~
Shapel finally fit in.
~ ~
Friday, March 18th Post-Maryland. Stop 1: Cafe Wha?
Oh man, what crazy prices... $10 cover charge plus one drink minimum. I passed by it all the time and had no idea. Stop 2: Bleeker St. Bar Played some pool with Will. Won 2 games, then he won 3. I'll be back soon for a rematch. Stop 3: Final Stop: The Edge I think this was one of the few times I walked in and thought I might have entered the wrong bar. I didn't know anyone there. There were men with big furry hats and women with dollar bills on their shirts. And drunk Bulgarians. Then I saw Pete, and calmed down a bit. Soon enough the regulars started showing up.
Went to Maryland Wednesday through Friday with Anthony and Tori. Thus, the three dates below are reversed, to prevent presenting the trip in reverse. Wednesday, March 16th Wednesday. We drive to Maryland. Anthony goes to check out University of Maryland's Law School, I go to find work and relax, Tori...I don't know...
Most city skylines look more or less the same. New York used to have a unique skyline before someone decided to fly a plane through it. Memphis is pretty unique. They have some huge teepee or something like that. Dallas is also recognizable. The rest (out of the ones I've been to) are harder to distinguish. Baltimore, like many small cities, is really into its teams. There are signs all around supporting them. I like that. Something everyone has in common. 4ish PM We arrive in Baltimore, rather quickly and trafficlessly. The city itself, on the other hand, was one big traffic jam. And the streets are deserted. All the stores close at 4 PM. No people around, only tourists. And the tourists were all Clay People. Let me explain: there was a convention in Baltimore of the NCECA, which is some national ceramics club, or something of the sort, so all the hotels were swamped with people from all over the United States who do pottery (kind of like in that movie Ghost where Demi and Patrick are expressing their sexual feelings through pottery and then the Ghostbusters come and suck him into their vacuum). There were 6,000 people! I had no idea so many people were into that stuff, that there were even nationwide meetings about it. And it turned out that some clay people were just as surprised as I was. Anyway, 4ishhhh PM We go to eat at this nearby cafe. Almost everything is closed. There's a Chinese food place that's open, but it's set up such that you can see the kitchen through the window from outside. Hell, I will never want to see how them Chinese people make that food. That will scar me for life. So we go to this cafe. Huge place, no one inside. The manager comes up to the table to make sure we are enjoying our meal. I am. I ordered crab soup with tomato and basil. Mmmmm. I'm going to learn to cook that. Maryland is known for their crabs. That and their harbor. So next we go to their harbor. The waitress at the cafe told us that it gets crazy in Baltimore at night. Every night, parties and fights. The best is watching the girl fights. And that's why the pubs close at 2 AM. Because people are too drunk by then.
They're either very trustworthy people, or they are on their own survival of the fittest mission, because there are no gates or fences separating land from sea. Good thing it wasn't windy or Anthony might have ended up in that water. The rest of the harbor is filled with ESPN Zones, Barnes and Nobles, and Pizzeria Unos. Very Baltimorean. 7ish Tori goes back to the hotel. Anthony and I go bar-hunting. We find a few bars, but they are all empty. The streets are deserted. No lights shining through the windows. We can hear the electricity of a streetlight. We walk through the streets of Baltimore in our hoodies and boots. A guy walks by, doesn't dare look at us. Just looks down, avoiding eye contact, and tries to swiftly pass by. Why? Because we're the weirdos in this town! We're walking around looking like we're going to mug someone. People in Maryland are not like that. I will never be able to walk into a Rite Aid in my slippers in a town like that. 9ish Anthony and I play free pool in the hotel lounge. We are awesome. We own the table. 11ish The three of us go in search of dinner. All the places are closed. Anthony and Tori find a Thai restaurant. I figure I can have Thai anytime in NY, so I go nearby to a bar. The bar has open mic night and 25 cent buffalo wings every Wednesday. It's packed. I go in and sit at the bar. Make conversation with the people around me. The guy on my left has a slight Southern accent. He tells me that Southern is the best accent, that it's the true American accent. He attends culinary school. The guy on my right is a potter. That is, he's here for the convention. We argue about smoking laws and other stuff. He's from Canada. They shouldn't be allowed out of there too often. 12ish and for the rest of the night I am back at the hotel. Anthony can't sleep with the TV off. I can't sleep with the TV on. So we spend the night adjusting the volume back and forth. Thursday, March 17th St. Patrick's Day! Quite a day, too. 8 AM Today, Anthony goes to check out the University of Maryland Law School, located a few blocks from the hotel. I had set up two interviews in the University of Maryland myself, not knowing how far it was from the Law School. Well, the main campus of UM is in College Park, which is in Baltimore County, about an hour away from Baltimore itself. But I figure I have time. My first appointment is at 1 PM. So I walk over to the train station, from which I plan on taking the MARC train straight to College Park. Across the street is a cafe, where I have my breakfast (which was also delicious- maybe it's being somewhere else and trying new food, or maybe it is the food itself, but either way I enjoyed all my meals in Baltimore). 10:30 I walk over to the MARC station, and find out that the trains run twice a day, 8:15 AM and 5:15 PM. That's so messed up!! I need to get to College Park, I have an appointment for a possible job. The cab ride will cost me "an arm and a leg" (I quote the ticket sales lady). The lady says that my only option is to go to Penn Station (yes, they have one of those too) and take a train from there to Washington D.C., and then take the metro from D.C. to College Park. The trains, she says, run once an hour, 20 minutes to the hour. The next train I can make is the 11:40 one. If I arrive in D.C. at 12:40, it's a short metro ride to College Park, so I shouldn't be too late. 11 The lady says that I can take a line train (or whatever they are called) to Penn Station from here. At first I decide to walk, since I have 40 minutes to kill, and Baltimore is not a big town, but I don't want to risk it, so I sit and wait for the line train. The ticket lady told me that the line trains come often, and the ride to Penn Station is 15 minutes. 11:15 A line train comes. But it's not the one I need. I could hop on it and then walk, but I still trust the lady that they come often, and I might as well get on the right train, since I'm already waiting anyway. 11:28 My line train comes. I am mad. The train is slower than the ending of the third Lord of the Rings movie. 11:42 The line train pulls into Penn Station. I dash towards the ticket booth, but it's too late. The train to D.C. has left. I am so screwed. The Penn station ticket sales lady tells me that my other option is to take the business class express train that will leave at 12:09, and will arrive in D.C. at 12:50. That's my best option. So I pay the $35 extra dollars and wait for the train. 12:09 PM No train. 12:10 No train. Etc... 12:17 The expensive business class express train finally pulls into Penn station. I get on, and enjoy the 30 minute luxury ride.
12:55 I arrive in D.C., run around in their little station maze searching for the metro. Red line, wait impatiently, transfer to Green line, wait impatiently. Get to College Park. Run around looking for a shuttle to the University Campus. Get to campus, run around looking for the building. Find building. Run around looking for the lab. 1:35 I am finally here, and I only hope that all that trouble of getting here shows enough devotion that all my flaws will not brought into consideration. 2:55 I am at my other appointment. Five minutes early. 3:30 I walk around the campus, looking for a shuttle back to the metro. I figure I can probably hop on the MARC this time, instead of circumventing through D.C. again. The campus really is beautiful. I'd love to be part of a real college experience. NYU has no campus, no school spirit, no football team. I must've missed out on a lot. But there's still graduate school. Then I can have the experience of both worlds.
4:30 I wait for the MARC train. Talk to a lady from Pittsburg who tells me that she's been to NYC. She starts talking about some school, and tells me if I know it, the one near the Duncan Donuts. Riiight.
6:30 After getting lost within the hotel, I finally get in. I haven't eaten yet. Anthony and Tori had gone driving around, and they found Fells point, apparently a piece out of the Village. But it's still too early, so I go downstairs to play some potters in pool. I end up meeting a few potters. One of them is really good in pool, so he and I end up playing for two hours. 8:55 The potters say that they are going to some African Dance show, and that they're going to go drinking afterwards, so they'll call me (they didn't). I go upstairs, put on some green, and Anthony and I go to Fells Point.
It served cheap green beer and free popcorn, also with some green sparkles or something like that.
Anthony and I practice writing our names upside down. Anthony can't write an upside down "N".
Anthony had decided to give up drinking, because he's an idiot, so I enjoy my chance at cheap beer on the biggest drinking holiday of the year, and Anthony pretends to enjoy his free water. Then we go bar hopping. Basically, Fells point is about three blocks of bars. Not a "piece of the Village" though, unfortunately. Not as many people outside. First of all, there aren't as many people in general. Second of all, why go outside if you can smoke inside. So we go into this place called "Gemini". Looks like a pretty packed bar. Then we notice there's an upstairs.
I feel like we stepped into a St. Patrick's Day Abercrombie Commercial party, or something similar. Everyone is wearing green. Everyone is a college student. It was packed. No one was dancing, everyone was just drinking and talking and laughing. For a while, there wasn't even music playing. And the place itself didn't look like a bar. It looked like we walked into someone's house party. It's like we entered a parallel universe of what could have been. Then we went to a few more bars. Talked to some people. I was getting trashed. Had an Irish car bomb somewhere in the middle of it all, too.
Friday, March 18th 9:30 AM Woke up, thankfully not too hungover. Anthony watched some Matlock, while I stole all the hotel shampoos and teas and all those other goodies.
12ish On the road. I'm zoning out. Suddenly, Tori must pee. No rest areas for miles.
One quarter of a mile later There's a rest area. One mile later Tori wants to finish peeing in a respectable place. We stop at the next rest area. It's sad. A good portion of the pictures from this trip are either of Tori's peeing detour or NYC buildings.
And that was my trip to Maryland. Not very exciting, I must say. I did talk to a bunch of people, which is a stop up from my usual shyness. I'm starting to enjoy finding out things about strangers. It's kind of cool. It's almost like spying, except it's not. I wouldn't mind living somewhere like Baltimore, though. Maybe not the downtown area, or anywhere near the projects, but there are nice areas there (from what I hear). College Park was lovely. I don't know if I'd get bored of a place like that, though. I don't feel like I would, but I never had that problem. Then again, I always go to the same place to eat, to the same place to hang out... I like that. I love adventure, and new things, but I don't want that to pertain to where I live. I don't want every day to be an adventure. Well, we'll see what happens. Tuesday, March 15th I had a good day. No pictures to prove it unfortunately, because I didn't take my camera along. First I beat George in 9 ball. That was awesome. I won a free dinner. Maybe I shouldn't be so happy considering he spotted me on the 2 ball, but hey, free dinner is free dinner, and it was quite good. Then I won my match at the Edge, which included a game-winning 8-ball bank shot that I practiced the night before. It's always wonderful when you practice something and then it carries over to when it counts. And the team won 4-1. Went over to Barfly to wish Kim a happy birthday. Spoke to Adrian, which was nice, because I hate being on bad terms with people, and he and I haven't spoken since New Years. Lost to Julie later on, but I almost won, and though that doesn't count in a game, it means something to me. So I had a nice day, overall. Tomorrow I'm going to Maryland for a few days, and I have an appointment set up for a research assistant job there. I hope that goes well, considering that the idea was so last minute for me. I feel that most of the important decisions I make in my life are sporadic. Ah well... So then, I'll have pictures when I come back from the trip, most of them probably of Anthony's closed eyes.
Sunday, March 13th Pool at Speak Easy. We won 4-1, we're still in first place, and I beat a 6 in three games! 'Twas a good day. Saturday, March 12th The next morning...
Mike, Mike, Mariya, and I, at my house. Green tea, Chinese food, fortune cookies, and conversations
~ On our way to Brooklyn...
~ Brooklyn in "da house".... I never feel like myself when using slang, so I always have to quote it...to accentuate the awkwardness that exists. Home sweet home,
~ At Anyway, the Russian cafe in Brooklyn...
Friday, March 11th Another party at mine and Matt's place. I didn't even bother naming the jpgs, considering I don't know who most of these people are.
Stacy, "true or false.."
Compare: evil to trying to be evil Show that face strange hairy man I don't know
Adam trying to make my psychological reality of emoticons list
Other people...posing for new possible emoticons. That second one on top from the left would make for an interesting emoticon. And that last dude, bottom right, don't give me that look, I don't know who you are either.
Only one is actually from The Bronx...
Some drink, others just ponder what else one can do with alcohol
You know it's bad when you have the same shoes as the opposite sex. Also tattoos, rock and roll, and somewhere in the midst of all that I ate a falafel.
Thursday, March 10th SPRING BREAK!!!!!! Ok, that's out of my system. What happened to the excitement about Spring Break anyway? I seem to be the only one... Maybe it hasn't hit anyone yet. Maybe I belong somewhere in Cancun... I ended up bar hopping yesterday. Inadvertently though. AJ told me that this is what happens when I expect too much. He's right too. I never used to expect to have fun, and I always ended up having fun, but last night I really thought many people out there shared my feelings about the onset of vacation. So Thirsty Scholar sucked. I didn't see anyone from NYU, not even the girl who throws these NYU events. We were out of there so fast that I didn't have time to take pictures of the pathetic old men at the bar. I did get some more Cooper Union geek pictures. We stopped by there beforehand.
~ After Thirsty Scholar we walked over to The Cellar on 14th St. Also, no one there. Though they did have two-dollar cans of beer, and that temporarily made me happy.
~ After The Cellar, Matt dragged us to 55th St. to Sasha's Lounge, where there was some big Russian get-together. Them Russians, man, they're starting to invade Manhattan, too. It sucked. I didn't even take pictures. But if you are interested in the mental imagery, I can describe it to you: loud Russian (and surprisingly some American) pop music. Guys in tight black Armani shirts with so much gel in their hair Ok. I won't go on. So Anthony and Mike said "it's not our crowd" and took a taxi back. I left not long after that. ~ Went to the Edge. I figured I'd at least play some pool. Haven't played in almost a week. At The Edge: AJ Julie John William
The Edge was pretty empty, except the pool list was strangely long, and I was getting bored. Julie told me she was going to go to this other bar nearby, so I joined her. ~ We went to Cherry Tavern.
It's a pretty nice place, I wish I would've known about it sooner. The beer was cheap, the pool table was small (I love small pool tables because of my height), and it was full of young guys.
*P.S. Julie, I looked around my website, and I still don't know what you're talking about... Tuesday, March 8th
[20:54:36] Mariya: that's it
Didn't go to pool...again. Didn't study much either, unfortunately. I was too tired and hungry, but I did watch the 24 episode I missed yesterday, and went out to dinner with my roommate, my mom, and my grandma.
Monday March 7th Actually, it's already Tuesday. And I have a midterm at 9 AM. I was out partying all night..... No. Actually, I wasn't. I studied. I even missed 24. I haven't missed a single episode yet. I must download it when all of this is over. Oh, if anyone is into Russian rock, like Nautilius Pampilius, Kino, or Upiter, I'm going to a concert on Sunday Mar 20th somewhere in Park Slope, if you want to go, let me know, I'll tell you where to get tickets. Sunday, March 6th 12:17 AM Serafina continues to procrastinate.... ::Messages a friend of a friend whom she has not spoken to since August:: [00:15:33] ErOtOpHiLe: brb
12 PM Damn you Mike, you made me procrastinate. Again. And now again, because I'm writing about it. Saturday, March 5th After a 3 1/2 hour conversation with Anthony about various dimensions of awkwardness, I announce that he has been upgraded to the friends section on my "People" page. Back to studying. Friday, March 4th
Inadvertent gathering of people with various levels of Jewness in my apartment. Drunken calculations and recalculations of Jewness:
Mike's shoe, Mariya's fake support, and Buggsy's continued blatant apathy in the evening's highlights.
At The Edge:
Thursday, March 3rd
And later at The Edge...
Ronnie and Michelle
Wednesday, March 2nd 11 PM I found out that people check my site daily. Now I feel the need to have something new daily to check. So I will, even if it's just me talking about something no one is interested in. For instance, I just had some nice Thai Vegetable Soup. The place downstairs has pretty good lunch specials. I always leave something left over for dinner, which is nice. Speaking of boring, I came across such a site. I love the fact that things can reach such an extreme sometimes that they end up at the other extreme. For example, the site I found. It's so dull that it's actually amusing. And their logo is a pair of shoes! That's awesome. See for yourself: http://www.wibsite.com/wiblog/dull/ On a totally different note, I love 24. Jack Bauer rules.
12 PM and onwards..
I got a pic from my old roommate Leah in my email box! This is from Christmas Eve 2003 at Carnegie Hall. Awesome. Other pics from tonight will be up shortly. I'm too tired to put them up now. Twas a long night. It's almost 4 AM now. I went out to Demsey's with Anthony and Mike. Anthony still thinks he can beat me at pool. And once again I proved otherwise. 4-1. I rule. Then I went to The Edge. Sometime in between it all... Went to Demsey's with Anthony and Mike.
I have a feeling people are hanging out with me just to see pics of them on my site. That's awesome. By the way, the reason my pics are getting smaller and smaller on the site has nothing to do with those hallucinogens you took an hour ago. It's because it takes me forever to save each one twice and then hyperlink the small ones so that when you click on it they enlarge. Thus, I want people to actually click on the pics. P.S. If anyone has the script please let me know. P.P.S. If anyone wants to help me out with setting up this blogging thing called "Nucleus" on the site please let me know.
After I got tired of beating Anthony, I went over to The Edge to take pics of people who are still missing from my friends page. I found out from Phil that Satellite has open mic on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, so I'm probably going to go embarrass myself there next Wednesday. Come watch. Tuesday, March 1st So much stuff to do...I finally have all the data from my experiment (all except this little 5 minute thing that no one is volunteering for <hint hint>) so I'm trying to analyze it, but with over 18000 data points SPSS keeps freezing. I think I finally found a solution that I'll try out tomorrow. As soon as I am through this week, I'll try to make March more bloggy (is that a word now?), in that I'll try to have comments built into the context of the page. Stay tuned. And I won to a 2 today. Had to win three games, not my usual two. It was pretty bad, and I hope I can attribute it to the lack of sleep I've recently had.
I haven't had enough: to February --> February All previous months --> Link to Life was.
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See, he rules.
